They struggle. Nixon rakes his fingers across the man’s eyes. The man screams and the hand with the blaster immediately grabs for his face. Nixon moves his hand up and grabs the man’s hair. He pulls the man’s head off the pavement then slams it back down. The smack echoes quickly down the alley, and Nixon does it again and then again and then again. The sound becomes wet then sticky and Nixon doesn’t stop until it sounds like he’s working a mop in a bucket.
It’s all over in a matter of seconds. The man is still and not breathing. Nixon’s never killed a man with his hands, but he doesn’t have time to think about that now. He looks back down the alley, and the two remaining men are staring into the darkness calling their friend by his name.
He grabs the blaster out of the dead man’s grip. He looks at it quickly. It’s not as powerful as the Uzek blaster, but it’ll get him out of this alley.
He pops up from behind his barrel and shoots once at the man leading the way. The man squeezes off a wild blast as he falls that winds up crushing a section of wall somewhere behind Nixon.
Nixon is back down behind his barrel and a shot from the second man pierces the top. A second shot rips a ragged chunk out of the wall above his head. A third hits the ground inches in front of him. He’s pinned down.
“OK! OK!” he shouts and puts one hand above the barrel.
“Toss the blaster,” the man shouts from the alley entrance.
Nixon tosses the Uzek blaster back into the dark of the alley. It clangs and clatters against the pavement.
“Now come up real slow.”
Nixon does as he’s told and stands slowly, one hand still raised above his head. Once his other hand, the one still holding the other blaster, clears the barrel he raises it quickly and fires a pair of shots in rapid succession.
The first: Hits the ground and tears up the paver stones there, the disintegrated tiles creating a cloud of dust.
The second: Hits the man in the neck, causing a fountain of blood to arc to the ground. The man grabs at his throat and falls to his knees then over on his side. He’s not dead, but it won’t be long.
The world is suddenly quiet again. Quiet but for the whine of the big blaster charging. Nixon steps toward the street. He presses his back to the wall and takes small stuttering steps. He pokes his head out quickly but the street is empty. He pulls back.
He pokes his head out again, looking across the street to the alleys across from him. They all look empty, but he knows they can’t be because the big blaster still whines.
He scans one more time, looking quickly from left to right and back again.
Then.
There.
A red light flashes. An indicator on the big blaster that it’s ready to fire.
A bolt of blaster energy as thick as a tree trunk leaps from the alley and obliterates the wall next to him. Brick and concrete fall all around, and Nixon looks back to the alley opening where he’d seen the light before. It’s dark now, but the whine has returned. He has time, but only a bit, and firing blind into an alley isn’t going to do him any good.
He fires the blaster instead into the ground in front of the alley, and the shots start digging up and destroying the paver stones and creating a second cloud of pavers and dust.
It's cover. Not much, but enough.
Nixon breaks out of the alley. The blaster is in one hand. The case is in the other. The bottom of his cloak waves and pops behind him as he runs.
In front of him are the silhouettes of the ships in the spaceport. They are becoming a clearer picture as he sprints toward them. The little speeder doesn't look so little. The cruiser looks bigger and boxier the closer he gets.
Again, the big gun whines.
Then there’s the concussive thunk of the big gun firing. The shot misses and digs a crater out of the ground in front of him. The impact knocks him to a knee and the case falls out of his hand. The metal box skips and skids away.
He scrambles on his hands and knees to get it, and he hears the sound of footfalls behind him. He looks, and coming up fast is the man who’s been firing the blaster at him. The gun is whining again.
Nixon gets to his feet and picks up the case then turns back toward the spaceport. He runs an irregular path, trying to keep his next move unpredictable. The big gun fires again anyway, the shot smaller this time because whoever is operating it didn’t let the gun get a full charge.
Nixon looks behind him, and the gunman is fiddling with the blaster, changing whatever kind of shot he’s been firing. Nixon turns back around and tries to will more energy out of a body that’s more than tired.
Has this only been two days? Was it really just yesterday morning that he was pinned against that alley wall, worrying what Uzel the Uzek was going to do to him? Just a day since he was sitting with Shaine at the Goodtimes Palace?
The air sizzles and a shot from the blaster passes over Nixon’s shoulder. It bores its way through the wall of the spaceport that’s still a hundred feet away. Nixon changes direction and hears another shot crackling its way toward him. This one is from a second gunman, and it catches the edge of his cloak.
He runs toward a wide opening in the wall in front of him. Above the
