James Axler – Deathlands

By then Rain Flower had guessed instinctively that something had gone seriously, lethally wrong and was several strides away from the others, racing full pelt toward the emerald fringe of the forest.

“Run,” Ryan shouted, grabbing Dean by the wrist, pulling him after him.

There was a moment of disorganized panic.

Doc took it into his befuddled old head that the best course of action was to pick up the ticking timer gren and throw it a long way in the opposite direction. But when Mildred dropped it, the lethal predark device had disappeared into the other thirty or so grens that lay scattered around the base of the concrete-fortified pillbox.

“By the” he began, shaking his head in bewilderment, not making any attempt to run for safety.

Mildred saved his life. She spotted his confusion and spun and raced back to him, slapping him smartly across the cheek as she arrived, then tugging him by the ear. She let go only when Doc yelped in pain and started to chase after her, his face flushed in anger.

Ryan had glanced at his chron as soon as he realized what Mildred’s warning meant.

Now, as he sprinted toward the welcoming cover of the florid shrubs and bushes beneath the trees, he was counting to himself, allowing for the timer having fifteen seconds to run before the ignition sequence was completed.

It was also at the front of his consciousness that the delay gren that J.B. had thrown inside the building had utterly failed to detonate. Bearing in mind the sorry state of most of the box, there was a better than average chance that none of the grenades would function properly.

But the odds weren’t good enough for Ryan to slow down in his run for shelter.

Rain Flower was first in the lung-bursting chase to safety, followed by Jak and Krysty. Ryan and Dean were running together in equal fourth, followed closely by J.B. Despite their slow start, Mildred and Doc were charging along at the heels of the Armorer.

“Twelve seconds!” Ryan panted. “Everyone down, now!”

The ground dipped slightly a few yards before the beginnings of the jungle, and he dived for it, rolling over on his face, cupping his ears and closing his eye. He opened his mouth, counting to himself under his breath.

The delay gren went off on fourteen seconds.

The ground shook and heaved as if from a major quake, lifting Ryan’s body clear of the grass for a moment, then sending him crashing down again. The hot blast tugged at his clothes and his hair, bits of stone and dirt stinging the exposed portions of his face.

The shock wave was colossal, and the surge of heat scorched his skin.

It seemed that the one gren had triggered all the others, sending them off within a nanosecond of one another, the whole box detonating virtually at once.

The noise was literally deafening.

Ryan lay still, pressed to the comforting earth, shoulders hunched, placing his hands over the top of his head to protect himself as best he could from the torrential hail of debris from the explosion.

Large stones and clods of turf began to patter around him, some of them hitting his back, none of them doing him any serious harm.

He had experienced the familiar sucking shock of an implode and recognized the characteristic stench of the burners and smokes going off. Shards of razored metal from the frag gren sliced through the air above him, ripping noisily into the leaves and branches of the trees.

His immediate worry was that one or more of the grens might have contained nerve gas.

As soon as the rumbling of the explosions had faded away, he risked a glance. Thick smoke was drifting from the wrecked pillbox, with flames glowing brightly at its heart. The wind seemed to be carrying it away from Ryan and the others, toward the main buildings of the base.

“Safe?” J.B. shouted.

“Better give it another half minute in case there’s more of the delays. How about nervies?”

The Armorer considered Ryan’s question for a few moments. “Don’t think I spotted any. But I can’t be sure. Yeah, be a bastard to get caught by one of them.”