Megan watched through a window as they bounced along the valley floor. The convoy got under way again and, after another hour, they began to make their way down through a narrow gulch, following the course of a dried-out riverbed before finally arriving at the base of a high cliff, above which mountainous slopes became lost in misty clouds.

A huge tented shape sat on the floor of the riverbed, immediately beneath a broad overhang of the cliff. It was only as the truck drew closer to this vast canvas shroud, painted the same colours as the surrounding landscape, that Megan could see the stanchions of a dropship peeking out from underneath. She guessed immediately it was the one that Sifra had used to transport her to Redstone.

The truck continued past the dropship, following a trail leading into a wide passageway carved out of the mountainside right beneath the overhang. The passageway angled downwards, its interior illuminated by a long sequence of lights strung from the arched roof, and eventually dwindling out of sight. A subtle shift in the pitch of the trucks engine noise told Megan they had passed through a pressure field.

The truck continued through a number of caverns, some natural and some clearly drilled out of the bare rock, before coming to a halt in a low, wide tunnel that clearly doubled as a makeshift hospital. A few dozen canvas cots had been arranged in rows against a wall, along with of all things an actual operating table, surrounded by trays of surgical instruments and bits and pieces of ancient-looking equipment. The two Freeholders left Megan in the charge of a single watchful guard and a gaunt, elderly-looking man who told her he would tend to her wounds.

She pulled off her breather mask as she perched on the edge of a cot while the doctor at least, she assumed he was a doctor examined her shoulder. She sat with folded arms concealing her breasts, her shirt lying by her side, till he informed her she had nothing more than a sprained shoulder and some severe bruising. It seemed the drone had used gel-capsule bullets, good for incapacitating people while leaving little in the way of actual physical damage.

He pushed an ice compress against her shoulder, then gave her some bitter liquid to drink before telling her to catch some sleep. The guard then cuffed one of her wrists to the rail of the cot and left her there.

At least they werent going to kill her instantly. That had to count for something, even if she suspected that Sifra was behind this decision. He had made it clear, after all, that he still had need for both herself and Bash.