EarthRise (30 page)

And why not? Especially since he had not only eliminated the woman called Storm, but done so in a manner that would cast suspicion on Franklin, thereby weakening the entire resistance movement.

Amocar fumbled under the seat, located the six-pack of Dos Equis, and popped the cap. It was warm,
too
warm, but wonderful nonetheless.

The helicopter droned, the beer went down, and Amocar allowed himself to dream.

NORTH OF EVERETT, WASHINGTON

The sun had set, the fires had died down, and most of the humans were fast asleep. From Nal-Uma’s perspective, seen through the combat goggles that he wore, they looked like blobs of light scattered across the open field. In the distance, spaced evenly along the perimeter of the camp, other blobs jumped from point to point. Not only had his warriors had less sleep than the slaves—they had been on the bounce since the night before.

The problem started with the fireworks set off during the previous dark cycle—and continued throughout the succeeding day.

First came the messages spray painted across freeway overpasses. Though unable to read them himself, Nal-Uma knew the glyphs had significance from the way the humans reacted. Those near the front of the column read the words, exchanged secretive glances, and sent a shiver back through the crowd.

Being no fool, and curious as to what the ferals were trying to tell their more domesticated brethren, Nal-Uma forced one of the slaves to translate. The woman was frightened and had a tendency to stutter. “The wwwords say, ‘Fffreedom is at hhhand,’ master, but I didn’t write them.”

“No,” the Kan replied thoughtfully, “you didn’t. Stay close . . . I may have need of you.”

Then, addressing the column from the top of a half-slagged semi, Nal-Uma attempted to put the matter away. His voice was amplified, and Sool, who along with Dixie was standing toward the rear of the crowd, had no difficulty hearing it.

“I will say this once and only once . . . Pay no attention to empty words written by pathetic creatures who live in the forest. Look around you . . . Is ‘freedom at hand’? No, I think not. Freedom, when it comes, will be granted after the temples have been completed. Remember that, and walk quickly, knowing that the sooner you arrive, the sooner you will finish. That is all.”

The Kan’s words acted to quiet the crowd, for a while at least, but the psychological warfare continued.

Nal-Uma put flankers out. The warriors had seen combat on other worlds, knew what it was to fight under strange circumstances, and weren’t easily shaken. Or so the file leader believed until the same warriors began to report a variety of strange phenomena and were clearly concerned about it. Ferals were sighted—but always in the distance. Horrible wailing sounds could be heard, which according to his human interpreter, came from something called bagpipes.

Objects were left where both the Kan and the slaves would see them. A cluster of small red, white, and blue flags that fluttered in the breeze, a Sauron skull, mounted on a pole, and hundreds of Hershey bars scattered across I-5.

The net result of all this activity was a tendency for the flankers to stay in close—and thereby cede everything else to the ferals. Not an especially good thing to do. Nal-Uma
knew
that, but lacking additional troops was powerless to do anything about it. So, knowing that his brethren were stretched thin, and that reinforcements were unlikely at best, he resolved to work with what he had.

The column, which normally stretched out to occupy half a unit or so, was compressed into half that distance, overseers were encouraged to mete out punishment for even minor offenses, and orbital fire support was called on to police the areas just beyond Nal-Uma’s flanks.

First came the pressure of suddenly displaced air, then the crack of what sounded like lightning, followed by the roll of artificial thunder. Yet in spite of the way the strikes served to bolster morale and keep the ferals at bay, the very fact that such a step was necessary served to keep Nal-Uma on edge.

Now, after a long stressful day, the fall of darkness meant the possibility of more harassment. Or, and this was what the file leader hoped for, the ferals had called it quits. There had been absolutely no sign of them for the last couple of units, and that augured well.

And so the day went, until night fell, and the Kan were forced to remain on high alert. To do so was consistent with the Sauron doctrine of dynamic defense, which stemmed from the mobility natural to Kan warriors. Because the Saurons remained in motion, rather than hunkering down behind static defenses, there were no strong points on which potential enemies could focus. To attack the Kan “was to attack the air,” or so the saying went, and Nal-Uma knew that it was true. Still, for reasons the Sauron couldn’t quite put his pincer on, he felt a sense of foreboding. An ancestor gibbered inside his head, and he tried to ignore it.

Now, as the file leader kept watch, shadows began to shift as Deac Smith and his resistance fighters began to move in. Where the previous night had been about flash and psychological impact, this was the real thing. Nal-Uma had twenty-three warriors to call upon plus a cadre of human overseers. Four of the Kan lay dead before the file leader knew the battle had begun.

Among the arsenal of weapons Deac’s Demons could call upon was the traditional Native American longbow, except that these bows were made out of high-tech laminates instead of wood, and were equipped with wheels, cams, cables, stabilizers, and light-intensifying 2X scopes.

Tests had been conducted using a captive Sauron, and based on the results of that endeavor, Deac Smith knew that the black carbon arrows would not only fly straight and true, but the handmade “bug points” would shatter Kan chitin and drive deep within their bodies.

The signal consisted of three clicks on his radio. There were six soft thumps as the bowstrings were released, four cracking noises as the arrows found their targets, and a bleating sound as a badly wounded warrior crashed to the ground.

The dead sentries were all from the same quadrant of the defensive line, which opened a gap. Manning, along with fifteen of Deac’s Demons, had belly-crawled to within thirty feet of the Sauron perimeter. He came to his feet, brought the Mossberg 12-gauge to port arms, and charged the newly created breach.

Then, on a signal from George Farley, who had command of that particular group, the infiltrators came together into an evolution so venerable that a Roman legionnaire would have instantly recognized the formation for what it was: the infantry square. And that’s where they were, all facing outward, when Nal-Uma did exactly what Deac Smith had predicted the Kan would do . . . he attacked.

Manning, one of those assigned to the area within the center of the square, checked to ensure that his safety was off and closed his eyes. That was important,
very
important, as Popcorn Farley had emphasized more than once. “Keep’em shut,” he admonished, “or pay the price when the flares go off. ’Cause if you’re blinded when the bugs fall, we are ski-rewed. Do you read me?”

Everybody read him, and most obeyed. But it was difficult,
very
difficult to close one’s eyes when the enemy was about to attack, which was the reason why Harv Bodine failed to do so. He watched all four of the flares go off, saw them bathe the landscape with harsh white light, and struggled to see.

Then, as the initial intensity of the flares started to fade, and they drifted slowly toward the ground, Farley gave the order. “Open your eyes! Watch for silhouettes! The bastards are in the air by now!”

And the Kan
were
in the air, as Nal-Uma could clearly see via his computer-assisted night goggles. He watched the color-coded blobs,
his
blobs, fall toward the red blobs, and felt a rising sense of excitement. Now, finally, the ferals would learn their lesson. And not just learn it, but learn it here, where the domesticated slaves could watch.

Like Dixie, Sool was rolled up in a pair of blankets, lying beneath one of the medical carts. The “pop” of the flares, the sudden wash of white light, and unexpected wail of bagpipes was more than enough to wake her. She shook the nurse. “Dixie! Wake up! It’s them!”

Subsequent to the nighttime visitation from Manning, the two women had prepared packs containing what few personal items they had, the set of surgical instruments that Sool had pieced together, and what few pharmaceuticals were on hand.

Now, rolling out from under the cart, they were already dressed and ready to go. All they had to do was grab the packs, sling them on their backs, and figure out which direction to take. All the slaves were up by then, standing in confused clumps, unsure of what to do.

That was when the gunfire erupted on the far side of the encampment and men and women dressed in buckskins and other outlandish attire seemed to materialize among the newly awoken slaves. “Follow me!” they yelled. “This way!” and proceeded to fade back into the darkness.

Some of the slaves followed, but many, conditioned by months of captivity hesitated, afraid to enter the unknown. Sool waved them forward. “Come on! Do as they say! This is our chance!”

And such was the doctor’s credibility, and such was her personal following, that the doubters followed. And other people followed
them
, and still others followed
them
, until a flood of humanity streamed off the field and vanished into the surrounding murk.

The mass exodus was very visible to Nal-Uma, just as
he
was very visible to Deac Smith, who had been stalking the Sauron for more than fifteen minutes by then.

In fact the file leader had just begun to absorb the nature of the feral plan, and appreciate the manner in which all of his forces had been sucked toward a single spot, when a human-shaped blob stepped into the space before him and the file leader realized the extent to which his own personal security had been ignored. Not only had he remained stationary in order to assess the situation, but he had neglected to sweep the area behind him. The t-gun was not only holstered, but tabbed in, which meant the human had the advantage. He was alive, however, remarkably so, which suggested a desire to parley. Silly really, since there was nothing to discuss, but why not? Especially if he could seize some sort of advantage.

Now, as Nal-Uma moved the goggles up and out of the way, the Sauron saw that the intruder had blackened his face, as if to imitate his betters, and held an ugly-looking submachine gun cradled in his hands.

Smith’s voice was level and calm. Nal-Uma heard the words via his translator but couldn’t make sense of them. “ ‘He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.’ That’s from the Holy Bible, Psalms 23:3.” The words might not mean much, but there was no mistaking the subtle movement of the weapon’s barrel.

The Sauron sent a message to the muscles located in his powerful hindquarters. They bunched just as they were supposed to, but at the very last second, just as the pent-up energy was about to be released, a burst of .9mm slugs tore his belly open, blew green gore out through Nal-Uma’s back, and silenced his line forever. Meanwhile, unaware of the sudden loss of leadership, the Kan pressed their attack.

Still blinded by the flares, Harv Bodine heard weapons fire all around him, and fired his as well. The bullets missed an incoming warrior by a good three feet and were lost in the night sky.

The Kan fired his t-gun twice. Both darts hit Bodine, and the combined explosions blew him in half.

Manning felt something warm splatter the back of his neck, heard the distinctive thump as a pair of enormous feet hit the ground, and spun to his right. The Kan was turning, too, only to the left, which made it a race. The first being to complete the turn, and acquire a target, would win.

The security chief heard himself scream some sort of incoherent war cry as the shotgun came around, and he squeezed the trigger.

Only half of the double-ought buck hit the Kan’s thorax, but that was enough to throw the warrior off-balance and send his darts wide. A man in buckskins took the projectiles in the back, staggered as they blew his spine out through his chest, and flopped facedown. Manning worked the Mossberg’s slide, felt more than heard the next shell slot itself in the chamber, and jerked the trigger.

This load of lead was dead on. The slugs, each the size of a .38 pistol round, tore the left side of the warrior’s throat out. His head seemed to wobble, toppled over sideways, and his body followed it down.

Now, ready to kill, and keep on killing, Manning jacked another shell into the weapon’s chamber and pulled a 360. But there was nothing to shoot at. Only half a dozen beings remained standing and all were human. They looked at each other as if surprised to discover that they were still alive.

Another set of flares went off and threw a ghastly pall over the circle of crumpled bodies as Farley bent over a fallen Kan, jerked the bowie knife free from the alien’s chest, and returned it to its sheath. Then, turning to his troops, Farley did what so many leaders had done before him. He put his grief on hold, gathered the living, and led them away. “All right! Time to pull out! Or would you like to be here when the shelling begins?”

As if to punctuate the ex-Ranger’s words, what sounded like a runaway freight train roared over their heads, something hit the center of the mostly emptied field, and a column of dirt mixed with abandoned belongings rose high into the air.

The debris was still falling, still raining down, when the survivors started to run.

In the meantime, off to the east, the mass exodus continued. The moment a group of slaves cleared the field and entered the tree line, they were divided into groups of twenty-five and led away. Sool and her companions were a good half mile into the woods, following an overgrown maintenance road, when the orbital bombardment began.

She felt the earth jump beneath her feet, listened to the successive explosions, and thought about Manning. He’d been there, she’d
felt
it, somewhere in the fighting. But where was he now? Lying on his back? Dead eyes staring at the stars? Or running for his life? No, for
her
life, or what her life could eventually be were the insanity to end. The slaves walked for the better part of two hours before being ushered into a musty-smelling farmhouse and herded down into the basement.