Simon Hawke - The Zenda Vendetta

“Well, let’s see if we can help act other stay alive long enough for Sapt and von Tarlenheim to reach us. We’re not out of danger yet.”

De Gautet’s sabre scraped against Hentzau’s blade, as he bore down on it and De Gautet’s eyes were wide with panic. He knew he was no match for Hentzau. Healso knew that the shot would, bring the others and he was hoping desperately that they would come before Hentzau finished him off. He cave way to Hentzau’s pressure and leapt backward, forcing Hama off balance momentarily, but Hentzau’s recovery was swift. However, it bought De Gautet enough time to unsheath his dagger and hurl it at him. Hentzau dodged it and it missed him by inches, striking the wall behind him and falling to the floor.

“Ah ha!” cried Hentzau. “Close, but not close enough! I’m afraid I have no more time for you, my friend. It’s too bad you didn’t throw in with me.”

“No, Rupert, please-”

Hentzau took his own dagger and threw it with a quick and easy motion. It plunged into De Gautet’s chest. De Garnet’s hands came up to clutch at it. He staggered one step forward and collapsed onto the floor. As Hentzau turned to run to the drawbridge and release it, a pistol shot cracked sharply and he felt the bullet pass close by his ear.

“Stop, Hentzau, or the next one shall not miss!”

Hentzau slowly turned around to see Michael standing with Lauengram on the stairs leading to the second floor, his pistol leveled at him. Michael’s face was livid with fury. He lisped slightly from missing the teeth that Falcon had knocked out.

“This does not seem to be my night,” said Henan, to himself. He thought that he could probably make a dive and manage to release the drawbridge, but he would certainly be killed in the attempt, and that was not his plan at all. His one chance was to stall and hope for rescue by the play-actor.

“Don’t be too eager to finish me off, Your Lordship,” he said to Michael. “Yon have enemies without. You’ll need help. Perhaps we can come to terms.”

“I do not deal with traitors!” Michael said. “I should have had you and Sophia killed when I first suspected your affair! Where is that treacherous slut?”

“Right here,” said Falcon, standing in the archway that led to the old section of the castle. She fired her laser and the beam struck Michael in the chest. His gun went off, but the shot was wild and he was already dead when he fell headlong down the stairs. Her second shot dropped a stunned and disbelieving Lauengram, who tumbled down the stairs to land in a heap on top of Michael.

Hentzau, stared at her in astonishment, the drawbridge momentarily forgotten. “The devil!” as said, awestruck. “How did you do that? What manner of weapon…” he stopped in mid-phrase as she turned toward him and aimed the laser at his chest.

Lucas held the warp grenade in his right hand, hesitating. He had never actually used one before. He was fully briefed on them and had trained with simulators, but the thought of setting off a pinpoint nuclear explosion gave him pause. Still, he had no other choice. He was badly hurt, he had only one eye left and the plasma burns were throbbing, causing him terrific pain. He wasn’t sure just how much radiation he would catch. Supposedly, it would not be lethal. Supposedly.

The grenade, a miniature bomb really, was preset. All it took was for him to arm it, then either place it manually or throw it just like a hand grenade. It was the latest in 27 ^th century weapons technology, a diabolical combination of nuclear device and time machine. It scared the hell out of him.

At the moment of detonation, the miniaturized chronocircuits created a Einstein-Rosen Bridge, or warp, with the result that the major force of the explosion was instantaneously clocked through time and space to the Orion Nebula, where such events were naturally commonplace. What would remain in his own immediate time and space would effectively constitute a pinpoint nuclear explosion, intensely concentrated, creating total devastation in a confined area that, theoretically, could be as small as a fingernail. Theoretically. In practice, they had not refined them that far yet. This one would be larger. Considerably larger.

Lucas swallowed hard and armed the device. He set it for air burst, then set the timer. His tongue licked at his cracked and blistered lips. He wondered if this was what it felt like for the bombardier on the Enola Gay. He shut his one remaining eye, counted to three, fobbed the grenade around the corner and dropped down onto the floor, covering his head with his arms and praying to God it worked just like the boys in Ordnance said it would. There was a blinding flash of white light, followed by a devastating roar.

“You always were too damned unpredictable, Rupert,” Falcon raid, pointing her laser at him. “It really is unfortunate. I thought you were rather nice and I was going to let you live.”

“Wait,” said Hentzau. “I can still help you. I can-”

“You can only interfere. You’ve become expendable. I’m sorry.”

“Before you kill me,” Hentzau said, stalling desperately, “at least tell me what that is. I’ve never seen such-”

“It doesn’t mater, Rupert. It wouldn’t make any difference to you, anyway. Say goodbye.”

The explosion rocked the castle. Startled, Falcon jerked her head in its direction and Hentzau moved. She fired, missing him narrowly as he leaped aside and in that moment, Rudolf hit with an awkward tackle and she fell, the laser skittering across the floor. Hentzau quickly snatched it up. Finn stood with his own laser leveled at Falcon and Rudolf as they thrashed upon the floor, but refrained from firing for fear of hitting the king.

“Rudolf, get away!” he shouted.

Falcon rolled over on her back, dragging the king on top of her, holding him with one arm around his neck, the other locked behind his head.

“Drop the laser, Delaney, or I’ll break his neck!” she said.

Finn fairly vibrated from the nitro hammering through him, but his shirt was soaked with blood and his vision was beginning to blur, “Break his neck and where does that leave you?” he said.

“Who the devil is Delaney?” Hentzau said. He glanced down at the laser. “Where the deuce is the trigger on this thing?”

“Kill him, Rupert!”

“Realty?” Henan said, insouciantly. “How? Besides, if I kill him, you’ll kill the king and where would that leave me? I’d be left with one dead play-actor, one dead king, one dead duke and what must be a small army just outside. No, that would never do. I must come out of this ahead somehow.”

“I can make you rich, Rupert,” she said. “Richer than you could ever imagine! There’s a small stud that fires-”

“Don’t do it, Hentzau,” Finn said. “I’d have to kill you.”

Hentzau examined the weapon with curiosity. “Strange-looking contraption. You mean this stud here?”

“Hentzau, if I don’t kill you, you can be sure she will. She doesn’t need you,” Finn said. “Don’t be a fool.”

“Shoot him, Rupert! Shoot!”

Hentzau held the laser the way he had seen her hold it, with his finger on the stud, then he came up to her and bent over, putting the weapon up against the side of her head.

“I’m sorry, my dear, but since the play-actor’s thrown in with the king, I think that I’d best do the same. The odds seem better to me. Be so kind as to release His Majesty.”

“Good man, Hentzau!” Finn said. “Now we-” his knees buckled and he sank down to the floor. “Oh, no!” he said. “Not now!”

He fell over on his side, unconscious.

Lucas huddled on the floor, holding his head from the concussion of the explosion. Fine dust filled the air with swirling fog and there was crumbled stone all around him. He sat up slowly, his ears ringing, to see if he was still in one piece. He was lacerated and bruised and burned in more places than he could count and he had no idea how much radiation he had received. His entire body hurt and he could barely see straight.