Dead of Night

Before this story begins, secret agent Jason Whittaker has been kidnapped and rescued, and he, his father Whit, and Connie Kendall are hiding out with NSA agent Jillian Marshall inside the Channel 10 television station. Jason knows the launch codes for a top-secret fleet of Navy submarines, and the team has just made an alarming discovery: a mysterious phone number tied to the enemy code name Cobra Orange belongs to Sky Feldstein, the station manager of the very building where they are hiding.

In the dark hours before dawn, Detective Polehaus shows up at Sky's door and finds her packing her little electric car for a sudden trip to Chicago, where she says her sick mother needs her. Polehaus politely carries her suitcase, asks a few questions about a photo she claims not to recognize, and watches her hurry away with her car battery nearly empty. Only later does he groan to his partner Burke that he practically helped a criminal escape, and he sets out to track her down by figuring out where she would have to stop and recharge.

Meanwhile, the team digs into Sky's records and finds a transfer of one million dollars into her account from an untraceable offshore source. Connie remembers that Sky recently borrowed the notepad at Whit's End to write something down during a phone call, and she volunteers to retrieve it, insisting, "You guys can't have all the fun." While she is gone, Jillian receives a chilling alert: a missile has launched, without orders, from a submarine called the Fair Play. Jason startles everyone by guessing which sub it was before Jillian can say - he has had the strange feeling that something was wrong with that very vessel. Mercifully, the missile struck an empty military complex and no one was hurt, but someone clearly has the secret codes, and it could happen again.

Connie returns triumphant. Using a trick from her Nancy Drew mystery class, she has shaded the notepad with a pencil to reveal the imprint of Sky's writing: Fair Play, Oraton - another submarine in the fleet - Helsinki, and a puzzling code, OMH 014. As the group marvels at Jason's uncanny hunch, the conversation turns to how God nudges people, and Jillian surprises everyone by sharing that she grew up as a missionary kid in Zimbabwe and considers her NSA work a calling to fight evil with God's love.

But suspicion is closing in on Jason himself. Privately, Jillian asks Whit whether his son could possibly be working for the enemy. Whit refuses to believe it, insisting, "A person's character is built one block at a time," and that Jason has proven his over a lifetime - yet he admits that in Jillian's position, he would have to suspect an agent in Jason's situation too. Soon afterward, Jillian receives orders she dreads carrying out: Jason's fingerprints have been found on a computer in a restricted room at the Pentagon, a place he swears he has never been. With genuine sorrow, she handcuffs him and places him under arrest for treason.

Just then, Whit's friend Dr. Lily Graham calls back with information about a research foundation from her past. Years ago, she worked on a secret government project developing a tiny computer chip that could be injected into a person's brain - a device able to read thoughts, stir up memories, and even control impulses, all without the person ever feeling it. The only telltale sign would be a lingering headache. The pieces snap horribly into place. Jason was unconscious after his kidnapping, and he has had a headache ever since. Whit remembers hearing Jason recite numbers and letters in his sleep - and Jason, stunned, recognizes them as the beginning of the launch code for the Oraton. His mysterious feelings about the submarines were never warnings from his gut at all; the enemy has been pulling those thoughts to the surface of his mind. The story ends on Jason's horrified realization: "I'm the leak. They're reading my brain."