The Last President

^{ABOUT THE SAME TIME. PALE BLUFF. ABOUT 3:30 PM CENTRAL TIME. THURSDAY, MAY 7, 2026.}

Carol May tapped her finger on the map at St. Francisville. “Everywhere else with a decent place to land is at least seven miles further walk to Pale Bluff. And if they land at one of the not-so-good places it will take them a lot longer to get onto shore and set up. So we’re looking at sending a few men on mules over there to wreck St. Francisville, but it’s two days to get there and then the question would be, what could they do to make it really useless to the Daybreakers? Anything ten guys could pile up on the ramps, ten thousand guys could take off the ramps pretty fast. And just burning the old buildings wouldn’t accomplish much. Lord Robert might like to sleep under a roof, but he won’t let it slow him down if he can’t. And most of his force will be camping out anyway.”

“You couldn’t mine anything, or booby trap it?”

“Not so it would mean anything. We might set up a few black-powder bombs or some tripwire deadfalls, but at best you might kill or injure a couple dozen tribals, and we figure we’ll be facing tens of thousands of them. And the only one that would really count is Lord Robert, and we will not get a shot at him, I think. It’s just… we know where they’ll be coming ashore and we could probably get a few troops there first, but we can’t think of anything useful for the troops to do once they get there.”

Bambi said, “What about trees along the bank upstream? Cut them down so they fall in the river, create snags?”

“Maybe, but—”

A chime from the other room announced a radio message coming in. Carol May put on her headphones, charged the capacitor, set the spark, and keyed QRZ, “who is calling?” She listened a moment and said, “Bambi, my one-time pad is in the drawer at your right. Key 310, please.”

Bambi handed her the sheet printed with triple rows divided into neat boxes; the middle row was typed in with random numbers, the top row blank for recording the incoming message, the lower row for the decrypt. Carol May set the sheet in front of her, put a fresh pencil beside it, and keyed QRV—go ahead.

“Apparently whatever it is, it’s a big deal, because Pueblo is calling way off their regular schedule, and they—” She picked up the pencil and took down a string of letters and numbers. When the page was about half full, she set down her pencil, keyed an acknowledgment, and shut down the transmitter. “Hunh. And they repeated the clear-code for DECIPHER IMMEDIATELY at the end of the message. Like anyone would get an emergency message and not decipher it ASAP. Whatever it is they really want us to know right away.”

After the first sentence, Carol May said, “All right, you finish the decryption. I’m going to make you a bag of sandwiches and a big thermos of coffee.”

“Am I going somewhere?”

“Ninety-nine percent chance, I’d say, if when you decrypt the rest of it, it’s like that first sentence. I’ll get your food packed. Good thing you got as much sleep as you did.”

Carol May had the sandwiches and thermos ready to go in a sturdy cardboard box when Bambi emerged from the radio room. “You were right. Thanks so much, and I hope you packed enough for two.”

“Of course. I’ve already put up my TAXI YES flag, so—there we are.”

A pedicab was pulling up at the front of the house. “Just a sec while I grab my flight bag and gear,” Bambi said. By the time that Claudia, the pedicabbie, was knocking on the door, Bambi had returned to the front room, bag slung over her shoulder, in her fur-lined moccasins, jacket, scarf, and goggled helmet. Claudia gaped for a moment, and Carol May couldn’t resist teasing, “Have you never seen a pilot before, or never carried a duchess?”

Sheepishly, Claudia said, “Actually, I’ve been looking for that pattern to knit a scarf for my husband.”

Bambi grinned. “Get me to the airfield in less than ten minutes, and since I have a spare scarf in the plane, you can have this one to copy. Just remember I’ll want it back; a tough thug of an FBI agent named Terry Bolton made it for me as a wedding present.”

“With my life,” Claudia said. “And I’ll see if we can make the airfield in five.”

At the airfield, the Stearman was ready—local ground crew were efficient—so Bambi just tossed her things into the forward cockpit, switched scarves with her spare, tossed the other to Claudia, and hugged the cabbie. “What’s the fee?”

“Carol May keeps me on retainer, and the loan of your scarf is the best tip I’m getting all year. Thanks, your, uh, Duchessness? That can’t be right.”

“Don’t get too good at titles. Doesn’t look good on an American. Thanks, Claudia, see you soon I hope.”

She felt like she really shouldn’t take the time, but she trotted over to the black and yellow checkerboard-patterned Gooney Express. Quattro was in the rear. He had already removed the passenger door and bolted the S-shaped, hand-fed bomb rack to the underside. Now he was reinstalling the black-powder Gatling as a door gun.

When he saw Bambi, he dropped the tools and jumped down to hug her. “Where to, Duchess Babe?”

“There’s a revolution forming in Athens and we might be able to replace the goofy religious nuts with an only slightly crazy right-winger, which is Jenny Whilmire Grayson, so I’m going to pick her up from the Army of the Wabash and plunk her down in Athens.”

“Charming company.”

“She’s not so bad, really, and we understand each other. We both were brainy hot chick trophy daughters for power-mad fathers.”

“So you’re in the same support group?”

“Yeah, and we both know the secret handshake. No shit, she’d piss you off and she’d drive Heather or James bugfuck crazy, but I can relate to her. I’m sure that’s a character flaw of some kind.”

“Well, better you than me. And while you’re gone I’ll have the Gooney to play with. By the time Lord Robert gets here, we’ll be set up to surprise the shit out of him.”

“Eahh. That’s another piece of bad news. Estimated time of arrival is way sooner, according to Heather’s emergency message. Carol May can fill you in on that. But if I were you I’d never leave the Gooney unflyable overnight.”

“Then I won’t. I’m just a flyguy with some charisma. You’re the one that knows how to do all this danger and fighting stuff. Think I should sleep out here?”

“Well, you might need to take off in a hurry any time, but you should be okay for a day or two. Maybe after tonight. Carol May’s place isn’t that far away, and mostly I’m just paranoid these days, and I worry about you. Also there might be some delay about me getting back here; I’ll be picking up some high-priority secure communications at Athens and delivering them to General Phat at Paducah, and I kind of think he’ll have more work for a pilot and plane, and then there’s a blackout on the tenth—the moon gun went off this morning—so I might be grounded someplace for a while.”

“Bambi, hon, being apart sucks, and I want you back as soon as you can be, but I’ll be fine. I’m going to be inside a wall, and guarded by armed troops, and my plane will be safe on the ground when the EMP hits. You’re flying over hundreds of miles of tribal territory in something that isn’t much more than a powered kite, and you know how when there’s a big military operation, like the one you’re visiting in Paducah, they always want you to fly right till the second before blackout starts.”

“Well, I’ll tell them no if they ask.”

“You better. You’ve already had one force-down in tribal country, and whatever it was for you, it was the scariest week of my life till we got you back. So you are not going to worry about me.” He held her a long time, and hugged extra hard. “Be back soon, Bambi, okay? I like the world better when you’re close.”

^{4 HOURS LATER. RICHMOND, KENTUCKY. ABOUT 8:30 PM EASTERN TIME. THURSDAY, MAY 7, 2026.}

Conversation was impossible between the open cockpits. Bambi and Jenny could communicate in very occasional shouts over the roar of the engine, but that was all. So Bambi’s view of Richmond at sunset—a little town with lights coming on, the guard changing on the city walls, and people trudging home from work—was all her own. They had built a new landing strip within the walls, and she flew low to take a look at it. They were just hoisting the white-circle-on-blue that meant “We have clean fuel,” and the long pennon that meant “Welcome, you were not expected.” Bambi waggled her wings to indicate she’d understood, then came around and brought the Stearman in for a smooth landing, or as smooth as you could do on partially deflated greased-linen tires. She taxied over to the reception area and killed the engine.

As they climbed out, Jenny said, “Whenever you and Quattro get a chance you should take a look at that NeoGoliath’s landing gear. Chris was all impressed that they used a double-spring axle like on an old-time covered wagon, with iron-rimmed wheels.”

“Yeah, interesting. I wonder what that lands like—”

A light cough nearby made them turn to see an older man in a somewhat lumpy, probably handmade blue uniform, sort of an inexpert copy of a police patrolman’s uniform, with the Cross and Eagle insignia on both shoulders. On his chest, he wore a metal disk with the words “Airfield Master—On Duty” stenciled in black paint. “Uh, I’m supposed to ask you to identify yourselves and what you’re doing here.”

“Of course. Bambi Castro Larsen. Pilot, RRC courier service.”

“Jenny Whilmire Grayson, urgent government business, en route to Athens.”

“Uh. Well, that is, uh. I have orders to detain you. I mean you, Ms. Grayson. I have no orders about you, Ms. Larsen.”

“I would like to see that order,” Bambi said, and held out her hand.

“Um, I don’t think—”

“Would you like me to demand it as an RRC courier who has an absolute right anywhere in the United States to protect my passengers from harassment? Or as a senior RRC agent who could call in troops to occupy this airfield if I don’t like the answer? Or as the Duchess of California, so that this can be an international incident? Because I’ll be happy to play it any of those ways. Or all of them.”

The man looked terrified, which was exactly what Bambi had intended, and handed over a transcribed radiogram. Without asking, Bambi also reached out and took the lantern from the man’s hand, holding it up to read. “‘All stations, Jenny Whilmire Grayson is to be detained but not harmed, for reasons necessary to the government.’ And then it adds ‘This order has been authorized by Reverend Donald Whilmire, National Constitutional Continuity Board Chairman and Acting NCCC.’ This doesn’t give an appropriate and specific description of the reasons, it doesn’t specify anything that you would need for an arrest warrant, and it’s signed by an authority that isn’t recognized in the rest of the United States.”

“They say I have to hold her.”

“They can say you have to shoot down the moon, depose God, or kill all the firstborn males in Kentucky, and you’re still the one who has to decide whether to try to comply or not.”

“I’m a Federal official—”

“What were you back before?”

“Ain’t got nothing to—”

“Because, buddy, I was a Federal agent and we learned about warrants, since screwing one up, or using an invalid one, could cost us a job or the Attorney General a conviction. And this is not a valid warrant. Now, you can point that gun at us and see if you can make us take orders that you have no power to give, on behalf of people who also had no power to give them, or you can shut up and do your job as Airfield Master, which I would bet you’re a lot better at than you are at playing cop.” She had been walking closer to him as she spoke, holding the lantern up so it shone in his eyes. “Now are you going to be a real Airfield Master or a fake cop?”

As she asked that question, she reached forward and lifted the man’s pistol from its holster, gently, not grabbing, and held it out in her open hand, so it pointed at neither of them, but he could reach for it easily. “You need this for routine protection on your job, I know. Do I have your word you aren’t going to go any further with this arrest nonsense, you’re not going to radio anywhere for orders or instructions, and you’ll get us a maintenance and fuel wagon out here? If you’ll give me your word about that, then I’ll fix things up tonight, we’ll sleep by the plane, and we’ll take off at first light. And you can always say I took your gun away from you and you had no choice.”

The man had seemed to shrink the whole time Bambi had been talking to him. “I don’t know what—”

“Exactly. I took your gun, I had the authority, and you didn’t know what to do so you just did your job as Airfield Master. Now take the deal—and your gun back. Just say, ‘Yes, ma’am.’”

He mumbled, “Yes, ma’am,” and took the gun as if afraid it might go off, sliding it uncomfortably back into his holster, then slouched off toward the main buildings.

“Think he’ll keep his word?”

“Probably, at least for a while. One of those things I’ve learned to have a feel for, spotting the people Daddy used to call ‘Natural omegas,’ people who are just looking for someone to tell them what to do. He probably really is a good Airfield Master and he’ll feel a lot more comfortable doing that than he did trying to be the KGB. So I think we’re all right. And anyway, I just volunteered us into sleeping under the wing, so we’re right where we need to be if trouble starts.”

“Good thing it looks like a warm night,” Jenny said.

“And thank god for Carol May’s sandwiches. My plan is, sandwiches now, get the checkout and fuel done right after, sack out, then open the coffee thermos when we get up and take off just as the sun rises.”

“Sounds good to me.”

The meal was good, no repairs were needed, and after fuel, tire air, oil, and lye were all topped up, they stretched out in blankets next to each other under the wing. Bambi said, “Hope you didn’t mind being a mechanic’s helper before bedtime.”

Jenny snorted. “I’m only afraid I might like the job so much I decide to give up on politics and become a full-time mechanic. You ever think about being just a pilot instead of a duchess?”

“Only about every other breath.”

“Well, good, it’s nice when you take a flying trip to know that the pilot isn’t crazy.”

From the sound of her breathing, Bambi knew that Jenny fell asleep almost immediately. Well, compared to what she’s been through recently, I guess sleeping under a plane wing and hoping you won’t be arrested in the middle of the night is probably pretty restful. For that matter when I consider what’s happened to her, I realize how lucky I am. A moment later, Bambi fell asleep too.

^{AN HOUR LATER. RUINS OF TERRE HAUTE, THE DOMAIN. 11:30 PM CENTRAL TIME. THURSDAY, MAY 7, 2026.}

Terre Haute had grown into a sizable town, back before, because it was a good landing at the big bend of the Wabash; the same fact, plus the convergence of road and rail in the area, had been in Grayson’s mind when he had decided to make it the main supply base for his reconquest of the Lost Quarter.

The garrison, just a short battalion of militia, had had almost no warning before the first big flotilla of canoes and rafts had begun landing just upstream of them. The first human wave of tribals—mostly fanatical types that Lord Robert didn’t like much anyway—had torn through the waterfront side of the garrison’s camp, cutting them off from escape and enabling forces to land downstream of them. Within three hours, well before the full force arrived, Lord Robert’s personal guard had been hanging the last of the captured and wounded, while the tribals drummed and celebrated. It had been a good little party, Lord Robert thought. And these guys really needed to blow off some steam considering how hard they’re working and how much they’ve accomplished.

Terre Haute was a good place for the forces to get some rest and to reorganize for the next phase, and the heap of supplies was so large that it took a couple of days for Bernstein and his quartermasters to take inventory and divvy up.

“I still don’t get why this is a good idea,” Nathanson was saying to Lord Robert, who was stretched out on an antique couch that had apparently had no synthetic materials, in the main room of a big old mansion he’d made his headquarters.

“Why what is a good idea?” Lord Robert took another sip of the high-priced fancy-ass brandy they had found, and decided that it really did taste like cough syrup and he would switch back to bourbon when he wanted another drink, which need not be soon. Got this sweet life going, not going to lose it because I’m drunk when a guy shows up with a knife.

“This,” Nathanson said, waving vaguely around himself. He drank rarely but always to get drunk, with no interest in adjusting his mood but apparently an occasional desire to get stupid and helpless. He was well on his way right now, but this was about the safest situation for it. “This. The big house. The cognac. The jewelry for the house bitches, the fancy shit like eating caviar, all that stuff that says we’re rich and better than anyone else. Don’t you think that’s gonna be bad for morale, sooner or later?”

“Just the opposite. I mean my followers are not going to be impressed with just any old cheap ass junk. I need to keep a little awe going, you know, and the living-rich stuff helps with that.”

Nathanson made a face; maybe the cognac was catching up with him too. “Lord Robert, doesn’t that sound kind of like a reason you made up on the spot?”

“Well,” Robert said, “I did. But the truth is, if I tell’em they feel that way, they’ll feel that way. That’s one of the things that you gotta realize, that these Daybreaker types, the fundamental thing about Daybreakers, whether they came in from fundamentalist churches or whether they came in from environmental groups or wherever they came from, the one thing they really had in common was they sure did love to be told what to do. There’s lots of people like that, always been. Hell, I don’t think people have revolutions ’cause they want freedom, that’s bullshit they tell themselves afterward ’cause they’re proud of themselves, I think what makes revolutions, is, is, whenever people want to be told what to do more by the opposition than they want to be told what to do by the government.” He was pleased with having had the thought, though he wasn’t sure it was true.

“In fact,” Robert said, “I been setting aside some of the good stuff and I’m gonna make public presents of it to you guys, big ceremony and all, and you’re going to accept it in front of the crowd, and that’s an order.”

“An order?”

“Sure. If this crowd ever turns on me for having made myself comfortable, you are going to have your head as far into the trap as I do. That way I don’t have to worry about you being able to sell me out to them. So what’d you rather have, Nathanson? A couple nice rugs, pricey booze from back before, maybe some canned goods?”

“Whatever. I was gonna show you a surprise from me, too, but then you invited me in and we got to drinking. Can you stand to look at something that’s not purely personal?”

“What’s the funny grin about?”

Nathanson held a finger up, walked back to the front entryway, and came in carrying a gun with a short stock, short barrel, and enormous drum magazine. On the magazine it bore the stamp “Newberry Tech Works, Castle Newberry, South Carolina.”

Lord Robert realized at once what it was. “Oh, yeah,” he said. “You’re fucking kidding me, right? I mean I’m dreaming? They went upriver to the war and they left behind a fucking machine gun?”

“Ten crates of them, and a mountain of ammo. It’s a Newberry SMG Model 1.” Nathanson pronounced that with careful reverence. “And they left them behind ’cause they had some big problems with them. There was a letter in an envelope tacked onto the crate that had broken ones in it. They were returning all the rest of them unused. Seems they blow up around the tenth time you use them—really blow up, blow up, I mean, like a round’ll jam in the barrel, flash gets around someplace, and the whole mag goes off. And they’re complaining too that they ain’t all that accurate, you have to be almost on top of a mob of enemy packed pretty thick to do you any good.

“So we test-fired one, and, yeah, it makes a mess of itself and probably jams like an old dog farts. The auto mechanism kind of looks like it was copied from a cuckoo clock, too, bet it breaks pretty often, and it doesn’t fire very fast when you hold the trigger down. Maybe two rounds a second. And you have to hand-load both the drum magazine and the little chain of caps. So they were getting rid of it before it got some of their guys killed, and it’s a lousy weapon for them because they want something that’ll work every time and be reliable and some guy can carry it through a whole war.”

“But for a weapon that you throw away… because you’re gonna throw the guy carrying it away…” Robert said. “And if you have slaves to do the loading… Yeah. Yeah.”

Nathanson beamed. “Just what I thought. Especially if we can trick or force some people we don’t want to take back with us into using it. Then it would be one of those win-all-around Daybreak situations.”

Bernstein came in from the foyer, and said, “Inventory’s coming along.”

“Grab some cognac, it tastes like shit but it’s good for Nathanson to get drunk on.”

“Naw, I need to be sober. So do you, Lord Robert.”

“I am. It’s General Drunk-ass here who has to worry, I’m just buzzed. So what’s up that I need to be sober for?”

“Guess who’s back and wanting to talk.”

“Did they send us anybody hot this time?”

Bernstein shrugged. “No, but they sent four people that are real whiny and polite and trying not to piss us off.”

“We ought to make them suck up to Little Joey,” Lord Robert mused, thinking of the terrified little man they had sent him before, who was now his devoted personal valet. “That would be entertaining. But I guess we should hear what they have to say, just in case it’s something nice.”

The three gray, tired-looking middle-aged men came in literally with hats in their hands. Those hats were functional, without feathers, jewels, or machine parts. Their shirts, sweaters, and pants were plain cheap cotton or wool, and they wore the lumpy semi-moccasins that many tribals made by sewing deerhide to old canvas sneakers to replace the rotted rubber soles. “Lord Robert, in the name of all the tribes and their Councils, and on behalf of the Guardian on the Moon, we would like to ask you for a favor.”

“Well, then,” Lord Robert said. “You must know there is not a whole lot of love between us, and I don’t see any reason why I should be doing you any favors.”

The man in the center of the delegation bowed very low and said, “We understand that. Some of us did not want to ask a favor at all. Some of us wanted to propose it to you as something with possible mutual benefit.”

“Mutual benefit is always of interest,” Lord Robert said. “Nathanson, Bernstein, let’s meet with our guests around the big table upstairs, where everyone can sit down.”

Lord Robert extended the small hospitality of offering water, and then added, “The cook might be able to find us all something, should we do that?”

The leader of the delegation visibly swallowed hard. “Um, yes, that would be good.”

Bernstein said, “I think the cook’s got fresh squirrel and rabbit, some wild carrots, and maybe some spring greens and he’s doing something up. Be right back.”

While he was gone, Lord Robert said, “I trust all is well with you? I have been very pleased with the people you sent me. In particular those ones from Lake Erie knew a lot about boats and rafts and stuff and we couldn’t’ve done this without them. I should probably warn you they mostly say they’re going to stay with me at Castle Earthstone afterward. That isn’t the issue you want to talk about, is it? Because I have told everyone you’ve sent me that they are free to join me, and even we have been surprised how many of them take us up on it.”

The quiet man on the left said, “Of course the Council will be displeased when we report that, but that’s not what we came here about.”

“Well, good then.”

Bernstein returned with two of the kitchen workers, bearing wild-game-and-vegetable stew. Someone must have found an unlooted stock of spices, as well, for it had a rich, tongue-stinging blend of pepper and mustard. Lord Robert ate his casually, watching his guests; after a couple of bites had not resulted in any of them falling over choking, they dove into the stew, eating as if starving. Which they probably are, Lord Robert thought. So even high-ranking people with important missions aren’t getting enough to eat out there in the tribal boons. Even with so many people dead, and the way Daybreak arranged for looting and hoarding right after Daybreak day, they must have finally run out of canned and dried stuff, and most of them probably never really learned how to hunt, fish, or grow much of anything. Too busy doing oogie-boogie ceremonies and robbing their neighbors.

He offered them seconds, and was amused that they accepted so quickly.

When he judged that they were finally more afraid than hungry, he smiled nicely. “Well, at least now we’re all more comfortable. This proposition you were thinking of making? Proposition me.”

Their leader said, “We will not contest your possession of your territory; in fact we will concede you all the lands east of the Wabash and the Tippecanoe, south of the Maumee, west of the Miami, and north of the Ohio. All tribes with claims in those areas will renounce them forever. Furthermore we will not try to create new tribes in the lands between Lake Michigan, the Ohio, the Wabash, and the Mississippi; if you conquer any of that land in this summer’s war, it is yours, as far as we are concerned.”

“But since you don’t hold it now it ain’t hardly yours to give away,” Lord Robert drawled. Beside him, Nathanson chuckled, and Bernstein smiled at them.

“That is true, but it also carries our pledge that we will not go to war for it or seek to gain it for tribes in the future.”

“Did any of you ever promise the plaztatic world—isn’t that what you call it—that you wouldn’t kill most of the people on Earth and send us all back to the Stone Age? It’s worth something to hear you say you’ll pull whatever is left of the tribes out of the Domain, which is what you can call my territory from now on. Promising that if I conquer more you won’t try to steal it—that’s pretty fuckin’ abstract, you know? So… you got any more for me or are you about to tell me what you want?”

The leader seemed to be trying to control his temper. Don’t suppose he liked being told that to his face. Don’t suppose I care what he likes, either. “We ask that this summer, you raid as deeply into the remainder of the plaztatic world as you can, destroy everything you can, especially anything that will be hard for them to replace, smash them down so that there is less chance that they will come back up. We would like you to take as many of our warriors with you as you can.”

Robert shrugged. “If I decide to do that, I will take along as many as you send me. And I will use them first; no reason to kill my own people, if you’re giving me people to kill in place of them.”

“We expected an answer somewhat in this kind. We’re prepared to send you much larger forces, and to call up the tribes from other areas like the Ouachitas and the southern mountains, to support your effort. But we are giving them to you so that you can conduct this great raid.”

“And because you’re out of resources and you need to get rid of them before they get too hungry. This way they can either eat by raiding all summer, or die raiding, but either way they’re not at home to be disillusioned with Daybreak, the way my people got to be, before I gave them the version that works.”

“As you wish to say it, let it be said. We will not argue about words.”

“So the real offer is, you’ll send me a lot of people, and you’ll make me a couple real vague promises, and coordinate some other attacks in other parts of the country, and in return, I tear the holy fuck out of everything between the Mississippi and the Rockies that I can get my hands on?”

“We would… that is close enough for us to agree with.”

“All right, three ways you have to sweeten the deal. One, that moon gun thing of yours drops a big old EMP over Pale Bluff sometime in the next few days, and you tell me exactly when it’s coming. Two, after that your moon gun just keeps dropping’em, steady as rain, on Pueblo, till I tell them to stop—but when I tell them to stop, they stop. Three, any of your troops that want to join my True Daybreak, and break away from you, they’re mine, no arguments, no take backs. Do me all those three and we got us a deal.”

The leader nodded, apparently taking no offense at Lord Robert’s tone, and said, “As for the Guardian on the Moon, we will do what we can but we don’t like to make promises on which we cannot deliver. We will say to those who communicate with the Guardian on the Moon that if the Guardian does these things, our agreement will take effect, and that if it does not, we do not have an agreement, and hope that the Guardian on the Moon thinks that reaching an agreement is as important as we do.”

Ha. Now I’m learning things. Robert asked, “You don’t really know who or what is running the moon gun, yourselves, do you?”

“We only know that the Guardian on the Moon is a force for good and helps us in ending the plaztatic world. None of us has ever met anyone who knows anything about the Guardian on the Moon. But though we all know nothing, we are teaching our children, so that when we are all dead, our children will know the Guardian on the Moon for what it really is: the Servant of Mister Atom, visible proof that The Play of Daybreak is true and the world is the way we taught them that it is.

“As for your use of our tribes—of course. Do whatever you like, so long as you carry your Great Raid deep and far. In fact, we will send some of the tribes from the Tennessee Valley, the Ouachitas, and Texas—and from the Ozarks too if you get that far—to join you; use them freely as well. We did not want any of them back in any case; strew their bones from Cairo to Seattle, or take them home and feed them yourself, it’s all one to us.”

“You don’t seem to mind our heresy much.”

“We don’t. Your so-called True Daybreak may offend us personally, just as the computers and technical knowledge we used to bring about Daybreak, back before, offended us. But we used them.

“Like everything else that must pass eventually, for the moment, you are a means. We have not compromised on the end. Whatever you may wrongly believe, you are going to help us kill plaztatic civilization. We can tolerate a small empire based on military conquest, the same sort of thing that the world has had many times before, if it hastens the final end of plaztatic civilization. Do as you like; ultimately you work for Gaia. We accept your offer completely, and let me add, personally, all hail Lord Robert of the Domain, for the services he shall perform for Mother Gaia.”

After an enthusiastic round of handshaking, the tribals went on their way.

Bernstein said, “Well, someone skunked someone, there, but I’ll be damned if I know who.”

“That’s ’cause we haven’t made sure that we are the skunkers and not the skunkees,” Robert said, cheerfully. “But we will. I know in my bones we will. Did Nathanson show you those fun toys he found?”

They each took one turn firing a Model 1, which was fun. After that, they sent for a tribal who had rudely refused True Daybreak and talked back to Nathanson. They made him practice fire the SMG a few more times, to see what Grayson’s letter to Duquesne had meant by “blow up.” It burned his face badly and tore off two fingers. Lord Robert and his advisors all had a good laugh.

^{THE NEXT DAY. ATHENS, TNG DISTRICT. 10:30 AM EASTERN TIME. FRIDAY, MAY 8, 2026.}

Jenny Whilmire Grayson had been slumped, not moving, in the front cockpit of the Stearman, for the last hour or more of the flight. Well, if she can sleep in that situation, it’s not like any of us ever gets enough sleep, Bambi reflected. She remembered that the first time Quattro had taken her up in this thing, it had been exhilarating, joyful, fascinating—and about fifteen minutes, and for fun. The three hours from Richmond to Athens, on a breakfast of two cups of lukewarm coffee, had been long and tiring for Bambi, and she was just as glad her passenger was probably dozing through most of them.

As they crossed the vast ruin of Atlanta, something in the changed rhythm of the plane must have awakened Jenny, who stirred, leaned back, and shouted, “Can we circle over Athens before we land? So we can see what’s up?”

“Sure!” Bambi shouted back. “Good idea! Will there be anyone there if I signal your house?”

“Should be!”

“General Grayson always had us do that! Then they know to bring the carriage!”

Jenny gave her a fairly jaunty thumbs-up, for the circumstances.

In Athens, seen from the air, this morning, the crowds surged through the streets like jellyfish in some absurdist maze, blocked occasionally by lines of troops or cops. At the corner of Baxter and Milledge, there appeared to be a mass brawl going on; downed picket signs and banners along Baxter suggested that one side had been marching on the TNG capital, the old U of Georgia campus, and the other side had ambushed them. Mounted troopers were riding down Milledge and a police line had been set up across Baxter.

They swung south and east to make a low pass over the Grayson house; Bambi was relieved that it was still standing in apparent good shape. She just hoped it wasn’t triggering too much for Jenny. Call me a heartless coward, but she’s been through a lot, and I might understand her better than other people, but she’s not exactly my BFF, and I’d rather not be the only person there when she starts to cry.

Bambi banked and descended northeast again, toward the airfield, but as they approached, she saw that there were people—lots of people, big swarms and herds of people, actually—on the runway, running back and forth, and… oh, man. Throwing rocks. Slugging each other. It’s pretty much a battle down there. And since that Airfield Master probably radioed that we were coming, I am guessing this is about us.

Many faces were turning up toward them, and there was a puff of smoke that had to be from a handgun; the shooter was immediately mobbed, but Bambi decided this was no time for taking chances, and circled higher. In a few minutes, a cavalry detachment showed up and went down the runway at a slow trot, shoving the crowds aside; infantry appeared and set up police lines, which took another fifteen minutes.

“Is that about us?” Bambi shouted.

“It’s about me. I can pick out some Christian symbols on the signs and the other side is waving the old fifty-star flag. One mob that wants me here, one that doesn’t!” Jenny turned to watch them more closely; with nothing to do but circle, with stick and rudder locked for the moment, Bambi had a free hand to squeeze Jenny’s arm. Jenny covered it with her other hand and twisted in the cockpit to hunch over toward Bambi.

Well, damn, I guess someone has to be the comforter.

At last the police lines seemed to be holding, the cross-and-eagle and fish-sign wielders were driven from the field, and the American flags began to cluster around the entrance to the terminal. A heliograph winked from the tower, indicating permission to land.

Not sure how long this relative safety was going to last, Bambi came in as swiftly as safety permitted. When she rolled to a stop in front of the terminal crowd, two uniforms with a lot of braid, one of them a woman, came striding up and delivered a very ostentatious salute.

Helping Jenny down from the plane, Bambi asked, “Are you going to be okay?”

“Probably not, but I’m going to do the right things, I hope,” Jenny said, under her breath.

The two uniforms came nearer; the man, a tall African-American with a shaved head, said, “Mrs. Grayson, I don’t know if you remember me—”

“Of course I do, Colonel Steen, and it’s good to have you here. I’m guessing you’re on my side?”

“Yours, the late General’s, the Constitution’s, and America’s, ma’am. This is Colonel Jardin, once upon a time she was a public affairs specialist.”

Jardin said, “I’m afraid we need you to give a speech that will result in some calm focus on our side; we have about equal problems with people wanting to go home and give up, and wanting to throw bricks. You don’t happen to know Monroe Motivated Sequence by any—”

“Speech competitions all through high school, speech minor in college, I’m your girl. Feed me the steps and I’ll make it happen.” Jenny’s smile was genuine, but Bambi wondered if anyone else noticed how tired she looked dragging herself upright.

“Good. I think we can stall them five more minutes but then we’ll have to put you up on the rostrum, ready or not.”

Sudden yelling from the crowd, apparently about nothing, seemed to confirm that.

Jenny turned back to Bambi. “I know you have places to be, and I’m guessing Colonel Steen can make the arrangements for you to get fuel and so on?”

Steen nodded. “Happy to. I don’t think I’ve seen you since I performed your wedding.”

“That was a happier time,” Bambi agreed, “but maybe just as busy. Yeah, I should try to be in Paducah tonight, and I’ve got a couple hours’ work to do on the ground here.”

“We’ll get you squared away,” Steen said confidently.

Bambi gave Jenny a last firm hug. “You need asylum, ever, you know Pueblo and all of California will open their doors, lady.”

As she followed the ground crew, which was using a mule to tow the Stearman backwards into a hangar, she could hear Jenny’s unamplified but powerful voice beginning to speak over the crowd, and the hush-and-shush of a crowd trying to make each other listen. Bambi was a little surprised at how affectionately she thought, Good luck, sister.

Jenny felt like when she turned her back on Bambi, she had truly lost her last friend, but she didn’t look back, squared her shoulders, and marched forward. Just like when Mama dropped me off at preschool and when Daddy dropped me off at Sarah Lawrence. Keep moving forward, try to play well with others.

Beside her, Jardin was murmuring, “The whole city is crazy, ma’am, that’s not an exaggeration, it’s just the way things are. Your carriage is coming, but it was delayed a few minutes so we could provide it with a cavalry escort. When it takes you back to your house you’ll have more of an escort, because the carriage with you in it is a much better target. Your house has been under guard since early April; I don’t know if the general ever told you.”

“He just muttered something about damn silliness. Is all this really necessary?”

“Oh, it’s necessary. Pay attention to your guards, ma’am. They’ll ask you to stay away from windows, not answer doors, and if you hear something moving and you don’t know what it is, head for the nearest guard, don’t go look yourself. And I’m afraid they’re right. Sorry to say there’s some fire damage to your garden, one whole row of rosebushes got burned when a firebomb bounced off your house.”

“I can see them being mad at me, but what did the roses ever do to them?” She did her best to make her smile genuine; it must have worked because Jardin looked relieved. She was probably wondering how I’d take all this.

Jardin added, “Also you’ve got a couple windows boarded up where someone shot them out, and we’re sending someone by the post office to pick up your mail and bring it in, because your mailbox has been set on fire a few times. Basically most of the attacks have been cowardly vandalism. But with you home, that house will attract worse things than cowardly vandals.”

“I will listen to my guards. Remember my husband was murdered while I was in the bathroom just three days ago.”

Colonel Jardin winced; Jenny sourly thought, Older military women sure are surprised when younger civilian women fail to be shrieking little mice, I guess. Well, I hope she’s suitably impressed, and she’ll start being blunt with me. I never had much patience for kindly ambiguity, and now I have none.

Jardin seemed to catch on. “All right. I’ll just lay it out straight. We’re trying to turn rioting in the city into a real revolution that will make the National Constitutional Continuity Board abdicate and ideally leave the city. The Army could probably do it ourselves but some of us would fight on their side, and we don’t want to fight each other, and besides once you start letting the military take power in coups, you never get them out of the business. So we need a popular uprising, after which we restore order, recognize the Provi government, and get things back on track for beating the tribes and electing a real government under the real Constitution in November.”

“I’ve been around the Army enough, even in not much more than a year, to understand that oath is serious,” Jenny said. “So you’re the PR person officially and I’m guessing unofficially you’re the minister for propaganda? Tell me what you need me to do and I’ll do it as well as I can.”

Jardin’s smile had broadened. “This is pleasantly easy, now that I know I can just tell you. You need to play the grieving widow card pretty big—”

“For sympathy, or more waving the bloody shirt?”

“Sympathy, for the moment. General Grayson was the closest thing the Army had to an actual hero, and the major thing we need you to tell them is that if he could only be here to lead them, he’d back the rebels and oppose the reverends.”

“He would. All right, I’m badly stressed out but I’ll manage, and if I cry on the rostrum I guess it’ll just enhance the effect. So, since you wanted a Monroe Motivated speech, that’s the Attention Step, then the Need Step is—”

“The rebels have been saying they just want their country back, they want to be Americans again, so I thought—”

“Great. I can run with that, and Jeff would’ve been all for it. No shading of the truth necessary. So then, Satisfaction Step, we’re going to take it back, Vision Step, taking it back is what America’s all about, so Action Step, so let’s take it back.”

“Perfect, ma’am. The one little side note is there’s a faction in the mobs that I think of as anarchic looters, and some people that are sorta Reds and just troublemakers, and we don’t want to give them too much encouragement, but we also don’t want to discourage them because frankly they’re better fighters and more determined than a lot of the middle of the road types. So you need to signal that we’re behind the radicals enough to keep them fighting, but we want to hand power over to the moderates.”

“And how do I do that?”

“Well, I was thinking some work-ins about the Constitution, maybe something that implies that Daybreak was foreign or unAmerican, remind them how many end-of-the-world fundamentalists were in the original Daybreak movement back before. Stress that the minute the government surrenders we want real law and order, that we’re not taking over to create mob rule, we want order under the Constitution.”

“I hope you’re not surprised, Colonel, that I am totally down with that program.”

Jardin smiled. “I’m glad you’re here, ma’am.”

In its way it really wasn’t different from speech contests in high school and college; really, just like extemp except she didn’t get fifteen minutes alone in the quiet to make notes. Afterward, she only remembered the outline that she and Jardin had sketched, and a few phrases here and there, but every pause for breath drew wild cheers, and she couldn’t have been doing too bad a job since Jardin was grinning at her when she came down from the rostrum.

Then they guided her out through the old air terminal to the street, and Jardin helped her into her carriage between two guards, and sat down facing her. “If you can give me just a little more energy for a few more minutes, please stand up and wave, and try to look confident and happy; we’re going through mostly rebel neighborhoods and there’ll be a lot of people out to cheer for you. Mind you, we might need to pull you back into your seat if trouble starts, so please pardon that in advance.”

This wasn’t so different from having been part of the court for Miss Clarke County, really. Except that when she was third runner up, there were other girls waving, and soldiers were not randomly jumping into the crowd to push people to the sidewalk, chase people down, or tear crosses out of people’s hands.

“We’re getting kind of loose in how we interpret free speech and freedom of religion, aren’t we?” she asked Jardin.

“We’re leaving cardboard signs and cloth banners alone, mostly. But wooden crosses have been used as clubs. Cardboard-box crosses have been used to conceal knives and pistols, so that’s different. Mind you I don’t like the PR of having soldiers knock people down to tear their crosses apart, but we’re finding enough weapons in them that we have to keep doing it.”

“What do all the signs about ‘Don’t Just Appoint, Anoint’ mean?”

“The reverends are caught between the way most people read the Constitution and the way their crazy followers read Revelations, ma’am. Some of the real dedicated crazies over on their side want the reverends to anoint a king of America, like Saul or David was anointed the king of Israel. And start building ships and building up the army to go fight at Armageddon. And mass-execute a whole lot of gays and unmarried non-virgins and known atheists, and make Catholics and Jews swear an oath of allegiance to the Bible. And after that there’s the crazy stuff.”

Jenny shuddered. “Daddy used to struggle against those people.”

“Well, you know, we can tell he still doesn’t like them much, ma’am, but he can’t afford to throw them out, either.”

“Like our radicals?”

“Just like.” Jardin’s flat expression invited no more conversation.

At last they reached the house, and it wasn’t until Jardin was walking her up the front steps that she thought, Oh, god, it’s really Jeff’s house, not mine, and it’s crawling with his stuff in every closet and corner, how am I going to bear up in front of everyone?

She didn’t. Maelene and Luther were just inside the door, hugging her and saying how sorry they were and how worried they’d been. She just let go and cried.

As her cook and maid steered her upstairs, Jardin followed. “I’m an experienced mother and old enough to be yours. Make this easy on us, and just let us all take care of you. The next meeting of the Board, which you’re going to crash, isn’t till early tomorrow morning, and then you have a rally afterward. I’ll be by to prep you for that meeting, right after breakfast—”

“Over breakfast,” Luther said firmly. “Mrs. Grayson hates to eat alone and she’s fine after that first sip of coffee. We’ll set that up after we get Mrs. Grayson settled in.”

“Over breakfast, then. Meanwhile, rest, sleep, recover, find whatever strength you have left because we’re going to ask you for all of it.”

After a short, blessedly hot bath, she curled up in the huge bed she used to share with Jeff, and just let the tears flow and the sobs come. There was still full daylight through the curtains when she fell asleep, and then she knew nothing till just before dawn, when Maelene woke her with coffee on a tray and the offer of another bath if she wanted it. She finished the pot of coffee in the tub, dried and dressed quickly, and was seated at the breakfast table when Jardin arrived. “How are you feeling this morning?” the colonel asked.

“A million years old, but ready for the next million. Let’s eat.”

^{ABOUT THE SAME TIME. PADUCAH, KENTUCKY. 4:30 PM CENTRAL TIME. FRIDAY, MAY 8, 2026.}

The heliograph and the flaggers directed Bambi to land on a long straight stretch of Park Avenue where they’d knocked down power poles and wires.

The city was filling up rapidly. Paducah was on what was left of two transcontinental rail routes, and troops from the Temper and Provi states and the semi-independent states between were converging. When she went in to report to General Phat, she found he was trying to sort out the most complicated organizational chart she’d ever seen. “We have two national armies, ten state militias that aren’t affiliated with either army, and troops from maybe a dozen government entities that didn’t exist back before, all piling in,” Phat said. “We have Unionist Texan companies and battalions that voted to leave the Texas Army and come here to fight for the USA, and Christian States of America separatists who just want to beat the tribals before they go home and start their own country, and a certain number of only slightly crazy hillbillies, rednecks, bikers, brawlers, bored teenagers, thugs, and goons who just want to get in on a fight against Daybreak because they like Daybreak even less than they like authority, and we’re in process of parceling them out to units that will take them and getting them something resembling minimal training.”

“I have a private letter, eyes only and no record, for you from Jenny Grayson.”

He accepted it. “Thanks for delivering this.”

“Heather and James wouldn’t like it, so don’t mention it to them.”

“Heather and James are safe back in Pueblo. Or as safe as anyone can be, considering things like poor old Arnie Yang and Allie Sok Banh both were attacked by Daybreak right there in the city. And they don’t like anything they don’t control, because they are intelligence staff, and intelligence staff has been like that since some guy in Sumer was trying to stamp out unauthorized cuneiform.” Phat opened the letter, and read. “She wrote this—”

“Just this morning, she wanted me to apologize for the last couple pages being so shaky, she literally wrote them on the fly—I should know, I was flying us.”

He read, folded the letter, nodded. “What do you think of her? Your completely indiscreet unpolished opinion, I mean.”

“You’re the second RRC person to ask in the last couple of days. She’s young, or she was, but she’s getting older fast. Funny to say that about someone who’s only a year younger than I am, but you know, back before, people had some choices about how mature to be, and now we don’t, and she’s at least willing to be more mature than she was a while ago. She’s much brighter than her public image would make you think. She’s had a lot of godawful shocks and she seems to be willing to learn from them.

“I think after her involvement in Cameron Nguyen-Peters’s murder, we all thought of her as Barbie Macbeth with a side order of Too Much Jesus, and maybe that’s what she started out as, but she learned from what happened. Or maybe she picked up some more rational ideas from her psycho husband. But however she did it, she’s not putting so much priority on pleasing her idiot religious maniac father, or climbing the Temper power ladder, or collecting cheers from the crowd. I don’t know what’s really important to her, now, and maybe she doesn’t either, but she’s gotten over a lot of her dumber and more destructive ideas.”

“That’s my impression too.” Phat seemed to be replaying something mentally, nodding as he did. “Chris Manckiewicz says he’s impressed with her, but you know, Chris really does think all the time about how he is writing ‘the first draft of history’ and he thinks we’re all going to be giants and legends in the next generation, so he’s kind of, um—”

“Easily led into hero-worship,” Bambi finished. “And a little in love with nearly all his subjects, and it’s probably pretty easy for a straight male to be a little in love with this one. I know. Well, the next generation really does need heroes, and Jenny isn’t any worse basis for a hero than any of the rest of us.”

Phat nodded, having decided, and smoothed out the letter so Bambi could see it too. “I wanted to hear your opinion before I told you why. She’s offering to slam the door shut behind Lord Robert and his horde; she can send a good-sized force north that would make it impossible for them to retreat if we beat them here. And a big smashing victory would probably cement me for the presidential election.”

“What’s she want in exchange?”

“Me to be her bad guy. In 2034, which is when my second term would be ending, she’ll be old enough to run for president. By that time she needs the First National Church broken, or at least squashed back into being the very eccentric Post Raptural Church that seemed like a joke when it started, so she won’t have it running a candidate on her right. And she can’t be seen to be the one who suppressed it. It’s actually not a bad deal; I’ll have to tackle the Church early on, anyway, and it wouldn’t hurt to have their main defender quietly cooperating with me.” He tapped the letter in his hand. “If I’m going to be President of the Restored Republic, I will have to deal with worse than a realistic politician that killed an old friend of mine, won’t I? And it’s impossible to know what the specifics of the deal will involve, so we’d basically have to trust each other to keep our word.”

Bambi nodded. “That’s what you wanted to talk about?”

“Yes, I suppose so.”

“Well, I’ll say to you what I’d say to her if she asked me. Better to make a deal with a reasonable devil while you can, than with a crazy devil when you have to. But worst of all is to let yourself forget, even for one second, that it’s a devil. Everybody’s accepting a lot. Someday someone will find something they can’t accept, and then we’re all screwed.”