blinding in comparison to the muted electric light inside the redoubt.
“No rockfall,” Jak murmured, “so why door stick?”
“That is a thorny question, my dear Jak,” Doc replied. “A multitude of possibilities await, and yet how can we be prepared for any unless we prepare for all?”
“Hot pipe, Doc, you talk some real shit sometimes,” Dean muttered, standing beside the older man.
Doc smiled ironically. “A trifle crudely put, young Dean, but you do have a point.”
“Well, I’d say we’re about to find out just exactly what that problem may be—out of all the myriad of possibilities, of course,” Krysty interjected with a touch of sarcasm.
“One thing for sure, it was no rockfall,” Mildred added, taking in the panorama before them.
The door of the redoubt was now fully retracted. Before them was nothing more than an azure-blue sky, with little sign of any chem clouds within the area framed by the portal. A couple of large, dark birds circled at a height that would appear to have been several hundred feet, indulging in a complex series of maneuvers that presaged a savage battle.
The sun was a burning orange globe surrounded by a haze that betrayed the fact that, although there were no chem clouds in sight, the atmosphere was still tainted by the remnants of the nukecaust. The swirling, skeetering figures of the large birds flew across the globe, lost momentarily in the light, far too bright to stare into. In less than the blink of an eye they were out the other side, and the ritual dance had ended.
The bird at the front turned, whirling suddenly in the air in a tight movement that swung him around to face the oncoming assailant. But his attempt to catch the following bird was doomed. The second bird ducked beneath the first bird as it turned, moving underneath, then jabbing swiftly and sharply, its beak tearing at the momentarily exposed belly of the leading bird.
The squawk of surprise and pain, harsh and guttural with an undertone of fear, carried across the still morning air, reaching them as the first bird began to fall, the slightest darkness in the sky betraying a rain of blood as something vital was torn.
The fight was that swift, that sudden, that savage. As the first bird fell, the second bird wheeled in the sky with an almost deceptive leisure, heading for its falling opponent. It swooped beneath the plummeting bird, jabbing at it so savagely that it changed the course of its fall. It followed it down, slowing the momentum of the fall by pushing it from side to side, sometimes jabbing so savagely and with such force that it propelled the now chilled bird upward for the slightest moment. The corpse, which had given one last harsh cry, was now disintegrating as it fell, ripped apart by the attack of its rival.
“Welcome back to the real world,” Mildred murmured.
Ryan walked to the lip of the tunnel and peered over the edge. The tunnels and corridors on the top level of a redoubt always sloped upward, but suddenly he realized that the angle of ascent had been slightly more than usual. Looking out over the land, he could see that it was a bare desert, with very little scrub cover, and the reddish-brown earth dry and loose. It was also some fifty feet below them, with a rock face that fell away from the mouth of the tunnel.
J.B. joined him, pushing his spectacles up the bridge of his nose as he looked down.
“So it was a rockfall, but not how either of us reckoned,” he observed.
The one-eyed warrior assented. “Looks like this redoubt was another one set into a mountainside, and when some of that mountain moved—” he gestured to emphasize his point “—the redoubt moved up, and the road in moved down.”
“Still, it’s not much of a climb. Even Doc should be able to make it.”
“Please do not mock me, John Barrymore,” Doc said, eyebrow raised as he peered over the Armorer’s shoulder. “It would seem to be a simple descent.”
“Probably, Doc, but we don’t know how safe it is yet. If the rocks have settled loosely, then…” Ryan gestured how the rocks would part.
“Then we are buzzard fodder,” Doc finished. “A fair point.”
“Exactly.” Ryan turned to the others. “We’ll take it one at a time. I’ll go first, then Krysty, Jak, Mildred, Dean, and Doc. J.B. last.”
“Sounds fine to me,” Mildred stated, staring down at the steep slope of loose rocks. “Sooner I get down the better.”
“Then let’s get to it,” Ryan stated.
The one-eyed warrior stepped off the lip of the redoubt entrance and onto the rocks, pressing hard with the ball of his foot to test the security of each rock before resting his weight.
He turned and faced the rocks, using his hands to steady himself. The slope was deceptive. Although the descent seemed steep, the slope of the rocks was less sheer, the outcrops providing plenty in the way of foot and handholds. The problems arose from the fact that the rock face was composed of many individual rocks rather than one slab. And until the descent had been made, there was no way of knowing how secure were the actual rocks.
Ryan took the descent slowly, searching for handholds and testing each rock. His feet stamped rocks, knocking some away from the face, landing firmly on others and using them to define a path. He was watched intently from above by the others, all of them making a note of the path for when they would come to use it. This was made easier by the falling rocks that had been rejected as footholds, which almost outlined Ryan’s route.
It was slow but not difficult, and Ryan’s progress was relatively easy. Despite that, he had to stop several times to wipe the sweat from his brow before it ran into his good eye, the occasional drop stinging his eyeball and making him blink furiously. He felt a sheen of sweat on his body, soaking into his clothes, and wondered how hot it would get at the height of the day.
THE DESERT SEEMED to stretch indefinitely in every direction, and although they had good water supplies Ryan would feel happier when J.B. had taken some readings and worked out roughly where they were. They knew the characteristics of the Deathlands better than most trading parties, having traversed great distances with the help of the mat-trans units.
If it was going to be this hot, then they would need to preserve water and work out the direction in which a ville or some kind of vegetation would be likely.
All of this crossed Ryan’s mind while the greater part of his attention was focused on his feet and hands. Any attack from around them—natural or otherwise—didn’t bother him as he knew J.B. would be on triple red while he was so exposed. Neither did he notice how far he had reached, so it was a pleasant surprise when one foot, groping for a rock, hit dirt.
Ryan stood at the bottom of the rock face, looking up at the path he had created. Krysty had already begun her descent, following his trail. She was swifter, having only to follow the path rather than create it. She set foot on the bottom and turned to the one-eyed warrior.
“So far, so good, lover,” she said simply. Ryan nodded, watching Jak begin his descent. The rest of the companions followed in rapid succession. J.B. immediately took readings with his minisextant.
“So?” the one-eyed warrior asked.
“Some old stamping ground,” J.B. said, squinting at the sun. “Not quite what they used to call New Mexico, but near enough. Kind
