James Axler - Ice and Fire

Ryan's needle reflexes saved his life. Instinctively he punched out at the creature, feeling the impact jar clear to his shoulder. He brushed aside the lunging, clawing hands, hitting the stickie twice more with short stabbing punches to its maniac face and soft belly.

"Roll away!" someone bellowed behind him. Riddler, he realized.

Unhesitatingly Ryan pulled away, hearing the other sleeve of his shirt tear beneath the questing suckers. He rolled on his shoulder and came up in a fighting crouch, wincing at the nearness of the heat and blast from the Last Hero's shotgun.

"Fuck a dead armadillo!" Jak gasped.

It was an amazing sight.

The nervous system of a stickie was sometimes rudimentary. The burst of shot from the shotgun had torn the thing's head clear away from its narrow shoulders, leaving its skull to dangle, held only by frayed strands of ligament and ragged muscle. But it still walked!

The impact sent the creature several drunken steps down the flank of the hill, but it miraculously maintained its balance, wobbling several more uneven strides before it finally tripped and fell, rolling to the bottom of the slope. During the fall its head had become detached and bounced off, coming to a stop against the rear wheel of Priest's Triumph.

"Owe you one, Riddler." Ryan examined himself to make sure none of the suckers had actually broken his skin. Sometimes they carried a virulent infection that could possibly kill.

"Yeah, man. You said something about these ugly mothers liking fire and noise. Seems we've been doing enough blasting to bring 'em running for fucking miles around."

"Right. Don't forget to collect your throwing knives, Jak, and reload that little Magnum of yours."

Riddler's bike was the only machine in working order. It spluttered and protested at having to carry three on the road back to Snakefish. They left the other two-wheel wags and the bodies where they'd fallen.

As they pulled out onto the highway, Ryan glanced behind him and was sure that he saw signs of movement toward Death Valley, as if other had been attracted by the noise and were coming to investigate.

A lot of .

The loss of three sec men brought Norman Mote running to see Ryan. His breath smelled of whisky and his clothing was disheveled. It was late afternoon and Ryan had just finished telling his colleagues about the attack of the stickies. Jak was upstairs in his room washing away the dirt and sweat of the encounter.

Riddler had dropped them off at the Rentaroom and gone to report to Zombie at their headquarters in the old Sierra Sunrise Park.

"What the scale-blasted rad shit is all this, Cawdor?" Mote bellowed.

Ryan didn't move from the chair in the lobby. "What's all what, Reverend?" he asked calmly.

"Coil-bound stickies! Chilling the Last Heroes! What do you know about it?"

Mote's suit was crumpled and there was a stain on the lapel of his jacket. He stood so close to Ryan that spittle was landing unpleasantly near him.

The one-eyed man stood so suddenly that Mote stumbled backward, catching his heel on a worn place in the carpet and nearly falling. Ruby Rainer had been listening in to Ryan's story, and she rushed forward to help him.

"Take care, Reverend Mote. Could have taken a nasty tumble there."

"Hollow tooth, woman! I'm all right. Leave me be!"

"You were asking me what I knew about it," Ryan said quietly. "I'll tell you. Me and Jak were invited to go on a run to one of the drilling rigs, toward Death Valley. We went along. They said they'd heard of stickies. They took us off the highway and we got ambushed. Seven of them. Three of your boys got downed."

"And the stickies?"

"All chilled. But I'd swear I saw more coming out of the hills. Noise and gunfire brings them running, Reverend."

"And that's it?"

"Yeah. Good of you to call by. Jak's fine and so am I. Had my torn shut sewed up by Mrs. Rainer there. That's it."

"This is awful. First Azrael goes missing on us and now this massacre of the innocents."

Ryan considered questioning the use of the word "innocents" to describe the two-wheel wag riders, but thought better of it.

"It's a visitation," Ruby Rainer proclaimed, hands clasped piously together.

"That's just what it is," Norman Mote agreed, nodding furiously. "And we must do something about it. I must speak with Zombie about recruiting some more young men to the colors. And then... perhaps it's time for another feeding. It has been many months since we... Yes, indeed." His whole manner brightened at the thought. "A feeding! I shall go and consult with my consort and with the apostolic apprentice on the matter."

Without even a farewell, he was gone, leaving the front door open so that a gust of warm, dusty air blew into the rooming house.

Ruby rubbed her bony hands together, beaming at her visitors. "A feeding! Well, now, isn't that lucky for you? Outlanders coming into the ville at the time of a feeding. Still, I mustn't stop here chitchattering with you. Got me some supper to go and cook for you."

After she'd gone Rick Ginsberg broke the silence. "You guys can't appreciate how weird this is for me. I'm in a house built around 1890. My head tells me it's around the year 2000. My body tells me that the period of remission of the ALS is perhaps ending. I feel tired and sort of off balance. Then I see Hell's Angels and I meet the biggest snake in the ever-loving world. But I'm still hanging on in there. Then this bullshit — the stickies show up! I don't feel ready to cope with whatever comes next. A feeding! And you figure this is a fancy word to hide a human sacrifice. Hell's bloody bells, Ryan! I'm going to bed. I'll take a rain check on the supper. Maybe I'll wake up tomorrow and find this is all some twisted nightmare. Good night."

Jak passed him in the doorway. The boy's hair was once again bleach clean, swimming around his lean shoulders.

"Freezie tired?" he asked when he'd joined the others in the lobby.

"Yeah," J.B. replied.

"What now, lover?" Krysty asked.

Ryan sighed, rubbing at torn skin on the knuckles of his right hand. "I don't know. We go or stay. If we go, then now's the time. First light tomorrow. Before this feeding. Before they find the dead snake. And before the big in-fight starts."

"Could help," J.B. said unexpectedly.

"You said that..." Ryan began, but the Armorer checked him.

"Yeah. But now the odds have come down some. They lost three from eleven. We get in first, preempt them?"

Ryan's tongue probed the small hole in his back tooth. "Chill them..."

"Before they chill us," J.B. finished. "Take out the bikers and the Motes fall with them. You can see that, Ryan."

"Sure. Seven of us."

"Six. Sorry, folks, but I was a peacenik then and I have to be a peacenik now. Make it six of us in the killing bits. But this is crazy. We just got to this town. Sure, they're a touch mad about snakes, but it doesn't mean there's going to be civil war. You can't kill people just because of something that might or might not happen."

"Thought you'd gone to bed." Ryan looked around and saw Rick leaning in the doorway.

"I had, but I got a feeling that something like this was going to happen."

Ryan nodded. "You travel with us and you got a voice. Same as we all have. But in the end this sure as fireblast isn't a democracy, Rick. Best you realize that."

"I have," Doc offered, "lived long enough in the Deathlands to know that there is often a mortal imperative and, indeed, a moral imperative, in chilling some people. Baron Teague and Cort Strasser are instances that leap readily to my mind. But the putting down of a beast you know to be rabid or a mindless creature or some... I fear that I have somewhat lost the thread of my argument."