Deathlands 117: Desolation Angels by James Axler Page A

sprouting from a grimy camo headband. She wore a rust-colored halter top with overstuffed cargo shorts, and an MP5-K machine pistol rested in a right-hand cross-draw holster strapped in front of them.
    “Always the cynic, Patch,” he said as she took her place at the railing alongside him.
    She shrugged. “Realist.” Her manner was as cool as it was skeptical. “Somebody’s gotta be, with a dreamer like you in charge.”
    He chuckled indulgently. “At least they were smart enough to come in with their hands empty,” he told her.
    Then to Ryan he said, “We’ve got blasters on you.”
    “I figured,” Ryan said. “So it doesn’t look as if you’ve got much to fear from us, does it?”
    “Could be a trick,” the woman said.
    Nikk laughed out loud. “It could always be a trick,” he said. “That’s what makes it a game.”
    “Razor Eddie’s reporting from the rooftop, Nikk,” another man’s voice called out the door. The speaker didn’t appear. “Says a gang is heading this way. Well armed. Thinks they’re the Desolation Angels.”
    “Oh, shit,” a man said from the blank darkness of a doorway on the ground floor, which dispelled any suspicion Ryan might have had that Nikk was bluffing about them being covered.
    Not that he’d had many to begin with.
    “Aren’t they outside their usual range?” Patch asked. She wasn’t just skeptical of Ryan and company, it appeared.
    Nikk shrugged. “They’ve been expanding lately. Prob’ly looking to keep up with DPD.”
    “Who’s DPD?” Ryan asked. “I don’t think we’ve made their acquaintance yet.”
    “You should hope that you never do.”
    “They bad news?” J.B. asked.
    Nikk grinned. “You really must be new in the ville,” he said. “If you haven’t learned yet that, here in D-Town, there are only two kinds of news. Bad news—”
    Patch laid her head against his shoulder. “And worse news,” she said.
    “Quite the comedic duo,” Doc murmured.
    Nikk shook his head. “Sorry. We’ve got no beef with the Angels. We’re not looking to start one, either. You’d best be moving on.”
    “And if we don’t?” Ryan asked.
    “Well, say what you will about the Angels,” the scavvy boss said, “which is mostly that they’re stoneheart bastards through and through, but they aren’t sadists. So I don’t reckon it makes them much, never mind whether we hand your bodies over to them still breathing or started on your way to room temperature.”

Chapter Seven
    Ryan hit the bay door running. Rather than take the ramp, he hopped down to the driveway.
    Immediately he heard shots from the west. He ducked. Unslinging his Steyr, he lay prone on the pavement, then crawled forward. The concrete-lined side of the cut totally covered him from enemy fire and concealed him from their view. He heard some of his companions drop from the opening behind him.
    As it sloped down close to sidewalk level, he stopped and raised his head to peer over it. The grass was too tall to allow him to see anything.
    Cautiously he raised his body on his left arm, as though he was doing a one-armed pushup. He still couldn’t see anything.
    Getting uneasy at not being able to see an enemy who obviously had seen him— or who knew roughly where he was—he pulled his knee forward, got a boot sole on the concrete and came up into a bent-forward kneeling position.
    At least he was able to glimpse their enemy over the tufted tops of the grass. The Desolation Angels were about fifty yards off. He saw a dozen or so, spread out into a creditable skirmish line, advancing with longblasters across their chests.
    Since they got a notion of what kind of quarry they were dealing with, the Angels had begun displaying a degree of professionalism. Apparently the war for dominance—or just survival—here in the Detroit rubble was a fierce one. Fierce enough to force the players to learn something a little better than the usual bullying and mob tactics used by gangs. Or even a lot of