Ain't Nobody's Business

by C. J. Clemens

  “Tell Mr. Darkbur we got Sheriff Greyson,” he yelled to someone inside the saloon.

  Lilly grabbed Brand and tugged her behind one of the fountains in the center of the courtyard. The weary deputy sank to the ground in a semiconscious state as Lilly considered her options.

  Milo, clearly grasping that Brand had inadvertently blown apart their plan, released his clutch on Davis and aimed his pistol at one of the two guards. Davis drew his own weapon and targeted the other one. The problem? Both guards were aiming back.

  For a moment, nobody fired. Lilly’s mind whirled—so many variables here. She couldn’t tell the difference between the criminals and the innocent bystanders, so she really didn’t want to start firing at anybody.

  Many patrons were still caught up in the situation. While some had scattered and bolted at the sight of Lilly’s gun, others had simply taken their place. Some had even brought their drinks outside while they watched the melee. Why the hell didn’t they take cover inside? Were they that stupid, or were they so acclimatized to nighttime showdowns that they considered this one just another form of free entertainment? No doubt if any of her people died in the ensuing firefight, the onlookers would consider it a bonus.

  The beefy minion in the doorway brandished his weapon, and three more of Darkbur’s goons shoved their way through the crowd, guns held aloft.

  Still, nobody fired. Milo and Davis maneuvered to the other side of the courtyard, behind the second fountain, but the porcana statue at its center was much smaller than the broncan one mounted on hers—and wouldn’t provide one stocky dworg and one sizable human male much cover. It would have made more sense for her and Brand to crouch behind the smaller fountain, but it was too late to switch now.

  “Sheriff Greyson,” Gono Darkbur’s voice rang out, his tone one of feigned politeness. “I’m assuming you’re trying to break into my building?”

  Lilly’s gaze shifted toward the open doorway of the saloon, where the crowd parted reverentially to let the crime lord pass into the courtyard.

  She peered around the broncan statue. “Only recovering what you stole, Gono. Give yourself up now, or it’s only going to get worse for you.”

  Darkbur chuckled. “There’s no way you’re getting out of this courtyard alive.”

  “Then I might as well take my shot,” Lilly muttered. She stood to her full height and leaned around the statue, just enough to get a good aim at the man.

  Unfortunately, for a hefty brute, Darkbur was damn fast. Just as Lilly squeezed off a round, he yanked a young man from the crowd and ducked behind him so that her plasma blast hit the hapless spectator square in the chest.

  Oh, no!

  “Kill them,” Darkbur yelled. “Kill them all!”

  Then he flung the young man to the side, plunged through the crowd, and vanished into the saloon. The man Lilly had accidentally shot sank, lifeless, to the ground.

  Lilly’s stomach tightened, but she had no time for regret. Her own life was on the line.

  More of Darkbur’s goons stomped through the doorway. Luckily, the dispersing crowd hampered their progress. Apparently, seeing the dead man crumpled on the concrete finally woke up the rest of the onlookers. Now in full panic mode, people tossed away their drinks and tried to flee the courtyard, clambering and clawing their way past the goons, back into the saloon.

  Amid the chaos of screams and broken glass, both sides of the battle opened fire.

  Blasts collided with the buildings, the benches, the statues, and the few remaining saloon patrons unlucky enough not to have scrambled out in time. Lilly cringed at the pointless carnage.

  Clenching her jaw, she crouched beside the fountain and managed to take a clean shot at one of Darkbur’s men—the big guy who’d outed her. The blast hit him in the shoulder and knocked him to the ground.

  She twisted to focus on another guard near the saloon, and a blast whizzed past her face so close she felt the hot air whip her cheek. She whirled to the side. The man she’d just shot wasn’t dead! From his position on the ground, he had propped himself on his elbows and aimed his rifle at her head.

  As she retreated, he took another shot, which blasted into the edge of the fountain’s pool. Water gushed out into the center of the courtyard, drenching Lilly’s boots.

  She crouched behind the broncan statue for cover, trying to keep an eye on the scene but unsure what to do next. Davis and Milo knelt behind the smaller porcana statue, shooting toward the growing group of men filtering into the courtyard, all aiming to kill them—painfully, if possible. Milo ceased firing long enough to pluck one of Bechet’s smoke grenades from his satchel. After arming it, he tossed it toward the men.

  Immediately, the area filled with a thick, dark-green smoke. It hadn’t reached Lilly yet, but she took a bracing breath of slightly fresher air in anticipation. Oddly, though, the smoke stayed put, suspended in a billowing shape, almost as if it were a solid entity.

  How bizarre.

  Captain Bechet and his daughter had certainly brought an impressive box of magic tricks with them.

  With all of Darkbur’s men trapped inside the greenish cloud, the shooting soon tapered off, and a much-needed moment of relief ensued. When one of the goons stepped through the green cloud and into the open air, he left a man-shaped opening behind in the smoke.

  Lilly gaped at it, momentarily forgetting her job. Luckily, Davis reacted more quickly, hitting the man directly in the face with a plasma blast that hollowed out his head and left his torso a gratuitously bloody mess.

  “That’s disgusting,” Milo said.

  “Crap.” Davis peered at the barrel of his rifle.

  Lilly looked over at her deputy. “You had it on full power?”

  “Yep, and now it’s drained.” Sighing, Davis threw down the rifle and drew out his pistol.

  Milo’s face crinkled in confusion.

  “Set at full power, I only had a few shots,” Davis explained. “Takes ten minutes to recharge.”

  “Well, this ain’t lasting ten minutes,” Lilly said.

  Nobody else had emerged from the smoke yet, but it was only a matter of time.

  Davis glanced at Brand, who, after resting for a few moments, had finally opened her eyes and risen to her feet. No doubt the cool water, which had drenched her pants as it flowed from the busted fountain, had done its part to rejuvenate her.

  Davis’s brow furrowed as he noted the full extent of her facial injuries. “Are you OK?”

  Brand fiercely shook out her limp blonde hair. “I’m good, I’m good.”

  She clicked off the safety catch on her blaster, which Shaw had apparently missed during her escape. Ignoring Davis’s concerned looks, she stood alongside Lilly and aimed her weapon at the dense cloud of green smoke.

  “Bring it on,” she growled with a determined menace Lilly had never heard from her deputy before.

  Galactic Blues

  We hope you’ve enjoyed the eighth episode of the Galactic Blues serial. To be notified of new releases, please subscribe to the Newton’s Gate list.

  Join the Newton’s Gate Universe

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  Of course, if you did enjoy this episode of Galactic Blues, please consider leaving a positive review. Thanks in advance!

  PREVIOUS EPISODES

  Galactic Blues Episode 1 - Born Under a Bad Sign

  Good pirates fight. Smart pirates run. The best aim for somewhere in between…

  After pulling off the heist of a lifetime, Captain Remy Bechet faces harrowing space battles, mutinous scumbags, and a vengeful nemesis from the past—all while trying to protect the ragtag crew he considers family.

  Meanwhile, on the planet Vox, Sheriff Lilly Greyson finds herself juggling formidable black-market dealers, horny deputies, and a worldwide crisis in the making.

  And for both, the day’s only half over.

&
nbsp; If you’re a fan of space operas like Firefly, Defiance, and Dark Matter, then you’ll love the first action-packed episode of the Galactic Blues serial.

  OTHER NGU RELEASES

  It’s easy to find other Newton’s Gate work. Every release inside the Newton’s Gate Universe will be listed under the C.J. Clemens name. Many of the releases will have other authors listed as well.

  Here are some of the current NGU releases:

  Deliver or Die: A Newton’s Gate Series (The Delivery Mage Book 1)

  By Jamie Davis & C.J. Clemens

  A dangerous tech warlord. A devious damsel. Is this smuggler mage getting paid or played?

  Baltimore, 2055. Ex-special ops agent Kurt Carter refuses to resort to killing any longer. Though this mage isn’t above skirting the law with a little magic to smuggle goods through the interstellar portals and back to Earth, he never expected to use the Newton’s gates on a ransom mission for the ex-wife he can’t seem to forget…

  With the help of a trigger-happy sidekick, Kurt has no choice but to break into a government building and steal a mysterious sarcophagus. After his ex throws an unexpected wrinkle into his plan, the smuggler mage must improvise to keep an impatient warlord at bay. Can Kurt save the girl and protect his business all without getting more blood on his hands?

  Deliver or Die is the first book in The Delivery Mage series of urban fantasy novels with a touch of interstellar travel. If you like magical antiheroes, action-packed space fantasies, and unique world-building, then you’ll love Jamie Davis’s rule-bending tale.

  ________________________

  The Realm: A Newton’s Gate Series

  By A.Q. Owen & C.J. Clemens

  HELL. HATH. NO. FURY.

  Orion’s little girl, dead now this last year, haunts his every hour, waking or not. His ex-wife, deep in the grip of her own grief and a drug problem, has abandoned Orion, deserting him and what scraps remained of their life.

  So, Orion drinks. And drinks. And rages. And burns through his fortune. And prays for death. Until he stumbles across his old high-school nemesis, Steve, one night in a dive bar.

  This supposed chance encounter turns out to be anything but. Since the advent of magic and alchemy, now strangely widespread after a recent high-profile scientific accident, Orion’s old rival has been conjuring a “plan” for his distraught adversary. A plan Steve swears comes direct from the Almighty himself.

  At first, his plan sounds crazy. Hell, Orion thinks, it is crazy: use a divine sword, a hiding spell, and the protection of God to invade hell and slay the devil, using good magic to restore order to the world. And to get the one thing he wants more than anything: revenge.

  Not surprisingly, Lucifer has his own plans—and turns out to be the toughest mark this hunter has ever tracked. Not to mention Satan’s legions of bloodthirsty, rapacious demons, who’ve been aching to kill a human for millennia, and his dark agents on Earth, eager to kill their own kind to curry favor with their master.

  ______________________

  Zombie Chaos Book 1: Bloodbath in the Big Easy: A Newton’s Gate series (A Post Apocalyptic Zombie Tale)

  WARNING: GRAPHIC LANGUAGE. GRAPHIC GORE. GRAPHIC SNARK.

  What would you do if you received a three-week warning of the coming zombie apocalypse? How would you prepare? What if the warning was wrong—and the undead rose a full week before you were ready?

  Joe Daniels may be luckier than most, but heʼs still in a jam. After weeks of prepping, he gets caught in a zombie storm. To accomplish his plans and stay alive, he has to rescue his wife, Clare, and travel 1,300 miles through Americaʼs zombie-infested countryside to the safety of northern Michigan.

  But, first, he has to battle his way out of New Orleans. With his cat, Azazel, in tow.

  Bloodbath in the Big Easy is the first book in the Zombie Chaos series. If you like the drama of The Walking Dead, the gore of Romeroʼs Dead series, and the humor of Shaun of the Dead, follow Joe on his journey through zombie-filled New Orleans.

  _____________________

  MORE RELEASES TO COME!

  Acknowledgments

  Galactic Blues was heavily influenced by the terrific characters and entertaining plots of Firefly, Defiance, and Dark Matter. We’re grateful such awesome sci-fi shows exist, and as with them, we hope that our serial enables other space opera fans to disappear into the universe we’ve created.

  The Newton’s Gate Universe has brought together over thirty sci-fi, fantasy, urban fantasy, horror, and thriller authors, and while the stories might have a common origin, each one creates its own unique world for you, the reader. We hope you enjoy exploring the many worlds of Newton’s Gate, and we thank you for being an important part of this collective journey.

  Characters

  While writing Galactic Blues, we’ve had fun developing images to represent our characters and using them as shortcuts to identify each chapter’s POV.

  Captain Remy Bechet

  Dreyla Bechet

  Sheriff Lilly Greyson

  Commander Tara Shaw