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sneaking around from behind.” He looks over at Terry with his deer rifle slung over his shoulder. “You put a bead on the rooftop. Make sure he isn’t up to anything funny.”
    Terry nods before taking a few steps back. Once in position he kneels down behind a stack of pallets, resting the gun on the pile while he watches the rooftop through his scope.
    “What do you need me to do?” I say.
    “Can you clone yourself?” he asks.
    “Not one of my tricks,” I laugh.
    “Then just keep your head on a swivel,” I promised Uriel I’d bring them all home safe.
    I crack my knuckles. “Can’t go breaking a promise now, can we?”
    He smiles at me, pulling his pistol out of its holster. That’s your sign Nal is worried. I can’t say he refuses to use a gun because I’ve seen him use one frequently. To be fair, it is normally in self defense, though. He has a thing about killing people as odd as that may sound.
    Not having others kill people for him though. Just killing them himself.
    I take a few steps forward, hoping to get a view of the men around the corner. It takes me ten steps before I see the first man, Josh kneeling on the ground lacing his boots. I side step a few times to catch a clear view of the rest. Once I see the man on the roof climbing down the access ladder in the front I signal Terry to lower his weapon. I figure that Nal wouldn’t want us to look too aggressive unless we had a reason. Seeing that the coast was clear, or at least everyone was on the ground in front of us, helped ease the tensions in our camp some.
    I take a few steps backwards when I notice Bert moving our way. Behind him, his other men have lowered their weapons, some even putting them away.
    Maybe Nal was right. We can handle this without shedding any blood.
    “I take it you two are in charge,” Bert says walking up.
    “I am,” Nal says. “But I don’t go anywhere without him.”
    “Then it’s only fair I bring one of mine in the conversation.” He turns around facing his group. “Ralph, get over here.”
    Ralph jogs around the corner into our little pow-wow, smiling. I guess he just learned he was second in command on the job. Always nice when that happens. Too bad the promotion probably didn’t come with a pay raise.
    “Let’s move over here,” Bert says, motioning towards a picnic table in the middle of the yard. “Been standing too much already.”
    I smile at Nal. I can’t help but to think that should be reason enough to lose weight, maybe find a treadmill somewhere. Not a lesson I’ve ever had to learn, thankfully. Less of a problem now with the lack of food. You tend to go easy on things when you don’t have much to go around. Better to save a bit for tomorrow instead of eating it all today. The exact opposite line of thought from the rest of the American culture that said you should super size it and eat it today.
    The four of us sit down on the table, Nal and I on one side with Bert and Ralph on the other. I’m thankful Nal sat on this side of the table because it gives us a clear view of his men. It’s not that I don’t trust Bert, but…
    Yeah, I don’t trust him. Or his men for that matter. At least from here they would have to shoot their boss to take us out. That’s all the comfort I need right now.
    “So, what are we talking about here,” Bert asks.
    “When I controlled the plant, I had twelve people stationed here constantly,” Nal says. “So, six men each, at minimum. Then another two each to cover the plant.”
    “You can run this with four people?” Ralph says. “We have a small army inside.”
    Nal laughs. “One for every chair?”
    Ralph nods.
    “Better to have too many, but three our four is all you need to monitor things. They can radio to the guards if they need a hand.”
    “Well, shoot,” Bert says. “This was a lot less painful than I thought it would be.”
    “You get to keep some men back at your camp now,” I smile. “Probably a better place for most of