Jason Frost - The cutthroat

Blackjack returned the smile, but there was a sadness in his eyes that made him look ill. He drew his.38 from the shoudler holster and pointed it at Eric. "You're the most irritating white man I've ever met." He waved at his crew behind him. "Pack it up folks. They know."

Tracy sagged. "I knew I w-ouldn't like it."

"Sorry, Tracy. But I warned you what I was at the beginning. I said I was a pirate, but you chose to interpret that to mean some kind of gentleman robber." He shook his head bitterly. "I don't have time to be a gentleman anything anymore. I'm dying. But before I go, I'm getting some of what's mine."

"What's yours? What the hell do you want?" Tracy demanded. "Guns, food, women? What?"

He gave her a hard look. "Not things. I want to live the way I want, for me. Hell, I'm not going to make some movie speech for you. I don't owe you an explanation."

"What are you going to do?"

He climbed to his feet, joined his crew. "I'm going to leave you here. We'll take your weapons and leave them a couple miles from here. I'll leave one of my armed crew to keep you covered while we get a good head start toward where the guns really are. You stay away from us and you'll live. That's all you get."

Eric looked at his watch again. "What about our ride to Santa Barbara?"

"Eric, never mind!" Tracy said.

Blackjack frowned at Eric. "Don't push it, Eric."

Eric's smile spread wider across his face. "Tracy, what do you know about the zoo in Hearst Castle?"

"I know there's got to be a point."

"Trust me."

"Somehow that doesn't make me feel better." Tracy shrugged. "The zoo. Hearst loved animals. Even when the field mice threatened to destroy his fruit trees, he hesitated to do anything about it because he didn't want them killed. That ought to clue you in on the way he felt about animals. He had two thousand fenced acres for what was once the largest private zoo in the country. He had something like thirty species of carnivores, including tigers and an elephant, and seventy species of assorted animals which he allowed to roam wherever they wanted. That enough?"

Eric shook his head.

She sighed. "He also had elaborate bear pits, lion pens, monkey houses. The whole thing was designed to provide maximum comfort for the animals. Kind of nice, when you think about it." She looked back and forth between Eric and Blackjack, who were staring at each other. "Th-th-that's all, folks."

Blackjack looked worse. His shoulders sagged under some invisible weight. His face was drawn, his eyes sallow.

"Unlike Tracy, Blackjack, I believed you when you told us you were a pirate. Which meant there was no reason I should trust you when you took Angel away last night. I followed you, figuring if you did make a deal with her, you wouldn't be satisfied unless she personally showed you where the guns were hidden. And she did."

"How could she?" Tracy asked. "Unless…"

"Unless they were hidden at Hearst Castle. Exactly. A perfect place for the government to take them. Easy to defend if they had to, hard to get to. Only that five-mile road, which is now underwater."

"The zoo!" Tracy said suddenly. "They hid them in the zoo."

"Right. The animals were all gone, but they built a special bin under the bear pit, impossible to find unless you know it's there. If only BeBop knew what he was sitting on."

"But he never will," Blackjack said, his voice tired. "We'll go back, take them to the ship, and return to Liar's Cove to auction off whatever we don't keep. We'll make a fortune in goods."

Tracy dug her cane into the ground and struggled to her feet. "Do you know the kind of scum you'll be giving guns to?"

"He knows," Eric said.

"Not giving," Blackjack smiled. "Selling."

"Not selling, either, I think," Eric said, tapping his watch crystal. "I mean, you didn't think I'd follow you to the cache and then fall for this gag of luring us away, did you?"

Blackjack looked confused, then horrified. He looked over his shoulder at Hearst Castle. "God, no!"

"God, yes," Eric said coldly.

The explosion lifted rocks and dirt and trees and concrete into a tangled plume of smoke and fire. Several smaller explosions followed, peppered with the chattering of boxes of bullets detonating like firecrackers. Bits of debris fell lazily to the ground as smoke swirled upward to join the Halo.

Blackjack spun angrily to face Eric, his jaw clenched, his lips trembling with rage. His dark skin seemed somehow even darker now. He thrust his.38 into Eric's face. "You made a terrible misjudgment thinking I wouldn't kill you for that."

Eric was calm, his features hammered in steel. "I didn't know whether you'd kill me or not, Blackjack. I'd like to think you wouldn't. But I wasn't willing to rely on faith. I've been wrong about people before."

Blackjack thumbed the hammer of his gun back with a deadly click. "Make it fast."

"After I followed you and Angel to the cache, I managed to make a fair time bomb out of all the stuff I found there. But first I moved some of it. Hid it."

Blackjack pressed the gun against Eric's forehead. "Where?"

"Well, now, that's the secret. There's not much hidden, though. Some rifles, pistols, a few boxes of ammunition. Not enough to conquer California, but enough for a few trained people on a floating farm, with a little luck, to protect themselves against any invasion. Maybe even move safely back to the land."

Blackjack stared at Eric for a full minute, maybe longer. Tracy held her breath, the rest of the crew shifted nervously.

Finally, Blackjack eased the hammer down on the gun, shoved it back into his holster. "Hell, what's a few blown up guns between good buddies like us? Hardly enough to justify me wasting a bullet on you"-he grinned- "this time."

The Argo dropped anchor near the coast of what once was Santa Barbara. A few crumbled homes and stores clung to the cliffs and ridges, but the rest of the city had slid into the ocean in less than thirty seconds several months earlier. A few items marked the trail: a telephone pole sticking out of the side of the cliff, its wires running straight down into the ocean; the front end of a Dodge Omni teetering over the edge of a ridge, held back by a movie theater marquee that had pinned the back end to the street. The movie marquee read, CL N EASTWO D IN…

Eric dropped his backpack over the side of the ship into the dinghy. Tracy handed her bow and quiver down to the young Australian man who would row them ashore.

"Where's Blackjack?" she asked.

Eric pointed and laughed. Blackjack was hoisting up his ratty skull and crossbones flag.

Tracv did not laugh. "Do you think he would have killed us back there?"

"I don't know."

"I like to think he wouldn't have."

"Me too."

"Still, I'm glad you hid those guns."

He smiled at her. "Me too."

Tracy felt the weight of the Smith amp; Wesson.357 Combat Magnum in her waistband and patted it happily. Eric balanced his crossbow over one shoulder. His new Remington.32 was fully loaded with an eight-shot clip and tucked into his boot. An extra box of cartridges was stashed in his backpack.

Blackjack marched over with a huge grin and gestured at his flag. "Long may she wave, eh?"

"You too," Eric said, offering his hand.

They shook, Blackjack taking Eric's hand in both of his. They nodded at each other as if in agreement, not to something they said, but in acknowledgment of what they were.

"Come here," Tracy said, pulling Blackjack down to her level. She kissed him quickly, leaving one of her tears on his cheek.

Blackjack watched them climb into the dinghy. "Take care of him," he said to Tracy. "He has a bit of the pirate in him too."

"A bit too much," she said and waved.

The Australian rowed the dinghy across the orange-tinted water, the only sounds now were the screaming of sea gulls and the splashing of his oars. Eric was staring at the shore, his mind already locked on Timmy and the search for Fallows.