“Look, what happened at Barksdale was terrible. But from a political point of view, seeing the bad guys walk all over us again down in Fort Worth is going to be a lot worse,” Cohen said rapidly. “We got a little bump in our numbers at first. But the polls are already starting to skew fast in Farrell’s direction — even with the press playing it pretty much our way.”
“And why is that?” Barbeau demanded.
Cohen swallowed hard. “I put in a call to our campaign people before this meeting,” he said. “They’ve been running focus groups with swing voters, the folks who’ve been hard for either campaign to lock down so far. But the longer this situation drags on, the more they see you as weak and even afraid… hiding out here while the bad guys whack our troops and factories at will.”
Despite himself, Rauch felt a new surge of respect — both for Cohen for daring to tell his boss something so unpalatable… and for the focus-group swing voters who seemed to have figured her out.
Obviously pushed to the brink and beyond, Barbeau slammed a hand down on the table. “Enough!” She fought to regain her composure for a moment and then went on in a quieter voice: “You want action, Luke? You want a big show for the low-information bozos who’re buying Farrell’s BS? Well, so be it.” She pushed back her chair and stood up. “In fact, this is something I should have done a long, long time ago.”
Icily, she turned toward Firestone. “Admiral, my understanding is that the Insurrection Act of 1807, as amended in 2006, gives me the authority to deploy the armed forces for the purpose of maintaining law and order on U.S. soil.”
Warily, he nodded. “That’s correct, Madam President. At least, in certain limited conditions. For example, you can use regular troops or the National Guard to restore order and enforce the law in cases where a terrorist attack makes it impossible for the local authorities to handle the situation.”
“Very well,” Barbeau continued coolly. “As your commander in chief, I now declare those conditions met.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Firestone agreed slowly. “That is your prerogative.” He seemed to sit up straighter in his chair. “May I ask what you intend?”
Listening while she outlined her plan, Rauch felt his eyes widening in disbelief.
Stripped down to shorts and a T-shirt, Brad McLanahan lounged in the pilot’s seat of the XCV-62 Ranger. Even with the shade provided by the camouflage netting draped across the aircraft, the cockpit was uncomfortably hot, though more bake oven than steam room, because the air was so dry. Since they couldn’t afford to run down the fuel cells in their auxiliary power unit, cooling the aircraft’s interior spaces was out of the question. They were operating on minimal power, drawing just enough juice to run the Ranger’s secure satellite communications system and some of its computers.
He finished reading the message from his father, typed in a short acknowledgment, and hit the send button on his MFD. It beeped once, confirming that his reply had been uploaded and transmitted to Poland.
Besides trying to figure out how Gryzlov’s mercenaries were hiding their movements, the older McLanahan had been riding herd on a group of Scion weapons analysts and cybernetics experts. They were tasked with preparing quick-and-dirty intelligence assessments of Russia’s new combat robots. Knowing how important any information — even of the sketchiest and most speculative kind — was to the Iron Wolf CID team lying in wait outside Sky Masters, his father had been sending them updates on a regular basis.
Brad sat back, thinking through the tactical implications of what he’d just read. Like the rest, this most recent assessment was long on guesswork and short on confirmed facts, but it was all they were going to get… at least until he and the others met Gryzlov’s machines in combat. Figuring out tactics that would give them a shot at winning that first fight was a daunting task. Sure, the battle simulations they’d run through back in the spring gave him a rough framework to work with. But those sims had been purely hypothetical. And tactics and maneuvers that worked well in the computer could fail miserably against actual machines whose speed, agility, armament, armor, and sensors varied significantly from their imaginary digital counterparts.
Ideally, they’d have been able to run through a new series of mock battles — this time against computer-generated enemies whose capabilities more closely matched those of the real-world Russian robots. He snorted. Yeah, Brad, he told himself, and in an ideal world you also wouldn’t be sitting sweating your ass off in this cockpit under the high desert sun. In the here and now, they were just going to have to suck it up and do their best.
“Wolf Two to Base Camp.” Major Nadia Rozek’s voice sounded in his headset. “I am just outside the perimeter. Request clearance to enter.”
“Copy that, Wolf Two,” Ian Schofield replied. “You’re clear to come on in.”
Smiling, Brad yanked off his headset and climbed down through the open hatch. This was what he’d been waiting for. Since relieving him shortly before dawn, Nadia had been on watch at their observation post overlooking Battle Mountain. Now it was Whack’s turn to keep an eye on things… which meant this was another of those all-too-brief periods when he and Nadia were both in the same place at the same time.
Outside the Ranger, the air was even hotter.
Schofield and Mike Knapp, a former sergeant in the U.S. Special Forces, had already rolled back a section of the camouflage net. Sunlight, impossibly bright after the dim cockpit, streamed through the opening.
Brad squinted against the brightness. A patch of the clear blue sky and sagebrush-strewn high desert plateau outside shimmered strangely, almost as though it were some kind of weird, moving mirage.
And then, accompanied by a faint whir from its actuators and hydraulics, Nadia’s Cybernetic Infantry Device was inside the shelter — apparently appearing out of thin air when she shut down the robot’s chameleon camouflage system. The two Iron Wolf recon troopers dragged the net back into place behind her.
The CID came to a halt and crouched down. A hatch on its back cycled open. Nadia swung herself out and dropped easily to the ground. After a quick, friendly nod to the other two men, she walked over to Brad with a big, heartfelt smile. She was already unzipping her black flight suit, revealing a skintight gray tank top and khaki shorts. Brad’s pulse quickened a bit. For the moment, she looked completely cool and comfortable. And, as always, incredibly alluring… at least to anyone who wasn’t scared of her physical prowess and intellect.
Climate control was one of the few good things about pulling a duty stint inside one of the robots here, he decided. If you had to isolate yourself from the human race inside a machine for an eight-hour stretch, at least you got air conditioning.
“Nice to see you, Major Rozek,” he said gravely. “Anything new down in the world?”
With equal gravity, she shook her head. “Nothing, Captain McLanahan. Even the FBI agents sound bored to death when they report to each other over the radio.”
Brad couldn’t help wincing. “Yeah, well, after learning what happened in Fort Worth last night, I’m starting to think the Russians aren’t coming after all.” Though he tried hard to keep his tone level, he knew she would be able to sense both his frustration and the nagging fear that he’d taken them on a wild-goose chase. Certainly, every day that passed without any sign of hostile activity made that seem more and more likely. “This stakeout operation could be a total waste of our time and resources.”