by Jerry Sohl
From their vantage points in the bedroom doorways all three could see the stairs. They stood there, getting their breath, gun arms tense, the smell of gunpowder smoke drifting up from the stairwell, an acrid, remindful smell that served to tighten the muscles in their trigger fingers.
There was movement downstairs—a sound such as mice might make in paper. There was another sound, the faint hum of the generator in the radio room. But no one came up the stairs.
"Car pulling up," Bobby Covington cried from the window in the bedroom Travis was in.
"More of them," he muttered. "They're going to make sure of the job."
"No—it's men!"
"Men!" Travis jerked to go to the window, thought the better of it. 'You sure it's not haploids, kid?"
"They're not worried about anything," Dick Wetzel, the other boy at the window, said with concern. "They're just standing around their cars on the hard road, looking this way."
"Now they're climbing the fence," Bobby called excitedly.
"Yell for them to look out," Travis ordered.
It wasn't needed. There were shots from the lower floor, an answering cry from the men. Travis tore himself from his post in time to see the men scattering. The gunfire and cries brought the others stationed on the second floor to Travis's room, since no other window opened to the west.
"Saved by the U. S. Cavalry!" Margano said wearily. .
"Judd Taylor's men," Travis said thankfully. "Didn't think he'd believe us. I hope they're armed."
As if in answer, the men between the house and the fence started firing at the house from behind bushes and trees. Those at the window ducked. Answering fire came from downstairs.
"Let's go down," Travis said, rising. "We can sandwich the haploids between us and those guys out there."
The group in the room turned to follow Travis. They piled up behind him as he stopped mid-step in the middle of the room.
Dr. Garner stood in the doorway, an automatic in her right hand. Her eyes glittered in fury, her face was flushed, her straggly hair in disorder around her head. She was having difficulty in getting her breath.
"Drop them!" And when they didn't instantly comply she repeated the command. "Drop the guns. Quickly!"
The weapons clattered to the floor.
"Kick them over to the north wall. Now move out by me through the door. There will be no hesitation. Move!"
The group, having no choice, moved dazedly past the woman.
"Into the radio room. Fast."
Those at work in the radio room glanced up when Travis entered, followed by the others.
"Is it all over?" Betty asked, running to him. Then she stopped short, seeing his expression, catching sight of the others. She fell back momentarily, then gasped when she saw Dr. Garner and ran to the door.
"Get back, Betty," Dr. Garner cried through clenched teeth. "We've lost the battle downstairs. I don't intend to lose this one. Get out of the way!" She stepped forward.
"You're mad, Mother!" Betty cried. "What good would it do to kill us all now?"
"You're just like your father—"
"You mean Dr. Tisdial—"
"Your father. A haploid would have been loyal. But you have your father's stamp."
Betty's fingers gripped the woodwork, her knuckles white, her astonished eyes on her mother's face.
"Are you going to move aside?" The words had a cold finality.
Still Betty did not move.
The gun came up a little as the forefinger tightened on the trigger. Travis held his breath, clenched his teeth as the action of a second seemed to drag to long minutes. Even the shots heard with such frequency downstairs a few moments ago were spaced farther and farther apart and seemed now, in this crucial moment, to have stopped altogether.
The sudden thuds were not gunfire. They were footsteps —men's footsteps on the stairs—many of them.
Dr. Garner's eyes widened as the sound enveloped them all. She turned her head slightly, rolled her eyes to the stairway. In the merest instant they became charged with hate. She swung her gun around, the .38 exploding in action.
The answering slugs whipped the wind out of her, the series of blasts knocking her first this way and then that, backwards, gasping, her cheeks sunk now to deep hollows, her .38 firing erratically. Then it all stopped.
Dr. Garner, first angry, then wondering, her eyes unseeing, her mouth slack, crumpled to the floor.
Travis took Betty by the shoulders, turned her, held her shaking body to his.
Dr. Leaf looked up from Ernie Somers' microscope, the old wry smile back on his face, his eyes twinkling.
"I see forty-eight chromosomes," he said. "Want to look?"
Travis grinned. "I'll take your word for it."
"Oh, darling," Betty cried as she turned to Travis, pulling his head down to hers.
He kissed her soundly.
Dr. Leaf pushed the microscope back on the table.
"Our work is really just beginning," he said. "If you can come out of it long enough, Travis, I'll tell you about it."
Travis and Betty sat down at the table. There was movement all through the house as cleaning-up operations had got underway. Judd Taylor's men had come in handy all the way around and now, as good neighbors, they were helping restore some semblance of order to the besieged house.
"We put on the May Day call," Dr. Leaf said. "The FCC picked it up. Some place called Grand Island, I think. Ernie knows. Well, anyway," he continued, lighting his pipe and inhaling gratefully, "they got in touch with Washington, only it wasn't Washington. There were radiations there and the President and all the bigwigs moved down the Potomac, I guess.
"Every male in the United States is getting a blood test. All AB men are being inducted in the army to fight the haploids. Every woman will have to register and have a biopsy. The haploids will be rounded up and just what they will do with them I don't know. That hasn't been decided yet. But the AB men will enter the cities in regular army units to take them over and set up registration stations. Woe be to the woman who doesn't have a registration card!
"And another little thing," the doctor said, fumbling with some papers on the table, sucking on his pipe as he did so. "Ernie typed this out as he received it. Orders for commissions."
"Commissions for what?" Travis asked. "My boy," Dr. Leaf said, chuckling. "You are about to become a brigadier general in the army of AB men."
"A general!"
"Yes. Now raise your right hand and repeat after me— and then you can do the same for me. I'm a brigadier, too, you see."
"There's no time to lose." The doctor consulted his wrist watch. "According to our radio conversation, the army plane will be here in twenty minutes."
"Travis!" Betty cried woefully. "You're not going to leave me now!"
"Miss Garner," the doctor smiled, "there's no rule about wives as far as generals are concerned. I'm sure you can go with him, that is, if he wants you."
"If he wants me!"
Travis beamed. "I don't believe there's much question now about how I'm going to spend my year."
"Better make that years, darling."
The End