It was possible that the two pilots assigned to fly Boeing were actually sick. And Breanna was at least arguably the next best choice on the base to take the mission: she had a lot of experience in the large jets. But it seemed to him like a hell of a coincidence.

Not to mention the fact that he should have been consulted about who would replace the other pilots. He hadn’t seen Mike this morning, nor had he talked to Ong. One of them must have made the call.

If Zen asked—when Zen asked—undoubtedly they’d give him the same line Jennifer had used. They’d tried calling him at home, blah-blah-blah.

And maybe they had. They could have called and gotten Bree. She would have instantly volunteered. That was Bree.

So maybe they weren’t conspiring against him. Even if it seemed that way.

He hadn’t gone home last night, and in fact hadn’t gone home for the past few nights. He was, in fact, avoiding her, trying to figure out what to do—or rather, how to do it.

Ong laid out the mission succinctly, setting the overall objective. They were going to put the Flighthawk through a series of low-altitude maneuvers to simulate a low-level penetration during an attack mission. The mother ship would follow behind it, first at five miles, then ten miles, then fifteen, and finally twenty. The extended distances were the point of the exercise; the Flighthawks had never been successfully controlled beyond seven miles while operating in Combat One, the secure communications mode.

Breanna then stood and reviewed her flight plan. Ordinarily this was, at best, a perfunctory part of the session. But Rap gave a precise, detailed briefing that covered everything from expected wind to fuel burn to radio rescue frequencies. She even included information about simulating an airdrop launch for the U/MFs, which the Boeing could not in fact handle. Jeff could tell the others were impressed that she’d done her homework.

Tough act to follow. He put down his coffee and began wheeling himself toward the front as she finished. With all the details already presented, his job was basically to ask if there were any questions and then give them a rah-rah to hit the door with.

He didn’t feel very rah-rah, though.

“We’ve gone over the courses and the distances,” he told them, faltering. “We, uh, we have complete satellite clearance through the morning. The Devil Canyon portion at the end of the flight is trickiest, because at twenty miles we have physical obstructions between the Boeing and the Flighthawk, assuming we’re at proper altitude—which of course we will be,” he added quickly, glancing toward Bree.

She was looking at him attentively, not glaring, not accusing, just watching.

“Look, I know it’s likely the project is going to be cut,” he said, looking back at the others. “There’s no reason to bullshit you guys. You’re too damn smart. There’s no political backing for the Flighthawks. You guys have been dealing with it for a hell of a lot longer than I have.”

He noticed one or two heads going up and down, saw a few frowns. Jennifer put her hands in front of her face as if she were going to cry.

“The thing is, we’re right. I know we’re right. The Flighthawks, UM/Fs, are the way of the future,” Jeff said. “There’s a lot of work to be done, as we all know, but somewhere down the line, these guys are going to be saving a hell of a lot of lives. They’re going to keep pilots from getting their butts blown off.” He laughed. “Not every pilot. But a lot of them. And this is what’s going to happen. They’ll mothball us, close us down. We’ll all go on to better jobs. Me, I’m thinking McDonald’s. Can I supersize that for you, sir?” he mocked.

They laughed.

“But I’ll tell you what’s going to happen,” Zen continued. “Few years from now, maybe two, maybe ten, maybe twenty—hell, I don’t know, the future. Somebody’s going to find our work on a shelf somewhere, and they’re going to realize we were right. They’re going to pull our reports out and they are going to save themselves a ton of work. Probably enough work to save one or two pilots in the process. So we have to get as much done before they pull the plug. Bastian’s going to save Dreamland,” he added, “by doing what he has to do. So we have to hang tough and do what we have to do.” Zen wheeled backward, starting for the door. “Let’s go kick some butt out there today, huh?”

Zen left them in silence, wheeling out the door before they could react. He continued across the hangar and out onto the tarmac where the modified 707, “Boeing,” waited.

The Flighthawk remote systems had grown even bigger since Zen’s accident. The UM/Fs had been grounded for nearly nine months while the entire project was reviewed; computer capacity had been increased on the controlling end, adding to the stored emergency procedures and routines. In the interim, and unrelated to the accident, the cooling mechanisms for the secure communications gear had been “improved.” These increased the remote controlling computer pallet from the size of a Honda Accord to that of a Chevy Suburban with a weight problem. Not only did it no longer fit in an F-15E, it was a squeeze to make the rear of the Boeing.

The scientists swore the gear would be miniaturized in the future—but they kept coming up with “improvements” that added to its bulk. Near-room-temperature superconducting chips and circuitry promised great advances in speed and much smaller sizes, but the gear was still too sensitive to be relied on. Not to mention expensive.

Zen’s accident had led the Air Force to abandon an important part of the original concept—having a combat pilot fly the robots along with his own plane. There were proposals to fit the gear into a B-2, but the guidance telemetry could theoretically alert next-generation sensors to the invisible bomber. The B-1 fuselage needed extensive modifications to fit the controlling unit. Neither plane’s wings could easily handle both UM/Fs, though the B-2’s could be reinforced to do so.

The Megafortress EB-52, on the other hand, was big and strong enough to handle the job. And in fact they had conducted several airdrops and test runs from the Mega-fortress before Zen’s accident. They’d managed one last week, just to make sure some of the modifications to the computer worked properly. Zen would have liked to do more, but the only Megafortress currently plumbed for airdrops was being used as a test bed for next-generation radar and communications jamming equipment. Those tests were running behind and had very high priority. By the time the plane—nicknamed “Raven”—was free for real feasibility work, the Flighthawks would be history.

“Hey, Major. Ready for blastoff?” asked Pete Connors out on the concrete apron.

“I’ve been ready all my life,” Zen told him, following Connors out toward the Boeing. The airman had parked a forklift near the rear crew door. They’d perfected this method of boarding the plane several days before. It was a hell of a lot easier than crawling down the stairs on his butt—which he had done on Raven.

“I ought to get one of these built into my wheelchair,” Stockard told him as he maneuvered under the large forks. Connors had played with the blades so he could easily lock them beneath Zen’s chair.

“Gee, Major, I’m surprised you haven’t gone for the Version 2.0 Upgraded Wheelchair,” joked Connors. “Has your TV, your satellite dish, your come-along cooler.”

“No sauna?” Jeff braced his arms as the metal forks clicked into the bottom of his chair.

“That’s in 3.0. You should sign up for beta-testing,” said the airman. “Ready?”

“Blastoff.”

It took Connors two attempts to get him lined up and through the special equipment bay in the rear of the plane. But that was a vast improvement over the first day, when it had taken eight or nine and he’d nearly fallen to the ground. Zen gave the airman a thumbs-up before rolling forward into the test-crew area.