Free The Sword and the Plough by Carl Hubrick Page A

various infantries throughout the Commonwealth.
    Lars crouched lower, viewing what he could
through a blackened tangle of twisted steel. They were closer now,
no farther than twenty metres and coming his way.
    All at once, the young woman lifted her head
and began to struggle frantically. Through a tumble of auburn hair,
Lars saw an oval face of such beauty, he gasped out loud.
    She was somewhere near his own age, he
guessed. Against the two burly troopers, her small stumbling figure
looked almost childlike. He looked about urgently for a better
place to hide.
    Suddenly, the young woman let out a scream
of rage and kicked out wildly. Her small foot connected with the
shin of one of the troopers. The man howled in anger, and swung his
free hand in a slap that snapped her head back. The man’s companion
uttered a scornful laugh.
    The young woman slumped and sagged in their
grasp, stunned by the force of the blow. The troopers swore and
hauled her upright.
    Lars did not think then, but leapt to his
feet triggered by outrage at what he had witnessed. He charged down
upon the nearest trooper.
    “Let her go!” he bellowed. He hauled his fist
back and let loose with a mighty haymaker.
    It was a beautiful punch for Lars’s debut
into fisticuffs. But the foreign soldier was combat trained. He
brushed the untrained blow aside and slammed an iron fist into the
young man’s belly.
    Lars doubled over and crumpled to the ground.
His lungs battled to breathe. His will struggled to stand, but his
limbs would not. Finally, he gasped out a moan, and managed to push
himself to his knees.
    The trooper thrust the female prisoner at his
companion. “Here!” he rasped. “Hold the mad bitch while I cuff this
Trionian clown.” He unclipped the Meredith pistol at his hip.
“Right scumbag; put your hands out behind you. Give me any trouble
and I’ll burn your damn head off.”
    Lars extended his hands behind him. He heard
the scratch of boots as the man stepped up to shackle him.
    “Damn Trionians!” the man muttered, standing
over him.
    Lars felt his strength returning. He sucked
in a breath. He shot to his feet.
    His rising shoulder caught the trooper in the
chest, throwing the man off balance. In an instant, Lars was upon
him, his fists flailing. The trooper howled with rage as the hail
of blows battered him down. The Meredith pistol flew from his grasp
and disappeared into the smoking rubble with a clatter.
    Lars now switched his attack to the second
trooper, but his luck had already run out. The man reacted swiftly
and shoved his prisoner into the young farmer’s path. Lars caught a
glimpse of her startled look as she cannoned into him.
    Lars stumbled over the young woman and
grabbed at the man. But the trooper was moving too fast. He caught
the young man’s outstretched arm and ducked under it, wrenching it
upward as he went. Lars could not help but cry out as his shoulder
muscles threatened to tear apart.
    The alien troopers were in no mood for fair
play. One now held Lars fast while the other drove in his fists at
will. Blood flowed from the young man’s eyes, nose, and mouth.
Shock and pain were his only awareness. Torment choked his
mind.
    At last, his consciousness faded into
blackness, and he slumped in his opponent’s grasp.
    They let him fall to the ground. He tried
to roll away when the first boot came, but there was no escape.
Explosions of pain ripped through him – agonising, relentless. His
mind and body burned in the same inferno.
    After a while, he could no longer distinguish
the troopers’ profanities and curses from his own grunts and
groans. It was all one. Then, above it all, he heard the
incongruous sound of a woman’s voice, distant and indistinct, as if
from the bottom of a barrel.
    “ Stop it! Stop it
now ! Or I’ll burn you both
to ashes.”
    The kicking ceased. Lars struggled against
his pain in an effort to haul himself clear of his tormenters, but
he had not the strength.
    He heard a male voice