Senator Thomas Goodvine stayed beneath the entrance archway, bending his head toward his wife to hear her over the buzz of the crowd, laughing at her softly spoken words, nodding in agreement. He pulled her beneath his shoulder to prevent her from being jostled by the steady stream of people hurrying to avoid the weather.
Two trees formed the unique archway to the theater, the branches interlocking overhead to form a small protection against the elements. The leaves rustled and the branches clicked together in the rushing wind. Clouds whirled and spun, weaving dark, ominous threads across the moon.
Another burst of lightning illuminated two large men pushing against the stream of theatergoers, apparently determined to gain shelter in the building. The flash of light faded, leaving only the dim lighting of the archway and the streetlights flickering ominously. Thelma Good-vine tugged at her husband's jacket to bring his attention back to her.
"Down! Get down!" Joie Sanders plowed into the senator and his wife, her arms outspread, sweeping them both to the ground. In one move she rolled up on her knee in front of them, a gun in her outstretched hand. "Gun, gun, everybody down!" she shouted. An orange-red flame burst from two revolvers in a steady stream toward the couple she'd been assigned to protect. Joie returned fire with her usual calm and dead-on accuracy, watching one man begin to topple, almost in slow motion, his gun still firing but up into the air.
People screamed, ran in every direction, fell to the ground, crouched behind flimsy cover. The second gunman grabbed a woman in a long fur and dragged her in front of him as a shield. Joie was already pushing at the senator and his wife in an effort to get them to crawl back inside the relative safety of the theater. The second gunman propelled the sobbing woman forward as he fired at Joie, who rolled again to cover her charges' line of retreat.
A bullet sliced through the flesh of her shoulder, burning a path of pain and spraying blood over the senator's trousers. Joie cried out, but steadied her aim, ignoring the churning in her stomach. Her world narrowed to one man, one target. She squeezed the trigger slowly, precisely, watched the ugly little hole blossom in the middle of the man's forehead. He went down like a rock, taking his hostage with him, falling in a tangle of arms and legs.
There was a small silence. Only the clicking of the branches could be heard, a strange, disquieting rhythm. Joie blinked, trying to clear her vision. She seemed to be looking into a large, shimmering pool, staring at a man with flat, cold eyes and something metal glinting in his hand. He rose up out of the crowd, slamming into Joie before she could scramble out of the way. She twisted just enough to escape the lethal blade, driving the butt of her gun upward into his jaw, then slamming it back down on his knife hand. He screamed, dropping the blade so that it went skittering along the sidewalk. His fist found her face, driving her backward. The man followed her down, his face a mask of hatred.
Something hit the back of his head hard, and Joie found herself staring up at one of her men. "Thanks, John. I think he smashed every bone in my body when he fell on me." She took his hand, allowed him to help her out from under the large body. Joie kicked the gun from the limp hand of the first man she'd shot, even as weakness overwhelmed her.
She sat down abruptly as her legs turned to rubber. "Get the senator and Mrs. Goodvine to safety, John." The wailing sirens were fading in and out. "Someone help that poor woman up."
"We've got it, Joie," one of the agents assured her. "We have the driver. How bad are you hurt? How many hits did you take? Give me your gun."
Joie looked down at the gun in her hand and noted with surprise she was aiming it at the motionless attacker. "Thanks, Robert. I think I'll just let you and John handle things for a while."
"Is she all right?" She could hear the senator's anxious voice. "Sanders? Are you hurt? I don't want to just leave her there; where are you taking us?"
Joie tried to lift her arm to indicate she was fine, but her arm seemed heavy and uncooperative. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. She just needed to be somewhere else, just for a short time while the medics fixed her up. It wasn't the first time she'd taken a hit and she doubted it would be the last. She had certain instincts that had taken her to the top of her profession. It was very dangerous at the top.
Joie could blend in. Some of the men liked to call her the chameleon. She could look strikingly beautiful, plain, or just average. She could blend in with the tough crowd, the homeless, or the rich and glamorous. It was a valuable gift, and she used it willingly. She was called in for the difficult assignments, the ones where action was inevitable. Few others had her skill with knives or guns, and no one could disappear into a crowd the way she could.
She took herself out of her body, watched the frantic scene around her with interest for a few minutes. The others assigned to the senator and the Austrian agents had everything under control. She was being put into an ambulance and hustled away from the scene. More than anything, she detested hospitals. She simply took herself away, soaring free. She wanted to be outdoors, under the sky or beneath the earth in a world of subterranean beauty - it didn't matter, as long as it wasn't within the walls of a hospital.
Joie felt weightless, free, skimming through the mountains she had studied so carefully. As she soared free, she planned a trip caving with her brother and sister as soon as the senator and his wife were safely back home. She crossed space. Smelled the rain. Felt cool and moist in the mist of the mountains. Far below her, she saw the entrance to a cave, spotlighted by the small sliver of moon that managed to peek around the thick cloud cover. Smiling, she dropped down to enter a world of crystal and ice. Whether she was dreaming or hallucinating didn't matter; all she cared about was escaping from the pain of her wounds and the smell of the hospital.
Traian lay in the cool earth, gazing up at the high, cathedral-like ceiling. His body hurt in so many places, he just wanted to rest. The beauty of the cave was breathtaking and took his mind off his physical pain. Then he turned his head and saw her. She was hovering just overhead to his left. A woman with a cap of dark hair and large eyes. She was staring down at him in complete astonishment.
"You're hurt," she said. "If you were real, I'd send the paramedics."
"What makes you think I am not real?"
"Because I'm not really here; I'm in a hospital many miles away. I don't even know where here is."
"You look real enough to me."
"What in the world are you doing lying in the mud in the middle of a cave?" Her soft laughter rippled through him. "You didn't mistake this for a beauty spa, did you?"