Early Byrd

words came out. "My nephews make me proud," he finally managed to say in his native tongue

  "He's not always lucid," Li warned us. "Once he attacked me. I fear I was forced to injure him further."

  At first I thought Li was joking; Rapput outweighed him by nearly a hundred pounds of claws, sinew, and muscle. Then I remembered the silver medal and how apparently he also knew something about the martial arts. So maybe, despite his three doctorate degrees, the man might be a lot more dangerous than he looked. I fumbled with his shackles and this time got lucky with the correct key the first time.

  Li stood and dusted himself off. "I'm proud of you as well. Both of you."

  Our most recent victim was armed with a nasty-looking pistol-thingie with a huge clip. Li snatched it up and checked the load as quickly and effortlessly as if he practiced with it every Tuesday and Thursday at the University of Chicago's faculty firing range. Then he looked at Tim's shotgun and grinned, making no effort to take it away from him. That made Tim smile even wider.

  "It was Yukon's," I explained. "We got him alone with us outside, and, well . . ."

  Li nodded, his face grim. "Right. It was necessary. Your parents would most definitely approve. So will everyone else that matters." Then he looked up the tunnel toward the main complex. "How many others?"

  "Five that we know of." I counted them off on my fingers. "Sam. Linda. Two at the front door—one of them has a big red beard. And one more that was guarding the door when we got here, but we don't know where he is right now."

  Li nodded and hefted the pistol in his hand. It looked like a toy to me, but our teacher seemed plenty happy with it. He followed my glance and smiled. "We'll get you a weapon of your own as soon as possible, Robert. Not only have you earned it, but I could use the help."

  I smiled back, feeling a lot better. Dad claimed armed men were citizens, while unarmed ones were subjects.

  "Now," he said, "our main problem is how to get out of here, Rapput and all." He frowned.

  "I think . . ." I said slowly. "I mean . . ."

  "Yeah," Tim agreed, picking up on my meaning.

  "Please," Li asked. "What are you saying to each other?"

  "That there's only one practical way to do it," I answered. "Even if we don't want to. And that's—"

  "—to kill them all without warning," Tim finished for me, his eyes cold. "Just like we already did the others. There's no other way. And every second we spend here talking about it is going to work against us."

  17

  Despite everything, Li made us wait back in the tunnel with Rapput while he "did what needed doing," in his own words. "If I don't make it, they'll be back here in seconds to see what went wrong. Should that happen, play innocent and then use the shotgun. Heck, I don't need to explain it—you're already doing just fine."

  "Aw!" Tim complained.

  I frowned. "We can help—it was us who rescued you, after all."

  Li shook his head. "This is different. And just as soon as I can figure it all out myself, I'll explain exactly why and how." Then he patted down the guard for more ammunition.

  "Listen to him," Rapput said, which surprised us because his eyes were closed and we'd sorta thought he was out of it again. "You've won your share and more of honor already today, boys. It's no shame for untrained youths to stand aside for a skilled professional." He looked at Li. "I've known who you were from the beginning, Colonel. It rather vexed me that your kind would stoop to such blatant dishonesty in honorable family matters. But now I'm glad you're here. This is properly a fight between you humans, and I have every confidence the proper side shall prevail."

  Li nodded, and then of all things bowed slightly before dancing up the hallway like an acrobat, making hardly a sound despite the nasty footing.

  "He and I have had an opportunity to talk," Rapput explained. "And as is often the case between beings of high honor, we managed to say much to each other with few words. Fear not—I have no doubts whatsoever regarding his ability." He grinned, albeit weakly. "Your fellow humans must think we're stupid. Li was once your father's commanding officer in an elite international unit, yet somehow they thought they could conceal this from us merely by hastily altering a few data files." He shook his head. "Ah well. The mutual deception was growing tiresome in any event. For both of us, I believe."

  By now I was unlocking Rapput's handcuffs, and he moaned as his broken arm was freed to rotate back into a more natural position. Just then Li's little gun fired a short burst—brrrp! Then there came a second. Boom! a shotgun went . . .

  . . . then there was only silence.

  "Hurry, Robertherman," Rapput urged me as I worked at freeing his feet—somehow I'd lost track of which keys I'd already ruled out. "We'll need to move as quickly as possible."

  I didn't like that the final round in the fight had been fired by a shotgun—Yukon and Sam were the only ones who carried them. But sure enough, it was Li who popped his head through the curtains. "Rapput? Can you walk, sir?"

  "Hah!" he declared, staggering to his feet. "I've been injured far more severely than this and then hiked forty-three . . ." His eyes rolled up. Then he collapsed back to the cage-floor, luckily landing on his good arm.

  Dad would've cursed, but Li was all business. "Boys," he ordered, "I need for you to remain as strong as you have been. As you said, one of the guards is missing and we have no idea where he might be or when he'll show up. He's a complete wild card, and we can't afford wild cards just now. So we're going to leave this place in five minutes or less. In that time I want you to round up all the water containers, food, matches, blankets, and other survival stuff you can and put it on the kitchen table." He looked away. "I should warn you that there are two bodies lying on the floor in there. One of them is the woman."

  We nodded as one. I felt even worse for Linda, somehow, than all the rest combined.

  "Good boys!" he added with a smile. "While you're working at that, I'm going to be making a stretcher for Rapput."

  "How are we . . ." Tim asked.

  "He's so heavy," I clarified. "So how can we move him?"

  "I'll take care of that," Li replied. "Now, you gather everything up as fast as you can. Except . . ." He'd been holding one hand behind his back—now he revealed Sam's double-barreled shotgun. It was even shorter than Yukon's, and the left barrel was still warm. "This is for you, Robert," he said as he broke the weapon open. The empty shell went flying, the unfired one merely lifting slightly. Then he placed it in my waiting hands. "You've earned it. Make sure to pick up all the ammo you can!"

  Our scrounging work was almost as easily said as done. Wordlessly Tim and I separated, with me heading for our bedroom and him for the kitchen. I snatched the blankets and comforters from our beds, then grabbed the pillowcases as well. They'd be perfect carrying-bags for the other loot. There not being much else of use in there, I hauled everything into the kitchen in one armload and dropped it on the table.

  It wasn't until then that I really saw what a slaughterhouse the room had been transformed into. The two front-room guards lay piled atop each other at the far kitchen entrance. It looked for all the world like they'd leapt to their feet together and run side-by-side into the narrow doorway, leaving neither of them room to swing their military-style rifles before a single burst had taken both out. Sam sat in the corner with a silly look on his face, one not improved by the single bullet-hole centered near-perfectly in his forehead. He was hit in several other places too, but the forehead wound was the one that really made an impression. And Linda . . . Poor Linda . . .

  For the first time that day, tears strung my eyes. She lay sprawled on the kitchen floor I'd seen her so happily mopping just a few moments before, wearing a frilly apron stained red from the dozen gaping buckshot wounds in her torso. She'd been a hotel manager; had she spent her workdays dreaming of a cabin in the country? And on the counter . . . On the counter . . .

  "What?" Timothy demanded, looking cross. "Don't go soft on us now, Robert. Okay?"


  I shook my head and pointed, tears flowing harder. On the counter was a baking sheet with a half-dozen chocolate-chip cookies lying unbaked on it, the oversized chips formed into smiling faces. I didn't need to guess who they were meant for.

  "Jeez," Tim said, staggering like he'd been punched in the gut.

  "She risked everything to save us," I whispered. "From her point of view, I mean. That was all. She wanted to save everyone everywhere from the aliens that want to make us fight their wars for them. And so did . . . So did . . ." I looked at Sam, who'd smiled so happily at us that very morning. "I just don't know . . ."

  Then Li's voice rose from behind us, his tone soft and regretful. "She was unarmed, so far as I could see. I shot Sam first, then the guards together when they made their move. I meant to take her alive. But . . ." He shook his head. "It must've been a muscle spasm as Sam died, or something." Then he stood straight. "Boys, I know . . ."

  "It hurts," I complained. "Did we . . . I mean, what else could we have done?"

  "Nothing," Li answered. "That's one of the problems with life that it's better to learn about when you're older. Even bad people almost always have at least some good in them. Worse still, sometimes we're forced to do terrible things to good people who are only doing what they in turn believe is right and decent. If there's anything in this universe more awful than that, I can't imagine what it is." He hung his