Something exploded.
Tana, Lisel, and Krisin jumped for the closest cover, a waist-high brick fence to the right. They landed in a dune of snow, which turned out to be hard on the top and damned cold underneath.
Something else exploded.
"Maybe they just want us to feel at home," Lisel suggested.
Krisin growled some answer. By then, there was a range of yells and shots, so the three of them just stayed in their not-so-cozy hiding spot and waited for things to calm down ... or at least until they could sort out the good guys from the bad guys.
"I think we were set up," Krisin offered.
"There is a wonderful thought," Tana replied. She snarled up at the sky as it began to snow, as if someone had just opened a door and shoved the white stuff out.
"I think we should move," Lisel added. He looked up over the fence and dropped down again. "There are a lot of angry people heading our way."
"What the hell did we do to them?" Tana demanded.
The voices grew louder and closer. The three of them scurried away on their knees but left a trail behind that anyone could follow. The only thing that stopped them from being tracked was that first, the Earthers were clueless, and second, everyone else was doing the same thing and leaving much the same trails. Tana heard people yelling, but no one seemed to know what was happening. Something else exploded. More people fired.
"We changed our location three times today. How the hell did they even know we were here?" a familiar voice demanded.
"I am sure I don't know," a squeaky and also familiar voice answered.
"Oh hell, Sally. Tell me you didn't --"
"That I didn't what, Tom? Call some of my friends who are more interested in Earth than any of these outsiders? How dare the Earth Council assume we want to bow down to this group when they should be thanking us for even letting them step on this world."
"You consider this letting them step on the world?" Tom demanded. "And your friends are doing damage to your precious historical buildings out there. You are responsible for this disaster."
"I didn't set those bombs are fire those lasers!"
"You just invited the people here who did so. That makes you responsible. They never would have found us up here in Aspen. I don't know why I thought you would behave politely for once. I should have known something was going on. You are going to be up on charges for this one, Sally."
"They wouldn't dare."
"Why not?"
"They just wouldn't. Why can't these people just go back to where they came from and leave Earth to those of us who were born here."
"Actually," Krisin said as he stood in all his furry glory, "I was born here on earth."
Sally shrieked as though Krisin had attacked her. By then, Tana and Lisel had stood as well, and Tana wanted to go over and slap the stupid woman. When another bomb went off, she decided getting clear of this area might be a better idea.
"I apologize for this mess," Tom said with a shake of his head and a glance at where people were yelling again. "Let's get up to the building. At least there's some shelter out of the storm there, and it sounds as though they've fought the lunatics back out of the area."
It did sound as though the battle moved farther away. Tana was happy with the idea of getting in out of the snow.
"They were spying on us!" Sally accused.
"Us and about 20 other people," Lisel said with a wave of his arm out toward snow around them.
Several piles of snow started to move as people stood all around them. Tana was grateful to see all the glares directed at Sally.
In fact, two people in the uniform of what must be the local police service marched straight over to Sally, cuffed her, and dragged the woman away before she could do more than sputter. Before long, however, they could hear her squeaky little voice complaining all the way to wherever it was they took her. Tom watched the retreat with a growing smile, and he even turned that smile on them.
"Again, I apologize for this mess. We had rumors that something was going to happen, so we changed location several times."
"Why didn't you just cancel?" Lisel asked.
"You were already in the system in your huge spaceship, and it seemed kind of rude at that point to say no sorry we changed our mind," Tom answered. He shook his head. "Despite how annoying Sally has been in the past, I really never expected her to do something like this. I wasn't surprised she was so rude, but for her to call in terrorists… that was more than I ever expected."
They were heading up toward a lovely wooden building that seemed to have gone untouched in the rest of this madness. Tana hoped they could get some food soon. She could still hear shouts. The snow fell in a heavy veil across the scene when she looked back. Even Sally's voice and faded into the background noise.
Maybe this wouldn't be so bad. It would be warmer in the building, and they left most of those stupid reporters back in Denver hours ago. The little bit of trouble probably didn't bother her as much as it should. Tana supposed that she had just spent too much time in battle.
Someone stepped out from behind a tree to the right. Tana reached for a gun that she didn't have and started to curse, but it was Krisin who shoved Tana, Lisel, and Tom down into the snow.
"Traitor!" The man yelled and fired his weapon.
Krisin gasped and fell. Blood splattered the snow, and he didn't move.
No comments:
Post a Comment