"And what kind of heretical idea is it?" asked 'Kajramee, scowling at the younger Elite in a far more menacing fashion than the other soldier deserved. You had to give it to 'Lothomee, he didn't even flinch.

"Excellency, you must agree that our current position here cannot last. The chances of our keeping hold of this ship, much less our own lives, are decreasing rapidly with every passing moment. It is, regretably, my recommendation that we purge the data banks to prevent losing important tactical data to the human scourge."

"Madness!" 'Karamee snarled. "We will not give in."

"But Excellency-"

"I will hear no more of this," 'Kajramee snapped. "This is cowardice, and I will not allow it. 'Lothomee, if you truly are such a wimpering curr as would accept a loss like this, be out of my sight."

"Excellency-!"

"NOW, SCUM!" 'Kajramee roared, the plasma blade in his hand flaring to life to accentuate his point. 'Lothomee weighed his options. He decided he would rather take his chances getting out of the ship alive than his odds dealing with an irrational 'Kajramee.

'Galimee watched all of this dubiously.

"I beg your pardon, Excellency, but it is no cowardice to prevent valuable information reaching enemy hands."

"It is a travesty to one's honor to concede defeat with no blade to your throat," 'Kajramee snarled.

"Do you not see our situation?" asked 'Galimee, shaking his head. "I am sorry, 'Kajramee, but you are the mad one here. We must retreat. It is better to run so that we may crush these foes later than to die in vain over pride."

This touching argument, however, was interrupted by a very ominous sound.

That sound was the steady, skittering hiss of a plasma blade going to town on something. The something in question happened to be the bulkhead.

The Elites ducked for cover again and watched with narrowed eyes. Someone was forcing a plasma blade through the wall, cutting from the doorway across to the right.

"They're widening the door!" announced 'Kajramee, forgetting the disagreement and back in commander mode. "Fire on the blade!" He wasted no time in setting an example, leveling two rifles at it.

On the other side of the bulkhead, Blood was gritting his teeth and pushing the sword along. This was harder work than he'd expected, and was also a lot more tricky. The sword liked to slide deeper into the wall than he wanted it and that made it hard to push. Then the Elites started firing on it and actually made life a little easier, the hot plasma was starting to melt the metal and the sword's path became smoother.

Blood had carved a rather large swath along the wall, and now forced the sword down. Near the floor, then back across. That was harder, he was crouched to the deck to do that.

"I sure hope this works," said Mathers anxiously. The combined teams of Sgt. Wolf and Lt. Baker were standing abreast in the hallway, guns at the ready. Once the section of wall was out of the way, they were going to blanket that room with fire. The computers didn't matter anymore, the chance they had survived the grenades was pretty slim. Coupled with the fact the Green still held the belief their enemy actually had a sensible leader who would have the brains to purge the banks, they decided the odds were too narrow to bother with anymore. They just had to get rid of the aliens now.

"It oughta work, Blood's a freelancer," said Wolf reasonably. "Yeh don' get to be a freelancer unless yeh gen'rally know what yer doin'."

And Blood pushed the sword while the Elites obediently wasted shots on the other side of the wall, all save 'Kajramee wondering whether they ought to just cut and run.

And then he was done.

The wall was only supported at the bottom right corner, near the door, and it was ready to come down.

Blood kicked it. Lead and plasma tore at eachother, shields flared on all sides, and Blood fell back crouched low, shifting his sword to his shield arm and adding what he could into the blaze with his pistol.

At that moment, there was nobody 'Kajramee hated more in all existence than he hated Blood.

He could feel bullets beating on his shields, and knew in a matter of seconds they were going to start biting his flesh. And he didn't care. 'Kajramee didn't care about anything anymore, every inclination to violence he posessed was at full gear and there was nothing to hold him back.

'Kajramee roared and launched himself over the computer bank at the human. That one had a sword. It was absolute sacrilege. And to rub more salt in the wound, he had used that very same sacred weapon to completely screw 'Kajramee over.

He wasn't going to live long now.

Blood had the presence of mind to draw the Jackal shield up to fend off the first crushing sword blow, bringing his own blade up to meet 'Kajramee's. The Elite had a massive advantage. He was much bigger, had a far superior muscular structure, and had not been fighting almost non-stop for a while now.

Unfortunately for 'Kajramee, guns moved to him immediately.

The Jackal shield finally died under another sword stroke and Blood managed to parry, being driven back against the wall as 'Kajramee bellowed nonsense in his native tongue. He brought the blade down again, Blood had no time to strike back and was blocking stroke after stroke and then-

"Gyaaaaah!"

The sword cut neatly through Blood's shields like so much paper, diving into the armor with a sizzling hiss. 'Kajramee screamed in triumph as he drove it down Blood's left side. His eyes were alight with the gleam of the dying insane, purple blood dripping from various gunshot wounds all over his body now as his completely dead shields occasionally sparked in vain.
And he paused a moment, and Blood struck up.

The sword drove into 'Kajramee just below the side of his ribcage, carving upward and searing flesh as it went. The Elite had been dying the whole time and it was this that killed him, and Blood's head swam as the Elite died with a mad, anguished scream. The battle raged on over him as his legs gave out, and the freelancer collapsed on the floor and felt himself slowly bleeding away.

Well, he thought, with what he was sure was his final moment of consciousness, It's been fun.

------

'Galimee limped along the hall, snarling to himself in pain and trying to force his body to go faster. His right leg was threatening to give out any second now, there was a piece of lead embedded in the muscle above the knee and it was a wonder he was still able to put any weight on it. Then again, it was 'Galimee. 'Galimee had been firing a gun within minutes of losing his trigger finger. It was all just a matter of how badly you needed it.

Kula 'Kajramee was dead, the control room was completely and utterly lost, and 'Galimee was looking for a Jackal. He didn't even know why. You did insane things when your chances of survival were something akin to nill.

'Galimee hated himself for running out on the fight, and it didn't make him feel any better that everyone else had done the same when 'Kajramee went down. He had been the only thing really keeping them there. 'Lothomee was dead too now, shame. 'Galimee had seen him shot. He had been a good kid. Not that it mattered anymore.

The wounded Elite stumbled into the main weapon station and leaned against an available console, completely unsurprised by the dead bodies that had been until recently manning the guns. The humans had been here too. Damnable, but expected. To add to the atmosphere of grim hopelessness, the electricity was out in this section of the ship and it was eerily dark. He supposed the stupid fleshbags had something to do with that as well.

"VAK!" 'Galimee howled, eyes raking the room. "I know you're here, Vak!"

There was a soft shuffling noise, and a maintenance panel in the floor popped loose. The Jackal shifted the cover and poked his head up, peering at 'Galimee quizically with eyes that glowed in the dark.

"Yes, Excellency?" he asked in a calm, unruffled, genuinely puzzled demeanor. It was the same old subservience that 'Galimee had always seen out of him. While there was nothing insubordinate about it, it still felt like Vak was sneering at him.

"Do not play stupid with me, Jackal," he growled. "You have a plan. You are a schemer, Vak, and you have always been a schemer. You intend to survive this, and I want to know how." The words just came to him from nowhere, like the idea to find the Jackal in the first place.

Vak looked at 'Galimee, and the Elite saw in the Jackal's face that uncanny and almost unnatural intelligence that set him apart from the rest of his ilk. He had the sense that he was being measured and weighed in precise, shrewd consideration by someone that was in some inexplicable way superior.

"I think, Aru 'Galimee," he said finally, carefully, "that I can tell you."

'Galimee would have ordinarily bristled at a member of the lower races using his name, but in this case he did not. Vak wasn't talking down to him, though how he sensed that he didn't know. By dropping the honorific, Vak was elevating 'Galimee to his own level far above where he had previously considered the Elite as just another lowly, pushy force of nature in his miserable little life. 'Galimee was Vak's equal now.

"What is the plan?" the Elite asked. Vak shifted a bit in his hole in the floor.

"I will try to make some room for you here. The first thing is to get out of sight." Vak's crested head disappeared into the deck again and he began tossing lengths of wiring, routers, various components over his shoulder. He must've been the one to kill the power to the room, 'Galimee realized, to allow for the creation of his hiding place. After a moment, Vak motioned for 'Galimee to come down into the cramped hole. Mandibles clenched firmly together and trying not to think about his leg, the wounded Elite did so.

Vak dragged the panel back over the top and secured it as 'Galimee looked around his tiny hiding space. The Elite had to sit with his back hunched and legs folded uncomfortably, and even then it was still very close. Not very dignified, but better than dead. The space was illuminated by several work lights, and there was a strange piece of equipment cobbled together from scraps of things lying in the bottom of the crawlspace. Vak scooped it up immediately and returned to working on it.

"I am building a communicator," he said. "My plan is simple. We wait on them (he didn't need to specify who) to think all of us are dead, then we sneak out into the trees and contact the ship. They can pick us up. Or we die, that remains a great possibility, but I should hope it does not come to that," Vak explained with his usual amount of pessimism. "I do not even see why I bother. There is not much for me to want to go back to."

"You have duty," replied 'Galimee firmly. "You swore to the Covenant as deeply as I did."

"Did I have a choice?" said the Jackal bitterly.

And that ended the conversation. For 'Galimee it was like taking a sucker punch, and he nearly lashed out at Vak for the impudence. It was ingrateful, it was unfaithful, it was heretical.

But then again, he was right. Vak hadn't had a choice, his life had never been his own from the moment he was born. His more advanced training was just a bare attempt to make him more useful and less sarcastic. Instead, it made him hate-bait for the Elites.

Life sucked when you were a Jackal.

'Galimee had a hard time coming to grips with that idea. It went against anything and everything he'd ever thought he knew about the lower races. They were stupid, they needed solid direction and could not have taken care of themselves on their own. They were animals. But here sat Vak, at work on a communicator with a last ditch plan to stay alive, and definitely not stupid.

His head hurt. Radical, reality-shattering ideas were not easy to take at the best of times. 'Galimee had bullets in him and was a little unstable from blood loss right then so it was even worse.

"Is the plan sound?" asked Vak finally, not looking up from his work on the device. It was an attempt at an apology, really.

"It seems that way to me," 'Galimee replied. "Do you have anything I can use to patch myself up?"

Vak looked up at 'Galimee again, eyes flicking over the Elite's bleeding body. He pulled a medical kit out from under a piece of conduit and shoved it along the floor to 'Galimee. Without comment, the Jackal went back to work.

Back to work, Vak thought mirthlessly. There's always work.

-------

Sparks sprayed off the warthog's right side as it screeched against a wall, Corporal Donovan struggling to keep it in control at such a high speed in the narrow halls of the ship. Cornering was difficult, the hog was barely short enough nose to tail to clear a full ninety degrees in the close space. Still, they had to move. There were lives in his hands.

The fighting was essentially over, but that just meant it was time to get the wounded out. There were dead, too, but the dead could wait. Donovan drove through the ship, guided only by bursts of radio contact from the scattered soldiers. They piled as many as they could into the hog and he ran them out, then dove back in for more.

Some of them died before he got back outside. It was grim work, it was ugly work, but it had to be done.

-------

Blood woke up again on the Pelican, the pain in his body nulled a bit by the bio foam pumped into the wound. He lay still and didn't move, tried not to think. Everything he knew about his body jigged across his brain, and despite trying not to he found himself listing off the damage. The muscles he knew were cut, all the possible damage to his organs, which membranes were punctured. He also tried not to think about the smell of his own sword-seared flesh, but that was even harder. The worst, though, was his chance of survival. All of these things culminated into the ultimate understanding for Blood that he was probably going to die.

And, if truth be told, he was strangely okay with that.

"You doin' okay?"

That was Holcomb, sitting on the Pelican's floor hunched up as small as he could with his wounded arm hanging limp.

"I don't think so," said Blood quietly, wincing. Oooohhhh man, that had to be his diaphragm, didn't it? "You?"

"I'll live," Holcomb said, dismissing it. "They ran. The Elites, I mean. When you killed the big one they scattered. We went after some of them, but one or two got away. Couldn't've done it without you."

"Thanks."

"Go back to sleep, Blood," said Holcomb after a few seconds of quiet. "You need it."

"Fine by me."

------

Outpost Delta was in a state of organized chaos. The combined medical staff of the Albatross, the Dracos, and Delta Squadron were taking care of the influx of injured soldiers from the fighting. The men left behind were helping move the wounded to the med-bay and, when the base facility filled, onto the ships.

Jake had melted off resentfully into the rush somewhere with her twin sprained arms, and Davis couldn't do much with his own limbs as weak as they were from lack of use. That left Ohio as the only able-bodied member of his squadron, and he was hard at work making up for the rest of them. Things ran in bursts of activity. With each Pelican the outpost exploded into movement, but when they were gone it descended into an eerie, waiting quiet in preparation for more.

It was in one of these lulls that Ohio ran across Holcomb again.

"Hey man, you're still in one piece!" he said, but the grin was a bit strained. There were too many dead people for even Ohio to be very upbeat.

"More or less," Holcomb replied, gesturing with his good arm to indicate the bad one. He was under orders not to bend it if he could help it now that it was somewhat bandaged up. Holcomb was in better shape than some, he could walk unaided. "I miss anything?"

"Nah," Ohio replied, shaking his head. "How'd it go?"

Holcomb leaned against the wall. "Well, considering we were outnumbered by a lot, attacking a fortified enemy position, and Wolf was in charge of my team, I think we came out pretty well. I'm pretty sure most of the Covenant are dead, if not all of them. You seen Blood?"

Ohio furrowed his brows. "Do I want to know?"

"He's not dead. At least, not yet," Holcomb said. "Got sworded by an Elite, but he killed it. There were a bunch of 'em holed up in the control room and Blood got this idea to use the sword to make the opening bigger so they couldn't hide behind the wall. It worked."

"Where is he?" asked Ohio.

Holcomb sighed. "I'm not gonna tell you, because word would get around to Jake and Jake would go get under everybody's feet to make sure he's okay. And you'd probably do the same thing, for that matter. He's asleep anyway, or at least knocked out, and it's probably better if he doesn't try to move any."

"What can I say? You know me."

"Too well, Ohio, too well," Holcomb replied with a nod. "Speaking of Jake, where's she and where's Davis?"

"Jake's sulking somewhere because she can't help," said Ohio, thinking about it. "Davis is probably just staying out of the way, same reason. You can go look for 'em if you want. You aren't as useful with only one arm, but I have stuff I need to do." He sighed.

The PA came on. "Pelican inbound, all able-bodied men be advised."

"That's my cue," said Ohio with a shrug. "See you when this all dies down." And with that he headed back up and outside.

Holcomb went further into the base, heading for the rooms. He had a pretty good idea of where Jake would be, and the chances were Davis was catching up on sleep or something as well. A-BOB was probably roving randomly, and Holcomb decided it would be okay to leave the robot well enough alone until he absolutely had to deal with him.

He rapped his gauntleted knuckles against both his team mates' doors at once.

"Hey, knock knock."

Jake's door wrenched open first, and he was met with savage I-have-half-a-mind-to-kill-you-where-you-stand glare before Jake recognized him.

"Oh, hi," she said, managing to wrangle her expression into something calm and only faintly surprised. "When'd you get back?"

"Just now. You won't have to kill me," Holcomb replied.

"Good." Jake's attention shifted to Davis' door.

"DAVIS!" she shouted.

"WHAT?!"

"YOU CAN STOP PRETENDING YOU'RE NOT THERE, HOLCOMB'S BACK!"

The door opened and Davis peered out, short red hair mussed up in a way that suggested it had just been under a pillow. "Really?" he asked, then caught sight of Holcomb and smiled. The smile faltered slightly when he noticed the bandaging.

"Hey! What happened to you, man? You alright?"

"Yeah, pretty much. Shot in the elbow with a needler when my shields went down, but I'm luckier than some people," Holcomb replied. "You guys alright?"

"Not much changed," Jake replied. "I'd be out there moving people, but... well...," she shrugged one shoulder, eyes flicking down to her splinted arms.

"I can't lift much of anything right now," Davis confessed. "Too much bed rest."

"Which is exactly why you were sleeping just now," Jake said, rolling her eyes.

"Oh, um... yeah..." Davis couldn't come up with a good counter and chose to let it drop.

Holcomb just smiled to himself on the inside of his helmet. Much as they tried his patience and caused him no end of headaches, it was good to be back with the group.

The most tense part of the rest of the rest of the day was the arrival of the second Covenant ship. It managed to go unnoticed for a surprising strtetch of time, and only after someone spotted a horse-shoe shaped dropship rising up out of the jungle did it come to their attention. Strangely enough, though, the ship was content to run once it had picked up the smaller vessel. The presence of the two human ships may have added to that, but they would never know.

Aboard the craft, four Jackals and an Elite climbed out of the dropship. Kar, Raz, and Yiv were just dumbstruck by their sheer luck at that moment. Vak and 'Galimee had run across the other three Jackals hiding under a fallen tree on their way to find higher ground to send the distress call from. Vak had, on some whim or another of his, taken pity on them and brought them along. It wasn't their fault they were stupid.

"Good plan, Jackal," said 'Galimee quietly as they waited on someone to come debrief them.

"Thankyou, Excellency." And like that, Vak was your average Jackal again.

'Galimee sighed with relief.

------

Blood was stabilized, but he was asleep most of the time. He made a conscious effort to sleep a lot, it was better than being awake because he didn't feel anything or have to think about it. It was decided that he was not to be disturbed at all.

But Ohio wasn't easily dissuaded when he put his mind to something. Giving up was bad for his business, and often resulted in death threats. It wasn't something he did a lot of. So Ohio spent an hour complaining and stubbornly refusing to give in before the medics got sick of him and said, "Okay, fine, just for a minute, then will you shut up and go away?!"

So Ohio was the only non-medic to talk to Blood.

His friend had been moved to a spare room so he could be by himself away from all the others, and therefore sleep better. Ohio, through a stroke of luck, caught him in one of his waking hours.

"I'd say I'm surprised to see you," said Blood, "But I'm not."

"Awe hey, what are friends for?" Ohio shrugged, taking a seat in a chair. "Sup, man?"

"Aside from being almost dead, not much," said Blood. "How did you convince them to let you in?"

"Oh, the usual. Be irritating enough and someone will get tired of it eventually," Ohio replied. "So, heard you got sworded. What's that like?"

"What you'd expect. Hurts like hell, burns while it cuts. I'm on like seven different drips right now and I can still feel it."

"Sucks," Ohio observed.

"Yeah, that," Blood agreed. "Holcomb doing alright?"

"Yeah, his arm's kinda bad but ought to be fine with time." Ohio laughed. "I just realized, I'm the only one in my squadron that didn't get seriously hurt." It was true. A roof fell on Davis, Jake crashed a Banshee, Holcomb was shot, and Wolf was shot multiple times. That didn't stop her from running around belting out orders same as always, but she was Wolf and Wolf was crazy.

"Don't jinx yourself, you never know," Blood replied. "When you guys shipping out?"

"Tomorrow, the lieutenant said." Ohio made a face. "Back to the hellhole it is."

"Well, good luck with that. Nobody's been in to tell me anything, so I might get shipped out again if I live. Just a feeling," Blood said. "Nice to see you again, for old times' sake."

"It's been fun," Ohio agreed. "You get better. Maybe when this is all over we can go hunt a bounty or something. For old times' sake."

"That'd be a laugh. I'm in." Blood nodded. "Now get out, I'm trying to heal in here."

"Sure thing." And Ohio left him to it.

------

Shipping out went by in a whirl of movement. Omega Squadron hadn't been there long, but it felt like they'd lived at Outpost Delta for years. Everybody took a shower and began mourning in advance for personal hygiene. The Dracos was designated to return the four stranded Greens and their robot back to their base, which had been successfully rebuilt. The able-bodied members of Delta Squadron as well as some of the more minorly injured ones managed to convince Baker to let them throw a party to celebrate the victory, and it doubled for seeing off Omega Squadron as well. There was music on the PA, including fistfights over who got to use it next, and somehow the daily rations seemed to taste better when everyone was actually enjoying themselves. People talked. All the tension of the last few days dissipated in one evening's worth of relieved chaos.

The officers sat back in a corner and chatted amongst themselves, except for Wolf. Wolf, predictably, spent the entire time arguing with people and being too loud. Ohio took advantage of their distraction and joined in a game of poker. The members of Delta Squadron involved prudently quit, but left the ships' crewmen to their fate. Mostly because this fate was rather entertaining to watch. A few members of the Albatross's men remembered Ohio and backed out as well, but that just encouraged the lot from the Dracos to stay in just to prove they were made of sterner stuff.

And so it was that Ohio proved them wrong and Jake, being generally antisocial and avoided by everybody else, had nothing better to do than watch.

"I'll give it to you, you're good," she said grudgingly after he finished cleaning out one of the Dracos' gunners. Ohio shrugged one shoulder.

"That's what I've heard."

The man that just lost it all swore once and stalked off to go share his grievances with some of Ohio's other victims.

"Is he begging for another fight over here?" asked Davis, sliding into a chair next to Jake. She nodded.

"Isn't he always?"

"Oh c'mon, guys, what's wrong with a nice, innocent game of cards?" asked Ohio.

Davis just shook his head and laughed.

The Dracos' navigator looked up at them. "You know this guy?"

"Familiar to the point of contempt," said Jake.

"Has he ever lost?"

"Not that I've heard."

The navigator shook his head disgustedly. "I've got better things to do right now, I'm out."

Ohio just laughed as he left.

"You might wanna keep it down over here, if the lieutenant sees you, you're busted," said Holcomb, taking a seat on Jake's other side.

"Too late," said Davis, craning his neck up to see the white-armored figure of Sergeant Strickland making his way through the crowd of people. "Here comes Strickland."

"Oh, him?" Ohio cupped his cards into his hand and shifted not so inconspicuously over to the table with the rest of his squadron.

"Okay, cough up the cards," said Strickland on arrival.

"What cards?" Ohio asked. "I don't see any cards. Does anybody else see cards?"

Strickland's eyes narrowed.

"The ones in your hand. I know you're playing, Wolf saw you."

"Then why doesn't she come over here herself?" asked Davis, genuinely curious.

Strickland rolled his eyes. "She's in a rather engaging argument with Peterson. Something to do with Darth Vader and Superman."

"Why am I not surprised?" Jake sighed.

"ANYWAY," said Strickland forcefully, cutting back to the matter at hand before they could turn his reprimand into a meandering heap of unrelated babble. "You're busted, freelancer. Disobeying a direct order. Gimme the cards."

Ohio sighed and gave them to Strickland. "That was a nice hand, too."

Strickland shook his head. "I'll let you off easy, just because it's not worth my time. Just don't do it again."

"Yes, sir," Ohio said, ducking his head guiltily.

Strickland returned Ohio's hand into the deck with an "Excuse me, gentlemen," and when walked off to go be no fun somewhere else.

"That's odd," said A-BOB, also sitting at the table. He had wandered over here because the idea of a "party" went entirely over the robot's processor with a whizz. Lost in a bewildering, noisy crowd, A-BOB had hunted out the familiar presence of a member of his squadron, and had found Jake and Ohio first.

"What's odd, A-BOB?" asked Davis.

"Freelancer Ohio's behavior has been exceptional, considering prior record," the robot explained. "I do not understand why playing games with cards is forbidden to him. I saw no evidence of any underhanded procedures in his game."

"He's too good at it for his own good," said Holcomb.

"Oh," A-BOB replied. "I will store this information for future reference." And he whirred quietly for a moment as he added "good at playing cards, forbidden to do so" to his list of data on Ohio.

Said freelancer was looking over at the deck meaningfully, his hand had just been placed on the bottom. It wouldn't be too hard to get it back...

"You wouldn't," said Jake.

He didn't answer for a moment, then sighed. "I won't," he grumbled, turning around to face the table again. "But I wanna."

Holcomb clapped him on the back with his functional arm. "Good man. So, Blood alright?"

"So something did happen to him," said Jake. "I knew it."

"You kind of freak out about stuff like that, so we didn't tell you," said Holcomb. Jake glared at him, but sat back in her chair again and transfered the scowl to the wall.

"He's doing okay, I think he'll live," said Ohio.

"That's good," said Davis. "I think being almost cut in half is worse than being hit by the roof," he added after a moment's thought.

Ohio snorted. "Naw, really?"

Davis stuck his tongue out at the freelancer.

"Children, please," Jake growled.

"Yes, Mom," said Ohio.

------

The return trip to Outpost Omega from Capulet 3 seemed longer than the flight from it, probably because there didn't happen to be another squadron of soldiers aboard. Jake's injuries had recovered entirely by the time they got back and Davis had regained full use of his arms and legs at more or less the same level as before. Holcomb's elbow was a little stiff and would probably always be, but it was better than being dead. Ohio was Ohio.

The most interesting part was when Jake broke somebody's nose on his behalf, because the freelancer was playing poker again and people were getting mad at him again. The result was a fight, predictably, and Ohio was re-banned from cards by the captain.

When asked about it, Jake just shrugged. "What else am I supposed to do? He can't throw a good punch."

Holcomb was about to say "And you know this how?" but realized they fought often enough that Jake ought to know. "You're impossible, Jake."

Davis, when informed, just laughed. Ohio was just a little surprised, but made no real comment on it. A-BOB was thoroughly confused, but that was to be expected.

Normalcy was creeping back, and everybody realized how badly they'd missed its infinitely reassuring presence.