Tomorrow War Read online

  Now Y was offering him a job—maybe. But it would be for the Government and worse yet, the OSS. Not only did the intelligence service pay notoriously low wages, their assignments were usually fraught with danger.

  “What if I’m not interested?” he asked Y.

  Both Y and Crabb laughed. All three of them had spent time during the war against Germany in a place called Dreamland, up in Iceland. They all knew each other pretty well. And they knew if the gig was a paying one, Zoltan would be interested.

  “Here’s the dilly-oh,” Y began, looking across the smoky table at the middle-aged, goateed psychic. “Hawk Hunter is missing. I’ve been ordered to find him. I can pick anyone I want to help me. My own psychic instincts are telling me I should pick you.”

  Zoltan just stared back at him. He knew Hunter of course. They were friends—sort of.

  “Missing?” he asked. “Missing where?”

  “That’s top secret … ,” Y replied.

  Zoltan looked deeply into the OSS man’s eyes. Then his face turned a bit pale.

  “Aw, shit … that huge bombing?” he gasped. “The bomb that sunk Japan? Hunter was in on that?”

  “He sank Japan for Christ’s sake, who else could have done that?” Crabb said from the door.

  Zoltan closed his eyes and felt a shiver go through him.

  “Man, he wasted the place …,” he said slowly, conjuring up a mental image of the newly expanded Sea of Japan. “I can’t tell you how many dead. But the vibes I’m getting tell me they were mostly military. Could that be so?”

  Y nodded. “Most of the main island is gone. That’s the reports we get. And that it was totally under military control. Most civilians had been deported about six months before.”

  Zoltan nodded. “Yes, somehow I knew that.”

  Y looked up at Crabb, who opened the door and magically reached out and retrieved a tray carrying a bottle of scotch, a pot of coffee, and three huge mugs. He set it on the table, poured out three cups of thick joe, then added a gigantic splash of scotch to a pair of the steaming brews. He pushed one of the booze-laden mugs in front of Zoltan, taking the other laced coffee for himself.

  All three men took a huge swig. Zoltan more than the others.

  Then Y reached inside his uniform pocket and came out with a photo of the huge B-2000 bomber that had dropped the superbomb on Japan.

  Zoltan took one look at the airplane and felt another series of shivers go through him.

  “Oh, man, them is some bad vibes,” he said, nervously pulling on his goatee. “Talk about the angel of death. And look at the size of that thing!”

  “Are you saying it will be easy to find?” Y asked.

  Zoltan studied the photo. The airplane looked like a battleship with wings.

  “Even the moon is hard to find if you don’t know where to look for it,” he replied solemnly.

  “OK,” Y said finally. “Here’s what I have to do: I’ve been ordered to assemble a small—a very small—expeditionary force. We transit to Asia and look for, and hopefully find, Hawk and the rest of his crew.”

  Zoltan looked up at him. “And … ?”

  “And your government has requested that you come along,” Y told him.

  Zoltan’s mind flashed through a series of images: bowls filled with rice, stagnant water, and snakes. Lots and lots of snakes. He shivered again.

  “What would be my role exactly?” he asked.

  Y thought a moment. “As an advisor,” he replied. “Help me pick the rest of the unit. Help me get the right kind of transportation. Then come along and use your, well … unique abilities to aid in the search. Simple as that.”

  Zoltan just laughed. Nothing was simple in this universe.

  “And if I refuse?” he asked Y.

  Y just smiled. “Then I’ll have to reactivate your military status—and order you to go. That way you’ll not get paid a dime over minimum wage.”

  Zoltan looked up at Crabb for help, but the burly nightclub owner was deep into his booze-laced coffee cup.

  Zoltan turned back to the OSS agent.

  “Well, I guess I have no choice,” he said.

  Y shook his hand. “Welcome aboard,” he said quietly. “Let’s set up a time tomorrow so I can brief you.”

  Zoltan wiped the sweat from his lip. He had a very bad feeling about all this.

  “Are you talking about a search party or a body-recovery team?” he asked Y.

  The OSS man just swigged his coffee.

  “Well, that’s the first question I want to ask you,” he said.

  Y moved a bit closer to him. Crabb made sure the door was locked.

  “Can you tell … ?” Y asked, his words trailing off. Zoltan just looked at him. “What? If Hawk is still alive?”

  Y nodded solemnly. “Are any of them still with us?” Zoltan felt a sweat break out on his forehead. “I’m not so good at that particular aspect of thought transfer.”

  Y’s face became grim. “Take a guess.”

  Zoltan wiped his brow, closed his eyes, and put his hand to his right temple. He stayed like that for a very long time.

  “If I had to guess,” he finally replied slowly, “I’d say ‘no.’”

  A cold chill suddenly swept the room.

  Zoltan was shaking his head.

  “Nope,” he said quietly. “I’m afraid none of them are still alive”

  Y stared down at his hands for a moment. “Will that make our job harder or easier?”

  Zoltan laughed grimly.

  “You should know by now, my friend, that looking for the dead is much more difficult than finding the living,” he said.

  He paused a moment, then saw quick visions of an empty ocean, a jungle on fire, and a very long railroad track.

  “Yes,” he added. “Dead men always leave a cold trail. And this one seems very cold ….”

  CHAPTER 4

  Edwards Air Corps Aerodrome California

  One week later

  IT WAS A BLAZING-HOT day.

  There were high clouds off to the west, gathering with a slightly ominous look to them.

  Agent Y was standing out on an auxiliary flight line of the huge, bustling Air Corps base, sweating his ass off. All around him, gigantic Air Corps bombers were being decommissioned and put back into their hangar storage areas, possibly never to see combat again. He nervously checked his watch. Timing was everything in this world. And unlike the big bombers and their crews, so soon returning from war to the rest of their lives, Y’s future was now being compressed into a very small window of time, one that would keep closing at a very rapid pace.

  One week had passed since the meeting in Chicago at Crabb’s club. It had been a hectic seven days for Y. He had spent the majority of it in Washington getting briefed for his impending search mission by a legion of military and OSS higher-ups. Listening patiently to their cautions and advice, he’d pretended to take copious notes at each session—only to throw them all away once he’d left the Beltway.

  The main concern in D.C. was one of appearance—that was the bottom line. The greatest fear of everyone he talked to was that the story of the whole superbombing affair would reach the media before the B-2000 and its crew were found. Hawk Hunter was a high-profile, if somewhat mysterious, war hero, and the public would demand to know what happened to him when word of the super-bombing eventually did leak out. The Government did not want to be put in the awkward position of having to say: “We don’t know what happened to him.” To do this would signal the country’s rabid celebrity-driven press to look into security matters that no one in the military or the OSS wanted them to see. It would also revive the biggest question of all: Where did Hawk Hunter come from in the first place?

  And that was a secret no one who knew the truth ever wanted to reveal—Y included.

  So Hawk and the B-2000 crew had to be found—and found quickly. Dead or alive, it really didn’t matter. The affair just needed closure, and it needed it now. Then it would be up to Y to write
the last chapter in the history of the country’s sixty years of war. Like the huge bombers being put into mothballs, maybe for forever, this story finally had to have an end.

  However, with Y tied up in Washington, it had been left up to Zoltan to gather together the resources they would need for the mission to proceed. There were a few times when Y had wondered if he would come to regret his decision to include the psychic in his search plans. Like it had once been said about someone else, Zoltan certainly worked in mysterious ways.

  Y’s first assignment for Zoltan was to find a team to use in searching for the missing B-2000 bomber and its crew. Zoltan had just about the entire U.S. military to choose from, and Y had really thought the psychic’s ability would locate a team of tough, combat-hardened, special-forces types who would be just right for the job. Now, one week later, Y was, to say the least, skeptical about the group Zoltan had chosen.

  They were standing nearby on the flight line, bags packed, ready to go. And indeed Zoltan had rustled up some special forces. But instead of arranging for an attachment from some famous Army teams such as the 882nd Airborne or the Air Corps Blue Berets, he’d somehow uncovered a fairly obscure unit of Sea Marines reservists called Unit 167.

  There were twenty-six of them in all, and they were essentially shock troops. The odd thing was their specialty was not exactly combat search and rescue, rather it was taking over enemy ships on the high seas, and if need be, sailing them to friendlier ports. Why Zoltan felt the need to bring them, Y wasn’t sure, and with time running out, there was nothing he could do about it anyhow. Like it or not, Unit 167 would have to do.

  Standing in line with them now was another person Zoltan felt should go on the mission: Colonel Crabb himself. Crabb was not a military officer, his “colonel” rank was one of pure invention. And while Crabb was an outstanding guy and certainly had a perceptive and level head on his shoulders, Y wasn’t really sure that the search mission would be something he’d find to his liking. After all, Crabb was in his late forties, and looked more at home with a drink in his hand and a blonde on his knee than a Fritz-style battle helmet and a double-barreled assault rifle. But when Y asked Zoltan why he’d selected Crabb to join them, the psychic had simply replied: “Two reasons: he’s a friend of Hawk’s, and my vibes tell me we’ll need a morale officer.”

  Y chose not to argue the point.

  Now they were all waiting for their air transport, and that would prove to be the oddest aspect of all.

  When Y was first ordered to organize the search party, he was torn between going to Asia by air or sea. Flying would be quicker, of course, but there was always the pain of trying to find a place to land and refuel, especially in what might be a hostile environment. A surface ship would be slower, but their mobility options would definitely be increased.

  When Y told this to Zoltan, the psychic did his fingers-to-the-temple routine and shouted, “Ah ha!” He then said he had just the dude they needed.

  They were all waiting for this “dude” now.

  He was late.

  Y finally walked over to Zoltan. The sun was climbing higher, the air was blistering, and everyone was dressed in heavy jungle fatigues. It was getting very uncomfortable. And they were already one hour behind schedule.

  “OK, swami,” Y said to him. “Where’s our ride?”

  Zoltan was stung by his comment—it was a grave insult to call him “swami.” But instead of getting angry, he just closed his eyes, put his fingers to his temple … and smiled.

  Then he turned to the east, pointed, and said: “Here he comes now.”

  Y heard it a few seconds later.

  It was a deep, growling noise, definitely an airplane but not like one he’d ever heard before. He keyed his radio phone and buzzed the Edwards tower.

  “You have something coming in for us?” he asked.

  “‘Something’ is the operative word,” the tower man responded wryly.

  They saw it a few moments later. It was huge, it was airborne, and for a moment Y thought he’d at last been the beneficiary of Zoltan’s peculiar genius.

  While Y had been torn between needing a ship or an airplane, Zoltan had cooked up a combination. What was now approaching them was a seaplane. But a very strange one.

  It looked like an airplane Y was familiar with called a UVF-100 Super Albatross. But in this universe of bigger-is-always-better, this flying beast was at least ten times the size of the substantial UVF-100.

  It carried twelve double-reaction jet engines on its top-wing assembly, with four wing float-pylons below, and a fuselage curved into a distinctive amphibious bottom. The plane was studded with dozens of observation bubbles and blisters, and was painted in a garish tropical-style yellow-and-green color scheme. Y could feel the eyeballs popping out of his head. This airplane seemed much too large to fly. If the missing B-2000 bomber looked like a flying battleship, then this airplane looked like a flying cruise liner.

  The massive aircraft circled the air base twice—eating up ten minutes—and then came in for a landing, taking all of Edwards’s ten-mile landing strip to do so. Hundreds of wheels extended, its dozen jet engines screaming in reverse, it slowly rolled to a gentle stop right in front of them.

  Five minutes passed, Y imagined it took that long for the plane’s commander to unstrap and climb down to earth. The hatch did eventually open and the seaplane’s commander dropped out. He was in his forties, a rugged individual, but with long nonregulation hair stuffed back into a ponytail, an ancient aviator’s cap on his head, a desert camo flight suit, and black sneakers. He was drinking a beer.

  Y looked at him in amazement.

  Zoltan was beaming. He greeted the pilot like they were long-lost brothers. Then they walked over to Y.

  “I’d like to introduce Bro,” Zoltan said.

  “‘Bro’?”

  The pilot stuck his hand. “Yeah, Cowboy Bobby Baulis. But most people call me Bro, like in ‘brother.’ You dig, man?”

  Y finally shook hands and found that the man’s grip nearly crushed his fingers.

  “You’re the guy who wants to hop over the pool, right? You got your doodles packed?” he asked Y, sipping his beer.

  Y turned to Zoltan for translation.

  “He wants to know if we’re ready to go, for a trip over the Pacific.”

  At this point Y pulled Zoltan aside.

  “Are you certain about this guy?” he asked him sternly.

  “Certain in what way?” Zoltan replied. “Is he a competent pilot? Will he stick with us? That sort of thing?”

  Y just shook his head in frustration. “No,” he replied. “Are you certain that he is sane? That he has all his cards? You know?”

  Zoltan just waved away Y’s concerns. “Believe me, Bro is as good as gold. I did an intense psychic background search on him. Just like Unit One-sixty-seven and Crabb, this man will be a vital part of the team. You’ll see.”

  “It’s essential that he become a vital part,” Y told Zoltan. “We’ve got an important job to do and the lives of many people are in his hands. If he fucks up, it will be your head.”

  Zoltan’s hand unconsciously went to his neck. As a youth he’d had the words “Cut along dotted line” tattooed around the back of his neck. Since then, any mention of his head leaving his body in an unnatural manner sent chills through his spine.

  Y studied the enormous seaplane and had to admit it appeared well-kept, sturdy, and rugged enough. And it certainly looked nonmilitary; in fact, there were no numbers or markings on it at all. But even if it was falling apart, he had no choice but to use the winged beast for transport. Time was running out. They had to leave right now.

  “OK,” he said finally. “It will have to do.” He gave the nod to Unit 167’s CO and soon the Sea Marines were trooping up the cargo ramp and climbing into the vast seaplane. Crabb climbed aboard with considerably less elan. This bothered Y. He knew that when the easygoing Crabb looked worried, it was usually time to be concerned. And at that mome
nt the colonel looked very worried.

  CHAPTER 5

  IT TOOK ALMOST TWENTY-FOUR hours for the “Bro-Bird” to make the Pacific crossing.

  The airplane sailed through the sky like a huge clipper ship sailing across the sea, a slave to the shifting winds. At some points on the journey, its airspeed dipped to a perilously low eighty knots. Most times, though, it cruised at about 140 and change.

  Still, the Bro-Bird was quite an aircraft. Besides having an enormous cargo hold, the huge amphibian held a crew of twenty-four, had room enough to accommodate the entire twenty-six-man Unit 167 with their own private berths, had a large galley the size of a midtown restaurant and a midlevel “function room” that was decked out like a nightclub. This place was called, appropriately enough, “Cloud Nine.” Colonel Crabb took to Cloud Nine right away. Show biz was in Crabb’s blood, and a few of Bro’s crew doubled as passable jazz musicians. Once airborne, Crabb soon had them up and playing his favorite songs. Drinks were served, tables put together. It was like being in the famous Blue Note—just four miles up.

  No amount of music, however, could drag Y out of the funk that overtook him shortly after takeoff from Edwards.

  For some reason, just as they got airborne, it hit him like a punch in the stomach: There was a real possibility that Hawk Hunter and the rest of the B-2000 crew were dead. Zoltan was convinced of it, and Crabb was, too.

  Now sitting alone at a dark corner table inside Cloud Nine, nursing an ice water, Y found the same somber thoughts going through his mind.

  Hawk Hunter. Dead.

  What did that mean exactly?

  Y knew from his experience with the mysterious fighter pilot that his being in this universe was not at all typical. Hunter’s very presence affected the world in odd, subtle, and sometimes not so subtle ways. And there was proof. Over the years those rare persons who had claimed to see “angels” just assumed they were messengers from God, beings from On High. Most people, though, believed this was rubbish. But Y was privy to a secret study the OSS had undertaken after Hunter’s sudden appearance in this world about a year before. Combining information from his experience with reported “angel sightings” over the years, they concluded that somehow, some way, certain individuals had been able—maybe without their knowledge or through no fault of their own—to pass from one universe to any other. How or why was not known. But while these people looked and acted like anyone else on Earth, by their very presence they were just different and could have an effect on everything from raising the dead to winning global conflicts single-handedly. The study concluded that these people were what had been termed down through the ages as “angels.”