They waited for a full minute but nothing happened.
“What’s going on?” Lieutenant Garber inquired, joining them and peering at the undergrowth in confusion. “Why have you stopped?”
“Were you daydreamin’?” Hickok rejoined.
“We’re being shadowed,” Blade revealed.
“What? Where?” Lieutenant Garber asked, gazing all around.
“Don’t pee your pants, junior,” Hickok said. “They’re not aimin’ to attack us yet.”
“How do you know?” Garber questioned skeptically.
“If they intended to kill us keep us from entering their territory, they would have charged us already,” Blade speculated. “They might want us alive. If so, they’ll wait to jump us until we’re out of hearing range of Sentry Post 17.”
“If you’re certain they plan to attack us, why don’t we go back and try again after dark?” Lieutenant Garber proposed.
“It wouldn’t make any difference,” Blade said. “If they’re watching the sentry post around the clock, they’d see us enter at night.” He paused. “No, we go in now. At least we have the daylight in our favor. They can’t come at us without being spotted.”
“We hope,” Hickok said.
Blade straightened and waved his left arm forward. “Stay frosty,” he advised, and led the way.
“In this heat?” Hickok complained. “You must be kiddin’.”
“There would be a lot less hot air if you’d keep your trap shut for five minutes,” Geronimo joked.
“At least I don’t fart folks to death,” Hickok retorted.
“And I do?”
“Who ate that moldy can of baked beans we found that time?” Hickok stated. “Who went around fartin’ up a storm for a week? Who wilted plants at ten feet? Who got jumped by a female skunk that mistook him for a male polecat?”
“Rikki-Tikki-Tavi?”
“Try again, rocks-for-brains.”
“What can I say? That took place twelve years ago. And I wasn’t jumped by a female skunk,” Geronimo said.
“You mean that smell was your natural odor?” Hickok asked, and smirked in triumph.
“Children, please,” Blade said sternly.
They fell silent.
An hour went by and on they trekked through the residential suburb of the city. The buildings had all sustained weather-related damage during the 106 years since the nuclear Armageddon. Roofs were blistered and broken and partly caved in in many cases. The exterior walls were cracked and crumbling. Hardly a window was intact.
“Do you reckon the people who lived here skedaddled when the war broke out?” Hickok asked.
“Most of them, anyway,” Blade answered. “We know the U.S.
government evacuated hundreds of thousands, maybe more, into the Rocky Mountain region and the Midwest at the onset of hostilities.”
“I wonder why the lousy Commies didn’t hit Dallas with a nuclear bomb or missile?”
“Who knows? Their systems weren’t very accurate. Maybe they tried and missed. Maybe there were other targets they wanted to take out first.
General Reese told me that Dallas was rated as a tertiary target,” Blade said.
“Terry who?”
“Dallas wasn’t considered crucial by the Soviets.”
“If I was from Dallas, I’d be plumb insulted,” Hickok commented.
“So would the—” Geronimo froze in midstride. He tilted his head.
“What is it?” Hickok asked.
Blade halted and surveyed their surroundings. Decayed, disintegrating homes were on both sides of the highway. Forty feet in front of them on the left, rearing six stories into the humid air, rose a squat black structure. Large, faded words were visible near the top, with several letters missing. Blade read the letters.
“I heard a sound,” Geronimo announced.
“What kind of sound?” Blade inquired. He’d learned to rely upon the exceptional senses Geronimo possessed. Undoubtedly because of his Blackfoot inheritance, Geronimo enjoyed outstanding eyesight and hearing.
“A hissing, like something expelling a breath,” Geronimo stated.
“Are you sure you weren’t fartin’ again?” Hickok asked.
Blade advanced cautiously, his eyes scrutinizing the nearby homes and settling on the black monolith. The building had been constructed of an opaque, glasslike substance. All of the upper four floors were intact, but there were gaping holes in the two lower stories, gloomy, ragged cavities averaging five feet in diameter. What could have made those holes? he wondered. Looters? Scavengers? An explosion of some kind?
A faint scraping noise came from the monolith.
Blade swung the M60 to cover the monolith. He detected a flicker of movement in a cavity on the southwest corner, a brief streak of a thin, reddish whip.
What in the world?
He tread lightly, striving to peer into the murky recesses of the artificial caves. Were the attackers lurking within, girding for a charge? He came abreast of the monolith, his body tensed for action, ready for anything.
Or so he thought.
A huge reptilian head suddenly poked from a cavity on the ground floor, its red tongue darting in and out of its wicked-looking maw. The skin was a rusty brown with distinct, rough scales. Its dark, unfathomable eyes were enclosed in rings of bright red. The beast stood at least five feet high at the shoulders.
“Dear Lord!” Lieutenant Garber exclaimed.
More reptilian creatures appeared, glaring balefully at the humans, their demeanor unmistakably menacing.
“Why do I feel like a slab of venison?” Hickok quipped.
Blade continued walking slowly, hoping they could pass the monolith without incident.
“I didn’t know there were alligators in Texas,” Hickok said.
“Those aren’t alligators, you dummy. They’re mutations. Spiny lizards, I believe,” Geronimo stated.
“No foolin’, professor?”
Nine lizards were now staring at the Warriors and soldiers.
“Do you suppose they eat things like insects and snakes?” Hickok asked of no one in particular.
“We should be so lucky,” Geronimo responded.
One of the larger lizards abruptly sprang from its hole, darting at its intended prey with astounding speed, legs flying, mouth wide open. As if on cue, all the rest of the mutations burst from their dens, swooping toward the highway en masse.
“Here they come!” Lieutenant Garber belabored the obvious.
The first lizard made a beeline at Hickok.
“Eat this, sucker!” the gunman declared, the Henry already to his right shoulder. The rifle boomed.
The shot caught the reptile in the mouth, the slug boring through its head and tearing out the top of its cranium. It stumbled and sprawled onto its bluish-tinged belly, thrashing uncontrollably.
Geronimo cut loose with the Browning, and the chatter of M-16’s created a metallic din as the Civilized Zone troopers opened up.
Move! Blade’s mind shrieked, and he did, taking several strides to the east, wanting the angle to be just right so he wouldn’t accidentally hit any of his friends and allies. The short span of grass between the monolith and the curb was a mass of hurtling mutations. He squeezed the trigger, gripping the M60 firmly with both hands, his legs braced.
A hail of rounds slammed into the closest lizard, bowling the beast over, miniature geysers spraying from its perforated body.
Blade elevated the barrel, going for the next two creatures, seeing his slugs rip into their heads and necks, the thundering and bucking.
Hickok and Geronimo were pouring lead into another of the genetic deviates.
The remaining four lizards surged toward the soldiers. Despite the deadly rain from the M-16’s, they barely checked their rush. A bulky mutant reached Humes and struck, clamping its jaws on the trooper’s midriff and lifting him from the ground. Humes screamed as the lizard shook him savagely. He dropped his M-16 and flailed ineffectually at the lizard’s head.