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His speech meets with affirmations and a sense of solidarity until someone in the back asks, "What about Starkey?"

Then everyone waits to see what Connor will say

"Starkey is one of us," Connor tells thele one of us be unwound"

- - -

With no one to fly the Dreaether Hayden, Ashley, and half a dozen others--some from the Holy of Whollies, and other kids he knows he can trust They eneral--and Connor pulls plan B out of thin air

"We set up two fronts--here, and here" He points to a hand-drawn h the north gate Once they’re in, we drive theht down the main aisle, then ambush from both sides, with about fifty of us"

"Live a we have Live a"

"They’ll have more than us," Ashley points out "No matter e do, they’ll outlast us"

"Yes, but it’s all about buying time," Connor tells her "When our ammo runs loe retreat to here--behind the fuel tanker, east of the fighter jets"

"Won’t they corner us?" another kid asks

"When they start to close in, we blow the tanker and run east"

"We’ll never h The second the fifty take on the Juvies,to the south" And on theout like a fan toward the remote southern fence "That fence is full of holes"

Hayden nods, getting it, and points to the main aisle "So if the fifty do their job here and then draw the Juvies to the east, keeping theed and distracted, by the time they realize everyone else is on the run, they’ll never be able to catch theht be able to round up some, but the others will ain, but at least they’ll be alive, and whole"

And then co question "What about the fifty?"

Finally Connor has to answer "We’ll be the sacrifices so the others can survive"

He can actually hear the click in Hayden’s Adam’s apple as he ss "So ," Hayden says

"Any of you who aren’t up for it, I won’t hold it against you if you leave," Connor says, but everyone knows that’s like the

"All right, good," he says when no one raises a hand "Each of you put together a teaainst the Juvies, then let the others know to start running when the alarht or turn seventeen"

"Why wait until the alarm sounds?" someone asks "Why not abandon the Graveyard now?"

"Because," Connor points out, "they’re watching our everyto bail, they’ll have squad cars lining that periet there, and they can pick us off like rabbits--but if all their forces are tied up in a single forward offensive, that’s e’ll have a back door"

They all approve of Connor’s logic He see by the seat of his pants

"How much time do we have?" Ashley asks

Connor lets Hayden field that one

"Days if we’re lucky," Hayden tells her "Hours if we’re not"

58 - Trace

While Connor has his su back to the Graveyard He had been called for an e with his "employers," to confirm that Graveyard AWOLs were responsible for the house fires in Tucson There was enough evidence to lay the attacks on the Graveyard’s doorstep--it made no sense to deny it What the suits from Proactive Citizenry wanted to knohy Trace hadn’t told them about these attacks ahead of time After all, that was his entire purpose there--to let the before it happened They refused to believe that he had been just as blindsided by it as they were

"Do you have any idea the position this puts us in?" they asked him "The Juvenile Authority wants to clean the place out, and with these attacks on civilian neighborhoods, on’t be able to stop theht you controlled them"