Ryan nodded, turning to the others. “Might as well holster the blasters, friends. Saves the bastards taking them away from us. But keep your hands close.”
“That is well done, One-Eye. If you had not done that, then I would have come out alone and fought you all and taken away those impure toys and thrown them into the shit heap. So, you have behaved with wisdom.”
“Thanks,” Ryan said laconically. “You ready to come out and show yourselves?”
They heard a single barked word of command.
Jak whistled under his breath as the pine woods around them seemed to come to instant life. Ryan’s joking estimate of two hundred men ambushing them was suddenly not at all funny.
At a quick count, Ryan made it well over a hundred, and he wondered about the iron discipline that had kept them silent and patiently waiting. Most were what he guessed to be ordinary foot soldiers for the local baron, wearing identical crimson blouses and baggy white pants, with thonged sandals on their feet. Half a dozen of them carried huge rectangular banners on bamboo poles, with Japanese lettering on them.
All carried long daggers or short swords, and most held the enormously powerful bows, each with a five-foot arrow notched and ready.
A few also carried the “impure” firearms.
“Semiautomatic New Nambu 9 mm,” J.B. stated. “Interesting. Eight rounds. Based on the old U.S. M-1911 pistol.”
“What’s the rifle?”
“It’s a 7.62 mm NATO blaster. Twenty rounds. Safety selector on the right, above the trigger. Safe, single-shot and full-auto. Comes with a tripod. No, a bipod. Looks like they’ve all been well cared for.”
Ryan was more interested in the small group of horsemen who had walked their animals out from under the trees.
They were dressed much like the samurai that they’d already encountered in Deathlands, with horned helmets and full body armor. None of them carried blasters, but they all wore long swords on the left hip and all of them had the long bows, ready strung, fastened to their ornate saddles.
The horses were stocky mountain ponies, all wearing slatted armor across their chests and with rich silken blankets covering their flanks.
The leader of the warriors heeled his animal forward, stopping about twenty yards from the group of outlanders, scowling down at them.
“Two women, a white-haired boy, an old man, a weakling with glasses and a leader who has only one eye. What can you know of otoko no michi ?”
Ryan grinned pleasantly. “Well, if we knew what that was, we could tell you what we know of it.”
” Otoko no michi . It is the manly and honorable way of the samurai.”
“Then I guess you’re right. We don’t know diddley about that stuff.”
The scowl deepened. “You find all of this risible, do you, gaijin ?”
The man had a slight problem with pronouncing the letters l and r , and Ryan struggled for a moment to try to work out what was being said.
“Risible,” Doc prompted. “Means he wonders why you think it’s all funny.”
“Yeah, I just got it, Doc. Thanks.”
He turned to the leader of the Japanese mini army. “We don’t think all this is funny. Absolutely not.”
“You came through the gateway?”
“Sure. But we never expected to end up here in Japan. No control over the way the gateways make jumps.”
The man didn’t try to hide his disappointment. “You do not understand how it works?”
“No.”
“Honto desu ne?”
“Wants to know if you’re telling him the truth,” Mildred mouthed.
“Since the skydark time and the long winters, all records have been lost,” Ryan said.
” Hai, hai, wakarimashita, wakarimashita .” He shook his head. “I should not speak in our language, which you cannot comprehend. I was saying just that I understood what you said.”
“But you’ve been making jumps out of here into Deathlands, haven’t you?”
“That is possible.” It was as though a mask had dropped, veiling the man’s eyes.
“You said that your baron was offering us his hospitality,” Ryan said. “We’re tired and hungry, and would very much like to accept his generosity.”
The leader of the samurai was obviously having difficulty in trying to decide just what his attitude should be toward the alien invaders. Should he treat them as enemies, peasants or honored guests? It was safer and would run less risk of losing face if he was cautious.