Exchange

Exchange Dale E. Cozort

Other works by Dale R. Cozort American Indian Victories—Alternate Histories of the Struggles between Indians and the Europeans Char The BEMs

Books can be ordered from: www.bytechservices.com 1500A East College Way #554 Mount Vernon, WA 98273

About the author… Dale Cozort is a computer instructor, married, with a teenage daughter and adult stepdaughter. He has been writing seriously for fourteen years—mostly science fiction short stories or alternate history essays. He has written three novels and a book-length series of alternate history essays called American Indian Victories. His novel Char was one of five finalists in the TrueTV Search for the Next Great Crime Writer contest. His political and historical essays have appeared on the popular military/historical website StrategyPage.com. Dale lives near Chicago with his wife, daughter, too many books and computers, three cats and two worried birds. He is active in the Chicago area Science Fiction Convention scene. For more information, see: www.dalecozort.com or contact me via e-mail at [email protected] This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual, real life events, locales or persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental. ISBN 0975431471 ISBN-13 978-0975431474 © 2010 Dale R. Cozort

Dedication To My Family and My Online and Real World Writing Groups Author’s Note The Exchange is the product of stolen minutes…bits of time between work and family obligations over a period of more than a decade. It’s also the product of a wife and children willing to respect my writing time, individuals in writers’ groups willing to read pieces of the original very rough drafts and suggest improvements, and especially of Beth Hill, the incredibly patient editor who showed me levels of novel polishing I had been only dimly aware of, and of the publisher who believes in this story enough to make the considerable financial investment involved in bringing it to market. For the latest information, drop by my website www.DaleCozort.com or my blog at http://dalecoz.livejournal.com

About the cover… The cover illustrations were created by artist Pav Kovacic. http://pavsketch.blogspot.com Graphics designer Guy Corp pulled the whole thing together. http://www.grafixcorp.com

Exchange

Chapter One The prelude to the Exchange announced itself with a gust of ionized air, a shift of electrical charges that made Sharon Mack’s skin tingle. Eleven fifty-eight. Two minutes early by Sharon’s watch. Hot sunlight poured from a cloudless sky onto strip-mall parking lots running along both sides of Highway 25 on the outskirts of Rockport, Illinois. Under the supervision of surveyors, a team of hastily drafted civilians stretched yellow and black warning tape at the boundary of the Exchange Zone—the EZ. A curved line of white stakes stretched left and right— marking the calculated fringe of Bear Country. Sharon stretched her back and wiped perspiration from her forehead before returning to her assigned task—keeping the clueless from wandering under high-tension power lines. Overhead a crew worked on the wiring, freeing cables and dropping them to the ground. It was better to drop the lines in a controlled manner before they were cut by the Exchange than chance them snapping afterward. A trickle of sweat ran into her eyes. She blinked at the sting. Marines, rifles at the ready, patrolled the inside edge of the EZ. Illinois State Police had jurisdiction outside; tan-clad officers watched over a work group digging up a natural gas pipeline to seal the end. A stream of trucks carrying workers, equipment, and additional Marines rumbled along the four-lane highway into the EZ. In the opposite direction, bumper-to-bumper traffic jammed the highway—refugees fleeing Rockport. Sharon glanced at the cars and hoped Bethany was in one of them. Her stomach knotted. Bethany. Her daughter. Seven years old. 1

Dale R. Cozort The sky rumbled. As she watched, state troopers stopped the flow of cars. Someone behind her said, “Any minute now.” The troopers ushered cars and civilian workers out of the interface zone. A Marine shouted, “Look out!” An oversized, iridescent-blue pickup truck pulled out of the stalled traffic and raced on the shoulder of the highway, making a desperate run. A state patrol car moved to cut it off, but the truck slewed over the shoulder and—with clumps of dirt and grass flying—roared toward the EZ. It turned toward Sharon’s work party. The civilians scrambled to get out of the way, dropping their shovels and rakes. The truck’s engine growled. It headed straight toward Sharon, moving too fast to evade before swerving at the last second. She glimpsed the driver and passengers—a half-dozen, scruffy-looking men. The truck rolled over an abandoned rake. A front tire exploded. The driver fought the steering wheel. The truck, out of control, careened toward the EZ. At 12:01 Sharon heard thunder from the clear June sky. The sun stood directly overhead. Surrounding it, the sky was clear, but only in a perfect, off-center blue circle stretching to the horizon. From outside the circle, dark, ominous clouds moved in quickly. The perfection of the circle lasted only a few seconds before the edges blurred as the air from the timelines mixed. Sharon felt a cool wind and raindrops on her face. Outside the EZ, the strip mall had disappeared—replaced by a low hill covered with prairie grass and patchy clumps of trees. The cab of the pickup truck was gone. Momentum kept the amputated truck bed going—its front edge plowed thick grass and dirt. It crashed into a tree and flipped, dumping passengers into the brush. Too much happened at once for Sharon to grasp it all. The highway now abruptly ended in a grove of trees. A massive elm, sheared in half, stood where the shoulder had been. Its other half was gone, carried with the chunk of Bear Country that was now part of the old world. The half-tree creaked and leaned before the trunk splintered and it fell. Marines scrambled to get out of the way as branches crashed onto the hood of their Humvee. A pizza 2

Exchange place at the end of the strip mall was missing a wall. Its roof tilted, sagged, then collapsed. Sharon rushed toward the mangled truck, approaching a stocky, prematurely gray-haired man in a form-fitting T-shirt who brushed leaves from his body. Angry, he pointed at her. A tattoo of a rifle covered his sculpted forearm. “Weren’t for you, we woulda’ made it.” Sharon stared at him, bewildered. “What?” she said. One of the other guys from the truck yelled, “It’s a bear!” Sharon gasped. The approaching animal was longer than the truck bed and almost as tall at the shoulders, like a bear, but leaner. Its eyes held a feral, predatory look. One of the men from the truck ran when the bear was still thirty yards away. Sharon barely had time to blink before the bear covered those yards and casually swatted him with an oversized paw. The man’s body cartwheeled. A Marine Humvee raced toward the bear with lights flashing and horn blaring. The massive animal stood on its hind legs and roared. The men from the wrecked truck staggered to their feet and circled, moving slowly, trying to get behind the Humvee without drawing the bear’s attention. Several limped; two dragged the dead weight of an unconscious man. With arrogant swagger, the bear approached. Running toward the scene, three Marines fired their weapons, startling the bear. It stopped, glared down at the humans, and snorted— before turning and ambling away. Sharon took a deep, shaky breath and let it out slowly. And that’s why they call it Bear Country. She stood for a moment, catching her breath and enjoying the cool breeze. That earned a glare from a barrel-shaped, female Marine standing guard beside her. Palmer, her name patch said. “Best stand back in case one of the sparkies drops a wrench or something, ma’am,” Palmer said, gesturing at the workers descending from the suspension tower. The polite words had the tone of an order. “I’m a computer jockey, not a construction worker,” Sharon said as she moved away from the pylon. When martial law was imposed and the call, backed by armed Marines and State 3

Dale R. Cozort Police, came for volunteers, they gave her no time to change into work clothes or find gloves. She’d been pounding stakes; she lifted sore hands and winced at the blister on her thumb. Then she brushed sand off her gray dress slacks and white blouse, now stained with sweat and dirt. The calculations gave them only three hours of warning, three hours to mobilize and prepare for the Exchange. Time. Not near enough. She glanced back at the Marine. “Could you handle that bear if it kept coming?” Palmer grunted. “It moves, I shoot it.” “And if it keeps coming? It would take a cannon to kill one of those things. And, what if we’re attacked by some other iceage animal on steroids?” Palmer said nothing. “And that’s not all of it,” Sharon continued. “Can you shoot a bug, a bat smaller than a grasshopper, or a virus? That’s what they’re really afraid of. If Bear Country animals get loose back in the world and start breeding or a disease comes back with us—” Gunshots. A hundred yards away. The survey crew gawked in the direction of the shots. Raindrops splattered on dirt, pavement and grass. Wind stirred the trees. Three helicopters, painted with green and brown camouflage, arced low. Sharon moved under a tree to get out of the drizzle. A lumbering cargo helicopter, engine screaming, swooped in and landed close enough that she felt the downwash from the rotors. Men and women in camouflage uniforms swarmed it— unloading bundles of twelve-foot fence posts and barbed wire. Sharon stretched the protesting muscles of her lower back and stared out into Bear Country. “Did you ever think you’d be standing twenty feet from another world?” Sharon said. Palmer ignored her. “Not really another world, I guess, but a different version of ours. Here, our ancestors died out or never developed. Too much competition? Killed off by climate or disease?” Palmer looked bored. “You already knew that? Maybe you don’t care...” Sharon noticed most of the stakes marking the EZ were gone. “The 4

Exchange eggheads guessed wrong by two minutes and by a good three feet. That’s not reassuring.” Palmer grunted. “If that’s the worst screw-up we run into, I won’t complain. Those guys in the truck? Friends of yours?” “No. Never seen them before.” “You know they’re AKs?” “Aryan Kings? The street gang?” “That’s what the tattoos said. And more are coming.” A bright blue pickup identical to the amputated one pulled up. The driver, wearing a radio earpiece, sharp chinos, a formfitting black T, and reflective sunglasses got out. He towered over Sharon. “Getting a good look at you. There are a hundred cops around. There won’t always be.” He took out a cell phone and clicked her picture. “Our brothers would have made it if you weren’t in the way.” Sharon glared at the Marine. “Are you just going to stand there?” Palmer pointed her rifle. “Shut up and hit the dirt.” “What?” “Down! Now!” Sharon hesitated before going down on one knee. Palmer’s rifle barked. Sharon, open-mouthed, stared at the Marine, then glanced back at Bear Country. Dozens of long-legged, greenfurred monkeys boiled out of the grass on the far side of the firebreak. They ran so fast they looked like a movie playing in fast-forward. Palmer yelled, “Down! Flat! You’re in my line of fire!” A monkey lunged before Sharon could get the rest of the way down. She kicked at it, missed, and sprawled in the grass. She rolled and came up in a fighting stance. The AK from the pickup was on one knee with a stunned expression on his face. His cell phone lay on the ground by Sharon’s foot; she kicked it into the weeds. A second monkey raced in and hit Palmer in the face with a rock. Palmer dropped her rifle, swayed for a second, then fell to her knees with hands covering her face. Blood seeped through her fingers. Most of the pack was already past. They raced into the thick brush—Sharon’s eyes had trouble tracking them once they hit the weeds. 5

Dale R. Cozort A monkey at the rear of the pack skidded to a stop, then darted back and grabbed the Marine’s rifle. Sharon jumped forward to seize the barrel end. She lifted the rifle, with the monkey still clinging to it, and slammed the animal into the ground. It let go and staggered a few steps. Sharon smashed the rifle butt into the monkey’s head. The impact knocked it off its feet. Moving in drunken slow motion, the animal tried to get up. She hit it again. It stopped moving. She started another swing, but someone grabbed the rifle. “That’s enough, ma’am. We’ll take it from here.” Sharon turned to face a tall, well-proportioned blonde in a well-tailored, light-green dress. A soldier sprinted past Sharon and draped a net over the monkey. The tall woman released the rifle butt. With intelligent brown eyes, she studied Sharon. “Did any get past?” Sharon’s adrenaline rush faded. She felt weak and short of breath. “Yeah, dozens.” The blonde pulled out a radio. “Monkeys in sector three. Get choppers and trackers over here ASAP.” She put the radio away. “Marine butt will fry over this. They had three hours to set up a perimeter, but the fence is still in pieces. So much for operational readiness.” Sharon strode over to Palmer, who sat on a tuft of grass with her hands on her face. “Are you okay?” Sharon asked. “Yeah. Broke my nose, but I’ll be fine.” Sharon stared, realized Palmer was serious, and shook her head. Lady Marines are tough. The blonde strolled over and lifted Palmer’s hand. “Get that cleaned up and bandaged, Marine. Make sure you tell the medic you got up close and personal with an LGM.” Palmer touched her nose gingerly with her bloody fingers. “Yes, ma’am.” Sharon watched Palmer amble off. She turned to the blonde. “Are you in her chain of command?” “I am her chain of command,” the woman said. 6

Exchange The AK got up. “Where’s my cell phone?” Sharon stared at him. “Who cares? Do you know where you are? Do you know what we’ll be going through for the next two weeks?” “You screwed with us. Don’t think this is over.” The blonde grimaced. “Whatever it was, yeah, it’s over. You’ll spend the next two weeks piloting a shovel.” She gestured at Marines surrounding the truck and pointed to the gang members. “Get these bangers doing something useful.” As the Marines escorted the men away, the blonde turned to Sharon. “Someone you know?” “Never seen them before today. I didn’t do anything to them. Why’d they come after me like that?” “Because you were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Take some free advice—steer clear of them. You handled the LGM pretty well. Martial arts?” “Some. LGM?” “Little Green Monkey. Jump on a truck and get to the shelter before curfew.” “I want to make sure my daughter got out.” “How old is she?” “Seven, but she’s...” “What?” “She has issues. Let’s leave it at that.” “Okay. Special needs or not, if she’s seven they weren’t supposed to draft you. Is there anyone you can call? Husband? Boyfriend? Family?” “Ex-husband—restraining order. The sitter was supposed to gather my daughter’s things and get her out. The soldiers wouldn’t listen. They gave me a choice of work crew or bullet.” The woman shrugged. “They screwed up. Sorry. They were in a hurry. Okay, you’ve done your part. We have enough warm bodies.” She handed Sharon a laminated card. “This will get you through security. See the sergeant, get briefed, then find your daughter.” The wind tossed Sharon’s hair. She brushed it back from her eyes and strolled over to a burly man in a tan, brown and gray 7

Dale R. Cozort Marine combat utility uniform. He looked up from his clipboard and she showed him the card. The sergeant glanced at it. “Get-out-of-jail-free card? Good for you. Ground rules: Stay in Rockport. Stay away from the EZ. You have an hour until curfew. Go home. Lock your doors. Close the shutters if you have them. Stay there. If you’re caught driving after curfew your vehicle will be confiscated. Cell phones will work as long as the cell tower batteries hold up—a few days at most. Don’t waste power trying to call the old world. It’s not there. You can’t recharge your phone, so emergencies only. Beyond generators running key facilities, there is no electricity. You may or may not have running water. Avoid the Bear Country animals. Even the small ones have teeth, claws, and sometimes venom.” Sharon tried not to think about Bethany—hiding her impatience as the sergeant went through his list. Come on! Come on! I have a daughter to check on! Finally, he said, “Exchanges average two weeks. We’ll have emergency medical care, food, and water at city hall, the hospital, and the high school. Use your food and drink at home first. Questions?” “No.” “Any medical problems I should know about?” “No.” “Three hours before the Exchange ends we’ll know it’s coming. You’ll hear a pulsed siren. When you hear that siren, report to the high school for evacuation into quarantine facilities. Make sure you have your important papers with you. Got it?” “Yes.” The sergeant handed her a printed list of the rules. “One hour. When you hear the sirens, that’s curfew. The patrols won’t mess around. If you’re out, you’ll be shot. Beat it.” Workers piled onto flatbed trucks. Sharon showed her card to a driver. “My house is on Eleventh Street. It’s on the way if you’re headed toward town. Will you drop me?” The driver handed the card back. “These cards are hard to come by. You know Anna Morgan?” 8

Exchange “Who’s Anna Morgan?” The driver studied Sharon’s face for a moment. “I’ll drop you. Jump in back.” The truck bed was already crowded, but a young man wearing a NASCAR cap helped her up. Two soldiers stretched a chain to hold them in. A tap on the truck’s side told the driver they were ready. The vehicle started with a gassy cloud of diesel and heaved into motion. Sharon smiled at the NASCAR man. “Thanks.” He shrugged. The truck weaved through parked equipment, workers, and soldiers directing traffic and rumbled onto Highway 25. At the exit to Eleventh Street, the driver pulled to the shoulder. Sharon slipped under the chain and jumped down. The truck lurched back into motion. The young man tipped his cap and grinned, and Sharon raised her hand in reply. She jogged up the off ramp—glanced at her watch. Twenty minutes until curfew. Time enough. She turned the corner by her house. Oh, no. Mary’s car was still in the driveway. Why didn’t she leave? Sharon vacillated between relief at not being separated from Bethany for two weeks and fury at Mary for not getting her daughter out of the danger zone. She climbed the steps and pushed the door open. The door abruptly jerked from her hand. Her ex-husband, Anthony, grinned. “Hi, honey.” Sharon almost got her arm up in time to block the Early Times whiskey bottle he swung at her head.

9

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Two A dog howled. The howl went on and on, mixed with yaps, deep-throated barks and a whoofing noise that sounded almost human. Sharon thought vaguely about throwing something at the dog, but her head throbbed whenever she moved. It throbbed when the dog howled too, and even when it was silent, but not as much. She toyed with the idea of getting up and finding an aspirin. Maybe Bethany can—“Bethany!” Her mind snapped into focus, and she opened her eyes. She was lying on the floor of her living room. The room was dark except for the last sunlight of the day, which cast a weak pool of fading daylight in front of the partly open door. The late evening sun reflected off towering clouds, turning the sky red. Sharon’s hands were tied behind her back. She tried to move and found that her legs were tied too. Spots formed in front of her eyes as she raised her head and scanned the room. It was empty of people. The whoofing sound she had heard earlier was coming from the spare bedroom. The only sound in the living room was a faint hissing of static from a battery-powered radio. Sharon managed to sit up. She groaned as pain radiated out from her jaw and down from the top of her head. She sagged back against the wall and waited for the worst of the pain to subside. The dog howled again and she finally recognized the sound: her neighbors to the west chained their mixed-breed—a German Shepherd head and body on stumpy Dachshund legs— in their back yard when they went to work. And they didn’t come back for it. Nice people. 10

Exchange Sharon jumped as the radio suddenly came to life with the DJ saying, “This is Bill Simkin from WGNB radio. We’re back on the air thanks to an emergency generator loaned to us by the United States Marine Corps. We’ll be broadcasting twenty minutes of emergency information three times a day for the next two weeks, until the Exchange reverses and we rejoin The World. In case you hadn’t noticed, we’re now in another reality—totally isolated from the rest of humanity, except possibly for several hundred convicts who escaped when their maximum security prison went over in an Exchange years ago.” Sharon brought her knees up and braced her back against the wall, then lifted her hips and wrestled her hands in front of her. She half listened to the DJ as she waited for the throbbing in her head to subside. “—tell our listeners when and where the first Exchange happened, Tracy?” “The first Exchange was five years ago on New Zealand’s North Island,” a female voice, apparently Tracy, said. “That’s actually one of the best places it could have happened. New Zealand is one of the most geographically isolated large land masses on earth, so the Bear Country animals weren’t able to spread far, even though we didn’t have a response ready. Also, the Bear Country animals on New Zealand were harmless— flightless birds and primitive rat-sized mammals. There have been over two hundred Exchanges since then and we haven’t always been that lucky.” Sharon looked out the door at her neighborhood. It appeared unchanged—with neatly mowed lawns in front of ranch-style brick houses on a curving street. Cars still sat in front of many of the garages. A basketball nestled in the gutter at the end of one of the driveways, straight down from a basketball hoop mounted on the garage. There was no movement on the street; no joggers, nobody walking their dog, nobody driving to the grocery store. And no sound other than the dog howling and the radio. The DJ was saying, “A lot of people expected glaciers. Can you explain why we don’t see that?” “We didn’t go back in time to the ice age. We went sideways into another reality. Animals like mammoths and 11

Dale R. Cozort sabertooths survived in Bear Country. They didn’t back in The World. The climates are pretty much the same.” Sharon brought her wrists up to her face, studied the ropes in the fading light and swore at the tidy knots her ex-husband had tied. Why didn’t you do a half-assed job on this like you do on everything else? She went to work on the ropes with her teeth. That set her jaw to throbbing even more. On the radio, Tracy said, “—big mystery of Bear Country is what you call the weird stuff. The bats are the weirdest, but around twenty percent of the large animals in Bear Country are in the wrong place. There are kangaroos in North America. There are monkeys from Africa in North and South America. The weird stuff’s been here millions of years, though, so there’s nothing exactly like it in our timeline. The extra competition gives Bear Country animals their edge.” “How did animals get from Africa and Australia to North America?” Tracy laughed. “That’s the million-dollar question. It doesn’t seem possible since Bear Country continents are in the same places ours are.” The light through the door faded as Sharon worked at the knot. She paused only when the pain in her jaw brought tears and gritted teeth. On the radio, the DJ asked, “If you went out into Bear Country, what would you be most afraid of?” “Don’t go out there,” Tracy said. “It’s against the law. And, of course, it’s just plain dumb.” “But what is the most dangerous animal in Bear Country?” “Try the bears,” Sharon said. The whoofing sound from the bedroom got louder. “Bethany?” The sound stopped. “Mary?” It started again. The dog had stopped howling for a while. Now it started again too. “—and there are amber wolves, cheetahs, plus the tough plant-eaters like Mastodons and the big kangaroos.” “I don’t think of kangaroos in the same danger class as sabertooths.” “These are. Don’t mess with them.” 12

Exchange “There are a lot of things we don’t want to mess with in Bear Country.” “That’s why we quarantine Exchange Zones,” Tracy said. “Bear Country animals are tougher than ours. They would take over if they got loose in The World, especially the little seed-eater bats. Think rabbits in Australia.” Sharon tried to get her fingers around so she could get at the knots. She glanced down at her dress pants. No sign of them having been disturbed. Which means I’ll kill him fast and without a whole lot of pain. She looked for something to help pull the ropes off. The cover of her living room computer was off as usual, with a couple of memory sticks sitting beside it, waiting for her to swap them in. She couldn’t remember if she left a screwdriver over there. The computer was silent, of course. The radio broadcast ended and the whole house was quiet for a time, uncomfortably quiet. She found herself almost hoping the dog would howl. The huffing from the bedroom came again. What is that? Bethany? She called her daughter’s name out loud. The huffing sound came and then the dog’s howl. “Save your breath, will you?” Or keep howling until someone comes to take care of you and maybe they’ll find me. She tried to trace the knots on her wrists in the fading light. She bit a knot and pulled at it, pain radiating from the bruise on her jaw. She thought about who might come by and help her. Her sister was still in Texas. Her parents would have been evacuated along with the rest of the people in the retirement community at the edge of town. They’ll spend the next two weeks worrying about their granddaughter—and maybe thinking about their prodigal daughter a time or two. Just long enough to say how like me it was to not get her out, to not make sure she’s safe. And still I miss them. Pathetic. She had a flash of her dad leaning on his cane and peering down at her. “Well, this is what you get when you marry a nice car, a nice head of hair, and the paranoid nutcase who came with them.” And then he would say something about Anthony causing Bethany to be the way she is. A faint sound from outside caught her ear. A car. She turned, half expecting to see her dad’s meticulously clean and polished black Crown Victoria pulling into the driveway. Instead, she watched a Humvee in camouflage paint go by, moving 13

Dale R. Cozort slowly, but gone before she could react. No other cars moving. After curfew—no traffic at all. Shadows pooled in the street and lawns outside the open door. She turned so she could keep an eye on the yard while still pulling at the ropes with her teeth. The dog howled again, but the howl choked off abruptly. The street and yard suddenly seemed much darker. She waited for the howling to start again, pulling at the knots more frantically in the dying light as the silence lingered. The knot finally loosened a little. As she tore at the ropes, she heard a faint sound from the street, a scraping that teased the edge of her hearing. It eased away as she focused on it, then came a little louder as she went back to tearing at the knot. Still no sound from the dog. Sharon felt the muscles in her arms and legs tense and her heart raced. She took a deep cleansing breath and let it out slowly, willing her muscles to relax. That helped a little, but she tore at the rope even harder. It slipped out from between her teeth. Shit. She fumbled for the strand in the near total darkness. The sound from the sidewalk teased her ears again and a light dazzled her. “Who’s there?” It was a male voice, deep and strong. “I’m in my own house,” Sharon said. “Who are you?” The sound was closer this time. Sharon tried to see past the light, but could only make out a low squat shadow, not much more than waist high. The shadow seemed far too short for the voice. The voice came again, saying, “Computer lady; I recognize you now. What are you doing on the floor and why is your door open?” “None of your business.” “You’re in my neighborhood. That makes you my business.” “Who are you?” “You alone? That nutcase of an ex-husband still hanging around?” “Don’t know as you need to know that.” The figure behind the flashlight got closer. “You’re tied up. Did Anthony crawl out of his whiskey bottle and do something to you?” 14

Exchange “He brought the whiskey bottle with him. Who are you?” The light neared the bottom of her steps and Sharon tensed, ready to slam her side against the door to shut it. “Neighborhood watch, what’s left of it. I can’t help you with the ropes.” “I’ll get them.” Sharon got a better look at the man behind the flashlight. “You can’t because you’re in a wheelchair and you can’t get up the steps. You’re the guy who sits at the corner at rush hour.” The old guy who creeps me out. She recognized the silhouette of a shotgun in the man’s wheelchair. “Name’s Elroy Campbell. Intended to get over and let the dog out but it took a while to get the shotgun from where I hid it so my daughter wouldn’t find it. Yeah, she’s always here to tell me what I can’t do, but did she come get me when the going got tough? Nope. Old coot might have slowed her down. Young healthy thing with a big, strapping husband and no kids. But she got out—and left me here. Well, I can handle things myself, no thanks to her.” “Can you get the light out of my eyes? Actually it would help if you turned it on the ropes.” “I’d have told her to take a hike if she had come, but she should’ve come anyway.” Sharon found the strand she had been working on and got it in her teeth again. Her jaw still throbbed, but she pushed the pain to the back of her mind. “Haven’t heard from that dog lately.” Elroy flashed his light toward the side of the house. “Thought I saw something move back there. I hope the dog just went to sleep. I’m not counting on it though.” Sharon kept pulling on the ropes. “So Anthony hit you and tied you up?” “Yeah.” “I thought you were some big martial arts guru.” “Black belt,” she mumbled through the rope. “Which means I almost got my hand up instead of standing there with my mouth open.” “Almost doesn’t cut it on blocking whiskey bottles. Want me to call the Marines?” “I can handle it.” 15

Dale R. Cozort “Really? How long have you been laying there?” Hours at least. Too many. Sharon didn’t say anything, but she tore at the rope with renewed vigor. The knot loosened a bit more. “He took your daughter. I saw them leave.” “I know. Will you shut up and let me get these knots?” “Marines won’t do anything anyway. Domestic dispute. Custody battle. They don’t have time to care, even if you tell them he’s taking her to Sister West.” “He isn’t. They kicked him out. Shut up.” “Snippy. You realize I used to be a cop.” “I don’t care. Shut up.” “Real snippy. Maybe I shouldn’t toss you my pocket knife.” Sharon glared at the old man. “You haven’t even started to see snippy. Give me the knife.” Even with the knife it wasn’t easy to get the ropes off with her hands tied. Sharon tried to get up after she got the last rope off and fell against the wall. She leaned there until the worst of the dizziness passed, then looked into the flashlight beam. “Thanks. Be back in a minute.” She found a flashlight and ran to the bedroom. “Bethany!” She was disappointed but not surprised to see the chubby, sixtysomething face of her babysitter, Mary, who was tied up and gagged on the bed. “Where’s Bethany?” Mary shook her head and made the whoofing sound Sharon heard earlier. Sharon yanked the gag out. “What happened?” “Your husband—” “Ex-husband. Where’d he take her?” “I don’t know.” Sharon untied the woman and led her to the living room. Elroy was still sitting in front of the porch. “I was wondering what happened to your babysitter. If your husband didn’t head straight to Sister West and her bunch of nutjobs, he’s probably at that fried-out trailer his dad used to own north of town. He’ll probably have his brothers with him.” “How do you know about the trailer?” 16

Exchange “I used to be a cop,” Elroy said. “Your daughter has the face of an angel but she has some issues. You need to get her back before Anthony and company decide to give her an exorcism.” “They—” Sharon stopped. Might actually do something that crazy. Anthony can’t admit it was probably in his genes. It has to be something I did or the government did or the big corporations did. “He’ll get around to blaming the devil eventually,” Elroy said. “All she’d have to do is say something and have it come true, like—” “Shut up.” “Babysitter told me she said crash a good ten seconds before two cars ran into each other a while back.” Sharon glared back at Mary. “Somebody talks too much. She’s not psychic or possessed. She sees details and puts them together.” “I know. She’s a Dustin Hoffman.” “Huh?” “Rain Man—or Rain Girl, I suppose. Idiot savant. Probably autistic and OCD too. I know that and you know that. I’m not sure your ex-hubby accepts that.” Sharon didn’t respond. Elroy turned his flashlight off. “Batteries won’t last forever.” The beam from Sharon’s flashlight seemed lost as she directed it into the dark street. The houses on her block blended into the darkness. No porch lights. No lights in the windows. Not even a flickering candle. Sharon said, “I wonder why the dog stopped barking.” Sharon sat in her chair in the dark living room and listened to Mary snore in the guest bedroom. She held her car keys loosely in her hand. I have to wait. Marines are on hair trigger tonight. No point in getting shot. Logic didn’t help her fall asleep. Bethany with him, with his temper always a glance or a word away from exploding, especially after a few drinks. The thought drove away sleep and kept it away. Sharon turned the radio up, hoping that the white noise of the static would help. It didn’t. Neither did pacing the darkened room or doing karate katas. 17

Dale R. Cozort The night passed, and Sharon must have slept, because the radio came to blaring life and she woke with her head and her jaw aching. The DJ said, “If you’re listening to this you made it through the night. Curfew is lifted until eight o’clock tonight. Do not use your car unnecessarily; you won’t be able to get more gas. Do not use your cell phone unnecessarily; that’s your lifeline in case of an emergency. Do call authorities if you see any unfamiliar animals. Do not approach any animal you see, familiar or unfamiliar.” Sharon thought about the dog. She went to the back yard and leaned over the fence. Nothing. The chain went from the stake out into the grass, but the dog was nowhere in the yard. As she stood by the fence, Elroy wheeled his chair through the gate. “It’s broken. I don’t think that little dog is strong enough to do that.” Sharon looked at her neighbor closely for the first time. He appeared to be in his seventies, with broad shoulders and heavy arm muscles but with a big belly and spindly legs. His face was deeply but pleasantly lined, as if he’d spent a lot of time smiling. He bent down as far as he could in the wheelchair. “Yep. Snapped off clean. Not stretched. No rust.” “Any blood?” “Nope. More than one type of paw print though. No sign of a fight. I’m guessing a big cat—panther-sized at least—got annoyed by the yapping. If that’s what happened, at least it was quick.” “And I was lying there helpless, thanks to my ex-husband. One more score to settle with him. Too bad about the dog.” “Yeah, even if he was annoying. So there’s probably something loose around here already, in spite of the Marines. Big predators are curious and they cover a lot of territory. Watch yourself.” “I won’t be here. I’m going. I shouldn’t have wasted time looking for the dog.” Elroy nodded. “You were curious. What are you going to do about your daughter?” “Get her back.” “I got that part. How?” 18

Exchange “I don’t know yet.” “Well, you might want to figure that out. Your hus—” “Ex-husband.” “Whatever. He’s bad enough. Sister West and her crew are in a whole different class. Go up against them and you’ll end up dead, or brainwashed and selling flowers in some airport with your head shaved.” Sharon walked to her back door. “Sister West and company kicked him out, so hopefully I won’t have to go up against them. I’m not going to let him take my daughter.” “He’s already done that. I hear Sister West is pulling out.” “What? Where could they go?” “Bear Country.” “That’s crazy!” “So are they.” “How do you know that?” Elroy gestured back toward his house. “Amateur radio— runs off a solar panel.” “How would they get past the Marines?” “The Marines seem to be setting up along the freeway and pretty much ignoring anything north of it. That leaves Sister West and her nutjobs on the outside.” “Why?” “Who knows? Maybe not enough people to cover it all. You’re going no matter what I say, aren’t you?” “Yes. After Anthony. And soon. The trailer is just south of the freeway, but Anthony would know how to sneak past the Marines if he wanted to.” “Got a gun?” “Yes.” Elroy rolled his chair over to the neighbor’s side of the fence. “I bet it’s a little lady-gun. A twenty-two. Maybe a thirtyeight. Know how to use it?” “I have a trophy or two that says so.” “Marksmanship, huh? That body and you know how to shoot a gun; my type of woman. Want to have my baby?” “No. And you just went from neighbor back to creepy old man.” 19

Dale R. Cozort “Creepy old man, huh?” Elroy chuckled. “You wouldn’t have thought that thirty years ago.” “Yeah, because I wasn’t born then.” “Well, I guess you told me.” Elroy smiled up at her. “Okay, neighbor. I’m going to loan you a real gun and give you some advice. I’ll meet you at your car.” Sharon went in and quickly changed into jeans, a longsleeved shirt and hiking boots. She woke up Mary and sent her home. Elroy rolled up as she rushed to her car. He handed her a couple of gallon jugs full of water. “This isn’t enough if you have to chase him out into Bear Country, but you probably didn’t think to bring any.” Sharon thought about mentioning the twelve-ounce bottle in her backpack. “Some. Not enough. Thanks.” He handed her a revolver and a box of ammunition. “It’s a forty-five. Brace yourself to shoot; it kicks.” “How does this help?” “It gives you a very small chance of surviving against some of the stuff you may run into out there instead of no chance at all. I wish I could give you something better, but this is the best I have. Ever shot anything alive?” “No.” “You may freeze the first time. Try to just see a target.” Sharon put the revolver in the glove compartment. “Thanks.” “Here’s the advice part: Don’t go. He has two brothers, both of them just as mean as he is. If you do go, don’t follow him out into Bear Country. If you do go out into Bear Country, don’t get out of your car. If you have to get out of your car, head back to Rockport as quick as those gorgeous legs of yours can carry you.” “I’ll try.” “Are you going out of love or are you going out of duty?” “What kind of question is that? Of course I love my daughter.” “You probably do, and I admire you for it. The thing is, it’s awfully tough to keep up that love when you can never touch her because of the OCD and you can never carry on a normal 20

Exchange conversation with her, and you know that she’ll never be independent, never be able to raise a family.” “You know way too much about my business.” “Cop habit. Hard to break. Plus, I think about my neighbors. You’re one of the good ones. If life gives you a bad hand, you play it the best way you can. Your ex-husband gets the same hand and runs away from it every way a man can run.” “Well, you nailed that.” “One other thing. There have been maybe two hundred of these Exchanges. As near as I can figure, at least seven of those times the part of our world that went over to Bear Country came back with no people and everything that could burn, burned. Do you know why?” “I’d never even heard about that happening. Well, there was the one where the convicts got loose and burned down a bunch of stuff.” Elroy nodded. “That was only fifty miles from here, which is another reason not to follow Anthony out there. The other cases didn’t make the headlines the way you’d think they would. And now, courtesy of ham radio, I know why.” “Why?” “You wouldn’t believe me. Not yet.”

21

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Three Sharon parked at the side of a gravel road half a mile from the access road to the old Mack trailer. She slid Elroy’s pistol under the driver’s seat and carried her own familiar gun. She slogged her way through an abandoned field covered with wild blackberry briers and waist-high thistles to a hill overlooking the trailer. As she settled in to watch, Anthony’s brother Russell swung his small, wiry frame down the wooden steps from the derelict mobile home and headed toward the latrine. He ducked under the laundry hanging from lines strung between scrub trees, then walked around the little vegetable garden between the trailer and the outhouse. Anthony came out a few seconds later, carrying a rifle. He tossed his long, curly blond hair out of his eyes, ran his fingers through his sparse beard, and scanned the area around the trailer. His eyes lingered near Sharon’s hiding place, and she resisted the urge to shrink further back into the brush. Russell exited the latrine and strolled out of sight among the scrub trees. Anthony opened the hood of one of the three rusty, white SUVs parked near the mobile home and started puttering with the engine. Okay, so now what do I do? Three SUVs meant that both of Anthony’s brothers were around. Russell would shoot me in a heartbeat if Anthony told him to. David would do whatever he had to do to avoid growing a backbone. The air smelled and felt like rain. At least that was familiar; rain must be rain in every timeline. Sharon felt the first few drops and shivered. I sure hope it’s the same. 22

Exchange David and his wife, Nicole, came out of the trailer. Nicole shuffled over to the clothesline and started taking down the clothes, tossing them into an old plastic basket. Sharon recognized one of Bethany’s dresses on the line. David walked over to help. Clinging to the routines, Sharon thought. If they pretend everything’s normal, maybe they can just go on with their lives. Nicole glanced up through strands of long, uncombed brown hair, and even from where she was hiding, Sharon saw the deep lines of too much work, worry, and sun on her face. Nicole still looked good, though, and David kissed her on the forehead. Bethany came out of the trailer, wearing a bright red dress, her straight blond hair in braids. She avoided eye contact with the adults and turned sideways, as if trying to hide in the scruffy, weed-covered yard. As usual, her face held a dazzling but unchanging smile. Sharon focused on her, looking for bruises or other signs of maltreatment. “You want to visit your daughter? Might as well come on down.” Russell’s voice came from close behind her. “You’ll need to lose the gun, though.” Sharon looked back. Russell stood about three yards away from her, holding a rifle. She fought to keep the despair off her face. Russell said, “I saw you when I was in the outhouse. Anthony figured you might be along. You ought to keep an eye out behind you.” Sharon got up. Calm. No emotions. No sign of weakness. “I was a little busy seeing my daughter for the first time in two days. Are you really going to shoot me?” Russell motioned at Sharon’s pistol. “Were you really going to shoot my brother?” “The thought crossed my mind. I’d rather just take my daughter and go.” “Hmmm. Why don’t you set your cute, little, lady’s gun on the ground and march down there in front of me?” Anthony glared at her as Russell walked her down to the trailer. Five kids ranging from a boy five years old to a girl almost fifteen ran out of the mobile home and gawked at Sharon; Russell’s and David’s kids. Bethany didn’t move and her expression didn’t change. 23

Dale R. Cozort “I figured you’d follow me once you got loose,” Anthony said. “Maybe I should have done something more permanent.” Nicole looked up sharply, but didn’t say anything. Sharon said, “Don’t you think hitting a mother over the head and kidnapping her daughter is enough?” She looked around the little group. “The rest of you want to be a part of this? Want to chat about it with the Marines? Want to keep a mom and her daughter apart at gunpoint in front of your kids?” Bethany seemed to come alive. She pointed at the clothesline and yelled, “Clothes off the line! It’s coming!” Sharon made a move toward her daughter. Anthony stepped in the way. He glared down at her. “Stay away from her! You’ve done enough damage.” Bethany ran from the porch up the hill. “Clothes off the line! It’s coming! Can’t you feel it?” Anthony ran to intercept her, but she dodged past and quickly outdistanced him. Sharon took a step after them, but Russell leveled his gun at her. “Stay out of it!” Anthony yelled back, “Get the cars! Head her off at the road!” Russell gestured to David. “Do it! I’ll keep an eye on Sharon.” As David raced away, Sharon eased her hands down. Russell waved his rifle in her direction. “Get them back up!” “Nope. My shoulders are tired. You’ve got a big, old, heman gun. Are you afraid—” She paused. “What’s that?” “You forgot the behind you part.” “Shhh.” Sharon listened intently. There was a faint but deep rumbling in the distance—deep enough to be thunder but continuous. The rumbling seemed to get closer. Rain soaked them. Sharon squinted through the downpour at Russell. “What is that? Can you hear the rumbling?” “I don’t feel—okay, I do now. Tornado?” Sharon shook her head. “The sky’s wrong.” She felt the ground vibrate under her feet. Up the hill, Bethany was still yelling, “Clothes off the line! It’s coming!” “Bethany has good instincts. Why did she do that? Wait a second. Flash flood!” 24

Exchange “In the Midwest?” Russell shook his head. “Maybe a dam broke. Come on!” Sharon started toward the high ground, wiping the rainwater out of her eyes. “Stop!” Russell waved the rifle. “I’ll shoot.” “And your kids will drown. Your choice.” She kept moving. The rumbling got louder. Nicole said, “I’m getting out of here!” She ran to an SUV and swung it around, the rest of the family hesitated, then followed her, leaving Russell standing alone with the rifle pointed at Sharon. Sharon looked back. “Run! Now!” Russell hesitated. A seven-foot-tall wall of water and uprooted trees surged into sight through the scrubby brush and rushed along the low ground directly toward the old mobile home. Russell sprinted for the hill and made it as water hit and smashed the little wooden shack over the latrine. It washed over the young corn in the vegetable garden. Then it hit the mobile home, smashed it into a tangled mass of metal and wood, and swirled the remnants away. The clothes on the clotheslines were the last of the Mack family possessions to be swept into the rushing water. They came off the lines one garment at a time until only Bethany’s dress remained. Finally, the lines themselves were snapped by a piece of passing debris and the dress swirled away. Sharon watched the floodwaters surge past. From the hill she saw the waters crash into the raised dirt and concrete of the freeway. A wave lapped over the concrete, then water began pooling along the south side of the freeway. Nicole drove up to them in the crowded SUV. She looked exhilarated. “Good riddance. Maybe we can get on with our lives now.” The same lack of sorrow reflected on the faces of all but one of the Mack family. Anthony. As he walked up, Anthony’s face reflected a cold fury which showed in his voice when he said, “They did this to us. They can’t stand to see people be free, be out of their control.” Sharon stared at the wild little river that now swirled through what had been the Mack homestead. “And how do you think they managed this?” 25

Dale R. Cozort Anthony shrugged. “Diverted a river or something.” Bethany ran up and peered at the churning water. “It’s still hungry. Hear it growl?” “What do you mean, honey?” Sharon tried to meet Bethany’s eyes, but as usual Bethany avoided eye contact. “Leave her alone,” Anthony said. Sharon glared at him. “So you hit me over the head with a whiskey bottle and take my daughter down into an old piece of riverbed. You almost get her killed when the river breaks through into the old path, but it’s somebody else’s fault, as always.” Anthony held up his arms and stood silent, his eyes riveting each of his brothers and their families. Finally, in his deep orator’s voice, he said, “I told you the clouds that first day were a sign. Remember the circle of clear bright sky and the storm clouds that swept in from Bear Country and overwhelmed them? Those clouds were a sign that the old sinful world was closing in on us, that it wouldn’t leave us alone, that it would push in on us until there was nothing left of our freedom, until we were forced to become sheep like everybody else. At the same time it gave us a way out, a way to escape that world and make our own. All we need is courage, brothers and sisters. An Exchange means we can start over, make our own world.” Sharon glowered at him. “I knew your brain was leaking oil, but—wow! Do you realize what Bear Country is?” “Yeah. Empty. No people. No government to tell you how you can or can’t raise your kids. No bloodsuckers to live off of our sweat.” Anthony stared at the little group huddled near the bank of the new river. “This can’t be a coincidence. It chose us to go over there and make a new life.” Sharon snorted. “Yeah, right. It chose you the same way a tornado chooses a trailer park. Exchanges are a natural phenomenon. There have been dozens of them so far, maybe hundreds. It’s a coincidence, whiskey boy. Deal with it.” “God chose us. He destroyed our old life and opened up the gates so we can walk out into a new one. He has put a world in our hands to shape the way he wants it shaped.” “So you’re going to get my daughter and your brothers killed with your signs and new worlds,” Sharon said. “You just lost everything except the clothes on your backs and what you’re 26

Exchange carrying in your pockets. You have a couple of guns and maybe twenty or thirty rounds of ammunition. After that gets used up what are you going to do? Use your pocket knives? They call the other timeline Bear Country for a reason. There are sabertooths over there, actually a mile or two away from here. They never died off. There are bears and lions, too, not to mention half a dozen other things I wouldn’t want to fight with a pocket knife. People can’t live over there, at least not without a lot of stuff that you don’t have. You don’t have enough guns. You don’t have food. You don’t have medicine. Anything you had stored got washed away.” Anthony shook his head. “We can have anything we want. We can have rifles. We can have trucks. We can have food. The Church of the Second Chance—” “Sister West’s people? They kicked you out, remember?” “I still have friends there. They’ll help us get started.” “Not with my daughter.” “That’s not your choice. I finally have a chance to get her away from all of the pollution and the garbage they put in food and from TV and from you. I’m going to get all of that out of her system and let her grow up normal, have a real life.” Anthony looked around at the others. “My ex-wife wants us to give up our chance at finally being truly free because she’s done such a good job raising my daughter—so good that Bethany can’t even carry on a conversation and goes spastic if you touch her. What do you want to do? Give up? Go back into town and ask the sheep in there to feed us and give us clothes? To protect us? Do you want to give up what little freedom we had? I’m going to go out and take the freedom we’ve always dreamed of, that we need. Is anyone with me?” Russell nodded. “Yeah, I’m in.” David’s eyes wavered between Sharon and Anthony. “What do we do when the food and ammunition run out?” “By that time we’ll know how to live off of the land. What we get from Sister West is just a little boost to get us started.” Anthony grinned at Sharon. “You won’t be going. You’ll be a little tied up. Again.”

27

Dale R. Cozort Anthony pulled a coiled rope from the SUV and pointed to a tree. “Back against that and reach your hands behind you so they’re touching.” “No.” “That martial arts crap isn’t going to stop a bullet.” “So you’re going to shoot me in front of our daughter and your brothers’ kids?” “If I have to.” “Kidnapping. Murder.” Sharon tried to get David to meet her eyes. “Are you in for this, David? How about you, Nicole?” Anthony cocked the pistol. “If you don’t shut up and back against the tree now, I’ll shoot you between the eyes.” Bethany said, “He’ll shoot. His finger is heavy.” Sharon backed to the tree and stretched her arms around it. Anthony tied her hands together, then tied her feet to the tree while Russell held a gun on her. She watched for a chance to make a move, but didn’t see any. Anthony handed David Sharon’s pistol. “Search her. Careful. She’s got mad martial arts skills. At least that’s what she says.” Russell and Anthony rummaged through the two surviving SUVs. None of the others met Sharon’s eye, though Nicole wandered past and said, “That tongue of his is going to get us all killed.” “Or jailed. If you walk away and I don’t get loose you’ve just committed murder. So why don’t you do something about it?” Nicole glared at David. “I’m waiting to see if my husband’s willing to stand up for himself and his kids. I won’t wait much longer.” He turned away. “Brothers stick together.” Nicole glanced over at Anthony and Russell. They were busy with the SUV. She pressed a pocket knife into Sharon’s hand and brushed past David. “We’re not going to leave her here to die.” He tried to meet Nicole’s gaze, but looked away. “Okay. We’ll be long gone by the time she gets loose anyway.” Bethany stood silently near her mother, not quite looking at her. Anthony jogged over and tried to coax her away. 28

Exchange “Don’t touch her. She’ll wash the spot until she bleeds,” Sharon said. “I know how to handle my own daughter,” Anthony said. He kept his hands away, though. Bethany almost looked at him and said in a matter-of-fact tone, “You’ll bleed in the water.”

29

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Four Several hours later, Sharon stood at the top of a knoll. She stared across the EZ into Bear Country. Wind stirred a vast grassy sea marked with islands of trees. There was no sign of human impact to the landscape except for ruts ripped in the soil by trucks; ugly, alien slashes through thick savanna grass. I shouldn’t have stopped. Tracking the convoy kept her mind and body distanced from the pain and despair that threatened to overwhelm her. Stopping gave a foothold to the pain of her bruised jaw and ropeburned wrists and ankles. Pain she could deal with, but Anthony or maybe Sister West’s collection of loonies had Bethany. Bethany, her fixed smile hiding what? Terror? Bewilderment? A flicker in her peripheral vision startled her. She reached for the gun on her belt—Elroy’s heavy .45, retrieved from her car. A grasshopper-sized green and yellow bat hopped from a grass stem and fluttered away. Nothing. As she studied the horizon, details jumped into focus. In the distance, hairy, elephant-like mastodons tested the breeze with questing trunks while green monkeys scrambled between their bulky forms. Nearer, a prairie dog, big as a raccoon, stood at attention next to its burrow—watching her with suspicion. June’s hot late-afternoon sun made her squint through her sunglasses. “You have to keep moving if you don’t want someone sneaking up behind you.” The calm but unfamiliar voice was close. Reflex sent her hand streaking toward her belt, but he was quicker—he smoothly plucked her gun from its holster. Spinning, she turned toward the voice, acutely aware of her empty hand. 30

Exchange The man was tall, well over six feet, and husky. He had deeply tanned skin; his head was topped with blond hair mussed by the wind. His khaki pants and polo shirt were unwrinkled and clean, and he appeared cool in spite of the heat of the day. He smiled sheepishly—showing white, even teeth set in a square jaw. “Childish of me to sneak up on you and take your gun. However, you looked like you were out to kill someone. I wanted to make sure it wasn’t me.” Sharon blinked to see if he’d vanish as suddenly as he’d appeared. She moved back a step, then her anger boiled. “I’m extremely tired of people sneaking up behind me,” she said. “If you’re real, I’m probably going to kill you.” The man stepped toward her. “So you are in the mood to kill someone, which is why I grabbed your gun. I’ll give it back if you promise not to shoot me.” “I’ll think about it. Who are you?” “My name is Leo, and who are you?” “Sharon. To sneak up on me, you must move like a ghost—except you leave a trail.” “Sorry about that.” “Sneaking up on me or leaving a trail?” “A little of both.” “What are you doing out here?” Leo smiled. “Good question. Wandering about in another timeline? Risky. We could get eaten by a sabertooth or we could stay out too long and get stranded. They say Exchanges last two weeks, but who really knows? Sooner or later, the Exchange will reverse itself and Rockport will disappear. Like getting off on the wrong floor and having the elevator door shut behind you, except that the elevator never comes back. Just you and me. Well, not quite. You and me and whoever made the ruts.” “Like Adam and Eve.” Sharon intended the comment to come out sarcastic, but she heard a wistfulness in her voice that made her cringe. She hastily added, “The elevator does come back. There have been a couple hundred Exchanges.” “But they never happen twice in the same place and only rarely even close together.” 31

Dale R. Cozort Leo slowly extended the grip of her pistol—she grabbed it. He hurried along the ruts Sharon had been following, speaking over his shoulder. “I can’t help but think of the Exchange fifty miles west of here, the one where the prison came back, but the guards were murdered and the prisoners were missing.” Sharon hesitated for a second and then followed him. “You still haven’t told me what you’re doing out here.” “That makes us even. What are you doing out here?” “I started out in a jeep—swerved to miss a badger. Hit a stump and broke the radiator.” “But you kept going,” Leo said. “Determined. Well, Sharon, I think you’re trying to catch someone who stole something important. Money? Jewelry? Heirloom? What’s important enough to risk your life for?” “How do you—” “What’s with the bruise on your cheek?” “Whiskey bottle.” “Ah. And you have rope marks on your wrists, plus shallow cut marks,” Leo said. “Someone clubbed you, tied you up and robbed you of something. But what could it be? Money’s worthless here and it’s too soon for food to be as valuable as gold. And you don’t seem the type to worry over jewelry.” “My daughter. My seven-year-old daughter.” Leo stopped abruptly and turned to face her. “One of the people who made these ruts took her?” “My ex-husband. Anthony.” “Why?” Sharon turned so that the tall man couldn’t see the tears on her cheeks. “He wants to live out here. He thinks the cult will help him.” “Cult? Sister West and her flock?” Sharon nodded. “A bunch of them got arrested for kidnapping and murder a few years ago.” “I heard about that.” “Anthony was a member until they kicked him out. He says he still has friends there who’ll help him.” “Friends in Sister West’s flock, huh?” 32

Exchange “I think Sister West plans to stay over here,” she said. “That wouldn’t surprise me.” “It should surprise you.” Sharon brushed a grasshoppersized mosquito off her arm. “They couldn’t survive out here.” “It would be a tough life if you weren’t prepared. What will you do if you catch up with them?” Sharon sighed. “I don’t know. Grab my daughter and bring her back. If they’re guarding her too well, I’ll go back for help.” Leo nodded. “Did you ask the Marines to help?” “I didn’t bother,” Sharon said. “They have bigger problems on their plate.” Leo nodded. “Their mission is to protect Rockport— enforce quarantine and get the city back to the world in one piece, if possible. I imagine chasing down a stray girl doesn’t weigh much on their scale. So, you’re out here alone. Brave. Stupid, but brave.” “I can take care of myself.” “Like you did when you went up against the whiskey bottle?” “He won’t find me so easy to surprise next time,” she said. “I have a black belt.” Leo stopped and smiled down at her. “A martial artist. How interesting. Going to use your black belt against a bear?” He turned and walked quickly. Sharon hurried to catch up. “The plan is to stay out of the way of bears. Or shoot them.” “Well at least shooting one might make it mad. A karate chop wouldn’t even do that.” “So what’s your plan to stop a bear?” “Play dead and hope he’s not hungry.” Leo stopped and scanned the horizon. “Hold up. I hear something. Sounds like horses.” “Are there any over here?” “Yeah, a species of mustangs that died out at the end of the ice age back in the World. They’re close. Almost on top of us.” He crouched in the grass and tugged her to join him. A dozen men on horseback abruptly appeared over a low hill. They wore the tattered remnants of orange jumpsuits. 33

Dale R. Cozort “Convicts! So much for Adam and Eve.” Leo frowned. “Two years without women. I’m sure they’d be happy to be Adam to your Eve. I hope you know how to use that gun.” “If they try anything, they’ll find out.” The convicts rode up, deploying in a semicircle. A wiry man with a pockmarked face said, “What have we here? Strays from the flock?” The man glanced at Leo, froze and stared. His face turned pale under the dirt. He talked quietly to his buddies. A short, balding convict shook his head. Sharon heard a fragment of the reply, “…don’t care who he is. I haven’t had a woman in years.” She eased the pistol from her belt. Not a man. Just a target. The balding convict spurred his horse and approached at a gallop. He raised a stone-tipped spear. The others eyed Leo and stayed put. Sharon raised the pistol, thumbed the hammer back, and aimed at the center of the man’s chest. “I’ll shoot.” He grinned and kept coming. Sharon hesitated. The sight wavered. No choice. Do it. She fired. The pistol jerked against her hand and the bullet’s crack echoed in the still landscape. Above his paunchy stomach, a red stain blossomed on the man’s tattered shirt. The spear dropped at Sharon’s feet. The convict fell with one foot still in the stirrup, spooking his horse, and the animal ran off, dragging his unconscious rider. Sharon caught a glimpse of a rifle tattoo on the convict’s flailing forearm—AK. She shuddered when his head bounced off a rock outcropping and turned away, only to find the convicts’ semicircle had dissolved into chaos. Another convict fell off his bucking horse, which kicked him in the chest with both hind feet when he started to get up. The man flew backward and twitched in the grass. When the remaining convicts got their horses under control, the man with the pockmarked face spoke to Leo. “Don’t imagine you’d sell the bitch?” “You can’t afford her,” Leo said. 34

Exchange Sharon stared at her companion. A strange, eager expression faded from his face as she watched. “Let us just get what’s left of Joe and catch the horse that ran off. Then we’ll be on our way.” “Good idea.” While Sharon and Leo watched, the convicts hauled up the bodies and arranged them on horses. They rode off, several looking over shoulders to stare or gesture at Sharon and Leo. Sharon kept her pistol pointed warily toward them until they disappeared over a hill. “They didn’t seem like the kind of men to give up that easily,” she said. “He was an AK. I think they all were.” “Aryan Kings? Probably. They’re in most prisons and a lot of cities in the Midwest.” “Not people to run away from a fight.” Leo grinned. “Maybe you scared them off. Only three of them had guns and who knows if those guns had ammunition. Could be a lot of things.” “I don’t think so,” Sharon said. “I think you scared them.” Leo smiled. “You had the gun.” “I had the gun but they weren’t afraid of me. Who are you?” “Leo.” “That’s not enough.” “No, it probably isn’t. You just shot a man. Are you okay?” Leo peered down at her. “I haven’t had a chance to think about it yet.” Sharon turned away, then felt nauseated. She fell to her knees Leo rested a strong, callused hand on her shoulder. The touch felt right, desperately needed. Don’t trust him! Don’t let him see you’re weak! She stood up too soon and swayed, knees locked, dizzy but trying to look strong. It took a minute, but the sickness passed. While scanning the horizon for more trouble, she unconsciously replaced the spent cartridge in the pistol. “Sorry,” she said. “I understand. Taking a life is no trivial thing.” “Anthony—” 35

Dale R. Cozort “You won’t kill him. It won’t come to that,” Leo said. “Follow me.” He veered off to the right of the ruts they’d been following. Sharon stopped. “Where are you going?” “I think one of Sister West’s trucks broke down and they pushed it this way to hide it. If there’s nothing seriously wrong, maybe I can get it going.” Sharon tried to spot a trail in the knee-high grass. “I don’t see anything,” she said. Leo nodded. “They hid the trail. I almost missed it myself.” They trudged several hundred yards before Sharon spotted the truck hidden in a gully with branches piled over it. Leo opened the hood and poked around. He pulled open the driver’s side door and turned the key. The truck started. He grinned at Sharon. “Battery cable worked loose. They reinforced the suspension but didn’t tighten the battery cables. So, walk or ride, your choice.” Sharon shook her head. “Good set of choices there.” She climbed in. Leo drove back to the ruts they’d been following and swung onto the trail. Sharon looked out at the Bear Country prairie and forced her body to relax—pushing pain and worry to the back of her mind. She watched the little dramas of life around her. A tiny brown bat landed on the mirror outside her window. It glared at its reflection in the mirror, raised its wings, hissed, and flew away. A bird swooped on the bat. Sharon didn’t see if it got away. Half a dozen birds flew over the truck, darting and snapping at insects and small bats disturbed by their passage. They drove for nearly an hour before the truck crested a hill and nearly hit a sabertooth cat feeding on a buffalo calf. The cat backed off, hissing and baring large blade-like teeth. It crouched, then charged the truck, but stopped before making contact. Leo slowed, but kept edging forward. Sharon took out her cell phone and took a picture as the sabertooth backed off. The cat came back once they were past. After growling disapproval, it went back to feeding. “I’m glad we’re in this truck. I wouldn’t want to meet that beast on foot.” 36

Exchange He grinned. “I agree.” His grin faded when Sharon pulled out her pistol and pointed it at his head. “Too bad your ride ends now—before you drive me into Sister West’s compound to deliver me to them.” Leo chuckled. “I knew finding the truck was too obvious, but I don’t want to be on foot out here at night. I didn’t think you bought it. Which is why I switched guns with you. The one you have is empty.” Sharon frowned at the unfamiliar weapon. She shifted her aim a couple of inches from his head and pulled the trigger. The hammer clicked on an empty chamber. Sharon stared at the gun, then at Leo. All the anger, frustration, and pain of the day was in her voice. “If the mind games don’t stop right now, I’ll tear off one of your arms and beat you to death with it. Let’s start with a full name; who are you?” Leo laughed. “I have the gun and you’re making threats. I like that.” He stopped the truck and shifted in his seat to face her. He held out a hand for a handshake. “My name’s Leo West.”

37

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Five Sharon kept her face impassive. “West? Related to Sister West?” “Yes. By marriage,” Leo said. “We didn’t know your husband had taken your little girl by force when he came to mooch off of us, but I figured I’d better collect you. Don’t want you bringing the Marines down on us before we get the situation straightened out.” “What do you mean by straightened out?” Leo started the truck and steered it around a mud hole. “I don’t know,” he said. “It’s out of my hands. We may send your daughter home tomorrow morning, but we have to worry about the Marines. Living in Bear Country is illegal.” “But you’re planning to live out here, legal or not.” “That’s the plan. And yes, we know it’s against a bunch of laws, treaties, executive orders, and probably a local ordinance or two,” Leo said. “But sometimes we obey a higher law.” “The laws are to keep Bear Country animals from learning to be afraid of people,” Sharon said. “That would make them harder to catch if they got loose in The World.” “So I’ve been told,” Leo turned away and concentrated on driving. He didn’t pull a gun on Sharon. She thought about trying to use her martial arts skills to overpower the man but decided against that. A fight could easily wreck the truck, and Leo’s overwhelming size advantage would be hard to counter at close quarters.

38

Exchange Leo grinned at her. “You were going to Sister West’s when I found you. You still are. You wouldn’t have made it on foot, not in the daylight and certainly not at night. You’ll be okay.” “I hope you’re not going to say trust me.” “No. Not yet.” Leo hit the brake as a mob of kangaroos meandered in front of the truck and stared at it. He glanced over at Sharon. “If you don’t get ice on your jaw you won’t be able to open your mouth tomorrow.” “Where would I get ice over here?” “Good question. Maybe we’ll have it in a few years. For now we’ll try cold water.” Leo studied her face. “You would look good minus the bruise and with a smile.” “You won’t see that for a while.” “Maybe.” He kept looking at her. “What?” “I like the way the sun plays through your hair—turns it from brown to auburn.” A smile wavered onto Sharon’s face, then faded. Leo turned away. “Sorry. Sounded like a bad pickup line, didn’t it?” “A little. Actually—a lot. If you said that to me at a bar you wouldn’t get my phone number.” She glanced at his strong, darkly tanned face. But you might get my e-mail address—if I was in stupid mode, which I seem to be in now. And if I didn’t have a daughter to get back…and an ex-husband to kill. They rode silently for a few minutes until Leo said, “You’ll be okay. Don’t worry.” “The DJ on Rockport’s radio station said that nothing is what it seems out here,” Sharon said. “I’m starting to believe him.” “They’re on the air?” “Three times a day for twenty minutes using an emergency generator.” “He’s right,” Leo said. “Absolutely nothing is what it seems out here. No one is who they seem out here. Trust no one.” “Not even you?” 39

Dale R. Cozort Leo grinned. “You know the answer to that, or you think you do. Even there, remember that there are wheels within wheels, lies within lies.” Sharon stared at the ruts ahead of them. “So nothing is what it seems,” she said. “How do you know? How do you know any more about Bear Country than I do?” “Maybe I don’t.” “I think you do. Here is something that doesn’t make sense: your trucks have reinforced suspensions. I went to your compound back in Rockport looking for my daughter. By the time I got there you were packed up and moving into Bear Country. That’s less than twenty-four hours from when they spotted the Exchange coming. I thought no one could predict one until three hours before they happened. You didn’t prepare for this in three hours.” “No, we didn’t.” Sharon waited for him to continue, but instead he asked, “So tell me everything you know about the Mack brothers.” “I was married to Anthony, of course,” Sharon said. “He’s another Sister West, only maybe even more nuts. He thinks the government is out to get him, so he does everything he can to make that true.” “And he thinks he still has friends in Sister West’s crew,” Leo said. “Interesting. So what does Sharon Mack do back in The World?” “Computer stuff. Hardware, software, low-level stuff. I used to be a real get-down-to-the-hardware-and-tweak-the-baremetal kind of girl, but now I mostly do support.” “A techie. You don’t look like a techie.” Sharon grinned. “What does a techie look like?” “I don’t really know. Maybe you could help if we have trouble with the stuff back there.” Sharon glanced at the back of the truck. “What are we carrying?” “Solar cell panels. This truck represents about five percent of our electricity.” “Just five percent?” Sharon asked. “How many trucks do you have?” 40

Exchange “Sorry. I can’t tell you that,” Leo said. “Solar cells are the key to making it over here. They’re expensive and they don’t give a lot of power, but they’ll keep giving it any time the sun’s out for the next twenty-plus years. By that time we’ll build up enough to make our own power.” “What about nighttime and cloudy days?” Sharon glanced up at the sky. “Speaking of clouds, have you ever seen anything like that?” Leo took one look at a towering mass of clouds approaching from the southwest and stopped the truck. “We need to get a tarp over the solar panels and tie it down. We’ll remember you helped when we decide on your daughter.” Sharon hesitated, then ran out to help Leo with the tarp. Thunder rumbled and the air abruptly chilled. Sharon tied her part of the tarp and ran to the next section. She found herself beside Leo, their hands touching as they worked to attach the flapping canvas. Clouds raced in front of the sun, and the afternoon suddenly became dusk. Large, heavy raindrops fell. Lightning flashed, followed almost instantly by a clap of thunder and a gust of wind. A line of rain rushed toward them at freighttrain speed across the prairie. The rain hit, instantly soaking and partially blinding them. They tried to keep working, but marble-sized hail pelted them and clanged against the truck. Leo hesitated, tied one last rope, then tapped Sharon on the shoulder. They ran to the truck cab and jumped in, dripping and followed by nearly horizontal rain. Leo leaned back and yelled over the noise of the storm, “It’s a bad one. I’ve only seen it get that dark that fast one other time, and I’m glad I had a nice solid basement to go to then.” The truck shuddered in the wind. A gust raised something in the back and slammed it down. Leo shook his head. “Solar panel is like a sail; I hope we got them down tight.” Sharon began shivering as she sat in the cold truck cab. Leo took off his soaked shirt, pulled her over and covered both of them. Sharon moved closer. Leo eased her head down onto his shoulder. She could feel hard, bare ridges of stomach muscle under her hand. Leo brushed a strand of hair out of her face and 41

Dale R. Cozort gently stroked the wet tangles. She looked up and met his eyes. He half-smiled, moved a fraction of an inch toward her, then closed his eyes, sighed, and leaned back. She started to draw away, then put her head back against his chest. She closed her eyes. I didn’t want him to kiss me. An image sprang into her mind of him continuing the slow movement of his lips toward hers—of lips touching. She tried to push that image out of her head, but part of her mind held and savored it. Definitely in stupid mode. After a minute or two, she raised her head. “What’s that?” “Rain. Wind. Thunder. Oh wait; it’s hailing again.” The hail pounded them with increasing force. Sharon jumped after a particularly loud impact. “It’s pitting the glass,” she said. “We may have to hike back.” “You really don’t want to be on foot in Bear Country after dark. Speaking of which, it may rain all night.” Leo sighed. “I would drive on, but I can’t see ten feet in front of me.” He started the truck and turned on the heater. “We can’t let it run too long or we’ll run out of gas.” They huddled together in their wet clothes. Sharon said, “It sure got dark in a hurry.” Thunder crashed very close to them, and she felt Leo jump at the sound. “At least you’re human; I was beginning to wonder.” The thunderstorm continued through the evening and into the night. Leo let the truck run for fifteen minutes every hour. He found a thin, tattered blanket in an emergency kit and wrapped it around them. The blanket helped some, but they were both shivering soon after the heater stopped. Finally Leo sat up. “This isn’t working. I could probably make it, but you need to get out of those wet clothes.” Sharon pulled away. “That would be a no.” Leo smiled. “I know. You don’t trust me. Why should you? That’s why I’m giving you back your pistol, fully loaded. No tricks. I don’t want you to die of exposure.” Sharon took the weapon, checked to make sure it was loaded and put it on the seat beside her. She stripped to her 42

Exchange underwear and put her clothes in front of the heater vents. She moved back to her side of the cab. Leo shook his head. “It’s not going to help much if you’re over there. For tonight—just for tonight—consider me a way of keeping warm.” “Again with the no. I know where that can end up.” “Not unless you want it to.” Yeah, and we may have a split ballot on that one. “I’ll stay over here.” The thunder and rain eased off from time to time, but new lines of thunderstorms kept coming. Wind and rain lashed the truck, and thunder cracked sharply, uncomfortably close. In spite of the storm, Sharon’s body gradually relaxed. Eventually the rain fell into a soothing rhythm. A clap of thunder startled her into wakefulness and she realized that she had dozed off. She frantically searched for the pistol. “It’s still there,” Leo said. “No tricks. Not tonight.” “That’s what the first guy I kissed said before the kiss.” “And then?” “Then he tried to get me to sleep with him. Didn’t want to take no for an answer.” “I’m sorry.” Sharon felt the hard shape of the pistol against her hip. She reached back and touched it. “I sure know how to pick them, don’t I? Anthony and Sam Kittle and—” “Sam Kittle. That’s a name I’ve heard before. One of the escaped convicts. And he was—” “Yes, he was my first kiss,” Sharon said. “Not a great choice, huh?” Leo shrugged. “The pistol is still there and still loaded.” “I believe you.” Sharon dozed off again. Sometime later she was vaguely aware of firm ridges of muscles against the front of her body. Her arms were moving slowly across masculine flesh, massaging the cold away. She felt the response as her hands moved, and her own body started to respond. Then she woke up a little more and stopped her hands abruptly. Leo sat up and pulled away from her. “You might not want to do that. I’m here to keep you warm 43

Dale R. Cozort tonight, but I’m not made out of stone and this is definitely not the time or the place.” “That’s for sure. I’m sorry.” Sharon moved back to her side of the truck. “How did I get over there?” “I don’t know. I woke up and—” “Yeah. I’m sorry.” “I’m not.” Leo took her hands in his. “But let’s just sleep now, okay?” Did I mention I’m really in stupid mode? They sat in the darkness. A silence grew between them, not uncomfortable but with a certain tension. Finally, Sharon heard Leo’s breathing get slower and deeper. As she tried to fall back asleep, her mind darted uncomfortably between images—from Anthony in one of his many mean drunks with Bethany huddling terrified, to the balding convict’s head bouncing off a rock, then to Sam Kittle and the kiss. The showers stopped at some point, but the night went on and on. Sharon wasn’t aware of going back to sleep, but she must have because when she opened her eyes, the first hints of dawn showed in the now clear sky. A wolf howled, shockingly close. Sharon turned to the side window and saw movement outside the truck. She reached back and grabbed her pistol. A dog-like face with piercing pale blue eyes appeared inches from the glass. Leo whispered, “Amber wolves. They’re probably just curious.” The wolf stood on its hind legs and looked Sharon in the eye. It sniffed at the window, then circled the truck. Finally it made a complex twittering sound and strolled away. Several dozen other wolves joined the curious one. They trotted to a low hill and sat watching the truck. Sharon hastily pulled on her stiff, damp clothes. Leo sat up and put his shirt back on. He looked at Sharon with a hint not of coldness, but of distance. “It’s light enough that we can go on now. I hope your husband and daughter are okay.” “My ex-husband.” “I hope Sister West and her daughter are okay too.” Sharon stiffened. “Daughter?” 44

Exchange “Allison,” Leo said. “Allison West. You’ll like her, for a while.” “And then?” “Who knows? You may be kindred spirits, though I doubt it. If Anthony is who I think he is, then you and Allison may have a common relationship. If you don’t mind me asking, what was the problem with you and Anthony?” “When it was obvious that my daughter had problems, he tried to find answers everywhere except in doing the hard work it took to raise her. He got drunk. He got abusive. Then he got religion for a while and from there he jumped into tinfoil-hat politics,” Sharon said. “It was almost like he was competing with her to see who could be more screwed up and needy.” “Yet the Church of the Second Chance shapes people like that into responsible members of our community,” Leo said. “Everyone has a past they’re trying to improve on.” “Yeah, but you kicked him out, and rightly so. And then he hit me on the head with a whiskey bottle. Not much evidence of shaping or responsibility there.” “Sometimes a person isn’t ready to change yet.” “Yeah, that would be Anthony, except for the yet part. He was born a jerk and he’ll die a jerk.” “We’ll have to see.” “And what do you have in your past?” Leo sat upright. “I’ve been investigated for murder twice,” he said. “Ruled self-defense both times.” “Was it really self-defense?” His lips smiled. “God and I know. That’s enough.”

45

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Six The amber wolves followed the truck when Leo started it, howling or twittering from time to time. The rain turned the route to Sister West’s new compound into a treacherous obstacle course. Leo steered the truck in wide detours around mud and standing water. He frowned. “I’m worried about a couple of low spots. With this much rain they’ll be tricky. One’s coming up in a few minutes.” The truck came to the crest of a long gentle hill and started down a steeper slope on the other side. Leo steered the truck toward a relatively high spot between two oxbow lakes. Waisthigh grass made it hard to see where the lakes ended and solid ground began. “This is one of the spots,” Leo said. “It used to be a riverbed, but the river changed course years ago. Definitely muddy, but we should get through if we keep up our momentum.” The truck skidded and fish-tailed as it hit a mud puddle mostly hidden by grass. Leo controlled the skid and they made it through a low spot, but then the front tires hit a shallow gully. The truck bottomed out and stopped abruptly. Leo tried to back up, but the truck remained stuck. He got out and pushed, with Sharon steering, but the truck just bogged down more. Finally he shook his head. “We’re wasting gas.” Sharon waded over to him through the mud and wet grass. She felt ice-cold water seep into her shoes. The amber wolves kept their distance, testing the air and watching Sharon and Leo with their pale blue eyes. Leo said, “I hear something.” “What?” 46

Exchange He held up his hand for silence. Sharon strained to hear. There was a faint but deep rumbling in the distance—deep enough to be thunder but continuous. The wolves howled in unison. The rumbling got louder. Sharon muttered, “It’s still hungry.” “What?” “Something Bethany said; the water’s still hungry.” She spun, staring across the lakes. “It must have broken through the freeway! It’s a flash flood!” Sharon felt the ground vibrate under her feet. The amber wolves ran uphill, away from the truck. “In the Midwest?” “The Exchange blocked the river. It flooded the other side of the freeway. Now it’s breaking through into the old riverbed. Come on!” She took a step toward the high ground, just as a wall of water and uprooted logs twice her height surged into sight through the scrubby trees. It rushed directly toward the truck. Water hit and smashed a grove of trees, adding branches and saplings to the swirling mass. Leo yelled, “Too late for the high ground! Behind the truck!” “Why?” “Debris!” They ran to the side of the truck away from the onrushing water and grabbed the side. It’s still hungry and it’s going to get me this time! Leo yelled over the roar, “Get a good breath! Don’t give up!” He put an arm around her and grabbed the truck bed. She felt his breath at her ear, strong arms protecting her, just before the wall of water hit the truck. Bethany, I’m sorry! The water lifted the truck and carried it along, while debris shattered the windows and sent shards of glass frothing by them. The solar panels broke loose and became missiles. One cartwheeled into the truck inches from Sharon’s head, then gouged painfully into her thigh. The impact spun her away from Leo, and his grip on her arm weakened and slid away. She lost track of the truck and Leo as she fought to survive in a blur of water, motion, and tumbling debris. 47

Dale R. Cozort The current pushed her under water, and another solar panel slammed into her. She tried to push it away, but something hit it and pushed it back into her. She felt the panel jerk as other debris hit it, and realized it was shielding her. She grabbed the panel and held on as it jerked wildly in the current. The force of the water subsided a little. By now the effort of holding her breath was overwhelming, but the solar panel stayed stubbornly between her and the surface. It was taller and wider than her body, and what had been her shield now seemed to take on a life of its own, moving to cut off her path to the surface. You’re not going to get me. I won’t die and leave Bethany out here! Sharon clawed the solar panel aside and grabbed a breath, partly of air and partly of muddy water. She fought to keep from coughing and inhaling more water. The water swept Sharon along, helpless and struggling for another breath. Something slammed painfully into her back. Her hand flailed and caught the edge of it. She held on and pulled herself onto what appeared to be part of an old trailer. She had a second to wonder where it came from, then found herself fending off tree limbs that swirled around her, lashing at her skin and face. The piece of trailer moved slower than most of the debris, and the water around Sharon gradually slowed from chaotic to merely treacherous and fast moving. She saw no sign of Leo, not even after screaming herself hoarse calling for him. The word Mack was painted on the piece of trailer in crude black letters. Sharon wondered at the irony of the trailer being her salvation, then she noticed something or someone swimming desperately several yard away from her. “Leo!” She quickly realized that the figure was too small to be Leo and her heart sank. It sank even lower when she realized the struggling swimmer must be a child. She crawled to the edge of her refuge and held out her hand, “Over here! Grab on!” A tired hand grabbed hers and the swimmer pulled himself up onto the debris. It was a green monkey, no larger than a cat. It stared at her through wary gray eyes, but seemed too exhausted to move. The new riverbed curved and the current swirled the piece of trailer against the bank. It stuck for a couple of seconds, 48

Exchange and then floated away. Sharon grabbed an overhanging treebranch and held her hand out to the monkey. It hesitated, almost too long, before it took her hand. She pulled herself and the monkey onto dry land and sprawled there, exhausted. The sun gradually dried Sharon’s wet clothing as she watched the river settle into its new course. It was far too deep to wade across and filled with too much fast-swirling debris for her to swim across. Once she recovered enough to stand, Sharon spent an hour pacing up and down the bank of the new river, searching for Leo. She saw no sign of footprints leading from the river and no body. Finally she sat near the monkey on the bank of the new river, exhausted. She thought about the swirling, snarling wall of debris and shook her head. Don’t be dead! The thought brought with it a wave of loneliness. She fought it back. I barely know the guy and I don’t trust him. Just to hear a human voice, she said, “But I always seem to be attracted to the guys I can’t trust. Which is what got me here in the first place.” The monkey touched her hand with its paw and chirped. Sharon stared at the fast-healing ruts on the other side of the river, then at the monkey. “Well, civilization’s over here, along with the Marines. My daughter’s over there, along with a bunch of nutcases and my ex-husband.” The monkey looked at her with calm gray eyes and made a complex clicking sound. It sat and groomed its fur, dark green except for a white patch like a downward-facing arrow on its chest. Sharon shook her head. “And I’m talking to a monkey. So, what makes you so dangerous?” She glanced at the two-footlong, inch-thick stick she carried, her only weapon since she lost her pistol in the flood. “You’re more dangerous than a bear or a sabertooth tiger according to the guy on the radio. I could really use knowing why.” The monkey showed no sign of aggression. It also showed no sign of going away. It foraged for insects and bats in the grass near Sharon, snatching them and popping them in its mouth so quickly that the motion blurred. Sharon thought about trying to chase it away, but decided that might precipitate whatever danger 49

Dale R. Cozort the monkey posed. Instead she found a couple of rocks and tried to chip a point on one. As she chipped, the amber wolves returned. One ventured close and twittered at the monkey. The monkey sat calmly and made a high-pitched series of noises. The wolf came closer and offered a tentative lunge at the monkey. Sharon didn’t see any contact, but the wolf abruptly yipped and ran off with its tail between its legs. Within a short time, Sharon’s hands were cramping and bruised from the effort of chipping rocks. She noticed the monkey watching her intently and held up the rocks. “Don’t you wish you could do this? This is what separates us from you.” The monkey strolled over and picked up a couple of the larger chips that she had flaked off. It chipped at one of them for a couple of minutes with quick, practiced motions, then moved back, carrying a sharp-edged chip in an odd grip between its thumb and the top of the next finger. Sharon stared at the monkey and said in a subdued voice, “Well, that’s supposed to be one of the things that separates you from us.” The monkey chipped an edge onto a larger rock and handed it to her. “Thank you, I think. I also think I need a name for you. How about Fred?” Sharon asked. “Yep, I think you’re Fred. Well, Fred, the rock-chipping thing explains some of the danger. I wonder what else you’re hiding.” The monkey stood upright and seemed to be listening. He abruptly made a noise like a rattlesnake, and every hair on his body stood on end. Fred suddenly appeared twice as big and infinitely more dangerous. Sharon heard the sound of a car engine in the distance. Before she could investigate, the underbrush fifty yards away sprouted monkeys. Dozens if not hundreds of monkeys stalked toward them. They looked like larger, tougher versions of Fred, but Fred obviously didn’t feel any kinship. He growled and made the rattlesnake chitter again. Sharon grabbed her club and swung it back and forth, stamping her feet. The monkeys coming toward her slowed and glanced at each other, but didn’t stop. They spread out as they approached, making a half-circle that pinned Sharon and Fred with their backs to the river. Fred snarled a fierce, steady growl. A monkey lunged at Sharon. She 50

Exchange swung the club at him, felt it connect. Another monkey lunged for her ankle. Sharon yanked her foot out of the way and kicked the monkey in the side of the head. The kick sent her off-balance and she fell, rolled, and came up in a fighting stance just in time to see most of the monkeys charge off toward a column of Hummers approaching down the riverbank. Marines firing automatic weapons from the Hummers stopped the charge, and dozens of monkeys fell bleeding into the grass. The monkeys still capable of running sped off, vanishing into the underbrush so quickly that their disappearance seemed like a magician’s trick. Sharon turned and found herself facing the same tall blond woman she had encountered earlier. The woman peered at Sharon with sharp brown eyes. “Did any of them bite you?” Sharon suddenly felt weak and short of breath. She took a deep breath and said, “I don’t know. I don’t think so.” The other woman pulled out a radio, pushed a button and said, “Ran into monkeys in sector five north. Get helicopters and tracking teams with dogs over here ASAP.” She put the radio away, then asked, “See anybody else out here?” “I was with a man,” Sharon said. “He got washed away when I did. I haven’t seen him since.” “I’ll send a team on to search for him. Anybody else?” “Some convicts yesterday.” “Really? We’ll have to chat about that. Any debris from Rockport? Any pieces of cars or houses?” “Siding from a mobile home,” Sharon said. “I think it belonged to the Mack brothers, but unfortunately they didn’t get caught in the flood.” “I’ve heard of them. So why were you out here getting ready to redo Custer’s last stand against a bunch of monkeys instead of being home with your daughter?” “I’m trying to find her. She was kidnapped.” “By her father, right?” “Yes.” Sharon pressed the heels of her hands deep into her eyes, trying to come to grips with a flash flood, attacking monkeys, and a woman who seemed to know an awful lot about her business. “Well, congratulations. Your go-anywhere pass is revoked and you’re now in charge of guarding that monkey you were 51

Dale R. Cozort beating when I first saw you. That’ll give you something to do…keep you out of trouble. Your daughter’s situation is on my list; I’ll take care of it when I get to it. No need to wander around out here and get yourself killed.” Sharon stared at the tall woman. “How did you know about my daughter?” The woman ignored her and strolled back to one of the Humvees. A smaller, red-haired woman handed Sharon a mesh bag with the monkey struggling in it. She smiled at Sharon, started walking in the wake of the tall woman, and said, “Just go with the flow. I’m Tracy Stevens. It looked like the other monkey was with you. How did that happen?” Sharon walked with her, and Fred followed them. “I saved him from the flood. He seems to have decided I’m his new mom.” “Better you than me,” Tracy said. “Wonder how long that will last.” “He made me a little knife thing. I didn’t know monkeys could make tools.” “Things are different over here. How much do you think the monkey in the bag weighs?” Sharon hefted the bag. “It’s a lot lighter than it looks. No more than ten pounds.” Tracy nodded. “And that’s an adult male. They’re small, but they can sure cause trouble. You’re lucky you weren’t a mile farther down the river. The flood hit farms north of Rockport and we were searching for survivors. We were just about to turn back when we heard your little shindig.” “Thank you. Your voice sounds familiar, by the way.” “I’ve been on the radio a time or two. As to the thanks, just don’t come out here again,” Tracy said. “If Anna Morgan says that something is handled, it is.” “Anna Morgan is the tall blonde, right?” Tracy nodded. “To answer your earlier question, one of your neighbors called and told us.” “Elroy. I don’t know whether to thank him or tell him to mind his own business. And I lost his pistol in the flood.” A helicopter buzzed in and off-loaded teams of tracking dogs. With the dogs straining at their leashes, the teams moved 52

Exchange out. The helicopter took off and started sweeping back and forth in the direction the monkeys had gone. Tracy watched the dogs before turning to Sharon. “They’re new at this. Most dogs won’t track a monkey pack more than once.” “Why are they trying to chase the monkeys?” “That’s too big a pack too close to Rockport,” Tracy said. “Plus we killed some of them. They have a nasty habit of remembering things like that and hitting back. Hopefully we can make them more scared of us than they are angry.” Sharon asked, “So what are you going to do about my daughter?” “Handle it as soon as we get done putting out a bunch of other fires.” “What fires? You should have Rockport buttoned up tight by now.” Tracy shook her head. “Not even close. We don’t have enough manpower. We don’t have enough wire. We don’t have enough fence posts. This is a big Exchange. Over a hundred square miles came over with us. That’s almost twenty-five miles of perimeter on this side of the Exchange alone. Those hundred plus square miles got replaced by that many square miles of Bear Country, all of which the people back home have to guard too. Even if we had enough fence, it would just screen out the medium-sized animals that can’t climb or burrow. It won’t do anything to stop birds, bats, insects, or plant seeds.” “Probably wouldn’t stop a woolly mammoth or a sabertooth tiger either,” Sharon said. “We probably won’t get anything that big for a while. There won’t be many big predators close to us. When they do come in, the Marines in the helicopters have a list of the big animals scientists want to bring back and study. They’ll dart any of those they see and shoot down anything else that warning shots don’t stop.” “Ruthless.” “But necessary, and that’s just the beginning. By the time we’re done, a buffer area half a mile wide on the Bear Country side should be as close to sterile as we can make it, almost down to bare dirt. How we’re going to do that with the resources we have is another story.” 53

Dale R. Cozort Anna Morgan kept striding along the line of Hummers. Sharon and Tracy had to almost run to keep up with her. Tracy said, “Where we have the material, the fence will be anchored in six feet of concrete. That’ll stop most of the burrowers.” “You seem to know a lot about these things.” Tracy stepped over a dead monkey. “I’ve been to fifteen or twenty Exchanges so far; I lost count.” “So this is routine for you.” Tracy stopped and laughed bitterly. “Exchanges are never routine. Every one I’ve been at so far has come awfully close to being a disaster. This one may already be a disaster. If any of those little monkeys got out on the other side and if they start breeding, they’ll cause billions of dollars worth of crop damage. They’ll also push half a dozen native species out of their territory, may even cause them to go extinct. And the monkeys are the least of my worries at the moment.” Sharon noticed that Marines along their route were staring at the monkey struggling and snapping in the bag. No one questioned her, though. “Shouldn’t someone be asking me why I’m carrying this monkey and have another tagging along behind me?” “Probably. We act like we know what we’re doing, and they’ve got other things on their minds. Somebody should be by to pick us up any time now.” Anna suddenly stopped and stared down at Sharon. “You’re maybe twenty-five years old. You’re probably a teacher or office drone. Single. You’re in pretty good shape but not outstanding. You’ve probably had martial arts training but not that much. Yet why do I have this feeling that you’re going to pay a key role in our little drama?” Sharon watched a clump of trees and dirt swirl by in the current with a wet and bedraggled squirrel clinging to one branch. “I have no clue. What drama?” Anna shrugged and moved on. “I’m rarely wrong about people. I’ll keep you for a while and see what happens.” Sharon turned to Tracy. “What—” “Don’t worry about it.” A jeep pulled up and stopped in front of them. The driver got out and handed Anna the keys. Fred hopped into the back of 54

Exchange the jeep and refused to leave. Sharon tried to coax him out, then glanced over at Anna. “He won’t get out.” Anna turned back and tried to shoo the monkey. He eyed her warily, but pushed deeper into the seat. “Well, he doesn’t seem hostile. I guess we take him with us.” “I thought they were dangerous.” Anna nodded. “In a pack they are. You got a taste of that. One of them? I don’t know. This is a young one—probably about like a human ten-year-old. I’ll let the jeep roll forward a little. Maybe he’ll jump out when we start moving.” Fred didn’t jump, though he looked worried when the jeep moved. He settled in after a couple of seconds and seemed to enjoy the ride. “He may be setting himself up to be taken back to The World and studied,” Tracy said. “Finding out more about those things is one of our top priorities. How do they survive Midwestern winters? What makes them attack? What makes them back off? How do the big packs communicate? They really are about the most dangerous critters in Bear Country.” “I’d never heard of them.” “Why would you when everybody’s talking about mammoths and sabertooth tigers?” Tracy grinned at Sharon. “Of course, the real danger came when that Marine handed Anna Morgan the keys. Get in; fasten your seat belt; and if you believe in a god—pray.”

55

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Seven “I was not praying, at least not out loud.” Tracy laughed. “Maybe you should have been. You would have been if we’d been flying.” “She flies? That’s scary.” Sharon glanced up at Anna. “Has anybody ever told you that you drive like a bat out of hell?” Anna ignored her and got out of the jeep. Sharon looked back at Fred. The monkey seemed disappointed that the ride had ended, but he got out and wandered off into the brush. “I wonder if we’ll see him again.” Anna shrugged, pulled out a pair of binoculars and strode the last couple of feet to the top of the tallest hill near Rockport. “This will be a good place to watch them set up the perimeter. We can see almost half the circle from here. Hel-lo. That looks an awful lot like an airport over there.” “We have an airport of sorts,” Sharon said. “It’s for private and corporate planes. Summit Foods owns a couple.” Anna said, “Information I could have used three hours before the Exchange.” “Don’t you have databases of that stuff?” Sharon asked. Tracy laughed. “Sure we do. And I bet that if we spent enough time digging we’d figure out why they didn’t flag this one.” “We’ll have to post Marines here,” Anna said. “This view is too good to let somebody else grab it. Of course, we’ll have an even better view when we get the blimp up.” “You realize that we’re in Bear Country here, right? Sharon asked. “Who’s going to grab this hill? Monkeys?” 56

Exchange Anna ignored her again. Tracy handed Sharon a pair of binoculars and pulled another from her pack. “Get used to it.” “Get used to what?” “Being ignored and being in Bear Country,” Tracy said. “Chances are we’ll set up a base here, plus a quarantine facility in case someone catches a Bear Country disease that we can’t risk bringing back with us. Do you understand what they’re trying to do with the perimeter?” “Keep Bear Country animals out.” “Yeah,” Tracy said. “Except in three hours we didn’t get enough people here to guard thirty-five-odd miles of fence. So we’ll shoot anything dangerous that wanders into town and worry about the rest when we get back.” Sharon nodded. “Makes sense. Why did you leave so many state police on the other side?” “Nutcases. Every Exchange a few try to come over. They would starve to death if they made it. If you want to live in Bear Country, you have to know where an Exchange is coming.” “I think Sister West knew.” “You can see where their compound was.” Tracy pointed her binoculars toward the northwestern part of the EZ. “I can make out the foundation slabs of bigger buildings. Maybe they knew, though I don’t see how. Or maybe they got lucky—well, they may think they got lucky. Getting stuck in Bear Country isn’t a good thing.” Sharon asked, “How many people stayed?” “Out of twenty thousand people in Rockport and the surrounding area, two thousand are still here on work details,” Tracy said. “I’d guess another couple thousand didn’t get out, including the Aryan Kings you ran into.” “Actually they almost ran into me. Then I met another bunch of them out here and one tried to ride me down. His idea of courtship, I guess.” “Out here in Bear Country, huh? What did you do? “I—discouraged him.” “Watch yourself. They’re bad news.” “The ones I met out here probably came from the prison that came over. The ones I saw in town were trying to get out.” 57

Dale R. Cozort “Most of them stayed,” Tracy said. “We would have moved them out if we had time, but we didn’t.” “The ones in town may link up with the convicts. That’ll be interesting.” “We have a contingency plan or two.” “So three or four thousand people came over?” “And four hundred-odd Marines—less than half what we need—a few dozen biologists, and of course you and your daughter.” Anna looked out across Rockport through a pair of binoculars, then down at a map on her computer. “If we had the whole Marine Expeditionary Unit here we could hold the entire Exchange Zone. With our actual numbers, we have to write off everything north of the freeway—about forty percent of what came over.” Tracy nodded. “It’s mostly farms and forest preserve up there. The freeway is a built-in barrier we can patrol except where the water washed it out.” Sharon focused her binoculars on the farms north of town. “I’m surprised you’re discussing this in front of me.” “Nothing you couldn’t figure out,” Tracy said. “How many farmers stayed?” “We don’t know,” Tracy said. “The smart ones got out, with their livestock. When we get back we’ll have to burn crops and slaughter livestock; dogs and cats too. Can’t risk bringing back Bear Country diseases. Farmer Dave loses everything. He gets paid for it, but it still hurts.” “What about the forest preserve?” Tracy turned her binoculars toward the preserve. “That’s the part I hate. It all has to go—sterilized down to bedrock.” “That won’t make you a lot of friends.” “Neither will what we’re doing to the farmers near the fence.” Tracy pointed down. A bulldozer carved a path through a field of corn, then through a well-kept white farmhouse. Sharon said, “I’m glad my house isn’t near the fence. I just wish it was outside the EZ.” “That might not help. The National Guard is in charge there,” Tracy said. “They burn a mile-wide belt—twenty-five 58

Exchange thousand acres—outside the Exchange zone, assuming the politicians let them.” Sharon watched the fence go up around more of Rockport. “And they burn everything in the part of Bear Country that shows up in our world?” “Yep, just like the forest preserve.” “That’s stupid. It’ll push Bear Country birds and bats out.” Anna grinned at Tracy. “Wisdom from the mouths of babes. Amazing.” She turned and raised her binoculars again. Sharon glared at her. “What brought that on?” Tracy smiled. “Frustration. We don’t make the policies. Just try to make them work. And you’re right. A lot of what goes on around an Exchange is pointless. Marines secure a line because that’s what they do. And Congress makes us use solar panels where diesel generators make more sense because micromanaging is what they do.” “What’s wrong with solar panels?” “Nothing, but panels and batteries weigh more per watthour than generators and diesel for two weeks and the idea of polluting Bear Country with a few diesel generators is ludicrous. Like spitting in an ocean. We get the expensive, high-efficiency solar cells that normally go on satellites, which helps.” Sharon nodded. “I saw one of yours. Sister West had the same kind.” Anna interrupted. “There’s a rifle beside you. Do you know how to use it?” Sharon fumbled with the unfamiliar mechanism, but managed to chamber a round. “A little target practice, but I’m no sharpshooter with a rifle. A pistol, on the other hand…” Anna looked puzzled. “I know you’re going to be useful; I just can’t figure out how. Hand me the rifle.” She took the weapon and fired three quick shots at a thick area of brush about twenty-five yards down the hill. Sharon heard a chittering like a monstrous rattlesnake, and monkeys poured out of the brush, scattering as they ran down the slope. Anna fired three more times, but Sharon didn’t see any monkeys fall. She did see motion out of the corner of her eye, though, and whipped around in time to see three monkeys dragging the bagged one out of the jeep. 59

Dale R. Cozort Sharon yelled, and Anna moved with startling speed, running around the jeep so she could get a clear shot. One of them moved toward her, and she shot it down on the run. The other two dropped their captured companion and ran for cover in their long-legged gait. Anna got off two more shots, but neither of the monkeys fell. Sharon watched the monkeys disappear into the brush. Tracy smiled at her. “Good save.” “Thanks.” Anna walked over and shook her hand. “Thanks for spotting those three. I was focused on the ones in front of me, which might have been the point of the exercise.” She laughed “We almost got outwitted by a bunch of monkeys.” “That’s scary.” Anna walked away. Tracy grinned at Sharon. “She likes you.” “She’s a little overwhelming. Who is she and why does she keep saying I’ll be useful?” “She used to play college basketball. I can’t tell you what she does now. You can probably figure out the general picture, though. She’s got good instincts. If she thinks you’ll be useful, chances are you will be.” “Maybe I don’t want to be useful. How did the monkeys follow us? We had to have averaged close to fifty miles an hour across broken country.” Tracy strolled over to the monkey Anna had shot. She jabbed it with a stick, examined the bullet hole, then said, “It’s dead. Come check it out.” Sharon walked to the monkey’s body. It seemed small and harmless on the ground, and Sharon turned away. Tracy saw the movement and said, “Bear Country will get you used to things like this.” “I don’t want to be used to things like this.” “Then go home and stay there,” Tracy said. Fred ran in from the brush and poked the dead monkey with his finger. Tracy picked up one of the monkey’s paws and said, “These things are built to run fast on the ground; you can tell by the long legs and short fingers. They can hit bursts of 60

Exchange forty-five miles an hour and sustained speeds of forty-miles an hour.” Sharon whistled. “That’s faster than most dogs.” “And these monkeys have functional hands.” “How can you be so…” Sharon waved a hand. “So matter of fact about it? You just casually saunter over and act like It’s just a dead monkey. Let’s check out its paws and talk about how fast it can run. It was alive not more than five minutes ago.” “Like I said, you get used to it.” Sharon forced the revulsion off her face. “How did monkeys from Africa get to North America in Bear Country?” Tracy laughed. “If I knew that, I’d be collecting my Nobel Prize about now.” “I thought that might be one of those things the general public isn’t allowed to know.” “Nope. We don’t know,” Tracy said. “We also don’t know why bats here took over most of the rat-and-mouse ways of life.” Sharon pointed. “Forest preserve. Beautiful old-growth trees that you’re calmly planning to burn down because there might be Bear Country animals in it. This is all so brutal.” Tracy grinned. “And we’re the good guys.” “I’m beginning to wonder about that,” Sharon said. Tracy said, “We have our reasons. A new species can devastate an area if it has no natural enemies. Imagine monkeys or bats loose back home. The bats run almost as fast as a ground animal. They burrow. They fly. They have litters of ten pups every thirty days. They’re as adaptable as cockroaches. And they would have no natural enemies.” “And they’re poisonous.” “Just the little pollinator bats. Back in the 1400s, the Portuguese settled some islands in the Atlantic. They let rabbits loose. The rabbits bred and ate until there was no food left and the settlers had to leave. These bats make rabbits look like poster children for birth control.” Tracy pointed to the forest preserve. “Imagine a desert down there. No leaves on the trees. No grass. Just bare dirt and the skeletons of bare trees. Imagine the whole thing covered with bats—tens of thousands per acre, eating any little sprig of green. So burning down a forest preserve is pretty small change, isn’t it?” 61

Dale R. Cozort “I don’t want to think about having to make those kinds of decisions,” Sharon said. “I’ll be glad when I get my daughter back and go back to my cubicle and my computer.” “Will you really? Is a cubicle and a computer your ‘happily ever after’?” “It’s my ‘good enough.’ It pays the bills.” “That’s most people most of the time,” Tracy said. “This won’t be over when Rockport comes back, you know. There will be another Exchange in a few weeks or a month. The physics people say the number will peak in a few years, then taper off. Until then, things aren’t going back to normal. So you adapt— like your parents adapted to cars and telephone. And no, we don’t secretly know where Exchanges are going to happen.” “What about that Irving guy? He claimed he could predict some of them.” “Dr. Irving tossed out enough locations that he’s bound to be right sometimes. Probably snake oil.” “So why did the government shut him up?” “It didn’t. Property values went through the floor places where he predicted an Exchange. Homeowners sued. He shut up.” Sharon laughed. “That I can see, but he was right at least once.” Anna walked back over. “Make that twice counting Rockport. It was on a list he did for us that we kept under wraps, or tried to.” “Sister West and her people knew. They had to. They were ready to go. They had solar panels, trucks with reinforced suspensions, and God knows what else,” Sharon said. “They could have just been survivalists,” Tracy said, “They got caught in an Exchange and were ready to take advantage of it.” “What do you know about Sister West?” Anna asked. “Nothing that isn’t on the local grapevine,” Sharon said. “They’re a cult. A bunch of nutcases. Can’t be all bad though. They kicked my ex-husband out. Oh, and I was with Leo West when I nearly drowned in the flood. He got swept away. He was the guy I told you about.” 62

Exchange Tracy and Anna glanced at each other. Tracy said, “We were wondering when you’d pass that along.” “You already knew? How?” Anna stalked away from them, reaching for her radio. “We have our ways,” Tracy said. “I would have told you earlier, but he did save my life. I didn’t think you would try as hard if you thought you were searching for one of Sister West’s people.” “There you were wrong,” Tracy said. Anna walked back over to them and said, “Let’s have your story from start to finish—from when your husband hit you until we rescued you from the monkeys. I want just the facts, all of them. No opinions. Nothing left out.” Sharon told her story, with Anna breaking in from time to time with probing questions. Sharon left out a few intimate moments with Leo. When she finished, Anna nodded. “Leo West seems to have messed with your mind a bit. He has a reputation for doing that. You’re not quite telling me everything, but I can fill in the blanks.” Sharon tried to keep her face impassive. I hope not...not all of the blanks. Out loud she asked, “Do you know him? What was—is he like?” Anna ignored the question without even offering a knowing look and turned away—taking out her radio again. Sharon watched Anna. If he’s alive I may have just betrayed him. If he’s dead— Sharon tried to push that thought away. At least I did it for a little girl, not thirty pieces of silver. The thought brought no comfort.

63

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Eight Later that evening, Sharon sat in Anna’s hotel room. Many thousands of dollars worth of computer and communications equipment overflowed the desk and crowded the room. The monkey they had captured was awake in a sturdy cage at one end of the room. It sat quietly, holding its head and watching them. Fred paced in front of the cage, just out of reach of the other monkey. “What are we going to do with Fred? We can’t let him run free in the hotel room, can we?” Tracy grinned. “I heard we a couple of times in there. You’re the adopted mom; what do you want to do with him?” “We can’t let him loose with all this equipment, but the hotel has to be almost empty,” Sharon said. “Why don’t I take over the adjoining room?” “Are you sure you want to be in the same room with one of these beasties?” Tracy asked. “I don’t know. He seems friendly, but he is a wild animal. What do you think?” Tracy shrugged. “Young ones are okay in research labs back home, but adults get vicious. This one’s probably young enough to be okay.” Sharon watched the two monkeys for a while before turning away. “I’m guessing the one in the cage has a major headache. How long are you going to keep it?” “Until we don’t need it anymore.” Anna grinned. “Speaking of headaches, you look like you’ve been playing tackling dummy for a pro football team. How are you feeling?”

64

Exchange Adrenaline had pushed pain out of Sharon’s mind for a while. Now it flooded in. “How am I feeling? Like a pro football team used me as a tackling dummy.” Tracy gave Sharon an aspirin, then poured another one into her hand when Sharon stared at the bottle and cleared her throat. Tracy next pulled out an instant ice pack and squeezed it a couple of times before tossing it to Sharon. “This is a big luxury over here. Enjoy it.” Sharon started to relax a little. Her eyelids drooped as her body worked to repair the many bumps and bruises. Anna glanced over. “Yes, you should be exhausted with the day you’ve had. Now you’ve got a choice: You can sleep in the next room or you can sleep on the couch.” “Or, I could go back to my house and get back to my life.” Anna shook her head. “Not yet. You’re not done being useful. Do you have family you need to get in touch with?” “My parents are probably back in The World, but I do have a daughter that I would like to see again, in case you’ve forgotten,” Sharon said. Anna looked at her sharply. “Your daughter is fine.” “How could you know that?” Anna waved her arms in a gesture taking in the computer and communications equipment in the room. “I have my ways.” “Then use your ways to get my daughter back.” Anna took two quick strides to a computer and typed. Then she turned and said, “I’m sorry.” She flipped a switch. The computer screen went blank. “We’ll have to deal with the Sister West situation eventually. They can’t stay in Bear Country. That’s not a battle I want to fight at the moment, though. We know where they are. We have a robot surveyor watching them in case they decide to move again. They can wait. Your daughter, on the other hand, shouldn’t wait. The question is, how do we get her out without a fight? I don’t have an answer for that one yet, but I will, and soon. Just stay put and we’ll deal with it.” Anna turned back to her computer. Tracy whispered, “I’ve never heard her say that before.” “What?” “‘I’m sorry.’” 65

Dale R. Cozort “I would rather hear her say, ‘we got your daughter back.’ In the meantime, do you mind driving me over to my house? I’ve worn these clothes through a thunderstorm, two floods, and the two monkey attacks.” “Sure.” As they strode out to the jeep, Tracy asked, “I didn’t want to say anything in front of Anna, but are you deliberately being mysterious about the night you spent out in Bear Country with Leo West?” “No. I just don’t want to think about him after what happened in the flood.” “If he’s alive, you don’t want to get involved with him,” Tracy said. “That would put you right in the middle of a game bigger and more vicious than you can imagine.” “I’ve been out there,” Sharon said. “I’ve had a taste of Bear Country. I shot a man and watched his horse drag him along, with his head bouncing off rocks. I may have killed him, but I had no choice. So yes, I know Bear Country can be vicious.” “You said Leo West talked about wheels within wheels, lies within lies,” Tracy said. “Believe him. And sit tight. Let us get your daughter out of there and deal with Sister West.” “I’ll wait a day or two, maybe. Not forever.” They pulled up in front of Sharon’s house. Sharon got out and said, “Thanks for the ride. And for the rescue. I can handle it from here.” Tracy shook her head. “Sorry. I have to wait and take you back. Anna’s orders.” The small one-story frame house had made it this far into the Exchange without damage. But it was starting to look, to feel, unfamiliar to Sharon. The perfectly matched décor and precisely placed knickknacks didn’t belong in the wild grandeur that was Bear Country. It doesn’t belong here. Neither do I. There was no electricity and no hot water, so Sharon took a cold shower and washed her hair by the light of a batterypowered lantern. She put on a clean pair of blue jeans and an old tie-dyed T-shirt and went out to Tracy’s jeep. “I would really rather stay here.” Tracy shook her head. “Sorry. You attract trouble and we already have plenty of that.” 66

Exchange Sharon reluctantly climbed into the car. “Why can’t you just talk to Sister West? Tell her that you want Bethany back, and if they don’t give her back you’ll come get her.” “Because that might make them run, or it might make them hurt your daughter,” Tracy said. “It’ll be handled.” “It had better be handled in the next day or two, or I’ll handle it myself,” Sharon said. She settled back and let Tracy drive her back to Anna’s hotel room. Sharon woke to the sound of dogs howling. Her neck ached, and she rubbed it as she sat up, trying to orient herself. She opened the door to the adjoining room and saw Anna’s tall form at one of her computers. Anna glanced over and grinned at Sharon. “I knew you would be useful. I would have confirmed that Leo West was missing eventually on my own, but it might have taken a day or two.” “But I saved you some time. I’m not entirely sure I’m glad to help. I don’t know why you’re so interested in him.” Sharon meandered over to the window and stared out into a sunny June morning. She could still hear dogs howling outside. “Now, if you’ll just shoot Anthony for me, I’ll call it even. Actually, I’d want to get it on video so I could watch it in slow motion.” “If he really kidnapped a seven-year-old girl and took her out into Bear Country, I might just do that—at least the shooting part,” Anna said. “I’m having trouble with how interrelated people are around here.” “Get used to it. This is small-town America. Everybody knows everybody else. So, am I done being useful?” “I don’t think so. I’ll let you know.” Anna headed to the shower. Sharon got up and ran through a set of martial arts forms—mostly short, powerful strikes with her forearms, knees and elbows. Tracy sat up in bed. “You weren’t joking when you said you wanted this Anthony dead.” Sharon continued with her forms. Finally, she pointed to a small scar near her eyebrow. “We had words a few times while we were married. I weigh about half what he does. He’s starting to go to flab, but he’s still strong. This one took five stitches to 67

Dale R. Cozort close. There are three others. I accumulated over twenty stitches during the marriage, plus some dental work.” “I doubt that you had the martial arts training back then,” Tracy said. “Those are some of the scariest martial arts moves I’ve ever seen.” “I’m not training for a dance.” Tracy shook her head. “No. You’re training to break bones and mess up joints. Why don’t you let the police handle it? He must have spent time in jail for what he did.” “No. I didn’t press charges the first several times because I thought we could patch things up and save the marriage,” Sharon said. “When I did press charges, his daddy’s lawyers got him off. They even claimed that I was trying to kill him.” “Were you?” Maybe. Probably. “I’m not sure what I was trying to do. I do know that he’ll pay for the stitches some day, and for a lot of other things. The last time he got drunk and came after me I was too nice. I hurt him, but I held back a little. I figured I would just teach him a lesson. Even after everything he did, I didn’t put him in the hospital, even though I could have. And then he came back a few months later and sucker punched me with a whiskey bottle. So, no more holding back. No more teaching him a lesson. I won’t break the law and I won’t go out of my way to start trouble with him, but if he hurts Bethany or ever comes after Bethany or me again, I’ll take him down, and he’ll never get up.” Tracy said, “You never really know how you’re going to react until something actually happens. Let us handle it. Let him stay out in Bear Country.” Anna came out of the bathroom wearing a blue jogging suit. “The dogs are still barking. I wonder why.” Sharon looked out the window. “I don’t know.” Anna stared down at the monkey. It crouched in the far corner of its cage and snarled at her, exposing formidable canine teeth. Fred snarled back from the other corner of the room. Anna grinned and said, “I don’t think our big-toothed monkey and I are going to be friends anytime soon. Isn’t that right, Big Tooth? Do you mind if I call you that? Or maybe I’ll just call you Mr. Tooth.” 68

Exchange The monkey snarled again. Anna said, “I think it’s time we get a little more use out of Mr. Tooth. Sharon, you carry his cage. I’ll be carrying a rifle.” Sharon carried the monkey out to the parking lot. She took two steps toward Anna’s jeep, then stopped abruptly. Fred bristled and growled softly as he walked beside her. Anna gave Sharon a faint smile. “Problem?” “Yeah, but I don’t know what it is.” Anna’s smile broadened. “You’ve got good eyes and ears. Now we’ll just have to train them to tell your brain what they see.” Sharon asked, “What should they be telling me?” Anna pulled a radio out of her pocket, pressed a button, and said, “Morgan here. Got my location? Right, the parking lot of my hotel. I need security teams to seal off the parking lot and then move in. Be ready to handle Bear Country monkeys.” Sharon turned to Tracy. “I hate it when she ignores me.” “You should be getting used to it by now.” The captive monkey made its rattlesnake hiss and lunged at the mesh side of its cage. Sharon jumped and almost dropped the cage. Monkeys swarmed out of two cars near Anna’s jeep and ran toward them. Anna yelled, “Back inside.” Sharon fumbled for the door handle for a nightmarish second, then jerked the door open. Two monkeys hurtled toward her, but she managed to get the cage up in time to block their leaps. The monkeys hit the cage, bounced sideways, and were inside the hotel. One of them lunged at Sharon’s leg. She slammed the cage down on its back and drew back her leg. She heard a gunshot just as she passed through the hotel doorway. The two monkeys ran down the hall and disappeared around a corner. Tracy shouted, “Two inside.” Anna slammed the door closed, grabbed her radio, and yelled, “Move in now!” The monkeys hurled rocks at the glass of the door; the glass held. Two dozen monkeys picked up a parking block and rammed it into the window like a battering ram. The impact put a spider web of cracks in the glass, but the window stayed intact. 69

Dale R. Cozort Anna yelled, “Hold the door so I can let go and shoot if the window goes.” Sharon grabbed the door. As she did, she heard a helicopter approaching. It flew in fast and low across the parking lot. Car windows exploded in its path and bullets shattered the top of the hotel window. Sharon hit the floor, arms over her head.

70

Exchange

Chapter Nine When Sharon raised her head, the monkeys in front of the door were gone. So was the helicopter. She saw Anna crouched behind a chair, yelling into her radio. Tracy moved out from a doorway, holding a pistol. “Is it over?” Tracy checked out the hallway in both directions. “I think so, if Anna can call off the idiots in the helicopter. Two monkeys are still in the hotel, though.” Tracy seemed remarkably calm. Sharon wondered if she looked as scared as she felt. She noticed her hand shaking, and stuck it in her pocket. Tracy grinned. “You didn’t do too badly for an amateur.” Sharon flopped to the floor beside the cage. “Did you know this was going to happen?” “The monkeys coming after us like this? No, not here in town. We expected them to make another try once we were out in the country, but this was a surprise.” “How did I know something was wrong?” Anna came over. “Same way I did; the barking dogs made you wary. Then you saw a car door open just a crack, dome lights on, and Mr. Tooth being very attentive all of a sudden. Your subconscious just didn’t know how to tell you what the problem was.” Sharon mentally replayed the attack. “They acted more like people than animals—setting an ambush, using tools. How did they get in the cars?” “They probably found unlocked ones. The cars weren’t perfect for an ambush; they picked the best ones they could get into. They aren’t dumb. I think our little friend Mr. Tooth figured 71

Dale R. Cozort out from my body language that I had spotted the ambush. They learn very fast. We’re lucky our ancestors didn’t have to compete with anything like that.” Marines moved in and spent the next hour searching in and around the hotel. They found one dead monkey, which had been shot from the helicopter. They didn’t find the two in the hotel or the rest of the pack. Finally, the Marines called off the search and posted guards around the hotel. Anna glanced at her watch. “Well, as if we haven’t had enough excitement for one morning, I have to catch a helicopter out into Bear Country.” Sharon asked, “Are you going to use the monkey we captured as bait again?” Anna grinned. “Probably when I get back. They won’t stop trying as long as Mr. Tooth is alive. They have an uncanny ability to track us. We have to take advantage of that to round these things up, and the sooner the better. They don’t know all of our capabilities yet, but they’re learning too fast. And this town isn’t big enough for both us and them. Our world isn’t big enough for both us and them.” Sharon reached down and took Fred’s hand. “That’s sad.” Tracy laughed. “He’s in that nice preteen stage where he wants his mommy. Wait until he gets to be a teenager.” Sharon took a brief nap, waking up when Anna got back to the hotel. Marines guarded the room, watching Fred and Tooth. Anna said, “I can handle them from here. Did they find the two that got in?” “No, ma’am.” “That could make for some excitement later on.” Anna calmly went to her computer and caught up on the day’s messages. “So when is somebody going to do something about my daughter?” Sharon asked. Anna turned from her computer. “I’ve been working on that. Leo showed up at Sister West’s compound today, apparently okay.” Sharon tried to keep her face impassive, but Tracy grinned and said to Anna, “Told you she was falling for him.” 72

Exchange Sharon shook her head. “I didn’t—” “Your face said someone just turned the sun back on, even though you tried to hide it,” Tracy said. “Remember what I said about getting in the middle? Sounds like you’re there.” “He’s taken.” “That I didn’t know,” Tracy said. Sharon asked, “What about Bethany?” “Haven’t seen your daughter lately,” Anna said. “But our coverage has been spotty. Surveyor limped in for repairs after a thunderstorm and we had no visual for five or six hours.” Anna left to settle a dispute between the Marine commander and the biologists. Sharon asked Tracy, “What are they fighting about?” Tracy turned back to her computer. “Mostly typical alpha male stuff. If the Marines aren’t running the show, they don’t want to play with the other kids. The biologists fought long and hard to shake off the Marine leashes so they can actually do biology during an Exchange. Now that they’re not in charge, the Marines do the absolute minimum they have to. Of course, that’s just the biologists’ side of it. Talk to the Marines and they’ll tell you that they never have enough people—” “Which is apparently true.” “And they don’t get input on science missions, and they don’t want to get their people killed because some biologist takes a crazy risk,” Tracy said. “All sounds logical to me,” Sharon said. “Yeah, in the short term,” Tracy said. “In the long term it may cause us to miss something life-and-death-type important back in The World.” Tracy focused on her computer. After a few minutes she said, “We have surveyor video of both your daughter and Leo from before the thunderstorm; it’ll be released to the public when we get back. Right now I’m fuzzing the resolution so people don’t know exactly what our capacity is. Sister West and company know we’re watching them. There’s no harm in you seeing the video—a mom should be able to see her daughter.” Sharon pulled up a chair beside Tracy. Tracy said, “We’re fifteen minutes away from the part you want, but it’s interesting to watch.” 73

Dale R. Cozort The video began with the surveyor sweeping over Bear Country on its way to Sister West’s compound. Most of the animals ignored the surveyor. Birds swooped close a couple of times. Once, a swarm of black and yellow pollinator bats erupted out of a nest in a pair of dying trees and launched a vicious but futile attack on the surveyor. Packs of amber wolves and the little monkeys stopped what they were doing and stared up at the surveyor until it passed over. Sharon grinned. “One of my dad’s dogs used to go crazy over helicopters, barking and trying to chase them.” Tracy nodded. “Makes it hard to study monkeys or amber wolves. By the way, about the bats? They’re very dangerous if they think you’re threatening their nest. They’re poisonous. Not as bad as a rattlesnake, but bad enough—a dozen bites will kill you. And they aren’t really predators, but if you die from their stings, they’ll eat you.” Sharon caught the shiver of distaste that moved over Tracy. At least the woman was squeamish about something. “And they’re smart enough to site their nests near natural hazards where other animals fall in and can’t get out.” The surveyor approached Sister West’s compound. The compound looked temporary, with several dozen pickup trucks parked on high ground, a dozen motor homes parked nose to tail, and a few buildings going up. A partially-completed fence stretched around a third of the compound. Stacks of building material dotted the area. Tracy said, “This isn’t current. They have more of the fence up now, more houses. The part you’re interested in should be coming up.” The surveyor’s camera zoomed in, showing identifiable but unfamiliar men or women. Finally it zoomed in on a familiar figure strolling far below. Sharon recognized the gait and the hair. “Leo.” She intended that to come out calmly, but it was almost like she was crying out to him. Tracy laughed. “My dear, in the business we would say, ‘You’ve got it bad.’ You are very much attracted to the man, or at least have the hots for him, whether you want to be or not, and whether you should be or not.” “I’m glad to see him alive.” 74

Exchange Tracy froze the video, ran it backwards, played it again, then laughed. “I didn’t get quite as big a reaction that time, but still off the charts.” She let the video run forward so Sharon could see Bethany. Her little girl had her usual fixed smile. Sharon didn’t see any sign of injuries in the brief clip. Tracy ran it several times. Each brought tears to Sharon’s eyes, but she kept asking for yet another glimpse of her daughter. Finally Tracy said, “Don’t torture yourself. Just go and relax while I finish this.” Sharon went to the other side of the room and sat in an easy chair. The drapes were drawn, leaving the room in semidarkness. Sharon leaned back and closed her eyes. Concern for Bethany fought briefly with her body’s exhaustion before she fell asleep. She slept restlessly, her dreams filled with disturbing images from the past few days. The convict’s head bounced off of a rock, then the man raised that battered head and glared at her accusingly, blood streaming from the wound in his chest. Then the wall of water raced toward her again and suddenly she was kissing Leo. The dream kiss went on and on, becoming more passionate. His arms were around her and her body pressed against his. Then a rainbow-colored snake flew out of the floodwater and landed at their feet. It raised its tail and made a monstrously loud rattling sound. Sharon woke with the rattle echoing in her ears. That was Freudian. I need to get out more. She realized that she could still hear the sound, and she sat up, trying to orient herself. Tracy was still at the computer, turning toward Sharon. Sharon glanced around the room. Fred stood in the corner, eyes alert, teeth bared in a snarl, and fur standing on end. He stared past Sharon and the rattle sounded from his throat again.

75

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Ten Sharon followed Fred’s stare, then sat up abruptly to gape at the monkey sitting motionless on a nightstand. When the monkey leaped at her, Sharon grabbed her pillow and jammed it between herself and the monkey. Three more monkeys rushed toward her from the closet. The first monkey hit the pillow and then raced up it toward her face. Sharon heard the crack of Tracy’s pistol. The monkey fell, grabbing its leg. One of the other monkeys tossed a lamp at them. The lamp sparked and went out when it hit the floor, leaving the room dark. Sharon jumped up and ran to the end of the couch. She thought she remembered seeing another lamp there. Someone pounded on the door, and the monkeys responded with their rattlesnake noise. Sharon yelled, “Monkeys in the room! Get the Marines.” Tracy said, “Get a light on!” “I’m trying.” Finally Sharon got the other lamp turned on. The caged monkey was still in the room, but the others were gone. Tracy sat cross-legged on the floor near her chair, holding her pistol in a marksman’s grip. She jumped up and followed a trail of blood drops to a vent near the ceiling. Sharon grabbed the rifle. She stared at the vent and asked, “How did they get that open without us hearing them?” Tracy turned the main room light on. She inspected the vent. “Wow. They chiseled the wood out around the screws while we were gone. They must have waited until you were asleep and I was busy to come out. Fortunately you woke up when they opened the vent.” 76

Exchange Sharon shook her head. “They were already in the room when I woke up—must have been hiding in a closet. How did they know this was the right room?” “I don’t know.” Someone pounded on the door. Tracy swung it open, and the two of them spent the next half hour answering questions from Marine guards. More Marines arrived and searched the hotel. Anna finally returned, looking tired and unhappy. “You missed your chance,” Sharon said. “Four of them made a try for Tooth, but they all got away.” “In broad daylight with two people sitting in the room,” Anna said. “They don’t scare much, do they? There were four? So the inside ones let more in. I shouldn’t be surprised, but I am. I’m also surprised that Tracy didn’t get any of them.” Tracy reloaded her pistol. “I hit one. I was working on the computer, with my mind a million miles away when they attacked, and I had to be careful shooting inside a hotel room. Didn’t want to put holes in your equipment.” She grinned. “Or in Sharon.” Sharon asked, “How are you doing on getting Bethany back?” “Not my top priority at the moment,” Anna said. “We lost a helicopter with mechanical problems. It had to land out in Bear Country, and that’s the last we heard from it. Rescue team went out but the crew is gone and the helicopter is stripped—nothing movable left. That means someone out there has heavy duty automatic weapons.” “Was it Sister West’s people?” “I doubt it. It was probably convicts.” “Look, I’m sorry about the guys on the helicopter,” Sharon said. “I know you have other issues, but I have a daughter to rescue. Where is Bethany on your to-do list?” Anna turned away. “My business.” She walked to the door. Sharon said, “I think I’m done being useful here.” Anna turned and studied Sharon. “Before you decide that, I want to take you on a little ride.” “Do I have a choice?” “No,” Anna said. “I’m still looking for you to be really useful.” 77

Dale R. Cozort “I’ve done my share.” They walked out to Anna’s jeep with Fred close behind them. Anna said, “Got to inspect the defenses. What works against a sabertooth or a herd of mammoths may not work against men with rifles and automatic weapons.” “Are you sure they’d even bother us? Maybe they’ll just surrender and be happy to get back to The World.” “That’s not going to happen.” “Really? Why not?” “Because they’ll know they can’t come back. They’ll try to sneak in and raid us for food, guns, and women.” She drove off at her usual breakneck pace through the nearly deserted streets of Rockport. Sharon said, “You keep saying Bethany’s on your list but you can’t do anything about her. Why not?” “We started out with maybe half the Marines we needed because we couldn’t get the rest here in time. You don’t need to know the exact number of Marines, but it’s in the hundreds, not thousands.” “Four hundred, to be exact,” Sharon said. “Tracy mentioned the number earlier.” “Remind me to shoot you or hold one of those Men-InBlack memory eraser gadgets in front of your face,” Anna said. “Actually, it’s no huge secret. Add a hundred local police from the surrounding towns and another hundred or so volunteers with military or police experience. Plus, most of the biologists have military backgrounds, which is why we chose them, so that’s another dozen or so.” “That sounds like a lot.” Anna shook her head. “Not when you need to defend thirty-five miles of perimeter. We dropped that to thirty miles by giving up the farmland north of the expressway and the forest preserve, but that’s going to bite us because the convicts will go through and loot empty farms, then pick off the farmers one at a time.” “So they get stronger and you get weaker,” Sharon said. “Unless we get the guns and the farmers back to Rockport, that’s exactly what will happen. Problem is, the farmers who stayed are the stubborn ones. Either we bring them in at 78

Exchange gunpoint, which takes people we don’t have, or we leave them out there until the convicts get them.” Sharon stared up at the hill overlooking Rockport. “You have enough people to build yourself quite a little fortress up there—fences, solar panels, and buildings.” Anna nodded. “We put it on the front burner when we found out the convicts were still around. Half the town isn’t defendable if someone else owns that hill.” They drove the Exchange perimeter, past work details doing hard physical labor under the hot sun. For the most part, the volunteers surveyed the burned-out zone encircling the southern part of the Exchange area, collecting insects or pulling up plants for analysis. Sharon was suddenly thankful to be rattling around in a jeep with a wild driver. As she rode, Sharon saw tanker trucks spraying herbicides and insecticides along the boundary of the EZ. “To keep the sides from encroaching on each other,” was all Anna said. Workers near the Exchange Zone wore surgical gloves and air filters; even with the air blowing through the jeep, Sharon’s eyes stung from the chemicals. A group of workers turned and gawked as they drove past. One of them pointed at the jeep and yelled, “We’ve got unfinished business.” Fred growled. Sharon looked back. “Was that—” “The AKs who were hassling you?” Anna nodded. “Yep. They’ve probably worked harder in the last few days than they’ve ever worked in their lives. I’m not sensing much gratitude.” Sharon tried to relax and enjoy the ride. The breeze kept her cool in spite of the sun and she was reasonably comfortable until Anna drove out of Rockport. There were no roads along the perimeter in this section, so Anna headed cross-country. The constant jarring brought back Sharon’s headache. Once she swallowed a bug and gagged as she coughed the taste out of her mouth. A little later a grasshopper-sized bat thumped against the side of her head and clung to her hair, partly blocking her vision. Fred grabbed it and popped it into his mouth before she could react. She glanced over at Anna. “That was—” “I saw it. We’re at the edge of the defense zone. The freeway’s not far ahead.” 79

Dale R. Cozort Sharon could see the freeway now. Its four lanes ended abruptly at the Exchange line, with a grove of trees just over the line. Several of the trees were scarred by truncated limbs and halfsheared trunks, mutilated during the Exchange. Anna asked, “Have you noticed how often we’ve seen amber wolf packs on the other side of the fence or heard them howl?” Sharon stretched her arms and legs. “How often?” “Too often. They may be tracking us.” “Why does it matter?” Sharon asked. Anna said, “Biologists will be interested. There are a lot of subtle interactions here. Most of the plant eaters respond to each other’s alarm calls. And we’ve noticed that groups of mammoths are always with a group of the little monkeys, though not vice versa.” “Why would that happen?” “It makes sense. Their diets don’t overlap. Mammoths have a great sense of smell and mediocre eyesight. Monkeys are just the opposite. They’d each be good at spotting enemies the other species might miss. Plus the monkeys help keep the vampire birds away.” “Vampire birds?” Sharon laughed. “That’s a myth.” “Nope,” Anna said. “They’re around. Tiny things, not much bigger than a bee. Think of them as the bird equivalent of a mosquito. They usually stay away from people—probably don’t like being slapped at.” Sharon heard a truck engine and saw a pickup truck racing along the other side of the perimeter fence. “What is that truck— ” “Doing on the other side of the fence?” Anna finished. “I don’t know. I’ve been tracking it for a while.” The truck stopped and someone in it waved something white on the end of a stick. Anna eased the jeep closer. “I’m not liking this.” A man opened the passenger-side door and yelled, “How you doing, Sharon Mack?” Sam Kittle? This day is going from bad to nightmarish. “Not bad,” she said. “What are you doing here?” 80

Exchange Sam grinned. “I just thought I’d say hi to my old highschool girlfriend.” “You’re talking to the wrong person then.” Sam’s face took on an expression of mock horror. “You mean that kiss didn’t mean anything to you?” He laughed. “Come on over so we don’t have to shout at each other.” Anna looked around. “This is not a good place for an ambush. Keep on your toes though.” She inched the jeep forward until they were within twenty yards of the convict’s truck. Sharon glared over at Sam. “Bear Country ages people in a hurry. You’d pass for ten years older than me and you’re not even thirty.” “Yeah, it does age a person a bit, just being out in the sun so much. On the other hand, you can shoot someone if they’re coming at you with a spear and no one asks hard questions about whether or not it was self-defense.” “If you’re talking about that convict, it was self-defense,” Sharon said. “He was going to—” “I know what he was going to do. Plus he was an AK. Shooting AKs is always a good thing,” Sam said. “Back in The World, though, you would have had a ton of explaining to do. You would have been tied up with the police and the courts for months. Why don’t you come out of that law-riddled little world and try mine for a while?” “Why don’t you go back and get yourself a nice book contract, then sit in the air-conditioning with an ice-cold drink that you know isn’t going to give you stomach rot while you write the book?” Sharon asked. “That’s what I would do.” “That’s you. You never did have much sense of adventure. I found that out after that first kiss. I might be tempted to do the book thing. Then again I might not. The thing is, it can’t happen: I can’t go back. That’s okay. Over there a man can dream big dreams, but they stay dreams. Over here, who knows?” “Big dreams get people killed.” Sam grinned at Sharon. “That happens. And sometimes you just sacrifice a few pawns. We’ll see how things play out.” Anna asked, “Whose truck is that?”

81

Dale R. Cozort “Borrowed from Sister West’s people. Just decided to drive by and see how Rockport’s doing. We haven’t been introduced. I’m—” “Sam Kittle. I know.” “And you must be Anna Morgan. Do you know you have a monkey in the back of your jeep?” “Yep,” Anna said. “Speaking of Sister West…Have you seen her people? We think they want to go native.” “Not in our neck of the woods,” Sam said. “Actually, the women are welcome; the men aren’t.” “You’re driving one of their trucks. Are you already making them feel unwelcome?” “A little bit,” Sam said. He smiled at Anna. “Sister West and company are building themselves quite a little complex out in Bear Country. Isn’t that illegal? Maybe you ought to send the Marines out there and bring them in. You can leave the women and the stuff.” “They’re not at the top of my to-do list,” Anna said. “If they’re stupid enough to go out there and starve to death, I guess they’ll just have to do it.” Sam gave Anna the same look of mock horror he’d given Sharon. “You’re not going to go out and round them up? If I paid taxes, I’d feel so betrayed. Oh well, it was worth a shot. Guess we’ll have to get the women on our own.” He fingered his beard in a gesture Sharon remembered from high school. “Is Summit Foods still there?” Sharon nodded. “Yep. They didn’t fold after they fired you. I know that comes as a shock.” “I may have to do something about that.” Anna said, “You would have to go through a lot of Marines. Besides, the building is probably insured.” “I wonder if their insurance covers acts of war?” Sam said. Sharon said, “The way I heard it, Summit gave you a chance when you didn’t deserve it, and fired you three months later when you did deserve it.” “That’s not the way I remember it.” Sharon grinned. “I don’t imagine it is. Miss the brownie mix?” 82

Exchange “Oh God, brownies.” Sam grinned at Anna. “Summit’s a food packaging plant. When I worked there, they packaged brownie mix. I’d walk in the door and smell it. I gained ten pounds just from the smell. Right now I’d face one of those monster bears for a batch of brownies. Yeah, it might be a waste to just gut the building. I mean there’s brownie mix in there, and all of those vending machines with cigarettes and pop. I may want to get all of that stuff out first.” “I doubt if you’ll have to make that call,” Anna said “You might be surprised,” Sam said. “You know, if the Marines just stood aside and let me at Summit Foods I might be able to get my guys to leave everyone else in Rockport alone.” Anna shook her head. “Sorry.” “Not a problem.” Sam glanced at his watch. “I can’t stay. Don’t want anybody crashing our little conversation.” Sharon said, “Are you sure you don’t want to think about that book deal? You may have the fanciest mud hut in Bear Country, but it still won’t have indoor plumbing.” Sam grinned. “Power and revenge on the one hand, toilet paper, pop, and TV on the other. I’ll have to sleep on that one. Here’s an idea back at you, Sharon. I’ve worked with a lot of men in Rockport. I like them. I like you. You’re mostly good, honest, hard-working people. Stay in Bear Country with us and we’ll treat you just like everybody else. We’ll help you make a new life over here. Or you can stay in Rockport and get caught in the middle of a war. Your choice. But I think bad things are going to happen in Rockport in the next week or two. You really should get out before that happens. Think about it. Spread the word back in town.” He got back in the truck and it headed away from the fence, deeper into Bear Country. Sharon turned on Anna. “You’re just going to let him drive away? I thought you were just stalling, had a plan to take him in. He’s major trouble—very smart, very ruthless. I think he has military experience too.” “Marine sergeant before they booted him out. I know what he is,” Anna said. “Who he is. That’s why I let him talk—stalling— long enough to get a drone over here to follow him home. There’s maybe a fifty-fifty chance of that happening.” 83

Dale R. Cozort “Make that pretty close to zero.” Sharon pointed across the freeway where columns of smoke were rising from three points on the horizon. The sound of distant gunshots reached them, and Anna picked up her radio. “Cons hitting the farms north of the freeway.”

84

Exchange

Chapter Eleven Anna turned the jeep around. “The Marines lost contact with another helicopter,” she said. “Now, we have fires the convicts didn’t need to set. I smell diversion.” She smacked the steering wheel. “But where else will they hit us?” Sharon asked, “Rockport? They may try to grab the civilian workers along the Exchange line as hostages.” Anna nodded. “That’s covered, but I’ll pull the workers back to keep them out of any firefights.” Sharon said, “You have to bring the farmers and their guns in.” “I know. But what are the convicts planning to do when I do that?” Anna raced back to Rockport, talking into her radio, turning her head constantly to check for threats. Sharon, braced against the erratic bouncing of the jeep, stared out the window all the way back to Rockport. When they reached town, she told Anna, “I know you have to balance all the lives you’re responsible for against each other; I’m glad that’s not my job. The thing is, it isn’t my job. My job is getting one little girl back safely. She’s about to be caught in a war between convicts and nutcases. That can’t happen. If you aren’t going to do anything about it, I will.” “So what would you do?” “I don’t know,” Sharon said. “Maybe talk to Leo West. He said he would put in a good word for me with the elders.” Anna turned away. “Good luck getting there.” “The thing is, I’m done being useful here.” 85

Dale R. Cozort “We are under martial law,” Anna said. “But actually...I think I am done with you for a while. I’ll drop you and your monkey off at your house.” She handed Sharon a radio. “Keep this with you and on.” Sharon spent the rest of the afternoon at her house. She packed a few clothes in a backpack and busied herself filling water bottles while hoping that Anna or Tracy would call. Finally, restless, she got up to pace the street instead of the few feet in her living room. Tracy came up the walk as Sharon and Fred went out the door. Tracy said, “Sorry about Anna.” “I’m getting used to it,” Sharon said. “She’s a tad busy. Was there an attack? I didn’t hear gunshots.” “Nothing so far. It’s coming though. You can feel it building. We’re trying to cut off the guys that attacked the farmhouse. So far, nothing on that either.” Sharon kept walking, and Tracy fell in beside her. “I’m glad you’re here, but what are you doing here?” “I’m taking a break so I don’t go totally off the rails.” Tracy studied Sharon’s face. “Any plans for when it’s over?” Sharon shrugged. “Get on with my life, I guess.” “Can you do that with your ex-husband running around?” “I don’t know. I doubt it. I doubt if he’ll let me,” Sharon said. “Doubt if I can just let him run around after what he did to me, even if he did leave me alone from now on.” “Why don’t you leave when the Exchange ends—get out of Rockport? Get as far away from him as you can. Try to forget him.” “Before the Exchange I might have,” Sharon said. “Since then he’s stolen my daughter twice, hit me over the head with a whiskey bottle, pointed a gun at me and twice he left me tied up where I could’ve died. He has a tab to settle. Then maybe I can figure out what I want to do with the rest of my life.” Tracy nodded. “Let’s walk for a while.” Sharon and Tracy paced the streets of Rockport for the next half hour or so, with Fred exploring the town around them while carefully keeping them in sight. The cloudless summer evening would have been pleasant under more normal circumstances. They saw no signs of convict activity, but Sharon 86

Exchange felt eyes following them, watching. The waning sun left one side of the street in deep shadows, while glaring off the windshields of the scattered cars on the sunlit side. The town was silent, silent in a way that jarred Sharon more than the silence of Bear Country had. The constant familiar background noises of TVs, cars, computers, and conversation were all missing. Her footsteps and Tracy’s echoed stridently through the silence. They ended up in an elaborate playground with a wooden castle, a swing set, and bars for children to swing on. They watched a couple of pre-teen girls do acrobatics on a bar near the swing set. The girls played to their unexpected audience. Tracy said, “I’m surprised their parents let these kids out. Too bad we didn’t get them evacuated. They’re going to have a hard time in quarantine.” Fred suddenly bristled and ran back to Sharon. She glanced down at the monkey. “You didn’t like that word either, did you? That’s right. We have two weeks of quarantine to look forward to when we get back.” Tracy said, “Sorry, but its four weeks.” Sharon sighed. “Fun. By the way, how’s Mr. Tooth?” “Fine. I think his pack is still tracking us.” “Inside Rockport? That’s scary,” Sharon said. “You’re probably right though.” She pointed to the playground. A young monkey, barely more than an infant, tottered out to where the girls were and swung on the bar with them. The three played together for a minute before an adult monkey came out from under the castle and collected the young one. Tracy smiled. “That’s a side of them I haven’t seen before. I hope they get back where they belong before the Exchange ends.” Sharon said, “Maybe those monkeys just want to get Mr. Tooth back and go home. We should let them.” “I wish it was that simple,” Tracy said. “Home for them is probably mostly in the little fragment of Bear Country that’s taking our place back in The World.” “There’s plenty of Bear Country just outside Rockport.” Tracy said, “Yes, but it belongs to other packs of monkeys, and this pack would have to fight for any of that territory they tried to use. You saw how they went after Fred.” 87

Dale R. Cozort “It was almost like a war,” Sharon said. “That’s it exactly. This pack doesn’t have a home over here—at least not enough to support themselves.” “I think I understand,” Sharon said. “And unfortunately, home for them is now mostly an insecticide-and-herbicideblasted ruin courtesy of your people back in the world.” “That was the plan anyway,” Tracy said. They walked back to Sharon’s house. Tracy said, “Duty calls. Can you promise to let us handle Bethany?” Sharon frowned. “I’m sorry. I can’t just sit here and hope someone gets around to rescuing her. Give me a firm time within the next six hours when you’ll have her back, and I might wait. On the to-do list doesn’t do it for me anymore.” Tracy hugged her. “Do what you have to then, but if you’re going to go back out into Bear Country, at least wait until morning. I’ll try to get you any help I can.” “You don’t understand,” Sharon said. “She’s with Anthony. She’s in real danger from that alone if he gets drunk and I’m not there to protect her. Then there are the convicts. If they attack Sister West, she’ll be right in the middle.” “I’ll do what I can to help. We’re on your side.” Tracy handed Sharon a pistol and a package of ammunition. “You didn’t get this from me. Don’t do anything stupid, but if you do go out there this may help a little.” “Thanks.” “I’m serious about the ‘don’t do anything stupid’ bit. A pistol won’t stop one of those bears or a pack of monkeys or a big enough bunch of cons. Getting yourself killed won’t help your daughter.” “I know. But it’s my fault. She’s out there because I was stupid,” Sharon said. “I should have found some way to take care of Anthony permanently and I didn’t. I can’t leave her there.” “I know you can’t. Just let us handle it.” Tracy drove off. Sharon walked back toward her house, with Fred trailing her. She saw movement in the front yard of a house near hers and wandered over. Elroy Campbell stood precariously on a ladder, pruning branches from a tree in his immaculate yard. His wheelchair sat at the bottom of the ladder, a shotgun leaning against it. The old man smiled down at Sharon. 88

Exchange “Sharon Mack. I figured the bears got you.” Sharon grinned. “Not even close, Elroy. Did you find the dog?” “Not a hair. You didn’t find your daughter, did you?” The smile faded. “Not yet.” “I didn’t figure anything short of getting eaten would stop you,” Elroy said. “You lost my gun.” “In a flash flood. Sorry.” “Get a chance to use it?” “Yeah.” Elroy climbed another step and leaned over to cut another branch. “Shoot something?” “Someone.” “Anthony, I hope?” “I wish. Horny escaped convict.” “Don’t worry about the pistol then. Get me another one when we get back if you feel like it. Are you okay about the guy you shot?” “Except when I think about it.” “Yeah. You know there’s a monkey following you?” “He decided I’m his mommy.” “Sounds like you’ll have a story or two to tell when you get back.” Elroy turned back to his pruning. “Oh, people were poking around your house while you were gone.” Sharon moved to the ladder, rested her foot on the bottom rung. “Who?” “Nobody I know,” Elroy said. “A young man—not a teenager but young—came by and knocked on your door. Then a bunch of scruffy teenagers came by and prowled around. Gangbangers or trying to look like they were. They may have been trying to break in. I showed them the shotgun and they wandered off.” “Did they get into the house?” “I don’t think so.” “Thanks for chasing them off,” Sharon said. “What are you doing pruning trees in the middle of an Exchange?” “It needs doing. Branches are shading the solar panel for my ham radio rig. There’s no one else here to cut them.” “Who can you talk to over here anyway?” 89

Dale R. Cozort “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.” “Try me.” “Okay. I’ve chatted with folks out in Idaho a time or two.” “Since the Exchange?” “Yep. They’ve been in Bear Country over three years. They have a few stories to tell too.” Elroy paused. “But you wouldn’t believe most of them.” “Why not? I’ve been out there. I know how tough it is.” “Right. But I doubt you would buy the reason their town was burned to the ground.” “Again, try me.” “Not just yet. I’ll give you a chance to see a little more, understand life a little better.” “Well, okay. If you need anything, remember I’m just down the block,” Sharon said. The old man grinned. “And if you need anything, remember I’m just up the block.” He tottered down the ladder and dropped into his wheelchair as Sharon strode down the too quiet street to her house, fingering the gun in her pocket, wondering what she would find in her too quiet home.

90

Exchange

Chapter Twelve Sharon prowled restlessly around the house, searching for anything that might be useful in Bear Country. Fred watched, apparently fascinated, when she filled a glass with water from the faucet. He climbed into the kitchen sink and turned the water on and off. He took a gulp of water and then put his fingers over the faucet, spraying water on the surface of the sink. Sharon almost stopped him, but decided to watch as he played. She handed him a glass, and he filled it. He looked through the glass and water at Sharon, then at the door and the sink. “It’s all distorted, isn’t it?” Sharon said. Fred used both paws to get down from the sink and dropped the glass. It shattered, leaving glass fragments and water strewn across the kitchen floor. Fred picked up two of the larger fragments and tested their edges, then carried them back up the sink and chipped at them with the rock he’d been carrying, improving the edges and making them easier to handle. Sharon swept up the rest of the glass and water and put the glass in a wastebasket. She said, “You’re getting to be kind of highmaintenance, young man.” Fred handed her the larger of the two fragments; it fit neatly in her hand. “Well thanks, I think.” Sharon put the glass fragment on the counter to finish sweeping. Fred picked up the last few pieces of glass, putting them in the wastebasket. Sharon laughed. “That was nice. Why do you have to grow up and get dangerous on me?” Fred looked up at her, chirped, then froze. He seemed to be listening intently and his hair stood on end. Sharon didn’t hear anything. “What is it?” Fred went to a window and made his rattlesnake alarm call. Sharon rushed over. She saw a wheelchair lying on its side on the 91

Dale R. Cozort sidewalk, its top wheel still spinning. One arm stuck out from behind it, clutching a shotgun. Sharon got her pistol and ran out, with Fred following. His fur was still standing on end and the rattlesnake sound came continuously now. Sharon peered up and down the street. It appeared to be deserted. “Elroy? Are you okay?” The only response was a groan from behind the wheelchair. Sharon rushed over, warily keeping an eye on the street as she went. As she got to the chair, the figure behind it rose and suddenly the shotgun barrel was pressed against the underside of her jaw. A young man’s voice said, “Hand me the gun. No sudden moves.” Fred darted toward the man, but Sharon yelled “No!” and he stopped. Half a dozen men emerged from where they had been hiding in cars parked along the street. They were dressed identically in baggy pants and white wifebeater T-shirts and appeared to be in their late teens or early twenties. Three of them carried pistols and the rest carried long, lock-blade knives. Sharon recognized the rifle tattoos on their forearms: Aryan Kings. She forced down her fear and shock, and weighed the odds as calmly as she could. Almost no chance of breaking away. Shotgun would get me, and even if it didn’t, three more pistols. She handed her pistol to the man holding the shotgun. One of the men aimed his gun at Fred. Fred let out another rattle and disappeared under a hedge. The man shot twice, but missed wildly both times. Somebody said, “Okay, tie her up.” She recognized the scar-faced man who had taken her picture with his cell phone the day of the Exchange. He grinned down at her. “It took a while, but we got loose from the dirt-grubber detail and found you. You shouldn’t have messed with us, and you really shouldn’t have killed our brother.” “He gave me no choice!” He slapped her across the face. “Don’t raise your voice to me.” They tied her hands behind her back and marched her back to her house. As she walked, Sharon felt something sharp rub against her ankle. She glanced down and saw Fred’s sliver of glass protruding from the back of her shoe. He must have stuck it 92

Exchange there before he ran. She walked carefully the rest of the way into the house to avoid dislodging her only weapon. The men forced her into her living room. Sharon tried to push down the fear that welled up in her mind. Remember them. Remember their faces. Survive, then hunt them down. A tall AK with a lizard tattoo on one cheek said, “This can go easy or it can go hard. No, actually it’s going to go hard either way. But there is the kind of hard where we take your money and a lot of guys might be daddy if you end up knocked up. And then there’s the kind of hard where that happens plus we trash your house, we trash your face, and we put you in a wheelchair for the rest of your life.” Sharon didn’t say anything. She could feel her hands trembling, more from rage than fear, but she took a deep breath and tried to push both out of her mind. Wait for them to relax. Wait for the odds to get better. If they don’t, take as many with me as I can. If they try to tie my legs, I make my move and hope it’s over quickly. I’m sorry, Bethany. I wanted to be there for you. The radio Tracy had given her was on the kitchen counter, not more than three strides away, but totally useless as she stood with her hands tied and a shotgun at her neck. The AK with the lizard on his cheek seemed to be the leader. He said, “Here’s how it works. You keep telling us where the valuable stuff is. Money, credit cards, bank card pin numbers, car titles. As long as you keep that kind of stuff coming, we don’t trash your house and your face. If we end up happy, things don’t go quite as hard.” Sharon said, “I don’t have much, but what I have is in my purse.” Her voice came out without tremor, and the AK with the shotgun looked at her sharply. “The lady doesn’t sound all that scared. Maybe she needs a little fear boost.” He pushed the shotgun against her neck and fingered the trigger. “I give this a little tug and Boom! Your face is plastered on the ceiling.” He lowered the shotgun and fired it into her television, filling the living room with the roar of the shot and spraying glass over the carpeting. He reloaded and jammed the hot barrel against her neck again. When she leaned 93

Dale R. Cozort away, he shot out the computer monitor, then fired into the computer itself. Scarface found a hammer and slammed it down on a stack of videos. Finally Lizard Cheek said, “Okay, that’s just a little taste. Where’s the good stuff?” “All of the cash I’ve got is in my purse.” One of the AKs casually rifled through the purse and took out a small wad of money. “I think this is going to be one of those really hard ones.” Two of the AKs began tearing pages from Bethany’s books—and throwing them into the toilet. Another one ripped pictures from a photo album and fed them into a fire he lit in the sink. Sharon watched the destruction and used her growing anger to push everything out to the corners of her mind except a cold calculation of the odds against her. She let tears flow—all too genuine—and allowed herself to sag heavily against the arms holding her up. At the same time she brought her heel up and tugged the sliver of glass from her shoe. The AKs spread out through the house, smashing dishes, breaking windows, slashing cushions and mattresses, and feeding books and videos into the fire in the sink. Sharon worked the piece of glass against the rope around her wrists. The AK with the shotgun wandered away and smashed a light fixture with the gun barrel. Sharon carefully tracked the guns. The guy with the shotgun also had her pistol. Four with guns. The rope parted and Sharon eased her hands out of the loop. As she did that, the remaining AK realized her hands were free. He opened his mouth to yell and started to bring his pistol around. Sharon punched him in the Adam’s apple and stripped the pistol from his hand. The anger that had been building as she watched the destruction of her home flashed white hot, and she slammed her fist into the man’s groin. As he folded, she grabbed him behind the head and pulled him down as she drove her knee into his face. The punk by the light fixture turned—raising the shotgun. Sharon fired twice and he fell back into the shattered television. Sharon fired again, and the AK feeding pictures into the sink fire 94

Exchange fell headfirst into the counter, then sprawled on the floor with wisps of smoke rising from his hair. She fired yet again and Lizard Cheek fell. He reached for his fallen gun. Sharon kicked it away, then shot him again, but the hammer fell on an empty chamber. She kicked him in the face with the full force of her anger powering the kick. The man’s head snapped back and he went limp. Sharon faced the remaining three AKs in her shattered dining room. The men looked scared, and some of Sharon’s anger faded. She said, “Time to run now.” The scar-faced AK said, “Three of us with knives. One of you. More of us behind you and your gun is empty. We’re not afraid of you.” Sharon said, “Actually, you are afraid of me. Four of your friends are either dead or wishing they were. I don’t really want to kill or hurt anyone else tonight, but after what you did to my home, my things, I don’t really care much if I do.” The three AKs turned white and hastily dropped their knives on the table. Sharon said, “Now that I didn’t expect.” A calm voice behind her said, “It has something to do with the guy behind you pointing a shotgun at them.” She recognized the voice, but didn’t turn around. “Leo?” She tried to make his name come out matter-of-factly. It didn’t. She picked up the knives, careful not to get too close or get between Leo and the AKs. “Sorry. My place is a bit of a mess right now.” Leo said, “I stopped by earlier and you weren’t here, then I came back up and you were—” “Tied up,” Sharon finished. The fear and anger seeped away and suddenly Sharon found herself laughing and crying at the same time. Leo said, “I was watching for a chance to get you out of there but I didn’t see one. Then you kind of made it pointless. The Marines are on their way. I’m keeping half an eye on the four you spindled and mutilated until they get here.” “The four, are they—” Leo said, “You’d be better off not knowing. If you killed them, they richly deserved it. If they survive, then so be it. You don’t have blood on your hands.” 95

Dale R. Cozort The Marines arrived a few minutes later. They took the three AKs away. Medics came in and examined the injured or dead ones. Sharon said, “Let’s go outside. I don’t want to see this.” Tracy arrived few minutes later. She stared at the devastation inside the house, then came out and gave Sharon a hug. She glanced at Leo then at Sharon. “I see your point.” Sharon stared at her, puzzled. “What?” “Nothing important,” Tracy said. “Just commenting on your good taste. Are you okay?” “I’m fine. Not a scratch on me,” Sharon said. “Can you believe that? All of that and not a scratch on me. Not a bruise.” She laughed and then found she couldn’t stop. She abruptly sat in the grass and after a second or two, she had to put her head between her knees to fight off a flood of nausea. After it passed, she sat up. Tracy said, “I was wondering when you would realize what you just did. Are you crazy? You just went after seven guys with guns. What were you thinking?” “Only four of them had guns,” Sharon said. “I was thinking that they had to be planning to kill me because they weren’t hiding their faces and I might never get that good of a chance again.” “Honey, this isn’t Hollywood. It’s not a movie,” Tracy said. “Your chances of actually doing what you managed to do and not get yourself killed were so close to zero I don’t think you could tell the difference.” Sharon rubbed a tear off her cheek. “I figured I had nothing to lose. The choices were dying after they were through hurting me and humiliating me, or dying a few minutes earlier and maybe hurting one or two them enough that they wouldn’t be able to do anything to anybody else. When I started it felt right. I’ve been training for something like this for years, and when it happened it was like they were moving in slow motion. I always knew exactly what to do next.” Tracy said, “You’ll have to thank your martial arts instructor someday. A lot of folks with a hell of a lot of training freeze when they get into a real fight. Martial arts or no martial arts, though, don’t try anything like this again. Your chances of 96

Exchange getting out alive would be the same as this time, which means you almost certainly wouldn’t.” “Amen.” Leo stepped out of the shadows and stopped next to Tracy. “Listen to this nice lady.” “I promise to try to avoid taking on seven gangbangers barehanded in the future,” Sharon said. “Is old Elroy okay?” Leo said, “I found him tied up on his back porch. He had a few bruises, but he should be okay. Fred’s hanging around too, apparently just waiting for the excitement to calm down.” Sharon gazed at her house. The well-kept lawn seemed smaller than it had a few days ago. The frame house with its dark green siding seemed smaller and shabbier too. “I haven’t had many happy times here, but it was home.” “Was?” Tracy asked. “Are you going out to Bear Country to get your daughter or are you going out there to stay?” “It is home. I’m not going to let a bunch of gang wannabes change that.” Sharon marched back into the house, grabbed a broom, and cleaned until it got too dark to see what she was doing. Leo and Tracy helped. After a while, Fred came in and rambled through the wreckage collecting sharp objects. He kept a wary distance from Leo and his fur rose sharply whenever Leo came close to him. Finally Sharon slumped down on a couch with slashed cushions. Tracy and Leo sat beside her. Even in the dim light, Sharon could see how much of the devastation remained. The whole house reeked from the fire in the sink. Fred put a paw on her shoulder, and she held it in her hand. She smiled at the monkey. “I couldn’t have done it without your piece of glass.” The smile faded. Sharon leaned her head back on the top of the couch and her eyes filled with tears. “One more set of bad memories here. Nightmare memories. Things shouldn’t have that much power over you, but when I saw them ripping up Bethany’s books and burning our pictures, it was like they were taking the few good memories I had and turning them into—” “Don’t let them take the good memories away from you,” Leo said. “Don’t let them change those memories at all. The books and pictures aren’t really important. The memories of reading to your daughter and watching her grow up—those are 97

Dale R. Cozort important. They’ll get you through the tough times, and no one can take them away from you unless you let them.” “Can you get her back?” Sharon asked. “Anthony is just as bad in his own way as the AKs. Talk to your elders. Tell them she needs to be back with me.” “I’ve talked to them,” Leo said. “But so has Anthony. He’s a good talker. He knows all the right buttons to push. I’m here to take you to the elders so you can present your side.” Tracy said, “In my position, there are things I’m better off not hearing, things I don’t want to officially know. Good luck, Sharon. And be careful. Here’s a hint: What you did this evening was not being careful. You’ll need to watch what you do even more now. These guys weren’t all of the AKs. When what you did here gets around, it will humiliate the gang. The fact that they went after you instead of someone in the next block was probably random at first, but they’re targeting you now, and we don’t have enough Marines to help you. I wouldn’t advise staying here.” “They were targeting me this time,” Sharon said. “They heard about the guy I shot. But it doesn’t matter. I’m not going to get chased out of my own house.” “Remember what I said about being careful? If you stay here, you may be taking on a lot more than seven AKs. Think about it. Keep the radio. You won’t be able to use it if you go out in Bear Country far enough, but in town or close to it we may be able to pick you up. No more heroics, okay?” She picked up one last fallen couch cushion before walking to the door. “The world may be messed up, but the stars will be beautiful tonight.” After Tracy left, Sharon pushed herself up. “Let’s just go…head out now and get it over with.” “You don’t want to be in Bear Country after dark,” Leo said. “We can leave first thing in the morning.” “So what do we do tonight?” “Tracy gave me an idea. Have you ever really seen the stars? I mean seen them, out away from the lights on a clear night?” “I’ve looked up, seen the Big Dipper and wondered what the big deal was,” Sharon said. 98

Exchange “My dear, you either have no soul or you’ve never really seen the stars,” Leo said. “I think it’s time to figure out which. Find some warm clothes and come with me.” “It’s June.” Sharon said. “Why do I need warm clothes?” “It’s a clear night. The heat radiates off into space and it gets surprisingly cold outside,” Leo said. “At least bring a jacket.” He led her out to a pickup truck parked a block from her house. Fred tagged along, though he seemed nervous in the darkness. Leo drove a couple of blocks, to the middle of a large field with a baseball diamond and a playground. “We’ll have a good view from here, and nobody can sneak up on us.” He parked the truck and climbed into the back. “I have blankets if we need them. Now just climb in, lie back, and look up.” The darkness in the playground was more complete than anything Sharon had experienced. A sliver of moon hung from the sky. A few distant lights gave off a subtle glow, more conspicuous because of their small number. The houses ringing the playground were dark, the streetlights were dark. No car headlights lit up the surrounding streets. Sharon’s eyes took a couple of minutes to adjust to the darkness, then she climbed into the back of the truck and lay beside Leo. Their hands touched, and she left her hand where it was, enjoying the contact. Sharon got her first look at a dark night sky and gasped. It was full of stars, with the stars floating in an enormous, dark space that dwarfed even their numbers. The Big Dipper was no longer a faint outline; it was an overwhelming presence. Leo said, “You’ve lived your life with light pollution hiding the real sky from you. Now most of that pollution is gone.” Fred chirped beside Sharon. She smiled at him. “You can probably see the stars as well as I can. Do you stare up at those little pinpoints of light? Do you wonder what they are? Does your mind turn them into shapes like our minds do?” The monkey chirped again. Sharon said, “I think he actually does look up there. I think he wonders. I wish I could get inside his head and see what he’s thinking.” “If any animal is capable of seeing the stars and wondering what they are, it would be Fred and his buddies.”

99

Dale R. Cozort “I wonder where they’re going, what they’re going to become,” Sharon said. “Will Bear Country be their world the way we’ve made The World ours?” “That’s hard to predict,’’ Leo said. “It’s in God’s hands. Listen. Do you hear anything?” Sharon listened. She heard a faint, distant hum of diesel generators and the rustle of wind through the trees. “Nothing out of place.” “There’s a constant man-made sea of noise around us back in The World. Computer hums, traffic noises, train whistles, televisions blaring, music playing, and people talking. Take that away and people either get restless or find it restful, relaxing.” “I think I could get used to it.” “This isn’t really a dark night sky. From a distance you would still see a glow from Rockport, even with just a few emergency lights going.” A faint breeze stirred. Sharon felt the tension from the events of the evening ebb. She moved closer to Leo and put her head on his chest, feeling the hard muscles beneath his shirt. His arm went around her and pulled her close. She smelled a faint, pleasant mix of cologne and perspiration. She stared up at him, at his faint outline in the darkness, and she remembered their night in the truck. He’s taken. The unwelcome thought kept her from moving closer, and another thought pushed its unwelcome way into the center of her mind. She tried to ignore it, but it grew stronger and she felt the tension welling back up. “Something wrong?” Leo asked. “I don’t know. Just something odd.” “What?” “Nothing important,” Sharon said. “Okay.” She could feel Leo withdraw. “How did you know I named the monkey Fred?” Sharon asked. “Did you tell me?” “No. You used the name before I could have,” Sharon said. “How did you even know there was a monkey hanging around me?” Leo pulled away and sat up. “Wow, that is a mystery, isn’t it? How could I have known what you called him? How could I 100

Exchange have even known he existed? Another mystery. Maybe another lie.” “You could just tell me.” That came out sounding angrier than Sharon intended it to. She sat up and quickly added, “I’ve trusted too many of the wrong guys. I don’t care how you knew. I just don’t want more mysteries and secrets between us.” “I understand,” Leo said. He squeezed her fingers. “I wish I could tell you all my secrets, but they’re not mine to tell. Some mysteries will have to stay unsolved for a while.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry.” Silence grew between them as they sat. Finally Sharon lay back down. Leo followed suit a couple of seconds later. Sharon gazed up at the stars again and tried to relax. Leo said, “I see something odd up there. It’s moving too fast to be a star or even a planet.” “Is it a plane?” “There shouldn’t be anything flying over here at night,” Leo said. “I think it’s a satellite.” “What’s odd about—oh. That is odd. Most of the sky is from Bear Country,” Sharon said. “Does the Exchange go up into space too? Maybe it got trapped in this Exchange or maybe another one.” “Exchanges don’t go high enough to trap a satellite. The Exchange area is a sphere. This one is about as big as they get, and it would reach up about four miles at its highest point. Satellites are at least a hundred miles up. If what we’re seeing is a satellite, somebody deliberately launched it into Bear Country, and it has to be either recent or classified. Otherwise I’d have heard about it.” “So you don’t have all of the answers about Bear Country either,” Sharon said. “Do you think Tracy knew about the satellite?” Leo said, “Probably. It’s there to be seen. You just have to look up and understand what you’re looking at.” “So she told us to look up,” Sharon said. “Why did she think it mattered to us?” “Maybe she just wanted you out of the house tonight,” Leo said. 101

Dale R. Cozort “Enough mysteries. I don’t care. I just realized that I haven’t thanked you for coming in and stopping me from killing the other three creeps.” “You mean the three with knives you were going to tackle—with your bare hands?” Leo chuckled. “So thank me.” “Thanks.” Sharon reached out and shook his hand. “That’s nice,” Leo said. “Of course I got more thanks than that for stranding you out in Bear Country.” “Okay.” Sharon leaned over and kissed him on the lips. The kiss lingered, but before it could grow passionate, Fred growled softly. Sharon pulled away. “Does he not like us kissing? He’s acting more like a kid all the time.” “I don’t think that’s it,” Leo said. A gunshot rang out and echoed through the empty streets. Fred’s growl got louder. He climbed to the top of the truck cab and made his rattlesnake sound. Leo snapped, “That was a shotgun. Get in the truck! Now!” Sharon scrambled into the cab. “What is it? Is somebody coming? What’s going on?” Fred pulled himself through her open window and bounced from her lap to the seat between her and Leo. “The shot was from the direction of your house,” Leo said. “I’m afraid I can guess what’s happening.” They came back to finish the job.

102

Exchange

Chapter Thirteen Sharon stared through the windshield and willed the truck to go faster. By the time they pulled up in front of her house, flames were shooting from it in three places. Elroy sat in his wheelchair on the sidewalk, his shotgun pointed toward the house. He said, “They ran off when I shot at them, but they started fires. There are buckets in my house, and I’ll get a garden hose going.” As Sharon and Leo ran to get the buckets, Leo said, “I smell gasoline.” The gas made the fire stubborn. Sharon and Leo slowed it down, but the blaze was still clinging to life when fire trucks came and put out the remaining hot spots. When the fire was out, Sharon sat down heavily on the curb in front of her house. Elroy peered down at her. “I heard you whipped seven of them barehanded. I didn’t know you had it in you.” Sharon got up and gave the old man a kiss on the forehead. “Thanks for keeping an eye on my house. I only whipped four. Leo came in and saved the other three.” “I saved them?” Leo walked up. “I seem to remember them having knives and you having an empty gun.” “You saved them.” “I believe you did save them,” Elroy said. “And I’m calling it seven. Any time the house needs watching, I’ll be there.” “You’ll need to really watch out from now on. Tracy warned me—the AKs would want to get back at me,” Sharon said. “But what else could I have done? Cower in front of them? Let them kill me? They gave me no choice.” 103

Dale R. Cozort Leo put his hand on her shoulder. “You did what you had to do,” he said. Sharon stared at the fire damage to her home. “They’ll come back and try to finish it, won’t they?” “Probably, unless the Marines catch them,” Leo said. “But I wouldn’t count on that. They would have burned the house down this time if they’d known how to use the gasoline.” “It’s my fault.” Sharon got up and stumbled toward the fire-blackened remnants of her life. “If I hadn’t been here they would have probably walked past the house, just like they walked past all the other houses on the block. I should have found a way to leave and take Bethany with me. We’d both be safe back in The World. The house would still be there when Rockport came back. If they burn it down, how am I going to tell Bethany that all of her little treasures are gone? How can I tell her that her books were shredded and thrown in the toilet, that everything else she owned was burned? All of her clothes are in there. All of the pictures she drew. All the songs she recorded and all the videos of her growing up—” “You couldn’t have gotten her out,” Leo said. “Losing stuff is bad, but you’re okay. We just have to go on from here.” Tracy and Anna didn’t check in, but a jeepload of Marines cruised by the house on a regular basis after the fires were out. Sharon found a flashlight. She dug up her vital papers and a small selection of Bethany’s things by the dim light and crammed them into a fireproof lockbox Elroy gave her. She packed bags for herself and Bethany. Leo said, “The convicts are better armed now, so they’re a real threat to a single truck and two people. Our best bet is to leave a little before dawn, head north, and get to the Bear Country border at dawn. Hopefully we can get to Sister West’s compound before the convicts wake up.” “How will we get past the Marines?” Sharon asked. “I have a story that got me in,” Leo said. “It should get us back out.” Sharon finished packing and prowled around the house. The flashlight slowly dimmed as she worked. Leo tried to help, but Sharon said, “There’s nothing you can do. Sleep if you can.” 104

Exchange Within minutes, the flashlight grew too dim to use. Sharon used the remaining power to reach the living room. Fred and Leo sat at opposite ends of the couch. “You two getting to be friends?” “We’re making a little progress,” Leo said. “At least he doesn’t growl whenever I move anymore.” Sharon sat between them and turned off the flashlight to conserve any remaining battery power. The room went dark, darker even than the playground had been. She couldn’t see any hint of Leo sitting less than a foot away. “Why doesn’t Fred like you?” “I don’t know. Jealous maybe. You’re his mommy now.” Sharon laid her head against the back of the couch and tried to sleep. She was sleepy enough, but the smell from the fires filled the air and made it impossible to push the events of the evening out of her mind. She kept her pistol close at hand and listened carefully for any reaction from Fred. The digits on her watch changed at an agonizing crawl. Sharon heard Leo’s breath fall into the steady pattern of sleep. She reached out and laid her hand on his chest. He reached up and grasped her fingers, apparently without waking up. What are you really up to? Why all the mysteries big and small? And do I really care about any of that? With her hand in Leo’s, Sharon finally slept. A few hours later, Sharon watched the slight glow in the early morning sky from Rockport’s lights dwindle as they drove along a gravel road north of the freeway. She brushed tears from her eyes and peeked over at Leo. It was too dark for Sharon to see the expression on his face. What does he feel about me? Anything? Can he tell how I feel when I touch him? Fred perched on the back of Sharon’s seat and gently brushed his fingers through her hair. She glanced back at the monkey and smiled. I suppose I should be creeped out, but it feels good. Her smile faded as she saw flames rising from farms to the east of them, and clouds of smoke blotted out the stars in that direction. 105

Dale R. Cozort The bouncing of the truck somehow kept moving her closer to Leo. The stress of the last twenty-four hours finally caught up with her and she dozed. When Sharon woke, her head rested on Leo’s shoulder. She sat up and said, “It’s been too long. When the flash flood hit I should have found a way across the river and just kept going. Once I got back to Rockport, I just kept hoping Anna would take care of finding Bethany. I waited too long.” “You wouldn’t have made it a mile on foot with no weapons,” Leo said. “If the animals didn’t get you the convicts would have. Then you wouldn’t have had a lot of choices.” She nodded. “I know, but I should have found a way.” Her head drifted back down onto his shoulder and she dozed again. She slept restlessly as the truck bounced her around, waking up several times, but not completely enough to organize her thoughts. She finally woke again to the sound of distant gunfire. Leo glanced down at her. “It sounds like some farmer is putting up a fight.” “Should we help?” Leo hesitated, then shook his head. “There probably isn’t much we could do against a big gang of convicts. I might try if was just me, but you have a daughter to rescue.” “What happened to the other pickup truck?” “The one with the solar panels in it?” Leo shrugged. “That one’s probably smashed to a twisted hunk of metal, along with the solar panels.” “So you’re short some electricity,” Sharon said. “I never got a chance to ask: what happened after we got separated?” Leo jerked the steering wheel and barely avoided a stump almost hidden in the tall grass. “I’m not sure. I got hit by a piece of debris and was operating on instinct for quite a while. The current washed me a long way downstream and to the opposite bank. By the time I got back to where the flood hit us, you were gone. Sister West got worried and sent a search party. They found me but we couldn’t find a way across the river; it was still too wild. We could see from the tire tracks that someone found you. So I went back and tried to get the elders to send your daughter back to you.” “How did you end up at my house?” Sharon asked. 106

Exchange “I decided to see if you would come and argue your case to the elders,” Leo said. “Our scouts found a ford I could use once the river settled down.” “You came alone?” “It didn’t start out that way,” he said. “Sister West sent an escort. I sent them back. Too much work to do there. And so here you are. It’s up to you as to what happens to your daughter. I’ve pushed as hard as I can. From now on I’ll have to stay out of it.” They reached the end of the road, and Leo reduced his speed. “We scouted out the route back. Hopefully I know about all the trees, boulder and washouts, but no guarantees. If we hit any of those things, or even a deer-sized animal, we could be stranded here. Keep an eye out.” He stopped the truck briefly as they reached the crest of a hill. Sharon glanced at her watch. It was nearly five in the morning. The sun still stood low in the eastern sky, reflecting spectacularly off clouds. Sharon gazed across an area of scattered trees and tall grass that stretched as far as she could see through her binoculars. A herd of mammoths grazed near a grove of trees—troops of green monkeys wandered among them. Monkeys climbed on the mammoths and foraged along their backs, picking and eating insects from the mammoths’ hair. Sharon said, “I wonder if they know we’re up here.” “The convicts?” “Well, them too,” Sharon said. “But I was thinking about the monkeys down there. And the mammoths.” “Hopefully not our problem,” Leo said. “Just cross your fingers that they don’t get curious or decide we’re a threat or get stampeded by something. There are enough convicts around that a gunshot could carry if the wind was just right. That would blow our element of surprise, assuming it wasn’t already gone from the start.” They drove on in silence for a while, with the truck jolting over the roadless savannah. Leo said, “We’re following an animal trail. That’s how a lot of roads got started back in The World. I just hope we don’t meet the animal.” “I’m seeing a lot of amber wolves,” Sharon said Leo nodded. “A lot of howling too. No convicts though.” 107

Dale R. Cozort “Not that I can spot. I’ve been watching.” “You don’t sound too confident of that,” Leo said. “I’m not. There are too many places to hide out there.” Sharon checked the odometer. They had covered twelve miles in the hour since they entered Bear Country. The next hour of their trip was uneventful, almost ominously so. As they drove deeper into Bear Country, animals became scarce and wary. She caught a quick glimpse of a fleeing rabbit, nothing else. Fred seemed to notice the lack of animals too. He stopped chirping and nervously stared through the window as they drove. Leo glanced at Fred. “Something is getting him more and more spooked. Sure there’s nothing coming our way?” “No, I’m not,” Sharon said. “There aren’t many things that will spook one of these monkeys.” As the truck drove on, Sharon watched Fred. The monkey got increasingly jittery, moving closer to Sharon and tightening his grip on the piece of glass he still carried. Sharon shook her head. “What’s the matter? What’s coming at us?” She tried to follow the monkey’s gaze, but all she saw was a couple of large dying trees with a circle of bare dirt extending away from them for a dozen or more yards in all directions. A monstrously large, deep rustling—like leaves tumbling in the wind, only magnified several hundred times—crackled in the morning air as the truck got closer to the trees. Sharon recognized the trees and felt blood drain from her face. “Pollinator bats! A big colony of them in those trees! I saw them attack a surveyor.” Leo immediately stopped the truck. “Make sure your window’s up.” The trees erupted with a huge mass of bumblebeesized yellow and black bodies. The bats circled the trees. Leo shut the engine off. He whispered, “Be very quiet and don’t move unless you have to. They haven’t decided we’re a threat yet. If they do, they’ll swarm out, ready to bite anything that moves. Those yellow and black stripes mean they’ll be poisonous.”

108

Exchange The three of them froze, their breathing loud in the truck’s cab. Fred pressed against Sharon’s side. Sharon found her hand gripping Leo’s knee. “Leo, there’s one coming this w—” “I see it.” A bat fluttered at her window. She forced herself to breath. The bat landed and crawled to the top of the window, Its tiny eyes glared at her as its paws explored the seal at the top of the door. “Leo!”

109

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Fourteen The bat on the window flew off and the menacing yellow and black forms of the others continued to circle their nest in the trees. Sharon whispered, “What are we so afraid of? They can’t get in. All we have to do is keep driving.” Leo whispered back, “I’m not a hundred percent sure they can’t get in. And once they attack they’ll keep attacking. If the truck stalled we would be in a world of hurt. Wait. They’ll settle down, and then we can drive away.” Sharon tried to relax as the bats continued to circle. The front of the truck was in the area of bare dirt. Sharon peered out at the ground. A few stunted plants grew in the fringe of the circle, but a few yards farther away from the trees the savannah resumed its normal exuberant growth. “I wonder what caused the bare spot.” “Fire?” Sharon studied the ground more closely. “No sign of fire. Plants will grow in a little patch of soil in a rock, but not here. Why? What’s keeping them from growing?” Leo stared out. “I don’t know. A chemical in the soil or lack of nutrients? Something toxic in the air?” Sharon said, “I think we need to get out of here, bats or no bats.” Leo nodded. “I’ll just ease the truck back a few yards.” He started the truck, put it in reverse and pressed the accelerator, gently at first and then more firmly. “I’m not sure what’s going on but the truck isn’t moving.” He pressed the accelerator harder. The front tires began spinning, but the rear ones gradually pulled the truck back. The bats became increasingly agitated as the engine roared. Just as the truck pulled free from whatever 110

Exchange held it, they attacked. Bats thudded and fluttered against the windshield and the side windows. Leo turned the truck and drove it almost blindly away from the nest, with tiny winged bodies filling the windshield. Yellow and black bodies hit the glass and slid down it, either stunned or dead. The truck surged forward as Leo tried to outrun the swarm. It jolted across the rough terrain. Sharon glanced at the speedometer. In spite of the jolting and the sensation of speed, they were only going a little over twenty-five miles an hour. That was fast enough though, and the bats gradually fell behind and turned back. Sharon took a deep breath and let it out. “That was way too close.” She glanced up at Fred. His hair was still on end. His growl grew louder. She followed his gaze. A black and yellow bat the size of her thumb sat on the toe of her boot. It tried to bite the thick leather, then crawled a few inches up toward the leg of her pants and tried again. The leather stopped it. It crawled higher. Sharon reached cautiously down just below her knee and pulled the leg of her pants tight against her boot. She said, “Leo. Got a problem here.” “I see it.” Fred growled louder, then eased down from the seat back onto Sharon’s lap. His hand shot out and the bat disappeared into his mouth. Sharon glanced at the monkey and then at Leo. “Did you see that? Will he be okay?” “I hope so. His digestive system should be able to break down the nasty stuff,” Leo said. “They’re smart enough not to eat anything that would hurt them.” Sharon hugged Fred and said, “Thank you.” She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the seat for a couple of minutes and felt her heartbeat gradually return to normal. Finally she laughed nervously. “That thing scared me more than seven AKs did.” Leo reached over and took her hand. They rode for a while before he said, “It was an oil seep. That’s the only thing I can think of. We’re lucky we didn’t drive too far into it.” “What?” “The bare area by the bat trees was an oil seep,” Leo said. “I’ve seen it before. A heavy oil—tar—seeps from underground 111

Dale R. Cozort and a crust hardens on the top. Dust blows over and hides it. It’s like a miniature version of the La Brea Tar Pits. We just missed getting stuck in it.” “Wow. They weren’t kidding about this being tough country,” Sharon said. “What else are we going to run into?” The rest of the ride was actually uneventful. An hour later they pulled into Sister West’s compound. It resembled a construction site for a subdivision. Clusters of trucks, campers, and stacks of lumber covered most of the area, but the fence was almost done and the construction had a noticeably more permanent feel than Sharon remembered from the surveyor video. The fenced area enclosed a rectangle at least eight to ten city blocks long and almost as wide. A two-story frame building the size of a small motel was nearly complete at the center of the compound. Frames of a few other houses were already up. Concrete foundations around the main building marked spots where Sister West’s people were preparing to put up more houses. Sharon counted eight clusters of eight foundations apiece either poured or marked off. “Bigger project than I expected,” Sharon said. Leo nodded. “We have several hundred people to house. Getting building material out here takes too much time and effort for us to waste any of it. As of last night, people were sleeping in bunks three families to a room—in campers and what’s going to be the administration building. Even that’s a big step up from the first night. We’ll have the church and the administration building done this afternoon, and first houses up by late tonight.” Sharon shook her head. “No way you can build that fast.” “Sure we can. Everything’s modular. Just put up a section, nail, and move on. They’ll just be shells, but people can move in now and finish the interiors later. All of the houses will be quads—four families apiece. We would love to do single family, but we can’t haul enough building material out here to build over two hundred and fifty houses, and we would have to defend a larger area if we did manage it. By the way, you’re now standing in the town of Fort Eegan.” “Fort Eegan? Where did that name come from?” “Nowhere. It just had a ring to it.” 112

Exchange “What’s over there?” Sharon pointed to an area about the size of a city block fenced off from the rest of Fort Eegan with thick wooden pickets over six feet high. “Sorry. We have to have some secrets,” Leo said. Sharon eyed the area curiously. “Now you’ve got me wondering.” “Along with everyone else.” Sharon surveyed the compound. She didn’t see the Mack brothers or Bethany. She did see Fort Eegan grow stronger as she watched. One crew planted eight-foot-tall fence posts along the remaining unfenced area, while another strung fencing topped with barbed wire between the posts. Other groups poured concrete for foundations or put together sections of walls. Late in the afternoon, Sharon met Sister West. In person, Sister West looked and acted like Sharon’s old grade-school librarian. The tiny woman’s black hair was streaked with gray. Deep wrinkles around her eyes gave her face a kindly, motherly appearance. She sat as if in deep thought with her piercing gray eyes cast down. There was a vagueness about her, as if the world and its complexities were a puzzle, or an irritation to be avoided. But she still manages to scare the crap out of me. Sister West didn’t look up as she sat with Sharon and Leo in the shade of the partly completed church. Her eyes focused on the concrete near Sharon’s foot as she said, “A child needs both a father and a mother. You once loved this man enough to be one with him…to have a child with him. Is there any chance of reconciliation?” “He hit me in the jaw with a whisky bottle, tied me up, and kidnapped my daughter,” Sharon said. “What do you think?” “Having a child is the most sacred and important commitment that a person can make.” “I married the wrong man for the wrong reasons and poured too many years of my life down the rat hole of that marriage,” Sharon said. “I finally got smart and moved on. I’m not going back. Where is Bethany?” Leo sighed. “Anthony and his crew repaid our hospitality by stealing a truckload of our supplies. We sent people after them, but they aren’t back yet, and we can’t contact them. We may have our radios repaired by tomorrow. Then again, we may 113

Dale R. Cozort not. The storm caused a lot of damage, and that was one of our worst losses—other than the solar panels. We lost five percent of our electricity when that truck got washed away.” “What are you going to do if you catch them?” “We’ll get the elders together, listen to both of you, then vote,” Leo said. “Since Anthony ripped us off, I’d be surprised if they voted against you. I did tell them how much you helped me during the storm, and they appreciate that.” “I didn’t do it expecting something in return. I did it because you needed help.” Leo smiled at her. “I know. Will you promise not to leave until we get him back?” Sharon shook her head. “No, but I’ll give you two days. I can’t risk getting stranded over here.” “Exchanges average close to two weeks.” “And some have been as short as a week. I’ll wait two days.” Leo stood up. “Follow me. Someone wants to meet you.” His hand touched Sister West’s shoulder as he went by. Sister West remained seated as Leo and Sharon walked away. As they strolled past the groups of houses, their hands brushed. Leo smiled down at Sharon. “We’ll be done with the houses and public buildings within a week. We’ll still have to build storm shelters, but we’ll be close to done. This is a good bunch of people. They work hard. Most of them have been practicing for years to build the self-discipline that it’ll take to make it over here. Would it be too horrible to be trapped over here with me…with us?” “Trapped with a couple hundred religious fanatics and my creepy ex-husband? Playing noble savage with sabertooth tigers and the other big hungry things they have over here? Not having birth control or a doctor to go to if I get pregnant? No thanks.” “There are over nine hundred of us—” “That many? I thought it was a couple hundred.” “We kept things low-key to avoid attracting attention.” Leo said. “We have three doctors—one of them a surgeon—a veterinarian, and five people with most of the training for an MD but no paperwork. We have chemists, engineers, books on how technology works, and no intention of acting like noble savages. 114

Exchange We’ve seen how not to build a technological civilization. Now we’re going to get it right.” Sharon tilted her head back, studied his face. “You really believe in this, don’t you?” “I can’t understand why anyone wouldn’t. It’s like going to the stars and finding a brand new empty planet, but without the travel time. My descendants and maybe your descendants will own this world, will shape it the way it should be shaped. That’s a dream worth sacrificing for.” Leo smiled down at her. “In my way I suppose I am a fanatic, but then so are most people who make a difference.” A tall, well-tanned young woman with short brown hair bustled over to them, making Sharon suddenly feel old, short, and dumpy. The young woman gave Leo a perfunctory hug and smiled an unexpectedly warm and friendly smile at Sharon. She held out her hand. “I’m Allison West. Judging from the swelling on your face, you must be Sharon Mack.” Sharon nodded. Allison took her hand. “I’m supposed to introduce you to everybody and make you feel at home.” She grinned at Leo. “I’ll take it from here. Thanks.” Leo hesitated for a second, then turned away. “Take good care of her.” Allison led Sharon away. Sharon said, “Sister West is your mom, right?” Allison nodded. “I saw her on stage one time. She’s different in real life.” “Like two different people,” Allison said. She stared after Leo. “Eye candy, isn’t he? You think he’s more than that though, don’t you? Everybody does.” “Well…” “Be careful. He’s quite capable of killing people, among other things.” “What other things?” “Hopefully the system isn’t up yet, but in a day or two this whole place will be wired so that he can sit at a computer and bring up a video of whatever is going on anywhere in the compound. That’s the way it was back in The World. The only private place is the bathrooms. And not always there.” “What? You’re kidding.” 115

Dale R. Cozort “He convinced my mom that it was the only way to keep sin from creeping into the church even here,” Allison said. “He’s quite the control freak. Mom gets up on stage, but he pulls the strings, on her, on me, on everyone here. If you get a chance, get your daughter and get out. Ever heard of Jonestown?” “The place where the cult did the murder-suicide thing?” “There are too many parallels. Get out if you can. Bring the Marines and get the rest of us out if you make it.” Sharon gestured at the people in the garden. “Everyone seems happy.” “Yes, don’t they? I look happy too when the cameras are on. I play the friendly, naive card very well,” Allison said. “I think I’ve fooled him so far. He wouldn’t have let me talk to you alone if he knew what I really think.” “How do you know he didn’t send me to find out what you really think?” “I counseled your ex-husband before he left; he told me enough about you that I know who you are.” “Will Leo let my daughter go?” “I doubt it. I think he’ll stall until the Exchange reverses itself, then you’ll see who he really is.” Sharon shook her head in small disillusioned movements, then swore. “I liked him. I kind of trusted him. He convinced me he was totally sincere.” Allison shrugged. “When you can fake sincerity all kinds of doors open.” “Where does your mom fit in?” “She still believes in the Prince Charming act. She gets up in front of the congregation and says the words he wants her to say.” “It’s hard to believe she’s the same person I saw in front of an audience.” “She’s a different person on stage,” Allison said. “If she told the congregation to attack the gates of hell and bring the devil back so she could spit in his face, they would do it. If you sat in that congregation, you’d probably find yourself carried along with them.” “I believe it,” Sharon said. “That kind of power is dangerous.” 116

Exchange “Not really. She’s a little eccentric, but without Leo she’s harmless.” Allison pulled Sharon into one of the unfinished structures. “Look. You can see where the wiring goes and where the camera gets mounted.” Sharon stared up at the wiring and mounting points. She felt a dull mixture of anger and disillusionment well up inside her. She turned back to Allison. “Okay. As soon as my daughter gets back, I’ll watch for a chance to grab her and run for Rockport.” “Good. I’ll help you get food together, and I may be able to get you a key to one of the trucks. Wait until just a short time before you’re ready to go, then ask for a counseling session with me. I’ll pass you the key and a note telling you what I know about avoiding the cameras.” Allison grabbed Sharon’s hand. “Smile and look relaxed. He’s walking by and looking this way.” Sharon peered across the garden. Leo waved and smiled at her. She forced herself to smile and wave back. He strolled on. Allison continued. “Fair warning—if you get away, he’ll track you down and try to kill you. I think he likes to kill people. I saw him almost get into a fight once; a drunk pulled a knife on him. Leo got a gleam in his eye and I could feel how eager he was to go after the guy. He didn’t, because mom was there, but he wanted to so bad you could see it in his whole body. The drunk could see it too. He sobered up quick and put the knife away.” “That explains a lot. I’ve seen that expression. Okay. If he comes after me I’ll just have to take him out before he has a chance to get me.” “Good luck.” “Yeah.” Sharon surveyed the nearly completed compound. She saw several women using shovels to spade up rectangular sections of savanna grass, struggling with the tough sod, while others went behind them and planted seeds. “It’s late in the year for planting crops.” Allison waved to one of the gardeners. “We know what will mature before it frosts. We’ll have a limited crop this year, then a good one next year. We brought three years worth of food for everybody in case the crops fail. We also brought enough livestock to get herds going even if we lose a lot of them to disease or have to eat some of them.” 117

Dale R. Cozort “Wow. Somebody was planning ahead. But why not try to domesticate some of the local animals? The convicts tamed horses.” “We thought about that. Too much chance the local animals would have diseases that spread to people. Plus domesticating a new species is hard work, and most of the time it doesn’t work out. Why waste the effort when it’s already been done for us?” Allison smiled. “We did a lot of things right: water purification equipment, composting toilets, deep cycle batteries— custom-built nickel iron ones that should last twenty years—for storing energy from the solar cells. Even everything we need to set up a small-scale hydro-electric plant on one of the nearby rivers.” “How did you know to settle here?” “We studied maps from the robot surveyors that flew over this area in previous Exchanges and chose this spot because it’s high enough to be defendable, out of migration paths for the big animals, and doesn’t flood, yet there is plenty of fertile land around it.” “How did you get the maps?” “They aren’t secret. The government releases them—puts them online. I don’t think they release everything, but we learned a lot by just using public sources. We did a good job of researching Bear Country. I may not like the guy, but Leo leaves nothing to chance.” “Then a freak storm comes along and knocks out all of your radios.” Allison laughed. “Leo told you that, I bet.” “Shit. And I believed every word of it. I’m an idiot.” “He’s good at what he does.” “Apparently,” Sharon said. “This is none of my business, but I can’t see your mom and him being physical.” “Physical? What makes you think they are?” “Well, he said they were married. Is that just another one of his lies?” Allison hesitated, then said, “No, but they aren’t physical. At least I don’t think they are. He uses her to control people. She sees him as a friend and someone to take care of the grubby little details she could never cope with.” Allison glanced at her watch. 118

Exchange “I’ve got to go. I’ll try to find out where your daughter really is and what’s going on with Anthony and this group that chased after him. When you go back to Leo, relax and act like you would if you didn’t know any of the stuff I’ve told you.” “I don’t know if I can; I never was any good at lying. What I think is usually on my face, but I’ll try.”

119

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Fifteen The rest of the day in Fort Eegan was for the most part uneventful. Kodiak-sized bears wandered by twice, came up to the fence, and stared at the camp curiously. Once Sharon saw a pack of twenty reddish-brown wolves trot by, checking out the fence and the guard tower with their noses and their pale blue eyes. A pack of several dozen small green monkeys tried to climb the fence, but ran off when guards shot over their heads. Fred stayed close by. His fur rose when he saw the monkeys by the fence, and he stared curiously in the direction of the shots. Groups of scouts buzzed by on motorbikes. The first time she heard them go by, Sharon questioned that use of fuel. A woman standing nearby said, “Bikes get eighty miles to the gallon. Right now we need scouts out and moving fast so we’ll know what’s coming before it hits us. As we get stronger we won’t need that as much.” Sharon spent most of her time working in the gardens to make the day go quicker. She ended up with an extremely sore back and sore knees, along with a sense of satisfaction far beyond what she normally felt at the end of a day working at a computer. Mid-afternoon she gave her side of the story to the board of elders. They were friendly and sympathetic but non-committal. Sharon avoided Leo and didn’t see Allison. The compound grew stronger. Guard towers went up at intervals along the fence. Groups of men and women dug trenches for plumbing, while other teams cut and stacked wood for the winter. Long chains of men and women passed buckets of water up from a nearby stream to a cluster of water filters, where it was purified and stored. Another group drilled a well. 120

Exchange Late in the afternoon Leo sought Sharon out. He smiled. “Well, you haven’t tried to leave yet.” The smile faded. “I have bad news.” “I want my daughter. What’s going on with this expedition she’s supposedly with?” “That’s what I came to tell you. We have our radios going, but the group chasing Anthony and company isn’t responding.” “Why?” “I don’t know. I wish I did. I’m sorry to put you through this.” “Are you really?” Sharon was immediately sorry that the words had come out. Leo glanced sharply at her. “I could tell something was bothering you, something beyond missing your daughter. What is it? We’ve treated you as fairly as we can under the circumstances. I’m sorry I can’t just wave my hand and produce your daughter, Sharon. I would if I could.” Sharon stared up at the calm face and impulsively said, “I know what you are. I found the video camera setup in my room and I’ve seen the cameras scattered around the compound.” Leo looked genuinely puzzled. “What are you talking about? There have never been video cameras in the living quarters. We had some in the public areas at our original compound, but we haven’t installed them here. Why should we? We used them to teach skills we thought we’d need in Bear Country. We didn’t want to bring experts into the compound so we set up classrooms with two-way video.” “Oh, that’s very good.” Sharon clapped her hands in mock applause. “If you can fake sincerity—” “Okay, I know you’re worried about your daughter, and I can understand that,” Leo said. “I’m not your enemy here. If you think there are cameras hidden in your room or anywhere else, go find them and show me where they are. Search anywhere you want and take as much time as you want. If you find anything, we’ll talk. Oh, by the way, you left your pistol in the truck. Here it is. I trust you.” He handed her the pistol, then stalked away. Sharon stared after him, then checked the pistol. She even took out the ammunition and examined it for signs of tampering. She didn’t find any. She went back to one of the garden plots, 121

Dale R. Cozort deliberately choosing one near the fenced area, and started weeding with a group of men and women. After a couple of minutes she asked one woman, “Did you have two-way video classes back in The World?” The woman nodded. “Sure. We had classes on gardening, preserving food, pottery, metalwork, and even engineering. Why?” “I saw one of the camera mountings.” The woman nodded. “We brought the cameras but we don’t plan to install them, at least not until we create sister colonies. That’s at least two years away.” “None in the rooms?” “No. I think they have the electricity from the solar panels wired in, but no cameras.” Sharon quietly weeded for a couple of minutes, then said, “Interesting.” She watched Leo walk by in the distance, but didn’t respond when he waved. She looked for gaps in the fencing, but didn’t see any large enough for her to see through. As she tugged at a particularly stubborn clump of grass, something metallic came up, caught in the roots. Sharon noticed the sun glinting off an edge of it, and brushed dirt away. One of the women asked, “What is it?” “I don’t know,” Sharon said. “It’s shaped like an arrowhead, but it’s made out of some kind of metal.” She examined the arrowhead more closely. She couldn’t tell what kind of metal it was, but it was crudely made…apparently cut out of something originally intended for another purpose. One of the men said, “I think we’d better show Leo.” Leo jogged over at the man’s whistle. “Sharp eyes,” he said. Sharon asked, “What is it? Something the convicts made?” “That I can’t tell you,” Leo said. “I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to ask all of you to leave this section.” The workers gathered their tools and moved to another area. Sharon lingered, but Leo strode away without saying anything else. Later that evening, one of the scouts brought an injured convict into Fort Eegan. The convict spotted Sharon as guards 122

Exchange led him past her. He turned and glared at Sharon. “He died. The guy you shot.” Sharon fought to keep her face emotionless. “He gave me no choice.” “He had friends. They want you bad.” “Yeah. They came after me. It didn’t work out too well for them. Why are you here?” “My horse ran away. I was slowing them down.” “Nice bunch of people.” Leo strolled past Sharon on his way to question the convict. He glanced at her and smiled. “Found any video cameras yet?” She glared at him, went back to one of the little gardens and weeded vigorously in the late evening sun until he walked away. She went back to her room as twilight fell and turned on a radio. Surprisingly, it worked, or at least gave off static. Sharon played with the tuning until she got the Rockport station. The DJ was saying, “For those of you who just joined us, I’m speaking with Anna Morgan, Chief Project Officer for this Exchange. Anna, what do you think is going on back in The World? I guess a one-hundred-square-mile piece of Bear Country is sitting where Rockport was. How are they coping with that?” “Of course we have no way of communicating with people back there,” Anna said. “But, based on previous Exchanges and standard practice, they’ll start by building a fence ten feet high. It will be anchored in six feet of concrete. That’ll stop most of the burrowers.” “What about the birds and bats?” Anna said, “A few will get out. Some do every Exchange. My counterpart there will have his hands full, and not just from birds or bats flying out. Unfortunately, people try to smuggle Bear Country animals out of the Exchange zone from time to time, and that’s a real danger. Animals will also come back with us, whether we like it or not. We try to keep them out, but realistically it’s impossible. We hope that even if a few individual Bear Country birds and bats come back with us, there won’t be enough to find one another and start breeding. We’ll just have to deal with them when we get back.” 123

Dale R. Cozort Sharon half-listened as the interview continued. A pair of candles provided the only light in the room. Fred was still awake and active. He had explored the room from top to bottom, opening every unlocked drawer or closet. He examined the kitchen knives carefully, testing their edge before putting them back in the drawer. Socks seemed to fascinate him. He put a pair on his feet and another on his hands, but used his teeth to pull the smooth cloth from his hands after he couldn’t pick up a piece of chipped glass. The DJ said, “I notice you’re setting up some kind of facility out in Bear Country on a hill overlooking Rockport.” Anna said, “Yes, we’ll set up a base there, plus a quarantine facility in case someone catches a Bear Country disease that we can’t risk bringing back with us.” “So what would you do if somebody went into quarantine? Just leave them here when the Exchange ends?” “That’s it exactly. I know that sounds pretty cold-blooded, but a major epidemic back in The World could kill millions, so we wouldn’t have much choice,” Anna said. “Yeah, that is a tough decision. What if somebody just catches a cold or the flu?” “We try to figure that out. If we actually had to leave someone over here, we would give them a chance to survive and hope that another Exchange happened in the area. We would leave them food, water, ammunition, and a few other necessities.” “I thought there were laws and treaties against people living in Bear Country.” “And those laws and treaties have quarantine clauses,” Anna said. “After what happened down in South America—” “What happened in South America?” Anna let an uncomfortable silence stretch before responding. “Let’s just say, something we don’t want to have happen again.” After Sharon lit the candles, they became the focus of Fred’s attention. He perched on the fireplace, seeing how close he could get his hands to the fire without getting burned. Sharon didn’t interfere, but watched the animal carefully. She half-expected him to try to move the candle or put 124

Exchange something flammable too close to it. At that point she would have to draw the line, but she didn’t want to do that. The monkey’s interest in the candle fascinated Sharon. Do home-world monkeys stare at fire that way? Fred glanced at Sharon and went back to studying the candle. He held the chipped rock over the candle, then gradually moved it down until the rock pushed the candle’s wick into the melted wax, putting the flame out. The monkey watched the glow of the wick die. He warily touched the wick, then jerked his hand back from the still hot wax. Sharon laughed. “Fire’s a tricky thing. It’ll get you if you don’t watch it.” The DJ was asking, “What if an Exchange happened in downtown Chicago?” “That’s the nightmare scenario. Hundreds of thousands of people would die of thirst or starvation. We couldn’t get them out.” “Which of the Exchanges so far caused the most human casualties?” Anna said, “Probably one of the early ones in West Africa. A Nigerian city of several hundred thousand went over. That was before we had procedures set up and by the time local authorities knew they were going to be hit, there wasn’t enough time to get people out. The city was totally deserted when it came back, and most of the buildings were burned-out shells. Even the pets were gone.” “What happened to the people?” Anna said, “We have theories, but no hard evidence to prove them. I could speculate but we just don’t know for sure.” “So could they be alive somewhere in Bear Country?” “Surveyors from later Exchanges in the same general area found no trace of survivors, but it is possible some survived. That’s why I said that one probably caused the most casualties.” Fred moved away from the candle and chirped. Sharon smiled at him. “Want the fire back?” She took a lighter from a drawer and lit the candle again. She started to set the lighter down, and then noticed the monkey’s gaze. “Maybe I’d better keep this in my pocket.” 125

Dale R. Cozort The DJ asked, “So, what are you trying to do on this side? Keep all of the Bear Country animals out so that we don’t bring any back with us when the Exchange reverses?” “That’s the idea,” Anna said. “Think about it, though. We have three hours to get people, equipment, food, medicine, and fuel from the nearest army or marine base into an Exchange area. That’s a trick, especially when there isn’t an airport nearby. Everything has to come by road or helicopter. A lot of people and equipment we would really love to have here were still on the way to Rockport when the Exchange hit. That’s not unusual; we rarely get enough people or equipment into an Exchange area with that three-hour window. We do what we can over here. When we get back to The World, they’ll have a crew waiting to give the whole area a thorough going-over.” “So they have the easy job back there,” the DJ said. “Not easy. Easier maybe...” After a while Fred lost interest in the candles and bedded down in the bathtub. Sharon shut the bathroom door and stood listening to Anna’s voice, clinging to it as a tie back to The World. The DJ asked, “Why did all, or almost all, of the world’s nations agree not to settle Bear Country?” “Mainly because it’s hard to do anything valuable over here,” Anna said. “Sure, there is oil in Bear Country, and gold and diamonds, but even if an Exchange happens close to one of those resources and you’re able to get equipment over here to drill or mine, there may never be another Exchange close enough for you to get your cargo out. Remember, Bear Country doesn’t just have bad roads. It has no roads at all. Moving something heavy even fifty miles is a real challenge over here.” “Are any Bear Country animals running around loose back in The World?” “As hard as we try to stop it, viruses, bacteria and insects probably get through. Other than that, nothing in the wild outside of Australia.” “What about Australia?” “In the third Exchange, the Australian government brought back a couple of dozen marsupial species and deliberately introduced them. That was controversial, but it hasn’t 126

Exchange been a total disaster, mainly because they just replaced species that died out after the last ice age—and because we got lucky.” “Wasn’t there talk of doing something like that in the United States? Bringing back some of the animals that went extinct after the ice age?” “We studied it,” Anna said. “It’s too dangerous.” The interview ended and Sharon turned the radio off— suddenly feeling tired and depressed. She sat and stared at the walls of her room for a while, then got up to get ready for bed. She changed clothes quickly in the bathroom, then slipped into the bed she’d been assigned. She spent half an hour staring wistfully out the window at the faint and distant sky-glow from generator-driven lights in Rockport. Several times she woke up disturbed by half-remembered snatches of dreams where Leo kissed her or peered down at her through a camera lens. Once she got up and searched her room, but didn’t find a camera. Sharon was almost back to sleep when Allison knocked on her door. Allison peered up and down the hall, then moved close and whispered, “I know where your daughter is, but she’s in a lot of danger.” “The cameras were for two-way video classrooms.” “Officially, yes,” Allison said. “We don’t have time for that now. I got a chance to talk to the convict alone for a few minutes. He knows where Leo has your ex-husband and daughter stashed. The cons plan to grab your daughter. You’ve got to get her out of there before that happens.” “How can I do that?” “I’ll get you keys to one of the trucks, and I’ll make sure the guards at the gate think it’s okay.” “How will I find the place?” “I’ll give you directions.” “When?” “I don’t know,” Allison said. “I’ll find a time when Leo’s distracted. If you’re going to do something like this, do it in broad daylight. If you tried it tonight, Leo would be on your trail in five minutes. During the day he may not notice you’re gone for an hour or more.” Sharon nodded. “Okay, I’ll do it.” 127

Dale R. Cozort “Good. I’ll get you a gun.” Sharon started to go back to bed, then impulsively pulled on a robe and strolled into the garden outside her room. The moon was behind the clouds and her eyes took a few minutes to adjust to the darkness. She stood and stared at the stars. She jumped as Leo’s voice came from a few feet away. “More stars than most people will ever see back in The World.” “I wish you wouldn’t do that.” “Look at the stars? We don’t have a real good history with that, do we?” Leo asked. “I was here first, though I don’t mind the company.” He stood with his chin tilted up for a few seconds as the moon eased its way out from behind the clouds, then said, “Saw Allison stop by your door.” “I didn’t come out here to look at the stars. I came to see the sky-glow from Rockport, what little there is of it. I want my daughter back and I want to get back to The World. I don’t want to be here.” Leo glanced down at her. “You look good in the moonlight.” Sharon continued to stare at the horizon. Leo bent down a little. “I’ve watched you in the gardens. You really care about the plants.” “They don’t lie to me,” Sharon said. “They don’t play mind games. I know which side they’re really on.” Leo nodded. “That’s a problem with people, isn’t it? By the way, we’re giving our convict friend food and water, then sending him on his way in a few days.” “Why?” “He hasn’t decided that he needs to make a new start in his life yet. He says the right words, but he doesn’t believe them. Not yet. Back home I’d let him stick around for a few weeks. I’d let him keep saying those words and be around decent people. Eventually, the good in him would come out. Over here, we can’t help him. He would be a danger to the town; somebody would have to watch him all the time. We don’t have anyone to spare to do that.” “Do you have somebody watching me?” 128

Exchange Leo laughed. “Cameras again? No. I trust you, and I’m a pretty good judge of character.” “So what do you think of my character?” “I think you’ve had a tough life, partly because you’ve let things drift. You let events make decisions for you instead of making them for yourself. I think you drifted into and out of a marriage without making the big, tough decisions that you needed to make. You’re good at the little decisions, but the big ones give you problems.” That’s way too me. Sharon turned away. “Well, I did have to ask.” “And I gave you an honest answer,” Leo said. “I’d love to see you stay here after the Exchange, and I think that deep down you want to stay. Unfortunately, I think you’ll let things drift so that eventually the Exchange will end with you still here, or still in Rockport. If you do that, you’ll always wonder if you missed out on something wonderful, or if you end up here and things get tough, you’ll feel trapped.” “I feel trapped now,” Sharon said. “I want my daughter back. I need to see her, tell her I love her. I’d be back in The World with her now if your people hadn’t let Anthony back in, Mr. Great-Judge-of-Character.” “I wasn’t here when that happened, I’m afraid.” Leo’s smile went away. He hesitated for a few seconds. “We’ll get your daughter back before the Exchange ends. Then the ball is in your court. If you don’t go back to Rockport while you can, you’ll be deciding to stay. I’d love to have you here, but please promise me that you’ll make that decision yourself.” Sharon glared up at him. “Do you really think I want to be here? I’ve made my decision. Take me to where Anthony and Bethany are supposed to be, first thing in the morning.” Leo peered down at Sharon for a couple of seconds, then nodded. “I think it’s time we found out what’s going on with our people. We don’t have anyone to spare, but we can’t let that many people stay out of contact for that long without checking on them.” Sharon said, “I’m going with whoever goes out there.” Leo smiled. “I wouldn’t dream of stopping you. Be ready to go in at dawn tomorrow morning.” 129

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Sixteen Sharon went back to her room and checked her pistol. She stashed a little food and extra ammunition in a backpack. Allison met her when she came out of her room in the morning. “I heard you’re going out with Leo. Really want to do this? I thought we had a plan.” Sharon kept walking. “I want my daughter back. I go right after things if I want them, in spite of what some people think.” Allison nodded. “I’m going too.” “Why?” “Who knows, this may be my last chance to get back to civilization.” Leo joined them, then pulled Sharon aside. “Were you serious about the computer skills?” “Why?” “Every time there’s an Exchange, the Marines leave a few robot surveyors behind and hope another Exchange happens close enough that they can transmit the data back. They’re solarpowered, robotic, miniature planes. They carry digital video cameras, night vision gizmos, and computers to compress the data. Data port connects to a laptop. We found one, but it isn’t working right. It could tell us things we need to know about this part of Bear Country. It could help us avoid another flash flood. Think you could get it working?” “My daughter is out there and you want me to do your geek work for you?” Sharon asked. “How did you get this, anyway?” “A magician—” “—never tells his secrets,” Sharon finished. “Fine. I’ll look at it.” 130

Exchange Leo waved to Allison and led Sharon to a tidy little apartment, sparsely but tastefully furnished, with tree-leaf green and light brown walls. “Your apartment?” Leo nodded. He strode across the room—brisk and businesslike. The surveyor sat on a kitchen counter. Sharon examined it and then glanced at Leo. “I thought you said these were standard interfaces. They aren’t like anything I’ve ever seen.” Leo pulled a manual out of his briefcase and handed it to her. Sharon studied the manual, compared it to the surveyor, then said, “Different model. They’re nowhere close to alike, at least not in the details.” “Not like in the manual, huh?” “Nothing I even recognize.” Leo nodded and removed a cable from his briefcase. “That I can help you with. See if this works.” The cable fit, but Sharon couldn’t get anything coherent out of the surveyor. Finally she said, “Must be something wrong with the signal from the surveyor.” She tried to read the raw data coming out. Leo peered over her shoulder. “They tell me that the signals coming out on this model are in four states instead of two, whatever that means. They said something about octal math. Does that make any sense to you?” Sharon glanced up at him. “I understand the words, but I have no idea why anyone would do it that way.” She worked with the data for a while, then said. “Yep. That’s what they’re doing. I don’t know why. We’re getting an intermittent connection on one of the pins. I can get most of the information now that I know what to look for, but they’re using a video format I’ve never seen before. I don’t know how to decode it.” “Once you read the data, I can play it.” Sharon finally got video on the laptop. She watched it for a few minutes, then closed her eyes and shuddered. “There’s something wrong. The video—it’s wrong.” Leo smiled down at her. “Wrong how? That’s Bear Country. I see animals moving around. I see trees swaying in the breeze.” “I don’t know. It’s not what’s on the video. It’s the video itself. Something’s not right.” 131

Dale R. Cozort Leo nodded and closed the laptop. “Wheels within wheels. Lies within lies.” “You said that before. What do you mean?” Leo looked tired. He put the laptop away, then said, “You’ll see, or maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll just find your daughter, go back to Rockport and wait for the Exchange to end. Right now let’s figure out how to get to your daughter.” He pulled out a map and spread it on the desk. “An Exchange always brings over a perfect circle—actually a sphere—of our world. No one knows why.” He penciled the circle in on the map. “This was a big Exchange. From what our scouts tell us, over a hundred square miles of our world came over with us.” “It was eerie seeing a freeway I’ve driven on just end,” Sharon said. “Highway on one side of the line, grass and tree trunks on the other.” “Why not? I saw a picture from one of the earlier ones where an Exchange cut a car in two. Mom and dad in the front seat stayed. The baby in the car seat went to Bear Country. It could have come in the middle of your house. Matter of fact, it almost certainly came in the middle of somebody’s house. If the Exchange had happened in Chicago or New York it could have cut a skyscraper in half. Try dealing with that.” Sharon said, “It could have cut a dam in half, or diverted a river. Oh wait, it did.” “Well...I got a really sweet hug out of that.” “That was before,” Sharon said. “Yeah, I got that impression.” Leo turned back to the map. “We’ll be cutting through the northern part of this hunk of our world that came over with us. There are still farmers up there, according to our scouts. The Marines would have moved them out if they had time. A lot of old farmers are stubborn enough to just button things up and stay put.” “Anna said about four thousand people came over.” “Not counting the Marines, us, and as many biologists, geologists and climatologists as they could get here in three hours.” “I was surprised at how easy it was to get out to Bear Country.” 132

Exchange Leo pointed to the map. “That’s a lot of miles there. The Marines are spread thin. They have to patrol twenty-five to thirty miles of perimeter on this side alone, plus keep half an eye on the AKs and anyone else in Rockport that might want to cause trouble.” “I know,” Sharon said. “By the way, why are you telling me all of this stuff about the route?” “I don’t want you to think I’m trying to trick you into going back without your daughter.” Allison pulled Sharon aside as they walked out. She grinned at Leo. “Give us a half hour.” They walked behind a building. Allison looked around furtively before slipping Sharon a pistol and an ankle holster. “Don’t let anyone know you have it.” Sharon waved away the pistol. “Already have one.” “You may need one Leo doesn’t know about,” Allison said. Sharon checked the safety and strapped the pistol on. “I’m surprised Leo let us go that easily.” “He’s occupied getting supplies together, hopefully long enough that you can talk to Woody.” “Woody?” “The convict. He can tell you where your daughter really is.” “What are you talking about? She’s with Anthony.” “Who told you that?” “Leo. He said Anthony was here and stole a truck—” “Don’t tell me you really believed him?” “Okay, where is she then?” “Probably with the convicts. Woody knows.” “But Leo—” Allison shook her head. “Did you actually hear anything from anyone else about Anthony and company being here?” “No, but I didn’t ask.” “I was here, but I didn’t see them. This is just another one of Leo’s head games.” Sharon slammed her hand against the door. “Why? What does he want from me?” “What does he want from any of us?” Allison asked. “Maybe he wants to stall—trap you over here. Maybe he wants to 133

Dale R. Cozort lure you out of the compound and hunt you down. I don’t know. I do know that if you do things the way he wants you to do them, he’ll still be pulling your strings.” They walked to the room where Woody was being held. Allison charmed her way past the guards and then said, “This is as far as I go.” She opened the door and nodded to Woody, who was standing by the bed with his hands handcuffed behind his back. Sharon went in and Allison closed the door behind her. Sharon studied Woody. He was no more than two inches taller than she was, and skinny but wiry-looking. His hair was still blond, but streaks of gray in his mustache hinted at approaching middle age. He stared at her, eyes lingering at her chest, and grinned, showing that he was missing a couple of teeth. She grinned back, then said, “Look at me that way again and you’ll be missing more teeth.” He made a show of staring at her chest again. “So you’re a tough lady. Only thing is, you need me to get your daughter back.” Sharon took two quick steps across the room, grabbed Woody by the hair and slammed the side of his head against the wall, then swung him sprawling back down onto the bed. “I’m not interested and I’m not in a real patient mood. Got a daughter to find.” He glared up at her. “You made your point. You’re not interested. Fine. I’m not looking anymore.” Sharon abruptly pulled her gun. “Get up and turn around. Now!” “Why?” “Because I’ll shoot if you don’t.” The man turned around, and Sharon nodded. “There was something about the way you moved. Drop whatever you used to open the cuffs on the seat behind you.” He hesitated for a moment, then dropped a key on the seat. Sharon picked it up and clicked the handcuffs closed on the man’s wrist. “So, where did you get the key?” “Leo West. I was supposed to con you into sneaking out with me, then turn you loose without your shoes or your gun and let Leo hunt you down. That man has a screw loose. He likes to 134

Exchange kill people. Look, he’ll still kill you. He won’t let you get back to Rockport alive.” “I’ll handle Leo West.” “Maybe. My friend Toad stood in front of one of those monster bears and didn’t flinch—just kept shooting until it dropped with a paw two inches from his shoe. Leo West scares him. You’ve got a little target shooting and an attitude going for you. Think it’ll be enough?” “I guess it’ll have to be,” Sharon said. “If you hadn’t shot Baldy, I could take you back to my friends. You’d have to give a little something back, but if you went on your own you could have been choosy.” “I’ll take my chances with Leo. Is my little girl really out there?” The convict shrugged. “She was. She should still be.” “What did Allison tell you?” “She asked me to get you to your daughter. I thought about it, but Leo made me a better offer.” Sharon shoved the convict back onto the bed. After a couple of minutes, she said, “I hate men.” The convict winced. “I can tell.” Sharon stood at the prison door. “She’s not a pawn in some demented game. She’s a little girl.” “And you brought her over here because you were afraid somebody would steal your silverware,” Woody said. Sharon slapped him hard across the face, trying unsuccessfully to hold back the tears. Woody looked away. After a minute, he turned back to her. “I was a good dad when I wasn’t drunk.” Sharon glared at him. “I doubt it.” “‘Course I was drunk most of the time. I wanted to be a good dad, though. That should count for something.” “It’s a start. But there’s a lot more to it than that. It’s hard to be a good dad when you think of women as Kleenex.” “Kleenex?” “Isn’t that how men see women? As something to be used and thrown away? Or maybe to hang onto for a while if there isn’t another one handy?” 135

Dale R. Cozort Woody shrugged. “Some guys, some of the time. Maybe most guys most of the time. Were you a good mom?” “Why do you want to know?” The convict got up and walked to a small, high window. “Never mind. You have a picture of your daughter in your purse, don’t you?” “Why do you care?” “I bet she’s a cute little kid,” Woody said. “A kid ought to be with her mom—ought to grow up with decent people around her.” Sharon narrowed her eyes. “What would you know about that?” Woody shook his head. “You aren’t making this easy. I’m sorry—” “That you looked at me like I was a slab of meat? I don’t think you are.” “I haven’t been alone with a woman for a while. I haven’t been with anybody who wouldn’t cut my throat for a cigarette for even longer.” “That’s not my problem. I really don’t want to talk to you. I’m just here because I have to be.” “I’ve been over here close to two years.” “So now you can go back if you want to,” Sharon said. “Just go to Rockport and wait for the Exchange to reverse.” “I’d be in jail long enough to go straight from there to a nursing home. Still, I thought about going back and serving the time if I got the chance. Out there—” He jerked his head at the landscape outside the fence. “Out there it looks rich with all the animals and plants. Try to live off of the land, though, and you don’t see any of that stuff. The animals here are smart, smarter than ours, I think. They learn to run and learn to hide. You work morning to night just to stay alive.” Sharon didn’t reply. After a few minutes, Woody said, “On the other hand, it sure is beautiful country. I bet part of you wouldn’t mind staying. And, most of Sister West’s crew are good people.” “Except for Leo.” “If you’re thinking about staying, I’ve got two words for you: Toilet paper. Guys killed each other for it until we ran out 136

Exchange completely. Cigarettes are worth even more than toilet paper, and women would be priceless, if there were any here we could get at.” Sharon said, “Just shut up.” “You’re making it really hard, lady. I’m trying to work myself up into doing the right thing for once in my life, and you keep kicking me in the teeth.” Sharon glared over at the man. “Okay. So do the right thing. I won’t stop you.” The man stared out the window for a long time. “It’s beautiful country, but it’s hard. It promises you everything, but it’ll never deliver. Just like—” “Just like Allison? Woody laughed a short, bitter laugh. “So you already knew.” “About Allison?” Sharon shrugged. “I suspected it. I didn’t actually know until just now.” Woody turned and looked her in the eyes. “If you do what Allison tells you to do, you’ll be riding into a trap. Your daughter isn’t out there. She really is still with Anthony.” “And Allison gave you the key?” Woody nodded. “What made you suspicious?” The bitterness in Sharon’s laugh matched Woody’s. “I’m not stupid. I don’t believe anyone over here. Why did you tell me? I don’t buy a sudden attack of conscience.” He turned back to the window. “Who knows? Maybe I started thinking about my son. Maybe you remind me of someone I knew back in The World. Maybe Allison reminds me of someone that I knew back in The World. Maybe I don’t want her to win and laugh in my face when I ask for what she promised. More likely I realized you’d try to fight your way out when you realized you were in a trap. I would be right beside you and I don’t like the idea of sitting in the middle of a firefight in handcuffs.” “So Allison wants to send me out there to get picked up by your friends. Did she tell you why?” “No. She offered me something if I’d help her. She even gave me a very small sample.” “Okay. Does that make Leo the good guy?” 137

Dale R. Cozort “I don’t know. I don’t think so. I wasn’t lying when I told you that a couple of the guys I was with took one look at him and got rabbit-in-the-headlights scared. I don’t know why.” Sharon opened the door, then turned to leave. “Well, this has been worthless.” “At least you know for sure one person isn’t on your side. What are you going to do?” “Find Allison, slap the smile off of her face, then shoot her if she gives me half an excuse.” “And then what?” “I don’t know.” Sharon stalked out, slammed the door, then opened it and said, “I don’t care why you told me. Thanks.” She turned around to see Leo standing in the doorway of the outer room. He smiled at her. “Thanks for what?” “A little information on who-is-who and what-is-what around here.” Leo grinned. “Not cameras again, I hope.” “No. Why are the convicts afraid of you?” He said, “I could speculate, but I’d rather not. Let’s talk about something else. We ran into delays that will push us into the late afternoon…unless we want to be out there tonight, we’ll have to wait until morning.” “Tomorrow morning. Another delay.” She slowly inhaled, then let out a long breath. “Well, that gives me time to deal with Allison.” Leo shook his head. “I can’t let you do that.” “Do you know what she tried to do?” Leo said, “Not exactly, but I can guess. I know what Allison is; let me deal with her. She’s dangerous.” “So am I.” Leo smiled. “Dangerous, yes. Sneaky, no. Allison is both. Leave her to me.” “Maybe. Just keep her away from me.”

138

Exchange

Chapter Seventeen Sharon worked in her part of the garden the rest of the morning, then wandered around Fort Eegan with Fred after lunch. The ugly construction scars were already smoothed out, and the buildings appeared more finished, more permanent. When Sharon turned away from the high fence, the barbed wire, and the guard towers, the sense of permanence tugged at her. Fort Eegan now looked and felt like a tidy, well-maintained, Midwestern small town. When she turned toward the edge of the construction, the wire and the towers and the growing swath of bare, denuded prairie on the other side of the fence repelled her. Fred never strayed far from Sharon. He foraged for insects as she gardened and orbited as she toured Fort Eegan. Leo strolled past them and waved. “It looks like he’s adopted you,” he said. “Maybe the rest of his pack got wiped out in the flood.” “Is it safe to have him around like this? I like it, but—” Leo approached the monkey, but stopped as Fred bristled. “Well, he’s gradually letting me get closer. Does he do that to everybody?” “No. Just you and Allison. I guess he’s a good judge of character.” “If you’re asking if you can keep him, that’s up to you. He seems friendly enough to most people. You aren’t staying here anyway, so it’s not my business.” Sharon didn’t talk to either Allison or Leo for several hours. She went back to her room and gave Fred an apple. She leaned back onto her bed, thought about Bethany and cried. Fred came to her and put his paw on her hand. They sat together as afternoon turned into evening. 139

Dale R. Cozort Sharon finally went out to see one of Sister West’s sermons late that evening. The tiny woman seemed to grow when she strode on stage, and her voice and piercing gray eyes dominated the room. She spoke for an hour without notes, and with no signs of restlessness even among the congregation’s children. By the time the sermon ended, it was dark. Leo walked up to Sharon as she went back to her room, hesitated, then turned away. She put Fred in the bathroom that night, but he quickly opened the door and settled into a chair beside her bed. She tried to coax him back in, but he wouldn’t go, so finally she left him in the chair and went to sleep. That night, Sharon’s dreams were a jumble of images. Leo stroking her hair morphed into Leo slamming a heavy ornate prison door in her face, with Anthony and Sam Kittle laughing behind him. Then Bethany was running down the streets of the compound with Anthony staggering after her in a drunken rage. Sharon woke to that last image. She sat up and peered out the window at the sky glow from Rockport. That’s home. My house. My job. My cubicle. My good-enough. This is just...a place. Part of the glow was obscured by a watchtower. She turned away from the manufactured light and toward the stars—so many and so deep on this clear June night. I’ll never see stars like that back in The World. Fred reached out and touched her hand with his paw. Sharon took one more glance at the sky glow from Rockport and then stared out at the stars until she fell asleep. The sun from an early summer morning glared off the hoods of the trucks. Sharon squinted against it, then drifted over to Woody, who was standing by the rearmost truck, hands cuffed behind his back. Sharon said, “I almost asked to have you ride with me. I’m not sure why.” “Maybe the fact that Fred likes me.” Woody reached back and touched the monkey’s hand. He grinned. “Might also be the sparkling conversation or the keen insights on Bear Country, or 140

Exchange maybe that you don’t have to ride in the same truck with Allison. Or is it the subtle way I admire your chest?” “You haven’t done that lately, which is why I haven’t killed you.” “Maybe I’ll look again right before I leave.” Woody paused and leaned toward Sharon, his face intent. “I know you think you’re smart and tough. Maybe you are. If you want to live through the next day, remember this; out here no one is who they seem to be. Of course you know that already, don’t you?” Sharon shot a sharp glance at Woody. He suddenly somehow seemed not larger, but more formidable than he had a second ago. “Are you who you seem to be?” “I’m not sure even I know,” Woody said. “I do know something, though. I worked construction a few years. There’s an old construction-industry saying that you can put up a building fast. You can put it up cheap. You can put it up so that it’ll last. You just can’t do all three at once. I checked out Sister West’s compound and I saw fast and built so that it’ll last. I didn’t see cheap. As a matter of fact I saw a lot of dollar signs. Those buildings are solid. They have all kinds of expensive little tricks built in to keep them cooler in the summer and hotter in the winter. Someone spent a lot of money figuring out designs and buying building supplies, trucks, and equipment. Sister West and Leo West and the entire leadership could have taken the money it took to buy all of that and bought themselves nice houses on the beach in California and still had plenty left over.” “So, instead, they did something they believed in,” Sharon said. “And they knew where to build,” Woody said. “They found a big hill with a gentle slope and enough trees that if they sited their houses right, a lot of them had natural shade. They’re close to places where they can find sand and gravel for cement. How did they know where to go?” “What are you trying to say?” Woody smiled. “I’m just asking questions. The more important question is, do you really have a picture of your daughter in your purse?” “Why do you keep asking that?” “Do you?” 141

Dale R. Cozort “Yes!” “Good. I’ll have to glance at it someday,” Woody said. His smile faded. “Bear Country will kill you if you’re weak or stupid or just take your mind off of what you’re doing for a second.” “Sounds like you want to go back to The World,” Sharon said. “In a lot of ways…I do. Actually, I want to go back to when I was a drunk, stupid, cocky twenty-something and shake myself so I won’t be here in the first place. You shoot someone dead and get caught, there’s no going back. Doesn’t matter how young and drunk and stupid and cocky you were when you did it.” “There’s no coming back for whoever you shot either,” Sharon said. “You have a point there,” Woody said. He scanned the horizon, then turned back to Sharon and smiled again, a smile that unexpectedly made him almost handsome. “I like you. I really do. Allison probably gave you a hideaway gun—in an ankle holster or something. Be sure you swap out the ammunition. Do it right now. Oh, and we’ll almost certainly get ambushed. If you get out of the ambush and want to make it back, keep moving. If you stop, they’ll get you. You won’t even see them coming.” Sharon glanced around, then reached down, retrieved the gun Allison had given her and ejected a shell. She examined it and smiled. Not real subtle now, are you, Allison? She replaced the shells with ammunition from her backpack. Woody said, “Just thinking out loud here. Sister West and her crew are awfully well organized, aren’t they? And it isn’t just organization. They have an amazing lot of resources too. It took a lot of time and money to put them out here in Bear Country with a chance to make a go of it. You wonder how a bunch of nutcases managed to do that.” “Leo is good at what he does.” Woody laughed. “Yeah, he is. And you have no idea what he does.” “And you do?” “Maybe.” 142

Exchange Leo walked over. “Sharon, I think we’re going to put you in the front truck between Allison and me.” “You want her to be alive when the trip’s over?” “If you know someone’s playing you, it can be fun to let them think they still are. How good an actress are you?” “Not very.” “Try. I don’t want an open war with everything else we have to deal with.” Leo, Sharon, Fred and Allison squeezed into the front seat of a pickup and drove out of the compound. Sharon noticed that Woody was in a truck behind them. She glanced at Leo. “So are you actually letting him go?” “Yep, just like I said last night. But we’re going to wait a day or two. I think there’s more to him than he wants us to believe. Watching how he reacts may tell us something useful.” “He’s smarter than he acts.” “I know.” Sharon sat uncomfortably between Leo and Allison, rigid and unmoving, trying to keep from jostling against Leo as the truck bumped along. A couple of motorbikes went in front of them, and five more pickup trucks followed. Allison smiled at Sharon. “How much do you know about Bear Country?” “Not as much as I should, obviously.” Sharon said. “I know it’s dangerous out here. I’ve experienced that up close and personal. Lesson one is don’t assume that an animal over here is going to act like its equivalent back in The World.” “That’s the biggie,” Allison said. “Don’t assume plants are the same here either.” Sharon jumped as an eerie, modulated, almost musical howling rose outside the truck. It was followed by a high-pitched, complex twittering sound. “That first sound was amber wolves, but what was the second, a bird?” Allison shook her head. “Nope. It’s amber wolves too. There must be a hundred of them. I can see them moving around.” Sharon leaned over and peered out the side window. After a while, she saw dog-like bodies moving through the tall grass around them. 143

Dale R. Cozort “Saw them when Leo and I were stranded. Are they dangerous?” Allison leaned out the window and took a picture with her cell phone. “They seem to act just like wolves. No one has studied them that much, though. Why waste time on a dog when you can study a sabertooth or a giant bear? I haven’t heard of them attacking people.” The wolves darted from one hiding place to another, but Sharon got a good look at one. “How did they get the name? They’re not exactly amber. They’re more reddish brown.” Allison said, “First one they found was closer to amber. The name stuck.” “So how are they different from our wolves?” “We don’t know much about them,” Allison said. “Brain size averages forty percent higher than home-dimension wolves, but that’s not unusual for animals over here. We don’t know how they use that extra brainpower, but if it’s there it’s being used some way.” The wolves stopped twittering, pointed their snouts in the air, and howled in unison for several minutes. Finally, they stopped. A few seconds later, Sharon heard a faint response in the distance. Allison pressed her ear against the glass, then said, “The next pack over is singing the same song. It must be hardwired into their brains.” The motorbikes ahead of them slowed, and Leo stopped the truck. Sharon leaned forward and saw a reddish-brown head poking through the grass by the window. She peered into cold but intelligent-looking blue eyes set in a wolf-like head. The animal stared back at her from no more than three feet away, and then made the twittering sound, turned and loped off—glancing once over its shoulder. The wolves howled again. Leo asked, “Did you hear the differences that time? The sound was just as complicated, but totally different than the first one.” Sharon glanced over at him. “You don’t strike me as the type that would be interested.” “I’m interested in everything about this place. We never know what’s going to be important.” Leo shook his head. “Allison’s right for once. Don’t judge animals over here by what 144

Exchange animals back home can do. That’ll get you killed. This is a different ballpark, with a different set of rules. I’m surprised that any convicts survived here two years.” Allison said, “The wolves are still out there.” Sharon looked out the window. Most of the wolves were now lying in whatever shade they could find. “They act like a bunch of lazy dogs just waiting to be domesticated. There are no people over here to domesticate them though, are there?” Leo shook his head. “They haven’t studied Africa much, but there are North American and Australian animals over there too. One theory claims that the extra competition was just enough to keep the Bear Country equivalent of our ancestors from developing like we did. One guy claims that chimps over here are more like us than the ones back home because our ancestors weren’t there to keep them from developing in that direction.” Sharon listened to the amber wolves twittering. “They’re getting restless. Something is coming that they’re afraid of. A bear? A lion?” She got out her binoculars. The truck moved forward again. She saw a group of kangaroos bounding away from the approaching trucks. Leo hit the brakes hard. A group of the little monkeys stood defiantly in front of the truck. Leo eased the truck forward until the monkeys backed off. Sharon heard amber wolves twittering in the distance but saw nothing threatening other than the monkeys. A breeze blew through the truck cab, and Sharon felt pleasantly cool. She forced herself to relax, drinking in details of the sun and the leaves and the blowing grass. A tiny brown bird, no larger than the first joint of her thumb, buzzed around the mirror. The bird seemed curious, hovering and looking at the truck through tiny eyes set on either side of an absurdly long nose. Sharon grinned and told the bird, “If I had it to do over again, I’d spend less of my life in offices. Maybe they’ll put that on my tombstone.” The next hour faded into a blur to Sharon. The truck bounced wildly across the prairie, adding new sets of aching muscles to the ones that already ached. She added vague 145

Dale R. Cozort impressions of a huge amount of wildlife to her knowledge of Bear Country—horses, antelope, kangaroos, ground sloths, mammoths, buffalo, and swarms of little monkeys. They avoided the few larger animals they saw. They also avoided the little monkeys. The pack of amber wolves followed, keeping a respectful distance. Parts of the pack split off a couple of times and came back dragging pieces of deer, antelope, or kangaroos. After an hour, they stopped the trucks in the shade of a grove of elm trees and got out to stretch their legs. Sharon walked over to Leo. “Watch this. Fred’s stalking a weird little bat. I thought it was a mouse at first.” “Not surprising,” Leo said. “Over here bats do a lot of the things rats, mice and insects do back in The World. Bear Country has four times as many bat species as The World does. Watch.” Fred edged toward a clump of grass. He slammed his hand down, just too late to catch a small furry shape. The animal ran along the ground for a few seconds, with the monkey two steps behind it. Then it flew a couple of hundred yards, leaving Fred far behind. Fred gave up the chase and ran back to Sharon. Leo said, “He was chasing a little seed-eater bat. Think chipmunk with wings.” Sharon said, “I didn’t know bats could run on the ground like that.” “Ours can’t. That’s why they do better over here.” “Why did it run so long before it flew?” “Probably afraid a hawk or eagle would get it.” Sharon said. “I’m surprised monkeys can live through our winters.” “They store food for the winter. They don’t really hibernate, but they slow their metabolism and don’t move around much during the cold season. The big packs split up too.” The amber wolves chose that moment to howl one of their songs. Sharon said, “Sounds like they’re talking. I wonder if we could talk them into bringing us food.” Leo said, “If you’re hungry enough, I can show you plants that should be edible. Of course the ones here aren’t exactly the same species as those back home. They could be poisonous.” 146

Exchange “I think I’ll stick with food from The World.” Allison strolled over. “Shouldn’t we be going?” Sharon watched a group of monkeys in the distance. “How much farther?” “Educated wild guess: five minutes until we hit a gravel road that will take us across the stretch of The World that came over with us,” Leo said. “Then half an hour after that.” “We haven’t seen many big carnivores.” “They’re not common, and the amber wolves scare some of them away.” “So why are the wolves following us?” Leo walked back to the truck. “Curiosity maybe. I don’t know. Big predators have to be curious. They also have to be cautious.” “Why cautious?” Leo said, “A predator’s wasting energy if it doesn’t go after the easiest prey it can find. Plus it can’t afford to get hurt. Injured predators starve to death.” Leo started the truck. “I’m a little worried about how little wildlife we’re seeing. The wolves would account for part of it, but I’m beginning to think something else is wrong.” Sharon said, “Not another bat tree, I hope.” They swung onto the gravel road. Sharon caught glimpses of two gutted farmhouses as they drove. Leo said, “Looters. Could have been cons. Could have been AKs from Rockport.” They passed three burned-out pickup trucks—one with a clutter of charred furniture sticking out of the back. They didn’t see any bodies. Allison said, “Probably farmers. A couple of families made a run for the freeway when the fires started. Those two trucks might have made it if they hadn’t stopped to load a few hundred bucks worth of furniture.” “Sometimes you just can’t let go of something no matter how much holding onto it costs you,” Sharon said. “You hold on to an idea, a picture, or an old couch that you could have replaced for five bucks at a garage sale.” She shivered. “I never was much for stuff,” Leo said. “You spend a lifetime collecting things and cluttering up your life with them 147

Dale R. Cozort just so your kids have to rent a dumpster and spend two months of their lives figuring out the five percent of your stuff they want to keep.” Sharon frowned. “That’s a sad way of thinking about it.” “He who dies with the most toys makes his kids rent the biggest dumpster,” Leo said. “Most people drift through life never finding anything or anyone to give their lives purpose. They try to fill the void with things, but the void is way too big.” “I don’t have a void in my life. I have Bethany. I have my job. I have my house—what’s left of it.” “And you’re happy?” Sharon didn’t respond. Leo stopped the truck. “I saw sunlight reflect off metal out in the corn. Somebody’s out there, probably with a rifle.” Sharon peered out at the knee-high corn. “Convicts?” “Or a survivor from the trucks,” Leo said. He yelled, “Hello out there! Do you need help?” Nicole Mack stood up in the cornfield, holding a rifle. In nicer clothes and makeup she might have been pretty, maybe very pretty. Even in a faded and torn, ankle-length, flowered dress that had been in style five years ago and with her brown hair uncombed, she still didn’t look bad—just tired and worn down. Sharon said, “That’s Nicole Mack, David’s wife. I’ll get out so she recognizes me.” She squeezed past Allison, got out of the truck, and yelled, “Are you okay, Nicole?” Nicole walked up to the truck. “No. I’m not okay. I live in a stinking trailer with nine others, go to the bathroom in an outhouse, and just when I think things can’t get any worse, what little I still own gets washed away in a flash flood. I think that has to be rock bottom. Wrong. Your control freak, ex-husband Anthony decides he’s going to take us all over to another timeline where we can starve to death or be eaten by animals that should have gone extinct in caveman times.” “Where’s Bethany?” Nicole didn’t meet her eyes. “Not here.” “You don’t have to protect him; it’s your choice. You can stop him. I only want my daughter back. I want her safe.” “Easier said than done.” 148

Exchange “You know where this is headed. You say the words, but you’ve got to do something.” “I gave you the knife.” “Thanks. Now give me my daughter.” “It’s not that easy. Let me handle it. And yes, I know where this leads. Anthony and Russell assume we’ll spend the rest of our lives squirting out babies to populate the place. Other than that, life is just peachy—oh, except for the fact that my husband is gone and someone is burning farmhouses and killing people.” “David’s gone? Where is he?” “He’s out hunting with Anthony. They’re trying to kill kangaroos with homemade spears.” “Why?” “I don’t know. It must be a male thing.” Allison got out of the truck. “It’s a too-many-cousins-intheir-family-tree thing. Going after just about any of the bigger animals in Bear Country is a good way to get killed.” Nicole glared at her, then turned away. “Oh well. At least it’d be over.” Leo said, “If you want out, you can come with us.” Nicole shook her head. “I’m going to give my husband another day or two. If he doesn’t make a stand, you’ll probably see me over in Rockport.” “They’ll let you go?” “I think so. I hope so. I’ve got to go now.” “Not until you give me Bethany.” “My daughter is back at the Pinkston farm, coughing her lungs out. Bethany was doing the same thing, and Russell’s wife snuck away with her—took her to town to see a doctor. A little antibiotic would probably help both of them, but there’s no room for that in Anthony’s caveman fantasies.” The woman turned to go. Sharon said, “I’ll go back with you, just to see for myself.” “Russell’s there. He won’t be happy to see you.” “He’ll be less happy when I’m done with him.” “You need help?” Leo looked unhappy. “Against Russell? I doubt it. If you hear gunshots you’ll want to come running.” 149

Dale R. Cozort They walked back to the Pinkston farmhouse. Nicole said, “The Pinkstons left before the Exchange. We sheltered here after we got supplies from West’s people.” “Stole them from what I heard.” “That’s not what Anthony said.” Nicole shook her head. “And I believed him again. That boy has a reality distortion field going on.” “Yeah. It doesn’t work on me anymore though.” “Everything we took goes back then. We’re not thieves. I’m even going to make sure we pay for everything we use or break at the Pinkstons.” “Has anybody come after you from Sister West’s bunch?” “Not that I know of.” “They were following you. Weird.” Sharon said. “I saw a piece of your trailer. I actually rode out another flash flood on it.” “Bethany said ‘the water’s still hungry’. She’s—” “She’s not psychic. She’s smart in her own way, but I can always figure out how she knew something.” “She told Anthony he would bleed in the water.” “Did he?” “He cut himself shaving.” “Yeah, several dozen times while we were married. He probably will bleed for real eventually. If he’s near water the next time I see him he definitely will. How sick is she?” “Bethany? Probably bronchitis. She should be okay with a dose of antibiotics.” “She’d better be.” They walked up to a white frame farmhouse sheltered by towering maple trees. The grass in the lawn stood ankle high, still wet from a recent thunderstorm. Nicole smiled. “I had forgotten how nice it is to be in a real house with indoor plumbing and enough beds to go around. I cheered inside when the water smashed our outhouse. An outhouse for crying out loud! Then it hit the mobile home and smashed it into a tangled mass of rusty metal. And you know what? It felt good. It felt fantastic. I watched the last three years of my life get swept away, and the only thing I felt was relieved. I felt like dancing. I thought it was finally over and I could get back to a real life. Wrong.” 150

Exchange They walked into the Pinkston farmhouse. Russell was working at the kitchen table to fasten a chipped rock to the end of a pole. He slammed the pole and spearhead down on the table when they came in. He glared at Nicole, and yelled, “Don’t interrupt me!” He stalked out of the kitchen, nearly bumping Sharon, then did an almost comical double-take. Sharon said, “Don’t let me stop you from finishing your über weapon.” She stepped aside. “There’s probably some of that glue that’ll hold anything somewhere in the house.” Russell started to push past her. Sharon grabbed his wrist and bent his hand back toward his forearm. “I just found out that my daughter’s sick enough that even your wife had enough sense to get her to the doctor. I’m not in the mood to be pushed.” “You need to let go!” “Yeah? I’ve been meaning to ask, Russell. Are there any hospitals in this caveman fantasy of yours? You know, hospitals like the one that saved your wife and baby last time she was pregnant? Hospitals like the one you’ll need for your wrist if I push just a little harder.” Russell tried to pull back, but Sharon increased the pressure and forced him to his knees. “It doesn’t matter how strong you are. It doesn’t take much pressure to break a wrist. You let my daughter get kidnapped. Why shouldn’t I break your wrist and then break both of your elbows? Let somebody spoonfeed you for the next six months.” “You need to shut up and let go.” Sharon glared down at the man. “Anthony might outgrow these fantasies of his if you didn’t encourage him. Ask your wife how she’d feel about pumping out a baby every year for the next ten years with no doctor. Ask her how she’d feel about being old and used up at forty-five. Ask yourself how you’d feel if one of your kids died from a little bug that antibiotics could knock out.” Russell stifled a groan, but glared defiantly back at her. “That’s the life everybody on earth had until a hundred years ago. We’ll make it. Pioneers don’t have it easy, but they are the ones that shape the world the way they want to shape it.”

151

Dale R. Cozort Nichole shook her head. “The irony is that he doesn’t really believe any of that. He’s just a follower, and whatever Anthony says is what he says.” Russell lurched sideways, throwing Sharon off balance. He grabbed a pistol from a nearby counter with his free hand. Before he could point it at her, Sharon grabbed that wrist and swung him into an arm bar, with his arm elbow-down across her shoulder. “You’re a second away from a broken elbow. Drop it!” Russell reached across for the pistol with his other hand. Sharon’s instincts took over. She pulled down on the trapped forearm and pushed up with her shoulder. There was a dry cracking sound and Russell screamed, then swore. The pistol fell from his grip and Sharon kicked it away. She shuddered as the adrenaline rush started to subside. Worse than when I shot the guy. Russell sagged to the floor, hugging his useless arm, his face pale. Sharon stared down at him, tears in her eyes. “I didn’t—” “You did what you had to do,” Nicole said. She glared at Russell. “You’re an idiot. What did you expect? You helped kidnap her daughter—held a gun on her and left her tied up out in woods where she could have died. Did you expect her to let you do it again? You need to get to a doctor.” Sharon said. “Is Bethany really in Rockport?” Nicole nodded. “Are you going to be okay? Will they really let you go?” “I hope so,” Nicole said. “Go. Tell Anthony and my husband that we have to get back to town. Warn them that the convicts are raiding around here.” “Don’t let Russell do anything dumb. I’m not in the mood.” Sharon strode back toward the truck. She saw Leo standing by it, his shirt open at the collar and showing his wellmuscled chest. You’re not going to lure me into another mess like that one. Why do you have to look so good? Why does it have to feel like it does—like safety and comfort and hope—when I touch you? Why do I have to want you near me? Out loud she said, “One down and one to go.” Allison’s smile went away. “One of what down?” 152

Exchange “One of Anthony’s brothers. I had to break his arm.” Sharon tried to keep her voice matter-of-fact, but had to turn away to hide the tears in her eyes. Leo said, “I don’t think they’re going to let Nicole go. I think she knows that.” “Are you going to let me go?” Sharon asked. Leo peered down at her, a breeze gently tousling his blond hair. “Do you really want me to?”

153

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Eighteen They found Anthony and David Mack a short distance into Bear country. Anthony came up to the lead truck, rifle in hand. “You need to go back the way you came. We’re hunting.” Sharon said, “Yeah, we heard. You’re trying to kill a kangaroo with a spear or something stupid like that. You know that convicts are raiding the farmhouses near the Pinkstons? Oh, and I broke Russell’s elbow. He’ll need a doctor. I wish it had been you. You and I have unfinished business.” “If you really broke his elbow we do have unfinished business. We came out here to prove something. It’ll just take a couple of minutes. Then I’ll deal with you.” Anthony pointed out into the plains where several hundred kangaroos lounged in the shade of a grove of trees. “I think we’ll get ourselves one of those. They’re basically deer that hop. Of course they don’t have the brainpower deer do, seeing as they’re just overgrown ’possums.” Leo said, “You did hear what she said about the convicts and your brother? Your brothers’ wives and kids are back there.” “With Russell and a lot of guns,” Anthony said. “That won’t be enough if they come for you,” Woody said. “This is our business. Stay out of it.” Anthony glared at Leo. “You aren’t exactly here legally yourself. You’re just like us. You feel it too, don’t you?” “Feel what?” “The tug of freedom, of the frontier, of a chance to go out and build something of your own without a thousand little bureaucrats and their thousands of little interfering rules. This country was built by people who left everything behind when they came here. All laws and comforts and security. They came 154

Exchange over and built something great. Our ancestors did that. It’s in our genes, in our culture. Don’t you feel it? Isn’t that why you’re here?” “Right now I’m here to talk you out of getting yourself killed,” Leo said. “You can’t just walk out here and live. Bear Country will kill you even if the convicts don’t.” Anthony grinned. His breath reeked of whiskey, but his words were clear and he raised his voice so Sister West’s people could hear. “I told you that the old world was closing in on us, that it wouldn’t leave us alone, that it would push in on us until there was nothing left of our freedom, until we were forced to become sheep like everybody else. Just as the pressure became almost impossible to bear, we were given a way out, a way to escape that world and make our own. All we need is courage. With courage, we can start over, make our own world.” Leo shook his head. “Do you have any idea how many ways Bear Country can kill you?” “You’ve been hanging around my ex-wife too long. She’ll suck the manhood right out of you.” “You can always get more of your version of manhood out of a whiskey bottle,” Sharon said. Anthony shook his head. “This is none of your business. It will be easy living here. See those plants by the river? Indians used to eat the seeds. That patch will feed us for weeks. And the kangaroos will be easy pickings. They’re close to a bend in the river. David and I will use the dogs to herd them into the bend, push them up against the river, and spear a couple. We’ll have our rifles in case something nasty tries to interfere. On the way we’ll collect some of those seeds. It’s simple but it should work.” “What if they just swim across the river?” Allison asked. “I don’t think they will. It’s too wide and the current is too fast. I don’t think kangaroos can swim, anyway.” Leo said, “I think you’re overconfident. I think they’ll get away. You might want to hope that’s all they do.” “We’ll see in a minute.” Anthony turned and stalked away. The dogs followed him. David stood by the truck for a couple of seconds. Sharon said, “Your brother is an idiot.” 155

Dale R. Cozort “I should never have come back after dad died. I’m an accountant—a CPA no less.” He sighed and strolled after Anthony. Leo glanced back at the other trucks. “We should stop them, but I’ve got to admit I’m curious about what’ll happen.” “Like a train wreck,” Allison said. The kangaroos were already aware of the Mack brothers’ approach. Two big males stalked toward the men and stood erect, drumming on their chests like gorillas. Fred’s hair stood on end and he growled softly. The rest of the kangaroos moved away from the river bend. The dogs rushed forward to block their escape. The ’roos turned on the speed, and most of them made it through the gap. One jumped directly over David’s head, clearing it with room to spare and easily outdistanced a dog that tried to chase it. The dogs turned two young kangaroos back toward the riverbend. With David and Anthony’s help, they herded the animals to the water’s edge. The ’roos waded out into chest-deep water and waited. The dogs raced into the water after them as David and Anthony ran to the riverbank. As the dogs approached, the kangaroos grabbed them and pushed their heads under water. Leo swore and raised his rifle, but the Mack brothers had already rushed into the water with their spears. The kangaroos moved in a quick flurry of motion, then Anthony went down. One of the dogs broke loose and paddled frantically to the bank. It knocked David down in its haste to get to shore. The kangaroos scrambled up the bank and hopped back to the rest of their group. Leo raised his rifle, but didn’t fire. “There’s not much point now.” Leo, Allison, and Sharon ran down to the riverbank. By the time they got there, Anthony was on his hands and knees, arms on the bank and legs still in the shallow water. A growing pool of red leaked from Anthony’s thigh and turned the water under his knee red. David stared at the blood. “You’ll bleed in the water.” He turned to Sharon. She shook her head. “She’s not psychic.” “She does an awful good imitation then.” He turned to his brother. “Are you okay?” 156

Exchange Anthony’s face went hard. “It’s just a scratch. The ’roo must have bumped my spear and caused it to gouge my leg. Just a little bad luck. We’ll put a bandage on it and try again.” He stood and Sharon got a good look at his leg. Anthony’s thigh was deeply slashed from his hip almost to his knee. Blood and river mud intermingled in the deep wound. Leo said, “You have a major problem there.” David sat up, saw the wound on his brother’s leg, and winced. “They have a long claw on the big toe of their hind feet. I saw it when that one jumped over me. It must have reared up on its tail and cut him with it.” Anthony stood up, blood pouring from the wound. Allison rushed over, but Anthony pushed her away. “Just a little bad luck.” Sharon thought about the power of legs that could propel a two-hundred-pound animal over a man’s head. She said, “No, if it had really been bad luck the ’roo would have done its thing two inches to the left, and let’s just say you wouldn’t be half the man you are now. And it would have happened out of the water so it got its full power into the kick. Of course, that’s an awfully small target so I’m not surprised it missed.” Anthony laughed. “It’s just a scratch.” Sharon glanced at Anthony sharply. His eyes had an odd, unfocused look to them. He stared down at his leg and laughed uncontrollably. “Shock?” Sharon asked. “He was drunk to begin with. Now he looks high.” David said, “He ate some of those seeds.” Leo sighed. “Okay. Let’s get him back to the Pinkston house.” Anthony insisted on walking by himself. He wouldn’t let his brother treat the wound. He talked nonstop for about five minutes, then abruptly passed out and fell forward. David caught him on the way down. Leo said, “He needs to get to a hospital.” David shook his head. “Just get us back to the Pinkston farm. We’ll take care of it.” 157

Dale R. Cozort As David and one of Sister West’s people carried Anthony away, Fred abruptly stood upright and stared out over the knee-high grass. He hastily scampered over to Sharon, touched her hand with his paw, then ran off through the grass Woody strolled over and watched the monkey run. “I think he found his pack. He looked torn between going and staying with you, but once he decided, he sure moved. He had to have been going forty miles an hour, at least.” Sharon watched until Fred joined a group of other monkeys. She felt surprisingly depressed at the monkey’s sudden departure. The only one out here I could trust. “Pretty sad,” Woody said. “Was that your husband with the spear and the gimpy leg?” “Ex-husband.” “Didn’t seem to bother you much seeing him cut open.” “I—no, it didn’t. He was abusive and he kidnapped my daughter, but I suppose I should feel sorry he got hurt. I don’t though. Maybe I will eventually. Am I an awful person?” “You’re asking me?” “Yeah. That’s sad too, isn’t it?” Woody grinned. “I know industrial-strength bad; you got just enough bad in you to be interesting.” It was early afternoon before they carried Anthony’s unconscious form back to the Pinkston farm and got back on track. They took back the stolen truck and the supplies, leaving the Mack brothers with their old SUV. They saw no convicts and no sign of anybody else in the area. Sharon sat by the window on the way back, with Allison between her and Leo. The afternoon sun from a clear blue sky played over the green and dark brown of the landscape. It looked like a picture postcard. The sun and beauty darkened rather than lightened Sharon’s mood, even when they reached the top of a small hill and gazed down across the prairie at a group of mammoths grazing in the distance, tossing dust in the air with their trunks. Monkeys moved among the herd. A ground sloth walked near the mammoths, surprisingly fast for its awkward knuckle-walking gait. 158

Exchange Leo steered the truck around the multi-ton bulk of another ground sloth that refused to move out of his way. Most other animals appeared curious rather than defiant. Kangaroo mobs hopped parallel to them for a short distance, then easily pulled ahead and cut in front of them. Leo glanced down at the speedometer. “Kangaroos doing forty-five miles an hour, and we weren’t even pushing them.” Horses watched as the vehicle came into sight, before running away. The little monkeys and the smaller predators moved out of their way but didn’t seem particularly frightened. Leo dodged a rock that would have cracked the radiator if he hadn’t noticed it in time. He glanced over at Sharon. “This is beautiful country.” Sharon shrugged. “It has teeth. So, did your missing people overlook Anthony and crew or are they still behind us somewhere?” “I don’t know. Thunderstorms washed out the tracks. We’re past where they stopped for their last transmission, by three or four miles. They would have had plenty of time to find Anthony and company. Something happened to them. We’ll have to backtrack.” “Correction. You have to backtrack. I have a sick daughter to take care of.” Leo steered around a low spot filled with muddy water. “Fair enough. We’ll get to a main road and send you home.” They drove on. Sharon tried to feel joy at the prospect of seeing Bethany. I’m a bad mother. Am I really doing all of this out of love, or is it just out of duty? Old Elroy obviously thought it was out of duty. She sat with her pistol in her lap, ready to shoot at any sign of an attack and half hoping that one would come. At one point something moved near the truck, and she almost shot it before she realized it was a panicked rabbit running away from the truck with its ears back. Bethany needs me. She’s wonderful and I know she loves me in her own way. And she’s sick. She needs me. 159

Dale R. Cozort Sharon peered at a little hill not far from them. “There’s something odd about that hill over there.” Leo looked where she was pointing. “I don’t see anything. What is it?” “I don’t know. Something’s odd about it, though.” Leo stopped the truck and they strode over. “Ground’s disturbed. Something’s been buried since the storm and somebody did a good job of hiding it. You got sharp eyes; I would have driven right past.” He yelled for the people in the other trucks to come over. Sharon studied the ground. Her heart skipped a beat. “Drag marks over here, lots of them. And bloodstains.” Sister West’s people deployed around the hill as Leo and a couple of the others dug into the newly disturbed dirt. They found a body about three feet down. Leo rolled the man over. “He was one of ours.” “What killed him?” “Knife or spear wound in the back. The wound’s too big for it to have been an arrow.” Leo turned to the others. “Look sharp, unless you want to end up buried with our friend here.” Sharon picked up a shovel and joined them. Leo said, “You don’t have to—” “I’ve seen dead people before.” She quickly uncovered another body and then another, both men. “How many people did you send?” “Fifteen. Three of them women.” Sharon slammed the shovel into the ground. “Why did you let women go?” “Wasn’t my decision,” Leo said. “I didn’t even know about it until you and I got back.” They quickly uncovered a dozen bodies—all male— stripped and stacked on top of one another. They dug half an hour before they decided that there were no more bodies. Leo shook his head. “No women.” Allison said, “Not to mention guns or trucks or anything else the convicts could use.” Leo looked grim. “That’s the way I read it.” He followed the drag marks back into a little valley. “I’m guessing they 160

Exchange ambushed our people here when they stopped to eat—probably killed the guards before they had a chance to yell, then got close and speared anyone who tried to fight them.” He scouted through the surrounding brush. “I doubt that our guys got off more than half a dozen shots.” “Then they buried the bodies, took the trucks and guns and tried to wipe out the tire tracks behind them,” Allison said. “Going to follow them?” “Sounds like a real good way to get ambushed ourselves, especially now that they have rifles.” Leo walked over to the improvised grave. “We lost friends here. At least we can mark their graves and say a few words over them.” They reburied the bodies, dragged large flat stones to the site and held a brief, impromptu funeral. When they finished, Leo said, “The first twelve of many, I’m afraid. We can’t stop caring though. We can’t let Bear Country harden us.” “You’re right,” Sharon said, “I’m sorry you lost your people. I know I probably looked impatient. I have a sick little girl to deal with. It’s hard to keep that off my mind.” Leo nodded. “I know.” He turned to Woody. “Did your people do this?” “I wish. A dozen guns and some women, plus the food and the trucks. That would make a big difference.” “So, you’re saying this wasn’t convicts?” Sharon asked. “I didn’t say that. It just wasn’t my people. The only bunch that could pull this off would be the Red Spears—Sam Kittle and his crew.” “And you aren’t part of these Red Spears?” Leo asked. Woody shook his head and pointed to his forearm. “AK. We had five gangs. We’re down to two now. The Spears are tough. We ran out of stuff to fight over a long time ago. We have plenty of room and plenty of excitement with the animals around, but the Spears still kill anyone from the other gangs—well, just the AKs now—on sight.” Leo nodded. “What do you think of Sam Kittle?” “Sam Kittle’s as slippery as mashed potatoes on a wet floor.” “Mashed potatoes?” 161

Dale R. Cozort “More slippery than a banana peel. He always knew where we were and when to hit us.” “How many men does he have?” Woody shrugged. “Maybe three or four hundred. It’s hard to say. A lot of guys died in the first few months. It took strong leaders to hold the groups together, especially this kind of people, when the food got scarce and we ran out of bullets for the few guns we had.” Sharon shook her head. “How could you not thrive over here with all of the animals to hunt and none of them afraid of you?” “Yeah, that’s what a lot of people thought,” Woody said. “This looks like rich country. Thing is, when you settle somewhere and start hunting them, the animals go somewhere else in a hurry. Then you’re down to eating seeds and bats. We saw a lot of animals for the first month or two. They’d come right up to us. Even then they were hard to kill. After a couple of months we hardly ever saw anything bigger than a rabbit. We may have killed them off anywhere near us, or maybe they figured out we were dangerous and hid or left. All I know is they disappeared and we had to move on.” Allison said, “You couldn’t have killed them off that quick. They learned to be afraid of people—hopefully just where you were.” The amber wolves twittered for a while, then howled an intricate chorus. A few seconds after they finished, Sharon heard another pack howling. “That sounded close.” Leo nodded. “The other pack’s less than a mile away. Both of those choruses were different from the first ones and from each other. I wish I could analyze them.” Sharon heard a whistling sound. “That sounds human,” she said. A few minutes later, a dozen bearded men riding small, brown-and-white-striped horses came into sight through the tall grass. They rode awkwardly in crudely made saddles. Most wore pieces of ragged prison uniforms and carried long spears, but Sharon saw a few rifles and pistols in the group and a few of the men were wearing jeans. Several men led spare horses. Another pack of amber wolves trotted in a loose circle around them. 162

Exchange The bearded men rode toward the trucks. The amber wolves reared up on their hind legs, causing the horses to shy away, buck, and try to bite their riders. Two men fell off and had to duck lethal-looking kicks. Sharon said, “The tall one with the blond hair is Sam Kittle.” Three of the convicts rode forward, then dismounted and tossed several deer carcasses in front of the line of wolves. A wolf went out and sniffed at each one, then twittered. More wolves came out and collected the carcasses. Leo levered a round into his rifle and said, “Something we can help you with?” Sam Kittle rode closer. “Yeah. Give us your toilet paper, cigarettes, and the women. We’ll let you live—may even trade you horses for them.” “Well there’s a man with his priorities in order. Do you want us to toss in a case of cold beer?” Sam seemed startled. “Cold beer. I’d forgotten about cold beer. Yep. I doubt if you have any, but if you had a case or two and it was really cold we might let you keep the women. Probably not though.” Leo muttered, “Keep your eyes open.” Out loud he said, “Enjoying life over here?” “No toilet paper and no women. How do you think we like it over here?” Sharon studied Sam Kittle. She said quietly to Leo, “He looks even older than he did when I saw him earlier; can’t be over thirty. Smells like none of them have had a bath for a while.” Leo nodded. He said to the convicts, “The women stay. If we find any cigarettes or toilet paper you can have them. You’d be better off just going to Rockport and turning yourselves in. You’ve been here two years. Back home they want the kind of information you have—maybe enough to pardon you and let most of you do the lecture circuit at a lot of dollar signs per pop. Live in a mansion instead of a mud hut. Sit around and get fat and lazy.” Sam said, “That sounds good to me personally. But I don’t think the boys here would buy it. Those guards didn’t die on their own. You know, I already had this conversation with Sharon, yet 163

Dale R. Cozort here she is. And it sure looks to me like your crew is setting up to stay out here. Might want to think about what you’re leaving behind yourself.” “We already have,” Leo said. “We’re leaving a lot of evil back there.” “There’s plenty of evil over here too, as you can see.” Leo gestured toward the bodies. “Your work?” Sam glanced over at the hole. “It’s a tough world. Easy to get yourself killed, especially if you’re on someone else’s turf.” “And this is your turf?” Sam said, “This is our world.” “There’s plenty of room for a few hundred or a few thousand people.” “Actually, there isn’t. Go back to Rockport. Leave your fancy equipment and your guns and your fancy compound. We’ll let you go back—well, at least the men.” Leo grinned. “It doesn’t sound like we’re going to come to a meeting of the minds, so here’s an offer back at you: give us the women back unharmed and we won’t hunt you down like dogs.” Sam grinned back at Leo. “Well, now that we’ve got the macho stuff out of the way, let’s talk about how we can help each other. Anyone have cigarettes?” One of Sister West’s people took a battered, half-empty pack out of his pocket and tossed it over. Sam took two cigarettes, stared at the pack wistfully, then passed it to his men. “Your women were okay when I left. You owe me big-time for that. I put my butt on the line to keep them that way for now, and almost got it shot off.” Leo said, “We’ll thank you when they come back and tell us they’re okay.” Sam took a drag from his cigarette, then coughed until he wheezed. “Stuff’s nasty.” He took another drag. “But my body still wants it. If you could get us a few dozen cartons of these, we might give you your women. Nah. Who am I trying to kid? The women aren’t coming back. Even if I wanted to trade for them, I couldn’t swing it. The little girl might make it out if you gave us enough cigarettes, food, guns, and ammunition to make it worth our while.” 164

Exchange Leo shook his head. “First, the little girl is already in Rockport.” “Well, she headed off that way. Doesn’t mean she got there.” Sharon’s heart sank. “So we trade you guns and then you use them to come after us?” Leo gestured toward the bodies. “You already owe us in blood.” Sam grinned. “I could make a bunch of promises about the guns. If you don’t trust me, why bother? Ball’s in your court. The Exchange won’t last forever. If you wait too long your little girl will be stranded among a bunch of guys who make me look like a choirboy. She won’t like the experience.” “No, she probably wouldn’t,” Leo said. “Sure you don’t want to go back to Rockport and enjoy all the comforts of modern living?” Sam said, “Toilet paper. Showers. TV. Beer. Cigarettes. Women. The basics of life. And of course laws and police—all of the pesky little things that keep you from killing people who need killing and taking things that are just sitting there asking to be taken. Nope. Afraid not. By the way, you know you’ve got an AK with you?” “That’s what the tattoo says.” “We kill AKs on sight. Sort of like you kill poisonous snakes.” “Hmmm. Not this time,” Leo said. “How do you talk to the wolves?” Sam smiled coldly. “How do you know I do?” “It’s pretty obvious. They told you where we were. You gave them the deer carcasses.” Sam shook his head. “And here I thought we were going to be friends.” He raised his arm. Leo fired into the brush near the trucks as quickly as he could pull the trigger. Sharon caught a glimpse of a dozen convicts armed with spears charging toward them. She fired twice and saw one of the convicts go down. The butt of a spear slammed into her belly and she lost the pistol as she gasped for air. 165

Dale R. Cozort Sam got his horse back under control and looked back at her, then saluted with two fingers. “See you soon, Sharon Mack,” he said before riding away. Sharon felt strong hands grab her and drag her toward the brush as she fought for breath.

166

Exchange

Chapter Nineteen Sharon woke in a large wooden cage with the morning sun beating down on her face. She started to sit up and quickly became aware of nausea and a pounding headache. Someone said, “Wasn’t sure if you were going to wake up.” Sharon glanced around, moving her head slowly. “Anthony? What—” “The cons brought you in last night, along with a couple of others.” Anthony Mack was lying several yards from her, his leg heavily bandaged. “The cons hit us on the way back to town.” “Where are your brothers and their families?” “I haven’t seen them since the attack. I got away.” “Then what are you doing here?” “I got back to town. Doctor told me I had a choice of losing the leg or having the infection get me. I figured I would come out here and at least die a free man.” Anthony gestured at the wooden cage around them. “Now I won’t even get that. Sam Kittle—” “—thinks you’re an idiot. And he’s right. You realize—as soon as your leg heals, I’m going to beat the crap out of you.” “Do it now if you’re going to. I told you. I’m dying.” “I’m not going to be a hypocrite and say I’m sorry.” “I don’t expect you to.” “Have you seen Bethany?” “No. She’s back in Rockport as far as I know.” “Sam claims he has her.” “I hope not.” Anthony tried to sit up and winced. “Sam Kittle and I go back a ways. I didn’t realize how much he doesn’t 167

Dale R. Cozort like me. He tells me that since killing me would be merciful he’s going to let his men ‘entertain’ my brothers’ wives and daughters tonight.” “But he didn’t mention Bethany?” “No. The fever goes up at night. Hopefully I won’t be conscious to see that.” “I don’t think he’ll actually do it. Does he even have them?” Anthony shrugged. “I don’t know. I hope not. They always told me that power corrupts. He wouldn’t think about doing that over some bad feelings back in The World. Here he has the power. No one’s going to stop him. He feels like doing it, so he does it.” Sharon glanced around the cage. “It looks like they caught Woody.” “You know him? They brought him in last night.” Anthony said. “I don’t trust him. They also brought Allison in last night.” “Allison,” Sharon said. “Good. No, bad. Trapped with you two. Where is she?” “With Sam, I guess.” “Have you seen Leo?” “Leo West? No.” So they didn’t catch him. Or they killed him. Sharon tried to push that last thought out of her mind, but it lurked at the edges and gnawed at her. She examined the gate of the cage. “You sound a little more...I don’t know.” “Together? I’m dying. That changes things.” “Maybe. Gate doesn’t look that solid.” Anthony nodded. “I’d like to test that out for half an hour with no convicts watching. I haven’t had a chance to yet.” Sharon got up slowly, in stages, and looked around Sam’s headquarters. It was basically a hilltop with ten-foot-tall, sharpened, wooden poles in a rectangle around it and gates set at each end. Derelict cars were scattered around the hilltop, several of them mounded with dirt and with sun tarps shading them. Sam Kittle sauntered up to the cage, accompanied by three men carrying rifles. He grinned at Anthony. 168

Exchange “We’re gearing up for the big show tonight. You’ll have a good view from here.” Sharon said, “Burning your bridges, aren’t you?” “I might be if I was planning on going back. Then again I’m not sure whose laws have jurisdiction over here,” Sam said. “Might be that they couldn’t touch me. This might just make my book sell better. Ready for the tour of your new home?” Sharon wrinkled her nose. “I think I’ve already seen it. I’ve definitely smelled it. I like what you’ve done with the place. The décor is late junkyard and early smells-like-an-outhouse, isn’t it?” “That’s what we were going for.” Sam grinned. “Got to admit that it could use a woman’s touch, but of course that’s where you come in.” “So what do want me for?” “Other than the obvious? I happened to remember that you used to be a computer whiz,” Sam said. “I’ve got a job for you.” “Sorry. I’m not interested.” Sam grinned. “Oh, that won’t be a problem. You actually have a choice of jobs. There’s the one where you spend a lot of quality time with a bunch of guys with strange ideas of quality time. We don’t feed you much and if you’re lucky you die in three or four months. Oh, and you work all day in the hot sun and get burned into old age in six months if you’re unlucky enough to live that long. Then there’s the one where you work on the two surveyors I have at headquarters, get video from them, and become my staff techno-whiz. Today you get to try out job number two. If it doesn’t work out, tomorrow you get to try job number one.” “As I said, I’m not interested.” “That’s your call. We’ll give you a little sample of the working in the sun bit this morning and see if you change your mind.” The convicts took Sharon and several other prisoners— some from Sister West’s compound and some from Rockport— to a site a half-mile from the main compound and set them to work clearing brush. The morning was hot and humid. The June sun poured down on the workers. Around mid-morning, the day’s first breeze stirred. Sharon stopped digging for a second— 169

Dale R. Cozort enjoying the cool air moving over her hot skin. That earned her a glare from a short, pockmarked convict standing guard nearby. He said, “Widen it another foot, then get your sorry, little, soft-handed carcass out of the way.” Sharon glanced at her hands, then down at her blue jeans and dark green T-shirt, stained with perspiration and dirt. “You’ll find out how soft my fists are if I ever catch you without a gun.” The convict said, “So, are you ready to do Sam’s computer work?” “No.” Sharon started digging again, keeping a wary eye on a grove of trees near them. “So did you guys vote on who gets to be the head honcho?” The convict laughed. “Oh, yeah. Secret ballot. And we have a choir—sing cute little hymns on Sunday mornings.” “How did Sam end up in charge?” “Because he’ll kill anyone who even thinks about challenging him. And he kept us alive. I don’t think anyone else could have.” “There are a lot of deadly things living out here.” “And we’ve survived them all.” “So far,” Sharon said. “It can’t be much of a life. Back in Rockport I worked for Summit Foods. Some days they would package brownie mix, and I would sit there at my computer and the plant would fill with aroma from that mix. I could get up anytime I wanted to, go to the break room and buy a brownie or a cold can of pop from the vending machine. Rockport’s no more than thirty miles away. You—any of you—could hop in a truck and be there in an hour. Why not do just that?” “Because I was in for life. No chance of parole. I killed someone because they—” “Talked too much,” Sharon finished. “I’ve heard that a time or two.” “In this case, believe it. I’d forgotten how irritating women can be when they yap at you.” Sharon heard gunshots from the other side of the new stockade. She studied the ground near her. The only movement she saw was from the wind moving the grass and leaves. Three pickup trucks filled with poles for the stockade drove past. A 170

Exchange monkey darted out in front of the last one and the truck hit it, sending its body flying. The monkey got up and staggered off. The convict behind Sharon swore. “That’s real trouble. Finish what you’re doing, fast.” Sharon hastily finished her section of brush clearing and moved back a few yards to get out of the way. A larger truck pulled up and stopped a short distance behind them. Men and women prisoners swarmed out of it and unloaded twelve-foot fence posts. Sharon leaned on her shovel for a few seconds, stretching the protesting muscles of her lower back and looking out at Bear Country. She said, “So the monkey spooked you, did it?” The convict ignored her. “I had one as a pet. It was really very nice.” “You may have thought you had it as a pet. It probably thought it had you as a pet.” Sharon looked around. “We don’t belong here, you know. Our ancestors died out or never developed. Too much competition. That should tell you something.” The convict’s eyes lingered on her chest. “You know how many people the boss had to kill to keep you from getting banged by pretty much everyone here?” “Last people who tried that ended up dead or wishing they were.” “The AKs? I’ve heard the story. Can’t say as I believe it.” “So how many people did he have to kill?” “Just two. Think about that. You don’t want to mess with the man.” One of the other convicts yelled, “In the trucks, now!” Convicts and their prisoners piled into the trucks, climbing on top of the poles. Sharon balanced precariously, half on the side of the lead truck’s bed and half on the cargo of poles. The truck roared forward. One of the prisoners yelled, “What’s going on? Why are we running?” That became apparent a few seconds later. Monkeys swarmed over the last truck in line, in spite of the fact that it sped frantically through the brush. They broke out the cab windows and swarmed inside. The truck veered and ran into a tree. Most of the people in the truck escaped. Others fell as the monkeys 171

Dale R. Cozort swarmed in, biting and swinging clubs. The other trucks kept going, leaving both convicts and their prisoners to their fates. The monkeys didn’t pursue the rest of the trucks, which soon got back to Sam Kittle’s compound. Sam met them at the gate. He talked to one of the drivers briefly, swore at length, and then said, “Just bring her to headquarters.” The convicts led Sharon to a bus with two flat tires and graffiti scrawled over the name of a prison. She said, “So this is your headquarter. I expected something more mud-hut.” Sam said, “Even has electricity, at least for a few days. We picked up a generator and gas from Rockport.” He walked in and pointed to an improvised desk with a surveyor sitting on it and a jumble of computer and electronic parts around it. “Get that one running by noon and I’ll give you the cold drink of your choice. Believe me, by the time you’ve been here a couple of years you’ll kill for something like that.” “Which is why you ought to go back and take that book deal.” “Not a choice I can take, I’m afraid.” Sam motioned for his men who were standing guard by the door to go away, then turned to Sharon. “I hear you saw our little friends—the monkeys—in action.” “Yeah. It’s not the first time. One of them tried to take a rifle a few days ago.” “Probably thought it was a nice-looking club, I hope. They probably couldn’t use it anyway. It’s too big and has too much recoil,” Sam said. “We try not to bother them, but it doesn’t take much to get them bothered. They fight like wolverines, only in packs. I’ve never seen a pack of monkeys back down from a fight with anything over here, even the monster bears. We’ll either have to fight them or give them blood money to settle them down.” “Blood money?” “Actually, peanut butter. They love peanut butter.” Sharon said, “I had one as a pet. I named him Fred.” “Really? I guess that makes you the queen of tough, doesn’t it?” 172

Exchange “Do you realize that the monkeys killed at least half a dozen people out there? You just move on like nothing happened,” Sharon said. “How can you live like that?” Sam got a beer out of the cooler. He didn’t offer her one. “You get used to it,” he said. “You should know. You’ve killed two men since you got here if I can believe the stories. I bet the first one bothered you. I bet you had nightmares. But the second one didn’t bother you as much, did he? You haven’t even thought about number two much, have you? Bear Country is already making you tougher.” Sharon fought to keep despair off her face. She managed a cold smile. “Are you sure you should be alone with me?” Sam laughed. “I heard you have that fancy karate stuff. I think I could still take you. Bear Country makes a man hard or it kills him. You couldn’t get out of camp if I’m wrong anyway. Let’s put the macho stuff aside for a while and just talk.” Sharon thought about pulling out her hideaway pistol and trying to use Sam as a hostage to get out of the compound. Instead she said, “I don’t do macho.” Sam laughed. “You do a pretty good imitation then. I hear you took on nine AKs with your bare hands and won.” “Seven.” “What?” “There were just seven,” Sharon said. “And only four of them had guns.” Sam stared at her. “You’re serious. I thought that was just one of those crazy rumors. You’ll have to tell me about that some day.” “I don’t think so. I don’t want to think about it. A bunch more of them tried to burn my house down later that night. AKs in town, convict AKs out here, then whatever you call your bunch of losers. I need a score card just to keep track of the gangs.” “Don’t bother. None of the AKs will be around much longer. I’ll have to chat with them about trying to burn down your house. Can’t have a bunch of wannabes messing with someone I’ve kissed. Are there any other crazy rumors about you that happen to be true? I heard one that says you’re an undercover fed. Do you have any idea why?” 173

Dale R. Cozort “No. I have no idea.” Sam laughed. “Of course you would say that even if you were. Why were you riding around in a jeep with Anna Morgan then?” “I was trying to talk her into helping me find my daughter.” “Sounds thin,” Sam said. “You’re riding around with Anna Morgan and then you show up with Sister West’s crew. The feds would love to have someone inside the West crew, if they didn’t already before the Exchange. You fit the profile. On the other hand, I kind of kept track of you until I went into the correctional center.” “Stalked me?” “Not really. Just a casual interest. I heard about it when you married Anthony Mack. That was a real winner of a move. You would have actually been better off with me, and I’m a long ways from being daddy material. Anthony Mack was born a jerk and he’ll die a jerk.” “That’s my line.” “I stole it. I heard you had a daughter. Other than that, you probably know more about me than I know about you.” “That’s because my friends called me whenever your name hit the police blotter,” Sharon said. “Every time you got into a fight, held up a convenience store, or whatever other penny-ante thing you did, I heard about it. I’m not sure why. We went out for less than a month.” “Penny-ante? You think I’m just trying to set myself over here as some two-bit warlord?” Sam said. “You think I’m just a guy indulging a power fantasy.” “Well, yeah. The bit about making a dying man’s relatives and kids entertain your men in front of him kind of clinches that for me.” “Not going to happen,” Sam said. “I’ll make him sweat today, then postpone it until tomorrow night, then just let it drop.” “The man’s dying. Isn’t that enough?” Sam shrugged. “I don’t know. You were married to him. I heard he beat you. I heard he blamed you because your daughter 174

Exchange has problems. I heard he kidnapped your kid. Is dying enough to pay that back?” “I don’t know. If it isn’t, what is?” “I don’t know. Where’s your daughter?” “Supposedly in Rockport. She’s sick.” “That’s too bad. Want me to bring her here so you can be together?” “No.” “Didn’t think so,” Sam said, “So is dying enough punishment for what Anthony did? Nope. Deep down you know that. Forget Anthony. He’s an idiot. Wasted his life on a fantasy and talked his family into wasting theirs too. He would have wasted yours and your daughter’s if you had let him. Now he’s dying of his own stupidity. Oh well, not important. The surveyors are important. They’re survival-of-us-all-type important.” Sharon glanced at the surveyor on the desk. “Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t do this one. I’d have to have the right interface and I don’t have one.” Sam nodded. “I figured that. Why don’t you open it up and see if you can figure out some way to improvise? You know you want to. Your fingers are just itching to get in there and see how it works.” Sharon went over and examined the surveyor. “Have you had it open?” “No. Afraid we’d break it.” Sharon opened a couple of latches with a screwdriver, then slid the top of the surveyor off. A puff of stale air and dust came out of it and they both coughed. She said, “What is this?” “I bet you’re going to tell me that you can’t make heads or tails of anything in there.” “It’s true. I can’t,” Sharon said. “I’m not playing any kind of game here. I don’t recognize any of the chips, if they even are chips.” Sam said, “And I’m supposed to believe that?” “I don’t care what you believe. I don’t know how this thing works at all. I wouldn’t even know how to start to work on it. So work me to death or shoot me or whatever.” “No need for that,” Sam said. “You’ve already done what I needed you to do. Thanks. Now, go back to your cage and think 175

Dale R. Cozort about what you saw inside there. I’m not a penny-ante warlord. I’m the right guy at the right time and the right place.” “For what?” “Just go back and think about it.” Allison was in the cage when Sharon came back. She strolled over to Sharon and asked, “What do you have that gets all of these bad boys panting after you? First Leo and now this convict boss.” “Why are you even trying to talk to me? I know what you tried to do.” “It’s my word against Woody’s. Do you really believe him?” “Oh, I believe him. If I ever get out of here the question will be should I slap you first or just shoot you?” “Oh, yeah. Believing Woody means that you can think Leo’s okay,” Allison said. “Your head knows what he is. Your heart—” “You don’t know anything about my heart.” Allison laughed. “This thing you have with Leo—it’s definitely love, or at least a passable imitation. That would mean you’re thinking with the heart, or maybe something a little further down the body.” Sharon took a deep breath and gave herself a second or two for her anger to cool. “What do you want?” “Your ex-husband—at least I did. He’s broken now, so time to move on.” “Just like that?” “Yeah. Just like that.” “You were the friend he still had in Sister West’s camp.” “Yeah. That was me.” Allison glanced at Sharon. “If you get out, go home. Take Leo the ice man with you. You can’t make it over here. Game’s almost over and you’re just starting to figure out who the players are.” “So you set me up for Anthony?” Sharon shook her head. “You’re the one who doesn’t know who the players are. Anthony is about Anthony—how Anthony feels, how everything that goes wrong isn’t really Anthony’s fault.” “Hello. I’m right here and I’m not dead yet,” Anthony broke in. 176

Exchange Sharon didn’t look at him. “I’m not going to say I’m sorry you’re dying, because after all you put me through, I’m not sure I am. I am sorry you didn’t find what you wanted in life.” She walked as far away from Allison and Anthony as she could in the cage and sat down in the only spot of shade available. She let her hand brush against her ankle holster. The hideaway gun was still there, not that it would do her much good at the moment. “Take some of them with me, I guess.” “What?” Sharon said, “Nothing. I was talking to myself. Here’s something weird though. So far they’ve been perfect gentlemen. Well, actually I passed out after they grabbed me and woke up with a guy trying to kiss me. Sam Kittle came over and told him to back off.” Anthony said, “Don’t expect that to last.” “When it stops it’ll cost them body parts.” “Maybe,” Anthony said. “I wonder why Sam’s protecting you. He has to have an angle. I also wonder how he’s making it stick. Have any idea how to get back to Rockport if you happen to get out of here?” “I’m guessing we’re around thirty miles east of Rockport,” Sharon said. “I was out part of the time, but they didn’t make any effort to keep me from seeing where they were going.” “They’re pretty cocky.” “Yeah. Truck they brought me in is parked outside the gate. I could get back to Rockport if I could just figure out a way of getting out of the cage, getting through a couple hundred armed convicts, hotwiring a truck, and driving it home without hitting a big rock or a tree.” “Yeah. Not easy. I can’t go back anyway,” Anthony said. “When the Exchange reverses, I’m not going to be the pathetic guy in the wheelchair who got himself kicked to pieces by an overgrown ’possum.” Woody rolled over and sat up. “Speaking of going back, this is day six of the Exchange, right?” “Uh—yes I guess it is,” Sharon said. “So it could reverse any time from tomorrow on.” “Fun thought.” 177

Dale R. Cozort The convicts interrupted their conversation by tossing canned meat into the cages. One of them said, “Eat up. That’s lunch and supper.” Sharon looked at one of the cans. “It’s new. They probably looted it from some farmhouse.” She popped the top on the can, and her stomach rumbled. “I must really be hungry. This smells good right now, even if I’m going to have to eat it with my fingers.” “Which you probably are,” Woody said. “What did Sam want with you a couple of minutes ago?” Sharon thought back on the conversation. “I don’t know exactly. He told me to work on a robot surveyor he found, but he apparently knew I wouldn’t be able to fix it before he showed it to me.” “So why show it to you?” “Exactly. Unless showing it to me was the whole point,” Sharon said, “Is that it?” She shook his head. “No, can’t be. Pretty much has to be though.” “What?” “Nothing I want to speculate on,” Sharon said. “If I ever get back, I need to have a serious chat with Leo West.” Sharon began feeling sick to her stomach in the early evening. She crawled over to Woody. “That meat might have been a mistake. Are you feeling it?” “I’m sitting in a cage in the hot sun after eating greasy meat with my fingers and drinking water I don’t want to think too much about,” Woody said. He turned to Anthony. “How about you?” “My fever is going up again, but remember—I’m dying. It’s just a matter of time. I doubt that anything we eat would make much difference.” Sharon sat with her head between her knees, which helped a little. She said, “Maybe just the after-effects of running on adrenaline for six days.” Her right arm—especially the hand—started going numb. She sat in the June sun and watched the shade from the posts around the headquarters gradually extend toward the cage. A 178

Exchange couple of convicts came over just as the shade reached her corner of the cage. “Up! You’re coming with us now!” Sharon got up, watched black spots grow in front of her eyes, and tried to grab the bars of the cage. Her right hand didn’t grip, and she almost fell before she could get her left hand around a bar and steady herself. She stood holding the bar and feeling nauseated for a couple of seconds, then the convicts opened the door and hustled her to Sam’s bus. Sam was lying back in one of the seats with his eyes closed when Sharon stumbled in. He opened one eye and mumbled, “What did you do to me?” “I didn’t do anything—” Sam sat up slowly, holding his head, and pointed a pistol in Sharon’s direction. The muzzle wavered in a large arc. “You poisoned me, but how? I didn’t drink or eat anything.” Sharon got her left hand around one of the uprights at the front of the bus and struggled to pull her thoughts together. “I didn’t,” she said. “I couldn’t have. Maybe they put something in the cans you stole.” Sam shook his head, slowly. He winced, and the pistol almost slipped out of his hand. “The cans were sealed, and we washed them. It can’t be that. Besides, no one else is sick.” “No one except me. Are you nauseated? Dizzy? Are your hands numb? Is it hard to grip anything?” Sam nodded. “That’s it.” “I got it too.” “Just us so far.” Sam looked down at the pistol and steadied it a little. “Why? What did we do that no one else did?” “Opened the surveyor,” Sharon said. “No one else was here then. We caught some kind of bug from the surveyor. That probe is not from back in The World.” Sam swore softly. “I thought it wasn’t. I just wanted someone who knew computers to look at it so I was sure. So we caught a bug from wherever it came from.” He peered up at his men. “Take her back to her cage. Don’t let anyone near her. Don’t let anyone near me.” “It’s probably too late for that if whatever we got is contagious.” 179

Dale R. Cozort Sam almost fell out of his chair, but straightened and held the pistol almost steady for a couple of seconds. “I’m tough. Everyone still alive here is tough.” He almost dropped the pistol again and then set it down. “Get her out of here.” Sharon stumbled back to the cage, with her escort keeping their distance behind her. When she got back in the cage she tried to ease herself down, but fell heavily to her knees and then onto her side. Anthony yelled over, “Are you okay?” Sharon rolled over so she faced him. She noticed that Woody was no longer in the cage. “No, I’m not okay. Stay away from everybody here if you can.” “I don’t have a lot of choice on that. Why?” Sharon said, “I picked up a bug of some kind. So did Sam. It could be their version of a mild flu. It could be their version of smallpox.” Anthony said, “Sorry but I’m hoping for smallpox. I hope Sam’s face rots off.” “That would probably mean that I get the same thing. Really want that?” “Yesterday, yeah. Today I’m not sure.” Allison moved to the other side of the cage. “I don’t care what rots off as long as you keep it over there.” Anthony didn’t say anything. Sharon managed to sit up. She didn’t see any convicts close by. She turned to Anthony. “We may be able to get out if they leave us alone long enough. Just flex the wires back and forth until they break. If this spreads to the other convicts, we’ll watch for a chance and get out of here. If you get out and I don’t, go back to Sister West’s people and tell Leo—the surveyor he has is really not from around here.”

180

Exchange

Chapter Twenty Sharon tried to stay awake, but kept drifting into something between sleep and delirium in the hot sun. Allison said, “I haven’t seen our guards for a while. Maybe they really are getting sick.” Sharon glared at her. “If I get out of here, you’re on your own.” “Really? Know how to hotwire a truck?” “No. Do you?” Allison laughed. “Yeah. Unless you want to go on foot, I go with you.” Sharon yelled, “Hey, you’ve got a guy dying out here.” No one responded. She turned to Allison. “Can you see anybody from there?” “There are people in the cars. They look like they’re asleep or unconscious.” Sharon staggered over to the gate of the cage and rattled it, then worked on the bottom-most of the three wires holding the gate up. She could barely move the wire but she flexed it back and forth, looking up once in a while to see if anyone was watching her. Allison sat at the other end of the cage and sipped water from their water bucket. Sharon glared at her. “It wouldn’t kill you to help if you really intend to come with me.” “You’re doing fine over there. I’m doing fine over here.” The wire gradually got easier to move, and finally Sharon twisted it around enough that it broke. She tried to push the gate open enough to crawl out, but the top two wires held it too tight. She turned to Allison. “I might be able to squeeze through if you pushed while I squeezed.” 181

Dale R. Cozort Allison nodded. “But then you would walk off and I’d still be in here. Either we both go or neither of us goes.” “I wouldn’t—okay, I probably would. Fine I’ll just keep working and hope that none of the convicts happens to toddle by in the next half hour.” Allison leaned back in a little pocket of shade. “That works for me.” Sharon turned her attention to the next wire up. She repeated the agonizingly slow process of bending the wire back and forth until it broke twenty minutes later. Sharon squeezed through the opening and said, “If you’re coming, make it now.” Anthony said, “Good luck.” Sharon nodded and staggered from the cage to the nearest gate as quickly as she could. She lifted the bar that held it closed and stumbled out to one of the pickup trucks. She heard Allison coming behind her. “Key’s in the ignition. I guess that means I don’t need you.” Allison said, “Actually, it doesn’t mean anything.” Sharon looked back into the barrel of a rifle. She shook her head. “He’s not worth it.” “Anthony? It’s not really about him anymore. It’s about you. You come over here all sweet and trusting and Captain Ice falls in love with you inside of thirty minutes.” “Captain Ice?” “Leo, or whatever his name really is.” “He’s in love with me?” “Oh yeah, right. That’s a big surprise to you.” “That doesn’t make any sense. Is Leo even alive to fight about? Besides, I thought you wanted Anthony. And Leo’s your dad or step-dad.” Allison laughed. “Actually he’s sort of an uncle by marriage. Mom married one of his cousins. My dad—the cousin—died in a car accident before I was born. Leo is fair game. He just isn’t interested.” “But you said—” “I said a lot of things. And you believed them. It was kind of fun jerking you around.” Allison’s lips slid into a feral grin. 182

Exchange “Anthony was a good second choice. And yes, Leo’s still alive— or at least he was last time I saw him.” “If he loves me how do you know he isn’t out there ready to swoop in to the rescue?” “No, he’s out doing what he does best. Oh, I’m sure he’ll kill whoever needs killing and save the day for us all. It’ll take a while even for him, though. By the time he gets here, you’ll be dead and I’ll be gone,” Allison said. “Maybe all of this doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t really have to, though; I have the gun. Sometimes I just take a real strong dislike to someone. I’ve never killed anyone over it before, but then I’ve never had this good of a chance. Think about it—you were captured by convicts. You tried to get away. They shot you. Who’s going to question it?” “Leo could probably trace the bullet to that rifle.” Allison laughed. “Nice try. Maybe—if he found it and had the equipment. It doesn’t matter anyway. I picked it up by a dying convict. It’ll go back there.” Sharon pushed back her nausea and exhaustion and tried to think. She might be able to reach the pickup truck with one desperate leap, but she couldn’t start it fast enough to get away. Allison was almost close enough to try a disarming move, but not quite. And I can barely stand up. Allison grinned at Sharon. “You know what Leo’s all about—killing and power. That’s the bottom line with him.” “So why do you want him?” “Because that’s what I’m all about too.” Sharon steeled herself and said calmly, “Do you know why we got away so easily?” “Because they got sick. Who cares?” “We got away because they wanted us to. I don’t know why, but they did.” That started out as a bluff, but as she said it, Sharon realized it was probably true. “You think they would leave a rifle that actually shoots so you could grab it? If you shoot that thing it’ll blow up in your face, just like the pistol you gave me was supposed to do. Or it may not do anything at all.” “That’s such a pathetic little bluff. I’ll take that chance.”

183

Dale R. Cozort “Really? Out here they don’t do plastic surgery. And if you had half your face blown away, Anthony would walk away without looking back. I know. I was married to him.” Allison laughed. “Anthony doesn’t matter anymore. And even if I believed you, I don’t have a choice. I can’t walk away now.” “Why not? I’ll be gone in a day or a week when Rockport goes back. You can make whatever life you want to here.” “I don’t want to make a life here,” Allison said. “I’m going back to Rockport. That’s the way we planned it from the start— lure you out here and make sure you never made it back. Anthony didn’t have the guts to just kill you back in Rockport.” Sharon scanned the horizon. It was starting to get dark and she thought she could see Rockport’s faint sky glow. She looked back at Allison. “You believe me about the rifle. I can see it in your eyes.” “Maybe I do. That’s just the sort of thing the god my mom believes in would pull. Of course I stopped believing in him when I was three.” Allison looked up at the sky. “Go ahead. Blow my head off. Forget the exploding rifle. Use a thunderbolt.” Sharon watched Allison’s finger tighten on the trigger. She took a quick step forward and knocked the rifle barrel over and down with a hook kick, then got her hand on the barrel and yanked. Allison pulled the trigger, and the rifle exploded, not in her face, but close to it. Sharon took what was left of the rifle away from her, and Allison fell forward on her knees, hands covering her face. A trickle of blood ran down her wrists and dripped onto her shirt. After a few seconds, the wounded girl crawled away without saying a word. Sharon let her go. Sharon let out her breath and collapsed on the truck seat. She tried to turn the key, but it took a couple of times because her hands were trembling too much. She finally got the truck started, locked the doors and headed toward Rockport. She looked back at the convict camp and muttered. “What kind of game are you playing?” Sharon drove a few yards, then stopped the truck. She sat and gathered her thoughts. Finally she shook her head and climbed 184

Exchange painfully down. She staggered back into the convict camp. Sam stepped out from behind his ‘headquarters’, along with half a dozen other convicts. “I guess no one won that bet,” he said. “I figured you’d head back to Rockport. Most of the boys figured the West compound. Guess it was none of the above.” “Why would you give up two women—” “One woman. We collected the other one a few minutes ago—minus her good looks,” Sam said. “Okay, one woman and probably a truck. Why would you give us up? How could you get the others to go along with giving us up?” “Because I see quite a few moves ahead.” Sam strolled up to her. “And my correctional-center friends here have figured out that it isn’t a good idea to question my orders—well, the live ones anyway. What did you think of that little scene in my headquarters? Oscar material, don’t you think?” “So there wasn’t any plague from that surveyor, and you probably put something in the food.” “Oh, there was a plague—maybe not from that surveyor, but from the other one we found that probably came from the same place,” Sam said. “And you do have it. We injected it under your skin while you were asleep.” “Why?” “Because we’ve figured out that doing that usually makes someone a carrier, but it doesn’t make them too sick,” Sam said. “You must have a crappy immune system—no pun intended.” “And the point of all of this was...” Sam grinned. “To take out as much of Rockport’s command and control as we could or to do the same thing to Leo West and company.” “You know that surveyor wasn’t made by humans—at least not our kind of humans,” Sharon said. “Yep. I figured that.” Sam glanced at the other convicts. “Told you she has a brain. We didn’t know for sure until you looked at it and couldn’t figure out where up was on it.” “So do you know where it came from?” “The surveyor?” Sam shrugged. “I got the general idea. It turns out that old Bear Country is a real slut of a reality. It’s 185

Dale R. Cozort bumping and grinding up against our world, and doing the same thing to some other reality. The other reality has people or something like people. They want to find out what’s over here, so they send surveyors. Maybe they’re sending more than just surveyors—or intend to.” Sharon said, “That would explain the animals.” “Huh?” “It would explain the animals that don’t belong—bats, kangaroos, monkeys. If Bear Country ‘bumped’ against other realities before, then having all of those animals running around makes sense,” Sharon said. “It does Exchanges with one reality. Some animals from that reality survive over here. Then it does the same thing with another reality, getting still more odd-ball animals.” Sam motioned to the other convicts and they prodded Sharon back to the cage. “If I was in your shoes,” he said, “I’d be worried about a lot of other things, not about where the animals here came from. You’re a pawn on my chessboard, and will be the rest of your life. I didn’t use you quite the way I planned, but I’ll find another use for you, and then another one. I’ve got the pieces all lined up where I want them. Sister West’s crew is already getting hit by our little plague. It’s nasty stuff. You got just a taste of it. People who get the full thing usually end up paralyzed for a couple of days. Sometimes it shuts down the heart and lungs and that’s the end of the story.” Sharon felt a wave of exhaustion, mixed with despair, wash over her. She pushed it back defiantly. “How did you—” “Make it through the plague? We lost maybe one in ten when it hit us,” Sam said. “Most of the guys that made it could barely crawl to water. About one in three of us are apparently carriers—we don’t show any symptoms after the first couple of days but people catch it from us. Most of the rest get it out of their systems and it apparently never comes back. I’m a carrier, so that book deal was never in the cards for me. If I went back, they’d have to lock me away for life.” “Would that be any worse than this?” Sharon gestured at the convict headquarters. 186

Exchange “Well, you decide,” Sam said. “We injected you with the bug. Like I said, injection pretty much guarantees you’ll get a mild version and be a carrier. You’re as stuck here as I am.” “This is a mild version? And you did it to me deliberately?” “I need someone around with brains. I saw you with Anna Morgan and then with Leo West and figured I could get quite a bit of mileage out of you. Don’t worry. We won’t be living like this long,” Sam said. “First we go after West’s crew. We’ll roll over them because they’ll be pretty much helpless from the plague. That’ll give us the guns and ammunition we need to clean out Rockport when the plague hits them. By the time we run out of the things we take from Sister West and Rockport, we’ll be making a lot of what we need ourselves.” “And even if that works you end up a penny-ante warlord.” Sam laughed. “Speaking of penny-ante warlords, I hear that Anna Morgan isn’t really trying to defend Rockport. She’s mainly just trying to set herself up as warlord or empress or some such thing. Been planning it for years—just waiting for the right Exchange with the right size town, the right location, and the right set of Marines to make it happen. Too bad she happened to pick Rockport. It might have worked someplace else.” “I think you’re delusional.” Sam paused at the gate of the cage. Sharon noticed Allison and Woody were back inside. Allison held a blood-stained handkerchief against her cheek. “Aw, I’m puncturing your bubble, aren’t I?” Sam said. “You think you’ve linked up with a genuine heroine and you find out that she’s just another power-hungry, grasping dictator wannabe. Why so surprised? Didn’t they teach you that bit about power corrupting back in school?” “I learned not to believe anything that people like you say before I even got to school.” “Right. Well, actually I think it was after a certain kiss,” Sam said. “Or maybe the attempt at date rape that came after it.” “That’s not the way I remember it.” “Probably not.” 187

Dale R. Cozort “I’m not a nice guy,” Sam said. “Been proven in court a few times, so of course you don’t believe me. But I’m sure you’ve noticed a few odd little things about what kind of equipment showed up at this Exchange—like more solar panels and less heavy military equipment than you would expect. And then she builds an expansive base out in Bear Country when she doesn’t have enough Marines to defend Rockport. That’s odd, huh? You’re smart enough that you have to be wondering about those kinds of things.” “Anna Morgan is the real deal. You’ll always be small time. There was a reason you robbed convenience stores instead of banks.” “Not at all,” Sam said. “Given time I’ll own this continent. And I’ll own it for our kind of humans. That’s not penny-ante. It’s about as big as you can get.” “Too big for you,” Sharon said. “That surveyor is alien technology—non-human technology. Do you realize what that means? Do you realize how devastating this one disease would be if it got loose back home? And how many other diseases we’ve never encountered are sitting around on their technology? We’re worried enough about Bear Country diseases. A full-fledged technological civilization will be worse than Bear Country could hope to be on diseases. Even if that wasn’t true, do you have the slightest clue how much potential for disruption the technology in that thing has? Do you realize that whoever made that surveyor could be hostile, and they could have technology that would make ours look like bows and arrows?” “Oh, I realize all of those things,” Sam said. “Most of them look like opportunities to me. I couldn’t do much about those opportunities until Rockport came over. Now with a little luck and a lot of smarts—well, let’s just say that a man who thinks big can be just as big as he wants to be.” “Or he can be dead,” Sharon said. “So, if this all works out for you, what are you going to do with the people in Rockport?” Sam took a couple of steps back from the cage. “Well, that’s a problem. I’d rather not leave anyone alive in Rockport to tell people back home we’re still around and planning to run this neck of the woods. We either take people with us or kill them. The women aren’t a problem…I just wish there were more of 188

Exchange them. The men are another matter. Chances are we’ll put them to work doing heavy lifting around here. If anyone even thinks about stepping out of line, we’ll just shoot the bunch of them.” “When did you get so ruthless?” “Always was. You should know that. I just didn’t have as many chances to show it off,” Sam said. “If you want to eat steak there’s a dead cow involved somewhere along the line; it can’t be helped. Our ancestors didn’t dot every ‘i’ and cross every ‘t’ while they were settling the frontier back in The World. If they had, the street signs would be in Indian instead of English.” Anthony rolled over and glared at Sam. “Not something to be proud of. The Indians were free men.” Sam grinned at him. “And that worked out well for them. And now, you finally got out from under all of those little laws you hate. How do you like it? No law to make you pay taxes. No law to make you get a driver’s license. Oh, and no law to keep me from doing anything I want to you. Maybe we’ll crucify you—just tie you to a tree and let you die of thirst and exposure. Maybe we’ll eat you. There is nothing to stop us out here. There are no laws to even say it’s a bad thing. Now tell me you wouldn’t be happy to see the sheriff riding this way with his posse.” Anthony sighed and slumped against the wood of the cage. “You’re just another part of the system, the part that takes over when the velvet glove doesn’t do it. The system tries to buy you. It buys you with houses and cars and electronic gizmos. If you fall for that, you spend most of your life working for the latest trinkets. If the system can’t buy you with trinkets, it tries more basic stuff. It bought my brother David by selling his daughter’s life back to him. I don’t blame him for selling out. If it had been me, I’d have done the same thing. The system bought Russell’s wife. If she stayed over here she couldn’t control how many babies she pumps out. It bought Russell by giving him a shot at using his arm again.” “Will you just stop it?” Sharon felt the fury of all of the years of listening to those rants rise up in her. “It’s over. You wasted your life. You put the people you should have loved in danger. You were never willing to admit that the problems were inside you, so you could never even take the first step toward solving them.” 189

Dale R. Cozort “Let me finish. If the system can’t buy someone, it breaks them. It can’t buy me, so it wants to break me...to make me a symbol of what freedom costs. It wants to turn me into a crippled loser in a wheelchair, a charity case, something to frighten the sheep away from the freedom their souls crave.” Anthony paused and groaned. “I won’t let that happen. My decision to come to Bear Country was final. I’ll live or die here, where the system can’t touch me.” Sam said, “But you just claimed I’m part of the system, and I can touch you. I can touch your brothers. I can touch their kids. I can touch their wives. Looking forward to that part. Sounds like Bear Country was a bad move for you.” Woody had been lying in the shade, apparently asleep. He sat up and said, “You take kicking a man when he’s down to an art form. Speaking of which, I don’t think Sharon here has quite figured out the full sweep of what you had in mind for her yet.” Sam grinned. “And you have?” “I made it through two years of you trying to kill me. Yeah, I figured you out.” Woody turned to Sharon. “You were supposed to go back to Rockport and lure some of the Marines out by telling them that the convicts were all sick and getting the people they kidnapped out would be easy. Then you were supposed to make sure that as much of the rest of the leadership in Rockport as possible got hit by the bug—all while thinking you were saving the day. The bug’s probably already loose in Rockport and symptoms will show up about the time the Marines coming here get about as far as they’re going to get from Rockport.” He turned to Sam. “That about right?” “You’re doing the talking. Anything else?” “Yeah. Here’s your problem. There are hundreds of groups that would love to make a fresh start over here. How many little ethnic groups want their own country and will never have it back in The World? How many exile groups will never have a chance to overthrow their government? They could have their whole country and as much else as they want over here. All it takes is for somebody to figure out a way of predicting where Exchanges are going to happen. Looks to me like West and company did it. In that case, the place is going to be overrun by people wanting to carve out a piece of it.” 190

Exchange Sam shook his head. “Even if that’s true, we have a big edge because we know how to live here. If they try to settle around us, we’ll kill them. If they try to settle somewhere else, we’ll kill them when we find them. Right now, I’m just going to savor my triumph with a cold beer—courtesy of one of Rockport’s farmers.” Sharon shook her head. “I can’t believe I kissed you, even if I was only fourteen.” “We’ll try that again some time. I promise.” Sam grinned. “For right now, though, you can either go back in the cage or we can go to my office and chat, just the two of us.” “Why? Another con? Another mind game?” Sam shook his head. “I don’t really need to con you. The beauty of this setup is that it doesn’t matter whether or not you know about it. If you go back, you do what I want you to do. If you don’t, I’m sure Allison will. Just think about it—Allison loose in the same town as your little girl. You’ll go. But we are going to chat first.” “I guess I don’t have a choice.” They walked over to Sam’s headquarters. Sharon stood with her arms folded across her chest while Sam sat in the driver’s seat. He stared out the window for a long time. Finally he said, “Seeing yourself through someone else’s eyes. That can be a kick in the teeth.” “Maybe it should be.” “Maybe.” Sam shook his head. “I was a tough, hot-headed, know-it-all kid. I had a little problem with impulse control as you remember.” “It was my first kiss.” “I know,” Sam said. He turned toward her. “I got in one scrape too many. I went into the army to get my life straightened out. It didn’t take. Then I screwed up again and ended up with my correctional-center buddies. The only choice I had was to act tougher and meaner than the toughest and meanest of them. After two years in prison and two years over here, I don’t know if it’s an act anymore. The act and the man underneath—it’s getting harder to know the difference now.” “Is there any?” 191

Dale R. Cozort “I hope so. I watched you walk out the door after my big act and I realized that I didn’t feel any great sense of triumph. All I felt was lost.” Sharon shook her head. “Then why did you go through that whole routine outside?” “Getting control of this gang was tough. Keeping it is tougher,” Sam said. “Ever seen a lion tamer? He controls the lions—makes them do whatever he wants them to do, no matter how much they don’t want to do it. They’re always watching though. One sign of weakness, one false move and they attack.” “And you’re the lion tamer.” “I have absolute control over these guys. I could tell them to kill you or Anthony or Woody or any one of the cons and they would. No questions asked,” Sam said. “But that control is always fragile. If it slips, I’m dead.” “So that’s how you justify what you do; no choice,” Sharon said. “I don’t buy it. Why are you telling me this? You know I’m not going to believe anything you say.” “Tonight, Anthony Mack will be free to go. He can go out and live or die on his own,” Sam said. “I’m done messing with him. He wants to die in freedom, he can die in freedom.” “What about his brothers and their wives and kids?” “They’re back in Rockport as far as I know,” Sam said. “I never had them. It was just a mind game.” “Again, why are you telling me this?” Sam ignored the question. “You’re free to go. I’ll even give you an escort to the edge of town. Don’t worry about spreading the plague. I just got word that some farmers took it into Rockport with them. So that part of the plan wasn’t really necessary anyway.” “You trapped me here for no reason,” Sharon said. “Sounds like it,” Sam said. Sharon tried to slap him but he caught her hand and held it easily. “Save your strength; you’re still weak.” “You sound almost like you care.” Sharon pulled her hand away. “Are we done?” “Not quite,” Sam said. “You see, over the last couple of days my buddies out there have collected up over two hundred young women and teenage girls from the area around Rockport. 192

Exchange If we’re really going to set ourselves up around here, those women have to stay. They have to—well, let’s just say that they’ll have a tough life without a lot of choices. A couple of days ago that seemed like just another part of the plan. Today—even if I wanted to let them go I couldn’t. But if someone were to rescue them, that would just be a bad break. Too bad, just bad luck. That might be something you could arrange.” “I don’t believe you. This is just another con,” Sharon said. “What are you trying to get me to do this time? Lure a rescue party out so you can ambush them?” Sam turned away. “We have the women. You can try to get someone to rescue them or you can leave them to rot. It’s your call. Nothing I can do or say is going to make much difference on that.” “Let Woody go.” “What?” Sharon turned toward him. “If you’re really having this change of heart, let Woody go.” “That’s asking a lot. I worked two years to catch him.” Sam paused for a couple of seconds, “Okay. Fine. He can go with you. For old times. For the fourteen-year-old girl I kissed...and for the sixteen-year-old kid who kissed her.” He handed Sharon a surgical mask and gave her a series of numbers. “The mask is in case you don’t believe me about the plague already being in Rockport. The women are in a compound about half a mile from where the monkeys attacked you. The numbers give you an exact map location. Memorize them. The women will be guarded. I have to do that. Get someone to get them out of there if you can.” He picked up a plastic bag and walked with Sharon to one of the gates, then whistled. Sharon looked at the bag. “That smells like Spam.” “Yep. The amber wolves love the stuff. They get ten cans of Spam to get you back to Rockport safely, five now and five when they get you there. Go now, so you can make Rockport before dark.”

193

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Twenty-one Sharon and Woody arrived at Rockport shortly after dark. They worked their way through Marine checkpoints, showing Sharon’s ID, and finally stood in front of the high school. Woody held out his hand after they parked the truck. “I don’t know what you said to Sam, but thank you. I owe you.” “What are you going to do?” “I don’t know. Maybe pass myself off as a farmer. Go through quarantine and then start over.” “They’ll probably figure it out.” “Yeah, and even if they don’t I’d probably just screw up again. So why did you get me out of there?” “Fred liked you. And you told me the truth eventually.” “Part of it, anyway. Did Sam say anything about me?” “No.” “I’ll see you around.” He walked away. Sharon worked her way up the chain of command to a Marine who gave her a hypodermic shot in the arm, then to Anna Morgan. Anna wore a chem-bio suit. Sharon studied Anna. “It was a lot easier to get to you the first time. Where did you say you are in the chain of command?” “The top, at least over here,” Anna said, “though I have to remind the Marines of that once in a while. I hear you have a story to tell—you know where the convicts are holding the women who disappeared from Rockport. The story about the women is a trap, of course. The women are really there—we knew that already, and Sam undoubtedly suspected that we knew. Your ex-boyfriend is a slippery one. Oh, and you aren’t stuck here. Yes, you were probably a carrier. The shot you got on the 194

Exchange way in should cure that. You’ll be as good as new in a day or two.” “How did you know—” “About everything you were going to tell me? I have my ways.” “Why would Sam send me back here if he thought you already knew about the women and was setting a trap for you? Knowing about it spoils his trap.” “Unfortunately, the best kind of trap is one that your opponent has to go into anyway.” Anna sighed. “You realize that you were incredibly lucky. Taking a pickup truck across thirty miles of Bear Country isn’t something to try unless you’re desperate.” “Which I was,” Sharon said. “I kept thinking that if I kept going I could get back and see Bethany—which still hasn’t happened.” “And probably won’t for a while,” Anna said. “We’re still trying to track her down. Don’t rush it. You don’t want to give her what you have, if she doesn’t have it already, especially with the crude medical care we could give her here.” “It took me five hours to go those thirty miles, plus the extra ten or fifteen miles to get around little creeks and gullies that the truck couldn’t make it through,” Sharon said. “Every minute of that ride I was thinking about seeing my daughter. I need to see her.” “You will,” Anna said. “You need to sketch the obstacles for us at some point. Aerial photos don’t pick up the little stuff. Now the question is: why are you really here?” “I told you. The women. A trap.” “Sure. Thing is, Sam Kittle’s about as slippery as they come, yet he makes it obvious that he wants us to go somewhere. As you said, he knows we would have at least suspected a trap as soon as we heard your story. He also would know we would put you in quarantine as soon as we heard about any kind of disease, which means he can’t expect to use you to spread it. He thinks like an onion. You peel off the first layer. Now, what are the layers underneath about?”

195

Dale R. Cozort Sharon leaned back in her chair and rested her eyes. The adrenaline that sustained her through the grueling drive back to Rockport ebbed and she had trouble reopening her eyes. “Maybe he isn’t as smart as you think he is,” she said. “Maybe he isn’t as smart as he thinks he is.” Anna shrugged. “Maybe. Actually I think he absolutely is as smart as he thinks he is.” Several people stumbled in, escorted by Marines in chembio suits. Sharon recognized several. “Did you quarantine everyone I talked to on the way in?” Anna seemed not to hear the question. She stared off into space for several seconds. “So you looked inside the robot surveyor. Sam made a point of showing it to you.” “Yes.” “And you couldn’t make any sense of what you saw inside,” Anna said. “That’s right. It’s not human technology.” Sharon stared at Anna defiantly, searching for skepticism. Anna just nodded. “Like I said, the best kind of trap is one where the other side has to go in, even if he knows it’s a trap.” She pushed away from the table. “So you’re going to rescue the women?” Anna sighed. “I wish I could say yes. Get every detail about the convict camp down, especially anything about where you saw the surveyor.” “Why aren’t you going to rescue them?” Sharon asked. Anna ignored that question too. She started to leave, then turned and said, “You’re tough. You’ve proven that over and over again in the last week. However things turn out in the next few hours, remember that you want to be there for your little girl and that you can make it.” “You can’t just leave them there,” Sharon said. Anna locked eyes with her. “As a matter of fact, I can. I may have nightmares about it for the next couple of years, but I can, and I may have to. I’m responsible for four thousand people in and around Rockport. If I could rescue a few hundred without putting everyone else in danger, I would. I can’t though. Sometimes the world is a tough place.” 196

Exchange Anna stepped away and talked into her radio. Marines in chem-bio suits brought a steady trickle of people into the preschool-quarantine center as the night wore on. A few of them came in on stretchers. Others walked in…some protesting loudly. Sharon lost track of Anna for a while, then the tall woman came back in, still in her spacesuit, and glanced at Sharon. “Feeling better?” “Yes. My temperature’s down to normal as of an hour ago. I’m tired, bored, and stressed out, but not sick. You’ve got to help those women.” “No, actually you have to help us,” Anna said. “Nurses are already overwhelmed. We have nobody to spare. Cons snuck through our lines and are raiding the north side of town. Organize the victims who can still walk. Have them get people water and get them cleaned up if they need it.” “I thought you quarantined everyone I talked to.” “Yes, but the bug was already here,” Anna said. “We didn’t spot it until it spread. A year ago that would have been a disaster. Now, it’s just an annoyance if we catch it soon enough.” “Where is Bethany? When can I see her?” “When you’re not contagious and the intelligence people find her I can put you together. That might take a while though—at least twenty-four hours without a fever.” Anna stood awkwardly for a couple of seconds, then said, “Not a big fan of your ex-husband, are you? The whiskey bottle across the head and kidnapping Bethany come to mind.” “No. I hope Anthony burns in hell.” “Well, if that’s where he’s going, he’s probably there. One of our helicopter scouts spotted a body this evening. It was him.” Sharon felt a wave of conflicting emotion flood in—relief, a little regret, and a release of long-held anger. She said quietly, “We were almost civil to one another the last time we talked. He knew he was dying, and a little of the guy I married surfaced, at least until he went off on his usual rant. Not enough to erase all the years of pain and not enough to make me sorry he’s dead, but a little.” Anna’s pager beeped. She stepped away to return the call.

197

Dale R. Cozort When she came back she said, “Russell’s wife and your daughter never made it back to Rockport. Marines found the SUV north of town with its tires shot out.”

198

Exchange

Chapter Twenty-two Elroy showed up at the preschool in his wheelchair at two in the morning. He rolled over to Sharon. “Volunteering for service, ma’am.” “Are you sick?” “Nope. I’m immune—in a high-risk group, so they poked me a couple of days ago. I came over to help.” Sharon handed him a pitcher of water. “Keep their water bottles full and take temperatures. If someone has trouble breathing, grab a nurse.” He rolled away, and Sharon concentrated on the patients, pushing fear and anger to the back of her mind as best she could. The old man rolled back up to her after a half hour. “Find your daughter?” “No. I think the convicts have her.” “Then why are you here?” “Because I’m still contagious and they won’t let me out.” Elroy rolled his chair along beside her as they worked. “Any idea where she is?” “No.” “It’s dangerous out there. Five helicopters flew off a few hours ago, and I’m guessing they were full of Marines because suddenly there were a lot fewer Marines around town. Then the convicts and gangbangers came out to play. I could hear gunshots in every direction from my house.” “Bethany’s out in that.” She kept working mechanically, her mind on her daughter. “I’m sorry.” “I know.” Sharon’s next patient had a blue cast to his features and a temperature of 104. She called a nurse over and a 199

Dale R. Cozort group of medical personnel was soon working frantically over him. “It’ll kill you if you wait too long to get it treated. At least that’s what my amateur radio buddies out in Idaho tell me.” Elroy kept working his way down the line of patients. “They tell a lot of things, including not counting on coming back from an Exchange.” “Because of whoever or whatever made those surveyors?” “What are you talking about?” “Aliens. The ones that made the robot surveyors.” “Huh? And I thought what I was going to say was ‘woo woo’.” Elroy laughed, drawing dirty looks from the nurses working over the patient with the high fever. “What’s this about aliens?” “I thought that was where you were headed.” “No. Out in Idaho the military called everybody in to the local WalMart, supposedly so they could get trucked into quarantine. Only that’s not where they went. The trucks drove them out into Bear Country. Then the Marines burned the town. Actually they burned the entire Exchange Zone.” “Why?” “Disease. The Marines didn’t know if they could keep it from spreading back in the world.” Elroy paused and watched the nurses working over the stricken patient. “Whoever was in charge was brave. They stranded themselves and the Marines too. And they probably died out there. Almost everybody did.” “Think the Marines will do that here?” “I hope not. Probably not unless something else hits us. But don’t count on going home.” The nurses scattered and someone wheeled their patient out. Sharon asked, “Was he—” “Dead?” Elroy nodded. “Looked like it to me. So, convicts have your daughter?” “Yeah. It has to be AKs. Sam would have told me if he had her. No reason to hide it.” A nurse came by and said, “Sorry to interrupt, but we’re getting overwhelmed here. If you can walk, we need you to help the people who can’t.” 200

Exchange Elroy grinned. “I can’t walk but I can roll. Bring it on.” The trickle of injured flowing into the pre-school became a flood. Sharon went into a machine-like mode, bringing people water and helping them sit up to drink it without choking. The aisles between the stretchers got narrower and narrower as the night went on. Sharon saw Elroy occasionally, but he was too busy to talk. Sometime after midnight a new group of volunteers relieved Sharon and Elroy. Sharon bedded down on a cot in a corner of the quarantine room. In spite of the grueling day she had been through, Sharon had trouble falling asleep. When she finally drifted off, her sleep was full of nightmares, with Sam, the gray-haired AK, and Allison chasing her through an endless series of dark, empty streets. In one nightmare, Leo and Bethany stood motionless behind a panel of glass in a department store window, like mannequins. Leo was shirtless, and a dim light from the store played on the hard, ridged muscles of his chest and stomach. She pounded on the window, but both of them remained in place with a hand raised as if to say goodbye. Sharon waved and yelled, but Leo and Bethany didn’t respond. The glass grew thicker and darker as she stood in front of it, until it merged with the bricks of the storefront. The sun was high in the sky when Sharon woke up. Anna Morgan stood beside her cot. She was no longer wearing the chem-bio suit. Anna said, “You talk in your sleep.” “What did I say?” “You yelled a name. Leo. Wouldn’t be yelling for Leo West, would you?” “I was having a nightmare.” “Involving Leo West?” Sharon sat up. “Sort of.” “A guy named Woody has been trying to find you. Says he knows where your daughter is. You can talk to him, but don’t trust him. His tattoos say he’s an AK.” “I know him.” “It hasn’t quite been twenty-four hours, but if your fever is still down, I’ll pull some strings and let him see you in a while.” 201

Dale R. Cozort “Thank you.” “Oh, and in case you’re interested, Leo is back at the West compound. We’re flying a helicopter-load of solar panels out there.” “Wait. You realize that they’re out there illegally, right? Why are you giving them solar panels?” “Because we’re running out of time. We don’t know exactly when the Exchange will end, but it will be too soon,” Anna said. “Surveyors like the one Leo has are an absolute priority. I have to get them, even if that means—” “Leaving kidnapped women in the hands of a bunch of convicts?” Sharon asked. “I heard that you sent helicopters out last night. Did they go after the women or after Sam’s surveyor?” Anna didn’t seem to hear the question. Sharon exploded. “Did you just leave them there, to the kind of hell we both know they’re going to face? There were almost two hundred women, penned up like animals. Are these surveyors really more important than that?” “According to the orders I’m sworn to obey, they are,” Anna said. “And there is a good reason for those orders. You know what the surveyors are by now.” “Non-human technology from yet another timeline,” Sharon said. “Probably more advanced than ours. Yes, you’re desperate for every scrap of that technology you can get your hands on, but to leave those wom—” “Then there is the matter of the satellite,” Anna said. “It wasn’t up there last Exchange. It isn’t ours. It certainly doesn’t belong to any other country from back in The World. Something’s moving aggressively to explore Bear Country. We need to know more about them. I had a few tricks up my sleeve. Those tricks could get me either Sam’s surveyor or the women, but not both.” “How could you live with that choice? Some of those women are mothers snatched away from their children—from infants, from toddlers, from seven-year-olds.” A haunted look flitted across Anna’s face. “It won’t be the first hard decision I’ve made. I live with them by not sleeping well some nights. You’re about to make a decision that you may live to regret, too.” 202

Exchange “What decision?” “You may or may not get your daughter back,” Anna said. “But when the Exchange reverses tonight or tomorrow or the next day, you’ll be back in The World for the rest of your life. Leo will be in out in Bear Country for the rest of your life. And you’ll wake up every day and know there’s a hole in your heart that will never heal.” Sharon closed her eyes. “How can you know anything about my heart?” Anna sat on the cot beside her. “When you told me what happened to you, I could tell you left a few things out. But I could also tell you were in love with Leo. A blind person could see it in your face. A deaf person could hear it in your voice when you said his name. You are totally, completely, head-over heels in love with the man.” “What, a lecture on love from a woman who leaves other women to be abused? Who keeps a mother separated from her daughter?” “Just because I’m heartless when it comes to my job doesn’t mean I don’t know heartache. And you’ll feel it when you have to leave that man. I’ve watched you, Sharon Mack. I know what moves you.” Sharon stood and turned away. “I let my emotions tell me what to do too many times in my life. What did it get me? My exhusband kidnapped my daughter after putting me through six years of hell. I’m not going to follow a guy I barely know out into ice-age North America on steroids. And even if I was crazy enough to do that, I wouldn’t take my daughter with me. If I find her we’ll come back here. We’ll be safe. We’re not going to give that up.” Anna said, “That’s what your head says. What does your heart say?” “It doesn’t matter. I’m a parent. I can’t keep Bethany out there. I could have lost her for good when Anthony took her. I’m not going to risk that again,” Sharon said. “Besides, what kind of a future would I have with a man who tells me up front that I’m dealing with wheels within wheels, lies within lies?” Anna nodded. “Yes, Leo West does have his secrets. So do I. Sometimes you have to. If you find your daughter, go to Sister 203

Dale R. Cozort West’s. Say your goodbyes. Talk to Leo West about the women the same way you’ve talked to me. Maybe he’ll find a way to help them.” Sharon sat back down on the cot. “I can’t do that. God knows I want to, but if I talk to Leo I’ll find a reason to stay a little longer, then a little longer, and eventually I’ll be trapped there, and Bethany will be trapped there. What if Leo actually does turn out to be the kind of control-freak nutcase Allison said he was?” “He won’t.” “How can you know that? He’s with Sister West. He’s trying to live out there. He has to be nuts.” Anna smiled at her. “He’s not. I know that. You know that. Think about it.” A young Marine walked up and handed Anna a slip of paper. Anna glanced at it, then said, “You’re probably not contagious anymore, so you’re free to go.” With that, she walked away. Sharon slumped back on the cot and closed her eyes. She said out loud, “I’m not going to let myself see him. I’m going to grab Bethany and never let go of her.” “You sound like you’re trying to convince yourself.” Sharon opened her eyes. Elroy perched on his wheelchair next to her cot. “How much did you hear?” “All of it. I told you I used to be a cop, right?” Sharon nodded. “I can spot a gangbanger at a glance. I can spot whitecollar criminals in their three-piece suits. And I can spot the good ones. You’re one of the good ones, in spite of marrying that piece of trash, Anthony. Leo is one of the good ones. You probably want to chat with him.” “I can’t. Seeing him again, then leaving? I don’t think I could do it.” “You asked Anna how she could live with herself if she left those women there. Could you live with yourself if you didn’t try to save them?” “Why does it have to be me? Anyone could tell him where they are and ask him to help.” Elroy said, “But he’s in love with you.” 204

Exchange “Is he? He never said that. I don’t know what he’s thinking.” “Your call. I say talk to him. It’s the only chance for those women.” “Why did I have to wait until an Exchange to find out I had a wonderful, caring neighbor?” Sharon sat up and kissed him on the forehead. “So I’m back out of the creepy-old-guy category?” “Yeah,” Sharon said. “Permanently. And, I’ll talk to him— for all the wrong reasons. Keep an eye on my house. I won’t be staying in Bear Country.” “Well, you may or may not. If I don’t see you again I hope it’s because you made the right choice, whatever that is for you and your daughter.” “Me too.” Elroy turned his wheelchair and rolled away. “I’ve got to get back to work. Goodbye, neighbor.”

205

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Twenty-three Woody stood outside the improvised quarantine area as Sharon came out. He said, “You never told me much about your daughter. Now I know why.” “I’m not ashamed of her. She’s just different.” “You could say that. I know where she is. I can get you to her if you can get us out of town. Fair warning though; it’s a trap.” “What do you mean?” “My AK buddies have her, but they want you. I’m supposed to lure you out there with a gun full of blanks and then deliver you to them.” “Why are you telling me this?” “Because if I don’t they’ll find another way of luring you.” “You know I have to go.” “Why? You have no chance of rescuing her. They aren’t going to let her go even if they get you.” “I know. But I have to go. She has bronchitis. She needs an antibiotic. I have to get her to a doctor. Look, I’ve been up against AKs from Rockport. I’ve been up against convict AKs. I’ve been up against Sam’s bunch. I’ve been up against my exhusband and his brothers. I’ve been up against Allison West and her lies. I’ve been up against a monster bear and a sabertooth tiger and two flash floods and the plague and poisonous bats and a couple of hundred genius monkeys. If I have to, I’ll go through the aliens that sent out those surveyors. I want my daughter back and I’m not going to stop until I get her.” “Well, I figured you’d go, but at least you know what you’re getting into. Still have your hideaway gun?” 206

Exchange “Yeah, and an old pistol Sam gave me.” “I assume you checked it out.” She walked toward the pickup truck. “As well as I could.” A half-hour later she watched Rockport get smaller in the rearview mirror. As Woody drove the truck deeper into Bear Country, Sharon cried until her throat was raw. When she had no more tears, she wiped her eyes and stared out the window. She saw flames rising from houses on the fringe of Rockport, and clouds of smoke blotted her view in that direction. Convicts. Sam Kittle burning peoples’ houses, kidnapping them, and ruining their lives. Is there any good left in him at all, or is everything just another level of con? The stress of the last twenty-four hours and the aftereffects of sickness finally caught up to her—she dozed off. She woke up with her head at an awkward angle and sat up and stared out the window into Bear Country. Leo was right. I let the big decisions get made for me. Her head drifted downward—she again relaxed into sleep. She slept restlessly, then woke to the pop of metal striking metal. The truck lurched and went through a series of wild maneuvers. She braced herself and looked out. Yellow streaks flashed by. Tracer bullets? Woody yelled, “Watch it!” Sharon ducked as glass splinters sprayed through the passenger-side window. Woody slewed the truck in a tight circle and gunned it back along the ruts where they had come toward the rendezvous. The ride was rough, and Sharon thumped against the side of the truck as they flew over bumps. She yelled, ‘Why are they shooting at you?” “Good question. Grab the steering wheel. I’m going to find out.” “What?” “Just take the wheel. I’m going to jump.” He slowed a little, then jumped and rolled—with bullets flying around him. Sharon scooted over and drove on. She stared out the window at a sea of grass sprinkled with islands of trees. Hills and valleys rose and subsided, partly obscured by the differing lengths of the grass. Going back along the same path would make her vulnerable. On the other hand, leaving the ruts 207

Dale R. Cozort could mean cracking the truck’s radiator on a boulder hidden in the grass. Yet if she slowed to avoid obstacles, the convicts’ horses could outrun her. She weighed the risks and decided that a dash along the ruts gave her a marginally better chance. Not very good odds. She accelerated as fast as she dared…just under thirty miles per hour. The truck hit a bump and her head banged against the roof. She hastily buckled her seatbelt and slowed down—and saw sunlight reflect off metal in front of her. She hit the accelerator again—a mistake. Two tires blew out as the truck drove over pieces of wood with nails stabbed through them. Sharon fought to keep the truck under control, but it had a mind of its own, and that mind was determined to jerk the steering wheel from her grip. Her gun bounced painfully off her knee on its way to the floor. The truck crashed through a thicket of inch-thick saplings, snapping them but slowing the truck— when it hit a fallen log and the engine died, the jolt was not much worse than the ones she’d already felt. Sharon reached for her gun, but someone opened the door, grabbed her leg and yanked her out before she could get it. She fell, rolled and kicked the man in the face with her free leg. More convicts swarmed over her, and she fought a tide of unwashed bodies trying to keep her down. One convict staggered away with an eye bleeding from a thumb gouge. Another fell, with her kick leaving his knee bent in a way nature never intended. More men swarmed. More staggered away holding body parts. Finally a calm voice said, “Okay, get off of her before she maims the lot of you.” The convicts moved back and Sharon snapped into a fighting stance. A cluster of convicts armed with rifles and pistols stood around a stocky gray-haired man. It was the AK who confronted her on the first day of the Exchange. He stood out because he was neatly shaven and his clothes were spotless. “Next fast move gets you shot,” he said. Sharon stood defiantly. “Then shoot.” 208

Exchange “First we shoot your kneecaps. When you fall, we take our clubs and break your arms. Then we search you and tie you up. That’s the hard way. Easy way is, we search you and tie you up. I like the hard way better myself, but bullets are scarce out here. It seems like a waste.” Sharon let her arms drop to her side. One convict grabbed her backpack and searched it. Two others grabbed her arms, turned her around, and frisked her. Sharon resigned herself to the discovery of her hideaway gun. Before that happened, the convict searching her backpack said, “Watch it; she was wired. Has a transmitter sewn into the strap of her backpack.” Sharon turned around. “What?” Someone said, “Smash the thing.” One of the convicts started to push Sharon back around, then stopped and stepped back. Sharon turned and saw Woody strolling toward the other convicts. He grinned at the gray-haired man. “Good move, Grey. You wrecked a perfectly good truck to catch one little housewife.”

209

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Twenty-four Grey smiled at Woody. “You shouldn’t have come back. You have no friends here—at least not live ones. I’m glad you came, though. It’s time to settle the leadership issue. Oh, and your little housewife is FBI, in case you hadn’t figured that out.” “No, she’s not, she’s just a housewife searching for her little girl. She has a picture of the daughter in her purse. Take a look. I know you had five of my buddies stabbed in the back before you tried to kill me on the way in. I saw the bodies. Do you really think you can come out to Bear Country straight from living soft in town and that’s all it takes to run things around here?” “Yeah, actually I do.” Woody smiled. “Well you’re about to find out how wrong you are.” The convicts holding Sharon let go of her arms and backed off. Most of the convicts drifted away from Grey, declaring neutrality with their feet. Six stood defiantly with him. Sharon spotted Bethany standing between two convicts, her habitual fixed smile unwavering. Her gaze wandered toward Sharon, but she didn’t meet Sharon’s eyes. Grey glanced around. “Seven to one. Do you even have a gun?” Woody produced one in a casual—but somehow lightningfast—motion. One of the convicts by Grey tried to edge away, but stopped when Grey glared at him. Woody grinned. “I stashed it before I let West and company catch me. Oldfashioned six-shooter. That means that one person gets to walk 210

Exchange away from this. If you want to be that person, don’t twitch. Don’t even think real hard about twitching.” A tall man near Grey said, “There are seven of us. We aren’t—” Woody cocked and fired his pistol. The man jerked, then went to his knees. He tried to raise his gun, made it halfway, then knelt in the dirt for a second or two with his pistol wavering in ever larger arcs, then fired into the dirt three times before falling on his face. Woody looked Grey in the eye and said, “Only six now. Are you going to do anything about it? You’ve been a good little boy so far—not even a twitch. Of course, I haven’t turned my back on you.” Bethany looked straight at Grey and said, “Blood will come fast. Bright red and pretty.” Grey glared over at her. “Shut her up.” The convicts on either side of Bethany looked uneasy. Grey’s face still held a smile, but his eyes showed fear. Grey’s supporters wore their fear openly. Woody paced back and forth for a second, then said, “Let’s play school. Anyone who stabbed one of my friends in the back, or ordered someone else to do it, raise your hand.” He paused for a second. “Nobody? That’s hard to believe. Well, I’ll just have to play detective. One of the murderers cut himself in the fight. I saw blood drops leading away.” A convict with a dirty, red-stained piece of cloth wound around one arm raised his gun. Woody fired. The convict stumbled in an aimless circle, then fell onto his back and was still. Sharon glanced around. The convicts were all watching the macabre standoff. She eased into a squat, putting her hidden gun within reach. As she started pulling her pant leg up, she heard a roar behind her. Two bear cubs peeked around the bed of the wrecked truck. A Kodiak-sized bear—a thousand pounds of teeth, claws, and muscle—ran toward them at a gallop. The cubs’ mother? Sharon grabbed her gun and moved away from the cubs. A shot sounded behind her. She whipped around to see Woody going down—clutching his thigh and dropping his gun. Grey thumbed back the hammer for another shot. Sharon snapped off 211

Dale R. Cozort her own shot, missing Grey but hitting one of the men behind him. Grey ran for cover behind a clump of trees. Sharon heard the bear roar behind her again, uncomfortably close. She risked a quick glance back and saw the mother bear bowl over two fleeing convicts…grabbing one by the neck and shaking him without breaking stride. Sharon spotted her backpack on the ground and snatched it. Then she ran to the front of the truck, putting it between her and the last place she had seen Grey. Sharon took a deep breath, then poked her head around the front of the truck. Woody was nowhere in sight, but Bethany ran toward her. Sharon opened the truck door and grabbed her other gun, then ran over to Bethany. “Follow me!” Bethany ran behind her as she moved in an arc that she hoped would put her on the trail back to Rockport—and with no convicts between her and town. At least twenty rider-less horses stampeded past with crudely-made stirrups thudding against their sides. Sharon heard the bear roar again far behind her. The roar was followed by several shots and a couple of screams. The noises faded as Sharon put distance between her and the battle. She watched the trail behind her for predators and pursuing convicts. A troop of monkeys followed her, standing on their hind legs to get a better look over the tall grass. Reddishbrown wolves moved parallel, keeping their distance. The wolves howled a haunting chorus, then loped away. The troop of monkeys circled and moved ahead of Sharon. They focused on the trail ahead. She looked closer. A man crawled slowly along the ruts. He glanced back, and Sharon recognized Woody. She eased up next to him. “Need help?” “You willing to help me?” Sharon held out her hand. “Yeah. I shouldn’t be. You just killed two people. You also showed off the worst case of testosterone poisoning I’ve ever seen. Oh, and you neglected to tell me that you’re the leader of a bunch of murdering AKs.” “Was. I was the leader of the AKs—the ones out here, not the ones in town,” Woody said. He didn’t take her hand. “I would have been again if the bear hadn’t shown up. Now I’m just 212

Exchange a guy who can’t walk. I got up and ran for a while, but something’s tore up in my leg, and every time my foot hits the ground I felt it tear more.” Sharon found a sturdy branch. “Okay. Use this as a cane. I’ll try to slow the bleeding. Then, if you can keep up with me, we’ll stick together.” “Fair enough. So this is your daughter. Kind of spooky, but I like her. Why didn’t you hug her? I expected a big reunion.” “She’s OCD. If I touched her she would keep washing until she bled.” “I’m sorry. A mom should be able to hug her daughter.” “Yeah.” Sharon tried to meet Bethany’s eyes. “I love you. I’m so glad to see that you’re okay.” Bethany didn’t quite look at her, and her expression didn’t change. Sharon turned and worked on the wound. “You know, starting a gunfight with seven guys is the biggest piece of macho stupidity I’ve ever seen.” Woody winced. “It would have worked. Grey could pick up the front of a truck or yank my arms off without breaking a sweat, and he’s probably smarter than me, but he doesn’t have fire in his belly. He can’t see what he has to do the split-second he has to do it. He has to think about it. I would always have been a step ahead of him.” “Are you going to try again?” “No. I had one chance. They’ve seen me bleed and run. I can’t go back. Besides, Grey probably made a deal with Sam Kittle to get the guns so he could make his little coup stick. Sam will screw him and the rest of my people over when the time’s right, and when Sam Kittle screws you over you usually end up dead. I’ll probably join up with Sister West’s outfit. By the way, thanks for saving my life back there. Why did you do that?” “I’m not sure. Why would Sister West take you now?” Woody clenched his fists as Sharon wrapped a relatively clean piece of his undershirt around the wound. “They’ll take me because I want them to. I’ll take Leo West aside and ask him if he wants everyone in the compound to know a few things about him.” “I don’t blackmail.” Leo’s voice came from less than a yard away. 213

Dale R. Cozort Sharon whipped around. “Keep doing that and you’ll get shot.” “That’s the chance I take.” He examined Woody’s leg. “So, the bug in my backpack was yours,” Sharon said. “A transmitter and a GPS. Maybe Allison wasn’t too far off about the cameras.” “No cameras. But yes, a transmitter and a tracking device.” “Why?” “I didn’t want to lose you.” Leo turned to Woody. “Can you make it another half a mile? I may have backup coming, but the cons are getting organized, so any distance you can put between them and you would be good.” Woody stood up, nearly doubled over with a groan, but said, “Yeah. I’ll make it.” Sharon locked eyes with Leo. “What are you hiding? What does Woody know that you don’t want Sister West to know?” “You may find out in the next couple of days. We’ll see.” After regrouping, they moved out. Woody slowed them, but limped along without complaining. Sharon noticed his knuckles were white on his improvised cane. They walked silently for a few minutes, then Sharon glared at Leo. “You put a bug in my backpack so you wouldn’t lose me. I think you just did.” “I wanted to make sure you didn’t get in over your head.” “I can take care of myself.” “Maybe. I also wanted to find out where Woody actually fit in. Of course, he figured you were wired and played the penitent flunky for me.” Woody managed a grin. “It wasn’t hard. I like Sharon, and I’m tired of having to watch my back.” “We’ll see. I don’t know if we need someone in the flock who’s ruthless enough to run a gang of these convicts.” Woody said, “That probably won’t be your decision. They have horses and trucks and motorcycles now. They have rifles to our pistols. They know the country. We won’t make it back unless we split up. Probably not even then.” Leo nodded. “I know. Been thinking about that. Sharon, head out now. Run. We’ll try to distract them.” 214

Exchange “What? Why now?” Woody said, “Because he hears the motorbikes coming. If they see us and don’t see you they may come after us. If they see you, you’re target number one. You know what they’ll do to you if they catch you. Go. You’ve got a daughter to raise and you never asked to be out here. Both of us did in our own way.” Sharon looked at the two of them. Her anger faded and she impulsively kissed Leo on the lips, and then stood awkwardly for a couple of seconds. “Sorry.” “I’m not.” Wolves twittered near them again, and she saw them moving through the grass nearby—testing the air with their noses. Sharon pointed her pistol at one, and it hastily disappeared into a patch of thick grass. She didn’t fire because she knew a shot would draw the convicts even if the wolves weren’t already guiding them. Half a dozen convicts rode into view over a low hill as Sharon and Bethany moved away. They ducked into a patch of tall grass and crawled through it until they were out of the convicts’ line of sight, then got up and ran. Sharon heard shots behind her and cursed herself as a coward, but kept running. She heard motorbikes in front of her and ducked into tall grass. Bethany followed and crouched next to her. Two dozen men on motorbikes came over a hill in her direction. Sharon recognized some of them. “Sister West’s people, Bethany. Let’s go, honey.”

215

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Twenty-five The main body of the AKs was between them and Rockport, so their rescuers headed back toward Fort Eegan. Sharon and the other three rode precariously on the back of their rescuers’ motorbikes. Leo yelled. “There’ll be a helicopter going to Rockport this afternoon. You can hitch a ride.” AKs skirmished with the people at the rear of the column, but didn’t make a determined attack. The motorbikes quickly covered the ground to Fort Eegan. As she rode closer, Sharon could see the compound was getting ready for war. Trenches cut through what had been the start of gardens and lawns. Sandbags were visible around the buildings. They got inside the gate just as a helicopter landed directly in front of them. Someone yelled, “Get out! Fast! We took some hits. I’m not sure how bad!” Sharon hopped off as the motorbike stopped—and found herself face-to-face with Leo. Her hand headed instinctively to her hair, but she stopped the gesture. I’m an idiot. She said, “I haven’t had a chance to introduce you to Bethany. She’s—” “I know. We’ll get her on antibiotics.” “How do know about her? No, never mind. You have secrets.” “That I do.” They stood awkwardly. Finally Leo said, “I heard you got back to Rockport.” “No thanks to you.” 216

Exchange “By the time we fought off the convicts and made it back you were already on your way to Rockport,” Leo said. “If there had been a rescue party, it would have just been me. We can’t spare anyone else. The convicts—the AKs and probably part of Sam’s bunch—are massing for an attack. One of our scouts saw Sam Kittle himself a couple miles from here.” “I thought he hated the AKs.” “He probably does, but he wants what we have more than he hates them.” “I won’t be here when they come.” Sharon kept her voice neutral. She looked up at him. Kiss me and tell me you want me to stay. In a neutral voice she said, “Thanks for rescuing me again. I was going to ask you a favor, but it doesn’t sound like you’ll be able to help.” “To rescue the women?” Leo shook his head. “Anna told me you would ask. Unfortunately, the answer has to be no. We barely have enough people to hold this compound.” “They still have Allison.” “She’ll fit in with them,” Leo said. “You know what she tried to do to you...” “What does Sister West think?” Sharon asked. “Of her daughter as a sociopath? She knows. She knew for quite a while but wouldn’t admit it.” Sharon nodded and stood awkwardly waiting for Leo to say something. Finally she said, “Anthony’s dead.” “I’m...sorry. Did you resolve any of the issues between you?” “Not really. We were civil the last time we talked, but he never admitted he was wrong—never apologized. The last words I heard from him were some from one of his tinfoil-hat rants.” “Take good care of your daughter. She’s fragile and she’s seen things no kid should have to see. She’s pretty. She has your eyes and hair.” The words had the sound of a dismissal, but neither of them moved. Finally Sharon said, “I hear you’re not really married to Sister West.” Leo looked puzzled. “What gave you that idea?” 217

Dale R. Cozort “You said you were related to her by marriage, and then Allison—” “Allison picked up on it some way and played her usual head game.” Leo laughed. “Bad choice of words on my part.” “That’s an understatement.” Leo gazed at her intently. “What does that change? Why does it matter?” “Maybe it doesn’t make any difference at all,” Sharon said. “Do you really have to stay?” He nodded. “I helped lead these people out here. I can’t leave them now. Do you really want to go?” “I’m a parent before I’m anything else,” Sharon said. “I can’t keep her out here, especially not now. Not in the middle of a war.” “I understand,” Leo said. They stood in uncomfortable silence. Finally Leo said, “Woody claimed that you talked Sam Kittle into letting him go.” Sharon smiled. “Yep. Sam actually did it. That’s the first time I’ve ever heard of him doing something where he didn’t have an angle.” “Oh, Sam had an angle,” Leo said. “He figured turning Woody loose would spark a fight between the AKs from Rockport and the ones from the prison.” “That sort of worked.” “He also tried to let the plague loose here. Unfortunately, it was already here. We’re taking people who were exposed for quarantine in the meeting hall.” “Can you stop it from spreading?” “Oh, you’ll see an epidemic,” Leo said. “I figure the convicts will wait until dark, but they’ll probably hit us while the plague’s doing its worst.” “I would like to think there’s still some good in Sam,” Sharon said. “Did Woody say anything about him letting Anthony go?” Leo nodded. “He let Anthony go first. The guy was already almost dead.” “But at least he died the way he wanted.” Leo nodded. “Not what I would call a happy ending, but it will have to do. Speaking of endings, they’re repairing damage to 218

Exchange the helicopter’s engines. You have thirty-five minutes before you have to be back at the helicopter. Figure ten minutes to get back with a little cushion. What would you like to do with your last twenty-five minutes in Bear Country?” “I want you to hold me.” The words rushed out before Sharon had a chance to stop them. She stood awkwardly as Leo smiled at her. “Is that really what you want? I don’t know if that’s a good idea.” “It’s an awful idea. And I can’t, not with my daughter standing here. But it’s what I want.” Yes, I want Leo to hold me, comfort me, but he won’t. Can’t. And I want to hold my daughter and squeeze her tight…but I can’t do that either. I will not cry. Not here. Not now. Sharon turned away from Leo, stepped closer to Bethany, and passed a hand over her daughter’s hair without touching her. A moment later a man ran up and whispered to Leo. Leo nodded and stepped close to Sharon. “Sometimes I hate myself.” “Why?” “For having to tell you that your old friend Sam Kittle wants to talk to you.” “I don’t want to talk to him,” Sharon said. “Not now. Not ever.” “Not high on my list of things to do in the next ten minutes,” Leo said. “But he says it’s important and he’ll talk only to you.” Sharon sighed and pushed her shoulders back. “Okay. Get somebody to watch Bethany.” Sam Kittle was on one of the Bear Country horses holding a white cloth tied to the muzzle of his rifle. When he saw them, he rode to the fence and grinned at Sharon. “You’re looking good…got over the plague pretty quick. I assume you’re still a carrier.” “No, actually I’m not.” “Odd,” Sam said. “That’s okay though. You can go back to Rockport with your daughter and just go on with your life.” 219

Dale R. Cozort “If I want to.” “You want to,” Sam said. “Why are you here anyway? I thought I sent you back to Rockport. You really don’t want to be here tonight.” “I was trying to save those women you told me about,” Sharon said. “Didn’t get it done, did you?” Leo strode over. “What do you want?” “Just a last nice chat with an old friend,” Sam said. “I don’t have anything to say to you.” Sharon said, “You could just let the women go.” Sam shook his head. “We’ve already had that conversation. I can’t.” “You realize some of those women are mothers, torn away from their children. How can you live with doing that?” “I can live with it because I wouldn’t live five minutes if I tried to stop it,” Sam said. “You need to get out of here. This place is going down.” “And I suppose you can’t stop that either,” Sharon said. Sam peered down at her. “Actually, I don’t want to stop it. I just don’t want you here when it happens.” “Well, I may be here,” Sharon said. “My daughter may be here. Even if we aren’t, hundreds of other women and children will be.” “I know. But you need to be out of here. Go back to Rockport where you’ll be safe.” Sharon said, “You may recall the last time I was in Rockport—the AKs tried to burn my house down, not to mention doing a few other things.” “The AKs aren’t an issue anymore,” Sam said. “I told them you’re off-limits.” “Just like that?” Sharon asked. “And now they won’t bother me?” “No. Not just like that. They decided they were tough enough to play in my league,” Sam said. “They aren’t, but that’ll get settled. You’ll be safe in Rockport. Go back.” “That’s my decision.” “I know.” Sam stared down at her, then sighed. “I did my best. If you stay, good luck. Keep your head down.” 220

Exchange He turned and rode away. Leo watched him go, then said, “You don’t know how tempted I was to shoot him—white flag or no white flag.” He turned away. “I’ll regret not doing it.” His watch beeped. He closed his eyes and shook his head. “Why now?” “What is it?” “You have ten minutes to get back to the helicopter.” “You set an alarm on your watch?” “That I did.” Sharon glared at him, suddenly furious. “Why?” “I want you here,” Leo said. “I want you with me. But you have to make that choice.” “If I choose, you know what it will have to be,” Sharon said. Leo brushed his fingertips over her forearm, but Sharon stepped away from him. He said, “Stay, but make the decision yourself. Don’t slide into it. Don’t let it get made for you.” Sharon turned and stalked away without a word. As she did, anger faded, replaced by emptiness. She muttered, “I finally meet a decent man, and I can’t be with him.” She met Bethany at the helicopter. A cluster of men examined a partly disassembled engine. One of them looked up. “It’s going to be a while before this thing flies again.” “How long?” “Probably not tonight. If we absolutely had to, we might be able to lift off and maybe even limp back, but we’re not going to try unless we have to. Tomorrow afternoon is more likely.” That’s what I get for wishing—for something stupid. Sharon turned to Leo, who had followed her. “Is there any other way we can get back?” “We can give you a truck and a rifle, but with the convicts getting ready to attack, you wouldn’t make it far without more escort than we can give you. We should have some time. If the Exchange waits until even just tomorrow to reverse, and if we give the convicts a bad enough beating tonight, then maybe,” Leo said. “Of course by then the helicopter should be ready. I’m sorry. I really do want you to choose for yourself.” 221

Dale R. Cozort “I got that,” Sharon said. “Sometimes you might want to leave a girl a few illusions about herself, though.” “The watch alarm? Believe me, I didn’t want to set that. But...I also didn’t want to make your decision for you. Even though”—he circled one of her wrists with his hand—“even though deep down I want to lock you in my room until after the Exchange reverses. Sounds like caveman stuff, doesn’t it?” He shook his head, released her hand. “Sorry. The alarm was my way of dealing with that.” “Why tell me now? Why not—” “I just thought you should know.” Sharon stared at Leo until he looked out at the fence and the guard towers and asked, “Can you shoot a rifle?” “What?” She turned to follow his gaze. “At a target.” He handed her a rifle. “If you can hit a target you can hit a convict. You may need to tonight, if not sooner. Get familiar with it. Make sure you know how it works.” “Are you sure you ought to be handing me a rifle right now?” Leo smiled at her. “I want you here, but you had a tough choice to make. You may still have that choice. Whichever you choose, I’ll respect you, but you decide. I don’t want to trap you here if you don’t want to be here.” A gunshot rang out in the distance, and Sharon whirled toward the sound. Leo said, “Sorry, but I’ve got to go do my job. Keep away from the fence and be ready to head for shelter if you hear more shots.” Sharon watched him walk away. I love you. Come with me back to Rockport. Out loud she said, “Be careful.” Leo looked over his shoulder and nodded. “Back at you.” Sharon looked around the compound. Almost all the buildings were finished, with even the trim on most buildings neatly painted. Shade and fruit tree saplings planted the first couple of days already seemed taller and greener. The June sky was cloudless, but a light breeze felt comfortable on Sharon’s skin. 222

Exchange The late afternoon dragged on. Sharon didn’t see much more of Leo. The plague appeared to be spreading. Woody volunteered to help, in spite of his injured leg. A steady trickle of people headed to quarantine, a few of them on stretchers. Sharon and Bethany walked over to see if they could help. The door was locked. A woman opened it just a crack when Sharon knocked. “You can’t come in. Quarantine.” “We’ve already had it,” Sharon said. “We’re immune. Can we help?” The woman shook her head. “We already have plenty of help.” Woody’s voice came from inside the church. “Just let them in for five minutes. Got something important to tell them.” The woman reluctantly moved aside. Woody hobbled over to meet them. “Your daughter’s still spooky, but she’s pretty— prettier than she looked in the picture.” “What picture?” “The one you carry in your wallet.” “How do you know? I never showed it to you.” “I know. I had to imagine her, and she’s prettier than I imagined.” Woody smiled at Bethany. “Your mom still hasn’t figured out who the teams are out here. Kind of hard to root for a team when you don’t know who they really are. I mean nutcases versus convicts. Who cares who wins that little shooting match?” Sharon said, “I do.” Woody nodded. “You would because you’re in love with Leo West. The problem is, Leo West doesn’t exist. Oh, there’s a guy running around using that name, but he’s an undercover Fed of some sort, probably FBI.” “Oh, come on.” Sharon said. “I thought we were done with mind games.” “This isn’t one,” Woody said. “Remember when I told you that I knew something about Leo that he wouldn’t want the rest of Sister West’s people to know about? This is it. He nailed a couple of my guys in a sting five years ago. That’s why we were afraid of him. That’s why Grey thought you were FBI. We saw you with Leo.” “That can’t be true,” Sharon said. “Why would he—” 223

Dale R. Cozort “Infiltrate a cult that was accumulating guns and talking about moving out into Bear Country?” Woody interrupted. “That’s a tough one. Let me think. Nope. I can’t think of any reason.” “But if he’s an undercover FBI agent, how could he pretend to be related to Sister West? She would know whether or not he really was,” Sharon said. “And why would he let things go this far? Why wouldn’t he just get in touch with Anna and have the Marines swoop down on Sister West and company as soon as they set foot in Bear Country? Why would they let them build this elaborate complex?” “That I don’t know,” Woody said. “Maybe they let the cult build up so the bust will look more impressive on TV. I’ve been expecting some kind of maneuver where the Feds swoop in and round everybody up and Sister West’s people find out their guns don’t work. I haven’t seen any sign of that. Maybe they’re hoping the cons and Sister West’s people weaken each other enough that the Feds can just come in and mop up.” “I’ve been around Anna Morgan. I can’t see her setting up something like that,” Sharon said. Woody laughed. “Why not? Isn’t she smart enough? Isn’t she ruthless enough? Isn’t she dedicated enough to her job?” “Maybe, but that’s not the way she works.” “Call me cynical,” Woody said. “But I look out and see a Marine helicopter positioned where it could take off any time and dominate half of the compound. That means the Marines know where this place is. Here’s what I figure: The cons attack, get into a firefight with Sister West’s crew. Both sides shoot off a lot of ammunition and take a lot of casualties. Leo West, or whatever his name is, conveniently disappears. Then the helicopter takes off. A bunch more swoop in and haul what’s left of both sides back to Rockport. End of story.” “Why are you telling me this?” Sharon asked. Woody glanced at Bethany. “She’s a cute kid. I hate to see her mom go into tonight not knowing who she’s fallen in love with, without knowing that the guy she thinks she knows is planning to betray everyone he’s been working with for years.” Woody turned to Sharon. “Maybe you’d prefer an undercover Fed to a cult leader. Maybe that makes falling for him okay.” 224

Exchange “I talked to him. He believes in this colony.” “Or he’s a good undercover agent with a convincing cover story,” Woody said. “And you’re the good guy in all this?” “Nope. I’m still the same guy you saw kill two people. I can’t stop being that guy even if I want to. Testosterone poisoning, I think you called it,” Woody said. “One other thing. Have you noticed that it doesn’t smell bad in here?” Sharon nodded. “I hadn’t noticed it, but now that you mention it—” “Supposed to be an epidemic going on,” Woody said. “You were in the middle of a real one back in Rockport. Notice some differences?” “So you’re saying it’s not real?” “I’m just pointing out some things,” Woody said. “The defenses of this compound are getting weaker and weaker, but there doesn’t seem to really be an epidemic going on. Odd?” He pointed to the walls around them. “Or well-planned?”

225

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Twenty-six The afternoon turned into evening. The sun beat down from a cloudless sky. A troop of the little green monkeys came close to the fence, and Sharon thought she recognized Fred’s white arrowhead marking, but none of the monkeys reacted to her presence inside the fence. Leo pulled the motorcycle scouts in after the convicts tried to ambush them. He stopped by to talk to Sharon as the sun headed slowly to the western horizon. “It’s coming,” he said. “No more motorcycle scouts. The bikes are too visible. From now on we’ll have to rely on foot patrols and remote-controlled aircraft with video cameras. The cons are moving in men and equipment. They’ll make their move as soon as it gets dark.” Sharon and Bethany got pulled into a work detail taking windows out of houses and boarding over the holes with thick oak planks with firing slits between them. The glass, soon to be impossible to replace, went into relatively safe areas deep inside the houses. The compound gradually became less tidy and more like a battleground-to-be. Groups of men and women dug shallow three-foot-wide trenches between the buildings and piled dirt along the side facing out, so that people could move between buildings when the firing started. Other groups piled more dirt around the two completed storm shelters and made L-shaped mounds of dirt around the entrances. The remote-controlled aircraft buzzed over from time to time. Burst of gunfire rang out more and more often from the valleys below the compound as the sun slid below the horizon. 226

Exchange Leo sought her out. He said, “It won’t be long now. From now on, always make sure you aren’t visible from outside the fence. A good marksman could hit you from out there wherever you are in the compound, so don’t be a target. When the firing starts in earnest or if you hear a snapping sound after a shot, head for the administration building. The snapping means someone’s shooting in your direction. I wish we had more basements and storm shelters built.” “What do we do?” Sharon asked. “When it starts, I mean.” “I would like you to go to the deepest interior part of the administration building and stay there until this is over,” Leo said. “But, I doubt you’ll start listening to me now.” “I’m not going to cower while someone else does the fighting,” Sharon said. “You’ll need every rifle.” “But that means your daughter will find a way to be in the thick of it too. Really want that?” Leo asked. “Think about it. We won’t have time to think or argue when the time comes.” “No part of this compound will really be safe,” Sharon said. “Put me where I can help.” “Your call.” He walked on, but the gunfire suddenly increased, and a heavy automatic weapon joined in. Leo ran back. “It’s started.” Leo led the way to the flat roof of the administration building. He handed Sharon an ancient, Russian-made nightvision scope. The firing died down for a few minutes. Sharon crouched by Bethany and stared out into the twilight through the scope. The blurry green images were better than what she could see in the dark with her naked eye, but not by much. The faint, distant sky-glow from Rockport made a portion of the display slightly brighter than the rest. She glanced at Leo and asked quietly, “Can we hold them off?” Leo shrugged. “We don’t have a whole lot of choice. I guess we needed more guns and fewer solar panels.” “Not in the long run.” Sharon turned back to her night scope. “Good view from here.” “The long run doesn’t matter if we don’t win tonight,” Leo said. “We designed the compound to be defensible, but not against hundreds of convicts with automatic weapons. I just wish 227

Dale R. Cozort more people knew how to shoot. We didn’t practice back in Rockport because we didn’t want to spook the neighbors even more than they already were. Most people have had basic gun safety and that’s it.” Sharon turned abruptly. “I just realized something. If some of the cons got in earlier, they’ll go after the gasoline tanks. If they start a fire, we’ll be silhouetted against the flames whenever we move.” Leo chuckled. “Not bad thinking. Yep. That’s what they probably intend to do.” “And?” “We hopefully have that under control,” Leo said. “We think we do.” Sharon panned her night-vision scope. “Saw one—make that at least two.” Gunshots rang out. Bats started a chorus of curiously mechanical-sounding alarm calls, like obnoxious wind-up toys. Sharon spotted more convicts flitting through the grass near the fence. Then the grass erupted—dozens of convicts raced toward the compound. The buildings spouted muzzle-blast flames—as did the grass near the fence as the convicts returned fire. The night echoed loudly with gunshots. A few convicts fell, but most kept coming. More poured through the wire as a series of explosions shook the compound. One of the explosions tore through half-dozen convicts near the fence. Sharon heard a series of sharp snapping sounds near her as Leo fired into a group of attackers. Several of them fell. He does like to kill people. The thought stuck in her head even as she poured shots down at the convicts as quickly as she could aim and pull the trigger. A man she fired at suddenly became a tower of flames. She heard Leo say into the radio, “They’ve got gasoline bombs. Be ready to get out if you can’t stop a fire.” Sharon realized that she was saying “I’m sorry” out loud over and over again. She tried to stop, but couldn’t, even as she steeled herself and kept shooting. Convicts she aimed at went down and she tried to tell herself that it wasn’t from her shots.

228

Exchange The night was filled with muzzle flashes. Sharon noticed several brighter than normal flashes from convict rifles. The convicts’ rate of fire abruptly slowed. Sharon glanced at Leo. “What—” “I don’t know.” He thumbed on the radio. “Anyone see what the extra-sized flashes are?” He listened to the radio and shook his head. “No idea.” The convicts opened up with a heavy automatic weapon again, and Sharon saw one corner of a building disintegrate under the fire. “Someone was supposed to take that thing out. Doesn’t look like they got it done,” Leo said. He crawled to the edge of the roof. “I guess I’m going to have to go do it myself.” Sharon watched Leo climb down from the roof and head off into the darkness. She wiped a tear from her cheek and said to Bethany, “I’m so sorry—” Bethany’s fixed smile didn’t change. She said in a singsong voice, “He’s coming here to bleed.” Sharon stopped and listened, then whispered, “Someone is coming up the ladder. You go hide in the corner, Bethany.” Sharon crawled to the edge of the roof with her rifle poised and looked down. She kept it warily not quite pointed at Sister West as the woman climbed onto the roof. Sister West smiled at Sharon and Bethany. She kept her hands noticeably far from the revolver holstered around her waist. The gun looked far too big for the tiny woman. Sister West smiled. “Not quite sure why I’m here, are you?” “I had issues with your daughter, but I’m busy trying to stay alive at the moment. Can we deal with Allison later?” Sister West’s face grew sad. “Is she still alive?” “I think so. I’m not sure. A rifle exploded in her face, but she crawled away.” “And you left her with the convicts?” “She tried to shoot me. I know you don’t—” “You know nothing,” Sister West snapped. “I know what Allison is. A mother’s love can blind one to reality for a time, but not forever. How bad was she hurt?” “I don’t think she’s really that bad off physically,” Sharon said. “She’ll probably have a scar on her cheek the rest of her life, 229

Dale R. Cozort and she’ll have bruises and powder burns on her face for a week or two. But, her head’s even more messed up than it was before. She won’t like life with the convicts. She threw her life away.” “And you didn’t?” “Maybe I did. Or maybe I’ll be back to Rockport in the morning.” Sharon flinched as a bullet tore off part of a shingle two inches from her hand. She added, “Assuming we make it through the night.” Sister West nodded. “You’re right. Stay alive now. Deal with all of that later.” A pickup truck raced toward the building with a group of men in the back firing rifles. Sharon fired and saw one of the men fall, clutching his stomach. I hope it was a convict. She thought it was, but the fighting was confused enough that she couldn’t be sure. She heard three quick shots from behind her and looked around to see the muzzle flash as Sister West fire a fourth shot from her revolver in the direction of the men in the truck. The truck raced by so close that Sharon couldn’t see it without exposing her head over the side of the roof. Something thumped hard against the side of the building. Sharon heard a scraping sound from the direction of the thump and waited with her rifle poised. Sister West yelled, “Behind you!” Sharon whirled and saw Sister West shoot two convicts as they climbed onto the roof. Sharon had time to see holes in the exact centers of their foreheads and Sister West trying to reload as two more attackers advanced toward her before somebody tackled Sharon from behind and knocked her rifle away. She slammed her head back into the man’s face and managed to break free. She turned and braced herself; Grey crouched on the roof in front of her with blood running from his nose onto his shirt. Her rifle sat on the roof between them. Sharon risked a quick glance over at Sister West. The two convicts were trying to get the revolver away from her and were having a surprisingly tough time doing it. Grey shook his head. 230

Exchange “Women are supposed to scream, not shoot two of my men and give me a bloody nose. But you’ll both—make that all three—be screaming eventually.” Sharon looked at the man’s powerful shoulders and arms. “Woody said you can pick up the front of a car. He also said that you don’t have what it takes to be a leader. Don’t have that fire in the belly.” Grey laughed. “And he was wrong about that too.” He moved toward her, carefully. Sharon snapped a quick kick at the side of his head, but he partially blocked it with his shoulder and said, “You kick like a little girl.” He pulled a knife and flipped it open with one hand. Sharon said, “My ex-husband opened a knife that way when he was drunk. Of course, he was a complete loser.” “I’ll remember that. Maybe I’ll carve it on your forehead.” Sharon feinted toward Grey’s groin with a kick and jabbed him in the nose with her fist, moving in and back out before the knife shifted more than a couple of inches. More blood flowed from the already injured nose. Grey put one hand up to his face and Sharon said, “That’s it! I know what the flashes were!” “What?” “You got most of your rifles and ammunition from Sam. He must have screwed with some of the ammunition so the rifles blow up. He did that to a rifle he left for Allison West to find. I figured it out when you put your hand to your face—just like she did when the rifle blew up.” Grey paused and looked thoughtful. “That’s possible. Thanks. I may let you be choosy in the company you keep after all.” Sharon said, “That won’t be an issue.” She shot a quick glance to gauge the distance, then spun and kicked the temple of one of the men struggling with Sister West. The man staggered and fell with his head and shoulders over the edge of the roof. Sharon snapped back to face Grey before he could move. “I can take you out just like that. No contest. Your head might be hard enough to take it, but what about your eyes?” Grey lowered his head, put his hands across his face and charged. Sharon stepped aside and kicked him in the kidneys. His 231

Dale R. Cozort back arched and he moaned, but then he abruptly changed directions and grabbed Bethany. He held his knife to her throat and gasped out, “Little tip. If you can take someone out, just do it. Don’t talk about it.” Sharon felt the accumulated fatigue and pain of the last several days wash over her. Her arms and legs grew suddenly heavy. She saw a blur of motion out of the corner of her eye and turned to see Sister West’s remaining attacker fold up in the middle, holding his groin. Sister West hit the convict in the side of his head with her pistol and then stepped out of the way as he fell. She calmly reloaded her revolver and glared at Grey. “Let the girl go.” “Or what?” “Or I’ll shoot you,” Sister West said. “There isn’t enough little girl to hide all of you. I’ll just shoot the parts I can hit and then stand back and let you bleed out.” “I’ll cut her throat,” Grey said. “Plus you aren’t that good a shot.” “Let’s see. If you cut her throat, I’ll shoot you. You lose.” Sister West levered the pistol’s hammer back. “On the count of three you lose a major artery. One. Two—” “What are you doing?” Sharon started toward Sister West. “Are you crazy? That’s my daughter.” “Crazy? Yes, that’s me. Just a crazy little lady who leads a crazy, dangerous cult. A crazy lady with a gun.” Grey said, “Crazy, yeah. But bluffing.” Bethany turned her head. “Blood comes fast. Bright red and pretty.” Grey glared down at her. “Stop saying that!” Sister West said, “Artery blood is bright red. Three. Last chance.” She paused for a second, but fired before Sharon could get close enough to stop her. Grey grunted and grabbed his thigh with one hand, but he kept the knife at Bethany’s throat. Sister West said, “Yes, I am that good a shot. That one nicked an artery. Not a whole lot of pain, but you’ll bleed out pretty quickly unless you get the bleeding stopped. If you hurt the girl, we’ll just let it happen.” Grey stared at the bright red blood spurting from his leg. “You really are crazy.” 232

Exchange “And you’re dying. Drop the knife and we’ll patch you up. You’ll probably die anyway, but that’s your problem.” Grey dropped the knife and Bethany ran to Sharon. Sister West said, “I had my fingers crossed.” She shot Grey in the chest. “Why did you do that?” Sharon stared at Grey sprawled motionless on the roof. “Is he—” “Dead? He will be,” Sister West said. “We play by a different set of rules here. I led these people into Bear Country and I will protect them.” Sharon glared at Sister West. “Where did that come from? You go from harmless librarian-type to homicidal Annie Oakley. And you can’t even blame testosterone poisoning.” Sister West shrugged. “You could thank me for saving your daughter. People aren’t always who they seem out here.” “It doesn’t seem like anybody is.” Sharon looked down at Bethany, who was clinging to her waist and sobbing quietly. “Thank you, I think.” She started to put her arms around her daughter, but stopped inches away. A heavy automatic weapon started firing again, and Sharon pulled Bethany down on the roof with her. She raised her head enough to see over the edge. “They’re shooting at their own people—or maybe Leo hijacked the gun and is shooting at them.” Grey stirred and moaned. Sharon said, “Maybe we should help him.” Sister West said, “There’s nothing we can do. There’s nothing I want to do.” The helicopter took off and swooped low over the compound, firing an automatic weapon as it went. Sharon watched, horrified, as the helicopter’s guns tore up the ground approaching the other automatic weapon and then around it. She saw the flash of an explosion and heard the sound of it a fraction of a second later. “Leo!” Sister West ran over to her. “Did he get out?” “Leo? I didn’t see anybody run away.” Sharon felt sick to her stomach. She wiped tears from her cheek. “You’re in love with him.” 233

Dale R. Cozort “Maybe I am. Maybe I was. Maybe it doesn’t matter anymore.” The helicopter made another pass, and the convicts’ fire trailed off. Sharon saw convicts running away from the compound. She picked up her rifle and aimed at one of the fleeing figures, then shook her head. Sister West said, “Shoot them.” Sharon shook her head again, slower this time. “They’re running. It’s over.” “You don’t leave rattlesnakes in your back yard.” Sister West took the rifle and fired half a dozen shots. “Now there are one or two fewer rattlesnakes around to bother us.” Bethany said, “It’s happening, just like Woody said.” Sharon froze. She looked down at Sister West’s compound with a mixture of relief and a sense of loss. She watched the night sky and waited for more helicopters to swarm and swoop…to round up Sister West’s people and the convicts. Instead, the helicopter turned and headed toward Rockport at high speed. Something rippled though her, but it wasn’t physical. Time. We had time. Didn’t we? The sound of the screaming helicopter engine faded in the distance, then abruptly cut off. Gunshots trailed off and stopped. Grey raised his head. His voice was weak, but he offered Sharon a demon’s grin. “I may be dying, but you still lost. Remember that glow in the sky from Rockport? It went away when the sound of the helicopter stopped. They were trying to get out before the Exchange reversed. I hope it sliced them in half. Either way, you’re stuck here. Your daughter is stuck here and you’ll both die here. Bear Country will get you.” Sharon stared over in the direction Rockport had been. Grey was right. The sky-glow was gone. She turned back to Grey. “Bear Country won’t get us without a fight.” Grey laughed. The laugh trailed off and his head lolled back onto the roof. He didn’t move. Sister West checked him for a pulse. “He’s dead.” 234

Exchange The fear and anger that sustained Sharon for the last hour suddenly faded, and she abruptly collapsed to her knees. She tried to look through the night-scope, but her hands trembled too much. She stared at the dark night sky where Rockport had been and felt more alone than she’d ever felt in her life. All of her options… Just like that. Gone. She curled into a ball and sobbed.

235

Dale R. Cozort

Chapter Twenty-seven Sharon sat up and looked out over the compound. The guard towers loomed over the houses, casting a shadow over them in the moonlight. Sister West’s people moved around on both sides of the fence, collecting dead or wounded convicts and their weapons. She tried to tell herself that she didn’t care anymore, but her eyes searched the perimeter of the compound. Sister West said, “You’re looking for Leo, aren’t you? You have no idea who he really is.” “So, who is he—was he—really?” “I’m already a was?” Leo’s voice came from the rooftop behind her. “Who do you want me to be?” Sharon tried not to feel an overwhelming relief. She didn’t turn around. Her voice turned cold. “You killed the convicts around the machine guns, turned one of the guns against the rest of the convicts, and got out in the nick of time. My hero comes home, hands drenched with blood.” “The first machine gun was already out of action before I got there,” Leo said. “The mechanism had been smashed with rocks. I found Fred, your monkey, among a bunch of dead or dying convicts and dead or dying monkeys. He followed me home.” Sharon turned and saw the monkey beside Leo, the white arrowhead spot obvious on his chest. “What happened?” “I’m just guessing, but the convicts probably killed or hurt a monkey. The monkeys waited for their chance and rushed,” Leo said. “They got the gun, but the pack was almost wiped out.” “And Fred knew enough about guns to be able to survive,” Sharon said. “What happened at the other machine gun?” “I don’t know. The helicopter got there first.” “But it shot into the convicts.” 236

Exchange Leo nodded. “I saw that. I don’t know why.” “So you’re not the hero. What are you then?” “What do you want me to be?” “Let’s see, what are the choices? Cult leader. Maybe an undercover FBI agent,” Sharon said. “But if you’re undercover FBI, why did we end up out here in Bear Country? Weren’t helicopters supposed to swoop in, arrest everybody and take them back to Rockport?” Leo said, “I see you’ve been talking to Woody. Well, let’s see if you can put the pieces together. You have all of them now…everything you need to figure out who is who and what is actually going on.” “It doesn’t matter. Everything you’ve done has been a lie,” Sharon said. “Like you said, wheels within wheels. You stood and talked to me about colonizing a new world while planning your next big bust…planning to make all of that hard work from all of those people into some big boost to your career.” Sister West said, “She still doesn’t get it. The girl is dense.” Sharon scrambled up and faced Leo. “What am I supposed to get? You’re a Fed. You were trying to maneuver these people into a position where they could be arrested. You screwed up. Now we’re stuck in Bear Country.” “No, actually everything went pretty much according to plan,” Leo said. “Oh, there were a few things I wish hadn’t happened. We didn’t expect any of the convicts to survive two years over here. We should have planned for that. It would have saved lives. Then there was the flash flood. We had to ask Anna for extra solar panels, which is going to be hard for her to explain, but we covered that by making it look like it was in return for the surveyor. I wish we could have taken out Sam Kittle and his gang, instead of just Grey’s gang, but we can’t have everything. Overall, though, it didn’t go too bad for an extreme long shot.” “Wait. Are you FBI or aren’t you?” “I used to be. You’ve hopefully never heard of the people I work for now,” Leo said. “Of course, on the plus side, there is you. When Anna asked me to go out and make sure you got here safely that first day—” “Anna sent you? When we first met?” 237

Dale R. Cozort “She didn’t think you would actually go out into Bear Country,” Leo said. “When she figured out you had, she asked me to deal with it, since we let your ex-husband into the church.” Sister West interrupted. “Look dear, this whole operation—me, Leo, the Church of the Second Chance—is what we call a false-flag operation. It’s a wholly owned subsidiary of an agency of the U.S. government. And that agency fully intended for us to get stranded in Bear Country, as did Anna Morgan, Tracy Stevens and their bosses all the way to the top.” She paused and glanced at Sharon. “Still no light bulb going on? Sleep on it. You’re about to fall asleep on your feet anyway.” Sharon nodded and climbed down from the roof, with Bethany and Fred following her. She looked up at Leo. “Coming?” He shook his head. “I have loose ends to tie up. Things like dead and unconscious convicts.” Sister West said, “You haven’t even told him you’re glad he’s alive.” Sharon said, “I’m glad you’re alive.” She tried to make the words cold and matter-of-fact, but failed. A tear ran down her cheek and several more followed it. Leo climbed down and took her in his arms. He held her quietly for a few minutes and then said, “I can’t start to know what you’re feeling right now, but I know how I feel. I feel like I’ve never been this alone and trapped in my life. I planned to end up here, but I look at the sky over where Rockport was and no matter what I tell myself, my body wants out. It wants to go back. I feel like I’m on the wrong side of the sky. The only thing that feels good or right in this entire universe right now is being here with you and holding you.” “Tomorrow, I’ll want answers. Tonight...” Sharon put her head against Leo’s chest and pushed the events and questions of the night to the outer fringes of her mind. She stood and enjoyed the feel of his arms around her until a thought pushed its way into her consciousness. She said, “I really am an idiot. I know exactly what you’re doing and why you’re doing it.” Sharon woke to a knock on her door. Leo. 238

Exchange He said, “Sam Kittle just came up to the fence with a white flag tied to the barrel of his rifle. He asked to see you.” “What time is it?” “Morning. Or close to it. The sun will be up in a few minutes.” Sharon groaned. “What does he want?” “He didn’t say.” “Wait a second.” Sharon hastily got dressed and made ready. They threaded through the remnants of last night’s battle as they made their way to the fence. The bodies of the convicts were gone, but they still had to step around piles of shell casings and blotches of red in the grass. When they got close, Sam said, “Sharon Mack. You made it through the night. I’m glad.” Sharon said, “Sam Kittle. You made it through the night. I’m not glad.” He laughed. “Is that any way to talk to the guy that saved you last night?” “How did you save me?” “I had my guys at the machine gun turn it on Grey’s men.” “Why?” “To save you, of course,” Sam said. “Oh, and to gut his gang so it wasn’t competition anymore, and so that what was left of it would have to join me.” “I guess that worked out well for you,” Sharon said. “Do you want your Boy Scout badge now?” “No. I’ll wait until the conversation is over.” Sam looked into the brush not far from the compound and waved his arm. “Maybe this next bit is just another one of my little schemes. Or maybe there is still a sixteen-year-old boy lurking inside of me wanting to do a little something to make up for what I did back then. I’m not even sure I know. Either way”—he pointed into Bear Country—“the women we caught when we ambushed your trucks are gathered out there. So is Russell Mack’s wife. They are free to go.” “Why are you doing this? What do you want in exchange? What about the women from Rockport? 239

Dale R. Cozort “Like I said, I’m not quite sure why,” Sam said. “I couldn’t swing letting all the women from Rockport go, but I got the ones with kids back to Rockport before the Exchange ended, and I pulled my people back before the Exchange ended.” “Of course, I can’t verify any of that.” Leo said, “He’s telling the truth, just not quite all of it. Apparently he rounded up the AKs wives and girlfriends and brought them over to Bear Country while the AKs attacked us.” Sam grinned. “They wanted to be with bad boys. Now they really are. How did you know that?” “Anna radioed me shortly before the Exchange ended,” Leo said. “Anna was trying to trap you in Rockport, but you pulled out half an hour too soon.” “I figured she had some kind of trap waiting for me.” Sam grinned at Sharon. “As far as that sixteen-year-old boy you once liked is concerned, we’re now even. I owe you nothing more. As far as Sister West is concerned, if there is any more fighting between us it will start from you. We’ll stay away from you as long as you stay away from us. We’ll even trade with you and help you learn how to live over here. I doubt if you’ll stay away. You’ll try to get the women back. The offer is there, though.” Leo said, “We can’t let you keep a bunch of kidnapped women.” “I didn’t think you would, but for now, you know where I stand.” Sharon asked, “What about Allison West?” “She isn’t coming. She could have, but she fits in better with us,” Sam said. “She’ll be running the place in six months,” Leo said. Sam laughed. “If she tries, I’ll kill her.” The sun peeked over the horizon as Sister West’s people stumbled in from the brush. They looked bone-tired and scared but unharmed. Sharon asked, “Are we done here?” “Not quite. I want to let you know a few things I’ve figured out about Sister West and this compound you’re in.” “I think I already know them,” Sharon said. “But go ahead. Tell me what you think you know.” 240

Exchange “A lot of things didn’t fit about this place when I first saw it,” Sam said. “Sister West and company had all kinds of state-ofthe-art gadgets. They had to know an Exchange was coming. They already had trucks with reinforced suspensions. They were able to pick up their entire compound and get it on trucks in maybe six hours. They already had a location picked out over here. They had a route to it picked out. I asked myself some questions like how and why.” Sharon nodded. “And what kind of answers did you come up with?” “They had someone on the inside and that someone was Anna Morgan. I thought she was trying to set herself up as a warlord. She was actually working for Sister West. That’s why Anna sent over more solar panels and the helicopter came to bail you out.” “And why would she work with us?” Leo asked. “I don’t know,” Sam said. “Money? It doesn’t matter. She was working for you.” “Or maybe they were working for her,” Sharon said. Sam frowned. “So you’re saying she really is trying to be a warlord out here. No. I don’t buy that. Like it or not, Sister West and company would turn into rivals. She wouldn’t want that. No. There’s something else going on. I’ll figure it out eventually.” “Whatever it is, leave it alone,” Leo said. “It’s bigger than you can imagine.” “I doubt that,” Sam said. “I can imagine owning this continent.” He rubbed his jaw. “So what happens now?” “We can’t let you keep the women,” Leo said. Sam nodded. “And I can’t give them up. So, eventually we’ll fight again, but that’s a problem for another day.” He turned to Sharon. “I’m truly sorry you’re stranded here.” Sharon said, “I could say the same for you. They can cure plague carriers now. You could have gone back.” “And that would be why the plague never really took hold either here or in Rockport,” Sam said. “As far as going back goes, that’s information I could have used yesterday.” He shook his head. “Who am I trying to kid? There is no way I would go back. Be seeing you.” He turned and rode away. 241

Dale R. Cozort Leo and Sharon watched him go as the morning sun warmed the short grass and the gardens of Fort Eegan. He disappeared into a little grove of trees. A few puffy white clouds coasted lazily across the sky. Sharon said, “You let him go again.” They strolled back toward the administration building. “Yeah, I hope I don’t regret that,” Leo said. “You said you understood what was going on. Do you really?” “Most of it. Sister West said this whole thing is a false-flag operation. So, did some government agency send Sister West out to found the Church of the Second Chance?” Leo shook his head. “It was a real cult. Very nasty and dangerous. Sister West infiltrated it, worked her way up into the leadership and gathered enough evidence to bust most of the other top leaders for murder. They went to jail, and there she was, leader of her own cult and with no clue what to do with it.” “Then someone had the bright idea of hollowing it out, filling the top leadership with your people and setting it up in one of the spots where you were pretty sure an Exchange would eventually happen,” Sharon said. Faintly, she heard an organ playing in the church, and Sister West’s voice saying something about a day of thanksgiving. “It’s perfectly deniable. Back home they’ll say that a cult managed to slip out and found a colony. We didn’t have enough Marines to bring them back. Too bad. And the U.S. gets to violate the treaties against settling over here. But why bother? You can’t do much with Bear Country. We’re stranded. Even if we find something valuable like gold or diamonds we probably couldn’t send it back. This doesn’t make sense.” Leo said, “When Exchanges started, the major powers figured out that they couldn’t do much with the place. They decided that settling over here had more risks than benefits. So they passed laws and signed treaties to keep people from settling. That put them in a bind when it suddenly became vital to have a presence in Bear Country. There is one thing we can send back every time there’s an Exchange: information.” “But that was always true. What changed? Wait. The othertimeline surveyors,” Sharon said. “And now you’re saying that the 242

Exchange U.S. is deliberately violating those treaties and you’re okay with that? Why?” “If we were actually doing that, we would just be joining everybody else that signed those treaties,” Leo said. “When the city in Nigeria came back empty, it was just another in a long series of Bear Country mysteries. When we found the first nonhuman surveyor, that put a whole new light on everything, including what might have happened in Nigeria. Something nonhuman and apparently hostile is exploring Bear Country…using technology that is at least fifty years ahead of us. We know that and so do the other powers. The question is, what do we do about it? We needed a permanent presence over here. We could have torn up the treaties, but they serve a useful purpose. We don’t want Bear Country to be overrun by misfits and nutjobs from all of the little ethnic groups that want their own country, along with people like Sam. So any U.S. settlement had to be deniable. It had to avoid openly breaking the law or the treaties.” “And I bet you have similar operations waiting in a bunch of places on Dr. Irving’s list,” Sharon said. Leo skirted a patch of drying blood. “Probably. I wouldn’t know.” “Great. So my daughter and I are right in the middle of a spy operation. All these people are in on it?” Leo said, “Most of them aren’t. People came over to colonize Bear Country because it gave them a second chance in life. We screened out most of the losers and nutcases, and added some of our people with necessary skills. Other than that, what you see is what you get.” “What about the arrowhead I found and the fenced-in area?” Sharon asked. “There are things I can’t tell you about,” Leo said. “I’m sorry.” “Was there really an epidemic yesterday?” Sharon asked. “No. Everyone here was inoculated before the Exchange. We were trying to lure the convicts in while we could still bring in the Marine helicopters,” Leo said. “We didn’t expect Sam to gimmick the ammunition he gave Grey so it blew up…or to turn on him that soon. I guess we should have. How are you doing?” 243

Dale R. Cozort “Bethany washed and washed until she bled where Grey touched her, and then had nightmares.” “About Grey and the other convicts?” “And about her dad dying, I think,” Sharon said. “How is she taking that?” Sharon sighed. “I haven’t told her, but I think she knows. She said some things that may have meant that or may have meant something else.” “I heard a rumor that she’s psychic—tells the future. You just have to figure out what she means.” “She’s not psychic. She says things and then—” “They come true?” “Things happen that people then shape into her seeing the future. She’s just a little girl with a lot of problems—more now, given what she’s been through. She’s shoved the whole thing back into some corner of her mind.” “It may stay buried there for years. At some point she’ll have to bring all the images and emotions out and deal with them. You have to make her strong enough to cope with them when that time comes.” Leo stepped around a grasshopper-sized bat that landed in his path. “I wish we could help some of the convicts. A few of them might have been salvageable. Chasing them back out into Bear Country without weapons puts blood on our hands. I already have enough of that to last a couple of lifetimes. I push the images back the same way Bethany does, but sometimes I wake up at two in the morning and the memory, the garbage, comes out. I’m not always strong enough to push it back then.” Sharon looked up at Leo. “I’ve got almost as much blood on my hands as you do. And I’m starting the two-in-the-morning wakeup routine.” “Maybe we’ll share that routine some time.” “There are a lot of other things I’d rather be doing with you at two in the morning,” Sharon said. She stood on tiptoe and kissed him. “Hopefully without an alarm.” Leo smiled. “Next time I’ll make sure we have plenty of time.” “You had better,” Sharon said. “Don’t mess with the lady black-belt’s heart. I’ve killed—” Her smile faded and a tear traced 244

Exchange its way down her cheek. “I’ve killed way too many men in the last week.” Leo pulled her close. “And I love you anyway. Unfortunately, you really, honestly didn’t have any choice in any of those cases.” Sharon rested her head on his chest and the pain faded gradually. “I’m glad they let Woody stay.” “We’re taking a chance, but I think he’ll be okay.” Leo smiled at her, then the smile trickled away, leaving him looking uneasy, vulnerable. “Are you sorry you can’t go back?” Sharon sighed. “Are you going to say I told you so?” “No. I just wish you had decided on your own.” “Um...” She stepped back, looked down at the grass before lifting her eyes again. Before looking into Leo’s tanned face. “I did. I made my choice the first day I met you,” she said. “I didn’t admit it to myself, but I’ve known all along that wherever you were, that’s where I wanted to be.” They wandered along the fence, looking out over their new home. A troop of green monkeys stirred in a little grove of trees where they had spent the night. A brown bear circled wide to avoid coming close to the monkey troop on his way down to the river. Sharon said, “I’m sorry I believed Allison, even for a little while. I’m an idiot.” “Not really. You came to us with a prefabricated set of expectations—you’d been told we were a cult. We had a reputation we worked hard to create. Allison played on that. She filled in details that fit with what you expected. I had to be some kind of psycho or I wouldn’t be here. She pressed the right buttons and you bought it, but not for long.” “So...where do we go from here?” “The colony or us?” “Both.” “The colony spends the next five or ten years trying to survive. We sit in the path of whatever is sending out those surveyors. If we survive, then we try to form a society we want future generations to inherit. We lay the groundwork, knowing each generation will have to fight forces inside and outside of themselves, forces that will push some toward greed or tyranny 245

Dale R. Cozort and others to do anything they want in the name of freedom— anything but take responsibility for their actions.” He turned to look over the compound before facing Sharon again. “I have no illusions. These people came to Bear Country partly to escape all of that, but the dark impulses came along with them, inside of them. It’s part of being human.” “And us?” “If you’re willing, we spend the rest of our lives building a relationship,” Leo said. “The kind you’d want to raise your daughter, to raise a family, in.” Sharon felt a Bear Country breeze ripple through her hair as the sun dried the dew. Green monkeys came down from their trees and began foraging. Construction crews were already at work erasing the scars of last night’s battle. She tried to find a sense of loss for her familiar life back in the world—her house, her job, her cubicle. The ‘good enough.’ The loneliness. Sharon turned to Leo and said, “I choose to spend the rest of my life with you.” As they retraced their steps, Bethany strolled toward them. She smiled her fixed smile. “They’ll come for us, from the sky and the emptiness.” THE END

246