Zero City

by James Axler

  "Well?" Zanders shouted. "Any signs of muties?"

  "No, sir," a private called down. "Just dead men without faces."

  "All of them?"

  "Yes, sir!"

  How odd, muties usually attacked from behind.

  "Hey, Sarge! Here's Leonard!" a sec man cried out.

  The sergeant knew that Leonard had recently reconditioned a big batch of predark fire extinguishers and had to be hauling them over for the troops to use. Good man. The kid was worth ten of the father.

  But the squat APC rolled straight down the street past the burning wooden skeleton of the brewery, then turned right and charged directly toward the tunnel, traveling much too fast to ever stop in time.

  The sergeant couldn't believe his eyes. That idiot lieutenant had been correct. "Jail break!" Zanders bellowed, leveling his blaster and cutting loose, the rounds ricocheting off the armor plating of the military half track as if he were throwing stones. Several of the other sec men followed his example, but the .75-caliber lead miniballs of their muzzle-loaders did even less damage.

  With everybody else out fighting fires, the lone sec man in the machine-gun nest swiveled the repaired blaster on its stanchion and started firing in controlled bursts as he expertly tracked the approaching war wag. The half-inch-wide bullets punched a line of holes through the chassis of the armored personnel carrier.

  Then the machine gun mounted on top of the APC chattered nonstop as it raked the nest, sandbags spitting dust, sparks flying off the ground and car bodies of the wall. A lantern burst, and the lone sec man cried out and dropped. Unencumbered, the vehicle vanished into the tunnel, spewing oil from a punctured housing.

  "WE MADE IT," Krysty said, shifting the med kit on her back, struggling with the bolt of the machine gun to free a jammed round. The baron didn't take good care of his weapons.

  "Any damage?" Ryan asked, shifting the steering levers.

  "We got a line of holes along the aft end of the half track. Nothing much."

  The road ahead was poorly lit by the predark headlights, and Ryan cursed as he worked the gears. He was unfamiliar with this machine. "Get ready to jump. We should be in the middle of the tunnel soon."

  Krysty glanced at their cargo. The wag was stacked with all of the ammo and fuel they were able to load from the garage in the few minutes they had after killing the driver. "Think it's enough to collapse the tunnel?"

  The APC took a pothole with only the smallest jounce. "Damn well hope so. With this closed, they have no way to chase us."

  "No sign of anybody yet," she announced, checking through the aft ob slit. "Must be too busy fighting the fires. Nope. Here they come."

  "Buy us some time," Ryan snapped, killing the headlights. He had already smashed the taillights of the wag before leaving so it would be difficult for snipers to triangulate on the wag. Unfortunately, feeble as they were, the headlights outshone the aft bulbs and silhouetted the APC in stark relief, making it a near perfect target. Driving by the yellow parking lights was tough, but the vehicle took the potholes with ease.

  A small wag of some kind roared into the tunnel, and its driver foolishly clicked on its headlights. Bracing herself against the moving vehicle, Krysty pointed directly between them and fired, moving the stream of bullets slightly upward, the phosphorescent tracers creating a dotted line along the tunnel. The wag veered wildly and slammed into the wall, whooshing into flames.

  "Got one," she stated, savagely clearing another jam. "But more coming."

  Ryan didn't reply, concentrating on his driving.

  Krysty swept the tunnel with the machine gun until down to her last linked belt. However, the next vehicle didn't repeat the mistakes of the previous one, but drove through the blackness, visible only by the fiery flowers of the muzzle-flashes from the blasters of the sec men. The steady ricochets off the back armor of the APC spoke highly of their accuracy, and the lack of a blaster powerful enough to punch through the 12 mm alloy plating.

  Climbing from the top gunner's seat, Krysty joined Ryan in the front of the wag.

  "Ammo?" he asked, pumping the brakes for a test. Good thing they were going EVA soon. The engine temperature was climbing like a rocket. The wag had been damaged back in the ville. Cooling system, oil system, something like that. And at the rate the engine was warming, it would never reach the other end of the tunnel. But that wasn't the plan.

  "One belt left," she answered. "Can't use that if we want to get out of this alive."

  By the dim glow of the dashboard, Krysty disassembled a grenade. Hers had been taken by the guards, but Ryan still had his from the armory in the redoubt. Now it was the key to their escape. Extracting the plastic explosive from inside, she cradled it in both hands and climbed back to the gunner's seat atop the war wag.

  "Hold on!" Ryan cried, yanking the steering levers hard in opposite directions. Tires squealing, the aft treads dug into the macadam and the APC was brought to a shuddering halt across the middle two lanes of the roadway.

  Reaching under the dashboard, he pulled out handfuls of wires. "Engine is dead," he stated.

  "Blaster is set," Krysty added, climbing down and swinging past the chairs to reach the door.

  They hit the ground running and took off into the darkness. Pausing for a moment, Ryan fired his silenced pistol at the vehicles as they braked at the APC.

  Some scattered rounds came their way, and Krysty fired the MAC-11 back at them a few times. "Wonder how long it's going to take them to think of using the APC's machine gun on us—"

  A fireball erupted atop the wag, closely followed by an even louder detonation, the concussion knocking the companions off their feet. Burning men dashed about shrieking as an inferno grew in the tunnel, the black lump of the shattered APC a hulking shambles amid the crackling flames.

  "J.B. was right," she said grimly. "A little plas-ex in the blaster barrel and they blow themselves to hell."

  Another explosion shook the tunnel, and the entire passageway shuddered, a low creaking moan sounding from the walls. Tiles rained off the ceiling, and chunks of concrete were starting to come loose.

  "Seems to have worked too well," Ryan commented, taking her arm and starting to back away. "Fireblast! If the containment sleeve cracks, the river will flood in and we're dead, too."

  The pair sprinted down the tunnel, trying not to imagine the millions of tons of polluted water pressing against the weakened tunnel walls and struggling to get in.

  IN THE PREDARK RUINS, a pickup truck rattled to a noisy halt in the parking lot of the library, and five sec men disembarked. The alcohol lanterns hanging from the grille of the wag showed the ground was churned with explosions, spent brass everywhere. A line of smoldering trucks edged the parking lot, and two corpses lay sprawled on the sandy asphalt, an old white-haired man, and a short guy without a shirt. Neither man was armed.

  "Well, well," Benson said, stepping from the pickup. "Look what we have here. Charles, Hawk, recce the area, see if there are any more folks about. Fred, check the trucks."

  It took only a few minutes to check the perimeter of the parking lot before the men returned, giving the all-clear signal.

  "Great! Let's check for loot, boys." Benson beamed happily.

  "But what about the muties?" a nervous private asked. "Shouldn't we be inside?"

  "Not going back to the ville before we find Harold," the sergeant admonished. "Besides, between the searchlights and our lanterns, no mutie is coming anywhere near this spot."

  That sounded acceptable, and the men spread out, hunting for anything usable.

  "Hey, Sarge!" the private called out from near the smoking chassis of a destroyed Mack truck. "Some of this stuff isn't burned much."

  "Anything good?" the sergeant asked, walking closer, his boots crunching on the packed sand. With the lanterns behind him, his legs cast long shadows across the parking lot.

  "Don't know. What's an MRE?" The sec man tried to open the foil pack and started to turn red from the effort. There w
ere directions clearly printed on the package, but the squiggles were meaningless to the man.

  Keeping a careful watch on the sky, the two sec men proceeded to the library while the driver kicked over the white-haired corpse in a weird coat. The man's shirt was covered with so much blood it was impossible to tell if it was his or came from the other fellow. "These must be the last of those jolt dealers the muties aced," the driver theorized. "They came out of hiding to reclaim their stuff and kilt each other."

  "Good." A toothless sec man laughed happily, rattling the library doors. There was no sound from inside. "More for us."

  The foil finally ripped apart, spilling out an assortment of smaller packs and pouches. "Hey!" the man cried in delight. "These are food packs!"

  "Hell, no wonder they fought," the driver commented. "Let's see what else they got on them."

  Fred rubbed his chin. "Mebbe a little jolt?"

  "Could be." The driver grinned, bending over the old man when there was a sharp metallic click. The driver recoiled just before his chest exploded, and he flew backward to slam into the pickup with a hole the size of a dinner plate in his torso.

  "Sumbitch!" Benson cursed, clawing for his blaster.

  But the other corpse rolled over, firing a squat machine gun from a prone position. The sec men near the library died on the spot. The sergeant drew his pistol and got off a wild shot before the LeMat removed his head in a grisly spray of bones, brains and blood.

  The last sec man jumped over the low stone wall and took off for his life. Stumbling after him, J.B. and Doc both fired their blasters, but the nimble man disappeared into the ruins.

  "Bedamned, we are shaky," Doc rumbled, clumsily reloading his blaster.

  "Just be glad we're still alive," J.B. panted, leaning against the library wall. He was exhausted from the minor exertion. "When I saw those stupes going for the library, I almost shot them right there."

  "They were not a good pattern yet."

  "I know. That's why I waited."

  Finished reloading, Doc holstered his piece and took a lantern from the pickup. Hurrying over to the library, he lifted it to a window. Instantly, there was a rustling of bodies and the snapping of wings. He ducked quickly and a juicy gob flew across the lot.

  "Our guests seem most perturbed by imprisonment," Doc stated, closing his eyes until a wave of dizziness passed. "Perhaps we should amend the terms of their captivity."

  "Too dangerous to shoot them through the windows," J.B. said claiming his rumpled hat from where it had dropped. He winced from the pain in his pulsating arm as he beat the dust off the fedora, then reset the crown and brim. "That bat venom is bad news, and they spit way too accurately for my taste."

  "And mine, sir." Moving about, Doc found his sword and ebony cane. "Think there is enough fuel in the—well, let's be polite and call it a vehicle—to burn them to death?"

  Forcing himself to keep standing, J.B. donned the hat, then tilted it an inch to the proper angle. Dressed again, the man felt more like his old self. "No way, even if the tank was full."

  "How inconvenient," Doc commented, glancing at the skyscraper rising about the ruins. The upper levels were lost in the distance of the nighttime sky. "And I can only postulate that we did indeed capture them all, or else we would be long dead and eaten while we were unconscious."

  "Screw them. Let's blow," J.B. said, shivering slightly. "It's colder than a baron's witch out here, and I'm starving."

  Doc slid off his frock coat and it was gratefully accepted. "I shall fix the flat tire on the Hummer while you shop among the trucks for undamaged MRE packs. It will be warmer than the exposed street."

  "Okay, by me," J.B. chattered, buttoning the garment shut. Lying on the sand, he had been warmed by the stored heat from the day. Standing, the desert winds took it away, chilling him to the bone. Hadn't been this cold since the Zarks. "Just hurry, okay?"

  "I shall endeavor to do so, sir," Doc replied. As he rounded the corner, he leaned heavily on his cane, the lantern held high to light the way.

  Watching where he stepped, J.B. poked though the glowing rubble, gathering items and stuffing them into the voluminous pockets of the coat. Actually, Doc had been correct; it was a lot warmer here amid the twisted metal, and the Armorer felt better with each passing minute. Whatever the toxin was the bats made, it clearly wasn't lethal. Maybe just knocked a victim out so the muties could feed at their leisure. Grisly thought.

  Several minutes later, Doc drove the Hummer alongside the ruined trucks, and J.B. stumbled inside, the frock coat bulging.

  "Ah, thanks." He sighed, rubbing his hands before the vent. The military heater was turned on full force, sending out waves of hellishly hot air. "Feels wonderful."

  "My own pleasure," Doc said, starting to drive, both hands streaked with grease, a knuckle bleeding slightly. "If I owned a brass monkey, it would now be singing soprano."

  J.B. laughed. "Good one."

  "Find anything?"

  Feeling the numbness leave his cheeks, J.B. patted the bulging coat. "A few souvenirs, and enough food to keep us going for a week."

  "Excellent. Now our top priority is to get inside and get you outside something hot."

  "Sounds good." With fumbling fingers, the Armorer snapped the window shut just as there came the faint sound of blasterfire.

  Immediately, Doc killed the lights and slowed the Hummer. "That was close by. Could it be our escaped sec man?"

  "Wrong caliber. He had a .38, those were smoothbore muzzle-loaders."

  "Perhaps additional people being herded into the tunnel by wolves," Doc suggested, as if not believing the notion himself. He sucked on the cracked knuckle and flexed his hand.

  "Or Krysty and Ryan leaving in a hurry," J.B. countered. "We better go check, just in case."

  The noises came again. A machine gun chattered, the dull thud of a gren, and one of the searchlight beams disappeared.

  "That's them," J.B. said, hauling the Uzi into view. "Go!"

  Shifting gears, Doc stomped on the gas, and the Hummer peeled away from the curb, leaving billowing dust clouds in its wake.

  Chapter Eighteen

  A hand reached around the sagging door frame of the wooden barrier closing off the front of the tunnel and blindly fired a blaster three times. The shots zinged off the tiled ceiling and into the distance.

  "Now," Ryan snapped, kneeling behind some garbage and carefully aiming the Steyr SSG-70.

  Krysty cried out in pain and fell to the tunnel floor. After a few moments, a sec man peeked around the door and Ryan blew away a chunk of his temple. The body collapsed onto the sandy ground, his rusty blaster rolling out of sight. Unseen hands dragged the corpse out of the doorway. Once again, all that could be seen through the sagging door in the barrier was a waist-high sandbag wall and the ruins beyond.

  "That's two down," the woman said, getting back up. "How many were there to start, four or six?"

  "Don't recall," Ryan growled, firing at the left side of the barrier. The 7.62 mm round slammed into the wood, but didn't penetrate.

  "Fireblast," he cursed. "Damn thing is made out of different kinds of planks. Sometimes I get through— most often I don't."

  Glancing over a shoulder, Krysty noted the tiny specks of lantern light were a lot closer. She sprayed a few bursts at them, but got no answering cry of pain. Damn sec men had to have the lanterns hanging from the ends of sticks or something. No way she could target the guards.

  "Range?" Ryan asked, the Steyr held loosely in his grip, his single eye wide for any indication of the guards.

  "Too damn close," she replied, trying the MAC-11. The hissing autofire hosed a full clip down the tunnel with no results.

  High up on the frame, a shiny square edged past the door, and Ryan shattered the mirror, a finger dropping to the ground. A stream of curses sounded and again several revolvers popped into view, firing wildly.

  Ryan shot a blaster out of its owner's grip, the weapon spinning away over the sandbags. Then Kr
ysty gave a spray from the noisy Skorpion. Lacking a suppressor, its bullets hit harder, blowing chunks of wood from the frame, leaving clusters of splinters sticking out.

  Shifting the med kit on her back, Krysty mentally wished she hadn't thrown away the dead gren. It would have bought them seconds of shock when they were forced to rush the doorway. Caught between an unknown number of armed sec men behind, and only a few ahead of them, a frontal charge was the logical way out. At least the ville guards were on foot. None of their wags had gotten past the burning APC. Yet.

  Easing a fresh clip into the Steyr, Ryan fired randomly at the barrier, but only two holes showed daylight and nobody shouted in pain.

  Just then, shots boomed from down the tunnel, and a miniball impacted on the ground between them.

  "Shit, they can see our silhouettes," Krysty spit, crouching lower and firing back. This time, she got a hit, but it was only a single voice.

  "And they have our range. This is it. We got to chance a charge," Ryan said, rising and drawing his SIG-Sauer. "You ready?"

  Standing, Krysty worked the bolts on both of her weapons. "See you in hell, lover."

  For a precious second, the man and woman exchanged private glances, then started to creep forward, but froze motionless when a long sharp whistle sounded from outside, closely followed by two more.

  Separating to the opposite sides of the tunnel, Krysty crossed her arms at the wrists and aimed her blasters in both directions as Ryan chanced an answering whistle. A guttural voice on the other side of the barrier asked a question to somebody in the negative just as the wooden slats furiously shook from a barrage of machine-gun fire and the telltale discharge of the predark LeMat. Men screamed, handblasters discharging from their death convulsions. Bodies fell into view. The Uzi chattered once more, followed by another thundering round from the LeMat, then silence.

  Whistling again, Ryan got an answer. Exiting the tunnel, the companions relaxed a notch as J.B. and Doc walked from the idling Hummer parked near a curb. But the smiles on the two men quickly faded when they saw the serious expressions on the man and woman.