by Diurnal Lee
Command was hopping when Logan followed Dalton through the door. He saw a good three or four dozen people, all seemingly involved in tasks and animated conversation, most of whom he didn't recognize from his last visit. In the middle of the open space, in a nest of blankets atop a packing crate, a burbling infant--Gem's he presumed--held court to a succession of passing transgenics.
"Any newcomers since the blockade began?" Logan asked.
Dalton grinned at him and gestured toward the far end of the room, where Luke seemed to be explaining their makeshift housing map to an attentive cluster of people. "Sure thing. A few get through every day. Luke's got his welcome spiel down pat." He took the steps up to the loft two at a time, leaving Logan to follow at a more dignified pace.
Crowded around the video hookup in the upper area, Alec, Mole and a few others laughed and gestured expansively. Logan was halfway up the steps toward them when a shout came from across the room. "Fire in the hole!"
Just about everyone at the near end of the room flattened to the ground, while people at the far end scattered in all directions. As Logan was tackled backward off the steps, he caught a blur of someone leaping over the loft railing, headed directly toward the threat.
Then the world exploded in fire and thunder, and Logan spent an indeterminate time waiting to breathe again.
"Jesus wept," somebody groaned as Dalton was crawling off of him. "Fucking suicide bombers."
Mole and Dix had search and rescue teams organized before Logan was even on his feet. It soon became clear that the few bodies on the ground at the far end of the room were beyond help.
They found Alec in the middle of the room, half-buried under a chunk of ceiling, his clothes and hair charred, metal and wooden shrapnel imbedded in his back and side. Blood matted the hair on one side of his head, making his face deathly pale by contrast. He was curled around the baby, who started wailing when they uncovered her, but seemed otherwise unharmed.
"Looks like I owe Alec an apology," said Logan, leaning heavily on Dalton's shoulder. "I didn't think he was capable of caring about anybody but himself."
Mole gently pried the squalling infant out of Alec's grip and cradled her in the crook of his arm. "You want to piss him off that bad?" He snorted. "Go right ahead."
Confused, Logan straightened. "You saying he had some other motive for saving the kid?"
Mole shrugged one shoulder as he jiggled the baby up and down. "No fucking motive to it. Alec was in command. He acted to secure the most vulnerable non-combatant in the area."
"At risk to his own life," Logan insisted. "Where I come from, we call that heroism."
"Civilians," Mole grunted, shifting the baby in his grip to dig the stub of an unlit cigar out of a breast pocket. On the floor between them, a medic pulled a six inch length of jagged, blood-slick wood from Alec's side. "Kid was just doing his job."
End