Neilson made a sympathetic sound. Treb felt his lips twitch into a thin crooked line. This is what it meant to be human. To feel sorrow for another man's misfortunes—and then kill him!
Sure, Neilson was a good sort. Only twenty-four and in love with a girl, a woman really, widow of a dead lunar explorer. And he was a clean-living sort, nothing dishonorable or hateful about him. They even honored the same God.
But tomorrow, or the next day, or a month from now, he would kill or wound Neilson. Unless, as might well happen, Neilson got to him first.
He pushed aside a thought that came more and more often of late. Why not surrender, or let Neilson capture him? He did not consider suicide—little Gram and Alse needed him—although he had not been thinking of them when he signed for this ugly miniature battle in space. His wife's death had been too vivid yet.
But, why not surrender? He had enough money. The valley people could struggle along without the machines and the dam he had hoped to grant them with victory. And Baryt could lose the island of Daafa to Andilia without crippling herself. The three hundred and fifty inhabitants could be transferred to the mainland.
Treb laughed silently, a laugh that cut off with a twinge of drawing ugly pain from his wounded forearm. He knew that he could no more surrender without a fight than he could command his breathing to stop forever. He was a man, and men cannot give up dishonorably....
"I'd like to see those two kids sometime, if you're still around, Treb." Neilson had moved again. His voice was lower but he was nearer.
"Stop around anytime, Harl." Treb moved a few feet deeper into a thicket. "We'll show you what real Baryt hospitality is."
"That's a promise, Treb."
Killing. That's what war was. So you had to kill. Or you volunteered to kill. But you didn't have to like it. All these little wars under UN supervision were needless—arbitration would serve as well. But the people, the leaders—someone—wanted blood. So ten or twelve or fifteen citizens of one nation fought an equal number of the other state's sons.