“Deep down in that complicated Taglioni soul of his? I don’t know. You’ll have to ask him. And, yeah, I mean it. Ask him.”

“That’s very . . .” Kalico bit it off.

“The TriNA took him all apart, pulled a lot of bad shit out of his memory, and Dek had to put it all back. Then he had to deal with the demons in his head, both human and quetzal.”

“Are we really having this talk?”

Talina pulled up a leg, rubbing her calf. “Consider me the girlfriend you and I never had as kids. Kalico, I’m too old, too filled with alien genetic material, to get tripped up in a human emotional minefield with a woman like you.”

“Like me?” Kalico cocked a scarred brow. “And that means?”

Talina gave her knowing grin. “Considering that once upon a time we were committed to killing each other, when--in all that followed--did you ever become a good and valued friend? If you’re having misgivings about what to do with Dek, you and he had better spend some time together and work it out.”

Kalico’s clever gaze didn’t waver. “You really mean that, don’t you?”

“Yeah. You’re important to me. I don’t have that many people to drink with as it is. That friend thing, you know? For another, Dek’s turned into a Wild One. Even with quetzal sense, we had too many close calls out at Two Falls Gap. Who knows how long it will be before Donovan kills him? Or any of us, for that matter? And, finally, who the fuck knows what we’re going to find when we get out to the Maritime Unit?”

Kalico offered her scarred hand. “Deal.” She paused. “But if you tell anyone that you’re the girlfriend I never had? I’ll have Abu Sassi and Dina Michegan break both of your legs.”

87

Rifle hanging from her good right arm, Michaela led the way down the stairs. Behind her, Casey wept, seemed to have trouble with the steps. That’s who she had to rely on? Casey? After watching her oldest daughter murder Jym? Watch Tomaya pulled down into the slime? Only to learn that her infant was missing after Mikoru’s murder?

Does she even know how to fire that rifle?

No time to ask now; she was at the door to the second level. Carefully, she peered through the window. What she could see of the hall was empty.

“Let’s do this,” she said more for herself than Casey, and flung the door open.

Michaela burst out into the hallway, swung the rifle this way and that, looking for any danger. The bare floor, the lights gleaming, doors orderly and closed . . . well, all except for the clinic.

Michaela winced. Gabarron still lay there, unattended, well past rigor by now, and probably starting to swell.

Pus and blood, we’ve got to get the hell out of here.