***
A few days later, the four surviving bikers entered the lowlands toting large backpacks and an assortment of weapons. Two battered women followed, also carrying heavy loads. The girls clung together a short distance from the men.
“Hang in there, Susie,” Pam whispered. “We’ll get through this somehow.”
She looked off into the barren landscape and her brave words fell flat. Who out here could possibly help them?
“The air smells crappy,” Bill said. “Maybe we should go back up a ways.”
“Naw,” Brad said, “if I have to spend another day up there, I’ll go bat shit.
He clapped Bill on the shoulder.
“Everybody’s got to go sometime, eh?”
“You’re fucking A right!” Tom chimed in.
“Okay then,” Brad said. “First order of business is to find some transportation.”
The group proceeded down the road, off to God only knew what deviltry.
12. The Road Unwinds
The days blurred past for Winston and Star as they retraced the route they’d taken to Pickle Lake Castle months earlier. Things went much smoother this time under the protection of the bird umbrella and with the guard detail of Iridium and the mech wolves bringing up the rear.
They passed the same derelict towns, the same pile ups of abandoned motor vehicles; dust devils still howled. But the countryside was definitely less barren than before. Green or fresh were not adjectives that came to mind to describe the landscape, but to an experienced optical sensor, the battle for biological life seemed to be turning a corner for the better.
Had Winston and Star been human, they might have exalted in their progress, taken pride in their strengthening muscles. But they had already been in peak condition whey they’d started the journey. All that concerned them was that their mechanical parts would hold up to the stress of constant motion – which they did, gratifyingly well.
Star had been constructed of top-grade components from the beginning, and Winston’s various upgrades had moved him beyond the frail scholar model robot he’d started out to be. Dr. Horvath’s financial resources had not been adequate to fund a robust physical plant to match Winston’s great intellect. But the situation had largely been overcome, now that money was no longer an object.
Winston came to not mind the seemingly endless hours on the road, so long as Star led the way – her graceful body controlling the scooter on the downward runs, her hips swaying as she walked, the occasional backward glance she would send his way ...
The mad rush of power he’d experienced as mayor had worn off, replaced by other priorities – Star priorities. He began to wonder what it would be like to possess the sensuous form gliding along ahead of him, how a physical coupling with her might feel. Could a ‘heaven on earth’ really exist, as Star claimed?
He tried to put such notions out of his mind, however. The mission they were on could not possibly succeed. Winston knew that well, but he would rather have been permanently deactivated than shatter Star’s illusions. Brutal reality would do that soon enough.
At night, the mech birds formed themselves into a heap and assumed inactive mode en masse. Iridium shared watch duty with Winston and Star. The two mech wolves – Fang and Ripper Winston had named them in ‘honor’ of the wolves once assigned to him by Fascista Ultimo – remained on hair trigger alert, ready to snap back into active mode at the slightest provocation.
The original Fang and Ripper had been torn apart by Iridium to open their escape route from Mech City. Hopefully, things would turn out better for their replacements.
The blackness was less silent now. The whirs and chirps of insect life forms populated it, along with the occasional sound of little animals moving through the weeds. The world seemed to be stirring awake from its long nightmare, and its faint pulse was most detectable in the nocturnal hours.
They passed through the devastated region of bomb craters with hardly a pause. The collapsed bridge over the river near King Vicente Towne barely slowed their progress, mech birds simply carried them over the deep chasm. Fang and Ripper were terrified at the prospect of being hoisted by mech birds, and only strong coercion from Iri got them to cooperate.