Brennan pulled up before the Jokertown Clinic, killed the engine, and got out of the van. He walked through the sliding glass doors that led into the receiving area and entered chaos.

A half-hysterical woman was shouting to a harried-looking nurse that no, dammit, her baby was always that sort of suffocated purplish color, but still, her gills just weren't working right, while another white-uniformed nurse was explaining to an excessively furry man that Blue Cross usually didn't consider electrolysis a necessary medical procedure, no matter how badly he wanted a career in the food-service industry. Another joker-female and quite attractive if you discounted the mottled, flaking condition of her skin was sitting reading an eight-month-old copy of National Geographic while her toddlers slithered after each other in and out of the chairs, circling around a gaunt, hollow-eyed old joker who was coughing continually and spitting up unhealthy-looking gobs of something into a styrofoam cup clutched firmly in his chelate forepaws.

Someone behind Brennan muttered, "Excuse me," in a harried voice, and swept by. It was Tachyon. He was accompanied by a woman who was attractive in a gaunt, hard-edged sort of way, despite the eye patch and the jagged scar that ran down her right cheek. She moved in a graceful economical manner that suggested she knew how to handle herself in almost any situation. That was rather a necessity for anyone who spent a lot of time around the doctor.

"Tachyon."

He turned with a put-upon sigh that caught in his throat as he recognized Brennan and he frowned at the expression on Brennan's face. "What is it? Is Jennifer-"

"We have to talk," Brennan said, glancing at the woman. "Somewhere in private."

She looked curiously from Tachyon to Brennan and back again to the alien. Tachyon gestured at her vaguely with his small delicate-looking hands. "Daniel, this is Cody Havero, Dr. Cody Havero. Cody, this is, uh, a friend of mine…"

As usual, Tachyon's mouth had worked faster than his brain, mentioning Brennan's real first name. Brennan, exlast year as the mysterious bow-and-arrow vigilante known as Yeoman, preferred to keep such information private. "Daniel Archer," Brennan supplied.

Tachyon nodded, and Havero offered her hand. "What is it? Is Jennifer all right?" Tachyon repeated. Brennan shook his head as he released Havero's hand. "I haven't had a chance to check on her yet. There's something else we have to discuss. Immediately."

Havero glanced again from Tachyon to Brennan. "I can take a hint," she said. "I have to go over some patient histories with Nurse Follet at the front desk. We can finish our discussion after you two are done."

"Right," Tachyon said. "Thank you, Cody." He glanced around the reception area. "Come," he said to Brennan, taking his arm. "The coffee machine seems to be deserted. We can talk while I get some caffeine into my system. It looks like it's going to be one of those days."

Mother and gilled baby rushed past them with a sympathetic nurse, and the squealing joker children played tag around them as they walked by, but the area around the vending machine was deserted. Tachyon put eighty cents into the coffee machine and got a small paper cup full of a black, strong-smelling liquid.

"Can I get one for you?" Tachyon asked Brennan, but Brennan shook his head. "That's right," Tachyon said. "You take tea. I can have some brought from my office-"

Brennan shook his head again. "Let's get down to it, Doctor."

Tachyon looked at him, hurt in his lilac eyes. "We used to be friends, Daniel. We fought the Swarm togetherl We="

"We fought many battles together, Doctor," Brennan said stiffly. "That didn't keep you from walking into my mind and taking it when you saw fit."

"I had to do that! You were going to kill Hiram, and Jay wanted you sent to jail! Burning Sky! What was I supposed to do?"

"There are no easy answers," Brennan said. "Neither of us follows the herd. Both of us do what we have to do. Both of us have to live with the consequences of our actions."

"We were friends," Tachyon whispered.

"Once," Brennan said.

There was a moment's silence, and Tachyon looked down into his coffee cup. He took a sip and grimaced. "Now it's cold," he said. "Well. What did you want to see me about?"

"I think that Kien may have been behind the attack," Brennan said.

Tachyon stared at him. "Nonsense," he snorted. "Kien is dead."

Brennan shook his head. "Maybe. But maybe he's reaching out from the grave. Maybe he gave his underlings orders to kill all his enemies when he died."

Tachyon frowned, considering it. "Why would they wait over a year to strike?"

Brennan shrugged. "I don't know. But remember. You were on Kien's hit list too."

"I was, wasn't L" Tachyon sighed. "Yet another complication in an already too-complicated life." He looked at Brennan and was about to add something more, but a shout from the reception desk made them both turn and stare.

"Tachyon!" Havero called out suddenly. "Alert the staff, stat! Something's-"

Even as Havero spoke, there was a commotion at the door. An ambulance, lights flashing, sirens wailing, roared up and braked to a sudden halt. Havero reached over the counter, punched a button on the hospital intercom, and was reeling off orders as the ambulance attendants leapt out of the vehicle. One ran around to the rear of the ambulance; the other approached the clinic's double glass doors, which whooshed open as he neared.

"Gang fight," the driver cried. "Killer Geeks and Demon Princes. We've got a load, and there's more on the way." Tachyon cut across the reception area, Brennan on his heels. The driver headed back to help the attendant open the vehicle's back door. They slid a blanket-covered gurney from the ambulance, and Havero, standing in front of the reception counter, screamed, "Everyone get down!"

Brennan and Tachyon reacted with the reflexes of seasoned combat veterans. They hit the polished linoleum floor as the figure on the ambulance gurney sat up, threw his blanket off, and emptied a clip from an Uzi into the reception area at full automatic.

Brennan rolled as he hit the floor. In a frozen second he saw the bullets whine through the reception area like a swarm of angry bees. The old man spitting into the cup was stitched across the chest. He hunched forward and slid off the chair, surprise and pain on his face as his expression froze and his eyes glazed.

The woman reading the National Geographic was unharmed until she saw her children cut down as they stood rooted in terror in the center of the room. She leaped to her feet, an endless hysterical scream ripping out of her throat. The furry guy was lucky, too, but Cody Havero's luck was miraculous. The gunman seemed drawn by her scream and half instinctively swept his weapon in her direction. But she leaned backward, doing a strange sort of limbo, and Brennan saw out of the corner of his eye that most of the burst punched through the counter above her.

By then, he had reached the Browning holstered in the small of his back. Stomach pressed tight to the floor, he drew and aimed with one fluid motion, almost forgetting that he had a gun, replaying in his brain the instant coordination of muscle and mind that was his when firing a bow. He held the pistol out before him, both arms extended, hands clasped loosely, muscles relaxed, eyes almost closed. He squeezed off a single shot, and the man sitting on the stretcher bucked backward. Brennan's mind trapped the moment like an insect encased in amber. He played it back as the man fell and saw a round black hole punched in the middle of the assassin's forehead.

"Christ!" one of the ambulance attendants swore, and fumbled for something buttoned up under his coat. Brennan now knew that he had plenty of time, and he knew that they needed some questions answered. He shot both attendants in their kneecaps.