Keeping Darkon from becoming aware that he and Saber basically had their own, two – or three, depending on how one counted – man conspiracy was surprisingly simple, though Gunnar would hardly go so far as to say it was easy. It did, after all, entail the both of them shutting up and doing as they were told more often than Gunnar particularly enjoyed. Though he'd have still needed to step lightly around Spear in any case.

Really, the only Teknoman that Gunnar could see himself relaxing around – aside from Saber, of course – was Javelin, but that idea had issues of its own.

Finding himself called before Darkon's assembled forces – some of them who'd been close enough to Fritz Wallace that he'd been willing to call them family – Gunnar shoved all his uneasy thoughts and tenuous plans as far from his conscious mind as he could. All he could allow himself to think were the kind of thoughts any loyal Teknoman would have on their mind.

Gunnar, you are to lead Spear and Javelin to the location I presented to you, Darkon ordered. I wish to know what could have possibly drawn the attention of one of our own to the place that you and Saber described to me.

Yes, sir, Teknoman Gunnar said, bowing his head slightly, forcing himself not to think about anything but the orders he'd just been given.

He couldn't be curious, he couldn't be worried, he couldn't be concerned; he couldn't question, he could simply obey.

The three of them left the underground environs of Darkon's base, making their way back to the maze of fast-food restaurants, cheap outlet stores, and what Gunnar thought might have been a strip-mall in the distance was fairly uneventful. He'd made a point of going back for the other pairs of sunglasses, stored with the backpacks that had been brought down into this underground hell when Fritz Wallace and the people who had been closest to him had had the supreme misfortune to walk blithely over the top of it.

Spear and Javelin had deferred to Gunnar's expertise, though whether that was because he was Darkon's Guide, because he was a senior Teknoman, or whether Darkon had simply ordered them to do so was one more of the things that Gunnar wasn't letting himself wonder about.

When the three of them arrived in the city, in that same place that he and Saber had searched in vain for signs of where Shara might have been hiding or staying, Gunnar found that it hadn't seemed to change since the last time he'd seen it. The people had changed, sure, but people were a lot more mercurial than the environment around them.

Gunnar also found that the trip to the city itself made him hungrier than he could really account for, so he led Spear and Javelin over to a nearby McDonalds he'd managed to catch a glimpse of during the time that he and Saber had been looking for Shara in this place. Digging out the wallet he'd brought along, Gunnar glanced over the menu, then counted how much money he'd been able to find for his own use.

None of the others – the ones who'd actually survived, anyway – remembered the money they'd had in their respective wallets, or even that they'd had wallets in the first place, so Gunnar hadn't felt more than the briefest flash of guilt at taking said money for himself.

Once he'd managed to determine that he did, in fact, have enough money to feed the three of them properly, Gunnar joined up with the line of normal humans. It felt more than a little overwhelming: the noises of people speaking, walking from place to place, the clack of trays and the crinkle of paper, the sound of running soda fountains and the squeak and slap of shoes on the linoleum flooring. That was one of the reasons he'd told Spear and Javelin to stay out of the restaurant and wait for him to come back.

Those two were less essentially human than he was, and so Gunnar didn't know how either of them would have reacted to the kind of sensory-overload that he'd just had to deal with. Just before he left the McDonald's, however, Gunnar heard the amusing spectacle of someone asking for a Happy Meal with "extra happy". So, at least there was something to laugh about, even in his current circumstances.

Meeting up with Spear and Javelin again, Gunnar gave them their share of the food he'd bought, and the three of them began making their way through the city. Gunnar didn't wonder what the three of them were doing out here, he didn't think beyond the next step he was going to take, and he didn't consider what the two behind him might think about he was doing. The sounds and sights of the city all around Gunnar blurred into the background, and Gunnar left Spear and Javelin to report what it was that they'd seen and heard.

They were, after all, less essentially human than he was.