As if in response, the fiery clouds in the sky rumbled ominously, making Gaza almost drop his gun belt. Trying to hide the fear in his stomach, the man forced trembling hands to buckle the holster around his waist, and he cleared his mind of foolish worries with the comforting routine of checking the big blasters. His personal handcannons had been bought from that bitch Trader before she decided he was stockpiling too many blasters. As if there was such a thing as too many weapons. She just wanted to keep him weak, unable to leave the desert and expand his domain. But that was changing now, and soon he would have that blond bitch under the knife. Not to make her a wife, oh, no, this time it would be just for the sheer pleasure of bloody revenge.
Going to the rear of the vehicle, Gaza checked the clutch and electric motor for the heavy winch. Designed to pull the wag from swampy ground, the cable was thick and strong. When Gaza had first obtained the vehicle, he had walked out the cable to its full length to learn exactly how long it was. He had used a knife to scratch the framework for every ten paces, and now counted ten such marks. Roughly a hundred feet. The sinkhole was about that deep. Which meant there was no way he could anchor the cable and have the APC lower itself to the ground below. Damn. But he could lower down a couple of his wives to raid the ancient structures before the whole place was leveled by the flames.
“Damn you Ryan!” he screamed at the buildings showing below the cliff. “Damn you to hell!” Strangely, the words echoed among the windowless concrete hives, as if carrying onward forever.
CLOSING THE DOOR to the museum, J.B. locked it with a click and stood to join the others on the front steps. Washed, fed and well rested, the other companions were spread out in a defensive arc with their backs to the museum and blasters held ready. Just for a moment, J.B. thought he heard somebody calling a name, and then it was gone, carried away on the breeze.
The plaza of the building was alive with scavengers, insects of every kind and flocks of rustling birds, mostly black buzzards. They had arrived during the night, hundreds of them, along with some vultures. Normally bitter enemies constantly fighting over every scrap of food, now the birds roosted side by side, stuffing themselves on the dried human flesh that lay sprawled in the streets in such abundance.
Trying to hide it, Doc was repulsed by the sounds. The noise of the feasting was horrible, the ripping of cloth followed by the stabbing of sharp beaks and then the ripping of skin and cartilage. It reminded him of pigs at the trough, and he forced away the madness that welled at that dark memory.
Away from the bloodless carnage, a smoky pall hung over the city, thick clouds swirling along the streets, distant reddish lights showing new buildings burning out of control, mingling with the occasional crash of falling masonry and splintering wood.
“Ryan,” Mildred said, licking her lips.
The big man turned. “Yeah?”
“You know how I’m always pushing for us to recce just a little more, and try to salvage more technology, medicine, whatever?” She frowned. “Well, not this time. We’re standing in the middle of the powder keg, and we can’t leave fast enough.”
“I second that,” Dean added grimly, adjusting his grip on the lightweight crossbow.
Krysty glanced around at the other buildings and stores near the museum. Her hair was strangely still, its lack of motion showing her deep concern.
“The question still remains,” she muttered. “How do we get out of here? A hundred feet straight up is a hell of a climb.”
“We’ve done it before,” J.B. stated, tilting back his hat to survey the sprawling metropolis. “But only as a last resort.”
Every building seemed to be crawling with birds and other scavengers. More winged creatures were circling the exposed city, some of them soaring between the buildings and roosting amid the gargoyles and spires of a cathedral. The stained glass windows were about the only glass remaining intact.