Cloris was ill.

We assumed she was recovering, she'd been shot before, but she seemed to lose her…will.


She had no family. Didn't believe much except a Sigg beats a Glock in the heat and, well, I don't know what else she believed.


We weren't fighting for America anymore. Maybe we lost focus. Once we got the baby to Berlin everything changed.


You're not supposed to think you can reach out and touch the matrix…that's absurd. But we delivered the child of Mohammed to the The Council, thwarting the Vatican and all of Islam. Jesus H. Christ would they be pissed.


The Jews offered the most money for The Babe, but the vinyardists won. They get everything anymore but there is nothing we can do.

Nothing.

We'd be damned fools to try.


Cloris adored her mates in SBS, they saved her bacon in Afghanistan…long enough for us to spend a dear bit of time together.


It was beastly. The whole thing.

The fight of the future will be for Jesus…any victory will be dark, brutal, insane, but hopefully just.


Fighting urges or fighting urchins…our form of relative relativism works well on the job Smart people don’t need so much wisdom…stupid people need wisdom.



On the watch…ready to capture a wandering idea, an elephant in the dark…a tiger in the wind.


The massive old Dominica Hotel, always a favorite when I visited the area exploded in a shudder of churning brick and mortar, a glass and timber cloud that hovered momentarily, then collapsed into itself.



My mind raced to all my friends working and staying at The Dominica. Some could have predicted the jet in the night…we all thought about it from but nobody could have been ready.


Two more jets approached from the north, heading dead into me…frozen spots in the sky.


I looked for Cloris…I couldn’t recall if she’d been with me when..

A heavy pistol shot, probably a long-barreled .45, shattered the terrible, murky night ripped by vicious winds, slashing rain and marbled arcs, bolts and shards of lightning.

A rage of nature swallowed the blast, close enough to raise the hair on my neck, but out of sight.

It took a moment to come to my senses, I must have been sleeping a long time in the Hummer…but it wasn’t dark when I was dozing, and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, as

I recall.

I don’t know how I could have been sleeping for so long. Don’t even remember being tired. My gear was within arm’s reach in the back seat.

I dragged the assault pack up front and strapped it on, yanked the utility belt out of its case and clipped myself into it.

The Hummer keys were gone. I flipped on the walkie-talkie, slapped clips into the Glocks and smashed the dome light with the butt of my combat knife.

Sliding out the door onto the ground I left the vehicle for better cover in the brush. A gash of lightning ripped overhead and thunder rushed in from every quarter.

I pulled the .44 from its holster strapped to my thigh and slapped a Surefire flashlight to the barrel. I pulled the hammer back and moved toward the area where the shot was fired off the left front bumper, off in the windscrambled brush, maybe ten meters distant.

Thunder and wind covered my sound as I pushed through the brush and backed up to a tree, clinching my throat mic to my neck and checking for contact with Cloris.

Straining my eyes for anything out there. Nothing… But in nothing can everything. I snapped on the flashlight just as bushes parted and a face loomed: a blast, a whizz…I fired and a stranger dropped hard into the mud.

With my light in his eyes I rushed the down shooter, stomped his gun hand in the mud and snapped a neck with my boot.

I grabbed the weapon, a big Colt, and slid it under my utility belt, snapped off the light and moved away from the stiff and into the sloppy vegetation under cover to see if I could raise Cloris.

“Waltraute… Baby, kann Sie hören mich?”……

“Wal….” “Der Kampf von der Zukunft wird für Jesus…irgendeinen Sieg wird sein dunkel, brutal, unsinnig, aber hoffentlich nur sein.”

Cloris drove the Hummer out of the dawn and into the day.

“Vous êtes de votre esprit, Homeboy.” She shook her head patiently. I jumped up with a start and looked around. The Hummer was rolling tough into the dark, green foothills.

I wiped drool from a lip and looked over at the driver.

“Waltraute?” Cloris ground her eye into my cheek.

We drove at Dawn.

Cloris drove the Hummer while I stared out the window, her mug of coffee lukewarming my duke. She listened to xm radio and I tumbled through my mind, trying to excavate events from the evening.

Despite my training, I couldn’t extract any key evidence…no feelings, no memories (dammit). I could only assume my innocence, and began to feel pretty decent about myself.

The girls tricked me to stay warm, no more.

“I smell Chocolate.”

“You can’t smell chocolate, Cloris..I..” She turned and smiled at me. I withered.

“I told the Twins to hold you until I got there. Can’t be late.” Cloris smiled, both hands at the wheel, hair blowing in the wind.

I drifted off, raking my dreams for any sign of life. By the time I discovered my sleep, I no longer remembered why I cared. But I did, so I found myself wedging my finger’s into Cloris’ mind, seeing if there was anyway I could let myself in without her knowing.

I wanted to know what it could possibly be like to be her. What, I suppose Cloris thinks of me. My devotion.

“Are you in my underwear?” Cloris chuckled. “I thought you were trying to get into my mind.” She turned the radio down, a sly bit of Strayhorn via Ellington.

“You’re prying on me…chocolates?..you know they make me romantic.”

She smiled.

I turned to stare out the window. Whatever happened with me and the Feltons (whatever it was, it was duty), was as much fun as I could look forward to into the near future.