Day of Honor 01_ Ancient Blood - Diane Carey [110]
“Freeze—oh, to hell with it!” Picard rushed to the foredeck and drove a shoulder into the patriot, who was about to finish Alexander with another sword swipe. Together, Picard and the patriot went sprawling.
The man was half his age, but Picard was twice as mad. He grasped the armed man by the neck, raised him up a bit, then slammed his head into the deck. The sword clattered from the man’s numbed hand.
“Alexander!” Picard spun off his knees and scrambled to the boy, who was trying to sit up.
“I’m getting up!” Alexander insisted valiantly. “Don’t stop the program! It’s just a cut! That’s all!”
Damn, the boy was quick! Before Picard could hold him down he cranked his legs under him, grasped the ship’s rail, and hoisted himself up. The front of his shirt was soggy with plum-colored blood, and the same for the cut shoulder. One arm hung numb, but other than that he was looking out at the wharf.
“Look!”
British soldiers were swarming from the street onto the wharf, lined up just beautifully, and took stern aim at all the patriots on the docks.
“Cease fire!” a voice called from the docks. “Colonials, cease fire! Cease fire!”
Picard looked … it was Patrick O’Heyne, standing at about the middle of the main wharf, holding both hands up. His rifle lay on the wharf at his feet.
He was giving up, to spare the lives of the cornered patriots—people who had been led out here by the need to possess this ship.
The patriot sparring with Sandy backed off, and Sandy cautiously came around to Picard’s side. “The boy is wounded, sir,” he said.
“I know! What kind of swine attacks a child!”
“But, sir, it’s war,” Sandy explained simply, and of course he was right.
The patriot who was still standing on the deck stepped well away from them and waved to O’Heyne, then put his sword down reluctantly. He was giving up.
Like so much of the Revolutionary War, this skirmish had been for nothing but the philosophical point struggling to have its meager voice heard. The frigate Justina was once again a Royal Navy ship.
The night was blessedly cool against his hot skin and the hairs on his neck that were still standing from the electrical jolts.
On his way to the main doors of the jail complex, Worf had stepped through a half dozen fires set by Odette Khanty as she tried to block him from following her. She had kicked her awkward business shoes off and set fire to them, too. She was probably running now.
Worf refused to run. He balled his fists and stalked, step upon step, as regulated as a parade. His boots made an authoritative chunk on the brick with stride. He began to concentrate on the sound, for it brought his mind slowly back from the effects of the buffalo prod.
Behind him, the jail building burned more and more excitedly as the fires began to spread to floor cloths and fabric-covered chairs, and anything else. Even in a jail, fire would find something to consume, even if only the paint on the walls.
He felt like the fire. Ready to burn and determined to avenge his friend’s death.
He approached the balcony of the governor’s mansion, as he saw the guards there and the dozen or more police vehicles rolling or hovering into the courtyard behind him, drowning the courtyard in scene lights. They were all coming to arrest Odette Khanty. He ignored them. He saw his target.
A good day to die.
The police officers flooded from their vehicles and hurried across the courtyard toward the balcony. Worf felt them closing behind him, but he refused to break into a run. It was as if he had a deflector shield around his body. None of them approached him or tried to stop him. Whether they recognized him from the broadcast or simply wanted to concentrate on the woman, he did not know or care.
Each bootstep drove into his aching head like a nail. He wished he had treated Grant with more respect. How impressive—the data thread had still been there. Grant never gave it up. He might’ve bought himself a more merciful death if he had, but the thread was still there. Hours upon hours of circumstantial evidence