The captain cocked his head at the insistent potentate who had so unexpectedly appeared, but favored him with a thin smile. Giving those gathered a curt nod, he stalked down the gangplank, followed by his chief officers. Pam whistled softly in relief, so far so good. Dore frantically took hold of one of Pam's shaking hands, pushing all the blood out of it with a single squeeze. The men of the Second Chance Bird stood perfectly still, a set of bronze statues in the late afternoon sun.
The sneering officers, certainly no real gentlemen, but pirates through and through, stepped primly onto the dock. They sauntered confidently over to Gerbald and his men, all of whom bowed deeply in unison at Gerbald's unspoken cue. This pleased the officers greatly. They smiled and chuckled to themselves, smug in their superiority. Gerbald the Great Khan graciously swept his arms once more toward the gathered gifts. With an openly condescending nod of acceptance to Gerbald, the captain bent down to open one of the boxes. This was filled with some of the treasure they had found aboard the junk, and a gleam of avarice came to the captain's scheming eyes. His officers bent down as well, opening up other boxes to find more of the same. As they became engrossed in the windfall the odd- looking visitors began to surround them, cutting them off from the nearby sailors.
Chapter Forty-One: All Hell Breaks Loose
One of those sailors realized what was happening, and pushed the nearest visitor out of the way as he tried to rejoin his captain, one hand on the back of the disguised Swede's neck. His hand slipped off the sweaty skin and with an expression of astonishment he held up his palm to show that it was stained the same shade of orange-yellow. There was a moment of silence as everyone stared at him.
"The jig is up," Pam sighed to Dore, her heart sinking.
The man with the stained hand began to shout at the top of his lungs, presumably to rouse reinforcements. Pam realized the Swede he had pushed was actually Lojtnant Lundkvist. Thanks to their disguises it was hard to tell them apart at this distance. The Lojtnant calmly produced a very sharp sword from within his loose silk cloak and stopped the shouts by slicing the man's throat wide open. He pushed the corpse backward to fall into the other sailors who had started to follow him. These now hesitated at the sight of so much blood. Even so, it was too late. An alarm bell began to sound on the Effrayant. Within moments, around forty surly-looking marines surged onto the deck from various quarters, all armed to the teeth. The Swedes were now well outnumbered.
"Christ, they have a freaking army with them!" Pam exclaimed. She thought fast, ignoring her terror.
"Carronade! Sweep that deck," she screamed at the top of her lungs. Her men were ready for that signal and all of them dropped to the deck. Gerbald leaped from his palanquin, and knocked over the captain on his way down, it having been decided they wanted to keep that one alive if they could. The other officers, realizing what was happening, flung themselves down to the deck as well. The bosun swept the cover off the carronade and aimed it directly at the marines heading toward their gangplank. Not a second later its load of anti-personnel shot sprayed death across the Effrayant's deck. At least half the enemy fell dead or dying to the deck, their moans of agony awful to hear. Still, that left at least twenty, who hurried across the gang plank or swung to the dock on ropes.
Knowing it would take time for the bosun to reload, Lundkvist and his Swedish marines, who had mostly been stationed near the front of the procession, leaped back to their feet and opened fire on the advancing soldiers, along with any sailors who had dared to draw their arms. Pam gasped as a musket ball hit the Lojtnant, shattering half of his left knee in an explosion of blood and white bone chips. He started to fall but was held up by two of his men, who continued to fire their uptime-make pistols into the charging soldiers even as they dragged him backwards to the line the men around Gerbald were forming. Stunned by the amazing rate of fire, the soldiers quailed long enough for the Lojtnant to reach safety before finding their courage and mounting a charge. The marines swiftly closed with the Swedes, who were making a stand, and the dock rang with the clang and crash of close quarters sword fighting.
Meanwhile, Gerbald had pulled out his Snake Charmer, and had the nasty little shotgun pointed directly at the captain's head. The rest of the palanquin bearers had their swords and pistols aimed at the prone officers. The prisoners were quickly relieved of their weapons while the Swedes tightly bound their hands behind them and tied their ankles together; they wouldn't be going anywhere for a while. The captain was pulled roughly to his feet by the Swedes, the double mouths of Gerbald's shotgun-pistol jammed into the back of his neck. This group fell all the way back to the Second Chance Bird with their captives. Pam could hear Gerbald loudly taunt the captain over the din of combat.
"Surprise, surprise, surprise!" Gerbald exclaimed cheerfully in his best Gomer Pyle imitation, the skill of which would sadly be lost on the captive captain. "I'll bet you speak English better than I do French, eh, mon capitan? Well, don't you?" Gerbald gave the trembling man a little shove against the cheek with the barrels of his weapon. "Speak up, quickly! German will also do," he added in his native tongue.
"I speak English. What do you want, you stinking buffoon?"
Gerbald smiled broadly at the insult, respecting the man's courage for uttering it before slapping him so hard across the face that the man fell to the ground and had to be lifted up again. Now Gerbald brought his face within a few inches of the captain's, and his voice turned as cold as Germany's winter skies.
"Call your dogs off, now! If they don't surrender immediately I will take great pleasure in killing you, you son of a jackal. I may yet. It's best to do as I say. Understand? Now tell them, tell them if you want to live!"
Pam suppressed a groan, she could hear The Terminator loud and clear in that last line. We really do need to get him an acting job someday, he has truly missed his calling.
"Yes, yes, I will do it," the captain cried, cowed by Gerbald's menacing presence. With panic in his eyes he began to scream orders. Some of the enemy paused at the sound of his words, but the battle continued. Pam saw to her horror that two Swedish marines had fallen to the dock's knotted planks, undoubtedly beyond help. Even so, their side's weaponry was superior. The dock was littered with renegade corpses, rivers of blood running off the edge to make crimson waterfalls, expanding into billowing red clouds in the clear waters below. The captain continued to order his troops to stand down and slowly the combat ground to a halt.
Pam had been so caught up with the action nearby that she had completely forgotten about the colonists. She looked to the shore to see that they had another problem. Two dozen of the African slavers had arrived, each wielding a nasty looking scimitar. They were running down the dock, straight toward Second Chance Bird.
"Gerbald, look!"
"Tell them to stop!" he ordered the captured captain. The captain shouted hoarsely at the charging men but they ignored him, blood-lust flashing in their dark eyes. The Swedes had formed a circular line around Second Chance Bird's lowest point and were reloading their weapons. The men at the carronade were frantically trying to do the same, but were having some kind of trouble with the weapon. As usual, Murphy's Law was in effect. The bosun's curses echoed loudly around the bay. The enemy marines started to advance again but the terrified wail of their captain made them stop. Never taking their eyes off their first foes, the Swedish marines rejoined the rest of the men, and made ready to resume fighting. Obviously against their will, the enemy fighters were backing away toward their own ship, disgusted with their leaders for getting captured so easily, but unwilling to sacrifice them for a certain victory, either. They stepped silently aside as the slavers trampled past them, whooping an eerie war cry.