Time spike

by Eric Flint

  They seemed to be under the command-if you could use the term at all-of a committee of four or five sergeants. And the sergeants seemed to spend most of their time arguing with each other. Arguing about what, it was hard to know, given the crude nature of the operation.

  Probably arguing about whether to rape the women now or wait until nightfall. Hulbert, realizing he was holding his breath out of sheer anger, forced himself to resume his normal slow, easy breathing. Andy, where the hell is that signal? Blacklock had gone one way, off to Hulbert's left, and Watkins and his Cherokees and the U.S. soldiers off to the right. The two leaders were working partway around the big clearing, far enough to encircle it as much as possible without running the risk of getting into a crossfire. The plan was simple enough. Andy figured-with Watkins' smile confirming his guess-that the Cherokees could get in position faster than his own people. So, once Andy was ready, he'd give the signal. The signal would be as simple as the plan. Blacklock and his platoon would just start shooting. No warning, nothing. Whatever lingering thoughts any of them might have had about negotiating with the conquistadores went up with the flaming huts. Even Andy, with his incredible self-control, had reached the limit. "I want all of them dead," he'd said quietly. As even-tempered as the man was-he was something of a legend, that way, among the prison guards-there was no mistaking the fury lurking beneath the words. "As many as we can manage, anyway. And we're not taking any prisoners, either. We never did get anything worth getting out of that one shithead we caught." Rod had spotted Watkins' expression, when Andy said that. The Cherokee chief seemed to be suppressing a smile.

  Ross didn't have any trouble figuring out the reason. Not knowing what else to do, Andy had decided to leave the prisoner in the town when the expedition set off. Stephen McQuade was still back there too. The man's wounds were healing, well enough, but he wasn't in good enough shape yet to participate in any battles. On the other hand, he wouldn't have any trouble using a knife. For that matter, neither would Susan Fisher, on a trussed-up prisoner. Between the two of them, had Rod been in that Spaniard's boots, he'd have much rather faced McQuade. There was something implacable about the little Cherokee medicine woman. By the time they got back, McQuade and Fisher would have discovered whatever it was that Spaniard knew. Their notions of suitable interrogation methods were decidedly nineteenth-century frontier. Rod was quite sure of that. He was just as sure that the man would be dead. He'd come to like the Cherokees, as he'd gotten to know them. But he didn't much doubt that under that sophisticated surface, at least when it got provoked, there was a spirit just about a savage as any Apache or Comanche's. A fusillade erupted, coming from the area where Blacklock had taken his people. An instant later, the gunshots sounding much deeper, came a fusillade from the Cherokees and Sergeant Kershner's men. "Fire!"Bailey shouted. Rod had told Jerry to give the signal. He didn't want to be distracted from his own immediate task.

  Moscoso was there. Rod had spotted him almost at once. Not hard to do, since he was one of the arguing sergeants. Hulbert had never stopped tracking him with his rifle since. He was tempted to gut-shoot the bastard, as angry as he was. But he didn't break training and habit.

  The sniper's triangle was his target. The shot took Moscoso right above the breastbone, rupturing the aorta. Blood spouted everywhere as he went down. He wasstill tempted to gut-shoot the bastard. But that was pointless. Moscoso was dead and they didn't have ammunition to spare. In the distance, maybe a hundred yards from the village and over two hundred yards from Hulbert's position, there was a man on horseback surrounded by several other horsemen. That might be de Soto himself. It was worth hoping for, anyway. Rod had kept him under surveillance also. He went down. Then, the horseman next to him. Then, the one on his other side. Shooting from a prone position with a rifle at this range-about two hundred and twenty yards-Rod Hulbert might as well have been called the Grim Reaper. He took down two more of the horsemen in that center group, before the rest scattered. Thereafter, it was slower work. Hulbert concentrated on the horsemen he could see at a distance, ignoring the bulk of the Spanish troops milling around outside the village. The closest of those soldiers weren't more than a hundred yards away, and the farthest not more than two hundred. Any guard could hit that target, especially as bunched up as they were.

  Hulbert did take a moment to survey the battle, to see how it was going. "Battle, my ass," he muttered. "This is a turkey shoot. Iknew we could have handled it on our own." "Quit bragging," said Bailey. He aimed, and fired again. "Even if you're right." Rod estimated there were somewhere between four and five hundred Spaniards in the little army they were facing. That meant the numerical odds were worse than two to one, abstractly. But that was reckoning "numbers" by a crude head count. Once you factored in the force multiplier that the repeating rifles gave the prison guards, the odds switched drastically. In the same time it took a conquistador to fire and reload one of their matchlocks, a guard could go through a ten-round magazine-aiming every shot, not just blasting away. Measuring by firepower instead of men, the advantage was actually five to one in favor of the prison guards. That wasn't even counting the Cherokees and the U.S. soldiers, who were also firing. Much better than five-to-one, actually, since you also had to factor in the much greater accuracy of the modern rifles. A sixteenth-century matchlock wasn't accurate beyond fifty yards, if that far. A number of shots had been fired by the Spaniards since the fighting started, but Rod was sure that if anyone on his side had been hit, it was pure bad luck.

  They were all sheltered behind trees and logs, and the Spaniards were out in the open. At least one person in charge over there seemed to have finally realized it, too. Out of the swirling chaos of hundreds of conquistadores caught completely by surprise, somebody was managing to bring some order and discipline to a group of about thirty of them.

  And then-ruthless bastard, but smart-he was moving the group behind the tied-up villagers, using them for a shield. Several of the guards were now yelling at the captives to lie down, but those poor people were even more frightened and confused than the Spaniards. Most of them were children. Besides, throwing yourself to the ground when you were tied to the person next to you by a rope around the neck was a good way to get strangled unless everybody did it in unison. "Fuck,"

  Rod hissed. Bailey was looking off to the right, where Watkins and the Cherokees had taken position. "What the hell… Rod, what are theydoing?" Hulbert looked over. Sergeant Kershner and his squad had moved out into the open area surrounding the village, and were forming up into a line. Then, at a shouted command from Kershner, they started marching around to the side. "They're going to get behind the Spaniards, so they can't use the villagers for a shield. Jesus. Talk about raw guts." Seven men against perhaps thirty-and Kershner's men were armed with muzzle-loading muskets, not semiautomatic rifles. As firearms, shot for shot, their Harpers Ferry Model 1816 flintlocks were considerably superior to the Spaniards' matchlocks. But they couldn't be reloaded all that much more quickly. Once those U.S. soldiers fired a volley, they'd be dead meat if the Spaniards charged.

  All they'd have to counter the Spanish halberds and swords would be nineteen-inch bayonets. Rod's low opinion of the conquistadores as a military force did not extend to sneering at their ability to use edged weapons at close range. In that situation, they'd be murderous.

  "Come on," he said. He rose and waved his hand at the rest of his platoon. "Follow me!" He started trotting. Not directly toward the looming confrontation between Kershner's men and that one group of Spaniards, but in a looping route that took him around the still-milling mass outside the village. He thought he and his men could get there before the Spaniards charged Kershner after that first volley was fired. But it soon became clear his crude flanking maneuver wasn't going to work. The problem wasn't any shrewd countermove on the part of the enemy, it was just the sheer chaos of the situation.

  Ragged groups of conquistadores were peeling away from the big mob in the center-that was just a killing zone by n
ow-and heading toward the shelter of the trees. Some of them were confused enough to run toward Rod and his men instead of away from them. "Oh, fuck." Rod stopped and gestured for his platoon to come to a halt. They were going to have to fire what amounted to their own volleys just to clear a path.

  Kevin Griffin gave Geoffrey Watkins a sly little smile. "Itold you he'd be strong-headed." Watkins didn't respond. He was chewing on his lower lip, trying to decide what to do. On the one hand, he didn't have that many more men than the Spanish group Kershner was going at.

  And the muskets they had weren't much better. On the other hand…

  "Let's go," he growled. "I don't want to have to listen to my niece yelling at me for the next year or two." Griffin chuckled. "She yells pretty good." He stood up and waved the Cherokees forward. Andy Blacklock was trying to decide what to do also. His battle plan had worked just about the way he'd hoped it would, until those Spaniards started using the villagers for a shield. Now, what had been a completely one-sided fight-not even a battle, so much as huge firing squad in action-was likely to become a hand-to-hand melee. Up close, he was quite sure the Spaniards would be a far deadlier opponent. But he didn't see where he really had much choice. So, he too rose and waved his people forward. Then, when they were more or less lined up, they advanced on the enemy in a formation that wasn't much better organized than the shattered Spanish army. The training that prison guards got did not include battlefield tactics. It sure as hell didn't include precision marching. "Go, Salukis!" Brian Carmichael shouted.

  Within two or three seconds, more than half the guards in Andy's platoon were shouting the same slogan. Then many of the guards in Hulbert's platoon started doing the same. Just before they stopped, more or less lined up, and started firing into the mob of Spaniards at close range. And most of them kept shouting the slogan as they fired.

  "This is nuts," Andy muttered to himself. But the shouting was contagious, and it impelled everyone forward at a much quicker pace.

  "Go, Salukis!" he shouted. "Go right at 'em!" Whether it was the strange slogan-which couldn't have made any sense at all to de Soto's men-or simply the sight of dozens of guards in blue uniforms charging at them after they'd already seen half of their own forces gunned down, or whether it was Hulbert's platoon's deadly close-range fire coming from another angle, Andy would never know. Nor care. All that mattered was that the Spaniards broke. Not more than a dozen shots were fired from their matchlocks, and they were off and running. A goodly number of them threw their heavy guns away as they ran. "Halt!

  Halt!" he shouted. "Goddamittohell, come to a screeching fucking STOP!

  Right now!" After a second or two, his people obeyed him. Andy pointed at the fleeing Spaniards. "Shoot them. Now. While they're still in range." That was just murder, really. Andy had read a little military history and knew that what he was doing came under the euphemism of "pursuit," even if his people were standing still and just shooting.

  But what the term really meant waskick 'em when they're down and keep kicking until they're meatpaste. It didn't occur to him, until the shooting had almost stopped because there weren't any enemies still in sight, to wonder what had happened to Kershner and his squad. "I knew they'd break," Kershner told Watkins calmly. "These men might have been soldiers once, but they're nothing but killers now. One good volley taking down three or four of them, and they ran." Geoffrey still thought the youngster was probably a lunatic. But… The Spaniardshad broken. By the time Watkins and Griffin and the Cherokees arrived to save Kershner and his men, they didn't need saving. They'd just been reloading their muskets. He looked at the villagers. By now, they'd managed to get themselves all on the ground, out of the line of fire. So far as he could tell, not one of them had been shot. That was a minor miracle, in itself. "Cut them loose, Kevin." Griffin nodded and trotted over to the villagers. They flinched, when they saw him pull out his knife, but relaxed once they realized he was just cutting the ropes away. "Now what?" asked Kershner. Watkins surveyed the scene. The open area around the village was piled with bodies. Piled high, in some places. You could literally walk across it stepping only on Spaniards, except for a few clear patches here and there. This had just been butchery-and it wasn't over yet. "Captain Blacklock said he doesn't want any prisoners. But I don't think he's really got the stomach for it. Do you?" Kershner's blue eyes scanned the field. "I'm Swabian, you know. Wasn't born there, but I know all the stories. For centuries, men just like these slaughtered and murdered and pillaged and raped back and forth across my people's lands. Any time some villagers got their hands on some of them, they didn't take any prisoners either. So, yes, I've got the stomach for it." He turned to his men. "You heard him, boys. This is what bayonets are for."

  Watkins had always thought those bayonets were a little silly-looking.

  After watching for a couple of minutes, he changed his mind.

  Chapter 42 "Hulbert, look. Can you believe what you're seeing?"

  Jerry Bailey's voice was gruff, but filled with humor. Then the man laughed aloud. "Man, oh man, how good can it get?" Confused, Hulbert looked. Bailey was pointing to an area between two of the huts. Ten brown and tan puppies, no longer than a man's palm, squirmed and whimpered as they tried to get their mother to care for them. The mother couldn't. She'd been hit by a bullet during the battle. But the puppies were fine. Alive and well. His brows drew into a frown. The dogs the Spaniards had were vicious creatures trained to maim and kill on command. A number of them had been shot in the battle, several of them while trying to attack the oncoming prison guards. He wanted no part of those dogs. It'd be like trying to keep half-tame wolves. But that was mostly because of the way the dogs had been reared. And these dogs might have belonged to the villagers anyway. They looked like they might be part coyote. Starting with puppies… He thought of Marie Keehn and had to swallow hard in order to control his emotions.

  Marie liked dogs. If he could bring her a puppy, she would feel like she had been given a little piece of home. "Come on," he said. "Let's get us a pair of hunting dogs before the women scoop them up for pets." Bailey's grin was as wide as Hulbert's. "The dogs at the prison have all been fixed. I thought that meant the species was probably a gonner." He followed Hulbert, just one step behind. "They won't be as tame as what we're used to." "It doesn't matter what they are, they're close enough to dogs for me. We can always breed out the undesirable characteristics, and work towards the good ones." Rod knelt down in order to get a better look at the pups. Jerry squatted next to him.

  "What are we going to call it?" he asked. "Call what?" "What's happening to some of the animals we're running across?" Bailey pointed at the pups. "When the last of something dies out, we say it's gone extinct. But, if something from the future dies out, it's not extinction. It can't be. I mean, how can a species die out before it evolves?" Rod shook his head. "That's Edelman's department. Or Carmichael's, I guess, if you don't believe in evolution." He rolled one of the whimpering pups onto its back and rubbed its belly. "You found them, Jerry. You get pick of litter." It didn't take the C.O. long to choose. The brown and black, chubby little female whimpered then growled when he picked her up, but quickly settled down and sucked and nipped at his pinky finger. "Uh-oh, Hulbert. It looks like we've been spotted. If you want one of these, you better hurry.

  Marilyn's headed this way and she looks like a woman on a mission."

  Marilyn Traber was wearing the exact same grin Bailey wore. "Don't even think of hogging all of them, guys. I'm warning you. Don't go there." Grin or no grin, she looked downright threatening. "Yeah, sure, Marilyn. Pick whichever one you want. Except-" Quickly, Rod made his choice. Jerry had picked a female, so he'd pick a male. That way, between them, they'd have a breeding pair. "This one." "And now a mystery must be resolved," said Watkins. "Who or what is 'saluki'? "

  Andy Blacklock smiled. "Well, it's a little embarrassing. It didn't even occur to me we might need a battle cry. Luckily, somebody improvised. A saluki is a type of dog. More to the point
, it's the mascot SIU chose for its sports teams." The Cherokee chief got a long-suffering look on his face. "And who is Essayeyou?" "Oh. Sorry.

  It stands for Southern Illinois University. The campus at Carbondale is the closest university to us. Was the closest, anyway. Most of the guards rooted for them." "They dug up roots for them? Why? They were paidthat badly as guards?" Andy got a long-suffering look on his face.

  Marilyn Traber found a reed basket inside one of the Indian huts.

  The ten small puppies were tucked inside it and covered with a swatch of cloth cut from a cape worn by one of the Spaniards. The pups were very young; not all of them had their eyes open. Traber was not so young. Life had opened her eyes a long time back. And she knew too well that dealing with the horrors of this new world would probably open them a little more. But none of that mattered. Not right this minute. Now, nothing mattered except these ten, warm, squirming fragments of normalcy. She lifted a corner of the improvised blanket and took another peek at them. Looking at them made her feel good. She then flashed a grin at the two C.O.'s standing nearby. Winnfield and Sharps were taking their orders to defend the small creatures seriously. They scanned the forest almost continuously, determined neither man not beast would be allowed to hurt the ten small canines.

  Three of the pups were promised out. She, Bailey, and Hulbert had already staked their claims. But the other seven were up for grabs.