by James Axler
The two stared at each other, then the lieutenant made a move for the pistol at his side. Instantly the guard shifted his aim and fired. The holster jerked, a ragged scar in the polished leather where the round had plowed through.
"Next one goes in your face," the teenager stated, sweat dripping off his cheeks and dampening his shirt.
Suddenly a squad of sec men raced into view carrying a wide assortment of weapons.
"Excellent." Brandon smiled, easing his stance. "Good response time and fine shooting, Sergeant."
"Private, sir."
"Not anymore," Brandon said. "Nor are you working for internal sec. You're with me now, a private guard for the baron himself. I need a new XO on the boat, and I think you'll do."
"Me, sir? Thank you, sir!"
"What's your name, son?"
"Hannigan, sir. Thor Hannigan."
"Meet me down at the dock, slip 2, PT 264. We'll talk later, Sergeant Hannigan."
"Aye, sir!"
"The rest of you men are dismissed!" Brandon shouted.
Relaxing, the other sec men shouldered their weapons and walked back to their assigned posts. Beaming a smile, Brandon tried to get past the boy, and the longblaster was shoved into his face again.
"Nice try. Password or die," Hannigan said low and dangerous. His finger was already putting pressure on the trigger, and any attempt to knock the blaster aside would only set it off.
In cold fury, the lieutenant stared at the man, then slowly nodded. "Excellent," he said. "Black dust, I'll take you on as crew! The password is broken sword."
"Pass, sir," Hannigan said, lowering his weapon to port arms.
Watching his step, Brandon walked inside, then turned. "Don't forget to pick up that spent brass," he said, gesturing vaguely at the spent round on the ground.
Hannigan sneered. "That's for privates, not me."
"Good man," he grunted. "You'll go far."
Proceeding down the main corridor, Brandon went past the dining hall, the armory and then the soundproof doors to the dungeon. Whimpering and the thump of metal on flesh could be heard softly from within. Soundproof, his ass. Damn door needed repairs again. Too many near escapes had damaged the jamb once more. When would the men learn to cut the hamstrings of prisoners so they couldn't run, even if they got free from the shackles? Time for more beatings.
Stopping before the entrance to the throne room, the lieutenant smoothed his hair and made sure the flap on his holster was buttoned down tight before entering. The baron had more rules on sec than he did.
He knocked on the sheet metal covering the door, and an old woman pushed the heavy portal aside and let him enter.
"How is he?" Brandon asked, glancing around the huge room. The baron was holding court over some people from another island who were trying to buy more black powder.
"Bad, sir," the woman muttered softly. "Wife nineteen gave him another girl."
"Black dust! Did he let this one live?"
She shook her head. "Threw it into the sea himself."
Brandon heard the shift from a person to a thing. He couldn't blame her. The woman was trained to deliver children, not murder newborns. But the baron was set on getting a son to replace him when death finally came, or claimed that he would take them all to hell when he died. Nobody doubted the threat.
On a raised wooden platform, an obscene pile of flesh sat in an armless throne, wads of mottled flesh hanging over either side of the chair. Slaves stood attendant on both sides, with armed sec men in the corners, and a large crowd of people standing patiently before the pulsating mound of fat as he nosily guzzled from a cup of wine made from a spent 120 mm artillery round.
Baron Maxwell Kinnison was beyond repulsive.
His hard piggy eyes were sunk deep in a pool of fat, and a tremendous belly flopped over his gunbelt and quivered upon his unseen lap. His clothing was a mixture of Navy uniforms and bedsheets, and the checkered grips of predark revolvers jutted from his clothing in several locations. Hair grew in irregular tufts in his otherwise bald head, his face was a mass of open sores and the fingers of both hands were wrapped in strips of cloth stained black and yellow from the dried blood and pus.
His disease was called the red death. Some old healer once called it by the fancy name of leprosy. Kinnison was dying by pieces, and only massive amounts of jolt and alcohol helped him dull the pain enough to stay coherent. Any remaining sanity had disappeared years earlier. However, he was still the only person alive who knew the secret formula for making black powder, which was the very heart of their power over the lesser islands. No matter how many people wanted him aced, that secret had to be pried from the bloated whale first, no matter what the cost.
Snorting for air through his tiny nose, the baron took a whole chicken from the bowl of roasted birds alongside his throne and started to rip the skin off the white meat with jagged yellow teeth.
"My lord," Brandon said, advancing and snapping off a salute.
"Report," the baron mumbled, his mouth overflowing with food. Bits of bird fell to add to the vast collection of stains on his embroidered tunic.
"Pirates attacked another convoy headed for the western islands. I sank two, but couldn't find their hidden docks."
"Some escaped?" Kinnison shouted, bits of food spraying from his mouth. "Unsatisfactory, Lieutenant!"
"Indeed it is, my baron. Also the payment ship from Cold Harbor ville is extremely late. Almost two weeks behind schedule. I checked with their baron, and it seems that ship did sail on time. I found no evidence of trickery on their part."
"Better not," the baron muttered, tearing off another mouthful.
"My lord, there was a bad storm," a slim man suggested. "Mebbe a sea mutie got them. It has happened before."
Brandon scowled at the man, but kept his peace. Griffin was the baron's personal healer. He was always scrubbed clean, from his pointed beard to his soft leather moccasins. His clothing was plain, almost nondescript, and if he was armed, the blaster was nowhere in sight.
Swallowing the partially chewed meat, Baron Kinnison tossed away the half-eaten bird and picked up a fresh one. "That is a possibility, Griffin," he said, nibbling on the capon. "Or they may only be damaged and trying to make repairs on some uninhabited island along the route. How many do they normally pass, Lieutenant?"
"Twenty-four," Brandon replied, "if they follow the undersea rivers to make good speed."
"Too many to check." Kinnison frowned, then winced as if in pain. Reaching quickly into a pocket, he withdrew a vial and sprinkled a pinch of white powder into his brass mug of wine. He drained the container, the excess flowing over the rim and down his wattled cheeks.
"Better." He sighed in relief, then resoundingly belched and extended the mug. "More!"
Nervous slaves rushed forward to fill the brass mug from sealed glass bottles, and a terrified slave was forced at gunpoint to sip from the cup before the baron drank once more.
Politely most of the people in the throne room glanced away from the sight of their baron quaffing so huge a dose of jolt. As if on cue, a slave who was serving food to the visitors cast aside his plastic tray and shoved over a man from an island ville, the man's silvery belt knife now in his bony grasp.
"Die, pig!" the slave screamed, charging the throne, the steel blade raised high for a killing stroke. With blinding speed, Brandon pulled his weapon, but Griffin was standing in the line of fire. Damn the man! As the lieutenant tried to get around the obstruction, the armed guards in the room reacted instantly, the cross fire of their longblasters chilling two slaves and hitting the running man twice before he made it to the steps that led to the throne. Bleeding profusely, the slave staggered onward, then screamed in fury as he lunged forward with the knife.
Still sipping wine, Baron Kinnison calmly drew a sleek blue revolver from within the voluminous folds of his tunic and shot the assassin directly in the face, the flame from the barrel engulfing his features.
Gore went everywhere, as human
debris blew across the chamber. The shocked crowd could only stare as the mutilated body slumped toward the floor. Then Kinnison's revolver spoke twice more, blasting away chunks of the would-be killer before the corpse hit the granite floor. A bare foot twitched once, and the corpse stopped moving.
Taking aim, Kinnison fired three more times into the body, then tossed the empty blaster aside, only to pull another into view. "Griffin!" he bellowed.
"Yes, my lord?" the man asked, rushing closer. He knew the baron wasn't hurt, and asking would only anger the man more than he was. If that was possible.
"What ville was this man from?"
"Blackstone, on the Island of Flowers."
As the pain began to ease, Kinnison set aside his mug and scowled. Blackstone, what a useless place, only good for slaves, some meat animals and not much else. An island covered with flowers, few crops and no ruins or minerals. Even the fishing was bad.
"Triple the amount of their tribute for black powder over the next two seasons," he stated, tucking away the snub-nosed .44 Magnum pistol. The blaster had no range at all, but for targets under a yard away it was devastating. "If they claim to be unable to pay, fine. Tell them they're cut off for five seasons. When the ville falls, I'm sure the new baron will be much more accommodating."
"At once, my lord! And the body?"
"Throw it to the dogs."
Griffin bowed. "As you order, sir. Guards!" Two sec men stepped forward, took the arms of the dead slave and hauled him away. In their wake, slaves arrived with wet rags and started to wash away the blood.
"I'm so pleased you are not hurt, Baron Kinnison," a man said politely from the attending crowd. "And if I may take this opportunity, Tiger Shark ville is being constantly attacked by jungle muties and we are desperate for more black powder. Now we can offer you three ships of grain and fruit, instead of the usual two. But not until next year, so I was wondering—"
"Silence!" the baron roared, pounding a fist on the table full of food. "Your audience is over. Come back tomorrow."
Begging forgiveness, the group daintily stepped over the sticky trail on the floor on their retreat. When the last of them had departed, a sergeant bolted the door shut.
"Whiny bastards," Kinnison growled, reaching for another chicken. Then he stayed his hand, and incredibly lifted his imposing bulk from the throne.
"Come with me, Lieutenant," he commanded, waddling across the room with tiny scraps of food falling off his stained clothing.
Marching very slowly alongside his baron, Brandon followed the sweating fat man into a smaller room. Here the walls were lined with longblasters, hand cannons and even rapidfires. Covering an entire wall was a detailed painting of the Marshall Islands, every known landmass, island and atoll clearly noted. Some sections of the wall map were raised higher than others, layers upon layers of corrections lifting the features until it was almost a contoured relief map.
Casting a glance to his left, Kinnison frowned at a framed map of the archipelago, the ancient paper brittle and yellow. The two bore so little in common that the predark map was almost useless. How many new islands had risen during the nukestorm of skydark, while so many more disappeared beneath the boiling waters? There were no indications of any active volcanoes on the old map, yet now the volcanoes were the secret source of his power. The only known source of sulfur in the entire chain of islands.
"My world," the baron said softly.
"The whole world," Brandon corrected him. He felt allowed to speak such now that they were alone in the war room.
"Brandon, I have four wars going on in the western and southern islands," Kinnison said, tracing the areas on the wall with a bandaged finger. Flecks of dried blood marked the painted surface. "And the sea muties are rising early to the east. We lose those villes, and it's no beef and fewer slaves until we find some more fools to go live there again."
"We need more flash," the lieutenant suggested. "And aside from Cold Harbor, the only other source is Forbidden Island."
The baron stared at the small crescent island to the south of his domain. On the old map, it bore another name, but that meant nothing to him here in the present. "You volunteering to go there?" he asked, slightly amused.
"Fuck no," the lieutenant replied curtly. Then hastily he added, "Sir."
The baron allowed the discourtesy because he felt the same way. Nothing imaginable could ever force him to set foot on that rad-blasted hellhole.
"Didn't think you were that stupe," he admonished. "I have enough flash for a while, but the mills must have more, and soon."
"Can't risk using any of our own stores," Brandon said, thinking aloud. "It would weaken our defenses too much, and the pirates are getting bolder every day. At least we don't have any muties to fight on our home island."
"Not since my father slaughtered them twenty seasons ago," Kinnison agreed. The hairless giants with forked tongues were immune to fire and possessed inhuman strength. Incredible fighters, the last to die had sent his father on the last train west and made him the ruler of the world.
"I don't like this," Kinnison muttered. "Cold Harbor loses a ship just when we need their flash the most. This could be a trick of some kind. Weaken us, catch us off guard."
Reluctantly Brandon was forced to agree. "We could send a single ship to Cold Harbor and report to their baron that we found the wreckage of their cargo ship. We chilled the pirates who sank it, and now want our original shipment. Plus a bounty for the pirates."
"They can't refuse that," Kinnison stated, moving to the only chair in the room and gratefully sitting down. His leg was hurting again. "Yes, very good. We'll go with your plan."
"I'll need reinforcements," Brandon stated. "In case they refuse to pay or outright resist. One ship, far from home, and some coldhearts could night-creep us and steal the entire vessel."
Kinnison stopped massaging his sore leg. "Refuse!" he roared, his face contorting into a feral mask. "Refuse one of my sec men?"
"Or they could plead poverty," Brandon suggested hastily. The baron was becoming more and more violent. Perhaps the rot was spreading to his brain. That wouldn't be good. "You know the same old stories, that shipment was all they could spare, blah, blah, starving children, boo-hoo. Might even be true, but what do we care? Pay or die. That's the law."
"Blasted people might even be working with the pirates. They have a base somewhere, why not Cold Harbor?"
"That's true, sir."
"All right, take a couple of the windjammers and—" The baron scowled. "No, can't take any chances. Better take an armada, ten of the PT boats, fully armed with rapidfires, torps and Firebirds. Hide the fleet on a nearby island, and then go in alone to ask about the tribute. If they apologize and pay, take the flash and come home."
"If not?"
Kinnison sneered. "Then level the ville and put everybody in chains to work the mines. Afterward, ace the men and bring me the rest alive. The brats will become slaves, and I'll choose a new bitch to fuck."
The baron grinned lustfully. "Mebbe I'll finally get a son if I seed enough of the women."
Hiding his emotions, Brandon was pleased. The sec men would have the pick of the sluts once the fat bastard was exhausted. And the women would do anything the sec men asked, anything at all, to avoid the terrible bed of the baron.
"I'll leave on the morning tide," Brandon said, giving a salute. "I would like to sleep in a bed that doesn't move for one night."
"Acceptable," the baron said leniently. As with any valuable animal, a good master had to know when to beat his dog and when to pet. Too much one way and it became useless; too much the other, and it would turn and attack. "But I want you to leave before dawn, and return by the end of the week. I need that flash, Lieutenant. Get it, and do not fail me."
"Have I ever, sir?"
"Not yet," Kinnison grunted. "Which is why you're still alive."
Brandon said nothing aloud, but his eyes were smoldering pools of hatred as he marched from the room and down the lon
g corridor of the predark castle.
Chapter Eight
With Mildred and Krysty setting up sick bay, and Dean helping to raise the sails, J.B. stayed on the Constellation to cover Ryan, Jak and Doc with his Uzi while they retrieved their backpacks. The three men on shore then did a recce of the ville with some of the sailors from the ship to make sure that none of the slavers was still alive. None had survived the wrath of the women prisoners. Body parts lay strewed along the beach, the crabs scuttling among the dead, dragging everything they could into the shoals. High above, hungry scream-wings circled the ville, waiting until it was clear for them to join the bloody feast.
Suddenly there was a motion in the sky, and the scream-wings were gone, clutched in the beaks of golden condors. Then they were gone from sight.
Knowing the women would sooner believe Doc before the young sailors, Ryan had Doc invite the females on board as crew. Cowering in the empty houses, most of them laughed wildly at the suggestion and declared their intention to stay and make the deserted ville their own. The few who decided to board the ship, did so hesitantly, as if afraid to disobey.
Once they were back on board the Constellation, Captain Jones had O'Malley free the sea anchor and started to shout incomprehensible orders to Daniels at the wheel. The crew dashed about pulling on ropes and climbing like monkeys in the complex rigging above. Soon the great ship was moving away from the shore, then past the breakers and into the open sea. Now the mainsail was raised, the yards of patched canvas billowing taut as it caught the wind and the ship lurched forward with renewed speed, the waves breaking into white spray across her bow.
Standing at the port-side gunwale, the three men watched as the lush tropical island receded. Now the second island with its vine-covered mesa rose into view above the forests of the lower woody atoll.
"Any sign of the gateway?" Doc asked softly, glancing behind them.
"None," Ryan replied, squinting. "Nor the bridge."
"Good," Jak grunted. "Others not find."
"Hey!" Krysty shouted from the other side of the ship.
