Crosswind

by Steve Rzasa

  “And you’re part of this special party?” Cope asked.

  “No. I…I don’t know what that means.” Winch stirred his potatoes as he stared at the plate.

  “Well, make ready anyway, “Cope said. “It could prove useful.”

  Winch had a retort in mind but footsteps pounding on the floor interrupted. Jesca bolted to their table. “Oneyear’s back!”

  Oneyear stormed into the barroom. He had shed his stolen uniform in favor of a white shirt and black vest and pants, and he had a pistol riding in a holster on his belt. “Peace Branch is on their way here. I finally found a place to hide the motorwagon, but I stumbled onto a pair of officers a few blocks back. Had to shoot my way past them. We’d better find a place to make our stand.” Oneyear patted the holster.

  “Hey, there, now, there’ll be no gunplay in my establishment, wakarimasu ka?” Saburo inserted himself between Oneyear and Winch. He glared a long ways up at Oneyear’s impassive face.

  “Kinda need our guns if Peace Branch tries to invite us to their precinct,” Oneyear said dryly.

  “It’d be best if we just slipped out the back. Correct, Mister Sakei?”

  Saburo frowned. “It’d be best for my business, that’s certain.”

  “Perhaps we don’t need weapons.” Jesca gave Winch a disconcerting look full of expectation. “Winch, what you did at the precinct, when Beam had us…”

  “I don’t know if it will happen again, or even how it happened in the first place.”

  Jesca was crestfallen. Oneyear glanced between the two of them, finally settling his gaze on Winch.

  “It’s a lengthy tale, big fella,” Cope said. “Don’t push him.”

  More motorwagons slowed outside. Winch could hear their flash steam engines settle into a waiting rumble.

  Saburo went to the door. He let loose a colorful string of words Winch had never heard before, but judging by the glare on his face, they weren’t complimentary. “Peace Branch, three wagons full. There’s a dozen men out there!”

  A rumble of discontent rippled through the crowd in the Saber’s Blade.

  Oneyear turned, gun in his hand and a snarl on his face. “They’ll be in for a tussle if they try to take me from the Allfather.”

  “Easy, there.” Cope patted him on the arm. “Tuck the firepower away, and let me handle this.”

  “You?” Jesca asked.

  “Well, don’t everybody act so surprised,” Cope said sourly. “I do happen to have a plan.”

  “And what does that require?”

  Cope unleashed what Winch figured was his most daring, most dashing grin yet. “It requires, dear Jesca, a single kiss.”

  Winch heard shouts outside. Where to run? Cope gestured toward the rear of the barroom, and Saburo nodded. There was a lone empty table off to one side.

  Cope sat down. Jesca sat opposite him, with Oneyear by her side.

  Jesca frowned at him as Oneyear slid his seat closer. Cope shook his head, looking disgusted. He pushed on Jesca until she and Oneyear were shoulder to shoulder. He said something Winch couldn’t hear over the din of the bar patrons who were oblivious to the ruckus, to Oneyear’s gun waving, to Saburo’s worried looks out the window, and to the arriving corps of Peace Branch men shouting outside. Oneyear draped an arm around Jesca.

  “Attention!”

  Winch was halfway through the crowded barroom when Captain Beam’s voice cut through the banter like the sound of a hammer in the wilderness. “Peace Branch officers.” Beam stood inside the entrance, in front of the bar. His voice was loud, firm, and utterly pleasant. “Put your hands were we can see them, and keep them empty.”

  Winch froze amidst a group of men sharing beers. He turned his head ever so slightly, enough to see Beam, ten Peace Branch officers in matching black suits and red ties, and a very riled Sergeant Taube complete with two black eyes and a bandaged nose.

  “You heard the man!” Taube waved his gun, a black Klaus revolver.

  All conversation in the bar skidded to a halt. The whisper of hands rustling against cloth filled the air.

  Saburo was all smiles. He extended his hand. “Gentlemen! Welcome to the Saber’s Blade. Dingo! Get these men some drinks and let’s have a round of ale for all the customers on the house!”

  Cheers went up, drowning out whatever it was Taube said next. Several of the men crowded the bar in the rush to obtain a fresh glass. Taube shouldered his way through the crowd, shouting obscenities both varied and colorful. He headed right for Winch but so far hadn’t seemed to notice him.

  A louder voice cut over the chatter. “And I say you best keep your blamed hands off her!”

  Winch spun to look. It was Oneyear. The burly man shoved to his feet. His chair careened backwards into another bar patron. Cope was the target of the burly man’s sudden fury.

  Cope had his arm possessively around the Jesca’s waist. She didn’t look unsettled.

  Winch’s blood pumped as, for one dark second, he suppressed the urge to cross the crowded room and punch his brother. But the wink that Cope slipped in his direction held him firm.

  “Oh, really?” Cope said theatrically. “And why don’t we just let her decide who’s home she’s going to?” With that, he twisted Jesca to him and kissed her square on the mouth.

  Jesca’s eyes went wide with astonishment but only momentarily. She soon snaked her arms around Cope’s neck and closed her eyes.

  A raucous cheer went up from the men nearby.

  Winch could not believe it. This had to be simply Cope’s plan. Wasn’t it?

  Oneyear howled with outrage. He planted both hands under the edge of the table and heaved it aside. Glasses crashed, and ale splashed. The table banged to the floor and rolled in a quarter circle. Its trajectory brought it into contact with a drunken man’s shin.

  “Oy! Watch what yer doin’!”

  Cope pushed suddenly away from Jesca. She screamed, quite realistically. Oneyear aimed a sloppy punch at Cope’s head and missed. Cope stepped in and shoved the bigger man over backward. Right onto the table behind him.

  This time, the cries from the crowd were nowhere near laudatory. Three men pulled Oneyear up, but before they could retaliate, he executed a much sharper series of blows that sent all three reeling.

  “That’s enough!” Sergeant Taube’s voice sounded odd, as if his nose were pinched shut. “Boys, get in there and clean up.”

  The Peace Branch officers pushed their way through the crowd.

  The barroom erupted into a massive brawl. Winch ducked an ale glass that whirled by his head. It dripped on him in midflight. He figured it had been recently emptied. He ducked and rolled across the floor in what was intended to be a smooth evasion. Instead he struck his back on a chair leg.

  Jesca dragged him up. “Don’t just lay there!” she hissed. “Get us out of here!”

  “With what?”

  Cope threw a punch that knocked a man into a chair. Both collapsed. “Tarnal skies, Winch, work your way to the door!”

  Peace Branch police shouted warnings. Those went entirely unheeded. Taube leveled his gun at the ceiling for what Winch supposed was a warning shot. But a fist caught him square in the nose. Oneyear’s fist, to be precise.

  Winch edged his way through the crowd, pulling Jesca by the hand and elbowing people aside. He dodged blows not meant for him but coming perilously close to injuring his person.

  Cope planted his elbow squarely in someone’s face then grabbed another man by the lapels. He yanked him across the floor, letting his weight carry him right into another man advancing with a knife.

  Krump!

  Winch looked back to see Jesca standing with a dented tankard over a limp form. She winced.

  Suddenly the door was right there, and Beam was less than eight feet away. He saw Winch, and his eyes plainly telegraphed cold fury. He raised both his hands.

  Saburo applied a half-full bottle of ale to the back of his head.

  Beam’s eyes rolled and he sagged to th
e floor.

  Saburo hoisted the broken bottle high. “Shori! Now you owe me for some of my finest!”

  “On our tab, good fella!” Cope tossed him a salute.

  • • •

  There were plenty of motorwagons available in the street.

  “Jesca, you and Oneyear take a different route to the aerodrome than us,” Winch said.

  “Right.” Jesca bit her lip. “I think the north road from the Old City should suffice.”

  “You don’t worry none, gents.” Oneyear smiled. “I’ll get us there.”

  “Good fortune.” Cope shook his hand, then turned to Jesca. “Jesca…I…”

  She grabbed him and kissed him.

  Oneyear whistled low. “Better get going.”

  Winch waited a moment. He listened nervously to the bellows of rage and pain, the crashing glass and breaking furniture, echoing forth from the Saber’s Blade. “Ah, Cope? Shouldn’t we best be going?”

  The pair separated. They stared at each other. Cope opened his mouth twice to speak, but nothing exited.

  Jesca patted him gently on the cheek. “Go.”

  Cope did.

  Winch and Jesca exchanged smiles. “Be safe,” Winch said. It was the best he could come up with.

  Jesca kissed him on the cheek. Oh, blue skies. His face felt like he’d stuck it in an open furnace. “Be careful, Winch.”

  She got into a dark blue motorwagon with Oneyear. Winch stared as it spun in the street and rumbled off.

  He joined Cope, who was sitting behind the wheel of a brand new wagon with no roof. The vehicle was bright red. Cope’s customary grin greeted him. “Come along now, brother.” He gunned the engine for effect. It echoed loudly in the street. “I’m dying to give one of these a spin.

  Winch had barely sat, and made sure both rucksacks were secure, when the wagon shot forward like a bullet from a Keach gun. “Branter spit!”

  “Ha! You’ve said it!” Cope jerked the wheel, sending the motorwagon careening around a corner. Steam sprayed behind them like snow in a blizzard.

  Bells clanged from somewhere back on West Commonwealth. “Peace Branch?” Winch asked.

  “Most likely!” Cope squinted at the odometer on the wagon’s dashboard. “Huh. Forty-five. Not too bad for something without wings.” He yanked down on a lever. The engine shifted tones into a higher pitched, faster growl. Steam hissed from the tailpipes. It thundered down the road. Cope cranked the wheel to avoid a cart piled with potatoes. Someone yelled angrily. The sound flew past Winch’s ears. “Sorry!” Cope called. Then he grinned sidelong at Winch. “Not really, you know.”

  “I reckoned.”

  More clanging. Winch spotted two Peace Branch motorwagons skidding around the corner of West Commonwealth onto this road. What road was this? He should’ve consulted his map.

  “Any thoughts on getting us back to the main gate, Big Brother?” Cope gripped the wheel. His eyes never left the road. A truck loomed ahead. Cope zipped the wagon around it like it was nothing more bothersome than a pothole.

  “I’m working on that.” Winch rummaged through the rucksack and nearly lost the whole thing out the side of the wagon as Cope sent it careening around another corner. “Skies, Cope!” Winch held onto the map and the bag with a death grip. “My boys drive their bicycles with greater care.”

  Cope snorted. “You’ll kindly notice I haven’t crashed.”

  “Yet.” Winch folded the map into a useable portion that showed the Old City.

  “You just navigate, and let me fly!”

  The sound of distant cracks punctuated their argument. Winch ignored them and read the map until something banged into the car. He spun around. There was now a hole big enough to accommodate his thumb dug deep into bright red paint. “Cope, they’re shooting at us.”

  “Typical reporter, bringing me nothing but bad news.” Cope patted his holster. “Would you care to shoot back?”

  “No.” Where were they? Winch spotted a sign for McCarthy Street fly by. Ah. And a delicatessen named Samson’s. That put them on…Baumgartner. “Stay on this one. It will take us back down to Straight Street. Then turn right to get to the gate.”

  “This one?” Cope jabbed a finger at an approaching intersection.

  “No, not yet!” More gunshots. Winch ducked his head involuntarily.

  “I’m becoming a mite cross with them.” Cope’s right hand ducked to his holster. He drew his gun, leveled it upside down over his shoulder, and fired.

  Winch made himself as small a target in his seat as possible. Keep us unscathed, Allfather. “I don’t think you hit them.”

  “Wasn’t really trying to, Winch. I mostly wanted to dissuade them from getting too close.” Cope flicked the lever on his gun and fired again. The ’wagon swerved to the right, its front wheel banging off a sidewalk.

  “Maybe you’d best put that down for now.”

  “I won’t argue that.” They sped past another intersection. “It wasn’t that one, was it?”

  “No. Two more.” Winch dug around his bag. “Where’s my gun?”

  “Ah, pretty sure Peace Branch didn’t put it back in your bag for you, Winch.”

  He blushed. Oh. Of course.

  “Here.” Cope passed him the levergun. “It has four shots left. Be a good sibling and reload, will you?”

  Winch turned in his seat and rested the gun on the jouncing body of the motorwagon. Not such a good idea. He tried steadying it by leaning on his elbow. Worse.

  More gun shots buzzed by. “Looks like they have carbines!” Winch hollered. He fired two shots. The levergun bucked in his hands worse than a cat that didn’t want to be picked up.

  “Just as well. Here’s our turn.” Cope poked him. “Turn around.”

  Winch did. They were approaching the intersection with Straight Street rather quickly. And there was a lot of traffic, mostly motorwagons, a few men on branterback, and diprotodons stomping along with their carts in tow. “Are you planning to slow down?”

  “Not very much.” Cope cranked a lever. The ’wagon’s engine practically bellowed. A needle by the steering wheel tipped near the red zone. The boiler temperature had spiked. It raced toward the intersection. “Hold on tight, and try not to fall out.”

  Winch obeyed.

  Cope veered the car sharply to the left, into the oncoming lane. They shot between a pair of motorwagons whose drivers honked irately. Their ’wagon roared into the far left side of the intersection and kept going.

  Winch stared in shock as branters howled and scurried from their path. Motorwagons screeched to a halt all around. ‘’

  They were nearly to the other side of the intersection when Cope yanked on the brakes and wrenched the wheel so hard that Winch thought he might break it. He scowled and gritted his teeth.

  The ’wagon’s tires skidded and shrieked. Smoke and steam filled the air. Winch was disoriented, and closed his eyes. His stomach went in four directions at once, none of them good. When everything righted itself, they were pointing the correct way on Straight Street. The gate was just a block away.

  “Wahoo!” Cope slapped him on the shoulder and grinned hugely. “Great skies, that was a thrill!”

  Winch nodded numbly.

  The pursuing Peace Branch cars raced right through the intersection. They didn’t match Cope’s turn, apparently. Behind them, Winch heard squealing brakes and a chorus of horns.

  But the gate was still ahead. And Winch despaired when he saw that it was closing slowly. Two militiamen were at the crank that controlled the mechanism. He couldn’t hear the grinding of gears, but he imagined he could feel the vibration through the street.

  “Now what?” Cope slowed the ’wagon’s headlong rush.

  Winch flipped through ideas in his mind faster than pages in a notebook. That was when he saw the truck waiting at the gate—the truck from which two more militiamen leapt. It had crates in the back. Stamped with the blurred black word AMMUNITION.

  Winch’s hand acted before he
could acknowledge the thoughts behind it. He jerked back on one of the levers, and their red motorwagon growled full-speed ahead.

  “Winch!” Cope seized his arm. “I’m not one to usually begrudge a man his want for speed, but this isn’t the time!”

  “It is!” Winch shouted back. He jerked the rucksack over his shoulders. “Keep us steady to that truck! It’s loaded down with ammunition and should make for quite the show, provided we have enough fuel on us.”

  The gate and the truck grew rapidly in Winch’s vision. Militiamen scrambled out of the way. The crack of carbines firing broke through the rumble of the ’wagon’s steam engine. Winch and Cope ducked.

  “And what now?”

  “We jump.”

  Cope stared at him. “Jump?”

  Winch nodded. He poised himself by the edge of the ’wagon. Oh, dear. That pavement rushed by faster than an aeroplane’s prop spinning.

  “You know, I think I might just be a bad influence on you.” Cope got his own rucksack on and took his gun back from Winch.

  “I reloaded.”

  “Thanks much.”

  They were close now.

  “Jump!” Winch cried.

  Cope went first, with a howl that faded quickly.

  “Forgive me for my insanity, Allfather.” Then Winch pushed off.

  Pavement rushed up to reach him. He covered his face and tucked in on himself. For a blissful second, the cool, rushing air and muffled sounds—shouting, the blast of gunfire, the retreating rumble of the motorwagon—held him in their embrace.

  Then his body hit what felt like a wall, except that he went rolling over and over and over on its impenetrable surface. He was certain, if he survived this, that his skin would resemble one tremendous bruise.

  He slammed ingloriously into a barrel of water, and the air went rushing from his lungs.

  Winch pried his eyes open in time to see the motorwagon, driverless and steadfast, collide with the back of the ammunition truck. It crumpled and burst apart, casting metal bits and wood frame and that lovely red paint finish skyward and streetside. The impact shouldered the truck into the gap between the gates, slamming the front end up against one of the massive wooden doors.