Inside the craft, Harper and his crew experienced none of the usual shaking, rocking and swaying of conventional speedboats. In fact, they hardly sensed any motion at all. If they felt they were riding on air, it was because they were. Propellers at the front of the Ghost’s nacelles were generating a churning cushion of air bubbles underneath it, stabilizing the hull and eliminating friction with the water.

Kono Head was about twenty-five miles up the coast from Pier 1. Shortly before four o’clock in the morning, fifteen minutes after Harper had climbed aboard the Ghost and launched, it came flying toward Kono doing a swift, almost soundless fifty-five knots, racing along atop its churning bed of foam.

Inland to the northwest, meanwhile, Carmody’s team had arrived at the landing station’s rear flank. They were also on the hurried move.

“Annemarie,” Morse said into her phone.

“Carol,” Fucillo said into hers. She glanced at her clock on the Resolute desk. Nine-thirty in the morning, they had spoken just hours ago. And Carol’s voice carried the weight of an iron anvil. This couldn’t be good news. “What’s going on?”

“We have an urgent situation in Hawaii,” Morse said, and explained.

The two-lane ran full circle around the base of the Kono Head tuff cone, eventually linking up to wider and busier traffic arteries to the north and west. The two JLTVs sped over Honolulu Harbor on the H-1 and made a couple of turns to get on the loop, dropping Carmody’s team off on the west side of the crater, right on the slope above and behind the cable landing station. The Coast Guard drivers immediately U-turned and pulled into a scenic lookout about an eighth of a mile back to wait.

Carmody was with Dixon, Schultz and Musil. He knew it would be four of them on the ground against Malkira’s unknown number of bastards. But he’d led the two Fox Team members for years and trusted them with his life. Plus, Musil was no slouch. By reputation, and from what Carmody had seen of him. In his view, Malkira could have five times as many men and still be at a disadvantage.

At the southern shoulder of the road, Carmody paused and looked straight down into the parking lot through his goggles. He saw three men out back, spread out across the building’s rear wall in the darkness. Another two on the east side of the facility. They were wearing camos and night goggles and full face masks. He assumed there were more on the east side, but it was partly blocked from his viewpoint. He would worry about the ones inside later.

“Outlier?” he said over the RoIP. “You with me?”

“Yes.” Kali’s voice in his ear.

“All right,” he said. “Cut the juice.”