There was no response-unless one counted the sight of a broad back and pistoning legs, moving fast and still picking up speed as they shrank steadily into the distance.

She wasn't sure if the adrenaline flowing through them after their triumph over the guards allowed them to catch up, or if he had subtlety slowed his pace. If the latter, he wouldn't have admitted to it. Irregardless, the escapees, now five, caught up to him atop an east-facing ridge. Between the ash and the creeping dawn that still thankfully lay behind them, the ambient temperature was well up above a hundred degrees Fahrenheit. Everyone was grateful for the fact that the ashfall had nearly ceased.

Drenched in sweat and wiping volcanic spew from her face, she drew alongside Ridd.i.c.k as they ran together along the ridge top. Having to reserve oxygen for breathing kept any conversation brief.

"Blasted the c.r.a.p out of 'em." She chortled. "Been waiting a long time to do something like that." When he didn't reply, she added, "You?"

There was a pause as they pounded along side-by-side, the others keeping pace behind them, before he finally responded. "You even care if you get out of this alive?"

"Not really." She said it without emotion, as casually and indifferently as if contemplating the scenery. Together, they leaped off the last ledge and landed simultaneously on a lava bridge that spanned a significant cleft in the rocks.

"Well, maybe I do," he replied unexpectedly.

She eyed him uncertainly for a moment. There was more in that curt affirmation than a mere desire to stay alive. She did not expect it from him, and it kept her wondering and speculating on hidden meanings as she ran on.

Though the sulfur fissure through which they were taking a hoped-for shortcut was lined with a fortune in rare minerals, no one paused to do any informal collecting. There was no time, and money meant nothing now. Not out here, in the open. On the surface. Smooth and supportive underfoot, the fissure Ridd.i.c.k had found ran in exactly the direction they needed to take. With luck, it would dump them out only a short distance from the hangar site.

It dumped them out, all right, and at the expected location. There was only one problem. Their luck had run as dry as the volcanic surface underfoot.

"Oh no," the Guv was muttering. Stopped, staring, he just kept repeating it, over and over again. "No, no, no, no . . ."

There was something between them and the hangar site. Something none of them, knowing virtually nothing of the actual surface topography, could have foreseen. It was only a mountain. A small mountain, really. But still a mountain. Composed of melted and reformed sulphurous rock, it completely blocked the way forward. It was steep, and domineering, and immovable, and the Guv would have cried if he could have spared water for the tears.

"s.h.i.t," one of the other escapees snapped as he lowered the weapon he was carrying. Not only his voice threatened to snap.

Knowing they were looking to him, Ridd.i.c.k could have consoled them with encouraging words. He might have strived to minimize the trial ahead. Instead, he did what he did best: spoke not a word, and kept moving forward. There was, after all, nothing else to do, and words would not get them over the obstacle a spiteful Nature had placed before them. Racing to the base of the mountain, he started climbing. No one hesitated to follow him. There was no going back now. There hadn't been for some time. Overhead, a brilliant razor's edge of light split the rapidly waning night sky.

The sun was coming up.

They scrambled and sc.r.a.ped their way upward, ignoring b.l.o.o.d.y fingers and frequent cuts, paying no attention to the increasingly lethal drop below them. If not directly helpful, Ridd.i.c.k was at least a target, a goal. Even vertically, he seemed to be making speed. They could not possibly catch up to him. They could not possibly fall too far behind. His receding form was encouragement enough.

With a shorter reach than the others, Kyra was beginning to struggle. Slipping once, she barely caught herself. If she let go, she'd fall all the way to the bottom: far enough now so that she would not have to worry about getting back up and trying again. Complicating matters, the increasing heat was making the rock itself almost too hot to touch.

Seeing her repeatedly flicking her hands to cool them for the next reach and grab, the Guv worked his way up alongside her. "Like this." He showed her his hands, both wrapped with belt leather. "Your belts, use your belts. Gun sling, anything."

Too tired to fire back one of her usual defiant responses, she just barked tiredly at him. "Go, go, go- I don't need your help. I'll make it."

He paused only briefly to favor her with a single lingering stare. Then he was moving again, size notwithstanding, pa.s.sing her on the upward climb. He did not look back to see her cutting up her belt into pieces suitable for hand wrapping.

Above the others, Ridd.i.c.k caught a glimpse of what he had been hoping for. In lieu of the Promised Land, he would settle for the summit. With one powerful heave, he propelled himself to the top.

The view beyond was striking in its desolation. Distant volcanoes smoked on the horizon; rivers of congealed molten rock streaked a surface forever frozen in time; and, virtually at his feet, a rocky plateau sloped away into a great undulating valley of crazed volcanic gla.s.s. Rising from the center of the valley was a single stone steeple, a natural landmark that could not be missed even from atmosphere.

Below it, he knew, lay the hangar complex, and within that complex, the mercenary ship.

Sucking in each superheated breath as if it was his last, one of the convicts emerged on the crest beside him. As the man collapsed and lay fighting for air, Ridd.i.c.k turned to check behind him. The landscape was dominated by a towering volcano, but it wasn't geology that drew the big man's attention. It was the sliver of sunlight growing at its edge, a hidden solar a.s.sa.s.sin that was coming inexorably for them all. Reaching into a pocket, he drew out his black goggles and slipped them on. They might protect his vision, but they would do nothing to save his life.

Peering over, he scanned the cliff face on the backside of the mountain. Figures were evident, climbing toward him. He checked the sequin of sun once more. Not fast enough.

"Kyra!"

Looking up, she saw the familiar figure bent over the edge. "What?"

He had no time to go into details. Nor did he. The urgency was plain in his voice. "Get that a.s.s moving! Now Now!"

It was enough. She knew he didn't raise his voice unless it was absolutely, positively, unavoidable. Which meant only one thing. She didn't need to look around to see the sun approaching behind her. She could feel it tickling her neck, feeling its way down her spine, considering how best to finish the puny sack of damp meat that was stuck to the rock wall like a paralyzed fly.

His words were all the jolt she needed. Finding a new gear, she threw everything she had into a last desperate acceleration, choosing speed over caution now. Anything to keep ascending, to keep moving upward. If she fell, she died. If the sun caught her out on the rock face, she died. The only way to survive was to make it to the top and to the other side. The shaded side.

Spidering to the top, the Guv reached the crest and, panting and wheezing, pulled himself up and over. As he rolled and sat up, the sky behind him exploded in whiteness sharp and hard as a diamond as Crematoria's sun finally appeared.

Where she clung to the face of the cliff, sunlight smashed into Kyra with almost physical force, drawing a gasp that mixed fear and desperation. A nearby crevice offered the only hope, the only respite. The only shade. She threw herself into it. Nearby, the only other convict still on the sunward side of the mountain found another cleft and did likewise. Up above, Ridd.i.c.k, the Guv, and the other remaining survivor of the breakout had already ducked down into the still tolerable shade zone provided by the backside of the mountain. Rocky outcroppings provided additional cover. Cover that would last only until the sun rose above the mountaintop.

From below, a still strong but increasingly plaintive voice cried, "Ridd.i.c.k?" "Ridd.i.c.k?"

"Yeah," he responded, not moving from behind his chosen rock.

There was a brief pause, then, "'Know what I said about not caring if I lived or died?"

"Yeah." As always, there was no change in the big man's tone, nothing to indicate what he might be thinking.

"'Knew I was kiddin', right?"

By now her voice had faded, not in intensity, but in maturity: a change in age forced by a change in surroundings. She sounded like the kid he had once known, a little girl named Jack. He said nothing- but his attention shifted to a coil of cable that was secured at the Guv's belt.

Noticing the direction of his stare, the Guv felt compelled to remind the big man of his own words. "One speed. That's what you said. That's what we agreed to." Ridd.i.c.k didn't reply. His gaze traveled from the cable coil to the crest of the mountain. But he was thinking.

Meanwhile, the third member of the little band who had managed to make it to the top finally gave in to burning curiosity and peered guardedly around the edge of his protective outcropping. He didn't say anything, but his eyes went wide and his jaws parted. It wasn't necessary to give words to what he was seeing. There were no words, anyway.

Generated by the abrupt change and huge rise in temperature as the sun ascended above this part of the world, a visible thermal front had appeared. Caught between the lingering cold of the night side and the soaring temperature of Crematoria's morning, the resultant pressure differential sp.a.w.ned a solid line of superheated wind which, when combined with the thermal front, came thundering across the landscape from north to south, riding the front line of the terminator. The ground quaked as the wind and heat front pa.s.sed over it, shattering loose scree and sending ash and gravel flying. Safe in their subterranean prison tiers, the Guv and the convicts had heard it, could time chronometers by it, every fifty-two hours. But in those depths it was m.u.f.fled by solid rock and hushed by distance. Out here, on the surface, the tsunami of wind and heat had nothing to mute the roar of its relentless advance.

And it was driving pitilessly straight toward the mountain.

Kyra heard it first. Then, peering out from the depths of her protective crevice, she saw it. All thoughts of stoicism fled, all pretext at toughness and indifference falling away like so much desiccated, disintegrating tissue, she screamed.

"RIDd.i.c.k!"

Peering out from his own shelter, the Guv stared at the approaching wave in fascination. Over the years he'd heard it hundreds of times and had tried to visualize it, with little success.

"Jesus Christ," he murmured to no one in particular. "So that's that's what it looks like." Nearby, the other convict who had managed to make it to the top was also staring, mesmerized and mumbling to himself. what it looks like." Nearby, the other convict who had managed to make it to the top was also staring, mesmerized and mumbling to himself.

"Temperature differential, pressure differential; wind and heat from the north pole to the south. Meeting the advancing terminator every new day. Round and round she goes, and where she hits, everything blows. . . ."

He looked around sharply. Ridd.i.c.k was close by, still hugging the shade. The big man was even more commanding than usual, and there was unusual intensity in his voice.

"Gimme cable, shirt, your water-all of it. Then get the h.e.l.l gone. Go. Move Move."

They didn't argue with him. First, because it would not have done any good. Second, because they owed him for having brought them this far. And lastly, because they could tell from his tone and see from his expression that if they did not give him what he needed, he would take it anyway. Neither man tried to argue. There was no time here, now, in this place, to p.i.s.s away on internal dissention. They turned over the goods, not knowing what he wanted them for and not asking. Not asking, because he might decide to ask them to join him in whatever crazy move he was contemplating.

As soon as the last of the gear had been handed over, both men started down the backside of the mountain. The temperature continued to rise, but they still had plenty of shade. For how much longer, it was impossible to predict. The stone tower, with its promise of man-made shelter and a ship beneath, was all the incentive they needed to send them all but bounding over the treacherous rocks.

Behind and above them now, Ridd.i.c.k moved fast but methodically. First he donned the Guv's commodious overshirt, tugging the ends of the sleeves as far down as he could, covering as much exposed skin as possible. Then he fashioned loops at both ends of the cable. One went around an upthrust rock; a solid stone protrusion, a finger of mountain that would not break off no matter what kind of crazy pressure he chose to apply to it. The other, larger loop went around his waist.

In his mind, he'd already run the necessary calculations. As always in such situations, there were factors he could not account for, could not wholly quantify. That was physics for you: always throwing some s.h.i.t in your face whenever you thought you had everything worked out. He took a long drink of the acc.u.mulated water, then dumped the rest of it over him, carefully saturating as much clothing as possible. Moving as fast as he could to minimize evaporation time, he gripped the cable not far above where it looped around his waist, took a running jump, and threw himself toward the sun. Out in front of him, the sound of the approaching thermal wind front had risen to explosive proportions.

His kick-off carried him far to one side. Reaching the apex of his leap, Ridd.i.c.k-become-pendulum started dropping and swinging back. As he did so, he turned in mid-air and freed one hand, hanging onto the cable with the other, black goggles flashing, flashing, as they fought off the hungry sunlight.

Below, the heated wind front had reached the base of the mountain and was screaming upward. Just three people were there to see it, hypnotized and terrified at once by the line of implacable force that was rising toward their inadequate hiding places. Mouth agape, Kyra could only stare at the monster that was climbing toward her. Ridd.i.c.k could have studied it, too. But he was busy.

Then she was airborne, soaring sideways, having been plucked out of her crevice as neatly as a raptor chick by its mother. Her slim form was locked in Ridd.i.c.k's arm and shielded by his body. As the pendulum effect began to slow, the big man made contact with the cliff face. His feet slamming against the rock, he began running-sideways, perpendicular to the precipice, regaining speed. It was a crazy, impossible sprint, racing against gravity and common sense. But Ridd.i.c.k was an impossible man. As to his sanity, there were those who might have debated it. But not to his face.

Witnessing the implausible rescue, the unfortunate convict who had trapped himself in another fissure on the rock face moved when he should have waited, hoping the big man would come back for him. He should have summoned what courage remained to him and tried the rock, tried to climb. Instead, the only move he made was to peer tentatively out from his hiding place. Out and down, at the ascending thermal wind. He was able to gape at it for several seconds before it met his face. And took it off.

Pounding, digging forcefully against the cliff, Ridd.i.c.k's legs provided just enough additional thrust to carry him and his burden back up to the top of the mountain. Almost before they lost the last of their forward momentum, he had dropped her and was disengaging himself from the cable. All the banshees of h.e.l.l were howling in his ears when he threw himself down and forward.

Just in time for the leading edge of the thermal front to reach the crest of the mountain and blast over it.

Rolling hard, he and Kyra tumbled downslope, farther into the shade and safety of the back of the mountain. When they both finally came to a stop, scratched and dirty, she was the first one to sit up. That in itself being unusual, she quickly saw the reason why.

Steam was pouring off Ridd.i.c.k as he rose, staggering slightly. He had been exposed for less than a minute-but it had been a minute in the devil's own sauna. Black ash that had adhered to his skin in places had actually helped to protect him. As for those areas not protected by ash or clothing, boots or goggles, it was fortunate his ancestry was not exclusively Caucasoid. There was just enough melanin in his skin to have saved him from a serious, if widely scattered, burn. He gave silent thanks to favorable genetics.

Nearby, Kyra was staring at him. A look pa.s.sed between them. Then she shrugged, Hey, I woulda Hey, I woulda made it, made it, and without another word, started down. and without another word, started down.

XV.

It had been a long time since the Guv had done any running, and it was finally starting to take its toll. Not that what he and his companion were doing at the moment could exactly be called running. It was more akin to slipping, sliding, stumbling, and praying you didn't fall flat on your a.s.s and, worse, break something you might need later. Like a femur.

The ground underfoot was as broken and nasty as a slam guard's heart. Barefoot, their feet would have been cut to shreds in minutes by the planes and blades of volcanic gla.s.s. Here and there the two men encountered shallow depressions in which falling ash had acc.u.mulated and compacted. Grateful for these softer patches, they tried to move along them, hop-scotching their way steadily forward.

Though they'd made pretty good time since abandoning the top of the mountain that now loomed behind them, they were starting to run out of gas. Impetus to keep going came from the knowledge that though they were still in shade, it wouldn't be long before the steadily rising sun put in its inevitable soul-sucking appearance above the ragged peak. Thought of what would happen to them when that happened was enough to keep legs moving and brains focused.

Looking up, the Guv saw something that provided yet another shot of the adrenaline he thought had all been used up. The stone pillar that marked the location of the underground hangar was just ahead, jutting above the last rise. The entrance to the hangar itself couldn't be more than five hundred meters off.

"Almost there," he gasped, lips cracked from the heat and lack of water.

"Almost," the other convict wheezed. "One more hill. Just one more f.u.c.king hill."

Practically on hands and knees, the two men started up the final rise, slipping and scrabbling on the maddeningly slick, gla.s.sy surface. The crest was ten meters away. Then seven. Then three . . .

Something grabbed the Guv's ankle.

Shocked, stunned, he whipped around and looked down, mixed exclamation and curse rising in his throat. At the sight of who was holding him, he stifled the incipient shout aborning.

"Dead mouth," Ridd.i.c.k said warningly.

He did not have to put finger to lips. The words were enough. Laying flat against the surface of the rise, the Guv fought to still his breathing. Nearby, his companion was panting hard. Making absolutely no noise, Ridd.i.c.k slid up alongside the other man and placed a hand over his mouth to m.u.f.fle the labored breathing. Taking the hint, the convict nodded tersely and strove for absolute silence.

At first there was nothing, the thermal wind having moved on past the far sides of the valley, its perpetual thunder a distant memory now. Then a hint of something. Something new and not natural. A low, ominous thrumming.

Motioning for the Guv and the other convict to stay where they were, Ridd.i.c.k snaked his way to the top of the rise. Unable to restrain her curiosity, or to sit still, Kyra wormed up beside him. What she saw took away what little breath she still had.

They were not alone.

Engines humming, an imposing black warship hovered over the landing strip that had been hewn from Crematoria's surface. Below and nearby gleamed the hangar doors, still in shade. They were shut tight. In front of them, foot soldiers in battle gear busied themselves like so many black ants; checking, inspecting, appraising, searching. Pulling on their leashes, lensing Necros were actively scanning every meter of building and ground. In the midst of them and clearly in charge was a figure Ridd.i.c.k recognized from his holiday on Helion Prime: the Necromonger commander called Vaako.

Next to him, Kyra queried in the softest whisper possible, "And those would be . . . ?"

"Necromongers," Ridd.i.c.k told her.

She turned back to the view below. "So that's what they look like. Creepy b.a.s.t.a.r.ds, aren't they?"

"That's the idea," he rumbled quietly.

She made a face. "s.h.i.t. I hate hate not being the bad guys." not being the bad guys."

In the midst of the inspection, one of the lensors suddenly turned away from the ground it had been scrutinizing, its head angling toward a nearby rise. It stood like that for a moment. Not entirely human, not wholly machine, indicator lights on its head and sides winking to show that it was alive. Or more properly, functioning. Then it signaled. In response, several soldiers stopped what they were doing and trotted off in the direction of the indicated slope, weapons held at the ready.

It was not good. The escapees now found themselves caught between the advancing and wary Necromonger troops and the rising sun behind. If they went forward, without cover, the soldiers would mow them down in seconds. If they tried to retreat and find a place to hide, the ascending sun would soon poach them just as effectively.

Kyra saw it and lay figuring the odds. So did the Guv and his companion, who had crawled up alongside her. At least if they all charged together, they might catch a soldier or two mentally napping. The trick would be to take down the squad advancing toward them and get close in to the hangar before other troops realized what was happening and could bring heavy weapons to bear. She licked her lips. Not because they were dry, but in antic.i.p.ation. If there was anything she hated, it was sitting and waiting. Once you let the other guy take the initiative, you've lost half the battle already.

"Figure one minute to get inside that hangar." She glanced back over her shoulder. The soldiers might change course, but the sun would not. "We gonna do this or not?"

Lying on the ground, it was immediately apparent what Ridd.i.c.k was going to do. It was plain to see: it just didn't make any sense. To all intents and purposes, he was relaxing, popping nuts from a bag he carried into his mouth.

"Wait."

The convict flattened out on already too-hot volcanic rock alongside the Guv hissed at him. "What am I waitin' for? To turn into freakin' charcoal?"

Ridd.i.c.k glanced in his direction, not raising his voice. Hardly ever raising his voice. "Just wait."

Kyra glared at the convict. Frustrated and frightened, the man looked to the Guv for direction. The Guv said nothing; just kissed his battered, scarred wedding ring for whatever luck it might hold, and- waited. There was nothing else to do. They would all hang together or, as the ancient saying went, they would surely hang separately.

There was a faraway look in his eyes, and when he spoke it was as if he was trying to speed his words, at least, on their way to someplace off this world. Someplace better.

"Her name was Ellen," he murmured reminiscently, his tone haunted. "I never really forgot. And we lived on Helion Prime."

Ridd.i.c.k nodded once, understanding. He usually did understand: he just rarely found any reason to show that he did.

On the other side of the rise, the squad of soldiers had begun moving upslope in the direction indicated by the suspicious lensor. A noise made them halt, and turn. Behind them, the hangar doors were rumbling open. Antic.i.p.ating that others of their number had made it inside and were operating the relevant instrumentation, they paused only out of curiosity. In a moment, they would resume their climb.

Except that the figures who appeared in the open portal wore no body armor, wore nothing common to Necromonger society, wore no insignia of any rank. In fact, the only thing they wore besides strange uniforms were expressions of utter bewilderment. In this they were matched by more than one of the now flabbergasted soldiers.

Then someone let off a shot, and looks of confusion were obscured by the sound and fury of concentrated gunfire.

On the other side of the rise, Ridd.i.c.k finished the last of the nuts, cast a thoughtful glance in the direction of the rising sun, matched the number of shots fired to the number of seconds expired, and finally turned, unlimbering his own weapons as he did so.