by James Axler
“Ryan, what—”
“Don’t…move…” Ryan stared at the mutie only three feet away from him, pinning it with his hardest stare. The beast gave as good as it received, its large, black eyes gazing back into his, as if it knew it would have to fight to keep this meal.
Not taking his eye off the abomination, Ryan’s hand slowly crept toward the handle of his panga. The pig-rat tensed in anticipation, hindquarters lowering to J.B.’s stained, bloody pants as it prepared to spring.
Their eyes locked one last time, and Ryan moved the millisecond he saw the pig-rat jump.
As the brute pushed off, Ryan drew the heavy blade and brought it around in a short, vicious arc. The flat of the machete smacked into the rodent’s head right before it would have sank its teeth into Ryan’s face. The blow sent the creature hurtling away, falling with a startled shriek into the ravenous crowd below.
“Thanks…fucker clawed me bad…”
Ryan nodded, unable to speak, and more so because he had no idea what to say. It didn’t seem like Krysty or the others had heard him inside, and the pipe was about to break loose at any moment, sending them down to a very short, one-way trip to be a feast for the rad-blasted muties below.
He shifted his weight to lessen the strain, but his movement only caused the pipe to groan again and drop a few more inches. With his free hand, he drew his blaster and cocked the hammer.
“This is it. I’ll break the pipe free, hope to crush a shitload of them underneath. When it drops, make for the door. We might be able to get inside before they bring us down. I’ll be shooting the whole way, so you just run. Don’t stop for anything, and that includes me.”
J.B. raised his head, and Ryan was startled to see his friend’s face flushed a bright, mottled red. “Be…right…behind you…”
“All right, here we go.” Ryan turned to face the elevator, about to throw his entire weight upon the pipe to send it crashing to the floor, when the metal doors below began to slide open.
Krysty was framed in the doorway, looking every inch like a flame-haired, avenging angel, only instead of a sword, she was holding something much better.
The S&W M-4000 shotgun was braced against her hip, ready to spew a hailstorm of metal death.
“Fire in the hole!” Ryan shouted, throwing himself back on the pipe, jamming his right ear into his shoulder and clapping his left hand over his left, just before the world split apart in explosions of thunder and flame.
His head aching and rattled from the weapon going off right under him, Ryan was dimly aware of strong hands pulling him from the pipe and helping him into the elevator. Other hands gripped him and helped him to a corner of the small room, where he sank to his knees. “J.B.—”
Krysty’s face appeared in front of him through a pall of smoke, speaking slowly and distinctly. “We got him out—”
That was as far as she got before Ryan crushed her to him and kissed her long and hard for as long as he had air in his lungs. Her strong arms curled around his back was the best sensation he’d felt in a long time.
When they parted, he wasn’t the only one breathless. “Nice to see you too, lover,” she panted.
“Bastard good to be seen. The doors…”
“Are locked as tight as a drum, my good man.” With a courtly flourish, Doc spun his ancient LeMat on his finger, nearly dropping it before steadying it with his other hand and dropping it back into his holster. “I daresay your paramour was like a woman possessed. She swore she heard you outside the door, even when the rest of us could not through the ruckus of that hellspawn outside. At the last, she said she was going to open them, and would perforate with lead anyone who tried to impede her. Obviously she was right on the money and gave those impudent beasts the what for. While she went out and brought the two of you back, I stood guard with my trusty sidearm, and when she got J.B., I gave them something to think about with my second barrel while we closed the doors again.”
“So, we’re moving?”
“Most assuredly, my dear Ryan. However, I’m not sure you are going to like the particular direction we seem to be heading.”
Doc’s words made Ryan realize just what was off about the movement of the elevator. It didn’t have the stomach-lurching feel of ascension at all. Pushing off the wall to his feet, he stalked to the panel with the buttons, his face darkening as he saw which one was lit.
“Fireblast, Doc, why the hell’d you press the bottom one? We want to go up, not down!”
“Easy, Ryan.” Krysty grabbed his arm, distracting him. “About fifteen minutes after you left, a recording came on telling us to clear the elevator as it was due to go to the maintenance level in ten minutes. We started counting down, and when it got to thirty seconds—well, I wasn’t leaving without you.”
“But as to where exactly we’re going, we don’t have a clue, other than the maintenance level,” Mildred said from where she was bent over J.B., field-dressing his wounds as best she could. “Jesus, Ryan, where the hell did you two go—swimmin’ through a sewer?”
“Yeah. We used a little plastique to clear the mat-trans comp room. J.B. got bit and clawed by a pair of them. How’s he doing?”
“Not good. The exertion worked the infection into his bloodstream more quickly than Jak, so they’re running neck and neck regarding who’s worse off at the moment. We’ve got to get medicine into them, fast.”
She didn’t mention the unspoken truth: if there was any medicine to be had it was in the upper levels. Assuming they made it that far in the first place.
The elevator ground to a halt, and the disembodied voice spoke again, startling Ryan, who was hearing it for the first time.
“Maintenance level. This elevator will be inoperative until the proper visual inspection has been performed, and a supervisor has approved it. Thank you.”
“Never met such polite machines,” he muttered, slinging the Steyr longblaster over his shoulder, his SIG-Sauer filling his right hand. “End of the line, people. Krysty, you got Jak. Mildred, help J.B. Keep your blasters out if you can manage it. I don’t know what the hell we’re going to find down here. Doc, you’re on my left. Let’s get the fuck out of this metal coffin.”
Doc took his position at Ryan’s left shoulder, levering back the trigger of his LeMat with a click. “Truer words were never spoken, my friend.”
Ryan raised his SIG-Sauer and nodded at the old man. “Do it.”
Chapter Nine
The elevator doors opened into impenetrable, pitch-blackness. The bright fluorescent light emanating from the elevator was quickly swallowed by the stygian dark outside.
“Guess the lights aren’t on down here.” Mildred said. She had J.B.’s left arm draped around her shoulders, holding it in place with her left, and her blaster in her right hand, ready to shoot. Krysty had done the same with the skinny, shivering Jak, careful to avoid the shards of razor sewn into his jacket.
“No, and it certainly doesn’t smell any more pleasant than the festering pit we just left, does it?” Doc said, covering his mouth and nose.
Indeed, it didn’t smell any better outside. In fact, the reek was much worse. It was warmer here than in the mat-trans corridor, and more humid, and the pervasive odors of rot and mold surrounded them. Although he didn’t say it, Ryan was pretty sure of one of the components making up the miasma around them—rotting meat.
“Need a light.” Bending to grab one of the carpet strips, he rubbed it in the filthy fur of a dead rat body, smearing it with feces and hair, then wrapped it around the blade of his panga. “Mildred, J.B.’s got a flint on him, find it.”
“I’m not dead yet…” Ryan half turned to see the Armorer holding out the small stone, a scowl creasing his eyebrows.
“Hell, never said you were, just figured you were takin’ a little nap after our running around up there. Since you’re awake, you can make yourself useful and carry the rest of that carpet. We’re gonna need more fuel when this runs out.”
J.B. accepted two
handfuls of the thin strips, stuffing them in his pockets.
Kneeling, Ryan struck the flint against the steel of his knife, sending a shower of sparks into the makeshift torch, which flared into sullen light. He caught Krysty’s worried stare and nodded, wordlessly telling her it would be all right, when in fact he had no idea whether any of them would survive the next few minutes. With Jak and J.B. incapacitated, their numbers were down by a third. That meant two of the best warriors in the group were out of action, and Ryan estimated their ability was more or less cut by half, particularly with two others carrying them along. Doc and Mildred were more than capable, he’d grant them that, but they simply weren’t in the other two men’s league. Krysty was another story, easily equal to any of the other men when it came to chilling, as she had demonstrated time after time. Her lethal performance in the hallway had proved that point yet again.
Rising, he raised the torch overhead to cast the maximum available light out in front of them. “All right, let’s move out. Stay close and sing out if you see anything. You ready, Doc?”
The old man stared at the limp corpse of one of the rats with unfocused eyes. “Would that I had a piece of string to swing it on, that is a fine pastime for a young boy to while an afternoon away, is it not?”
“Ah, Doc…” Ryan toed the stiffening body with his boot. “You saying you used to swing these on a string?”
“Oh, yes, it was great fun for the boys to scare the girls with—that or a dead cat, you see.”
“And they say the twenty-second century is uncivilized. Sometimes I think you boys don’t have anything on the nineteenth.” Mildred muttered.
At the moment, Ryan agreed with her. “Doc? Doc, snap out of it. We might be walking into trouble down here, and we need you in the here and now, understand?”
The white-haired man’s eyes blinked once, twice, then he stared up at Ryan with his more-or-less usual gaze. “Beg pardon, dear sir, I was gamboling down the misty paths of memory lane for a moment.” Doc hoisted the LeMat in front of his face. “It shall not happen again, I assure you.”
“All right, let’s go.” Ryan’s torch was already burning low, and the first order of business was to find a better light source, and quick.
His blaster extended into the room, Ryan took a step out, then another. The stench hit him like a physical blow, almost overpowering in its intensity. Beside him, Doc exited the elevator, and immediately turned to be quietly sick in the corner.
The floor was alternately slick and dry, making footing treacherous. Bringing the torch down, Ryan saw more mutie shit covering the floor as in the hallway, just not as deep here. The lumps were larger, however, some the size of a child’s fist, which sparked a faint alarm in Ryan’s mind. “Go slow, everyone. We don’t need any twisted or broken ankles here.”
“Yeah, we got enough problems already,” Mildred replied.
“Well, here is some news of import that may cheer us.” Doc darted off into the darkness, only to return a moment later wheeling something in front of him on squealing, crusted wheels. “I found a chair.”
“Great, Doc, great.” Ryan grimaced as he stared at the ancient piece of furniture, which looked as if it would fall apart if he breathed on it, much less sat down. It was also covered with feces, which Doc busily brushed off. “What in the hell are we supposed to do with it?”
The old man’s expression turned sly, as if only he knew the answer to a great riddle. With effort, he wrenched off one of the metal arms in a squeal of rusted metal and held it up. “Wrapped in your clever mixture of mutant shit and U.S. government-approved carpet—supplied by the lowest bidder, of course—I believe this would make a more than adequate torch, would it not?”
“He’s got you there, Ryan,” Krysty said.
“Guess he does.” Shaking the guttering remains of his first torch off the panga, Ryan cleaned and sheathed it before breaking off the other chair arm. In two minutes he had fashioned a pair of torches, one of which he passed to Doc. “You found them, you get to carry one.”
“Its lustrous gleam blazes like the bejeweled flame that lit the brazier whenst mankind came together to celebrate the first Olympiad in Athens, shining out like a shaft of gold when all around is dark—or is that a stream of bat’s piss? In either event, I will guard it with my very life.”
“I’d settle for finding a light of some kind, electric or otherwise—” Ryan began to reply before Krysty’s urgent whisper cut him off.
“We’re not alone.”
Everyone froze, and Ryan lifted his torch higher to try to spot what might be coming at them from the dark. “How many?”
“A lot, all around us—and they’re bigger than the ones in the hallway.”
Now Ryan heard the skittering of many feet; the peculiar rustle-clack of the pig-rats as they approached. A shadowed form remained just out of the yellow circle of torchlight, and Ryan’s breath hitched in his throat for a second—it was as large as a medium dog. He brought up his blaster, but with a flash of a naked, pink tail as big around as his thumb, it vanished into the gloom.
“What’s the plan?” Krysty asked.
“Give me J.B.’s Uzi.” Holstering his SIG-Sauer, Ryan accepted the submachine gun, unfolded the stock and snugged it into his shoulder to brace when he fired. “All right, we follow the wall until we come to another exit. They can’t surround us then. Keep your blasters out and shoot anything inside the light. Above all, keep moving. There must be another way out of here. Let’s move.”
Keeping his back to the wall, and the torch in front of him, Ryan led the way, searching for the corner that would take them deeper into the cavernous room. The patter of many paws and hooves grew louder now, as if they were being shadowed by a veritable mob of the hideous beasts.
Ryan stopped short when he saw what he was about to walk into. The muties had been crapping down here for so long they had created piles of feces as high as Ryan’s head. He couldn’t even see the wall beyond in the dimming light. “Far as we go this way, people. Follow me.”
A flash of greasy, gray fur appeared in the torchlight, and Ryan squeezed the trigger of the Uzi, sending a single bullet into the pig-rat’s skull, the noise of the shot drowning out the scurrying of the stalking rodents for a few moments. It skidded to a stop at his feet, a mottled pink and back tongue lolling out as it spasmed and died. Even lying on its side, the creature’s body rose almost to Ryan’s knee.
“Good lord!” Mildred said. “They grow them big down here.”
“Keep moving. That shot scared them off, but they’ll be back, and probably a lot more next time.” Ryan set the pace, but was distracted by Doc, who stepped ahead of him to peer at a pile of shit, torch held high.
“Doc, we’ve got to keep moving.”
“Is it? It is! Give me a minute or two, my dear Ryan, and I will have the answer to your prayers in hand shortly.” Dropping his torch on the ground, Doc plunged his hands into a pile of shit, flinging fist-sized lumps aside with an expression of demented glee on his face.
“Ryan!” Mildred’s urgent hiss swiveled his head around to see a pair of the large pig-rats creeping in behind them. Stepping in front of the women, Ryan aimed and fired two careful shots that took the muties down, but they were quickly replaced by more. Ryan waved the torch, which seemed to keep them at bay, but the brutes only retreated far enough to be outside the immediate reach of the blazing brand. Lifting the torch overhead again, Ryan saw they were encircled by a double ring of the beasts, with dozens of claws scraping the floor as they approached. Finding the fire selector on the Uzi with his thumb, Ryan flicked it to full-auto and prepared to send a burst into the front line.
“Whatever you’re doing, Doc, you better do it fast!” The pig-rats were only a couple yards away now, grunting, snuffling and drooling in their desire to tear into fresh meat. Tightening his grip on the submachine gun, Ryan squeezed off a burst. The 9 mm rounds punched through a trio of muties, sending them squealing away to be set upon by their comra
des.
The crack of Krysty’s and Mildred’s blasters also joined the fray, but Ryan saw it was hopeless—there were just too many of the vermin. He triggered short bursts until the Uzi clicked empty, then handed it to Mildred and drew his SIG-Sauer intent on making the nearest mutie’s attempt to steal a bite a fatal decision.
He had just drawn a bead on the closest one, which was hungrily eyeing his leg, when a two-foot-long tongue of flame shot past him and into the mutie’s face, searing it to a crisp as he watched in stunned amazement.
Chapter Ten
The pack of pig-rats halted its advance upon seeing the face of their comrade immolated right next to them. The burn victim screamed in agony and staggered away, its eyes heated to milky-white blindness. One of the others snapped at its foreleg, and when it turned to face that threat, another snuck in from behind and went for its underbelly. In seconds, the wounded one was down and dead, feasted upon by a half dozen of its fellows.
Ryan turned from the grisly sight—now nicely illuminated—back to Doc, who now held a curious apparatus. It looked to be a pipe about two feet long, bent at a sixty-degree angle, with a two-foot-long tongue of blue-orange flame erupting from a small nozzle. The other end was attached to a pair of large, steel cylinders by stiff rubber tubes. Above the odor of feces, Ryan now detected the faint scent of what smelled like burned garlic.
Doc’s face had lit up like a boy’s on Christmas morning. “MAPP gas welding torch—liquefied petroleum gas mixed with methylacetylene-propadiene. If I can get a hand with the fuel tank—” he waved at the pair of tall cylinders with a pair of gauges at the top “—we should be able to stroll out of here like walking out of church on a sunny Sunday afternoon.”
“Then let’s go. Neither Jak nor J.B. are getting any better while we stand around gawking!” Mildred said.
