Robert Adams - Bili the Axe

“No, it was over forty years ago, this time of which I speak. I was then an ensign of foot and I came damned bloody close to dying that day, so I remember it full well. There was never a merger with those valiant folk possible. So long and hard and unstintingly did they oppose us that, in the end, we found it necessary to slay every adult male and female and many of the young’uns, even. The empty lands and a very few children was all we secured in the end.

“Those admirable folk called themselves Sinsnatyers, and almost every one of the couple of score boy children we adopted of them has become a fighter of note in Skohshun ranks. I greatly fear that if we push these Kuhmbuhluhners too hard, too far, we may well end with a similar situation or a worse one, mayhap. We now know their mettle and they ours, so should we now offer to treat… ?”

All of the other officers made to speak, but Earl Devemee forestalled them, raising his hand and saying, “Allright, brigadier, nothing can be lost by trying your idea; we can’t fight for some months, yet, anyway. You choose three heralds, send them to me, and I’ll draw up a set of demands and concessions—a great many of the former and a very few of the latter, of course.”

But the brigadier frowned. “I had been thinking along lines more of negotiation between more or less equals, Earl Devernee, but we can try it your way, to start. Don’t any of you be surprised, however, if these feisty bastards send back both heralds and list with detailed instructions as to where we can insert said list!”

General James Hiram Corbett, U.S.A., returned the saber flourish with a hand salute and acknowledged the crisp report of his subordinate, Major Gumpner, with a nod of the head. Then he smiled. “Okay, Gump, let’s get this show on the road. I’ll join the column after I’ve had a few last words with Dr. Sternheimer.”

As the major trotted off toward the formation of men and their beasts, Corbett reined his big riding mule around and toed it over to the communications building. There he dismounted, hitched the mule and strode inside. After returning the salute and greeting of the duty sergeant, he said, “Get the Center for me, please. Dr. Stemheimer, of course.”

The young radio operator seated himself at his console, threw several switches, turned some knobs, then began to intone, “Broomtown Base calling J&R Kennedy Research Center.”

“Center, here,” the reply presently came. “Who are you calling?”

The general strode over to the console and picked up a mike. “This is General Corbett. Get me Dr. Stemheimer, stat!”

“I’m already here, Jay,” a smooth, deep voice replied. “I had an idea that you’d call just before you left. Have you thought of something else we can supply?”

“No, David, we’re as well equipped as it’s possible for us to be, now. Barring unforeseen circumstances, I’ll be in contact with you or the Broomtown Base once every day, most likely when we halt for the night. Is that a suitable arrangement?”

“Of course it is, Jay—whatever is easiest for you and your party. Your mission is vital to us, here at the Center, so you’ll get all the cooperation we can afford you. How soon do you think you’ll need the copters?”

Wrinkling his forehead, the officer answered, “We’d best just play that one by ear, David. At this stage, I simply am incapable of estimating a date. My intel sources lead me to believe that there is a great deal of movement up north, so much that it sounds like a migration of some people or other. Since they’re said to be heading west and south and east, we are certain to come face to face with them no matter where we angle our route of march, which most likely means fighting at least part of our way.”

“Then perhaps you should have more troops, Jay—and I think there are some machine guns in the Center armory, too.”

Corbett sighed. “David, David, you mean so well, I know, but you simply don’t understand the logistics here. If these four troops of dragoons can’t do the job, then a damned full-strength regiment couldn’t accomplish it. And supplying more than the two hundred and fifty-odd now in this force would be a real nightmare; the preparations alone would probably keep us from starting before this time next year, if that early.”

“Well, then, Jay, how about those machine guns? I can have them up there in only a few hours… ?”

Another sigh from Corbett. “David, thank you; most sincerely, I thank you for your obvious concern, but no thank you on the machine guns. For one thing, only I and a very few of my current officers have ever fired one. For another, I’ve no faintest idea where I’d be able to round up the additional pack mules I’d need to carry God alone knows how many more thousands of rounds of ammo for the damned things. Besides, we’re well enough armed, in my considered judgment, without any fully automatic weapons.

“Each trooper has a rifle and fifty-five rounds of ammo for it, plus four grenades, a bayonet, a saber and a dirk. Each of the officers and senior noncoms has a carbine, pistol, saber and dirk, plus grenades if they want them; they carry fifty-five rounds for their carbines and at least fourteen for their pistols. I’ve also seen to it that every one of my packers is armed with and qualified with a carbine or rifle. The ammo carried by the men plus the spare ammo in the mule packs gives us something over thirty-two thousand rounds for the shoulder weapons, alone. I am convinced that we cannot possibly need more than we have.”

“Allright, Jay, allright,” said Sternheimer. “I make no pretense of knowing the best ways of handling a military situation, never having had any training or experience along those lines. I simply wish no stone unturned in seeing to it that we at the Center provide you everything and anything you need or might need to accomplish your ends, up there. We lost poor Erica, last time, we certainly don’t want to lose you, too.”

Corbett noted silently that the Director made no mention of Dr. Harry Braun, Dr. Erica Arenstein’s former husband and her murderer. Because he had been suffering from a severe infection in a broken leg, Braun had been sent ahead along with an escort of three men when a sudden and unexplained malady had struck down most of Corbett’s then command.

But instead of proceeding as ordered and then sending back aid from Broomtown Base, Braun had coldly murdered again, then informed all at Broomtown and the Center that he was the only survivor of the party, that Corbett and all of the others were long since dead.

Of course, when Corbett and his reduced party arrived to put the lie to Braun’s fanciful tales, the murderer’s rising star had abruptly plunged to absolute nadir. Unwilling to kill one of his peers—one of the few twentieth-century scientists and specialists who made up the hierarchy of the Center—Sternheimer had given some thought to the murders, misdeeds and assorted lies of Harry Braun, then arrived at a truly fiendish punishment just short of a richly deserved execution.

After being openly stripped of all his offices and the privileges he had had, he was assigned to a demeaning and most tedious job. But that had not been the extent of Sternheimer’s savage retribution, and Jay Corbett could not.repress a cold shudder when he thought of what else had been done to Braun.

Braun had been drugged, and taken to the transfer laboratories and his mind had been transferred from its young, healthy body into another one—an older one, which was slowly dying of an exceedingly painful and very unpleasant variety of cancer. Each time Corbett had visited the Center since then and had chanced to see the bent, shuffling, unwell body in which Braun was now imprisoned, he had been nauseated, wishing that he had shot Braun when he had had the opportunity, for any death would have been far more merciful than this form of lingering torture.