Rita Longknife--Enemy in Sight Read online

  Until he woke up the next morning to a woman screaming.

  Ed and Number Two were out of their bedrolls in a flash. Pistols in hand, if nothing else on, they raced to the next tent. There, a guy lay next to the shrieking woman.

  He grinned through an entirely new smile halfway down his throat.

  “Damn it, how could anything that big get in unnoticed last night?” was the unanswered question posed to no one by Calico Jack as he joined them, his night’s companion at his side, also naked, but with a rifle in his hands.

  Ed scowled at Calico.

  “You didn’t mention that these big fellows could get around that quietly.”

  “This is the first time it’s happened in a guarded fort.”

  “If they’d picked the next tent over, that could have been me,” Ed said, suddenly feeling a lot more vulnerable than just from the insect-like things buzzing his naked skin.

  A couple of shots rang out.

  Ed and Calico looked at each other.

  Then several assault rifles went to full rock and roll.

  “Oh, shit,” Calico whispered, and as one, the four of them turned back to the open commons.

  It was a bloody mess. Big fellows lay everywhere. Some dead. Others moaning and trying to drag their large bodies away from the slaughter.

  “What the hell happened here?” Calico demanded.

  No one said anything.

  “Something happened here,” Calico shouted. “Somebody better start talking or I’ll take my knife to the lot of you.”

  “Th . . . that . . . that one tried to run,” a young gunner stammered. Ed recognized him. He was from the Queen Anne’s Revenge. He’d come down on the same shuttle with Ed.

  Where’d he get the gun?

  “I was told to stand watch,” the kid said, explaining how a sailor had ended up with a gun. “That one didn’t stop when I shouted ‘halt.’ He just kept going. He was trying to escape.”

  “That one?” Calico said, pointing at one very dead big one. “The one next to the food box?”

  “That’s a food box?” The kid’s eyes got wide, but at least his rifle was now pointed at the ground.

  “Yeah. It took us a couple of days to realize they ate that crap,” Calico Jack said. “I don’t think they really like it,” he told Ed. “But when they’re hungry enough, they eat those kinds of yams. Yes, kid, he was going for his one meal of the day.”

  The kid was turning whiter shades of white. He dropped his gun, barrel down, into the mud.

  “Okay, that says why one of them got dead. How come they all are?”

  “They charged the wall,” a middle-aged woman said, her gun carried easily by its sling around her neck. “They all charged the wall. It was kill them or have them go over. I guess they panicked.”

  “And maybe we did too,” Calico said, eyeing all the trigger-pullers with smoking guns. “How many of you just got down here last night?”

  All but two or three raised their hands.

  “Maggie?” Calico said, raising his voice.

  The middle-aged woman shrugged, but kept her gun pointed at no one . . . and all of them.

  “The troops down here needed a good night sleep, so I put the new kids on the watch. Hell, Jack, in a day or two they can go back up to orbit and enjoy some rest. Us down here aren’t getting a lot of sleep.”

  “Damn,” Calico Jack muttered. “Maggie, you put a bunch of dumb shits on the watch. No wonder we got this.”

  “You didn’t tell me not to.”

  “I didn’t say that you could.”

  Again, Maggie shrugged. “So, what do we do with the bodies?”

  Calico grimaced. “Make sure they’re all bodies. Then pile them up and burn them. We can’t have the ones at the other forts knowing about this. And hell, we can’t have the ones in the jungle any the wiser, either.”

  There was a whistling sound. Ed looked up to see a huge rock sailing through the sky. He gauged its flight, and stood his ground.

  It smashed into a tent. There was a brief scream from someone who’d managed to sleep through the morning’s racket. A very brief scream that quickly died with finality.

  “Where’d that come from?” Ed demanded, and then moved aside. A second one tumbled to the ground where he’d been standing, bounced, and rolled into the tent with the slit throat.

  A woman screamed and others ran to help her. She had to be dragged out. Her leg was twisted in a way no leg should be.

  “Get her to the medic,” Calico ordered. “And watch your heads!” he added tersely as another rock slammed into a now empty tent. Everyone was up now.

  “Where are these damn rocks coming from?” Ed demanded.

  “Damned if I know,” was Calico’s only answer.

  “Revenge, come in,” Ed said to his commlink.

  “Number Three here, boss,” came in an eager voice.

  “You know what fort I’m at?”

  “I got you located, boss. We’re overhead. Sorry I can’t beam you up.”

  “Bad joke, Number Three. Someone in the jungle is tossing rocks at us. Can you spot them?”

  “Give us a minute, boss. Yeah, that’s your grinning face. Boss, you should have washed up. You got something in your teeth.”

  “Worse joke. Tell me you got who’s tossing rocks at us.”

  “Oh, watch out. One’s coming in.”

  Ed looked up. The rock wasn’t headed anywhere close to him, but across the square, several gunners and pikes made space for it.

  “Yep, I got them. Stupid looking thing, boss. They’re using ropes to pull at trees.”

  “Laze them.”

  “Give me a minute, boss. It ain’t like we’re not playing with ourselves while the cat’s away.”

  “Laze them,” Ed repeated.

  Off in the distance, the air got hazy and, suddenly, there was an explosion and trees flying every which way and a fire breaking out.

  “There’s more of them, boss.”

  “Hit ’em,” Calico Jack said over Ed’s shoulder.

  “Do it,” Ed said.

  “Doing it, boss,” and another explosion and more flying trees and fire.

  They didn’t have to ask for the third or fourth shot.

  “I think that’s all of them. At least that we can make out from here,” Number Three reported.

  “Good job. Advise the next ships in orbit what you did. Things are changing down here.”

  “It sure looks like it.”

  Ed turned to Calico Jack and raised a questioning eyebrow. Jack turned to Maggie. “Get your best troops together and get out there and clean up this mess. I want to know how they’re throwing rocks around.”

  “I’ll get right on it, Jack,” she said, and turned to several hard-looking gun types. “Get the maggots out of bed, and sober or not, we’re going for a walk in the jungle.”

  “Not that place,” came from one, but she was already turning to shout orders to a couple of others who rounded up more gunners and pikes and got them moving toward the gate.

  “What do we do?” the space pirate who’d started the whole mess asked plaintively.

  “Well, you can get all your fellow tourists,” Calico Jack said, “pile these bodies up and burn them. Then, if you have any time left, you can pan for gold, though I’d suggest that at least half of you keep your guns up and eyes on the jungle. Mind you, I’m not telling you to, but I’d strongly suggest it.”

  Calico was as aware as Ed that pirates didn’t take orders well. Today, it looked like Jack’s suggestion was carrying the power of law. Those not forming up to assault the jungle turned to, piling up big bodies and hunting up gas to start the fire.

  Once they torched the pile, the stink was enough to drive everyone out of the fort. Even those headed into the jungle with the bloodthirsty leaves seemed relieved to get away from the stink.

  “What do we do?” Ed asked Jack.

  “We, me bucko, get our tired asses back into town. If they can toss rocks in
daylight and sneak into camp to slit throats at night, I think we need to rethink our priorities. Mind you, I’m not telling all you other captains what to do, but if we aren’t willing to look to our own defenses before gold digging, I’m getting my ass and all the asses following me the hell out of this place.”

  “You’ll be behind me,” Ed said.

  Calico Jack organized a well-armed convoy. Ed’s Number Two gave him a quick kiss and headed for one of the gun trucks. She slapped in a 500-round magazine, pulled the arming bolt back on the machine gun, and set an intent look on her face.

  She was very good in bed, but she did like blowing shit up.

  The drive down river was only slightly faster, though a whole lot bumpier.

  As they approached the third fort, they came across three gunners lounging on the bank and a dozen big fellows wading in the river shallows, panning. The gunners took one look at the convoy and stood up.

  One of them approached Calico Jack. “You look like death on a stick, if you don’t mind me saying so, Captain.”

  “We’ve had trouble up river,” Jack said.

  “We heard the explosions. Saw the fires.”

  “Then you should have known to be more alert,” Calico said.

  “A fellow can’t stay on his toes all the time.”

  “Now might be a good time to see how long you can.”

  The gunner eyed Calico, then glanced up river where the smoke was still billowing. He turned back to his mates. “Okay, crew, let’s keep alert. Just cause yesterday was boring don’t mean today will be.”

  The other two eyed the convoy, then the smoke, then one of them turned to search the jungle not five meters from them. The other eyed the big fellows. Some of them had noticed the smoke. No doubt they’d heard the explosions if the gunners had.

  One of them waded a bit deeper out into the river. Dug up a pan full of gravel, sluiced it about a few times, then galloped for deeper water and dove.

  The big fellow didn’t make it. A machine gun cut him near in half. Ed looked back to see Number Two grinning over her sights.

  “I knew that one was going to make a go for it,” she said.

  “You got him good,” the senior local gunner said.

  “You better get the next one,” Calico Jack said. “We’re heading east,” and so saying, gunned his rig onward.

  The crew they talked with must have had a commlink. When they got to the third fort, its walls were already manned with alert guards, walking the ramparts. Others were moving out to reinforce the guards watching the aliens pan for gold. Even some of the sailors that had come down to do their own panning were being handed guns or pikes and seemed to be taking them on with a will.

  It was noon as they rolled into town. The impact of the morning had arrived ahead of them. Guards were out, overseeing big ones hacking back the jungle. Others were digging out a moat and building up a wall. No doubt, the shooters on that wall would have clear fire lanes.

  Calico Jack took them right up to what they’d identified as the governor’s palace, next to the fortified treasure house. Made of mud brick like the treasure house, it had a high ceiling made of long tree trunks. It was divided up into several smaller rooms around one great room with a long plank table. There were three-legged stools around it. Jack considered it the governor’s palace because it was large and mud brick with lots of gold and silver plate lining the walls. Of computer terminals or comm stations, there wasn’t one in sight. Interesting.

  Several captains were already waiting for them.

  “What happened?” “What’s going on?” “How bad is it?” were only a few of the questions that greeted them.

  “Come inside and we’ll talk about it,” Calico said, and stormed in the door, through the hall and into the vast meeting room. He knew just where the liquor locker was and had it open and a bottle of rum in his hands in no time. Only when it was half empty did he turn to those behind him.

  “Take a seat. This is going to be a long meeting,” Calico Jack said, and the captains did as he suggested.

  “We got problems,” he said, and told them of his morning. “Ed was up there with me. It was his Revenge that blew their little jungle sling shots to hell.”

  Captain Edmon Leher nodded in affirmation of the story.

  “How could one of those big lugs tiptoe into one of our forts at night with guards out?” Captain Huzi demanded.

  “Was it one of them or one of us?” asked Grace O’Malley, who’d just come down for some R&R.

  “Good question,” Ed said. “It kind of got exciting around the old fort after that, so I can’t say that we really did much of a job investigating the little knifing. Still, the gal in the bedroll next to the guy seemed to be truly put off by the whole affair. It didn’t exactly look like she did it herself.”

  “But how didn’t she know the guy next to her was being knifed?” Huzi shot right back at Ed.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Calico Jack said, “I don’t rightly care whether she knifed him or he knifed himself, the problem is those big fellows out there. The ones we have aren’t nearly as docile as they’ve been making out to be. One tried to run already this morning and got shot down.”

  “He’s not the only one,” Grace said. “We’ve had several reports back this morning of runners. Those explosions up your way, Jack, could be heard all the way down here. They may not have been as loud as they were there, but we heard them. And if my eyes aren’t lying to me, the big fellows are whispering among themselves a lot.”

  “Can’t we stop that?” Billy Maynard asked. “Shoot any that does?”

  “That would be all of them,” Grace said, dryly.

  “Maybe we need to shoot them all,” came from somewhere down the table. Ed didn’t see who it was that tossed that ugly dog on the table, but once there, it just laid there. No one said yes and no one said no to the proposition.

  “You want to do all the sweating to get the gold out of that damn river? We’re getting nothing out of that mountain of silver up there. Not a damn thing,” Billy pointed out. “And as for where they got the jewels, nobody seems to have any idea. We’re sitting on a fortune and it’s just laying out there in the mud.”

  That did get a lot of grumbling agreement.

  Calico Jack’s commlink buzzed at that moment. “Yes,” he snapped. The rum seemed to be having its effect. Jack was a nasty, roaring drunk.

  “Maggie here, boss. We’ve found what was tossing the rocks in the fort.”

  “What was it? They build a catapult or something?” Jack asked.

  “No. It looks like this damn place grows them.”

  “Huh?”

  “There’s this tree. It’s one long trunk with some nasty stuff on the top, but it bends in the wind a lot and that’s how it tosses its rocks. Not really rocks but big seed kind of things. Well, these bastards had ropes on the thing. One pair pulls the head down, the other pulls the middle from the other way. One group lets go, and then the other. The tree comes whipping back up, the honking big seed gets tossed loose. They can hurl that damn seed a long damn way, boss. The seed not only is heavy, but it’s got thorns all over it. You don’t want to be on the receiving end of this thing.”

  “Even the damn trees can kill us. This planet is hell,” Captain Huzi muttered.

  “The trees can kill us with these big fellows pulling on the trees with ropes,” Ed snapped, then took two deep breaths and spoke calmly. “Maggie, how many bodies did my Revenge leave for you?”

  “It’s hard to say. There is this fire burning around here, but most of it has burned out. I’d say we found twenty dead big fellows. There’s a pretty big trail where the others ran off. Boss, you want me to trail them?”

  “You think you can catch them?” Calico asked.

  “They’re running. We’re gunning. I don’t see a problem. Besides, if we run into trouble, we can always holler for some of those damn lasers in orbit.”

  Calico looked around the room. Heads nodded.
/>   “Go after them. Maybe if we kill them all, the others will get it through their thick heads that it’s a really bad idea to cause us trouble.”

  “I’m on it boss. See you tomorrow. Maybe the next day.”

  Calico looked around the room, his face hot, his eyes burning. “Double the guards on everything. Double the watch tonight. Get that wall up and people on it.”

  He paused, then turned to Ed. “What about using the lasers in orbit to cut back on the jungle? Get it burning and any of those damn slingshot trees cut in half?”

  “That sounds like a good idea,” Ed agreed, and made the call.

  Five minutes later, the heavens opened up and the fire fell from it. Across the river from the town, the jungle began to burn.

  “That ought to teach those bastards,” Calico Jack said to Ed Lehrer. He started on his second bottle of rum.

  Ed left Calico getting dead drunk. He and Number Two took the next shuttle up. If they were going to slash and burn the jungle, they’d better do it to a plan.

  13

  General Ray Longknife watched as a the 1st Guard Battalion broke into four companies and marched aboard the waiting heavy cruisers. Rita had outdone herself.

  The waiting ships weren’t just heavy cruisers, they were four of the just completed Astute class. Completed too late for the war, they’d gone directly into mothballs.

  Now, Rita had command of four of them and their 9.2-inch lasers.

  “God help anything that gets in our way,” Ray said, grinning from ear to ear.

  “Amen,” his wife answered.

  “How’d you manage this?”

  “I asked for them,” she said, simply. “I asked for them and then sent out a call for any of my old pilot officers who weren’t knocked up or making milk for their youngster. Despite what you men claimed, most of us girls in uniform did know how to keep our panties on and weren’t just dying for the war to end so we could jump in bed with you.”

  “I’m glad you were,” Ray said, and covered any leer with a chuckle.

  Maybe he didn’t do as good a job as he’d thought. She slugged his arm.