"We have people at Andersen on Guam, co-located with your base. The port, too, maybe a thousand people total. It's a lot smaller than it used to be." Jackson lifted his secure phone and punched in the numbers for CINC-PAC.

"Admiral Seaton? This is Jackson again. Anything else?"

"We can't raise anybody west of Midway, Rob. It's starting to look real."

"How does this thing work?" Oreza asked.

"I hate to say this, but I'm not sure. I didn't bother reading the manual," Burroughs admitted. The sat-phone was sitting on the coffee table, its antenna extended through the drill hole in the bottom of the mixing bowl, which was in turn sitting atop two piles of books. "I'm not sure if it broadcasts its position to the satellites periodically or not." For which reason they felt it necessary to maintain the comical arrangement.

"You turn mine off by putting the antenna back down," Isabel Oreza observed, causing two male heads to turn. "Or you can just take the batteries out, right?"

"Damn." Burroughs managed to say it first, but not by much. He lifted the bowl off, put the little antenna back in its hole, then flipped off the battery cover and withdrew the two AAs. The phone was now completely off. "Ma'am, if you want to get into the master's program at Sanford, use me as a reference, okay?"

"Ladies and gentlemen." Heads turned in the living room to see a smiling man in green fatigues. His English was letter-perfect. "I am General Tokikichi Arima of the Japanese Ground Self-Defense Forces. Please allow me to explain what has happened today.

"First of all, let me assure you that there is no cause for alarm. There was an unfortunate shooting at the police substation adjacent to your parliament building, but the two police officers who were hurt in the exchange are both doing well in your local hospital. If you have heard rumors of violence or death, those rumors are not true," the General assured the twenty-nine thousand citizens of Saipan.

"You probably want to know what has happened," he went on. "Early today, forces under my command began arriving on Saipan and Guam. As you know from your history, and indeed as some of the older citizens on this island well remember, until 1944 the Mariana Islands were possessions of Japan. It may surprise some of you to know that since the court decision several years ago allowing Japanese citizens to purchase real estate in the islands, the majority of the land on Saipan and Guam is owned by my countrymen. You also know of our love and affection for these islands and the people who live here. We have invested billions of dollars here and created a renaissance in the local economy after years of shameful neglect by the American government. Therefore, we're not really strangers at all, are we?