Outlanders 17 Purgatory road, page 4
As he rolled on the ground, spitting up jets of blood and plucking at his lower right leg, which somewhat resembled an inverted L, Kane spun in time to deflect a short sword aimed at his ribs. He back-fisted it aside, hitting the flat of the blade. He spun to his left on one foot while the other swept out and down to scythe behind the Black Dragon's ankle. The man went down, chopping at Kane's legs as he fell in a bid to take him down with him, or at least inflict an incapacitating wound.
Kane jumped straight up, and the katana slashed empty air but almost close enough to shave calluses from the soles of his feet. He tried to land on the man's belly with all of his strength, but the Dragon rolled frantically to one side, wrenching himself erect at the same time. The blade of his sword licked out. Kane had no time to dodge.
The man's legs suddenly went out from under him as if he had slipped on an oil slick. As he went down, Kane saw that his features were blurred by a wet red smear. On the fringes of his hearing, he heard the familiar hollow boom of Sin Eater. He spun toward the palace, trying to pinpoint the source of the shot.
Kiyomasa's horse came pounding out of the mob of men, clods of turf flying from beneath its hooves. Kiyomasa slumped in the saddle, clutching at the feathered shaft sprouting from his chest. The animal would have galloped past, but Grant leaped forward and secured a grip on the bridle. The horse screamed, showed its teeth and tried to rear. Kane joined him, grabbing the reins. They exerted all of their upper-body strength and managed to bring the animal to a halt. Kane spoke to it soothingly.
Kiyomasa tried to dismount but with a wheeze he toppled sideways. Shizuka was there to catch him, and to Kane's surprise and admiration she didn't fold beneath his weight. She eased him down as carefully as she could. Kane released the horse, but it didn't run away. It stood trembling, blood trickling from a cut on its flank, its coat shining with lather. Lowering its head, it sniffed at Kiyomasa then pawed the ground nervously.
Cradling Kiyomasa's head in her arms, Shizuka spoke to him briefly. The samurai captain's lips writhed, and he grasped her upper arm convulsively. Kane saw him speak, but he could hear nothing. The man's respiration was labored, and a scarlet froth flecked his lips.
Kiyomasa's mouth creased in a small smile, and he folded his hands over his chest, arranging his legs in a position of grave dignity. He closed his eyes, shuddered almost imperceptibly and died.
Shizuka gently placed his head on the ground and remained crouched over him. Grant reached out and laid a hand on her shoulder. "We can't stay here, Shizuka."
She flung his hand away and sprang to her feet, snatching up Kiyomasa's long katana in the process. A mad cry of fury exploded from her throat, and she raced toward the fringes of the battle zone, shrieking words of rage. Grant and Kane went after her.
Shizuka met a Black Dragon who thrust a barbed yari spear at her torso. She parried it and swung the approach, not even when she leaped nimbly into the saddle. It tossed its head, its mane whipping wildly as if impatient to rejoin the battle.
Alarmed, Grant snatched at the bridle. "Wait, Goddammit! You can't just charge in there—"
The stallion twisted away, and Shizuka brandished her twin swords. She cried shrilly, "That's exactly what I am going to do! This insanity ends now!"
She drove her heels into the horse's ribs, and it bounded toward the field of combat. Grant cast a fearful glance toward Kane and shouted, "Find Brigid and something to give us an edge!"
With naginata in hand, he sprinted after Shizuka. Kane started to call him back, but he closed his mouth, not wanting to distract his partner. He watched, expecting at any second to see an arrow fell Shizuka or a sword to pierce her.
He was surprised to see the swords clenched in either fist block and parry thrusts aimed at her. With a savage yell throbbing in Shizuka's throat, woman and stallion thundered among the milling combatants. Without any urging the horse made a leap and launched itself into the press of men and steel.
Then came madness—a din of screams, a forest of blades that waved about Shizuka but parted before her. Both the Black Dragons and the Tigers of Heaven reacted as if the horse and rider had dropped onto them out of the sky. The stallion wallowed a moment across crumpled human bodies, trampling flat of the sword in her left hand into the man's stomach. He doubled up from the pain. She didn't follow through with a decapitating stroke. Rather, she screamed, "Kankou!"
He spit a word that even to Kane and Grant sounded like an insult, and forced himself to straighten. He whipped the spear in an overhead arc.
Shizuka raised her swords, crossing them to fashion an X, and caught the blow that would otherwise have split open her skull. The force of the blow drove her to one knee. Grimacing, she pushed the spear shaft upward with her two weapons. She strained against the man for a long moment, then flung herself to one side, executing a reverse slash in the same shaved sliver of a second. The edge of her blade surgically removed the Black Dragon's left foot right above the ankle.
He performed a hobbled back jump, his mouth opening as he tried to comprehend why his foot still stayed on the grass when the rest of him had moved away. In that half second of confusion and disbelief, Shizuka's right-hand katana sliced through his neck, separating the head from it. A scarlet-foaming fountain spumed from the opened arteries. Blood spattered across her cheek and upper chest in an artless, speckling pattern.
Eyes ablaze, Shizuka whirled toward Kiyomasa's stallion. It still stood over the body of its dead master, nuzzling his face. She pushed between Kane and Grant and ran toward it. The horse didn't shy at her and biting while Shizuka's weapons rose, fell and licked out with terrible effect.
Grant formed a mobile bulwark around Shizuka and her mount, deploying all of the skill and combat acumen he had earned through years of training and bloody experience. Again and again the curved blade of the naginata turned a sword from Shizuka's back or beat aside a spear point meant for the horse. The long pole intercepted blows that would have killed the woman. Twice he took superficial cuts on his own body.
Kane clenched his teeth, his jaw muscles knotting as he watched. It wasn't easy to guard another person and keep from being gutted at the same time. He took a few steps toward the mob, then saw a couple of partially armored Tigers of Heaven rallying to Grant's side.
"Ryouko! " Shizuka shouted.
He turned, then, and ran for the palace, toward the overhanging terrace from which he had seen the gren fall. Grasping a low crossbar, he heaved himself up and vaulted over the top rail. He cast a glance over his shoulder to the killing zone.
Shizuka and her stallion formed the leading point of a wedge formation. The Black Dragons couldn't stand up to them, so they parted to both sides, like the sea before the prow of a ship The Tigers pressed in against one flank, and helped to drive the Dragons relentlessly back until they had to turn to meet another frontal assault.
Back and forth the battle rolled, blades sinking into flesh, piercing chests, hacking into bone, feet churning the ground into crimson-tinged sludge. Shizuka and Grant moved through the whirling, eddying mass of men, shouting and slashing. Again and again a Black Dragon who slashed at her found a blade in his chest before he could strike. Arrows missed her as she moved like a lithe, phantom centaur.
Kane went through the open shoji and nearly tripped on a pair of bodies just inside the door. Reflexively, he whipped up his katana, squinting to see through the gloom.
In a harsh whisper, Brigid declared, "It's me, Kane—and Lord Takaun."
Stepping closer, Kane saw the daimyo of New Edo lying in a half-prone position, his back against the wall. Takaun was a slender man of medium height. He wore an unadorned red kimono, and his blue sash bore no ornamentation at all. His cleanshaved face was narrow, with heavy eyebrows over hooded eyes. His long black hair, shot through with silvery threads, lay loosely over his shoulders. Even in the poor light, Kane could see how the front of his robe glistened wetly. Brigid kneeled beside him, pressing a rolled-up cloth against the man's midsection.
"He was very nearly assassinated," she said tightly. "By Yoshika."
Kane dredged his memory to place a face with the name. "Yoshika, the geisha? Shizuka's sister?"
"And," Takaun said with a surprising calm, "a Black Dragon. Her masquerade was perfect. She stabbed me with one of her hairpins. I believe it was treated with fugu poison."
Kane went to one knee beside him. "What's that?"
"It comes from the sex organs of the globefish. In the old days, my people relished it as both a delicacy and a way to commit suicide."
Brigid said, "The scientific name for it is tetrodotoxin. It's like curare—causes paralysis of the central nervous system. Apparently, Yoshika didn't get in a real good shot."
"What she managed was sufficient," Takaun said mildly. "Already I am suffering from double vision and can barely keep my head up. Soon my lungs will be paralyzed."
"I'll have to give you artificial respiration," Brigid said matter-of-factly. "The fact you're still breathing at all shows the dose she gave you wasn't strong enough to be lethal."
Kane edged closer and on the floor beside Brigid he saw a war bag and an unholstered Sin Eater. Swiftly, he reached across Takaun and snatched the blaster. Although his and Grant's Sin Eaters were virtually identical, he instinctively knew it was his own. He began to holster the big-bored automatic to his right forearm. The Sin Eaters were more than just weapons; they were almost as much a badge of office as the Mag duty badges. All Magistrates were expected to know their assigned side arms more intimately than anything else in the world.
Less than fourteen inches in length at full extension, the weapon featured a magazine that carried twenty 9 mm rounds. When not in use, the stock folded over the top of the weapon, lying perpendicular to the frame, reducing its holstered length to ten inches. When the Sin Eater was needed, the wrist tendons were flexed in a certain way, and sensitive, electrically powered actuators activated a flexible cable in the holster and snapped the weapon smoothly into the hand, the stock unfolding in the same motion. Since the pistol had no trigger guard or safety, only a firing stud, the Sin Eater fired immediately upon touching the crooked index finger. Sin Eaters were incredibly lethal weapons and almost impossible for a novice to manage. Recruits were never allowed live ammunition until a tedious, six-month-long training period was successfully completed.
Kane ejected the clip, saw one round was missing and quirked a questioning eyebrow toward Brigid. She said, "Lord Takaun had it in his hand when he came across me."
Weakly, Takaun said, "I had it brought to me so I could examine it. I'm shamed to admit that its intricacies eluded me."
"But not you, Baptiste?" Kane inquired with a thin smile.
"I've seen you operate it enough for me to know how to unholster it."
Slamming the clip back into the blaster, he said, "I'm damn glad you're such a quick study. You probably saved me from being filleted."
Her lips creased in a wan smile. "I'd say there was no 'probably' about it."
"How goes the battle?" Takaun rasped.
Once he felt the familiar, comforting weight of the autoblaster, Kane's optimism level rose. "It's been a seesaw. Kiyomasa is dead, and Shizuka has taken command of the Tigers of Heaven."
Picking up the war bag, Kane pawed briefly through its contents, identifying by feel two CS gas grens and another flash-bang. He noted the Copperhead slung over Brigid's shoulder. Taking the concussion gren, he handed the bag to her and turned toward the terrace. "Stay with Takaun."
She stiffened, opening her mouth to voice a protest, but he cut her off with a sharp gesture. "I need you here as my ace. Keep watching me. When you see my signal, lob those gassers."
Her jade eyes narrowed momentarily in worry. "They'll affect both parties."
"Not if my plan works out." He smiled sourly. "And what are the odds of that?"
She smiled at his bit of self-deprecating humor. "Hopefully, they'll be more than one percent."
He grinned fleetingly in appreciation, brought his index finger to his nose and snapped it away smartly in the "one percent" salute. It was a gesture he and Grant had developed during their Mag days, reserved for undertakings that appeared to have vanishingly small chances of success.
Takaun tried to lift an arm and reach out for Kane, but all he accomplished was a spasmodic contraction of his hand and fingers. "Kane-san," he croaked, "try to spare the Black Dragons. They are still my people."
"That," replied Kane flatly, "is entirely up to them."
Chapter 4
Kane vaulted over the top rail of the terrace and landed clumsily, going to one knee and nearly dropping the flash-bang. His left ankle twinged. He cursed the weakness in his legs, a consequence of his captivity in the subterranean stud farm beneath Area 51.
Struggling to his feet, Kane jammed the gren into his pocket and loped toward the edge of the battle, trying to find the least fatal area to insert himself. Where the press of combatants was the thickest, he saw Shizuka still astride the black stallion, her two bloodstained swords hewing up and down. Red gashes on her ivory thighs trickled blood, so some weapons had gotten past Grant's guard. Men fought wherever they could, spread out all over the lawn. Taking the palace didn't seem to be the objective any longer.
Both factions had suffered heavy losses, and though Kane felt great respect for the courage of the Tigers and the Dragons, he held little admiration for the tactics they employed. Whoever lost the battle died. The only rule was victory or death, with no middle ground. Kane thought it was monumentally stupid and an incredible waste.
Achieving a goal had become less important than the warriors' own illusory values or honor. Kane had seen egocentric illusions bring death and destruction before. The Magistrates, although not as singleminded about personal honor as the samurai, still put their own arrogance ahead of shrewd strategy. There was certainly nothing shrewd about this butchery.
Still, he couldn't completely condemn either warring faction of samurai. The similarities between the warriors of New Edo and the Magistrates were greater than any minor differences. Both Tiger and Dragon had decided to follow paths laid down by their forebears, eschewing their own identities in favor of those chosen by others.
Grant and Kane had chosen to smother their own identities, as had their fathers and grandfathers before them. All Magistrates followed a patrilineal tradition, assuming the duties and positions of their fathers. They didn't have given names, each taking the surname of the father, as though the first Magistrate to bear the name was the same man as the last.
The originators of the Magistrates had believed that only surnames, family names, engendered a sense of obligation to the duties of their ancestors' office, insuring that subsequent generations never lost touch with their hereditary roles as enforcers.
Last names became badges of social distinction, almost titles.
And like the samurai who had sworn oaths of fealty to a daimyo or an emperor, the black-armored Magistrates ruthlessly enforced the laws of the baronies, believing it was the only way to wring a degree of order out of postnuke chaos. For many years, both Kane and Grant had believed the only way to stem the floodtide of anarchy was to unquestioningly obey the laws of the barons.
As Magistrates, the courses their lives followed had been charted before their births. They had exchanged personal hopes, dreams and desires for a life of service. They were destined to live, fight and die, usually violently, as they fulfilled their oaths to impose a degree of order upon the chaos of postnukecaust America. Kane's life had taken another course, but he learned later he was following the secret path laid down by his father.
Reaching the swirling eddy of battle, Kane paused uncertainly Figures were locked in a mass of combat, falling to the ground beneath the impacts of blades and spears. Black Dragon and Tiger of Heaven ran this way and that, in disorganized clusters of terror and fury.
A Tiger fell at Kane's feet with a wheeze, clutching his hands to his upper body where a feathered shaft sprouted. A spattering of arrows fell. The thrum of loosed bowstrings vibrated through the air, and more warriors fell gasping and crying out.
Taking a deep breath of resolve, Kane lowered his head and lunged into the melee, using the heavy metal frame of his Sin Eater as a bludgeon to clear a path. He whacked skulls, knocking black-kimonoed men out of his way. He didn't want to shoot any of the Black Dragons, even though he was fairly certain neither they nor the Tigers carried firearms. Shizuka had told them New Edo possessed a very limited supply of blasters, and an even more limited supply of ammunition, claiming they didn't have the natural resources to manufacture much of it themselves.
Over his head came a faint whoosh, a glint of some dark metal, and a stinging force ripped the katana from his hand. Kane flung himself backward, trying to shake some feeling back into his numbed hand. A large black-robed man sprang from the press of battle, whirling a metal flail or whip in his right hand. Connected to a wooden pole about four feet long, the chigiriki was a series of iron rods linked together by metal rings. A heavy iron weight with beveled edges dangled from the end.
Kane hastily leveled his Sin Eater, but the flail snapped out again and smashed hard into the frame of the blaster. His pistol snapped back into the holster, and he realized with a mixture of disgust and fear the spring-release-cable mechanism had been knocked askew. He knew from past experience it couldn't be repaired quickly.
Kane backed away, keeping his eyes on the man's feet. The whirling lengths of metal hummed through the air in a blurry circle. He knew better than to stare at them, because the spinning motion induced a mild hypnotic effect. Kane's eyes. Batting aside the hand, Kane dashed a straight right into the snarling face under him, and started a flow of blood from the lips.
Feinting to the left, Kane leaped to the right, pivoted and swung his left leg up and around in a perfect crescent kick. The Black Dragon surged forward in the opposite direction. Kane's foot grazed his head, but the weighted end of the chigiriki slapped into Kane's ribs, smashing all the wind out of him and knocking him backward. With a nimble twist and sidewise wrench of his whole body, the Black Dragon managed to shove Kane to one side and club at him with the doubled chigiriki. The blow glanced off Kane's raised forearm. He rolled and came swiftly to his feet, and planted a foot on the side of the man's neck as he tried to rise.
