This time, Mildred didn’t grab a handful of the boy’s shirttail and pull him upright.
This time, like Krysty, who’d been thrown off her booted feet and hurled into the thrashing waters, and like Jak, who’d been tossed forward down the narrow passageway and directly into the newly created hole in the bulkhead, Dean also went tumbling like a dropped bit of refuse into the ocean blue.
Dean took blank note of how one of the toe tips of Krysty’s cowboy boots caught the light and flickered like a faraway star, a pale wink of blue and gone before he fell into deep oblivion.
J.B. WAS DREAMING. He was on an elevated mountain peak somewhere in Colorado, the air crisp in his lungs. When he exhaled, small clouds of steam puffed out. His glasses were slightly misted over with condensation from the heat of his body and the cool of the air, but when he reached to wipe them clean he was perplexed to find he wasn’t wearing his specs.
The misty covering on his eyes that obscured his vision was coming from inside his own body. Triple-strange to overheat from the inside. He’d have to ask Mildred about that. He might be getting sick, and even the mildest of infections could prove fatal in the uninhabitable Deathlands.
“Hey, J.B.,” Trader said.
The Armorer turned to take in the old man. The
Trader looked good. Damn good. Last time J.B. had seen his former mentor, the Trader was showing his age and then some. Now, he looked as healthy and robust as the day J.B. and he had first met, all those years ago outside J.B.’s boyhood home of Cripple Creek near the Rockies.
The Trader’s grizzled salt-and-pepper hair stood on his scalp like an angry porcupine, and his big cigar was firmly clamped between his teeth. J.B. could smell the pungent scent of burning tobacco and that, too, helped assure him of his friend’s identity, for the Trader had always smoked the same putrid weed.
The older man’s red-brown complexion was visible under the days of stubble across his broad face. His powerful build was unstooped by disease or age, and his trusty Armalite rifle was slung over his shoulder in a casual manner, but ready to be unlimbered and fired in an instant if needed.
J.B. was glad to see him. “Hey, Trader,” he said. “What brings you over?”
“Got something for you,” Trader rumbled, his voice like a misfiring diesel engine. He reached into a coat pocket, his own long coat lined with even more hiding places than J.B.’s scuffed leather jacket. “Found them back on War Wag One. Thought you could use a pair.”
He held out a small box covered in black felt about the size of the palm of his hand. The hinged lid was closed. A golden line where top met bottom glinted in the sunlight.
“Didn’t have to do that,” J.B. said warily. He wasn’t a man who liked to owe favors, not even to the Trader.
“No, I didn’t, but I did,” Trader replied, his gruff voice colored with annoyance. “Now show some respect and say thank-you.”
“Thanks. I think. What is it?” J.B. asked.
“Go ahead,” Trader urged. “Open the box.”
The Armorer reached out and took the package, holding it in his left hand while using a dirty fingernail of his right to flip open the top.
“Dark night!” he bellowed in shock. J.B. wasn’t the sort to startle at a prank, but the Trader had certainly put a scare into him with the contents of the innocuous little box.
Inside the case were two human eyes, eyelids attached, severed at the optic nerves. One eye was light blue, the other nearly cobalt. Some stray drops of red had splattered on the interior pink lining of the box. Gory, yes, but what had elicited the bellow from J.B. was that both of the eyes shifted and peered up at him.
“Goddammit! What kind of shit are you trying to pull, Trader?” J.B. demanded in a loud voice. He looked up to find the larger man had miraculously vanished. He slammed the small container shut, locking away the dismembered eyeballs in their twin puddles of grue.