Eldorado…Part 8

*Before…

I yell down. “I think we’re catching up!”
The next thing I know is Doc Faraday unlashed some rope to something and put her foot into something and gave a nod and some of her folk grabbed a line and with a zip and a whoosh she flies up the mast to where I am like some fairy princess.
Okay that was impressive especially with that oh so very British look she has on her face.
“Alright Doc that was impressive.”
Her eyes have this sparkle there to them when we’re this close and I can smell her powder and perfume a mix of light rose and coconut and her lips are painted really, really red in a very nice way and she does that almost smile with the head tuck.
Oh…well then Quite…as she’d say.
Then there’s this bit of mischief that plays up and she opens her hand for my spyglass.
“But of course I’m a Doctor.”

*And Now…

I pass her the spyglass an I’m a bit bemused by the way that she’s acting and I’ll confess there’s something to like about a woman that can do what she just did.

I’m a little spoiled by my girls because they’re both from the circus life and I met them there and they’re all sorts of capable but as much as womenfolk are more capable than most give them credit for it’s a whole different stripe of cat that does stuff like this.

She nudges me with her hip as she folds it out. “Hold me if you please?”

I…

“Alrighty, y’might want to look at getting something less wind catching next time Doc yer dress and such is pretty and all but it’s kind of dangerous.”

She’s looking through the spyglass still but her lips do that upturn into a bow. “I like my dress thank you very much; it’s a one of a kind.”

“Like I said it’s pretty.”

Wait…did I just feel?

H’yup that’s a pack of throwing knives and I’d wager if I moved my hands a bit more freely that she carries other things to under all of that. Well don’t let it be said that once I was used to having such a pair as I got more than a few things have been hid in my corsets.

She shouts something down to the crew and they start shouting back and forth and I don’t know what she said or they’re sayin but she got them moving for certain and not long after that I see steam pumping out more and we start moving a bit faster and a bit faster and she’s watching things still.

“Do you think that you’re ready for shooting like this Miss Steele?”

“I am, and you can call me Nikki.”

“Hmm…not quite yet I don’t think after all we just met.”

Alrighty…

That has to a British thing or something I hear they’re all about propriety and stuff, and apparently they’re like that even when they’re breaking the rules like they’re doing now.

It don’t matter where y’go there’s a certain bunch of things that are not seen as proper for a woman to do.

And y’know double that if they think it’s something all capable and daring and makes you look better or as capable as a man.

Honest to god I’m kinda glad I’m not one of those men anymore if I ever was in the first place.

“I believe that you are just fair enough in in about a quarter glass.”

“Quarter glass of what?”

“Hourglass, fifteen minutes.”

We head down and I actually head off to quickly use the head. Yes I’m taking the time to pee before things get heavy and then I come back and get the things for the rifle ready and spare shells in my vest pockets and check the sights and the mounted spy glass and I get a drink of water and head back up.

Three or four minutes left and I use it to get used to the feet and the sway of the boat and get into that rhythm I hear her yell up. “I believe now would be a good time to start you attempts Miss Steele.”

Okay then I take a breath and I sight up and it’s far…and there’s the wind and elevation and height too and then there’s the wave dips…that’s what I’m waiting for. For us to rise up on a wave and for them to be down and have all that height and…

I fire.

The first shot misses the pilot/helmsman and it makes him duck and scamper. Good enough that means there’s no one steering the ship now and I know what I have to adjust for and I fire off two more one taking a chunk of of the deck near there and the third shot is right in the wheel.

I’m putting the fright into them of getting close to the thing and it’s having an effect already.

It’s listing and the crew is scampering running to make ready and I see that son-of-a-snake and I see him going for cover and as much as I want to try to sight in on his mangy ass I know I don’t have the time.

We dip down out of sight with the waves and I move my head away from the rifle it’s important to do that and I close my scope eye too for the few seconds because it rests your eye and it doesn’t wreck the visual memory that your eye’s got from the last thing it was like focused on.

An ol sharpshooter’s trick.

I feel the swell and I hear the gatling gun opening fire now that we’re coming back into they’re sight too and they’ve a man at the helm again.

The gun’s roaring and firing and that’s actually all to the good really the thing’s a killer fer sure but it’s not a weapon with a good range and it sure ain’t really accurate and the more ammo that they use the better really.

And as much as I don’t like killing there’s the fact that they’re doing all of this with him and that means that I’m going to use any means I have and I sight in and I put a rifle shot through the head of the fella at the wheel.

I coulda and might shoulda held off an took him in the shoulder but dead in the head says a lot more about staying the hell away from that wheel than a shot to the shoulder would and it says a great deal about how good I am with a long gun.

Just because I’m a gunfighter and use a leg iron as my trade don’t mean I’m still not Nikki Steele with a long gun too.

I fire off a few random and yet good guessed shots around the ship I hit two out of five and I’m not trying to but they don’t know that.

I see that bugger out from cover with some other fellas that look like they’re with him and they’re doing something and I lose sight of them as we get blocked out by the wave action.

I take the time to reload and it’s the same deal when we see each other again and the gatling gun’s spitting death at us and all it’s doing is killing fish maybe and I see a kid now at the wheel and there’s a couple of guns on him from the deck making him take the wheel and a couple of crew standing and blocking sight of them…I mean I can see them but I can’t get a shot. I’m good but I’m not going to shoot the crew either since they’re likely under threat too and I am for certain now going to shoot the kid at the wheel.

Dammit t’hell and Alabama.

What to do…and now I’m running out of time…

Well honestly I know some fellas that aren’t crew and are likely signed on with Damon and that’s the gunner at the gatling and the reload man, Damon wouldn’t trust no one else but his own with such a thing.

I put a bullet in each of them before the wave dips us down again.

I load two more shells.

We’re getting closer now, and we might be getting into a range where they might start hitting us and I’m not gonna take that chance with that gatling gun and I’m going to do as much damage as I can with it.

The wave crests up and I see they’re ditching the life boats and leaving them in their wake and some barrels of things to get in our way or maybe punch a hole in us because it don’t take too much to hole a ships enough to hurt her…not with speed on you.

And yet there’s still something else about all of that stuff in the water too.

And that gat’s firing and this time there’s the whiz-whine of rounds passing us and people taking cover as I’m hearing yells and thunks of shells hitting wood.

“Goddammit!”

I open fire and I know what I’m tryin for and that’s the gatling gun this time and the gunner but he ducks after my first shot and he’s still got it pointed our way but he’s firing wild.

I put a round into the casin but she’d still firin, I miss the gun as we hit a crate they’ve dumped and oranges are everywhere in the water I still don’t trust that not to be a thing…I’ve got my angry woman’s intuition in my gut going off and I can just feel badness coming.

I put another round into the casing of the gatling gun and we take some more rounds and I see shots hitting the gunner catching him in the head and I look to see Daniel standing there with his own long rifle sighting in and taking shots even as rounds were whizzing by him and crates of ours were busting up and a lamp shattered not a yard from him and he just stood there as cool as you please and took that shot.

Why am I not just cursed with an interestin life but meeting all these interesting people that make me want things that maybe I shouldn’t.

I’m still getting used to the girls an me.

I wasn’t raised with that good with just being with who you’re with when you want to be and yet still committed to those you’re living with…I’m not saying it doesn’t have its advantages but still….damn Danny why do you gotta be just one of those good ones.

I put another round in the casing as another fella grabbed the gun and the crank and he gets maybe ten rounds off and it stops with a jammed motion and he’s yelling and Daniel puts another bullet in that fella too and I hear even from here Damon cursing and swearing and I look for a chance to put a round in him and there’s another bump and anther to our ship and I see more crates and I see.

There’s kegs in one of the life boats and there’s all sorts of fuse cords in there burning and stuff.

“Explosives!” I scream.

I scream it a might too late because a second later there’s one hell of a boom and I’m blown off the perch I’m using and I lose the rifle into the drink and I hit the water…I know I’m going to hit the water so I kinda curl so I’m not so flat and cover my head with my arms and then I’m in the water.

I open my eyes and look up and I can see the water burning and I can see the boat still in one piece and things in the water and I’m trying to swim and kick and I’m damned heavy.

But I’m damned stubborn too…I’m not going to give up and then I…I see Doc Faraday coming down just like she was when she was coming up only she’s riding the anchor and holding it’s chain and she pushes off towards me in that damned dress and I see her with some kind of thing over her mouth and it’s got a bottle or a jug or something and she’s…she bubbling out air?

Oh shit she’s got something to breath or something!

I swim to her and we meet and she takes it off and I breathe as she shoves it on my face and it’s damned odd and tastes like a chemists pharmacy or something but it’s air and she looks at me and she’s lost her hat and all and she presses something on that breathin thing and I inhale again but slower…try to make this last and then she takes a breath and then she smiles and she grips this brooch on her dress and yanks it off and there’s some cord or whatnot and…?

And her dress, under the skirts it’s filling up with air and it’s getting puffy and filling out and she looks like some odd way too proper English mermaid and I feel her slip her boot under my foot and we’re floating upwards like a sack of air.

We share the air bottle once more each before she lets it go and we come up to the surface and we’re panting and breathing hard and her skirt’s all floofed out around us like a southern belle settling at a plantation picnic.

I look at her and she looks at me and she’s smiling and her hairs in a mess and there’s burning debris and stuff all around us and everything and dammit I’m alive.

So I kiss her.

And I’ll be damned if she doesn’t kiss me back right away and everything too.

I break the kiss and she smiles at me. “Well then I think now it’s fine to call you Nikki then right?”