Unknown - The_Growing_589064

When her hands are steady enough, she turns starts the van again, turns carefully so that she does not run over the two dead men, and sets out again toward the south.

7

Several hours later, Dakota leaves her patient’s room, wiping her hands on a towel supplied by her cousin. He’kase is resting comfortably in the care of one of the rescued women who has had some Nurse’s Aide training. Her wound is clean and dry, and antibiotics are pumping their way through her tiny system. In place of the medicine pouch, which again holds its customary place around Koda’s neck, the youngster holds an eagle feather, the sacred icon that Manny has held onto since he was shorn of his flowing locks upon first entering the Air Force.

“Damn, Koda. I forgot how good you were at this stuff.”

“You’re not so bad yourself.”

The cousins share a rueful laugh as they walk through the late November evening, nodding to the soldiers as they pass.

Once inside the main house, Manny takes his leave, scurrying off to the shower.

Maggie looks up from her place at the kitchen table and beckons Dakota over with a smile. A mug of steaming black coffee is already there, as if awaiting her presence. Dakota acquiesces, sitting down with a groan and stretching out her long legs as she lifts the mug to her lips, inhaling the fragrance with a sigh of approval.

“Things went okay?” Maggie guesses from the look on Koda’s face.

“As well as can be expected,” Dakota replies, taking a bracing sip of coffee, letting it warm her from the inside out. “Manny hasn’t lost his touch. He’s got the makings of a damn decent medic.”

“Better that than a pilot,” Maggie jokes.

“Hey!!” Manny yells, filling the doorway with his towel-girded bulk. “I heard that!”

Both women laugh, knowing that the young man before them is as good as it gets when it comes to flying. Absolutely fearless, he can make a jet walk and talk and turn on a dime. He’s one of the best of the best, and everyone knows it.

“Alright, flyboy, get your ass to bed. We’re on the road at 0430.”

Snapping off a crisp salute while still managing to retain the hold both on towel and dignity, Manny grins, winks, and turns back down the hall. The soft click of his door shutting puts paid to the conversation.

Silence falls among them, a soft ethereal mist. Peering at Dakota over the rim of her coffee cup, Allen takes in the sharp, clean lines of her face and the energy that seems to hum around her even now, while sitting quietly apparently lost in thought. It’s a sweet Siren’s song, one that Maggie is in no way adverse to hearing.

“See anything interesting?”

Dakota’s warm contralto rolls over her and Maggie is suddenly glad that her mocha skin hides her flush well.

Though not, perhaps, quite as well as she might have liked, given the sparkle of amusement in the crystal eyes turned her way.

“I might,” she allows, responding to the tease with a small one of her own. A smile curves her lips, and her gaze is bold and direct, though not overly aggressive. To put the cliché into perspective, Maggie Allen is a woman who knows what she wants and isn’t shy about reaching for it. As career Air Force, she’s seen her share of too many wars and too many deaths and when opportunities for warmth and life present themselves on gilt-edged platters, she rarely hesitates.

The silence between them is almost palpable, filling the shadowed and cobwebby corners of the large living area with a turbulent, humming energy.

Their gazes break at the same time. Maggie looks over at a painting hanging above the mantle in the living room. Dakota looks down at her hands. The ring finger of her left hand looks strangely naked; the small band of paler flesh highlighted like an afterimage of a life long past.

Seven years, Dakota thinks, her thumb rubbing over the pale, soft skin. A time for beginnings. A time for endings. A generation. An itch. Seven virtues and seven vices. Paradise and damnation. Confusion? Maybe. Guilt? A little of that, too.

She sighs.

“I have a room to myself in the back of the house,” Allen says, very softly. “One of the perks of being CO.” She smiles a little. “I’d like to share it with you tonight.”

Dakota looks up then, her gaze piercing and direct. The sharply etched plains of her face soften just slightly, and Allen is stunned once again by the woman’s striking beauty.

“I’d like that.”

8

When Dakota next awakens, it’s still dark, and she knows without looking that dawn is a long way off. She stretches slightly, then settles, arms comfortably curled around the warm body in her arms. For a moment, she thinks she’s dreaming, but the hair that brushes against her chest is shorter and coarser than what she’s used to, and the body draped across her is more muscular and compact. It awakens her to the reality of her situation, but the reality is, in truth, not all that unpleasant.

Maggie hums sleepily and, lifting her head just slightly, presses a kiss to the warm, bare breast upon which she is resting her head. “Mmm. Good morning.” Her voice is deep and sleep burred and the sound of it reaches into Koda’s belly and twists it pleasantly.

“It is that.”

“What time is it?”

In an automatic reflex, Dakota looks over at the nightstand, but of course, the clock that stands there is blank without the electricity needed to run it.

“Damn,” Maggie says, chuckling. “Forgot about that.” Reaching across Koda’s body, she picks up the watch she’s left on the nightstand and peers into it through sleep blurred eyes. “0320. Good thing I don’t need much sleep, hmm?”

“You could always grab a little more.”

Maggie laughs, a throaty chuckle. “With you here? Naked? Darling, sleep is the last thing I plan on grabbing.”

A strong hand slides up a muscled thigh, and Maggie slides with it, reaching Dakota’s tempting lips and entangling her own in a deep, luscious kiss. “Dear god, woman,” she pants when she finally pulls away. “I never thought I’d say this to another human being, but you’ve got flying beat by a long mile.”

Dakota’s deep chuckle follows her down to sensual oblivion.

CHAPTER FOUR

“Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream….”

1

KIRSTEN HUDDLES BEFORE the dying fire, watching the play of scarlet and orange amid the black remains of the embers. She is wrapped in her own sleeping bag, shielded from the concrete floor by a pair of thin mattresses pulled off one of the bunk beds. Asimov is stretched out on another with his head in her lap. She rubs his ears absently.

The small cabin is warm. She has before her the prospect of the first comfortable night since the insurrection began. She has a hot meal inside her, even if it was only canned stew set in the ashes, and has cleaned up as best she can with water warmed the same way and a bar of looted soap. She needs to sleep.

Over and over in her mind, Kirsten replays her encounter with the men at the barricade. Over and over she imagines it differently: introducing herself as a refugee fleeing toward her family in Indiana, perhaps. Shaking hands, accepting their hospitality and a temporary alliance. She is almost certain she could have trusted them far enough to set her safely on her way.

And over and over, she imagines what would have happened if she had been wrong. And what would have happened after that, will probably still happen if she doesn’t get through to the droid facility at Minot.

Outside the snow is falling again, hissing softly as it drifts past the windows. It is the one bit of luck she has had today, the new fall obscuring the ruts made by her tires on the deserted roads. The dead men’s companions had not followed her, or if they had, they had set out too late to catch up before the light failed and the clouds closed in again. Rural areas are as dangerous to her as the urban centers. In the cities the droids will still be hunting down humans. In the farm counties, the humans who remain will be defending their homes and families against the droids.