"It is. I'm concerned about pursuit or surveillance."

The two hung there for several heartbeats, but saw no sign of any other astral presences.

Kyle signaled, and they dropped down to the surface of the lake and skirted its edge, skimming over the various sun-bathers, bike-riders, strutters, dog-walkers, and other denizens of Chicago out to enjoy the afternoon sun. As the coastline changed at where Kyle believed Fullerton to be, he soared inland, Walsh close behind.

The effects of the earlier ritual pulled at Kyle, guiding him ever farther north and west. He pushed on, passing across the breadth of Chicago's northside in a few blinks of an eye. Then, sensing he was near, he slowed and dropped closer to the ground. Walsh drew up alongside him.

"Any idea where we are?" Kyle asked him. "I sure as drek don't."

Walsh nodded. "Near Harlem and Irving Park."

"I'm going to go low and coast. I don't want to suddenly be on top of this place."

Kyle drifted down to just above the level of the cars passing on the major road beneath them. He tried to judge the distance carefully to keep from being brushed aside or sent spinning by the physical mass of the people in those cars. At the approach to a major intersection, he could sense a surge of emotion as the light changed and a slight gridlock developed. When Kyle finally came down to the ground, he chose to land in a trash barrel so no one would bump into him. Walsh dropped down a short distance behind him, pressed half into a storefront. They both hoped the auras of the mundanes passing by would conceal them from anything that happened to look their way.

"We there?" asked Walsh.

"Yes," said Kyle, pointing north along the intersecting street. "It's right up there, third one in." There was little that could be seen, just a dim storefront. Nothing magical. Nothing extraordinary.

"Looks normal," said Walsh. 'They could be gone already."

"Let's hope not."

"Why don't you head back and tell them where," Walsh said. "I'll stand guard here."

"All right," Kyle said, and lifted off to the south, traveling in that direction for a while, then turning west to find the intersection with Western, where the police convoy would be. From there he turned south again, following what he believed to be Western.

Then, seconds later, he passed over an interstate highway, which he was certain was Interstate 90/94 headed in toward the Noose. But that, he thought, was too far south. Kyle paused and hung in the air trying to remember if Western crossed 90/94 north or south of North Avenue. He continued on, watching for the presence of the large command vans and the helicopter that would be flying cover.

He paused again when he came to another expressway, one he knew to be Interstate 290 heading directly east into the city from the western suburbs. That told him he'd gone too far south. Not for the first time in his life, Kyle cursed the fact that there was no simple way to follow the connection with his body back to it.

Kyle shot east, to the lake, arriving there in a fraction of a second. He then followed the shoreline north, looking for the lakeshore at North Avenue, where he and Walsh had passed over it. He continued north, finally stopping at the break in the shoreline which he knew to be Fullerton. He was now too far north.

Kyle cursed again, knowing that his stupidity was costing him valuable time that he couldn't afford to waste, when he felt a shock, a short, quick pain in his left arm. His perception blurred, and he felt himself pulled back to his body by the force of what he took to be Hanna Uljaken’s blow. Then he felt the sensation again, harder across his neck, and he slammed into his body and a wave of pain.

His physical senses returned and he was on the floor, covered in something warm. A man yelled. "Grab him! Grab him!"

Kyle rolled over, pushing against a booted leg near him, just as another spray of blood exploded from Sergeant Walsh's neck. Still in the chair, pinned there by another Eagle officer, Walsh's body thrashed and the side of his head darkened as blood vessels ruptured and bone shattered. Still on the floor, Kyle cast a web of protective magical energies around Walsh. He could do nothing to stop what he took to be a vicious assault on the mage's astral form, but he was suddenly afraid that any magicians present at the other end could use the connection between Walsh's spirit body and physical form to "ground" a spell directly into the command van. The best he could hope for was to disrupt those energies if they leaped through.

Walsh's body jerked again, and his bloodied eyes flew open as he screamed and pitched forward even against the strength of the two officers holding him. He fell across Kyle's legs and onto the floor. Kyle immediately dropped the protective energies and placed his hand on the man's neck in an effort to staunch the arterial flow.

The thrashing subsided as Walsh's resistance collapsed and his body slipped rapidly into shock. His eyes glazed and his breath faltered.

"Harlem, north of Irving!" Kyle screamed, and then focused his magical talents on me dying mage. He quickly synchronized their two auras and began channeling living energy directly into Walsh's being. Kyle felt the other mage's spirit faltering when it needed to be strong, at least strong enough, if he was going to be able to continue healing him.

Walsh's spirit flickered, slipping from Kyle's control. There, just as Kyle's essence meshed with his, Kenneth Walsh died, his True Self dissolving into chaos, back into the dance of energy from which it came.

Kyle leaned back, releasing his grip and allowing the last spurts of blood from the mans sputtering heart to arc across the room. He was covered in Walsh's blood, as Malley and the other trooper who'd tried to restrain his thrashings. Beyond them and equally as stunned, Hanna Uljaken stood ashen, except for a spray of Crimson across her face and blouse. Kyle collapsed back against the cold wall of the van.

“Harlem, north of Irving," he said again. "That's where they are…

The storefront, when Kyle finally got a clear look at it, was simple and drab. As he and half a dozen Eagle troopers moved toward it from an alley across the street, he could see paint peeling from the door and window frames, the view inside blocked by old newspapers and plastic garbage bags hanging in the windows. A lopsided sign still hung over the entrance, the letters themselves long gone, but the ghostly outline of the words were still visible-UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD: FOR THE NEXT STAGE OF YOUR LIFE.

Thoughts of Beth's sister Ellen rushed into Kyle's mind, And Strevich's warnings, Mitch Truman's destroyed mind, the true form of Linda Hayward, and the vicious roach spirit he'd killed in the hospital. The Brotherhood was somehow mixed up in this. But he couldn't think about it now, there was no time as the strike team rushed forward from the alley, steps behind a two-man team coming in from the side.

The lead trooper dropped into position covering the closed door as Kyle's group reached the middle of the street, the traffic stopped in both directions by Eagle troopers at the flanking intersections. Kyle was just reaching the curb when the second trooper slammed his heavy riot shotgun against the door lock mechanism and pulled the trigger.

Kyle's group reached the doorway moments after the shot splintered the doorframe and sent the metal lock hurling inside. The lead trooper in Kyle's group hit the door hard, his solid metal riot shield braced in front of him.

The rest of the door shattered under his weight, and the team moved inside. Kyle could hear similar noises as the team led by Malley and Woodhouse entered through the rear. Some of the troopers were armed for urban combat, carrying riot guns firing high-velocity flechette or SABOT rounds designed to cut lightly armored targets to bits. Others were armed with more conventional assault weapons and submachine guns. A couple were armed primarily with nonlethal weaponry-riot guns firing gel rounds, stun batons and gloves, shock/concussion grenades, and net guns in case they met "questionable" targets. It was they who fired first on the two men who rushed forward against the onslaught. The pair fell quickly, knocked off their feet by a barrage of gel rounds, and then subdued by the skillful application of shock batons.