Pony Soldiers

by James Axler

  For some time after they first met, Ryan never saw Doc Tanner without a battered stovepipe hat that looked like it could have once belonged to Abe Lin­coln. But when they were sailing down the Hudson, heading south from the redoubt toward Virginia, Doc had lost patience with the hat and wheeled it into the foaming water.

  Doc's contribution to the armament of the group was twofold. He carried an elegant ebony walking stick with a silver lion's head as its handle. A twist and a pull revealed the steel rapier blade concealed inside the cane. And on his hip, in a hand-tooled Mexican rig, was a gun about as old as Doc himself. It was a double-barreled Le Mat blaster, which fired .36-caliber ammunition. A quick adjustment of the firing pin and it blasted out a single round of .63 scattergun ammu­nition. Doc wasn't much of a marksman, but using the shotgun barrel of the Le Mat at close range meant you didn't need to be that good.

  They were six friends, moving through the scorched lands like a cleansing wind, generally leaving things a little better than they found them.

  "THREE-FIVE-TWO CODE, DOC?"

  "I beg your pardon, my dear Ryan? What was that you said?"

  "Let her go and pay attention. Entrance code into the redoubt?"

  "I would imagine that it is three and five and two, Ryan, is it not?"

  "Let's try it."

  The wind was rising and the chem clouds gathering to spring. Already they could make out jagged silver slashes of lightning spearing the tops of the moun­tains to the north. Ryan had seen storms so severe that they could kill an unprotected man, and Trader had often mentioned seeing freak weather down south that carried acid rain from hot spots—powerful enough to take the skin off a person in a couple of minutes. And kill him in five.

  Ryan punched in the number code on the elevated panel, waiting for the familiar hiss of hydraulics as the powerful sec doors began to operate.

  The darkness within suddenly blossomed with light as the sensors picked up movement of the doors. As soon as the gap was wide enough, Jak darted through, blaster in hand, calling for the others to follow him as soon as he was sure the main entrance region was safe and clear. Ryan came through last, feeling the sting of hail on his cheeks as the storm came shrieking in after them.

  The reverse code of 2-5-3 sent the doors sliding shut once more. The noise of the wind was muffled, then ceased. Inside the redoubt there was the familiar feel­ing of dead, stale air and a heavy silence all around them. Ryan took a deep breath.

  "Nobody here," he said.

  "Mebbe, lover," Krysty replied quietly.

  "You hear something?" J.B. asked, keeping the Uzi at the ready.

  "Can't tell. Someone's been here recently. Within the last week or so. But the doors…"

  Ryan had already checked. From the prints in the dust he could clearly make out that nobody had been in or out that way since they passed through the doors, months ago.

  "Mebbe someone saw when we come out and started poking around? Thought we came from in­side so could get in. Mebbe." Jak shook his head.

  "Better get stocked up on ammo, then go to the dorms and sleep. Rest up. We'll go to the mat-trans gateway in the morning after we eat. How's that sound to everyone else?"

  Looking around, Ryan realized how bone-weary they all looked. It had been hard times trying to re­turn to this redoubt, far harder than he'd imagined when they left Virginia. Maybe it would be better if they took a few days in the safety of the redoubt to recharge their personal batteries.

  "Beds first," Lori said, yawning.

  "I believe that I might second that particular motion, Ryan," Doc added. "It's been too long since I laid these weary old bones on anything softer than granite."

  "Sure thing, Doc, straight to the dorms. Eat. Sleep. We'll see how the morning looks."

  The plan of the complex, just inside the main en­trance, showed that the redoubt had only the single way in and out. But if Krysty's mutie senses were to be believed, and someone had gotten in, then the earth-slides over the years could have exposed some distant part of the building.

  It was cold inside, despite the warmth of the sum­mer weather outside. It seemed to Ryan that more of the lights in the angles of walls and ceilings had mal­functioned. It crossed his mind—but he set the thought aside—that the gateway itself might also have stopped working.

  They went along in a careful single file, Jak in the lead, followed by Ryan. Then came Krysty, followed by Doc and Lori. As usual, J.B. brought up the rear of the group.

  At each interior door, or at the turning of a pas­sage, everyone stopped, flattened against the curving walls, waiting until Jak had checked it out. One of the Trader's sayings that Ryan remembered was about caution. "Nobody ever gotten himself chilled from being careful."

  Even so, the ambush was so skillfully laid that it nearly took them.

  Chapter Two

  The muties must have had phenomenal hearing, sharp enough to catch the whispering sounds of Ryan and the others as they cat-footed their way along the corridors, giving them time to lay their plan and take up their hiding places.

  They'd picked the spot well.

  It was an open area that had probably been used by the guards of the redoubt for eating. There were sev­eral dozen plas-topped tables stacked along one wall, and a metal serving counter ran down the center, with deep recesses spaced along its length, which would have held the dishes of food.

  The corridor opposite led directly to the sleeping quarters, then to the storage sections of the redoubt and finally to the mat-trans gateway.

  Jak Lauren had been moaning about feeling hun­gry and thirsty, turning to call to Ryan. "Dry as nun's…"

  If the muties had been armed with blasters they could easily have sent all six to buy the farm.

  The tables went skittering over as four came burst­ing out from cover, and a half dozen leaped from the shadowy hollows of the serving counter. All were screaming and whooping and holding knives and spears.

  In that microsecond of shock, Ryan's fighting brain was working in overdrive, appraising the situation. Calculating odds and angles. Ten against six. Lances against blasters. Surprise on their side.

  None of the muties was taller than five and a half feet. They were men, with the tops of their skulls shaved clean and a shaggy fringe of hair dangling at the sides and back. All wore home-weave jerkins and pants, and sandals made from old land wag tires.

  The attack was so unexpected that the muties got close to their targets without a single shot being fired.

  The ones from behind the tables concentrated on Doc and Lori, rushing them, screaming in high, gut­tural voices. J.B. whirled, facing two more, while Krysty and Ryan spun to defend themselves against the last three muties. Jak, in the lead, was far enough ahead of the rest to be spared the initial attack.

  It couldn't properly be called a firefight, as the combat was too close for blasters to play much of a part.

  Only the Armorer managed to snap off any bullets, squeezing the trigger on the Uzi, hearing its lethal chatter as it ripped open the bellies and chests of the two muties that had chosen him for their prey. Both went tumbling over in a welter of blood and flailing arms and legs. Their lances and knives went clattering across the plas-tiles of the old cafeteria.

  The other five of J.B.'s companions were too tan­gled with their enemies for him to risk using the blaster again.

  Lori screamed as a knife flashed, opening her blouse and leaving a thin crimson line of blood seeping over the ribs. Doc had a moment to twist the lion's head of his ebony cane, dropping the cover and lashing out with the hissing steel. The rapier wasn't really suited to the rough-and-tumble of close combat, but the old-timer succeeded in pinking one of the muties neatly through the throat, cutting the vocal cords and silenc­ing the yelps. He withdrew the blade and lunged again, this time beneath the upraised right arm. The point pierced through the man's heart.

  Krysty kicked out at the first of her attackers, slowing down his charge, giving her a splinter of fro­zen time
to draw the 9 mm Heckler & Koch from its holster. But the mutie cocked his arm and threw his spear at her, knocking the blaster from her hand.

  Ryan drew the honed cleaver from his belt, feeling the wooden hilt match his fingers. The balance of the eighteen-inch blade was perfect for hacking in a me­lee like this one and he waded in, lips pulled off his teeth in a ferocious grin.

  He swung it in a singing figure eight, holding off the pair of whooping muties, forcing them to retreat to­ward the counter. One thrust at him with the spear, and Ryan chopped the point off. The man stopped, jaw gaping at Ryan's speed and power. It was all the chance the one-eyed angel of death needed. A feint toward the face and then a devastating blow to the thigh. The panga snapped the long bone, severing the femoral artery and putting a fourth gibbering mutant down on the floor. His blood gushed out, patterning the polished metal of the serving counter.

  The other man facing Ryan turned to run, realizing that the ambush had failed. But Ryan wasn't done.

  In three quick steps he overtook the scuttling little figure, the blood-slick blade hefted high. He brought it hacking down to splinter the collarbone on the right side of the stubby neck, angling sideways into the throat.

  Five down. Five to go.

  If you face someone with a knife in a confined space and you can't get away, then you get in close. Krysty Wroth knew that and she dived at her opponent, grappling with him even before her own blaster had finished clattering on the floor.

  Its flesh was moist and smelled of the taint of cor­ruption, overlaid with a sour chemical scent that was literally sickening. Krysty gagged, fighting for breath against the nauseous stench of the mutie.

  Like all great killers she fought with a cold, ana­lytic, ruthless intensity, clearing her mind of anything but the need to survive and conquer.

  Back in her home ville of Harmony, Krysty's uncle, Tyas McCann, had once said he'd heard a notorious hired killer say that when he did a good job he reached an acceptable level of ecstasy. She'd never forgotten that phrase.

  The mutie suffered from multidigits. There were eleven fingers and three thumbs on the right hand and nearly as many on the left, most of them stubby, re­sidual little pink paddles of limp flesh. When she grabbed at the man's knife hand Krysty felt a mo­mentary wave of revulsion as she broke off several of the creature's useless fingers, feeling blood spurt over her own hand from the injuries.

  It whined and tried to pull itself free, but Krysty wasn't about to let it go. She reached around for the knife she always carried, but her hands were slippery and she couldn't grasp the hilt.

  "Ryan!" she yelled. "Help me!"

  He was there, appearing behind the mutie's shoul­der, steel blade dropping crimson, actually smoking in the cold air of the redoubt. He grabbed at the flap­ping coat of the mutie, tugging him away from Krysty, sending him dancing off balance. The panga hissed once, twice. The first cut lopped the mutie's right hand off the arm, blood gouting high, while the second, re­versed blow ripped open the man's stomach, empty­ing his intestines onto the floor.

  Four left.

  Doc ran another of their attackers through the cen­ter of the chest, withdrawing the rapier with an al­most casual elegance. The mutie clutched at the wound, slumping to the floor, dead.

  "Touché," Doc said.

  Three of the screeching mutants were still alive and on their feet.

  Seeing that they had lost the fight, with most of their group chilled, the survivors turned away, facing only Jak. The muties were all in line with Doc and Lori, and the boy couldn't risk drawing his pistol. He stood, arms by his side, staring at the gibbering trio of muties.

  Ryan had gone for his G-12, but it wasn't the time or the place for the lethal firepower of the gray automatic rifle. He could only stand and watch the four­teen-year-old boy.

  "Come on, bastards," Jak said, voice sibilant in the silence. His confidence stopped the muties in their tracks, leaving them waving their spears and knives in a halfhearted threat.

  "Stay where y'are, then," he added, in a normal conversational tone.

  His hands weaved a deadly pattern, faster than Ryan's eye could follow, flickering from side to side. Steel danced in the slim, white fingers, spinning through the air like tiny, turning mirrors.

  "Gaia!" Krysty breathed, hardly believing what she saw.

  "Fireblast!" Ryan exclaimed.

  Lori Quint said nothing. Doc Tanner's jaw gaped and he whistled between his teeth.

  "Not bad, kid," J.B. said admiringly.

  Each of the three throwing knives had found its target. The talent of the albino boy was staggering, verging on the magical. Using both left and right hands he'd thrown three different knives at three dif­ferent enemies and chilled them all as effectively as a twelve-bore charge through the head.

  The leader of the ambush wore a strip of green cloth tied around his head. The leaf-bladed knife thunked home in the hollow between throat and chest, sending him staggering back, sinking to his knees, eyes wide in shock. Before he hit the floor, the mutie on the left was also down, the knife protruding from the socket of his right eye, blood mingling with the clear fluid as it ran down the cheek. The last of them never moved, dying where he stood, sinking to the floor as though some­one had thrown a switch and drained his life away. The knife was buried in the side of his neck, neatly clip­ping the artery.

  Ten down.

  None to go.

  "IF TEN GOT IN, then a hundred could," the Armorer said when they reached the dorms. Ryan made sure the door at the farther end was closed and bolted, and he set guards, in pairs, to watch the other entrance to the long room.

  "Yeah. The sooner we get out through the gateway the better," he agreed. "Thought about staying here for a few days. Better not. Let's sleep now and then get the ammo and supplies in the morning. And then get the long winter out of here."

  They made up beds from the tattered mattresses and thick, dark brown blankets, still showing the sten­ciled letters USFNY in their corners. Most of the overhead lights were out, giving the place the cold gloom of an Arctic cavern.

  Despite the discomfort and the threat of a further attack, all six warriors managed to sleep surprisingly well.

  Chapter Three

  SOMEONE HAD PICKED OVER the shelves of self-heats since they were last in the Mohawk redoubt. The ob­vious guess was the muties, though not even Jak's morning exploration had revealed a way they could have gotten into the old military complex. But there were still enough cans left for them to activate for breakfast.

  Ryan found he was eating yellow soup and some sort of minced fruit. The labels had faded away some time in the past hundred years. The others had different mixes. Jak opened nine cans before he found one that wasn't a particularly unpleasant pale blue slush, warmed by the chemicals triggered by opening the ring-pull, to around twenty degrees centigrade.

  They hunted down the ammo section of the redoubt. This time Ryan took even greater precautions, keeping everyone in extended recce file, to avoid a re­peat of the situation in the dining hall, where they'd been ambushed while in a group. He took point him­self, moving slow and careful, only beckoning up Krysty, second in line, when he was sure the section was safe. Then he moved on, while she called up Jak Lauren, then Lori, Doc and J.B., keeping a good dis­tance between each of them.

  There was no further sign of muties, but there was clear evidence that they'd penetrated deep into the rambling complex: urine stains on concrete walls and piles of human excrement scattered along the corri­dors.

  There was also some crude graffiti. Daubs in red and black, most of them completely impossible to understand. A few were the usual porno stuff—men with gigantic penises and women with absurdly huge breasts.

  "Seen double-poor swampies draw like this," Jak said.

  "I regret to say that I have seen similar defacement streaked all over the heart of some of the finest and most civilized cities that this planet ever saw," Doc put in sadly.

  IT WAS WITH RELI
EF that Ryan filled his pockets with more of the light caseless rounds for the G-12. "Hap­piness is a full mag," he said to Krysty with a grin.

  "Look," J.B. called, pointing to the contents of a large wooden box that he'd found under one of the benches. It was marked USFNY like everything else in the redoubt.

  "What have you got?" Ryan asked.

  "Equaloy. Haven't seen any in years."

  Ryan had first joined the traveling guerrilla leader called the Trader around ten years ago, just a few months before the Armorer enrolled with him on War Wag One. He'd seen plenty of ammo in his time, but he couldn't recall equaloy. The name rang a bell, but he couldn't pin down where.

  "How's that?"

  "Aluminum bullets. Self-lube. Nylon coated. Great."

  Ryan remembered. "Sure. They got a flat trajec­tory, don't they?"

  Jak was looking in the crate. "Heard. Triple veloc­ity."

  J.B. nodded. "Right, kid."

  "Don't call me—"

  "Sorry, kid." The Armorer favored the boy with one of his rare smiles. "Triple's right. But when they hit someone the bullet stops quick, and all the kinetic energy keeps right on going. Blows your guts apart with the shock."

  "What caliber they got?" Jak asked.

  "Nine mill, .357. Nothing for Doc."

  "I'm fine, thank you, Mr. Dix," the old man re­plied, patting the pockets of his frock coat.

  It was late morning by the time they'd all stocked up on food, drink and ammunition, each member of the group taking a backpack, adjusting the straps to fit, loading them up.

  Pressed by Ryan, Doc Tanner finally persuaded Lori to change her clothes. Helped by Krysty, the tall blonde went into the next section of the redoubt and discarded the satin blouse and short red skirt. She emerged wearing a vac-sealed dark blue navy-style shirt and a cotton skirt in the same color, cut to the knee.

  When she came out again, Doc Tanner went and kissed her hand, stooping over it like an old-fashioned courtier, smiling at the worried expression on Lori's face.