Manny had a little more than half that. Less, once he paid off Oscar’s wife. Widow. Fuck, man, you sent him out there. The uncertainty and despair must have been obvious on his face. Both Donald Farris and Nana Yazzie gave him the kind of looks normally reserved for wounded kittens.

“I may be able to help,” the old Brit said. “I do have some connections in Germany. People who might sponsor your visa. If you help.”

The thought of a visa, the mental image of seeing one stamped in his otherwise-worthless passport, was intoxicating. Manny’d never traveled outside of Texas but he had kept, at all times, an active passport. It had been the physical anchor for his wildest dreams. And now Donald Farris was telling him he could make something as magical as a visa real. Manny almost swooned.

“Do I have to decide now?” he asked, careful to keep his tone as calm as he could manage.

“Of course not,” Nana Yazzie said, “that would be terribly unfair. You should get some sleep and then a proper breakfast. There’s certainly enough time for that. And you look exhausted.”

He was. Now that the excitement of the morning had faded, he felt gripped by a bone-deep weariness that was not at all helped by the dim lighting and comfortable cushions around him. Reggie should have been even more tired, what with jet lag. But the journalist looked alert, jittery despite the bags under his eyes.

“If it’s possible,” Reggie said, “and you have one, I could really use a high speed data connection. My deck’s been spotty since the shooting started. I’ve got a lot to upload to the company servers, and I should probably check in with my editors, let them know I’m not dead, et cetera…”

“That won’t be a problem.” She stood, and her knees popped audibly with the movement. “Ooh,” she grunted and then continued, “Topaz and Mike–”

“Skullfucker Mike.”

“–will show you to a nice, relatively soundproof room. They’ll help you get onto our data tower too, Reggie.”

“Thank you.”

She looked at Manny again, and fixed him with her sad grandmother’s smile.

“We’ll give you as much time to decide as we can. We expect the Kingdom to hold for a few days. But we didn’t expect them to launch an attack like this. So take that with a grain of salt.”

“I’m Texan, Nana,” Manny said. “I take everything with salt.”

Chapter 11

Roland.

Roland loved to fight men in powered armor. The increased firepower and durability gave them an outside chance, which made it fun. And the sheer expense of modern suits made it feel a little like wailing on rich kids with fancy toys.