David Robbins - Anaheim Run

Melissa Parmalee—shapely, slim, five feet eight and dainty—grabbed the M-16 barrel and tore the gun from his hands ! The M-16 went off, but the round imbedded harmlessly in the ceiling.

Blade crouched, his hands gripping his Bowies, his astounded gaze on Parmalee.

The woman tilted her head and laughed, a brittle, malevolent titter.

“Look at him!” she said to Nightshade. “The fool can’t believe his eyes!”

Nightshade grinned and pointed his Darter at the Warrior.

“No!” Parmalee exclaimed. “He’s mine! This will only take a minute. I want the privilege of snapping his spine! Mo one else is on this floor. You watch the elevator.”

Nightshade nodded.

Parmalee disdainfully extended the M-16 toward Blade. “Here! Do you want this?”

Blade waited for her to make a move.

Parmalee snickered. “I guess you don’t!” She held the stock in her right hand and squeezed, crushing the gun with a grinding of metal and a crunching noise, then contemptously flung the useless weapon to the floor.

“Have you figured it out yet?” Parmalee baited him.

“I think so,” Blade responded.

“Oh, really?” Parmalee retorted sarcastically.

“I was wrong,” Blade said. “The Soviets didn’t hire the Gild to assassinate the Federation leaders. They don’t want to kill just the leaders. The Russians want to crush the entire Federation. Their spy, Ebert, would have relayed details of the summit, and the Soviets would plan their strategy accordingly.”

“But if the Soviets didn’t hire the Gild,” Parmalee observed mockingly, “who did?”

“I didn’t know until just now when you destroyed the gun,” Blade stated. “I didn’t realize more than one of our enemies might have a spy planted in President Toland’s administration. But the Civilized Zone is the perfect place to plant a spy. The Family, the Clan, and the Moles are too small to successfully infiltrate an outsider. And the Flatheads and the Cavalry are out of the question, unless the spy is an Indian or an expert horseman. But the Civilized Zone is so large, with President Toland’s staff numbering in the dozens, that installing a secret agent would be relatively simple.”

Parmalee took a step toward the Warrior. “But you still haven’t told me which side I’m with. And here I heard you were such a bright little boy!”

“Only someone with incredible strength could pulverize an M-16,” Blade noted. “A mutant, say… or an android.”

Melissa Parmalee cackled. “Excellent!”

Blade’s mind flashed back to his harrowing experiences in Houston, Texas, renamed Androxia by the android rulers of that city-state.

Developed by NASA prior to the war to replace human astronauts and prevent the loss of human lives, the androids had continued producing themselves after civilization crumbled to a standstill. Eventually, the androids had conquered the surviving humans in southern Texas and established themselves as the ruling class. Dubbed the Superiors, the androids were led by a computerized entity known as Primator, an entity Blade had exterminated before escaping from Androxia.

Parmalee took another step. “Now that the socializing is dispensed with, let’s conclude this, shall we?”

Blade whipped his Bowies from their sheaths and backed up. “There’s one thing I don’t understand,” he said, stalling, biding time until he could devise a scheme to dispose of the android.

“Just one thing?” Parmalee rejoined.

“I didn’t know there were female androids,” Blade mentioned. “All I saw in Androxia were male androids.”

Parmalee smiled proudly. “I am the first of a new breed of Superior.

Not only are my external features female in aspect, but I have been endowed with a wider range of human characteristics than my predecessors. I make the perfect spy. And once I have proven myself in the field, Primator intends to manufacture thousands more like me.”

“But Primator was terminated,” Blade said.

Parmalee grinned. “Did you really believe Primator was slain by a lowly human?”

Blade straightened. “Primator is alive?”

“And he sends his regards,” Parmalee declared maliciously.

“Then the hiring of the Gild wasn’t merely to try and ruin the Freedom Federation,” Blade deduced. “It was personal. Primator wants revenge!”

Parmalee nodded. “Finally you see the light! Preventing California from joining the Freedom Federation was a secondary goal. Eliminating the leaders was also incidental. Primator wants retribution. Employing the Gild was a means to an end.” She paused. “I’m under orders not to jeopardize my clandestine status. But I was given definite instructions in case a situation like this should arise. If the opportunity arose to achieve Primator’s revenge without risk of apprehension, I was directed to use my personal discretion. And guess what?”

Blade’s fingers tightened on the Bowies. He expected the android to assail him and he wasn’t disappointed.

Parmalee executed a flying tackle, her shoulders driving into the giant’s midsection as her arms wrapped around his waist.

Blade was knocked backward, staggered by the android’s super-human might, stumbling and falling onto his back with her on top bestriding his chest.

Parmalee lunged, attempting to pin the Warrior’s arms to the floor.

Blade arced his right Bowie up and in, sinking the ten-inch blade into the android’s chest between the breasts.

Parmalee looked at the Bowie, then backhanded the Warrior across the mouth, stunning him and dislodging his right hand from the Bowie hilt.

She slowly stood and stepped backward. “We won’t be needing this anymore,” she announced, her right hand effortlessly pulling the Bowie from her body.

Blade rolled onto his feet, squatting, his leg muscles tensing for a spring.

Parmalee tossed the right Bowie aside.

Blade performed a tackle of his own, bearing the android to the floor, the tip of his left Bowie tearing into her abdomen. He clasped the hilt with both hands and surged, cleaving a six-inch gash in her belly and ripping her clothes.

Parmalee laughed, then rammed her right knee into the small of the Warrior’s broad back, propelling him forward where she could fasten her fingers onto his throat.

Blade rose unsteadily, hampered by the android clinging to his neck. He wrenched on the left Bowie, cutting her open some more, a colorless liquid spurting from her ruptured abdomen and covering his hands and forearms. And still Parmalee clung to him, her nails digging into his throat, beginning to constrict his breathing. He was forced to release the Bowie and hammer at her with his pile-driver fists, pounding her face again and again and again. Her nose was crushed by one of his blows, flattening into a pulpy mass. He battered her mouth and her chin, splitting her lips, but his onslaught was unavailing. She simply dug her fingers in deeper. It felt like his neck was being pried apart.

Parmalee tried to kick the Warrior in the crotch.

Blade twisted, avoiding her foot. He grabbed her wrists and endeavored to pull her hands from his throat, his massive muscles bulging with his herculean effort, the veins on his temples protruding. But the android clung to him like a leech, slowly but surely strangling him.

He had to do something!

The gleam of a metallic object on the floor drew his attention, something lying near Hickok’s leg.

One of the Pythons!

His breaths coming in ragged gasps, feeling as if his throat was about to be crushed at any second, in desperation he deliberately plowed into Parmalee and sent both of them toppling to the carpet with the android on the bottom. He had to act before Parmalee or the mutant guessed his intent! The android was smiling.