Chapter 10: Word of Honor

The rain was at a lull in the mid-afternoon gloom, and while our “copycat” biometric indications showed no immediate threat, I coordinated with Juanita and Dmitri, and things switched around considerably for an hour or so. Dmitri himself joined Juanita and “guard-dog” Sally in the barn’s upper floor for a bit of intense prisoner interrogation, which I hoped would not include some of the “enhanced” techniques I’d heard about in the CIA. Sofia and Wanda moved to the south bunker and waited there, while Doriana and I trudged to the lodge for a hot shower and change of clothes. Mrs. G fussed over little Rocko for a few minutes. The pooch really loved that lady, but there wasn’t a lot she could do, under the circumstances; and he curled up and went to sleep on a blanket in a warm corner of the kitchen as she began preparing the evening meal.

Leisurely showers with Doriana rank high on my “best things to do” list, but we felt rushed. We also felt guilty that our actions had caused a confrontation that might otherwise have been avoided; and while I had long since verbalized my forgiveness to my shower mate, she kept asking for it, over and over. Finally, when she started in on the topic of “that poor man might still be alive if...” I tried to insert a liberal dose of logic; telling her that he and his ilk were here to kill us. Period. His actions bespoke the truth of that supposition. And we could only imagine what Hyphen had in store for Sadie. Something a bit more emphatic than just a quick death, we could be sure. That seemed to placate her, but I felt compelled to hold her in my arms for many minutes as the warm water sluiced over us.

We dressed in dry clothes and put the filthy duds in one of the washers in the basement, asking Mrs. G if she could switch them to the dryer after dinner sometime. She questioned us about the puppy adventure, but we cut things short in an effort to get back to our posts. Hannah was right. It DID seem like a long walk, especially when the rain picked up again. But eventually, we were back at our station in the south bunker. Sofia and Wanda greeted me with kisses, but they really wanted to provide comfort to Doriana, and I allowed the three of them to huddle by themselves for twenty minutes, chatting and hugging. I heard a few tears being shed, as well, but I didn’t intervene. When Mrs. G sent them a text message that dinner was nearing completion, they left in their golfcart, and we were back to our normal wartime footing.

The tablets issued a “ding,” alerting us to an incoming message, and we all had to acknowledge that we’d tune in for another SITREP conference at five o’clock, in thirty minutes. The tablet that we kept ever-present with the troop locations hadn’t shown any other movement of forces, but I did notice one peculiar thing about how they seemed to interact with each other. I’d bring it up to the group when we had our video meeting. Doriana and I made sure everything in our area was prepared for action, then we cozied up in front of the tablet as it counted down below the one-minute mark.

“Many tings change,” Dmitri informed us. “Jacob’s prisoners, dey give us much information. Also, dey say dey wants to defect and fight with us.”

“The problem,” Juanita interrupted, “is as old as military history itself. How much credence do we give deserters? How much faith and trust do we put into the hands of people who are proven traitors to the other side?”

“Where are they now?” I asked.

“We have them here,” Juanita said. “They’re handcuffed and waiting in a room down the hall where they can’t hear what we’re saying.”

“Sadie,” I continued, “were you there for this interrogation?” She nodded. “What was your impression of these ladies?”

Our scientific member of the family smiled. “I liked them. Especially the smaller one, Linda. I thought she was sweet. But I’m not an expert on military intelligence.”

“Juanita,” I told her firmly. “Please go get our two prisoners. I want to see them. I want to ask them one question. I want them, and everyone, to hear what I have to say.”

She was obviously studying my image in the video display very closely for a very long ten seconds. Finally, she nodded, got up and left the scene.

“What you doin’, Jacob?” Dmitri asked sternly. “You hire me to run military operation. You don’t trust my opinion on dis?”

“I trust you implicitly, Dmitri; and I value your opinions very highly. But that doesn’t mean I can’t make my own decisions. Juanita mentioned military history. Generals have had to answer to their civilian presidents for all of OUR history, and they often have to alter plans and develop new strategies because of their orders. I could ask the other members of my group for their concurrence, if you’d like to take a vote.”

“I will ALWAYS back any decision from Jacob,” Wanda interjected. “All in favor?”

There was a loud chorus of “Ayes” from the various participants of the video conference, with Hannah’s voice ringing the loudest.

“Don’t argue with the president,” Juanita said sternly, sitting back down. The two women from our skirmish down the hill were standing behind her, their hands behind their backs. I assume they were still handcuffed.

“I not argue with YOU, Juanita,” Dmitri groused. “I keep havin’ argument wit Jacob all de time! Including dis one!”

“Francine,” I said, “I’m sorry I didn’t introduce myself properly earlier. I’m Jacob Jones.”

“Hero of the Apocalypse,” she said, nodding.

“Um ... no,” I said. “Anyway, Juanita once explained that several of your contingent, out in the desert, had sort of ‘paired up,’ romantically. She also gave us the impression that there were two women that had become involved with each other. From what I saw earlier today, I am assuming you are those women. Not that it’s any of my business, but may I ask if that’s correct?”

The two handcuffed women looked at each other, and the taller, elder of them faced the monitor again. “Yes. I love her unconditionally. She is my ... everything!”

“It was rather obvious from your actions,” I responded. “And now: I am given to understand that you wish to change sides in this little altercation and fight for us. Is that also correct?”

“Yes,” she answered immediately, but offered nothing else. I believe I saw it in her eyes. She knew that there was an argument about this among us, questioning whether or not they could be trusted. She also believed that anything else she said could be misconstrued and used against her cause. This was one sharp lady.

“You know what I’m going to ask you to do, don’t you Francine?”

She gawked openly at what was undoubtedly my image on a screen in front of her. Of course, in video calls, images rarely lined up with the camera lens, and she was staring at a spot slightly to the left. “Are you for real?” she asked incredulously. “Is that REALLY what you’re going to base your decision on?”

“Do it!” I ordered. “Not just to me, but to everybody here! Do it now!” There was a very long pause. It didn’t look as if anybody was breathing.

Francine stood as straight as possible under the circumstances. “I give everyone here my word of honor that I will serve and fight only on your behalf. I will give my life, if necessary, to protect you.”

“Please remove her handcuffs, Juanita,” I said. “She’s one of us now. How about you, Linda? Do you also give us your word of honor?”

“Um ... yes,” she said softly.

Again, there was a long silence. “Uh ... Jacob...” Professor Gonzales began.

“I have to agree with Francine, Jacob,” Juanita told me. “Are you for real?”

“Jacob,” Dmitri urged. “She a deserter from her last command! You just take her word?”

“Her word of honor, Dmitri,” I argued. “Granted, I don’t rightly know the value of that; but I have to ask. What is the value of YOUR word? What is the value of your honor?” He gawked openly at the camera. “I am inclined to give both of those attributes the highest priority when dealing with a man or a woman in uniform, unless proven otherwise. Am I wrong? So far, everything this woman has said and done leads me to believe her.”

After several seconds of no comments, Wanda muttered: “Long, loud silence. My big oaf wins again with his faith in others.”

Juanita was unlocking the handcuffs. I don’t think she intended to be heard by the rest of us, but the microphone picked it up. “I always liked you, Francine. Please, please, please don’t let us down.”

As soon as the cuffs were dispensed with, the two women flung themselves into each other’s arms, and clung to one another almost desperately.

“Get a room!” Wanda groused. Finally, there were some laughs and the mood of distrust abated, at least somewhat.

“Please get some chairs and join the meeting, ladies,” I told them. “Dmitri, before we get on with our SITREP, may I ask a question about something I’ve observed from the bio-scan Sadie developed for us?”

The Russian was clearly ill-at-ease with how this entire meeting was going. “Uh ... What you want to know?”

“Can you put the scan of their main base up on the monitor, Sadie?” I asked. It took about five seconds, but the display filled their portion of the screen. “Look at the person up at the top, about one o’clock. Sorry, I don’t have any way to point it out to the group from here.”

A cursor circled one yellow dot. “This one?”

“No. The one next to it. To the left.”

“This one?”

“Yes. Can you zoom in any further?”

“No. That maximum magnification.”

“Well,” I told everyone, “that’s not just one person. It’s two.” There was dead silence again, I assumed because everybody was taking time to comprehend what I was saying. “I’m presuming that the only way for your scanned data points to merge is if they’re stacked with perspective to the receiver. I guess it’s possible that they brought bunk beds to sleep in, but I think that’s a little farfetched.” I paused again. The dot was moving slightly, back and forth. Then, as we watched, the single yellow dot split into two dots, very close together, but still moving very subtly, back and forth.

“Oh my God!” Wanda said loudly. “They’re fucking! That’s two people! And they’re fucking!”

“Yes, we know,” Dmitri said patiently. “Like I said, many tings we tink we know have changed. Dis one of dem. May I continue with meeting now, please?”

“Dmitri, my friend, please forgive me for interrupting you!” I told him earnestly. “By all means, get on with your briefing! I, for one, can’t wait to find out what this is all about!”

“From the very beginning,” Sadie said quickly, “I had problems with their headcount. You’re right, Jacob; their dots do keep merging. At the very least, some appeared to be very close to each other. But the truth never dawned on me. The info that Francine and Linda brought us is ... well ... bizarre, to say the least.”

Dmitri wrested back control of the meeting. “Our enemy’s numbers far fewer den we tought,” he told us loudly. “About tirty percent of dose dots ... dey camp followers!”

“What?!” my teacher asked incredulously.

“Uh ... What’s a camp follower?” Sofia asked.

“The night before The Event,” Francine told us, “our leader sent out six of his trusted lackeys and lured twenty women from escort services onto the base, where they were drugged and detained. There’s a ‘team doctor’ in our ranks, Doctor Ronsler.”

“A super-creepy dude,” Sally-on-the-right told us.

“Ronsler and Barrington-Smythe did something to them,” Francine said, her voice breaking. The team in the barn had switched the video display back again so that we could all see one another. Our former prisoner was openly crying. She tried to say something further, but seemed unable.

“If you don’t mind, I’ll summarize what I think happened,” Juanita said, taking over. “Together, Doc Ronsler and Doctor Hyphen apparently used a regimen of illegal drugs, hypnotic mind control, and perhaps even surgery, to make these ladies docile, submissive playthings. There was talk of implanting some sort of device into their brains or something, though nobody seems to know if that’s real or if it was just some urban legend. Whatever the actual process was, each girl they employed it on became a sort of satisfied, bimbo-like version of a jack-off internet story. Hyphen decided to use the sexual lure of the women to entice the men to stay and provide his military entourage.

“But it didn’t work, of course. The women in the unit obviously wanted nothing to do with something like this. The men in charge tried to entice Francine here with the same argument they were suggesting to the guys, figuring that a dominant lesbian’s attitude toward keeping women sex slaves was the same as the average horny male. They also really NEEDED her with them. Francine was the unit’s only trained combat medic. As it turned out, hesitating to give them an answer saved her; but it didn’t save little Linda here.

“After the Sallys and I took off, there were nine military women left in the group. Three of them bolted right after we did, and according to Francine, one of them made it and was never seen again. The other two were captured by the guys. Then the whole lot of them were shot up with drugs and thrown in with the escort girls. All except Francine. She tells us that she pretended to be ‘one of the guys’ in hopes of snatching Linda and escaping. She insists that she told them she’d fight with them as long as she could have Linda as payment when this campaign was over.”

Juanita took a deep breath before continuing. “So, follow my numbers here. With the four of us gone, along with one woman fighter, who escaped, there were thirty-one men on that base, including one medical doctor and the boss. There was one lesbian soldier. And, with the conversion of our remaining seven women fighters into forced sexual slavery, there were twenty-seven female non-combatants.

“Since then, three of the men, all previously married, I might add, have gone AWOL. During the fuel stop in Klamath Falls, three more literally flew the coop: two pilots and a mechanic, who were also part of the fighting force.”

“Twenty-five,” I said aloud.

“I’m not finished yet,” Juanita continued. “Ronsler, the medical man, along with five other men and fifteen slave-women, stayed to hold down the fort in Arizona. The vast majority of their military hardware is there, after all; and they couldn’t just leave it unguarded. If you recall our analysis yesterday, we thought we were facing 28 combatants. Well, evidently, eleven of those were non-fighting ladies, brought along to provide sexual comfort to the troops. One of those was Linda. Of the SEVENTEEN actual combatants they had this morning, one was killed and one was Francine. Also, I don’t think Doctor Hyphen counts as a fighter. So...”

“Fourteen,” several of us said at once.

“That’s all they have?” Sofia asked in amazement.

“Dat NOT all they have!” Dmitri barked. “Keep big picture, peoples!” He waited for the commotion to die down. “Dey gots bomber drones, but we don’t know how many. And, dey got extra bombs for dose drones; but again, we don’t know how many of dose, eeder. And, dey got robots.”

“Robots?” Wanda asked, appalled. “What kind of robots?”

“According to Francine, at least two dogs and four bi-peds! She don’t know about track robots. But any of dose very deadly.”

“Dogs?” Sofia asked, enthralled.

“Robot trackers?” Wanda chimed in.

“We gots no time for dis, peoples! We brief you later!”

“I have to know,” I said firmly. “How did Linda go from being a ... um ... camp follower to an armed combatant this morning?”

We watched as Juanita turned to the woman now sitting beside her. “Care to answer that, Francine?”

The new member took a deep breath. “This morning in camp, there were suddenly these paper fliers all over the place. ‘Come to the main gate,’ they said. ‘Switch sides.’ Linda had been used by one of the guys through the night. Since her ... um ... conversion, she’s been very popular. But, when she was through, I found her and we started talking. Somehow, I don’t think I was the only one thinking of taking you up on your offer. But I WAS the only one who got spotted making plans. One of the commanders in the squad, Randy, saw us. He went to the boss ... um ... to Hyphen, and suggested Linda and I be on the first recon mission. The drones could fly programmed routes, but they couldn’t SEE anything in the rain. So anyway, Linda got back in uniform and went up with us. She was meant to be incentive. Randy was always behind us. I never had a chance to run. And if I had tried, I knew I’d never see Linda again. She was on the mission as insurance.”

“Okay, that makes sense,” I said. “Thank you for explaining.”

“Drones!” Juanita shouted. “Drones inbound!”

“Okay, everybody shut up and follow what I say!” Dmitri said firmly. “Sadie, you gots MTI operative?”

There was a pause. “Yes,” she said calmly. “MTI seems to be working optimally. Three targets. Wait a minute. Four targets inbound. Launching interceptors. First drone away! Second drone away! Dmitri, I’m sending you targeting now.”

“Everybody puts on your intercom earphones!” Dmitri ordered. “Sallys, gets to your battle stations!”

There was a long pause, during which we shoved our earphones into place. “What’s MTI?” Doriana asked, but I put a hand on her elbow and shook my head, letting her know she should keep silent. Everybody seemed to have the same idea. Nobody said a word for a long half minute.

“Jacob, dey arrives at your post first. Be ready!”

I touched my earpiece. “Ready for what, exactly?

“When I tell you,” Juanita said, “I want you and Doriana to move as fast as you can to the east end of the bunker!”

Doriana gave me a questioning look, and I shrugged. I had no idea what was happening or why.

“NOW!” Juanita shouted. It was getting dark in the structure, and before Doriana had taken ten steps, she stumbled and fell. I scooped her up in my arms and sprinted for the end of the bunker for all I was worth. One of the guns began firing rhythmically, at a rate which I judged to be about two rounds per second; a bang bang bang bang bang, that went on and on, and my partner put her hands over her ears. I wished I could do the same.

“Splash-One!” we heard Sadie shout. “I’ve always wanted to say that! We got one! Way to go, Dmitri! Three to go!”

“Sally! Are you on station?” Dmitri asked.

“Sally in the east bunker,” a voice said calmly.

“Sally in the west bunker,” an identical voice said.

“Jacob! Reload gun number two!”

Nobody saw my sour expression. I’d only just gotten us to the far end of the bunker. In addition to that, nobody had ever told me that the guns were numbered. However, only one of them had been firing, so that was obviously the one he was talking about. Sprinting back the way I’d just come, I reached that weapon and ejected the nearly-empty magazine. “Ouch!” shouted, though my ICS was deactivated and nobody except Doriana heard me. I had inadvertently touched the barrel of the weapon, and it was scorching-hot. Being more careful, I slapped a fresh mag into the thing and chambered the first round, then I started back toward my companion.

“Sally! Take cover!” Juanita screamed. I could only imagine both of them diving for the deck simultaneously. There was a bright flash of white that seemed to fill our bunker, and then a crack of thunder followed two seconds later.

“Splash-Two,” Sadie shouted. “Two down, two to go! I took it out with one of Jacob’s drones! The MTI programming works!”

This was all very confusing. Doriana and I hadn’t launched any drones. I wished now that I’d shut up at the beginning our meeting and let Dmitri brief us on all the “new things” he’d intended to.

“I’ve lost the second drone,” Sadie said. “It hit its target, but didn’t take it out. We’re launching one from the south bunker!”

I heard an unfamiliar hydraulic whine, and I looked out as the metal lid covering our drone emplacement lifted into the vertical. Almost immediately thereafter, I saw a drone launch vertically at a very high rate of speed; and the metal cover retracted again.

“Sally! Are you okay?” Juanita yelled.

“Sally in the east bunker: I’m just fine.”

It was an uncomfortably long silence that followed. “Sally?” Juanita asked again.

There was a long period of gunfire; another string of “bangs” that seemed to stretch on for many seconds, but it came from far away. I couldn’t guess at the direction.

“Um ... I’ve been hit in the leg,” Sally’s voice muttered weakly. “I ... um ... can’t seem to stop the bleeding. I’m ... uh ... applying a tourniquet.”

“Doriana!” Juanita ordered. “Grab your med kit and get to the west bunker. Now! Go!”

I looked up and was startled to find that my partner was no longer with me. I caught a glimpse of her as she raced out through the doorway into the late afternoon mist and rain. “On the way,” I heard her tell everyone through my earpiece.

“I tinks I got de one dat approached lodge,” Dmitri said matter-of-factly.

“I confirm,” Sadie said in a loud voice. “One to go! It’s the one that hit the west bunker! I think it’s returning to its to base on the south side of the mountain!”

“It sitting goose!” Dmitri said excitedly. “Chase it wit bomber drone you just launched! Get it before it makes it back!”

“Okay,” Sadie said in a determined voice. There was a long pause. “It’s no good,” she said, the descension in her spirits evident. “It’s pulling ahead! Our drone isn’t fast enough!”

“It too heavy!” Dmitri yelled. “Lighten load! Drop all its bombs!”

“Oh,” Sadie replied thoughtfully. “Okay. It’s clear of all our forces and structures. Here goes!”

I was looking out the front of the bunker toward the south. Only a few seconds later, there was a bright flash, followed by a cracking boom. Then there was another one. And another and another. All the detonations were occurring in those woods Doriana and I had gone to the edge of earlier in the day.

“It worked!” Sadie hollered. “Our drone is gaining fast! Theirs is almost home, though!”

“It has to slow down to land,” Dmitri said confidently. “Time to sacrifice our knight to take dare rook! No time for finesse, Sadie! Trust those MTI instruments of yours! Don’t slow down! Take de shot!”

“Holy shit!” Juanita exclaimed. “She did it! Her kamikaze drone hit theirs! She hit it!”

“Destroyed?” Dmitri asked.

“We have no way of knowing,” Juanita said thoughtfully. “Ours was flying at almost a hundred kilometers per hour, though. I don’t see how it could have possibly...” There was a long pause. “Oh, fuck!” She exclaimed. “Where the hell did she go?” Another pause. “Did anyone see her leave?”

“What going on?” Dmitri asked, startled.

“It’s Francine!” Juanita yelled. “Our former prisoner has flown the coop! I knew it! I knew we shouldn’t have trusted somebody who...”

“Is her lover, Linda, still there?” I asked.

“Oh. Um ... Yes. Yes, she’s still here. She’s in a chair in the corner, sound asleep.”

“She wouldn’t have left her behind,” I said confidently. “She’s still around somewhere, I guarantee it.”

“But where?”

“Francine is here,” Doriana told us.

“Where here?” Dmitri’s voice queried.

“The west bunker. Hannah, do we have something called a ‘trauma kit?”

“Already got it!” Hannah’s voice sounded breathlessly. “Almost there! Less than a minute!” She was obviously running.

“Sally,” Doriana continued, “Francine says she needs you. She says she has to give an immediate transfusion, and she doesn’t think there’s time to test for a match.”

“On my way! It’s all the way across the compound. Four minutes, maybe. Dmitri, the east bunker is unmanned. How’s she doing?”

“I don’t know,” Doriana answered. “She’s unconscious, and she’s horribly pale! Francine’s working on her. Hannah just got here with the big med kit. Francine’s getting everything ready now.”

“Three minutes,” Sally said.

“I’m O-positive,” the sheriff’s voice intoned.

There was a pause. “Francine says get your ass over here!” Doriana told him.

“I’m on the way.”

By my reckoning, two of the three other bunkers were now unmanned, and the other one had been turned into an ER. “Juanita, are there any hostile targets anywhere on the mountain right now?”

“Um ... no. Everything’s clear.”

“I’m going to wander over there, too. Sing out if you see anything coming our way.”

“Okay, Jacob.”

“And Sadie,” I continued, “congratulations on a decisive victory in our first defensive military engagement. You, too, Dmitri and Juanita. That was masterful! I think I’m going to sit down tonight and write an ode or something. Future generations need to remember this.”

“We can all sing it together when Sally’s better,” Juanita commented.

I put on a parka and wandered out into the rain. Instead of heading directly toward the bunker next door, I climbed at an angle back toward the lodge, the way Doriana and I had come after our shower. I took off my boots in the foyer; and carrying them, I found my way back to the “command room” where Dmitri and Mr. G made their decisions, monitored the cameras and shot the mounted guns in the bunkers. Our Russian commander was on a landline telephone, talking to Juanita in the barn’s control center. When he saw me, he said his goodbyes and hung up. He walked over to me and we shook hands.

“You right about Francine,” he said. “I don’t tink she very good soldier, but she good person. She maybe save Sally.”

“She’s going to be okay?”

“Let’s go togedder, find out.”

The west bunker was just below the back of the lodge. As he waited for me on the porch to put my boots back on, I asked: “What’s MTI?”

“Moving Target Indicator. Part of old radar set from decades ago. Computer display, it eliminate all stationary returns. Only moving targets show up on scope. Dat make dem easy to identify, track and shoot down. Sadie send me data for targeting guns. I get lucky and shoot a couple, yes? She use a couple your drones and fly dem into radar targets. Work pretty slick, no?”

“Yes,” I said thoughtfully.

It was only a short hike to the bunker. As I mentioned before, the interior of these things was always a little claustrophobic, in my opinion. But now, the place held half a dozen people, all huddled around two identical figures on the cold concrete floor. The Sallys were connected by a clear plastic tube carrying bright red blood from donor to recipient. Doriana and our newest addition, Francine, were bending over one of the pale Sally’s legs, their heads actually touching as they peered fixedly at a place where Hannah was shining two flashlights.

“There’s only one tube of glue in the trauma kit,” Francine was explaining. “We’re going to need it to close the wound itself, so hold some in reserve. The femoral is smaller than the iliac, which is farther up here. Remember, this is only a temporary fix. We’ve got to get her to a real surgeon, down in the Acton Hospital; and we’ll probably have three, maybe four days before we start worrying about gangrene, since we’ve restored at least partial blood flow. The bleeding has stopped. This is as good as we can hope for right now. Let’s start closing the wound.”

Doriana was totally enthralled. I don’t think she even knew we were there.

Dmitri tapped me on the arm and led me over to a pile of rubble closer to the left side of the bunker. There was rebar showing in places, but the structure would still discourage trespassers. “Metal splinter from explosion hit her in leg,” he explained. “Went trough witout hitting bone, but nicked artery. She passed out before she put on de tourniquet.”

He motioned me to follow, and we went out into the gathering night. Together, we climbed back to the lodge, but instead of going inside, he sat in one of the rocking chairs on the porch. I chose another one.

“Rain stop,” he said.

“Maybe. You never can tell.” We sat in silence for a while. “It’s getting warmer.”

“It don’t feel warmer to me. Cold as a witch’s tit.”

“Something’s going to change, though,” I told him. I thought a moment. “Why did you have us running back and forth in the bunker?”

“I tink you already figure out answer to dat one.”

“You think they’re specifically targeting bio-signatures,” I guessed. “You believe they’re trying to kill as many of us as possible, as rapidly as possible. You wanted us to present a sitting target and then shift quickly as they were preparing to deploy their bombs.”

He sighed heavily. “I was not able to watch dem all quick enough. Nearly got Sally killed.”

I nodded, and we were silent for a long time. “That’s what it feels like in the military, isn’t it? Everybody has a part to play, but very few of them know what’s actually going on. I’m not sure I could do that for a profession.”

“It not for everybody.”

It was really getting dark. We rocked in silence. “There’s one thing that we could do that they would never expect,” I said softly.

“Yes.”

Again, a hush seemed to fall all around us. “Are we going to do it?”