“Look at them,” Mark said softly, just to her. “That’s why we’re here.”

She replied as quietly, “Except an addict never forgets how it feels to be high.”

He squeezed her shoulder. He could not agree more. They had to swallow it, though. Their first loyalty—their only loyalty—must remain to mankind.

More loudly he announced, “We’re going to destroy these things.”

“Is this all of them?” a man asked.

“The only ones who were here,” Gina muttered.

“But more could come?”

Mark said to the group, “We have to leave.”

Nobody spoke.

“We have to,” Mark repeated.

Gina said, “We will help you. You have our word.”

“My kids are still at the house,” one man said. “My wife. I know it’s just one family but I’ve seen what’s going on.” He came close to Gina. His face, lined with care, communicated as deep a plea as a human being can express. “Please help my family.”

Gina said nothing. Her tears spoke instead.

In his early career, Mark had often had to face the age-old plea that every soldier must bear, for help that he cannot provide. But bear it he must, because the soldier knows, always, that military action is not primarily about saving individuals, but about saving societies, ways of life, worlds.

He responded in the only way a soldier can: “We’ll get this done.”

Gina bowed her head.

The man swallowed his choking tears, then stepped back into the shadows. Gina followed him, but Mark put a hand on her arm.

“Got to go now.”

“Where?”

“Out.”

She followed him in silence. No questions, no, not from this soldier. If he had told her the truth, that what they had to do was to obtain and detonate nuclear weapons, and that they would not survive the explosions, he wondered how she would react.

Or, no, he didn’t. He knew. Just like him, she would do what she had to do, even if it meant her life.

*   *   *

George Hammond had been so afraid for so many hours that it seemed as if life before the storm—only a few days ago—had unfolded years and years ago.

As he drove into Willoughby after a tense journey across the continent and a desperately uneasy dash along dark roads, he experienced deepening unease. The whole region had emptied of people, with massive traffic jams on the highways leading out of the Bay Area. Because of the risk, Travis had not been willing to transport him here in a chopper, so he’d driven instead. In contrast to the highways, the back roads were almost without traffic, so he’d had fewer problems than he had imagined he would.