The Shadows of God - J. Gregory Keyes [69]
“You think we have no chance of escaping. I think we have a slim chance, yet you know more of our situation than I do, yes? Let me help you. You are a brave man, and I wish every chance to give you your life. If you don't tell me what I want to know, and we are captured, your countrymen will find your corpse floating in the water, if they find you at all. If you tell me, and they capture us, I will let you live to rejoin them. You say we will be caught no matter what. Tell me.”
He removed the rag from the fellow's mouth.
“It's—” He paused, and Unoka shrugged and brought his knife up again.
“No!” Histrov said. “It's the aetherschreiber in the cabinet. In the captain's room.”
“I saw no such device.”
“Yes. It is a secret. They would have schreibed you, and when you never answered they would know the ship was in enemy hands.”
“Tell me exactly where that is?”
“I don't know. I was not the captain.”
Oglethorpe lifted an eyebrow. “Tear the room apart,” Oglethorpe told Parmenter. “Find that schreiber and throw it into the sea.”
At about that moment, the lights above them started to descend. Oglethorpe held his breath, almost, as they came level and then continued down.
“Well,” he said. “So much for those three. That gives us a breath to draw, I think. The chief met with success, it seems. MacKay, as soon as Tomochichi is back on board, move this scow.”
“Aye, sir.”
“And put Mr. Histrov back in chains.”
Oglethorpe went back to the lower hatch, where his men were taking in the rope tied to the old Yamacraw's leg. He waited with a small smile on his face, ready to congratulate his old friend.
But what rose up from the hatch was no Tomochichi, chief of the Yamacraw. It was a monster in the shape of a man, a construction of what resembled dull ceramic, but which bunched and knotted like the muscles of a man. Its head was a mirrored globe, and it had four arms. Two ended in sword blades, the other two in kraftpistoles.
“Talos!” Oglethorpe shouted, but it was already too late for his men at the rope. The automaton sheered through both with its scimitar limbs so that each fell apart at the waist. Neither man knew he was dead, but pitched back, trying to find legs he no longer had.
Then twin searing kraftpistole bolts jagged through the crew compartment. Oglethorpe felt the heat, stepped aside, and fired his own weapon at the thing. Likewise, Parmenter drew a Fahrenheit pistol captured from one of the English officers and directed a white-hot spray of molten silver against the talos.
It rose up, giving no indication that it was hurt.
With a howl, Unoka leapt into the air and landed on the ta-los’ shoulders, hacking at the silver globe with his throwing ax. It rang like a bell, but did not crack. Sword blades shot up to pierce him, but he wrapped his legs around the monster's neck and swung his body back to dodge, as nimbly as any acrobat.
Not completely distracted by this, the talos fired its kraft-pistoles again, and more men died in flaming agony.
Parmenter suddenly lunged forward, not at the talos, but at something behind it. Just as Unoka finally dropped from it, dodging the scything arms, Parmenter came up behind, and Oglethorpe saw what he was about as the captain looped a long steel chain around the talos’ head. Bellowing, Oglethorpe rushed beneath the weapon arms and grappled with it, trying to keep it occupied while Parmenter finished.
Never in Oglethorpe's life had he felt something so strong or relentless. Though inside the reach of its guns, the arms scissored together, pinching the life from him.
Meanwhile, however, Parmenter finished his task. The anchor cable wrapped firmly around the unholy thing, he now released the anchor.
When it went, it nearly took Oglethorpe's head off, but by a miracle, his long hair oiled the demon's grip, and allowed him to slip away from it with no more than a bloody scalp. Down through the hatch the talos went.
“Cut that damned chain!” Oglethorpe shouted, “else