by James Axler
The Armorer was grateful for the flares. Aside from the implo grens, the satchel was the lightest it had bee n in a long time. Some untrustworthy timing pencils, the spare boxes of ammo, the implo grens, a butane light, and that was about the lot. Good thing the droid had been in such bad condition. Using an implo inside a redoubt was as tricky as firing a shotgun inside a predark phone booth. It didn’t matter which direction you were aiming at, some of it was coming right back in your face.
Krysty lifted up the hood of the biggest wag and started to inspect the big diesel power plant, testing the hoses and wires and belts with her bare hands. She normally left such things to J.B., but this was a major job and all of them would have to help.
“Looks good so far,” she announced, bent far over the engine. “Somebody want to check the axles?”
“Hold it. Before we go any further, maybe I should go outside and see where we are,” J.B. offered. “Could be daylight out there. Could be a ville only a few miles away and we don’t need to rebuild a wag. Just walk there.”
Going through the glovebox for a map, Ryan found nothing but transport papers in military code and slammed it shut.
“Nuke that shit. We all go outside together,” he growled. “Open that blast door, and there could be a hundred millipedes waiting to rush in. Best to be mobile when we leave in case of trouble.”
The mental image of a nest of the muties made the Armorer grimace in spite of himself, and he recognized the wisdom of the caution. Rabbits ran fast, but they always ended up in the stew because they were stupid. Smart and slow was how you kept your head, as the Trader always used to say. True words.
As the companions worked on rebuilding the wag, a millipede scurried past the open doorway of the stairwell.
“Little bastards must be hidden somewhere we haven’t looked,” Dean growled, starting to reach for his blaster. But the insect was already gone, chased away from the nukelamps. He couldn’t imagine why J.B. had never tried making one of those before. They worked great.
“Fuck ’em,” Ryan decided, wiping off his hands before taking another bite of the venison jerky. He chewed for a while before continuing. “They can have the base. We’ll be leaving soon enough.”
In short order, a jack was found and the big wag was given the best of the assortment of tires from the other wrecks. Hoses were exchanged, wires replaced, wiper blades, everything they could replace with the simple tools available. Plus, a box full of spare parts, fuses and such. Just in case.
Slowly the hours ticked by and the air in the redoubt was becoming noticeably ripe from the dead bugs and sweating humans. More than once Ryan thought about opening the blast door to the outside, but decided against taking the chance. There was a small breeze of hot air coming from under the closet door. That would have to suffice until they were ready to roll. Might only get one chance at this, so be it better be good.
“Well, the nuke battery is in place,” Krysty said, stepping away from the engine of the wag and wiping off her hands. “We have plenty of power, and the tires are good. Just no juice left in the gas tank.”
“That we have to spare,” Ryan said, tightening the last of the fourteen lug nuts on the rear tire. “Fill the tank, and let’s take twenty additional cans, fifteen for us, five for bartering.”
“Why not take all of the cans we can fit?” Dean asked, then paused. “Because we have to leave room for us and supplies. Right. Never mind.”
“Trade juice?” Jak asked, starting to lug over the heavy fuel containers. “Ammo best. Few folks got wags, but all barons got blasters.”
“Fuel is better,” Mildred countered, removing the cap to the fuel tank. There was a sigh of escaping fumes as dry as a Baltimore martini. God, how she missed those. “Also, fuel is less deadly if it comes our way again.”
“Never heard of a Molotov?” J.B. asked, lashing the exhaust pipe tighter into place with a twisted length of stiff wire.
Then crawling from underneath the chassis, the man said, “Damn but that’s a good idea. Make some Molotovs in case of more millipedes. We got the juice to spare, and there was a bar full of empty liquor bottles in the officers’ mess. And Krysty found those foam cups before.”
“There was some liquid soap in the laundry, too,” Dean added, lugging over a can of fuel.
“Soap is good, but foam is better,” Ryan said, using his panga to scrape some corrosion off a set of electrical contacts. “But we’re also going to need additional water. The hot air that was coming from the cracked vent could mean we’re in a desert.”
In exaggerated care, Jak set down the cans with a sloshing thump. “From pipes in pump room. Might be okay.”
“Sounds good. But I want to test anything before we drink it,” Mildred warned, putting down the empty canister. “Clear doesn’t always mean clean.”
“Okay. Both go,” the lanky teenager told her.
Taking one of the nukelamps, the pair descended into the stairwell, and soon the glow from their light dimmed with distance. Over at the workbench, J.B. had lined up the soda bottles found earlier and started to hack the coffee cups to pieces and making neat little piles.
As Dean brought over another can of fuel, Doc joined him at the task, and Krysty took over pouring the juice into the tank.
“How much fuel and water we should take is the real problem,” Ryan said, thinking aloud. Cleaning the panga on a sleeve, he sheathed the blade and reconnected the electrical contacts. There was no way of checking the diesel until they started it up, so he was done for the moment.
“What do you mean?” Doc asked, setting down the cans and rubbing his palms for a moment.
Sitting on a wheel rim, Ryan pulled out a piece of jerky and chewed off a mouthful. “We don’t even know how far it is to the nearest ville, much less the next redoubt,” he stated, glancing at the dark tunnel that led to the blast doors. He had been trying very hard to think about what would happen if they couldn’t open the exit. Trapped inside with the millipedes until starvation drove them mad. Better to eat a blaster than go down that road.
“If we don’t know for sure, let’s take an equal balance,” Krysty said, pouring more fuel into the tank. There was a gurgling noise as some trapped air fought to reach the surface, and she waited a moment until the turbulence was settled. “That way we’re prepared for anything.”
“Works for me,” Ryan said, standing again, his break over.
Light brightened the stairwell, and the companions stepped behind the wrecked cars with hands on weapons until there was a sharp whistle announcing that everything was okay, and they relaxed. Seconds later, Mildred and Jak appeared in the doorway.
“Found water,” Jak said happily, pulling a hand truck up the last of the steps. The teenager then clumsily wheeled it around to then push a large steel drum into the garage.
“The pipes were empty from our shower,” Mildred said, carrying the nukelamp in one hand, her blaster in the other, “but we managed to find this drum and fill it with fifty-five gallons of water. It’s drainage from the reactor, all we could drain from an access pump.”
“Nuke water?” Doc demanded arching both snowy eyebrows. “By the Three Kennedys, madam, I have never been that thirsty! Are you quite sure it is safe?”
“See for yourself,” Mildred suggested, holstering her piece, as Jak lowered the hand truck with a bang, the drum sloshing loudly.
Removing the lid, J.B. unclipped the rad counter from his lapel and held it close to the clear fluid. The needle moved slightly.
“Low rads, seems safe enough to drink,” he said reluctantly.
“Of course,” Mildred stated, then added, “As long as we don’t do it too often.” The physician had no intention of trying to explain to the others that this was technically not water, but actually deutronium enriched water, heavy-water shielding for the fusion reactor. However, it was nonlethal and potable, and that was all that mattered.
Warily, Ryan checked his own rad counter and got a similar reading. “It
’s clean, all right. Okay, we use this as our backup supply,” he stated. “And the radiator gets it before us.”
“No prob,” Dean said, rubbing his mouth with the back of a hand. Nuke water. Hot pipe, he’d rather drink mutie pee than touch a drop of that, no matter what Mildred said.
“Done,” Krysty stated, screwing the cap back onto the fuel tank. “That’s every drop it can hold.”
“Put the rest in the back, and let’s try the engine,” Ryan said, swinging open the door and climbing behind the wheel. “Hopefully all this work wasn’t for shit.”
Pumping the gas pedal, he set the choke and pressed the starter. The engine sluggishly turned over with a sad groaning noise that slowly started to build in speed and volume. Pumping the gas harder, Ryan adjusted the choke to make the mixture to the carburetor richer and the engine sputtered briefly, then caught with a roar, banging and clanging.
Reaching under the hood, J.B. used a screwdriver to adjust something Ryan couldn’t see because of the angle, and the big diesel suddenly settled down to a low roar of controlled power.
“That’ll do it,” J.B. said with satisfaction, tucking the screwdriver into his munitions bag. “Better let her run until we’re ready to leave. That’ll give the seals a chance to absorb some oil before we put them under real pressure.”
Playing with the choke, Ryan got the engine lowered to a gentle rumble, the sputters coming with less and less frequency. They needed to run the engine to break it in before leaving, but with the ventilation system gone, the exhaust fumes mixed with the previous oil smoke and the mounting stink of the aced millipedes into a noxious reek that was getting worse by the minute.
“Okay, load her up,” Ryan said, resting an arm on the window. “Toss in anything you think we might need. With the power gone, once we’re outside, we’re not getting back in, so this is a one-way trip. Strip the place to the walls.”
The companions moved with a purpose, eager to leave the dying redoubt. Since there were no seats in the rear of the wag, they added a couple of the better mattresses from the officers’ quarters, and packed spare blankets, a shovel, spare rope, some chains, the box full of Molotovs, spare pieces of canvas from the other GMC trunks to use as patches, and all of the fuel containers they could comfortably fit. It took everybody, including Ryan, to hoist the water drum into the rear of the trunk, and they lashed it firmly in place in the middle of the fuel cans. Just a bit of extra insurance.
“That’s everything,” J.B. said, fighting a cough from the thickening atmosphere. “Let’s move out!” Slamming shut the gate and locking it into position with steel pins on both sides, he went to the front cab and climbed into the passenger seat alongside Ryan, laying the S&W shotgun between them where it couldn’t be seen from the ground.
“Expecting trouble, John Barrymore?” Doc rasped through the tiny slit of the rear window. There was a sliding panel to separate the cab from the cargo space, but it was open at the moment. The man was trying not to show it, but the filthy air was obviously hurting his throat.
“Just get ready for it,” the Armorer said tightly, checking the action on his Uzi machine gun.
“Hang on, this is going to be rough!” Ryan shouted to the people in the rear, his voice breaking for a moment. Fireblast, the air was almost thick enough to chew! His forehead was still hurting from the earlier slam, and this crap was making his entire head throb.
Shifting into a low gear, he threw the switch engaging the independent drive system and started to climb over the smashed cars until reaching the floor again. Now going to uniform drive, Ryan fed the big diesel some power and the front steel grate slammed into another wag knocking it aside. The jolt shook the entire group, and the people in the back had to hang on tight and drop their nukelamps.
“Put the pedal to the metal!” Mildred shouted, then paid for that by getting a lungful of the billowing smog and almost passing out.
Saving his breath, Ryan didn’t reply but did as she suggested and soon a clear area led the wag to another impasse blocked by wreckage. Using the independent drive again, he tried to keep the lumbering wag level as its weight noisily crumpled the hoods of luxury government cars and smaller vehicles.
“Running hot,” Ryan growled, shifting gears and pumping gas. “Don’t like that!”
“Ignore it. It’ll be fine,” J.B. answered, watching a millipede dart into the shadows away from the glaring headlights of the moving wag.
With a hard jounce, the wag hit the concrete floor again, and now there was nothing barring their way to the exit tunnel. Designed for much larger vehicles, the GMC 6×6 had plenty of room to traverse the zigzagging path of the antiradiation maze.
A dozen small cracks in the tunnel wall were brightly lit by the headlights of the vehicle, but none appeared deeper than a yard or so, and there was no sensation of a warm breeze. Actually, at this point, they would have welcomed it. Everybody was breathing hard as their lungs labored to draw in enough oxygen, and Krysty looked as if she were going to be ill at any moment.
Reaching the end of the access tunnel, spanning the wall before the 6×6 was a colossal black door large enough for a predark Army tank to roll through without hindrance. The two-and-one-half ton wag was a toy in comparison. Carefully, they looked it over for any warping or discolorization that would indicate a close nuke hit, but the dense metal was as smooth as satin without a mark.
Ryan braked to a halt, the companions staying alert while he slid out of the driver’s seat and J.B. went behind the wheel, covering him with the Uzi. Walking to the wall on an angle so that the headlights would illuminate his way, Ryan found an armored keypad set into the frame and tried the exit code, but nothing happened. Expecting that, he pried open a service hatch under the keypad and grabbed hold of the wheel. It took all of the man’s strength to get the mechanism working.
The wheel began to turn, gradually becoming looser, and the speed increased until there was a solid clunk. Releasing the wheel, Ryan pulled hard on the lever alongside and there was low rumble as the thick alloy door began to rise. A wave of heat washed into the redoubt, bringing a wealth of hot clean air. The companions breathed in deep, savoring the lack of smells even as wind blown sand hit the windshield of the wag with stinging force.
As Ryan took the passenger’s seat, J.B. hit the gas and drove toward the opening. Even as the vehicle reached the blast door, the opening rising door was noticeably slowing, the charge built by rotating the wheel barely enough to move the megatons of armored steel. As the wag drove through the opening, the blast door began to close and there was a screech of metal on metal as it caught the rear gate of the wag. The trapped vehicle was slowly being crushed. J.B. shifted gears and hit the gas, banking the steering wheel hard to angle the aft end free from the grasp of titanic blast door before any serious damage was done.
With a painful screech, the gate was torn free and the door slammed shut, crushing the piece of military steel flat against the jamb of the redoubt as if it were no more than cardboard.
In the silence of the warm night, fresh air washed over the companions and they drank it in gratefully. Lifting a nukelamp out the window, Ryan angled it about, but the powerful ray vanished into the distance of a featureless desert.
“What the…this is salt, not sand,” Krysty said, spitting and wiping her mouth. She strained to hear any sound of waves on the beach, but there was only the soft whisper of the hot wind and nothing else. It was as if they were on another planet.
“Damn, it is salt. Maybe we’re in Utah again,” Mildred guessed, taking a drink from her canteen. “Or maybe the Nevada salt flats.”
Still panning the brilliant beam about, Ryan narrowed his eye at that comment. Nevada, eh? There was a couple of redoubts there they might reach. Along with some old enemies.
“Could be anywhere,” J.B. said, slowing the wag while trying to decide in which direction to travel. His pocket compass said they were heading west, but without knowing where they were that meant less than nothi
ng. And he couldn’t use the sextant until the sun rose or stars became visible.
“Keep going straight,” Ryan said, turning off the beam and placing the heavy device on the floorboards between his boots. “Often the front door of a redoubt points toward a predark city. Probably another of their safety features.”
“Is that why we come out of a redoubt and often find villes and ruins and such directly ahead of us?” Dean asked, his voice already sounding more normal. “Hot pipe, and I thought it was just luck or something.”
As the wag bumped through a low depression, his father paused before answering, “No such thing as luck,” Ryan replied grimly, the wind from the window ruffling his long hair. “Only brains and guts. Folks earn what comes their way.”
Nodding in agreement, J.B. fed more power to the wag and the companions rolled into the Stygian night of the salt desert.
AS THE WAG disappeared into the darkness, the ground before the redoubt churned and a swarm of millipedes rose to the surface, snapping their pinchers and running about in circles. The bugs seemed confused that their prey had gotten away, chittering in rage.
Then one millipede paused, its featureless face twitching as it tested the air, searching, tasting. With a high-pitched cry, it surged to the west in hungry pursuit of the metal and heat. The rest of the millipedes soon followed, flowing across the salt like a black cloud in the stormy sky above, instincts telling them that where there was a mag field, there was always living food to be found.
Chapter Seven
The ocean breeze blew steadily over the solitary guard on the stone tower as the cannie watched the bobbing headlights of the motorcycle pack crawl along the cliff road toward the oceanfront ville, the moonlight gleaming off the polished skulls on their handlebars.
Far below the base of the cliff, whitecaps were breaking on the smooth stones of the beach with the sound of distant thunder. There was no access to Hellsgate ville from that direction, which was why the elders had chosen to build here. The cliff was sheer, with no path or trail to facilitate passage. And the Mex Gulf was a death trap, the water filled for miles with bits and pieces of predark wreckage, mostly the rusted remains of warships, but also some scattered chunks of buildings and roads. No ship could land without being smashed to pieces. Not to mention the sea muties that pulled down ships and sometimes wandered onto the shore looking for food. Bad things, as big as houses with tentacles and glowing eyes.