“We do what I decide,” Rainbow countered, “when I decide it.”
“What are you saying?” Scar Face objected. “You going to take this one along too? We don’t need him! We don’t even need the other one! If this thing breaks down, it breaks down.”
Rainbow was weighing his words.
“Is Geronimo really with you?” Blade asked.
Scar Face snickered. “You bet your white ass!” He threw open the door and brutally hauled Geronimo from the transport.
“Lone Cougar! Don’t!” Star yelled, trying to pull Geronimo back inside.
Lone Cougar shoved Geronimo to the cracked pavement, laughing.
Another Flathead joined them, hefting Geronimo’s FNC.
Blade took a step toward his friend.
Lone Cougar swung the shotgun up, aiming at Blade’s chest. “Make a move, white ass! I’ll blow you away!”
Blade stared at Rainbow. “He must be related to you. Breeding shows.”
Rainbow’s mouth twitched. “Think you’re funny, Warrior? I’ve got news for you. You’ve just sealed your fate, yours and poor Geronimo’s. Help him up!”
Blade assisted Geronimo in rising. Blood was seeping from a bandage on his left shoulder. “Are you going to make it?” Blade asked.
Geronimo, clutching his wounded shoulder, grinned weakly and nodded. “Just a minor inconvenience. No worse than listening to one of Hickok’s jokes.”
“Move!” Rainbow barked, waving the Dan Wesson, herding them past the front of the transport.
Star’s tear-streaked face appeared at the door. “Don’t do it! Please!”
“Be quiet, honey,” Rainbow chided her daughter. “This must be done.
Watch and learn. You’ve got to be strong if you’re going to be the wife of a chief someday.”
“But they’re our friends!” Star wailed.
“No white man can be our friend,” Rainbow stated.
“Geronimo isn’t white!”
“No, but he’s one of the Family, one of them. He may be red on the outside, but inside he’s as white as Blade. Trust me. One day you’ll understand all of this.”
Blade and Geronimo were herded fifteen yards in front of the transport and stopped in the middle of the highway.
“That’s far enough!” Rainbow snapped. “Right out in the open, with no place to hide!”
The four Flatheads formed a line, Rainbow at the eastern tip, followed by Lone Cougar, Tall Oak, and Running Hare.
“A firing squad,” Geronimo stated the obvious. “How original.”
“You had your chance,” Rainbow said. “I gave you an opportunity to join us, remember?”
“Join you!” Geronimo exploded, venting his anger in an unusual emotional display. “Why should I join a pack of murdering vultures? You constantly criticize the whites and harp on the atrocities they committed against the red race. Well, Sister, you’re no better than they are. No! You’re worse! Because you allowed the Family to take you in and heal you, you embraced our hospitality, and all the time you hated us, despised us with every fiber of your being. You’re…” he paused, coughing.
“Don’t bother,” Blade soothed him. “It’s not worth it.” He gauged the distance to the nearest Flathead, Rainbow. Maybe, if he moved fast enough, he could catch her off guard and grab the Dan Wesson.
“This is a waste of our time,” Lone Cougar declared. “Let’s finish them and get it over with.”
Rainbow, her features a grim mask, nodded. “On the count of three.”
“I wish you had stayed in hiding,” Geronimo mentioned, glancing affectionately at Blade.
The Flatheads aimed their weapons at the two Warriors.
“I never thought it would end like this,” Blade mused aloud.
Rainbow, smiling wickedly, centered the Dan Wesson on Geronimo’s forehead. “One,” she announced in a strident tone.
“I wish Hickok was here,” Geronimo casually commented.
Blade glanced at Geronimo, his eyebrows knitting. “What?”
“Two,” Rainbow continued her countdown.
“We do almost everything else together,” Geronimo explained. “Why should he miss out on this?”
Blade, despite their predicament, threw back his head and laughed uproariously.
Rainbow, about to give the final number, hesitated, bewildered by their lighthearted attitude. “What the hell can you find so funny at a time like this?” she angrily demanded.
Geronimo winked at Blade and soberly faced Rainbow. “Your face.”
Blade’s mirth was seemingly uncontrollable. He actually stumbled several steps in Rainbow’s direction. Doubled over, he kept laughing, but inwardly his mind was cool and calculating as he tensed his leg muscles for a leap at Rainbow.
“Let’s plug these morons!” Lone Cougar urged.
Rainbow sighted again and drew back the hammer on the Dan Wesson.
At that moment, its tires squealing as it rounded the first curve to the south at high speed, a jeep roared into view.
“What the…” Lone Cougar blurted.
“Citadel troops!” Tall Oak shouted in alarm.
Blade, spinning, caught sight of the jeep and its occupants as he looped his steely left arm under Geronimo’s armpits and bodily hoisted him from the roadway.
It was Angier and the three other soldiers!
One of the soldiers was driving, another was beside him, and the third sat in the back behind the driver, his hands holding an ammunition belt, about to feed the cartridges into a swivel-mounted machine gun. Angier was standing, gripping the .45-caliber machine gun, steadying the lengthy barrel as the jeep closed on its quarry, only thirty yards distant.
Blade ran, carrying Geronimo, heading for the forest at the western border of Highway 35.
The Flatheads began to scatter, making for the SEAL.
They weren’t fast enough.
Angier opened up with the heavy machine gun, the slugs tearing the pavement as they tore a path down the middle of the roadway, then swerved to the left, catching Tall Oak and Running Hare.
Tall Oak was struck first, the impact of the bullets stitching a pattern across his chest, miniature geysers of crimson spurting outward. He staggered and fell on his face.
Running Hare was caught in midturn, his right side bearing the brunt of the slugs. He screamed once, falling in a disjointed heap onto the highway.
Angier swung the gun to the right, going after the remaining two Flatheads.
Blade reached the woods and hastily pulled Geronimo in after him. He glanced over his shoulder.
Lone Cougar was racing for the transport when the machine gun zeroed in. His back erupted in a spray of blood and he howled like a banshee as he dropped to his knees, then toppled over.
Rainbow almost made it.
She was inches from the open driver’s door when a stray slug sped into the top of her head and exited through her forehead. Her brains and blood smeared the door as she sank to the road.
“Mommy!” Star shrieked in horror, too terrified to leave the safety of the SEAL.
“Stay hidden,” Blade ordered, lowering Geronimo to the ground.
“I can help,” Geronimo stubbornly objected, beginning to push himself erect.
“Stay put! You’re in no condition for a fight and I can do it alone. I hope.”
Blade ran, weaving between the trees, bearing north. If he could come in behind the transport, interpose the vehicle as a shield, preventing the soldiers from spotting him, he could get inside the SEAL before them. If Rainbow had his Dan Wesson, then his Bowies and the A-1 must still be in the transport. None of the Flatheads had had them when they were shot.
Move! his brain clamored.
Watch out for rocks and roots. Mustn’t trip now!
He was ten yards past the SEAL and he cut toward the highway. One final tree loomed in front of him. He darted behind the trunk and peered to his right.
The jeep was slowly, cautiously, rolling to a stop near the dead Indians.