lover was likewise crouched, her Glock 18C blaster looking especially futile clutched in her white hands. Her hair had retracted itself to a tight scarlet cap on her skull.
He felt the vibrations of the hull through his boot soles change. At the same time the growl of the Diesels grew louder and slightly higher in pitch. Trace had ordered full throttle. Her husband was doubtless belowdecks now, babying the powerful marine engines to keep them churning at maximum power. Ryan could feel the propellers straining to drive the vessel and the burden she towed faster. But there was no way to give hundreds of tons jackrabbit acceleration. Their accumulation of speed would go painfully slowly.
And the pursuing vessels already had a speed advantage, even though their steam engines were powering them against the Sippiâs sluggish but immensely powerful flow. If this was a race, they couldnât win it.
And if this was an artillery duelâwell, Ryan thought, the Queen was nuked, as the tug had no artillery. Accommodations were tight aboard the tubby vessel as it wasâhe and his companions slept on deck, when weather permitted, as fortunately it had most nights theyâd been on the Queen. And every pound counted when your entire living was based on hauling cargo. The Conoyers could have mounted a black powder cannon, but they chose not to.
Even if they had, they would have been outgunned. The enemy cannoneers hadnât yet hit the lumbering tug, but it was a matter of time.
Something cracked above Ryanâs head. He ducked even lower, instinctively. The crack was repeated, slightly less loud.
I know that song, he thought. Someone was firing a blaster at himânot a charcoal-burner nineteenth-century replica, but a smokeless-powder high-powered longblaster.
The longblaster shots, in their way, concerned him more than the cannonade. Most black powder cannon werenât rifled, and therefore werenât accurate, even though a metal ball weighing just a couple of pounds could do a shocking amount of damage to a body. While most blaster-shooters werenât particularly accurate, either, there was always the chance that their pursuers would have a marksman in their ranks.
On the other hand, the Queenâs complement most definitely did. And his name was Ryan Cawdor.
He laid the Steyrâs foregrip on the rail and sighted through the low-power Leupold variable scope. He didnât need much magnification to confirm what he already suspected: the weird, dully metallic stuff covering the oncoming boats looked that way because it was weird and metallic.
The vessels had been covered, at least up front, in plates and pieces of scrap metal.
âJ.B.,â he called. He didnât take his eye from the scope. âGet over here. Iâve got work for you.â
The attacking vessels were steaming in a V formation, with the lead boat on Ryanâs right. As he panned his scope across the vessels, he noticed activity on the bow of the one to his left. Men were swabbing out the barrel of their blaster with what looked like a wet mop and probably was, so that the fresh charge of black powder they were fixing to put in wouldnât cook off the moment they inserted it.
Ryan sighted in on the nearest gunner and drew a deep breath. As the sight lined up he let half of it out, bit back the rest and squeezed the trigger.
The carbine bucked and roared. Automatically Ryanâs right hand left the rear grip to work the bolt, jacking out the spent case and slamming home a fresh cartridge from the 10-round magazine in his longblaster. The empty brass clinked off the deck boards and rolled out one of the scuppers, which was a shame, since the things were valuable for their metal, even if they were bent or otherwise unable to be reloaded. But spilled blood wouldnât go back in the body, either. All that mattered to Ryan now was lining up the next shot.
As he expected, the four-person crew was hunkered down and frozen in place. A brighter smear on the improvised-armor plate above them and to the left showed where Ryanâs bullet had hit and knocked away a path of rust the size of his palm.
Also as expected. Like any master marksman, Ryan knew pretty well where a bullet would go when it left his longblasterânot an option except in aimed fire, of course. Though neither the Yazoo nor the Sippi were exactly racing today, the interference of their currents meeting did cause some chop, which in turn made the Queen wallow in a not-entirely-predictable way. But it wasnât hard to compensate for the motion. And while she was still turning to starboard, into the bigger riverâs flow, the enemy ships were coming pretty straight on, and not fast, either. That meant Ryan didnât have to lead his target much to speak of.
The second shot wasnât perfect, either. Because of the Queenâs motion he still pulled slightly off, though he reckoned the shot would take the swabber in the right shoulder. When the scope came back level, Ryan saw that his target was out of sight, and the short, skinny kid whoâd been just to his right was spattered with red and visibly freaking out about it.
The other two shooters dived for cover behind the armored rail, which unlike the Queenâs wooden hull would reliably stop most bullets, possibly including his pointy-nosed, high-powered, 7.62 mm full-metal-jacket slug. It depended on the hardness of whichever chunk of scrap he happened to hit.
A quick examination showed all four boats carried but a single bow blaster each. It also showed a shocking bright flash of yellow fire from the one on the left-most craft, followed by a vast gout of smoke that instantly began to blow back over the hunchbacked, ironclad shape of the cabin in the breeze of its passage, as well as overboard in the crossing wind.
This time, the projectileâs moan punctuated with a shattering crash from somewhere astern.
âIs everybody fit to fight?â Ryan shouted. He still kept his eye to the glass. He was getting an idea.
âEverybodyâs fine,â J.B. replied, crouching at his left side. âThe shot blew a section of the starboard rail to glowing nuke shit, just aft of the cabin.â
âReckon you can hit anybody with the Uzi at this range?â
A beat passed while J.B. considered that. Ryan continued scrutinizing the closing craft.
âBe easiest firing single shots, with the folding stock extended, like she was a big fat carbine. I could hit one of those boats, anyway, Iâm pretty sure, but wouldnât promise anything more precise. Nor even how much damage a round would do if it hit somebody at this range.â
J.B. paused again.
âBut I reckon you mean full-auto?â
Ryan grinned behind the Scoutâs receiver.
He actually sensed the Armorerâs shrug. Perhaps because he knew the little man so well. They had been best friends for years, ever since theyâd served together in the war wags headed by the enigmaticâand legendaryâcharacter known only as the Trader.
âReckon I could bounce a few off theirâ¦what? They got some jury-rigged armor, donât they?â
âYeah and yeah. Iâm about to throw a real scare at them. I want you to make sure they get the message.â
Another loud noiseâthis one was definitely an explosion, though without the terrible sharp sound and shockwave of high explosive. Immediately the hand-cranked siren
