James Axler – Starfall

“Then what happens?” Krysty asked, her voice cracking with emotion and exhaustion.

Elmore shrugged. “You mean what do they do with the information? Take it back to the others, I guess. You’d have to talk to Donovan about the rest of it.”

“He knows about things like this?” Ryan asked.

“Only person I know of that would,” Elmore admitted. He looked uneasy about saying that, and Ryan knew the man was wondering if he’d said too much. “Finding Don­ovan ain’t easy.”

“Saw a map once with Heimdall Foundation marked on it,” Ryan said, laying the ace on the line. “A few days west of here, traveling by foot.”

“He won’t be there,” Elmore said. “And that’s assum­ing that map and your memory of it are right.”

“Where’ll he be?”

Elmore looked imploringly at Ryan. “Mister, I don’t want to die. And if you turn me over to the baron’s men out there, that’s surely what’s going to happen.”

Ryan couldn’t argue with that, and there wasn’t time to investigate the matter between the two men any further at the moment. “Where’s Donovan?”

“It’s spring,” Elmore answered reluctantly. “He’ll be up in the mountains making sure of the water supply to the Foundation. Staying hidden like they do takes a lot of water to run things.”

“If we take you out of here,” Ryan said, “you can take us to Donovan?”

“Hell, yes.”

Ryan looked at the man. “You try to fuck around with me, I’ll chill you the first time I know it.”

“Sure.”

“Cawdor!” Naylor shouted from outside.

“I’m here,” Ryan shouted back.

“We can still deal,” the sec chief roared.

“Don’t know about you,” Ryan said, “but I’m kind of shy on trust at this end.”

“One of my men got jumpy,” Naylor explained. “Didn’t mean nothing by it.”

“A man under your command who doesn’t follow orders isn’t worth having,” Ryan responded. “Man will never be able to carry his own weight, much less work into the po­sition of being an asset.”

There was a pause. “I see you’ve had some training.”

“Enough.”

“What about the man I want?”

“Make you another deal,” Ryan said, “since you seem so keen on changing the one I thought we had.”

Naylor paused, and the silence drew out. “Tell me,” he said at last.

“Trot out the man who fired that shot,” Ryan stated. “Then I want you to execute him in front of me.”

“What?”

“You heard me. Call it a show of faith.” Ryan glanced at J.B., making sure his friend was comfortable with the idea.

“Man might not feel so bad about chilling some poor bastard,” the Armorer said, “who’s already been wounded or is dead. Stake him out there, shoot him a couple times, make it look good.”

“That’s fine,” Ryan said. “Every minute we get here gives Jak and Dean that much more time to get to the other end of that tunnel.”

“You can’t be serious about asking me to chill one of my own men,” Naylor called back.

“I’m serious about it. If you don’t want to chill him yourself, get him to that clearing and I’ll chill him for you.” He lined up the Steyr, gazing through the scope and sifting through the shadows he spotted around Naylor’s po­sition.

“I can’t do that,” Naylor said.

“That’s too fucking bad,” Ryan told the man. “Because you’re not getting the man without doing it.”

“Don’t take the high hand with me, Cawdor. I’ve been looking at that building, noticing how much wood is in it. If you don’t get burned to death in a fire, you’ll at least be smoked out. Give me the man, and I’ll make sure you get out of here alive.”

“Mebbe there’s something you haven’t been consider­ing,” Ryan said laconically. “You walked into this situation and ended up between my people and the coldhearts. What makes you so sure you can just walk right back out of here when you get ready?”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Turn your back on me, and I’ll chill you and your peo­ple every time I get a shot,” Ryan promised. “I figure my chances here look better if you’re trapped over there. The coldhearts waiting to pick up the pieces won’t be quite so anxious to come back in here.”