скачать книгу бесплатно
Shaking Earth
James Axler
After a nuclear blast all but vaporized the Western Hemisphere in the late twenty-first century, America became known as Deathlands, a hellhole that has proved itself a formidable foe in the fight for survival–a place where the will to see another day comes down to raw courage and a good aim.Ryan Cawdor and his warrior group roam the vast and violent landscape, fighting to live and living to fight for a better life, knowing that death may not be the only way out, but it's the quickest.In a land steeped in ancient legend, power and destruction, the crumbling ruins of what was once Mexico City is now under siege by a bloodthirsty tribe of aboriginal muties. Emerging from a gateway into the partially submerged ruins of this once great city, Ryan and his group ally themselves with a fair and just baron caught in a treacherous power struggle with a dangerous rival. An internecine war foreshadows ultimate destruction of the valley at a time when unity of command and purpose offers the only hope against a terrible fate…. In the Deathlands everyone has a future. Some will wish they didn't't.
The woman threw away her useless blaster
“Macahuitl!” she screamed. “Macahuitl!”
Ryan wondered if it was a prayer or a curse. It was neither. One of the handful of Chichimecs still on their feet tossed her one of the obsidian-edged clubs.
The female marauder fielded the club deftly. She hacked it savagely into the tentacle that gripped her. The volcanic glass, sharper than a surgeon’s scalpel, half severed the leg-thick member.
Holding the SIG-Sauer in both hands, Ryan backed cautiously away from the rail. He looked around quickly, trying to take stock of the tactical situation.
It was, basically, battle over.
Other titles in the Deathlands saga:
Red Holocaust
Neutron Solstice
Crater Lake
Homeward Bound
Pony Soldiers
Dectra Chain
Ice and Fire
Red Equinox
Northstar Rising
Time Nomads
Latitude Zero
Seedling
Dark Carnival
Chill Factor
Moon Fate
Fury’s Pilgrims
Shockscape
Deep Empire
Cold Asylum
Twilight Children
Rider, Reaper
Road Wars
Trader Redux
Genesis Echo
Shadowfall
Ground Zero
Emerald Fire
Bloodlines
Crossways
Keepers of the Sun
Circle Thrice
Eclipse at Noon
Stoneface
Bitter Fruit
Skydark
Demons of Eden
The Mars Arena
Watersleep
Nightmare Passage
Freedom Lost
Way of the Wolf
Dark Emblem
Crucible of Time
Starfall
Encounter:
Collector’s Edition
Gemini Rising
Gaia’s Demise
Dark Reckoning
Shadow World
Pandora’s Redoubt
Rat King
Zero City
Savage Armada
Judas Strike
Shadow Fortress
Sunchild
Breakthrough
Salvation Road
Amazon Gate
Destiny’s Truth
Skydark Spawn
Damnation Road Show
Devil Riders
Bloodfire
Hellbenders
Separation
Death Hunt
Shaking Earth
DEATH LANDS®
James Axler
A conquering army on the border will not be halted by the power of eloquence.
—Otto von Bismarck
1815–1898
THE DEATHLANDS SAGA
This world is their legacy, a world born in the violent nuclear spasm of 2001 that was the bitter outcome of a struggle for global dominance.
There is no real escape from this shockscape where life always hangs in the balance, vulnerable to newly demonic nature, barbarism, lawlessness.
But they are the warrior survivalists, and they endure—in the way of the lion, the hawk and the tiger, true to nature’s heart despite its ruination.
Ryan Cawdor: The privileged son of an East Coast baron. Acquainted with betrayal from a tender age, he is a master of the hard realities.
Krysty Wroth: Harmony ville’s own Titian-haired beauty, a woman with the strength of tempered steel. Her premonitions and Gaia powers have been fostered by her Mother Sonja.
J. B. Dix, the Armorer: Weapons master and Ryan’s close ally, he, too, honed his skills traversing the Deathlands with the legendary Trader.
Doctor Theophilus Tanner: Torn from his family and a gentler life in 1896, Doc has been thrown into a future he couldn’t have imagined.
Dr. Mildred Wyeth: Her father was killed by the Ku Klux Klan, but her fate is not much lighter. Restored from predark cryogenic suspension, she brings twentieth-century healing skills to a nightmare.
Jak Lauren: A true child of the wastelands, reared on adversity, loss and danger, the albino teenager is a fierce fighter and loyal friend.
Dean Cawdor: Ryan’s young son by Sharona accepts the only world he knows, and yet he is the seedling bearing the promise of tomorrow.
In a world where all was lost, they are humanity’s last hope….
Contents
Prologue (#u833c1fd0-9be1-58ed-ba14-30c101cff156)
Chapter One (#u893ff45a-8512-512d-84b7-64adca4c012c)
Chapter Two (#u9590a067-92f8-52d1-ab12-041c4881ec42)
Chapter Three (#ub74c3044-06bd-5efc-b5e5-f1f488d49809)
