"Just in time," Doc greeted them. "Our sleeper has just recently awakened."
Clarissa stretched her arms and legs. A few yards away, the muties were also rising from their fruit-induced sleep. "What happened? One minute I was talking to you, and then the next I was fast asleep."
"The fruit," Doc explained, "which came courtesy of Fox Farm, seems to have been laced with some sort of sedative."
"And you gave it to me to eat, knowing that?"
"You were hungry," J.B. stated. "It wasn't lethal, and we didn't have anything else to give you…or your friends, to eat. Besides, it was either that or chill you."
She looked at the Armorer for a long time, probably wondering if he was kidding or serious. "I believe you would have, too," she said at last.
J.B. remained silent.
"This museum you spoke of," Doc said. "Is it close enough to travel to in the dark, or should we find some other accommodation for the night?"
"Not a good idea to be out at night."
"Know safe place?" Jak asked.
"Sure."
"Okay, we'll rest up tonight, and tomorrow we'll hit the museum."
J.B. turned to Clarissa. "Lead the way."
MILDRED WAS LED into a well-lit and very clean room in the basement of the main building. A row of beds stood against each wall, ten to a row, twenty beds in all. All but four of the beds were empty.
Sitting at one end of the room at a desk was an old woman who had to be in her sixties. She was gray haired, hunched over and the knuckles of her hands were gnarled with arthritis.
"Two at once," the old woman said when Mildred brought Jasmine into the nursery.
"No," Mildred said. "I'm just here to help her."
"You a midwife?"
"No, not exactly."
"Healer?"
"Sort of."
"Oh well, welcome, then. I could use the help. What's her story?"
"Her water's broke and she's had some muconium staining."
"Is that like dark water?"
"Yes."
"She may be overdue, then."
"That's right." Mildred had wondered if the old woman would be in the way, but it was obvious that she'd delivered plenty of babies in her time and knew what she was doing.
"Here, honey," the old woman said, taking Jasmine's hands and placing them on her nipples. "Touch them, twist them and pull on them for the next little while."
"What will that do?" Jasmine asked.
Mildred wondered about that, too, but then remembered that nipple stimulation released the hormone oxytocin, which caused the uterus to contract. But how did you go about explaining that to a woman born and raised in the Deathlands?
"It will help make the baby come out," Mildred said, deciding the simplest explanation was best.
The old woman nodded her approval, then turned to Mildred. "Now, help me get ready."
Mildred smiled. There'd been so much chilling in her life recently, it would be wonderful to help bring some new life into the Deathlands.
"My pleasure," Mildred said, rolling up her sleeves.
"DINNER'S SERVED in twenty," the sec man shouted as the crew exited the wag. "Show starts in an hour."
"The showers are this way," Brody stated.
"What if I don't want a shower?" Ryan asked.
Brody shook his head. "Everyone's got to go through. The baron likes his people to be clean when they rut. Protection against disease, healthy offspring and all that. Besides, the water's hot, and it'll make you feel good after a day working in the orchard."
Ryan entered the large room where both men and women were getting undressed. About half of the women were noticeably heavy, and all the men looked fit and healthy.
Brody gave Ryan a plastic crate with the name of a predark dairy imprinted on the side. "Put your clothes in the crate. You can get them washed if you want, or you can put them on again after your shower. Up to you."
Although his clothes could probably do with a wash, he decided he'd put them on again. If they went into the wash, there was no telling when or if he'd get back the same clothes.
Ryan stepped into the shower. Brody stood off to the side, keeping an eye out for Purvis while Ryan washed up. The one-eyed man was grateful for the chance to wash the blood, dust and grime from his body. He put his head under the water, which was both fresh and warm thanks to the farm's unlimited supply of water and electricity, and let it flow over him like a river.
As he soaped up and rinsed for the last time, Ryan caught sight of Purvis at the exit to the showers. He decided to ignore him for the time being, knowing that the man wouldn't do anything while so many slaves were still in the showers with them.
But with Purvis standing there and looking for a fight, the others rinsed off quickly and left, leaving Ryan and Brody alone with him.
Purvis was as tall and as muscular as one might expect from the dominant male of a work crew. He also looked as if he'd been in a few fights during his time on the farm. Several of his teeth were missing, his nose was caved in and there was a bite-sized chunk of flesh missing from the outside of his right thigh.
"Your time has come, One-eye," Purvis said, taking a couple of steps into the shower.
"He doesn't want any trouble, Purvis," Brody argued. "He doesn't know how things work on the farm, that's all."
Ryan decided to say nothing for the moment, giving Purvis the chance to back out of this without getting hurt.
"You got that right, Brody. He don't know shit about what he's got himself into."
"He made a mistake is all," Brody reasoned. "He was thinking like an outlander, not like a slave. Forget it this time, and it won't happen again."
There was a slight grin on Purvis's face. He was obviously enjoying hearing Brody talk.
But Ryan didn't like it at all.
"No, it will happen again," Ryan said. "It will happen every time you beat on a woman, Purvis, or anybody else who's done you no wrong."
"You're all talk." Purvis took a few steps closer.
"I've been called a lot of things," Ryan said, "but never that."
The big man hesitated. He gestured to Brody. "I don't like the odds."
Ryan nodded. "Get out of here, Brody!"
"But—"
"Get out!"
Brody left without another word.
"Pack your bags, One-eye," Purvis said. "You're about to board the last train west."
Ryan said nothing, too busy assessing the situation to waste time on more talk. The water was still running in the showers. It helped drown out their voices so the sec men couldn't hear them, but it also made the floor of the shower very slippery. Purvis was a head taller than Ryan and probably outweighed him by fifty pounds. So if Ryan was to have any chance against the bigger man, he'd have to move fast, strike first and strike hard.
"C'mon, One-eye, I'm waiting."
Ryan crouched, pushed off from the wall and slid across the smooth tiles of the shower floor. He struck Purvis's legs while still moving at a good clip, and the big man toppled, landing hard on his shoulder.
Before the man had time to recover, Ryan was on his feet again. He kicked out with his right foot, catching the side of Purvis's head with his heel. The blow seemed to have little effect on the downed man because he managed to get to his feet as if he'd received little more than a tap on the shoulder.
"You're fast," he said. "I'll give you that."
Ryan decided if it worked once, it might be worth trying again. He knelt, got onto his hands and swung his feet out in a wide arc, taking Purvis's feet out from under him again. This time the big man fell backward, landing hard on his back and striking his head on the hard, wet floor.
Purvis seemed to be in pain so Ryan moved in to take advantage. But when he got close, Purvis reached out and grabbed the one-eyed man's feet, pulling him off the floor. Ryan managed to break his fall with his hands, but still landed heavily on the tiles, smacking the right side of his face hard enough to see bright sparks of pai
n flashing behind his eye.
After his heavy falls, the big man was slowly getting stronger, and Ryan knew that if he managed to get close, it was possible that he would be smothered in his grip.
A crowd of slaves had gathered at the entrance to the shower, but there were still no sec men in sight, which meant that only one of them would be walking out of the showers alive.
Ryan backed away from Purvis until his back touched one of the shower room's tiled walls.
"You can't run from me, One-eye." Purvis grinned, taking the move as a sign of weakness.
But in truth, Ryan was merely putting as much space between himself and the big man as he could. A second later he was off running, leaping through the air and throwing his shoulder and all of his body weight into Purvis's chest.
There was a large whoosh as Ryan knocked the air out of the man's lungs, and then a hard smack as Purvis fell backward with Ryan on top of him.
Purvis gulped for air.
Ryan took hold of the man's head and kept slamming it onto the hard tile floor until the back of his skull was crushed. Blood leaked onto the shower floor.
He let go of the big man's ruined head and looked over to the shower entrance. The slaves were gone and in their place were two sec men. They didn't look all that surprised to see a dead man lying on the shower floor. If Purvis was anything special, you sure couldn't tell from the sec men's expressions.
"What happened to him?" one of the sec men asked.
"Slipped on some soap," Ryan answered.
"Second one this month," the other sec man commented.
Chapter Nineteen
"Are we there yet?" Dean asked. The sun had set, and the boy was feeling tired.
"Almost," Clarissa answered as she led them up-river to some unknown destination.
"Patience, my dear boy," Doc said. "If the woman leads us to a safe place in which to spend the night, the peaceful rest we will receive will be more than worth the walk."
"There it is," she said, pointing off into the distance. "Just behind that rise."
The companions continued on, followed tirelessly by a group of muties, like seagulls trailing behind a ship hoping to catch something churned up by the ship's wake.
When they reached the rise, J.B. stopped abruptly and grabbed Clarissa by the arm. "There's nothing here," he said, taking another look around. "If you double cross us, it'll be the last thing you ever do."
"No double cross. You wanted someplace safe, so I'm bringing you to my home, or at least the place I've been living these past few months."
"But there's nothing here."
"Nothing on the surface, but there's plenty underground. Follow me."
Again the friends placed their trust in their female guide. When they reached the bottom of the rise, they came upon a concrete kiosk in the middle of the field.
"This looks like the place where we arrived," Dean whispered to Jak.
"Same, but different."
There was a door on one side of the kiosk. Clarissa opened it and gestured to the four friends. "After you, boys."
"What's this?" J.B. asked.
"An entrance to a water tunnel."
"That leads where?"
"To one of the power plants downriver," Clarissa answered. "I can't be sure which one, since most of them aren't operating anymore and to find out I'd have to walk some five miles in the dark. I figured it's not that important."
J.B. followed the other three friends inside. "What about the muties?"
"They're content to wait for me outside at the entrance until I reappear in the morning."
"I must say that is an excellent security measure," Doc said.
"For some reason, they don't like going underground, or the dark," she said, closing the door and making sure it was locked.
The tunnel was indeed dark. With the door closed, J.B. couldn't see his hands, even when he held them directly in front of his face. "Anyone have a gas lighter?" J.B. asked.
In answer, a small point of light came on to J.B.'s left, illuminating Jak's pale figure.
But a moment later another, much brighter light came on in the tunnel. "There's a few live wires around the falls," Clarissa said, twisting a plastic connector knob onto the ends of two wires. "You just have to know where to look, and not use so much that Baron Fox would notice someone is stealing juice from him."
"Wow!" Dean gasped, his neck craning to take in the enormous size of the tunnel.
"Wow indeed," Doc echoed.
"Big," Jak said.
They were standing at the bottom of a huge concrete tunnel that was roughly fifty or sixty feet across and stretched out in both directions for what seemed like forever. It was like a redoubt, J.B. thought but the tunnel was completely cylindrical—like a blaster barrel—and there seemed to be no end to it.
"And this carried water to the power stations downriver?" J.B. asked.
"When there was water to be carried there," she answered.
But despite it being dry, there was still a soft wash of sound echoing through the tunnel, as if the river's ghost still haunted the caverns beneath the city.
"Now it's just a safe place to sleep."
"An excellent idea, my dear," Doc said.
"What is?"
"Sleep."
"Be my guest."
She had transformed a section of the tunnel into a living space, with several sleeping places made of grasses and twigs.
The companions settled in.
THE FOOD in the farm's cafeteria was as good as one would expect from a farm. The soup and stew had both been made fresh, and Ryan was amazed to find real bits of meat floating around in both.
He took a seat on a bench at one of the tables near the exit, and Brody sat with him. When they'd left the showers, there had been plenty of activity among the sec men as they got rid of Purvis's body and cleaned the showers for the next crew coming in. Ryan wondered why they didn't get the slaves to do the job for them, but figured it was easy to keep the man's death secret from the baron if they handled the problem themselves.
"Nobody will miss Purvis," Brody explained. "But if the baron catches wind of what happened, he might want an explanation. They'll tell him the man slipped on some soap and that will be the end of it."
"But that was what happened," Ryan said with a wink of his eye.
"You'll do all right here, Ryan."
Halfway through the meal, Mildred came and joined Ryan, sitting across the table from him. "Aren't you eating anything?" Ryan asked when he noticed Mildred had no tray in front of her.
"Nursery workers get fed first, and best," she said, running a hand over her stomach. "I didn't think I'd ever eat steak again."
"How is…?" Brody began, then hesitated, looking around to see if any sec men were listening. "How is Jasmine?"
Mildred looked surprised.
"Mildred," Ryan said, "allow me to introduce Brody. He's the mate of the woman you took to the nursery."
"Pleased to meet you," Mildred said, shaking the man's hand.
"Jasmine?" Brody said.
"She's fine," Mildred answered. "It was tough going for a while, but she's doing real well now."
"And the baby?"
"A boy."
Brody smiled.
"Correct me if I'm wrong," Ryan said, "but you're not supposed to have attachments to the children born here."
"I have a son," Brody said.
Mildred looked over at Ryan. "That's right. The baby was taken from the mother and is now being taken care of by someone else in the nursery. I found out when the baby's six months old he'll be shipped off to a family down south."
"No," Brody said, obviously heartbroken.
"But you knew that would happen?" Ryan said.
"It doesn't matter if I knew," Brody answered. "That's my boy, my flesh and blood. I told myself a thousand times that this would happen, that we'd lose him, and I tried to prepare for it, but nothing can prepare you for losing your child like that."
&nb
sp; Mildred reached over and held Brody's hand.
Ryan looked at the man, understanding a little of what he was going through. Ryan himself had gone through life in the Deathlands never knowing of the son he had. But then, just days after meeting the ten-year-old child for the first time, there had been a bond between them that grew stronger every day. Brody's bond with his newborn was being broken against his will and it hurt the man deeply.
"You may be reunited with your woman and your son yet," Ryan said. "In a couple of days this whole place is going to be turned upside down."
Brody shook his head in despair and gestured toward Ryan and Mildred. "Who's going to do it? You two?"
"Mebbe us, mebbe help from outside, mebbe both."
"You mean there were more out there with you?"
"Four more."
Brody's smile was wide and bright. "I'll help you, then. Whatever you need, I'll see that you get it."
"I need you to stay strong," Ryan said. "For your son."
Mildred nodded in agreement.
"You got it."
THERE WAS a knock at Krysty's door.
"Yes?"
The door opened and a short, heavy bull of a sec man entered the room. "The baron wants you to join him in the cafeteria in twenty minutes."
"All right."
"And he wants you to wear this." The sec man's lips pulled back to reveal a smile full of black holes and broken teeth. In his grimy hand was what looked like a few slips of black fabric.
"What's that?" Krysty asked.
"It's what the baron wants you to wear."
"But what is it?"
"Clothes for a gaudy slut."
"And he wants me to wear them?"
"That's right. He's gonna parade you around to the slaves as his new prize."
"And if I don't put on the clothes?"
"He said I could have you myself," the sec man said, his big beefy tongue slobbering over his bruised and swollen bottom lip. "So if you don't want to put it on, I think mebbe we should stop wasting time and get right down to business."
Krysty considered her options. There was no way she'd let this foul creature lay a finger on her, but even if she resisted all his advances there'd be three more sec men outside the door, all too eager to help him.
Axler, James - Deathlands 61 - Skydark Spawn Page 12