Broken Lands (Benny Imura 6)

She spun to see a pair of burly ravagers running at her. One had a fire ax and the other was inserting a fresh magazine into an assault rifle. Behind her, Spider and Alethea were desperately battling a wave of fast-infected who were swarming over the wall.

Sombra started forward, but Gutsy hip-checked him out of the way, fearing for him even though it meant she was going to die. The ravager with the rifle raised it, a nasty grin on his face, and aimed the weapon dead center at her chest. She was too far away. Even Sombra was too far away.

She snarled and rushed him anyway. If death wanted to take her, then death would have to work for it. With a howl of rage, she charged the ravagers.

Then the head of the ravager with the gun exploded.

It was very immediate and nasty and wet. The body simply puddled down and the rifle clattered to the catwalk. The other ravager paused, gaping at his comrade. There was no accompanying gunshot, but nothing except a heavy-caliber bullet could have done that much damage.

For a split second the ravager and Gutsy stared at the corpse and then at each other. The second burned away, and Gutsy swung her crowbar at the ravager before he could raise his ax. There was a lot of fear and rage and even hopelessness powering that blow. It shattered the ravager’s elbow, sending the ax flying over his shoulder. Gutsy gave the killer no time, no chance. She lashed out with a kick to the knee so savage that it bent his leg backward with a sound like a dry tree limb snapping. As he canted sideward, she jumped into the air and put every ounce of body weight behind a vicious swing to his head. He went down, smashed flat, the unnatural life crushed out of him.

Gutsy landed, turned, and rushed to help her friends but jerked to a stop as a third ravager pulled himself over the edge of the catwalk and fired a pistol at her. Or tried to. As he raised the gun, his head exploded with the same awful force.

She never heard that shot either.

Another ravager fell a second later with the whole lower part of his face disi

ntegrating into a red-black cloud of mist.

89

“NICE SHOT,” SAID JOE LEDGER.

Sam Imura lay on a hummock, his sniper rifle steady on a bipod. Six loaded magazines stood in a row on a clean piece of cloth, ready to hand.

Sam ignored him as he worked the slide and fired, worked the slide and fired.

“Sam, look,” said Ledger, and pointed to where a very tall ravager was walking along the entrance corridor with several other ravagers flanking him like guards. “Is that the Raggedy Man, d’you think?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” Sam sighted at him through his scope. “No clear shot.”

“It’s all good,” said Ledger. He patted Grimm on his armored head, drew his sword, and said, “My turn.”

90

THE RUSTED SIGN SAID TEXAS ROSE CAR WASH.

The place looked deserted, abandoned. It was a single-story block building squatting just off the main highway. Junked cars lay where they’d died when the EMPs blew out the fuses for the world. There were bones among the weeds. In all it looked like ten thousand places Benny and the others had seen out here in the Ruin. Proof that life had existed here once, but further proof that it had passed away.

The four teens circled it with their quads and then stopped outside. Silence fell as they killed their engines and dust clouds wandered off into the night.

The left side of the building was, indeed, a car wash, with brushes and a conveyor belt and hoses. To the right were two service bays for oil changes and tire rotations, as advertised on signs partly covered with creeper vines. The far right-hand side was an office and store with glass grimed to opacity.

“Are you sure this is the place?” asked Chong. “Kind of looks like nothing much at all.”

Benny shrugged. “It’s what he said.”

“Yes,” said Lilah. “This is the place.”

“How can you be so sure?” asked Nix.

Instead of answering, Lilah dismounted, took her spear, and approached the first of the two service bays. The others followed, weapons in hand.

Chong saw it first and grunted. Benny and Nix saw it soon after.

There was a bloody handprint on the edge of the entrance. Fresh blood. Red blood. Not the blacker blood of the dead. They heard the moan a moment later and a figure lumbered out of the darkness. He wore a military uniform and held a pistol loosely in a slack hand. He was dead, much of his face and throat torn away.

A second figure moved into view behind him. A woman in a similar uniform. One of her hands had been bitten off. Moonlight could not reach very far into the service bay, but far enough to see the blood spatter from a battle. Three zoms lay on the ground, their bodies stitched with bullet holes. Beyond them, strips of pale light revealed the shape of a door that stood partly open. The light looked electric rather than like firelight.