The journalist arched an eyebrow at Manny and returned the gaze. He had the look of a man peering into the enclosure of a particularly exotic zoo animal. Manny wanted to resent it, but he’d been doing this job long enough to know this was just how journalists looked at people.

Reggie downed his drink. He reached a hand up to signal the bartender and then looked back at Manny. “Can I buy you another round?”

Manny shook his head. “No thanks. I’m tired, and I don’t want to drag ass at the front tomorrow.”

He downed the last of his beer, bid Reggie a good night, and headed over to the spot of turf where he’d set up his sleeping bag and gear. He popped off his shoes, his pants, and his shirt and rubbed himself down with a handful of wet naps. Then he grabbed a nightshirt and sweatpants from his bag and slipped them on. Manny considered clean pajamas a necessity.

He fired up his deck again once he was swaddled in his sleeping bag. There was a juddering start, and then the corners of his vision were populated by a series of small, partly translucent screens. Each one bulged with updates; friends asking about his weekend plans, spam from his college, notifications about new video uploads, and headlines from the local news. David had messaged him twice more, to let him know he and his journalists were headed back to Austin and, then, that they’d arrived.

Oscar still hadn’t responded. Manny’s initial concern was over his loyalty: I got that fucker started as a stringer. If he sold that video and cut me out of the deal I’m going…going to… But the longer he thought about Oscar, the more Manny worried that something might have happened. He’d been working in Plano today, near a very stable chunk of the front. But this far out, almost anything could happen…

Manny closed his eyes, sighed, and tried to purge the anxiety from his mind. There was nothing to do now, other than get to sleep so he could wake up tomorrow and make more money. That thought prompted Manny to pull open his banking app and check on the status of his saving’s account. The numbers glowed, fat and happy, in the space right in front of his head. Another five months in the field, maybe six. Then I buy that plane ticket.

He started to think about the pictures he’d seen of Dublin and ­Berlin and Barcelona, all the places he thought he might live if this war would just hang on a little longer. He soon fell asleep, and slept pretty well until the first mortar landed.

Chapter 2

Roland.

He woke up, suddenly aware of two pressing problems:

The acid’s worn off.

And,

Eight people are here to kill me.