"What about Alex?" Annie asked hesitantly.
"The Visitors have him, I believe. They know that he knows where you and Mr Donovan are, and I think Lydia is very determined to get that information. What we went through is a long and involved story. Why don't we go up to the mine and I'll tell you the whole tale. ..."
* * *
"But how did you get away?" Donovan asked as they passed a canteen of water around. The group was seated in the shade at the mine entrance.
"Well," O'Toole continued, "the smoke was already too thick for me to see where Chris had gone to. I could hear his voice, but that was it. I could tell he was way across the room, probably near a window. But I didn't think there was any chance I could get over there. Also, 1 knew the fire was getting close to the propane tank, and I figured I better take the nearest exit route."
Annie nodded. "Of course—downstairs."
"Right." O'Toole noticed quizzical looks coming from lyier and Donovan. "In the middle of the front room, there's a trapdoor leading down to a storage basement. Well, the fellow who-buik the house was something of a survivalist, so he put a shelter down there—concrete walls, heavy door, the whole bit. And the shelter has a tunnel that leads out of the house and comes up aboveground about thirty yards away, under cover of the woods. I got to the shelter with the flames flicking at my heels. It was a close call, I'll tell you. But from there, it was perfectly easy and simple to escape into the woods."
"The question is, what do we do now?" Annie said. "If Alex gives them the location of this mine, they'll be up here in no time."
"And if he doesn't," Donovan said, "then Lydia is going to keep killing hostages until someone turns us in—even if she kills the whole town."
"Which she'll do," O'Toole said, "since no one else knows where you are except me. And I'm obviously not there to tell her" {
"We can't let that go on," Donovan said firmly, letting out a deep breath and setting his mouth in a thin line.
"What're we going to do, Gooder—waltz down there und give ourselves up?"
Donovan let the sarcastic question hang in the air for a , moment as he looked from face to face. "In a word, yeah."
Ham rose to his feet, face turning red. "Are you nuts, Donovan? Have you finally lost it?"
"No, I'm not nuts, and I don't mean both of us."
"Well, if you expect me to saunter down to Lizard-Lips Lydia, you are crazy."
Donovan shook his head. "No, not you—me. You and Barry have to get this report back to L.A.—to Julie and the others before it's too late. I'm expendable—this information isn't."
"Mike," Ham began, but the tone of his voice indicated he knew Donovan was right.
"You know we don't have any choice."
"She'll kill you, Donovan," Annie protested.
"No, I don't think she will. She wants me alive, to present me to Diana. I'm too important to them to kill—at least not right away. Annie, you guide Ham and Barry out of this area. Get 'em far enough from here that they can call Barry's pilot and have a fighting chance to fly out without getting shot down by Lydia's four ships."
"Three," O'Toole corrected. "We've got some local saboteurs doing their bit to make Lydia's stay less than pleasant."
"Hmm, that's always nice to heai;" Donovan said. "Ham, you were right about one thing, 1 think. I can't just waltz down and give Lydia a hug. We want to make this look convincing, and we want her to lay off the town. O'Toole, you're going to capture me and bring me in."
"Gee, I've always wanted to play bounty huntei;" he said dryly. "I'll do it if you think it'll make a difference."
"I think it will," Donovan repeated. "But you do run a risk—some people might think less fondly of you for being a turncoat. Still want to do it?"
"If it increases the chances of Lydia getting the hell away from Crow's Fork before anyone else dies, no question about it."
Donovan stretched, cracking his knuckles nervously, "Well, okay, then. Let's saddle up and get out of here."
Barry and Annie started to move first. Tyler gave Donovan a searching look, their eyes locking.
"We'll get back and get you out, Gooder;" Tyler said. "You just stay alive for a while, okay? I can't imagine life without you always giving me a hard time."
Donovan nodded. "I'll be waiting—if Lydia doesn't get impatient and kill me first."
"Use your charm. I'd give you a lesson, but we're outa time."
Chapter 15
Donovan and O'Toole paused in the woods and dismounted from their horses just before emerging into the foothills that led down to Crow's Fork. In the distance, the smoldering remains of the trail guide's house gave off a diaphanous veil of smoke.
"Are you sure you want to go through with this, Donovan?"
Donovan chuckled anxiously. "No, not at all, but I don't have much choice."
"Sure you do. You could just turn around and walk off into the sunset. I'm the only one who would know, and Lord knows, I wouldn't hold it against you."
"That's not a choice," Donovan said, shaking his head.
The big Irishman narrowed his eyes. "You act like all this is somehow your fault, and you've got to atone for the sin of bringing the Visitors down on our heads."
Donovan's expression hardened, and he looked away. "Maybe I do feel like it's my fault. I should've been smart enough to guess that Maragato might've been a Visitor posing as one of us. Maybe I should've ordered a medical checkup. Maybe—"
"Maybe's don't pay the rent, Mike."
"But they do teach lessons. Just hope I live long enough to remember this one and apply it next time." He sat down on a tree stump, resting his chin on his hands. "I don't know—I make so many mistakes. And this time, innocent people died because of one of them."
"You don't think great generals and military leaders didn't make mistakes all through history?"
"You calling me a great military leader?" Donovan asked, cutting irony in his voice.
O'Toole smiled gently. "No, but you're doing your best. All of you in the resistance are, when a lot of the rest of us aren't even pitching in. I was in Vietnam, Mike. I saw mistakes you wouldn't believe. Hell, the whole bloody war was a mistake from start to finish. And you're thinking of it the wrong way. You're not making mistakes. You're more likely just trying your damnedest to clean up after other people's mistakes."
"What other people?"
"People who made errors of judgment that let the Visitors get a toehold during both their invasions."
"Hey, O'Toole, it's hard to blame people when they're dealing with something like this. Jesus, I doubt that West Point spends much time teaching cadets what to do in case of alien invasions of Earth. And where are Presidents and prime ministers supposed to check for the way past leaders reacted to invasions by five-mile-wide flying saucers?"
"Thank you for making my point. If those people who're trained to be leaders and deal with world crises couldn't have been prepared for something like this, how in hell could you have been?"
"My mind says you're right, O'Toole, but my gut still tells me I should've known better" Donovan shrugged. "What the hell. Guess we better get this over with before Lydia starts rounding up more hostages."
James and a Visitor guard saw O'Toole and Donovan approaching on foot. Weapons raised, the aliens moved out to meet them. Donovan's hands were tied behind his back as O'Toole led him.
"Well, Mr. Donovan, this is a welcome turn of events. Lydia has been hoping you'd arrive."
"Yeah, I'll bet."
"We'll take him from here," James said, nodding to the guard, who shoved Donovan ahead with the tip of his laser
rifle. Donovan stumbled forward, then turned and gave the alien a dirty look.
"I guess you won't be needing me for anything," O'Toole said.
"On the contrary," James answered. "I think Lydia will want to thank you personally. Come with us."
James turned and strode quickly toward the command skytighter. He pressed a button next to the hatch and it s
lid open. "Commander;" he said, ducking his head inside, "we have Donovan."
There was a studied moment of silence from inside, as if Lydia didn't want to appear too anxious to claim her prize. Finally she came out of the small craft, stepping down slowly, ceremoniously, then standing straight and tall. "Mr. Donovan," she said with great dignity and satisfaction. She turned to O'Toole. "I'm gratified to see you alive, Mr. O'Toole. We'd thought you'd perished when your house burned down. An unfortunate act of sabotage. Perhaps being a victim yourself convinced you the correct thing to do was in fact to find Mr. Donovan and give him to us."
"We just want you to leave Crow's Fork, Lydia. You've got what you came for."
"Not entirely," she interrupted. "I also came for Mr. Tyler. I have a feeling Mr. Donovan knows something of his friend's whereabouts."
"Not a thing, Lydia," Donovan said evenly, trying not to sound defiant. He didn't think provoking her would accomplish much at this point.
"We'll find out very soon. James, take him to the interrogation room."
Lydia's second-in-command obeyed, directing four shock troopers to the task.
"Prepare him," Lydia called after them. "I'll be right there to start the questioning. We've got no time to waste." She went back inside her skyfighter.
O'Toole walked slowly away, drifting in the direction of his burned-out house but keeping a close eye on where they were taking Donovan. The Visitors hustled him to a glass-fronted one-story building that had a sign over its door that said "clinic." To be sure, he waited until they actually went in. He wondered what Lydia meant by "interrogation room," and his stomach churned as he thought of the possible perversions now occurring in this place normally used to heal people.
Donovan looked around. The waiting room out front looked like the one in any other community clinic in a small town. Magazines were left open where people had thrown them when the Visitors had arrived, and toys and building blocks were strewn across the floor; discarded by children scooped up by their panicked parents.
"I'm not due for a physical for months," Donovan said to no one in particular.
They walked him through a door to what had been an examining room but was now occupied by more Visitor guards. In the center of the room, the table had been modified—a horizontal tubelike plexiglass apparatus that could encompass a body had been placed over it. Wires and electrodes entered the tube, hanging inside it, awaiting a subject to which they could be attached.
"Tanning salon?" Donovan murmured. The Visitors ignored him.
Lydia strode into the examining area, boots clicking smartly on the tile floor. "Put him in there."
Two of the guards pinioned his arms to his sides and started to lift him off his feet. He elbowed one in the face and tried to trip the other with his leg. Two other Visitors joined the scuffle and held him firmly.
"Mr. Donovan," Lydia said sharply, "resisting isn't going to accomplish anything except perhaps the breaking of some of your limbs. My guards have undergone considerable training—gentleness was not part of the curriculum."
"Wouldn't you have been disappointed if I didn't try?"
"Not in the least. Get him in there, now."
This time five guards swept him up and had him horizontal before he could resist. They slid him feet first into the clear tube. The ends were still open, and Lydia waved two technicians in. While the guards secured his hands and feet, the techs attached the wires and electrodes to his head and neck. The female technician unbuttoned his shirt and attached one pad to his chest, over his heart.
"Lydia, didn't anybody ever tell you the way to a man's heart is through his stomach?"
Placing hands on hips, she scowled. "I assume that's a human joke of some sort. Biologically, it's not very likely. Since you may be curious, that particular stimu-pad is to shock your heart back into operation in case it should stop at any point during the interrogation process."
Donovan swallowed, perpsiration beading on his forehead in spite of his attempts to stay calm. "Why do I get the feeling this isn't going to be a multiple-choice test?"
"I don't want you to expire unexpectedly, Mr Donovan. Not until I'm done with you."
"Wouldn't Diana prefer to have me alive?" The tube opening near his head was sealed and his muffled voice bounced off the surface just a few inches over his face. He hoped they could still hear him outside.
"I suppose she would," Lydia said. "But Diana's wishes aren't my prime concern. My questioning will get all the vital information possible from that brain of yours. Diana could question you from now until doomsday, as you humans might say, and she'd learn no more than I would. Maybe even less. I think she'd prefer you and Tyler dead together than you alive alone."
"Gee, Ham would be thrilled to hear that. I know he's always considered us a team," Donovan joked.
"Ready, Commander," said the female technician.
"Good," Lydia said. "Intensity one—"
The female tech had moved to a control panel containing what looked to Donovan like EKG and brain-wave monitors. The tech threw four toggle switches and Donovan felt a tingling course over his skin, like a troop of tiny ants marching across his body. It wasn't at all unpleasant, almost a gentle tickling. But he tensed himself, knowing that it wasn't intended to be painful. He guessed it simply meant the device was activated, the current barely running into him. He felt light-headed at the same time, as if the electrodes attached to his head were drawing energy away from his brain. The room began to spin and a wave of nausea wobbled through his gut.
"All right, Mr. Donovan," Lydia said, her voice echoing from far away. "Tell me where Mr Tyler is."
"Planet Earth," came Donovan's reply. Disconcertingly, his mouth moved slowly, his voice sounding to his ears as if it came through a two-second-tape-delay mechanism.
From his prone position, he couldn't see Lydia nod to the female technician at the console. But the current exploded through Donovan's body and seared every nerve ending. He couldn't stop the scream that leaped from his throat involuntarily. When it was over, he twitched for four or five seconds like a fish flopping on a boat deck.
"That was just a short dose, Mr. Donovan," Lydia said. Her voice came from a speaker embedded in the plexiglass at his left ear. "The more you refuse to answer, the less pleasant the experience will become. And I should warn you, there's not much tissue damage from this technique, so you won't easily die from what we're doing to you, not until the highest settings. You may lose consciousness, but when you come to, the pain will still be there. Please consider that for a moment."
"Thanks for the advice."
"I see your sense of humor hasn't been diminished by the pain. Perhaps longer-duration suffering will have some effect. Now, think very hard, Donovan. Your continued good health may depend on your answer. Where can I find Ham Tyler?"
Donovan tried to shrug, and his face twitched into a semblance of a smile. "The thing is, Lydia, I really don't know."
The security cadre commander turned to the life-monitor technician. "Analysis, Margaret?"
The technician pursed her lips as she examined a repeat reading of Donovan's physiological response. "Inconclusive, Commander. I think he knows more than he's telling but is being truthful when he says he doesn't know Tyler's location. I suggest trying another line of questioning while he's still conscious."
"Very well. Donovan, have you been receiving smuggled weapons from other resistance groups?"
"No."
Without warning, Lydia angrily reached over to Margaret's console and twisted the control. Donovan screamed in surprised agony and the technician quickly turned the dial back to minimum, then gave her superior officer a harsh look. "Commander, let me do my job. There is some danger of—"
"I don't care," Lydia snapped. "I want answers from this human, and pain can be a very convincing prod."
"Not if you kill him," Margaret said icily.
Lydia narrowed her eyes and spoke in a quiet, intense voice. "I thought you said he could be rev
ived—"
"Under controlled circumstances. But if enough power is applied in too rapid a surge, there will be nothing to revive, Commander. It wouldn't be easy to kill him, but it is possible. I'm trained in the use of this equipment. With all due respect, you're not."
Donovan's eyes were blurred by tears. He was paralyzed, completely numbed by the last jolt. He felt suspended in a vast ocean of nothingness, empty space that somehow supported him—no, trapped him in its center—unable to move or drift or float in a direction he might want to choose. His body was more a part of that void than a part of him.
He saw a form approach his cage, a hand pound on it. He'd heard faraway voices but couldn't make out what they were saying. But now he heard, loud and clear; Lydia saying, "Donovan, tell me what I want to know. Answer these questions or you'll die painfully and slowly. I promise."
His vision cleared and he saw Lydia above him, caressing his plexiglass cocoon, her voice suddenly gentle.
"I know you think you're protecting your friends, Donovan. And I know some of those friends are Visitors, members of what you call the fifth column. Has it occurred to you some of them are not your friends, but my spies? How do you know the information they pass along to you is real? How do you know they're not passing along disinformation to you, designed to lead you in exactly the direction I want you to go?"
Donovan tried to speak, tried to protest. His lips fluttered helplessly, muscles and nerves still unable to respond. All he could form was the word "No."
Lydia smiled down at him, her face distorted by the curvature of the enclosure. "Oh, yes, yes, Donovan. I'm afraid it's true. Would you like an example? The secret plan you probably know about now, brought to you by one of my trusted aides, Barry—the one to invade the United States by disrupting power? It's a fake, a planted strategy to mislead you and lure you out of hiding at a time and place I'd know about. After you and your band of criminals stole my prisoners, I genuinely wanted to repay you for your kindness. You might say I'm just beginning."
Donovan's mind reeled, tumbled, and fell down some black abyss. The Visitor's voice echoed, growing distant, fading to nothing. . . .
V06 - Prisoners and Pawns Page 14