by George Olney
"Got it?"
Youthful cheers were her answer.
Dallas looked over her shoulder. The three carryalls that had been chasing them were about seven hundred yards away. "Okay, guys, everyone into position and, for God's sake, watch your heads and asses. Nobody stick 'em up until this thing's over!"
Another cheer. Then everyone got flat on the ground.
Lying behind her rocks, Frenchy watched as the three carryalls slowed and approached within about four hundred yards. She already had the choke on her bopper dialed up to maximum, so it wouldn't be too hard to hit someone at that range. If she could hit them. She didn't try. Dallas was going to start the ball.
As she watched, Frenchy saw the carryalls finally pull to a stop about three hundred yards out and begin to offload. She activated the holographic sights on her bopper, but paused and looked over at her best friend. "Babe," she said, "this is the kind of thing I signed up with the Arm to do. Protect these kids and get them back to their homes. Maev did, too. You didn't sign up for this, Dallas, and I'm sorry I dragged you into it. Things aren't looking too good."
Dallas was already in firing position, intently looking through her bopper's holographic sight. "Don't sweat it, babe," Dallas replied in a soft murmur that showed she was concentrating on her sights, not the backs-to-the-wall tactical situation. "Kids behind us. Murdering bastards in front of us. Me between.
"I'm a Marine. It's what we do."
Chapter 15
Dallas's first shot hit a carryall fuel tank. It exploded with a huge fireball, felling the men around it and obliterating everyone still on the big truck. Frenchy tried but missed a fuel tank on her first shot. She hit on the second. Maev didn't miss her first shot. Two more huge explosions. More hostile casualties.
Frenchy figured there were probably about thirty or forty slavers on the three trucks when they arrived, but most of them were now on the ground. Some of those were alive. Given unnatural postures, parts missing, and other obvious indicators, others weren't. The remainder, well away from the explosions, were standing, but appeared stunned. Still, far too many slavers survived for Frenchy's taste. Time to fix that.
A few slavers had the presence of mind to begin shooting back, although some of those were dumb enough to stand while they did it. Frenchy concentrated on trying to pick off the standing targets. So did Maev, Dallas, and Sarena - with better effect. These were the easy shots, but things were starting to change. Survivors' fire was ragged and all over the place, but they were going to ground now, and they were going to get accurate soon enough.
"Keep up the pressure," Dallas said crisply. "These guys are street toughs and thugs, not soldiers. They aren't the type that deals well with a situation like this. We've got to hurt them before they can get organized and attack. If we manage to get whatever leader they have, they might not even try at all."
On the ground below, the slavers were all behind brush or rocks. Some of them began to move forward in short rushes, covered by fire from the rest. "Damn, guys," Dallas said calmly. "Looks like there were a few soldiers and at least some kind of leader down there. They're coming. Try to get as many as you can. We might get lucky and hit the guy leading this."
Slaver bolts were getting more accurate, knocking pieces off the surrounding rocks. Frenchy heard a short scream from the upper ledge and rolled onto her back immediately, her first impulse driving her to check on the teenagers. She was stopped by Nos's yell. "It's okay. We're okay, Mom. Marva got hit by a rock chip. Milla's using some wound spray from the med kit on her."
"Just keep down," Frenchy yelled back. She rolled over into a prone firing position and began looking for a target. Hurt her kids, would they. Bastards! Dead bastards as soon as she could see one.
The fight was really one sided, even though they were outnumbered. A continual trickle of casualties caused the slavers forward movement to slow and stop. Or Frenchy thought it did.
"On your left, babe!" Dallas said urgently. "Five of them down at the base of the rocks!"
She couldn't see them! Wrong angle! To hell with this, Frenchy thought as she dialed her choke to zero. She readied herself for a few seconds, taking a deep breath, then flopped over the edge of her parapet and pointed her bopper at the base of the rock formation. There they were.
THUMP.
"Did I get 'em?" she said urgently to Dallas as she ducked back behind her rocks like a squirrel into its hole.
No she didn't. Not all of them.
Just then she heard the scrabbling noise of someone coming up and over the parapet. It was one of the slavers, standing, B-42 coming up to aim at her!
That's when Nos leaped down from his position, holding his sword. "YAAAAH!!!"
Nos landed on the slaver's blind side and swung with all of his wiry strength. For the moment, he forgot all of his sword training. He just swung instinctively. He really wasn't aiming, except at the man's body. More by good luck than good management, the blade nearly severed the slaver's neck, but didn't lodge in the spinal cord.
Goofy kid, Frenchy's brain gibbered in the middle of the rapid fire action, taking a sword to a gun fight. She was damn glad he did.
The slaver was down but there was another right behind him and Nos was frozen, staring at the man he'd killed lying in a bloody mess on the ground. A pistol bolt knocked the newcomer back over the parapet, dead. Frenchy's head snapped up to the upper ledge and saw Milla, just dropping flat after her shot.
The near brush from another bolt threw chips in all directions and snapped Nos out of his paralysis. The boy dived onto the ground next to Frenchy. "Thanks, son," she said, a little short of breath from the close call. "You saved my life."
"I had to do it, Mom," he gasped, breathing hard from mild shock. "I had to do it. I couldn't do anything when they killed Mama and Dad. I could help you." There were tears in his eyes.
She reached over and grabbed his shoulder firmly. "I understand, Nos. I've been there. It isn't easy. You've got to get over it. We're still in the middle of this. There'll be time later to feel. Right now, we have to stay alive and that means killing these bastards."
Nos took a deep breath and nodded, turning back to the fight.
Dallas was studying the slavers. "They're all pretty much in a line down there, or getting back to it."
She rolled over on her back and yelled at the upper ledge, "Suppressive fire on that firing line! Don't try to hit them, just put it in the area!"
The sudden burst of pistol bolts broke the slavers. Almost as one, they got up and ran back for the smoking carryall debris. Dallas, Maev, and Sarena made sure a few of them didn't make it.
Once things settled down, there were only scattered shots coming back at the rock formation, but none were very close. The slavers were just shooting to shoot. It didn't look like anyone was coordinating the fire, either. They must have gotten the leader.
"Standoff," Dallas yelled. "Everybody cease fire! Save your ammo!"
She rolled on her side and gave Frenchy a grin. "This is just what we want, time for the cavalry to get here."
With shocked surprise, Frenchy saw blood oozing from the side of Dallas's leathers. "Babe, you're hit!"
Dallas looked calmly down at her wound. "Grazed by a rock chip. I'm good, babe. Don't sweat it."
Frenchy suddenly realized she was also bleeding slightly from a number of minor wounds. What with the fight, she hadn't noticed. Maev and Sarena were in the same shape. Probably everybody had a nick or two. "Damn rocks," was all she could think of to say.
Maev spoke up. "I just hope they don't have a long range communicator down there. If they do, they've called up reinforcements and more of them are on the way."
Frenchy saw a rapidly growing speck in the air over the horizon. "It looks like they called for help," she said, her voice flat.
Maev followed Frenchy's look. "Airbus. Room for at least forty."
Frenchy thought hard and fast. Forty, fifty, it didn't matter. They were going to keep fighting. If the
y had to go down, they were going hard. She just wished the kids weren't here. Damn, did she always have to get into a no-win situation?
"All right!" Dallas said loudly. "Everybody back in place. This thing isn't over yet!"
Frenchy put a hand on Nos's shoulder. "You stay here, honey," she said gently. "I may need more protection."
She saw Nos swell a little with pride and smiled to herself. She wanted him close by. Easier to keep out of trouble. She was still trying to wrap her mind around her little boy killing a bad guy with a sword.
As she watched the airbus settle into a landing further out from the destroyed trucks, something was tugging at Frenchy's consciousness. There was a feeling. A familiar feeling. What was it? She suddenly realized all of her attention had been on the fight and she hadn't noticed something else happening.
She let her mind go open, try to understand what she was getting.
Then she knew.
Frenchy rolled onto her back and yelled. "Nobody shoot! We have friends out there. The cavalry's arrived!"
Dallas was the only one that understood the cavalry reference. "Damn!" she yelled. "Somebody blow charge!"
The rest got the idea after a moment and settled back into place, content to stay out of the line of the bolts that were still coming their way.
Frenchy smiled grimly. Grae was here. Grae and his friends. Somebody was about to get their clock cleaned.
She let impressions flow into her mind. Grae. Tribal men. A lot of tribal men. A lot of great big tribal men. And they were pissed. They were also creeping into position. She could feel the feral grin on her face. A thing of beauty was unfolding.
Armed slavers were filing rapidly off the airbus, but Frenchy realized that, here and there, slavers on the periphery of the original group were starting to vanish. Looking carefully, she saw one big tribesman pop up and take off a slaver's head with his sword. Then the swordsman was down again, vanished back into the scattered underbrush. She was way too far away to hear any noise from the killing, but she doubted if it was loud enough for the slavers to hear it, even as close as they were. Too fast. Too smooth.
Dallas was also watching. "That was my guy," she said happily. "Joe's here."
That's when a rocket came ripping out from a place where Frenchy could swear there was nothing but brush. It flashed into the airbus, which obligingly exploded, killing everyone aboard and some of the men immediately around it.
That was a general signal. Bolts came from other apparently empty locations, stitching groups of slavers and throwing their bodies in all directions.
"HI YAAAH, NIR YALLAH!!"
With the sound of the Yellow Knife war cry, tribesmen suddenly charged out of the brush throughout the area. Most had B-42s in automatic fire mode using short, choppy bursts. A few got in close and used their big swords to deadly effect. There was bolt fire in all directions, not to mention screams.
Almost half of the remaining slavers died in those first frantic seconds of the attack, but it was the swords that broke them. The slavers were galactic and unused to the primal fright long blades produced, not to mention the blood and gore from a strike. Weapons were thrown on the ground and hands shot skyward in surrender.
It was a perfect ambush. As with all well done ambushes, there was a lot of luck as well as skill involved, but Frenchy figured that this time luck favored the good guys. It looked like there were few, if any, casualties on Grae's side. The slavers, on the other hand, were pretty well clobbered. Hard.
Lying behind her rocks, Frenchy gave a deep sigh and laid her head briefly on her bopper. It was all over but the cleanup. Looking again, she could see the unmistakable forms of Grae, Evan, and Jongular out there. Thankfully, they were okay. She slowly stood up. "Okay, gang. Give it a few more minutes then we can go down and thank our rescuers."
Nos was standing next to her. He looked at the tableau on the rough land below the rocks then turned to her. "Mom, can we talk for a moment? Privately, I mean?"
Frenchy nodded then shot Dallas a quick significant look, letting her know she was now in charge for a few minutes. "Sure, son. Let's step over here."
She was certain she knew what Nos wanted to talk about.
"Mom, I just killed a guy and I don't know how I'm feeling. I don't feel glad or proud, but I don't feel like I've done anything I'm sorry about, either. I'm kind of depressed, too. What's going on?" The look he gave her was a little worried and puzzled at the same time.
Frenchy reached over and hugged him. Absently, she realized again how much the boy'd grown. Growing emotionally, too. Fast. "Honey, you're feeling the letdown after a fight. It happens to everyone. I get it every time."
She looked into his worried eyes. This was important. This wasn't explaining the facts of life to a child. It was her job to clarify what was happening to a kid rapidly becoming a young man because of what had happened in his life - way too early. "Nos, honey, you're just feeling what everyone feels the first time they have to kill someone in a fight. I felt the same way the first time I had to do it. Every time, still."
Nos's eyes got big at that revelation. Mom had killed a guy in a hard fight like this?
Frenchy looked out over the Barrens. "Before we ever came here, I told Aunt Dallas things get rough on Lycanth and she'd probably have to kill someone or something just to stay alive. She's been around the block enough times to understand and accept that. Trust me, though. She's feeling reaction right now, just like you and me and everyone, even the guys down there rounding up those slavers. We're all human.
"The girl that saved your life is probably feeling the same things you are - and she was raised to expect she'd have to kill someone sooner or later. Like I keep saying, Lycanth is a rough place, but it's a wonderful place too. It's worth fighting for."
The look she turned to Nos got darker. "I'm sorry you had to do that as young as you are, but that's why you're getting weapons training and why we're very serious about it. That sonofabitch you killed was going to kill me and he was perfectly willing to do it. You saved my life. If you hadn't killed him we wouldn't be having this conversation because I wouldn't be around to talk to you. That balances things out, son.
"What all the adventure stuff doesn't tell you is how you're going to feel after you kill someone, but don't let it hit you too hard. There are people that just plain need killing and those people will do their dead level best to kill you just because they want to do it. In the end, you have to take them out first to stay alive. Don't ever give them a chance. I learned that the first time I had to kill someone - and I grew up knowing some folks were just plain bad.
"Don't talk about it, brag about it like some people do," Frenchy said earnestly. She was a mother trying to reassure her son, but keep him from going too far in the wrong direction. "It's just something you had to do. Just be yourself, Nos, the guy that's had a rough time lately but's getting through it and coming out on top. Go ahead, enjoy life and have fun learning and growing. There's nothing wrong with that. You're young, but you were man enough to do what you had to do when you had to do it. I'm proud of you for that. But don't feel like you have to kill again just to prove you're a man. I won't like you then. It's the why - not the what - that means something.
"Just do whatever you have to do when you have to do it. Be like your dad. Don't brag, just do what you need to," she finished with a little smile. "I love you, Nos. You're my son. You weren't afraid to do the right thing and that's what makes me proud.
"Okay?"
Nos looked her in the eyes for a moment then grabbed her in a hug. "Got it, Mom. I love you too."
Frenchy teared up for a moment, but shook it off. There was still stuff to do and the area was still dangerous. There would be time later to get Grae, sit down, and talk about things that needed talking about with Nos, but not now.
She gave Nos another little hug then let him go and swung back to the gathering group. "All right, let's go down and join the party! Follow me down, but be careful! We don't know
if they got all of those bastards."
They climbed down off the rocks with weapons at the ready and everyone carefully scanning the surrounding area. They were about fifty yards from their rock fort when Frenchy's psi alerted her. She spun to her left and fired her bopper from the hip.
THUMP!
The bopper's choke was still set to 0, so a fan shaped area of rocky land and brush suddenly converted to burned fragments about twenty yards out, some of those fragments flying a good ten yards further. A few of those were bits and pieces of slaver. Frenchy spun back to the group and snarled, "There was someone hiding behind that bush with a gun. He wasn't one of ours."
She was still frowning as she looked at Nos. "Like I told you. Never give a sonofabitch a chance at you."
Nos nodded, slowly, and hefted his sword slightly to settle it more securely in his hand as he watched around them. Nos, Frenchy decided, was going to come out of this in good shape.
Now to find her guy.
As the group got closer to the scene of recent battle, Frenchy could see Grae, Evan, and Jongular head out to meet them. Grae was carrying a B-42 with the comfortable ease that told Frenchy the weapon was an old friend to him. Something from his War days, she suspected. Jongular had sheathed his sword, but a number of other men, ten or twelve, still had theirs out and were giving the bunch of captured slavers hard looks.
Good. Let those bastards sweat. They'd tried to hurt her boy. Stolen little girls, too.
"Hello, Mistress." Grae's wonderful dry voice was as welcome to her as anything she could imagine. It ran tingles up her spine, too.
Grae's face was decorated with green jagged rays. The war paint of a Master Warrior. The rest of the Yellow Knife guys were also in war paint. Figured.
He threw a free arm around her shoulders and hugged her then looked at Nos plus sword. It seemed to Frenchy that he was already aware of how Nos had used it. "Is that yours now, son?"
Nos turned to Milla, not too far away. Frenchy noted with amusement the girl had been close to him ever since they got off the rocks. Nos held out the leeth'al sword to her. "I really can't take this," he said. "You guys captured it and you loaned it to me. I guess it's yours."