Deathlands 124: Child of Slaughter (6 page)

As for the first mutie who’d swung around and driven Mildred away from Krysty, he was down for the count. Peering between pillars, Mildred saw Krysty standing over him, whaling away at him with her powerful fists.

“You go, girl.” Mildred smiled grimly, then heard a sound and whipped around just in time for someone else’s fist to slam into the side of her head.

Mildred’s vision went dark before she could get a look at her attacker. She was dimly aware of her legs folding up underneath her, her body collapsing, and then…she was off in the nothingness, the perfect black vacuum of absolute unconsciousness.

Chapter Nine

Ryan and Jak fought back-to-back, blasting away at the muties working their way toward them through the forest of spikes.

Jak’s .357 Magnum Colt Python coughed out a round, and a mutie screamed in agony. “Another bite dust.” Jak spun the revolver around his index finger, then blew on the barrel as if puffing away smoke. “Jak six, muties zero.”

Ryan snorted and kept sweeping his longblaster from side to side. “But the bastards keep coming.” He thought he saw movement and flicked the barrel toward a spike, then realized it was a false alarm and continued his sweep. “How the hell many of them are there anyway?”

“More are, more fun for me.” Jak cocked the Python and went back to combing the surroundings with his bright red eyes. “Hey, muties!” he shouted.

As if on cue, a mutie leaped between distant pillars, crossing from one to the other. Jak didn’t fire, but he fixed his gaze on the mutie’s new cover like a dog watching a fox’s den.

Just then, Ryan heard a blaster shot fired nearby. He listened to the echo, trying to tell what specific weapon had put it out there, but the spikes upset the acoustics, and he couldn’t read the weapon’s signature.

“I hope the others are all right.” With the shape Krysty was in, he was worrying more than usual, second-guessing his call to split up the team.

“Down one man, muties surrounding, ammo low.” Jak grinned a wolf’s grin. “Of course all right.” The mutie twitched from behind his pillar, and Jak jerked his blaster’s barrel to follow. “Just another Deathlands day.”

Suddenly, a body darted from behind another spike at ten o’clock and ran into Ryan’s field of vision. He caught it out of the corner of his eye, swung his longblaster around to fire…and lost his shot. Whoever was over there disappeared behind another pale column.

“More company,” Ryan said quietly. “I think they’re taking up position, getting ready to move.”

“Want move first?” Jak asked. “Or stay sitting ducks?”

Ryan thought it over for all of a second. “Let’s move out and work our way back in.” He pointed toward the cover of the figure he’d glimpsed a moment ago and headed in that direction.

“Getting bored one place anyway.” Jak headed in the opposite direction.

As Ryan worked his way between jutting spikes, he walked as softly as he could, keeping his longblaster at the ready. He paused at each fresh spike, ducking quickly past it to check for muties sheltering behind, then sliding around the column to take that shelter himself.

It unnerved him a little when he heard Krysty shrieking in the distance, but he kept his head and kept moving. He knew her well enough to realize that wasn’t the kind of cry she made when under physical attack. The only cry she ever uttered in battle was a raging war whoop as she shattered bones and drew blood with abandon.

Ryan glided around an especially thick pillar, then stopped and flicked back behind it. Two muties were creeping past on the other side, one carrying a sawed-off shotgun, the other a remade M-16 fitted with a rusty bayonet.

Ryan breathed slowly and adjusted his grip on the Scout
longblaster. Then he eased himself around the pillar and froze. Suddenly, a bayonet and a double-barreled sawed-off were staring him in the face.

The muties had gotten the jump on him. They had to have heard or sensed him, maybe spotted his shadow, and doubled back. Now Ryan was royally screwed.

“Surrender!” the mutie with the sawed-off shouted. “Throw your weapon aside and get on the ground.”

“You first.” Ryan didn’t blink. He had the Scout aimed squarely at the bayonet-wielding mutie’s abdomen. As long as he kept it there, he still had a chance of keeping them off balance.

The mutie with the M-16 drew the blaster back, getting ready to ram the bayonet into Ryan.

At that moment, the mutie’s head exploded. His body crumpled backward, dead before it hit the ground.

While the other mutie gaped, Ryan seized his opportunity. Without a heartbeat’s hesitation, he cranked off a shot, putting a round right through his head.

The mutie looked at Ryan with wide-eyed amazement, making a move to raise his shotgun, but he didn’t quite make it. His body slumped atop the other mutie’s, splattering blood and gore in all directions.

Thirty yards off, a woman stood between two pillars.

Even from a distance, Ryan could see that she was more than six feet tall. Her black leather jumpsuit was tight enough to reveal the muscular lines of her body; her breasts were large, but otherwise she was whipcord lean.

As for her platinum blonde hair, it was tied back in a ponytail, all but for a single black braid that hung from her left temple.

Even to a man like Ryan, whose heart belonged to his soul mate, this woman was an impressive sight. Equally impressive was the weapon in her hands, though it was pointed in his direction: a Heckler & Koch G-36 automatic
longblaster, complete with hundred-round drum magazine.

Without a word, she started walking toward him. She looked neither right nor left, as if she didn’t fear being gunned down while leaving her cover behind. She just kept her eyes fixed on Ryan with cold and single-minded intensity.

“Nice shooting,” Ryan said when she got within ten yards of him. “Thanks for the assist.”

The woman did not say a word as she stalked up to him. Even when she stopped, fewer than four feet away, she remained silent.

That gave Ryan time to take in her features at close range. Her eyes were icy gray like mist, glittering in a ray of sunlight washing over her from above. Her cheekbones were high, her nose angular, her lips full, dark crimson and pressed tightly together.

“You.” She was taller than he’d thought—six foot four at least—and looked down her nose at him when she spoke. “Who are you?” Her voice was deep.

“My name is Ryan Cawdor.” Ryan nodded once, curtly, at her. “And who are you?”

“Why are you in the Shift?” the woman asked.

Ryan couldn’t help noticing that she hadn’t lowered her longblaster. “Why are
you
here?” The less he revealed at the moment, the better. For all he knew, the woman might be in league with the people who’d taken Doc.

“You brought a team.” She bobbed her head to one side. “You are looking for something.”

Ryan didn’t know what to think of her. Was that arrogance in her eyes, suspicion or just frosty appraisal?

“What’s this ‘Shift’ you just mentioned?”

“You’re slow, aren’t you?” She sneered a little, then moved her head in an arc from right to left, taking in her surroundings. “The Shift is the land of a million changes.”

Ryan narrowed his eyes. “Is that so?” In that instant, he decided he didn’t like her, though he still wasn’t sure if she was necessarily malicious. “Thanks for finally answering one of my questions.”

The woman cocked her head left like a big carnivorous bird about to pounce. “Union.”

Ryan scowled. “What?”

“That is my name. So now I have answered two.” Leaning closer, still with the Heckler & Koch between them, she glared at him. “And you have still answered only one, Ryan Cawdor.”

Just as Ryan was starting to wonder if he might need to make some kind of deadly move, Krysty screamed again. Jerking to attention, Ryan looked in the direction of her cry.

At which point, he heard the chattering of weapons somewhere in the same vicinity.

He pushed forward, and Union backed off. “I need to go,” he said, swinging up the Scout.

As he charged past her, Ryan hoped Union wouldn’t shoot him in the back, and she didn’t. But he did hear her running after him, her feet flicking through the sand in counterpoint to his own.

He wondered, as he ran, exactly what she had in mind and which of them was most likely to survive it.

Chapter Ten

As Krysty screamed and writhed on the ground, three hostile muties cautiously approached, staring down at her, which was exactly what she wanted them to do.

This time, her screams were all phony, and she was playing possum to draw them. Until then, they’d been hiding behind nearby spikes, popping off potshots.

But now they were out in the open, surrounding their prey, never imagining that they were her prey.

Krysty twisted in the sand, kicking and thrashing. She let out one more howl of agony, an earsplitting shriek that made the muties wince.

Then she suddenly fell still. She let herself collapse, becoming inert as if she were dead.

Keeping her eyes open but motionless, she lay there as the muties leaned closer, sizing up her condition. They were wondering what to do, if their job was done in this case or if they needed to finish her off.

One of them poked her hip with his toe. The long nail on it jabbed her, but she forced herself to remain still.

Suddenly she exploded into action.

Lashing out her left leg, she drove the heel of her boot into the bare ankle of the mutie who had kicked her. As he squealed in pain, Krysty sprang to her feet.

From that moment on, it was no-holds-barred combat. Krysty was tall and muscular, and could hold her own in any combat situation. She had holstered her Glock for the
ploy, and couldn’t draw it before one of the muties would get off a shot.

In a whirlwind of motion, she danced among them with arms and legs flying, chopping them down like a scythe through wheat.

Enraged, one of them came back fast, springing from the ground where she’d thrown him, but his frantic swings were no match for her rock-solid defense. Krysty dodged every blow he attempted, then knocked him back hard with a high kick to the face. This time, he didn’t go down, but she could see he’d blacked out with his eyes open. She followed through with a blow to his chest, and he toppled backward, as straight as a tree.

Just like that, the tables were turned. Instead of three muties staring down at her, Krysty was staring down at them. Every one of them was out cold, and she was still fully alert and ready for more action.

Ryan charged out of the forest of spikes.

“I knew you’d be fine.” He grinned as he reached her.

“I certainly hope you didn’t think I needed help.”

Ryan snorted. “I know better. By the way, we’ve got company.”

A tall blonde in a black leather jumpsuit strolled out from behind a stout pillar.

“She calls herself Union.” Ryan turned and watched as the woman strode toward them. “She helped me out with that automatic longblaster of hers.”

Krysty got an eyeful of her big blaster and nodded once. “Good for her.”

“According to her, this place is called the Shift,” said Ryan. “Though she didn’t tell me much more than that.”

Krysty narrowed her eyes. “Whose side is she on? Did she tell you that much?”

Union looked and sounded aloof to the point of arrogance. “Whoever isn’t trying to kill me, I suppose.”

“And we’re just supposed to trust you?” Krysty asked.

Union shrugged. Krysty could have sworn she was stifling a yawn. “Just don’t try to kill me, and we’ll be okay.”

Krysty doubted it but shrugged in kind. “Sounds like a plan,” she said, though it didn’t, really. She didn’t imagine for a second that Union was worthy of her trust. She didn’t think the woman had any intention of allying herself with them.

But Krysty and her team were in the shit as always, and their options were limited. Trust her or back away—those were the only two choices she could think of at the moment.

“All right, then.” She slumped and rested her hands on her knees. “Let’s table the buddy-buddy stuff until after we put down the mutie army. Agreed?”

Union shrugged as if she couldn’t care less and raised the H&K. “Go time?”

“Suit yourself.” Ryan shrugged, too, then shot a wink at Krysty. “Whatever floats your boat.”

Even weakened as she was, Krysty managed a chuckle at that one.

Just then, footsteps scuffed through the nearby sand. Ryan and Union whirled with weapons at the ready, but it was Jak, not a mutie, who marched out from between spikes.

“Back off the trigger,” Ryan snapped, dropping the Scout’s barrel. “He’s with us.”

Scowling, Union hesitated, then slowly lowered her weapon.

“Who this?” Jak asked.

“I was just going to ask the same question,” Union said coldly.

“Jak, meet Union,” Ryan said. “Union, this is Jak.”

“Union Jak.” Jak’s smile had its own touch of frost. “Have ring to it.”

“Whatever.” Union sighed loudly. “If this is how you people kill muties, it’s no wonder your backs are up against the wall.”

Jak laughed. “You funny! All talk, no action!”

Union glared, then suddenly stomped toward him. “I don’t have time for this.” She paused beside him, her cold stare locking with his bright red eyes. Then she flashed a sexy smile. “So what do you say we go mow down some mutie scum, big boy?” She sashayed past him, her longblaster swaying in perfect counterpoint with her shapely buttocks in the tight black leather jumpsuit.

Ryan watched her go, suitably stunned by the change in demeanor. He glanced at Krysty, who frowned back at him, then turned his gaze to Jak.

The albino shrugged nonchalantly. “What can say?” He raised his eyebrows. “Guess Jak irresistible.” Then he spun and followed Union, disappearing into the forest of spikes.

Ryan stared at his retreating back, hoping like hell that he hadn’t made a mistake in bringing Union back to the group.

Chapter Eleven

Somebody slapped Doc so hard across the face that he woke instantly from the depths of a dream and instantly wished he hadn’t.