“You want to feed your little bald dog to their big man-eating guard dogs?” asked Trip, sounding a little angry.

“No, of course not. Don’t be silly. I’m just saying, he could go to a part of the fence far from where you want to be and bark. Call them away. Then you could get in position and they wouldn’t hear you.”

Trip nodded slowly. “Could work. But how do you keep from Buster getting seen or eaten?”

“Someone just puts Buster down on his leash, lets him bark his head off for a while, and then picks him up and runs away.”

“Depending on what time of day it is, that could work,” I said, nodding appreciatively at Peter’s plan, feeling only a little guilty about putting Buster’s fuzzy butt in danger. “The only issue is getting him to stop barking. He’ll bark as the person tries to run away, and they’d be totally out in the open and vulnerable.”

“Not if you used some meat,” said Trip.

“Meat?” I asked, totally confused.

“Buster likes snake meat more than anything. If you shove a piece of that stuff in his face, he’ll stop barking to eat it. He even quits licking to eat snake.”

Everyone laughed.

“Well, that must be some pretty powerful stuff,” I said, trying not to be too shocked over the fact that Trip knew my dog-partner better than I did. I really hadn’t been paying enough attention to either one of them.

“Okay, so anyone have any other ideas about dog distraction?”

“Poison,” said Winky, matter-of-factly.

I shook my head at her, smiling slightly. “Damn, Winky.”

She shrugged. “What? It’s us or them, right? I pick us. Besides, they have the taste for human meat themselves. Canner dogs can’t be allowed to live any more than their canner owners.”

“If we kill their dogs, we might as well hang up a sign that says we’re coming. We can’t be that obvious,” said Coli, her tone making it clear she thought Winky was an idiot.

“Well, I’m poisoning them when we go in for the search and destroy part of the mission,” said Winky, her chin jutting out.

“Okay,” I said, using my best peacemaking voice, "so Winky’s going to off the killer dogs when it’s go-time. Who’s going to carry Buster to safety, with a pocketful of juicy snake meat?” I scanned the crowd, but no one responded. Eyes darted around, everyone looking to the other for an answer.

Peter sighed. “I’ll do it. But I’m not putting any snake meat in my pocket. Someone will have to give me a baggie or something.”

I shook my head. “No. No way. You’re not going.”

“Why not?” he said indignantly. “Are you saying I can’t help rescue those kids? Because you aren’t the boss of me, Bryn. I do what I want.”

I tried not to smile. He looked so cute when he was mad, his hair sticking out in all directions, his twiggy arms jutting out at his sides as he rested his hands on his hips.

“I know you want to go, but you didn’t even enter the fight competition. And we all know it’s because you would have lost. Badly.” I didn’t mean to insult him, but even he knew it was the truth. There was no point in dancing around the issue.

“I’m not planning on fighting. I’m planning on causing a distraction and sprinting my butt off. I’m fully capable of running scared. I’ve done it many times in my life.”

That earned him a few laughs.

I looked at Kowi and Trip. “What do you guys think?”

Trip shrugged. “If he wants to put his ass on the line, let him. We are.”

Peter nodded his approval, refusing to look at me.

“I think we need to consider how anyone might slow us down or make us more vulnerable,” said Kowi in a low tone. It seemed like he was trying not to insult Peter.

“I can take care of myself,” said Peter. “And if you need to, you can leave me behind.”

I could practically see up his nose into his brain, his chin was so high in the air. “Okay, fine. Go with us if you want. But don’t call me to come in and save your scrawny butt if you get into trouble,” I said, a little irritated that he was going. I could see the value in it, but I also knew how easy he’d be to kill.

“I know you say that out of love, Bryn, so I’m going to let it go,” said Peter, now looking down his nose at me. He’d gone from miffed martyr to scolding librarian in a flash.

I stuck my tongue out at him and then looked away. I caught Bodo’s eye and he winked at me. Knowing Bodo would probably stay behind to save Peter if he were in trouble made me feel better about letting him go. With Bodo watching over him, he had a much better chance of making it back to the swamp, and I could hardly block him from going out of concern for his safety and not do the same for everyone else. We were all going to be in danger, because no matter how good we were at fighting, none of it could stop a well-aimed bullet. I made a mental note to be sure Peter had his .357 with him on the day we left.

“So what time do we go? And what day?” asked Winky.

“They tend to sleep in until nearly lunchtime in our experience,” said Peter.

“Yeah. Dey like to party at night,” said Bodo.

“Did Celia have anything to say about that?” I asked Trip. I couldn’t remember her mentioning it to me.

“Kind of. She said they drank a lot and had lots of late night … uh … barbecues.” He cleared his throat and looked up at the ceiling. All of us remained quiet for a few seconds before Winky broke the silence.

“So do we go in the morning then?”

“Not necessarily,” I said, remembering George’s wisdom. “We have to watch them do their thing, so we need to go for a full day and night. And if we could do it for more than one day, that would be better - to see what their routines are.”

“Let’s just plan on one day and if we can do more, we will,” said Trip. “We’re not going to be able to plan everything. Some things will just have to be done on the fly.”

“When are we leaving?” asked Winky. “I have to get our stuff ready. Clothes and paint.”

“Clothes and paint?” I asked. I had no idea what she was talking about.

“Yeah.”

The others kept talking as if she made complete sense.

“Coli and some of the others can help you. I’d like to leave in five days,” said Kowi. “We can get a little training done with Bryn first and then go. Plan to have us gone for three days max.”

“Fine. No problem,” said Winky, moving away from us to go talk to some girls who were standing on the outskirts.

“What is she talking about? Paint?” All I could picture was the group of us throwing buckets of color on things. Or spraying graffiti - Canners Be Gone!

“Camouflage and warpaint,” said Trip, looking away from me to address the guys behind him. “You guys get our weapons and any stuff we can use for distractions.”

“Like what kind of distractions?” asked Paci.

“Noisy ones. Exploding ones,” I said absently, still struggling with the whole paint idea.

Paci smiled devilishly. “Well allll riiiight. Now that’s what I’m talking about.” He rubbed his hands together.

“So we’ve got some teams,” said Kowi. “Peter’s on the distraction team. What about you, Bodo? Where will you be?”

Bodo shifted from one foot to the other. He glanced nervously at me and then Peter a couple times before answering. “I will be with Peter. Doing da distracting with animals.”

I squinted my eyes at Bodo, trying to figure out if his choice of words was intentionally vague or if it was just his crazy German thing coming out again. His body language gave nothing away, save for the fact that he appeared to be avoiding my eyes, looking anywhere else but in my direction.

I had a feeling he was thinking about Nina, but I didn’t know if that meant he was afraid to leave her behind or what. He can run but he can’t hide. I’ll make him tell me later. I relaxed knowing that he’d be lying next to me in less than eight hours and I’d get my answers.

“Okay,” said Kowi, “so that’s Peter and Bodo with Paci and whoever he takes on the distraction team - I assume that’ll include at least Fohi, right?”

Paci nodded.

“The rest of us will position ourselves to gather info,” said Trip. “And get ready to kick ass if needed.”

“All of us need to be ready to do that,” I said. “Workouts at eight o’clock tomorrow. Same place as this morning.” I turned my back to go to our hut. “No bystanders this time,” I shouted over my shoulder. I was freaking out enough over the huge obstacles to our success already, and I didn’t need any more distractions to add on top of it.

Peter and Bodo fell into step next to me, one on either side, and we trudged back through the trees and roots to our little hut over the swamp.

***

We got back to the hut, Peter going right to his pantry organizing and Bodo, Buster, and I going to the mattresses to hang out. I immediately made it my mission to figure out what Bodo had planned for his part in the canner recon.

“So, fess up. What are you going to do when we get to that house?”

Bodo shrugged. “I don’t know. Help Peter. Make sure he doesn’t get eaten.”

“What else? I saw you not looking at me.”

“I don’t look at you all da time, Bryn.”

“No, but certain times you do and you didn’t this certain time.”

“You’re being like one of dose girls who does dat crazy talk now, aren’t you? Trying to trick me into saying da wrong thing.” He held up his finger and shook it at me. “Nice try dare, Bryn. But I am too smart for dat.”

I grabbed his finger and squeezed it hard, bending it back a little as a threat. “Don’t shake your finger in my face, first of all. And second, don’t play that guy game where you act like I’m being all crazy girly and doing crap that doesn’t make sense. You know what I’m talking about.”

“Bryn, I think maybe I want to have my finger back still attached to my hand. And maybe we should just take a nap because you look very tired to me.” He tried to pull his hand back, but I held on. It forced me forward and up onto my knees in front of him.

“Stop pulling me,” I insisted.

“Stop squeezing my defenseless finger.” He was smiling, obviously not appreciating how serious I was.

“Your bird is going to have a problem landing on your hand if you have a messed up finger in the way,” I warned.

“Don’t you mean he’s going to have a hard time making a bird if his finger is messed up?” asked Peter, joining us, completely non-plussed over the tension in the room.

“No!” we both said.

“Hey, feisty, watch it,” said Peter, motioning for Buster to join him and sit in his lap.

I turned my attention back to Bodo, staring him down with as serious a face as I could manage. “Stop. Pulling. On. Me.”

“Stop. Pulling. On. Me,” he said, leaning over quickly to kiss me on the mouth.

I let go of his finger and pushed him hard. He fell backwards, his head going over the edge of the hut’s floor to dangle over the swamp.

I couldn’t help myself. I seized the opportunity, jumping on top of him, belly to belly, and pushing his head farther back. “Admit it!” I demanded. “You’re planning something with that bird!”

“No!” he grunted out. “Never!” He reached up trying to dislodge me, pulling me higher in the process and causing me to end up with my upper body partway over the edge.

“Let go of me you big oaf!” I yelled after I felt his arms go around me.