The man who had become Wichita's husband was the only man she had ever been all the way with, and she didn't care if no one but him and her sister believed it. His had been a strange personality to bring to bed. He was intelligent, curious, and affectionate, but also quiet, timid and so tense. When she initiated their first "intimate" experience, his first reaction had been to push her hands away. It had taken her more time to get him relaxed than to do her work... Then when it was done, he had been so exhausted and clinging and pitifully grateful it embarrassed her. She had managed to calm him down again, and get him to lay down. And that was when he started unbuckling her belt...

"What are you thinking about?" Columbus said. Across the table, his wife only smiled. He took one of her hands in his. With the other, she fingered his gift, now in a cheap vase. "It's beautiful," she said, then added teasingly, "way better than plastic." He blushed.

They literally did not say a word as they ate their plate of spaghetti, but there were smiles, and touches, and soft laughter. They walked out, arm in arm and hip to increasingly ample hip, in the direction of the parking garage. "So," Columbus said, "I was asking around, about what duties you can have... and they say that they may have an outside job for you. We could even work together on it."

She kissed him, long and hard, right in the middle of the market, then kept walking. "Tell me about it."

"Well... It's not a hunting or exploration party. What it really is is a diplomatic mission, and I think you've got just the right skills..."

He went on to explain mostly what she already knew. After more than three months on the offensive, Circus Circus and its allies had expanded their territory almost tenfold. They had gone west, clearing swaths of commercial and residential developments, including a house where Columbus and Wichita now lived. They had gone south, to help the Treasure Island Casino destroy a zombie nest in Vegas' biggest mall. They had fought their way north, to link up with the downtown casinos of the Freemont Street Alliance. Finally, they had gone east, clearing a convention center that had been an epicenter of the city's outbreak and eliminating the team of Tweedle Dum, Tweedle Dee and Alice, a terrifying trio of plague-resistant cannibals that had taken over the city's last intact hospital.

With the new territory had come new problems. The ones for which the Circus had been least prepared came from the "Nevilles". As areas were cleared of zombies, it was found that an unexpected number of the uninfected had survived, as individuals, small groups and even functional colonies, without any outside support. They had earned the nickname of the protagonist of I Am Legend. Unfortunately, like Matheson's anti-hero, the battle for survival had warped and fractured hearts and minds.

Of those who had survived in isolation, Up to half had diagnosable post-traumatic stress. A fourth to a third had some form of hallucinations. One in twenty could not or would not speak. One in a hundred would either attack or flee from anyone who approached. Even apart from these obvious maladies, there were ubiquitous problems, a panoply of delusions, obsessions and superstitions almost as many and varied as the Nevilles themselves. In many ways, those who functioned well enough to engage with the casino dwellers were the most troublesome, in the most alarming cases entering society only to pursue and even draw others into their worlds of madness.

"The board has finally approved a project to take a census of the Nevilles, and start developing a program for assimilation," Columbus said. "They asked Dr. Stanford and me to lead it. I think you would be wonderful as an additional team member."

"Why?" Wichita asked with cautious interest.

"Because, you're good with people," Columbus said. "When you're around, people get more at ease, friendlier... even somebody like me."

They stopped and kissed beside the Tremors Truck. "It sounds wonderful," Wichita said. Then she lowered the tail gate and raised a collapsible camper shell. Her husband paused to check his watch, then yelped as she took him by the arm and pulled him in.