James Axler – Freedom Lost

By December 2000, the whitecoats had had enough of Doc’s uncooperative attitude and his attempts to escape, and had thrust the defiant Doc Tanner one hundred years into the future, into a world that had become bitterly known as the Deathlands.

However, even in the Deathlands, some areas were safer than others, and the Barrens where Tanner and his friends were now standing were definitely not on anyone’s top ten places to stay.

WITH THE CHARIOT now inside the redoubt, they again went along the passageway leading down. Nothing had changed. The passageway leading down appeared the same as they had left itthe concrete floor sprinkled with a light smattering of sand from outside.

“Looks clear,” Ryan said, still following his safety procedure even if they’d been there a very short while ago. “Let’s do it. Triple red until I give the word.”

Ryan brought up the rear, lingering behind the others. Krysty Wroth hung back too, waiting for him. Her keen eyes searched his face, looking for some sort of outward manifestation to reflect the feelings she knew were churning inside his guts about what happened to them in Aten.

Perhaps J.B. had summed up the experience best when he remarked”Like being trapped in one long wet dream without a climax, and even if you could come, you’d still feel like you’d done something wrong.”

The only one of the group to escape the sexual sadism of the place had been Dean. Perhaps sensing some of the debauchery to come in their destination, Ryan had taken up a man named Danielson on his offer of sanctuary for the boy in the bosom of Fort Fubara safe haven en route to the walls of the Egyptian-styled city.

All the way back to the dome-shaped redoubt, Dean had been chattering away with questions. Where did they get the awesome chariot? What had taken them so long in getting back? Why couldn’t he go to Aten and see the pyramid for himself?

For once, Ryan hadn’t even possessed the strength to summon the anger to shut the boy up, but since all of them shared Ryan’s exhaustion, no one had bothered to answer Dean’s queries, and the boy had soon given up out of boredom.

“Lover?” Krysty began, wincing at the hesitation and embarrassment she felt. Feeling ill at ease with Ryan was a new sensation for her, and she didn’t like the unfamiliar emotion.

“Uh-uh,” Ryan cautioned, knowing from her tone she was getting ready to walk down a road he wasn’t interested in traveling just yet. “Let’s get to the gateway first. Sooner we find out which way the stick floats, the sooner we can plan for the future.”

Krysty knew Ryan’s words were law when he was in this sort of mood, but she didn’t care. This was the first instant they’d been alone since escaping the city, and the air had to be cleared before she could allow herself to go forward.

She blocked his path, and, choosing her words carefully, said, “That’s what I want to talk about. Our future and how the recent past may affect it.”

“What?” Ryan asked dumbly, his eye questioning her.

Krysty’s hair undulated, reflecting her own confusion and turmoil. “I know what’s troubling you, lover.”

“You do.” His tone was flat, cold. Krysty knew she was inching out onto dangerous ground.

“Yes,” she said firmly.

“Your mutie senses tell you that or are you coasting on feminine intuition?” Ryan asked softly, the tone of his voice easing back the sarcasm of the words.

Krysty held his gaze. “Tension’s been thick enough to reach out and hold. Not just affecting us. Affecting everybody.”

Ryan looked away. “It’ll pass. Until we know whether or not this bastard mat-trans unit is going to work this time, we’re all going to be in a pissy mood.”

“I’m not talking about the mat-trans unit, and you know it.”

Ryan shrugged, making a move to step around her. “You weren’t responsible for what happened back there.”

Krysty caught his arm, her strong fingers biting into it. “You say that, but you don’t know how sure you are of it,” she laughed bitterly. “I was under Akhnaton’s will, I can’t deny it.”