Blair hesitated, looking into her dark eyes. He couldn't now deny being attracted to Rachel, her quiet strength and her irreverent humor. Always before it seemed too much like a betrayal of Angel. . . .
But Angel was gone, and she would have been the first one to want him to pick up the pieces of his life and move on. Rachel had already helped him over the first, most difficult adjustment. It seemed right, somehow, that they travel further down the road she helped him find that led out of the darkness.
"You think our parts might mesh, Chief?" he asked her, his smile broadening.
"You never know until you take a test run," she said. "Tonight, maybe?"
"Tonight," he agreed quietly.
He was almost surprised at the intensity of the emotion behind that one simple word.
"Got a minute, Colonel? Before I have to go on watch?"
Blair looked up at Lieutenant Rollins and gave him a curt nod. "Sure. Pull up a chair." He hesitated, studying the young communications officer's worried expression. "What's on your mind, Lieutenant?"
Rollins sat down, looking uncomfortable. "I think I've finally turned up something solid, Colonel. In that . . . matter Cobra and I've been looking into."
"And that is?"
"I figured out where I'd seen that harmonic pattern before," Rollins told him. "It's been used a time or two in psychiatric work. Personality overlays . . ." Rollins hesitated. "Sometimes, with a subject, you want to be able to switch from a substitute personality to the original, or back again. They use it in therapy, overlaying a well-adjusted behavior pattern over a personality that's got problems, but the doctors want to be able to retrieve the original identity, locate the root of the problem."
"Yeah, I've heard about it. You think it applies here?"
"If I'm right, the Kilrathi might have used that message from Thrakhath as a carrier for a personality trigger. When it was played, it brought up a different personality in a Kilrathi agent on board." Rollins hesitated. "If Cobra's right, it would have brought back an original personality in Hobbes, something overlaid by the one we've known all along. Or . . ."
"Or what?" Blair demanded.
"I . . . was thinking about what you said. About Cobra. She admitted there was something familiar about the signal, but she didn't say what. But it set me to thinking. What if the signal was supposed to bring up an implanted personality in her . . . something programmed by the Kilrathi to make her work as a spy. Hell, she might not even be aware of it any more, if the work was sophisticated enough."
Blair looked down at his drink. "Once again, there's no real proof," he said slowly. "We can hatch theories until the sun goes nova, but without real evidence . . .
"I know, sir," Rollins said, biting his lower lip and looking worried. "But . . . hell, I don't know what to think any more or who to trust. I think I've identified another part of Thrakhath's transmission that carries a low-frequency side message, but it seems like it's a pretty old code. It was discontinued a while back, and is no longer in our current files. I'm still trying to reconstruct it. Maybe we'll know more then. But meantime, what do I do? Tell Cobra? If she's the spy . . .
"Keep it to yourself, Lieutenant," Blair said. His wrist implant chimed a reminder. "Damn. I've got a meeting with Paladin and the Captain." He stood up. "You keep working on that signal, Lieutenant. Crack it fast because we have to find out if there really is a leak — before we start General Taggart's new mission.
Lieutenant Laurel Buckley studied the sleek lines of the Excalibur and gave a low whistle of appreciation. "Man, oh man, that is a thing of beauty," she said softly. Cobra was looking forward to trying the new craft out, even if it was only a routine patrol.
"I'll say," Chief Coriolis said, looking up from where she was kneeling, checking the locking mechanism on the forward landing gear "This is one nice piece of machinery."
"Where's Ski, Chief?" Cobra asked. Technician First Class Glazowski was her usual plane captain, but he was nowhere in sight.
"Had to put all the Gold Squadron plane captains through a crash course on how to care and feed these beauties," Rachel told her. "I'm the only one who's up on the specs at the moment. Don't worry, he'll be done by the time your patrol gets back." She looked around. "Who's going out with you?"
"Vaquero," Cobra said. "Except he's late, as usual." She moved over to the cockpit ladder. "I swear he'll be late to his own cantina opening."
"I'll have Flight Control put out a call for him," Rachel said. "You need any help strapping on this baby?"
"Nah. Looks like you're overworked as it is."
"I'll say. I'm supposed to have five techs on every bird. Today I've only got three to get both you guys up and flying." The tech looked disgusted. "My watch roster looks thinner every day, seems like."
"Well, I can run through my checklist just fine by myself. Just don't forget to send somebody out here to give me my clearance when it's time to launch!"
Rachel chuckled and turned away. Buckley paused at the bottom of the ladder and cocked her head to one side. Something . . . someone was moving around on the other side of the Excalibur.
She set her helmet and gauntlets down on the wing and ducked under the fuselage to investigate. From what Rachel just said there shouldn't have been any technicians working in that corner of the bay. . . .
Something struck her in the stomach as she straightened, knocking her backward against the hull of the fighter with such force that she banged her head. As she shook it, trying to clear her blurring vision and the ringing in her ears, she became aware of the pain in her abdomen. Her fingers, clutching at the spot, came away sticky with blood
And then her vision did clear, for a moment, as she slumped to the deck. The bulky figure standing over her might have stepped out of her worst nightmare.
"Hobbes . . ." she gasped. Then blackness took her.
Rachel Coriolis entered the Flight Control Center and dropped into the nearest vacant seat. "God, I'll be glad to get some sack time," she said. She suppressed a grin as she remembered the plans she'd made with Blair. She doubted either one of them would get much sack time tonight. "They're all yours, Captain. And good riddance."
Lieutenant Ion Radescu, the duty Flight Controller, gave her a grin. "Come on, Rachel, you know you love it. What would your life be without fighters to work over, huh? '
"A hell of a lot cleaner," she said, returning his smile. Since Admiral Tolwyn's departure, she'd gone right back to her old habits of dress.
Radescu chuckled and turned to his console. "Okay, boys and girls, let's get this show started." He thumbed a mike switch. "Prowler Flight, this is Control. Radio check."
"Prowler Two," Vaquero said. "Read you five by five."
There was a moment of silence before Cobra's voice came on the speakers. "Clear signal."
The FCO frowned. "Prowler One, I'm not getting anything on video from you. You got a fault showing?"