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his attention spread out across the forest. The grade was gradual now, sliding
into the valley where the redoubt was housed. More than anything, he needed
sleep.
Fatigue ate into his bones and joints like acid rain.
KRYSTY STEPPED into the small stream and followed it against the current to
the base of the towering silver-leafed maple the companions had chosen as a
marker to remember the trail. She carried her .38 in her fist. Liberty and his
gang might no longer be a threat in the area, but they had spotted mutated
beasts in the forest.
Jak and Dean were far ahead of her. She glanced back in Ryan's direction, but
didn't see him or J.B, "They're okay," Mildred said quietly. "Would have been
shooting if they hadn't been."
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Krysty nodded. Her sentient hair coiled tight against her scalp. Perhaps it
was from the cold, and maybe even from the dread of the coming jump. A trip
through a mat-trans chamber was never any of the companions' idea of a good
time.
She stepped out of the stream under the maple and walked along the bank. Her
wet socks reminded her of the holes she had meant to have mended while in
Hazard. Then she remembered that there were a few extra socks from that mall
in the Carolinas where they'd picked up some necessities.
A little farther on, she found Doc and Albert waiting beside the stream. Frogs
croaked in the wide spillway beneath moss-encrusted boulders towering thirty
feet above the ground.
The dwarf wheezed hard, coughing a little as he tried to regain his breath. He
excused himself in a squeaky voice as the two women approached.
"You did good, little man," Mildred complimented. "This is rough country."
"Been a rough life," Albeit wheezed. "Had to get hard or die." He glanced
around. "How much farther?"
"We're here," Krysty answered.
Albert appeared puzzled. "You've got to be joking." He waved at the rock and
trees surrounding them. "This is a box canyon. Those jackers following us will
leave our corpses out here for the animals."
"We won't be here by the time they get here," Dean said. He stood on a shelf
of rock twenty feet up the rock face. His Browning Hi-Power blaster was in his
hand.
Krysty noted with satisfaction that the hammer on the blaster wasn't rolled
back into the ready position.
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Deathlands 42 - Way of the Wolf
Five minutes later J.B. and Ryan joined the group. "They're still behind us,"
the one-eyed man said. "Be here in a couple minutes."
Even now, with her mutie sensitive hearing, Krysty could pick up the sounds of
men talking and breaking through the brush. They were careful men and didn't
make as much noise as most, but if a listener knew what to listen for, the
sounds were evident.
"Jak," Ryan said, "take us in. Condition yellow. Light up a torch. Krysty, you
take up a torch, too. Make sure we can see where we're headed."
Krysty followed Mildred, climbing up onto the rock to a narrow shelf just
below where Jak and Dean stood. Both the boys had already disappeared into the
crack that sundered the wall of rock from top to bottom.
There had been a tunnel at one time, Krysty knew, but it had most likely caved
in after the nukecaust. However, even as warped nature had taken away, it had
also provided in the form of the crack that ran deep into the heart of the
hill.
Krysty turned sideways and eased into the crack. The dim sunlight, already
blunted by the leafy canopy overhead, darkened quickly to full black. She felt
her way along cautiously, using her mutie senses, as well as her hands and
feet.
"When those jackers get here," Albert said, "all they're going to have to do
is cover us over."
"My dear, diminutive friend," Doc said confidently, "trust in us and fear not.
For this path truly is our salvation from this grievous situation we currently
find ourselves embroiled in."
"Still feel bad not knowing where we're headed," the dwarf replied.
Krysty felt along the wall, glancing back in time to catch sight of Ryan
filing into the crack behind her. A cool wind breezed from the depths below.
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Deathlands 42 - Way of the Wolf
Another dozen steps and the constricting crack opened up. Light flared in
front of her as Jak cracked a self-light and ignited the oil-based torch they
had set up after their arrival. The redoubt hadn't been stocked much in the
supply department. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]