Date: Thursday 22/04/2060, Location: 47.56532, 43.05013

Unaware of the drama unfolding to the south, Marius and Kai along with the base repair team were busy working on the helicopter, measuring up the fittings and bracings required for the cargo hook. With scores of metres of rock overhead, their phones remained silent, no message from the other team disturbing them as they went about their business.

Tads sat in her lodge, busy working away on mystic matters and designing her formulas. A few incense sticks smouldered away in their holders, the light grey smoke slowly rising and coiling through the air as they carried their scents through the lodge and helping her reach a zen-like state where she felt in tune with the astral plane and could manipulate the complex magical components in her mind.

Concerned with much more mundane matters, the rest of the team worked on lifting the floor plates of the chopper to expose the structural members, working out just how much reinforcement would be needed – or in some cases, replacement. While they were fitting the alloy I-beams into place, Marius spotted an opportunity and carefully changed the plans somewhat. Alongside the cargo hatch in the floor, he removed some material to create two narrow spaces, each about two metres long, half a metre wide and with a height that tapered down as it followed the contours of the chopper's outer hull.

When he was done, he'd created two smuggling compartments that were very difficult to spot, though somewhat awkwardly shaped and accessed. While it would be possible to fit a slender person in each one, it would lead to a nightmare journey – though of course for someone fleeing from a warzone or assassin, that might still be preferable – and fitting regular cargo in them would also prove to be tough due to the shape and size restrictions. However, if they had a need to move military weapons, or more densely valued cargo such as gems, magical telesma or data stored on chips or disks, they would be ideal.

The work crew didn't seem at all bothered by the changes, helping out with the fitting and working to fit the panels as closely as they could to disguise the spaces – clearly understanding exactly what they were for. It was unsurprising given the nature of the location, but Marius was pleasantly surprised when there was no mention of a surcharge or any additional fees being required.

While all the banging, sawing, welding and chemical sealing was going on, Tads remained ensconced in her lodge, slowly drawing complex shapes with her stick of chalk as she worked through the requirements of her craft. While a hermetic mage might have filled a blackboard with a complex mathematical formula, quantifying and manipulating values representing the transition of mana from one form or place to another, her work was more freeform, the chalk sketching out a series of flowing art. She was no artist, and if you had asked her to draw an animal, person or car she would have struggled – yet with her totem guiding her, unconsciously a complex but beautiful scene appeared before her, charged with magical energy and potential.

They worked on for hours, making great progress with their work, undisturbed by events in the outside world… Tads mentioned during a coffee break that she could even try and put up a ward around the new compartment – though it would be much better if they waited until all of the team were around again.

Meanwhile, in a field three hundred kilometres to the south, the rest of the team were speeding across a field leaving a trail of destruction behind them. Heading south-east, Shimazu was keeping the cloud of death on his right-hand flank, trying to drive roughly parallel to it and maintain distance. Aswon was keeping a careful eye on the cloud out of the windows as he did so, describing what he saw.

"This is very bad – whatever it is, I just saw a flock of crows fly into it, and moments later they just started to fall from the sky, one after another. It's not getting any closer to us though, but whatever it is, it's lethal."

"I've just tuned into a radio station, shush a minute." Hunter concentrated, his eyes defocused as he listened to the start of a broadcast, then he spoke again, translating from the Russian dialogue. "People are being evacuated from a massive corridor, stretching over a hundred kilometres wide, and all the way to Rostov. The military are being mobilised to set up road blocks and help with the evacuations, and air traffic is being diverted around the area."

"Are they saying anything about why?" asked Nadia.

"Claiming it's a chemical leak from a factory owned by a foreign corporation. Doesn't sound particularly believable, but that's what they're going with…" Nadia nodded, then broke out her phone and thought carefully for a minute, before calling Marius to advise him. The phone rang half a dozen times then went to voicemail, so she tried to call again. After the third time, she sighed unhappily and resigned herself to the fact that he really was unavailable, and left a brief message describing the road closure.

The six wheel truck continued to race across the rough fields. The wheels, each a metre in diameter and with thick knobbly treads gave Shimazu excellent traction and the recent cold weather had at least left the going "firm". The truck was clearly designed for terrain just like this, and Shimazu was able to keep up a good progress as he headed cross-country. The suspension was given a thorough workout, and the truck cab swayed from side to side as the system soaked up the ridges and rough terrain, with the occasional lurch as they thundered across a drainage ditch at sixty kilometres per hour. The massive V10 engine powered them on though, pushing through hedges and fences that happened to be in the way as they carved a straight line through the countryside.

Occasionally Shimazu was able to find a country lane or road that headed in their direction for a while, and they pushed up to nearly a hundred kph, but soon enough they found themselves bursting through a gate and hammering across some barren farmland again as they sought to find the end of the cloud.

Dusk descended upon them and Shimazu was forced to turn on the lights, unable to use the sensors and enhanced cybernetics to transform the dull light into something safe to navigate by. At least the huge sweeps of light also served as a warning to livestock to get out of the way when they occasionally encountered it.

Full darkness had descended, and they were on one of the narrow country roads bordered by high hedges that wound between the fields, taking advantage of the compacted gravel track to make better time. A blur of motion ahead and suddenly people were falling through the hedge, sprawling onto the road ahead of them. Shimazu slammed on the anchors, and all six wheels locked up, skidding across the gravel and bringing the truck to a slithering halt.

Lit up by the lights were six people, sprawled on the road and picking themselves up – mostly. One of them was on a stretcher – or at least had been before they'd been unceremoniously dropped onto the ground as the bearers had slipped and fallen through the hedge and ditch onto the road. The men were scrabbling to lift the body back onto the stretcher now, moving quickly and surely and giving a squeeze of a clear plastic bag before jamming it under the motionless body.

As the team in the truck took in the scene, more details filtered through. All of the men looked fit and on the large side, aided by the bulky jackets and clothing they appeared to be wearing. All had a strangely lumpy suit on, made of shiny material, with elasticated cuffs and huge hoods. And perhaps most importantly, all were wearing some kind of assault rifle or submachine gun on a friction sling around their neck and shoulder. Nobody was pointing guns at the team yet – though it wouldn't take long to change that!

"Noddy suits," muttered Hunter. Shimazu made an inquisitive noise, so Hunter explained. "NBC suits, or noddy suits – nuclear, chemical and biological suits. Rubberised and coated with chemical seals, to stop soldiers getting taken out by NBC agents. And one of the most miserable things in the world to wear. Hello, where are they going?" Hunter frowned and moved a little, attracted by vague signs of movement to the rear of the vehicle. As he changed position, he saw – or thought he saw, at least two or three more of the figures trying to come around the back of the vehicle.

Shimazu flashed the lights, slowly, off and then on again, then lowered them to the side lights. He hoped it would be clear from that, that they had seen the people in the road and wished to talk. Sure enough, one of the figures came over to the driver's side door, approaching slowly. As he did so, the other people moved around and took up a perimeter, one of them crouching down by the man on the stretcher. As his clothes were moved around, it looked like he'd taken one or more rounds to the abdomen, and had been quickly patched up in the field.

They cracked the door and looked down at the man. He in turn gazed up at them, his handsome face quickly examining them all. When he spoke, it was Russian with a very slight hint of some regional accent.

"What unit are you with, Comrades?"

"Not military. The truck sold off and is now a normal vehicle. But, you appear to be in need of assistance. Can we help?" Shimazu spoke with a neutral voice, trying not to put too much inflexion into his limited Russian vocabulary.

"Yes, our unit member has been injured. We must take him to the hospital, quickly. Your assistance would be helpful." As he finished speaking, Hunter leant past Shimazu and interjected in much more fluent Russian.

"Where is the rest of your unit? And can you tell the people trying to sneak around the back of our vehicle to stop, as It's making me nervous." The man listened, and then waved a hand in a short chopping motion, then brushed away towards the edges of the road. The shadows to the rear moved backwards, away from the truck.

"Alas, the rest of our unit was ambushed by terrorists. This is all that is left, and we need to get our wounded to the hospital quickly or it will not go well for them. Will you help us? We can offer generous compensation for trouble?"

Hunter held up a single finger to the man in a "one moment" gesture rather than a "go fuck yourself gesture", then carefully pulled the door closed.

"Killed by terrorists, eh? Not bloody likely. Seems more likely these are the terrorists, tagged by some defence guards or something. But they're offering cash, and we need money." Nobody else said anything, so he leant over again, and pushed the door open. "So, where are you wanting to get to?"

"Across the border into the Trans Caucus League? Baku has a fine hospital, I hear?" Hunter nodded, then held up a finger again, letting the door swing shut.

"We're going that way anyway, and we're already illegals. Might as well earn some cash while we're at it?" Shimazu and Nadia said nothing, while Aswon was being uncharacteristically quiet. Hunter didn't have time to wonder about that at the moment, and leant out again. "Ok, we can take the wounded person, and one escort to keep an eye on them, over the border and deliver them to Baku hospital. We might know some people here that could come and pick up the rest of you, or help you get over as well."

The man looked at him for a moment, then turned to the rest of his group and babbled some commands. Hunter listened intently – it sounded like a weird hybrid language – there were words that sounds like Russian, Georgian and Azerbaijani in there, along with some others that were completely new to him. It sparked his curiosity and he hoped the man would speak some more so he could get a better understanding of what was being said.

He was destined to be disappointed though, as the man seemed to be of few words. His troops moved quickly and efficiently, around to the back of the truck and into the space between the truck and trailer, lifting the stretcher up and sliding it into the passageway between the shower/toilet and the kitchenette. One of the troops climbed up afterwards, moving over the body as carefully as they could and pushing their gear onto a bunk, then getting out of the way. Hunter leant over to the troops outside, passing over a small slip of plastic with his contact number and a passphrase marked on one side. The person he'd been negotiating with reached up to grab it, gave it a quick look and then jumped down from the tow-bar to the gravel surface below.

The troops slammed the rear door shut, then headed through the hedge into the field on the opposite side of the road, moving quickly now they were no longer encumbered with the wounded man, and fading into the darkness. They hadn't even said goodbye to the two left behind, as far as they could tell.

Shimazu got the truck back underway, heading down the road with Nadia navigating and guiding him, while Hunter came into the back to check on the newcomer. He found Aswon here, who was sitting in one of the jump seats, quietly examining his spear.

Aswon had been here for some time, in the same pose and staring intently at his weapon with his mind defocussed and his sight extended into the astral. Something was very, very wrong, and he was feeling off-balance and confused. He wished Tads was here to talk to, or at the very least either Kai or Shimazu – but it was just him at the moment. He sighed, and stared at the spear again.

It glowed faintly in astral space, the edges hard and well-defined, warping the flow of mana around them with the eddies of force radiating out from the ancient wood. He could see the runes carved down the side – "Medaron Speren mes Bele se'Farad" glowing a little, the ancient text finely carved with delicate touches. He thought it was Sperethiel, the magical language of the elves – and if it was it translated to something like "Harmony of Death, The Path of the Great Hunt". Certainly the name indicated there was something special to the weapon.

He could also see his aura infused with the weapon, a link from him to it, and it to him. If he lost the weapon somehow, he could track it down with that link – but it would work both ways, of course. That much was normal – any foci or artefact when bonded would forge that link with the owner, unlocking powers to them and becoming more useful. So why, when he looked at the spear, did it look like it would be quite happy for him to perform a bonding ritual with it. For him to invest even more of his magical soul into the link between them. He'd never come across anything quite like it before.

He glanced up for a moment as the truck lurched back into action, and saw the two newcomers in the back with him, and quickly assensed them, passing on the information to Hunter.

"One on the stretcher is badly wounded, has a few bits of ware, slipping in and out of consciousness. The one with them is worried, a little paranoid, but has an edge of hope. Can't sense any duplicity or evil from either of them."

Hunter nodded, and then prodded for Shimazu to pick up the pace, apparently happy with the report from Aswon as to their passengers motives. Once they were underway, he tried to call Kai and then Marius to give them an update, and once again was faced with their voicemail. He left a vague message, trying not to give details that would incriminate anyone, and asked for them to give him a call.

Nadia had been deep in thought, leaning up against the door of the truck. Now she twisted and turned towards the rest of them.

"This cloud – it will be causing much disruption. Massive road closures, much chaos. One of the things it will particularly affect is the courier and transport business. Vehicles will be held, not given permission to cross the cloud, or told to go so far out of their way to deliver that it becomes impossible to meet deadlines and contract requirements." Shimazu nodded gently, not wanting to upset the 'trode net on his skull, and Hunter grunted in agreement, while Aswon listened, wondering where she was going with this.

"So how about one of you contact my dad? He's bound to have someone either on the road, or due to make a trip, and now faced with no work because they can't reach their destination. The trucks are just going to slowly build up costs, even sitting still – and that's bad news. If we tell them there's a group of people that need to be smuggled over the border, he can probably arrange the pickup and still make some money out of them, and that'll make him happy. And takes care of the other group of people as well."

Aswon pursed his lips, looking like he'd just eaten something sour, and Shimazu very carefully kept his eyes on the road. Only Hunter broke into a smile and seemed enthused with the idea.

"I mean no disrespect, but I wonder if questioning your father is a good idea. He will, undoubtedly, once again enquire as if we have seen you or know anything about you – and that means we will either have to tell him the truth, or lie to him directly." The tone of voice made it quite clear what Aswon thought about telling a direct lie to another person.

"Yeah, I don't want to do that either. And I know it's somehow going to come down to me talking to him, isn't it?" said Shimazu.

"Well, he is your friend." Hunter's voice was gleeful as he contemplated the situation. "It's only right that you talk to him. We wouldn't even know him if it wasn't for you!"

Shimazu grumbled, pulling faces and trying to put off the inevitable for the next ten miles while Nadia continued to point out the wisdom of the situation. Aswon wisely retreated from the situation, going instead to watch their passengers, while Hunter sat in his normal seat, drink in hand and watched the contest of wills.

Eventually Shimazu broke down, or just got bored of the argument and agreed to call Turul. Sure enough, after they had exchanged greetings, the first question was about Nadia and her status. Shimazu made an apology, explaining that he was driving at the moment, and might go quiet or sound distant at times, but then said that they'd not seen or heard of her, but they were still looking out for her. He looked miserable as he listened to Turul speak of his missing daughter, clearly still distressed and wondering where she was and what he had done to drive her away.

Nadia at least made it slightly easier by staying quiet and staring out into the darkness, avoiding eye contact with anyone else while Shimazu chatted. Slowly the situation was explained, with some carefully vague phrases and concepts floated around, hypothetically. After a short time though, Turul had been given the contact details and code phrases, and informed them that yes, he actually had a driver that was stuck in Russia, twiddling his thumbs at a cargo node, unable to head north west due to the road closures. The chance to make at least some money from one of his drivers that would otherwise just be a loss was too enticing – and it wasn't as if Turul wasn't heavily involved in the smuggling scene anyway.

With that arranged, they told their passenger the good news. The relief on his face was palpable, and his thanks were sincere and carried an undercurrent of honesty that was hard to fake. Aswon decided to strike while the iron was hot. He got the radio turned on, and went to sit in the back with the two passengers, waiting quietly until the top of the hour when there was a news update. The announcer had a few words to say about the previous song, then gave a summary of the developing situation with the cloud, reporting on the exclusion zone and the military clampdown on the area, along with details of the travel restrictions. Aswon stared at the able-bodied passenger.

"Listen, I don't want to know what you guys did. In fact, I specifically don't want you to tell me – if we don't know, we can't give away the information. But I just want to know what kind of trouble we might be looking at." Aswon pondered for a moment. "Say for a moment that we knew of some people right, that had broken into an industrial plant, something like the one the man on the radio was talking about, and there had been a toxic leak. What kind of trouble would they be looking at? Some kind of corporate guards? Local police? What?"

The passenger squirmed somewhat, clearly struggling to work out what to say. He nervously fiddled with the unconscious body, checking over the pressure bandages and adjusting the position of the fluid bag, giving the mostly empty bag a little squeeze. Aswon gave him a moment, searching through their own first aid kit and digging out the bag of blood expanders from there, passing over the fresh bag to the man who gave a nod of thanks.

"I would say for people such as that, they would be most worried by the KGB and state troops." Aswon nodded, watching his face as he nervously licked at his lips. "I would say…" Aswon held up a hand, interrupting him.

"If it's anything about the cause of this cloud, we don't need to know. We don't WANT to know, ok? Unless it's something that specifically affects us here and now, the less we know the better. We're just some people helping out some stranded folk from the side of the road." Their eyes met, and the passenger gave a little nod. "Now – there was some mention of a little reward for helping you out. So – how many zeros are we looking at?"

"You are helping us for free?" Aswon saw the man look at him in surprise and confusion, as if the mention of money was a new thing. He bit back the instant hot retort that sprang to mind, about how the guy had better not welch on them, and instead took a calming breath, and assensed the man once more. He could feel the confusion and gratitude coming off him in waves, but no sense of deceit or smugness, nothing indicating he had "got one over" on them.

With a sudden start, his mind made a leap of intuition – and he decided to clarify what he had said.

"No, what I mean is the reward for helping you. Say it is the number one, how many number zeros follow it. Ten Nuyen? A Hundred? A Thousand?" He saw realisation dawn on the face before him, as the turn of phrase made more sense to him now.

"Ahh, I would expect our commander will be generous with his payment. For saving the life of Yousif, he will be pleased and pay much." Aswon filed away the man's name, wondering if, or when, the guy would realise he'd blurted it out in passing. "But you would have to speak to him directly. All I can say is that our commander is a man of honour, and has paid much to buy us equipment and training. I do not think you will find him unwilling to compensate you well."

Nadia squeezed through the door into the rear of the truck, moving carefully towards them as the truck swayed around a wide sweeping bend on the road.

"Hey, just thought you should know. Shimazu has just had a call, saying that a pickup's been arranged." Aswon winced internally, trying not to show his alarm as she made the same mistake their passenger had made only moments ago. "Someone is heading to that general area and has been given the passphrase and contact number, and will get them down to the border and hopefully across with no fuss.

The passenger looked incredibly relieved, sitting back and leaning against the fridge for a moment with his eyes closed. He stayed like that for nearly ten seconds, then sat upright with a start and began to rummage around in his rucksack, pulling out bits of kit and putting them to one side while he hunted for something. A few moments later he pulled out a small but fancy looking communications system and extended the aerial, folding out the guide wave dish around it and then turning on the sat-phone. Whoever he was calling answered quickly enough, then he gave a rapid fire report, speaking for nearly a minute without pause then abruptly going quiet and listening for a response.

Aswon was as intrigued as Hunter had been as he listened to the confusing jumble of languages all merged and melded into one. He was a little more familiar with some of the languages used around the Trans Caucus League than Hunter, and he thought he recognised a few dialects that might have been donors to the language. After a few words in response from the other end of the call, their passenger hit the disconnect button, and then laid the sat-phone on top of the rucksack, turned off but still unfolded and ready to use.

Aswon realised with a start that they'd overlooked a small, but probably very important detail, and started to rummage around himself, looking for the bug scanner. When he found it, he passed it over to Nadia with a look, and then moved to the wounded man on the floor.

"Do you want me to help you move him while you put on the fresh bag of blood expanders? That one looks nearly empty." He hoped Nadia realised what to do while he provided the distraction, and he busied himself with the task of genuinely being helpful while they worked on the wounded man, ensuring his treatment was sufficient.

When he was done, Nadia was gone. He checked to be sure their passenger was ok, passed him a sealed bottle of water and an energy bar from their supplies and then climbed through the narrow doorway into the cab of the truck to catch up with her.

"I ran the scanner over the back as best as I could without him noticing, just like Marius taught me. There was a very low power transmitter active on him I think, like the sort of thing you have on a fork-lift loader, so you can track it in a warehouse. Hunter thinks it's a squad tracker for tactical movement. Other than that, nothing I can spot." Aswon nodded in understanding, then leant over towards Hunter and checked on the map. They were a good five hundred kilometres from the border yet, and at their current speed that was at least seven hours away. With nothing else to do, he opened the door again and climbed into the back to go keep an eye on their guests and make sure everything was ok.

Back in the quarry, Marius, Kai and Tads relaxed after a pretty hard and draining day of work. They'd gone to the recreation area for dinner and eaten their fill of gumbo – Kai wisely avoiding a monster portion of the red spicy stuff this time – before returning to their pod to relax for the evening. The airline-style toilets had been fitted into the curved wall of the chopper on one side of the hold, while the set of bunks had been bolted into position on the other. The beige fittings looked incongruous in the olive drab painted chopper, with the curved and gentle styling of the civilian airline design looking out of place against the stark brutality of military efficiency. Still, they were effective and looked comfortable and would make life considerably easier for the team.

Marius started to think about how he could improve the chopper's stealthiness, realising that it was going to be a tall order given the size of the craft. He had some idea floating around in his head about using some upgrades to the electronics suite to help with active countermeasures, and was wondering if the same kind of smart materials that had been fitted to the truck would help with their shape. Getting about as far as he could with idle speculation, he grabbed his tablet and wandered out of the pod, heading to the entrance to where he could get a signal.

'Ding. Ding. Ding. D-d-d-d-d-ding!' The phone vibrated as it entered signal coverage and message after message was suddenly delivered from the local cell tower. Marius sighed and paged through them, binning off the spam texts from the service provider, the corporate sponsored adverts and targeted marketing aimed at the fictitious owner of the phone. Then the missed calls were displayed, and the voice mails popped up. Marius started to play them back, listening with growing concern to the messages in order as Hunter and Nadia's reports throughout the day painted a picture of trouble, giving fragmentary information with each message. When he had finished working through them, he hit the sync button on his phone, firing up the saved query he had been working on, and downloading a number of matrix pages to read offline, then headed back to the other to play them the messages.

"Kai, Tads, listen to these!" Marius hit the playback button, playing the messages one after another. Tads looked more and more concerned with each message, envisioning what kind of evil was rolling across the landscape, but Kai seemed much less concerned, instead checking out the map and trying to figure out where they were from the oblique references and occasional name dropped. He managed to work out a general line of travel, and extended the route down towards the border – they'd be coming in from the eastern end, rather than south from Sochi as they'd originally planned – but that was ok. He was distracted somewhat when he heard the last message from Hunter though, snapped out of his map viewing when he heard his name.

"…so we figure that's a Kai problem, after all, he's the boss so it's got to be his issue, hasn't it? So can you ask the boss, what he wants us to do to follow up with these people we're rescuing, and what his instructions are?" They could hear the smile on Hunters face as he recorded that one, as he palmed off responsibility of what was going on. Kai glanced at the others and saw he was going to get no help there – Tads was too upset by the idea of a massive toxic cloud spreading across the land, while Marius was quietly muttering horrific death-threats aimed at Shimazu if he should damage the truck.

"Marius, hey, Marius! Stop threatening to eviscerate Shimazu, you know he's not going to do anything deliberate. Why don't you head outside, call Nadia and find out what the situation is, get a live update and we'll take it from there?" Marius scowled, but headed out, aiming for the entrance to the caves and a decent signal.

Once near the entrance, he contacted Nadia, spending the first couple of minutes chatting with her and making sure she was ok, then asking about the current situation and what was going on. Based on the number of messages, he managed to ask the right kind of questions to fill in nearly all of the blanks and get an idea of what the situation was and how things were going, and was soon a little more relaxed – the truck team had things pretty much under control, it seemed. With an update on their position, intended crossing place and an idea of where they were going, he spent another minute or two chatting with Nadia, then disconnected and headed back to Kai to report in.

The truck rolled on through the countryside, sticking to the highways now and making decent time as they travelled south east towards the coast. The plains of Russia were arid and sparse, field after field of soy crops scrabbling for survival in the poor soil, tended to by ancient machinery and equally old farmers. Towns that barely justified the name clung to the road like a child to its mother, dependent on them for survival.

Shimazu hit the controls to change the appearance of the truck, the smart materials changing the shape of the fairings and cab to present a new silhouette and the piezo-electrical paint rippling into a new colour and logo combination as night fell, changing the appearance of the vehicle enough that it might confuse sensors looking for a particular signature. In the back, the wounded man lay still, tended to by his squad mate from time to time, and who otherwise dozed in a sitting position, drained from what had probably been a fairly hairy combat mission and then escape across the Russian countryside.

They stopped at a fuel station near Kachalay, noting to their surprise that fuel seemed to have gotten significantly cheaper over the last week or so, dropping in price by nearly a full Nuyen per litre. It seemed crazy not to take advantage of the lower price, so they filled the tank the monster tank with diesel right to the top.

Now they were on the coast road, the E119, they made steady progress, merged in with the commercial traffic doing the long haul routes to the south. The occasional car whizzed past them, darting in and out of the heavier vehicles and then accelerating smartly away, but on the whole they stuck to a steady 100kph, keeping pace with the articulated lorries and smaller goods vehicles carrying bulk cargoes.

They got to Samur, the border crossing point, a little after midnight. Ahead of them there was a snake of brake lights as the queue built up at the brightly-lit crossing point. Far in the distance they could see the huge stone and brick archway built over the road, two narrow lanes flanked with guard booths and inspection points waiting with a stream of traffic built up. Heavy duty plascrete blocks painted with yellow and black chevrons were laid out before the archway, forming a number of lanes for the traffic to queue into.

With their previous experience of the Russian border crossing, they knew what to look for – and sure enough, there was an officer working the line of vehicles, clipboard in mittened hand, the furry ears of his hat pulled down low over his head to try and stop the wind wicking away his body heat. By the time he got somewhere near them, Hunter had gathered a whole bunch of crumpled notes and was pressing them flat ready to pass to the inspector. The knock on the truck door was entirely expected, and Hunter slithered down to meet him in the cold night air.

"Good evening, sir. Here are our IDs, and our permits. We're hoping to make a rapid transit to the south as we have delicate fruits in the trailer that will spoil if we don't get them to market." Hunter rolled out the lie quickly, not caring that nobody would believe a story like that. As he handed over the ID stick, the roll of notes stuck out from between two of his fingers, clearly on offer to the official. The stick, and the roll of notes, were quickly taken, and the stick laid on top of the clipboard, not even inserted into the electronics port while the man gave the bundle of notes a quick check over.

"Ahh yes, of course. Fruit – very time sensitive. Well. Everything looks to be in order here, I think. Pull up to the gate in the third lane, with the red markings. Good evening, comrade." He slotted the ID finally, gave only the briefest of looks at the text then hit the big green check button and handed the ID cylinder back to Hunter. Hunter nodded gratefully, and then climbed back into the truck, not saying anything until the door was closed, then directing Shimazu to the appointed lane.

Most of the traffic was queuing in the right-most lane, with only a few vehicles in the middle lane, who were quickly bumped to the front of the queue whenever there was a space. They pulled up in the red marked third lane, and got priority over both of the other queues, barely having time to stop. Another inspector appeared, and again Hunter climbed down and met him by the roadside, sliding over another equally large bundle of bills. This time the check was slightly more thorough – the official checking the ID and the tags on the truck, making sure they came back as legitimate and without warrants. He walked around the truck once, looking at the wheels and pausing at the back as if checking the cargo area. It seemed mostly for show though, presumably for the cameras that were dotted over the archway.

Five minutes later they were waved on, Shimazu carefully sliding the truck through the narrow stone building and into the no-man's land. A hundred metres later, another archway and another quick inspection – this time from a TCL official who seemed even less fussed about the contents of their vehicle – they didn't even leave the safety of their heated booth, instead settling for checking the vehicle out over the CCTV system and the reading from the weighbridge built into the ground.

They drove on through the night to the south, sticking to the main road. Shimazu gave a snort, and pointed out of the windscreen.

"Look! Quba!" The sign flashed by, the turning from the main highway not looking particularly noteworthy. Nadia looked confused, and Hunter explained the significance to the team – how only a few months ago they'd come down from the mountains in this very truck, escaping from captivity at the hands of the local warlord and stealing his transport. Nadia listened as they explained about their activities in Quba, rescuing the policeman's daughter from the slavers and their encounter in the health clinic when Tads had been branded a witch by the hysterical mother.

They pushed on to the south, heading towards Baku, in somewhat familiar territory now. As they drove south, Nadia grew quieter and quieter, staring around her at the area she grew up in. She'd probably travelled more in the last three months than she had done in her entire life up to this point. She hunkered down in the seat, staring out at the world around her – and the rest of the passengers in the truck left her be, driving along in silence.

Another hour saw them arrive at Baku hospital, pulling up into the ambulance bay just past 03:00. The building was a squat plascrete structure, relatively modern looking but without style or taste. It rose up like a monolith, tiny windows studded the sides at least letting some natural light into the ward rooms. But down at ground level there was just brutal concrete structures, cracked tarmac and the stale smoke from cheap imported cigarettes smoked by the paramedics. As they pulled into one of the ambulance bays, a hospital orderly approached them, full of self-importance to tell them they couldn't park there.

Behind him, a man leaned against the wall just outside the double swing doors leading into the emergency department, smoking a slender cigar. Dressed in an old, faded and well-worn leather jacket, battered jeans and sturdy hiking boots, he had a craggy face and well-defined stubble that looked like it should be selling aftershave or some other male grooming product. As the back door opened and their passenger spilled out to the ground, he stood up abruptly, the half-smoked cigar cartwheeling off into the night. He pursed his lips and whistled loudly, the shrill noise stopping the orderly in his tracks.

"I need a stretcher here, and the OR cleared. Get the doctor ready." The orderly's whole demeanour changed instantly, and he became obsequious, nodding and almost giving a half bow before rushing off to deal with the man's demands. When the orderly had left, his face cracked into a smile. "Good to see you. How is he?"

"It is bad sir, quite bad. We gave him the best first aid we could, and we had some help from these people on the way back, including some supplies." The orderly returned with a gurney and three other staff members, and they quickly worked to lift the wounded and unconscious man from the back of the truck onto the bed, and then wheeled him into the hospital.

"Go in with him, keep an eye on him as far as surgery, then get yourself some food and drink. I'm going to talk to our friends here." He turned towards Hunter, Aswon and Shimazu, looking them up and down. "So, that's twice we've met now. Let's hope this is better circumstances than last time?"

The three of them stared at the man, remembering the last time they had met – the disastrous conversation between Kai and his abysmal attempt at Russian, and the missile that had ended up half trashing their truck.

"Well, we hope so too. Our…boss… is a lot better at Russian now, not that he's here at the moment. But yes, we hope that it's a lot more cordial this time. We can't afford another misunderstanding like that."

"So, how did you happen to come across my man there?"

"Believe it or not, we were just heading to the border. Driving along the road, near dusk, and they almost fell in front of the truck as they stumbled through a hedge. Carrying the wounded guy on a stretcher. I guess they'd been running with him for some time, and it had just worn them down." Hunter spoke quietly, his normal grin absent, as he described the condition of the troops when they'd found them. "Carrying a dead weight like that saps the strength – but you can't leave a man behind."

"And you just happened to be coming this way?"

"Well, we heading back to the TCL, but not Baku. But we decided to help out anyway. And then he mentioned that you'd probably be very grateful, and possibly quite generous…"

"Oh, did he, now?" The team wondered if they'd overstepped the mark, but after a moment the man shook his head wryly, and he didn't seem to have taken offense. "Well, I'm sure we can negotiate something. Here." He reached into his pocket, and pulled out a small business card and handed it over to Hunter. Hunter grabbed it and checked over the text, which had a name and title, then a phone number in small text – no logo or pictures, no glitz or fanciness.

'Mike Duncan, Security Analyst: +870 1903 4477'

"And of course, seeing as we're here, we might as well stock up on a few essentials, replace the supplies in the med-kit, things like that. But here's the contact number for our boss – and like I said, he's gotten a lot better at Russian in the last month or two." Hunter scribbled down the contact number for Kai and passed it back to the man, who shoved it into a pocket.

"Excuse me for a moment, I'll be right back." Aswon headed back to the truck, climbing into the rear and pulling the door shut behind him. He quickly rummaged around through the supplies until he found what he wanted, then headed into the front and checked that Nadia was ok. She seemed fine, and was carefully watching the scene outside where Hunter and Shimazu were making small talk with 'Mike'. Aswon climbed out of the front and walked over to them, holding out his small package to their new friend. "Here, these are for you. By way of apology for what happened before.

Mike took the proffered box, opening it carefully and staring at the truffles inside for a moment, then gave them a cautious sniff.

"Unusual thing to be carrying around with you."

"We're an unusual bunch of people – and it makes for an interesting gift, don't you think?"

"It does indeed." Mike gave Aswon a considering look, then shrugged. "Forgive me, but I need to go check on my men, and see if I can find the rest of them."

"Oh – well, we have some good news there. We told them we'd only bring the wounded man and one escort. They were pretty heavily armed, and we didn't know who they were or if we could trust them. But after a chat with him, we figured he was ok – so we've made arrangements for the rest of them to be met by a contact of ours and smuggled over the border, back here."

"That is the best news I've heard today!" Mike reached into his inside pocket, and pulled out a silver hip-flask, unscrewed the top and took a large gulp of the liquid, before offering it out to the team. Shimazu politely declined, but Hunter and Aswon both took a slug, feeling the incredibly smooth spirit slide down their gullet. It had an odd taste to it, some kind of unusual fruit – perhaps an edge of some variation of strawberry. Whatever it was, the drink was pleasant and felt like the kind of thing that would clobber the hell out of you if you weren't careful with how much you drank.

When he'd secured his flask and returned it to his pocket, Mike tilted his head to one side for a moment, then gestured with his head to follow them, turning wordlessly and striding into the hospital. He led the way through to the pharmacy and waited for the sleepy looking technician to slide open the hatch and attend to him.

"Hi there. These people need some supplies. Give them whatever they want and put it on my tab. I'll leave you to get your stuff – when you're all done, I'm just in that office up there, second door on the left. Come find me." With that he stuck his hands in his pockets and wandered up towards the indicated door, disappearing into the office a moment later.

"I would suggest just grabbing the essential supplies. Let's not be rude to our new friend, in case he checks the bill later." Aswon suggested, "I think he's being sincere, but I suspect this may also be a test." Shimazu nodded in agreement with him, and Hunter thought about trying to wind them up a little – but given the time of morning, decided to not push it, this time. They grabbed some anti-coagulants for Hunter's supply box, and some blood expanders and other essentials to restock their first aid kit, then wandered up towards the office, knocking politely on the door and entering when they heard Mike call.

It wasn't a big office, something belonging to a mid-level manager perhaps, with no windows to the outside world. With the four of them in there, particularly the size of Shimazu and Hunter, it was decidedly cramped. Mike had his feet up on the desk, and the swivel chair pushed back against the wall, a tablet held in his hands as he paged through some document.

"So, all stocked up I hope. Now, in terms of 'consideration' for your efforts in getting my guys back here, and into care. What do you want?" Mike let his gaze flick from one to the other member of the team, waiting for them to reply. It was quiet for about twenty seconds as they each contemplated the open-ended offer, wondering which of them was going to speak first. Aswon cleared his throat and broke the deadlock.

"I think, that given our previous history and misunderstanding, that our boss would like to get better relations with someone like you. So with that in mind, I would say that if we can forgo any monetary reward, and instead ask for passage or safe harbour in your lands or the area you control. That would be a valuable thing for us, and might help us build a working relationship." Mike's expression didn't change – he would make an excellent poker player, Shimazu thought.

"We can work something out, I'm sure. Yes, that sounds fine to me." There was a knock at the door, and a nurse opened the door far enough to lean in and give him a smile and a thumbs up sign, before leaving and gently closing the door behind her. "Well, it looks like surgery is going well. If you'll excuse me, gentlemen."

"No problem, we should be on our way, too. We've still got a long way to go on our journey. Thank you." Aswon spoke for the team, then ushered people out of the cramped space, into the much more roomy corridor. Mike headed off towards the lift up to the theatres, presumably to check on his men, and the three of them headed back to the truck, collecting their package of drugs and supplies on the way.

It was close to four in the morning by the time they had the truck turned around and leaving the hospital, and six by the time they got back to the ranch. Much to their surprise, after parking up they discovered that most of the house was up and awake, with breakfast on the go. It appeared that Germaine was a very early riser and had actually already left and was out on horseback for her morning ride.

The team grabbed showers and breakfast, perking them up after nearly twenty four hours on the go. Feeling vaguely human, they checked in with Rusudan and Naena. Things were going well with the ranch apparently, with a few bookings coming in for the summer season already. Eteri and Vardo had been giving Germaine and Henry riding lessons, and they were now competent enough to be out in the hills by themselves it seemed. The kids had been helping look after their guests, and Germaine seemed to be enjoying herself.

They pulled out the Russian dolls, and handed them over to Rusudan, and Aswon turned in his chair to address them both.

"Now, first of all, these are a gift for Germaine. But we'd like you to present them to her, with our compliments. Is that ok?" He saw them nod. "Now, second of all, Nadia here is going to be staying for a while. We've given her some money to help make improvements to the place and build up the facilities for when we return, but she's very good with management, logistics and problem solving. So I'm sure she'll help out with the business if you're willing to let her, and will be an asset not only to us, but to you as well." Rusudan and Naena nodded at her, and Nadia put on a wan smile for them, but the team could tell her heart wasn't really in it.

"Third and last thing – we need to get a train to Batumi, from Baku. What's the easiest way to get up there?"

"Ahh, I can take you. I have a car now, to replace the old truck. We can all fit in, just about."

With that sorted, the team got ready to move out, checking that Nadia had her clothes, the codes for the truck and the certified cred-stick with the funds on it. As they loaded up into the car, Hunter sent a message to Kai to let him know they were on the way, and they were soon dozing in the car as Rusudan drove them the hundred kilometres north to the city of Baku.

Far to the north, Kai received the message as he went to the cave entrance at breakfast, getting an update on the weather, news and checking his email. He got Marius to finish packing up just after they had eaten, and file the flight plan. With disgust, Marius told them they had a large diversion to make – the toxic cloud was diverting air traffic all over the area, causing massive diversions and re-routing of commercial traffic, all across southern Russia.

They lifted off, and soon worked out that with their basic flight plan filed, and the lack of history, priority cargo and other critical factors that they were the ones that always seemed to be picked to "go around" or "wait for clearance" to enter the various parts of controlled airspace and get routed into the flight corridors – and that the journey down to Batumi was actually going to take them almost as long as the rail journey would. It was so long in fact, that with the head start the ground team had on them, they were likely to arrive into Batumi first!

Joining the queue of airborne traffic waiting for clearance to travel, they headed south amongst the congested airspace, in a journey of frustration - wondering if anyone would notice if they shot down some other craft with the machine gun to cause further disruption then slunk away below radar coverage and went off-plan.

Fortunately with Marius flying, that was no more than wild speculation in Kai's fervid imagination, and they slowly made their way south, heading towards their rendezvous with the rest of the team in Batumi.