Pax rammed the barrel of his Ruger into the Warrior’s back. “Shut your face and move your ass!”
Hickok winced, staring at the evident boss. “You touch me with that rifle again and I’m going to cram the barrel down your throat!”
Pax pointed the barrel at the Warrior’s head. “Keep flapping your gums and you can die right here!”
“Go kiss a buffalo’s butt,” Hickok cracked.
Pax angrily motioned with the Ruger. “Move it! Now!”
“Which way?” Hickok asked.
“Follow them,” Pax directed.
Four of the motley group were walking to the north along a faint trail.
Hickok fell in behind the four.
“No tricks, mister!” Pax warned, staying behind the Warrior. Tab and two men brought up the rear.
“You mind tellin’ me who you people are?” Hickok inquired.
“As if you don’t know!” Pax rejoined acidly.
“I don’t,” Hickok said. “I’ve never laid eyes on you before.”
“Bullshit!” Pax declared bitterly. “You saw all of us a week ago!”
“I’ve never seen you before,” Hickok reiterated. “I wasn’t even in California a week ago.”
“What’s a California?” Pax queried.
Hickok glanced over his right shoulder. “You’re joshin’ me, right?”
“My name’s not Josh,” Pax responded.
“You really don’t know what California is?” Hickok questioned in disbelief.
Pax shook his head.
“The Free State of California is the name of the state you live in,” Hickok explained.
“What’s a state?” Pax wanted to know.
Hickok’s brow creased in bewilderment. “You mind settin’ me straight on a few things?”
Pax scrutinized the man in the buckskins. “Like what?”
“Can you read?” Hickok inquired.
“What’s that?” Pax responded, the Ruger barrel fixed on the prisoner’s back.
“Do you know what a book is?” Hickok asked.
“Nope,” Pax replied.
“Ain’t them those things we use to help get the fires started sometimes?” Tab chimed in.
“Those things?” Pax said. “We don’t see many of them in the Kingdom anymore.”
“The Kingdom?” Hickok repeated quizzically.
“The Kingdom, mister,” Pax stated. “Where we live. This place.”
“You call this old amusement park the Kingdom?” Hickok remarked.
“Why?”
“I don’t know nothing about no amusement park,” Pax asserted. “This place is our home. It’s always been called the Kingdom. That’s what my dad called it and his dad before him.”
“How long have you folks lived here?” Hickok asked.
“Our families have lived here since doomsday,” Pax answered.
“Doomsday? You mean World War Three?”
Pax shrugged. “Call it whatever you want, mister. My dad told me all about it. A long, long time ago, in the land outside of the Kingdom, everybody was trying to kill everybody else. Doomsday, my dad called it. The end of everything. We’ve been here ever since.”
“Your family, your ancestors, hid out in the park during the war and stayed here after it was over,” Hickok reasoned aloud.
“Of course we stayed here in the Kingdom,” Pax said. “Where else would we go?”
“There’s a whole wide world out there,” Hickok stated. “You should see it sometime.”
Pax made a snorting sound. “Who are you trying to kid? We know what’s out there! Poison air and poison ground. Killers and robbers. And lots of mutants. We wouldn’t last a day out there, mister.”
“You can call me Hickok,” the gunman suggested. “Where’d you ever hear the world is as bad as all that?”
“From my dad,” Pax said. “His dad passed it on to him. We know we’re safe in the Kingdom and we’re never going to leave.”
“You’ve got to leave sometime,” Hickok advised. “You’ll be surprised to find out that the folks out there aren’t half as bad as you make ’em out to be. Not all of ’em, anyway.”
“Yeah. Sure. And I suppose you and your friends are a good example, huh?” Pax demanded testily.
“My friends?”
“Don’t play innocent, you son of a bitch!” Pax exploded. “We don’t know how all of you got in, but a week ago Chester found the bunch of you staying in that building on Orleans Square. We spied on you for two days, watching you come and go. You bastards with your black robes and puff guns!”
Puff guns? Hickok realized the man was referring to the Gild members’ favorite weapons, the Darters.
“Chester was all for being friendly,” Pax was saying. “He said we shouldn’t kill you before we found out what you wanted.”
“What happened?”
“You know damn well what happened!” Pax snapped, his face livid.
“You shot Chester and three of our brothers and drove us to the island!
You would have caught all of us, but you didn’t know we had canoes on the north shore.”
Hickok contemplated Pax’s disclosures. No wonder these people hated his guts! They believed he was part of the Gild, and the Gild had tried to wipe them out.
“We’ve been watching you on and off ever since,” Pax went on. “No one knows the Kingdom like we do. We can spy on you anytime. You ain’t such great shakes!”
“And I saw what you did to those three outsiders,” Tab mentioned. “I followed one of your scouting parties.”
“You never should have left the Kingdom,” Pax said reproachfully.
“I wanted to see what they were up to,” Tab explained. “They didn’t go very far. I think they were just looking around to see what was out there.”
He paused, frowning at Hickok. “I never did see no sense in why those three people were killed.”
“Don’t look at me,” Hickok said. “I’m not one of the Gild.”
“What’s the Gild?” Pax inquired.
“They’re the varmints who gunned down your kin,” Hickok said.
“And you ain’t one of them?” Pax asked skeptically.
“That’s what I’ve been tryin’ to tell you,” Hickok stressed.
“You expect us to believe you?” Pax retorted resentfully.
“I’m tellin’ the truth,” Hickok averred.
“Lies won’t save you,” Pax declared. “We’re going to pay you back for what you did to Chester and the others.”
“You’d kill an innocent man?” Hickok asked.
“Doesn’t matter to us whether you’re innocent or not,” Pax said.
“Why not?”
Pax grinned, exposing his discolored teeth. “Because we’re hungry.”
Chapter Twelve
“You shouldn’t leave the grounds, sir,” the lieutenant warned. “It could be dangerous out there.”
Boone gazed at the brick wall, his brown hair waving in a gust of wind, his brown eyes studying the red streak before him. “If Hickok went over, then I’m going over.”
The lieutenant in charge of the cleanup detail shook his head. “I can’t stop you, but I don’t think you’re doing the right thing.”
Boone stared at the corpse lying at the base of the wall. A pair of soldiers were wrapping their deceased comrade in a body bag.
“We don’t really know if the Warrior went over the wall,” the lieutenant noted.
“There’s nowhere else he could have gone,” Boone countered. “I know he’s not in the hotel, and I’ve searched the garden from one end to the other. Hickok isn’t on the grounds. He was after the hit man. If the trail of dead soldiers ends here, then the assassin went over the wall at this spot and Hickok followed him.”
“If you’re determined to see this through,” the lieutenant offered, “I can go with you.”
“Thanks, but no,” Boone said. “I can make a lot faster time by myself.
But you can do
me a favor.”
“Name it.”
“Find Blade, the other Warrior,” Boone directed.
“The one with all the muscles?” the lieutenant queried.
“That’s him. Tell him where I’ve gone, and ask him to relay the news to Kilrane. He’ll understand.”
“Will do,” the lieutenant promised. He moved next to the wall and cupped his hands at his waist. “Can I give you a boost?”
“Thanks.” Boone placed his right moccasin in the officer’s hands and nodded.
The lieutenant heaved.
Boone sailed upward, easily gripping the top of the wall and sliding over to the far side. He landed upright, his hands on his 44 Magnums. He had to find Hickok, if only to redeem himself in his own eyes. If he hadn’t rushed headlong into the garden in pursuit of the Warrior and the assassin, if he’d only paid more attention to their tracks and less to keeping Hickok in sight, he wouldn’t have lost them. His stupidity bothered him, and he knew he wouldn’t live it down if the Warrior was killed.
The Cavalryman crouched and examined bootprints and moccasin tracks, both leading off to the northeast. Elated his hunch had been right, Boone rose and jogged across the field. He found an animal trail in the forest beyond and ran along the path until he reached an obstruction, a chain-link fence covered with plant growth.
Now which way? he wondered.
Boone spotted a hole in the vegetation and squatted to peer through it.
A flock of sparrows perched in a tree on the far side of the chain-link fence suddenly broke into flight, chirping wildly.
Boone stood, listening. A lifetime on the Dakota plains had taught him to recognize and react to the subtle signals nature provided. Something had spooked the sparrows, but what? He detected the pounding of feet coming from the other side of the fence, and he quickly moved to the right and ducked around a thick bush.
A moment later a head poked through the hole in the fence. A thin man in a soldier’s uniform crawled into view with an unusual rifle slung over his left shoulder.
Boone was on him while the man was still on his hands and knees, pressing the barrel of his right Hombre against the startled crawler’s left ear.
The man stiffened and gasped.
“Howdy,” Boone greeted him. “Who are you?”
“Leftwich,” the man blurted. “Private Leftwich. I was sent out to look for the guy who tried to kill the leaders earlier.”
“I don’t think so,” Boone said.
“Why don’t you believe me?” Leftwich asked in annoyance.
“For starters your rifle isn’t Free State Army issue,” Boone mentioned.
“I’ve never seen a gun like it. What is it?”
Leftwich clamped his thin lips together.
“Suit yourself,” Boone said, his right foot lashing forward.
Leftwich was struck in the ribs. He grunted and tumbled onto his right side, wheezing, clutching at his chest.
Boone leaned over the sickly-looking man. “One more time. What kind of rifle is that?”
“A Darter!” Leftwich replied breathlessly.
Boone reached out and tapped the oblong cylinder under the Darter’s barrel. “This is what was used on the soldiers in the garden, and somebody tried to kill me with one of these. What’s it shoot?”
“Explosive darts,” Leftwich revealed, grimacing in pain.
“You don’t say,” Boone commented. “How?”
Leftwich was rubbing his left side. “Compressed air. The Darters are accurate up to one hundred yards. Semiautomatic or full auto.”
“Do they explode on contact?” Boone inquired.
“They detonate on penetration of the target,” Leftwich detailed.
Boone straightened. “Slip your Darter to the ground.”
Leftwich slowly removed the sling and gingerly deposited the Darter on the grass.
Boone squatted, his right Hombre trained on the assassin, and lifted the Darter in his left hand. “I’ll hang onto this for you. Stand up.”
Leftwich complied, his eyes pinpoints of hatred.
“Where’s Hickok?” Boone asked.
“I don’t know any Hickok,” Leftwich answered.
“Suit yourself,” Boone said. He backed up several strides.
“I don’t know any Hickok!” Leftwich reiterated.
“Does your mom know she raised a chronic liar?” Boone commented.
He checked the Darter and found a safety located over the trigger. “Is this thing loaded?” he questioned while flicking the safety off.
Leftwich’s beady eyes widened. “Be careful with that!”
Boone aimed the Darter at the assassin’s head. “I think I’d like a demonstration.”
Leftwich glanced from the Darter to the Hombre. “I don’t know where Hickok is! Honest! He got away from us!”
“Us?”
“The Gild,” Leftwich disclosed.
“You’re going to take me to where you last saw Hickok,” Boone ordered.
“If I suspect you’re playing me for a fool, I’ll shoot you with your own gun.”
Leftwich scowled. “This just isn’t my day,” he muttered.
Boone holstered his right Magnum, gripping the Darter with both hands. “After you.” He indicated the hole in the fence with a sweep of the barrel. “Stay on your hands and knees when you get to the other side.
Don’t stand until I tell you to.”
Leftwich knelt next to the hole. “Who are you? Another Warrior?”
“No,” Boone replied.
“You look like one,” Leftwich said.
“Through the hole,” Boone stated. He crouched and watched Leftwich obey, then went through himself. “On your feet,” he commanded, rising.
“Now what?” Leftwich asked.
“I told you. Take me to where you last saw Hickok,” Boone directed.
Leftwich dejectedly started off.
Boone refrained from interrogating the phony soldier, concerned their voices might attract unwanted attention. The assassin could be questioned after Hickok was safe and sound. He followed Leftwich to a lake, then north along the shore. When they reached a large gray beast in a stand of trees, he halted. “What’s that?”
“An artificial elephant, you hick,” Leftwich responded.
“Wasn’t civilization grand?” Boone remarked. “Keep going.”
Leftwich headed toward tall structures to the northeast.
As he trod on the heals of the weasel of an assassin, Boone reflected on the chain of circumstances resulting in his presence in the Free State of California. Five years ago, before the Cavalry had made contact with the Family, prior to the Cavalry joining the Freedom Federation, his life had been much simpler. Boone had been raised on a ranch in central South Dakota, and he deeply missed those relatively carefree days spent as a young horseman on the plains. He enjoyed fond memories of his four brothers and three sisters, and he looked forward to seeing them again in June at the annual Boone reunion. They would swap tales about their experiences during the past year, and his brothers and sisters would undoubtedly pester him, as they had done the past five years, to hear about his exploits. They were undeniably proud of the degree of notoriety he had achieved as best friend and chief adviser to Kilrane, the Cavalry leader. Not to mention his fame as a pistoleer.
Boone disliked his fame and the consequences of having an exaggerated reputation. He sighed, thinking of the time four relatives of the previous Cavalry leader had attempted to bushwack Kilrane. Instead, the simpletons had caught Boone in their trap, and he had slain all four in a stand-up gunfight. That unfortunate incident had increased his celebrity tenfold, and Boone had resented every undeserved iota of attention. Killing someone was not his idea of a worthwhile accomplishment, not an act to be extolled to high heaven. He knew Hickok actually relished his renown, and he couldn’t comprehend how the Warrior could abide all those overstated stories and fawning idiots a man with a rep inevitably encountered.
Give him
the bouncing rhythm of a sturdy stallion, the comfortable feel of a well-worn saddle, and a cool breeze on his face! He longed for the good old days, the days before the Cavalry joined the Federation, when there were less complications. As Kilrane’s right hand and personal bodyguard, Boone was entrusted with protecting his friend at all times, including the periodic extended trips to attend Federation Council meetings. Initially, when the Federation had first been formed, Boone had liked the traveling, the meeting of new people, and the making of new friends. But enough was enough! Five years of being at Kilrane’s beck and call, five years of living an unsettled existence, five years during which his own ranch had suffered from neglect and his relationships with the fairer sex had fizzled to zero had all taken their toll. He was eager for a prolonged rest, a chance to work on his spread and court one of the local ladies. And he promised himself he would bring the matter up with Kilrane at the first opportunity.
They were about a hundred yards from the buildings.
“That’s where I last saw Hickok,” Leftwich said, pointing at the second building from the right.
“In there?” Boone questioned skeptically.
“That’s right,” Leftwich maintained. “He attacked us, then took off. The last I saw him, he was going into the tunnels.”
“What are the tunnels?” Boone queried.
“There’s a whole network of them under those buildings,” Leftwich said.
“I don’t know who dug them. I only know they’re there.”
“He must be out of there by now,” Boone commented.
“Maybe not,” Leftwich said. “Those tunnels are a damn maze. It’s real easy to get lost down there.”
A maze? Boone thoughtfully gazed at the structures. He’d used the exact same word a short while ago to describe the gardens behind the hotel. Was it possible Leftwich was telling the truth, that Hickok was lost in an underground labyrinth?
Anaheim Run Page 12
