“Shut up, Doc,” hissed J.B.
“Hell of a firefight,” sighed Finn. “Way to fucking go.”
At first, the defenders gunned down several of the hired pistoleers. But there were too many of them, and one by one the defenders were picked off. Crimson sprayed as they died in slow-motion. Finally it was the kid and the old man who led the attack. The boy had a blaster nearly as big as he was, but he froze and was about to get himself chilled. Then the one whom Doc had said was called Luke Askew rosefrom the dead, it seemedand stabbed the attacker, the two men falling together, locked in each other’s arms.
Ryan felt the short hairs rising on the back of his neck as the single, pure voice of a woman came swelling with the old hymn again. The skinny preacher with crazed cowardly eyes told the boy they wouldn’t stay.
Told him that the land they’d wantedwhich the men had died forwas not meant for them. It was tainted with blood, and they were moving on. In the end the kid drew on the man in black, insisting that they bury his friends before they moved on, and grudgingly the settlers agreed. At the last, with the lines of “Amazing Grace” still ringing out, the boy dropped his blaster beside the graves and rode away.
“Though we are dead, ten thousand years,” sang the woman; and all around the vid-house, Lauren’s gang sang. Several people were weeping at the beauty and power of the film, well over a century from the past.
Ryan felt a prickling behind his own eyes.
“Son of a fucking bitch, ain’t it,” said a grizzled man behind him. “Always kind of lifts me. Makes me want to get out and ice the baron on my fucking ownsome.”
The lights returned, making everyone blink. Ryan glanced around him, seeing the ragged army he was about to help. And he saw why the short piece of film was so important to Jak Lauren’s people.
The battle appeared hopeless, against overwhelming odds. Yet the faded images, with the crackling sound track, typified the desperate lonely, struggles that were taking place all over Deathlands. Ryan was understanding it more and more. It was a natural process. Groups arose, some promoting only themselves, others trying to clean up the world. As he saw it, it wasn’t enough just to worry about your own survival. Sometimes you had to stand up and fight for things you believed in.
It was that courage that Ryan saw in the ratlike teenager and his raggled army. “Time we talked.”
“Sure. You four, and me and my five top chillers. That set with you?”
“Yeah. Want to know all ’bout the Baron Tourment. His ville. Where he lives. Where he’ll keep prisoners. Sec men. Blasters. All that.”
“And more,” said J.B. “We know all that, we can get the plans made.”
Ryan stood up, stretching. “Some food and drink. Need to be ready by dark.”
Jak Lauren peeled back his lips in an icy grin. “Be dark in around five hours. Time for real good plan. We were lost, now we’re found.”
“Mebbe,” said Ryan.
Chapter Twenty
THE CELLAR DOOR OF the Best Western Snowy Egret inched open, then stopped. It opened a finger’s-breadth more, then stopped again. The two women heard the deep resonant voice of Baron Tourment laughing quietly.
“Very good. Oh, very good.”
Krysty wondered for an insane moment whether she could possibly take out the chieftain of Lafayette, realizing immediately that the butchering of the two guards had left her too drained even to wrestle a kitten.
“I am impressed, ladies. Fucking impressed. Oh, yes, I am.”
Inside the room, it was almost silent. Just the hypnotic buzzing of a blowfly, conjured from nowhere to feast on the banquet of blood that poured from the mouth of the one sec man, the groin of the other. The baron’s voice resonated from outside the room.
“Alain and Neal. Two of the best, if that roguish Mephisto is to be believed. Are you to be believed, Mephisto? Eh?”
“They were good. You sure they’re chilled?”
“Can’t you taste their souls fleeing from their useless carcasses? Such a sour, yet sweet flavor. No, they are dead, are they not, sluts?”