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passages. The right ended in a rockfall, slabs of granite sealing the tunnel
completely. But the left side went on for a distance. Faint noise could be
heard in the tunnel, voices, and some sort of dragging, moist sound. Frowning,
Ryan covered his mouth and jerked a hand toward the main tunnel. Once they
reached it, he walked away from the side tunnel a few yards before speaking.
"That sounded like the runts," he said.
"Good news, bad news," Mildred muttered, turning the knife in her hand
nervously.
J.B. tilted back his fedora. "What the hell is the good news?"
"If they got here, then there's a way back to the main cavern," she explained.
"We're not cut off."
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"Do here," Jak said, offering the crossbow to the woman. Mildred took the
weapon and the teenager gestured, a knife sliding into each hand. "Never know
what hit."
"Not here. There's no cover," Ryan countered. "We need someplace to ambush the
muties. Can't go back to the bridge. The other side branch is blocked." He
turned and heading farther along the tunnel. "We keep going. Any ammo left?"
"Not a single round," J.B. stated grimly, patting his clothing.
"Everybody got a knife?"
"I daresay yes, my dear Ryan," Doc rumbled, sliding his sword free once more.
The tunnel continued for hundreds of yards, with the noise from the runts
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becoming fainter until it was lost completely. But the companions kept going.
Just because they couldn't hear the rants, didn't mean the little muties
weren't still after them.
Suddenly, Ryan raised a hand for a halt. A faint blue star shone straight
ahead of them. They waited a few minutes but the light didn't move, or alter
in any way.
Ryan waved a hand forward, and as the companions cautiously advanced, the star
became a beam of bluish light piercing the darkness. The companions kept to
the side of the tunnel to offer as small a target for snipers as possible.
"That's not daylight," Ryan said, squinting against the smoky flames of the
torch.
"More like a halogen light," J.B. stated incredulously.
Mildred shifted her grip on the crossbow. "Down here?"
He shrugged. "That's what it looks like."
"Could be," Ryan muttered, dropping the torch and grinding out the flames. "We
crawl from here. Mebbe this is the way to the surface."
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"Ash storm okay by me," Jak said stoutly. "Least could run if need."
Extinguishing the second torch, the companions went on the floor and crept
toward the strange illumination until the light filled the tunnel brightly.
Knowing they were in plain sight, they waited for an attack, or any response,
but only silence greeted their presence.
Slowly, Ryan stood and walked into the light until he could see the front end
of some sort of machine. It was a truck with a broken grille. Its left
headlight was smashed, but the right blazed. Large rocks were strewed across
the floor, slabs of stone stacked behind the wag as if it had been caught in
an avalanche.
His palm tight on the handle of his knife, Ryan edged past the chunks of
limestone. Glancing into the cab, he saw two corpses dressed in blue uniforms
slumped against the dashboard. Their heads were split open, slivers of
windshield protruding from their slack faces.
Sheathing the blade, Ryan whistled twice, and the rest of the companions
rushed forward to join him at the wreck.
"Dark night," J.B. whispered, taking in the scene. "How did this get all the
way down here?"
"Quake?" Jak asked, running a hand over the machine as if unsure it was
actually there. The metal was cold under his touch. "Been here while."
"Can't have been here for very long. The headlight is still working," Mildred
offered. "No, that's wrong. The nuke battery would power the bulb until it
burned out. Might have been here for weeks, months."
Reaching in through the broken window, Ryan pulled a sandwich off the top of
the dashboard. He squeezed the bread, and it crunched slightly. "Only been a
couple of weeks," he said, sniffing the food. Smelled like peanut butter.
Definitely predark supplies. He took a bite, chewed and swallowed. "Days," he
corrected, breaking the sandwich into pieces and passing the morsels around.
Everybody wolfed his or her portion and started to loot the vehicle.
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Pulling open the door to the truck, Ryan grabbed the body of the blue shirt as
it fell out sideways. The corpse had a blaster in its belt, and an AK-47
rested on the floor. Ryan tossed the handcannon and gun belt to J.B. and
appropriated the
Kalashnikov. Briefly, the one-eyed man checked the weapon, dropping the clip
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to make sure it contained ammo.
"Fireblast," he cursed, holding the magazine in the light. "The clip is bent.
No way this'll feed properly."
"Mine's okay," J.B. said, jacking the slide. "Got a full load of .45 rounds."
At the other door, Doc struggled with the handle. Impatiently, he used the
silver head of his swordstick to break the window and grab a second
longblaster from the hands of the other sec man. He tossed the weapon to Jak
and yanked a shoulder bag free of the corpse's stiff arms.
"Fucking A," Jak said, sounding pleased. "Let runts come now!"
Yanking open the canvas bag, Doc grinned in delight, "And here is even better
news," he said, lifting a handful of loaded clips into view. "Spare ammo by
the pound, and lots of grens!"
"Yo," Ryan called, holding out an open hand.
Doc tossed the man a clip, and Ryan slapped it into the breech of the
rapidfire, working the bolt to eject a live round, then dropping the clip to
insert the bullet, "This one works," he said, satisfied. "Give me two more.
There are a lot of runts."
"For a while," Doc agreed ominously, walking around the wag. He gave Ryan two
more and passed several to Jak. Judiciously, the old man then handed an
explosive charge to everybody. The last six he kept in the bag and slung it
over a shoulder.
"What kind are they?" Mildred asked, studying the military sphere. The ball
was colored green with a black stripe. She didn't know that code.
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Holding the gren in the headlight, J.B. checked the colorations. "Steel
shrapnel,"
he announced. "High explosive, antipersonnel."
"Shit!" If they used them in the tight confines of the tunnel, the ricochets
could tear them into pieces.
Dragging the body from behind the wheel, Ryan checked the floor and the
glovebox. Nothing useful there, except for a metal ring of keys, which he
pocketed. Those might come in handy later. Pushing the seat forward, the one-
eyed warrior checked the storage compartment behind the seat. He found some
gnawed chicken bones, empty brass, a length of rope, a crowbar, a bullwhip, a
thermos, some heavy towing chain, a coil of fuse too coated with blood to ever
be useful, a blanket and some loose envelopes of shiny plastic.
"MRE packs," Ryan said, tossing them out behind as he dug for more. The packs
were loose, scattered amid the tools and junk as if completely unimportant.
Sheffield had to be rolling in predark supplies. Ryan cut his hands unearthing
the
Mylar envelopes, but he didn't care. There was enough food for days.
The companions grabbed the packs off the floor and filled their pockets.
Everybody wanted to dig into the food here and now, but this was neither the
time nor the place. Jamming an envelope into her carpetbag, Mildred noticed a
tiny speck of light on her shoe. It wasn't same shade of blue as the halogen [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]