Tale of the Thunderbolt (9 page)

He chambered the first round in his gun and lightly ascended the stairs to the open deck just behind the wheelhouse. As his head broke the level of the upper deck, he listened with “hard ears” to voices from the bridge.

“And when is this supposed to happen?” the captain said from somewhere on the bridge.

“Early in the morning, sir. The ship's power will be cut off, and that's when they'll take the ship,” Valentine heard a high-pitched voice say.

“It makes no sense,” Worthington's voice exclaimed. “They will be ashore by then, Grogs and marines, and Rowan will be with them.”

“Can't argue it, there's something afoot, that's for certain,” Saunders said. “Damn, there always was something about Rowan I didn't like. Haven't I said so time and again, Lieutenant?”

Worthington changed the subject. “I've already alerted the master-at-arms,” he said. “I didn't know which marines to trust. Dortmund is bringing an armed guard up now, and he's — ”

Valentine's worries cleared, as they always did when planning gave way to doing. All his questions were gone: it had become a matter of killing everyone on the bridge, and somehow holding the wheelhouse and upper deck through the coming confusion. The moon had disappeared below the horizon, leaving the ship lit only by the stars and its few running lights.

“Halt!” Valentine heard a voice boom from the bottom of the staircase. “Unsling your weapon, sir, and don't touch anything but the sling.”

He turned to see Dortmund, three sailors lined up behind him, pistols pointed up at him. While he had been concentrating on the bridge, Dortmund had reached the bottom of the stairs without Valentine noticing. Valentine thanked God that Dortmund hadn't shot first and questioned later. He obeyed the instructions, going so far as to crouch to put the gun on the stair below his feet, and readied himself for a leap —

— when the loud, deadly rattle of a machine gun roared from behind the sailors, filling the night with noise. Dortmund's men fell forward, jerking spasmodically as if swept off their feet by an electrified broom. The hard plinking sound of bullets ricocheting off metal stairs and walls punctuated the sound of the slugs tearing through flesh, a noise that reminded some part of Valentine's mind of eggs thrown against a wall. The four-petal blossom of the machine-gun's muzzle flare lit Post's snarling features as he fired the support weapon from his hip, using a thick leather strap to help him wield it.

One sailor went overboard with a cry; the others fell at the bottom of the stairs.

Valentine retrieved his own gun before they hit the deck. Blood had been shed, and his hopes of a simple seizure of the ship were cut down as brutally as Dortmund and his henchmen. He peeked over the edge of the deck above, only to be met by a burst of bullets that zipped out to sea past his ear. Worthington was no fool; he had armed himself before going to the captain. Valentine had to get down to Ahn-Kha and his Grogs, so he would at least have a nucleus of armed men to command.

The lights died, and Valentine felt a change in the ship's motion. The Chief had level-headedly proceeded with the plan upon hearing the firing above.

Valentine backed down the stairs and joined Post, where his lieutenant covered the starboard side walkway from the base of the stairs.

“What the hell happened?” Post said. “Where did Dortmund come from?”

“One of the ship's boys overheard something and went to the exec. We've got to get to the Grogs.”

The ship's public-address system squealed into static-filled life. “All hands, all hands, this is the captain speaking. . . .”

Valentine grabbed Post by the arm and pulled him into the stairwell leading into the bowels of the ship, almost jerking him out of his shoes with the force of his movement. Two shots rang out from the top of the stairway, cutting the air where they stood seconds ago, as Saunders's voice continued.

“. . . Captain Rowan of the Marines, Lieutenant Post, the Grogs, and an unknown number of others are attempting to mutiny. They are to be shot on sight. All hands to the aft deck, all hands to the aft deck.”

“Make a hole, damn it! Make a hole!” Valentine barked, exiting the stairway with Post in tow, waving his submachine gun to accentuate the threat as they pushed back sailors popping like magical rabbits into the narrow passageway. Somewhere around the T-junction corner ahead he heard Ahn-Kha's bellow, barking out orders in the Grog patois. The captain's voice continued to issue orders over the PA, including one to the dead Dortmund to report to the Oerlikon. An emergency light bathed the corridor in harsh shadows. Valentine turned a corner and caught sight of a knot of Grogs standing behind a small, bright spotlight pointed down the corridor. He shielded his eyes.

“Ahn-Kha, it's me and Post! Cut that light for a second.”

The two men hustled toward the improvised barricade.

A pistol fired from the darkness behind them, and Post grunted. He sagged against Valentine, who turned and fired up the passageway. Ahn-Kha leapt forward with apish agility, blocked the floodlight with his bulk, and put his mammoth arm around Post's chest. The machine-gun clattered to the steel floor, but Post gripped the strap as Ahn-Kha dragged him backwards. Valentine backed down the corridor, but whoever fired stayed safely around the corner of the intersection at the end of the hall.

He reached the Grogs outside the arms locker. Ahn-Kha had improvised a barricade of mattresses and a wooden door, which the muscular Grogs still worked to construct as they shifted a beam to let them pass. Ahn-Kha carried Post into the arms locker and gently stretched him out onto the floor. Valentine knelt beside his lieutenant, who had blood staining the undershirt across his chest.

Post groaned and coughed. “I can taste blood,” he said.

Valentine found the wound, high enough on his chest to nearly be at the shoulder. He grabbed a first-aid kit off the wall and found a compress within. He applied the dressing to the softly pulsing hole. Noticing blood on the floor, he gently lifted Post and found another hole opposite.

“Good news, Will. It went straight through.”

“Watch . . . out. The captain'll have the marines on you in a minute.”

“Most of them won't be armed. All they'll have are whatever guns are scattered in the ship.”

“Stern. He'll send men down the hatches.” Post was pale with pain, but still thinking clearly enough. His bravery gave Valentine heart.

“We've blocked everything off,” Ahn-Kha said from the doorway. “The Chief is welding the access hatches shut.”

A Grog hooted and fired toward the T-intersection forward. The shotgun blast sounded like a grenade explosion in the confined area of the metal passageway.

They heard a clatter around the shadowed corner of the T-intersection facing the barricade. Ahn-Kha knelt behind the mattress-shielded door, the pump-action in his hands looking like a child's toy.

“Mr. Rowan?” a voice called down the hall. “It's Partridge. I've got Went and Torres with me. What's happening, sir?”

Valentine exchanged a look with Ahn-Kha, and mouthed the word
marines.
“I don't have time for the whole story, Party. But everything the captain said over the intercom is true. Post is with me. We are trying to take the ship.”

“What're you talking to him for?” a voice said from around the right-hand corner of the intersection.

“Shut up, See-Pee. It's our officer,” Valentine heard Torres growl.

“You planning on going into the Blue, sir?” Partridge continued, ignoring the byplay.

“Something like that. It's a life away from the Reapers to any man who comes with me.”

“You move, and I'll shoot you down,” the unknown voice from the right side of the T-intersection threatened.

“Hey, what're — ,” Partridge began, but the sound of shots cut him off. Valentine heard four shots in rapid succession, and the three marines appeared in the corridor, Torres and Went holding the wounded Partridge between them. They squinted in the glare of the spotlight, holding up their free hands. Torres had a revolver in his, and Went a rifle.

“Bastards! You killed Delano!” someone yelled from around the corner as the marines approached the barricade.

Ahn-Kha plucked the wounded man over and bore him into the arms locker, and put him down next to Post. Valentine helped the other two. Torres followed Partridge, who had blood already soaking through the right side of his uniform.

“We're with you, Mr. Rowan,” Went, one of Valentine's deadeyes, said once they were safely behind the mattresses again. “When we heard the announcement, Party, he said, ‘Who'd you rather take orders from, Saunders or Mr.

Rowan?' I grabbed my match rifle, and Torres got Corporal Grant's pistol, and came to see what was happening. That bastard Delano fired first, sir, and we shot back. Everything's dark and confused. I heard firing forward. I think everyone's shooting at each other.”

“I'm glad you're here, Went. I want to be straight with you. This is not going as I planned. It's us, the Grogs, and the Chief and a few of his men. We're outnumbered about eight to one.”

The corners of Went's mouth twitched back into something that, if not a smile, was at least a wry grimace. “Leastways the guns are here.” He peered over the edge of the barricade. “They won't take me alive. I'm not going to get delivered in handcuffs to some Hood.”

The hatch to the generator room at the bottom level of the ship opened, and the Chief's face looked up at the assembled Grogs and men. “Tight as a drum, they're going to have to blow a big hole in the ship to get at us from down here. Captain's going to have an interesting time commanding the ship without engines.”

“Good work, Chief,” Valentine said.

Valentine heard a commotion down the hall and sought out the location with hard ears. The captain was speaking to someone, demanding a report. Saunders did not care for the answers, he began to yell. “That's all? And you let men
join
them?”

“They shot Delano, sir, and he had the only gun right then.”

“You've got a wrench in your hands — you should have bashed some skulls in with it. Out of my sight!”

After a moment, Valentine heard Saunders's voice raised again, this time projecting from somewhere along the starboard-side corridor.

“The attempt on the ship has failed, Rowan. You know it, and I'm sure it's starting to dawn on those deluded enough to follow you.”

“We're ready to wreck the engines, Captain, if we come to believe that,” Valentine called back.

“You're a dead man, Rowan, and so's your pet drunk. But I'm offering an amnesty to whoever turns you in. I'll hush all this up. Like it never happened, long as they frog-march you and Post out.”

Valentine looked over his shoulder; Torres and Went were both looking at him. He read doubt in their expressions, but whether it was doubt in him or doubt in the captain's promise he could not say. He slowly placed his gun on the floor, butt end pointed at the marines. “Takers?” Valentine asked softly.

Went blanched, but Torres just smiled and shook his head. Partridge groaned something from his position on the floor of the arms locker.

“What was that?” Valentine asked Torres, who knelt beside the wounded man.

“ ‘Tell Captain Saunders to go fuck himself,' ” Torres repeated for the wounded man.

Valentine picked up his gun. “We put it to a vote, Captain, and it's unanimous: Go fuck yourself.”

“You'll all bleed, you renegade bastards,” the captain swore.

“Tell me, sir,” Valentine shouted back. “What happened to the last captain that failed in a mission because of a mutiny? I heard Kurians ordered — ”

“By Kur, Rowan, I'll make it so hot for you, you'll wish you were in hell. I'll keelhaul you. You'll beg me to let you die, renegade!”

Torres disappeared into the arms locker and returned, scooting up toward Valentine with something in his hand. Valentine recognized the can-shaped object as one of the ship's grenades. “Play much pool, Mr. Rowan?” Torres asked, putting two fingers into the ring atop the explosive.

“Not my game, Torres,” Valentine whispered back.

“Can I try a two-bumper shot?”

“Be my guest.”

Torres pulled the pin and listened for the hiss. Valentine saw a thin wisp of smoke appear from the central fixture that held the fuse. The marine stood and, with a left-handed sidearm throw, sent the grenade spinning down the corridor, whirling like a gyroscope toward the voice of the captain. Valentine kept his head up long enough to see it bounce off the bullet-marked wall at the crossbar of the T-intersection and heard it hit again somewhere in the corridor corner leading to the starboard passageway.

There was just enough time before the explosion for cries of “Grenade!” and “Look out!” to be heard, before an orange flash lit up the corridor.

As the ringing noise faded from their ears, Valentine felt the sweat running down the skin over his spine.

“About time for the captain to try something really stupid,” Valentine predicted grimly, hearing voices yell back and forth from both sides of the intersection. He hated the thought of what was coming.

The captain obliged him. The loyal sailors and marines of the
Thunderbolt
tried to take the barricade with a rush. One of the machine guns from the upper deck appeared around the portside corner and began firing blindly toward the barricade. Valentine and Torres knelt behind the mattress-reinforced door, while the others took cover in rooms off the main passageway. Valentine heard the bullets hitting the door with a chunking sound, but the mattresses slowed down even the large-caliber shells enough so they failed to do more than dig into the solid wood.