by James Axler
“All of them?” the voice asked, startled.
“Confirmed,” Kate growled. “If they ain’t in chains, put lead in their head!”
“Will do, Chief!” The radio crackled, even the short distance affected by the rads in the sea.
“Knives are cheaper,” Roberto stated, staying close to the woman, the sawed-off held level at his waist with both hands.
She shrugged in reply. “Fuck it. We got the ammo. Besides, I’ll damn well not lose another one of our people cleaning out this viper’s nest,” Kate shot back furiously. “Ten rounds now will save us a hundred in the future.”
There was a scrambling motion at the base of a second guard tower, and from the gaping doorway stumbled a bloody man in robes with both hands raised. Roberto fired before Kate could even register the fact, and as he fell the cannie elder was then torn apart by crisscrossing blasterfire from a dozen directions.
“Standard divvy among the dead?” Roberto asked, tightening his lips into what could have been a grin as he reloaded again. The 12-gauge sawed-off did a nuking amount of damage, but he was always shoving in shells. Too bad there wasn’t such a thing as a clip fed shotgun. Wouldn’t that be a pisser?
“Not this time,” the woman answered. “We turn the entire contents of the ville over to the slaves. They earned it in ways we don’t want to think about. Then we divvy half of our food with them, too. Toss everything found in the kitchens and storehouses into the sea. It’s all dirty. Who knows what they used to bake the bread, or fried the fish in.”
Mebbe human fat, Roberto comprehended, going queasy. Dark night, he never would have thought about that. “Good call, Chief,” he stated, swallowing hard. “I’ll see it done personally. But we’re still taking shine and fuel, right?”
Removing her hat, Kate fanned away the smoke from the burning buildings, the fumes carried a reek of burning flesh that made her cringe. “Damn straight, all we can carry,” the woman added without any trace of humor. “From here we can finally risk a journey to the north.”
Roberto frowned. By that, she meant across the Great Salt. A hellzone considered by many to be the bleeding ass of the Deathlands with its rad storms, quicksand, tornados, muties and worst of all, the Scorpion God.
Machine-gun fire sounded from somewhere in the ville, ending with a wailing scream, followed by cheers. Sounded like the slaves were free and already equalling some old scores.
“Be a mighty good day when we ace the Scorpion,” Roberto said grimly. “A lot of debts to be paid there, too.”
“More than you know,” Kate muttered, tucking her hat back on her head.
Chapter Eight
Sucking on a dry piece of jerky, Krysty was taking her turn behind the wheel as dawn began to lighten the eastern sky behind the wag. Straight ahead, the bright headlights of the old wag bounced wildly with every irregularity of the ground, and she was forced to slow to a mere crawl to keep from crashing into the occasional hole or rock. She hoped nothing attacked the wag, because at this miserable speed, they couldn’t outrun a fat baron.
When Ryan was driving the wag, at first it had seemed they were following a predark road buried beneath the salt. But soon it became obvious that this was merely a wash, the vestigial remains of a dried river that snaked through the desolate landscape. Aside from the shallow depression of the river, the land was flat and featureless without even mountains on the horizon, the largest dune of sandy salt only a few feet in height. It was as if the world had been sandpapered smooth.
No, it was sandblasted smooth, Krysty corrected, by the bombs of skydark. Whatever had once been here had to have been mighty important in the old days for it to receive such a concentrated bombing. Some sort of military base, or factory town. Had to have been big.
Sitting in the passenger side of the cab, Dean scowled alertly at the endless vista of dried salt with open hostility, J.B.’s scattergun expertly cradled in his hands. The boy carried a harmonica in his shirt pocket, a gift from long ago, and he was slowly getting fairly good on the instrument. But for some reason he felt the music would have been inappropriate. Dean found that he was sometimes a little nervous when it was just him and Krysty, kind of as if he were a small kid being watched over by a parent, instead of a young man of nearly thirteen years standing guard. The weirdly mixed feelings confused the hell out of the boy. Mildred told him it was normal for him to feel that way. He was in transition from childhood to adulthood. Adolescence, it was called. Dean wished it would just pass him by.
Buried under a pile of blankets, the rest of the companions were sleeping in the rear of the vehicle, huddled in a group to share body heat and help fight off the nighttime chill. It had to have been dawn when they arrived at the redoubt, but as they escaped from the installation, the warmth quickly faded from the air and the desert turned deeply cold. Krysty and Dean had the heater under the dashboard to keep them comfortable, but the rest simply had to cope as best they could.
As the sun slowly ascended, it burned away the blanket of polluted clouds and filled the desert with the rosy gleam of predawn, turning everything delicate shades of pinks. Soon the biting chill was no longer whistling into the cab from around the mismatched doors, and the woman turned off the heater to save juice. Once long ago, in an Alaskan redoubt, Krysty had studied a map of the old world. This could be the middle of the Australian desert, literally thousands of miles away from anything. Every drop of fuel needed to be saved until the companions had a better idea of where they were headed.
Slow miles passed as Krysty continued rolling on through the brightening desert. As they jounced through a shallow crack in the riverbed, the land gently rose into a swell and Krysty realized she was no longer in the wash. Maybe the predark river had turned at some point, or went underground, there was no way of telling. But now the wag was rolling across the desert floor, the heavy tires crunching steadily on the crusty salt ground. She debated trying to backtrack and find the wash once more, but decided to stay on course. J.B. had placed his compass on the dashboard, and the needle was still pointing due west.
“Damn, there’s nothing in sight for miles,” Dean said, leaning out the window. “Mebbe we should stop and take a rest. Let J.B. find out where we are, and such.”
“I was thinking the same thing myself,” Krysty replied, grinding gears. “Also, the engine has been starting to run hot. Might be something wrong.”
“Might be low on water,” he suggested, glancing at the gauge.
“Could be,” she agreed, easing the speed of the rattling wag to the merest crawl. “But it’s best to make sure.”
Slowing to an easy halt, Krysty turned off the engine and waited while the machine rattled to a complete stop before setting the parking brake. Warily, the two companions checked the area around them before leaving the cab. Walking across the ground, their combat boots steadily crunched on the crust of dried salt.
“Well, one good thing about this stuff,” Dean muttered, shifting his grip on the scattergun. “At least nobody can sneak in close without being heard.”
“That’s for damn sure,” Krysty agreed, a hand on her own blaster. “Unless it was flying, but I don’t see anything around for a screamwing, or skeeter, to eat.”
The boy nodded in agreement, but kept a closer watch on the open sky for any signs of movement. Aside from the departing toxic clouds, the air was a clear azure blue and thoroughly empty.
Reaching the rear, Dean stood guard with the shotgun while Krysty untied the lacings holding the canvas flaps shut and threw one aside admitting the morning sunlight into the back of the wag. Amid the water barrels, fuel cans and piles of backpacks, there was a lumpy mound of mixed blankets with a few boots sticking out from underneath.
“Good morning!” Krysty called, shaking the nearest boot. “Rise and shine.”
The mound of blankets stopped snoring and started to break apart under her urgings.
“Already awake. Been for a while,” Ryan said from the shadows in the corner, and the
man stepped closer into the light. Mildred had been afraid that his head wound might be serious to make him slip into a coma if he went to sleep too soon, so the one-eyed man reluctantly decided to back her call and stayed up the whole night. Much as he wanted some sack time, Ryan was bastard sure he didn’t want it to last forever. Head wounds chilled in a way no other wound did.
“You look like hell, lover,” the redhead said to the disheveled man.
He grunted at that and stiffly climbed down from the rear of the wag onto the hard ground. Loose white sand was blowing across the land, and Ryan again tasted salt in the air. This was no desert, but an ocean. Some of the nukes during skydark missed their coastal targets and hit the sea bottoms, throwing up boiling tidal waves of salt water dozens of miles across the mainland, sometimes hundreds of miles. Over the years the salt mud dried into a thick crust over the once living soil, forming hard flat deserts.
“Makes the Washington Hole seem almost like Eden,” J.B. said, adjusting his wire-rimmed glasses as the creeping dawn began to fill the rear of the wag, warming it noticeably.
Soft thunder peeled in the shifting clouds, sounding like distant artillery as J.B. slapped his fedora into shape and tucked it on the back of his head. At least they wouldn’t have to worry about acid rain for a while. That was something good, at least.
“Broke down?” Jak asked, appearing from under a pile of blankets. The rosy tint of dawn was already fading to become the clear hard light of daytime.
“Nope, but the engine is running a little hot,” Krysty replied. “We thought it best to stop, give it a rest.”
“And make breakfast,” Dean added.
“Better check hoses first,” Jak mumbled, holstering the blaster and shuffling forward to jump off the end of the wag. His boots sank inches deep into the salty sand. He hated the desert and longed for a smell of a proper bayou again.
Shoving away the blankets, Doc gave a bone-cracking yawn and ran stiff fingers through his silver hair.
“What a desolate location,” he rumbled, exiting the vehicle to blink at the reflected dawn. “We could be in the middle of the Sahara or the Gobi desert for all we know.”
“Could be the Painted Desert of New Mexico,” Krysty added. “Sure isn’t Colorado or Ohio.”
Stretching to work off the fog of sleep, Ryan became alert at that remark. Ohio was neutral territory, but there were a bastard lot of folks who wanted their hides in New Mex. That was the very heart of the Deathlands.
“Well, I’ll have us fixed in a few minutes,” J.B. stated, pulling the minisextant from his jacket pocket and looking through it to sweep the sky until locating the sun.
“I’ll make coffee, if somebody starts a fire,” Mildred offered, fighting off a yawn. She spent the night spooning with John, but any trace of a romantic interlude had been neutralized by the close presence of the rest of the companions also huddled under the blankets.
“No wood for a fire,” Dean said, gesturing around them. “Nothing.”
“Damn, you’re right,” the physician grumbled unhappily. “Guess it’ll be an MRE of meat loaf for breakfast, and cold coffee.”
“We’ve had worse,” Krysty commented, opening her backpack to pull out a tin mess kit. “Better than boiled boot.”
Mildred made a face. That had been a hell of a meal. The closest they had ever come to starving to death.
“Be right back,” Ryan announced, drawing his blaster. Stepping behind the largest dune for a few minutes, the man soon returned zipping up his fatigues.
“Got our position yet, J.B.?” he growled.
“Not just yet. Too many clouds in the way,” the Armorer answered, squinting through the sextant. As carefully as possible, he centered the unobstructed sun in the lens, balancing the horizon against the half mirror inside the optical device. This gave him the reading and writing down the numbers, he did a few calculations and checked the plastic map from his backpack.
“We’re back in Texas,” J.B. said, lowering the sextant. “About six hundred miles away from that gateway at the Grandee.”
“Good enough,” Ryan said, rubbing his unshaven jaw. The gateway wasn’t a redoubt, just a stripped down mat-trans chamber, but it would take them to a redoubt. If it still worked.
“Six hundred miles is a mighty long way.” Krysty sighed, loosening her collar. “Especially in this heat.” Her bearskin coat was hanging from a bolt in the back of the wag, a little extra cover in case the others needed it during the cold night. Now it seemed like she wouldn’t be needing it during the day, either. Already she could tell it was going to be a scorcher. Good thing they had a lot of water, even if it was slightly radioactive.
Just then, a trio of tiny red scorpions scurried out from under a rock, closely followed by a much larger black scorpion. The black arachnid grabbed a red one and started tearing it apart on the spot, stuffing the juicy gobbets into his mouth. The other two made good their escape under another rock, while the third was being eaten alive.
A scratching sound seemed to fill the air. The companions pulled their blasters and glanced around. But aside from the scorpions battling each other, there was nothing in sight anywhere.
“Could be the wind,” Dean said hesitantly, as if not believing the possibility himself. The wind in the Deathlands often played tricks, making faraway things sound right behind you, sometimes even making sand seem to be splashing pools of water. Back at Nicolas Brody’s school, he had heard of people lost in the desert going feeb from the wind and the heat.
“Something is wrong here,” Krysty said, her hair flexing and curling. “Do you think we could be standing on a…”
Then the sound came again with a haunting familiarity, and icy-cold adrenaline flooded Dean’s body as he saw the surface of the desert moving like a low wave in the water from something underneath the salty crust. Then the crystalline sheath cracked and a featureless head appeared with pinchers snapping.
“Bugs!” Dean shouted, kneeling to fire the shotgun across the swarm, as the compacted salt broke apart and out rushed a carpet of millipedes flowing their way like a river of death.
A dozen millipedes were blown away from the barrage of fléchette rounds, but the rest just kept coming as unstoppable as the dawn around them. The muties had to have been following the wag since it left the redoubt. Either that or the desert was infested with them. Bad news either way.
“Get the wag moving!” Ryan ordered, squinting against the wash of daylight behind the bugs even while triggering his softly chugging SIG-Sauer. Fireblast, the damn things couldn’t have chosen a better time to attack! With the light in their eyes it was triple-hard to aim, and once the insects were among the companions they would be reduced to scraps in a few minutes.
The closest to the cab, Krysty scrambled inside the wag and started to crank the engine. Meanwhile, the rest of the companions threw down a wall of lead, salt dust mixing with black blood as the insects died, but kept on coming nonetheless, as mindless as a storm. Rushing to the back of the wag, Ryan grabbed a Molotov from the wooden box, lit the rag fuse and smashed the bomb directly in front of the bugs, the pool of fire momentarily slowing their advance.
Shoving the Uzi into Mildred’s hands, J.B. frantically rummaged in his munitions bag and pulled out an implo gren. Setting the release, he pulled the ring and threw the gren hard toward the bugs clustered around the Molotov puddle. The millipedes scattered momentarily as the sphere hit and bounced a few times to finally land behind the insects.
“Missed!” Jak roared, his Colt blowing fire.
“Like hell I did!” J.B. shouted, grabbing the canvas side of the wag and bracing himself. “Hold on!”
Suddenly, there was a brilliant flash of searing blue light and a muted roar that became a powerful rush of air that almost pulled the companions off their feet in a whirlwind of loose salt as the predark device created a microsecond well of supercondensed gravity. Then the field was gone with only a steaming hole to mark the spot.
The imp
losion had aced only a handful of the bugs, but dozens more had been pulled backward from the vacuum of the reverse blast, and were scrambling about madly in the smooth glass crater totally confused. Precious time had been bought, with only a few of the muties still coming, pinchers snapping. But more were heading their way again with every tick of the clock.
On the ground, the black scorpion dropped its partially finished meal and raced away for safety under a rock.
“Use another!” Dean cried, hammering the bugs with his Browning. “Use them all!”
“Too close! Get off the ground!” Ryan ordered, scrambling backward into the rear of the wag, his blaster throwing hot lead. A millipede squealed as a score of legs were ripped off its belly by the 9 mm slug, but it continued to move, bleeding badly but very much alive.
Throwing a couple more Molotovs into the fire of the first one to spread the blaze, Doc and Jak then shoved Mildred into the wag and jumped in after her, with Dean close behind. Taking back the exhausted Uzi from the furious physician, J.B. fed it a fresh magazine from his munitions bag and stitched a line across the foremost wave of bugs. But exactly as before in the redoubt, the wounded kept coming until they died.
The wag vibrated, the exhaust pipe belching smoke as Krysty fought to get the stubborn diesel to turn over. What could be wrong with the thing? Hellfire, it was still warm from before, power read good on the dashboard and she knew there was plenty of fuel. Mebbe the mix was too rich? Pumping the gas pedal and pulling the choke all the way out instead of in, Krysty hit the starter and the engine briefly sputtered, paused as if stalling, then surged into life.
Moments later, the millipedes rushed underneath the wag, biting at the tires, the dead scorpion and the dropped wrapper from an unconsumed MRE pack. Several started to crawl up the sides of the wag, and Krysty used her Smith & Wesson to blow off a twitching head that appeared at the open passenger-side window.
“Come on, get this heap moving!” Ryan bellowed, exchanging clips.
The noise of the bugs was getting deafening loud, and he wasn’t sure the woman had heard him when the wag started rolling forward, the bugs cracking like popcorn beneath the wide tires.
