Blood Ties (21 page)

Jake and Cole cleared the stairs just as the ladies, smiling and laughing together, stepped down from the digger. The digger now looked more like one of the assault units Jake had seen in the war than it did mining equipment. The ones in the war had been much bigger and far more clunky than Qi’s design, but the principle was the same.

“You boys all set?” Qi asked as she pulled off her goggles and blew a strand of hair out of her face. Skeeter’s smile disappeared when she saw Jake, and she turned her eyes to the ground. She obviously still felt guilty about the position she’d put him in.

“We’re good to go,” Jake said. “Skeeter, you got your gear?”

“Yes, sir,” she said quietly, still not looking at him. She stepped behind one of the benches and reappeared, rolling her suitcase. Her long coat was draped over it, and Jake could tell from the lumps inside that she’d already loaded it up with her gadgets.

“Qi, Cole, think you two could move that machine out back while Skeeter and I have a little talk?” Jake said quietly. Skeeter got a worried look in her eyes. Jake had deliberately avoided being around the girl to let her stew about stowing away on the
Jezebel
, and it was time to finally have a come-to-Jesus meeting.

“Sure, Jake,” Cole said and glanced at Skeeter. Qi looked Skeeter’s way as well, and when Skeeter looked at Qi, Jake saw the woman give Skeeter an encouraging nod.

“Qi, can we use your office?”

“Go ahead,” she said and turned towards the machine. Cole stepped up with her and helped her climb into the cockpit.

“Hey, Cole,” Jake called, “can you see if there’s a way to set up a little pillbox in the back of that wagon about
yay-big
?” Jake asked, casting a quick glance at Skeeter.

Cole gave Jake a knowing nod. “You got it.”

Turning to the machine, Cole watched Qi clamber over the armored cockpit plating that leaned out on thick pistons and disappear behind it.

Jake motioned towards the office door and waited for Skeeter to step up to it. She opened it and moved inside, hitting a switch on the wall as she went in. Qi’s office was cluttered with papers and pipe and gears and a few dozen gizmos, doodads, and whatchamahoozits that Jake couldn’t begin to recognize. A large desk occupied the middle of the room and faced out on a large bay window still covered by a metal, rolling door. They heard the digger’s engine cough to life, grumbling and rumbling.

“Have a seat,” Jake said sternly. “You and I are gonna have a little talk, young lady.”

“Yes, sir,” she said meekly as she sat in the chair and swiveled around to face him.

They heard a heavy metal clanking outside as the machine turned and headed out the other side of the shop through a large door that led to Qi’s warehouse.

Jake leaned back against an overflowing bookcase, resting his hand on his pistol grips. “Before I say anything, I want you to promise me you won’t say a word until I say I’m finished. Can you do that?” For an instant she gave him a look that bordered on defiant. They both knew it was as hard for Skeeter to keep her mouth shut as it was for Lumpy to walk quietly. Jake turned up the stern in his voice and said, “Promise.”

Skeeter took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I promise,” she said seriously. Jake checked her fingers to make sure they weren’t crossed.

“You shouldn’t have stowed away on the
Jezebel
,” Jake began. He saw her take a quick breath to blurt something out, and he waited patiently. She slowly regained control and settled back in her chair. He nodded, keeping his face stern but smiling inside. “I told you not to come, and now I gotta worry about keeping you safe, along with Qi and Cole and the Lady’s property … and we have a whole mess of people out there who are ready to burn each and every one of us down the moment we peek our heads up. You understand that now, right?”

She nodded, remembering not to say anything.

Jake took his hat off and settled it on a stack of papers next to him. “Skeeter, the reason you shouldn’t have come was because I asked you not to.” He hesitated and then stared into her eyes. “But the fact of the matter is that I probably shouldn’t have told you to stay behind.” Her mouth dropped open, and she looked at him, dumbfounded. “Hearing old Chung talk about Qi got me to thinking about you. You were on your own long before you ever met me, and you’ve got more brains, guile, and guts than most men I run into. And the truth is you’re old enough to be on your own, hell, even get married if you wanted.” At the mention of marriage she gave him a disgusted look. “I guess what I’m trying to say is that from now on, I ain’t gonna be telling you what you can and can’t do when it comes to stuff like this.” Her face brightened. He eyed her with a dangerous look. “But there’s a price.”

Her smile disappeared in a flash, and she was wary, maybe even a little afraid. “Price?” she asked.

“That’s right,” Jake nodded. “In all the times you’ve seen me and Cole work together when the heat was on, have you ever seen either one of us not do something the other ordered? And I mean ever.”

She thought about it, and Jake knew for certain that she remembered everything she saw. Skeeter’s memory was perfect, if not better. “No, sir,” she replied, a sort of awareness growing in her eyes.

“Why do you think that is?”

Without a moment’s pause she said, “’Cause you got each other’s backs.”

“That’s right,” Jake said somberly, nodding his head. “Cole and me know that no matter what, when we say duck, the other is gonna do so without asking why.”

“I think I understand,” she said slowly.

“It’s the third rule of this business, and you can’t get it wrong, Skeeter.” Jake put his hat back on and looked deep into her eyes. “There ain’t no second chances, no I’m sorry’s, no I didn’t mean to’s. You mess this up, even once, and somebody gets dead. You’ve seen me and Cole tear into some pretty unsavory sorts, and so far we’ve come out on top. But it might not always work out that way. In this line of work good people get killed … like Chung’s men … and it happens more often than I care to think about. The next time it could be you or me or Cole or someone like Qi or Chung. I’m pretty sure you don’t want that, do ya?”

“No, sir,” she replied quietly.

“You’ll see,” he continued, “when you’re standing over a dead body of someone you care about and they have a hole in ’em because you didn’t do what you were supposed to, that’s a world of hurt you don’t want because it
never
goes away
. I’ve been there. It kills a little part of you inside that you can never get back.”

“I promise, Jake. I’ll do exactly what you say, when you say to do it. So help me God.” Jake could tell she meant it, and he’d never seen her as serious before. “What about the first two rules?” she asked, solemnly.

“We’ll get there, kiddo,” he replied. He realized that he’d just taken on an even greater responsibility, and it occurred to him that the lessons ahead for the young woman were likely to be hard ones. He felt his eyes welling up, his pride for her swelling—but it was combined with fear. He stood away from the bookcase and held out his arms. “All right, now gimme a hug so we can get on with this fiasco.” She leapt out of the chair and crashed into him, wrapping her arms around him. He hugged her back, shaking his head to wipe away the tears that had formed.

“Thank you, Jake!” she whispered. “I won’t let you down.”

“All right, all right,” he said, disengaging from her. “I know you won’t. Now get on out there, and let’s get loaded up.” Jake pulled out his pocket watch as she walked out into the shop. It was 4:30 a.m., and the sun would be up soon, burning off the fog.

All they had to do was make it through the worst parts of San Francisco, including the warehouse district.
And do it without getting killed
, Jake thought.

After that it would be easy,
he told himself.

Chapter Twenty-four – The Gauntlet

“When it was just me, I never worried about getting killed. It was always the people around me that I worried about.”

~ Jake Lasater

Fog swirled around them, and the grumbling chatter of Qi’s digger filled the dark morning air. Jake inspected the pillbox Cole and Qi had hastily set up in the back of the wagon, wedged in between the sidewall and the Lady’s box. Near the front of the wagon, four thick plates of the same dark metal that covered the cockpits of Qi’s machine had been clamped into place, forming a small box big enough for Skeeter to crouch in with her suitcase.

Jake cast a glance over to Cole. “You got our down payment?” he asked.

Cole nodded and patted one of his saddlebags. “Right here. The Lady paid us before she disappeared.”

Jake nodded and looked down at Skeeter. He lifted her up into the back of the wagon and handed up her suitcase. “Remember what I said, Skeeter. When I say jump, you jump. And duck means duck.”

“You got it, Jake,” she said, smiling, and she gave him a salute that made him proud. He gave her a wink. “Now get settled in there. Keep down, and be ready to toss some of them poppers when I say so.” She nodded, hefted her suitcase over the rear plate, and crouched down.

Jake turned and found Qi standing there. She stared up into his eyes and looked like she needed a kiss, so he obliged.

She pulled back slightly and looked at him with a faint smile. “There’s something I have to tell you,” she whispered into his ear. “You don’t need my permission.”

“What?” Jake said, doing his best to pretend he didn’t understand.

“Lady Dănești. You don’t need my permission.” Jake felt his cheeks warm, and Qi pinched one of them, her eyes laughing at him. “You’re a good man, Jake Lasater. And maybe it’s time you let go of that sadness you’ve been holding on to.”

“What?” he asked, this time completely bewildered.

She kissed him warmly, the passion they normally shared replaced with loving tenderness, and hugged him tight. She let out a little laugh, and then walked around the wagon to Lumpy. Jake looked around the wagon and saw her mumbling something quietly as her hand rested on the bull’s neck. Seconds later a soft flash of green light enshrouded Lumpy with the same green glow Qi had when the assassins had nailed her with the chaingun.

“Insurance,” she said to Jake with a wink and walked over to the modified digger.

“That’s a handy little trick,” Jake observed. “Can you do us all up like that?”

“No, I can’t manage another one for a few hours at best,” she replied sadly, “but I do have a few other tricks up my sleeve.”

“The Lady taught you quite a bit.” he said.

“More than I could hope for. She opened a whole new world for me,” she said simply as she turned away.

“Be sure to thank her for me,” Jake added, wondering what else Qi might have learned. Then his thoughts turned to what they were about to do. “So where’s your grandfather?” he called after Qi as she stepped up to the digger. “Is he coming along?”

She looked up through the fog at the rooftops barely visible above them. “He’s up there somewhere, doing what he does best, along with many of his soldiers.”

“We couldn’t ask for a better escort,” Jake observed.

Qi leapt up on her digger’s leg and disappeared behind the metal cockpit. There was a hiss as the pistons shut her inside, and then a second hiss as her copilot above closed himself in. Jake moved around the wagon, stepped up onto the driver’s seat, and grabbed the reins.

He turned his head to Cole, already mounted up on Koto. “You ready,
amigo
?” he asked as he twisted the iris of his ocular to let in as much light as possible.

Cole took in a deep breath, closed his eyes, and then let it out slowly. He reseated his pistol. “Let’s get rolling,” he said, and hefted the chaingun up in both hands.

“Qi,” Jake shouted at the machine, “you take point, then Cole, and we’ll take up the rear.” Jake looked up at the rooftops. “Chung, if you can hear me, give us a few flankers.”

“He can hear,” Qi’s mechanically amplified voice came from the rig.

Jake nodded and motioned towards the gate that opened on the alley behind Qi’s workshop. “Ladies first,” he said, motioning with his hand. Chung’s grandson hit a button on a control panel by the gate, and with the sound of gears turning, the whole fence slid to the side. The massive power plant inside the machine revved up. With loud, clanging stomps in the earth, Qi guided the machine out through the gate. As she turned into the alley, the arms rose and tracked left and right slowly. Jake pitied anyone who got in front of the Gatlings mounted on each arm. Cole fell in behind, a grim, determined look on his face.

“Skeeter?” Jake said. He snapped the reins against Lumpy’s back to get the bull moving, and they started off with a lurch, falling in stride behind Cole.

“Yeah?” she replied, popping her head up a bit to look at Jake.

“Lumpy is twelve o’clock and the ass-end of this rig is six o’clock. If I call out time and distance, I want you to heave one of them poppers as close to on-target as you can.” Jake looked back at the girl scrunched into the pillbox. “Can you do that?”

A wicked grin spread across her face. “Piece of cake, Jake,” she said with a menacing resolve that surprised him. Jake set the Thumper between his legs and gripped it firmly. Qi turned left out of the alley and headed down the street toward the warehouse district. Jake knew there would be a few twists and turns, but they would be heading generally southeast through the fog. He figured there wouldn’t be much action until they were well out of the residential district—less chance of Ming’s men drawing the attention of San Fran Marshals.

Jake clung to a slim hope that the pasting they’d given Ming’s men the night before had given the man pause, but considering the determination Jake had encountered when he’d had to kill Ming’s brother, he knew there’d be shooting before they even got close to the
Jezebel
.

It occurred to him suddenly that the streets were empty, as if all of Chinatown knew what was about to happen. Through a brief gap in the fog, Jake’s left eye picked up a flicker of motion on one of the rooftops. A small figure in black leapt out of a shadow from behind a chimney stack, and another figure in black who had been crouched behind the façade of the building rose up to meet him. Jake reached for his pistol and saw Cole tracking with the chaingun, but it ended as soon as it started. Jake saw several flashes reflected by what had to be Chung’s metal fans. The victim’s body silently slid off the roof and thumped into the dirt in the alley between two buildings, lost in the mist.

“Chung got his first kill,” Jake hissed at Cole’s back. Cole didn’t turn his head, but he nodded to indicate he’d heard. Chung disappeared again into the shadows and Jake saw a few more follow in his footsteps. As they traveled through the cobbled streets of San Francisco, they occasionally heard the clash of metal or an abbreviated yell as another man was cut down in the shadowy fog. Jake could only hope Chung’s soldiers were doing the cutting.

They travelled another fifteen blocks and turned onto Fremont before the buildings changed from houses and storefronts to warehouses.

When they crossed into the warehouse district proper, Qi turned right, crossed between two high, windowless rows of warehouses, and turned left onto 2nd Street. The gaps between the buildings were wide enough now to prevent someone from jumping from one roof to the next, which meant that Chung and his men either were on the ground or had given up. Jake hoped for the former, but he didn’t see a single figure in black moving between the buildings as he rolled by.

Lumpy seemed to have gotten the idea of following Cole, so Jake loosened his grip on the reins and picked up the Thumper, cradling it in his arms, left handed. He’d spent a great deal of time practicing to shoot a rifle left-handed to take advantage of his night-vision. As he peeked through the scope, he traced a line along rooftops and down alleys to see if he could spot anyone. A gentle breeze pushed the mists around like mud in a pond, thickening the fog in some places, breaking it up in others.

The smell of the ocean grew stronger as it cleared out between several warehouses. Spotty gaps in the fog let Jake see the dark surface of San Francisco Bay, and he heard waves swishing on the rocky shoreline. Qi turned right down King Street, and Jake could now make out the faint, red envelope of the
Jezebel
illuminated by ground lights a thousand yards past a channel that started only a few blocks away. Qi seemed to be headed for one of the small bridges that spanned the channel, and Jake realized it would be a perfect bottleneck. There were stacks of crates and assorted dock equipment scattered around the area, with plenty of places to hide.
That’s where I’d put it,
Jake thought to himself. He had to hope that Qi and Chung had talked about the route to the
Jezebel.

“Cole,” Jake said and pointed at the spot in front of the bridge. Cole turned and then cast his gaze where Jake pointed. “Do you see it?” Another break in the fog allowed Cole to zero in on the spot.

Cole turned back and nodded. “I surely do.”

“Think you can play hide and seek along that left flank?” Jake asked, nodding towards the beach.

A big grin spread across Cole’s face. “I surely do,” he repeated with a wicked grin. He eased Koto out of the line and pulled back slightly on the reins. When he was even with the wagon, he handed the reins to Jake and hopped up onto the driver’s seat. With two quick motions he slid his boots off. He pulled the sling of the chaingun around so that the weapon rested between his shoulders and then pulled out the Bowie knife he kept in a sheath at the back of his gun belt. He dropped his hat on the seat next to Jake and pulled off his shirt, setting it on top of the hat. With a quick jerk he pulled a leather strap from inside his belt. He wrapped it around the bulk of his long, wavy black hair, making a ponytail at the back of his neck and then tied it off.

“Watch yourself,
amigo
,” Jake said.

“You, too.” Without another word Cole leapt over Koto, landing on the far side, and took off running between two warehouses as silently as any of Chung’s men. Jake tied off Koto’s reins to the buckboard and checked both pistols again, running the cylinder of each along his arm to make sure they were fully loaded.

Qi turned town 3rd Street and headed for the bridge. A wide gap between two small buildings and several rows of cargo crates arrayed beyond created a path that led straight up to the bridge.

“Skeeter,” Jake called over his back, “scoot to the back of that pillbox and get ready with them poppers. I’ll be coming back there directly.”

“Jake! Behind you!” Skeeter shouted.

Jake heard the flutter of fabric behind and to his left, and it was only the speed of his clockwork left that saved him. The filigreed Peacekeeper was already out of its holster and pointed at a man sailing down from the roof of the warehouse when Jake’s eye picked him out of the darkness. The pistol barked once, and the slug caught the man in the face, killing him instantly and spinning his body backwards. The sword that had been coming down towards Jake’s head fell from dead hands, rotated slightly, and stuck point first in the boards between Jake’s feet.

Jake rolled backward over the seat and came up with his knees planted on the Lady’s box just in time to see a group of men in black with rifles step out from a line of cargo crates near the canal. The arms of Qi’s digger shifted, and the twin gun pods on each arm tracked directly towards them. A staccato rhythm of gunfire, slower than the chainguns, erupted from the digger and poured into the assassins. They scattered like cockroaches when the lights came on.

Jake turned toward the back of the wagon and saw two groups of men in black step around from behind the warehouses, one on each side of the street.

“Skeeter! Four-thirty, thirty feet,” he yelled and fired off several rounds as he dropped down into the pillbox. Skeeter tossed one of her poppers as two men dropped in their tracks, hit by Jake’s volley. A barrage of gunfire came in at the wagon from both sides, but the shots either whistled overhead or ricocheted off of the Lady’s box and the steel plates of the pillbox. Skeeter’s popper went off right on target. The group of four men flew like ragdolls in a hurricane. Jake fired several more rounds into the group on the right, and two more went down. The last one fired his pistol and the bullet glanced off Jake’s left arm, sending up sparks as it ricocheted into the night. Jake took aim and put a round through the man’s throat, sending him to the ground in a heap.

That’s when Jake heard two power plants start up, one far ahead of Qi’s position and the other from behind the warehouse on his left. The power plants were much louder than Qi’s and sounded rougher, similar to the ones he’d encountered during the war, but something sounded different about them.

With a clank of metal feet, a mechanized assault unit stomped around the corner of the building. Jake gulped. He knew what they were capable of, and an image of the one standing atop Jackinaw Ridge flicked through his thoughts.

Fifteen feet of gleaming armor stared down at the gunfight unfolding before it. Its design was clearly based on the old Confederate model, but it appeared to be larger and more heavily armored. It also had a distinct head that swiveled and took in everything going on. The ends of its arms were more complex than the standard Confederate units he remembered. They had hydraulic-driven claws on the end and large gun pods mounted on the lower forearm.

“Oh shit,” Jake said as the assault unit turned toward the wagon, its arms rising into position. Jake could only hope that these machines were no more maneuverable than the Confederate models because it would give Qi’s digger at least some advantage. Jake grabbed Skeeter by the collar and yanked her out of the pillbox, causing her to squeal. Dragging her along, he dove behind the driver’s seat of the wagon and placed his body between her and the machine.

A massive, dual-explosion ripped through the night as antipersonnel rounds cooked off from both arms of the enemy unit. The impact rattled Jake’s teeth. Splinters flew everywhere, and the rear-left side of the wagon dropped down, the wheel blown to pieces.