“And me,” another voice said. A slender figure emerged from behind another shack, his body swathed in white linen folds. Intense ruby red eyes stared out from an unnaturally pale face. The satin finish of the six-inch-long barrel of his revolver reflected the sun in dancing pinpoints.
“Me, too,” another voice added, this one with a husky yet undeniably feminine lilt to it. A sturdily built dark-skinned woman sidled into view, a long-barreled pistol held in a two-fisted grip.
“And last—and perhaps the least, though that is purely subjective—is my humble self.” A skinny, silver-haired scarecrow of a man stepped into the street, the hollow bores of his double-barreled blaster fixed on them like hollow, dead eyes.
J.B. made a casual move as if to adjust his clothing, and an Uzi connected to his neck by a lanyard appeared in his right hand.
The Incarnates were surrounded, outflanked by unwavering blaster barrels. They stared in disbelief, in something more than disbelief. They were shocked into speechless immobility.
J.B. indulged in a low, laconic chuckle of self-congratulation. His hurriedly concocted plan to divert the helmeted men while his friends went out the back of the storage building and took up positions around them had been accomplished very smoothly. Knowing that Krysty’s Smith & Wesson and Dean’s Browning Hi-Power were trained on the so-called Incarnates from inside the building made him feel even better.
“This isn’t necessary,” Horus squawked. “We mean you no harm.”
“Right,” Jak said, his single word heavy with irony.
“You’re sec men,” Ryan stated. “Sec men for Hell Eyes.”
All six of the Incarnates visibly flinched at the last two words.
“Heresy,” Khnum bleated. “We are the servants in the city of truth, sworn to serve the First Kingdom and the glorious dynasty of Akhnaton.”
“A glorious dynasty,” Horus interjected, “you are invited to play a part in its destiny.”
“Not a very significant part, of course,” Anubis said, “but it’s far better than being left out of it altogether.”
Ryan wasn’t sure if the dog-headed man was serious or trying to defuse the situation with sarcasm. Nor did he much care at the moment. “Take off those helmets,” he said sharply. “Drop your giggers.”
The Incarnates didn’t move. Anubis said, very matter-of-factly, “That we will not do. You will put up your arms and come with us. You will not be harmed. My word of honor on it.”
The arrogant, self-confident tone sent prickles of anger rushing through Ryan. “Do what I say, or I’ll chill you where you stand. My word of honor on it.”
The V of the slim rod in Khnum’s hand shifted slightly. Ryan blinked as a puff of wind tossed a pinch of grit into his face. In the tiny tick of time before and after the blink, Ryan’s eye registered a flash of light, like an errant reflection of the sun.
The shock of the blow, which wasn’t just a physical impact, picked him up, flung him back and bowled him over. He fell as limp and cold as a corpse to the sandy ground.
Before his body had fully settled, the air shivered with a scream of rage from Krysty, followed a shaved fraction of an instant later by the ear-knocking report of her handblaster.
The .38-caliber round fanned cool air on the right side of J.B.’s face as it drove from the doorway behind him and struck Khnum in the center of his bare back. The ram-headed man flailed forward, as if he had just received a kick, a small, blue-rimmed hole sprouting in the hollow of his spine. The bullet exited just above his pelvis in a splattering welter of scarlet liquid ribbons and blue-pink intestinal tissue.
The metauh shafts in the hands of the Incarnates flicked back and forth, spitting little white flares of light. Doc twisted his lean body in a painful contortion as a thread of miniature lightning passed very close by him. He squeezed the trigger of his Le Mat, and a clump of deadly 18-gauge grapeshot ripped into the flat-muscled abdomen of Set. His lower torso flew apart in a greasy explosion of blood and bowels. The snake-headed man went over backward, bent double, voicing a very unreptilian howl of agony. The silver rod spun from his hand.