Not that he expected anything.
Most redoubts were stripped clean either just before or just after skydark.
THIS ONE was different.
“Smallest redoubt I think we’ve come across,” J.B. commented. “Must’ve been built just as cover for the gateway.”
It had taken them only a half hour to explore the whole place. The main control section, which would house the comp nukes, was sealed off behind a coded sec door that they couldn’t open. But a schematic plan of the whole complex showed how relatively small the place was.
Ryan looked at one of the maps. “Just the mat-trans at the bottom of the elevator and the admin and living quarters up here. Not more than seventy or eighty men and women here. Probably less than that.”
“If I may correct your hypothesis, my dear Cawdor, I would suggest that the greater likelihood was for there to be living quarters outside the redoubt. The dormitory we saw and the eating facility would hardly have served that many personnel. Probably just those actually involved on the six- or eight-hour work shift here.”
J.B. nodded at Doc’s words. “Could be right. When we get outside we can see. But look at what we already got here.”
There were three dormitories, each with ten single beds; a dining room and kitchen; bathroom facilities, with hot and cold running water, and no sign of any sort of intrusive insect life; small armory, which was the only part of the redoubt that had been stripped clean; a larder with dried and frozen food supplies; a small number of separate study-bedrooms, and, to Dean’s stunned amazement and delight, a room that held about a dozen sophisticated arcade-quality video games.
Ryan had to come real close to losing his temper with his son to stop the boy going straight there.
“No.”
“Dad?”
“No!”
“Come on, Dad!”
“First things first, Dean. We make sure the perimeter’s safe. Then all of us get a bath. You and me specially.”
“I don’t need a wash. I got wet during that second jump in Maine.”
Doc patted Dean on the top of his curly head. “Getting wet in what smells like the contents of an abandoned septic tank isn’t quite the same as having a good wash, my young prince among cherubim and seraphim.”
“Then can I play the”
“Then we eat.”
“After that?” Dean’s voice cracked in his desperation. “Please Dad!”
“Then I reckon it’ll be about time for everyone to catch some shut-eye. Specially you and me, Dean.”
The desolate look on his son’s face made him smile.
“Give him a break, lover,” Krysty urged.
“All right.”
“Oh, thanks, Dad!”
Ryan lifted a hand. “But we do everything in the right order. Understand? And you do need some double-serious sleep. So, you stop playing when I tell you.”
“I’d like to have a good look around this place, Ryan,” J.B. said. “Quick glance at some of those small rooms turned up stuff left behind when they pulled out.”
“Tomorrow morning?” Ryan suggested. “Rest of you can look tonight, if you want. Those jumps have really taken me apart and put me back together crooked.”
The Armorer shook his head. “No. I wouldn’t mind an early bed for a change. How about you, Mildred?”
“Ready when you are, John. Can we use one of the private rooms?”
“Only got single beds,” Jak said, his pale lips tugged back off his strong teeth in a feral grin.
“All we need,” Mildred replied.
THERE WAS THE SMUDGED residue of old pieces of soap in the metal dishes of the individual shower units and, by working hard with them, Ryan managed to produce a slightly scummy lather. He rubbed at the stinking slime that had crusted in his hair, washing down over his face and chest.
He got some of the yellow coal-tar soap in his eye, and he was blinking, blind, when he felt a warm soapy hand slide between his buttocks from behind and grip him by the cock.
Ryan’s mouth opened in surprise, and he swallowed a mouthful of hot water.
“Cleanliness is being next to God, was what Uncle Tyas McCann used to say to me, back in Harmony ville,” Krysty said, pressing her naked body against him, her nipples peaking against his streaming scarred skin.