Prodigal's Return

by James Axler

  “What did you say?” Krysty asked, her M-16 combo sweeping the trees overhead.

  “That’s what people used to call out in the Middle Ages to warn pedestrians in the streets that they were about to toss their night soil out the window,” Mildred glibly explained.

  “Out the window onto the ville street?” Ryan asked, clearly shocked. “Were these feebs, or barbs?”

  “Oh, no, just ordinary folks.” Mildred grinned sheepishly. “It was a simpler time, I assure you.”

  “Simpler than now?”

  “I concede the point,” she said. “But still—”

  “Is that why a shitter’s called a loo?” Krysty asked, moving away from the next aerial bombardment. Whatever the possum had eaten reeked worse than a chem storm.

  “I think it comes from the word lavatory,” Mildred said hesitantly. “But I do recall that the word crap comes from Thomas Crapper, the man who popularized the flush toilet.”

  “Are you serious?” Krysty said.

  “Sure! Take my word for it.”

  Coming out the forest, the companions started across a rolling hillside of smooth green grass that was dotted with large sunflowers. In the distance, an aircraft carrier rose up from the ground like a surrealistic skyscraper. The bow was buried into the earth all the way to the command island, and at the stern the three propellers spun listlessly in the wind, clearly showing that they were was no longer connected to the engines. The entire hull was heavily corroded with rust, and the shadow of the carrier extended across the landscape like the pointed gnomon of a sundial, indicating that it was just before noon. Oddly, nothing was growing on the vessel, and the nearby ground was bare of plant life.

  Even as Ryan started to check his rad counter, the device began clicking steadily. “It’s hot,” he announced, veering sharply away from the wreckage.

  Driving the lead wag over the hill, Alan stared at the huge military craft, then immediately angled after the companions to head due north. A moment later, his rad counter started to click wildly.

  “The nuke must have gone off underwater, and blew it so fragging high that it came straight down like an arrow,” Krysty said, her hair flexing and curling in amusement. “Then again, we’re pretty far inland. Think it’s one of those mil sats orbiting the moon?”

  “No, it’s just a ship,” Ryan countered, watching the sunflowers to make sure the plants weren’t turning to track their progress. This close to a rad pit, he suspected even the bastard rocks of being muties.

  Waving gently in the breeze, the plants did nothing unusual, but Ryan still kept a close watch on them until they were far behind.

  Several hours later, something large began to appear on the horizon. At first Ryan thought it was a mountain, but as the haze of distance cleared, he grunted at the sight of a predark city. Pulling out the Navy telescope, he extended it completely and swept the array of crumbling buildings. Most of the homes in the suburbs were gone, only crumbling piles of bricks remaining to mark their former locations. However, the downtown structures seemed relatively intact, with reflected light from the skyscrapers telling of windows still being present.

  “Don’t recall any large cities in this section of Georgia,” Mildred said, digging out her binoculars. “Then again, I’ve really only been to Atlanta for a few medical conferences.” She sighed. “My God, it was a beautiful city.”

  “Well, these ruins look good to me,” Ryan stated, lowering the telescope. “There’s no sign of any blast craters or spiderwebs. Some minor damage possibly from the carrier, and what looks like a meteor strike, but nothing serious.”

  “Just as long as there’s no ivy,” Krysty muttered, referring to an incident where she’d almost lost her life to an infestation of the mutie plants. Tiny vines burrowed inside a person, infesting every part of the body, seizing complete control until the poor bastard was nothing more than a puppet, yet horribly alive. She clearly recalled the expressions in the eyes of the victims. It was an image that would never leave her.

  “No ivy in sight,” Mildred said, adjusting the focus on her mini-binoculars. “I’d say it was well worth a quick recce to see if there’s anything to salvage. Just one untouched bomb shelter, and we’re fully stocked on ammo again.”

  “Or just one robotic tank, and we’re a stain on the pavement,” Ryan countered, tucking away the telescope. “Those big guns have a hell of a range.”

  She shrugged. “True enough.”

  “Then again,” Ryan continued, his voice taking on a new tone, “these ruins would be a good location for a gang of coldhearts to hide, and waylay convoys avoiding the carrier.”

  “You’ve been expecting something like this,” Mildred stated, shifting the strap of her med kit to a more comfortable position.

  “Be a fool not to,” Ryan replied, patting a pocket to count the number of magazines it held for the Galil.

  Thoughtfully scratching her chin, Krysty started to ask a question, but then the horses whinnied in fear. Suddenly alert, she caught a faint stink on the wind, a tangy rotten-egg smell that burned her nose.

  “Acid rain!” she yelled, tightening the reins to try to control the mare. “Acid rain is coming!” Dancing with terror, the animal desperately wanted to bolt, to try to escape from the melting death from above.

  At the cry, every driver in the convoy jerked up his or her head to study the sky. In dark harmony, a soft rumble of thunder sounded, and sheet lightning flashed among the purple-and-orange clouds.

  “Nuking hellfire, head for the ruins!” Alan shouted, lashing his team into motion. “We’ll try to take cover under a bridge!”

  Cursing, the rest of the drivers did the same to their horses, and soon a ragged line of wags was jouncing and rattling across the grassy field, heading toward the crumbling ruins.

  “Shitfire, there are no intact bridges!” Mildred yelled, heading toward the suburbs. “Follow me! I know where to go!”

  “Parking garage?” Ryan asked, leaning into the wind to help his stallion run faster.

  “No, over there!” Mildred pointed. “See those hourglass shapes?”

  “Are you a feeb?” Alan demanded hotly, nearly losing his seat as his wag bounced over a cracked piece of highway pavement hidden in the grass. “Those be nuke towers! We’ll fry for sure!”

  Among the weeds, all the flowers were quickly closing their petals to try to survive the coming assault.

  “No, they’re steam towers!” Mildred lied. “Trust me! There is no safer place in a rainstorm than an electrical power station!”

  “You sure?” Alan demanded, not looking in her direction, his full attention on trying to control the team. The animals were wide-eyed with terror, the blind instinct to run from the storm nearly overwhelming their years of training.

  “It’s my ass, too, you know!” Mildred countered.

  A minute passed, then another. On the hillside, a single drop of rain fell, and a clump of grass began to wilt and turn brown.

  “Follow Mildred!” Alan bellowed, the words almost lost in a deafening crash of thunder and lightning.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Galloping madly through the decaying suburbs, the rest of the companions joined Ryan and the others as they tried to find the smoothest path for the wags along the ancient streets. But after a century of neglect the pavement had buckled in numerous areas, cracking wide to expose the bed of loose gravel underneath. Potholes were everywhere, many of them with trees growing inside, and the rusting remains of wags blocked entire intersections.

  “A power plant, madam?” Doc demanded, banking his horse around an open sewer drain, the manhole cover nowhere in sight. “Pray tell, what was the logic behind that choice, if any?”

  “If rain ever got inside the place everybody would die, right?” Mildred said quickly, briefly slowing her mount to trot through a low hedge. Birds erupted into flight at the stomping of the horse hooves, and a two-headed snaked wiggled away, loudly hissing in stereo.

  “So?” Jak demanded,
reins in one fist, the Colt Python in the other.

  “So a power plant has to be absolutely waterproof! It’s mandatory!”

  “Sounds good to me!” J.B. growled.

  “And what if the roof was damaged from falling debris?” Doc demanded.

  Mildred grinned. “Then it’s been nice knowing you!”

  “Dr. Weyth, you are the most genuinely annoying person I have ever meet in my entire life!”

  “Thanks, Doc! I like you, too!”

  Barreling around a corner, Alan came into view wildly lashing the horses into a frenzy. Their hooves pounded the pavement so hard that sparks flew from the iron shoes. In tight formation came the other eleven wags. Some of the travelers were staring at the rows of destroyed homes and strip malls in obvious fright, but nobody said a word. Survival was paramount. Everything else, including terror, was only a secondary concern.

  Weaving around the larger potholes, the wags hit a lot of the smaller ones. Incredibly, the patched tires held, and while the wooden axles bent alarmingly, none of them actually broke.

  Careening around another corner, the wags encountered rush hour, perfectly preserved, and plowed on through, smashing aside the piles of rust, and shiny fiberglass sedans. A few of the delivery trucks still had windows, but those noisily shattered at the violent collisions. Several of the repaired wooden slats on the wags had cracked open again, and the occasional loose item went sailing away, a leather boot, a wooden bowl. And then a swaddled infant went flying off, to land squalling in a patch of the weeds.

  “Adrian!” the mother screamed. “Lawrence, stop the wag!”

  Still bringing up the rear of the convoy, Cordelia never slowed as she swung low in her saddle and snatched the living bundle off the ground.

  “Keep those wags moving!” she bellowed, tucking the wailing baby under an arm.

  More and more often, fat yellow drops fell, smacking into the ground and cracked sidewalks. Visibly, plants withered. The pungent reek of sulfur was becoming strong, and everybody was braced for the inevitable shreaks as living flesh was touched by the hellish rain.

  “There it is!” Ryan bellowed, trying to make his horse run even faster. “Move with a purpose, people!”

  Covering a city block, the power station rose above the sprawling ruins to dominate the landscape. Once there had been a ten-foot-tall fence to keep out the curious, rampant ecologists, media reporters and terrorists. But that had fallen long ago, and now only galvanized steel posts and loose strands of rusty wire stuck out randomly. Beyond that was an extensive parking lot, without vehicles, the pavement cracked into a gray-and-black mosaic. Several of the outer structures had fallen down, including the guard kiosk. However, the main building seemed completely intact.

  “Thank you, Lord,” Mildred whispered, her heart starting to beat once more.

  Destroyed by implacable time itself, the front gate was completely missing, and the companions charged up the front drive, only to ride past the barred front doors and circle around to the rear.

  Lightning flashed brightly overhead as the companions reached the loading dock. As expected, there was a concrete ramp for the larger deliveries, and at the top was a double set of doors, closed with a heavy steel chain.

  “Give me a minute,” J.B. said, reining in his mount and pulling out a package of tools.

  “No time!” Ryan countered, drawing the 9 mm SIG-Sauer, but then holstering the blaster. This task needed brute force, not accuracy. “Doc, open the bastard door!”

  “With pleasure!” Doc declared, firing from the saddle. The big bore .44 LeMat boomed louder than the thunder, and the padlock exploded into pieces, the chains sliding away with a rattle.

  Riding up the ramp, Ryan and the others reined to a fast halt and scrambled off their horses. It took all six of them to push open the squealing doors, flakes of rust sprinkling to the floor from the stubborn hinges, and then they were forced to retreat for a precious minute to allow any trapped air to properly vent. Sealed tight for more than a century, many predark buildings were rich with organic poisons and deadly molds from decaying matter, most of it former people.

  A visible cloud of grayish fumes swept across the loading dock just as the first of the wags rolled into view, the horses whinnying in terror.

  Igniting a road flare, J.B. led the way inside, dragging along his reluctant horse. Ryan and Krysty were next, their blasters searching for any possible dangers.

  Only a few yards into the building, a second set of doors blocked the way, but those were easily opened. Now the companions walked into a huge room filled with hulking generators set into the terrazzo floor. A complex maze of catwalks lined the walls, and the ceiling was lost in dim shadows. A thick layer of dust lay over everything, and as they watched, a couple of skeletons in bright orange uniforms crumbled away.

  “Millie?” J.B. asked anxiously, slapping a hand over his mouth and nose.

  Warily, she took a tiny sniff, then gratefully exhaled. “Just stale air, John, nothing harmful.” Actually, the air wasn’t that dusty. She found the fact rather curious.

  “There’s no place else to go even if it was,” Ryan said, then turned and shouted, “All clear! Get those people inside!”

  As the wags began to clatter up the ramp, Jak looked around and tapped Mildred on the shoulder.

  “This not coal plant, it nuke!” he whispered.

  “I know that,” she answered quickly. “But I had to get those people moving. Besides, the core would have converted back into lead by now. The elements only had a half-life of fifty years.”

  “You sure?” Jak demanded.

  “Of course!” she replied, crossing her fingers.

  Taking down some coats from pegs set into the cinder-block wall, Ryan and Krysty used their knives to slash the material into rags, then set the strips on fire to direct the wags deeper into the power plant.

  “Move to the rear!” Ryan shouted, guiding a pale driver around a massive generator. “Make space for the next wag!”

  In spite of the size of the room, it was a tight squeeze for the wags and their uneasy teams of horses. But finally Cordelia rode in through the double doors and holstered her flintlock.

  “Seen better,” she drawled, releasing a white-knuckled grip on the reins. “But then, seen worse, too.”

  “Is that everybody?” Alan demanded, rushing from the gloom. “Are we all inside?”

  “Seem to be,” Cordelia said, sliding off her horse.

  He sighed. “Good. Then let’s shut those doors!”

  Eagerly, a score of people rushed to obey, and quickly closed the outer doors, dragging over several large pieces of equipment to help hold them in place. Then they did it again for the inner doors, using a desk and a forklift.

  “That’ll do for now,” Alan declared, brushing back his long hair. With a start, he saw a fresh burn mark on the back of his hand where the rain had hit. When had that happened? He had to have been just too bastard busy to notice the pain.

  A moment later, thunder and lightning heralded the gentle patter of rain.

  “See, we had plenty of time,” Cordelia said casually. “The rain missed us by a good two or three seconds.”

  Laughing weakly, Alan slapped the woman on the arm, then ambled away to check over the rest of his people.

  “Wash that hand!” Mildred directed.

  Waving backward over a shoulder, he merely nodded.

  “Ben?” Mildred asked with a scowl.

  “I’ll take care of him, my sister,” Dewitt replied, grabbing his fishing tackle box of medical supplies.

  “’Sister’?” Ryan asked, resting the Galil on a shoulder.

  “Just professional courtesy. Brothers-in-arms, that sort of thing.”

  “Like J.B. and me.” Ryan nodded. “Gotcha.”

  Just then, the burning rags died out, and there was only the sputtering flame of the road flare.

  “God’s balls, those things smell bad,” Alan said with a cough, waving away the magnesium
fumes. Then he loudly clapped his hands. “Listen up, people! Time to break out the alcohol lanterns! This is what we have been saving them for all these years!”

  “‘Malt does more than Milton can…’” Library said, using a butane lighter to ignite the wick on a hurricane lantern. The glass reservoir sloshed with raw shine.

  “‘…to justify God’s ways to man,’” Doc finished, breaking into a smile. “Great Scott, madam, you know the works of A. E. Housman?”

  “Just the one,” she admitted, as a clear blue light began to infuse the area. “When I was a child, I found a book called Bartlett’s, and have been studying it ever since.”

  “You have memorized Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations?” Doc gasped in delight. “Both volumes?”

  “‘In all things be mighty.’” Library grinned, holding the lantern high. “Marcus Cicero, 63 B.C.”

  “Ahem. ‘For death is nothing, comfort less,’” Doc started, then paused in a friendly test.

  “‘Valor is all in all,’” Library continued.

  “‘Base nations who depart from it…’”

  “‘Shall sure, and justly, fall!’”

  “General George S. Patton,” Doc stated.

  The old man and Library grinned like idiots, then bowed to each other.

  “Nuking hell, now there’s two of them,” Cordelia muttered, massaging a temple.

  “I vote for immediate sterilization,” Mildred said.

  Unexpectedly, light began to infuse the shadows. Everybody looked up to see the deadly rain washing away decades of dirty, grime and dried bird droppings from a series of decorative skylights in the curved roof.

  “Dark night, I sure hope the glass in those is strong if it’s a hard acid rain,” J.B. declared, shifting his fedora.

  “Well, we’ll find out soon enough,” Krysty said.

  Among the travelers, several made a gesture of protection.

  Outside the building, something screamed in unimaginable agony, the sound continuing for an incredibly long time before finally stopping. Then there was only the soft patter of rain on the roof.