Valentine's worries cleared, as they always did when planning gave way to doing. All his questions were gone: it had become a matter of killing everyone on the bridge, and somehow holding the wheelhouse and upper deck through the coming confusion. The moon had disappeared below the horizon, leaving the ship lit only by the stars and its few running lights.
"Halt!" Valentine heard a voice boom from the bottom of the staircase. "Unsling your weapon, sir, and don't touch anything but the sling."
He turned to see Dortmund, three sailors lined up behind him, pistols pointed up at him. While he had been concentrating on the bridge, Dortmund had reached the bottom of the stairs without Valentine noticing. Valentine thanked God that Dortmund hadn't shot first and questioned later. He obeyed the instructions, going so far as to crouch to put the gun on the stair below his feet, and readied himself for a leap-
-when the loud, deadly rattle of a machine gun roared from behind the sailors, filling the night with noise. Dortmund's men fell forward, jerking spasmodically as if swept off their feet by an electrified broom. The hard plinking sound of bullets ricocheting off metal stairs and walls punctuated the sound of the slugs tearing through flesh, a noise that reminded some part of Valentine's mind of eggs thrown against a wall. The four-petal blossom of the machine-gun's muzzle flare lit Post's snarling features as he fired the support weapon from his hip, using a thick leather strap to help him wield it.
One sailor went overboard with a cry; the others fell at the bottom of the stairs.
Valentine retrieved his own gun before they hit the deck. Blood had been shed, and his hopes of a simple seizure of the ship were cut down as brutally as Dortmund and his henchmen. He peeked over the edge of the deck above, only to be met by a burst of bullets that zipped out to sea past his ear. Worthington was no fool; he had armed himself before going to the captain. Valentine had to get down to Ahn-Kha and his Grogs, so he would at least have a nucleus of armed men to command.
The lights died, and Valentine felt a change in the ship's motion. The Chief had level-headedly proceeded with the plan upon hearing the firing above.
Valentine backed down the stairs and joined Post, where his lieutenant covered the starboard side walkway from the base of the stairs.
"What the hell happened?" Post said. "Where did Dortmund come from?"
"One of the ship's boys overheard something and went to the exec. We've got to get to the Grogs."
The ship's public-address system squealed into static-filled life. "All hands, all hands, this is the captain speaking . . . ."
Valentine grabbed Post by the arm and pulled him into the stairwell leading into the bowels of the ship, almost jerking him out of his shoes with the force of his movement. Two shots rang out from the top of the stairway, cutting the air where they stood seconds ago, as Saunders's voice continued.
"... Captain Rowan of the Marines, Lieutenant Post, the Grogs, and an unknown number of others are attempting to mutiny. They are to be shot on sight. All hands to the aft deck, all hands to the aft deck."
"Make a hole, damn it! Make a hole!" Valentine barked, exiting the stairway with Post in tow, waving his submachine gun to accentuate the threat as they pushed back sailors popping like magical rabbits into the narrow passageway. Somewhere around the T-junction corner ahead he heard Ahn-Kha's bellow, barking out orders in the Grog patois. The captain's voice continued to issue orders over the PA, including one to the dead Dortmund to report to the Oerlikon. An emergency light bathed the corridor in harsh shadows. Valentine turned a corner and caught sight of a knot of Grogs standing behind a small, bright spotlight pointed down the corridor. He shielded his eyes.
"Ahn-Kha, it's me and Post! Cut that light for a second."
The two men hustled toward the improvised barricade.
A pistol fired from the darkness behind them, and Post grunted. He sagged against Valentine, who turned and fired up the passageway. Ahn-Kha leapt forward with apish agility, blocked the floodlight with his bulk, and put his mammoth arm around Post's chest. The machine-gun clattered to the steel floor, but Post gripped the strap as Ahn-Kha dragged him backwards. Valentine backed down the corridor, but whoever fired stayed safely around the corner of the intersection at the end of the hall.
He reached the Grogs outside the arms locker. Ahn-Kha had improvised a barricade of mattresses and a wooden door, which the muscular Grogs still worked to construct as they shifted a beam to let them pass. Ahn-Kha carried Post into the arms locker and gently stretched him out onto the floor. Valentine knelt beside his lieutenant, who had blood staining the undershirt across his chest.
Post groaned and coughed. "I can taste blood," he said.
Valentine found the wound, high enough on his chest to nearly be at the shoulder. He grabbed a first-aid kit off the wall and found a compress within. He applied the dressing to the softly pulsing hole. Noticing blood on the floor, he gently lifted Post and found another hole opposite.
"Good news, Will. It went straight through."
"Watch ... out. The captain'll have the marines on you in a minute."
"Most of them won't be armed. All they'll have are whatever guns are scattered in the ship."
"Stern. He'll send men down the hatches." Post was pale with pain, but still thinking clearly enough. His bravery gave Valentine heart.
"We've blocked everything off," Ahn-Kha said from the doorway. "The Chief is welding the access hatches shut."
A Grog hooted and fired toward the T-intersection forward. The shotgun blast sounded like a grenade explosion in the confined area of the metal passageway.
They heard a clatter around the shadowed corner of the T-intersection facing the barricade. Ahn-Kha knelt behind the mattress-shielded door, the pump-action in his hands looking like a child's toy.
"Mr. Rowan?" a voice called down the hall. "It's Partridge. I've got Went and Torres with me. What's happening, sir?"
Valentine exchanged a look with Ahn-Kha, and mouthed the word marines. "I don't have time for the whole story, Party. But everything the captain said over the intercom is true. Post is with me. We are trying to take the ship."
"What're you talking to him for?" a voice said from around the right-hand corner of the intersection.