“I wonder what Portland looks like,” Hickok mentioned. “If it was hit, like you said, then it must look like New York.”
“We’re being watched,” Rikki suddenly interrupted.
The Warriors halted.
“Where?” Blade asked, searching the closest structures.
“I don’t know,” Rikki replied.
Hickok looked in all directions. “I don’t see anyone.”
“I know we are being watched,” Rikki insisted. “I can feel their eyes on us.”
Hickok glanced at the martial artist, grinning. “Have you been readin’ those old superhero comic books in the Family library again?”
Yama slowly pivoted, probing the buildings. “Movement,” he declared.
“Where?” Blade demanded.
Yama motioned with his Wilkinson at a seven-story-square structure to the south. “There. On the fourth floor. I saw a face at the busted window in the middle.”
“Human?” Blade inquired.
“Seemed to be,” Yama said. “But I saw it for just a second.”
Blade studied the building, examining the rows of shattered windows on the side fronting the highway. He saw several enormous yellow letters near the top, part of a wrecked sign.
ANK.
What in the world was an ANK?
Blade discerned a row of lesser letters under the first word.
OF A LE.
What did it mean? He moved toward the ANK, his Commando at the ready. If there was someone inside the building, then whoever it was might know where to find Manta.
“Orders, pard?” Hickok asked.
“I want to question whoever is in there,” Blade said. “We take him or her alive.”
“What if it’s a mutant?” Hickok noted.
“Don’t kill it unless it tries to harm us,” Blade directed.
“I hope it’s not a carnivorous daffodil,” Hickok quipped.
“Enough already with the daffodils,” Blade said.
“What have you got against flowers?” Hickok rejoined.
Blade kept his eyes trained on the windows. They were a block from the building, which was on their right, with trees bordering the sidewalk to their left.
“I don’t like this, pard,” Hickok mentioned. “This is a perfect spot to be bushwhacked.”
“I sense danger,” Rikki concurred.
Blade slowed his pace. “We can’t turn back. Stay sharp.”
Blade saw a face appear at the window on the fourth floor, but the visage withdrew before he could identify whether the countenance was human or otherwise.
“Did you see that?” Hickok asked.
“I saw it,” Blade confirmed.
The Warriors angled toward a series of concrete steps leading to a pair of huge glass doors. Amazingly, the glass panes were unbroken.
“Would it be wise for all of us to go inside?” Rikki queried.
“No,” Blade said. “If this is a trap, then two of us should stay outside.
Hickok and I will go in. Yama and you will cover us from those steps.”
“Be careful,” Yama cautioned.
“What can happen? He’s with me,” Hickok stated.
Yama grinned. “Be doubly careful,” he told Blade.
Blade grew tense as he reached the bottom of the steps. He lightly touched his trigger finger to the Commando trigger. Just in case. “On me,” he said to the gunman.
“Like a shadow,” Hickok promised.
Blade nodded at Rikki and Yama, then took the steps two at a time. He gained the uppermost step and darted to the right of the glass doors, his broad back to the wall.
Hickok ducked to the left.
Squinting because of the glare on the glass panes, Blade leaned forward and peered inside. The recesses of the building were dark and ominous.
“Ready when you are, pard,” Hickok whispered.
Blade wrenched on the right-hand door, flinging it wide and lunging inside, moving to the right away from the lighted doorway.
As before, Hickok bore to the left.
Blade crouched and waited for his eyes to adjust to the murky dimness.
The chamber they were in was spacious and filled with dust-caked furniture. Cobwebs hung from the ceiling. To the right was a wooden counter running the length of the room, while to the left were six desks positioned along the wall. At the rear of the chamber, in the center, was an elevator shaft with the door open and the cage gone. Blade could just make out a black cable dangling down the shaft.
Where was the elevator?
Blade spotted a door in the far corner of the room, at the end of the counter, hanging from its upper hinge.
What was beyond the door? An office? Or a stairwell?
Blade rose and hastened across the chamber to the door, Hickok on his heels.
The doorway afforded access to a flight of stairs.
Blade started ascending the stairwell, vigilantly staring upward, the Commando held next to his chest. He came to a landing and paused, listening.
Not a sound.
Frowning, Blade advanced higher. Like the others, his intuition was blaring a mental warning, and prior experience had taught him never to disregard his intuition. But he felt confident they could handle any opposition. And with Rikki and Yama covering the front, what could go wrong?
Plenty.
Blade was two steps below the fourth floor landing when he heard the pad of stealthy footsteps. He halted, perceiving the landing door was open.
The sound of the footsteps stopped.
Blade sidled toward the landing, easing onto the platform and inching toward the doorway.
A dim corridor became visible past the door.
What was that?
Blade thought he’d heard a hushed word spoken, but he wasn’t positive.
He stepped into the doorway and squatted.
Far down the hallway a Stygian figure streaked from one side of the corridor to the other, then vanished.
Someone was hiding down there.
Blade stood and strode forward, managing a solitary stride before all hell broke loose.
The brittle bark of automatic gunfire arose from outside, from the vicinity of the front steps.
Blade whirled toward the landing, intending to race downstairs and aid Rikki and Yama.
Hickok, in the middle of the landing, glanced over Blade’s head. “Above you!” he cried in alarm.
Blade went to look up, but before he could something dropped on him from the darkness overhead. As the constricting object draped around him and encased him from his head to his waist, he realized with a start it was a net!
“Blade!” Hickok shouted, coming to his friend’s rescue.
Just as two forms pounced on the gunman from aloft.
Blade, struggling to extricate himself from the mesh net, saw Hickok go down in a jumble of flailing limbs. The M-16 clattered to the landing.
“Hickok!” he yelled, exerting his massive muscles to the maximum, his veins bulging, but the net refused to give.
The three thrashing figures on the landing rolled to the edge, up to the metal railing. They came erect, still fighting. Hickok was nowhere near as skilled as Rikki or Yama in hand-to-hand combat, but he was holding his own against his assailants until tragedy struck.
Horrified, Blade watched as one of the attackers tried to land a haymaker on the gunfighter’s chin. Instead, the gunman’s foe appeared to trip and slam into Hickok, who was grappling with his other adversary.
The next instant, Hickok was hurtling over the top rail into the abyss beyond.
“Hickok!” Blade screamed.
The gunman plummeted from sight.
“No!” Blade roared, straining against the net, twisting and rocking from side to side.
From the corridor and the landing they came, over a dozen forms converging on the giant, tackling him, bearing him to the floor.
Blade bucked and heaved, kicking at the heads and arms encircling his legs and ankles. His ri
ght boot smashed into a man’s face and the antagonist shrieked in agony. He almost succeeded in dislodging those clinging to him, striving to restrain him, when one of his opponents abruptly reared alongside his head bearing an upraised club.
Damn!
Blade saw the club descending and tried to jerk his head aside, but the net hampered his movement.
The club thudded into the left side of the giant’s head.
Blade’s world seemed to spin, with pinpoints of light flickering everywhere.
And then the lights went out.
Chapter Six
Rikki and Yama were at the bottom of the front steps when the ambush came.
“I don’t like being separated from the others,” Yama commented, surveying the trees and the buildings across the street.
“It couldn’t be helped,” Rikki remarked.
They waited for a minute in silence.
Yama looked at his diminutive companion. “Did you notice something different this time about the selection process?”
Rikki gazed at Yama. “What do you mean?”
“Blade personally asked us to make this run to Seattle,” Yama observed.
Rikki didn’t see the point. “So?”
“So in the past the selection process was conducted differently,” Yama mentioned. “Think back. When Blade and Plato needed a Warrior to infiltrate the Citadel in Wyoming, they had all the Warriors draw straws. The short straw got to go.”
“That was you,” Rikki said.
“And when they needed a Warrior to venture to St. Louis,” Yama went on, “they had us draw lots again. Hickok and you went.”
Rikki’s forehead furrowed in reflection. “True.”
“That’s not all,” Yama said. “What about the trip to Philadelphia? Again, they drew lots to determine which Warriors would go. But not this time. Blade specifically wanted us. Why? Doesn’t it make you wonder?”
Rikki pursed his lips. “To be honest, I hadn’t given the matter much thought.”
“You were probably too busy communing with the Spirit to notice,” Yama stated, grinning.
“Communing with the Spirit is essential to my inner harmony,” Rikki said. “Don’t you commune regularly?”
“Yes, but not as often as you do,” Yama responded. “I’m more interested in perfecting my craft as a Warrior, in developing my skill in the line of duty.”
“Duty?” Rikki rejoined. “Or death?”
“What?” Yama asked.
“Of all the Warriors, you have a supreme fascination with the subject of death,” Rikki said. “You even took the name of the Hindu King of Death. And of all the Warriors, you are the most versatile at your trade. Most of us have adopted one weapon as our province of expertise, but not you. You have mastered every weapon in the Family armory. When it comes to dispensing death, few of the Warriors are as capable as you.”
“I don’t know about that,” Yama said.
“We are quite different, you and I,” Rikki asserted. “We view life and death differently. I try to live my life to the fullest through the philosophy of the martial arts, while your life is devoted to acquiring as many lethal attributes as possible for the sole purpose of being Death Incarnate. Even our perspectives on the afterlife are diverse. I don’t fear death because I regard dying as simply a technique for attaining a higher level of spiritual living. You, on the other hand, don’t fear death because you don’t fear anything. You are Death, Yama, whether you’re willing to admit it or not.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Yama retorted in surprise. “I’m just a Warrior, like you.” He paused. “I never knew you felt this way about me.”
“I hope I haven’t offended you,” Rikki said.
“Not at all,” Yama declared. “But there’s more to my outlook on life than death.”
“Like wh—” Rikki began, then spun toward the street, toward the opposite sidewalk, leveling his HK-93.
The trap was sprung.
They poured out of the buildings on the far side of the road, dozens of them, unkempt, clad in rags, filthy and unshaven, and armed with everything from pipes to knives to a few guns. They created a bloodthirsty din as they surged toward the pair of Warriors on the steps, their features contorted in bestial hatred.
“They’re human!” Rikki cried.
“So?” Yama crouched and cut loose with the Wilkinson, downing six of their onrushing attackers with a quick burst. He backed up the steps, Rikki at his side.
“We must warn Blade!” Rikki shouted, turning to run to the glass doors.
The doors abruptly swung open and four barbaric men emerged.
Starting down the concrete steps, they uttered strident, savage whoops.
Two of them carried clubs, one a sword, and the fourth an axe.
“Behind us!” Rikki warned Yama, then fired the HK-93 from his hip.
The quartet died in midstride, tumbling down the steps as their chests were perforated by the powerful slugs.
Another burly man appeared at the glass doors, a rifle in his hands. He snapped off a hasty shot, which went wild, then retreated inside.
“They’re in the building!” Rikki cried.
The mob in the street had slowed at Yama’s initial burst. A lean woman with a Winchester got off a shot, the bullet striking the concrete at Yama’s feet and ricocheting off.
Yama fired, stitching her from chin to navel with crimson holes.
“We’ve got to reach Blade!” Rikki declared.
Yama risked a glance over his right shoulder. He spied four or five forms just inside the glass doors. “They’ll cut us down if we try to go in there!”
“We can’t leave Blade and Hickok!” Rikki said.
Yama looked to the right, then the left. More foes were bearing down on them from both directions. Their position was untenable. “We can’t hold here!” he yelled to make himself heard over the clamor of the onrushing throng, then shot two nearby men.
“We have to reach Blade and Hickok!” Rikki persisted, sending several rounds into the glass doors. The pane to the left shattered. There were screams of anguish. “Follow me!” he directed, racing to the left, to the edge of the steps, shooting at a row of charging figures and dropping five of them. The rest scurried away.
Yama spotted a man aiming a revolver and sent him into eternity.
Rikki reached the end of the concrete steps and dropped to the sidewalk below. There was a narrow alley between the building Blade and Hickok were in and a smaller structure, a rundown supermarket. He dashed into the alley, making for the rear of the building. There had to be a back exit! If Yama and he could find it, they could enter and find their friends.
Yama jumped to the pavement and unleashed a volley to discourge pursuit, then sprinted after Rikki.
The alley was filled with rusted garbage cans, piles of moldy trash, and other discarded items. An obnoxious stench permeated the air.
The Warriors wound past the mounds of refuse, seeking an exit at the tail end of the alley.
Instead, they found a brick wall.
Rikki drew to a halt, scanning the walls for a door.
Yama came up behind his fellow Warrior. “Now what?” he snapped in frustration. From the sound of things, their enemies were coming down the alley after them.
“Over the wall,” Rikki said.
Yama nodded and quickly knelt, placing the Wilkinson on the ground.
He cupped his hands.
Rikki glanced up at the rim of the wall five feet above his head. He set his right foot on Yama’s palms, the HK-93 in his left hand. “Ready.”
Yama straightened and heaved, his steely muscles propelling the martial artist upward.
Rikki almost went clear over the wall. He hooked his right arm on the lip and lithely perched himself on the top. On the far side of the wall was a sidewalk and a city street. He gripped the HK-93 by the barrel and slowly eased the weapon as low as his left arm could go, then released it.
The uproar in the alley was gro
wing louder.
Rikki took hold of the wall with his left arm and extended his right toward his friend. “Hurry,” he advised.
Yama slung the Carbine over his right shoulder. He took two steps backward, then ran forward and jumped, easily grasping Rikki’s right hand with his own. He used his momentum and Rikki’s assistance to swing onto the crown of the wall, then promptly dropped to the sidewalk below.
Rikki leaped from the wall, alighting with the ease and grace of a cat.
He scooped up the HK-93.
To the right was the rear of the building Blade and Hickok had entered, and in the center was a wooden door.
“Let’s go,” Rikki urged, moving toward the door.
“Wait a second,” Yama said.
Rikki looked back.
Yama had the Wilkinson cradled in his arms. He was watching the top of the brick wall, waiting. From the volume of the hubbub, it was obvious their pursuers were on the other side of the wall. Sure enough, a moment later a trio of heads appeared above the rim, evidently supported by their comrades underneath. Yama fired, whipping the barrel in a tight sweep.
The three pursuers sprayed blood and brains as they toppled from view.
“They won’t try that again for a while,” Yama said.
Rikki raced to the rear door. Yama’s ploy had bought them a little time, an opportunity to find Blade and Hickok. He grabbed the doorknob and tugged.
The door was locked!
“What’s wrong?” Yama queried.
“The door is locked,” Rikki told him.
“Stand back,” Yama directed. He aimed the Wilkinson at the knob.
A gleaming arrow arced out of the sky, from behind the two Warriors, intended for the big man in blue.
Rikki caught a motion out of the corner of his right eye and went to shout a warning, but he was too late.
The arrow struck home, catching Yama in the lower left corner of his back, piercing his skin and flesh and going all the way through his body, its point protruding from the fabric of his dark-blue uniform to the left of his navel. He inadvertantly grunted, falling to his knees, as agony lanced his frame.
Seattle Run Page 6
