“The beast must be armor plated,” Doc muttered to himself, drawing his LeMat from its position beneath his coat and bringing it up to take aim. With the attention of the creature focused on J.B., Doc had the precious few fractions of a second to take a better aim. As the creature reared upright—more in indignation than pain—at the impact of the Uzi slugs, Doc aimed for the head, discharging both barrels of the LeMat, so that the charge of shot was followed in rapid succession by the ball.
Doc had aimed for the gaping maw of the creature, having already registered that apparent thickness of its hide. If he could get his pistol to fire into the yellow-and-red maw, then it would tear into the soft tissue and do an endless amount of damage, perhaps even ripping up into the brain area.
Unfortunately for Doc, he misjudged the rise of the creature by a fraction, not surprising under the circumstances, but enough to deflect his original aim. Instead of the LeMat scoring a hit in the one known exposed area of the creature, the shot ripped across the left-hand side of the creature’s neck, tearing at the fur and causing small gouts of blood to shoot out at the point of impact. It made the mutie bear roar louder, its yellow eyes taking on a bloodshot tinge of red raw anger. The ball fared little better, embedding itself somewhere in the fur of the neck without seeming to do much damage… except to make the creature more angry.
In the time this had taken, the entire caravan had turned to the rear in order to face the menace. Ryan and Gloria had left their positions at the front, and were now headed toward the rear, blasters ready.
As other members of the Gate took aim and fired, it was obvious that the handblasters were useless against the mutie creature. Its hide was far too thick, covered in who knew what kind of armored and crusted skin in those areas where the fur still grew, for the smaller-caliber bullets of the handblasters to penetrate. Ryan had already unslung his Steyr and was raising it as he ran back, skipping between the tribe members who were trying to both meet the menace and also avoid getting in one another’s way—a problem that was very real in the enclosed space of their hacked path.
“J.B.!” Ryan yelled as he brought up the blaster. “I’ll draw it, you finish the fucker!”
Not pausing to see if the Armorer heard him amid the din of the enclosed firefight, Ryan stopped and planted his feet on the floor of the jungle, raising the Steyr and blocking out everything around, so that all he could see or hear was the mutie that threatened the column.
The one-eyed warrior loosed a round, aiming at the side of the creature’s head. From such an angle, he knew it would cause no great damage, but he hoped that it would be enough to draw its attention away from the rear of the column, and perhaps give his old friend the shot he needed.
The bullet drilled into the side of the bear’s head, tearing at its ear and making rivulets of blood run down into the fur, matting those parts not already matted by filth and pus.
The bear screamed in pain—the pain of an irritation rather than a mortal wound—and its instinct made it turn toward the source of this irritation.
Which was exactly what J.B. wanted. The creature was now at an angle to him, its head raised to its full height as it sought the source of the pain among the melee in front of it. For an all important fraction of a second, it was still and at the apex of its rise.
The head was tilted at a twenty-five-degree angle, the mouth open in full roar. J.B. could see the yellowed fangs and the red flesh of the mouth as though they were the only things that existed. He moved his body with a swift and sinuous movement, altering his stance so that his blaster was at an oblique angle to the creature. He had reslung the Uzi, and now held his M-4000, which he aimed at the exposed vulnerable area.