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should they reach Eden and take on such opponents as would be there, he brought along a set of Greek garroting chains.
    Archer was of course well armed—he even slept with his special homemade steel crossbow cradled in his arms. Rock knew he carried a grab bag of good weapons under those multiple smelly bearskins he wore. The bearded mountain man had, for one thing, lengths of rope and steel cable. He liked to combine his arrows and these cords for grappling purposes—or just to lasso some unfortunate enemy. Over his shoulder on a ratty leather strap, he wore a knapsack full of ancient musket weapons all loaded with grape-shot and nails.
    Chen of course carried sixteen explosive and forty non-explosive shuriken. He also carried a yarawa stick—for jabbing pressure points—and a set of nunchaku.
    Detroit Green carried twin bandoliers of grenades strapped across his brawny chest. Also, a set of throwing blades. Plus an ancient western Colt .45 Rock had given him on his birthday.
    McCaughlin was the one with the power-brass knuckles. It added to the force of his fists; the explosive-bolt knuckles would do what the crushing power of his massive shoulders wouldn’t do to a door or wall or person. The big trail cook also had taken to carrying a boomerang—he had been taught its use by a friendly Australian comrade some time ago.
    Rona carried her crossbow of aluminum and a quiver of arrows. Lighter than Archer’s heavy homemade weapon of steel and wood, yet deadly. Rona Wallender’s arrows were tipped with poisons. Lots of different poisons. Plus she carried her “lady’s weapon”—a tiny derringer-type pistol with .22 bullets in a handle clip. Bullets tipped with poison too.
    Scheransky carried the Russian weapons of choice—the bludgeon, plus a Dragunov sniper rifle and the laser-honed short sword in his belt.
    Thus armed, the Freefighters could take on platoons of Soviet special forces. And they might have to, Rockson thought. They might just have to do just that . . . For America was crawling with the Soviet invaders.
    “Too bad we can’t take along a tank,” McCaughlin joked as the loaded sleds and their earnest drivers waited for the steel doors to open to the outside world of terror.
    “Yeah,” Rockson quipped, “or a few pieces of artillery. Snow or no snow, I doubt the Soviets have stopped patrolling the area between here and Mexico. They like winter, right, Scheransky?”
    “Indubitably, Russians like winter. Why, in Moscow, we even eat ice cream in weather like this . . .” Scheransky said.
    “Make mine tutti-frutti,” said Detroit. “Look, the sun is out.”
    It was out. The door slid open to reveal a clear day. There was a pleasant pink-ocher sunrise sending multiple beams of light up over the craggy ice-laden peaks of the Rocky Mountains to the east.
    “Red sky in morning, sailor take warning . . .” Rockson muttered.
    “What did you say?” Detroit yelled over the din of the eager wolf-dogs.
    “The weather could change for the worse soon,” Rock rephrased.
    Archer slid his sled right past the Doomsday Warrior’s the minute the three teams of six dogs each had gotten out on the slope heading down from Carson Mountain. The damned dogs obeyed his every mutter. Perhaps it was his smell that ingratiated the big mountainman to the dogs, Rock thought. Whatever it was, Archer was the only one who didn’t have to use a whip on the beasts to steer them.
    Those Freefighters who weren’t driving the sleds rode alongside, tethered by rope, sliding along on their short steel skis. Danik was apparently having a ball on his skis, despite very little training in their use. He slid up alongside Rockson and said, “The sunrise is so beautiful. So many colors. It’s sad my friends are not here to see us and this beautiful day.”
    “Just a typical sunrise,” Rock smiled, “Evidently you like the surface world.”
    “Yes, it is most fascinating and beautiful.”
    For hours they traversed country Rock