The wailing was broadcast from the highest towers of Vox Core. It was a signal to get inside the walls, that some kind of attack was imminent, and surely that was true. But here was the important thing: if Vox Core was able to sound the siren, at least some of its power must have been restored.

Vox Core was alive!

“Means what?” asked Turk, still fighting sleep.

“It means we have a chance of getting out of this!” I managed to wiggle upright so I could have a look. Vox Core was still mainly dark … but even as I registered that fact a searchlight rayed from the nearest watchtower and swept over the treeless meadows, lighting up the Farmers as they doused their fires and hurried to suit up for war. Then there were more lights: tower by tower, block by block, Vox Core began to reclaim itself from the darkness. Smaller lights like fireflies scattered from the high aerodromes, and those were aircraft, armed and lethal.

It made me giddy. I heard myself shouting into the noise: Here we are! Come and get us! Something stupid like that. Treya’s old loyalties bursting out of my throat.

Then the weapons rained down, and the Farmers began to die.

Chapter Six. Turk Findley’s Story

CHAPTER FIVE

SANDRA AND BOSE

Sandra booked off two hours for lunch, making creative use of a free hour she had originally scheduled for her next consultation with Orrin Mather. The restaurant where she had arranged to meet Bose was crowded with employees from the carpet wholesaler across the highway, but the table she snagged was out of the way and screened from the worst of the noise by a hedge of plastic ficus. Quiet enough for conversation. Bose nodded approvingly when he arrived.

He wasn’t in uniform. He looked better out of police drag, Sandra thought. Jeans and a white shirt that set off his complexion. She asked him whether he was on duty today.

He said he was. “But I don’t always wear the blues. I work out of Robbery/Homicide.”

“Really?”

“That’s not as impressive as it sounds. HPD went through massive reorganization after the Spin. Departments were dismantled and put back together like Lego blocks. I’m not a detective. I just do grunt work. I’m relatively new in the division.”

“So how does that connect you to Orrin Mather?”

He frowned. “I’ll explain, but can we talk about the document first?”

“I notice you call it ‘the document.’ Not ‘Orrin’s document.’ So you don’t believe he wrote it?”

“I’m not saying that.”