By contrast, the second man seemed to be all skin and bones. His blue shirt and jeans clung loosely to his thin frame. A shock of blond hair crowned his brow. Clasped firmly and tucked against his right side was an Uzi.
The woman called Cathy had a semiautomatic pistol, resting in a flapped holster on her right hip.
“I’m Reeves!” the large man declared. “Who claims I’m a wimp?” He came within six yards of the trio and halted.
“No one said you’re a wimp,” Marlon answered quickly.
“Bull! I heard this jerk call me a wimp!” Reeves growled, and wagged his left thumb at the gunman.
“Simmer down, manure-mind,” Hickok said calmly. “We wanted to get you out in the open, that’s all.”
Reeves glanced at the Chains, then at Marlon. “Why? What kind of game are you playing? I’m warning you. One word from me and the Stompers will blow you away.”
“This isn’t a game. It isn’t a trick,” Marlon said. “We’re here on serious business. I want to offer you a truce so we can join forces against the Chosen.”
The head of the Stompers blinked rapidly, his mouth slackening in amazement. “Say what!”
“You know as well as I do that the only way we can beat the Chosen is if we combine our gangs,” Marlon stated. “We’re planning to take them on, and we need your help.”
“You’ve never asked for our help before,” Reeves noted suspiciously.
“Why now?”
“The Chosen have captured a friend of ours,” Geronimo interjected.
“We intend to rescue him.”
“And who the hell are you?” Reeves snapped. “I’ve never laid eyes on you or the chump in the buckskins.”
“We’re from the Family,” Geronimo answered.
“The what?”
“The Family is an ally of the Civilized Zone.”
“So? Who cares? Your friend means nothing to us,” Reeves said.
“They can help us if we’ll help them,” Marlon declared.
“How can these turkeys help us?” Reeves queried.
“We can assist you in relocating to the Civilized Zone if you’ll aid us in freeing our friend,” Geronimo mentioned.
The thin man with the Uzi took a half step forward. “Relocate? You’d help us get out of Dallas?”
“That’s right,” Geronimo assured him.
“What’s the Civilized Zone like?” Cathy asked.
“Compared to Dallas, it’s paradise,” Geronimo told her.
Reeves snorted. “How do you know we can trust these pricks? They could be feeding us a pack of lies.”
“I trust them,” Marlon said.
“Oh, now that’s encouraging! As if we’d believe you,” Reeves responded, and laughed.
Marlon’s features reddened. “Listen, Reeves. You know that I hate you as much as you hate me. I wouldn’t be making this offer if it wasn’t genuine. The last thing in the world I’d ever want to do is ask you for help.
I know what you’re like.”
“Then you know you’re wasting your breath,” Reeves said.
“Maybe we should listen to them,” the thin man ventured.
“No way, Dan,” Reeves stated emphatically.
“But if they’re serious, this is our chance to get out of this hellhole,” Dan commented.
“No.”
“What about those of us who have kids?” Dan asked the hulking leader.
“Your kids will be fine. We’ll look after them like we always have,” Reeves replied.
“But there are fewer and fewer of us every month,” Cathy said, chiming in.
“Now don’t you start!” Reeves said. He glared at Marlon. “You came all this way for nothing, sucker! Don’t get lost on your way back.”
“I think we should agree to help them,” Dan declared stubbornly.
“Tough. You’re not the head of the Stompers. I am,” Reeves stated arrogantly. “As long as I’m the top dog, what I say goes.” He started to turn.
“Hold the fort there, ugly,” Hickok suddenly spoke up.
“What the hell do you want?” Reeves snarled.
Hickok looked at the thin man. “If you were in charge of the Stompers, you’d help us?”
“That’s right,” Dan responded.
What transpired next happened so swiftly that those who witnessed it were shocked speechless by the brutal abruptness of the act. The gunfighter’s right hand blurred as the right Python swung up and out, and with the booming of the Colt a hole materialized between Reeves’s eyes and the rear of his cranium erupted in a spray of blood and brains. He fell straight backwards, like a mighty oak toppling over in the forest, and thudded on the ground.
The gunfighter twirled the Python into its holster and smiled at the Stomper named Dan. “Congratulations. You’re now in charge.”
Dan gawked at the blood oozing from the hole in Reeves’s forehead.
“You shot him!” he blurted out.
Stompers converged on them from the park.
Hickok walked over to the thin man. “You’d best snap out of it. The next move is up to you.” His voice lowered menacingly. “And you’d better make the right move, and pronto, or I’m liable to lose my temper.”
Dan glanced at the gunman, at those hands hovering near the pearl-handled Colts, and gulped.
Chapter Twenty
Blade stood at the west end of the field, near the uprights, his arms at his sides, staring at the 100 or so members of the Chosen gathered in the stands in front of him to witness whatever had been planned. He recalled the uneventful ride from CHEMITEX back to the stadium, and he wished he had made a break then instead of waiting for a better opportunity to arise. None had, and now, with the sun sinking toward the western horizon but still visible above the stadium wall, he braced himself for the worst. From the wicked grins the Chosen were casting in his direction, he knew the Lawgiver had something diabolical in store for him.
For over an hour the elderly maniac had addressed his followers, exhorting them to stand firm in their commitment to remove the impure heathen from the face of the earth. The Lawgiver had extolled the Chosen as God’s special people, a people with a divine mission to perform. He’d quoted from Scripture to justify his statements. The longer he’d talked, the more fanatical he’d become, his arms gesturing animatedly as he inspired them to attain new heights of devotion to the will of the Maker.
Again and again he’d stressed his personal relationship with the Maker, claiming that all he did, his every action and thought, was directed by God. And the Chosen had responded to the Lawgiver’s pronouncements enthusiastically, cheering and applauding after almost every sentence.
They were his puppets, and he was the puppet master.
Standing in the lowest row, the Lawgiver now gazed at the Warrior and smiled. “Well, mercenary, the moment of your meeting with Destiny has arrived.”
Blade said nothing. He refused to give the Lawgiver any satisfaction by reacting.
“You must be curious about the Destiny I refer to,” the Lawgiver said.
“I will explain, but first I must offer my gratitude for your kind gifts.”
The Warrior’s eyes narrowed.
“In all my years I haven’t seen a pair of knives in such outstanding condition,” the Lawgiver remarked, and leaned down to retrieve the Bowies from the floor near his feet. He held the knives aloft. “Your machine gun will be used to protect our tanker trucks when they enter the Civilized Zone. But I have decided to keep these for myself. Thank you.”
Blade’s lips compressed tightly.
The Lawgiver lowered the knives. “And now for our evening’s entertainment. Perhaps you noticed the wild cattle feeding in the vicinity of our chemical plant?”