The Armorer adjusted his fedora and wiped sweat away from his forehead. "It's true, though. Someone from before the long winters and who knows a lot about blasters. I could listen to you for days."
"Talk's cheap," Doc muttered tetchily.
"How's that?" she snapped, turning on him, eyes narrowing to pinpoints of anger.
"I remarked, merely, that talk was very cheap, Dr. Wyeth. But the price of action can sometimes be more realistic."
"Realistic! Are you implying that I'm making this up? That I can't really shoot?"
"No, no no. I read the screen on you, as we all did. I'm sure that it was once true. But that was many years ago."
"And besides, Doc, the bitch is dead! Is that what you mean? That I couldn't do it now? Ryan, give me that pistol of yours. I'm getting tired of this old guy's flapping tongue and that hornet's endless buzzing. Can't do much about the one, but I can sure as shit stop the other."
Ryan handed over the SIG-Sauer, watching the woman carefully. He noticed that J.B. had eased his own pistol, just in case. Looking out for "just in case" was a good way of staying alive.
"Thanks." She looked at Doc. "You figure I don't know guns? This is the SIG-Sauer, P-226. Fifteen rounds of 9 mm ammo. Barrel length is just under four and a half inches. Overall length is seven and three-quarter inches. Weighs in at a fingernail under twenty-six ounces. What else? Yeah. Push-button mag release. This built-in baffle silencer's a later addition, coming in not that long before I was... ill." The hesitation was almost imperceptible.
"Talk," Doc whispered.
The humming of the darting mutie insect was loud enough to almost drown out his word. But not quite.
"All right to fire one off, Ryan?" Mildred asked.
"Sure," he replied, impressed that she'd thought to ask first.
The woman tested the pistol for weight and balance, smiling approvingly. Her eyes followed the huge insect as it lunged and thrusted menacingly, feinting in toward the watchers, then cutting away, its hum increasing to a raging whine. Ryan's guess put it at close to a foot long, but it was moving very fast and erratically. If Mildred Wyeth really thought she could hit it, in midair, then she had a lot of confidence and nerve.
With the silencer, the sound of the SIG-Sauer was little louder than an elderly clergyman's clearing his throat. Mildred had braced her right wrist with her left for extra steadiness, shooting, Ryan was pleased to see, without squinting an eye shut. He was a lot better than average shot himself, but he was aware that his monocular vision prevented him from ever being outstanding.
On the evidence of that single, squeezed shot, Mildred was outstanding. The mutie insect disintegrated in a rainbow burst of shattered pulp as it was obliterated by the 9 mm full-metal-jacket round. There was virtually nothing left of its corpse to fall lightly to the dense foliage around them.
"Nice shot," Krysty said.
"Terrific shot," J. B. amplified admiringly. Ryan nodded his agreement. Jak gaped, slack-jawed.
"Could have been luck," Doc grunted, but his eyes were twinkling and he couldn't check a foolish grin from establishing itself across his face. "But," he added hastily, "I guess it wasn't luck. Just damnably good shooting. My congratulations, ma'am."
"Old hand and eye haven't lost much of their coordination." Mildred handed the warm gun back to Ryan. "It pulls a half inch or so left over fifty yards. If you like, I could fix it for you."
Ryan shook his head in amused disbelief. Now they were six again.
Chapter Fifteen
The friends continued northeast, stopping every hour or so to try to draw breath in the fetid heat of the jungle. Twice they crossed flowing water. On the second occasion Jak tripped over a web of tangling vines and tumbled into the river. Ryan was there first, crawling onto a fallen tree to peer for the vanished boy.
The silt was so thick that he feared for a dozen heartbeats that Jak might have been sucked under and trapped in the mud and weeds. Then his eye was caught by a tremor of movement, deep in the turgid stream. A flash of white, like a fish moving belly-up or like waving strands of albino hair.
Hanging on with his left hand to a moss-slick stump, Ryan swung himself over and down, his right hand reaching into the warm waters. He fumbled for a moment, then found the tangled skein of hair. He clutched at it, knotting Jak's hair in his fist and heaving up with all of his strength. Then J.B. was at his side, pulling on Ryan's belt to save the man from being drawn in after the teenager.
Krysty was also on the log, helping the Armorer to tug Jak from the river's sucking embrace. She tucked him under her arm and carried him to the bank. J.B. heaved Ryan to safety, and the two men also made it back to solid earth.
Jak lay on his back, arms limp, one leg folded under him. His eyes were closed and brown water trickled from his open mouth. His hair was matted and filthy, framing his white face.
"We going to stand around and watch the boy die?" Mildred snapped.
"I was..." Krysty began, but the older woman elbowed her aside.
"Cemeteries are full with folks who got there because of other folk's good intentions. Lad's swallowed most of the river. Give me room."
Mildred hoisted her pants and dropped astride the unconscious boy, digging fists hard under his rib cage and pushing. Jak expelled more of the river and jerked spasmodically, his left leg kicking out.
Mildred nodded to herself. "That's it, son," she said. "Let's fight for it." She bent lower and applied her mouth to Jak's bloodless lips, breathing into his body, then easing away again. She lifted his arms from the ground and then lowered them, repeating the process several times.
"Will our snow-headed chum be all right, Doctor?" Doc asked cautiously.
Jak gave the answer himself, suddenly coughing and spitting out a mixture of brackish water and vomit. Mildred had anticipated the reaction and dodged sideways.
"This is the moment I hate most. Been puked over when I summered as a lifeguard, premed school. Sit up, Jak."
The boy coughed and spluttered again, and she helped him with an arm behind the shoulders. His eyes were open, glowing like chips of molten ruby in the caverns of washed ivory.
"Better?"
"Yeah. What fuck happened? Tree grabbed me. In water. Thought farm bought."
"Ryan pulled you out," Mildred replied, standing and brushing moss and dead leaves off her blouse. "You should thank him."
"And Mildred brought you back to us," Ryan insisted, trying to wring water out of his clothes. He dislodged a black leech from his wrist and stared at the blurred streak of diluted blood where it had been happily feeding.
"Thanks, Mildred. Thanks, Ryan."
The woman grinned and patted him hard on the back, making him cough again. "Think nothing of it. Just take two tablets and call me in the morning if you don't feel better. You do have Blue Cross coverage, I take it?"
Jak shook his head, bewildered.
"No? Then I might just have to throw you back in the river."
It was the middle of the afternoon, and they'd been climbing steadily for the past couple of hours. The vegetation was beginning to show the first signs of thinning out, and the overwhelming heat was easing a little.
Krysty was taking her turn with Ryan's panga, which had by now lost its keenest edge. They had just beaten their way through a towering cluster of waxen, orange and scarlet flowers, whose twisted trumpet shape defeated even Krysty's knowledge of botany.
"Listen," she said, holding up the panga, the steel dripping emerald sap.