Off by himself, Doc retrieved his LeMat from a shelf inside a locker where he had placed the blaster before entering the shower room. Although the weapon wouldn’t have been harmed from the water, the black-powder charges in the revolving chamber would have washed out, drastically reducing his precious reserve of ammo and shot. Removing a damp handkerchief from his sodden pocket, Doc vigorously rubbed the sticky residue off the huge handcannon until it seemed to be thoroughly clean. But he made a mental note to properly cleanse the weapon in a pot of boiling water at the first chance.
“Good as ever,” Ryan stated, checking the play on his SIG-Sauer before returning the clip into the grip with a satisfying click. “Now let’s see about getting the hell out of this bastard tomb.”
Rolling up their damp sleeves, Ryan, J.B. and Krysty each took a nukelamp and led the way back to the garage level. Setting down the lamps in a triangular pattern for maximum coverage, the companions got to work searching through the assorted vehicles for something that could be repaired.
The civilian cars had been garbage to begin with and had been too close to the dynamite charges and were even worse now. Going to the military wags, the companions found another APC, but it was also stripped to the walls, the 25 mm cannon, machine guns, seats, radios, and even the engine gone. The war wag was just an armored box with a sagging door.
Ryan had hoped for the Hummers, brute tough wags that could nearly go anywhere. But they had been left running and the engines were burned out, the bearings fused solid from the overheating when the oil ran out. Even the nuke batteries were dead after a century of being left turned on.
“Starting to look like we’ll be walking this time,” Ryan said, going to the row of big GMC 6X6 M-35 wags marked with the logo of the U.S. Marine Corps. Odd that they often found different services from the predark days all mixed together in the redoubts. It was as if the government had simply grabbed hold of whatever they could and jammed the troops into the nearest redoubt to be sorted out later. Only that time never came.
The first wag had its engine missing, the second lacked tires, but the third seemed in decent shape. The metal and wood framework arching over the rear section was still in good condition, solid and strong, although the canvas covering was lacking. Never installed, lost, or eaten by the bugs, there was no way of knowing. But the first wag had good canvas.
“We do a mix and match here,” Mildred said, sliding off her backpack. “Use parts from one to fix another.”
“I’ll find some wrenches,” Dean offered, rushing over to the musty workbenches to shift through the assortment of parts and greasy cans to locate a few tools. A sturdy toolkit yielded a wealth of socket wrenches and pliers.
Checking under the front seat of the first GMC wag for a jack, Ryan unearthed a plastic box full of road flares. Two of the waxy cylinders crumbled at his touch, but the rest were still firm. He tucked one into a jacket pocket and passed the rest to J.B., who added them to the scant few materials in his munitions bag.
The Armorer was grateful for the flares. Aside from the implo grens, the satchel was the lightest it had been in a long time. Some untrustworthy timing pencils, the spare boxes of ammo, the implo grens, a butane light, and that was about the lot. Good thing the droid had been in such bad condition. Using an implo inside a redoubt was as tricky as firing a shotgun inside a predark phone booth. It didn’t matter which direction you were aiming at, some of it was coming right back in your face.
Krysty lifted up the hood of the biggest wag and started to inspect the big diesel power plant, testing the hoses and wires and belts with her bare hands.
She normally left such things to J.B., but this was a major job and all of them would have to help.