Trying to explain to men like these was always difficult, and in any case
Reacher himself had no real idea why he was the way he was. It was relatively
easy to accept the physical aspects of genetic mutation—why some mutants had no
mouths, for instance, or three eyes, or scales, or pachydermatous skin.
Especially these days. Those who knew about these matters said that the full
effects of the Nuke were only just beginning to come to the surface.
But how in hell did you explain something that went on in the mind? Something
that was not at all tangible. Something extrasensory. Something that had to do
with the emotions. At least that was the way Reacher figured it, if he thought
about it at all, which wasn’t very often. There were other more pressing
problems to think about and try to cope with in this wacko world. Like a lot of
muties, Reacher accepted that he was different and kept his head down. There was
no percentage in making waves. Again, the guys who knew about these things had
actually figured out a very strange scenario: they said that maybe in another
two or three generations—if there was anyone left at all in this hell-world—it
could be that mutants would exceed normals. That in fact it would be the muties
who were the norms, the norms muties. That was a pretty wild mind. Ain’t nothing
physical, McCandless, but it’s never wrong. Somewhere up the road we got
trouble. Could be us, could be guys waiting for us. Could be a rockslide. I
dunno. But it’s there, and I’m warning you. We have to tread careful, real
careful.”
“Shit!” McCandless spat at the rutted road, his brow a corrugation of leathery
lines. “Ya tellin’ me nothin’. We gotta tread real careful where!”
“I’m warning you,” repeated Reacher stubbornly. “This is special, whatever it
is. This is death.”
McCandless’s eyes locked onto the mutie’s for a microsecond, then flicked away.
The bulky man pulled at his beard.
“And it’s gonna happen, no matter what?”
Reacher bit his lip.
“It ain’t as simple as that. Yeah, it’s gonna happen, whatever. Doesn’t
necessarily mean it’s gonna happen to us.”
“Ya never wrong, huh?”
Reacher fidgeted, shrugged.
“Niney-nine percent.”
McCandless’s face split into a grin. Reacher thought he looked more insane than
ever.
“Well, okay! That’s good enough, Reacher, you mutie!” He stepped forward,
thumped Reacher hard across the back. “I’m feelin’ lucky today! That one percent
is ridin’ for me! We’re gonna get us the loot and we’re all gonna be kings of
the mountain! Ain’t that right, Rogan?”
Rogan grinned sourly. “Sure is, boss.”
McCandless fixed Kurt with his crazed gaze.
“What about the blaster? Whaddya think, Kurt? We ridin’ lucky?”
Kurt’s face was expressionless, a mask. He was bitterly regretting this whole
venture. He had a strong feeling, an unshakable feeling that they were all going
to wind up dead. Nastily. Or if not quite that, some disaster was heading their
way with no reprieve.
This feeling had been building up inside him for three days. It had actually
started about two seconds after McCandless had first clapped him on the shoulder
on the dusty drag outside Joe’s Bites in Main Street Mocsin and offered him the
blaster’s job for an eighth share in whatever they found in the Darks. It was an
insane proposition, and McCandless had an insane reputation. The only reason
Kurt had agreed to it—instantly and without thinking about it much at all—was
that the night before he’d bucked one of Jordan Teague’s captains, felled him to
the floor in the tawdry casino in the center of the Strip, and he was already
making panic plans to get out of Mocsin fast. The only snag was, the next land
wagon train wasn’t scheduled to leave for at least a week and Kurt did not have
the cash or even the creds to buy himself some wheels and the necessary amount
of fuel that would take him to the next main center of population two hundred
and fifty kilometers to the south. The fact that Teague’s captain, an ugly son
of a bitch with a walleye named Hagic, had been cheating Kurt—and Kurt had