Perhaps half of the throng responded with a desultory negative.
Blade scanned the people below him. “Listen!” he snapped. “My friends and I risked our lives for you! If you want to stay in the Twin Cities, that’s fine with us! But if you don’t, I need to know now! So I’ll ask you again. Do you want the soldiers to take you into the Civilized Zone? Do you want to live under a dictator? Do you want someone else telling you what you can do and when you should do it? Do you?”
This time, the reaction was thunderous. “No! No! No!”
Blade waved for silence. “Good! Then pay attention! A lot of the Army troopers got away. They may return by themselves, or they could radio for reinforcements. Either way, we can’t stay here any longer. We could try to hold them off, but our supplies are limited. They’d eventually overrun us. There isn’t a place in the Twin Cities where we’d be safe. So here is what I propose. I say we pack ourselves into these trucks and head for our Home, for the place where Hickok, Geronimo, Joshua, and I come from. There are some small towns nearby. I guarantee you that my Family will do everything in its power to aid you in resettling. It won’t be easy. Food will be scarce on the trip there, and the winter ahead will undoubtedly be rough. But my Family will see to it you have a roof over your head, and well share our food with you and help you in killing game. In the spring, we’ll show you how to grow enough food to feed yourselves. So what will it be? Do we go?”
The night rocked with the chorus of “Go! Go! Go!”
“Good!” Blade yelled when they quieted. “Here’s what I want you to do.”
He hesitated. “First, who’s in charge of the Horns now that Reverend Paul is dead? I was told that Brother Timothy is the leader now.”
“I am,” a man in black cried out, a thin man with a thick beard. Joshua was standing next to him.
“Okay.” Blade pointed to the right. “Timothy, I want you to have all your people form over there. I’ll be with you in a moment.” He looked down and spotted Zahner at the front of the assemblage. “Zahner, have your people gather over there.” He pointed to the left.
“Will do,” Zahner said.
“Where’s Bear?” Blade demanded.
“Right here!” Bear shouted from near the stockade.
“Get the Porns together right there,” Blade ordered, indicating directly in front of the trucks. “Let’s go! Time is critical!”
“What do you want us to do?” Hickok inquired, looking up.
“After they’ve formed into their respective groups,” Blade directed, “go to each one and take five men from each. Then scour this field and collect all the arms and ammunition you find. Don’t miss a thing. Be sure and get those machine guns from the sentry towers still standing. Pile the weapons near the SEAL. We’ll divide them up equally among the three factions. Remember. We can’t afford to display any favoritism here. The slightest provocation could set them against each another.”
“Do you think these trucks can carry all of us to the Home?” Geronimo queried.
“Jarvis intended to take them all the way to Denver,” Blade reminded him. “Check. One of these trucks must have a spare supply of gasoline.”
“How long do you reckon it will take us?” Hickok asked.
Blade calculated aloud. “It’s about three hundred and seventy miles from the Twin Cities to our Home. If we push it, we can make a hundred miles a day, possibly more. So we could conceivably reach the Home within three or four days. The sooner the better. We’ll be sitting ducks on the open highway.”
“You figure the Army will try and stop us?” Hickok questioned.
“You can count on it,” Blade affirmed. “Like Jarvis said, Samuel doesn’t want us getting any stronger than we already are. I don’t know how many troops they can muster between here and the Home, but whatever they’ve got they’ll throw at us.”
“Should be a mighty interesting trip,” Hickok remarked.
“You’ve got that right,” Blade concurred.
“Aren’t you sorry now?” Hickok inquired.
“Sorry? About what?”
“Sorry that you didn’t send Yama with us and go on that spying assignment yourself, instead of having all the Warriors draw lots? Just think! Instead of going through all of this aggravation, you could be doing just what Yama is probably doing right now. You could be taking it easy, strolling through downtown Cheyenne and enjoying the sights.” The gunman sighed wistfully. “Yes, sir. Some folks get all the luck!”
Chapter Twenty
Yama ducked to the right, pulling Lynx after him. He leaned against the wall and shoved Lynx in the direction of the stairs.
“Ahhhh, Mom!” Lynx protested. “I wanna stay here and play!”
“Move!” Yama commanded, marveling at Lynx’s levity in light of the dire circumstances.
Lynx chuckled and hastened down the hall.
Yama counted to three, then swung into the junction, the Wilkinson leveled.
The two men in white were only five yards away, racing at full speed.
The Wilkinson burped, the nine-millimeter bullets, traveling at over two thousand feet per second, catching the two men in their chests before they could hope to react. Both went down as Yama leaped for cover.
The troopers advancing along the hallway began firing, their M-16’s chattering, the slugs striking the walls and ricocheting wildly.
Yama ran, hugging the right-hand wall, passing closed doors on both sides of the hallway.
Lynx was twenty yards ahead, holding the door to a stairwell wide open and gesturing for Yama to hurry.
The klaxons ceased wailing.
Yama was almost abreast of a large machine of some sort, a rectangular affair with a photograph of a drink covering the upper half and a row of glowing buttons aligned along the center, when his headlong rush was derailed by two simultaneous events. The soldiers reached the junction behind him and started shooting at the fleeing Warrior, even as a door directly in front of him opened and an elderly woman walked out.
Yama was unable to stop in time.
The woman shrieked as he plowed into her, the force of the impact spinning him around and knocking him into the drink machine.
Yama stumbled and fell to his knees, his gaze on the woman as she staggered, her mouth widening for a scream, a scream never heard because at that instant her forehead exploded outward as she was struck by the M-16 fire.
“Come on!” Lynx shouted encouragement.
Yama dropped to his elbows and knees and twisted, facing the junction.
The soldiers were just leaving the junction and bearing down on him.
Yama aimed and pulled the trigger, the Wilkinson recoiling against his shoulder, his shots finding their mark. Three of the men in uniform went down and the rest hesitated.
Lynx slid into the concealment of the stairwell.
Yama rolled, finding cover behind the drink machine as it was racked with gunfire from the M-16’s.
Had Lynx deserted him?
Yama discarded the troubling thought as he popped out from behind the machine and pumped more rounds into the troopers.
One of them fell, his face bloody, screeching in torment.
Four down, eight to go.
Yama jerked behind the drink machine again as the soldiers intensified their assault. He glanced at the stairwell. If he tried to reach it, he knew he’d be cut to ribbons before he managed to go four feet.
The sound of the bullets striking the drink machine made it seem as if it was being attacked by a giant woodpecker.
Yama prepared to give them another blast.
“Spread out!” one of the soldiers yelled. “We’ve got him pinned down!”
That they did.
Yama attempted to lean out and fire, but a withering spray from the M-16’s drove him back.