Red Holocaust

Chapter Seven

Ryan and J.B. Dix were poring over a hand-drawn map of the redoubt and stockpile done on six separate sheets of paper, each one showing two different levels. The complexity of the place was staggering. It had more than seventy miles of interconnecting corridors and passages, with stairs and elevators between levels. The gateway was down on the fourth level, with the only viable exit to the bleak outside six levels below that.

Though the group had done a great deal of exploring, there were still considerable areas left where no one had been able to go.

"There be dragons," said Doc Tanner, coming up behind Ryan and J.B. and pointing with a scrawny finger at a blank area on the map.

"Dragons. What the fuck are they?" asked Ryan, straightening up from the table.

"Fire-breathing mutie lizards is the best explanation that I can offer, sir."

Behind the old man, J.B. raised his eyes to the ceiling and shook his head. Since they'd been in the redoubt, Ryan had suspected more than once that Doc's sanity was returning. But often his behavior wasn't very encouraging.

"You never been up here before, Doc?"

"Never that I recall. But I fear that some of my brain cells have somehow become displaced. I can no longer remember all I might."

"Got to go, Ryan," said J.B., walking briskly to the door. "See you, Doc."

The door hissed shut. Ryan folded the maps and tucked them into an inside pocket of his coat. "Fireblast! We've been here six days. Could stay here the rest of our lives if we wanted."

"But do you want?"

"Don't know. Good place."

"Is it really, my dear Mr. Cawdor? If I may be frank with you, I confess that I have my doubts."

"Why?"

Doc moved closer to Ryan, his boots creaking. He half smiled, showing his oddly perfect set of gleaming teeth. His voice was its usual deep, rich tone.

"This redoubt raises so many questions in my poor, fuddled mind. Why only three survivors after a hundred years? And such an odd trio. Quint, Rachel and the dumb child, Lori. He is the Keeper. That's a hereditary position, and such positions bestow power without responsibility."

"You know he doesn't read, Doc?"

"Yes." The stovepipe hat dipped forward as Doc stared down at the floor. "Where are the others? He knows how to keep this place functioning by ritual and by rote. That is all."

"That's nothin'. Most of the Trader's men couldn't read or write. But if you showed them somethin', they could do it. It's the way War Wag One was run."

Doc nodded. "And yet... so many closed doors, are there not, my dear young friend."

"Yes. We've tried to spring 'em but they've got good sec locks on 'em. If we blow 'em, then Quint would hear it. What do you reckon's behind 'em?"

"More of the past? More of the future? Surely, precious little of the present. I do not know, Mr. Cawdor."

"Mebbe we should find out. But I tell you, Doc... I'm blocked to the back teeth with this place. This afternoon I'm goin' to get out and see some sky."

"There are muties aplenty."

"I know, but I've got security," he said, patting his guns.

"Cawdor," mused Doc, laying a forefinger alongside his thin nose. "Why does that name produce a distant and tiny murmur of a muffled bell?"

Ryan stared at him with his good eye. Unconsciously his hand strayed up to the livid scar that ran down his chillingly pale blue right eye, then moved down to tug at his lip on the same side.

"What... some legend of a great and powerful baron out East, beyond the Blue Ridges. Twin sons and a dreadful feud that ended... How did it end, Mr. Cawdor?" Showing a sudden ferocious glint of intelligence, Doc's eyes were bright and piercing as a mewed hawk's. For the first time since he'd known Doc Tanner, Ryan realized that the old man had once been a grim force to reckon with.

"I don't know what the fuck you're talkin' about, Doc. Your legend doesn't mean a thing to me."

"If it doesn't have... doesn't have?.. Upon my soul, but it's gone again. What were we talking about?"

"The gateways, whether you'd found any clue how to work the bastard things."

Doc shook his head. "I fear not. I have discussed the matter with Mr. Quint, who tells me that the Keeper never knew about the gateway. Said that Special Ops MT ran them. I asked him what that meant and he didn't have any idea at all. The man is simply a gibbering parrot with no brain of his own."

"So we have a choice — stay here in Alaska, try and find transport back to Deathlands or risk the gateway again."

"Man gives birth astride a grave, Mr. Cawdor. What choice is that?"

Doc turned on his heel and quickly walked out, heading back toward their quarters. Ryan watched him, then decided that some food might be a good idea. He knew that eventually he had to get outside, away from the concrete walls and strip lights or risk losing part of his own sanity.

"Yummy, yummy, it's the best for your tummy."

Finnegan threw the empty package on the table. The pizza it had contained was already cooking in one of the gray microwaves along the kitchen wall.

"Momma Maria says it's the best America makes," he continued, examining the bright wrapping, on which a stout, beaming, garishly made-up elderly woman held a skillet with a huge pizza on it while a brace of wide-eyed bambinos looked on hungrily.

Hunaker was waiting for her double beanburger to finish. "Free for fiber-fighters — Double discount vouchers at your local grocery," it said on the package, and in much smaller print, "Subject to availability. Offer closes June 1, 2001."

"By the time their offer closed, the whole world had closed as well," Hunaker observed.

All of them had taken advantage of the unbelievable range of clothes and supplies to dress and equip themselves better. But most of them had also kept some of their old gear. Doc kept his hat, frock coat and battered boots, but gave up his faded cream shirt for a new one in faded denim. Ryan kept his long coat, but took some new thermals, dark gray breeches, a brown shirt and a new pair of combat boots with high lacings to replace the old pair with a bite from a rabid mongrel on the right toe.

Finnegan and Hennings each picked similar outfits: high-necked jumpers in dark blue, with matching pants and black combat boots with steel toe caps. Okie kept her coveralls, choosing a sweater in light green for over the top. She also took a pair of low-heeled tan leather riding boots with the name Tony Lama inside.

Hunaker picked an exotic blouse in black satin with a pattern of leaves in green that matched her hair, gray cord trousers and gray ankle boots.

J.B. changed only his pants, which had been torn in a fight in the Darks. He searched the echoing hangar of the clothes store until he found a pair as nearly identical as possible.

Krysty found a new pair of coveralls, in her usual khaki. One problem they had was that clothes in unsealed or inadequately sealed boxes tended to fray and fall apart within hours of being worn. A pair of black leather trousers that Hennings had donned began to disintegrate almost instantly, resembling midnight lace within minutes after the air attacked them.

Krysty's one indulgence was in footwear. Lori went with her, tottering on her absurd high-heeled, thigh-length boots, the silver spurs jingling behind her. She took Krysty by the arm and led her to a section labeled Fashion & Working Boots — Top Names.

There they found row upon row of large white cardboard boxes arranged by size and by maker: Tex Robin, Dave Little, Henry Leopold, Larry Mahan and, the one she liked best, J. E. Turnipseede.

Miming her enthusiasm, Lori pulled down box after box, ripping out the contents of each to reveal a cascade of dazzling colors, and patterns and leathers. Lori rummaged through the piles, looking for one she thought Krysty might like. Her first choice had a heel nearly as high as her own boots, and Krysty waved them away, smiling and trying to make the mute girl understand that she would fall over in them.

"Those," she said, pointing to a pair in dark blue leather that had silver falcons with spread wings on the front. The tips of the pointed toes, finished in sharp, chiseled silver, seemed like lethal weapons. The heels were no higher than ordinary combat boots, and like the pair that Okie had chosen, Krysty's boots were made by someone called Tony Lama. As Krysty bent to try them on, her scarlet hair spread out in a brilliant wave over the dark calfskin of the boots. Then she stood up, feeling the snugness of the fit.

"They're just wonderful, Lori. Thanks a lot."

A shadow crossed the girl's face, as though someone had walked over her grave, but it vanished so quickly that Krysty wondered if she'd imagined it. But she knew that she hadn't.

"Ripened in the sun of Kansas and sweetened by the rain of Kansas," said Finnegan, tearing open a waxed pack of breakfast cereal. "What the fuck is Kansas?"

"It was a place, stupe," replied J.B. Dix. "In the east of Deathlands."

Ryan grinned. It was a little after noon and he was preparing to leave the redoubt. He'd hinted to the doddering Quint that he was thinking about it, and the old man had thrown a fit, spraying spittle as he gesticulated angrily.

"Keeper says not go. Those as goes is dead. Those as stays is the lucky ones. Don't try it. Many gone over the years, says the Keeper. Only us left. Lori got to have us a babe. Be next Keeper. Not Rachel, she's too fuckin' old for babes."

Cawdor hadn't argued with him. There was no point in rocking the boat. He and J.B. had discussed it and agreed that they should move on soon. In the redoubt the only thing you got was soft.

Hun, Okie and Hennings had become fascinated with some ancient vid and audio equipment they'd found in one of the cavernous stores. There were collections of films and TV programs as well as thousands of comp discs. Ryan had discovered similar stocks in other warehouses, but nothing on this massive scale. They could have played them for ten years and never have heard or seen the same thing twice,

Hun had taken a liking to a record called Robert Zimmerman Meets Again with the Boys from the Band, It seemed to be some sort of reunion concert from the year 2000, in some long-gone ville called Hibbing, Minnesota. She kept on playing it through a pocket quad with lightweight cans.

Okie watched endless programs on one of the TVs and was amazed by the amount of violence. A series based on a unit of sec men was her favorite and she bored the others with her enthusiasm.

"Listen, this little bastard called Belker is the greatest blaster you ever seen. Bites the shit out of the scum. But he don't kill as many as he should, probably to make him seem weak an interestin'. He's got some real old guns — thirty-eights and Magnums." She turned suddenly and pointed at Ryan. "Do you feel lucky, punk?" she said, laughing hysterically.

Nobody else laughed. Nobody else understood what on the blasted earth she was laughing at.

Doc walked with Ryan down through the levels toward the exit. Not sharing an interest with the others in the old techno toys, Ryan contented himself with finding a library of crumbling paperback books — more than he had seen in his life, all gathered in one large room, with ladders to the high shelves and a balcony.

"Had you the time, my dear Ryan," said Doc, "then you would find the answer to every riddle known to man in this one library."

"The secret of who you are and how come you know so much about what happened before the Chill?"

"I like to speak to a man who likes to speak his mind. Indeed I do, sir. I would often tell Wilbur that."

"Wilbur? Who's Wilbur?"

Doc looked puzzled. "I have no recollection, I fear. Did I say Wilbur? Ah well... As to my past, Ryan, I fear it must remain locked away awhile longer."

"But one day, huh?"

"Perhaps, my dear Mr. Cawdor. Perhaps. Ah, here comes the delightful Miss Lori, teetering along so prettily. It is peculiar, don't you think, that she is so much younger than Quint and the harridan? An enigma shrouded in mystery, that."

The girl looked dazzlingly pretty to Ryan, her long golden hair tied back with a strand of emerald ribbon. Her red satin blouse had a small rip across the right breast, showing a tantalizing amount of flesh. Her short suede skirt clung tightly to her thighs, heightening her femininity. On her right hip was the bolstered pearl-handled Walther PPK, apparently chambered for a .22 cartridge. Not much of a stopper unless you were very good with it.

"Hi," said Ryan, receiving a broad smile from the girl, and a nod.

"Leave you two young people together, I think," said Doc, grinning and bowing formally from the waist to Lori, walking off before Ryan could say anything.

"I'm goin' out," said Ryan.

Her head shook so violently that he feared she might have a fit.

"Yeah, want to see some outside. Seen enough inside for a while. You comin'?"

Again a shake of her head. She took his arm and tried to pull him back into the center of the redoubt.

"No, lady, I'm goin'. You stay. That's fine."

She kept her grip on his arm but made no further effort to check him. He walked along with her at his side, conscious of her attractiveness; wearing heels, she topped him by a couple of inches.

Ryan felt himself becoming aroused. Time was he'd have just laid her down in the passage and done it to her — without a single pang of conscience or regret. A woman asked for it with Ryan Cawdor, and a woman got it. Simple as icin' a stickie.

They descended the winding stairs level by level until they reached the tenth floor, which was near the bottom of the complex. At the base of the staircase, there was a pair of heavy steel doors, firmly locked. Ryan paused, wondering what the Keeper wanted to shut off in there.

"What's in there, Lori?"

Her face tightened with concentration. She put both hands to her cheek and closed her eyes, miming sleep.

"Beds? You come and sleep down here?"

Lori shook her head sadly. Then she bit her lip, trying again. She pointed to the doors and clutched her chest, rolled her eyes and sank slowly and gracefully to the floor, where she lay still, one leg bent beneath her. Not quite understanding the meaning of the pantomime, Ryan noticed that the girl wore no panties beneath the red suede skirt, and that her pubic hair was naturally as gold as her head.

"They... they're dead in there? Sleeping? Dead?"

She sat up with a radiant smile, then folded her arms around herself and shuddered.

"Frozen? Fireblast, you mean that there's folk in there, frozen and dead?"

She stood up, looking at him, mouth trembling open, almost as if she was about to talk. But the moment passed, and she turned and ran down a lateral corridor until all he heard was the tinkling of her spurs.

He stood for some seconds, looking at the great doors, wondering if the secret of the lost generations of the redoubt lay behind them. But whatever the secret was, he decided that it didn't much interest him. What he wanted was some fresh air.

He and J.B. had worked out the controls on a previous visit. The exit code was displayed on a green liquid panel. It was three digits. As soon as you pressed the Ready button, a return code appeared, three digits plus a letter to complete the sequence. Ryan touched the button that turned on the display panel. It showed 9.2.9. and the return code, 5.9.6. followed by the letter H.

The secondary entrance to the redoubt slid soundlessly open.

Ryan's nostrils were immediately filled with the stench of sulfur. Outside, sleet and snow whirled across a flat paved area about fifty paces square. In the stockpile they'd found dozens of snow buggies with tracks that enabled them to go over any kind of terrain. But for this brief excursion, Ryan had chosen to go on foot.

Repeating to himself, "Five, nine, six, H," he stepped through the door and watched it close behind him.

The landscape was as bleak as anything he'd ever seen. The redoubt was set into the side of a mountain. A long trail wound toward a steep valley below. There was no sign of vegetation anywhere.

He wore his thermals, with a thick sweater and his trusty long coat. The LAPA 5.56 mm was on his right hip, the steel panga on the left. The SIG-Sauer was holstered under the coat.

There were jagged peaks all around, vanishing into the murk, all of them layered with snow. The cold was intense, making him think that the rumors of the persisting nuclear winter were true. The sky was a sallow color, streaked like bile, showing occasional flashes of silver brightness from the chem debris that still permeated the heavens. Far off to the west, Ryan could make out a tall mountain with a smear of orange smoke trailing from it, indicating an active volcano.

For an instant, the ground vibrated beneath his feet from a minor earth tremor. Ryan steadied himself, rubbing his right eye to clear the irritation from the ocher clouds.

Squinting with his good eye, he spotted movement on the far side of the valley beneath an overhang of gray rock. It looked like a pair of huge bears, their coats of dirty white marked with yellow mud. As he watched them, they turned toward him.

Although the bears showed no sign of becoming a threat, Ryan drew the LAPA, holding it at the ready. They were probably a good half mile away as the mutie gulls flew, probably five miles by the shortest trail. Ironically, the two animals probably saved his life. Without them he wouldn't have drawn his gun.

The attackers came from above and behind. They dropped on top of Ryan and sent him crashing to the icy ground. He scrabbled to his feet, but just as he was upright again, one of them hit him behind the knees and he went flying to one side. But even as he fell, he snapped off a burst from his LAPA, the stream of lead stitching two of the five diminutive muties. They went spinning away, mouths open with screams, blood and intestines spilling from their torn stomachs.

As Ryan hit the ground, his gun struck rock with a solid cracking noise. His elbow and shoulder were jarred by the fall, but he was quickly up on one knee, steadying the gun at the three remaining dwarfs, who were shrouded in furs so that only their slit-eyes showed. One had obscenely long monkey arms that trailed in the snow as he moved. Another seemed to have a residual third leg sprouting from his left thigh. Ryan assumed that they were men, though there was no evidence either way. All three carried long spears tipped with barbed ivory points. Communicating with one another in grunts, they pointed at their two dying comrades and stamped their feet on the rocky ground in obvious rage.

"Come on, you little fuckers," said Ryan, holding his gun steady.

One of them waved his spear, shuffling nearer to the lone man. Still keeping them covered, Ryan slowly rose glancing around in case more muties were sneaking up behind him.

He held his fire as long as he could, though not out of any foolish milksop ideas of mercy or kindness. It was always good to know as much as possible about your enemies. Anyone not a friend was always an enemy. If Alaska was filled with these bloodthirsty muties, then it was as well to know what their weapons were. Did they have only spears?

They came closer, hissing menacingly, thrusting their wooden lances forward.

"Close enough," said Ryan, tightening his finger on the trigger.

There was a metallic grating sound, and nothing else happened. The fall had jammed the LAPA.

"Fireblast and shit!" snarled Ryan.