"A V-Six," he said. "A 3.5 liter, 24-valve single overhead cam, but it'll develop just over two hundred horsepower at 5900 RPM. It's not a muscle machine like the Dodge Viper--one of those will blow the doors off a Corvette--but it'll scoot right along." Toni was tough, beautiful--and she knew about cars. There was a combination a lot of men would appreciate in a woman, him included.

Dangerous road, Alex. Better stay off it.

"Let me know when you get it running," she said.

"I will. So, what brings you here so early?"

"We've had some developments."

His house phone rang. He nodded at Toni. "Just a second." He walked to the wall, intending to get rid of whoever it was.

"h.e.l.lo?"

"Hi, guess who!"

"Susie! How are you?"

"Great, Dadster. Mom said I should call and thank you for the skates."

For a moment, he went blank; then the empty spot was filled with panic. Her birthday was yesterday! Jesus, how could he have forgotten that? And what skates was she talking about? Had Megan covered for him? That would be a first.

"How was the party, hon? I'm sorry I couldn't be there for it."

"It was terrif. All my friends came, except Lori, but she's got the flu, so that's okay, and even Tommy Jerkface Stupid Dumb Head came."

Michaels grinned. At seven--no, eight, now--Susie had never been shy in expressing herself. Tommy must be the new boy she liked. The worse the names, the more the like. He felt a pang of sadness, another stabbing sensation in his gut. It was a long way from Boise to Washington, D.C. He was missing all of Susie's best moments.

"How's your mother?"

"She's fine. She's making breakfast. We got to sleep in because it's a teacher work day. You want to talk to her?"

Michaels suddenly remembered that Toni was there in the garage. He flicked a glance in her direction, but she had squatted down next to the Prowler and was looking at the front struts. The pants she wore pulled tight across her tight rear end. He looked away. It was not something he should be noticing while talking to his daughter.

"No, I'll talk to her later, hon. Give her my love."

"I will. When are you coming out to visit, Dadster?"

"Soon, baby, soon as I can get loose."

"Got a crisis, huh?"

For a moment, he wondered how she knew that. But she didn't let it lie very long. "That's what Mom said, you got a crisis, why you couldn't come to my party. She said you always got a crisis."

"That's the truth, baby. Never a dull moment."

"I gotta go. I just heard the microwave go off, so the waffles are done. I love you, Dadster."

"I love you, too, Susie. Say h.e.l.lo to your mom for me."

"Bye!"> He hung up. He missed her. Missed Megan, too, even though the divorce had become final more than three years ago. It hadn't been his idea to split up. Even after the decree, he'd still had hope. Somehow, they'd get together, work things out. . . .

He turned his attention back to Toni, who had come up from her squat and was now leaning over the engine compartment, looking inside. He moved to stand next to her. "My daughter," he said.

"How'd she like the skates?" Toni said.

He blinked at her as she leaned back from the car and looked at him. "You sent them?" sent them?"

"I--well, yeah. You were up to your eyeb.a.l.l.s in things, so--yeah. I hope that wasn't out of line."

He shook his head. "Not at all. You saved my b.u.t.t. I can't believe I forgot. Her mother would have never let me live it down. Thank you, Toni."

"I'm still your a.s.sistant," she said. "My job is to make you look good."

Well. He had hired her because of her credentials, and she'd been very good at her job. But she was proving to be a lot more than that.

He became aware they were standing only half a meter apart. She was an attractive woman, she smelled clean and fresh and he wanted to hug her. But he was her boss, after all, and he was afraid the hug might be misinterpreted. Especially given that his feeling right at that moment wasn't exactly platonic.

Oh? his little inner voice said. his little inner voice said. Maybe you're really afraid a hug won't be misinterpreted at all, hey? What if she likes it? Maybe you're really afraid a hug won't be misinterpreted at all, hey? What if she likes it?

He suddenly felt the need to wipe his hands again. He turned, took a couple of steps and grabbed a fresh shop rag. "So, what's up?"

Toni felt a stab of disappointment. She had felt the heat in him, thought for just a moment he might reach out to her, literally, and her breath had caught in antic.i.p.ation. Yes. Yes, do it!

But--no. Instead, Alex turned away from her and began wiping his already clean hands on a cloth. Became all business again.

d.a.m.n. She had a sudden flash of fantasy--lying with him right here, making pa.s.sionate love in this wild purple car of his.

Wishful thinking, Toni.

Still, it had definitely been a good thing to have sent that birthday present to his daughter. His grat.i.tude had been real enough. She felt that, too.

"You want the bad news? Or the worse news?"

"G.o.d."

Thursday, September 16th, 7:50 a.m. Quantico "Colonel? I think maybe you ought to saddle up," Michaels said.

"Sir?" John Howard sat forward in his office chair, his back suddenly straight and tense.

"According to a coded message intercepted by CIA listening post at the U.S. emba.s.sy in the Ukraine, a physical attack is planned on the station there, likely in the next few days. We'd like two things. One, you take a platoon or so of your best to augment the Marine guard at the emba.s.sy and head off any attack. Two, and more importantly, we wouldn't be real unhappy if you could find out who is behind it while you're sitting around waiting for the shooting to start."

Howard grinned at the blank screen. Yes! Yes! "Won't the Ukrainians, uh, "Won't the Ukrainians, uh, frown frown on us wandering around in their country chasing terrorists?" on us wandering around in their country chasing terrorists?"

"Officially, yes. Officially, you and your troops won't be leaving the emba.s.sy, which is U.S. territory. Unofficially, the local government won't get in your way. We've got a Dad Tee policy in effect for this operation."

Howard grinned again. Dad Tee, from the acronym DADT--Don't Ask, Don't Tell--a policy sp.a.w.ned long before the Clinton Administration had made the term popular. What that meant was, as long as he and his men didn't get caught doing something too blatant, the host country could--and would--pretend it didn't see them. If he didn't burn down the capitol or a.s.sa.s.sinate the President while CNN had a camera on him, they'd be okay.

"I'll have my teams in the air in thirty minutes, Commander Michaels."

"Don't break a leg, Colonel. Take an hour or two. The pertinent information is being downloaded to your S&T computer even as we speak. Your contact at the emba.s.sy will be Morgan Hunter, the CIA station chief, but it's your operation."

"Sir."> After he hung up, Howard couldn't keep the grin from his face. Finally. A field operation, and not a virtual one. The real thing.

He found himself breathing faster, and with a sudden urge to visit the bathroom. This was it.

"Time to rock and roll," he said to the air. "Rock and roll! roll!"

Thursday, September 16th, 8:15 a.m. Quantico In his office, Jay Gridley prepared to ride the net.

Cybers.p.a.ce wasn't really like the old movies that had first depicted it, Gridley knew. But virtual reality constructs--VRCs--did use imagery to help a webwalker navigate the web. The images could be almost anything a user wanted. There were hundreds of standard commercial overlays, from cities with freeways, to old Western towns, to s.p.a.ce flights. And there were tens of thousands of share-ware scenarios to be had on the web. Some of the best software you could get was free. Download or timeshare the ware, and the net could be anything anybody had ever bothered to program. If you couldn't find anything that suited you, you could create your own vehicle. You didn't even need to be a programmer; any fool could do it. WebWeaveWare these days was easier than paint-by-numbers.

Gridley had several favorite travel pieces he used when he donned his VR gear and went on-line. He did the finger weave to access the command mode, waved the web to life and said, "Dodge Viper, Bavaria."

The VR gear gave him an image of a mountain road in a somewhat-stylized German landscape. He was inside an RT/10 Viper, a black convertible roadster with broad white racing stripes, driving down a steep switchback. There would be a border crossing coming up soon. He clutched and downshifted from sixth into fifth, tapped the accelerator and grinned at the crisp breeze ruffling his long black hair. He enjoyed the cla.s.sic James Bond movies, even though saying, "Gridley, Jay Jay Gridley," didn't have quite the same ring to it. . . . Gridley," didn't have quite the same ring to it. . . .

The border crossing loomed. A single uniformed soldier stood behind a black-and-yellow-striped pole blocking the road, a submachine gun held at port arms.

Gridley downshifted and braked. The roadster rumbled deep in its muscular throat as it rolled to a stop.

The guard said, "Your papers, please."

The guard smelled like cheap aftershave and stale sweat, with a touch of cigarette tobacco thrown in.

Gridley smiled, reached into the pocket of his tuxedo--well, if you were gonna play, you might as well go all the way--and removed his pa.s.sport.

Eventually, he would have to program himself a female pa.s.senger to complete this scenario. A sultry redhead, perhaps, or a dark and deadly brunette. A woman afraid of the speed, but excited by it nonetheless. Yeah. . . .

In the real world, an electronic pa.s.sword was tendered to a gate server on the web, bits of binary hex code pulsed from one system to another, but in VR, the visuals were so much more pleasing and much more intuitive.

A cursory inspection, then the guard returned his pa.s.sport, nodded curtly and raised the barrier. Gridley had come this way before. There was never any problem.

Around the next curve, the mountain road turned suddenly into an autobahn, with traffic zooming past at speeds in excess of 160 kilometers per hour. He tromped the Viper accelerator, laid rubber--first . . . second . . . even in third--upshifted when the engine peaked in fourth, then fifth gears, achieved sixth as he merged with the flow of cars and trucks barreling along.

James Bond's old Astin-Martin, and in the later movies the BMW, would never have kept up with the Viper. It had a top speed of around 260 kilometers per hour, with an eight-liter, ten-cylinder engine that would get one to that top speed with unbelievable rapidity. It was a rocket with wheels.

He was in the netstream now, his program running smoothly. He liked the freeway image, but he could, if he wished, switch to a more leisurely hike along a stream, or a bicycle tour of France, although that kind of sudden program change did tend to jar one somewhat.

Ahead was an exit sign: CyberNation.

Gridley frowned. There had been a lot of infospew lately about CyberNation, a VR "country" that was accepting not only tourists, but residents. They--whoever the programmers were who'd created the VRland--were offering a whole bunch of computer perks if you were willing to "emigrate" to their creation--if you were willing to give up your electronic citizenship in your own country for theirs, a thing that seemed unlikely. He hadn't checked into it himself, but it was an interesting idea. Some day, in his copious spare time, he'd have to see what all the fuss was about.

He glanced at the a.n.a.log clock inset into the car's dashboard--no digital gauges for this beast.

A sleek Jaguar pa.s.sed the Viper, and Gridley smiled at it. Oh, yeah?

He goosed the Viper, felt the jolt of acceleration even in sixth gear as the car surged forward and began to gain on the Jag as if it were standing still. He flew past, seeing the frowning driver's face. Gridley grinned. The Jag didn't have any more, and the Viper wasn't even close to red-lining the tach. So long, pal!

He was still feeling pretty full of himself when he saw the wreck about half a mile ahead of him. A big semi had flipped and turned onto its side, the trailer now blocked all the lanes on his side of the freeway. Traffic was lined up for a quarter mile, and the line was getting longer fast.

d.a.m.n!

Gridley hit the brakes--carefully, they were top-of-the-line disk but not little-old-granny ABS--and started downshifting. Fortunately, the Viper was as good at stopping as it was at going. He pulled to a halt behind a big Mercedes full of men in hats, then checked his rearview mirror to see that the Jag was also slowing to a stop behind him.

What the virtual image meant was that someone had bollixed the system link he was using. Whether by accident or on purpose, he couldn't say.

A European-style siren dopplered and hee-haw-heehawed toward the wreck on the other side of the Autobahn, blue lights flashing. That would be the cops--or the diagnostics--coming to see what was what.

Traffic was now at a standstill on his side of the highway. Gridley vaulted over the Viper's low door; fortunately the tux had plenty of stretch. He'd just mosey over to the cops and see if he could find out what was going on. Surely an Americanized Thai in a tuxedo could get a few answers, especially in his Bond persona. . . .

Tyrone Howard rode the net, wind blasting his bare face--well, bare except for the old-style aviator goggles he wore. These were the only protection he had on the big Harley Davidson XLCH that rumbled along at more than a hundred miles an hour. A cla.s.sic bike, they didn't make them anymore, and one he was still several years away from being old enough to drive even if he could find or afford one. The thing with VR was that you could do stuff you couldn't do in RW--the real world.

He was in L.A., had just skirted a fender bender that blocked most of the Hollywood Freeway going north, hauling b.u.t.t toward the valley when the reminder vox he'd set up warned him of the time. His dad was on the way home, and he'd only have a couple of minutes to visit before he had to take off again. He couldn't tell Tyrone where he was going or anything--that was secret stuff--but at least they could say good-bye. His dad had been excited, even though he had tried to hide it. Too bad Mom was down in Birmingham, visiting her sister. She'd be sorry she'd missed Dad.

He pulled the bike onto an off-ramp, geared down and rolled into a parking lot. When he shoved his World War I aviator goggles up onto his forehead, the VR band also went up in RW, and all of a sudden he was back in his room. He blinked. RW always looked so . . . pale pale compared to VR. Like compared to VR. Like it it was the imitation, and virtual was the real place. was the imitation, and virtual was the real place.

Just in time. He heard the front door open.

"Tyrone?"

"Hey, Pop!"

Tyrone got up, and nearly tripped on his own feet. Jeez! He was constantly knocking stuff over or slipping and sliding. Grandaddy Carl said that his dad had been the same way at thirteen, couldn't walk down a ten-foot-wide hall without b.u.mping into both walls nine times. Tyrone found that hard to believe, that his dad had ever been that clumsy. Or that he he would someday grow out of it. would someday grow out of it.

When he reached the living room without destroying any furniture, he saw his dad there, in Net Force fatigues, neutral gray pants and shirt over spit-polished black boots. Behind his father, Master Sergeant Julio Fernandez stood by the door, dressed similarly.

"Hey, Tyrone," the sergeant said.

"Hey, Sarge. How's it goin'?"

"Not bad, for an old Hispanic." He grinned. Fernandez had retired from the RA--Regular Army--at the same time Colonel Howard had left. They went way back, had known each other for twenty years. They'd joined Net Force at pretty much the same time. His father had told him that Sarge had said if the colonel could work for civilians, he could manage it, too. But Sarge's love for computers was below zero, and Tyrone thought that was kind of strange, given that that was the business Net Force was in.

"I wanted to stop by before we took off," his dad said. "I've already called your mother. She'll be back on the commuter flight arriving at eighteen hundred, so you'll only be on your own for a couple of hours. Think you can handle that?"

Tyrone grinned. "I dunno, Pop. That's pretty scary. After I get home from school, I'll be alone in the house for all that time. I could starve. Maybe die of terminal boredom."

"Life is hard. Mrs. Townsend is running the car pool today, right?"