Ben Bova - Test of Fire

“No, not on this side of the airfield,” Angela said.

It was a tense ride. The truck was agonizingly slow, and it seemed to take forever to get through the spots where the tangled trees and undergrowth crowded up to the very edge of the highway.

The men kept their weapons in their grips, straining their eyes on the foliage. Alec saw that they were sweating despite the cool shadows of the trees and the wind blowing against them.

He kept watching Angela. She seemed concerned, but not frightened. She’s not expecting trouble here, he reasoned, so neither should we.

But his palms still felt cold and slippery.

Kobol stayed in constant touch with the ships by radio. Alec had taken his helmet off and hung it by its chin strap on the platform railing.

“Do you know my father well?” he asked Angela.

She nodded. “He’s my father, too.”

Alec felt as if she had kicked him in the stomach.

There was no air left in his lungs. He could not speak.

“Stepfather,” she added, oblivious to his plight.

“He and my mother, before she died…” Her voice trailed off and she looked away, into the distance.

With a struggle, Alec sucked air into his lungs.

He realized that his teeth were clenched together so hard the pain shot to the top of his head.

Angela turned back to face him. “He loved my mother very much,” she said. “It wasn’t just a man taking a woman. They were like man and wife. And he’s taken good care of me ever since I was a little girl.”

Alec said nothing. The knot inside him tightened with every heartbeat.

“You really live on the Moon?” she asked.

“Yes.” His voice sounded like a dying croak, even to himself.

“Did I say something wrong?”

“No. Nothing.” He shook his head. “I… it’s just that… I didn’t expect to meet a stepsister. My mother will be very interested.”

“Oh. Yeah, I guess so. I see.”

“Do you?”

“Yes, I do.” Her chin went up a notch.

Alec shook his head. “I think not.”

“There’s the airfield,” Gianelli’s voice rang out.

“Hot damn, those ships look beautiful!”

Alec scrambled to his feet just as an explosion erupted in the trees on the far side of the airfield, billowing black, flame-streaked smoke into the sky. The thundering roar reached his ears a splitsecond later. It felt almost like a physical blow.

“They’re getting closer,” Angela said. For the first time her voice sounded tinged with fear.

“Will won’t be able to hold them back much longer.”

The truck was plummeting down the highway now, descending from the ridge crest and racing full tilt for the ships. They were still parked together, gleaming silvery in the glaring sunlight, looking strangely out of place in this land of soft greens and gray-brown concrete.

The other laser trucks were gathered in a semicircle on the far side of the shuttles. But as far as Alec could see, no weapons were being fired.

Alec turned to follow a trooper’s outstretched arm and saw three men who had just emerged from the woods off to the right side of the ships.

Even without binoculars he could make out the angular shapes of guns slung over their shoulders.

They stopped and waved their arms over their heads.

“Wait!” Angela yelled as the men on the truck swung their weapons toward the trio. “That’s Will! Don’t shoot!”

Before anyone could stop her she jumped off the truck and ran toward the three men.

“Hold your fire,” Alec snapped. He pushed up to the driver’s cab and rapped on its roof. “Get over there, where those men are.” Turning to the troopers, he commanded, “All of you except Kobol, off the truck and get to the ships. Now!”

Their faces showed they didn’t like what was going on, especially trotting a kilometer or two in the open, with those dark woods nearby. But they obeyed Alec’s order.

The truck pulled up alongside Angela. She stopped running and the three men walked easily toward her. They wore nondescript, ragtag clothes: cut-off shorts, ancient gray shirts, one wore a vest, only one had boots. But their weapons were clean and each of them was laden with bulging cases of ammunition slung on straps across their shoulders.

Alec clambered down from the truck to meet them. Kobol stayed up on the laser mount, with the heavy copper mirror of the weapon pointing its shining face at Alec’s back. He could fry us all in half a second, Alec knew.

Angela was smiling like a child. She reached for Alec’s arm, as if to drag him an extra step or two toward the advancing men.

One of them had already stepped ahead of the other two. Angela said, “Alec, this is Will Russo… Will, Alec Morgan.”

“Oh-ho! So you’re Doug’s boy!”

There had never been a dog or a puppy in the lunar settlement. Alec had seen tapes of children’s shows, though, years before. Suddenly the image of a huge, friendly St. Bernard puppy flashed into his mind: he remembered how it had overpowered everyone else in the story with well-meaning enthusiasm that knocked down grown men and destroyed furniture. Will Russo was a big, shambling, grinning, happy St. Bernard pup. Like many truly big men, he was slightly stooped at the shoulders, from leaning over to deal with men smaller than himself. His face was round, with slightly protruding eyes, ruddy cheeks, reddish curly hair that was matted down with perspiration, an easy soft chuckling grin.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” he said. His voice was the velvet tenor of a balladeer. But he grabbed Alec’s hand in a massive paw and pumped it heartily. “Sorry we have to be so brief, but there’s a lot more of them than there are of us. We can hold them off for you for maybe another half-hour…”

Another explosion punctuated his words.

“The woods are swarming with them. Those weapons of yours are really a prize they want.”

“Casualties?” Angela asked.

Russo frowned. “Some. It’s been mostly hit and run until just now. Just starting to get serious.”

Another explosion. Closer. Alec’s ears rang.

“Wait a minute,” Alec said to Russo. “I’ve got to know a lot more about what’s going on here…”

“Good Lord, this is no time for explanations. You’ve only got…”

Alec planted his fists on his hips. “I’m not budging until I find out…”

A high, sighing noise like the rushing of air through a punctured bulkhead.

“Incoming!” one of the men yelled.

Russo dove into Alec, knocking him down.

Before Alec could say or do anything a series of explosions blasted the universe into flame and unbearable noise and shock. The ground heaved beneath him. Clods of earth pattered down. Alec could taste acrid smoke.

He was on his belly, face down in the damp grass. Head buzzing, he slowly looked up. Angela was on her knees, a trickle of blood wending a thin red line down her arm. Russo was squatting on his heels alongside her.

“Looks like you’re right,” he said, without the slightest sign of fear or anger. “You’re not leaving.”

He pointed, and Alec saw that one of the shuttles was in flames.

It had turned into a bloody mess. Ferret scrambled up the steep side of the ridge, trying to get away from the screams of the dying.

Billy-Joe was down there, along with most of the rest of the band, blown into bleeding twisted blobs of blackened flesh by the explosions. Ferret himself was almost untouched; just a few scratches here and there, and a long painful gash down his left leg.

Something had gone very wrong. Instead of the usual rush, where all the gangs attacked the strangers, fighting had broken out among the gangs themselves. First. Right at the beginning. It had never happened that way before. He didn’t understand it.