Over the sounds of their desperate retreat, J.B. could hear and feel the propellers’ insistent beat. The aircraft hung behind and above him, watching, waiting, perhaps fine-tuning its elevation and angle to take the perfect chill shot. J.B. expected to die before he reached the top of the chute on the other side of the ridge. No shot came.
He paused for breath at the drop-off. Over his shoulder he saw that the aircraft hadn’t advanced. The pilot was toying with them.
On the plain in the distance below, moonlight turned mud lakes silver, and clouds of steam rose into the night sky, carrying with them the smell of hot sulfur. J.B. looked over the edge. Thanks to the dim light, the drop didn’t seem so bad. Of course, it didn’t matter how it looked. They had to make the jump, anyway.
Suddenly, the sound of the aircraft changed. When the Armorer looked back, it was no longer there. The prop noise faded as the now-invisible ship swung away from them, circling and then crossing the ridge to the west. Once the aircraft cleared the ridge, it arced back in their direction. More head games, J.B. thought. “He’s going to nail us when we’re in the chute.” he told the others. “We’ve got to hit the ground running.”
J.B. screwed his hat as far down on his head as it would go, then hurled himself over the edge. As he flailed his legs to keep his balance, the wind rushed up at his face, ripping at his glasses, screaming past his ears. He hit the ground all right, but not running. As he landed on the soles of his feet, his knees caved in from the force of the impact, and his butt smashed down on the gravel in the chute.
He shook it off as best he could. There was no time to really pull himself together. He had to get out of the way or be crushed by the others jumping after him. As J.B. shoulder-rolled down the slope, he felt the whoosh and heard the grunt Mildred made as she crashed to the ground. Then he was up and running. He couldn’t wait to make sure everyone else made it down because that would have blocked the escape route.
After three or four strides, his run became a slide, and his slide was on the verge of becoming another fall. He jammed the buttstock of the M-4000 into the loose rock, using it as a rudder to control his wild descent.
At the bottom of the chute, the grade flattened and J.B. came to a skidding stop. Mildred bumped into him a moment later, followed by Jak, Dean, Krysty and Doc. The experience had turned the old man a whiter shade of pale. Eyes tightly shut, Doc kept shaking his head and mumbling to himself. It was a miracle that no one had broken an ankle.
Barely breathing, they listened, straining to screen out the rumble of volcanic lakes and hissing steam vents. Overhead, now lost in the dark, the rhythmic beating of the aircraft came at them from the south.
“Let’s move,” J.B. urged.
Because he had no choice, he led them through an obstacle course of boiling hot springs, over ground he knew had to be undermined. They ran on a thin crust of earth that could give way under their combined weight, plunging them to a terrible death by scalding.
“Don’t break. Don’t break. Don’t break,” he muttered with every running stride.
They reached and rounded the muddy shore of an infernal lake, and as they raced on, they kicked through a scatter of shattered bones, pelvic girdles, ribs, vertebrae. There were paw prints, as well. Lots of them, jumbled and pressed deep into the muck. The heat along the shore was so intense that the sweat dripping off J.B.’s face, off his chest, and pouring down the middle of his back had no cooling effect. He felt as if his clothes were going to burst into flame.
When he looked up, a black shadow passed across the stars, cutting off all hope of their retreat. J.B. slowed, then stopped. He stood slope-shouldered, his blasters hanging useless in his hands. The companions closed ranks around him, facing the oncoming aircraft. Rumbling caldrons to the rear spit drops of boiling mud on their unprotected backs.