The Hound of Justice

by Claire O'Dell

  She stopped and stared directly into my face.

  I gulped and ducked my head. Next to me, Dane went still.

  After a very long moment, Adler continued into her office. I closed my eyes and breathed a prayer to God, who was sometimes my god after all.

  Had we betrayed ourselves?

  We’d find out tomorrow night.

  21

  Back in the motel room. Ten of us crowded onto the bunk beds or sitting cross-legged on the scuffed linoleum floor. Kite had drawn the shades and turned the overhead light to its dimmest setting. Midnight was long past, but we were all too keyed up to care. On our blessedly uneventful return from the factory, we’d found Micha and Sara studying an outsize tablet with hi-res maps of the area. Kite had handed out several more tablets to Dane and the rest of us.

  “Nice tech,” I said to her when I got mine. “Did you go shopping last night?”

  Kite shrugged.

  Fine. I guess we’re still keeping secrets from each other.

  I settled onto a bed and pretended to study the maps on my tablet, but my uncooperative brain kept veering back to that moment when Nadine Adler had stared straight into my eyes. Don’t worry, Dane had told me. She always looks that angry.

  Meanwhile Micha and Raven had started an argument over the technical capabilities of certain rapid-fire guns, and Owl was adding her own commentary.

  Sara cleared her throat. Everyone went quiet.

  “We launch the rescue tomorrow,” she said. “Yes, tomorrow,” she said when Owl started to protest. “I know it’s sooner than we first planned, but our dear friends have obviously moved their own schedule up.”

  Dane was nodding. “I wish we could make our move tonight. Those rats are more nervous than I’d have expected.” When Micha raised her eyebrows in question, Dane told her, “Adler was there. A very unhappy Adler. We . . . had a bit of an encounter.”

  “Doc,” Sara said in that soft rough voice of hers. “What have you done?”

  “Nothing,” Dane told her. “Just . . . she noticed us. How much, I can’t say.”

  “All the more reason to act quickly.”

  Sara tapped her fingers over the tablet, making the display flicker through a dozen images. “So. A few changes to the plan you and I discussed,” she said to Dane. “I’d meant for Doc to stay outside the factory, away from the explosions, but after last night, it might look suspicious. Raven, you join the outside crew, while Doc goes inside.” To me, she said, “Do try to keep out of trouble, my love.”

  Micha snorted. Raven eyed me with a speculative glance.

  “We are not loves,” I stated clearly.

  “Oh, no,” Micha said. “Your love owns a bookstore back in DC.”

  “She— Oh, never mind.”

  “Children, children, please,” Sara said. “Here is a rough draft of our plan. Same crew, minus Raven, who has called in sick. Owl, you will slip on the wet floor, say, half an hour into the shift. Alas, you shall be unable to continue and must beg leave to wait for the others in your car. Don’t be too dramatic. Plausible is our goal.”

  “The things I do for a good cause,” Owl said under her breath.

  Sara flicked her gaze toward Owl. “We all make sacrifices, my dear. Moving on. The crew is now shorthanded and possibly less organized without their supervisor.”

  Dane’s smile was brief and edged. “Indeed. We cannot hope to work as diligently without our overseer.”

  We all laughed softly, including Owl.

  “At ten fifteen,” Sara went on, “Ferret and Raven shall create a major distraction at the loading dock, and several smaller ones scattered about the grounds. Once we’ve drawn the guards away, the outside brigade shall penetrate the factory and arm our comrades inside.”

  “Meanwhile,” Dane said, “Doc and I will extract Sa’id and her sister, join the rest of you, and make our grand escape. Obviously, this means we need to evacuate our people and equipment from the area. Kite, please make arrangements for that. One van with a clean record and driver will do . . . say, our Coyote. We also want a reliable off-road truck with a cargo cover—one with military camouflage would be lovely—and new papers for everyone.”

  Kite noted all these items on her tablet. She didn’t appear overwhelmed by the assignment.

  “How much time will you need for the operation?” Sara asked me.

  I made a rapid calculation. “Based on what Sa’id told me . . . Half an hour max, including prep and closing the patient.”

  Dane sucked her teeth. “Tricky. We intend to take out all the guards, but we can’t guarantee that we won’t have pursuit.”

  “It is what it is,” Sara said. “Ferret, Raven? Can you provide us with enough gunpower for that kind of situation? It will be noisy,” she told Dane. “But then, we won’t be exactly quiet when we make our assault.”

  I could see that Dane was unhappy, but she didn’t argue.

  “We’ll work things out,” Micha said. “Raven knows a few reliable suppliers. But we need a few more details before we go shopping. And what about the small matter of crossing the border? Are the nice boys and girls of the Federal Army going to shoot first and ask questions later? Or will they just shoot first, then shoot again?”

  “We have to take that risk,” Sara said.

  “We do not,” Micha insisted.

  Dane made a hushing noise. “We have more details to work out. We know that. Hound, Ferret, Raven. Let’s go next door. Doc, we need a complete list of medicine, equipment, whatever you need. Don’t second-guess yourself. Pretend the Lord’s Own Supply Clerk can grant your every wish.”

  Kite locked the door behind them, then settled back onto her bed and fiddled with her tablet. Working out the evacuation, I guessed. Owl and the other women bunked down for the night, like good soldiers who trusted their commanders to make the right decisions.

  The motel walls were thin enough I could hear the conversation next door, the tone if not the words themselves. Conversation, my ass. Micha had launched into a tirade, which Dane attempted to mediate. Once, Sara laughed. Once, I heard a thump, as though Micha had punched the wall.

  I sighed and tapped my tablet. The detailed map evaporated in a cloud of pixels, leaving a blank screen. Some desktop, I thought.

  “Tap again,” Kite said softly.

  I tapped again. The “desktop” jiggled, then resolved into a different color, with half a dozen of the usual icons at the bottom. I tapped open the text editor with an empty document.

  Okay, Lord’s Own Supply Clerk, let’s get rolling.

  Appendectomy Kit, I wrote. Those should be fairly common, and they’d include most of the surgical instruments I’d need. Make sure the kit is labeled ultrasonic cleaned.

  Emergency Surgical Kit came next. There’d be an overlap with the appendectomy kit, but my time in the army told me that redundancy was never a bad thing. The surgical kit would have needles, sutures, bandages, and antibiotic gel, among other useful items.

  Medicine. That was where I truly did need the Lord’s Supply Clerk. I had no idea what the laws in the New Confederacy were. But if I could have whatever I desired . . .

  Sedatives, to calm the patient. Diazepam or lorazepam would do.

  Lidocaine, to block the pain. Which meant a sterile syringe and needle combo. Make that a box of combos.

  Oral and liquid antibiotics. Even though Sa’id claimed her sister had no allergies, I didn’t want to take chances. Amoxicillin, clindamycin, sulfamethoxazole. And as long as we were wishing, an SAIMR polyvalent antivenom kit.

  Then there was the matter of scrubbing up. Strict procedure would have had me sterilize Lazarus with an electron-beam unit, and even better, a handheld device for emergency work, but such a device didn’t exist yet, and even the Lord’s Own Supply Clerk could not whistle up a future technology. I’d have to trust to the gloves to protect my patient.

  One box of surgical sterile gloves. Neoprene.

  I wrote down all the medications and supplies I c
ould imagine I needed and then some. But was it enough? I chewed on my thumb as I considered how much would or could go wrong with my patient.

  I want a trained surgical nurse. I want an anesthesiologist. Oh, hell, I want a sterile surgical theater and full staff, not this twenty-some-minute panicked field operation.

  But heaven’s supply clerk could only do so much. It is what it is, Sara had said.

  I gave up second-guessing myself, saved the document, and tapped the screen to close the app. Pixels whirled around like snowflakes before dissolving into the familiar blank screen. Very slick tech, indeed. I was tempted to tap the screen a second time to see what other goodies the tablet contained.

  “Don’t mess around with it,” Kite said. “It’s programmed to wipe clean if you don’t have the right access.”

  And evidently, I did not. I handed the tablet over to Kite and stretched.

  “You should get some sleep,” she said. She nodded at the other women, all of them deeply asleep or making a damn good show of it. I rubbed my hands over my face. Lazarus’s metal skin felt nearly as warm and damp as my hand of flesh. Was it my imagination or this Oklahoma spring night?

  The voices from next door were barely audible. Softer and more deliberate. Good. Maybe now they’d settled down to working out those details.

  “I need some air,” I said.

  Kite made a soft noise of doubt, but after a moment’s consideration, she unlocked the door.

  Outside a breeze lifted the sweat from my skin. I breathed in the night air, air laden with the sweet scent of wildflowers, of grass crushed underfoot, and a drift of exhaust fumes. The moon had set hours ago, leaving behind a scattering of stars. Cloudy, Oklahoma, lay invisible, without even a neon sign from the motel or gas station to break the darkness. From a distance came the faint creaking of frogs, the ripple of a creek, all the soft, soothing voices of the night.

  Sara had not once questioned my ability to perform this surgery. Nor had anyone else, not really. They, all of them, took for granted that I could do the job.

  As if I were a genuine surgeon, with two good hands.

  I held up Lazarus and studied my left hand. A faint gleam from the starlight flowed over the bright metal mesh, somewhat less bright since Georgia. Tomorrow I’d have to go over the electronics and connection points, test the response times on the micro-movement setting.

  I curled Lazarus into a fist, then uncurled each finger one by one. The simplest drill, the first one Sydney taught me. Repeat three times, each round faster than the last. Next, the piano-key drills, which had driven Sara to distraction when I practiced on the electronic keyboard, now silent as I played upon keys of air and imagination.

  Halfway through the drill, a door opened behind me. Quietly, so that I felt its movement rather than heard it. Micha and Raven emerged first. Both looked weary, and Micha had a faintly distracted air, as though she were calculating logistics. Kite admitted them after Raven scratched on the door.

  A few moments later, Sara and Dane exited the room.

  “Can’t sleep, Doc?” Dane said.

  I shrugged.

  “I could mix you a special drink,” Sara offered.

  “Thank you, but no,” I replied.

  She chuckled. “My heart, it is stricken, that you do not trust me.”

  “Perhaps I should do a spot of surgery on your heart, then.”

  “Hound, stop it,” Dane said. “I won’t have you upsetting my people. Go to bed. I want to spend a few moments outside with Doc, enjoying the fresh air.” When Sara cast a doubtful eye at her, Dane made shooing motions. Sara stifled a laugh, but I noticed she did as Dane asked, a thing I’d thought impossible.

  Quiet settled over the motel parking lot. Dane leaned against the wall next to me and took a small bottle from her jacket pocket. “Care for a taste of Oklahoma’s finest?”

  I accepted the bottle shot and unscrewed the cap. Powerful fumes rose straight up my nose, making my eyes water. “Phew. What is that stuff? Homebrew?”

  Dane laughed softly. “Local brewery. Part of the disguise.” She extracted a second bottle and drank the shot in one gulp. Even watching made my throat burn. I took a tentative sip. Choked back a cough and tried again. That second sip went down more easily than the first.

  “It’s the grit that gives it flavor,” Dane said. “You get used to it.”

  She was quiet another few moments as we both watched the night sky. I tried a third sip. Considered briefly the possibility that Dane meant to drug me to sleep, much as Sara had done last autumn. No, not her style. She was the conscientious commander, checking on all her troops.

  “So, tell me, Doc. Where did you meet Hound?”

  Her voice was liquid, soft, and low. I knew better than to mistake its softness for friendliness. Very carefully, I chose my words. “We met back in DC. A friend introduced us.”

  “Heh.” She laughed. “Are they still your friend?”

  My gut untangled itself. “He is. What about you? How did you meet Sara?”

  A long silence followed, while I wished I could recall that slip of the tongue.

  Dane pulled out another bottle shot and took a meditative sip. “Don’t worry. I knew that detail before.” She paused, then went on, “Maybe it’s best you know. Not the deep dark secrets but the others . . . Yes, let’s do this.”

  We both took a swallow. Dane wiped her mouth. “We go back a ways, Sara and I,” she said. “Went to university together. Her an NYC kid with parents too rich to know any better. Me, a kid off the cornfields of Kansas. She was an obnoxious little shit in those days, but so was I.”

  She took another swig from her bottle.

  “Anyway,” she went on. “We ranted about politics. We marched in the streets. We did all the ordinary stuff. Nothing worked, not for long. I wanted to give up, but Sara said no, no way. We were the guardians of the future, she told me. I told her that God had not appointed her the Hound of Justice.”

  Ah, yes. I could picture such a conversation.

  We both drank.

  “Eventually,” Dane said, “we wore ourselves out with all the legal means. We attempted the very illegal and lost. I don’t want to go into what we did, what we tried to do. All I can say is that we weren’t squeaky-clean kids, for damn sure. But the white judges and juries of this land, Confederates and Federals, have already judged us as terrorists, no matter what we do.”

  Dane finished off her bottle shot, produced two more. Though I didn’t want any more, I took the bottle, not wanting to interrupt the flow of her talk.

  “I won’t say we were right or wrong,” Dane said softly. “But I can say that Sara . . . lost part of herself one day. I don’t like to remember that day myself. A few months after that, Ferret came to collect her. The family would see that she had proper care, she said. And maybe they were right, because a few years after that, Hound applied to the FBI and ended up with one of their shadow units. She chose to change the world one way. I chose to join the Resistance. I can’t say either of us was wrong.”

  Wasn’t much I could say myself. We all took different roads, hoping to reach that selfsame destination.

  “Thank you,” I said softly.

  “Thought you should know,” she answered. “Here, give me that bottle. Go get yourself to sleep.”

  Smart advice from a smart commander. I handed over the bottle and scratched at the door. As I slid inside, I saw Dane outside, still studying the skies.

  ***

  By the time I woke up—very late—everyone except Kite had vanished from the motel room. Kite herself hunched over her tablet, clearly absorbed in her assigned tasks. Even though I’d made no sound, she said, “Coffee in the thermos. Biscuits and honey in the bag next to it.”

  “Has anyone ever told you that you are one unnerving woman?” I said as I levered myself upright and searched around for the promised coffee.

  A brief smile lightened her expression. “Frequently.”

  Oh, I see. A mischievous nerd, ar
e we?

  I managed to pour a cup of coffee without scalding myself and drank that down while the sleep drained from my body. A second cup and a biscuit followed, me taking my time, because I knew the day would stretch out long enough without any help. Besides, someone had found the best biscuit maker in all of Oklahoma, and I wanted to do justice to their art.

  Sara reappeared an hour later, just as I was running through my drills with Lazarus. “What’s the word?” she asked Kite.

  “We have the van and two cars,” Kite said. “Still working on that off-road vehicle, but I have a few leads. Should have that tied up before three P.M. What’s the matter?” she asked with a twinkle in her eye. “Don’t you trust me?”

  Oh, burn. Yes. I was right. She is a wicked nerd.

  Sara bit back a reply and, like a cat, pretended her true goal was a cup of coffee. This was a Sara I had never seen before—openly nervous, uncertain. It had to be because she was not the field agent in charge. These were Dane’s people, and they answered to her.

  “How is our friend?” Sara said next, nodding at Lazarus.

  “Awake and lively,” I said. “Which is more than I can say.”

  “I did offer to drug you last night.”

  “Which I deeply appreciate. However, a nap this afternoon will do just as well.”

  I went back to my drills. Kite continued to concentrate on her work. Eventually, Sara asked for and received a tablet. She called up the detailed maps of the area once more and studied them. Around noon, Dane returned with bags of sandwiches. Kite fetched more coffee and cups from her secret source. Micha and Raven made their return soon after that, each carrying two grocery bags overflowing with bags of potato chips.

  They unpacked the chips and laid out the various other supplies hidden underneath.

  “We found everything on your list,” Raven said to me. “Emergency kits, antibiotics. Surgical gloves. By god, we even found the antivenom, though we had to go all the way to Ardmore. Check these over and let me know if anything is missing.”

  “What about our explosives?” Dane asked.