by James Axler
"No resistance," he rumbled, coughing to the taste of the bitter ashes. "Whatever did this penetrated mighty deep into the earth."
"There's lava over there," a young sec man said hesitantly. Impulsively, he reached for his blaster, then released the weapon. There was nothing here to shoot. Whatever battle had been fought was long over. "Mebbe it was a volcano? I heard of them from my ma. Mebbe the ville just got cooked with steam."
Spitting out a long stream of brown juice, Clem frowned deeply. "Let me tell ya, kid, no steam nor lava did that," he stated as a fact.
"Don't like this," the lieutenant muttered, cracking his knuckles and stepping onto the strange soil. He sank to his knees and quickly stepped back onto the road. A rat scurried by, and he resisted the temptation to shoot it out of sheer annoyance.
"Mebbe Overton…" the corporal started.
Clem snorted and glanced around at the hellish vista. "Can't be. If his coldhearts could do this, why not just show us and declare himself baron? Who would be crazy enough to try and fight this with blasters and knives?"
"More likely it's removing potential enemies," the sergeant said gruffly, fighting to keep his horse calm. The animal was very unhappy and wanted to leave the moment they had arrived. He didn't blame it a bit. "Chill before getting chilled."
Nobody spoke for a few minutes, thinking seriously about that possibility.
"Might be," Clem agreed, pausing to spit again. "That is, if this be a weapon and not some bizarre natural effect of the Deathlands. We be mighty close to the Washington Hole. All sorts of crazy stuff happens there."
"Hey, look at this," the lieutenant said, holding up a small gray object. "It's an intact bullet."
Leaning over in the saddle, a sec man glanced around closely. "Say, there's lots of them. Over there, and there!"
"Weirdest thing," the lieutenant said, frowning. "It's not damaged in the slightest."
"Oh, nuke me!" Clem exclaimed in sudden understanding, and he hawked out the whole chaw. "They must of been shooting at the sky, and the slug fell without hitting nothing!"
"The sky," a sec man whispered. "You mean, a plane?"
"Or a bomb?" another asked in a hoarse whisper.
"Fucked if I know!" Clem wheeled his horse about. "Everybody, back to Front Royal! We got to warn Baron Cawdor before this thing strikes again!"
"Wait, sir!" the lieutenant shouted, waving.
"What for?" Clem demanded hotly, the reins tight in his hands.
The sec man took the reins of his own mount and handed them to a surprised Clem. "It took us two days to get here with full supplies. If you drop everything except your blaster, and take my horse as a spare, you can get there in one day."
Clem tied the reins to the pommel of his saddle. "Smart thinking. See ya back the Front Royal!" With a war whoop, the chief of the sec men kicked his horse into a full gallop. Yards away, his saddlebags dropped to the road, then his water bag, the bedroll and then he was gone from sight over a hillock.
"One day," the lieutenant said. "I just hope it's enough time to evac the ville."
"To do what?" a sec man asked. "Run away?"
"And what else can we do against a plane dropping bombs?" the sergeant retorted.
The rest of the brown shirts didn't reply as the lieutenant climbed on the largest horse behind a private and they started riding southward to their homes. Hopefully, the ville would still be there when they arrived.
SMOKING A CIGAR in the morning light, the blue shirt watched the road winding down the side of the steep hill through his binocs and fought back a yawn. It was another two days until his relief came, and he could go back to the complex for hot meals and slave girls. Sniper duty was boring. Anybody he saw was fleeing the Tennessee River valley, and he wasn't allowed to loot any food or have a woman. The survivors might meet Ryan coming along on the road and give away his location.
The mined bridge over the river was clear as always. Horses and people could cross safely, but Major Sheffield said that if a big wag like an APC or a Hummer tried to go across, the whole thing would blow sky-high. He'd liked to see that. It would help relieve the boredom.
To the south rose the foothills of the big mountains. They were little things, only a couple hundred feet high, hardly worth calling a hill. More of a mound, really. A dirt road wound down the steeply sloped side, zigzagging along to finally go over the top near the peak. Personally, the sec man didn't think any wag could travel over the rocky terrain without busting an axle, or worse. It was for walking, or horses, not wags.
Which meant he was here for nothing, doing nothing. He took another drag on the cigar, and blew a smoke ring into the air, contemplating randomly shooting at folks as they passed by just to watch them dance.
Then a speck rose over the crest, and he took a look with the binocs. Probably just some more greenies from Georgia, or stickies. Focusing the military glasses on the hill, he followed the roadway until reaching the tiny dot again. The cigar dropped from his mouth, and he leaned forward, nearly falling from his perch in the tree. It was them! Holy shit, it was Ryan and his gang!
THE ROAD DOWN THE HILL was covered with rocks, making driving almost impossible. The Hummer scraped bottom more than once when it rolled over broken chunks of granite. The view was spectacular, although the trees lining the serpentine road blocked most of their view of the valley below. But they could catch glimpses of a river, and seemingly endless forests of blue pine carpeting the landscape to the horizon.
Shifting gears and fighting for control, Krysty finally reached the bottom of the road and floored the wag. The Hummer surged forward in a burst of speed, and almost immediately there was a bang, the vehicle veering to the left.
"Gaia!" she spit, fighting the wag to a stop. "That tire finally blew."
"Better here than up there," J.B. said, climbing from the rear seats. "Well, we got almost fifty miles out of it. That's not bad. Time to use the spare."
Dean stepped into the bushes for a moment, while Jak stood guard at the M-60. The road ahead was level and straight, going directly to a predark bridge.
"Bridge looks in good condition," Mildred said, adjusting the focus on the binocs.
"We'll have to check for traps," Ryan commented. "This is close to Shiloh, and the blues could be anywhere."
The words were still in the air when a volley of bullets chattered across the armored chassis of the Hummer, closely followed by sound of a distant rifle cutting through the peace of the forest. Everybody dived for cover.
Lying in the dirt, Ryan worked the bolt on his Steyr SSG-70 rifle, chambering a round for immediate use. "That sounds like an AK-47," he said, sighting through the scope on the longblaster, sweeping the trees. "Yeah, it's a blue. I caught a glimpse of a muzzle-flash in the trees."
More rounds hit the wag, two impacting on the jack supporting the vehicle. The flat was lying on the ground, the new tire resting against the Hummer waiting to be attached. The jack was hit again and shook, but didn't fall.
"There seems to be only one sniper," Doc said, moving away from the wobbly vehicle.
"Only one firing," Ryan corrected him grimly. "There could more."
"Bastard's smart, too. He waited until I had the flat off, then started firing. We're not going anywhere," J.B. stated, adjusting his wire-rimmed glasses to sit more firmly on his face. Last thing he wanted was for them to slide off in the middle of a battle.
"Anybody hurt?" Mildred asked from the bushes.
Just then another wave of bullets pounded over the armored hull of the Hummer, sounding like hail on a tin roof. Several rounds hit a tire, but didn't puncture the military rubber.
"Undamaged so far," Ryan answered, as trained hands fired the Steyr and worked the bolt, loading another round. "But not for long. This guy is good."
"Too good," J.B. added, firing the Uzi twice at random trees on the distant hill. Return fire kicked up dust directly in front of him, and the Armorer dived off the road into the bushes, crawling hastily away
from the spot at which he entered. Seconds later, that location shook from a hail of incoming rounds.
"Much too bastard good," J.B. muttered.
A figure appeared from the trees, holding a silvered revolver. "Want me to try a LAW?" Krysty offered, the plastic tube draped over her back.
Targeting the tops of trees, Ryan shook his head, firing again. "Don't waste it. We still have a long way to go."
"Besides, he's not going to hurt us with an AK-47."
J.B. retorted, firing the Uzi randomly at the hilltop. "Not at this range, anyway."
"Incoming!" Dean shouted, and a split-second later, a fiery dart riding a contrail of smoke flashed by them, heading for the Hummer. A wave of heat from the exhaust washed over the companions as the rocket missed the wag by a foot and disappeared into the woods. Silence ruled the area for long tense seconds, then the forest erupted into a fireball of thundering flame.
"That was a LAW!" Ryan growled. "Okay, anybody got a gren?"
"At this range?" Krysty asked, puzzled.
"Just throw it as far as you can!"
Pulling the pin, the redhead dropped the handle and heaved the sphere with all of her strength. The ball hit the road roughly thirty yards away and rolled a few more before the charge exploded, throwing a cloud of smoke and dirt into the air.
"Camouflage," Ryan said, throwing his own slightly to the left of the first Another huge cloud of dirt covered the roadway, completely masking the Hummer.
Sporadic fire came from the sniper as the companions used the rest of the grens to maintain the dust cloud. Resting the flat tire against his spine as protection from incoming rounds, J.B. hastily attached the new tire, using only half the nuts. But he wasted a few precious seconds making sure those were solid and tight.
"Done, go!" he shouted.
At the wheel, Mildred, the sole occupant of the wag, started the engine and rolled away, crumpling the jack still attached at the frame of the military vehicle. She cut a fast turn, throwing more clouds of dirt into the air with the spinning tires, then charged headlong into the trees and vanished among the foliage.
As if the sniper deduced their plan, another LAW streaked through the dust to violently detonate a scant yard away from where the Hummer had been parked.
"Now!" Ryan ordered, and he charged into the trees at a full run, the rest of the companions only steps behind.
Moving fast through the pine trees, Ryan curved across the sloped side of the valley, rising slowly alongside the sniper. Raising a fist, he pointed directions, and the others split into teams to converge on the sniper from different directions.
A Kalashnikov constantly chattered at the trees, the noise guiding the companions to the location of the hidden gunner. Minutes later, they found him.
The blue shirt was sitting on a hunter's box, just a few planks nailed to branches, giving him a stable platform to hide in as he waited for prey to come into view. The upper branches of the tree shook as spent brass arched from the hot breech of his blaster. Soft curses sounded, and the shooting stopped.
Creeping closer, Ryan saw the sec man rummaging frantically in a duffel bag. Then he pulled another LAW into view with a satisfied cry.
"Don't!" Ryan barked, standing and working the bolt on the Steyr. The weapon was already loaded, but the noise would drive home the point that he was armed.
The sec man registered shock, then rage and dropped the LAW, going for his longblaster. Without a qualm, Ryan fired, hitting the man in the chest, the 7.62 mm round slamming him backward into the tree trunk. Then J.B. added the fury of his Uzi, and the corpse tumbled from the trees to land on a rock with a sickening crunch. Rivulets of blood began dripping onto the ground from his hidden face.
"Doc, Dean, sweep the area for any more," Ryan ordered, approaching the corpse. There was a map sticking out of his back pocket.
But before he could reach the document, the bushes parted and two more blue shirts walked out, firing their Kalashnikovs. Diving for cover, Ryan shot the closer man in the belly with his Steyr. The other blue fired his longblaster, but then a knife sprouted from his throat. Gagging on his own blood, the sec man fell to his knees, still triggering the AK-47, shooting in every direction. Then Krysty stepped from behind a tree and fired her hand blaster into his face, finishing the job.
"Perimeter sweep, twenty yards!" Ryan ordered, rising from the ground.
Krysty, Doc and Dean moved into the forest as J.B. climbed up the crude ladder. On the platform, he stayed crouched, studying the forest around them. When satisfied, he whistled an all-clear signal and climbed back down with the duffel bag and the dead man's AK-47.
Ryan got the map as the Armorer checked the contents of the duffel. "Dark night, he had two more LAWs, and an implo gren that could have reduced the Hummer to a soup can!"
"If he got close enough," Ryan agreed, looking over the plastic paper. It was the same as the other, just a map of Tennessee. Nothing more.
A long whistle came from the forest, and Ryan answered with two short ones. The rest of the companions stepped into sight from several locations.
"Nobody that we can find," Krysty reported, holstering her revolver. "Find anything useful?"
"Nothing so far," Ryan said, turning the map over. Nothing was circled or highlighted as with the last one they had found, but there was a notation scrawled at the bottom with indelible ink. Ryan looked twice at the map to make sure he was reading it correctly.
"There's a name on this," he said, his features carved from stone. "Might mean shit, but here it is."
"Who?" Jak asked, reloading.
"Checkpoints along Timber Ridge Road, password is El Morro. Main-gate entry password…Jamaisvous."
"What did you say?" Doc whispered, dropping the LeMat from limp fingers. The man looked as if he had just been hit wife a club.
"Silas," Ryan repeated, showing the map. "Silas Jamaisvous."
Without speaking, Doc retrieved the weapon, his mind lost in dark thoughts. So it was about to all begin once more.
Stuffing ammo clips from the corpse into his pockets, Dean frowned. "I thought he died in that mat-trans jump."
"We hoped he died," Krysty stated, her hair a flaming corona about her tense face. "Guess not."
"Crap! We can't go anywhere near a redoubt," J.B. grunted, slinging the duffel bag over a shoulder. "Silas knows the access codes, and could have sec men waiting for us."
"Or worse," Jak added grimly.
"So what should we do?"
"We find his base and kill the son of bitch permanently this time," Ryan said, turning on a heel. "Come on, we still have to fix that tire and get across the bridge. Once on the other side, we'll hide the wag and proceed on foot."
Chapter Seventeen
Standing alone on the top floor of the observation tower at Casanova ville, a sec man squinted at the cloudy sky and smiled.
"Almost lunchtime," the man commented aloud, his stomach rumbling in harmony. Although the sun was blocked by heavy clouds, he could still see that it was just reaching dead overhead. Noon. Soon a servant would bring him a basket of food. The sentry only hoped it wasn't rat again. They had been eating rat for the past month, and he was getting sick of the same thing every freaking day. Sure, it was better than nothing, but what good was being a sec man if you ate like a civilian?
With a sigh, he rested the heavy barrel of his muzzle-loading longblaster on a shoulder. Spare pieces of flint were tucked into loops on his belt, and his shirt pocket was neatly lined with paper cartridges for charging his weapon. It was a bloody clever invention of the baron's. Instead of counting as you poured black powder into your weapon, he had made these little paper tubes from library books. A person bit off the top and poured out the black powder inside. It was exactly enough for a full charge, always the same. At the bottom was the miniball, and you used a nimrod to stuff the paper that the cartridge was made out of down the barrel to hold the load in place. Powder, shot and wadding all in one. The sec men could fire ten times
faster than before, making their crew of a hundred shoot like a thousand!
One of the servants had dared to suggest it was a predark idea from something called the Civil War, and the liar had been beaten to death right in the market square. Nobody insulted the baron and lived. Except his mud head of a son, that was.
Lightning flashed overhead, and the sentry felt a warm breeze blow over the tower. In October? Suddenly, there was a loud peal of thunder, and bright light flooded the ville. Glancing upward, he was stunned to see the sky become an impossibly clear blue color. He hadn't ever seen anything like it before! Then his eyes began to sting, and the world went totally black. Blinking to clear his vision, the sentry realized in horror that he was blind. He began to itch all over, as if a million insects were eating his skin. Dropping his longblaster, the sec man dashed for the stairs, going for help, and went straight off the edge of the roof. He screamed all the way down to the cobblestone streets and abruptly stopped as he hit.
Nobody noticed. Cooked birds were also plummeting from the sky, the leaves falling from the wilting trees. Tendrils of smoke rose from the thatched roofs of huts, people screamed, clawing at their faces, horses bolted in panic, blasters exploded, removing hands and entire arms, the fuel dump fireballed and the artesian well began to boil. Becoming hotter by the second, the thick walls of the castle started to turn reddish, then orange, and the melting stones began to sag toward the ground in thick glowing streams. Support timbers snapped, windows shattered, and the shrieking of people trapped in the dungeon rose to anguished howls.
Minutes later, silence ruled what remained of Casanova. Not a wall stood intact, not a creature moved, not a sound could be heard except for a low bubbling from the white-hot lava pool in the middle of the flaky black soil. Then a low rumble of thunder sounded as lightning flashed, and the clear sky darkened again to form a solid dome of stormy clouds over the precise circle of destruction.
THE SOUNDS OF METAL ON METAL, and metal on stone, filled the hollow expanse of the quarry. A wide road spiraled down the sides of the great pit all the way to the cutting floor, where the slaves trimmed the massive stone blocks into smooth rectangles. A sentry post was placed at the bottom of the ramp, with another at the distant top.
