Last Ranger (7 page)

It was getting dark but he didn’t stick around to see the bone fireworks while heading south as fast as he dared travel in
the twilight as the road grew steadily worse. He drove into the night, the Harley’s headlight cutting through the blackness
with a wide beam. Stone didn’t stop until near midnight when he couldn’t see a single one of the bomb craters, even standing
on top of the bike and looking around 360 degrees. He made himself gulp down another can of Spam and some hard biscuits, then
a handful of vitamins he had snatched from the bunker.

He camped out on a rise where he could see all around him nice and clear, and chewed down the lousy chow bite by unappetizing
bite. The sight of all those rotting folks had done wonders for his stomach. But he knew if he didn’t eat he’d start getting
weak, even sick. This was not the way to travel around the new America. The weak perished as fast as they came along. They
were the fodder of accelerating barbarism.

When he’d finished, Stone went over to the dog. It still wasn’t moving though the heart did not seem to have slowed since
he’d last checked. He knew the animal hadn’t eaten for days now. He made a gruel from some of the biscuits and some condensed
milk, and then mixed it all together with water from his thermos to form a wet paste. Stone wedged the dog’s mouth open and
started slowly slopping small spoonfuls of the stuff in, then turned the animal’s head from side to side trying to work some
down. He spent nearly twenty minutes spooning the slop and could hardly even tell if any was getting down the canine’s gullet,
as much of it seemed to have fallen on Stone’s pants and down to the ground. But with the very last spoonful the dog suddenly
coughed and spat up a spray of the food, then lapsed right back into complete stillness.

Still it was movement of some kind. It showed the creature was still on this side of the black veil. Great, Stone thought
darkly as he sat back against the bike, took out both of his pistols, and laid them on his lap for instant access. So the
dog was alive. One fucking cough in three days and I think it’s the medical miracle of the century. He somehow fell asleep
but he slept fitfully, waking up and reaching for the guns as he thought he heard something. But each time it was just a dream,
and he sank from one nightmare to another like a drowning man being bounced from wave to storming wave.

T
HE next morning Stone woke to a biting rain, which had already soaked his hair and outer clothes. Thank God he’d covered Excaliber’s
box before he retired, or the deeply dreaming mutt would be floating in dog soup right now. He mounted up onto the bike, knowing
it was too wet to even try to make a fire for coffee—and with all things considered—he was in just about the foulest mood
he could remember, grayer even than the rain-streaked air around him, through which he could see but fifty or sixty feet.
He stared straight ahead, grinding his teeth together with angry unconscious mouthings about the state of affairs. He then
fell into a trance with all his attention on the road and its numerous holes and chasms already filling with water, some looking
big enough for the bike to completely disappear into without a trace.

After about fifty miles Stone was slightly heartened to see a rusting sign that said Hartley was the next town. That meant
Amarillo wasn’t more than another thirty. He’d be there by nightfall. Not that he was greatly looking forward to it, since
he had little or no idea of just how he was going to go about rescuing April. The Dwarf was the cleverest bastard he’d come
up against and Stone knew he’d have to be extremely careful—and lucky—to come out of this one. He wished beyond measure that
he’d killed the little bastard the last time they met—when he’d had the chance. If only he’d looked out the window and had
seen that the murdering eggman had landed in water after his twelve-story fall. He could have torn ass downstairs and ended
the threat to mankind with a few slugs. If, if, if. If a rat had a tux it would be a Senator. That’s what his dad had always
said. The Major hadn’t gotten along with the political breed especially well.

With the rain continuing, the four-laner he was riding on became virtually unusable, and Stone had to take the next exit ramp,
which was broken into jagged sections, though he was able to tear over it with a few quick jumps of the bike. Then he was
back on sparsely bushed flat terrain with a few rolling hills to the east. He got up a good head of steam and headed south,
keeping a close eye on the compass he’d super-glued to the top of the bike while in the bunker. The rain at last seemed to
die out, though a constant irritating mist continued to fill the air, making him have to wipe his face every twenty or so
seconds as the stuff felt sticky, uncomfortable. He could see a little better now and got up to a respectable forty on the
soaked flats.

He couldn’t have been off the highway more than twenty minutes when he heard a sound. Very dim at first—like a far-off airplane
propeller—then louder as he cruised on. It was more than one thing creating the noise, not airplanes but cars, he realized.
It was rare to hear a whole bunch at a time, as cars were an oddity in the new America. Most motor vehicles were no longer
functioning, and those that were didn’t have gasoline to run them. Gas was nonexistent. Stone had only the bunker’s supply
and one other hidden hundred gallon tank that his father had set up. After all that was used up he’d be in the same boat as
the rest of the sinking world. Yet here someone apparently obtained enough octane to get a whole little fleet of them going.

Stone suddenly heard shooting and debated whether to go on straight ahead or check out the sounds that were coming from the
low hills to the west a mile or two. His decision was to keep going—he had his own problems—and he did, even giving it extra
gas to get out of there. But as the firing continued he could hear it sounded like one gun was returning the fire of a dozen.
Now that wasn’t right whichever way you looked at it. Against his better judgement, Stone whipped the bars to the right and
pulled back on the accelerator so that the bike shot forward as though it wanted in on the action too.

It took only a minute to get to the top of a row of hills a few hundred feet high, and he came to a stop as he reached the
peak and looked down over the far side. It was a vast canvas of beauty and death. Stone could see for miles, the rolling hills
far to the east, a lightning storm sending down flickers of yellow. But it was the battle unfolding right below him that caught
his eye. A single rider was on a motorcycle as big as Stone’s and was tearing ass almost parallel to the row of hills Stone
gazed down from. The biker was being pursued by four vehicles, just about the most ramshackle things Stone had ever seen,
hardly more than mini log cabins built atop rusting frames. One of the “cars” had no frame at all, just some branches lashed
down onto the axles. On them, four men were sending out a storm of death—bullets, arrows, and even a slingshot that one of
them used to fling steel balls as fast as the eye could see.

Stone could see the biker clearly thought he had it made to safety as the figure sat up a little straighter and looked around
as if to give a Bronx cheer as he pulled slowly ahead of the pursuing masses. However, the biker couldn’t see what Stone could:
two more cars were coming in the opposite direction right over the next slope several hundred yards off. With down-sloping
walls on both sides of the escape route, the biker was being led into a trap. Stone made another split-second decision: he
hunched down into the seat and pushed off with both feet, turning the Harley to max.

The bike shot forward along the top of the hill. Stone didn’t think he’d been spotted by any of the parties concerned—yet.
He kept low, pulling back so he could keep an eye on the whole scene unraveling. He’d have to time it all perfectly or it
was a wrap before he even began. He saw the biker reach the top of the slope and suddenly catch sight of the two other attack
cars, these as sloppily made as the main force, just branches and pieces of jagged steel all roped together around the wheels
and the chugging engines. Clouds of oily smoke were sent up as they drove the metal bodies forward like lumbering rogue elephants.

The biker unleashed a few blasts from some kind of rifle he had tied to the front of the cycle, and one of the riders hanging
on the side of one of the cars took a direct hit and went flying off. But then the biker did too. Stone saw his right shoulder
fly back and a splotch of red appear on the black jacket, which had writing on the back that Stone couldn’t read. Somehow
the biker stayed on. And in a way that sheer perseverance made Stone feel that he had done the right thing. No one should
die who fought to live so hard. He saw there was no more time and swerved the bike to the right, suddenly shooting down the
slope right toward the fifty yards of open space between biker and the cutoff cars. He gripped down on the machine gun’s trigger
when he was halfway there, not wanting to give the bastards another second to peg in shots on the biker, who looked like he
couldn’t take another hit.

Stone’s 50-cals tore up the turf between the approaching attack cars and the biker and created some confusion for them, Stone
could see. They slowed down slightly and looked around trying to find out who was letting loose with the firepower. Then one
of them sighted Stone coming down the hillside like a demon possessed. The men in the two cars instantly stopped their pursuit
of the biker and both vehicles turned toward Stone like two immense sailing ships creaking and shaking with the turns. The
foul-looking specimens on the backs of both vehicles began opening up with their various crude weapons, screaming wildly and
pointing as Stone’s bike bore down on them.

Though they clearly felt that it was Stone who was making the mistake as they laughed and shouted that the biker was crazy,
that changed quickly enough as Stone let loose with another burst from the 50-cal and this time he was in better target range.
The slugs tore across the front of one of the cars, sending out a whirlwind of blood from inside that splattered through the
broken windows. The car lurched wildly away from its companion vehicle and veered over toward the slope, where it overturned
and went skidding along on its back, crushing the three riders into a stew of red dirt.

But the other car, whether out of bravery or stupidity—or both—kept coming at Stone, who pulled his glance away just long
enough to check out the biker. The rider had stopped and was standing by his bike kicking at it. The machine wasn’t moving.
Great! The rest of the five-car attack force was approaching rapidly from the south, and the biker took out his rifle from
atop the stalled cycle and lifted it toward the approaching cars. Stone ripped his gaze back on the single attack car ahead.
It was about a hundred feet off and he could now see the face of the driver and a man by his side, aiming a shotgun through
the glassless windshield. Both looked like they’d been eating coal.

The shotgun fired and Stone felt a whoosh of lead pass just over his shoulder. He pulled the 50-cal again and swept it straight
down the center of the truck. Guts and faces and stuff exploded out the window space in a gush of red. Suddenly Stone was
past the thing like two jousting knights bypassing one another. He wheeled around and saw that the car was still moving along
but out of control. He shot forward and caught up with it, leaning to one side as he came alongside the vehicle, which had
slowed to about ten and was putting along like a little golf cart.

Stone made a strange sound when he saw what his slugs had wrought inside the thing. They’d been cut to pieces. Neither man
had a face anymore or much of anything else for that matter. But that was their problem. He pulled up to the car, setting
one foot inside of it, and grabbed hold of the bloody collar of the ex-driver, pulling him out the door and over his bike
so the corpse fell with a splat behind him. Stone saw that the second man’s foot was wedged in on the gas pedal, keeping the
vehicle going. Good, maybe he had a little special delivery present for the rest of the gang. Keeping the bike maneuvered
alongside the ancient hybrid vehicle, he turned the wheel, bringing the car around in a wide circle, then he straightened
it back out again.

The biker had dropped to one knee and was firing at the fleet of cars bearing down on him, which were unleashing their own
stream of fire. Stone aimed the car toward the center of the approaching attackers.

“Come on—go faster, you rusting son-of-a-bitch,” Stone screamed at the thing, though the metal wreck didn’t seem to hear him,
just moved along at the same ten miles an hour, happy as a purring cat. Stone let loose with another volley with his free
hand on the bike handlebar, not so much to hit anything as he was still too far, but to let the biker know it was time to
get the hell out of there. There was no need to make Custer’s Last Stand. The helmeted head swung up and around and seemed
confused for a second. But then when he saw Stone firing at the cars, not at him, the biker jumped up and began tearing ass
back toward Stone as fast as his legs could move.