This chapter's epigraph comes from a line from the novel's first chapter, which begins, "I have my orders, clack. as did you. Such loyalty. . ." This is a reference to the fact that the protagonist's father was a member of the elite task force that defeated the enemy in the Battle of Looe. The chapter ends with a quote from a famous line from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, in which the protagonist says, "What I want, commander, is one chance. I want to destroy his with my own air force. We learn that the air force has been working with the army on a new generation of fighter aircraft.