“Shit! Olmstead’s going to have our heads!” Vince shouted.

            “Hold it together.  They don’t know how things went down,” Fox said.  “For all they know Briggs could have been ambushed while investigating suspicious activity.”

            Although he tried to reassure his friend, Fox was terrified that Olmstead would be displeased.  They’d been put in charge of a small security team with five troops.  Vince and Fox were in the service a year longer than the other three and they’d been in charge.  It was their responsibility to keep the younger soldiers alive and under control.  Since hearing about the deaths of their three underlings, Fox had been bracing himself for a trip to Truax’s office.  Now that he’d received a summons to Olmstead’s main building, Fox just wanted to dive under his bed, hugging a pillow.

            To get out of this situation, Fox knew that both he and Vince would have to appear calm, competent, and strong.  If Olmstead suspected their troop of insubordination, Fox and Vince would both be plunged from the wall for sure.  The only question was if they’d be offered to Truax or fed alive to the undead.  Fox wasn’t sure which was worse.

            Their meeting wasn’t for another four hours.  Under normal circumstances, they’d have had time to catch some sleep, but Fox was wired.  To make matters worse, Vince continuously paced back and forth.  Fox wondered how many times his partner would have to complete the circle before his feet pounded the tiles into dust and began wearing down the floorboards.

            “Would you fucking sit still?”

            “Sorry,” Vince said.

            He moved to the top bunk, climbed halfway up then slid back down to the ground where he continued walking.  Fox had picked the bottom bunk.  If the building caught fire, the undead stormed the compound, or someone went crazy and started shooting, Fox would have been able to slip out quickly.  Right now, he questioned his logic.  Fox wondered if the top bunk would conceal Vince’s nervous marathon.

            Irritated, Fox rolled over on his side and faced the wall.  Once Vince’s pacing was outside of Fox’s vision, the noises weren’t so prevalent.  He wasn’t so nervous.  If the meeting wasn’t now, Olmstead wasn’t displeased.  His eyes closed, and the fading footsteps retreated into an abyss.  Soon after drifting off, Fox Mann dreamt of Hell.

*

            When they pulled behind the barn, two guards appeared to their front with raised rifles.  They approached slowly without shouting instructions.  Both men wore ball caps, long sleeved shirts, and blue jeans.  Though Turnbull had claimed they’d been living in the wilderness for months, both men were clean shaven.  Sam assumed that there were at least one or two guards hidden in the ruined crops and tall grass.

            Turnbull hilled the engine and the guards moved to each side, still training their weapons on the passengers.  After waiting until the guards were two yards from the doors, Turnbull rolled down his window.

            “Well Rick,” he said, “looks like I’m one of you now.”

            “Good to see you face to face again.  What’s it been?  Six months?”

            Sam recognized Rick’s voice.  Turnbull had spoken in code over the jeep’s radio, probably arranging the meeting place with the other man.

            “So,” Turnbull said, “You guys feel like raising a little hell?”

            Rick slung his rifle over his shoulder and pulled a hand held radio from his belt.

            “All clear,” he said.  To Turnbull: “Let’s meet inside.”

            Before Rick finished speaking, four more men with rifles emerged from the crops.  Their guns hung over their shoulders, and their disposition was relaxed.  They were dressed similarly to the men who’d met the jeep and each of them had a walkie talkie.  One had a machete strapped to his leg.

            Making a V out of his index and middle finger, Rick pointed at two of the guards.

            “You two hang outside and make sure there’s no trouble.”

            Turnbull and his guards opened the jeep doors and climbed out.  Sam and Helen followed.

            “We cleared out the area, but you never know.  I think we’re safe here for a few hours as long as we don’t make too much noise.  Most of the secure buildings are out in the city where there a ton of those things but here’s nice for a short break.”

            They walked past the barn and entered a farmhouse through the back door.  It led into what used to be a kitchen.  The refrigerator was missing and broken furniture was stacked in the middle of the floor.  When they crossed into the living room, they found a dinner table and five chairs.  A guard met them at the doorway, holding a shotgun.  Another guard covered the front window with a hunting rifle.

            “There are two more men upstairs,” Rick said.

            That meant there were ten troops on the farm in addition to Turnbull and his two guards.  Sam had no idea how well the men had been trained or how long each of them had been living outside.  They had a good sense of the surrounding area, which would work in Sam’s favor if they were on his side.  However, if he and Helen needed to escape, it might be a challenge.

            “We have a couple of new faces,” Turnbull said.

            “What?  You brought a couple of…”

            Before he finished his sentence, Rick raised his rifle.  The other troops followed.  Sam wasn’t sure what made least comfortable: how quick their new acquaintances were to raise their rifles or how badly each of them shook.  As beads of sweat rolled over his eyes, Rick blinked.

            “They’re okay,” Turnbull said, holding his hands out and shaking his head.

            “How do I know that?  How do I know they aren’t going to slip off at the first chance and contact Olmstead?”

            “Olmstead attacked their home.  Why would they want to help him?”

            “For asylum.  Where else are they going to go?”

            “Olmstead is planning to kill their people.  He’s already given their leader to Truax.  These two were next on his list.”

            “Look,” Sam said.  Rick tightened his grip on the rifle and his upper body trembled.  From the horror he’d seen in the past weeks, Sam had no doubt the man pointing the gun at his head had a real reason to be paranoid of any new faces.  Letting his eyes wander to Helen, he saw the girl move her eyes between the armed guards.  Perhaps she was planning a daring escape.  Sam again thought of the troop numbers.  Keeping his hands in Rick’s sight, Sam said: “We want that son of a bitch as bad as you do.”

            After the words left his mouth, Sam realized how bad they’d sounded.

            “Of course you’d say that.”

            “How are they going to slip away?” Turnbull asked.  “Olmstead thinks they found a way to keep the dead from walking.  Some kind of a vaccination.  I’m not sure what he wants with it, but he’s willing to kill over three hundred people to get his hands on it.  There are no deals.  This isn’t about finding your people.  Think about it.  Why else would they have even made it to Olmstead’s radar?”

            Rick didn’t seem entirely convinced, but he started to relax.

            “We’re brothers,” Gideon said.  “Trust me.  This is big and it’s about time we got involved.”

            Rick slowly started to lower his rifle.  Sam kept his eyes on him, but noticed Helen relax in his peripheral.

            “Would I have brought them here if I thought they were going to be a danger?”

            Rick let his arm drop, aiming the barrel of his rifle towards the floor and shook his head.  The other gunmen lowered their weapons and Sam noticed the other man who met them out front sigh with relief.

            For the first time, Sam was glad to be unarmed.  Otherwise, he was sure Rick and the others would have gunned him and Helen down.  Though the others seemed more at ease, Sam was going to have to keep an eye on their newest acquaintance.  He had a feeling Turnbull had only won them a reprieve.  He was also worried that Rick would not go along with their plan.  If he had to, Sam would pick a strategic location and attempt to fight off an army by himself but he’d rather participate in a successful campaign with additional bodies and supplies.

            “What did you mean when you said ‘get involved?’” Rick asked.

            “I mean fighting back.  How many of us have been disappeared?  How long has Olmstead been letting bastards like Truax run free as long as they’re useful to him?  You know what?  Helen and Sam here came up with a plan and I think it could work.”

            “Do you have a cigarette?” Rick asked.

            Turnbull fished into his jacket’s inner pocket and plucked out a pack.  He tossed it underhand and Rick snatched the white box with his left hand.  After plucking out a cigarette, he planted it in his mouth.  The soldier then reached into his jacket and fished out a lighter.  After thumbing the wheel several times, Rick tossed it aside.

            “Broken.”

            Turnbull tossed a match book to his brother.  With shaking hands and eager eyes, Rick broke off a wooden stick and struck it against the phosphorus strip.  It took two tries, but this time he was successful.  After lighting the cigarette, Rick took a deep breath of smoke then exhaled with a moan.

            With a grin on his face and looking much more relaxed, Rick said: “I’ve been craving one of these for two months.”

            Sam knew the feeling.  He’d quit smoking a year before the dead started to walk.  The first six months were hard, but Sam didn’t miss the habit.  Even before he’d seen a walking corpse, there’d been times when he needed the stamina smoking had taken from him.

            He wondered how quickly Rick would burn through that pack.

            “Do you think we have a prayer of beating Olmstead’s army?” Rick asked.

            “Not head on, but we have a unique opportunity.  How many people would Olmstead want to know about this cure?  Only a trusted few.  If he really wanted to improve life for everyone here, he’d have negotiated with their people,” he motioned to Sam and Helen.  “He would have told more of his officers what was going on.  If we play this right, he’ll only be able to send his most loyal troops after us and because of where we are, they’ll have to come from the outpost.  That’s probably a hundred men he’ll muster up.”

            “So we take out a hundred of his men?  There are thousands more.”

            “But word will spread.  Olmstead’s people are not invincible.”

            “How many men do you think I can spare?  We’ve lost enough men and women trying to keep our children alive.  We don’t have large raiding parties.  We have to stay in small groups and stay mobile or else live in the sewer.  The undead have taken a few of us, but do you know how many we lose to disease and the winter?  We can’t afford to be revolutionaries.”

            “You have children out there,” Helen said.

            “You have no idea what it’s like,” Rick started.

            Sam eyed Turnbull.  His anxiety mirrored Sam’s own.  The last thing Rick needed to hear was about the atrocities in which Helen had participated.

            “Olmstead would have used the families of suspected traitors as leverage or to set an example.  The refugees had to get their families out of there for a chance at a life.  I know.  I’ve had some experience with a tyrant just as bad.”

            Rick looked puzzled.  His lips parsed like he wanted to say something, but didn’t know what.

            “All we have to do is shake things up.  Put a few cracks in the people’s fear and Olmstead will lose his grip.  We don’t even need to get to him directly,” Helen said.  “You sound like you’re not sure how long your people can survive out here as it is.  With Olmstead out of the way, you can have a home again.”

            Rick stayed silent.

            “We’ve been talking about this for a long time,” Turnbull said.  “If not now, then when?”

            “Before I commit anyone to this, I want to hear the plan.”

*

            “Where are we going?” Ted asked.

            “Don’t know,” Jack responded.

            It was true.  Ever since they’d left the garage, it seemed like Jack had been guided by something else.  From Ted’s perspective, it probably looked like he was driving around aimlessly, without a plan.  Under normal circumstances that would get you killed, but Jack felt that there was a destination, a goal.  He wondered if it was connected to the dreams he’d had in the cramped trailer.

            “Are we heading back to regroup and warn the others?  Are we going to out to the wilderness?  Right now we’re not heading towards either.”

            “I don’t know where we’re going.”

            “Jack, there are too many zombies outside for my liking.”

            “We’re fine as long as we keep moving,” he said although he didn’t quite believe it.  They were passing through a lot of unexplored territory and even though he trusted the guiding force, it would be easy to become trapped.  They’d had to take several detours to avoid streets that were just too thick with the undead.

            The walking corpses weren’t their only problem.  They’d run into several jammed roads that hadn’t been cleared out.  All it took were two or three cars in the wrong place and the road was blocked.  In other places, buildings had crumbled into the street.  Sometimes lamp posts got in the way.  All of it was crawling with the undead.

            “So how is this supposed to help our situation?”

            “I don’t know.”

            “You’re not making me feel much better.”

            The last time they’d had some space between themselves and the living dead, Ted had offered to drive.  Of course Jack refused.  Ted would have taken a logical course of action, steering them away from what they needed to find.

            We need to find something?

            “Look Ted,” Jack started.  “During our ride in the sardine cans, I had a pretty vivid dream.  Helen told me I was pretty scared.  So was she when she couldn’t wake me up.  When we stopped I woke up, but couldn’t remember anything until I saw our greeting party.  I’d recognized some men we hadn’t seen before from the dream.”

            “So what’s this have to do with our current situation?”

            “I can feel something guiding me.”

            “That makes me feel a lot better.  Can I drive now?”

            “Switching seats.  That would be a pretty good trick right now.”

            They both laughed, although Ted’s was more nervous.  The undead packed the streets, but there was still room to move.  Thankfully none of them threw rocks at the jeep.

            After speeding past what used to be a traffic light, Jack’s eyes traveled to a turnoff.  Though the sign was missing, something told him that it led to an interstate.  Freeways were tricky.  If they hadn’t been cleared while there was still a National Guard, they were often clogged.  Though most of the undead on the elevated freeways were trapped in their cars, Jack still didn’t like seeing the backup.  If a blockade formed behind him while there were hundreds or thousands of cars in front, there would be no escape.  However, something told him that this stretch of highway was okay.

            He cut right.  Judging by the way Ted screamed and gripped his seat belt, Jack had taken the turn too sharp.  Ignoring Ted’s protest, Jack sped up as he headed up the on ramp.  When they cleared the curve and passed on to open highway, Ted exhaled.

            “God damn it Jack!  You couldn’t see past that ramp.  There could have been a fucking car there!”

            “I knew there wasn’t,” Jack said.  “Something told me I have to make it onto this freeway and I have to do it fast.”

            “If your driving doesn’t kill us, I’m going to ram my foot so hard up your ass I’ll be picking your teeth out of my boot!”

            “What better reason to live?”

            Though Ted was right, Jack kept the speed at seventy miles an hour until they reached the end of the open road.  After five minutes, the road half filled with cars.  It was as if the clean up teams only had time to clean up half the road.  The cars looked as though they had all been pushed towards the left, leaving the right lane and shoulder opened.  There was no telling what might be ahead, so Jack cut the speed down to fifty.  If the road narrowed, there would be no room to maneuver.  A long string of profanities left Ted’s mouth as though he was praying to a strange new god.

            At least the road’s a straightaway, Jack thought.

            A few miles later, Ted’s cursing stopped, and he pointed ahead.

            “What’s that?”

            Jack squinted and saw a growing speck in the distance.  A vehicle blocked the right-hand lane about two miles ahead.  Immediately, Jack pressed on the break, closing half the distance before the Jeep eased to a stop.

            “Oh fuck this!” Ted shouted.

            “Take it easy, I think we’re supposed to meet with these people.”

            “We haven’t had much luck with that sort of thing lately.”

            “If they wanted to hurt us, they’d be charging at us right now.  Besides, why would I be drawn here just to be attacked by a small group?”

            “I still don’t buy this psychic thing.”

            “If it makes you feel better, you can stay behind the jeep and cover me.”

            “Who’s going to cover me after they shoot you?”

            Ted’s apprehension made Jack uneasy.  Between the two of them, Ted had always been the more adventurous and more likely to get into trouble.  Back at the movie theater, Ted was the one mouthing off to the thugs.  His belligerence only rivaled by Helen’s form.  In all the years they’d known each other, Jack had never seen his friend turn as white as he was at that moment.  It made Jack start to doubt himself and that could get them both killed.

            Before he explored his budding doubts, Jack eased the jeep forward until they were fifty yards away.  They’d given the occupants of the other vehicle plenty of time to prepare, as they were holding a defensive position behind the car.  Jack saw two men and a woman pointing rifles in his direction.

            “Shit, they’re already trained on us,” Ted said, wiping his brow.

            “If we run now, it’ll probably scare them.”

            “Never scare someone with a gun pointed at you.  Looks like it’s too late to do the smart thing.  Let’s try your plan.”

            “Thanks,” Jack said.  “We best leave the rifles inside.”

            That was becoming a pattern in his life.

            Slowly, they opened the doors and stepped out of the jeep.  As their feet hit the crumbling pavement, both boys raised their hands.  Their motions were slow and as casual as they could manage.

            “That’s good,” a man with a forming gray beard shouted.  “Keep those hands where we can see them.”

            “I’m Jack.  This is Ted.  We don’t mean any harm.”

            “Step closer.”

            As they closed the distance, Jack got a better look at the occupants of the vehicle.  The gray haired man and a younger man both looked comfortable with their firearms.  Though stubble sprouted from the younger man’s face, Jack guessed that he kept a cleaner shave than the older one.  They looked as though they’d seen action.  The woman was a different story.  Probably two years older than Jack, she knew how to hold a weapon, but she was nervous.  Jack guessed she’d never held the weapon on a live human before.  Hell, she might have even not faced too many of the living dead.  Of the three guns aimed at him, hers was the one that Jack dreaded the most.

            “What brings you here, boy?”

            “Something told me I needed to be here.”

            “You look familiar,” the old man said.

            Suddenly the three strangers didn’t look so strange.  Jack couldn’t place it, but he guessed he’d seen them in a dream.

            “Have you been having some strange dreams lately?”

            The two men lowered their rifles and stepped out from behind the car.

            “You’ll have to excuse my daughter,” the old man said.  “She’s still a skeptic.”

            “Holy shit,” Ted cursed.

            “You’ll have to excuse Ted.  Same reason.”

            “I’m Sal.  This is Jasper, and my daughter Sarah.”

            “Where did you come from?”

            “Our home got destroyed maybe a week ago,” Jasper said.  “We were hoping we’d find some help.”

            “We have about thirty survivors stashed away.  All of them children plus one other woman,” Sal said.

            “Did your people send out a transmission as you were being attacked?” Jack asked.

            Sarah nodded.

            “I was with a team that responded.  We saw the aftermath.”

            “You might want to know that they took out the fuckers’ leader,” Ted threw in, “so they shouldn’t be causing too much trouble from now on.”

            “I wouldn’t say that,” Sal said.  “They’re on the move.”

            The words came just as hard as a fist to his gut.  His lips trembled as he tried to speak.  After a moment, he regained his composure.

            “Then it looks like we’ve got a lot to talk about.”

*

            After not seeing his brother for the better part of a year, Gideon had to fight to keep himself from crying.  Before Rick’s escape, Gideon wouldn’t have believed that his little brother could have survived outside of the walls.  Before the day he’d been forced to leave, Rick had never seen intense combat.  Unlike Gideon, he’d been a few years too young to serve in Vietnam.  Without a chance to go overseas, Rick hadn’t seen any combat until six months after he joined the service, when the dead started to walk.  He’d been up against the undead, just like everyone else, but he hadn’t been forced to face any living humans more dangerous than rioters.

            Gideon’s unit had been up against various gangs and militias who’d used to collapse of society as a chance to grab real power.  Some had joined, but most of them fought.  Throughout the first ten years, pirates had been a problem.  They’d avoided the main compounds and most of the outposts because there were too many armed guards.  However, they’d routinely attacked scouting and scavenging parties.  Again, Gideon’s unit was called upon to quell the threat.

            Until the last time they’d met, Rick had always seemed jealous of his older brother.  It had disturbed Gideon because had he not been in the war, he wouldn’t have wished for the experience.  Still, he couldn’t blame his brother entirely.  After the horrors he’d seen overseas, nothing shocked him.  He almost felt prepared for what was ahead when he’d first heard reports of corpses rising.  Before he’d seen his first walking corpse, Gideon had woken up in a cold sweat on many nights with the image of Tommy Keller after being hit by American napalm.  His flesh had crisped and blackened and his face was gone, but somehow he was still alive and screaming.  Not even the walking dead could pull that moment from his nightmares.

            Now when he stood outside, facing his brother Gideon felt like he was looking into a different set of eyes.  Rick now seemed to understand what Gideon had gone through years ago.  He’d been pushed further than most other people and was now stronger for it.  At the same time, there was a feral quality about Rick, which scared him.  A little suspicion of the newcomers was to be expected, but his level of paranoia was irrational.  Gideon had feared a shootout back in the barn.  The previous night, Gideon had planned to allow close to three hundred people to die.  He’d have hated it, but Gideon could have lived with himself.  A violent confrontation inside of the farmhouse would have forced Gideon to kill his brother, which was the one action he couldn’t have lived with.

            “So you trust them?”

            “They’re not with Olmstead and we seem to be their best chance at saving their people.”

            Rick had already ordered one of his men to send out a request for any available men to meet at the chosen combat site.  Because Olmstead would surely pick up the broadcasts, they were coded.  Hopefully the chatter wouldn’t tip Olmstead off about what was really going on.  However, he did hope that it would catch his attention.  He hoped it would also make him seem desperate.

            “If we’re going to do this,” Rick said, “we have to make sure that they get no prisoners.”

            “I have that taken care of.”

            Rick followed Gideon to the jeep and watched his older brother pull out a shoe box.  He removed the lid to reveal a supply of cyanide capsules that was more than enough for the group they’d be putting together.  Gideon had carried suicide capsules before for sensitive missions in Vietnam and even after the dead had started to walk.

            “Hopefully we won’t need them.”

            “I should have known my big brother would come through.”

            He placed the box back in the car.  The brothers continued walking around the edge of the property.

            “Is this what it’s been like for you?” Rick asked.

            “What?”

            “About a month ago, I led a scouting party.  We were looking for some new places to settle down, and catch our breath.  It’d be nice to have someplace warm for the winter that’s above ground.  Anyway, we ran into… I guess it was a hunting party.  They recognized us right off and opened fire.  There were three car loads of them to our party of four, so we ran.  It was only a matter of minutes before we got cornered by wreckage.”

            With shaking hands, Rick reached into his pocket and pulled a cigarette out of the pack Gideon had given him.  After three tries, he was able to strike a match.

            “I parked the jeep near a pile of fallen concrete, hoping it would give us some cover.  I was able to dive behind it with one of my men, Luke.  I took a moment to glance back at the jeep and saw Ken take a shot to the head.  I remember his body almost crumbling.  He was probably dead before he got halfway to the ground.  My other soldier, Ronnie took cover behind the jeep.  We returned fire and held them back for less than a minute before Luke dropped.  He was still alive, but in bad shape.  He’d been hit twice in the shoulder and was losing blood fast.  He could have died any minute, but he might have made it.  I took a minute too look at his wound, but there was so much shooting.  I knew if I didn’t get back into the action, I’d lose Ronnie too.”

            Rick paused to take a long drag from his cigarette.

            “If I just turned my back on Luke he could have died, then he’d have been a danger to us.  I turned my gun on him and shot Luke square in the face with my rifle.  He wasn’t ready.  One moment, his eyes were pleading with me.  The next, a good chunk of his head was missing.  I immediately turned towards our attackers to return fire, but I didn’t need to.  The undead moans were loud enough to drown out the gun fire.  The hunters took their time retreating, but they’d decided they didn’t want to deal with us and the undead at the same time.  When it was over, Ronnie asked me how Luke was.  I couldn’t tell him the truth…  I told him, Luke bled to death before I shot him.”

            Rick stopped walking and looked around, perhaps afraid someone would see him.

            “God, I see Luke’s kid almost every day.”

            His voice quivered and he couldn’t say any more.  For a few seconds, Rick attempted to hold back a sob, but lost the battle.  Gideon took his brother in his arms.

            “It’s okay, man.  I’ve had to do the same thing.  You had no way to know the battle would end in a couple of seconds.”

            Gideon had learned to live with life or dead decisions.  They’d been a necessity for him for more than half of his life.  But for Rick, the shooting had to have been infinitely worse.  He’d been involved with such decisions, but he’d never had to make them.  Again, he thought of Tommy.  Had he not been trying to keep himself alive and if a Huey not been in sight, Turnbull probably would have killed the mutilated soldier to put him out of his misery.  But even then he knew the soldier was going to die in a matter of minutes, maybe hours.  Even if the doctors were able to keep him alive, he’d have needed to be drugged and kept on machines, which was no life at all.

            “Pull yourself together.  You don’t want your men to see you crying like this.”

            “I’m sorry.  I just haven’t talked about it since…”

            “It’s okay.  You’ll have plenty of time for regrets in a couple of days if we’re still alive.”

            “How’d you get used to this?”

            Gideon wanted to say he didn’t.  It’s what people always said in these situations.  But in truth, that would have been a lie.

            “You know just last night, I was prepared to just sit back and let Olmstead execute Sam and Helen’s people.  I’d hoped it would enrage our people and start a rebellion.”

            There was no hint of surprise in Rick’s expression.  Gideon wondered if his brother had always seen him as a cold monster.  He hoped his little brother didn’t aspire to achieve such indifference.

            “What changed your mind?”

            “I guess I still have a soul.”

            “We should leave soon.”

            “Yeah.”

            They walked off in separate directions.

*

            Buckingham had picked up Fox and Vince himself.  Had they not worked closely with him in the past, Fox would have been horrified.  As the jeep rolled on, Fox had made sure to keep track of where they were going.  If they were rolling towards a painful execution, he needed to prepare himself.  They were heading to the main building’s parking garage.  The meeting wasn’t on the wall.  As long as they weren’t scheduled to talk with Truax, it was a good sign.  Though Vince was still shaking, Fox relaxed when he saw Buckingham press the button for the top floor.  Throwing someone off of a rooftop in the middle of a compound wasn’t Olmstead’s style.  They were in the clear, at least for now.

            When the elevator doors opened, Buckingham directed the boys to the doorway at the end of the hall.  Doing as they were instructed, Fox and Vince made their way to a wooden doorway.  Though other offices lined the hallway, Fox suspected they were empty.  Not only did Olmstead like his privacy, but he was paranoid as hell.  Not just that the people surrounding him were plotting.  Chemical attack, brain embolism, heart attack; there were a hundred ways a person could just drop dead.  From what Fox had picked up, he figured Olmstead was afraid of all those things.  The only people who were allowed to stay near him for long periods of time were people Olmstead could not picture dieing.  Fox figured he should have felt honored, but there was still a nagging sense of doom whispering from the back of his mind.

            Unsure of just opening the door, Fox knocked.

            “Mr. Bianchi and Mann please take a seat,” Olmstead greeted.

            “Thank you,” both boys responded.

            “I understand the three guards found dead last night were under your command.”

            Vince looked like he was about to open his mouth and say something.  Instead he kept quiet and looked over to Fox.

            Good, Fox thought.  Just stay quiet and play cool.

            “My condolences.  I’ve lost plenty of men in combat.  I know what you must be feeling right now.”

            He didn’t say “I’m very displeased with you.”  Fox and Vince might just get out of this building alive.

            Fox thanked Olmstead again.

            “You probably want a crack at the people who killed them.”

            “More than anything,” Vince said.  Instead of nervous he now seemed excited.

            “Good,” Olmstead’s response had mirrored Fox’s thought.  “Two of their soldiers disappeared last night and a source tells me that they had help getting out.  Gideon Turnbull disappeared soon after along with two other refugees.  A source informed me that he’d been working against us the whole time.”

            After the incident with his brother, Fox wasn’t surprised at all.

            “I’m going to assemble a hunting party and Buckingham has spoken very highly of you both.  It’s not a command position, but I’m assigning you both to the operation.”

            Holy shit!  They’d been assigned outside duty before, but Vince and Fox had never been in a hunting party.

            “I want you to get some rest.  Someone else will handle your shifts until you’re needed, but stay where we can find you.”

            “Yes sir,” they said.

            “Dismissed.”

            When they got back down to the garage, there was no ride waiting for them, but that didn’t bother Fox.  They weren’t going to be needed right away, so why not celebrate?

            When they got outside of the parking garage, Vince jumped in the air and shouted: “Fuck yes!”

            “The bar?” Fox asked.

            Again, Vince said: “Fuck yes!”

            There weren’t many women in the compound, but maybe one of them would get lucky.

*

            There’d been chatter all over the radio since the previous night.  Olmstead had recognized two of the voices.  Others where vaguely familiar.  Turnbull had been talking to his brother and several defectors were talking to each other.  Maybe they were figuring out where the new escapees should go.  It was also possible that they were planning something.  They had refugees who knew where the cure was.  It was an important time for them.

            Olmstead had the feeling that it was an important time for him too.  If Turnbull had made connections to the escapees, he’d lead the hunters straight into their network.  Gideon might not break in Truax’s playhouse but Richard Turnbull was a wild card.  The younger brother had always been weaker, but hearing his voice on the radio had been a big surprise.  If Olmstead had to guess, he would have figured the brother would have died shortly after escaping the compound.  Getting him under Truax’s torch would be an interesting experiment.

            Olmstead reached under his desk and pulled out a bottle of bourbon and a snifter.  After plucking the cork from the bottle, he poured two fingers of the amber liquid into his glass and drank.

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