A wonder working power in the precious...

...credible as they seem are not the results of mass stereo...

You may wish to adjust the dial.

You're currently tuned to the wrong station. I'm When they found Claude with news of the massacre, she was sitting at the edge of her sister's

bed in the westernmost wing of the hospital, half asleep from the ping and mutter of the

machines keeping Bessa alive. A faint frown wrinkled her forehead, the old survivor's guilt.

She was a big woman, with sun-freckled skin and canvas sleeves rolled tight around her forearms. The old hospital chair was taught under her weight, but her sister

had grown so frail she could have floated through the ceiling. Heavy boots rang in the hall

outside. Clayt lifted her head. Bess's eyes flickered.

"'Claid?'

"'I'm right here.' She reached out, took her sister's cool fingers. They were holding hands like

this when Brack appeared at the door. Clayd, he was a small man, compact, professional.

The mustache suited him.

Like Clayd, he was dressed in practical canvas, with a Zed gun heavy at his hip.

Some instinct in him was straining to salute, even though they didn't do things that way

in the commune.

There's something you've got to come and see. Clayd glanced at Bessa, but her big sister just smiled.

She had the saintly look of someone on the edge of heaven. Go, Clayd, the commune needs you.

It was a clear night.

The red harvest moon hung low against a star-burnt purple sky, against black conifers.

The hub whined softly as it carried them over rough ground.

You might want to prepare yourself, Breck told her.

...