meters away, was an ill-lit road; the whoosh of speeding cars rose
from its body as breath. Overhead's full moon cast shadow across
the swamp. Tracing distance by the Empire State-something in
its look was wrong, though I couldn't say what-I estimated that
our standing point should be occupied, so far as I knew by what
now seemed but dream's logic, by PriTel's twenty-floor parking
unistructure.
"Where've we come?" Jake finally asked.
"Home," I said, wishing to hold further speculation until fully
facted. "There's New York. This must be Jersey. We've come down
in the Flats Preserve"-that is, the old Jersey Flats acreage remaining, set aside by the government as a public park, where buried
wastes made the tumorous foliage especially lush.
"I've been," said Jake. "It's not wide enough to spit across."
"Road's there. Let's make for it. Get ourselves citied quick."
Jake lay Oktobriana on the plane's wing, leaned against the
fuselage and sighed. "I need a fix," he said. "Take my arm. Foot my
side solid to lever proper. I motion, you pull."
"You won't stand."
"I drew two hundred mils of Diodin from first aid early on. The
pain's settled. Prep and set, Luther, you're experienced."
Diodin or no, he slipped a bullet between his brittle teeth before
we operated, quickly, as if I wouldn't see. He signaled; I tugged.
The grind heard loud assured our success. His lips kept still
throughout the transaction.
"You're AO?" I asked; he nodded. With good limb he touched
the bad one.
"It's happened before. After she's hospitaled I'll have it onceovered. Let's move." Checking Oktobriana for look, for respiration, for temp, he lifted her one-armed; I struggled with overloaded cases, slogging through the reeds, feet sliding in the mud.
After thirty meters Jake's whites were black from collar to cuffs.
Mosquitoes grew fat on our flesh as we splashed through the chesthigh growth.
"Estimate that Alekhine"-as ever, Jake mispronounced-"is in
Russia. We seek?"
"Might have to. He's implanted. Should be easy to track once
we're ranged near. "
"If we recover the one we had," he said, "think she can reset?"
"Sounds as if her boss had the know in that instance," I sighed.
Something in my back felt rubbery. "Possibly, though. I think the
one out here's our quickest bet. Wish we could search tonight-"
"She might term," Jake said. "I've no X-ray eyes to clear her
innards. " I wondered if there were snakes about; wished I wore
boots into which pants might be stuffed. "We weren't over twenty
meters high when I pitched him. Dropping onto this'd be like
tumbling on a sponge if he landed right." Jake shook his head free
from mosquitoes' pinch, if for but a second. "If I hadn't allowed
emotion to operate I wouldn't have thrown-"
"Unavoidable, Jake," I said. "What's done's done."
"Always avoidable," he said. That he had permitted feeling to
enter his most sacrosanct action ripped him through, I saw, though
such-feel ingonly made his action more spectacular.
"If he's still viable he'll emerge in time. If not we'll return and
retrieve. For now-"
"We need repair."
"Exactly. All we can do tonight is earplay." Lifting his head, Jake
examined the sky's starry bowl. "This heat's killing," I said; where
the swamp didn't soak, sweat did. "What's seeable?"
"Summer stars," he said. "Orion's missed. So's Hydra and Gemini. There's Scorpius, Libra and Hercules. Post-ides of June, I'd
hazard-"
"It's March-"
"Not here."
We neared a nesting ground; a birdflock scattered airways before us, two meters near, shooting from the fen, throwing my heart into
overdrive. Coming soon after to the highway's dry embankment,
we ascended. A rest essentialled topside under any circumstance;
what we saw made us as statues.
"This isn't," said Jake, kneeling, propping Oktobriana with care
against -a post. "Can't be, Luther-"
We faced a macadam road holding four narrow, empty lanes.
The guardrail against which Oktobriana slept was nothing
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