"Sir, the only nukes we have in our inventory are in storage," Borstein said. His voice was admirably mechanical, the other uniformed people thought. "I propose that we next initiate a conference call with CINC-SAC."

"Do it," Fowler ordered. It happened instantly.

"Mr President, this is CINC-SAC," General Peter Fremont, USAF announced. His voice was all business.

"What the hell is going on?"

"Sir, we do not know that, but there are some things we should do immediately."

"Go on."

"Sir, I recommend that we immediately place all of our strategic forces on a higher alert level. I recommend DEFCON-TWO. If we are dealing with a nuclear attack, we should posture our forces to maximum readiness. That will enable us to respond to an attack with the greatest possible effect. It could also have the effect of deterring whoever got this thing underway, in the event that he might have - or we could give him - second thoughts."

"If I can add to that, sir, we should also increase our readiness across the board. If for no other reason, the availability of military units to provide assistance and to reduce possible civilian panic might be very useful. I recommend DEFCON-THREE for conventional forces."

"Better to do that selectively, Robert," Liz Elliot said.

"I heard that - who is it?" Borstein asked.

"This is the National Security Advisor," Liz said, a touch too loudly. She was as pale as her white silk blouse. Fowler was still under control. Elliot was struggling to do the same.

"We have not met, Dr Elliot. Unfortunately, our command-and-control systems do not allow us to do that selectively - at least not very fast. By sending out the alert now, however, we can activate all the units we need, then select the units we need to do things while they come on line. That will save us at least an hour. That is my recommendation."

"I concur in that," General Fremont added at once.

"Very well, do it," Fowler said. It sounded reasonable enough.

The communications were handled through separate channels. CINC-SAC handled the strategic forces. The first Emergency Action Message used the same robotic voice that had already scrambled the alerted SAC wings. While the SAC bomber bases already knew that they were being alerted, the DEFCON-TWO notice made it official and far more ominous. Fiber-optic land-lines carried a similar notice to the Navy's Extremely Low Frequency radio system located in Michigan's Upper Peninsula region. This signal had to be sent out by mechanical Morse. The nature of this radio system was such that it could only send out its characters very slowly, rather like the speed of a novice typist, and it acted as a cueing system, telling submarines to come to the surface for a more detailed message to be delivered by satellite radios.