Bomber went out into the garden and sat down on a bench looking out over Pia's copter. He sat for a long time, drinking in the details as if looking into the casket of a forgotten lover. She'd kept it pristine. It wasn't the stripped-apart, half-forgotten wreck he'd found in the care of the Hong Kong Federal Police. This was an armed and fully operational war machine. Some of the Federation's best labs were still at work trying to duplicate bits of technology from F Squadron's experiments. How Pia had managed to hide one for so long was anybody's guess.
     Too many unwanted memories were spinning around in his skull. Squadron test flights. Hours and hours of simulations, maintenance, tweaking. Nights full of drinks and laughter, clashes and reconciliations, smiles on familiar faces. A whole life to have lost. Bomber tended to dwell on things, when he thought about them at all, and he could no longer seem to repress the old days like he used to.
     And now Pia was dead. One more empty void in his heart. It felt like his past was unravelling somehow, like magnetic tape slowly winding off its spool.
     "Toledo's on his way," Hawthorn announced from the patio door. "He thinks he can help us get the copter ready to go."
     "By this point I'm willin' to believe anything Toledo tells me."
     A few hesitant steps took Hawthorn to the bench, where he leaned back and stared emptily at the sky. "It wasn't supposed to end like this."
     "No, but this is the ending we got. Whatever happens between now and tomorrow night, I'm still gonna climb into that cockpit and take Gabriel out of this sky. We don't get to direct our own finale."
     "Whatever happens, huh?"
     "That's right." Shutting his eyes against the dull ache at his core, Bomber added, "You got my wing, Hawk?"
     "I got your wing, Jake." He sent a furtive sideways glance at Bomber. "And I don't trust the Colonel."
     Bomber smiled mechanically and placed a finger against his lips. There was no room for that kind of talk here. No way to know who might be listening.
     A dark shadow fell over them as a small blimp came between them and the patch of clouds that hid the sun. It descended in a businesslike manner towards Pia Gonzalez's villa. Bomber recognised the logo on the side as a haulage company, and several spindly robots abseiled down to check out the helicopter for lifting. It wouldn't be flying under its own steam just yet.
     Two dozen spidery plastic tendrils took their laser measurements while Bomber and Hawthorn watched. Then they clamped themselves to the tarpaulin-covered bulk at just the right spots, hoisted their hooks upwards, and snagged the lines dangling from the blimp. Slowly, carefully, Pia's copter took to the sky for the first time in years.
     "I wonder where that's going," said Hawthorn.
     "We'll find out. In a minute or two he'll ask me to pilot it, and I'll say yes. Then you, me and Toledo are gonna make things happen."
     "God, you're depressing to hang around, Jake."
     Bomber shrugged and stood up to stretch the kinks from his aching legs. Popping, cracking noises emanated from his bones as he worked them. They were probably never going to be quite the same, but they'd do. It was really his own fault for jumping out of an airship. Why on Earth did he do that? The more he thought about it, the stupider it seemed. Even a parachute would've helped.
     He gave a slight smile when Colonel Obrin appeared in the doorway, brusquely shoving a sheet of electronic paper into Bomber's hand. "We've got a nano warning, boys. Somebody's dusted the area. We should move."
     "Where to, Sir?" Hawthorn asked, fulfilling his part in the routine.
     "You'll understand when you get there." His moustache bristled as he looked Bomber in the eye. "That is, if Jacob is willing to rise to the call one more time to top off a distinguished flying career."
     I'm a soldier, thought Bomber as he agreed to fly his last mission. And this is war.