James Axler: Crater Lake

"After Lori sent that one to go buy the farm, we checked a ways up the corridor," J.B. answered. "To the left's a dead end. Blank wall. No more doors. Other way's open, but the ceiling's real bad. Lot of places where it's collapsed."

"There's a big fall less than a hundred yards along that way," Krysty added. "Narrow gap's all. We figured best to come back in here with you sleeping so tight."

"Best we go look," Ryan said.

"Follow up that radio message," J.B. said, his voice holding just a hint of a question.

"Yeah. Why not?"

This time Ryan was a whole lot more careful. He kept flat as the lever was thrown, then moved out quickly, backed by Finn. The others came out only after the signal was given that the corridor was clear.

"See that?" Krysty said, pointing at the outside of the glittering metal door. It was deeply scratched and gouged, with scorch marks in places. "Someone tried real hard to get in there."

"Muties like him?" Ryan suggested, pointing with the barrel of the G-12 at the corpse of the little man. Lori had shot him with either a lot of luck or impressive skill. Bearing in mind how close the bullet had come to taking him through the back of the neck, Ryan chose not to think too long on which it had been.

The dead man was only about five feet in height and looked about thirty years old. His face was flat, with a coppery cast to the skin. The lips were narrow, peeled back to reveal long, curved teeth. The nails on the small hands were long and twisted, like horn. The man wore a coat of animal skins and furs, probably rodent. The gun had a hand-carved stock, while the barrel was iron, with the extra-large mouth riveted on. It was based on a primitive flintlock design.

"Rough old blaster," Finn said.

"Rip the belly out of even you," Ryan replied, kicking it aside with his foot.

The blood was drying, black around the neat hole just above the man's right eye. It had leaked over his face, filling the gaping mouth with a pool of crimson. A lot more blood had oozed from the exit wound at the back of the skull.

There was an odd weapon hooked to the belt of the dead mutie. It consisted of several narrow lengths of hollow wood, each about twelve inches long, ending in a sharp, barbed tip of something like ivory. A rawhide cord ran through the middle of the sections. J.B. bent over it.

"Interesting."

"What is it, Mr. Dix? I confess myself somewhat puzzled by it."

"Spear."

Doc Tanner smiled doubtfully. "You are teasing me, are you not?"

"No."

"A spear only a foot in length? Perhaps for hunting the inhabitants of the land of Lilliput."

"Where the fuck's that, Doc?" Finn asked. But his question was ignored.

The Armorer unhooked the strange weapon from the belt of the corpse. He held the cord and flicked it hard with his wrist. Miraculously the sections slotted into one another, producing a lethal, six-foot-long spear.

"Gimme," Jak said, holding out a hand. He took the spear, let it fall into its component sections, then whipped it out to full length. Grinning delightedly, he said, "Be good. I can keep it, Ryan?"

"Sure. Why not? Come on, let's go."

The avalanche could have happened anytime. Maybe only a month ago, maybe when the bombs had rained down on the free land of America. Concrete, stones and earth had slipped, blocking the corridor and leaving only a small gap barely three feet high at its apex.

"Anything?" Ryan asked Krysty.

"No. Not close. But I can hear something, quite a long way off. Maybe an engine. Maybe feet moving. Can't tell. Blurred by the deeps here."

"I'll go look," Jak volunteered. "I'm smallest here for it."

The albino scampered lightly up the earthslide on hands and knees, pausing a moment and staring into the hole.

"Does it go through?" Ryan shouted.

"Yeah. It's around ten feet. Easy. You coming?"

Finnegan had the most difficulty, wriggling along on his stomach, pushing his gun ahead of him, panting, red-faced, sweating despite the chill, but eventually he made it.

When Ryan himself was halfway through, bringing up the rear of the group, he was suddenly oppressed by the thought of how many trillions of tons of dirt hung above him. It had fallen before. One day it might fall again.

The corridor resumed on the far side of the dirt tunnel. It stretched out, ill-lit, curving gently to the right. The air tasted noticeably fresher, and it was much colder.

"Fucking freezing, Ryan. Got to get some warmer gear. Left most of mine along the way."

Finn was right. If it was as bitter as this deep down in the redoubt, it didn't much bear thinking on what it would be like if they got out into the open.

"If they evacuated in a rush, there could be some clothes around."

"If they haven't got to 'em first," J.B. said, pointing with his mini-Uzi at the many footprints that patterned the dusty floor.

"Must be hundreds of 'em," Finnegan said, bending to study the marks. "Most got skin boots on, like the chilled mutie back there."

"But they didn't get in the gateway," Ryan said. "Controls aren't hard. Just the number code on the panel. Figures they can't read. That being so, there may be other parts of the redoubt they haven't penetrated. We stay here, we freeze. We go back to the gateway and move on, then we never follow up that radio beam."

"Then it's onward and upward, my dear Ryan," Doc Tanner said, grinning and showing his oddly perfect teeth. "Let us carry our banner with its strange device and cry 'Excalibur!' to all we meet."

There were times when Ryan thought the old man would never get his full set of brains back.

Everyone was on battle alert.

J.B. took point, with Finn three paces behind him on the other side of the corridor. Doc and Lori walked together, followed by Jak. Krysty came sixth, and Ryan covered the rear, twenty paces behind her.

J.B. signaled for everyone to halt, then dropped to one knee, squinting along the barrel of the mini-Uzi. "Thought I saw somebody," he whispered. "Gone."

And once Ryan himself paused at a place where the corridor bent more sharply. He went around the curve, hesitated then suddenly retreated. Just at the edge of his vision, about a hundred paces away, two or three of the diminutive muties had seen him and had scampered out of sight.

They passed several rooms, most with open doors. Without exception, the rooms had been stripped completely bare. Some had carried signs over them, stenciled on wood, then affixed to the concrete. Though these were all gone, a few ghostly impressions of the lettering remained, in the same way that a picture on a wall will leave a pattern when taken down.

Orthodontal Surgery, one said.

Comsec R & R, another, more mysterious one said.

TR Manual 31C, a third said.

One door was much larger than the others, wide enough to get a war wag through it. It was simply headed Stores Subsec 9M.

"Stores sounds promising," J.B. said, beckoning to the others. "Worth a try?"

"How do we get in? Over, under or around?"

"Or through , Ryan?" the Armorer asked. "Looks like the muties have tried." There were ample dents and scratches in the dull matt-green metal, but no sign that the door had been opened in the past hundred years. "Control panel's not harmed."

Oddly, that was true. There was a palm-print indent in the control panel to the right of the door. A small digital display glowed faintly in the half-light.

"Any guesses?" Ryan asked.

"Probably not a sec lock system," Doc Tanner said. "No need deep inside the redoubt. Clean the dust off the panel and look at which ones are worn. Bound to show."

Ryan used his sleeve to wipe the display clear of gray dust. His breath fogged the transparent plastic, and he smeared that away. By squinting at an angle he could see that the old man was right. The letter K was marked, and so was the number 7. He pressed them, but nothing happened.