Ring of Fire II(222)

"Drop the fucking bomb!"



"Oh. Yeah."





Watching, Janos didn't wonder for more than an instant why the up-timers had committed the seemingly pointless act of bombing an empty patch of meadow. Judging from the way the first bomb had exploded, the device had been detonated by a contact fuse, probably armed by the act of releasing it. Not the sort of thing any sane man wants to be sitting atop when he tries to crash an aircraft as gently as possible.



The plane came down. And confirmed once again Janos' long-standing conviction that plans and schemes and plots are just naturally prone to crashing.





"Oh, hell," said Noelle. At first, she'd thought that the plane had come down safely. Almost as if it were landing on a proper airfield. Then—one of the wheels must have hit an unseen obstruction—she saw the still undamaged wing dip sharply and strike the ground. The plane skewed around, tipped up on its nose—please God, don't let that propeller come apart in pieces and chew anybody up—and seemed to balance precariously for a moment.



Then it looked as if the plane just more or less disintegrated into its component parts. The newly-damaged wing broke off, the fuselage tipped and rolled, and the plane flopped down on its side. Most of the other wing broke off, as did part of the tail assembly when it hit.



Still . . .



There was no explosion. No flames. People had walked away from car crashes worse than that.



"Just wait for me, Eddie," she said. "And don't move. Your arm's busted."



She got on her horse and headed for the crash site.





Janos pointed to the enemy cavalryman still on the ground by the remains of the wagon.



"Gardiner, see to him. Keep him under guard, that's all. Do him no harm unless he attacks you. Gage, follow me."



He set off after the other cavalryman, toward the downed plane.



"What are we going to do?" asked Gage, loud enough to be heard over the sound of the cantering horses.



"Seize them and take them with us, any who survived. What else can we do? I don't think this is a reconnaissance patrol from a larger force following them. They wouldn't have sent just two men for that purpose. I'm not certain, but I think these are operating alone. If we let any of them go—and there's at least one of them in good condition—they'll take the alarm to Hof. Two bomb explosions, a crashed warcraft, even the sorriest garrison in Creation will react to that."



Gage was silent for a moment. Then, as Janos expected, he raised the other obvious alternative.



"We could kill them."



"Oh, splendid," said Janos. "Just what Austria needs. Half our army is facing Wallenstein on the north, most of the rest is facing the Turks to the south—and we ignite a new war by committing a pointless massacre."



"It was a thought," said Gage mildly. "Probably not a good one, I admit."



Drugeth's irritation with the Englishman was only momentary. He'd considered that solution himself. But he still had hopes they could complete this adventure without the sort of drastic measures that would trigger off an explosive reaction from the USE.



Firmly, he ignored his own hard-gained wisdom on the subjects of plans and their likely outcomes.





Chapter 10. The Sword



By the time Denise got done hauling Lannie out of the wreck, she was exhausted. Getting Keenan out hadn't been too bad, even though he'd been in the cramped rear of the cockpit. But Keenan had just been dazed and bruised, not pinned by some of the equipment that had been broken loose and all but completely unconscious.



Denise was strong for a girl her age and build, but the fact remained that the age was almost-sixteen and while the build was great for making girls jealous and boys drool—not that she appreciated either one—it wasn't that good for frantically trying to free a normal-sized man from wreckage and haul him out by bodily force. Not for the first time in her life, she wished she'd inherited more of her dad's bulk and muscle and less of her mother's appearance.



But, finally, it was done. Probably hadn't taken more than a few minutes, actually. With the last of her strength, she lowered Lannie onto the ground and half-spilled herself out of the fuselage. Fortunately, the meadow was pretty soft ground. On her hands and knees, she saw that Keenan was sitting up and holding his head. He was groaning a little, but so far as she could tell he didn't really seem to be hurt.



In the corner of her eye, she caught sight of a pair of legs. Looking over, she saw Noelle, with a very strained expression on her face.



"Hey, look," she said defensively, "I'm sorry. We didn't know it was you."



Belatedly, she realized that Noelle wasn't actually looking at her. She was looking over Denise's head at something off to the side.