“Shit,” said Scott. “Stay here!”
He took off down Fourth Street at a dead run. Jenny hesitated for a moment, then started running after him.
“What the hell is Scott doing with them?” Andre said. “Maybe that isn’t Scott.” said Lucas. “At least, not our Scott.”
“It has to be,” she said. “We just crossed over. Scott! Wait!” The Kid glanced over his shoulder at them briefly, then turned back and kept on walking.
“It’s not him,” said Lucas.
Andre shook her head. “But how…
“I don’t know!” said Lucas. “Maybe we’ve crossed over again without knowing it. Maybe we’re caught in some kind of ripple effect, a timewave. The instability’s increasing. Jesus. This is it!”
“How do you know?”
“It’s got to be! In this timeline, the Montana Kid was part of the shoot-out at the O.K. Corral. In our timeline, he wasn’t even there. Until now. We were right. Scott has to be the key! Come on!”
“What are we going to do?”
“Hell if I know.” Lucas said, as they started running after the Earps. “We’ll have to wait for Darkness.”
‘What if he doesn’t show?”
“Then we’re Fucked. “
Delaney reached the bottom of the stairs just as Stone and Capiletti came through the front door. Stone leaped to one side as Capiletti went for his sidearm. Finn fired, the loud report of the. 45 filling the lobby. The clerk cried out in alarm and dropped down behind his desk as Capiletti fell, a bullet through his chest. Finn ducked back as Stone fired his laser and the beam passed inches from his face. He filed again and missed.
He swore through clenched teeth. A Colt. 45 against a laser. Terrific odds. And he only had four bullets left. Two men dressed in black commando gear came diving through the front door. Delaney fired, wounding one of them, then felt a wash of searing heat go past him as the plasma charge narrowly missed him and struck the wall, igniting it. He fired again and missed the third man diving through the door, then darted up the stairs as a second plasma charge was fired, barely missing him and starting another fire as it struck the wall. His clothes were smoldering.
“Get him, dammit!” he heard Stone yell, and then he ducked around the stair post and snapped off another shot, dropping the man who’d fired the first two plasma rounds.
“They’re in, Geordy!” he shouted. “Watch it!”
He started running up the stairs. One bullet left. And no time to reload.
“Delaney! ”
Cooper was above him on the landing. He tossed down the disruptor. Finn dropped the Colt and caught it, then heard the boom of Cooper’s Desert Eagle. He felt something whoosh past his ear and then there was an explosion behind him as the round struck one of the S. 0. G. commandos in the chest and ignited. spattering the walls with blood and mangled flesh.
Downstairs, at the back entrance, Georgeson was knocked off his feet as the door exploded inward and the S.O.G. commandos came rushing through. He fired both his lasers from the floor and dropped the first man through the door, then was struck twice by laser fire from the men behind him. He fired again. dropping one more assailant, took another laser hit, but kept on firing, killing the last man through the door. He staggered to his feet, badly wounded, a hole through the side of his face, and several more through his chest and shoulder. He gasped for breath and fell to his knees as one lung collapsed, then looked up and saw Ben Stone coming through the smoke and flames. He raised his lasers, but he wasn’t quick enough. Stone fired. The heavy 45 caliber slug smashed into Georgeson’s forehead and exited through the other side, taking a bloody lump of bone and br ain wi t h
it. The Ranger w as hurled backwards by the impact, and he was dead before he hit the floor.
Upstairs. Tilley was engaged in a furious crossfire with the men on the roof across the way. He couldn’t use his plasma rifle, for fear of setting the building across the street on fire. The desk clerk, oblivious to the laser beams flashing back and forth above him, ran out into the street, screaming. “Fire! Fire!” Boarders in the morning house were dashing down the stairs and out the back, paying no attention to the bodies they tripped over as they stumbled out through the smoke and flames on the first floor. Cooper came out onto the roof just as two of the S.O.G. commandos materialized behind Tilley. He fired twice, the explosive rounds slamming into his targets and making bloody salsa out of them, then dropped to the roof as Tilley spun around and yelled, “ DOWN!”
Tilley fired over him, taking out one more commando who had clocked in behind Cooper, but not before he took a laser hit in the chest. He cried out and slumped over, grimacing with pain. Cooper started to get up, but a laser beam coming from across the street grazed his temple and he cried out, dropping back down, a smoking furrow in his hair.
“Son of a bitch! Tilley, you okay’?”
“Don’t know… damn, it hurts…”
“Hang on, I’ll get those bastards!”
Cooper quickly programmed his disc for the leap to the roof across the street. He could only guess wildly at the distance and the height, but there was no other choice. He programmed in his estimate and clocked.
He appeared about three feet above them… over the edge of the roof, with nothing but empty space below him.
“ Aw, fuck!” he shouted.