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“But you can,” she told him. “Now that you know what you’re capable of.”

He looked at her, trying to read her expression in the near darkness.

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

She shrugged, smiled slightly. “A lot of things in this world bother me. You deal with them or you go mad. This happens to be my way of dealing with this.” Her gaze met his. “Of dealing with you.”

He considered. “What if Connor and the others are right about me?”

She stared back. “What do you think about you?”

“I don’t know.” He turned away. “I don’t know what to think.”

Reaching out, she put a hand on his arm, felt metal where skin and clothing had been blasted away. Where another might have recoiled at the contact, she did not.

“That doesn’t sound like a machine reaction to me, Marcus. Machines don’t equivocate. They always know exactly what to think. In contrast, you sound very human.”

His voice dropped. “Thanks. Small consolation, I guess.”

“Better than none.” She indicated the surrounding forest. “You’d better make your move. The whole outer perimeter will be crawling with patrols any minute now.”

He started forward, paused to look back at her.

“What about you?”

Another shrug. “A little treason, that’s all. How bad can the punishment be?”

He knew the answer to that even if she didn’t want to admit to it. Reaching out, he took hold of her forearm.

“Come on. We’ll discuss your prospects later.”

Having commandeered the first rejuvenated Blackhawk that was armed, fully fueled, and available, Connor took the swift chopper up and headed toward the area where he expected to find the escapees. Almost immediately, something rose from the treetops in the vicinity of the silo and sped southward. Tracking it with the chopper’s infrared spotter, he took aim—and held fire. Unless the thing called Marcus Wright was capable of greater transformations than he had thus far demonstrated, the soaring shape was exactly what it appeared to be.

Connor could have blasted it anyway, just to be certain, but chose instead to let the startled great horned owl continue with its interrupted nocturnal hunt.

The helicopter was heavy with a full load of ordinance; everything from rotating mini-guns to napalm canisters. When they reached the location Connor had designated, he cut speed. They began to circle the forested area by the river, sometimes slowing to a hover, as he searched for movement below.

When Wright punched through the protective grid that covered the outside of the shaft, he and Williams emerged onto one of the concentric minefields. They knew immediately they were in the midst of a minefield because when it hit the ground the heavy cover he had knocked to one side set off one of the subterranean explosive devices. If Connor and the others back inside the base were still uncertain as to their location, that oversight had now been inadvertently rectified.

No shots came screaming in response. No one had seen them—yet.

Flares lit up the minefield. In response, Williams dug once more into her bag of tricks. The spool of detonation cord she produced was slender but powerful. Unreeling all of it, she rose and heaved it forward. Implanting the detonator, she turned her head away from the opening and depressed the igniter. One mine immediately blew skyward, setting off another next to it. Within seconds it seemed as if every mine in the immediate vicinity was going off. Without waiting to see if that was indeed the case and ignoring the dirt and debris that was now raining down on them, they rushed out of the vent and headed for the temptingly close line of trees.

***

On the ground, pursuing troops who had emerged from the base tried to separate the fleeing figures from the erupting smoke and chaos. Doing so in broad daylight would have been difficult enough. At night, anything taller than a rabbit could be mistaken for a human. Additionally, care had to be taken so they did not shoot each other.

Notwithstanding the lousy conditions, several thought they had the fugitives in their sights. They had been told, if it was at all possible, to try