 
ALAMO SQUARE

Stan McCown

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2011 Stan McCown

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BOOK I
Chapter One

FIVE MONTHS BEFORE THE WAR

SAN FRANCISCO

She just appeared out of nowhere, at ten in the morning, tapping at the edge of his open office door, then stepping in. In the first seconds, Mike could only stare, unable to breathe, or so much as shake his head in disbelief, or keep his mouth from falling open.

"Hi, it's me."

"Jenny." It was all he could say, but having gotten out the word, he was able to move, standing at first, then pretending to clear his eyes. That made her laugh, and with that, the spell was broken.

"Well at least you remember me. That's a good start. May I come in?"

"Oh my god, yes, please, I'm sorry," he told her. "Come in, come in. Sit. I'll get coffee, you drank coffee, I remember. Cream and fake sugar—"

"You remember that?"

"Jenny, I remember every little detail." He pulled the visitor's chair around for her, fluttering his hands, wanting to offer her help into the seat, knowing she had no need of it.

"I think you're as nervous as I am," she said. "That's good. Why don't you go bring the coffee, then sit, so we can catch up."

"Yes, sure." He slipped out and down to the break room, pouring coffee for both of them, vaguely terrified she would be gone when he returned, or turn out to have only been his imagination. But no, she was still there, playing with her hands, as if they pained her.

"You all right?" he asked and she smiled that life-giving smile.

"As I said, I'm nervous, too."

"Why, what's wrong?"

She shook her head, a quick little motion, then shrugged. "Nothing. Just...showing up like this, not sure if it's a horrible mistake or not."

"How could it be a mistake? You could always come visit me any time,

anywhere—"

She held up her hands in a way that stopped him cold.

"Mike, there's a lot more to it than that. Brace yourself: I'm here to stay. I have a job here, I mean right here, the _Sentinel_. In fact, they hired me to begin by filling in while you're in San Alonzo."

"Oh wow, you work here now? That's fantastic. And you'll stay when I come back?"

"Yep. Forever and ever, or as long as they like my work. Unless there's a problem. Between you and me."

"Problem? It's a dream come true, why would it be a problem?"

Jenny looked around, noting that his office had no door.

"Can you get away a few minutes, somewhere outside, so we can talk?"

"Absolutely."

"And have a bite?"

"All the better. Now?"

"We need to talk before I stay a minute longer. So yes, please, now."

"Come on."

Mike edged back from behind the desk, wanting to offer his hand again, and wanting to watch the way she moved when she rose, but he could not bring himself to ogle her that way.

She wore blue jeans and a buttoned top, with a little scarf loosely tied around her neck, much the way she had dressed when he first met her. He had dreamed again and again of taking off the scarf and kissing her neck, and the feeling had returned. He wanted to touch her back or shoulder as they walked along but did not dare, though he had done so many times while they were in San Diego.

Once on the street, she thrilled him by slipping her arm through his, causing them to bump hips as they walked along.

Mike took them to a cozy little upscale café a couple of blocks down, on Market, and just like that, found himself seated across from the woman who had dominated his thoughts for nearly two years.

Waiting for a server, she smiled, still a nervous smile. "I shouldn't have just showed up, without letting you know. And I sort of guessed they might have told you, at least that someone was being brought in, to begin by filling in for you."

"They did, but they wouldn't have known to tell me who."

"No, I guess not. So it should've been me. I should've told you."

Mike responded that it didn't make any difference, as long as she was there now but she shook her head.

"I should have found out about us, first. About whether...well, I see you don't have a ring, but whether you're with someone else. If you are, then, oh god—"

"You mean you're here to—"

"Yes! I finally divorced the bastard. I'm free! But if you aren't—"

"Jenny, my god, I am, I'm free. There's been nobody— since I met you, I haven't seen anyone, I've had no interest in anyone else. I didn't know when I'd get over you, but...you're here to...be with me?"

"If you're still interested."

"Interested? I'd marry you in an instant if—"

"I accept," she said and Mike thought his heart would seize up.

"You do? I'm sorry, I'm sorry, if I'd known, I'd have found a better way, more romantic—but I fly out in three hours, and I should've waited—"

"No! If you hadn't said it, I would've. I know you're going into a dangerous situation, down there and I hoped it would work out that I could ask you to marry me, so you'd know you'd have me waiting, but fuck it, it works just as well like this. Don't worry about how you asked, just go down there knowing when you come back, you have a woman waiting to marry you. That way, I hope, you'll be more careful. For me, if not for you. Okay?"

The server arrived and they struggled to turn their minds to ordering something. Then they were alone again.

"I'm sorry this worked out that we only have this little time before you go. It's going to break my heart to see you leave, but let me take you to the airport when you're ready, and say goodbye there. It'll be much sweeter than the goodbye in San Diego, when we could never plan to see each other again. That nearly killed me.

"Let's gobble this down, then go away somewhere at least halfway private, for as long as you have before the flight."

Mike feared that if he did anything now, it would be to go back to the _Sentinel_ foreswear his mission to San Alonzo and stay here with her. His only response then, was to nod agreement with her suggestions.

After lunch, she told him she was staying in a hotel out near the airport for now. "I'd love to take you there right now, but I don't think we'd keep our hands off each other.

"Do you know of a quieter place but too public to go too far?" she said.

He led her down to a cab stand and twenty minutes later they alit at a park in Pacific Heights, called Alamo Square, a park famous for the colorfully painted Victorian houses that lined the streets, some of which had graced postcards and calendars for decades. Although there were tourists even now taking pictures, it was possible to walk up the back side of the park and enjoy some measure of privacy.

They strolled about until they found a place isolated enough for their needs. There, she came to him and for the first time ever, Mike held Jenny in his arms.

"Can I kiss you? Or should we wait for that magic night when I'm back?"

"If you don't kiss me now, I'll cry. I promise you, a kiss will keep me warm until I have you home," she said.

Mike cupped her cheek then met her lips, and in that moment, his life passed into the new world in which Jenny was the dominant factor and always would be....

The rest of the day was a blur of happiness and looming sorrow. Eventually, they returned to his office, so he could retrieve his packed and ready bags, and then she drove him out to the airport. In a haze, he checked in for the flight, and much too soon, they stood before the security gate, clinging to each other, both sobbing quietly, trying not to make a scene.

"Darling, be safe, be careful, and do good work. I'll try to make you proud of me back here," she whispered. "Now I'm going to walk away because I can't stand to see you leave."

She let go and Mike made himself pass through the gate.

And so, they began their life together by parting.

Chapter Two

CARTAGENA, COLOMBIA

In terms of emotional distance, it was the longest trip of Mike's life, from San Francisco, to Miami, and finally to Cartagena, Colombia. All that way, when he should be thinking about what to do when he hit the ground, he could only think of Jenny.

As far as the war itself, there was a great deal to think about. The rocket attacks on the three airliners flying over the United States, two years ago, and the long buildup to war with the country that harbored the new wave of terrorists, the oil-rich nation of San Alonzo, had transformed the United States almost as completely as the attacks on the two towers in New York City in 2001; a weak minded man named Harvey Kelcher, who had somehow ascended to the presidency, was suddenly a national hero, because he had proclaimed a hard line against a small country, a country whose government had not yet been proven complicit or even sympathetic to the attacks, but which had proven a roadblock to US designs on the world's oil supply.

Mike wasn't ready to buy it. He was not prepared to say the attacks were exactly fishy, but they were pretty perfect, as far as Kelcher's aspirations were concerned. And that was only one step removed from fishy.

But what he hoped to learn, entering San Alonzo in the midst of war, he could not say. He just had this sense he had to be there, if for no other reason than to see how the US military conducted itself against a country that had not been proven guilty of...well anything.

Again, as had been the fashion since 2001, the military had "embedded" reporters, reporters who's lives and survival depended upon the military they were supposedly objectively reporting on. No other American correspondents were welcome in the war, but Mike would be coming in under the radar, he hoped. He would not embed, he would be independent. And he wondered just how much he would be able to see. And worried over what would happen if he was caught by his own government....

All that should be on his mind, and in a way it was, but despite his promise to her, everything was dominated by Jenny. Even the idea of having her with him, not just as a lover but as a professional partner would not pass from his mind. She had demonstrated to him that one previous time they had ever seen each other, at the crash in San Diego, that she was the best field journalist he had ever known. She had made him better during those three days, and he had five years experience on her. Imagine what they could do here, together, on this story.

And imagine trying to report it, worrying over her every step of the way. Every time a bullet whined, he'd look over, terrified he'd find her torn and bleeding.

No, this was best, knowing she was home and safe. Home. And when he thought that, it would set off another hour of incredulous meanderings of thought. _Jenny, home. Waiting for me._

The fog in his mind finally cleared on the ground in Cartegena, where he had to make rational decisions and go to work. At the airport, he met with his partner, a French correspondent who had been set up for him by friends in the international journalistic community.

René Arsembault was already togged out like a stereotypical field reporter, in a rumpled campaign hat and a photographer's vest over a safari shirt. He seemed to recognize Mike and nodded a greeting.

"Mike Lansford, eh? So we finally meet. I'm René. _Mon dieu_ , but you are a strapping man, aren't you? I shall hide behind you if the bullets get too heavy," he said.

"Then you'd better be a fast runner because I'm under official orders to turn tail if that happens."

They both laughed and Mike instantly suspected this would be a good partnership, even if the French man wasn't Jenny.

Small, thin-shouldered, Arsembault finally thought to offer his hand for a quick shake then pulled it away as if afraid of being hurt by the bigger man.

"Come, I have everything set up, a hotel, a vehicle, we can be on our way tomorrow."

"So what's the plan? How do we get into Libertad City?"

"The Colombians are sending a convoy of support vehicles, and we're going to ride in one of their hummers. They'll take us all the way in to the middle of the action, and we don't even have to be embedded! Eh? Eh?"

"And just how the hell did you pull that off?"

"Try and imagine," Arsembault said, rubbing his thumb and two fingers together.

"Aha. A little chicanery before we even start. Okay, fine, if that's what works, as long as it gets us there. I just hope I don't have to pony up."

"'Pony up'? What is that?"

Mike had to chuckle.

"It means I don't want to contribute."

"Oh, I see. Very well, we'll talk about it later. But in that case, you will be buying me drinks and dinner, all the way then."

"Um hm. I've got a company credit card. So when do we go?"

"We meet with them in the morning, and whenever they want to go, we go. For now, let us get you settled in."

Arsembault drove Mike through the narrow streets of the city, a port from which Caribbean pirates had operated centuries ago, and in a different way, still did. Under other circumstances, Mike would have been salivating at the prospects of exploring Cartagena, but it was out of the question now. If Jenny had not appeared, he might have given thought to tarrying after his mission for a vacation here.

But that led to thoughts of having Jenny along and he almost gasped at what wonderful possibilities that suggested. _Stop that, you've got to keep her off your mind, until you're done here._

The hotel that Arsembault had arranged for them was not what one would call five-star but it offered a view of the old walled city and had air conditioning. What more could he ask for? But thinking it, Mike blanched at the obvious answer to that question, and hastened out the door, to meet up with his far less lovely dinner companion.

But the meal, for which Mike did indeed pay, was excellent and the coffee better. And were it not for the not-small detail a certain tousled-haired woman he had left behind, he could have said he was ready to go to war in the morning with no reservations.

The Colombians making up the team Mike had joined were jovial. Going to war was nothing to them. Living in a country that had been caught up in internal and eternal strife for decades, the troops weren't strangers to fighting and didn't seem the least bit tense, to be rushing into a bigger war over in San Alonzo.

"We will kick their _chingada_ asses good," the driver exulted, once he pulled into place within the convoy of armored vehicles and trucks.

"Yeah, but why are you people—Colombians—getting involved in this war?" Mike asked, telling himself this was it, his first official journalistic question of the whole mission.

"Because you people helped us whip the goddamn guerrillas," the Colombian said. "Turn about, what is the word?"

"Is fair play," Mike finished.

" _Sì_ , it is that. Besides, like your friend here, your people pay us good."

Mike left the issue at that but filed it away to write and report when he could settle down for the night. Meantime, he concentrated on enjoying the ride across the northeastern tier of Colombia, into San Alonzo.

All in all, it was around three hundred miles from Cartagena, up north to Barranquilla then over eastward along the Caribbean. The latter part of the trip followed a seemingly gentle highway east of Santa Marta into the Guajira Desert. But "gentle" referred only to the terrain, and "highway" was no more than a hopeless aspiration for the rough, misbegotten road.

Subject to a nearly constant battle between smugglers, drug runners, the Guajira Indians who gave it the name, and any local authorities crazy enough to stand up to them all, the route was almost suicide for anybody but a military convoy such as this. People in unarmed, single car treks only made through by pure chance and good luck. Or driving at autobahn speeds.

The land itself over much of the route was beautiful, with salt-white beaches graced by flamingoes wading in by-waters along the way, but the Guajira people were fierce and not to be trifled with, so a tourists' paradise this was not.

For a military expedition, however, the greatest enemy was heat. Inside the vehicles, even with windows popped open, Mike felt himself melting. And the odor of men locked

up, sweating, was almost lethal.

Nor did the heat seem to let up by so much as a degree after dark. Lying in his tent, soaked in his own sweat, Mike tried to will himself to sleep, but there was no such hope. So he was left to do the worst thing he could: think of Jenny. What was she doing tonight, where did she dine, was she meeting new friends at the paper and going out for some entertainment or was she at home thinking of him?

Although in that way lay madness, the little fantasy got him through the first night along the Caribbean, because he did forget the heat and even slept a little, enough that when someone kicked at the door-flap around dawn, he was groggy and unready to get started.

Arsembault was no better off. They bumped into each other and swore, trying to put their boots on, but then laughed over it later when they were outside lining up for coffee and breakfast. And when the sun rose, off in the direction of San Alonzo, lighting up the Caribbean in fiery diamonds, Mike grudgingly admitted that he was glad to be up.

Two hours after the kick that woke him, the outfit was all aboard and roaring forward down the highway.

The actual invasion of that part of San Alonzo by the United States had taken place days ago, from Lake Libertad; the fighting at Libertad City was still building to a crescendo and had not penetrated into the center of town. The Americans were most concerned with securing the airport, first, and Mike understood that was where the hot action was going on. And that was where the Colombians had been directed.

The San Alonzon military all in all had put up a much stiffer resistance than anybody could have imagined, making use of their familiarity with the heat and the layout of the land, as well as guerrilla tactics developed while fighting in the jungles to the south.

Mike found it hard to imagine the US army pummeling a beautiful and modern city like Libertad, and he dreaded seeing what had happened to downtown, but he knew the city had been "softened up" with hits from huge numbers of bomb and cruise missile attacks before the troops came in on the ground.

What caught him by surprise was the San Alonzon defense of the airport. So strong was it that the Colombians were unable to reach the objective. And suddenly, out of what had been an almost leisurely cruise across from Colombia, Mike and Arsembault found themselves in the maws of hell....

The ambush was quick, loud and bloody, and somewhere in the "fog of war", Mike and his companions became prisoners.

Chapter Three

THE OUTSKIRTS OF LIBERTAD, SAN ALONZO

When the smoke and confusion cleared, Mike found himself seated on the ground, his hands tied behind him while San Alonzon irregulars marched back and forth, threatening to shoot the entire collection of invaders.

A man with a very ugly looking machine gun stopped before Mike and unleashed a rapid-fire diatribe in Spanish. He seemed to expect a reply but Mike shrugged.

"No comprendo. No habla Espaniol."

"No? English?"

"Sí."

"Americano?"

"Sí."

The commando charged his weapon and Mike was too shocked and surprised that he was about to die to even know fear.

"What are you doing with fucking Colombians?" the gunman said in English. He was a lean man, with almost a baby face, but with a baby face that had an edge, something in his eyes that spoke of having seen too much in life, and little of it good.

"We're reporters," Mike said. "We refused to be embedded with the US Army so we paid for a ride with the Colombians. We wanted to see the war from a different view.

We wanted to tell the truth, not what the American side wanted us to tell. Are you going to shoot us for that?"

Something in that amused the San Alonzon. He again paced back and forth, trying not to smile. Soon he came back and stood over Mike again.

"You actually pay to go to a war? Are you crazy?"

"Probably," Mike replied and that seemed to please the other man.

"Aha. Then you should come with me."

"I have trouble getting to my feet like this."

The San Alonzon said something to one of his men, who helped Mike to stand. "And him? Who is he?"

"He's a French reporter."

"Ah." With a go-ahead nod, the guerrilla leader had Arsembault lifted also. Leaving their hands still bound, the San Alonzons marched down the street to an alley, and on past a few rundown houses to an even more ramshackle building in the terminus of a cul-de-sac. The rich aroma of cooking that drifted into the alley reminded Mike how long he had been since breakfast and he wondered if he were ever going to have another.

Upstairs, he and Arsembault were delivered to what passed for a guerrilla-style command post.

"Sit. Behave yourselves and I take off the bindings.

"Now tell me why you're here."

Mike described his position as a reporter on the World Desk of the San Francisco _Sentinel_ and mentioned his part ten years earlier in ending the short but devastating nuclear exchange in the Persian Gulf. Suddenly, a light went on for the San Alonzon and he nodded.

"Yes, yes, I remember it was a reporter who did that. So it was you? _Madre de Dios_ , I am honored. Are you here to try and stop our war?"

"Look, I'd give my right arm to stop it, if there were anything I could do. But given the government we have back home, Kelcher and his people, I have no clout at all. So I'm just here to do what I told you, try to tell the truth. I'm sorry."

"No, no, do not be. It would be a miracle. But...."

The smallish man spun around almost gracefully, as if he had been a dancer or still was, and flopped into a large chair.

"Sit. I have to think," he said. "No wait." He directed one of his men to undo the ties so Mike and Arsembault could take their seats comfortably.

Less like a warrior now, the man had the appearance and made the gestures of a philosopher, perhaps a painter, and Mike suspected war was not his vocation but was something he had fallen into. Like so many other San Alonzons in these times.

"You want a story, do you?"

Mike fought the impulse to tell him that all he wanted at the moment was to live another day so he could see Jenny again. Instead, he said yes, of course he wanted a story.

"Then I have one for you. Upstairs, we have two CIA men. They are defectors. What do you think of that?"

"That would be worth something right there. Spooks hardly ever defect. That would be pretty rare. So what about this particular pair? What makes them a story?"

"Because they have something to say, something that we would like to see emerge. Do you want to talk to them?"

"Are you kidding? Hell yeah, I'd love to."

"Good. But only you then. Not the French one. Come."

Just like that, the guerrilla led down a corridor to where a ladder protruded through a hole in the ceiling, bringing to mind the Indian houses in pueblos back in the American Southwest.

Climbing up into the next level, Mike followed his escort down a long hallway where paint had become a long lost dream, stopping before a closed door at the end.

Somewhere, a baby cried and a guitar strummed a melancholy tune, both sounding as close as if they were in the hallway with him. The haunting melody seemed at once both out of place and perfect for this strange location and time. Again, Mike was assailed by a waking dream of having Jenny beside him, sharing this experience, and he blinked, to rid himself of the vision before it distracted him.

"Wait out here," the San Alonzon was saying. "I ask them, see if they will talk to you."

He was gone inside the room at the end of the hall for about five minutes.

"It is all right. They will at least meet you."

"That's a good start, I guess."

Inside, Mike found two men in blue jeans and olive drab T-shirts seated at a table, playing dominoes. They had the look of scholars gone to seed.

"You have a name?" the older of the two said before Mike had a chance to open his mouth.

"Mike Lansford. But I won't waste my time asking yours."

"Lansford, huh?" The younger one rubbed his chin, on which a fine stubble had grown. "He mentioned the war, Kuwait. Lansford, was that the name? It could have been. Yeah, I think so," he added, to his partner.

"Okay, it's worth a shot. We'll talk. Have a seat."

"Good, so you'll talk, but what are we talking about? He said you two were defectors. Aside from Agee, I couldn't name one other CIA defector. What am I to make of this?"

"So what are you saying, you don't want to talk to us? I thought a reporter'd drool over the prospects."

Mike told them that he was a little skeptical, adding that it was too easy, that they told the San Alonzons they were defectors and the guerrillas just accepted. "I guess I'm going to play devil's advocate and be a little harder to sell. Do you mind? Or should I play dumb and just take it all at face value?"

"Why don't you hear what we're selling, and then decide. Then you can do whatever the fuck you want with it, if they," he nodded at the closed door, but the meaning was clear, "let you go."

"Then give me a glimmer of the ground rules. He says you have something you'd like to see the light of day. Assuming that's true, are you going to tell me or do I have to get lucky and guess the right questions to ask? I'm not psychologically prepared to play mind games with two professional spooks. So how does this go?"

"A lot is going to depend on you. Like, what will you do with this? We aren't prisoners here, we're in a safe haven. We're free to go any time we want, but our life expectancy, outside of here, would be about five minutes. Since we can't show our faces, we want some kind of notion of what you'd do with this besides just writing a story.

"But based on your past, what I remember, if you're really that same guy, you have a reputation for trying to improve a situation you think needs it. Right? That's the only reason we'd level with you. Do you have the guts to hear this and do something with it?"

Mike pointed out the CIA man was essentially asking him to write a blank check. Then he told them that as far as his ability to use whatever they told him, because of the negotiations he had conducted to end the nuclear war in the Gulf, he had become personal friends with the president at the time, Lawrence Buckner. "He's still got a very big voice and I can put this in his hands, if it's really worth his time. So do you want to give me a shot at that or not?"

Some part of what he was saying seemed to reach the two CIA officers. Without conferring, they abandoned their game and pulled their chairs around to face him, nodding him to a seat on the low sofa behind him.

"This whole war's bogus," the older one said without further preamble.

"Well that's not an original idea, but I have to say you seem pretty definite about it."

"Damn straight. The whole frigging thing was set up by the airliner shootings, and that's what's phony, Lansford."

Mike managed not to betray his excitement, but inside, he was doing flips, sensing he was on the verge of a major find here.

"How's that phony? They were shot down, I should know, I stepped over bodies half-buried in the ground in San Diego. I could smell the roasted flesh, I had the stink on me for days. I puked my guts out. It was real. What makes that a scoop?"

"Oh fuck yes, they were shot down all right. And true, they were even shot down by San Alonzons, but it was set up, by our side. How the hell do you think they got hold of ground-to-air missiles inside the US?" the older man said.

"Listen to me, Lansford, we, him and me, were involved in placing the missiles in their hands. We were directed to see that they got them. We didn't know what was coming, we thought it would be a scare, a near-miss, to stir up a fire-storm, but not to take them down.

"But they knew. Somebody in the White House knew. They approved. That's what gave them the excuse to invade, Lansford, but it's for the oil, and another base on the edge of the Caribbean basin, not because of terrorism. It's being used again, as just an excuse to carry out another agenda. And what that is, we can't get a handle on."

The second man told Mike to look at everything that had happened since the airliner had been shot down. He pointed out all the goals the Kelcher administration had sought which they were able to achieve because of the renewed war on terrorism. "It was all done to facilitate it, by people in the administration. We even know the trail from us to a certain point high in the sky, someone inside the White House.

"Do you have the cojones to keep listening?"

Mike nodded. "Go on."

"Someone somewhere in the vicinity of the National Security Council ran the whole thing," the younger man said. "We haven't been able to pinpoint who it was and we don't have the proof you'd need to blow this open, but maybe you can find it, now that you know.

"The last name of the man who ran it begins with K. That's all we have. And there are several candidates, and no, it isn't Kelcher. He no doubt was in on it, but we're talking about the man who was the liaison between CIA and the White House."

"K. All right, that's a start."

"You don't seem surprised at what we're telling you," the other one said.

"Well what you wouldn't know is that the internet groups have made this issue a cottage industry, dozens of people who insist Kelcher benefited way too much from the shoot-downs for it to have just happened right when he needed them. As you pointed out. So it's not exactly a new idea. The only surprise is that I'm in the same room with people who know particulars. Okay?"

"Aha. Okay, that's interesting."

The second man told Mike that he had one more hint, assuming he truly intended to follow up on what they were telling him. "And mind you, we don't for a moment believe you or anyone else will ever find the smoking gun. But there's a woman in a safe house in Paris, with French intelligence, her name is Molly—she was one of us—who has defected, like we have, and that's all we'll say. And she has part of the key. She might be able to get you one piece closer."

"Molly," Mike said. "Okay. Anything else?"

"I can give you our boss's name on the op. Campion. He's a deputy division chief, operates out of Langley, so he doesn't show his face much. Doesn't have a cover organization, isn't out of any overseas station, that you can track down, and isn't directly inside the NSC. So you're not much likely to find anything, but you might get lucky, who the hell knows?"

The man shrugged, as if that was all he could say, but Mike wasn't ready to stop there. He pumped them for anything else he could extract, which wasn't much. They refused to even explain why they were in San Alonzo or from what station or base they had defected.

"So you walked when you realized you'd helped shoot down the jets?"

The older one sighed.

"I wish I could say so, but no. We didn't bail out until we caught on that we were the throw-away guys. Campion wanted the ones who knew too much to disappear, and we figured that out about a day ahead. I won't even tell you the horror story of getting out of there in the dead of night. It's been a picnic since then, compared. And don't ask us what we're going to do when our friends here can't protect us. I'll say that we're looking real seriously at Brazil, but getting there isn't going to be a lane strewn with rose petals."

Mike told them he wished he had some manner of help to offer but at the moment, he wasn't even sure how he would get out of the country alive. "Our ride seems to have gotten themselves bushwhacked," he added.

"So I hear. So maybe you'll be our guests for awhile."

"It could be. Maybe it's time for me to find out." Certain now there was no more to be learned here, he thanked the two men, shook hands, then knocked on the door.

The San Alonzon was waiting in the grimy hallway and greeted Mike now with a smirk.

"Are you satisfied?"

"Yeah, I think I got something. So what now?"

"We will arrange to let one of the Colombian trucks escape, and make sure they have no direction out but back to where they came from. We'll let you escape on the grounds that you're neutral reporters. You and the French one can go."

Mike and Arsembault had to remain in "custody" for the rest of the day while the San Alonzon's prepared the situation under which the single Colombian vehicle and driver would have no choice but return the Cartegena. But at least Mike had a plate full of the food that had smelled so wonderful, earlier.

Two days later, the truck set off from Libertad, heading back the other way.

Chapter Four

CARTAGENA, COLOMBIA

From the time they arrived at the hotel in downtown Libertad, Arsembault had asked Mike several times about what he had learned in his meeting with the CIA men. Mike answered each time that he would tell him when they were safely in a hotel in Cartagena.

Now, after a harrowing ride across the danger zone of the Guajira coast, safely ensconced in their Cartagena hotel room, Arsembault trotted out a bottle of wine and set it on the table. Then he again probed Mike for what he had gotten out of the CIA men.  
"I'm going to put you off a little longer, until I have a little more distance between me and that nightmare back there. Tomorrow, I guarantee it, I'll give it to you," he said, and to his surprise, Arsembault didn't press him.

Soon as Arsembault left, Mike called his immediate boss, Phil Bachelor, in San Francisco.

"Jesus, man, are you all right? Where are you?" Bachelor demanded.

"Cartagena. I'm sorry, I bailed out."

"Sorry, my ass. It's all over the news how a US tank shelled a hotel with reporters. Thank God you weren't there! You had me scared to death, man."

"They did? No, I had my own little adventure, but that makes me sick to hear it."

Bachelor asked if Mike were all right and he assured the other man he was all in one piece. "That's why I'm calling, Phil. I wanted to make sure you and Lex, and everybody else know I'm back safe."

"Oh man, thanks for checking in with us. What the hell's going on over there in that madhouse?"

"Well I have some thoughts on that subject but this isn't how or when I want to pass them along. But I had ulterior motives for calling.

"First, how is Ms. McGuire doing? Jenny?"

"Jenny? Oh man, Mike, that lady's an absolute peach. Hell, we don't even want you back, we're giving her your office and job and everything. She's the best thing since fresh butter."

"Oh, well thanks. But, seriously, she's doing good work?"

"Seriously, yes. I mean great work. I've already offered her a permanent job. But don't be an idiot, the last thing you need to worry about is your own job with us—"

"I'm not, Phil. I just want to know how she is. Is she happy, is she in good spirits?"

"What am I missing here? What's she to you?"

"I don't want to embarrass her, Phil, but the woman is everything to me. I want to know if she heard about the attack. I want her to know, without any fanfare, that I'm back here in Colombia with all my arms and legs. And let it be known I'll be home within the day, if I can catch a flight."

"Well my fucking god, you work fast. She walks in, and bang—"

Mike assured Bachelor that he had known Jenny since covering the airliner attacks and added the would tell him the rest when he got home. "Just make sure she hears I'm fine. Don't embarrass her, just make it subtle, but make it clear it's a message from me to her. Tell her I'll call her on the flight, she wants to pick me up."

"Oh. I see. Well that's a drag, I thought I'd take a shot at her myself.

"No, seriously, I'm happy for you. She's a fabulous lady—"

"I know, Phil—"

"I was going to say I'll pass my regrets to her for having the bad luck to be tangled up with a clod like you."

"Thanks buddy, I like you, too. Just tell her."

"Sure."

Now, with the personal issues set aside, Bachelor tried to worm anything out of Mike that he could tell him now. Mike made clear he was not about to speak of anything major on the phone, adding that the most important information was not in fact about the details of the war, receiving a predictably excited response.

"It's something gigantic," Mike added, deliberately teasing his boss.

"Okay, I'll be waiting. You just take care the rest of the way."

"That's easy. My big worry now is going to be avoiding hangover.

"See you soon."

With that done, Mike put his feet up, opened a beer and luxuriated in the freedom to fall asleep where he sat. And struggled with the desire to imagine that Jenny was lying beside him. In just a few hours, she would be back at the office and know the worst was over, he was on his way back. It made Mike smile to himself, something rare for him.

He heard the commotion out in the hall, but hell, this was Colombia, and it could be a party or a mugging, and either way, it was four in the morning and he had double locks on the door so he could just ignore it. Anything short of a full scale frontal assault wasn't going to stir him. But they had awakened him from a dream that somehow involved Jenny, and now he'd lost the train of it. He was angry to have to let it go, and yet relieved to not have to resist where the dream seemed to be leading.

He moved to the door and yelled through it.

"Knock it off out there!"

"Hey, _mon ami_ , come out and play!" It was Arsembault's voice and he sounded slightly tipsy.

"Go to bed, you drunken frog. I'm trying to sleep!"

"No, come out, I want you to meet somebody. Come on, you'll thank me."

Just to shut him up, so he could go back to sleep, Mike roused himself enough to wander over to the door and pop it open a crack, peering out, trying to look as grumpy and groggy as he could, which didn't take an Oscar performance.

"Yeah? Make it quick."

"Quick. All right, quick. You got it, Pal."

Something wasn't right. The French accent was gone. A foot hit the door, pushing it open and knocking Mike back into the room; suddenly three more men besides Arsembault were in there with him.

They worked fast and clean and there wasn't even time to be shocked. They bagged his head, cuffed his hands behind his back, then something hard and cold touched his temple and he assumed it was a gun. Smoothly, they walked him through the hotel and shoved him into the back of a vehicle. All the way, it was only Arsembault's voice he heard, and the "reporter" was clearly in charge, his French accent gone without a trace.

"Don't let him open his mouth, don't let anybody get close to him, from here on," Arsembault was saying. "Orders are that he should just disappear. As far as anybody's to know, this bastard's fallen into a black hole."

And those were the last words Mike heard for a week.

They offered him only four swallows of water, a couple of bites of sandwiches and two toilet stops over what he estimated to be twelve hours from the time they came through the door. In those twelve hours, Mike Lansford's world had apparently come to an end. In a bid to stay sane, and to occupy his mind, Mike spent a lot of time devising elaborate ways to murder the man he knew as René Arsembault.

How had they managed to infiltrate Arsembault, or whoever the hell he really was, into Mike's system of contacts? Was he CIA or FBI? Either way, he had obviously been quite frustrated not to join Mike's meeting with the Company defectors, or to hear what Mike had uncovered.

Well no doubt they would have it all out of him now.

In the hours and days to come, Arsembault or his colleagues would surely extract everything Mike knew, using any one of a dozen intriguing methods of interrogation. And then what? Mike did not dare let himself think about what came after that.

Where was he now? In Guantanamo, like the Islamic captives from Afghanistan, years ago, some of whom were still rumored to be there? All he knew was that they slung him into a very small cell, with virtually no features except a bed pan, a slot under the door, and a single light bulb locked up behind a protective screen, hanging from the ceiling.

At first, they left him there for hours, in heat that seemed to rise by the minute. To even try and sleep, he had to use his shirt for a pillow and his pants to cover his eyes from the heartless bulb that came to dominate his world. But there was very little sleep to be had.

Just because anything that broke the featurelessness of his existence was a blessing, Mike found it a relief when the door clanged open the first time. He didn't even flinch when two men entered and held guns to the side of his head.

"Go ahead, do it," he said in a voice made weak from thirst. "Just do it, save us all some trouble."

"Nope, you don't get off that easy, cowboy. Now get on your feet and come with us."

"And if I don't?"

"What we'll do is fill you up with about three thousand volts, then carry what's left. Now move!" Mike saw the electric shock-device in the second man's hand and obeyed.

So began the interrogations, although they asked him nothing while he was still conscious; instead, they stripped him down and injected something into his arm. That was all he knew until some time later, when he awakened from a sickeningly dizzy condition, and they walked him back to the cell and shoved him in. There, he lay on the floor and shivered for hours, finally falling back into a state of unconsciousness....

He assumed that they had extracted everything he knew. Then why did they come for him every day for what he estimated to be at least a week?

Some days, they physically tortured him, going so far as to attaching electrodes to his testicles, and they asked him the same questions again and again.

"What is the proof of the missile plan? Who are the contacts? Who is this 'Molly' and where is she in France?" they demanded.

"I don't know, I don't know, and I don't know." It was all he could say, but they were never satisfied. And surely they had already asked all this under the influence of the drugs, and would have only gotten the same answers. That convinced him that at this point, they were well past any kind of bona fide interrogation and were simply out to torture him.

Nevertheless, they asked every day, in a different manner, and Mike began thinking of how he could force them to kill him, so all this would go away. But they kept him too well-shackled to make a move against them, so like a carnival ride one had to endure to the end, he seemed destined to live through this hell until they got tired of it.

But what was the point of it all? They could have gotten away with executing the Taliban captives from Afghanistan after that war began, but they had not. They could do the same to him now, so why didn't they just do it and be done with it? Instead, as had been done to the prisoners in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, it seemed the perverse pleasure of the government to torment people out of sheer malevolence; there was no other explanation Mike could think of for it.

But one day, even the torture and interrogation stopped. They locked him in the room, and seemed to finally just throw him away. In a twisted sense, Mike found himself looking back with fondness to the time when they physically abused him, because it was not as bad as this total, boundless isolation. Surely this would end up driving him insane. Punishment, that was all it could possibly be. Punishment for what? For discovering the truth about the missile attacks? Or just for having gone to San Alonzo as an independent journalist? He could not figure it out.

So how high did the orders go that sentenced him to this hell? Kelcher? He imagined wrapping his hands around the president's throat and strangling the answers out of him. That became the third fantasy he used to make it through the endless days, along with loving Jenny and tearing every shred of flesh off of Arsembault's body.

Every day, he took one of those three notions and explored it as absolutely far as he could take it.

This was perhaps Mike's worst nightmare, eternal imprisonment, an apparent life sentence, with no way of knowing from one minute to the next if anyone were trying to free him, or could free him, or if his life would end here, x-number of years from now, long after he had gone insane.

In the second week, or what Mike calculated as the second week, because he no longer saw the sun or a clock, he begun plotting his own murder. By now, he was convinced he would never see Jenny again, and she would almost certainly be informed that he was dead, and what could she do but believe it? It would tear her up, Mike couldn't stand to even imagine how she would feel, it made him sick, it depressed him to the point of collapse.

Nevertheless, he could see only one way out, in a body bag, but there were no tools with which he could even kill himself. So they would have to do it for him. He only hoped Jenny never learned the truth of how his miserable life really ended.

BOOK II

BEFORE THE WAR
Chapter One

SOMEWHERE IN NORTHERN CALIFORNIA

This had once been gold country. Indeed, dotted along the hillside above, long exhausted mines still reminded one of an era when free men had no fear of a government that was for all intents and purposes as far away as the back side of the moon.

Wilmot O'Toole flopped into the hammock strung between a couple of towering hemlocks, just outside the front door of his castle.

Castle. Yes, this was a place where that mindset still prevailed—a man's home was truly his castle—a concept that had passed away for most men almost as long ago as the end of the placer mining era. But here, a stone's throw, or at least the flight distance of a thirty ought-six round from the sleepy town of Shady Cove, that era still hung bravely on.

But for how much longer? Shady Cove, a wide spot on the back-road from Sacramento to Lake Tahoe, was threatening to develop into a real town, and that bothered Wilmot O'Toole no end. O'Toole made his living as the proprietor of a survivalist outfitting service and he prided himself on living the lifestyle he promoted. Indeed, he was recognized as the natural leader of the loose survivalist network that operated throughout the hills from Placerville, to Auburn in the North, to Grass Valley, and as far south as Angels Camp.

But O'Toole's influence ended where it ran up against the territory under the sway of Reverend Brown's White Christian separatist outfit called The Nation of the New Order.

One day, there must surely be a reckoning with The Nation. And yet, at times, O'Toole wondered why that must be. Why shouldn't they work together for the larger purposes that both outfits held in common, carving out a niche where the US government held no tangible control and would never interfere in the simple, free lives of the people dwelling there?

Other times, he knew it was a pipe dream; for one thing, the government would never permit even one small enclave like this to exist for long without interference. Sooner or later they would come in here and destroy this way of life, and the bigger these groups grew, the sooner the feds would get wind of it and bring their black helicopters. And The Nation itself was a problem: its people weren't out merely to rid themselves of government, they were after power and control over everybody in the region—including O'Toole and his people—with or against their wishes.

In contrast, Wilmot O'Toole told himself and anyone else who would listen, his purposes were higher. Sometimes he even believed it himself.

Today, Wilmot had a guest. Seated on a log bench, Billy Campion swigged a beer and stroked Wilmot's dog Ranger, cocking an ear in the direction of small arms fire somewhere up the valley.

"Man, your boys are really working it, aren't they?"

"Oh yeah, they believe in staying proficient, that's for damn sure," O'Toole said. "But really, they just love to shoot. And God knows, I do encourage it. Hell, man, every round they fire is money for the kid."

"Yeah? Firing range fees?"

"No, we keep that free. But who do you think sells them the ammo?"

Campion grinned and raised his beer. "Well done. Sounds like your mama didn't raise any idiot, did she. I like that, it's a cool scam. Convince 'em to practice then sell 'em the goods. Then what happens when you get rich?"

"Oh, fat chance. Like I could care about getting rich, anyway. All I want is enough money to get my kids back. I hate like shit to have to deal with lawyers, but that's what it'll take."

"I get it. And maybe I can help some when the time comes.

"Willy, would you permit your old deputy to give you a little friendly advice: whatever you're going to do, you'd better get your ass in gear."

Wilmot didn't like the tone of Campion's voice. He sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the hammock.

"What's that mean?"

"I didn't come here just to drink up your beer or breathe up your air, Dude. I've got some intelligence that might make you sit up and pant."

"Yeah? Like what?"

"The information we have says Kelcher has convinced himself the time has come to neutralize Russia once and for all."

"'Neutralize'? How? You and I both know that could mean a lot of things. But I don't see a lot of ways to 'neutralize' Russia without...well, World War III. Tell me you're not talking about that."

"I'm talking about that, Buddy. Come on, we also both know it's always been coming. Cold War or not, it was always foreordained. There would always be the fight for all the marbles, and it has to come now. Soon. Always over the oil."

"Are you serious, you're saying Kelcher's really got the balls to go for it?"

"I guarantee you that's not even a question," Campion said. He added that a reason existed for President Kelcher believe he could attack Russia without a risk to the United States. "I'll explain later, but accept that as gospel. So look ahead: when Russia's off the table, he turns to Europe and tells them to surrender or they'll get some of the same.

"This is it, this is the play we've always seen coming, when the one superpower—that's us—takes over the world. American Exceptionalism taken to the end game."

O'Toole told Campion that he was certain he was missing some vital information, because the other man was making nuclear war sound like a virtue.

"I never signed onto the American Exceptionalism game in the first place," he added. "As far as I'm concerned, it's bad enough that the government is so fucking all powerful here at home, but you're talking about a monolith over the whole goddamn world. Why're you happy with it? I thought we were on the same page about this."

"You're just accepting, then, that Kelcher's going to come through it, that we're going to come through it unscathed. Why?"

"You did miss something. You missed the part where I said Kelcher believed he could attack Russia and get away scott-free. I said 'believed.' Why would you think he could do that? That we could do that?"

"You're so damn sure Kelcher's going to come through this untouched. You seemed willing to just accept it. Why?"

Wilmot shrugged.

"The Missile Defense Shield. All of a sudden, they stopped talking about it. There's only two reasons for that: the lefties were right and it's impossible...or it's ready and waiting for anybody stupid enough to take a shot, and they don't want the details to even hint to the Russians how to duplicate it. So there's a fair-to-middling chance that if we push Russia, and they go, we'll wipe them out and not break a sweat. And my money's on that scenario."

"Well that, my friend, is the proverbial catch in all this. Kelcher's an idiot, which we all know, but he's also been deked out of his socks. His handlers have convinced him the Missile Defense Shield is going to save his ass. He believes the same bullshit you do, that anything the Russians manage to get off the ground will be stopped."

Campion confirmed that the President Kelcher was being informed that the Nuclear Defense Shield was perfected to the order of ninety-nine point seven percent, when in fact, the test data had all been "fudged."

"They always do that, on everything, from pencil sharpeners to mega-warhead systems," Campion added. "You want to know the truth? The thing's only sixty-seven percent effective. Do you know what that means?"

"I think I can figure that out. Something like, on average, out of every hundred warheads they launch, about thirty-three get through. So the question comes down to how many will they get off? How many do they have left?"

"It's in range of two hundred they're projected to get off in this scenario. No longer thousands. If that holds, you're looking at sixty-some-odd hits. Lot of them against hardened launch sites, so the cities won't be hit as bad as that. It'll be ugly, but not like the Cold War estimates of an Armageddon."

"You're saying they'd risk it, put up with that amount of damage. Is that what you're trying to sell me, Billy?"

Something in Campion's eyes gave Wilmot O'Toole a cold chill. And considering that it was coming from Billy Campion, that was cold. Of all the people under O'Toole's command, Campion had been the one who killed the easiest and seemed to love it. The old dime-store novel description of "dead, cold eyes of a killer" never fit anyone better than Bill Campion. Slickly good looking, and oily of tongue, Campion could talk his way in just about anywhere, and for a moment, a strange moment of fear, Wilmot had the sensation that somehow he had let the enemy inside his door. The enemy. Billy.

But that disorienting moment passed and Campion became an ordinary mortal again. Calmly, as if describing a baseball game he'd watched the night before, Billy Campion revealed to O'Toole the master plan of the Kelcher government. As it unfolded through Campion's words, O'Toole slipped out of the hammock and wandered across the grass, staring into the hills, in the direction of the firing.

"What do you say?" his erstwhile deputy commander asked him.

"If it's true, it's absolutely mind blowing."

"Of course it is. And it's true. I thought you deserved a heads-up. But listen, Willy, if you want me to keep you on top of things, you have to treat this as Top Secret, along with whatever else I bring you about it. Understood?"

Wilmot nodded.

"You know I can keep my mouth shut. But can you do one thing for me when you go back over there to Palo Alto?"

"Well it depends, of course. I can't promise just anything but let's hear it."

O'Toole asked him to execute a computer run back at his think tank concerning the war scenario in works and the danger of nuclear winter. "Do that and get back to me with it, okay? Nuclear winter would kill us, here. We couldn't handle it up here, it's the thing I'm most afraid of."

"Believe me, we're already working on that. I'll bring you the results soon as I can. Obviously I can't transmit any of this, it has to be totally face-to-face. And I can't slip out and run over here every week."

"No, that wouldn't be good. Do what you can and not compromise yourself."

"Right.

"Anything else?"

"Nope. That's all my business. Now let's get wasted!"

Wilmot put Campion up for the night, aware that Billy was used to much better housing back in the Bay Area. But he also knew Campion was a campaigner. As young officers, company commander and deputy, they had been tent mates in the Iraq war and certainly Wilmot's place up in the woods was much better than those quarters had been.

Campion stayed for two days then said he must head back to Palo Alto and the moment he was gone, Wilmot O'Toole called together his "staff" for a meeting there at the house.

"I want the men training day and night and ready to mobilize at a moment's notice," he told his field leaders.

"If something pops near-future, the first order of business is to open up the prison at Folsom and liberate those people. We can use them. I mean...you know which ones I mean. The white ones. I think they'll thank us, and for food and lodging they'll do a job for us. The second move is to overrun Mather Air Force Base in Sacramento and seize their ground gear. And after that, Sacramento will be ours in short order.

"And we'll probably run into trouble from Reverend Brown's little flock over east of here. When we do, I want them subdued, and then I want whoever's left of them to join us.

"Let's go to work."

When his staff dispersed, Wilmot picked up the telephone and began making contacts across the west. He knew the names of other leaders like himself and subtly

passed the word that something "big" might be "popping" soon. They were all aware he had links to a strong intelligence source and when he made a prediction like that, it was something they must listen to.

But he also had to be careful. His wasn't the only similar force in this region—besides The Nation, other extremist outfits operated all over the foothills of the Sierras, and they would all be jockeying for power in the event of a paralyzing nuclear war.

There were other forces similar to his that were conservative and survivalist in ideology, but not nearly as doctrinal as The Nation and the likes, and those, he wanted to ally with. He must soothe them, convince them they were all allies, for otherwise, if this big war Campion described actually came off, O'Toole could find himself fighting on at least three fronts before he fired his first shot.

However if he used all his Special Forces organizational skill, he could bring all these smaller armies together to become the primary force of control and power in California. And after that...well he didn't yet allow himself to dwell on the possibilities.

Chapter Two

The compound was well known to the authorities between Lake Tahoe and Sacramento. It was surrounded by a double fence topped with concertina wire and many likened it in appearance to a minimum security prison. At times, human rights and anti-racist groups marched outside the fencing, but they were always greeted by "skinhead" commandos armed with automatic rifles taking up very menacing postures just inside.

Often one could hear the rat-a-tat of small arms fire somewhere among the trees, and it was known that guerrilla and paramilitary groups received training there. But down the road near Shady Cove, a similar outfit carried on the same way, under the command of a certain Wilmot O'Toole and no one paid it such attention, because it did not openly espouse a racist mantra.

The Nation's leader was a man who called himself The Reverend Brown; his diocese was the Church of Simplification. And the name was meant to be taken literally: the day when the United States became All-White and Christian, everything would be much simpler, he said to all who would listen.

Today, the Rev had called a meeting of his inner circle.

"I've become privy to some interesting, and what some might call disturbing news. Although I'm not sure it's really so 'disturbing' at all. For us, anyways.

"It comes to me that the president plans to nuke the Russians and Chinese, once and for all. This is reliable enough intelligence that I'm going to recommend you set up your people for action."

Brown told his people that if the war actually happened, he wanted the main roads from Tahoe, Carson City, Nevada, and the freeway coming west from Truckee cut off to prevent anybody flooding their area from farther east.

"I don't want any influx of people trying to get into our area and use up our grits and fill up our land. The same goes in the opposite direction. I want our area closed entirely to outsiders by vehicle from the west. If anybody makes it on foot, that's fine, we can use the bodies. Especially if they're darker than we are. That's what those kinds of people were put on earth to do, to work for people like us.

"Next, I recommend that you create families if you ain't got 'em. We're gonna need to produce, we're going to need to expand, because as we take property, we're going to want the next generation to be even larger and stronger in number than we are now. So if you ain't married, try to get that way and if you are, go home and poke the little lady and give her another baby.

"And pass the word to your groups."

Brown let them know that he had written up specific mobilization orders, and that his first interest was to neutralize the survivalist network under Wilmot O'Toole.

"He's bound to go after Sacramento, if it isn't wiped out, and he's welcome to it. For now. Let him do the work, then we'll take it away from him when we're ready. And then we'll be the power of Northern California, and then some."

Brown suggested that his people should bring in any of O'Toole's who saw the good of joining The Nation, and eliminate all others in the other outfit.

"As far as work, per se, is concerned, the minute the first bomb falls, there ain't any more. From that second on, your only obligation is to the Lord and The Nation, because there won't be any more such thing as work for pay. Drop your jobs like a rock and muster in your forces and let's go on the offensive.

"Any questions?"

The response was a chorus of "No Sir, Reverend!" But then one hand rose.

"Yeah?"

A man named Skip Slade stood and respectfully bowed his head. "I got one, Reverend."

"Well spill it, son."

"How soon is this expected?"

"Uncertain. Today, tomorrow, next Christmas. Don't think in terms of when. Assume it could come down any minute and act accordingly and you can't go wrong, get it?"

"Yeah, sure. I can do that."

"Great. Then unless there's any more questions, let's get to it."

No one had anything else to say or ask and so Reverend Brown dismissed the meeting.

Reverend Brown's source of information on the threat of nuclear war was one William Campion. Wilmot O'Toole's good friend and former deputy in the army, who claimed to work for a think tank, had other affiliations as well. While he was supposedly returning to Palo Alto, as he told O'Toole, he instead had immediately driven east to the compound of The Nation and met with Reverend Brown.

Along with the information Brown had passed on to his people, Campion had brought something more tangible than just words and warnings.

"Come out here and take a look," he had told Brown. "I've been visiting friends who are concerned that you hold your own. Our brothers in the South haven't forgotten you up here. You're our bulwark in this corner of the country."

He led Brown out to his recreational vehicle, which hauled behind it a smaller trailer that would appear to casual observers to be a camper.

Popping the top off to the side, Campion revealed an interior packed with weapons, ammunition, and explosives.

"This came off the black market. They're all yours, go ahead and hand them out. Now I've told you before what my friends would like for you to do. Primary goal is to take Reno and Carson City early on. Other friends of ours will go after Boise, and over time, together, you can move on Salt Lake City. That's as far east as you should extend yourself, working together with the others."

Campion assured the reverend that people of a like mind to him in the area around Denver would secure the mountain states. Brown was not to worry about anything bigger, Campion told him, until after the bombing had come and gone and he could assess the level of damage.

Brown, however, indicated that he was not sure he wanted to expand from his area, other than to Sacramento.

"Why?"

"Problem is, we're content enough just having Northern California. What's this stuff about Utah? I don't want to get in no scraps with the Mormons. We just want our area, all white and all ours."

Campion was patient, explaining that Brown would not be expected to personally leave his area. "You'll be getting reinforcements, enough people for you to stay here, yourself, but also to send people out there, to take more control. You don't have to hold it, just take it, and others will come join you and share the whole thing with you. Is that something you'd interested in?"

"Well, yeah, I s'pose. Sure. As long as we're completely left alone here. Just so we don't get any blacks or Jews in here, except ones we can put to work at the point of a gun. You guarantee it'll be that way?"

"It'll be that way, Reverend."

"Well, then okay."

But now, with that part of his concerns satisfied, Reverend Brown, who barely knew anything about it, brought up the missile shield. "Isn't it supposed to prevent all this? Won't it protect Kelcher and the rest of the country?"

"It's supposed to, but it isn't good enough to do that. Trust me, when the shit begins to fall, the country's going to be ripe for our kind of people to create the Christian Nation. You've picked your name well. You may haven chosen the name for the whole country, when this is over."

"Well then, Hallelujah."

"Yes, Hallelujah.

"Now, I've got to get back where I'm expected to be," Campion told him. "I don't figure to see you again until long after the big game is under way. Good luck and good hunting."

"Thank you sir," Reverend Brown said. He shook hands and Campion climbed behind the wheel, heading east, to take the longer route back to Palo Alto through Truckee and Donner Pass because he couldn't afford to be spotted by O'Toole's people coming from the wrong direction after having met and armed his enemies.

Chapter Three

Skip Slade didn't like the government or the president any more than Wilmot O'Toole did. But Kelcher had done Slade and his colleagues a huge favor. Despite tremendous cries of anguish from environmentalists, the corporation-friendly Kelcher administration had managed to open up vast tracts of forest in areas of Northern California formerly off-limits areas to logging. And logging was Skip Slade's world.

However, the largesse sent his way by Kelcher did not endear the president to him a lick. To Slade, all this was his due, so Kelcher was only giving him what was his. And even so, he reviled the president as a hateful symbol of government, which, like O'Toole, Slade detested with every fiber of his being.

If there was one other thing Skip Slade hated, it was all the dusky people of the country. For Slade, the answer of course was to create a whole section of the country where nobody but White Christian folks would be allowed to settle. "Separatist" was a word he knew, only because it was preached at him by Reverend Brown. Slade was not conscious that the notion of a white separatist nation had been the dream of men like him for decades. To Slade, it seemed the freshest idea on the planet.

Skip Slade lived in a world more closed off to the outside than Wilmot O'Toole could ever hope to achieve. With no link to the news, and no interest in having one, Slade was not privy to advance knowledge of the confrontation growing between East and West, and would have had no comprehension of what had spawned it if he heard. As a matter of fact, all these years later, he still had only a sketchy notion of what the short, terrible nuclear war in the Persian Gulf had been about or who had been involved.

Practically speaking, Skip Slade knew no more of the outside world than he learned in the weekly harangues from Reverend Brown.

Unaware of the relationship between The Rev and Campion, or even of Campion's existence, Skip Slade spent the rest of the day after the latest meeting with Reverend Brown, preparing his own unit for action, and then that night, he undertook the other challenge Brown had issued.

Just as there was only one cafe in Silverdale, a tidy little establishment called Judy's Axe, there was only one night spot in town, and it did not even have a name, because it was off the road and not open to anybody save those who knew about it. But in Silverdale, that was where virtually everyone gathered on a night off.

Sometimes there was a live band, sometimes just the juke box. Tonight, a foot-stomping country outfit from somewhere over in Nevada was kicking up the sawdust at the front of the place when Skip walked in.

He hoped she would be there tonight, and his hope was rewarded. Way in the back, there she was, seated at a table made of hewn oak, with a couple of friends, all of them laughing and almost hugging their tall beers. Skip had to work his way around the people dancing vigorously at the front before he could reach her table.

"Could I have a little talk with you?" he said.

She looked up at him and blinked a couple of times.

"Now? Hell, man, we just got here. Why don't you pull up a chair, buy us a round and then we can talk later on?"

"Sure. Ladies?" He dipped his head to the other two, receiving tacit permission to sit.

But once sitting, Slade struggled to make conversation and the three women mostly ignored him, going on with their own talk, while the music made it difficult to hear anything they said anyway.

Off and on, other men came up and stole all three away for dances, and Slade wished to hell he could dance. But he waited, and finally the latest set ended and the three women returned, plopping down in their chairs.

"Now?" he said and the woman he addressed shrugged and followed him out into the cricket-chirping darkness.

"Okay, what's all this?" she demanded.

She wasn't attractive. For the purposes at hand, it didn't matter—Skip Slade would never land a good looking woman, he had resigned himself to that a long time ago—but this was a good woman, sturdy, a hard worker, just the kind of woman he, and The Nation, needed. And he liked her well enough.

"Look, I'm getting along, a little older, you know, and we've known each other since we were born, practically. I've got a nice place, we could...you know, kids, a family—"

"What are you trying to say? Holy crap—Skip Slade, are you trying to propose to me? Is that what you're trying to do? Is it?"

He looked down at his feet, running hands over his shaved head.

"Well, yeah."

"And you're serious."

"Yeah, sure."

"Look at me. Look at me, goddamn it! Are you nuts? Are you fucking crazy? Jesus Christ, Slade, you're the most uncouth son of a bitch in this valley. So all of a sudden you get a hair up your ass you want to get married and make kids. And you pick me. My God. That's not an honor, it's an insult.

"Let me save you some trouble. You're too well known around here, there ain't one woman who'd even shack up with you for the winter, let alone carry your brats. If you're serious about suddenly having to have a wife, you'd better go up to Truckee, or down to Shady Cove, where you ain't known, cause you ain't gonna find nothing in this valley. You get it?"

"Uh...."

"Then I'll make it a little plainer: I wouldn't let you even hold my hand if you were the last man on earth. Any questions?"

Skip Slade scuffed at the dirt and didn't know how to answer this.

"Look, I...I'm sorry for asking. Can we still be friends?"

Something about that amused the woman. She let a little grin play on her lips and with a finger under his chin, tipped his head up to look at her.

"You'd still be friends after that?"

"Well, yeah. It ain't the same thing, friends, girlfriends. It don't matter. Yeah, friends."

"Well you sure got a thicker skin than I imagined. Sure. Friends. Long as you keep your friggin' hands off me."

"Okay, thank you." He stuck out his hand and she shook it, then turned him around and headed him back inside, draping an arm over his shoulder and walking him back to her table.

"Somebody oughta take pity on you one day and teach you to dance," she said, before the music got too loud to talk any more.

But he had failed in obeying The Rev's order and in the whole region, there was no other woman he could even consider, and even if there were, Skip Slade was not sure he was up to facing another rejection like this, thick hide or no. So for now, he gave up, ashamed to have failed his leader's wishes.

However he would damn sure do the other part, he would prepare his men for the new world to come, if the bombs actually fell, and thinking about that, he felt better.

BOOK I CONTINUED
Chapter Five

FOUR MONTHS BEFORE THE WAR

SAN FRANCISCO

The few hours together with Mike had been for Jenny the best times of her life. And most bittersweet.

They had agreed not to try to stay in touch while he was gone, so not having heard from him, while difficult, had been understandable. Then came reports about the shellings of the hotel in Libertad and for a couple of days she lived in limbo. And fear. Yet she had no reason to even believe he was in the same city.

She walked in one morning to wonderful news.

"I talked to the knucklehead last night," Phil Bachelor told her. "He's fine. He was nowhere near that hotel, and he's back safe in Cartagena and by now, ought to be in the air coming home. He said he'd call you from Miami and let you know when he's coming in."

"Wonderful! Thanks, Phil. You've made my day. No, my week. Any estimate when he's coming in?"

"Absolutely none. I don't know what flight he's taking, when it leaves, or anything. Just keep your phone close by, that's all I can say."

She spent the rest of the morning walking on air, but when night came and there was no call, she ate dinner alone and sat up waiting.

By morning, she was beginning to be frantic. But she wasn't alone. Bachelor was pacing the floor of his office when she checked in.

"I don't know. Nothing. I've...Jenny, I've checked all the airlines, all the sources, everything, and there's been no crash reported. I don't know who to contact down there, he was the only one I was in touch with. I just have no idea how to look for him."

"We've got to do something," she said.

"Jenny, I didn't want to get personal about this, but I didn't know you and Mike were...well whatever you call your relationship, I didn't know until he told me from Cartagena. I'm very happy for both of you, and if I'd already have known, I can't think of anything I would have done differently. So now, with him not showing up, I'm a little at a loss at what to say...to help.

"But if there's anything I can do—"

Jenny told him he could make calls. She asked if she had heard right, that Mike was in Cartagena when he called and if Bachelor had any idea what hotel where Mike had been staying.

"Nope. Nothing but the name of the French guy he was working with. Some independent news agency. I can try."

"Try! Let's do it."

"All right, I'll try."

And so the odyssey began. Over the rest of the day, and several days that followed, Phil Bachelor and Jenny McGuire worked every lead they could find searching for the whereabouts of Mike Lansford.

The trail ended with terrible abruptness four days later. Jenny looked up, around two in the afternoon, to find a red-eyed Phil Bachelor standing over her desk.

"Oh God, what?"

"Will you come to my office?"

Jenny could barely stand and her legs threatened to wobble out from under her over the course of the walk down the length of the room, and she only made it to a chair in Bachelor's room by seconds before she would have collapsed to her knees. She was already sobbing behind her hand when he pulled up a chair and sat by her, squeezing her shoulder.

"Mike knew former President Buckner, because of his part in ending that war in the Gulf ten years ago. Buckner keeps his ears to the ground still, and receives CIA briefings periodically, as every ex-president has the right to do. I've talked to him a couple of times and he knew Mike worked here.

"He called me this morning. The CIA reported that Mike had met with a couple of 'renegade' DO officers outside of Libertad, and in a raid by the Army, they were all killed. I'm sorry. They won't do anything about releasing his...remains or anything. Or any other details.

"I don't know what happened, he must have gotten a hot lead after he called me and went back. Or maybe he was there and couldn't dare tell me, maybe he wasn't in Colombia at all. Maybe he was under duress or something. Something about it's phony, but I can't get a handle on it.

"I asked Buckner to find out more if he could. He said he'd try."

Jenny couldn't move. It hadn't set in yet, Mike was dead, all the happiness she had been waiting for, his return, their life together, all of it, gone.

Bachelor let her stay there, but he went into action, making calls that were only background blurs to her heartache. He sent his secretary in to watch over her, but it was a couple of hours before Jenny could stir.

When she did, however, she asked if Bachelor could link her up with Lawrence Buckner.

"Tell him I was Mike's fiancée. I'd like to talk to him. Can you?"

"He said get in touch if I needed to. Sure."

Jenny listened while Bachelor made the call, and after about ten minutes of waiting, he had the former president on the line and made the explanation of who Jenny was. Then he handed the phone over.

"Mr. President?"

"You can call me Larry, Dear. I'm so sorry for your loss. I'm sick over it, myself. Mike was a great friend, and I'm livid over this atrocity. Is there anything I can do to help?"

"Yes, I want them to make this whole thing transparent, and I want him retrieved. I want to know everything and I want to make the world know what's going on down there. That's why he went...why he died. I want accountability. So anything you can do along those lines...including the issue of these so-called renegade CIA people he died with.

"I know I'm asking a lot, but you asked me what you could do. You can't bring him back, but anything else you can do will be appreciated."

"Then can I have a number to reach you directly?"

Jenny gave him her cell number and her home number.

"I'm already working my contacts, but I'll work it harder still and get something back for you, Jenny. I can't say anything that'll make your loss easier, but the first opportunity, I'd like to meet you."

"Thank you. For everything."

"Well it's literally the least I can do."

When she hung up, Jenny sat back and bawled her eyes out. Then she left the building and for hours, walked through town, until exhausted, then returned to the _Sentinel_ for her car and drove home, collapsing in bed but unable to sleep.

The call came at two in the morning.

"Jenny McGuire."

"It's Larry. Jenny, be calm, take a deep breath. He's alive."

She dropped the phone and shrieked, but just as quickly picked it up.

"Where? I'll be there!"

"He's out there in California. But there's a reason I told you to be calm. He's in prison, labeled an enemy combatant, and he may be there awhile. I mean up to years. I'll work to get him out, but I have zero clout with the Kelcher Administration and it may come down to publicity.

"I do have one other possibility. Senator Carver, but please, don't count on anything with that, until I talk to him and see what he can do. He's from Kelcher's party."

Buckner told Jenny that he still lacked details but that he was about to catch a helicopter to Milwaukee. "I'll be out there some time tomorrow. First thing tomorrow, you and Phil need to go to your paper's legal department and start a suit to force them to release him on the grounds of freedom of the press, and also the well-established right of American citizens accused of being enemy combatants to have council.

"I'm talking to my own legal people looking at all the power that can be brought to bear on this. One thing."

"Yes?"

"Do not go public with this yet. The last thing we want to do is harden them against this. Right now, they have no idea anybody knows or cares about a reporter in prison as an enemy combatant. We don't want to give them ideas or advance warning until we talk to all the experts we can find."

Buckner told Jenny he would see her the next day and would call her when he had landed.

"Oh Lord, I'm so happy he's alive, no matter where he is. Thank you so much for telling me."

Buckner advised Jenny to try and get some sleep because she would need all her resources to fight for Mike's freedom. "This is going to be a long, uphill fight, I think."

And it was long: six weeks, with all Jenny's time and energy devoted to fighting for Mike's freedom. That morning, after Lawrence Buckner's call, she woke Phil Bachelor up with the happy yet disturbing news. First thing, at the paper, she and Bachelor rousted out the paper's legal team, and the fight was on.

Chapter Six

SOMEWHERE IN NORTHERN CALIFORNIA

For the first time in what seemed like weeks, but might have only been days, the door clanged, the sign they were coming in. As much as he hated the guards, Mike was almost excited to have something new happen, even if it led to bad results, as it always did. Worse than physical mistreatment, it was boredom and despair that had all but destroyed his mind; anything that stimulated it would be a blessing, even torture.

He jumped to his feet, already standing by the time all the interlocks had been activated and the two usual guards entered.

"Get back, sit down, asshole, I'll zap the living shit out of you," the lead guard told him.

"Why don't you turn it up all the way and do us all a favor," Mike responded. "Then explain how you lost control and killed your prisoner. Go ahead, do it."

"It won't be us, our pure hands won't be stained, however much we might enjoy it. But we are authorized to hurt you a lot along the way. If that's what you're up for, we're your men. So shall we start breaking things now or will you come along quietly?"

"This should be interesting. What now?"

"You come with us, but first, you put on these," the guard said, and for the first time, Mike noticed that they had dragged in heavy chains. If it meant leaving this place, Mike was willing to put up with the manacles.

At their direction, Mike shuffled to the exit, the shackles dragging, weighing him down like the gravity of a heavy planet. At the door, he craned his head out, the first time he had been allowed even that much freedom since the isolation had begun. He found that after so much time in the twelve foot room, the outside corridor seemed too big and for a moment he suffered a wave of disorientation and had to close his eyes. But when he didn't move fast enough, one of the guards pushed him with a booted foot and he stumbled over the raised sill of the door and almost sprawled in the hallway. But with a tug on the chains, the guard jerked him upright.

"Clumsy bastard."

Shambling along, Mike kept his eyes closed to mere slits, until he could accustom himself to the long view down the hall. He paid no attention to the pointed cracks passed between the two guards about "dead man walking," and the "last mile." Given that he had already faced the fact that death was his friend, nothing about that in their ugly banter could scare him. It was premature to imagine how they might kill him when the order came down, but he could hope it would be a bullet to the brain when he wasn't looking.

Once beyond the entrance to the usual interrogation chamber, Mike had entered new territory within the prison. Down a short section of a hallway off to the left his tormenters arrived at a door different from all the others in this high security section. To pass through required both keys and an electric switch operated by somebody out of sight, but the door only led to another short corridor with no features other than an identical door at the other end.

Mike stood in place before this door, waiting for it to open, no doubt upon yet another corridor, or another chamber where they could harass him or torture him further.

The heavy ask of hauling the chains along had dulled his mind to the sequence of operations leading to each door opening. Staring straight ahead at the latest barrier, when it rolled out of his way, for a moment Mike did not realize what he was seeing in the blackness before him. Not until a slight breeze fluttered in, bringing the smell of mown grass did it hit him: outside, in the night.

The guards stepped outside, leaving Mike in place just inside for a moment, with no instructions. Wondering if they would shoot him if he tried to escape, he took a step forward, careful to lift his foot over the still, and for what might be the last time, savored the out of doors. Instantly, the vastness of the scene, even in the night overwhelmed him and he closed his eyes, wondering if he would even hear the blast of gunfire that killed him.

A noise out of his view made Mike jump, the firing up of an engine. He opened his eyes to see a van backing up to the door. The junior of his two guards stepped out and opened the rear doors.

"Go on, get the fuck in," the other guard told him. In no hurry, Mike moved in slow, shambling steps, taking in the openness, the tiny hint of freedom for as long as he could, the crackling light of stars, the dim glow of the moon through wisps of cloud.

"Goddamn you, go!" The lead guard clubbed Mike on the shoulder, sending him into a stumbling lurch that ended when he fell had first into the van, unable to regain control of his weighted feet. The second guard grabbed the chains and hoisted them up, causing him to roll up in a ball when the hatch closed behind him.

The guards climbed into the front seats and in seconds, roared away.

For ten minutes, the van cruised on. The cargo section had no seats so Mike had to brace himself against the side, noticing that a solid bulkhead separated him from the men up front. At least they could not taunt him, and his long stint in isolation made it easy to manage being alone, even in a moving isolation cell.

Before he could clear his head enough to try and imagine where this would end, the van suddenly sped up, until it seemed to be roaring along at a hundred miles an hour and Mike hoped that when they wrecked it, as they were bound to do at this rate, his two oppressors would also be killed. The notion was absurd, of course, surely they had no intention of committing suicide, but still the blazing speed and the way the van seemed to glide on the road became terrifying, even for someone who was willing to die rather than remain locked up forever.

The wild careen ended in a sudden skidding stop, the vehicle skewing sideways, sending Mike against tumbling and rolling against the opposite wall, then back, then forward. Any second, the van would roll and Mike would break his neck, but instead, the action began slowing, then finally all motion was stopped altogether.

Outside doors slammed, voices called over loudspeakers and a shot was fired.

The lead guard yelled an oath that Mike could hear through the bulkhead. The van lurched forward, impacted something at low speed then tried to back up, and hit something else. Mike heard the front doors open and slam shut again, someone banged the side of the van, one more shot was fired, then the back door opened.

Mike sat up and bright lines blinded him. He clenched his eyes tightly shut, wondering if he would have time to perceive the muzzle flashes that would put him out of his misery....

"Well, do you want to spend the rest of your life in there?" a voice said. "Come on out.

"You! Which of you assholes has the keys? Unlock these shackles, goddamn it."

"Kiss my ass," was the answer and Mike recognized the voice of the lead guard.

"Here, I'll get it," someone else said. "Here it is. Come over here, pal, let's get you out of this."

Mike worked his way to the edge of the van, kicking his legs to overcome the drag of the chains, until one of the still-almost invisible men behind the flashlights could reach the locks with the key. "Here we go, that's one. Now your hands."

When the manacles dropped off, Mike gasped in relief. But who had him now and why did this take place...out in the middle of nowhere?

"Can you stand and walk?" the apparent rescuer said.

"Think so." Mike slid off the aft end of the van, onto his feet, surprised at the sense of lightness the absence of the chains presented him. "I feel like I'm in zero gee. But yeah, I'm okay. So what now? Who're you, and what's going to happen?"

"You're going for a ride, and that's all I can say. Come on."

In the background, he heard arguing, swearing and threats between his erstwhile guards and his rescuers...or new guards, whichever proved true. He could make out three vehicles besides the van, and the more ordinary car he was being directed to enter, but outside of that, it was pitch black all around and he assumed this drama was taking place on a highway far from civilization. He did not even know what state he was in.

"Go on, get it, we've got a long ways to go," one of the newcomers on the scene told him. "There's some water and a sandwich and a couple of soft drinks in a cooler in the back. If you need a piss stop or something we'll pull over when we get away from these goons a little ways."

"I'm fine. If you're taking me away from them, let's just go."

"Hah! I kind of thought you'd see it that way. Just don't pee in my car."

One of the pair opened the rear door of the sedan and soon as Mike was seated, the two men took up their places in the front and the car backed a little way off the highway and turned around, soon to roar back in the other direction, but at a pace somewhat less terrifying than the ride he had just lived through.

Mike just sat in place for the first few miles, too stunned to do anything but ride along and calm down. He refused to believe he was safe, even when the men up front turned on a radio and made conversation between them about sports events and other minor subjects. Mike decided not to try and force answers out of them as long as they ignored him.

After a few miles, he dipped into the cooler and found one of the soft drinks.

"Anything, guys?"

"Naw, I'll just have to go if I do. Have at it. Better eat, too, it's a long one."

"Sure."

He found the sandwiches and suddenly realized he was starved for something beside the gruel they'd been serving him in the prison. When his stomach was satisfied, and his thirst assuaged, he decided to try to get some answers after all.

"All right, I appreciate your help, but what's the deal? If I've been recruited into the Mafia or something, maybe we'd better talk about it, eh?"

"No. We've got orders to transport one individual named Lansford. We don't have orders to talk about it. You'll get whatever they want to tell you at the other end."

"So where's the other end?"

"Where we stop."

"I'm not laughing back here. But all right, if that's how you want to play it, I hope you don't mind if I curl up and sleep."

"Makes us no never mind. We might pull in for a cup of coffee later. You want in on it or sleep?"

"Coffee would be good."

"You got it."

Before he tried to rest, Mike took a long look out the rear window, both shocked and pleased to see no vehicles of any kind. He closed his eyes and slumped in the seat, finally stretching out as much as he could. He wanted to think good thoughts, but none of this worked out in his mind as anything except some kind of federal shenanigans.

Most likely he was caught up in a turf war and would just end up in some other locked-down facility. Mike had never known exactly who held him in the first place and had no better idea who these goons were, and supposed it didn't matter. The only wild card in it all was their relative decency, the consideration of food and drink, the lack of manacles, and their seeming animosity toward his original guards.

The one thing Mike did not permit himself to think about was Jenny. Not yet, not until he knew more.

Hands on his shoulder shook him awake.

"Oh, coffee stop?"

"Sorry, we let you slept through it. This is the end of the road. Out you go."

"Uh oh."

If they heard the last comment, neither man responded. Mike stepped out and they allowed him a moment to orient himself somewhat.

They were parked in the lot of a large motel, at the far end of a small town. In the distance, he could see nothing but what looked like a rotating beacon, the sort that might be found at an airport, or a lighthouse.

He could make out nothing of the town that was familiar, but of course there thousands of small towns across the country and he probably couldn't have recognized ten of them so it was no surprise. The nearest building at this end of the main drag, besides the motel, was a gas station, across the street. He recognized the brand as one found in California, but it could also be found in Nevada, Arizona, and Oregon.

A hand closed on his shoulder.

"You doing okay, Pal?"

"That reminds me of a joke. The guy who fell off the Empire State Building and at the fiftieth floor somebody leans out and ask how he's doing. 'Okay, so far,' he says."

"Hilarious, but I don't get it."

"I'm doing okay, so far," Mike said. "Just waiting to see how hard the bottom's going to be."

"Well let's find out. Upstairs. I'll be glad to be rid of you, you've been nothing but trouble since we set eyes on you." He chuckled, turning Mike toward a side entrance leading into the motel's rooms. With a key card he opened the door and led Mike up a short flight of stairs, stopping before a room no different from any other.

Down the hall, men in gray suits stood at spaced intervals, staring back at Mike, grim and cold.

This had an ugly look to it, like some kind of drug cartel operation. But there was no time to build up fear before the driver tapped out a familiar, jaunty code on the door and Mike could hear security locks being released on the inner side.

Bracing himself to confront some slit-eyed thug, Mike watched the door swing open and found himself face to face with Lawrence Buckner, the former president of the United States.

Chapter Seven

Buckner led Mike inside and closed the door quickly, almost in the faces of the two men who had brought him here.

"I don't...what's going on?" Mike said.

"I assume they didn't tell you anything. Right?"

"Trust me, not a word. Until I saw you just now, I thought I was...well I had no idea who's hands I was in, but it didn't look good. How—"

"I have to leave soon. I can't stay out of sight in this out-of-the-way place for long. Have to leave tonight. I just wanted to see for myself you're out of their hands and safe. You'll hear in a minute how all this developed. I just want to know, before I go, that you're all right."

"It was rough, psychologically, but as far as I know, nothing permanent. So the short answer, I'm fine Larry. Whatever you did to spring me, thanks, and then some. You know I mean it.

"But who were those guys? And how is it I'm free?"

"US Marshals. You're released on the basis of an order by a federal judge, who dispatched them to issue papers, demanding that Homeland Security give you up. We were monitoring the radio, we understand it almost came to a fire fight when they recovered you. When I go back east, I'll stop in Washington and make sure the right people know what's going on."

Lawrence Buckner directed Mike to a sofa and he flopped to a seat, bending over at the waist, just absorbing the reality of this fabulous change in his life.

Mike felt a hand on his shoulder. "You really going to be all right?"

"Never better in my life. Just need to come down, you know?"

"I know."

"But before you go," Mike told Buckner, "there's some crazy stuff I have to tell you. You really need to hear it, give me ten minutes. Okay?"

Mike sat up and Buckner took a seat on the coffee table before him and told him to go ahead.

"Larry, all this happened because I found out something I wasn't supposed to, in San Alonzo. This administration is...my god, they're behind the attacks on the airliners. I can't prove it, but they know I was close. Somebody I trusted turned out to be CIA, at least I think it was CIA. They had to shut me up, and I'm still mystified why they didn't just kill me outright. But based on what I heard, I'm ready to believe anything about Kelcher and his people. I want to tell you what I found."

"Did you say you can't prove it?"

"Yes, but—"

Buckner told Mike he couldn't touch anything about the accusations without iron-clad proof. He added that when Mike felt up to returning to work, he should do whatever he must to find the proof, and when he did, then he could bring it to Buckner.

Mike assured him he understood that and would throw all his resources into the finding of the proof.

"Good enough. Then for now, I need to show up in the city and get some sleep. I've been up since, hell, nearly thirty-six hours. I'm going to turn you over to somebody who's been kicking up a firestorm in your behalf. You'll be in good hands.

"Go down the hall, Room Four Oh Seven. I've got Secret Service camped out on either side of me, so it's a couple of doors down.

"You know how to get hold of me. I don't expect to see you tomorrow, so call me back in Madison when you want to bring me the proof."

"Larry, how do I thank you for this?"

"You thanked me in advance, ten years ago. I'm still paying back. So no problem. Now scoot."

He opened the door and ushered Mike back out into the hall. Despite the nap on the way south, Mike was becoming groggy and hoped whoever was waiting for him would just open the door, get out of the way and let him flop in bed for a couple of hours. And then he'd be ready for anything....

Mike tapped at the indicated door, unsure what time it was, not wanting to wake up the entire floor. Again, he heard the undoing of security latches and the door swung open.

She flew into his arms before he could blink or say a word.

"Mike," she whispered against his ear, then burst into gentle tears, her body convulsing with every breath. He clung to her, squeezing her, unable to believe it was real.

"Jenny, how did you...how are you here?"

"Where in the world would I be? Come on in, I don't want to share you with anybody."

She led him inside and almost slammed the door behind him.

"I thought you were dead," she told him, crying harder. "It almost killed me. It was so unbearable, I wanted to die. I love you so much, you can't even begin to know how much. I'm sorry, I'm just so happy. I know it must not look like it, but these are good tears. Believe me.

"Hold me, never let me go, Sweetheart."

She told him that until that moment when she had opened the door to find him, she had no idea if Buckner and his contacts would be able to free Mike at all. "I've been shaking, a total wreck, almost sick. But now, oh lord, Mike, it's over."

"Jenny, the worst thing all this time was assuming you'd think I was dead. I'm so sorry, Baby. There was nothing in the world I could do to let you know."

"Of course. But it's almost worth it all, the way I feel right now.

"But look at you, that fucking jumpsuit. Get that off, I want to burn it. Come on, do you want to lie down, or—"

"A shower and shave. I haven't been able to clean up for weeks. I must smell like a pig sty. Let me go wash down real fast, and...but I don't have anything else to put on."

"I uh, have some of your things. Phil Bachelor knew where your key was, we went to your place, he suspected you might be out of clothes by now so we packed you a little emergency change, even bought a razor. Go on, I won't intrude. This time. Although I'm tempted to join you."

In a frenzy, Mike slipped into the bathroom and rushed through a shower, then removed the beard. He found a pair of his own jogging pants and a tee shirt folded on the sink waiting for him. When he emerged, Jenny was perched on the edge of the bed, in a soft nightgown she must have had on under her robe when he arrived. She jumped to her feet and came to him, laying her head on his shoulder.

"Feel better?"

"Infinitely. And you?"

"Wonderful, but so tired. I've been living on adrenaline the last week. And I can't even imagine how you've been sleeping. Oh god, Mike, I want to know what you've been through, but I'm afraid it's going to break my heart. I want to just hold you and caress you and make you comfortable and let you know you that you're really safe. But I know you must be as tired as I am, or worse.

"If...well, sex is just put off until we're both rested, all right? I don't want our first time to be in here, like this, I want it to be perfect. But I want to be next to you while we sleep. If in the middle of the night, we both suddenly...are ready, then so be it."

She let go of him, only enough to walk him to the bed.

They nestled in each other's arms, and for both of them, sleep came within seconds.

Mike woke up, with bright sun flooding the room, and suffered an almost nauseating sense of disorientation. He moved, and felt something warm and soft against him and it all came back. Jenny! He had to calm down and convince himself it wasn't a dream, because many of his dreams in prison began this way.

He slipped his arms around her as much as he could and squeezed her.

"Mm-mm?" she said, then half sat up. "What? Who's that—"

"Jenny, it's Mike. I'm sorry, I just had to know you were real—"

"Oh god, yes! Mike. I'm sorry, I was really out, I didn't realize—"

"Sh-h, I understand."

"How are you this morning?"

He assured her he had never been better in his life. They agreed that the first priority must be breakfast and they hurried to change. Mike found a second set of clothes, more conventional, and dressed while Jenny slipped into the bathroom to do the same.

For the two or three minutes she was out of sight, Mike suffered an agony of unreasonable fear that he would never see her again. When he heard the door opening, he rushed forward, to be right there when she appeared, wrapping her up in his arms for a moment.

"I'm sorry, Baby," he whispered. "I'll be like this for awhile, until I get over being in isolation. And missing you."

"And the problem is what? Hold me, as long as you like, we can eat any old time."

She clung to him, quivering, and they kissed, gently at first, then with greater and greater hunger, finally letting go, panting for breath.

"Lord," she murmured. "About that sex...help me be strong, we really should eat and go home before evening, but I want to...."

"I know. Come on or you'll be my lunch."

She giggled at that and pivoted out of his arms, catching him by the hand and leading to the door.

They flirted across the table and played footsies under it. They touched fingertips, then twined fingers together, teasing each other's palms, driving sexual tension almost to a painful level. Waiting to receive their meals and finish them so they could get away and be together was nearly unbearable. In that place, they could speak of nothing about what had placed them there, or how she had come to be in touch with Buckner. He could not tell her what he had seen and heard since he left weeks ago, so all they could do was make chit-chat while burning to be on the road heading home.

Once in the car, with Jenny driving, they could begin sharing information about the events since they had said goodbye. She began first, explaining how Lawrence Buckner had become involved and why Mike was free, with help of friends, particularly Phil Bachelor.

"There's something else," she said. "Senator Carver is in the middle of all this. Since he's from Kelcher's party, but someone Larry Buckner respects, Larry approached him to intercede, and use his clout with the Armed Services Committee, and boy, did he ever. And Carver immediately contacted a judge, and threatened to expose this war against reporters that your incarceration represented, and that's essentially why you and I are here.

"They're wonderful people, every one of them."

"I hope I can thank them somehow. But you first. What can I do...Jenny, you're my angel, not just because I love you. How do I begin to thank you?"

She drove for a quarter of a mile without answering, glancing over at him two or three times.

"Thank me? Jesus, Mike, I thought you were dead! I wanted to die, myself. I was saving my own life, finding you and bringing you back. But what else on earth would I have done? Thank me? I thank you, for surviving, to be here for me. I have to have you in my world from now on, Mike. I couldn't stand to have found you that one day, again, and then lose you."

She was crying, wiping at her eyes, slowing down while she recovered, and he reached for her hand.

"And then...and then I heard what had really happened, and I think it was almost as close to killing me, to know you were rotting in prison, as it was when I thought you were dead. As much as I adore you, I have to admit I was doing it as much for my own emotional survival as for you."

She apologized for crying. "But believe it or not, this is me being happier than I've ever been.

"And I have a secret, a small one, but guess what? I found an apartment, big enough for both of us. I saw your place, it isn't...big enough. Mine'll do for now. I mean, ours. But I'm taking you to yours first, so you can pick up whatever you need, then we'll go to the place I rented for both of us."

A pelting rain had begun, still falling when they reached Mike's apartment. When he had what he needed all in a pile, he went to her for a hug and a few kisses, then together they schlepped everything down to her car. His own was still parked, he hoped, at the _Sentinel_ offices, where he had left it when Jenny drove him to the airport for the fateful flight to Colombia.

At their place out south of Golden Gate Park, she bade him dump his things in the guest bedroom. "I figure you'll want to use this as your office until we find a permanent home. I know this place is spendy, and I've been scraping by, and if I never got you back, I'd end up moving somewhere cheaper. But I'm up for a raise, Phil said, and hopefully you won't mind helping with the rent."

Mike refused to speak of money, insuring her everything would work out that way, and all they should think about was recovering and picking their up with their lives as a couple.

For the night, they agreed to eat out and dress up for it, and with a call, Mike arranged reservations and they went to separate rooms to prepare.

When he was ready, feeling a bit odd at dressing formally, Mike took a seat in the living room and waited for the woman of his life....

Shyly, she slipped out the hallway into his sight. Looking up from a magazine he had found on the end table, he gasped.

"Oh Jenny."

"It's okay?"

"God. I didn't know a woman could look so fabulous."

She wore a two-piece lime green evening outfit, strapless, offering a hint of cleavage, and a taste of island-brown skin at the stomach, and Mike felt himself melting. He approached her, tentatively, shaken at the unreality of having a woman like this love him and want him as her own.

She blinked a couple of times, a tiny smile playing on her lips. "I'm a little embarrassed to show this much skin in public, but I feel like...I wanted to be a little hot and sexy for you. If you don't like it, you'll just have to take it off me later."

"It's all I can do not to right now," he said. "Can I touch you?"

"Touch me? I'm your future wife, you'll be touching me all over the place...starting later tonight. Why do you think I'm in this outfit? I want to make you hot for me, to want to touch me. This isn't a tease, please touch."

They clung to each other and kissed, and suffered the urge to have their first lovemaking immediately, but also agreed to wait until after a calm, wonderful dinner so as to make their first time all the more romantic. With a last kiss before going, in a form of sweet agony of need for each other, they pulled away and hurried to the car.

Chapter Eight

For their first dinner, Mike had chosen one of the famous restaurants on Fisherman's Wharf. Once out of the car, on impulse he picked Jenny up by the waist and spun her around, rewarded with a giggly laugh he had never heard from her before.

With time to spare before their reservation, they wandered out past the restaurant, onto a pier from which tourist boats had come and gone earlier in the day, bound for Alcatraz Island and other local spots in the Bay. Now, the pier was dark and isolated, and they cuddled together, sharing a kiss.

It was soft at first, but suddenly their tongues met and all the heat, the desire and passion that had been kept at simmer up to that moment, throughout their relationship, threatened to erupt beyond all bounds. Her body stiffened against him, she shivered and their kisses wandered, until he found himself about to bury his face at her cleavage. Instead of stopping him, she moaned softly and ran her fingers through his hair, tugging at her outfit to offer him more of her top to kiss.

And then with a start they both seemed to share, they realized they were outdoors within sight of hundreds of tourists just up the walkway on the main street. Jenny turned away, arching her back against a wooden railing, catching her breath.

"I want you so badly I ache," she whispered. "I swear, I could hike my skirt and have you right here. We'd better get inside before we do something to get ourselves arrested."

She turned and clung to him now, and Mike could not imagine how he could ever stand to ever let her out of his arms, let alone his sight. Reluctantly, he released her enough to walk around the corner to the restaurant; they held hands inside, now forced to behave themselves until they could go home.

Over the second drinks of the evening, Mike peered across at her, past the sputtering candle at the center of the table.

"I'm forming an idea," he said.

"Oh?"

"I have something, unfinished business, that involves a trip to Paris."

"Oh no, so soon?"

"Sweetheart, my idea is, we marry and go there together, for our honeymoon."

"Paris? Oh lord, I don't believe it. When?"

"I need to do some research. If you want to marry sooner, we can do that, then finish the honeymoon when it's workable. If you want a big wedding, we can take our time. I can't imagine sooner than a month, for Paris. Just think about it, work it into your own preferences, about the wedding and the rest. And we'll make it happen."

"No, I don't want a big marriage, or any kind of religious ceremony. Just as low key as possible. Okay?"

"Perfect."

She stared at the candle and seemed mesmerized for some time. The server arrived and Jenny managed to draw her attention to the menu. After ordering, she nodded to herself and seemed to have returned from wherever her thoughts had gone.

"Do we talk about children?" she asked.

The question caught Mike far off guard.

"Children? You don't have—"

"Me? Already? No, I'd have told you something like that long before now. But how about you? I know you and your first wife didn't."

"No, and it was a good thing, considering what happened."

"But should we talk about it? I'm on the pill, I started it before I came out here, until we had this talk. So do you want to even think about kids yet or let us settle in together?

"And let me temper that by saying I'm not sure how I feel about it, myself yet."

Her eyes were growing moist; Mike gazed at her, falling more deeply in love with her by the second.

"Jenny, will you be upset if I can't answer now? Will you let me just get used to being back, to having you in my life first?"

"I would say no, I don't mind, take your time, but there's one thing I have to tell you. And you can go from there to decide what to say. I just need to tell you that it was the subject of children that started the trouble with Doug."

"Oh?"

"Yes. He woke one day and realized he didn't want to have black children. It was as if he suddenly realize he was married to a black woman. Even a light skinned one. And that's when I began to realize he was a flaming racist.

"He never hinted it, but he obviously knew I was black when we started seeing each other, then married, so I just assumed color didn't matter. When I first brought up children, just asking, not sure myself, he suddenly changed. He demanded that I protect myself and refused to even talk about having children at all. Then suddenly stopped sleeping with me, ever.

"And I discovered, without meaning to, without even suspecting, that he belonged to both racist and anti-immigrant organizations. And more than that, I found out, again without expecting to or looking for it, that he was sleeping around. With one of his racist women friends.

"It all stunned me. My father is white, I'm used to being in totally mixed society, with no racism of any kind, and I just didn't see that part coming."

"Are you...afraid I'm—"

"No, I'm sorry, that isn't what I meant, I just wanted you to know. No. Yes. Fuck, I'm screwing this up, I'm sorry, but I needed some assurance—"

"Jenny, be calm. Take a breath, take a sip, relax, Sweetheart."

She did as he asked but her eyes were filling. Mike reached across and touched one tear on her cheek with his finger.

"Jenny, when I was locked up, totally alone, one of my fantasies, one of the things that kept me going, was imagining you holding our baby. And once I dreamt of holding her myself.

"My only reservation about kids, right now, is that I want us to have time together, just the two of us for awhile. Call me selfish, but I don't want to share you with a child yet. And then, after a year or so, when we can do some traveling unimpeded, yes, I'll be ready for a baby if you are. And if you aren't, I'll be fine with that, too. But as far what our baby looks like, all I can hope for is that she gets your looks, not mine. Okay—"

She was crying and but presented him with a wondrous smile through the tears. When he asked if she needed to hear more she shook her head.

"No, god no, you've said it all. Let's just leave it there until, as you say, we've normalized being together awhile. And yes, I'm feeling selfish too."

It was impossible to remember anything else they spoke of over dinner that night. They did not talk much or have to after that. They did have a couple more drinks, then hand in hand, sometimes holding onto each other, they returned to the car and hurried home.

There, they almost feverishly rushed up the stairs and into the bedroom. Mike caught her up in his arms from behind and nibbled at her neck, then asked permission to undress her and she sighed, murmuring for him to hurry.

And soon they consummated their love, a love that had seemed doomed to eternal separation only a couple of days before.

But when they lay quiet again, melded as one even in sleep, it seemed impossible that their life together would ever end from that time on.

Chapter Nine

In the morning, seated at the kitchen table, Jenny asked Mike to tell her everything he had lived through since they had said goodbye at the airport, and when she heard the worst of it, she wept for his suffering.

Mike did not want to admit his intentions of forcing his tormentors to kill him rather than living away from her in isolation the rest of his life but he did. She nodded, agreeing she would have felt the same way.

With that aside, she asked him what he had learned in San Alonzo that seemed to have triggered the government's ire at him.

Mike refused to tell her while they were in the house, declaring that what he knew was of such power and danger that he did not want to bring it into their home sanctuary.

"Before I'll talk about it, I'd either want to go away from here, to some remote place, or better still, at the _Sentinel_ office.

"Believe me, when I tell you, you're going to understand why I'm being careful, even though I already had to tell whoever was holding me. I still don't want to talk about it openly."

Jenny found it easy to understand that they should not talk about it at home.

But she added, "As a journalist, I'm already excited to hear what you know—and prepared to be shocked and appalled as an American. Is that the right response? Appalled?"

Mike only nodded, refusing to expand on her words.

They decided stay away from the office and have a pleasant day out and about and not speak of the ugly issues resulting from Mike's sojourn in South America until the next day.

At the office in the morning, Mike's first order of business was a quick meeting with the staff, so he could thank all those who had supported him so wonderfully, especially his boss, Phil Bachelor. Then he could sit down with Jenny in his office and finally relate what he had been through in San Alonzo, especially the meeting with the CIA renegades in Libertad, what they had told him, and what that suggested about the Kelcher Administration.

"I thought they were bad enough, but this is a whole new level of...it's hard not to call it treason, isn't it?" she responded. "I don't think even 'appalled' does justice to it, now that I know. But I can sure as hell see why they wanted you shut up.

"But I have to tell you something difficult," she added.

Mike suspected what that might be but he did as she asked and let her get to it her own way.

"They wouldn't have just let you out, no matter who ordered it, if they couldn't muzzle you," she told him. "Buckner, Bachelor, Carver, and I had to make agreements in your name."

She told him that among those agreements was that he could never say a word about what he knew or what he had been through, or anything that would embarrass the Kelcher administration.

"They didn't event tell us what would happen if you violated that, but if you do, they'll probably come after all of us. I'm sorry we spoke for you, that we muzzled you by proxy, but it was that important, to set you free. Try not to be too pissed at us over that, please?"

She seemed genuinely worried but he squeezed her hand.

"Listen, even if I did feel muzzled, I'd never have gotten out of there to report anything, anyway. And rest assured that even if there weren't any agreement like that, I'd know better than be seen and heard telling what I know or what I went through, believe me. So on worries, okay?"

Her eyes brightened and she was able to smile.

"You were really worried about my reaction?" he asked her.

"yes, right now, I'm very fragile about you," she said. "Mike, I'd be devastated if you were even slightly unhappy with me. I'll get over this, but thinking I'd lost you, and worrying over anything that comes between us is scary. If I burned your toast, I'd be jumpy."

Mike peered at her, confused at her feelings, given how strong he knew she was about other things.

"Jenny, tell me something. Was he mean to you? Ever? Enough to make you afraid, after you found out the truth about him? Your ex?"

She squeezed her lips together and nodded almost imperceptibly. "Yes. He was a total asshole."

"Oh god, Angel, I can't stand hearing that. You think I would hurt you if you upset me? Really?"

"No. I told you I'm just fragile. I love you so much. I'd be hurt if you didn't speak to me over something for awhile."

Now Mike wept, wishing they were home so he could wrap her in his arms and assure her with touches that she was the most precious thing in the world to him.

"Jenny, everything's fine about this. I already decided I would pursue it through hidden routes they couldn't trace, and I can still do that. It's actually better you made that deal, they might relax about me a bit. Okay?"

He tipped her chin up, wanting to kiss her softly but feared he wouldn't be able to stop and they had agreed not to do anything inappropriate at the office.

"Promise me, it's okay?"

"Yes." She brightened and Mike wanted to do flips across the narrow room.

With that behind them, Mike reminded her he had mentioned a need to go to Paris.

"It connects to this. It's a way to act on this, they won't see. It'll be tricky, but I know the president of France from the negotiations after the war, and through him, I hope to find a totally covert way to speak to this Molly, the CIA officer who defected to French intelligence, and if she can give me something to verify what I heard, I'll use it. Carefully.

"But it's a long shot," he added.

"Wow. That would be powerful. Then what? Or what, until then?"

"Until then, I need to be seen doing very dull, mundane stories, as cover. San Alonzo was the only thing I was working on when I left, I had cleared the decks for it, so I have to find something else, but that's easy to do.

"While I'll tell you everything I find all along the way, I won't let you any closer in case it blows up on me. Plus, now that they've seen you advocating for me, they'll watch you, in case I try to put out what I know through you, so you can't be seen doing anything that relates. You should find something neutral as well, for a few weeks."

She told him she had a number of pending stories of less impact that she had meant to pursue for some time. "I could let you look through them and find something among them for cover if you don't have anything."

"Well I'm sure Phil would find something, but I'll look through your files first."

They agreed to move Jenny into Mike's office so they could cooperate without running back and forth. Soon as she had her few items transferred, she opened up her files and let Mike run through them seeking something to use as his cover story.

For a half hour after she passed over her spare laptop with the files duplicated, Mike took his time trying to reset his mind to the work, still finding the experiences of the last few weeks had an effect on the clarity of his thinking.

When he reached a certain file, he called her attention to it.

"How did you get onto this?"

"I doubled in science writing," she told him. "They sent me to the nuclear weapon lab to do a story on a power plant that could double for laser beams in space, and for ion engines to send spacecraft to Mars and farther at much higher speeds. I kept my eyes and ears open while I was at it and heard about this.

"So I made notes on it, meaning to follow up when I could."

"I have a friend who works in a think tank, who's done this kind of research, among other things," Mike told her. "I could talk to him and get the latest on this. I'm interested. Could I take this one?"

"I'll never get back there. Sure go ahead."

Mike asked her how old was the information she had saved and heard it was two years.

"And not a word of it since," he muttered. "This says they were zeroing in on a laser and missile-based defense shield that can knock out ninety percent of incoming warheads. Two years ago. I heard something about that when I was in the Gulf. The war there pushed them to accelerate work on it after it had slacked off since the Cold War.

"I wonder how far they've advanced. I bet Frank would know."

"Well that figure of ninety percent is just what I heard, I wouldn't take it as gospel," Jenny said. "If anything, it's probably low. If it's much better, they probably wouldn't want potential enemies to know."

"Potential enemies. It refers here to terrorist 'states' that might be able to launch missiles. North Korea, Iran. That's crazy. They never claimed to have missiles that could reach any farther than the coast.

"This described protecting the whole country. They're still worrying about Russia. And China.

"It wouldn't take a lot to defend the coasts. If they're only ninety percent reliable to stop weak ICBM threats, that's not much. No...."

"I don't see it matters—"

"It doesn't, just a story I could do to show them I'm staying clear of anything controversial. It's something I'd be known to cover. I'll set it aside and call Frank. He would know more."

"What's to know?" Jenny wondered, but not adamantly, almost distractedly, in fact.

"Oh, well, I'd be curious if they claim to have improved it over ninety percent since you overheard that. And to find out if they're claiming that's against potential Russian and Chinese attacks or just rogue countries."

Jenny asked how Mike would interpret ninety percent effectiveness for a shield against missiles and he told her he read it to mean that for every hundred incoming warheads, ten would reach targets. "Last I heard, the Russians have about two hundred, not necessarily aimed at us but still active, counting submarines. That would be twenty that got through, if they ever threw them all at us. Probably most would hit our own missile sites, but the worry would be nuclear winter, depending on how many we set off on them."

"God," Jenny said. "I heard tales from my parents about the Cold War. I'm not sure I even want to think about that. That's one reason I didn't follow up, I'd sooner ignore it. But you can have it."

"I might," he said. "It's a start.

With that agreed, Mike continued to go through the notes she had provided and found a couple of other subjects he could use for the moment as cover while he investigated the San Alonzo issue and dabbled in the defense shield as a possible story.

Before he called Keller, Mike reported back to Phil Bachelor and told him the arrangement he had decided upon, to write a deceptive cover story to hide his plan to follow up what he had learned in San Alonzo, and mentioned the defensive shield as a good story to use for the diversion.

"Makes no never mind to me," Phil told him. "As long as you're here, alive, and not touching you-know-what, you can do whatever you want for awhile. If you need to go somewhere to follow up on some wild hare, just give me a viable excuse."

Mike grinned and nodded, then returned to the office to call Frank Keller.

Chapter Ten

Back in the office, Mike opened his file of names and addresses, tracking down the last known number for Frank Keller. Jenny sat back and watched bemusedly while Mike dialed it up and waited for an answer.

"Keller. Who's this?"

"Same old straight-to-the point Frank," Mike said.

"Mike?"

"Yeah. Got a minute?"

"Yeah, but where the hell have you been? I've been trying to get hold of you all over the place! Last they told me from down there, you were in San Alonzo and then you just disappeared."

"Actually, that's pretty close to true. But I'm not going into that now, it's water over the dam. I called because I have a question for you but it needs to be face to face. You planning on coming down here any time soon?"

Keller told Mike he had been wanting to confer with Mike for weeks, so knowing he was still alive and wanted to meet was incentive enough for him to make the trip. On the spot, they agreed to meet at Mike's old house in two days at ten in the morning.

With that arranged, Mike asked Keller to give him a clue of what he considered so important to discuss.

"No, no way, not on the phone. We'll talk when I get there."

Keller said he had another call coming in and he'd see Mike in two days.

When he hung up, Mike turned to Jenny. "Well that's odd."

"Why? What did he say?"

"It's what he didn't say. He was agitated, sounded like he had something urgent on his mind, and you have to know Frank to know he never treats anything urgent. Hell, an elephant in the living room would barely rate an email."

Mike told of the meeting to come and invited her to join him but she declined on the grounds that it would be best if Mike met with his old friend privately first, then she would be pleased to join them later.

"You're sure?"

"I'm sure." With a warm smile, she told him she had no intention of hanging on him every moment of his life. "You'll know when it's time to bring me in."

Feeling unsettled, Mike tried to put Keller's reaction aside and develop one of the smaller stories he had borrowed from Jenny as a cover.

When at home, away from work, for the next couple of days, Mike and Jenny concentrated on establishing a normal life at home, while holding the disturbing thoughts about the Kelcher Administration at bay. At the office, Jenny continued resurrecting the project she had put on hold while trying to rescue Mike, and he tried to bring himself back into the flow of national and international events that had happened during the time he was lost to the world.

The morning Frank Keller was due to arrive, Mike kissed Jenny goodbye at home as she left for the paper, then drove down to Daly City, to the apartment he had not yet emptied out, the place where Keller knew to find him.

At around ten, when Frank Keller pulled his truck into the driveway, Mike was a bit dismayed to find a passenger aboard.

"I know what you're thinking," Keller said before Mike could raise the issue. "Since I was planning to come down here, I wanted to deal with another issue that's been pending. This is a colleague of mine, Eric Waterfield—he works out at Livermore and I picked him up on the way.

"He's tied up in this same business I'm here to see you about."

"Well no offense but this might put a crimp in what I wanted to see _you_ about. But I'll let you have your say first."

Mike offered his hand and Waterfield shook it.

"Maybe we can have some private opportunity later?" he told Frank Keller.

"If you think it'll be needed when Eric and I have had our say."

The attitude, suggesting a hint of one-upmanship, wasn't like Frank Keller, but Mike let it ride for now.

"Why don't we go grab a bite then get down to business," he told his visitors. They made noises of agreement and he joined them in the truck, settling in the back seat of the SUV.

"Go west here, and a couple of blocks up there's a great little cafe," he told Keller.

All through the meal, Keller kept looking at his watch and seemed a bit edgy.

"All right, guys, I wasn't born yesterday," Mike said, shifting in his seat. "Come on, now give—what the hell is really going on here?"

Except for the almost perpetual frown he wore, Frank Keller would have been considered an amiable-looking man. The frown wasn't a sign of ill-humor, however, it was only a reflection of the intensity of the man. Even with that, sometimes that intensity came out in the form of humor, and he could be as wickedly funny as he seemed sober, but he never quite lost that frown. Today, however, it seemed deeper than usual, and Mike's question lit a fire in Keller's eyes, and despite all he'd been through in the last couple of months, Mike almost shrank away from the gaze of this, his closest friend after Jenny.

"We're taking you to meet somebody," Keller said, and his voice was lowered to conspiratorial tones. "This guy's on a tight schedule and where we're going, we can't just wander in and wait on a sofa until he's ready. Don't worry, that'll make sense when we're there."

"So now it's a meeting, is it. First, you wanted to talk to me totally in private, then I find Eric here—again, no offense, Eric—I'm just going on what Frank said. But now you spring a 'meeting' on me, with some third party.

"So what am I supposed to make of all this?"

"Nothing. Not now. There's nothing we can talk about here that'll clear it up, but I said that when we get there, you'll see."

Keller told Mike to just enjoy breakfast and be patient.

Something about simply explaining the agenda seemed to relax Keller a bit. He and Eric exchanged conversation about baseball, teasing each other about the constant rivalry between the Mariners of Seattle and A's of Oakland. Whether designed or not, that kind of exchange made it easy for Mike to chime in, and suddenly, they had all finished and were on the way.

Back in the vehicle seated in the second seat, Mike began plotting a way to isolate Frank long enough to speak of his own concerns, as well as to reveal what he had uncovered in San Alonzo.

Not until they passed Treasure Island, partway along the Oakland Bay Bridge heading to the mainland, did Keller glance over at Waterfield and nod.

"Okay, tell him."

"Tell me what?"

"Well if you'll give me a chance, I'm telling you," the sandy-haired Waterfield said, but his slightly gravelly voice held a tinge of amusement.

"Sorry. So tell me, already."

"Okay, do you know anything about an organization called The American Millennium?"

"Yeah, I'm plenty aware of them. What of it?"

"Well the point that's germane to what we're doing today is that they see Russia and China as standing in the way of total American global domination. They call it 'American exceptionalism'—"

"I've heard of it," Mike said. "I call it 'America über alles.' It's a concept that's been around a very long time, that America is ordained by God to run the world. So why are you invoking it here? And to me?"

"The Millennium people have had it rubbed in their faces that the US can't dominate the world either through economic power or conventional war. Jesus Christ, they got their asses handed to them by a bunch of hillbillies living in caves in Afghanistan. The idea that they could ever subdue China and Russia, the big dogs out there, by either of those means would be a fantasy, right?"

"Would be, shit," Mike said. "It's been a fantasy since Korea. So?"

"You didn't catch the key word? 'Conventional war'?"

"The Cold War's over. Mutually Assured Destruction won the day," Mike said. "Unless...."

"Spit it out," Keller said.

"There's an actual working defensive shield."

"Shazam! The side that got a foolproof nuclear defense shield first had the others by the nuts. The ideal set-up for nuclear black mail, _nicht wahr_?"

Mike tried to calm the eerie tingle in his limbs. "How did you guess what I was coming to you about?"

Keller and Waterfield exchanged puzzled glances. "Who said we did? Is that it? The defense shield? What do you know?"

"Not enough," Mike said. "I was going to ask you what you knew. All I have is that it isn't a dead issue, that they're still trying to perfect it, that maybe the nuclear exchange in the Gulf convinced them to get back to work on it. Hm?"

"What exactly do you want to know?"

"The information that reached me says that two years ago, it was good to ninety percent of efficiency. I was going to ask you if they'd improved on that since. If they did, it might tempt them to start something, but I was just fishing for a cover story. I was going to ask what you knew about it."

"And do what with it?"

Mike shook his head. "Nothing. Given the situation I'm in, I can't do anything, but I want to know."

"What situation?" Keller asked. "Is it connected to where you've been?"

Mike nodded, deciding to trust both men, not sure why. With that, he told them what he had encountered and what he had learned at San Alonzo, and what the government had done to him as a result.

"So I can't do anything to ruffle Kelcher's feathers."

"Yet you want to know if the shield is close to perfected," Waterfield said, making it sound like an accusation.

"Okay, it worries me. I'll put it in a word, but it goes back to what you were talking about, how the US could dominate the world without a sufficient army or economic power. Blackmail. With nukes. There, that's it. That was just lurking in the back of my mind, if they ever perfected it."

Both the two men in the front seat swore under their breaths.

"And you wonder if Kelcher's ready to go from having his people shoot down airliners to threatening Russia and China with annihilation?"

"It's got to be considered."

Waterfield asked how it would work. "Would the US reveal it had perfected the shield and dare Russia and China to pre-emptively launch, or would the US hit one or two sites in the countries then demand complete submission, or what?"

"I thought they'd announce it and demand Russia and China fold up, economically, and turn over access to all the oil reserves and sites they have or we'd start hitting them, and fend off their attack and leave them sitting ducks. Then ask them again to fold up. Some scenario like that."

"Stop right there," Keller cut in. "We'll continue this when we get inside."

"No, I have to know one more thing," Waterfield stated. "As a reporter, Mike, what's your game in all this? Find out where they might drop the token warheads and get the scoop? Put yourself on the ground as close as you can survive and cover the carnage?"

"I don't know you but the words 'fuck you' are very close to my lips, Waterfield. You apparently don't know my background. Mine and Frank's. I got no scoop out of the Gulf nuclear war, but I used what access I had to put a stop to it as soon as possible. If any of this is true, my mission will be to prevent it first, and to hell with a story.

"You got that?"

Waterfield was grinning, almost maddeningly, while Frank Keller remained silent, allowing the tension to play out.

"What's so funny?" Mike demanded.

"I knew you would say that, Frank told me. And I believe it's true. But I had to get you to put it out there. Sorry for that, but why do you think we're riding along with you, admitting what we know, if we didn't trust you to do what we all want to do. Stop it?"

"You're saying...there's something to stop?"

"Can it," Keller said. "Wait until we get there."

The other two men agreed to wait, but Mike did ask where they were going. They had taken the wrong way if they were going to Waterfield's base outside of Livermore.

"Concord," Keller answered. "Our contact's an Army colonel. And you'll like this, Mike, he's actually an aide to Hoyt Folger, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff."

Mike complained that the general who was Kelcher's chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was nobody he could deal with. "You're asking to talk to the very people who're behind this shit! Isn't that a little crazy?"

Waterfield responded that Hoyt Folger was a holdover from Buckner's administration who was hot to prevent the gambit to blackmail Russia and China, but was in no position to stop it without being fired.

"He's trying to do what he can from the inside, which is why Bryant is willing to interface with us. He's Folger's surrogate, or in intelligence terms, his 'cut-out.'"

Keller explained how the chairman of the Joint Chiefs could not change policy, he could only carry it out. "The Secretary of Defense, the president, and whoever act as his puppet masters make the policy and Folger has to implement it."

"Including San Alonzo? Did Folger go along with that?"

"Willingly? Fuck no. What could he do, it was going to happen, and if he was fired, whoever replaced him would do it anyway. Folger has to put up the appearance of going along, so he's going to seem more gung-ho than necessary, to sell it."

"I see. I hope you're right."

"Just listen to Bryant and if you don't like how it smells, you don't have to do a thing," Waterfield said. "Otherwise, you do what your instincts tell you. No risk for you, okay?"

When Mike asked why Bryant would be willing to meet with him, the other two men again told him to wait and see. And that was the last that Mike could wring out of them until they arrived at the base.

Chapter Eleven

Just north of the city of Concord, they entered open land, almost desert-like in nature, where high fences festooned with warnings against trespassing on government property lined both sides of the road. Mike knew this was all Navy territory, and that huge numbers of nuclear warheads had once been stored out there in bunkers hidden among the hillocks, and they might still be there; it was because this was all Navy property that he wondered why the Army Chief of Staff's aide would be found here.

The issue was cleared up for Mike when Keller turned off the main road onto an unmarked dirt track which ran up and over a long mound of sand that screened from sight everything beyond from the main road. Where the fences appeared from the main road to end, they actually made right angle turns to create a corridor along which the dirt track continued for a quarter mile, ending at a double gated security post.

Crisp military police in white gloves approached and leaned in for a brief conference with Keller; he directed them around the truck to Waterfield, who displayed two pieces of identification that clearly satisfied the MP's.

Without further pressing either Mike or Keller for documentation of any kind, they allowed the trio to proceed.

After picking up temporary badges, Mike and the others ended up at a structure that had the looks of a four story World War II vintage military building. Oddly, however, it was all alone, surrounded on flat ground broken by the mounds of what might have been bomb storage cells as far as could be seen.

Inside, a major greeted the three civilians and led them into a surprisingly modern elevator that even more surprisingly began to descend rather than rise.

"So are we bound for the very bowels of hell?" Mike wondered aloud. The major seemed amused, unable to suppress a bit of a laugh.

"No, we don't have the authorization for that particular level," he said.

"Ah, only as far as purgatory, then?"

"Oh, you'll find out."

After what Mike judged to be about five stories below ground level, the four emerged into a chamber that completely belied the World War II facade up on the surface. The room, far wider than the "footprint" of the building above it, was set up like a modern day command and control center, and Mike realized on the spot why an aide to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff could be found here.

Mike peered at the "Big board" at the front of the room, curious to see if any kind of "situation" might be in work, but before he could even accommodate his eyes to the lighting, the major hustled the three civilians on through and into a more ordinary section of the level. After a couple of turns around the corners of hallways, they entered a nondescript office space, where a slim, boyish-faced, fortyish man with an easy grin awaited them.

"Mike, this is Colonel Bryant, aide to General Folger," Keller said, trying to sound formal and casual at the same time.

"Colonel," Mike said in greeting, offering a mock salute, which Bryant returned with a jaunty wave.

"Don't get hung up on the chicken-shit formalities. I go by Avery," the officer told Mike. "Have a seat, there'll be some coffee and donuts in a minute." Bryant leaned out the door and hollered down the hall for an orderly to bring the refreshments.

"So, have you given him the lowdown?" Bryant asked the other two men.

"Mostly," Keller said, adding they had briefed Mike up to the issue of Kelcher's plans. "He asked about the Missile Shield. We decided to dump that one on you."

"Oh, well thanks a hell of a lot," Bryant said, but tempered the comment with another grin.

Bryant asked Mike to describe what he knew about the shield, without asking how he had acquired any such information. "What can you say about it?" Bryant finished. Mike recited the same explanation he had given Keller and Waterfield.

"So you haven't heard the current and official figures being reported at the National Security Council, then. Oh, and to the president. That happens to be ninety-nine point seven. That's the number Kelcher is supposed to believe.

"But his handlers, who're running things, know better. That ninety-nine seven would be about as efficient as human engineering could make anything. But the truth is that the shield's actually a fucking sieve."

Bryant was no longer grinning. "That's the real top secret information in all this."

"A 'sieve?'"

"Comparatively speaking, given the job it's supposed to do. The real numbers describing its efficiency are around sixty-seven percent."

Mike caught himself mouthing, _oh my god_ , but if Bryant noticed, he ignored it.

"To put that in perspective: for every one hundred warheads directed toward the shield, no matter how delivered, about thirty-three would be expected to get through and go off.

"There are at least two key elements of concern," Bryant continued. "Obviously, in fact, if there's a nuclear exchange, and the Russians get much off, we get creamed, despite the shield. That's bad enough, but the larger question is nuclear winter.

"Our protocol for a...an operation...is to keep our own megatonnage well below the threshold of nuclear winter, with a hefty margin to spare, based on the best estimates of what that would be. If we hit the Russians with that level and at the same time, we could catch all but one or two of theirs, the bet's covered. If they could set off as much as we could, never mind more, then all the worst scenarios of the Cold War would be right back with us."

Mike had flown to his feet midway through Bryant's last words, wandering around in the biggest part of a circle the room's size permitted.

"What the hell, exactly, are you saying? You're not calmly telling me this is going to happen, are you? That one side or another is about to unload are you?"

Bryant was absolutely somber now.

"'Fraid so. The fucking insane people at the highest levels are going to try and blackmail Russia and China into total submission and threaten to take out their known missile bases if they don't give in. Our estimate is that Kelcher will go along, especially being led to believe we can't be hurt in any exchange.

"They're going to pass information to the Russians, the same crap they've handed to Kelcher and the Security Council, supposedly proving it's near perfect, and if Russia or China refuse to submit based on that, we're going to hit them with a small 'package,' two warheads each on their own nuclear bases, and hope they get on their knees rather than fight back."

"And if they don't—"

"Then it's all up to how many they send our way. And whether our side says to hell with the nuclear winter thresh-hold and goes all-out."

Mike speculated that it might be better, in the threat of nuclear winter, if Russia and China were already covered by some kind of shield of their own, and Bryant agreed.

"Hell, if there were time, I'd recommend we send them what we know about ours and help them set it up, even ship them anti-missile missiles and the heavy lasers to do it. But there isn't time and we could never get away with it.

"In other words, the best scenario of all would be if every warhead sent in either direction were neutralized. Then we could deal with putting the bulk of the administration in jail. But that part's out of our hands."

Mike demanded to know if the war Bryant described was a definite plan or only a theoretical game.

"The blackmail threat is definite, it will be made. Whether there'll be any actual nuclear strikes, we aren't certain. As for timing, I can tell you it's set up to occur before the coming presidential election, because Kelcher intends to parlay it into stopping the election, leaving him president for as far into the future as we can project.

"So that makes it all the more horrific."

"That's only about six months. This is going to start in six months?"

"At the longest. Could come earlier by weeks," Bryant told Mike.

"Jesus. So what's going on here, you guys thought that you'd share the misery with me? Why me?"

At that, Bryant was able to chuckle, but it died quickly when he said that Mike was the greatest hope that those who knew of the threat and wanted to stop it had on their side.

"We want you to try and pull off the kind of negotiations you and Keller did in the Mideast. On a greater scale. Even so far as maybe passing word to Kelcher that the shield he thinks is foolproof, isn't. In other words, to let the stupid shit know what he'll be doing if he goes along and plays this game."

Bryant added that Mike might be asked to visit Europe on a mission he would not describe.

"Not asking much, are you? How am I supposed to pull this off?"

"We'll back you all the away, absolutely as much as we can."

"Why don't you just tell Kelcher?"

"We can't reach him any more. He's completely isolated by one layer of his people who are in on it. If we tried, all we'd do is get ourselves hanged, possibly literally. We've got to get around them somehow and we hope you can do it for us."

Mike assured him he now understood the situation, if not the methods he could try. "So where the hell do I begin?"

"You'll be contacted in the near future to meet with Folger. In the meantime, you should consider the actual mechanics of such a mission to Europe. Up to then, you do what makes sense, and nobody's going to order you around. All we want is to facilitate you in your best effort. We can even get you to Europe invisibly, on our planes if that's what you want to do."

"Then I guess that's good enough. But I warn you now, don't count on this. Don't count on me."

"I know, but whatever happens, rest assured you'll have our everlasting thanks, if you can do anything at all."

Bryant made clear to Mike that the facility in which they were meeting could survive anything except a direct hit, and he invited Mike to take shelter there if all else failed. "I've set up passwords and all you need to know, and I'll make sure everybody here is aware you're to be brought in if you come knocking on the door." Bryant added that Mike could bring one guest.

"I appreciate that. And believe me, I might take you up on it, if I can't pull off this miracle you're counting on."

Bryant passed off a portable drive with information that would tell Mike how to pass messages and receive them, as well as how to set up any secret transportation he needed.

"Then I believe our work here is done, gentlemen.

"I'll have the major lead you out. Thanks for coming."

"I hope I can make you glad you went to the trouble," Mike said. "But no guarantees."

"Of course not, Pal. It's the nature of the beast. But we've got to take every possible shot.

"See you around."

That was it. In minutes, they were upstairs and in the truck again, and soon after, on the freeway heading back to San Francisco.

It was a mostly silent return trip but Mike's mind was already operating on overdrive, thinking of ways to carry out the huge responsibility that had been dumped on him.

And trying not to think of the nightmare that would erupt if he failed.

Chapter Twelve

Back in San Francisco, after discussing their separate plans to ride out the war if it could not be stopped, Keller and Waterfield left Mike off at his old house. They turned down his offer to get together for the evening, begging off that they wanted to return to their home ground.

They shook hands all around, and by then, it was after five, so instead of joining Jenny for the last few minutes of her work day at the _Sentinel_ , Mike waited for her at home.

There, he found it impossible to sit down and be calm. Not a pacer in usual circumstances, Mike could not stop wandering the house, suffering an irrational need to see Jenny and know she was safe. He heard the car drive in and was waiting right at the door when she walked in, wanting to take her in his arms but refraining until she had time to settle in a moment.

"What's with you?" she said. "You look strange. Everything all right?"

"I love you, I'm crazy for you, I've missed you—"

"Ooh, that's sweet, and nice, but there's more to it than that. I don't think you're waiting to snatch me off to the bedroom. Are you?"

"I will. But there's something I want you to know, immediately, or soon as possible. You'll see why I'm so glad to see you. Soon as you're ready, let's go for a drive."

She went into his arms first, for a kiss, hurried to the back room with her bag and he left her privacy. In no more than five minutes she was back, upbeat and ready to go back out and hear his words.

Soon as they pulled out of the drive, she made the assumption that he had learned something significant from Keller about the shield.

"The shield, yeah, but it's only the beginning," he told her. "But I don't even want to say more in the car."

"Why were you so...why did you react that way when I walked in?"

"You'll understand that, too." He reached across and squeezed her hand, but would not tell her anything he had learned until they were across the Golden Gate Bridge, where he pulled into an overlook turnout on the other side and walked her away from the car, into an area where no one else could overhear.

"So what is it that is more important than dragging me into the bedroom first?" she said, grinning in a leering way to let him know she was teasing.

Mike straddled a low brick wall that bordered the parking and patted the place before him so she could sit back in his arms. He held her against him and spoke in a low voice only she could hear, describing what he had fallen into.

She lay her head back against his shoulder, shaking it two or three times.

"My Jesus, it's so much worse than the worst I could imagine," she told him. "But where does any of this connect to what you discovered in San Alonzo?"

Mike shrugged. "I don't know. Not even sure it does, but whether it does or not, this is so much bigger, the rest doesn't even register on the same screen. Everything, all I know and all I have to worry about, except you, goes away beside this. This is everything, until it's over, one way or another."

Jenny readily agreed with that but asked how would he approach it.

"We have to try and stop it, first, then if we can't, we have to find a way to minimize the damage. That's what they're expecting from me."

When Jenny asked how he would begin, Mike told her it was much too soon for him to have even started developing any kind of plan. "As you saw, I was just agitated to see you and know you were safe first. And no, I'm not going to follow you around every moment, but until I warned you, I was just antsy."

She assured him that after hearing what he had to tell her, she understood. "Maybe I'll be following you around, instead," she added.

Mike did go so far as to speculate that he might have no better choice, ultimately, than to go to the French, English, or German governments and convince them to expose the plan to blackmail Russia and China. "I didn't bring that up with them, but it's in the back of my mind as something to do."

"Wouldn't that force them to launch it early?" she wondered and Mike assured her he had no idea.

"I'm not sure of anything yet," he added. "That'll be a last resort, yet I may have to jump straight to it. But I'll see if Folger contacts me and if anything comes of that."

He added he would also meet with Buckner, somewhere, and work with him to try and stop the nightmare.

"What about Carver?" Jenny asked. "Could Carver get you close to Kelcher? Close enough to make fucking sure he knows the shield is a piece of shit?"

That gave Mike pause. He wondered aloud whether he should trust Carver, pointing out that the senator was from the same party as Kelcher even though he had helped rescue Mike from the clutches of Kelcher's government.

"I'd have to meet Carver, sound him out. Not ready to say," he told Jenny.

For a few moments, Jenny lay back in his arms, nuzzling his cheek with hers as much as she could from her position, but he knew she was framing a question. Finally she asked it.

"How...." she murmured, having to stop and try again, "how do we find a positive outlook on this? How do we walk around like normal people, knowing this horrible war might really happen? How?"

"The only positive I can think of right now," he told her, "is that we have a warning and a place to go ride it out. Frank Keller is going to a cabin he has, up outside of Vancouver, British Columbia, where he feels secure to sit it out above ground. But he feels guilty about using what he knows to save himself when millions might die.

"We may go through that same feeling when it gets closer, Jenny. But at least we'll have done all we can until then to save everybody that we can, by stopping it. How do you feel about surviving when so many others will suffer?"

"Right now," she murmured, "it scares me so much, I don't have the strength to turn down a bomb shelter away from most of the targets. I just can't imagine being out there when an H-bomb goes off, even a hundred miles away.

"I guess you have a different feeling, since you really did see them go off. Are you scared at all?"

Mike told her the bombs that had been detonated in the Gulf were much smaller than what the Russians or Chinese might be able to set off. For that reason, he easily admitted being terrified at the prospect of being above ground if several hit Northern California.

The sun had set and although San Francisco, which seemed to be almost in their laps, was lighting up for the evening in its own stunning display, they both felt a little cold with the sun gone.

"We can go," he told her. "You're filled in with everything I know. Let's go eat."

They returned to the car and drove to a restaurant up ahead in Sausalito.

Across the table they held hands and gazed at each other with almost heartbreaking fondness. They both confessed a sensation of unsettled stomachs and did not eat all of their dinners. Instead, they agreed to go home and get a little drunk, in hopes it would improve their morale.

When he awoke in the morning, with Jenny still lying peacefully beside him, an hour before the alarm would go have gone off, it hit him. Quietly, trying not to wake her, Mike left the bed and put on a robe, slipping into the living room, taking his wallet with him.

Using a coded system he had devised to hide important contacts, a system ironically based on the way the CIA masked the identity of agents in the field, Mike tracked down the number of Lawrence Buckner that he kept in his pocket book. He hoped Larry was back home in Milwaukee.

"Yes, the Buckner Library," a woman's voice answered.

"I'd like to speak to the president," Mike said.

"I'm afraid that's out of the question. He isn't here and I can't route you to him by any means. Would you like to leave a message?"

"Yes. Please take this number." Mike provided his cell phone contact. "The message is 'Teheran'. He'll know what it means."

"That's all?"

"Yes Ma'am."

"Very well. Thank you."

Carrying his cell phone back to the bedroom, he crawled in beside Jenny. She sat up, sleepy-eyed and asked if he was all right.

"Yeah, but I just made the first move. I'll tell you in the car on the way in. Go back to sleep, Honey."

She turned and nestled against him and after having taken the first action in his mission, Mike was able to return to sleep right away.

"I tried to call Larry Buckner," Mike told her in the car on the way to the _Sentinel_ in the morning. "I'm going to ask him to come out here and talk, and in the process, see what he thinks about bringing Arthur Carver in on it."

"I think that would be good, but what can Carver do, really?"

"He's head of the Armed Services Committee and could maybe get us closer to Kelcher."

"I can think of something else he could do from that position," Jenny said and promised to tell him when they were in their offices. Meantime, they agreed not to even share what they knew with Phil Bachelor yet, so once at the paper, after she explained her idea about Carver, they tried to concentrate on mundane activities, almost going insane in the process.

Buckner saved their sanity by calling at ten.

"Hey, man, what's up?" he said. "Any further trouble over your escapades with Homeland Security?"

"Not so far. That's not what this is about, Larry, at least not directly. But it's important.

"What do you think of Arthur Carver?"

"Carver?"

"Yeah. A highly volatile issue has come up, one I would like to see you about, in person. I hope you could come join us soon, or I could go see you. But first, do you actually think I can trust Carver?"

"I'm going to tell you a small secret about Art. I came that close to offering him Secretary of Defense when I was in office. What does that tell you?"

"Exactly what I needed to hear. Thanks. So what do you think, can you make it over?"

"I can't answer that without looking at my schedule. Let me get back to you."

"Of course."

Knowing the former president's time was more valuable than his own, Mike let Buckner go quickly and relayed to Jenny what he had heard.

"That's an endorsement for Carver, all right," she said. "So now?"

"We need to know if Carver's still in town, or back in D.C. Since you met him before and know him, want to do the honors and try to reach him?"

"Sure."

After a couple of calls using the numbers she had been given during the process of achieving Mike's freedom, Jenny finally made direct contact with Carver's secretary. After a moment, it was apparent to Mike that the senator himself was on the line.

Instead of handing the phone to Mike, however, Jenny went ahead and arranged a meeting for nine the following morning at Carver's local office.

"He's set up a block of time for us. I wonder if he already knows something's up."

"We'll find out."

With that achieved, Mike could relax, satisfied he and Jenny had done absolutely everything they could to tackle the terrible assignment he had been given.

Chapter Thirteen

Senator Arthur Carver maintained a local office in a high-rise on Nob Hill. Mike and Jenny took a cab up there in the morning and he greeted them like old friends.

"Before I say another thing, I really want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for making them set me free," Mike told him.

"Are you kidding? When I heard what was going on, my blood boiled. I know what you did for the world in the Gulf, and I was god damned if I'd let them get away with what they were doing to you.

"But, I have a sneaking hunch you aren't here to thank me. So let's make use of one of those little clichés I detest, but which fit so well. Let's cut to the chase."

"Yes. But wait."

Mike withdrew a pocket notebook and wrote a question, asking how secure he could feel speaking openly about sensitive matters.

Carver stared at the words, then at Mike, perceiving no hint of levity over his manner of asking, and shook his head, touching a finger to his own lips as further emphasis.

Carver wandered away a few feet, walking in a small circle, brow furrowed in thought. No doubt, he was contemplating the impact of Mike's query, surely assuming Mike wanted to speak of the issues that had caused him to be arrested.

When he returned before them, Carver expressed a hankering for lunch out of the office and asked if they would join him. Playing along Mike and Jenny eagerly agreed and Carver informed his staff he was going out.

Once in his car, he told them, "To fully respond to your question, the truth is that I don't necessarily think anyone's bugging the office, but I'm sure as hell not going to assume. I'm glad you thought to ask and get me out here before you said anything covert.

"Don't even say any more here, until we get somewhere you feel comfortable about as a place to talk."

Mike directed him to the beach at Fort Point, along the bay, virtually at the foot of the Golden Gate Bridge, beside a national historical landmark known as Fort Winfield Scott.

While they strolled out along the beach near the water line, outside of the hearing of anyone in sight, Mike told the senator everything.

As he had done back at the office, to buy a moment to think, Carver again wandered a few feet away from Mike and Jenny, staring out across the Bay, his eyes absently following the progress of a gigantic tanker scudding under the bridge. For some time, he remained there, leaving Mike and Jenny to huddle against the breeze that had kicked up ahead of a fog bank lurking over the north side of the bay.

When he came back, he took his time, his head down, kicking at rocks, still thinking.

"Don't be shocked, but I'm going to have to admit I'm already alerted on this situation," he said. "Including the issue of the Missile Defense Shield. Not...just the fact that it's defective, but that it was cited as something that could allow us to attack Russia with impunity. It hasn't been mentioned in months, but it was brought up some time back. Then suddenly all such talk disappeared.

"What I didn't know was anything like a timetable. I've wanted to try and find out if Kelcher knows the shield's no good and is still willing to go along with this or not. And you want to make sure he does know. Why?"

"No matter who is leading him around by the nose, the bottom line is that he's still the president," Mike responded. "He can stop it all, either by never calling for it to be carried out, or absolutely demanding the whole idea must be abandoned.

"I don't even understand how the military who support him would justify an attack on Russia or China if he demanded it, without congressional approval, but I understand he's got generals in the right place who'll go along anyway. After it's done, however, everything will probably be in such chaos that nobody will be in a position to go back and impeach or arrest the people responsible, including the generals, except other generals and ground armies.

"Hoyt Folger, I understand, is opposed, but he's not part of the nuclear triad that would launch—"

"Ah, but he is in charge of most of the ground forces who could...at least try to arrest Kelcher and the others, including the generals who violated everything and launched.

"Right?"

"Hell, you're actually ahead of the curve as far as that goes, but yeah, that would be something I should bring up to him, in case he didn't think of it," Mike agreed.

"But back to Kelcher, you hope that if he learned the truth about the Shield, he'd put the kibosh on the whole thing?" Carver wondered.

When Mike confirmed his assumption, Carver emphatically denied the hope. "He won't stop it. I know him well enough to be sure he'll accept the damage if it means we win. Just leave it at that. He isn't a route to stopping this."

Mike admitted he could accept that, but he insisted they had to try everything, and that was one of the things possible, and might be the first they could attempt.

Carver responded that based on what he already knew, he had done everything he could to try and stop the war, already. "Do you think I would sit here on my hands, otherwise?"

Mike told him he had no idea Carver already knew, so he had harbored no notion of what the senator might have already done, in attempting to stop the nightmarish plan.

"So what's happened so far?"

Carver could only say that absolutely nothing had resulted from his efforts. "You have to understand something else: no one not in Kelcher's inner circle can approach him privately any more. And that's alarming enough it its own right. He no longer sees anybody but lobbyists and personal supporters now. No more one-on-one meetings with senators or congressmen or anybody but his handlers.

"Christ, even at fund-raisers, he comes in, he speaks, he goes out, and there's no private face time with him at all. His minders are always around him. Do you get the picture? They're making damn sure no strange ideas come to him, let alone uncomfortable facts. He's totally dependent on what they want him to know."

Carver emphasized that as a result, he was not the person Mike was looking for who would have an opportunity to either tell Kelcher the truth about the shield or to try and derail him from the mad operation.

"So given that, what can I try and do to help?"

"Smithson," Mike said. "Can you talk to Smithson? Everybody on the planet knows it's an open secret that Smithson's the real president. Do we know if he is aware of the truth about the Shield?"

Carver told Mike and Jenny that it was Vice President Smithson who was leading the entire operation to attack Russia and China. That being the case, not only did Smithson know everything about the situation, he would block all attempts to stop it.

"Look man, you've got to face it: if they've decided they're going to do this, there's no power on earth that can get in there and make them stop. Not from that direction. And I don't know another direction."

Now, Jenny presented her own plan, her own hope of what Carver might be able to do, which she had suggested to Mike earlier.

"Since you're on the armed services committee, what are the chances you can essentially remove the oxygen from the fire?

"The military has to carry out the operation," she went on. "If the President orders it, no matter what Folger does, you believe the Navy and Air Force chiefs will carry it out, right? So is there any way of approaching them, convincing them that the orders would be illegal, that they have no authorization to obey them without provocation, and that to do it would be...well crazy? Never mind highly illegal. Could you threaten them with Congressional action? Can't Congress stand up and announce this and...denounce it, threaten impeachment, something like that?"

Carver peered at Mike, frowning in thought.

"Jesus, that would be sticky. Not out of the question but sticky. I wouldn't do it in committee, this can't be spoken out in the open and the committee leaks like a fish net even when it's in closed security session. I'd have to approach senators and congressmen I trusted, on both sides of the aisle, and also the CNO and the Air Force chief separately and off the record. And I might have to bring up the issue as carefully, and diplomatically, as I've ever done anything."

But he added that there was still no good reason to think her plan would do any good. "If they're off the deep end with gung-ho-ness to use their nukes and threaten Europe into a corner, I don't see that a few words and empty bluff will change it. And both the general and the admiral are known for considering the presidency only one step below God. I don't think they'd refuse the orders from Kelcher, no matter what."

Carver glanced at his watch and said he should show his face back at the office. "Don't think somebody won't notice I slipped out and had a private conversation with two reporters in a place where nobody could eavesdrop."

"I know," Mike told him. "But it's okay. I think we've done what we need to."

"Mike, Jenny, the three of us really must stay in touch until this is resolved. Agreed?"

"Absolutely," Mike said.

"Okay, let's go."

Carver took them back to his office so they could get the car and go on.

Once in the _Sentinel_ , Mike described the meeting to Phil Bachelor.

"So what the hell's going to happen with this? With Carver, I mean? The issue you went there about? Is it going to save the world?"

"It seems that unless I do go to Europe and get them to blow it all open, the best bet is Folger. Until I know what he can or is willing to do, first to prevent this, then to do the right thing afterward if it can't be stopped first, I can't speculate further."

Bachelor easily accepted Mike's assessment and told him he was completely free to pursue the mission in any way he must and need not even bother trying to put out cover stories in the meantime.

"Mike, I hate to say this, I hate to put this on anybody, but it sounds to me like the whole world, even though it doesn't have a clue, is counting on the two of you!"

"Well that's hard to face but I already knew that."

He clapped Bachelor on the shoulder and returned to Jenny in their joint office.

Chapter Fourteen

SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA

Sometimes Sacramento seemed like the end of the world.

Leslie Lansford had nothing against the city, except that it wasn't the Bay Area. But when the opportunity had come for work here, it was one she could not pass up, and it turned out to be in Sacramento, so here she was. That was eight years ago, and she had turned her back on everything left in her world, back in San Francisco, and moved ninety miles east.

She still didn't always feel at home here, and had not made many friends. In San Francisco, she did lot of friends, and although most of them had been more her friends than Mike's, because she left him, they had almost totally turned their backs on her. It had been a shock, usually a woman's friends supported her against her ex-husband after a divorce, but hers had stood by Mike instead.

However Leslie still had her male suitors, and she had tried to start over with her love life. She gave them every chance, looking for that one who could replace Mike. And not one of them could.

Eight years alone...how had she done it?

Seated in her bathroom, applying the hopefully perfect amount of makeup, she made faces at herself, most of them frowns. Nervous, she took deep breaths to calm herself. The man tonight was one of the best prospects yet. A liberal state congressman with aspirations to the governor's office, or even the US Senate, he was perhaps five years younger than she was.

Finished putting on her face, she tried out three dresses before she found the right tone, something that showed a little shoulder but would be conservative enough for an art opening. No cleavage, no thigh, no bare midriff, though she still had the flat stomach for it.

So it would be this number. She put it on and fussed for fifteen minutes settling it just right around her.

And then it was wait time.

She greeted him at the door with a quick hug.

"Hi, Jerry. Want a drink first?"

"You know, I thought we'd stop in somewhere in town, if it's all right."

"Sure, that would be nice. Preferably a Mexican restaurant, they're the only people who really know what a margarita is, and that's what I'd like."

"Hey, I know just the place."

"Well then let's do it."

"Just give me a second." Jeremy Miles stepped back and looked her up and down, not in a leering way. "Wow. Am I glad I looked at that house, and found you."

Having said it, he gasped, turning beet red.

"Oh Jeeze, Leslie, I hope you aren't insulted. I don't want you to feel like I'm ogling you—"

"Insulted? That a thirtyish guy wants to ogle a forty-year old? Ogle away, Jerry."

"Come on, if you're forty—"

"Oh, I'm forty, Dear. But not dead yet."

"No, sure not. Not at all. I tell you, Leslie, you are a dazzler."

Now it was her turn to redden and she squeezed his arms.

"You're sweet, even if blind. Come on, you can whisper wonderful things in my ear later. We should go."

He took her hand for the short walk to his car. It was an electric car, she noted, in keeping with his environmental reputation, a perfect fit to her own leanings.

And the evening was wonderful for awhile. The show, a photographic art display in a place just up from the Capitol, was all right, but the company was the best. Leslie met a number of people she could never have even bought a ticket to meet if she weren't on the arm of Jeremy Miles, and afterward, he took her to a quiet, but lovely restaurant for dinner. She liked the way he treated her, a nice meal, but not pretentious. He didn't seem to feel the need of flashing money around, but she knew he had it.

And at last, they sat in a table in the back, illuminated only by candle-light, and gazed at each other.

"You, uh, impressed some of my friends tonight, I could tell," Jeremy told her.

"Me?"

"I have this feeling, they looked at you, saw a very attractive woman, and thought, oh, Jeremy's latched onto a babe. Which means, no brains—wait, just hear me out.

"Then, I think you dazzled them with your grasp of politics. And me, too."

"You're trying to tell me you thought you were going out with a bimbo?"

"Come on, hell no, but I mean if you take anybody, your garden variety person, man or woman, and put them among people with expertise on certain arcane subjects, what do you get? They'll just hang out and try to stick in a comment here and there, and it'll come off like mumbo-jumbo, then soon they turn off and mentally drift away. What they will not do is hold their own.

"I can tell you that if I had my choice, of woman, girlfriend...wife...she would be sweet, enjoyable to be around, nice to look at, and my equal in intellect.

"Leslie, I'm not proposing...yet...but you are all that and then some."

"Oh my. Mike would be...never mind."

"Mike. That's this ex of yours?"

"Please forget I mentioned him. It's just that what you described is everything he would have believed I'm not."

"Not good looking?"

"I'm not going to admit to that, so yes. Even that. I'm charmed, Jeremy, I don't know how to respond to this."

"I'm not looking for a response," he told her. "I just wanted you to know how I feel. And yes, I want to ask if this is a one time thing or if I can feel comfortable asking you out again."

"Under one condition," Leslie answered.

"Yeah?"

"That it isn't always going to be a semi-formal, culture-related evening. Ask me to a ballgame. In San Francisco, even. Or a hike, a boat ride, or dancing. Okay?"

"That's perfect. I thought you'd respond more to something like tonight. Or a play—"

"Or a movie," she added. "Or just a night out with pizza and beer. All of the above."

"Okay, that's great. I get sick of trying to come off as the buttoned-down legislator all the time, but that's what most women expect, and to have any interest, they seem to want to be impressed. I don't think you do."

"No, really I don't."

He told her how refreshing he found that, wondering if she knew how difficult it was to be "on" all the time.

"Actually, I do," Leslie said. "Real estate is a people job, and I struggle to pull it off. I want to just slap some of them, tell them to fuck off, but I can't. So I understand."

"I can't imagine you telling anybody to fuck off."

She could not hold back a laugh.

"Oh, believe me I can, Jerry.

"But there's another side of me. Fun and games and parties, that's who I used to be. But I also want to talk politics, although not in the mode of who's the better money-raiser or vote getter. You know what I want to talk about, when we talk about it?"

"What?"

"The real motivations in politics. You're the first actual politician, or lawmaker, or whatever you want to call yourself, I've ever had a social relationship with. I met some, when I was with Mike, but it was always either on the record or avoiding saying something they didn't want Mike to report that would make them look real. Or look bad. So how you and I do from now on is going to revolve around whether you trust me enough to really talk about what the politics are about. When we talk politics."

"You want to know my real passion, then? Why I'm in politics?"

"That's exactly what I want to know," she told him.

He told her he wanted to get into international policy, suggesting that perhaps he should have entered the foreign service instead of running for office. "But then I'd just be working for some politician. But as one myself, I might one day be able to be a statesman, a big difference."

"President?" she said.

He would not admit to an interest in that, suggesting perhaps he was better fitted to be Secretary of State or the United Nations ambassador. "Or at least, inside the National Security Council."

"Yes! I think that would be hot," she said.

"Hot?"

"Yeah. Sexy, exciting. I have this sneaking little hunch that the NSC makes and controls more policy than anything or anybody else in the country."

Jeremy Miles stared at her, in a way she found difficult to read. "Am I hearing this right? Where did I miss the turn?"

"What?"

"I'm sitting here in a romantic restaurant with a gorgeous woman and she's knocking me out with this amazing dissertation on government. I love it. But I'm shocked."

"You know what?" she said. "So am I. I don't know where in the hell that came from. Mike would pass out if he heard me. He'd never believe it was me...."

But in that, she realized she had gone too far. Jeremy blinked his eyes a couple of times, in a sleepy way, and seemed to turn off.

"What?"

"Leslie, you divorced this guy nearly eight years ago, right? Why are you still trying to impress him? And why do I get the feeling I'm competing with him? He's just a reporter, right? Or was. A reporter."

"He was...and I trust is...a hell of a lot more than that. He negotiated the end of the Oil Wars before they turned into World War III. He hobnobs with Lawrence Buckner and people like that. He goes all over the world into the hot spots to find out...exactly the kind of question I just asked you—what's the real motivation behind whatever's going on? And yet Mike's the most humble, down-to-earth man I've ever known."

"Yeah? Then why did you divorce him?"

She closed her eyes and felt tears very near to the surface.

"Because I was an idiot," she said and would not say more.

After that, the evening deteriorated. Jeremy didn't speak much more, and she knew she had lost her best chance at happiness or a future, with him at least, but she found it impossible to say or do what it might take to fix it with him.

Riding back to her house, she even thought of offering herself, hoping sex could repair the damage, but she couldn't find the passion or spirit to even try. And so she left the car at the curb and he made no attempt to join her.

And she never went out with him again.

BOOK II CONTINUED

Later the same Year
Chapter Four

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA

Even in broad daylight, the flashes reached all the way to the foothills of the Sierras, on the other side of California. The ripple of heavy BOOMs from hydrogen warheads going off a hundred miles away left no doubt the war had come and gone.

Even those who believed it would liberate them from the government they viewed as oppressive were silent and grim that day.

In the afternoon, an inordinate number of vehicles and a large congregation of people huddled around a radio just outside the boss's shack. A group of forest-firefighters who had arrived from the mop-up of a blaze several valleys over, mostly college kids who worked at it in the summer, spoke in agitated tones about the aftermath and what might have happened to their homes.

Of course the Reverend's warning of war to come had not reached these people, but Skip Slade had prepared himself and his forces over the weeks since he first heard about it and had received two more shipments of weapons; now, he simply had to get to work.

With the world of laws now gone away, maybe for good, now it was raw strength—both of body and of will—that would prevail; though lacking in intellect, Skip Slade possessed both those other qualities in full measure.

Angered and sickened by all the sobbing and mewling, he jumped onto a fallen log and whistled as loudly as he could. As all heads turned his way, in one fateful moment Slade took into his hands control of the entire valley.

"Okay knock it off and listen up! If you can't figure it out for yourself, let me spell things out: starting right now, there's a whole new order of things. The cities are gone, and with them, all the politicians, all your bleeding-heart social workers, the environmentalists and everybody who fucked up the world for us. Now it's our world. We're going to put things back together our way! Those of you who are not already with me are either going to join us now or wish to hell you had.

"We're going to take back this whole country, us here and those like us. A plan is in place and nobody's gonna stop us. We've already sealed off this entire region, so all of you inside are stuck here unless we let you go.

"But I'll make it a little easier: if you aren't on our side, I'd just as soon you pack up now and get the fuck out. Go on down and join the weak sisters while you can. See how well you'll survive down there without your government and all your fancy technology behind you. You can bet your sweet asses we'll be fine without it, up here. But us strong types will need all the food there is up here, so you chickens just go ahead and run along, and tell the others down there we'll be comin' for 'em soon enough."

"What about the survivalists, those assholes over by Shady Cove?" one of the foresters yelled.

"What about them?"

"They're heavily armed, and they're at least as well- prepared to get through this as we are, but you're inviting these people to run right into their arms and tell them about us. What's the point in that?"

"To hell with it, let 'em know. I told you, a plan's already been made, and it includes dealing with them! They've got their place in the scheme of things, only they don't know it yet. They're going to have the choice of fighting us or joining us, and if they make the wrong choice, they'll be goners."

The logger didn't answer back and Slade hooked his thumbs in his heavy suspenders and grinned as if he'd personally won a victory. For a moment, the crowd seemed to surge back a step, as if Skip Slade had ascended to some higher plain of power. And for a moment he gave thought to the woman who had turned him down as his mate in the new world he had been told was coming, and was here now. What would she say if she were here at this moment of his crowning glory?

That night, all those in camp who were not "with" Slade did disappear. He did not spend time thinking about where they would go or what they would do. He had no feeling that anyone in the surrounding vicinity could threaten The Nation, and he was truly pleased that there were fewer noncombatant mouths to feed.

However, there had been three black people among those who had left and only later, lying in his bunk thinking about the coming days, did Skip Slade regret not detaining them. Someone would be needed to dig toilets. That was when the idea came to him. In the morning, he put it into work.

"Marvis," he said, drawing his deputy off to the side, during breakfast.

"Take a detail of people who ain't got guns and go up to the old headquarters where we store the dynamite and shit and turn it into a compound, sort of like the Rev's but smaller."

"Why you sly dog. You telling me, you're going to try and make your own outfit?"

"Me? Hell no, I'm a good soldier. We're making a...a prison camp. What am I trying to say?"

"A concentration camp?"

Slade snapped his fingers. "Yeah, that. We're gonna be bringing dark people in. There were three of 'em we could've kept, if we'd already built this thing. It's time to pen them up and use 'em. Shit details, you understand? And teach 'em to grow stuff, maybe chickens, pigs, like that, that we'll all need to eat. Somebody's got to do the dirty work. Remember the plantations? That's what we're going to do here. You understand?"

Marvis Kirkpatrick was grinning. He jabbed Slade in the arm with his elbow. "Good thinking, buddy. I didn't know you had it in you. Sure, we'll make ourselves a little camp. Hell, we could even have ourselves a harem."

"Harem?"

"You know. A collection of broads. All ours."

"I know the word, Marvis. But I gotta tell you, I'm disturbed at the very idea. I know damn well what you're suggesting. You're talking about niggers. About cohabitating with them, is that what I'm getting from this?"

"Well yeah, of course that's what I'm talking about."

"And I'm talking about making a jail. Not a brothel."

"No, you're talking about the Old South. Not a jail, a compound, where the darkies live when they aren't working, that's exactly what you said. Make them grow food, make them clean toilets, then at the end of the day, put them back in the compound. Well the Old South...in the Old South, Massa had no problem slipping out and paying nocturnal visits to the wenches. Some of them black ones run really cute, man. Even I got to admit that. Shit, I ain't proud. You sure as hell got no place to be too proud. You ain't got any woman at all."

"Are you nuts?" For a moment Slade grabbed his deputy by the shirt front. "Screw a nigger?"

"Don't be a prude."

"That ain't it! What comes of screwing? Children. The last thing we need is to produce a line of half-niggers, when there are plenty of them around for our purposes without making more of 'em. The very fucking idea turns my stomach. I couldn't even stand to touch one of 'em.

"No, listen to me, Marvis, I'm telling you not to do that. Just lock 'em up, make 'em work and when you have to, make examples of 'em. And if you get naked with any of them, you'd better see that I don't find out about it."

Marvis Kirkpatrick grinned. "You're the boss."

Marvis left that afternoon with a work detail, heading up the ridge to the storage facilities where the concentration camp was to be.

Chapter Five

SHADY COVE

From the moment the radio began describing the fall of warheads on the West Coast, Wilmot O'Toole sent his men to work. He had issued the orders weeks ago, although the men did not know why. His lieutenants did know where to go and what was expected of them and they set out even as the heavy concussion of detonating warheads hundreds of miles away shattered the quiet air of Shady Cove.

In O'Toole's game plan, Sacramento played a major part, if it survived the war. So far, he knew it had survived because the effects of a warhead going off that nearby would have been stunning.

The orders sent O'Toole's men only as far as he had previously decided they could go in the event Sacramento was hit, and they were to hold there forty-eight hours to await further instructions. When that time elapsed and Sacramento remained untouched, he sent them forward, to the next stage indicated in their orders.

In other directions, other units of his army had different orders and had been sent to carry them out even as the last reverberations of blasts over on the coast continued. By those orders, O'Toole dispatched his men to extend operations to the north, toward the interstate freeway, and east, up the back road to Tahoe, but carefully, because he knew the Nation of the New Order filled that area and he was not ready to start a fight with them.

As for the south, his men also proceeded gingerly, aware that the Brotherhood of Yahweh held position in that area, and as with The Nation, he was not ready to fight them until Sacramento was under control, and that could take some time.

Both groups, the Brotherhood, and The Nation, for short, were well known to O'Toole, and he anticipated that they too would put out feelers, hopefully avoiding clashes with his group until later, something like cavalry units during the Civil War had extended the outer edge of the armies they were part of, until they "felt" the enemy.

South of the Brotherhood's domain, O'Toole had allies of his own, down toward Calaveras county—people he had helped arm and train—and he knew they were already on the move to provide help on his eastern flank.

Early on, leaving men to guard his home, O'Toole transferred his mobile headquarters closer and closer to Sacramento, spending two weeks in the vicinity of Folsom. By then, his men had moved mile by mile toward Sacramento, with the goal of neutralizing the California government, if it still functioned.

When his army reached a stable position for the next phase, O'Toole returned to his home and base of Shady Cove to hold a council of war.

That was where he found Billy Campion waiting for him.

"Well look what the rat dragged in," he said, offering his hand. "So you've abandoned your hidey hole and come looking for a home, is that it?"

"That's cat," Campion corrected him. "What the cat dragged in. And be kind. After all, who gave you the heads-up in the first place? And now, I bear news you can't live without."

O'Toole off-handedly invited Campion to pass his "news."

"I happen to be privy to something that's going to blow your socks off, actually," Campion told him. "What would you say if I told you that before the war, the Kelcher Administration undertook something that would benefit all of us?"

O'Toole chuckled. "Oh, you mean besides getting their asses royally creamed? Look, the only news I'm interested in about them is that they don't run things any more. Can you tell me that?"

It was Campion's turn to laugh. "Well I'm so sorry, pal, but I won't be able to tell you that. Actually, Kelcher and his whole government—not congress, mind you—but the real government are all holed up safely in Mount Weather."

O'Toole spat. "Well that sucks. The only good outcome I saw out of this war was putting an end to governments. And you're telling me the Russians and Chinese couldn't even do that for us?"

"Hah. They did a hell of a lot better than that, unwittingly, of course."

"They? You're saying the Russians and Chinese?"

"Yep."

Campion took a seat on a stump that O'Toole used for wood-chopping and lit a pipe. Casually, he proceeded to relate the momentous news he had brought for Wilmot O'Toole's attention.

The years of peace between the United States and Russia had resulted in a tremendous reduction in ground based alert nuclear missiles and bombers, but it had not brought the number near to zero. Even more had remained aboard nuclear submarines, and the Chinese had their own, Campion pointed out, which O'Toole had already known.

Campion explained now that the Kelcher administration, knowing how porous was the nuclear defense shield, had arranged to make use of it to protect only the southern part of the United States, allowing Russia and China to hit cities in the north and the West Coast. Even with that, only fifteen warheads had detonated in the United States, far below the number that would threaten nuclear winter, and the United States had responded with a similar number, enough to set Russia's and China's economic infrastructure back decades, without wiping them out.

"And how is that good for me and mine?" O'Toole said.

"Think about what I described. Cities of the north and the West Coast. All cities that weren't friendly to Kelcher and his people. The south was his peoples' stronghold, and they made goddamn sure it survived.

"Willie, my man, the South has won the Civil War."

Wilmot O'Toole managed to gain control of his jaw before it fell open.

"Is that what this was? The whole thing? Are you fucking kidding me?"

"Nope. Atlanta will be the new capital, all the key financial documents were transferred there first, and the economy, even the stock market will move merrily on, but millions of non-white, non-Christian inner city assholes are gone, and likewise all their white friends. And the non-whites in the rest of the country...well people like you will be the army that takes care of them. All over the south, forces like yours are on the move, and federal agents inside the cities, and whites with guns who think like we do, will be activated, without realizing the part they're playing.

"So I'm here to give you your place in it all."

"No, I'm not part of it. I'm not cooperating with any government, even this new Confederate government you're describing. Leave me out of it.

"But tell me a couple of things, Billy."

Amiably, Campion nodded for Wilmot to go on.

"How do you know all this? You tell me you're in private business, outside the system, and now you're telling me what the government did, as if you know. You're with them, aren't you? What are you, CIA, all this time?"

"So?"

"No, I'm not finished. If you think I'm with you, how about the Brotherhood? The Nation? Do you have a similar spiel for them? Did you...did you arm them too?"

Campion was not quick to deny the accusation and O'Toole studied him, his blood rising.

"Wait a minute, you fucker, you did, didn't you? You armed them, too!"

Campion took note of the sudden change in O'Toole's attitude and put a hand on the gun at his hip but otherwise only cocked his head. But O'Toole wasn't finished with his accusations. "The guns and ammo were all government issue, weren't they? You recruited us. Is that it? And armed my enemies."

"So? I'm telling you, you're all on the same side now. You and them against anybody who isn't Christian and pure white. Period. You'll be the new government out here. States' rights, man—you and the others are instructed to seize Sacramento and become the government. Meanwhile, other outfits east of here, Nevada, Utah, they'll be sending emissaries. You'll have your own empires and when the government gets around to it, it'll send people to arrange for anything you need. From Atlanta, I mean."

"You mean under Kelcher's leadership. Right? No elections—he's a dictator, now, or Smithson. Isn't he? How long before the army—call it Confederate army if you like—moves in here and takes us all out. No, Kelcher won't put up with us on our own. If the government still exists, now they can take us on directly.

"You stupid motherfucker—"

For the first time, the normally imperturbable Bill Campion showed alarm, his eyes widening. His hand closed on the grip of his gun but O'Toole did not bother drawing his own. He knew that with a gesture, he could have Campion disarmed and surrounded, or shot down where he sat, if it came to that, before he could clear his holster.

"I'm not in this to either make a government or be a piece of one. You knew that," O'Toole said. "You knew my stance and you set me up and used me. You didn't give me new allies, you armed my enemies."

Wilmot O'Toole began to walk around his former comrade, the way a gunfighter stalked his prey, and the alarm in Campion's demeanor began to turn toward panic. He stood up but did not leave the stump.

"Don't get stupid," he said.

O'Toole raised his hand and made a circling motion. Within seconds, twelve men Campion had never detected stepped into the yard and surrounded him. By then, he knew the situation had turned on him.

"You know you can't shoot your way out of here," O'Toole said. "You've got the choice of going out in a blaze of glory or surrendering. Right now, I'm not particularly concerned which it is, but for old time's sakes, why don't you just make it easy."

Nodding concession, Campion threw up his hands.

"Okay, fine, you've got me. Get it out of your system, then when you come back to your senses, we'll talk."

"I appreciate that, Billy." O'Toole disarmed Campion and instructed his men to confine him in the jail in town until he decided what to do with him.

With this revelation about the situation in mind, Wilmot O'Toole turned back for Sacramento.

That was when the two civilians were brought to him and the woman essentially fell into his life.

Chapter Six

BEYOND STOCKTON

For the woman, it was stunningly surreal to face the fact that her sole purpose in life had been reduced to this long hike for survival with this man she didn't really know. Oh it was true, they did slowly develop an intimacy that had nothing to do with emotional feelings or sex. For instance, they often had no choice but to relieve themselves in front of each other and ended up bathing in streams side by side, and nudity became normal. And still, to her vast relief, he never made a move of any kind to approach her sexually.

Whether he was gay or not, whether he had a woman somewhere or not, she didn't explore and he offered no hints. It just didn't matter, he was a companion, a friend, and a good one, without becoming too close, and that was the best she could ask for....

They passed the flatness of the San Joachin Valley and began going uphill, into the lower heights of the Sierras.

"We've got to get back further west before winter sets in," Eric noted one afternoon when the peaks rising above the Yosemite Valley came into view. "We wouldn't survive it up here for a week."

"So how far do we go before we can dare go back?" she asked him.

"I have a lot of concerns about all the towns and cities, particularly Sacramento. I think we need to get north of there, before we try to turn west again, up in the hills above Interstate Eighty. If Sacramento survived, that is. If they didn't hit it. If they did, it's going to be a zoo."

"So what's the bottom line, are you saying?"

"I'm saying we've got a long haul ahead of us. We'll probably have to ride the winter out with what we've got or what we can find. I don't want to give you a false sense of hope. But I think you know the situation as well as I do"

"Yeah, I'm afraid I do."

By then, they were also tacking north, into gold mining country of song and story. Their most easterly swing ended at the town of Angel's Camp, site of the contest of "jumping frogs", made famous in the Mark Twain story. In fact, they spent a night in the grounds where the contest was still advertised to take place. To their relief, no one else was there to bother them.

Even as for days more they continued unhindered, they discovered an interesting phenomenon: life in these towns was continuing almost as if no war had occurred. As an example, while bartering had begun, money was also still being exchanged.

Despite the seemingly idyllic life in these valleys, Jenny and Waterfield also began to encounter an attitude that was rather worrisome.

"Fuck all them back there," one grizzled man at a diner said, waving his arms vaguely in the direction of the coast. "We didn't need them cities. We don't need 'em now. Finally, we've got rid of the shittin' government once and for all and we can just live. You two might as well settle in and be happy. You both look healthy, like you can work hard. That's all we ask, hereabouts. What say?"

Eric seemed adept at talking the anti-government line and she let him take the lead. He espoused sentiments that seemed to strike a chord in the old-timer and cautiously allowed as how he would like to find just the right place to "dig in" further up the trail. The fact that the pair seemed disposed to move on didn't bother the local, yet he treated them as if they were already locals themselves. But he did say one more thing that seemed an unhealthy portent.

"It don't matter at all that the young lady's a Negro. She's welcome just the same."

If that weren't upsetting enough, as they moved ahead, very soon the first truly ominous signs began to emerge.

JOIN THE NATION OR DIE; TAKE CALIFORNIA NOW; ON TO SACRAMENTO; THIS COUNTRY IS OURS; DEATH TO THE NIGGERS AND ZIONISTS, SPICS, AND FOREIGNERS,

were messages posted more and more often.

And soon, they began encountering men in strange uniforms, armed and very interested in their purposes.

"What you after?" one of them said when the man and woman passed their post, a former school-bus shelter at the entrance to a country lane.

"We're not after anything, we're just trying to get home."

"And where's home?"

Her companion glanced her way as if for permission to answer.

"Concord."

"Yeah? Well you'll never make it. We control everything from here on. We're going to take Sacramento and nobody's going through."

For a moment, the man looked her up and down.

"You're a pretty one, and light enough, but something tells me you're a nigger, ain't you?"

To her everlasting gratitude, her companion bristled at the words. "You watch your mouth, buddy," he said. "What the hell's her race got to do with it?"

"You'll find out if you keep goin'. I'm a lot more tolerant than the ones further up. I'd think about going back the way I done come, but if you're stupid enough to go on, I ain't gonna stop you."

She huddled against her friend, suddenly scared almost to the point of being sick.

"You said 'we'," Eric told him. "I'd be interested to hear who 'we' are."

"Well just who do you think?"

Eric shrugged. "How would we know? If you're the new order, we'd like to know who we're part of. Is that asking too much?"

"Naw, that ain't too much.

"We're just what you called us, the new order. The government is gone, the government that put us in this war, that taxed us, that controlled our guns, that told us who we had to associate with and where we could live. It's all gone. Formally, we're The Brotherhood of Yahweh-Christian, and God help anybody who opposes us. If you think different, you'd better just hurry on along, but I'll bet you don't make it home. We need people, willing or not, and somebody's going to decide you two fit the bill. Or that a nigger and a nigger-lover don't deserve to be walking around free.

"So what's it going to be? You going to stay here and join us or keep going on this insane plan of yours?"

"We need to go," her companion said. It sounded lame and the man fingered his side arm but he jerked his head in the direction they were heading.

"Then get the fuck out of here."

They took each others' hands and hurried away.

White supremacist/survivalist groups had not been significant or important in this part of the country before the war. Their small size in numbers, however, was greatly magnified both by their firepower and the fact that they had prepared for this day. Among their first acts had been to either overpower the legal authorities of the area or absorb them. Now, they were the power and the authority of the region.

Given the choice of being on the outside of the de facto power of the region, many citizens, who subscribed to some of the same beliefs, such as gun rights and hatred of taxation, found it within themselves to join the survivalist networks and lay siege to those who opposed them.

From what the two outsiders could discern, from conversations and snippets of other information they had picked up along the way, they understood that the groups of the area had coalesced into two umbrella forces, one going by no particular name, the other calling itself The Nation of the New Order, which was allied with the Brotherhood. The two groups were vying with each other for control of Sacramento, and by implication, control of Northern California.

From their now isolated position, the two could not gain a clear understanding of what had happened to the bona fide government, and even less of the national government.

One thing was certain, however—it was only a matter of time before someone among those in control chose not to ignore the fact that Jenny was African-American. The two must obviously take pains now to avoid running into locals, so they abandoned the roads, working their way through woods, and in that way, successfully continued for two more days before the end came....

In that last day of freedom, wherever they turned, they could hear gunfire. They were within the overall vicinity of Sacramento now, but between their position and the city was an entrenched army conducting a siege.

It was a couple of months now that they had been on the trail, and working north, they reached the town of Folsom, ironically once called Negro Bar, only to discover that the prison had been broken open.

With their way blocked, hoping to slip around eastward for some distance, then north to Auburn before doubling back in the direction of Concord, along the interstate, they camped one night in a clearing a half mile from the nearest town, thinking they would be safe.

Their hopes ended at dawn, in an awful din of gunfire and explosions all around them. She covered her head and closed her eyes, and there was no more she could do, but her companion climbed over her, protecting her with his own body. She was too scared to even acknowledge to herself what a gallant act it was, she could only hug the ground and shake as bullets whicked through their tent. The noise level was deafening, the explosions continued to approach, and twice the tent almost collapsed from the blasts.

And then it all stopped. Neither she nor her companion moved for several minutes but when she asked him to let her up, he did not respond. And then she realized something warm and wet was seeping into her clothing. Stifling a scream, she rolled him off her and quickly determined she was alone now. Suddenly oblivious to whatever was going on outside, she knelt over him, sobbing, sick with grief, not yet even thinking about what it would mean to try and continue by herself.

There was little time to deal with this disaster. With a sound and fury like the charge of a Civil War regiment, men rushed right through the clearing where the tent lay, shouting and firing, in an attack that lasted another two or three minutes. Whom each side was fighting, she had no idea; clearly, she was not a target and she flattened herself again on the ground, next to his body, but no more bullets sheared through the tent.

And then the fighting was over. Through the ringing in her ears, she made out the crunch of feet on the ground, converging upon the tent.

Chapter Seven

OUTSIDE OF SHADY COVE

At first, he thought she was wounded. She was covered in blood, but as dirty and disheveled as she was by now, she was still clearly the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in person. Whoever she might be, it was obvious by her ragged clothes that she and the dead man had been on the move for days, even weeks.

At the moment, exhausted and emotionally collapsed from the death of her man, she remained slumped on the ground, where O'Toole's men had left her. Yet she seemed healthy, obviously having been well fed. The pack that his men had salvaged from the tent had freeze-dried foods and enough other goods to last her several more days. She and the man seemed to have known what they were doing, as far as survival was concerned.

He dismissed the men who had brought her in and knelt beside her, lifting her up enough to pour water into her mouth. She spluttered and opened her eyes, but there was no light in them.

"What?"

"You should drink this. Then I want to get you out of sight. You were lucky, the boys knew they'd better bring you to me, but if I just left you here, they'd figure out something to do with you, and it wouldn't be pretty. Come on, upsy-daisy, I want you to come over here and get in my truck. Let's go."

He pulled her to her feet, but she swayed as if she would fall down if he let her go. O'Toole picked her up and carried her to his vehicle and wrestled the passenger door open, virtually pouring her into the front seat.

"Lady, I want you to listen to me. Are you listening, can you hear me?"

"I hear," she mumbled.

"I can't imagine what the hell you two were doing out here, but until I come up with a better idea what to do with you, I'm going to take you to my place, where there's running water and food. Maybe we can find you some extra clothes. If you like, you can settle down for awhile, get a good's night sleep, some decent food and take it from there tomorrow.

"I'm sorry about your man, and I don't know what you'll want to do now, but we'll talk about it tomorrow."

She only nodded and he gave up trying to make a dialogue with her and drove her to his place, again having to carry her inside. He lay her on the bed and she seemed unconscious; panicking now, concerned that the blood covering part of her clothes was in fact her own, certain now he would find a bullet wound he had missed at first, he searched her clothes for holes, relieved to find nothing that suggested she had been hit.

O'Toole was due at a meeting and didn't have time to sit up with her until she recovered enough to talk, so he let her rest. Before he did go, however, he took time to remove her shoes and socks, to make her a little more comfortable, fighting the impulse to massage her swollen feet. But the clock was ticking and he just left her to sleep.

He did take time to set up a cold dinner for her in the refrigerator and left a note on the table telling her about it and urging her to make herself at home.

And then he proceeded to lock up the house from the outside so she wouldn't come to and be tempted to wander outside.

During the staff meeting, in which he first reported what he had learned from Campion, Wilmot O'Toole fought a strange, giddy feeling, knowing such a lovely woman was asleep in his house. It didn't seem to matter that she had come with another man, now dead, that she had no idea who Wilmot was, and probably had no interest in staying here as his woman. What mattered was that for a little while she was there and he could fantasize that she was his woman. He even wrestled with the urge to brag about her to his sub-commanders, but the last thing she needed was for her presence to be known any more widely than it was already.

By the time the meeting was over, he had changed his plans. He had intended to travel down to Sacramento but under the new set of circumstances of the last couple of days, from the sour deal with Billy Campion to the arrival of the woman, O'Toole decided not to go for a couple more days.

When his staff had excused themselves, he remained in his seat in the field tent for several minutes, just thinking about her. What a spark she had brought him, without any idea of it. And yet, little by little, a disturbing fact intruded on his glow of pleasure: it was her skin color. She was either very, very tanned or a person of other than pure white ancestry. If she were a Latino woman, or maybe a Mediterranean type, that wouldn't be a problem. But if it were something else...well if his suspicion was true, she couldn't be his woman, and he would face an awful decision about what to do with her, and damned soon.

However for now, he forced himself to put that question out of his mind. Perhaps she was in fact pure white, oh, say, Italian. Until he knew differently, he could continue with his little fantasy that she was willingly his woman.

BOOK I CONTINUED

BEFORE THE WAR

SAN FRANCISCO
Chapter Fifteen

Waiting to hear from Folger, Mike and Jenny took the next weekend to house-hunt. It seemed morbidly futile to try and find a place of their own, because if the war couldn't be stopped, their home would be destroyed with the rest of the city. Yet they agreed that for as long as they were able, they had to act as if life would go on.

Jenny's first choice for location was the neighborhood around Alamo Square, where they had come the day Mike had to leave for Alonzo. From that point, the city spread before them in a sweeping view, and Jenny confessed this was where she would love to have a home.

"It's funny, I don't know the city very well, yet I already I know this is one of my favorite places in town," she told Mike. "But I hardly imagine we can afford anything in the whole neighborhood. And that's assuming there's anything for sale around here. Ah, but we can dream, can't we?"

"Angel, we've got to keep dreaming," Mike told her. "If this is what you want, we could find a way to afford it."

"Well I won't say no, if that's what you think. Let's just look. For drooling purposes, if nothing else."

So they spent part of the day driving up and down streets until they found a place for sale that was hardly bigger than their current rented apartment. When they called the number to arrange a visit, however, they learned the cost was so ridiculously high that Jenny herself turned it down. Since it had been the only house in the entire area they had found that was for sale, a little sadly they made their way down and back home, to begin poring through newspapers for a place to buy somewhere else.

But they had at least made their first attempt to find a home together.

Two days later Mike looked up to see a stranger standing in the office door. With hardly a word, the visitor delivered a written message then walked away.

YOU HAVE AN APPOINTMENT WITH GENERAL FOLGER AT

0900 WEDNESDAY. CALL THIS NUMBER BELOW IF YOU CANNOT MAKE IT AND SAY 'ALABASTER'. YOU WILL BE RESCHEDULED.

The message included further instructions Mike was to follow when he reached Washington. Soon as the man had disappeared, Mike handed the message to Jenny.

"Two days," she said. "This is big news, isn't it? You have to make this meeting."

"That's for damn sure, but I don't want to go without you," he said. "I don't know what happens if you show up, but let's find out. You'll come with me, won't you?"

"Look, I don't want to be separated from you any more than you want me to. You're goddamn right, I'll go. You want me to make reservations? How soon should we leave?"

"Maybe we should fly out tomorrow, make damn sure we're there. What do you think?"

"I guess if we just go over and back, we can drop everything and do that. I'll set it up."

Relieved to let Jenny take care of the details of the trip, Mike spent the rest of the day polishing his own ideas to present to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

The rendezvous with General Folger did not come quickly or easily. Evidently concerned about being observed meeting with them, he had set up a covert arrangement which placed them on a certain street corner at an exact time, to be picked up in a nondescript car and driven to a park outside the Beltway in Virginia.

Deposited there and left alone, Mike and Jenny suffered through some nervous minutes, speculating whether they might have been set up somehow for an ambush.

Before them lay fields near where the two Civil War battles called Bull Run had been fought, both losses by the North. Mike wondered aloud if this little park was the place where citizens of Washington had come to watch the first Bull Run, and then had nearly been overwhelmed by the charging Rebels and forced to flee back to town in disarray and terror. Thinking about the art of war then, compared to now, he turned around and faced the direction of Washington.

The firepower available to the forces of North and South had seemed frightening in those days, but compared to thermonuclear warheads, the most potent weaponry of the Civil War era was comparatively no more than pop guns.

In that moment, a motorcycle came whining in off the main road outside the park, careening onto the narrow turnout, kicking gravel when it skewed almost to a stop before serenely gliding around the parking area to their position.

Mike and Jenny clung to each other in alarm. They had nowhere to go, even the nearest tree was farther than the motorcyclist, who remained in place, still on the seat, in a commanding position. Mike moved Jenny behind his body, providing what immediate protection he could, then waited to face the worst.

The rider was all in black leather, his helmet visor dark, so no details showed through, and he took his time dismounting the cycle, taking a couple of steps toward Mike and Jenny before stopping. By then, although Mike had not spotted any weapon, he was not ready to yet relax.

Finally, the helmet came off, revealing a handsome, totally bald African American man: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Hoyt Folger.

"General. Jesus, man, you had us going," Mike said. "I think you just about scared me out of ten years there."

In a deep, resonant voice, Folger laughed. "Good. I'll have you know, I busted my ass getting out here unseen. Nobody but you two and my aide know where I am right now. I wanted an isolated place like this. That way, unless somebody else shows up, we can speak completely in the clear.

"But before we do, may I know who your lovely companion is?"

"This is Jenny McGuire, my partner at the _Sentinel_. You have to give her the same consideration as my aide that you do Colonel Bryant. In every way."

"Wow. Okay, that's better. I'd be pretty concerned and more than a little pissed off if you'd just brought along a date.

"So in that case, it's good to meet both of you, but our window of security isn't very big, so let's get down to business, shall we? I'd have preferred a more comfortable setting, but this is more prudent.

"For starters, we are all agreed that we're trying to stop this war before it can start, right?"

"We'd be insane if we didn't, wouldn't we?" Mike answered.

"Yeah, but right off the top, we'd better be sensible and realistic and admit it might be impossible to prevent it."

Mike assured Folger that Jenny and he had already accommodated themselves to that hateful prospect.

"That being the case," Mike added, "I understood I would be expected to go to the Europeans and try to do something, but I can't say I quite understand what."

"What I need is someone who is invisible to my own organization, to carry a message to people I trust in NATO. I can't send Bryant, he's too well known. I can't send anybody in uniform, and nobody, obviously, in any intelligence outfit. But I can send a journalist. Or rather, allow a journalist to go, and there is a distinction."

Folger reached into his leathers and brought out a portable drive in a small transport case and told Mike all the information he needed to know was there.

"I want you to only read this on a computer that's totally isolated to any outside links. If after you go over this, you decide you can't do what I'm asking, let me know immediately so I can try to find somebody else. I'm not going to recruit a backup until you tell me no, okay?"

In bare explanation of his plan, Folger told Mike and Jenny that he wanted and needed operational capability to be set up outside the United States in case the war could not be prevented, so he would have a base that survived and wasn't touched by Kelcher's loyalists.

"I intend, afterward, to bring European military forces into play to protect their own part of the world, in cooperation with NATO. But here's the key inspiration, guys. I want Europe in position to help us survive here, as a population, if we're hammered. I want Europe to stay untouched, I want them to negotiate themselves security so they can hold their own and pick up the industrial slack while the US is physically out of action. And I want them to be prepared to send help to the surviving population here, then help us get back on our feet as early as possible."

"Jesus, that's a better idea than anything I've heard so far," Mike told him.

"Good, I'm relieved you agree."

Mike asked where he would be set down in Europe to begin and Folger told him he would see that Mike went wherever he preferred, as long as he ended up in Germany at the base where he was to meet Folger's contacts.

When Mike agreed, Folger asked if he had anything else he wanted to bring up.

"Yeah, but this is where Jenny comes in."

Folger nodded to her to explain and she told him the plan she had devised to hopefully prevent the war, or at least to improve the aftermath. She told him that before the war could be set off, Folger should try to use the power of his army to approach and challenge the Air Force and Navy members of the Joint Chiefs, to warn them they were suspected of conspiring with Kelcher to trigger nuclear war.

"You should be prepared to warn them you'll arrest Kelcher and Smithson himself and hand them over to Congress for impeachment, along with all the evidence, and if they don't stand down, they'll be charged and removed, and possibly imprisoned."

Mike braced himself, expecting Folger to bristle at the idea but he nodded.

"That's not...completely beyond my own line of thinking," Folger said. "As a last resort. But I've held off on the grounds that it would be essentially a military coup."

"No," Jenny responded, "because it isn't an empty bluff. You really would go to Congress with all the evidence. We know that at least one senator from Kelcher's party will jump in, and Buckner can rally those from the other party, by showing them the evidence. And when all that's presented, Congress will be pressed to impeach them. You, the military, will never take control of the government, you will only conduct the kind of arrest of an out of control president that's been needed more than once in the past."

"That's a hell of a responsibility," Folger muttered. "The issue of evidence is a sticking point. It has to be goddamn foolproof."

For a moment, Mike struggled with the urge to tell Folger what he might be able to bring back from Europe as evidence against Kelcher and Smithson—which revolved not around the plan to trigger nuclear war, but the complicity in shooting down the airliners. Mike had already decided that his first move once in Europe would be to try and reach the former CIA officer known as "Molly," but he had never even admitted this to Jenny or Bachelor because it was too much of a wild hope.

In that moment of decision, Mike faced the fact that it was still too much so to dangle before Folger. Instead, he left Jenny's plan and his endorsement of it for Folger to ponder.

She had one more thing to add, however. "If the war goes off, or just before it does, and Kelcher tries to suspend elections and stay in office, you must arrest him, because we don't want him running what's left of the country. If you can bring European support to help us all live through the next couple of years, it has to be with a different government in Washington. That is an absolute minimum of what you have to do. Can you agree?"

Folger had the look of someone staring an angry bear in the eyes.

"You...think that's his game? To set himself up as dictator? Before the war?"

Jenny assured him it seemed possible. The general only nodded and said by all means if it reached that point, he would step in.

"That I can promise.

"Then if there's no more, I'm antsy to get back where I'm expected. I'll see that a cab makes it out here in the next few minutes."

For the first time, Mike and Hoyt Folger finally shook hands. Then he turned to Jenny, clicked his heels and dipped his head. She offered her hand and he shook it, too.

"Jenny, I'm charmed to know you."

"Thank you, Hoyt. I hope to see you again some time, too."

"I'd love that.

"Good luck, you two."

He pulled on his helmet and climbed astride the cycle.

With a half-wave, half-salute, he roared back out and soon hit the road beyond the park. Fifteen minutes later, a cab arrived to take them back to town.

Chapter Sixteen

NEAR DULLES AIRPORT

That night, from Virginia, Mike called Frank Keller in Seattle, urging him to get down to San Francisco as soon as possible. Later, over dinner, Mike detected a sadness in Jenny that tore at his heart.

"I know what you're thinking," he sighed. "The trip to Europe. But I promise you, I'll make it as fast as I can, a couple of days, hardly longer than this one."

He reached across to touch her face and she caught his hand up in hers and held it there against her cheek.

"I know this thing isn't supposed to happen for months, but what if something breaks while you're there?"

"I told you about the base in Concord, where I'm invited to ride it out. I'll show you what you need so you can get in there without me. They'll take you in. And when I come back, I'll find you there."

Jenny expressed surprised that the people at the bunker might allow her inside if Mike was not with her. Mike assured her he would make certain they knew to do so, and that she would have the necessary documentation and codes in time.

With that, Jenny's mood transformed instantly, to know a rendezvous would be arranged with Mike even if the war erupted while he was in Europe. Still, she was clearly distraught over the parting that was to come. Mike assured her he was as sick over the idea as she was, but the mission had to be carried out.

"I know. But I'm going to ask something. Not demand, but ask. I want to make a baby with you, even with the horrible possibility that's staring us in the face. If we can survive, our baby can survive, and if we can't, it won't matter. It has to be up to you, you have to decide, I won't just stop my protection unless you agree, but if you do, I'll stop it immediately."

Mike took her hands and kissed them one at a time.

"Then do it, Sweetheart. Let's try to make you pregnant, that's what I want. Okay?"

"God, yes," she told him, bowing her head, crying softly now.

They suddenly were inclined to hurry through the meal and rushed back to the room, making love frantically, and clinging together in tears afterward.

"You really are my life," she whispered, and he felt her trembling and he could not imagine how he could love her more than he did now.

Mike waited until they were in the air next day before he brought up something on his mind.

"I'm not sure how to say this, and I don't want you to be upset, but I'm worried about Leslie."

She had been resting with her head against his shoulder but now she snapped up, peering at him. Her reaction alarmed him and he feared he had made the first big mistake in their time together as lovers.

"Leslie?" she said.

"Jenny, try to understand, she was so vulnerable and so afraid, and she lives in Sacramento, which is a very possible target. I did love her—I still love her, though never the way I love you. It doesn't matter how much she hurt me, I'm worried that she'll be...if this happens, she wouldn't have a chance. But now that I've brought it up, you're going to be—"

"No, I know what you think and I'm not. If you're worried for her, that just tells me how wonderful you are. You don't have to say another word, except tell me what you'd like to do for her."

He held her a moment, too overcome by her reaction to answer at first.

"I'm not sure what I could do," he finally said. "Just find a way to warn her without giving too much away, I guess."

"Well my god, Baby, by all means warn her, why not? I'm all for it."

But Mike wasn't at all sure how he could approach and get through to Leslie so that she would listen to him. "I don't know what she'd do if I even showed my face, Jenny. "Sweetheart, I'm asking for advice. How do I approach her, when she never wanted to see me again? How do I get through to her?"

"Go through a third person?"

"Who?"

"Frank Keller's coming back down, doesn't he know her?"

At that, Mike chuckled under his breath.

"What?"

Mike told her how Leslie and Frank Keller were all but enemies, that Frank was part of the reason Leslie left Mike.

"Frank Keller. That's like cats and dogs, Jenny. Oil and water. She always saw him as a reminder of how she claimed I changed after I came back from Kuwait. How I'd been 'gentle' as she put it, then I came back 'hardened.' She blamed Keller for turning me into a war correspondent, which I always denied, but there wasn't any use bothering.

"And worse, Keller had nothing to do with any changes I went through, but to her, he was a reminder of the changes. And...because he and I talked about hard things, about what we saw, and about things she wouldn't talk about, she hated him."

Jenny wondered what it was they could talk about that bothered Leslie.

"It's hard to explain, but she hated hearing the ugly things, the bad things even about daily news. She only wanted to hear sunny, happy things, and before I went to the Middle East, I loved that about her, but when I came back, and I needed to talk about those kinds of things, the way you and I do, she would cover her ears and almost scream.

"So soon, we weren't talking at all. And then Keller would show up, and instead of sitting there and nobody talking, he and I would go out, and she accused him of taking me away from her."

"I can't imagine."

"No, because you and I are so much alike. Leslie could never imagine standing in...that crash scene, seeing what we saw, and staying sane."

Jenny nodded, her lips pursed. "I get it. Then I'm sorry for her. If that's how she is, no, she wouldn't stand a chance after the war. And I get it that Frank couldn't be the go-between."

"No."

She let a silence grow, but only for a few seconds, and a gleam came to her eye that lit up Mike's heart, even having no idea what she was thinking.

"But I could," Jenny declared.

"You could? What?"

"Be the go-between. Mike, let me call Leslie! Maybe I could either get her to listen to you, or tell her the situation. I'd certainly be willing to try."

Mike wanted her to understand that he hadn't been fishing for her to offer but she assured him she knew that and had done so freely. Her sweetness and kindness overwhelmed him and he wiped at his eyes until she pushed his hand away and finished it for him, adding a soft kiss on his cheek.

With that decided, Mike and Jenny put talk about anything to do with the threatened war aside and tried to be upbeat the rest of the way home.

But next morning, Jenny tried to call Leslie and received no answer.

Two days later, Frank Keller returned to San Francisco as Mike had requested, and again, he brought Eric Waterfield with him. Mike was certain Frank would have a totally different opinion of Jenny than he had of Leslie and had difficulty containing his excitement to have his best friend and the woman of his life meet.

That evening, all four of them gathered for dinner in town. Mike filled Frank in on everything that had happened since he first brought the crisis to Mike's attention.

"It's moving well, isn't it?" Keller mused. "This is the best news I could have heard, short of someone arresting the entire Kelcher gang now."

Mike and Jenny exchanged glances and Keller picked up on it.

"What? What was that about?"

"Uh, that's in the works."

"What is?"

Mike told Keller and Waterfield what had been discussed with Folger about taking Kelcher and the others into custody as a last resort. Again, Mike held back his own hopes of providing evidence that could seal the case against the administration.

Even without knowing that, Keller enthused over the possibility.

"But don't fall in love with the idea," Mike cautioned both men. "You have to recognize that the chances are against it."

"I know, but it's good enough just to know it's still being considered."

They threw around ideas for awhile then Mike told Keller he wanted to arrange to contact him by radio when Keller moved up to Canada. "I'd like to make sure we can rendezvous afterward when...whatever happens, happens. Or doesn't. If we had time, it might actually be better for us to go join you than stay in the 'hole' in Concord."

"Aha! Here you go. I was going to bring that up."

Keller produced a card with the information Mike would need to reach his field radio. "Why don't you give me a call once a week, to check in, so we can stay on top of things."

"You've got it...."

Up to this time, although he had just barely nodded his head to her upon introduction, Frank had essentially snubbed Jenny. It was Eric Waterfield who made conversation with her while Mike and Keller hashed things out, and she and Eric seemed to get along well. But Mike didn't fail to notice Keller's reaction to the woman who had come to mean more to Mike than his own life. And Keller's attitude puzzled him even more. He would bring this up another time.

That other time came the next day. Keller had asked Mike to join him for lunch, and while he didn't exclude Jenny, he didn't pointedly invite her either, but Mike made the assumption she was invited. However, when he asked her, she declined.

"I think the two of you need to talk, without me. Or three of you, if Eric's going. I'm not sure why, but I don't think Frank approves of me, Mike. And I don't want to be a problem between the two of you, the way Leslie seems to have been. So just go, enjoy and don't worry about me. Okay?"

"Sweetheart, I don't want to exclude you from anything."

She understood but expressed a wish not to be a millstone around his neck with his friends. "I can just imagine Frank might be calling me 'the old ball and chain', or something like that, as if I'm taking your freedom. I know, men talk that way. And I don't want it to be that way. And I won't even suggest he might have feelings about my being black."

She succeeded in assuring Mike that she was perfectly all right with the situation.

"Please?" she finished.

"God you're sweet," he said. But he resolved anew to have it out with Frank about his treatment of her.

Indeed, Keller seemed happy to find Jenny hadn't come along and wasted no time forcing the issue.

"So you were able to get away from the ball and chain."

Mike almost choked at the manifestation of Jenny's prediction, coming in exactly the same words.

"All right, that does it, man. Just exactly what is it about Jenny that's a problem with you? She even wondered if it were race."

"Race? Hey, look man, you know a lot better than to say that to me. Fuck, man, I don't even know how to answer that."

"And I don't know how to deal with your attitude about her otherwise."

Using references back to when Mike was still married to Leslie and the tension existed between Keller and her, Keller described his fear that Jenny would prove to be as weak and scared of the world as Leslie and would end up hurting Mike the same way.

In answer, using graphic terms, Mike described the circumstances in which he and Jenny had met, serving as pool reporters in the midst of the wreckage and gore of the San Diego crash, where the second of the two jets had been shot down.

"We both puked on each other's shoes several times, but she stayed with it and ended up writing the story that made the papers. She's as tough as I am, so don't let the sweetness and the looks fool you. She's just about everything Leslie isn't."

"Jesus," Frank muttered. "Yes, if that's how she is, then I think you've found the jewel of a lifetime. I'm so sorry if I hurt her."

"She doesn't hurt easily. Unlike Leslie, too. All she cares about is that she doesn't get between you and me while you're here. That's why she didn't come to lunch. Shall I pass along your apology?"

"No. I want her to hear it from me. She has that coming. And I have it coming to have to face her with it.

"Let's all get together tomorrow, go somewhere, the new gang, and I'll let her know along the way. Yeah?"

"I'd love it and I know she would too. You're on."

With that, for Mike, the lunch was better and more satisfying than he could have remotely dreamed.

But it was one lunch closer to the time when he would be leaving Jenny for Europe.

Chapter Seventeen

SAN FRANCISCO

That night, Mike related the conversation with Keller to Jenny and relayed the invitation to join him the next day for a road trip. Eagerly she accepted and in that spirit, in the morning they set out on a drive, with Keller himself behind the wheel, heading across the Golden Gate, bound for Point Reyes. But on the way, just after they crossed the bridge, Jenny caught both Mike and Frank Keller by surprise.

"Mike, let's go find Leslie now."

"How do we do that, you never even got hold of her, did you?"

"I know, but if we can find her house, we can at least leave a note. This might be our only chance. Maybe she would call me, sight unseen. I'll try her again once we're in Sacramento. Please?"

Mike caught Keller rolling his eyes, but Jenny was right, it was the best time to make this attempt, while they were on this side of the Golden Gate.

"Look, you two, if this is a joke, then fine, you got me. So can we go on to the beach?"

"No, sorry, man, we aren't joking. We didn't plan this to spring on you, but Jenny and I've been talking about finding her. If we're ever going to do it, today's the day."

"Find her for what? What, for God's sakes?"

Mike explained the issue and Keller made no reply, driving along for a couple of miles, thinking. But when the turn-off to the San Rafael Bridge came up, he took it. Even then, he remained silent and stared ahead in what might be anger, at the least, frustration.

"Talk to me, Frank," Mike said.

"No, if you have to do this, fine. Just leave me out of it."

"No problem, we wrote you off as a go-between immediately," Mike assured him.

They rode silently all the way over to Sacramento, and Mike regretted having spoiled the outing, but what they were doing was right. Keller hadn't yet made his apology to Jenny and he hoped his mood would improve after the attempt to pass word to Leslie was behind them.

In the California capital, they stopped at a phone booth and Jenny hopped out, looking up Leslie's address. The telephone number she had received from information was different from the one posted in the book and when she returned to the truck she called it and let Mike listen in.

A woman promptly answered, although from his position, Mike couldn't tell if it were Leslie or not until Jenny asked her directly and received confirmation.

"Who is this?" Leslie asked.

"You won't know me, my name is Jenny. But I'm a friend of Mike's."

"Friend? As in girlfriend?"

"Well, yes. In fact, we're engaged."

"Yeah, well whoop-de-doo. So what do you want from me?"

"Actually, I'm concerned for you. Look, this has nothing to do with Mike, or with your history with him, but it's important. Could I talk to you a few minutes in person?"

Silence for a moment.

"And why would I listen to you?"

Jenny reiterated her concern for Leslie, adding that a threat existed from an outside source that had nothing to do with Mike, but which was very real and he thought Leslie ought to know about it and Jenny had offered to speak for him.

"First, you convince me why you'd give a big fat rip about me, of all people," Leslie insisted.

"Because my whole world revolves around Mike, and if you were once important to him and he's worried for you, I'm worried for you. It's hard to explain, but in a strange way, you're like family to me, even if distant family. And I don't give a damn about your past history with Mike, we're both worried about your future. All our futures, in fact.

"What else do you need to know, god damn it?"

"My god, you're a feisty one, aren't you. But it sounds like your heart's in the right place. I won't see him, understand? I'll see you, you tell me what you want me to know, and...go then away. Okay?"

"That's fine. So what now?"

"Jenny, is this really...truly a crisis? Is it?"

"It's a...major crisis, yes."

Mike heard Leslie sigh even from his place near where Jenny was holding the phone.

"Okay, look, would you...would you come by, come in a minute, or as soon as you can get here, let me meet you? Just you. Swear you won't make me see him. Just come in and tell me? You drink coffee?"

"Um hm."

"I'll make fresh. But if I see him, I run out the back door and that's that."

"Got it," Jenny assured her. She heard the connection break and closed the phone.

"Just hearing your side of it, she sounds like more of a cunt than ever," Keller said. Jenny gasped and leaned through the gap in the front seats.

"I don't believe I heard that language. If that's your attitude, no wonder she hated you. I wonder now if you also call me a cunt when I'm not around?"

Keller had already turned red faced and sank over against his door panel, covering his face. Mike was grinning at his buddy's discomfiture but Jenny was as irate as he had ever seen her.

"I can't defend that. It just slipped out," Frank said. "Now, I guess you see how ugly it was between us. But no, I've never used that word with you."

"Okay, well I get the picture," Jenny told him. "So call up her address on your GPS and get us there and park at the nearest corner and I'll walk, so she doesn't have to see either of your two ugly faces." She stuck out her tongue at them but Mike caught a mischievous gleam in her eye and couldn't keep from grinning.

Keller straightened in his seat and punched up the location of Leslie's home on his navigation tracker and in a half hour, they stopped next to a park at the end of the block.

"I'll be as fast as I can," she said. Slipping out, she hurried up the street and turned at one of the houses and disappeared from Mike's view.

The wait was a quarter hour or so. Jenny appeared at the street in front of Leslie's house and raised an arm, gesturing them to drive forward. Keller fired up the engine and rolled ahead to a stop at the curb where Jenny had signaled. By then, she had disappeared back inside and the two men exchanged questioning glances.

The door at the house where they had stopped opened and Jenny stepped back out, with Leslie in tow, holding onto her hand.

Mike climbed out and stopped in place at the foot of the sidewalk, unsure what was going on. Jenny led Leslie on until his ex-wife stood before him.

"I convinced her to see you anyway," Jenny said. "She wants to hear more than I was free to tell her."

It was not until he offered his hand that Leslie seemed to find strength. Then suddenly she broke from Jenny's grip and went into his arms. Astonished, Mike held her, finally kissing her cheek.

"I missed you, little bunny," he told her, but then immediately put his hand out to Jenny and brought her close and the three embraced.

"So how are you doing?" he asked Leslie.

"Oh, fine. I'm in real estate now, pretty successful. Still single. Other than that...." she shrugged.

For some reason, despite all his complaints and untoward comments, Frank Keller stepped out from behind the wheel and approached the others.

"You remember Frank?" Mike said, trying to make a joke of it.

"Oh hell yes," Leslie said warily. Frank offered his hand and almost formally, they shook, but he studied her, up and down.

"You look good, Les."

"Yeah, yourself, too," she said, managing a smile. "Been forever, hasn't it?"

"Yeah, long time."

"Look, let's not make this a public spectacle," Mike told her. "Could we get you to join us in the truck for this? What we want to talk about can't be said too loudly."

He escorted Leslie around, opening the door so she could take his former seat, up front with Keller, while he joined Jenny in the back seat.

"Guys, I told her the minimal story I could and guess what? She was all over it. She knew the threat was building. And get this, she says she's become a news junky. So you don't have to do much to convince her she needs to be prepared to leave if Kelcher goes mad. What she needs to know is where she could run. I have no idea what you're thinking, Mike."

Keller eased the truck out and while they talked, drove up to the back highway leading in the direction of Folsom, where the famous prison was located.

"All I could suggest," Mike told his ex-wife, "is that you keep a set of survival gear packed and be ready to drive toward the mountains, get as far up there until you see flashes and hear blasts, then seal yourself up in the car for several hours while the fallout passed. Then...try to find a town up there that survived and move in.

"If you find out," he went on, "that Sacramento isn't hit, you can start trying to make your way back. But by then, now that we're talking again, the three of us ought to try to find a place to meet, Jenny and you and me."

"Where will you be when it goes off?"

Mike only told her they would be in the area of Concord. "I'll come up with a place we can find you when it's all over and call you with it. Jesus, I should have thought this out," he added.

"I'm just knocked out," Leslie told him, her voice soft, almost a murmur. "After the way I treated you, Mike, to have you worry for me and go to this trouble. I'm...oh, Lord, guys, I don't know what to say. After the way I was."

"Leslie, I don't want to go into what happened between us," Mike told her. "I don't want you to think about it any more, I've had a life since then, I'm very happy with this one back here," he squeezed Jenny's hand, "and you did what you had to. Let's just talk about now and the future.

"I'm curious how you're aware of the situation, given your aversion to what was going on in the world. What's this about you being a news junky, now?"

At that, Leslie laughed. "Yeah, me and the news.

"My parents, you know, sheltered me growing up. And then you sheltered me, Mike, in your loving way. You tried, even when you had to go overseas to do that story. I'm not rehashing that, but when in my infinite stupidity, I left you after you came back, and when you probably needed me most, my parents were aghast. They worshipped you, Mike, and they couldn't believe I did that. They wouldn't let me move back home, they said I had to live with my idiocy, I had to find my own way and face the world.

"And oh my god, it was hard. Yet I did it. I'm proud of that, Mike. I became tougher. Tough enough, anyway. You won't believe this, but so many things about you and what you'd tried to teach me had seeped through. By osmosis, maybe, but when the world slapped me in the face, I was somehow ready for it."

She said once she had to survive on her own, she began paying attention to what was going on in the world, and suddenly woke up one day and realized she was hooked on following the news.

"So the bottom line is that I'm well aware of what Kelcher's capable of doing. If you're trying to gently suggest he might start a war with the Russians, I know it's true. Believe me, I'll be watching the news, I'll know it if warning signs emerge. Thanks to you. All of you.

"In any case, I'm not quite the scared little bunny you remember, Mike."

"I see that. I do. And I'm happy at the change."

"Yeah." It was Keller, who was watching Leslie now, between glances at the road, apparently seeing a different woman than he remembered.

"Frank, I know this has to be difficult for you," Leslie told him. "You didn't like me, I knew that. But then, of course, the feeling was more than mutual. So I'm not sure how to thank you for being a good sport now."

Keller was staring ahead now, no longer looking at her and Jenny hoped he wouldn't say something that would spoil all of this. But he surprised them all.

"Les, I'll let you in on a little secret about the very cocksure Frank Keller: I didn't like myself, either, back then. Maybe I saw in you an innocence I'd lost, while I was working for the defense industry.

"I still don't like...well I'm still paying for the things I was part of. I helped design newer, better bombs, some of which Kelcher may be about to rain down on innocent people. I'll never get past my part in this—the more dangerous this situation gets, the more guilty I feel.

"In fact, sometimes I really can't stand myself." He was on the verge of tears and Leslie reached across and touched his shoulder.

"No, Frank, you can't let yourself think that way! Look at what you're doing, you're using your expertise to try to save us all. That more than makes up for the other. And that's what matters. I would even say it's all that matters now."

"Frank's planning to go to Vancouver to ride it out, up in the mountains there," Mike said. "Alone."

"Really? Alone? Why?"

"It's part of my self-imposed penance," Frank said. "A journey, a trial, a cleansing, I guess. Maybe...maybe if I come back, and we somehow escape having this war, I'll feel like I'm ready to have a life, finally."

Jenny glanced back and forth at the two. Leslie was gazing at Frank now, and Jenny wondered if something were there that neither had ever faced, particularly when Leslie had still been married to Mike. Taking a deep breath, squeezing Mike's hand, Jenny leaned forward, almost between the two seats.

"Leslie, can you take a vacation, some time off?"

"Hah! Yes. I've got tons built up, I never go anywhere."

"You're going to think I'm crazy, but take it now, pack up enough things, and go with Frank up to Seattle, or even all the way to see where he's going to ride out the war in Canada. Spend however long you can spare with him, then catch a bus back. That way, if you get the feeling it's coming, get in your car and drive up there to join him if there's time. That's where you can ride it out!

"That's where Mike and I could come find both of you. And then together, the four of us could all figure out how to start up again in the aftermath.

"Go ahead, tell me to screw off, but I think it's something you should both consider."

Once again amazed at Jenny, Mike braced himself for an outburst—from Frank, or Leslie, or both—but in the meantime, Jenny passed him a glance he easily read, a plea for him to help.

"That's it, how you can live through it," he said. "I think she's onto something. Frank, Leslie's changed, I can certainly see that. You say you haven't changed, but I know better. So is there no way this is reasonable? To save a friend's life, you wouldn't offer her a place to survive? You two couldn't put up with each other for a few days now? A trial? A test run?"

Keller pulled over off the road next to a field and left the truck, wandering out to the fence, leaning over it. Jenny urged Leslie to go join him but Mike said wait.

"Let him think. This is vintage Frank Keller. He'll come up with an answer and whatever it is, it'll be final, you won't be able to sway him. Wait it out."

For five minutes, Keller hung out at the edge of the field, motionless, but Mike knew his friend's agile mind was in overdrive.

When Frank Keller returned and climbed in behind the wheel, it was impossible to know what he had decided just by looking. But he didn't start the truck right away.

"Les," he said, gazing at her across the front of the cab, "how do you feel about this? Is it insane?"

"Does that mean you'd think of taking me?"

"To save your life? Yes, of course." He actually chuckled. "I honestly believe we could keep from killing each other until this is over. We might even have some good times, who knows? Maybe instead of a vacation, a test ride, you should just...pack it in and come on with me. If we survive and you've lost your job, I can find you a place up in Seattle.

"What do you say?"

"Permanently? Where would I live?"

"I've got a guest room in Seattle. I'd move in there and give you the run of my place. In Canada, it might be a little cozier, not as much room. Try it?"

"I think I might...yes, I could do that."

In the back seat, Jenny curled up in Mike's arms now and wiped at her own eyes.

"No, but I'm serious, is this what you want?" Frank asked her. "Are you saying you'd really like to come with me?"

She couldn't answer, she covered her mouth, crying now, but she nodded yes. After a moment, however, she met him halfway across the cab of the truck for a long embrace and a soft kiss.

"Well! Then I guess we need to let you start packing, don't we?" Frank said. He squeezed her hand and held it all the way back to her place.

Keller drove Mike and Jenny home, staying on the sofa, waking early to return to pick up Leslie in Sacramento. They both hugged him before he left. Jenny leaned close and told him, "I'm glad to know you, Frank."

"Oh God, I'm so happy Mike has you. You are a such a jewel, woman. And I know I've never felt as happy in my life. How am I going to thank you?"

"By taking good care of her. By loving her, no matter what, the rest of the way."

"I will, Jenny. We'll be fine."

"I know. I could see that, I could tell. Now go to her."

She shooed him out the door and Mike embraced her as they watched Frank disappear around the corner.

"And as for you—I want you in the bedroom. Let's take another shot at making a baby," Jenny whispered and Mike carried her back to bed for one more time before they left for the office.

That day, Mike asked Bachelor to join him in his car; they drove around town while Mike filled his boss in on everything, unwilling to offer anyone outside the loop a chance of listening in. Bachelor was all but speechless and when they were all back in the office, Bachelor shook hands with Mike as if to say goodbye, though he wasn't leaving for a few days.

When the time arrived, the same man who had come to Mike with instructions on meeting Folger returned with information on the flight to Europe. Suddenly, it was two days away and Mike and Jenny clung to each other every free moment. He was no longer going in to the office, and she was showing her face but barely accomplishing anything, finding it hard to concentrate with the coming separation weighing so heavily on her heart.

The morning he was to go, Jenny sat on the bed sobbing softly while he dressed. Soon, Eric Waterfield would arrive, to take Mike first to the Concord Army base, where he would receive transport to Travis Air Force Base, further north toward Sacramento.

At eight o'clock, the buzzer from downstairs went off and Mike let Waterfield in. There was time to kiss Jenny once more, squeeze her hand, then go. She was brave, coming to him, holding him once and giving him that kiss, then saying goodbye.

And he was out the door.

BOOK II CONTINUED
Chapter Eight

SHADY COVE

She awoke some time after daylight the next day. The sensation of being rested was almost exhilarating and it was only after she sat on the edge of the bed for a minute or so that it hit her. Eric was dead, she was all alone, and in the hands of someone...well she couldn't figure out just who this man was, but she must be in his house.

"Hey! Are you here?" She jumped down from the high-mounted bed and realized her boots and socks were off. Quickly she checked herself over, shocked to discover she was covered in blood above her waist but was otherwise dressed. In a panic she pulled at her clothes, looking for a wound and finding nothing. It must be Eric's blood, and little by little the details began to come back to her.

She found her pack lying on the floor but before she changed into old clothes from it, she tiptoed out of the bedroom, wanting to know if the man was in the house or if he had a bathroom she could use to change.

"Hey, is anybody in here?" she tried again. Receiving no answer, she was emboldened to explore, soon finding a bathroom. Quickly she dressed in the dirty clothes, tossing the bloody ones aside for now, until they could be washed. While she was there, she relieved herself, then continued exploring.

In the kitchen, she found the note directing her to food. Starved, she dug into the refrigerator and found herself eating like a pig.

"You're turning into a slob," she said, needing to hear a voice, even if it were her own.

The house was rustic and she soon realized it was built into the side of a hill, less a house than a lean-to, something a prospector might live in, yet it was comfortable and warm.

She tried to step out but the doors were all locked, apparently from the outside. The feeling of being a prisoner panicked her and she forced herself to calm down. She returned to the bed and lay down, trying to think, but a couple of minutes later she heard a door open and jumped down, rushing to the sound of it.

"Oh good, you're on your feet. How you doing, Ma'am?"

"Why am I locked in? I want to be on my way," she demanded.

"And where do you think you'd be going, all alone?"

"Concord. I'm trying to meet someone there."

"Is that what you think? Miss, let me clue you in on some facts of life, in these days. In case you haven't somehow caught on, we're living in total anarchy. The only thing resembling law or government that's left are people like me and my forces. All you have to do is pass from the control of one group to another and all the rules change. There's no such thing as pulling out your cell phone and dialing 911 for help, it just isn't there. Nor is cell phone service, for that matter.

"Take us for instance, we're trying seize control of Sacramento, while other people are trying to do the same thing, and at the same time, they want to whip us, and no matter which direction you go, there'll be people like us trying to run everything. And in case you don't have the picture yet, Ma'am, they can do any damn thing they want...with you. Get it?"

"I get it. But I don't know that I agree."

"Well let me give you something to think about," O'Toole told her. "About five minutes—at the longest—after you stepped out the door, you'd find about a hundred men all eager to enjoy your company, and believe me, they wouldn't have sipping tea with you on their minds.

"I realize you aren't ready to accept it, but I'm the best thing you've got going for you, the fact that I'm more interested in protecting you than doing something to you is a blessing you ought to take note of. So I strongly recommend you stay put, under my control, while you can. I'm urging you to get comfortable here for a few weeks, at least, and see what shakes out."

The woman sighed and picked at a scab on her hand.

"What if I said I want to go and take my chances anyway?"

"I'd say no. I'd say it would be a waste to let you get yourself killed. I have a feeling you're the kind of woman we're really going to need, somebody who can take care of herself and is willing to stand up for what she wants.

"So I'm going to say sorry, but I insist that you stay here until things are under better control. No matter how strong you are, it only takes one bad man with a gun or knife to neutralize all that."

"So you're just going to lock me up in here. That's my life from now on?"

He pointed out that he had already told her that they needed time for the period following the war to sort itself out. "It might just turn out that I can eventually help you get to Concord, or wherever the hell else you want to go. Just not right now.

"Speaking of hell, by the looks of you, you've been through it already. I'm offering you a chance to have a relatively normal, and very safe life for awhile. Why don't you be smart and take it, sit back, relax, and take it easy awhile?"

"I'll think about it. For now, you have any aspirin?"

"I can find some. You need it?"

"And antacid. I've been feeling a little sick at my stomach for a few days. Must have been something I shouldn't have eaten somewhere along the line."

"Probably so. Standby."

He disappeared into the kitchen and came back with the medicine she requested.

"I'm going to scrounge you up some clothes. If you'll make me a list of the things you need for comfort, I'll go get them. You know, woman stuff, proper underwear... whatever. Okay?"

"Well right now, certain 'woman stuff' doesn't seem to be a high priority. I should be having my period and I'm not. I think I have an idea why, and why I'm not feeling up to par. Which means if I'm right, I've got about seven months to get somewhere safe, or you might have a smaller problem to help me take care of until it grows up to be a bigger problem. What do you think of that?"

"A baby?"

She acknowledged she might be pregnant, that she had been with her man about the right amount of time ago. "Is there anyone around who could help me deliver when the time came? I've never done this before and I'm going to be terrified."

"Oh Jeeze, and the father, the man—"

"No, Eric wasn't the father, we were friends, but the father's the one I'm hoping to reach in Concord."

"Oh, I see. Okay, but make a list of whatever, you know?"

He provided her with a paper and pencil and left her alone.

He made a hot meal for them that evening, some kind of meat, probably deer or elk, and she sat down with him, although choosing a place that kept the long rough-hewn table between them.

"So what do you call yourselves? Your people? Militia? Paramilitary? What?"

"Well we don't have a formal name, we're just who we are. I think of us as liberators. But we were survival-ists. Now we're surviv-ing. We aren't a militia, as militias go. But then, I guess by definition, yes. Paramilitary, too, I suppose.

"The common thread is that none of us believe in the government we had, and we believe in the local sheriff as the highest form of law, but that's actually almost cliché. I don't care if he's called the sheriff or chief of police or what, but the local law enforcement officer's about as high a form of government as we agree with."

" _Posse Comitatus_ , then."

"Right."

"That would make you libertarians," she said.

"Wow. You're quite a smart little lady, aren't you?"

"Well I guess I'm not an ignoramus," she said, smiling softly. "I know a little about things, yes. And neither are you. An idiot, I mean. You weren't always doing this, were you? What's your story?"

"You really care?"

"Well let's say I do." To soften her sarcasm, she permitted herself a wan smile.

"Okay, that's good enough for me." He seemed almost to bask in her feigned interest and she began for the first time entertaining the notion of manipulating this man. But to what end, she wasn't sure yet.

He told her he had been a special forces officer in the US Army, that his degree had been in history. "I was in ROTC, then the first Persian Gulf War as a lieutenant. Ended up a colonel. Then the second Bush war against Iraq, and some things started stinking. He treated the people who actually fought like shit, and lied about the reason we had to go in. We knew it was over oil, and by then the fucking attorney general was taking our rights-left and right and I just said that's it. I retired and joined the movement. And here I am."

"And family?"

O'Toole picked at a bit of food on his lip and gazed off across the room for a moment, his eyes unfocused.

"Yes. Divorced, the wife kept the kids. And there are my parents. All of them were in Fresno. Are in Fresno, but God knows what's going to come of them."

"Do you know if it survived the bombings?" she said.

He told her Fresno hadn't been hit, adding that the war turned out to be pretty limited. "I understand it was all sub-launched missiles that got through." And then he added something shocking, that the Kelcher administration had made the best use of the porous defense shield by saving the southern part of the United States.

"How do you know all this, living out here?" she demanded.

"One of my former subordinates in the army went to work for a think tank, or at least that's how he described it to me. The master plan, he said, was to let the coasts go and the northern cities, Chicago, Detroit, and also Boston and New York all be wiped out, then turn the militias and other groups like that...like us...loose, along with the federal police agencies, and 'cleanse' the nation of the unwanted.

"And now," he added, his voice dripping with distaste, "I'm expected to play my part with my people, and when the time comes, Kelcher emerges from his hole and picks right up, except all his political enemies and others are eliminated."

"'And others'," she said, making it not a question but a statement.

"Yeah, the...the vermin, the misfits, the...."

"Non-whites. You have trouble saying it in front of me, don't you? What do you usually say? Niggers?"

He gasped and tried to disguise it as a cough but she knew.

"And yet you don't entirely approve, do you? What part of it bothers you, eradicating a race, or groups of races, assuming it also means Latinos and Asians and Jews, or that it's Kelcher who'll inherit the all-white nation afterward?"

When he didn't answer, she saw fit to let that go for now. Instead, she picked up on something else.

"Where is this contact of yours that told you all this?"

"I've kept him in custody. Why?"

"I would really like to talk to him. I'd like to know more about this idea, this 'cleansing'. Which means 'ethnic cleansing', right?"

"I've told you what he said."

"But I'll ask you again, can I talk to this man?"

Wilmot O'Toole pulled at his chin, sucking in his cheeks, seemingly troubled over the request.

"I can't take you to him, I don't want my men to see you. You're very...attractive and as I tried to tell you, they sort of consider there aren't any laws right now. I'd have to bring him here. You really think it's important?"

She shrugged, not sure anything was important any more. But she needed something to keep her mind occupied and she might learn something that would be useful sooner or later.

"Yes, I think it could be. Maybe I'd ask a question you didn't think of that would help you. What can it hurt?"

"Yeah, what can it hurt. Okay, I'll do it."

"Meantime, what about your parents and children?" she asked him. "Can't you go down and find them now?"

His mouth fell open as if the thought hadn't come to him before.

"Do you think?" he said. "But people like us, other...militias are all around Fresno. God knows what's happening there. If it's anything like Sacramento...."

"Can you get through?"

"I can't leave here now. Things are...it's becoming more and more problematical.

"There's something you deserve to know. While we have our way in the direction of Sacramento, only a few miles away and all around us on the east is a different kind of army. They're well organized but they're also full of religious nuts. It's a white supremacist group calling itself The Nation and there's always been a reckoning coming between them and us.

"I can't go away and leave this to my subordinates while things are at the worst. It would be cowardice. I have to stay here until we beat them off and secure Sacramento. And then...well listen, when that's happened, I tell you what I'll do. I'll take you wherever you're going and then I'll go on and find my kids."

Suddenly, that seemed like a very acceptable possibility for her.

"I just hope it doesn't take until I'm big as a house," she said. "Maybe better after it's born, if I'm really pregnant. But whatever, we'll do it. Thank you. And for your hospitality."

"At your service," he said and he all but saluted.

In that moment, she had a strange sense that everything was going to work out, that she would really see the father of her child—the light of her own life—again, but it would just take a little longer than she could have hoped.

Chapter Nine

Wilmot O'Toole had her wait inside while his men brought Billy Campion from the town jail to the cottage out back and secured him to a chair. He made sure his own people were completely gone from his property before he led her out into the open to cross over to the cottage and meet with the prisoner.

Campion seemed comfortable despite the shackles, and he had never lost the attitude that sooner or later O'Toole would let him go. But when he saw the woman, he tensed.

"What is this?"

"I've brought someone who's interested in meeting you and asking some questions. Maybe she can convince me you're not so bad and we can let you go. What do you think?"

"Let me get this straight, you're asking me to be interrogated by a broad? And a nigger, to boot? What's wrong with you?"

It was like a cold slap to both of them, the woman and O'Toole. He looked at her and it was if it were the first time he realized she was African-American, despite her comments earlier. A wave of terror swept through her—what would he do, now that he faced it? Would he throw her out, incarcerate her, too, or what?

"That...that doesn't matter, you're going to answer," O'Toole said, but he kept casting sideward glances at her.

"Screw you. You can shoot me first, but there's a limit to everything. I won't be interrogated by some nigger cunt, so fuck it."

Jenny stepped closer, looming over Campion, where he was confined to a chair.

"Is that really what you'd prefer?" she said. "You would rather be dead than talk to me because of the color of my skin, or my gender, or both? Is race that fucking important to you? After all, you assholes have what you wanted, you won the Civil War, you have your White Christian victory. Why would you want to die now, just because someone you don't approve of has some questions for you?"

Campion glared at her, refusing to answer.

"All right," she added, "let me sweeten the pot a little and tell you the truth: if you die, I consider it a personal victory for me! So are you willing to let me win just because you insist on being a shit head?"

Campion turned his head slowly, to glare up at O'Toole. "So when was it you became a race traitor? What are you going to do now, make your own little gang of half-niggers with this bitch?"

O'Toole had his hand raised to punch Campion when she moved, grabbing his arm, holding him back.

"Stop it, goddamn it! Both of you. How idiotic can you get? Half the country's destroyed and you two are arguing like school children.

"Look," she told Campion, "he and I aren't fucking, if that's what you're thinking. We barely know each other, and he's strictly using me to gather intelligence. I came in from just outside San Francisco and I've seen and heard a lot about the situation and he's listening. I'm here to ask you questions so we can all compare notes and understand the bigger picture. If you're stupid enough to let race get in the way of all that, then you're probably too stupid to contribute anything anyway. Or to live much longer on your own in this new world.

"Oh screw it, this is a waste of time. Come on," she said to O'Toole, and turned for the door. But she heard the one called Campion shift in his seat.

"Wait. Wil, if I talk, you let me go? I'm not doing you any good locked up. You had your revenge, you put me away awhile. What good's it do you to keep me like this?"

"What'll you do if I let you go? Run right over to The Nation and tell them my strengths and weaknesses? I can't let you go until they're beaten."

Campion realized it was a point he couldn't argue.

"If I talk now, you'll let me go later?"

"I'll do it."

"All right, that's good enough for me. You were always straight with me, Willy. What is it she wants?"

"You have to talk to her directly if you want out."

O'Toole nodded to her to go ahead.

"Where's the new capital going to be?" she said. "When is Kelcher moving in?"

"Atlanta. I don't know how long he's going to stay underground, there's a possibility of more war. He's out to dominate Europe and if they don't cooperate, he might hit them, too. And Russia may not have fired everything, waiting to see, so there could be more. Until he's sure he's got complete control, he isn't coming out of the hole. There's no rush, the boys out in the field know what to do."

"How? How is this 'cleansing' operation organized?" she said. "If I'm understanding this, it would be made up of groups not unlike this one, which are more interested in their own sovereignty than allegiance to a larger government. How are they all going to be brought under one big tent?"

O'Toole watched her, his eyes widening. She suspected that none of these questions had yet occurred to him.

"Most of them don't know. Most of the groups will be encouraged to control their area, to act more like one-celled organisms in a colony than in a whole body. Each one is being led to believe that they would inherit it all, they only had to wipe out the undesirables in their region.

"The key is that they were sold on a nigger uprising after the war. They were convinced to be prepared, and if we have things set up the way it was planned, the niggers in the surviving cities, north and south, will put up enough of a resistance that the boys will go after them all-out and eradicate them. It'll take awhile, but it'll happen. That's the plan."

Campion went into greater detail and she wished she had a pen and paper to write all this down.

"The bottom line is that you mean to end up with a white, Christian nation, isn't it?" she demanded.

"Yeah, and woe unto you when we get it, woman. That was part of the American Millennium plan. A thousand years of American power in the world, and white Christian power at home. And it's all right on line. Everything's good," Campion said.

"Except for you, getting yourself all locked up," O'Toole said.

"Well if you keep your word, even that's going to be all right."

"But what about us? We aren't part of your scheme. We may be white separatists in the heart, but we aren't going to join your nation. We have no desire to be Kelcher's police force," O'Toole added.

"Well I'll give you a clue: the army and national guard will come and visit you one day and we'll see how free and easy you are.

"I think you'd better give that some thought, bro," Campion told him.

"Then I have some news for you," she told Campion. "I'm afraid your darkie Army commander, General Folger, isn't going to play the game."

"Ha! Folger won't be around by then. Soon as Kelcher has Europe straightened out, he'll remove Folger and arrest him, or worse, and so fast it'll make his eyes spin. Then the army will follow orders. No problem."

"You mean the fairly large number of blacks and Latinos in the army are going to cooperate in creating a white nation?" she said.

"Look, wench, all that's thought out in fine detail. I don't know what you think you're going to do with it. When the time comes, you'll just be one more statistic yourself."

She showed no outward reaction to his words, but internally, she was already starting to process it. Why, she wasn't sure, unless she could somehow work on O'Toole in such a way as to win her freedom sooner. And then, she would take all this information with her to Concord, and from there, it would reach Folger....

"I see. Well this is all very fascinating," she said.

"But I guess I know all I need to, that's good for me. I'm a little tired."

"I guess that's it, then, Billy. Thanks for your cooperation."

"Buzz off, O'Toole, don't bother trying to make nice over this. I know where you stand now."

"Then maybe I'd better not ever let you go."

"You made a deal!"

"Then you'd better hope I stabilize the situation around here so the goddamn Nation doesn't matter."

O'Toole opened the door and gestured her out, and back to the house. There, he sat down in the big common area that served as a living room and she curled up in a second chair, suspecting he'd want to talk.

"So what does all this tell you?" he said.

"When I reach my friends, they'll know how to use it. It might not be so easy for Kelcher to seize control, or even get out of his base if the Army knows the plan."

"Are you telling me you would be in contact with the Army?"

"Would that surprise you?"

O'Toole lounged back in his chair and studied her. "No, I don't think so.

"Christ," he added. "I don't want to side with the army particularly, but it might be better than Kelcher. I was in the army, I can deal with them. Maybe I need to get you back to your people sooner rather than later."

She told him with a grim smile how she would feel about that. O'Toole responded that he would have to think about it and added that he must return Campion to the jail and meet with his men because of what he had learned. "Which I would never have known if you hadn't gotten it out of him. Again, amazing.

"I'll go in the morning and it might be a couple of days. I hope you'll be comfortable here."

"I'll be fine. I'll wash out a few things if you don't mind my using the water."

"Of course not."

Oddly, after that, they spent the rest of the day in the living room, making occasional conversation and reading from O'Toole's generous library. Night came and he provided dinner, then left her the bedroom. In the morning he was gone, but the doors were again locked from the outside. In that, he had wasted time, because she realized he was right, that being outside here, with his men, probably most of them horny and no longer constrained by rape laws, was no place for her to be. Even if they figured out she was black, she knew racists were not always unwilling to have their pleasure with "wenches."

The way he left her the run of the house puzzled her.

In fact, his treatment of her altogether made no sense. He was undoubtedly a racist himself, yet in all the time since Campion had spoken the magic words—about race—O'Toole had ignored it, had not acknowledged it at all. For now, he was treating her as if she were not African-American. Or better, as if it didn't matter.

So she felt very good about having insisted on the interview of this Campion character. If she made it back to Concord, she would have some significant intelligence for the people there. And, of course, for the father of her possible child....

Chapter Ten

AT THE TIME OF THE WAR—

ON THE ROAD TO LAKE TAHOE

For Doctor Benjamin Howe, his three children, and his wife Megan, the onset of the war had been unrealistic and unbelievable. Having converted a medical conference at one of the resort hotels at Lake Tahoe into a mini-vacation for the family before school started, Howe was just outside of Placerville on the back road, heading west when the reports started coming in on the radio.

The initial radio bulletins detailing explosions of gigantic proportions taking place first, on the East Coast, then soon enough, on the West, had the feel of science fiction.

"My god, it's some kind of terrorist attack," he said.

But very quickly, the reports indicated the explosions were nuclear in nature and soon after that, it was clear the United States was under large-scale attack from somewhere.

"It has to be Russia, who else can do it? How did this happen, we weren't in any kind of trouble with Russia?" It was amazing how he could speculate so calmly over something so horrible, so potentially world-ending. Yet they were up in the hills of California and there wasn't the slightest tremor in the air to hint that millions of people were dying.

But then came the flashes that were visible all the way across the state, and the dull sound of thunder that followed long afterward and suddenly it wasn't science fiction any more.

There was no choice, he turned around, heading back east, away from the coast, and home, unsure what to do, except that they couldn't go back to Oakland, because the flashes they had seen were surely from the Bay Area. It must be gone now, and with it everything in their lives that wasn't in the car with them. And that, more than anything, seemed unreal and impossible to comprehend.

For a few miles they continued on, but the end came without warning. Explosions erupted all around them and up ahead a tree crashed down, blocking the roadway and he skidded to a stop.

"Everybody down, below the windows!" But his wife Megan did not duck until she had made sure all the children were hidden in the back.

The shots were quick, only five or so, but when they ended, the windows of the car were shattered and Megan was thrown into Benjamin's arms, dead instantly.

He wailed, in a way he had never done in his life. But before he had a moment to mourn his companion for twenty years, people in dark outfits swarmed the car, yanking open the door and pulling the family out, throwing them face down on the ground, focusing guns at their heads.

"Look what we've got, a whole fucking passel of niggers," one of the men said. "You know what this is? You know what we've done? We've taken the very first slaves of the new confederacy." The horrible man let out what he must have fancied as a rebel yell and suddenly the squad of animals with him were doing the same.

The rest of the day, the week, the next month took place in a fog for Benjamin Howe and his family. Their captors marched them through a forest to a compound that had the looks of a World War II Stalag, and threw them inside.

"Here's your home, until we find work for you. We'll feed you when and if we feel like it and any attempt to escape is a death sentence. You follow what I'm saying?"

Benjamin Howe was in a state of almost catatonic paralysis over the loss of his wife and made no reply. He fell on the ground where they shoved him, next to Megan's body, and it was up to his oldest son, George, at seventeen, to calm things down.

Thinking back to the stories he had heard of slaves in the Old South, George tried to remember the speech patterns they were known for.

"Yes Suh, we understands, Suh. We won't try to escape, no Suh."

It was a dangerous moment. If the man believed George was making fun of him, anything could happen, but if he was the dolt he seemed to be, he would assume this was the way blacks normally talked and would feel mollified.

He stared at George for a moment with his hands on his hips.

"Yeah, that's a good boy. Smart boy. You keep the rest of them in line and that'll be fine."

"Yes Suh." And then George added the touch that strangely, would buy the family some time and better days to come.

"Yes Suh, Cap'n."

The white supremacist smiled.

"Yeah, that's right, it's Cap'n to you. You be good, buck."

George didn't answer, he just wanted the man gone so he could attend to his father and bury his mother. And start figuring out how to get the rest of them the hell out of there alive.

Three days later, a bullet-headed man who seemed to have a position of power arrived and entered the compound, swaggering around its perimeter, peering at the collection of African-Americans which had increased in number since the Howes were taken. The newcomers, another family of three backed away, sheltered by the children of the Howe family, led by George. His father was still lost to the world, and although George grieved over his mother almost unbearably, he had to hold himself together for the sake of the others, particularly his sister Melissa, who was in as bad a state as her father.

"Come out here!" the white man demanded. "All of you. Move!"

The leader had armed men with him and two of them cocked their weapons, pointing them in the air, with clear intent, if the orders weren't obeyed.

George herded everyone out of the single building near the edge of the compound, helping his father, who barely functioned enough to walk.

"I hear-tell you're a doctor," the white man said, addressing George's father.

"Yes suh, he a doctor," George said, holding onto the dialect until he got a handle on this new "massa".

"We ain't got a doctor in our valley, so I'm going to be sending wounded people in here. I want you to make a list of what you need to save my people's lives. You do that and I'll make it better in here. You refuse, or you butcher just one operation and it's gonna be hell.

"What do you say?"

"Suh, Cap'n, my pappy's still not over my mammy's death. He hears what you're saying' and I'll have you a list of what he need soon. He ain't a surgeon, he a...a fambly doctor, Suh. But he can do it. Just you wait and see. He'll come around and everything'll be fine."

The man approached George and walked around him, looking him up and down and for a moment, George was certain he was going to make him pull off his shirt and assess his suitability for the plow. George, six foot two, was a standout fullback, but he was also an honors student in English, and wasn't truthfully accustomed to physical work except on the practice field. He tried to blank his mind to what he might be facing for the rest of his life, but he also saw possibilities for using this obviously dull-witted man to advantage.

But the man didn't demand that he remove his shirt.

"My name's Slade. General Slade, to you, you understand, boy? No Captain, it's General. And I'm putting you in charge in here, and we'll be bringing in more and more of you niggers. You're the overseer once we start working. You up to that?"

"Yes Suh. I's up to it."

"Good." He nodded his head speculatively. "Good. I'll be back."

And he was back. Often.

Over the next several days, Benjamin Howe recovered from the death of his wife, mostly because his children needed him to come out of the fog of despondency and loss. By the time the man now known as Skip Slade returned, Dr. Howe had made a list of what he felt would be needed to sustain both an emergency room and a general clinic for those who would eventually swell the ranks of this concentration camp.

George told his father of the speech pattern he had adopted, to try and lull the white captors but Dr. Howe was having none of it.

"Bullshit, I'm not toadying up to those bastards. If I have to treat their wounded just to keep us alive and fed here, I'll do it, but that's the most I'll demean myself. And you knock it off, too. Okay?"

"All right, Dad. I sure as hell didn't enjoy it. I'm glad you said it."

"Good. Look, Son, you've really been a rock. I can't tell you how proud I am of you. But I don't know what's going to become of us, I just don't know...."

And neither did George.

Over the weeks that followed, as indeed wounded members of what the Howes now knew was the outfit called The Nation were brought in and treated, a strange thing developed. Slade exhibited a certain unconscious respect for the doctor, respect bordering on awe. He spoke to him not as a slave but as a man, even while he talked down to everyone else in the camp. Except George, who, he seemed to equate in some way with his father in terms of being his own superior mentally. Indeed, the man seemed to have some grasp of his own intellectual weakness and sometimes even made light of it. So odd, he hated blacks, yet respected people smarter than himself, no matter the tint of their skin or standing in the world.

And George Howe fully intended to capitalize upon that fact to the maximum....

BOOK I CONTINUED
Chapter Eighteen

BEFORE THE WAR

TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE

The journey from Travis Air Force Base, to Aviano in Italy, to Milano, finally to Paris by train, had overall an end-of-the-world feeling to it for Mike.

Never having really slept, Mike stepped out of the Austerlitz train station in Paris in something of a daze, but at least the trip was done. He had timed it so he would arrive in Paris in the morning.

After a telephone call, the president's office sent a car for him, delivering Mike to the Palais de l'Élysée, where he was to meet President Clervoy. Now, despite a long-standing friendship with the president that went back to Mike's work with President Buckner, when Clervoy was French ambassador, Mike suffered a certain nervousness.

Despite trusting Clervoy, it was possible the French president would take what Mike had to tell him the wrong way and destroy both the mission and the hopes riding on it.

In his private office, François Clervoy rushed forward to greet Mike, offering him a wide grin, shaking his hand.

"Mike, Mike, my friend! This is wonderful, it is so good to see you again. Please, sit down," the president told him.

The man who had led Mike to the office excused himself, closing the door behind him. The president took a seat behind an unprepossessing desk.

"It is sad to know that there is much more beyond the chance to renew our friendship, to your visit here. Larry Buckner has passed me a carefully worded message, but there were no specifics, only that your visit was of great importance. What am I to make of that? It does not sound like good news."

"No, good news it isn't," Mike said. "But listen, before I say a word of it, I want to be assured we can speak absolutely candidly in this room. You'll see why when I begin."

"Yes, trust this room to be secure," Clervoy told him and Mike sighed.

"All right here it is...."

Mike proceeded to relate the entire situation as he knew it up to the moment.

The president of the Republic of France turned almost gray.

" _Sacre merde_. This is most serious, most serious," he said. "Much worse than I could have imagined. I must meet with my people. I assure you it will not leave their confidence, but I cannot act on this alone, if the time comes. And I'll of course, as you wish, have to speak to other leaders if necessary, to help your people after it happens, if it cannot be prevented."

"I realize that. I have no choice but to trust your discretion."

"I appreciate that very much. Am I to understand this general does not know you would come straight to me?"

"I didn't give him a hint of it, but he knows I have plans of my own and as long as I cooperate with his, he doesn't care."

"Very good. All right, unless you have other plans, I will arrange to put you up for the night and meet again about this tomorrow."

"That would be good, I just arrived and I really need to stay out of sight, so if you could do that—"

"Consider it done. I will place it in the hands of my security people.

"Now don't think of me as being rude, please, in sending you away so quickly, and I admit that nothing is more important than what you have brought me. But I must not be seen altering my plans. I would invite you to dinner tonight but cannot. I promise we will dine together soon.

"For now, please." He gestured Mike back out to where he had waited for the meeting, in an anteroom down the corridor.

For five minutes, Mike stewed, uncertain what happened now, until two men approached him, large men, dressed quite casually, with loose fitting sweatshirts over their running clothes. One of them pulled back the shirt tail, exposing a handgun in the waistband of his pants.

"Forgive me, this is not to use on you," he said, grinning. "We have been assigned as your protection. Please come with us, you are to be housed in a hotel nearby for the evening. If you accept. I understand this is to be undertaken with discretion."

"Of course."

"Come this way, please."

The two agents led Mike out a rear entrance into a black van without windows in back. Mike was relieved that his face would not be seen on the street, because he had come to fear Kelcher's people everywhere, watching his every move. He sincerely hoped it was only his imagination working overtime and not the reality.

A short few minutes after he boarded the vehicle, his escorts delivered him to a room on the third floor of a luxury hotel in the heart of town.

"Anything you want, just call, it is compliments of the Republic of France," the escort told him. "Only, for your protection, do not leave the room, or even open the doors to the verandah. I do not think your life is in danger but we understand your government is not to know you are here."

"Yes, that's for damn sure," Mike said, managing to muster a weak smile. "Thank you."

"It is our pleasure."

When they left, Mike took a long bath, then perused the menu and called up a modest dinner. But he did indulge in a bottle of world class wine from the rack in one corner of the room, wondering to himself how much per night he was costing the Republic. And how much longer money would have any meaning.

What he wanted now, more than anything on Earth was to call Jenny, but they had both agreed the risk that the they could be tracked by their phones was too great. Of all times, he couldn't give anything away about where he was. Still, it was damnably hard to resist, just to hear her voice.

It was still early in the day but after the long trip getting here without much sleep, he skipped lunch and flopped into bed, passing out almost immediately.

After waking up and calling in for dinner, Mike killed time watching news on an English channel, and had no trouble sleeping later. Up early, he paced, watched more television, read, and waited for something from Clervoy that would allow him to finish his mission.

Finally, around noon, his two escorts came for him.

Mike had a feeling that now, things would become interesting.

President Clervoy was changed. Mike could almost say the president's gray hair was whiter and his face was more drawn and lined. It was a good bet he had not slept much the night before.

"We have analyzed your information and confirmed it where that is possible. Of course we are not inside the Kelcher administration, but given that your contacts are, and based on what President Buckner managed to pass along, we take it seriously. I have set up hotlines with several of the leaders here in Europe, without hinting anything except that we might have to get into contact on short notice. I wish I could tell them to prepare emergency supplies and forces to fly into the United States but dare not.

"I will prepare our own, however. Now, what else can I do?"

"I told you of our hope to arrest Kelcher after the war. What I didn't tell General Folger, because it would be a needless distraction at that point, is that I have a strong reason to believe Kelcher and his people are guilty of treason and the key may be right here in Paris."

"Yes? Am I supposed to know something about this?" Clervoy asked him.

"Not yet, but you may be able to help me find it."

"I don't understand."

Mike explained the issue of the missiles, and the report that a CIA officer known to him only as "Molly" was under the protection of French security.

"If this woman can provide proof that Kelcher was implicit in the shooting down of the airliners, the chances are Smithson is too. If this woman has proof somehow, it's what Folger would need to arrest the president and vice president ahead of the war. Some deal might be made to stop the war in exchange for letting them get away with involvement in the airliner attacks. It's all a long shot, but I have to follow up as far as I can."

" _Mon dieu_. That would be a miracle, for all of us! Tell me what you need."

"I need to meet with her, this 'Molly'."

"Then I will certainly talk to my people and see if there is any roadblock to such a meeting. I will strongly urge them to find a way."

With that agreed, Mike returned to his hotel.

Just like that, he was left alone. How would he keep from going insane, until he could meet with Molly, then go finish his mission in Germany, and go home?

Come on, man, you survived that prison for weeks, you'll get through one lousy afternoon and night, and compared to that, this is a veritable castle.

He dug into his bag and found a book he had almost forgotten about and flopped on the bed, and in what seemed like minutes, but by his watch was three hours, someone knocked on the door.

Chapter Nineteen

SAN FRANCISCO

With Mike on his way, unable to stand doing nothing, Jenny established the first contact with Senator Carver since the last meeting, hopeful that he had made some progress toward stopping the war, as he had said he would try to do.

He invited her to his office at two that afternoon. At the door, he greeted her personally, not leaving it to his secretary, offering a handshake then quickly escorting her to a seat in front of his desk. He pulled a chair around to join her.

"Ms. McGuire, I've been thinking about you and Mr. Lansford since we were together last. I have some unfortunate news to report to you."

"Oh God, what?"

"First, as I told you, Kelcher continues to be isolated from anybody outside his immediate circle. But he's also stopped attending even 'safe' meetings, lobbyists or anything else. He seems, well, hunkered down is the only word that comes to me. And to me, that's somewhat ominous."

Carver added that the next bad news was the fact that he had approached the Air Force and Navy chiefs of staff, based on Jenny's own suggestion. "All I can report is that they have no qualms about carrying on with this thing because they claim it won't be pre-emptive, it'll be in reaction."

"Come on, that's just semantics," Jenny retorted but Carver shook his head.

"No, I have an awful feeling that something is being cooked up to provoke a confrontation, to push the Russians into attacking first. I don't know how, but that's what I get."

"Oh. Okay, I think I already saw that coming, now that you say it. They're in the Gulf, right? And sailing toward a showdown, but I thought it was by agreement. It's been awfully quiet, but I bet under the radar there's a lot of nasty messages going back and forth about now," she said.

"Uh, I'm afraid I don't know, but I can ask.

"If you're right...look, I was already toying with an idea and you just convinced me."

Carver rummaged in his desk drawer and brought out a pager.

"Here. Would you do me a big favor and wear this? It might be a little premature, but if something big breaks soon, I'd like to be able to reach you quickly."

"Soon? How soon? Not for weeks, right? I can't see how this would be necessary—"

"Please, I do think it's important. Would you just humor me?"

She made a face of impatience even though she agreed. Carver sat back and regarded her in an intense, almost discomfiting way. Surely he wasn't about to hit on her, of all things. How would she deal with that, in the middle of the very powerful forces gathering in the air high above her head, politically speaking? She could not afford to break off contact with him no matter what, but it would be rough. And what would Mike say if she told him?

"Ms. McGuire—Jenny, if I may—do you understand why I'm asking you to be available this way?"

"Frankly, no."

"Okay, I'm going to level with you. I'm aware of the situation you describe in the Gulf. I frankly don't think it's advanced to the degree you suggested, but I have done some digging and it does look like a confrontation could brew up in a hurry that would lead to a...to just what we're afraid of, with Russia. Soon."

Carver told her he believed something had spooked Kelcher's people, causing them to push the agenda faster than the earlier estimates.

"So I want you to use the pager because if I hear anything imminent, on the Russian situation in the Gulf that suggests it could all go hot, well you're on my short list of people I'll alert. I figure I owe my preparations, for myself and my family, to you and Mike. This is the least I can do."

Jenny's heart was racing. "Are you saying you think it's coming any minute? If it does, he'll still be in Europe! Oh God, suddenly Paris seems like a million miles away. Please, tell me this can't happen while he's still over there."

"Oh. I see. You and Mike....?"

"Yes. Very much so."

"Wow, I didn't get that before. You hid it very well, and I applaud your discretion, that was the diplomatic thing to do. And I'm happy for you, Jenny, both of you.

"But after what we just discussed, it oughtn't to surprise you. And who knows who'll jump first. Or blink first. And if it happened, it could come fast. Each side, if they committed to Go, would want the jump."

Jenny told Carver of the arrangement for her to join Mike at the military base in Concord. She asked him if she should rush out there and try to get in immediately.

"But what about everybody I know, I can't just let everyone die...." Her voice was starting to rise, out of her control, until Carver put a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

"Jenny, be calm. I have a real good idea how strong you are, and I'm sorry to say you may need that strength. But right now, I admit I'm just being pessimistic, I don't think it's quite as dire as I painted it. You have to know me, to know that sometimes I come down with worst-case-itis really bad. So think good thoughts, and go on doing what you have to do."

"Well I'll try," she said.

"All right, look, if it's any comfort, I don't really think we're looking at war in the next few days. I think it's more like the next few weeks, at worst. I think they'll let the Russian ships actually start off-loading people to approach the wells, and then they'll start talking, and threatening. Days. At least.

"What I am saying is that the window of opportunity, to completely stop Kelcher's attack seems to be shrinking to minuscule proportions."

"Well that makes me feel better. I mean the time line. Not much better, but you know, I'll gladly take small favors, in these horrible times."

"Yes, you and me too."

Carver described a wish for Jenny and him to stay in touch and keep each other informed of anything new that pointed to the eruption, as quickly as possible.

"Absolutely," she agreed. "You've promised to warn me and I wouldn't do any less."

"Great.

"Jenny, if we survive, if someone stops the insanity, soon as possible, I want you and Mike to meet my family. I want to have the two of you over, for a barbecue and an evening just to relax and forget all this. If we can't stop it, well it doesn't bear thinking. But I promise you one thing, I'll see both of you again soon."

That seemed the end of her visit and she excused herself.

By the time she returned to her office, the enormity of his warning hit her, that the war might be sooner than she and Mike imagined, and she found herself shaking.

The next day, Eric Waterfield called her.

"I'm sure Frank would want me to update you," he said.

"He's probably in Vancouver by now. With that woman Leslie."

"Good," she told him. "And there are some things I think you might like to know. I don't suppose I could interest you in meeting and hearing what's new?"

"Oh, I think you could," Waterfield responded. "The best thing we could do is exchange all the information we have. I can be in town for lunch if you don't mind."

"Lunch works fine for me, but I don't want to talk anywhere public. Let's grab a bite then go for a drive, maybe park somewhere we can keep an eye out for nosy people. I know a place we can buy some great sandwiches first."

"Sounds good to me."

She told him where to pick her up and at noon, she stepped out onto Montgomery Street and he cruised by.

Jenny directed Waterfield to the same parking lot at Fort Point, nearly under the Golden Gate Bridge, where Mike and she had conferenced with Carver. Jenny sat on a rock and while she ate, she updated Waterfield on what she had heard the day before.

"Carver did that? He tried to talk them out of it? Wow, that's amazing."

"Maybe it's amazing but it's also heart-breaking that they wouldn't budge," Jenny said. "And worse, that they expect Russia to launch first."

"Yeah, that's true."

He bent over, doodling in the sand before him, thinking.

"I think this is something someone should have already done and I'm going to take it on myself," he said. "Could you bring Carver together with me? What I want to do is take both of you to meet Colonel Bryant, at the Concord base. I think you both should have access to this place. Would you ask him? Since he was in town as late as yesterday, maybe he's still around."

"Let's just find out."

Jenny unclipped her cell phone and called Senator Carver on the spot.

"Hi, Art, I'm with someone who actually introduced Mike and me to this overall situation," she said. "He wants to get together with you, introduce you to General Folger's aide and show you a facility. Could we arrange something?"

"When?" Carver said.

"Your schedule's a lot tighter than mine. It would be up to you."

"For this, I can clear everything in about five minutes. What's wrong with right now?"

"Standby."

She turned to Waterfield. "He says how about right now?"

Waterfield's face lit up. "Couldn't be better. Let's do it. Set up whatever kind of arrangement he wants."

Jenny relayed the message and Carver asked where they were. When Jenny told him, he said he'd have his aide deliver him in twenty minutes.

"Christ," Waterfield said. "Bring it on."

Twenty minutes later on the dot, a car pulled up and Senator Arthur Carver climbed out. He introduced himself to Waterfield, then moved into the seat up front offered by Waterfield. Jenny settled in back and they were on their way.

In the Concord base, Jenny looked around in amazement at the plot board in the front of the room. However again, like Mike before her, she was led on past, to the office where she and the Senator met with Colonel Bryant.

But what she thought was an introductory meeting suddenly turned into something quite else.

"Eric," Bryant said, addressing Waterfield without much preamble, "since we talked last, a pretty disconcerting scenario has developed."

"Oh?"

"Well I'll be more blunt than that: the situation in the Gulf has gone to shit. The Russians were sucked into a trap, believing they had the go for a move into Iran and now Kelcher's calling them on it. Big threats, everything you'd expect to turn into the provocation he can use to launch. The Russians are moving their nuclear subs from normal patrol activity, like we use, to configurations that clearly threaten the US. So of course the Navy has responded. Attack subs are shadowing their missile carriers and the whole thing looks ugly."

"There it is," Carver said. "So what now? How long?"

"Seventy-two hours," Bryant said, and he seemed very certain.

A cold horror flowed through Jenny; she struggled to hold her panic at bay by addressing issues.

"What's our strategic posture?" she asked Bryant.

"We aren't letting them see us raise our defense status. Diplomatically, there's no information passing either way that I know of. It's all very silent, all very much below the surface, figuratively as much as literally. If Kelcher's talking to them, we don't know it, but we strongly doubt it. It's probably past that point. He's almost certainly geared to go. This is apparently just what he wants. And letting them launch first looks very much as if he doesn't know the true status of the Shield. He seems to think he can just sit there and pick their warheads off, and then pound them at leisure. Essentially bloody murder, except it's going to go both ways."

"Oh God, oh God," she said, struggling not to moan.

"Ms. McGuire, I made an offer to Mike to come here and take shelter in the event the war breaks out. When I told him that, I told him he could bring a guest. I presume that would be you. So I'll extend the same courtesy to you now, in his absence: if you want to move in here right now, you're welcome."

"Oh no, Mike's in Paris. He'd never be able to come back, I'll never see him again."

Bryant put a hand on her shoulder. "Look, Jenny, this isn't any of my business, but if you stay out there in San Francisco and it's hit, it's for sure you'll never see him again. But it seems logical to me that if you survive, anything can happen. For one thing, under the worse case, if he can still get back into the country, I'm guessing he'll make a beeline for this very spot right here. It could be only weeks before the two of you are back together, no matter what. It all points logically to your staying here, Jenny."

"But I have to think, I have to make plans," she said. "I have to do things at home, in case this doesn't happen and I end up going back. Suppose I go home, take care of things, then come back?" she said. "Is there time?"

"I think so. I'll give you a pass to get you in. Go back, do what you need to, then return. But damn fast.

"Of course, Senator, the same applies to you."

"Well I have much the same situation she has, plus, my family. Are they welcome?"

"Absolutely. We'd be glad to have you all."

"Then I have to go get them," Carver said. "If we have three days, I'll plan to come back day after tomorrow. Would you recommend that?"

Bryant scratched the back of his neck, looking anywhere but at Carver and Jenny.

"Yeah, I think that's a safe margin."

"Then we should go back and get to work, shouldn't we?" Carver said.

The others, including Jenny all agreed and in minutes, she, Waterfield and Carver were on their way back to San Francisco.

That night, Jenny lay in the dark trembling. She was afraid of the war, by all means, but what paralyzed her was worry over what Mike would have to go through to make it back into the country, and hopefully to the base there in Concord. And what would he think had happened to her? How would he react? She tried to imagine how she would react if she believed he was dead, and she already knew what that was. Almost complete collapse. Could he be stronger, keep functioning, and make it back to Concord?

But would he even be able to return to the States? Nothing was certain, and for the first time, she faced the possibility she would never see him again. And it seemed like more of a death sentence than the warheads themselves.

Chapter Twenty

PARIS

Waiting at the door when Mike opened were the two stalwart French security agents, grinning at him like old buddies.

"Compliments from Le Presidente," one of them told him. "He has sent us to fetch you, because the other business you discussed has been approved, but you must come now. Yes? Are you ready?"

Assuming they meant the chance to talk to Molly, Mike hastened to accept. For a moment he debated with himself whether to bring his bag or travel light and hope he would return to this facility for his things. Shaking his head, he decided to just go.

They drove him into town and spiraled up a hill in the east side of Paris that presented a marvelous view of the city.

"Where is this?" he said.

"We in town mostly just call it The Butte, but its proper name is Montmartre, Mount of the Martyrs. We think it is ironic to have a safe house up here, eh?"

"I hope to hell it isn't ironic," Mike said. "I for one plan to come back down in one piece."

"Oh yes, it's what they all say," the other agent answered with a chuckle, elbowing his partner.

Stopping in a narrow road near the top, the driver turned around and addressed Mike.

"You will enter a square up there, the area is called ' _Le Tertre_ ', it is something of an artist colony and a tourist 'trap'. In a minute you will receive a call. Here, take this," he handed over a cell phone. "Speak into it the word 'Kronos'. Someone will soon come for you and say, 'Prometheus' to you and you again say, 'Kronos' and they will take it from there. When you have done your business, they will call us back and we will take you either to Clervoy or back where we got you. That is to be determined."

"Okay, let's do it." Mike noted that it was closing in on twilight and he couldn't decide if that made it safer to be out in the open or more dangerous.

"See you later, guys," he said and climbed out.

From his position on this hill the Eiffel Tower seemed near enough to touch, though he reckoned it was three or four miles away. Indulging himself in a momentary reverie, Mike stopped and imagined having Jenny by his side at this place, on their honeymoon. In those seconds, the rest of the world and all its awaiting nightmares disappeared for him and he could have remained there, suspended in that waking dream forever. But the phone was buzzing insistently and he snapped out of it and answered.

"Speak," was all the voice at the other end said.

"Kronos."

"Wait."

Suddenly feeling very vulnerable, suffering an urge to run and hide, Mike forced himself to stay where he was. A minute or two later, a man in jogging clothes and a French bicyclist's hat approached, but acted as if he would walk right past. At the last instant, however, at his closest point, he spoke the recognition code almost under his breath and Mike responded again with "Kronos".

Another man appeared from out of a nearby alleyway and gestured Mike to follow.

This second agent led Mike through the artist's colony that had been described to him, a courtyard bounded on four sides by colorful buildings, many of which were cafés

and bars, around which young men and women circulated, offering to sketch caricatures of the tourists for cash.

The agent slipped into a narrow opening between buildings, then around a corner and up a flight of rickety stairs to a walkway. At the far end, he tapped out a code on a keypad and the dully painted red door swung open, accepting them into the safe house.

"Come this way," the agent said, directing Mike to a hallway, where he reached up and tugged down a ladder. "She is up there. Now, you are on your own."

Mike climbed the ladder, reminded, in a jolt of deja vú, of the similar configuration in Libertad where he had first heard of Molly. Up the ladder, he popped through the floor of a loft that occupied the entire length of the house. But when he found the room empty, a sudden foreboding swept through him: had he been led into a trap?

Mike let the door through which he had entered slam shut, hoping the noise would roust out anyone who was waiting up there for him.

"Hello? Anybody in here?"

"Just here," a disembodied voice answered. At the far end, a conventional door swung open from a walled section in one end of the room, and the woman stepped out.

"You must be Lansford," she said. "I'm Molly, and that's all you need to know about me."

"Well I think I know a bit more about you already. If what I was told is true, I also know you're ex-CIA. But beyond that, I guess I don't need to know any more."

"Well that's great, just wonderful, but what about you? I know you're named Lansford, but what I don't know is why I ought to be talking to you. That's what nobody's explained to me yet."

From that inauspicious beginning, Mike spent a quarter of an hour jousting with her over whether she should trust him or not, and why. He held out until there was no other option, the situation with the two men in Libertad. But once he told her, it changed everything.

"Ah, so I see," she said. "They're still alive, that's good. Or were. Okay, that buys you one shot at this thing. So what are you after?"

Now, Mike told her his mission to destroy the Kelcher administration before it destroyed the world. Molly portrayed no shock at his words about the war plan, but she offered him a seat on her sofa, made some coffee and sat down on a low table in front of him and bade him go on.

"As I said, they told me you know something about the missile attacks on the airliners. Was I steered wrong?"

"Nope. But what can you do with it?"

"I'm working with former president Buckner, Senator Carver, and General Folger. If you could hand me something that could be proven in a court of law, Folger is willing to arrest Kelcher, if the FBI won't. It would do us all a world of good if we could get this done before he blows up half the world. Is that something you'd have an interest in?"

Her face went pale and she took a gasping breath.

"Jesus, I guess it is," she said. "Folger would do that?"

"If it were iron-clad proof." He left out the minor detail that he had not discussed this specific possibility of arresting Kelcher before the war with Folger.

"Can you give me something to use, then?" he asked her.

"For starters, yes, I can help you out a little on the missile issue. But before we go any further, there's more to this you would want to know. Will you trust me to do this my way?"

"Hey, you've got complete control here. We'll do this however you want. You know the stakes, so it's your show."

"Uh huh. Okay, the whole thing that I'm involved in began as what we call a game. Are you familiar with what I mean? Not a game like checkers or baseball, but—"

"You mean more like a war game," Mike supplied.

She nodded.

"Yeah, good, so you understand. Well one of those games, while I was there, was to hypothetically supply weapons to groups that were on the blacklist, groups the ATF or FBI hadn't been able to do anything about for one reason or another.

"But then, of course, it went off the game board, became more than only hypothetical. The weapons were supplied, and obviously, the groups didn't know where the guns game from, and they damn sure never imagined they were from us. But the minute they received the weapons, we tipped off the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, who came in and raided them for having the illegal stuff. You could call it entrapment on a monumental scale."

"Yeah, that's no news, it's been done before. Maybe not on such a large scale," Mike said, "but I know that's been done. Then what?"

"Well at the same time, while we were arming them, we were also arming groups that weren't on the blacklist. Groups the administration approved of but couldn't openly support."

"Examples?"

"Anti-abortion groups."

"Yeah, well pardon me if I don't pass out in shock about that," Mike told her. "But I'm glad to hear old suspicions confirmed. What else?"

"Well the biggest of all were the separatist and racist militias, largely because they tended to support Kelcher's policies and vote for him in blocks, even though a lot of them are anti-government. They do support those who do the most for their causes. And no one's ever done as much for them as Kelcher.

"This happened going into the mid-term elections when he needed as much backing for his party's congressional and senate votes as he could get. But I have a sneaking hunch it's still going on, they're still moving shit into the hands of these assholes.

"So as a result, we've got these extremely violent and dangerous groups all over the country freshly armed to the teeth. I won't even bother to mention the terrorists. I'll save that for later.

"Arming these white groups wasn't enough. We were also directed to arm drug gangs in the inner cities.

"Well that's when I had it," she said. "Not that I wasn't ready to go already. But that was just the capper, the last fucking straw."

"Would I be painfully naïve if I asked why they armed the drug groups?" Mike said. "Is it to give the DEA a _raison d'etre_?"

"No," she said, nodding to herself. "That's a good guess but it's wrong. They're looking for some kind of action, they're looking to either actually create—or create the illusion—of a black uprising against the white population. And they've given the militant white groups at least an even playing field. Why and how, I can't figure it out, there's something missing. But I can hazard a guess."

"Hazard away," Mike told her.

"All right, if I were to guess, the ultimate goal is to create a large enough series of riots and open battles to allow Kelcher to declare martial law. And if that happens just before the election, well let's say I won't be surprised. Although this war scenario will apparently trump that.

"But add that to cooperating with the missile attacks and you've at least got grounds to impeach Kelcher, whether you can arrest him or not. The only defense he'd have is that some of his people did this on their own.

"I have the information that proves they didn't."

For Mike the room seemed to go ice cold. If any of this were true, if this Molly wasn't pulling a scam, or wasn't out of her mind, what she had just described went beyond the worst Mike had yet come to believe about Kelcher. He forced himself to concentrate, not to lose focus now, until he had everything she could give him.

"So who ran you upstream on this?" he asked her. "Somebody in Division at CIA? How did you receive your orders?

"My orders came down from a Deputy Division Chief named William Campion. He was in charge of the whole program. But he was working under the National Security Council. The man there was Jacob Kreuter. Kreuter, to give you the connection you need, is Smithson's national security advisor."

Kreuter, in the NSC, starting with the letter K! Just what the two CIA men in Libertad had said. So far so good.

"Okay, Kreuter," Mike said. "I know it's off the deep end, but what I'm looking for is something that proves this. I don't suppose you've got that."

"No, I don't have that," she said. Mike had not believed he would find it, but hearing it spoken so positively was a heart-sinking let down. So why was she grinning?

"Not in my pocket," she said.

"What?"

"I don't have the proof with me. What the hell good would it do me here? I don't dare show my face as long as Kelcher's in office. But the proof is there."

"It is? Where?"

"In Chicago, there's a prosecutor, and an FBI man, they have it all, everything necessary to put Kelcher, Smithson, Kreuter, Campion, and about five others in prison for life. Maybe even a firing squad. But they're paralyzed. If they made an attempt to use it, given the climate of action against whistle-blowers, judges, prosecutors and FBI under Kelcher's attorney general, they'd first be shut up so fast it would blow your hair off. And second, they'd disappear."

She let that sink in a moment then added, "I'm not exaggerating, Lansford. But they've been sitting on this—their only hope was to use it when Kelcher's out of office, and put them all in prison retroactively. Do you think Folger could protect these people now, and put this into play and take Kelcher out with it?"

"Oh God," Mike said.

"I'll take that as a yes.

"Lansford, I want you to understand something. I don't know you, and I'm insane to trust you, and it scares the shit out of me to expose this, but I have a strong sense that this is our only shot. So I'm going to give it to you. This might be the biggest gamble in history, Lansford. I swear, if you've fucked me over, I'll track you down and choke you with your own dick."

Molly dug around under her bed and returned with a brief case, and from it, extracted several pages, sealed them in a manila envelope and handed them to Mike.

"This will put you next to the people in Chicago, with numbers to call and codes to use that will convince them to meet with you. After that, it's up to your golden tongue, and Folger, to take it to the house. I pray to God you're legit."

"I am. And I'm everlastingly grateful. But there's a couple more details I'd like to work on, on top of this.

"You mentioned this William Campion, your boss on this operation. I'd like to have a little talk with him, if you could offer me any help. Where might I find him?"

Molly shrugged. "I doubt you would be able to run him down, but he operates out of cover on both coasts. In the East, it's a conservative 'heritage' group called Working for Our Nation.

"Out west, it's a think tank in Palo Alto, the Millennium Institute."

Mike knew the Institute very well: Frank Keller had had dealings with it, on weapons issues, and had alerted Mike to its link to the American Millennium group. Mike had interviewed members, and if this was a CIA cover organization, he had possible inroads to tracking down this Campion through contacts within.

"Is there anything else you want to add, or ask of me?" Mike said. "I can't make any promises, but you've earned everything I can do."

"There's something I could name," she grinned. "It would be extremely inappropriate, but I've been locked in here for a long, long time. But I don't have any protection and the last thing I need is a kid. And you probably have someone anyway."

"Yes. Sorry."

"Oh well," she said. "For all their Gallic charm, the boys downstairs have decided to be perfectly honorable, professional, and boring. So I guess all I can ask is that you get rid of the bastards in Washington and set me free."

"Believe me, that's first on my list of things to do today," he said.

"I like you, you're irreverent," she said. "But I recommend you start making your way out of here before it gets too much later tonight. Maybe I'll see you again some time on the other side of the pond in better days."

"Amen to that."

Mike offered his hand, though under the circumstances the gesture seemed lame. However Molly was eager to respond, answering with a warm smile. Her hand on his lingered a moment longer than necessary but he didn't fight it, for her sake.

Then she opened the hatch and Mike climbed down.

Two days later, Mike arrived at the NATO command center in Germany, meeting with the people Folger had designated. After several hours of work, with everything set up as Folger had wanted it, Mike was able to partake of a late dinner then climb into bed with the luxury of being able to call Bryant and begin the process of returning to Jenny the very next day.

BOOK II CONTINUED
Chapter Eleven

SHADY COVE

A FEW WEEKS AFTER HER ARRIVAL

By now, she could tell when Wilmot O'Toole was agitated. In fact, as strange as it seemed, she actually felt she had gotten to know him pretty well. It wasn't that she liked him or could like anyone like him, in large part due to what he stood for, but he was as kind to her as someone of his sort could be. And he still claimed he would take her to Concord when he felt the war here was won.

But he wasn't satisfied about that war.

She made him talk, made him tell her what was going on.

"The people in Sacramento panicked when the bombs were going off all over the country," he said. "They ran, many of them, they tore up the place, they created confusion, they didn't know what to do, where to go, and there were terrible traffic jams."

"How do you know this, from out here? You have spies?"

They spoke over dinner, where they had most of their conversations; O'Toole put down his fork and looked into her eyes.

"Would that be so terrible? I mean hell, the government used spies. I used spies, when I was in the army, we called them G2, and also Defense Intelligence Agency. Why would it be wrong for a civilian army to use spies?"

"Hey, I don't remember condemning you for it, I just asked.

"Wilmot, you've become touchy. Or are you just growing tired of me?"

She said it deliberately, knowing a button to push, and he reacted the way she wanted, his mouth opening, his eyes growing wide. "Oh no, no, I could never grow tired of you. No, I just...there's a lot of tension for me out there. I'm sorry if I seem that way."

"No, it's all right," she said. "Go on, so you have spies."

He lowered his eyes.

"No. Actually I don't. I just wondered why it would bother you. No, I learned what was going on by interrogating the escapees."

"Interrogate. Now that's a word that really does bother me," she said. "There are all kinds of meanings to that word. The 'escapees' were citizens, weren't they? Why would you interrogate them? Interrogation implies a hostile attitude. What was that about?"

"Well...well, all right, so interrogation wasn't the right word. We talked to them, just talked. Interviewed. Is that better? While we found them places to stay."

"Why not send them back home?"

"Because we were fighting in there, trying to take the seat of government. We protected them from that."

"Uh huh. And who were you fighting?"

He was taking on the aspects of a chastised child, receiving a tongue-lashing from a beloved relative.

"Well, you know there were some military, some police, like that. And a bunch of...well, you know, inner city people. The worst, the gangs, the niggers."

She had heard this language from him before and had bided her time before bringing up the obvious issue. Sooner or later the point would come, when he was totally comfortable, and she decided this was it. What would he do, after all?

"Let me ask you something. You had blacks in your outfit in the Army, you commanded them, didn't you? Right now, or at least before the war started, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs was black. We've had a black president. How did you relate to black people when you commanded them, and when it was very politically incorrect to use that kind of language? How did you handle it?"

Something changed in that moment. Something came over Wilmot O'Toole, or perhaps it was more as if something came off of him. A shadow from over his eyes, one might say.

"Oh God," he said.

"Wilmot, look at me. Really look at me. What do you see?"

"A very beautiful woman."

"Is that all? Face up to it, Wilmot, what?"

"I can't say it."

"Then let me say it. I'm black. And you know it. Campion said it, and you tried to ignore it, and now you're in denial. If I am black, but you have feelings for me, what does that make you? What would your people think? My mother was black and my father was white, so I'm fairly light-skinned, but for your purposes, I'm black, Wilmot. So where does that put us? You hate my kind. I've heard enough to know that. It doesn't matter that you've tolerated us, not just me, and also men in your command. I remember what you said early on, about preferring not to associate with them.

"Them. But Jesus Christ, Wilmot, that's me, I'm 'them'! In your own lexicon, I'm a nigger! And you love me. I know you do. So now there's something profound you have to face up to."

His face was white, not the white of a conventional Caucasian, but of one who had just seen a ghost. He stood up, then sat down, he mopped his face with his hands, then he stared at her, really seeing her the first time.

He spoke her name, but it came out a strangled cry.

"Wilmot, either black people are not the terrible group of people you think we are, or I'm as horrible as the others are. We're either all the same thing or all individuals, just like whites, Jews, Japanese, Latinos and everyone else. So either you're going to have to throw me out and let me go—or do something worse to me—or you're going to have to seriously rethink your beliefs.

"The time has come to face it."

"Oh God, why couldn't you have let it alone? Why did you have to do this?"

"Because I'll have my child, sooner or later. He or she could be darker than I am, he could be more obviously African-American, even though the father's white. You never know what the genes are going to decide to do. And sooner or later your people would know it. What would they do, then? To you, for protecting a black woman? What would they do to me and my baby? You would have to face it in a worse way, by what your men would say, and what they would do to us. To us. To my baby and me...and to you.

"Remember Campion? 'Race traitor'?

"But that's not why I brought it up now.

"You have told me there is something worse on our other side, this Nation. But suddenly you've admitted your war against Sacramento is against blacks. If they are on the side of the authorities now as you say, then aren't they the bona fide defenders of the population? So I need to know if you're fighting them because you want to take Sacramento for your cause...or because you're really a very serious racist, who might as well throw in with The Nation and do it right?"

She knew this was a tremendous gamble, but it had to be faced now. If The Nation should ever defeat him, her life and that of her baby would be finished. God only knew what would happen to her, and if she could convince him to join with the people of Sacramento to fight The Nation, she could be free very soon and continue on to Concord.

It seemed in that moment that her life and that of her unborn child weighed in the balance of his decision.

But O'Toole made no answer. He was up on his feet now; reeling a little, holding onto the table as if for support, he took a step and then another, and finally stumbled out the door, leaving her there at the table, shaking.

Wilmot O'Toole was gone for two days. In that time, she suffered terrible pangs of fear. Her future and her baby's depended on what O'Toole did when he finally returned and she had no idea what that would be.

When he next walked into the house, he was clearly a different man. He went to her and took her in his arms, something he had never dared do before now.

"I do love you," he whispered. "I love you so very much, I adore you, I worship you. And I know you'll never love me, but that doesn't make any difference. I love you more than I've ever loved anyone in my life.

"I've had a terrible struggle with my people, but I managed to convince them the worst enemy is The Nation. I couldn't talk to them about race, I couldn't put it in those terms, they wouldn't understand why I changed. They would've turned on me. As you said, they'd call me a race traitor, like Campion did. Well it would be that bad in aces.

"But I've arranged to back off against Sacramento, to set up negotiations, to convince them if I can to ignore the national government, if there's one left and to work with us. I have no idea what'll come of it, and I might lose on the issue of Posse Comitatus, but if I do, if the people, in Sacramento, want to try and maintain the government, then the will of the people, which is sovereign, will have spoken. At least they'll decide for themselves. As Trotsky once put it, they'll vote with their feet.

"If I can just bring that about, you've convinced me to be satisfied."

"You'll be proud, and I'll be proud of you," she said, hoping she was selling it.

"In the meantime," he added, "you've also convinced me to start seriously attacking The Nation and not just fighting a holding action. I don't know if we can beat them, but we're first going to chase them out of California.

"And soon as I can arrange it, I'm going to move you past my people, into Sacramento, so you can go wherever you have to go.

"I'm going to miss you, woman, the rest of my life, but you'll be on your way soon. In days, I hope."

"Oh Wilmot, that's so wonderful. I knew you would do the right thing," she said, hoping she wasn't pouring it on too thick. "Does that mean I can start preparing to go?"

"Of course. Just wait, as I said, a few more days."

O'Toole left again soon, to go back to the "western front" as he called it, to organize the new initiative he had described to her. He was gone for a week, but when he returned, something was changed, something was wrong. She saw it immediately.

She took his shoulders and looked him in the eyes.

"What happened, what is it?"

"They've turned on me, the men. The council. I have to face them, it's essentially courts martial. They disapproved of the idea of letting up on the siege. I'm not sure what's going to happen, I could still convince them, but I've got to get you out of here."

"Why?"

"Why do you think? If they strip me of everything, they'll come in here, they know I have someone here, but I've never let them near to see you. They'll come for you and God knows what'll happen. I can't let you be here. So I want you to pack up and let's go."

"Go where? They're in control all around aren't they?"

"Auburn, the nearest thing to a city, north of here, hasn't been taken. We've left it open, making sure The Nation doesn't take it either. If I can get you there, you can keep going north and even bypass Sacramento if you want to, I hope. It's the only chance.

"Please, pack up, let's go tonight."

Despite her long-standing wishes to leave here, the suddenness of it was a shock. In her condition, traveling wouldn't be easy and she had given up trying to go until she had the baby in arms, but now....

She threw herself into preparing. Over the time she had been here, O'Toole had brought her clothes, all pants as she requested, and lately some maternity tops, along with plenty of women's underwear. She threw it all into the big pack she had brought from Fremont and changed into the roughest clothes and boots for hiking.

And then they were on the way.

The last thing before they left this place that had been her home these months, she took his hand.

"Come on with me. Clear away, just go, screw them all. Two of us will be better able to make it. Just go. Now's your time to go on back to Fresno and find your family. Come on, Wil."

He seemed on the verge of sobbing but he tightened his jaw and said no.

"I have to fight for everything you told me to do. To protect the people, of Sacramento, and...everywhere. I took them on as my responsibility and now I have to follow through. I have to try and take control again. Otherwise, my people will just become an armed mob. I can't just turn them loose, they're my fault.

"Oh God, Sweetheart, if there's anything in the world I'd want to do, it's stay with you. I'd love to make the baby my own, but it isn't, and you'd never accept me that way. So the next best thing I can do is try to help you escape."

There was no more she could say, she knew he was fixed on this course. So she let him lead out, into the darkness.

For the first five hours, the trek went well. They headed north and she wondered how far he was going to continue with her.

"Up there not far is Interstate Eighty. I want to see you beyond it, a little ways, but parallel it. It'll take until tomorrow night, I think, for us to get to Eighty."

"Okay, whatever it takes. Let's just keep going."

He squeezed her hand and pushed through the brush.

In that time, despite their differences, she and O'Toole developed an even closer friendship than she had enjoyed with Eric weeks before. They holed up in a cave and curled together for warmth. Before the sun rose, he was making a fire and cooking a camp-style breakfast complete with coffee. Then they stayed out of sight that day and moved again all night, and again holed up the following day. It was on the following night that he determined Interstate Eighty lay just ahead.

"Remember what I said, guide on the freeway but don't walk on it any more than you have to, you'll stand out too clearly to anybody watching. And if you do, go at night, hide in the daytime like we've been doing, until you reach Auburn," he said. "This is the end of the line, I've got to go back."

"No, you said you'd stay with me until I was safe beyond the freeway. If it's not far...."

"You're doing fine, and I've really got to get back to my people. If I'm missing too long—"

"Wilmot, come on, just let it go and come the rest of the way with me."

He shook his head. "Believe me, everything within me wants to, but it isn't the right thing to do. God protect you. I'd give anything to have you be mine, but go find your man."

He pulled her close and hugged her and was crying when he let her go and crunched almost silently back through the woods. But so was she.

All along, the going had been rough, with her belly a burden, as well as a bit of an impediment through brush and undergrowth, but with O'Toole there to always offer a hand, it had been bearable. Now, the last few hundred yards to the freeway were exhausting.

"Damn you, kid, you'd better be a hell of a son or daughter," she said to her stomach, then laughed at herself for the silliness of how it sounded. "Oh well, I guess if the Native American women could do this, so can I," she added.

She arrived at the freeway by reaching a side road and walking down it until it was just yards from the highway.

Her worst obstacle was the protective barrier in the middle of the interstate and she worked her way over it, rather than jumping up on it and down the other side the way she would if she weren't pregnant.

The freeway itself was dangerous only because she stood out so starkly, as O'Toole had pointed out. Certainly, there was no traffic, which was in itself eerie enough, but anyone observing this stretch, for instance, watching for deer, would spot her in a second. There was no hiding. The woods around the houses beyond the freeway had been somewhat cleared and she remained on the road a little longer, moving west, until she reached deeper brush and she again climbed over the final barrier, and disappeared as quickly as she could, facing a difficult struggle, but at least she felt as if she had escaped the danger zone around the highway and the houses.

When she could see nothing but trees, she found a clearing and set up her tent, planning to wait out the rest of daylight, before returning to the road and using it to navigate by in the dark.

Cloud covered the sky, it was the most profound darkness, and with that, complete silence she had ever known. Back on the interstate, she felt as if she were just tearing up the miles, and began wondering if lights would be on in the outskirts of this Auburn and whether she should hole up and approach it, once she could see something of it, after daylight.

The highway rounded a curve, and somehow she sensed that the terrain had closed in, that she was passing through walls, and it all sloped slightly downward.

The boom came from far over her head and she heard the bullet ping off the highway. Jenny shrieked and dropped to her knees, covering her head. Any moment she would die but the fatal shot never came. Instead, a voice from on high.

"Don't move. Take off your pack and spread out on the road. Now!"

She did as ordered and minutes later, they were all over her.

Chapter Twelve

NEAR SILVERDALE

Out of semi-consciousness, Jenny awoke to the sounds of an argument between two men she did not know, and she was at the center of the debate.

"So that's her, the talk's all over the camp. What's she doing in here, Skip? You planning to keep her? What'll you do with the kid?"

"You have a particular reason for asking? Is there any reason it's any of your business?"

"Yeah, there's a pretty big reason. You made a camp up there just for people like her, and that's where she ought to be. But if you don't want her for your own, she's up for grabs to any who does. So speaking for the boys, and especially myself, I'm waiting for a decision. If you're keeping her, say so now, and if not, I get first choice after you."

"First choice for what?"

Nothing was said for a couple of minutes but she heard creaking of floor boards and sensed the two men were somehow posturing. She held her breath, terrified to let them know she was conscious.

"For what?" the one called Skip demanded again.

"What do you think, come on. You don't have a woman, none of them would come be with you, and this one doesn't have a choice. She already comes with a kid, and Jesus, man, look at her, belly and all she's hot as they get. Don't tell me you're going to toss her in with the others. Why let them have all the fun? So what's it going to be, you or me?"

"You seem to be missing something, Marvis. Look at her. She's at least half nigger. And you want her?"

"Well of course she's a darkie. Christ, do you really think I'd try to just up and keep a white woman? That's a sin. We wouldn't even be discussing it.

"So what's it gonna be?"

"We went through this once before when we built the camp. There'll be no race-mixing in my command, none at all. You talk about a sin keeping a white woman that way, but that ain't nothing compared to this. It's bad enough this one's already mixed, herself, but there'll be no more of it. I'll see that she goes to the camp and if I hear tell that you pay her or any of the others a visit up there, I'll kick you clear out of the movement. You hear me?"

"Look, I don't care how high and mighty you've gotten, you don't tell me who I'll have in my bed. I don't happen to have the same view you have. Back in the Old South, you don't think the Massas didn't slip out to the hen house whenever they got the urge?"

"That don't mean anything to me, Marvis, I call the shots here."

"Yeah? Well if you won't give her to me, and won't claim her for yourself, I want to see you put her in the camp, right now, today. Otherwise, I'm gonna get her. You can count on that."

More creaking of the floor, and she wished she could see what was going on. She was certain she could hear the two men breathing, and almost smell the stench of testosterone. This was the animal side of the human race at its worst and her life weighed in the balance.

"Make a decision, Pal," Marvis demanded.

"I have. You're finished, that's my decision. You ain't my deputy any more. You ain't even fit to be in The Nation any more. I want you to pack your shit and go away. I don't care if you join those people on the other side, just git."

"Or what, Slade? Or what?"

The sound was ominous and unmistakable, the hiss of a big knife being drawn, and she clenched her eyes tightly closed, not wanting to see what happened next. Or who it happened to.

If the one called Marvis won this confrontation, she would be a raped in the next sixty seconds and might be dead when that was over. And if not, she would be his sex slave for perhaps the rest of her life. At the other extreme, she would be sent to this place to which both men referred and she feared to even imagine what that might mean.

There was silence a moment, neither man seemed to flinch, but at least neither made a move. Then a shift. One of them did move, perhaps a step, by the way the wood beneath him complained. Still Jenny did not dare look.

"All right, I'm out of here," Marvis said. "You're gonna wish you hadn't gone off the deep end, Slade. And you'd better watch your fuckin' back, that's all I'm gonna say."

She heard boots stomping out of the room and a few seconds later a door slammed. And for the first time in a minute or longer, she breathed.

It was time to let this man know she was conscious and see what was going to happen to her now. Opening her eyes, she found a slim, long-faced man who was shaved bald, the man who must be Skip Slade. Surprisingly, he had an almost jovial look to him, but his eyes were cold and beady.

"What the hell are you looking at, you little bitch? Were you lying there snooping on me?"

"No, I just came to."

"Well you just done cost me my best friend. I ought to have you whipped. What the hell were you doing in my area?"

"Whipped? No, look, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean anything by it," she said. "I swear I didn't want to be in your area any more than you want me. Why couldn't your people just leave me alone and let me go on?"

He thought about that a moment, his forehead wrinkled.

"You're one of them, you don't have any rights. You don't get to just walk around anywhere you want, don't you know any better? Don't you know your place, wench?"

"'Wench'? My place? No, I don't know my place! You talk like this is Alabama in 1950. So what has to happen to me because I'm black?"

"There's a camp. Up higher, up toward the mountains. For you people. You'll go there, there's even a doctor, and when we need you, you'll work. After the baby. And that's it."

"And in the meantime? I haven't eaten in an awfully long time. And thirsty. Or are you going to just starve me?"

He pondered that a minute, flopping in a chair next to the bed. "You're with child, right? You ain't just got a big stomach?"

"Yes, I'm with child. What's that matter?"

"I don't know. What are you allowed to eat or drink?"

The question was so unexpected that despite her situation, she almost had to laugh.

"Allowed? You mean by a doctor or something? I haven't seen a doctor. Do I look like I just came from anywhere that had a doctor?"

"Don't you talk smart to me, I'll slap your uppity face off! I'm trying to help you and that's all you can do? So what can you eat? That's a civil question."

"I'm sorry," she told him. "The answer is, I've eaten anything I could get. As far as I know, anything I could eat even if I weren't pregnant is okay to eat now."

"And drinking?"

"Far as I know, anything but alcohol. Milk and water are probably best."

"I can get that. I have venison, to eat. How about that?"

"I guess. I need something."

"Okay, you sit tight, woman."

"I have to uh, you know—"

"Yeah?" A blank look on his face, and he shook his head. "What?"

"Bathroom. Pee. Understand? Am I allowed to use the bathroom or are you going to make me do it out in the yard?"

"If you weren't bearing that pickaninny, I swear I'd whip you and teach you some manners, how to talk to your betters."

Not sure why, she felt the need to push the envelope.

"Why does that matter? If you're going to torture a human being for what they say, because you despise them over the color of their skin, what difference does it make if they're carrying another despised human being inside of them? Isn't it a bargain, sort of two for one? If you're such a brave big man that you can beat a woman, who's going to stop you?"

"Goddamn you and your smart mouth!" Slade reached out and back-handed her before she anticipated it, knocking her back across the bed, into the wall. More angry than hurt, she curled up in a ball and wailed, playing it up a bit.

Through the sound of her own theatrical sobbing, she heard his boots stomping and thought he was walking out, but the stomping stopped before it faded away and she peeked out from behind her hand to find him standing right there, staring down at her.

"Bastard," she said. "Inhuman. You're worse than the other one. At least he only wanted to fuck me! Woman beater! Gutless piece of shit!"

"You stop that! I didn't mean to hit you, it just...you baited me. If you behave, you don't get hit. Just shut up."

"You might as well beat me, if you aren't going to feed me or let me go to the bathroom. Or should I just piss on your bed? I'll do it, I swear to god."

"No. Jesus Christ, no, get down from there, goddamn you, you ain't gonna piss in my bed!

"The bathroom's back here. Come on."

She eased herself down and followed his directions, pleased that he didn't stand and watch her relieve herself.

When she emerged, he was still back in the bedroom and she crept out to rejoin him, expecting anything.

"You finished?" he said.

"Yeah, finished."  
"Then get your ass down here. So you'll shut up, I'm gonna feed you. Come on."

She followed him to a surprisingly modern kitchen, accepted his grunted orders to sit down at the table and waited while he rummaged around among some cans, then produced meat from the refrigerator and heated it. For all the time he prepared the meal, she kept her mouth shut and so did he. When it was ready, meat and beans, he plopped it down in front of her, along with a plate and silverware.

"So eat."

"And then what?"

"What the fuck is it to you? I have business outside, so you stay here. If you go outside, somebody like Marvis is gonna take you, and if you're willing to let that happen, you ain't too swift. I suggest you hide in here and lock the doors. I can't watch all my men."

"What did I miss here? After all this slave talk, you'd let me just walk away?"

"Hah! You might be dumb, but even a dog would be too smart to go out there when there's bears all around. It's the same for you, them men are bears and you're the honey.

You wouldn't get a hundred yards before somebody'd get you, so I don't have to worry about you escaping."

"I see. How long'll you be gone?"

He banged the table, almost knocking the plate into her lap.

"Goddang you, you ain't my mammy! Or my boss. I don't report nothing to you, who the hell do you think you are? I'll be gone as long as I'm gone. It could be till dark or next December. There's enough grub in there to last you. If you don't know how to cook, I guess you will starve. Or learn."

And that was it, Skip Slade walked out the door, leaving her sitting there with her mouth open. None of this figured—one minute he was ready to whip her for opening her the mouth, the next, he left her the run of the house.

He was gone until morning. Unlike Wilmot O'Toole's house, there was no library for her to read, and certainly no television—it was enough of a wonder that after the war, there was still electricity up here. But for now it didn't matter. Very soon after Skip Slade walked out, she retreated to the bedroom and wilted, exhausted by the fear and frustration of having nearly escaped, only to fall into the hands of these people...and this man.

Some time in the night, she awoke, plagued by the need to go to the toilet again. She barely made out Slade curled up on the bedroom floor in a sleeping bag, snoring away, and she almost stepped on him before she knew it. Even with her stumbling around in the darkness, he didn't stir, and she tiptoed, once she saw him, amazed that a white man who was obviously a flaming racist would give up his bed to a black woman.

She returned to the bed and managed to sleep until the sun came through the window, awakened more by the smell of bacon and eggs that wafted into the bedroom than by the light. She wondered how long after he had eaten he would allow her to make her breakfast. Almost sick from the wonderful aroma while being denied, she curled up and feigned sleep, imagining he would eat and leave....

She heard the boots, clomping around, heading her direction. She tensed, keeping her eyes tightly closed. His footsteps approached the bed, and suddenly he was shaking her.

"Hey wench. Come and get it while it's hot."

"Huh?"

"We eat breakfast with the roosters around here or we don't eat at all. Get your ass in here or forget it."

"No, no, wait, I'm coming."

She sat up and to her immense shock, he reached out a hand, to help her off the bed. He let go soon as she landed on her feet and seemed a little shocked at the touch.

"Lazy bitch," he said, but she would have sworn he was smiling. What was going on with this guy?

The meal was as good as it smelled. He had even poured coffee. "That's okay, having a baby and all? You drink coffee?"

"Oh god yes."

"Milk and sugar?"

"Little of each."

He shoved a pitcher and a bowl toward her.

Yet despite the gesture, over the course of the meal, he refused to look at her and didn't say a another word. When he set his fork aside and seemed about to leave, she made her move.

"At the risk of being uppity again, may I ask a question?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"Why this? In the South, even as late as the 'Fifties, blacks didn't eat with whites, didn't use their toilets, drink from the same glasses or water fountains, and on like that. You're playing this...game of being a plantation 'massa', but you aren't playing it to the hilt. I'm just curious why."

"What do you mean 'playing'?"

"I don't care if we had a terrible war, this isn't the South, and it isn't the era of before the Civil War. Now I certainly understand that you have the physical power to do anything you want to me. But as far as I can tell, you can pretty much do that to anybody around here. Up to the point that your boys will back you up. I gather you're fighting other people, over toward Sacramento. So I'm assuming that you must capture some of them. So by the rules of anarchy, you can do anything you want to them, as well.

"So what do you do, kill them outright, put them in this prison of yours or what? Or because they're white, do you give them some kind of pass?"

Slade scratched at his chin, the mill of his mind grinding slowly.

"We...I don't know, we haven't caught any alive yet. I don't know what's going to happen when we take prisoners."

"Can we talk about it?"

He actually looked at her for a few seconds but seemed unable to hold the gaze and snapped his eyes away.

"What's wrong? Is it so horrible to look at a black woman?"

"No. In fact...you're the prettiest woman I've ever done seen. Marvis tried to say you black wenches could be cute sometimes, but I didn't believe it. And you're not hardly dark. So I figure you must be only half-black."

"My father's white, yes. What of it? I'm still a nigger, to you."

"Yeah."

"Then why can't you look at me? Is it because you know you're going to do something terrible to me, sooner or later, and you actually might have something that resembles a conscience?"

It was another calculated gamble, and she wasn't sure why she kept trying. And yet she felt for some reason that she must. For one thing, she had never had the chance—or the curse—to sit down calmly with a virulent racist and explore his thinking, and she had a deep seated urge to find out what really made him that way.

"The...the others up there, are real dark. Not like you, and it somehow doesn't seem the same, to put you up there."

"Bullshit! It's the same, all right. You're calling people who look different than you something other than human, and claiming the right to pen them up like dogs or cattle or something. Last night you equated my mind with that of a dog. So you know I'm one of them, and believe you me, I am. Either you put _me_ up there, or you let _them_ go."

He refused to acknowledge her so she pushed on.

"I get the feeling you disapprove of sex with blacks. Why is that? It isn't the same as sex with monkeys or sheep, because you can create a child with a black woman. That's because, whether you care to admit it or not, we're people exactly like you. So why is it? Why do you hate us? Why do you hate me? Come on, say it, you must be quite sure. Why?"

"Stop it! You aren't like us. You're...dumber. Dirtier, you steal, you do drugs, you don't like to work...."

"Me? Do I stink, to you? Do I smell? Am I dirtier? Am I high on drugs? Can you tell me that no white person stinks, is dirty, steals or does drugs? Yes or no?"

"I don't know."

"Well if you're going to lock people up, whip them, or whatever you do, you had better fucking well know! You'd better be as goddamn sure of that as you are of your own name. Look at me. You call me a nigger. Am I filthy? Am I ugly, do I stink? Yes or no? Because if I'm not, if one nigger doesn't fit your world picture, then that entire world picture is false!

"You know something, Skip Slade? They tried to say blacks couldn't make soldiers in the Civil War. One Southern general said that if they did, it meant the South's entire 'theory of slavery' was wrong. Do you know what he really meant? He meant that if they could function like white men in a stressful situation, in war, the South's entire contention that blacks weren't the same as normal men was wrong. And they saw! In the end, they were so desperate, they made soldiers out of them and they outdid their white counterparts. And even the generals admitted slavery was wrong. While the war was still going on!

"Stonewall Jackson never did believe in slavery. Longstreet either.

"Is your theory of slavery right or wrong, Slade? Look at me! Am I less human than a white woman? Am I?"

"I told you, you're the prettiest woman I ever saw."

"Then think, Slade. Am I more dull-witted than a white person? Just think. Imagine yourself whipping me raw. Really imagine it. Imagine the blood running down my back, blood as red as yours. Go ahead, close your eyes and imagine. Imagine my skin blistered and torn. Do it!"

In that moment, perhaps the most unexpected thing happened that she had ever witnessed. Skip Slade broke down in tears.

It was time to leave it alone for now. He sobbed into his hands for a few minutes, then quietly left the table. It was impossible to guess what she had done to her future. She did not want to think about the possibility that he would go up to this camp where the other blacks were apparently kept and take this out on them. Or come back, hardened against her and do what she had challenged him to do. Or worse.

Chapter Thirteen

He was gone a couple of days. She fretted, she wandered around the house trying to stay focused and sane, she made meals when she was hungry, slept when she couldn't stay awake, and tried very hard not to dwell on her future.

But much of the time, she thought of Mike. The pain of being separated from him was as acute as it had been at the beginning, but the events of her life had sometimes pushed it to the background.

In these two days, however, the pain of losing him returned with a vengeance. So terrible was the anguish that she almost wished Slade would put her out of her misery.

When he returned, Skip Slade asked her to join him in the living room.

"I don't know what to think," he said. "I'm not smart, I'm almost a dummy. I don't know, now, what's right. I would go talk to the Reverend Brown, but I'm afraid. Some of the things I think now...I could be shot for. I'm all confused. I can't get my head around...what you said, about blacks and whites. But you....well I tried to forget you but I can't. You're in my head all the time. I've never known anybody like you, as smart, or a woman who would talk to me. I mean really talk to me like I'm somebody.

"How I feel about you...and even your baby, well I worry about your baby. If I could, I would...."

"What, Skip? What would you do? Adopt the baby?"

"Adopt? Yes. And take you away."

"Skip, if you did, you might as well go, too. I don't think you belong with these people any more. I'm not sure you hate any more.

"Skip, do you love me?"

Again, he broke down, covering his face, sobbing quietly. And he nodded.

This was dangerous territory. The best she could say about this man was that she didn't quite hate him, but she would be glad to use him the way she had O'Toole if she could. And still it hurt her to be dishonest, even with Skip Slade. But worst of all, if he came to believe she had feelings for him, what might happen?

"Why can't we go?" she asked him. "Start over somewhere else? And if we do it, we need to do it soon, before I'm too far along to travel. I asked you to think, about how you felt. Now, I'm asking you to think about this."

"Yes, I'll think about it. I don't know what'll come of it, but I'll see. Please don't push me about it, I'm going to do what I can. Okay?"

He had never reasoned with her that way before and it seemed a major turning point.

Skip Slade disappeared after that, and it turned out he was gone for weeks. He had laid in a heavy supply of food, so she was in no danger of starving, and in the first days, she expected him back any time and managed to stay calm. As the days added up, she grew terrified, certain he had either abandoned her or died.

She heard it in the dead of night. Was it Marvis back, to wreak his vengeance on Skip, and probably on her? She hid in a closet, shivering in fear, hearing the clomping of feet through the house. It went on too long, she felt on the verge of fainting in terror, and then he called her name.

With a shriek of relief, she disentangled herself from behind the clothes in the closet, so gratified it was him, she rushed into his arms.

"Skip, are you all right? Where the hell have you been, you scared me to death!"

"No, Dear, nothing's all right," he said. She had never heard him disheartened like this before. He wrapped her in his arms and patted her hair, far more than he had ever touched her before.

"I did all I could to get you out of here," he said. "But the war is too hot, it's just impossible to let you go and hope you'd get somewhere safe. I even tried to bring a doctor but except for the gentleman we caught and put in the camp, there isn't any. I'm sorry. For you to have the baby safely, I have to take you up there. I just don't have a choice!"

He began to cry, amazing enough in its own right, but she was powerless to do anything except hold him, to try and comfort him. For the moment, it was the depths of Skip Slade's emotions, the broken-hearted sobs that tore at her.

Only in time did the full impact of what he was saying make itself felt: that any hope of being free to go find Mike was gone.

"Oh God, I have to give you up," he concluded. "I'll lose you, and it's...breaking my heart. I love you so."

"I know, Skip. But I'll be there, you'll know where I am, you can come see me. It'll be all right."

"But I don't want you living like that. This is bad enough, my lousy place here, but—"

"I'm strong, Skip. That's one of the things you love about me. I'll do fine. Soon, you'll be able to see...our baby. Just think about that."

It was amazing that she was about to go to prison and she was comforting the warden. But it was an insane world and always would be from now on.

He held her tenderly now, and despite all the bad things she knew about this man, she suffered a clear emotional pain for him. Despite his limited capacities, he had come a long way under her stealth tutelage. And he did belong elsewhere, no longer among these people. In a way, she had handicapped him, made his life less secure if he did stay. She could very well have created a monster instead of converting him as she had, and she felt distinct responsibility for his future.

Two nights later, when he had decided he could wait no more to take her to the doctor, he backed his truck up close to the door. Although she was bound for prison life, this was a moment of high drama—it was the last time, before the baby was born—that she had to face the risk of being caught by Slade's men. Just inside the front door, she waited, but while she hesitated, he did not.

"Let's go, let's go, hurry inside and duck down!" he said. Looking left and right, thankful for the darkness, she took a deep breath and made the dash, as fast as her stomach would let her, out the door, across the wooden porch and down the rickety steps and into the rear hatch of his wide-bodied truck. Slade clumsily tried to help her aboard, then quietly closed the door, not taking the gamble of slamming it and drawing unwanted eyes her way.

"All right, now, cover up in this blanket, they might look inside if they see me heading up there. They're just that way. And you know what'll happen to us both if they find you. I couldn't explain it and they'd call me a race traitor and...."

"I know, I know," she said, from under the blanket. "Oh fuck, I'm scared to death. Can we just go?"

"Yes, yes, I'm going. I'll try to be gentle, it's a rough road."

His first move, however, wasn't very smooth. The truck lurched into gear and she felt it through every part of her stomach.

For two hours he drove, the last hour over very uneven ground, moving slowly, doing a much better job now of not jostling her and the baby she was carrying; it still amazed her, what transformations this man, with his limited mental capacity had passed through, knowing instinctively that a woman close to term with a baby would suffer on a rough road.

Though he had admitted this was a concentration camp, to actually see this place, to know this was what her life had come to chilled the blood in her veins. The sensation was exactly the same as if she were an innocent person in the old, normal days before the war, who was unjustly being delivered to a prison for life without parole. Yes, in a way, she now understood how Mike had felt after San Alonzo.

Strange to say, she accepted that under the circumstances, this was the best Skip Slade could do for her, because there was nowhere within a hundred square miles now that was not under the control of his men. She knew he could remain in command only as long as he followed the laws they all agreed on. And one of those laws dictated that African-Americans were henceforth to be slaves. That was what her life had come to in this horrible new world after the war. She had always known that once he put her here, he could never come rescue her....

Slade worked his way through the gates and parked inside the compound. Outside the truck, excited voices told her she was among friends even before she met them.

"Where is she, where is she?" young people were saying. "Is she all right?"

"She's fine," Slade said, trying to calm them down. "I had to hide her back here. Just quiet yourselves, she's right here."

He opened the rear door but blocked the way for a moment.

"Now listen, please, you be careful with her. She's going to have a baby, so you've got to be gentle."

He assisted her out of the truck, onto the hard-packed ground. There was a distinct nip in the air, up here in the foothills of the Sierras and she shivered. Not far from here, forty members of the Donner Party had frozen to death in the winter of 1846, and winter was on its way.

Slade hurried to pull the blanket up around her shoulders and walked with her to the building beside which he had parked, in the middle of the half-acre compound.

Such was the change which Skip Slade had undergone that instead of bursting through the door, as his status and power allowed, he knocked first, then opened it, leaning in, waiting for permission to enter.

"Doctor Howe? She's here."

A bulky, fortyish black man appeared and nodded.

"Okay, we'll take over from here. Thanks, Skip."

"Yes Sir. Now look, you take damn good care of her or it'll go rough on you all, you hear?"

"Yes, yes, I know that, Skip. But you just rest easy. You did well, bringing me these supplies, and I'll do right by you for it. She'll be fine, you hear?"

"Okay, but she'd better be."

With a nod to the woman, then a squeeze of her hand, Skip Slade turned away.

"Look, I've got to get back and show my face to my boys," he told the doctor. "If they ever hear about this, I'll be dead. And if I'm dead, I can't do nothing to help you no more, do you understand?"

"Yes, Skip, we understand. And we thank you. Now go ahead and go, don't get yourself into trouble."

"Yes Sir, I wouldn't want to do that."

But before he walked away, he came back and stopped before her, dipping his head, and she could see the glint of tears in his eyes.

"You take care of the child, you hear me? And of course, take care of yourself. I'm sorry I can't do any better for you. Sorry I couldn't send you somewhere free. I'm so sorry."

He was crying openly now. One more time, she found herself comforting her jailer. She wondered what these people were thinking, seeing this and realized how it must appear. But for this moment, she did not care, she would try to explain later.

"Skip, it's okay. We'll be fine now," she told him. "I want to thank you for saving me and my baby. There isn't anything more I could have asked from you under these conditions. Good luck to you, Skip."

"No, I want to thank you for so much. For all you taught me, and everything. You...know. Thanks."

"Of course. Now go, and be careful."

She was sure she would never see him again. Given the kind of man he was, despite the changes she had wrought in him, that was perhaps only a small pity. But with his parting, she was also certain that she had seen her last day as a free citizen of the land once called America.

And when he drove out the gate, she covered her face and sobbed.

BOOK I CONTINUED
Chapter Twenty-One

GERMANY

For most of the next day, Mike tried to make contact with Bryant but the base in Concord was not answering. Until he could work out a stealthy return flight back through the military, he was stuck, and he didn't like it. He spent the day hanging around the radio room, and noticed the cycling in of the European military officers. Some of them were led to meet him and expressed their gratitude for his help, but there seemed no air of urgency among them.

After dinner, having yet again failed to reach Bryant and now starting to worry a little, Mike returned to his room and read awhile, then around midnight, gave up and began the mechanics of going to bed. He was about to disappear in the shower when the knock on the door came. He pulled a robe on and answered.

"Gerhardt?"

The German liaison officer was pale, and before he said a word, Mike knew something had gone disastrously wrong. Gerhardt stood in place, shaking his head in small increments, finding it difficult to speak.

" _Was ist los_?" Mike asked, hoping hearing his own language would snap the German captain back to himself.

"You must get dressed and come to the command center," was all Gerhardt said, but he waited while Mike pulled on his clothes.

The day before, Gerhardt and given Mike a tour of the situation room, and had watched the movement of airborne traffic on the big plot board the day before. The room was like many he had seen over his career, and especially during the war in the Gulf, including the one in the facility where he had met Bryant. Today, the board was in confusion, with lines moving all over. His mind didn't immediately register what that must mean.

"What is it?" he asked Gerhardt.

"The first wave is off the ground, both directions."

"Wave?"

"Mike, it is the war," Gerhardt told him. "The one you warned us of. The Russians moved their subs into attack configurations and the Americans took out most of them with their attacks subs, but they left some in place and the Russians fired their nuclear missiles."

"Oh Jesus." The world went gray for a moment, but quickly cleared as Mike tried to concentrate his attention to the big map on just the Bay Area. Jenny. In the middle of it all. About to be blown into plasma.

"Mike, you have someone there, no? Where?"

"San Francisco."

"Oh. I'm sorry. Very sorry. But listen, maybe there's warning there, maybe she's gotten out of town."

"No, no, I never set her up to meet Bryant. I thought there'd be plenty of time when I went back. She probably has no warning at all."

Mike felt himself starting to panic, vaguely aware that this German officer, who was a virtual stranger to him, was squeezing his shoulder in a comradely way, although the other man may not have even been aware he was doing it.

An Italian non-commissioned officer moved close and was telling Gerhardt something. The German translated it for Mike, although the words penetrated his mind only like water through mud, taking seconds before he registered what Gerhardt was telling him.

"Their telemetry indicates the shield deployment has been shifted," he was telling him. "It is very strange but they're essentially cutting out the West coast and the cities up in the North, including New York, Boston, and strangely, Washington. It is all set up now to bias the shield toward protecting the southern part of your country."

"The South, and the Midwest," Mike said, his head spinning. "He sold out the rest. What a motherfucker."

"Who?" Gerhardt asked Mike. "I don't understand what you're talking about."

"Who else? Kelcher and his people. He could never show his face on the coasts, he was booed out of town. They loved him in the middle and the South. And now he's paying them back."

"But that is crazy, he is also selling out so much industry."

"Yeah, but he's going to take it here. Don't you get it that's the game, that's what I was telling you. He'll be threatening all of you here, demanding they put your industry under the control of his people, in the places where it isn't already, until he rebuilds his own. Suddenly it's so crystal clear. This war is less about beating Russia than it is about wiping out everything he and his kind hate about his own country, putting himself in power permanently, creating a dictatorship. A white Christian dictatorship. That's exactly what my contact in Paris told me. And damn it, they never gave me time to prove it and arrest him first. Bastards!"

Mike made himself concentrate on the action now. A segment of the big screen had been transformed to a live view of the United States from a European satellite. It was maddeningly calm on the screen, just the earth from high altitude, but on the computer screen, the terrible thing was well along: launches from the Russian subs.

Mike ignored everything else and watched those lines, the progress of the Russian sub-launched warheads, numb, almost forgetting to breathe. On the live planet-view small white flashes at sea matched the plot-board. Overall, Russia launched about twenty submarine-based missiles, and the Chinese twelve. Being so much closer than Russia's land-launched ICBM's, the sub-launched warheads took much less time to reach the United States, yet those by-passing the coasts and heading anywhere except the positions Gerhardt had named were winking out, one by one, taken down by anti-missiles and powerful lasers, the key elements of the Shield.

But most of the warheads so far had been targeted for US missile and bomber sites.

Then came the first tragedies. From a Russian submarine, Boston was taken out, and Mike felt as if he were dying. The bright flash of the detonation showed clearly on the real-time satellite picture in one corner of the screen. Washington, D.C. was next, then New York.

From somewhere in the back of the room, a radio came on, transmitted down by a satellite link, with an announcer speaking English with an American accent.

"Where's that coming from?" Mike demanded.

"It's an L.A. Emergency Network station," a European voice replied in English. From Los Angeles."

Mike called for the radio to be turned up and heard announcer's voice saying, "We are receiving reports that several cities on the East coast have suffered huge explosions. There is no report of military activity from the Pentagon, but eye-witness reports indicate the explosions are nuclear in nature.

"Please do not panic, but we recommend you evacuate downtown areas and seek any kind of shelter you can; do not look toward the city center."

"Did you hear that?" Mike said. "Kelcher didn't even let them warn anyone!"

Inexorably, the lines from Russian submarines converged now on West Coast cities. Seattle, San Diego, Portland, Los Angeles...and now San Francisco. Flash-flash-flash. Paralyzed, Mike still sat in place, staring at the plot board, which soon stopped changing as the war apparently ran its course. So short, it took so little time to wipe out everything.

Gerhardt leaned close, squeezing his shoulder again.

"Mike, it is over for now. You should go back and get some sleep."

"I couldn't sleep, how could I sleep, ever again?" he said.

"I can find something to help you sleep. Want me to do that?"

Mike didn't answer, and he barely noticed when Gerhardt slipped away. The German was gone fifteen minutes or so and when he returned he had something for Mike to drink.

"I talked to the dispensary, this will help you. Okay?"

Mike accepted the drink, not tasting it. Nor did he think anything of it when he began to feel weak, he just continued to stare at the screen, but oddly, it began to fade out....

Chapter Twenty-Two

Mike awoke on a bed in a dispensary, to find Gerhardt seated next to him, reading. How long had he been there? Slowly, it came to him, the horror, Jenny's certain death, the end of life as he knew it.

He stirred and the German liaison officer set down his book.

"Are you all right?"

"Why am I here?"

"What they gave you was a bit more than a sleep aid. I asked them to sedate you. I'm sorry for knocking you out without your permission, but _mein Gott_ , nobody should have to go through what you did. I wanted you to have some rest before you had to cope with it all. I apologize, Mike—"

"What time, how long—"

"Five hours."

"You've been here all that time?"

"No, they told me about when you would awake, I got here ten minutes ago.

"Mike, I have news. Americans have appealed to our government for a flight home. The government has agreed. You are of course first on the list to be offered a place. In fact, I think you will be looked upon as the leader of those going back. What do you say? You will go back, won't you?"

"Go? Back there? Without her?" His head began to swim and he couldn't think, not sure if it were the effect of the sedatives or his own mental state.

"Before this, you wanted to be there for her," Gerhardt reminded Mike. "Why not now?"

"Because she's dead! I saw what happened to the Bay Area, there's no chance in the world. There's nothing for me to go back to."

"Well I'm sure you'd be welcome here. If that's what you wanted to do, stay. And you know NATO will set you up to stay. Or go. Anything.

"I also know it's too early to try and think.

"Mike, you have a few options I want you to face up to—"

"No, Gerhardt, I don't want to—"

"Please, just let me say this and don't stop me. Then you can answer however you see fit."

Too deadened to fight, Mike just let the German captain go on.

"One of the things you can do is forget about Jenny and stay here, to assume she's dead and that there's nothing you can do about it. But that's the easiest choice, you don't have to do anything—"

"Easy?"

"Please, just let me finish.

"Mike, here's the hardest choice: Jenny might be alive, but lying in the ruins, hurt. Or she might be alive and well but wandering lost and alone in the Bay Area somewhere, vulnerable to people who outnumber her, who'll prey on her. That is a hard choice because you must do something if it is true, not just sit here and give up. Those are your possibilities, and I want you to think about all of them before you say you can't go back over there without her."

Gerhardt went on to explain how welcome Mike would be at councils in Europe that would be forming to determine a common response, but he wasn't hearing the other man any more. The awful pictures Gerhardt had painted of Jenny's possible fate hit him suddenly and he collapsed in a heap, sobbing harder than he had ever done in his life.

"I can't stand it, I can't stand it," he moaned, over and over. Little by little, Gerhardt coaxed Mike to his feet and walked him back to his room, then spoke into his cell phone in German.

Ten minutes later, a doctor arrived with another sedative and Mike calmed down and dropped off to sleep.

She walked in the dead of night on terrible, broken ground, gaunt from hunger, going where, she didn't know, stumbling, sometimes falling down and taking a long time to reach her feet.

All around her, shadows moved, men and other things that needed a meal or wanted a woman, following her, making horrible noises, closing in, skittering like huge rats.

She limped, one arm dangled useless and she bled from somewhere unclear.

As daylight neared, they made their move, suddenly jumping out as a group and surrounding her. There were terrible sounds and he knew what was happening.

He sat up in the dead of night, panting.

"Jenny! Oh god." He howled, reaching for his cell phone, calling the number that would connect him to Gerhardt.

"You're right, I have to go to her. Now! I have to go with the others and somehow get to the States. Please, don't let them go without me!"

"No, don't worry, they won't. You've got plenty of time. And they really do want you to lead them. They know of you and they need you! But we have received a call from the president of France. He desires to meet with you and we will fly you there the moment you are ready. More Americans have gathered there and want to go home and you may be asked to lead them."

"Yes, I want to go see Clervoy. Give me ten minutes, I'll be ready to go."

Gerhardt excused himself but was back in fifteen minutes, and grabbed one of Mike's bags himself. In an hour, the flight to Paris was airborne.

Clervoy's greeting for Mike was rich with emotion, more than the situation seemed to warrant, even for Mike, in his heightened state of feeling over Jenny.

"Oh my friend, it is unbelievable, all of this. I must tell you, Kelcher, after the war, has done exactly what you said he would do, he has issued several belligerent statements toward the rest of the world, and particularly ourselves. But it is worse even than that.

"I want my Defense Minister to fill you in. Please, come this way."

Clervoy led Mike down to an underground room that was a small version of the room he had visited in Concord, where a uniformed general greeted him with a salute and a click of heels.

"This is Minister LaSalle," Clervoy said.

"At your service, Sir," the general-minister said.

"Then start by dispensing with the formality, all right?" Mike said.

" _Certainement_ , if you wish."

"So go ahead, tell me what you know."

"I can tell you that your president is threatening anyone who tries to take advantage of the United States while it's 'licking its wounds.' He's demanded the complete surrender of all our European forces and capital cities to NATO. Again, what you told us to expect, I understand.

"He says he 'generously' held back his missile forces against Russia but has a huge reserve and will wipe out anybody who threatens him in any way.

"We have worked something of a miracle and a deception since you left. All the key European NATO deputy commanders have come here to Paris, leaving their superiors in their expected places, with their American counterparts, who will still be reporting to whatever is left of the command structure in the United States.

"As you suggested, I have seen to it that the European Community and the individual countries of the Union are claiming to surrender to US authority, so we're playing the delaying game, the way you and Folger wanted. That's where we stand at this moment.

"But there's one thing, what you would call a 'hitch', I believe is the word."

"Yeah?"

"I'm afraid the Russian submarines that held back some of their missiles aren't going off-station. They're hovering near the American coasts still, and it's clear they can just as totally destroy what's left of your country as Kelcher can Europe. The center of the country survived intact, but the Russians are threatening it now, so as horrible as it sounds, the war we've already had might only be the opening volley. Our calculations assure us that up to this time, nuclear winter is not threatened, and for that we're all grateful, both sides kept their yields down. But I do not think it would take much of anything on either side for it all to go up. And Kelcher's liable to do anything if that happens. Right now, we're as much at ground zero as the people in New York were.

"I submit that you, who are more privy to both sides than anyone known to be alive, should be right in the middle of this, Mr. Lansford. Will you join us?"

"Well hard as it is to accept, that's really why I'm here, so I guess I don't have much of a choice. I get the feeling you're right, I'm the only one right now who's got the ear of both sides, to a certain extent. I'll do all I can."

"That is what we ask. So how may we begin?"

Mike nodded to himself, thinking, trying to find the answer to that very question.

"All right, look, I have a friend who went to Vancouver to ride out the war, if it couldn't be avoided. I want to contact him by radio and if, as I understand, you're sending people back home, we should go to Vancouver first. Then I'll try to get hold of my military contact.

"François, I would like for you to work with the Canadian Prime Minister in my behalf. I need to know where Canada stands in all this.

"I know that Washington, DC is gone, and although I have an idea where Kelcher is, which is a base called Mt. Weather, on the East Coast, I want to go down the West Coast to the Bay Area. I was working with Senator Carver and if he survived, I want him in on this negotiation. Everything points to my trying to reach a military command bunker in Concord, California, and work from there.

"These people who want to go home will also need help from the Canadians on the ground. That's the starting point. Is that workable?"

"Yes, but there is something else you should know," the Defense Minister said. "In the last couple of hours, across the spectrum of NATO bases, the US Army representatives have quietly turned control over to us, as was planned, if it could be done."

"So Folger got the message to them. That's a relief."

"Yes, but the situation with the Russian missile submarines—this was unexpected and it could still prove fatal to us all. So how should we follow this up?"

Mike had not yet had time to think about that particular scenario. Agreeing to be a major player in all this, and having all the answers were two different things.

He asked Clervoy for a few minutes to think over the situation and the president excused himself, taking the defense minister with him.

Mike closed his eyes, sitting back in the plush chair, and in his head, pictures appeared....

Submarines. With Russian, French and British flags. All that stood up against Kelcher now. Released from the constraints of NATO by the recent developments. To do what?

And he knew.

Mike yelled for someone to bring LaSalle and an aide rushed through the door, returning with the Defense Minister in seconds. Clervoy was right behind him.

Mike almost physically propelled a bemused LaSalle to Clervoy's desk and turned a notepad to face him.

"Yes?"

"Write!

"If they've maintained the deception, at this point, Kelcher still thinks he's totally in control. If he thinks NATO is moving with troops to lock down on Paris, Berlin, Rome, he's comfortable. He's not thinking about French and English subs, since they're armed with US weapons. That's outside of NATO's purview.

"You've got to hold that deception of surrender, but working with Folger's people in NATO, you've got to quietly position yourselves to bottle up any troops not under

Kelcher's control, here on the continent. Then, you announce that you'll join with Russian subs and finish off the US and US bases here in Europe if Kelcher doesn't stand down his military and surrender to arrest and submit to international war crimes trial.

"He won't do it, but it'll buy time for Folger to make a move. That's what we need, time. Kelcher has to blink, to wait, not launch until suddenly he's in custody and it's too late."

LaSalle wrote what he was told, then when Mike indicated he was finished, he dashed out of the room to put it in work.

"Christ," Mike said. "I hope that's enough."

"So with that in motion, what now?" the French president asked him.

"I need to get back to North America as fast as possible and stay in the game, to contact Folger and go on. I need to make some radio calls first. Can I do it from here?"

"Our entire government is at your service," Clervoy said.

As before, Mike could not establish contact with Bryant. That was a discouraging piece of news. He found it hard to believe the base would have sustained a direct hit, and he hoped that perhaps the silence was only because their radio antennas had been knocked out of action.

Using the information Folger had provided him, Mike had the French radio technicians attempt to contact him directly at NORAD Headquarters in Colorado Springs.

Mike suffered what seemed an interminable wait but which was in fact no more than five minutes. With great relief, Mike finally heard Folger's distinctive voice.

"What's the story over there?"

Mike ran through everything he knew and what he had advised Clervoy. "It's going to be up to you. Can you rein them in and keep this under control?"

"First of all, I've lost a large number of my ground forces in the States. They were casualties in actual attacks, and most of the rest I was forced to deploy. They were actually on their way in your direction when it all went down. So they're effectively out of use. But I have enough, I hope, just barely, to carry off the minimum plan we discussed. I'm setting that up as we speak and I hope in twenty-four hours to have results."

"What about the Air Force and Navy commanders?"

"When we carry out the operation," and by that, Mike knew he meant the arrest of Kelcher and as many of his people who were with him as possible, "we don't know what side of the fence they'll fall on. That threat you propose from French, British and Russian subs, is a good one. Kelcher's side doesn't want to absorb any more damage, most concerned with nuclear winter, I know that. If they think they can wipe out European control without retaliation, fine. So those subs are key to show them some threat in return."

"But sooner or later, we have to stand down from all this," Mike said.

"Let's get the government out of enemy hands, first," Folger said. "It's still extremely touchy."

"I understand that.

"I'm going to be heading home soon and land in Vancouver, I hope, and ultimately reach for Bryant's position at Concord. I have an idea how to restore a civilian government in accordance with the Constitution once you make the arrest, but we can discuss that when the current one's out of office."

"Yes."

"Then I'll let you go. I hope to talk to you from Vancouver, or sooner if events warrant."

He nodded to the technician, who ended the transmission.

But while he had a radio available, Mike asked to call Frank Keller, fishing out his wallet with the card that had the frequency written on it.

It was another wait before the call came through.

"Mike, Mike, that's you? Where the hell are you?" Frank Keller said. "You with Bryant?"

"No, I'm in Paris. But I'm going back, I'm having them take me there, first to Vancouver, to make our rendezvous. There's a lot more involved, and I don't want to say it over the air."

"Mike, it's so great to know you're all right, man."

"But Frank, do you realize Jenny probably didn't make it? Right now, I'm running on adrenaline, but I've already gone through a tough time, seeing San Francisco go up, knowing she was in the middle of it."

"Oh Jesus Christ, I didn't even think about that! I'm sorry, man. But look, you can't assume anything. She could have gotten out, she could have just happened to be out of town. Anything can happen. Absolutely do not give up, do you hear me?"

"Yeah, sure. I try, Frank."

"Good. So let's agree to meet at the Vancouver airport, right?"

"Yes, go to the main terminal."

"You've got it. See you soon."

"Frank, is Leslie still with you?"

"Yeah, right here. Want to say hi?"

"Could I?"

"Of course. Here she is."

"Hi, bunny," Mike said.

"Hi yourself. I'm so sorry about Jenny. How are you holding up?"

"I'm just hanging on, but I'm busy so it helps. Are you keeping Frank in line?"

"Oh, you know," she said and he could hear a laugh in her voice. "We're doing very well and very happy together, Mike."

"That's wonderful."

Keller came back on and verified the plan for a rendezvous then signed off.

Mike took off the headphones when the call was over and he covered his face a moment, fighting tears. It was a great lift to know friends from his old life were alive and he would soon see them. But then what? No, it's too soon to think about that.

One of the agents who had worked with Mike all along appeared now.

"I'm to take you to the airport, to join the others who are leaving," he said.

"I'd like to tell Clervoy goodbye. Is there time?"

"Of course. They say you are 'the boss', anything you say goes. The plane will wait."

The French agent sent for Clervoy and soon Mike and the French president embraced in farewell.

"Thank you so much for what you've done." Clervoy was becoming emotional and Mike found it difficult to hold up, as well.

"I hope to hear from you soon, with good news," Clervoy said and let that serve as goodbye.

In an hour Mike was aboard the jet, meeting the collection of tourists and other Americans who were still caught in the throes of uncertainty and panic, awaiting return to what, they could not imagine. They took to Mike as if he were their guru. But he was running on fumes, terrified of when he had to strap into his seat and face thinking about Jenny.

BOOK II CONTINUED
Chapter Thirteen

SOMEWHERE NEAR SILVERDALE

His name, she would learn, was Benjamin Howe. The doctor took her inside the building and back to his examination table. Before he touched her, he sat her down and pulled up a chair across from her.

"I'm a bit confused over your situation, Ma'am—your relationship to Slade. Would I be out of place asking you?"

After she spoke her name and asked him to use it instead of "Ma'am," she told him how she came to be with Skip Slade, and why she had been brought here. The doctor's eyes went wide and he shook his head.

"Well I'll be damned. Sounds to me like you must really be something. You mind if I ask you another question?"

"You're my doctor, I don't know of anything you can't ask me. What?"

"Have you ever 'passed'?"

"Passed? You mean pretended to be white? To get something or get away with something? No. Not in this day and age. Not after we've had a black president, are you kidding me? Hell, I can't remember ever having heard or used that word except in movies. I've done just fine being who I am and I've never been shy about letting people knew I was African-American."

"Well I don't think it hurts that you're an incredibly attractive woman."

"If you're asking did I ever play on that, well I've never believed that about myself and no, I've never used it, either. Any other questions?"

"No, and I apologize, but you need to understand, I come out of Mississippi, and down there, these things still do matter. Please forgive me."

"Dr. Howe, it's okay. Our situation here is pretty awful, so as far as I'm concerned, a lot of conventions that used to be important just don't matter at all now."

"I know, I know, I'm just having trouble getting my mind around that, so I again apologize," Dr. Howe said.

"But now there's one more thing that bothers me. Slade kept referring to 'his' baby, but you say you conceived with someone else entirely, before the war. Which works out

time-wise. So can you please, please relieve my mind that we aren't delivering his child?"

Now she permitted herself a grimace. "If you think I would let his penis within a mile of me...."

Howe chuckled. "All right, point taken. But I'm curious about this attitude of his that it's his baby."

She made an attempt to explain how she had "played" Skip Slade and this time she thought his eyes would bug right out of his head.

"Jesus-himself, that's a hell of a ploy. You must really be something. I mean that.

"You know it's weird, but I did see a change in the bastard over the time we've been in here but I had no idea why. I guess I know why, now, though. I hope it does help someone. And if it helps us here, all the better. I'd say we owe you quite a debt of gratitude."

She was a little embarrassed and found it hard to respond to that, but quite pleased to know there had already been a positive effect from her efforts with Skip Slade.

"Okay, moving along," Howe said. "I believe we have a picture of where things stand. So I'll ask you some questions about your medical history and we'll proceed to check you out and determine how we'll approach delivery when the time comes."

Howe produced a hand-written form and had her fill it out, and when she was finished, he examined her, pronouncing her pregnancy and the baby, as far as he could tell with the equipment available, completely normal.

"But there's something you should know right off the top. I need you to be prepared that when the time comes, there may be considerable pain. I don't have much to help you with that, so we'll go through a regimen of natural childbirth, of which I'm not a huge proponent, but the breathing exercises and all should help. Okay?"

"Whatever you say, Doctor."

"Look, uh, I'd like it if you'd please, call me Ben."

"Okay, Ben. Whatever you say."

"Just like that? I tell you there's going to be a rough time ahead and you don't even flinch?"

She just shrugged. "Life has been so hateful since the war, I've been through so much, I can't find it in myself to worry about a little pain until it's here. I'm just relieved to have somebody who knows what he's about. And I'll be so happy to have my child in my arms, a little pain...." Again she shrugged.

"My god, I have a feeling you're one tough little cookie. And I mean that in the kindest way."

"No, I don't feel that way. I just cope."

"Yeah, well I think that's what being tough is.

"But anyway, now you know. You'll be delivering, I would guess, in a week. Until then, no reason you shouldn't be ambulatory. Since you're now one of us, I want to meet the family, and move you in."

He took her out and introduced her to the twenty-three African Americans and family of five Jews who had been somehow caught and thrown into this prison.

Over time, she would hear their different stories—all of them had been tourists, many caught on the road to or from Placerville to Tahoe when The Nation closed in upon them. Howe's oldest child was named George and he was amazingly articulate and self-confident for someone his age, which must be around seventeen.

"George is really the leader here," Ben Howe said. "He just lets me pretend to be the head of the family. He got us through the horrible first days, and God knows what would have happened if he hadn't been up to it."

George, for the first time, seemed out of his element, embarrassed at the praise. She put her hand on his shoulder and made him look at her.

"You're quite a guy, aren't you?" she said, smiling as brightly as she could make herself do.

"It wasn't anything, Ma'am."

"Ma'am? No!" She told him her name and said that was what he should call her.

Now, she met the other Howe children, all the way down to ten year old David, who came to her unbidden and put his arms around her waist. The gesture was so sweet and charming, and at once so sad, knowing he had lost his mother, that she had to struggle not to cry. She feared that would have had a depressing effect on all the others and to stave it off, she made a big production of hefting little David and holding him out before her.

"My word, what a big boy! Wow, you're gonna push old George here out of power in another year, eh?"

That made everyone laugh and she pulled David close and hugged him, kissing him on the cheek.

That Benjamin Howe was a man in torment, there could be no doubt. Losing his wife was enough, but falling into this insane life had clearly driven him to the brink, yet he had come back, if only for the sake of his family. All this was crystal clear to her without a direct word of it being said. From the moment of meeting his family, while she waited for own baby to come into the world, she dedicated herself to being a mother for Benjamin's youngsters, and except for his daughter Melissa, they took to her in a touching way.

Melissa could not reconcile another woman as even a substitute mother and shied away from her completely. So Jenny set herself the task of winning Melissa over. But she already had a plan. Once the baby was born, perhaps Melissa would accept the role of big sister and help her figure out what it was about, having a baby of one's own.

And so, strangely, even being incarcerated in a slave camp, she was happier than she had been at any time since the war had begun.

But there was a tide running through the lives of those who had gathered here. They all knew something worse was in store for them in time. Why would they be sequestered, if The Nation didn't mean them harm when they settled their military differences with the groups around them? And what would happen when the emissaries from the larger groups attempting to take total power out in the heartland arrived?

Certainly they would demand something be done with...or to this group of refugees/prisoners here, and that could be the nightmare to end all nightmares. She dreaded to imagine it.

There was one key question, however: could the "new" Skip Slade do anything to save them?

When the baby came, she really did go through hell, not handling the pain well at all. She clenched her teeth and swore and screamed and sweated, but finally it was done and the little bundle lay on her chest. And seeing her daughter, she instantly knew it was all worth it.

"My lord, she's beautiful," she murmured.

"She sure is, she's a really wonderful little dear, isn't she?" the woman, a very recent captive, who had assisted in the delivery said. "What are you naming her?"

With the delivery over, Dr. Howe busied himself at one edge of the room but upon hearing the question, he turned and looked her way, clearly interested in hearing the name.

"Ben," she said.

"Ben?" He chuckled. "I appreciate the honor, but in case you didn't notice, your baby's a little girl and Ben's a terrible name for a little girl."

"No, I was going to ask you...may I name her after your wife? Can I have your blessing to call her Meg? Do you think your children would approve?"

For the first time in the short few days she had known him, Dr. Howe really lost his composure. He covered his face for a moment and she knew he was crying. But in the midst of his emotional release, he came to her and took her hand.

"I'd be honored. Will you please do that? It would be wonderful. Her name was actually Megan."

"And, Melissa...may that be her middle name?"

At that, he could only nod.

And so, her daughter became Megan Melissa.

Skip Slade never returned, and she doubted she would ever learn why. What she did know was that in the days after Megan's birth, while she was still directly under the care of Dr. Howe, events changed drastically. Something had happened back to the west and armed white men of The Nation came and uprooted the camp, sending everyone on the run in the opposite direction. Over the first two months of Megan's life, her extended family moved three times, heading, everyone suspected, closer and closer to Lake Tahoe.

She tried to figure out if this had connections to the plans of "Reverend Brown," or if they were being maneuvered by outside agencies into a rendezvous with one of the larger, more connected white supremacist groups that were known to exist. Or were they trying to escape Wilmot O'Toole's people?

Winter came in, a horrible winter, yet apparently not so bad by the standards of the Sierras, and they built lean-tos and the white captors hardly ever visited them, which was good in its own way, but they also provided them with nothing. There was a lot of talk of the Donner Party; what food they had was acquired by George, leading seven other young men and three girls who had arrived since the war, who foraged for game and what vegetables could be found and identified as edible.

Even the youngest, Ben Howe's ten year old son David became a prolific trapper and her favorite of them all. The first time he called her "Mom", she sobbed, holding him against her chest and caressing his hair, while Meg slept next to her in the makeshift cradle on the floor.

But when spring returned, the "bubbas"—as George and some of the others liked to call their captors—did the same, and now they seemed more powerful, and there were enough of them to completely control all the prisoners, who were now joined by Asians and Latinos and another Jewish family.

Just before summer, a terrible discovery was made.

The Nation had captured and now held the former capital of Nevada. Although Carson City had been trashed in the battle, The Nation was running it in some semblance of order now. The captives were moved into the minimum security prison on the outskirts of town, which had been emptied of its white inmates, most of whom had willingly joined with The Nation.

The blacks, who made up the greater proportion of the original prison population, became a positive force among the whole community of captives. Never mind their crimes, which was predominantly of a drug nature, they became leaders and schemed to overthrow The Nation, counseled by cooler heads among the civilian captives to avoid violence that would hurt the noncombatants.

Over time, however, no opportunity for action presented itself and all such talk died out. By then, fulfilling the anticipation of a return to pre-Civil War conditions, the captives were employed literally as slaves, the black and Latino men who had been prisoners of the state forced into heavy-lifting work, while the women and children were employed as servants in town.

Carson City, before its takeover, had not tolerated racism. The people were independent, almost fiercely so, and proud that their city remained small, many bragging that they could go anywhere in town in ten minutes. But they were not of the kind who had invaded from California after the war. Mostly of European...white...or Latino background, they did not take well to being commandeered by anyone from outside, be it legitimate government, militia or anyone else.

Although they did not openly fight The Nation, they did not cooperate with it and because of that, they were sent packing. Most would probably move up the road to nearby Reno; The Nation as a fighting force was not ready to take on that city, which had a sizable security force, much of it associated with the organizations running the casinos. So for a time, The Nation hunkered down in Carson City and life became a routine for the prisoners.

She became at first a maid, like most of the other women, carrying Meg on her back while she conducted her menial work in houses taken over by The Nation. Over time, as Meg grew old enough to be taken care of by others, Jenny left her daughter back in the prison during the days, looked after by those too old or otherwise unable to do physical labor. It was difficult at first to be separated from her daughter most of the day, but the nights...oh, the nights.

That was the time when she began teaching Megan everything she could about life, starting early to show her how to read, and most of all, she told Meg about her father and promised one day he would come for them. Whether she even believed it herself or not any more, she could no longer say, but if she could keep the dream alive with Meg, she might be able to hold onto it herself a little longer.

Soon, however, Meg wasn't the only one she was educating. While she carried out back-breaking labor during the day, well into the night she became teacher for all the children of the whole population within the prison....

....Soon, a very dark time came.

Ben Howe was about twenty years older than she was and had no interest in ever taking another woman into his life. Nor had she any intentions of ever making a life with any man but the father of her child, but still she and Ben became very close friends and companions and she moved into his quarters in the prison, with his three children. Meg became for all intents and purposes their baby sister. But though Meg's mother was the woman of the house, Melissa was growing into a splendid young woman in her own right and had over time accepted her surrogate mother and they came to love each other dearly.

The first terrible change to their lives was the night Melissa returned from her work sobbing, holding her crotch and collapsing soon as she entered the room.

"Sweetie, Honey, what happened?"

"Some Bubba raped me. Oh god!"

Learning of this atrocity, Benjamin Howe went almost out of control with rage, the only time in all those years Jenny knew him that she saw him lose his temper.

"Ben, you have to calm down and find out if they gave her a disease and treat it. Then you and Mellie have to sit down and talk about what happens if she's pregnant. You have to decide whether to abort. It's up to the two of you, but you have to face it, Ben."

It was hours into the night before he could respond.

Up to that time, once he calmed down, he just sat in his chair and stared. She went to him, holding his hand, squeezing it, until he finally began to return to himself.

Dully, he asked her, "What would you do? Would you abort or keep the baby?"

"I can't help you decide that, it wouldn't be fair. I've carried a baby, so in this case, it wouldn't be my first. It should be up to her."

"But tell me, I have to hear your opinion," he said.

"Please, just tell me."

"All right, if you want it straight, I'd abort. I wouldn't take anything from those shits, least of all their DNA. If I had been pregnant by Skip Slade, I would have found a way to abort. No. I would not let it grow. That's my opinion."

"Thank you, I needed to hear it from you. Now you go to bed, get some rest."

"You too."

"I'll try."

But something seemed to die in Ben Howe after that. Although Melissa did not become pregnant, her father lived less than another year, and it was yet another terrible, terrible blow in Jenny's life when he died. In all their lives. Especially for Meg, who had come to see him as her grandfather.

And after that, life only grew more and more dismal for a long time to come.

BOOK I CONTINUED
Chapter Twenty-Three

IN THE AIR TO VANCOUVER

Mike closed his eyes and for awhile, disappeared into a world from which he never wanted to return. As long as he could keep his eyes shut, and be left alone, he could exist inside a waking dream that Jenny still lived. In that dream, he was with her somewhere far away from tragedy, fear and death, in a paradise they had never been given the chance to explore together. It did not matter where, for it wasn't the place, it was Jenny by his side that made it paradise.

It came to an end with a jolt. The French hostess, trying to maintain her own fiction that this was a normal flight, was gently shaking him, offering dinner. With a palpable shock of loss at having Jenny's existence snuffed out by the intrusion, Mike opened his eyes and accepted a meal he wasn't sure he had the stomach to swallow.

With that, she was gone for him; he could no longer retreat within himself and find her again, the flight was too near its end. Indeed, out the window, as they approached Vancouver from over the pole, glaciers and mountains were passing beneath the wings, and soon they would be on the ground and Mike must do something to make this "expedition" a real thing. What, he did not yet know. In truth, he felt more lost than ever....

For the approach, flight crew invited him to watch the landing from a jump-seat just behind them; needing a diversion to save him from destructive feelings, he accepted the offer. Before him, out the windshield, the airport hove into view, and soon ground vehicles and other aircraft were flashing by and the jet slowed and taxied to the terminal. His horrible sojourn was over but his nightmare was only beginning.

The lead flight hostess opened the passenger door and ground crew rolled up portable stairs. Mike lagged back inside the cabin, watching the other thirty-three Americans who had accompanied him rush down the steps, many of them stopping to kiss the ground. He hoped they would have better luck in their searches for loved ones than he would.

When all the others had gone, the flight attendants had to wait for Mike to exit, but he was frozen, unable and unwilling to leave. If he never climbed down there, Jenny could always live in his heart and mind; once he descended those few steps, his life would be transformed for ever.

From his refuge just inside the door, he stared out across the airport at the majestic mountains that rose several miles away, beyond downtown Vancouver, glinting with a few late patches of snow that still clung to the ski runs. He continued to stare that way, refusing to turn his eyes down, to the ground, only twenty feet away, where for him there was nothing. How long could he hide up here, away from unbearable reality?

Then something changed. People were approaching the foot of the stairs, waving their arms, trying to call him out, to make him surrender. "Mike, Mike, come down, it's us!"

He backed away inside, hiding from them, from this cruel joke, wondering who had put strangers up to this. There was no one who could possibly know him here.

And then he snapped out of his funk. Frank and Leslie!

No one else could comfort him but his two best remaining friends. Grabbing his bags from inside the plane, he raced down the stairs, reaching Leslie first, dropping everything and picking her up off the ground, twirling her in a circle, both of them laughing joyfully. When he landed her again, he kissed her full on the mouth, then reached for Frank, and the three of them clung together.

Finally, they calmed down, and Frank picked up Mike's two small pieces of baggage and headed toward the terminal, leaving Mike and Leslie alone for a minute or two before they joined him.

"This is the only good thing that could happen, having you back," Leslie told him. "Thank god they were willing to make a flight.

"How are you doing, Sweetheart?"

"No good. Seeing you and Frank is a tremendous lift, but I'm not making it, without her."

"I can't even imagine how you're feeling," she told him. "It really breaks my heart." Her eyes were starting to well up. "Even for me, it's bad enough and I hardly knew her. She's responsible for bringing Frank and me together, and she was so sweet and wonderful. It's so strange but I miss her, too."

She buried her face against Mike's shoulder and sobbed, shaking so hard he had to hold her tight to try and calm her down.

"Les, you can't even begin to know what it means to me that you care so much," he said. "I needed this, I needed someone to understand. If you and Frank hadn't been here, right now—"

"Yes," she whispered. "I think I know.

"Come on, let's go while we can."

He released her from his arms and they started on for the terminal, where Frank waited just inside. Mike gripped his friend's shoulder one brief time when they arrived, then wondered aloud what was to happen now.

"Well I don't know what you pulled off over there," Frank said, "but it sounds like the entire country here is at your beck and call. The premier of BC is flying over from the capital in Victoria in the morning. He's empowered to speak for the Prime Minister, and Ottawa's also sending someone, and Canada is pledging to throw all its weight into this mission. They seem to think you're going to put everything right down there, install a new government and throw Kelcher in the clink. I haven't done anything to dissuade them.

"But before that, they're very concerned about the diplomatic situation, with the Russians and the threat of more war. They're willing to do anything you need to put a stop to it."

"Yeah, but that means doing what?" Mike said. "Physically, what are they going to do?"

"For starters, they're sending a military cargo plane and supporting gear so we can go wherever you want to go to establish a base down there and keep it going. Part of that includes radiation suits. That was my idea."

"What in the hell for? We aren't going to solve anything clomping around in the blast zones, Frank."

"No? What if Concord was hit and we have to evacuate those folks? To rescue whoever might be in there?"

"Concord?" Mike shrugged, barely able to recall what that was about. "Why?"

"Mike, think of the possibilities. Bryant, his invitation, to people we knew, to ride out the war there? Think."

Concord? Oh yes, Bryant and his base. That seemed so long ago, so meaningless. He never had raised Bryant by radio and had forgotten about it, with everything else.

Concord. Could she have somehow made it there? Frank had been careful not to say her name, to let Mike come to it himself, but now the world seemed to wobble for a moment; Mike fought against his momentary confusion and as Frank had done, kept her name unspoken.

"All right," he said, "so we bring radiation suits. Check.

"So, here I am, and what do I do now? Where are you two staying? Is money worth anything now?"

"Sure, Canadian money. But not yours, even if you had any. Everything for you is on the house, they're regarding you as a visiting diplomat," Frank said. "Les and I are getting to ride on your coat tails.

"Why don't you just settle in first. Come on, you're probably tired from the flight and all the stress."

"Yeah, I didn't really sleep. I guess I am a little woozy."

"Let's go."

Keller led Mike through the terminal to the same truck he had been driving the last time they were together. It took only minutes to reach their hotel.

There, the surrealism of it all struck Mike oddly: down the road a hundred and fifty miles, the war had devastated cities Mike knew well, killing hundreds of thousands, yet here he was calmly checking into his room, dropping his few remaining possessions on the floor, testing the bed as if he were on a regular trip to a convention. A hotel. This wasn't how he pictured returning to the nightmare....

But it was the nightmare. He was alone, she should be beside him, kicking off her shoes, nestling her head on his shoulder, enticing him into a little afternoon lovemaking, or a shower together, then a walk somewhere, a night in town. But she wasn't there, he was alone.

Alone.

In a panic, he rushed back out and caught Frank and Leslie on their way to lunch.

"Hey, you're supposed to be asleep," Frank said but Mike shook his head.

"Not yet. Not ready to try. Mind if I join you? Would I be in the way?"

"Don't be crazy, we've been living to have you back," Leslie said. Still holding Frank's hand, she also took Mike's and the three best friends continued on to the restaurant.

Seated at their table, for a terrible moment, Mike's mind flashed back to that lunch with Frank, Jenny and Eric Waterfield in what seemed another age. If he closed his eyes, he would see her there, but he kept them open and before him, alive and watching him, Leslie gazed at him and he focused everything upon her, desperate to replace Jenny's image with Leslie's solid reality.

And she did not fail to notice his attention, perhaps misunderstanding, but the glowing smile she lavished upon him kept Mike's pain under control. Then something happened, she turned pink and dipped her head and would not gaze at him that way any more.

"Mike, before we left the room, just now," she told him, still averting her eyes, "we were saying how relieved we are to have you home. You know, in this life, now, the way it all is, it's the best thing Frank and I could ask for, the three of us to be together."

"But I nearly didn't come back," Mike told her.

"What do you mean?"

"I watched San Francisco go, and I almost gave up. Somebody convinced me to go on and that's the only reason I did. It wasn't easy, but he dragged me back into trying to break the continuing threat, and...well I've just been kind of droning on since, running on nothing but adrenaline."

"Honey, I can understand how you must feel, but I'm sorry, I don't care why you came back, I'm just so happy you did. Still, I can't really understand how you'd even think of giving up on Jenny."

"I was there...Frank knows what it's like, I saw Teheran go, and even though that was a much smaller bomb, then, I knew how it would be for miles around, in the Bay Area, and just couldn't believe there was any hope. I still don't, but I'm going to try, just on the chance she somehow did reach Concord.

"If this friend in Germany hadn't convinced me Jenny might need me, I couldn't have tried. I'd still be there. I don't know what I would have done by then. Les, I don't know how to live in a world without Jenny, and most of the time, nothing seems to matter. I'm having a very hard time even concentrating on stopping Kelcher. I'm really just making it minute to minute.

"I don't expect you to understand, but I just feel completely dead inside. It's hard to care, at all. I could just walk in front of a truck, that's how much it hurts."

"Mike, God no, don't even say that! You can't let this happen to you. You have to fight. Until you find proof otherwise you have to assume we're going to find her. You must," Leslie said.

She touched his cheek. "Listen to me, Mike: if we can't ever find her, all right, then you can face it when the time comes. But in the meantime, think of what happens to her if she's alive and you don't stop Kelcher from killing us all with nuclear winter. Mike, tell me this: can you take the gamble that you aren't also negotiating for her? Can't you feel it, that if we all die, from what Kelcher does, then she dies too, and really dies? Are you willing to risk that?"

She had him now, and the Leslie who had divorced him would never have been able to do this. He was mesmerized, and he was shocked by her strength. Not thinking, not even aware of her lover sitting right there, he touched her cheek in return, and when that wasn't enough, he leaned out to kiss her nose in a way he used to do so long ago.

"No, no, and thank you. Okay, I'll go as far as I can stand to go, Little Bunny," he told her. "I'm going to need all the help you can give me, both of you. You may have to remind me every day. Are you strong enough?"

"If you're strong enough to do this, we'll be strong enough," Frank said. "We're ready to do anything we have to for you. Anything, I swear it."

There was no more anyone could add to that and they finished lunch in silence.

Afterward, Leslie walked Mike to his room, and Frank seemed to approve, leaving them to be alone. She urged Mike to try and sleep, and when he agreed, she tucked him in and sat beside him on the bed, running her fingers through his hair in a way she used to do when they were married.

"I love you so," she whispered. "I'm so sad for you, so tortured, I'd do anything for you, Mike. I'd leave Frank—and I adore him—and come back to you for all time if it would help, but I know it isn't what you want. I'm not Jenny and I could never be. If I were more like her, we'd have stayed together."

"It isn't why we parted, Leslie. It isn't because of how I felt about you that we did. I loved you all the time, it almost killed me when you went away. I think maybe losing Jenny has hit me so hard because losing you devastated me. I never touched another woman, after you, until Jenny. I just didn't have the desire. No one could replace you, just Jenny."

"Oh. Oh my, I had no idea. I imagined you dripping with girls, I couldn't have ever expected this. I don't know what to say."

"It doesn't matter."

"But it's ironic, that I'm not...that I can't replace Jenny for you the way she did. I wish I could, Sweetheart. I wish you could have me back and make it. I wish you could have me back and be happy again. I wish I could be what you need."

She collapsed against him, crying softly and he squeezed her, trying to be the strong one for her now, because he knew she would have to be inhumanly strong for him in days to come.

Chapter Twenty-Four

VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA

When someone knocked on the door, it was morning and Leslie had slipped away, back to join Frank. But her presence for awhile had given Mike the peace he needed to sleep and with daylight came something he had experienced at other hopeless times before: a false positive, that life wasn't as horrible as it seemed. He resolved to hang onto that for as long as he could.

They knocked again and rushing to open before they left, and seeing Leslie's face again did nothing to dispel the better feeling. She came into his arms and kissed him in a hot, lingering, powerful way, though her sweetheart was right behind her. Against his will, Mike became aroused and had to stop before he said or did something absolutely inappropriate.

"Oh lord," she said, collapsing his arms. Mike could feel her quivering in a way he knew from the old days meant she was also very aroused for him.

"I can go for a walk," Frank said but Mike reached out and grabbed his sleeve.

"She's...I'm just trying to survive, Frank. I'm sorry—"

"No, don't say any more. We've talked, Mike. I would share her, and she would...help you that way if it was what you needed. That's how much you mean to both of us. Any time...you think you can't make it, she can be with you. However you both need, no questions asks."

"Jesus, man, how do I answer that. But I will resist as hard as I can. Not that I wouldn't...Les...but—"

She cupped his head, kissing his neck. "What he said," she whispered, but now Leslie let him go.

"I think I'd better do something, to move, to be active," Mike announced. "I'm ready to roll, for now. So what's on the agenda?"

"Breakfast, first," Frank said. "Then at ten, the Canadians are going to join us for the first session. After that, we should have you check in with Folger and get everything moving."

"Okay, then let's go. I'm actually hungry."

He gave Leslie as squeeze on the bottom then turned in the direction he assumed they would find the restaurant.

They actually enjoyed an almost happy breakfast and then ten o'clock came around and they sat down with the Canadians.

That meeting was good for Mike. It was something constructive and it further distracted him from somber thoughts of Jenny for a little longer.

There was an unexpected addition, a member of the French legation in Vancouver, who was empowered to represent both France and the European Community in general in working with Mike. At the outset of the meeting Premier Hobart updated Mike on the diplomatic front, as Canada and the Europeans saw it.

"Given what happened to them, the Russians are being quite reasonable, in our estimation," Hobart said. "To be sure, they're taking a hard-line stance, but that's better than folding up to the Americans. On the other hand, they could have pulverized the US a lot worse than they did. They were as worried over nuclear winter as we are.

"In their view, they're the last bulwark against Kelcher's global aspirations. They fully recognize that despite the pounding much of the US took, they're still the superpower they were before it began. And Kelcher is still demanding complete surrender of Europe to American authority. The Russians won't put up with it. They're far more used to surviving dreadful conditions at home than Americans are, and they figure they rode out the war in pretty good shape. They'd rather not be hit any more but they're not going to roll over.

"In that respect, Kelcher lost. In the respect that he still commands the situation, he won. And while Europe is claiming to surrender to US demands, apparently due to your own valuable work, they're operating through back channels to stand by Russia. So bottom line, we're sitting on the edge of a very dangerous stand-off. And yet at the same time, for the moment it's fairly stable."

"And right now," Mike pronounced. "That's the best we can ask for right now."

He went on to reveal the plan, working with Folger, to shut down the military command and control system from within and arrest Kelcher. This seemed to shock the man from Ottawa.

"Can I report that to the Prime Minister?"

"Absolutely. But make totally sure it reaches him by secure means. Until Kelcher's in hand, we can't afford to let even a hint to leak out or he might somehow wiggle away."

"Let me understand this," the French consular officer said. "You are attempting to arrest your own president?"

"Yes we are."

"And may I have an understanding of how, on what grounds?"

Mike explained his plan, and the French officer frowned. "Well it is such a pity you did not do so before this happened."

"He couldn't just have him arrested on suspicion of planning this war," Hobart explained to the legate.

"Actually, I could," Mike said. "If I had had one more week, I have in my hands the means to do it." He told the assembled group of his investigations into the attacks on the airliners and the certainty that authorities in Chicago possessed the evidence to bring about the arrest.

" _Mon dieu_ , but that is a pity. Do you think, if you should succeed, that he might be turned over to an international war crimes tribunal?"

For a moment or two the question hovered in the air, only a frivolous indulgence by the French representative. The last thing Mike had to worry about was handing Kelcher over for a tribunal in Europe.

Hobart, the British Columbia leader was asking what would happen if and when Kelcher was arrested and removed from office. Frank Keller was speculating on the answer but something was starting to tickle Mike's mind.

Hobart was saying, "If the Army arrested him, would that lead to a military coup?" and Frank was formulating a reply, no doubt to defend Hoyt Folger when Mike jumped from the table.

"Stop it! Frank, we've got to call Folger right now. Now! Gentlemen, if you'll excuse me, I think you've given me the answer to end this."

Mike grabbed Frank Keller by the shirt and with muttered apologies, Keller and Leslie accompanied Mike to the radio set in the Kellers' room.

Still, Mike had to wait out a couple of agonizing hours until Folger was available to take his call.

"What've you got?" the general said.

"How would you like to let the Canadians do your dirty work for you?"

"Say that again? The Canadians? Well that would go over like a you-know-what."

"I don't think it'll come to it, actually," Mike told him. "But it was suggested a little while ago that Kelcher and Smithson, at least, would be warmly welcomed by an international tribunal on war crimes."

"Yeah, and so what?"

"They're being resistant to arrest or resignation, right?"

"To put it mildly. I don't see the point."

"You can't arrest him and turn him over to a war crimes tribunal, but under the conditions on the ground, if we could get a Canadian team in place, and you kind of stepped aside and let them go in, they could take him. Right?"

"Mike, I don't care if Kelcher and Smithson were captured by the frigging Spanish Inquisition, the generals would still accept only their orders. They'd still be in power."

"I know. But let's say you send Kelcher a message that the Canadians are at the door, digging their way in, wherever the hell he's hiding out, and you can't do anything to prevent their arrest. Unless, you add, they resign and surrender to your authority for protection. You damn sure wouldn't turn private American citizens over to the Canadians, would you?

"Think you could sell them on it?"

"Oh fuck. But they might threaten to launch the rest before then."

"And you tell them if they do, even though they might pull it off, they'd be even more certain to hang in the Hague. Ask them which is better, keeping their necks un-stretched or killing everybody on the planet. Think you can sell it?"

"You're nuts," Folger said. "And thank god you are, man. Yeah, Mike, I do believe I can sell it. Are you going to actually send Canadians on the ground to make it look good?"

"If you think we need to, I can do it."

"I'll get back to you."

Mike ended the call and sat back in the chair, blowing out air.

"Frank, would you do me a favor and see if Hobart and the French envoy are still around? If I didn't insult them too much, we need to make this look good."

"I'll convince them. Relax, buddy, you done good," Frank said. Mike sat back and wilted, feeling physically exhausted. He closed his eyes and that was all he remembered until Leslie shook him awake some unknown time later.

Frank Keller had explained Mike's plan and reason for bolting out of the meeting earlier. By now, when Mike joined them, the Canadian province leader was reporting that the European Community had secretly met and agreed on the principles of war crimes charges and had arranged the sitting of a tribunal, at least on paper, that Folger could use to threaten Kelcher into resigning.

The Canadians had already agreed to put a special forces unit together, ready to move in on the ground and besiege Kelcher's bunker, with or without intent to actually break in, depending upon what Folger required.

"Aren't you people something," Mike said. "All right, I'll get back on the horn and tell him the game is afoot. I apologize again for running out."

"Mr. Lansford," the French envoy said, "in these times, small things like protocol or...I don't want to say manners, but you know what I mean, are of no importance. What you are doing is everything. Continue to act however you must to make this all happen."

"I appreciate the comfort zone you're offering me to work in. And I'm glad we're all agreed that nothing else is as important as this. And you also make me feel very small, with a very large boulder on my back."

The French man smiled.

"I believe I understand. Not from experience, mind you."

With no more business to accomplish, they all agreed to adjourn for now and again, Mike called Folger, reported the situation and received assurance the general would put it into operation.

Over the next couple of days, while events were being carried out in wide places across Canada and the United States, for Mike in Vancouver, it was all a waiting game. Even the preparations for the move down to the Bay Area took place all around him, but not with him. Frank Keller had taken charge, only after Mike had willingly ceded leadership. Having literally conducted expeditions, twice to Mount Everest a few years ago, Frank Keller knew how to do this and Mike was content to leave it to him.

It was a mistake, of course. He should have jumped in, because it would have almost kept Jenny off his mind during the daylight hours.

But while Frank worked, Leslie kept Mike company, cajoling him into joining her on a foray into downtown Vancouver, several miles away, for a matinee movie and dinner. They walked through the picturesque Gas Town and rode to the top of a building that provided a wide view of the city, and the evening out put off his misery and his fears, in thinking about soon flying over San Francisco and seeing what was left.

Leslie was a great comfort. It could never seem like the best of their times together, and mustn't, yet it was better in ways. They held hands and smiled at each other over the table, and even spoke sexy words suggesting what they might do together in bed, but the talk was enough to satisfy Mike, yet when it was time to go back, riding on the light rail train that carried them to the airport, he fell into a shell, excluding her, staring out the window, steeling himself to get through another night alone. He was not yet ready to seek solace with Leslie in bed, but that might eventually be all that could keep him sane and alive.

Chapter Twenty-Five

As a result of Frank Keller's work, the expedition back to the Bay Area came together quickly. The Canadian government supplied anything Frank suggested might be needed, including the radiation suits, along with a powerful radio that could reach Europe and certainly Folger, from the air. It was all loaded aboard a large military cargo plane, and in four days after Mike had arrived from Paris, the expedition was ready to fly. In this time, Folger was still negotiating with Kelcher's people and nothing had broken yet.

Mike said a round of good-byes to the Canadians who had supported his mission so well, and accompanied by Frank and Leslie, climbed the ladder into the passenger section of the plane.

The plan was to fly the coast, observing the conditions at airports that might be used for later rescue and salvage work, as well as checking the status of towns that had not been hit in the war, and to make notes of what might be needed from the Canadians to help civilians cope with the stoppage of vital services, at least as much as could be determined from the air.

Further plans included the horrible task of eyeballing the sites that had been hit by Russian warheads.

Mike had tentatively selected Sacramento as his ground base in the Bay Area, if it proved stable enough after the war. As the second largest surviving city in Northern California, after San Jose, Sacramento had certain advantages: it was located in a better position for movement in and out, and seemed less likely to be threatened by the fires that even now must still be raging outward from the blast sites in the Bay Area.

But there was another reason he chose Sacramento. Mike had in mind using its status as a state capital in his scheme of reviving civilian government soon as Kelcher was removed from power.

After a heart-stopping flight over the destroyed cities of Seattle in Washington, and Portland, Oregon, the cargo jet reached Sacramento. Mike was disappointed to find the city was not in as pristine condition as he had imagined. A miniature war zone seemed to have broken out and hostile forces attacked the plane with small arms fire from the ground on the southeast side of town, forcing the pilot to make an emergency climb, before circling north, to where the airport was located.

There, the news was better: they received no ground fire and the situation for miles around the airport appeared calm, due to a military presence that seemed to be protecting the terminal and runways. Among flags fluttering in the light breeze were regular army unit banners, the California state flag and the US flag. Whether this Army group was in contact with Folger or was operating on its own would be determined once Mike and his team landed, but what he could see convinced him they could go on in for landing if they got good response over the radio.

The sound of the jet appeared to have energized the people on the ground at the airport. They flocked around the army vehicles, pointing and gesticulating; a police cruiser rolled up from the direction of the city and the cops seemed on friendly terms with everyone present. Did they believe the jet was a friend or foe?

"Try to make contact, see if they're manning the tower, let's make sure they know we're on their side," Mike told the flight commander. "See how they feel about visitors."

"Standby."

Mike could only hear one side of the conversation when the commander called the tower. "This is a Canadian government flight coming down to survey what you need for recovery," the commander said. "Request permission to land. Over?"

The copilot, listening in, nodded good news to Mike and as the pilot swung around to the north, he related to Mike what he had heard.

"They warned us away from the southeast side of town, said we could take some small arms fire. I told them we knew. They guarantee us we're safe out here at the north end so it's your call. Do we go in?"

"Hell yes," Mike told him and on the next circle, the commander lined up on the runway.

At the terminal, they were eagerly greeted by what turned out to be the remaining government of California, which was taking refuge on the airport grounds. The governor was well aware of the delicate military situation between the United States and Europe and eagerly sat down with Mike for a full-scale briefing.

"First, I'd like an understanding of who's doing the shooting in the south side, and why you've evacuated downtown," Mike said.

"Downtown's under siege now from some kind of militia outfit. The police and national guard in the area felt we could defend this area as a command location, using the city as a buffer. The guard doesn't have enough people to fight and protect us here so it's mostly police on the front lines, with a lot of armed citizens, many of them former gang members from the inner city. It's a strange alliance, black, white, Asian, and Latino drug traffickers, bankers with shotguns and cops elbow to elbow looking over the barricades at the new bad guys. But they aren't going to hold them off long."

"Where is everybody else?"

"Well, you know, that's the hell of it. We understand a lot of people fled completely, up to towns like Chico and Redding, while many are huddling at home. But a lot were taken prisoner by these assholes out there. They're locked up and surrounded on Mather Air Force Base, after the Air Police and the ranger teams there were whipped."

Something about that set off an alarm bell in Mike's head but what it suggested, he wasn't ready to openly say.

He concentrated on making arrangements for all those with him to have quarters in the area.

The governor sent people scurrying to make room for the new arrivals, while Mike returned to the aircraft, with Keller, Leslie and one of the Canadian pilots. There, Keller set up the radio and began trying to contact Folger.

While Keller fiddled with the radio, the airplane commander took Mike aside. He asked for permission to contact his command back in Canada and arrange for help to come down and protect Sacramento.

"I'll agree to that, but what I'd like first is if you or your copilot should join us when we fly out tomorrow, and let's start out by trying to assess the size of the opposition, then you can judge for yourself what kind of force you'd need to ask for. Or what kind Folger needs to send, if he can. But to answer your basic question, yes, I agree we need to secure this town."

By now, Keller had opened a dialogue with Folger and handed the headphones over to Mike.

"It's going to take awhile," Folger informed Mike. "We've initiated negotiations, but they're dug in. I mean that more than literally, you know what I'm saying. But I haven't actually hit them with the tribunal thing yet. I'm waiting for the Canadians to slip in under the Air Force's nose."

"That's good. What about smoking them out? Can you physically shut them down, block their ventilation, or even pump something noxious in?" Mike said. "I'm assuming they're underground."

"Yeah. But they have families in there. That's a last resort and it can't be anything that'll actually hurt anybody."

"No. See if when the Canadians arrive, you can get them to take a representative in who can paint a picture of what the tribunal will do. Let them use their imagination, whatever it takes to scare them into resigning. Get it?"

"Damn straight. I think we're going to get this done, Mike. So it's time for you to think about something: when he and Smithson resign, the generals are going to be royally pissed and you'd better have a goddamn strong candidate to be sworn in and all the constitutional niceties or these guys might go rogue."

"I'm thinking about it. I hope to have something by then."

"Good luck, Mike," Folger said.

Mike thanked him, but there was nothing in the way of luck anyone could wish that was likely to answer his deepest need. Tomorrow, he would face up to Jenny's fate and when he settled in his tent after the conversation with Folger, he lay there and trembled for much of the night.

Mike began, in those hours, to ask a question that left his whole body feeling cold: if he were certain she had died, and he couldn't stand it, how would he terminate his own miserable existence with the least trauma to others, but the best certainty of success? He had spoken almost flippantly of "stepping in front of a truck", but he hadn't really given thought to how he would manage to end his pain if he reached that point. The first serious exploration of such a question was so exhausting that he fell asleep and when he awoke, it seemed more like a dream than a very real life-issue. However he would have to face that question again in only a few hours if something did not convince him Jenny was somewhere alive.

Chapter Twenty-Six

SACRAMENTO

The entire group met at a communal breakfast served in one of the airport concourses and Mike forced himself to gag a few bites down.

A pilot had taxied a large national guard helicopter into place outside and after breakfast, working with Frank Keller and the ground crew, Mike supervised its loading for the aerial survey and a hopeful rescue of the bunker at Concord.

Sooner than he was ready to face the search that could lead to the end of his hopes, Mike had to board the craft and strap in. As the transport rose from the ground, Leslie stood out on the pad waving and blowing kisses to both Mike and her sweetheart. The pilot rotated the helicopter, causing Leslie to disappear from view and Mike suffered the sensation that he would never see Leslie again, either, and he almost lost his fragile hold on his emotions.

Now, he knew true terror. In a couple of hours, he realized his quest would be over one way or another. If Jenny were there, in the Concord base, then in the midst of the nightmare of San Francisco's destruction, it would be for Mike a glorious day. The best day of his life. And if she were not, the depths of despair.

Feeling like a disembodied being, with Leslie now gone from his sight, he closed his eyes, barely remembering the need to survey Sacramento from above....

The city had the appearance of an unfinished map.

From Watt Avenue east there appeared to be total destruction, despite the fact that the war itself had not touched the city. Some kind of barrier of rubble had been erected on the east side of town as a line of protection against the militia force coming from that direction. But Mike could see elements of the besieging army and they had laid waste to a wide swath of ground and occupied it like ants.

Every gasoline station, every oil storage tank, everything holding volatile material within that area had apparently been set off. The smoke still filling the sky would add to the effects of the bombings to the west, where conflagrations triggered by the initial flash and the resulting fires storms continued to eat their way toward the mountains, setting off in Mike an anger rising to the level of hatred at whoever was unnecessarily destroying an un-bombed city.

Yet the damage all stopped at the barrier, which was pierced with openings, where main streets passed through.

West of there, they found that the city seemed normal, if mostly silent. There did seem to be some movement and it must be totally a voluntary effort by civilians and a few police and firemen, as the governor had described it.

Spiraling outward, the flight took in a larger view of the enemy, reaching Mather Air Force Base where a tent city had been set up and civilian captives waved and made gestures that were clear: get us out of here! But they were not held directly under the gun and that seemed a positive development.

Yet Mike could only file that information away for future use, pleased that the Canadian copilot, dispatched on this mission by his commander, was making copious notes on a pad clipped to his flight suit knee.

Exactly who these hostiles were, and how far east they held sway was impossible to tell from just this aerial survey. That seemed about all that could be learned here.

So the craft turned west, heading first to San Francisco.

Even up and over the coastal range of hills east of the Bay Area, the fires that had been created by the horrendous flashes of X-rays from the exploding warheads had taken everything in their path, for as long as they had fuel. Mike had seen the same thing up in Washington State and Oregon, where the fires would eventually founder only when they reached the timberlines of the highest mountains of the Cascades. Here, the end would be the flatlands, the farmlands, in which the fires would weaken and eventually die out.

And in the direction of Sacramento, this had already happened. Many towns had been totally erased by the flames, but the denizens, unlike those in blast zones, had been able to flee, and tent cities were evident all through the northern part of the Bay Area.

Mike wondered how San Jose had fared. But today they would not deviate that far from their plan.

No, everything now focused on San Francisco, then the Concord base.

As they neared the city, Mike felt his entire body tensing. Soon, his world might end and he tried to calm himself for that reality.

They flew north, first, trying to avoid the bulk of the smoke that still lingered over the smoldering suburbs of the Bay Area. The helicopter pilot passed over the town of Fort Bragg, heading for the open sea, reasoning that the prevailing winds would have blown the smoke east, opening a route to approach San Francisco from the west. And he proved correct, for flying with the wind, they found the city was clear except for the clouds one could expect at any time of year in the area.

Soon, Mike looked down upon the bald rock of Alcatraz, sterilized of any adorning surface features by the blast. And where the Golden Gate had been, only two blackened stumps pierced the water.

And then he forced himself to raise the level of his gaze and look at the whole city....

Just as he had found in Seattle, here it was possible to recognize the general shape of the city—the hills were all there, the water lapped at the same shoreline he knew so well—but over all, there lay a horrible gray ashen cover, exactly the same as had spread over the other bombed cities. Not so much as a single corpse could be seen, nothing living, only black or gray colors and jumbled debris. In the city itself, there was not one man-made landmark Mike could recognize. It was impossible to even find the stumps of well-known buildings. Anything on the surface had been covered by homogeneous debris or ground into powder by the force of the blasts.

Apparently, the detonations had been air bursts because no crater could be perceived; that was both better and worse. A higher burst, the lack of a crater, lowered the amount of radiated debris to be spread far and wide, but at the same time, the higher the burst, the more distant the initial flash of X-rays would have set fires and caused other damage.

Rubbed out were any hopes of even locating the block where he and Jenny had lived, never mind the apartment itself. He asked the pilot to circle the area again and again as he sought any conceivable identifying feature that might let him make sense of the neighborhood. Then he searched for the location of the _Sentinel_ , the other place she might be. But it was simply nonexistent.

"Okay, that's enough," Keller suddenly announced. "We don't have time for this, Mike. We have to go to Concord and see if they survived."

Everything above ground where the bunker had been located at Concord was erased by fire. That would have been very bad news, but for two things. A pole of some kind had been raised with a flag fluttering from it, and vehicles moved around and military police waved enthusiastically at what must be the first aircraft to show up since the fires and scoured the area.

"Hey, that's great, they lived through it!" Keller exulted. However Mike was in no mental state to share enthusiasm over anything.

A landing site had already been cleared, as if waiting for visitors and Keller directed the pilot to go ahead and touch down.

Men were busy on the surface, working at clearing up the debris of the above-ground segment of building that had burned. Seeing a military helicopter, they gesticulated and cheered, and two of those closest to the landing pad rushed into place and when the hatch opened, almost dragged Keller out, pounding him on the shoulders and shaking his hand. Mike jumped down and grabbed one of them.

"Go get Bryant! Tell him Lansford and Keller are here."

"Sir, we've already called down that we have visitors. The Colonel is already on his way up."

"Great! Where'll he come from? Where's the bunker?"

The young man led Mike over to a depression in the ground, and spun a wheeled locking handle, opening a circular hatchway that pivoted upward, revealing a tube-like passage into the ground.

"He'll emerge from here."

Already, a clanging came from further down and in seconds, a similar hatch about twenty feet lower swung open and the first face to appear was that of Avery Bryant.

"Mike! Jesus Christ, what a sight for sore eyes!"

Bryant clambered on up, and on solid ground, grabbed Mike up in a bear-hug.

"Look who comes riding in at the head of the cavalry! We were starting to think we'd have to send an expedition out on foot. But to where? We had no goddamn idea where. So where the hell are you operating out of?"

"Sacramento."

"Ah, makes sense."

"Avery, I have something to ask you. Who's down there? Did anybody I know make it?"

"Uh, yeah, Senator Carver and his family."

"Yeah, and who else?"

"Who you have in mind...oh Christ. That's right. The young lady. Your lady.

"Mike, I sent Waterfield for her. I told him to get her back here. She and Carver and Waterfield came here a couple of days earlier and I told them to come move in. She said she had things to do first. Then she would come. Carver did. But it happened too soon. I...oh Jesus, Mike, I assume they were caught downtown...."

Mike didn't hear any more even though Bryant went on about how fast it would have been, how painless, not even a flash of light, it would happen too quickly for human senses to even register. Mike collapsed in a heap in the ashes beside the hatchway, burying his head between his knees.

By then, others were emerging, including Carver, but Mike was oblivious to it all....

He didn't remember the flight back to Sacramento.

By the time they landed, Mike, for all intents and purposes, had joined Jenny in the limbo of the dead.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Leslie had tried to take charge of Mike's welfare when they landed and it became clear the emotional state he was in. But Frank wouldn't allow it. There were decisions to be made and no time to waste and he made Mike attend. But he might as well have not bothered.

Mike did not even take a chair. He dropped to a seat on the floor in a corner of the room where the first emergency session was taking place. Frank let him go for now, and he remained there, knees drawn up, his head down, totally ignoring the discussions going on around him.

Leslie moved in beside him and wrapped him in her arms, sobbing quietly against his neck, as if she were his woman, helping him through some unbearable loss, and of course Frank did not stop her.

In the meeting, the first statement came from the Canadian pilot who had delivered them from Vancouver.

"Before we go any further, what I want to see is some action in ejecting these paramilitary types from the area around here. When're you going to talk to Folger and find out what your army can do?"

"That's my first priority," Frank Keller replied. "If that's what we're going to do, bring the military in to defend Sacramento, we should make this airport the focal point of everything for awhile, as Mike originally intended. Might as well have everything in one place. Might even ask you to go pluck Folger from his bunker and bring him here."

"Fine with me. So do it."

All this came to Mike as if through a tunnel, but not a word of it meant anything to him now. He knew, as surely as if he had seen it with his own eyes, that Jenny had been obliterated by the fireball over San Francisco. Jenny was gone, that was the simple formula the world had been reduced to. Nothing else mattered.

But Keller only left him alone so long. With the preliminary point made, Frank came back to Mike and squatted before him.

"All right, that's enough, man, snap out of it. It's time for you to talk to Folger and finish what you started. You hear me?"

But Mike refused to acknowledge him. Keller wasn't accepting that, either.

"Goddamn it, man, this whole thing, the whole fucking world can still go up! Get over here and get in the game."

Nothing. Mike heard him but the words were gibberish.

But Leslie nuzzled his neck.

"Darling, you have to go to work. I can't stay here and be with you if you don't. I won't stay if you don't do this. Come on, you're needed."

By then, Keller had asked everyone to leave the room. Now, he seized Mike's shoulders in his strong hands and raised him to his feet, snatching him out of Leslie's hands, shoving Mike against the wall.

"God damn you, you have to snap out of it,"

"Let go, I just don't care any more."

"No? Goddamn it, listen to me. Did you love her? Did you love Jenny? Did you?"

Mike turned his head, refusing to even acknowledge the question, so Keller slapped him, hard.

"Come on, fight me, let's go, Pal," Keller said but Mike just closed his eyes and tried to ignore it all.

"So in other words, you didn't love her."

"I loved her more than anything," Mike murmured.

"Bullshit. What about Leslie?"

"Leave her out of this. Jenny's dead, nothing matters."

"Yeah, well if you don't help us stop this insane asshole Kelcher and his berserk Navy, Leslie will be dead, along with all the rest of us. So are you willing to let the whole world die just because you loved Jenny? Is that what love is to you, man?"

"Stop it, stop it, you're twisting it into something hideous—"

"No, my friend, you're the one doing that. These women, these two fantastic women, two of the best people in the entire world, both saw and see something in you that I don't. What it is, I can't imagine—you're a loser, you're worthless, yet they would both give up everything for you. And you're betraying them both.

"I don't know how I ever called you a friend. And I don't know how Jenny or Leslie could have loved you, seeing what you're really like...."

"Oh God, no...." The tears came in a flood and Mike collapsed, would have fallen to the floor if Frank Keller didn't hold him up. Frank wrapped his arms around him, hugging him and Mike sobbed, "No, no, that's not me, that's not who Jenny loved."

"Then show her memory—show Leslie now—get out there and help us save this thing. In her name, Mike. And Leslie's. Can you do it?"

Nodding his head, unable to let go of his friend, Mike said the words Frank Keller needed to hear.

"Okay, good," Keller said. "Then we're going to call Folger and finish the game. Right? Are you going to do this?"

"I'll try," Mike said.

Keller summoned back the others and sent the call through. For the first minute or so, after Folger came on the radio, Keller did the talking, letting Mike listen in and hopefully the juices would flow.

"Okay, I'm putting him on. It's been a little rough, so give him a chance to get his feet under him," Keller concluded to Folger.

"Go on, Mike."

"Hoyt?"

"Hey, man, I'm sorry about...well I think I understand the extent of your loss. No, I don't. I wish there were something I could do. But let's end this thing, in her name, okay?"

"Yes, that's all there is now," Mike said. "So what's the status?"

"We have an agreement in principle with Kelcher and Smithson. They've bought the line that they'll be thrown to the wolves and that their generals can't save them if the Canadians get in, grab them and take them out. But the generals are in a pretty prickly frame of mind with me, for letting this happen. I have zero credibility with them. And yet they're stymied by the French, British and Russian submarine standoff. If we didn't have that, they might be inclined to start picking off European cities.

"It ain't over, Mike, but it's better than it was.

"In fact," he added, "it's close enough to ask what the hell we do with them when we get them out of there?"

In spite of himself, Mike's mind began to work, he knew what had to be done and he said it.

"For starters, make damn sure the instruments of resignation are witnessed by somebody with judicial authority to make it stick. If you can find any kind of federal judge alive anywhere over in the east, or anywhere for that matter, who is willing to cooperate, put him in place. Then let him dictate what niceties are required. It has to be somebody the generals will respect and accept, so you're going to have to find a way to arrange that with them.

"Then, when that's done, when they've resigned, when there's absolutely no doubt they're out of office, bring them here. Make it clear we're sparing them the ignominy of being put before the world tribunal. But also make it clear they're going to face charges here, and that they're very much under arrest.

"Got that?"

"Yeah, will do," Folger said. "But then what? As far as commander-in-chief who can shut down the generals is concerned I mean?"

"Get Kelcher and Smithson here, with binding resignation papers, and I'll give you a president," Mike said.

"Yes Sir."

The formality shocked him and he tried to make light of it but Folger was serious.

"Mike, right now, for my money, you're the head of state of whatever's left of the country. What you say goes, even after you get a president sworn in. You've got all the strings in you hands, and the plan, and the rest of us are winging it. And you've done this before."

"But not like this."

"I don't care, I'm taking my cues from you, Mike."

He could only sigh, but everyone in the room with him was nodding in agreement with what they had heard Folger tell him.

"All right, if you insist. Carry on, General, I've told you what we need."

"I say again, yes Sir."

"Oh, one more thing, as long as you're taking orders, I'm going to ask you to move your command out here to Sacramento soon as possible."

"Put Avery on. I'll set him to work on that immediately."

"Excellent."

Mike didn't listen to the business between Folger and Bryant. There was no more he could do here. Now it was the greatest waiting game in human history.

For the next three days, life, the whole world, everything seemed frozen in stasis, on hold until someone gave ground in the stalemate with the Navy and Air Force. In the afternoon of the third day, seated squat-legged on the cot in a tent outside the terminal, Mike looked up when Bryant leaned his head in.

"Buddy, my boss is on the line. Got some words for you."

"Oh? Good or bad?"

"Hah. Are you kidding me? I have no idea. He doesn't tell anybody anything until you hear it first. So with all due respect, get your ass in gear." Bryant flashed that boyish grin and Mike uncoiled himself and pulled on shoes, following Bryant into the terminal, where he was based now.

Mike adjusted the headphones over his ears and accepted the microphone.

"Lansford here. Who'm I talking to?"

"It's Hoyt."

"Ah, that's what I wanted to hear. Now what can you tell me?"

"Something you might enjoy. The administration is in custody. Your war crimes tribunal threat pushed them over the edge. I think they were getting a little crazy holed up down there.

"So we're putting them on a flight and sending them your way. You can do whatever the hell you want with them, the minute they hit tarmac there, I wash my hands of them. They've signed binding resignation papers, I got two federal judges to notarize, authenticate and sign in blood, so even the two generals have accepted. The judges looked around and found some obscure member of the cabinet who didn't resign and are temporarily allowing her to act as president. I immediately suggested she order the generals to disarm but they refused to accept because she wasn't sworn in. But they did agree to hold the line.

"So you'd better be ready to put somebody's hand on a Bible and say I do, and finally lay this whole thing to rest the minute you have the resignation papers."

"Okay, I'll put that in work. You pack their asses on a plane and head it this way, and you get over here yourself, and I'll give you a president. Got that?"

"Yes Sir."

About to close the connection, Mike realized he needed to act as if he were really some kind of leader.

"General?"

"Yes Sir?"

"Great work."

"Thank you, Sir."

The way Chairman of the Joint Chiefs said it gave Mike a chill, and he hoped his embarrassment didn't show to those in the room.

But that was it, he ended the connection. And then he summoned Senator Carver and the governor.

"Gentlemen, the President of the United States, the Vice President, and most of the members of their cabinet have resigned. The papers will arrive with their persons, and I want you to put together all the official state judiciary personnel you have, and at least one federal judge, examine the papers, which were already vetted by a couple of federal judges over there, and I want a firm decision as to whether this is all legal, and that Kelcher and Smithson are validly out of office.

"We have someone the judges back east recognize through the line of succession as a candidate to be sworn in, but I think we can trump that. If not, we'll live with her, if she'll order the generals to stand down."

"So who?" Bryant asked. "If you've got somebody up your sleeve, I think we'd better hear it, hadn't we?"

"I'm coming to that.

"Here's my reasoning: third in line after the Vice President is Speaker of the House. Next is President Pro-Tempore of the Senate. Unless Kelcher was harboring a Congressman in his hideout, we know of only one member of either house who's still alive. That happens to be you," he said, turning to Arthur Carver. "According to my recollection of the Constitution, it says that the Senate shall choose a president pro tempore. Well there's only one Senator left and I hope you will do us the favor of selecting yourself president pro tempore. Do you so choose?"

"Mike, these exercises in semantics—"

"Humor me. You're the Senate. Do you so choose?"

"Yeah, yeah, I select myself president pro tempore and I accept. So what?"

"You didn't hear what I said a minute ago? As President Pro-Tempore of the Senate, absent the Speaker of the House, you, Senator Arthur Carver, are now the next in line to succeed to the presidency. The instant these resignations are accepted by legal experts here, you're the man."

"This isn't any time for jokes, Mike."

"This isn't a goddamn joke! I'm as dead serious as I can get. This is the end of the war. You take the oath one minute and the next minute get on the line and order those goddamn generals to absolutely stand down and immediately disable every fucking warhead in the arsenal, and we all get to live a little longer. Is that serious enough for you?"

"By the living Christ," Carver murmured. "But I need to hear from a federal judge that this is valid."

"Isn't that what I said we'd do? But the only important point here is that these two generals accept you as president. So everything else is really only housekeeping. If you don't like the job, you can resign ten minutes later and we'll give it to the lady who's holding it now. Just get those generals to disarm and then you can do what you want."

"No, I can do this. It just isn't the direction I saw you heading with this, man. It's kind of a shock to be told you have to take the oath of office of president."

Carver wandered in a little circle, the way Mike had seen him do twice before. He was shaking his head, then he nodded, making his way back.

"It's odd, you know?" he muttered. "As a Senator, I thought of running for president, the idea was always there, but I didn't want to put my family through a campaign and all the nastiness that I knew had to accompany it. So I gave up on the dream. And you hand it to me on a silver platter. Now? When the country's been blown to pieces?"

"Art, it's a crazy world, but wherever he is, I have no doubt Larry Buckner would say the best man rose to the top. I'm truly glad it's you. But if you still have doubts, you've got until Kelcher gets here to decide. Nobody can make you do this."

"No, I already said I'd take it."

"That's good, that's very good. You've just made my day, because now I'm finished. I've completed my contribution to this entire comedy of errors. I hereby drop the whole thing into your hands, all of you. So if you'll excuse me, I'll be in my tent."

Mike walked out the door and no one tried to deter him.

It was true, the moment he passed out of the room, he had no further interest in what happened, content that he had given them a president and that it would end the military threat. The rest, they could finally take on without him. With the passing of the torch, from Mike to Carver, what little he had left to live for was gone.

In his tent, Mike dropped to a seat on the bed then slowly keeled over, wishing he could just close his eyes and have it all go away forever. There would be no more Frank Keller coming in and demanding that he stay in the game. He had given them all they could ask from him.

However he was not to be left alone. Only moments after he lay on the bed, tent flaps rustled and Leslie walked in. Finding him this way, she sat on the bed and took his hand.

Mike wanted to tell her to go away and leave him alone, but he could not—even in this dark hour of hopeless, he could not stand to hurt her feelings. So he let her be there and just tried to pretend she wasn't.

"This is killing me, Mike," she whispered. "Is that what you want? I can't stand what you're going through, I can't stand watching you slowly leave us. Oh, sure, I can understand you don't want to go on, but you aren't just killing yourself. I guess when you've decided to die, you just don't care what you do to the people you leave behind. I guess I can understand that, but I can't let you go and not try anything I can to help you.

"Is there anything I can say or do? Anything?"

"Les, I can't stop missing her. I miss her all the time, everything reminds me of her. That's why I can't accept the generous, wonderful offer you and Frank have made. And I don't want to get over it. I can't explain how it feels, to know that she's nothing, that she just doesn't even exist, that she's been turned into atoms and scattered to infinity.

"When I think of what happened to her, that she just isn't there, I have this freezing sensation and it makes me sick. I can't come to grips with the fact that she just...doesn't exist. And I don't want to exist any more, either. I can't make anything else matter to me, I just want to go away."

She lay down beside him, her head on his shoulder, and almost in self defense he took her in his arms, he squeezed her. He knew she was suffering over this, but not as much or in any way the same as he was. But she deserved to know something he felt was true.

"Les, if we had stayed together, all the way through, and all else were equal, meaning I never knew Jenny, or because you and I were happy, if I had never become involved with her, I would be the happiest man in the world right now to have you here and safe with me."

"Oh god."

She clutched at him, clinging so fiercely that her fingers dug into his arm, crying so hard her sobs shook the bed. But then she calmed down; laying her mouth next to his ear, she spoke so softly he could barely hear her.

"If only you could get over her, and if you said the word, as much as I love Frank, I would come back to you forever. You were always my first and greatest love. As long as you're alive, that will be true, so remember it. I'd never make the mistake I made once before. Okay?"

"But I won't ask you to leave him," he told her.

"I only pray you will," she said, and now she moved away.

"No. You know why."

"Yes, I know why." She sat up on the edge of the bed, bending over her knees, breathing long sighs.

"I wish..." she said and had to stop and try again. "I wish, Mike, that you'd never met Jenny."

Before he could move, she seemed to realize the impact of her words. She flew to her feet and backed away.

"Mike, I'm sorry. I didn't mean—"

He was up now, he went to her, took her shoulders in his hands for a moment and stared at her, meaning to shake her, but he could not even do that. He just let her go.

He was staggering now, out the door, so hurt, so shocked at what she had said, that he almost ran to get away from her.

He didn't come back to some semblance of control for a block, but even when he was himself again, he kept walking. He had no idea if she had followed him, or what state she was in, and he did not want to know. His only refuge from madness was action. He walked, he kept walking, he didn't want to see Leslie again, he just wanted to walk until he collapsed and died of exhaustion and starvation. And of course he would not even achieve that.

Mike did not stop until he found himself at the big basketball arena seven or eight miles closer to town. He had not set out for it, it had just attracted his numbed mind, a target, something too big to miss.

But by the time he arrived, pain and anger and been blunted, though not completely dissolved. What he found there, all around the arena, in the vast parking lot and open spaces beyond, diverted even that. Thousands of people were camped in makeshift shelters, a gigantic assemblage of people, sitting in folding chairs, making lunch, sitting up talking or just staring out into the vast distances that opened from that point. Through his dulled wits came the realization that this was a refugee center for people who had either fled the danger zone of Sacramento or...what? The Bay Area?

With no purpose in mind, Mike wandered among them, asking questions about their situation, finding that indeed, they were refugees from both Sacramento and the blast and fire zones surrounding the bombed-out areas. At some point, the journalist in him emerged and he began trying to build a mental picture of their plight, despite his own personal hopelessness. It soon became clear that here were people who were much worse off than he was, who had also lost family members, and in some cases, more than just one person. And yet they were carrying on.

It was no inspiration to him, it even added to his own burden of pain and loss, but their stories drew him in and he spent the remainder of the day among them, with the unspoken intent of meeting every one of them.

It took all the hours of daylight, and much of the night to complete his strange task. Exhaustion, as much emotional as physical, was beginning to wear him down, but by now he had visited every group of refugees outside the arena and most of those huddled on the main floor and all the concourses inside.

It was nearing dawn when he happened to sit down with a woman who appeared as sad and lonely as he was.

He conversed with her a few minutes, but she could barely speak, and Mike did most of the talking, trying to find something to say that could help her. He asked her questions, where she was when the war erupted, how she came there, and at first she only spoke monosyllables, but suddenly it seemed a catharsis to talk about it and it all came out at once.

"My husband was out of town on business, in Reno," she said. "We lived out in Burlingame, which is a little north of the San Mateo Bridge—"

"I know where it is," Mike told her.

"Well my next door neighbor and his wife—that's them over there in that cubicle—heard on the radio that something terrible was happening on the east coast, it sounded like war. We just all piled in his truck and started driving south. We got beyond the bridge when everything lit up and there was the terrible noise, and we knew what it was. But we kept driving, around the end of the Bay, and up back roads until we got to Stockton. The roads were clogged there, and there wasn't any gas and we abandoned the truck and moved on foot. We just barely made it through the gathering refugees in the valley."

"What about your husband?"

"He never came back. I mean...well he could be anywhere but how will we know? He might be in Reno, that's where he was going, but it's a million miles away. He has family in Walnut Creek and we at first agreed to try and go there from Stockton, but the fires and the crazy people kept forcing us east. We could never have gotten there on the ground."

Something about that tickled at Mike's mind. Walnut Creek. Next door to Concord. Impossible to reach.

She went on but now he tuned it out. What was going on?

Waterfield had been sent for Jenny, they said. Neither ever showed up in Concord. Probably she had never made it out of San Francisco, but Waterfield had been alerted so it hadn't all been completely out of the clear blue sky. If he had reached her, they would have set out for the base. And what? They would have run into the same thing this woman did, a huge clog of people fleeing, into the San Joachin valley. Jenny and Waterfield would have had to go down the peninsula to somewhere they could cross the Bay, or around it. This woman had probably enjoyed a head start and still she had run into an impossible situation trying to get to Walnut Creek.

Were Jenny and Waterfield even now trying to work their way to...somewhere? Not Concord, the fires had swept through. Where?

_Is there any chance in the world?_ Jenny and Waterfield, together out there somewhere in one of the vast refugee camps? Had they been pushed further east by the crush of refugees, trying to circle around to come in by the back way to Concord? If so, had they walked right into the hands of the group that had taken territory south of Sacramento, including the Air Force base?

For a moment Mike's head went light. When it cleared, he flew to his feet. He thanked the woman and rushed out of the arena, back out into the dawn, struggling to orient himself toward the airport. Nearly running the whole way back, he arrived at the terminal panting, exhausted. For a moment he dropped to a seat in an abandoned passenger lounge.

Jenny. She could be alive. Leslie had brought Mike back to his own life, or he could have ended his miserable existence by now, and Jenny might be left out there alone.

He jumped back to his feet and ran up and down the terminal shouting Leslie's name.

Down near the middle, she appeared, from out of the coffee shop, clinging to a doorway, sobbing, unable to move. Mike ran to her, and when he arrived, he took her in his arms.

"You saved me," he whispered. "She might have survived, and if I had given up, killed myself or died...."

He couldn't go on, lost in a torrent of tears and the two clung together sobbing until they slowly sank to the floor, holding on for many long minutes.

"Mike, what I said about her, when I realized how terrible...and then you were gone and I was terrified...I'm so sorry."

"Les, it's okay, I know the intent of what you said. Yes, I even thought that myself, that I wouldn't be suffering all this if I never knew her. But to hear somebody else say it....

"But then, if I didn't, if she didn't bring the three of us back together, you might be dead, you wouldn't be with Frank at all—she brought you and him together—you would have been there when this army attacked the city. We can't change anything and words don't mean anything. It's okay, Bunny.

"But I wanted you to know, I'm here to stay, you needn't worry about saving me from myself any more. She may be out there and the rest of my life, I'll fight to make it safe for her to come home some day. If she's gone, if she's dead, I'll never know, but I'll never stop trying. Okay?"

"Oh god, yes, it's okay."

"Then I want you to go home to your man, I want you to make a baby with him. Or more. We need genes like yours and his, and I want a child I can come visit and hold, someone, a reason, to always bring me back, because I don't know where I will have to go to fight for her. Make me a home, you and Frank, a place I can always come back to when I need peace. Please?"

"Yes," she whispered. "I just wish it were your baby."

"No. Love Frank. He's my friend, make him happy, and be happy. And that will make me happy, too. Go. I'm okay, Les. I'll be okay. I swear. You saved me, now go save your romance."

"Mike," she whispered, but when he lifted her to her feet and propelled her away with a fond pat on her bottom, she hurried to find Frank.

And after she was gone from sight, for an hour he paced, now left to wait for the arrival of Kelcher and his band of monsters.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

When Mike, accompanied by Leslie and Frank, reported to the terminal, Arthur Carver grabbed him in a fond bear hug, then pumped his hand over and over.

"I thought you'd disappeared. I don't know where you were, but while you were gone, I really had a chance to think about the situation, and if I have to do this, well man, I can't tell you—I need your expertise so badly, Mike. The mechanism doesn't exist right now to nominate a Vice President, there's no Congress and Senate to confirm it, so we'll be doing without. But if we could, you'd be the one in a minute. And I might even resign and drop this whole fucking thing on your shoulders."

But Carver was grinning.

"You know I wouldn't take it," Mike said.

"I suspected that. But it doesn't matter, whatever other title you want, I'm asking you to be my principal advisor. Along with Frank and Leslie, and Folger and Bryant, you'll be my cabinet for as long as you choose to be."

"All right, if that's the case, let's have our first meeting, before Kelcher gets here. I have an issue I want to address, starting immediately. You have any more pressing business or can we do it?"

"This is my only business. If you want a meeting, that's it. Who all do you want?"

"Okay," Mike said. "You, Frank and Leslie, the governor, the two Canadian pilots, and Bryant. I can't think of anybody else, but you can bring who you want."

"That's fine. Come on."

Frank and Leslie were right there and Bryant was within shouting distance. They sat down at a table in a conference room and Carver turned it over to Mike.

"There are factors that I don't know, but which I hope to find out when Kelcher gets here," he said. "But I want to immediately put all resources available to work dealing with two issues.

"Number one, there are thousands of people up at the arena, I talked to most of them last night. We need to form a coherent plan for finding them permanent housing and restoring services here, to make sure whatever electric power source is supplying the area stays up and running. I commend the governor that that's been maintained already.

"Then we need to start rolling back this group that's keeping the city locked down. I may have a personal stake in this, I pray to god I do, but sooner or later I'd come to this point anyway, because it's going to come up when I meet Kelcher.

"When Folger gets here, I want you and him," he addressed Bryant, "to work with the Canadians and reduce this threat out there. Don't kill a single person you don't have to, I'd rather rehabilitate these people and put them to useful work for the survival of everybody, but get the frigging guns out of their hands and if you have to, put them in jail awhile until they offer some agreement to behave.

"If they have captives, civilians, treat them with kid gloves. I have a bad feeling that what we're seeing here with these people is only the tip of the iceberg across the country. But I won't know how to approach it until I talk to Kelcher. If that suggests he knows something about it, and that I have a reason to think so, I'll explain when I've gotten my hands on him.

"Anybody have a caveat about these priorities?"

"No, no, I totally agree," Carver said.

Around the table there was a muttering of concordance but no offer of suggestions yet. When he adjourned the meeting, Mike called Carver and the governor aside.

"Get all the people who know anything about disaster relief, and I guess that would be the FEMA people first, and go to work on taking care of the refugees, immediately. We can't do anything militarily until Folger gets here and he assesses what the army and the Canadians can do.

"Oh, and like I said, do a survey of services, particularly power and water. And then I want people to fly down to San Jose and Fresno and see that they're on the same page and if not, kick them in the butt to do it.

"And then I want people to find out the state of the fires and if there's any possibility of going to work on them, wherever they're still burning.

"I have a bad feeling Southern California's too big for us to take on yet. We'll have to work into that, but soon as possible, we will. Okay?"

"Aye, Sir," Carver said. If he seemed to be mocking Mike he dispelled that notion by hastening the governor off to call all his people as Mike had demanded.

Mike joined Frank and Leslie and told them what he had set in motion and asked them to join the planning teams when the governor and Carver assembled them.

That afternoon, Folger arrived, bringing word that Kelcher's entourage would be there in the morning. Mike and Bryant briefed him, introducing the general to the Canadians, and they set to work preparing an offensive against the militia group that held the city at bay.

There was no fanfare in the morning when the defunct Kelcher Administration landed. Senator, soon-to-be President Carver turned it all over to Mike to run any way he wanted. Mike selected General Folger and the head of the California State Patrol to join him when Kelcher and the others stepped off the plane, and he asked them to go along with anything he offered or threatened the former administration. "It isn't binding, but I need all the leverage I can get with them."

"I understand," Folger told him and the top cop agreed.

Mike directed that the family members accompanying the principals be made comfortable. Their lives would be turned upside down enough as it was. He also asked that the arrestees be gathered together under loose watch in one of the rooms where passengers once waited for flights.

Then he called for Kelcher to be brought into the small office where Mike would do his work, accompanied only by Folger and the patrol chief.

And so at last for Mike, it came down to the face-to-face confrontation with the first of the men he held personally responsible for Jenny's death, or at least her horrible sojourn, wherever she was. Harvey Kelcher was a tall man who had once been considered very good looking and was still not bad for someone in his early sixties. Unfortunately, in the slick political climate of the country at the time, those looks had taken him a lot further than his intellect, or scruples, could ever have done. He continued to carry himself as if this were a pre-arranged meeting with some minor functionary of another government; he settled his raincoat carefully on the chair next to him then sat down in the air conditioned office Mike had chosen.

"Before we say another word, I want my attorney, my chief of staff and—"

"No, Kelcher. You get none of that. But I am going to treat you a little better than you and your people treated enemy combatants. At least I'm thinking about letting you have a lawyer later. That's more than I ever got under your wonderful stewardship."

"Then you can kiss my ass. I won't stand for this. Just forget it."

"Let me give you a little heads-up, then. Although you're liable for several million murder charges, there's only one that means anything to me. My fiancé may have died in San Francisco. The cause of death was a Russian warhead, and by my reckoning, it happened because of you. So if you have the smallest inkling that I hold any sympathy for you, you'd better rethink that.

"And if you think you can will yourself out of this by refusing to put up with it, well that has no more impact than the wishes or will of all the people who preferred not to die because of your actions.

"There is only one way you can improve your future, Kelcher. And that's by telling me everything I ask, and the complete truth when you do. As long as you're useful to me, you're eligible for a real trial. The instant you first lie to me, you're no longer useful and I'll throw you away. I'll let your imagination suggest what that means.

"That's the best offer I've got.

"So, shall we proceed?"

Kelcher looked down at his hands, picking at a fingernail.

"I think I get it. You hold the cards. I don't even know who you are, but I'm at your mercy. Go ahead."

"Good. So here's what I'm after. I want to understand your master plan. I want to know why you arranged to have the coasts laid open to the Russians and protected the center of the country. I understand your idea of completely controlling Europe and then the world, to sew up all the oil, we won't go into that. We foiled that. What I want to know is what you had in mind for your own country.

"I want to know why you were willing to let so many people die, to tear up so many cities, to allow Russia to do so much damage, knowing the defense shield was porous. Why were you so eager to gain control of the European economy and their ports and industry and throw your own away?

"And why did you arm large numbers of white supremacists? Why?"

What came over Kelcher now was the last thing Mike expected to see. The ex-president turned pale and his breathing became labored, and Mike thought he was having a heart attack. But little by little it became clear Kelcher was simply terrified to answer the last question. Mike prodded him, gently, but he could see that Kelcher was psychologically withdrawing.

"Answer me, goddamn it!" he finally said, but Kelcher shook his head.

"Answer me!"

Suddenly, Kelcher changed his tune. He sat up straighter, he looked Mike in the eye.

"No, it was all Smithson. I was the dummy. Everybody knows it, the talk shows all joked about it, everybody knew I was the dupe. Smithson was the real president, they all said, and that was true. They tricked me, they told me the Shield was perfect, we could wipe out Russia and wouldn't be touched. I take no responsibility."

"Except that you were willing to kill millions of innocent Russians over oil, without any risk whatsoever. And the launches couldn't happen until you gave the go-codes. So you almost literally sent them all on their way, every fucking megaton. You did that and there's no way out from under that. But otherwise, I'll accept that you didn't know how bad it would be, here. So will you testify?"

"Against whom?"

"Who do you think? Who did you just tell me is really responsible? Smithson. And against anybody else who has it coming? Yes?"

"Will it help me in any way?"

"You want to know the truth? I don't really care if you walk. If you help me nail one person, whoever is most responsible, I'll accept that, as long as I find out the answers to what I want to know. So yes, I'll definitely see that you get something better. Maybe even probation. Just give me the heads of the real people behind this and my answers."

"I will."

"Okay." Mike nodded to the cop. "Keep him away from the others. I think they're his greatest threat right now. Put him up somewhere and see that he has whatever he needs to be comfortable, feed him, whatever."

The cop had heard everything and although he wasn't pleased, he had agreed to go along with what Mike said.

Soon as Kelcher was out of sight, Mike called for Smithson.

If Kelcher had been arrogant at first and tried to carry on as if he were still in power, Smithson lifted the game to a degree a hundred times beyond.

"You people are so far out of your Constitutional rights here that this whole thing is a farce," he said. "If you think this forced resignation will hold water, you had better think again. As far as this proceeding, you have no basis—"

Mike slammed his fist on the table.

"Shut up, Smithson. I've already checked and the legal authorities have accepted the resignations. Carver will be sworn in as president within the hour, so your power and authority are gone. And the Triad commanders will accept Carver's orders and stand down. That whole game is over. You're out of office forever, no matter your own opinion on the issue.

"What you'd better get that tiny mind of yours around is the fact that you aren't fighting for your political life, you're fighting for your physical life, and your freedom. The sooner you get that through your head, the better.

"Let me give you the stakes: you caused the deaths of millions of people and you took an action that helped Russia defeat your own country. And you had a reason for it. I don't know what it is, but what I do know is that you committed treason. So that's how you're going down in history. That's your legacy. And you're liable for the punishment traitors receive in a time of war.

"But I'm willing to offer an alternative. You and your administration put people into prison for life with no recourse to counsel and no trial, by calling them enemy combatants. I'm willing to give you the same courtesy. Instead of being executed for high treason, I'm willing to let you live. If I do, you're going to be thrown into a hole and never see daylight again. So I'm going to leave it up to you, which way you want to go."

"Or what?"

"What do you mean, 'or what?'"

"I don't know who you are, and frankly don't give a rat's ass, but you didn't haul me in here to just to offer me a choice of how to end my life. You have a deal. You want something and you think I can give it to you. So let's just go right to it. What the hell do you want? And what are you offering?"

"Easy time, maybe probation. Maybe some very, very hard work as community service. I don't know, we can negotiate. If your information is valuable enough, I'm not concerned about you as a threat so if I have to let you go in exchange for what you can do for me, I don't have a problem."

"Are you empowered to do that?"

"Why would I be the first person they let you talk to? Hell yeah, I'm empowered. So what do you say?"

"I don't exactly understand what you're after. The war's come and gone, the dead are dead, the cities are wrecked, we lost, the Europeans won, and believe me, I'd love to get my hands on the son of a bitch who engineered that."

Mike refrained from crowing that he was the man who had pulled that off. Smithson would probably clam up completely. Maybe he would tell him later.

"What do you want?" Smithson added.

"I want to know why you gave the coasts to the Russians, why you didn't spread the Shield and protect as many cities as you could. Why you wanted us all dead out here. And I think you did. And why you had somebody named Kreuter arm the militias ahead of all this.

"I'm not going to fuck around going into the issue of the attacks on the airliners and the bogus war in San Alonzo, even if they were part of the plan. That's all water too far under the bridge. But now you see how much I already know. I have my hands on papers that could have indicted several people for some of this and had you arrested before you triggered the war. I only wish to Christ I'd had time.

"But what's done is done, as you said. So tell me why. I can't make sense of it. What am I missing?"

"Look, I...don't know the details," Smithson said. "You're right, Jacob Kreuter ran it all. It was his plan, he was the brains. He's here, you have him, talk to him first, and if there's any more I can tell you that he doesn't, I'll supply it. I don't know enough to help you."

"Let me get this straight," Mike said. "You were the Vice President. Kelcher, a few minutes ago, told me he was the dummy and you were the puppeteer, which we all assumed anyway. So you were the actual president, one of the most lustful people after power on the planet, and there was a massive plan that resulted in millions of deaths, based on a faulty defense shield, and involved the arming of virulent racist and anti-government forces, and you let some lower level advisor run it and you couldn't be bothered to know anything about it? That's what you want to sell me? It further involved murdering several hundred Americans in order to trigger a war with San Alonzo, which resulted in a few more hundred deaths on either side, and you weren't really in on it, just kind of let it happen?

"Come on."

Smithson shifted in his seat, his only admission of concern.

"Wait, before you answer, let me point something out," Mike said. "No matter what part you actually had in planning it, you approved it. You must have. The operation couldn't have happened without your hand in it, because the generals were unwilling to stand down until you and Kelcher were replaced. So you and he were the responsible officials. So this Kreuter can't save you, he can't fall on his sword, he was following orders and I'm going to pin it all on you.

"So if you want to walk, you have to give it all up. If you truly didn't know the details, that's pitiful. But it doesn't get you out of it. If you can't give me the answer, you'd better pray to whatever god you pray to that Kreuter can. If he can, I'll accept that you did what you could. If he can't, or won't, you get nothing.

"So do you want to put everything on him? Is that it?"

For the first time, Smithson lost his composure. Mike had seen this man on television oh so many times, always the in-charge, dynamic, often angry and threatening power-mad monster, but always in control. To see him pale and all but collapse was almost frightening. It was as if the ground under Mike's feet had begun to crack.

But it was a victory. Smithson was done. He shook his head, this once mighty man, then he nodded, as if winning and losing a dialogue with himself.

"When I tell you I can't give you the details, it's true. I didn't need them. That isn't how it works, you don't do the details, you go crazy if you try. You have generals, you have deputies, you have aides, and they know how to do the things, the actual ops. You tell them what the ops will be and they make them happen. If they need a sign-off, you give it to them.

"So I have to tell you again, Kreuter knows the workings of it. But yes, I ran the plan. I wasn't alone, the entire core of the Millennium group wrote parts of it, approved it, voted on it and I took it from there. And then I crammed it down Kelcher's throat. If he refused to buy into it, we were prepared to have him removed on the basis of mental incompetence. We could get that done.

"But he jumped on it. He was on board."

"So give me the plan. I'll see if I need more details. What was the plan as you wrote it and how far did it get?"

"Millennium," Smithson said. "That was the theme. A thousand years, we picked it because it made a good name. We didn't care what happened when we left the scene ourselves in a few years, it could collapse in ten years, but The American Millennium had that ring.

"It also sounded religious. That was part of it, we needed all the religious support we could get. We all talked a good line, fight abortion, fight gay marriage, the whole Christian thing, but not too many of us really cared. We needed the power of the hard right Christian movement. We put a lot of work into that."

He seemed calm now. And then he said it all, without even blinking.

"But basically, it was ethnic cleansing, to leave us the kind of country we wanted to lead on after the war. A white, Christian country. We joked that it was the end of the Civil War and the South would win. Just for that, we picked the new capital to be Atlanta, when things got back to normal."

So simple, the Civil War. Mike felt a wave of light-headedness. Jenny. She was the target, and all the people of color. He wanted to break Smithson's neck.

But Mike had really already known it and refused to face it. All the evidence had said so. Now, Smithson so casually put it right out there and Mike knew he had a war on his hands.

"You, motherfucker, you think you won the Civil War, do you?"

"No, that was something we sold to the people on the ground.

"Listen to me, son, this country was falling out of control. The minorities, if I have to use the politically correct term, were outnumbering us and much too soon, we'd be the minorities. Sooner or later they'd rise up and probably slaughter us in large numbers. How long could we keep them weighed down, locked up in their shit-holes in the 'inner city'? Or keep throwing them into prison so we'd hold the numbers down?

"That was the key, the cities. They were overrunning the cities, forcing our people outside. Into the suburbs. But our real constituency was the so called Christian masses in the towns, the rural communities, the Bible Belt. That was who we wanted left, to be the core population.

"You don't get it, do you? You can't figure out why we threw away the cities, especially the coasts. Well you people out here were the enemy. The larger cities had the minorities and the lefties, and we didn't need either one. So if the shield couldn't protect everybody, let the Russians do a lot of our dirty work for us."

Mike was still too stunned even to be angry, yet. That was good, he could function still, and sit here and listen to this almost objectively.

"What about the cities that were covered, that survived? Baltimore, Chicago? You left yourself a lot of enemies, even if the whites there weren't as much to the left as the ones you managed to get rid of. I'd say your plan wasn't completely foolproof."

"No? That's where you have to ask Kreuter. That's where the guns and the militias came in. Those are the details I didn't bother with. He guaranteed he had taken care of it all. Kreuter dislikes the minorities even more than the rest of us. He assured me he had a lot of nasty surprises for the ones who got away. And I would venture to say it's all humming along quite well, without us.

"Kreuter was a true believer, he really meant to create a White Christian nation, and you might have your little rump government over here, Mister Whatever Your Name is, but you don't run the country. And I wouldn't be surprised if Kreuter's people don't one day spill over the mountains and kick you all out on your ass. You might have beaten us, but you didn't win. Not by a long shot. And I can pretty much guarantee that by now, if you try to beat them, you'll help kill the fucking minorities you're out to save.

"That was the prime directive, purge them all, and hold as many as hostages as necessary to make sure that nigger son of a bitch right there," Smithson nodded his head at Hoyt Folger, "didn't try to bring the army in and neutralize them before it was done.

"So you people want to run the country. That's the country you've inherited."

Smithson claimed he could offer no more, that Mike had what he needed to get the details from Kreuter.

"I don't know what you're going to do with it, though, except trigger your own civil war. I don't think you have any idea the forces you're about to unleash. If you have any brains, you'll tear up our resignations, put us back in office and let us get back to our work and you'll all catch the next plane to Canada or wherever the fuck you want to go."

Smithson's chutzpah did not surprise or shock Mike. But now he was left with the question of what to do with him. Given his attitude and the warning he had issued, Smithson could not very well be left to his own devices.

And something he had said made Mike want to yank the cop's pistol and shoot him in the mouth.

"Just so you know who you're dealing with," Mike said, "my fiancée was black. So when you use the N-word with me, you're only convincing me to cut off your balls. Just think about that awhile."

But for now, Mike had more to worry about. He dismissed Smithson and called for Kreuter.

Kreuter proved to be a weasel-faced man who carried the air of someone who was at once in complete control of the moment, and too bored to care.

"So you are Kreuter," Mike began. "I have to tell you, I'm surprised. For so much trouble, you sure don't look like much to me."

"Go to hell."

"It's a little late for that, I'm already in hell. And you had a big hand in putting me there. And don't think you'll win me over with sweet-talk.

"Smithson has given me the big picture. I offered him a deal, I might even let him walk. Or at least live. All I care about are the details. So the choice for you is the rest of your life in a hole, a bullet to the heart, or I'll put you on a plane and send you anywhere you want to go as long as it's out of the country. If you give me all the details."

Mike told him he knew Kreuter was the man who dreamt of the White Christian millennium. "Smithson assures me there isn't thing-one I can do to stop it, he says you've put it all on automatic and those of us here in this little corner of paradise are an endangered species, that we can't even hold what we've got here. So if you want to make me lock you up over something we can't stop anyway, that's your choice. If you want to tell me what you've put into motion, I'm inclined to be lenient. It's your call."

"Yes, I do want out of the country. I'll give you all of it, but send me to Brazil and forget you ever knew me. That's my deal."

"You do right by me and you've got it," Mike said.

Jacob Kreuter cast his sly eyes back and forth from Mike, to Folger, to the patrol commander and back again. He nodded his head, ever so slightly, and then he told Mike enough to know that his fight for Jenny's life, and his struggle against the American Millennium, would be a long, hard, all-out war.

BOOK II CONTINUED
Chapter Fourteen

CARSON CITY

While the leaders of the Nation were not overly bright and not educated to any noticeable degree at all, neither were they deaf and blind.

One morning, a hefty, shaved-head man who did actually answer to the nickname "Bubba", but whose real name was, unlikely enough, Oliver Porterfield, summoned Jenny to the "big house", which was the building that looked like a simple county courthouse but was the erstwhile capitol of Nevada.

"Sit down Missy," he said.

"Yes Sir?"

"You know what I hear? They tell me you're tutoring the nigger children like you was a teacher."

"Yes Sir."

"So what is it that gives you the right to do that?"

"It, well...no one said I couldn't, Sir."

He fixed her with a stern glare and she wanted to hide or cover her head or duck. But he grinned.

"No, Missy, I guess that isn't what I meant. I mean, why is it they listen to you? Maybe the 'right' to do it isn't the word. I guess I'm asking how you know so much. Were you a teacher Before?"

"No Sir. I was a...a journalist. A reporter."

"Oh. Aha, I see. So you know lots of...things."

"I suppose I know some things," she replied, then braced herself. This could be a recipe for disaster: how well would he, this Oliver Porterfield, accept having his "theory of slavery" destroyed? While she had no idea where this interview was leading, she could imagine nothing good coming from it. But it was too late to take it back so she could only go with it.

She held her breath because his next words could be the end for Megan and her.

"So," he said, and it gave nothing away. And in saying it, he seemed strangely tentative, almost defensive. "So, uh, could you teach ours? Our young ones. Would you?"

Was this a trick question? What did he mean, "would" she? He held her life in his hands. If he said teach, she must teach. But what about Meg?

"Am I permitted to ask what the arrangements would be, Sir?"

"Well you'd have to leave those others behind, move here to town instead of living out at the prison, and teach us only. I mean our kids. Live here, easy work, a lot easier than it would be for them back there where you are now. You'd be like a nanny some of the time. You seem clean and you have a young one, right? She'd benefit from the teaching. As long as she didn't mix with ours. What do you think?"

There were potentially very bad things involved in this, and but perhaps some very good ones. Losing touch with Ben Howe's family back at the prison would be heartbreaking, yet there were things she might accomplish here that would benefit them, if she could operate on these people the way she had on O'Toole and Slade.

She had to make a decision now. And her first loyalty, her first concern, over all, and always, was for Megan. If she turned this down, she would be punished, she was sure of it, and Megan would be the one who was hurt the most. And if she accepted, Megan would have a better life.

With a cry in her throat, a cry that she swallowed back before Bubba/Oliver saw it, she accepted the offer.

It seemed easy, a guilty pleasure. There should be nothing to it compared to the backbreaking work to be done by the others over in the prison grounds, just teach a collection of children who apparently had no formal education, from about eight years old to around fifteen, it appeared. She understood they had all been home schooled up to now, but she imagined being home schooled by ignorant people had only spread the ignorance.

The reality of it when she first began was an eye-opener, however. The children were immensely difficult, because despite the orders from the adults, especially Porterfield, to listen to what she said and obey her, the minute the grownups disappeared, the children were most disrespectful, and used all the possible racial epithets and combinations of them she had ever even imagined.

So one of her early and most difficult challenges was to ignore the words and try to teach them anyway. But the brats were not interested in schooling, and that added to the problem.

Yet they were the future of the nation, if things continued as they were now. Could these impossible monsters be educated to something besides death and hatred?

Oh, boy, was it a challenge. However she worked out an arrangement with Porterfield, in which they were not to be released from class each day until they had absorbed the lessons to her satisfaction. The one thing they did not dare do was skip out on her because the punishment would be worse than the unloved schooling from the unloved black teacher.

So she forced herself to wait out their hatefulness and rebellion against her, conducting her own little war of attrition, and slowly, she began winning it. The formula was not to set each day's objective so high that it couldn't be reached with a little patience. Every day, she extended it, while their resistance slowly waned. She sensed they were growing bored with baiting her and when they really understood that they could not escape, each day, until they cooperated, they began cooperating.

Having never taught, until recently back at the prison, she had to improvise, to learn how to teach, but one of the concepts she quickly developed was to use entertainment and games as much as possible to inculcate the lessons. And that seemed to gain their interest.

And so, after about two weeks, as if they had all convened outside of class and come to an agreement, one day these white children walked in as a body, sat down, shut up, and the real work began. Despite her situation, as a captive, as someone who still ached for her sweetheart, nevertheless, it was one of the happier moments she could remember, certainly since she had fallen off the edge of the world, into Skip Slade's hands in the first place.

Her most difficult job now was to devise "lesson plans" for the various grades that were represented by the children's ages. That was mitigated by the fact that most of them couldn't read at all, so she could make literacy a common subject for starters.

It took time, but what else did she have?

The nightmare came without any kind of warning. After class one day, making her way to the small room she and Megan shared in the former archives building behind the capitol, which had been turned into the school for The Nation's children, she passed a room that was normally empty. A light was on, which was not usual, and with electricity at a premium, she stepped inside to flip the switch off and that was where he waited. Stepping out of a bathroom, he moved quickly to slam the door shut, locking her up inside.

"Oh, sorry, Sir, I didn't know you were in here."

"I know you didn't," he said. She didn't know his name, he was just one more "bubba", someone she had noticed lurking around the area, once in the company of a child and a woman, who must be his unfortunate family.

"Well what can I do for you?" she asked him, already terrified of the answer.

"It's funny you should ask. I have a little project for you."

"Oh?"

"You see, I got a big nice house, here in town. Used to belong to a Jew doctor. Now he lives among you-uns. Ain't that justice for you? But what I'm thinking is that you're about the prettiest little wench I ever seen. How would you like to work in my house, when you ain't teaching, and live really high on the hog?"

"Why would you honor me this way?" she said, straining hard not to visibly tremble.

"Well I just gave you a clue. You seen my wife? She's turned into a hag. I give you a little room—nice room—downstairs and I come visit you from time to time, and...do I have to spell it out, are you that dumb?"

"Oh."

"Oh? Is that yes?"

"I'd...rather not."

"Rather not? You mean, you're refusing me. Is that what? I make you a great offer and all you have to do is fuck me and you live the life of Riley, and you say no? No wonder we think you-uns are stupid. You are stupid! Goddamn filthy little cunt."

She had a nightmarish understanding of what was about to happen here. Her throat constricted and her first thought was for Megan. What would happen to her when her mother was killed in the next few minutes by this beast?

She glanced at the door and he chuckled.

"No way in hell. Now I'm gonna give you one chance. You show me you're sorry and agree to be my house nigger and all's forgiven. What say?" He undid his pants and pulled them down, exposing his erect penis, which he held out pointed toward her.

"Go on, on your knees, and everything will be fine. Do it!"

When she refused, he lunged at her, and instinctively she screamed. But she did something else, she kicked at his pants, now down completely around his feet, and he tripped over them and fell, and in that instant she jumped for the door.

But it flew open before she could turn the handle.

Oliver Porterfield stood in the hallway and both Jenny and her assailant froze where they were.

"What in the hell's going on in here?"

"He tried to rape me," she said, certain she was condemning herself to death. The other man was still on the floor, tangled in his pants, his penis still exposed and hard, a clear proof of what she claimed.

Porterfield took a step his way. Reaching down, he picked the man up by the collar and pushed him against the wall.

"What've you got to say?"

"She wanted to suck me, I whipped it out, then she screamed."

"Yeah? Do you always get that reaction when they see your cock?"

"Come on, man, you know," he said, pulling up his pants, grinning now, in that elbow-nudging way men were wont to do. "So what, she's just a nigger cunt but what a piece of ass, eh? Who wouldn't want some of that? Look at it, prime A-one meat.

"Oh well, excuse me, Bubba, I got to get going."

Porterfield slammed the door shut again.

"That's true. You gotta get going. You go pack your shit and you go. All the way, out of the outfit. Out of town. I don't want to see your face inside here again. You hear me?"

"Aw, Bubba, don't be a dick—"

Porterfield grabbed him by the shirt and swung him around, from where he was against the wall, in a half-circle until he collided with the wall again on Porterfield's other side.

"I said get out. Take your wife with you, if she can stand you. If not, she can stay. But you, I want out of town by sun up. If you're still here, I'll hang you."

"Oh shit, man."

"Shit, my ass. One more word and I'll go tell your wife what was going on here."

The man backed out of the room now, glaring at Porterfield, and Jenny was glad he was too angry to even look at her. He slammed the door behind him and now, she feared for what came next. It was impossible to imagine how Porterfield would react to this, to her, though innocent as she was.

He approached her and she forced herself to hold her ground. He stopped within a foot of her, reached out, touched her chin and tipped her face up so he could look into her eyes.

"You okay, Dear?" he said and the last word stunned her almost into silence. "Huh?" he added.

"Yes, Sir. I'm fine. Thank you...so much."

"Well we can't have our teacher being treated that way, can we? Why don't you hurry home to your little girl, I'm sure you're upset and scared. Go calm down and I'll make damn sure he doesn't come bother you."

"Thank you. I'll do that now."

He opened the door and followed Jenny to her room, where a girl from the prison camp was watching Megan while she taught her class.

Jenny could not calm down for the rest of the evening, and it was late when Porterfield knocked on the door.

"Can I come in?"

"Yes, yes, of course. Here, have a seat." She offered him the only chair in the room and sat down on the bed.

"Yes Sir?"

"Will you do me a favor?" he said.

"Yes Sir?"

"Just that. When you and I are the only ones around, you needn't call me 'Sir'. Ollie is good enough, I go by Ollie. Okay?"

"Yes...Ollie. That's better."

"Yeah, I think so too.

"So how are you doing? How do you feel, after that terrible scare?"

"I'm better. I don't know how to thank you for saving me."

"Well I honestly don't think I saved you. Not directly. I think you had him pretty well under control."

For a moment, Porterfield dipped his head and snickered. "Seeing him all tangled up in his pants, his pecker hanging out...pardon my French...trying to act like it was all okay. I'm sorry, it was just funny, that's all."

"Yeah," she said, "I guess it was, now that I think about it."

"But I think you're right in a way," he said. "You were on your way to get free of him this time, but he'd have taken it out on you. I think you and I and the whole community are well shed of him. I'm not sorry to have him leave. I've got a guard on him until he's gone, so there isn't any danger."

"I appreciate that very, very much," she said.

"Good. Good.

"So, to new business, okay?"

"New?"

"Yep.

"First, I want to tell you, the way you handle those kids is amazing. They're really learning, they're behaving, and I have a damn good idea how they acted to begin with. I don't know how you did it, but you're quite a wonder.

"So I'm going to ask you to take on some more work. It won't be an everyday job, but it'll take more of your time. I can't offer you any particular reward in exchange, but maybe it'll keep your mind busy. Knowing you're...very smart, it must be real boring for you here. Maybe this will help. What do you think?"

"Well if this were the old days, if this were back home, and if I weren't in the position I'm in, I'd tell you I won't sign a blank check."

"Beg your pardon?"

Realizing he didn't understand her meaning, she nodded to herself.

"What I mean is that you're asking me to commit to something you haven't explained. I'm sort of asking you to tell me what it is before I answer. Unless I have no choice."

"Oh. Well yes, you have your choice. I guess it doesn't make sense unless I tell you does it?"

Again he chuckled.

"That's what I'm saying." She didn't know what was going on here, but she was immediately alert for the possibility of "playing" Oliver Porterfield the way she had Wilmot O'Toole and Skip Slade.

"Well what I have in mind is that we get messages from other groups like ours, and sometimes we don't know what to make of them. You know, none of us are Nobel Prize winners. Sometimes we're a bit embarrassed and I'm thinking of bringing you some of these messages and let you....uh...."

"Interpret them?"

"Yes. Interpret them. And maybe help me write good answers. What do you say? You see from that, it won't take a lot of your time. But I also see a problem you might have."

"What would that be?"

"Well, you're our prisoners. You might see it as helping the enemy. Maybe your friends, over there," he jerked his head in the direction of the prison across town, "might see it the same way. That might bother you and I could understand that, so you think about it and let me know if it's all right with you. If you don't want to do it, nobody will know I asked and it will all stay right here in the room."

"All right, I'll think it over."

"Then I have to excuse myself. See you tomorrow."

"Sure."

Quite confused at all this, she let Porterfield out, then showered and went to bed, holding Megan close.

With her baby in her arms, quiet and happy, she spent long hours trying to decide whether to accept the strange offer Porterfield had made. The only drawback she could see was having to explain to the Howes and others why she would undertake such a job. And explain it she would. She never for one moment considered hiding it from them.

What would they say?

It was hours later, too close to daylight for comfort, that it came to her out of a restless sleep, out of what might have been a dream, or her subconscious mind "dumping" the information into her conscious. In any case, it was the right answer. If she won Porterfield's confidence, she might use her position to find a way to get all her friends out of this. And that was worth almost anything. Anything but the life of the precious being who shared her bed. And instead, it might benefit Megan most of all. So she would do it.

Chapter Fifteen

Porterfield knocked on her door at ten; bigger surprise, he brought breakfast for her, for Megan, and one for himself, setting up the tray on a table he had somehow wrestled in along with it for that purpose.

"So, is it too soon to ask for your decision? Need more time?"

"No, I thought about it a lot last night. I'm ready to answer you."

"Oh?" Porterfield turned his head as if waiting for a blow, watching her from the corner of his eyes.

"I'm doing it," she said.

"Ah, fan-damn-tactic. Sorry, didn't mean for the little one to hear that language."

"It's all right, she hears a lot worse from me. So that's good?"

"Hey, wow, I really didn't expect it. Go ahead, carry on your regular day today and we can start tomorrow. I'll bring you some messages and you can go to work on them for me."

With business done, he seemed to have no more on his mind and concentrated on the meal. She let him eat for a few minutes, but she had a question for him, a little nervous about how he would react to it, never mind concern about the answer itself.

"You know, at the beginning," she said, "the leader was Skip Slade. At least he was one of the leaders, as I understand it. And there was another man, Marvis-something. Is that right?"

He wiped his mouth with a napkin and nodded, off-handedly. "Marvis Kirkpatrick. Yeah. Why?"

"So does anybody know what happened to them?"

He stared at her and she felt a tinge of fear. It was all going too well and if she blew it by asking too much, she would never forgive himself. Porterfield finished with the napkin and plopped it on the table.

"Any reason you ask?"

"Well, he was the one who started the...camp, where we were kept before we moved here. And then he disappeared. He was the only name and face I really knew before you. Just wondering."

"Huh." Porterfield scratched his head.

"Well, you know, he done defected. Is that the right word? Left us and joined up with them other fellers, the ones over there close to Sacramento. Some old boy named O'Toole. Only that one got himself killed. Slade joined them. Might have even taken 'em over for all I know."

"O'Toole was killed?"

"Yes Ma'am. Why?"

"I was...his people took me first. I was with them, then he tried to get me away but I was caught by Slade's. I'm...well I thought he would still be around."

"You're not going to tell me O'Toole was the girl's—"

"Oh no! The father was from San Francisco. He was out of the country when the war happened. I escaped and wandered here with another man, a friend, and he was lost when O'Toole's people took us."

"And you was carrying...." He gestured at the baby.

"Yes."

"My, my, you been through a lot. That's hell. You must be one hardy wen...one hardy woman. And you don't look it, you know? Slim and uh...can I say sweet? Well anyway, you must really be something. No, I already knew you was."

For a moment, a strange look came to his eye and he stared out as if he were looking through the walls into great distances somewhere.

"You know, I never been farther from home than I am now. Sometimes I feel a little lost, even a little scared. Now you can't never tell anybody I said that, I got to be the big strong boss, you know? But I'm just a hick from a tiny little town back there. Most of us are. That's why we need you."

"I see. Well I have to say I never expected to hear that."

"Yeah," he said, laughing, "I reckon you didn't. And I never figured to say it to someone like yourself."

At that moment, she was hit by an inspiration.

"There's something I'd like to tell you, something that might help you in a different way. A heads-up, sort of."

Oliver Porterfield folded his arms and rocked the chair backward, creaking it ominously, as if it would explode in splinters any second.

"Yeah?" he said.

She told him about the interrogation of Campion she had carried out while she was still in O'Toole's camp. She gave him everything, the whole story, except the plans by the Kelcher Administration to send in the army afterward and wipe out the groups they had armed, the groups like The Nation. That somehow didn't seem a good idea to propagate just now.

"Do you see," she went on, "if this man's right—and he was obviously inside the government somehow and ought to know—all of you were manipulated by the Kelcher people? Maybe The Nation wasn't as much so as others, but in any case, you would be part of the plan to provide Kelcher his ready-made country clean of the people he detests. If this is right, somewhere around a corner ahead, the FBI and Bureau of Alcohol, Firearms and Tobacco are waiting to lead you by the nose to their bidding, and Kelcher's."

"By damn, we won't cooperate with that!"

"I thought you might not like to."

"We need to warn them. We need to let them know out there. I won't put up with this!"

Inwardly, she smiled, but she had to hold a solemn expression to match his. Carefully, she steered him toward asking her to help. At the first hint of it, she suggested maybe she could compose some messages on the subject that would provide a warning to other organizations with which they were communicating.

"Would you do that?" he said, almost panting like a puppy.

"I don't know why not. Should I put some ideas together for your approval?"

"Yes, please! Tomorrow when we start to work in earnest, I'll look at them."

And so it began.

Over coming weeks, she wrote the messages that warned other groups of the interference planned by the FBI and of Kelcher's grand vision of using them to "cleanse" the nation, then to discard them. In return, she learned, in reading responses, that Kelcher had not yet appeared and that in many places a condition not far short of civil war had obtained.

But more she learned. In the weeks and months right after the war, before last winter, large numbers of minority refugees from the bigger cities had been "driven" north, toward the Canadian border by forces representing the groups like The Nation. The plan, she was discovering, had been something Campion had not mentioned, that of ejecting as many of the "unwanted" as possible completely out of the country. Apparently the same thing was happening in Texas, where they were being herded toward the border with Mexico, and in St. Louis and along the Gulf of Mexico, where they were being systematically crammed onto boats and shipped to various locations in the Caribbean.

But the winter for those people, especially the ones sent north, with virtually no provisions or shelter had been devastating and thousands had died. At least that was what she heard, and it sickened her. Of course those reporting it had no remorse, it was just a fact, but there seemed to be more to the story that wasn't being related back and forth among the groups and she couldn't get to the bottom of it. Nor could she tell why so many people had been pushed away from the cities. Again, the reports seemed to shroud some facts that no one wanted to speak openly.

On her own, she began to see a dangerous possibility.

Food and fuel were already becoming an issue of concern here among The Nation. How soon before the majority of the two hundred or so members of the group pressed Porterfield to let them rid themselves of the prisoners rather than feed them? How soon before they were either herded north, or killed?

Once a week, she was allowed now to go visit the Howes and others at the prison. The next time, after she came to those chilling questions, she sat down with as many of the prisoners as she could convene.

After explaining her concerns, she posed them a question.

"How can you make yourselves indispensable to The Nation?"

"Why in the hell would we do that?" one of the erstwhile state prison inmates asked, a big burly man in his fifties who had been convicted for extortion. "Come on, girl, why?"

"Didn't you hear what I just told you? If we don't convince these people they can't live without us, they will live without us, when the crunch time comes. I know it may be sickening to think of demeaning yourselves to them any more, but which is worse, that or death? Just think about it. When I come back next week, I recommend you have a majority decision and some ideas, if you agree with me."

With that said, she put the issue aside and spent the rest of the day just visiting.

When she returned next time, they had prepared a detailed menu of activities they could undertake that could conceivably convince The Nation that they couldn't afford to get rid of them. She read it over and nodded approvingly.

"May I present this to Porterfield?"

"Is that what it takes to put it into force?" George Howe said. "It doesn't do us a hell of a lot of good if it doesn't happen, does it?"

She laughed and squeezed his shoulder. It was unusual for him to even speak up this way despite all her attempts to convince him to relax with her. Despite the age and experience of the recently added penitentiary inmates, George continued to be the leader of the entire group of internees. But he was usually shy with her.

"You're right, of course," she said. "So that's an okay?"

"It's an okay," the former prisoner answered for George.

With that decided, she set business aside to again just visit for the remainder of her free day. When it was time to return, she folded the hand-written list several times and smuggled it back to her quarters in town.

In the coming months both parts of her program were successfully carried out. Porterfield never saw what was going on with the "slaves" even when they had voluntarily assumed responsibility for all the essential services of the city, work that the Nation had failed to recognize needed doing over the long run. Prior to this, the blacks, Jews, Latinos and Asians sequestered in the prison had been forced to do all the dirty work in town, but now, they had branched out and operated everything of a mechanical nature except cars, including the maintenance of power, water and natural gas, which would have soon stopped functioning otherwise.

As for Jenny, she had essentially taken over running the office that served as headquarters for The Nation. In the evenings she continued to teach but during most of the day, with Megan in a crib, then later a playpen in the room, she handled virtually all but the simplest business for The Nation.

By the approach of the second winter, she had pieced together enough clues out of the incoming correspondence to know that a viable government existed somewhere in the country, probably in California, although that wasn't specified, and that it was taking small steps of action to try and bring an end at least to the chaos that had developed into what might be a simmering civil war. There were hints that some kind of army force had clashed on occasion with the white extremist groups, but where that had happened, no details emerged. It was more of a rumor among the groups that they were under threat, and they regarded their hostages, where they had kept any, as the last line of defense, to be used as human shields if all else failed.

As this information emerged, it terrified her, and she managed to hide all of it from Porterfield and the others. She did not want them warned in any way that there might be a threat or to be given the idea of human shields before they thought of it themselves, in their less than stellar minds.

Then came the first details of this military campaign "out there." As early as last year, the first year of the war, before winter, it seemed that Army units of whatever US government existed, working in small squads out of Canada, had attacked two groups that were driving hostages into the cold trackless north of the Dakotas. What had come of this she could not tell. Nothing was said about what had happened to the hostages or the groups themselves. However for the first time, she began to feel some hope. Could it occur here?

And then she was assailed by panic. What happened if they did come? Would they know there were hostages with the Nation or would they come in with guns blazing or what?

She began thinking of ways to pass word to the Army, or at least to the Canadians, that Jenny and her friends were here, that The Nation held a place in a backwater of the country, with over two hundred innocent people, who craved freedom but did not want to die achieving it.

Most of the contact among the various groups, at least those she had so far dealt with was by telegram. But some of the groups used high powered radios, of the kind employed by sheriff and mountain rescue teams, as well as the military.

She it was who convinced Porterfield that radios would be a stronger way to communicate and he agreed. It had not come to any member of the group before that time to try and improve contacts. But now, Porterfield brought in a radio, and used it alone, apparently not trusting any of his lieutenants to speak for The Nation.

And over time, that summer, Porterfield taught her how to use it, and working together, they established contact with a wider range of outfits, much farther distant. But of course these people "out there" would not have found it acceptable to speak to a woman, let alone an African-American, so Porterfield let her sit with him during the transmissions and make written comments to help him respond.

From then on, when he wasn't around, when she was handling the office unsupervised, she began trying to contact the Army or the Canadians, or both, without accidentally revealing herself to the white groups.

The first attempt was nerve-wracking. Only after a week of building up the courage, fearful of what would happen if she were caught, did she take up the offensive, looking for outside help.

BOOK I Continued
Chapter Twenty-Nine

SACRAMENTO

When he felt certain he had gotten all he could out of Kreuter, Mike stood up and walked out the door, taking General Folger with him. He left it to the Highway Patrol officer to do the right thing with the prisoner. He had no more use for Kreuter and hoped to never see him again.

The swearing in of President Carver had been held off until Mike was ready to participate. Within moments of his reporting to the auditorium in the terminal, the ceremony was carried out, with little fanfare. Immediately, the president joined Mike and Folger in contacting the generals who still controlled the nuclear forces. Both had dispatched deputies to study the resignation and the determinations made by judicial experts and now, the swearing in of Carver.

"Let's go, tell them your opinion," Folger said and the two deputies, one a rear admiral and the other a brigadier general, confirmed that the transfer of power appeared totally legitimate.

"You have that?" Folger demanded.

"I have it."

"All right, the next voice you hear is the Commander-in-Chief.

"Go ahead, Mr. President," Folger added, for the two Triad commanders to hear.

"I'm ordering you both to unconditionally and totally stand down from nuclear alert, begin the dismantling of every vehicle in your theaters that has nuclear warheads or bombs, and do so in the presence of Canadian inspectors who will be dispatched when you send us a complete inventory.

"Do you receive and accept those orders?"

In the background, Mike heard either the general or the admiral mutter, "Fuck." But after a moment's hesitation, each responded in the affirmative.

"Very well, then I'll contact the Europeans and Russians and we'll go from there. Thank you.

"I think General Folger has some additional words for you. Henceforth, consider his orders as coming from me. Understood?"

"Yes," the two men said, almost simultaneously. Carver did not flinch at the disrespect in their tones or the failure to say "Sir" as protocol demanded.

Folger immediately ordered both men to report to him in Sacramento when they had completed the stand-down. Mike knew they would both be relieved of command and asked to resign their commissions. He doubted they were under any delusions about their careers at this point, either. As if in this new world, a career, military or otherwise, meant what it once did.

With this business done, Mike called an immediate meeting with President Carver, a quick, preliminary meeting to outline the shocking discovery he had made in interrogating Kreuter. Carver listened for a few minutes then abruptly stopped the session.

"Don't say another word, Mike. I want the others in on this before we make even one move," he said. "For me, at least, it's been a long day, and I'm not in any frame of mind to cope with this. Let's just leave this right here for now and talk about it first thing in the morning."

Mike was secretly relieved not to have to go over this without some time to absorb what he had uncovered through Smithson and Kreuter and he made no attempt to press the issue further for now.

After the meeting with Carver, he set out for the tent, but when he passed the coffee shop, Leslie called to him from inside.

He found her at a table with Frank, and at their invitation, flopped to a seat.

"Will you have dinner with us?"

"Where?"

"Right here. There are volunteers in there, they're going to feed everybody and then we're taking you home."

"Home?"

"Pending your approval, Carver has talked to the governor, Folger and the police and decided it's safe to move the seat of government to downtown. It's going to happen in a couple of days, it's part of what you called for, in working to find homes for the refugees. We've found homes for ourselves by the capitol and we've arranged an apartment for you. So when we finish here, we're taking you home.

"We may have to come back up here for the next couple of days for business, but for tonight, we want you to come join us and get away from all this. Will you?"

"I'm flabbergasted, to have a home, but yes."

No more was said on the subject, but Mike sensed a tension in Leslie that lasted through the meal and when it was over, she asked him to join her for a walk before they left for downtown. He exchanged glances with Frank, who seemed completely at ease with this, so he agreed.

She led him out into the night and for a couple of minutes, walked slowly with him, laying her head on his shoulder, not saying what was on her mind. He stopped them in their tracks and turned her to face him.

"Les, what is it?"

"I love you, more than you can imagine, and you know that. Frank knows it, I haven't made any attempt to hide it from him. But after what I said, about Jenny, no matter how that turned out, I've been afraid I lost your love. It doesn't matter that I have Frank, I crave your love still, Mike. If I thought I lost that, it would tear me up inside. You were angry with me, and I deserved it, but I need to know if you hate me now. I'm terrified to hear it, but I need to know."

Mike pulled her back to him, cradling her in his arms, running his hands up and down her shoulders in a way he used to do when they were together. Then he lifted her face and kissed her lips.

"I love you more than ever. Not for that, not even for causing me to revive my hopes about Jenny. I love you more because of what you've become. On top of what you were. Les, if it weren't for Jenny, you'd be my perfect woman now. And at a moment like this, maybe because I'm more relaxed about her, that she may be alive, I'm feeling things I wouldn't have felt. Right now, as difficult as it may be to understand and to face, given the circumstances, I'm closer to feeling aroused for you as a lover than I ever thought I could be again. Maybe it's important that you know that.

"If that helps, then take that home, Les, and offer whatever it causes you to feel for me, to Frank. Love him for me, Les, love him hard and hot, do it for me, and remember what I said. I want you and him to make me a child that I can come see and watch grow up and love like it was my own. Go. Go back, take him home, forget me for tonight, I still have the tent and I can move tomorrow. Run to him, Leslie, be happy, be happy tonight for me."

"Oh god." She clung to him a moment, then kissed him hard, and turned, running fast as she could, back inside. Mike smiled upon her leaving, then returned to his tent and slept as he had not in weeks. And in his dreams, as a great relief from his morbid thoughts since the war, he dreamt of sex with Leslie, and almost wished it could be real.

Chapter Thirty

In the morning, still at the airport, President Carver convened the first official meeting of his administration, directing Mike to address the cabinet with what he had learned the day before.

"Here was the master plan, and for all intents and purposes, despite the fact that Kelcher and Smithson are in custody, it's still on line," Mike said. "We know the first part, to take down Russia and blackmail the rest of the world into surrendering control of the world's oil, and to force Europe to pick up the industrial slack that was wiped out here. And we know what came of that.

"But they had an insane agenda for here at home. As I had seen, they did bias the shield to protect the center of the country. And they did arm key large numbers of white supremacist militias. And their plan was to take advantage of the massive numbers of deaths in the cities on the coast. What they were after was a huge overbalance of population toward the predominantly white and very religious and conservative towns of the Bible Belt and the South.

"And they figure the number of minorities who survived the war, the number of liberal minded people, after the coast cities were destroyed is severely reduced. They even counted on the evacuation of those cities protected by the shield and working with carefully picked units of the National Guard, intend to created a pincer movement to close in on the populations of the large cities and either kill them outright, lock them outside of any services, essentially rendering them homeless and starving, take them captive against any future action by outside forces, or herd them toward the borders and eject them from the country.

"In short, it's a massive pogrom of ethnic and religious cleansing, and right now, there's a terrible likelihood it's succeeding and pretty far along."

Those present in the room, from Carver to the military aides Folger and Bryant had invited in, almost as one lowered their heads and gasped. Only Folger, who had heard it from Smithson and Kreuter at the same time that Mike did remained impassive.

"Let me put it another way," Mike told them. "Right now, if they have achieved their aim, there's a second war going on out there, a civil war, but a very one-sided one."

"I can't feature a few, and I have a pretty good idea how many there, a few white supremacists groups or even militias tying up the whole population out there," Bryant said. "Is that it, is that the whole thing? It isn't, is it? You might as well give us the worst of it."

"Well you're right," Mike said. "It is a hell of a lot worse.

"Before the war, bypassing Hoyt here, the Defense Secretary under Kelcher passed orders to certain select National Guard commanders, eyes-only, secret orders, telling them to prepare, in the near future, and in the event of an unprecedented catastrophic situation, for a massive insurrection by minorities throughout the Midwest. In the event of such an event, which of course was the war, these units were instructed to move quickly, to isolate the minority communities and be prepared to defend the white population, and in many cases, they had orders to pre-emptively attack.

"If this has been carried out, and right now, we don't have any idea what the hell is going on out there, but have to assume it did, the entire community of minorities, and particularly blacks, and also Jews, and anybody who ideologically or religiously disagrees with Kelcher's compatriots are in jeopardy.

"The plan is elaborate and nightmarish." Mike explained the scenario Kreuter had described before him, concluding, "So that's what's before us. That's what our country may be coming to. I don't know how widespread this is, how many states are involved, but if it happens in just one place, it's unbearable. Kreuter estimates that thousands will be dead before we can make a move, and tens of thousands may die over the winter. He believes we'll lose, that they'll secure the entire center and south of the country, and those of us who are on the edges will never be able to take the rest back.

"People, I don't know that he's wrong."

He let them absorb that a moment before he continued.

"Look, I know we have a lot of things on our plate. We want to clean up the blasted cities, rebuild, start goods moving, establish cross-continent transportation, and take care of survivors in our own back yard. A couple of days ago, I even insisted we start doing that.

"But we can't do that, and take back the country for our citizens. Not alone. We're going to have to put our hats in our hands and go ask Europe to help. And Canada. I recommend we urge Europe to take on as much of the human services work as they can handle, on both coasts, and I'm going to ask Canada to join us in the military front to beat Kreuter's game.

"I'm going to ask each of you to take on one of these issues and move on it. Work together, to see that it's all covered and coordinated, but count me out. My work will be the war, to take the country back from the Millennium Group. Of course, I can use all the help I can get, but I'll leave it to the rest of you to volunteer as you can. Except Hoyt and Avery. I'm commandeering them for the duration.

"Any quibbles?"

Seated beside him, Leslie buried her face in her hands and wept. The governor sat back in his seat, as if to distance himself from the whole thing, but he did not utter a dissent.

"That sounds like a no to me," Carver said. "So that's it, let's form committees, take any and everybody in the governor's office, every official in the California government and put them on one of them. Mike, you'll do whatever you want to do, however you want it, and the rest of us will snap-to when you call. You're the one who's going to put this country back together so you're the boss."

"I've got something to say," Frank Keller announced.

"I'm not going to impose myself in Mike's war, but I'm going to make an initial statement and assumption, just to get it in work if I can.

"Operating from the mindset of a think tank wonk, I'm going to guess, and Hoyt and Avery can correct me if they demur, that the very top job to begin with is reconnaissance. In other words, we need to know what the hell really is going on out there before we even think about how to fight it."

"I was going to jump in on that point," Bryant said.

Much more than just Folger's aide now, Avery Bryant was the chief of staff of the Army, subject only to Folger's and Carver's authority. As such, Mike's war would be as much his to prosecute as anybody's.

"You're right, Frank, you can't even rationally talk about an operation against these people without intelligence. If Hoyt will indulge me, I'd like to get right on that. Mike, can we sit down and go over every word of what this little shit Kreuter, and his daddy Smithson gave you?"

"Absolutely. I taped the whole thing."

"Fantastic."

"There's another aspect to this," Hoyt Folger noted. "We need to get a link to these national guard commanders and make goddamn good and sure they know who's boss, and then as boss, we've got to order them to stand down from any such insane orders and return to the normal mission of the national guard in a situation like this, which is cleanup, policing and protection of everybody.

"To get that done it'll undoubtedly entail putting people on the ground in the areas involved. We can try to communicate with the these guard CO's directly but ten to one they've got orders to lock out contact from anybody except whoever is, or was, their interface with Kelcher. That being broken, they probably won't pick up the phone for us."

Folger continued to issue orders to implement the work and Bryant took notes, nodding along.

Folger, Bryant and Mike exchanged glances and almost as one, nodded agreement on the plan.

"Let's do it, guys," Folger said.

And so "Lansford's war" began.

Chapter Thirty-One

At first light, Folger contacted North American Air Defense Command headquarters in Colorado Springs, the location where he had ridden out the war, and passed the orders that would initiate aerial and satellite reconnaissance of the areas of interest in the Midwest. Bryant dispatched officers to carry out the direct contact with the national guard, and Mike met with the two Canadian pilots, who were now considered military attachés empowered to communicate with the Canadian government and speak for them.

For Mike, the coming week was a whirlwind of activities. He met with the Canadians several times to set up his own variations on the military initiative, and in that week, the initial reconnaissance and "humint" or Human Intelligence work got under way on the ground in the affected areas. That principally meant putting people in place to find others who knew what was needed to be known, what some people might call espionage, in "Zone Bravo" as Folger had officially designated the entire region of conflict.

Mike spent the rest of the time waiting by assembling contingency plans for every possibility that might be reported back from "the Zone." Bryant was too busy to work directly with him and placed a colonel at Mike's disposal, but they did not get along well. The colonel had an intense anti-civilian bias and did not share the concerns that consumed Mike's life about the population of the country. Worse, Mike suspected there was at least a tinge of racism in the colonel's make up.

Reluctantly, not wanting to create hostility, Mike finally felt compelled to meet with Bryant and ask for a more sympathetic "liaison". But Bryant wasted no time transferring the colonel to a detail assigned to watch the Kelcher Administration, a distinct demotion.

The colonel's replacement was a major who was much more to Mike's liking and progress became instantly smoother. Meantime, the Canadians reported in with extreme support from their government.

By now, the move to the capitol building in downtown Sacramento had been made. Folger and Bryant set up in an office that had been used formerly by the California government to coordinate activity with the national guard, under normal, pre-war conditions. From this location, they received the incoming reports from Colorado Springs by satellite, but they had also dispatched a reliable officer to meet directly with those in NORAD that Folger trusted.

Mike was at breakfast with Frank and Leslie when Bryant called and asked him to join Folger and himself.

When he walked into the "Petite Pentagon" as Folger called the center, Mike knew the news was not the best it could be. Bryant was pacing, unlike him, and Folger was turned, his back to the room, staring out the window onto the busy street.

"Mike, you'd better sit down," Bryant said.

"Uh oh, you're scaring me."

"I'm sorry, but I'm afraid it's with cause.

"The good news first. Four of the national guard units took control of their regions and nothing negative happened. Not much good happened, they mainly kept the peace, but unfortunately, those were among the less populated areas. But Chicago...oh shit...Chicago's the poster child for everything that could go wrong."

"Christ. What happened? Just say it, what the fuck happened?"

"The guard took Kreuter's pre-existing orders and ran with it. They moved into the South Side and proceeded to rampage against the black community. They panicked, just went ape-shit, arresting civilians left and right, for no goddamn reason, killing a lot of people who resisted in the slightest way, men, women and children, old people, and started burning as many buildings as possible, destroying anything that might be used for shelter.

"Meantime they began herding the arrestees and others they had just gathered in under the gun into Soldier Field as a 'detention center.' But by then, they had permitted a white supremacist cell from north of Chicago to march in and handed the entire stadium full over to them, and then moved on further into Chicago, and repeated the game in the north end, using Wrigley.

"So Chicago is pretty much an all white city now and there are thousands of dead minorities, and as of right now, tens of thousands in the hands of racists, and the buzz is, when they get tired of the game, they'll cart some away in trucks as hostages and wipe out the rest.

"So any thoughts we had of tiptoeing in and going slowly are out the window, Mike. We're in a very urgent need to take control in Chicago and it may be down to hours before there's an even more horrific bloodbath. The question is whether we can do it by way of convincing the Illinois guard commander, or finding the governor and convincing him to put a fast stop to this. And then we have to hope the guard itself will obey."

"And if they don't?"

"Then we're going to have to do it the hard way. The plan we've developed is to assemble a force and go in against the national guard and the fuckers in the white sheets. And if we do, I don't think there's much good that can happen to those thousands in the stadiums."

"So that little bastard Kreuter wasn't exaggerating," Mike said.

"Not in the least.

"Mike, your advice and opinion is as hot as ours. If you have a better idea how to stop this, go for it. But bear in mind, this is only one of the lousy situations we're up against in Zone Bravo. It might be the biggest and the worst, given the sheer number of innocent people involved, but intel says it's by no means the only case. And that doesn't even include Detroit because we don't have any humint there yet.

"There are also other kinds of related situations we have to deal with and we haven't even had time to go into them. If and when we can somehow reduce the Chicago situation to some good end, we'll have to take on the rest."

"Why can't you put some of your spare people on the other issues now? I don't want to ignore anything, even if we can't act on it yet. I want to be able to go, bang-bang-bang, from one to the next. Every delay we make is lives lost out there."

Bryant scratched at the back of his neck in an absent way. "Yeah, I know. I kind of wanted your go-ahead before I did that."

"You've got it.

"So let's talk about how you're going to approach the Chicago situation."

"What we want to do is put together another special forces squad and drop them right into the stadium scenario, to whip the supremacist forces operating there, and make sure the Guard can't come to their rescue, and then worry about the Guard's interference in the city when we can. What do you think?"

"How big a special forces presence can you drop in?"

The two generals exchanged glances but Folger left it to his deputy to answer.

"Just two squads right now, fifty men each, one for Wrigley, one for Soldier Field. That's all we can assemble within reach. We're still trying to bring our people back from Europe and call in as many units that survived around the country into a viable single outfit as we can. We know there are tens of thousands of men and women who can combat this, but we can't get it together in time."

"All right, here's the ace in the hole I've been sitting on. The Canadians have assembled five special forces hostage rescue units and placed them near the borders in Zone Bravo. These units aren't any bigger than you described yours, fifty or so, but in a day, they can bring them together into one two hundred and fifty person super-team, or a couple of hundred and twenty-five man groups.

"If you think that's enough to make some difference, let's call them in. Eh?"

"So that's what you've been doing? No, I couldn't feature you sitting on your ass waiting this out," Folger said. He was grinning, nodding appreciatively at Mike.

"I didn't imagine this, but then I was trying to consolidate our own forces and not getting very far.

"Yes, for Christ's sakes, bring them in. I'd like to coordinate this thing with them and if they're agreeable, let them handle this whole show so I can divert our two squads elsewhere. You have any problems linking me with your Canadian liaisons?"

"The last thing I'm going to is try to run a military operation myself," Mike said. "I consider my work diplomatic. Hell yes, I'll hand it off to you. I just want to stay in the game, to hear what's going on and I want to get as close to the action as I can. How you guys, and the Canadians, do this, and what you can do, I'm in no position to judge. Just save as many as you can."

"Then let's put it in work, there's no time to waste."

"Just call in the two Canadian pilots, I go through them. But first, I want to know what you didn't tell me, the other scenarios. I want to hear the whole situation."

"It's pretty much the way you laid it out," Folger said. "All the variations, the hostage-taking, the capture and subjugation of towns and small cities both by national guard and the white supremacists, but while they've concentrated near the bigger cities, it's spotty across the entire region of Zone Bravo. That's the good news. None of this is being formed into a large, coherent operation, so no major chunks of the country are in their hands. It's true that they do seem interested in coalescing into a unified 'nation', but if we act, they won't pull it off before winter, when they'll pretty much have to settle with the turf they control."

"In other words, we need to keep them fragmented if we can."

"Absolutely.

"But the down side of everything is what will happen to whole communities of minorities who had their homes and entire neighborhoods burned out and destroyed by these people. They're going to be vulnerable and exposed to the cold, and we can't just go in and help them because they're isolated by armed units. The supremacists forces aren't large, but they're well armed and we can't get in without giving them the opportunity to wipe out a lot of the people we're trying to help. Our best bet is to air-drop supplies to help the people make it through the winter, and then in spring, we'd better have a major offensive in mind.

"Right now, I don't know what that can be."

"Then let me ask you something," Mike said. "Who's supplying these people? How is it that while the militias are mobile, they are able to make it through the winter, themselves? I assume they've taken some of the housing for themselves, but who's feeding them? Where's their power, their gasoline, everything else coming from? Are the white people outside their cordon sanitaire cooperating with them? Or just putting up with them?"

"A little of each, depending on the instance, to answer your last question," Bryant said. "As for the rest, they're dependent on what they can command. I think I'm getting a glimmer of where you're heading."

"Well one of the ways they attack cancer is to cut off its blood supply then back off and let it die. We could hasten the process by finding and killing their power, and other lines of supply, and then negotiating with them. Let them know that if their hostages starve, then they'll starve with them. Convince them they're all in it together, themselves and their hostages. We give them back their services, we feed them, only in proportion to the number of hostages, or prisoners they release.

"We'd have to start that now, to let them know before winter gets serious that they're going to have the same fate as the people they're threatening. It might take more Canadian forces outside the two hundred and fifty, but they don't have to be special-force trained. And we'd have to study each case, to see where the supplies were coming from and how to cut them off."

"Damn, you're good," Bryant said. "Let's get McLaughlin in here, he's the expert on logistics. If anybody can plan this, he can. But it'll mean another serious intelligence assignment, aimed at each of these cases."

Folger suggested finding civilians in the utility service sector who would be willing to cooperate as intelligence gatherers.

"Right," Bryant said. "We should hop to it."

With no more delay or discussion, they put the plans into operation.

Chapter Thirty-Two

In the weeks that followed, mixed success graced the efforts outlined by Mike, Folger and Bryant that day. Thousands of people died, murdered in three separate massacres in stadiums, despite the best efforts by the Canadian special force teams. Hundreds more died due to exposure and starvation around Zone Bravo during the winter.

On the positive side of the ledger, other thousands were rescued and lives were saved in joint operations of American and Canadian special forces.

Several hundred white supremacist leaders, along with their families surrendered, but in three instances, whole groups, numbering up to thirty-seven in one instance, died of exposure and starvation when services were cut off and they refused to give in. But in those instances, while a relative handful of supremacists died, several dozen of their hostages died as well. This set up a horrifying precedent: those militia members who refused to be taken alive would be bound to take any hostages with them.

In every instance, every failure, every loss of innocent life, Mike's state of mind took a hit. There were nowhere nearly enough successes to overcome the deaths, but he was cheered when the weather in the Midwest finally appeared to improve for the Spring season.

Constantly, Mike had come and gone from the various sites of battle or negotiation and sometimes Frank and Leslie, and other times Leslie alone came and joined him.

In the winter, the couple had formalized their relationship, finally marrying in a brief ceremony Mike was ecstatic to attend.

Now, one warm day in May, the Kellers, as they now could call themselves, arrived for a visit at Mike's latest base of operation. They invited him to join them in the hotel room where they were staying.

Mike greeted them both warmly as he always did, with a hug. But Frank just as quickly excused himself, leaving Leslie and Mike alone.

"What's up?" Mike said. "Are you two...all right?"

"More than all right," she said. "I asked him to let me tell you alone. I'm pregnant."

"Oh god, Les, that's fantastic! Is everything okay, I mean with you and the baby? Any complications? You...I guess I can see it a little. Just a bit of a tummy."

"Yep. The doctor says I'm a cow, I should have no problem. Not exactly the nicest way to put it but it was good news. I wanted to make sure, so I'd know, to ask you to be back there, home, when it pops. I want the kid to know you from the earliest time. Will you promise me?"

"I asked you to have a baby I could love and could live for. You think I'm going to let even one event in that kid's life go without being there? Especially its debut. This is one of the best promises I've ever been asked to make. I'll be there, Les. When?"

"Next February."

"Okay, fantastic. I'm as happy as I could possibly be, Little Bunny. This is absolutely the best news I've heard since...well I can't remember when. Do you know if it's a boy or girl?"

"No, not yet. We don't want to know.

"But about that, there's one thing: if it's a girl, I want your permission to name her Jenny."

Mike dropped to a seat, overcome with tears. Leslie came and sat in his lap, looping her arms around his neck.

"Honey? I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you."

"No, Les, not hurt at all," he managed to say. "Elated. Yes, yes, please, name her Jenny, if she's a she. What an honor. Thank you. God, I love you, Les. This doubly makes my day. Let's go celebrate. I haven't had anything to celebrate any sooner than I've had good news."

And so the three close friends spent an evening out in the town, although in post-war, in an area which had recently seen a mid-winter nightmare of skirmishes between federal forces and white supremacists, a night out did not consist of much. And in honor of Leslie's pregnancy and her abstention from alcohol for the duration, they celebrated with soft drinks and tea.

When they returned to the hotel, Mike sat up in the room talking with the Kellers until late in night. While Frank sprawled comfortably on the bed, Leslie had joined Mike on the sofa, curled up in his arms, and with Frank snoozing away, the two fell asleep together.

But his dream was not about the woman in his arms, it was of Jenny. And it was a nightmare about her and the life she might be leading now, if she were alive at all.

In the morning, Frank was gone, with a note that he needed a cup of coffee, but Mike knew he was leaving Leslie the freedom to share some time with him. However the dream had energized him, in a negative way. He had lazed around, operationally speaking, too long into summer, and now, he suffered an urge to go right after the enemy and waste not another second doing it. So he slipped out of Leslie's arms and started putting on his boots, when she stirred and found him gone from the bed. She sat up and realized he was about to leave.

"Mike? Come lie down, hold me a little longer."

"I have to go. Jenny...I haven't done a thing to find her, I haven't figured out how, and now it's time."

"Yes, but wait. Come back, sit down. Lie down. Just a while."

"It isn't a good idea, it was too...comfortable last night. With you."

"I know. But Mike, even though we're married and I'm pregnant, the same agreement about you and me is still in place. Please, make love with me, just once. Then go. I can't get pregnant, so there's no risk. I want you inside me, one more time. When my child is born, I won't ever ask again, so this is our chance."

"Leslie?"

For a moment he wavered. In the night, before the dream, when Leslie had moved in his arms, he had felt arousal for her, as he had that one other time back in Sacramento, but this time it had shocked and upset him, not because her husband was in the same room but because it seemed a betrayal of Jenny.

He suddenly had that feeling now, an almost alarming and dizzying feeling, that if he had sex, made love, fucked, or anything he wanted to call it with Leslie, he would be betraying a living Jenny. And that was one of the most wonderful thoughts in his life, for one reason. Deep inside, he still believed she was alive!

Leslie left the sofa and sat on the bed and began undressing, believing he was about to come accept her avid invitation. But he leaned over the bed, touching her cheek softly, then kissed her lips.

"I love you, Les. I always will. I ache to make love with you, but I won't. I'm going to find Jenny. I'm sorry."

"No, I'm the one who's sorry. But I understand. And I love you all the harder for the way you are. Good luck, Sweetheart. I mean it."

"I know."

He squeezed her hand then hurried out the door while he had the strength to stay out of her bed.

Mike arranged not to see Leslie again before she and Frank returned to Sacramento. But he sought out his best friend and sat him down on a log out in a park near the hotel.

"Frank, you know what Leslie offered me, but I turned it down. I want you to understand, it was for one reason, but a wonderful reason." Mike explained how he had come to the glowing realization that a living Jenny might still exist, to whom he would remain faithful.

"I want you to know it's the greatest offer a man can make to another short of sacrificing himself. But I want you to know something else. I haven't come right out and said it yet, but I'm overjoyed that you and Leslie have a life together and will have a kid. That makes me almost as proud as if it were mine. And the fact that my two favorite people on earth, after Jenny, are going to bring a life into this lousy world, well it both exhilarates and scares me, for the baby.

"Frank, I'm fighting for Jenny, but you and Les have given me another incentive to throw all I have into making this a better world. I hope your kid can grow up and barely see the scars, and think of what we're going through now, and the last year, as ancient history."

"Well while we're at it," Frank said, "there's one more thing I've owed you for all this time. I did try to apologize for doubting Jenny, what seems a long time ago, but I never had the chance to thank her for bringing Leslie and me together. And I barely know her, but I love your woman, Mike. She is everything you tried to tell me she was, and much more."

"Thank you for that. And most of all, thank you for saying 'is' and not 'was'. Now you know why I wouldn't touch Leslie, because I'm clinging to that hope that Jenny is still out there."

"I know. And if I were religious, I'd pray to God she is," Frank said.

"Now, I'm going to take my wonderful lady back home. I expect you to be in the delivery room with me because I'm going to be scared shitless. I think of all the things I've seen and been through in my life, watching my wife deliver my child will be the hardest. Can I count on you?"

"Solid gold," Mike said.

"Then I'll see you in February, at the latest."

"Probably sooner, I'll want to check in and make sure my girl is doing okay along the way."

They didn't shake hands, there was no need for anything so formal. Frank walked away, back to Leslie, and Mike wandered on to the local command center, with the intention of pressing the offensive before another hour of the spring could pass.

By then, all the national guard units of Zone Bravo had been brought under control, either through accepting orders of the President, or by confrontation with the superior firepower of a combined US and Canadian military force. Across the country, another kind of offensive was under way already, so soon after the calamitous war. That offensive was humanitarian and recuperative.

The Europeans had supplied vast amounts of food and shelter to those in refugee camps on the east and west coasts, and there were few fatalities over the winter, because there were no hostile forces to keep the supplies out of the hands of those who needed them. It was not a happy or comfortable winter but it had been survived and already, an upbeat attitude was building, despite the millions of deaths and the vast swath of destruction.

For one thing, by then all the people on both coasts knew a government continued to exist and that it was working hard for their benefit and the recovery. Just the awareness that the nation was not permanently rent apart in anarchy made a huge difference in the mindset of the survivors.

The cities that had not been hit but all of which had suffered considerably from the panic and loss of services, both on the coasts and in the rest of the country, were slowly starting to function again. With the help, again, from Canada, essential services were coming back on line, although electrical power was a major problem due to the disruption of lines and in several cases, destruction of power plants within the blast zone of Russian warheads. Early-on, work was being attempted to overcome those losses. Sadly, yet in a way, beneficially, the large number of deaths would greatly lower the demand for power, allowing remaining plants, as well as power offered by Canada, to somewhat hold the line.

Of course, rebuilding the country would take years, physically as well as socially, yet by mid-summer, the job was well under way.

However in the western segments of the un-bombed center of the nation, all the way over to and even west of the Rocky Mountains, large areas of the country were outside the control of the government, because that was where most of the remaining white supremacist groups held sway. And worse, a considerable number of national guardsmen, rather than surrender or accept the orders of President Carver, had walked or in many cases driven away with their weapons, including tanks and armored personnel carriers, defecting to the separatists. So now, before the country could be totally reunited under the government, these outfits must be defeated militarily. Negotiations and deals for services alone would no longer suffice.

During one of his visits in Sacramento, Mike attended a cabinet meeting, unaware of what he was about to be singled out for. Carver feigned to be presiding over some routine business, but stopped and swiveled back in his chair and pointed the stem of his pipe in Mike's direction.

"I'm glad you're here, I've been waiting for this opportunity."

"Uh oh," Mike said, but he was grinning. "What did I do now?"

"Oh, you've done plenty. But you're going to do more. I'm afraid I'm going to add to your burden and put something new on your head. To do it, you can use anybody in the country to help you, but I don't think you'll need much more than yourself and a few friends, if I know you. But I'm asking you do this in six months."

"Oh? What?"

"Write us a first draft of a new Constitution. And Frank, and Leslie, I've got a little job for you, too. Put together a team, whoever and as many as you need, to create the capability for national elections by November of next year, to elect everyone from my own successor to a full Senate and House of Representatives proportional to the population remaining. If that sounds like I'm also ordering you to get a census done...I am." He grinned and the Kellers nodded.

"You don't ask much, do you? May I walk across the Great Lakes while I do it?" Frank said, but he was smiling.

"Whatever it takes. All right, get to it," the president said. Frank helped Leslie out of her chair and with that the meeting was over.

Before he left for "the front", Mike visited the Kellers in their home, down the street from the capitol. Leslie encouraged Mike to rub her belly, and in farewell for the moment, he lifted the hem of her maternity dress and kissed her where she bulged.

"Little Jenny says thanks," Leslie told him.

"Oh? You know now?"

"Yeah, we couldn't wait. I wasn't going to tell you, but I can't wait for that either. Yes, it's going to be Jenny."

Mike collapsed for a moment against the door frame and wiped at his eyes. "I adore her already, almost much as I adore her mother. And her father. And her namesake. Take care, Sweetie," he added.

"I will, Mike. I love you."

He hurried out the door before he lost control of his emotions, and by evening, occupied a flight heading back to the Midwest.

Chapter Thirty-Three

After that meeting in Sacramento, the rest of the year of operations against the entrenched supremacist groups was slow, with few successes. The fact that Mike completely penned the first draft of a new Constitution meant he had far too much time on his hands that summer, and into the fall.

To know that Jenny might be spending another year in captivity pushed him to the ragged edge of depression, and to combat it, he returned to Sacramento, to spend time in the closeness of his friends.

Leslie was blossoming wonderfully, and the baby...Jenny...was kicking. He tried to lose himself in the happy times but at night, he found it harder and harder to sleep.

Then one morning, he awoke with an epiphany.

Avery Bryant was out of town, but Hoyt Folger made himself and his staff at Mike's service in the "petite Pentagon".

"What's up, buddy?" the deep-voiced general said.

"When we secured Sacramento last year, you captured quite a few of the ones who were responsible, right?"

"Yeah, a fair number."

"I don't know where my head's been, but I need to meet with some of them, see if they would trade some time off in exchange for help. Maybe they can offer some ideas for infiltrating, or talking down any of the outfits still holding out."

"Easy. We put them in Folsom, for want of a better idea. They've got the run of the place, but I wouldn't go in there without some protection."

"No, I wouldn't either."

Folger arranged for someone to drive Mike out to the prison that day. A complete roster of the inmates had been made, and Mike was aware that the original commander of the outfit that had besieged Sacramento, an outfit which had no formal name of its own, was a Wilmot O'Toole, once an Army Special Forces colonel. But there was no such name among the list of inmates.

Disappointed, Mike perused the entire list, not a difficult assignment for there were only forty-three. Midway down the page, something jumped out at him.

William Campion. Where had he heard the name? He put down the list and sat back, closing his eyes, straining. So much had happened, how could he dredge up a small fact like this? But only after a minute or so, a face came to his mind's eye. Not a man's face, a woman's. Molly....

....William Campion, her boss in CIA. A division chief, although which division, Mike didn't remember or care. Was this the same William Campion?

Mike asked the guards, all regular army personnel, if they had done any research on the inmates and they presented him with a thick notebook. Mike thumbed through until he found Campion's page and read it, nodding to himself.

"All right, bring me this guy," he said, tapping the name at the top of the page.

Soon Campion came before him, shackled for the course of the interview at the feet and hands. Mike decided to try the nice guy approach first.

"Get this guy out of this shit, how can he be comfortable like this?"

"Sure."

"Hey, thanks, Pal," Campion said.

"Oh sure. How about some coffee?"

"I'd rather a beer," Campion said, but Mike smiled.

"Sorry, I couldn't even get one for myself if I wanted to inside here. They're kind of sticklers about that. Coffee has to do until we can get you out of this."

"Oh. Well in that case, I guess I can wait."

"Go on, have a seat, take a load off. I need to ask some questions before we close this out."

"Sure."

When the hardware was removed from his hands and feet, William Campion settled easily into the chair, stretching out his booted feet as if it were a backyard party.

"Well, I have some interesting information here," Mike said. "It seems your name has come up before. Your, uh, fame precedes you."

"Is that so."

"Oh yeah. Can you, uh, kind of fill me in on your background a little?"

"I was with the organization called Working for our Nation."

"Yeah? Where's that located?"

"Baltimore."

"Okay. And how did you get into this situation? How were you with O'Toole's group, what put you here?"

Campion hadn't prepared an answer for that. His face went blank, either by design or lack of ideas to get himself out of this. Then it came to him. The transition from blank to casual was almost too smooth to catch, but Mike was watching for it.

"I was on vacation, I had family in San Fran, I was driving up to Tahoe when the war went off. These assholes pulled me off the road and threw me in the town jail. That's about it."

"Well that's a sad story. Thank god we finally got you out. So tell me a little about O'Toole."

"O'Toole?"

"Yeah, the commander of this ragged-ass outfit who captured you."

"I don't know, never met him." The blank face again and Campion added a shrug to sell the deal. Mike didn't change his expression, maintaining a jovial smile.

"Well that's too bad, O'Toole sounded like an interesting character. Special Forces unit commander, the 29th Armored in Desert Storm, Silver Star, liberated a Kuwaiti city...and you never got to meet him?"

Sweat sprouted on Campion's upper lip. If Mike knew all this about O'Toole, Campion must be thinking, he knew that he had been O'Toole's deputy in the 29th.

"All right, what about it?" Campion said. "What's that got to do with it? The son of a bitch locked me up."

"Why? Because he found out you were a CIA Division Chief, using the Millennium Institute for cover?"

Campion was just too cool to break. He hardly blinked.

"What if? I was trying to bring the fucker and his outfit down."

"What a great guy. But is there anything else you were involved in? Like arming O'Toole, and others? Do you remember a woman named Molly, who went missing from your division when you asked her to put guns into the clutches of one too many outlaw groups?

"She blew the whistle on you, Campion. What would happen if I brought Jacob Kreuter in here and asked him where you fit in? He's down the hall. Awaiting trial. He's already bought himself leniency by blowing the whistle on Smithson. If I offered him an even better deal for telling me about you, what would he say?"

"No, you don't need him. I can help. What do you need to know?"

Mike looked into Campion's eyes and felt a chill. This man had killed, had gunned innocent people down in cold blood while looking them in the eye, Mike was certain of it. No wonder he was so cool, he hardly had any normal human feelings at all. Except, maybe, fear, for his own lousy fucking hide.

"Where did you really fit in, with O'Toole's outfit? What's your real story, why did O'Toole really put you on ice? And before you answer, bear in mind that if you're sniffing around for a deal, you had better wonder just how much I already know. I absolutely guarantee that if you lie to me even once from here on, over even the smallest detail, even the time of day, well I believe the military expression is, your ass is grass. You'd better be one hundred percent straight with me from now on."

"Oh shit," Campion said and the cold light in his eyes went out. "You already know the worst. Yes, under Kreuter's signature, I armed the groups out there. And I made one too many visits to Willy, trying to sell him on the part we needed him to play and he lost his cool. He turned, flipped, whatever you want to say. So he locked me up.

"But if it weren't for that goddamn cunt he was harboring, I would've eventually sweet-talked his ass out of it. But the fucking bitch...god she was good looking for one of them."

"For one of what?"

"Nigger. Half-nigger, probably. High yellow, whatever the fuck it is. But nigger, that's for damn sure."

"A black woman. Where did she fit in?"

"Well I don't know, she was with him. I don't know, they denied they were fucking—those were her exact words—but Willy was sure pussy-whipped if you ask me. I don't know how she really fit in, she was just with him.

"What I do know is that she knew way too much for her own fucking good. Maybe she stumbled into his hands. He was protecting her from his boys."

Mike didn't dare think what his mind was trying to tell him. "This black woman, what did she look like?"

"Really hot, fairly light, didn't I just tell you? And carrying a brat, you know, just starting to show. And even that, she was still built like a brick shit house. Jesus."

"I see.

"You said she knew more than was good for her. What does that mean?"

"She seemed to know a lot about the war, she claimed that Folger wouldn't cooperate with us when the war was over. She demanded to know our larger plans and it's clear she was...well, connected. I don't know. She said she'd come from San Francisco...."

Mike gripped the arm of the chair, feeling light-headed. Jenny. She did live! And she was carrying their baby. Or had been. Their child would be born by now. But where was she? Oh Jesus, had she been killed in the assault that defeated O'Toole's army?

"What happened to her?" Mike asked. He stopped a moment, realizing that if this man knew she meant so much to Mike, he would tell him anything he wanted to hear to save himself. Mike had to play him in a way Campion could accept, so he added, "I know who this cunt is, I've wanted to get my hands on her myself. Where is she?"

Campion grinned. "Sorry, you won't get the pleasure. That ass-wipe O'Toole tried to skip out with her, later on. They got him, got 'em both, Reverend Brown's boys, The Nation. Shot O'Toole and left him for dead and then gang fucked the broad to death and tossed her body in a hole. That's what O'Toole told us before he croaked. End of story, end of game."

Mike heard no more, he staggered out of the room and out into the hall, and that was the last he remembered. Jenny, Jenny, raped to death, carrying his child...now, it was truly the end of the world for him.

Chapter Thirty-Four

SACRAMENTO

It was almost identical to the first time, in Germany, when he thought she must have died. The world was just as fuzzy, he could barely function, and he knew he had been sedated and was coming out of it. Nothing else did he know or remember. Slowly, voices came to him, none of them familiar and the words were gibberish.

Then it all began to focus. The first thing that became clear was one sound...the voice of Leslie. It ought to have been enough to bring him back but it wasn't. That was because the next thing that came to him was the horrible truth: Jenny was dead after all. He had not been there soon enough to save her.

And that was enough to doom him. He closed his eyes and tried to fade out again, but something was wrong.

Leslie was speaking, and though her words still had no meaning, that was not the trouble. There was another voice, an odd one, and it was squalling. And there was a weight on his chest.

Unable to stop himself, he opened his eyes again and now the world was no longer a fog. There was Leslie gazing down upon him, half smiling, half in anguish. But the other sound?

Crying. A baby. Leslie's. Leslie's baby.

"Jenny?" he managed to say.

"Yes, we call her Little Jenny for now. Isn't she sweet?"

Mike forced his eyes to focus on the baby.

"I thought it might help if you held her."

For Leslie's sake, he struggled to recover and even made himself smile.

"Yes, yes, thank you," he said. His arms were functioning again and he lifted the baby, gazing at her, then at her mother's face.

"She really is beautiful."

"Mike, I'm so sorry I never had a baby by you. No, I'm not sorry now, I mean, but—"

"I know. I know. But why?"

"I extracted a promise from you, that you'd be here for all her important times. You missed the first one, her birth, but that's understandable, you've been sedated a week, off and on. But I'm going to hold you to the rest. I know what you're going through, but you've already survived it the first time before you thought she might still be alive.

"You're going to survive this, and you're going to continue to be here for Little Jenny's important moments.

"I thought you ought to see her the first time I was on my feet. I just got out of bed, Mike, and I've brought her to you. You only missed her birth by a few hours."

"Oh. I'm sorry. Frank, where is he, I'm sorry, I was going to be with him, too."

"He was a rock. It's okay, Mike.

"Now, you're going to start back to work, you're going to go on making this a world worth having Jenny grow up in. You're going to give her a country back, and it's going to start right now. Come on."

She took the tiny baby away and handed her to Frank, who had been in the room all along.

"Leslie, yes, this is the only thing that could save me. Little Jenny...."

But he was crying and now so was Leslie. With her baby safely in its father's arms, she held Mike a little while, then made him, as she had done so recently, leave his bed and go back to living.

And over the days, weeks and months to come, it was Leslie, Frank and their daughter who indeed kept Mike sane and alive, and even finally made it possible for him to function and go back to the war.

But the war had a different character now. Already, only a year and a half after the cataclysm that had threatened to destroy the world, progress was rushing forward on all fronts except Mike's own personal mission. Except for those towns that had been taken, the separatist outfits were already being ignored and if not forgotten, certainly left as an afterthought by the greatest part of the population of the country, who were profoundly engaged in rebuilding their lives and their communities.

One by one, but over a painfully long time, separatist groups were surrendering. It was at a rate of about one per six months or so, but there were bad experiences mixed in.

Two such groups had carried out mass suicides, killing the leaders and their families, but along with them, over a hundred hostages each. Every such case was an emotional setback for Mike, but he refrained from rushing back to take succor with Frank, Leslie and Little Jenny, for his pain would only dampen their happiness.

Instead, he reserved his visits for good times, the milestones in Little Jenny's life that he had promised to share and when he visited, he somehow made himself act jolly.

The bad times he handled in the darkness of his quarters, and of his mind, one case at a time.

The successes in saving the captives came in part from infiltrated intelligence personnel, who in one or two cases literally broke prisoners out in the dead of night, intercepted by waiting nearby hostage-rescue teams. In a couple of other instances, surrender of the enemy was arranged in exchange for food and supplies that relieved the starvation of both prisoners and captors, who had all reached the limits of human endurance.

As year after year passed, the remaining separatist groups became more and more marginalized, but Mike would never be satisfied until they were all "reduced" with the least loss of innocent life. Only President Carver, now officially elected to the office, the Kellers and the two stalwart army generals Folger and Bryant, and Mike's Canadian military supporters stood by Mike in his war to free every last hostage, but they were the only ones that counted. By their orders, the entire US military establishment and much of Canada's remained at Mike's service. And yet that was not enough.

Then in the fourth year, some help arrived, by a most unexpected avenue.

BOOK II CONTINUED
Chapter Sixteen

CARSON CITY

It had been one of the inspired moves of her life, certainly since the war. Bringing George into the "office" had taken time and it had not been easy to win even Oliver Porterfield over, but once done, it was worth it a million times over. It worked in large part because George, with all his other attributes at such a tender age, proved a prodigy with electronics. The first time the radio broke down, only George Howe, of anyone Porterfield could find or recruit, knew how to fix it. For her, it was perfect.

After that, like her, George, became an indispensable member of "the office". He moved into a room of his own near hers, and very soon, he was speaking with radio operators in other cities when none of the white men were around. The genius in the whole thing was that George, over the radio certainly, was not recognized as an African-American by the sound of his voice. So for the first time, through George, she was able to communicate directly with other groups who had radio capability. He was accepted as the radio operator for The Nation and with that, her game was on.

She could now learn of the action that was going on between American/Canadian military forces and certain of the white groups. Now she came to know that there had been successful rescues, as well as failures with large loss of life among the hostages. But most of all, it meant there was hope. Someone was doing something for their benefit!

Through these radio calls, bit by bit, Jenny assembled a picture of the overall layout of the nation now, where the groupings were largest, their relative strengths, the number of prisoners they held and their vulnerabilities. She and George drew up a concealed strategic map and tracked movements of all the elements involved; and then one day she woke up and decided the time had come for the next, most dangerous phase.

With George as her voice, she established contact with a Canadian army unit and begin, detail by detail, in painfully slow increments, to inform them of what they were up against. Verbally, through George, she transferred the map they had developed, and yet she could sense doubt among her contacts.

And well they should doubt. There was not a shred of proof she could give them that George was not planting false information. Never once did he identify himself as black or as a hostage, let alone give away their location. In fact, George used a code, calling himself "The Doc", a tribute to his father.

Tentatively, the Canadians accepted information she and George provided about a group of extremists in the vicinity of Miles City, Montana, who were an outgrowth of the militia forces that once spread across the state. They had no hostages, but they were armed and represented a fairly large and mobile unit that had it in their heads to make a move on Billings, the population of which at that time was living a peaceful if austere existence.

The Canadians took the gamble, using her intelligence, and wrapped up the group, finding them exactly as she had reported, and to them, that seemed to go a long way toward proving her "bona fides" as they said in intelligence parlance. And so, she/George became the only asset on the side of the Canadians and their allies in the war against the white extremist groups. And through her work, in the third and fourth year after the war, the tide began to swing.

BOOK I CONTINUED
Chapter Thirty-Five

CALGARY, ALBERTA, CANADA

It was the first time Mike spoke directly to "The Doc".

In truth, "spoke" wasn't the precise word because Mike only communicated through either a Canadian or US Army radio technician, but he sat nearby with a headset on and typed his responses into a computer read by the man at the microphone.

In his campaign to defeat the separatist and militia groups in the northern tier of the country, Mike worked equally with the Canadian and US forces. When he learned of the mysterious voice that was inside one of the groups, Mike moved into the Calgary base to exploit it as long and far as he could.

By that time, The Doc, embedded in The Nation, was somewhere in Nevada. It was impossible to discern much about the individual himself, he was very careful never to transmit anything that could jeopardize his position or his identity. Mike could only assume he was a white man who had either infiltrated inside the group where he was based, or had "crossed over". Such an infiltration was something Mike had tried with only small success throughout his campaign, yet now, it had fallen into his lap.

At the same time, the Canadians had concerns that this was in fact a provocation, designed to mislead them, to set them up for a slaughter, and The Doc's initial contacts and information were quite suspect. Only when his intelligence led to a totally successful raid on a group in Montana who held no hostages did Mike or the Canadians begin to believe him.

With the slowly developing proof that "the Doc" was in fact on their side and could be trusted, Mike concentrated more and more on working with the unknown spy. But those contacts depended upon waiting for the Doc's opportunities to send out his clandestine transmissions. Mike had no understanding of the situation the man operated under, and what conditions were required before he could get his hands on the radio each time. Some day, Mike intended to meet him face to face and clear up all the mysteries, but for now, the details simply didn't matter. Only the intelligence supplied by the covert operator counted. The contacts worked out to about twice a week on average, but now, those "bursts" of information, when they came, were growing in volume and value.

By the fourth year after the war, roads were open up and down both coasts, and rebuilt cities were taking shape. Even San Francisco, with many of the most famous landmarks being reproduced, was beginning to look familiar again, but seeing it come back to life, without Jenny, was too painful and after one brief visit, Mike left again and vowed never to go back.

Meantime, little by little, the war in the Zone was being won. Mike had developed a tremendous rapport and long-range relationship with the mysterious "Doc" and was certain now he was in fact a prisoner and looked forward to the day when he could free the man.

But there was a problem. The Nation of the New Order, the very group who had captured and murdered Jenny, had long since uprooted from its base in Carson City, which was mostly bereft of food or sources of it, and the people were migrating eastward by whatever means they could muster, including foot, to south central Idaho. With each of these upheavals, The Doc had fallen out of contact for weeks, only to eventually resurface again with a report of The Nation's latest move, when they came to rest at some campsite or town for a few days. Each time he fell out of touch with the covert contact man, Mike agonized over the Doc's fate and celebrated quietly when he came back on the air.

During the time when he was most actively involved with other groups, The Doc arranged three different surrenders of starving, weakened supremacist groups around the area. But little by little, The Doc's information on other groups was diminishing and he was beginning to sound Mike out over the possibility of a rescue for his own people.

And for Mike that very question was becoming more and more important. He could actually begin to see a point, perhaps no more than a year or two away, when his long war would be over. But until The Doc and his friends were rescued, that would not happen.

With the approaching end of his mission, Mike faced a terrifying question: what then, in his own life?

All this time, Jenny Keller was his inspiration. She called him Uncle Mike, and as he had promised to Leslie, he made certain he was on hand to share all her important days. If it were not for that, he might not have made it even this far. However with the coming end to his long war, he foresaw a sense of meaningless in his life. Someone else's child could only be a part of his own life for so long before she went her own way. And what would keep him going then, he could not imagine. Without Jenny, and without Little Jenny, the future did not bear thinking.

Around the country, people were beginning to become part of the whole again. A Constitutional Convention was planned for the regenerated San Francisco, in which the document Mike had written, which had been only slightly amended by others, including legal scholars, would be ratified as the new law of the land. The second election cycle since the war had come and gone, bringing together a new national Senate and Congress.

Now the "rebel" groups, which had once threatened to destroy what was left of America, were more like the isolated Native American tribes of the 1870's as they related to the rest of the country: nuisances to be avoided until they were cleaned up as time permitted.

Indeed, over the next year and a half, one by one, those groups surrendered or were beaten, and the war was drawing to a close. The end was definitely in sight. In fact, Mike had put together a plan to reel in whatever proved to be the last of the outfits and either force a surrender or execute a trap.

It was becoming evident that due to their starting place inside of California, and the long trek they had undertaken, The Nation would be that last group standing.

Its surrender would be the Appomattox of the war, and Mike's friends all knew it, and knew The Nation's defeat would be especially poignant for Mike because they had murdered Jenny. So the Kellers quietly planned for a great victory party when the deed was done and Mike returned home.

But Mike wasn't having any part of it. He knew what it would mean for him, when the last surrender was made; despite the fact that he was focusing all his being upon The Nation, he could see nothing but a cloudy wall looming before him on the other side of the victory, with no details beyond it. He had no plans to ever peer beyond.

Yet there was no temptation on his part to prolong the six years of captivity for the people still under The Nation's thumb just to give himself a little longer before he had to face the loss of his raison d'etre. He planned the end of the campaign as thoroughly but with as much dispatch as he had planned every one before it.

But The Nation would throw him a curve.

BOOK II CONTINUED
Chapter Seventeen

IDAHO

As outfits began to be tracked down or surrendered, those still surviving banded together in larger and larger aggregations. During one of their moves, from Twin Falls up toward Pocatello, The Nation absorbed two smaller bands and their hostages. George Howe was eventually able to pass word of this to the unidentified American who was working with the Canadians. For some reason, this American would never speak directly over the radio, and although through George, Jenny and the American had developed a second-hand rapport, there was never anything personal exchanged, nothing about themselves, only their mutual mission of liberation. In fact, the man had no idea he was working through an intermediary with a woman at all.

Be that as it may, although the American was unwilling to risk the lives of the captives by setting up a frontal attack on the now enlarged group that still called itself The Nation, he was able to prepare an operation that suddenly bore fruit for many of them. He was able, he reported, to put a small squad of commandos ten miles north of Pocatello, where Jenny had reported The Nation intended to base for awhile, on the road to...wherever they were trying to reach, which destination she did not know. Advance forces of The Nation had already moved up and taken control of the town and the long, wearying trudge on the ground would end there, for now.

For a long time, a couple of years, the former prisoners from the Nevada penitentiary had been planning a mass escape, set for whatever time they determined was most propitious, or when desperation set in. Word of this had been passed to the American, who suggested now might be the right time. He could do more to support the escape and receive the escapees than he could have any time before. If they could break away and hurry ten miles up Interstate Fifteen north, he would be there to meet them.

The men who were planning the escape agreed it should be now. Therefore on a dark night, with the "bubbas" as tired from travel as the prisoners, it came off. Out of about two hundred and eighty captives, both ex-state prisoners and ordinary civilians like the Howes, all but around thirty made it away. All of the Howes left except George, who refused to abandon Megan and Jenny. For the Howes, saying goodbye was one of the saddest nights of their lives, exceeded only by the deaths of their mother and then their father.

But when word came back from the American in Canada that they were safe, Jenny and George had a quiet little celebration. That night, she came closer to offering herself to George, to make love with him, than she had ever meant to let happen. But something stopped her short. Perhaps she foresaw terrible things for herself in the days to come and it might be such a bittersweet thing for George that he might be scarred the rest of his life if he lost her afterwards. Perhaps, on the other hand, it was loyalty to Megan's father, despite the certainty by now that she would never see him again. In either case, the night left George a virgin and her alone in bed with her daughter.

And in the night, a trembling came to her, fear of the terrible punishment to be exacted upon those who had not managed to escape, including George, Megan and herself.

But the ire of the leadership did not fall on the prisoners who had remained. It fell instead upon one of their own. At sundown on the day of the escape, one of the newer leaders, who had joined from the largest Montana group, having seized control of the now composite Nation, took Oliver Porterfield out onto the grounds of the university, tied him to a post and shot him.

It was a horrible shock, and it spelled the end of George's and her time in the command post. They would never have access to the radio or any other communications system again. She, Megan and George were thrown back into the compound with the other twenty-eight prisoners, and they were locked in a high school gymnasium, with guards all around and clear orders that if anyone merely showed their heads when not summoned, they would be shot.

They were not to remain in Pocatello long. Starvation and pressure from the Army drove The Nation south, toward the bigger towns and cities of Utah. Apparently the Army and the unknown American who was seeking their liberation considered thirty-one hostages too many to risk, so The Nation was allowed to move un-harassed. Never in that time did the Americans or Canadians permit The Nation's leaders to see even one single hostile vehicle.

Now, however now, the sensation of having been abandoned was difficult to shake, even as it vied with the feeling that the end of their captivity was coming soon. Yet that possibility was fraught with terror: how could this end in anything but a final shoot-out? And why would the new, even harsher leaders of The Nation let the prisoners go alive if it appeared they were about to die or be defeated at last?

Huddled in the latest building at the latest stop, Jenny held Megan close and became increasingly melancholy. George was there, of course, as were the other twenty-eight survivors, but he had no idea what to say or do now to comfort her.

When Megan fell asleep, her mother tried to express her feelings to George.

"I'm scared to die, to end it, especially when it seems like it was so close to rescue for us. But it's Megan and you I'm most scared for," she said. "I'm looking for anything that might let the two of you get out, if I can't make it.

"George, I'm willing to even put on a diversion if I have to. I'm asking you to promise me that if something big happens and you see the chance to take Meggie with you and go, that you'll go. Don't worry about me, I'll do all I can to get out. But don't hesitate or wait, just go."

"Oh god, you know I can't do that."

"George, I know how you feel about me. If you love me, and I know you love her, you'll do the thing that means the most to me—save her and save yourself. I'm asking you to promise me you will."

"Why? Why can't it be all of us?" His voice was on the edge of a wail and she covered his mouth before he woke up the child or alarmed others in the room.

"Listen to me: I do intend to be with you, but if something happens, there may only be time for two to escape. I'm just covering all the contingencies, all right? I just need to rest at night knowing this particular one is covered, that you'll do as I ask. Then, maybe I can relax enough to be able to plan how to get us all out. Okay?"

"Yes, yes, in that case, of course. You don't know how hard it is for me to agree, to even think about leaving you behind. You know how much I love you."

It was the first time he had ever said it, though she knew it was true. She took his hand and then leaned close and kissed his cheek.

"And I feel the same for you, George. So, we've said what has to be said. Let's leave it right here and hope for good things. Except for one thing. If you do this, and we find each other again, I want to marry you, if you don't think our age difference is too much. Is that something you can live for? I need to know."

"Yes, yes, except to be free, there's nothing else in the whole world I want as much as to have you as my wife. Yes, I promise, then. I promise. But please, please, make it out, too."

"I mean to, George. Now say no more about this until it happens."

She kissed him, offering all the passion she was able to muster and then pulled away, a little afraid of what she had just done, promising to marry him as a way to make him take care of her child if she had to die, when it wasn't what she wanted for herself at all.

But now, in the days that followed, she began trying to brace Megan for frightful things, to school her in what she must do if terrible shooting and explosions should happen. Megan gazed at her with wide eyes, yet she listened.

"Mommy, we'll run together, won't we?"

"Of course we will. But we might be separated. If we are, you must stay with George. And if you lose him somehow, you just keep going and I'll find you again, okay? But you must go when I tell you the time has come. Don't wait for me, no matter what, I'll be there. Promise me?"

Reluctantly, Megan made the promise and with that done, Jenny tried to keep life as happy for her daughter as possible, in their remaining time together.

The travel came to an end in the outskirts of Ogden, Utah. There, The Nation saw its last gain of reinforcements, about a hundred hard-core members from a long-time enclave of white supremacists who had managed to stay out of all the action since the war, but who now threw in their lot with The Nation at this, the eleventh hour of the sixth year.

These locals held a small farm and some outlying houses just south of the former Hill Air Force Base, which had been shut down and turned over to the city of Ogden as a community center since the big war.

Using the thirty-one hostages as human shields, The Nation and its new allies moved onto the base, taking it over.

By now, the US Army had begun passing messages to the leadership of The Nation, demanding surrender and negotiating terms. But the radical leaders still refused and threatened to begin killing a hostage a day until they received what they wanted. And what they wanted was an open corridor of passage among a collection of buildings between the south entrance of the base and the white supremacist holdings nearby. Since the Army controlled the countryside all around, they could afford to agree. In fact, the government military made the appearance of offering The Nation an even greater freedom of movement than they asked, no doubt looking for the possibility of stringing out the manpower of the Nation enough that it could be broken up and, as the terminology in the Civil War would have expressed it, defeat them in "detail".

That was the layout that obtained over the winter and early Spring, while pressures built for some kind of showdown.

In what loomed as the final days, her mother again told Megan everything she could about her father and the wonderful few days when they became lovers and promised to marry, and how things had led up to the end of their time together. For a six year old, Megan was extraordinarily perceptive and seemed to comprehend everything her mommy told her.

Now, despite all the assurances she could make to Megan, that Jenny would come to her daughter no matter where they were in the event of an escape, it was time to admit her fears.

"If something happens and we don't find each other," she said, somehow holding her voice steady, to give the little girl what strength she could, "go to them, and you must tell them about your father and ask them to take you to him."

But it was too much. For the first time, Meg realized her mother expected to die and she cried so hard she became sick and her mother promised her it would all be fine, they just might only be separated for awhile. And that calmed her.

Then finally, one day in June, the war seemed to have come to them. They were all closed up in a big building on the base, what Jenny recognized as an old Air Force hangar. She could hear loudspeakers addressing The Nation, and shouting and commotion, and some of their captors became agitated and started pushing the men among the prisoners, as if to take their frustration and fear out upon them. But led by George, the prisoners remained cool and for an hour or so calm was restored.

Still, the voices spoke from outside, and suddenly, something broke. The prisoners were packed into trucks, the big hangar doors creaked back enough to permit them to pass through, and a headlong rush began, away from the base.

Explosions and fire erupted along the way, creating a thin screen of smoke; two chances for Megan, her mother and George to escape came and were quickly closed off, but thirteen of the prisoners did make free, and as if gathering their remaining family together, the surviving members of The Nation brought the few prisoners who were left back to the farm they had occupied briefly a few days before.

It became a wild run through a gamut of noise and new explosions and their accompanying fire and smoke. When something exploded so close by that the truck swerved, George saw the opportunity she had urged him to look for and he grabbed Megan in his arms and jumped over the side of a truck, running through smoke, looking back, thinking Jenny was right behind them.

But Jenny hadn't seen the move coming in time to follow; the truck accelerated, throwing her into the middle of the cargo bed before she could bail out; by the time she recovered, it was rolling too fast for her to survive a flying leap.

She reached the side of the truck in time to see George and Meg disappear through the smoke, then another great explosion ripped the air right behind them and it was the last she saw of them. The truck pulled to a halt, gunmen directed the remaining prisoners into a nearby barn; she was almost blinded by tears and knew the end was here....

George ran on, hard and fast, carrying the girl in his arms, and suddenly Megan found herself being taken by other arms, by men in strange uniforms she had never seen before.

Megan's last sight of the other prisoners was through a curtain of smoke, as they were dragged by their captors into a barn. Then ten minutes later, while she was shuffled from one strange man to another, the barn blew to pieces in a terrible explosion and Meg collapsed in shock and sorrow, at the death of her beloved mother, the beacon and soul of her life.

BOOK I CONTINUED
Chapter Thirty-Three

SALT LAKE CITY

SIX YEARS AFTER THE WAR

Mike had chosen Salt Lake City as a wall against which The Nation might be forced. He had positioned the Army and Canadian forces so as to channel The Nation down Interstate Fifteen, through the corridor west of the Wasatch Mountains and east of the Great Salt Lake, with nowhere to go but down the valley through Ogden, to what for them would be the dead end at Utah's capital.

Rare among cities in the entire nation, Salt Lake City had neither been bombed nor damaged much by panic after the war. As much as possible, the city had continued to operate normally all these years, and there would be no welcome for The Nation there. The police and National Guard were arrayed against them, and they would know that. Ogden was as far as they could go and they had to make their stand there.

This had been Mike's master plan for closing out the Nation, to run them town by town to this decisive confrontation, where they would have the choice of surrendering or living with their small group of hostages until starved or negotiated out in exchange for food and water.

He had hoped at this late date they would finally come to their senses and surrender from their position in the old hangar at former Hill Air Force Base. He believed he could negotiate or defeat them by attrition right there. If not, then there would be a final fight. There were would be loss of prisoners and it agonized Mike, but he hoped to keep it to one percent. That was too much, yet even Bryant counseled him that it was about as low as could be reasonably expected.

The rest of the army, those on the ground in Ogden, saw it a different way. They wanted to go home, to turn to other things, and so, to end this whole six year long war now and be done with it. To them, twenty or so hostages was an acceptable cost. But Arthur Carver had long, long since made it clear to the military, first under Hoyt Folger and now under General Avery Bryant, that Mike's decisions and orders were the law.

Still, the army commander on the scene tried to push Mike to go along with his plan. And just as stubbornly, desperately, Mike resisted.

Oddly, this little set-to was not taking place on the national center stage. Around the country, in its resurgence, few people knew of or cared what was going on here. It was anticlimactic, the country was whole again and this barely rated a column in any newspaper outside of Salt Lake. The Nation was now equated with some group of "nuts" holed up with guns and a few hostages that only needed to be flushed out, drawing even less attention than the Branch Davidian standoff in Waco, Texas years ago.

But to Mike, his life, his world, everything about his existence revolved around this last operation. These twenty or so hostages became metaphors for the whole war he had fought not just against the "rebels", but against the entire American political system that had led to nuclear war and then to the existence of this kind of nightmare in the first place.

Already, that entire system that had slipped so badly out of repair, the system called free market capitalism, was as dead as Communism had been after the fall of the Berlin Wall, nearly forty years earlier. But few people recognized that only when The Nation was no more and the last hostages were rescued or dead, would the end of the old world, as epitomized by Harvey Kelcher's presidency end. Only when The Nation was ended would any last remnant of the American Millennium as conceived by the likes of William Smithson and Jacob Kreuter be dead.

When that moment came, when the last hostage walked free under the sun, and Jenny's ghost, who still wandered the halls of Mike's mind finally rested, he would have to face the end of his life, for he would have no other reason to be.

But Leslie was one step ahead of him. She had figured out long ago that when this moment came, wherever it came, Mike would need something to save him. The only hope was that her own daughter Jenny, whom Mike adored as if she were his own, would give him a spark.

And so, Leslie, Frank and Jenny were there at the end of the operation, in the headquarters where Mike worked with army rangers to plan the wrap-up of the Nation.

Squatting on the floor around a local map, in an evacuated high school near the base, Mike familiarized himself with the layout of the area.

"How about the local people who're caught up in this? How much firepower were you using and what kind of safeguards do you have in place to protect them if we don't contain the Nation here?"

"Well you're going to find that most of the firepower's being supplied by the locals," the crusty colonel in charge of the operation told him. "What gunfire there's been has been by them, taking potshots. Our biggest concern is to tone it down. We're moving in to push the locals out of the picture—they're way too goddamn ready to burst in, guns blazing, and to hell with captives."

"No! For god's sakes, get them out of there, then. That's the thing we've been trying to prevent the damn entire last six years! Arrest them if you have to."

"And then what? We don't see a clear way to end this, the bad guys could hole up in that hangar until they all starve. What's the plan?"

"I don't know yet. So let's form one."

"Go ahead, genius, I'm listening...."

Ignoring the sarcasm, over the course of the afternoon Mike did come up with an idea he hoped was good enough.

It was decided to put gentle pressure on the Nation, rather than use force that would make them desperate.

Already, they had been granted that open corridor of free movement from the hangar that they demanded, through that part of town to their recently acquired farm a mile or so south. Initially, after they had fled into Hill Field, the Army had seized the property, but with the agreement, they released it again, and now, Mike wanted The Nation to return to it when they were "smoked out" of the hangar. The farm was a place where The Nation, consisting now itself of about a hundred people, besides the hostages, could be approached more easily in stealth and for negotiations, with a greater likelihood the hostages could escape in any action that should develop. Mike wanted to encourage the leaders that if they let all the hostages go, they would be allowed to escape.

"All this time, to catch these people, and you'd really give them a walk?" the colonel said.

"Look, it's never been about them. Never. From the very first hour of the war. It was always about the people, the hostages. When they're free, and these people are disarmed, the work is done. The whole atmosphere under which they could do this kind of thing is gone. Sure, I'd like them in custody, but that's not the first goal. If to save the hostages, it means letting the leaders go, that's the route we'll take."

"That's bullshit. You're too fucking soft on 'em."

"Yeah? Then let me you something: they killed my woman and my child. If you don't think I want to make them pay, you don't know anything. But I know that if she were still with us, she wouldn't hear of it, not for her sake, that the hostages should die. She would be right there telling you to let these bastards go if that was the only way to save the people. And hard as it is for me to say the same thing, that's what I'm doing. If it takes letting them go, to save the hostages, we'll do it."

The colonel spat but he made no open dissent. However Mike had the sickening feeling that he had doomed everyone.

The colonel had no intention of letting The Nation go free, to hell with the hostages. And as long as the colonel disavowed that intent, Mike could do nothing to defend against it.

For a few minutes he stared out the window, terrified he had just made the mistake of his life, perhaps even bigger than going to Paris without Jenny.

But now, it was time to move on his plan and do the best he could.

Messages informing The Nation, inside the hangar, of the offer were called out over bullhorns, but there was no reply. Over the course of a long night, nothing new developed and dawn opened fiery and threatening.

However not long after first light, the doors of the hangar opened, and trucks rumbled out. Mike received the message at the school and the colonel in charge on the scene said they were "going for it" with incendiary devices, hoping to confuse the Nation so a ranger squad could rush them and rescue the hostages.

"Negative, negative, negative, let them go!"

"No, I've had it up to here. I'm finished with your appeasement, Lansford. I might get fired over this, but right now, it's my fucking operation, and you can't stop it."

And so it was done. The army set off the explosives, creating clouds of smoke and confusion, but there was gunfire, coming from the Nation, and they made a mad dash for the farm. A haze of dust and smoke enveloped the scene, hiding everything behind its gray cloak.

Out of the cloud, seven hostages emerged, seven who had seized a moment of confusion and fled. Seven, only seven. The others remained behind the smoky wall.

And then came the great series of explosions, a suicide blast, the end of it all, The Nation up in a fireball, taking the remaining hostages with them.

Utterly lost and defeated, Mike reached the command post, where he fell to his knees on the floor, oblivious to anyone around him, torn apart in sorrow for these innocent people he had never met and had desired so fervently to save. The colonel, who had fought in all the battles of the last six years expressed contempt for Mike, and seemed to hold no fear of reprisal for his mutiny and the deaths it had caused. And Mike was too distraught to take action. He was as close to emotional collapse as he had been in all the time since he learned how Jenny had really died.

Frank Keller was there; once again he tried to bring Mike out of it.

"Listen to me," Keller said. "This couldn't have gone any better no matter how you tried. These were bad people, Mike. They destroyed a lot of lives along the way, and the people who were here must have been with them a long time. They were still liberated, Mike. It's horrible to say but death had to be better than what they had gone through all this time. Over all these years, you put our country back together. This was the best way it could have been and you should be proud."

"Then why aren't I? Proud? I'm just tired. Why does it all seem like a failure to me? It's all so empty. Nothing's left, Frank, this just feels like the end. I just want to rest. Just rest. Forever, maybe."

"What about Les? And Little Jenny? Don't they mean anything to you? They love you, they need you."

"No, they aren't mine. And shouldn't be. They can't be my life, Frank. They'll grow apart from me and it's the way it should be. So now's the time to let it begin."

"So what are you going to do, find a gun and blow your head off?"

Mike shook his head. "I don't know. That might be the easiest way. There are enough guns around...."

This one time, Frank Keller seemed to find no answer that would bring Mike back from the brink. He didn't even try, didn't lift him up and slap him, he just left the room and Mike thought it was over.

But Frank had one more gambit to try.

She came in and sat down next to him on the floor.

"Uncle Mike."

"Jenny? You shouldn't be here, Honey, this is a terrible thing."

"I know, but Daddy said you needed to see me. I love you, Uncle Mike. Mommy loves you, so does Daddy. I would be so sad if you weren't around. I know about what happened here, but you saved so many people. Please, be happy about those. Please?" She threw her arms around his neck and hugged him, crying softly, and Mike sat there on the floor and held onto her, crying too.

"Mike? Uncle Mike? If something happened to you, I don't know how I could make it." She was a little girl, five years old, and she shouldn't know to even think such a thing. But her words caught him off guard. They were so much like the words her namesake had spoken a long time ago, and he felt something like a shock passing through him. He looked into little Jenny's beautiful eyes, the eyes of her mother, and he felt power returning.

But for how long it would sustain him, he couldn't know. She wasn't his daughter, but he wanted to crush her in his arms and never let her go. And her words had for this moment given him strength he needed to shake himself out of his depression, and for her sake, he made himself appear happy.

Holding her hand, he joined her parents and led them to the dining facility for supper. That night, they all slept next to each other on pallets in a second room of the high school. And for that one night, Mike slept well, but feared for his mind-set when morning came and he must deal with the aftermath of the terrible day's events.

His first request after breakfast was to meet with the last hostages/prisoners who had been saved the day before.

It was what he had done at every liberation since the very first so long ago. Could it be that The Doc was among them?

They were in a nearby hospital being evaluated and allowed to rest before they began trying to return to normal society, a place in time and space where many of them had never been. Accompanied by Leslie, Frank and Jenny, Mike set forth from room to room, where the evacuees were resting.

It was in the third room that the world turned upside down....

She was young, barely older than Little Jenny, seated in bed, her eyes closed, tears on her cheeks. A small bandage was on her arm, where an intravenous attachment was made.

The nurse moved close and whispered to Mike.

"She's suffered a terrible tragedy, she lost her mother yesterday and she's taking it very hard. She may not be up to meeting you."

"I'd like to say a word to her though, something, to try and help her. She's...she seems so familiar to me.

She...." A lump was forming in his throat and he found it difficult to swallow. "I'd like just to ask her...."

"Well we'll try. Come on."

The nurse led him over, with Leslie beside him, holding Little Jenny in her arms just behind Mike, so she could see the girl.

"Honey?" the nurse said, gently touching the child's arm. "There's someone who'd like to meet you."

Eyes flickered open, eyes that were so...familiar. Mike felt himself shaking.

"Yes?" she said.

"Hi. How are you?"

"My mommy...." She managed not to fall apart but fresh tears ran down her cheeks.

"I know, Honey. I'm so sorry. I'm so hurt for you, I feel so badly.

"What's your name?"

"Meg. Megan."

"Megan? That's a nice name. What's your last name, Dear?"

She closed her eyes a moment and breathed shallowly.

"McGuire," she said, the word barely making it past her lips.

The room seemed to go dim. Mike gripped the frame of the bed lest he fall down.

"Mc-McGuire? Who was your mother?"

For a moment, Meg covered her face, fighting not to lose her composure. "Jenny. Jenny McGuire."

And for a moment, the lights did go dim for Mike. He staggered, and both Leslie and Frank were there to steady him; he thought he was dying but it all stabilized after a second or two.

But even Leslie, still holding her own Jenny, seemed not to understand. And then something in this began to reach her.

"Jenny. Oh god," she said. "Meg, who was your father? Did you know?"

"Yes, she never let me forget. Mike. Mike Lansford was his name."

Now, Leslie was the first to figure it out. With a gasp, she was the one who rushed to Meg.

"Honey, this _is_ your father," she sobbed. "This is Mike Lansford!

"Oh, little Dear, we didn't know. I'm so glad to meet you."

And then Leslie asked the question that had not yet impacted Mike.

"Jenny was alive all this time?"

"Y-yes, she died in the explosion, when the barn blew up yesterday. Right in front of my eyes."

Now Megan collapsed in tears. Mike was too stunned to truly comprehend what was going on. For a moment, Leslie, setting her daughter on a chair, leaned over the bed to squeeze Megan to her breast, sobbing in sympathy, not just for her but for Mike as well; it was Frank, trailing behind the others who went to Mike and took him in an embrace, the way he had that many times since the war.

"Mike, I'm so sorry. I know what you're thinking, but you didn't know. You thought she died the way Campion told you, but she had five years more and this wasn't as terrible a way to go as you thought. It was quick...please, don't blame yourself. There was no more you could do."

But Mike was inconsolable. Nothing Frank or Leslie could do would help him stand this. It wasn't for an hour that he finally recovered enough to go to his daughter and finally put his arms around her.

"I love you, Sweetheart," he whispered. "You're so much like Jenny, I saw it when I walked in, you almost are Jenny. And I'm sorry I wasn't there for you."

"You didn't know, Daddy. I've wanted to find you all my life. She always told me if I somehow got away, to find my daddy if I could. If only she had been here too."

When he was somewhat back to his senses, Mike arranged for Meg to be released from the hospital and he took her to a hotel for the night and with Frank, Leslie and Jenny, they sat up talking and hugging each other, the five of them, nearly until dawn.

BOOK III
Chapter One

NEAR OGDEN, UTAH

The report came on his cell phone, about one in the afternoon, causing Mike to almost drop the instrument.

"Yeah, it's true," the colonel from the command post said. "It turns out the buildings on the farm had a series of tunnels with exits outside the fences, toward the valley down there. They skipped, Mike. The fuckers got away, a lot of them. They blew up the house but they weren't in it.

"We don't know if they took the hostages or left them up there when it blew.

"They've moved to a house down near the river. We're going to try and negotiate a final surrender. I was absolutely ordered to let you in on it if you want it."

Red-eyed from the late night with his daughter and his closest friends, Mike sighed and for a brief span of time gave thought to opting out. But this was it. He had thought it was over and now it wasn't.

And most of all, the men who had killed Jenny and had played at least some part in her slavery and Meg's were still alive and for the first time in his life, Mike really felt like killing someone. What he would do when he had them in his hands, he couldn't say. But right now, murder was in his heart.

"I'm there," he told the colonel. "Don't make a move until I get there."

"Then shake it. Sir."

"I said I'm on my fucking way...."

After hugging Meg one more time, Mike rushed to the scene. There, he wasted no time in recriminations over the escape. Once these men were wrapped up and the six-year struggle was finally over, it wouldn't matter. He would go back to his little girl and start trying to give her the life she had been denied her whole existence.

The entire neighborhood had been cleared. The plot of ground occupied land flanked by peach orchards, and there was a line of houses on the last street about a block from the river itself.

"What've you done so far?"

"They're surrounded, they're not going anywhere, so the situation's stabilized. We've got the choice of just storming them and let the chips fall where they may or try and talk them out. Frankly, I'm for the first but I have orders straight from Sacramento to do whatever you say.

"What's it going to be?"

"I already told you my opinion on that," Mike answered. "But now, you know what? I have to tell you, I'm awfully tempted to just blow the fucking place up.

"But no, we're going to finish this the way we carried it out all along. I want to see these bastards eye to eye and that's what we're going to do, unless they've got more explosives and really take themselves out this time.

"I'm going down to talk them out of there. Back me up."

The colonel sighed, knowing how much tougher it would be to do it Mike's way, but he gave the orders. Sharpshooters worked their way closer and covered the direction Mike must go to reach the door, moving so as to face the least threat from gunmen inside the building.

Coming around the house on the east, using bare trees from the orchard as cover, ducking and running, carrying a supposedly bullet-proof shield, Mike worked his way up until he was behind a stone fence just thirty feet from the door. Somewhat backed up by armed soldiers, Mike raised up enough to address the house with an amplified megaphone.

"Listen up, you have no way out of this but surrender," he told them. "However you want to end it, that's how it's going to end. You can come out quietly and we deal with it that way. Or we can come on in and put you out of your misery. Your call."

Mike let them have five minutes to huddle inside before he made the ultimatum.

"In fifteen minutes," he said over the loudspeaker, "if we don't get some kind of indication, we're going to assume you want to go out in a blaze of glory. But any kind of sign, just move a curtain or raise a blind and we'll hold off."

For those fifteen minutes, Mike conferred with the colonel on the phone. And for those fifteen minutes, not a flicker of life showed in the house.

"So how do we finish it?" the Army commander asked him.

"I don't want a shoot-out. I want tear gas up here, and stun grenades, anything to drive them out without a fight. Go ahead, send up somebody who's qualified to use the stuff."

"Jesus Christ, you don't make it easy, do you. All right, you got it."

It was long past fifteen minutes when two men arrived, approaching by the same route Mike had used, one carrying a grenade launcher, the other an olive drab sapper's bag.

"Tell me exactly what that stuff is," Mike asked them, still crouching behind the fence.

"What you asked for, Sir," the sergeant in charge said. "These are stun grenades—you know—flash-and-bang. I can fire 'em right through the window next to the door. Soon as they go off, my partner rushes in and tosses the gas through the hole. Then we wait. They're liable to come out of any opening after that. You just give the word and it's go."

Mike lowered his head for the space of a few breaths.

This was it, all the work of so many years almost over. He should be exultant but all he really felt was psychological exhaustion. All he wanted was just to go back and sit in a rocking chair holding his daughter. And try not to cry every day because her mother wasn't there. To live with the knowledge that Jenny had always been alive but out of all reach would be almost as hard as having never known her fate; or to wonder if he could have rescued her years ago.

It was too much to face, and on impulse, before he had to think any more, he raised his head and looked into the young sergeant's eyes.

"End it," he said.

He covered his ears as the grenade launcher barked and the projectile crashed through the window, exploding with a great loud coughing blast. The second soldier bolted forward and slipped three or four tear gas charges through the hole in the glass then ran back and dove behind the tree again.

The first thing Mike heard was hollering and gunfire inside the house. For another two minutes nothing more happened and he was at a loss. When did they go in and find the bodies, if that's all that was left?

Five minutes more, and Mike heard a shout off to his right. Soldiers in body armor and gas masks who had been watching the scene suddenly rushed around from the front side and onto the porch, yelling and war-whooping. They kicked in the front door and entered with weapons pointed ahead.

There was no answering gunfire, but the back door came open and out of the swirling vapor, forms appeared, in gas masks but civilian clothes.

A woman came first, being escorted out by one of the soldiers who was mask-less now. She stumbled, almost fell on the porch. The soldier made a gesture that the sergeant beside Mike interpreted.

"All clear, he says, the bad guys are dead. Come on."

Mike jumped and ran forward, mystified at the presence of civilians in this house. Must have been there when the men took it over. How could he have known—no one had told him.

Two more civilians, also in masks, struggling, one of them a black man, one an Asian child. Mike helped the latter down and took off her mask.

"You're okay, honey, you're safe. Was this your house?" he asked the man.

"No, Sir, we were with them. With the bubbas. All the way from Carson City."

"What?"

"Yes Sir. We were the slaves. They said so. Are we free?"

"Oh yes, my friend, you're free."

Something was wrong, something Mike couldn't comprehend. They were still coming out and he approached the man, who was now kneeling beside the child as if she were his own.

"We're home, now darling," the man was saying. Mike put a hand on his shoulder.

"Excuse me, but how many were there, of you, in there?"

"About ten."

"Ten?"

Something hit Mike hard, inside his mind, something Meg had told him. Ten. Almost blind now, Mike ran to the house and grabbed the next person out, a black woman. No. The next. A Latino man. No. The next. A black man. The next: a tall woman, stumbling, without a mask, covering her face, choking, spittle running down between her fingers, sobbing from the pain and irritation of the gas.

He picked her up, not daring to believe. He carried her, he rushed to the back yard, and he set her down on a picnic table. Ripping off the bottom of his shirt, he applied it to her eyes, and she slowly took her hands away....

He didn't know her.

He made himself concentrate on helping her anyway, but his heart was breaking. He heard commotion behind him, and just turned his head on instinct.

The woman carried a baby. Her face was covered in dirt and long hair hung down obscuring her features, and she was struggling from the effects of the tear gas. Yet just as something about Megan had snapped his head around, so did this woman.

He ran to her. He took the baby, he pulled the hair from her face and wiped her streaming eyes....

He could have been flying away on a cloud. He would have known her in any conditions, even if it had been twenty years later.

She still didn't realize, her eyes were still blinded from the gas, but Mike tenderly cupped her head against his shoulder and caressed her hair in an old familiar way for just a moment before he could make his voice work enough to whisper to her.

"Do you recognize my voice?"

Her head came up and she gasped.

"Oh my lord—Mike?"

"Good, so you still remember me. Jenny, I have Megan, she's safe and well. How about you, are you all right?"

"Oh god, yes, but I never stopped thinking about you for a minute. I can't believe this."

"No, I can't either, but come on, let's go home. We've got our whole lives ahead of us. All three of us..."

Chapter Two

SAN FRANCISCO

On the site of the old city hall, which had resembled the now vanished capitol in Washington, the new capitol of the United States had been built, in San Francisco. The move to transfer the actual government from Sacramento to San Francisco had not been made yet but would happen this year. In front of the new capitol, across a short mall was the new President's mansion, deliberately not patterned after the White House. On the mall itself was a tall monument to all those who had died in the bombing of San Francisco.

Many blocks away, down on New Montgomery Street, a building was rising where the _Sentinel_ had existed. As with every new building in town, a plaque had been installed naming as many of those who had lost their lives in that location as were known.

Up on a hill, overlooking town, with an especially lovely view of the new Coit Tower, was a row of houses, copies of the famous homes painted in pastel colors, across from the approximate location of the park once called Alamo Square, where tourists had flocked to take pictures.

It was the very place they had once spoken of having a home, before the war, fearing however that it would have been too expensive. Still, it had been a dream of theirs.

With San Francisco growing again, Jenny found it almost impossible to believe that she had seen the city go up in a mushroom cloud. It was not nearly finished being rebuilt, there were many open spaces but each site was being restored as much as it had been Before as could be done, except to eliminate things that were better left to history. Even a China Town was rising out of the ashes, and the main changes in the city were improvements of rundown areas. The new San Francisco would be one of the great cities of the world, even greater than it had been Before.

Jenny hugged her husband and their daughter stood beside him. For just a moment more, they took in the sight of their new home. Then the three of them crossed the street. Behind them came George Howe, who would live on one side of them. On the other would be the Kellers.

Little Jenny and Meg were more like sisters than just best friends. Already, Meg was excited about going to school. But she would be far ahead of her class because her mother had taught her well, well enough that she might belong two or more classes beyond her age group. But that was for later in the year.

For now, finally, Mike opened the door and carried his wife over the threshold, with their daughter right behind them, into the home they had waited over six years, and through a war, to enjoy.

