“Pretty sure she tried,” observed Chong.
Alethea raised her hand. “Permission to, like, totally kill her the next time we see her.”
“Granted,” said Chong. He rubbed his head.
“Do we have any idea where this… this…,” Nix began, fishing for an appropriately vile word and instead giving her word choice enough venom to kill a scorpion, “… woman… might have gone?”
“Not anyplace around here,” said Spider. “No one in New Alamo is going to help her.”
“And the base is destroyed; there’s nowhere to go,” said Gutsy.
“We can use the dogs to track her,” said Ledger. “My guess is she went to ground somewhere in town. There are a lot of empty buildings. She’s going to need rest, food, and supplies. Then she’s going to have to sneak out of here as soon as it’s dark. There may be other bases around, and she’ll—”
Gutsy suddenly shot to her feet. “Oh no!”
“What’s wrong?” Ledger demanded.
“God, I think I know where she’s going,” Gutsy cried, and then she was running. Sombra uttered a sharp bark of alarm and leaped to follow her. Ledger gave Sam a look, and then ran to catch up.
8
THERE WAS A STEADY FLOW of refugees coming in from the Broken Lands. Some were alone and half-crazed from seeing everyone they knew and loved slaughtered; others were family groups. One group of a dozen older teens and young twentysomethings had come in just after the big fight at the gate. Their camp had been down by the Rio Grande and had been overrun. Only they had survived.
Karen Peak welcomed them and, like the others before them, sent the young survivors to see Mr. Martinez, who was in charge of hou
sing.
“I’m no Realtor, but I guess you kids can take your pick,” he said, gesturing to a row of homes inside the east wall.
“No one lives here?” asked the tall young man who acted as the spokesman for the group. He was nineteen, but his face was weathered and his eyes looked ancient. He wore a cowboy hat over long blond hair.
“No,” said Martinez. “Any house you see with a red ribbon on the door is free for the taking. Sad truth, kids, is we lost a lot of good folks in this part of town. You’ll have to deal with anything they left behind. Clothes, pictures, and all that. We don’t have enough people to clean all these houses out.”
“That’s no problem,” said the young man.
Martinez managed a smile. “It’ll be a comfort to us all to have some new faces around here. Some new life, if you take my meaning. Lot of older folks in this part of town, so having you kids here is great. Say, I never did catch your name, son.…”
“Trócaire,” said the teen with a genial smile.
“Wow, that’s a mouthful.”
“It’s Irish,” he said. “My parents moved here when I was four. Just before the plague. And this is Ténèbres.” He indicated a thin girl, a year or so younger than he was, whose long black ponytail stuck out through the opening of a red baseball cap.
“Happy to meet you, Teeny-breeze,” said Martinez, mangling it.
“This is great,” Ténèbres said. “Thanks. I hope we’re not inconveniencing you.”
“No, no, just the opposite. Great to have you.” Martìnez smiled and held his arms wide to indicate all of New Alamo. “This is your town now.”
He left them there and walked back to the town hall to fetch the next group.
“Our town,” said Ténèbres.
“Yes,” said Trócaire, smiling. “Nice to know.”
9
MR. URREA TAPPED MR. FORD ON THE shoulder. “I don’t like the look of this.”