Time spike

by Eric Flint

  If this is our own past, then the one thing we know is that we didn't make it. Whatever civilization we manage to start will disappear without a trace. So, we don't have to worry about which timeline we're in-ours or a new one. All we have to do is build our present. The one we want to live in and the one we want to leave to our children."

  Jenny wiped her eyes on her sleeve. "So, we're the new Adam and Eve."

  "What are we going to do?" Hulbert asked. "Go meet the Cherokees. Our guest says he was traveling with them on the Trail of Tears. By then, the Cherokee weren't even close to what any sane man would call 'wild savages.' They even had their own alphabet. I figure we can get along with them okay." Joe looked dubious. "Has it occurred to you they might be holding a grudge?" Andy shrugged. "Against who? Americans almost two hundred years back? A lot's changed since then. I don't see any reason to think they can't figure that out for themselves. I think Stephen McQuade already has. It helps, you know, that he can look around and see for himself that we're now a multiracial society." He picked up the pad he'd use to take notes while talking to Stephen McQuade, the wounded Cherokee. The Cherokees had been in southern Illinois when the Quiver caught them. So had the prison. "Yeah, it's starting to make sense." Everything we're running across is something that existed somewhere in this area, at one time or another. Not exactly where the prison is, maybe, but pretty close. The Trail of Tears passed through this area. So did de Soto. And I'll bet money the Indians McQuade spent the night with were Mounds people." He handed the pad to Edelman. "I think your theory about us getting shoved into the past and taking others with us is pretty accurate. Look at this.

  All of these people were here in Southern Illinois, within a few miles of the prison. They were just here at different times." Edelman looked at Andy's notes. "If it's the real de Soto, we're in trouble. That bastard was nothing but a butcher. Everywhere he went he stole everything he could get his hands on, and enslaved anyone he could. Of course he only murdered, robbed, tortured and raped in the name of God and gold." Jenny gave him a strained smile. "Christians didn't exactly corner the market on that type of behavior, you know." "True enough,"

  Edelman said. "But the conquistadores were right at the top of the class. It wasn't just de Soto. When I was in high school, I did a report on gold mines. During the 1500s, the Franciscan monastery was running the show in Cuba. Those Spanish monks were so ruthless, the Indians they enslaved to work the mines would commit mass suicide.

  They would get their hands on enough rope to hang themselves, and then during the middle of the night they would say goodbye to each other, wrap those ropes around their own necks, then jump." Andy suppressed the urge to shudder. He knew the way things used to be done. He had the same history teacher Edelman had. Mr. Carter had refused to sugarcoat anything. He believed the only way to correct things was to make sure kids grew up knowing just how evil people could become if left unchecked. And he didn't restrict that lesson to the Europeans and Adolf Hitler. He had rubbed man's inhumanity to man in their faces using every civilization on the planet. He wanted them to know there was no such thing as the good old days. "When we get through with the Cherokees, assuming we can," Andy said, "then we'll try to work something out with de Soto. He'll be a lot tougher to deal with, I expect. But he might not be impossible. He was greedy. He wanted to be rich and move up the ranks in power. Once he realizes there is no gold, no Catholic church, no monarchy to give him land that does not belong to them, we should be able to come to some sort of agreement with him and his men. When the only thing of value is your next meal, a man's perspective tends to change. I speak a little Spanish, and some of the C.O.'s are fluent in it. We won't have trouble understanding each other." "I hate this place!" Jenny didn't look at any of the men in the room. She kept her eyes on the floor. "Andy, you're talking about dealing with people who act worse than the ones we have behind bars. If you strike a deal with de Soto, how do you justify keeping our murderers, our rapists, our thieves, behind bars?

  How do you say, this devilis our friend, but that devil has to stay locked up?" "Jenny, we have no choice. We can't go back to our world.

  We have to live in this one. We have to adapt, or we die." "Adapt, or sell our souls?" He walked across the room and stood directly in front of her. "I will do whatever I have to do to keep us alive. I'm trying, Jenny. The first thing we have to do is warn the Cherokees. From what McQuade told me about the shape they're in, they won't be able to survive an attack from de Soto. Then, we'll try to warn the Mounds people. Then, we will try to talk some sense into the conquistadores.

  When we get back we will start releasing the nonviolent prisoners."

  "Release them, or let them out of their cells?" Joe asked. "That's going to depend on what we find out there. Until I know more, I'm not willing to hand any of them a gun or a knife. Every gun and every box of ammo given away is less we have to defend us from dinosaurs, Spaniards, and I don't know what else. So, how do they take care of themselves? You've seen the things roaming around outside the walls.

  If I open the gate and send them down the road, unarmed, they're dead.

  And if I unlock the gates, and then let the prisoners remain inside the prison, every one of us could wind up murdered in our sleep. The decision on what we do with and for the prisoners waits. Now," Andy said, "get the department heads together. We have a trip to plan."

  Lieutenant Hulbert stood at the door to the cafeteria waiting for Marie Keehn to finish briefing the kitchen staff on food preparation and storage. He felt foolish, but didn't care. He figured the woman would probably laugh at what he was going to say, think he was paranoid, but he was going to say it anyway. He had to. She was amazing. She was also as far from his so-called type as any woman could get. He preferred athletic looking women. Usually light complexioned blondes. Sometimes redheads. But they were always slim and muscular. She was none of these things. Instead, she was dark haired and dark eyed. Tiny but curvy. Almost, but not quite, chubby.

  Buxom. Voluptuous in miniature. He smiled at the thought then frowned.

  She was damn good with a gun. She worked well under pressure, didn't lose her head. And when instincts counted, hers were right on the money. And she could smile. And laugh. That's what it was. The other stuff was just gravy on the potatoes. It was that laugh. She had a dry humor and knew how to take a joke. And she was smart. He hoped she was very smart. She was staying behind with Joe. And Collins. He didn't like that. He wanted her with them. But Andy had been stubborn about it. He insisted Joe might need her. She was the only sharpshooter besides Hulbert the prison had. And since Hulbert was going, she had to stay. Andy was probably right, although that hadn't stopped Rod from arguing. Instead of sending half their force, Hulbert wanted only a handful to go. He wanted to just make contact and begin the negotiations for peace. But Andy had shot that down. No negotiating.

  There wasn't time. With de Soto roaming around loose out there, not to mention dinosaurs, the Cherokees needed to be behind the walls of the prison. They were already worn out from the trials they'd undergone in the course of the Trail of Tears. The same went for the Mounds people.

  Once everyone was inside, then they would figure out what to do about the animals and about the Spaniards. Rod hadn't bothered to point out that the prison, with over two thousand prisoners, was not exactly "safe." Everyone knew that. But everyone also knew there were Utahraptors beyond the walls, and Spanish conquistadores, and who knew what else. Hulbert had argued a smaller group could travel faster, which meant safer. He had pointed out that emptying the prison of well over half its guards might be for nothing. They might not be able to find Watkins or the Mounds people. Or, both groups might refuse to join them. Or, once Andy met with them, he might not want them to join the guards inside the walls. But the bottom line was, there always had to be someone in charge, someone calling the shots, and that someone was Andy. So that meant Hulbert was leaving and Marie was staying behind. And that also meant Jenny went with them. Andy hadn't want
ed the R.N. to leave the facility. He believed the prison was the safest place for the women. But Jenny insisted she was the only nurse in good enough physical shape to make the trip. And a nurse had to go. Even though Jenny had explained how risky the trip could be, Stephen McQuade was refusing to give them directions to the Cherokee camp. He was going with them, or they would have to find the camp on their own.

  McQuade was still in guarded condition and there was too much that could go wrong. So, a team of six guards had been assigned to carry his stretcher. Three teams of two. And Jenny was going and Marie was staying and Hulbert and Andy both wished like hell it was the other way around. "What's up?" Marie said, exiting the lunchroom. "We need to talk. I'm leaving with Andy and you're being left here with Joe."

  "Doesn't surprise me." The look she gave him was different from the one Jenny had given Andy when they had argued over who was going and who was staying. Marie wasn't mad. She was disappointed. Disappointed in him. "I tried to get him to let you come along, but he wants you here. Joe has to have someone with sharpshooter status." "I see." He watched as she thought about what he said. He could see the war of emotions going on below the surface, and he could see when that war ended. She accepted the logic in Andy's decision faster and easier than he had. "Marie," he looked at the wall behind her, not at her face. He couldn't look her in the eye. "I don't want you to turn everything in. Hold back a little something you can carry with you at all times. Even in the showers." She didn't ask why or what. Instead, she said, "That's against the rules." "And you've never broken one?"

  "Maybe, one." "Okay, break one more." There was so much he wanted to say, but settled on, "If you get caught, and they dock your pay, I'll make it up to you." "You bet you will. You'll be out the dough for a steak dinner, drinks and dancing at the swankiest place in town." "You got it." His voice became gruff. "And anything else you want."

  "Hulbert, you have no idea what this is going to cost you." She smiled that easy going smile of hers, then grew serious. "You're not asking me to do anything I didn't want to do anyway. Things aren't right. The tension in this place can be cut with a knife. Something happened while we were hunting." "Yeah, that's why I want you to be real careful. Don't get caught up in anything. If things start to look a little iffy, bail. If you guess wrong and wind up in a tub of hot water, I'll tell Andy I told you to do it." "When do you leave?" she asked. "In about an hour." "Walk me to the armory. I have a rifle to turn in; you can distractStacy while I get something easier to conceal." "And get enough ammo to hold off an army." She looked him in the face and this time he returned the look, letting his eyes meet hers. "Marie, I'm serious, dead serious about this. I have this gut level feeling, and it's a bad one." "Okay," she said. "I'll do it. But you tell Joe you transferred me to the field, and I'm not assigned to a post. Scratch me off the shift roster altogether. That will give me the ability to be anyplace I feel the need to be. But when you get back you have to tell me why." "Collins-" She shook her head. "No. Not Collins. I want to know why you warned me. Why you felt you wanted to protect me." He touched her hair. "That's an easy one." "No. Don't tell me now. It'll jinx it." She stood on her toes and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. "Luck, for us," she whispered. She then turned toward the armory, all business.

  Chapter 20 The men who had been so eager to join Hernando de Soto on his expedition into the interior of the New World were now desperate to go back to Spain. The gold and silver they'd sought were nowhere to be found in this land of demons. The plantations, worked by slaves taken from native villages, were nothing more than a dream either. There weren't enough of them. They'd found hardly any more than the Tula slaves they'd brought with them, before the great river disappeared and the dragon's sulfur breath began rising from cracks and fissures in the ground. So many Spaniards had died-so many Spaniards, and so many of their horses. Most of the pigs were gone too. Not from dying but from running way. The only creatures doing well were the dogs. They had not lost one dog.

  Chapter 21 Stephen McQuade dozed off and on as he was carried along the riverbank. Occasionally he would mumble something and the small team that carried him and his stretcher would assure him they were still following the river. They passed the cave where Marie Keehn found him and started the upward climb leading to the pine forest. It wouldn't be long and they would leave the water's edge. They would be well inside the forest by nightfall. Jeff Edelman would occasionally wander away from the slow moving group of C.O. s and would return, always carrying something new that he'd show the others. The conifers that Jeff found so fascinating did not register much on Andy. They didn't really seem that much different from the ones he'd known in Illinois. But the six-inch long tooth certainly got his attention. So did the egg the size of an ostrich's. But no one talked much. It was as if they could barely breathe. The volcano not too far from the prison had been apparently dormant. But on the second day they came into sight of a volcano in the distance that was sending a thin plume of gray-tinged smoke into the air. That might be a problem some day, but the potential threat was too distant in comparison to the others he faced that Andy decided it wasn't worth worrying about. *** Around noon the next day, Andy took his share of the cold rations being passed out and sighed. They couldn't afford the time to build a fire and heat the slabs of meat, so he took a bite of the sandwich and forced himself not to make a face. Gristle and grease on rye. He then took a swig of water, immediately regretting it. The liquid, instead of washing the taste from his mouth, caused the grease to solidify, coating his tongue and teeth. Gunshots sounded. And what he was sure were screams. Andy dropped his sandwich to the ground and unslung his rifle. The C.O.'s all did the same. The gunfire and shrieks were coming from somewhere up ahead. Rod Hulbert was by his side. "That doesn't sound like people fighting off an animal. It sounds like a war." Andy nodded. That's exactly what it sounded like.

  And from the timber of the shrieks, it also sounded like women and children were the ones being attacked. Andy motioned for Jerry Bailey to stay with Jenny and her patient, Stephen McQuade. He then motioned for the others to follow him. The prison team worked its way through the woods. It didn't take them long to spot the men doing the killing.

  They were dressed in armor and wore helmets. A good number of them were on horseback. Several of them were shooting into the center of a village whose houses were made of downed branches and animal hides.

  Eight men of the village came rushing out, naked except for loincloths and wielding nothing more than decorated clubs. They weren't trying to attack the Spaniards, though. They were just trying to rescue two women and five children who'd been caught in the open, unable to get to the safety of their homes or the woods. The women had draped their bodies over their children in a pathetic attempt at protection.

  Several Spaniards fired, but none of them hit anything. Given the matchlocks they were using, that wasn't surprising. The Indians were a moving target-moving fast, too-and the range was at least fifty yards.

  Andy was pretty sure they'd only started shooting to panic their victims. They could have already killed the women and children, if they wanted to, huddled they way they were in the open. If the kids had been on their own, they might very well have been killed by now.

  But the instinctive protective gesture of the two women had kept them alive. The conquistadores might not want the children, but they'd want the women intact. One of the Spaniards on a horse, wearing a fancy-looking blue coat, bellowed something and the rest of them lowered their guns. He got off his horse, drew his sword, and the rest started following suit. Two of the Spaniards, it seemed, would be left behind holding the horses while the rest went into the village.

  Clearly, the leader intended to save whatever ammunition they had left. Conquistadores like this, armored and armed with steel swords, would have no trouble butchering natives completely unarmored and with nothing better than clubs. All the more so, since most of the Spaniards would be veterans of Europe's ferocious wars. Andy did a quick count. Fifteen Span
iards. Seventeen, counting the two holding the horses. They were probably the same detachment from de Soto's forces who'd attacked McQuade and the Indians he had been with. He made his decision just as quickly. This wasn't a prison uprising. This was war. There would be no negotiating and no prisoners taken. He had too many behind bars to take care of as it was. The bastards died.

  That simple. He nodded at Hulbert and made a summoning motion. Rod started heading his way, moving carefully so he wouldn't be spotted.

  Fortunately, there wasn't much chance of that since the Spaniards' attention was entirely on the village and the prison guards were well off to the side and slightly to their rear. Brian Carmichael was right next to him. Andy leaned over and said softly: "Take ten men with you into the woods. Circle the village about two-thirds of the way around.

  Whatever you do, make sure you don't wind up directly across from us, where we might get ourselves in an accidental crossfire. After we start firing, if any of those bastards try to get away, kill 'em. We want just one prisoner, no more." He glanced at the Spaniards approaching the village. "The one with the fancy blue coat. He's the only one we leave standing." Brian nodded and took off, tapping a guard here and there as he went. Those he tapped fell in line behind him. Seconds later they were gone from sight. By then, Hulbert was next to him. "We'll aim for the ones with guns first. Pass it along.