by James Axler
The trail wound down again, going through a natural archway so low all had to duck except Albert. Thirty yards farther on, the crack led into a concrete arm of the redoubt. The first glimpse of the metal housing occurred when the lantern's light gleamed from the opening ahead.
Jak made the short drop into the access tunnel. He lifted his torch high to illuminate the interior.
Krysty scanned the access tunnel, matching what she saw with what the companions had left behind only a few days earlier. Debris lay scattered across the concrete floor, covering the metal tracks laid in grooves in some places. Nearly twenty feet across and almost that in height, the tunnel had to have been part of the supply zones back before the nukecaust.
Krysty clambered into the tunnel and stood by the opening to light the way for J.B. and Ryan while Jak went on ahead. They wound through the long tunnel, following a sharper grade as it continued to go underground. At the end of it, they found the large freight elevator they had used to ascend.
Energized by nuclear power, the redoubt had survived the nukecaust and the hundred-odd years that had followed skydark, with every indication that it would continue functioning for hundreds more.
If they had found the redoubt before it had been gutted, Krysty knew it would have been a great find, the kind of find that had first set the Trader in business all those years ago.
The companions assembled in the elevator. J.B. manned the controls.
"Everybody's on condition red," Ryan said. "Wyatt and his jackers might find their way into the redoubt, as well, and we don't know that this place is still empty. Keep your blasters out, but be sure you know what you're aiming at before you squeeze the trigger." He glanced at Krysty.
She shook her head, letting him know her mutie senses hadn't detected anything. The redoubt felt as lifeless as a crypt.
"All right, J.B., let's go." The Armorer hit the control panel, choosing the level indicator for the lowest section of the redoubt. The doors closed, taking their time and squealing in protest. Despite having nuclear power that would last for centuries, regular maintenance had been missing for a long time.
After the long series of earsplitting screeches, the doors closed. Enclosed within the elevator cage, the smoke from the two torches quickly pooled against the ceiling, forming a black cloud.
The elevator dropped through the bowels of the earth.
Albert moaned and dropped to his knees.
"What's wrong, friend Albert?" Doc asked, bending to put a hand to the little man's shoulders.
"Sick," the dwarf gasped. Then he threw up. "Feels like I'm falling, but I see the floor right here."
"This is your first time with an elevator, then."
Doc said.
Albert's shoulders heaved again as he threw up once more.
Krysty took a step away. Luckily the freight elevator was large enough none of them were too close together.
"Read about elevators before," Albert groaned.
"Never saw one until today. Never want to see one again."
Jak laughed, a short, harsh bark of sound. "Think elevator bad? Wait till mat-trans."
The elevator cage shrilled to a jerky stop, metal grinding against metal. Without some kind of overhaul, Krysty doubted that it would last more than a few more trips to the surface and back.
"Everybody alert," Ryan ordered.
The companions tramped through the dust, Doc reaching down to hold the back of the dwarfs jacket to keep him upright. At least Albert's nausea seemed to be gone for the moment even if he hadn't gotten his land legs back.
Krysty probed the darkness with her mutie senses. Between her and Jak, she knew most of anything that might be waiting for them in the darkness would be caught.
The albino teen hugged the walls, following the blue line that marked the floor under the layers of dust. Every now and again he had to scuff his foot across the floor to make certain the line was still there. He correlated those with the marks put on the wall by the companions when they had come through the first time.
"What is this place, Doc?" Albert asked in a voice not much above a whisper.
"A long time ago," Doc said, "well before sky-dark even, there was a government entity that operated under the aggrandized nomenclature of the Totality Concept. They constructed these redoubts, and stocked them with myriad things. The mat-trans unit that we are seeking here was developed by a further division of secrets called Overproject Whisper under the code name Cerberus."
"Heard of Cerberus before," the little man said. "Some kind of three-headed mutie dog supposedly watching over hell. Called it Hades. The Greeks made up all the stories."
"That is correct. And as it turns out, the name was most aptly placed, because this Cerberus does open unto the very jaws of hell."
"There's one thing I always found curious about the Greeks' stories," Albert said.
"What's that, dear fellow?"
"They wrote about this hell like it was some kind of bad place."
"Yes."
"But, Doc, none of it really seemed as bad as what Deathlands turned out to be."
There was silence for a time. "My friend," Doc said gravely, "I believe that is because a healthy mind could not really envision how badly things could go for the human race once something like this happened."
Then Jak's torch lit up the door ahead of them. The albino keyed in the code, and the vanadium door slid open with near silent shushes. The friends cast aside their torches, as the redoubt was awash with cool fluorescent light.
Jak led the way inside, and they followed a twisting corridor, avoiding the other empty rooms they had found their first time through. From the way most of the rooms had been systematically stripped,
Ryan and J.B. had speculated that the military personnel who had survived the nukecaust had evacuated the structure at some point. But what had become of them remained a mystery, like so many other things after the world had died.
The end of the corridor opened into a large room that contained the mat-trans unit. The chamber was hexagonally shaped, and metal disks set in the floor and ceiling glowed with a pulsating light. Thick armaglass walls the color of fresh-cut jade shut them off from the mat-trans unit.
"What is that?" Albert asked.
"That," Doc said dryly, "is the very maw of perdition like none of you have ever seen, my little friend."
"Oh."
Krysty watched the dwarf and felt sorry for him. Doc could have gone on and elaborated more about what was going to happen to him once the transfer sequence was activated, but it would only have been cruel. When staying wasn't an option, a person had to go. Krysty had gotten that from her Mother Sonja.
"Everybody in," Ryan ordered after hurrying forward to open the door.
The companions filed into the gateway and stripped off their gear, making themselves as comfortable as they could across the glowing metal disks set into the floor.
"Is this another elevator, Doc?" Albert's voice held worry now, but he stripped off his blasters and the pack he carried.
"No," the old man said, stretching himself out prone. "I assure you, this grim piece of business is in nowise nearly as comforting as an elevator ride. Settle down as best you can, friend, because life as you know it—for a time—shall be over."
Albert glanced back through the jade armaglass walls. "Mebbe we should try to find another way, then."
"There is no other way," Mildred snapped.
Krysty knew the woman wasn't angry with Albert, just nervous about the upcoming jump.
"We came in the only way out," Krysty said, leaning in close to Ryan. Sometimes it helped if she touched her lover before they went under the mat-trans effects. Even then, she hardly ever woke up next to him.
Albert sat, stretching his legs before him as he put his back to the armaglass wall.
Ryan shut the door to begin the jump, then hurried to Krysty's side. The metal disks in the floor and ceiling glowed more brightly, and a fine mist descended from the ceiling
.
Krysty twined her fingers in Ryan's. "Hope you have pleasant dreams, lover."
"Or at least," Ryan said, "ones that aren't too bad."
Nightmares and nausea seemed to be the two most prevalent byproducts brought about by the jumps. Rarely had the companions avoided them.
As she breathed in her first full, deep breath of the mist-laden air, Krysty's brains seemed to turn into oatmeal, dulling her mutie senses with a sensation of being suffocated.
Doc's voice singsonged from the corner, filled with a strength and vigor that was surprising. "Here we go, my friends. Can you envision some future when we can look back, and see our alternate possibilities—if we chose this or that option? Could we ever say 'two roads diverged in a wood, and I—I took the one less traveled by.' I think Robert Frost summed up our present state quite well. Don't you?"
"Don't you?"
"Don't you?"
And as Doc's words seemed to hang in the air, growing more and more indistinct with each echo, Krysty knew the jump had begun. There was no saving them from the nightmares now.
Chapter Nineteen
"A man lives long enough and slows down his life," the Trader was saying, "he's going to have a lot of regrets."
In the jump dream, Ryan walked with the older man. The Trader carried his Armalite and hacked and coughed just the way Ryan remembered. Only the one-eyed man knew almost for a fact that the Trader was nowhere around Hazard, and probably nowhere near around where they were jumping to.
He scanned the hostile terrain they were in, all rad-blasted and shooting up twisted trees from a ground that looked like burned glass. He couldn't say that he'd ever been to such a place, but it didn't seem too far from reality for Deathlands.
The next couple steps, though, brought them to the edge of a thickly wooded area that looked like something out of a painting Doc had once shown them. The trees stood straight and tall, reaching up into the white fleecy clouds that had taken the place of the rad-dust-filled clouds that had hovered overhead earlier. Those had been purple and cancerous, greenish around the edges.
"I don't have any regrets," Ryan said.
The Trader shrugged and came to a stop, looking out over the forest. "I know you don't think you do now, but you're getting long in the tooth."
A boy's face peered through the branches. Innocence gleamed in his bright, impossibly blue eyes, followed by a shy smile that promised mischief. Ryan figured the boy hadn't seen ten years yet, and probably hadn't been past the forest's edge.
"You're older than I am, Trader," Ryan said. "Mebbe you got regrets."
The man shook his head. "No regrets for me. Did everything in my life that I set out to do. Ain't the same with you."
Ryan's vision misted red as his anger took him. "How do you figure that?"
The boy across the glade stepped into the open. And the full impossibility of him stepped into Ryan's view. From the waist up, the boy looked totally norm, but from the waist down he was all horse. His upper body swayed sinuously as his lower four legs moved him forward. He darted forward in a quick thumping of unshod hooves, like he was going to come right up to Ryan and the Trader. Then he stopped, still a dozen feet away, and galloped back to the tree line.
"Play?" he asked in a melodious voice.
"Got no time to play," Trader growled. "Go away, boy, you're bothering me."
Two other centaurs came from the woods, one male and one female, her pendulous breasts swinging freely. The male carried a bow with an arrow already set to string. The female carried a spear with a long blade set on the other end.
"You didn't answer my question, Trader." The man swung around on Ryan and caught him with a backhanded slap that sent the one-eyed man crashing to the ground. Black comets swirled in Ryan's vision, bouncing crazily off each other.
"Don't you be getting uppity with me," Trader snarled. "I made you who you are. I can damn sure unmake you—make you a follower, or a lone wolf." Ryan forced himself not to draw the SIG-Sauer. After he'd located the Trader, they'd had some harsh words between them, but nothing like this. "Okay, Trader. Sorry. Mebbe I was out of line."
"You were out of line," Trader agreed, "and you're never going to be in line again. You want to know why?"
"Sure." Ryan went along with the dream, hoping it would end soon.
He walked with the Trader again, threading through the forest. Then the terrain shifted, and the Trader walked without concern across the ocean that stretched beneath him.
Ryan followed, not as able to walk on the water as his companion. His boots sunk ankle deep into the emerald ocean.
"It's because of your son," Trader said. "Because of Dean that you'll never be without regrets. Having children does something to a man. Takes his edge off, takes away his zest for life and the unexpected that makes him the adventurer he's supposed to be. And having children replaces those things with fear. Lock, stock and barrel, and you better bastard believe it."
"Dean's making me stronger in some ways," Ryan argued.
Trader shot him a murderous glance. "You daring disrespect my view, you worthless baron-get whelp?"
Ryan forced out a no. But he noticed that his disagreement with the Trader caused him to sink in the ocean up past his shins. The going got tougher as he fought the water. Whatever surface he walked on beneath the water also felt more spongy.
"Good, because I don't want to see you drown out here, Ryan. Truly I don't. I looked after your ass for a number of years, and I don't like to see all that time go to waste."
Ryan struggled to keep up with the older man, losing nearly half a step. And there was no end of the ocean in sight.
"Dean's going to pull you down," Trader went on. "You're going to want more for the boy than you'd want for yourself. A man knows his own limitations, knows the hardships he can handle. Always makes the wrong call when he tries raising children. That's woman's work."
Ryan knew the real Trader didn't feel like that. Not exactly. But the voice carried a timbre of truth with it.
"You'd been better off if the boy had been stillborn," Trader said. "You're always going to be risking what you have to make a better shake for Dean. And for what? Paying penance for a quick roll in the hay with that slut Sharona? Man should put a higher price on his future than that."
The Trader was out of reach now, and the ocean sucked at Ryan's boots.
"That's not true," Ryan yelled. The ocean drank him down, swallowing him up to his hips. "Dean can carry his own weight." Suddenly he couldn't move forward anymore.
The Trader turned and put his hands on his hips. "Look at you now, Ryan. You're about to be in over your bastard head, and you can't even admit it. You used to be more pragmatic than that."
"Fuck you!" Ryan exploded, trying to pull himself through the chest-high water. "You aren't Trader! Trader wouldn't say anything like that!" He struggled now, trying to keep his head above water.
"Dean's just Sharona's way of dragging you down even after she's caught the last train to the coast herself," Trader said.
The water closed over Ryan's head. He fought clear of it with difficulty, smashing his arms against the ocean. But he knew the sustained effort would exhaust him in short order.
Then something closed around his crotch and yanked him down. Underwater now, he glanced down to see what had hold of him, surprised he didn't feel claws or teeth. Some of the mutie fishes living in the rad-blasted oceans were spun right out of nightmare.
Only it wasn't a mutie fish or a water monster that held him. It was Sharona Carson, the dead mother of Dean.
She was as Ryan remembered in her better days, golden haired and looking as beautiful as any woman could want to be. She wore a purple diaphanous gown that hugged her curves and clung to her breasts.
Before Ryan knew it, he was naked. Sharona had hold of his erection, continuing to pull him down into the waiting darkness. Ryan's lungs ballooned up inside his chest, threatening to explode. He reached for her wrist, trying to find a pressure point
.
Only this Sharona's wrist was as hard and as slick as any sec droid's. She held him effortlessly in one hand.
"Coming to stay with me this time, Ryan. We'll talk about Dean. You'll like that, won't you?"
Weak now and barely able to move, Ryan felt his senses swirling. But he saw Sharona's mouth open, saw her starting to take his hardness in. Her teeth glinted like diamonds, edged like razors.
Ryan screamed a denial, and the word took form in the shape of an explosion of bubbles around him. His last breath left his body as he grabbed Sharona by the hair and tried in vain to keep her razored mouth back.
She bit down.
ALBERT LOOKED AROUND, surprised to find himself in a cave. "Doc?"
There was no answer.
The cave in front of him seemed to stretch on like some dark, ugly throat. Wind blew its fetid breath over him from somewhere ahead, carrying with it the stench of sulfurous farts.
He turned and tried to go back, but all he found was solid rock blocking his way. He didn't understand that at all. It was funny that he couldn't remember waking up, walking out of the mat-trans unit. But it wasn't humorous.
The fetid wind continued to blow over him, feeling like it was drying him out. He guessed that after a couple hours of standing around in it, a man might begin to resemble a hunk of jerked beef.
He drew his .38s and called out for Doc again. All he heard was the distant rolling thunder of his own voice. Having no other choice, he went forward through the cave.
Light gleamed all around. At first he thought the walls were rad-blasted and he was walking into certain death, but then he saw that lichens gathered on the rough stone surfaces. It was their internal glow that lighted the way.
The tunnel continued down, and the wind grew hotter. Albert sweated profusely. His clothes were soaking wet before he figured he'd gone half a mile.
Then the path he followed leveled out and widened, opening onto a big cave that he couldn't see across. A small dock jutted for a short distance into the calm black water, hewed of logs that had to have been carried a long way because Albert saw no trees nearby.
