James Axler - Strontium Swamp

Some of the rats had reached where the mammals, lizards and insects were swarming over the sand, and a skirmish had commenced between them. The night air was filled with squeals, howls and screams of pain as the rats hit their foes like a furry wall, lashing and biting at anything that came near.

A rustling roar from behind them, the air rent with more squeals, made Ryan turn around. He swore softly at the sight that greeted his eye: there were more rats, those still left in the other parts of the warren, that were now breaking surface, spreading like a sentient carpet over the surface of the sand. They swarmed toward the companions, and the one-eyed warrior knew that this was going to be a rough ride.

The lizards and reptiles, with their toughened hides, were coping well with the attacks of the rats, their tails flicking and breaking the spines of the furry marauders, their tongues wrapping around the creatures and wringing the air from them as the bites of the rodents failed to penetrate the toughened lizard skin. And yet some of the rodents were making their own progress. Masses of them could chill a lizard by swarming over it, the sheer mass of bites getting through the hide, making the creature turn so that its soft underbelly was exposed, an easier target for the razor-sharp teeth.

The insects, although smaller and easily swallowed or crushed by the weight of the rats en masse, had their own weapons to offer: venom from their shells or from their mouths and pincers pierced the rats’ flesh, penetrated into their bloodstreams and made them scream in the agony of being chilled.

While the battle raged just feet from where they were standing, the companions faced their own fight. The rats that had swarmed out of the other sections of the warren were upon them, the sheer weight of the rodents moving around and beneath them making it hard to keep a steady footing, which was particularly important for Mildred and Jak, who were trying to help J.B. out of the sand, where he was now buried up to the waste. It was almost impossible to try to dig him out, as the sand was covered with rats that—although they had no interest in the Armorer, and had a mind only to join the battle below—were only too willing to lash out at any hands that tried to move them and scoop the sand. In their haste, they were climbing over J.B.’s torso, swarming over his neck and head and almost obscuring him from view.

Ryan and Krysty reached Doc and helped the old man steady himself as he swiped at the rats with his cane. Together, the three of them began to move toward where Jak and Mildred labored.

Ryan drew his panga from its thigh sheath, and he and Doc—who had by now unsheathed the Toledo steel blade contained within the cane—set about carving some space around the area where J.B. was trapped. While they did this, Krysty joined Mildred and Jak in helping to dig the Armorer out of the hole. They still had to fend off the occasional rodent, but the vast majority were now engaged in the struggle for survival just below them, and those that still lingered were, for the most part, deflected by the blows of Ryan and Doc.

“Oh for a pipe to blow,” Doc grunted between sweeps of the sword.

“What?” Ryan asked, bewildered.

“A long story, and one I shall—” he grunted as another rat became history “—tell you when it becomes more provident. Though it could hardly be more appropriate.”

J.B. struggled out of the sand pit, cursing and shaking himself, still feeling the rats scurrying over him. He turned to look at the carnage that was to his rear and stopped dead, silenced by the battle that was still raging.

The companions watched, spectators who were glad to be no longer caught in the middle, as the fight continued. The small mammals were no match for the rats, and most of them were either chilled or retreating, but the match between the lizards and insects on one side, and the rodents on the other, was evenly balanced. Both had their weaknesses, but their strengths contrasted and evened up the fight. It was awesome to witness the struggle for desert supremacy.

The struggle was brought to an end only when the sun began to rise. The knowledge that the day would soon become unbearably hot sent them fleeing back to their lairs, determined to make the shade before they began to fry. The ultimate battle for supremacy could wait until another night. Ryan wondered how often this had been played and replayed.

The rats swarmed around the companions but seemed to ignore them, heading only for their warren, carrying the carrion from the battlefield with them to add to their supplies of food deep underground. Receding into the distance, the lizards and reptiles were doing the same. Nothing was to be wasted in this harsh environment.

As suddenly as it began, it was ended. The desert was silent once more, with only the disturbance of the sand and some patches of blood and fur to mark the battle. Even those would soon vanish with the shifting of the sands during the day and with the coming of the next storms.

“Not much chance of resting now that the sun’s coming up,” Ryan stated. “And I don’t know about you, but I don’t want another night like that if I can help it. I say we press on.”

As he expected, there was no opposition to this plan. He told J.B. of Jak’s comments about their location and the best direction to strike out. The Armorer took his minisextant from out of his canvas bag and took a reading.

“Yeah, if we go that away,” he said, pointing west, “then we should hit where Jak thinks. I just wish I could say how long it’ll take.”

“It’ll take as long as it takes,” Ryan said, “and we’ve got no other choice. As long as we can get the hell away from here.”

It was a comment that needed no argument after the rigors of the night. Wearily they formed into a line, with Ryan at lead and J.B. covering the rear, and began to march—slowly, achingly—toward whatever destiny next had in store for them.

“Three days and nights. Let us hope that it does not extend to forty days in the wilderness.” Doc sighed in a distracted manner as he rose from sleep and took in the new morning around them.

“If you keep being that cheerful, I might just put you out of your misery,” Mildred told him with a sour tone. “Anyway, when the hell did you get so damn religious?”

Doc smiled beatifically. “One was always brought up with the good book, even when Mr. Darwin made certain parts of it seem a little like a fable.”

“Two suns, two argument same. Shut up,” Jak ranted as he took a sip of water then grimaced before taking a chunk out of the lizard they had cooked the night before. “Boring.”

Certainly, something had happened to Doc in the time between coming out of the jump and the current morning. Perhaps it had been the states of delirium followed by the storm, or perhaps it had been some jump-induced dream of which he had said nothing. Either way, he had been spouting in a religious vein ever since they’d begun their trek across the desert. For Mildred, daughter of a preacher in the predark world, this was irritating for some reason she couldn’t comprehend.

After the attack on their first night out of the redoubt, and after J.B. had secured a direction from his minisextant, they had started to march. Pacing was difficult. It was an unknown distance balanced against their lack of water and salt tablets, and the sparseness of their diet. The fact that there was water and life present in the desert was a given—the events of that night had proved it. However, locating the obviously deep springs and trapping some of the wildlife was another matter entirely.