"Any ideas as to where we should start?" Jess continued as they resumed their trek. The walking path, now a little hillier, was wide enough to allow them to walk side by side.

"I would suggest Washington is the most obvious place for answers, but it also poses the greatest danger. There are cameras on every corner, more police officers and federal agents than any other city in the entire country and lastly, I suspect, I'll be recognised there. And, let's not forget, my only known link to my past, Alexander, is also there."

"But you don't know who he is. Wouldn't going after Trent make more sense?"

"Dead men don't talk."

"Sometimes they leave a trail."

"More often they lead to a trap. My instinct tells me to go with Alexander."

"If you don't know where he is, or what he looks like, how will you find him?" Jess persisted. Her tenacity was admirable, but infuriating. She had no idea of the gravity of their situation. These people practiced neither decency nor morality. They killed anyone who challenged their rule.

"He'll find me."

"He'll kill you." Jess stopped walking. He read her mind. And her eyes were readying for a fight. She had to understand this was his world, a world of deceit and treachery.

"Only if I'm foolish enough to let him get that close," said Calin.

"Won't you need to talk to him?" she asked.

"No way, the first rendezvous is purely reconnaissance, an exercise in discovering just who is in the enemy camp."

"Something tells me you've done this before."

"It's possibly why I'm still alive."

"When and where do you plan to schedule this confrontation?"

"Someplace that's crowded with thousands of visitors, maybe the Lincoln Memorial. As for the timing, yesterday would have been ideal. We can't afford to allow them too much time to prepare."

"They'll swarm the place with agents."

"That's what I'm banking on. I hope to see a familiar face, one I recognise and one that triggers a memory." She stared at him in disbelief.

"There's another problem too, you know."

"My dear, Jess, what's a day without a challenge." His face broke into a smile. "What now?"

"We're almost two thousand miles from DC, we've run out of money and we have no transport. And we're being hunted by every law enforcement officer in the land."

"Perhaps it's time I made a phone call."

"We don't have a phone either."

*

"Why are we going this way?" asked Jess as Calin headed upstream. "The bridge we passed under last night was back the other way."

"Sometimes, Jess, I find it's best to just follow your instincts. Then you try to anticipate how your opponent will respond. It's a bit like a game of poker, you bluff and you gamble, never really knowing the other side's strength."

"Surely, there's more to it than just guesswork?"

"There is," conceded Calin. "I don't know how to define it. You just know. But sometimes you're wrong. Alexis was a case in point."

"How did she deceive you?"

"She didn't, I deluded myself. In my desperation to discover my real identity, I disregarded years of training and damn near got myself killed," Calin answered. "I believed she really intended to help."

"Don't be so hard on yourself, Calin. We all stuff up occasionally."

"I was trained to ...." Memory halted his flow of words. He was in a classroom. It was a lecture on how to mount a successful escape. The lecture was titled: Fapatee, the three steps of escape.

Fapatee was an acronym for firstly assess, plan, analyse then execute escape. What had prompted this recollection? Was his memory coming back?


"Are you alright, Calin?" she asked as the silence extended beyond a minute. "You've gone very quiet."

"Sorry, Jess, just had another flashback, one that might actually assist us."

"Tell me." Calin condensed Fapatee into a ninety second summary. "How does that help us?"

"I applied fapatee to our situation. It doesn't take a genius to assess our dilemma, it's beyond hopeless. We're broke, we're trapped and we're fast running out of opportunity. Analysis highlighted our needs. We have to get to Washington, we have to locate some link to Trent and we have to remain invisible. In other words we're in need of miracles. Have I filled you with hope yet?"

"I'm still listening."

"The final part of fapatee deals with escape. At this point, that's the easy part. I have no doubt we can get away from here, but where do we go? Our pursuers will never stop looking. Death alone will satisfy their requirements."

"Stop it, Calin, you're filling me with hope." For the first time in a while, her face brightened into a smile.

"Let's face it, Jess. I should already be dead. We both should be. But there's something inside me, maybe it's instinct or perhaps I'm a pre-programmed robot. It's insane. But, I fear, it's true. Look at what I've survived in the past couple of days, a shoot-out, a bail-out from a speeding truck and a confrontation with an armed rapist. I've broken into houses, stolen money, phones and vehicles. And let's not forget eluded and overcome Alexis and her specialist Military colleagues. I've skills no law-abiding citizen possesses. I'm a killer and a thief. And most importantly, I've undertaken extensive training that's ensured I know someone of importance."

"You don't have to convince me, Calin; I've been there and seen most of it. Are you trying to impress me?" Her smile eased the tension. "So what does the insane pre-programmed robot have in mind?"

"A journey to Washington," he answered.

"Would you care to elaborate on your travel plans, Mr Roberts?"

"A few minutes ago, Jess, you asked why we're heading upstream. At the time I said instinct, I think I can now expand on that. Yes, it was instinctive, but it was an ingrained response, a decision based on the years of training I spoke about. In hindsight, it probably wasn't training. It was brainwashing. It was as simple as that. They cleared my brain of its old habits and replaced it with new logic. Just like the erasing of a computer's hard drive."

"You always take this long to get to the point?"

"I thought blondes were slow on the uptake." He easily evaded the punch she threw.

"What's going upstream got to do with getting to Washington?"

"It's a combination of geography and climate, Jess. First, its winter, second, we're in Montana and third, most mountains around these parts have abundant coverings of snow."

"None of that gets us closer to DC."

"True, but hopefully it will lead us to a small community which in turn may provide us with opportunity and a means of transport." Calin paused, everything hinged on one assumption; the neighbourhood he'd find would be predominantly farming, with the occasional weekender rather than a commercial skiing resort.

"Jess, it is going to be a long, hard walk and it will get even colder. Are you up to it?"

"Try and stop me." Her ability to overcome physical pain and exhaustion was, he sensed, a product of the many years intensive gym work. It served to minimise the effects of the hunger they now experienced. More than twelve hours had passed since she had found him semi-conscious. In that time he had observed her intently. She was super competitive, he liked that. She'd never allow him to outlast her.

Not even the sub-freezing temperature affected her. Like him, her clothing offered little warmth. They weren't dressed for wintery conditions. The wind added to the chill factor. In silence they soldiered on.