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  “What are those?” Hickok asked, leaning forward. “You said you didn’t make them.”

  “I never said that,” Captain Wargo answered. “We don’t produce them in quantity, but we do have a few. Trikes and four-wheelers can’t serve all our needs.”

  Blade followed the police escort into the parking lot. The area was crawling with men and women in blue uniform. Civilians filled the sidewalks, hurrying to and fro, engaged in their daily activities.

  “Pull in there,” Captain Wargo instructed, pointing at a wide expanse of parking lot devoid of trikes. It was situated in front of the middle of the Central Core, not far from a pair of gold doors. “It’s been reserved for you.”

  Blade drove to the spot indicated and braked, aligning the transport so the front end faced the Central Core.

  The trio of Technic police positioned their trikes around the SEAL.

  They were joined by dozens of others, some coming from the parking lot, others from the Central Core. Within minutes, they had formed into a blue phalanx enclosing the SEAL on four sides.

  “See?” Captain Wargo said. “No one will bother the SEAL.”

  “Not even if they get a permit first?” Hickok quipped.

  Captain Wargo’s right hand surreptitiously moved to his rear pocket.

  He slid his fingers inside and clasped a brown plastic ball with a solitary red button. Slowly, proceeding cautiously, he removed the object and eased his hand toward the floor.

  Blade turned in his seat. “Geronimo, you stay here and keep an eye on the SEAL. Keep the doors locked. You know what to do,” he said meaningfully.

  Geronimo nodded. “The SEAL is in good hands. Don’t worry.”

  Blade nodded. “Hickok, you’re with me.”

  Hickok patted his Henry. “Like a shadow.”

  Captain Wargo opened his door. “Whenever you’re ready?”

  “My Commando,” Blade said to the gunman.

  Hickok twisted and reached over the back of his seat into the rear section. Blade’s Commando was lying on top of the pile of food, ammunition, and spare clothing.

  He grabbed it by the barrel and swung it around.

  “Here.”

  Blade took the gun. “Thanks. Let’s go.” He threw his door open and dropped to the ground.

  Hickok followed suit.

  “Last chance to change your mind,” Captain Wargo said to Geronimo with a friendly smile, while his right hand crept under his bucket seat.

  “I must stay here,” Geronimo replied.

  Captain Wargo nodded. “Suit yourself. You’ll miss some great food, though.” He pressed the red button on the plastic ball and gently placed it on the floor under the seat. “See you later.” He clambered from the transport and closed the door.

  Blade and Hickok walked to the front of the SEAL, next to the grill, their weapons at the ready, and waited for the Technic officer to reach them.

  “You’re in for a treat,” Captain Wargo announced as he led the way toward the Central Core.

  Blade glanced over his left shoulder and saw Geronimo locking the doors and rolling up the widows. Good. There was no way the Technics could break into the transport with the doors and windows secure, leaving Geronimo as snug as the proverbial bug.

  The Technic police, all at attention, parted, allowing Captain Wargo and the two Warriors to cross the parking lot to the sidewalk and reach the gold doors.

  “Is this real gold?” Hickok asked.

  “We don’t believe in imitations,” Wargo cryptically responded. He extended his left arm and touched one of a series of buttons in a panel to the left of the doors. Immediately, the doors hissed open. “Pneumatically controlled,” he said for their benefit, and entered.

  Blade paused, examining the layout. Ahead was a huge foyer or lobby, lavishly adorned, but oddly empty. Across the room was a row of cubicles with lighted numerals projecting from the wall overhead.

  The gunman also noted the cubicles. “I know what they are,” Hickok said. “I’ve seen ’em before. They’re called elevators.”

  Captain Wargo walked across the lobby toward the elevators.

  Blade and Hickok tentatively tagged after the officer.

  “We’ll take an elevator up to the reception room,” Wargo said. He strode to the righthand elevator and stepped inside.

  Blade and Hickok, constantly surveying the lobby, staying side by side, stepped up to the elevator.

  “Can’t we take some stairs?” Blade asked.

  “Climb ten floors?” Captain Wargo replied. He snickered. “You can, if you want to. But I’m not about to climb ten flights when there’s an elevator handy.”

  Blade hesitated, then entered the elevator.

  Hickok strolled in, studying the overhead light, the bank of lit buttons on the right side, and the small grill in the center of the floor.

  Captain Wargo smiled reassuringly. “There’s nothing to be nervous about. Believe me, you’ll never know this ride took place.” His right hand stabbed one of the buttons.

  The elevator door started to close. And that’s when it happened.

  Captain Wargo dived, his arms outstretched. His hurtling form narrowly missed the closing door.

  Blade leveled the Commando, but the gunman was faster. The Henry boomed, but the closing door intervened, the slug hitting the edge of the door and careening outside.

  The elevator door slammed shut.

  “Blast!” Hickok fumed. “We’re trapped!”

  Blade pounded on the right wall, then the door. “They’re too thick to break through,” he commented methodically.

  Hickok stared straight up. “What about the light?”

  Blade inspected the overhead light. It was rectangular, about two feet in width. A man might be able to squeeze—

  There was a loud thump from underneath the elevator.

  “What the blazes was that?” Hickok asked.

  “I don’t know,” Blade said.

  Another distinct thump sounded.

  “I don’t like this, pard,” Hickok remarked.

  “We walked right into this one,” Blade admitted, frowning. “I think they’re after the SEAL, but they’ll never get it. I left the keys inside with Geronimo.”

  “I hope you’re right,” Hickok stated, bending over to peer at the buttons. “Should I push one of these?”

  “Go for it.”

  Hickok punched the button marked OPEN.

  Nothing happened. “Uh-oh,” the gunman said.

  Blade, scrutinizing the overhead light, felt a slight burning sensation in his nostrils.

  “A bullet would ricochet off these walls,” Hickok was saying. “Say, do you smell somethin’?”

  Blade glanced down.

  Curling, wispy white tendrils were emanating from the grill in the elevator floor. They rose toward the ceiling, spreading, congealing into a cloudy mass.

  Damn! Blade crouched and laid his hands over the small grill, striving to cover the slits with his fingers and stifle the smoke. He was only partially successful. The smoke continued to seep out, filling the elevator.

  “What a lousy way to go!” Hickok said, and coughed. His eyes were watering, his nose tingling, and his lungs gasping for fresh air.

  Blade was feeling dizzy. He weaved unsteadily and put his left hand over his mouth and nose.

  “Do… you… think it’s… poisonous?” Hickok asked, doubling over and collapsing on his knees.

  “Don’t… know,” Blade croaked, his throat parched and raspy.

  The elevator was a muggy, misty white haze.

  Blade’s legs buckled and he fell to the floor. He wished he could apologize to Hickok. He’d stupidly led the gunman into a trap any amateur would have avoided. There was only one consolation. The bastards would never get the SEAL. Geronimo was locked inside safe and sound.

  It served the bastards right!

  Blade struggled to rise, but his limbs refused to obey, and he pitched onto his face with a protracted sigh.
r />   Chapter Eight

  Lieutenant Alicia Farrow was in a dire quandary.

  What the hell was she supposed to do?

  Farrow ran her right hand through her crewcut black hair, her dark eyes troubled.

  What was she going to do?

  Farrow was seated on the bank of the inner moat, 50 yards north of the drawbridge, her back leaning against the trunk of a tall maple tree. She stared at the slowly meandering water, dejected.

  Her ass was grass!

  She had deliberately violated her orders! The Minister would boil her in oil when he found out! Violating an order was an offense in the first degree, punishable by death.

  Her death.

  Farrow closed her eyes, deep in reflection. According to her instructions, she should have given the signal yesterday. Somewhere out there, lurking in the trees, waiting for her to activate her beeper, was the four-member demolition crew. What were their names? Sergeant Darden was one. And Private Rundle was another. There was a loudmouth named Johnson, and one other whose name eluded her. They would be wondering why she didn’t signal. How long before they sent someone to check on her?

  How long before they discovered she was derelict in her duty?

  But how could she do it?

  How could she give the signal, knowing the compound would be demolished by a series of devastating explosions?

  How could she give the signal, knowing what it would mean to her newfound friends?

  Dammit!

  Why did she have to go and become attached to these people? She’d never acted this way before! She was allowing raw emotionalism to pervert her higher purpose.

  But she couldn’t help herself.

  There was something intangible about the Family, some elusive quality supremely attractive in its simplicity. Maybe it was the way they all cared for one another. Really cared. Not the fake bullshit so common among the Technics, but authentic affection. She’d seen it. She’d experienced it. A peculiar sensation, new to her, alien in its profound impact on her mind and heart.

  Was it—she balked at mentally framing the word—was it love? Real love? Not the artificial crap she’d known all her life. But sincere, unaffected, pure love?

  Whatever it was, it scared the daylights out of her!

  She felt it most when in Yama’s presence. Incredibly, she couldn’t get enough of him. She concocted excuses to be near him. Asked him questions to draw out their conversations, when she already knew the answers. She wanted to be near him every second of every day.

  What the hell had happened to her?

  F arrow opened her eyes and gazed at the moat. She had a decision to make, and she couldn’t afford to wait any longer. Either she sent the signal, or she told Yama about the demolition team.

  One or the other.

  But which?

  “Mind some company?” asked a deep voice.

  Farrow glanced up, and there he was, the morning sun to his rear, adding a preternatural glow to the outline of his muscular physique, his dark blue garment bulging with power, his silver hair and mustache neatly combed, freshly washed.

  Farrow couldn’t force her mouth to function. She swallowed, nodding.

  Yama sat down next to her, laying his Wilkinson on the grass. “I was searching all over for you. Is everything all right?”

  Farrow averted her eyes. “Fine,” she responded huskily.

  “Are you sure?” Yama insisted.

  “I’m okay,” Farrow asserted. “Why do you ask?”

  “Just a feeling I have,” Yama said. He scrutinized her features for a moment. “Are you homesick?”

  “What?” Farrow replied in surprise.

  “Are you homesick? Do you miss your fellow Technics? Is that why you’re upset?” Yama inquired.

  “I’m not upset,” Farrow rejoined stiffly.

  “Whatever you say,” Yama said.

  Farrow nervously bit her lower lip, then glanced at him. “I don’t miss them,” she confided. “Truth to tell, I don’t even want to go back.”

  “Then don’t.”

  Farrow laughed bitterly. “Oh, yeah! Just like that!”

  “Why not?” Yama asked.

  “They might not like it,” Farrow said.

  “So what? It’s your life. You can do whatever you want,” Yama declared.

  “That’s easy for you to say,” Farrow stated. She decided to change the subject. “I’d like to hear some more about you.”

  “Me? You already know more than anyone else,” Yama remarked.

  “But I don’t know everything, and I want to know all about you,” Farrow blatantly told him. “For instance, how is it you Warriors are all so different? I mean, you all attended the same Family school. You all had the same teachers. Yet each of you is as different from the other as night from day.”

  “It’s no great mystery,” Yama said, his left arm propped on the ground, relaxed. “No two people are alike. We’re as unique and individual as snowflakes. Different tastes, different likes and dislikes, different interests and talents. Some people have a talent for the soil and they become Tillers.

  Others are tuned to psychic circuits and become Empaths. A few, like Joshua, attain harmony with the cosmos and become spiritual sages, dispensing truth to troubled souls. Then there are the Warriors. Our talent lies in the skillful manipulation of violence. Not much of a talent, when you compare it in the others. But it serves to safeguard our Home and our Family.” He paused, staring at the west wall. “Even similar talents can be diverse in their expression. Take the Warriors as an example. We might be termed masters of death, but each of us has perfected the mastery of a different technique in the execution of our duties, all consistent with our talents and personal preferences. Hickok is a revolver specialist. Rikki is unbeatable with a katana. Blade has his Bowies. Teucer his bow. True, we were all raised in the same environment and instructed by the same Elders, but the environment and the instructions affected us differently because we are individuals. Each of us has formed our own philosophy of life. We live according to our highest concepts of truth, beauty, and goodness. We answer to the Spirit and ourselves and no one else.” He stopped, bemused. “Why is it, whenever I’m near you, I can’t seem to stop talking?”

  “Don’t stop on my account,” Farrow said.

  “I’ve never had this happen,” Yama commented.

  “I don’t mind if you don’t,” Farrow stated, grinning.

  Yama stared into her eyes. “I’ll be honest with you, Alicia. I’ve come to care for you a great deal. I don’t want you to leave. Not just yet anyway. I’d like to get to know you better.”

  Alicia turned her face away.

  “I’m sorry,” Yama said. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  “You don’t understand,” Farrow said huskily, refusing to let him see the torment twisting her features.

  “Explain it to me,” Yama said.

  “I can’t.”

  “Why not?” Yama pressed her.

  “Please. Leave it alone,” Farrow pleaded. She heard his clothes rustle as he rose.

  “Whatever you want,” Yama declared. “But I’m always ready to listen when you decide you can trust me.” His footsteps receded to the southwest.

  Farrow glanced over her right shoulder, her eyes misty.

  Curse her stupidity!

  Now she’d done it! Gone and driven him off! Maybe antagonized him!

  There was no other choice! She must tell him about the Minister and the demolition crew! But how would he react? Despise her for being a part of the dastardly plot? Could she risk it?

  Lieutenant Alicia Farrow drew her knees up to her chest and encircled her legs with her arms. She buried her face in the stiff fabric of her fatigue pants and silently weeped, torn to the core of her being.

  To give the signal, and lose her new friends and probably Yama too, or to continue wavering and face execution?

  To do her duty, or as her heart dictated?

  That was the question. />
  But what the hell was the answer?

  Chapter Nine

  He became conscious of a dull ache in the back of his head, a palpable pounding at the base of his skull. There was a bitter taste in his mouth, lingering on his tongue and lips. For a minute, he was disoriented, striving to recall where he was and what had happened.

  Suddenly, he remembered in a rush.

  Blade’s eyes snapped open and he tried to stand, mistakenly assuming he was still on the elevator floor.

  But he was wrong.

  The giant Warrior had been stripped naked. He was securely locked in steel manacles, one on each wrist and around each ankle, and was suspended several inches above a white, tiled floor, his limbs spreadeagled, on a smooth blue wall.

  What the…!????

  Blade found himself a prisoner in a rectangular room. Accept for a brown easy chair eight feet away, the chamber was barren of furniture.

  The ceiling radiated a pale, pinkish light. From somewhere off in the distance came a muted rumbling.

  Where was he?

  Someone groaned to his left.

  Blade turned his head in the direction of the sound and found Hickok four feet away, likewise manacled to the wall.

  The gunman’s eyelids fluttered, then slowly opened. “Oh! My achin’ noggin! Did you get a description of the buffalo that hit me?”

  “Afraid not,” Blade replied, chuckling.

  Hickok glanced downward. “What the blazes is this?” he exploded. “I’m in my birthday suit!”

  “Join the club,” Blade said.

  Hickok’s face became a vivid scarlet. He looked up, glaring around the room. “Some bozo is gonna pay for this!”

  “We really walked into this one,” Blade commented regretfully.

  “Don’t blame yourself, pard,” Hickok stated. “These sleazy turkeys set us up real good. There was nothing else you could have done.”

  “I don’t know—” Blade began, then paused as a door on the far side of the chamber opened.

  In walked four people, three men and a woman.

  Blade recognized only one of them, the bastard Wargo. He was bringing up the rear of the little group, possibly indicating an inferior social status.