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There was an edge to his voice that brooked no argument, and Ryan felt a nagging doubt begin to creep at the back of his mind. The low drawl in which Correll spoke barely changed in pitch or volume, yet was stopped from being a monotone by an underlying edge. Ryan had the vaguest notion that the edge in the man’s voice was that of madness. He was driven by something, but the one-eyed warrior had yet to find out exactly what that something was.
They walked on, past the area of habitation and up toward the main ramp and double set of sec doors leading to the outside. Correll punched in a code and opened the first set, leading them through. He paused before the second set, which opened onto the outside.
“Blasters ready,” he intoned. “That means you, as well, Ryan Cawdor, and your people. Every time that we go outside, we need to be triple-red aware.”
“Your enemies, or just muties and wildlife?” Ryan asked.
The ghost of a smile flickered across Correll’s face. “It’s all wildlife out there, friend, and they’re all our enemies.”
He punched in the final code and pressed a lever, the outer sec doors lifting to reveal to Ryan and the companions the world outside this particular redoubt.
In truth, it was hard to tell what the outside was like, as the fluorescent lighting inside made it hard for their eyes to adjust to the gloom outside. Although both J.B. and Ryan had wrist chrons, it was useless for them to use those as they had no idea whereabouts in the they had landed. The Armorer had hoped that a look at the terrain would give him an idea, as he was usually accurate at judging their general location by the topography of the land. But wherever they were, it seemed to be late evening, and in the cloudless sky overhead there were stars beginning to show through the twilight.
“We must hurry,” Correll said, breaking into their respective thoughts. “The open door will be visible for some way. Come…”
He led most of the party outside and onto the bare rock around. Two of his sec people stayed within the boundary of the redoubt, and at a nod from their leader, closed the sec door.
“I don’t want the inside visible any longer than necessary when it’s dark,” he offered by way of explanation before leading them across the rock floor to an incline.
Looking around, the companions could tell that the redoubt was recessed into the side of a mountain that had a series of graded ridges running up the side. These had been fashioned into a road at one time, as there were still traces of blacktop material, but an earth movement—either the earth itself or possibly even the activities of the mutie worms—had caused much of the rock to fall away.
Correll stopped and pointed over the incline. It began gently, then after a few yards fell away into nothing. He said, “See, everyone who comes near figures that there was something leading up here, and then it all went. But that ain’t true. We only discovered this place by chance and fate, and then because there’s another road that moves from the other side of the hill and goes up then down before it gets to here. See, you take the long route and sometimes you get what you want, whereas you always want the quickest, then you get fucked off.”
Ryan looked at the road that ran in the opposite direction from the sheltered entrance to the redoubt. It certainly ran up, and then out of sight around the side of the mountain. But it was obvious to the one-eyed man that Correll was talking about something else when he mouthed the last sentence. Something that had to do with the secrets of the old tech that he believed they could find.
J.B., meanwhile, was taking a good look around, his eyes adjusting to the gloom, trying to work out where they could be in the Deathlands. The mountain on which they stood was one of a few scattered for as far as he could see. He could turn 180 degrees and get a good view of what the terrain was like. It seemed to be scattered mountains, with desert in between. Although the air was cold now, he guessed that it could be mighty hot at the peak of the day. Enough that there was little scrub and vegetation around.
Correll disturbed his musings.
“Time to consign these friends to the past,” he said sadly. “Fate said their time had come, and you can’t argue with that.”
The man and woman carrying one end each of the chilled corpses moved toward the incline where Correll was standing. Jak and Dean, each grasping the other end of a corpse, followed, not knowing what was expected of them. In turn, each of the corpses was tossed over the side of the incline. Dean lingered to take a look below. It was impossible to see what was at the bottom of the mountain, as the darkness and shadow closed in. He looked back toward Correll, an unspoken question forming.
“There’s mutie dogs and jackals down there, other kinds of rodent. They pick the bones clean. Ain’t much clue left of us being here, ain’t no chance of any illness spreading, and you feed the fuckers and they don’t bother us much. Serves a lot of purposes.”
Correll shrugged and turned back to the sec door, walking rapidly up the rock floor to where the metal door, its camou paint barely touched by the rad-blasted years, was silent and still. The rest of his party followed, with Ryan and his companions following a fraction of a second later.
Correll rapped on the door with his knuckles. It barely sounded on the thick metal, but the pair on the other side of the door had to have been listening for his return and signal, as the door immediately began to rise. Correll entered while it was still rising to its full height, and was greeted by Lonnie, who had joined the others at the sec door. The crop-haired man seemed relieved to have left the med lab.
“Well?” Correll asked simply.
“He’s getting something called plasma, and the doctor did something to his shoulder, gave him some of the drugs. Travis is with him now, but he’s asleep and seems to be out of pain. Travis could learn a lot from her.”
“Good.” Correll nodded.
Then, turning to Ryan and his companions as they approached, he continued, “Your friend Mildred seems to be extremely knowledgeable. Cy sounds like he’s in good hands.”
“It is only fair, as we were responsible,” Doc murmured. The silence that greeted his remark made him feel uncomfortable.
“Really don’t think you should have pointed that out,” Krysty muttered, looking at their erstwhile opponents.
“No, the old man is right,” Correll interjected. “But that was appropriate for all, then. Perhaps it gave us a chance to learn something about the other. The past is another land.”
“Let’s hope we’ve sailed away from it, then,” J.B. whispered to Ryan as Correll led them all back down the corridor.
“Yeah, and the tide doesn’t wash us back,” the one-eyed man replied thoughtfully.
They were led into the section of the redoubt that was now used as living quarters by Correll’s people. Because of the problems caused by the giant worms and the manner in which they caused damage and possible death on the lower levels of the redoubt, it had been necessary for the community to base all their living operations around the upper two levels, rather than spread themselves across the whole base. Therefore, although they used the shower room with caution, they had taken most of the bedding from the dorms and used what had been offices and sec command posts and surveillance rooms to make new sleeping areas. They seemed to have either paired off, or slept and lived in small groups in what had once been military offices. The kitchens, which were also on one of the lower levels, had also been plundered, and the ovens and microwaves that had been previously installed in those areas had been taken out and reinstalled in an upper level area that had once, in the days before skydark, been used as an area for briefing the redoubt personnel. Thus, it was a long room that had plenty of space in which to deploy the ovens and also store much of the supplies from the kitchen areas.
J.B. and Ryan both observed this with interest, but kept their peace. Dean, however, wasn’t so silent, and as they passed this area he noted to Krysty, “If they’ve got those working, then they must have a pretty good idea of how a lot of this works.”
Correll stopped and turned to the younger Cawdor. “Son, I wish I could say you were right, but I don’t think any of us can claim that great a knowledge. Thing is, we’ve lived down here a while, and when the muties got too keen on using this place as a shortcut to wherever the hell they’re headed, then we all kinda figured that we needed to use that as little as possible. Which meant taking all the ovens out and getting them here, where it was safe. Only thing we had to leave was the really cold place—couldn’t figure a way of getting the food from that room and keeping it cold, so we had to leave that there and kinda take our chances like with the showers. But the other stuff…See, we took them apart kinda slow, so we could make out where everything went. Then we pulled them up here and figured out which bits of cable looked the same. But as to how it all actually works?”
“Have you tried anything else?” Dean persisted.
Correll allowed himself a ghostly smile that seemed unnatural on his grim visage. “Son, we live among this stuff, now. Where we eat and sleep, there’s flickering lights and old tech all around. Sometimes some of it gives out, sometimes we try to fix it. I don’t know if we do any good. I don’t even know if we really learn anything from it, but sometimes the lights start again, and sometimes you can still see the outside and some parts of in here on the screens.”
Doc looked around him. “I think you do yourself a disservice, my dear sir. The air-conditioning is still working, there is still water filtered through the plant, you have nearly all the facilities up and running. You should be congratulated.”
“I thank you kindly,” Correll replied graciously, “but the truth of the matter is that fate has been kind to us since our arrival here. We know how to keep things running, but if we had a real problem, then our feeble knowledge would be sorely stretched. Which is why, my friend, we wish to discover some more secrets of the old tech, and so unlock the way this place runs.”
Ryan interrupted. “Which is exactly what we’d like to do.”
Correll nodded. “Yes, we will talk more of this, but first we should eat. Your friend Mildred will be joining us. She has done a very fine job.”
Turning on his heel in a manner that suggested conversation was now over, Correll moved off, trailing his party and the companions in his wake.
As they walked on, J.B. turned it over in his mind. Correll and his people had the knowledge to keep some of the plant working, and working well. They would also, presumably, be able to maintain the wags that were stored on the second level. J.B. hadn’t noticed any on their way up, but then the wag bays were always kept apart from the rest of the redoubt because of the hazards of fuel storage. If the wags had been in as good a condition as the rest of the redoubt seemed to be, then they would have good transport, and plenty of fuel. From the way in which the party initially opposing them had been armed, it was an obvious conclusion that the armory had been well-equipped, and—taking a surreptitious glance at the party around him—they knew well enough how to look after their blasters. He had no doubt that the med lab was well equipped, as Millie would have made her feelings known on the matter to the man Lonnie, and Correll would have felt the rough edge of Millie’s tongue secondhand.
All in all, they had a good base from which to wage a war, and the equipment with which to win it. Redoubts this well equipped and maintained were rare, and anyone who stumbled across them had just gotten lucky.
Thing was, what did Correll and his people want to do with it? J.B. had a creeping feeling, tingling at the back of his neck, that Correll was spoiling for a fight with someone, and the companions had just stumbled into the beginnings of a private war, with the search for old tech and the arrival of an outside interest just the excuse and impetus he needed.
Coincidentally, much the same set of thoughts were running through Ryan’s head as they walked on.
Mebbe, the one-eyed man mused, they would learn something later that night.
THE COMPANIONS WERE given their own sleeping and living space, with bedding and a change of clothes taken from the supplies that still existed. The space was an old office that had just had the office furniture removed, and was noticeably free from much in the way of old tech.
“You can shower if you’re willing to take a chance,” Correll said as his parting shot. “Ain’t usually a problem, just be ready to move fast if you feel those tremors.”
When he and the accompanying party had left them alone, Krysty said, “I don’t know about you, lover, but it doesn’t all add up yet.”
Ryan shook his head. “Mebbe we’ll discover more when we eat—mebbe get to meet the rest properly.”
“Yeah, I don’t think this is that big a community,” added Mildred, who had joined them when Correll had shown them their quarters. “Should be fairly easy to keep tabs on them all, get the feel of what’s going on.”
“Should be…” J.B. said quietly. “Reckon they’ve got enough here to start a small war, and that’s what they’re after.”
Ryan agreed. “But why?”
“Dunno yet, but I guess we can’t hurry it up—so if it’s okay with everyone, I’ll take my chances with the showers,” Dean interjected. “May as well face it clean and fresh.” He grinned.
“Sound good,” Jak added, running a hand through his stringy white hair. “Good cold water make sharper.”
“Yeah, I could go for that,” Ryan agreed. “We’ll take it in shifts, stand lookout for any mutie trouble.”
They started to go, but Ryan noticed that Doc was still standing against the wall, looking pensive. As the others left, Ryan broke away and went over to Doc.
“What is it?”
Doc, lost in reverie, grunted and looked up at Ryan. For a moment, it seemed as though the old man’s eyes were a million miles and thousand of years from that room. The distance and desolation in them was enough to make Ryan—for all that he had seen—start back. Then the mists cleared for Doc, and he was once again back with the one-eyed warrior.
“I’m sorry, my dear boy, but for a moment I felt as though I was standing outside of myself, outside of everything.”
“You okay, Doc?”
“By the Three Kennedys, what a ridiculous question.” Doc laughed bitterly. “You of all people should know that the last thing I really am is okay. But for a second, I was reminded of something that I seem to remember from what seems many years ago. I suppose it is many years,” he added, surprise entering his tone, “but that is by the by. It is our host. There is something about the gentleman that haunts me. I feel he is a lost soul.”
“I think it’s me you’ve lost there, Doc,” Ryan said softly. He felt Doc was trying to tell him something important, but he couldn’t quite grasp it.
“He is driven by an inner demon that has taken over everything that he is or was. It is a demon that is part of him, and yet is apart. It has control of him to such an extent that it will care not for anyone or anything around. We should be wary of him, my dear Ryan, very wary. He means us no harm, I am sure, but we are the catalyst for him to put his own plans for vengeance into operation. And he will be merciless.”
Ryan chewed his lip, trying to unravel Doc’s language, the likes of which was no longer heard in the Deathlands. Finally, he nodded. “I understand. I figured along the same lines, I guess. But it’s a matter of playing the odds, Doc, and I figure that we should go with it. If we pay heed, and keep our backs covered—”
“Then that is all we can do,” Doc finished.
WITHIN A FEW HOURS, the companions, refreshed by their showers, were visited by Lonnie and Travis, who informed them that they would be eating shortly in the large room where the ovens were now installed. Travis also informed Mildred that Cy was sleeping, and that his condition was stable.
“But I’d be grateful if you could take a look at him later,” he added.
Mildred agreed, and waited until Lonnie and Travis had left before murmuring, “Considering we injured him, they’re being too damn nice about it.”
J.B. shrugged. “That’s life—and chilling—Millie. Most places they’d have chilled us straight away, but…”
“But we’ll find out soon enough,” Ryan finished.
The companions made their way to the eating room. The rest of the redoubt was empty except for one man, who sat alone in one of the living quarters. Doc looked in, and observed that it was a room that housed the monitors for all the sec cameras in the redoubt. To his surprise, none of the monitors were dark.
“Good heavens, that is most unusual!” he exclaimed.
The man on duty turned to him and shrugged. “Hell, if any of these go down, we probably couldn’t fix ’em. Have to start posting guards. Still, our luck’s holding so far. Guess Papa Joe’s right—mebbe it is our fate to be here and get even.”
Doc nodded and smiled. “Guess so, friend,” he said cheerily before slipping out of the room, adding to himself, “Now, that really is interesting.”
As they reached the eating room, they could see that the whole community was gathered together. There were about thirty in all, with only one-third of those being female. They were eating in relative silence, with only a very low hum of conversation taking place. Looking around, Dean could see that there were no children—no one, in fact, who seemed to be under the age of sixteen. The youngest-looking man in the room was a whip-thin boy who had the beginning of a beard, and was hunched over his food, as though wanting to appear invisible. Yet this had the opposite effect, as his intensity was such that he appeared to radiate a nervous energy that drew your eyes to him. Bizarrely, it was almost as though he could feel Dean looking at him. He turned to face the younger Cawdor, his eyes burning bright through his spectacles, a keen intelligence showing through. His eyes locked on Dean’s, as though he were assessing him. Then he gave the faintest of grins, and the briefest of nods, before turning back to his food.
Unusual for a community setup, there seemed to be no table and privileges reserved for the baron—although it had been noticeable that Correll hadn’t referred to himself as such—and the man who was leader was seated to one side of the room, with a group of people among whom were Travis and the Native American woman who had been in the defense party they had faced earlier. Correll stood when he noticed the companions enter, and beckoned them to him. They seated themselves at his table, some of the redoubt community moving to make room, and were served food by those who acted as cooks. Even these seemed to be on a par with everyone else, as there was no sign of a pecking order, and the cooks were as lean and fit as the people they had faced earlier.
In fact, this was one thing that all seemed to share. They seemed trained and fit, ready for combat at any time. This was a community that was carrying no passengers.
While they ate, they made small talk, and it wasn’t until the meal was nearly over that Ryan judged it time to broach the subject that had, sooner or later, to be talked about.
The one-eyed man downed some of the brew that had been supplied with the meal, then took a breath. “I guess it’s about time we all leveled. You know we came here using old tech. It was something we stumbled on, and we can’t control it although we know how to trigger it. It’s some kind of system for transporting people and objects across vast distances by breaking it all up into atoms and shooting it across from one comp to another.”
Correll nodded slowly, sucking in his breath. “That’d be crazy talk if I hadn’t known there was no other way to get into this place. So you can work it, but not control it?”
Ryan shook his head. “Guess it’s like you in that sense. You know something about the old tech, enough to use some and keep some going, but not enough to really make it work for you.”
Correll nodded. “That’s what we can find out. It’ll be sweet, and we can settle a few old scores. But to get at that knowledge, I need to know you’ll join us in a firefight.”
“Never shirked one yet,” Ryan said levelly. “Just tell us what it’s about.”
Correll sat back in his seat and looked up at the ceiling. “We’ve been here for about ten years now, just getting ourselves ready for when fate decrees we can rise again. See, I used to be sec chief for Charity—” he spit the name of the ville with an undisguised venom “—which is just about the stupidest name you can think of for a ville run by such a coldheart son of a gaudy like Baron Al ‘Red’ Jourgensen. Got run out of town because I was heading sec on a convoy headed for a trade rendezvous. We got raided by a party from Summerfield—they’re the ones who know something about the old ways, ’cause they had blasters and shit like you ain’t seen before. We didn’t stand a chance. All the things we were trading, all the jack we carried, it all went. Red wanted to chill me and the rest of the party who survived, so we had to run. Dammit, there was shit all we could do….
“Anyway, we found this place, and over the years there were others who Red was a shit to…. See, we lost the trade and jack ’cause Red didn’t let me take enough blasters or men. Always frightened he was gonna be overthrown if he let that happen. Stupe bastard deserves what he’ll get. We all come from Charity, but we won’t show none to old Red.”
“So why is it right now?” Krysty asked.
Correll raised an eyebrow. “Fate works in strange ways. It’s hard desert land out there, and that rad-blasting sun means jackshit grows that well. Summerfield may have old tech, but they ain’t got shit to protect their water, and they lost a whole heap of women ’cause of rad sickness. While Red—Well, that stupe fucker has screwed up his whole farming scheme, and there ain’t jackshit to eat. He needs jack for food and seed crop to start over.”
J.B. nodded to himself. From the description of the land, and what he’d seen earlier on the outside, he was now sure that he had been correct in his guess that they had landed somewhere in New Mex. That knowledge may be useful.
Correll was in full flow. “So Charity and Summerfield have a little deal going down. Red is selling them some women for breeding stock, and in return he gets jack to buy food and seed crop to start over. Thing is, we know the route they gonna have to take, and we’re gonna take them out. Get the jack and the women, then in the confusion when they think they’re double-crossing each other, we take out Summerfield, get their secrets, then wipe that bastard Red off the face of the earth.”
Correll’s speech had been listened to by all in silence, the hush spreading as he talked longer. Now he was cheered by the assembled throng.
“We’ve trained hard, denied ourselves families, denied ourselves rest, and now fate has delivered vengeance to us,” he yelled, to be greeted by whoops and hollers.
“They call us the Hellbenders out there,” one of the group screamed. “I know, I ain’t been here long. But they’re right—we’re sure as hell bent on vengeance.”
Ryan touched Correll on the arm, and the leader looked down at him, his eyes wild and gleaming, for a moment not seeing the one-eyed man.
“So when the hell does this begin?” Ryan queried.
“Seven days, friend, as long as it took to create this dust bowl before skydark. If that can happen, we can sure as hell get it together to whip some ass.”
Chapter Five
“It is not very long,” Doc mused. “Not very long at all.”
It was the morning after their first meal with the people they now knew were called the Hellbenders, and while Mildred went with Travis to check on Cy’s condition, the rest of the companions were taking a few moments to assess, through headaches caused by the previous night’s strong brew, what they had learned.
As the evening had worn on, and the redoubt dwellers had become intoxicated, so the rowdiness had increased. People were singing and shouting at one another, and Correll had tried to make himself heard to Ryan. But the volume from the assembled throng was too great, and the gaunt man’s voice strained to be heard.
It was then that he gave a demonstration of his authority that made the one-eyed man assess the power that he held, and conclude that it was very great. Frustrated at not being able to make himself heard, a cloud of fury crossing his brow, Correll rose to his feet and then climbed onto the table. This movement immediately caught the eye of J.B., who rose an eyebrow at Ryan, receiving a similar gesture from his friend. This would be a telling moment.
Correll drew a long knife from a scabbard attached to his thigh. It was similar to Ryan’s panga, but with a more curved blade that caught light from the candles that were augmenting the now dimmed fluorescent tubes, reflecting it in glittering patterns. Correll tossed the knife in the air so that it spun, and as it came back down he caught it by the point and, in one fluid motion, threw it so that it described a parabola around the circumference of the room. It skidded low across the tops of heads, its passing marked by a rush of air that breathed on the people, making them stop and turn. If someone had been standing higher than head height—on a chair, or on a table—then the knife would have sliced into them. As it was, Correll had judged the height to perfection, leaving nothing in the wake of the flight but a series of turned heads and a growing silence around the room.
