black boulder.
He entered a shallow dip, and for several minutes the radar station was out of
sight. When he emerged, it was a scant quarter mile off across level ground.
Ryan knew then that he was going to make it.
Despite his dimmed vision, he suddenly made out a group of people hurrying
toward him. They were shouting and waving, but he couldn’t quite hear the words.
Now, so close to safety, Ryan was able to let go. He slipped wearily to his
knees. Finally, like a tired man entering deep water, he slid forward on his
face, waiting for the others to come to him.
Chapter Seventeen
A LOUD CLICKING SOUND, echoing, becoming louder and loader. A threatening,
insistent noise that seemed as if it were drilling into Ryan’s brain.
The sound became almost deafening.
And stopped.
“What…?” he began. “What the fuck was that poundin’ noise?”
“What noise?”
“Clicking. Metal on stone?”
“The heels of my boots in the corridor,” replied Krysty Wroth.
“Sounded like hammers in my head. How long did I sleep this time?”
She sat beside him on the battered metal bed, her long hair tied back with a
strip of black ribbon. “I guess about an hour, lover. Altogether, today, around
seven hours. It was just after dawn when I heard you comin’ and we came out to
carry you in. You were near the end, Ryan.”
“I know it. Where’s J.B.?”
“Gone to visit the ghost town by the dam. You remember him tellin’ you?”
Ryan sat up, feeling bone weary but for the first time, realizing that he was
safe and well. They’d given him warm soup and a light brown alcoholic liquid
that tasted of burned wood and blazed in his throat as he swallowed it.
“I recall you tellin’ me how you and J.B. fought your way clear, killed three or
four of them Russians, then headed here and met up with Henn. The two buggies
are both runnin’ okay now, right?”
Krysty nodded. “Yeah. I wanted to stay and look for you. J.B. said no.”
“He was right. In that sort of situation, I’d have left him.”
“He’s up with Okie and Doc. They radioed they’d found a town in a valley by the
dam. They’ve got a missile up there.”
Ryan swung his legs over the side of the bed, standing unsteadily, waving away
the girl’s helping hand. “No, I’m— Missile? What sort?”
She shook her head. “J.B. said it was experimental. Reeled off a load of
reference letters and numbers that didn’t mean anything to him.”
“Can it be…?”
“Blasted off? Yeah. There’s a launcher. Oh, an’ J.B. says there’s a dummy one,
as well, without any launch motor or explosive—just a shell.”
“Is he comin’ back here today?”
“No. Said you was up. We’ve got food and heat and all. Lori’s been sniveling
with a cold. I think we should have left her at the redoubt, Ryan.”
“She’d have died, She saved us from that bloody-minded old bastard Quint. She’s
not used to the outside, that’s all.”
“You figure those killers are comin’ after us, Ryan?” asked Krysty.
“That quake must have scattered their ponies. It’ll take ’em a day or more to
get together. But… yeah, I guess that yellow-eyed shitter was interested enough
in us to come this way. Round about tomorrow noon, we could have us a real
firefight. It’d be better if we were all together, so let’s go join the others.”
THE SEVERE QUAKES that had opened the earth around the camp of the Narodniki,
delaying them in their southerly push, had barely been felt by the pursuing
militia, who were on the far side of a range of low hills.
It had enabled them to close the gap on the guerrillas. And the closer they got,
the faster they moved.
Major Zimyanin sat on his horse, peering ahead. Ice hung from the stiff points
of his long moustache. He removed his fur cap with its single silver circle and
wiped his bald head with a fur glove. His pockmarked face was less gloomy than
usual.
All the signs indicated that they were catching up with the band of killers.
They’d found the raggled, frozen corpses that Uchitel and his group had left as