Ben Bova - Test of Fire

Alec almost swung at him. At the last instant he managed to check himself, already leaning toward Jameson with his fists clenched and ready.

Forcing his voice to remain calm, Alec asked, “Join the traitor? Let the settlement die?”

“They’ve left us to die.”

“They’ll send all the help we need, when we’re ready for it.”

Jameson made a low, sighing sound. “It better be soon, if you expect to have any of these men following you.”

“It will be,” Alec snapped. He was blazing hotter than the fire now, not trusting himself to say any more. He started to walk away.

“Wait,” Jameson called. He unbuckled his gunbelt as he walked up to Alec. “If you’re going to go strolling in the dark, you’d better have at least a pistol. Don’t trust anybody.”

Alec’s anger softened. “All right,” he said.

“Thanks.” He strapped the gun to his hip.

Walking down a crooked lane between two rows of huts, Alec saw that the stars were gleaming brightly. He recognized Orion rising sideways above the southern horizon. It’ll be winter soon, he thought. We’ve got to get the job done before the snows start.

He paced along the bare dirt path slowly, thinking, planning, trying not to think of confronting Angela and questioning her. I’ve got to find a power source for the radios. Douglas must have a few tucked away here and there, this close to his headquarters. Find one, make a raid, stay long enough to get a message off to the satellite.

A sound pulled him up short. A gasp, scuffling, heavy breathing. He flattened himself against the rough logs of the nearest hut and slid the pistol from its holster.

Again. A muffled sound, almost a groan, but stifled.

Carefully, Alec edged along the log wall. A dim light glowed faintly from a doorway in the next hut. He tiptoed for it. More gasps, whispers, then a low voice saying:

“C’mon cutey… come across… you won’t look too good if you don’t…”

Alec stepped into the hut, gun level at his waist.

In the wavering light of a single candle, he saw one of his own youngsters holding Angela’s arms pinned tightly behind her back with one brawny arm, his other meaty hand over her mouth.

Gianelli stood in front of her with a long, slim knife. Her shirt was torn away and three long welling red slashes streaked down one breast to the nipple. Her eyes were wide with pain and terror.

“Gianelli!”

He wheeled around. The knife blade was red.

“You want to find out where your father is, I’ll find out for you,” Gianelli said, his voice low and shaking with excitement. “I’ll get a lot more out of her, besides.”

“Get away from her.”

The kid let his hand drop from Angela’s mouth, but still held her arms.

“Listen,” Gianelli said. “I’ve had a bellyfull of your orders. I’ll get what you want from her and then I’ll get what I want.”

The gun’s blast was deafening in the tiny hut.

Gianelli slammed back against the wall, his mouth open in a silent “Ooohhh…” He dropped the knife and slid to the floor.

The kid stepped away from Angela, toward Gianelli’s crumpled body. “I… he told me…”

Alec fired once more and the kid’s face dissolved in an explosion of blood. Angela screamed and Alec grabbed her, pulled her out of the hut into the clean night air, leaving the stench of gunsmoke and blood behind them.

“They… they…” she gulped.

“They’re dead,” Alec said. He still held the gun.

His hand was trembling so badly that it took three tries to slide it back into his holster.

Jameson was the first to reach them, a carbine in one hand. Half a dozen other men pounded up right behind him.

“What happened?”

“I just killed two men who couldn’t follow orders. Drag them out into the village square and leave them there.”

They were a quiet and subdued group when they left the village the next morning. The villagers stood mutely around the two corpses as Alec lined his men together and marched them out the gate, down the westward road. Angela rode on the captured wagon beside Alec. Douglas’ man, unarmed, drove the horses.

She still seemed dazed. “You’re just going to… leave the bodies there?”

Alec had not slept all night. His head throbbed.

“Let the villagers bury them in the fields. Make good use of them.”

“Why…? You didn’t have to kill them.”

He turned on the hard wooden seat to stare at her. She looked as bleak as he felt. “Did you want me to leave them with you?”

“I…” Angela ran a hand through her blonde hair. “In some crazy way I feel like it’s my fault. Partially, at least.”

“I shot them. They deserved it. If I had to do it all over again, I’d do it exactly the same way.”

She shuddered visibly. “Because it was me.”

“Because they were acting like scum!”

“With me. If it had been one of the village women…”

“I’d have done the same thing,” Alec said coldly.

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

They rode in silence for most of the morning, heading for the hills that bordered the western edge of the valley, under a sky of rolling fat cumulus clouds that checkered the landscape with warm sunlight and sudden cool shadow.

“Jameson found out last night that there’s a relay station for the horses over the first row of hills,” Alec said to her. “Is that true?”

She hesitated, then nodded. “Yes. And it’s built like a little fortress.”

“Can you talk the people there into giving us fresh horses peacefully, or will we have to fight ?”

“Why should I help you?”

“You’ve got a damned short memory.”

“No. A long one.”

“All right, be tough. We’ll get the horses anyway.”

Which Alec did, by the simple expedient of threatening to shoot Angela if the men holding the station didn’t give them all the horses in their fortified corral. Alec held Angela on a knoll, far enough from the station so that the men could see her plainly enough. Jameson did the negotiating.

Angela fumed, “You’re using me!”

“That’s right,” Alec replied, smiling. “But that’s better than killing people, isn’t it?”

She was too angry to answer.

Toward sunset, as they rode together on the wagon, he asked her, “Still angry with me?”

“Yes.” But she looked more sullen than angry.

“Are you in pain?”

“No.”

“There’s no soreness?”

“Of course it’s sore! But it hasn’t bled anymore. And the bandage is still in place. Want to inspect it for yourself?”

“Dammit, I didn’t do it to you!”

“You killed them. You shot that boy.”

“You ought to be glad that I did.”

“You’re a murderer and you expect me to love you for it?”

“You wanted me to leave you alone with them so they could carve you into little pieces?”

“So it’s my fault!”

He knew he was red-faced; he could feel his cheeks burning. The driver kept his eyes strictly forward, not daring to show any expression at all on his face.

Lowering his voice, Alec said, “Yes, it was your fault. You were right this morning. If it hadn’t been you I wouldn’t have killed them. I lost control. I couldn’t stand to see them with their hands on you. I…”

“All right,” Angela said soothingly. “It’s all right. I’ve been a terrible bitch. I’m sorry.”

They rode together in silence, Alec’s mind whirling in confusion, until it grew too dark to ride further.

Alec slept with her that night. Without a word of prearrangement they walked off together from the campfire and took their blankets from the back of the wagon. Side by side, still unspeaking, they moved off into the darkness.