"Trouble?" she asked. Then, sniffing the air and catching the cordite, she added, "You've got a habit of being too close to blasters that just go off."

Jak said nothing. Pushing past her, he left the tent before his temper got the better of him. He could feel her eyes bore into his back as he walked away. Her time would come. It would be the two of them if necessary. He had no quarrel with her, but if she felt differently, then he would see it through.

Chapter Ten.

As they progressed, it became apparent that they were traveling down an incline that was gentle and barely noticeable, but nonetheless had an effect on the surrounding jungle. Over a period of three hours, they found progress easier in terms of both exertion and the amount of foliage that had to be chopped back to supply a path.

"Valley of some kind," Gloria said to Ryan. "Different soil, too. Look at the change around us."

The one-eyed warrior looked around. The stunted trees were more prevalent than the creepers and shrubs that had crossed their path prior to this point. The root systems of the trees had also retreated farther into the ground, making the way underfoot less treacherous. There was still a canopy of leaves and branches that made the light filter through in shafts and blocks rather than as a clear view of the sky, but even this was more evenly distributed than before.

Gloria raised her panga, pointing to the treetops. "See how they're spread out more, sweets? That's because they're more deeply rooted, growing strong and straight. Which means we're coming into a place where the water and goodness lies deeper in the soil. Which isn't what I'd expect in a valley."

"Mebbe this is leading downward into something larger," Ryan suggested, "like mebbe we're coming down from a plateau?"

Gloria chewed her lip. "No news from the outriders on big changes in the landscape. Wonder what I could see from above?"

And before Ryan had a chance to answer her, the Amazon queen had left his side and scaled the nearest tree, sheathing her panga and stretching her sinewy arms up to grasp a lower branch, pulling herself upward and over onto the limb with a feline grace. She disappeared into the canopy of foliage.

Krysty joined Ryan. "Gloria scouting the land?"

He nodded. "If this is a valley, then we need to know what the h.e.l.l the incline's like. If it isn't, then what does it end in?"

"Trouble," the t.i.tian-haired woman answered quietly.

Ryan turned to her. The strands of long, flaming hair that usually hung loosely over her shoulders were coiled in tight to her neck.

"What is it?" he asked softly, not wanting to alert any of the Gate to Krysty's doomie sensibility until he himself knew what she was thinking.

"Not sure," she replied in an equally cautious tone. "It can't be too near, as the Gate scouts haven't reported anything, but since we started to go downhill and the landscape started to change, I've had this growing knowledge that we're headed into trouble. I just wish it wasn't so vague."

"Better vague than nothing," came a voice from just above them. Both Ryan and Krysty looked up to see Gloria hanging from a tree limb, having moved across the trees with the stealth of a tree monkey.

The woman flipped off the branch, landing effortlessly on her thonged feet.

"I couldn't see much from up there," she continued, "but one thing is for sure- there's enough hiding places. I couldn't even spot my own outriders. Which is okay, 'cause they'd be in deep s.h.i.t if I could! But there could be anything in there, and there are a couple of spots where we'd be very vulnerable."

"Like?" Ryan queried.

"My guess is that we're in an area that was sacred in some way, and hidden from the view of the world. There are some areas where camouflage was used, and the years have worn it away. Mebbe ten miles from here there's a settlement of some kind. No fires or signs of life I could see, but at this distance it's too soon to say." She shrugged. "But before we get that far, there's a plain in the middle of this that stretches for about a mile. Why the h.e.l.l it should be there, I don't know. It doesn't feel right."

"Mebbe that's what's worrying me," Krysty said. "It could be something residual that's giving me this, rather than any real danger."

Gloria shook her head. "Never ignore a doomie, honey. What I mean is that the plain looks like it was man-made in some way. This is a decline into a lower ground level, not a valley, and with this around-" she gestured to the woodlands around them "-then there's no reason in nature why that plain should suddenly be there. It's kinda weird, and that worries me."

"How far to the plain?" Ryan asked.

"About half a mile," Gloria answered.

The one-eyed warrior nodded, his mouth set in a grim line. They had to advance, and if there was a settlement ahead that was deserted, then it could prove instructive. But to get there...

"Triple red, without a doubt," he said. "Reckon we should call in the outriders, as well. If they haven't seen anything out there, then mebbe whatever's waiting-if it is-is too smart to be caught out that way. Besides which, this is their territory."

"Agreed. I'll call them back and we proceed with extreme caution. The unknown is a worse enemy than anything you see," the Gate queen murmured before turning and letting out an earsplitting screech that was a signal to her outriders.

J.B., Jak, Dean, Mildred and Doc moved through the stilled procession of the Gate until they were level with Krysty, Ryan and Gloria. While the tribe was content to wait for their queen to inform them of what was happening, the companions were more anxious to know. Krysty and Gloria filled them in on what had been discovered and discussed.

"I wonder," Doc mused, almost to himself. "Could it really be so, after all?"

"Could what be so?" Mildred prompted.

Doc looked at her as though she had completely missed the plot, even though it was a story that had been running only in his own head for some time now. "My dear Dr. Wyeth," he said in amazement, "why, surely it's obvious."

Mildred raised an eyebrow. "Not to me, you crazy old coot. So come down off that cloud and fill me in. Pretend I'm stupid, okay?"

Doc raised a smile. "As if I could ever believe that, my dear madam. I merely surmise that this could be the place for which we seek, and the place that I dredged from the recesses of my poor, addled memory, which, I may add, I do know to be not the most reliable of sources. No, my dear madam, I do indeed wonder if this is the shadow capital of which I heard talk, and which seems so well to fit in with the legends of our dear friend here." With which he indicated Gloria with a sweeping flourish.

J.B. polished his spectacles on the corner of his shirt, focusing his thoughts with each movement of his thumb and forefinger across the surface of the lens.

"If that's the case," he said slowly and deliberately, "then we're gonna have to be right there for the Illuminated Ones, 'cause we know they're still around."

Gloria, who had been listening intently, nodded. "That's why I want us all together. I don't want to lose outriders just 'cause they're alone. Safety in numbers, now."

By this time, all the outriders had responded to the signal and were back with the tribe. Gloria gathered them together and filled them in on what was known and what was surmised. There was a buzz of excitement that pa.s.sed through the tribe at the thought that they may be the generation to attain that for which they had spent so long searching.

Gloria held up both hands. "Wait," she cried in a tone of voice that none of the companions had heard her use before. There was a harsh edge to it that seemed almost alien. She continued, almost imperious, "If we are to be the chosen ones who reach the promised places, then we must do it properly. I want none of us to lose our chance to be there because of the slackness of others. We are all together -we are all one. Remember that and remember well."

There was a silence that hung over the tribe as they considered this.

Gloria broke the silence. "Okay, we've got half a mile to the plain. Then we need vigilance. Let's go- and keep it sweet, my people."

She turned to Ryan and his companions.

"Let's do it, babes," she said simply.

ON TRIPLE RED, the tribe and the companions made their way through the last stages of the jungle growth. As they neared the beginning of the plain, it became apparent that the vast expanse of gra.s.sland was basically a disguised pa.s.sive defense. Although it seemed innocent enough, it was wide enough to make circling it and staying in the cover of the forest growth a tedious and drawn out task. The easiest route forward was to move across the plain, and although it was large enough to make the journey safe because any attack could be seen from some distance, it also made any party moving across that plain equally visible.

"This is not ideal," Doc commented as they set foot onto the plain.

"No, but it's the best option, as long as we stay together and stay on red," Gloria answered. "And I'll tell you something else, honey-this is no natural plain."

"How can you tell?" Krysty furrowed her brow. The plain seemed to be natural enough, the scrub stretching out to the trees, far flung on each side.

"Two things," the Amazon queen replied. "First thing is the way that the gra.s.sland ends suddenly at the edges of the plain. Even the most squared of natural plains has little hollows and indents into the trees. This hasn't."

Krysty followed the sharp, penetrating blue eyes of the Gate queen as she surveyed the outer edges of the plain. It was true; the plain was sharply defined at all sides, rather than bleeding naturally into the woodland.

"Second thing is this-look at the gra.s.s. No way is that natural, babe. This is regularly fired and burned to keep it to stubble. That doesn't happen by accident... not regularly, right?"

"So we could be being watched, right, Glo?" Margia grimaced sourly. "That's really good to know."

"Shut it, Marg," her sister replied. "Mebbe we can be seen, but we can also see."

"Always better to avoid trouble. I thought you'd know that, even if others don't," Margia snapped, with a glare at Jak that could have dropped the albino where he trod, if Jak Lauren could be affected by such things.

Gloria, who had spent some time since the fight between her sister and Mildred keeping them apart, didn't bother to answer. She looked at Jak, whose eyes met hers with the message that Margia couldn't rattle him. The Gate queen accepted this, and was about to ask her sister why she had strayed to the front of the column rather than stay back with the armory wags when her attention was distracted by a cry from Tammy.

"On the edge-right hand, just to the rear... Dunno what, but there's a lot of it."

Ryan spun at the same moment as the warrior queen, and could see that there was movement on the edge of the plain.

"Not just there, over to the left, too." J.B. called, pulling binoculars from the canvas bag he was carrying. Focusing them, he whispered to himself, "Dark night, what the f.u.c.k are they?"

Ryan's monocular gaze tried to penetrate the vast distance and pick out detail, but even with the piercing gaze of that blue orb, the exact detail of the ma.s.s movement was still indistinguishable.

"J.B., quick," he snapped, holding out his hand. The Armorer handed him the binoculars, and Ryan raised them to his eye and the useless socket. "Fireblast! I don't believe it-more of the f.u.c.kers, but worse than before."

"More of what f.u.c.kers?" Mildred asked.

Gloria, shading her eyes with one hand and focusing her sharp blue gaze on the far side of the plain, said simply, "Stickies. More mutie than before."

Ryan handed Mildred the binoculars, and the woman looked through them. To her, it appeared that the ma.s.sed group of stickies had been in some way surgically or genetically altered like the ones they had encountered on their first meeting with the Gate. The shapes of the heads seemed bulbous on some, and others had a stronger musculature than the average stickie.

"Well?" Doc asked. He was now leaning in close to Mildred.

"Like the others, maybe more so." Doc nodded, agreeing with himself on some point that he wouldn't share. "That would make sense. Let the first ones go as a field experiment, then keep the new batch closer to home, easier to observe... and to act as guard dogs."

"At least this gives us time to prepare our defenses," Ryan observed. Then, to Gloria, "Well?"

The Gate queen gave the one-eyed warrior her lopsided smile. "My show, then?"

"Your people," Ryan answered. With a brief nod, the woman turned to her people. She signaled them with a series of whistles, conveying her messages and instructions at high speed.

The men of the tribe formed the wags into a circle, protecting the armory, the food stores and the sacred papers and writings of the tribe. Jon and Petor pa.s.sed out rifles and machine blasters to the other men, while the women of the tribe took formation around the wags. There was little cover that could be afforded to them, but they had the advantage of blasters, while the stickies who were advancing at speed across the plain from all sides carried only sticks and sharpened flints and stones. Glancing around at the advancing horde, Mildred noted two things. First, the stickies were also advancing from the area where the tribe had just emerged onto the plain, which suggested that they had the cunning of the previous horde of stickies, something added by surgery and genetic manipulation to the stickie psyche. Second, and perhaps more worrying in an immediate sense, was that the tribe and Ryan's people were vastly outnumbered. Even with their superior strategic sense and their blasters, there was still a chance of the stickies breaking through and overwhelming them on sheer numbers.

It wasn't going to be an easy battle.

"Hold fire until they're in range," Margia cried. "Every bullet must count."

The tension was acute as the women of the Gate and Ryan's people stood firm, blasters ready but holding back until the last moment to begin fire. They were fanned out in a circle, but kept it tight and close to the wags.

Gloria stood upright beside Jak, who held his .357 Magnum Colt Python, his red eyes fixed on the approaching horde. Gloria had her Vortak raised, clasped easily but firmly in both hands, steadying herself for the jolt of the first shot. Despite the tension that coursed through her frame, fueled by adrenaline, she stood as easy as the albino at her side.

"Ready, sweets?" she murmured to him.

"Now," Jak answered without moving his white head.

Gloria let out an ear-piercing scream that acted as a signal for the onslaught to begin.

The distant rumble of the approaching horde, running and tumbling over one another in their crazed blood l.u.s.t, chattering excitedly at the prospect of blood and flesh within their grasp, was suddenly drowned by the roar of ma.s.sed blasterfire as the Gate and the companions started to fire. J.B. chose his Uzi, set to short, controlled bursts, over his other blasters. Ryan used the Steyr, sighting carefully so as to not waste a single sh.e.l.l.

And it was because of this that he noticed that these stickies were less vulnerable than any others they had encountered.

"Problem, people," the one-eyed warrior shouted over the noise. "These f.u.c.kers are gonna be really hard to chill."

"Why?" Gloria yelled back. "See through the sights," Ryan replied shortly. "Unless you blow the f.u.c.ker's head off, it doesn't wound easy. They don't f.u.c.king bleed!"

"s.h.i.t-genetics," Mildred screamed above the noise, "work on the clotting agent."

"My, this will be fun," Doc remarked to himself, reloading the LeMat and attempting to sight yet another stickie for a full load of shot, this time raising his aim for a head shot. A body blow might not stop them, but at least a stickie with no head would find it impossible to keep moving.

The old man fired the LeMat, the charge catching one of the advancing muties full in the face. It was about twenty yards away when the grapeshot hit, and even at that distance Doc was able to discern the way the mutie's features blurred and distorted beneath a mist of blood as the shot spread across the head, traveling at a high velocity. Where the sharp, pinp.r.i.c.k eyes and the needlelike teeth had previously been the prominent features in a bland, papery face, now they disappeared beneath a hail of metal and ripped flesh, the teeth smashed beyond repair and the eyes burst so that the viscera spread back into the sockets, driven back by the force of the shot as it ripped through the soft bone and softer flesh.

The head of the stickie-noticeably distorted at the rear of the cranium, Doc was able to note quickly before that cranium was ripped apart by the charge from the LeMat-vanished in a haze of blood, bone fragments and shredded flesh. The mutie, short of what little brain it possessed to power its motor functions, stumbled in its run and fell to the ground, crumpling like an old sheet dropped from a moving wag.

Doc was satisfied that it was one less, but knew with a sinking feeling that it wasn't enough. Even in the time it took him to reload the LeMat, having loosed the ball prior to the charge for once, the advancing stickie horde had gained ground. There were simply too many of them for a blaster such as his. With a sigh, he holstered the large percussion pistol and drew the swordstick from its silver lion's-head cane.

If it came to close combat, then he would be ready.

And he knew that it would.

Around Doc, the rest of the Gate warriors were reaching the same conclusion independently. The men behind were firing over their head with the machine blasters and rifles, standing on the wags to clear their own people, but the fact that-as men-they had little battle experience was showing up badly in the few stickies they could stop. The vast majority of ammo that was discharged caused some wounds to the advancing horde, but there were few shots that bit home to chill. The rapidity with which the stickies stopped bleeding meant that they were able to keep coming, some of them on their knees or in loping, stumbling runs where legs had been rendered useless by shots severing tendons or smashing bone. The lack of pain or blood loss meant that the injury didn't register in their mutie brain.

The horde advanced, leaving chilled stickies scattered around, but not enough to make much of a dent in their number.

The Amazons were discovering how handblasters could be excellent close fighting weapons, but relatively ineffective at longer distances. The lack of accuracy over the greater distance was telling now. As the stickies got closer, more of the women's shots were hitting home fatally, but the fact that the stickies had been able to get so close in the first instance meant that there were too many to chill with blasters alone.

Jak, Dean, Mildred and Krysty also had that problem. The albino's .357 Magnum Colt Python was an exceptionally powerful handblaster, but even he couldn't reload and fire quickly enough to chill all the advancing enemy. Dean's Browning Hi-Power, Mildred's ZKR and Krysty's .38-caliber Smith & Wesson were good blasters, and highly accurate, but couldn't cope with the sheer bulk of the enemy-especially an enemy that couldn't easily be stopped except by a chill shot.

Ryan and J.B. were faring better. The Armorer had pushed his Uzi to one side and hauled out the M-4000, letting fly with several charges of the viciously barbed metal flechettes that he used in his shot. The hot metal had spread over a relatively wide area, aimed at head height, and had taken out several stickies in one shot by spreading some splattered brain around the plain. Ryan had reverted to his SIG-Sauer, having realized that he needed to create a little more damage in the mutie ranks than the Steyr would allow him. The rifle was extremely accurate, and he had a good chill rate with it, but he felt compelled to try to make more of a dent in the vast numbers of the opposition.

Margia tried to wipe out a section of the horde on her side of the battlefield with a gren. A shrapnel gren of a vintage long predark, she pitched it into an area where there seemed to be a high concentration of the muties. It exploded with a m.u.f.fled whomp, spreading earth from the large gouge it created in the otherwise flat plain. It took out a couple of stickies, and the blond armorer felt pleased to see so many go down...not so pleased a few seconds later, when she saw them start to drag themselves to their feet and continue-or, in the case of those whose legs were useless, just drag themselves onward.

Gloria and Jak stood back to back, picking off the stickies with single shots that inflicted maximum damage while still preserving as much ammo as was possible.

"Hand-to-hand soon," Jak murmured. "Too close to blast all."

Gloria cast him a glance over her shoulder. She smiled lopsidedly, her strong white teeth almost feral. Her piercing blue eyes shone wildly with the heat of battle.

"Suits me, babe," she answered him. "They'll have to go a long, long f.u.c.king way to get the best of us, right?"

Jak spared himself a grin, cold against the white of his skin. "Chill them before get that far."