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cameras in the new Sheraton Hotel in Madrid," he said. "The man was Richard Aubrey Barnette, age thirty, whose Internet company License-to-Steal.com earned him fourteen million dollars last month. He fell twenty-eight stories onto a cab, killing the driver and causing a traffic accident that killed three others and injured five."
    Michaels said, "I see. And this is related to the casino owner who trashed his competitor's place of business before being killed by local police?"
    "Yes."
    "And to the woman who attacked a gang of construction workers who whistled at her and put seven of them into intensive care?"
    "Yes," Lee said. "And to others of a similar nature."
    Michaels looked at his boss, then at Lee. "And I take it that, since you are DEA, you think drugs were somehow involved?"
    Lee frowned, not sure if Michaels was pulling his chain or not. Which, Michaels had to admit to himself, he was, a little. Lee seemed awfully stiff.
    Lee said, "Yes, we are certain of that."
    Michaels nodded. "Please don't take offense, Mr. Lee, but this concerns Net Force how?"
    Lee looked at Allison for support and got it. She said, "My counterpart at DEA has asked for our assistance. Naturally, the FBI and any of its subsidiaries are happy to help in any way we can."
    "Naturally," Michaels said, knowing full well that interagency cooperation was more often like competing football teams than the least bit collective. Rivalries among the dozen or so agencies that comprised the intelligence community in the U.S.--everybody from CIA to FBI to NSA to DIA to NRO--were old, established, and more often than not, nobody gave up anything without some quid pro quo. Yes, they were all technically on the same team, but practically speaking, an agency was happy to shine its own star any way it could, and if that included using another agency's shirt to do it, well, that's how the game was played. Michaels had discovered this early in his career, long before he left the field to take over Net Force. And DEA wasn't a major player anyhow, given its somewhat limited mission.
    Michaels said, "So how is it that Net Force can do something here DEA can't?"
    Lee, a short man with a fierce look, flushed. Michaels could almost see him bite his tongue to keep from saying what he really wanted to say, which was undoubtedly rude. Instead, Lee said, "How much do you know about the drug laws, Commander Michaels?"
    "Not much," he admitted.
    "All right, let me give you a quick and rough overview. Federal drug regulation in the United States comes under the authority of the Controlled Substances Act--that's CSA--Title II, of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, with various amendments since. Legal--and illegal--drugs are put on one of five schedules, depending on what uses have been established for them and on how much potential for abuse they have. Schedule I is reserved for dangerous drugs without medical applications that have a high potential for abuse, Schedule V is for stuff with low abuse potential."
    "We're talking about the difference between, say, heroin and aspirin?" Michaels said.
    "Precisely. The CSA gets pretty specific about these things."
    "Go ahead, I'm still with you."
    "In the last few years, there has been a resurgence in so-called designer drugs, that is to say, those that don't slot neatly into the traditional categories. Variations and combinations of things like MDA and Ecstasy and certain new anabolic steroids, like that. The government realized that certain individuals were trying to circumvent the intent of the law by adding a molecule here or subtracting one there to make a drug that wasn't technically illegal, so there is a provision for analog drugs not addressed by the code.
    "So, basically, any salt, compound, derivative, optical or geometric isomers, salts of isomers, whatever, based on a drug that is regulated become automatically de facto regulated the moment it is created."
    Michaels nodded again, wondering where