James Axler – Rat King

inserted, felt the pressure as the liquid started to drip into his bloodstream.

Was it imagination, or could he already feel his muscles start to atrophy?

The tech finished attaching him to the apparatus that would keep him alive and

prisoner in this room. Now came the moment he had been dreading. They took the

cables attached to his head and inserted jacks into the mainframe computer. A

series of codes was punched in.

Doc felt a tingling sensation begin at the back of his brain and braced himself.

Suddenly he was no longer in the room. A rush, a blinding light, and an immense

spasm of pain that ran through his entire frame, making him convulse in spasms

that passed slowly. The lights began to settle into shapes, the oppressive

silence melted into white noise that resolved into pulses of static sound that

eventually shaped into words.

“Welcome to the torture machine, Dr. Tanner. Welcome to our nightmares.”

Chapter Fifteen

Even though the storm was abating, and the conditions meant that they could see

more than a few yards in front of them and weren’t scoured by sprays of dirt and

dust, it was still a long, hard slog toward the ville.

“Don’t these storms ever stop?” Mildred asked as she shook the dirt from her

braids.

Mac shook his head. “Not in the valley. That’s just the way it is.”

They continued in silence through the relative calm. Limbs ached, skin was sore,

resistance was low. Escape was the last thing they could think of at the moment.

Despite the talk of a ritualistic chilling, Ryan felt they needed to reach the

ville and assess the situation from there.

And then there was Doc. If there was a chance they could get him back, then this

would have to be taken. It would also give them access to a mat-trans.

But before all else they had to actually reach the ville.

The terrain was still flat, but there was a gradual incline on the distance.

Looking ahead, Ryan could see the lip of the valley begin to form. They had to

be only a few miles from the ville by now. It seemed to Ryan that the wild

storms were contained within the bowl of the valley, and as they reached the

edges the winds were allowed by nature to dissipate.

There was more foliage and growth here. Not enough to support farming, but

certainly a scattering of scrub that was more than they had seen so far.

The natural corollary of this was there had to be wildlife of some kind. Ryan

glanced at Jak, who was scanning the brush.

“Things move—not dangerous…yet,” the albino added with a lupine grin.

J.B. turned to Mac. “What lives here?”

Before the sec man answered, Ryan noted that the Armorer’s limp had grown worse.

J.B. was almost dragging his left foot, relying more and more on Mildred to

support him.

Mac gestured expansively with his blaster. “Could be anything lives out here in

this rad-blasted hole. Don’t rightly know, as we never stick around long enough

to find out. You follow my drift?”

Ryan nodded, a wry grin cracking his dried and chaffed lips. For the first time

he felt empathy with their captors. “Best way. Imagine the worst and you don’t

get surprised.”

“Right, One-eye. There are stories of strange creatures that live here, between

the outside of the valley and the heart of the storm. Can’t ever say that I’ve

rightly seen anything, though. I guess they may just be as scared of us as we

are of them.”

“That I doubt,” J.B. interrupted. “Never seen a wild mutie creature that didn’t

want to rip your heart out.”

“Unless you rip first,” Jak added.

Dean didn’t seem to be paying attention to the idle chatter, looking over to the

left as he walked, with an intent expression.

“What is it?” Krysty asked, noticing his distraction.

“Don’t know,” Dean commented shortly. “Not yet. Some kind of movement over

there.”

Krysty stopped and followed the line of Dean’s arm. About fifty yards away,

still partly obscured by the remnants of the storm, there was something that

looked to Krysty like a small hill.