“The Magus isn’t gonna let us quietly slip away after what we just did to his plans,” J.B. commented. “He never lets things like this slide.”
“The carny chillers are going to regroup and come after us, that’s for sure,” Krysty said.
“We can’t count on the ville folks for any help, either,” Mildred quickly added.
“They don’t understand what happened in the tent. All they saw was us shooting first, without provocation. They don’t know what we saved them from. And there’s no way to tell them now. They’re going to be as eager to blast us to pieces as the roustabouts.”
“In a situation like this, as far as the locals are concerned, every outlander has a target on his or her back,” Ryan said.
At that moment, blasterfire barked at them from the top of the berm. Well-concealed and well-protected shooters lying prone along its ridge sent a volley of bullets smacking into the sides of the tent, forcing the companions to scramble for cover.
There was no telling to which side the attackers belonged.
And under the circumstances, it didn’t matter a nukin’ damn.
J.B. and Jak put up covering fire, spraying the face of the berm with buckshot and Magnum slugs as they all ducked inside the protection of the tent entrance.
“Is it okay for us to be in here?” Krysty asked Mildred. “Aren’t we going to get poisoned?”
“Very little of the gas got loose,” the black woman said. “And what was released has been diluted by the volume of air in here. It shouldn’t hurt us, except for maybe minor skin rashes and burning eyes.”
“It might be safe to breathe in here, but we can’t stay,” Ryan said. “We’ve got to make our break, and we’ve got to make it now, before the other sides get themselves organized.”
“Mebbe they are already organized,” J.B. speculated. “Could be those shooters along the berm out there are set up to herd us into an ambush.”
“That’s a chance we’ve got to take,” Ryan said. “We’ve lost the element of surprise, and that was our only advantage. We’re way outnumbered and way outgunned. The folks who live here can defend themselves against the looters. But all we can do at this point is beat a fighting retreat. We’ve got to get out of this ville.”
“And we sure can’t do it on foot,” J.B. added. “The rousties will run us down in minutes with their wags.”
“Our only hope is to steal a fast one and roll out of here in it,” Ryan agreed.
“If we can, we’d better find a way to disable the other wags before we take off,” J.B. added. “Otherwise, all we’re doing is changing the location of our funerals.”
Ryan drew a broad circle in the dirt with his fingertip. “Tent,” he said, marking the entrance with a slash. “The shortest route to the wags is to the right, past the rows of sideshow trailers, over here.”
“If I was planning an ambush,” Mildred said, “that’s right where I’d set it up. With hard cover for my shooters from the berm and the trailers, and the targets caught out in open ground between.”
“Sounds like we’ve got to go the other way, then,” Krysty said. “The long way.”
“That puts us in plain sight of the ville and whatever’s happening there,” J.B. said.
“From the sound of it,” Ryan said, “everybody in Bullard is pretty well occupied. Let’s just hope they stay that way.”
“What about Leeloo?” Dean asked his father.
The little girl stood beside Dean, her back straight, her eyes unblinking, her crown of daisies slightly tilted.
“He’s right, Ryan,” Krysty said. “We can’t just leave her here with all these chillers on the loose.”
“We’ll find a way to get her safely back to her people,” Ryan said. “But first, we’ve got to deal with the shooters from the top of the berm so we can circle around the other side of the tent.”
“I draw fire other way,” Jak said, already moving in a blur.
“Jak, wait!” Ryan cried, reaching for him.
Too late.
The albino slipped out of the tent, his Colt Python raised in his fist. No sooner had he vanished than a torrent of slugs slapped the wall of the tent in the direction he had fled. The direction of the mutie menagerie.