Cruel Summer

Alix smiled when their gazes met, but it quickly faded as she felt darkness, like a cold shade passing over her on that warm day. It thrilled her and she stood there blinking at her best friend, Olly Phines, actually shivering.

"A goose walked over your grave," Olly told her, because the day was too sunny for shivers, "The place where you're going to be buried, a goose walked over your grave."

Alix barely heard these words as Mother pushed past Olly and grabbed her arm dragging her across the play yard. She followed staunchly, still tingling all over marveling at what she was feeling, it was not déjà vu but something akin, a premonition she was sure.

"Momma Hen," she said, when they reached their car, "Why hath thou come for me so early?"

Mother seemed to realize then that she was acting ultra-bizarre; she smiled and played along with their usual game; a fairy tale language and alternate egos, Momma Hen and Clever Chick.

"We've some urgent business on the other side of town my dear," Mother said, "We have to take a special ride and leave Silver City forever."

"Leave?" Alix asked. She had never known any other place but Silver City, and P.S. Lily of the Valley where she attended school, and the scandalously yellow mansion she shared with Mother with the park right across the street.

"I don't want to leave," she whined, "Olly is here, and our home is here…remember Momma Hen? All of our wishes were to come true there."

"I know my Clever Chick," Mother said and sighed, "But an evil has come upon the land, we will not be safe here much longer."

"Has someone found out our magical secret then?" Alix asked sadly.

"Something else," Mother said, she would not say anything after that, she just hunched over the wheel occasionally growling as she weaved through traffic. Alix stared out the window at the familiar sights of Silver City; the Sports Coliseum where there was a special wild animal show every year, (actual crocodiles, bears, and lions too) the towers of downtown, and beyond in the distance the Silver City Power Plant where Mother was the board's chief scientist. She was also curator if the museum of the Silver City museum of natural science. They went to all sorts of parties and Mother always won awards, was called a genius, one of the greatest minds of the century, the city loved her, so the city loved her daughter, called her clever Alix in bylines in the papes.

The sky was too blue and wide; with the most perfect clouds she had ever seen, for Mother to be hurrying her out of school to some mysterious destination. She wanted to tell her mother this, but only shared the comment about the clouds.

"Fool," Mother yelled at a lagging motorist, "Doomed fucking fools."

When she caught Alix staring at her she told her to reach into the dash caddy and fetch a cigarette, she even told her to light it for her.

"You're my darling, Clever Chick," she said between puffs as they exited to a rougher, older part of town, where children wandered the streets in the middle of the weekday, that vacant look mother once told her was hunger in their eyes.

"I would never let you down, I would move the heavens to avoid any catastrophe," Mother told her.

Alix smiled a bit, because she believed her, she spoke seriously then, not playing the fairy tale game. "I understand Mother; something evil is coming, seriously."

"Then you must know we are going on one of the biggest adventures of our life," she said.

An explosion like thunder above their heads startled her and she swore again, saying that awful old "F" word, she stopped the car telling Alix to get out, to hurry.

They were in the parking lot of some old grocery store. There were other cars parked; silver sedans like their own, the sunlight splintering off their slivers-of-chrome bumpers, not the sort of cars that would visit such a shabby side of town.

There was another roar like thunder and the very air around them trembled, they both looked up to see the flash of light, the tail behind a black bubble with stubby wings as it arced across the sky and out of sight.

"Mother what was that?" Alix asked.

"An escape pod," she answered, taking her hand, pulling her across the parking lot, calling out for someone named John who opened the front door.

"I thought I told you to leave her," he told Mother, "We could have missed our chance."

"You're insane," Mother growled, "I'd have perished here in this doomed city first."

"We're late," John said.

Alix did not look at him; some of Mother's closest friends did not care for her daughter. They were jealous, Alix was sure.

Upon entering the building, she almost expected to see a grocery, bright florescent displays, and refrigerated cases, a lady giving out free samples of cookies. Instead, there were steel beams, a large opening in the ceiling, the glare of day shining through, the hissing of hydraulics, and the smell of propulsion gas. She saw two more pods, the front open, two short rows of seats inside.

"Where are we going?" Alix asked, frightened, she had not told Mother but she had been able to clock the sped of the last pod. It was faster than any of them had ever traveled, and she was sure that Olly's father (who owned a car lot) could not get his family a ticket to ride in the pod.

Alix stopped in her tracks when she was not answered, Mother stopped, and turned, she looked like normal for a second, stooping to smooth Alix's pinafore hugging her. "Please don't be frightened, this is perfectly safe."

"It's the plant isn't it?" Alix asked pulling away, "-But the drills. The bell didn't sound we didn't go down to the basement-"

Mother caught her wrists. "This is the drill, Honey," she said sternly. "Those drills are just to comfort the masses. Do you think a basement can keep you and your friends safe when five hundred megatons, aimed at just the right reactor comes to town?"

Alix tried to escape her grasp but Mother held strong.

"Clever Chick, you're smart enough to answer me," she said, "Do you think you'd be safe from that?"

"No," Alix said.

"Then we must go," Mother said, taking her to the pod, "We're going to land somewhere near the gulf; Photon City."

She took her seat in the back with Alix, the man; John, sat up front, the harnesses floated down from the ceiling and Mother made sure their own were locked tight. Alix looked around the inside of the pod, it was seamless, there was a small oxygen supply probably a little extra vented in so they would all be giddy as they were whipped through the stratosphere faster than the speed of sound.

The pod reminded her of the slingshots the boys at school were not supposed to have how a pebble could bruise like a baseball with just the right velocity.

Alix wondered if John was smart enough to know the risk involved, his brow was sweaty, he wiped at it with the cuffs of his sleeves. The woman in the control tower talked to him over the intercom asked him if they were all in the restraints. John told her they were "Go."

Mother gasped as the pod began to tremble, the rockets behind it powering up, she knew the risk, how dangerous it was to be flung across the country like a pea out of a boy's slingshot.

"I've put too much faith in science for it to fail me," she whispered.

John let out a savage howl as the rockets burst, projecting them up and out of the grocery. Alix was glad they could not see the blue sky blur with the clouds, all white, she doubted if John would howl at that, he would not have a choice but to stare in awe and wet his pants.

Alix was impressed, the pod glided smoothly, trembling every minute or so for a few seconds. Mother did not say a word. John eventually stopped howling; panting now, out of breath.

Then, the pod began to shudder, then it began to shake, Alix called out to Mother and noticed that she had fainted; there was something more in the air than extra oxygen; just in case the occupants should experience turbulence or suddenly lose propulsion and begin to plummet.

Alix raised her harness; a small alarm began to complain as she eased over the seat next to John he was muttering in his unconsciousness.

"Doomed fool," she said to him as she looked over the front panel, a series of vid screens displaying their altitude, speed, power, and course.

The pod rolled sideways, Alix lost her balance, fell back across John's lap, she pulled herself upright, and looked to her Mother, saw the strip of blurred sky appear over her head, the wind like giant, ghostly fingers prying the pod open.

Alix was frightened then, she wished she was asleep like Mother and John, she would not have to see her self be torn apart by the forces generated by the pod, would not have to watch Mother die.

She crawled back over John to look at the screen; they were half landing, half falling as they approached their destination, loosing speed, but not enough. She tore at the panel beneath the screen burning her fingers, she found the mainframe, sure that if the computer could gage their descent it could access the components to control it.

The creature was stubborn but not very secure; it tried to detour Alix with long-winded questions that might have confused a simpleton. She was able to access the pilot and arrange a premature reduction of speed, a new descent pattern. It complied; she tampered with the rockets keeping the pod level.

"What next?" she asked as they neared landing, "What next?"

"Alix?" she turned to see Mother twisting in her harness calling to her groggily, a stream of blood ran from her nose.

"We're crashing," she told her, "We're going to crash."

The computer prompted landing gear, Alix agreed, and the screen showed her a series of floatation devices expanding as air filled them.

"We're supposed to land in water?" she asked Mother who nodded.

"The gulf," she said, "The gulf."

The top half of the pod ripped off, Alix ducked down, further reduced their speed, the pod scraped earth, then flipped, tumbling across black asphalt, and then turned right side up, skidding to a halt.

She did not look at John, still strapped in his seat, as she crawled back across the seat for her mother. She found only a sparking set of wires where the second seat had been. Alix raised her head peered down the highway at the trail of debris, Mother was among them.

She climbed out of the pod, her legs trembling as she jogged down the highway calling for her mother. She looked around her for any signs of civilization, buildings, or people. There were only grassy hills. She followed the broken pieces of the pod off the asphalt to a rut of over turned earth.

She found Mother there, still strapped in to her harness in her seat; she had lost a few pieces in the crash as well.

"Who's the doomed fool now?" Alix asked her; angry though she was sure she should have been sad.

Mother always explained what Alix was to do if anything happened to her, that she was to run and hide. Alix knew that if she were around when people discovered the wreckage they would try to take her to see a doctor, even if she convinced them she was fine. She could never allow that.

Alix reached into her pocket and pulled out a small medallion, Olly had given it to her and she kept it secret from Mother who thought religious cults were ridiculous. Alix though, found herself drawn to the phenomena that lurked in the shadows behind science.

The medallion came on a red cord, it was a coppery bronze color engraved with a single flame shaped like a heart. Alix hang it around her neck. The flame was the emblem for a pair of Goddesses. Mother said she was just being rebellious, but Alix liked to think that she truly believed, that she had faith.

"I hope that you wake up somewhere Mother Hen," she said, "I hope that someday I will wake up there too."

She looked up at the blue sky, and went on her way.

- - - - - - - - -

-I-

-The Convoy-

Because falling rain sounded so similar to distant gunfire she woke up in that pissed off angry way, reaching for her Hammersmith and fat blade at once, believing she would open her eyes to some desert or jungle or a crumbling ghetto. Her lids leapt apart as her snatching hand punched over a lamp, the crash startled her to her feet.

She froze and let her senses catch up to her actions; let her eyes see the gray spaces between the vertical blinds, the posh wallpaper of the first rate hotel, the over flowing bucket of bitterly melted ice around the unopened champagne bottle, the water running in a purposeful rivulet that spread around her retirement plaque.

She shrugged out of her black dress coat decorated with her ribbon pins, and creased by sleep laying it across the chair. She walked to the other side of the suite flexing her sore knees on the way to the bathroom. She used the toilet and splashed some water on her face.

She returned to the chair she slept in to retrieve the plaque, began drying it on her undershirt as she went stopping to read the inscription in the gloom of day.

"Presented to USMC General Eustace T. Grimke in honor of her retirement from active duty by virtue of uncommon valor," there were the same words spoken to her the night before at her discharge.

She had not realized that the Marine Commandant was reading the plaque, but thought they were words selected for her occasion. The Commandants signature was listed below the words, as was that of the Commander in Chief, and the presidential eagle.

General Grimke's retirement discharge ceremony had been a press conference, the commandant, a couple of cabinet members, the cameras, and of course, the plaque; branded brass and real wood a souvenir of her forty years of service to her country's defense.

After the interviews and the photo ops they were all gone to the four corners, Grimke returned to her suite to enjoy her spoils; a fancy, opulent supper and her plaque as if her road home had been fraught with steak and champagne, that her retirement would as well be bubbly and frivolous.

Grimke showered and redressed. She called the concierge and two boys in burgundy came for her trunks.

All of the exclusive guests were still asleep, people tended to do more of that lately, the hours of the day pushed back because physically there was no more day.

The nuclear winter was estimated to last for another year. Scientists under pressure from the government did not dare speculate what poisons would rain down once the atmosphere circulated, when the radioactive particles blown into the sky would settle, or what shape the ozone would be in once the skies cleared.

Grimke entered the gray day carrying her two black weapons cases marked with red X's. A cab was hailed for her, and her trunks loaded. She told the driver where she was headed, and then stared out the taxi window as she passed 1600 Pennsylvania and the White House Museum with its huge, park lawns studded by people and statues of the presidents of old.

She sat back as the cab sped past a vagrant holding up his hands as the local police and their vicious, barking black dogs accosted him, the scene soundless from her side of the window.

Just a week back and she saw that her fellow soldiers had not just been exaggerating gossip from unreliable news sources; there was a fucking apocalypse back home. The skies were darker than the stories she had heard, darker than the romantic perpetual twilight she had envisioned; the flat gray of a stormy day, but black up top like a malevolent God peeking through window blinds.

The cab stopped at the cara-terminal, she paid the driver who turned and saluted her eyes hard, shiny with some emotion; Grimke had gotten many such reactions that week. She only nodded stiffly.

She carried her weapon cases into the terminal two of the D.C. cops checked her cases, eyes fondling the Hammersmith, and the sword, exchanging glances before scanning her breast of ribbons recognizing the ones that represented her silver star, her bronze stars, her purple hearts.

Grimke knew she was a sight; she wore her winter service blues, a red beret over her short, silver hair, a gray long sleeved shirt with the collar and red tie peeking over the v-neck of her black cable cardigan, her ribbons affixed over her breast, her three stars pinned across her shoulders, black trousers tucked into calf high boots with white overshoes. The uniform had been her skin for forty years. She would have felt odd in civilian clothes.

She waited in line briefly to pass through the narrow X-Ray passage that scanned people as they went with though them and their baggage for weapons and illegal contraband. She was stopped once again her cases explored, her sword and gun scanned and approved for travel.

Like the cops, and the taxi driver, the cara-terminal workers drivers and security were mostly discharged soldiers, they either resented her three silver and black stars or revered them, but they all saluted when they noticed her arrival.

She answered each salute with a nod as she checked her bags, none of the cara-terminal personnel had any noticeable scars, or disfigurements but their eyes told of other wounds, they were Grimke's own eyes. Discharged soldiers usually worked the tough jobs if they were not physically broken, jobs like the caravans across country.

The terminal was a cement-walled rectangle that stood an empty shell most of the time, until the traveling city the convoy returned with people, and their habits, bringing it to life.

The Silver City blast six months before made inter-public travel impossible, and the trains had few stops as they crisscrossed the country. The caravans went from Canada to Mexico, from the Pacific Public to the Atlantic. They were simply foilies; mobile, fiberglass homes in an array of colors; hauled by trucks flanked by armed riders on motorcycle because the land between cities was lawless.

Grimke slipped on her all-weather, black pea coat to ward off the chill and began her exploration. The foilies were parked in the formation they had arrived in, mechanics looked under the hoods at the engines while the travelers milled around, stretched their legs, and smoked.

There were several mess foilies smoking from their cooking, there were little shop foilies that sold everything from toiletries to contraband; things like cigarettes and chocolate. Certain industries had failed after the blast; their products disappeared from the market, were hoarded, and could only be acquired in between cities.

The owner of the convoy, one Shannon Cole, had chosen gray as the color her fleet all emblazoned with a bronze C. Some of the foilies were singles, some splits, shared by two different travelers or families.

It had been a long time since Grimke saw children, real live children who moved, playing, bickering, and eating sweets, unlike the war waifs she usually came across that barely moved except to exhale a heavy breath or blink, propped up against walls starving or laying in the streets dead.

These she saw in the terminal were the little princes and princesses of the middle class dismissed the anxiety their parents felt traveling cross-country, they stamped their little feet demandingly as if they were on a holiday.

She nearly smiled at them though their energy caused her old bones to tire instantly; her knees and shoulders ache.

A day officially discharged and she was already falling apart, already overwhelmed. She paused to collect herself she stopped a greasy, sallow, man wheeling a metallic cart and bought a fu sandwich.

After the blast, there was not much of anything to eat; Farm Corp (the country's crowning achievement, located in the Midwest) was lost. Even for those who could afford the tripling of prices on non-perishable foods, things were scarce. The Zepeda Corporation developed a food substitute once unpopular because of its blandness it could be molded into any shape, and coaxed into any texture. There was plenty of fu for the food crisis, the government bought a surplus and gave it away until Zepeda Corp perfected and marketed the new products.

She ate while leaning against one of the cement calls of the cara-terminal, the fu bread on Grimke's sandwich was spongy, the so-called roast beef was perfectly tender though, the mustard spicy. She tracked down the squeaky cart and bought a second sandwich. She ate it slowly, in a bliss wondering at what other earthly pleasures she was free to seek.

She admitted to herself then, as she lunched, that sex had haunted the darkest part of her mind. She had started chasing and catching girls at the age of eleven was defiant of her straight-laced mother, Elder Grimke's disdain. She sent her rebellious daughter to military school and after graduation authorized her enlistment into the Marines at seventeen, just as her father had for her, and his father did for him.

War was Eustace Grimke's career, and there was no time to spare for wooing women, and though her senses were still sharp, her body still strong, she was afraid she would wither and perish upon entering the civilized world.

The few days in D.C. had renewed her confidence in her attractiveness; she received plenty of stares and flirtatious gestures. She suspected that it was the uniform.

She had always been lean, broader in her younger days, but age loosened her muscle mass. Grimke was well above average height and that alone got plenty of attention, as did her distinguished cap of silver half-curls, her gray-brown eyes set deep beneath her brow, her dark rich brown-skinned face with sharp features and high cheekbones.

She finished her second sandwich and continued walking the line of trucks and foilies. Towards the end of the line she noticed the red lights; single scarlet bulbs that glowed dimly above the doors of the foilies at the end of the line but she did not realize they had a meaning until the whispers started.

"Hey boss," a man whispered from the side of one trailer, "I got cards in here, come on in, play a game. Make some wagers."

"No thanks," she said blandly as she passed wondering if she should have brought her fat blade or her Hammersmith along.

She passed the next two red-lighted trailers without incident. A languid silhouette waited at the foilie that followed, she had been looking down smoking a cigarette but livened as Grimke neared, was smiling when she left the side of the foilie to meet her.

"A Marine," she called playfully, walking in step when Grimke quickened her pace.

"You just out or something?" she asked.

"Yes, and whatever you're hawking I'm not interested," Grimke said turning her head the woman was less than half her age, a boyish face hair beneath a gray fedora cocked over one eye.

The young woman laughed. "You don't know what I'm hawking," she said, "But I know what you need."

Grimke paused to face her. "What?"

"I know your type," she answered, "Off into that soldiering; I got some girls who can't wait to meet a soldier such as yourself."

Grimke walked on faster, ignoring her, but the pimp began to skip beside like a jester, talking.

"I can let you talk to them for nothing," she said, "Just to get to know them, get you a cocktail and a back massage…You listening? I'm talking about paradise here, you ain't such a creeper you wouldn't enjoy that."

"Excuse me?" Grimke asked, stopping in her tracks she was used to dealing with you but not any that dared disrespect her, "Did you just call me a creeper?"

She had not heard the words since she fought with her mother shortly before going off to military school. She was surprised the newest generations of youngsters had not picked up another word to ridicule their elderly.

The young pimp's look of amusement faded a bit, she seemed relive some moment with her mother, and she opened her mouth to speak.

"Get used to it, General," a stubby dusky woman appeared, pausing, statue straight to give a brisk salute. She wore loose trousers tucked into her boots, a long, royal purple coat clasped by ornate gold buttons, black cavalry gloves that come to her elbows she had to be pushing ninety.

"So nice to have you aboard," she offered her hand.

Grimke nodded and shook with her. A few people around D.C. recognized her from the pictures in the banners, the hourly news that flashed on certain vid channels, always in her black dress uniform decked with medals and ribbons.

"Get lost," she said to the young pimp then turned her attentions to Grimke squinting she looked her up and down.

"Hell you look as stoic in real life as you do in your pictures."

Grimke was not used to being addressed so frankly, she was sure she had not been ribbed since basic training. It was refreshing and unsettling at the same time. She did not know how to reply to the woman who just laughed.

"USMC Corporal Shannon Cole, retired," she said, "I hardly ever introduce myself that way, Grimke but you have that affect on me."

"Semper Fi," she took the little old woman's hand, recognizing the name as the owner of the caravan.

"Always faithful," Cole said her hair was a wispy white halo around her head, "You strike me as the type."

"Your fleet is impressive," Grimke said.

"You've wondered down to the end," Cole said, "No one comes down here unless they're looking for some diversions."

"I was exploring," Grimke said, "I had no idea you had such amusements in your caravan."

"Of course," Cole said leading her towards the front of the convoy, "Drinking, gambling and girls…I started off transporting goods, people and their vices are much more profitable."

Grimke nodded her eyes straying to an approaching woman, her gaze sticking to the graceful form. She was stunning in a black suit with a pink and pale yellow tartan, a matching drape trimmed in black sable at the hem and a high collar shaped to show her throat, a matching skirt made full by several more gauzy layers of pink beneath revealing shapely calves and pumps despite the weather.

Grimke reminded herself not to appear to be openly staring, forced her eyes away as the woman passed allowing a second glance.

Her skin was flawless, butter cream, a halo of black waves fell loosely just above the base of her neck. Large black shades with oval lenses covered her eyes though the sun had not been seen in that part of the world in over a year.

"So where are they sending you?" Cole asked.

"To police Photon City," Grimke told her refocusing on the old woman, "As the chief."

"You're going to lead the knaves?" Cole asked, stopping in front of a large extra-tall foilie, "It's a damned war zone."

"So I've heard," Grimke said, and smiled grimly.

"It's still early yet," Cole said, clapping her hands, "But I haven't slept in days, we traveled through the night and I'm hevved, let's have a drink, play some bones before we depart."

It sounded agreeable enough.

"It's not like the caravan isn't a risky business," Cole said she pressed her hand against the scanner. The front door slid open, and Grimke followed her inside.

"We get addicted to it Grimke, we have to fight something or else we go home and drink ourselves to suicide."

The place was dimly lit by lamps anchored to wood paneled walls, crammed with artifacts she had collected in her travels. Grimke's eyes traveled from stuffed game, to war junk; a helmet blackened by fire, old-fashioned shells, an actual revolver pistol. There was a bar and a few shelves of books, a vid screen glowed forgotten.

"It's been an honor to watch it all go to hell," Cole remarked, "Like it must have been seeing all the great empires of the past fall."

"We're winning," Grimke reminded her as she removed the all-weather.

"Not in the long run," Cole sighed going to the bar, obviously her pride and joy, it gleamed from polish, shining bottles and decanters rested on their own silk circlets to protect the wood.

"Help yourself General I know the life," Cole said, "All self denial."

"I'm not much of a drinker," Grimke told her.

"I don't know how you're going to survive in this new wasteland," Cole said.

Grimke scanned the bar for something non-alcoholic then remembered how allegedly rare liquor had been since the blast. This must have been one of the benefits of traveling the new wasteland.

Cole grunted as if to read her mind. "I've had a bottle sent to your room, scotch, and a nice seltzer."

"Then I'll have that then, mostly seltzer," she conceded and watched her host fix the drink.

"According to the papes you've been kicking ass all over the world," Cole said, "Some folks think you're propaganda, a hoax, the government trying to glamorize soldiering to the next generation, some think you're a super solider an experiment that bit the hand that fed you."

Grimke frowned. "I'm neither, just flesh and blood."

"Of course you've been wounded," Cole leaned forward.

"Of course," Grimke finally sipped her drink, it did not burn as she suspected, but warmed her, "I've been shot, stabbed, nearly had my throat slit once."

She stretched her neck and showed the scar, the only one she dared to show.

"Somebody didn't know what they were doing," Cole said, "Sliced down like they were playing a violin."

"She was just a girl," Grimke told her, "My first blood kill."

"Shit," Cole said in a quick whisper. They both knew that shooting a copter out of the sky, or a man twenty feet away, was different from a knife-to-knife, hand to hand kill.

"I was just a kid myself," Grimke's stare was vacant as she took another pull from the glass. Cole sighed and produced a red velvet bag of dominoes, dumped them into a black dotted white tile puddle on the table between them. Cole turned them on their faces.

Grimke pulled her chair up and stirred the bones since she was the guest, then chose seven for her hand.

"I had the honor of fighting in Korea, and Sudan," Cole said, choosing her hand, "Took a blast to the gut, they had to pull about a mile of intestine out of me."

Grimke nodded, pretending to divide her attention between the woman and the game, but her focus was on Cole and what she was getting at; sensing she wanted something more than the usual wound-story swap.

"I didn't think I would make it as long as I did," Grimke took on her usual I'm- just-a-lucky-bitch tone, "But I just kept coming out alive, sometimes five out of five hundred-"

"Yeah," Cole said, "I was always a fucking coward, got drafted right out of high school. What about you?"

"My mother was a Marine," Grimke said, "Her father was; he fought at the Gulf Shores. I joined up out of military school."

Cole called fifteen points. "Your own ma recruited you huh? So you're from the famous Grimke's directly."

She said nothing in reply, only called twenty.

Her grandfather Elder Grimke I had been instrumental in the war following the dissolving of the states, and later the building of the Southern Public. Her mother, Elder II, taught her a lot about war since she was old enough to comprehend games like common bones. That part of the game was not just tallying points but stopping one's opponent from scoring.

"I lost a wife to war," Cole said, "And then when I thought I had outsmarted fate, I lost a husband to war." she gave a grim chuckle.

Grimke cleared her throat to find a sincere tone. "I'm sorry to hear about that-"

"Sorry shit," Cole slurred, and squinted across the table speaking low, "It's all going to start sneaking up on you General. You're all cool and stoic now but it's really going to bite you in the ass."

Grimke calmly added five to her score.

"One minute," Cole said, "You're fucking a beautiful woman and she's crying out, moaning, then you don't hear her passion. No. You hear the whimpering of a man you've killed years ago."

She laughed at Grimke's minute wince before her face turned back to stone; convinced the old woman was out of her mind.

"Talk like that is not against protocol out here," Cole said, "In fact you may even feel the need to rustle up a slice of something."

"Not just yet for me," she replied curtly. She was growing more uncomfortable by the moment; the woman was bitter about something, probably a defector, one of the ex- military who went around publicly or otherwise badmouthing the military.

Cole snorted. "I was never a prude like you, that's what they want; us to be goddamned machines, they scare you out of feeling things so you'll focus on fighting."

Grimke could have herself easily joined in, she had, after all, been promised full retirement just seven years ago and planned to buy a plot of land on the Canadian border where there was still some wilderness. The plan was to live out her life far away from the battle, with a horse and a canoe, and maybe a woman.

She stood. "Thank you for the scotch Cole, but I must go I'd like to get rested during this journey."

Cole followed her to the door. "I won't keep you then Grimke, but once you're in Photon City, go down to Waugh street and see the old folks tenement, you don't have to go inside to smell the disrepair, the old Vets hang out there on the curb in their wheelchairs, on their crutches, panhandling to survive in between their measly severance checks."

Grimke was outside, but turned. "Don't you think I know about the tenements?" she asked, "Don't you think that was my fear, and the fear of my mother before me?"

"But you got stars stitched on you. Think there are any ancient stars on Waugh? Your ma included." Cole asked and Grimke snatched her shirt in two hands hauling her out of the trailer.

"I won't be judged by you," Grimke roared in her face, "Hag. Defector."

The old woman only laughed. "Defector," she scoffed, "They got you brainwashed good."

Some teamsters grabbed Grimke, pulled her backwards, she fought, but they were young bucks in defense of their grizzled, crazed mother-creature.

"Get the fuck out of here," Cole told the teamsters who had come to her aid, "Get back to work."

They let Grimke fly and she stumbled back ready to fight. "What the hell do you want from me?"

"I want you to admit they've wronged us cause you're as high on the chain as I'm going to get," a tear streamed down her cheek, "I'm ninety-two years old. I want one of you fuckers to look me in the eye and fucking salute me for what I've done."

She was crazy. Grimke was sure of that, but she was embarrassed suddenly at the emotion that had taken over, ashamed that the woman was witness, it could be used against her, and it was a sign of weakness.

"There's more than one way to get to Photon City," Grimke told her, "I'll leave this terminal now."

They stood staring at each other until Cole laughed.

"You're sure fucking wound tight, Grimke," she said and patted her back, "Come on back inside I got some fellow travelers I want you to meet."

She wavered, reluctant, but the outburst had knocked her off her guard she nodded slowly and followed her back inside, had a drink while Cole radioed her friends, giving the order to start the convoy.

The COL Smith was the first to arrive; he was Grimke's age, dapper in a gray suit and hat. She stood to salute him but he stuck out his hand as if to shake only to bend swiftly and kiss her hand.

The foilie begin to move as they talked, Cole continued to radio orders to her command, occasionally swearing.

People could still be transported between foilies when they were moving and Smith's husband arrived shortly after, pudgy, puffing out clouds of smoke from a cigar as stubby as he. There was something almost presidential in his bearing; in the jaunt of the little black cap he wore.

"I've missed the introductions," he said shrugging out of his fur jacket, "And COL Smith's cheesy hand-kiss bit no doubt."

"Eustace Grimke," she said shaking his hands.

"You're real," he said, "Though I don't doubt those tricksters in Washington would send you; a very well trained actress on a tour of the country to quell the rumors."

Grimke frowned a little until he grinned broadly.

"Seeing as you're fresh out I'll introduce myself as Vice Admiral," he winked as he spoke the V-word, "Cline."

She nodded and they were seated.

"This is quite a collection you've got," Smith said to Cole then turned to Grimke, "Has she made you apologize yet?"

"No," Cole interrupted, "I didn't have the heart to force her."

"Of course she tried," Grimke said, "I'm just so damned stubborn."

"A real soldier," Cline commented, "Not a Navy fop or my dear COL Smith who is one hundred percent grade-A pussy."

"Really," Smith objected, "I served and was wounded Hsin Hsiang."

"I missed Hsin by a year," Grimke said, "That one'll go down in history before any others."

"I was shot clean through the shoulder," Smith said, "Be glad you missed that one."

"You must tell us Grimke," Cline said, "Is the Commander In Chief as folksy as he pretends?"

"I suppose," she answered, "I was like a rookie in a flash fight that day."

Cline let out a little belt of laughter. "Smith swears he has dead eyes like a bird."

"That he does," Grimke answered, as the foilie door opened, and a young fresh faced woman walked in, she was military, with a loose swagger; obviously a pilot.

"Airman Fields," Cole said, turning her head, "Come in child."

The lovely woman Grimke had noticed earlier followed; Smith and Cline stood, but she was other wise ignored.

Fields wore a cast on her leg, her arm in a sling, she smirked when she noticed Grimke's stars and ribbons across her right breast, the youngster curled her lip, tossed her chin in an arrogant greeting.

"Cline. Smith," she said pulling up a chair, slumping into it to brood.

"Fields here was the youngest Airman to earn the Purple Heart," Cole said, "Over in Byelorussia."

Grimke nodded, more interested in the name of the other woman, she was older than Airman Fields, just past thirty, not a trace of girl on her, just smooth womanhood.

"I was forced to make an emergency landing," the young pilot said, she had a short, clipped way of speaking, "Decided to take out a tank while I was at it, totaled an Eagle 7, one of the new ones."

"Crash. Boom." Smith said, raising his eyebrows, "What I'd give to be that young and restless again."

"I didn't think I just acted," Fields said, she removed a gold cigarette case from her sling, selected a smoke, and stuck it in her mouth.

"Grimke was telling me about her first blood kill," Cole said, "A run in with a girl and a fat blade. Where was that?"

"New Bethlehem," Grimke said.

"That hell?" Cline asked, "You must have been a child."

"Not much younger than Fields," Grimke said, "You could never tell who was who over there."

"Did you use the Mameluke?" the young pilot asked amused.

"You don't get those until officer school," Grimke said, "I was taken quite off guard, but I managed to turn her blade around on her."

She could not block out the visions. For the second time that day someone mentioned New Bethlehem, so she had to see that girl choke on her life, staggering, smearing blood on the walls of the tiny room before falling dead.

"I'm going back," Fields said, "As soon as I'm healed," she pointed to Grimke's pins, "I want to earn the Uncommon Valor."

"Only corpses win those," Cline said, "And Grimke here."

"What'd you get that for?" Fields asked edging forward.

"I don't talk about it," Grimke said glancing around at them, at the nameless woman who had not said a word since she walked through the door on the arm of the young flyer.

"Whatever it was it's behind you now," Fields pressed, "The papes say it was the Ukraine."

Grimke sighed. "If you know the story-"

"I don't know," Fields said, "I want to know what you did to earn the Uncommon Valor and still be walking amongst us."

"I don't talk about it," Grimke said, they were all watching her too closely and she knew that her anxiety was showing through, it bothered her that she was becoming transparent.

"Perhaps she does not want to talk about it," the dark haired woman spoke up.

Grimke lifted her head, met her gaze, the woman's eyes seemed to flash from across the room.

"She's right," Cole said, "Grimke got enough shit from the press, the Commandant, and the Chief."

"Don't tell me you've got the shock," Fields nearly laughed, "I thought old horses like yourself are too tough to let yourselves be haunted by some bad dreams."

The woman stood. "I'm leaving," she said indignantly, "Cole, call me a ride back to my foilie."

Cole complied but Fields could have cared less, she was engrossed in a more entertaining sport.

"You want an Uncommon Valor," Grimke said reaching through the collar of her sweater, slipping her hand in to unpin her ribbon that represented the highest honor, any soldier could achieve.

"You can have mine."

"You're not serious," Fields laughed as the ribbon was removed, tossed across the space between them. The young pilot snatched the pin out of the air then looked up at Grimke puzzled.

"Do yourself a favor," she said, "Take that, I'll give you the medal too, just don't go back overseas."

"Hey, I'm not a defector," Fields said, looking around at the other soldiers.

"Then you're a dead kid," Grimke said, standing slowly to spare her knees, "If you survive you'll end up some broken old woman watching some young thing throw her life away."

"Passionate isn't she?" Cole stood, "Come on General, let's fix you another drink."

She let herself be led to the bar as their host took drink orders. The woman stood waiting at the door her shining black gaze caught Grimke's followed her to the bar.

"You're kind of nuts aren't you Grimke?" Cole whispered, as she busied herself filling glasses with ice.

She looked away for just as second and the contact broke, the woman turned to face the door her fingertips pressed against the jamb, neck curved slightly.

"Not ready just yet?" she asked, watching Grimke watch the woman.

"It's been a long time-" she confessed and shrugged, "Since I've seen a woman like that."

"Her name is Elise Lacroix," Cole said, "She's a prostitute."
Grimke said nothing in reply.

"She's more aesthetics than actual skills," Cole continued, "She joined with us in Canada, my guess is that she's some runaway wife who figured it would be easy to give lousy blow jobs in order to get by in the world."

"Won't her husband or wife come after her?" Grimke asked as the foilie door opened, there was the roar of an engine and the rushing wind.

"Not if she faked her own kidnapping," Cole said, and laughed handing Grimke another scotch.

Elise Lacroix stepped out into the night as they returned to their seats she glanced back as Fields joined her complaining over the wind. She saluted over her shoulder as she stepped on to the platform attached to a truck speeding alongside the foilie.

They returned to their seats, Smith, and Cline ceased their own whispered conversation so there was nothing but silence. Grimke's pin lay on her armrest; she tucked it in a pocket and sipped her drink listening to the others talk until Cole dismissed her, offering to send a platform to take her to her foilie.

She thanked the old Corporal, when the truck came around Grimke stepped onto the shaking, platform contraption and was driven to her foilie.

The operator waited until she scanned her card and entered before he detached and gave a merry honk. She slid the door closed, turned, noticed her luggage there waiting. The foilie was a single, nicely furnished; the interior walls were smoky gray, bare fiberglass, clear near the ceiling above the door.

There were several heavy, wide, upholstered chairs in front of a vid screen panel, a bed in the left corner, a table, and two chairs to the right. Each area was sectioned off by a printed rug.

She repositioned her luggage near the bed, and inspected the black trunks, duffel, the long case, and the short case; everything she owned. The long case held her Mameluke in it's case wrapped in blue embroidered velvet, tied with a gold tassel. The steel blade was engraved with the classes she had held as officer, the hilt plated with white gold. Historically, the sword had been ornamental but as the years passed, the blade length shortened, and regulation called for it to be sharpened at all times, an officer had to know how to use the Mameluke in combat.

The smaller case held her personal handguns, double barrel Tex edition Hammersmiths, she closed it only peeping at the weapons. The trunks held her clothing, several sets of service blues and two dress uniforms and evening dress should a formal event ever arise. She had P. T's for exercising, and several of the drab R and R outfits.

She broke down and read the banner on the vid, the scrolling, cynical, news reports that rolled at the bottom of the screen while advertisements and program listings flashed then faded. The white publics had their citizens under lockdown while in her home public, the Southern Public, folks were being kidnapped right off the street and held for ransom.

As with everywhere in the world, the rich had it all and the poor were slaughtering each other in the streets over what was left. There had been civil unrest; over nuclear power, over the bloody noses the country received when some offended country's freedom fighters snuck in, over national wage.

Everyone was still reeling from the bombing of the nuclear plant in the central public, the Silver City blast that left a 3-mile crater in the middle of the country, and rendered hundreds of miles unlivable because of radioactive fallout, leaving the Southern and Atlantic public under gray skies.

Commander-in-Chief Waylon was on the verge of declaring war on another country over some international trade embargo the UN Corporation set up. Meanwhile, the perpetrators of what was currently being called, the greatest crime ever committed on the nation was on the loose.

Then she saw her own name, her own image, holding the plaque, flanked by the commandant and the Commander in Chief, who grinned broadly at the cameras.

The articles took time to explain her tours and honors, when she was wounded in the Urkraine and given the Uncommon Valor; information she certainly had not given.

Grimke removed her sweater and tie, she would have fallen asleep in the bed, but she did not trust them just yet. She retired to one of the big chairs reclining it, propping her feet and folding her arms as is she were roosting, she dropped her head and snoozed away.

- - - - - - - - -

-II-

-Act of God-

Once again, she woke up angry, in a chair, feeling heavy, tired. She was tempted to stretch her bones out in the bed, and tried to remember the last time she had slept in the deep comfort of a high mattress dressed in sheets and blankets. She stood as if to shake the anger like a cramp in her thigh. She had some of Cole's scotch and seltzer, then just some seltzer. It was nearly mid-morning.

Grimke passed the rest of the day watching the vid, snacking on the trove of goodies in the bar. She napped, woke, and polished her boots, then her sword. Near dinnertime, she was surprised to hear a chime. She recognized it as a doorbell meaning she had a visitor, she checked the window to make sure they had not stopped and found the scenery still flying by.

She went to the door and peeped out to see the beautiful woman, the prostitute.

Grimke turned away backing against the door as if the woman would try to bust it down; she had not bothered to put on her tie, and her shirt was rumpled.

She decided not to waste time getting dressed since she would be getting rid of the woman before she had time to notice that Grimke was out of uniform.

She went back to the door, opened it slowly.

"Hello," Elise said her hair whipping around her head, "Cole sent me."

"I'm going to have to send you back," Grimke told her, moving to close the door.

"She says, it won't kill you to humor an old woman," her voice was deep, but not husky; whispery, smoky, yet she did not have to shout through the wind.

"This is extremely inappropriate," Grimke said, finding that she had to raise her voice, "I don't hire prostitutes."

"Cole is not so wrong to send me," she said, "There will be women in Photon City, and they will all be buzzing about the beautiful soldier, not opening your door will only infuriate them."

"I'm sure I can survive a city full of lust scorned women," Grimke said, and moved to close the door.

"And the day one of them catches your eye?" she asked, "Will you pretend you don't see them?"

Grimke paused and stared at her, coal black curls whipping around her head, the driver shouted something urgent.

She stepped aside and welcomed the woman in.

"I'm Elise," she presented her hand; she did not extend it, Grimke had to reach out and take it.

"Grimke," she answered, "Eustace Grimke."

The woman smiled and said: "Eustace"

She had perfectly shaped lips, Grimke noticed the mole on her cheek beneath her eye, how she stood there unflinching under the silent scrutiny, she was used to being gazed at.

Grimke cleared her throat. "Would you like to join me for a drink?"

"I would," Elise stepped forward into the foilie; behind her, the truck detached and sped ahead.

"An excellent gesture, women are curious of the homes and hospitality of their love interests," she inspected the foilie, reached to her throat, and unclasped her gray colored wrap.

Grimke at her back gallantly helped her remove it and pegged it on the stand by the door.

Beneath Elise wore another layered skirt, a gray, form fitting, suit jacket with a high round collar joined to the lapel all trimmed in pink silk all the way down to the deep V that revealed the top of her cleavage. The contrast of the full skirt and the tight top, her neat waist and full breasts reminded Grimke of why she had always appreciated the brilliant aesthetics of a woman's form.

"I have scotch and seltzer," Grimke said walking past her to the table.

"I'll have the seltzer," she said watching her fix the drinks.

"I'm kind of ashamed about last night," Elise said, "Fields was very disrespectful I should have given her a piece of my mind."

"I'd rather not talk about Fields right now," Grimke said, she had a beautiful woman alone, a woman sent to seduce her, she did not want to be talking about obnoxious little airmen.

"Of course," Elise said, "What Cole did not tell me was why you're going to Photon City."

"I don't want to talk about that either," Grimke said bringing her the drink, she paused then took it, taking a sip of seltzer.

"What would you like to talk about, Eustace?" she asked.

"I don't know," Grimke said, sitting across from her scooting her chair back a bit before settling, shocked the woman remembered, and was using her first name, "I'm not much for entertaining."

"I am," she gave a small chuckle, "And not just the obvious…my father and I were very social before he passed away, black tie balls, jet cocktails, various galas."

"Sounds high-sy," Grimke said wondering how such a duchess ended up on her knees giving ancient corporals, and arrogant flyers blow jobs.

She smiled and took a sip of her seltzer. "It must be the blast getting to me but back in the day it would have been rude of me to talk of anything but frivolities."

"Silver City," Grimke said, "I was on a tour of duty when it happened and I've only read back articles about it through the banners."

"I was at home and felt this awful chill," she paused and closed her eyes as if she might shiver; when she opened them again Grimke noticed they were dark, almost black.

"We were near Canada just above the target area; I felt the floor tremble under my feet. Of course then everyone went insane with worry and grief if they weren't decimated."

There was some sorrow in her voice. "I was very frightened for us all then Eustace because they said there wasn't enough food that the country had been virtually split in two because everyone was afraid to travel through the shit to switch coasts."

Grimke nodded gravely she had not gotten a chance to feel that fear for herself or anyone else not having any family to worry after.

"I was sheltered, but being out lets me see first hand-," Elise said, "-how we've really been affected. Our national psyche."

Grimke nearly smiled at the phrase, she wondered if she and Fields had talked about the national psyche.

"We're better off than a lot of folks," she said swallowing her amusement, "Some nations we've left with nothing, not even fu."

"That's true," Elise lifted her glass in a mock toast, "And we haven't talked about anything frivolous."

"This is a new time," Grimke said, "Perhaps we'll all become deep."

Elise laughed. "You'll be disappointed to know we're all as shallow, frivolous, as consumed by decadence as before."

"That's just human nature I suppose," Grimke said.

"And we'll never stop being human," Elise said tilting her head thoughtfully, "If we did that would be the real apocalypse."

"I didn't know I was sitting down with a philosopher," Grimke said suddenly tired.

"I'm used to wearing many different hats," Elise said.

"We are losing it you know, our humanity," Grimke said then, "I've seen men and women revert to animals and never fully be able to come back, they walk upright and use forks and read poetry but once that animal has been let loose…"

"You're wrong Grimke," Elise said, "That's all part of us, that animal part or else we wouldn't lust for each other, or desire to be close."

"Which brings us to the reason for your visit," Grimke deadpanned, "People don't stop to think that women like you are extremely clever, they see a pretty face and dismiss you."

"They do," Elise said.

The trailer stopped its swaying and was still.

Grimke stood and began to tell her that she was glad that they could sit and talk, and was grateful to talk and catch more than a glance at Elise.

And she stood too as if to leave but instead of walking to the door she walked towards Grimke who tensed, trained not to back away from anything.

"We should try to get to know each other a bit," she whispered leaning closer.

"You've got the wrong idea lady," Grimke's voice caught in her throat and she swallowed, "I don't hire prostitutes."

"War is such a horrible thing," she said reaching up and touching the collar of her shirt, fingering the brass eagle-globe-anchor before slipping her hand past where the tie should have been.

"You have probably seen all sorts of atrocities, but have you had time to stop and touch a woman? Enjoy the pleasures of an evening in her embrace?" her hand continued sliding down, unbuttoning Grimke's shirt.

"I'm an old axe," she confessed to the whore, "I can't feel that kind of thing anymore."

"Of course you can," she pleaded and stood on the tips of her toes, touched Grimke's cheek with her lips, cruising them to her ear to kiss just below it.

"That's enough," Grimke said.

"Eustace," she whispered into her neck.

Grimke fought the minute urge to shove her away, and began to ponder a new urge to do the exact opposite. She looked down at the woman after a time, and when they kissed she did not think at all of the whore in New Bethlehem her hand slid to Elise's neck, the other to her waist. She wrapped her arms around Grimke her tongue fever hot and dexterous, her lips soft and supple.

She moved her hips, slowly pressing against Grimke's. Something surged inside the old soldier; she grabbed the woman's waist and tried to pull her closer threatening their balance. She held Elise as they stumbled, supported them both, and in the process the other woman's face came to rest on Grimke's breast. She stiffened, bent her head to watch Elise rest her head there for a few seconds.

Grimke let go of her then and stepped away, (the woman closed her eyes and sighed) watched her face register defeat, she found herself wanting to apologize but refused.

"I suppose I should have just invited you to dinner," Elise said.

"I'd like to rest some more," Grimke said

"And I can't convince you otherwise?" she asked.

"No. Please, I've had a long week," Grimke said striding to the rack to collect the wrap holding her breath when she stirred it and smelled perfume as if she were avoiding the stench of death.

She wanted to touch her again as she helped her in to the wrap instead she watched her turn buttoning it, smiling glumly.

"We should be in Photon City by tomorrow evening. It's my stop too," she said stepping out of the door when Grimke opened it, "You should come see me before then."

Grimke made no reply only spoke to say goodnight.

She stood frozen after the woman left, then paused to fix herself another scotch but did not drink. It was a gift from Cole, like Elise's visit. She paced the foilie changing her shirt, knotting on a tie, pulling on her sweater, snatching her all-weather as she left.

The caravan had stopped for a meal and Grimke could smell food cooking from the mess foilie, the front was folded open and steam poured out and sank to the ground.

The sky was a harder gray than DC's and there were a few more degrees chill in the air.

She went to Cole's foilie and knocked. The door slid open partially filled by the form of the old woman. An overhead light snapped on and there she was grinning.

"Grimke," the old woman said then she frowned, "You look like you're here for my throat."

"Why'd you send Elise?" she asked, "Why'd you send a prostitute to my foilie?"

Cole chuckled. "I wish I could take the credit for that, wonder why I didn't think of it."

"So you didn't send her?" she asked.

"What'd you two get up to?" Cole wanted to know, she stepped back into the foilie beckoning her in.

"Tell me you got a little more than one of her lousy blow jobs."

Grimke followed her inside and closed the door behind her shutting out the cold night.

"I allowed no such thing."

"You look…haunted," Cole said, "You wanted to do something."

"Of course," Grimke sighed, "At first I was appalled, but I still let her in, I only wanted to talk you see."

"If you wanted that kind of company you wouldn't have been so rude to me and my friendsover cocktails," Cole said, "You wanted something else out of that woman."

Grimke took a seat in the chair she had played dominoes in earlier. "She lied to me."

"Yeah she did," Cole said, "She knew you'd let her in."

Grimke's chest swelled with indignation. "I sensed something so I told her good day."

"That's the only reason I can think why you would dismiss a beautiful woman," Cole said, "Sensing something is wrong."

"So you would have slept with her?" Grimke asked.

"She wanted to sleep with you?" Cole asked, "She wasn't on her knees?"

Grimke frowned at her. "No she was not on her knees, she said-," Grimke paused, as a look of glee passed over the old woman's face smoothing out the lines in her cheeks.

"What did she say?" Cole asked.

"She said we should get to know each other," Grimke said through tight lips.

"You should have," Cole said, plucking a little communicator off her side and spoke into it, "I'm having the General in here with me for dinner."

There was some static and someone said an affirmative.

"I don't believe you Grimke," Cole said, sitting across from her, "She was trying to lay some on you, nothing has changed, women still fall out for a uniform."

"Always," Grimke affirmed.

"And you're such a smooth fucker," Cole laughed, "For serious, I bet you get panties thrown at your feet like petals."

Grimke felt a flash of heat cross her face. "I bet I don't. I'm too old for this shit."

A porter arrived at the door, Cole hollered him in, and he entered with two deep bowls of steaming soup.

Cole clapped her hands together in anticipation as it was all set before them.

"Munch said there is something awf about the weather," the porter said, "The temp has dropped."

"We're right under the blast sight," Cole said, "It's going to be stone cold for awhile."

The porter nodded and left them.

"These dudes," Cole said handing Grimke a spoon and some bread, "Always looking for a post-apocalyptic boogie to jump out and get them."

Grimke was more interested in the soup; the broth was orange and brown, red, and green bits floated in it.

"Vegetables and meat," Cole said and rolled her eyes.

"Fu," Grimke said after a taste of the broth, "It's delicious."

"As long as it's not ground up enemies," Cole twinkled and they went quiet for several minutes while they ate. There was not doubt the old woman was military, she ate mess style; frequent eye contact with whoever sat across but not saying a word.

Grimke found herself thinking of the prostitute assuring her that humanity would never be lost, and she believed her for the most part. Mostly she recalled the press of their lips, the smooth skin at her neck under her fingers.

"She's very clever," Grimke broke the silence, "The woman, Elise."

"You should call on her," Cole said, "She knew you would catch her in the lie, make it her fault that you want her, figured once you assuage yourself of the guilt you'd be as good as hers."

Grimke stared at the old woman for a minute then sighed. "I haven't had much luck with whores in the past."

Cole chuckled and clapped her hands. "You poor thing."

"Listen," Grimke said, "You're going to like this one, its' probably one of the worse war wounds in history."

She nodded. "So I'm listening."

"I was nineteen, a year or so out of basic," Grimke told her, "And I was in New Bethlehem that religious settlement that went to hell, the place was crime ridden, and I was part of the command sent in to police the place."

She paused.

"Young Grimke goes to war," Cole surmised, "Don't try editing it, just tell it."

"The whores were notorious," Grimke said, "We were warned from day one to be on the lookout, but one day this shanty tent town was attacked and this girl (I say girl now but she wasn't even younger than me, I thought she was a goddess) comes half dragging half carrying this old man, her father."

She had called herself Sara but a later investigation proved that the name was most likely an alias. Grimke had never met such a girl, with hard eyes that always betrayed her and showed the years of pain and loss she had experienced.

"And you helped her, and fell in love," Cole finished.

"I did," Grimke said, "I was on fire for her. I shirked duty and went searching for her. I found her and we ended up in this hotel about to make love when she pulls this fat-blade on me and tries to cut my throat."

She closed her eyes and recalled fighting for her life, half-naked in a tiny, dark motel room, Sara's hard, pained eyes flashing with madness as she cursed in her mother language trying to kill Grimke. She had ended up killing the girl, and instead of leaving her as just another unsolved murder she had reported her crime. If there had not been such a shortage of manpower she would have been court marshaled.

"That was your first blood kill," Cole said, "I bet that shamed you, being a Grimke and all."

"It did," she said. Elder had pulled some strings, left her own command to come have a talk with her daughter. Grimke remembered the big deal the units at New Bethlehem made in anticipation of Elder's visit. The woman was a living legend back then, a few months from her own retirement she was Titus Andromacus come to smooth things over for one of her dishonorable sons.

"You're a good soldier, I hear," Elder had told her, "But there are plenty of those, and that's all you'll ever be if you don't start acting like a leader, like a Grimke, and not one of these senseless, whore chasing grunts."

"I killed a girl," young Eustace informed her mother, all defiance, "Don't you care that I'm a murderer?"

"She was the enemy," Elder Grimke said, "One last Bethlehem rat, next week she might have strolled up to a past strapped with explosives."

After some photo ops around the base, Elder was gone, and that was the last time Grimke saw her mother. Shortly after her retirement, she returned to Constellation Ranch, (the compound where the entire extended family rested in between battles, waiting for husbands and wives, and children to come home, or in the oak shaded gravesite in peace), Elder ended her own life with a neat small caliber pistol to her head.

"But even worse I haven't had much experience since then," Grimke admitted to Cole, "Two women to be exact but it didn't last the night."

"Was that your call or theirs?" Cole asked.

"Mine," Grimke said, "They were military. I didn't want to be on trial again."

"Seems to me you should have found yourself some non-personnel to get lucky with," Cole said.

"I never bothered searching again," Grimke said, "And I was always off fighting somewhere, it wasn't a priority."

Cole fixed them a drink, and this time Grimke did not object to the extra scotch.

"You've got a complex," Cole said, "I'll do us a favor and not bother blaming any one though this militaristic society we've made ourselves into is the reason why young Grimke was sent out to New Bethlehem, why there was such a hell on earth in the first place. Where young women had to bait their bodies to lure in lusty GI's-"

"I get it Cole," Grimke said.

"Well then you should go visit Elise," Cole continued, "Spend the night reclaiming your sexuality."

"I don't think so Cole," Grimke said.

"It won't be her perhaps," the old corporal continued, "But it's going to be someone, sooner or later."

Grimke made no retort.

"The war is over," Cole shouted at her, "You still got thirty years before you shrivel up ugly like me and even then you still got about fifty or sixty years left in you."

They laughed at that comment for a few hours, conversation instigated by more drinks. Grimke left Cole late that night and almost went in search of Elise's foilie, but the caravan was starting up again.

As soon as her foilie door slid shut, Grimke peeled out of all her clothes save her skivvies and climbed into the full bed, not an issued cot, or a chair, or the dirt, but a full bed. She tossed off the pillows as she used to do when she was a kid and curled up, falling asleep instantly.

She woke when the foilie came to a sudden stop. She started out of bed and peeked out the window to see one of the workers drive by in a maintenance cart.

"Hey Grimke," Cole's voice, half drowned in static, filled the foilie, "Come out here and take a look at this."

Grimke frowned. No one had told her of an intercom system. She dressed in a fresh pair of service pants, a fresh shirt from her trunk. She left her foilie pulling on her beret as she went. The temperature had dropped significantly from the day before and she wished she had brought her all-weather. The day sky was just as dark as the night, the color of storm clouds, just as threatening.

There seemed to be a crowd of workers gathered at the front of the convoy, Grimke joined them and found Cole inspecting a busted tire, the culprit a large piece of spiked metal.

"Look at this shit," Cole said.

"Sabotage," Grimke said.

"I know," Cole straightened and surveyed the wood beyond, "Someone is out there waiting for our next move."

"Has anything like this ever happened?" Grimke asked.

"We get jacks trying to single off foilies so they can pick ‘em clean," Cole said, "But this bastard's got my whole caravan stopped."

"Move the rest of the foilies," Grimke said, "Get them out of here."

"It would take an army to go against my whole company here," Cole insisted, "-Crazy to leave a whole foilie behind."

Grimke frowned. "Something stinks, old woman."

Cole nodded. "I'm smelling." She peered at the shrapnel then called out to her men. "Who'll stay behind and look after this foilie while it's repaired?"

She got half-dozen volunteers and added on a few more.

"Don't think you're going to leave me out," Grimke said.

"You're nuts," Cole said, "You going to go your whole life looking for little wars?"

"I am going to Photon City after all," she said.

Grimke jogged back to her foilie, going for her weapons cases, and a pair of black gloves along with her coat.

Instead of going back to Cole, she stopped one of the workers and asked for Elise's foilie. He smiled wryly and pointed her in the right direction; it was a few foilies beyond her own.

Grimke pounded on the foilie door making sure the Hammersmith she brought was tucked away in her jacket, secured her sword at her side.

Elise appeared in the dark doorway dressed in something white and bulky. She had been waiting. She said nothing only smiled a knowing smile and stepped backwards. Grimke followed instantly wanting to kiss her perfectly sculpted lying lips. The foilie was dark and cold, the heat turned off. She slid the door closed.

"Is everything alright in here?" she asked.

A light switched on and flickered on the lowest setting. Elise was revealed dressed in nothing but long a coat of white fur, the swell of her breast's meeting revealed, her stomach, and abdomen. She wore a pair of black panties, her legs, and feet bare.

"Look there is something going on," Grimke told her, "I can feel it."

"What do you mean?" she asked eyes shinning.

"The caravans' going to move on, leave one that was sabotaged behind," Grimke said.

Elise stepped forward and touched her face running her fingers along the sword at Grimke's side.

"I suppose you're going to stay behind and help?" she said, one hand reaching down, fingers lightly brushing the golden hilt. It turned Grimke on, an instant flash of heat throughout her whole body that made her step away.

"Why'd you lie about Cole sending you?" she asked.

"I knew she told you what I do for a living," Elise said, "I knew you probably wouldn't come to me so I came to you."

"Do you trick all of your customers?" she asked.

"I did not treat you like a customer," Elise said, "You gave me no money; I asked for none…I wanted you."

Grimke scoffed. "I don't know where you're from lady but in the real world you can't want and have people."

"You're wrong," she smiled, parting her coat further, "You could have me."

She took Grimke's gloved right hand, gently tugged it away, let it fall to the floor. She brought the soldier's hand to her lips, did not kiss them, but warmed the fingers with her breath.

Grimke quickly recovered her hand, instead of retreating it across the space between them, she touched Elise; first, just below where her breasts met, slipping down to her hip.

"You don't understand," she whispered, "I'm not a civilized human being anymore, any gentility I show is just part of my training."

"That's not true," Elise said stepping closer.

Grimke dropped her hand. "I don't have time for this right now," she said exasperated, "I'm too old to try to learn this seduction stuff."

Elise frowned, puzzled. "What do you mean learn?"

"The only action I ever got was when twelve, (and that's another story) then when I was eighteen I joined up," Grimke confessed, "I was so fucking green, I was in New Bethlehem it was supposed to be neutral, but people were being blown to bits every day and there were women, prostitutes who would just throw themselves at you. I took one and she turned out to be a guerilla."

Grimke opened her collar and revealed the scar.

Elise touched it. "I'm not a guerilla."

"I don't know that for sure," Grimke said.

"I wouldn't hurt you Eustace," Elise said, taking her other hand, the one still gloved and stripped it, "How could I hurt something so beautiful?"

"If you think I'm so inexperienced I don't know flattery-" she began but the other woman chuckled, pressing close hiding her face in Grimke's shoulder.

"I'm sincere. You're beautiful," she said, looking up at her, "The glint of your eyes, your skin."

"I think you're lovely," Grimke said, "I was telling Cole I haven't seen a woman like you in a long time."

"Hmm," Elise replied, and Grimke pushed the fur off one of her shoulders and watched her bare breast in the low light. She tested its fullness and felt the nipple shrink under her palm, watched the flesh goose pimple.

The foilie trembled, groaned on its axels, the door rumbled and warped as a charge was exploded outside the door.

They parted. Elise stepped backward reaching in the darkness for clothes. Grimke removed her sword and Hammerstein as the door shook, kicked by some jack. In the background Elise clicked off the light.

There was laughter on the other side of the rumbling door, the hinges shrieking as they weakened.

Grimke sank slowly hiding the gleam of her sword, she turned her head to look for Elise and saw that she had already hidden herself away. Gray light stumbled into the room as the door gave way and crashed to the floor. She saw two of them- she was no stranger to silhouettes. All around the convoy there were shots. She was at war again.

She shot first, the Hammersmith gave no flash as if was engineered, but at the report and the falling of a comrade, the other silhouette fired, turning to the left. Grimke was up, leaping one of the plush chairs, bringing her sword up over her head. The jack saw her from the corner of his eyes, flinched, and turned, gun raised.

Her blade met his wrist along with the power gathered in her descent, severing through skin and tendon, rendering his hand, useless, dropped the gun. She landed punching the jack in his throat, kicking him swiftly when he fell.

There were more gunshots outside. Others would be coming.

Grimke collected the jack's gun and turned whispering for Elise, she appeared from the shadows barely dressed in her smart skirt and jacket from the day before.

"Shit," Grimke muttered quickly poking her head out the door, an army had emerged from the woods; and Cole's people were fighting them off. In a flash her mind registered the chaos, women screaming, children crying, a man being shot in the back, jacks already carrying off things, the woods silent beyond the road.

Others would be coming for their spoils.

"We're going to run for the trees," Grimke took Elise's hand and dashed out the door.

There was a cry of alarm and one of them fired; Grimke did not take time to fire back until they had crashed into the trees.

The jacks followed, howling dogs after their quarry. The flash of Elise's pale legs as she ran barefoot crazed them like the switch of a deer's white tail and jumping exposed white belly.

They traded fire and Grimke reloaded another clip and ran again, her eyes passed over Elise's face; she was intent on escape, running ahead of Grimke not looking back as if she had to run once in the past.

The jacks were closer, such a chase was nothing new to them either. Grimke searched as she ran for a place to stop, cover to take a stand. The trees stopped suddenly and they were at a field of rotting stumps that stretched to the horizon, the earth rutted in ditches of black mud and slime; an abandoned lumber site, the trees looted, the land could no longer grow anything green. Grimke slid to a stop shoving Elise down a shallow slippery slope among a couple of forgotten logs.

Grimke ducked behind a stump peering down at the woman whose breast she had caressed just moments before.

The jacks appeared in the old lumberyard leaping into the mud behind fallen trees as Grimke rained fire on them.

"Come on out leatherneck," they growled, "We want your woman."

They fired again trying to flush her out until they were out of bullets; there was some discussion of what to do. Grimke was silent her gaze never leaving Elise's as she lay among the moldy logs.

"Don't move," she mouthed and the woman nodded.

Grimke leapt to another stump firing with both guns as she did startling the jacks; she rolled behind another stump and checked to see if she was too far away from Elise. She raised her head, there was no return fire.

So she went for them.

They rushed her and she shot two and tossed the emptied gun she had lifted off the jack that had broken in Elise's foilie. She fended the last three off with her Hammersmith. They circled her, one edged towards Elise and she fired shooting the man in the leg.

Another saw this as a chance to attack, she was fast but the blade was quicker and sliced down the middle of her breast and stomach.

Elise was erect shouting something.

"Bitch," the wounded jack accused Grimke.

Grimke hissed at her.

"Behind you," Elise shouted.

Before she could turn the jacks rushed her again, she fired, and something hit her hard in the back of her head. She stumbled half a turn firing, swinging the sword in an arc over her head.

"Eustace," Elise was screaming then she was there between them grabbing Grimke by her arm, and the back of her shirt pulling her away. The jacks held their ground, Grimke was able to hold on to the gun, but let go of the sword as Elise dragged her away.

"Leave us alone," Elise screamed her pitch had climbed to a growl.

They laughed and edged closer like hateful children towards a wounded animal.

Grimke tried to scramble to her feet, her head lolled back as she began to lose consciousness, Elise looked down at her there was sorrow in her eyes, she seemed to be making up her mind to do something. She was still beautiful, like a troubled goddess.

She looked back up at the jacks, opened her mouth, and roared, not an enraged woman's call but some animal like a wild cat.

A startled look passed among the jacks, then they pounced, the bleeding one heaping some abuses on Grimke, kicking her in the stomach, and stomping her back.

The others grabbed Elise, began stripping away her clothing. Grimke could hear the rips of the smart jacket. She rolled away from the bleeding jack clutching the fat blade.

"Fucking bitch," the jack grabbed the sword clutching the hilt all wrong, "How about some of your own shit."

There were more rips behind Grimke, then silence, the jack with the sword lunged, Grimke side stepped the sword and stabbed her in the neck just above the collarbone, her fat blade returning clean.

The jack fell face forward and Grimke turned ready to take the rest of them, entranced by Elise's nakedness, they had not noticed their comrade's battle and death.

"What the fuck is this?" one of them said stepping away.

Grimke saw Elise naked, her legs splayed; pried apart by her attackers, her eyes dead. She retrieved her sword from the dead jack.

"Bastards," she roared at them, but something else caught their attention, something black and ominous in the distance sending a frigid breeze their way, swirling around the warmer air.

"Act of God," someone yelled, and the jacks took off through the woods.

Grimke looked up; saw the black cyclone spinning in the distance, heading towards them. It was unlike anything she had ever seen or heard of; a twister of cold black from the north, a product of the atmospheric circulation sweeping down from the North Pole across Canada and through the blast site, below the gaping hole in the ozone, and through the fallout zone swirling up violent storms carrying black clouds of radioactive debris.

"Elise," she whispered, "Oh shit," she went to Elise her pale nakedness a stark contrast beneath the gray sky, among the black mud, and broken trees. She bent touching her neck trying to find a pulse.

There was none.

Grimke stood glancing over her naked body for wounds, her eyes caught at Elise's crotch. The area was bare. Of hair. Of a part and folds. Blank, like the area between a doll's legs, but rounder and smooth, fleshed.

She opened her eyes then, saw Grimke looking. She sat up gasping, her eyes darting away.

"We got to get out of here," Grimke told her, slipping off her all weather and draping it around her shoulders.

Elise just sat there, her eyes switching back and forth from Grimke to the cyclone, watching it thunder closer bringing a swirling bitter cold wind. Grimke could feel the earth beneath them quake as if it were nothing but fancy foilie.

"Come on," she said, hoisting her to her feet, "I don't know if we'll be able to get out of here alive."

Elise turned and when she did Grimke saw the reflections of the cyclone in her eyes. She pulled her along, through the mud, the cyclone barreling their way; unlike anything that Grimke had ever run from; train, tank or aircraft.

She spotted a length of old drainage pipe; a cylindrical cage of iron with cement poured over running out of the ground.

"I don't think this is big enough for the both of us," Grimke yelled, prying at the grate over the pipe with her sword.

"Get inside," Elise whispered, looking up at the cyclone.

The grate opened the rusted creaks drowned out by the approaching tornado.

"We'll go in feet first, you first then me," Grimke called.

"No," she said, unheard over the winds, Grimke read her lips.

She stood and hugged her around the shoulders. "We'll go together, you have to help me."

There was such a sorrow in her eyes, Grimke quickly kissed her lips. She jabbed her sword into the wet earth running it to the hilt. She hugged Elise again and sank them to their knees, they went head first into the pipe inching along, snaking against each other, there was barely enough room for anything other than their bodies, air, filthy water, and all around them hell, the pipe trembling inside the earth as if it would be swallowed whole.

They stopped chest to chest in the roaring darkness, clutching each other, legs parted, thighs between, breaths on their necks, belly to belly. The cyclone thundered over like a train, the air slammed against them, the grimy water flowed up around them.

The quiet came gradually; Grimke felt it despite the ringing in her ears. They negotiated themselves back into the day wet and filthy. Grimke struggled to catch her breath as she eyed Elise who sat watching her.

"So what are you?" she asked, "A man?"

"No," Elise said, "There is nothing human about me."

"You fooled me," Grimke said, "You're an android."

Elise nodded.

"And you're on the run," Grimke said, "From who?"

"No one in particular," Elise said, "It's illegal for me to exist, I'm running from being discovered."

"In your line of work that would not have taken long," Grimke said, standing collecting her sword it remained buried to the hilt in the mud.

"In Photon City, I was going to join an agency you can specialize in a particular skill."

"Photon City is a jungle," Grimke disagreed.

"What else is there for me?" Elise asked, "I won't turn myself off, I won't die."

Grimke just stared at her. "Let's get out of here I'm freezing my ass off."

"Why?" she asked. "I should have taken my chances with the cyclone."

"I'm not going to tell anyone if that's what you think," Grimke said, walking away from her.

Elise followed, reluctantly; she desperately began to explain her self. Her existence.

"I was made eighty-two years ago by a woman named Crawford Dunn," she said.

"I know that name," Grimke said as they negotiated the terrain.

When she was a kid everyone was shielding their children's ears from the name. Dunn got excessively rich in the sex novelty industry, Grimke used to read her banned magazine with delinquent friends who told her the urban legend of the billion dollar sex robots that caused a big controversy in the time of their grandfathers and ultimately shut down the budding cyborg industry.

"People were experimenting with robots in human skin to teach and drive taxis even to pilot planes. Crawford approached the process with a different idea, what she called pleasure-borgs," Elise explained, "She started with something innocuous, a tribade model, a lesbian cyborg."

Grimke laughed a little she was taken back to her tumultuous childhood, that crowd she had fallen in when she was 12; a group of sexually adventurous kids. Her mother catching her with an older girl and one of Dunn's products in a chemically induced ecstasy so strong it did not end with Elder Grimke's appearance.

Her mother could only shut the door to her daughter's bedroom and wait for the storm to pass before sending her daughter to military school three years earlier than planned.

"She thought of everything," Elise continued. "You've been close enough to me to know, my skin is a hybrid of plastics, and silicone, my muscles and fleshy places were designed the same. I was also given a nervous system wired to a pleasure center, a hyperthalamus Crawford called it; her theory was that I could give pleasure better if I could receive it in return."

Grimke stopped their march to turn and look at her. "So you're just a doll."

"I'm not just a doll," Elise said.

"I know that," Grimke said, "But that's what you were meant to be, a doll."

Elise agreed grudgingly. "But I've learned to be more than that, all on my own."

They were silent as they reached the road, and the caravan. Cole's men and women had fought off the jacks just in time to take cover from the winds of the cyclone.

Grimke convinced a medic that they were fine, and sent Elise to her foilie as Cole arrived.

"Funny how things go down," Cole remarked upon greeting.

"It wasn't a coincidence," Grimke said, "I was at her foilie when everything went down. I wanted to make sure she was safe."

"Looks like you did just that," Cole said watching Elise walk to her foilie looking back over her shoulder.

"You look like you're about to keel over," Cole was saying.

"No," Grimke said, "I'd like to help things get rolling out of here, just in case those jacks return."

The older woman nodded grimly. "Glad to have you aboard."

- - - - - - - - -

Black night had fallen by the time the convoy was ready to move. Grimke showered, changed out of her filthy clothes, and stumbled to Elise's foilie.

She answered the door fully dressed in soft silk pearl white pajamas.

"The foilie will be moving on soon," she fumbled for her words, "I was wondering if I could join you for the rest of the trip."

Elise did not say a thing, only stepped away from the door.

"You don't sleep then I suppose," Grimke said, walking into the foilie.

"I do," Elise said, giving a tiny smile, "I sleep when you sleep and wake when you wake, but I can set myself to rest."

Grimke frowned. "What do you mean?" she asked, "You sleep when I sleep?"

"Don't you find me beautiful?" Elise asked.

"I do find you very beautiful," Grimke confessed, "And desirable."

"Then you should let me be your companion when we get to Photon City," Elise said her eyes shinning, "You were right, it is dangerous for me alone, I need someone to protect me."

Grimke looked at her and could not help but think that Crawford Dunn had out done herself.

"I don't think that would be possible Elise," she said.

"But you'd sleep with me?" she asked her voice rose with resentment, "That is why you came here. I'm not a real person; you're certainly safe opening yourself up to a robot."

Grimke felt ashamed then, she did not know why she had come to travel the rest of the journey to Photon City with Elise, and gave up part of the reason why she'd come to her foilie.

"I came because I was curious," Grimke said, "I wanted to know how you've come to be so human."

"I evolved," she said, "I was taken out of my world of luxury and comforts, confiscated, taken from Crawford by the government. The G-Men did horrible things to me Grimke, I came to understand sorrow, and heartache though I don't have one, I learned that people lie, that they mask feelings…I learned to do those things, to be human, I learned to feel beyond pleasure, the joy I knew with Crawford."

"And what if I was like those G-Men?" Grimke asked, "You were willing to risk yourself?"

"I knew you weren't that type of person," Elise said, "From the moment I saw you I knew my secret would be safe."

"How?" Grimke asked.

"Because I dreamed of you," Elise said.

Grimke turned away from her, paced half the length of the foilie.

"There's no way you can dream," she said. "How do I know to believe you? Your life is masquerading as something you aren't"

"I'm not masquerading," Elise said, her face showing frustration. Grimke wanted to know if the expression was natural or learned.

"It's through suffering that I've become who I am," Elise said, "A person, not just what Crawford programmed me to be."

"And you dream," Grimke said, still half-incredulous.

"I saw the cyclone," Elise said. "A few nights ago, I saw it in a dream, and I saw you guiding me through it."

They gravitated across the foilie and were in the vicinity of the bed, and toilet chamber.

"So why were you so difficult to get moving?" Grimke asked, the foilie lurched forward, and they were moving again. "Why were you trying to get me to go in there without you?"

"I never had a dream like that before," Elise said, walking close to Grimke, taking her hands, "One that came true. I didn't trust it as a literal vision, and I saw how brave you were, I did not want you to risk your life to save mine."

She urged her to sit on the bed, Grimke resisted.

"You're tired," Elise said, "Let me tell you what happened when I was taken away from Crawford."

Grimke relented she wanted to hear this woman's war stories she sat and lay back while Elise curled on her side watching her intently.

"So?" she asked, "Start telling me your story before I pass out in your bed."

"Would that be so bad?" Elise asked.

"I'm not sure yet," Grimke mumbled, cocking one eyebrow to see the expression on her face.

"The government took me and ran their tests," Elise said evenly. "There was not much to figure out. I desperately wanted home, and Crawford. Then they began experiments to discover my pleasure center and that is how I came to understand shame, because though I was frightened they were still able to manipulate me into full ecstasies for hours at a time, they were getting off on it."

Grimke felt rage for her, remembering the jacks in the woods earlier that day. She had always known there were people out in the world that got off on ruining beautiful, delicate, things and she had seen the spectrum of them and their cruelties from Commander in Chief to G.I.

"I was rescued by a woman named Mathers," Elise told her, "She led a radical group that believed robots are more than artificial intelligence, that we are capable of actual emotions. Then I did something strange. I fell in love with someone else. I had not forgotten Crawford but Mathers was so amazing, she helped me to evolve."

"Whatever happened to Crawford?" Grimke asked.

"I ran away and returned to her," Elise said.

"Did you like Crawford?" Grimke asked. "I mean you were programmed to like her but she kind of kept you as a doll while Mathers freed you."

"I loved Crawford," she brightened. "Even when I was taken from her, I dreamed of her."

"And Mathers?" Grimke asked.

"I--," she said and there was that shine again in her eyes as if they were haunted, Grimke recognized these as tears that could not fall, she watched her in disbelief.

"Mathers did not treat me the way I needed, she never touched me, not like you or Crawford, she said it was wrong, and it made me angry when she refused to kiss me or touch me. She had a husband and I hated him."

"Jealousy and anger," Grimke said, "Emotions born from passion."

"She was an asshole," Elise said, "She thought I was a freak."

"I don't think you're a freak," Grimke told her as she reached out touching her chin, realizing that there was no way she could leave her behind. She was amazing. A miracle.

She smiled, rising moving over to lay closer. "I feel safe with you, from the big bad world, maybe it's my old programming trapped inside of my personality."

She took the general in her arms and kissed her eyes gently. "Who would ever understand that Eustace?" she asked, "That I'm a human being though not flesh and blood, if any one ever discovered the truth-"

Grimke lifted her head and kissed her. "We've got a lot to figure out," she said as Elise wrapped her arms around her back, rubbing at the tender bruises left by the jacks.

She leaned in and their foreheads touched, the sides of their noses slid together as their lips met. Grimke stretched her tired muscles as they kissed, as if she were awaking from a long, frozen slumber.

"When I saw you in my dream," Elise said, "You stepped out of that cyclone, a soldier with that sword in your hand. It terrified me."

Grimke looked up at her, as gray as the sky above them but not as flat. "And when you really saw me? Were you scared?"

"Yes," she admitted, "When I first noticed you, but that whole exchange with Fields over the medal changed my mind, I saw that you were haunted, you reminded me of Crawford, and I instantly wanted to comfort you like I used to comfort her."

Grimke chuckled. "Really? And how did you used to go about that?"

"I would care for her," Elise said, "She'd lost her legs before she made me, I learned to nurse for her, and I would also arrange her appointments, and later after I was confiscated, then returned I handled everything because we had to hide in Canada."

"That's right," Grimke said, "She got suspicious of everyone, turned into a hermit."

"That was what she fed the media," Elise said, "The government kept her under close watch, especially when Mathers freed me. Crawford was angry that I'd been taken from her, but also scared, she would have fought-"

"She did not want to risk losing you again," Grimke said, "She loved you."

Elise frowned. "All of you have some tragic flaw."

Grimke copied her frown. "All of you? Who? Humans?"

"The women I come to love," Elise said, smiling a bit, "Crawford selfishly forced me into a sleep, programmed me to wake with no knowledge of anything, a buried treasure for whoever happened to find me there in the basement. The blast in Silver City woke me; I'd been sleeping for twenty years."

Grimke blinked appalled, thinking of the horny G-Men. "What if someone evil would have found you?"

Elise shook her head. "Crawford did not care. She was the mighty pharaoh taking all of her belonging with her to the underworld."

"We all have a tragic flaw," Grimke agreed bitterly.

The other woman sighed, pressed the side of her face against the general's chest. "None of them were as strong as you."

"Physically?" Grimke asked into her perfumed hair, "Or what?"

"Just strong," Elise said, "Mind. Spirit. And none of them could take on a bunch of jacks."

Grimke contemplated her last statement. She was a four-star general in the Marine Corp, she had answered her mother's challenge those years ago, used her name, her wits, and her strength to advance. She was fifty-seven years old with nothing as sharp as it used to be, and here was some woman talking about her spirit.

She wanted to question Elise on the subject but found herself dozing away, the exhaustion the body next to her lulled her to sleep.

She woke when the foilie stopped, Elise walked past the bed dressed primly in tweed, opened the door. Grimke heard her exchange good mornings with Cole and sat up quickly.

"There you are," the old woman grinned, taking in her rumpled shirt and pants, "Rest well?"

"Splendidly," Grimke told her, rubbing a hand through her gray half-curls.

"Good morning," Elise said.

"Good morning," Grimke smiled at her, "Cole, where's the nearest town?"

"What are you after?" she asked, "We're in Walker Outpost; you can get just about anything here."

There were outposts settled along the borders of the publics, they were part fort part trucks stop, part layover spots where caravan travelers could take shuttles to the train stations.

"Someone to marry us," Grimke said, "Elise and I."

Cole clapped her hands together, threw her head back laughing. "One of those jacks must have knocked you about the head."

Grimke looked to Elise, who wore a stunned expression. "Are you sure?" she mouthed.

"I'm serious," she said to Cole, not taking her eyes from Elise, "People get married all the time for less honorable reasons."

The old woman nodded. "I don't think you're capable of being anything but honorable, Grimke, but this feels a lot like that thing in New Bethlehem to me."

"Cole," Elise warned.

"It does, doesn't it?" Grimke asked, "But this isn't New Bethlehem, I'm not a green behind the ears kid, and Elise is not a guerilla."

Cole looked from the general to her mistress, several times. She stood slowly the gravity of the situation weighing on her body as much as the weariness of her age.

"You'll have to get to the local Justice of the Peace," Cole informed them, "I'll arrange a car to take you, and then deliver you to the train station."

Grimke went to her, extended her hand. "Thank you."

"She's mysterious as hell," Cole murmured, clasping her hand, "Stubborn too. She's kind though, you can feel it all around her…Compassion."

They both looked to Elise as she approached. "Thank you Cole," she said, going to the old woman, placing a hand on her shoulder, sliding it across her back to the other. Grimke could not help but be reminded of the intimacy the two had shared.

When Cole left the foilie, she went to Elise and claimed her with a kiss,

"Should I change?" she asked.

"No," Grimke said, "You could look sexy in a burlap sack."

Elise chuckled. "Eustace. What the hell is burlap?"

Grimke laughed; it would have been nice to take this woman to Canada, to have her in the seclusion of the semi-wild, in a bit of sunshine, on moon sparkling waters. Photon City was hardly the proper place for a beautiful woman. Grimke decided she would have to make due, suddenly looking forward to her new position as Police Chief.

- - - - - - - - -

-III-

-Poll Night-

The storm left the day confused, rushed by the winds into arriving half clothed in gray streaked light, half dressed in foggy starless night. Freezing rain dripped from the over flowing gutters spattering her as she watched the May evening come cold pulse flashing, lightning, no thunder.

Marx moved away from the dripping gutter backed into her big rambling old house and bolted the door. The windows had been plated over years ago by the creeper she purchased the place from, the inside dimly lit by tiny chandeliers, reproductions of older, grander ones, the tubes had been made to look like they contained real gas powered flame under crystal.

They were the most expensive thing in the house, Marx's own touch. She liked replicas of old things that could only be seen in books, she liked books; dusty and water- marked the bindings separating from the pages. Most of the house was laid out in thin red carpet the brown walls painted with ivy, sparsely furnished by tables and mirrors. Marx quartered upstairs behind another bolted door a monitor set on the other side showing the hall beyond the door, the stairs, and the front yard in front of the door.

In her apartment was a tiny kitchen with a high long table and four high chairs, a simple, sunken bed built into the floor in the highest style of fashion, and a couple more antique, easy-chairs covered in red velvet that were arranged around the vid-screen, which currently displayed the city polls.

Marx studied the screen for a minute figuring out the decimals as the bars twitched representing a slow climb, it looked like Mayor Sloan would have a second term over her opponent that creeper Stimson. In the city-steward category, it seemed four of the five representatives for the sections of the city were going to be the same old jacks, but that dark horse police Captain West was towering her two opponents to reign the 3^rd Ward, Marx's neighborhood.

She had voted earlier against the captain, and for the mayor's second term. Marx could have easily purchased an exemption but it was easier to appear a good citizen in the records considering the line of business she was in; the knaves were less likely to harass a registered voter.

She went to the shower a shallow curtained area surrounded by bright lights, not fluorescents but real UV racks mounted from the ceiling. There were two uncovered tanks flanking the shallow tiled floor, filled with water, tinted blue from gardener's capsules and a few inches of loose, mineral rich soil from the park. Bushy, pale-green plants grew from the dirt their tops barely touching the surface.

The fourX like tiny trees of green hands, grew in the tanks their roots soaking in the dissolved minerals.

"Cool water?" she asked them and turned on the showerhead, removed her clothes. Marx had always been a willowy thing, tall, a narrow face and a pouting bottom lip. She had been trying to muscle up a bit when she got pregnant, now she looked ridiculous; skinny limbs and her little round stick-out belly. She laughed to herself not sure why she remained pregnant; it could have been easy to remedy her self with a pill and a couple of days in bed. She was barely twenty after all, just beginning life, bringing one in.

She stepped into the shallow and showered with a little soap, natural stuff, so as not to poison her plants. The light was good for her too during this apocalypse. She rubbed her tummy wondering if her baby could sense the light through her skin.

Marx had been too cowed to take the pill and bleed in bed alone for two to three days, she was afraid of seeing ghost babies in her dreams. She was more terrified of surgery so that was out. In the end she was stuck and scared as hell of the birth pains that would come in four months and the baby that would come later.

Marx stepped out the shower, threw a couple of blue tablets to her plants, and stirred the water to make sure they dissolved. She dried herself as she went to her closet and chose a black suit with a red quilted satin lining in the jacket, a black shirt, and a red scarf. She hummed a little to herself as she brushed away a bit of lint from her pants, then began to dress watching herself in the closet's mirror as her reflection re-clad its wispy, pale limbs in black and red.

She pulled on her heavy boots, then strapped her retractable tazer baton to her thigh and she was ready for the streets, bloody, or frosty, or slick, or running with coppery brown sewage/toxic waste that could ooze from the gutters.

Snug in her black overcoat and red gloves she ventured out into her ward, hand at her side, close to her baton ignoring the cold to survey her surroundings. Wary. A world of big, bad, jacks and sneering transients revealed itself as usual, the possibility of some trouble lurking in every misshapen shadow. Marx had been attacked several times before, been roughed up, several times she even had the hell beat out of her.

Beyond the shadows the green, blue, red, silver, and gold sparks of fire works glittered above the smoky streets. Dinner vans cruised the maze of streets selling everything from food products, to flavored ice, to hot beer (heavily spiced to hide the watered down taste) to fireworks to mark the special occasion.

Marx lowered her guard, stopped to buy a mustard flavored sausage on a stick; she ate it, tried to pretend it was real meat and not Fu colored, flavored, then molded into a phallic shape, and shoved on to a stick. She had never been much of an eater until Fu came along, then the pregnancy. She especially liked the Little Deluxe Chocolate cupcakes; they were so good she was sure the rumors were true about certain illegal R.X.s being injected right in for the euphoric effect of eating something sinful.

She finished off the sausage as she walked the block to the garage where she paid a grip to have her trix kept. Only the toughest bastards dared to drive through the back streets of Calvary away from the bright lights of the strips in a trix, which could, without effort, be over turned by a big guy, even a twosie.

Marx was tough, but not so much. Her curse was a criminal genius. She knew what it would cost to have muscle around her, and she also knew what kind of attention it would bring. She was registered as an artist so she lived that way, and most artists knew the streets as well as any crimer.

She showed her pass, rode the elevator to her floor, and found her little electric car jacked in among a sea of others like partially blown bubbles, front ends narrower, the rears rounder.

Just about thing imaginable could be accustomed onto a trix (also called an Urban Transport Module-UTM). Usually the heaviest thing on the trix was the titanium safety cage, the little engine's parts and casings. The fiberglass body was clear in the front and served as a windshield the only window on the thing. It came as high as Marx's chest and with her lanky legs she always felt crammed inside. The front end was narrower than the back, the four gi-tread tires pushed out a bit, the engine contained in the housing.

Marx's was black with real live chrome bumpers, the engine was not internal but pushed out and housed in chrome, and there was more chrome trim, as eye catching as she dared to be.

The U.T.Ms ran on synthet a clone of old oil people were forced to give up on, unless they were blaring rich, those people still drove cars of course.

Once Marx had seen an extra long car limo downtown, certainly long sleek and black not a fucking toy like her trix, to her surprise about a dozen people came out dressed in restored furs, blaring rich people.

Marx cruised all the way down Calvary to the strip of circuses. Poll Day was a plant holiday so the lower level scientists were out mincing with the crimers, artists, and kids as well as other day workers. That's what Marx liked about the Southern Public; no one had a problem with any one else, as long as the people felt as if they were being properly represented and everything was being blamed on the war. As long as the food was good, there was plenty to drink, and the vids worked, as long as everyone had their R.Xs and were properly shattered even when they were at the helm of one hugest nuclear reactors in the country.

That was where Marx came in, except she did not deal in pills, injectables, or those boxes, the little devices that attached to the ears with little electrodes, sending pulses straight to the brain for an alleged clean high.

Marx a good old-fashioned pharmer; grew fourX, a gift from the earth and water, just like the ancient native ancestors her mother assured her she had. She kept her big crop in the attic of Old School, a nightclub owned by her pal Barker.

She would not call herself the head of any syndicate because those several individuals, her contacts, and dealers, did not know about each other, when people started organizing in gangs shit happened and they all got picked up eventually, or other jacks got jealous and wanted to fight.

Another factor that contributed to the peace of the Southern Public was everyone doing their damned job, and no one feeling their livelihoods disturbed. Crimers hated that especially.

Marx was becoming too big for her britches, rumors of her setup a thing she could not control. One of her dealers, a broad named Robin, had taken it upon herself to ask around for others like herself employed by Marx, and talk of how much flat the fourX raked in started circulating the streets of the 3^rd Ward.

Marx was still not sure of how to deal with the bitch, she was not the violent sort but she feared she would have to do something more than stop dealing with Robin and her accomplice.

During the last few weeks Marx had become a recluse, but decided to venture out for the night of Poll Day because everyone would be about, there would be plenty of crimes expected tonight, and perhaps if she had to add to the sum total that is just the way things would be.

Perhaps she would buy a gun. She imagined herself running down Robin in a dark alleyway allowing a few rounds into the bitch, her limp body crumpling to the ground.

"That's what you end up with when you fuck with my family," Marx sneered in the rearview mirror.

Her first stop was a club called Bleak where Georgie her partner in the fourX business was a dancer. Depression was in high fashion among the working class, so was traveling in packs of acquaintances, twisting on whatever R.Xs, staring blank eyed at swaying naked women and men as if they were too concerned political matters to get off, too intelligent to have a good push and pull.

On poll night they were all debating over the mayor's imminent victory trying not to get too riled and blow their image. They always ended up having fatal fallouts brawling from too many R.Xs and not enough sex.

Marx had been born in the right time because she had it; that faraway look, that apathy, or either that was how all of her generation turned out. She caught a few looks as she walked through Bleak, the owners of those gazes pretending not to notice her, swift in black and red despite her belly, and that air she carried; not cockiness, not arrogance, but obliviousness.

The pregnancy added to her mystique and people figured she was a bad bitch to be carrying around a baby doing what she did. Marx had counted on that sentiment when she decided not to do the abortion.

She walked right up to Georgie dancing on a narrow platform in nothing but a black fig leaf over her slice. Talk about lithe. That was Georgie. But she had some heft she was fleshed out, perfect tits, exquisite buttocks that she flashed in a quick turn pretending not to see Marx that goddamned despondency plastered on her face as she danced.

Marx knew she saw her and she broke out into a grin. It was very rare, Marx's grin, only Georgie and Barker had really seen it. Georgie smirked, that was allowed at Bleak. Her skin was the color of those chocolate Deluxe Cupcakes, pure flavor.

"Come on down from there and talk to me," Marx called and was ignored.

Marx pouted before her until she finally relented, crouching down slowly so that they were eye to eye, there was sweat beaded up on her chest, Marx caught the glint of it in the flashing overhead lights, her spicy scent filled her nostrils.

"You want a private dance you gotta pay the bouncer," Georgie said, very professional like and danced herself erect again.

Marx backed away into Russ who guarded over the dancers and it was his pleasure to break any one who got out of hand.

"See something you like?" he asked.

Marx pressed a hand full of flat on him. "How about a little time with the amazon?"

"You got it," he said raising his hand and signaling to Georgie who hopped down from her pedestal and sauntered past them. Marx followed to one of the little black booths spotted with points of light some spy holes for those who liked to watch. Marx gave over some more money.

"I want a real private dance," she said.

Russ left and Georgie began to move slowly to some overhead canned music.

"Real cute," Marx said.

Georgie continued to grind in the far corner Marx moved to touch her, missed by a mile.

"I treat you well; we're partners," Marx was getting impatient, "Why are you jacking me around?"

"You're the jack," she said calmly, "You wouldn't even answer the door of that great unnatural shack for me, and I knew you were there Marx."

"Yeah?" Marx asked, snatching her arm, Georgie towered over her, "You can see through doors? Walls"

She shoved Marx hard rocking their little booth, the lights trembled like stars. "I knew because I froze my ass off in this apocalypse, spying your house."

Georgie was stronger, she had made that apparent the first time they had spent the night together, showing off that she was a dangerous thing.

"I was hacking some things out," Marx told her, "Something's gathering around me, some fucking bane."

She gave a cruel laugh. "There's always some bane out to get you Marxie, if it ain't the Singletons it's the knaves, it's your people or even the goddamned zoids."

Marx felt mean then. "Only a fool could do what I do and not look over their shoulder."

"Then you ain't a crimer," Georgie said stalking around Marx as if she were going to strike, and she had before because Marx could be so stubborn, with such a sarcastic mouth. She did not back down, she never did, she decided to give Georgie a taste of her own bane, she reached out quickly snatching off the black fig leaf knowing it was fastened there with a kind of adhesive.

Georgie sucked air; she covered her bare slice with her hand, flamed "You're a goddamned petal."

Marx smirked at her modesty. "You're the petal."

"You think you deserve to see this?" Georgie asked, cupping her mound laughing but not as cruelly as before.

"I awlready saw that," Marx faked a yawn, "Maybe too much of it."

"Yeah but not enough or you wouldn't be here," Georgie did not believe her nonchalance for a second, she removed her hand slowly, spread her legs and unhooked her silken shrouded penis and testis taped between her buttocks.

Marx took a tentative step forward reaching her hand out as if she were gently cupping a little wild creature. Georgie pulled her close already captured.

"Look Georgie girl I'm not flamed at you," Marx sighed, "I just want to make my living without being worried about someone coming from behind me and breaking the back of my head out...and soon there'll be the baby."

"Anyone'd have to get through me first," Georgie said, she had a real woman's voice, not pinched child voice like other girls of her type, her voice was smooth as hell. Womanly.

Marx held on to her, felt her grow and stiffen in her hands. Georgie had not bothered with changing to a girl all the way, said that cutting off her prod would be like taking away her power. Marx argued that she was not really a woman then because of that very power. It was why Marx had not run screaming into the night when she found out Georgie was not really a girl.

"How you been feelin'," Georgie asked, stepping away, "You up for some of this?"

Marx chuckled. "Not really."

"Well you got to do something," Georgie said, "I'm not about to try to bundle all this back up."

"I gotta pee," Marx said, "Your seed is right on my bladder."

"Maybe I can nudge it off," she said, coming at Marx pelvis first. She ducked past her and right out the little door laughing closing it quickly behind her. Outside she could hear Georgie raging. Since the pregnancy she had been repulsed by the thought of Georgie's prod, she was sure that once the baby was born she would never be able to go near it again. She found herself dreaming of a regular girl like herself, not a star, just a regular girl.

But she would cross that bridge when she came to it.

She had a couple of syrupy sodas while waiting for Georgie to finish dancing. She greeted Marx by squeezing the back of her neck with a big slender hand.

"You're gonna pay for leaving me blue in there," she hissed.

Marx didn't jump only tensed a chill rattled up her spine though she was sure Georgie was only gnashing. She let go and wrapped her arms around Marx patting the side of her belly.

"Let's get out of here," Marx said, "I hope Barker has been taking care of my babies."

"He's just as crazy as you are," Georgie said, she had changed into a stunning black dress and heels, over this she nestled in a huge black faux fur Marx had paid a pound of flat for. Georgie liked flash, though it made Marx nervous, she was her girl after all, and any decent crimer's earnings could be told by how flashy their girls were.

At the ravey, Old School; Marx, and Georgie were VIPs so as her trix was parked they strolled inside past the bar and the dance floor to Barker's office.

"What's ing?" she called.

"Marx," Barker was behind his little bar in there mixing up a drink, "Where you been? Word was you'd gotten into some dirt."

Marx frowned a little and she eyed Georgie. "You know I don't like that shit, being talked about."

"I know," Barker said, he was a cocky, brown, man who'd had the bottom parts of his legs blown off in the war, so he hobbled along with little extensions below his knees. "But you've been supplying this city with most of its fourX, good quality shit no one has seen in generations, people were going to ask."

Barker ambled off quickly. His ways would have gone unnoticed if it weren't for his name. He reminded Marx of a little crippled, old, dog, experienced in the world, he was loyal, and could be vicious. He had always been a little cowed of Georgie who was the alpha male of their little group and always kept one ear cocked to her moods.

Marx took a seat on a sofa shaped like a woman's painted lips and sighed.

"I think this life is wearing me down," she said.

"Because you let it," Georgie said, fixing her self a drink and bringing Marx something someone had fermented chemically, it was as syrupy as the soda.

Marx screwed up her face at the drink and the topic of conversation. "You know this stuff isn't good for the baby."

"The baby," Georgie drawled, she had not for a second been a reluctant father like Marx figured, she had agonized for weeks afraid to tell, but Georgie was cool, and said a baby was fine as long she was not expected to wear slacks and a sweater vest and get a job at the power plant. In fact, Georgie had sired several babies.

Marx could not help but give her a little smile as she drank and discussed their cut of the night's earnings from Barker, usually there was a fight and Georgie extorted more than had been agreed upon. Marx always turned around and gave Barker his fair share later.

"I want to see the plants," Marx said, and Barker stood to open the attic for her.

"I'm going to dance," Georgie said, draining her drink, and stalked out of the office her game face on.

Barker pulled the long rope and the ladder slid down to the floor. Marx noticed that it was harder to negotiate the rungs than it had been two weeks before.

"I won't be able to make this journey in a month or so," Marx said.

"Don't worry girl, your plants are in good hands," Barker followed a palm on her back to steady her.

Marx huffed to the top. Georgie called it an elf den because she couldn't fit under the short ceiling. Up there the troughs spread the length of the club, and it was as bright as natural day. There were rows of converted fish tanks filled with the pale green plants. Marx had it dried out in a different place supervised by that traitor, Alfie, whom she had known since the orphanage.

"I know Georgie has been wreaking havoc while I've been away," she said stopping to rest and behold her little world.

Barker laughed. "Georgie feels very dearly about you."

"She feels dearly about my flat," Marx told him.

"Of course," Barker pointed to her gut, "But you chose her."

"I did," Marx said, "And that Robin, she did a little investigating and got in touch with Alfie."

"Shit, is that so bad?" Barker asked, "You got money for muscle, for lawyers, you don't have to skulk around all secretive."

"First of all, I'm not going to jail," Marx said, "Second, I don't want to go against any jacks like the Singletons who will probably break me as soon as they find out who I am, and third I like to skulk."

Barker laughed. "First of all you're crazy," he said, "Second the Singletons could give a damn about fourX."

"Oh but they're greedy fucks," Marx said of the biggest crime family in Southern public.

"I'm sure Georgie can take them," Barker said.

"What's the matter?" Marx asked, "Has she been raging at you?"

"No everything's fine, girl," he said, "Come on let's get you back down."

Back in the office she kissed the top of his head. "Be good little man."

"You too girl," he said, and she left him sitting on his lipstick sofa.

Georgie met her outside the door she had been at some fourX and was twisting. Marx snuggled close so she could smell the musky scene of the smoke, she thought she would miss taking a good twist, but she really didn't at all.

Old School was a totally different club from Bleak, they had good music that all the youngsters liked to come into and do their hops to. They danced in lines that stretched all the way across the club dancing in sync.

"Someone just told me they saw Robin in this ward," Georgie said above the music.

"Where?" Marx asked.

"She's on foot with some of her compadres," Georgie told her, "We should break her, show her who is top of this syndicate."

Marx left her arms. She did not like that word ‘syndicate'. "I'm not a fucking Singleton."

"No," Georgie slid behind her and whispered in her ear, "But you need to send a message to her to Alfie through her."

She nodded, she would rather that bitch Robin broken than Alfie who was like a brother to her, she could forgive him at least, and he was like Marx; not that hard to scare.

Marx kind of knew that something like this had to be done and Georgie telling her so just verified it.

Marx turned. "I can't, I'm a coward."

"I'll help you," Georgie said, "That's what I'm here for."

They walked out of Old School one of the guys brought the trix and Georgie slid behind the wheel sneering as the guy handed her an awf metal club.

"What's that for?" Marx asked once she was inside.

"You're still a petal," she said, "You've still got all that sensitivity of a fucking orphan, for the brains you got; you're still a petal."

"I'm sorry, Georgie," Marx said.

"Don't worry about it, Dearly," she said, and whispered, "I'll do what I have to do."

So they went looking for Robin. It was a fact that the bitch loved to hang out at this ravey called Tainted that had the best arcade in town. Robin was such a good gamer she had almost gone pro.

Marx felt too old to be going to Tainted, especially with her big belly. In her mid teens she had been addicted to a game called Sniper's Revenge; in it a player could be a renegade op on a sniping spree.

The place was beneath Georgie and she stalked through with her game face on, ordered a drink.

Marx explored and found her old game. She plunked down some change and picked up the old rifle/controller, peeped through the scope and killed a couple of foreign dignitaries.

She was exhilarated when Georgie came to collect her.

"I haven't been here in ages," she said, reluctant to leave, she still had several tries left.

"Let's go," Georgie insisted, they walked out onto the strip a few blocks to the bridge over the great bayou that had over grown its banks in some flood about fifty years ago taking out a stretch of freeway. Mayor Sloan had it dredged during her first term, made a big deal of it too, like her various other beautification projects. She commissioned a couple of little ferries to be built like those ancient river boats to go back and forth from the strip to Mecom Square and renamed the bayou for her love interest, Pamela Zepeda, the heiress to the go-billion dollar, nuclear-powered fortune.

People crowded the sidewalks, a group lined up to take the bayou ferry to Mecom Square and that was where she spotted Robin.

"There she is," Marx clutched Georgie's arm.

"I see her ass," she replied, of course she didn't have the bat.

They lined up to board the ferry but did not make it.

"We'll have to take the next," Georgie said.

"I want to go home," Marx complained, ready for poll night to be over, "I'm hungry, and my feet are tired."

"Not so soon, Dearly," Georgie said, watching the ferry float down the narrow banks.

They waited for the second ferry and paid the fare to ride. Marx thought the water would make her tum queasy, but the black shimmering waters were soothing. Georgie opened her fur and let her snuggle inside.

"We'll break her, that's what we'll do," Georgie said.

"Maybe-" Marx began.

"Maybe shit," Georgie said sternly, "Did you see that fucking whore? Rich off your flat, she is nothing, a washed up gamer, and you took pity on her and helped her out."

The ferry stopped at the fountain where people were gathered celebrating poll night under three flags, Photon City's flag, a red ord orbited by five yellow stars, and the Southern public's flag, the blue cross on it's side dividing the flag into uneven sections and the last commemorating the tragedy in Silver City.

Marx remembered her orphan years how they used to have blast drills. Of course they could not afford a shelter so they had practiced by diving under desks or their beds when the alarm sounded. For years Marx had nightmares of being buried alive under her own bed with the dust weeds.

There had been roughly a half-dozen attacks in the last forty years. One man's terrorist was another man's freedom fighter. The big blast had not put a stop to it all either. Things went on as normal except there was a little hole in the middle of the country, a radioactive no man's land, winter beyond. Everything still went on as normal after every one who was not decimated changed their underwear; the shock waves were felt damned near to Canada, down to the Gulf causing a couple of weeks of terror, scrambled images on vid screens, fuzzy communications.

Georgie searched for Robin around the fountains, actually a set of three, two smaller ones three tiers high with a larger one in the middle. Colored water jetted to the sky in arcs and splashed into the deep base misting the night.

Marx spotted fire just off Mecom; a pyre burning at the top of the Obelisk; another ancient facet of the city. Once it belonged to a museum, but the works of art were removed and the building was left empty.

The museum now belonged to a cult and renamed the chapel.

The city had not received the little sect with much enthusiasm, and if the cult's leaders had consulted Marx, she would have told them that since they had settled in the Southern Public they would never be trusted. The people were still suppressing the guilt of past sins, their ancestors had put so much trust in the one God and his crucified son, and supported so much dirt done in their names over the course of a thousand years that they had excommunicated religion, just did their dirt without the righteous mask. It made everything a lot easier, especially the apocalypse.

"Where you going?" Georgie asked angrily, Marx ignored it had been a long time since she had seen so much fire and it was drawing her as if she were a gypsy moth.

"Can we go that way?" Marx asked, "Towards the chapel."

"I guess," Georgie said, "I can't tell where the hell Robin went."

They walked East. Since it was Poll Night a lot of people were on the street, and the fire attracted them too. The chapel was located on a rise of land with a few now dead trees, most of the time it served as a quiet little park, the dead grass replaced with turf by the cult.

Tonight the members were out with torches lighting up the Obelisk. It was an amazing sight that even made Georgie stop to stare.

"Looks like my prod don't it?" she asked Marx, who laughed.

"It sure does, all afire," she played along and clasped Georgie's hand as they went closer.

There was all sorts of talk about Death Cult; that they were ultra modern ghouls who believed death brought new life, that they were probably planning some mass suicide on a city bus or even the ferry.

Their leader Eluvia Moss was a lanky old broad with a mass of brown hair all the way down to her waist. She and her cult wore robes of different somber colors like gray and blue and black.

"What are they up to?" Georgie asked, because she knew Marx donated money to the little cult regularly and it pissed her off because she could never figure out why.

"There would be a full moon tonight if we could see it," Marx told her, "They're mourning the loss of the light."

"Mourning," Georgie scoffed.

The crowd was growing agitated, Marx could feel their unease there was too much fire on the scene it was making everyone primal. People laughed and poked fun, Georgie pretended she was a zombie. Marx told her to stop gnashing, getting flamed that the disrespectful mob had gathered.

"Junk," someone yelled and threw a brick or a bottle, knocking one of the cult members out, another of the robed culters dropped his torch, pulled out a gun and started blasting.

The crowd collapsed, a few falling wounded, or ducking for cover or scattering across the green into the shadows.

Georgie pulled Marx along and they hit a stuck patch of crowd in the narrow street. She looked up and saw Robin coming right at her, beady eyes intent on doing some dirt, and damn near screamed, but found that she couldn't, she backed into Georgie and felt something sharp stick her a bit in the side, she reached around then looked down and at her hand saw blood in the blazing firelight.

She looked up to see Georgie sneering coldly.

"You ass, you've gone and stabbed me," she said, "Robin-"

She saw Georgie's eyes shift and turned her head just in time to see Robin, another knife raised coming down in an arc aimed for her belly.

Marx's arm latched around her gut and the knife cut a deep gash just above her elbow, she stepped back and screamed, she reached for her tazer, found that it had been picked right off her thigh.

Robin grinned, the knife clattered to the sidewalk and the people just kept coming running for their lives.

Marx fell and the wave of people rolled over her, she could see their panicked faces above, and hear their shouts. Feet thudded against her body, and someone tripped over her. She folded her arms around her belly and screamed again, because that was all she could do to keep from the crowd's trampling feet.

She heard sirens then, the wave of people stopped, and a black shadow rolled over her, pulling Marx towards the under currents unconsciousness. She fought it and looked up to see a red head woman who smiled kindly at her that worried, bent, brow of a doctor when things did not look so good.

Marx asked her if she was a doctor and saw the Knave uniform.

"Oh shit," she said, "I'm registered, I have my I.D, its' real. I'm an artist."

"You're fine," she said, touching Marx's face with the back of her hand, using her other hand to bother with the wounds. Her face had smooth neutral planes, her hair was a soft red, her eyes were some light color in the fire light, and she used good soap not that chemical stuff.

"You smell good," Marx told her and let the back wave carry her away.

- - - - - - - - -

Chaos. She watched the city beyond. She had learned to distinguish the end of her neighborhood, Old Town, and the other four wards, from her penthouse. The 2^nd Ward and the proud gates around Midtown, the lights of Calvary in the 3^rd Ward, the darkness of the 4^th and 5th wards, the great bayou Sisina, and The Park, a shanty town around it among dying trees, and the nuclear reactors towering in the distance glowing with red lights.

She could always trust Photon City, depend on it's people to react in certain ways; they were patriotic but they did not trust the government of the United Publics and did not want its interference in their home, the Southern Public where there was supposed to be the most freedoms, where things could get down right unlawful.

She could trust the workers to work, and the city council, a clash of classes to always be at each other's throat and never agree on anything. She could trust the crimers to break the law and the Rangers to catch up to them.

The only people she did not trust in Photon City were the rich, the spoiled young heirs of fortunes they could not spend in three lifetimes, and their parents who spent most of their time laboring to look half their age.

Mayor Sloan turned to them, the supporters, the so-called well-wishers, and the notorious gossips. Some had thrown obstacles in her path, some were lying in wait for the right opportunity to aid in her humiliation then participate in her being railed out of town.

The only wealthy who dared to stay in Photon City were newbies, sons and daughters of fathers who used illegitimate business ventures to gain enough capital to begin legal ones. The further down the line these fathers were, the higher in the aristocracy the newbies were.

Most of them had lived their entire lives in luxurious leisure, but that did not make them soft. A few newbies carried around reveals, handguns in elegant leather holsters. There was an air of lawlessness in Photon City, the rich were not safe from the dangerously poor, and the desperately poor were not safe from the dangerously rich.

Mayor Sloan was sure to win a second term that night, the people of the wards trusted her, even the sharks in the room to some extent, during her first term she proved herself more remarkable than just the youngest mayor in Photon City's history, but the most ambitious.

She knew how to get the people's attention, they were the strophe and anti-strophe their collective voices thundering whims and rights. She built up Photon City, a new theater, an outdoors club, and other accents that made the newbies feel as if they were living in a city worthy of their wealth, and privilege.

Sloan was done with spoiling them, for her second term she planned to be sterner. She was aiming for governorship in the next ten years, she would be fifty-one, she would stop dying a streak of her hair for image, the people-newbies included- trusted gray hair but not too much of it.

Unlike other celebrations in the city, this one had working central heat, the party goers checked their faux and restored furs with the young man in the hunter green waist coat at the door. The women wore long, sleeveless, and backless dresses to bare their lamp-tanned skin once they shed their fur coats, the men silk shirts and vests, ties.

Mayor Sloan liked to be elegant but not too showy; her black silk dress left her arms and shoulders bare and fell long with narrow slits. It would have been quite a plain dress on a lesser woman, but Mayor Sloan had natural coloring, bronze beneath her fawn colored skin, a splendid shape, slender and straight as was the fashion, feminine yet not too curvy.

She made her rounds through her guests all there to celebrate her impending victory, waiting for Governor Ramsey to drop in as he was traveling across the Public that night. He was a crafty bastard- with his cowboy politics; she had studied his every move, taking notes for her own transformation from the pupae speaking softly to a take-no-prisoners imago.

Mayor Sloan caught sight of Dusty Zepeda finishing a cocktail with one hand, snatching another glass from a passing waiter with the other.

"Mrs. Zepeda," Sloan gave the billionaire's wife a generous smile, "Have you seen Pamela?"

The woman laughed. "I haven't seen her all night, I suppose she had better things to do than attend your little soiree."

The woman had a way of putting things in perspective, and Mayor Sloan continued her vigil for Governor Ramsey's personal air ship to glide along the horizon to land at the airport. She had seen it before, majestic, impervious, escorted by a half dozen Osprey copters. One day it would be her own to glide across the skies of the Southern Public, with Pamela as her wife at her side.

Sloan waited for five agitated minutes and returned to Mrs. Zepeda now joined by her husband Herbert. His father had been a professional smuggler, a crimer, who acquired Zepeda Corp during the Corporate Wars, not only taking the behemoth company but as became the custom the name.

Dusty and Herbert were both stout people and would not have all been fashionable if they did not own the city financially, besides owning the rights to the artificial food product Fu and supplying the entire country with decent sustenance.

Zepeda was on top of the world since the blast, but the old man was a wreck, being the biggest source of nuclear power in the country and most likely the next target for terrorists could do that to a person. He drank and ate way too much (able to afford real imported meat and foodstuffs) while his wife and daughter Pamela injected and pilled themselves into a permanent apathy as was the style.

"I still haven't seen her," Dusty spoke up; she had luxurious blond hair that was allowed it to trail down her back speckled throughout with tiny, jeweled barrettes.

"Jules dear," Herbert said, taking it upon himself to be fatherly, "The governor will be here any minute don't slight him by going off hunting for Pamela."

"I doubt the mayor will be too peeved if I am not here right away," she gave a tight lipped smile, "I'll only be a minute."

The old man cleared his throat the thought of a blast on Photon City terrified him but Jules Sloan was a bigger threat. She was engaged to his errant daughter, heiress to the Zepeda throne, once he keeled over of a heart attack or whatever the fates planned, Pamela would be in charge with Jules Sloan at her side.

"She'll wash up," Herbert downed another drink, "Sinking ships usually do."

"Pamela has turned out well considering she never had much guidance," Sloan said icily.

"And you plan to guide her I suppose," Herbert said as the mayor walked away, "You've only switched her from my pent building to yours."

She paused for a second, a look of disgust passing over her face, his raised voice had gotten the attention of several partygoers, and she wondered what she would have to pay to keep the outburst out of the papes the next day.

She entered the foyer of the high rise's ballroom to the sliding glass elevator door, she entered and pressed the button to Pamela's floor, just the year before she had moved from her parent's building and through heir laws they had no choice but to fund her new life because she could have sued them using one of their own lawyers.

The old man had never approved of Sloan's brazen overtures to his daughter, the buzz around their love affair, the bayou renamed for her. The tie with Sloan and her historical family should have been appreciated since Zepeda was not very popular among the politicians, but the old man was convinced that his money would keep him aloft not social connections.

She bothered with her mahogany tresses in the door's reflection then spent the rest of the way up brooding.

She entered Pamela's house not bothering to greet the doorman who breathed the word ‘mayor' then stepped aside. She was heading towards the bedchamber but heard laughter coming from the closed den, the great sliding doors imprinted with a relief of angels opened when she paused.

There was Pamela blonde and buxom in her red evening dress a draped style that had to be wrapped cunningly. She was a goddess, sitting with her shoes off laughing at her pet poet of the week and her eunuch psychic as they acted out some vulgar anecdote.

They froze when they saw the mayor and straightened. Pamela frowned she looked like her mother but free of a wreath of fat with that same classic face of clean planes, what would have been archaically called corn fed. She had a siphon tube in one hand, the smoking device on an antique side table.

"Jules," she said disappearing the frown. "Is the party on awlready?"

"Yes," Mayor Sloan despised the plain way she had of speaking, that street-drawl language she picked up from her poets and the fat psychic. The den sank down a bit surrounded on all four sides by marble steps; she shifted above looking down on them.

"The party certainly is ‘on'. The governor could be here any minute, and here you are smoking that disgusting herb."

She froze eyes flashing, waiting for her words to weigh on them, but the poet broke into laugher, Pamela, and the psychic followed trying to swallow their mirth.

"Out," Mayor Sloan said steely, "You two out or I'll have those hovels where you live raided and sacked and you in lockdown."

The poet and the psychic looked to their mistress for a second, back at the mayor then took their leave.

"You can't do that," Pamela stood, "You can't come in here and threaten my guests."

"Your guests," Mayor Sloan scoffed, "Street trash."

"They're better than your that scene you have upstairs," Pamela told her.

"Listen we don't have time for this rebellion," Sloan said, "The governor will be here soon."

"Then you should go receive him," Pamela said returning to her chair and her siphon, "Without me."

"You're such a child sometimes," Sloan said, "If you weren't a Zepeda you'd have starved to death a long time ago."

Pamela shifted, but otherwise ignored the words; she puffed on her siphon a pipe for smoking fourX, a self-firing cylinder filled with the herb was placed inside and surrounded by water and a bit of liquor for taste. The cylinder boiled the water and released the smoke.

It could have been an old fashioned lamp; blue panels of frosted glass on a octagonal base, the whole thing held together with silver engraved plating, the top tapered into a silver ornament, a finely cast skull, the mouth open, the lick tube spilling forward indigo clouded by the smoke trapped inside. A pipe stem was grafted on the end of the tube. Pamela had a haughty, regal way of taking the tube between her fingers and lips.

"So you're just going to sit there smoking your brain," Sloan paced down a set of steps, "You'll end up as dull and fat as your mother, then how will you run the plant?"

She turned her blonde head. "You'd be running the plant. It's what you want isn't it?"

"And stay here in this death trap city?" Sloan asked, "My family didn't fight for the succession of this public just so we could watch the corporations bring on an apocalypse."

"Save your speeches for the governor's race," Pamela narrowed her eyes.

"You know what I want," Sloan said, "I told you two years ago when I first came to this city where I was headed and I will with you or without you Pamela."

She put the siphon tube in her mouth and inhaled smoke. "I don't think my way of life would mesh well in the governor's mansion."

"That's no way to live," Sloan told her, "Those poets are leeches writing for the latest pair of boots, and R.Xs and that psychic is the most ridiculous man on the planet."

"He's my shaman," Pamela said, "For my spiritual enhancement."

As unpopular as religion was there were a few eccentricities the government did not bother to follow. To keep the cult leaders from springing up like wild fire there was a conspiracy that planted restrictions like castration and other mutilations. Only serious students had these modifications and took it all very seriously. Little did their disciples like Pamela know that the whole ideal had all started off as a joke five decades ago.

"I'm all for your spirit," Sloan said, though she thought it all a huge waste of time and effort, but Pamela's entire existence had been one of indulgence and leisure, she did not want to tamper too much with her lifestyle.

"I just want you for your own sake to think about the position you hold as the only Zepeda besides your parents, your place at my side as well."

Pamela laughed her fogged brain was telling her to be angry but the herb was not allowing her to take anything seriously. For all of her spirit enhancing and little rebellions she enjoyed her place at the mayor's side, building the bridge to politics her fathers before her had not bothered to do. She had entertained the governor several times and once even the Commander of the country's military who everyone answered to.

She knew she dazzled them all with her father's confidence that wealth cowed the world to an individual's feet, reminding politicians that products had saved the country's population from starvation, from freezing to death. It was the quick thinking of the corporations that kept up the Southern public's morale and where that confidence looked ugly on her short, fat father, it was fascinating on a, curvaceous, unconventionally pretty, rich woman on the arm of the poised mayor of the energy capital of the country.

Sloan's Communiqué buzzed on her wrist, she touched the clip on her ear, was told by her assistant, Ashe, downstairs that the mayor had arrived and would be landing on the roof shortly.

"He's here," she said and sighed, "I'm not trying to change you Pamela-"

"You only want to dull me down so I'll be acceptable," she stood dropping her siphon and smoothing her dress and walking out of the den.

Sloan watched her leave and smiled a bit, then stood to follow.

"Don't they already adore you?" she asked, "When Ramsey sees you in that dress he's going to turn into a human tripod."

Pamela grinned. "You're disgusting."

Inside the elevator she leaned against Mayor Sloan and kissed her, a slow searching kiss to measure her anger. Sloan clutched her waist backing her into the cushioned wall of the elevator tasting her neck and pulling her dress from her shoulder to sample the perfumed skin beneath.

Their physical relationship was never a problem; Sloan could never get enough of the heiress and was confident in her skills to know the feeling was mutual. They parted to mark the lust burning in the other's eyes.

"How are the polls looking?" Pamela asked.

"Horrible," the mayor said and laughed, "If you're the ape who dared to run against Jules Sloan."

Pamela pressed close and nipped her ear. "May you have a thousand more victories my love."

"One at a time," Sloan said, "My next is in August when we marry."

The elevator stopped at the roof, and they moved away from each other slighty.

"I won't be so easily won as this city," Pamela said under her breath, as the doors slid open.

The mayor flinched and turned her head to look at the buxom blond, she smiled broadly at her and looked up to greet Governor Ramsey braving the draft of chill air.

Ramsey a well-suited man with an unkempt beard grinned as he and three attaches entered the elevator. Everyone maneuvered to shake hands. They rode the elevator to the ballroom floor.

"And your General?" Ramsey asked.

"She'll arrive in a day or so; in time for the swearing in," Sloan told him.

"A real war hero to police your city," Ramsey said, "If she's just half competent you'll earn yourself another term."

"Grimke and Sloan," Pamela said, "Historical Gulf Shore heroes we all read in our textbooks."

"All these powerful women in this city," Ramsey said, "We'll have to rename it Photon Roost."

"Trust me there is no roosting in Photon City," Pamela replied to the sexist remark as she escorted the mayor to greet his constituents.

Mayor Sloan watched them walk away a satisfied smile on her face, as she rethought her fiancé's ability to handle the governorship.

Her communiqué vibrated on her wrist and she answered. It was a bulletin from the police Captain and pro temp Chief West; briefing her on a riot near Mecom fountain. There were an unknown amount of injured and three dead when one of the death cult members had opened fire on a crowd of spectators while Moss the leader of the cult was dead of a heart attack. On an unrelated note a plot to murder a pregnant fourX grower had been foiled.

Mayor Sloan ended the communication in time to see Pamela returning flanked by her mother and father.

"The polls are closed," she handed over a glass of champagne, "It looks like you've won yourself a second term."

Sloan gave a half grin and raised the glass.

"This time try to keep any city officials from being blown to smithereens," Herbert Zepeda toasted.

"Dearly," Dusty said to her husband, glass poised midair, "Perhaps you should have run yourself instead of sinking all your time and money in that Stimson wiener."

"Stimson?" Pamela asked, "Daddy, how very fucking awf."

Mr. Zepeda stammered, bewildered his wife had disclosed the information. Sloan nearly laughed and made a mental note to be careful of the Zepeda women.

"Come on Herbert," Dusty said calmly, "I'll get you to the car; you've had too much to drink."

She watched the couple exit, and wondered of she would ever be a doddering old drunk leaving a party, leaning heavily on her wife.

Around the party, guests were spreading the news of Mayor Sloan's victory and they began to cheer. She smiled graciously at them taking Pamela's hand.

The press that had been allowed at the event snapped a few pictures and rushed off to get the next scoop, the other partygoers soon followed. Sloan received a few calls of congratulations from her parents and other old protégés all the while searching the emptying ballroom for Pamela, could not find her. Annoyed she rode the elevator to her own pent hoping her fiancé had read her mind and was awaiting her arrival.

Sloan went straight to her bedroom her breath caught in her lungs as if she were an eager virgin. Pamela was there dressed in a net of fine gold chains wrapped around her body, blue and green jewels twinkling in the low lamp light, her own eyes sparkling some color in between, a sea green.

"What's this?" she asked her fiancé.

"It was to be your comfort if you lost," Pamela said, "Your prize if you won."

Sloan was stepping forward to take her. "If I lost?"

"I like to be prepared either way," she said and bridged the distance between them wrapping her arms around Sloan's neck and kissing her, her hands moving down to relieve her of her evening dress. It fell at her feet in a black pool and she stepped away from it completely naked to claim her.

They backed into the bed, Pamela's legs open to receive Sloan, and they grinded for a couple of delicious moments before slowing to re-explore each other's bodies before returning and lingering in favorite places.

Sloan relished Pamela's breasts, gathering them in her hands and kissing, sucking, biting. She rolled over on her back and beckoned her love to cover her with her body. Pamela did her ass against Sloan's mound, her shoulders across her breasts, Sloan's arms around her waist guiding the movements of her hips, claiming her entire weight on top of her, the chain's and precious stones pressing into her skin as Pamela rocked until she could feel Sloan's wetness against her ass.

Sloan's hands strayed between Pamela's legs finding her desire manipulating, steering her lover's rolling hips through the quickening pace, her own heat fueling them across the night.

Pamela stopped and turned over facing Sloan pressing their bellies together the bones of their pelvises colliding, the skin of their wet thighs whispering as their centers joined.

They clutched each other their mouths open breathing in and out the anticipation of their climax, their tongues met through the storm briefly pulling them together, letting go as they moaned their pleasure.

Sloan pulled away after taking only a fourth of her fill of Pamela for the evening.

"I have a few calls to make before it is too late," she said redressing watching Pamela grin knowing this was part of their game, the beginning of a session that would last until dawn.

Sloan walked into her study, lowered the vid screen at her desk and reviewed the final numbers of the poll count.

Pamela joined her taking note of the ward stewards. "Tabitha West won the 3rd," she said, "The police captain?"

"That very one," Sloan said puzzled.

After the former Police Chief Jack Lacy's death three months prior Sloan made West interim chief while she arranged for Grimke. Lacy had been an ignorant bureaucrat with all sorts of grandiose ideas about a Utopian police force, a brother hood, and West had been his most avid student. The citizens had been pleased for a short time with the kind, friendly picture Lacy painted and after the blast they turned. Sloan figured West would get the next car bomb just for being his student.

"She's one of the most lack luster woman in the Publics," the mayor told her fiancé, "Then she runs for City Steward and actually wins them over."

"What do you think she wants?" Pamela asked.

"She wants what they all want," Sloan said, "Some radical idea to revolutionize the way we live, that doesn't happen but every hundred years."

"You should call her," Pamela said, "Find out exactly what she desires you're good at finding that out about a woman."

"I'm certainly not going to woo Tabitha West like I did with you," Sloan said fussing with her hair she wanted to use the vid option when she called the Captain, she liked to look people in the eyes especially when she was not in the room.

"You'd better not," Pamela admonished peeling off her chains, redressing too.

"It'll be hard to find West out," Sloan said, "What does the woman want who has everything? What does the woman who has nothing want?"

Sloan dialed up the police head quarters. She was told by a harried Ranger that West was over at Signet hospital. Sloan ended the call grimacing.

"What's going on?" Pamela whispered.

"Some brawl on the green," Sloan told her calling the hospital and letting the receptionist know who she was speaking to.

Soon Captain West's face appeared on the screen, pale framed by red hair pulled back, a smart pair of square framed spectacles across the bridge of her nose. She stood before the vid blank, still.

"Congratulations Captain," Pamela spoke up, she and Sloan looked at each other thinking there was some kind of glitch until West broke her statue silence.

"Thank you Mayor Sloan, Ms. Zepeda," she said, her voice had that old lost twang suggesting that she was not original Photon City cosmopolitan.

"Has it been that rough of a night?" the mayor tried to be jovial.

"I've been with the pregnant woman who was attacked earlier," West said.

"You could have avoided all of that if you'd have joined us tonight," the mayor told her, "Barely anyone knows who you are."

"The rioters certainly know me," West said, "You'll find that I'm not the type to attend parties and the like, I'm here for the people, to protect them from Death Cult and from being exploited by the newbies."

"Then we'll leave you to your duties," Pamela said abruptly, "Goodnight Captain."

"Mayor Sloan," West bowed her head, "Ms. Zepeda."

The screen went blank as the call was ended.

"How fucking dare she?" the mayor asked, "When she was playing grab ass in the locker room at her second rate college, I was getting things done."

"She's not that much younger than we are," Pamela said, "Not even ten years."

"Does it matter?" Sloan asked, "She's a seedling, probably from a clan of Neanderthals just crawling out of the sewers while the Sloans were fighting on the beaches of Galvest."

"Give the woman a chance, Jules," Pamela said, "She's a nobody."

"I've worked too hard for the people to be led astray by some Robin Hood," Sloan brooded while her fiancé undressed her.

"You worry too much," Pamela said undressing, "Should I put the chains back on?"

Sloan pulled herself from her mood. "Yes the chains," she said, only a bit distracted, "Perhaps I can get a gold belt with a jeweled lock on it, I'll hold the key and unlock it when I feel like you're worthy of a little ecstasy."

Pamela moaned and fell on her knees before Sloan. "You'd enjoy seeing me suffer like that?"

Sloan laughed. "I'd only do it as an experiment to see if you'd ravish me beyond recognition once I freed you."

"You'd never give me that kind of power," Pamela said, her eyes burning, "And who'd watch over this grand city?"

- - - - - - - - -

Ranger Captain Tabitha West noticed she had not gotten all of the young woman's blood off her hands. She left the vid-booth and returned to the sinks to wash. Her legs trembled beneath her, West took some comfort leaning on the cold steel of the sink. She had just thrown down her gauntlet before the coldest woman in the Southern Public.

Signet Hospital was a hive of wounded citizens; most from the riot and various acts of violence that had broken out in honor of Poll Night. There were several of the cult members gathered holding a vigil until the body of their priestess was released. They were sure that Moss had ascended to some heaven without them that it did not matter how shitty the world was because one day they would ascend too.

Religions were irresponsible that way, with beliefs to uplift some of society and oppress others. Time and time again history had proven that faiths were dangerous. Once one world religion was agreed upon starting the most gruesome set of wars the world had ever seen. And so the new faith had become no faith at all, at least not a pubic one, and certainly not one devoted to death.

West returned to the young pregnant woman's room, the nurse told her that she was still asleep.

"I'll wait if that's fine," West said and the nurse looked usure but at the same time too tired to argue with the police captain.

West watched the young woman sleep off the drugs, watched her vitals as well as the screen that pictured the silhouette of the infant inside of her. Pregnancies in Photon City were rare. West certainly did not agree with killing babies, but she stood next to a woman's right to her own body. She wondered what kind of young woman was this who carried a baby inside of her while living in one of the most dangerous cities in the Southern Public.

Her name was Marx she had been an orphan and still carried the serial number given to her in lieu of a last name. She was a crime prodigy, a child of the streets, in trouble with the law since the age of seven. Upon inspection, she seemed like an innocuous little degenerate, half-cherubic as she slept; but she was a mastermind with connections in the 3^rd Ward with club owners, and in the lawless park area where families lived and warred like third world tribes.

Marx was the head of a nameless gang that grew the illegal, narcotic plant fourX, that night her lover had gone through with a plot to betray her and attempted to murder her.

She blinked her eyes open and frowned, she had narrow, pert features, the habit of crinkling her nose when she was in a disagreeable state.

"Marx, you're safe now," she said gently, "I'm Ranger Captain West."

"Awf," she muttered, "I'm fucked aren't I?"

The captain shrugged as the crimer touched her belly and smiled.

"My baby's still alive," she said, "Good, he's tough like his ma."

"Actually she's a girl the nurse says," West smiled a little and pointed to the monitor. Marx turned and smiled, serenely.

"Hey there little girl, hey," she whispered.

"Do you remember what happened?" West said drawing away, watching her back as she watched the monitor, she said nothing.

"Marx?" West asked walking around the bed.

"Georgie, that bitch," Marx said, her eyes were closed a tear streaming down each cheek, "Where is he?"

"In max prison by now," West said, "We found him and his lover Robin at Tainted, Barker told us everything, pointed us to evidence-"

"That Barker," she nodded wiping her eyes, noticing the bandage on her arm, "He's a good man."

"He was in on it Marx," West said, "He also gave up the stash."

"Awf," she whispered and covered her face with her hands then dropped them, anguish flashing in her eyes, "My plants, what did you do with them?"

"They'll be destroyed," West said, "And you could be imprisoned if I did not bargain for you."

"Bargain for me?" Marx asked sitting up on the bed moving as if she was going to try to get to the floor, "Fuck you lady, for real, fuck you, fucking knave."

She lost her balance and began to fall forward flailing her arms. West stepped closer and caught her.

"You and your child could have been murdered tonight," West said sternly, hoisting her back on to the bed, "Do you think that would have been better than your ridiculous drugs."

"They're not drugs," Marx insisted, "They come from the earth, or at least they did originally, its not my fault jacks abuse them."

"It's an illegal act," West said, "Perhaps you'd make an orphan of your child while you spend your life in women's max with Georgie and Robin?"

Marx laughed. "You sent Georgie to women's max?" she snorted, "It'll be like a vacation for her, she's a dagger." She laughed some more. "Really, a sick, sadistic vacation."

West hung her head. "I thought you were different, Marx, you just have a baby inside you, maybe max is the right place for you, off the streets away from nurturing a baby."

Marx laughed again. "Hey, I'm going to be an excellent mother, you know what it takes to cultivate and fucking nurture all the fourX I've grown."

"So what will it be?" West asked, "Max or the streets?"

"What do you want from me?" Marx asked, "You knaves are the crimers that's what."

"I know Moss was your grandmother," West said, "She passed away tonight."

She frowned again her rage silenced. "The poor old creeper," Marx said quietly, "I thought I was the only one who knew."

There were a lot of orphans Marx's age a lot of mothers and fathers and grandparents had been lost in the plant explosion nearly twenty years before. West wondered why Marx had not made herself known to her grand mother a lot of orphans were never able to find relatives. Moss was estranged from her daughter and probably had no idea she was a grandmother.

"I've been investigating the Death Cult, trying to find a window in," West said sticking to the matter at hand, "It's the law that all cults are to be fully investigated-"

"You want to take them out?" Marx asked, "I can tell you there is nothing sinister going on, just a bunch of weirdoes and their ideals. And it's called Heart Fire by the way."

"How do you know this?" West asked.

"I make donations," Marx said, "I've made more than enough money, thought I should do a little philanthropy."

"Can these charities be easily traced back to you?" West asked. She did not want to admit it but this little pregnant crimer was different from the others she had come across in her career.

"What if I don't want to do this?" Marx asked.

"You really have no choice," the captain said, "Infiltrate the cult or go to jail."

"I thought you were a good guy captain?" Marx asked, "You come in here like a good guy."

"I'm not the one growing fourX," West said, "You've taken away from society, now you're going to fix the damage you've done so to speak."

"Of course," Marx rolled her eyes, "I don't want to go to jail. I'd be eaten alive for real."

West told her she would return to check on her in the morning and left the young woman, glad she had Marx in her service, all she needed was a little guidance. She and the baby could have a good life. West had never really dreamed of having a child of her own, but as soon as she had seen Marx fall hours before on the green, bloody arms over her swollen belly, the sight triggered all feelings maternal inside of the captain.

Most of her fascination was curiosity, she had forgotten what powers her body held, that she herself could give birth to a child if she chose to. She smiled a bit as she walked the scream-streaked corridors of Signet Hospital.

Lieutenant Vogle found her, he was a tall strapping guy, perhaps good baby material. Her smile broadened and he frowned.

"Are you alright captain?" he asked.

"Fine," she instantly smothered the mirth, "Have you gotten all the statements we need for tonight's incidents?"

"Yes Captain," he said, "We got about twenty unregistered and the shooter Corke."

"Tell me about him," she said.

"The guy is cool, will only say that he acted in self defense," Vogle said, "He had a cannon on him though, one of those military issues that only officers get, a Hammersmith."

"Is he registered?" she asked, registered citizens were supposed to have their major ownerships like cars, guns, and homes listed.

"No," Vogle said, "He's been here awhile."

"What about the other two?" West asked.

"Off to women's max to await their trail," he said, "A crazy cult and fourX bust in one night, that's gotsta be some kind of new record."

West nodded the respect in his eyes unsettled her, just six months ago she was still hated around headquarters still called a book cop behind her back because of her academic achievements.

"I'm going to call it a night," she said, "Return to headquarters, call me if anything goes down, and keep someone on the woman Marx's door."

Outside the city had calmed down, and the filthy light of day was returning. She found her official police SUT and cruised to headquarters where she had a town home in the barracks section. She parked in the lot and plugged her car into the battery jack fixture, and walked towards her home.

The barracks were plain brown brick buildings behind the office building, beyond was the city jail made of the same brown brick. West's little town house was on the second row, her neighbors were still awake celebrating poll night. There were colorful lights decorating the light posts and artificial shrubs. The Rangers were glad to have one of their own on the City Council especially the crime ridden 3^rd Ward. They congratulated her as she went.

"Captain ya'll after one of these burgers?" a Ranger named Rice asked. A lovely mahogany skinned woman she was always flirting (rumor had it that she worked hard, and played even harder) but the captain never bothered to flirt back. Rice was good for a cup of tea on the front stoop; at least that was as friendly as West dared to get.

"No thanks," she told her, "You folks ever go to bed?"

"Its poll night Captain," Rice said, "You should join us for a time."

"I should be getting to sleep," West stopped for a minute, "The mayor will want to rip my head off tomorrow."

"Whatever for?" Rice asked serving up a fu burger to one of her pals.

"I smarted off to her when she called to congratulate me," West said.

"You're crazy," Rice laughed. "Hey company, Captain is already giving Sloan what-for."

Everyone cheered.

They chatted about the riot for a minute and West was off to her little townhome. Inside she was alone, City Steward, Police Captain of Photon city, she felt a small prick in her chest that she had no one to celebrate with. And the young Captain had other needs that had not been met in a while. Perhaps she should have stolen Rice away from her party.

The words of Jack Lacy her mentor rang in her head; "Never give them anything to club you with, West the people will love you, especially your dirt."

She had come to Photon City after eight years studying law enforcement, and minor city management. She had heard of Lacy and thought him pompous but was sure she could learn much from him, the man had gone through cities in the East and West, (Silver City before it became the target of nuclear attack) improving the way things were run from police to public transportation. He would have made a fine mayor if some maniac had not planted a bomb in his car.

West fixed herself a cup of tea to put her to bed as she recalled fearing for her own safety after Lacy's murder. She was well known as his pupil, and was further implicated as chief mourner, Lacy having no family.

She had holed up in her apartment ignoring calls from the press wondering if her own life would end in a fiery wreck, no family, no friends, even the people turned against her. She had the same disparaging thoughts as she sipped her tea and listened to the laughter next door.

- - - - - - - - -

Over the years Dusty Zepeda gave her daughter a formal education in the wifely arts specializing in powerful husbands. She made it clear to Pamela after the engagement to Jules that she was not exempt, like any other wife she could find herself replaced.

Pamela swore that she would begin to follow her mother's teachings more rigidly, but she resented a lot of it. Why should she spend her life catering to Jules Sloan? Flirting with idiot politicians stirring their envy to feed Jules' ego? Talking her down from her childish broods because she felt threatened by a little Ranger?

These were things she had seen her mother do and wonder why people looked at Dusty and consider her the weaker of the relationship, why she was not running the plant while her husband simpered after her.

Pamela managed to coax Jules back to bed with some wine and her own nakedness. Jules half-heartedly made love to her then drank away the rest of the night agonizing over her swearing in ceremony.

"You know I could plan that for you," Pamela said turning away from her on her belly.

"Wha?" Sloan asked and laughed a bit tipsy, straightened wine glass in one hand, touching her fiancé's bare back with her other.

"I certainly could," Pamela said over her shoulder, "I'm much more in tune to the fashion of things than you."

She could feel Sloan's shrug. "I don't know."

Pamela smirked, turned over let the sheet slip off her breasts. "One doesn't necessarily have to be a professional to do one of these soirees Dusty does it all the time."

"Your mother is a genius," Sloan said, "You think she'd help out?"

"Don't need her," Pamela said, "We'll use the theater, we'll even use some of the dancers for entertainment."

"Oh no," Sloan said, "I was thinking of a more somber occasion."

"Boring," Pamela drawled, "We'll only invite certain newbies, the ones that don't show up or who aren't invited will be sorry when they find out how stunning everything was and you won't be able to keep them away with a megaton at the next party you throw."

Sloan paused in thought she was an elitist at heart and wanted to impress the newbies who generally were not interested in politics.

"The party is in a week Pamela," Jules said, "You know how important this is to me, especially if it's your project."

She smiled at her hosting the swearing in would prove she was governor's wife material, as if she needed such approval.

"I won't disappoint you, Jules," Pamela said, and sat up to take her in her arms, "You don't worry about a thing."

"You know I will," Jules sighed snuggling close the way she did when she was tired and ready to sleep.

Pamela let her slip away, move out of her arms when she was genuinely lulled. She slept too waking when Jules was up and out for the day. She answered her communiqué absentmindedly put away in a bedside table's draw when she was dressing in her jeweled lingerie the night before.

It was Tony Hillenburg, her personal driver and bodyguard telling her that some ranger had gotten hold of the spoils of a Ranger raid on a nightclub and was looking for a buyer for two hundred tanks of fourX.

She leapt out of bed and dressed getting her driver to take her down to the old abandoned bank of warehouses to make her bid. That morning, she became owner of the largest fourX stash in Photon City.

- - - - - - - - -

-IV-

-The Results-

The next morning Sloan left Pamela in her bed asleep. The sight of the billionaire's daughter naked on her belly was always tempting but Sloan had business to attend to. She dressed in one of her workout suits; black with gray piping then called up her driver. She took the elevator down to the garage to meet him.

At 8am the city streets were virtually empty, the shift change at the plant happened at dawn, and the rush to the shops and offices in old town would not begin for another two hours.

She read the banner on the vid in her car. The headlines announced her second term victory. There was also amateur footage of the riot on the green where the death cult chapel was located. The shooter a cult member who started the whole mess had been apprehended and would be charged to the full extent of the law.

Her car passed through the gates of the exclusive outdoor club she had built during her first term. The newbies desperate for any new diversion came there in droves around noon when it was fashionable to leave their homes. She usually had the mornings to herself and used the running trail. She called Captain West from her communiqué, told her that she needed to speak to her right away, that they would meet at the outdoor club. She had been hoping to catch West asleep or that some tart would answer, but the captain picked up right away not groggy but not exactly chipper.

Sloan began her run, she was used to the sting of cold air in her lungs, even the day after Silver City she was out jogging when everyone else was cowering in their homes. If she was going to obliterated Sloan wanted to be on her feet, not cowering.

The Captain appeared half an hour later borderline frumpy in skinny square framed glassed, her red hair pulled back in a pert tail. The fact that she wore the uniform well, her full lips, and gray-blue eyes saved her from utter drabness.

"Mayor Sloan," she said in greeting.

"Captain," she slowing so West could catch up, ignored the glorified paper pusher hired by that fool Jack Lacy as she cooled down her body. West had seemed bland enough to Sloan who had given her the title of Interim Chief and the little minx had used those few months as a stepping-stone to city steward.

She acknowledged the captain with a glance to find she was deliberately looking away her cheeks red. Sloan wanted to laugh surprised she was West's type, the mayor continuted to slow her pace, taking deep relaxing breaths, pausing to stretch.

"Is everything in order for Chief Grimke's arrival?" Sloan asked.

"Yes," West said evenly and filled her in on some details, "There was some trouble with the weather yesterday and there will be a few days delay."

"And there won't be any quibbles about turning things over to her," Sloan said, "I know you've been here longer and there are loyalties to you."

"I've already discussed this with all levels of the force," West said, "I'm steward now and I must concentrate on that."

"Yes about that," Sloan said, "I hope you're not confused with ideals about what your goals as steward should be."

West nodded slowly. "I've been made to understand that my goals as steward are whatever I set them to be."

"Don't set them too high," Sloan said, and began walking towards the clubhouse, "Whatever ideals are mode now won't be for long."

"I think that is up to the people to decide," West said, following.

"Crusaders like you are a dime a dozen," Sloan stopped in her tracks, the mayor was losing her temper, she could not stand these self-righteous climbers and their social causes, "They work their lives away for the fickle people or when they get pissed off at the government they go after whoever is closest."

West said nothing her face had reddened considerably and Sloan could not tell if it was from anger or the realization that her crusade was nothing.

"I suppose," she said at last, "But my plan is not to let anyone down."

Sloan wanted to laugh in her face, instead she walked on. "Just make sure your duties as captain are not neglected. Grimke is going to need to know the way things work around here. I doubt if she's ever worked in civil law enforcement."

"This cult," West said following her, "I believe there is no place for it in our city."

"I agree," the mayor said, "What do you believe they will do without their leader?"

"Martyr her," West said, "Gain more members."

"You sound paranoid," the mayor said.

"Didn't we have enough problems with religion before the civil wars?" West said, "It's been historically proven that people can not keep states laws from mincing with church laws."

"You sound like Lacy," the mayor snorted.

"We know nothing about this cult," West said ignoring the last comment, "Not even the real name."

"I thought it was called Death Cult," Sloan perked interested.

"It's called Heart Fire," West said and nodded when the mayor rolled her eyes, "I know, very romantic, but I learned this from Moss' granddaughter, she has anonymously made contact through monetary donations."

"The fourX farmer?" Sloan asked, really interested she despised the drug and all it represented.

"I want to send her in," West said, "I've gained her cooperation, she's expecting a child and her lover tried to murder her last night in effect we took out her major crop last night, and in return for her house and her freedom-"

"Captain," the mayor grinned, "You've extorted from a pregnant citizen to get inside of a cult."

"Sometimes certain things have to be done to maintain the public safety," West said as they approached the clubhouse, there were a few groundskeepers on the lawn.

"That's a good impression of Jack Lacy," Sloan laughed, "What do you hope to grab out of this for yourself?"

"I don't sacrifice the city for my own selfish desires," she said coolly.

"You should start," Sloan said walking away from her into the club house, "Or you'll end up blown to bits with nothing to show for it."

She went to her private suit to shower and dress for the day. After a light breakfast she returned to Old Town where residents and employees were stirring people recognized her car and looked on in respect as she passed.

There was plenty to be done during the coming week in preparation for her swearing in. It would have to be an impressive party to keep the newbies attention, that wild elegance that was so prized these days.

She called Pamela and found that her fiancé was up and about, most likely on the siphon back in her parlor among her court of shamans and poets.

Mayor Sloan turned her attentions to the arrangements being made for her swearing. She wanted every thing to be perfect, grander than her last swearing in. The rich had not cared what the politicians were up to in Photon City for decades, and from the very second she was sworn in she wanted the newbies to take notice.

Her pains had earned her Pamela Zepeda hand and a new era; the wealthy once again actually desiring political power, no longer disdaining local government as working class and it did not matter if it was only for a hobby, a fad.

For her second term she planned to enlarge her staff, bringing in some of the newbies, and giving them titles. She was certain the tactic would go over well, those who did not receive them would be ardently jealous, the newbies were not used to closed doors, most of them belonged to elite social clubs, and other informal circles. There would be a great uproar.

If she was to build a proper court for her governorship she would have to be sure to make sure politics did not go out of fashion.

- - - - - - - - -

West left the park angry, regretful of having thrown the gauntlet down the night before. Surely there had been a more civilized way to deal with Sloan.

"Way to go hotshot," she admonished herself. She wasn't usually so blunt, the mayor just brought out the worst in her she supposed. Sloan had never bothered to hide her disdain for Jack Lacy and instead of supporting more manpower into the investigation of his death she declared a crime crisis giving the Rangers a pay raise then sending them to crack down on prostitution and illegal gambling.

West returned to Signet to check on her pregnant young crimer Marx only to find that she had taken off during the night. She hit the 3^rd ward immediately to search her out Marx had friends among the club owners.

The Calvary strip was dead would return to life when the gray sky darkened and night settled. It was dangerous enough for West to be out there in her little marked trix cruiser stepping onto the filthy street in all of her brass. Since coming to Photon City West lived in the 3^rd Ward, but did not know the area past the infamous strip, and Signet, and the Ranger Compound.

Barker's place Old School was barricaded with red tape, marking it a crime scene, she almost expected to find Marx haunting the place. West trudged on past a row of forms sleeping under blankets on the cold cement, just feet away from a gutter running with shiny, brown sludge.

She had done her homework in order to catch up with Marx; all springing from her investigation of the cult Heart Fire inadvertently stumbling upon the biggest fourX raid Photon City had ever seen. West had taken some time that morning to view the crime scene documentation; the rows of tanks in which the pale green plants grew lush under lamps, all thriving as far as she could tell. It took some amount of genius to care for so many plants to keep them growing under such conditions.

West returned to her cruiser abandoning her search for the time being, her first meeting with the city council was that morning. She debated about going to the barracks to change out of her uniform but civilian clothes would have added to her anxiety. She drove into Old Town and the old courthouse that had been converted into offices for city clerks, the council members, and other officials.

The building was over a hundred years old with a brilliant glass dome at the top. In the lobby there was a hall of fame of sort commemorating all of the city officials of old that in some way had made a difference.

She remembered coming to Photon City as part of a class trip in high school and marveling at those same pictures, over a dozen were black and white. Back then she had serious plans for being a federal officer working at the ancient bureaucratic temples in D.C. She rode the elevator to the floor designated for the council members.

West met the receptionist and was shown to her new office, smaller than her office down at headquarters but more elegantly furnished. There was even a mini bar. West wondered why people at and drank so much more now.

She pulled back the vertical blinds and beheld her excellent view of downtown. She grinned to herself.

"Well Jack," she said to herself, "This country girl's come a long way."

There was a gentle knock at the door and councilwoman Catherine Bradstreet walked in smiling. She was in charge of the 1^st Ward, Old Town, the rich and the middle class. Her mother owned the Bradstreet Corporation but did not dare spoil her like the other newbies. Catherine actually had brains, and she was pretty despite all the newbie trappings like artificially tanned skin, and impractical hair all the way down to her ass.

"How nice to meet you Captain West," she extended her hand taking in the uniform.

West shook, glad she had stuck with her blues they would bring her an automatic respect as a Ranger Officer.

"I'm pleased," she said.

"We're all gathered in the coffee room if you'll join us," Bradstreet said graciously.

West nodded and followed her giving the office a thumbs-up as she departed.

"We've basically given up on the conference room and have all of our behind-the-door meetings in the coffee room," Bradstreet said, pausing at a pair of doors, she turned back to West.

"You ready for these animals, Captain?" she stage whispered.

"I suppose," she answered.

Councilwoman Bradstreet opened the doors, announcing that she had found Captain West.

She greeted the other three as she went; there was Councilman York of the 2nd Ward, Midtown, the middle class neighborhoods, Mrs. Trapp of the 4^th Ward mostly factories and warehouses, and Mr. McHarry of the poor, residential 5^th Ward, where the laborers of the 4^th home every night.

"Our new 3^rd Warder," Trapp said, she was a gruff burly woman with dark blond hair and steely eyes. She was called a working class hero because she had spent most of her lifetime welding pipes for oil lines and was sick and tired of the CEOs getting the choicest cuts of everything in life.

"I'm honored to meet you all," West said as she was sat and given a filled cup by a young man, "You've done some great things for this city."

"And you'll have your chance," McHarry said, he was a middle-aged man with a perfect little mustache.

"So you're the Ranger Captain," Bradstreet said, "Tell us how you worked your way up."

"I went to T.U. on a full scholarship and got into criminal justice," she said, "I even took the Federal Police program."

"Why aren't you in D.C. then?" Bradstreet asked.

"The Rangers made a better offer," West said, "They were looking for bright minds so to speak, scholars, I was allowed to come on as captain."

"Don't you remember all the press five years ago?" York spoke up he was talking to Bradstreet, "It was all Jack Lacy's idea," he turned to West, "So you've been here longer than the mayor."

"Yes," West said, "Mayor Sloan and I have been working closely these days."

"The General that's coming," Trapp blurted, "I know a bright mind such as yourself know that this is a total farce."

"Or course," West said, "This woman Grimke has no back ground in policing."

"Let's hope she's a dummy chief and does not actually believe in trying to police Photon City," Trapp said, "The last thing we need is a war in our own backyards."

"You must admit that it's a brilliant strategy," Bradstreet bothered with her perfectly dyed tresses, "The Sloans and the Grimkes made this public."

"We need action to solve our crime problems not sentiment," West said and the others nodded gravely.

"What special projects do you have in mind?" Trapp asked, "To improve the den of crimers in the 3^rd."

"I'll have to work closely with the new chief," West said, "Which shouldn't be a problem, I'm hoping she'll be somewhat civilized."

"You'll have your work cut out for you young Captain," McHarry said, "These war people spend most of their time on justified killing sprees."

"Protecting these countries," York said graciously, "They're brave and deserve the proper honors but they don't need to be trying to police cities."

"Mr. York always keeps us on task," Bradstreet said.

There was a thoughtful pause in the room, West's mind racing to make a decision about revealing her plan to investigate Heart Fire, she wanted to impress these representatives of the people, show them that she was worthy.

"The mayor has approved my proposal to study the Death Cult," West said, "What possible threats they pose to Photon City."

"And this was prompted by the riot on the green?" York asked.

"No," West said, "I've been doing my own research into Euvia Moss prompted by the death of Jack Lacy."

"You believed she was involved?" Bradstreet asked intrigued.

"Yes," she answered, "My own investigation linked her to the cult and her involvement with defector military personnel like Corke, the shooter who was apprehended last night, the man is a weapons expert dishonorably discharged after being implicated in a plot to sabotage one of the missions he was to lead on Byelorussia."

McHarry laughed. "A lot of people wanted Jack Lacy dead, now this Moss woman is dead and you're going after her cult?"

"She has renegade soldiers among her congregation," West said, "Defectors who carry guns."

"Paranoia," York said, "It sounds like the kind of shadow chasing Lacy would do from beyond the grave to avenge his own murder."

Bradstreet stifled a laugh. "Really Captain, I hope you're pursuing this in your capacity as a Ranger and not as a member of this council."

"We were hoping that you would begin efforts to clean up the 3^rd," Trapp said, "Not to play witch trail."

West was stunned into silence, humiliated.

"I don't believe this is a game," she said evenly, "Jack Lacy was a fine public servant who did not fall over from a heart attack from too much excitement, his car was bombed," she looked around at the other council members, she saw the pity in their faces and knew they thought she was young and foolish.

"Excuse me, but I must return to head quarters," she stood, told them good day, then retreated.

Trapp caught up with her at the elevators, stopped the closing doors with a strong broad hand.

"A little advice kid," Trapp said, "Stop trying to live by Jack Lacy's testaments and find out your own."

West nodded grimly, stepped back as the elevator doors closed.

- - - - - - - - -

Marx did not bother waiting for the captain to return to Signet. Things were so busy at Signet no one was shocked at patients disappearing. She knew of someone about fifty-percent more decent to treat her and baby. She left the crumbling med-center and caught the trolley back to Calvary, then stumbled home.

The Rangers had not gotten to her house as the captain had said. She checked on her plants then called Doc the old guy who patched up crimers on the run. She told him she needed a second opinion.

He arrived, a grizzled old goat, he balked at her pregnancy and they had a blowout. She called him a cake and flashed some flat. He got brave, sober then, and changed her bandages. He gave the same old blah the doctors at Signet had.

Georgie had proved to be a cow after all the wound she had inflicted was not so deep, Robins was worse. The Signet doctors had sealed the wounds up good but they would have to be drained and kept clean.

Marx told him to come by to see her every day that he had better be there because she would have his money. When he was gone she tried to rest glad to have her own bed, but baby would not let her insisting on being fed.

She got her self to her feet when there was a chime letting her know she had a visitor. She looked at the monitor and saw West frowning right at her.

"Fuck," Marx said, and went to let her in.

"Real smart," West said in greeting, she looked weary.

Marx brightened when she saw the bags of food West brought.

"How'd you know?" she asked.

"I figured you'd be too busy running to grab something to eat," West said, following her inside scrutinizing her pad as they walked upstairs.

"So this is how you live," she said, "In a fortress."

"I like to stay safe," Marx said, taking the bags and attacking them.

"A fortress can also be a prison," West said, "You mean to bring a child into a life like this?"

"Well I'm certainly not going to become a professional informant," Marx said around a mouthful of banana pudding.

"I already told the mayor about our little project," West said, "This won't be hard, there won't be any danger. And I've even left you with plants to continue to make your living."

She motioned towards the tub.

"Heart Fire is harmless," Marx insisted, "They don't deserve this bane."

"They're an unsanctioned religious group," West said.

"You're unsanctioned," she said, rummaging through the bags and retrieving some chicken flavored biscuits, "I'm really tired of arguing right now."

"Good," West told her, "You rest up, heal yourself."

"If I wasn't with child," Marx said, "I'd rage and rush you, stomp you good for all your awf dirt and bane."

West frowned. "Is that some kind of a threat?"

"You bet it is," Marx said.

She kind of tossed her red tail and surveyed the place some more and Marx watched her, and nearly laughed out loud because here was a Knave sitting in her house bringing her groceries, all high-sy in her damned blue and gray.

"I've got work to do," West said abruptly, "You stay here in bed and I'll be back to check on you later."

"Right," Marx said, and followed her out munching on biscuits as she went. She went back to her room, looked through the bags, found among all the packages of freeze-dried soup bars, three hard lumps wrapped in foil, tucked deep. She opened them and they were real honest pears. She bit one in disbelief and it was juicy as anything she felt she had tasted in eons.

Marx ravaged the rest of it in second and marveled at the rest. Then the phone rang. Thinking it was the knave she went and answered it the call was blind, no vid came up.

"Yeah?" Marx asked the caller.

"Is this Marx?" the voice asked, a little more cultured and polite than she was used to.

"Who the hell is this?" she asked, "How'd you get this number?"

"I'm calling about your fourX," the caller said, "I managed to save some."

"What?" Marx asked, "Who the fuck is this?"

"You'll know me when you get here," she said and gave out some address.

"What?" Marx asked, "You got to slow down. Where?"

Slower and clearer she gave the address again, a place not too far away from Marx, an abandoned church.

"Alright fine," she said and closed the communiqué.

She sat for a minute pondering. The whole thing could have been a trap set by the Knaves of some plan B Georgie had set up to end her and baby's lives.

Marx got up and stomped around her room redressing in khaki's, a hooded sweatshirt, jacket, and sweater hat smashing her hair across her brow. She grabbed a black knapsack and filled it with some blue tablets, some quartz crystals, her gloves, and a little pair of golden shears.

Tazzer strapped on Marx, hit the streets. She had no idea where her trix was but Barker also stored his rat in the same parking garage and Marx had the key. She checked the gauge on the scooter finding it was sufficiently fueled with synthet. She kicked the starter and putted back onto the streets driving with her wounded arm wrapped up in a sling.

It took her forever to get to Old Town but she found the warehouse, circled it. The area was desolate, great crumbling buildings no one had bothered to remodel over the millenniums. Marx did manage to spy a white car parked not too far from the warehouse but it was still conspicuous.

Marx smiled like a cat because she had come across very clumsy rat. She parked right in front of the building sure she was not dealing with any of Georgie's low life friends. She was certain when a fat cake came out, the guy had on a purple suit and a gold tie with a psychic's association medallion pinned on it.

He didn't wear boots so she could tell he traveled by car to places where there was no chance of toxic sludge being in the street, but he wasn't a newbie, she could just tell.

"You don't sound like the babe who called," Marx said upon greeting.

"No, I'm Pygmalion," he told her, he had a put on high-sy drawl, "My friend is financing this venture, she is the one who called you because you're the only one who can keep up the plants."

"Right," she said, "Show me ‘em."

She stepped forward to go inside but he stepped in front of her blocking the way. Marx looked up into his beady black eyes.

"You don't trust me," she said and shrugged but she was getting flamed, "Like you said I'm the only one who can cultivate those plants, Piggy."

He continued looking down his nose at her. "You're nothing but a little jack dagger stuffed by some freak."

"Watch where you step," she narrowed her eyes, "Anybody ever tell you pregnant women have special powers?"

He was a half second from startling but his sensibilities got the better of him, still Marx could tell he was not sure if she was gnashing or not.

"Let her in," someone stepped from the rusted from door a blond angel in a spotless white pants suit, the jacket trimmed in fur.

Marx smiled wryly glad to have something better to look at.

"Boss," she addressed the woman, "I'm glad we can be in business together."

She extended her hand and the woman in white's features twitched with that same snobbishness as if she were not sure she should shake. Marx held firm and was rewarded with a weak grip.

A newbie.

Marx almost laughed she cast a glance over her shoulder at Pygmalion.

"I thought my psychic could take care of the plants," she said leading the way, "But he had no idea what to do and the things are wilting."

"There are just some things the paranormal can't solve," Marx sighed as she followed slipping on a pair of gloves.

Inside of the warehouse someone had made an honest attempt, the plants were in their tanks filled too deep, the soil stirred in with the water making it cloudy. There was some half-assed light they were trying to bask in.

"Oh babies," she whimpered when she saw them, "This is no good."

She called out for more water, and set to draining the tanks right on the warehouse floor, caressed their leaves and showered them all with a little water from her hands as the newbie sent her guy Tony out, she and the psychic stayed behind to watch.

More than a quarter of the crop was mature and ready for harvest, but most of them were missing.

"Then we got work to do," Marx told her, "We got over two hundred plants here, they ain't gonna heal themselves."

"Go on Pygmalion," the newbie said, "Help her."

Marx rolled her eyes and began to order him about which he did not like, the fat guy kept looking over at his newbie mistress and she would nod encouragingly.

The water was brought; Marx replanted the fourX and supervised the refilling of the tanks. She looked up during the process to notice that the newbie had gone.

"So what's ing with her?" she asked Piggy as she used her shears to take some of the sticky buds to work with at home.

"She's a connoisseur of your product," he asked, "Has been for a long time."

"Wow," Marx said, "She's yummy."

The psychic laughed. "As if she would have anything to do with you. You're just some botanic idiot savant"

"Big words," she said, "I guess you read the dictionary to get your push since they cut off your prod."

"Fuck off, dam," he blurted.

Night had fallen by the time all the lamps were up and the fourX were nearly back to their old glory. Marx took some time to fawn over them, giving them the blue tablets, placing quarts here and there, stirring their water and talking to them and the baby.

"We're not to leave you here alone with the plants," Pygmalion took pride in telling her, "Tony and Cross here will look after the warehouse."

"Awf," Marx frowned, "If this is a fucking partnership I want to bring in my own guys."

She had known Tony and Cross from around the way, two bit thugs with not a brain between them. She used her communiqué to dial up Alfie.

"Wait," Pygmalion said, "I can't allow this."

Marx ignored him. Alfie was glad to hear from her, he had probably been agonizing wondering if he was ass out now.

"You still got a place with me," she told him explaining that she had her crop back, "I just don't have the patience to spend the night in this warehouse freezing my ass off so bring your thuggiest pal and do it for me."

"Yeah sure," he answered, "I hate that cake Georgie for what he's done."

"Whatever," she told him, "Just make sure you keep this new operation stifled, "You know how I do things."

She looked up at the psychic who was busy trying to dial his own mistress on his communiqué, the newbie was not answering.

"Tell your lady that if she's going to deal with me she's going to have to get used to slumming it," Marx said walking past him towards the door, "She bought these plants, not me."

- - - - - - - - - -

-V-

-Swearing In-

Bringing the rail through Photon City would be a risky venture, and any interest Parker Gomez the president of Southeastern Railways showed Sloan was determined to indulge. They spent most of the day at The Sahara in Old Town drinking cocktails and dining on all sorts of decadence.

Gomez was extremely handsome; a neat beard, perfect copper colored skin, his head shaved clean. He could have any woman in the Public so it drove him insane that he could not have the mayor but then he would have hated to spoil all of his black fantasies of her dominating him on a pile of silk cushions by actually fucking her.

They adjourned to her offices to meet with some city engineers to discuss possible routes. Sloan was especially pleased with the rail going through Old Town, and a system of grand over passes to impress the business nervous about arriving at one of the nations target cities.

"And Southern Rail?" Gomez asked of the current rail system that ran from the Capitol to Photon City.

"A freight system that offers a few seats to travels" Sloan said, "There should be no competition."

"That's the thing, no one comes of Photon City," Gomez said tooling with the engineer's vid-map that sent a gold colored engine across an automated track, slowing through the simulated arches to the red brick station with a clock tower.

"People will come," Sloan said, "And they'll bring business."

Since air flight had been restricted to military eighty years before the rail industry became the source of inter-public transportation, but there had not left much room to grow until the blast created a void in the middle of the continent.

"You do have one of the biggest cities in the public," Gomez said, "But the citizens they're all stagnant, and I don't think the newbies are worth coming to Photon City for."

"But our energy is worth tapping in to," Sloan said coldly.

Gomez gave a short, dry, laugh. "That fool Zepeda said he would keep our talks hushed from his daughter."

Sloan smiled. "She's a resourceful girl. That is why I chose her."

Graham Ashe, her personal assistant entered the office out of breath, he was pale, chubby, and the slightest upset could cause him to pant.

"That awful crimer is here," he turned his head and scuttled on in followed by Masha Singleton, matriarch to the Southern Public's only crime syndicate because all those who had gone against her were put down.

She sauntered in accompanied by her son and daughter, twins, her utmost pride and joy. Masha was a mother, lean and weathered by the sun, her eyes cunning slants, lips full, her hair brown-black to her waist. She wore tight black thermal pants, tall brown boots, and a shirt like a short kimono, black with a silver colored trim, and sash.

Gomez stood as if death had arrived in a trio. Masha grinned at him.

"Don't worry Parker, I'm not here for you," she said.

"Masha," Sloan said, "I was not expecting you in town."

"The children wanted their fourX," she said, "It's rumored that you have the best here."

"Not anymore," Sloan said dully.

The Singletons were no longer children; they stood tall, fully developed nineteen year olds, literally their mother's clones. Masha had paid billions to have her cells duplicated and artificially fertilized. The process had once been perfected but had fallen out of fashion and was lost in the last century, the art of cloning forgotten. As a result the boy Beau could not speak and the girl, Petra was a sociopath. The both of them wore their hair long like their mother.

"What do you mean?" Petra asked, her eyes darting to her brother's panicked face.

"The Rangers found the supplier, she's been arrested," Sloan said, "Her crop was destroyed."

"Why would you do a foolish thing like that?" Petra asked, her eyes cutting to her brother who expressed his own questions in a series of lewd gestures.

"fourX has no place in my city," Sloan said, wanting to tell the Singletons they did not belong either.

"Perhaps I should go," Gomez stood, Beau rushed to the table and knocked the monitor to the floor, the model picture crashing and flickering to black.

"You go on and bring your rails through Photon City," Masha said, "I'm sure I'll be able to throw some business your way."

Gomez nodded flashing Sloan a look that blamed her for this misfortune.

"I don't need your favors," Sloan told her.

"Its not a favor," Masha said, "I've decided to settle here in Photon City, and since I have no friends at Southern Rail it would save me the effort of trying to befriend them."

Gomez nodded. "I'll get on that right away, Masha." He nodded to the crime matriarch then her spawn before he left.

"You cannot have Photon City," Sloan said, "I'm not finished with it."

"Let me reveal to you a little known fact," Masha Singleton said, "I own the Southern Public, all of you over grown bureaucrats, aristocrats, officers, corporations have turned to me for something, have worked for me, including you."

"I paid my debt to you," Sloan insisted, those years she hustled in the unregulated synthet game in the, an unreliable often volatile fuel. She helped sell the knock off synthet to different companies around the Capitol city during hard times and Masha had her gang extort and extended loyalty, bribing inspectors and the regulators they worked for.

The money had been plentiful, she was good at what she did, and as a result became an honorary member of the Singleton family as did any one from lieutenant to lowest underling who took pride in the work they did for the family, stayed loyal and did nothing to piss Masha off.

The family was a pack of gypsies, collectively nicknamed the eaters of cities; they had long settled each one in the Southern Public, leaving lieutenants to oversee Masha's business ventures.

When she left the Capitol and began her political career, Sloan was sure that she cut those old ties, she should have known better.

"Do you ever think a slimy bitch like yourself could ever pay my mother back for taking you under her wing?" Petra asked.

"It'll ruin me," Sloan said, "When I'm governor you can have Photon City."

"I can show you ruin," Petra said, producing a knife.

Masha stopped her with an open palm. "You disappoint me today Jules, you disrespect me in front of my darlings I can handle that but I do not know if they can."

"You must understand," Sloan said, "When I'm governor we can both benefit-"

Masha cut her off with a hiss. "Do you think I need a governor?" she asked, "It is they who need me. Do you think I care for running the world? No I just care for my world that I have built."

Sloan stood back and rubbed her cheek looked up at the Singletons the boy hooting, the girl grinning, their mother's eyes flashing with anger.

"Today I am not sure if you are my enemy or my family," Masha told her, "That is a bad place to be in the following days you'll have to prove to me which you are."

That said she left the office, her boy followed, the girl lingered for a few seconds to throw a three-fingered salute then bringing the lewd gesture across her young throat in a slashing motion, a promise to cut her throat soon.

- - - - - - - - -

There was nothing in all of the publics quite like the Photon City Theater Hall. Since the end of filmmaking and television reverting to animated dramas, the stage culture was revived. Every major city had a theater for traveling shows, while Photon City had its own troupe of multitalented performers, a team of actors, visual artists, and writers that produced a new play every week

The plays were a great source of entertainment for the newbies who gathered in the huge lobby at least an hour before the weekly presentations to compare clothes and cars.

Pamela's family gave hefty endowments yearly, so procuring the theater for the swearing in was no problems. She had the lobby with its Romanesque design draped in the burgundy, ivory, and royal blue of the Southern Public, and Photon City flags. A banner, one of Jules' publicity shots enlarged would preside over the party. A small dance floor was being set up before a gold gated area for a forty-piece jazz band.

The week following Poll Night had been stressful but Pamela was sure she'd planned a party that would please Sloan's crowd and impress the newbies. She gave some final orders before leaving the theater hall for the warehouse.

Calls from Pygmalion with messages from the crimer Marx distracted her all week. The woman wanted to speak with Pamela, was getting impatient and angry that she was being ignored.

She had one of her poets, Cross, drive her to the warehouse, Marx and Pygmalion were bickering about something. Tony was already there as well as Marx's two associates.

"How nice to see you again," the pregnant woman said blandly.

"I apologize for not coming sooner," Pamela said, "It's been a hectic week."

"Yes, the taxing life of a newbie," Marx said, introducing her cohorts as Alfie and Rhoda, they nodded but did not say a word.

Pamela did not care for their presence she did not fully trust the crimer Marx so insistent that she have some of her old syndicate be a part of the new venture. Though they did not seem very tough, just insolent, young and intelligent like Marx. Dangerous.

"These two know a little something more about growing fourX than your psychic and your thugs," Marx said, "They're not muscle. I don't deal with muscle."

"I suppose," Pamela said, "We should discuss how we'll sell our product as well as divvying up the profit."

"I agree," Marx said, and they took seats on dusty folding chairs, the crimer adjusting her wounded arm still wrapped carefully in a sling.

"We're really going to have to use our brains for this people," she said, "Before we get connected with a club I trust we're going to have to pay these owners to sell around."

"I was thinking we could hook up with Curt over at BurningHouse," Alfie suggested, "He's swift."

"We'll see," Marx said, "I never really liked him."

"You don't like nobody," Alfie chided.

"I have some venues in mind," Pamela spoke up, "Pygmalion and his friends have always sold to the newbies."

Alfie laughed. "Hevving up the price too."

She looked at her psychic who reddened indignantly. "You must understand what I have to go through to get fourX, going to those clubs, dealing with crimers-"

Marx rolled her eyes. "We're all crimers here this isn't exactly as legitimate business we're into. We have no competition we own this so we can give the shit away or be dishonest as we please."

Pamela was now sure the crimer Marx could not be trusted her pregnant belly and the glow to her skin made her appear innocuous enough, but then again she had lived a life on the streets. She spoke plainly and bluntly, yet intelligently.

"Perhaps now the psychics and poets can go straight to Pygmalion, purchase from him," Pamela suggested, "While your people handle the street selling."

Marx took a moment to mull. "What's this my people thing?" she asked, "We won't get nowhere unless we're all one syndicate…I've come to trust Tony and Cross while I've been taking care of things around here, but as for you and your psychic, I don't even know you're real name."

She took her own moment. "I'm Pamela," she admitted.

Marx sat back in her chair, patting the side of her belly, she wore a mint green hooded sweat shirt unzipped a white thermal tee underneath stretched over her stomach.

"What turns a fine newbie like your self to a life of crime?" Rhoda spoke up, she was brown skinned with perfectly round staring eyes, her hair had been died a blood red.

"I wanted some excitement," Pamela said, "I've always been fascinated by fourX, especially in the past year when things stopped growing."

"fourX has been cultivated in closets for years," Marx said, "I was taught how it grows in secret."

"We should not be suspicious of each other," Pamela said, "We all have a respect for this plant, its spiritual properties, even Pygmalion here."

"Easier said than done," Marx said, "The flat we'll be making here is no joke, it's the money that makes people do awf things."

The pregnant crimer stood, Pamela did likewise and the two walked among the tanks, Marx explaining the dynamics to her new business partner.

"I think they're pleased," she said wearily, "I should thank you for saving them."

"You talk as if they are living creatures," Pamela said carefully so it would not seem as if she were making fun of the crimer.

"Don't you know anything about science?" the young woman asked, "They respire, except it's backwards they take in carbon dioxide and breathe out oxygen, that's why our air is all stale these days, we're probably keel over soon."

"Oh," Pamela said.

"Spend some time around them," Marx said, sensing her disbelief, "The extra oxygen can make you giddy."

"About the money," Pamela said, "Did it make your last partner turn on you?"

"It did," Marx answered, waving goodbye to the others as she headed towards the doors, "Not that I was very trusting before, now I'm going to be a handful to work with."

She said goodbye and left on her little scooter turning her head a bit before she breezed around a corner.

Pamela had her driver take her home, as they neared her building the communiqué on her wrist sounded.

"Where have you been?" Jules asked.

"Just out, Darling," she said into her communiqué, "In search of diversions for tonight."

"Call me once you get home," Jules said more than impatient, pissed, "I'll be waiting."

"Shit," Pamela muttered when the call was ended.

Pamela wanted to protect Jules from her extracurricular activities, she would have never approved of a crop of fourX in her possession with the intent to distribute. It certainly was not the hobby a governor's wife should participate in.

She would have to ask Marx how she had organized her gang and find out what happened to cause them to fall. She wanted to form her own syndicate growing and selling fourX, it would provide a fine diversion until she left with Jules for other conquests.

The dressmaker she hired was waiting impatiently with her gown for the swearing in. Pamela had chosen a light gold color that sparkled slightly, not too much, there were two deep Vs in the front and back.

Her communiqué buzzed again during the final fitting, Pamela did not answer she knew it was Jules angry because she had not called back.

"It's going to be a very busy evening," she said to no one in particular but the dressmaker agreed she had several more fittings. Coming to Photon City to serve the newbies had been a lucrative career choice but they could be so demanding.

- - - - - - - - -

Grimke had not known temptation for a long time. There was Elise sitting across from her in their private car dressed in another enticingly prim suit, maroon, and black, anger clouded her eyes. Soon they would reach Photon City, and her new wife was not speaking to her.

Only hours before the two of them stood in front of a bored old man, after signing their marriage license, and he pronounced them spouses, joined in official matrimony. Elise not only had the proper documentation; birth records, travel logs, and pass port to account for her past, she also had the rings.

"They belonged to Crawford and me," she said, after they boarded the train and a porter situated them in their private car, a wedding gift from Cole, where they could spend their six-hour honeymoon on the way to Photon City.

"Please don't feel weird about wearing them," Elise said, as she presented the rings on her open palm, "I just thought we should have matching rings when we get to our destination."

"I agree," Grimke said stiffly.

The rings were simple; blue sapphires set in white gold, one was slimmer, distinctly feminine than the other.

Grimke took the heavier one, and slipped it on the wrong finger. Elise laughed and helped her. They had began to kiss, Elise pulling close, nearly in Grimke's lap hands at the back of her neck, caressing her gray half curls.

Grimke's hands roamed to the buttons of her new wife's jacket, and she helped pull it off her shoulders and arms. She was slowly becoming familiar with Elise's body, she certainly felt like a real woman, her fingers, her tongue feverish, the warmth of her body so close.

Once she had roamed up her skirt, Grimke was not sure how to handle her; the place between her legs was marvelously fleshy, soft, and burning. Elise leaned forward smiling, whispering encouragement into her ear, her own hand between them unclasping the black red trimmed dress uniform jacket, deftly freeing the brass globe-eagle-anchor buttons.

Grimke was not sure why she stopped, there were so many things running through her head, but later as Elise stared back at her from the other side of the car indignantly, she knew it was fear. She did not know how to handle the situation, Elise, moaning and sighing in her ear, that heat growing between them.

"How did you do it?" she asked, "When you were with Fields and those others? Did you feel anything?"

Elise had blinked, and quickly disengaged her self, smoothing her skirt, catching her jacket, walking to the other side of the car.

"I just have to know," Grimke said.

"What?" she asked calmly, "That you're not just another trick?"

"That's not what I meant," Grimke asking, preferring to have her back in her arms.

"Those people in the caravan made their own assumptions," Elise said, "They saw that I was beautiful and refined, alone, they figured I was a whore. The worst thing that could happen to me is people growing suspicious, or some jack deciding that they have to have me because they think I'm unattainable."

"So you went along with it all?" Grimke asked, "Just to stay safe."

"I befriended Cole," Elise said, "She assured my safety, for a price of course, she wanted more of me than I was willing to give…for a lot of people its enough to have a beautiful woman on her knees, but not Cole-we reached a compromise."

She imagined the old woman in Elise's arms; she would have been like a fire to those world-weary bones, Grimke knew because she had the same feeling.

"You were sweet to her," she finally said, "I'm sure she appreciated it."

Elise nodded. Grimke was still not sure why she had rescued her, if she had rescued her, was not sure why she even thought of her as a woman. At first she was sure she was under some kind of spell, her mother's fathers would have called it unnatural, though they had always preached that a good soldier needed a good woman. Grimke felt as if she had found a prospect; an instant partner a lifetime of trust, and compassion gained from several minutes clutching each other in a filthy pipe while the earth shuddered around them.

Elise only watched her closely like an attentive cat answering questions: She was able to eat in very small quantities, have liquids too, all solely for the purpose of appearances. She could sense hot and cold but was not uncomfortable in extremely cold weather, too much heat was dangerous to her components. She could get wet but not be submerged past her waist.

They talked about Elise going into seclusion with Crawford once she found her way back, hiding out in Canada for years before Crawford died, and avoided speaking of her time with the G-Men.

"Sit with me," Grimke said, and she returned.

"What is it Eustace?" she asked.

"We're getting close to Photon City," she said, "I'll have to meet with some officials."

"Don't worry," Elise said, touching the side of her face, "I'll wait for you."

"I've sent word that I'm recently married," Grimke said, "I told them I met up with an old friend."

"How romantic," Elise said and replaced her hand on Grimke's face with her lips.

She turned her head to look into her eyes. Elise's beauty only added to the unwanted attention, and her accessories while once out of fashion had reappeared as stylish among the wealthy, and the wealthy they did not usually travel in second class train cars with officers who carried cases with red Xs on them.

Grimke found that she was very content to sit with her and hold her remarkably warm hand-to begin to love her.

They stepped off the train, Grimke not sure what to expect, the sight of people darting to greet loved ones, shuffling off the sway of the train ride to collect baggage.

"We'll get our things," Grimke said and they walked side by side, Elise's lovely dark eyes rolling skyward taking in the towers of Photon City's hard gray skyline above them. She watched her marvel, comment that she had not been in a big city in years.

Grimke smiled and held both of her weapons cases in one hand and took Elise's hand in the other mostly to hurry her along, but also because something inside of her was growing for Elise.

"General Grimke," a woman with unruly, sandy hair snapped a picture of them, "Jill Swilly. Press. A few questions please."

She paused gawking at the reported and still clutching Elise.

"I'm extremely late," she stammered.

"General Grimke," a red head in a Ranger uniform stopped before them and extended her hand.

The reporter, Swilly stepped back frowning a bit.

"Yes," Grimke said letting go of Elise to shake.

"I'm Captain West," the Ranger said, "I'm here to show you around for the day."

"Excellent," she said.

"That's all, Swilly," the Captain said to the reporter, her frame was smaller, but she stood rock solid until Swilly moved on.

Grimke watched her go, and then introduced Elise.

"Hello Captain," she said and they clasped hands.

"Your things are being delivered right away to your home," the captain said, "We can go there first."

They followed her out of the terminal to a police car, Elise looking to the city beyond, the sea of people, cars and UTMs, the dull glare of the public vids, and advertisements.

"It's gorgeous," she said.

The Captain glanced back at them as she opened the back door for Elise.

"This is the first time I've heard Photon City called gorgeous," she said.

They drove through Old Town, the affluent section the corporations called home taking the high rises, towers of glass as their home. Mid-Town was rows of fine little homes of red and white bricks with tiny lawns of faux grass and faux roses, everything was gated and guarded by Black Stripes a force of private security, the captain explained. There were actual schools and children playing in a nearby park and people walking dogs.

Grimke checked the mirror to peer at Elise watching out the windows.

The car stopped in front of a tall, skinny house of red brick, two gray pillars carved in the shapes of robed women held up the high entablature of their narrow front porch.

"This one is yours," the captain said, "Please go in, I'll wait out here for you, General."

Grimke nodded.

"Thank you Captain West," Elise said.

They crossed the lawn together. "Eustace its lovely," she said.

"Yes it's very grand," Grimke said at a loss for words, "Those pillars are very fancy."

She put her hand on the front door's key pad, the screen scanned and opened.

"We'll have to get you in the system," she said to Elise.

"No need," she said holding up her right hand, "I can open any key pad with this."

Grimke raised her eyebrows as she walked inside. "I have the feeling I'm never going to stop learning new things about you."

"That's the way things should be in a marriage," she replied.

Beyond the front door was a foyer with stairs that led to the second floor. To the left was a fairly large den furnished with opulent black furniture, black wood end tables inlaid with bands of silver trim, and silvery lamps with lozenge shaped soft lights.

To the right of the stairs was a small parlor with Sun King furniture, beyond was a dinning room, with a huge oval shaped, black table. The kitchen was small with a slab of real marble counter scratched by the previous owner.

Upstairs were two bedrooms and a study; a simple house after all Grimke realized and was relieved especially that Elise was impressed with it.

"Certainly not like anything you ever lived in with Crawford," Grimke said.

"No," she answered as they adjourned downstairs, "But then I've lived in a closet when the G-Men weren't using me, and with Mathers I lived in a little lab."

Grimke hugged her. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be," Elise pulled away, "A new house for a new life with you."

"You're amazing," Grimke said she went to the table where she had laid her cases and opened the first with her Hammersmith. She removed her jacket and struggled with her shoulder holster.

"And what should I do while you're out saving the city?" Elise asked, she had been watching and came to help with the holster.

"Stay out of trouble," Grimke told her and grinned as the back of her neck was kissed.

"That's no fun at all," Elise smiled and came around for her lips.

"This isn't Canada," Grimke said, "Why don't you take some time to fix up the place a bit? Make it more your style."

"I could do that," Elise said turning to survey their new home, "Crawford never let me decorate, but I've seen enough of it."

"A challenge," Grimke slipped on her all-weather, "Order whatever you like, use my account number just remember I'm not a billionaire."

"Of course," Elise wrapped her up in a delicious hug, "You've given me a second chance, Eustace, a new life."

Grimke gave her a little smile and wondered how many lives Elise would live. She left her and walked out to the car where Captain West waited expectantly.

"You ready Chief?" she asked.

"I am," Grimke said, "I was hoping we could visit part of a normal beat today captain."

"Right," West said.

They were silent the rest of the way, bullying the car through the streets of pedestrians and UTMs. West was a patient yet stern driver. She only blasted her sirens one time at a group of rowdy youth shaking the littler UTMs as they crossed the street.

Headquarters was located just west of the downtown towers. The main building was a blur of activity or it appeared to be until Grimke figured the place out as just waiting lines.

The first Grimke saw was a line of rangers with perps shackled to their arms they were waiting for another group of rangers to fill out their paper work. A lot of the perps were tired and cranky, mouthy, then some were crazed, and the rangers wrestled with them every agonizing moment of waiting.

There were a group of rangers posted along the halls, sentinels to keep order, there was a lot of shouting and threatening, and a man was even shocked with a tazer until he pissed his pants.

West herded her away from the scene, past sliding glass doors, up an escalator that revealed several more floors of listless people slack mouthed watching the screaming and cursing, dodging the brawling.

"What are these people being held for?" Grimke asked as they ascended.

"They were picked up for not being registered," West told her, "We hold them here and help them to get registered, put on job lists-"

"Seems like a waste of time and manpower to me," Grimke said.

"Even criminals have the right to witness their due process every step of the way," West argued, "It keeps cases being snagged on paper technicalities."

Grimke was surprised they all hadn't drowned in their precious paper work.

"While we're tazing the criminals we've caught there are a lot more going free," Grimke said to West.

"Chief, with all do respect this is a city where things are done to better the society," West said.

"Most hotspots are places where people live their lives," Grimke told her. "We should be here to make sure people are able to live safely no matter who has what."

They went to the fourth floor where crimers were charged and further processed, then were escorted across a covered bridge to the jail units, which were damned near empty Grimke noted. The guards greeted them cheerfully and the warden showed them around the facilities.

"Rangers I'd like to know why you're not in proper uniforms," Grimke said disregarding the few crimers who spent their days watching educational forums on vid screens, they looked like bored overfed monkeys caged behind the shatter proof clear walls over the front of their cells.

"General," a man cried desperately, banging on the wall making it shake slightly, "Remember me, it's Major Corke."

Grimke stopped and frowned at the man, she did not recognize him she would have remembered the dark tattoos nearly covering the skin on his forearms.

"I'm here unjustly, for defending myself," he cried.

The warden made a point of showing his badge. "No one can access anything without the proper I.D," he assured her, as the man, Corke's, clamor ended as abruptly as it started.

"Not my point," Grimke said turning to West crisp and prim in a clean uniform and hat, "Besides you Captain, I've seen rangers in half a uniform, most tie-less, hat-less, and in worse cases stained and unkempt."

West of course was fuming, Grimke duly noted, this was her force, and here was the general marching on her heels peering sternly, judging the way things were run in Photon City.

"Every Ranger is issued proper uniforms," she said, looking over her shoulder to catch Corke watching, grinning, "And more are available to anyone who needs any article."

"Yes, but what the rules of attire?" Grimke asked. "And how are infractions against those rules enforced?"

"Jack Lacy did not bother with uniforms," West said, she kind of grimaced but did not back down.

Grimke frowned. "I want a copy of those rules immediately. You'll assign someone to fetch those for me?" she asked.

"Of course, Chief," West said, "Now if I can show you the barracks-"

"Are they much nicer than these cells?" Grimke asked.

"Yes they are," West answered, her voice rising indignantly.

"Then I can hold off seeing them for a time," Grimke said.

The tour ended with a presentation of her new office, and she nodded as West showed her the vid, the private lavatory, the window facing Old Town.

"That's fine, I'd like to go down to Waugh now," she said.

"The Park?" West asked.

"Yes," Grimke said, "On my way to Photon City I heard there is a lawless section of land."

Young West looked humiliated as if she had personally let things go to ruin. She gave the captain a smile.

"We'll set all that right," Grimke told her.

They returned to the lot and the car.

"Let's try out some of those," Grimke pointed to the group of hogs over in the next lot, they were trixes without the fiber glass casing and went relatively faster.

"I suppose," West said, "If you're sure."

"Don't worry about me," Grimke said, "Just two weeks ago I was still in combat."

West nodded as Grimke led the way to the hogs.

- - - - - - - - -

The old woman had a death wish, West was sure of that, she radioed for two of the best Rangers to accompany them. She had never charged into any situation guns blazing, West somehow was always on the edges of any fray, gripping her riot baton, behind a plastic face shield, standing on her tiptoes in order to see above the shifting ranks as the carnage growing closer.

Grimke was a war hero. West could see her leading the attack in desert colored fatigues, mowing down a village of rebel infidels then dragging two of her wounded Marine buddies to safety shoving them in an escape copter and unselfishly staying behind to set up mine traps for the enemy's retaliation forces.

The General pulled ahead of West and stopped in front of the veteran tenement in disrepair, the old leathernecks, airmen, seamen, and grunts, loitering, some drunk, some mad, replaying various battles behind dead eyes.

Less than a minute of watching they were off again, West wondering what the stop was all about, Grimke followed her off the street down onto the gravel trail of the park stopping at a safe enough distance to observe the look-out kids observing them.

"They watch for Rangers and other enemies," West warned, once the new chief pulled up by her side, "They'll run as soon as we get too close."

"We'll go the perimeter then," Grimke said, peering through the day at the ragged children, adolescents, and teens. She led the way, scattering them, West wondering if she was enjoying seeing the kids disperse like vermin upon seeing a tall, strange ranger in black and red.

West did not disdain the people of the park, but she did not think their lifestyle should be encouraged by providing city services. They were unregistered citizens, they paid no taxes, and did not vote; they allowed themselves to be exploited by the corporations who doled out puny daily wages. They were losing out in the end.

Several kids hit Sisina, the bayou that wound lazily through the park; they had kayaks and paddled across to the other bank and a cluster of foilies.

The squatters lived in clans usually taking the last name of its leader or just grabbing one from a character from the drama-anime that came on during prime time. They spent a lot of time fighting over territory that did not belong to them, and there was always some kind of feud going on. West thought of her pregnant crimer, Marx, she knew the park, had clawed her way out during her climb up the crime ladder.

Grimke veered off the trail suddenly down the slopping land into the park. West cursed and followed her driving the streets of the park paths worn by the tires of hogs and feet.

Dogs barked and the squatters stared coldly or jeered as they passed. West focused on Grimke abandoning the prospect of radioing in for her back up. She was relieved when she noticed that the new chief was slowing to a stop. Her hog slowed too but not because she was letting up on the clutch, the gages flickered then sank.

"Juicers," West called out dismounting her hog now useless, going for her police piece. She switched on her ear scanner and the gold colored mic piece pinned to her jacket.

Grimke was ready for action; she removed her jacket revealing a big ass Hammersmith in a shoulder holster as she faced the small crowd of crimers heading their way, young ones with pipes and machetes, tiny but deadly revolvers. They were dirty with shaggy hair, and skinny the gleam of starvation in their eyes, it all made them genderless.

"We're not here for anyone," Grimke spoke up, "Just driving through."

"Don't like the looks of no knaves driving through here," one of the kids said, "Especially creeper broad ones."

The others laughed.

"Turn off the juicers so we can leave," West spoke up, "Like she said we were just passing through."

"Creeper?" Grimke asked, "I bet I could out box your puny ass."

The kids laughed. "Laredo she talking about you," someone shouted.

"I can rage any old broad," Laredo said, "Break you down."

Grimke put up her fists. "Let's do this: I got money that say you can't."

"We could just rush ya'll and take it," Laredo said, "Them hogs, and that Hammersmith."

"So you won't take a challenge from an old woman?" she asked, "You cowed? Your momma work at the plant and you came out allwrong?"

"Fuck you," Laredo's fists were up, "First I'm gonna break your crooked old face you fucking dagger, then I'm gonna get your Smith, and your little girlfriend."

She was insane, West was sure of it then, Grimke told her to put her gun away and started dancing hands up with the little teenaged demon, the others cheering.

The kid's face was well protected and the kid was fast, West noticed the scabbed knuckles, she was sure Grimke noticed and figured Laredo never turned down a challenge.

The captain was sure this was a distraction that she was to do something because Grimke certainly was not going to box a kid from the park.

After a couple of rapid fire misses from her opponent the chief landed a punch that rang out through the dull day. The kid wavered stunned; one protected fist lowered just a bit. Several older squatters burst through the crowd in time to see Laredo fall flat out.

"What the hell is going on here?" the squatter asked, her eyes fiery with hatred and the man urged the boy up to continue the fight.

The others explained, Grimke whispered at West to stay away from her piece.

"This old broad won," one of the kids told the couple.

The man began to swear at the boy ordering him to get up and finish, Laredo refused shocked at the river of blood streaming from his nose to his hands.

"Turn off the juicers," Grimke ordered.

The woman nodded and yelled obscenities at the kids. "Ya'll not to be playing around with the juicers."

One kid ran to a nearby tree, pulled out a metallic canister from the fork of the trunk, and twisted the top, the hogs roared back to life. West ran to stop hers from coasting away. While she was distracted Grimke introduced herself to the squatters.

"Whatsit, ya'll don't like the police?" she asked the woman.

"Knaves don't come here," she said, "The Park takes care of the Park."

"But that can get sticky," Grimke said talking in short sentences in the lingo of the neighborhood.

"Life ain't ever fair play," the woman said.

"But there is a law to the way things should be," Grimke told her, "It's fairly fair."

"Fairly," the woman agreed, "This is ours. Claim Isaacs, it's me, my man Presley, my boy, Laredo few ones that had nothing, I'll get word to the other claims not to be messing with no knaves who come through here."

"Appreciated," Grimke said going to her hog.

"See ya, Chief," the Isaacs man said, admiring the mark she had made on his boy.

West led her out of the park and back to headquarters.

"That was a good start," Grimke said of the scenario in the park.

"That was what I was trying to warn you about," West shouted at her, "You're going to get Rangers hurt and killed, this isn't war and I won't let them be expendable like the soldiers where you come from."

"The park is as much the city as Old Town," Grimke said and added, "Or Calvary, or anywhere, I will have Rangers out there but not to arrest folks for not being registered but to establish some law."

West sighed. "Why not?" she asked, "Why not be just as barbaric as these squatters punching kids out?"

Grimke ignored the comment. "You guys got a mess around here?"

"You mean a cafeteria?" she asked.

"Right," Grimke said.

- - - - - - - - -

"So how did you learn how to talk like park folks?" West asked as they negotiated the crowded cafeteria, where the city's police enjoyed their fu free on the city.

"I'm not the world's best at talking," Grimke said, she knew the Captain thought she was some kind of cave woman, and it kind of pained her to state the obvious, "I commanded a guy who came from the park."

They watched the vid as they ate cubed "chicken" on a sticky bed of rice all drenched in a translucent red sauce. Grimke saw Captain West's picture on the news banner below an animated sitcom.

"Congratulations," she said, "City Steward that explains a lot."

West reddened.

"Oh and a big raid," Grimke nodded, "fourX."

"I don't know why you sound so amazed," Captain West said not eating much of her dinner, "I'm not just a paper pusher or a politician, I'm a ranger."

"I never doubted your dedication," Grimke said, "I'm impressed."

West gave a short wave to someone and the new chief turned to see a young ranger with a tray of food who quickly averted her gaze and sat with some others.

Grimke did not want to get personal and ask questions she did not have to. She already knew all about young West. She was a crusader and that left little time for her own life.

"I thought you were mad Sloan did not make you chief but I see that you never wanted that," Grimke said, "You just actually give a damn, it's going to take you a while to trust me, see that I give a damn too."

West looked up from her plastic plate her gray-blue eyes narrowed; she did not appreciate the new chief figuring her out so quickly.

"Where to next?" she asked.

"I want to go to the scene of that riot," Grimke pointed to the vid above West's head, "Make sure nothing goes wrong for this Moss person's memorial."

"I suppose you're religious then?" she asked sarcastically.

"No," Grimke said, "I don't want more riots."

"The memorial is this evening," West said, "That's cutting it close for the swearing in."

"That's tonight?" Grimke asked.

"Yeah," West said, "A week after the poll."

"Are you going?" she asked not sure if she was up to such an event, not sure if she could take Elise along.

"I wouldn't," West said, "But the City Council is to attend."

Grimke changed the subject, she had work to do and if she could not make it to the party that was alright with her.

"Better get some forces together for that memorial," she said.

- - - - - - - - -

It flamed Marx that she had to buy back her own Trix. Some crooked knave had sold it off to a sleazy lot dude who cared less about it being stolen from a pregnant woman.

She stopped at a fu stand and had some broth while she skimmed one of the public vid screens. Marx noticed that Moss's memorial was going on and debated whether to go as she ate a couple of Chocolate Deluxe cupcakes that reminded her of that whore-dog Georgie. She did not want to be anywhere near the cult with the captain breathing down her neck. During the week since the riot, the captain came every day to check on her bringing fruit and other treats, the good stuff not available at fu stands. She was intent on getting Marx healed up. She concluded that West was too nice, too idealistic for her own good. It occurred to Marx that she should go pay her respects to Euvia, she did not have to tell a soul who she was or tell the captain she was even going.

She decided to go back to the greens.

First she went home for some sort of offering to send away with her grandmother. She searched through a closet of junk but the only thing that struck her was a red banner trimmed all around in gold colored thread.

She wished she had flowers and recalled those great funeral wreaths; before she realized she had her own blooms. She wondered if grandmother would approve. But then who had passed the stories and knowledge down to Marx's mother to pass to her?

The rangers were there keeping an eye on everything, keepinga crowd of onlookers at bay, which meant Marx could not get through. She paced the perimeter in her black suit until she saw West standing with a Marine of all things.

"Hey knave," she called to her, "How about getting me in?"

West frowned at her bit. "You're supposed to be resting."

"This?" Marx asked lifting her sling a bit, "It's nothing."

"I could escort you in," West said, "If you can convince Townsend to let you in-"

Marx showered the red banner bundled around the fourX leaves. "I brought a gift…who's your friend?"

West turned. "This is USMC General Grimke she's the new police chief."

"Oh yeah," Marx said, "Does she say anything?

"I do," Grimke spoke up she offered her hand, "It's been some time since I've seen a pregnant woman."

Marx turned sideways showing off her belly. "I'm such a celebrity I had to buy my own trix back from the scum who bought it from a crooked Ranger."

Grimke raised her eyebrows. "I'm sorry to hear that…"

"Marx," she said and they were officially introduced, "They're all bent in some way, even perfect West here; she has the wrong ideas about everything."

"Cute," the captain said putting hand to the small of the pregnant woman's back taking her through the barricade towards the chapel, "Don't you take anything seriously?" she asked, "That was my new boss."

"Hey I'm a citizen I have the right to complain," Marx said as West clutched her wrist suddenly, she tried to snatch it away, "Hey don't get rough."

"I'm trying to make this look believable," West said, "This could not have gone better if I'd planned it."

"Like I was telling the new chief, you're all bent," Marx went on walking.

A man in a robe appeared out of the gloom.

"I knew you knaves were gathered for a reason," he said, "Can't leave us to mourn our reverend in peace."

"We only mean to keep another riot from happening," West said, and introduced herself as the police captain.

"This woman was injured here last week," she said.

"I've been interested in Heart Fire for a time," Marx spoke up, "I send a parcel every other month."

"Yeah?" he asked in disbelief, "What's the return postmark?"

"There is none," Marx said, "I don't mail it, I have little guy with no legs below the knee bring it, I scrawl a heart in fire on the inner package because I never know what to write."

"You've been very generous to us," he said, "I'm Casper."

"Marx," she answered and West let go of her so she could follow him across the green.

"What has kept you from joining us?" he asked.

"The father of my child, and my own inhibitions," she said looking over her shoulder at the captain standing in the quickening darkness, "But now he's gone, the other night I could have been killed no matter what side of that bottle I was on."

"So why did you come here?" he asked, "Knowing the probable danger, the fact that you have a life within you."

"I figured out which side I want to be on," she said, "I don't think I'll ever believe in some perfect utopian hereafter, but I'd like to seek the answers."

"Of course Heart Fire does not hold the answers," Casper said.

"But you do seek them," Marx said and he nodded, they were approaching the chapel, a plain gray building with no windows. The congregation gathered outside, some dressed in robes, some in street clothes. There could not have been more than a hundred Marx estimated. She stopped Casper by putting a hand on his shoulder.

"I never would have known about what goes on here at the chapel if I had not found my grandmother," she told him.

"Is she among us?" he asked.

"She was," Marx answered, "Her name was Euvia Moss."

He started. "I cannot believe that so easily."

"I don't expect you to," she answered, "I came tonight especially to pay my respects, because I never knew her and when I found her I didn't have the guts to show my face."

"Follow me," he said.

He led her through the crowd of mourners into the chapel there was a dimly lit lobby with brown brick floors the columns cracked across and right through. There were the old state flag with its single white star, and the stars on the stripes, and the flag of the Southern Public all standing together in a cluster of brass. There were also stained glass twisted sculptures of a bare foot woman in a long dress with a scarlet bodice and skirt, and not far behind her another woman wielding two axes. Both had flickering hearts in their chests.

"Those are our spirit guides," Casper explained, "The Keeper, she looks after our souls she is also called The Barefoot Goddess and the Reaper, she collects our souls when it is our time to go."

"Doesn't she have a cute nickname?" Marx asked sarcastically.

"The One Who Reaps should not be feared," Casper told her.

Marx had to keep herself from snorting at the entranceway of the chapel stood a woman in a white robe like the one her grandmother wore the night of the riot when she fell.

"Reverend Townsend," Casper said, "Our philanthropist has come."

"We are sure of this?" she asked before looking Marx's way, she was short, fat and completely bald except for a barely visible cobwebby haze that curled around her head.

"She knew about the heart on the inside of the package, and the deliverer," Casper explained.

"His name is Barker," Marx spoke up.

Townsend stepped aside. "Please, you are welcome here."

Marx left them before Casper could go into her lineage. Her grandmother was elevated in a shallow bottomed coffin on a raised platform in the center of the room, the chapel. There seemed to be no altar just rings of stone and wooden benches. The walls were decorated with six huge canvases of purple, blue and green static.

Marx climbed the steps of the platform and saw her grandmother Euvia Moss, her eyes closed, her arms at her sides dressed in a white robe with a fiery heart stitched over the breast, there was a red sash around her neck with orange axes.

"Granny," she said, "If you'll allow me to give you this…"

She tucked the banner in the crease of the robe between her arm and her body fingers brushing linen swathed dead flesh.

"I don't know if you would have wanted to know me or not," Marx whispered, "You would have most certainly hated Georgie, probably would have told me what a skunk she was before she showed me her ass. We probably could have grown fourX together or something." She sighed, "I'm such a jack because I don't wish I would have come sooner. I'm a coward you see, always looking out for some bane, I'm still afraid that you wouldn't have wanted me."

She stood up straight her hand at the side of her belly. "Anyway, I'll probably never know if you wanted me or not."

She could have cried, but she did not, she only turned away from the coffin, staggered towards the door slowing to look at the pictures of her grandmother on a floating vid screen. She had seemed like a pretty pleased old broad.

Marx walked away looking around her self consciously at the other members, her stomach churned and she could almost feel her partially digested supper slosh around inside of her. The nausea went instantly to her head in a wave of dizziness.

Townsend came from the left. "You should not leave so soon."

"I don't feel so swift," Marx said ready to ditch West's plot because she officially no longer wanted to be there, "I should be getting home."

The Reverend stopped her catching her elbow, sternly, steadying her with her matronly form.

"Casper tells me that you believe you are Euvia's granddaughter," she said.

"I know," Marx said, "I hired an investigator about two years ago, he led me here to the green, I didn't know what else to do, so I sent money."

"Know that we are here for you," she said after taking in the information, her eyes kind and brown, "You know you would be welcome here if you were not Euvia's granddaughter."

"Thank you," Marx said, "But would she have welcomed me?"

"She was a kind and generous woman," Townsend said, "Extremely private but she told me of her lost daughter taken by the plant."

"Did she ever talk of growing things?" Marx asked.

"One of her many talents," Townsend said, "She revered the earth and was sad to see it dying under blackened skies."

"Did she ever speak of certain ancestors?" Marx asked, "Native ancestors?"

Townsend grinned. "She did," the grin was washed away by a sudden shower of tears, "She would say that they kept her in tune to things people had long forgotten she was very wise."

Marx nodded she looked to her grandmother's coffin and felt a feeling of warmth surround her. She could sense her own heart beating in her chest in sync with the tiny pulse of her baby, and something else, perhaps Euvia Moss.

"I don't think I will go just yet," Marx said to the reverend, "I'll stay."

"I'm glad," Townsend said squinting her eyes, "You do have Euvia's likeness, and so skinny."

"Have you seen my profile lately?" Marx asked standing sideways.

"And such a blessing," she sighed reaching out a hand with a questioning look Marx nodded to.

She touched her belly. "Euvia would have been pleased."

The rest of the members began to file in and fill in the benches around the coffin.

"What's going on?" Marx asked Townsend.

"Tonight we'll hold a vigil," she said, "And pray to the Keeper, to thank her for taking out sister into her bosom on the Other Side, allowing her to enjoy her journey after, learning, and loving."

"So we never have to die," Marx said.

"No," Townsend said, "We journey without the cloister of our bodies, without the impulses of our brain we are able to know."

Marx nodded. "How many members do you have?"

"Ninety-three," she said, "Or should I say one thirty-two…"

A look of sorrow briefly passed her pale face as she paused. She went on to explain that Heart Fire was divided into novices, true believers who lived double lives coming to the chapel from their homes, there were newbies, plant drones, scientists, artists, and even crimers. Next were the congregate, those formally committed.

Then there were deacons, ex soldiers like Corke who had all experienced the same phenomena; encounters with the Reaper on battle fields. Their stories were exactly the same, a woman in blood red armor with pale skin and shoulder length black hair, her eyes shinning blue light came and collected the souls of their comrades that she severed from their bodies with an axe.

Casper was their leader the dude sounded paranoid to Marx he had been anticipating such an incident like the riot that had taken place a few nights before. That was why Corke had been carrying a gun. Marx was shocked to find her self agreeing with Captain West. The reverend of course was on top, and that had been grandma Moss who first discovered the old teachings while researching the city and all the names it had been called before.

According to her findings Photon city was nearly destroyed by fire long ago before the beginning of the division of the old fifty, and the civil wars. This had been written off as an attack from one of the many enemies the country had earned but was actually the kidnapping of the Hiding Goddess' mortal daughter by the Desperado the ruler of the underworld.

"The Hiding Goddess is the ultimate presence," Townsend explained, "All things are a manifestation of Her Self, water, animals, humans, our emotions, she came to earth and lived semi-mortal a great evil broke her spirit, then she went in hiding leaving seven mortal daughters as her legacy."

"And this Desperado snatched her daughter," Marx said.

"Yes, she wanted to make her queen, little did she know that the underworld was the Goddess's hiding place, she had taken shelter in a labyrinth," Townsend said, a small group had gathered around listening gravely, apparently they never got tired of that particular fairy tale, it had the air of something that had been told over and over.

"Meanwhile, the Reaper, a great warrior and mage when she was mortal, gained passage to the Underworld afraid for her lover's life. She fought the Desperado but by then it was too late to return to this world, the Hiding One empowered her daughter who did become queen of the underworld, and there she has built a home sending her consort to collect souls."

Townsend looked around at them beaming. "Of course the Goddess accepts all good souls no matter what crimes they have committed for she knows that there must be darkness to balance out light-"

"So there are jacks there on the Other Side?" Marx asked and knew instantly she had committed a faux pas, someone muttered ‘novice'.

"Yes Marx," Townsend said, "There are those on the Other Side who are what you would call jacks but they are genuinely good souls."

"Most of the old religions were tricky about that," Casper spoke up, "Claiming that certain souls would be shut out of afterlife for crimes committed in earthly form, crimes ranging from dancing to being foreign."

"But they still require that faith," Marx told him, "It's difficult to hold, it just seems to me that if a deity wants to be followed they'd ride down on a lightning bolt to set some things right here on earth."

Townsend laughed. "That would be very simple, and we would not need generals to run our police force."

Casper frowned. "The Goddess has hidden herself because she has no protectors, no one who would fight for her and so we must seek out her knowledge to shield it from the world."

Marx noted the edge in his voice, realized that the so called deacons were on the defense. A lot of them had come back to the publics abandoned by their government; shunned by the people. It was hard for ex-military to find jobs beyond policing or the factories, or the power plant. All they had to do was claim they had some vision, and be accepted into the top tiers of a religious movements, given a title, given respect, a purpose.

"Of course," Townsend agreed smiling at Marx then at the congregation, "Oh but to have a child here in our presence, so close to the Goddess right now. The knowledge we seek is not so deeply hidden, if we were to open our hearts and be as clean as the unborn infant within this young woman, then we would know peace of the soul and know and know."

"What mercy to know," someone shouted.

"What joy to know," came another call.

"Yes," Townsend agreed.

Marx was sure they were junks but haunting ones, she made her way home deep in thought. She was sitting down for a snack when West came to visit, she was on her way to the swearing in and wore a more formal uniform. She looked good, Marx was actually nervous around her and could not stop giggling.

"Laugh all you want," West said.

"I'm sorry, you look nice," Marx pouted over her laughter.

She wanted to know how things went at the vigil Marx told the minimum, she did not want the captain to know she partially agreed with her, that Heart Fire was on the offense, looking for any flying brick to use as a reason to start shooting. Anyway, she her self did not have any proof, only the feeling she got out of the place.

"They were still at it when I left," she ended her report.

"I'm glad you're in," West said, and for a second Marx thought she meant infiltrating Heart Fire but she meant in for the night, safe in her fortress.

Marx was helping her to the door when she realized the concern and smiled, the captain turned to her, kind eyes gleaming and she could not help but take her hand, a gesture she meant to be friendly but made her nervous anyway.

"Thanks for the pears," she said, "They're really good."

"My department takes care of our snitches," she teased, revenge for what she thought was laughter at her outfit.

Marx let go of her hand realizing that she was not the only nervous one there at the bottom of her stairs.

"Goodnight Captain," she said and watched her go.

- - - - - - - - -

"I don't understand why I cannot go," Elise said to Eustace, "I used to pass as human all the time."

"I won't risk it," she said, lacing up her second shiny dress boot, Elise had never realized before that Eustace had such small feet.

"You're angry with me then," Elise worried, "You don't like the house."

"I like the house just fine," Grimke said sliding on her red vest over her black shirt, she stopped to hold Elise.

She had tried her best not to go very opulent with the whole thing, tried to make the house a place Eustace would feel comfortable and safe after battling it out on the streets of Photon City. She had the windows fitted for new drapes, a heavy velvety royal blue; the style of furniture was fashionably bleak and black some accents of color were what the place needed.

She decided on Asian blue, Chinese vases, a resin statue of a samurai warrior on horse back, several prints of Japanese waves, a silk tapestry embroidered with Korean words-all things she felt Grimke would like.

Elise had only allowed herself one room with an antique dressing table with soft light around it and rotating racks for her clothing. If she had to be a shut in she figured she might as well look good.

Eustace had not been pleased when she came home to all of the workers and delivery people around the place installing this and that.

"I'm sorry you can't go," Eustace insisted, "This is for our own safety, what if some one recognizes you?"

"Crawford's friends are long gone," Elise told her, "It's been over sixty years," she widened her eyes, "Sixty years."

"Still," Eustace said.

"I won't become a shut in Eustace," Elise insisted, "I was programmed to be social, I'm a social person."

The doorbell chimed.

"That's my ride, I've got to go," Eustace said carefully putting on her special evening jacket, it had the same kind of collar with the brass eagle-globe-anchor except the hem had a diagonal cut, and the cuffs on the sleeves were red, stitched with laurels of gold thread, there were lots of brass buttons, the silver stars stitched across the tops of the shoulders.

"I'll get you out of here Elise just give me some time to adjust," she said placing a black and white cap with the eagle-globe-anchor above the bill.

And then she was gone without so much as a peck on the cheek.

It had not taken Elise long to learn anger. She was older than Eustace Grimke by over a dozen years. She was no soldier but she had seen a lot more wars, in fact she had watched the country pick up its feeble old head after civil strife dissolved everything.

For some reason her memory was recalling to her the time when she was five years online and she had asked Crawford what she was.

"Why you're thirty percent Dorothy Gale way after her story was finished, you're twenty percent Betty Paige, you're the roman Cleopatra, you're Salome, you're Helen, you're a 3-D animated Mona Lisa, you're Aphrodite."

"I don't understand," Elise had told her.

"You're beautiful, and exotic, but you're the girl next door," Crawford said, "You see the way everyone looks at you when we go to parties, the way they envy you."

It took Elise years to understand what her creator meant by those words, when she was with Mathers she they disgusted her, once she was back with Crawford she learned to take more pride in them. She certainly knew now, and though Mathers had tried to convince her other wise it was programmed within her to be a companion to someone strong to care for them and go to parties on their arm, a trophy in effect, there could be pride in that if the emotions involved were genuine.

She went to her room, she had not unpacked anything. Elise found the one the contained one of her favorite evening dresses, just a few years ago it would have been out of style but fashions were constantly recycling themselves. The dress was red, clingy with a loose skirt that had a spit up the side, embroidered around the low cut front.

She smiled to herself Grimke would no longer be able to resist her any once she saw the way heads would turn.

- - - - - - - - -

Sloan was surprised to find that Pamela had arrived first at the swearing in, she wore a dress of a slightly iridescent gold material cut a little more conservatively than her usual choices. Her blonde hair looked darker combed up like a jeweled headdress.

She was talking with some newbie who faded when Sloan came from behind to take her hand and kiss it.

"There you are," Pamela said, "I was wondering when you'd decide to arrive."

"You look stunning," Sloan said.

"So do you," Pamela said grabbing the lapel of Sloan's long black tailored coat, "Where have you been?" she asked.

"I had a quick meeting," she said, looking up at the two uniforms that had caught everyone's attention. It was West and Grimke. Pamela turned her head and made an audible gasp.

"That's the new chief?" she grinned, "I think I'm in lust," she teased her fiancé.

"Down girl," Sloan said, Grimke and West were locked in some deep conversation, the captain, the shorter of the two had the new chief by the elbow and the chief of police was leaning sideways her head cocked down.

Grimke straightened at last having spotted the mayor, she marched ahead the captain behind her.

"Goddamn that West," Sloan hissed to Pamela, "She got Grimke."

"Grimke doesn't look like the kind of woman that can be got," she blushed and stepped past her, hand extended; sure she could stun the old woman with her beauty. Sloan also confidant of her fiancé's gorgeousness hung back to watch, this being one of their favorite party games.

- - - - - - - - -

"I'm glad I'm not the only one who came in uniform," West seemed genuinely relieved, she was waiting outside the pavilion for Grimke chatting with some of the rangers on guard. She wore her formal blues; a short dark blue jacket with a gold braid wound around her shoulder and a long blue skirt with gold stripes up the sides, her red hair pulled back by a single brass barrette.

"It's not too much?" Grimke asked, debating on complimenting the young captain on her own dress, afraid she would inadvertently betray how stunning she thought she looked, "I always feel like a nutcracker in this get-up."

West laughed covering her mouth with her hand before taking two glasses from a pausing waiter and handed one to Grimke. They immediately downed their drinks and discarded their glasses.

"Your wife couldn't make it?" West asked.

"No," Grimke answered, "She's feeling a little bit under the weather today."

The both of them felt awkward there, looking out at the newbies, the council members, the CEOs and other hangers on.

"I'm to take you to meet the mayor," West said, "She wants to talk to you privately."

"Right," Grimke said.

"Chief?" she asked, "We got across to each other today, we both have certain ideals but basically it's for the good of Photon City."

"I believe that, West," Grimke said.

"Sloan," the captain solemnly, "She doesn't care about nothing but her ride to governor."

Grimke nodded. "I know what I was brought here for West, to grab headlines, I know nothing about policing a city, but that's my job now, I always do my job."

"Don't look now then," the captain said, "Cause there she is at ten o'clock."

Grimke smiled and went to meet Sloan. Years ago their ancestors had met on the beach in Galvest and resisted an army. Leland Sloan was in the state police by day, by night he led the revolt of one state from an entire country torn by civil war. Elder Grimke I was part of that group, a sort of lieutenant, a retired Marine who like his granddaughter traded one war for another, his battalion fought a bloody scene along the coast, flying under a banner designed by his mother as a family crest, a blue cross trimmed in red on a white field.

Later that cross was turned sideways the end stretched to reach across the flag, a single star added to the center of the head where the crucified one hung his thorn crowned head.

The Sloans gained all the power while the Grimke's continued fighting, for there were always new wars some place in the world.

Just as Grimke was close enough to greet the mayor a curvy blonde stepped forward.

"You must be the new chief," she smiled.

- - - - - - - - -

Pamela thought she would embarrass them all by squealing as Grimke took her hand gently in her own and bowed low, not kissing it, but when her head was alongside their grasps she raised their hands a bit then straightened.

"General Grimke," she blushed, a formality streak flashed over her, "I'm Pamela Zepeda Sloan."

"Ms. Zepeda," she said, because it would have been rude to call her Mrs. Sloan since her own name had bearing, "How nice to meet you."

"Charmed," Pamela said, feeling Sloan slinking behind her, probably pissed because she felt like the chief and the captain were best friends.

"Grimke," Sloan said, as if they were great friends, briskly saluting.

"Mayor Sloan," she said, and they shook, "I must say that you have a fine city here."

"Of course, Grimke," the mayor said, Pamela could tell she was not impressed by the flattery, "I put a lot of work into her, still waiting for the proper yield."

"I won't let you down," she said, stepping aside and fully revealing West who waved a little, Pamela had always thought she was sexy in a prim way that would have been fun to muss.

"West and I were just discussing improvements," Grimke said, and the captain nodded.

"Then she won't mind if I steal you away for a moment," Sloan said, turning to show the way to a private room she had set up for the occasion.

They left without a word and Pamela smiled a little at the captain.

"Congratulations on your raid," she said to West, "Quite impressive."

"Thank you Ms. Zepeda," she answered.

"And the new chief is she settling well?" Pamela asked.

"I suppose, we've only had the day," West said, "Her wife seemed quite impressed-"

"Wife?" Pamela asked, "How darling that she has a little wife."

"She's sick so she was not able to make it tonight," West said, and the heiress nearly laughed, here was the noble captain, inches away from gossiping. Grimke and her wife had piqued West's interest.

Councilwoman Bradstreet sidled up to the captain to greet her, frowning, a little puzzled that the two of them were still talking. She stole West away and Pamela started some idle chatter with a newbie.

- - - - - - - - -

Sloan showed the way and followed Grimke away from the party to the inner pavilion to a conference room where a decanter halfway filled with liquid amber, ice, and glasses waited.

The mayor watched the soldier pause and turn on her heal, her neck straight turning slighting inside of the stiff collar and noticed that even her gray curls seemed uniform.

"Chief Grimke, you must give me your first day impressions," Sloan said she showed her a seat.

She opened her mouth to answer and the mayor interrupted to ask if she would like a drink. Grimke stammered and accepted did not say a word until Sloan prompted her to continue.

"I find that Photon City is more metropolitan than I had anticipated," Grimke said and Sloan nodded gravely.

"Most out-of-towners think they will find a wild, wild shootout around every corner but things are much more civilized."

"That is why I went to the park," Grimke said, "I wanted to see the extremes of our city-" she looked up with questioning eyes, "May I be so forward as to say our?"

Sloan laughed. "I wish all Photonians would assume more accountability for this city."

"I believe there is always law among a group of people," Grimke said, "It's either going to be to strongest who run things with the backs of their hands are the wisest who are backed by the people."

"So you are suggesting that we bring law to the park," Sloan said, "But only the strong can marshal such a place."

Grimke shook her head. "There is already such law there, my guess is one of the families there most likely extorting and bullying but the others would support a fairer kind of law."

"And you know this for sure?" Sloan asked.

"West and I had a run-in with some park folks," Grimke said, "The leader of one of the clans assured me that she would spread the word of more Rangers coming in."

"And you believe this park folk?" Sloan asked.

"There would have been no reason for her to lie," Grimke said, "I've found that mercenaries have a certain honor."

"Mercenary," Sloan said, "An interesting old word."

"Just a term," Grimke said.

"One that does not bother me in the least," the mayor said, "That is why I picked you because you know war, made the way safe for many other cities, you're a hero."

The soldier gave a grim smile. "I thank you, my family is pleased that we are bonded with the Sloans again."

The mayor smiled back and wondered if she had blown too much smoke. Grimke made her nervous as if she could see inside her soul and know that she did not give a damn about those squatters in the park. Sloan wondered why she cared what a gnarly old leather neck thought of her.

"What do you think of Captain West?" Sloan asked.

"She's a good ranger," Grimke said.

"Fervent," Sloan said, "Passionate about her beliefs, don't hold back, these are things a seasoned soldier like your self should have seen a mile away."

"I saw," Grimke said, "But she is young, her diligence is enough for now."

"Yes, youth, a very idealistic time for us all," Sloan said, "She wants to get inside of the cult, thinks if we are not careful we'll all be back on our knees trying to supplicate and dominate at once like we were two hundred years ago."

"Heart Fire is the least of my concern," Grimke said, "Their following is small, and they don't seem to be radicals."

"I like to know all the goings on in the city," Sloan said, "If I could keep an eye on every citizen I would. I have agreed to let West infiltrate the cult."

"I will do nothing to hinder her operation," Grimke said.

"We should return to the party then," Sloan said standing, offering her hand, "And Grimke, if there is any thing you need: A car. Money. Supplies. I can even arrange for you to meet some of our singles around here."

"I've married," Grimke said, abruptly, "Her name is Elise."

Sloan hid her amusement and wondered what kind of mouse the old soldier had partnered up with, a withering mother, perhaps of one of the peoples the army conquered.

"This is sudden," she said, "There was nothing in your file-"

"Just recently," Grimke said, "We've been friends forever, despite our distance we have come to care a great deal for each other."

"Congratulations then," Sloan said, noticing the worry that passed over the new chief's face at the mention of her wife.

"She did not join you tonight?" she asked standing to lead her back to the gathering.

"The trip tired her," Grimke said.

The chief looked lost as she returned to the party pausing to survey the gathering. Being in such a climate was probably as foreign and frightening as a battlefield would have been to the spoiled newbies.

Pamela returned to them, she pointed to Grimke's simple gold ring with a single panel of blue sapphire.

"Are you married Chief Grimke?" she asked. Damned she was good.

"Yes," she answered stiffly, "Just recently, to an old friend."

"Jules and I are to marry in August," Pamela beamed, "Of course everyone will be there, I hope to meet your new wife sooner though."

"Yes," Grimke said her voice far off, her gaze trained towards the entrance, her body stiffened, Sloan looked to Pamela, and the two of them frowned.

"Excuse me," the new chief said vacantly, not waiting for their acknowledgement she walked away from them.

"She's weird," Sloan said, "I knew there was something wrong with her."

Pamela gasped. "She's not weird, she's in love."

She pointed to a woman in red, across the room, raven black hair, a body as luscious as Pamela's but elegant instead of blatantly sexy.

"That's her wife?" Sloan asked.

The woman's gaze swept the room, she smiled when she saw Grimke, went to greet her, placing an arm around her neck, and one of the chief's hand strayed briefly at the curve of her hip.

"I expected her to be older, and plainer," Pamela said.

Sloan laughed. "You're still the loveliest woman in the Southern Public," she reassured her, "Look at how the newbies are staring," she paused, "I don't think I should have a problem with Grimke."

- - - - - - - - -

"Are you angry with me?" Elise asked in her embrace, and then stepped away, the dress was amazing, cut open in the front, dipping low, a high collar circled the back of her neck, the dress clung to her shoulders, and the sleeves came down a little past her elbows.

"I should be," Grimke said, "But you look like a goddess."

Elise laughed. "And all I can think of is getting you out of that uniform."

It was Grimke's turn to laugh. "Did you go through all the trouble just to come here to seduce me?"

"No, I came to save you from a room full of the rich and powerful," Elise said, "The Tigers of Rome."

"Oh, we're not all so bad," Mayor Sloan said.

Grimke cleared her throat and took her wife's hand. "My Elise," she said cordially offering the hand to the mayor, "Not sick in bed at all it seems. This is Mayor Sloan."

"How nice to meet you," she grinned and clasped the mayor's hand, then Pamela's.

"I had to get myself together to come watch over my general tonight."

"She's among friends," Sloan said, "I could have sent one of my cars to collect you; Photon City is stately but dangerous."

"It's not Elise you should fear for, but the city," Grimke dead panned, and they all laughed.

Pamela asked about their trip from D.C. flagging down a waiter to bring more champagne. Grimke stood back, let Elise tell of the journey, a daring experiment, but she felt too anxious and needed a break from the banter.

Grimke noticed that the Mayor's fiancé was obviously smitten with Elise, she watched them converse until West dragged her off to meet the weary eyed city Controller, a short dark haired woman with a heavy brow by the name of Criner.

Then there was the City Council, West's protégés; Ms. Bradstreet of the 1^st Ward, York of the 2^nd, Ms. Trapp the blue collar hero of the 4^th Ward; who had spent her life welding pipelines, and from the 5^th the shadowy Mr. York.

"We must know," Bradstreet said, her figured contained in black, with a huge diamond around her neck, "Where your lovely wife is from."

"All over," Grimke said, "Her family traveled a lot."

Bradstreet was enthused, she smelled money. "You must tell her to come to my shops."

Grimke's glance brushed West's as Trapp spoke up.

"I know all about your family," she said gruffly, "I thought ya'll were different from the Sloans."

"We're an entirely separate people," Grimke frowned, not sure what Trapp was getting at until Elise arrived, drawing stares as she passed through the crowd. It did not help that by all appearances Elise could be estimated as twenty years younger than Grimke.

"I pray all our hopes aren't sold out for pretty baubles for your young wife," the working class hero continued.

West spoke up. "Grimke wants to police the park-"

"Yeah crush everyone under her stars and brass," Trapp said, "Ethnic cleansing."

"Inappropriate," York was appalled, "Can't we go one evening without a confrontation of the classes?"

"There won't ever be such niceties until the rich stop living on the backs of the poor," McHarry said, he was tall, dark, and imposing, "And that'll never happen."

Grimke watched them bicker, she wished she had her Hammerstein to restore the peace she looked to her left to see Elise smiling as she joined them.

"Chief Grimke is here to do a job," she said, "Forgoing her retirement to serve her country one last time; to police this city, she's not a politician she is a soldier."

Trapp laughed. "And how much does it cost to keep a duchess like you in lovely gowns?" she asked.

"Her entire pension," Elise said, "But I have my own money."

Bradstreet chuckled and lifted her glass to independence.

"We civilians are an ungrateful, frivolous lot," Elise said to Trapp, "It's easy for us to have our opinions of warrior folk who basically do the dirty-work of a nation."

"What the commander in chief had her in doesn't concern me," Trapp said, "Just my ward protected from the crimers by nothing but slip-shod police force."

Elise shook her head. "If it weren't for people like the Grimkes, whole families devoted to protecting our country you wouldn't have a ward to look out for."

"I see their not making trophy wives like they used to," Trapp said, determined to have the last word she exited the scene.

Elise turned to her wife. "Could we dance?"

"Thanks," Grimke said excusing them as Elise pulled her on to the dance floor, "You saved my life back there."

"And you wanted to leave me behind," she said moving Grimke's hands to her waist, they began to dance.

"I thought I'd have trouble with you," Elise remarked, "But you're not a bad dancer."

"They taught us in officer school," Grimke said, "Trying to keep us refined I guess, still doesn't keep me from wanting to break Trapp's jaw."

"Trust me being out called out by a trophy wife is much worse to a beast like that," she answered running her fingers up Grimke's neck and caressing her gray curls around her cap.
She sighed. "I never considered thinking of you as a trophy wife."

"Does that disturb you?" Elise asked.

"No," Grimke told her, "I've earned you, and you're much better than that plaque the commandant gave me."

- - - - - - - - -

Sylvie Rowe laughed dryly at the mayor's comment on the city's toxic sewers and turned to see if the rest of her friends wore the same disaffected look. Sloan could not express in words how angry the new fashion of being bored and discontent made her.

She thought for once how she would like to have an intelligent conversation with these so-called adults about anything but the latest weekly play held in the theater or the latest shipment of imports that could be haggled over for ridiculous amounts of money.

"Mayor Sloan," an overweight ranger lieutenant pushed his way through the newbies like a dog scaring up pecking pigeons.

"Masha Singleton is here," he said, "She says you invited her personally, that she'll get in one way or another."

"The crime queen," Sylvie blurted and turned to see if her friends had heard, "Perhaps she's come to hold us up."

They rippled with laughter and looked to the lieutenant.

"I wish such a matter could have been dealt with confidentially rather than announced in front of my guests," Sloan told him.

"I was actually looking for the new chief," he said.

"There is no disturbance you should bring them in," Sylvie said, innocent of the fact that the Singletons were moving into town and would go straight for the shipping docks her father's business as well as any other channels of importing and exporting products from the city.

"Masha Singleton here?" Sloan asked, a revelation in her brain, "You newbies wouldn't know how to handle it."

"Do you think we'd be frightened?" Sylvie asked in return and her friends hollered that they would not.

Sloan took a moment to listen to the hysterics, and the gasps of excitement, the anxious laughter born of nervous jokes.

"Show Ms. Singleton in," the mayor told the ranger.

"This party was dead two days ago," Sylvia laughed, and went to spread the news that mobsters were there at the swearing in and that they must not be afraid.

They burst through the ballroom doors a minute later in black and silver, the children first; Beau in silver pants and a black jacket, a silver tie heavy with sparking jewels, Petra in a white tank top and a skirt made of layers of black lace, and high silver boots.

Masha followed in black tails, trailed by three more of her entourage. Sloan recognized Asa Singleton an aging fop, Pharaoh Singleton a brick tower of a woman, and Clive Singleton a scientist and all around scholar; they had long taken the name but had never risen higher than the rank of glorified lackey, their loyalty all Masha rewarded them for.

The newbies parted watching them with fascination.

The Singletons grabbed drinks two at a time from passing waiters, Beau caught a little plate of sushi from a girl with a rolling tray piling the fish in his mouth as he walked. He bobbed his head smiling at his sister and mother.

Masha headed straight to Sloan. "Jules, I almost got the feeling we weren't wanted."

"How awful of me not to have given you an invitation this afternoon," the mayor smiled, "Please, welcome and enjoy."

The crime queen grinned and leaned close kissing Sloan on the cheek, pausing.

"Remember, Dearly, it's I who use you, not the other way around," she whispered harshly, and stepped away to watch her son grin and wolf down food.

"By the way," she said, "Beau approves of the eats."

- - - - - - - - -

"The Singletons," Trapp said after her wife came and whispered discreetly in her ear, then stood on her tiptoes and pointed.

West turned to see them, eating and drinking as they headed towards the mayor.

"And look who she pals around," Trapp said, as Masha Singleton kissed Sloan on the cheek, "I don't trust her or any of her hired help."

West stepped away maneuvering the party to get a closer look at the crime family.

She was near the band when she crossed paths with one of Masha's clones; the girl wore black leather gloves to her elbows. She seemed to want to confront West but was trapped by a group of newbies, as she shoved one out of the way, the captain turned, disappeared past another stagnant crowd.

"Fucking Knave," she heard the girl shout.

West looked down, saw the parquet of the dance floor, and looked around for Chief Grimke sure she had seen her there last with her wife.

"My men," one of the Singletons called to the band, "Play faster."

The leader ignored the man and continued the song. The Singleton jumped over the little gold gate around the pit and seized the man by the back of the neck.

"Something realer than that, you fuck," he roared.

- - - - - - - - -

Asa Kiest Singleton had never been much to look at, he knew that, but that never stopped him from dancing, even when he used to hop on corners for the spare change in people's pockets, people like the newbies here at the mayor's swearing in.

They had called him Old Pug then, because he had eyes like the dog of that name just big and bulgy, especially when he danced.

And now that he had the music right all he needed was a decent broad to hop with, she had to have on just the right dress filled out by just the right body. He found one being led away by a dagger soldier and skipped right between their clasped hands.

"Mind if I take her for a spin, Sir?" he asked the soldier, as he snatched the broad's hand and gave her a twirl into his arms, he seized her ass and howled when she tried to pull away.

"Come on baby, give me a chance to out do that creeper," he said, trying to lead her into a double hop but she went stone on him.

Asa growled at her, was about to tell her what she'd do if she knew what was best for her when something clamped down on his right shoulder, and sort of crunched the spot where his neck ended there.

He turned around swinging at the old dagger soldier; she dodged him, caught his right wrist, then gave him a twirl, his entire arm from the place where she had originally pinched suddenly felt on fire. Asa lost his balance and fell on one knee. The music faded as the band ceased their playing.

"Do you know who the fuck I am?" he laughed at the dagger's folly.

"You've had too much to drink," she told him, and turned around to see an older man and a teenage girl, more crimers.

"I'm Ranger Chief Grimke," she announced.

- - - - - - - - -

They laughed; the girl, the burly woman, and the man in the silver and black checkered jacket who'd grabbed Elise trying to force her into a dance. He had a hysteric high-pitched laugh; he got to his feet and saluted.

"Well fuck me, Sir," he said.

West appeared. "They're Singletons," she whispered.

"Crimers," Grimke said, "How'd you get in here?"

"The mayor invited us," the girl said.

Sloan exited the crowd of partygoers that surrounded the parquet; she was shoulder to shoulder with an older woman Grimke knew instantly as Masha Singleton by her outlawish beauty. The infamous Crime Queen.

"What's going on here?" she asked, traces of amusement on her face.

"I've had a blow out with this dagger," the Singleton in the checkered coat reported to his boss, "As if I wanted something more than just a dance with her awf woman."

Grimke kept her eye on Sloan wondering what kind of Mayor invited a crime family to her swearing in, wondered what role she had planned for a soldier ranger.

"We're guests here," the woman said, "We shouldn't be snatching women for any reason."

"Just as honored guests as she is," the girl said, pointing to Grimke, "She called us crimers as if we raged in here and weren't welcomed."

"Masha," Sloan spoke up, "You must forgive Grimke, she has been at war for the last forty years."

"I'm not the one who needs forgiveness," the chief spoke up, "And certainly not from a Singleton."

The woman prowled towards Grimke, stopped, gave Elise and West a feral grin.

"Perhaps it is best that we all be friends," she said, "Soon, we'll share this city."

Grimke looked past her at Sloan.

"I don't deal with your type," she said, as she switched her gaze back to Masha Singleton, "I'll have you in women's max before I share this city with you."

Masha turned to Sloan. "Where do you find these Blowhards for the People?"

"She's right," the mayor said, "These citizens shouldn't have to contend for the city's resources with law breakers."

"We shouldn't even have to breathe the same air," Trapp shouted.

Masha laughed. "These citizens?" she asked, "These aristocrats and newbies? They're the biggest crimers of all because they brainwash folks into growing old defending them from those who only wish to avenge the dirt done to them."

She walked up to Grimke and grabbed her chin gently, she would have moved, but the woman had her eyes locked on her own, the black pupils seemed to widen a bit and ripple.

"Poor old soldier," she said, "Still strong, but foolish," Masha lowered her voice to a whisper, "Do you really feel it's necessary to go down in a boom of fire? I could arrange that for you."

Grimke lifted her head away from her grip, and the woman laughed. She sensed something between the crime boss and the mayor, it was not exactly camaraderie, and she wondered why Sloan would play such a dangerous game with a dangerous woman.

"Let's go," Masha sneered, and backed off the dance floor, her family following.

The girl stopped to turn a hiss some obscenities.

"You're dead, Mayor," Petra said, "You, and your fucking knaves."

Grimke watched them go amid a wave of murmurs from the party; she looked to Sloan, then to West, then Elise who gave her a little smile. She went to her wife and took her hand.

"One night in Photon City and you're already having your life threatened, Eustace," she remarked.

"Yeah," the chief said, looking past her when she noticed Trapp approaching.

"When I decide if this wasn't an elaborate drama arranged by you, Sloan and Masha Singleton, I'll congratulate you," she said and walked away.

The mayor left the dance floor too; she ascended the short staircase to the podium where Governor Ramsey appeared on a large vid screen to re-swear her into office. He began a rushed speech and when he was finished with his bored grating, Sloan made her own speech smiling down lovingly at her citizens. She told them how proud she was of their elegance, and their bravery, how she planned to not only make Photon City the energy capitol of the country, but also a place people will not be afraid to visit for the culture and recreation, the beauty of the city.

She introduced Grimke as the locomotive that would pull her plans into motion, a decorated war hero with the Commander in Chief's own commendations.

Grimke, not prepared for public speaking, did so reluctantly. When she happened to glance back at Elise, her new wife gave her a reassuring nod, and Grimke was glad she had come.

The general climbed the stage, shook hands with Jules Sloan who beamed, continuing her applause as Grimke settled behind the stand.

"Just two weeks ago I was in Byelorussia; it was much colder there than it is here, bitter cold," she said, "I was leading a raid on a factory just off the Gulf of Riga where the deadly Black-7 chemical weapon was being manufactured at an alarming 1,000 units a day."

She tried not be haunted by those visions of her last battle, the way tactical weapons elongated shadows when they exploded, the way light was distorted.

"Of course, the land beyond the beach was a mine field, we knew that," she told Photon City's elite, "We have ways of killing such devices, but something went wrong." She looked down at the podium, shook her head, "I can't explain to you what its like to be among the fire when it comes raining down; shrapnel, bullets," Grimke said, "And not even the toughest soldier can hold back a scream when their entire hand is impaled by a metal spring, projected at over five hundred miles an hour. Its pure carnage and you never get used to it, even after forty years. I was sure my time had come it seemed my luck since my retirement was two weeks away."

The crowd laughed a little.

"You see, I had planned to go live my days in peace with some beautiful woman if I was that lucky, but then I got the call that I was to come here. I did a lot of swearing and cursing the name Sloan, but as you know our families are tied and when you put a Grimke with a Sloan things seem to get done. Of course I survived out there, but we never got to that factory- that's what I'm trying to say here, the good do not always triumph but the effort is never a waste."

She gave a distracted nod and left the podium passing Sloan as she descended the platform pausing long enough to receive an embrace from her wife.

"Well done," Elise whispered, but Grimke barely heard her, she felt sick to her stomach and wanted to make a hasty retreat.

"Let's go home," she managed and her wife nodded.

They walked outside of the pavilion Elise leading the way, Grimke following her, head down letting her say goodnight to everyone they passed. They waited shortly for the car Grimke had hired to pull around front, Elise staring into the night, nestled in her fur lined wrap. Grimke leaned on her a bit her wife turned her neck to nuzzle her hair.

"It's been a long day," she said, "You need rest."

"I'm an old woman," Grimke admitted, "Sloan has put into those people's head that I'm some kind of hero."

"You are," Elise insisted, "You only doubt because you feel it's an obligation."

Grimke straightened as the car arrived pausing to admire her wife who was still a stranger to her, a refreshing one, but still a stranger-before opening the car's door and stepping aside so she could slide over the interior to the other side.

"Chief," West called.

Grimke looked up, she wondered how long the young captain had been watching, listening. She realized then that Photon City was a small town that word got around fast if the topic was interesting enough.

"I just wanted to tell you goodnight," the captain said, she ambled forward her hands stiff at her sides.

"Goodnight West," Grimke said.

"And your wife as well," the captain said, as Elise leaned out of the car and they wished each other a good night, Elise once again thanking West for taking care of them earlier.

Grimke distractedly began to talk shop until her wife urged her into the car with a whispered, "Come Eustace."

She said goodbye to West and they drove to their little home. Grimke tipped the driver and joined Elise on the porch. Inside they hung up their coats and adjourned upstairs.

She ran a bath and undressed Grimke, waited for her to sink in then kneeling next to the steaming claw footed tub in her eveningwear to wash her back.

"This is heaven you know," Grimke said.

"Really?" Elise asked, "You're very easy to please Eustace."

"Is this the type of thing you used to do for Crawford?" she asked.

"Among others," Elise said, and they were silent for a moment, then Grimke turned suddenly bending her naked back and leaning forward as if to kiss her. She paused not able to look her in the eyes.

"Do you really desire me?" Grimke asked. "Or is it your programming? Would you even know?"

Elise gave a little laugh to the chief's surprise. "No woman can trust her feelings. Isn't it all programming when you get down to it?"

Grimke had no reply for this she straightened and looked at her.

"This is going to be no fun if you keep questioning everything," Elise said, "About seventy years ago I still didn't know shit, and I desired who was I programmed to, but now I'm a ripe eighty-two, I like to think anything that has lived so long knows a little bit about desire."

Grimke shook her head. "Not me."

Elise caught her face in both hands and kissed her.

"Soon, one of these days, I'll teach you."

To be continued in part 2 (chapter VI)

Photon City

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