Styachowski smiled, but Lambert leaned forward. "Does that mean you're going?"
"I haven't spoken to a Lifeweaver in years", Valentine said. "I've gathered quite a list of questions".
"Great. We can get you as far as Denver", Styachowski said. "They can..."
"No. Sounds like your pipeline's got leaks, if LeHavre couldn't get through. I'm going as David Valentine, ex-Southern Command. He'd
have to figure out his own way there. I'll have to write up a list of gear I need, though. Gold will be on it".
"Give it to Moira", Lambert said, suddenly informal. "Where do you want it delivered?"
"Do you know Nancy's?"
"I know Nancy's", Duvalier said. "Used to be the best safe house between Kansas City and the Rockies. Practically in Free Territory these days".
"I'll meet you there in three weeks".
"Thanks for rejoining the team, Valentine", Lambert said.
Valentine felt a little warmth in the look they exchanged. A bad use of a football-coach metaphor made her fallible - and therefore human.
"Will I have a contact I can trust out there?" Valentine asked. "I might need backup. Supplies or gear".
"I'll catch up to you at Nancy's", Styachowski said.
"Good to see you again, Valentine", Lambert said. "From this day on, your little charge is history. On paper, anyway".
Duvalier was the last to leave and ran her tongue obscenely against her lips as they said good-bye. "Even Queen Balance Sheet folds at last", she said quietly. 'Til buy you a drink at Hob's to make up. I'm guessing that ego of yours needs some soothing after getting shaded by a woman half your size".
"I'll have to chit that. If I'm going to be back at Nancy's in twenty days, I have to get that list to Styachowski and get my worm rigged".
The corner of Duvalier's mouth went up, but she ignored the opportunity for another raunchy joke. "Be careful, sweet David. May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest".
First Macbeth, now Hamlet. He wondered where Duvalier had even picked up the line. He kissed her on the cheek. "I will".
St. Louis, Missouri: The mighty river-flanked city has again grown to be one of the most crowded civic centers in the Midwest, second only to Kurian-held Chicago, almost bursting at the bluffs when set against the mile-high vistas of the thinly populated Denver Freehold.
Except that the population is mostly nonhuman.
The Missouri River valley from St. Louis to Omaha belongs to the sentient bipeds - "Grogs" in the highly unspecific vernacular. In some of the Zones, they still serve their original purpose, acting as a military caste between the Kurian overlords and the human populace. Other Grog clans and tribes took land grants after their twelve-years service (Grog tradition holds that there are five twelve-year periods to a full life, and the Grog who makes it past his fifth age is revered indeed). The Kurians settled them as bulwarks against the few areas not under their control.
The reason the Kurians left such backwaters held by enemies or unreliable transplants is still a subject of no little debate.
Grog custom makes warfare a way of life and a path to status; theft entrepreneurship and slave-taking are the twenty-first-century version of human resource management. While the "Gray One" clans and tribes that inhabit the valley consider herding a noble and respectable duty, the dirt digging of agricultural work is left to their slaves of the human caste, not quite despised, but only rarely admitted into Grog homes on an equal basis.
Tree humans live among the Grogs, wearing hatbands or wrist tokens that serve as proof that "foot pass" (as the term is translated) has been paid to the admitting tribe. "Looie" is a refuge from both the terror of the Reapers and the justice of the embattled United Free Republic to the south, and
humanity there has carved out niches that many would consider enviable. They perform for Grog audiences under the Oriental decor of the Fox Theatre, sweep the streets of the Hill, operate specialized workshops, breweries, and distilleries in Carondelet, or keep trading posts stocked with goods imported from both Kurian Zone and Freehold. A small cadre of experienced arms men even teaches at the old City Museum. The best of the Grog child warriors are sent there by their tribes to improve their warcraftiness and learn from others.
Churches educate, heal, and minister to both human and the rare Grog desperate enough to seek succor outside his clan, under generous land grants from tribal leaders who otherwise would have fewer men to serve them. An entire human ghetto has grown up around the Basilica of St. Louis, catering to human needs, including that of a surprisingly well-equipped hospital and small school. The orderlies drink and the students study nearby at that eternal mark of urban culture: a cafe looking out on the sugar-beet gardens of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial.
But everyone is careful to always have afoot-pass token on display: a red wooden bracelet with copper pennies inlaid for the Headstriker Tribe, a decoupage of old postage stamps set on a wooden tongue depressor for the Sharpeyes, a battered bit of embossed black leather with white stitching for the Startold...
* * *
David Valentine stepped out of the confessional, still able to sense the anxious sweat on the priest who remained in his stuffy little booth. The cathedral, lit by candles, arched overhead like a vast cave and echoed the noises of the few who remained after evening services. Janitors were putting out the oil lamps.
"Father Dahl might need a moment", he told the three people waiting. It had been a long and busy year since he'd last knelt next to a priest. The ritual always made him feel better, thanks to its tiny, tenuous connection to his upbringing in the schoolhouse of Father Max.