“No!” Dean cried.
But Krysty had already pulled Leeloo back inside.
“Everybody on the floor back there!” Ryan shouted over the clatter, stomping the gas pedal. “Get behind the armor!”
Bullets rattled the sides of the stripped Winnebago, howling as they passed through and through overhead, slamming into the tempered steel plate with solid whacks.
Ryan steered for the berm entrance as the RV picked up speed. The Winnebago vibrated over the rough ground as if it was going to come unriveted, unscrewed and unglued.
“Fireblast!” Ryan swore as the break in the perimeter wall came into view of the ob port.
No further explanation was necessary.
Bullets rained down on the armored shutters. The ville sec men had already manned the top of the berm wall on either side of the only exit, and now they were cutting loose with everything they had. The shooters’ angle of fire meant that their slugs cut through high in the walls and roof, and sliced into the middle of the cargo box’s deck. The companions pressed their backs hard against the armor to keep from being cut to pieces.
Ryan didn’t give the sec men time to correct their aim. When he passed through the gap and the choking pall of black powder smoke, he was going seventy-five miles per hour.
For a full thirty seconds, as Ryan made for the ruined interstate, bullets whined at them. Then the shooting suddenly stopped. The range from the berm was better than a half mile and growing, and the sec men had realized they were just wasting bullets.
As Dean released his pent up breath, Ryan and J.B. raised the armored shutters, letting in the glare of bright sunlight. The rutted highway stretched ruler straight for miles ahead. Over the engine and road noise, there was a crackle of small-arms fire from the ville behind them.
“Suppose they’re finishing off the last of the rousties,” J.B. speculated. “Mebbe the sideshow freaks, too.”
“So much for Gert Wolfram’s World Famous Carny Show,” Krysty said.
“Good riddance,” Mildred added.
Ryan reached over and tapped the twin fuel gauges with a fingernail. Dean noted that one was dead empty, the other jiggling above the one-third full mark. His father eased off the gas. Dean knew he was trying to conserve as much fuel as possible, and put the maximum distance between them and Bullard ville before the tank ran dry.
“What are we going to do about the girl now?” Mildred asked.
“We can’t take her with us,” Krysty said. “She’s too young. She’s got to go back to her ville.”
There was no argument from the other companions. Not even from Dean. “I can’t just stay?” Leeloo asked him.
Dean shook his head. She was much safer inside the berm.
The little girl heaved a sigh.
“Trouble is,” J.B. said, “how do we get her back to Bullard without getting ourselves all shot to hell?”
“We can wait until the smoke clears,” Ryan said.
“Let everybody back there settle down. She can stay with us for a week or two, then we’ll sneak her back.”
Leeloo looked pleased at the idea.
“Uh-oh, Ryan,” J.B. said as he glanced into his side mirror. “We got company.”
Dean peered over his shoulder into the dirty glass, past the dust cloud they were raising. About a half mile behind them was a second dust cloud, and in the middle of it was an RV just like the one they were riding in.
“I count four carny wags chasing us,” the Armorer stated, “including the biggest wag in their convoy.”
“Who’s driving them?” Mildred said. “Did the carny folk manage to escape, too?”
“Can’t see,” J.B. told her. “They’re still too far back to tell. Probably got their armor down, anyway.”
“Rousties or sec men,” Ryan said, “it doesn’t make much difference. You can bet they’re after our hides.” He pressed the accelerator to the floorboard and held it there.
Even so, the trailing wags were closing distance. Dean could see that Ryan was unable to make the RV go faster than seventy-eight miles per hour. The front end started to shimmy and shake. It didn’t like going that fast, particularly on a chem-rain-etched roadway. The Winnebago sounded as if it was about to come apart. The engine noise was tremendous, as was the whistling of the wind through hundreds of bullet holes.