Profiteer

Baldy, punk number one, picked up Dom’s slug-thrower, smiled in appreciation at the expensive antique, and aimed it at Dom.

 

Punk number two, the one with the Proudhon Spaceport shoulder patch, leveled a Griffith-Five High Frequency pulse carbine at him. The pulse carbine was a close-combat infantry weapon that, in a pinch, could be watted up to take on light armored vehicles.

 

Punk number three wore a black beret, leather jacket, and a three-fingered artificial hand. That hand was holding a fifteen-millimeter Dittrich High Mass Electromag. The HME rounds would be steel-cored uranium. If it hit the target, the target would drop. Even if the target wore powered armor. A testosterone weapon.

 

Punk four had vidlens eyes and a necklace of human teeth. The fact that he armed himself only with a machete in the midst of all that hardware made him a little scary. It also marked him as stupid, or crazy.

 

Punk five wore half a facial reconstruction in brushed chrome. He carried an antique frontier auto-shotgun. That thing was made for taking on large hostile fauna. He wore crossed bandoliers of shells.

 

Punk six had a smartgun. She had old unit tattoos on her face, from some off-planet marine force. Her custom job had wires jacked into her arm.

 

Dom would have preferred the Confed marines.

 

“A fucking corp,” said Beret.

 

“Vent his ass,” said the woman.

 

“Hell you say, Trace. Corp exec, ransom—” said the one with the shoulder patch.

 

“Sell ‘im,” the guy with half a face agreed.

 

“Vent him,” said the woman as she began to power up her weapon.

 

“It’s your call, Bull,” said the man with video eyes.

 

The bald one looked down on him, shaking his head. “He looks like a corporate type. Could be worth something to someone—”

 

Patch and half-face gave satisfied nods to each other.

 

“—But I don’t want to deal with the upkeep, and the bastard shot a chair at me.” Baldy looked up at the woman. “Vent him, Trace.”

 

“Just the head,” said Beret, “We can harvest—”

 

Dom had been trying to think of a way he could either talk or fight his way out of this. He was about to say something, when Beret was interrupted by an impact that shook the ground. The punks all turned to face in the same direction.

 

“Shit, it’s a fucking paladin!” That was the last thing Beret ever said. A beam of energy shot through his torso, cutting him neatly in half.

 

The one with the shoulder patch fired his pulse carbine, cutting a left flank swath while the woman with the smartgun cut in from the right. They should have caught the attacker in the cross fire.

 

A shadow passed over them. Whoever it was jumped. There was another impact, and the ground shook again.

 

Trace and Patch were cut down from behind.

 

Half-face returned fire with his auto-shotgun. It sounded like a jackhammer and was about as accurate. A beam of energy erased the remainder of his face.

 

In the interim, Baldy and the video-eyed machete wielder had run off for parts unknown.

 

Dom got to his feet, holding his arms wide, and faced the paladin. The paladin’s body armor was spotless white, gold, and gleaming chrome. He had a narrow-aperture plasma weapon cabled into his backpack. The pack towered over the ovoid helmet, sign of a manpack contragrav unit. A gold cross was laminated on the paladin’s right shoulder.

 

The voice that addressed Dom passed through a electronic filter and had the bass turned way up. “Lower your hands, citizen. I do the Lord’s work.”

 

Religious fanatic. “I appreciate your help—” Dom read a small chromed nameplate on the breast of the body armor. “Brother Rourke.”

 

“Thanks are not required. It is our calling to combat the Devil’s influence on this poor lawless world—”

 

Dom ignored Rourke’s pitch. He spent the time looking over the four sinners that the nut had just erased. It wasn’t that he objected to the killing. If there were ever four people that needed the express route off-planet, it was these punks. It was doing it in the name of God that grated. It was almost as bad as killing someone in the name of some government.

 

“—is customary to transfer a small tithe to the Church.”

 

Dom looked up from Trace’s corpse. “What?”

 

“Proper thanks to the Church of Christ, Avenger for your deliverance is made by tithing to—”

 

“That’s what I thought you said.” Great racket, save any poor bastard that looks like he has two grams to rub together and make a sure profit. It was just too bad for Brother Rourke this time. “All my assets have been taken over. I don’t have any cash on me.”

 

“That is unfortunate.”

 

Rourke lifted another weapon before Dom could react. The paladin shot him, and the world blinked out of existence.

 

<>

 

* * * *

 

CHAPTER SIX

 

Coup d’État

 

 

“Might might not make right, but it makes a damn good argument for its position.”

—The Cynic’s Book of Wisdom

 

“Do not hold the delusion that your advancement is accomplished by crushing others.”

—Marcus Tullinus Cicero

(106-43 BC)