Axler, James - Deathlands 60 - Destiny's Truth Page 8

  Something she didn't feel possible as all her muscles protested. She took aim at one of the birds, and the shell from her ZKR flew straight into the creature's head, blurring it into a spray of blood, feather and bone. The lifeless corpse kept coming, and hit the ground near her with a sickening thud. She tried to readjust her aim, but her injured arm failed to respond.

  The bird had to surely land on her, beak and talons tearing at her weakened and unprotected body.

  And then the bird changed trajectory, veering sideways to hit the ground near her, a trail of blood and intestine pouring from the hole ripped in its side. Looking up, she saw Doc staring down, the LeMat aimed in her direction, the ball charge having taken out the danger.

  Doc's previous shot, spreading grape shot charge among the flock that had headed for the path, had done much damage. Judicious shooting from the others had chilled individual birds, leaving only the falling corpses to endanger them.

  J.B. looked across to Doc.

  "Damn fine shot," he said thankfully.

  Doc grinned. "One endeavors to do one's best, my dear John Barrymore. Now, shall we try to rescue poor Dr. Wyeth?"

  AFTER THEY HAD PICKED their way down the hillside and collected Mildred, Ryan decided that they would travel around the bottom of the hill until they reached the far side. It was obvious that the Gate would not have set up camp where there was such a predatory flock—at least, not without neutralizing the danger. It wasn't worth risking another earth slide like the one that had nearly chilled Mildred, who was bruised and aching, but otherwise unharmed. It took her the best part of a day to get back to speed, and so their progress was slow, but at least she was alive, and without any major injuries.

  It took the best part of the following day for the companions to get beyond the shadow of the hill, and they had just entered a patch of wooded land when Krysty stopped them.

  "What is it?" Ryan asked, but the question was unnecessary, as one look at her hair, curling protectively around her head and neck, told him all he needed to know.

  "I'm not certain exactly what, but there's a need to be wary here," she said slowly.

  Ryan nodded. "Okay. Blasters ready, triple red. We'll stay in formation, but keep it tight and real frosty."

  The words were unnecessary. The companions knew that Krysty's mutie sense acted as an early warning, and whatever was ahead of them, they would be ready…or so they thought.

  The trees were more of the dwarf elms, and what they lacked in height they made up for in the density of their cluster. The roots were aboveground, making the floor of the wood uneven, and a trap for less than cautious feet to catch and break among the rock hard wood. There was no direct path, only an uneven trail that wound through the trees. The light was poor as the overhead canopy of leaves was thick, and cut out most of the light from the sun. They were groping their way through in this semidarkness, and were listening intently for any other sign of activity.

  Jak suddenly stopped. "Others," he hissed, "coming from left, right—mebbe six, seven—and quick!"

  Ryan strained his ears and stared hard into the gloom. It was almost impossible to see or hear anything, except…

  "Fireblast! They're almost on us," he yelled, raising his SIG-Sauer.

  "Where the hell are they?" Mildred shouted. "I can't—"

  She was cut short as a slender figure dropped from the trees above and onto her shoulders with a bloodcurdling and deafening scream. It was the cue for other warriors to drop from above. Their opponents had managed to travel through the branches of the trees without disturbing the foliage enough to be visible to any except those with Jak's highly developed senses.

  The albino had looked up as his enemy had fallen, and had palmed a knife with which he now engaged his opponent in combat. Falling with her—for he could see it was a woman—he pulled her to him and then used the momentum to part them, turning to come to his feet before her with the knife held in the palm of his hand, blade outward. She did likewise, and it was only when they were in such close proximity, and easily visible, that their mutual identities became apparent.

  "Tammy!" the albino exclaimed with shocked surprise.

  "Jak! Shit, who else could it be but you who'd nearly get the better of me with a blade!" the Gate warrior exclaimed, a smile of surprise cracking her face.

  At the sound of this exchange, the fighting came to a surprised halt, as Gate warriors recognized those they had attacked, and the companions pulled back from their sudden line of defense. Warrior faced warrior, glad that combat had not proceeded further.

  "Well, well, by The Three Kennedys," Doc said wryly. "We were just saying how nice it would be to bump into you once again."

  Chapter Five

  Astonishment on the part of the Gate sec party was matched only by relief from the companions. They had found their quarry after several days where it seemed as though they were wandering without aim. For the Gate, however, there was none of this relief, only joy.

  "Just you wait until we get you back to camp," Tammy said excitedly. "They won't believe it… especially Gloria," she added, with a glance at Jak.

  "Then let's get moving," Ryan agreed. "Mildred got caught in a landslide, and she needs as much rest as possible."

  "Hell, it ain't that bad, Ryan," Mildred protested, but as she flexed her still aching muscles and they, too, protested, she added, "Then again, maybe it's not such a bad idea."

  The two groups picked themselves up, dusted themselves off, and Ryan and his people followed the Gate sec party as they began to weave a way through the dense woodland. They seemed to head toward the heart, where there would surely be little room for a tribe the size of the Gate to camp, particularly if they wanted to erect camouflage barriers like the ones they had used before the mat-trans jump.

  "By the goddess," Tammy said to Jak as they moved, almost gabbling in her excitement, "I thought we'd lost you guys forever. What the hell happened back there?"

  "Long story," Jak said simply. "Talk later."

  "Yeah, guess so. The main thing is that you're all here, right? And we can get those fuckers now."

  Even though Tammy and Jak were at the front of the sec party, the companions and the rest of the sec patrol were close enough to hear this exchange.

  "You mean the Illuminated Ones? You've seen them around here?" Ryan asked urgently.

  "Hell, yeah—more than that," Tammy replied. "But wait till we get back and celebrate your arrival. Gloria will tell you all."

  Ryan was about to press the matter, but was stayed by a hand from Doc. Panting a little from his exertions in keeping up with the fierce pace set by the Gate, he said, "I know you are impatient, friend Ryan. We all are. But you know that these women cannot be hurried."

  Ryan nodded. He knew that Doc was right, but all the same he felt a mounting sense of impatience as they continued their journey at a rapid pace.

  A journey that was over before any of the companions had a chance to realize it. Tammy let loose a whistling call, followed by a series of guttural whoops, and it seemed as though a bank of foliage opened up before them, revealing a clearing where the Gate had set up its camp. Although all their camouflage, most of their wags and a lot of the tents had been left behind—from both haste and necessity—during the flight after the Illuminated Ones, the armory had been intact, and the tribe had obviously used its trading opportunities and skills to acquire more tents and materials and construct another set of camouflage shields from the materials around them. Certainly, they had disguised their whereabouts as adequately as when the companions had first encountered them.

  As the sec party and the companions entered the camp, there was considerable interest. Obviously, they had been intercepted by a routine patrol that should have found nothing, and should not have returned this early. However, the interest soon turned to a buzz of excitement as Ryan and his people were recognized by the Gate members who could catch sight of them. They found themselves greeted by shouts and joy and disbelief, and it was
almost impossible to return the greetings that started to flow. Dean, in particular, was looking out for Jon. For a second, he almost hoped that Pietor would be in among those greeting them, even though he could recall only too clearly the grief they had shared at the chilling of their friend. Suddenly Jon appeared from among the throng, the disbelief fighting for space with the sheer joy in his expression.

  "Dean! How the fuck—?"

  "Tell you later," Dean cried, "but it's good to see you again!"

  There was no time for any more words to be shared before he was swept on by the tide of the Gate people, now propelling the companions toward the tent where Gloria—the queen of the Gate—held court.

  "Wait till she sees you, man—she'll be so pleased, sweets," Tammy whispered to Jak, a big grin splitting her face.

  Jak's visage was as impassive as ever. It was rare for him to let pleasure or pain show on his face. But although he was about to encounter Gloria once more, it wasn't joy that rilled his heart, rather, it was dread.

  The nightmare of the mat-trans dream still haunted him, and a part of him was on triple red for the Gate queen to come from her tent and try to rip him to shreds, her body covered with the open sores of the pox.

  He stood, all activity around him tuned out, waiting for Gloria to emerge. It was as though the Gate, his compatriots, the camp, the woodland—indeed, the whole world—were blotted out, and there remained only himself, face-to-face with his destiny.

  The tent flap parted, and he could hear the husky, sweet tones that he knew so well.

  "What the fuck is all this stupidworks noise about? Has everyone gone plain stupe or—" Gloria emerged into the open, straightening and staring the companions full in the face. She stood silent for a moment, her mouth open in surprise. She was still the same Gloria: whip thin, muscles glistening under her tan, the cut-off denims and shirt showing much of her taut skin, her eyes liquid under that mane of flowing red hair… and not a blister, pockmark or sore anywhere on her body. Jak breathed a mental sigh of relief, and relaxed, the pleasure at seeing her again now flowing through him.

  Gloria broke the silence that had fallen over the tribe with a wild whoop.

  "Glory be to Gaia! I never thought we'd see you again—any of you, but especially you, babes," she added, throwing herself into Jak's arms and kissing him full-on, her tongue expressing things that words couldn't.

  A cheering broke out from the Gate, and Gloria stepped back. "This is truly a miracle! Now then, this we've just got to celebrate!"

  Ryan stepped forward. "Gloria, glad as we are to see you, we've been searching for you for a reason. We—"

  He was stopped by a raised hand from the Gate queen, who—despite being tiny next to the one-eyed warrior—had the authority to silence even Ryan Cawdor without question.

  "There is nothing so pressing that we can't party down when the need arises. Tomorrow we will talk of what we've done and where we've been and even of what we have to do, sweets. But right now, we chill out and celebrate. Remember, honey, chilling out can stop you being chilled."

  Ryan stared at her for a second, but as her face cracked into a grin, the one-eyed man found himself following suit.

  And so the celebrations began.

  ALTHOUGH THE CELEBRATION didn't end until first light, such was the restorative powers of the tribe that the companions found themselves roused shortly after noon, and while the rest of the tribe went about its business, Tammy and Jon joined their queen outside her tent in discovering what had happened to the companions after they had made the mat-trans jump. But first, Dean congratulated Jon on becoming the new Armorer of the Gate tribe. After Margia was chilled— albeit by her own stupidity—during the battle in the redoubt, it had been important for someone to take over the running and maintenance of the armory. As Jon had been Margia's assistant, it seemed an obvious choice for Gloria to make, even though a male had never before been awarded such status in the tribe. The young man was almost bashful as he was congratulated, and invited J.B. to check the armory later and give him any advice he had to offer.

  Getting to business, Ryan outlined to Gloria what happened to the companions since they had been parted by the mat-trans jump. He put forward the theory that the old comps had a fail-safe mechanism that changed the destinations of jumps, and told of how they had left the redoubt and traveled to Crossroads. He neglected to mention Jak's dream, and a glance at the albino confirmed that Jak, too, had been reticent to mention this to Gloria. Perhaps it was as well. At this stage it could be counterproductive.

  He did, however, talk at great length of the disease they had encountered in Crossroads, and how they felt it related to the Illuminated Ones and their sightings. Mildred and Doc told of the incidences of smallpox before it had been eradicated long before the nukecaust. They wanted to drive home just how devastating it could be, in case it was hard for the Gate to imagine.

  They shouldn't have worried. Gloria could quite plainly see the importance of such a disease spreading across the land.

  "None of us have been in the ville long enough to see such a thing," she began when Ryan had finished, "but it seems to me that the baron is some kind of a stupidworks fool who'd rather hide his head than face facts. If they're hiding it away, then it'll be the chilling of them. That's their choice, but not when it affects the rest of the people across the land.

  "I knew our paths would cross again," she continued, "as it's in our fate. As to your notion that the old tech would send us to different places from the Illuminated Ones, then it's either a wrongheaded notion, or that tech really is fucked by time…because we ended up following them right into the belly of their beast."

  The Gate queen paused before continuing. "I know that you'd warned us about traveling through the chambers, and how it could make you feel, but I don't think any of us were really prepared for that feeling of being torn up into tiny pieces and then flung through the air before being shoved back together by someone with a heaviness of hand. None of us was really ready to fight, and the fact that we had to get it together and face whatever was outside the chamber only made things harder.

  "But I guess that they were feeling the same way— or else they didn't expect us to follow them—as no one came to attack us when we were at our most vulnerable… for which I give thanks to the goddess.

  "We were soon ready, and we came out into a room like the one we had left. It was deserted except for a few of the Illuminated soldiers, and we were able to chill them real easy, as they were taken totally by surprise. I guess they were able to raise an alarm, 'cause a whole load of others were ready to meet us when we hit the corridors. Trouble was, they knew exactly where they were, and we didn't—shit, we had no way of knowing if that redoubt was the same design as the one we had left behind. And we were wondering where the hell you were! 'Cause we knew you'd jumped into the other chamber, and the second chamber where we'd landed was empty when we got the hell out, we kinda figured that you'd gotten chilled along the way, and that made us all madder than ever, I guess…

  "There were more of them than us, and they had those laser blasters, as well as normal ones, but fuck it. We were mad and ready to chill any fucker that got in our way, and you know that they might have the hardware but they ain't no good at firefighting, so we were able to drive them back and make some kind of dent on their numbers. We lost a couple, but a lot less than you'd expect when we were supposed to be the ones up against it.

  "We were making progress, but suddenly it changed. They pulled right back, and we were chasing them rather than fighting them. I guess it was a tactic to make us chase and run where the hell they wanted us. Not the first time they tried that, but this time we were so blood fired that we were blinded, and let them push us exactly where they wanted. They sealed off some corridors so that we were going exactly where they wanted. Then it happened.

  "Ahead of us, the corridor was sealed with a sec door, and as we went through, before we had a chance to double back they brought the door down
on our tail. We were trapped in a section of corridor, and as we started to try and break out, they started soaking us with water, for Gaia's sake! Yet it wasn't like the trick they tried on us before, to soak us into submission. This was different. It wasn't water like ice, and it was too fine to really get in the way, so we were able to keep hammering at the door with battering rams, and trying to lever the door or blow the mechanism. We were too hemmed in to try any plas-ex or heavy duty blasters on the door, which was the fucker of it."

  While Gloria had been talking, J.B. had noticed a sudden expression of surprise and then rapt concentration come over Mildred's face when the queen had mentioned the fine mist that had been rained upon them; and he had also noticed Mildred glance at Doc, and the almost imperceptible nod that the old man had given in acknowledgment. Meanwhile, Gloria was finishing her story. "It seemed like we were there for hours, and then suddenly the sec door lifted and there was the outside world. We got the fuck out, away from the rain, as we were all soaked through and it was starting to finally have an effect. Oh, sweet goddess, it was good to see the outside world. There was no way they were going to let us back in, so we left to make camp and wait. Since then, we've done some trading, some hunting… but not the one thing we want to hunt—those Illuminated scum fuckers. Our people have heard stories of them coming out, too, but we haven't caught any of them yet…yet," she added venomously.

  "So you know where they are?" Ryan asked.

  Gloria looked at him as though the one-eyed man were a stupe child.