“Hold up,” Leah ordered to the driver.

The convoy rolled to a stop as Leah drew her binoculars.

“What you got, boss?” Dwayne asked.

She narrowed onto her target. “It’s humanoid, that’s for sure.”

“Think it might be a hollow.”

“No. They’re moving away from us.”

“Could be another dreg then.”

“Could be. Only one way to find out.” She drew her radio and put in the order.

Their engines hissed into action, and the trucks moved to intercept, spreading wide across the dusty plains to form the widest net. Leah’s rig barreled through the center as their target got larger and more clear. Thinned brown hair puffed out over a masculine face, revealing a Mark along the cheek that tore into his muscles beneath, along with some exposed teeth down to the gums. Much like her own Mark that she kept hidden below her scarf.

They made it within a hundred yards before the wanderer gave up his escape, knelt his head down, and threw his arms in the air. Their truck parked nearby, and Leah stepped out alone while Dwayne took aim from the minigun turret behind.

She held out her own hands wide to calm her target.

“Easy there, my friend,” Leah said. “You look like you can use some help.”

The guy kept his head bowed. His teeth grit where exposed.

“Can you talk?” Leah asked while the quiet lingered. “Gonna be a boring conversation if it’s on my own.”

“Yes,” he said at least.

“Then look me in the eye and let’s see where this goes.”

He raised his eyes slowly. The telltale red of a rezzer stained his irises, twisting what once must have been blue into deep violet. But hollowing had been hitting him hard, for a mantle of white cataracts had dimmed those same eyes into something duller and lighter.

“I’m Tristan,” he said. “Please, d-d-don’t hurt m-me.”

“My name’s Leah, and if I planned to kill you, it would’ve happened by now.”

Tristan blinked a few times as he considered the thought. “I j-j-just want to g-get aw-w-way.”

“Get away from where?”

“Not w-w-where. Them.”

“Okay. Then who is ‘them’?”

Tristan grit his teeth, his eyes watering.

“Come on, Tristan,” Leah said. “We were doing so well. In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve got enough firepower here to turn everything that you’ve ever seen into a pile of dust.” The other two trucks parked nearby as if to strengthen the point. “Why don’t we take a step back? Where did you come from, and what happened to cause you to leave? Tell me everything you can remember.” She turned around and snapped a finger. One of her guards nodded. “We’ve got all the time in the world.”

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Another moment came and went before Tristan dared to speak. It was a nightmare understanding his story with such thick stutters, but Leah did her best to follow along. Her guard brought him some fresh meat, though the rest of her entourage stayed in the trucks behind. The guy was jittery as shit.

Apparently, Tristan belonged to an Enclave northeast. Perhaps as far as Utah, where the land was more fertile. He and a dozen others had gotten by raising a flock of sheep in a closed-off valley. From how he told it, they had formed a pretty strong community, with a palisade wall they doused in undead ichor to keep the hollows away and a couple spare guns to kill anything smarter. They even had some kind of election system to decide who’d be in charge, though Tristan never entered. All things considered, it might have been one of the most robust Enclaves out there.

Until someone else showed up.

“And who were they?” Leah asked.

“The Beholders,” Tristan said, blinking back tears. “They p-p-promised us salv-v-vation, b-but it was a l-l-lie.”

“They killed you as soon as they got in?”

He shook his head. “No, w-worse! We h-h-had to be b-baptized, they said. But it changed the others. It m-made them unr-r-recognizable. They forgot who they w-w-were.”

“In what way?”

“Just… Dif-f-ferent. They couldn’t th-think the s-s-same anymore. Their minds w-w-were trans-f-formed!”

What the hell could do that? Leah considered the possibilities but came up short. Too little information.

She handed him another hunk of meat. “Tell me about the Beholders, Tristan. What did they look like?”

“C-c-cloaks,” he coughed out. “Some with w-white. Others in b-b-black. The black cloaks w-were the most d-d-dangerous. They murdered Tobias when h-h-he refused to d-d-do their baptism.”

Leah perked an eyebrow at the sound of black cloaks. “Do you mean the Inquisitors?”

His pupils flashed in terror. “How d-did you know!?”

That proved it. “I think it’s time that you come with us.” If this guy had come across the same group that targeted Liam, she needed to get him back home, fed up, and properly interrogated. She held out a hand. “Don’t worry, I’ll protect you.”

Tristan looked at the bloody remnants of the free meal he’d received and licked his lips. “You m-m-mean it?”

“Yes. We’ve got a whole city of our kind waiting for you. Just take my hand, and it’ll be yours too.”

“A whole world,” he repeated before putting his palm in hers. She led him back to the truck, nice and easy.

But the moment they drew near, Tristan suddenly froze. One of Charon’s men opened the door for them, revealing his long black cloak that fell to the ground.

“No!” Tristan shrieked.

“Calm down,” Leah said. “He’s one of mine, not them.”

“Liar!” Tristan yanked himself free and swung his leg out. Leah tumbled into the dust.

Damn it. By the time she’d gotten her bearings, Tristan had cleared a healthy distance, bumbling away in a movement that was somewhere between an uncoordinated sprint and a stumble.

“Go!” Leah ordered her crew. “I want you to bring him to me. Alive!”

The lead truck roared in pursuit while Leah chased on foot, her own steps precise and disciplined. She couldn’t let him get away. She couldn’t afford to lose her only lead. If that meant hacking off Tristan’s arms and legs and throwing him in the barrel, then that was how this would go down.

This wasn’t just about Liam anymore. If there was a group out there strong enough to take out entire Enclaves and fucking with their reservoirs to boot, then it would be on her to beat them. Pandemonium’s security couldn’t be allowed to lapse. She needed to know who they were, where they came from, and most importantly, how many they had in their ranks.

She almost had him. Tristan scaled a hill where the truck couldn’t chase, but one of the guards crawled onto the roof with a harpoon gun and took aim. Any second now, they would have him.

But then the truck hit a bump as the shot went off. The harpoon flew high where it should’ve gone low. Leah was powerless as a puff of black mist burst from Tristan’s scalp. Right where the spear struck.

“Shit!” the guard swore. “Sorry about that, boss.”

Leah stared blankly. Just like that, she was back to where she started.

Alone and without answers.