Mark Fuller awoke with a knife at his throat. A big, ugly man, burned dark and with scars crisscrossing his bare chest, squatted in front of them. He eyed Mark and Juanita, then grinned. "What have we got ourselves?" he said. "A couple of runaways?"
"I got everything, Art," someone said from behind them.
"Yeah. Okay, mates, up and at 'em. Move out. I ain't got all day."
Mark helped Juanita to her feet. One arm was asleep from holding her. As Mark stood, the ugly man expertly took the gun from Mark's belt. "Who are you?" Mark asked.
"Call me Art. Sergeant to the Boss. Come on, let's go."
There were five others, all mounted. Art led the way through the jungle. When Mark tried to say something to Juanita, Art turned. "I'm going to tell you once. Shut up. Say another word to anybody but me, and I kill you. Say anything to me that I don't want to hear, and I'll cut you. Got that?"
"Yes, sir," Mark said.
Art laughed. "Now you've got the idea."
They rode on in silence.
The Free State was mostly caves in hillsides above the sea. It held over five hundred men and women. There were other encampments of escapees out in the jungles, Art said. "But we've got the biggest. Been pretty careful—when we raid the planters, we can usually make it look like one of the other outfits did it. Governor don't have much army anyway. They won't follow us here."
Mark started to say something about the mercenaries that the governor was hiring. Then he thought better of it.
The boss was a heavy man with long, colorless hair growing to below his shoulders. He had a handlebar mustache and staring blue eyes. He sat in the mouth of a cave on a big carved chair as if it were a throne, and he held a rifle across his knees. A big black man stood behind the chair, watching everyone, saying nothing.
"Escapees, eh?"
"Yes," Mark said.
"Yes, boss. Don't forget that."
"Yes, boss."
"What can you do? Can you fight?"
When Mark didn't answer, the Boss pointed to a smaller man in the crowd that had gathered around. "Take him, Choam."
The small man moved toward Mark. His foot lashed upward and hit Mark in the ribs. Then he moved closer. Mark tried to hit him, but the man dodged away and slapped Mark across the face. "Enough," the boss said. "You can't fight. What can you do?"
"I—"
"Yeah." He looked backward over his shoulder to the black man. "You want him, George?"
"No."
"Right. Art, you found him. He's yours. I'll take the girl."
"But you can't!" Mark shouted.
"No!" Juanita said.
The other men looked at the boss. They saw he was laughing. They all laughed. Art and the two others took Mark's arms and began to drag him away. Two more led Juanita into the cave behind the boss.
"But this isn't right!" Mark shouted.
There was more laughter. The boss stood. "Maybe I'll give her back when I'm through. Unless Art wants her. Art?"
"I got a woman."
"Yeah." The boss turned toward the cave. Then he turned back to Mark and the men holding him. "Leave the kid here, Art. I'd like to talk to him. Get the girl cleaned up," he shouted behind him. "The rest of you get out of here."
The others left, all but the black man who stood behind the boss's throne. The black man went a few meters away and sat under a rock ledge. It looked cool in there. He took out a pipe and began stuffing it.
"Come here, kid. What's your name?"
"Fuller," Mark said. "Mark Fuller."
"Come over here. Sit down." The boss indicated a flat rock bench just inside the cave mouth. The cave seemed to go in a long way; he could hear women talking. "Sit, I said. Tell me how you got here." The boss's tone was conversational, almost friendly.
"I was in a student riot." Mark strained to hear, but there were no more sounds from inside the cave.
"Student, eh. Relax, Fuller. Nobody's hurting your girlfriend. Your concern is touching. Don't see much of that out here. Tell me about your riot. Where was it?"
The boss was a good listener. When Mark fell silent, the man would ask questions—probing questions, as if he were interested in Mark's story. Sometimes he smiled.
Outside were work parties: wood details; a group incomprehensibly digging a ditch in the flinty ground out in front of the caves; women carrying water. None of them seemed interested in the boss's conversation. Instead, they seemed almost afraid to look into the cave—all but the black man, who sat in his cool niche and never seemed to look away.
Bit by bit Mark told of his arrest and sentence, and of Ewigfeuer's plantation. The boss nodded. "So you came looking for the Free States. And what did you expect to find?"
"Free men! Freedom, not—"
"Not despotism." There was something like kindness in the words. The boss chuckled. "You know, Fuller, it's remarkable how much your story is like mine. Except that I've always known how to fight. And how to make friends. Good friends." He tilted his head toward the black man. "George, here, for instance. Between us there's nothing we can't handle. You poor fool, what the hell did you think you'd do out here? What good are you? You can't fight, you whine about what's right and fair, and you don't know how to take care of yourself, and you come off into the bush to find us. You knew who we were."
"But—"
"And now you're all broken up about your woman. I'm not going to take anything she hasn't got plenty of. It doesn't get used up." He stood and shouted to one of the men in the yard. "Send Art over."
"So you're going to rape Juanita." Mark looked around for a weapon, for anything. There was a rifle near the boss's chair. His eyes flickered toward it.
The boss laughed. "Try it. But you won't. Aw, hell, Fuller, you'll be all right. Maybe you'll even learn something. Now I've got a date."
"But—" If there was something I could say, Mark thought. "Why are you doing this?"
"Why not? Because I'll lose your valuable loyalty? Get something straight, Fuller. This is it. There's no place left to go. Live here and learn our ways, or go jump over the cliff there. Or take off into the green and see how far you get. You think you're pretty sharp. Maybe you are. We'll see. Maybe you'll learn to be some use to us. Maybe. Art, take the kid into your squad and see if he can fit in."
"Right, boss. Come on." Art took Mark's arm. "Look, if you're going try something, do it and get it over with. I don't want to watch you all the time."
Mark turned and followed the other man. Helpless. Damn fool, and helpless. He laughed.
"Yeah?" Art said. "What's funny?"
"The Free State. Freedom. Free men—"
"We're free," Art said. "More'n the losers in Whiskeytown. Maybe one day you will be. When we think we can trust you." He pointed to the cliff edge. The sea inlet was beyond it. "Anybody we can't trust goes over that. The fall don't always kill 'em, but I never saw anybody make it to shore."
Art found him a place in his cave. There were six other men and four women there. The others looked at Mark for a moment, then went back to whatever they had been doing. Mark sat staring at the cave floor and thought he heard, off toward the Boss's cave, a man laughing and a girl crying. For the first time since he was twelve, Mark tried to pray.
Pray for what? he asked himself. He didn't know. I hate them. All of them.
Just when, Mark Fuller, are you going to get some control over your life? But that doesn't just happen. I have to do it for myself. Somehow.
A week went past. It was a meaningless existence. He cooked for the squad, gathered wood and washed dishes, and listened to the sounds of the other men and their women at night. They never left him alone.
The crying from the boss's cave stopped, but he didn't see Juanita. When he gathered wood, there were sometimes women from the boss's area, and he overheard them talking about what a relief it was that Chambliss—that seemed to be the boss's name—had a new playmate. They did not seem at all jealous of the new arrival.
Play along with them, Mark thought. Play along until—until what? What can I do? Escape? Get back to the plantation? How? And what happens then? But I won't join them, I won't become a part of this! I won't!
After a week they took Mark on hunting parties. He was unarmed—his job was to carry the game. They had to walk several kilometers away from the caves. Chambliss didn't permit hunting near the encampment.
Mark was paired with Art. The older man was neither friendly nor unfriendly; he treated Mark as a useful tool, someone to carry and do work.
"Is this all there is?" Mark asked. "Hunting, sitting around the camp, eating and—"
"—a little screwing," Art said. "What the hell do you want us to do? Set up farms so the governor'll know where we are? We're doin' all right. Nobody tells us what to do."
"Except the boss."
"Yeah. Except the boss. But nobody hassles us. We can live for ourselves. Cheer up, kid, you'll feel better when you get your woman back. He'll get tired of her one of these days. Or maybe we'll get some more when we go raiding. Only thing is, you have to fight for a woman. You better do it better'n you did the other day."
"Doesn't she—don't the women have anything to say about who they pair up with?" Mark asked.
"Why should they?"
On the tenth day there was an alarm. Someone thought he heard a helicopter. The boss ordered night guards.
Mark was paired with a man named Cal. They sat among the rocks at the edge of the clearing. Cal had a rifle and a knife, but Mark was unarmed. The jungle was black dark, without even stars above.
Finally the smaller man took tobacco and paper from his pocket. "Smoke?"
"Thanks, I'd like one."
"Sure." He rolled two cigarettes. "Maybe you'll do, huh? Had my doubts about you when you first come. You know, it's a wonder the boss didn't have you tossed over the side, the way you yelled at him like that. No woman's worth that, you know."
"Yeah."
"She mean much to you?" Cal asked.
"Some," Mark swallowed hard. His mouth tasted bitter. "'Course, they get the idea they own you, there's not much you can do."
Cal laughed. "Yeah. Had an old lady like that in Baltimore. Stabbed me one night for messing around with her sister. Where you from, kid?"
"Santa Maria. Part of San-San."
"I been there once. North San-San, not the part where you come from. Here." He handed Mark the cigarette and struck a match to light both.
They smoked in silence. It wasn't all tobacco, Mark found; there was a good shot of borloi in the cigarette. Mark avoided inhaling but spoke as if holding his breath. Cal sucked and packed.
"Good weed," Cal said. "You should have brought some when you ran off."
"Had to get out fast."
"Yeah." They listened to the sounds of the jungle. "Hell of a life," Cal said. "Wish I could get back to Earth. Some Welfare Island, anyplace where it's not so damned hot. I'd like to live in Alaska. You ever been there?"
"No. Isn't there—don't you have any plans? Some way to make things better?"
"Well, the boss talks about it, but nothing happens," Cal said. "Every now and then we go raid a place, get some new women. We got a still in not long ago, that's something."
Mark shuddered. "Cal?"
"Yah?"
"Got another cigarette?"
"You'll owe me for it."
"Sure."
"Okay." Cal took out paper and tobacco and rolled two more smokes. He handed one to Mark. "Been thinking. There ought to be something better'n this, but I sure don't see what it'll be." As Cal struck his match, Mark shut his eyes so he wouldn't be blinded. Then he lifted the rock he'd found in the darkness and brought it down hard onto Cal's head. The man slumped, but Mark hit him again. He felt something wet and sticky warming his fingers and shuddered.
Then he was sick, but he had to work fast. He took Cal's rifle and knife and his matches. There wasn't anything else useful. Mark moved from the rocks onto the narrow strip of flinty ground. No one challenged him. He ran into the jungle with no idea of where to go.
He tried to think. Hiding out until morning wouldn't help. They'd find Cal and come looking. And Juanita was back there. Mark ran through the squishy mud. Tears came and he fought them back, but then he was sobbing. Where am I going? Where? And why bother?
He ran on until he felt something moving beside him. He drew in a breath to cry out, but a hand clamped over his mouth. Another grasped his wrist. He felt a knifepoint at his throat. "One sound and you're dead," a voice whispered. "Got that?"
Mark nodded.
"Right. Just keep remembering that. Okay, Ardway, let's go."
"Roger," a voice answered.
He was half-carried through the jungle from the camp. There were several men. He did not know how many. They moved silently. "Ready to walk?" someone asked.
"Yes," Mark whispered. "Who are—"
"Shut up. One more sound and we cut your kidneys out. You'll take a week dying. Now follow the man ahead of you."
Mark made more noise than all the others combined, although he tried to walk silently. They went a long way through knee-deep water and thick mud, then over harder ground. He thought they were going slightly uphill. Then he no longer felt the loom of the trees. They were in a clearing.
The night was pitch black. How do they see? Mark wondered. And who are they? He thought he could make out a darker shape ahead of him. It was more a feeling than anything else, but then he touched something soft. "Through that," one of his captors said.
It was a curtain. Another was brought down behind him as he went through, and still another was lifted ahead of him. Light blinded him. He stood blinking.
He was inside a tent. Half a dozen uniformed men stood around a map table. At the end of the tent opposite Mark was a tall, slender man. Mark could not guess how old he was, but there were thin streaks of gray in his hair. His jungle camouflage uniform was neatly pressed. He looked at Mark without expression. "Well, Sergeant Major?"
"Strange, Colonel. This man was sitting guard with another guy. Neither one of them knew what he was doing. We watched them a couple of hours. Then this one beats the other one's brains out with a rock and runs right into the jungle."
Mercenaries, Mark thought. They've come to—"I need help," Mark said. "They've got my—my wife in there."
"Your name?" the colonel asked.
"Mark Fuller."
The colonel looked to his right. Another officer had a small desk console. He punched Mark's name into it, and words flashed across the screen. The Colonel read for a moment. "Escaped convict. Juanita Corlee escaped with you. That is your wife?"
"Yes."
"And you had a falling-out with the Free Staters."
"No. It wasn't that way at all." Mark blurted out his story.
The colonel looked back to the readout screen. "And you are surprised." He nodded to himself. "I knew the schools on Earth were of little use. It says here that you are an intelligent man, Fuller. So far you haven't shown many signs of it."
"No. Lord God, no. Who—who are you? Please."
"I am Colonel John Christian Falkenberg. This regiment has been retained by the Tanith governor to suppress these so-called Free States. You were captured by Sergeant Major Calvin, and these are my officers. Now, Fuller, what can you tell me about the camp layout? What weapons have they?"
"I don't know much," Mark said. "Sir." Now why did I say that?
"There are other women captives in that camp," Falkenberg said.
"Here," one of the other officers said. "Show us what you do know, Fuller. How good is this satellite photo map?"
"Christ, Rottermill," a third officer said. "Let the lad be for a moment."
"Major Savage, intelligence is my job."
"So is human compassion. Ian, do you think you can find this boy a drink?" Major Savage beckoned to Falkenberg and led him to the far corner of the tent. Another officer brought a nylon musette bag from under the table and took out a bottle. He handed the brandy to Mark.
Falkenberg listened to Savage. Then he nodded. "We can only try. Fuller, did you see any signs of power supplies in that camp?"
"No, sir. There was no electricity at all. Only flashlights."
"Any special armament?"
"Colonel, I only saw rifles and pistols, but I heard talk of machine guns. I don't know how many."
"I see. Still, it is unlikely that they have laser weapons. Rottermill, have any target seekers turned up missing from armories? What are the chances that they have air defense missiles?"
"Slim, Colonel. Practically none. None stolen I know of."
"Check that out, please. Jeremy, you may be right," Falkenberg said. "I believe we can use the helicopters as fighting vehicles."
There was a moment of silence; then the officer who'd given Mark the brandy said, "Colonel, that's damned risky. There's precious little armor on those things."
"Machines not much better than ours were major fighting vehicles less than a hundred years ago, Captain Frazer." Falkenberg studied the map. "You see, Fuller, we could have wiped out this lot any time. The hostages are our real problem. Because of them we have kept Aviation Company back and brought in our troops on foot. We've not been able to carry heavy equipment or even much personal body armor across these swamps."
No, I don't expect you would, Mark thought. He tried to imagine a large group traveling silently through the swamps. It seemed impossible. What had they done when animals attacked? Certainly no one in the Free State had heard any gunfire. Why would an armed man let himself be killed when he could shoot?
"I expect they will threaten their prisoners when they know we are here," Falkenberg said. "Of course we will negotiate as long as possible. How long do you think it will take for them to act when they know that we will not actually make any concessions?"
"I don't know," Mark said. It was something he could not have imagined two years before: men who'd kill and torture, sometimes for no reason at all. No. Not men. Beasts.
"Well, you've precipitated the action," Falkenberg said. "They'll find your dead companion within hours. Captain Frazer."
"Sir."
"You have been studying this map. If you held this encampment, what defenses would you set up?"
"I'd dig in around this open area and hope someone was fool enough to come at us through it, Colonel."
"Yes. Sergeant Major."
"Sir!"
"Show me where they have placed their sentries." Falkenberg watched as Calvin sketched in outposts. Then he nodded. "It seems this Chambliss has some rudimentary military sense. Rings of sentries. In-depth defense. Can you infiltrate that, Sergeant Major?"
"Not likely, sir."
"Yes." Falkenberg stood for a moment. Then he turned to Captain Frazer. "Ian, you will take your scouts and half the infantry. Make preparations for an attack on the open area. We will code that Green A. This is not precisely a feint, Ian. It would be a good thing if you could punch through. However, I do not expect you to succeed, so conserve your men."
Frazer straightened to attention. "Sir."
"We won't abandon you, Ian. When the enemy is well committed there, we'll use the helicopters to take you out. Then we will move on both their flanks and roll them up." Falkenberg pointed to the map again. "This depression seems secure enough as a landing area. Code that Green A-one."
Major Jeremy Savage held a match over the bowl of his pipe and inhaled carefully. When he was satisfied with the light, he said, "Close timing needed, John Christian. Ian's in a spot of trouble if we lose the choppers."
"Have a better way, Jerry?" Falkenberg asked.
"No."
"Right. Fuller, can you navigate a helicopter?"
"Yes, sir. I can even fly one."
Falkenberg nodded again. "Yes. You are a taxpayer's son, aren't you? Fuller, you will go with Number 3 chopper. Captain Owensford."
"Sir."
"I want you to lead the rescue of the hostages. Sergeant Major, I want a squad of headquarters assault guards, full body armor, in Number 3. Fuller will guide the pilot as close as possible to the cave where the women are held. Captain Owensford will follow in Number 2 with another assault squad. Every effort will be made to secure the hostages alive."
"Yes, sir," Owensford said.
"Fuller, is this understood?"
"Yes, sir."
"Very good. You won't have time to go in with them. When the troops are off, those choppers must move out fast. We'll need them to rescue Ian's lot."
"Colonel?" Mark said.
"Yes?"
"Not all women are hostages. Some of them will fight, I think. I don't know how many. And not all the men are—not everybody wants to be in there. Some would run off if they could."
"And what do you expect me to do about it?"
"I don't know, sir."
"Neither do I, but Captain Owensford will be aware of the situation. Sergeant Major, we will move this command post in one hour. Until then, Fuller, I'll ask you to show Captain Rottermill everything you know about that camp."
It isn't going to work, Mark thought. I prayed for her to die. Only I don't know if she wants to die. And now she will. He took another pull from the bottle and felt it taken from his hand.
"Later," Rottermill said. "For now, tell me what you know about this lot."