[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
necessary these dark days for the many folks who couldn't read.
"Pretty clever," J.B. muttered. "Having outlanders living without a roof, must
cut their stay short."
"Make buy more water, too," Jak added, rubbing a hand across his dry mouth.
The canteen hung heavy at his side, but he was holding off until they were
some place out of the direct sun.
"Okay, this is the place," Hawk announced, reining
his stallion to a halt and walking it around. "You can put the wag in the barn
over there. We have no other outlanders staying here, so you won't be
bothering any horses."
"Fair enough. Any laws we should know about?"
Ryan asked, turning on the heater to keep the heating engine operating. As a
wave of hot air rushed from the vents, the temperature gauge needle flickered
and began to move away from the red line in a pulsating motion.
"Yeah, there are. You can leave Rockpoint anytime you want during the day, but
not at night," Hawk said, leaning forward in the saddle, both hands crossed
over the pommel. "Disobey a sec man, ten lashes. Steal water, thirty lashes.
Hurt a horse, a hundred lashes. Go anywhere near the temple, death. Say
anything treasonous against the baron, you get into the temple.
Permanently. You leave at dawn in three days."
With that done, the big man shook the bridle to start the stallion trotting
away. The rest of the sec men rode around the sputtering wag with hands on
blasters once in a patent display of firepower, then followed their chief back
into the coolness of the covered ville.
"Mother Gaia, I wonder why they let us come inside," Krysty said. "They sure
as hell don't seem to want any visitors."
"Only way to get any news about what's happening outside the walls," Ryan
explained, turning the wheel to head for the adobe barn. "New plagues, new
muties, and such. If they stay too isolated, something big could come their
way and they wouldn't be ready to fight, or run."
"Simple self preservation," Mildred said in agreement. "Nothing more. Walls
this thick were built to keep something out."
"Or in," Doc added cryptically.
Rolling the wag into the barn, Ryan made a wide arc and managed to turn it
around to park facing the exit.
It would be ready to charge and smash through the door in case they had to
leave in a hurry. Ryan turned off the engine, and he and J.B. both stayed in
the vehicle, listening carefully as it sputtered and backfired to finally go
still.
"Intake is clogged with salt dust," J.B. said with a frown. "Tricky to fix
that."
Setting the handbrake, Ryan added, "And we got to remove that thermostat."
"Damn straight we do. My legs are feeling like they've been dipped in acid
rain."
"At least we got the spare juice to flush the manifold," Ryan told him,
Page 72
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
reaching under the dashboard and pulling a handful of fuses. "But that's for
tomorrow, after we rest and eat."
"Good," Jak said eagerly, lowering the canteen and smacking his lips.
"Starving."
Tucking the fuses into a pocket, Ryan climbed down from the cab and walked to
the rear of the wag to claim his backpack. A slanted shadow cut across the
interior of the barn from the setting sun, but if there was a difference in
temperature it wasn't readily noticeable.
Why anybody would build a ville here in the first place was a puzzle. Then
again, maybe it was started by folks fleeing across the salty desert and they
found water.
"Dean takes first watch," Ryan directed, checking his wrist chron. "Doc next,
then Jak, J.B. and me. We switch every two hours."
"No prob," the boy said, lifting a nukelamp and checking to make sure the
device still worked. Even in the daylight, the brilliant beam was clearly
visible.
Turning it off, he placed the lamp on the ground in the
far corner where the beam could shine in the open doorway. Hidden in the
shadows behind the light, he would be a hard target to shoot.
Gathering their backpacks, Mildred and Krysty said nothing about being left
out of the rotation schedule.
They knew that a woman standing guard alone at night would only be an open
invitation for serious trouble.
They'd do a turn during the day, or by a campfire once the group was far from
the ville.
Lifting the hood, J.B. pulled an ignition wire and coiled it into a bundle
before tucking it into his munitions bag. Too many folks seemed to know how to
jump a fuse these days, so he decided to take some extra insurance. Unless a
hijacker had exactly the correct replacement for the same make and model wag,
the vehicle wasn't going to move an inch. The rope, shovels and other small
items they could safely leave behind. There was only the single entrance, and
Dean was a good shot.
"Don't lose that, John," Mildred joked, slinging her own backpack onto a
shoulder. "We really don't want to stay here for any longer than necessary."
"Got that right," the Armorer replied, as he slipped the S&W M-4000 off his
back and offered it to Dean.
"How about some company?"
"Thanks," Dean replied, accepting the shotgun and resting it on a shoulder.
"You hear this, you better come running."
"Or sound the horn," Ryan instructed, checking over the arrangement inside the
barn with approval. The site was tight. "See you in two hours."
"No problem," the boy said, racking the weapon.
As the rest of the companions walked from the barn, Dean followed them to the
doorway. Watching them
head for the ramshackle motel, he noticed a young girl across the street just
standing there, her slim arms holding a clay water jug. She was about his own
age, just starting to fill her raggedy dress with the shape of a woman. She
was so beautiful it was like something from a predark vid, and on impulse he
gave a brief wave. Shyly, the girl smiled and that was when he noticed her
topaz eyes, bluer than the sky after a storm. Dean started forward, but then
stopped, knowing that he couldn't leave the wag unattended.
Frantically, he tried to think of something to call out to her, but nothing
came to mind. After waiting a minute, the girl shrugged in resignation and
padded around a corner with her water jug. Dean followed her progress until
she was gone from sight.
"Mebbe this place isn't so bad," he said softly, and settled down into a
Page 73
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
comfortable position against the wall to watch the street in the hope that she
might return.
CROSSING THE CRACKED asphalt of what once had been the parking lot for the
motel, Ryan found the way into the building blocked by a mangy dog laying in
front of the door, its pale tongue lolling from the heat.
Nudging gently with a combat boot, Ryan got the dog to move and walked into
the building.
As the one-eyed man pushed aside the door, the rusty hinges creaked, and the
cracked glass wobbled loosely in the frame. Waiting a moment for his vision to
adjust to the darkness, he then stepped out of the afternoon sun into the
lobby of the predark motel. It was somewhat cooler, although the air reeked of
sour sweat and rancid cooking grease.
Across the lobby, a stack of sandbags formed a sort of front desk, flat stones
on top serving as a counter.
Sitting behind that was a fat man wearing a moth eaten cowboy hat and no
shirt, picking his teeth with a thumbnail. Hanging on the nearby wall was a
baseball bat spiked with nails in the manner of a medieval flail.
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]