James Axler – Deathlands 35 – Skydark

Mildred went rigid beside Ryan, the expression on her face mingled fury and horror. Hie physician had been willing to give up her life if necessary to save these norms from the stickie hordes; she certainly hadn’t figured on being turned out as a gaudy slut. Ryan had to physically restrain J.B. from starting

forward.

“No, Strootz,” Elijah said, “you’ve got enough warm bodies down there. She goes to the cooler with the men. And when they die, she dies, too.”

Ryan watched Mildred relax. Death was something she knew she could face-after all, she had already done it once.

“Get them out of my sight,” Elijah said to Lester. “All but the red-hair. She stays here with me.”

To one of the servants, he said, “Bring me my magnifier glass!”

Applause and scattered cheers burst from the crowd.

“Would you boys like to see how a real expert mutie exam is done?” the baron asked his toadies. “Mebbe get your faces right up against the lens so you could learn something interesting?”

The men jumped to their feet, cheering and catcalling.

Ryan leaned close to Krysty. “I’m sorry,” he said. “We’ll get out of this mess somehow. Hang on.”

“You, too,” she said. Under the bravery and defiance that flashed in her green eyes, there was fear.

Before Ryan could say more, the sec men separated him from Krysty with the muzzles of their blasters, then roughly shoved him, Mildred, Jak, J.B. and Doc toward the exit

“Wait a minute!” the baron bellowed down from his dais. When they stopped and turned to look back, he said, “What’s that stick the old one’s carrying?”

“Nothing, Baron,” Lester said. “He’s a crippie. Needs it to walk. Otherwise, he’d have to be carried.”

“Let me see it.”

Lester snatched the ebony cane away from Doc and passed it up to Elijah.

The baron examined the silver handle, found the release catch and unsheathed the rapier. “What’s this? You let a weapon get past your search? You let him bring a sword in here?” A groan went up among the toadies. “Baron, uh, I, uh…”

Elijah resheathed the blade and threw the stick back at the sec man. “Put it in my quarters with the rest of their gear. You’re going to pay for that mistake, Lester. Tomorrow you’re going to take a turn on the wheel.” The audience whistled and clapped. The sec man’s jaw went slack, his face suddenly pale. He didn’t protest the sentence. Those who protested did two turns.

At this point Elijah’s servant rushed up with the magnifier. Set in a brass frame and handle, it had a convex lens six inches across. With a sweep of his arm, the baron sent the food platters on the table before him crashing to the floor. Having cleared his exam table, he said, “Bring her up here to me.”

As Ryan and the others were pushed from the dining room, they heard Elijah say, “Strip her down and move the candles closer. I need plenty of light for this kind

of work.”

The wives and children waiting in the hallway didn’t laugh and throw confetti when the five companions were paraded past them at blasterpoint. Instead, they yelled insults, kicked and slapped. It was all part of the evening’s entertainment.

With the sec men’s blasters pressed hard into their

flesh, Ryan and his friends rode the elevator down in silence. Finally J.B. said, “We all knew this could happen, Ryan. We all knew the risk.”

“Yes, we did,” Doc said. “Be assured of that”

“You’re not to blame, Ryan,” Mildred told him.

Ryan could think of nothing to say to Jak, no way to make things right Words could only do so much. And they were cheap. Young Jak was headed for the mutie zoo, where death came slowly, sometimes over die course of decades, and only after unspeakable suffering and degradation. He had every right to be angry. With any luck he wouldn’t be there long.

When they reached the lobby, the car stopped and six of the sec men separated Jak from the others. The white-haired teen stepped out of the elevator surrounded by his armed escort

“Your friend seemed awfully quiet,” Lester said to Ryan as he ignited a hand torch from the one already burning in the elevator. “Guess you must’ve told him what goes on in the zoo. Actually it’s a lot worse than when you saw it last Baron’s got the whole place full now. He’s collected some of die damnedest-looking muties you ever seen. Kind of hard for any of them to get to sleep, I imagine. Bunches of them are always screaming, screwing and carrying on.”