Ahern, Jerry - The Savage Horde

As the wildman spun toward him, he arched the butt of the CAR-up, the heel of the flat metal buttplate catching at the tip of the wildman's jaw, the head snapping back, Rourke smashing out with the full flat of the butt for the center of the man's face.

Rourke wheeled half right as the body dropped away, tucking down his right elbow to recover the stroke, slashing down with the muzzle of the CAR as if there had been a bayonet in place. The flash deflector laid open the right cheek of the man coming at him with the machete. Rourke snapped his left foot out, going into a forward ^thrust, the flash deflectored muzzle punching into the attacker's Adam's apple. The man went down.

Rourke took the step forward on his right, pivoting, the bayonetless rifle in a high guard position, a wildman with a spear rushing him. Rourke swatted the spear away, taking a long stride out with his right leg, dipping low, snapping the butt of the rifle up in an arc, the toe of the butt impacting against the left cheekbone of the man with the spear, the body falling back as Rubenstein stepped in from the far right, the pistol grip of the Schmeisser connecting against the man's left temple.

Rourke wheeled, sidestepping as Rubenstein advanced on two of the wildmen, one armed with a riot shotgun, another with an assault rifle. Rubenstein's MP-was already spitting, Rourke snatching the Detonics from his belt, thumbing down the safety and emptying the pistol's remaining four rounds into the two men.

Rubenstein started forward, Rourke reaching out the right hand which still held the empty Detonics, the slide

locked back over the spent magazine.

"Wait!"

Cole was the only one still fighting—a wildman roughly his own size, blond shoulder length hair falling across his face and half obscuring the irregular beard.

The man was barehanded—so was Cole, his rifle gone somewhere, the . he'd threatened Rourke with still in his holster.

The wildman's hands reached out, Rourke not shifting his eyes as by feel he swapped for a fresh magazine in the Detonics, leaving the six pack intact, getting one from his musette bag.

By feel again, he found the slide stop, thumbing it down, hearing the slide rake forward.

Cole had the . out of the holster now, the man he fought swatting it away, the pistol discharging skyward. Cole slumped back, making to fire the . again as the blond haired wildman came at him. Nothing happened.

Rourke pumped the Detonics' trigger once, the wildman's head exploding on the left side, the body sprawling back across the sand.

Cole was looking up, at Rourke, then down to his gun. Rourke took four steps forward and stopped beside Cole. He reached down, carefully taking the pistol.

The slide was only part way into battery, the full metal case -grain hardball round somehow jammed diagonally, bullet pointing upward.

"Odd," Rourke almost wispered. "Jam like that in a military gun. Wouldn't have happened though if you'd fed that round into the chamber off the top of the magazine." Rourke thumbed the magazine catch release, pulling the magazine out, the half chambered round jamming it. He counted the glimmers of brass in the witness holes, the bottom hole empty only. He jacked back the slide, popping the seventh round out of the breech and into the palm of his right hand. "Like I told

you." He flashed what he hoped was his biggest smile as he tossed Cole the empty pistol, the magazine and the loose round.

Rourke turned away, under his breath muttering, "Shit—"

Chapter 32

Sarah kept her eyes closed. She could hear Michael breathing, hear Annie snoring a little as she always did. She heard nothing from Millie but had checked a few moments earlier—the girl had always been a sound, unimaginative sleeper.

She was alone in the small tent except for them—except for her thoughts. She kept her eyes closed tight, but could not sleep.

There had been no word through Bill Mulliner—no word of John. She had asked David Balfry and he had promised to put out feelers that very night—to see if her husband had contacted the resistance or if U.S. II knew his whereabouts.

"David Balfry," she murmured.

He was a handsome man, by any woman's standards, she thought.

She wondered why he had smiled at her.

She rolled over, the blankets on the hard, damp ground not so uncomfortable she couldn't sleep—since the Night of The War she had slept under far worse conditions.

She made herself think of the refugees—in the morning, Reverend Steel would be back and she'd begin helping him as a nurse—She couldn't stay forever at the refugee center.

She would take up the search for John if no news came of his whereabouts. She would do that.

John was strong—David Balfry—he was strong, too. She remembered the way his hand had felt. It had been a long time since a man had held her hand like that, no matter how brief.

She closed her eyes tighter, rolling onto her back again. She mentally reconstructed her husband's features. His eyes—they could see through you, she remembered. His forehead was high, but it had always been high, his hair thick, healthy, dark. There had been gray hair on his chest—prematurely gray, she had realized then and told herself now. She thought of the hardness of his muscles when he held her in his arms.

She opened her eyes, staring up at the tent beyond the hazy darkness, the grayness.

"John," she whispered, barely hearing her own words, feeling them more. "I need you. now—"She realized what her hands were doing—and she kept them there, closing her eyes.

Chapter 33

Rourke understood it now—why no one had come in response to the shots.

The chanting and screaming would have drowned out any noise.

The wildmen chanted, men and women, dressed in the same curious mixture of tattered conventional clothing, animal skins and rags.

The shore party Cole had risked did the screaming. Men—all of them hung on crudely made crosses of limbs and scrap timbers—were being tortured in a variety of ways. Pyres were set about the bases of each cross and Rourke watched now as one of the wildmen reached a faggot into the bonfire which crackled loudly in the wind in the center of the ring of crosses, the ring of crucified men and their torturers.

The faggot glowed and sparked in the wind—it was now a torch. , "Holy shit," Rubenstein murmured, Rourke feeling the younger man's breath beside him.

"You might say that," Rourke observed.

"What are we gonna do?" It was Cole's voice, his whisper like a blade being drawn across a rough stone.

"That's an odd question for you to ask me," Rourke noted, not looking at Cole, watching the progress instead of the wildmen who held the torch. "We left one man dead on the beach—well, that isn't really true. We sent his body back with the other two and the two prisoners. And one of your two men was wounded. Now even if Lieutenant O'Neal had his shore party in the boats, should still be ten minutes before they'd even hit the beach. Then another fifteen minutes' climb up here. I'd say that leaves only the three of us."

"The three of us against them," Cole snarled. "You're crazy—there must be a hundred of 'em—all of 'em with guns and more of those damn knives."

Rourke turned and looked at Cole, then at Paul Rubenstein. "I guess that doesn't leave three of us then—'nly leaves two of us. You guard the rear, Cole—your rear. Looks like you're pretty damned experienced at it anyway."

Rourke pushed himself up over the rocks, feeling Cole tug at him. He looked back at the man.

He didn't have to say anything. Paul whispered, "What he meant was—save your ass—seems you got a lot of practice at it."

Rourke finished moving across the rocks, hearing Rubenstein beside him as he slipped down onto the grassy expanse below, hiding in the shadow there while he watched the man with the torch stop in front of one of the crosses. "Ohh, boy,"