lined up the man with the spear gun and fired. The gun didn't kick at all, but there was a brief wash of pressure on both the inner and outer surface of his gloved wrist. It was the angled back blast from the charge that kicked the round out of the barrel, equalizing the propulsive force both forward and back. An instant later, the tail of the round lit up like a tracer as its gyrojets kicked into life and sent it jumping forward.
And straight into the bulkhead behind the crossbowman. But now Lee understood why Finder had paused after taking two shots. He had been comparing the trajectory of his fire to the three-dimensional drift of his target. But now Lee's target was raising the reloaded spear gun. Lee fired two rounds.
The spear gunner spun sharply to the right as Lee's first bullet hit him in that arm. The second shot, a blind miss, extinguished whatever fleeting flare of triumph the young lieutenant had felt. Sighting carefully, Lee prepared to spend a fourth bullet on this target—
From behind him, a ten millimeter automatic barked three times. At least one of the rounds hit the wounded spearman in the center of mass. Blood erupted like a thin stream from a child's bubble-making toy, and the man's movements diminished into fitful writhing.
Lee turned to thank the now-pistol armed Roderigo Burns—but the rating was desperately reaching out for the wall, trying to stop the tumble imparted by his own quick sequence of shots. Lee stretched to help him—
Finder's voice was a respectful, if curt, reminder. “You wanted a fast advance, right, Lieutenant?”
Lee paused, nodded, turned back toward the bridge and snapped his hips down so that his feet contacted the deck; as they did, he kicked.
Arrowing forward ahead of his sergeant, he couldn't help smiling at Finder's appreciative mutter over the private circuit, “Not half bad—for a newb.”
* * *
Taking the bridge was pure anticlimax. Although the last two mutineers were armed with ten millimeters, they blasted away at a stray suit glove that Finder spun lazily through the doorway. Only three shots from each, but that was all advantage the top-kick needed. Swimming around the rim of the hatchway with the fell purpose of a stubby piranha, he watched as the hijackers tried to correct their tumbles and took careful aim.
Lee chinned the private circuit. “If they're helpless enough, we could take them pris—”
“Negative, L.T. Look at them; they're reorienting already. They're either Upsiders or have enough training to recover from the tumble. We'll have lost our advantage in another three seconds.”
Lee sighed, “Fire at will.”
They both did: two rounds from each of them finished the job.
That was when one of the door-opening alarms went off to their rear. Tugging themselves around into sharp 180 degree turns, Lee and Finder kicked and soared back the way they had come.
Before reaching the site of the first gun battle, they saw Burns taking cover in a hatchway, the distinctive bark of a ten millimeter causing him to flinch back even farther. Just then, a series of sharp, higher-velocity cracks echoed at them from even farther up the corridor.
“All clear,” signaled Lewis on the open circuit. “There was just one of them. Probably asleep when we came in. I got ‘im. Sarge, I hit him all three times, even though the recoil had me—”
“Great, Lewis, that's great.” Finder turned to Lee. “Well, there goes your chance to interrogate a prisoner, L.T.”
Lee shook his head. “Rotten luck, Sarge, rotten luck.”
Finder switched to private circuit. “That presumes the death of that last hijacker was a matter of luck—that there was no intent involved. Sir.” Finder's glance in Lewis' direction was dour.
Yes, Lee reflected, he and the sergeant would have an awful lot to chat about later on . . .
* * *
Arriving back on the bridge of his customs cutter, Lee relieved the acting XO, Bernardo de los Reyes, with an exchange of lazy salutes.
“Started worrying about you out there, Skipper,” said de los Reyes.
Lee finished pulling off his suit gloves. “Had to go to radio silence before we took out the hostiles about two hours ago. There were five of them.”
“And why so shy during the last two hours?” de los Reyes asked in an almost bored drawl, which was an act for the benefit of the bridge ratings. Bernie knew damned well that the extended radio silence meant something unusual was up. Probably something dangerous.