Winter Duty (Vampire Earth #8)

Winter Duty (Vampire Earth #8) Page 13

Ravies.

One of the most terrifying weapons in the Kurian Order's arsenal is the disease that makes man revert to a howling beast, a lizard brain seeking to kill, feed, and, yes, sometimes even procreate.

How they remove all the higher brain functions, leaving the lower full of savage cunning and reckless determination, only their elite scientists would be able to say.

The fear of a ravies outbreak is one way of keeping their human herds in line. There's such a thing as civilizational memory, and the human strata of the Kurian Order have been taught that only timely arrival of help from Kur stemmed the howling tide that threatened to wash away mankind in the red-number year of 2022. They instinctively know that without the protection of the towers, the screamers might return.

Anyone who's heard the dive-bomber wail of a ravies victim in full cry has the unhappy privilege of hearing it repeated in nightmares for years to come.

Of course in the Freeholds, they know that ravies is just another Kurian trick up one of the sleeves of a determined and ruthless creature with more limbs than can be easily counted on a living specimen.

Folk remedies abound, all of them nearly useless. A bucket of ice-cold water is said to distract a sufferer long enough for you to make an escape. If you suck a wound clean while chewing real mint gum mixed with pieces of pickled ginger, onion, and garlic, you'll never catch an infection from a bite. Pregnant women are naturally immune-this particular canard leads to all manner of bizarre remedies as others seek the mystic benefits, from drinking breast milk to pouring umbilical cord blood into a fresh wound. And, of course, that the only sure way to stop a ravies sufferer from getting at you is to shoot them in the head.

Of course, anyone who's ever emptied a magazine into the center mass of an oncoming screamer knows that they go down and stay down when suffering sucking chest wounds, cardiac damage, or traumatic blood loss.

No, the only facts absolutely known about ravies is that it is a disease that affects brain tissue and the nervous system. Sufferers don't feel any pain and are hyperaware, ravenous, and irritable, and if they are startled or provoked, they will try to rend and bite the source into submission and an easy meal. Heart rate and blood pressure both increase. Most brain-wave patterns decrease, save for the delta, the wave most associated with dreams, and beta, which increases during anxiety or intense concentration.

Many wonder why the Kurians, usually so careful with lives and the aura that might be harvested, allow whole populations to be reduced by the disease.

David Valentine had two theories. One is that ravies encounters shocked and wore down professional military types-no one enjoys gunning down children and preteens who, under ideal conditions, could be easily kept away with a walking stick or a riot shield until they drop from exhaustion. It took David Valentine months to quit hearing the screams in his sleep following his first encounter with ravies near the Red River in 2065. The other is that sufferers were harvested like everyone else in the Kurian Order, with the disease simply adding flavor to the aura thanks to the unknown tortures of body and mind.

Stuck was right, as it turned out. There weren't many cases in town. As they switched vehicles for refueling from the trailer, only one more ravie attacked, and Frat brought her down with a clean head shot.

They prepared to leave the mill once there was full daylight.

"We're going to try to keep moving to make it back to Fort Seng without another stop," Valentine told the assembled vehicle chiefs in the mill. "We'll take on rescues of anyone alongside the road until the vehicles are at capacity."

"Isn't that dangerous, sir?" Chieftain asked. "They might be bit. And if we lose a vehicle, who'll end up walking if there's no excess capacity?"

"And what about that kid?" Silvertip put in. "He's been bit."

"He's in Boneyard, with his mother and Doc keeping an eye on him," Valentine said. "At the moment he's not symptomatic, not even trembling, so the iodine may have got it or Southern Command's last year's vaccination may work against this strain. In any case, they'll keep him sedated. As for rescues, if we lose a vehicle, we'll travel overloaded and chance the fine."

One or two got the joke and laughed.

"One more thing: Let's break out the winter camouflage. We're still soldiers, and we still have eyes in the sky watching us and enemies to fight."

The winter camouflage was mostly old bedsheets and fancy table-cloths cut into ponchos, and extra felt that could be wrapped around your shins and tied with twine to create extrawarm gaiters.

Valentine changed the route order. Bushmaster would go first in order to clear drifts. Rover would follow, and then Boneyard and Chuckwagon brought up the rear. The two Southern Command Bears would ride in the Chuckwagon, as they'd most likely be attacked from the rear by ravies running on foot-Valentine had never heard of a ravie driving.

They wouldn't use the motorcycles at all, not with the snow and this strain of ravies that could leap the way they'd seen at the mill gate. Longshot volunteered to ride in the open atop Bushmaster so she could stand up and look over drifts, but Valentine told her to keep warm out of the wind.

So they pulled out. Valentine chalked a rough mile marker of empty circles on one of the roof struts of Rover. Every ten miles, he'd mark one off.

As they pulled out of Grand Junction and made it back to the old federal highway, he filled in the first of the twelve circles.

Three circles filled.

With room in Rover thanks to Mrs. O'Coombe being in Boneyard, Brother Mark now rode shotgun and Boelnitz, desirous of keeping away from Stuck, crammed himself into the backmost seat. Valentine sat behind Habanero so he could consult his maps and speak into the driver's ear, Duvalier next to him.

The snowfall had stopped, but the wind still threw up enough snow to make visibility bad and kept the convoy to less than five miles an hour.

The heavy cloud cover made for gloomy thoughts.

"Anything from the A-o-K on the radio?" Valentine asked as Habanero worked buttons to tune it.

"No, sir. Got some CB, just some lady looking for her man. Says she's scared."

"Take her position and tell her we'll report her if we can get in touch with anyone," Valentine said.

While Habanero spoke on the radio, Duvalier nudged in closer to him.

"I wonder if this is it for Kentucky, then. How widespread is the virus, do you think? Think they hit the Republics too?" Duvalier asked.

"If it's a tough new strain, seems a waste not to do as much damage as you can. Either way, Southern Command needs to know it's here. Any luck with the radio?" Valentine asked Habanero.

"Maybe atmospherics are just bad," Habanero said.

"What do you mean, if this is it?" Brother Mark said, balling his fists on the dash. "Kentucky survived the ravies plague in 2022 when nobody knew what was happening. They'll survive this. People are more prepared for this sort of crisis now."

Valentine looked at mile markers on the truck top. "Someone told me once that the Kurians were handling both sides of this war, and if they ever became really worried about us, they'd just wipe us out."

Brother Mark sighed. "Of all people, Valentine, I'm surprised you would consider such nonsense. Why would they want the Freeholds? We run guns into the Kurian Zones, broadcast news, and give people a safe place to run to, if they get away. They can't want that."

"I don't know," Valentine said. "Having a war going on can be handy. You can blame shortages on it, deaths, tell folks that the reason the days of milk and honey are a long way off is because there's a war to be won first. And its a convenient place to send ambitious, restive men who might otherwise challenge Kur."

Brother Mark locked his knuckles against each other. "I don't think so. Unless they are keeping it even from the Church. I rose fairly high before my soul fought back against my interest, and many times I handled communications for my Archon. I saw nothing to indicate that was true."

"Maybe they wouldn't trust such an important detail to written communications."

"There are five-year plenaries attended by a majority of Archons from around the world. None but the Archons attend. They depart with masses of facts and figures-not that the thick binders of data do them much good; you cannot trust the statistics of a functionary whose life depends on pleasing the boss with the totals in a report. But when the Archons return, there are sometimes a few promotions or a new Church construction project-ordinary activities."

"I wouldn't mind dropping in on one of those and changing the agenda," Valentine said. He glanced at his map again. Two more miles and he could fill in another circle. "Where are they held?"

"The location is held secret until the last minute. Probably because of vigorous, ambitious young men such as yourself with similar ideas."

Valentine always smiled inside at Brother Mark's description of him as a wet-behind-the-ears kid.

"Let me see. . . . Since I entered the Church it has been held at Paris, Cairo, Bahrain, Rome, and Rio de Janeiro. Not that there aren't important churchmen from Indonesia or middle Africa or the subcontinent; I believe the Archons simply like to see a few sights and shop."

They saw their share of sights on the drive, descending from the Mississippi plateau in central Kentucky.

Valentine would rather not have seen any of them, and it took a while for him to forget them.

As the wind died down and it turned into a still winter day, they saw smudges on the horizon, barns and houses and whole blocks of towns burning.

They saw cars and trucks with doors torn off and windshields punched in, blood splattered on the upholstery and panels.

The column passed huddled figures along the side of the road, sitting in meager shelter afforded by ruins of houses and ancient, rusted shells of cars and trucks. Many of them had frozen to death, fleeing God-knew-what blind in the night. When the column saw a figure floundering in the snow, waving its arms, they slowed and shouted. If it shouted back in English, they let them climb into the back of the Chuckwagon.

If not . . .

Target practice, Chieftain called it.

For the ravies, the snow worked against them.

Valentine tried to turn his mind off, not think about the future. The old Kurian trick might just work again. If that armored column massing outside Owensboro came into Kentucky and plunged into the heartland of the state-and the Kentucky Alliance-bringing order by killing off the diseased and dangerous, the Kur might just be hailed as heroes. At the very least they'd have little difficulty seizing key road junctions, towns, and rail lines. The disease-ravaged A-o-K wouldn't be in any kind of shape to contest the matter.

His own command would be hounded out of the state, and Southern Command, instead of having a quietly neutral bunch of legworm ranchers, would have a full-fledged enemy with access to some hard-to-stop cavalry.

Five circles filled in . . .

"I think I've got a Kentucky contact, sir. Major Valentine, they're asking for you by name. You know somebody called Ankle?"

Ahn-Kha! Even Duvalier bolted awake.

Valentine put on a pair of earphones and cursed when they wouldn't adjust fast enough.

He heard his friend's deep, slightly rubbery tones speaking: " . . . very short of ammunition. Before I lost contact with friends in the Shenandoah, I was told they had military roadblocks in all the principal passes, and there were reports of aircraft flying in the mountains."

"How are you, Old Horse?" Valentine asked, his throat tight.

"My David, can it be that you are caught up in this too?"

"Afraid so. What's your status?"

"It goes . . . hard, my David. There are so few of us left. I sent some of the men away so they could see to their homes and families. I only hope I did not delay too long. We are-Well, best not to say too much over the radio. But a good-bye may be in order."

For Ahn-Kha, always quick to make light of burdens, to talk like this, it turned everything behind Valentine's stomach muscles into a solid block of ice.

"Don't draw attention to yourself. They seem to be drawn by light and noise," Valentine said. "You haven't been bitten, have you?"

Static came back, or maybe the Golden One was laughing and shaking the mike. "Oh, yes, many times. Fortunately I seem to be immune. I wish I could say the same for the rest of my brave men. I will not say more. We have made some hard choices, hard decisions, and more hard decisions are coming. As you said, we too are aware that they are drawn to sudden sounds and sharp flashes and-" His words were lost to static. Habanero adjusted the dial. "We've used blasting explosives to try to draw them up into the mountains, away from our populations. We have, perhaps, been too successful. One might walk across the throng using heads like paving stones. Excuse me, there is some commotion. I must sign off."

"Good luck," Valentine said, wishing for once he had Sime's tongue for a phrase worthy of his old friend.

Valentine watched Boelnitz, an earpiece for the radio in one ear, writing furiously and transcribing the Grog's words.

"Who's writing this passage? Pencil Boelnitz or Cooper Llewellyn?" Valentine asked.

"I don't know, Major. All I can do is try to be accurate about what I'm hearing."

"I hope you're getting it right, sir. That's the hulking, hairy-handed killer I know," Valentine said.

Boelnitz drew away, pencil trembling. Valentine realized he was snarling.

Seven circles filled in . . .

They were getting closer to the Ohio now. The land became less hilly and was filled with more old farms. Someone sprayed the column with gunfire as they passed. It caused no casualties, but Valentine wondered if the person shot because he or she suspected they were from the Northwest Ordnance, or if they shot because they suspected they were Southern Command.

Out of the hills, the drifts grew less and less and finally disappeared entirely. The snow hadn't been as heavy in this part of Kentucky. Valentine put Rover back at the head of the column, but the ice patches were still treacherous.

"Major, Doc says we should pull over," Habanero said, acknowledging a signal. Valentine had taken his headset off so he could think about Ahn-Kha.

"Why?" But Valentine could guess.

"He wants you to look at Rockaway."

Valentine didn't want to stop for anything. "He's symptomatic?"

"Doc just wants to pull over."

Valentine signaled for a stop. Everyone took the opportunity to get out and hit the honeybuckets.

Valentine went to the Boneyard. The nurse silently opened the rear hatch. A red-eyed Mrs. O'Coombe nodded to him, her Bible stuck in her lap, a finger marking her place.

"Well, Doc?" Valentine asked.

He shook his head. "He's symptomatic. Starting to shake."

"You have him sedated?"

"Yes," the nurse said.

"What's the usual medical procedure for ravies?" Valentine said.

Doc sighed. "Ninety percent of the time, they're quietly eutha nized. Some are kept around to try various kinds of experimental medications. They don't feel pain, from what we can tell by brain-wave function and glandular response. Oh, and early cases are important for study to develop a vaccine. That's where the booster shots come from. Too bad he missed this last series, issue date October. We should have thought to bring some."

"I want you to end this, Mister Valentine," Mrs. O'Coombe said.

"End this?" Valentine asked.

"I can't watch him suffer."

"He's not suffering, is he, Doc?"

Doc agreed, "Not while the sedatives hold out. Even when they wear off, provided we can keep him in the bed, I'm not sure suffering is the right word for what he'll be going through."

Valentine wondered how much of the patriotic, Bible-reading charity act of Mrs. O'Coombe was real. With Keve Rockaway/ O'Coombe dead, she'd own the vast ranch her husband had built.

"Any decision about your son's health I'll leave to the Doc."

Doc said, "I work for her ladyship, I'll remind you, Valentine."

"A rich woman outranks the Hippocratic oath?" Valentine asked.

"Major," Doc said. "Please. I'm in no hurry. I'm just wondering if I'll still have a job if I ever make it back to the Hooked O-C."

"Do what you can, Doc," Valentine said. "Anything else?"

"One more thing, Major," Doc said. He took out a little powder blue case. "In my younger days, before I settled down to bring babies into the world and plaster broken bones and dig bullets out, I was a researcher.

"This is a perfectly ordinary piece of medical technology from fifty years back. Nowadays I use it for interesting butterfly pupae and leaves. It instantly freezes and preserves, like liquid nitrogen without all the fuss and bother.

"I've been taking samples of Keve's blood as the disease progressed to see how his body's fighting it, and to see just how the ravies virus is attacking and changing him. It could be useful to Southern Command in developing a serum for a vaccination." He handed the case to Valentine.

"I'll get it back across the Mississippi as soon as I can," Valentine said.

Mrs. O'Coombe caressed her son's head.

"Keep an eye on her, Doc," Valentine said.

"Understood." Doc lowered his voice. "In all honesty, Major, she does love her son. She loved all her sons. Deep down, I think she was really trying to get him back home, but make it his idea."

Valentine stepped out of Boneyard. "Hey, Major," he heard one of the Wolves call. "There's a plane flying around north of here a few miles. Two-engine job. Looks kind of like it's circling."

Valentine wondered if the plane was part of Jack in the Box's operation. How did he fit in with the divine judgment of war, famine, disease, and death to Kentucky?

Which reminded him. He called Frat over. "Frat, how are you on a motorcycle?"

"Decent, sir. I used one to get around in Kansas."

"I want you to courier something important back to Fort Seng for us. And, if necessary, get it all the way back to the Mississippi-but that'll be for Colonel Lambert to decide."

"I don't want to leave you in the middle of this mess," Frat said.

"You'll do as I ask, Lieutenant. If you want to be addressed as captain in a week, that is."

"Captain!" Frat grinned.

"A platoon of Wolves this far outside Southern Command is supposed to have a captain in charge. I hope you'll be it."

"Not as easy as it sounds. But we should get a sample back to Southern Command as soon as possible."

They gave Stuck's big motorcycle to Frat. Frat grabbed his rifle and his bag and very carefully put Doc's sample freezer in a hard case. Doc added a final blood sample and a note before packing it on the bike.

Valentine shook Frat's hand, and the young man tied a scarf around his face. "I'll get it through, sir."

Valentine wondered just where that Ordnance armored column was. Their own vehicles would be simple target practice for a real-

"Frat, even if we don't get through, these blood samples need to. They're more important to Southern Command than everything in this convoy."

"Understood, sir."

He watched the youth rumble off, trying not to think of his own misadventures as a courier. Maybe somewhere on the road Frat would meet another capable young teen, the way Valentine had long ago met Frat. Part of being in service was helping train talented young people to take your place.

By the time Frat had left, the plane had taken off too, flying back to the north-probably across the Ohio in just a few minutes.

Valentine tried to raise Fort Seng to inform Lambert that Frat was on the way, but he couldn't make contact. With one more thing to worry about, Valentine returned to Rover and put the convoy in motion again.

"See if you can find a road turning north," he told Habanero. "I'd like to see what that plane is up to."

"Looks like a flea market that broke up quick," Duvalier said.

Valentine wouldn't forget the sight of the body field as long as he lived.

Even as an old man he'd remember details, be able to traverse the gentle slopes dotted with briar thickets, stepping from body to body.

You had to choose route and footing if you didn't want to step on some child.

Judging from the injuries and old bloodstains on the bodies, these were ravies victims. Some had torn or missing clothes, and all had the haggard, thin-skinned look of someone in the grip of the raving madness.

"What killed them, Doc?" Valentine asked.

"My guess is some kind of nerve agent. That accounts for some of the grotesque posing. Whatever it was, it happened quickly." He knelt to look at a body. "Notice anything funny about these?" Doc asked.

"There's nothing funny in this field," Duvalier said.

"Strange, then. Look at the ravies," Doc said.

Valentine had a tough time looking close. This was like peeping into a Nazi gas chamber. Though he felt a bit of a hypocrite; he would have turned the Bushmaster's cannon on them if they'd been attacking his vehicles.

"I don't-" Duvalier said.

"The hair," Doc said. "Ears, chins, eyebrows, arm hair. Worse on the men than the women, but everyone but the kids are showing very rapid body hair growth. A side effect of this strain of ravies, perhaps?"

Valentine let the doctor keep chattering. Valentine wondered where the pilot of the little twin-engined plane was now. Enjoying a cup of coffee at an airstrip, while his plane is being refueled?

"I don't think they really knew what was happening," Doc said. "Ravies does cloud the mind a bit."

"Wolves found something interesting, sir," Chieftain reported, looking at a deerskin-clad arm waving them over.

The vehicle tracks were easy to find and, sadly, easier to follow. They stood at the center of the field, in an empty space like a little doughnut hole surrounded by bodies.

"Okay, they drove in, or the ravies found them here," Doc said. "Then when the ravies were good and tight around the vehicle, those inside slaughtered them all in a matter of minutes."

"This one was still twitching," Valentine said, looking at a victim who'd left gouges in the turf. "I think he tried to crawl toward the truck."

Chieftain said, "Maybe it was a field bakery van or a chuck wagon. Food, you think? Baskets of fresh bread hanging off it? They look hungry."

"Ravies does that," Doc said. "You get ravenous. It's a hard virus on the system. The body's usual defense mechanisms-fatigue, nausea-that discourage activity during hunger are overridden."

Valentine wondered what could attract such throngs of ravies, yet keep them from tearing whatever made those tracks to bits. His own column would probably have need of such a gimmick before they returned to Fort Seng.

Nine circles filled in . . .

Maybe it was the sun in their eyes as they drove west. Maybe it was error caused by driver fatigue. Maybe it was the speed. Valentine was anxious to move fast-there was less snow on the ground, and they had a chance to be back at Fort Seng that night.

They dipped as they passed under a railroad bridge, much overgrown, and suddenly there were ravies on either side of them and the headlights of a big armored car before them.

It wasn't an equal contest. Rover folded against the old Brinks truck like a cardboard box hitting a steamroller.

When the stars began to fade from Valentine's eyes, he heard angelic strings playing. For a moment, he couldn't decide if he was hallucinating or ascending to a very unoriginal, badly lit, bare-bones heaven.

Valentine looked out the spiderwebbed window and saw tattered ravies all around, cocking their heads, milling, either working themselves up to an attack or calming down after one.

Then he saw the big armored car, and it all came back to him.

The music was coming from the armored car. Chopin or someone like him.

Valentine prodded Habanero, but it would take more than a friendly tap to revive him. He was impaled on the steering column like a butterfly on a pin.

Duvalier opened her door and fell out, still gripping her sword cane. Brother Mark seemed to be unconscious, blood masking his face, with a similar stain on the window.

Valentine heard an engine roar, and the armored car backed up. He waited for it to rev up, roar forward, and crush what was left of Rover.

He took his rifle out of its clip and climbed out. The least damaged of any of them, Boelnitz or whatever he called himself crawled forward and out.

Boneyard came forward to their rescue.

The music suddenly died. A new tune struck up, a harsh number welcoming them to a jungle with plenty of fun and games.

The ravies didn't like the sound of the music. They began to spread away from the armored car in consternation.

Boneyard's driver came out of his cab. He slammed the door as he climbed down.

The ravies heads turned, looking at him.

"Careful," Valentine said.

Boneyard's driver put his gun to his shoulder and fired at the speaker atop the armored car.

Which showed initiative but not very good judgment.

A pair of teenage ravies came running, as though the spitting assault rifle was an ice cream truck's musical bell.

Bushmaster bumped off road and gave them covering fire, Silvertip at the turret ring with the 20mm cannon.

Like sand running out of an hourglass, more and more ravies sprang into violent motion, running toward the vehicles.

Nothing to do about it now.

Valentine went around behind Rover, set his rifle on the rear bumper, and began to fire into the ravies. Machine guns and cannon tore into them.

Regular troops would have scattered or taken cover on the ground. Not these men, women, and children. Most of them went for the Bushmaster: It was the biggest and-

"Chuckwagon," Duvalier shouted in Valentine's ear, pointing.

A mass of ravies hit Bushmaster like an incoming tsunami. They tipped it, perhaps by accident, in their fury to get at the noisy guns.

Valentine pulled Brother Mark out of Rover and threw him over his shoulder in a fireman's carry. A ravie with a mustache gone mad sprang around the corner.

"Uungh!" Duvalier grunted as she opened the ravie from rib to hip point with her sword. She spun and took a child's head off behind her.

Chuckwagon pulled up next to Boneyard, forming a V by having the front bumpers just meet.

"Leave them, leave them!" Mrs. O'Coombe shouted to the Boneyard's driver. "Get me out of here!"

Silvertip extracted himself from Bushmaster's cupola. But he'd left an arm behind, crushed against the autocannon. He tottered a few steps toward the tattered crowd beating at the driver's front window, studded leather fist raised, and toppled face forward into the snow.

Valentine set down Brother Mark between the two big trucks.

He brought down three approaching ravies, clicked on empty, and changed magazines.

But there was still fighting around Bushmaster.

Longshot climbed out one of the side doors, now a top hatch on the prostrate APC. Her bike was strapped there. All she had to do was untie it and right it. Valentine watched, astonished, as she gunned the engine, laid a streak of rubber with the back tire as the front stayed braked. She released and shot along the armored side of the Bushmaster, flew off its front, and knocked a ravie down as she landed. Sending up a rooster tail of snow, she tore off east.

"That coward," Mrs. O'Coombe sputtered. "There were wounded in there."

A figure tottered out from around the back of Bushmaster, looking like a doomed beetle covered by biting army ants. Bee staggered under the weight of a dozen men, women, and children. She shrugged one off.

All Valentine had left for the Type Three was Quickwood bullets. He loaded and used them, sighting carefully and picking two off of Bee.

Bee writhed, throwing off a few, breaking another with a punch, crushing a head, removing an arm.

But there were too many, clawing and biting.

Bee dropped under the weight.

Valentine saw her agonized face through the mass of legs.

Valentine lined up his Type Three, ready to put a bullet in her head. Bee opened her mouth-

To bite an ankle.

Valentine only hoped he could end with such courage.

With the bayonet, mes enfants. It's nothing but shot, Valentine thought, quoting one of the heroes of the Legion he'd read of thanks to the headquarters library.

Valentine had never used a rifle bayonet for anything but opening cans since training. But he extended the one on the Type Three.

Valentine charged, yelling, his vision going red in fury and despair.

The ravies bared their teeth.

Valentine threw himself into them, lunging and wrenching and clubbing. A hand like a steel claw grabbed his arm, and he responded by giving way to the pull, throwing himself into the opponent. He clubbed the butt of his gun into the ravie's face again and again.

Another lunge and he lifted a young man off Bee like a kebab on his bayonet skewer.

He noticed Duvalier next to him, slashing like mad, killing anything that approached her like a bug zapper firing cold steel bolts.

He got Bee's arm around his shoulder and dragged her up. She managed to rise.

A storm of gunfire cut down the ravies in his way back to the V between Boneyard and Chuckwagon. Stuck stood atop the Bushmaster, firing his assault shotgun. Chieftain stood at his back, removing fingers and hands from ravies trying to climb atop the wreck.

Valentine realized he was bleeding but he felt no pain, fighting madness coursing through his nervous system.

He stumbled into the Boneyard, almost carrying Bee, rifle dangling by its sling and .45 pistol in his hand now.

"Graawg," Bee said, tears in her good eye, the other socket a gory pulp, pointing to bloody divots in her shoulder.

"Doc, you got a shot or something you can give her?" Valentine asked.

"I'll fix her up."

Valentine waved Stuck over.

"No, wounded inside!" he shouted, gesturing at the Bushmaster beneath him.

He emptied the shotgun into the remaining ravies all around.

Pkew!

A red blossom appeared in Stuck's shoulder, and he toppled off the APC.

Valentine looked back at the musical armored car. A rifle barrel projected from a rivet-trimmed slot in the front passenger-side window.

He could see the grinning faces of the driver and gunner behind their armored glass.

"Chieftain, take out those fuckers!" Valentine shouted.

The Bear nodded and disappeared.

Stuck, despite the rifle wound, was still swinging. He had a knife in each hand and used them like meathooks, plunging the blades in and pulling his opponents off their feet.

"You want a piece of me? There's plenty left, you assholes! Reapers and Grogs left enough for yas!"

Stuck led the remaining ravies down the road, shouting and gesticulating even as his steps grew more and more erratic.

While Stuck attracted ravie attention, Chieftain was dragging something away from the Bushmaster. Valentine realized it was the 20mm cannon. The big Bear, hair bristling up like a cockatiel's, righted it, braced it with his legs, and pointed it at the armored car.

Valentine looked at the armored car. The faces in the cabin weren't smiling anymore.

Krack! Krack! Krack! Krack! Krack!

The thick glass of the armored car had five holes with little auras of cracks all around, and blood splattered about on the inside.

And still the music played on.

Valentine-covered in quick-and-dirty bandages and iodine, injected with Mrs. O'Coombe's expensive Boneyard antibiotics, and feeling like he'd been taken apart and put together by a drunk tinker-investigated the musical armored car.

The back door was unlocked. After the cannon fire had killed the men in the cab, whoever was back there ran off into the growing dark.

There were a lot of dials and switches and electronic equipment, a screen and a controller for a camera at the back, and a blinking little box that one of the Wolves told him held all the music the system played in digital form.

Most of the music was soothing light classical, according to the computer-literate Wolf. "I guess they were attracting those Woolies by playing calming music," the Wolf said, giving this strain of ravies a name that was soon in wide use both officially and unofficially.

"It must soothe them," Doc said.

"And attract them at the same time. Must have been what they used to gather them . . . so the plane could spray them. That's how they killed them off," Valentine said, words finally catching up to his guesswork.

They fiddled until they had music playing and put some gentle Mozart up. A few ravies, wandering back from their final encounter with Stuck, shuffled up to the truck to listen.

Valentine gave orders that they weren't to be harmed. More important, they weren't to be disturbed by any aggravating noise.

They were prevented from engaging in further speculation by the arrival of a company from the Fort Seng battalion.

They were on bikes, Captain Nilay Patel wobbling unevenly at their head.

"The cavalry's a little late to the rescue," Valentine said with an effort. He had at least three bloody ravies bites, bound up in stinging iodine.

"The cavalry is having a hard time biking on melting ice," Patel said. "It's Colonel Lambert's idea, sir. We were leading a party of civilians out of Owensboro with the full battalion in field gear. There's a whole Northwest Ordnance column of trucks and motorcycle infantry and light armor getting set to cross the bridge where you got that Kurian."

"And you were heading toward them or away?"

"Trying to keep as quiet as possible as we got away, obviously, sir. That fury on a motorcycle came roaring up and said you'd had some difficulty. Colonel Lambert sent me back for you and Captain Ediyak ahead with the dependents, and then organized the rest into a Mike Force to support either if we ran into trouble. She's a better than fair tactician, sir."

"Where'd you get the bicycles?"

"We found them in a warehouse in Owensboro. Ownership seemed to be a matter of some dispute, as they were meant for transport to a purchaser in the Ordnance, but said trader was in no mood to fulfill his end with ravies in town. Colonel Lambert made him a generous purchase offer."

"What was that?" Valentine asked, but he suspected he knew Lambert's bid.

"He could ride along with the rest of the civilians, provided the bikes came as well." Patel looked at the stuporous ravies gathered around the musical truck. "What are we going to do with this lot?"

"Give them back to the people who created them."

"An excellent idea, sir, but just how do we do that?"

"We're going to need some noise, Patel. A whole lot of noise."

"I'm sure that can be arranged. Music or-"

"I have three vocalists in mind," Valentine said. "My radio's wrecked. Can you put me in touch with Fort Seng?"

They cleaned out the armored car's cab and brought the engine to life. Valentine put Ma at the wheel, as she understood both the armored car's controls and the volume and direction controls on the loudspeakers. Valentine had them turn down the road toward Owensboro. According to Patel, the city had been hard hit by ravies.

Bee with her Grog gun, the techie Wolf, Boelnitz for the sake of his story, and Chieftain just in case rode in back. Valentine road shotgun, squeezed onto the seat with Duvalier, who was clinging to him like a limpet.

"I'm worried about those bites," she said. "First sign of trembling, you go into handcuffs."

Valentine wondered if the bites were taking their toll. He was so very tired. But he had to see this through before he succumbed to either exhaustion or the disease.

They passed through the beltline of the city and drove among the Woolies like wary naturalists intruding on a family of gorillas. They thronged thicker and thicker around the armored car.

Suspicious, bloodshot eyes glared at them. Nostrils flared as the Woolies took in their scent.

"A little more soothing music," Valentine said.

Ma fiddled with her thumb, rolling it back and forth across the ancient, electrical-taped device. Harsh, synthesized music blared.

The Woolies startled.

The music hushed, stopped. A big Woolie, his mouth ringed by a brown smear of dried blood like a child's misadventure with lipstick, lurched toward the speaker, head cocked.

Ma said something under her breath-Valentine had no attention to spare for anyone but the big Woolie-and a soothing cello backed by violins started up.

The speakers ratcheted up, filling the main street with noise.

More Woolies emerged from alleys and doorways, some dragging dead dogs or more gruesome bits of fodder.

"They like that," Duvalier said, peering out a firing slot.

"Just like the Pied Piper," Valentine said. "Now to teach Hamelin a lesson."

Soon his followers filled two lanes and the verge to either side of the highway leading out of Owensboro and to the east.

They found a slight hill from which they could see the bridge and watch the fireworks. Valentine signaled Ma to stop the soothing music.

Valentine's trio of iron throats opened up. Guinevere, Igraine, and Morganna began to sing, and their notes fell upon the highway in brilliant flash and thunder.

The ravies ran toward the bridge.

"There go the Woolies!" one of the artillery observers reported over the radio. The Wolf's moniker had spread quickly.

The forces of the Northwest Ordnance had removed their barricades and some of the fencing to allow the invasion force to rumble across the bridge, its formation undisturbed. The Woolies found no resistance to their rush.

Panic struck the soldiers of Ohio's elite force. Immunization or no, an inoculation wasn't proof against one's injection arm being yanked out of its socket.

Valentine, having seen the destruction visited on Kentucky, rejoiced at like medicine being distributed among the "relief" forces parked in a long file along the highway.

He heard the drone of an engine. A plane hove into view.

"Bee!" Valentine said. He formed his hands into wings and had them crash.

Bee grinned from among her bandages, licked a bullet, and slid it into her big Grog gun. She put the gun to her shoulder and raised the barrel to the sky, as though it were a flag. The barrel began to descend as smoothly as a fine watch hand, lining up with the approaching plane, which had turned to pass directly over the bridge so that its flight path matched the north-south span.

It was a two-engine plane. She'd have to be quick to take out both as it passed over the bridge.

The plane dove, seeming to head straight for them. It hadn't started sprinkling its nerve agent yet, not wanting to lay it on their own forces.

Bee brought the gun barrel down, down, down, humming to herself. She fired.

The plane didn't so much as wobble. It continued its pass, remorseless. Valentine waited for the fine spray of nerve agent that would lock up heart and limb-

The plane shot over their heads, wingtips still, level as a board, engines roaring and flaps down, following a perfect five-degree decline to hit and skip and cartwheel into the woods of Kentucky.

Valentine heard firing from the other side of the bridge. A gasoline explosion lit up the low winter clouds.

Valentine tried to tell himself that he was killing two birds with one stone, not slaughtering civilians to confuse a military offensive.

"I know what the editorial in the Clarion would be," Boelnitz said. "Southern Command Uses Bioweapons in Indiana Massacre."

Valentine was inclined to agree: both that they'd use the headline and that the headline was true. But you had to give the enemy whatever flavor of hell they gave you. "Of course, you could add some picturesque color thanks to your firsthand experiences."

"Hell with them," Boelnitz said. "You know, the publisher used to tell me, 'It's always more complicated than a headline.' That's only so much bovine scat one can tolerate. Our headline here is pretty easy. 'Victory.' They should have offered, instead of threatened."

"I hope we can remember that," Valentine said. "You know, Llwellyn or Boelnitz or whatever you want to call yourself, Kentucky could use a newspaper. It's one of the building blocks of a civilization. What do you say? Want to bring the first amendment back to Kentucky?"

Boelnitz smiled. "I have a feeling that as long as you're here, there'll be no end of stories."