Read Deathlands 117: Desolation Angels for Free Online

even with the Python’s tendency to overpenetrate. At least two people fired back, and Ricky and Jak had to duck hastily as chips of concrete flew from the corner.
    Shots were fired from up the street, too close to be the original pursuers—they had to come from Ryan and company. Ricky bent to avoid making his head a ripe target by poking it out where it had been before and risked a quick look at the enemy.
    Their pursuers were picking themselves up off the street and racing back for the far side. They left only two of their comrades lying there: the rifleman Ryan had shot and the runner Ricky got.
    Their five friends pelted by, turning up the same street they had.
    “Better move along,” J.B. called in passing. “The first bunch got themselves sorted out, and they’re not happy!”
    Ricky and Jak looked at each other and grinned. Then they headed out after the others as J.B. fired a quick burst back the way he’d come, then pivoted to loose another across the street.
    * * *
    A S R ICKY AND Jak moved on, J.B. took station against the textured gray wall a few steps down the street. He held his Uzi ready. No new targets presented themselves immediately, from either the original pursuers storming out the front entrance after them or the new set from the giant building’s far end. He knew they wouldn’t stay out of play for long.
    Ryan ran past him, turned and knelt, bringing up his Steyr.
    “Into the garage!” he shouted.
    J.B. promptly wheeled right and trotted toward the entrance. It was wide, meant to allow two-lane access for cars going in and out of the parking structure. He slung his Uzi and took up his shotgun.
    Jak slipped in first. He still had his Python in one white fist, which looked like a child’s compared to the big blaster. Concern was written all over his pinched features.
    Ricky waited beside the open bay, clutching his DeLisle and peering uneasily inside. Krysty, Mildred and Doc stood in the street, out of direct line of the wide door, covering the street and the bluish building across it. They kept their handblasters ready.
    Unspoken but obvious—even to J.B., who didn’t take hints—was that they weren’t any more anxious to plunge into the depths of the garage than Ricky was.
    “Back me up,” J.B. told his apprentice as he went by. He entered the building without waiting to see if Ricky followed. He would.
    The Armorer took a step to his left to clear the fatal funnel of the doorway. Nothing good could come from standing there silhouetted by the bright daylight. While his eyes adjusted, he covered the interior with his M4000 held almost but not quite at shoulder level, ready to whip the rest of the way up at the first sign of trouble.
    Jak squatted next to a thick pillar that supported the next level. In the daylight that filtered in through the building’s open sides J.B. saw lots of humped shapes—cars stalled by the Big Nuke and left here to rot. Some had been torn open by scavvies. In places he could make out what looked like piles of fiberglass body panels that had been torn off by industrious scavengers looking to reclaim the metal frames.
    J.B. wondered why they hadn’t been far more thoroughly mined out. A colony as populous as the big ruin looked to be could always find uses for that much steel and other metal, either for itself or as valuable trade goods. They could also muster the manpower to cut up even heavy frames by hand into chunks small enough to haul away.
    “Keep moving,” Ryan said. “Out the other side and right.”
    The others were already inside the building. Ryan fired a couple quick blasts out the way they had come, though glancing back J.B. could see no targets. Evidently the one-eyed man was just reminding their pursuers of the possible consequences of sticking their noses around the corner to peer in after their prey.
    J.B. doubted it would discourage them. For long, anyway. But he knew Ryan’s mind and realized the idea was to keep them off everybody’s