“Combined, we have enough for three days,” Mildred replied. She considered it part of her job in the group to keep track of the food. “After that, we hunt for cans.”
“Or hunt,” Jak said, leaning heavily on the ebony stick. Then he glanced backward at the stain and frowned. “Not partial to rat.”
“Should be no shortage of food,” Ryan said. “If it really was a neutron bomb that chilled this place, the stores should have tons of canned goods. Neutron blasts make cans last forever.”
“Just watch for rust,” Mildred reminded curtly. “Somebody gets ptomaine poisoning, there’s nothing I can do to help.”
“A feeb in swamp ate from rusty can,” Jak said. “Saw it. Died screaming.”
Instantly, everybody became alert as a warm wind blew down the street, carrying a faint whiff of sulfur. Nervously, they scrutinized the sky overhead. A flock of condors was lazily winging over the city, and endless sheet lightning was booming amid the fiery orange-and-purple clouds. But there was no sign of the dreaded acid rain coming. The smell of sulfur had to have been from the windward vents of the local volcanoes. Nothing to worry about.
“Let’s get a move on,” Ryan said, starting along the parked cars in the street. “And if a spider attacks, blow out a store window and get inside. It’s too big to follow us through most stores.”
As the group went along the city streets, the smell of sulfur got consistently stronger, then eased away just as fast as it came. Taking a cross street, they found no cars about, and the sightless eyes of the countless glass windows became a hall of mirrors reflecting their images against one another, forming a multiple of ever smaller companions. Ryan fought the urge to start blowing out glass, and gratefully left the visual labyrinth of the city block behind as they took another turn, getting ever closer to the skyscraper.
But then just for a moment, Ryan spotted a new reflection in a silvery window. It was a tall man with his silvery hair tied back, and wearing a fancy embroidered duster, with a long white eagle feather in his hair.
Ryan stared at the sight, feeling his guts twist and heart pound like predark artillery. It was the same man who appeared in the Deathlands just before Trader took the long walk to nowhere. Instinctively, Ryan started for his blaster, then thought better of it.
“Hey,” he called out in a friendly manner.
The reflection turned and was gone. Charging forward, Ryan ran around the corner and found himself staring at a long empty street. A breeze blew some dust off the roadway into a ghostly cloud, and a lizard scuttled under a rusted-out mailbox to escape from the heat of the day.
“Ryan,” a voice said.
The man spun with a finger tightening on the trigger of the Steyr, to see Krysty come about the corner.
“Hey,” he repeated, the word sounding flat in the dry air. “Just saw the strangest thing.”
Almost worried, Krysty studied his face for a moment. She had never seen him this way before. “Looks like you just saw death itself,” she said, adding a smile to let him know it was a joke.
But the big man didn’t laugh or smile. Instead, Ryan turned and stared hard at the empty street again.
“Mebbe I did,” Ryan muttered, feeling as if he had just been given a warning of some kind. A damn important one, too. But whether it was to go, or stay, or what, he had no idea. Only one thing was certain; something terrible was about to happen. Right here and now.
Just then, a sharp whistle shrilled, and the pair rushed back to the others. The rest of the companions were gathered around the front doors of a four-story building, a dark neon sign stretching across its second-floor facade proudly proclaiming it a department store.
“Might be just what we were looking for.” Mildred smiled, cupping hands to her face in an effort to see inside. But another set of doors stood a few yards away from the street doors, and the exterior light couldn’t penetrate strong enough for the woman to be able to make out anything clearlyonly vague outlines of display cases, racks of clothing and what she hoped were mannequins. Sure had a lot of them, though.