Releasing the string, Mildred stood slowly and raised the blaster toward the distant skylight, flicking off the safety. The blood was pounding in her veins, and Mildred seemed to have preternatural senses. She knew it was only a fear-induced adrenaline rush, but it still seemed as if she could almost see the winged muties on the rooftop, prowling around, searching for an opening, a hole, any way to reach the human food inside.

Controlling her breathing, Mildred aimed the blaster, slid the fire control to full-auto and waited for the sound of shattering gla.s.s.

LONG PINK TONGUES lolling from the desert heat, a pack of wolves padded through the stone forest of man. The flat-faced mountains rose into the distant sky, and when the soft sand gave way to hard slabs of black rock, their claws clicked on the odd material. The evening wind was blowing steadily from the east, the smell of old blood fueling their fury and forcing them onward. A pack of man had somehow slain all the males of their pack, and the stink of the skinned flesh wafting through the night ignited a savagery in the wolves that bordered on madness.

The two-legs in the iron forest had taught them to herd man to them in exchange for food. The wolves liked the game and feared the two-legs with their boom sticks. But this was a matter of blood. The killers had to be killed. It was the way of their world, the law of the new jungle.

And over the years, the wolves had learned to attack man from behind, or strike from the shadows, and the deadly boom sticks would only make noise, but nothing more. And without the stick, man was easy food.

Furry ears p.r.i.c.ked upward as a faint trace of smoke in the air made the wolves snarl in response to the possibility of fire. Then the lead female growled and the rest kept moving, warily stalking around a corner. Smoke was the scent of man. The prey was near.

Suddenly, a breeze washed over the animals, carrying the reek of rotting meat, and they froze motionless, recognizing a familiar danger. Nostrils flared, eyes darting, they sought the source of the stench when there was a blur of movement and a young b.i.t.c.h fell over with her head gone, warm blood pumping from the gaping neck wound.

Snarling wildly, the wolves formed a hasty circle, baring their fangs as they faced in every direction. The wind washed over them again with an odd snapping sound, and another tumbled over dead. The pack went wild, darting around in a circle trying to find the unseen attackers. However, nothing was visible and the numbing stench completely blocked their ability to sniff out even a general direction.

Then a struggling wolf was lifted bodily into the dark, warm blood sprinkling down like gentle rain.

Self-preservation overwhelmed loyalty, and the pack ran for the safety of the distant dunes. But as they raced down the sandy street a third was beheaded, a fourth disappeared, a fifth howled in unimaginableagony as most of its back was violently removed. Whimpering in terror, a few of the wolves rolled on their backs to expose their bellies in total surrender. Others desperately crawled underneath broken stonework, while the rest fled in blind panic, moving like gray ghosts in the darkness.

Nothing worked. Soon only sc.r.a.ps of warm fur and slowly spreading pools of blood marred the sandy stretch of roadway as deathly silence returned to the ancient ruins.

The bodies of the wolves were nowhere to be seen.

ALMOST DROPPING his smoking lantern, a sec man on the wall of the ville yelled a warning as another started beating a hammer on a metal bell taken from the fallen tower of a church. The bell rang loudly under the blows of the hammer, the noise awakening the citizens, spreading lights and cries across Alphaville.

"Incoming!" a private screamed, fumbling with his musket.

"Hit the lights!" a sergeant ordered, rushing out of a guardhouse, pulling up his pants. Behind him, a woman guard was doing the same, her face a combination of annoyance and terror.

Blasters clenched in sweaty hands, sec men rushed to their posts. From the darkness near the tunnel came the sputtering cough of the lawnmower struggling to catch, then a roar as the engine came to life.

Now came the rumble of the big diesel generators turning over. The exhaust pipes spit out black smoke, the whole a.s.sembly shaking until the machinery revved to a sustained roar of power.

Switches were thrown, and the searchlights crashed alive, the twin beams stabbing high into the sky and catching dozens of the approaching muties. The beasts keened in agony, two of them clawing at their faces and dropping like stones while the rest wheeled crazily to avoid the horrible illumination.

The men working the searchlights zigzagged the beams across the sky, searching for the airborne enemy.

Suddenly, a dark shape plummeted to the ground and bounced off the protective bars covering the Plexiglas lens of the searchlight.

"Dead wolf!" shouted a man on the wall, just as another slammed onto a woman carrying a lit torch. She went down and the torch was extinguished, creating a small zone of blackness.

Raggedly, a rain of wolves plummeted from the night, smashing lanterns and pounding the searchlights with triphammer blows. The protective bars bent, but held for the moment.

A truck in front of the tunnel turned on its headlights and the interior was brightly lit. The five muties crawling on the ceiling froze in position as the sec men opened fire with crossbows and muskets. Off to the side, the deadly .50-caliber machine gun lay disa.s.sembled where the frantic repair crew had stopped for the night, unable to continue the work in pitch-dark. The muties retreated from the light, except for a fanged male who madly charged the men, flying straight toward them only feet off the ground. The sec men stood their ground, steadily firing, until the mutie was among them. It careened off one man, knocking him aside as it angled toward another. The first man dropped to his knees, screaming hideously while trying to hold together the b.l.o.o.d.y ruin of his face. The rest scattered, diving underneath vehicles and into water troughs placed just for that purpose. But the mutie got two more before returning to the flock, its talons dripping red as it soared away.

Then brilliant blue-white globes dotted the night as reserve troops arrived, carrying lanterns. The wicks in the gla.s.s flumes burned fast, but threw off an intense nimbus. Oddly, the sec men placed them on theground, and then retreated. The reasoning was made clear when greenish rain fell from the sky, impacting on the hot lanterns. The flumes cracked, and the contents whooshed into fireb.a.l.l.s as the mutie poison reached the wicks and ignited.

The alarm continued to sound as an APC arrived, the back treads throwing off a cloud of sparks as the wag charged down the paved streets. A .50-caliber machine gun on top of the military wag sprayed short bursts into the sky as the side door slammed to the ground, forming a ramp, and out stepped a large muscular man. He was wearing what resembled a policeman's uniform with the insignia removed, and elaborate needlework on the cuffs and collar.

Drawing a fat blaster from a shoulder holster, Baron Strichland pointed it skyward and fired. The weapon thumped, sending a sizzling rocket high into the night, then a small explosion occurred and sizzling light filled the sky as the magnesium flare started to gently drift to the ground on a parachute.

Caught between the flare and the searchlights, the muties swirled blindly, screaming their rage as the APC burped green tracers skyward, and the sec men steadily banged away with revolvers and longblasters.

Then a winged shape fell to the ground, impacting with a sickening crunch. The guards ignored the fallen creature, but swarms of old women and children charged out to savagely beat the mutie with baseball bats and lead pipes until it was utterly deceased.

A second mutie dropped to its death as another flare arced for the heavens. Then the searchlights traversed the air over the battleground, showing the winged monsters flapping back toward the ruins. A flurry of crossbow bolts arched after them, and one more tumbled from the sky, its body a pincushion of feathered shafts.

IN A GREENHOUSE, Ryan and Krysty watched the fierce battle while sipping some water and trying to ignore the ache in their bellies. This was the fourth greenhouse they had visited. The crude handmade benches lining the structure were filled with thick growths of bushy carrot tops on one side and plump cuc.u.mbers dangling from support sticks on the other bench. The smell of the fresh food was heady, intoxicating, but they knew what the dark loam in the stands was partially made of, and in spite of being hungry, the two could find no appet.i.te for this food.

Moving closer to the wall, they watched the firefight near the tunnel, the stuttering flashes of the blasters and the searchlights.

Lying on the floor behind them was a bound sec man, tied hand and foot with strips of his shirt, a sock jammed into his mouth.

"They got it down to a science," Ryan observed, "with ground crews mopping up the wounded."

"I wonder if the sec men are really good," she mused, "or if they've just fought the same battle so often they have it down to a science."

"You think this was staged?"

"What better way to stay in power then endlessly save your citizens from a terrible enemy?"

Ryan considered the notion. "The local baron can't keep control with the food supplies. If the people ever found out where the soil came from, they'd revolt." "Remember Mildred and Doc telling us about compost heaps? Wonder why they don't boil their garbage until it's sterile and mix that with the sand."

"Mebbe they don't know that trick."

"But they can make alcohol."

"Everybody has a still. That's booze for partying and fuel for wags. A yard-long piece of seamless copper tubing is more useful than a thousand airplanes."

Krysty's reply was cut short by the sound of talking outside the greenhouse. The two quickly moved beneath the table in the center aisle seconds before the door opened and sec men entered, one holding an alcohol lantern, the other a tiny revolver. It was only a d.i.n.ky .22, hardly fit to be a starter's pistol for a race. But Ryan knew in the right hand and at the right range, it could kill as fast as a .50-caliber Desert Eagle. Shoot a man in the shoulder, and the little rounds would rattle around inside, bouncing off bones and piercing every vital organ before tumbling out his stomach. Nasty stuff.

"What c.r.a.p," one man said, walking along the aisles of plants, the lantern sizzling and popping. "n.o.body is going to steal a carrot during an attack and risk going to the Machine."

"Better than wall duty," his companion replied. "You see how many we lost tonight?"

"Three or four. Pretty bad."

"Aye."

Reaching the end of the greenhouse, they turned and started down the other aisle. "d.a.m.n lucky the fat s.l.u.t found a predark med kit..."

Instantly, Ryan was behind the man, the long curved blade of his panga tight against the sec man's throat. "Don't move," he whispered hoa.r.s.ely.

The other sec man stepped backward, drawing his revolver, and Krysty rose to slam a wooden stool over his head. With a sigh, the man crumpled to the ground.

"You're the invaders," the prisoner said until Ryan tightened the blade, a trickle of blood flowing from the wound.

"Here's the deal," he growled as Krysty took away the man's weapons, a knife and a muzzle-loading pistol. "You get to live if you tell us about that med kit."

"What med-?" He gagged as Krysty placed the muzzle of her .38 against the man's crotch and clicked back the hammer.

"One lie, one ball," she said coldly. "Two lies, no b.a.l.l.s, Three and you lose anything remaining."

The man broke into a sweat, his hands flexing helplessly in the air.

"Gaudy house," he finally whispered. "Northeast corner of the market. Big fat b.i.t.c.h, Patrica, said she found a med kit. Baron doesn't believe her, but she turned it in as you're supposed to so we can't touchher."

"Where is it now?" Ryan demanded, tightening his hold slightly.

"Vault in the palace. Don't have the combination. n.o.body does but the baron and Leonard."

"That his lover, captain of the guards?" Krysty asked.

"Son!" Panic took his eyes. "Don't kill me!"

In spite of his promise, Ryan was torn on the matter. He knew it was the smart move to kill the man. But a deal had been made, and he gave his word. That didn't mean s.h.i.t in the Deathlands, except to the man whose honor backed the pledge.

"Get some rope," Ryan said.

Holstering her piece, Krysty nodded and turned away, then cried out and dived to the floor. A woman was at the door holding a scattergun. Ryan shoved his prisoner forward as the weapon boomed. The discharge lifted the sec man off the ground, and he crashed amid the green plants, blood and organs splattering everywhere.

The armed guard thumbed back the second hammer of her blaster as Ryan shot her in the knee from under the table. The shotgun fired again, blowing away a dozen panes of gla.s.s as the sec woman fell to the ground screaming in pain. Something white-hot scored Krysty's cheek as she shot the sec woman in the throat, then again in the head. The screaming stopped.

Quickly searching the corpses, the companions found a rough map of the ville, spare cartridges for their blasters, a piece of honeycomb, half an apple and some jerky. Krysty carefully smelled the meat, then risked nibbling a corner.

"Wolf," she declared thankfully.

The pair divided the food, devouring the sc.r.a.ps as a group of people bearing alcohol lanterns started to come their way.

"Hey, Sue," called out a voice. "You okay?"

Moving to the far door, Krysty cut loose with a full throated scream of terror as Ryan shot the lantern lying on the floor with his silenced pistol. Instantly, a pool of burning alcohol spread across the greenhouse, igniting the clothing of the dead.

"Intruders in the greenhouse!" a sec man shouted, firing his longblaster wildly into the sky.

Others took up the fight as the companions quietly retreated from the commotion into the blackness of the night.

"Patrica first?" Krysty asked after they had reached a safe distance from the growing conflagration.

Thumbing some fresh rounds into his ammo clip to replace the spent cartridges, Ryan nodded. "She's our ticket to the baron." "And he's our way out. Let's go."

Chapter Fourteen.

Dragging a brace of window curtains behind it, the Hummer rolled to a halt in front of the nameless skysc.r.a.per. J.B. killed the engine and set the brake.

"Any tracks?" he asked, looking backward out the window.

"Not a thing, John Barrymore," Doc replied.

"Good," the man said, sliding out from behind the wheel. "Last night was too close of a call. If those muties had gotten inside, we would have been chilled for sure. Sure as h.e.l.l don't want any of the frigging sec men finding our bolt-hole."

"I wholeheartedly concur, my friend," Doc agreed, stepping to the ground and closing the door. "And here is the solution to our security dilemma. Voila! The Tower of Babel!"

"Not quite. But, yes, it is tall."

Somber and impressive, the truncated facade of the skysc.r.a.per fronted the apex of the corner, its ten stories of windows frosty white from erosion and age. And if the building had once possessed a name, it had been removed by the rain and the winds long ago.

"Got that list from Millie?" J.B. asked, slinging a LAW over his shoulder. He had given the S&W M-4000 shotgun to Mildred, as Doc had done with Jak and the Heckler & Koch, including a few of the LAWs and their only Hafla napalm rocket launcher, leaving the pair as well armed as possible. J.B.

sported only his 9 mm Uzi, one LAW and a lot of grens. Doc carried his LeMat, and a backpack of Molotov c.o.c.ktails, a special treat for the muties should they be caught outside when night came.

Doc patted his shirt pocket, the gesture making his backpack tinkle and clatter. "Right here, sir. Our dear madam physician is most clever indeed. I myself never would have thought of looking for helicopters to find a hospital."

"Yep. The sign may be gone, and the building too dirty to tell if it's white or what," the Armorer agreed, removing the ignition fuse from under the dashboard, "but from above, if you see a short building with a heliport, it's either the local PD or a hospital. Apparently, every hospital had them in her day."

"Are you not going to b.o.o.by-trap the seat?" Doc asked, curious.

"Too dicy. We might come back running," J.B. countered, walking away while checking his blaster.

"Best to leave us a fast escape route, just in case."

"Most wise, John Barrymore. If we wish to use the structure as a lookout point to survey the ruins and ville, who is to say the baron and his sec men have not thought of the same idea, and are already there waiting for us?"

J.B. paused to clean his gla.s.ses with a pocket rag. "That's why we're going in slow and silent," he said, tucking them back into position on his bony nose.

The Armorer jerked his head to the left. Doc nodded and took a position at the side of the building asJ.B. checked the revolving door. Made of unbreakable Plexiglas set in a steel frame, it had survived the ages in excellent shape. But the lock was standard office issue and easily fell open to J.B.'s nimble fingers.

Once inside the building, Doc reached into his backpack and withdrew a lantern. J.B. ignited the wick with a butane lighter. One hundred years old and the lighter still worked. Without it, he'd be banging rocks together for sparks. They found pyrotabs sometimes in the redoubts, but not often enough.

Under the a.s.sault of the bright light, they could see that the foyer was littered with bottles and leathery sc.r.a.ps of what appeared to be the remains of briefcases and shoes. A pair of gla.s.ses frames lay near a pile of pinstriped rags in front of the double doors to the elevator bank, and a baby carriage covered with cobwebs stood alone by the telephones. A receptionist kiosk was situated along one wall, near a newsstand and snack shop, and a huge digital clock was a dull blank circle on the wall.

Hopping over a purely ornamental gate, they ignored the powerless elevator and headed for the emergency stairs. The door creaked loudly as they forced it open, disturbing a horde of lizards. The tiny reptiles changed color as they scurried away in every direction.

"Boo," J.B. said, as they started up the long flight of stairs.

An hour later, the friends finally reached the observation floor of the tower. The desert wind moaned softly across them as they walked across the bare floor. According to the sign in the stairwell, this had once been a posh restaurant reserved for the rich and powerful. The entire floor was empty except for a scattering of marble pillars supporting the ceiling. Probably just concrete faced with marble. The walls had obviously been an array of gigantic windows to afford the diners a spectacular view of the city. But storms had shattered the fragile gla.s.s this high up with no other buildings to buffet the tempest of the desert winds. Jagged snowy daggers lined the four sides of the window frames, and twinkling transparent shards lay scattered across the floor like a smashed sheet of ice.

Crunching the gla.s.s underfoot as they walked, neither man spoke as they separated and went to opposite corners. Below them stretched a desolate vista, the sprawling metropolis reaching outward for miles to the distant desert, where soft rolling dunes marked the end of the ruins. The once mighty city had been reduced to crumbling mounds from the bombs of its builders, and the greatest destroyer of all, implacable time.

"No sign of any hospital to the south," Doc reported, the wind ruffling his longish hair.

"Same for the east," J.B. said, holding on to his gla.s.ses to keep them from flying away. The wind was brisk at this height, and he was having difficulty staying on his feet.