It was a faded red pole barn with a pile of rusted automobile parts drifted against its back wall, the property bounded at the perimeter by a few cracked and leaning posts that had once been a split-rail fence. Just visible against the flatlands that planed to the horizon on all sides, a gravel track wandered southwest across fifty miles of nothing. Nothing that could be seen, at least. The barren landscape probably concealed enough firepower to repel a military assault. Even American military. Travis stood at an open bay door of the barn, alongside Paige and fifteen others who made up a larger version of the teams he’d met in Alaska. He’d heard the proper terms for them now: the units were called detachments, and their members were known as operators. At the moment, each of the fifteen was dressed casually, weapons and armor stowed in green plastic carrying cases, though their bodies and expressions marked them as hardened, well trained. Paige had the same look. No doubt she’d come up through their ranks, though it was obvious now that she outranked everyone present.
