Read War World X: Takeover for Free Online

help you identify those, and so can other friends of mine. Warn the settlers not to take them in. If they can’t reach Hell’s-A-Comin’ let them make boats and move out onto the river.
    “Fourth, make some well-disguised escape tunnels. There’s always the possibility that you’ll need them. Mark paths not only to your own outlying farms but to settlers’ farms as well, and make sure to keep the good will of those settlers.
    “Fifth—”
    Charles Castell listened attentively, but his face grew bleaker and older with every word.
    Wilgar listened even more intently, eyes wide in fascination.

     
    Kennicott Camp One, or Kenny-Camp as it was more commonly called, had a company dock, a company office-building, company sheds, company housing and a company store, and everything else was a jerrybuilt slum. The open-pit hafnium mine lay a quarter-mile back from the river, a shameless eyesore with the machines always busy in it: diggers, belts and pumps constantly serviced by the indentured “wage-slaves.” Beside it lay the huge artificial mountain of the mine-tailings, being worked by ragged free miners. Beyond it, in the bare hills above the forest, were the numerous man-made caves of the shimmer stone prospectors.
    Van Damm frowned at the scene as Makhno made the Celia fast at the dock, then turned to DeCastro. “I hope you can make a living from company scrip,” he said. “It is plain that there is little else here but barter.”
    “I will happily deal in whatever my customers can pay,” said DeCastro with a smile, as he watched his personnel pull the barge close to the dock. “Besides, the minerals which the company machines cast off can include surprising riches. Do you see that rather shabby assayer’s office there?” He pointed. “I have it on good authority that respectable amounts of gold, silver and copper have come through its doors.”
    “To say nothing of crude iron,” Van Damm murmured, fixing the location firmly in his memory.
    “They have their own smelter,” added Makhno, giving Van Damm a significant glance. “We’ll be dropping in there, soon.”
    “Please, senores , assist my companions to unload the barge while I go to seek suitable lodgings for my enterprise.” DeCastro hauled himself up onto the dock, automatically patting the filled holster on his hip and cast a calculating look around the near buildings.
    “I’ll come with you,” said Van Damm, climbing up on the dock beside him. “This does not look like a town where it is safe for a man to walk alone.”
    “Very well,” shrugged DeCastro, looking away.
    Makhno, watching as the two of them strolled down the dock, judged that Vanny was safe on his own, then turned his attention to unloading the raft and barge. DeCastro’s hirelings, he noted—even the women—worked as if they were used to it. By the time Van Damm and DeCastro returned, dragging a handcart, everything was unloaded on the dock and the personnel of the former Golden Parrot were sitting on the assorted crates passing a canteen around.
    “Found a good spot, did you?” asked Makhno, eyeing the handcart.
    “Most excellent.” DeCastro snapped his fingers at his hirelings, who got up and began loading the crates on the handcart. “These hills are honeycombed with man-made caves, and I’ve obtained a small one for an excellent price.”
    “For free, to be exact.” Van Damm smiled briefly. “Nobody was using it. The place seems to have a bad reputation.”
    “We shall change that.” DeCastro smiled. “Come, mi compadres : let us load and move quickly. Chaco, you stay here and wait with the second load. Inez, bring the ladies and personal gear. Move! Move!”
    It took half an hour for the personnel of the Golden Parrot to fill the handcart and move out. Chaco sat on a crate in the barge and pulled out the canteen again. Assorted passersby glanced at the barge, glanced at Makhno on the raft, and kept walking.
    “I see that the people here know you,” Van