“Dark night!” J.B. cursed in frustration. “If we only had a weapon with good range, we could ace them both right here and now!”
“That would pay many debts,” Doc stated, the wind ruffling his long silvery hair. His heart was pounding hard, but he somehow maintained an outward calm. Kidnapper, torturer, killer, what there words could describe the lunatic genius behind Overproject Whisper and all of its subdivisions that had taken Dr. Theophilus Tanner away from his beloved wife and children.
“Emily,” Doc whispered, and for the tiniest flicker of time he thought he heard her call his name in return. But it was only the cold mountain winds, moaning through the pines of the Tennessee valley.
Stepping closer, Mildred placed a hand on the old man’s arm and squeezed gently. Doc started to speak, but his voice broke and he turned away from the valley.
“Chilling the bastards would be nice,” Krysty agreed. “But we still need to find out what they are doing with that freaking big dish.”
“True, but it would be a lot easier to recce if the baron and his top gun were both breathing dirt.” Ryan worked the bolt on the Steyr, then wrapped the strap around his muscular forearm to help steady his aim. The angle was wrong, so he lay down and placed the barrel on the lowest rail of the fence. The electric wires hummed above, but he reasoned his blaster was far enough away to not set off an alarm.
“Can’t do it,” J.B. said, collapsing his telescope. “Not shouldn’t, but you can’t. It’s beyond the range of your blaster.”
“Beyond the effective range,” Ryan corrected him, studying the wind push as it pushed a stray piece of paper along the roof of a building. The air was moving faster up here, slower down there. That meant less sheerage, but greater density. “The rounds will reach them, just not with their full force.”
“What do bruises?” Jak demanded angrily. “Means it’ll only chill the mutie-maker, but not remove his entire head,” Ryan said, wiggling into a more comfortable position. The short grass was itchy under him, a rock pressing into his hip. The Deathlands warrior ignored the tiny disturbances and concentrated on the silver-haired man near the APC. The element of surprise was his. But if he missed this time, Silas might stay inside until further notice, never giving the companions another clear shot. Was it worth the risk? Should he take the shot?
“Fuck, yes,” Ryan growled softly to himself. Taking a deep breath and holding it, he placed the crosshairs of the scope on the whitecoat’s chest, moved it a foot to the left, then six inches up, and fired.
But even before he finished pulling the trigger, Ryan remembered Overton’s bulletproof jacket. Quickly, he worked the bolt and fired again, lower this time, then again, slightly to the left, and once more adjusting to the right.
“FOOL! MORON!” Silas raged, stamping his good foot and gesturing at the exposed wiring of the transformer. “Look at this mess! You have the goddamn fence wired completely wrong! I told you a looped circuit so that a break in one area will not leave us defenseless across the entire fence. Looped—don’t you know the word?”
“Sir, I can handle this later,” the major urged again. “We should be inside out of sight.”
Silas glared at him in outrage. “Not until we have this fixed! The electric fence is our main protection from Ryan or another slave revolt, and this idiot screwed up the wiring!”
Lashing out, Silas hit the man with his cane. “Now get gloves and fix the circuits, while it’s hot!”
“I’m not sure where the gloves are, sir,” the sec man protested.
“Do it anyway,” Silas growled.
The other sec men murmured in fear.
“While it’s hot? I could be chilled, sir!” the man wailed.
Imperiously, Silas glared at the cringing man. “I have more sec men if you should fail.”
Damp with sweat, the blue shirt looked to his chief for assistance.
“Do as the commander orders,” Sheffield said sternly. “And next time, if you don’t know what to do, ask for help before figuring it out yourself.”