The Dying Time (Book 2): After The Dying Time (2 page)

Ellen helped him sit up and went back to tending his wounds. He saw they were still in the clearing. Jim’s tall, lean form standing guard, pacing the perimeter. Distant gunshots echoed from farther down the valley. Aaron Goldstein buzzed by overhead in the Freeholds gyrocopter, scouting out the enemy.

“How’re we doing?” Michael asked, wincing as Ellen dug a large splinter out of his back.

Jim Cantrell, his lifelong friend stopped pacing and snapped, “They’re whipped.”

Michael raised his eyebrows at Jim’s angry tone. Surely a man he’d known since he was ten would understand. They’d been through this before, but Jim looked like a balloon about to pop.

Michael flinched as Ellen’s fingers probed his damaged ribs. “Spit it out before it poisons you.”

“Okay,” Jim agreed, dark brown eyes flashing. He pointed a finger at Michael and said, “Man, you’re a prize idiot. Staging a one man ambush against a battalion.” Jim shook his head in disbelief. “That kind of stupidity will get you killed and you damn well know it. I don’t suppose you stopped to think what Ellen and the kids would do without you, did you?”

Michael frowned.

“What?” Jim asked.

But before Michael could respond, Ellen said. “He was thinking about us when he attacked them.”

Michael sighed and closed his eyes. She understood--usually did, after she calmed down.

“I still think...” Jim began, then broke off and brought up his AR-15 as he spun toward a sound in the woods. Ellen grabbed one of her pistols and slapped the other into Michael’s outstretched palm.

Brush cracked and Dan Osaka, the tall, one-eyed, former Air Force Academy cadet, propelled a captive into the clearing. The prisoner stumbled over a broken branch and fell.

A smile formed when Dan saw Michael, but his voice was dead serious. “I caught this scumbag hiding near the Haley place. They’re all dead. May take us a day or two to finish mopping up around here. We’ve routed most of these bastards, but we’ve got a real problem.”

Michael and Ellen exchanged a quick, worried glance.

“Tell her what you told me,” Dan said, glowering at the man sprawled on the ground before him.

“P...Private Carmichael, Royal Army,” said the frightened soldier, glancing quickly from face to face.

Ellen’s eyes widened slightly. Royal Army?

Dan read her look perfectly. He shrugged. “That’s what he says--that he’s a soldier in the army of some king. From what I’ve seen of his buddies they’re all in uniform and well armed, so it could be true.”

Jim’s lips compressed in a thin line. Ellen’s brow furrowed and a shadow settled on her face. Her greatest fear...

Michael took her free hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. His back popped as he sat up straight. In the depths of his brown eyes a golden flame flickered to life.

Chapter 2: Luna City

Yuri Gargarin, Ludmilla’s son, the first baby born on the moon, had his father’s lean build, his mother’s gray eyes and his famous grandfather’s drive to be first. He peeked around the corner, saw the path was clear and bounded across the corridor like a lunar panther. His arms and hands propelled him from wall to wall, his feet never quite touching the floor as he rocketed along. Lunar flying, he called it and naturally he’d invented the technique. He zoomed high, almost brushing the ceiling as he crossed the next corridor and waived at Dr. Goldstein and her son Gabriel as they flinched from his sudden appearance. He ricocheted smoothly off the walls until he neared his home and settled easily to the floor.

As he entered the door he heard his father, talking to Commander Kent about how to save the people on Earth. Honestly, he didn’t know why that was such a big deal. Everything he’d learned about the people down there led him to think the universe would be better off without them. Always fighting and killing each other--eating each other--gross.

They had all the advantages, plenty of air to breathe and water to drink. Deos, they didn’t even have to suit up to go outside and he genuinely envied them that. But most of all he yearned to see animals--deer and elephants and birds and whales. Maybe they should try to prevent the coming impact to save the animals. The only animals on Luna were the worms in the soil and compost beds and they weren’t all that interesting. Besides, he was twelve and he really wanted a dog.

He slipped into his room, flipped open his comm unit and hailed Angela Kent. The two of them were supposed to meet up with Leia Morshidi and Hans Riley-Obermann after last class to “fly” the main lane to the spaceport.

*

Heinz Obermann scanned the readout again, brown eyes focused and intense, brows knitted. Something was wrong but he couldn’t pinpoint why power production levels were declining from reading the report. He shook his head, his long, wavy blonde hair bobbing slowly under the moons gentle pull and mumbled, “Surface check,” to himself. But first...a quick smile flitted across his face, he’d run this past Olivia.

She was due back today from a stint on the ISS and he couldn’t wait to see her again. A vision of her Catherine Zeta-Jones beauty flashed across his mind and his smile returned.

*

The ISS

Rana Hamide adjusted the visor on her space suit to reduce glare as she examined the port side ISS solar array. Her luminous dark brown eyes swept the panels and found numerous flaws. Small, delicate fingers, looking large and clumsy in her suit carefully measured a hole and she sighed.

“Problem, Rana?” Ludmilla Gargarin asked from the control module. Any space walk activity was closely monitored.

“Several, ‘Milla,” Rana replied. “I’m afraid we’re going to have to replace the port side array.

“Micrometeorites?”

“Yes, micrometeorite erosion. Plus these panels were hardest hit by ejecta after The Impact.” Fifteen years before the ISS had been moved to a much higher orbit to escape being destroyed when the asteroid named Havoc hit the Earth. The move had saved their lives, but some damage had been done and even after all those years there were still more earth bits sharing their orbit than was comfortable. Fortunately, they were moving at roughly the same speed as the ISS so they didn’t cause much damage.

Rana wiped a large Swiffer type dust catcher across the surface of the array and grimaced at how much dust it collected. No one had expected the vacuum of space to be so dirty, but the debris field that occupied their orbit still caused problems.

A blue marble Earth in quarter phase caught her eye and brought a sharp intake of breath. Even now, resigned to living their lives on the moon and the ISS, the sight of their home world brought pangs.

Her own country, Turkey, had been all but destroyed by quakes and fire falls, but in the western United States and Canada, in the landlocked South American countries of Bolivia and Paraguay electric lights were appearing as the ISS swept across the terminator line. Others had been noted in scattered parts of Australia, Great Britain and south central Europe, near Switzerland, if Mia Torno, their cartographer, was right.

Of course, chaos still reigned below. She shuddered recalling the depravity they’d witnessed in the remnants of California. The thought of what passed for civilization now on Earth made her skin crawl and she was glad she’d sided with those astronauts who elected to remain in orbit and settle the moon. Truly, she and her fellow Lunies were the hope of the human race and since no one from Earth had even pinged a communications satellite in almost a decade...well, maybe that was for the best. Maybe no one left alive down there knew that Havoc’s Twin was bearing down on them and would strike the planet in less than eight years. Maybe, a small part of her hoped, the asteroid would hit California.

She continued dusting the arrays, secure in the knowledge humanity would survive even if it was extinguished on Earth.

Chapter 3: The Cheyenne

Medicine Bow Mountains, Wyoming

July 5, 12 A.I.

Three Fingers sat quietly in the early morning darkness, listening to night birds and crickets. Sentry duty! He shrugged and stretched to remain alert. In the valley below, on the banks of the Laramie River, his village lay sleeping, or mostly so since a faint tinge of smoke still drifted up from the Council Fire. His mouth twitched but he banished the smile before it could form. Old warriors teaching lessons to young warriors was no laughing matter. Probably telling tales about their war leader Daniel Windwalker too. He remembered how Mitchell Stonehand delighted in describing the effect of Daniel’s gaze to young warriors. “In a fight,” he would shudder, “Daniel’s eyes are like a snake’s, but less human.”

A trout splashed in the river and another image flitted across his mind: Susan Redfeather’s lithe form stepping from the water, reaching for a towel. His face split into a grin. Now that was his idea of how to spend a night. He wondered when she would agree to marry him. Maybe if he...

What was that? The birds and insects had fallen still.

He turned at a slight sound and that motion caused the silenced bullet to miss his heart, the force of impact slamming him to the ground.

A dark shape stepped close and pointed something at him. Three Fingers struggled to raise his weapon but he had no strength. Susan! Her name blazed across his mind like a shooting star. My People! A single tear rolled onto his sun-browned cheek as he pulled air deep into his lungs. He had to warn his people.

“AIIIEEE!” His ululating death cry shattered the night as a second bullet tore his soul from his body.

Before the echoes faded, Daniel Windwalker was racing through the moonlit night toward the council fire in the center of the village. All around him men and women poured from their tipis, guns in hand, wild-eyed.

Small-arms fire crackled along the southern perimeter of the Cheyenne camp. Thundering hooves and roaring engines split the night. A cannon boomed and a tipi vanished in a blast of smoke and flame. He peered between the tipis toward the commotion and saw an uneven, rippling motion in the darkness beyond--a wave of riders and vehicles charging across the flats toward the Cheyenne village.

“Run!” he screamed to those he passed. “Head for the gap!” He pointed to a dark gash in the mountains rising behind them. Little ones, old people and women with children hurriedly obeyed. The bullwhip that hung from his belt slapped against the outer thigh of his right leg and his crossbow thumped rhythmically into his back as he ran. He cocked his Beretta and stuck one hand into his ammo pouch, counting the pre-loaded clips by feel.

A familiar shape appeared by his side as he dashed toward the heaviest fighting: Mitchell Stonehand leading two horses.

“Here!” Mitchell shouted, tossing a pair of reins to Daniel.

Daniel vaulted to the back of the horse and yelled, “Get the rest of the herd!”

Mitchell shook his head. “Ray and Susan are going for them.”

Daniel didn’t have to ask his friend to round up the warriors. They would already be heading for the fighting. He didn’t know what his people were up against yet, but whatever it was, he and the others had to hold long enough for the old ones and children to escape. Otherwise this could turn into another Sand Creek Massacre.

Two warriors ran by, heading for the rear, carrying a wounded man. Flashes lit up the sky, silhouetting four enemy vehicles as they approached: armored cars with mortars mounted on them. Explosions rocked the village.

Men in uniforms had overrun the sentries. Daniel was close enough now to see that the first wave of Cheyenne defenders had been overwhelmed. One glance told him there were too many enemy soldiers to hold. The most he could hope for was to slow them down.

Bullets filled the air. He ducked instinctively as one buzzed past his head.

Daniel spurred between two tipis, where a blonde-headed man in a brown uniform stood over the body of a Cheyenne woman, frantically trying to reload. With fire in his veins Daniel pulled the trigger. The gut-shot man fell to the ground writhing and pleading, but Daniel’s icy gray eyes were already seeking other targets. Two more brown uniforms darted around the tipi. Mitchell Stonehand rode one down as his tomahawk split the other’s head.

An old man staggered from the tipi, holding a frightened teenaged girl and an infant. Daniel slid his horse to a stop and leaped to the ground, handing the reins to the elder. Mitchell stopped beside him.

“Mount quickly, Grandfather. Get everyone headed for the gap.”

Cheyenne warriors were falling back. Bodies littered the ground. The armored cars were almost on top of them.

“Mitch! Pass the word! We fight at the gap!” Stonehand nodded and reined his horse away.

Fires lit the night--tipis burning, explosions blasting. Dust filled the air. All was confusion and chaos, moving bodies and horses, screaming men and women.

An enemy horseman charged at Daniel, firing. Daniel shot the man off his horse and grabbed at the reins, missing as the horse bolted by. He snatched three grenades from the dead man’s vest, slipping two into his ammo pouch, then reached for the man’s M16 and bandolier.

An armored vehicle swung past and stopped. Its tailgate opened and men poured out. Daniel sailed a grenade into the opening, cutting the survivors down with the M16.

Keeping to the shadows, Daniel ran back through the camp, killing enemy soldiers as he went. They were everywhere. At least half the village had been overrun. Rounding his home lodge he crashed into two of them, falling in a tangle of arms and legs. Daniel lost his grip on the rifle, but rolled to his feet with the Beretta in his left hand and the bullwhip in his right.

His opponents, a Private and a Corporal, were recovering, weapons swinging his way. The Beretta spoke and the Private dropped. The whip slashed the face of the other man, spoiling his aim. The Beretta spoke again and the Corporal’s rifle splintered from his hands.

The enemy soldier launched himself at Daniel, slamming into him, jarring the pistol and whip loose. The two men spun and fell, rolling on the ground. Their eyes locked and for an instant the Corporal froze. He’d never seen eyes so cold and frightening. Then Daniel’s hands closed around the man’s throat and for a short time the Corporal had more important things to worry about.

*

“Who comes?” The voice floated softly from the darkness between the rocks.

“Daniel.”

“Glad you made it, my friend,” said Mitchell Stonehand as he offered Daniel a hand up. “Are they following?”

Daniel looked back at the burning camp, half a mile away, his face gleaming in the firelight. “Yes, but it’ll take them a while to get organized. Several stopped at the outskirts of the camp. They’re too busy taking prisoners and looting.”

“At least they’re taking prisoners,” Mitchell said. “It could be worse.”

“Tell that to our women.”

There was a moment of silence, then Mitchell asked, “Any idea who these guys are? I haven’t seen weapons like theirs since the Great Spirit changed the world.”

“No, but I think we’ll find out soon,” Daniel said. The sounds of pursuit were growing louder. “How many made it out?”

“About three hundred, near as I can tell,” Mitchell answered. “Only about sixty warriors, though.”

“We’ll keep half. Send the rest ahead with our people.” Daniel was thinking furiously. “Tell them to push as hard as they can. Head South, over the pass, into Colorado.”

“Toward the Utes?” Once, long ago, when the white man first came to the West, the Ute and Cheyenne tribes had been mortal enemies, fighting each other instead of the white man. Now they knew better.

“Yes. They’ll send help.”

Without another word, Mitchell turned and drifted back up the gorge. As he went, he was thinking that a small boy, such as his son, Two Scars, could reach the Utes in as little as three days, if he was mounted on a fast horse. He smiled as he considered how proud his twelve-year-old would feel to be entrusted with such an important mission.

*

All through the night and half the next day Daniel and his thirty Cheyenne warriors held the narrow, twisting ravine against six hundred determined opponents. Thirty Cheyenne Dutch boys with their fingers in the dike, but for them there was no relief, no safety, no happy-ever-after, only bullets and pain, sacrifice and death.

When the enemy finally forced their way through the defile into the more open canyon beyond, there were only twenty fighters left to stop them. For the next three days, those twenty fought a desperate, round-the-clock, rear-guard action against a mechanized, well-mounted force, using the rugged terrain to slow the enemy to a crawl, sometimes stopping him altogether. Eventually, their ambushes taught the enemy commander that it wasn’t safe to pursue at night and he began making camp. Even so, he gained on them; for the Cheyenne people, who had driven themselves past the point of exhaustion to escape, were now so far gone they had to stop for rest.

Many of the young and old died from hardship, some falling by the way even as they reached the summit of the pass. As for the warriors defending their rear, by the evening of the seventh day, only eight remained. Grim faces etched with lines of fatigue, Daniel, Mitchell Stonehand, Raymond Stormcloud and Susan Redfeather prepared to die defending the pass. None of them had ever heard of Thermopylae, but those Spartans would have understood the honor of the Cheyenne stand and the desperation behind it.

*

“Daniel!” Mitchell yelled, pointing behind them toward the top of the pass.

A haggard Daniel spun to face the new threat--and saw a long line of warriors passing through his people on their way down: Utes!

“Ho, Mee-no-wah-yuh,” Daniel greeted the indian at the head of the line. “It is good to see my friend again.” They clasped hands, Daniel tall and lean, with a single eagle feather in his long, black hair, Minowayuh short and squat, wearing a beat up Stetson.

“And even better to see the warriors and food I bring with me,” Minowayuh replied.

Daniel shrugged. “Mah-hay-oh Above told me I could count on you,” he said.

“Ah, Daniel. You are so tired it takes The Great Spirit to tell you a Ute loves to fight? How far behind are they?”

“Maybe two hours, but they’ll camp down there in that clearing tonight,” Daniel said, pointing to a small meadow. He glanced at the sun. Slightly more than two hours of light left. He had watched the enemy commander’s tactics carefully during the past seven days, learning much about the man.

“Perhaps we should pay them a visit. We wouldn’t want them to think we are bad hosts.” Minowayuh grinned widely, revealing a golden incisor that gleamed in the sunlight.

“Minowayuh, you think with my mind,” Daniel replied and for the first time in a week he smiled.

*

From behind a veil of aspen leaves, the two Indians scrutinized the enemy bivouac. The camp was laid out along the same lines as previous nights, horses picketed in the tall grass, the three remaining armored cars posted in a triangle, two of them facing up-valley toward the Indians, prisoners confined in the middle of the enemy’s tents.

They planned the raid in the failing light. Afterwards, Minowayuh left to brief his men while Daniel took a last look at the prisoner compound. His first strike had to be against the two machine gun nests covering the captives.

*

Inching his way slowly through the grass, Daniel passed between two sentries, avoided a trip wire that would trigger cans and other noise makers and flowed between tents filled with sleeping men until he reached his position near one of the machine guns. His cold stare took in the two men manning it, as they in turn watched their relief approach. Changing of the guard. Daniel’s left hand closed gently around the medicine pouch that hung from around his neck and he breathed a silent prayer.

Across the compound, Raymond Stormcloud slid into place next to the other gun and opened a small pouch, taking out a grenade and laying it on the ground beside him. He and Daniel wanted to do this quietly, but the grenade made a good backup. Next, he readied a pair of throwing knives and a tomahawk.

Daniel placed his own grenade beside him, cocked his crossbow and unsheathed his fighting knife. He was ready.

The men being relieved joked for a few minutes with their replacements before heading for the comfort of their sleeping bags. Daniel waited patiently, his long, smooth muscles relaxed. Aspen leaves, stirred by a breeze, pattered like approaching rain.

A slight thud from across the compound told him Raymond had gone into action. In one smooth motion, Daniel drew back his right arm and threw his knife.

A second later, one of the machine gunners asked, “What was that?” The man turned and saw his partner falling, a knife protruding from his throat. It was the last thing he ever saw. Before he could yell, or even move, a crossbow bolt pierced his brain.