"Nobody talks unless we all go," he stated firmly, the rain audible in the background. Somebody was coughing hard from the stink of the polluted water. "The deal is everybody rides, or nobody."
"You a family?"
"Close enough," Ryan stated.
Part of her ability to trade with barons and civies was the talent to tell a fucking lie from a masked truth. Kate could hear in his voice that he considered this the truth. That didn't mean it was—he could be insane—but she wasn't getting that read off the man, and made her decision.
"Okay, drop your blasters and come in, one at a time," Kate said. "Anybody gets fancy and my troops will cut you down."
"The dog has no teeth," he countered. "We keep the blasters and come in together."
"Then you don't come in!"
"Then you don't get Gaza!"
There was a long pause as the rain water slowly rose, the salty mix a murky white like pus flowing from an infected wound.
"Okay, final chance," Kate growled into the hand comm. "You come in with the iron, but take it off once inside. But keep your knives. That's as good as it gets. Take it or leave it."
"And how do I know we can trust you?"
About time he asked that. "Fair enough," she said, and released the transmit switch. "Jake, give them the lights."
The driver adjusted the controls and on the outside hull of the war wag brilliant electric lights came on illuminating the sides of the huge rig. Covered by several layers of clear acrylic paint salvaged from an auto body shop, was the carefully painted symbol of a lightning bolt slashing across a star.
"If you know anything, that says everything," she stated. "The word of the Trader is jack in every ville for a thousand miles along the New Mex and Panhandle."
"Yes, it is," Ryan said. "Deal. We're coming in."
"Use the back door," Kate added, and turned the radio off.
"Think we can trust them, Chief?" Blackjack asked, turning from the machine gun blister.
"I don't trust anybody," she said, tucking the hand comm away and pulling out the Ingram to check the ammo clip. "Have armed guards meet them in the washroom, and if they cause us any trouble, blow them to hell."
Chapter Twenty
Sloshing through the foul water, the companions walked to the aft end of the imposing war wag. A door was already open there, bright lights showing from inside. The last to trundle into a small steel lined room, Ryan closed the door and the companions drew in their first deep breath since the deluge had started.
"Now what?" Dean asked, the foggy plastic sheets dripping yellow water onto the stainless steel floor.
"Use the hose," a voice said gruffly through a grille in the only other door. The stubby barrel of a rapidfire showed through the opening, pointing their way. "Then hang the ponchos on the wall and dump your blasters in the iron box in the corner."
Dutifully, the companions rinsed themselves, the faint yellow water swirling into a drain in the middle of the floor. The original Trader had used something similar for folks set on fire from Molotov cocktails and the like.
When they were clean, the air smelled even better and it was much easier to breathe. Shaking out the plastic shower curtains, they hung them on the steel hooks welded to the wall and let them drip directly onto the floor.
"Now the iron," the voice behind the blaster insisted, and there came the telltale sound of a slide being racked to drive home the necessity of obedience.
Reluctantly, the companions shed their weapons, placing the arsenal of blasters into an old U.S. Army footlocker, the munitions bag barely fitting within the tight confines. The lack of weight around his waist disturbed Ryan, and he really hated to give up the weapons, but there was no other way. The companions had been caught without blasters many times before, and it always cost a world of pain to get them back. At least they still had some blades.
"Ammo, too," the guard ordered, and they complied. What good was one without the other?
Now the door swung open, and three men entered, short rapidfires held in their hands, the blasters perfect for combat inside the cramped confines of a wag. One of the men held himself oddly stiff, his broad shoulders tense from some hidden ailment.
"That everything?" the guard demanded, looking them over carefully. "What's in the bag?"
Mildred opened the canvas satchel to display the collection of bottles and surgical instruments.
"You a healer?" he asked suspiciously.
She nodded, then added, "I bet that old busted leg hurts like a bitch in this kind of weather."
The stiff guard reacted in surprise to that, then let his face ease into a grim smile.
"Okay, you're a fucking healer." He chuckled, then motioned with the rapidfire toward the open doorway. However, his index finger was no longer resting on the trigger. "This way. The chief wants to see you in the galley."
The sound of the rain grew less noticeable as they walked along a narrow corridor, a perfect killing zone for defenders in the vehicle to ace invaders trying to reach the rear quarters. Soon the rumble of powerful engines could be heard, as well as the high pitched whine of an electric generator. But another set of doors closed off that section, and the engine room was left behind. Crew quarters came next, the bunks disheveled and personal items about, a lot of preDark girlie posters on the walls, some of them pure hardcore. Mildred tried not to blush, while Jak and Dean noticed the explicit pictures with frank approval.
A swinging set of louvered doors was chained open and the next room was warm, the air fragrant with the smell of a meat stew and black coffee. A long table was bolted to the floor, a bench on each side attached to the sturdy legs. Just like a submarine galley, Ryan noted privately, thinking of a stint with Admiral Poseidon. Everything firmly in place so that it wouldn't slide about in combat and get in the way of repairs, or an escape.
"Eat up," a slim woman announced, turning from a small electric stove built into the dividing wall, the burners glowing red as molten lava. "I made plenty, so there's plenty for everybody."
Expertly, she placed scarred red plastic bowls and utensils on the tables and then thumped a heavy metal pot full of bubbling stew in the middle of the table. There were chunks of meat mixed with veggies, and the smell was a pain in the belly of the hungry companions. Their last meal had been breakfast in the museum about twelve hours earlier.
"Coffee next!" the cook announced, turning back to the stove. A parkerized revolver rode in a holster at the small of her back where it would be safe from bumping into a hot stove.
As the companions took seats at the table, the skinny guard with a mustache frowned in disapproval.
"Hey, Matilda, the chief didn't say they got a meal," he stated.
"No, she didn't," a new man said as he entered the galley, a large revolver riding snug in a shoulder holster under his left arm. "But I do. So shut up, Anders, and stay out of the way."
The gray haired man was huge, not fat, just large, with a barrel chest and wide arms. The tendons on his hands were as pronounced as coiled cables under a tarpaulin, and his irregular nose had clearly been broken in countless fights.
Flashing in anger, Anders bridled at that, but then backed down from the big man and left the galley in a huff muttering to himself.
"Damn fool." Matilda sighed, placing a huge speckled urn of coffee on the table along with a tray of tin cups and a handful of mixed packets of powdered cream and sugar from MRE meal packs.
"Hell of a tech on the engines, though," the giant stated, leaning against the wall and crossing his thick arms. "Okay, Ryan, you and your people grab some chow. The chief will be with ya in a tick."
Feeding us so the sec men have enough time to search through our possessions, he realized, pouring a cup full of the black brew. Seven holsters but only six blasters would give vital info to anybody with a brain. It was a bastard smart move, and he would have done the same thing himself in their position.
Pouring a cup of the fresh coffee, Mildred studied the fluid
as it went into the cup, then sniffed carefully and took a small sip, holding the brew in her mouth for a moment before swallowing and nodding to the others. If there were any drugs in the potent Java, they were beyond her ability to discern.
The companions divided the food into the bowls and dug in with gusto. While they ate, the big man accepted a steaming cup of Java from the cook and took a gulp in spite of the boiling temperature.
"Blessed be, when you joined the convoy, Matilda," he said with a grin. "Our last cook could ruin food by opening the can, and his coffee was perfect for dipping pungi sticks into to poison muties."
The woman merely smiled and returned to her work. With so many sec men in the convoy, her work was never really finished. Matilda was either starting a meal, serving it or washing dishes afterward. But this was still a hundred times better for her and Avarm than working in a ville. Almost a whole day had gone by so far and nobody had tried to rape her or steal Avarm to put him in slave chains. It was just incredible.
"Got a name?" Ryan asked in a friendly manner, spooning more stew into his mouth.
"I'm Fat Pete," the man said, a hand resting on his thigh only inches away from the .357 Magnum S&W blaster riding at his side. "I'm the top kick here. Now." The word was added to the sentence after a split second had passed, Ryan could make a guess what it meant. The XO for the convoy had been aced by Gaza, probably one of the bike riders dissolving outside in the mud.
"Nothing to do with us," Ryan said firmly. "We're just trying to find the Trader, ace Gaza if we can."
"I like that second part," Kate said, stepping into view from the corridor.
Laying aside his spoon, Ryan watched as the tall woman entered the galley. So this was the person using the name of Trader. The woman was clean and well muscled, with fancy boots and two wide gun belts on her ample hips; one sporting a big bore revolver, the other carrying a hand comm. Her shirt swelled from a wealth of breast underneath, and her golden blond hair was tied off in a short ponytail with a strip of camou cloth. Her nose had been broken once and set poorly, and a band of scars circled each wrist. A former slave, eh?
Her skin was deeply bronzed from the Deathlands sun, and her eyes were hard, but not cold. There was still a trace of compassion in the expression.
"You the Trader?" Ryan asked, laying aside his spoon.
"Just Trader," Kate said, sliding back her Stetson hat until it hung down her back from the thong around her neck. "And inside these walls you can call me Kate."
"Ryan," he replied, indicating himself with a thumb, and then introducing the rest of the companions.
Leaning against the wall, Kate nodded at each in turn. They were lean and hard looking, but without that dead glint in their eyes of mercies or coldhearts. The redhead in the group was a real beauty, but she carried herself with a warrior's pride and nobody was telling her to get them things. All equal, eh? She liked that. Mebbe it had been a good idea to cut these folks a deal. Never enough friendlies out here in the Deathlands.
"Well, you're inside," she said as he finished. "So where the hell is Gaza?"
"Aced?" Fat Pete demanded, a note of urgency in his tone.
Pouring more coffee, Ryan shook his head. "The best way I read it, he's alive and down in the city. The APC was broken. Somebody ripped out some wires. He went down to find replacement parts."
Blowing air out his nose, Fat Pete glanced at the metal wall separating them from the city below. "Good," he said gruffly. "Then he's aced already and we can leave."
"Not yet," Kate stated. "Baron Gaza is tougher than he looks and luckier than any ten escaped slaves. Fighting Gaza is like blacksmithing iron—the harder you hit it, the stronger it gets. Harder to chill than the original Trader."
"Ain't that the bastard truth," Ryan growled in agreement.
"So how did you know him?" she asked. "The Trader, I mean."
"We rode with the Trader for years," Ryan said, indicating J.B. at the end of the table. "But we got caught in an ambush one day and the convoy was blown to hell. Sort of parted company after that." Which was all a hell of a big lie, but as close as the man would come to describing the chain of events that led to the discovery of the redoubts.
Just then, the rig shook slightly as the diesel engines kicked on for a moment to charge the batteries.
Kate could see nothing in the big man's scarred face, but she had a gut feeling he was holding some info back. She had encountered a lot of rumors in her search for the Trader, and the name of Ryan appeared often in the later years, but always as a staunch ally. Then she turned to study the wiry man with glasses and the hat. Yeah, so that had to be J.B. These were the men who stood by the Trader's side in that bad day in Mocsin and then into the Darks. Sounded like her search was over at last.
"And he's dead," Kate said as a question.
Pushing away his empty bowl, J.B. wiped his face on a cloth. "Don't know for sure," the Armorer replied honestly. "Last time we saw him, he and a friend were making a stand between a rock and a hard place. There was nothing we could do to help. They could have fought clear, but we just don't know."
"Did you know the first Trader?" Dean asked. "The real one?"
"We're all real traders," the woman said with a bitter laugh. "Just some more than others, is all.
"And, yes," she continued. "I met the man just once. When he came riding into my ville blowing lead in every direction. His sec men shouted his name as if it were a war chant. Aced every sec man there. Cleaned the place out."
Ryan scowled deeply at that. The Trader looting a ville? Bullshit.
"Then he set all of the slaves free," Kate went on, one hand stealing over to rub the scars on her wrist. "Left us all of the blasters, and even gave us some supplies and books, then went away. Took nothing but water, and we had plenty of that, so it was nothing to us."
"He did that a lot," Ryan said, leaning back in the bench. "The man had a bad itch about scratching slavers."
"Me, too," Kate said. After her release from the chains, the girl had fought hard to keep from going back into them as a gaudy slut in a brothel. But after a person had been to hell, no amount of whippings and beatings could make him or her go back. Soon she stole a blaster, then a horse and wagon and left on her own.
That was the beginning of her life as a trader. First acting as armed escort for pilgrims wanting to reach new lands, then exchanging goods for services, then goods for better goods. But always on the trail of the Trader to join with the man and work on freeing more slaves. A blaster and three live rounds bought her some info that proved to be all lies, but when she returned, a hot knife got her back the weapon and the truth.
Over the years, pieces of the puzzle fell into place and then she found it, one of the Trader's hidden depots where he cached supplies and fuel. There were a lot of blasters, grens, machine guns, all sorts of mil iron, and even a working wag that was now one of the small cargo vans of her armored convoy. But at the time it looked like a juggernaut from ancient legends. As unstoppable as a stampede and larger than the sky.
Now her wags sported a laser and dozens of missiles. Kate had a crew of fifty and three hidden caches of her own spread across the burning landscape. But still it wasn't enough to ever feel as safe as she had that day when the big man with an easy grin fired his blaster and blew open the locks on her chains, giving her the double edged gift of freedom.
"So these are the outlanders," a newcomer said from the corridor. The scrawny man had wild hair, thinning at the top even though he seemed no more than thirty or so. His teeth were a disaster, badly crooked, and his left foot was obviously deformed, little more than a twisted lump at the end of his leg.
"Everything okay?" Kate demanded, all business once more.
"Sure, sure," Eric said, limping into the room. "I have the radar on full, and our belly armor is live with current. Nobody's getting in, or out, without our knowing. And we're not going anywhere until this storm subsides, so I decided to meet our guests."
"They ai
n't guests," Fat Pete stated firmly. "We cut a deal, and we're sticking to our side. That's all."
"Fair enough," Eric said. "Still never hurts to check and see if they got a tech in the group."
"You and those damn machines."
"Saved our ass at Hellsgate."
"This is Eric, our chief tech," Kate said, with a head bob. "He runs the comp that runs the show."
"Mutie shit," Jak said rudely, removing his sunglasses and folding them to tuck them away into a shirt pocket. "All comps aced." The teenager knew that was only true on the surface. In the underground redoubts, the bases were run by huge banks of comps that operated fusion generators and the mat-trans system.
"Comps are real as a kick in the belly, friend," Eric said amiably. "Quite a lot of comps still function okay. Oh, not if they were left running since skydark, then the last program is now burned into the system forever and is now the only thing they can do. But if not turned on, they're okay."
"If you need any help, just let me know," Mildred offered, passing her bowl to Matilda. "I know something about computers."
Eric arched an eyebrow at that word. The healer spoke old tech? "Convince me," he said.
Mildred thought about all the jargon she had learned in med school, but most of that was system specific. Something general would do. "Cold is better than hot," she said. "They go slower when they overheat. If you got comps here, then you also have some serious air conditioners to compensate for the heat of the desert."
Erik stared at the woman in disbelief.
"Probably looted some software from an auto body shop to monitor your engines," the physician went on, taking a logical guess. "So what do you have on the start-up screen, clouds or an apple?"
"By God, you are a hacker," Erik said softly. "Wanna see the nest?"
Nest. That was as good a term for every tangle of computer wires the woman had ever encountered.
"Sure," she said, standing. "I can probably teach you how to defrag the hard drive. You would have to shut down for a while, but afterward it might double the processing speed."
Axler, James - Deathlands 64 - Bloodfire Page 22