"Everyone! Down, now!" The tangle-victim started to choke.

People sat. Laura and David, too. people sat in a spreading wave, like a sporting event. Some laced their hands behind their heads, as if by reflex. The captain grinned and bran- dished his gun over them. "Better." He kicked the man, casually.

Suddenly the nuns approached in a body. Their leader was a black woman; she pulled back her wimple, revealing gray hair, a lined face. "Captain," she said calmly. "This man is choking. "

"He a t'ief, Sister," the captain said.

"That may be, Captain, but he still needs to breathe."

Three of the Church women knelt by the victim, tugging at the strands around his throat. The old woman-an Abbess,

Laura thought unwillingly-turned to the crowd and spread her hands in the crook-fingered Church blessing. "Violence serves no one," she said. "Please be silent."

She walked away, her sisters following without a word.

They left the tangle-victim where he lay, wheezing quietly.

The captain shrugged, and slung his gun again, and turned away, gesturing to his men. After a moment people began to stand up.

["That was well done,"] Emerson said.

David helped Laura to her feet and picked up the baby's tote. "Hey! Carlotta!" They followed her.

Carlotta spoke briefly to the Abbess, pulled her wimple back, and stepped away from her sisters.

"Hello," she said. Her frizzy mane of hair was pulled back. Her sharp-cheeked face looked naked and bleak. It was the first time they'd ever seen Carlotta without makeup.

"I'm surprised to see you leaving," Laura told her.

Carlotta shook her head. "They hit our temple. A temporary setback."

"Sorry," David said. "We were burned out, too."

"We'll be back," Carlotta shrugged. "Where there's war, there's whores."

The speakers crackled into life-a Cuban stewardess speak- ing Spanish. "Hey, that's us," David said suddenly. "They want us at the desk." He paused. "You hold Loretta, I'll go." He hurried off.

Laura and Carlotta stared at each other.

"He told me what you did," Laura said. "In case you were wondering."

Carlotta half smirked. "Orders, Laura."

"I thought we were friends."

"Friends maybe. But not Sisters," Carlotta said. "I know where my loyalties lie. Just as well as you do."

Laura-hefted Loretta's tote and slipped its strap onto her shoulder. "Loyalty doesn't give you the right to trash my family life."

Carlotta blinked. "Family, huh? If family meant so much to you, you'd be taking care of your man and baby in Texas, not dragging them here into the line of fire."

"How dare you," Laura said. "David believes in this as much as I do. "

"No, he doesn't. You hustled him into this so you could crawl up your company hierarchy." She raised a hand. "Laura, he's just a man. You need to get him away from the guns.

The old evil's loose again. Men are full of war poison."

"That's craziness!"

Carlotta shook her head. "You're out of your league,

Laura. Are you willing to put your body between a gun and a victim? I am. But you're not, are you? You don't have faith."

"I'm faithful to David," Laura said tightly. "I'm faithful to my company. What about you? What about faithful old

Sticky?"

"Sticky's a buffalo soldier," Carlotta said. "Cannon fodder, full of war evil."

"So that's it?" Laura said, amazed. "You just drop him?

Write him off, just like that?"

"I'm off Romance now," Carlotta said, as if that ex- plained everything. She reached into her robes and handed

Laura a vial of red pills. "Look, take these, I don't need 'em now-and stop being so stupid. All that crap you think is so important two of these'll put it all out of your mind. Go back to Galveston, Laura, check into a hotel somewhere, and fuck David's brains out. Snuggle up under the covers and stay out of the way where you won't get hurt."

Carlotta folded her arms and refused to take the vial back.

Laura stuffed it angrily into her jeans pocket. "So it really was completely artificial," she said. "You never felt any- thing genuine for Sticky at all."

"I was watching him for the Church," she said. "He kills people."

"I can't believe this," Laura said, staring at her. "I don't much like Sticky, but I accept him. As a person. Not a monster. "

"He's a professional hit man," Carlotta said. "He's killed over a dozen people."

"I don't believe you."

"What did you expect-that he'd carry an axe and drool?

Captain Thompson doesn't follow your rules. The houngans have been workin' on him for years. He's not an 'acceptable person'-he's like an armed warhead! You wondered about drug factories-Sticky Thompson is a drug factory."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Laura said.

"I mean his guts are full, of bacteria. Special ones-little drug factories. Where do you think he got that nickname

Sticky? He can eat a carton of yogurt and it turns him into a killing machine."

"A killing machine?" Laura said. "A carton of yogurt?"

"It's the enzymes. The bugs eat 'em. Make him fast- strong-feeling no pain, no doubt at all. They're gonna sic him on Singapore, and wow, I feel sorry for that little island. "

Sticky Thompson-a drug-crazed assassin. She still couldn't believe it. But what did hit men look like, anyway? Laura's head spun. "Why didn't you tell me all this before?"

Carlotta looked at her pityingly. "Because you're a straight,

Laura.'

"Stop calling me that!" Laura said. "What makes you so different?"

"Look at you," Carlotta said. "You're educated. You're smart. You're beautiful. You're married to a goddamn archi- tect. You have a wonderful baby and friends in high places."

Her eyes narrowed; she began to hiss. "Then look at me.

I'm a cracker. Ugly. No family. Daddy used to beat me up. I never finished school-I can't hardly read and write. I'm diselxic, or whatever they call it. You ever wonder what happens to people who can't read and write? In your fucking beautiful Net world with all its fucking data? No, you never thought of that, did you? If I found a place for myself, it was in the teeth of people like -you."

She pulled her wimple back over her head. "And getting older, too. I bet you never even wondered what happens to old Church girls. When we can't work that old black magic on your precious husbands. Well, don't worry about me,

Mrs. Webster. Our Goddess stands by Her own. Our Church runs hospitals, clinics, rest homes-we take care of people.

The Goddess gave me my life, not you or your Net. So I don't owe you nothing!" She looked ready to spit. "Never forget that."

David came up with the tickets. "It's all set. We're out of here. Thank God." The speaker announced a flight the crowd broke into hubbub. The baby began whimpering. David took her tote. "You okay, Carlotta?"

"I'm jus' fine," Carlotta said, smiling on him sunnily.

"Y'all come visit me in Galveston, won't y'all? Our Rever- end Morgan just won a seat on the City Council. We got big plans for Galveston."

"This is our flight," David said. "Good thing we don't have any luggage--but man, I'm gonna miss that toolbox."