Dead men tell no tales, but the survivors bear serious grudges.

— attributed to Ryland LeSarte, date unknown

19 Decem, 5249 PD

“Grumpy?  Adam!  Are you still there?”

“Sounds like the line went dead,” Winston’s voice said faintly.  The young inspector’s eyes were closed, his breathing raspy and shallow.  Blood oozed from the gash above his ear, his body limp on the dirt floor of the hollow they’d tumbled into just in time to avoid being crushed by a crashing enemy bomber.  “Do you think he heard you?”

“I know he heard me,” Frederick growled, suppressing the strong urge to fling his commlink as far as his arm could throw it.  “I just don’t know if he was able to figure out where we are.”  Or if he’s even able to send someone to help us.

He’d better send someone.  I’ve got the inspector on one side and Brendan on the other.

He hadn’t dared to move Brendan Cho beyond struggling to drag him clear of the edge of the hollow, and he’d been glad that he’d at least done that.  A split second after he’d managed to pull the pilot to safety, the wreckage above them had shifted.

Cho would have been cut in half if Frederick hadn’t moved him.

Now the pilot lay within arms’ reach, unconscious and flat on his back, his face dirty, breathing shallow but even.  Still, when Frederick had checked his eyes, they’d been rolled up into his skull and the young man’s body was entirely limp.

Frederick hadn’t seen him coming or what had happened when the bomber hit, but he knew that there had to be more going on beneath Brendan’s uniform than what was immediately visible.

Damnation, Grumpy, you’d damned well better send someone to find us—and be quick about it.

“You think it’s bad out there?”

Frederick snorted, then groaned.  The world spun for a moment, then righted itself again.  “I have no doubt,” he said.  “We’ve never been attacked quite like this before.  Whoever’s come means business.”

“They’re nervous,” Winston said.  “Whoever it is, whoever did what they did to the Whispers.  They’re worried we’ll figure something out—that I’ll figure something out.  I’m sorry, Inspector Rose.  This is all my fault.”

“Like hell,” Frederick said.  “There’s no way that’s true.  They probably don’t even realize you’re here.”  And once they do, they’ll just chalk your injuries up to collateral damage.

            If we live that long, anyway.

Frederick shuddered, remembering what had happened on Mimir.

The attack had come without warning one early morning.  It had started with flyovers by unmarked fighters.  The first wave of bombers had come next as unknown ships drifted in from out of nowhere, black ships that vanished against the darkness of space.

No warning.  No escape.  The cities had been bombed, experimentally at first.  A few had been completely destroyed.  Others had suffered less damage, but had suffered more in the aftermath.

Sickness and starvation had come next, since the spaceports had been destroyed, the hospitals bombed into ruin—Mimir had been abandoned by everyone except for its allies, who often found themselves falling victim to the minefield that had been left behind by the mysterious attackers.

No one had moved.  No one cared.  The death of the Psychean Guard had begun that day that Mimir was bombed and had ended when Grant Channing and America Farragut had been captured.

“It’s happening all over again,” Frederick whispered.  “It’s the same people.  It’s same conspiracy.”

“What do you mean?” Winston asked, eyes cracking open.  One eye was bloodshot, ringed by a black eye.  He’d taken the brunt of the impact when they’d taken their tumble, when the bomber had come down.  “What are you talking about?”

“It’s just like Mimir,” Frederick said, feeling cold from head to toe.  “It’s exactly like Mimir.”

He’d read all of the reports, penned a few of his own based on eyewitness testimony from the survivors.  He hadn’t been on Mimir when that world had ended, but he knew enough.

I used to know who killed it.  Damnation, I wish I could remember.

Frederick Rose was no fool.  He knew that at one point, he’d unraveled the mystery, and the fact that he’d gotten far too close had nearly killed him.

And now, walking in my footsteps is going to get Inspector Winston killed.

“Go home once we make it through this,” he said hoarsely to the younger man.  “Go home and tell Sephora that she shouldn’t send people out here to get themselves killed.  My example should’ve taught her better than that.”

“I’m doing my job,” Winston said, his eyes sliding shut again.  “Are you telling me to run from my duty, Inspector Rose?”

“Living, breathing investigators are better than dead symbols,” Frederick said, wincing at the bitterness in his own voice.  “You know that they both begged me not to go?”

“Who?”

“Daci and Seph.  They told me not to go to Eldas.  Daci said she had a bad feeling about it.  Seph said someone had been trying to divert our attention from there.  There must have been a reason for it.  I should have listened.  Instead I went and found out what I needed to find out and they tried to murder me for it.”

“Do you remember?”

“No,” Frederick said, feeling the old ache start to rise again, the pain of not knowing, of not being able to remember.  “No, I’ve got no idea what it was that I used to know and forgot.  I know I was going to go back to New Earth and break the whole thing wide open.  There was going to be hell to pay and I was calling the piper’s tune.

“Or I would have, anyway, if I’d made it back in one piece.”

“But you’re sure it’s the same people?”

“The modus operandi is all the same,” Frederick whispered.  “It’s got to be the same people, the same conspiracy.  It’s all too close.”

“The records of your findings were sealed,” Winston said.  “You had to have diplomatic credentials or be a part of the Inspector General’s office to see them.  Hard for someone to copycat that.”

“Hard, but not impossible.”  Frederick shuddered.  “No.  It’s the same people and it’s happening all over again.

“E-557 is the new Mimir, not the Whispers.  The Whispers was just incidental.  This was their target all along.  We were their target all along.”

“That’s all right,” Brendan Cho rasped from the floor nearby.  “We’ll be making them pay just the same.”

Hell rained down on them,

A rain of fire, a rain of tears,

And o’er all who lived there

Spread the desolation of murdered dreams.

— Olarius Kemp, On the Death of Karenis Prime,c. 2013

19 Decem, 5249 PD

Her head throbbed dully as she stirred awake in an unfamiliar bed–not the one she’d been sharing with Ezra, not the bed that she’d slept in alone for so many years, but somewhere else, somewhere unknown.  The blankets smelled like her lover, though, and she shifted slightly, pushing them back and away.  A hiss of pain escaped her lips as the tattered, wasted muscles of her arm spasmed, the ache bone-deep abruptly returning.  She remembered taking something for the pain and something to help her sleep and falling asleep in their bed.  Now she blinked blearily at her surroundings and found them unfamiliar.

Where the hell am I?  Where’s Ezra?  Alana rubbed sleep from her eyes as she sat up fully, the blankets falling away.  “Ezra?  Are you here?”

No one answered.  She swung her legs over the side of the bed–barely more than a cot, though a little more comfortable than a ship’s bunk or a soldier’s billet back in Compact space–and stood slowly, testing her legs.  She felt a little shakier than she’d have liked, but straightened easily and looked around.  “Ezra?”

No answer.

She exhaled through her teeth.  It was a small room, non-descript with silver-gray walls and a few cots. Some kind of shelter, maybe?  Shelter from what?

Her arm hurt from shoulder to fingertips as she hugged it against her belly, cradled in her good arm.  The sling she’d been wearing was nowhere to be found and she muttered a quiet curse under her breath.

What the hell is going on?

She could hear rumbles in the distance, the ceiling shivering slightly.  Bile rose in her throat and she swallowed it back down.  That’s not a good sound.

“Where the hell is my comm,” she muttered to herself, already starting to poke around.  The place didn’t looked lived in at all, despite how neatly appointed all of it was.  It felt sterile.  Utilitarian.

Alana swore aloud.  It’s a bomb shelter, a raid shelter.  What the hell is going on up there?  She coughed and cleared her throat.  “Ezra Mason Grace, where the hell are you?”

The next bang she heard was much more immediate, followed by the sound of Ezra’s voice swearing heartily.  The door at the far end of the narrow room swung open and Ezra appeared, lugging a crate of something along with him.

“What are you doing up?”

“Never mind what I’m doing up.  Where the hell are we and what the hell is going on outside?”

“Shelter under the clinic,” Ezra answered promptly, giving the crate a final shove.  “The sirens went off and I got you moved down here.  You were out like a bloody light.”

“I’ve been drugged up to my eyebrows since you started working on my arm,” Alana muttered.  “Not that I’m not grateful for it because it hurts like a bitch if I’m not.  Why did the sirens go off?  What’s going on?”

He hesitated and she swore, heading for the door.  His hand instinctively shot out, grasping her shoulder to stop her.

Alana howled as white-hot pain lanced through her arm, dropping to a knee.  Ezra’s hand snapped open.

“Shit, ‘lana, I’m sorry.”  He scrabbled through an open medical kit set on a side table and pulled out an injector full of a pale blue liquid.  She tried to push him away but found that the pain had consumed what little energy she’d had.  A second later, he’d pressed the injector against her neck and released the drug into her system.  Another few seconds after that and it had started to take effect, the pain ebbing.

She looked up at him with eyes hazed by tears, tears she hated.  There were some things that you didn’t get used to shedding after you served the Compact and tears were one of those things.  “You should be sorry,” she whispered, her voice hoarse.  “Dammit, Ezra!  Just tell me what’s going on.”

“We’re under attack,” Ezra said quietly.  “The raid sirens went off.  It was all I could do to get you down here.  It was still early when they went off, not much of anyone out and about yet.  I don’t know what it looks like above right now and I don’t know that I want to find out.”

“I need my comm,” Alana said, struggling to her feet.  “And my sling.  Where are they?”

“Probably upstairs to the first and definitely upstairs to the second.”  Ezra helped her stand, wrapping an arm around her waist and steadying her as she swayed.  “Get back in bed.”

“There are people dying up there.”  Probably dying.  Maybe dying.

Ezra winced.  “I have to hope that most folks made it to shelter and are okay,” he said quietly, his voice little more than a hoarse whisper.  “There’s nothing I can do about that right now, ‘lana.  It’s too dangerous.”

“Lindsay and your sister.  Rachel.  Where are they?”

Blood drained from Ezra’s face and he shook his head slightly.  “I don’t know,” he said softly.  “I know that they were planning on meeting with some people at the council chambers today.  I’m sure they’re fine.  They’d have made it to cover.”

And I’d know if she was dead.  Alana swallowed against sudden tightness in her throat, lips thinning.  At least, I have to believe that I would.  She’s blood, practically my little sister.  I’d know.

I’d have to know.

“Get back into bed,” Ezra said gently.

“I have to find out where they are,” Alana whispered even as Ezra drew her back to the bed she’d been sleeping in.  “Ezra, I have to know.”  Her throat tightened.  “She’s my family.”

“I know,” he said quietly.  “Just settle.  I dropped my comm somewhere between here and the stairs.  I’ll see if I can raise her once I find it.”

“Promise me,” Alana said fiercely, even as she sank down onto the edge of the bed, cradling her bad arm tightly against her belly.  “Promise me, Ezra.”

“I promise,” he said quietly.  He leaned down to kiss her gently.

A shiver wracked her.

“I have a bad feeling, Ezra,” she said quietly.  “I’ve got a really, really bad feeling.”

“It’ll all be okay,” he murmured, actually sounding like he meant it.

Maybe he does.  Maybe he’s got the hope that I can’t carry anymore.

Ezra kissed her temple and left her there, perching on the edge of her bed, staring blankly at nothing as she hoped against hope that whatever Lindsay had seen all those weeks ago were dead wrong.

“Marcus, how many ground troops can we scramble right now?”

“Two squads are on base,” Harmin Marcus reported from his station.  “If we’re lucky and get the alert out now, we might be able to get two more.  Three squads are on-station across the water.”

Adam grimaced.  “They can’t help us now and they may be suffering the same sort of assault we are.  Have we heard from them at all?”

“Nothing, sir,” Tomasi said quietly.  “We’ve been pinging them, but it’s like they’re been completely obliterated.”

Only one way to know for sure, I guess.  Adam toggled the voice pickup back on.  “Theta Lead, do you have a read on Fort Solace?”

“Looks like it’s still there, sir, but we haven’t tried to raise them.”

Probably took out their towers or the local power grid there, too.  Adam shook his head even though the pilot couldn’t see him.  “Negative, Theta Lead.  Don’t deviate from your course.”

“Roger that, sir.”  Her breath rasped over the comm line.  “They’re starting to get close to the upper atmosphere.”

“If the bombardments start, run.”

“Yes, sir.”

His personal comm crackled in his pocket and he winced.  Who the hell’s trying to get in touch with me that way?  He dug it out and thumbed it active.  “Windsor.”

“Grumpy,” Frederick’s voice rasped.  “Grumpy, it’s bad.”

Adam’s heart stuttered, then returned to normal—if a little bit faster—rhythm.  “Freder!  Where the hell are you?  Where’s the Inspector?”

“He’s here.  They’re both hurt.  I can’t tell if I am.  Head’s still ringing and everything hurts.”

“Freder—”

“Send help, Grumpy.  One of the cellars at the vineyard.  Send help.”

The comm crackled once and died.

Bloody hell.  We’re about to be invaded and all of a sudden the only thing I can think about is how the hell I’m going to get help out to that vineyard to save my best friend and an Inspector First Grade who might be able to save us all.

What the hell am I going to do?

“Capships are moving in, Marshal.”

Adam suppressed a wince.  “Put Theta Leader on speakers and give me audio control.”

“Roger that.”

He took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly before Theta Leader’s voice abruptly cut in over the command center speakers.  “—guard is moving in, maybe four ships.  My sensors are saying they’re pretty well-armed, but I can’t get a clear read on the power levels of their lasers.”

“How many total, Theta Lead?” Adam asked.

“Nine ships,” she said.  “Bigger ones are hanging back.  Squadron’s keeping the fighters tied up in the upper atmosphere and low orbit.  Bombers are slipping through, but that’s why Gamma Squadron’s scrambled, right?”  Her breath rasped on the comm as she sucked in a deep breath.  “Sir, what are my orders if these cruisers open fire on the surface?”

The entire room went silent.  Gazes drifted toward Adam from consoles, from sensor screens, expectant.  The whole command center held its breath, waiting to see what Adam Windsor might say in answer to a young pilot’s question.

It’s not like we’ve got much of anyone out there that might help us.

“Split the squadron,” he said.  “Half of you make for the Mission Systems station at Cassini VII.  The rest of you head for New Earth.  Everyone takes recordings of what’s happened here.  You’ve been recording?”

“Yes, sir.  You have to ask?”

“Good girl,” he said, eyes sliding shut or a moment.  “Take those recordings to Mission Systems and the Commonwealth.  Take them to the Wanderers and Argopian and anyone you think will listen.  As soon as those ships open up on us, split.  If they start firing from orbit, there’s not going to be anything you can do to help us.”

Dead silence met him, both in the room and on the comm.  A wave of static passed over the line before Theta Leader’s voice came back to them, quiet and sad.

“Understood, Marshal.”

“Good,” he said quietly, feeling sick but knowing that it was the only responsible order he could give.  There was no hope of evacuation at this point, not with the fleet above and the bombers still active.

They may try to soften us up with a bombardment with more than just their bombers if they think that’ll do them some good.  Then again, the damage to real estate so far has been pretty minimal.

His stomach twisted.  No.  They’re getting ready to send landers and we’re in no position to fend them off the way we’ve got everyone bottled up in shelters.

            Damnation. We’ve managed to doom ourselves without even trying.

They skirted the edge of the woods along the city’s northern border, where the buildings thinned out and began to give way to woods and rocky rises and hillocks.  Lindsay’s heart thudded hard against her ribs as they ran as fast as they dared, staying low and trying to remain well beneath the notice of anyone or anything  flying above them.  The bombers seemed to just keep coming out of nowhere, chased by the meager fighter forces that they’d been able to scramble.

“Hellfire,” Kara cursed, her eyes following a bomber as the dying craft spun off toward the shallows offshore.  “We played at pacifism for too long.  We’re not prepared for this.”

“Uncle Adam and the other Marshals have been trying,” Lindsay said.  “It’s not their fault the Council’s tied their hands.”

“They didn’t try to argue for it very loudly.”

“Not until lately anyway.”  Lindsay smiled grimly.  “They didn’t have anything to back them up.  Spontaneous visions of death and destruction in front of the entire Council…that tends to help their case.”  Her gaze ranged down the treeline, toward the edge of the vineyard.  “We can’t keep to the trees.  We have to leave them.”

Kara nodded.  “City’s like a bloody ghost town.”

“No one’s stupid.  They’re all under cover.”  Except us, and Brendan wasn’t.  He must have been desperate to find the Inspector.  She should have been furious with her uncle for sending him, whether Winston was important to their futures or not.  It was stupidly dangerous to leave cover to find anyone.

And what the hell am I doing?  She suppressed the urge to sigh at herself.  Well, I guess my husband and have the same streak of stupidity in us that makes us do things that are ridiculously dangerous.

Kara squeezed her shoulder.  “Come on.  We can make a run for it now and I think we’ll hit the gap in the waves.”

Lindsay took a deep breath and nodded.  “On your count.”

“Two, one, go.”

They sprinted for the vineyard and the still-smoldering wreckage beyond it.

There was an eerie calm hanging over the city as the women scrambled up into the light of day, like the world before a storm.  Lindsay sucked in a breath, her gaze scything across the landscape.

“It’s not as bad as I thought it might be,” Kara said.  “But they’re hitting hard.”

Lindsay’s gaze flicked up toward the sky.  She could see the ships in the distance and she winced.  “Yeah, and there’s some coming around for another pass.  Come on, we’ve got to move quick or else we’re in trouble.”

Kara glanced up at winced.  “How many do you think?”

“Enough that my uncle’s probably scrambling more just because he knows we bailed on safety.”  Assuming he’s even got fighters left to scramble. All of ours are probably in the air already.

            This is bad.  Really bad.

At least it didn’t line up with anything she’d already seen that summer.  Not exactly, anyway.  It was some small measure of comfort that it didn’t.

But I’m not infallible and I don’t always remember what I’ve seen.  Maybe this was something that Brendan would remember but I don’t.

She suppressed a wince at the thought as Kara tugged on her hand.

“Come on.  We have to move, like you said.”

Lindsay sucked in a breath and nodded.  The pair of women moved away from the shelter, thirty yards away from where the Council House stood, eerily untouched by the bombings.  They skirted the edge of the trees to the roadway, catching an eyeful of the devastation below.  Small craters marked the landscape, the telltale signs of precision bombs dropped indiscriminately, as if their attackers weren’t exactly sure where to hit them.

Except for the fact that they knocked out the transformers, took down the power grids.

“Something isn’t right about all of this,” she said quietly.

“We’ll find out what it is,” Kara said as they scrambled across the roadway and started down the hill.  “After we find your husband.”

Ships whined above them, the sound of their engines leaving her ears buzzing with the sound of their passage.  No bombs dropped from this pass; their fighters chased the bombers, engines screaming and lasers firing.  Lindsay watched them soar above, transfixed for a moment, her throat tight.

“Is this our future?” she whispered, half to Kara and half to herself.  “Is this what we’re meant to suffer?”

“I don’t know the answer to that question, Lin,” Kara said quietly.  “Do you?”

“No,” Lindsay said.  “But I’m damned afraid that we’re going to find out.”

With a shudder, she started to run, leaving Kara to trail in her wake.

Whoever says that hope springs eternal was a bleeding liar.  Hope dies, just like everything else.

— attributed to Ryland LeSarte

19 Decem, 5249 PD

“Where’s Brendan?”

Lindsay forced her voice to stay steady, schooled her expression into a pale, cool mask of calm.  There were other people here besides just her and Rachel.  They didn’t need to see how upset she was, how shaken she was.  No one needed to see that.

His thoughts had gone blank just as she’d reached for him.  Once burned, twice shy.  The last time this had happened, he’d taken a knife to his implant on the return leg of the trip to rescue her parents.  Now, with the ground shivering above and around them, she was worried that it was something even worse this time.

He hasn’t even fully recovered from what he had to do to himself.  Now I can’t touch him and they’re bombing the city and if Brendan’s not with Uncle Adam…

“I sent him after Inspector Winston.”

Her heart sank.  Rachel took her hand, their fingers knitting together.  Her aunt squeezed her hand tightly and Lindsay swallowed hard.  “Where?”

“He was headed to the shore,” Adam said.

Rachel’s eyes narrowed.  “Give me the comm,” she mouthed at her niece.

Lindsay frowned, glancing at the others in the shelter before she handed it over.  Kara was here, so was Mugabe and an array of analysts and aides, half a dozen of them.  Kara raised a brow and Lindsay shook her head, lips thinning.

I don’t like this.  I don’t like any of this.

Brendan, where are you?  Please, please be okay. I can’t do this alone.

“Adam, spit out whatever’s sticking in your craw,” Rachel snapped as soon as the comm was in her hand.  “What the hell is going on up there and where’s Brendan?”

“We’re still trying to figure out who’s bombing us,” Adam fired back.  “Brendan was out trying to make sure that the Inspector and Freder made it to safety and we lost track of him when a bomb knocked out part of the power grid.  We haven’t been able to raise him on comms since.”

Lindsay’s stomach dropped and she pushed to her feet.  Rachel grabbed her wrist and held her firmly in place.

“Where?”

“Somewhere near the Forester’s vineyard.”

That’s all I need to know.  Lindsay tugged her arm free of her aunt’s grip.  “I can’t just sit here.”

“It’s not safe,” Rachel growled, glaring at her.  “You can’t go up there.”

“Watch me.”

Kara rolled to her feet.  “I’ll come with you.  You shouldn’t be up there alone.”

“You shouldn’t be up there at all!”  Adam barked, his voice tinny and small over the comm even though he was shouting.  “Stay put, we’ll find him.”

“Not fast enough, Uncle.”  Lindsay headed for the door.  “We’ll be careful.”

“Rachel, stop her.”

“I don’t think I can.”

Lindsay shot her aunt a tight smile and slipped through the heavy blast door, out of safety and into a world that was suddenly full of danger and death.

Bile rose in Adam’s throat, her words echoing in his ears.

He was on that hill.  Oh hell.

“Marshal?  I’ve got eyes for you.”

He sucked in a breath and turned.  “Where?”

“Patching through from Theta Leader.  They’re climbing up out of the atmosphere for a look at what’s up top.”

His stomach twisted.  At this point, I’m not sure I want that bad news.  “Can you get me audio?”

“Patching through to your headset, sir.”

Adam nodded a moment before the sound of comm chatter filled his ears.  He cleared his throat, then toggled the voice pickup to active.  “Theta Lead, this is Windsor.  What’s our situation in the air?”

“Outnumbered, but not outgunned against the bombers and the fighters, sir,” Theta Leader told him.  The young woman’s voice was a little shaky—this was her first combat experience that wasn’t inside of a simulator.

We’ve got a bunch of untried and untested men and women defending us.  He suppressed a shiver.  “Landers?”

“Haven’t seen any yet.  We’re keeping our eyes open.”

Adam stared at the holographic map of the city, still hovering in the dim of the emergency lights.  His stomach somersaulted as he waited for Theta Leader to say more.  All he could hear was the chatter of her squadron, calling out targets and giving warnings in the background.

“Marshal, we’re getting a call in from one of the shelters.”

He toggled the voice pickup off.  “Tell me you’ve got good news, Maricopa.”

“It’s the Oracle, sir.”

His stomach dropped.

Damn.  That’s not what I wanted to hear.  That’s not what I wanted to hear at all.

“Someone take over with Theta Leader and break in when we’ve got more information.  Get me visuals up on the monitors over there.”  He took a deep breath and steeled himself.  Delaying the unpleasantness wasn’t going to do any of them any good.  “And put Lindsay through.”

“I need eyes, dammit!”  Adam pounded a hand against a console.  “Get me visuals on what’s going on up there.”

They’d lost power in his command center briefly and that had severed the connection between him and the fighter that had been feeding them visuals of the war that had suddenly erupted on the surface.  The generators had kicked in, now, but communications was having an issue reestablishing the connection.

“Sir?”

“What?” he snapped at Tomasi, glaring at the young woman, who cringed under his stare.

“Sir—sir, we lost Commander Cho’s signal, too,” she said, her voice remarkably steady.  Brendan had taken her under his wing while she’d still been in training.  Adam knew she was fond of him.

Damn.  “Reestablish it.”

“I’ve been trying, sir.  It’s not broadcasting.”

That meant one of two things.  Either Brendan had turned the thing off—not likely—or it was too damaged to transmit—a worse thing.

The marshal took a short, quick breath and hoped against hope that it was just the link that was damaged, not its owner.

Linny-pie will skin me alive if something’s happened to him.

“I need eyes,” he growled again.

“Ground scanners are coming back online, sir.”

Thank goodness for small favors.  That’s something, at least.  “Give me a topographical of the city next to the viewer here.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Still working on audio and visuals from the squadrons.”

Adam shook his head grimly.  The sooner he could get that back, the more comfortable he’d feel—not that there was anything comfortable about their current tactical situation.

Hell, at this point I don’t even know what our tactical situation actually is.  That’s not a good thing.  He took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly.  Be okay, Rachel.  Be okay.

The holographic projector buzzed to life and the lights in operations dimmed slightly for the effort.  Adam grimaced.  The generators weren’t fully warmed up yet and it had been a bloody long time since they’d tested them.

Now would be the exact wrong time for them to fail.  Which means we’ve got a 75% chance of that happening.

            Hellfire.

He stared at the holographic image that slowly came to life, a miniaturized model of the city in light, hovering in midair.

Areas around several of the shelters had been bombed fairly heavily.  One of the wind farms had been obliterated.  The main power transfer station was gone.  When this was over, most of the city would be dark for days, maybe weeks.

“Damn,” he murmured.  “It’s like they knew exactly where to hit us.”  He took a deep breath and stared at Gabriel and Kara Forester’s vineyard.  “What the hell is that?”

“Looks like a bomber went down on the north slope,” one of the techs said.  “I’d know that hill anywhere.  We used to sled on it when I was a kid.”

Adam felt his heartrate increase.  “Tomasi, what was Commander Cho’s last known position?”

She winced.  “He—sir, he was on that hill.

“He was on that hill.”

Brendan swore and hit the dirt as the ground bucked beneath his feet with that first impact.  He rolled onto his back just in time to see unmarked fighters of unknown extraction screaming above him, chased by a pair of Foundation fighters hot on their tails.  He spat out mud and cursed.

Calm down.  You didn’t see this shit in her visions, did you?  No.  That means this is unexpected.

It also means that we really couldn’t predict it.  He rolled to his feet and after a few stumbling steps was moving at nearer to top speed again, not wasting the breath to give voice to the litany of curses that echoed inside of his skull.

Who the hell is attacking us?

Doesn’t matter.  You need to find Winston and you need to find him now.

The ground shuddered again as another set of bombers made another run, another pass.  The reports of the Foundation fighters’ gattlings echoed even at a distance and Brendan shivered.  The rounds would chew through just about anything.  He knew.  He’d seen the weapons tests.

The vineyard was within sight, now, but he saw nothing, saw no one.  It was achingly empty.

What if I was wrong?  What if they’re not out here, what if they went another way?

            What if…

He swore viciously and kept running.  No, they must’ve come this way.  Maybe they’ve already made it to safety.

It was a nice thought.

Brendan could no longer keep track of where the bombs were falling, where the ships were above his head.  All he could hear was the sound of his heart pounding in his ears as he pitched toward the shelter at Gabe’s café.

Then the sight of a bomber spiraling to the ground eclipsed his view of the world ahead of him and he stopped knowing anything at all.