Lee considered swerving to the left and right. Both columns of bikers were so close that at least some of them would be killed. But what about the rest? Could she outrun them? No. Could she kill them with her pistols? Hell no. So she held the wheel steady as the chopper on the left fell back and the driver stared at her. A spiral horn was protruding from his forehead, and his lips were pulled back to reveal rows of rotting teeth. Was that a smile or a grimace? It was impossible to tell.
At that point, Lee heard a shout and turned her head to the right. A woman with slits rather than a nose was peering in through the passenger-side window. Lee waved as if to say, “Hi,” and saw the biker flip her off. That seemed ominous, and Lee figured things were about to get ugly, when horn head opened his throttle and surged ahead. The rest of the column followed.
That was the signal for the riders on the shoulder to pass the truck as well—and Lee felt a profound sense of relief as the gang merged and pulled away. Luck, she thought to herself. I got lucky. Although it was likely that the unassuming truck, the ball cap, and the mask had been helpful as well.
It wasn’t long before the Pahrump sign appeared. As the highway split, Lee veered left onto Highway 160. Mountains rose to the right and there were places where hills hugged the road. There wasn’t much traffic at first, but when Lee hit a long, sloping hill, it was necessary to pass three semis before arriving on the flats beyond.
From that point forward the trip to Pahrump was uneventful. As she approached the town, a series of signs appeared. All of them said the same thing: PREPARE TO STOP. ENTRY FEE 20 NU. Nu being the currency of choice in the red zone even though it was issued by Pacifica.
This was something Lee hadn’t seen before. Apparently, the folks in Pahrump had chosen to raise funds by taxing travelers rather than themselves. Could she go around the town? Drive cross-country if necessary? Maybe. But the effort wasn’t worth it. And the citizens of Pahrump were counting on that.
Half a mile later Lee was forced to slow down and stop at the end of a relatively short line. It jerked forward until Lee was level with a wooden shack where a man with a saggy face and a couple of two-fingered hands took her money.
From there Lee drove into town. She was hungry and was on the lookout for a Mexican restaurant. Not having seen one she pulled into the lot that fronted Bob’s Barbecue.
She got out of the truck, locked it, and went inside. The walls were lined with boards that might have been salvaged from an old barn—and the picnic tables were covered with checkered tablecloths. The place was about half-full, and as far as Lee could tell, none of the customers was paying special attention to her. So far so good.
Lee went to the counter and ordered a brisket sandwich, fries, and a Diet Coke to go. There was no other choice since she couldn’t eat inside the restaurant without removing the mask and exposing herself to B. nosilla.
As Lee waited for her order, she noticed that most of her fellow customers were wearing pistols. That was the way of things in the Republic, so no one would question the fact that she was armed as well.
After they called her name Lee paid the cashier, took her food out to the truck, and went in search of some shade. She found it under a tree two blocks away. The brisket was tender, the fries were greasy, and the Coke hit the spot. Thus refreshed it was time to find the town of Heartbreak.
It wasn’t necessary to pay on the way out of Pahrump, but Lee decided to stop at the station on the edge of town, and top off the truck’s oversized tank. Fuel was a nice thing to have out in the desert.
Once on the highway, with the hot air pummeling her face, Lee felt a rare moment of happiness. Freedom really . . . And a sense of anticipation. Things had gone smoothly so far, and even though her emotions had a tendency to vacillate, Lee was looking forward to meeting her mother.
Nearly featureless desert stretched off in every direction as Lee followed the badly faded white line north. Highway 160 to Highway 95, where, according to the map, she should take a right. Eventually, if she continued east, Lee knew she’d wind up in Las Vegas.
A railroad track paralleled the highway on the left. And, judging from how shiny the tracks were, it was used frequently. After fifteen minutes or so, she spotted an intersection in the distance and slowed to read a large sign. HEEVY MINING. AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. TEN MILES. An arrow pointed to the left. That was when Lee saw a smaller sign that read, HEARTBREAK HWY, and knew she was in the right place.
It was necessary to wait for an oncoming car to pass before Lee could turn left. There was a slight rise where the track crossed the side road, and she felt a couple of bumps as the truck rolled over the rails and entered the narrow passageway that separated the hills on the left from the hills on the right. The Heartbreak Highway took her north.
Lee drove for ten minutes or so. Then, as she rounded a curve, the checkpoint appeared. It was located at a natural chokepoint between two sleep slopes. The guardhouse was painted an eye-searing white, was topped with a HEEVY MINING sign, and straddled both lanes of traffic. All for what purpose? To keep bandits out? Or to keep people in?
Lee had no choice but to slow down and come to a stop in front of a striped drop bar. A uniformed security guard was sitting on a stool in the strip on the east side of the guard station. There was no sense of urgency in the way he got up and ambled over to the truck. He looked normal except for the goiter that was growing at the base of his throat. According to the name badge clipped to his shirt pocket the guard’s last name was Tuel. “Good afternoon. Do you have a pass? If so, please place it on the inside surface of your windshield.”
“I don’t have one,” Lee replied. “I’m here to visit someone.”
Tuel shook his head. “Sorry . . . The company doesn’t allow visitors except on Sunday—and you would need a guest pass to enter then.”
Lee felt a growing sense of frustration. Sunday? That was three days away! “How would I go about obtaining a pass?”
“You’ll need to apply for it,” Tuel answered. “The company has an office in Indian Springs. You can submit a request there.”
“How long will the process take?”
“About a week,” the guard replied. “A car is waiting behind you. I’ll raise the arm so you can circle around and go back the way you came. Have a nice day.”
Lee had no choice but to follow Tuel’s instructions. She drove the truck around the guard station, waited for the southbound arm to lift, and let the clutch out. The truck jerked ahead. Lee felt a mix of disappointment, frustration, and anger as she drove back to Highway 95.
Why hadn’t her mother warned her? Where was she anyway? The address on the letter was care of someone else. And then there was the Heevy mining company. A business that operated much like a government. And a dictatorial one at that. The whole thing was strange to say the least.
Lee took a left on Highway 95. Was there a back way into the town of Heartbreak? No, that was ridiculous. The people who had gone to such lengths to close the highway off weren’t likely to leave a secondary route unguarded.
But Lee had to go somewhere while she thought things over. The obvious choice was to turn around and go home. But her mother was dying . . . And Lee wanted to see her for a variety of reasons. It would be a chance to reach some sort of closure where the mother-daughter relationship was concerned, and if she was lucky, get a chance to get a fresh perspective on her father too.
Such were Lee’s thoughts when she spotted a driveway up ahead and an unexpected splash of green back behind it. It was a place to turn off so she did. Then she saw the ruins of a house and the outbuildings beyond. Was the place deserted? If so, she could pause there and decide what to do.
Cautiously, in case the house was occupied, Lee drove up the drive and turned into an unpaved parking spot located behind the sagging house. The farmhouse had been occupied by squatters judging from the graffiti and piles of trash. But they were gone, and the house made the truck impossible to see from the highway.
As a
precaution Lee pulled wide and backed into the parking place so that she could depart quickly if necessary. It was an old trick practiced by patrolmen everywhere.
Lee took a bottle of water off the passenger seat and carried it with her as she got out. The grove of palm trees she’d seen from the road hinted at the presence of a spring and explained why the house had been built there. Lee made her way into the shade, blew a layer of dust off of an old bench, and sat down. The water was warm but wet.
Bees were buzzing around the wildflowers that had taken root in and around the old garden, and the occasional cricket could be heard, but that was all. With nothing else to do Lee took her phone out and turned it on. Maybe an important message would be there waiting for her. Something that would help guide her actions. But there was no service in that part of Nevada. She put the device away.
An old path led past the garden and wandered uphill. Lee followed the trail past an old chicken coop to a fence. The gate was long gone, but the path continued up along the side of the hill.
Lee knew that Heartbreak Valley lay what? About five miles beyond the top of the hill? Yes, that was a reasonable guess. So what about hiking up and over? She had her pack, plus the camping gear purchased back in Primm, and some exercise would feel good. Not in the sun, however . . . No way. Such a journey would best be carried out at night.
But what if she ran into more security? I’ll turn around and return here, Lee thought to herself. And that will put an end to it.
Lee made her way down the side of the hill. The more she thought about the hike the more she liked it. And by the time she returned to the truck, the idea had morphed into a plan. She would sleep if she could, eat dinner, and leave just before sunset. As for the truck, well, it would be there when she got back. Especially since she was going to disconnect the ignition coil. Could someone make the proper diagnosis and hot-wire the vehicle? Sure, but it was unlikely.
After pulling the wire loose, Lee went to work on her pack. She hoped to reach the town of Heartbreak by sunup, blend in, and find the woman named Myra Meo. But what if she failed? What if she had to spend the next day under the hot sun?
With that possibility in mind Lee filled her pack with bottles of water from the case in the truck. Four in all. Those plus the sleeping bag, a change of underwear, some toiletries, her gun kit, and a box of energy bars would be enough. The rest went back into the truck.
Lee spread a tarp out under the trees, made a pillow out of her jacket, and tried to sleep. That didn’t seem likely because of the heat. But then she awoke to discover that it was 5:30 P.M. She felt groggy and it took a major effort to stand up, find a place to pee, and return to the truck.
Lee couldn’t risk a fire and the smoke it would produce but didn’t have to. After boiling water over a tiny backpacking stove, she made a cup of instant coffee and poured the rest of the hot liquid into a foil bag labeled CHICKEN AND RICE. She’d eaten the freeze-dried meal before—and actually liked the glutinous mixture. So after consuming about half of the bag’s contents, and washing it down with instant coffee, Lee felt better.
It was six thirty by then. The light had begun to fade, and half an hour had passed since a vehicle had rolled by, so Lee figured it was safe to go.
So after a final look around she shouldered the pack and set off. The trail was steep, but the air was a good deal cooler by then, and she felt a sense of anticipation. What would it take? Four hours? Six? Then she’d be there. After that, well, time would tell.
* * *
A rocky overhang jutted out from the side of a hill to provide a patch of shade during the hottest time of day. As the sun went down, and the temperature fell, the pack began to stir. The animals weren’t dogs or wolves. They were an unholy mixture of both. And thanks to mutations caused by B. nosilla, they were even more dangerous than their ancestors had been.
One Ear was an excellent example of that. He looked like an oversized Rottweiler rather than a wolf. But to a large extent One Ear thought like a wolf. A smart wolf who weighed 150 pounds, had senses keener than those of his predecessors, and possessed some primitive social skills. All of which helped to explain why the mutimal and his mate Silver were alpha dogs. Meaning the pair from which most of the pack was descended—and to whom the rest of the animals looked for leadership.
So when One Ear began to stir, the rest of the pack watched to see what he would do. Like the rest of them One Ear had fleas. So the first order of business was to scratch himself. Then it was time to pad over to the shallow basin where cool, clean water was waiting. One Ear didn’t wonder why the liquid was there—or give thanks for the fact that it was. What was, was. He drank his fill as Silver looked on.
She was lying on her side so that six hungry pups could suckle at her teats. She knew she would be left behind when the pack went out to hunt. Then, once One Ear ate his fill, he would return to regurgitate some food for her.
Gimpy couldn’t run very well, not since the epic battle with the canyon dogs, but he was a good fighter. So he would stay with Silver and protect both her and One Ear’s pups from harm. Then, once the kill was made, he would be summoned to feed on the carcass. That level of specialization was a relatively recent development but one that was consistent with the wolf-dog instincts of the past and the natural extension of greater intelligence.
Silver produced a whining noise and One Ear went over to nuzzle and lick her. Neither one of them could speak nor did they need to. Both understood their roles and the nature of the relationship that bound them together.
But the moment was brief. One Ear was hungry and knew that the others were as well. So as he made his way out into the bone-strewn common area, his supersensitive nose was sampling the evening breeze. He, like the rest of the pack, could discriminate between thousands of different odors. Hundreds of them were associated with food. But none of those were in the offing, so the pack would have to go out and search for prey.
All of the hill dogs were ready, their bodies quivering, waiting for their leader to make the first move. But some of the pack’s best trackers were missing. That included Loner and Spot. One Ear threw his head back and produced a long-drawn-out howl that could be heard from miles away.
Loner heard the call and answered with a series of distinctive yips followed by a howl of his own. Spot, who was off to the south, joined in. He was following some meat—and not that far away. The hunt began.
* * *
Lee heard the first howl and the blood-chilling chorus that followed. The sound of it caused her heart to race. Dogs. Mutant dogs. Everyone knew how dangerous they could be . . . especially at night.
How far had she gone? A mile and a half maybe? It felt like more since she’d been trudging uphill. What should she do? Continue on? Or retreat? But because there was no way to know where the dogs were, either move could prove fatal.
Lee swore, shrugged the pack off, and opened a side pocket. She had a laser sight. It was designed to slip onto the rail under the Glock’s barrel just forward of the trigger assembly. That could be useful at night.
But, to ensure accuracy, she should mount the sight, aim through the pistol’s iron sights, and fire at a target. Then she would use a small wrench to align the laser with the open sights. That would produce a lot of noise however. And noise could attract the very dogs she was afraid of. So Lee decided to forgo the procedure and take her chances.
Suddenly, what had been a simple night hike had been transformed into a terrifying trek through a scary landscape. Each dimly seen bush, each rock, could be a mutimal. What would Lee notice first? The rattle of stones as toenails sought purchase in the gravelly soil? A chorus of howls coming from all around? Soon to be followed by an onslaught of wiry bodies?
Lee knew she would fall at that point, firing wildly, as the dogs swarmed her. Chances were that she’d be conscious when they ripped her belly open. It was a terrifying thought and Lee discovered that it was difficult to hike and look over her shoulder at the same time. She hurried up
the trail.
* * *
Spot was black except for the patch of white that rode his back like a saddle. One Ear was his father, Silver was his mother, and he would try to take over if One Ear was killed. Meanwhile he was hunting with the big dog, even leading the way at times, completely unaware of the fact that One Ear wanted him to do so. Especially when they were hunting a two-leg. That was because the alpha knew that most of the two-legs carried bang sticks. And the first dog to attack such a creature was likely to die. So it was better to be the second, or even the third dog, if he hoped to survive.
Spot paused next to a rock and sniffed all around it. A two-leg had been there. He knew that because of the complex combination of odors that hung in the air. He produced a throaty growl and surged up the trail. One Ear, Jitters, and Short Tail followed.
* * *
Lee had two choices. She could try to outrun her pursuers, a hopeless task if there ever was one, or fort up and face them. By using the flashlight she’d been able to examine various possibilities as she climbed. The key was to find a place where she could put her back against something solid and thereby force the dogs to attack one at a time. Unfortunately most of the hill was open, bare of significant vegetation, and therefore indefensible.
So it was only when Lee arrived on the summit that she saw what might be a possibility. There were lots of shadows. But, thanks to the starlight, Lee could see that part of the hilltop had sloughed away at some point. The result was a flat area and a big pile of rocks. And it was within that tumble of boulders that Lee sought safety.
It was also a natural lair for mutant rattlesnakes that, according to pictures she’d seen, could be eight feet long. But Lee couldn’t concern herself with that. All she could do was follow a natural passageway back to a dead end, place her back against a rock wall, and get ready for what promised to be a desperate battle. Doing so made her feel better. So much so that she stripped the foil off two energy bars and threw them into the passageway. “Here, doggy,” she called. “Come and get your treat.”
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