Antagonist - Childe Cycle 11 (22 page)

The
white-mind
face
Toni
had
been
wearing—the
inhumanly blank
face
that
signaled
a
concentration
state
in
someone
who
had attained
a
great
mastery
of
the
martial
arts—changed,
too,
as
her eyes
narrowed
and
her
lips
curled
in
a
grim
half-smile.
Bleys
thought he
caught
a
gleam
from
behind
her
lowered
eyelids.

Bleys
put
his
attention
back
on
the
sergeant.

"They're
my
men,
you
see,"
the
man
said,
as
if
that
explained
it all.
He
holstered
the
pistol
without
looking
at
it;
then
turned
and limped
toward
those
same
men,
who
had
been
chattering
softly among
themselves,
as
if
blind
and
deaf
to
the
drama
behind
them. The
volume
of
their
chatter
rose
for
a
moment
as
he
joined
them,
but died
out
as
he
spoke
softly
among
them.
After
a
few
sentences
he took
a
moment
to
check
each
man
individually,
looking
him
in
the eyes
and
asking
a
soft
question
or
two.
And
in
just
a
few
more
seconds,
Bleys
gave
them
an
order
as
the
countdown
on
his
pad
reached zero;
and
they
burst
through
the
doorway
one
at
a
time,
the
Dorsai leading.

Bleys
felt
himself
frozen
in
place,
listening
to
the
eruption
of sound
from
outside,
the
explosions
of
power
weapons
and
the whistling
of
cones.
Toni
gripped
his
arm,
pulling
him
toward
Dahno.

"We've
got
to
be
ready
to
go,"
she
said.
"Help
me
with
him.
If Henry
gets
through
to
us,
we
may
have
only
moments
to
get
out
before
the
opportunity
passes."

As
they
got
Dahno
to
his
feet,
silence
fell
outside.
They
waited tensely,
eyes
glued
to
the
entrance;
and
in
a
few
minutes
Bleys heard
Henry's
voice
call
his
name.

"We've
got
to
go
now,"
Toni
said,
quietly
but
intensely.

"Yes,"
Bleys
said.
He
had
to
go.
It
would
be
too
tragic
a
waste, otherwise....

CHAPTER
11

The
local
sun
was
lowering
toward
the
horizon
line
formed
by
the ridge
to
the
west
of
Henry
MacLean's
position,
the
dimming
of
its light
darkening
the
opposite
sky
as
he,
along
with
some
of
his
Soldiers,
walked
across
the
field,
pausing
to
check
out
each
body
they came
to.
To
all
sides
more
of
their
number
were
fanning
out,
alert for
any
further
threat,
and
he
could
see
another
thin
line
of
his
people
holding
the
crest
of
the
ridge
ahead
of
him.

This
land
had
never
been
very
productive—Henry's
eye
could still
be
that
of
a
farmer—and
having
a
war
fought
on
it
had
made
it rough
and
uneven,
pitted
and
scabbed.
There
were
no
trees
of
any size
nearby,
he
noted,
although
his
Soldiers,
in
their
attack,
had made
effective
use
of
the
scrubby
trees
and
underbrush
lining
the small
creek
that
curved
around
two
sides
of
this
position.
He
himself
had
walked
out
of
that
underbrush
to
move
up
the
gentle
slope.

It
was
no
surprise
to
him
that
there
were
few
trees
in
sight;
trees were
always
casualties
when
war
visited
in
one
place
for
very
long.

That
setting
star,
which
seemed
small
to
his
eyes,
was
called
Tau Ceti.
It
was
a
strange
name,
he
thought;
and
the
paleness
of
its
yellow
light
seemed
strange,
too—but
he
knew
he
felt
that
way
out
of his
lifelong
familiarity
with
the
more
orange
light
cast
by
Epsilon Eridanus,
the
star
that
shone
on
his
home
planet.

He
had
seen
bodies
lying
about
on
Association,
long
in
his
past; and
on
Newton,
too,
more
recently.
The
look
of
them
never
seemed to
change,
no
matter
the
color
of
the
light.

And
something
else
hadn't
changed:
once
dead,
it
did
not
matter whose
side
the
body
had
been
on.

He
had
been
moving
forward
as
he
thought,
part
of
a
skirmish line
of
the
former
Soldiers
of
God
he
led.
Now
he
stopped,
as
the
change
in
his
perspective
revealed
the
lips
of
the
trench
that
had been
their
objective.
The
entrance-w
ay
to
the
bunker
would
be
under
the
lip
on
the
farther
side,
he
knew;
in
a
few
more
steps
he would
be
able
to
see
it.

Henry
and
his
Soldiers
had
been
approaching
somewhat
obliquely to
the
line
of
the
trench,
which
now
presented
the
appearance
of
a kind
of
scar
cutting
across
the
barren
field.
It
didn't
seem
a
very strong
defensive
position,
he
thought,
but
perhaps
it
hadn't
needed to
be.
What
little
he
had
heard
about
the
war
that
had
been
fought over
this
area
suggested
it
hadn't
been
a
serious
contest....
He wondered
if
more
people
had
not
died
here
in
this
afternoon
than
in all
of
that
war.

With
a
hand
signal
he
started
his
Soldiers
moving
forward
again, cautious
as
always.
Those
to
his
right
had
already
reached
the trench,
and
two
of
them
stopped,
covering
down
its
length,
while the
other
two
leaped
over
it,
to
take
up
watch
on
the
other
side.

In
a
few
steps
more
he,
himself,
could
see
down
into
the
trench. There
were
more
bodies
here,
these
in
uniform.
From
some
distance
back
and
at
a
different
angle
he
had
seen
these
young
men burst
out
into
the
trench
from
the
bunker,
shouting
and
firing—and had
seen
them
blasted
down.
Two
had
gotten
a
little
distance
down the
trench,
back
the
way
he
had
just
come,
before
falling
into
the greasy
mud;
and
one
had
made
it
up
over
the
edge
of
the
trench,
the move
giving
him
enough
time
to
put
several
bolts
into
the
midst
of the
group
of
enemies
that
had
been
setting
up
a
power
cannon
intended
to
blast
Bleys
and
his
party
to
pieces
in
their
shelter.

It
was
that
cannon
that
had
forced
Henry
to
decide
on
immediate action.

"Bleys?
Are
you
here?"
he
called,
directing
his
voice
at
the
entrance
across
the
trench.
"Dahno?
Toni?"

As
he
waited
he
shifted
position,
two
strides
taking
him
over
to the
body
of
the
soldier
who
took
out
the
cannon.
The
man
was badly
torn
up,
having
taken
a
number
of
needles
before
bolts
from power
weapons
had
blasted
him
out
of
life.
He
had
never
dropped his
pistol,
though—his
hand,
curled
in
death,
still
held
it
firmly.