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directions like tentacles, the laser was silenced. As she brought the penetrator’s
     muzzle to bear on one wall of the Shelter, a bloody smile rose on Leila’s lips.
    Suddenly, her target blurred. Or more accurately, the car sank. As if the land surrounding
     the Shelter had become a bog, the car sunk nose first into the ground.
    Leila’s tense demeanor collapsed, deteriorating into devil-may-care laughter.
    The rear nozzles pivoted with a screech, disgorging fire. Flames ran along the sides
     of the vehicle, blowing away the rocky soil swallowing its muzzle. The tires spun
     at full speed. Whipping up a trail of dust, the battle car took to the air tail first.
     It spun to face the hill even before it touched back down, and the penetrator’s turret
     swiveled to the back, hurling a blast of silver light against the Shelter wall.
    The blast broke in two, and, in the same instant, was reduced to countless particles
     of light that flew in all directions. Even Leila’s driving skills couldn’t get her
     through this web of shrapnel.
    However . . .
    Landing back on solid ground, the battle car kept going straight for the storm of
     metallic particles, its body at a wild tilt as it pulled a wheelie. The darkness-shredding
     bullets sank into the belly of the car.
    Giving the engine full throttle, Leila pushed her vehicle to the top of the hill in
     one mad dash.

 
FUGITIVES
CHAPTER 2
    —
    I
    —
    As Leila hit the brakes, a gorgeous figure in black greeted her.
    “Very nicely done,” D said in his serene tone.
    Weathering a sensation that was neither fever nor chills racing down her spine, Leila
     replied with bald-faced hostility. “You still kicking around? If you don’t make tracks
     and fast, I’m gonna have to run you down and kill you,” she warned.
    Without acknowledging her threat, D said softly, “Someone should take a look at your
     wound.”
    “And you’d best . . . mind your own business!” Pain spread through the last words
     Leila spat. Pressing a hand to her right breast, she toppled forward in the driver’s
     seat. She’d taken a hit in the chest from a hunk of shrapnel that’d punched through
     the battle car’s floorboards.
    Walking over swiftly, D lifted Leila with ease and set her down in the shade of a
     nearby tree. Throwing a quick glance at the sky and the Shelter, D listened in the
     direction from which Leila had come.
    “They’re not coming,” the palm of his left hand could be heard to say. “Her people
     are still a long way off. What are you planning on doing?”
    “Can’t leave her like this.”
    “You can play nursemaid to the mortally wounded later. Our target’s in that steel
     box right now, completely immobilized. I say finish him off as soon as possible, and
     deliver the girl. After all, even if she’s been bitten already, if we slay the Noble
     she’ll be back to normal. That should please her no end.”
    Shrouded as always in an eerie aura, D’s beautiful visage clouded for an instant.
     “She’d be pleased? Because she was human again? Or because he was—”
    “Don’t start harping on that again. Has this fine spring day knocked a few of your
     screws loose? We’re so close, and if you just go do it now you could kill him without
     working up a sweat. The sun’ll be setting soon, you know. I say let the competition
     rot.” As if to corroborate the voice’s growing impatience, the sky began to don a
     darker shade of blue. At this time of year, sunset came around five Night, which gave
     D fewer than two hours to finish his work.
    Despite that, D pulled open the front of Leila’s coverall without a word. Evident
     even through her clothing, the pale fullness of her bosom was now laid bare. The flesh
     above her left breast burst outwards in a number of spots. Already the bloodied wounds
     had swollen black and blue. They were like so many eerie sarcomata growing from her
     white skin.
    D stood up, lifted the emergency kit from his saddlebags, and