Edge of Tomorrow (30 page)

“Thar she blows!” said Three. “Skin’s in the
green!”

“Confirmed!” said Syd. “They’re cursing
because they lost us! They say we disappeared around a rise!”

“OK, One. Climb out of here, and take us
home!” exclaimed Hatch.

“Roger, Five. Heading for home!” the pilot
responded. “Estimated time, 2 hours 35 minutes.

Syd prayed that Sara would last that
long.

Triple Eye Office, Istanbul

Saturday, August 4, 2001

10:15 P.M.

Shadow-3 landed, without any more incidents,
on the asphalt in front of the hangar at Triple Eye’s Istanbul
estate. The medic, Shirley, was waiting with a gurney near the
hangar door. With her were several of the ground crew and
Marli.

As the rotor slowed to a stop, Hatch
unbuckled and opened the chopper’s door and folded it down into
steps. The door was next to where Sara was lying. Syd still sat on
the floor next to her. Hatch descended the steps and talked to
Shirley while two hefty ground crewmen entered the chopper and
gently carried Sara out of the aircraft and placed her on the
gurney. Shirley and Marli pushed the gurney toward the large
house.

The Chief Engineer helped Syd to her feet and
they exited, followed by the two pilots.

Hatch came over to Syd and asked, “You OK,
Syd?”

“I think so. I should find some ice for this
bump on my head. It’s really swollen,” she answered.

“What happened?” he asked with concern.

“I was kneeling next to Sara when Brawley
went into ’Nam mode. I cracked my head on my seat.”

“Christ! I’m sorry, Syd! It was dicey there
for a while. You should let the doctor look at that.”

“I thought this mission was supposed to be a
slam dunk,” she said as they walked toward the house.

“My fault entirely! I should have guessed
that place was a munitions dump and stayed further away. It would
be a miracle if any of those bastards got out of that place. I
apologize to you for moving in so close, but I wanted to make it
look like a ground attack out of that copse of trees. I’ll
apologize to the crew, too,” he said. “I should kiss your boo-boo
and make it better.”

Syd made sure they were the only ones still
outside the house, then said, “I think I bit my lip, too. Do you
think you could make that better? But be gentle. I’m not
kidding.”

He took her in his arms and kissed her moist
lips very gently.

“I feel better already. Now, I want to check
on Sara.”

They entered the house, and Hatch led her
down a hall to a room which was configured as a hospital room.
There were four hospital beds and an operating table. Sara was on
the table and the Turkish doctor was working on her arm, stitching
the wound. Sara was awake, though still groggy. An IV was hanging
on a hook on a stand, the tubing going to a needle in Sara’s right
arm just below the elbow. Syd approached the table and looked at
Sara, who was very pale. Shirley was at the head of the table
monitoring the machines that were displaying Sara’s vitals.

“Yo, Dr. Z.!” Sara mumbled with a weak smile.
“The doc says you did good. Saved my fucking life!”

The doctor looked up at Syd and said with an
accent, “So you are the one who worked on her? The work you did not
only kept her from bleeding to death, I don’t think she will have
much of a scar. I should have guessed you were a doctor.”

“Not an M.D., Doctor. Ph.D.,” Syd
laughed.

“Well, you did great work. She needs two
units of blood and she will be as good as new,” said the
doctor.

Syd reached into the breast pocket of her
jumpsuit and took out the lump of lead she had taken out of Sara’s
arm.

“Here’s a souvenir for you, Sara,” she said,
holding it up between her thumb and index finger so Sara could see
it. “You can wear it on a chain as a good luck charm.”

“I guess it could have been worse,” moaned
Sara. “It could have been a fucking 20 millimeter!”

She tried a weak smile.

Hatch moved up next to Syd and said, “Hang in
there, Sara. Now you’ll have to take some time off without arguing
with me.”

“Just a scratch,” she said, her voice
weakening. “I’ll be up and at ’em in a day or two. But I need two
favors.”

“Name them. Anything for you, Sara,” he
said.

“One, get me home tomorrow. I’m already tired
of Turkey.”

“Done! We’ll go back to Florida tomorrow.
We’re through here. What’s the other one?”

“Two, take Dr. Z. to dinner and buy her drink
for me.”

“That’s an easy one,” he smiled, “though it
is late. What do you think, Syd?”

Syd was definitely not in the mood to go out
to a restaurant at this time of night. To please Sara, she figured
she should agree, and then talk to Hatch outside the room.

“Fine. I’ll make it an expensive one, Sara.
I’ll hit him in the pocketbook,” said Syd. “Now, you get some
rest.”

As Syd and Hatch left the room, Shirley asked
Sara, “What’s with the ‘Dr. Z.’ thing, Sara?”

“Oh. Dr. Zorrina. It’s a long story. I’ll
tell it to you sometime when I’m not so sleepy,” Sara answered as
she dozed off.

• • •

Back in the War Room, Syd said, “I just said
I’d go to dinner tonight to please Sara, Hatch. It’s really too
late, and my head is pounding. I just want to get out of this
bloody jumpsuit and take a long, hot shower. I do need a drink,
though. Badly. And some ice for this head.”

“I’ll take care of that. What do you want?
Wine? Hard stuff?”

“You choose, I don’t care.”

Hatch picked up the telephone and gave orders
to someone.

“We’ll have something in a minute. While
we’re waiting, I wonder if you are up to listening to some
recordings of the voice channels as we were leaving the target
area. It’s SOP to program one of our comm satellites to record all
voice channels during a mission. I would like to hear what those
fighter pilots and their radar station controllers were
saying.”

“OK. Start it right after we lost the skin,
if you can,” said Syd.

Hatch sat at the console next to her and
typed commands into the computer. Then, voices came over the
loudspeakers. Syd listened for a moment, making notes on a pad of
paper on the desk of her console.

“Skip ahead to where we went invisible
again,” she asked.

She listened for a few more minutes.

“OK, that’s enough. We’re in luck.
Here’s the overview: the lead pilot said he saw something, his
wingman said he did not; lead asks ground radar for help, they say
there’s nothing on their radar except the fighters; lead says he
can’t see anything on his radar either, but he definitely sees
something, and he’s going down for a closer look; he gets to 500
feet and the object he’s after disappears; ground radar says he’s
crazy, so does his wingman. It looks like we pulled it off without
being officially seen. They all say the pilot who saw us saw
shadows
, or something. That’s a
laugh!”

“That’s good! We’ll monitor the news tomorrow
and see who gets blamed. There will be a lot of finger pointing,”
said Hatch. “We still may have some damage control to do.”

A Turkish waiter arrived with a tray loaded
with an ice pack, a bucket of ice, two glasses, and a bottle of
cold Stoli vodka. A second waiter followed with a tray containing a
hibachi. The top of the hibachi was covered with skewers of meat
marinated in a spicy sauce. There was also a basket of assorted
breads and a bowl of dipping sauce. The waiters put everything on
the conference table and left.

“I got us a snack, too. You need something to
eat,” said Hatch.

Syd picked up the ice bag and put it to her
head while Hatch fixed two strong drinks on the rocks. He handed
one to Syd.

“This one is from Sara,” said Hatch, raising
his glass. Syd took hers and touched it to his.

“To Sara,” she said, then took a long swig.
It felt like fire going down, spreading through her stomach,
heading for her bloodstream.

“God, I needed that!” sighed Syd. “I hope I
did OK on Sara’s arm. Shirley should have been there.”

“The doctor said no one could have done
better. You saved Sara’s life. Besides, your translations of those
pilots’ conversations were critical to our survival. Without you, I
would have shot them out of the sky as soon as they started down,
and our cover would have been blown.”

Syd finished her drink too quickly. Hatch
added two ice cubes and refilled it.

“So you think if you get me drunk, you can
have your way with me, eh, milord?” giggled Syd.

“That hadn’t entered my mind, but now that
you bring it up, it has a certain appeal,” he smiled. Hatch sipped
his drink, watching her as she munched on a piece of marinated
chicken.

“Can we move this party to my room?
I
really
need to get out of
this bloody suit and take a shower,” Syd finally said.

Hatch loaded everything on a tray and
followed Syd to her room. He sat the tray on the coffee table and
she sat on her bed, pulling off boots and socks. She got up and
went to the table, picked up her drink and headed for the bathroom,
then put the drink on the counter after taking another sip. She
returned to the door of the bathroom and leaned against the
frame.

“I’m going to leave the door open so we can
talk. You may get lucky and see me naked. If I pass out in the
shower, come and get me,” she giggled.

She unzipped her jumpsuit and stepped out of
it. She turned and walked back into the bathroom in her underwear.
Hatch heard the shower water start. A hand came into view holding a
bra. Syd let it float to the floor.

“What do we have here, Syd? An invisible
striptease?” laughed Hatch.

Next came her panties.

“Just call me
Shadow-Syd
. I hope I don’t blow a circuit
board.”

He heard the shower door open and close. He
took his drink and stood just outside the open bathroom door.

“I could come and wash your back,” he said
over the sound of the water. Steam began to flow out of the
bathroom.

“Too risky. Hey, Hatch, I forgot to get my
nightgown. It’s in my duffel,” she answered.

He went to her duffel bag and rummaged around
and found a nightgown, a light-blue linen thing with small pink
roses on it. He could see his hand through it. He ambled back to
the steaming door.

“I found it. Where do you want it?”

“Come in and hang it on a hook for
me—please.”

He went in and hung it on a hook on the
opposite side of the entry away from the shower, so she would have
to pass by the open door to get at it. He glanced at the steamy
shower, which had a clear glass door, but could see only a steamy
shape, just like shower scenes on TV ads.

Damn! I really wanted to see her body! She
knew there was too much steam! She’s toying with me!

“It doesn’t look like we’re going to get our
second date in Istanbul, does it?” she said.

“We could lay over tomorrow.”

“No, Sara wants to go home. We should respect
her wishes.”

“I guess you’re right. I
know
you’re right.”

The water stopped and she opened the shower
door a few inches and stuck out her hand.

“Give me a towel, please; and go back to the
other room so I can get dressed.”

“I could dry your back.”

“Go!”

Hatch left the bathroom and stood where he
could watch her when she crossed to get her gown. She stuck her
hand around the corner.

“Aren’t you the sneaky one!” she giggled,
closing the door.

Before Hatch could recover, the door opened
and she entered the room in her flimsy nightgown. Her breasts stood
out like head lights on a Stutz Bear Cat, her nipples and areolas
clearly visible.

“You like?” she said.

“I like! Syd, that gown is nearly
transparent!”

“Nearly
is the
operative word,” she said, taking her glass to the table for a
refill.

Hatch went over and took the glass from
her.

“Let me get that for you, Syd. Sit.”

She sat down on the couch and crossed her
legs. The nightgown barely covered her hips: her legs were exposed
all the way up. Hatch fixed her drink and put it on the table in
front of her, then took a slug of his own.

She is too gorgeous for words! What is she
up to? She must be playing games with me—testing me somehow? What
am I supposed to do?

“Are you playing games with me, Syd?” he
asked finally.

“Games? Me?” she said, batting her eyelashes
and arching her back to accentuate her breasts. Then she slumped
forward and put her head in her hands for a moment.

She raised her head, looked at Hatch and
said, “I don’t know, Hatch! Last night I thought I knew where we
were headed: some romantic dates, get to know each other. Now,
things are different!”

“Different? How?” he asked, sitting next to
her, looking at her long, long naked legs.

“Number one, the mission. You’re suffering
from Post Mission Distress Disorder. All men get it after tough,
touch-and-go action. All that adrenalin rush is like a shot of
Viagra! I’ve seen it many times. All the guys head for their wives,
girl friends—or hookers. I can see it in your eyes, your body
actions. You want to get laid, Hatch!” she said seriously.

“Syd, how does that make things different?”
he laughed. “I wanted you last night, too, after you put my hand on
your breast.”

“I know!
But I
thought we had a plan to escape the one-night-stand and ‘see ya
later’ thing.”

“We did. We do. So what’s the problem?”

“Me!
I suffer
from the same disorder, just like you do. It’s not only a man
thing. I want sex as badly as you do right now,” she groaned. “But
I don’t want our first time to be because of a freaking
mission
!”