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branches brushing against him, creaking and cracking under the weight of the mighty saurian.
He had not a scintilla of doubt where he was.
This was the lair of the beast, the place where either he or the gator would die.
THREE HUNDRED YARDS AWAY, Krysty stood on the edge of the swamp, ankle deep in mud. She
was soaking wet, clothes torn, streaked with the dark slime of the bayou. In her right hand was the empty
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Deathlands 29 - Bloodlines
Smith amp; Wesson 640, pointing to the dirt. Her fiery hair was dull, matted to her skull, like a cap of
spun copper. Her vivid emerald eyes were wide with shock, her face as pale as Sierra snow. A vivid patch
of bright blood was smeared across her forehead.
Her lips were moving slowly as she talked to herself. But you would have needed to be very close to
catch a single whispered word.
"Great Gaia and all the Earth powers, help Ryan. Spare him for his courage. Mother Sonja, wherever you
are, aid him to survive against the monster. Don't let him die to let me live. Couldn't bear that. Rather die
myself if he's really gone. Please, oh please, oh please"
Standing alone in the fading light, Krysty began to cry helplessly.
RYAN LET GO of the gator's body, easing himself away, reaching up with his left hand to try to gauge
something of the proportions of the den. He was standing waist deep in the water. The roof of mud was
less than four feet above him, and one end seemed to be filled with a nest of branches and rotting bones.
He could hear the reptile breathing, heavy and harsh, close by, making the piggish snuffling that he'd
heard as it had grabbed Krysty.
"You there, lover?" he said cautiously.
His voice was flat and dead.
"Lover?"
There was no answer.
Krysty had either escaped before they plunged deep into the bayou, or she was lying within reach of him.
Unconscious? Dead?
It crossed his mind to risk using the SIG-Sauer. The immersion in water shouldn't have affected the sturdy
mechanism. It wasn't like one of the fragile cap-and-ball pistols that were still found around Deathlands.
But there was an overwhelming risk that he would only wound the creature, driving it into a maddened
rage. Standing there, blind, Ryan knew he would have absolutely no chance at all.
No. It had to be the panga and it had to be the closest of contact.
The thrust with the needle-sharp point of the eighteen-inch blade had been shrewdly struck. He knew that,
had felt it drive deep, grating between ribs, into the intestines. For all Ryan knew, it could have been a
mortal wound and the gator would be lying there, life ebbing.
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Deathlands 29 - Bloodlines
"Come on," he breathed, bracing himself for a flurry of movement from the mutie saurian. But it was still.
The water lapped around Ryan.
He took a careful half step forward, feeling with his combat boots for as solid a footing as he could find.
Both hands were stretched out in front of him as he inched toward the noise of breathing, a noise that
grew markedly faster and louder as the man moved across the subterranean den.
"Where the fuck are you, bastard?"
The water was growing a little more shallow. Ryan felt something brush the top of his head and winced,
reaching up to find that the ceiling was becoming lower, as well.
The attack came without warning.
The power and size of the creature was unbelievable, throwing Ryan back off his feet, nearly knocking
the panga from his hand. The jaws, fully six feet long, snapped at him, gripping across his upper chest,
crushing his lungs so that breathing became instantly impossible.
But it was the murderous accuracy of the gator that gave Ryan his chance. Now he knew precisely where
it was, and his blindness was no longer a handicap.
He had the free use of his right arm, and he brought the panga around and forced it between the jaws,
feeling teeth splinter and snap. He turned his wrist, so that the keen edge of the steel sliced at the inside of
the monster's jaws and tongue.
The grip relaxed for a moment and there was a loud exhalation of breath, almost like a shriek. The gator
backed off, hurt by the panga, but Ryan wasn't going to let the creature get away.
He followed it through the foaming water, churned up by the gator's rage and pain.
As he advanced, Ryan swung the panga, twice feeling the satisfying jar run up his arm as it struck solidly
home on flesh and gristle.
His left hand touched the gator on the foreleg, enabling him to work out precisely where the beast was
lying. He threw himself on it, one arm clamping around the murderous jaws, holding them shut. Despite
the straining efforts of the reptile to open its jaws and savage him, Ryan held fast.
It was a piece of lore that he'd learned from Trader. Even the biggest of saurians was helpless once you
closed its jaws and held them shut. They were incredibly powerful when it came to their snapping shut on
anyone, but surprisingly feeble when it came to trying to open them.
Trader had told Ryan that at least a dozen years ago, and he'd remembered it.
And it was true.
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Deathlands 29 - Bloodlines
Pinning the beast down, Ryan was free to use the panga against its throat and underbelly, where the scales
were much thinner. He used all of his strength, gasping out with the effort of each stabbing blow.
"Die fucker die fuckin' die."
The gator wriggled harder, its legs kicking out great chunks of the muddy walls of its lair. It bounced
Ryan against the ceiling, almost crushing him. But he held his grip and continued to hack at the creature.
It felt like it was going to try to dive out under the water to the open bayou, but seemed to change its mind
at the last moment.
The mutie's movements seemed to be getting slower and less violent. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]