by James Axler
"I'm glad you said it and I didn't," Mildred said. "I'd give anything for a tape recorder right now."
The steady forward momentum the two amphibian mutants had created as they pulled the raft along suddenly ceased, and the rope stretching into the water went slack for a final time.
"Looks like the free ride's over," J.B. observed.
"Guess they didn't want a personal thank-you," Mildred added lightly, giving her man a quick one-armed hug around the waist.
"Think we'll have to swim the rest of the way in, Dad?" Dean asked.
Ryan didn't answer. He was peering at the dock and the windmills.
"No," he said finally. "We're still on a direct course with the dock. See the ladder?"
He pointed at the lower front section of the dock.
"Tide'll take us right to it, I hope."
The one-eyed man was proved right. The yellow raft uncannily drifted into the proper position. Ryan and the Armorer both reached out and grabbed the lower rung.
"Like this balloon was remote controlled or something," Dean observed excitedly. "Slid in just like a hot pipe."
Now that the raft was stable and they had a place to go, J.B. scanned the area as best he could before actually exiting into the unknown. "What's the drill?" he asked. "Our friends seem to have pulled a vanishing act."
"Not much choice in the matter, J.B. We go ashore and see who's been building windmills," Ryan replied. "Mildred, see if you can get Doc to snap out of it long enough to use his hands and his feet. We're going to have to climb out of here and get on dry land."
"I'm not sure how much walking he's going to be able to do once he's on the dock," Mildred warned, lifting one of Doc's rubbery arms and dropping it back down with a wet slap as it hit the bottom of the life raft. "I'm not sure how much more I'm going to be able to take myself. We're all as weak as newborns."
"Not me! I feel great! Hungry as a two-headed mutie tiger, but I feel good," Dean said. "I'm ready to do some exploring."
"Sure, Dean, I'm feeling the adrenaline surge, too," Ryan told his son. "We've found a safe harbor, but once we get up on that dock, I doubt we're going to be able to do much of anything beyond a measured crawl."
The one-eyed warrior reached out, taking a rung of the wooden ladder and pulling himself upright. He was the first man out of the raft, his blaster in hand.
"Come on, Doc," Mildred said. "Rise and shine."
"Are we there yet?" Doc asked weakly.
DEAN SPOTTED A TRENCH with running water as soon as they stepped off the dock and onto the grassy beach lands where the windmills were standing.
"Hot damn! Water!"
"Hold up before you go drinking, Dean," Ryan warned. "Odds are these windmills are pumping some kind of seawater."
J.B. cupped a handful to his nostrils and sniffed. "Yeah, this is salty. Least, it smells salty. Course, everything smells salty to me after being out in that raft as long as we were."
"Looks like a settlement over there," Mildred said, pointing toward a group of tents and other structures in the near distance. No one there had noticed the visitors yet, or if they had, they weren't too excited about it.
The architecture of the settlement was nonexistent. Most of the shelters that came into view as Ryan and the others warily approached were indeed nothing more than old tents. There was a handful of recycled travel trailers and a broken-down motor home that was more rust than metal. A large circus tent with a high ceiling and faded strips of red and yellow stood near the center of the misshapen community. Picnic tables of wood were scattered in front of the tent and by a natural well, which appeared to serve as the source for fresh drinking water and bathing since three old white porcelain bathtubs with the plugs permanently adhered into their drains were behind a portable curtain.
Most of the people seemed to be dressed in similar loose-fitting jumpsuits.
"What kind of ville is this?" Dean asked, cocking his head in a quizzical fashion.
"Not a ville. It's a commune," a woman retorted. "What you see is what you get, so don't go shooting off those blasters or trying to push people around. Mind your business like everyone else is doing, you're welcome to stay."
"A commune, you say? So, where are the flowers in your hair, madam?" Doc asked.
"Haven't worn flowers in years, but it's a nice sentiment. I'm Shauna Watson. I run the place, such as it is."
"Ryan Cawdor," Ryan replied. "This here's my boy, Dean. The older man is Doc Tanner. J. B. Dix is on his right. The lady's Dr. Mildred Wyeth."
Shauna Watson looked to be about forty years old. Her thick black hair was cut painfully short to the scalp. Blue eyes, the same color as the blades of the windmill the companions had first seen, were set in a tanned face. Freckles dotted the bridge of her pug nose. She'd been cute, once—that much could be seen. Now, approaching middle age had taken a new spin, giving her an elfin, gamine quality she'd carry to her grave.
Like the others in her commune, she was wearing a one-piece khaki jumpsuit with a zipper running down the length of the front from throat to crotch.
The zipper was open down to the navel, leaving little to the imagination regarding her small yet still firm breasts. The sleeves of the functional attire were rolled up high on her upper arms, revealing veined biceps. Shauna wasn't a woman used to sitting back and letting others do the work. Knee-high boots with a flat heel and a wide utility-type work belt completed the ensemble.
"Two doctors?" Shauna said, looking at Doc and Mildred. "We could use a physician."
"Only one to choose from, I'm afraid," Doc interjected, having returned to his usual demeanor once more. "I am a doctor of letters. My colleague is the general practitioner."
"Got a little girl broke her arm just yesterday. I've tried to set up a temporary splint, but I'm no medic. Would you mind?"
"Not at all, but I've got to get some kind of nourishment in my stomach," Mildred said. "The shape I'm in right now, I wouldn't be much help to anybody."
"Fair enough. We can get together some food while your party washes up." Her gaze fell to the holster of Ryan's SIG-Sauer, as well as the other hardware the group was carrying.
"What is the story behind the blasters? You and your group are packing enough heat to burn down my entire place here without even emptying the clips."
"Protection," Ryan said. "The only man without a blaster these days is a dead one."
"You free-lancing for Poseidon? Doing merc work?"
"No. We don't even know who Poseidon is," Ryan said.
"One of the men when we first obtained our vessel mentioned a Lord Poseidon," Doc said. "They mockingly called themselves disciples."
Shauna snorted. "Calling himself a lord now, is he? Guess it's a good a title as any. Yeah, Lord Poseidon is a real piece of work, showing up here all the time and bleeding us dry. Bastard. No naval vessels can enter this part of the coast without his say-so."
"We did—" Mildred began to say, and stopped.
"Yeah, and then you found out the hard way about his paranoid little piece of the world," Shauna added. "The Admiral doesn't like surprises. He's the one who blew your boat out from under you."
Ryan's eye narrowed. "He's the one who caused the accident?"
"Unless you had a chart with the locations of the mines."
Ryan felt like he'd just been knifed in the stomach and gutted up to his chin. The sensation was a mix of pleasure and pain. The mine that had wrecked the Patch had a source, and the source's name was Poseidon. His hand shot out and grabbed Shauna by the upper arm, pulling her close to him.
"I have a debt to settle with your Admiral," he grated.
"Don't we all?" a new voice said from the nearby tent. The group turned and saw not a person, but the twin barrels of a shotgun sticking out of a window flap. "Let the lady go, One-eye, and we'll give you all the dope you need to know about Poseidon. Believe me, we don't exactly care for the son of a bitch, either."
"How did you know about ou
r boat?" Ryan asked the woman.
"Mike told me. Mike and Ida," she replied.
"Mike and Ida?" Dean retorted. "What kind of stupe names are those?"
"Mike and Ida are what we call the two Dwellers who saved your ass, boy," Shauna said. "You've seen them, so you know they're muties. Far as I can tell, Mike must've heard the explosion, mebbe he was even out that way when it happened. He's the one who found you, came back and discussed it with his people. They sent him to me, and we were all in agreement to bring you in."
Ryan tamped down his rage and released his grip on Shauna's arm.
She rubbed her upper arm vigorously to return the circulation. Ryan's fingers had clamped down like steel bands.
"Now," she said, "I'm letting all of you keep your blasters, just to show we can trust one another. Here at the commune, our day-to-day survival depends on our word."
"My word's good," Ryan said. "You'll have no trouble from us."
"You speak for the ones with you?" came the voice behind the shotgun.
"I do."
"I'm coming out, then."
A tall lean man with long blond hair and brown eyes stepped from hiding. For a change, he wasn't wearing one of the jumpsuits. He wasn't wearing much of anything at all but a pair of oft-repaired, cutoff blue jeans and a worn pair of sandals. Besides staying cool in the heat, the reason for his lack of clothing was undoubtedly to maintain a rich brown tan, and to show off the ornate tattooing that covered his entire body.
The shotgun was still leveled at the group.
"Name's Alan Carter," the man finally said, lowering the weapon. "I heard who you are. I'm sec man for the commune."
"Real trusting for a sec man, aren't you?" J.B. asked.
"Not really. But you said the magic word when you mentioned Poseidon," Carter responded. "I, for one, would like to see him dead, and any enemy of his is a friend of mine."
Ryan took in the pattern of tattoos that wrapped around Carter's chest, back, neck, arms and legs. The canvas his body had provided was a work of skin art. The subject seemed to be a mix of demons and machinery: skeletons with blazing skulls atop roaring motorcycles; green-faced monsters with pop-eyes and fangs, their tongues lolling out long and wet behind them as they shifted gears with floor-clutch rigs as big as their freakish heads; even homed devils atop rocket ships, waving their pitchforks as they blasted off into the great beyond.
"Nightmarish," Doc said, also gazing upon the tattoos. "How do you sleep at night?"
"By closing my eyes."
"About the accident…were there any casualties?" Shauna asked.
"Two," Ryan replied, his voice nearly catching in his throat. "A man and a woman, Jak Lauren and Krysty Wroth. I don't suppose your Mike found any more survivors?"
"No, he didn't."
"They'd be pretty hard to miss. Jak's a full albino and Krysty's got the reddest hair this side of a sunset."
"Sorry, Cawdor, but no. You and your buds are it."
"Mebbe another one of his mutie friends?"
"No bodies, no trace. Nothing," Carter said.
"Take a moment to wash up," Shauna said, gesturing toward the community baths. "I'll get supper going earlier than usual in your honor. After you're done, come inside the big tent here. Obviously we need to talk."
Chapter Fifteen
"Funny, I still feel wrong speaking of them in the past tense. I can't think of them as being dead. Not yet." Ryan stood on those words and began to pace along the earthen floor of the large central commune tent. The rest of his friends minus Mildred, who was checking the injured child, and Alan Carter and Shauna Watson were seated at various places along the numerous tables inside the tent. Normally this was the community dining room, but it also served as a place for meetings.
A meal was being prepared at the back of the tent while they talked.
"Before, Krysty's death seemed to be fate spitting down on my head again," Ryan continued. "Now I've got a face and a name to put on who took her from me."
"Poseidon's been responsible for a lot of deaths, Cawdor," Shauna said. "How far you intending to take this?"
"As far as it goes," Ryan replied.
Shauna nodded back. "Good."
"Why were you here?" Carter asked. "We don't get many sea travelers."
"We were looking to head up the coast. Head for the Carolinas, Virginia mebbe. Too damned hot down here," Ryan said. "No real agenda."
"I'd like to know more about these mutants," Mildred said as she entered, overhearing the end of the conversation and casually trying to change the subject from Ryan's lust for revenge on Poseidon. "Have they always been here?"
"As long as I can remember, Dr. Wyeth, but we don't know where the poor bastards were originally spawned," Shauna said. "There are old stories about a colony of test subjects housed on an old oil rig located far offshore. Scientists were living there while trying to create a new race of mutie. The Dwellers seem to be the result."
"So, how many of them are there?"
"About a dozen adults," Carter said. "A few kids. Most of their young are stillborn. Because of the high death rate, they treasure their children above all else. We never actually get to see the children. Except for me and a few others in the commune here, the Dwellers tend to shun contact with landers."
"Can't blame them for that."
"We have a trade deal with them similar to the one we have to maintain with Poseidon—except the mutants are much more fair and humane. No surprise there."
"They do talk, then? Ryan said he heard one speak to him," Mildred said.
"Right," Ryan added, but he really wasn't listening. Shauna's mention of a trade deal had him distracted. He was beginning to have the glimmer of an idea.
"Speech isn't very comfortable for them, especially English. The only reason Mike can talk as well as he does is because it's a carryover from his former humanity. They prefer to communicate in wordless ways. Their eyes, facial expressions—you know, body language."
"Tell me the pattern," Ryan said. "What's the usual way you go about trading?"
"Once a day, at sunset, we go and trade," Shauna replied. "What we have to offer is minuscule compared to the amount of seafood they bring us, but I think they like having us as neighbors, so they never complain."
"No, no, not the muties," Ryan said impatiently. "I'm talking about Poseidon."
"Once a week now that it's getting warmer," Carter said. "He should be sending a wag in to pick up his 'tribute' in the next day or two. Why?"
"Might have an idea. Let you know when," Ryan replied.
"Actually, before he got his navy fetish, Poseidon was rumored to be involved with the project that created the Dwellers," Shauna said. "Course, he couldn't have been more than a kid. I doubt he was the one actually doing the genetic engineering. Probably his old man or another relative."
"We have a lot in common with the muties," Carter added. "We all want to be left alone to live our own lives, simple as that. For them, Poseidon and his fleet aren't much of a threat, but for us, as long as he continues to show up demanding tribute for his so-called protection of our waterways, we can never hope to be safe."
Doc cleared his throat from across the tent's interior. "The truth lies in the name."
"Dammit, Doc, you need to be resting." Mildred crossed the room and reached down to take Doc's pulse.
"I am resting, my good woman. I cannot remember a time in recent memory when I was more at ease," Doc retorted. "There's dry land beneath my boot heels, the sky is sunny and warm without a hint of rain. I am dry and relatively clean. Life, for the immediate moment, is good."
He was telling the truth. His pulse was steady and true, and the ashen color his face had taken on was starting to fade back to its usual healthier sallow pallor—the natural skin tone the old man wore when up to full fighting strength.
"Go ahead, Doc. I recognize the look in your eye. You've got something to tell us," Mildred said. "But try and keep it shor
t. None of us are in the mood to be lectured at."
"Very well, Dr. Wyeth. As I was saying, the truth behind our unseen foe lies in the name he has chosen for himself. For one who has his origins in the sea, and continues to attempt to dominate his own little kingdom, the name of Poseidon is an inspired selection."
"How so?" Ryan asked, his own interest now spurred by Doc's comments.
"Greek mythology, sir," Doc said, propping himself up on an elbow as best he could without falling out of the flimsy folding cot, "the timeless tales of the ancient gods and the human heroes who tried vainly to live up to the examples set by their masters. Unfortunately for all of humanity, the gods, too, were as flawed as their human creations."
"Always wondered why everything was so screwed up," J.B. said.
"Poseidon was lord of the sea, and friend enough to man to present him with the first equine."
"First what?" Shauna said, frowning.
"First horse," Mildred translated. "Try and keep the florid speech patterns down to a level where we can all understand it, okay, Doc?"
"Of course, of course. Now where was I? Oh, yes. Poseidon was also brother to the mighty Zeus, the supreme ruler of all, and second only to him in eminence. Zeus was the storm bringer, ruler of the sky and master of the terrible thunderbolt. Poseidon's domain was nearly as great. His domain was the sea, and when he was not inhabiting the halls of grand Olympus with his brothers, Poseidon could be found below the waves in a magnificent palace of his own design."
"Sounds like the Admiral. He's always on or near or under the water somehow."
"Like Zeus, Poseidon was also a master of the storm, but only those at sea."
The memory of the storm and the subsequent accident was fresh in all of their minds.
Doc continued. "He carried a mighty trident, a three-pronged spear, with which he would shake and shatter whatever he pleased. In fact, Poseidon was commonly called 'Earth-Shaker.'"
"Lesson's over," Carter said. "The way they're waving in back, the food's ready."