“Here,” I said.

  The other side bellowed, starting to charge.

  My scalp tingled, an awful feeling.

  I aimed my lance. It was shaking. I pressed the firing button, launching the first mini-missile.

  The Nine, thank God, had spread out on either side of me. They fired their lances.

  Missiles hissed, speeding at the charging enemy. Other missiles followed the first salvo.

  As soon as lances clicked empty, one of the Nine pitched it aside and bellowed for another. Those who carried them put full lances into our shooters’ hands.

  We fired many lances at the enemy.

  I fired five before I was even aware of what was happening.

  The missiles smashed against enemy Neanderthals and blew them apart, blasting flesh and knocking them down in swaths. We slaughtered the poor slobs even as they charged.

  Truthfully, they could have probably reached us. Our nerve might have snapped long before they swung a club or short sword.

  Their nerve gave out first. They stopped, wavering in place.

  Others came at us from the sides.

  The Nine and I swiveled, switching targets, blasting new groups. I’d fired ten lances already.

  The mini-missiles or rocket-propelled grenades were taking them down. It was sickening and exhilarating at the same time. In the midst of battle, it was glorious to see your enemy go down. There was hardly anything more thrilling.

  I could feel the mammoths trumpeting, the sounds vibrating in the air.

  “Stop firing,” I shouted.

  I had to repeat that several times before they all ceased.

  I held a phasor in each hand. I aimed, pulled the triggers, and fanned back and forth, as one might imagine a raygun marksman would. I beamed many as Neanderthal flesh cooked and smoked.

  Their entire line had stopped, taking it. They had lost the courage to attack but hadn't yet snapped and fled.

  “Charge!” I yelled. I began to race at the Slave Guard Corps as I beamed more.

  I could feel Skarl, Zog and Drogar pounding beside me. They were firing their last lances. The mammoths trumpeted. The ground shook as they raced past us, charging the enemy host.

  To my great delight—the greatest and grandest feeling a man can have—the enemy turned in terror. Many pitched aside their weapons and started to run.

  That electrified our warriors. They were hunters. They roared and gave chase.

  We sprinted after the enemy horde. Mammoths reached a few. They trampled some, blood squishing as if from a bug. One mammoth grabbed a Neanderthal in its mighty trunk and hurled him into the air.

  You’d think fleeing men would be faster of foot than those chasing. Many tripped, however. Many screamed with terror. I don’t know what they saw or felt, but they’d lost it. The “it” being their courage.

  The enemy Neanderthals were guards. Perhaps they were only used to dealing with cringers. Now they faced free warriors come to save the Neanderthal women.

  We did one of the most horrendous things those of the human race can do, even though these were Neanderthals. Once you’ve stood in battle, fearing the enemy will shove his blade in your guts, faced the terror of death, even at a distance—your mouth is bone dry and your sphincter tighter than you can believe—and then the enemy runs. A feeling of elation and bloodlust boils to an intolerable pitch. You’ve made it. You’re okay, and the bastards who made you fear like that are running from you. Oh, man, you chase down your enemy and slaughter those who would have killed you. It was instinctual.

  I’m afraid even these Neanderthals had the bloodlust of Cro-Magnon men, which modern men still exhibited at times on the battlefield. We weren’t noble in that moment. We were savages. As I’ve said, we slaughtered the enemy even as he strove to escape.

  It was a crushing victory. The missiles had been critical and the phasors just as much. The fact that their drones had done nothing and the First Folk hadn’t given them technological weapons was key.

  We’d won the battle of the valley. We were now breaking and destroying the Slave Guard Corps.

  I raced with my comrades, beaming enemy Neanderthals in the back. We were sealing our victory.

  We were, after all, less than three hundred strong. We’d shattered them, and hopefully, they’d flee for good, far away and not for the mine tunnels.

  We’d opened the way. Could we save the women? First, we’d have to win the battle of the tunnels.

  -35-

  The smartest thing would have been to take those that retained a semblance of wit and head into the mines.

  Unfortunately, that was not what we did because we physically couldn’t. We chased the Slave Corps members as they raced for the other end of the valley toward the obelisk I hadn’t yet seen. They didn’t head for the mines, or if they did, only a small number of them did.

  We, including myself who gave chase, finally slumped to the ground, exhausted. We were all drenched with sweat, some with blood, and others with a foul conscience. I include myself there.

  I’d killed hundreds of Neanderthals with my lance and phasor fire, and several with a spiked club I’d picked off the ground, bashing enemies in the back of the head. I wasn’t proud of that. It was part of the bloodlust, part of my killer-ape heritage, if you believe in that. The Naked Ape was a book written in the sixties discussing that.

  I believed rather in the old concept called original sin, as taught to me in Sunday school and church when I’d gone in my youth. I hadn’t gone lately, though I have to admit I did believe the Good Book’s verdict about human nature. In any case, I wasn’t going to dwell on that.

  I lay on the ground, panting.

  We didn’t have any water or food. We were all exhausted. To get up now and finish the task in the mines—we were at an endpoint.

  I panted, seeing others approaching, Gruum leading them. They had water. More skins were packed upon the one mammoth they still controlled.

  As for the other mammoths, I had no idea what had happened to them. Had they fled? Had the rampage of killing stained their conscience as well? I doubt it. They were animals. They weren’t divinely made creatures like us and Neanderthals, who were human after all.

  We could mate and have children. Just as a Great Dane and Chihuahua looked very different from each other, they were dogs. The Neanderthals were people.

  How would I explain Philip? I couldn’t. I didn’t know the answer to Homo habilis.

  We were both exhausted and scattered. Even if a few of us could go into the mine now, we were so tired that a bad shock could reverse what we’d achieved. There were not that many of us, either. Even with such a great victory, we’d taken losses.

  I’d seen some of our Neanderthals go down during the wild chase. Some had twisted ankles. Some had hurt themselves badly in other ways. Some had engaged in vicious fights against the few who turned and fought for their lives.

  Gruum and his people reached us.

  I forced myself to sit up. I accepted a water skin and guzzled. Drinking the water felt so good and refreshing. Now, I needed nourishment.

  Philip was there. He looked at me strangely. “You are a murderer, aren’t you, Bayard?”

  I’d recouped just a bit from my exhaustion while sitting here. Had that been twenty minutes, a half-hour? I shook my head. I didn’t know.

  I looked at the smug Homo habilis. “You know, Philip, now isn’t the moment.”

  “Why is that?” he asked. “Are you too tired, too weak?”

  I didn’t reply.

  Philip scanned the area.

  There wasn’t any snow on the ground, nor did the wind blow much. I’d discarded my parka somewhere along the way. I’d need to find and get it back. I noticed the others around me. They’d shed their heavy skins and furs, no longer wearing them.

  I’m sure the plain was littered with the dead, clothes, weapons and what not, many empty lances.

  We needed to collect a group that could stand and fight.

  Gruum went from one Neanderthal to the next.

  Philip stayed with Zog and me. Yeah, it turned out Zog was with me. He’d wrapped a bloody bandage around one of his arms. He looked exhausted, with haunted eyes.

  “We did it,” Zog said. “But we must still save the women.”

  I nodded. “We’re going to. First, we have to recoup. We have to get our wind back.”

  “This is the moment, though,” Zog said. “I know it, you know it.”

  I turned to Philip. “Sit here. Sit right here where I can see you.”

  Philip complied, sitting. “I didn’t think you were going to smash them the way you did.”

  I nodded. “We had better weapons.”

  “You had better training and leadership, too,” Philip said. “Roger was a fool to have sent out the Slave Corps like he did.”

  “He was buying time,” I said, realizing the truth of that even as I said it.

  “Yes,” Philip said, “Roger is definitely buying time. I don’t know, though, if he’s going to be able to get the rest of the equipment out of the mines before you guys regain your wind.”

  “What about the women?” Zog asked harshly.

  Philip looked at me.

  I shook my head slightly because I think I saw the question in his eyes.

  “I don’t know,” Philip told Zog. “Probably, Roger will leave the women behind in his effort to escape.”

  That visibly relaxed an agitated Zog.

  In retrospect, it would have been better if we’d gone staggering and stumbling into the mines that instant. But we didn’t.

  We sat around and regained stamina. There was just so much a man and even a Neanderthal could do. When he fights in such an engagement and spills literal blood, and sees his enemies scattered before him, well—

  There was ancient story about Hannibal Barca in the greatest battle of his life, the Battle of Cannae, when he defeated 70,000 Roman legionnaires with less Libyans, Celtic Spaniards and Gauls. Hannibal’s soldier had encircled the Romans, slaughtering them for hours.

  Afterward, one of his great cavalry generals had said, “You must race for Rome this instant.” Hannibal couldn’t, of course. He didn’t have any siege engines for one thing, but his troops were exhausted. They’d been killing for hours, hacking a sword or shoving a spear. They didn’t have the energy to march at that point.

  The famous cavalry soldier had said, “Hannibal, you know how to win a great battle, but you don’t know how to exploit it.”

  I suspect the truth of the ancient story was that Hannibal’s troops were exhausted like us today. To run and fight, to have your energy stirred as ours had been—we needed a break.

  Slowly, with the mammoth as the signal post, groups of our Neanderthals began to straggle in. Some collapsed upon the ground and started to sleep. Others gulped water.

  An hour passed, two and three hours. Finally, a few of the warriors began to stir. Some had regained enough vitality to think of the women.

  They obviously didn’t have the women yet. They’d broken the Slave Guard Corps, but they hadn’t reached the mines.

  Given everything that had happened, it seemed true the First Folk were fleeing from Garm. We had to get into the mines and stop them from taking what the Neanderthals prized the most: their mates. How were they to continue their Neanderthal race without women?

  I stood up.

  Philip stood with me. “Are you going to let them kill me after all I’ve done to help you?”

  I stared at the little hominid. “Stay near me. But if you try anything tricky, you’re dead.”

  “I understand,” Philip said.

  I spoke with Gruum. He was with Brakka.

  “That was a splendid victory, Bayard,” Gruum said. Maybe he noticed I looked sane again. “Your ideas were right.”

  “Thanks, sir.”

  Gruum stared sadly at the ground. “It was too bad we had to slaughter so many of our own kind. I feel stained and soiled by it.”

  I looked around, leaning nearer and spoke quietly. “Please don’t let any of your warriors hear that, sir. You must show gratitude. You must show elation at what they did. Let them know they did well. You should be walking among them and praising them, speaking about their acts of courage and even more important, letting them speak to you about their acts of courage.”

  Brakka stared at me and then looked at Gruum. “He’s right. That’s an excellent idea. I suggest you do it this instant.”

  Once more, Gruum went among the warriors. We had barely over a hundred.

  The others, maybe they were still chasing down their foes. Maybe they’d stopped somewhere else. We had a hundred, maybe one hundred and ten Neanderthals in all. We’d taken a ghastly toll, but we had been so few to begin with, very few indeed.

  I imagined another hundred might show up later.

  I heard Philip talking in my ear, but I wasn’t paying attention to his words. I was still gathering my inner resources.

  As Gruum spoke to his warriors, as he listened to their deeds of glory, they began to revive even more. However, it wasn’t until the sun or the star began to head for the horizon that our group, which was now one hundred and sixty strong, stirred.

  Gruum returned to me. He looked tired. Listening to all those warriors, he looked very tired and yet he looked elated.

  “We truly did it,” Gruum said. “The acts of courage I’ve heard today—startling, startling. I wish I were young again to do this. Bayard, it is time for us to go to the mines. We must stop the evil that is about to happen. We’ve gotten this far, but what if the enemy still escapes?”

  “Yes, sir,” I said.

  In less than fifteen minutes, we headed for the mine entrance. All the warriors, including Gruum, knew exactly where the entrance was.

  Skarl, Zog, Drogar and the others had lances again. We had a small supply left. I had a phasor with half its energy remaining. I also had the Colt with two magazines to back me up.

  It took time, but I finally saw the entrance. There were some outer buildings built differently than humans would have done, of stone and wood. Then I saw the entrance to the main mine, a vast cavernous opening.

  What would we find inside? Had the First Folk shut off any electricity?

  We drew closer yet. Would someone jump out to oppose us?

  It was soon apparent they were ghost buildings. No one was home. No one hailed us from the mine. No one said anything.

  Brakka and I exchanged glances.

  “Is the mine empty?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” Brakka said. “Should we split the warriors into small teams and have them search all around?”

  “No. What are you thinking? We must keep everyone together or at best split into two parties. I suggest we all keep together. We’re only a few compared to what we’ve seen. We must strike as one, not losing our head to be picked off piecemeal.”

  “You’re right,” Brakka agreed.

  We entered the cavernous opening. The mine entrance was huge and seemed to shallow us whole.

  As we entered, the darkness enveloped us. Neanderthals lit torches for illumination, holding them high. The air grew colder and damp, and our footsteps echoed through the seemingly endless tunnels. We moved cautiously, our eyes straining to adjust to the darkness, and our ears listening for any sign of danger.

  “Stay close,” I whispered to the others. “We don’t know what lies ahead.”

  As we ventured deeper into the mine, we began to notice signs of recent activity. Empty crates and discarded tools littered the floors, and the tracks of hurried footsteps could be seen in the dust. It was clear that the First Folk and Neanderthals had been here, and not too long ago.

  We continued our search, following the trail left by the First Folk and slave Neanderthals. Our torches crackled even as the air grew more oppressive, and the tension among us was palpable. The free Neanderthals hoped their future mates were near, and they were growing increasingly restless.

  If the mines were empty, the women already gone—

  I gripped my phasor tighter. What would I do if the First Folk had already taken the women to their planet? There might be a riot here.

  I started thinking about alternatives, thinking hard indeed.

  -36-

  We’d gone down several levels using stairs as the elevators were out. It was dark and dreary. We could only see by the illumination our torches cast. We hadn’t found any flashlights or other mobile lights to aid our search. The free Neanderthals had been nervous entering the mine and were becoming more so down here.

  There was something amiss around us. I could feel it. I called for Philip.

  Big hairy Neanderthal hands pushed the Homo habilis to me.

  “Stay beside me,” I said quietly.

  Philip nodded. There was fear in his eyes. For once, I didn’t see any calculation there. Was that odd?

  “What do you know about what’s going on down here?” I asked.

  “I don’t know anything.”

  I looked at Philip closely. He must have gotten the message.

  He nodded. “I think they’re gone, everyone.”

  “You don’t feel anything amiss?”

  “No. Why would I?”

  I thought about that as torch-cast shadows danced upon the walls. There was something wrong here despite Philip’s assertion that they were all gone. Something oppressive weighed on me. I called for Skarl.

  Our largest Neanderthal soon padded beside me.

  “Is the mine empty?” I asked.

  “How should I know?”

  “Use your senses, your intuition. What do they tell you?”

  After a moment, Skarl searched the darkness. He listened carefully. He sniffed and cocked his head.

  “What do you think?” I asked.

  “The corridors are empty.”

  I don’t know why his confirmation of Philip’s words made me more nervous, not less. I felt something out there, watching us, waiting. Was that paranoia? Was it my Marine training coming into play? Was it delusion?

  Gruum and Brakka stepped near.

  “What do you suspect?” Gruum asked me.

  “A trick,” I said, without thinking. In a more measured voice, I added, “We’re deep under the earth. Who knows what is going to happen down here?”