“Just the latest of Landen’s crazy schemes,” Cavan said, as if that explained everything. “Only this time he’s got Alicia with him too.”
“Sure, they’re lousy odds, no question,” Charlie Hu said, nodding and keeping a serious note. “But better than the alternative. I’ll take them.”
Mitch looked around at them. He seemed persuaded, and was running over the practicalities in his mind. “It means we have to be up-front with the men too,” he said finally. “This isn’t something I can order them into blindly—or would be prepared to. They have to make their own choices too.”
Everyone looked at everyone else. Nobody dissented.
“So be it,” Cavan said.
* * *
“The reason we’ve been talking about getting to Mexico is that there’s another shuttle down a silo at a site just south of the border,” Mitch told the soldiers a half hour later. Apart from himself and Dan there were Furle, Dash, Legermount, and six troopers: four from the group that had hijacked the chopper and two uninjured from those who had stayed with the crashed Rustler. “Now, we’re not talking about huge numbers of people being there like you saw at Vandenberg. There’ll be just us here, plus a handful to be picked up in Texas. That means there’ll be extra room. After listening to Charlie, I’m willing to go for it. And for anyone else who’s prepared to take his chances, that’s the bonus at the end of the ride. But I’m not going to hang this on you as an order. It’s a volunteer mission. You’ve all heard the arguments. Each man is free to make his choice.”
Captain Furle still remembered the couple-of-hours-extra assurance that he’d heard the last time they talked about going to Mexico. “I can’t say I see how it’s going to change anything,” he objected. “Except for making our chances worse, that is. Whatever hits here, the same thing is gonna hit there just as bad. The only difference is that here we’ve at least got protection and some backup that’s halfway organized. There, we’d have nothing. We did what we could once, and it’s over. I’m still for heading north to Cheyenne Mountain. General Ullman promised us at Vandenberg that he’d find us room there.”
They showed mixed reactions. Keene could understand why. It hadn’t been that long ago when he himself had been looking for excuses to stay with the apparent safety that the military bases represented. Dan decided to attempt returning to the Air Force command in Colorado too and throw his lot in with Earth, come what may. The trooper with the hurt knee and the other who had come down sick were not up to such a further mission, and two more stayed with Furle through choice. That left two—their names were Birden and Reynolds—who would go with Mitch, Legermount, Dash, and the six civilians, including Cynthia.
Keene wondered if he was the only one who understood how much smaller the Amspace minishuttle was than a regular Air Force shuttle or the Boxcars that had gone up from Vandenberg. There was no telling how many people Harry Halloran might have brought with him, assuming he made it to San Saucillo. Keene didn’t relish the thought of possibly having to explain the situation to armed and angry men, should it turn out that there were no spare places after all. A likely response in that event might be an insistence at gunpoint that everyone submit to a draw. But first, they would have to get there. He would worry about it then, he decided. It was always possible that by that time the problem would have solved itself.
* * ** * *
Eleven in all were driven that night to the repaired siding in the railroad yards on the east side of the city, where the train to make the run to San Antonio was being assembled and fitted out. It consisted of six locomotives, three in tandem to the front and rear of a long line of boxcars and tankers with protected tops, with flatcars at intervals mounting sandbagged machine guns and posts for armed guards. Two coach cars in the center carried the command staff and guard reserves. Two flatcars pushed in front of the lead locomotive carried rails and equipment for track repairs. To reconnoiter and clear the route ahead as far as possible, a small scout train comprising a locomotive pushing several cars with engineers and a work crew, more rails and track-laying equipment, lifting gear, a couple of small earthmovers, and an Army escort had left earlier in the afternoon.