Pony Soldiers

by James Axler

  Rourke was already waiting for him, sitting on a small three-legged stool in one corner of the fighting area, with a brace of his cronies to second him. Apart from the stool, the other corner was empty.

  "Want me to back you, mister?" the sergeant asked, pushing a way through the silent crowd,

  "Yeah. Better than nothing, I guess."

  There was a momentary delay while McLaglen looked for the keys to release Ryan from the chains. Once he was free he rubbed at his arms, bending and straightening the knees, feeling circulation flowing again.

  Rourke had stripped to the waist, wearing only his dark blue breeches tucked into the high leather boots. Checking him over carefully, Ryan noticed that the sec man still kept the stubby cavalry spurs on the heels of the boots.

  "Big, ain't he?" McLaglen said.

  "Fat's the word," Ryan replied. "Carrying more spare weight around his gut than a farrowing hog."

  "Mean son of a bitch, though. Use his weight on you. Try and pin you. Mebbe use the spurs. That's the way he fights. Killed a young boy from Ohio only a month ago like that. Tore him up real bad. Lad bled to death."

  "Why d'you tell me all this? You want me to chill the bastard for you? That it?"

  "He wins, then he's harder to order around. Might challenge me one day. But the General wants him to win. Not chill you, mister. Get the bucko to rough you up some. So I got a bet each way. Kind of bet that I really like."

  "Come on, One-Eye!" Rourke yelled from the other side of the ring, which unleashed a burst of shouts in his support from the watching crowd. "Got a yeller belly, have yer?"

  Ryan considered making a joke about the size of the sec man's wobbling guts, but he decided that silence was the best reply to the hectoring. He simply contin­ued to ready himself, checking the feel of the ground and where the sunlight fell.

  "Any rules, McLaglen?" he asked.

  "Try and leave the ring without being thrown or kicked out, and they'll put you back. I'll stop it if Rourke's got you ready to buy the farm. Same if you manage to beat him. General won't want any killing 'tween you."

  "Any other rules?"

  "Yeah. Do him 'fore he does you."

  JAK WAS FEELING BETTER. The shower had eased the pain of the long ride across the desert, and his broken ribs had simmered down to a dull ache. The sec men who'd been ogling him had finally stopped when they saw the pale boy wasn't going to rise to their baiting. He'd been given a full uniform to wear, which fitted him reasonably well, though the pants seemed to have been made for someone a size or two smaller around the hips.

  The troopers escorted him to the main admin block of buildings. They showed him into a room that held a table and a couple of chairs as well as a wide bunk bed covered in a handmade Amish quilt and a long couch against one wall, upholstered in dark blue leather. The window looked across the parade ground, but the drapes were pulled most of the way across it.

  Jak could make out some sort of gathering beyond the flagpole, but he couldn't see or hear what was going on.

  "Food's on the way, kid," one of the sec men in­formed him. "Eat well and keep your strength up. Ready for when the General comes calling on you. Y'all hear me, now?"

  "Don't he look real purty in them breeches?" the other cavalryman said softly. "Snug around that firm young ass. Why, I swear I could take a—"

  "Shut that mouth of yourn," his friend snapped, pointing with his finger behind them to the other rooms in the building. "He don't take to that kind of… You double-stupe bastard!"

  They'd left Jak alone, shutting the door behind them, but he didn't catch the clicking of any kind of a sec lock.

  The food was brought in on an elegant, polished beechwood tray, served on real china plates with gleaming cutlery and a genuine glass.

  The sec man put the tray down on the table, winked at Jak and flounced out again. The albino boy no­ticed that his breeches also looked uncomfortably on the tight side.

  Jak hadn't eaten that kind of food for a long time. Once, back in Louisiana, they'd found a store out in the suburbs with its own nuke-solar generator still running, and it had been filled with sealed packs of amazing food. Jak's gang had broken into them and mixed them in large copper pans over bottled gas cookers, not knowing what a lot of them were.

  This meal was excellent. There was a tureen of veg­etable soup, with peas, small chunks of reconstituted potato and turnip and some fragments of meat that Jak deduced were ham. He noticed that all of the crockery and the knives, forks and spoons carried the neat crest of crossed sabers and the letters US, with the number "7" on them.

  Another covered dish contained several slices of chicken or turkey, with cranberry jelly, as well as creamed, dried potatoes and some irradiated vegeta­bles in side bowls. Jak helped himself, his mouth fill­ing with saliva at the scent and taste of the food. For a moment his mind wandered back to the rancheria at Drowned Squaw Canyon, to his friends who were waiting for him and to Steps Lightly Moon. He laid down his fork for a dozen heartbeats. The whole bal­ance of his life had shifted forever in the past day or so. Now he'd finally made love to a girl; there would never again be a first time for him. The Mescalero chiefs daughter said that she loved him. Whatever that might mean.

  And maybe he also loved her.

  Whatever that might mean.

  The last part of the meal was a kind of pastry with some cream stuff on top and some red fruit that Jak guessed were strawberries. They didn't taste like much to him.

  Before leaving, the sec man had poured a glass of a dark crimson liquid that was thick and sticky. Jak sipped at it, feeling a fiery warmth spreading through his body.

  It had been good food, but his mind was not lock­ing onto the problem of how he might make contact with Ryan and find some way of getting them both out.

  There was shouting from outside the window and Jak rose from the table, wiping his mouth with a damask dinner napkin. He tugged the drape back, the material dry and frail between his fingers. The crowd of sec men out on the parade ground had grown, and they were now ringing something around, something that was clearly exciting them. But Jak had no way of even guessing what it might be.

  Behind him he heard the door open and he began to turn, conscious yet again of how uncomfortably snug was the fit of the dark blue trooper's breeches.

  THERE ARE TWO SCHOOLS of thought about hand-to-hand fighting, particularly when you're up against someone who tops you by inches and outweighs you by more than one hundred pounds.

  "Get inside. Close in and stay tight and use speed and skill."

  "Keep away. Stay out of reach and move in and out quickly."

  Ryan had never actually subscribed to either theory. He went along with what the Trader used to say about close combat.

  "Do what's right, and do it hard and do it fast. That's all."

  McLaglen had patted Ryan on the shoulder. He had chosen to strip like the sec man, keeping on his com­bat boots and his pants. It was a hot day, and it would help to be sweating and slippery.

  "Quiet down!" the noncom bellowed. "Grudge fight between Rourke here and Ryan Cawdor. No rules, no stoppages. Man down and can't get up loses."

  "Man down, can't get up…is fucking dead!" roared the massive trooper, getting a cheer of encour­agement from his fellows.

  "Start on my word. Stop when I tell you. And I mean that about stopping, Rourke, my bucko. General's orders."

  "Sure thing, Sergeant." The big man grinned, lick­ing his blubbery lips.

  "Then… get ready. Fight!"

  JAK TURNED, SEEING that Cort Strasser was in the room, just as Krysty and Doc had described him. He wore a long yellow wig, framing a face of petrified cruelty. The boy was immediately struck by the thin skull, narrow eyes and hooked nose. His lips were like twin furrows hacked across the stretched skin. His full mustache spilled down both sides of his jaw, partly hiding the scars of what looked like a severe beating.

  He was wearing a long duster coat in beige linen, belted at the waist. The polish
ed toes of riding boots protruded from under the hem.

  "So, you want to come and join us here at Fort Se­curity, do you, young man?"

  "Yeah. Do."

  "You will call me General like everyone else here. Do you understand, Jak?"

  "Yeah, General. Understand."

  Strasser sat down on the couch, smiling pleasantly at Jak. "You look very well after your ordeal. I be­lieve you have injured your ribs."

  "Yeah, General."

  "Does that make it difficult for you to move? Let me be fucking specific, Trooper Lauren. Does it stop you from bending over?"

  AS MAULS GO, THE ONE between Ryan and Trooper Rourke wasn't much to talk about. It only lasted a minute or so, and the end was so abrupt that half the sec men watching didn't even realize that it was over.

  The ring was small enough for Rourke to think he could swamp the one-eyed man with his own bulk, corner him and wrestle him to the dirt. It had worked several times before.

  It should have worked again.

  It didn't.

  As the fat man shuffled toward him, arms spread, Ryan stood his ground for a moment, watching him. Then he began to back away, but he seemed to catch the heel of his boots in the raked earth and he stum­bled over. There was a great whoop of delight from the watching crowd, and Rourke rushed in, diving on top of the sprawled figure.

  But Ryan wasn't there anymore. He wriggled to his left, feeling the ground shake as the sec man landed at his side. Before Rourke could move, Ryan was up on his feet, kicking the trooper with a cold, savage accu­racy. The point of the toe cracked open the delicate elbow joint, into shards of bone and rags of torn car­tilage.

  Rourke shrieked in agony, crabbing his way to the farther corner of the ring, helping hands reaching through to tug him to his feet. The left arm dangled uselessly at his side, and the slobbering grin of antic­ipation had vanished. A look of sweating terror had taken over.

  "Come on, fat boy," Ryan whispered in the sud­den stillness.

  Rourke was surrounded by sec men. Magically, a knife appeared in his right hand, passed from behind. A short-bladed hideaway knife, with a handmade, taped hilt.

  "Hey!" Sergeant McLaglen shouted, without any real attempt at interference.

  "Don't matter," Ryan called over his shoulder, beckoning to Rourke. "I told you to come on, fat boy. Come on!"

  "Fucking Indian-lover bastard," Rourke screamed, coming in at Ryan again, the tip of the knife making jerking darts toward his opponent.

  Ryan waited, perfectly balanced on the balls of his feet, relaxed and ready. He feinted toward the knife with his left hand, swiveling like a dancer, kicking at the sec man's knees. Rourke dodged him, realizing too late that the kick had also been a feint.

  Ryan swung all the way around in a complete cir­cle, shifting feet, altering the direction of the real kick, following through like an old football player on a faded vid, going for a fifty-five-yard field goal.

  Because of Rourke's size, the spread of flesh on his thighs protected him from the killing power of the kick. But Ryan's boot still crunched hard enough into the sec man's groin to fold him over as if his appendix had ruptured.

  There was a sour whoosh of breath from the open mouth, and the knife fell from the trooper's fingers. "Get 'em going, keep 'em going," had been Trader's instructions. Without a split second's hesitation, Ryan crouched and brought up the heel of his right hand, with devastating force, against the injured man's nose.

  He felt the impact clear to his shoulder, hearing the familiar splintering of bone.

  Rourke went down like a steer under the poleax. His eyes were wide open, but only the bloodshot whites were showing to the bright sky. His legs kicked and twitched, fingers scraping at the sand of the parade ground, the nails breaking in the earth.

  A thin worm of crimson crept from between the thick lips.

  "He's broken his nose," someone said, voice high with surprise.

  "No, he hasn't," McLaglen said resignedly, climb­ing into the ring, his pistol drawn. "He's fucking killed him."

  STRASSER ROSE, UNCOILING himself from the sofa, going to peer out of the window. Both he and Jak had heard the raucous cheering fall into an instant, shocked silence.

  "I hear the sound of death," Strasser said. "I do fear that Trooper Rourke has proved better than I thought. Or Ryan Cawdor has proved too old and slow."

  Jak's heart missed a beat, and it seemed as though someone had sucked the air from the room.

  "Trooper, I had best go and view the remains of my old friend. We can talk later and by then your ribs might be rather better." He paused at the door. "I hope, my white-haired young man, for your sake, that you are well enough for… what I have in mind."

  As the door closed, Jak picked up the pitcher of water and poured himself a drink, finding that his hand was trembling.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  VOMIT COVERED MUCH OF Ryan's muscular chest, dappling the naked groin, trickling over his legs to form a stinking puddle around his bare feet.

  Cort Strasser had been coldly furious at the ease with which Ryan had butchered his tame bully.

  McLaglen had winced under the withering attack from his commanding officer, stammering and shuf­fling his feet, trying to explain that he'd warned Ryan not to chill the trooper. But it had all happened too quickly for him to be able to do anything.

  The General ordered Ryan to be stripped and then chained, standing, in the farther of the two sec cells. McLaglen wiped the sweat off his forehead once they were out of Strasser's office, glowering at the pris­oner.

  "You've done yourself, now, me bucko. And you fucking nearly did for me, sure you did."

  "I don't fight for fun. Man wants to take me on, then I'll try and chill him. That can of grease had it coming."

  McLaglen had left him, having obeyed the order from the General to make sure the fire in the brazier was burning brightly and the various torture imple­ments were glowing white-hot.

  When Strasser had come in, Ryan had heard the command to lock the dungeon from the outside. The General wore his wig, strands of it sticking to the beads of perspiration on his forehead. He wore a long coat, loosely belted at the waist. As he strode up and down, Ryan could see that the sec boss was naked beneath it.

  "I won't waste words on you, Ryan Cawdor," he said. "Talk costs nothing. Action can cost every­thing. Everything. I warned you what would happen if you crossed me. I was fucking triple-stupe to ever think you might work with me. Triple-stupe. So, I can start and take some pleasure."

  Ryan had lived long enough to be sure that this wasn't the main course. Though he was securely chained to the adobe wall, he still had some degree of movement. And for some really serious punitive tor­ture, you needed the victim to be very still. Ryan had seen some experts, had even suffered at their hands, and he had witnessed the amount of delicate skill that they all used. A needle or a scalpel in clumsy fingers can easily do either too little harm, or too much.

  This was all for starters. To relieve Strasser's feel­ings and let Ryan know that there would be much, much more to come.

  Strasser didn't actually use any of the heated metal probes, pincers and knives on his prisoner. He took them out of the brazier, holding them carefully by the rags wrapped around the handles, and he waved them close to Ryan's face, making sure he could safely flinch from the ruby glow. The parchment skin stretched in a narrow smile as one of the implements, curved like a corkscrew, neared Ryan's good eye, bringing sweat to his face.

  "Hot, isn't it, Ryan Cawdor? So hot that only an inch or so nearer and the radiation of the fire would sear out your vision. But I don't want that. Oh, no, not at all. Want you to see everything that goes on here. Right to the last."

  Mostly the sec boss had contented himself with us­ing his strong fingers.

  Pinching and tweaking, leaving neat rows of swol­len, purple bruises across the tanned flesh. Taking his pleasure from all the tender parts of Ryan's body. Be­neath the arm and behind the elbows and kn
ees. Along the insides of the thighs and at the back of the ears. Ryan nearly passed out when the sec boss took each nipple between thumb and finger, squeezing hard, harder, leaving them throbbing with pain, sur­rounded by white, puffed skin.

  "Now this," Strasser whispered, cupping Ryan's genitals in the palm of his right hand, tightening the pressure a little, grinning wolfishly as Ryan raised himself on the tips of his toes to try and avoid the in­evitable suffering.

  The obscenity was Strasser's obvious and visible arousal at the pain he was causing Ryan. His breath came faster and his skinny tongue danced over the chapped lips. His fingers tightened convulsively, making Ryan gasp, bringing a weird giggle from the sec boss.

  "Just beginning, my dear friend," he whispered. "I have a new companion, with the most dazzling snow-white hair and eyes like those glowing coals there. I think I shall go to him, perhaps bring him to watch. Perhaps…" The fingers squeezed and loosened, bringing the sour taste of bile floating into Ryan's throat. "Perhaps little Jakky might want to share the funning. Perhaps he might."

  At the last word the sec boss's skeletal body gave a great involuntary shudder, and he gripped Ryan's balls so ferociously that his prisoner slumped unconscious in the chains.

  By the time the darkness lifted, the sec door was firmly shut and the cell was empty again.

  KRYSTY STARTED AWAKE, eyes darting around the wickiup, past the yellow lights of the small earthen­ware lamps. The blankets that separated the long room into sections hung motionless. With her mutie hear­ing she could detect the regular sound of J.B.'s steady breathing, Lori's breath, lighter and more shallow, and the sonorous snoring of Doc, rasping like a file through cedarwood.

  "Gaia!" It had been like a fist, groping feverishly inside her head, plucking her awake, sweat trickling cold down her spine. Her burning hair coiled tightly and protectively around her skull.

  It was Ryan.

  Ryan was in bad trouble and needed help. Jak hadn't been able to get to him, which probably meant the albino kid was already chilled.