“Is that the time?” Elisa started, hearing the chimes of the antique on her mantle. “We're going to be late!” she told Juan as she got up from the couch and turned off the screen with a gesture.

“Wait, wait!” Juan protested with a smile. “You can't just leave me hanging like that, Chica!”

“Hanging like what?” she called from her bedroom where she was quickly laying out a conservative, but stylish outfit. She decided against a skirt or a dress and went with jeans and a delicately printed floral blouse whose V neck was quite flattering. With precise moves she quickly began to change clothes.

“You jumped out of a space liner?” he demanded.

“You need to watch more action movies,” she chided him with a laugh. The jeans were an older pair and a bit more snug than she remembered. She tried to pinch herself in a few strategic places and when she couldn't she decided the jeans tighter fit was due to wash shrinkage. “Dan Radcliffe did it years ago as James Bond in The Ivory Hammer and he was pushing fifty at the time!”

“You are my sister, not a special effect!” Juan shot back. “I mean, look, I know your work was dangerous, Elisa, but I thought it was just regular cop stuff! Maybe more SWAT, I guess, but...”

“I have sheltered you too much from the world, mi amgio!” she said as she opened the safe in her closet and removed a small, short barreled automatic pistol from the shelf. It was a Wilson Combat Virtue, a slimmed, short barreled 1911 they made and marketed to women. It was an expensive piece to start with that had been tuned to their 'Super-grade' level; the pinnacle of accuracy and mechanical engineering with tolerances measured in tens of thousandths of a millimeter. It had cost her two months pay and saved her life twice and so was worth every nickel as far as she was concerned. She checked that the magazine was still full and the pistol chambered as she had left it, then made sure the safety was returned to 'on' and tucked it into the Flash-Bang holster that was a part of the bra she was wearing. Her blouse covered any trace and now no one would know she was armed. A pair of spare magazines went into a holder disguised as a large smart phone on her waist. “It's a dangerous world out there, Juan. Full of bad people doing bad things,” she said sadly.

The safe secure, she walked back out into the living room where he was waiting. He flashed his wining smile. “I guess I'm not used to this new side of you, sis. Normally you don't like talking about your work.”

“Security system to armed,” she commanded as she took out both her cool cloak and his. The system beeped in response and she led the way out the door, still subconsciously listening for the clicks of the locks to activate. “I suppose you could say I've begun to make my peace with it,” she said as she led the way down the wooden stairs to the lobby below. “With this new promotion I'm not as directly in the line of fire as I was. New problems being in management of course, on top of the joys of field work, but having paid off my debt and now making a very nice living doing what I do, I suppose I'm enjoying it more.”

She waved at the old codger that was unabashedly ogling her through the half open door labeled superintendent on the way through to the garage. The Waterford Building had access directly onto the K Street Canal, as so the garage was a flooded dock the cars, in boat mode, were tied to. A pier system had been constructed with finger docks forming the 'parking spaces' that were now technically slips. They untied the lines from the car and after the cleats on it were folded back down into the body panels scrambled into the BMW and it started on the first try. Carefully maneuvering out of the garage, Elisa nudged the boat into the canal and from there out onto the inlet. “So, about this jump...?” Juan asked, casually with a sly smile.

“What is the big deal?” demanded an exasperated Elisa. “People jump out of airplanes every day!”

“Chica, you didn't jump out of an airplane, you jumped out of a space ship.”

“Oh, fine...”

Glasgow International Spaceport, Glasgow Montana 18 Years Earlier

The former Glasgow Air Force base had a long history of corporate partnerships. When the base was closed in 1976 it sat idle for twenty years before Boeing bought most of the base for a song and it became the Boeing Glasgow Flight Test Facility and they ran test flights in and out, not much traffic, but the former bases' two point seven kilometer runway meant even the largest of Boeing's aircraft could land, refuel and fly back to Seattle for moderate test flights.

Early in the twenty first century, Themis came to Montana to build their primary training facility to make use of the remoteness of the region, the relatively inexpensive land and access to a large body of water for use in training, they had leased rights, several hangers and adjoining buildings at the facility and paid to improve the runway to be able to handle a space liner.

The space liner was the brain child of the German government think tank Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt in partnership with a number of primarily German aeronautics companies, most notably Lufthansa. DLR, as it is known, dreamed up a piggy back craft, the larger of which was a flying fuel tank with a cockpit, engines and flight control systems, the other on its back the actual liner. It took off like a normal craft then the rocket motors ignited, the liner using the lifting craft as an external 'drop tank'. When empty, the tanker returned to its field of origin as a glider. The piggy back craft continued up, not quite achieving orbit. In this way, there was no place in the world that was more than two hours away.

It was dark and still very early; the techs scrambling over the craft did so by work lights and giant arrays of lights on poles like some aviation stadium. Between Adrenalin and the free flowing coffee no one was dreary eyed, despite the hour. There was an undertone of urgency, the attack was scheduled to occur at local dawn on Cayos Miskitos; time was of the essence. The liner boasted a capacity of two hundred, but one hundred Myrmidons, ten sets of Heavy Power Frames, eight cargo frames and eleven Erinyes and all the groups gear had the craft feeling extremely over loaded.

Elisa tapped her foot in nervous energy as she busied her hands screwing in the hose from the air bottle strapped to her para-wing harness into her helmet. Among its many virtues, with the helmet in place, the Fury armor was a sealed system. It wasn't a dive suit, nor was it a pressure suit, but in a pinch it could perform either role, while undamaged. While the vast bulk of the Myrmidons would be out the door first, they'd fall the longest and the liner didn't have an airlock. When the door was opened, all the air in the passenger compartment would be gone.

Not that it would matter; the amount of time between the groups leaving the liner was actually quite short because it was moving so quickly and almost straight down over Cayos Miskitos. The liner would land in the Canal Zone. The total time for the trip would only be twenty minutes.

There wasn't even time for the power frame drivers to suit up in the liner. They had 'walked' on board in the frames and were strapped down in them for the trip. One of Elisa's duties on her way out the door was to pop a series of ratchet tie downs on one side of them. Captain Hartlet would handle the other side.

The hose as secure as she could make it, Elisa hung the helmet on her harness and went through a couple of meditative sequences to control her excitement and nerves. The liner was taxing out on to the runway now. She accepted the IFF list Major Hawk's cranial computer implant pushed at her over the WIFI link and a quick look around the cabin made sure everyone was appropriately flagged. “This is Red Bird, com check,” the Major's voice ordered, thin and tinny in the vibration of the implant in her skull.

The task force sounded off over the radio as the liner's engines ramped up. They were rolling out now. Previously flat, the floor canted to nearly thirty degrees and the vibrations dropped noticeably. Out the window, the lights of the air port fell away into the darkness of the early morning. “Helmets on!” ordered Hawk's voice. “Boost in one minute!”

Elisa pulled on her helmet, making sure the locking ring was secure, then checked Bridget's collar next to her while she checked Elisa's. The computer in the helmet finished it's handshake with the computers in Elisa's armor and her skull and brought up the information that floated ghostly in front of her. A compass, pressure indicator on the suit, ammo counter, remaining air in the bottle and her own health status; everything was green and ready. “Work together,” Hawk's voice whispered in her head. “Remember your training and follow your objectives. Watch your partner's ass and we'll all get through this!”'

Diaz 'felt' Bridget looking at her and so turned to face the macabre helmet and mask she was wearing that matched her own. A private circuit indicator lit up as her voice quite calmly said, “If the intelligence is wrong, and there aren't reloads for the Heavies, we're all going to die.”

A small sting on the inside of her right thigh heralded the suit interfacing with the nanite factory there. A warm feeling flooded her and took the nerves away; her armor had instructed the factory to generate a light mixture of dopamine and anxiolcam, which sharpened her focus and calmed the agitation and nervous energy. “How long, do you think?” she thought back.

Bridget shrugged expressively, drawing the attention of several Myrmidon's around her. “Each heavy has one minute of ammo at full dump. Doesn't sound like much until you consider the rate of fire on those rotor-cannon they use. They'll likely use most of it securing our drop point and LZ. Assuming nothing else goes wrong? We'll be dead or captured by lunch. Most likely dead.”

“We can only do our part,” Elisa thought back to her as the back of the liner roared and they were pressed firmly into their seats. “The rest is in God's hands.” The liner surged upwards, higher and faster as the fuel from it's attendant tanker was consumed. With each moment there was less fuel, and thus less weight.

A shudder through the craft heralded the decoupling of the two craft, the liner continued up as the tanker began their long glide back to Glasgow. Then a sudden silence. Elisa looked out the window and the Earth curved away from her as the Sun began to glow along the horizon, thousands of miles away. A red light illuminated as the pressure holding Elisa to her seat vanished. The door opened into the infinite blackness of space. “Myrmidons! Follow me!”

True to his word, Hawk was first out the door, into the utter nothing. In silence, the final wave tumbled out the door, leaving the Furies and the heavies. The light turned off, then went red again as Elisa removed her seat belt and popped the tie downs as she passed each heavy, the pilots nodding to her as she went. She made a final check that her rifle was secure in it's sling and locked eyes through the mask with Captain Hartlet. Veronica winked at her as the light went green and the eleven Erinyes tumbled from the craft.

The utter silence of outer space was such that Elisa heard nothing but the sound of her own breathing for a moment. She looked over her shoulder for the others, but they were too far away to pick out. Sound returned as she felt resistance again. For a moment, it was like swimming through soup or gelatin as she was quickly slowed by the wind. Terminal velocity for most humans is something around one hundred ninety five kilometers per hour. The liner, going much faster quickly dropped out of sight in a fiery blaze of ionizing gasses..

Slowed now to her maximum falling speed, Elisa got her self into a spread eagle position. The helmet's IFF showed her where her sister Erinyes were and she slimmed her profile to form up. Ten new signals appeared below her as the Liner's dive flattened out as she headed for the Panama Pacifico Field. The heavies were already on the deck, creating a widening circle of carnage that would be LZ of the attack. The computer painted the IFF signals of Colonel Hiram's landing force at the docks and the battle was joined.

A tremendous explosion came up from the Docks from General Esteban’s largest asset, the former Honduran Navy's flag ship Atlántida, went up in flames. Atlántida had begun her life as the US Coast Guard Cutter Resolute and had been sold to Honduras early in the century. She'd been heavily modified with the addition of a pair of old Mk 45 Naval Guns that the Colonel was obviously interested in denying his enemy the use of. Atlántida was on fire and already listing heavily to her starboard side.

A red light on the status of the O2 bottle in her HUD flashed for a moment. It was reaching critical. Elisa checked her altitude and found she was below three kilometers, the air was thick enough to breath again. She reset her helmet to filter and the source from the outside air. The bottle quickly began to refill.

The radio chatter from the heavies showed they'd met minimal resistance and had a growing circle half a kilometer wide secured as a drop zone. Of course she was a little vague on what the heavies considered 'minimal' based on the smoke and fires in the area of the airport. “Team Two, on me,” she ordered and banked her body towards the warehouses that the circle the heavies had created over lapped slightly. At five hundred meters she tripped the deployment of her para-wing. It wasn't a parachute, nor was it strictly a hang-glider wing, but a deplorable hybrid of both. It was far more maneuverable than a parachute, and much faster. Free to move her hands now, Elisa found the G36 hanging from her harness by feel and snatched the charging lever.

The four members of Team Two buzzed the roof of the warehouse that was their commanders target. On it, a group of men were frantically trying to set up some kind of either heavy machine gun or, worse, a recoilless rifle. Elisa tagged the group and claimed her target, leading her team in a sharp bank. Four rifles spoke at once and the struggling men all died within a second of each other. The black clad Erinyes dropped to the roof and silently shed their wings. The gesture based combat language assigned roles as the girls moved with grace and silence to the roof access door.

Elisa drew her pistol and threaded a muffler on it before Bridget opened the door for her. They folded into the stairwell behind their leader. They emerged onto a catwalk that ran the circuit of the warehouse and could see down into it below. While it wasn't as full as a new supply might have indicated, there were hundreds, perhaps thousands of Myrmidon Heavy Frame reload crates.

The big frames used everything quickly, electricity, ammunition, people at times. Their primary weapon, a rotor-cannon based on the old GE M134, fired so fast that it was loaded from a hopper that held more than six thousand rounds. It weighed more than most could lift. The hopper had been integrated with a bank of lithium polymer batteries below it, all with a quick release system. Either a cargo frame or another Heavy could pick up the pack, dump the existent one on a buddy and reload him. The heavies trained to do this, but in some situations, they could simply focus on their primary job of putting lead down range and let a squad of cargo frames keep the boxes coming. Then the amount of fire the frames could put out was frightening.

Bridget's hand's said, We might live through this after all.

The team silently split, going in opposite directions on the cat walk, each lead with a suppressed pistol. Fortunately it seemed the occupants of the warehouse had already been dispatched on the roof. By the time Captain Hartlet arrived with her clutch of cargo frames, Team Two had lined up the first reloads for the heavies by the doors. “Report,” snapped the Captain as the supply specialists hustled by her in their cargo frames, part forklift, part power armor.

“Warehouse and resupply secure, Captain,” Elisa told her, fighting the urge to salute. “Four hostiles KIA on roof with a heavy weapon of some kind.”

“Jenkins, Smith, get on the roof and secure that weapon,” she snapped. The two Myrmidons saluted and departed at a trot. She turned back to Elisa. “Get the rest of Team Two and get your Heavies resupplied and get on your mission. We can expect a counter attack here any minute. On your way!”

“Ma'am!”

Elisa waved at the first two cargo frames that had reload boxes in their waldos. “You two! Come with me!”

Dawn was just beginning to break as the Sun slowly pulled herself out of the Caribbean Sea to the East. The warm cover of night shifted into deep gloaming shadows cast by the buildings around the air field, making the chunk that Themis had carved out of their own base seem awfully open and exposed. The last of the Myrmidons were drifting into to the protected circle the heavies had made, some returning fire their altitude gave them a better angle at as some of the desperate defenders tried to take pot shots at the reinforcements.

The airfield tarmac was flat and level, letting the cargo frames use their motorized foot pads and keep up with the lightening fast Furies as they raced to the western front of the line. Kolowaski and Saunders were on either side of their sergeant at the very tip of the western edge of reclaimed Themis property. Elisa walked around the left side of Kolowaski's power frame and slapped a discrete button on the leg.

The Myrmidon Heavy Power Frame was technically called the Dory, after the long spear used by the Greek Hoplite. The frame was originally to be referred to as the 'Hoplite', the heaviest of heavy infantry of the Greek phalanx, but there were objections from the drivers that the 'lite' and heavy was an oxymoron. So the frame was renamed after the Hoplite's weapon. It was a monstrous thing, nearly three meters tall and half way between an articulation frame and a vehicle. Like any tank, it depended on lighter infantry around it screening it from enemies that got too close. The button Elisa had pressed both let Kolowaski know she was there and that he was about to be reloaded.

Kolowaski found a fortified position at the far end of the runway that the Hondurans were frantically setting up and emptied the last of his hopper into it in a sustained blast of full auto that sounded like a giant tearing a massive book in half. A string of red orange tracers rained into the sandbags like lightening from Olympus until at last the barrels rolled to a stop, smoking slightly. Movement at the position had ceased. Kolowaski stepped forward from the line, his place being taken by a half squad of newly arrived Myrmidons, then turned around and ejected this spent hopper and battery pack. They were armored and used as advancing cover for the infantry behind them. On his reserve battery, he got back behind the line and faced front again, allowing the cargo frame driver to hoist his replacement hopper and drop it into the rack for it.

The ruddy light on the west from the fires on Atlántida were over powered now by the rising sun and oily black smoke from the blazing ship was caught on the prevailing wind and was driving across the air field that gave Elisa an idea. She turned back towards the fire control specialists that were clustered around the makeshift command center Major Hawk had set up. “Red Control, this is Athena, fire mission, over.”

One of the controllers, surprised at getting a call so early looked up and caught her gaze. “Athena, Red Control, say again, fire mission?”

“Affirmative, Red Control, fire mission, smoke, marching way points one through seven,” she told him, her implant pushing the notations she had marked to him. He shrugged as he bent over and picked up a drum fed grenade launcher, made an alteration to it's load and brought it up to his shoulder.

“Athena, Red Control, fire mission on the way.” The launcher spoke in rapid fire as the grenade arched over the runway in the direction of the main administrative building to the west. In short order the open space was covered in a thick blanket of cobalt blue smoke. “Athena, fire mission splash seven.”

Elisa gave him a thumbs up and the with a gesture lead her team into the blue obfuscation. The Erinyes darted forward as the squad of light plate grabbed the piggy back handles on their heavy brothers and rode them as they lumbered after the lithe, black clad females. The stride of a Dory was nearly two meters so they were deceptively fast for their lumbering bulk. Elisa and her sisters didn't have to slow down much for them to keep up.

Once in the jungle between the Admin building and the run way, the Erinyes took to the trees, leaping from branch to branch like some kind of game between them as they flanked out on either side of the road that the Dorys were restricted to. Gun fire, klaxons and other pandemonium were all over the island now. The Fog of War had firmly settled.

“Tía Elisa! Tía Elisa!” Diaz didn't need her enhanced reflexes to catch the jubilant ten year old that hurled himself into her grasp. Although it was obvious that Juan was annoyed that Raul’s excited arrival had interrupted the story he was hearing at a somewhat precipitous point. For her part, Elisa was delighted and twirled the youngster around before planting him on her hip and further mussing his already hopelessly mussed hair.

El Sombrero Rojo was an interesting kind of restaurant, relentlessly upper middle class, it was decorated and paid homage to the Criollo of what had been originally called New Spain, settled by expatriate Castilians and Catalans who considered themselves more Spanish than Mexican. While most of the restaurant's clientele could not tell the difference, it was built to look like it had been constructed of brick and adobe, laid out in a traditional hacienda style it sprawled through courtyards, sub-buildings both actually outside, and those only made to appear to be so ambiance did not have to bow to a lack of air conditioning. It's center piece was a courtyard playground themed as an apple orchard that a small throng of children were playing in, delightfully calling to each other in a mash of Spanish, English and other languages.

“Great grandpa wants to see you,” Raul told Elisa. “I told him all about how you came and rescued me from the sick lady.”

“Did you?” Elisa asked with a wry grin. “Now I am in trouble, aren't I?”

“He told me to watch for you,” the youngster replied, obviously pleased with himself for having been given a job of importance if only in his own eyes. “He was really impressed! He said hell must have frozen over because you were helping my mom, though I don't know why...?”

“Oh, Grand Papy is full of wit,” Elisa told Raul quickly. “So, you show tío Juan where your parents are sitting while I go see Grand Papy, si?”

Elisa let the youngster down and he promptly grabbed Juan by the hand and scampered off in the direction of one of the smaller, more intimate courtyards that was actually indoors. She already knew where Grand Papy was holding Court. Hėctor Sanchez Diaz was nearly a hundred. He had undergone two longevity treatments, once in his forties to extend his working life, the next in his seventies to extend his retirement. But for his age, he was still a vigorous bull of a man, broad, soft as befit his years and hard for the life he'd lived. The youngest son of the last Mexican Ambassador to the United States, Hėctor had stayed when the capital moved to Kansas City, and put down roots in Old DC. Now, the patriarch of the Diaz clan spent his days in the bar of El Sombrero Rojo, drinking beer and tequila while smoking cigars when he should be doing neither.

As soon as he caught sight of her he broke off the argument he was having with another man and rose to sweep her into one of his enormous bear hugs. His beard was well groomed and his thinning hair like it was milk white that stood in stark contrast to his ruddy complexion. His suit jacket smelled of brandy and cigar smoke. “Mi nieta la heroína!” he greeted. “How are you, Elisa?”

“Soy buena, abuelo!” she returned with a smile. “You, on the other hand, should not be...”

He waved off her protest with the hand holding the cigar she was protesting. “Let an old man have his comforts, nieta!” He guided her into the seat his debate partner had abandoned. “Roberto!” he called to the bar tender. “Dos Equis for my grand daughter! The heroine! Come, sit and tell me how you managed to do what many wagered could not be done and patched the relationship with your sister?” He grinned and took a pull on his cigar. “It does my old heart good to see my family acting like a family again before my time comes.”

“Nothing so miraculous,” she told him over the noises of protest he made at seeing her digging for her wallett through her purse. Roberto defered to the patriarch and refused the card she tried to offer for her beer. She took a sip and told him, “I was fortunate to be in the right line of work, at the right time. Truth be told, abuelo, and don't tell Juanita this, but it is likely Raul was taken because of me.”

“Oh, I have no doubt, both from what Juanita and young Raul have told me. Ay caramba! That a boy so young as Raul had to see such things!” He shook his head and speared her with one of his intense gazes from the corner of his eye. “You finally going to give it back?”

“I didn't...!” she started but his gesture silenced her protest before it truly got started.

“Don't lie to me, nieta,” he growled softly. “You took what did not belong to you, whether from your sister directly or before it was rightfully presented is of no consequence.” The cigar glowed as he drew on it yet politely exhaled away from her. “While Juanita needed taking down a place or two, it was not your place to do so.”

“Lo siento, abuelo,” she admitted softly.

The serious expression softened somewhat. “Good, good,” he admitted finally. “Perhaps I can go to face my maker with a clean conscience after all! And speaking of clean consciences, why don't you tell me all about this polite gringo Juanita says you are dating?”

“I'm not...” she started, but the old man gave her a fierce glance and a raised index finger in warning that caused her to sigh and shake her head. “Fine. His name is Thomas Vannoy, he's a co-worker at Themis, but in a different division.”

“And he makes sufficient money that my grand daughter will be well provided for?” Hėctor demanded, his gimlet eye warning of evasion or maneuvering.

“We make about the same,” she said after a moment of thought. “There are different bonus schedules that make an exact accounting problematic, but you needn't worry, abuelo, both of our nest eggs are well padded.”

“There was a time when a man would be shamed that his wife had to work,” he opined, his eyes distant and far away. “Even I can only barely remember such times. You have lived your life not knowing, and I weep for that.”

“I do not weep for my life, Papy.”

He smiled and patted her hand on the table. “No, nor should you. Of all my children and grandchildren and even great and greater grandchildren, you Elisa give me hope that boldness has not left the Diaz blood.”

She suppressed a laugh into a snort as she took a sip of her beer. “I recall you did not think so at the time.”

“At the time we thought you might be excommunicated!” he protested. “Your soul is more important than your body, Elisa! But, if his holiness is satisfied, how can I, good catholic that I am, object? Even if he is an American with no sense of the history of the office...”

“Papy!” she chided him. “Does it matter where the cleaner comes from so long as the mess is taken care of? Pope Gregory has brought the catholic church into the twenty first century! Just in time for it to be the twenty second!”

He waved off her objections with a tired gesture. “Yes, yes, you young people are so happy with all things modern. The Church does not need to be modern. The Church needs to be right. Right and wrong do not change.”

She cast down her eyes and fought against the tears that threatened to well up. “Is Elisa worth so much less than Edwardo?” she whispered. His old hand reached across the table and with surprising firmness for his age raised her eyes to his.

“You are my family, Elisa. My blood, in my veins through my son, to yours. Nothing can erase that! Of course I am saddened that when you marry your name will change, but for that you will never leave the family. So much that I hoped you would be a good father and a worthy successor to your father once he took my place is replaced by the certainty of the mother you will be. It is enough, and I am happy. And, should I be blessed to live to see you married, then I will toast to your happiness and offer my condolence to your husband that his own blood is no match for the fierce Diaz fire in your veins!”

“Papy! You don't even know him!”

“How can I?” he shot back. “My nieta is so embarrassed of her family she has not brought him to be met...” Elisa hauled out her PTN.

“You want me to call him and invite him over now?”

His smile was cagy behind the cigar smoke. “If you like.”

It turned out Thomas would like to meet more of the family, and while he had already eaten lunch, this was fortuitous as far as Hėctor was concerned. When Thomas had arrived twenty minutes later, introductions were scarcely out of the way before the patriarch of the Diaz clan scooped up Elisa's intended and marched him off to the bar, shooing away Elisa and telling her to go have lunch with her sister.

Elisa found and sat at the table in little courtyard where Juanita and Juan were exchanging small talk over chips and salsa. It was not lost on Elisa that from this vantage point Juanita could keep her son in eyesight at the orchard below them at all times. She poured some of the salsa into a small dish from a stack of several and heaped in extra jalapenos from a second dish next to the decanter of the salsa. She stirred the new mixture with a tortilla chip and tasted it to see if it met with her approval. Juanita had never liked things as spicy as Elisa cared for them. "So," Juanita began delicately. "Your voicemail said you had something for me? Some kind of form or expense report for saving Raul?"

Elisa took a sip of her beer to clear her mouth and shook her head. "No charge for family, Juanita." She rummaged through her purse to finally remove a small rosewood box which she offered. "Lo siento, mi hermana, I should never have taken this."

Tears welled up in Juanita's eyes as she took the box that contained the precious heirloom. She opened it to let the light play on the golden crucifix within in and the ancient rosary it hung from, before she sniffed and shook her head offering the box back. "N… No, Elisa, you are the oldest daughter, it's yours…"

"I may be the oldest daughter now," she replied gently pushing the box back towards Juanita, who even though she looked older than Elisa she was in fact younger. The fact that her older sister could pass for her daughter was one of many things Juanita and Elisa had argued about over the years. "But not when this was promised to you. Mother wanted you to have it."

"But I don't have a daughter…!" Juanita protested.

Elisa smiled and shook her head. "And I have no children at all!" She sighed and put her hand over her sister's hand. "Look, if you don't have a daughter before menopause and I do, I'll hold it in trust for her. If I don't and you don't we'll give it to Carmen for her daughter. All right?"

At the mention of the name of the youngest of the Diaz sisters, Juanita's face darkened. "You and this polite gringo of yours had best produce a daughter!" She ordered. "I won't risk that whore pawning…"

"Now, now," scolded Juan. "This is a happy occasion!"

"Agreed!" Elisa exclaimed as she dipped in a chip to the salsa and appreciated it. "What have you and Juan been talking about?" She asked as she motioned for her sister to put the box in her purse.

Juanita gave Elisa a reproachful glance she picked up her purse and carefully deposited the box within it. "What's this about you jumping out of spaceships?"

"Mi Dios en el cielo!" Elisa swore. "Do you think of nothing else?"

Juan was grinning. "Not lately," he replied flippantly. "As I recall you were running through trees?"

Cayos Miskitos, in the Western Caribbean, 18 years earlier

From a tree branch over eighteen meters off the ground, Elisa marked targets using the built-in vision amplifications in her helmet and shared them over the secured Wi-Fi link between her and the rest of her team. The sentries were beyond alert and well into nervous from the sounds of battle that were drifting from the airport and the docks. Atlántida's ammunition bunker exploded, sending a tremendous fireball up into the early morning light, causing the guards to flinch and finger their weapons more tightly.

Well, Bridget's voice said in her mind through her embedded implants and cyberwear. This looks like a grand time in the making.

Oh, it's not so tough, Elisa replied, also mentally. You've got six guys walking around pissing themselves with an interesting collection of obsolete battle rifles. I'm more worried about the two guys in the corner towers with the belt fed machine guns. Since I've been watching I haven't seen either of them flinch.

Todd Masters whispered voice inserted itself into the circuit. “Figure the walking guards are local toughs that were recruited, maybe press ganged. So the guys in the towers are either professional Mercs or deserters from real armies that have seen the elephant. They should be the primary targets."

Diaz sighed and looked down at the humanoid shaped figures that were only slightly warmer than the jungle around them. Both the fury armor and the Myrmidons combat uniforms were excellent at disguising heat signatures, but nothing was perfect. Look on the bright side, she thought at the group. None of them have night vision or FLIR or they'd already be shooting at us. If we all try to go in we'll just open up a can of worms.

"You have a better idea?" Master's voice demanded.

Yes, she thought. Bridget and I take out the north corner tower. From there she and I infiltrate, locate, and retrieve the hostages while you all remain out here as a distraction force.

Elisa and Bridget shared a glance as Todd's voice declared, "That's practically a suicide mission!"

No, Bridget's voice corrected him softly. Thinking you can sneak two heavy power frames and a squad of Myrmidons inside that perimeter without being noticed… That's suicide. You boys wait here and if we squawk for help you can come as loud and hard as you like.

"But…"

No but's, Elisa told him. Everything has a price, it's time for Bridget and I to start settling accounts. She forced a smile she didn't feel so it would be heard in her voice. Back before you know it! Without another word the two Furies leapt out through the trees, carefully working their way closer to the tower. They got as close as they dared when Elisa drew her pistol and began to thread the muffler back onto the end of the barrel.

Bridget looked at the tower, still a significant distance away, then back at Elisa. Long shot for a pistol, she worried. Diaz shrugged and brought up all her target assistance programs. The computer implanted in her skull obligingly overlaid a pair of target reticles, one of the guards fore head where she wanted the bullets to travel and one showing where the gyroscope approximated her pistol was pointing.

I don't have a silencer for the rifle, she thought at Bridget as she steadied herself against the tree and brought the pistol up. Once the two reticles were overlaying with each other she looked down to make sure none of the guards were close enough to hear her target fall.

Elisa swallowed, coming to grips with her feelings as she contemplated the action she was about to undertake. The soldiers on the roof had been readying a weapon to use against her coworkers and friends. They knew they were under attack and were actively defending themselves. This was much closer to murder and she wasn't sure if she was going to comfortable with it. As the seconds ticked by she clicked her safety off and steeled herself. Do you want me…?

Bridget's offer was drowned out by the soft report of the pistol and the mechanical clack of the slide moving against the recoil spring. The nine millimeter hollow point burrowed into the soldiers fore head just above where his eyebrows met. His head was snapped back from the force of the impact and he staggered back against the back wall of the tower before his legs gave out and he crumpled to the floor of the Lookout box at the top of the tower without falling out. In her mind's eye, Elisa imagined the hollow point expanding in the guards brain, imagined the hydrostatic shock wave that the impact would have sent out turning his brain to jelly and killing him almost instantly. Over her vision, the computer painted:

Lethality probability 100% kill confirmed

Elisa returned the weapon to safe, and lowered it her trigger finger rigid against the frame. My responsibility, she thought at her friend.

Juanita's dark complexion paled as her face pulled into a exaggerated expression of shock and disbelief. Even Juan had his exuberance for the war story dampened considerably. "How," she asked after a long moment of awkward silence. "How can you sit there and eat nachos and admit to… To…?"

Elisa raised an eyebrow. "Murder?" She asked in a dangerously quiet and mild tone. "That's what you're thinking, isn't it? Well it isn't. I don't feel the need to go into a long, technical explanation; suffice to say that once the old United States started employing private military contractors to wage war, corporations by default began to enjoy the same powers as countries. Waging war is one of those powers."

Juanita sighed, and shook her head. "Never mind the legalities, mi hermana,"she said causing Elisa's expression to brighten considerably. "How can you be so calm about it?"

The tortilla chip, laden with salsa, stopped halfway to Elisa's mouth and was slowly sat back down on the dish. "If I am calm," she replied quietly, "it is because I am a good Catholic, I confessed my sin, and was forgiven for it. I've made my peace with God for every one of the lives I've taken, because the computer in my head would not let me forget a single one of them. Do you know how many sins you have committed, mi hermana? I do, and I can never forget."

"You know how many…?" Juan asked softly.

Elisa did not take her eyes off her sister's face. "Killed, wounded, scarred for life; yes, Juan, I know exactly how many. Don't ask me; I won't answer, and if I would you really don't want to know. Father Leonard says I should think of myself as a policeman or soldier doing violence on behalf of society. Forgiven by God because sometimes force is required to maintain civilization. I hope he's right, I hope he speaks for God, because if he doesn't then I have a terrible accounting awaiting me."

"And while you were carrying that burden," Juanita whispered. "I was calling you horrible names and blaming you for what wasn't your fault. Lo siento, mi hermana!" Juanita rounded on Juan and shook her finger at him. "You! You stop making her remember this! Satisfy your prurient interests on some combat porn website…"

Elisa shook her head and placed a cautioning hand on Juanita's arm. Smiling, she said, "Don't take out your embarrassment on Juan, Juanita. For one thing it probably does me good to talk about this, and I can't say for certain that my life choices had nothing to do with what happened with Papa…"

Juanita covered her sister's hand with her own. "You may have been the reason he got drunk, but you didn't put the knife in his hand."

The beer was as bitter in her mouth as was the memory of finding her dead parents in her mind. "Maybe I'm not as comfortable anymore with lines that fine." She leaned back as the waiter arrived with their orders to give them room to place the plates in front of them.

"Plato caliente," the waiter cautioned as he sat them down.

"Gracias," Elisa murmured as she picked up the decanter of salsa and drizzled it over her plate.

"Don't beat yourself up!" Juanita commanded. "Haven't I done enough of that for you over the years?" Elisa forced a smile before placing a forkful of burrito in her mouth and chewing. "If this is helping you, perhaps you should continue? What happened after… After the guard?"

Cayos Miskitos, in the Western Caribbean, 18 years earlier

The main administration building for the island was a nightmare; the walls were riddled with bullet holes and blood spatter. It had been thoroughly looted and whatever bodies had fallen in the pools of blood left to dry behind had been moved. Even the florescent tubes overhead flickered off and on in a static pattern as if horrified by the carnage they had witnessed below.

Elisa and Bridget were not silent witnesses to the slaughter and added 3 bodies of their own to the carnage; two that Elisa had triple tapped into the hereafter with her pistol, one that Bridget had gutted like a fish and then carved into fillets with her glass edged daikatana. The mortal remains of the thugs had been stuffed into side rooms and closets, their weapons stuffed into a bag to help arm their soon to be released captives.

They had agreed the most likely place for the survivors to be held was the employee cafeteria, both large enough to hold everyone as well as having food as they had to eat. The two had thus entered through the loading dock and made their way up through the storage pantry to the kitchen. The kitchen door had a pair of guards, not looking into the cafeteria and their hostages, but out, towards the loading dock in their direction as they nervously gripped the battle rifles in their hands.

Nothing is ever easy, Elisa's hands said to Bridget, but the blonde's eyes twinkled through the visor of her helmet and it was clear she was smiling.

You want to live forever? Her hands demanded.

Just my old age, Elisa's replied as she drew her knife. The two Erinyes bumped their fists and silently drifted apart to slowly make their way around, each to approach their own target from his side, rather than directly. As it happened, Fortune was fickle and just as Elisa was stepping from the shadows, her target leaned against the wall, obviously bored and happened to look right at her. His eyes went wide as the armored form of the Fury silently crossed the distance between them, her arm already swinging.

Her off hand struck his chin, knocking his head up, exposing his throat as her knife raked across it, severing jugular vein, trachea and carotid artery in a spray of blood. His cry of alarm never left his now open throat, but his finger had been on the trigger of his rifle and as he died it fired with a deafening report in the silence. The corpse slid down the wall, joining his fellow in bloody death as Bridget shook her head. “I can't take you anywhere,” she whispered as the radio on the dead man’s shirt squawked to life.

“Quién disparó?” the speaker demanded. “Todas las unidades informan!”

Elisa took the radio as the two women opened the door from the kitchen into the cafeteria, intending to further confuse the enemy, but what they saw shocked the two women into stunned silence. They had stepped into an abattoir. The walls and floor were covered in half congealed blood, nearly an inch deep from the bodies, piled on top of each other where they had been machine gunned. Some seemed to have died, trying to rush the door, perhaps where the murderer had been firing from, the others were piled along this wall, obviously trying to flee into the kitchen.

Several bodies had been pulled over to make sure no one survived by virtue of being at the bottom of a pile of bodies.

Diaz was filled with a white hot rage as she brought the radio to her lips and growled into it, “Voy a matarte a todos!”

“¿Quien es este? ¡Alarma! Intrusos!”

Bridget's voice was hard and cold over the radio, not the private channel of the forward team, but the all call circuit that any Themis radio would receive. “No Quarter!” she growled, sheathing her knife and resetting the G36 to full auto. “They murdered all the hostages! Masters! Loud and hard!”

The two Furies began to run, back out the way they'd come, just as their Myrmidons opened the gates of Hell. The constant drone of automatic weapons fire blossomed across the island. Unleashed, the Myrmidon dogs of war were ravenous as explosions and fireballs began to sprout like red gold flowers in the jungle as the Infax employees extracted a brutal vengeance for their fallen.

Golden light from the morning Sun fell on a nightmare of explosions, spatters of blood, the cries of the wounded and the moans of the dying. As the light became better, the invaders resistance stiffened as they could now see as well as the technologically superior Myrmidons and Furies, but it was valor in the face of hopeless odds. The old rifles and grenades only prolonged a foregone conclusion as the numbers of the Junta's forces fell from surgically placed fire by trained, hardened killers.

By mid-morning the few survivors were throwing down their weapons and begging for mercy, receiving cruel butt strokes from the Myrmidon's rifles before being thrown to the ground and hogtied. 'General' Alejandro Esteban was captured trying to reach a small motor boat to flee in. Cayos Miskitos was firmly back in the hands of Themis.

“All of them?” Juan asked softly.

Elisa used the last of her beer to wash the final bite of the excellent fajita she had been enjoying from her mouth. “All of them,” she affirmed softly. “As near as we could figure, as soon as the heavy's hit the deck, Esteban had ordered his hostages machine gunned. Secretaries and clerks, administrators, they weren't fighters, they were predominately there to oversee the operations in the region, not participate.”

“What did you do with him?” Juanita asked as if she was afraid of the answer.

The Fury shrugged her indifference. “Me personally? Nothing. He was turned over to Major Hawk along with the other prisoners. As I understand it, the intel boys figured out who did the machine gunning, and the others, except Estabon were given the choice to go back to ' Honduragua' or some other point of origin if they could prove they were press ganged, though a number did ask about joining Themis, they were told in no uncertain terms we weren't interested.”

“What happened to the...the murderers?” Juanita wanted to know.

Elisa's face darkened. “Nothing good,” she growled. “And nothing I'll admit to here.”

“Oh,” the younger sister whispered.

“Major Hawk sent a note back to whomever ended up on top of the power vacuum left by 'General' Estabon basically saying 'We held back this time. We won't in future.' And a...token...of just how unforgiving we'd be.” Elisa paused to give a dark chuckle at the puzzled looks of her younger siblings. “A box. With Estabon's head in it.”

“How horrific!” Juanita declared. “Isn't that a...war crime? Or...something? I don't do criminal law.”

“It's only a war crime if you lose, mi hermana,” Diaz corrected her softly. She sighed and shook her head. “Then, we...”

She couldn't continue as from the front of the restaurant there was a stattico burst of automatic weapons fire over cries of terror and alarm, until finally a rough voice shouted, “Everybody be cool! This is a robbery!”