“Don’t move!” Mildred commanded, her .38 revolver pointed at Sparrow. The desk clerk froze motionless, his hand only inches from the club. Krysty and Doc went back to watch the front door and the balcony for the arrival of reinforcements.
With a low growl, the mutt started to rise and Jak pointed his Colt Python at the animal. “Call off,” he said, cocking back the hammer on the blaster.
“Sit, boy,” Sparrow said, shaking with rage.
Obediently, the dog stopped making noise, then turned around a few times before settling down with his bone once more.
Swinging around the Uzi, J.B. kicked open the office door and Ryan charged through, his blaster leading the way. Sitting on the dirty floor was another fat man, holding his bloody mouth. Next to him was a homemade blaster composed of a small-diameter bathroom pipe wrapped in layers of iron wire and bound to a wooden dowel. A cartridge was inserted into the crude barrel of the zip gun, two more rolling loosely on the linoleum.
“Kick it away,” Ryan ordered and the man complied, the homemade gun skittering under a metal desk. “Now, move, fat boy!”
Slowly, the corpulent fellow rose to shuffle into the lobby and joined Sparrow at the sandbags. This close together, it was clear the two men were brothers, maybe even twins. Or else the gene pool of the ville was dangerously small.
“Damn, you folks are good,” Sparrow muttered. “Haven’t seen anybody move that fast, not even Hawk.”
“Except for that bitch Kate,” Jed added, trying to staunch the flow of blood from his split lip. “Damn, I think a tooth is broken.”
“Tough,” Ryan growled. “Who’s Kate, the baron’s wife?”
“Some slut who works for the Trader,” Jed mumbled.
“Who? Oh, you mean Trader Kate,” Ryan corrected. There were a lot of traders in the Deathlands, and they all used the word as a title, the way the barons did. Only the legendary Trader was known by the single word.
“No, just Kate,” Sparrow corrected. “She’s the sec chief for Trader.”
“How do you know about the Trader?” Ryan asked, trying to control his words. The blaster felt big in his hands, as uncontrollable as a thrashing snake.
“I bought a predark med from him that saved my arm after a mutie bit me,” Jed said, blood dribbling down his chin. “Didn’t charge me anything what he could have.”
“How long ago was this?” Krysty asked urgently.
Sparrow started to lower his hands, but at a gesture from Mildred he quickly raised them again. “I dunno,” he said, scowling as if forcing a dim memory. “Maybe five months. Long time ago.”
“Months,” J.B. said slowly. “You gotta mean years. Five years, right?”
The fat man shrugged. “Whatever you say, you got the blaster,” he replied. “But I ain’t no feeb. It was less than half a year ago. He and the baron had a big fight about something, and the Trader ain’t been back since. Used to stop by fairly regularly. Bought a lot of water.”
“What’s he to y’all?” Jed asked suspiciously. “Kin?”
“Describe him,” Ryan demanded, feeling his heart pound in his chest. It was impossible.
The brothers exchanged glances. “The Trader? Hell, I dunno,” Sparrow said. “Never saw the guy. He was always inside a big-ass tank, stays behind a blister of the military glass.”
“How many wags?” J.B. demanded. “Describe them!”
Sparrow scrunched his face. “Well, there were three, one big wag and two others, each plated with metal and covered with blasters. Big stuff, cannons, mortars and rockets. Baron Gaza was scared to death of the guy. Hell, who wouldn’t be with all his weapons.”
“More,” Ryan said through clenched teeth.
Fumbling for a reply, Jed scratched his head. “Well, I heard Kate call the big wag War Wag One. That help any?”
The universe seemed to go still at those simple words, as if it were breaking apart and rejoining in a new pattern, reorganizing itself on a most basic of levels.
“He’s alive,” Ryan stated. “Trader is alive and back in business!”
Chapter Eleven
Mists of steam filling the air of the small marble room, Baron Edgar Gaza was sprawled naked in the shallow end of his large swimming pool, the clear mountain water flowing steadily around his hard muscular form from a feeder pipe. On the tiles near his head was a pile of dry towels and several loaded blasters. Laying at the bottom of the pool was a stiletto.