"Axler, James - Deathlands 050 - Pandora's Reboubt - Nick Pollotta" - читать интересную книгу автора (Axler James)
"Lake?" Jak snorted, squinting at the blazing sun and windswept landscape.
"Nuke landscaping," Ryan reminded him, resting both arms on the steering wheel. "Seems to be desert on every side but straight ahead. What are those odd mountains to the east?"
J.B. climbed in and closed the door. "The Alleghenies, extending into West Virginia and Pennsylvania. Can't tell you more. I don't know this section of America."
"As I recall, it was mostly farmland," Doc said, leaning forward in his seat. "Very low-level-priority targets. No military bases or heavy industry. Therefore, the area most likely avoided a major attack."
"Even some is a lot," Krysty commented, her hair moving as if stirred by unfelt-winds. "One nuke can ruin your whole damn day."
"Pennsylvania. That means the Amish," Mildred said thoughtfully. "Even in my day they had renounced technology. Lived by muscle power. Their civilization wouldn't collapse."
"Slave muscle?" Ryan asked suspiciously.
"Never! They were good Christian folks," Doc stated. "Hopefully, they still are. We should be able to trade with them."
"Sounds good," decided the one-eyed warrior. Pulling out the choke, he started the Detroit power plants with a low rumble. The gas gauge read just under the full line, and the side gauge read a reserve tank of four hundred gallons completely full. Plus, they had to have another couple of hundred gallons in cans. "J.B., any roads?"
"Nothing on the map. But there's supposed to be a river ahead of us. Always easy traveling there. Even if it's gone, the bed will make us a good road."
"East it is, then." Easing in the clutch and engaging the gears, Ryan brought the vehicle to a forward roll just as a beep sounded from the dashboard. Then another.
"It's the radar," he said, sounding surprised. "Something is coming our way."
"The dogs again?" Mildred asked, moving quickly to a Remington. She snapped the release and opened the breech, laying in a fresh belt of ammo. LB. did the same on the other side. In an ever-increasing rhythm, the beeps slowly started coming together faster and faster. "No. Not the dogs," Krysty said.
"So, what is it?"
"I don't know," Ryan said, pushing down the gas pedal, Leviathan moving off with increasing speed. "But it's bastard big and coming our way."
"Direct?"
"Sure is."
Resting the Mossberg on a vacant seat, Dean went to the port blasterslot and scrutinized the desert. Only sunbaked desolation was visible. Some clouds in the far distance. Nothing more. "You sure?" he asked.
Dodging an irregular outcrop, Ryan glanced at the glowing green blip on the luminescent screen, which was increasing in size by the second. "Hell, yeah."
"Found it!" Mildred cried, binocs to her face. "At seven o'clock, and moving fast."
"What is it?" Ryan asked, urging more rpm out of the engines. Fight or flight, speed was to their advantage either way. He didn't care what it was, anything that large was trouble.
"Squat, low." Mildred paused, adjusting the focus. "Resembles a tank, but I'm not familiar with the model. Must have been on patrol around the base."
"Waiting for coldhearts," Jak said. "Another Leviathan?"
"No," she retorted. "A real tank. Straight military. Only it is larger, like a Abrams on steroids. It's covered with antennas and dish shapes. But it only has a little cannon."
"What kind of little?" Ryan interrupted. "Short in length, or thin, a small-caliber blaster?"
"What's the difference?" the physician asked. He stared in the sideview mirror. Nothing in sight yet. "Escape," he told her over the beeping radar.
"Short and fat," J.B. announced. Hat in hand, the Armorer had his face pressed hard against the slot to steady his view against the jostling of the vehicle.
In response, Ryan pressed the accelerator firmly to the floor. The twin diesels roared in barely restrained fury. The quivering needle of the speedometer steadily climbed to forty kph, fifty, sixty, seventy, seventy-five, seventy-six....
Chapter Five
The radar was starting to keen so J.B. turned the machine off. They had been warned, its job was done.
"Could it be," Krysty asked urgently, "an intact Ranger?
"Hope not," Ryan said through gritted teeth.
"What's a Ranger?" Dean asked.
"A predark robot tank, comp-operated, no driver. Never heard of anybody ever stopping one."
Krysty spun her chair and worked the breech on the 75 mm recoilless rifle. It was empty. "Jak, help me find the shells for the rifle!"
"Move it or lose it, people!" Ryan shouted, watching their Hummer of supplies bounce along behind them. Several boxes had already come loose, and they were losing more goods constantly. But there was nothing he could do about that. Supplies and food could be replaced. Not lives.
"If only we had some bastard trees for cover," he snarled to himself. Those strange gray mountains seemed a million miles away, and there was a nuke crater between them. If it was old and cold, it would mean hardly any cover. Exactly what they didn't want. If it was hot, an even worse death awaited them of bleeding sores and coughing out pieces of their lungs. Maybe it was only the dogs pulling a trick, or some coldhearts in a Hummer.
"I do not see anything," Doc announced at the rear doors. "Just sand and... No, wait. There it is."
"Dark night, it's bigger than us!"
"Stop behind a dune and kill the engines," Doc suggested. "Perhaps it is following us by the noise.
"Must be the tracks in the sand."
"No," Krysty said. "It's following our radar!"
"Already off." Ryan cursed.
"Mebbe the guys inside only want to talk or trade," Dean suggested hopefully. "Or we can lure them out and-"
"There's nobody inside it," Ryan said, turning around a dune so quickly that six wheels left the ground. "That thing is fast."
"We are faster," Doc said in false confidence.
| © 2025 Библиотека RealLib.org (support [a t] reallib.org) |