Liberating Atlantis

And they weren't. "Yeah, you can do that," Frederick repeated. Then he went on, "You can do that if you don't mind the white folks catching you tomorrow-if you're real lucky, maybe the day after. Don't you get it, you God-damned fool? We've killed masters. White folks grab us now, they'll kill us as slow and filthy as they know how. Only way we can stay alive is to keep on fightin' and keep on wi

Were the just-freed slave white himself, would he have turned pale from rage or red with anger? Since he was not much lighter than Frederick, he didn't show what he was feeling that way. His scowl said he was angry. "I got it," he answered. "But who d'you think you are, to play the white man talkin' to me like that?"

"I ain't playin' the white man. I'm playin' the general," Frederick said. "Liberating Army's just like any other kind-it needs somebody in charge. Right now, that's me."

"If I'm in this here army, I'm still a slave, then," the copperskin said.

"If you ain't in this here army, you're a dead man walkin'," Frederick said.

Behind him, Lorenzo cocked his revolver. The click of the hammer going back sounded much louder than it really was. "If you ain't in this here army, you're a dead man-period," he declared.

The man who'd been complaining gave back a sickly grin. "I was just fu

"It's like Frederick said-this here is an army. When the general tells you to do somethin', you don't make no shitty jokes," Lorenzo growled. "You do it right away, no matter what the hell it is. Some other stuff you don't know nothin' about may depend on it. And somebody may blow your fuckin' head off if you fart around. Me, for instance. Understand what I'm talkin' about?"

"Uh-huh. Sure do," the younger copperskin said. He took the prospect of getting shot by his own people seriously, anyhow, even if he didn't have the brains to imagine that white folks might do it. Copperskins were supposed to be fierce and savage. Lorenzo used that to his own advantage, even against one of his own kind. And who could say for sure? He might have shot the new recruit as a lesson for the others. Frederick almost asked him, then decided not to. Some things he didn't need to know. Again, the Liberating Army advanced on a new plantation cross-country. Surprise still mattered, even if it wouldn't for much longer. The rifle muskets and their accouterments all fit in one wagon now. It also went cross-country. If the whites in the neighborhood were alerted to the rising, Frederick didn't want them taking back a big chunk of his weaponry all at once.

Whether the whites were alerted to the rising or not, the slaves on the Menand plantation knew something was up. "You go

"Not exactly," Frederick answered. Their faces fell till he explained: "You're go

He and Jacques Menand's slaves had been talking in low voices. When they heard that, they let out whoops of delight. Not nearly far enough away, a white man demanded, "What's that stupid commotion all about?"

"Your overseer?" Frederick whispered.

"That's right," answered a man who looked to be of mixed copperskin and Negro blood. "Sooner that God-damned son of a whore gets what's coming to him, happier we'll all be."

"Amen!" added a man who looked like a pure-blooded copperskin.

"I don't reckon you've got long to wait," Frederick said. "Can you lure him here?"

They didn't even need to do that. The overseer came forward of his own accord, to see what was going on. Rifle-musket butts, bayonets, and knives soon finished him off-though perhaps not soon enough to suit him. His screams rose up into the uncaring air. Frederick didn't worry about that. They wouldn't reach the big house, where gunfire might have.

Menand's slaves proved hot to join the Liberating Army. "First we kill this bastard here who's been fucking us," the copperskin said savagely. "Then we kill all the other white bastards, too." The rest of the field hands nodded.

The men who'd got the rifle muskets to the plantation passed them out. By now, they seemed as attached to the guns as any ordnance sergeants in the Atlantean army. "You take care of this piece, keep it clean, or we'll take it away from you and shove it up your ass," one of them warned the wide-eyed copperskin to whom he gave the weapon. "You got that?"

"You bet," the man answered. "I'll do whatever I have to do, long as I get the chance to kill me some white folks."

"Oh, I reckon we can take care of that," the Negro said grandly, as if he were personally responsible for it.

Drill sergeants would have despaired at the way the Liberating Army advanced on the Menands' house. The copperskins and Negroes kept no kind of order. One of these days, we'll have to fight real soldiers, Frederick thought. We'd better learn how to do those things, or they'll murder us. But that day wasn't here yet. At least the men advanced with high spirits. As long as they kept doing that, anything was possible.

No one fired at them from inside the big house. Everything was quiet-too quiet to suit Frederick. "What's wrong with them?" he said. "They must've seen us coming. They reckon we're here for a dance?"

Then one of the house slaves came out. He was wearing a boiled shirt, black jacket, and cravat like the ones Frederick had put on every day for so many years. "Menands done run off," he said. "You ain't go

"How'd they know in time to do that?" Frederick answered his own question: "Somebody came and told them!"

"You're a clever fellow, ain't you?" the house slave said. "A field hand, he came ru

"I bet he did!" Frederick said. "Stinking Judas must know what we'd do to him if we got our hands on him. Who was the son of a bitch?"

"His name is Jerome. He's a copperskin." The house slave didn't try to hide his distaste. Frederick understood every bit of it. House slaves always sneered at field hands. And Negroes and copperskins sneered at each other. Masters exploited all those differences. If this uprising was going to get anywhere, Frederick would have to find a way to plaster them over.

"Menands tell you why they were going?" he asked the house slave.

"Master Jacques said he didn't aim to wait around and get killed," the other Negro answered. "He asked if I wanted to go along, but I told him no. I reckoned I'd be safe enough." He brushed two fingers over the back of his other wrist, showing off his own dark skin.

"But they got away," Lorenzo said. "That ain't so good. That ain't even a little bit good."

"Tell me about it," Frederick said. "Word's go

"What are we go

"I've said it before-we could try splitting up and disappearing into the woods and the swamps, but you'd best believe they'll come after us," Frederick replied. "Slaves start killin' masters, the white folks don't forget about it. Only other choice-only one-we've got is fighting 'em and whipping 'em."

"We do that?" Three or four anxious slaves, Negroes and copperskins both, said the same thing at the same time.

"Damned right we can." Frederick didn't say they would, only that they could. He hoped they wouldn't notice the distinction. They didn't seem to. "Damned right we can," he repeated, sounding more confident than he felt. "First thing is, we know what happens if we lose."

He waited. Men's and women's heads bobbed up and down. They knew, all right. It wouldn't be pretty. It would be as ugly as vengeful whites could make it. Masters had to be harsh with slaves who rebelled, or they'd face uprisings every day of the week. They understood that as well as the slaves did.