Jem was on the metal-ribbed floor, his left hand grab-bing at the screaming lips of a gaping wound that opened up his neck. The carotid artery had been severed by the keen edge of the panga, and blood was flooding out in great pumping jets. His mouth was open, and he was trying to cry out.
Chrissy was also down, half on her side, struggling to get up. There was a purpling bruise on her left cheek, and a thread of crimson was worming from her nose and swollen lips. “You fucking…” she began.
What caught everyone’s eye was what the man and the woman wore on their right hands. Glinting in the poor light with a lethal sheen, the contraptions were made of smooth, dark leather, tight fitting. Each fingertip carried a sliver of curved steel, like a miniature razor, no more than three inches long and a half inch wide. Used to-gether, they were a terrifying weapon. The open sections of their belts made it immediately obvious where the bi-zarre blades had come from.
From the moment that Ryan Cawdor lashed out at the woman with his elbow to the realization of how close he and Jak had come to losing their lives took no more than five beats of the heart.
J.B. broke the moment of stillness and shock. “Pour it on them,” he snapped. “Chill ’em all. Every one of ’em.”
Jak tugged the hand brake on, leaped from his seat and started to blast out of the side window with the Magnum.
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Both girls eased back the blaster slits and began to fire into the waiting group of men. Then there was the cav-ernous boom of the Le Mat as Doc Tanner triggered the scattergun, vomiting lead into the faces of the nearest of the squatters.
Chrissy was scrabbling at the metal floor with the steel fingers, striking sparks in her insensate rage. Her eyes were wide open with the crazed lust to kill Ryan, who stood by his seat, staring down at her.
“Fuck you!” she grated. “How did you know? Heard us putting on the snickers?”
“No.”
“Then, how the…?”
“Goodbye,” Ryan said, drawing the SIG-Sauer P-226 and squeezing off a single round. The bullet hit Chrissy between the eyes, kicking her skull back against the floor of the wag with an echoing thud. Her head bounced once, then rolled to one side as she died.
It wasn’t much of a firefight-not from the point of view of the twenty or so squatters waiting outside for Jem and Chrissy to betray the strangers and deliver them into their tender hands. The ob-slits opened and the muzzles of blasters came peeking out, spitting fire and lead.
J.B.’s mini-Uzi and Ryan’s G-12 decided the battle almost before it had started. Thirty-two rounds of nine-millimeter stingers flew from the Armorer’s machine pis-tol. The Gewehr fired a burst that sounded like tearing silk.
The gang of assassins was ripped to pieces by the awe-some firepower of the two blasters.
Ryan didn’t very often like firing the caseless auto-matic rifle on continuous burst, but he couldn’t take a chance that the squatters might be able to take out their tires and then burn the wag. It wasn’t fully protected like
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a proper war wag and was vulnerable to a concerted at-tack by determined men.
“Hold fire! Gimme a chill count. J.B.?”
“Seven certain, three or four more down.”
“Krysty?”
“Agreed with J.B., plus two close in by the wheels. Both head shot.”
“Lori?”
Immediately Ryan grimaced, knowing from previous experience what the girl’s reply would be. “A lot chilled. Serve the cannies right.” Lori couldn’t count all that well.
“Doc? How many your side?”
“Pistoled four or five with a single shotgun round, Ryan. Two dead, maybe three.”
The running total made it sound like at least a dozen of the squatters had been perma-chilled, allowing for the couple on Jak’s side of the big wag’s cab.
There was a burst of firing from Doc and Lori’s side, bullets pinging like heavy hail off the rough arma-plate. The defenders immediately started to reply, both blasters making light, flat sounds.
“Some running!” Jak yelled, frantically winding down his window to get a clear shot at the fleeing men.