"But you went ahead and contacted him anyway, didn't you," Kennedy said. "Even after she'd told you about the third camp."

"No," Reid said. "It was before that."

"Before?"

Reid nodded.

"So you were never really assigned to me. You were watchdogging Malcolm."

"Something like that," Reid replied. "Look, I was pulled away from duty at Bravo camp. Webster seemed to think Malcolm could draw you out."

Reid studied Kennedy's face and realisation dawned in his expression. "Christ, she wasn't on your payroll, was she?"

"Now why in the world would you think something like that?"

"Her prints were on the gun we retrieved from Osakatown... Your gun."

Kennedy patted the Mauser at his side. "This gun here?"

Reid shook his head, as if trying to jostle his thoughts into order. "Damn," he swore softly. "What a fuck-up."

"Sounds like you backed the wrong horse."

Kennedy rose, scraping the chair away from him, and made for the door.

Reid looked up at him, his face a mixture of emotions, and said, "You've got a bunch of redskin extremists. You've got the director shitting himself. What the hell's going on here?"

"You tell me."

"I've been doing a little research. Hughes Aeronautics hasn't made a dime in two years. And five of your top physicists are AWOL. Propulsion experts. So tell me, what the hell are you building out here?"

Kennedy glanced over at the sentry and said, "Make sure he and the others get a decent meal, cigarettes. Whatever they need."

"Hey," Reid called out. "Hey."

Kennedy was at the exit. "What is it?"

"You better get your boys praying to their sky spirit or whatever hooey they got going. Once the director finds this place, we're all gonna be toast."

"And how's he going to do that?"

"He's been a step right behind you the whole way," Reid said, "and now you've stopped moving. Don't worry. He'll find you."

"I've got one more place to go," Kennedy replied, "and he sure as hell ain't going to find me there."

Outside the building, Kennedy stood on trembling legs. He felt his body's revolt against the long hours of wakefulness and deprivation and willed his worn limbs to give him just a few more hours. Meaning to check out the progress at the motor pool, he found himself strolling back across the grounds, instinctively scanning the area.

From his position, the entrance to the carapace was lost in the Rock's misshapen silhouette. Then he saw it. A flicker of movement; a shift of shadows. He froze and made out a solitary figure hunched near the base of the formation. He strode towards it with a measure of renewed vigour.

"Hey," he said.

Doc rose from his haunches with a groan.

Kennedy's enquiring glance posed the question without words.

"We're getting there," Doc said, his voice strained. "But we've got a ways to go. I'm taking a breather."

"Out here?"

Doc shrugged. He looked uncomfortable.

Kennedy gazed past him, at the unmarked grave. Ninety years ago Wells had buried his friend Gershon here.

He asked, "What do you think he'd have wanted?"

Doc selected a pebble from the desert floor. He ran his thumb across the smooth edge before laying it before the grave's marker. "What he's got, I guess," he muttered. "Peace."

Something came together then for Kennedy. A connection forming between Reid's stale offerings and the night's events. He understood what he had to do.

He returned to the makeshift lockup and gathered the prisoners in a group. They stared at him suspiciously, but their expressions turned to astonishment when he spoke.

"I've got a job for you," he said.

XIII.

"You hear that?" Lightholler nudged Morgan.

Morgan shifted and moaned.

Lightholler strained his ears for the sound, then rolled over and looked at his watch. He'd slept for two hours. Knotted muscles, cold and strained, protested as he performed a series of stretches. His arm ached dully. He gave the wound a quick inspection and went to wash his face. When he returned, Morgan was pulling on his boots. Looking up he said, "What is it now?"

"I thought I heard a plane." Lightholler crossed the room and opened the door slowly.

A blush of soft rosy light suffused the camp, an unreal, pre-dawn glimmer of hideous splendour. The horizon was a tawny haze. The base seemed smaller in this half-light. A horseshoe of squat buildings hunkered under patches of cowled netting and a blanket of crimson grit. Where they curved around the opposite edge of the grounds, they blended readily with the rolling mounds of sand and stony outcroppings.

There were no ghost dancers in sight, but recent experience had taught him that he couldn't trust his eyes where they were concerned. He peered out to the distant mountain ranges that ringed the installation and realised that even now his instincts cried out for some form of escape. He let out a short, contemptuous laugh.

Morgan checked his watch. "The major never called us. What are we supposed to do?"

Lightholler stepped outside.

Morgan said, "I think we better wait."

"For what?" The air bore a faint scent of cinders. To the far west the low cloud cover was augmented by a thin pillar of tarry grey smoke, but there were no sounds of battle. He decided that he was looking at consequences. "Kennedy may be caught up."

Morgan joined him by the doorway. "Hayes will know where the major is." His eyes drifted towards the smoke. "Looks kind of close, doesn't it?"

"Yeah, it does."

They threaded the doubled row of prefabs that comprised the north barracks and ducked under a series of ropes securing the camouflage, finally emerging into an open area. Their course took them towards the obelisk of red rock. Lightholler hadn't been able to make it out last night, yet it stood less than fifty yards beyond the shack that marked the entry shaft to the carapace. As they approached, he noticed the colours shifting along the formation. Some trick of the light perhaps. This was the rock Wells had mentioned in his journal, the landmark that had guided Kennedy in his search for the carapace. He wondered how that moment of revelation must have felt.

Morgan stopped.

Lightholler turned to see what had caught his attention. A ghost dancer had materialised on the path behind them.

"We're looking for the major," Morgan called out to him.

"He's looking for you," the dancer replied severely. "Follow me." He turned sharply and began leading them back towards the western edge of the compound.

"What's happening out there?" Morgan asked the dancer tentatively.

The soldier made no reply but quickened his step. He led them past a block of buildings and through the motor pool where several trucks were lined up by a gas pump. The trucks, like everything else in the compound, lay under canvas and netting. Lightholler spied a small gathering of men by a storehouse, remote from the rest of the western facade.

"That's the armoury," Morgan murmured.

Kennedy was standing amongst a number of ghost dancers. He acknowledged Morgan and Lightholler with a weary nod. The dancers parted to give them space.

Two of them climbed into a jeep parked near the building's entrance. It spluttered to life and tore across the pebbled surface of the motor pool towards the desert. The others made their way to the trucks. More men emerged from the armoury bearing heavy-looking olive-coloured canisters between them. They began loading the equipment onto the vehicles.

Lightholler said, "I thought nothing was working."

"We got a few of the trucks operational." Kennedy turned his attention back to the dancers. He pointed to a growing pile of gear next to one of the trucks. "Less of those and more medi-kits," he called out to one of the dancers.

"Anything else?" Morgan queried.

Kennedy gave him a blank look.

"Anything else operational?"

Kennedy shook his head. He was squinting against the rising sun and his expression was unreadable. He didn't offer anything more.

"You wanted to see us?" Lightholler prompted after a few moments.

"Yeah." Kennedy's eyes fell on their uniforms. He saw the blue shirts beneath their jackets and a smile applied itself to his worn features, but his voice remained distant and removed. "You guys wanted to help out."

"That's right." Lightholler's reply was guarded. "If we can."

"What's going on, Major?" Morgan was looking out past the white caliche of the desert floor, his eyes drawn back to the column of smoke, which was now a tapering grey spiral in the distance.

Kennedy reached out, gently grasping both men by the shoulder. "Come with me."

He walked them back towards the main cluster of buildings, halting at a smaller prefab. A body of ghost dancers, led by Tecumseh, were approaching across the grounds.

Lightholler followed Kennedy's gaze as it swept the compound and came to rest on the outlying formation of Red Rock itself. He experienced a moment of clarity and said, "Where are you going, Joseph?"

Morgan's puzzled gaze shifted between the two men.

"Shine's guiding a platoon of my men over from Alpha. They're on horseback. Only a few miles away now."

"Shine's coming here?" Morgan said, elated.

"There's another fifteen-hundred men held up at Indian Springs," Kennedy continued. "They've got trucks, tanks, weapons. They were hit hard by the pulse."

"Where's Indian Springs?" Lightholler asked.

"About fifteen miles south of here, give or take."

"We're going to Indian Springs?" Morgan asked.

"No."

Tecumseh's band was almost upon them. They halted at the edge of the grounds.

"What's in the trucks?" Lightholler asked.

"Fuel, distributor caps, fuses, circuit-breakers, wiring, tape and a shitload of ammo."

Clarity sludged as Lightholler tried to recap last night's events. Everything seemed a muddled footnote to his vision of the carapace. His initiation. "Eight hours," he said. "That's all Doc said we'd need."

"Doc wasn't giving any guarantees, John."

"But we're camouflaged," Morgan said. "They'll have a hard time finding us."

"No guarantees."

Lightholler composed his thoughts. "Your men have been drawing the Japanese south all night. There's bound to be enemy units between here and Indian Springs. Can you guarantee that you'll get there? That you'll be able to lead those men back here in time?"

"No, but I can assure you that I'll be best able to put those men to good use." There was a disturbing finality to his answer.

Morgan wrung his hands with slow, deliberate movements. His return to form was vaguely unnerving. Tecumseh remained just out of earshot.

"Darren," Lightholler said, "could you excuse us for a moment?"

Morgan's pale eyes blinked slowly. He backed away, shifting to where the dancers were loading the last of the trucks.

Lightholler turned to Kennedy. "Alright, Joseph," he said. "what's going on?"

"The journal's in my office, along with my files," Kennedy said. "Over there." He pointed to the smaller prefab just ahead of them. "Tecumseh will run the base's defence. I have complete faith in him. And Morgan will be alright-he knows what he has to do. Shine will want to go out on patrol. Don't let him leave the base. You're going to need him later on."

"For Wells?"

"For Wells."

Lightholler nodded slowly. "What makes you think you won't be here?"

"Nothing that I can explain to you right now."

"We still have secrets?" He didn't try to disguise the irony in his voice.