ahead. You don’t plan for the future, figure out the pros and cons of what
you’re doing. The present is all, lady. The here and now. It’s the only thing
you have to wrestle with. And that in fact is the history of the human race.
Always too frantic worrying about what was happening in the here and how. We
forgot that the future is created in the present, that whatever is done in the
here and now has an influence on the years to come.” His voice drifted low as he
stared at his boots. “Too late, lady. Too late…”
Krysty said accusingly, “You could make a start by not delivering all this heavy
shit to Mocsin.” She didn’t know anything about the load they were carrying, but
she knew all about Jordan Teague and his miniempire out near the Darks.
Ryan grinned sourly.
“Funny thing,” he said, “Teague ain’t gonna be—and you can take that as a
nondouble negative that’s a great big positive—he ain’t gonna be too fireblasted
pleased about this load.”
“That’s funny?”
“Well, you see, it just so happens that most of Teague’s consignment went up
when Truck Four blew. Boom!” He spread his arms high. “All those grenades, all
that high explosive, all those old armor-piercing shells. Sent most of his
delivery to glory in a great big blaze-out. Lucky for us, though, because that’s
what creamed most of the stickies and other mad muties that had us in a
terrible, terrible fix. And that means that Teague’s gonna be getting short
supplies. Pity.”
“And did it?”
“Did it what?”
“All go up.”
Ryan chuckled.
“As it happens, no, of course it didn’t. But Teague’s not to know that. It’s the
perfect scam. You may not believe this, but we do have a code. Of sorts. I mean,
listen—we don’t spend sleepless nights gnawing away at the problem, it’s too
late for that, way too late. The Old Man did it to survive.”
Krysty wrinkled her nose. What Ryan had said sounded to her like special
pleading. “You still didn’t answer the question,” she said. “Would you like to
escape?”
Ryan shook his head helplessly.
“To what? There is no escape from the Deathlands.”
“Uncle Tyas thought there was.”
“You mean, get a boat, take a trip, sail across the ocean? You don’t know what’s
out there or under the waves, just waiting for you. You don’t know what’s
waiting for you on the other side, either. Could be worse than here, though
that’s hard to imagine.”
“No, he didn’t mean that.”
Ryan pointed up at the dull metal ceiling of the swaying war wag.
“You mean up there? How? Why? All there is up there is free-floating garbage. We
know the old guys had, I dunno—” he groped for words, “—kind of settlements out
in space, huge constructions with their own air supplies. That kind of thing.
But how the hell d’you get to them? All the places where they had vehicles,
aircraft, what have you, were blitzed in the Nuke. We’ve stumbled across
launching grounds with wrecked machinery, incredible rusting hulks lying around,
chunks of dead metal. But there’s no way you can get this shit off the ground,
believe me. No way at all.”
“No, that’s not what I mean, either. Uncle Tyas knew. He’d found something out.
But he wouldn’t tell me. He and old Peter…”
“Who?”
“Peter Maritza, his buddy. His close buddy. They did just about everything
together. They were always poking into old books… and papers…” Her voice drifted
off.
“And?” he prompted her.
“I remember when it happened,” she said. “But I was only a kid at the time—maybe
fourteen or fifteen, that kind of age.”
EVEN AS SHE SPOKE Krysty could see the scene in the candlelit, tightly caulked
log cabin that stood at the edge of their hamlet, hidden deep in the rolling
hills and forests of the Sanctuary.
She saw again the hawk-faced man, with the deep-set, piercing eyes, then only in
his early fifties, striding around the main room muttering to himself as she sat
beside the fire quietly watching him with solemn, uncomprehending eyes.
She was still a little afraid of him. His tone was harsh, his manner abrupt. She