At Nicole’s command the computer searched its massive brain with breathtaking swiftness and fed the data to the screen. For one split second, she thought about delaying the data for Travis in order to give Eric even a small margin of time, but then she rejected the idea. Eric had specifically warned her against doing anything that would give her away. Even as the letters began flowing across her screen, she called out to Travis. “Richard Dawson was at the Kooska Mill and Lumber Company, 345 Green Street. That’s in the northwest sector.”

“Kooska!” Travis shouted, stabbing his finger at the flashing lights on the board. Nicole looked to where his finger pointed and saw the next two names, Stanley R. Kooska and Darla B. Kooska.

“Check the last one, check Brownley.” Without waiting for her response, Travis picked up the phone again. “Units Two and Four, Code Three to 345 Green Street. Watch for any vehicles or personnel fleeing the vicinity.”

He turned back to stare at Nicole’s monitoring screen, where the impersonal brain was spewing out the information on Brownley’s location at the time of severance. But before it had finished, another sharp clanging shattered the silence.

WARNING! WARNING! WRIST COMPUTERS 124667, 124668, 137125, AND 138976, CHARLES KEITH METCALF, DAWN JOANN METCALF, LISA RAE METCALF, AND JAMES CHARLES METCALF, HAVE BEEN SEVERED. TERMINATION VOLTAGE SEQUENCES NOW INITIATED.

Travis swore softly, the first profanity Nicole had heard since she was a small child. But it wasn’t Travis that had her shocked attention. She too stared at the screen. A whole family. Four at the same time. And that was in addition to the other four. But before she could comprehend what that meant, the flashing lights on her screen reverted to the message on Brownley’s tracking.

Travis, looking over her shoulder, burst out with another expletive. “Brownley’s somewhere else!”

“Yes,” Nicole answered with a cool precision that in no way revealed the exultation sweeping through her at that moment. “This time it’s in south central sector, 1461 Page Lane. That’s the home of—”

“The Metcalfs!” Travis exclaimed. “That means they have two operating teams.” Again he began to bark orders into the phone, sending additional teams racing to the second site.

“Captain Oakes,” Shirley broke in, “I have the data files on the first four.”

“Good. Read them out to me.”

Before she could speak, the door to Central Monitoring flew open and the Major strode in, his face red. He stopped and stared at the flashing board. “What?” he shouted. “Eight!”

“Yes,” Travis said quickly, “done in two different locations. I’ve got teams on the way to both places right now.”

“I can’t believe this!” the Major shouted.

“Shirley is giving us a run-down on who’s been operated on.”

“Proceed,” he snapped, not turning away from the screen.

“Richard Dawson,” Shirley began to read in a timid voice, “age twenty-five, male, Caucasian, single, born in Toledo, Ohio, came to Shalev—”