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elite troops known as Trail-Blazers who crewed the wagon-trains.

Totally dedicated and highly disciplined, the TrailBlazer Division was

a cross between the battle-hardened WW2 generation of US Marines and

the Waffen-SS of the same period. But even they had been known to lose

their grip when confronted by the awesome powers unleashed by a

summoner able to call upon the Seven Rings of Power.

Mr Snow, known as The Storm-Bringer, was one such individual - perhaps

the only one of his kind among the Plainfolk. Thanks to the efforts of

Steve and Roz Brickman, Mr Snow's protegee, Clearwater, was now in the

hands of the Federation. Well, almost. To be more precise, she was in

the intensive care ward of the mobile field hospital hitched to the Red

River wagon-train now heading south out of Nebraska.

Clearwater, on past form, was rated as potentially even more dangerous

than Mr Snow, but after suffering massive wounding followed by major

surgery she was now under continuous sedation and, in the short term,

was not judged to be a threat while in transit aboard Red River or to

the Federation where the research staff of the Life Institute were

eagerly awaiting her arrival.

That left Mr Snow, summoner and wordsmith of the Clan m'call, and his

other young pupil, Cadillac Deville, apprentice wordsmith and seer.

Their capture (at planning level it was called 'their removal from the

equation') was to be the final phase in OPERATION SQUARE-DANCE,

masterminded by Commander-General Ben Karlstrom.

Karlstrom, a close relative of the President-General, was the

Operational Director of AMEXICO, the covert operations unit formed to

carry out assignments initiated directly from the Oval Office currently

occupied by George Washington Jefferson the 31st.

In late 19th century terms, AMEXICO combined the functions of the

American CIA, the Gestapo of Germany's Third Reich and the British

SAS.

Intelligence-gathering, state security, commando-style forays and

'judicial terminations' in parallel to, but without the knowledge of,

the recognized military police and army intelligence units. Its agents

- known as mexicans - operated within the subterranean nation-state

ruled by the First Family and the blue-sky world above, and its

existence was the best-kept secret in the Federation.

The nine members of the Supreme Council were officially aware of the

general nature of the organization but they did not know the manpower

it employed, the resources it could call upon or the scope of its

activities.

Only Jefferson the 31st and Karlstrom knew the full score. Others

could only speculate. AMEXICO was the President-General's private army

and the impenetrable cloak of secrecy was essential because it was

sometimes called upon to eliminate potentially troublesome members of

the First Family.

To some readers, it may seem strange that disaffection of any sort

could exist in an enclosed totalitarian state in which every aspect of

the environment and its soldier-citizen's lives was controlled with

military precision and computerized efficiency from Day One. But such

was the case. Any reader with direct experience of the armed forces or

the electronics industry will know that 'military precision' and

'computerized efficiency' are mythical states which bear little

relation to what either system is able to deliver.

All monolithic power structures staffed by human beings are bound to be

less than perfect - especially one reliant on advanced technology - and

the Federation was no exception. Nine hundred years of relentless

regimentation had failed to produce a First Family version of 'Soviet

Man'. People at every level of the command structure still screwed up

and systems crashed with unfailing regularity. Depending on your

attitude towards what the First Family was trying to achieve this was

either a matter of grave concern or grounds for celebration. Proof of

the indestructibility of the human spirit; a ray of hope for the future

of mankind.