James Axler - Deathlands 048 - Dark Reckoning

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Incoming rounds drilled into the equipment around them.

Ryan returned fire, while J.B. frantically threw supplies into the chamber.

Grabbing a sack of grens, the one-eyed warrior held one out to J.B. so the

Armorer could see that the safety pin was firmly in place.

J.B. nodded, and they began to throw the deadly bombs wildly into the

warehouse.

Shouting warnings, Sheffield and his sec men scrambled to reach the exit. Tossing

the half-filled bag into the chamber, RyanJgd the way into the gateway, then

closed the door.

With pounding hearts, the two men waited for the swirling mists to engulf them,

or for the chamber door to swing open again and for them to be brutally cuf down

by a hail of bullets from the hated blues…

Dark Reckoning

by James Axler

A GOLD EAGLE BOOK FROM WORLDWIDE

TORONTO * NEW YORK • LONDON AMSTERDAM • PARIS • SYDNEY •

HAMBURG

STOCKHOLM • ATHENS • TOKYO • MILAN MADRID • WARSAW •

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BUDAPEST • AUCKLAND

If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is

stolen property. It was reported as unsold and destroyed to the publisher, and

neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this stripped

book."

To all my teachers, whose noteworthy skills helped forge my meager own:

Alexandra Dumas, Dashiell Hammett, Lester Dent, Richard Falkirk and Robert B.

Parker. Thanks, guys. I owe you all a beer.

First edition January

ISBN 0-373-62548-

DARK RECKONING

this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other

means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying

and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden

without the written permission of the publisher, Worldwide Library, 225 Duncan

Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.

All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author

and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They

are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author,

and all incidents are pure invention.

® and TM are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are

registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade

Marks Office and in other countries.

Printed in U.S.A.

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…the dire time was finally here. We stood uncertain at the crossroads of total

victory, and equally total defeat. A single moment's hesitation, the wrong word in

a communiqud, a lone stray bullet could shatter all of our efforts and cast us once

more at the feet of the beast.

But we chanced on fate, armed our guns and threw our resolve into the crucible of

blood…

—Sir Winston Churchill, Triumph and Tragedy,

THE DEATHLANDS SAGA

This world is their legacy, a world born in the violent nuclear spasm of 2001 that

was the bitter outcome of a struggle for global dominance.

There is no real escape from this shockscape where life always hangs in the

balance, vulnerable to newly demonic nature, barbarism, lawlessness.

But they are the warrior survivalists, and they endure—in the way of the lion, the

hawk and the tiger, true to nature's heart despite its ruination.

Ryan Cawdor: The privileged son of an East Coast baron. Acquainted with

betrayal from a tender age, he is a master of the hard realities.

Krysty Wroth: Harmony ville's own Titian-haired beauty, a woman with the

strength of tempered steel. Her premonitions and Gaia powers have been fostered

by her Mother Sonja.

J. B. Dix, the Armorer: Weapons master and Ryan's close ally, he, too, honed

his skills traversing the Deathlands with the legendary Trader.

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Doctor Theophilus Tanner: Torn from his family and a gentler life in 1896, Doc

has been thrown into a future he couldn't have imagined.

Dr. Mildred Wyeth: Her father was killed by the Ku Klux Klan, but her fate is

not much lighter. Restored from predark cryogenic suspension, she brings

twentieth-century healing skills to a nightmare.

Jak Lauren: A true child of the wastelands, reared on adversity, loss and danger,

the albino teenager is a fierce fighter and loyal friend.

Dean Cawdor: Ryan's young son by Sharona accepts the only world he knows,

and yet he is the seedling bearing the promise of tomorrow.

In a world where all was lost, they are humanity's last hope…

Chapter One

The howling alarms faded into blessed silence, and the ceiling lights of the

redoubt flickered into life, as bright and strong as ever. Almost immediately, the

seven bodies on the floor began to stir sluggishly.

As the burning waves of pain throughout his body slowly subsided, Ryan Cawdor

opened his good eye and pulled a ragged breath into his aching lungs.

"F-fireblast," the man cursed weakly, his cramped muscles relaxing for the first

time since he had entered the underground base. Never had the man encountered

anything like this before. His skin had felt as if it were on fire, with flesh-eating

ants digging inside his skull. A hot slug of lead in his gut would have been sweet

relief compared to what he had just gone through for the past…how long? His

mind was foggy about the passage of time, the endless searing pain blurring each

hour into the next. Days, months? He had no idea. A rumble shook his belly, and

a sour belch rose in his throat. Ryan was starving, so it had to have been quite

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awhile. Those blue-shirt sec men were going to pay for this, even if it took his last

drop of blood. He'd chill every one of them!

Almost without thought, Ryan ran his hands over his clothing in an old ritual. The

9 mm SIG-Sauer pistol was still at his hip, the curved panga in its sheath. The

ammo pouch was flat and empty, and he couldn't locate his Steyr SSG-70 sniper

rifle anywhere nearby on the nearby floor. Had he dropped it outside? That would

mean that the microwaves from the Kite satellite would have melted it into a

puddle of useless steel by now.

Trying to rise, Ryan fumbled and slumped onto the cool floor beside a huge metal

pump of some kind. The machine beat as steady as a human heart, performing

some task involved in maintaining the nuclear reactors of the military redoubt.

The rad shielding around the subterranean base was the only thing that gave the

companions some small amount of protection from the searing microwaves of the

orbiting Kite, and going to the very lowest level of the redoubt had helped even

more. But the sensation of being burned alive had only lessened, it never stopped,

and eventually increased to where the one-eyed man felt as if he were being

stabbed with a thousand needles, then red-hot knives. The agony robbed him of

strength until there was nothing else to do but pass out, only to awaken hours later

to the continuing bombardment.

Long minutes passed with only the sound of labored breathing breaking the

silence of the basement. Gathering his strength once more, Ryan tried to force

himself off the floor, and this time he succeeded. Struggling to his knees, the one-

eyed man tried to focus on his friends, but was having some degree of difficulty

doing so. Ryan realized he had to have taken more damage from the microwaves

than he originally thought. Another score to settle with the blues.

Brushing back his wild crop of long black hair, Ryan noticed how shaky his hands

were, the tanned skin red and irritated as if badly sunburned. He had spent a

thousand days in the deserts of Deathlands, but never got burned like this. For a

fleeting moment, he worried about cancer, then dismissed the problem. There was

nothing he could do about it, so he turned his attention to other more solvable

matters.

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摘要：

d3Incomingroundsdrilledintotheequipmentaroundthem.Ryanreturnedfire,whileJ.B.franticallythrewsuppliesintothechamber.Grabbingasackofgrens,theone-eyedwarriorheldoneouttoJ.B.sotheArmorercouldseethatthesafetypinwasfirmlyinplace.J.B.nodded,andtheybegantothrowthedeadlybombswildlyintothewarehouse.Shouting...

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