“It’s your imagination,” Hickok stated, and led the way along a worn trail. “The Trolls must have used this regularly. We’ll follow it and see where we end up.”
“What makes you think the Trolls came this way?”
Hickok knelt and pointed at the bare ground. “Look at all the scuff marks and heel prints. I have a friend named Geronimo, the best tracker there is, and if he were here right now he could tell you how many people had passed this way, how long ago it was, and even if they were right- or left-handed.”
“You’re kidding,” Sherry commented.
“I’m telling the truth,” Hickok said. “A competent tracker can determine from the depth of the imprint whether a person is right or left-handed. If a person is right-handed, the right heel digs in a bit deeper than the left. Or the other way around. Well, I’m not that good. But I am skilled enough to know a lot of Trolls passed this way some time back. I suspect the lousy varmints came this way when they moseyed out of Fox.”
“Has anyone ever told you,” Sherry noted, “that you talk funny sometimes?”
“You’re kidding!” Hickok smiled.
“Why?” Sherry asked him.
Hickok rose and continued deeper into the woods. “I reckon it’s because I like the Old West so much.”
“The what?”
“The western frontier of America in the days of the gunfighters, the sheriffs, and the outlaws,” Hickok answered.
“Never heard of it,” Sherry admitted.
“You have a good vocabulary,” Hickok observed. “You must be able to read.”
“My parents taught me,” she confided. “We have several hundred books, but none on this Old West.”
“Too bad,” Hickok stated. “We have a library where I come from, and it’s filled with hundreds of thousands of books. Books on every conceivable subject. My favorites were always the westerns, and in particular any book on the life of James Butler Hickok.”
“Who was he?” Sherry pushed a slim branch out of her path.
“One of the greatest Americans who ever lived. As a tribute to him, I took his name at my Naming.”
“Your what?”
“My Naming. When we turn sixteen we’re permitted to pick the name we want to be known by,” Hickok told her.
“You’re kidding!”
Hickok glanced over his left shoulder, frowning. “No. The man who built the place where I’m from wanted us to remember the past, to keep in touch with our historical roots, as he put it in his diary. So we’re told to go through the history books, or any of the others for that matter, and select whatever name we like. It’s as simple as that.”
“Where are you from?” Sherry inquired.
“Somewhere,” was his cryptic response.
“I told you where I’m from,” she pointed out.
“Thank you.”
“And you’re not going to let me know where you’re from?”
“I reckon not.”
“Why?” Sherry asked, an edge to her tone. “Don’t you trust me.”
“Nope,” he replied frankly.
“Why not?”
Hickok paused and stared into her eyes. “Trust is like love. You must earn it. Only an idiot trusts blindly.”
Sherry followed on his heels as he resumed their trek. He certainly was a strange one. But then, all men were a bit on the weird side. Must be a quirk in their genes. She gazed at the trees overhead, watching a squirrel scamper from limb to limb. Funny, how she sensed she could trust this one right off the bat. There was something about him, a quality of confidence he tended to inspire in others. What was this “score” business?
The chip on his shoulder must weigh tons!
The squirrel suddenly chattered like crazy and darted to the north.
Sherry detected a movement in the branches of a large tree ahead. The branches hung directly above the trail they were on. Was it the wind?
Hickok was strolling nonchalantly along the dirt trail, his Henry cradled in his arms.
Why should she worry? If Hickok wasn’t concerned, if he didn’t see anything wrong, then there probably wasn’t. He gave the impression of being a proficient fighter. Surely his senses would alert him if anything were amiss?
Those branches moved again, sagging unnaturally, as if a great weight were on them, concealed by the leaves.
Should she say something? Sherry tensed as they neared the tree, her eyes focused on those lower branches. Maybe she should tell…
The leaves abruptly parted, and a hulking form hurtled from concealment, leaping at the gunman seven feet away.
“Hickok!” Sherry shouted, frozen in her tracks. “Lookout!”
Chapter Four
“Scavengers!” Geronimo yelled.
There were at least thirty, attired in filthy rags and armed with a variety of weapons.
Blade knew their type well. They traveled in groups, preying on anyone they found, stealing food and guns and lives with indiscriminate abandon.
Thanks to the high walls encircling the Home, and the prowess of the Warriors, the Family was spared being ravaged by the bands of scavengers roaming the countryside.
“They’re all around us!” Star screamed, awake and terrified, gripping her mother, the knuckles on her hands white.
Blade destested these human vultures. He saw one of them runnng up to his side of the SEAL, carrying a knife, apparently intending to thrust it through Blade’s open window.
“Blade!” Rainbow needlessly cried a warning.
Blade slowly reached his right hand across his broad chest and drew the Dan Wesson .44 Magnum revolver from its leather shoulder holster.
Like Geronimo, he had lost many of the weapons he’d taken to the Twin Cities. Before departing for Kalispell, they had paid the armory a visit and selected their arms for this run. He liked the feel of this revolver. The Dan Wesson .44 Magnum was a big handgun, but in his massive hand it felt just right. In addition to the revolver, an Auto-Ordnance Model 27 A-1 was on the console beside him. It reminded him of the Commando Arms Carbine he’d used before. Like the Commando, the Auto-Ordnance was modified by the Family gunsmiths so it could function on full automatic.
The Auto-Ordnance was a re-creation of the Thompson Model 1927 used by gangsters during the early decades of the twentieth century.
“Blade!” Rainbow shouted.
Blade pointed the ten-inch barrel at the scavenger and squeezed the trigger. The boom of the .44 Magnum was deafening in the confines of the transport.
The scavenger reacted as though he’d slammed into a wall. His body was flung backward, sprawling in a heap at the side of the highway.
Blade aimed at a scavenger with a rifle and fired, the heavy slug taking the top of the scavenger’s head off.
Geronimo entered the fray. He still carried an Arminius .357 Magnum under his right arm, and his remaining tomahawk was tucked under his belt. The new addition to his personal arsenal was a FNC Auto Rifle, and he swung it out his window as three of the scavengers closed in. The FNC burped and the three men tumbled to the ground, one of them shrieking in agony.
Bullets and arrows were striking the body of the SEAL, some of them whining as they were deflected by the bulletproof plastic.
“Hang on!” Blade yelled as he accelerated, flooring the pedal.
The SEAL surged ahead, plowing into one of the attackers and bowling him aside.
Blade and Geronimo rolled up their windows as the transport raced down the hill. The men in front parted, firing at the vehicle in a fruitless attempt to stop it.
“Mommy!” Star screamed, frightened by the shouting, gesticulating men and the projectiles colliding with the body of the transport.
One of the scavengers, braver or dumber than the rest, stood his ground, a shotgun leveled at the SEAL.
Blade deliberately mowed the shotgun-wielder over, ramming the scavenger at the same instant the man fired. Carpenter’s scientists had performed their tasks, had met his rigid specifications, with remarkable precision; even at point-blank range, the shotgun pellets were unable to penetrate the impervious plastic shell comprising the SEAL’s outer surface. The scavenger, however, was not as indestructible. The front grill of the transport caught him in the chest and caved it in, his ribs folding in upon themselves. For the fleetest moment, the scavenger was airborne, his face pressed against the windshield, his mouth gaping in silent horror at his untimely fate. Then his body slipped under the SEAL, his shoulders angling to the left, and the asphalt clutched his bouncing form and hurtled him under the front tire. His head was immediately pulverized in a spray of flesh and crimson.