The chilling?”
All of it, from the beginning,” Gore said, refilling the cup.
Grub retold the entire tale once more. His new audience was less intrigued by the flourishes of purely fictitious heroism than by descriptions of the roachmen’s gear their body armor, blasters, cube on wheels and flesh-dissolving foam. Gore asked him pointed questions about the operation of each of these devices, from time to time shooting meaningful looks at his friends.
By the time the story was finished, so was the bottle. After Gore sent Spadecrawler to the bar to fetch another, he said, ‘ ‘I got a real sweet proposition for you, Grub.”
“I’m listening.
“If what you’re telling us is trueand for your sake it damn well better besounds like there’s some fine pickings waiting over at Moonboy.”
“You could look at it that way, I suppose.”
“What if I told you that the four of us are just the advance scouting party for our band? What if I told you we’ve got a bunch more pals camped just outside the ville? All with good, center-fire blasters like this one. All of them seasoned bush-fighters. Some of us used to be sec men over in the eastern baronies.”
“And what are you now?” Grub said.
“Opportunity seekers,” Gore replied. “If you lead us to these armored muties, we’ll chill them all, then divvy up the spoils, fair and square. Should be plenty to go around. Interested?”
Before he could respond, Giggly Jane’s hot fingers crawled into the middle of his lap and, once there, began to rummage around most skillfully. Awash in pleasure, Grub gazed helplessly into the whirlpools of her eyes.
“I’ve got an idea,” Gore said, scraping back his chair. “Why don’t we go someplace where we can talk more freely about the details of the job? Someplace where you and Giggly Jane can get much better acquainted.”
At this, the skinhead dug her nails into him and, leaning her face close to his, pushed the wet, squirming tip of her tongue deep into his ear. It was all the convincing he needed.
“I love women,” Grub confessed as he staggered to his feet.
Chapter Six
The midafternoon sun was still blisteringly hot when Ryan and the companions escorted Uda and the girls into the outskirts of Perdition. Built on a high, treeless knoll, the ville had an unobstructed view of incoming trouble, from across the riverbed or across the plain from the range of peaks to the west.
Uda knew right where she wanted to go. She selected one of the nearly identical, narrow dirt lanes that ran through the jumble of lean-tos at the base of the hill, and, with her children in tow, started on up. Similar shanties, roofed with car hoods and doors, spilled down the flanks of the knoll, along with drifting piles of the inhabitants’ refuse.
The entourage drew curious looks from rag-clad, low Perdition dwellers, but no one said anything to them, and no one stared at them for long.
At the top of the knoll, double-wide trailers sat in a circle. According to a huge, electric-powered sign that had been dark for more than a century, they were part of a pre-Apocalypse commercial enterprise called O-Ke Bonanza Manufactured Home and RV Center. The trailers at the hill’s summit and the lean-tos at the bottom were separated by a ring of junked and decaying motor homes, all of which had been turned into multifamily apartments. Uda had no trouble finding the one she was looking for, a Winnebago Brave sitting on its rusted brake drums. She knocked on the door and a woman who looked like her twin, only older, appeared at the cracked window.
After a tearful reunion with her sister, Uda said goodbye to each of the companions. “We won’t ever forget any of you,” she promised.
“Stay safe,” Ryan told her as Krysty and Mildred took turns hugging the two little girls.
After Mildred released the older one from the embrace, the girl walked over to Ryan, her back straight, her head held high, eyes shining. She reached up and placed a tiny, perfect Deathlands daisy onto his open palm. Staring up at him, she carefully closed his powerful fingers over it. Ryan basked in the intensity of her gaze, as hard and bright as a diamond. He felt a passing curiosity about who had fathered this child. What coldheart had crept into Uda’s bed while poor Benjy toiled in his rock garden? he wanted to ask, but didn’t. Better by far to savor such a mystery than to unravel it.