needed time to absorb such lessons … RANGE TO TARGET i 456 MILES. Still
well under the horizon from the Japanese aircraft, he gave his first vocal
command of the mission.
“Lightning Lead to Flight. Split into elements, now!”
Instantly, the two sets of four aircraft divided into pairs, separated by two
thousand yards. In both cases the F-22S held the lead, and in both cases the
trailing F-i5Es tucked in dangerously close to create a radar overlap. The
colonel in command flew as straight and level as his practiced skills allowed,
and he smiled to himself at the memory of the major’s remark. Nice ass, eh?
She was the first woman to fly with the Thunderbirds. Strobe lights went off,
and he hoped that the low-light gear she was wearing was working properly.
The northern £-767 was now four hundred miles away. The fighters cruised
in at five hundred knots, altitude thirty-five thousand feet for fuel economy.
The work schedule typical of Japanese executives made the entry less obvi-
ous than would have been the case in America. A man was in the lobby, but
he was watching TV, and Clark and Chavez walked through as though they
knew where they were going, and crime was not a problem in Tokyo any-
way. Breathing a little rapidly, they got into an elevator and punched a but-
ton, trading a relieved look that soon changed to renewed apprehension.
Ding was carrying his briefcase. Clark was not, and both were dressed in
their best suits and ties and white shirts, looking for all the world like busi-
nesspeople coining in for a late night’s conference on something or other.
The elevator slopped five floors from the top, a level selected because of the
lack of lights in the windows. Clark stuck his head out, knowing that it
looked vaguely criminal to do so, but the corridor was empty.
They moved quickly and quietly around the central bearing core of the
building, found the fire stairs, and started to climb. They looked for security
cameras, and again, thankfully, there were none on this level. Clark checked
up and down. No one else was in the stairwell. He continued to head up,
looking and listening before every movement.
“Our friends are back,” one of the airborne controllers announced over the
intercom. “Bearing zero-three-three, range four-two-zero kilometers.
One-no, two contacts, close formation, military aircraft inbound, speed
five hundred knots,” he concluded the announcement rapidly.
“Very well,” the senior controller responded evenly, selecting the dis-
play for his screen as he switched channels on his command phones. “Any
radar activity to the northeast?”
“None,” the electronic-countermeasures officer replied at once. “He
could be out there monitoring us, of course.”
“Wakaremas.”
The next order of business was to release the two fighters orbiting east of
the Kami aircraft. Both F-i5Js had recently arrived on station, and had
nearly full fuel tanks. An additional call ordered two more up from Chitose
Air Base. They would need about fifteen minutes to get on station, but that
was fine, the senior controller thought. He had the time.
“Lock on to them,” he ordered the operator.
“Got us already, do you?” the Colonel asked himself. “Good.” He held
course and speed, wanting them to get a good feel for his location and activi-
ties. The rest was mainly a matter of arithmetic. Figure the Eagles were now
about two hundred miles away, closing speed about a thousand. Six minutes
to separation. He checked his clock and commanded his eyes to sweep the
skies for something a little too bright to be a star.
There was a camera on the top level of the stairs. So Yamata was a little
paranoid. But even paranoids had enemies, Clark thought, noticing that the
body of the camera appeared to be pointed at the next landing. Ten steps to
the landing, and ten more to the next, where the door was. He decided to take
a moment to think about that. Chavez turned the knob on the door to his
right. It didn’t appear to be locked. Probably fire codes, Clark thought, ac-
knowledging the information with a IKK! but gelling out his burglar tools
iinyway.
“Well, what d’yji think?”
“I think I’d rather be somewhere else.” Ding hud his light in his hand as
John took his pistol out and screwed the suppressor in plitce “l-asl or
slow?”
That was the only remaining choice, really. A slow approach, like people
on regular business, lost, perhaps … no, not this time. Clark held up one
linger, took a deep breath and bounded upwards. Four seconds lulcr he
twisted the knob at the top landing and flung the door open. John dove to Ihe
floor, his pistol out and training in on the target. Ding jumped past him,
stood, and aimed his own weapon.
The guard outside the door had been looking the other way when the stair-
way entrance swung open. He turned in automatic alarm and saw a large
man lying sideways on the floor and possibly aiming a gun at him. That
caused him to reach for his own as his eyes locked on the potential targets.
There was a second man, holding something else that-
At this range the light had almost a physical force. The three million can-
dles of energy turned the entire world into the face of the sun, and then the
energy overload invaded the man’s central nervous system along the trigem-
inal nerve, which runs from the back of the eye along the base of the brain,
branching out through the neural network that controls the voluntary mus-
cles. The effect, as in Africa, was to overload the guard’s nervous system.
He fell to the floor like a rag doll, his twitching right hand still grasping a
pistol. The light was sufficiently bright that reflection from the white-
painted walls dazzled Chavez slightly, but Clark had remembered to shut his
eyes and raced for the double doors, which he drove apart with his shoulder.
One man was in view, just getting up from a chair in front of the TV, his
face surprised and alarmed at the unannounced entry. There wasn’t time for
mercy. Clark brought the gun up in both hands and squeezed twice, both
shots entering the man’s forehead. John felt Ding’s hand on his shoulder,
which allowed him to move right, almost running now, down a hallway,
looking into each room. Kitchen, he thought. You always found people in
the-
He did. This man was almost his height, and his gun was already out as he
moved for the hallway that led to the foyer, calling out a name and a ques-
tion, but he, too, was a little slow, and his gun was still down, and he met a
man with his pistol up and ready. It was the last thing he would ever see.
Clark needed another half a minute to check out the rest of the luxury apart-
ment, but found only empty rooms.
“Yevgeniy Pavlovich?” he called.
“Vanya, this way!” :
Clark moved back left, taking a quick look at both of the men he’d killed
its he tlul MI. just ID make sure, really. He knew that he’d remember these
Ixnlicv »\ he did all the others, knew that they’d come back to him, and he’d
try In explain away their deaths, as he always did.
K.OHU was sitting there, remarkably pale as Chave/VChekov finished
checking out the room. The guy in front of the TV hadn’t managed to clear
Ihc pistol from his shoulder holster-probably an idea he’d gotten from a
movie, Clark thought. The things were damned near useless if you needed
your weapon in a hurry.
“Clear left,” Chavez said, remembering to speak in Russian.
“Clear right.” Clark commanded himself to calm down, looking at the
guy by the TV, wondering which of the people they’d killed had been re-
sponsible for the death of Kim Norton. Well, probably not the one outside.
“Who are you?” Koga demanded with a mixture of shock and anger, not
quite remembering that they had met before. Clark took a breath before an-
swering.
“Koga-san, we are the people who are rescuing you.”
“You killed them!” The man pointed with a shaking hand.
‘ ‘We can speak about that later, perhaps. Will you come with us, please?
You are not in danger from us, sir.”
Koga wasn’t inhuman. Clark admired his concern for the dead men, even
though they had clearly not been friends. But it was time to get him the hell
out of here.
“Which one was Kaneda?” Chavez asked. The former Prime Minister
pointed to the one in the room. Ding walked over for a last look and
managed not to say anything before directing his eyes to Clark, his expres-
sion one that only the two could possibly understand.
“Vanya, time to leave.”
His threat receiver was going slightly nuts. The screen was all reds and yel-