~W~F~T~S~R~

It had been a dark eight months for Jonathan Power.

The dark didn't happen all at once. It crept up on him slowly. After the base exploded, taking his heart and home from him in a violent eruption, he became numb. His mind didn't want to accept what he knew, but it couldn't deny the truth. Then he did what he had to do – he made plans and gave orders – but he was moving on autopilot. He was going through the motions of being the team leader and doing his job. The only reason he could even breathe was because he was numb and didn't allow himself to think about what he lost.

They went back to the mountain afterwards to find… something, but there were no remains to bury. He placed a marker for Jennifer beside his father's, and that was when the darkness descended. He had to say goodbye to her instead of having that conversation with her, but he could only say it to her memory. Maybe it was a survival tactic, maybe it was his mind's way of dealing with his heart's loss, but everything about him spiraled into a harsher, unforgiving realm. He became angry and inflexible. He wanted to hurt Dread in any way possible, for as long as possible.

The idealistic Captain Power was gone. He became Dread's worst nightmare and for eight long, dark months, he rained all manner of destruction down on his enemy.

Then, out of the blue, they were asked to come to a base, and for the last hour, Jon had existed in a world of shock and disbelief.

Jennifer was alive.

Slowly, Jon felt the darkness going away. He felt the numbness ebb and diminish. For the first time in a long time, hope was beginning to form.

Jennifer was alive!

Jon sat there, unable to take his eyes off her. He listened, watched, assessed – it was Jennifer and she had no idea who they were. She had no idea who he was. She didn't remember any of it – not her past, not her life, not even her name. At the moment, she was Annie.

As he watched her, he noticed that there were subtle differences between Jennifer and Annie. Some of her words, the way she spoke, how she structured her sentences – there was a harder edge to her words and her voice than there had been. She asked somewhat leading questions that would prompt a spontaneous answer. When she answered a question, there was a slight evasion of the whole truth or a polite acquiescence in her tone. That indicated that she was luring information from them to determine if they could be trusted. Her posture seemed more rigid, more expectant of a fight. Given their circumstances, that made sense. Yet that hard edge didn't extend to her eyes. They were still the soft windows to a gentle soul with fierce fighting skills and courage that just didn't end. If he didn't know about what had happened to her and looked in her eyes, he would have thought that he was looking at Jennifer's, not Annie's. Jennifer was still in there, somewhere. He just had to find her.

Jon looked around the room to get a better idea of who Annie really was and how much of Jennifer was still there. The room bore testament to the fact that they were cobbling necessities together out of materials they found at the base. Board planks sat across cinder blocks to form a makeshift desk. Mismatched aluminum squares secured into support beams made the bookshelves. The topmost shelf was stacked with books. Jennifer always kept books on a high shelf, tools on a lower shelf within arm's reach. Jon asked her why once, and she said that the tools were used almost every hour of every day so they needed to be in a convenient location. Books were what she read when she had time, so they could take the more prestigious position of being placed on a higher shelf. One lower shelf had a variety of odd items on it: a piece of a broken blaster, an old shoe and a yo-yo. Jennifer never threw anything away. She would find a use for it, no matter its condition, but a yo-yo? The entire world had gone to hell in a hand basket, cities were razed to the ground, seasons had been disrupted, people were starving – and there, sitting on a shelf in almost pristine condition, was a simple, unassuming yo-yo. For a brief moment, Jon remembered what it felt like to be a kid playing with a yo-yo. His mother had given him one when he was a boy, and he spent weeks teaching himself how to perform tricks. If the situation they'd found themselves in wasn't so odd, Jon would have been tempted to try his hand at Walking-The-Dog.

Jon's attention was drawn to the bottom shelf. It wasn't just a spare set of clothes lying on the shelf. There, folded up in a neat stack of other items, was Jennifer's power suit. It was ripped, torn through the middle, the wiring frayed and poking out of the material, blood caked around the edges of the rip, but it was there. He covertly nudged Hawk and darted his eyes toward the bookshelf. Neither man made any indication to anyone else that they noticed it. There was time to wonder about the suit later. Jon quickly looked away and saw other items around the room. There was a cot – maybe this room served as her quarters as well as an office?

Out of the corner of his eye, Jon noticed Milo watching him. From the expression on his face, he didn't seem too happy that Jon was watching Annie so intently. The last thing Jon needed to do was stir up any anger or jealousy when they needed to appear friendly and helpful to the group. If they could help them, they would, but it would be easier if no one was at odds with each other. Jon had the distinct impression that Milo was interested in Annie but that she wasn't interested in being anything other than friends with him. Jon hoped that was the case. He didn't think he could survive going back to that dark, hopeless place again. He adjusted the way he was sitting, relaxed a bit. He tried not to watch her quite so intently, but it was difficult.

There was something else in Annie's style of leadership that he found intriguing. Jennifer was always self-assured, but there was more of an authoritarian air about her now. Jon had watched the body language of everyone they passed. Even Milo, Frost and Bingley behaved in a similar fashion. There was a deference to Jennifer… no, Annie. He had to remember to use that name temporarily. She was the leader. She was recognized by everyone as the one who gave the orders. She'd ask, they'd do. It was a simple as that. However, due to the size of the group, there wasn't the semi-relaxed command style that Jon utilized with his team. With a small team, a rigid, enforced leadership style wouldn't work. All opinions and recommendations needed to be freely expressed so the small team could work together. However, with a large group, a more formal command structure was necessary due to the number of individuals involved. Communication didn't move as easily or as freely within a large group, so there had to be an authority figure, one to make the ultimate decisions.

Jennifer was doing all that as Annie without remembering who she was or where she came from. She had no memory of leadership classes in the Dread Youth, no recall of leading biomechs or Dread Youth, no recollection of commanding resistance forces in battles they'd fought in. She was working on instinct, and it was serving her well.

Their story though… the facts didn't add up. Approximately one thousand people were suddenly and surprisingly there, and their memory was gone due to a damaged digitization unit? They stayed out in the open and were still alive? They attacked various Dread facilities and fended off several attacks on their base? Dread hadn't sent all his forces down on them? That made no sense.

Or did it?

Jon's tactical mind began running through various scenarios, and few worked logically with the facts at hand.

His thoughts were interrupted by a radio communication. "Annie?"

She pulled a small radio out of her pocket. It looked more like a walkie-talkie from decades earlier rather than a more modern communications device. Apparently, even the portable electronics they used were refitted antiques. "Go ahead, Merlin."

"We're picking up movement. Jones is trying to track the direction, but we've got some interference. Looks like it's biomech transmissions coming over the waves."

"Again?" Frost muttered. "Don't these guys ever get tired of attacking us?"

"And interference," Milo complained. "That means a bunch of them are talking to each other."

Scout whispered to Jon, "They seem more annoyed than worried."

Annie waved her hand to quiet everyone. "It's been two days since they hit us. Maybe they're getting bored?" She spoke into the radio. "How long until we have definite information?"

"A few minutes?"

"Let us know, Merlin. Yellow alert. Prepare to go to red if it's an attack, and we'll join you."

"Roger that."

Hawk leaned back in his chair, wiggling a bit as he tried to find a comfortable position. The low sound of the warning alarm sounded outside. "Merlin? Would that name come from the King Arthur stories?"

Annie nodded. "And Jones is from Davy Jones' Locker, Frost from the poet Robert Frost and Bingley from the Pride and Prejudice character Charles Bingley."

Hawk glanced at his teammates. "I really like the way they chose names. It took me and Joanna months to come up with names for our kids."

Jon was beginning to think that Jackson had understated his descriptions of how the group chose their names. They were taking names from anyone and anything they could find in order to establish an identity. However, as interesting as their name choosing was, Jon couldn't help but wonder at the truth of how and why they were there. Maybe the truth was found back at the beginning… "Annie, have you been able to find out anything about how you got here?" he asked her.

She shook her head. "Literally, every one of us woke up here. We were lying on the ground at this very location. We didn't know who we were, where we were, nothing."

Milo leaned against the wall, observing their guests, Jon especially. "Imagine a little over one thousand people waking up and finding themselves lying in the dirt next to complete strangers. It's not a good feeling."

Bingley stood beside the door, perhaps also acting as some sort of guard? Jon recognized the protective stance – they were on guard against them. It made sense for a military unit. They were protecting their leader against an unknown element.

Jon leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. "Were any of you wounded badly? Broken bones? Internal bleeding?"

Hawk touched Jon's arm. "Jon," he cautioned him.

"No," Annie answered, her voice somewhat curious as she looked from Hawk to Jon. "Why?"

Jon thought for a moment, then said, "Jackson told us that a doctor explained the memory loss, that it came from –"

"Stinson," Frost scoffed. "We hear he's a good doctor, but he hasn't been able to help us any. He showed up a few weeks after we woke up and the only thing he said is that we were relatively healthy other than the fact none of us remembered anything. Used to, he'd fly here in his cargo ship, check out some of us, ask us stupid questions like if we'd met any new people or if any other resistance groups had visited and told us if he'd ever heard of them. Then he'd fly back to his lab again. Hasn't been around in about a month. Personally, I think he's a fraud." He looked at Annie. "Didn't he say we were all affected by that gadget?"

Annie nodded. "A problem with something called a digitizing unit. Yes, he did. He said we were obviously digitized, and then we were brought here and released, but none of us remember anything before we woke up. Why?"

Scout cleared his throat. "The fact that no one was wounded is a bit unusual."

Annie seemed to consider this. "Some would have fought back," she murmured. "I should have thought of that. When the biomechs or the Dread soldiers showed up, some would have fought before being captured and some would have been wounded," she concluded. "No, none of us were wounded like that. Some of us have a lot of scars. Doctor Stinson said some of them were surgical scars." Then, her eyes darted back to Jon. She seemed to remember something more. "Some of us also had nasty bruises and cuts that we couldn't explain or figure out how we got them, so maybe some did put up a fight. I guess that's another clue to toss into the mystery."

So she is wondering what happened, Jon thought to himself. He was curious given how she spoke of their collective memory loss so nonchalantly earlier. "And none of you have had any hints or indications regarding your past?"

Annie shook her head. "No. Nothing. No hints, no moments, not even dreams or nightmares. We have some theories, but no one being wounded… that changes a few things."

I'm all broken up inside. Jon remembered the pain in her voice, how she was fighting to get her words out when she was minutes away from dying. Those had been her words. How was she not hurt now? How was she still alive?

Bingley shuffled his feet, apparently uncomfortable with the direction of the conversation. "Captain, right now, it doesn't matter if we can't remember a thing. We have to survive. We had to learn to work together. That wasn't easy because not all of us liked each other. Some of us still don't. There are personality conflicts and cases of territoriality that would scare a biomech. What you see here now isn't what it was like early on. We fought each other as much as we fought the robots. We learned fast that if we were going to survive, we had to work together no matter who we are or who we were. Memories aren't as immediately important as finding food and water and fighting off the enemy," he explained. "That's all your team is here to help us with, not trying to pick our brains about pasts we can't remember."

Jon raised a placating hand. "I meant no disrespect," he said quickly. "But it is puzzling. I know we can't understand the problems you've experienced, and I know the questions we have aren't nearly as numerous as yours, but we've got a lot of contacts all over the continent. Maybe we could find out some information if we knew more about your background here."

"Bingley," Annie jerked her head slightly and Bingley relaxed a bit. "Captain, you have to understand that we don't know you and have no idea if we can trust you. We've heard of your team, but that's all. We've only recently met Jackson, Mitchell and Pulaski, and just because they vouch for you doesn't mean much since a stranger's opinion doesn't carry a lot of weight with us. We don't know them, and none of us would remember if we met you."

"And we've given you no reason to trust us," Jon concluded. "I wish I knew how to prove you can."

Annie leaned back in her chair, looking to the ceiling as if it could give her some inspiration. "Trust takes time. Look at all of us. We're total strangers thrown together, and we're forced to trust each other. That courtesy doesn't necessarily extend to outsiders."

"So it's not personal. It's logical," Milo added. "Tempers have a tendency to get a little hot here."

Jon had no doubt that there was a lot of frustration going around the base camp. "I didn't mean to add insult to injury. We really do want to help," he explained.

Bingley cleared his throat. "Sorry, Captain. It's an uncomfortable situation for us. We go to sleep every night hoping we'll wake up in the morning and remember our pasts and we never do. Can you imagine what it's like to look in the mirror and not know the person looking back at you?"

"It gets worse than us not knowing ourselves," Frost added. "We don't know who each other is either. No one knows who's related to who or who hates who. Who's married, who's not – it's hard to form certain relationships under those conditions. People can be brothers and sisters, others could be bitter enemies. You don't want to cross certain lines when you don't know where the lines are."

Jon heard something in their voices, some anger, some sadness. They wanted to know who they were, and they didn't have the resources to find out. "We'll do what we can to try to help you find out who you are," he said, "but Jackson said we couldn't force memories. If we did –"

Annie interrupted quickly. "It would be bad for us. We know. I think that's the one thing that scares us. Not knowing is terrible. Forcing ourselves to remember and knowing we'll destroy each other if we do because we're mysteriously linked together somehow? That's worse." She pointed to a hand drawn map of the area tacked up on the wall. "We've explored some of the area surrounding us, but we haven't had a reason to venture too far from the base. So far, the Dread bases we've attacked and various ruins we've investigated are within a twenty mile radius of the base camp. We plan to go beyond that in the coming months. I think if some of us could find out what settlements we're from, maybe we could go back there, look around and maybe something would be familiar. It would be more than we have now."

"And it could trigger your memories," Tank offered. "All Jackson told us is that they couldn't be forced. Maybe showing something to someone isn't forcing?"

Annie nodded her head. "We have to try something, but I don't know how long it will take to find out where any of us came from. I hope everyone can keep a sense of patience until we do find out."

Hawk smiled. "That might be easier than you think. There are over one thousand people here. That many don't just disappear without others noticing."

Jon hoped she'd jump at the chance, but there was something still bothering her.

She leaned forward, maybe hoping that someone had an answer. "Something I don't understand is how so many could be imprisoned in this digitizer device without getting a lot of attention. That's a large number of people to take prisoner. Transports would be noticeable and –"

"Wait," Scout interrupted her. "Transports? Hold on a second - do you know what digitizing is?"

Annie almost chuckled. "No. Doctor Stinson just said we were digitized, there was a problem with the digitizer and that's what affected our memory. He made it sound like we were hit with some sort of stun blast and stuck in a cage."

The four men looked at each other. Jon took a deep breath as the realization of what the group wasn't aware of became apparent. He saw Annie glance at Milo who was watching their guests suspiciously.

"What?" Annie asked.

"A biodread has the capability of digitizing people," Scout started to explain.

"What's a biodread?" she asked.

She didn't know that term? After her last bout with Blastarr? Again, Jon had to remember that they were speaking with Annie, not Jennifer. "You've never seen Soaron flying over?"

"Soaron?"

Scout continued. "Soaron is Dread's biodread. That's a type of robot that he designed. It flies. It's superior to a biomech. Larger, autonomous, more sophisticated and more advanced than any biomech out there. It digitizes people, stores them in its memory and then takes them to Overmind who –"

"Wait," Annie held up a hand to stop him mid-explanation. "Stores them in memory? It sounds like you're saying people are being turned into streams of data and stored in a computer."

Scout nodded his head. "That's what digitizing is."

Annie stopped.

She sat perfectly still.

Apparently no one - not Jackson, not Mitchell, not Elzer, not Stinson - had explained what 'digitizing' was.

Milo wasn't quite so still. "Wait… we were turned into little bits of data and put on a hard drive?"

Bingley walked all the way into the room. "Inside a robot?"

Annie looked at Jon. Obviously, his earlier question now made more sense. "And I'm guessing digitizing doesn't heal wounds," she stated.

"No," Jon told her. "People are restored in the same condition they were digitized in."

"And no one was badly wounded when they woke up," she whispered to herself. "Something's very wrong with that scenario." She unconsciously touched her side.

Milo became suddenly worried. "Annie?"

She looked towards Milo. "I have scars that the doctor said looked like they came from emergency surgery to repair broken ribs and internal organs in my mid-section. He also said the scars didn't look that old – in fact, he said that they looked very recent. He told me that the physical trauma that produced the wounds would have been profound and fatal. I would have been dead in minutes. For me to still be alive, it had to have happened before I was digitized… Unless…"

Jon could almost see the logical scenarios being played out in her mind. Still, they couldn't say anything. Not yet. They couldn't force any memories.

"Unless what?" Milo asked.

"Unless I was wounded before I was digitized, healed afterwards and then brought here."

Frost leaned on the desk. "You'd remember that, wouldn't you?"

Annie almost grinned. "Would I? We don't know why we don't remember now. If those of us with scars had been wounded and healed, why would we remember any of it?"

The radio alarm screamed for Annie's attention. She picked it up and quickly pressed the transmit button. "Merlin?

"Annie! Incoming! North and west! Platoon of clickers each. More on the coattails."

"Two sides?" Frost jumped over the desk and rushed out of the room, Bingley practically on his heels. "That's a new one!"

"Sound red alert!" Annie ordered Merlin as she and Milo ran out the door, the Power Team following them. "Strike teams in position! Bring up weapons!"

The red alert alarm was blaring through the speakers as they emerged from the outer building. People were running, grabbing up weapons and hurrying to their battle stations. Children were picked up and taken to a secure location. Non-combatants moved out of the way of the armed soldiers. Guns were mounted onto turrets, front line personnel took position. Everyone moved as if they had rehearsed the performance daily.

Jon grabbed Annie's arm and stopped her in mid-run. "What can we do?"

"Annie, they've got troop carriers on the west side!" Merlin informed her.

"Are you any good at taking out transports?" she asked Jon.

Without another word, Jon stepped back and nodded to his team. Simultaneously, all four pressed the actibadges on their uniforms and said, "Power on!" Immediately, the armored Power Team was standing before her.

She looked at all four… "Okay, that's impressive," she muttered. "Go west. We'll take north," she said as she and Milo ran toward the north perimeter.

Suddenly, they heard the roar of tanks and the crunch of metal feet as they marched. They turned and saw the approach of two tanks and a platoon of biomechs in the distance.

"They're through the wall," Jon pulled his weapon. "Hawk, take the high ground. Scout, disable the transport on the left. Tank, flank them on the right so you can get a clear shot at the other. I'll have them aim for me."

Hawk flew off, and Scout pulled a grenade from his supply belt. "I hope this isn't their idea of a job interview," he told them as he ran off toward the attackers.

"If it is, we don't have references," Tank added as he charged into the battle.

Jon found himself running toward the biomechs alongside other base camp soldiers. No one gave him a second look. They were focused, determined and well-prepared. The soldiers took position behind barricades scattered around the field and started firing, but Jon didn't stop running. He sped to a location where the biomechs could see him – right out in the open.

Coordination was key to the plan, and it was a plan they had used many times in the past.

He aimed his blaster at the lead biomech and fired repeatedly. Hawk swooped in from above and fired down on the biomechs, tossing laser rings through their power supplies and head connectors. Scout engaged his suit's holographic program and initiated the biomech hologram. He rushed up behind one of the tanks and slapped two grenades under the fuel cells before escaping in the opposite direction. Tank aimed his laser cannon at the nearest enemy transport and the moment Scout's grenades went off, he fired directly at the fuel cells of the other tank. The explosion took out the remaining biomechs, leaving metal remnants scattered all over the field.

Frost was suddenly there beside him. "Pretty good," he said. "You guys are fast. You know how to work together."

"We know a few tricks," Jon told him.

"Frost!" Bingley yelled as he ran past them. "Northside's calling for backup! They've got more than one platoon attacking! One team, clean up here! The rest with us!"

Without hesitation, the Power Team turned and ran toward the northern perimeter. The biomech platoon was slowly advancing under the heavy onslaught of the base camp defenders. One by one, the biomechs were falling but another would come from the woods and take its place. Three strike teams had formed a picket line across the field, shooters were behind barricades, and the west side battle troops joined their firepower to theirs.

Through the dust and the smoke, Jon looked for Jennifer. She was behind a dirt-built barricade firing a grenade launcher at the oncoming troops, her aim deadly accurate.

"How do you want to hit them, Jon?" Hawk asked. "Looks like they're handling this one pretty well."

"Mini-tank on sensors!" one of the strike team leaders yelled.

No tank was visible, only the barrel of a gun poking through the trees.

Milo ran directly toward Annie. "Annie! Get down!" He yelled.

Annie didn't have time to move before the mini-tank fired a round directly toward her. Milo jumped at her and shoved her to the ground as the blast hit.

Annie immediately jumped back to her feet. "Shoulder-to-air! Take out the tank!"

A soldier brought a missile launcher to bear and fired directly at the mini-tank barrel. His aim was deadly. The missile hit the barrel head on, destroying the vehicle and the surrounding biomechs.

"All weapons fire!" Annie ordered the strike teams.

As one, the teams fired their weapons in a concentrated blast, the shots slammed into the remaining biomechs. The majority of them shorted out and fell to the ground. The rest were easily picked off by sniper fire.

Annie and Milo moved back from the battlefield. In a loud voice, she ordered, "Get me casualties and wounded. Verify the biomechs are destroyed and see what you can salvage. If any of their memory cells are still functioning, get what you can. Secure weapons, munitions and everyone stand down. I want damage reports. Strike teams, you're on the duty. Set up a perimeter and I want all sensors working double time! Get me spotters in the woods. I want to know if we can get a visual on anything else moving out there."

Not far away, the Power Team watched. Jon saw Annie walk around as if the near explosion hadn't happened. Milo stood close to her, always at her side, giving supporting orders to Annie's primary ones.

"They didn't need our help on this side. She's good," Hawk said in admiration.

"Covered all the bases," Scout added.

"And she didn't even blink," Tank included. "There's a lot of Jennifer in Annie."

"It's easy to see why she got the job," Jon told them. "It shouldn't surprise us. Let's see what we can do to help now."

What they witnessed next added another mysterious piece to the puzzle. The battle was over, the orders were given, but people were behaving as if the attack hadn't happened. They were laughing, joking, setting up for nightfall. The wounded and the dead were carried off to one of the buildings – the infirmary perhaps? No one seemed sad or affected by the deadly results of the attack. From where they stood, they saw the group once again become the individuals going on about their daily lives, depicting the same image they presented when the team first arrived. They didn't behave as people who had just gone through a battle.

"Uh, guys," Scout motioned toward the various groups forming behind them. "Notice anything strange?"

"I don't understand this," Hawk said as he removed his breather mask. "Is it my imagination or are they not really affected by all this?"

Jon noticed group after group sitting back down inside tents or around campfires, acting as if they didn't have a care in the world – "There's no emotional aftermath," he noticed. "They geared up for a fight, they fought, and now it's as if nothing happened. Maybe that's part of what happened to them?"

"It's as if they're going through the motions, no matter what they do." Tank observed.

Jon motioned for everyone to be quiet as Annie, Milo, Bingley and Frost approached them again. "How'd we do?" he asked Annie.

She smiled and didn't have to consider her answer. "Very impressive. Bingley? Are they the real deal?"

Bingley gave Jon a nod. "No doubts, Boss. It's them. They check out, suits and all."

Scout laughed. "This was a job interview. Did we need to produce references?"

"Not quite," Annie corrected. "Let's just say we needed you to prove you were who you said you were."

Ah, a trial by fire was the proof they needed. Jon suddenly realized that he'd been outmaneuvered by a very astute resistance commander. "Did we earn a little trust?"

"I think so," she agreed quickly. "When would you like to start speaking to some of the strike teams?"

Jon remembered what she'd told them when they entered the camp about not having teams ready to speak with them. Was that by accident or by design? There was a change in Annie's demeanor after Frost's declaration and the team's willingness to fight by their side – she was going to trust them. He wasn't quite sure what was going on, but he decided to play along. "It's late, you've just got out of a fight, and since we showed up a little earlier than you expected, how about tomorrow? Would that be all right?"

Annie smiled and nodded with apparent relief. "Tomorrow would be much better. No one likes to have their schedule hijacked without notice. I think after seeing how you dealt with those tanks and clickers, they'll all want to speak to you concerning tactics and methods. I'm sure they'll have some questions just like you will. Milo," she casually nodded her head toward the battlefield, "why don't you talk to some of the strike leaders and find out which teams are available tomorrow morning? Come up with a schedule? Have them meet after breakfast? Also, we'll have to arrange burials and funerals for anyone who didn't already have arrangements with friends."

Milo took one last look at Jon – it was not a friendly look. "You got it, Boss," Milo said as he mock-saluted and sauntered back to the strike team leaders.

Tank watched him leave. "Boss?" he asked her, clearly bemused.

"They started that a few months ago, and I have no idea why," Annie explained. "Frost, we need to take another look at the movement in the surrounding Dread bases. This was the first time they hit us on two fronts simultaneously. We need to figure out why."

Frost ran his hand through his hair. "No problem. Dread's been stocking those bases with more biomechs lately. I think he's getting ready for a major offensive, and we're the ones he wants to offend the most," he proclaimed as he walked toward the carryalls. "I'll head to the silo tonight and get you the information as soon as I can. I hope Jones got the carryall refueled."

Bingley turned on his heel. "I've got to get some supplies out of stock to repair one of the generators. If I can keep it online, we'll have an uninterrupted power supply if the worst happens. You need anything here, Annie?"

Annie shook her head. "I think I can handle it from here," she told him, this time her voice less authoritative, more reassuring.

As soon as he left, Jon ordered everyone to power down. Once again, they stood before Annie unarmored.

"Amazing," she whispered. "How do you turn your clothes into armor like that?"

"Trade secret," Scout said as he made certain his grenades were securely in his belt. "So was I right? Was that a job interview?"

"Uh, no," Annie confessed. "Honestly, it was coincidence, but we did need to check you out. We had to make sure you were who you said you were only we didn't know how. Bingley is the only one here had seen a Dread bulletin with your pictures or seen a recording of you and heard your voices. He found the recording on a reader an overunit had, but it was damaged and burned up after he finished playing it. I just had to keep you talking until Bingley was satisfied that you are the Power Team. I wasn't expecting an attack that you could fight in to prove it."

"Sneaky and brilliant," Hawk said appraisingly.

Jon could only agree with their actions. It was a wise move on Jenni… no, Annie's part. They had no reason to trust anyone, but they couldn't not trust anyone. "Is there anything we can do to help?"

"No, it's not necessary," Annie explained. "We have specialized teams that do clean up and post-battle security."

Hawk reached down and picked up a piece of a biomech that had landed near where they were. "How often do attacks on the camp itself happen?"

"For a while, it was rare. Then it became every few days. Now, it's happening more often. After this battle, it might be two days before they attack again. Frost will get us the latest information about any new movement and we can gauge their attack strategies then."

Tank pointed toward the camp in general. "Your people know exactly what to do in an battle. It was as if their movements are rehearsed."

"In a way, they are. We train every day," she assured them. "With the biomechs attacking more often over the last month, we've needed more training since we're getting in a lot of practice."

Again, Jon heard the nonchalant tone to her voice. This was a common event, so it wouldn't affect them as much as it would soldiers who didn't fight nearly every day.

"We'll do what we can so maybe you won't need so much practice." Jon was still curious about what Annie had said earlier. "You said before that you were having personnel problems that we could help with?"

"Tell you what, Captain, if you can contact the people you know, maybe find out who we are and where we come from, our personnel problems will undoubtedly disappear." Annie motioned for them to follow. "We don't know how many more biomechs are in the woods, so you'll be safer here than you would be back at your ship. I can show you to some empty sleeping quarters. We may not have a lot to share, but we do have the ability to be hospitable."

~W~F~T~S~R~

Annie led them inside one of the outer structures not far from her office. It wasn't very big; just six rooms connected by a long hallway, one level and partially cleared out. Surprisingly, it wasn't dusty or dirty. Evidence of excavating the building was evident – scratches in the walls, doors shoved against jambs instead of hanging on hinges, nuts/bolts/screws scratched, looking as if they had been recently tightened. They passed by the first two rooms. There were some benches and tables set up. The next two rooms had toys scattered across the floors, a couple of pool cues, ping pong paddles, balls of various size.

"Hawk," Scout pointed to the paddles. "Ping pong," he whispered, the sound of near glee echoing in his voice.

Hawk's eyes lit up the moment he saw the items. "I'm not spotting you any points," he said with a grin.

The last two had bunks and cots set up. All in all, it seemed as if they were setting up a school or a recreation hall.

Again, the temperature inside the building was much cooler than outside. Scout looked at a sensor that indicated the temperature. "How is the temperature regulated in these buildings?"

"It's what the brick is made out of," Annie explained. "It acts like adobe. It'll keep someone cool in summer and warm in winter."

"Impressive," Scout admired the simple structure. "But if it's so cool inside, why do people sleep in tents?"

"I didn't say we did," Annie joked.

That surprised Scout. "You've got enough buildings dug up to put almost one thousand people inside?"

"No, not quite," she told them. "A lot of people like sleeping in the tents. Some of the younger ones think they're living life like some of the heroes in the books. Like Daniel Boone or Davy Crockett or Robin Hood. Others feel more secure if they're sleeping under a roof. Inside the buildings mean mud doesn't rush in when it rains and birds don't fly in and leave evidence they were inside. Besides, a building gives a little more cover than a tent does during an attack. Now this building is still a work in progress, but you can billet down here," she told them as they approached the last two rooms. "Some of the engineers were down here last week. It's easier for them to camp out in whatever building they're helping clean out and repair, so you know those rooms are fit for habitation. They're still patching up the ceiling and walls in this one."

Hawk looked around approvingly at the structure. "So we won't be putting anybody out?" he asked her.

"No. Another building had a shift in its foundation and one of the rooms caved in. They've moved near that one temporarily. They won't get back to work here for about a week. They have declared this one safe."

"Safe?" Scout asked.

"We had some fatalities early on when buildings fell in on people when we were excavating," Annie explained, her voice sounding sad. "We're planning on using this one as a school for the kids once we can build desks and get some basic teaching supplies, but they're scarce so it's been put a little lower on the priority list. We think the former occupants may have used this particular building to house visiting troops, but we just don't know."

"Now, just outside –" she led them back out and pointed toward the very large tent just beyond, "over there is the mess hall. An infirmary is just to the right of it. We've got a few sentries roaming around, and they know to keep an eye on you if you need any help. I wouldn't bother the guards though. They're pretty easy to spot. The sentries aren't."

"Sentries?" Scout basically studied the massive numbers of people moving around them. There were people strolling around the camp, others setting up their own personal campsites. Whichever ones were sentries strolling around the perimeter and keeping a watch on the camp, they weren't obvious. "You couldn't pick them out of a crowd," he noticed.

"Would they need to be?" Annie asked, her voice sounding like she was about to laugh.

"No, not really," Scout said approvingly. "It's just a good way to camouflage your people. You hide them in plain sight. When you're attacked, then the enemy doesn't know which person does what job. It gives you a distinct advantage in a fight."

Annie had considered that as a sound tactic when she implemented it. "It seemed like the right thing to do at the time," she said.

"I have to ask," Scout made a sweeping gesture at the entire camp, "we have trouble finding enough food just for us. How do you feed all these people every day?"

Annie shrugged. "It's been difficult but not impossible. We found a lot of food stored here at this site. It was in vacuum-sealed containers and cans, but some of it was still edible. There were something called MREs in the cold storage facility – the less said about them, the better. We found uncontaminated wells so we had fresh water, and there were a lot of dehydrated goods and powdered items so we didn't starve. We've sent out hunters but there's not enough game to lower their populations by hunting them. We have found a lot of root vegetables growing all in the surrounding area. According to Jackson, that's why he came here – to check out the fact that there are woods. We've learned that that's not a common thing to see in other places?"

"Not by a long shot," Jon told her. "This is the first time we've seen anything that even looks like woods in years. Most other places are barren and desolate."

"Barren?" Annie glanced out at the tree-filled horizon. "I guess we're just secluded enough to not know what's beyond the trees," she mused.

Jon asked in a low voice, "Annie, we noticed that after the fight, everyone seemed to behave as if the attack hadn't happened. Is that normal?"

"Normal? Is that unusual behavior?"

"It's not in our experience," Jon explained.

"Oh." Annie frowned in confusion. "I've never thought about it. We're prepared for a variety of attacks, and they happen often enough that they're more like nuisances. It's not often we get more than a few platoons hitting us at the same time-"

"Platoons?" the four men repeated, astonished.

"I take it that's not the type of fighting you're used to seeing?" she asked Jon.

"Until recently, no," he explained. "We've got a lot of experience with surgical strikes, infiltrating Dread facilities, and destroying supply lines at their source."

Annie leaned against the wall of the building. "You're a small team, so making surgical strikes would make more sense. We're an entire base camp, so we would have some success with the broader attack. Jackson was right – there's a lot we can learn from each other."

The sound of a crying child reached their ears just as an older woman walked around the corner of the building carrying a crying, dark-haired child probably not even two years old. "I know, it'll be okay," she said as she patted the child's back. She looked exhausted and as if she was reaching the end of her patience.

Annie called out to her. "Lydia?"

The woman's eyes noticeably brightened when she saw them. "There you are, Annie. Maybe you could help? I can't get her to stop crying."

The little girl's eyes seemed to light up the moment she saw Annie. Whimpering, she stretched her chubby little arms out toward her as Annie reached out and took her from Lydia. "Hi there, sweetheart," she said as she hugged the little girl to her. "What's wrong? Huh?"

"I don't think she's feeling very good. She has a little bit of a fever, but neither Julia nor I could get her to stop crying. At first, I thought all the shooting scared her, but it never has before. I thought a walk could help, but it isn't," the woman told her. Then, she noticed the four men accompanying Annie. "Do we have guests?"

Annie smiled and performed the introductions. "Lydia, this is the Power team. Let's see if I have it straight: Captain Power, Major Masterson, Lieutenant Ellis and Sergeant Baker." She then nodded her head toward the woman. "This is Lydia. She helps take care of the children."

"Lydia?" Hawk approached and shook her hand in greeting. "Did your name come from the book Pride and Prejudice as well?"

Lydia and Annie both laughed. Then Lydia rolled up the sleeve on her shirt and showed them a small tattoo on her wrist. It was a tiger with small wings. "I found some sheet music about Lydia the Tattooed Lady, and I thought it was apropos."

Hawk laughed. "No argument there. Please, it'd probably be easier to call us by our call signs. I'm Hawk." He motioned to the others. "This is Scout, Tank and Jon."

"Jon's a call sign?" Lydia asked him.

Annie leaned over and said, "He doesn't have a call sign. He's never needed one."

The little girl grabbed hold of Annie's shirt with one hand and leaned over as if trying to get a better look at the newcomers. "What is it, Gracie?" she asked. "Want to meet our guests?"

Annie turned a little so the little girl could see the team. Hawk gently took the little girl's hand and shook it in greeting. "Hi there, Gracie," he said with a smile. He gently placed his hand on her forehead. "She does have a little bit of a fever. She's too old to be teething."

The little girl grinned and then buried her face in Annie's shoulder.

"I have no idea what's wrong," Lydia told him. "Annie?"

"I don't know anything about babies." Annie glanced back at Lydia.

That's when they noticed Gracie kept clutching her ear.

"I think she has an ear infection," Hawk told them. "My kids got them every now and then."

"Is that bad?" Lydia asked him.

Hawk smiled. "It's fixable."

Gracie turned her face away from Matt, and Annie explained, "Gracie's a little shy around strangers."

"She acts like she's yours," Jon commented.

Annie smiled and hoisted Gracie up a little on her shoulder. "No, not really. She just knows me. She's really attached to Julia. She's another person who takes care of children. Some of us help out when we can, but it's not easy to get away from our other duties."

Gracie gazed out at Matt again and gave him a little smile. He smiled back. "Where did the name Gracie come from?" he asked Annie.

"A twentieth century comic named Gracie Allen," Annie explained. "I found her biography in one of the buildings, and I liked the name. I think it'll do until we find out who she really is and get her back to her parents."

An added depth of awareness of what they already again knew hit the team. Children were there with no memory of their parents. Parents were there with no memory of their children. No memory meant – "You have no way of knowing who her parents are," Tank guessed. This wasn't just a group of people without their memories stranded in the middle of a reforming greenwood. These were entire families ripped apart and thrown together as strangers. It was an inflicted punishment that only someone with a sick sense of irony would indulge in.

Annie shook her head. "No. Doctor Stinson said he didn't have the equipment to run genetic tests to trace who's related to whom. Life for us started when we woke up here. Like we said, some of us could have been family, friends or enemies before, but now, it doesn't matter. We have to get along with each other and work together if we're going to survive. Maybe one day we'll be able to find out if any of us are connected to each other in any way."

It was clear that Gracie had formed a connection with Annie because she was more than content to sit in her arms. She curled herself up against Annie and sucked her thumb while keeping a close eye on the newcomers.

The team realized that there was even more going on with Annie's group than they had thought.