Hobarth's Truckstart and Trading Post, Missouri, February, the fifty-third year of the Kurian Order: The days of long-haul trucking are all but over.

Nevertheless a few overland "runs" still exist. The Atlanta-Chattanooga -Nashville artery still trickles, as does the old interstate between Baltimore and Boston. The Vegas-Phoenix-Los Angeles triangle is the scene of the yearly "Diamondbacks Run", where supercharged muscle cars roar from the coast to Vegas, where the crews switch to off-road vehicles for a trip to Phoenix, then make a final leg in tractor-trailers running loads back to Los Angeles, something of an indulgence for certain wealthy or engine-obsessed Quislings.

Dashboard cameras record the experience, and sometimes the final words of the drivers.

But the longest of the "hauls" still in existence is that from Chicago to Los Angeles, much of which runs along the old lines of fabled Route 66, even if the end point at the Sunset Strip meets the ocean rather more abruptly than it did a century ago.

The veterans of the "Devil's Dietary Tract", as the route is known, make fortunes hauling art, rare firearms, expensive clothing, and particularly electronics from point to point, liquor and consumables flowing west, finished products imported from the rest of the Pacific Rim back east. The Kurian Order shrugs at such baubles for their human herds, or perhaps believes that physical and mental energy expended acquiring a Picasso, a pristine set of golf clubs, or a vintage Remington 700 is activity that isn't being spent resisting the regime. Blacky marketers are given a wrist slap in

most instances. The security services of the great rail companies make sure nothing that can't be hidden in a purse or backpack moves cross-country on the rails - at least without a substantial bribe. That leaves internal combustion engine or pack animal for the traders and smugglers who want to move larger loads.

Some say that the "independents" - as the nonrail transportation companies are known - are riddled with Kurian informers. Any firm that helps the burgeoning resistance is quickly seized, its durable goods auctioned and personnel packed off to the Reapers.

Trucks need fuel, tires, and spare parts to run, and of course the crews need food and rest. So on the fringes of the Kurian Order, or within Grog-held territory, there are "starts", where men and machines can be reconditioned for the next leg of the run.

Hobarth's is a typical example of a fortress truckstart, encircled by wire and then an inner wall of broken tires wired together and filled with dirt, a tiny human settlement deep within the Grog territory of mid-Missouri. There's a substantial warehouse devoted to trade with the Grogs, cavernous aluminum barns for the repair of vehicles and the storage of spares. Behind it rusts a junkyard covering a dozen-odd acres guarded by rifles and half-savage dogs. The penalty for unauthorized scavenging is a bullet.

But for the tired, broken-down, and road-weary there's safety within. Even for those without the price of a cup of coffee, the Hobarth staff will feed, wash, and accommodate the most destitute - "three days of a month, three months of a year". "Christian duty", the staff calls it.

Others are welcome to buy, sell, or trade at Hobarth's store or the stalls of mechanics and craftsmen. There's even a small jeweler under the old three-orb sign, who also acts as a currency exchange, able to deal in most of the Kurian scrips of the Midwest. The local Grogs have become adept at extracting and reconditioning everything from wheel rims to timing belts and sparkplugs, bringing them in to trade for bullets or sealable plastic storage containers, which the Grogs prize for a well-appointed, bug-free hut.

Three high-clearance flatbed tow trucks, armored and armed with machine guns, compose the toughest salvage team an overnight drive in

any direction. Two of the team, the front one prowed in such a way that it resembles a vehicular battering ram, fling gravel as they turn in to the main gate, bringing in a rusted cab-over. Once inside the compound and behind the main building, long and flat as Dakota prairie, the crews elbow one another and point at a smallish legworm contentedly pulling up leafless kudzu near the tire wall. A steel-framed ergonomic office chair, complete with ottoman, folding umbrella, and movable windscreen, sits stapled and chained to its spongy, segmented back.

"Argent's in", the green-hatted driver of the battering-ram wrecker announces, opening a tow truck door with driver carries no cash, lots of lead stenciled on the side.

* * *

David Valentine, reading a book as he drank his coffee in the four-table "cafe", recognized Tim Hobarth's step behind - the tow truck driver wore steel-heeled boots, which rapped distinctively on the boarding.

"What's the crawl, Max?" Hobarth asked.

Valentine, who'd left his name in the shambles of a wrecked career in the United Free Republic, drew his cup and book a little closer, making room for the big driver. He'd just as soon continue reading his book with the brew, though the bitter melange that the Kurians labeled coffee insulted the palate of someone who'd had the real stuff in Jamaica.

"Omaha's getting set for a fight", Valentine said. To the families who worked Hobarth's, he was just a wandering Grog trader blessed with unusual luck in avoiding the Reapers. Valentine had stopped and visited the Golden Ones, in the fading hope that his old friend Ahn-Kha had wandered home with an epic story of escapades from the Kentucky foothills to Nebraska's far horizons.

"Kur needs those rail lines out of Omaha badly, now that so much south of Missouri is cut and Tulsa's been burned to the ground. The Golden Ones are great fighters, but if they put some big guns into Council Bluffs..".

"Poor dumb Grogs", Hobarth said. The sympathy in his voice belied his words.

Valentine liked Hobarth. He possessed some feeling for the creatures Kur had brought from other worlds to help subjugate humanity. Some of the tribes found themselves in wrecked and poisoned lands after the fighting was over, and a few, like the Golden Ones, had turned against the Kurians.

"The Golden Ones are a long way from dumb", Valentine said. "And they know engineering. They've got a network of tunnels under Omaha you wouldn't believe if you didn't see it, and they've rigged a few likely buildings to collapse. I wouldn't want to be part of the Omaha garrison, assuming the Iowa Guard takes it. They're recruiting out of the scrub-country clans again, looking for tribal support. Doubt they'll get it".

"How's business otherwise?" Hobarth asked.

"Lean. Omaha just wants optics and precision tools". It had been so long since he'd talked to another man that Valentine felt his mouth running on of its own accord. "Those are tough to come by, especially when they don't offer much in return. Leatherwork I can sometimes sell, but pottery? Oh, that reminds me. I might have a connection in Springfield for you for tires. That Grog molasses tobacco is getting popular in Chicago".

"Wonderful. Hey, I talked to Gramps again about you. He's upped the offer to a full family share if you join up".

"I told you before: I'm a crap driver".

"You'll learn, Argent. We could use you and that freaky hair of yours". Valentine had once explained that a nearby Reaper had caused his hair to stand on end. "The spring run to the coast is gearing up. See the world, you know?"

"Tourism through scratched-up goggles at the trigger ring? Not my way to see the country".

"Oh, I'm not talking hired-gun stuff. Scout salvage. You have a knack for getting in and out of places none of our clan come within a Reaper's run of".

Hobarth's was a great place to take respite, but Valentine wondered about settling down there. If he joined up, the next thing they'd expect was for him to marry - and there were a couple of widows near his age attached to the truckstart. Lora, who worked in the garage, never failed to do her hair and put on her best when he visited. Problem was, her conversation was limited to engine blocks, fuel injection, and ethanol when she wasn't parroting the New Universal Church propaganda she'd learned as a child.

"I'll think about it. Promise", Valentine said.

Hobarth was canny. He knew "Max Argent" well enough to know that if he wanted something, he jumped at a chance, whether it was a night on clean sheets or a volume in the little library that existed in the Hobarth attic.

"Reading again? Confed..". Hobarth knew parts manuals and truck manufacturers, but preferred the pool table and old pinball machines of the family rec room when it came time to unwind.

"Confederacy of Dunces", Valentine supplied.

"Sounds like the ministers in Kansas City. I hear there's cholera. Both sides of the river".

Kansas was bleeding again, and much on the mind of the whole Hobarth clan. She had broken into warring factions, supported by the UFR in the east and the powerful Kurians of the Southwest on the other side of the Arkansas River. "Route 666" had become tougher than ever.

Valentine contemplated his tea. "One of them will get bled. The Kurians don't like people dying without orders and proper processing".

Hobarth stiffened a little. It didn't do to say such things, even deep in the relatively neutral Grog lands.

Valentine changed the subject. "I'm about done with this. Can I get up in the book attic? I want to look up an item or two".

"Look something up? It's not an archive. It's a paper junk heap. Most of the stuffs falling apart".

"I saw a book there last trip. I just want to read up on it a little more".

"Wonderful. Do us a favor and clean up a few cobwebs while you're up there, okay?"

"Gladly".

"You accommodated?"

"Yes. Don't worry, the Dragon Lady's charging contractor rates. I had some Iowa scrip I wanted to dump anyway".

Hobarth smiled at the use of his aunt's nickname. "I'll tell everyone to be extra nice. You staying long?"

"Maybe a week. My worm needs a few days of feeding".

"You could use all that in-wall time to take a bath, you know. You could read in the tub".

"What, and lose my camouflage? The critters confuse the Reapers, you know".

"Wonderful. Something about you's just a bit out of alignment, you know that, Argent? And I don't mean that busted-up face of yours either".

* * *

Valentine didn't enjoy exercise. He'd rather heat his muscles chopping wood, or even digging a latrine ditch or picking apples, so something might be gained out of the calorie loss. He looked on exercise as a routine maintenance activity, like adjusting straps, darning socks, or sharpening and oiling a blade. It was not an end unto itself, but preparation so his body would be ready when called upon.

But he could combine it with a more interesting activity, like fishing.

So during his stay at the truckstart, every morning he'd sling his tackle on the legworm's harness and goad it out to one of the ponds or creeks, provided there wasn't a winter fog or cold rain. The Reapers sometimes prowled in daylight if the overcast was heavy enough.

So with a clear morning and in hope of a torpid catfish he'd prod his legworm out, where it could pull up bush in peace while he fished. On the way there and back he jogged from one side of the legworm to the other, practiced leaping on its back or mounting it using low tree

limbs to swing himself up, until his breath came hard and fast and his bad leg ached. If the fish weren't biting, he'd practice with his battle rifle - a few cartridges now and again could be replaced, and there was no such thing as a wasted shot if it kept you in practice. The time might come when being able to eat, or draw one more breath, would depend on a single bullet.

Besides, the women at the truckstart believed the smell of gun smoke to be an improvement.

Evenings he'd spend in the attic library, unless a truck came in. Then he'd join the rest of the Hobarth's gang and listen to the latest news, reports of road conditions, and shortages, always shortages. Valentine would borrow any kind of printed material - even Kurian leaflets sometimes carried clues as to the progress of the UFR. He read them with the mixed emotions of an estranged relative catching up on family events.

He lingered at the truckstart until he found a driver Tim Hobarth recommended who was heading south into the UFR. He entrusted the woman, a wispy-haired piece of leather who went sleeveless even on a cold day and drove an ancient diesel pickup pulling a high-clearance trailer, with a letter and coin for postage. He'd addressed the wax-paper packet to "William and Gail Post".

Post would make sure his information about the Iowa Guard's movements got into the right hands. A few Bear teams and some Wolves inserted into Omaha would make a world of difference.

Valentine spent the rest of the afternoon and evening moody and anxious to be off. He'd staved off the empty feeling by composing his letter to Southern Command and seeing it sent on. With that done, the guilty memories marched right back into his forebrain and set up residence. Finishing with Mary Carlson's murderers had left him empty and with too much time to think. Now free to get back to St. Louis, conscience partially cleared by his plea for help for the Golden Ones...

He spent his last evening at Hobarth's wandering the acres filled with wrecks, getting glimpses of the old world through faded bumper and window stickers and business information printed on car doors and rear windows.

WARNING: FREQUENT STOPS AT GARAGE SALES

GET ANY CLOSER AND YOU'D BETTER

BE WEARING A CONDOM

IN THE EVENT OF RAPTURE THIS VEHICLE WILL BE EMPTY

It was empty, unless you counted mice and spiders.

They weren't all pre-2022. Valentine saw one that he'd been told was popular in the early years of the Kurian Order. A smooth-sided luxury sedan with the half-sun, half-moon logo of the short-lived New World Fiber Network sat there, slowly hollowing like a rotten tooth as pieces fell away. Its rear-door sticker placed it firmly in the post-'22 generation:

I DON'T FEAR THE REAPER

Valentine heard a dull growl and turned, expecting to see one of the Hobarth dog pack. One good stare and they usually calmed down enough to make friends, animal to animal.

But he saw a quivering black-and-tan dog standing between the rows of creeper-covered cars, looking through the gap toward the next row. Valentine had time to see a barrel move before he heard a quick hiss and felt a firm tap just behind the neck.

He started to crouch, but the world turned gummy, and his defensive stance loosened into a kneel. Then he felt grass against his cheek and dirt in his eye, but that didn't matter. A pleasant, dark warmth beckoned and he gladly slid down the hill toward it.

* * *

Motion, and the smell of corn.

The corn came from fabric covering his face, probably a feed sack over his eyes. A cloying, wet mess in his pants. He tried to rise, but handcuffs held his wrists together behind him. Fight it fight it fight it.

"Hey, he's coming out of it already", a husky voice said. The words were being bent and twisted in his ear, where a surflike roar fought

with a deep thrumming reminiscent of the old Thunderbolt's engines at high revolutions.

A little higher-pitched whine: "The doc said out for twelve hours for sure. Nothing like that, nothing near".

"Knowing his system, he probably just had a nice nap", a female voice added. She cleared her throat. "Get him inside and sit him up. I'll get the others".

Nice nap, indeed. Valentine flexed, tried to clear the creosote someone had substituted for blood in his limbs. They settled him into a chair and he felt a distasteful squish in his underwear.

A needle went into his arm. This time he stayed awake.

Sort of.

Hard to tell if time was passing or not. He swore, but it came out as a dry-throated moan. It seemed the first part of his brain that was willing to try to work his mouth had a vocabulary limited to profanity.

More words, but they didn't make sense.

Then he was awake, only now the fabric over his face was wet; so were his chest and shoulders.

"Up and at 'em, Valentine", the husky voice said, more intelligibly this time.

They know my name. This can't be good.

Husky voice again: "You reading me?"

Valentine needed time to think, but more water came.

"Anyone want to work him over with a bar of soap? He really needs it", a faraway female voice said. Hard to tell if it was the same one he'd heard before; the earlier conversation came back vague as a dream.

Another voice, female, nearer: "David S. Valentine, former major with Southern Command, we meet at last".

"Mutfurker", Valentine croaked.

"I suppose you know you've made a lot of powerful enemies. Someone gets to be too big a thorn, it gets pulled out and snapped". A throat clearing followed by a soft cough. This voice was the same as the one in the car.

"Death teams, man", the husky voice said. "You got death teams on your ass. Just like the one that got your folks. Just like the one that has you now".

"He's awake now, I saw his head jerk", the faraway female voice said.

So that's it, Valentine thought. / wonder if they'll leave me strung up like F. A. James in Iowa. No, some Kurian will get me.

Husky voice: "Big reward. All we have to do is take you north of the Missouri. We'll all be rich".

"Spend it right away, you pricks", Valentine said. The words were slurred but sounded intelligible enough to him. "There's some Bears and a Cat who'll get you in turn".

Valentine heard light footsteps and the bag came off his face - a little painfully, it took a scab on his chin with it.

Alessa Duvalier stood in front of him, holding the feed sack. Her freckles had faded with the season and she had a fresh bandage on her hand. A long, tattered coat hung off her thin shoulders. "If I'm s'posed to be the Cat, I wouldn't be so sure, Val", she said. "I still remember the tap you gave me in St. Louis. The cut inside my mouth took forever to heal".

Confused relief flooded Valentine. He tried to form words, but they wouldn't come. His eyes went wet.

"Get him some water, Roberts", a woman in uniform said from the other side of the room. The air smelled like mold and termites. She had her back to him, and was studying a series of wedding pictures on the wall. It had peeling paper and old, dust-covered fixtures that at one time had thrown light on the pictures. A few pieces of furniture with the cushions long removed had been pushed against the walls, and Valentine noted that he sat at one end of an oval dinner table, once a fine piece of work but now scratched and water warped. A single fat white candle leaned at the center of the table, providing the only illumination in the room.

A short, wiry man with horn-rimmed glasses in a Southern Command uniform offered the mouth of a canteen. Valentine noticed a

corporal's chevron on his arm. "Just water", he said, in a surprisingly deep voice for his slender frame. Valentine drank, marking another man in Wolf leathers snoring on the bare spring bed of a sofa, oblivious to the conversation.

"So I've been recaptured by Southern Command?" Valentine said.

"For the record: name, place of birth, most recent rank?" the female with her back to him said.

"David Stuart Valentine, unincorporated Minnesota, major", Valentine supplied.

"He's sensible enough", Duvalier said. "Hungry, Valentine?"

"I'll eat". Valentine was shocked to see Moira Styachowski step in from another room. His artillery officer from the fight for Big Rock Hill on the banks of the Arkansas had put on a little weight since last he saw her, but her face still looked pale and her eyes tired.

"Quite a reunion", Valentine said as Duvalier slid flatbread and a jar that smelled like fatted bean paste across the table.

"More than you know", the woman studying the photos said. She turned. A trim, neatly attired woman with a colonel's bird on her tightly buttoned collar regarded him with sparkling eyes.

Valentine felt a little like a hog at a county fair set before a judge. Sharp chin to match the eyes ...

"Dots", Valentine said.

"For my sins, Colonel Lambert now", she said, her words cold and hard.

"Excuse me for not saluting", Valentine said. "I'm cuffed".

"Val, don't be difficult", Duvalier said.

"It's a private joke, Smoke", Lambert said. "I remember he once told me that he'd be saluting me someday, back when he was at the War College".

Duvalier, now sitting at the table, raised an intrigued eyebrow at him and he shook his head.

"Can I clean myself up?" Valentine asked.

"Please", Duvalier said.

"Roberts, take off the cuffs and show him his things", Lambert said.

The corporal led him to what had once been the house's kitchen. A ten-gallon jug of water sat on the counter; soap, towel, razor, and washcloth rested in a bucket.

Valentine saw packs and a duffel. The corporal extracted a set of Southern Command fatigues from one of them. Valentine recognized his old cammies from his stint as operations officer in the ad hoc regiment known as the Razors. His nose detected mothballs, though someone had made an effort to freshen up the uniform by packing it with acacia buds.

Valentine cleaned himself up, passed a forefinger over the thick fabric of the battle dress. Clever of Lambert. Once he was in uniform, sitting across the table from others in similar dress, old dutiful habits would naturally follow the way phrases come back when an adult who has long been in foreign lands speaks the language of home.

But Southern Command had made it amply clear that he was disposable. Valentine eschewed the uniform.

He heard a murmur from the other room and hardened his ears, but the exchange stopped almost as soon as it started. He returned to the table, the pleasant scent of clean women a welcome change in his nostrils.

Lambert watched him approach with steady eyes, a battered leather courier bag open in front of her. Styachowski was smearing peanut butter on a hard roll. Duvalier had taken off her duster and piled a small revolver, knives, and her old sword-cane on the seat next to her.

Valentine sat, the three women at the other end of the table making him feel like Macbeth looking across the cauldron at his witches.

"By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes", he said.

Styachowski paused, the roll halfway to her mouth. Duvalier's nose twitched, but perhaps Lambert recognized the allusion. Her eyes warmed a trifle.

Valentine waited to hear it, playing with refusals ranging from polite to obscene.

"By now you've guessed we're not here to haul you back to the Nut", Styachowski said.

"I'll listen", Valentine said. "Right up until you slide the pardon across the table. I'm working up saliva".

"You can walk out that door, Valentine", Lambert said. "How long you can keep walking is the question you should ask yourself. The little drama we acted out could have been true. Kurian hit teams have you on their list. You do something traceable and they'll hunt you down".

"They just missed you in Iowa", Duvalier said. "I caught one of their sniffers drunk in a bar outside Garrison Nine".

"Suppose they do catch up. What's it to you?"

"You used to be one of the best young talents in Southern Command", Lambert said.

"I used to be a lot of things. Now I'm just tired".

Duvalier poked him with her toe. "Quit the burnout talk".

"You sure you want him, Moira?" Lambert asked.

Styachowski nodded.

"How's life treating you, Wildcard?" Valentine asked. "I never thanked you for visiting me in the Nut".

"Valentine, I need your help", Styachowski said. "I'm putting together a new unit".

"A force of condemned men for suicide missions, right? Not interested".

"You used to wait until you knew what you were talking about to open your mouth", Styachowski said, stiffening. "I liked that about you".

Lambert picked up her attache. "Wasted flight".

"You flew here?" Valentine said.

"Once your old partner located you, yes", Lambert said. "Uncomfortable, cold, and loud".

Valentine knew that Southern Command had few air assets. Even generals traveled by train and car. Lambert must be a very big bug to have an airplane at her disposal.

"So Smoke tracks me down and Styachowski offers me the job. How do you fit in ?"

Lambert tapped her courier bag. "I'm the answer girl, just like at the War College, Valentine".

"Young for a colonel", Valentine said.

"It looks better on the letterhead", Lambert said. "I had a staff position, really unimportant a few years back, 'cooperative commands operations director.' If something was happening in New England or Europe or South America that the staff needed to know about, I summarized and passed it on. Once in a great while we'd get a liaison visit from Denver or Quebec City and I'd arrange briefings.

"Then Archangel hit and suddenly we were plunged into joint operations with the Texans. I had all the old responsibilities, but suddenly ten times the information was coming in, and we had to coordinate our movements with theirs, work out shared-supply issues, ad hoc attachments of Southern Command and Texas forces. Am I boring you, Valentine?"

Valentine looked up from his hands. "Not at all. I owe you a thank-you. You helped save the Razors".

"Texan enthusiasm saved the Razors. Once they started rolling I got out of their way. I just found them a few tugs".

The emotions of seeing the fleet of little boats come down the Arkansas River came back. Even the pain from the burns on his back and legs throbbed anew with the memory.

"What is my old friend General Martinez up to these days?"

Styachowski glanced at Lambert and shook her head, but Lambert spoke anyway: "Inspector general. It suits him. He keeps to the rear areas, getting expensive dinners and cigars as he makes his rounds. I can't deny he's popular. He sees to it that the food and comforts improve whenever he visits a post".

"Which reminds me", Duvalier said. "I've got a letter for you from Will and Gail. Over a year old now, but you haven't been leaving forwarding addresses". She dug in her duster and produced a wrinkled, grease-stained envelope. The letter smelled like turned bacon, but Valentine accepted it gratefully.

"So much for the past,'* Valentine said. "What do you have in mind for my future?"

"What I'm about to tell you is about as secret as anything can get, Valentine. Does your disenchantment with the Cause extend to materially hurting its efforts?"

"If anyone asks about this meeting, I'll assure them it was purely sexual".

Duvalier rolled her eyes. "Dream on, Valentine".

"C'mon, Major", Styachowski said.

"I don't have anyone to talk to, unless you count my legworm. If Kur does get its hands on me, there's no keeping secrets from them". Valentine had been questioned under drugs before.

"This is more of a morale matter for our side. Our Lifeweavers have disappeared".

"Still?" Valentine remembered that after Solon's brief occupation of the Ozarks the Lifeweavers had fled, but he'd assumed they would return. Assuming makes an ass out of...

"Almost", Styachowski said. "Your Old Father Wolf has been located in the Sierras in Mexico. We're working on getting him back up here. Ryu and the Bearclaw are thought to be dead. There were a couple others in Southern Command, staff-level advisers, also gone. With no Lifeweavers..".

"No more Hunters", Valentine supplied, so lost in his thoughts that he brought up what was obvious to all of them.

"Our regulars are a match for theirs any day", Lambert said. "Unless they get the bulge on us with artillery. We can even handle the Grogs, most of the time. But when the Reapers show up..."

Valentine knew all this. "I'm supposed to locate some, right?"

"No, the locating's been done. We want you to get a message through to them. Maybe even try to bring a few back".

"They're not just across the Missouri somewhere, I take it".

"Seattle".

Valentine managed to blink.

"You got one out of the Zoo in Chicago", Styachowski said.

"His body, you mean. I came upon Rho by accident, and he died during the escape".

Lambert had clean nails. Valentine got a chance to examine them when she placed her hand, palm down, near his. "This isn't a case of going into a Kurian Zone and breaking one out. You'll simply travel to the resistance in the Cascades, meet one, and let it know our need".

"Simply? It must be fifteen hundred miles. One way".

"You've been traveling the Kurian Zone for years".

"You don't know that".

Three sets of eyeballs exchanged glances. "We just assumed..."

There was that word again.

Valentine let out a breath. "It's not worth arguing. I'm not interesting in slogging over who knows how many mountain ranges, sorry. Send a radiogram".

"You haven't heard what we're offering", Lambert said.

"Some kind of pardon".

"Not for you. You know that baby Reaper you brought out of Kentucky..."

"He has a name".

"How can you tell it's a he?" Duvalier asked. Reapers had no vulnerable reproductive organs sharing space with their simple elimination system.

"Calling him 'it' won't..."

"You've been good enough to let the researchers at the Miskatonic take a look at him a couple of times", Lambert interrupted.

"Until he broke two fingers and the wrist of the nurse subjecting him to ultrasonics", Duvalier said.

"They were hurting him", Valentine said, heating at the memory.

Lambert smiled. "The Kurians are very interested in your little Reaper. Their agents have offered substantial bribes for information up and down the Free Territory as to his whereabouts. They think we've got him in a lab someplace".

"Of course", Valentine said.

"Even I don't know where you've got him stashed, 'zactly", Duvalier said. "You always meet the Miskatonic people in the Groglands around St. Louis".

Lambert ignored her. "They think we've got him hidden in the deepest, darkest hole in the Ozarks and they're trying to find it. Sooner or later they'll learn the truth".

Valentine remained silent, waiting for it.

"Or", Lambert said, "I can make sure that every record, every test, every note, and every photograph disappears. We've mocked up a pretty convincing skeleton out of bits and pieces of other Reapers. He'll be listed as dead, killed during testing, the bones archived, some tissue samples dropped into formaldehyde, and everything but abstracts of the research will be destroyed".

How did they know the chink in his armor? Duvalier, probably. At times it seemed she knew him better than he knew himself. She was a sound judge, not just of risk, but of character, vulnerabilities - it made her a better assassin. Save for the bloodlust that sometimes came over her when a Quisling touched her - if she'd had an education beyond the sham of her early years in the Great Plains Gulag, she could have ...

Keen judge of character. She picked you to train.

Valentine didn't know whether to hate the trio or admire them. He'd gotten careless with the last of Mary's murderers gone. Part of him was itching for something to do anyway. How much of his unwillingness was an act?

"There's got to be more to this", Valentine said. "Why not just contact the Pacific Northwest by regular channels? Southern Command must have some kind of communication route".

Styachowski suddenly became interested in a frayed cuff.

Lambert spoke again: "The Cause up there is in the hands of a genius. But like many geniuses, he's got his own ways".

"Friends and enemies both call him 'Mr. Adler,' " Styachowski said. "They say he came out of Seattle, originally. Didn't know one end of a gun from another when he showed up barefoot to volunteer, but he carried sixteen tons of grudge. He took a bunch of guerrillas

starving in the mountains and fighting each other as much as they did the Kurians, and turned them into the Terrors of the Cascades. They appear and disappear like a fog, always somewhere the Quislings are weak. He's putting a headlock on the most powerful Kurian in the western half of the United States, Seattle himself. The Big Wheel".

"Him I've heard of", Valentine said. "Wasn't he trying to absorb the whole West Coast?"

"We were both at the War College then", Lambert said. "It was all the talk among the higher-ups, worries that Seattle would be running the whole coast, knock Denver out, then come after us. I suppose it could still happen, if the forces in the Cascades fall apart".

"All the more reason to set up liaisons", Valentine said.

Lambert shook her head. "It's been tried. One mission came back saying this Adler had no time for any war but the one he was waging against Seattle. The next mission we sent quit Southern Command and started singing his praises as the savior of the human race. The third never even made it there".

"Lifeweavers don't exactly advertise their whereabouts", Valentine said. "I don't see how I can find any without this genius' permission".

Styachowski opened her mouth to speak but lost her words in a cough.

"Ahh, but that's your specialty, Val", Duvalier said. "You're going to show up and volunteer".

Styachowski glared at her.

"Barefoot?" Valentine asked.

"I don't think that's necessary", Styachowski said. "You're talented. An ex-Cat of Southern Command. Hero of Big Rock Hill. You're bound to end up in Pacific Command's version of the Hunters".

Their faces stood out against the dark uniforms and the shadows beyond the table. Odd that all three were approximately the same height when seated. Three witches, telling him his future over a dirty table with finish bubbled and cracked.

"And if I make contact with a Lifeweaver?"

"Simple message. Southern Command needs their help. Badly. Or we're finished".

"That dicey, is it?"

"We're running out of Hunters", Lambert said. "The lieutenant I used to admire would have known what that meant, and been the first to volunteer. We've sent calls for help north, east, and south. We want you to be west".

The lieutenant Dots used to admire would have been so startled at the news of her admiration that he would have been able to think about little else. Valentine just noted it as an interesting detail.

Duvalier, eyes raised to heaven, and mouth like she'd just swallowed a spoonful of castor oil, muttered something about "Ghost" being the wrong clan nickname.

"Have you told me everything?"

"Everything", Styachowski said. "Trust me, Val. You did at one time".

"There is one more thing", Lambert said. "It's not an important detail. But it might mean something to you. The third mission, the one that disappeared, was led by your old CO from Zulu Company. LeHavre".

Lots of things could happen on the trail. Even to a man as experienced as LeHavre.

"I don't suppose Ahn-Kha has wandered in from across the Mississippi? He'd be invaluable".

"Sorry, Val", Duvalier said, her voice soft for the first time that evening. "He'd be sitting here if he had".

Styachowski smiled, but Lambert leaned forward. "Does that mean you're going?"

"I haven't spoken to a Lifeweaver in years", Valentine said. "I've gathered quite a list of questions".

"Great. We can get you as far as Denver", Styachowski said. "They can..."

"No. Sounds like your pipeline's got leaks, if LeHavre couldn't get through. I'm going as David Valentine, ex-Southern Command. He'd

have to figure out his own way there. I'll have to write up a list of gear I need, though. Gold will be on it".

"Give it to Moira", Lambert said, suddenly informal. "Where do you want it delivered?"

"Do you know Nancy's?"

"I know Nancy's", Duvalier said. "Used to be the best safe house between Kansas City and the Rockies. Practically in Free Territory these days".

"I'll meet you there in three weeks".

"Thanks for rejoining the team, Valentine", Lambert said.

Valentine felt a little warmth in the look they exchanged. A bad use of a football-coach metaphor made her fallible - and therefore human.

"Will I have a contact I can trust out there?" Valentine asked. "I might need backup. Supplies or gear".

"I'll catch up to you at Nancy's", Styachowski said.

"Good to see you again, Valentine", Lambert said. "From this day on, your little charge is history. On paper, anyway".

Duvalier was the last to leave and ran her tongue obscenely against her lips as they said good-bye. "Even Queen Balance Sheet folds at last", she said quietly. 'Til buy you a drink at Hob's to make up. I'm guessing that ego of yours needs some soothing after getting shaded by a woman half your size".

"I'll have to chit that. If I'm going to be back at Nancy's in twenty days, I have to get that list to Styachowski and get my worm rigged".

The corner of Duvalier's mouth went up, but she ignored the opportunity for another raunchy joke. "Be careful, sweet David. May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest".

First Macbeth, now Hamlet. He wondered where Duvalier had even picked up the line. He kissed her on the cheek. "I will".