"I want every pistol, rifle, taser, kitchen knife and god-damn baseball bat in our barracks ASAP. Do you understand me Pierce? We need anything that can be used for defense. No breaks, no rest, no sleep. Affirmative?"

Moira briskly walked through the city headquarters. I lagged behind.

Pierce nodded. "Scavengers are on it, ma'am." He fell back, running to give orders to the rest of the scavenger captains.

She addressed Brigg without turning to look at him. "Tell me you have something we can fly," she said.

"Nothing yet, ma'am. But there's a lead on a potential helipad at a private residence the edge of London. Could be there's a helicopter there, but more likely than not the owner used it to escape London before the missile dropped."

"What about the Japanese aircraft that crashed into the Thames?" Moira asked.

"There's no way its flyable. It's been submerged for too long. The chances are so slim that-"

Moira stopped and put a finger into Brigg's chest. "The chances of us surviving at all are slim. Don't talk to me about what you can't do, tell me what you can do. Russia and China are slaughtering people. Families."

Her voice shook. There was more rage and emotion in her face than I'd ever seen. Moira was normally calm. In control. Now I could see tears forming in the corners of her eyes.

"They're killing kids," she said. "And we will do whatever we can to stop them. Understood?"

Brigg looked shocked. "Understood, ma'am."

Moira gave him a withering look and then marched outside. Soldiers fell into columns behind her, forming a personal guard. Outside, London-Chicago was mobilizing. Every armored vehicle the Scavengers could find was parked in Daley Plaza. In Millennium Park, new soldiers trained with makeshift weapons. Snipers lay on building tops, facing the gray mass of Void between us and them. Engineers retrofitted anti-aircraft to the tops of skyscrapers. Scavengers raided police precincts for body armor and bullets.

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Moira left Brigg and I standing in a mass of soldiers. They stared at us as if expecting trouble. Brigg led me behind a stone column in the courthouse, grabbed my arm, and spoke in an urgent whisper.

"Where's Lee?" he asked.

"Haven't seen her since the Observatory. I'd bet she's working on that stroke of genius she had," I said.

"It better be genius. Otherwise we're all going off the edge," he said.

I shook my head. "It doesn't make any sense," I said. "Why would they kill people at random? They didn't look like criminals."

"Isn't it obvious?" Brigg said, "they're thinning the herd. People take up resources. Anyone who can't contribute back is a drain on the city. Old people, people with disabilities, sick people..."

"Kids," I said. Shock settled over me like ice water. I couldn't believe I was saying it.

Brigg nodded. "Maybe in a few years they'd be good for something, but we're not dealing in years. We're dealing in days. They must be too. They must be out of food, close to being out of water. What doesn't make sense is..."

"What?" I asked.

"I almost don't want to say it. It's... inhuman. Look, if they were acting rationally, purely rationally, then they would see dumping those bodies into the void as wasteful. There's only so much to work with on these bedrocks and..."

Brigg raised a hand, unwilling, or unable, to finish his thought.

"You're talking about cannibalism," I said. "You're saying that its wasteful not to eat the bodies, if they're going to kill people."

"No! I mean. I don't know. I'm just thinking in terms of a closed system. There's water in those bodies. Nutrients, maybe not for eating directly but for fertilizer. Look, I'm just saying that this wasn't a purely logical move. Moscow-Beijing is terrified and they're acting irrationally. I'd bet anything the military has taken over completely and all the scientists are going off the edge next."

"You're saying we need to stop them. That's what Moira has been saying, but how -"

"No, Peter, listen to me," he said, grabbing my arms. "I'm not worried about stopping them. I'm worried about becoming them."

Brigg turned to me to face the window. Outside, Moira stood above a crowd of soldiers, giving an impassioned speech. Since news of the killings in Moscow-Beijing came to light, the people had rallied behind her war cry with almost religious fervor.

Brigg whispered, so that the soldiers couldn't hear us. "How long until anyone who doesn't agree with Moira's war goes off the edge?"