Terrence, on the other hand, had been a nutjob’s nutjob. When Sister Rosalie had assigned a book report on a “classic” in seventh grade— and by “classic” she had meant something like David Copperfield or The Last of the Mohicans —Terrence had turned in a glowing review of The Turner Diaries . Some of the literature they had found along with the guns had been considerably more radical. If Terrence had lived through the uprising, she had no doubt he would be yelling “I told you so!” to anyone who would listen.

But Terrence had been into droids, especially the military models. He’d even bought a surplus metalhead or two and had been trying to modify them for what he’d termed “commando operations.”

Live by the droid, die by the droid.

Beside her, Poteet turns his handsome new Bowie knife over in his hands. Once they had cracked the store, they had had to empty it down to the slingshots and Swiss Army can openers or risk the weapons’ getting loose in the population. Which would not have been a problem in nine cases out of ten. But the variety and extent of Terrence’s stock indicated a considerable customer base. And there was bound to be more than one surviving wingnut out there, more than one surviving Dietrich. Not the kind of folk one would want to trust with mortars and grenades and LAAW rockets.

“Eyes on the street, Joe,” she says quietly. “There’s more weapons like these out there, and not all are upstanding citizens like us.”

“Ma’am,” he says with a guilty glance up at her. Then he sets his prize aside and takes up his M-16 again, laying it lightly across his knees.

Koda flashes him a smile to let him know he’s not in trouble and glances into the rearview mirror. The other three trucks follow closely behind, all of them as heavily laden as Redtail One. Casually Dakota waves at the line of kids and teenagers standing across the street, watching as she and her party relieve Boney’s establishment of his inventory. She says, “They’re gonna be real disappointed we didn’t leave them anything.”

“Looks like folks have liberated just about everything that’s not nailed down.”

“And a few things that were.” Navigating around the hulks of cars left standing in the street, Koda gestures toward and abandoned house. The windows gape black, the glass lifted out, not broken; the wall studs stand bare like ribs where clapboard siding has been pried away, possibly for building, more likely for fuel. A couple blocks down, a six-foot-high plank fence with an iron gate surrounds another house.

“You know, ma’am, it could all still go to hell,” Poteet observes.

Koda shoots him a brief glance, noting the solemnity on his rawboned face. “In a heartbeat, Joe.”

Further along, the houses give way to a strip of used car lots and other businesses, all of them broken open with splinters of glass still scattered on the sidewalks, glittering now in the afternoon sun, their doors hanging loose on twisted hinges. A church still stands mostly intact; outside a branch bank a handful of twenty-dollar bills, bleached grey by the weather, skid along the gutter as a breeze gusts by.

Koda turns left to regain the Interstate, taking a different route than the one they had followed coming in. Maybe the wingnut paranoia is beginning to rub off, she reflects; given their firepower, there is no real possibility of ambush. Still, best not to advertise where they have been or become predictable.

At the next turn, the wind brings the sound of shouting, a man’s deep voice and, incongruously, the squeals and laughter of small children. A block down the street stands the venerable brick façade of St. Boniface’s church and school, and the voices grow louder as Koda pulls level with it. On the playground two small children ride the seesaws up and down, while another pumps his legs to carry the swing higher and higher. A veiled woman watches over them from a flight of steps leading up into the building, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes fixed on the knot of adults gathered at the picnic tables under a small grove of pine trees.

More veiled women, and for a moment time slips and it comes to Koda that the nuns have somehow returned. But most of the women wear jeans and sweaters; the few men, denim and Stetsons. All but one.

Standing on one of the concrete picnic tables, he leans on a tall cross made of two branches roughly lashed together. His beard, liberally sprinkled with grey, cascades past his collar, and his long hair stirs in the breeze. Before his ears dangle long, corkscrew curls, though Koda would bet her ranch and all the stock on it that he is no Hassid. He wears a cassock buttoned almost to the throat; on his chest lies a large cross, also crudely made from twigs. She slows the convoy, rolling down her window to hear more clearly.

“. . .only a righteous remnant left here on earth to endure the Tribulation. In those days, says the Prophet Isaiah, seven women will lay hold of one man, saying ‘be our husband.’ The time was when women could refuse their duty to the Lord and to their husbands, but no more. The man-faced scorpions of the Tribulation, sent by God to cleanse his earth of the unrighteous, have killed not a tenth part of mankind but nine out of ten. We let a woman rule over us, and this is God’s just punishment for our disobedience. Now we must restore the order God meant for us to live in. Let no woman have authority, but be in all submission, and if she would learn anything, let her ask her husband. But let her remember her real purpose, and that is the bearing of children.”

Frowning, Koda counts up the veiled women. Seven. The preacher’s “wives?” Two, at least, look under age, fifteen or so. “We’re gonna need to get some civilian law enforcement in here,” Joe mutters. “Next thing you know ol’ Judah there’s gonna start serving Kool-Aid.”

Koda gives him a sharp look. “You know this guy?”

“Know him? Nah.” Poteet shakes his head. “But I’ve seen him preaching on the streets or in parks a few times I was in town on weekends. Calls himself Judah ben Israel now, but I think it was Brother Sam Something before. Cops hauled him off once when he was baptizing folks in the Civic Center fountain during a concert.”

She has head enough. Judah ben Israel, is something they should have known was coming. Unfortunately, there is nothing in the framework of the law to deal with him, unless they can find a way to enforce the age of consent laws. Koda presses the gas pedal, speeding up the truck, and heads back to the relative sanity of the Base.

CHAPTER THIRTY NINE

DAWN IS STILL several hours away, but Kirsten is wide awake, her lover’s pillow clutched tightly against her chest as she stares at the blackened ceiling above. Her body still hums with the sweet energy of their lovemaking less than half an hour ago, and she already misses Dakota’s passionate presence. “The things you make me feel,” she murmurs into the still, humid air. She remembers the look Koda gave her when she thought she was sleeping. The tenderness and adoration emanating from those magnificent eyes was as palpable to Kristen as a caress, laying itself over the parts of her that were still wounded and raw from a lifetime standing on the outside, and making her feel, for that one wondrous moment in time, whole.

A sinking surge of guilt hits her belly and she rolls from the bed, pushing her lover’s pillow away from her as if she doesn’t deserve the comfort it holds. And in truth, perhaps she doesn’t. Keeping her plans from Dakota was the hardest thing she’d ever done. Compared to that, walking unarmed into Minot had been child’s play. What is it they say? Act first, apologize later, right?

She has the sinking feeling that no amount of contrition will ever make up for her silence of last night and this morning.

Please, God. Let her understand.

Striding into the bathroom, she turns on the tap and stands under the frigid spray, letting the stinging, icy water chase the thoughts and emotions from her. Her face, like her soul, grows stony, and by the time the water is once again silent, she resembles the very androids she is going after.

She dresses quickly and steps into the darkened living room. Koda had left one lamp burning low on the hearth, and its somber light casts Asi’s curled body into flickering shadow. Having gone out earlier with Dakota, he merely looks up at his master, tail thumping companionably against the hearthstone. A slight smile cracks Kirsten’s icy veneer, and squatting, she strokes his noble head, then hugs him close for a moment, allowing herself to enjoy his soft warmth and unwavering affection.

After a long moment, she pulls away and stands, looking down at him. “You be good today, you hear me?”

He looks up at her, slightly outraged, as if “good” isn’t his middle name.

Correctly interpreting the look, Kirsten rolls her eyes, shakes her head, and turns away, grabbing her laptop and the silver case she’s brought with her from the bedroom. Plucking a set of keys from their hook just inside the door, she lets herself out into the cool night.

Feeling a bit like a criminal, she stands at the driveway and looks carefully up and down the street. All is quiet, and dark, and, satisfied, she makes her way toward Koda’s truck. As she reaches the vehicle, a soft voice sounds behind her, causing her to jump and turn, body braced for a fight.

“Jesus, Lieutenant!” she gasps as the tall, muscled and incredibly handsome man steps out from the shadows. “You scared me!”

“Sorry about that, Ma’am,” he replies, touching the brim of his cap in salute and smiling at her.

“What are you doing lurking in the bushes in the middle of the night?”

“Following orders, Ma’am.”

“Orders? Who’s orders?”

“The Colonel’s, Ma’am. I’m part of your night guard.”