ascended to a height she estimated at about 100 to 150 feet. The rock curved out
in a wide parabola beyond her range of vision, but she figured that the valley
as a whole had to be at least thirty square miles.
The dust storm had abated. The sprays of dust and dirt were irritations rather
than major problems, and the wind had died down from a gale to a small zephyr
that plucked at their clothes and drove grit into their skin. But parts of the
valley were obscured by more intense storms, small pockets of violent rage that
scoured the land. The skies overhead were a puckered and constantly moving
mixture of purple, red and blue, the dark clouds of a chem storm breaking up and
reforming under the buffeting of the winds and letting the sky above shine
through.
“I’d guess that you don’t get much farming done around here,” she murmured.
The giant who had captured Krysty and Dean, and was still guarding them with the
homemade blaster, registered almost comical surprise.
“How the fireblasted hell did you know that?”
Krysty suppressed the urge to smile. “Just look at the skies and the storms.
It’s obvious. Guess we could always give you a few instructions on how to mebbe
make more of the land. After all, you must have realized that we don’t come
from…the ‘inside,’ did you call it?”
Mac scratched his chin with the barrel of his blaster and furrowed an already
well-creased brow.
“Guess we could do with some help. Trading’s hard down here. If we could mebbe—”
“You fool!” The growl came from the female bundle of rags suspended between J.B.
and Mildred. She was now fully conscious, but had decided that letting them
carry her would disable them in conditions they weren’t used to. Mildred winced
as the harsh voice cut through the surrounding noise of the storm.
“Don’t listen to their lies,” she continued. “They came from inside—it’s some
kind of trick. It must be. They can’t beat us in any other way, so they want to
infiltrate and subvert from within. They want us to take these asswipes to our
bosom so that they can smite us like a viper. No, there is only one thing
awaiting them— the ritual.”
Ryan and Jak exchanged glances. The mention of a ritual meant only one thing to
them—a slow and painful chilling.
Mildred dropped her end of the bundle of rags. The woman hit the ground with a
hissed, squeaking sound that was part shock and part outrage.
J.B. let go of his end of the woman and looked at Mildred over the top of his
glasses, scratching his head and pushing back his fedora.
“Hell, John, if they’re going to chill us anyway, why should we give a shit?”
There was a momentary stunned silence, then roars of laughter from their other
captors while the female rag bundle fumed in silence.
It could be the one chance they needed. Jak spun on his heel, ducked underneath
the barrel of Mac’s blaster and aimed a straight-edged blow at the man’s gut. He
felt his hand sink into the soft, fatty flesh before striking a wall of solid
muscle.
Mac wasn’t as slow as his bulk would have them believe. Even as Jak ducked
underneath him, he raised the blaster just enough to let Jak come underneath,
confident that he had enough muscle strength to withstand the blow, and then
brought the barrel down sharply at the base of Jak’s skull.
Jak’s white, flowing hair was stained red as the sharp metal edges of the badly
filed barrel tore the skin at his nape. The blow wasn’t hard enough to render
him unconscious, but it was enough to stun him and send him momentarily to his
knees.
Before he had a chance to recover, Mac followed up with his fist, grabbing Jak’s
hair and bunching it, using it as a rope with which to pull the albino up level
with his face. Then he thrust Jak away from him, and the small albino looked
even more waiflike and lost as he sprawled in the dust, clinging onto his
senses.
“Don’t fuck with us,” Mac growled, his previously lazy demeanor now lost. “We