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Dallas, March, the fiftieth year of the Kurian Order: Four square miles of concrete and structural steel slehold of a siege

Save for the sounds of streetfighting, hard to locate thanks to reflections froely es catch the eye here and there, but huue stormlike rumbles un fire fro holes in a sidewalk in afro streets in a quick wave before the whine of shellfire can catch them in the open

Viewed from above, or on a headquartersD is now a network of opposing circles

The largest circle encoreat towers of the city center Linked above the twentieth floor by spiderweb-like cables that allow the sure-tentacled Kurians interbuilding access withoutwith their human herds at street level, they sho holes and pits and hollows frouns and rockets At street level s, defended by batteries of guns manned by everyone from professional soldiers to minor functionaries in what until last year had been the affluent and sprawling North Texas Cooperative

Surrounding that central axis are an assort the central battlements like the chambers in a revolver's cylinder The closest to the front lines are Texas regulars out of the Pinewoods and the Rio Grande belt; others to the north and east fly the tricolor of the Ozarks, and a few saps to the rear are clusters of militias made up of men and women freed from the heavy hand of the Cooperative

Northwest of the city rests one of these s an airstrip once called Love Field The soldiers there are not placed to assault the city The ad hoc unit occupying the airport grew out of the rising in Little Rock that opened Operation Archangel They participate in the siege both as a sentied down the Arkansas River to rescue the that prevents an organized breakout Their airfield joins the extreht of the Texans

Their regi, a black-and-blue silhouette of an Arkansas razorback set under the joined Texas and Ozark flags, reads DON'T FEED ON ME Judged from a distance, the forces in this particular encampment, called Valentine's Razors by the veterans, aren't in shape to serve as anything but a supporting unit Only a few un pits fill their lines,those within the city Instead rolls of concertina wire on the open ground near the airstrip enclose cattle awaiting slaughter for the daily ration, and the airport's garages huenerators and power tools On the march southwest fro captured Kurian vehicles operational again, and in turning cattle, wheat, pigs, and corn into grist for various regimental kitchens Their aptitudes reflect the rear-area nature ofthe uprising in Little Rock

To a general of either side looking at a ence, military and personal, the Razors are one of the least-threatening circles surrounding Big D

But quality can rarely be judged from a distance

The first clue is in the rifles that each on-duty soldier always has within reach: long, heavy-barreled fillers with oversized banana hts, others with fixtures for high-capacity druration into Solon's Army of the Trans-Mississippi, they are the best battle rifles the famous Atlanta Gunworks produces Thanks to the Type Threes, any soldier is capable of turning into a supporting fire unit in a iven a simple wrench and a belt of the proper ammunition

Then there are the "prowlers" The mechanics of the Razors see to it that the best bits and pieces of Quisling wreckage imental motor pool, where they're asseh-axled, fat-tired, covered with rocket-propelled grenade-stopping webbing, each swary eyes, and sharp tusks and teeth, somewhere just above and forward of the front tires A few have front electric winches formed into snouts, and the beds of uns, and auto-grenade launchers Other longer, heavier, double-axled trucks are built to carry troops, loading and unloading from doors in the backs or sides of the transports, and an assortasoline supplies when on the ainst supply interruptions when encamped

The Razors shouldn't have worked Soldiers thrown together under the most dire of circumstances couldn't be expected to stand up to a determined assault, let alone hold a precarious position alone in the heart of enemy country The success of their faht be considered a measure as much of their enemy's incoiven to the ianized the Little Rock Rising

One of those men crosses the outskirts of the airstrip as the sun rises His ray uniform is thick with "Dallas Dust", an oatmeal-colored mixture of pulverized concrete, ash, and s froht side of his face only serves to show off an early spring tan, bronzing indicative of aenes A shortened version of his Razor's battle rifle with folding stocky and cut-down barrel bu The assault harness is festooned with everything froas un at his hip and a "camel" water bladder over his shoulder A veteran of the Razors would note the distinctly nonregulation moccasins on his feet, and infer that the Razors' operations officer, Major Valentine, was back from another of his "scouts"

David Valentine breathed in a last snootful of clean air and descended into thean uprooted young dandelion in his gun-free hand The stairwell to the old tered, replaced by churned-over earth paved with plywood strips dropping eight feet to the hole in the cinderblock side of the foundation where the basement door used to be

The entrance to the Razorbacks' headquarters rese It fooled the eyes that soers' positions