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Stedman nodded and walked over to the other side of the room to help a patient working on a Cybex machine.

"I'm a friend," Kilten said.

"Friend?" McKenzie said. "I don't have any friends."

"What about Captain Thorpe? He saved your life."

McKenzie frowned. "What do you know about me and Thorpe?"

"I read a classified file, code name Delilah, that contained the CIA's debriefing on your SO/NEST mission into Lebanon."

"Who are you?" McKenzie asked. "I saw your ID card. You work for the government."

"I work for the same government you work for."

"Worked," McKenzie spat. "Get the tense right. I don't work for them anymore. I gave them my arm and damn near gave them my life and it was all just an administrative screw up. That's what they told me during the debriefing. Can you believe that bullshit? They were dealing nuclear materials to the Israelis for God knows what reason and if they happened to kill me in the process of doing that, well, that's just too bad, right?"

Kilten nodded. "The CIA was keeping it a secret and the Department of Defense accidentally learned of the deal, not knowing exactly who was involved. So there you were, secretly watching our own government at work."

McKenzie frowned. "How do you know that?"

Kilten plowed on, ignoring the question. "Then when your commander became aware that the Israelis were involved, he bounced the whole thing up the chain of command until someone who knew what was going on pulled the plug on you."

"Loki," McKenzie hissed. "Who is he?"

"He's just a lackey who works for someone else," McKenzie said. "We'll get to that. I've run into him also. We have much in common, McKenzie. It seems we have both become cynics. The source of your dissatisfaction is rather obvious. I suppose mine is more complex. Suffice it to say my eyes have been opened. Better yet, I have a gut feeling that something bad is about to happen."

"Fuck bad. Look at my arm," McKenzie angrily said.

Kilten gave a sad laugh. "Your arm?" He rubbed a thin hand, blue veins sticking out, along his chin. "You see my hair? My skin? Radiation poisoning. Someone put a lethal dose of isotopes in my food sometime in the past month."

"Loki?"

Kilten nodded. "I would suspect so."

"Why?"

"Because I was asking questions that people don't want asked."

"Why didn't they just kill you outright?" McKenzie asked, drawing on his own violent background.

"I suppose they thought this would look like an accident. I work around nuclear materials all the time in the lab and field. Unfortunately for them I'm not that stupid, although they have succeeded in killing me."

Kilten stared at the angry man wearing the prosthesis. "I believe that you and I together can accomplish much. How would you like to profit from your misfortune as well as ensure the survival of the planet?"

"Fuck the planet," McKenzie growled. "I want what's due me."

"I think this is the start of a beautiful but short relationship," Kilten murmured, satisfied that he had found his man.

SUNDAY, AUGUST 29,1998

Chapter Five

Major Parker and her partner, Captain Lewis, walked to the surface entrance of the Launch Control Center, gravel crunching beneath their boots. Parker ran a hand across her forehead, feeling the perspiration despite the early morning position of the sun on the eastern horizon. The humidity was overwhelming. Coming from the low humidity of Colorado to the oppressive heat of Louisiana had sent her internal temperature control into a tailspin. It had only been two weeks, but she hoped she would acclimatize soon.

The surface entrance to the LCC was set in the middle of an open grassy space, about the size of a football field, surrounded on all sides by thick forest. Thirty feet from the edge of the forest on all sides surrounding the surface building was a twelve-foot-high fence topped with razor wire. One gravel road led to the building. No Trespassing signs were hung every ten feet on the fence. The signs also informed the curious that the use of deadly force was authorized against intruders. Video cameras, remote controlled machine guns, a satellite dish, and a small radar dish were on the roof of the building, the latter two pointing at the cloudless sky.

Parker and Lewis had arrived moments ago in a blue Air Force pickup from Barksdale Air Force Base — the 341st Missile Wing Headquarters and their home base. The pickup was parked right behind them, waiting to take the off-shift crew back to base.

Parker punched a code into the outer door and it opened. They stepped into an anteroom and approached a massive vault door guarding the elevator. A crest with a mailed fist holding lightning bolts and the stenciled words Omega Missile was bolted to the elevator door.

Both Lewis and Parker were dressed in black one-piece flight suits. On their right shoulders they wore a copy of the crest on the door. A Velcro tag on their chest gave their name, rank, and unit.

Lewis was a skinny, redheaded man, an inch shorter than Parker. He sported Air Force issue black-framed, thick-lensed glasses. Perched on his small nose, the bulky glasses always seemed ready to fall off.

Parker put her eyes up to the retinal scanner on the left side of the door. A mechanical voice echoed into the room.

"Retina verified. Major Parker. Launch status valid."

Lewis followed suit, lifting up his glasses so his eyes could push up against the rubber.

"Retina verified. Captain Lewis. Launch status valid."

There was a brief pause, then the computer spoke again.

"Launch officers on valid status verified. Please enter duty entry code."

On a numeric keypad next to the vault door, Parker entered the daily code they'd been assigned when departing Barksdale.

"Code valid. Look into the camera for duty crew identification."

Parker and Lewis stepped back and looked up into a video camera hanging from the ceiling.

"On-duty crew identifies," the computer intoned. "Opening door."

Parker made a mock bow in the direction of the speaker. "Thank you, REACT."

Lewis shifted the small daypack on his back. "You act like that computer is alive."

"That computer controls the lives of more people than God. Believe me, it is alive."

The vault door slowly swung open. They walked into the elevator and the door shut. The elevator hurtled down a hundred feet and abruptly halted, causing them both to flex their knees.

The elevator opened on the rear of the Launch Control Center and it was the only connection to the surface. To the right of the elevator, a door went to a separate, small room that held four bunks, a bathroom and a kitchen area. A door to the left went to a small area that contained enough stores for a crew of four for three months.

They walked into the Omega Missile Launch Control Center. There were rows of machinery in the forty-by-forty room. There was a gray tile floor and the walls were painted dull gray up to three feet, and then Air Force blue to the ceiling. Twelve years ago, when Parker started in missiles, the LCCs had been painted colors that psychologists had determined would be conducive to the crew's mental health during their extended tours of duty. That policy had been rescinded because of budget cutbacks and a change in command that had brought in a no-frills policy.

The entire facility was actually a capsule suspended from four huge shock absorbers, theoretically allowing it to survive the concussion of a direct nuclear strike overhead. The theory had yet to be put to the test and there was much speculation among missile crews as to whether that bit of 1960s engineering was outmoded. In the old days of the Cold War a facility such as this LCC would have had several warheads targeted at it anyway.