Maggie, her hand resting on the M-16 in her lap, does not reply immediately. Then she says, “It’s not just the emptiness. It’s the devastation.”

“Exactly.”

The weeks she has spent on the Base have spoiled her, Kirsten reflects. Even in the first days of the uprising, with bodies frozen or rotting where they lay at the whim of the weather, she has seen nothing like the urban landscape that scrolls across the small rectangle of the vehicle’s armored glass. Houses still stand, for the most part, though here and there blackened beams thrust up out of yet-unmelted snow covering the burnt- out rubble. Some, their windows boarded up, might have been purposefully abandoned when the inhabitants fled. Like others suddenly emptied, though, their doors stand open on broken hinges, odd bits of furniture and clothing scattered across dead lawns sodden with snowmelt. Brightly painted ceramic shards litter the sidewalk where the convoy pauses to turn, the wire frame of a lampshade jammed into the hollow of a tree root; the remains of sofa cushions tumble across a porch where a washing machine lies toppled beside them. Shards of glass cling to the frame of broken-out windows. Here and there a line of holes in splintered siding or gouged brick testifies to automatic weapons fire. There is no way to tell how much of the damage has been done by androids, how much by the looters and two-footed predators who have followed in their wake.

As they move toward the center of the city, signs of life begin to appear. In the abandoned parking lot of an apartment complex, a pair of ten-year-old boys and a cocker spaniel are chasing a Frisbee under the watchful eye of a grey-haired woman with pistol strapped to her hip. Above them, laundry festoons a cobweb of ropes strung between balconies, children’s sweaters in bright pink and yellow, work shirts, a woman’s nightgown in faded black satin and lace. Across the side of one of the buildings, red paint proclaims, JESUS IS COMING BACK!! under a crudely drawn image of a bearded man in a robe. The figure brandishes a sword with one hand, an open book in the other.

“You know, the fanatics scare me as badly as the androids,” Maggie says softly. “The damned metalheads might push us back to the Middle Ages, but it’ll be the schizos who hear God talking to them from the toaster that’ll keep us there.”

“They’re beginning to dig in. We may have to fight them, too.”

“Ironic, isn’t it? First we put down the slave rebellion; next we’re going to have to feed the fanatics and the self-appointed prophets to the lions.”

“Poor lions.” Kirsten’s mouth quirks up in an involuntary smile. “You know Dakota would never let us do that to innocent animals.”

“Or Tacoma. He’s the one with the affinity for cats.” Maggie leans forward and taps the driver on the shoulder. “We’re getting to people. Start the tape.”

Kirsten knows what to expect, but the sound of her own amplified voice is still a shock. The truck’s external speakers sputter and crackle for a moment, then boom out, “Attention! Attention please! This is Kirsten King, speaking for the United States Government. A census will be taken today and tomorrow at the City Auditorium. All citizens are asked to cooperate in determining the needs of the civilian population and in the re-establishment of civil institutions. Thank you for your assistance.” The recording plays over and over again.

As they approach the intersection of suburbia and the business district, signs of habitation become more common. Here and there they pass a pedestrian or a bicyclist. A man on a mule, a double pannier of winter apples suspended across its withers, becomes an unofficial roadblock when his mount halts suddenly in the middle of an intersection, apparently frightened by the strange, square metal things bearing down on it. The lead driver manages to swerve in time, and for an instant Kirsten finds herself face to face with a wall-eyed, bucking beast, its braying clearly audible even through the bulletproof glass and steel walls of the APC. Then her convoy sweeps past, leaving the rider tugging frantically at the creature’s reins.

“There’s a prophecy for you,” Maggie observes wryly. “The Jeep of the future.”

Their route carries them past the block-long remains of a Wal-Mart. The store itself stands back from the street, its massive bulk dark through the steel frames of shattered doors. Its parking lot, though, has been transformed into an open marketplace, with a hundred or so booths of timber studs and plywood crowded onto the asphalt. Many of them stand empty, and Kirsten takes that as a hopeful sign that the proprietors have reported as requested to the City Auditorium to be counted and identified. Others are still open for business. A pen on one side holds animal with long, shaggy coats, whether sheep or wool goats she cannot be sure. Another offers stacks of canned goods, looted from the Wal-Mart itself or other grocery chains; still a third displays a double rank of bicycles, a heavy chain run through their rear wheels into a staple pounded into the pavement at each end of the line. Under a sign that proclaims the occupant a “Taylor,” a woman sits at an old-fashioned treadle sewing machine, steadily feeding a garment of plaid flannel under the needle while a man, evidently her customer, stands by in his pants and undershirt. He holds a chicken firmly tucked under one arm. No prices are posted anywhere.

Kirsten has seen marketplaces like this in North Africa and in parts of Latin America.

Most were at least in part tourist traps, designed to bring in American dollars and German d-marks, attracting local business only incidentally and in small volume. And here, in a deserted parking lot, is the wealthiest, most vigorous economy in the history of the world, reduced to trading eggs for a stolen blanket or the mending of a torn sleeve.

A cold lump of fear congeals in her stomach. With it comes the realization that until now she has acknowledged only two possibilities: either they would all die, which has seemed by far the more likely outcome; or they would survive, pass through a rough patch of perhaps a year or so, until society could be restored to something like normality. Of course, some things would be different, with the numbers of men drastically reduced for a generation or two. Power balances would shift. But she has never truly doubted that enough technology, and the technicians to run it, could survive to make the world a reasonably comfortable place once again.

Until now.

And the cold grows more frigid still, a burning inside her. She—she, Kirsten King— is the duly constituted governor of these people, responsible for their safety and welfare in a world where safety is nonexistent and welfare is sufficient firewood to cook a bartered chicken or keep a family from freezing to death overnight. She may not have atomic warheads under her hand, but the burden of others’ lives is no less for that.

My God, how did Clinton do it? Or Kennedy? How did any of them do it who had any sense of obligation to their people?

In the last few blocks before the Auditorium, they encounter actual traffic, and the convoy slows to a crawl. There are pickups from the country side; more bicycles; horses; a wagon or two. Salvaged from the recesses of a barn or an historic home, a nineteenth-century buggy with a folded-down leather top passes them at a smart clip, followed by a teenager on a skateboard. Most folk, though, travel on foot, some carrying small children, almost all carrying a long gun or pistol strapped to a hip or under an arm. All must run a gauntlet of heavily armed and armored MP’s stationed at a temporary gate of pipe and hurricane fencing. They wave through the personal weapons, for the most part, though no one passes without baring his throat or submitting to a metal scan.

The line of APC’s passes through one vehicle at a time, troops and drivers checked as thoroughly as the civilians. Kirsten had argued at length with the Light Colonel commanding the MP’s over that, and finally had had to order him to treat her convoy exactly as he would civilian transport. If she was to lead these people—and the thought of it had kept her awake most of the night—she had to lead by example. She had to be the first and most visible to honor the law. Maggie, sitting beside her, had sworn to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States, and had laid her life at hazard to do it. It had never occurred to Kirsten when she took the same oath as the most junior member of Hilary Clinton’s Cabinet, that she would ever be asked to do the same.

An ironic smile touches her mouth. Last and least, and the only one left alive that can do what must be done.

At the doors, her escort form a cordon around her, rifles at the ready, eyes scanning the crowd that turns to stare. Maggie, walking just behind, keeps her own weapon at her side, not openly threatening, but prepared nonetheless. Odd, how that might make her uncomfortable if it were anyone but Maggie. She has never before in her life poached anyone’s lover—has hardly thought of having one of her own, much less taking someone else’s—but she trusts Maggie literally with her life, and not just for Dakota’s sake.

The crowd murmurs as they pass through, and she catches fleeting snatches of their comments:

“. . .Look, son, that’s the commander from the Cheyenne. . .”

“. . .our President now. . .”

“. . . cyborg egghead . . .”

“. . . I thought she’d be taller. . .”

From the door comes a snatch of song, and Kirsten puts up a hand to halt her entourage. A man sits beside the entrance on a folding stool, a guitar propped across his knees and a fold of denim where the rest of his left leg should be. His long, graying hair is tied at the nape with a thong of leather; sunglasses hide his eyes. The melody is an old one, a ballad from the feud-ridden Anglo-Scottish border in the days of the first Elizabeth, but the words are new: