The bullet hit her with a spectacular force, all the more dramatic for being unseen. One second she was sprinting from the crawler, the next she was sprawling across the track. She hit the ground hard and lay very still, a small red shape on the sandy ground, bullets chipping spurts of dust all around her.
Bennett screamed and ran from the cover of the rock, ignoring shouts from Mackendrick and Miriam James exhorting him to get back. He reached Ten Lee and scooped her up, aware only of the pumping of his heart, the rattle of bullets against the nearby vehicle. He hugged her to him like a child and staggered back to the rock, James dragging him to safety amid the din of the fire-fight.
He scanned Ten Lee in panic, trying to assess the extent of her injuries and fearing the worst. Her torso was fine—no blood!—and her head… no blood there either. Then he saw the stain spreading through the fabric of her flight-suit. She had been hit in the upper leg. He felt a wave of relief, followed by panic at the amount of blood she was losing. The material of the legging had been ripped by the bullet. He tore it the rest of the way and used it as a tourniquet to staunch the flow of blood. It seemed, though he was no expert, to be only a flesh wound. Ten Lee was staring up at him, childish disbelief in her big eyes. Bennett stroked her cheek. “You’ll be fine, Ten. Stay calm. Chant a mantra or something.”
He looked up, praying for an end to this hell.
The guards from the third truck were being picked off by the terrorists high above. Their bodies littered the track, blood soaking into the dust. Still the survivors exchanged fire, bobbing up from behind the truck to loose off more laser fire.
Miriam James jumped up to fire at the third truck, and then slid down behind the rock again. Her eyes found Mackendrick. She said something to him, and at first Bennett failed to register the words. They seemed divorced from the fact of the battle raging around them.
“So Quineau got through?” she said.
Bennett heard the words, but had difficulty understanding their significance. Only slowly did he begin to comprehend what James was talking about.
“We met,” Mackendrick replied, glancing at Bennett. “He told me.”
James grabbed Mackendrick’s arm. The old man winced at the force of the gesture. “But did he give you the softscreen? Have you got it with you?” There was something close to desperation in her voice.
“He gave me the softscreen. But’—and here Mackendrick looked up at Bennett again, as if apologising for his deception—‘it was stolen from me.”
“Jesus! You haven’t got it? Christ!” She hit the rock with the palm of her hand, tears streaming down her face.
Bennett looked at Mackendrick. “Mack…” He shook his head. “What’s going on? Why didn’t you tell us?”
“Josh, I couldn’t. Please believe me. I’ll tell you later, explain everything, okay?”
Bennett closed his eyes. He wanted to believe Mackendrick, but at the same time could not quell the sour feeling of betrayal rising in his throat like bile.
17
The muffled crump of an explosion shattered Bennett’s thoughts. He looked back along the road. The third crawler was a twisted mass of metal and rubber engulfed in roaring flames. He saw militia-men running, human torches cavorting in pain, and looked away.
Miriam James kicked him. “Get up! Back to the crawler. It won’t be long before they send out a patrol.”
“What about Ten? She’s injured!”
“We have medics where we’re going,” James said. “She’ll be well looked after.”
Bennett stood, lifting Ten Lee. She was no weight at all as he carried her at a run to the crawler and eased her on to the flat-bed. He climbed up after her, holding her head in his lap as the crawler started up and tore off down the track, Mackendrick in front with James. Other green-uniformed guards had started the first vehicle and it accelerated ahead, away from the scene of death and conflagration.
Ten minutes later they slowed. Bennett peered ahead. The first truck was turning off the track, seemingly into the very face of the mountain itself. Their crawler followed and plunged into darkness. They were passing through a tunnel bored into the mountainside. Bennett closed his eyes and sat back in the padded seat, holding Ten’s head. Her small hand found his fingers and squeezed.
They seemed to travel through the pitch black of the mountain’s heart for long, uncomfortable hours. Bennett nodded off, but came awake often when the crawler jolted over uneven rock. He lost all sense of duration. Ten Lee’s fingers were still clutching his, and from time to time he heard her soft moans of pain.
Ahead, at last, he made out a source of faint light. They emerged from the mountain, into the pale opal glow of the setting gas giant. They trundled along another narrow track, the land falling away precipitously to the right. All around, rearing craggy rock filled Bennett with a sense of lifeless hostility. They seemed to be moving ever higher, climbing through an endless series of sweeping tracks carved laboriously from the side of sheer cliff faces. Bennett closed his eyes and considered the terrible irony of surviving the fire-fight only to die when the transporter plunged into a ravine.
They came to yet another bend in the track, but beyond this Bennett made out the purple sweep of a small vale dotted with habitat domes and A-frames. The crawler slowed, skirting a road that hugged the face of the mountain.
Beneath a great sheltering overhang Bennett saw a ragged collection of old vehicles, antique transporters and automobiles. Other vehicles were drawing up beneath the crag, armed men and women jumping down and embracing each other.
The crawler passed into the shadow of the rock, slowed and came to a halt. Wearily, Bennett lifted Ten Lee from the flat-bed and, carrying her in his arms with Mackendrick beside him, walked out of the shadow of the overhang towards a group of men and women climbing the incline of the valley to meet them.
“Mack,” he said. “What the hell’s going on? Who are all these people?”
Before Mackendrick could reply, a tall, bearded man stepped forward with outstretched arms. He embraced Mackendrick, touched Bennett on the shoulder and called for assistance for Ten Lee.
“Welcome to Sanctuary,” he said. “Hupcka. Hans Hupcka. Please, come this way.”
Bennett followed Hupcka down the sloping sward of purple grass, Ten Lee in his arms. Something in her eyes as she stared up at him, her lips pursed to fight the pain, reminded Bennett of a child’s trusting gaze.
“Where are we, Josh?” she said in a small voice.
“Wish I knew, Ten. They must be terrorists.”
But what Bennett could not work out was the nature of Mackendrick’s involvement with them.
They came to a large A-frame and Bennett climbed the steps into a spartanly furnished lounge. Mackendrick and Hupcka crossed the room and stepped out on to a veranda overlooking the slope of the plain, the two men deep in conversation. Bennett laid Ten Lee on a foam-form and within seconds a medic was in attendance, peeling away the makeshift bandage of her flight-suit legging and cleaning the wound. Bennett knelt beside her, holding her hand and smiling encouragement rather than view the bloody gash.
“You’re lucky, girl,” the medic said. “The bullet went straight through. An inch to the right and it would’ve hit a major artery. We’ll have this fixed up in no time.”
He gave her an injection in the thigh and stitched the gaping hole. Bennett had expected the medic to use a plasti-skin sealant, but they were not on Earth, now. An antiseptic needle and thread was about as good as they could expect.
Ten Lee squeezed Bennett’s hand. “I heard what Mack said back there, Joshua. Why did he lie to us?”
“I don’t know. He must have had his reasons.”