TW12 The Six-Gun Solution NEW (28 page)

She stopped short, breathing hard. Her heart was hammering in her chest like a wild thing trying to claw its way out. She heard gunfire, but she also saw strange flashes of light, incredibly bright, thin beams lancing out across the street, from one rooftop to the other. Lasers, she thought. Like the weapons that the Master used. She was too late. It had already started. She turned and started running back the other way. All she could think of now was Scott, and Wyatt Earp was on his way to arrest him. Running as fast as she possibly could, she raced back down Fourth Street, heading toward the hotel. Somehow, she had to keep Wyatt from arresting Scott. Scott’s friends were in trouble and they needed him.

She stopped as she passed Spangenberg's Gun Store. She ran up onto the sidewalk and snatched up one of the wooden chairs George Spangenberg kept outside the shop, so that he and his customers could sit around and chew tobacco and pass the time of day as they watched the street. She grunted and swung the chair with all her might, smashing through the front display window of the store. She had to pull the chair out and smash it through again to make the hole big enough, then she climbed through, tearing her skirt on the jagged shards of glass and cutting herself in several places. She ignored the pain. She climbed into the store and ran around behind the glass display counters. George had locked them. With a small cry of frustration, she quickly looked around, picked up one of Spangenberg's hardbound account books and used it to break through the glass.

She reached inside the case and took out a Peacemaker with a seven-and-a-half-inch barrel and wood grips. She quickly glanced at the barrel. Engraved on the left side were the words, "Colt Single Action .45." She'd need .45 caliber cartridges. She opened up one of the wood cabinets and took out a box of ammunition, opened it and quickly loaded all six chambers. Then she climbed back out through the window, catching her skirt on the broken glass. With a desperate yank, she pulled free, ripping the dress and. carrying the gun in her right hand, ran toward Allen Street, past several astonished cowboys who were coming out of Hafford's Saloon.

They gaped at her open-mouthed as she ran past them, her hair wild, blood on her arms and cheeks, her dress torn in several places, and a gun in her right hand. Just as she turned the corner, she saw Wyatt and Scott coming out of the hotel. Wyatt with a gun in one hand and Scott's pistols, in their shoulder holster rig, carried in the other. As they stepped down onto the street, Jenny came to a stop and raised the Colt, holding it in both hands.

"Hold it right there. Wyatt!" she shouted.

Scott looked at her, eyes wide. "Jenny!"

Wyatt was equally surprised. "Good Lord," he said. "Jenny, have you lost your head?"

"You let him go!" she shouted. "You give him back his pistols and let him go right now!"

"Jenny, don't—" Scott started, but Wyatt silenced him.

"You keep your mouth shut. Kid," he said, "and don't you move."

"Let him go, Wyatt!" Jenny said, aiming the gun at him.

"I'm afraid I can't do that, Jenny," Earp replied. "Now put down that pistol before somebody gets hurt."

She pulled back the hammer on the Colt. "No, you drop yours. Wyatt! Drop it or I'll shoot, so help me!"

People were peering out through the doors of the saloon and from the hotel windows, ready to duck back quickly if bullets started flying.

"Now be sensible, Jenny. If you don't put down that pistol right now. I'll be forced to shoot the Kid," said Wyatt, aiming his revolver at Scott's back.

"You do that and I'll kill you, Wyatt. I swear to God!"

"You're no shootist, Jenny. You're liable to miss."

"Then I'll just keep shooting till I hit you, Wyatt, and you'll have to kill me. too! I don't care! If Scott dies, I don't want to live!"

"You're talkin' crazy, Jenny. Don't—"

"
Now
, Wyatt! Drop it and let him go right now or I'll shoot, so help me!"

"By God, I think she means it," Wyatt said. "Kid, talk some sense to her. Tell her this is foolish."

"Scott, Finn's in trouble!" she shouted. "He needs you, right now!"

"Better do as she says, Marshal," Scott said, tensing.

Wyatt sighed and shook his head. "You'll both regret this. Kid," he said. He dropped his gun to the street.

“I’ll take my guns, Marshal," Scott said, holding out his hand.

Wyatt Earp handed them over. Scott shrugged out of his coat and quickly slipped the rig on. He took out one of the fancy Colts.

“I'm sorry about this. Marshal," he said, "but I haven't got time to explain and I can't have you in the way."

He raised the gun and brought the barrel down on Wyatt's head. Earp collapsed to the street. Scott ran over to Jenny.

"You're amazing, you know that? Where's Finn?"

"At the rooming house," she said. "I heard shots and there were lasers—"

"Shit," said Scott. "Stay here!"

He took off down Fourth Street at a dead run. Jenny hesitated for a moment, then started running after him.

"What the hell is Scott doing with them?" Andre said. "Maybe that isn't Scott." said Lucas. “At least, not
our
Scott.”

"It
has
to be," she said. "We just crossed over.
Scott! Wait!"
The Kid glanced over his shoulder at them briefly, then turned back and kept on walking.

“It's not him," said Lucas.

Andre shook her head. "But how . . . “

"I don't
know!"
said Lucas. "Maybe we've crossed over again without knowing it. Maybe we're caught in some kind of ripple effect, a timewave. The instability's increasing. Jesus. This is it!"

"How do you know?"

"It's got to be! In this timeline, the Montana Kid was part of the shootout at the O.K. Corral. In our timeline, he wasn't even there. Until now. We were right. Scott has to be the key! Come on!"

"What are we going to do?"

"Hell if I know." Lucas said, as they started running after the Earps.

"We'll have to wait for Darkness."

'What if he doesn't show?"

"Then we're fucked.”

Delaney reached the bottom of the stairs just as Stone and Capiletti came through the front door. Stone leaped to one side as Capiletti went for his sidearm. Finn fired, the loud report of the .45 filling the lobby. The clerk cried out in alarm and dropped down behind his desk as Capiletti fell, a bullet through his chest. Finn ducked back as Stone fired his laser and the beam passed inches from his face. He filed again and missed.

He swore through clenched teeth. A Colt .45 against a laser. Terrific odds.

And he only had four bullets left. Two men dressed in black commando gear came diving through the front door. Delaney fired, wounding one of them, then felt a wash of searing heat go past him as the plasma charge narrowly missed him and struck the wall, igniting it. He fired again and missed the third man diving through the door, then darted up the stairs as a second plasma charge was fired, barely missing him and starting another fire as it struck the wall. His clothes were smoldering.

"Get him, dammit!" he heard Stone yell, and then he ducked around the stair post and snapped off another shot, dropping the man who'd fired the first two plasma rounds.

"They're in, Geordy!"
he shouted.
"Watch it!"

He started running up the stairs. One bullet left. And no time to reload.

"Delaney!
"

Cooper was above him on the landing. He tossed down the disruptor. Finn dropped the Colt and caught it, then heard the boom of Cooper's Desert Eagle. He felt something whoosh past his ear and then there was an explosion behind him as the round struck one of the S.0.G. commandos in the chest and ignited, spattering the walls with blood and mangled flesh.

Downstairs, at the back entrance, Georgeson was knocked off his feet as the door exploded inward and the S.O.G. commandos came rushing through. He fired both his lasers from the floor and dropped the first man through the door, then was struck twice by laser fire from the men behind him. He fired again, dropping one more assailant, took another laser hit, but kept on firing, killing the last man through the door. He staggered to his feet, badly wounded, a hole through the side of his face, and several more through his chest and shoulder.

He gasped for breath and fell to his knees as one lung collapsed, then looked up and saw Ben Stone coming through the smoke and flames. He raised his lasers, but he wasn't quick enough. Stone fired. The heavy 45 caliber slug smashed into Georgeson's forehead and exited through the other side, taking a bloody lump of bone and brain with it. The Ranger was hurled backwards by the impact, and he was dead before he hit the floor.

Upstairs, Tilley was engaged in a furious crossfire with the men on the roof across the way. He couldn't use his plasma rifle, for fear of setting the building across the street on fire. The desk clerk, oblivious to the laser beams flashing back and forth above him, ran out into the street, screaming, “Fire! Fire!” Boarders in the morning house were dashing down the stairs and out the back, paying no attention to the bodies they tripped over as they stumbled out through the smoke and flames on the first floor. Cooper came out onto the roof just as two of the S.O.G. commandos materialized behind Tilley. He fired twice, the explosive rounds slamming into his targets and making bloody salsa out of them, then dropped to the roof as Tilley spun around and yelled, "
DOWN
!"

Tilley fired over him, taking out one more commando who had clocked in behind Cooper, but not before he took a laser hit in the chest. He cried out and slumped over, grimacing with pain. Cooper started to get up, but a laser beam coming from across the street grazed his temple and he cried out, dropping back down, a smoking furrow in his hair.

“Son of a
bitch
! Tilley, you okay'?"

"Don't know . . . damn, it hurts. . . ."

“Hang on, I'll get those bastards!"

Cooper quickly programmed his disc for the leap to the roof across the street. He could only guess wildly at the distance and the height, but there was no other choice. He programmed in his estimate and clocked.

He appeared about three feet above them . . . over the edge of the roof, with nothing but empty space below him.

"
Aw, fuck
!" he shouted.

As he fell, he fired five times in rapid succession, saw the bullets strike their targets and explode on impact, then the ground came up and he fell the bone-jarring impact and heard a loud snap as he struck.

The stairwell was full of smoke. Ben Stone coughed and squinted, trying to see through it. He heard something and fired at the sound. A man cried out and Stone saw a disruptor come clattering down the stairs. He grinned.

"Got you, you bastard!" he said, triumphantly.

He bent down to pick up the weapon and then suddenly a figure came flying through the air, directly at him. Delaney hit him and both men tumbled down the stairs. Delaney scrambled to his feet, trying to ignore the pain of the smashed bone in his elbow. He pulled his knife out its sheath and raised it, then saw that Stone was lying motionless on the smoke-filled landing, his neck at a crazy angle.

He was dead.

Delaney bent over him and found his warp disc. Coughing from the smoke and grunting with pain, he programmed it for non-specific time and clocked Stone's body to the dead zone. Then he retrieved his disruptor and moved back to the first floor.

Tilley crawled to the edge of the roof and looked over. There was no more laser fire coming from the other side. He heard someone groaning in the street below and looked down to see Cooper lying there, sprawled on his back, his weapon on the ground beside him. He heard movement behind him and spun around—

"Easy, Tilley!" said Delaney.

With a sigh of relief. Tilley lowered his weapon. "We get 'em all?"

"I think so," said Delaney. "I clocked out the bodies. Geordy didn't make it."

"Shit . . ." said Tilley.

"How bad are you hit?"

"Don't know . . .

"Where's Cooper?"

"Down there." said Tilley, jerking his head toward the street below.

Delaney looked over the side. There was shouting in the street and the distant sound of bells as the fire brigade approached. Cooper was trying to crawl toward where his gun lay in the street.

"Damn," Delaney swore, “Tilley get out of here. Clock back to Plus Time."

"What about—“

"Forget it. We've lost our transition point. Tell the strike force to stand by. Nobody moves till we send word. Now go!"

"Got it."

Tilley reached for his warp disc and clocked out. Delaney ran back down the stairs and tumbled through the smoke and out the back door. He ran down the alleyway out to the street. People were converging on the rooming house, carrying buckets of water. Delaney ran over to Cooper, who'd just managed to retrieve his gun.

"You okay?"

"Yeah," grimaced Cooper, groaning through his teeth. "Misjudged the distance slightly . . . Peter Pan I ain't. Broke both my damn legs. . . ."

"Come on, we're clocking you out. . . ."

"What about Tilley?"

"He's clocked out already. I think he’ll make it."

"Geordy?"

"Dead,” said Finn. "But he got ‘em all."

"Son of a bitch," said Cooper, gasping.

Delaney fumbled for Cooper's warp disc.

"It's okay, I got it," Cooper said, "The bodies?"

"I clocked 'em out."

"What do you want me to do?"

"Get your legs fixed. Everything's on hold until we get a new transition point. Meanwhile, I've got to find the others. Now get out of here!"

"But we got the bastards, didn't we?"

"Yeah, you got ‘em. Now go!"

"Give 'em hell, Delaney. . . ."

Cooper activated his disc and clocked out.

Delaney got his feet and suddenly noticed that it was daylight. Startled, he turned back towards the rooming house. A second earlier, it had been dark and smoke was pouring from the windows. Men were shouting and running in the street, bells were clanging. . . . Now, suddenly, it was broad daylight and the fire had been put out. There were several people standing in the street, looking at the damage. A wagon passed him going one way, two riders walking their horses passed heading in the opposite direction. The sun was high in the sky.