Crimson Waters

by James Axler

  “Thanks for the offer,” J.B. said with a courteous tip of his hat, “but we’re going to have to pass.”

  Ryan and J.B. turned and ran to catch up with their companions.

  Chapter Eight

  “By the three Kennedys!” Doc exclaimed. “Stymied! So near and yet so far.”

  Krysty sighed. Even she, with her Deathlands-honed endurance, felt winded after their race through the darkened streets. They hid in a narrow alley between waterfront warehouses, examining the Sea Wasp Posse’s flagship, the Wailer. The clean-lined, gleaming-white ninety-footer was tied up to a stone jetty. A wooden gangplank fixed to the rail bobbed gently on the harbor swell.

  It also had a crew fully alerted by the ruckus in the ville. As evidenced not just by the angry-seeming sweep of its searchlight, but by the pair of alert-looking pirates who stood at the head of the gangplank, one armed with a remade AK, one with an MP-5. A bearded man with wildly bushy dreads crouched behind the welded splinter plate of a battered Browning .30-caliber machine gun, sweeping its perforated barrel back and forth restlessly like an insect’s antennae.

  Only a skeleton watch had been left aboard the motor yacht while the captain and crew enjoyed shore leave. But it was more than enough to cut the fugitives to bloody shreds if they tried to force their way aboard.

  And they were definitely being hunted. Krysty could hear shouts and curses a few blocks away. The pursuers had lost their trail. Furious pirates and sec men combed the ville street by street.

  “Here’s the plan....” Ryan said.

  * * *

  JAK SWAM THROUGH SHADOWED water with strong, inaudible strokes, keeping his arms and legs fully beneath the rocking surface. The vibration of the big yacht’s diesel engine stirred his guts.

  The Gulf Coast bayous where Jak had grown up hadn’t invited swimmers. They were full of aggressive gators with a marked appetite for human flesh, not to mention monsters even more scary and less natural.

  But Jak had grown up not just a hunter but a bandit, fighting against cruel barons. He had earned the name White Wolf for both his appearance and his savage cunning.

  Jak didn’t know if people swam in NuTuga harbor, but by the smell he doubted it. The Syndics could write all the laws they wanted; a harbor just naturally attracted junk and spilled fuel and all kinds of nastiness. Not that Jak cared. It wasn’t as if the bayous smelled like hyacinth blossoms, either.

  The key thing was that the jacked-up rump crew on board the Wailer was focused entirely on repelling boarders coming at them from shore. It seemed triple-stupe to him. But he wasn’t one to question an advantage.

  He had slipped into the water quickly and without a splash in the shadow of a stone jetty forty yards behind the yacht’s stern. First, he swam straight out and found the nylon aft anchor cable. It was slippery, slimed with algae. Even he could tell Silver-Eyed Chris was as finicky about his ships as the Syndic families were about their pirate haven. But, as with the harbor itself, it was extremely difficult to keep the sea’s vigorous nature from asserting itself.

  As slick as it was, the thick rope gave him hand- and footholds. He broke water without so much as a whisper of sound and slithered straight up.

  He was barefoot, dressed only in sodden jeans and a vest that held his throwing knives. His current favorite blade, a Cold Steel Natchez Bowie with an almost-foot-long blade, was clamped in his teeth.

  Along with his boots, he’d also skinned off the loose T-shirt he wore beneath the vest. When the Monitors had searched him for weapons, he’d simply swept the vest halves back, along with the jacket, while they peace-bonded his Python and the bowie in their counterbalancing holsters on his hips. They’d never seen the leaf-bladed throwers.

  Peace-bonding. What a triple-stupe idea. He had naturally busted the sealant caps and untwisted the wires the instant they were out of the Monitor patrol’s sight and none of his companions was looking. Ryan would’ve gotten hot beyond nuke-red, of course. But Jak reckoned it was easier to get forgiveness than permission.

  Cautiously, Jak lifted his dripping head to peek at the afterdeck. A lone sentry stood fixated on events ashore, either on the billows of yellow-lit smoke from the random blazes Jak had helped set in trash bins or storage shacks, or keeping watch for intruders rash enough to approach the yacht despite the spotlight’s actinic sweep and the powerful machine gun mounted in the bow. He was skinny even by Jak’s standards, emaciated almost, with a huge mass of dreads stuffed into a knit cap. He carried a hunting-style bolt-action longblaster slung butt-down, as if he didn’t plan on shooting it in a hurry.

  He was also remarkably tall, at least six and a half feet. It made no difference to Jak. He slithered over the rail, making no more noise than the sentry’s shadow falling on the smooth-stoned deck planks. He took the big knife from his teeth, then gathering himself, he sprang.

  Jak slammed against the man’s back, the protruding shoulder blades gouging him in the chest, the rifle butt of the longblaster cracking hard against the outside of his right knee. Ignoring the jab of pain, Jak pulled the man’s head back and stabbed the big bowie knife through the right side of the man’s throat, just forward enough to clear the spine. Then he punched outward with ferocious force.

  The man’s body’s convulsed. A great sheet of blood shot out of the ruptured throat, arterial spray from the severed carotid jutting into the air like ink from a frightened squid. Jak heard a great gurgle as the man tried to scream in terror and agony.

  But no cry came out. The blade had violated the airway as well as ripping through the cartilage of the Adam’s apple. Instead, the sound turned to a hideous bubbling wheeze as blood sloshed into lungs and belly.

  Jak continued to cling. Spasms racked the man’s body as if he were getting repeatedly kicked by a horse. They didn’t last long.

  The sentry dropped abruptly, as if his bones had dissolved within his gangly body. Prepared, Jak got his feet under him and braced when they hit the deck. The man’s deadweight was considerable. He let the man down easy, still making no sound louder than the blood splatting on the deck.

  The Sea Wasp would die of blood loss to the brain long before he could drown in his own gore. Jak’s throat slash turned the target off almost as quickly as beheading him would’ve done. Like any true hunter, Jak made it a point of pride to grant his prey the quickest, cleanest death possible.

  He rose to a crouch, shaking blood from the back of his left hand. Slipping a leaf-bladed throwing knife from his lightweight vest, he turned toward the square back of the yacht’s cabin. Faint light showed amber through the polarized glass. Engine rumbles vibrated up through his bare soles. Muted conversation and mellow chuckles sounded from inside the structure.

  He wasn’t particularly surprised by the strong odor of ganja smoke from the pilothouse. Silver-Eye ran a tight ship, but his pirates were only human. If his sentries were terrorized into staying straight, that was probably as much as the stone-hearted boss could ask.

  Jak slipped forward, cat-footing on bare feet.

  A door opened in the starboard side of the low, rakishly streamlined cabin. A head with thick dreads poked out in a cloud of marijuana smoke. He looked aft and saw the white ghost not fifteen feet away. He opened his mouth to scream.

  Jak’s right hand whipped forward. The throwing knife glittered in a dull arc to socket itself in the prominent Adam’s apple. The open mouth emitted a strangled gurgle that died in a rush of blood. The pirate fell.

  A horn commenced to wail from the pilothouse. Yellow light silhouetted the cabin as the Browning in the bow opened up in a thunderous stutter.

  * * *

  THOUGH THE .30-CALIBER BURST was clearly fired randomly, and raked the waterfront a good forty yards to the west, J.B. ducked instinctively behind the pile of stout casks at the corner of a warehouse.

  Behind him Mildred uttered a soft moan. “I hope Jak’s all right.”

  He grinned but said nothing. Of course the kid was all right; he had more lives t
han a cat and was harder to hit than a swallow chasing flies through twilight. Saying that was just her way of letting go of tension.

  Holding his fedora in his left hand, J.B. poked his head above one of the barrels that smelled strongly of whiskey, of all things. He saw the machine gun swinging his way. The pirate crouching behind the splinter shield, with only his legs visible behind the weapon’s columnar mounting, was blazing through a belt of linked ammo in a single long burst that would burn the barrel out directly if he didn’t ease off the trigger.

  J.B. hoped he wouldn’t do that. And not just because, as an armorer born as well as trained, he had a marrow-deep love of weapons.

  The machine gun’s strobing muzzle flame was brilliant yellow and big as a wag, stretching almost all the way to the stone dock. The burly weapon’s noise and blast were so ferocious that J.B. had to squint his eyes against their stinging impact.

  His lips skinned back from his teeth as the perforated barrel swept closer. He wanted to stay poised to make his move, but the jacketed .30-caliber bullets would rip right through the wooden walls of the warehouse to get him and Mildred, and shatter the barrel barricade like a giant hammer.

  He heard booming impacts as bullets began to rake the warehouse facade. Then the eruption of noise and fire cut off.

  Now J.B. heard the crack of Ryan’s Scout Tactical longblaster echo between the waterfront buildings through the ringing in his ears. It hadn’t been a long shot—perhaps a hundred, hundred and twenty feet, max—but in the dark, through a dazzling cloud of muzzle flash, Ryan had managed to hit the tiny sliver of brainpan exposed by the slit in the armor plate that protected the gunner.

  But that was Ryan all over. Steady.

  “Showtime,” J.B. said to Mildred, without looking over his shoulder. Cramming the hat back on his head, he straightened and stepped around the pile of casks. His left hand caught the short foregrip of his Uzi as he brought it to his hip.

  The two guards at the ship’s gangplank had their weapons up and were pointing them toward where Ryan’s longblaster had flashed. They didn’t fire. They were probably too disoriented by the abrupt explosion of events, and by the violent hammering of noise and blast from the machine gun, as well as its abrupt cessation.

  They got no more chances. J.B. cut them down with two quick bursts of 9 mm rounds.

  A man started to emerge from the cabin by the hatch. Firing past J.B.’s right shoulder, Mildred drilled the pirate through the forehead. He sprawled atop his buddy, who was still thrashing and kicking as he strangled on his own blood.

  Krysty and Doc bolted from the street to J.B.’s right, half a block west. Like a big night heron, his coat flapping like wings and long skinny legs pumping, Doc led the way up the gangplank. He could move like a young man when motivated. Krysty was hard on his heels. J.B. and Mildred covered them as they hit either side of the open hatchway. They dropped their packs to the deck and got ready to roll.

  A flash and crack went off on the other side of the long, low cabin. Another pirate had thought to go out that way. Fortunately, Jak had positioned himself to nail the man with his Magnum handblaster.

  For a moment Doc stood beside the cabin, his silver hair wild, a mad light blazing in his eyes. He held his huge LeMat wheelgun in his right hand and the sawed-off pump gun in his left. He swung inside the hatch, disappearing to the right. Fire flashed and handblasters boomed as Krysty wheeled in behind him and stepped to the left.

  J.B. raced up the gangplank, traveling its length in heartbeats.

  He covered left as he ran forward past the end of the cabin, but nobody crouched in wait for him. He let the Uzi drop on its sling and waved for Mildred to follow him from cover.

  As J.B. shed both his pack and Ryan’s, he saw her start toward the ship holding her handblaster muzzle-up. Mildred wasn’t fast, try as she might. She was also carrying Jak’s pack along with her own. At least she didn’t have far to go. As she started across the gangplank, J.B. kicked aside the dead pirate sprawled behind the Browning and took his place.

  A few seconds passed, then Ryan appeared, running flat out, his longblaster slantwise across his chest. As he headed west from the street, a mob of pursuers burst onto the waterfront behind him.

  Roaring in triumph, they leveled blasters at Ryan’s fleeing back.

  Chapter Nine

  The Browning’s receiver hadn’t cooled much, J.B. realized, but it would have to do. He swung the blaster around and cut loose into the pack of coldhearts. The bullets smashed them like bottles on a rail fence, but instead of glass fragments they spattered blood and random chunks of bone and flesh. A couple of pirates may have dodged in time to avoid having more holes put in their hides. It didn’t matter to J.B.; he was keeping his friends and himself safe, not chilling for its own sake.

  Ryan pounded up onto the yacht. J.B. moved the machine gun to the left. He blasted the opening of the alley where he’d hidden with Mildred a few moments before. Then, as Ryan raced into the cabin, vaulting the pair of pirate chills, he turned his attention to the street Krysty and Doc had emerged from.

  Even through the powerful vibration the blaster imparted to the deck through the mounting, J.B. felt the engine rev up. Mildred had gotten below and powered it up by hand. Krysty ran past to cast off the line tethering the bow to shore and winch up the forward anchor, or cut it loose.

  J.B. was in his element. It was a rare treat to get to fire a big old blaster like this, full rock-and-roll, with a big box of somebody else’s ammo to burn through. He swung the barrel back to scatter another group running up the street toward the gangplank.

  The armorer saw more shadows up the street and ripped off a couple of bursts at them for good measure. He saw Krysty drop the disconnected gangplank into the harbor and felt the diesel’s throb swell in volume up through his boots and shinbones and the Wailer pulled away from the dock.

  Glancing down, he saw that he had plenty of ammo in the can. This particular belt was near out, though. As if in response to his thought, Jak materialized and handed up the end of a fresh ammo belt just as the old one ran dry. As the spent links clattered musically on the deck, J.B. opened the big weapon’s feed tray and popped it in.

  He blasted up the waterfront as they pulled away. He gave special attention to the stone blockhouse of the Monitor station with its black-on-white flag flapping overhead. He mostly created a shower of black lava dust, although he thought a few rounds went in the shooting slits. A stray shot or two chopped the flagpole and brought down the skull and crossbones. Bonus.

  Keeping his focus soft so that any sign of major movement onshore would catch his eye, J.B. turned his attention to the smaller, stumpier yacht they were passing. He blasted it low in the stern, hoping to foul up the engine, if it had one, or at least the steering. Then, as the next ship came alongside, he did the same to it.

  J.B. became aware of people nearby. He let off the trigger for a moment to allow the barrel to cool. It wasn’t glowing yet, but the heat shimmer over it was plainly visible, distorting the lights of the ville.

  Doc had come to stand behind him. J.B. realized that besides the pilothouse, where Ryan was presumably steering the ship toward the harbor mouth, behind the Browning was the best place to get away from its terrible racket and side-blast.

  “You are not making any friends, shooting those other ships, John Barrymore!” Doc yelled, leaning close. Good call. His ear was ringing loud enough to beat a band, even though the blaster wasn’t currently going off.

  He laughed. “We aren’t likely to be visiting here again, anytime soon. Best to cut down on pursuit, I reckon.”

  The harbor shore curved out west, to the sea. Instead of running straight, Ryan followed the land, staying just outside ships moored to the docks, veering only enough to clear other vessels standing farther out. Krysty appeared as J.B. was blasting more anchored ships.

  He let go the trigger again. The receiver made popping noises audible even above the ringing in his ears as it cooled.


  “Ryan’s taking her close by the north edge of the harbor,” Krysty shouted. “He says he’s spotted a machine-gun emplacement there. He wants you to take care of it and discourage anybody from manning it.”

  J.B. winced. A heavy blaster like this one didn’t make an ace in the line target. Sure, a bullet through the vitals wouldn’t do a person any good, but the .30-cal, for all its strengths, wasn’t a precision instrument. A good receiver hit would jam a machine gun, and there was a dreamer’s chance of fouling the mount with a hit, so the piece wouldn’t traverse. But it was all a matter of strike or shit-out-of-luck; there was little skill in it.

  Then he shrugged. Ryan knew that, sure as he did. The one-eyed man would never be the weaponsmith J.B. was, but he did know his way around a blaster.

  Krysty clapped his arm and pointed northwest. On an artificial extension of the harbor edge, built out of broken lava rock, was a revetment of sandbags with a big blaster, a .50-caliber Browning.

  A blockhouse was set just inland of the blaster on the artificial spit. As J.B. swung the barrel of his machine gun that way, he saw figures break out and sprint across the brief intervening space.

  Though his own barrel had just cooled from a low, unhappy cherry glow, he dusted them with three quick bursts.

  “Give me a hand shooting, people,” he shouted. “If I melt this bitch down, we could be in a world of hurt!”

  His companions didn’t need more encouragement than that. Another figure darted from the blockhouse. Krysty cut loose with an AK she’d picked up from a dead pirate, and Jak banged out shots from a blaster he’d picked up. Doc lit off .44-caliber shots from his big replica handblaster, though the range was a good two hundred yards, and even Mildred would have had a hard time hitting a man-sized target at that range.

  The man went down, whether hit or scared J.B. didn’t know. It didn’t matter all that much. Then, an unpleasant thought occurred to J.B. He walked around the pintle mount, traversing his gun 180 degrees, toward the similar emplacement he feared was located a mile south. But his Browning was designed for long distances, spattering an area with lead instead of hitting targets with nail-driving accuracy.