“Time to wipe the skies clean, Major Duranda.” he said in a quiet voice, resignedly, “Time to wipe them clean. Now I need you to get hold of the Allied Forces Command in Afghanistan and tell them about the explosions. They seem to be heading across the border so it is their problem now. Oh, and Major, I do not see any need to tell them about our encounter with Pelishar Four at this time. That should be resolved soon enough.”

He turned back to the big screen and braced his hands behind his back. Major Duranda nodded briefly and then spun on his heels and headed out of the room. The general would leave the Americans and Europeans to handle this latest phenomenon. His people had too many wounds to tend to.

* * *

As the remaining fighters disengaged and turned away, Shahim breathed a proverbial sigh of relief. He had no desire to fight any more of these men, any more than they had a desire to die at his hands, no doubt.

The burly warrior settled his fighter’s course to bring him on an intercept path with where he assumed Martin and Jack were flying. On cue with his internal time clock, he saw the B-2’s sixth cruise missile appear on his radar screen with a rapidly vanishing blip. Martin and Jack were clearly not leaving their bomb bays open for long in order to minimize their exposure to detection. But it was long enough to confirm his assessment of their location and he refined his course accordingly.

They saw him coming in and started to fret. It had been a confusing fifteen minutes as the squadron ducked and died on their radar screens, four of its planes seeming to fight with themselves in a spasm of movement that left only one of the four standing. When the two that had stood safely apart from the battle had broken off pursuit, that had been equally confusing. But that still left that sole survivor, and he was now closing in on Jack and Martin. Not on the next pod, and not on the missile they had just launched to destroy it, but on their supposedly invisible plane.

Their radio, silent for so many hours, suddenly spat out a voice, making them both jump.

“Jack, Martin, can you hear me?” said the disembodied voice and they stared at each other, shock turning to curiosity at the voice suddenly coming over their comm.

“That is a tight band,” said Jack to Martin, before opening the comms channel to respond, “that means it is close range. No more than a few miles.” He looked at his radar and realization dawned on him with a smile of overwhelming relief, as he clicked on his own mike and spoke in return, “Good morning, my friend. Agent Shahim, I assume?”