“Friends of yours?” Cal muttered.
“No friend,” Hei Feng replied — in English.
One of the officers, dressed to the nines with enough brass for a tuba, got out and marched straight toward Hei Feng, who saluted smartly. The officer began pointing and shouting, and soon soldiers were spreading out into the rest of the temple, while three of them trained their guns on Cal.
“He is here for you,” Kim whispered. “You and your friends.”
Cal raised his hand slowly. “I thought Hei was keeping this quiet.”
Kim also raised his hands, out of caution if not solidarity. “He can be independent, but he still answers to people. Those people may have told his secret to someone else.”
Padilla and Yamato were brought into the courtyard at gunpoint, hands on their heads, while the officer continued to shout at Hei Feng. “What’s going on, boss?” Yamato asked.
“Think the vacation’s over,” Cal said.
Then the officer reached out and relieved Hei Feng of his sidearm and rifle, and Hei Feng raised his hands as well.
“Oh, shit,” Cal said. “This is bad. Ricky, light ’em up. Time to go.”
A moment later — nothing.
Cal turned to look at Yamato, who had a pained expression on his face. “It’s not there.”
“What do you mean, ‘It’s not there’?”
“I mean, it’s like a null field or something. I can’t call it up.”
“But the Chinese don’t have generators!” Cal hissed. “How the hell did — oh.”
Cal had missed the face when the jeeps first drove into the courtyard, probably because it wasn’t so different from the other Chinese and Korean faces he’d seen. But now, the person was unmistakable, the same one Cal had first seen in a European forest six years ago.
Mikhail Tsakhia, the original null-Variant, saw Cal looking over at him… and gave him a winning smile. Next to him, a human-shaped shadow coalesced from the darkness briefly, then disappeared again.
“What is it?” Padilla asked as they began to lead Hei Feng toward one of the jeeps.
Cal sighed. “We’re in trouble.”
21
Lieutenant General Bill Harrison was on the short side, compact, and seemed to wear a permanent scowl. Surprisingly, it made him the perfect negotiator at the armistice talks with North Korea in the contested village of Panmunjom. Danny Wallace thought Harrison would make one hell of a poker player, though word was that the general was quite the upstanding Christian, and would probably frown on gambling.
He was certainly frowning at Danny at the moment.
“Commander Wallace, I recognize you have orders here from General Vandenberg. I know Hoyt. Good man. But what he’s asking me to do is next to impossible,” Harrison said from behind his desk at U.N. Command Headquarters. “Those Koreans, they notice everything. They’re gonna notice new faces at the table. I don’t care how good your Major Lodge is. I’m sure he’s a damn fine negotiator, though nobody I know seems to have heard of him. We keep track of people in the Army, you know. We know the good ones.”
“Yes, sir. Major Lodge has been on detached duty for some time,” Danny responded, standing ramrod straight in his Navy whites, even though he stuck out like a sore thumb on the nearly all-Army base.
“And I can imagine to whence he’s been detached,” Harrison replied, carefully enunciating each word. “I’m well aware what happens to good military men on detached duty. And I remember when Hoyt was over at CIA. I can put two and two together just fine, Commander. But let me tell you, we are so close. So close to an agreement that could stop the fighting here and maybe get our boys home. If you and yours get in the way of that, I swear to God Almighty himself, you’ll spend the rest of your days in Leavenworth.”
“Sir, with respect,” Danny began, “we’re here because there’s a chance that someone else may try to get in the way of that agreement. We want to prevent that from happening.”
Harrison held up Vandenberg’s orders again. “So I see. ‘Rogue elements from the Soviet Union.’ I didn’t know the Soviets had rogue elements to begin with.”
“It’s a new development, sir.”
“And I suppose you’re not at liberty to tell me who or what these rogue elements are?”
It was all Danny could do to keep looking Harrison in the eye. “Sir, no, sir. I am not.”
“And the rest of your people will be off doing something else, which you’re also not at liberty to disclose.”
“Correct, sir.”
Harrison threw the paper down on the desk again. “I mean it, Commander. We’re trying to stop a war here. If you mess this up with your antics, I’ll have your head. I don’t like saying it, but by God, I mean it.”
Danny straightened up even further, so much so it felt like his spine would independently launch itself toward the ceiling. “Understood, sir.”
“Have Lodge and this other person — Stevens, is it? — report to the staging area tomorrow at oh-seven-hundred. Dismissed.”
Giving his best academy salute, Danny turned and walked out of the office, allowing his back to relax only when he left the building entirely. Outside, the rest of the Variants were waiting for him, all dressed in U.S. Army uniforms. Even Katie had been made a rather young-looking private, with a secretarial post as cover.
“Well?” Frank asked.
“You and Rose are reporting for duty with the delegation at 7 a.m. You remember how to spit-shine and polish, right?” Danny asked with a smirk.
“Like riding a bike. What about the rest of you?”
Danny pulled a map of the area from his pocket and unfolded it. “I’m getting the biggest concentration of Variant activity from somewhere in this direction,” he said, drawing a line with his finger to the north and east. “I’m thinking they’re near Kaesong. It’s only seven or eight miles from Panmunjom, where they’ve been holding the talks. If they’re going to disrupt things, it’s a good staging area.”
“What’s the plan?” Sorensen asked.
“Russian observers,” Danny said. “We still have some uniforms we can use, and the motor pool here has a couple Chinese jeeps to choose from.”
“And the language barrier?” Frank asked. “Maybe I should come with you instead.”
“No can do. You’re the only one here with real military experience, and this is a high-protocol thing. And if shit happens, nobody’s gonna listen to Rose here, sad to say.”
Mrs. Stevens harrumphed at that, straightening out her uniform. “Well, you made me a major. Doesn’t that count for something?”
Frank smiled at her apologetically. “Not when you’re a woman, and not in a room full of generals. Sorry. In that room, a major is the one getting the coffee, man or woman.”
Mrs. Stevens opened her mouth as if to say more, but thought better of it. Danny knew she’d quickly weigh all the angles before doing anything — which made her a good counterpoint to Frank’s impulsiveness. Frank’s plethora of talents, combined with Mrs. Stevens’s genius and caution, should put them in position to handle anything that might threaten the armistice talks.
“Just remember, you two — you’re there to observe, and only intervene if there’s an absolute direct threat,” Danny said. “And if things really go south, you make sure you save the North Korean delegation — and ideally, get seen doing it.”
Maggie looked out the window from the back seat of the sedan at the pines and mountains surrounding the roadway. Here and there, signs of war were evident — a crater in an otherwise pristine farm field, a hulked-out tank by the side of the road, a series of graves marked by little more than piled rocks and bits of wood.