Starfist: Hangfire (39 page)

Dean shouted as a half-eaten piece of fruit bounced off his shoulder.

"Steady, steady," Pasquin muttered. More fruit, half-eaten sandwiches, even a shoe or two, pelted them from the galleries. The corporal laughed. "We can take this for another six months."

A third jackal suddenly skittered into the arena.

It was 11:44.

"Uh-oh, that one hasn't been fed this morning," Claypoole said.

The beast hobbled forward, snarling. The crowd cheered wildly. The three Marines arranged themselves in a tight triangle and faced it. As soon as it lunged, Pasquin stepped backward quickly while Claypoole and Dean attacked it from the flanks, banging their swords on its snout. A look almost of surprise came over the thing's face as it reared back to get away from the pounding. At that moment Pasquin lunged forward and plunged the tip of his sword into one of its eyes. The jackal skreeked shrilly and shook its head. Dean and Claypoole closed in on it from the flanks and, holding their swords in both hands, rained fierce blows on its head. The blades were too dull to cut but the heavy blows opened its hide and blood spurted out. Dean managed to close the thing's other eye.

Blinded, the jackal whirled about and staggered off toward the other two, which jumped on it and began tearing it apart. The three Marines withdrew and reformed their little group, panting and catching their breath. The spectators went wild.

It was 11:48.

"What the hell's going on?" Noto Draya rumbled. He and Ferris, their aides and guards, sat in the emperor's box. The two capos were decked out in purple togas fringed in gold; golden coronets graced their heads. They drank wine from silver goblets and puffed on Davidoff Anniversarios No. 1.

"They won't last a lot longer, Noto," Ferris said. He held out his goblet and a nubile serving girl poured more wine. He laughed. "Man, they disposed of my librarian in no time at all!"

Draya laughed "Hey, sorry to hear about Johnny and that bitch, Juanita. Goddamned women are more trouble than most men can handle."

Ferris made a dismissive gesture with his cigar. "I'll miss Johnny but he should have known better than to mess with that bitch. He went down shooting, though. One bullet right in the back of her head, and him lying dying on the floor when he did it. Pretty cool, Johnny, right up to the end."

"Shoulda sent the whole crowd to Würzburg," Draya rumbled.

"Ah, yes, but then we wouldn't have a chance to see them tortured—and this spectacle!" Ferris laughed "On with the show! On with the show!" he shouted Those nearby took up the chant, and soon the entire Coliseum rocked with the roar of thousands of voices.

"Did you see how they fought him off?" the lad from Sisyphus hollered in his father's ear. "Boy, was that some fight, eh, Dad? Just three guys with those little swords! Wow, this is great, Dad! The greatest vacation ever!"

"Keep your eye on the one in the middle, son. I think he's in charge."

The screaming of the crowd, the stomping of thousands of pairs of feet, was so powerful it seemed a physical force, like the concussion of an artillery barrage.

The three Marines stood together, watching the jackals. The sweat streaming off their bodies mixed with the dust from the arena floor to cake them in brown mud. They wiped the sweat from their palms on their togas and they turned brown too.

"Maybe they'll take a nap when they're done," Claypoole said.

"Nah, you remember Wanderjahr. Those things don't kill just to eat, they kill because they like it,"

Dean responded. "They'll be at us soon enough."

Pasquin's foot was beginning to hurt again. "I can't last much longer," he confessed, "and I'll be on one leg. If I fall, leave me there. We'll close in on the first one to come within range of our swords. You two hack away at its head, I'll try to keep the second one at bay. If he gets me, I'll try to distract him until you can finish his partner. Then you'll have a fighting chance."

"Then we only have to worry about armored gladiators," Claypoole said.

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it," Pasquin answered. "Uh-oh, here they come!"

It was 11:50.

"All hands secure for landing!" Chief Riggs announced.

Nast flicked his comm unit to the command channel. "Heads up, just so you haven't forgotten, here's the drill one more time: soon as we're down, get out and into the stands. Secure your weapons until we're completely stopped and Chief gives us the green light to dismount. You guys carrying the scaling ladders, get them in place fast. Covering team, give them a volley of grenades as soon as you're topside and be prepared to suppress any fire from the boxes. The grenades won't have the same effect as in a room, but they'll stun them long enough for you to get up there and among them. Brock, I'll lead and you follow with your men. Shoot anyone who—"

"Mr. Nast," Chief Riggs interrupted, "the second Essay bosun reports he's losing power fast. Shall we abort?"

"Negative! Negative!" Nast yelled without hesitation. "We will proceed as planned! Men," he turned back to the command net, "be prepared for a hard landing. Anyone gets sick, he wears it." He didn't bother to tell them they were on their own now. He had no idea what he would do. Once on the ground he'd figure things out. "Chief, take us on in."

It was 11:52.

Before it could even get its mouth open to let out a roar, Dean and Claypoole were hacking away at the first jackal's head. It ducked and weaved, trying to avoid the blows. The second creature warily stalked around the small group and tried coming at them from the rear, but Pasquin was on guard. He shouted, waved his word and stomped his good foot in the dust. His bad foot was an agonizing ball of pain but he could not afford to ease up.

The first jackal let out a shriek of agony as Claypoole put out its right eye. Dean stepped in from the other side and plunged the point of his sword into the monster's other eye. Blood spurted out and coursed down his arm. The jackal backed away and squatted back, emitting long shrieks.

Pasquin's leg gave out at last and he went down hard. The second jackal was on him instantly. It grabbed the corporal's head between its short arms, but Pasquin brought his legs up to his chest, so its deadly hind claws were not able to reach his vital parts. He pounded the side of its head with the edge of his sword in his right hand and managed to keep its jaws up with his left arm. Claypoole, in a frenzy of blood lust, straddled the thing's back and began hammering powerful blows down upon the top of its head. The spectators in the stands could clearly hear the hollow thunk of the blade striking through the skin and hitting the bone of the animal's skull. Each blow elicited a shout of approval from the crowd. The blinded jackal stumbled and staggered about the arena. Eventually it crouched on the far side of the field, breathing heavily, refusing to move.

Pandemonium reigned in the Coliseum. The crowd was on its feet screaming for the men. The sound washed over them like a wave. Claypoole's jackal managed to fling him off its back. It staggered to its feet and hobbled away from the trio as quickly as it could. When it reached its companion it began eating him. The skreeks and shrieks of the dying animal penetrated even the victorious howling of the crowd.

Dean helped Pasquin to his feet; he could not stand unassisted because both legs had been so severely lacerated by the jackal's hind claws. Pasquin sank to a sitting position. Claypoole joined them. The roar of the crowd enfolded them. Thousands of people were standing in the galleries now, screaming and holding their thumbs up. Claypoole raised his arms over his head, his sword gripped firmly in his right hand. He turned around slowly, so everyone could see him. Dean did the same. Pasquin clenched his fists and raised them over his head.

"We beat them! We beat them!" Claypoole screamed triumphantly. "We beat them, goddamn you all, we beat them!" He had never in his life felt such power. It seemed now that he was leading the crowd in its wild enthusiasm. There was nothing he couldn't do! He looked to the emperor's box. Ferris and Draya were clearly visible from where he stood, standing out in their purple robes. He shook his bloody sword in their direction. "You're next, you fucking pigs!" he screamed. "Come on," he shouted at Dean, "we can scale that wall and get into their box! Let's get them!" Dragging Pasquin between them, they started running toward the box.

It was 11:57.

They stopped abruptly. Blocking their way was a line of gladiators rapidly trotting out of the staging area. Claypoole counted a dozen of them, heavily armored and bristling with nasty looking weapons.

"Drop me!" Pasquin shouted, "You can't fight and hold on to me! Drop me, I said!" The line began to advance on them. The crowd went wild again. Without a word, the two released Pasquin and took up a defensive stance over the corporal's prostrate form.

Suddenly, the advancing line of gladiators stopped. The men stood silently. The crowd also went silent. After all the screaming and shouting an eerie calm descended over the arena. The three Marines could clearly hear themselves panting. A big, heavily armored man stepped out from the center of the line. He carried a long sword. He stood facing the Marines. Slowly, the sword held vertical in one hand, he raised the hilt to his chin, the blade standing straight up in the air, flashing brightly in the sunlight.

"Get on with it!" a reedy, angry voice shouted from the emperor's box. Otherwise the Coliseum was plunged into total silence, all eyes fastened on the lone gladiator.

"We salute you!" the gladiator shouted in a voice that carried to the far reaches of the Coliseum. The other gladiators raised their weapons and shouted, "We salute you!"

"Well, I'll be goddamned!" Claypoole exclaimed.

It was noon.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Homs Ferris waddled to the front of the emperor's box, his vast bulk jiggling obscenely. "Get on with it!

Get on! You are all dead men if you don't!" he shouted, his face as purple as his robe. The big man standing in front of the line of gladiators did not even bother to look up at the box. "Get that man's name!"

Ferris screamed at an aide. Obediently, the man scurried off to find out who the gladiator was. Ferris turned to Draya, who lolled in his enormous chair, a huge goblet of wine in one hand. The sunlight sparkled brightly off the diamonds in the rings on his sausage-like fingers.

"Sumbitches gettin' beyond themselves," Draya rumbled. He shifted his cigar from the right to the left side of his mouth. An expression of annoyance came over his face. He removed the cigar and probed in his mouth with a finger, extracting a masticated wad of tobacco. He flipped it away. It landed on Johnny Sticks's former aide, Hugo. The men sitting around him laughed. Embarrassed, Hugo surreptitiously removed the mess with a napkin.

"Noto, I'll tell you what—" Ferris began.

Draya sat forward in his chair and held up a hand. "Listen." From far off to the northwest of the Coliseum there was a rumble. Draya sat back in his chair. "Goddamn storm coming! Are we gonna have to sit here in the rain?" he asked an aide.

The aide shrugged. "Weather report says clear and hot through the end of the week."

"We ought to build one of them domes, you know," Draya said, "so we could have climate control in here. This first-century Roman shit's fine once in a while, but goddamn, this is the twenty-fifth century and we oughta be able to sit in here without sweatin' our jewels off."

"We could build a special box, boss, just for the emperor," the aide offered.

"Nah." He waved a huge hand dismissively. "Then they'll want them too." He gestured at the thousands of spectators. "Buddha's prick on a stick, that thing's moving fast!" He gestured off to the northwest, where the distant rumbling had now risen in volume and intensity. "It's gettin' closer!" There was a small tinge of alarm in Draya's voice. "If I wasn't so damned comfortable I'd get under cover." A woman sitting beside him put her hand between his legs and smiled. "What's a little rain?" Draya laughed.

But now others had taken note of the approaching storm. People began looking up apprehensively at the sky, but it was cloudless. The rumble turned to a splitting roar, and suddenly, over the roof of the stadium, a massive black object appeared, spitting fire. Panic seized the spectators.

"Mom! Dad! It's a Confederation Navy Mark IV Essay!" the lad from Sisyphus shouted. "See, the forward stabilizer is mounted at a forty-five-degree angle instead of fifty-five, like on the Mark VI's!

Goddamn, Dad, this is the greatest fucking vacation since the beginning of the world!"

"Sonny!" his mother exclaimed. "Where did you learn to talk like that?"

"He's right, Mother!" the father shouted, also on his feet. "Holy jumping shit, they're raiding the emperor's box! God-damn, this is so real, goddamn, how do they do this stuff? Goddamn, lookit that, lookit that! What a goddamned surprise this is! Are we getting our money's worth or are we?"

The mother shook her head. Then she laughed. "Am I going to have a talk with you two when we get back to our hotel!"

Chief Riggs guided the Essay to a perfect landing directly behind the gladiators and only a meter from the wall. While the dust was still in the air, its rear ramp dropped and armed men raced out of it. The gladiators threw down their weapons.

"You take care of Raoul!" Claypoole shouted. "I've got work to do!" He ran unopposed through the gladiators, hopped nimbly onto the skirts of the Essay and hoisted himself topside. Two men in protective armor where putting up a short ladder to the emperor's box. Several others crouched nearby, firing stun grenades. To the utter amazement of the assault team, Claypoole dashed between them and flung himself up the ladder.

"Claypoole!" someone shouted behind him, but he paid no attention.

Two men wielding hand-blasters were trying to shepherd Homs Ferris to safety. Noto Draya sat dazed and confused in his seat, temporarily stunned by the grenades. Claypoole screamed and brought his sword down on Ferris's head with all his strength. Bone crunched and blood spurted from the wound.

Claypoole dodged under one man's arm and his gun went off with a harmless crack! He drove his knee into the other's groin, and as the man doubled over, he rammed the hilt of his sword down onto the top of his head. Executing a perfect pirouette, he smashed the blade of his sword into the first man's face, sending him backward in an explosion of blood.