S. Stirling: Dies The Fire

Goddess, she's a good kid, Juniper thought, and hugged her.

It was about time to get out themselves; the fires were burning westward despite a wind off the Coast Range- and thank the Goddess for that, because if it had been blowing from the east half the city would be gone by now, instead of just a quarter.

Shouts came from across the street, and a sound of shattering glass. The musician looked up sharply. Half a dozen young men-teens or early twenties-had thrown a trash container through a storefront window; they were scooping jewelry out of the trays within, reaching through the coarse mesh of the metal screen inside the glass.

The policeman cursed with savage weariness and drew his pistol; Juniper's stomach clenched, but they had to have order or things would be even worse than they were.

I hope he doesn't have to shoot anyone, she thought.

Most of the looters scattered, laughing as they ran, but one of them threw something at the approaching policeman. Juniper could see the looter clearly, down to the acne scars and bristle-cut black hair and the glint of narrow blue eyes. He wore baggy black sweats and ankle-high trainers, and a broad belt that glittered-made from chain mesh. Gold hoops dangled from both ears.

"Clear out, goddamnit!" the cop shouted hoarsely, and raised the pistol to fire in the air. "I'm not kidding!"

Click.

Juniper blinked in surprise. A woman living alone with her daughter on the road was well advised to keep a pistol, and she'd taken a course to learn how to use it safely. Misfires were rare.

The policeman evidently thought it was odd too. He jacked the slide of the automatic back, ejecting the useless round, and fired into the air once more.

Click.

He worked the slide to eject the spent cartridge and tried a third time-and now he was aiming at the thin-faced youth, who was beginning to smile. Two of his fellow looters hadn't fled either. They all looked at each other, and their smiles grew into grins.

Click.

One of them pulled a pistol of his own from behind his back, and pointed it at the lawman; it was a snub-nosed revolver, light and cheap. He pulled the trigger.

Click.

He shrugged, tossed the gun aside, and pulled a tire iron from his belt instead. The youth with the chain belt unhooked it and swung it from his left hand. Something else came into his right, and he made a quick figure-eight motion of the wrist.

Metal clattered on metal and a blade shone in the firelight. She recognized the type, a Balisong folding gravity knife-if you hung around Society types like Chuck Barstow, you overheard endless talk about everything from broadswords to fighting knives, like it or not.

The banger wasn't a sporting historical reenactor like the Society knights. He walked forward, stepping light on the balls of his feet, rolling the knife over his knuckles and back into his palm with casual ease. The other man flanking him was a hulking giant with a bandana around his head; he picked up a baseball bat from the sidewalk and smacked the head into his left palm. The full-sized Louisville Slugger looked like a kid's toy in his hand.

The policeman was backing up and looking around as he drew his nightstick. He was twenty years older than any of the three men walking towards him, and nobody else was left this close to the fires; the roaring of their approach was loud, and it was chokingly hot.

"Oh, hell," Dennis said. "Now I gotta do something really stupid."

He picked up the fire ax he'd brought from the Hopping Toad and walked out towards the policeman.

Juniper swallowed and looked around her, then at the storefront behind them. They'd broken it open for the tools they needed; she made a quick decision and dashed inside, taking the lantern with her. She hesitated at the axes and machetes and shovels: but she wasn't sure she could hit a human being with one, even if she had to. Instead she picked a bare ax helve out of a rack of them, giving thanks that redevelopment hadn't gotten this far yet and turned the place into a wine bar or an aromatherapy salon.

Stay here, she signed to Eilir. Get out the back way if you have to.

Then she turned and dashed out into the street; the firelight had gotten appreciably brighter in the few seconds it had taken. Dennis and the policeman were backed up against the pickup, and there was a turmoil of motion around them as the three street toughs feinted and lunged.

No time to waste on subtlety or warnings, she thought.

Especially not when all her potential opponents were stronger than she was, and would probably enjoy adding rape to theft and murder.

She ran forward, her steps soundless under the bellow of the fire that was only a block away now and both hands firmly clamped on the varnished wood. Dennis gave her away simply by the way his eyes went wide as he stared over his opponent's shoulder.

The man with the tire iron was turning when she hit him; instead of the back of his head, the hardwood cracked into the side of it, over the temple. Juniper Mackenzie wasn't a large woman-five-three, and slim-but she'd split a lot of firewood in her thirty years, and playing guitar professionally needed strong hands. The unpleasant crunching feel of breaking bone shivered back up the ax handle into her hands, and she froze for a moment, knowing that she'd probably killed a man.

Oh, Goddess, I didn't mean it! she thought, staring as he dropped with a boneless limpness.

Dennis had different reflexes, or perhaps he'd merely had enough adrenaline pumped into his system by the brief lethal fight. He punched the head of the ax into the gut of the giant with the baseball bat, and followed up with a roundhouse swing that would have taken an arm off at the shoulder if the big man hadn't thrown himself backward with a speed surprising in someone that size.

The blade scored his left arm instead of chopping it, and he fled clutching it and screaming curses; he sounded more angry than hurt. His smaller friend with the Balisong ran backward away from the suddenly long odds, the flickering menace of his knife discouraging thoughts of pursuit.

He halted a dozen paces away, his eyes coldly unafraid; they were an unexpected blue, slanted in a thin amber-colored face. Juniper met them for an instant, feeling a prickle down her neck and shoulders.

"Yo, bitch!" he called, shooting out his left hand with the middle finger pointing at her. " Chico there was a friend of mine. Maybe we'll meet again, get to know each other better. My name is Eddie Liu-remember that!"

Then he looked over Juniper's shoulder, shrugged, turned and followed his bigger friend in a light, bounding run.

She turned to see Eilir coming up with an ax handle of her own, and her gaze went back to her friend and the policeman.

"Either of you hurt?" she said.

Dennis leaned back against the wrecked truck, shaking his head and blowing like a walrus, his heavy face turned purple-red and running sweat beyond what the gathering heat would have accounted for. The policeman had a bleeding slash across the palm of his left hand where he'd fended off the Balisong.

Juniper tossed down her ax handle, suddenly disgusted with the feel of it, and helped him bandage his wound. Out of the corner of her eye she was conscious of Dennis recovering a little, and dragging off the body of the man she'd Hit. I just hit him. I had to, she thought. I really had to.

She was still thankful he moved it, and avoided looking at the damp track the bobbing head left on the pavement.

"You folks ought to get out of here," the policeman said. "I've got to get to the station and find out what's going on. Go home if you're far enough from the fire, or head up to campus if you're not."

He walked away, limping slightly and holding his injured left hand against his chest; the nightstick was ready in his right. Juniper pulled her daughter to her and held her, shivering. She looked into Dennis's eyes; her friend wasn't quite as purple now, but he looked worse somehow.