"David Robbins - Blade 9 - LA Strike" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robbins David L)

to Halma to be close to the last Federation faction, the one that had helped them relocate, the one
regarded as a sort of Utopia by all the rest.

The Family.

Started by a wealthy survivalist whoтАЩd constructed a 30-acre retreat on the outskirts of the former Lake
Bronson state Park, the Family now numbered over one hundred members. Although they were the
smallest faction in terms of sheer numbers, they wielded the most influence in Federation councils. It was
the idealistic survivalist, Kurt Carpenter, who had called his followers the Family and christened their
compound the Home. HeтАЩd instituted an educational and social system designed to ensure every Family
member could enjoy freedom in its truest definition. The current Family Leader, Plato, was known far
and wide for his sagacity and kindness.

Not all Family remembers enjoyed such a reputation, especially the 18 who had been chosen to be
Warriors, the guardians of the Home who were responsible for defending the Family from any and all
dangers. Renowned for their lethal skills, the Warriors were as celebrated in their own right as the
Spartans of antiquity, and justly So. One of their number, the bead Warrior, was undoubtedly the moat
famous man on the continent, a man who had traveled from the baking deserts of Mexico to the frigid
tundra of Alaska on his missions against enemies of the Family and the Federation, a man whose
reputation as a fighter was unmatched in the postwar era, whose twin Bowies were a symbol of hope for
all those oppressed by despots. The man that the Russians, the mob, the Technics, and others knew by
the name he had selected at his Naming ceremony on his sixteenth birthday, the man future historians
would credit with being largely responsible for salvaging the world from its dark age of despair and
helping to guide it toward the ultimate destiny of light and life.

Blade.

Totally unconscious of his statusтАФalthough aware of the many stories told about him around many a
campfire, he tended to shrug them off as idle gossipтАФthe young giant now stood studying the Force
recruits, each one a volunteer from a Federation faction, who had agreed to serve for a term of one year.

Lobo, whose given name was Leo Wood, hailed from the Clan. During his youthful days in the Twin
Cities, he had been a member of a gang known as the Porns. He was street smart and as tough as they
came, and his favorite weapon was a NATO, a spring-loaded knife with a four-inch blade that retracted
snugly into a slot at the top of the handle.

Standing next to Lobo was Sparrow Hawk, a Flathead Indian. Five-feet-six, he had shoulder-length
black hair and brown eyes. His beaded buckskins fit snugly over his powerful physique, except across
his wide shoulders and down his thick arms, where the garment had deliberately been designed loosely to
allow for unrestricted movement. Slung over his back by means of a brown leather cord tied to the shaft
near the steel bead and near the blunt end was his prized spear, a weapon that had once belonged to his
father. From the left side of his handcrafted leather belt hung a large bunting knife in a beaded sheath.

After Sparrow Hawk came the volunteer from the Cavalry, a lean man dressed in a black frock coat,
black pants, and black boots, all of which served to accent his white shirt.

On his head he wore a wide brimmed black hat, and on his right hip was a holstered revolver, a
pearl-handled, nickel-plated Smith and Wesson Model 586 Distinguished Combat Magnum. His eyes
were hazel, his hair brown. Doc Madsen was his name, although everyone simply referred to him as