An Air Force contingent did enter the airplane and check passports, though. An hour later they were climbing out of Lajes and heading for Gibraltar and the Mediterranean beyond. Once they were at altitude again, Stone went back to the trailer and lay down on a bunk. Shortly, he was asleep. He woke in time to get a look at Gibraltar, far below, then he had a dinner prepared by a caterer before they left Stewart, along with a glass of wine. Then he went to sleep again.

He didn’t wake up until Mike shook him.

“We’re landing in fifteen minutes,” he said.

Stone got up, washed his face and brushed his teeth, then went forward to a jump seat. The sun was up, and the airplane was descending at a much steeper angle than when they had landed in the Azores.

Mike spoke up. “We’re making a steep descent into Baghdad International, in order to give insurgents less chance of hitting us with missiles.”

“Missiles?” Stone asked. “Nobody mentioned missiles.”

“It’s less likely than it would have been a year ago, but we have to treat the place as a war zone. We won’t get off the airplane here, but I think you’ll find it interesting to watch what happens. There are two runways here, one of ten thousand feet and one of thirteen thousand. The airport is about ten miles west of the city.”

Stone couldn’t believe how steep the approach was. He tried to find the rate of descent on the instrument panel, but he was too far away to read it. He reckoned that they were falling out of the sky at the rate of at least eight or ten thousand feet a minute, with everything hanging out—landing gear, flaps, speedbrakes, spoilers, if the airplane had them. He had never seen a view of an airport out the pilot’s window like the one he could see now.

The airplane touched down, and immediately Stone was thrown against his seat belt as the engines were reversed. Shortly, they were off the runway, and Stone could see a fuel truck ahead of them, waiting. The airplane taxied up to the truck and cut its engines, as the tail ramp came down. Stone got out of his seat and followed Mike into the huge cargo bay. Immediately, forklifts began bringing in pallets of matériel. As soon as they were set down, the forklifts went back for more, and airmen secured each pallet with netting, cables, and rope. It was all incredibly efficient, and by the time the tail ramp had closed, the fuel truck was gone and the engines were starting. Stone noticed that the central area of the cargo bay, behind the Airstream, was empty. He followed Mike back to the jump seats.

“Where are we stopping for the extraction on the way back?” Stone asked Freeman.

“I don’t know,” Mike said. “Todd Bacon will tell us when we’re airborne.”