As far as Milosz could tell, the original Nigerian pirates weren't even operating here anymore, having been driven off by larger, better-armed and -organized competitors. So it just wasn't correct to call them pirates anymore. Whereas "asswits"-a term he had picked up from a British officer in Iraq-well, asswits very much appealed to him.

Colonel Kinninmore, however, was sticking with "pirates."

"The pirates we're looking at here are probably sourced from over a dozen different crews, until recently none of them coordinating very well but all of them pretty well established in the AOR, and with good equipment. Suspiciously good equipment. They have solid Russian AKMs, PKMs, a lot of Chinese Type 56s, and some crew-served stuff, which they've taken off the trucks since we started interdicting them by air. They have some night vision capabilities, a mix of Chinese and Russian gear, which seems to be unevenly distributed. Same with body armor; even got some scavenged NYPD vests thrown in. Their comms gear is very good. Although their radio security is not."

Milosz stole a glance out the window of the conference room. It was on the fourth floor of a nondescript office building near Union Square, looking out across a little park. All the big boys had been brought to the conference, special operators from all four branches of the U.S. military along with private contract operators from Sandline. One of the Navy SEALs from Ellis Island recognized Milosz and nodded to him.

Dolphin fucker, Milosz thought, nodding back and taking notice of one of the females in the room, a blond woman who could have been army or air force, it was hard to tell. She stood, popping her bubble gum, next to a very large… African American.

"Our first priority with this mission is getting those militia boys out of the shit," said Kinninmore. "But there is a secondary consideration, too."

The assembled men and women appeared to perk up at that.

"I said before that the pirates weren't very well coordinated until recently. But you'll all be aware that's changed in this latest round of fighting. Those of you who fought on Ellis will have encountered the guys there with the scarfs. They seemed to be providing tactical-level command. We've seen the same thing here on the big island. You'll also know we haven't yet been able to capture one."

Milosz remembered the mess one of those crazy fucks had made of Raab and Sievers.

"As a secondary, and for now I mean secondary, consideration, the National Command Authority would very much like it if we could obtain one of those gentlemen for a full and frank exchange of views on what the fuck they're doing in New York."

The room filled with grunts and a few curses. Everyone knew of somebody who'd been taken out by one of the exploding bad guys. Milosz peered out into the darkness. From here you could see flashes and snaking flights of tracer fire farther uptown. The open area below was well lit up as Strykers and Humvees poured into the staging post. Two converted M1Abrams tanks fitted with massive plows and Mk19 grenade launchers were grunting and chugging thick clouds of hot exhaust that caused the paint to peel on the abandoned cars. They cleared the intersections of wrecks, piling them up into a makeshift berm in case everything went wrong and the Americans had to retreat to a strongpoint.

"Anyway, that's where you come in," said Kinninmore, and instantly Milosz switched his full attention back to the briefing. The ads were over, and it was time for the main feature, as Sergeant Wilson would say.

"I need you to work in behind the enemy, determine their lines of approach, and mark them for interdiction. If, and only if, you can grab one of our mystery men without getting yourself blown to pieces, then you're tasked to do that, too."

"We getting full air this time, Colonel?" Master Sergeant Wilson asked in a familiar tone, teetering between hope and resignation. "Sounds like we can't count on arty."

"We are," said Kinninmore, surprising everyone. "We've got aircraft stacked up in holding patterns up to thirty thousand feet, all loaded for bear. We also have air force operators who will be assigned to each of your teams. The gloves are off, gentlemen. We have fast movers in play right now, in-flight tankers to keep them there. And they are ready to bring death and sadness down on the city. So you will be calling in the real deal. Whole blocks are gonna get leveled if the payoff demands it."

"Most excellent!" Milosz blurted out before he could stop himself.

Kinninmore did not seem put out by the interruption; instead, he grinned appreciatively.

"Indeed, it is most excellent Sergeant… Milosz."

He pronounced it wrong, but his sentiments were in the right place.

"No more dicking around, people. We have new orders direct from the president himself. Kill them all."

"Ah, I knew I liked this president," said Milosz. "He is reminding me of Clevinger, Yossarian's foil in Mister Heller's Catch-22. Has anyone read it? An excellent novel for military men, no?" He knew they were serious this time, because he was back in a helicopter, and they would be flying through rocket swarms before his feet touched the ground again. If they ever did. Outside of the Blackhawk, other helicopters orbited the rooftop, waiting for Milosz and Wilson to get clear in order to pick up the other teams waiting for insertion at their objectives. The woman from the briefing was sitting across from Milosz. She leaned forward and offered her hand.

"I don't believe we've done the formalities. Tech Sergeant Bonnie Gardener," she said. She nodded toward her partner, a large man with an M240 machine gun. "And this is my spotter, Staff Sergeant Veal."

The machine gunner merely nodded in response.

"Tactical air controller, air force special ops," explained Wilson as the engines spooled up and made normal conversation difficult. "We mark the targets. She calls 'em in."

"And what if asswit pirate boy is sitting in the Metropolitan Museum of Art?" asked Milosz. "Can be we bomb statutes and paintings now?"

Gardener grinned; an evil-looking grin it was, too.

"I'm from Alabama, Sergeant. We never did care much for art down there. 'Cept for that very special form of performance art created by five-hundred-pound bombs. Or dynamite and iron anvils. Y'all ever seen that done?"

Wilson laughed. "I like you already, Gardener. You're my kinda cracker."

And there was much to like about this Gardener, thought Milosz. She was a very attractive woman, although he knew better than to make anything of her sex. This Veal was a very ugly-looking guard dog indeed. Oh, well, the U.S. military took its warm bodies wherever it could find them these days. He was proof of that. And Gardener did not seem at all bothered to be heading into a roiling snake pit, even though women captured by the asswits had a much tougher time of it than men-and male prisoners were routinely tortured, humiliated, and killed in the most gruesome fashion, often on video, for propaganda. Gardener, however, seemed unconcerned.

He felt liftoff press them all into their seats before they banked away from the rooftop helipad. For just a moment he was afforded a clear view of the battle raging a dozen blocks north. The solid, rectilinear landscape of dead Manhattan, miles of right angles and straight lines soaring skyward in the bleak, inky blackness under a lowering sky, was broken and lit up in one small tile of open space where flaring light and fire raged. He could see small, single pinpoints of light moving through the rain from the north and west, like fireflies drawn to a spitting campfire. Across from him, Gardener checked her equipment as Wilson did the same thing. It was busywork. They had all checked and cross-checked their loadouts before climbing on board.

Milosz had switched up again, opting for an M4 fitted with an M203 grenade launcher from the traveling weapons locker that accompanied the ranger teams everywhere they went. He looked it over for any problems, performing a function check on the carbine while in flight. Sighting through the ACOG scope, the M4 felt impossibly light, even with the forty-millimeter launcher mounted under the carbine. He would have preferred a solid AKM with the same grenade launcher but was shot down every time he asked. No weapons that looked like those of the opposing forces, which was just as well since the SAPI plate in his body armor and the weight of three days' food, rations, and ammunition more than made up for the lightness of the carbine. For good measure, Milosz also packed a pair of claymores, eight rounds of HEMP for the 203, a quartet of frags, and a block of C-4.