Hippolyta was very much in control when she drove the Shay up to the gate at Olander Park. There was a car she recognized as being Corporal Watkins’ personal vehicle. She drove up alongside, driver’s side to driver’s side, as the window on the sedan rolled down, and noticed that both Janice and Rick were in civilian clothes. “Right on time, Hippolyta,” Janice said. “Do you know where we’re going?”

“I have the address,” Hippolyta said in her normal cold voice. “I have not been there.”

“We checked it out earlier,” Janice said. “If you like, we’ll lead you.”

“That would be excellent,” Hippolyta said with her calm, icy demeanor. “Let me turn around and we can proceed.”

Even that short exchange gave Sally the edge she needed to be certain the Hippolyta persona was fully in control. She was beyond the butterflies that Sally had experienced earlier, for now there was a job to do, a child to comfort. It was little enough that could be done. The Amazon kept her mind on her driving as she followed Janice’s car a few blocks down the street, and onto a side street.

Shelby’s house was not hard to find, wouldn’t have been even without the First to Know News van sitting outside of it and Shane and Jason waiting for their arrival. Even Jason’s presence didn’t disturb the Amazon; he was an irritant, nothing more. “Hippolyta, we’re glad you could come,” Jason said as he stepped up to the Shay.

“I was called,” she told him in a very short, flat tone. “Is the family ready for us?”

“Anytime,” Jason said, barely able to speak in her presence.

“Very well,” Hippolyta said, stepping out of the Shay and striding for the front door of the brick bungalow.

In a car parked across the street, the two men who had followed Jason to this house were not at all happy. “Shit,” the one named Mannie told the other, whose name was Luis. “That van is right in the fuckin’ way. I figured she’d park in front of it.”

“I told you we should have been farther up,” Luis snorted in reply. “We can do it anyway.”

“Not now,” Mannie replied, strangely calm. “They’re too close to the door. They’ll be inside by the time we could get in position. Let’s pull up, get in the space in front of that van and wait for them to come out.”

“They’re probably going to be a while,” Luis said, pulling out a cigarette and lighting it. “Maybe we ought to go away and come back in a few minutes.”

Shelby was in a downstairs room that was clearly a sickroom. She did not look well. Her face was pale and drawn, she was obviously weak, and her hair had been nothing but a memory for a long time. In spite of everything, she was excited to see the black-clad Amazon walk into her room. “Hippolyta!” she cried, though it was obvious her voice was much weakened. “You really came!”

“How could I not?” Hippolyta replied, the first hint of warmth entering her voice that anyone had heard tonight. The scene was touching enough that no one even noticed Shane already in the room with the camera on his shoulder getting it all on tape. “I am told that you have been very brave, Shelby. Such courage deserves reward.”

“I - I can’t believe that you would really come to see me.”

“As I said, Shelby, how could I not?” Hippolyta replied with a hint of a smile. “From what I’m told, you have been facing this tragedy like an Amazon, with your head held high in spite of everything. I’m proud to call you an Amazon for it. Continue to be brave, Sister.”

“But … but I haven’t done anything brave like you.”

“You have faced your future with as much bravery as anyone could do,” Hippolyta said. “When Pantariste, Xanthippe, and Antiopeia faced the Greeks at Troy, their fate was as certain as anything. But did they fall to their knees, cursing the Gods for their fate? No, Shelby, they did not. They died with their swords singing and Greeks falling to their blows despite the sure and certain knowledge that death lurked not long after. And they died with honor, doing what an Amazon is supposed to do. This is not Troy, and there are no Greeks emerging from wooden horses, but you are standing up to what must come just as bravely as they did long ago. How could I not come to honor you?”

“Do you … do you really think so?” Shelby asked, still amazed at her dream visitor.

“Yes, Shelby, I really do think so.”

The visit went on for several more minutes, with Shelby obviously awed at Hippolyta’s presence. Even so, Hippolyta could tell that the child had few reserves and was tiring fast. It would be better if she left soon and departed on a high note. “I fear I have other things to do this night, so I must be on my way. But I leave you with this: confront what must come like the Amazon that you are.”

“I … I will, Hippolyta. Thank you, Hippolyta. I’m really glad you could come to see me.”

Some Sally was creeping back into Hippolyta as she stepped back out into the hall. What a shit of a thing to happen to a nice kid like her! The kid really was facing her fate like an Amazon. Death was clearly coming and most likely soon, the signs were evident, but she was accepting it, not trying to deny it, not berating the world and everyone and everything in it for what was to come. That was worth a lot.

Still, she was glad to have it over with. Such a scene was hard, hard even for Hippolyta to have to face stoically. The little bit of Sally starting to emerge was damn glad that the event was over with. Now all she had to do was get in the Shay and drive swiftly away, while Rick and Janice kept Metheny from following or causing a scene. Her priorities now were simple: get the Shay back home, get out of the Hippolyta gear for hopefully the last time, and have a couple good stiff drinks.

Given the setup and the fact that it was only the two of them, Mannie and Luis were outside their car, crouched down behind it on the street side of the house. That wasn’t normally how they did this. It was good to be able to do the hit and get away, but they wanted a sure thing. This Hippolyta shit had gone on long enough and it had cost them a hell of a lot of money. It was time to put an end to this farce and prove just who was really running things. In other circumstances they might have called in some of their boys, rather than do it themselves, but with no warning there just hadn’t been time. Still, it would show the peons that their bosses could get their hands dirty, too.

“Here they come,” Luis whispered to Mannie.

An unnecessary statement; Mannie could see it too. “Let them get out in the open so we’re sure we have a clear shot, amigo. Let’s do this right.”

It was hard to wait; they could see some people standing on the porch. One of them was clearly the guy from the TV station. He still had the camera perched on his shoulder. They could see into the house, but not very far. The bitch in black was still behind the door, talking to someone inside. “Just come on out here, already,” Luis muttered. “Basta!”

“Plenty of time,” Mannie whispered.

Hippolyta took a minute or two to talk to Shelby’s parents, who were grateful that the Amazon had showed up, but were clearly almost broken from the ordeal of having to watch their beloved daughter slide downhill to a slow but certain death. Hippolyta tried to find a few words to give them courage, but it wasn’t as easy to do with an adult as it was to a kid who could suspend her disbelief. “Thanks again,” the child’s mother said. “It’ll help comfort her a lot.”

“I hope so, else I would not have come. Now, I must be on my way.”

“You take care, Hippolyta,” Shelby’s father said as the black-clad Amazon headed out the door.

Hippolyta took a couple steps onto the porch, pointedly ignoring Metheny, who was standing there with a microphone in his hand pressing for an interview. Shane had the camera up to get it. Well, tonight it wasn’t going to happen, Hippolyta thought. I just want—

All of a sudden there was a sustained blinking of lights and a roar from the street. Hippolyta and the others on the porch could hear it, could hear the bullets screaming past and hitting the brick of the porch and the front of the house behind them. “Down!” Rick yelled at the top of his lungs. A couple of the five on the porch were already diving for the cover of the brick wall that fronted the porch, and his shout drove the rest down quickly as they heard the bullets flying overhead and felt the chips of brick as they were spalled off of the house. Although he was the last one down, Rick hadn’t waited to take cover, either.

“What the hell?” Metheny yelled from the deck of the porch.

“WarLords, I bet,” Janice shouted back. “MAC-10s, about has to be.”

Gun aficionados tend to not think very highly of the MAC-10s Manny and Luis were firing at the house. They are not very accurate, nor do they have much effective range. On the other hand, they have a high rate of fire and put a lot of lead downrange very quickly, which is at best a mixed bag, because if the submachine gun isn’t kept under control it tends to scatter bullets all over the place, not necessarily toward what the shooter is aiming for.

Practice is not a concept that hoods like the WarLords think very highly of—not that there was a place or much time for them to do any covert practice anyway, especially the organization bosses. There were places around they might have gone to run a few magazines through the guns, but the likelihood of being discovered with illegal weapons was too much to risk. Manny and Luis had had even less practice than their underlings, who did almost all of the dirty work. The first half dozen rounds or so that they fired might have done some damage, but just plain missed. After that, while they held the triggers down, they were mostly struggling to keep the bucking little snakes under control, and the vast majority of bullets went well over the heads of anyone who might have been dumb enough to still be standing.

Hippolyta, the two cops, and the two from Channel 5 were about as safe as they could be on the decking behind the low brick wall—at least safe for the moment. Rick happened to be nearest the steps and took a quick peek around the edge of the wall to see if there was any chance of returning fire. But there were no clear targets, just the rapid flashes of light, and it wasn’t worth him just spraying shots out there. Though Rick had his Glock, since he was in civilian clothes, he only had the one clip in the gun, no spares. It was clear to him that any shots he fired would have to count. Janice had her Glock, too, and thank God had her portable radio in hand. She was already calling for assistance. And he knew Hippolyta had her .357, though he had no idea if she really knew how to use it—but it wouldn’t have surprised him at all if she did.

It didn’t take Manny and Luis long to blow through the fifty-round magazines on the guns each of them held and have to reload. Hippolyta was as out of the line of fire as anyone, but she was also madder than anyone else, too. It took insensitive shitheads with real balls to come and shoot up a sick kid’s house in hopes of getting their target. Now there was no Sally personality in her. Her reactions were pure Hippolyta, and she knew that this had to be ended as quickly as possible. The brief break when the guns quit firing gave her the opportunity that she needed. Since it was dark and she was dressed almost completely in black, Manny and Luis didn’t even notice when she dived over the edge of the low porch and landed out of their sight.

Hippolyta rolled on the grass to break her fall, picked herself up, and started running toward the back of the house. There was a low board fence separating this house from the neighbor’s, and it was the work of an instant to vault over it. Now truly out of sight, she ran around the back of the neighbor’s house. Then, with her black leather making her the next thing to a ghost in the dark of the night, she ran out to the street but stayed on the curb side of the vehicles to keep them between her and where the goons were again firing from.

Several cars, including the Shay, blocked her view of the gunmen, but the flash of the MAC-10s and their noise as the gunmen started firing again placed them perfectly for her. Keeping low and with minimal attempt to be stealthy, she worked her way up the house side of the row of cars until she was at the back of the First to Know News van. She moved out to the street side and crouched behind it for a moment, and only then pulled the .357 from the holster on her hip.

Like Rick and Janice, Hippolyta knew she didn’t have many rounds in the Model 581—only six, in her case, and like them, nothing for a reload, so she knew that she’d have to make them count. The only reserve was Penthesilea in the scabbard on her back. She took a couple of deep breaths, more to clear her mind than anything else, then leaped out into the street from behind the First to Know News van, the .357 up in a two-handed police grip and stance. She could see the two gunmen crouched behind their car, firing at the house, and it was clear that they had no idea she was there.

“Drop the guns, meatheads!” she yelled at the top of her lungs.

Manny and Luis weren’t expecting that in the slightest, but they had no intention of dropping the MAC-10s, either. Both started to swing their guns around in Hippolyta’s direction.

Hippolyta didn’t even think about it. One gunman was blocking the other one, but she had a good sight picture on his chest. She squeezed the trigger once, twice, in a double tap and watched him start to go down, clearing her view of the other one. Just after she had picked up a sight picture on the other chest and started squeezing off another double-tap, she heard three quick shots from near the house—the familiar, deep voice of a .40-caliber Glock. The second gunman jerked backward and to the side, also falling on the asphalt.

“Cease firing!” she yelled. “Two down!”

Staying behind the van, out of sight of the house, she moved toward the gunmen lying on the ground. The second one was definitely a “K.” After two head hits there wasn’t even much left of his head. It was a little harder to tell with the first gunman hit in the chest and only by Hippolyta, but he was definitely down and not moving. “All clear!” she yelled at the house, still not exposing herself to anyone who might not have gotten the message. “Cease firing. Two down. All clear!” she yelled again, keeping the Model 581 pointed at the first gunman, who still hadn’t moved.

“Hippolyta, are you all right?” Rick called out, his voice now closer to her than the house.

“I’m okay. Everybody up there all right?”

“Yes, God knows why,” he said walking up, his gun still drawn and pointing at the two gunmen. He glanced at the far one—who would later prove to be Luis—and said, “I thought I had a good shot.”

“You did. I think I got a good piece of both of them, but I don’t know if this one is for sure a K.” She bent down and took a closer look. “Yeah, he’s a goner,” she said after a moment. “Heart isn’t pumping anymore.”

“Jesus, I didn’t even realize you weren’t still on the porch until you nailed this one,” Rick replied, then as an afterthought yelled at the house, “All clear, two down and dead.”

Now Janice came, hurrying up herself. “I’ve got backup on the way,” she reported.

“All this because they wanted a piece of me,” Hippolyta said, the previous excitement in her voice now back to her normal icy calm, though regret over the incident could be heard in her voice. “Is everyone all right in the house?”

A sudden choked shout by a female voice from the house drew their attention. “Help, please! Shelby is dying!” All three of them took off running.

In the house, they found Shelby’s father trying to ease the comfort of his daughter while the mother tenderly held the girl’s hand.

“Call EMS!” Janice yelled as Rick ran for a first aid kit and Jan herself helped hold the girl in an attempt to aid her breathing. From the efforts of the little girl’s struggles it was obvious to Janice and Hippolyta that it would be a miracle indeed if Shelby would live even long enough to see the paramedics. She was conscious, though battling hard. It looked as if the shock of the attack on Hippolyta was just too much added to the excitement of the Amazon’s visit.

“Thank you... Hippolyta,” Shelby managed to whisper.

Hippolyta looked the rapidly weakening girl steadily in the eye and said, “Shelby, the ancient Greeks believed that when came the time to die, they would have to pay a fee to Charon the ferryman to cross the river Styx. When you meet Charon, as must we all, you are to tell him from me that your fee is paid in full twice over.”

“I didn’t … do anything,” Shelby gasped weakly, apparently aware of the myth.

“Yes you did,” Hippolyta told her sharply. “Had you not called for me there would be two pieces of evil still walking the street. They walk it no longer. Charon could ask for nothing better in payment. By calling me, you have done your duty as an Amazon, and I praise you for it.”

“Thank you ...” The girl’s reply was almost inaudible and cut off in mid breath, and as the few in the room watched, her eyes closed and her labored attempts at breathing simply stopped as she quickly faded into death. The shock of fright had taken its toll on her rapidly dwindling reserves, and in her already massively weakened state, her heart and will simply could not keep up. They could hear approaching sirens, patrol cars responding to the call for backup that Janice had made earlier.

Hippolyta turned to Shelby’s parents, who were frantic and weeping at this turn of events. “I am very sorry that this evil was visited upon you tonight, and truly sorry that my part in it has caused you distress and hastened the death of your daughter. But do not doubt that, before her passing, your daughter still did her duty as an Amazon. I salute both of you.

She turned back to look at Shelby’s body and said in benediction, “Fare thee well, Sister. I salute you, and I sincerely hope that sometime I will meet you on the other side of the Styx.” With that, Hippolyta turned and walked out the sickroom door, pulling the parents out with her.

Outside the room Hippolyta again started apologizing to Mr. and Mrs. Robbins, but the father, tears still flowing from his eyes, stopped her. “Hippolyta, you came at our daughter’s request and with our blessing. None of this is your fault. Shelby went more quickly this way, saving her the last of a painful, lingering death we all knew was happening but not for how much longer. It could have been just hours or maybe weeks of pain for her. We could tell that she was highly comforted by the words from you that she did hear, and we think she would be happy with the exchange, knowing she was dying and that her request to see you helped your effort at fighting crime.”

Shelby’s father looked at his wife. “Despite the cost of a life that was ending soon anyway, even though she is our daughter, both my wife and I are relieved to know that those two hoodlums are no longer a threat to the city. We do not want you agonizing over this. What is done is done and cannot be changed. You still have a job to do, evil to fight, and you should probably go and save yourself much embarrassing questioning.”

It seemed prophetic that her last words to Shelby had been about Hades, because for Hippolyta that was exactly where her next hour and more was spent. She stepped out the front door of the house and into a seeming sea of humanity. It was easy enough for the Amazon to act in the heat of action. It was hard indeed for Sally to stay in character when the quiet residential street was already thronged with neighbors, drawn by the noise that had stopped and were now wondering what had happened, and too few police there yet to help with crowd control. More people were showing up continuously. And before Hippolyta could get away, the media started arriving just behind two ambulances and a raft of patrol cars.

Shortly, all of the stations had news vans there, and it was as much of a city media convention as there ever had been in the town, though all were kept relatively orderly and behind police lines by the rapidly expanding number of patrolmen. Soon multiple lines of yellow tape crisscrossed and blocked the street. More police kept coming and—like for the media—it too was soon as close to a police convention as the city had ever seen.

Perhaps Lieutenant Turner was the only one who didn’t seem at all awed by the presence of Hippolyta at the scene, or of her being a major dealer of death to a couple of the city’s leading crime figures. Even so, Hippolyta had to tell her story a dozen times over, getting increasingly nervous as it grew more difficult to maintain the role.

Finally, what seemed like endless eons later, Lieutenant Turner came over to her. “Hippolyta,” he said. “I think we’ve got things as under control as they’re ever going to be. Unless you have some reason to hang around, you might as well get out of here.”

“Are you sure I will not be needed more in regard to this?” she replied, maintaining her appearance of icy calm.

“I don’t think so,” Turner said with a smile, and gave her a broad wink. “If we need more from you, I know how to get hold of you. Thanks for what you did tonight. That black outfit, quick thinking, and good shooting probably saved several other lives. I am really sorry about the sick little girl who died, though.”

“As are we all. Thank you, sir,” she replied. “I shall be available if needed.”

Grateful indeed for the chance to finally get out of this nightmare scene, Hippolyta turned toward the car, still sitting where she’d parked it near Shane’s Channel 5 News van. All of a sudden, a couple things came together in her mind. Turner said that, in spite of all the effort that Sally had gone through to keep Hippolyta’s real identity a secret, he knew how to get hold of her. When Bill first said that, she’d assumed he meant through her brother. But holy shit, Turner knew! With that confidence in his voice and the wink he’d given her he had to know! After all, Sally knew Bill Turner as well as any policeman on the force, better even than she knew Rick. She’d known him for years, starting back in grade school sometime, when Bill and her father had first been patrol partners. Somehow, he must have figured it out—maybe her voice or some mannerism had given her away.

She took another step toward the Shay … and now she knew for sure. The car had to have been what gave her away. Hell, Bill must have worked with her father on it, back when she was in college or in Battle Creek or somewhere! He had to know! She let out a sigh—apparently he’d decided to not say anything, but that meant that this had to be Hippolyta’s last appearance, not that she didn’t agree totally.

There was no doubt that Hippolyta had come to the end of her run in Toledo. It couldn’t be any other way. She’d had in mind since she watched Shelby die what the next step had to be, and she’d had plenty of time to think about it in the last hour or so. Now there was no choice but to do it, the girl’s death the real clincher, but in the overall just one more reason to never appear as the Amazon again. She glanced at the yellow tape marking the crime scene. Just beyond it was a cluster of media—vans from all the local stations, now including a second van from Channel 5, with Keri there holding a camera and supporting Hank McMahon as the reporter.

In addition to the television coverage, there were three or four people from the Blade and Ernie Kimmel from the Daily. There would be no better time, no better place. Now that she was sure what had to be done, Hippolyta pulled the Amazon to the top of her persona one last time, turned, and walked in the direction of the group. Even she couldn’t hide an internal smile as she noticed six video cameras go up onto six shoulders as she walked closer.

She was still ten or fifteen yards off when the questions started to get yelled, the kind of questions she might have yelled had she had been on the other side of that line. Remaining impassive, Hippolyta kept her silence as she walked up to within a couple yards of the police line, ignoring all the shouted questions and remaining silent as she held up her hands, her mime pose commanding silence.

The babble quickly died down enough for Hippolyta to be heard as she said loudly, though not shouting, “Ladies and gentlemen of the press, I have a statement to make.”

“Hippolyta, what happened tonight?” she heard Metheny shout in defiance of her request for order.

“In a moment, Mr. Metheny,” she said in her low voice register. She was surprised to notice that even Jason quieted down—an elbow to the ribs supplied by the reporter from Channel 24 may have helped it along. His bravery must increase when he has an audience, she noted, comparing this display with his obsequious tone when she’d first arrived tonight. As order was restored, she checked that all the cameras were up and running, and began her statement. “By the will of the Gods and Goddesses, evil lost a battle here tonight. However, I now know it was a mistake to work in public like this and allow innocent lives to be placed at risk by my actions, even though the intentions were those of a good deed. Indeed, one of those innocents died tonight as a result of this evil, who instead was targeting me. A young girl martyred because of my actions means I can no longer allow innocent people to be endangered by my presence. Therefore, in order to continue my mission, I must return to the shadows and work from there until my enemies are defeated. You shall not hear from me again until that day. Thank you for your forbearance, but now I must bid you farewell.”

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