“They can’t steer the ship,” Doc said softly.
“Good enough for me,” J.B. grunted.
Still not liking the odds, Ryan glanced at the others. Krysty and Doc nodded, Mildred cocked back the hammer on her revolver, Dean jacked the slide on his semiautomatic, Jak gestured and a knife dropped into his palm. He agreed with their decision.
Standing into plain view, Ryan started to shoot.
Chapter Five
Doc was a heartbeat behind Ryan. Leveling the LeMat, the scholar walked onto the beach firing his blaster. The .44-caliber hand cannon thundered flame and smoke, and a coldheart left the ground, flying backward for a yard before landing sprawled on the ground, his chest an ugly mess of bones and organs.
The chained sailors stared in wonder, while the shocked coldhearts hastily tried to draw their weapons. A few clumsily attempted to reload the flintlock longblasters, ripping open pouches of black powder that spilled onto the beach and was carried away by the blue waves.
Firing with every step, Doc strode among the slavers, bodies bursting from the impact of the soft-lead miniballs. Mental images of his own time of captivity flashed before his eyes, and the gentle scholar killed with ruthless satisfaction.
Meanwhile, the other companions opened fire from behind the cover of the broken wall, but J.B. stepped into view and triggered a spray of 9 mm Parabellum rounds at the slavers on the beach. Caught in the act of loading blasters, their riddled bodies tumbled into the surf, but amazingly the chattering of the submachine gun froze everybody into a tableau. Then the captives wildly cheered, and the coldhearts dropped to their knees.
Switching the selector pin to the shotgun chamber on his pistol, Doc paused at the bizarre surrender. What had just happened here?
“Rapidfires! It’s the lord baron’s sec men!” a slaver cried, dropping his flintlock. “Forgive us, masters!”
“W-w-we didn’t know this ville was under your protection!” another said, cringing in the bloody sand. “I humbly beg pardon for our actions.”
“Sirs! We are freeborn!” a chained man shouted, raising a fist in spite of the heavy links. “They branded us as slaves to sell!”
“So it would seem,” Ryan said in a low and dangerous voice. The Deathlands warrior was starting to understand what was happening. The locals had black-powder weapons, while the sec men of the baron in charge had automatic blasters. “Release the prisoners by order of the lord baron!”
Hesitantly the slavers started to obey, but many were whispering among themselves as they fiddled with the locks. The surf carried away most of the conversation, but Ryan still heard a few words.
“… so where are they?”
“No tattoos anywhere…”
“Are they really…?”
Taking advantage of the temporary peace, Krysty went to the table and cut the bound girl free. Weeping her thanks, the teen joined the other young women, clutching each other in terror. Krysty moved behind the table for protection, and with her hands out of sight, quickly reloaded her revolver. Doc joined her, his hands purging the spent chambers of the LeMat and reloading.
“How long?” he whispered.
“Any moment,” she whispered.
The sea breeze shifted the thinning smoke from the burning houses in the ville away from the beach, leaving them all in clear sight.
“Shit,” Jak muttered, leaning against the broken wall.
As the chains came off the sailors, the men fell upon the corpses, retrieving their clothes and weapons. Dean and Mildred meandered close by and took position near the roaring fire.
Lining the gunwale of the ship, men stood with flintlocks in their hands, uncertain of what was happening on shore. Removing a half-spent clip to insert a full mag, J.B. noted the stubby black barrels of cannons now jutting from the side of the sailing ship. Ryan had played a good turn, but the slavers were getting wise, and the situation was turning bad fast.
Summoning some courage, a large bald slaver walked from the crowd and directly addressed Ryan. “Sir,” he began respectfully, “are you…are you sec men of the lord baron?”
“Yes,” Ryan lied.
“Then where are your tattoos of rank?” The bald man seemed suspicious, his vision flicking from weapon to weapon, the avarice in his gaze painfully obvious.