The confined space stoked his claustrophobia. His hand began to shake as he reached for the small flashlight in his pocket.
It’s nothing, he told himself. Nothing.
But that didn’t stop his hand from shaking. Kharon’s fingers finally found the light. He switched it on and played it across the space in front of him.
Breathe.
He took a step forward, then turned back and made sure the door was locked. Lifting the duffel onto his shoulder, he walked swiftly to the end of the hall, where he found a set of steps leading off to his right. He went down cautiously, one hand tight on the rail. Then he ducked under another set of large pipes and electrical conduits and walked through an open space to another door. This one led to a second hallway, lit by a dull yellow light at the far end.
There was a door near the light, guarded by a combination lock. Kharon pounded the numbers quickly, pushing inside as the lock snapped open. Still breathing hard, he reached for the two switches to the left. One killed the light outside; the other turned on a set of daylight fluorescents that lined the ceiling.
The light helped him relax. He was inside a hidden lab complex that was once part of the Libyan effort to build a nuclear weapon. It had been abandoned for years when Kharon stumbled upon it.
He walked through what had been a large security/reception area. There was a lab room at the far end, guarded by another coded lock. Inside, he found his two workstations in sleep mode just as he had left them.
After making sure that his security had not been breached, Kharon unpacked his boxes and began downloading the information from the hard drives into his native system. While the drives spun, he booted a third computer that was tied into the university’s mainframes. He used it to get onto the Internet and scan the news relating to Libya.
Most of the stories about the riot either hinted that it had been staged or said so outright.
Idiot government.
The commission had returned to Tripoli. They said all the right things — the accident had been inexcusable, the loss of life was horrible.
And the questions he had asked about the autonomous drones?
Not even mentioned. The reporters were too stupid to understand what was going on.
Frustrated, Kharon began scanning stories from several days before, looking to see if the tips he’d planted had borne fruit. Rubio’s name didn’t even come up in the stories related to the incident.
Kharon leaned his elbow on the bench in front of the keyboard. He put his chin against his hand, then bit his index finger. He bit it so hard and so long that when he finally let go, his finger was white.
Embarrass Rubeo? Ruin him?
Hardly.
He was going to have to just kill him and be done with it.
6
Following their return to base and the formal debrief, Turk joined Shooter Squadron at their second ready room — the hotel lounge at the Sicilian Inn a few miles from the base. The seaside resort had been taken over by the allies, and the bar was filled with fliers from several member countries: Greece, France, a few Brits, and even some Germans. The pilots from Shooter Squadron commandeered a table on the terrace overlooking the beach and the sea. It was a brilliant night, with the stars twinkling and the moon so massive and yellow it looked as if it had been PhotoShopped in.
Grizzly and most of the others were still sick, but two pilots Turk had never met before came down to join them, Captain Frank Gordon from San Francisco, and the squadron’s junior pilot, Lieutenant Li Pike, a woman who had joined the Hog squadron just a few weeks before.
There was plenty of the usual joking around, but there was also a serious conversation on the rebel movement and the role of the allies as well. Pike, who had a degree in international relations, pointed out that this was the second time around for the allies — the first intervention, almost universally hailed when it ousted Gaddafi, had resulted in a terrible regime that was now itself being contested. In her opinion, intervention of any sort was futile; the locals should have been left to fend for themselves.
Paulson countered that just because things hadn’t worked out in the first place, there was no reason to give up — try, try again was more or less his motto.
“Ah, waste ’em all,” groused Beast, reaching for his beer. “Shoot ’em up and go home.”
“Do you really feel that way?” asked Pike. She had a sweet, almost innocent face — pretty, thought Turk.
“That’s how I feel, shit yeah. Doin’ good? Almost got us killed today. Turk had to blow a missile off his back.”
“Almost flew his Hog into the dirt,” said Paulson. “That would have been embarrassing. Dreamland hotshot kicks in the desert because he oversticks his plane.”
Turk was starting not to like Paulson very much, but he tried taking the ribbing good-naturedly. Objecting was the easiest way to guarantee it would continue.
“I have to say, the Hog goes where you point it,” he told the others. “Very nice aircraft.”
“Sure your muscles haven’t atrophied?” asked Paulson.
“I can still make a fist,” said Turk.
“I’m just jokin’ with ya, Captain,” sneered Paulson, getting up and heading toward the bar.
“Do you believe in intervention?” asked Pike.
“I haven’t really thought about it, to be honest,” Turk told her, grateful for the chance to change the subject.
“So what’s the F–40 like?” asked Beast.
“It’s interesting. Some days you forget you’re really in an airplane. It’s real smooth.”
“I don’t think I’d like that,” said Li.
“You get used to it.”
“They blame you for the accident?” asked Beast.
“No. That’s one good thing about all the systems they have in place for monitoring everything. They can see exactly what I did.”
“You think they’ll figure it out?” asked Li. “Soon, I mean.”
“I hope they don’t,” said Ginella, returning to the table after speaking with one of the French fliers. “Because it means we have our friend Turk here for a little bit.”
“You’re staying?” Li asked.
“Well…”
“Captain Mako can stay until we have our full complement back,” said Ginella. “As far as I’m concerned, he can stay forever.”
“I’m glad to be here,” said Turk.
The mood lightened as Ginella told a story she’d just heard from the Frenchmen. Turk watched Li, whose expression remained serious the whole time.
The more he watched her, the more beautiful she seemed to become. Her light tan skin was smooth and exotic in the dim light of the club. Her eyes sparkled.
Turk looked away whenever he suspected she was going to turn in his direction. She caught him once and smiled.
He tried to smile back, but he was sure that he must have looked like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car.
Paulson returned with a fresh round of drinks. He started bragging about how well he’d done in some Gunsmoke competition a year before. He seemed to be playing to Li, who sipped her drink coolly and avoided looking in his direction.
Turk got up and went over to the window, looking out at the sea. He was starting to feel tired. Everything that had happened over the past few days had worn him down. He decided he ought to find a ride back to his own hotel.