“What about the city?” Ryan demanded, stepping toward them. “Something there you want?”
Lowering their hands, the Core gave no reply, then turned away and descended into the loose sand to once more vanish from sight.
Scowling deeply, Doc glanced at the sand dune hiding whatever was on their left. “It’s a trap,” he declared. “It has to be. Enemies do not become friends without a reason.”
“Gaza might be that reason,” Ryan said thoughtfully. “This could be a simple matter of we’re the enemy of their enemy.”
“Mebbe want us chill Gaza,” Jak said as a suggestion. “Then ace us, could be.”
Shifting her grip on her Czech ZKR pistol, Mildred curled a lip at that idea. “Could be,” she agreed. “Or maybe they’re sending us somewhere safe from the coming storm.”
She knew that the others weren’t overly concerned about acid rain. They had been caught in many downpours before and were still alive. Plus, they each had plastic ponchos made from the shower curtains taken from the last redoubt they looted. The military material was very thick, and should protect them somewhat from ravages of the chem storm. Puddles were the real danger, finding themselves trapped in ever deepening pools of the sulfuric acid rain until it rose above their boots and started to irritate their legs.
With Ryan in the lead, the companions proceeded another twenty yards west before going around a dune. Jak could have been right about this being a trap. Besides, it never was a good idea to blindly follow the directions of anybody.
Staying low, Ryan paused as a trail of what seemed to be blood stretched from the desert toward the cliff.
Following it from a distance, the one-eyed man brought up his longblaster with a jerk at the sight of a corpse, its arms and legs blown off from some sort of explosion to the chest. J.B. prepared a pipe bomb and Jak got a Molotov ready while Ryan attached his pocket mirror to the end of the Steyr and took a recce around the slope of the dune. Now he could see more bodies scattered about, mixed with the remains of smashed motorcycles, along with a few unexploded land mines. Possibly duds, but there was no way of telling from this range. And parked in the middle of the destruction was a tan colored LAV 25 with three motorcycles leaning against the armored chassis.
“Hell of a fight,” J.B. stated. “Outriders from the Trader?”
“Then why the nuke hasn’t Gaza left yet?” Ryan queried, angling the mirror to try to find any other vehicles. But the war wag was alone with the deaders and the broken machines. The only oddity was that the winch had a cable going over the edge of the cliff and down into the city below. Gaza was looting the ruins while the Trader came charging down his throat? That made no bastard sense at all.
“Unless it’s busted,” Ryan said aloud, finishing the thought. “Guess the Core really was helping us.”
“No way the baron would leave the wag unprotected even if it was crippled,” Krysty said slowly, straining to hear the sound of an engine, but the vehicle was deathly quiet. “Which means it’s either boobied or has a guard.”
Thumbing back the hammer on his LeMat, Doc rumbled, “Probably a guard, dear lady, to operate the cable and haul his worthless hide back up with whatever he deemed was of such protean value.”
“Three bikes in sight,” Mildred added, doing the same to her ZKR target revolver. “I would guess Gaza went down with a guard, and left the third person here to cover his escape.”
“Makes sense,” Dean agreed, craning his neck to try to see the top of the transport. “Hot pipe, the hatch is closed! There goes using a Molotov.”
“No, a Molotov is just what we need,” Ryan said, trying to keep the tension from his voice as lightning flashed overhead, the thunder following only seconds behind. The storm was coming closer. They had to do it right the first time. There might not be a second.
Wrapping the strap of the Steyr around his forearm to help steady the longblaster, Ryan leveled the weapon and placed his eye to the scope. “Jak, hit the front of the wag with a Molotov,” he directed. “Then J.B., put a burst across the rear doors. The rest of you play dead.”