by James Axler
On the far side of the channel, J.B. took the front position, choosing to shoulder his M-4000, which, with its load of barbed-metal fléchettes, would wreak havoc on any flesh-and-blood enemy who may be lying in wait. Behind him, Mildred was ready with her Czech-made ZKR 551 target pistol. It wouldn’t cause as wide a range of damage as J.B.’s blaster, but with Mildred’s crackshot ability it was just as effective. Doc took the rear. The most vulnerable of the companions because of the mental and physical battering he had taken, he nonetheless had a streak of sheer granite will within him that would always make him a formidable opponent. If nothing else, he had his LeMat percussion pistol, which had the ability to inflict maximum damage on anything hostile that approached.
Ryan pressed hard on the lever and the outer door began to grind and open slowly. There was no inrush of water. Neither was there a trickle of rock and gravel to presage a landfall to indicate they were blocked in by rock.
As the door opened wider, the light from the redoubt tunnel flooded onto the land beyond. Dawn hadn’t yet broken, and Ryan cursed under his breath, knowing that the light streaming from the redoubt made them an easy target. He released the lever and flattened himself against the wall, motioning to the others to do likewise.
From what he had seen before pulling back, the land beyond the redoubt entrance was barren and flat, and there was a track that led from the door to the level ground. It was a shallow incline, and the dust on the track was undisturbed, suggesting that no one had been sniffing around the redoubt entrance for a long time.
He tried to still his breathing and to listen, straining for any noises that may betray anyone waiting in ambush, but he could hear nothing. He looked at Jak. The albino youth’s hunting senses were so finely honed that he had an almost preternatural grasp of the natural world around him. Jak shook his head briefly. He could neither hear nor smell anything dangerous out there. Ryan then looked at Krysty. With her doomie sense, her sentient hair would curl tightly and protectively to her scalp if there was imminent danger. The Titian mane was free-flowing.
The one-eyed man signaled across to the Armorer. They would move out, covered by their companions, and recce the area. He counted to three and signaled.
The two men rolled under the partly open door and hit the dirt outside the redoubt at the same moment, temporarily blind to the area beyond the arc of light as their eyes adjusted to the surrounding gloom. Ryan went left, J.B. right. Both held their blasters ready to fire at the least provocation.
Ryan felt the ground give beneath his feet. It was hard-packed dirt, suggesting that the area was dry, but there was a soft top layer, almost like dust, which made him feel that the place in which they had landed was like a desert. The impression was reinforced by the sparse trees and vegetation that loomed as darker shadows against the earth and sky as dawn approached.
His eye scanned the immediate area for cover and saw only a small cluster of rocks barely large enough to shelter one person. He made for the rocks, ready for an enemy to spring into view or to open fire. There was nothing to suggest the rocks were being used in such a manner. He skidded to a halt, hunkering down by them and pausing to look around.
All remained quiet.
He looked across to where the Armorer lay flat against the ground, one hand clutching the M-4000, the other clamping his battered fedora to his head. Their movements had thrown up a cloud of dust that shone in the approaching dawn as the first rays of the sun hit the motes.
J.B. shook his head. All was clear on his side of the track.
Ryan turned to signal the others to follow, then realized that they wouldn’t be able to see him. It was too dark outside the redoubt.
He rose to his feet and looked around. As the sun began to crawl above the horizon, he could see that the redoubt had been built into a hillside that had long since eroded, leaving the roof of the reinforced concrete tunnel almost exposed. The track had obviously, at some time, led down into the lee of the hill, but the weather conditions over the past century or so had virtually leveled the ground for as far as he could see. Which suggested that there were harsh storms—possibly chem storms—and that the desert wind was potentially deadly. They would have to get moving and try to find their way into a more hospitable terrain as soon as possible.
“Come on out. It’s clear,” he called as he walked back toward the entrance, waving J.B. back to the light as he did so. By the time he was within the pool of light, the Armorer was at his side and the others had emerged from the entrance.
“It looks bleak,” Mildred murmured.
“No animals. Bad sign,” Jak added.
Ryan had to agree. If the terrain could support little in the way of wildlife, then it was unlikely to welcome the companions.
“We need to move as soon as the sun’s up. Mebbe we’ll get a better look around in the light. And once it’s up, we can get a direction. Right, J.B.?”
The Armorer nodded, already searching his capacious pockets and baggage for his minisextant.
“What do you think caused that?” Mildred asked, facing the entrance and noticing the way the hill had eroded.
“Chem storms,” Krysty replied. “They could strip anything down if it’s stuck in them long enough.”
“Then I would venture to hope that we are not that unlucky,” Doc commented. “Although…”
J.B. had turned and was looking toward the horizon. The rising sun looked bloated and purple through the shimmering haze of cloud that hung sluggishly in the sky. Purple clouds—the sign of toxic chem—seemed to hover malevolently above the desert floor. As the light spread over the land, he could see that the foliage that had struggled to survive was stunted and twisted where years of chem-soaked rains had affected plant DNA structures. The earth had a faint purple-brown tinge in its dry constituency where the chemicals had infected the soil.
J.B. took a reading and pointed to the south-southwest.
“Sea’s over that way, I reckon. Depends how far north we are in the first place, though. Guess the sea should keep the land cleaner over there,” he added, unable to keep the uncertainty from his voice.
“Only one way to find out. And we sure as hell can’t stay here,” Ryan said simply.
They struck out in the direction indicated by J.B. once he’d consulted his minisextant and his old plasticized map. Ryan led the way, with J.B. bringing up the rear. Between them, Krysty and Mildred were followed by Doc and Jak, the albino mutie changing his position in the line to cover Doc’s back now that Dean was gone. It was a small thing, not even spoken of among them, but it was indicative of the changes they would have to make. Without the younger Cawdor, the dynamic of group security and battle plans had changed: regardless of personal feelings, to adapt for their survival they would have to almost forget that he had ever been among them.
The arid landscape that stretched around them was revealed in its immensity as the sun fully rose and cast its light over the land. As far as they could see, in every direction, the layer of dusty soil covered hard-packed earth that was streaked with the purple of the chem clouds above. It wasn’t desert. This was definitely soil rather than sand, but it seemed all the more desolate because of this. The few grasses that were spread in sparse croppings were tough, spiked blades that threatened to cut anyone who brushed against them. Few plants could survive in the nutrient-drained, chem-raddled soil, but those that did were sickly specimens that seemed to wither under the hot sun.
And a hot sun it was. The chem clouds, sparse purple and yellow wisps across the sky like a malevolent gauze, offered no protection from the harsh rays. Rather, they seemed to rap and to magnify the intensity of the heat, giving off a humid and fetid odor, with an underlying and poisonous sweetness that made breathing an effort.
As they marched, the companions were grateful the redoubt had given them plentiful supplies of water, since anything they would find—if at all—in this wasteland would be tainted and possibly deadly.
Grateful, also, for the salt t
ablets that Mildred had looted from the pharmacy in the redoubt and for the protective clothing that they had been able to find. The jackets Mildred, Doc, Jak and J.B. had chosen had been made for the old Pacific northwest weather, and so were thick and heavy. They also had hoods and visors that kept off the worst excesses of sunstroke, even if they made you sweat heavily underneath.
A whole day’s marching was slow and painful. Doc’s breath rasped painfully in time to their footsteps, and Jak stumbled and fell a couple of times, needing water and salt tablets more than the others. His small, slight frame had a surface area to mass ratio that made him lose water and salt quicker than any of the others, especially beneath the heavy protective jacket.
Mildred looked back at the pair several times as they marched, concern evident in her face.
The barren land seemed to stretch endlessly on all sides of them. Should they have struck out and tried to find life of some kind? Should they have taken another day or two’s rest—the ancient air-conditioning system could possibly have coped—and then made another jump, rather than risk being fried out here? Ryan had seemed to be motivated by more than just his survival instincts this time. It was a desire to escape the confines of a redoubt, and to just do something…anything. Or was she just reading that into the situation because she was tired, hot and cranky?
They stopped a couple of times on the first day, taking advantage of the sparse shade offered by a few stunted trees. The shallow root systems of the twisted trunks spread over a long distance before petering out, suggesting that they took whatever sustenance they could from the rain as it fell. It was likely that there was no water table unless a person dug deep—something that the lack of damage to the redoubt had earlier suggested—and that the only viable source for survival were the rains. Considering the dryness of the topsoil, it was likely there was little in the way of rainfall on anything approaching a regular basis. Looking at the deadly chem clouds floating above them, and the vast expanse of nothingness around them, the companions were glad for these signs: to be caught in a chem storm with no shelter would potentially be deadly.
Still, they trudged on in the heat, moving at a pace that seemed to deteriorate as the sun moved painfully slowly across the sky. Covering nowhere near the distance they usually would in such a time, the fall of twilight was promising. The temperature dropped rapidly, and although they all knew that before long it would be bone-chillingly cold, the sudden descent to a lower temperature was welcome after the stultifying heat of the day.
They continued until they came to the shelter of a stunted copse of trees. Ryan signaled for them to stop and, using the wood around them, they set about building a fire. The arid wasteland seemed deserted, but the light and heat was for protection as much as their own warmth. It would enable them to keep a lookout for any marauding nocturnal creatures. There had been no sign of any kind of life so far, but that wasn’t surprising considering the intense heat of the day. Anything that could live in such conditions would have to be hardy, and also nocturnal. The night, when they were trying to rest before the rigor of the next day, would be the dangerous time.
The companions organized themselves into watches and tried to rest. But, despite the clothes and thermal blankets they had taken from the redoubt stores, the cold seeped into their bones. When the time came to be roused for watch, none of them could safely say that they had gotten much rest.
As the sun rose the next morning, the companions were out of sorts and tired. Not one of them had had a good night’s rest.
“Gaia, but I hope this changes soon,” Krysty said as she stretched, looking up to the green-purple sky and making the most of that brief period between the chill of night and the heat of day.
“It can’t stretch like this for much farther. We should hit the coast soon,” J.B. stated.
“Trouble is, what kind of condition are we going to be in when we do?” Mildred commented. “The salt tablets won’t last forever and neither will the water.”
“We press on. Can’t turn back,” Ryan said simply.
Doc fixed Ryan with a stare. His blue eyes, sometimes clouded with troubled visions that only he could see, were today startlingly clear. He could almost see into Ryan’s heart, see the pain. But at what cost to the rest of them? He chose to say nothing—this wasn’t the time—and handed out self-heats to the other companions, leaving Ryan to last. The one-eyed man gestured that he wasn’t hungry.
“My dear boy, I do not care whether you are or not. You have to eat, keep up your strength. We are relying on you, do not forget,” he added with emphasis. “You are of little use to us if you do not have the energy reserves to march or to fight…and of little use to yourself in such a case, I should not wonder.”
Ryan frowned and studied the old man intently. He was right, of course, he was. The one-eyed man took the food. It was bland and chemical-tasting, as self-heats usually were, but it was energy. That was all that mattered.
“J.B., you reckon we’re still headed in the right direction?” he asked. The Armorer checked his minisextant with the sun and confirmed that they were still on south-southwest. “Then I figure we keep going. We’ve come too far to turn back. It has to get better…”
“More out there,” Jak commented. “Smell it, hear it. Mebbe not much, but something survives on more than this.” He bent and took a handful of the dry soil, letting it run through his fingers.
“Then let’s go,” Ryan decided. “Sooner we move, sooner we get the hell out of this.”
They broke camp and set off once more. Mildred wondered if she was the only one to detect the double entendre in Ryan’s choice of words. From the way that Krysty was looking at the one-eyed man, she suspected not.
Jak had been correct. It was a subtle change, and it took some while for them to notice, but the Gila monster that sprung across the line as they marched brought it home. The conditions were improving. The air was still stifling and the heat from the sun was still intense, but there was a lessening in the humidity. Looking up, they could see that the cloud cover was spare, the chem clouds allowing more of the sky to show through untainted. The soil around was still dry, but there were signs of lichen and fern. The grasses looked less stark. They were softer clumps, thicker and more lush. The trees appeared to twist less, the root systems seemingly able to burrow a little deeper into the earth.
Stopping to take note, Jak could tell that there was more wildlife. He could hear birds, see a few in the distance. Obviously poor, scrawny creatures, they were there, nonetheless. As were the reptiles and insects—more than that Gila monster or the dung beetle that now crawled across his combat boot. Even the presence of a dung beetle suggested mammals from which it could scavenge. Small one, mebbe, no more. The albino could sense no danger in the shape of larger predators.
Jak allowed himself a small smile. “More life—mebbe food and water and not so much heat,” he said to the others.
“Mebbe. Press on some more before we rest, see if we can find out what,” Ryan replied. For the first time in days, a smile creased his seemingly ever-grim visage.
They moved forward with a renewed sense of purpose and a pace quickened by expectation. And as they moved, so the landscape around them seemed to improve with every half mile they traversed. The dusty top layer of soil gave way to hard-packed ground beneath, which became that much softer beneath the trampling of their feet. The patches of grass and lichen spread out so that the exposed soil became an exception rather than the rule. And the musk of animal life grew stronger around them, becoming almost tangible.
Which should have been a warning.
The farther from the redoubt, the more the landscape began to resemble something that could feasibly support life. It was almost as if the redoubt itself had somehow acted as the epicenter for the desert area. Perhaps it had. Although the toxicity would have abated within the area itself, it was possible that the military activity in the redoubt had concentrated on chemical warfare, which was reflected in the desola
tion. The thought crossed Mildred’s mind and she made a note to check herself and the others for any signs of contamination that may occur in the next few days. Assuming that the next few days would be quiet enough to allow for such a check.
It seemed as though quiet might be the case as the day slowly faded into twilight and they put distance between themselves and the barren land. It was still stiflingly hot, but even so the temperature had dropped a few degrees and the lusher vegetation allowed for more shelter from the direct heat of the sun.
It also provided hiding places for the wildlife that became more prevalent.
Jak slowed and focused his attention on a clump of turquoise-berried shrubbery wild with red and yellow leaves among the green.
“What?” Ryan questioned briefly, stopping as he noticed the albino hunter slow down.
Jak answered him with an almost imperceptible nod, not bothering to shift the glare of his red eyes from his target. In a smooth, fluid motion he palmed a leaf-bladed throwing knife from within his patched camou jacket. The knife left his hand with minimal effort, flashing through the air and into the clump of vegetation.
There was a squeal—fear and pain mixed on a screeching note—and the bush seemed to take on a life of its own, exploding as two creatures shot outward in a blur of motion. They were moving away from the companions, fleeing in fear, but the death rattle from the shrub suggested that there had been a third creature and that Jak’s aim had been true.
Ryan moved toward the vegetation, the SIG-Sauer in his hand, ready to blast anything that may present the merest hint of a threat. He used his heavy combat boot, raised tentatively, to open up the dense foliage. It would take an incredibly strong bite or claw to go through the toughened leather, and he was unwilling to risk a more vulnerable hand or arm to the task.