Desert Kings

by James Axler

  With a low hydraulic sigh, the side of the lead wag cycled open and Delphi stepped onto the beach, Cotton and a few other troopers close behind. A soft breeze ruffled their clothing and hair, the dank air ripe with the pungent smell of filth and decay.

  “What a rad pit!” Cotton exhorted, hitching her gunbelt. “No wonder we never came this way before.”

  “Guess that’s why the locals call it Bad Water Lake,” a trooper drawled, scratching his unshaved neck. The man felt itchy just looking at the colossal quagmire.

  Another trooper grunted in agreement. “Shitfire, I’d rather walk across a rad pit naked than dip a toe in this stinking drek hole!”

  “I heartily agree,” Delphi muttered in annoyance, running a hand across his smooth blond hair. The cyborg did not recall the lake being in such a poor condition. Had it gotten worse, or were his memory circuits faulty? Briefly, he tried to access any still-functioning satellites overhead, but there was only the steady crackle of static from the thick layer of radioactive isotopes blanketing the world just behind the storm clouds.

  Suddenly a low swell lifted the scum and moved across the lake only to disappear down into the secret depths once more.

  “What was that, the tide or something?” a trooper asked nervously, tightening the grip on his BAR longblaster.

  “Something,” Delphi answered in droll amusement. “There are muties in the deep parts of the lake. They rarely come to the surface, but when they do, it is best not to be around.”

  “I zero that, Chief,” a sec woman replied with a grim expression.

  “Ever seen one of ’em, Chief?” a trooper asked curiously. “I heard tell of sea muties before. Krakens, they were called. Nothing but tentacles and teeth.”

  But Delphi said nothing in reply, his eyes narrowed in somber contemplation. Teeth in the water. No, surely the warning had been for the rodents in the millet field.

  “Mannheim, Caruthers, Beltran! Keep a finger on the triggers of the autoblasters!” Cotton shouted over a shoulder, unwilling to take her sight off the Stygian pool. “If anything comes into view from that pest bog, blast it!”

  In response, there came a chorus of metallic clicks from the Vulcan 20 mm rapid-fires on top of each wag as the safeties were released.

  Crossing his arms, Delphi scowled. The four war wags were all modified forms of a LAV 25, Piranha-class transport, and were waterproof, capable of floating for days. But there was no way in nuking hell he was going to risk crossing this stagnant pool of toxic chems just to save a few days. No, they’d have to take the long way around. Unfortunately, both directions were equally unappealing. To the north were mountains with deep ravines that might be impossible to cross, not to mention snow avalanches, and to the south was the Great Salt, and more stinking muties than he could think. Impossible terrain or nonstop combat. Damned if we do and damned if we don’t, he thought.

  “Okay, Chief, which direction do we try?” Cotton asked, squinting sideways.

  Weighing the options, Delphi started to reply when an internal alarm sounded inside his head. What in the…Son of a bitch, the LAV had just been destroyed! And less than a hundred miles to the east! He looked in that direction. But how was that possible? The nearest ville would be…Pine ville. But the cyborg had established that was a secure zone, a fallback position in case he ever needed to hide from TITAN. The LAV was programmed to never approach the ville under any circumstances.

  Which left only four distinct possibilities. The machine might have suffered some sort of malfunction and actually was in fine shape but was simply unable to broadcast anymore. That made the most sense. Second, that some natural disaster had destroyed the LAV, a volcano or an earthquake. Not an unreasonable possibility. But with the on-board protocols in effect, that seemed rather far-fetched. Third, an operative of TITAN could have found the machine and destroyed it. Delphi didn’t like that idea very much. It would mean that TITAN was now on the move against him, aggressive instead of reactive. He’d have to start watching for traps. The fourth possibility was the least likely, almost ridiculous, but the more Delphi considered it, the more it seemed to make some sort of horrible sense.

  Ryan, the cyborg raged silently. The LAV had to have been destroyed by Ryan, Tanner and the others! Logically that meant they had been hunting for him from the Colorado redoubt where the LAV had been in storage. Which also meant they were now heavily armed with AK-47 assault rifles and grenades. More than an equal for his troopers. The cyborg flexed his hand, feeling the weight of the damaged Educator buried inside his plastic skin. But not for his war wags, and certainly not for him.

  “Everybody back in the wags!” Delphi bellowed. “Get razor, people, we’re heading south!”

  “Across the Great Salt?” Cotton gasped, taken aback. “North would be a lot easier.”

  “And slower,” Delphi retorted. “We have more than enough firepower for anything, or any thing, that gets in our fragging way.”

  “If you say so, sir,” the woman relented hesitantly. “But why the rush? Why not take the time and go around the long way?”

  “Let’s just say that I heard a hoot,” Delphi replied, giving a carefully calculated half smile.

  The rest of the troopers grinned back, taking heart at his bravado.

  Blind Norad, they were dumber than stickies.

  “Besides, have I ever steered you wrong before?” the cyborg added.

  “No, sir, you haven’t,” Cotton replied, straightening her shoulders. “Okay, Chief, give the word and we’ll follow you right into nuking hell!”

  Good, Delphi mentally noted, starting back to the waiting machines. Because that was exactly where they were heading.

  Straight to hell.

  REACHING THE CREST of a low desert hillock, Chief Stirling paused to look around the desolate countryside. There was a blast crater to the south, the rill of lava thrusting upward like a picket fence of spears. But there was no glow in the air above the crater, so it was probably safe for the two men to stay in the area. Just not for too long, the sec chief amended privately.

  The weathered ruins of a predark city rose on the horizon to the west: concrete bridges broken off in mid-span, the crumpled remains of buildings littering the grounds. In every direction around the ruins were scattered pieces of broken tech, debris thrown wide of the nukestorm and embedded by the pervasive desert sand: a white enamel sink with the faucet still attached, the rim of a car tire, a topless female mannequin, the bent hatch to a tank, a gravestone, a stuffed bear.

  Removing the stopper from a canteen, Edward Rogan took a small sip of the lukewarm water and held it in his mouth for a minute to allow the tissues to absorb the fluid before finally allowing himself to swallow. As with everything else, there was an art to staying alive in the desert.

  “What a drek hole,” Rogan commented, scowling at the landscape. There was nothing in sight but desolation. Not even any trees to offer shade, or a trickling creek. It was the type of place a man would ride through on the way to somewhere else.

  “Seen worse, but not by much,” Stirling replied, pulling down his neckerchief. Pouring a few drops of water into a calloused palm, the man vigorously rubbed the water over his face. Damn, it was a hot day! And there was still a long way to ride before reaching Bad Water Lake. What they would do then, he wasn’t sure. But if Ryan and the others were in some sort of trouble, he’d just head for the sounds of chilling and watch out for flying lead.

  Snorting in reply, Rogan started to take another sip, but paused at the sound of thin metal fluttering in the wind. Only there was no wind to be felt this day. Not even a breeze.

  Easing a hand to his Webley, the huge sec man looked warily over a shoulder to see what made the noise, then he paused to blink in surprise.

  “Well, nuke me.” Rogan chuckled. “Looky there!”

  Turning fast, Stirling leveled his sawed-off alley-sweeper, then lowered the weapon when he saw an old, predark sign sticking out of the side of a small sand dune. Surrounded b
y tumbleweeds, the worn metal was heavily corroded with rust, but there was still just enough paint on the surface for him to see the vague outline of a red horse with wings. A red-winged horse.

  “Son of a bitch,” the sec chief whispered, resting the double-barrels on his shoulder. “Just like that doomie told us about. Think we should have a recce?”

  But Rogan was already off his mount and throwing the reins over a clump of cacti festooned with colorful flowers.

  “Yeah, guess so,” Stirling relented, and did the same to his own stallion to join the norm standing near the sign.

  “Okay, now what?” he asked bluntly.

  “How the frag do I know?” Rogan muttered, then squinted against the harsh sunlight. There was a dark shadow behind the tumbleweeds.

  Approaching the plants as if they were a pit full of stickies, Rogan saw they were plastic and lashed into position with thick nylon rope.

  “Markers,” Stirling whispered, swinging up his sawed-off again and clicking back the two hammers. “This is a cache for somebody. Mebbe coldhearts or slavers.”

  Or Delphi, Rogan mused, but he did not say that thought out loud. The chief did not know that he had once worked for the Delphi, only that he hated the bastard and wanted to ace him personally. That alone was enough of a bond to make the two men friends. The sluts could yak about love, but hatred kept a man strong, like powder in a blaster.

  Going to the largest tumbleweed, Rogan looked around carefully and grunted upon spotting a spring-loaded mantrap in the sawgrass. Moving back a few feet, he found a stick and tossed it onto the pressure plate of the trap. The rusty steel jaws closed with a resounding bang that made it leap off the ground and rattle the chain that anchored it to a wooden hatch set flush to the hard sand.

  “Watch for another,” Stirling warned knowingly, running a hand over his blue tattoo. “Nobody but a stupe leaves only one trap.”

  Nodding, Rogan used his machete to probe the edge of the hatch until finding the locking mechanism. Twisting the blade, he felt the lock give and jerked back fast as a scattergun boomed from the tunnel below. Dropping flat, the two men heard objects humming past them overhead for a few seconds. Then there was only silence and a spreading dust cloud that expanded until it was thinned down to nothing. The noise echoed across the sandy desert for a long time.

  Easing their heads over the jamb, the two men looked down into the tunnel to see a worn iron ladder attached to a cinder-block wall, electric lights glowing dimly from the concrete ceiling. The sec men exchanged excited looks. This was no trader’s cache, but a baron’s bolthole!

  Tossing down another stick, Rogan saw there was no reaction from the walls or floor of the predark tunnel. But Stirling held the man back and threw down a heavy stone. It hit the floor and cracked apart setting off another blaster hidden inside the wall.

  “Bastard really protected his stuff well,” Rogan said in grudging admiration.

  “Almost too well,” Stirling agreed, titling back his hat. “If we find any more traps, mebbe we should move on.”

  “No prob there. I like my guts where they are right now, safe inside me.”

  “You can load that into a blaster and fire it, my friend.”

  Testing the ladder with more sticks and stones, the two men made it down to the floor where they found a trip wire. Stepping over the wire, they crept around a corner and gasped.

  The next room was a storehouse of blasters and munitions. Plastic pallets lined the floor, and metal shelving covered the walls, every inch of the depot packed with mil supplies: combat boots, vacuum-packed fatigues in clear plastic bags, web holsters, ammo, grens, a pile of canvas satchels marked C-4 and a row of plastic tubes of unknown function. In the corner, a dusty canvas sheet was draped over something large and irregularly shaped.

  “Rapid-fires!” Rogan snorted in delight, taking an M-16 assault rifle down from a wall rack. “She’s packed with gel, but looks in perfect shape!”

  Already at the pallets of grens, Stirling was checking over the explosive charges for any signs of rust or corrosion. But they seemed to be in the same perfect condition as everything else. As if the cache had only been filled a few days ago. That stirred a dark suspicion at the back of his mind, but how anybody giving them a fortune in blasters could be a bad thing he had no idea. But instincts honed in a hundred battles told him this whole cache was some sort of clever trap. Stirling just wasn’t sure who it was set to ace.

  “LAWS!” Rogan laughed, lifting one of the plastic tubes. “These are fire rockets that fly farther than arrows and are hot like a dozen bombs!”

  Easing down the hammers on his double-barrel, Stirling gave a low whistle. “A man could take over a ville with this lot,” he said in a carefully measured tone.

  As if sensing trouble, Rogan turned. “You saved my ass,” he said bluntly, “and I gave Baron O’Connor my word. Never meant much before, but it does to you.” He said the last word strongly, thrusting out a finger. “I want this stuff so I can chill Delphi, then we give the rest to the baron. Got no interest in becoming one myself. Savvy?”

  “Natch,” Stirling said after a moment. Then he grinned. “So let’s loot the place, amigo! With these sorts of blasters, Delphi is gonna be eating dirt by noon!”

  “Fragging hope so,” Rogan muttered darkly, going to the corner and yanking away the canvas sheet. “Mebbe this is a flame-thrower or a—Nuke me!”

  With the soft sound of powerful hydraulics, the sec hunter droid slowly rose to its full height and took a single step toward the startled men, the thick steel arms extending to proffer the spinning metal blades.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The smoke slowly faded into the distance behind the companions as their battered war wag lumbered along the rolling hillside. Evening was darkening the world before they reached flat ground once more and stopped to refuel. The big barrels of diesel were tapped, the juice flowing into plastic buckets with a cloth stretched over them to filter out any dirt or debris that might have gotten mixed into the precious liquid.

  “Watch for any flashes of light,” Ryan warned, standing guard while Jak and Doc emptied the buckets into the rusty steel fuel tanks of the big rig. “Anything bright could be a war wag coming this way.”

  “Or a laser targeting us for a missile strike,” Krysty added ominously, working the arming bolt on a Kalashnikov. Standing in the rear of the flatbed gave the woman much greater visibility, and she was keeping a close watch on the setting sun. That was the direction Delphi would attack from if possible, hiding his advance in the dying glare.

  “If see, what do?” Jak asked, lowering the empty can to the ground and wiping a sheen of sweat from his brow.

  “Do?” Mildred repeated. “If a contrail starts arcing into the sky, we jump ship and run like the blazes!”

  “Thank you, Sister Mary Sunshine,” Doc said sarcastically, an AK-47 resting in his hands.

  “Even paranoids have enemies, Theophilus,” Mildred said, then chuckled, keeping a tight grip on the Kalashnikov. It had a massively greater range than her ZKR target pistol, and while the scope was low power, it was better than nothing. Mikhail Kalashnikov had invented a damn fine weapon.

  It was funny, the physician realized, back in her time this was the chosen weapon for the enemies of America: the Soviet Union, Vietcong, Arab terrorists, Colombian drug lords and the like, and here it was the protector of civilization. The irony would have been amusing if it wasn’t so damn heartbreaking.

  “Full,” Ryan announced, tossing the empty fuel can over the splintery wooden armor of the flatbed. It landed with a hollow clatter on the corrugated floor. “Let’s roll while we still have some daylight left.”

  “Miles to go before we sleep, eh, Doc?” J.B. said with a smile, trudging into the rear of the big rig.

  “Indubitably, sir,” Doc answered, stoically still on guard. “And as the poet so wisely added, we also have many promises to keep err we dare to sleep.”

  “Like acing Delphi,” Jak not
ed grimly, flipping his jacket over a shoulder and climbing into the cab. It was his turn to drive, and he was looking forward to operating the big rig. Ever since he saw his first wag, a steam jenny powering a water pump, the albino teen had liked machines. He considered them to be just like blasters. Not good or bad. Just tools. It all depended on who was holding the controls.

  After removing his jacket and setting it aside, Jak started the engine and ran a check over the controls while Doc got in the passenger seat to ride shotgun. The albino teen hunter knew everything had to be okay with the rig, or else Ryan or J.B. would have told him.

  Doc saw the condition of the teenager, and wisely slipped off his own frock coat and folded it neatly on the front seat. Even though night was coming, the air was steadily getting warmer. The companions were approaching the Great Salt, a vast crystalline plain of sizzling desert and sun-baked rock where nothing grew but the body count.

  Rumbling black smoke from the overhead exhaust pipes, Jak worked the gearshift and brake, and the Mack lurched into motion, starting across the barren flatlands and steadily building speed as they headed directly into the setting sun.

  “Miles go before sleep,” Jak said, shifting gears. “Know any other poems?”

  “Certainly!” Doc said with a smile, the barrel of the Kalashnikov protruding out the open window. “I have every sonnet written by Shakespeare memorized! Along with most of Milton’s ‘Paradise Lost,’ Dante’s ‘The Inferno,’ the collected works of Walt Whitman, Emily Bronte, Alfred Lord Tennyson—”

  “Anything good?” the teen interrupted, putting a lot of emphasis on the last word.

  “But they’re all excellent…” Doc started, sounding puzzled, then thoughtfully pursed his lips. “Ah, you mean ribald! Well, there is a most disrespectful limerick about a rather special fellow from Nantucket…”