OUT OF SARAJEVO

by Poto

"What does it mean, always moving towards these destinations, if the journey isn't joyful? The journey is what it is all about."
-- Melissa Etheridge, Storytellers

After a full year of siege the shrieking of an approaching missile was all too familiar. Sarajevo shook as a glow lit up the western sky. Almost beautiful, if it hadn't been so terrifying.

Somewhere, in the poorest districts of the city, the Serbs had dropped a bomb.

Tremors of the blast reached the fourth floor balcony of the Hotel Imperial, a run down pre-war relic, home to desperate families and conspicuous foreigners. Taylor Wilson watched, stunned, as the glow grew brighter, not with the force of the explosion, but with the blaze of city fires. Feet moved before her brain even had time to register.

There's a cease fire, a goddamned cease fire! What the FUCK are they doing dropping bombs on a helpless city in a cease fire?

Instinctively, she grabbed a packed, black shoulder bag and rushed from the shell-shocked apartment.

The rest of the city met her out on the street.

Taylor usually liked crowds. There were more faces to choose from, more reactions to pick apart with the lens, and more than enough heads to disguise one lonely American walking around snapping photographs of everything, trance-like and methodical.

Tonight they stared unanimously up at the western sky, trying to make out the height of the flames, the speed of the fire as it ripped through the stricken city. Some expressed grief, others terror. Still others breathed relief that the unsteady peace agreement had at last been broken, however paradoxical it seemed. It meant more bombs to be sure, but at least they knew to expect them.

Taylor shot them all, in close-up and in landscape, following some groups as they wandered aimlessly in the street. Shock registering, they looked desperately for something solid to grab hold of, to get their bearings again.

An educated guess told her the streets would be just as crowded all the way to the site of the blast. People would panic immediately, even those used to the steady humdrum of bombings that had reduced the city to rubble two, three, four times over again.

There'd be no taxis. She'd have to walk. As she looked up into the burning sky, the stars becoming quickly overpowered by the spreading menace of debris and soot, she changed her estimation. She'd have to run.

She broke into a slow jog at first to clear the crowd, and then a full paced run as she hit a narrow alleyway. For six months she'd explored the twists and turns of this city for exactly this reason. No matter where something happened in Sarajevo, she knew how to get there, and she knew how to get there fast. It was still a semi-blind rush towards the glowing, distant ruin of whatever had been decimated by the missile. The acrid smell of fire thickened, spinning her senses into nausea.

Half an hour into her run, soaked with sweat and choking on dust, Taylor reached the first wave of refugees headed away from the blast. The smell of the fire was leading her directly into the western precinct, a temporary city built for the displaced of the war, just slightly off the centre district of Sarajevo.

The double displaced. Taylor was already writing the exhibition captions in her head.

She snapped the survivors in their burned rags, leaning awkwardly on the street railing to get out of the way of the retreating populace. The streets became harder and harder to negotiate, the winding alleyways all packed with miserable faces.

With a stunned gasp Taylor arrived on the blast scene. A five story building had been gutted, its red cross flag fluttering decrepitly, uselessly, in the smoke filled breeze. Thick flames licked at the tops of the adjoining houses, and she could see a steady stream of people scrambling from make-shift ladders, still trying to escape from the ravaged buildings so long after the explosion.

The UN hospital and the adjoining orphanage were destroyed. Snapping off quick shots of the wider picture she moved in for a closer look, skirting the refugees and aid workers as they either rushed from the blaze or attempted fruitlessly to put it out with makeshift fire fighting equipment and buckets of tap water. She captured the crews as they struggled with the hoses, their first concern to stop the blaze from swallowing the adjoining wooden structures that made up the emergency housing.

As she watched wave after wave of injured struggle from the ruins she wiped a tear angrily for her streaked face. Taylor was too much of a cynic to believe the target had been random.

"Those bastards…" she whispered lamely, finger snapping madly to capture every face, every scream of anger or grief, every inch of the war-torn blast zone.

The photographer's senses stretched out and the hairs on the back of her neck bristled in warning. Distinct popping sounds betrayed the gathering momentum of the fire within the hospital building. Crews of people rushed in panic from the lower storeys as the remaining ceilings of each floor cracked and fell with a thunderous roar, spitting ash and sparks out over the crowd.

The streets gradually collected with the bodies of the fallen. Most had body parts blown savagely away, others sat in silence as city residents with some doctoring skills tended their shattered limbs, still alive but too frightened and shell shocked to utter a sound. She took a photograph of a man who seemed unharmed but who sat, wide eyed, with his hands over his ears as if to block out the rushing of the blast, or the screaming of its victims. When she tried to talk to him he stared up at her, confused and oblivious. The trauma pulled at her soul, tears welled and threatened to overwhelm her.

Cold professionalism kicked in. She stepped away, wrenching herself painfully back from the emotions of the crowd.

Then, suddenly, unexpectedly, she just couldn't. The strain of staring at the images took its toll and she stopped, out of breath, grasping at a street light that had somehow escaped the doom. The cool, steady metal stopped her from falling over, the touch an anchor. She dry retched, her throat spasming.

Her self-pity ended swiftly with a harsh tap on her shoulder.

"Hey, you with the camera, do you speak English?"

Taylor nodded her head lethargically towards the tall stranger, bile still bubbling at the top of her throat.

She swallowed hastily. Shake it off, Taylor!

"Hey? Hey! Hello? What are you, British?" The voice…American to be sure…home… Taylor was too hazy to figure out its state of origin. The woman was almost six feet tall, towering over her own small, blonde figure, with stern, deep blue eyes that cut dramatically through the squalor of the night air.

"I'm…I'm American." Taylor stammered finally, feeling the illness backing off, her senses and her capacity to function returning gradually to normal.

"Well, American, hold this bandage for me." The woman backed off and knelt by a five year old child about five metres away, Taylor noticed that her upper body was matted with blood and soot. On the ground tiny eyes opened wide with fear and surprise.

That woman must look like a giant running around like that, Taylor mused. Reaching for her camera was an instinct. She was pausing to take a picture of the dark haired woman when the stranger reared up sharply in barely suppressed anger.

"Did I say you should take my picture? I said you should come over here and hold this bandage for me." She flared.

Taylor dropped the camera slightly in surprise, but kept the lens aimed towards the little girl and her amateur doctor. The stranger gave her another filthy look before standing up to her full height and advancing.

"If you take my picture I'm going to ram that camera firmly up your ass. Now, hold this bandage or go and be useless someplace else. There are people dying here! Can't you think of anything more constructive to do than taking pictures of them doing it?"

Taylor recovered her wits and her indignation all at once. "I'm just doing my job. If there were enough people taking pictures of this and showing them to the world maybe this kind of crap wouldn't be happening at all." She grabbed the bandage from the woman's hands and held it in place as the stranger prepared a gauze dressing from the emergency medical kit she carried at her side. Despite being cajoled into irritation Taylor was thinking clearly enough to recognise the kit as American army issue.

"You believe what you want, just hold the damn bandage while you're doing it." The dark woman snapped in return, concentrating on covering the wound just below the girl's eye with the gauze.

The wound was already seeping, in danger of infection, a result of the thick ash and soot whirling chaotically all around them. Taylor looked up and saw that the stranger's face was so soot smeared that the woman must have been dangerously close to the fire at some point since the explosion.

Taking the bandage she wrapped it firmly around the little girl's head to keep the gauze in place. The stranger watched her closely, making sure the bandage sat in the correct spot. Taylor felt a presence and realised that an elderly couple hovered nearby, looking at the little girl with obvious anxiety. She looked up and spoke some of the few words of the Slavic language she'd picked up in her six months in the city, asking them if the girl was theirs. The couple nodded enthusiastically and reached out for the girl, who wobbled uneasily into their arms.

The girl deposited safely with her family, Taylor was free to turn her irritation to the belligerent stranger.

"Now who the hell are you? Mother Theresa? I didn't think there were any army left in Sarajevo, much less dressed like you are." Taylor gave a cursory glance to the stranger's faded black t-shirt, jeans and thick boots, all covered liberally with grit.

"Do I look like I have time for chit chat?" the dark woman snapped. Taylor might have mistaken the reply for arrogance had she not been watching the barely disguised worry playing out in the woman's intense eyes.

Gorgeous.

Taylor suppressed a desire to giggle at her ability to notice such a thing, in the middle of a disaster area, underneath layers of dirt.

She watched as the stranger gathered her medical supplies together. The woman stood up hurriedly and started making her way across the littered street.

Half way across she turned back to the photographer.

"Are you going to help or not? I could use someone who knows how to talk to these people."

Taylor realised she was gaping. Mortified, she gathered up her chin for a taut reply.

"I only know a few words, and those not very well."

"Well, it's better than me. I think I know how to order ice-cream and beer."

"Oh so we are human after all? Not some kind of mindless robot?"

The dark woman stared back for a few seconds before shrugging, all traces of sarcasm and humour draining quickly from her sculpted features.

"Not much point in being human at the moment."

Taylor nodded quickly in understanding, still tasting the thick bile in her throat she'd not been able to expel from her body. She noted the outstretched hand from the taller woman and took the hand firmly, trying to appear stronger than she felt.

"Alex. Ryan. Look, there's about twenty guys over the other side trying to haul a hose around to that building, only they need to turn off the water pressure first so the hose doesn't throw them all over the square. I can't seem to make them see what I mean."

"Taylor Wilson. I'm on it." Taylor replied quickly, tossing the camera quickly into the shoulder pack and placing it securely on her back.

The dark woman seemed about to react, hesitated, then changed her mind. She turned away, serious concentration settling once again on dark brows. She set a course for a group of men dragging an unconscious, burn-scarred woman from the lower story of the hospital via a long rickety ladder, her lithe body moving quickly into the fray.

Dragging her eyes away, Taylor took stock of her surroundings. She looked around, breathed a lungful of the dense, dirty air, and then raced over to the men wrestling almost comically with the makeshift fire hose.

Ten minutes later as the hose was being more successfully shifted across the square Taylor turned and saw Alex again, down on all fours pumping air as best she could into the lungs of an asphyxiating woman. It appeared her mouth to mouth was rusty at best, but Taylor could see the determination on the woman's face, even through the twenty metres of dust filling the air between them.

The injured woman struggled a little and the photographer caught her breath in hope, but sighed as the woman fell back limp, the life rushing quickly from her body. The strong frame of the dark woman knelt unmoving for a few long seconds, deflated shoulders the only outward sign of frustration for the life that had slipped through her fingers.

Taylor watched closely as Alex rocked back on her heels, wiping sweat and muck from her tired brow. The photographer inside her felt that instinctive urge to reach for her camera, but something held her back.

The look on her face when I tried to take her picture before, Taylor mused, remembering. There was something more than just irritation there.

Accustomed to the myriad looks a photographer receives from their subjects, she knew when not to push her luck. Walking slowly over to the dark woman she put one hand softly on her shoulder. Alex squirmed under the touch and rose off her haunches, doing her best to look anywhere but down at the dead woman.

"Tell that guy to put this one over with the others." Alex ordered.

Taylor bristled slightly but did as the taller woman asked, stumbling a little over the difficult phrasing. One of the men overlooking the scene nodded sadly and knelt to pick the woman up in a fireman's lift, struggling under the dead weight of the body. He dumped her as gently as he could, but still unceremoniously, on the street corner. She laid there, just an empty shell, the newest addition to what was becoming a frightening pile of the dead. Relatives looking for survivors picked amongst the corpses, trying to find missing loved ones…

…all hoping desperately they wouldn't find them in this particular spot.

And Taylor knew she had to photograph that scene. Her eye framed the shot and she raised her camera slowly, meticulously fiddling with the light meter. She could feel the taller woman's gaze boring into her back but she didn't let it break her concentration. The shutter clicked.

As she turned to face Alex she expected ridicule. She was not prepared for the dark look of utter sadness.

The chaos in the streets seemed to be dying down a little, but the flames still surged along unhindered. People had begun to stand around and watch the blaze instead of trying to fight it, giving in at last to the powerful force of its nature. Taylor wondered mournfully if there had really been anything at all the city residents could have done to stop it.

A light rain had started to fall.

"All those houses there are doomed." Alex stated flatly, mirroring Taylor's thoughts. The photographer just nodded, pulling up her camera for some final shots of the buildings as they burned away, their frames collapsing, feeding the inferno.

She became absorbed in the steady clicking and inner world of the camera, losing track of the taller woman standing beside her. When she looked up finally from her work, Alex Ryan was gone.

*****

With shutters drawn and taped securely to the wall to block out the light, the developing tanks were spread out haphazardly over the rickety dining table. Dishes of chemicals rested underneath a hastily erected wire line where the newly created prints hung to dry. Even with the dim light she could see the fire blazing across each of the prints. The buildings, the eyes of the people.

Irrationally, Taylor searched the prints for the photo she knew she hadn't taken - of the tall, dark haired woman. She who hadn't even hung around to see the townspeople celebrate a small triumph, saving the last of a block full of rickety buildings. She had missed the lifting of the mood, as they had all clung to this ray of hope during the mourning period that had stretched on long into the night.

In the early hours there had still been at least fifty unclaimed bodies lying on the sidewalk, some not even the nursing staff who'd survived the blast could come close to identifying. Taylor had stayed long enough to watch the military cart off the corpses, off to some unmarked plot no doubt, somewhere in one of the overfilled Sarajevo graveyards.

The pictures were stunning. Even Taylor's critical professional eye had to admit that. She had already packed the negatives securely away in protective paper, tucked into the inside pocket of her shoulder bag. When she left the city these were the prints that would cause the biggest stir in the outside world.

Taylor tried not to think about the people whose faces had haunted her constantly in the two days since the fire.

Underground newspapers recorded the missile blast as an unprovoked attack. The Serbian General Milosevic, who had ordered the breach of the peace treaty, had been branded a war criminal by the UN. There was apparently a warrant out for his arrest.

Taylor had exercised all her self control trying not to laugh. The UN in Sarajevo were like the London police force everyone made jokes about, with all the officious blustering and no firepower.

Alex Ryan is so wrong, she thought. There definitely seems to be room for a sense of humour amongst all this.

A light tapping at the door brought the photographer back to reality.

"If you open that door you're a dead man, whoever you are!" She cried out loudly in twisted Slavic, collecting the still developing prints from the tanks with the tongs and placing them up to dry. With steady hands she took care not to touch the dripping glossies, knowing every second that one slip cost her another dinner, as the price of replacement photography paper - brought in by black market dealers - drained her tenuous finances just that little bit more.

She heard the tapping again.

"I'll be with you in a second." This time in English, the concentration required for the procedure stripping her of her language skills momentarily.

The pictures all safely out of harm's way, Taylor crossed the room and opened the door a crack, her eyes bursting with the sudden light.

"Oh God, it's you." Taylor stumbled, instantly regretting her shock.

Alex leaned on the door frame, jeans and a long sleeved blue denim shirt lurking above the same black boots. Taylor wiped the chemical residue from her hands on the back of her stained and tattered pants, pulling her t-shirt down lower over her muscled stomach.

"What do you mean, 'oh God it's me' ", the woman replied suspiciously, her body instantly losing some of its casual posture. Taylor regretted the loss. She was, however, determined not to gawp like she had been doing the night of the blast.

Come on Taylor, show me some of that professionalism you're always bragging about. She grimaced inwardly.

"I think I have a right to be surprised, you seemed to express your opinion about photo-journalists fairly succinctly the other night."

The dark haired woman stuck a hand in her pocket and shrugged non-committally.

"Wait for two seconds will you? I have some prints drying in here, the less light that gets in the better."

"Why don’t you come out here?" Alex suggested.

Taylor chuckled nervously. Oh get a grip girl! What are you, twelve?

"All right." She opened the door another crack and struggled through an impossibly small opening, her slim frame barely squeezing through.

When both women were standing in the hallway Taylor finally had a chance to look the stranger up and down, without the added effect of dirt and grime to accentuate her finally sculptured cheekbones. She took in the weather beaten skin and the eyes betraying not much sleep the night before.

"You look kind of exhausted." Taylor began, indicating the blackness under Alex's eyes.

Touching her hands lightly to her eyes, Alex nodded grimly. "Too much happening in this city right now."

"There's been too much happening here for the past twelve months." Taylor replied stiffly.

Alex couldn't disagree, she merely nodded and looked deep in thought. Taylor endured the silence for long moments before her natural curiosity took over.

"What are you doing here? And how the hell did you find me in this dump?"

"I checked all the dumps an American photographer might use until I found one that had ever heard of you."

"I thought you didn't speak Slavic?"

"I don't."

She produced a tattered piece of paper from her hip pocket. The words Do you have a Taylor Wilson here? were scrawled across it in a spidery, economical hand, in perfect Slavic syntax.

"I had some guy in the main square who knew a few words of English write this down for me. It's worked before."

"Nice plan." Taylor replied intrigued. "But you didn't answer the 'what are you doing here?' part."

"I have a proposition for you."

Reaching into the back pocket of her jeans she pulled out a cracked leather wallet. She drew out yet another tattered piece of paper, this one with faded symbols and strange lettering.

"Don't tell me, another guy who didn't speak English decided he'd draw you a map?"

"Funny." Alex replied, not laughing.

"Yeah well, I have a bizarre defence mechanism against cryptic strangers showing up out of nowhere."

"You mentioned something the other night about wanting to stop a war." Alex interjected, bluntly.

Taylor's eyes narrowed. "I'm listening."

"So is everyone else in this hotel. Can we go somewhere and talk?"

****

"So you're military intelligence?" Taylor asked. She stuck her feet up casually on the empty chair at their quiet table in the little street-side café. Alex had obviously picked out the spot beforehand, having led them right there, to this exact table. Then the tall woman had begun to spill out her plan.

Alex shook her head. "Army recon."

"The difference being?"

"Subtle." Taking a long sip from her glass of water Alex leaned forward slightly in her chair. "I do the jobs that military intelligence is not supposed to some back from. Expendable so to speak. So we have our own little special division. One the Pentagon doesn't talk about much. I'd be surprised if they had files."

"How many of you are there?"

"I think at last count we were about…four. They don't last long in this division. The maximum tour is two years."

"How long have you lasted?"

"Two years." She stared off into middle distance, her eyes wandering but alert. "Once I get out of Sarajevo, that's it. But I've got one more thing to pull off before I leave. Call it a personal vendetta if you will. One last mission."

"And that involves me."

"That's right."

Taylor lifted her feet from the chair and stiffened out her shoulders apprehensively. Staring across at her companion she sensed something about her that had been missing from the chaos of the other night, a kind of paranoia that made you feel like she was constantly watching over her shoulder, without moving her head. With the wounded she'd been curt, but efficient and compassionate. The woman she was looking at now was all duty.

"So what do you need?" She asked at last, her curiosity whetted.

"I need your reputation." She glanced over at Taylor's face, saw the incomprehension, and shifted irritably, lengthy explanations obviously not her strong suit. "I checked you out. Three exhibitions from Cambodia, one from the Middle East. You travel around on UNESCO scholarships taking pictures of war zones and shoving them in people's faces. It appears I might have a use for that after all."

Tactful, Taylor scowled. "I don’t work for the government. I told them that myself three years ago."

"And they've blackballed you for funding ever since. I know, I read all about it."

"Cut the bullshit." Taylor reached for her coffee and downed half the cup at once, suddenly feeling in need of the caffeine rush. She lowered the cup from her lips and stared into it, horrified. "You obviously didn’t choose this place for its coffee."

Alex raised her eyebrows blankly. Throwing a last disgusted look at the coffee Taylor was all attention.

Pausing for effect, Alex sipped with what seemed like uncharacteristic delicacy at a glass of water. Taylor could almost feel her weighing her words with care.

"You refused to join Navy Intel, after a specific presidential request, and take pictures in Cuba of Socialist activities. Why?"

"Because I'm not a hired thug. Or a spy. I don't work for one side or the other." Taylor spat, staring straight down her nose into the sharp blue eyes that studied her, too intensely, in return. An involuntary shiver raced down her spine. She chose to ignore it.

"And because you're a communist."

"I'm not a fucking communist, not that it would be any of your business if I was. Is that what your dossier told you?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact."

"I took pictures of student rallies in Moscow protesting against the economic reform that was dragging the country into the sewer. I hardly think that makes me a communist. Why the fuck do you care anyway?"

Alex looked unimpressed at Taylor's explanation. "Actually, contrary to my own department's intel, I know you were there that day completely by accident, because your girlfriend, a Russian journalist named Michaela Ornova, was meeting you outside the Kremlin building. The protest just happened around you. You shot the pictures, captured some kid being beaten to death by Russian military, and were shortlisted for the Pulitzer. I even have the pictures."

"And this is supposed to prove what? That your computer is bigger than mine?" Taylor fidgeted in irritation. "You still haven't told me why you need me."

"I'm not sure I do need you, I just have to be sure."

"Sure about what?"

"That the message gets out right." Alex breathed heavily, and leaned in even closer. "You said you were interested in making people see the truth about war?" Taylor gave what she hoped was a perfunctory nod, pretending not to notice the obvious distaste Alex had for whatever it was she was so reluctant to spit out.

Finally the recon officer steeled herself visibly, taking a deep breath.

"I'm pretty sure… no I'm positive, we have evidence of Serbian genocide."

A heavy pause hung between them.

"Holy shit." Taylor breathed, professional and personal interest snapping into focus.

"Three days from here, there's an abandoned military post that the Serbs captured from the Croats more than ten months ago. There'd been rumours…at first there was nothing specific, just enough to feed my curiosity. But then my contacts found them. Mass graves, thousands of people, innocent people, being led out and shot in the streets. Stuff the world hasn't seen since Hitler."

"And you think we can get close enough to take pictures? You're the intel expert, why don’t you just take them yourself?"

"My reputation isn't all that clean, not even within the military. The shots could look posed. Like a set-up. It can't be anything that the Serbs can brush away, or deny, or that can be questioned. A TV crew would be the best thing, but there's no way we'd ever get either a crew or a satellite link in there. Stills are our best bet, and your reputation with them…"

"With my UNESCO backing, gives the UN a boost towards bringing down the law on their heads." She nodded in approval. "How long have you been dreaming up this plan?"

"Just since we met the other night, when I went back and checked your background." Taylor was surprised to see a small blush creep to the darker woman's cheeks. It disappeared almost instantly. "You wouldn't be working for the government really, just with the government. Or just me to be precise."

"And no military interference with what gets printed? My photos, my negs, my way?"

"I told them I was asking for info on another American citizen stuck here in Sarajevo. They don’t even know I'm approaching you."

Taylor's brows knitted in confusion. "I don’t understand."

"I was supposed to bug out a month ago, but I kept hanging around because of these rumours. Finally I got my orders. Ship leaves in four days, be on it. I've got just enough time to get out there, get the evidence I need, then it's back to the States. Maybe a war record with honours, and something to show for ten years of regular army, and two years of recon hell."

"So you'd want me to hold off with publicising the find until you're free and clear from the military…"

"Then we publish them, acknowledging both our roles in finding the evidence. You get to do whatever you like with the pictures."

"Do you know what this will mean..?" Taylor let out a sharp breath, not even realising she'd been holding it for the duration of Alex's speech.

"I'm hoping it will mean the beginning of the end to this goddamned war." Alex mumbled. "After what happened the other night it can't be fucking soon enough."

"I think we can agree on that."

*****

The attack on the hospital seemed to have been a one off event. According to the better and fresher info that Taylor was now being fed courtesy of Alex's laptop, telex and government connections, the Serbs were being driven back by UN forces from the hills surrounding Sarajevo. It was perfect timing for their exit from the city.

She quickened her pace as she walked down the dark alley, the camera equipment she hadn't pawned off to the black market dealers wrapped snugly in its shoulder bag; two Nikon cameras, a telescopic lens, and several filters. The bare minimum for a tabloid photographer, she thought, laughing softly to herself.

After the tragic wailings of the people in the blast zone the alleys still seemed deathly quiet to her, as if the entire population of the besieged city quivered silently under their beds. Taylor looked up at the windows, some shattered with blast impacts from long ago, others shuttered and boarded to the outside world, as if the precaution would make any difference against bombs or machine guns.

What Taylor had felt in the streets the last few days had surprised her. Rather than being openly afraid of renewed attacks on the city the people seemed vaguely relieved that the inevitable end to the cease fire had come at last. Before the attacks had been worse and the devastation more intense, but at least the people had known what to expect.

During the cease fire the whole city had sat in limbo, not knowing where the next attack would fall, or when. A sense of intense paranoia had been lifted from the streets and the people of the city began to function again, in fear of course, but in fear of the expected, rather than living in horror of the unknown and unanticipated.

Taylor increased her pace until she reached the stairwell leading down to the secret cellar, deep in the centre of the city. A barber shop traded above, oblivious to the fact that a dark woman lurked underneath, information feeding madly through her sophisticated army technology.

Tapping twice at the door she heard the bolt slide, and the door creaked slowly open.

Inside she found Alex working on the sight of a long range rifle, snapping the instrument roughly into place and adjusting the distance settings. On seeing Taylor she offered no greeting, merely leant down and picked up a sidearm from the table littered with various firearms.

"Do you know how to use one of these?" She asked, preo