Sunchild

The positive aspect of this was clean water to drink, and also to shower. The rest rooms of the diner-roadhouse were supplied with showers, and the group took the opportunity to wash the acid rain from their skin. Once this had been done, Mildred tackled Doc’s wounds. The deep scratches on his hands had ceased to bleed, but needed dressing. Searching the scavenged medical supplies in her med kit, Mildred found antiseptic and some bandages. Hoping that she would strike it lucky, she searched for the first-aid kit that all such diners would have carried by law before skydark. Cursing, she found that whoever used the diner had also used most of the first-aid kit, and there were only a few bandages left. The seal on the package had long since been broken, probably for several decades, as the adhesive on the small bandages was no longer of any use.

Doc was grateful for the bandages she could supply, and Ryan allowed the old man to rest while he organized watch. It was imperative that they take turns standing guard, as it was now apparent that the diner was in use as a way station, perhaps on a trading route.

It was while J.B. and Dean were on watch that the Armorer made his discovery.

The diner was lit by a small oil lamp that they had found in the kitchen, along with fuel to keep it going. There was a small generator, which again suggested that the roadhouse was in semiregular use, but it was empty, and they could find no fuel to run it.

The oil lamp was better. It enabled them to have just enough light to see what they were doing, without advertising their presence to the immediate area.

Dean took the kitchen and one side of the diner as his territory, while J.B. took the front and other side. They patrolled between the windows, keeping low and watching for movement outside. It wasn’t difficult, as the terrain was so flat and open.

After a short while on watch, J.B. decided to poke around the area of the front diner where the others weren’t sleeping. Although the front seemed to be in little use, judging from the way the dust and dirt seemed undisturbed, it seemed unlikely that, by the sheer law of averages, whoever used the kitchen and rest rooms didn’t, at some point, use the front.

And if they used the front, then there was a chance that they may have inadvertently left behind some clue as to their origin or position in the terrain.

If there was such a thing, then it wasn’t immediately obvious, and so the Armorer began a methodical search of the benches and tables of the diner.

Most of the seats were padded and covered in a PVC plastic that had originally been a bright orange check but had now faded to a dull pattern that was barely discernible. The covering was cracked in places, and it creaked when J.B. leaned on it or moved it to run his hand down the cracks between seats and cushioning.

But it was worth the effort. Down the back of one bench was a scrap of paper, much folded and worn. Taking it back to the light and straining his eyes, the Armorer could see that it was a hand-drawn map. It was crude, and with no indication of scale, but with ville names and travel routes written on it.

And just to help them, it even had their own location clearly marked.

“I MUST ADMIT this is surprising,” Doc remarked the following morning after taking the map from Ryan. “I would have put us much farther east.”

The one-eyed warrior nodded. According to the map, they were right in assuming that they had arrived to the north of the Deathlands, but were wrong in assuming that were still on the remains of the Eastern Seaboard. Although the lush vegetation they had seen on the gentler slope of the hill resembled the kind of growth they had seen to the east, they were in fact far to the west of the country, well on the way to what had once been Seattle.

It was an area of intense memory. Seattle was the area where Ryan and J.B. had traveled in a war wag to meet up once more with Trader, their old mentor, and his companion Abe. It was the area where Ryan and Trader had almost been ransomed into marrying the hideous daughters of a deranged baron before Abe and J.B. had rescued them.

And now they were back. On a different trail, and a long way down the line, Abe and Trader had gone from their lives once more.

“From the Illuminated Ones’ point of view, it could still make sense to be based here,” Mildred said. “In the old days, there were a lot of military bases along the line from here up through Canada to Alaska. The redoubt may only have been one in a chain. Besides which, it’s near enough to Washington, without being too near….”

She left unspoken her point that the redoubt and surrounding area were still habitable, whereas the hole in the world that had once been the capital of the old United States was still too rad-blasted for anything other than mutie bacteria to dwell.

“So which ville do we head for?” Krysty asked. There were two on the map, equidistant from the diner.

“This one looks the better bet,” J.B. said, pointing to a ville that was marked but wasn’t named. From the scrawled lines, it looked as though the city was belowground, using the network of surviving tunnels and sewers that had proliferated before skydark.

“It’s certainly where whoever owns this map comes from,” Ryan mused, “and it looks like whoever they are is part of what’s left of the Illuminated Ones.”

He indicated the map. Around the edges were scrawled numerous slogans and words: “Kallisti = Kaos;” “The future lies in the hands of the hidden past;” “Dreams are reality;” “The sun people are the shining ones.”

“If the ‘sun people’ are illuminated by that sun, then I suspect that may be right.” Doc sighed. “Why do these philosophies always seek to be self-aggrandizing?”

Dean gave him a puzzled stare. “Doc, sometimes I wish you made more sense. But mebbe you can tell us what this ville means.” He stabbed a finger at the other marked ville on the map—Samtvogel.

“That’s not English, is it,” Ryan stated rather than asked. Unlike most dwellers of the Deathlands, Ryan was at least aware that there were other lands outside of his own, and that there were other tongues.

“German,” Mildred replied before Doc. “It means—”

“Velvet bird,” Doc finished for her. “A most curious name…and with a most sinister edge.”

“It certainly doesn’t feel right,” Krysty said, her hair weaving about her. “I’d opt for the underground ville any day. Doc’s right, there’s just something…” She tailed off.

“No ville’s an easy option,” J.B. said quietly. “Always trouble around every bend.”

“Which is exactly why we should follow our gut instincts,” Ryan said decisively. “We’ll head for the ville that seems to be old Seattle.”

THE NIGHT’S REST in the diner had restored their energy, and although it was disappointingly bereft of any food, it was still good to eat from a proper table, even if it was only self-heats. They spent some time checking their supplies and cleaning their blasters, then hit the blacktop, heading farther east for the outskirts of the ruins of Seattle.

A breeze blew across the arid plain, breaking the heat from the sun that beat down from a now cloudless sky. The blue was tinged with a pale orange glow, the remnants of the chem clouds that carried the acid rain.

It was good weather for such a trek: not too hot, but neither numbing with cold. The rain, hopefully, would stay away. It would take a sudden increase in the speed and intensity of the wind to bring chem clouds scudding from beyond the horizon, but there was no such thing in the Deathlands as even or predictable weather conditions.

JAK SLOWED, a frown crossing his scarred features.

“Hear that?”

Ryan turned from his position at the head of the line. “I hear nothing…yet. What is it?”

Jak concentrated. “Wag. Going fast.”

J.B. looked around. “Dark night, we’re sitting targets here.”

Ryan looked around them. The Armorer was right. They were on the asphalt ribbon that stretched to the horizon in either direction. The hill from which they had descended was like an anthill in the distance behind them, and there was little around except sparse scrub and a few sickly trees, bent over and half-dead from the acid rains.

“Fireblast, where the fuck do we go?” he muttered.

As he scouted around for defensive cover, the wag came over the horizon, shimmering against the asphalt and seeming to hover above it as it careered toward them, the sun behind it making them squint against the glare to follow the wag’s progress.

The nearest cover was a small stand of scrub bushes 150 yards to their left. A smaller group grew to the right.

“Split into two, divide their fire,” Ryan snapped. “J.B., you take Mildred and Dean and that patch—” he indicated the smaller crop “—Krysty, Doc, Jak, over here…” With that he took off for the sparse cover, knowing that J.B. would already be halfway to his own patch.

The one-eyed warrior knew that he could trust J.B. to follow tactics close to his own. They had learned together under Trader, and knew the only way to handle a situation like this. Perhaps, if they were lucky, whoever was in the wag would pass by without stopping. There was no way they could actually have been missed, standing out against the empty road, or maybe the driver of the wag and his passengers would be friendly.

But the only thing it was wise to assume or expect was hostility. Anything other than a firefight would be a bonus.

Ryan hit the ground with the Steyr already unslung, settling the stock into his shoulder as he lined the sight against his eye. Without looking, he knew that Jak had his .357 ready, Doc had the LeMat poised and Krysty had the Smith & Wesson .38 in her hand.

On the other side of the road, J.B. had his Uzi set to rapidfire, while Dean and Mildred had their blasters ready for use.

The engine of the wag rattled, coughed and died. On the last rattle, the rear exit door descended. It was a six-wheeled all-terrain vehicle, probably ex-military. It was armored, with opaque glass on the windshield and side doors, and nothing along the side. Instead of standard military colors, it was painted in red, blue and green swirls that offered no camouflage and just made it stand out in the arid, dull landscape. Not that there was anywhere to hide.

With a massed cry, six figures emerged from the rear of the wag. All were carrying rifles of the type J.B. had found in the redoubt armory, and were dressed in one-piece suits that fitted closely to their bodies. Although of a uniform design, the suits were of varying bright colors. That two of them were female was obvious from their body shape, but their faces were hidden behind the opaque glass shields of silver helmets.

They were unlike anything any of the companions had ever seen before, and the surprise this caused gave the anonymous attackers just the edge they needed to take the offensive.