Vital Force by Trevor Scott Page B

Liechtenstein.
    â€œWhat so funny?” she asked him.
    â€œNothing. This is just getting so cloak and dagger. It’s pretty cool.”
    â€œGlad you like it.”
    When a passing lane came up, she sped up and started to pass a slow-moving camper trailer. But then she slowed down when she was even with the camper. Just before the passing lane was about to end, she jammed the gas and passed the truck and camper, barely making it with the oncoming traffic honking at her. Now the line of cars, with the Blazer at the end, would be even farther behind.
    She sped up and rushed toward the small town of Sisters.
    â—
    â€œDamn it,” said special agent Harris. “She’s on to us.”
    Agent Fisher had his hand on the dash. “Looks like it.” He pulled out a map from a side pouch and opened it to their current location. “Shit. The road splits in Sisters to one twenty-six and two forty-two. Which way will they go?”
    â€œNo. The McKenzie Highway, two forty-two, is closed until June or July. But that’s not the big problem. Look down the road a ways. Twenty splits to twenty-two toward Salem, they could stay on twenty toward Corvallis, or they could shoot down on one twenty-six to Eugene.”
    Fisher let out a heavy sigh. “Fuck. I’m gonna guess Eugene, since Cliff has another good friend there and he went to college there. But we need to get some help on the road from our friends.” He pulled out his cell phone and punched in a Portland number.
    He talked for a while, making sure there was a state patrol car watching for a white Trooper with California plates on Highway 22, Highway 20, and Highway 126, prior to any turn-offs. Once that was set, he made sure they had a Eugene police unit sitting on Cliff’s friend’s place there.
    â€œWell?” she asked. “Now what?”
    â€œWe bust our ass to Eugene. We’ll get no Agency help there. The entire office is in Portland at an organized anarchist rally.”
    â€œThat’s right. I was supposed to be there, but got pulled off for this gig.”
    â€œYou can thank me any time,” he said. “Oh yeah, we’ll need to change cars in Eugene. You don’t find that strange?”
    â€œChanging cars?”
    â€œNo. Organized anarchists. Kind of a contradiction.”
    She smiled. “Guess so.”
    They pushed on ahead, passing as many cars as they could at each opportunity.

16
    Northern Manchuria
    Jake had driven the taxi most of the night to Qiqihar. Since it had been so cold, with the heater barely working, they had been forced to keep their gloves on for the entire trip, which made it easy to clean up before dumping the car in front of a park some six blocks from the train station. They would have left no fingerprints.
    Now they were on a rickety old train used mostly by locals or the military, judging by all those in uniform, heading farther north into the hinterlands bordering Manchuria, Inner Mongolia, and Russia just a short distance over a mountain range.
    Although the train traveled along a river valley, mountains rose up from the east and west and seemed to be drawing to a close ahead, Jake noticed. There were no private compartments on this commuter, only rows of shabby chairs.
    The sun was rising and Su sat next to him, her head against his shoulder. She woke now and noticed Jake watching her.
    â€œWhere are we?” she whispered to him.
    He shrugged. “I don’t know. My map isn’t very detailed.”
    She looked outside and saw the sun making its way to the top of the mountain on the right side of the train. Then she looked to the left.
    â€œThose are the Hinggan Mountains,” she said, closing her eyes slightly and yawning.
    â€œHow can you tell?”
    â€œFirst, my grandfather worked here when I was a child. I came to visit him each summer. Might have been on this very train. Second, my company built a communications site on the ridge last