The guards shut the doors behind the scientist and the room went still. Frederika looked with longing at the remaining jack-infused tea and watched snowflakes float pasther window. She sighed deeply.

"Congratulations mother. That went well," Katrina said as she emerged from the servant's entrance, squeezing past the maid who had come to collect the dishes.

"I played my part to your liking?" Frederika replied acidly. She swished the lukewarm thin yellow liquid in her teacup. So harmless looking. She contemplated knocking it back to make this conversation more tolerable but then discarded the idea. Better to keep her wits.

"Oh mother," Katrina said falling onto the sofa, draping one leg over the arm. She paged through a two decade-old glossy magazine, the rail-thin models gracing its pages long since dead.

"You should go. The Johnson girl will arrive any minute. She doesn't like you."

Katrina snorted. "Ooh, the big mean Commander frightens me with her shiny black guns. I'll stay right here, thank you. If she dislikes me so much, perhaps she won't overstay her welcome."

Frederika glared. It occurred to her then that Katrina wanted to be seen, to make her presence known while Frederika cut the deal. Katrina was maneuvering to be the next head of the family, that much was clear. Abby wasted her time pandering to Frederika, and Rudy felt he'd take command simply because he was the only male. But Katrina had stayed close, cloyingly close, to her mother's business ever since Augustus died.

Frederika grudgingly knew her scheming daughter deserved the position. It was she who insisted that the newly discovered drug be transferred quickly to Reichman holdings before the other families grew curious; and it was she who pushed Frederika to assemble scientists to begin working on it immediately. She conceived the grand plan in a flash. Frederika wished she could think three steps ahead like her daughter. Yet she couldn't shake the feeling that Katrina would shove her to the side at the first opportunity to seize control of the family.

The phone chirped in her pocket. Frederika peered at the screen and moaned. "That goddamned Carlo Reyes again? I'm not picking up. The power is on the fritz in Whitefish and they have to ration hot water. He's calling it gross mismanagement, hinting his people might revolt. Well, let the spoiled bastards can march down here then."

Before Katrina could respond there was a knock on the door then it opened. Ellen Johnson entered wearing her full riot gear--as always--and her helmet tucked beneath her arm. She took three steps into the room and stood at attention. "You wanted to see me?" She sounded annoyed.

Frederika dispensed with formalities. The girl wouldn't sit even if invited, so why bother? Instead, Frederika fished in her pocket for the empty phial and held it in her withered fingers. "Recognize this?"

Ellen squinted. "What about it?"

"Have you recovered any more?"

Her eyes narrowed. "Why?"

Frederika scowled. "I'm the head of this organization and I'll ask the questions. Now answer."

Ellen sniffed and stared over Frederika's head out the window. "We took four phials off the prisoners. A week ago we recovered another dozen from another scavenger not far away. We suspect he was their supplier. All the samples already been routed to the Mansion's inventory. Per your orders."

"Where did he get his supply?"

"Don't know. He didn't survive the interrogation. He became quite agitated when he sobered up and the guards reacted. Things should have been handled...differently," she said in half-apology.

Katrina flipped the page of her magazine, her head down.

"Typical," Frederika said as she lowered herself into an armchair. "I have a proposition for your father. From my mouth to your ear and then his, understand? No further."

Ellen glanced at Katrina, then shrugged and nodded.

"There's been too much grumbling from the populous. Complaints about the food. The water. Overcrowding. Boredom with the sewing, the cleaning, everything we keep them busy with. We're mere months away from restoring power to the city, yet all I hear is complaints."

"And?" Ellen said. She didn't even blink at the ruse about the power, Frederika noted.

Katrina cut into the conversation. "We want to put small traces of jack in the water supply. Not much, just enough to get them to relax. Enjoy the fact they've alive and looked after."

Frederika's knuckles turned white on the armrest and she clenched her jaw. "That's enough Katrina," she said coldly.

Ellen shifted her stance. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Because we need your muscle to find more samples. These phials came from somewhere and we need to find it. Sniff out every gopher hole from here to Sweetwater if necessary. We need manpower and besides, we couldn't keep an operation like this secret from the Johnson family for long." A bit of flattery as sweetner Frederika thought.

"What about Reyes? The Lukowskis?"

Now it was Frederika's turn to shrug. Ellen was a smart girl--Frederika could almost see the wheels of her mind turning.

"Report back to your father. We're investigating possible locations of sub-labs even as we speak. By the time you come back with your answer we should have targeted several locations for search and seizure."

Ellen left and Katrina followed shortly after. Frederika let her daughter's infuriating intrusion into the conversation pass. Better to suffer one small indignity than alienate her and lose her tactical insights. As the servant straightened the room, Frederika stood at the window and watched the whitecaps forming on Lake Lawrence.

Then she ordered the serving girl to warm up the tea.