Children of Zero

by Andrew Calhoun

  Saeliko began moving again, staying low to the ground, one eye on the scene in front of the house and the other alert for branches or other debris that might crack underfoot and give their presence away. She hoped that Haley and Kettle would do the same.

  Her path through the trees wasn’t random; she was creeping closer to the rock cairn that she had been thrown behind during the first attack. Not only did it offer cover, she guessed that her scimitar was lying somewhere nearby. Saeliko could deal out plenty of violence without the long, curved blade, but things tended to go a lot easier with it in hand.

  And there it was, right where she thought it would be, the sleek steel lying next to a bedraggled shrub a few paces back from the cairn. She led her two followers in, gently picked up the scimitar by its hilt and then eased over to the relative safety of the shadow cast by the rock pile. Next to it was a cutlass. She handed that to Kettle, who accepted it and tested its balance, apparently finding it to his liking after twisting it this way and that.

  Over by the house, she could hear the Lavic women in a heated discussion. Saeliko didn’t have a clue what they were saying. She had a smattering of Lavic vocabulary in her head, but when they spoke quickly, she didn’t have a chance at keeping up. However, as fate would have it, she had two translators crouching next to her. She gestured to Haley, beckoning her to lean closer. “What are they saying?” Saeliko asked in a near-silent whisper.

  “They’re trying to figure out what to do with Radovan,” Haley reported, keeping her own volume just above mute. “They’ve got him, and . . . hold on . . . they’ve got the weird guy, too. Seventy-two. I guess he killed a lot of them before they captured him. Some of the crew want to throw him off the cliff and kill him right now; others want to torture him for a while.”

  “Either way, good riddance,” Saeliko said. She noted that Kettle was contemplating arguing the point, but he declined to offer his advice. She supposed that his newfound sense of moral righteousness was at odds with knowing that Seventy-two was intent on murdering him.

  “Okay, Harker Mikka’s talking,” Haley reported. Saeliko heard the majority of the crew fall quiet while a single voice started giving out commands. “She’s telling some of her crew to take both of them to the Black Star. They’re going to take Radovan prisoner and drag the floppy-haired man behind the boat for sharks. And now . . . wait . . . okay, Mikka is going to stay for a while. She wants to look around the house with a few of her crew and see what she can find. And now she’s ordering a few more people to do what they can for the wounded.”

  “Good,” Saeliko stated. “Let them split up. We’ll follow the group taking Radovan. Less people to fight.” Haley and Kettle both nodded in agreement. “Come on. If we fade back into the forest, we can run downhill and set up an ambush.”

  “What do we do after we get Radovan?” Haley asked. “You don’t have a ship anymore.”

  “We’ll have to steal one. There are lots of little fishing boats along the coast.” Even as she said it, she doubted her plan. There was no way they’d be able to outrun the Black Star in a dodgy fishing boat. Anyway, she’d solve the escape problem later.

  The three of them very carefully slunk back into the trees, heading on a diagonal course away from the house that would allow them to eventually move parallel to the trail leading back down toward Maglipan.

  They got no more than a half-dozen yards when they heard a “Pssst” sound from off to their left. Saeliko froze and looked for the source of the sound. The “Pssst” repeated itself, and her eyes honed in on a shallow pit in the ground with the charred remains of shrubs and bits of wood. She wasn’t sure if the crater was the result of Janx’s assault on the Epoch crew or Seventy-two’s assault on the Black Star crew. The chaos those rifles unleashed made it hard to keep track of what happened.

  At the back lip of the pit, Saeliko saw Ollan. He had been almost completely covered in a shower of dirt and rubble, which had probably saved his life by letting him lie still while the pandemonium raged around him. His blonde hair was now brown thanks to the thick ooze of mud plastered all around his head and the top half of his body.

  Saeliko lowered herself into the pit and eased over to him. “The Five, you’re a tough son of a rent-boy,” she whispered and smiled.

  He grinned back, the mud around his mouth cracking to accommodate. “You’re pretty hard to kill, yourself.”

  “I’m fucking invincible.” She said with a wink. “You should know that by now. Can you walk?”

  “More or less. I’ve got some new ventilation in one of my legs, but I figure that’s why the Five gave me two.”

  “Still have that crossbow of yours?”

  “Nope. Broken. But I’ve still got my pistol and an axe. What’s the plan?”

  “Same as always. We’re going to liberate Radovan.”

  “How many crew do we have left?”

  “Including you, four.”

  Ollan looked at Kettle and Haley for a few moments, noting with appreciation the fact that Haley was carrying one of the big rifles. “Could be worse I suppose.”

  “Ever the optimist. Good man.”

  Kettle gave a soft “Ahem” to catch their attention. “Maybe more than four,” he said once he got it. “Saeliko and Ollan both raised their eyebrows. “Dallas and Soup are headed this way. Amba’s alive, too. We left her down at the beach.”

  “Amba,” Ollan mumbled and grinned again.

  “Luckiest sailor in the whole Sollian,” Saeliko confirmed.

  “I saw Brenna,” Ollan said suddenly, sober again. “She’s dead. Shot right through the neck. Sorry about that.”

  Saeliko nodded. “I saw Lofi die in the woods not too far from here.”

  Ollan sighed. “She was a good woman.”

  “She was.”

  “All right,” Ollan said and began slowly lifting himself up out of the muck, careful not to make too much noise. “Let’s do this, shall we?”

  “Aye.” Saeliko put an arm under his big bicep and helped him up into a standing position. She noticed two strips of cloth that he had bound tightly around his upper left leg. They were both soaked in blood.

  The four of them walked out of the pit and began walking, Ollan obviously limping but doing quite well considering the obvious damage to his leg. Once she was sure that he could manage on his own, Saeliko took the lead and swept the landscape with her eyes looking for signs of threat.

  And then something strange happened. Ollan, in a loud and clear voice, commanded her to “Stop.” She straightened herself from her crouched stalking position and turned to face the big Lavic man.

  He was holding his flintlock in front of him, pointing it straight at her face. He stood no more than three paces away. If he pulled the trigger, he wouldn’t miss. Haley reacted first, pointing the barrels of the rifle at Ollan and whispering, “What are you doing?” Kettle raised his cutlass and took an attack stance.

  “Harker Mikka!” Ollan yelled out. The house was obstructed by trees, but Saeliko noted the instantaneous silence coming from that direction. She imagined the Lavic pirates spinning around trying to figure out where the voice was coming from.

  “Dacta lankda!” he called out. Saeliko recognized the Lavic words for over here.

  “Shit,” Haley said. “What do we do? What do we do?”

  But it was too late to do anything; they hadn’t put enough space between themselves and the crew of the Black Star. Within moments, they all came pouring through the trees, led by Harker Mikka herself. Behind Mikka, two other sailors had Seventy-two in tow. He had a rope leash around his neck, a knife and a crossbow bolt were sticking out of his back and his face had been pummeled by more than one fist. He was an absolute mess, and it wasn’t precisely clear how he was even standing.

  They had Radovan, too. The old man was winded, but compared to Seventy-two, he looked relatively fresh.

  There must have been forty or fifty of them in total. Seventy-two had dealt out a huge amount of damage and cull
ed their numbers, but in the end, they must have overwhelmed him.

  Saeliko also noticed something of importance. No one had bothered to pick up Seventy-two’s weapon, which meant that Haley was the only one still wielding its lethal power. They could use that to their advantage.

  “It’s okay,” Saeliko told Haley and Kettle as the Lavic pirates quickly began to form a circle around their four prey. “Just follow my lead and we’ll be fine.” They both looked completely unconvinced.

  “Harker Saeliko,” Mikka said, stepping forward and bowing her head slightly, a modest sign of respect that didn’t seem to suit the situation. “I was wondering when you would show up.” She was speaking in Maelian.

  “Harker Mikka,” Saeliko said and bowed back. “Nice to see you again, as always.”

  “It seems we’ve got quite the predicament here.”

  “Easily solved,” Saeliko replied. “You surrender Radovan to me and grant me safe passage, and I’ll let you and your crew go unharmed.”

  Mikka gave a hearty laugh, as did a few of her sailors who could understand Maelian. Even Ollan chuckled. “I think not,” Mikka finally said after everyone had had their fill. Then she turned to the women holding Radovan and barked out a few quick orders in Lavic. Saeliko caught the words Smollic Dar, and she could guess the rest. Three of the pirates guided Radovan back toward the trail, the other pirates parting to make room and then reclosing the circle around Saeliko and her companions.

  “Did you get a good look?” Mikka inquired. “That’s the last you’ll ever see of the infamous Radovan Mozik.”

  Saeliko ignored her and fixed her gaze on Ollan. “It was you.”

  “Aye, it was me.”

  “You went to Harker Mikka in Myffa’s Cove.”

  “Aye.”

  “You told her about Radovan.”

  “She already knew. Shen had already told her. What can I say, you can’t trust pirates.”

  “But it was you who told her where I would lay anchor at the Skag,” Saeliko said. “Shen never knew that. You told Mikka where I would lay anchor and then you led me right into an ambush.”

  “That’s right. I made a deal. I gave her information, and she gave me a future.”

  “What happened to our deal?”

  “What deal?”

  “On Butterfly Island. Right after we fished these two out of the sea. You told me I had your undying loyalty.”

  “No, Saeliko. I said that if you kept making the right decisions, you would have my undying loyalty. It became pretty clear that you were taking too many unnecessary risks. You were going to get us all killed.”

  “No, you got them all killed, Ollan. You got Brenna killed. You got Lofi killed. It was you.”

  “Shen did it first. Remember? You were all being betrayed by your own women before I cut my deal. You were too dangerous, Saeliko. Bold, yes, but not smart. I knew that I had to get off the Epoch before you killed me. That’s why I went to Harker Mikka.”

  Saeliko shook her head. “You should have trusted me.”

  “You know, I’m a little bit surprised,” Ollan said, changing the subject. “I was worried you might have figured it out after the Black Star found the Epoch.”

  “Oh, I did.”

  “Pardon?”

  “I guessed it was you.”

  He suddenly looked uncomfortable. “Then why didn’t you do something about it?”

  “I did.”

  “What?”

  “Remember when I used your pistol to interrogate Brenna?”

  Ollan’s eyes immediately dropped down and refocused on the flintlock in his hand. In less than the time it took to blink, his expression turned from curiosity to rage as his visual inspection led to one inescapable detail: the piece of flint that was normally held beneath the screw device and above the hammer was inexplicably gone. By the time he looked back up at Saeliko, the Saffisheen was already in motion.

  “Haley, start shooting people!” Saeliko commanded without taking her eyes off of Ollan.

  “No!” Ollan growled and pulled the trigger. Without the flint, it was an act of pure futility.

  Saeliko’s scimitar punched through Ollan’s ribcage and found the Lavic sailor’s heart. He was dead before he hit the ground.

  An instant later, Haley spun away from Ollan and pulled the trigger on her own weapon with exactly the opposite effect. The sharp rattattat sound of the rifle sung out and women fell to the ground either horribly wounded or merely trying to dodge the onslaught of hot metal spraying out of the top barrel.

  Saeliko ripped her blade out of Ollan’s chest, grabbed his flint-less pistol and went straight after Mikka. To the Lavic harker’s credit, the woman already had her pistol out and was aiming for Saeliko’s midsection. The Saffisheen twisted away as the shot was fired and threw Ollan’s pistol right at the harker’s head. Mikka dodged the wild throw, but she did so at the expense of her focus and balance. By the time she regained both, Saeliko was within striking distance. Mikka screeched and tried to use the side of her pistol as a shield against the oncoming scimitar. The midsection of the descending blade hammered the pistol out of the woman’s grip, which allowed the top portion of the blade to burry itself in Mikka’s shoulder and snap through her collar bone. Mikka fell screaming.

  The element of surprise had officially ended. Harker Mikka’s crew had their weapons out, and Saeliko guessed that she had roughly three shakes of a stick before a hail of pistol shots was fired in her general direction. She snarled and bounded back toward Haley.

  “Go!” she called out to her rifle-wielding ally. She grabbed Haley by the back of her collar and shoved her forward. Haley’s handiwork had created a wide opening in the encirclement of enemies and Saeliko was happy to take advantage. Together the two women sprinted forward just as the first salvo erupted from Lavic pistols.

  Saeliko felt something hot enter the back of her left arm. An instant later, Haley yelped in pain. They jumped over a fallen tree and ducked down into a depression in the earth. Haley turned and fired a few shots back at the pirates, warning them not to come closer. They might have had more guns, but hers was by far the most dangerous.

  “You hit?” Saeliko asked.

  “I think I got shot in the ass,” came a reply through gritted teeth. “Where’s Kettle?”

  Saeliko took a chance and lifted her head above the fallen tree to see if she could find an answer to that question. “Well, that’s fucking strange.”

  4.8 KETTLE

  Kettle was being choked to death, and he couldn’t understand why.

  As soon as Saeliko attacked, the man they called Seventy-two had used the ensuing confusion to escape his captors and sprint directly toward Kettle. It didn’t seem to matter one bit to the badly wounded, one-armed man that he didn’t have a weapon in hand.

  Kettle had a weapon. He had a boffing big cutlass, and he had used that cutlass to stab the oncoming maniac right through the gut. Seventy-two hadn’t even tried to avoid the blade. On the contrary, he almost seemed to welcome it, as if it were a meager price that he had to pay to get his remaining hand around Kettle’s throat.

  And now Kettle was lying on his back with this impaled lunatic on top of him trying to squeeze the life out of him. The top half of Kettle’s cutlass had come out the man’s lower back, well below the knife and crossbow bolt sticking out of his shoulder blades.

  A voice in his brain calmly fed him crucial information. Your hands are still holding the hilt of the cutlass, dumbass. Good point. He let go of his weapon and squirmed until he could bring his hands up and push against Seventy-two’s arm. He tried desperately to force the man to release his death grip.

  That didn’t do any good. For an impaled lunatic, Seventy-two was amazingly strong.

  Try something different, you useless twit. You’re running out of time. Another good point. His vision was starting to narrow.

  He reached up with both hands, one firmly grabbing the knife and the other the shaft of the crossbow bolt. He ro
tated them both, stirring them like soup ladles. He couldn’t imagine how much pain that would have caused, but he could see it on Seventy-two’s face. Eyes that burned with raging hatred and animosity now blinked rapidly as he tried to maintain his grip on Kettle’s throat and simultaneously endure the ocean of pain he must have been feeling.

  One more good twist of the bolt seemed to be the breaking point. Seventy-two’s grip released. Then he made a strange gargling, gasping noise and his eyes closed completely. After a few moments in which Kettle gratefully gasped big gulps of oxygen down his bruised windpipe, he realized that Seventy-two was no longer alive. The man had literally tried to kill him until his last breath.

  Kettle rolled Seventy-two onto his side and assessed the situation. He immediately noticed that there were a lot of women off to his left with flintlock pistols pointed at him. They probably hadn’t fired at him thus far because they, like Kettle, had been confused by Seventy-two’s outrageous actions. That phase had passed.

  The good news was that they weren’t very close. They had been backed off by Haley’s rifle and were mostly hiding behind boulders and trees and whatever else they could find.

  Speaking of Haley, Kettle had a sudden urge to get back to her side, not just because she had the biggest gun in the fight but also because they needed to figure out what to do next and his current position lying on his back in the middle of a firefight wasn’t conducive to making that happen.

  “Okay, Kettle,” he muttered to himself. “Be proactive. Be useful.” He flipped onto his stomach and began to scramble like a crocodile toward the source of Haley’s gunfire.

  Luckily, she must have seen him because as far as he could tell, she was firing directly over his head at the targets behind him, giving him the cover he needed to make it across the battlefield. After traveling a dozen meters in this way, he came to the fallen log and Saeliko popped up to help him clamber over it and into the basin they were hiding in.

  “What took you so long?” Saeliko asked.

  “Very funny.” He noticed that Saeliko’s left arm had been shot. She had tied a torn piece of cloth over the wound, but two lines of blood were running down her arm. Things were going pear-shaped.