“I think the next one is your replacement,” Col. Michelini told Onja, nodding toward another flashing beacon that approached from thirty miles out. Onja looked.

“What’s his name?”

Michelini didn’t answer; at that moment the speakers bellowed with SpectraWav talk.

“Timberwolf, Bush Control. Your approach is a bit unsteady. Are you on manual?”

“That’s affirm!” replied the approaching pilot’s youthful voice.

“Negat, Timberwolf. Go to autopilot, please.” The controller’s voice was cool and professional. Onja never ceased to admire the iciness of the men and women who kept the fighters untangled even in the heat of battle.

“With respect, sir—” the young pilot started to reply.

The controller bit him off instantly.

“Negat! You will use autopilot or you will abort your approach. That is an order, Lieutenant.”

“Roger, Bush Control. Autopilot engaged.” Onja heard resignation in the young voice, and shook her head.

“He sounds like a teenager, for god’s sake!” she told Michelini. “Why do I get all the kids?”

Michelini grunted. “Maybe Command figures they need mothering.”

Onja flashed her blue eyes at him, but bit back the “fuck you” she would have tossed to an equal or lesser rank.

“Anyway,” he added, “there aren’t that many these days.”

“If it were up to me, there wouldn’t be any. Nobody under twenty-five should be allowed inside a cockpit.”

She glanced back in time to see the rookie pilot hit the deck in a shriek of rockets and straining metal. In spite of the shaky approach, the PulsarFighter didn’t rock nose-down as most fighters did, the tail hardly rising at all, and was off the flight deck in thirteen seconds flat, riding the lift down to the hangar deck.

“At least he knows how to land,” she noted. Michelini grinned and nodded toward the exit.

“Go on down and meet him. From now on he’s yours, body and soul.”

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