Quick Silver - Hardcover

CHAPTER ONE

UNITED STATES NAVAL ACADEMY/ANNAPOLIS, MARYLAND

They had stolen her underwear.

Again.

Amy "Nuke" Bethune cursed like the sailor she hoped one day to become as she charged down the empty corridor on the third floor of Wing Three of Bancroft Hall, the hem of her tightly clutched b-robe flying behind her. Three years at the United States Naval Academy and everything she had done to earn her place as an equal among her classmates had come to nothing. She was still treated this way.

Not by the men. But by the other women.

Amy skidded to a stop on the slickly polished linoleum outside Midshipman Annika Marsh's dorm room. Marsh's name and graduating year were cut into the white plastic ID plate on the door, the color to alert other mids that this was a room for females. Male mids had their names cut into black plates.

Amy had targeted this room for two reasons, the most important being that Marsh was about her size. She knew that some might think she was about to take a strong initiative that would violate the Academy's honor concept, the solemn vow to never lie, cheat, or steal. But it was the only way she could complete her duty for today. Besides, the honor concept also stated that midshipmen were to ensure that others were able to benefit from the use of their own property. So it's not stealing, Amy told herself, it's emergency borrowing. The distinction made what she had to do a bit easier to justify. But not by much.

Amy pushed hard against the metal doorplate and the oversized, heavy door swung open as she knew it would. The level of trust among the Academy's 4,000-strong brigade of midshipmen meant that virtually none of the dorm-room doors was ever locked, except during long absences over holiday and vacation breaks. Considering that Marsh was more than likely one of the masterminds behind the disappearing underwear, though, Amy was surprised that her classmate seemed unprepared for retaliation.

Marsh's dorm room was the size of a small and spartan studio apartment, identical to Amy's and typical of the Hall. There were two narrow bunk beds, one to either side, with a built-in desk beneath each, and two closets along the wall. In one corner was a shower and sink -- an absolute timesaving necessity when 4,000 midshipmen had to follow identical schedules.

But Amy took no time to study the room. She headed straight for the cupboard unit built in against the end of Marsh's bunk, trying not to think what might happen to 12th Company's status if she were caught in the act.

Twelfth Company was Amy's cadre of 124 fellow mids from plebes to Firsties, one of the 36 companies making up the Academy's brigade of midshipmen. It was also the Academy's current Color Company, an honor it had earned for the past three years. Amy considered it no coincidence that 12th Company's ascendancy had begun when she had joined it. Points in an Academy-wide competition were awarded for academic, athletic, and professional excellence. Her performance in the classroom and on the diving team had added significantly to 12th Company's point score. This past year, she and her cadre had accumulated 320.6 out of a possible 360. Her accomplishments had also, obviously, raised her profile among the company to the point where her textbooks had begun disappearing, her e-mail account was regularly acquiring new passwords, and -- as had happened this morning -- her alarm clock could no longer be trusted.

For all that the Academy made a point of searching out young men and women who would excel in the Navy and Marine Corps, Amy was painfully learning that it also hewed to a military culture which valued team solidarity over individual achievement. Somewhere, unofficially, there existed an invisible boundary between excellence and independence. Marsh, among others, apparently thought Amy Bethune had crossed it.

But as Amy quickly searched through the stack of drawers in Marsh's cupboard, trying to find the midshipman's underwear, she rebelliously thought again that it was not her obligation to hold herself back in her quest for the controversial career goal that had earned her her nickname. Rather, it was her classmates' obligation to raise themselves to her standards.

Some might call -- and had called -- her attitude arrogant. To which Amy always replied, Welcome to the real world. If people didn't like her being the best at what she set out to do, then it was their mission to try to do even better. If they weren't prepared for that challenge, they'd soon find out that their only other choice was to get out of her way.

She hit pay dirt in the third drawer down. A sports bra and briefs, both, fortunately, still folded from the laundry. She quickly rifled through the remaining stack to see if she had the luxury of a choice in what she appropriated, but the only other option, crammed out of sight at the bottom of the stack, was a flaming-pink combo: transparent above and little more than a G-string below. Definitely not regulation.

As a calling card, Amy draped Marsh's racy weekend underwear over the green shade of the lamp beside the desktop computer, confident that even such flagrant disorder would be unlikely to cost Marsh a demerit. Commissioning week, when the latest class had graduated and all other classes moved up one year, had come and gone three weeks ago, putting the Academy into summer-leave and summer-training mode. That meant the Yard was noticeably less populated, especially on weekends, when not even the high-school students brought in for one of three introductory summer seminars were present. Room inspections, a frequent fact of life during the other semesters, especially for plebes, were almost nonexistent.

In fact, there were no plebes at the Academy right now. Most mids who had completed their plebe year, and were now officially Youngsters, were off patrolling New England ports on the Academy's unarmed Yard Patrol craft, training on the Academy's forty-four-foot sailing sloops, or taking part in joint maneuvers that simulated SEAL and Marines Corps exercises. The second-class students, those entering their third year, were getting firsthand introductions to naval aviation at Pensacola or to submarine operations off Florida, or fighting war games with Marines in the wilds of Virginia. And most new Firsties, like Amy -- those midshipmen who had been raised to their fourth and final year -- were serving as junior officers in operational fleet squadrons around the world. Except for the volunteers from 12th Company.

As the Academy's Color Company, they had earned special privileges and duties for the academic year, including the honor of representing the Academy at official government functions. And few events in recent memory were as official or as historic as today's at the Pentagon. Which was why forty-two second-, third-, and fourth-year midshipmen had responded to Commandant Rigby's invitation to give up part of their precious three-week summer leave to volunteer for a special honor detail: attending the President's NATO ceremony.

Every mid knew that even if they were to do little more than seat dignitaries and help set tables, their participation in what was surely to become one of the defining moments of the new century would forever mark their service records apart from others. To say nothing of the opportunity to clock face-time with the top brass.

But it was equally clear that there were those in the company, besides Marsh, who didn't want Amy to be able to share in that distinction and opportunity. Unfortunately for them, they obviously hadn't yet learned that Nuke Bethune was impossible to stop. She'd make it the way she always did -- on her own. Determinedly clutching the borrowed underwear, Amy flew out of Marsh's room, bare feet slapping the floor.

Back in her own room, she slammed the door behind her and checked