Exposed on the floor was some sort of a symbol, written in the dead woman’s blood. Two lines of different lengths were bisected by another line at an angle.
“Don’t recognize that,” Ryan said. “Doc?”
“Not Latin,” the scholar rumbled, studying the configuration. “Nor is it from the Greek alphabet, Sanskrit or hieroglyphics. Perhaps Hebrew?”
Mildred shrugged. “Hard to say.”
“Tech talk,” Jak sniffed as if that settled the matter.
“Mil code,” Dean suggested from the doorway.
Thoughtfully Ryan adjusted the strap of the long-blaster over his shoulder. “Could be anything. Or nothing. A person can get crazy when dying from blood loss, sort of like being drunk while freezing to death.”
“Nasty.”
“There’s no good way to die.”
“Must have been mighty important for her to write in blood,” Krysty said slowly, “and then lay a hand over the symbol to protect it from being smudged.”
Licking the point on a stubby pencil, Mildred carefully duplicated the symbol in her yellowed notepad and slid it back into her med kit.
“Might be important,” she said.
“Mebbe to her,” Ryan said, turning toward the machinery. “Not us. Our concern is getting out of here.”
Rising, Jak walked over to the open door and leaned against the jamb, his massive .357 Magnum Colt Python in hand. He offered the rest of the jerky to Dean, who accepted, and the two teens stood guard, chewing steadily. Edging the bare ground was a tattered wooden fence, and some rusted coils of what might have been barbed wire. On the other side was the crushed wreckage of civilian cars, and assorted junk.
“Invasion force?” Dean asked casually.
“Hell of a fight,” Jak said.
“Yep,” Dean agreed.
Swallowing, Jak took a deep breath. “Smells good.”
“Like home?”
A frown. “Bayou swamp, not jungle.” Then the albino cracked a rare smile. “But close enough.”
Crossing the room, Ryan went to the hodge-podge assortment of machinery. The collection reached from the front wall to the wall of the mat-trans unit. At the front end was a pile of nuke batteries. At the other end was a coil of highly polished copper, apparently filled with lots of smaller coils inside and a single massive iron bar in the middle. What it could be he had no idea.
Dusting off his hands, J.B. rose from behind the console and started flipping switches on the control board.
“Tell me,” Ryan said, coming closer.
“Damned if I know,” the short man replied, turning dials. Nothing happened. “Everything here seems to be in working order, so that’s not the problem.”
Going to a large metal tank extending from the side of a motor, J.B. unscrewed the cap and looked inside. Then he stuck in a hand, his fingertips coming out barely moistened.
“Nuke me, we’re trapped,” he stated glumly.
Just then, something loudly clicked and the machinery struggled into life, spewing out black clouds of exhaust, but it stopped after only a few seconds.
Ryan scowled darkly. “Doesn’t sound broken. Out of gas?”
“Yeah. Not a drop left in the fuel tank.”
“The mat-trans runs on gas?” Dean asked incredulously.
“How is that possible?” Krysty asked, joining the men at the console.
Pensively J.B. removed his fedora to scratch his head, then jammed the hat back on. “Ryan was right. These folks were desperate to leave. This is the most ramshackle piece of equipment I’ve ever seen. I’m astonished it ever worked.”
Going to the machines, J.B. said, “These nuke batteries start this big motor, which turns this modified car transmission to increase its rpm and turn this electric generator really fast so that it can feed high-voltage current into a step-up transformer, which boosts the voltage again and pours the electricity into this homemade Tesla coil until there is enough power to run the mat-trans.”
“Brilliant,” Doc rumbled, eagerly approaching the copper coil for inspection. “A homemade lightning bolt. Most impressive.”
“Freeze!” J.B. barked, and stepped between the scholar and the machinery. “The mat-trans needs a bastard load of power to work, and while that coil doesn’t have enough to send us anywhere, it’s still got sufficient volts to kill you. Won’t be anything left but ash and an echo.”
“Indeed,” Doc muttered, backing away from the predark power plant. “Thank you for the admonishment, John Barrymore.”