The pup tent that had been erected for her rippled in the wind, and hail dashed against the water-proofed canvas. It was ten in the morning and it was already clear that this wasn’t going to be a very good day for making any kind of progress.
It was the twenty-fourth of December, and the two Chinooks and their complement of fuel, supplies and men had still only made it one hundred and fifty miles north of Sacramento. They were closer to Red Bluff than Redding, putting down finally on the edges of what the map showed as the Yolla Bolly Middle Eel Wilderness. The young female navigator of the Chief’s chopper had found the name vaguely amusing until a few words from Margaret Tabor had driven all the blood from her cheeks and made her realize that becoming stranded on a mission of such prime importance to the organization really wasn’t all that amusing at all.
The weather had been miserable ever since they took off from the Hunters’ base in the desert. High wind veered out of the canyons and passes of the Sierras, making the choppers dangerous and difficult to handle.
But Margaret Tabor had insisted on pushing on.
Then there had been the drizzle, turning into sleet, eventually becoming the driving walls of snow that had made the engines cough and falter.
Even then they had still made what progress they could in between the showers.
But the clouds had bottomed out around Sacramento, giving ten-tenths cover and, finally, zero visibility. With no reliable radio communication and no air-traffic controllers to give helpful advice, even Margaret Tabor had to concede defeat, agreeing that they would have to put down.
Which they’d done the evening before, coming in low over the South Fork of the Cottonwood, its waters swollen by the heavy rain and snow of the past weeks.
Now they waited.
The disc was coming to an end.
She switched it off on the trim black-and-silver unit at her belt and rolled from her narrow bed to crawl across the floor of the tent to peer out at the morning.
She let out a stream of vile invective as calmly delivered as an elderly grade-school teacher commenting to parents on the excellent progress of their child.
What she wanted at that precise moment was someone whom she could hurt. Someone weak and helpless, preferably naked and bound, so that she could use one of her slim-bladed knives on their skin and flesh and organs and exorcise the anger that was surging through her veins.
But they were out on a mission of supreme importance. The gray suits that waited back at base would be nothing without her and the top-stream armed men with her.
It would be goodbye to the Hunters of the Sun if both the big helicopters and their contents were to be destroyed in a pointless crash.
She returned to her bed and lay on her back, secure in the certain knowledge that none of her men would dare to enter her tent without calling and waiting.
She closed her eyes and entertained her mind with a mixture of lethal memories, and the plans she had for Zelig if she caught up with him. It put her into a better frame of mind immediately, and it passed the waiting time.
AWAY TO THE NORTH, General John Kennedy Zelig sat in one of the stalled M113s and wondered what he could find to do to pass the waiting time.
Scouts had gone on both ahead and behind when their route was blocked by an earth fall, crowned with fresh piled snow. Their task was to recon on both sides of the blacktop for a few miles and report back to Zelig if they found any hope of an alternative route around the obstacle.
He didn’t remember having seen any potentially usable side trails for several miles.
Time was snaking away from him. Zelig liked the idea of control. Control over his men. Over Aurora. Over Operation Tempest.
Over himself.
But he hated the fact that he had no control at all over the hostile ticking of the clocks.
“Care for a hand of cards, General?”