The next morning they gathered their things and prepared to set out again. Luna wanted to avoid the town of Delta, which was apparently just a few miles down the road, but Eldon assured them over and over that it was safe and that, even better, it might be possible for them to resupply there. "It's a nice town," he said. "It's one of ours."
In other words, it was one of the towns under the jurisdiction of the Pale Riders. Because they were running short of food, and because Eldon kept insisting, they finally agreed to follow him into town.
He hopped on his motorcycle, revved it up, and sped off, while Luna switched on the glider. In a minute they were on the road again, flying through the burnt and barren desert landscape. The town of Delta -- a dusty, ramshackle little desert town -- soon hove into view on the horizon.
Eldon parked his motorcycle, and Luna her glider, outside the town's largest building: a solid-looking, three-story structure that looked like it might have been a courthouse or city hall. There were a couple of kids happily playing outside when they drove up, but they dropped the ball they were throwing around and immediately ran inside when they saw them coming. Stu wasn't terribly surprised by their reaction.
A minute later an older gentleman emerged from the courthouse, carrying a rifle. He recognized Eldon, however, because he lowered the gun when he saw him. "Eldon," he greeted, in a somewhat less-than-friendly tone.
"Morning, Mr. Hardy," the young man returned cheerfully. "Got a message for you." He retrieved a letter from a compartment in his motorcycle and handed it to him, then asked, "You think my friends and I could get some breakfast?"
"Who are they?" the other man asked suspiciously.
"Just some folks I met on the road. They're from Meku City. They're on their way to Lon Halos."
"That a fact?" He scowled at the group, and especially at Millie. "What's with that one? She infected?"
"I think she's some kind of robot," Eldon said airily. "They're nice enough. I spent the night with 'em. How about that breakfast?"
The man grunted in annoyance, but accepted Eldon's message, and reluctantly invited them into the courthouse's main lobby. The entire building appeared to have been converted into living space -- there were bed and mattresses all over, and there were several people here, including the children they had seen earlier, who stared at them with big, shining eyes. Stu gave them a smile and a wave, but they must have been shy; both of them retreated from him, hiding themselves behind the adults.
Eldon introduced them to this group. Hardy ordered an older woman -- presumably his wife -- to fetch them some eggs, toast, and coffee, and they had a pleasant if rather awkward meal in the company of these wary strangers. It was, in fact, the best meal Stu had had in a long time, much better than the canned PrestoMeat and plain potatoes they had been eating on the road. The food lifted their spirits, and Lucky even managed to make friends with the two children by sharing some of his sugary Nandies with them.
When they were finished, Luna thanked them for the meal and pushed herself away from the table; she was clearly anxious to leave. "We don't want to strain your hospitality," she told them. "We should get going."
Stu agreed. These people were obviously struggling; it was amazing that they had even offered them a meal. Besides, they were all staring at Millie, and some of their expressions were...disapproving. She had her hood up to cover her face, and she kept her cybernetic hand partially hidden beneath her long sleeve, but the red eye that sometimes glinted out of the shadow of her face was hard to miss, and hard to ignore.
Lucky traded some of his Nandies for a jar of strawberry jam, and they managed to acquire some shotgun shells as well, for Luna's shotgun, but when this bartering was complete, they left the courthouse and returned to the glider. Eldon, yawning and stretching his arms and looking quite relaxed, followed them out to bid them farewell.
"Lon Halos rots," he told them. "It's a nasty place, like I said, full of zombies and mutates. I hope you'll be all right."
"I hope so, too," Stu said. "Thanks for everything." He turned to open the door to the glider...and stopped. He had just heard the faint sound of an engine, rumbling out of the serene quiet of the desert. It sounded like it was coming from the north.
Lucky heard it, too. "What is that? A generator?"
"Some kind of vehicle," Millie said.
The town's buildings blocked their view of whatever it was that was producing these sounds, but Stu, looking up, saw a cloud of dust rising up into the northern sky.
"That's not one vehicle," Luna said, alarmed. "That's a dozen, at least, and they're headed this way."
"Could be the Rider fleet," Eldon said doubtfully. "Although I don't know what they'd be doing this far from Sharkhead."
"Those aren't bikes," Luna said. "Get in the glider, all of you. We're getting the hell out of here."
They started to get in, but by now Hardy and several other men and women had emerged from the courthouse to investigate the sound as well, and all looked worried. "What's going on?"
The sound of the engines grew closer and closer, and suddenly a beat-up truck came blasting out of a road running crosswise to the main street, followed by a four-wheeler, a rusted-out glider, and another truck. The beat-up truck had an orange pennant attached to it; it bore the symbol of a rattlesnake, and there were five or six men riding in the back, all armed with guns.
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"T-those aren't Riders," Eldon stammered, his eyes wide. "The rattlesnake! That's Steckler's flag!"
"Get in the glider!" Luna shouted over the engine noise. "We have to get out of here!"
The town was under attack. There probably would have been enough time for the four of them to pile into the glider and escape, but Stu found himself hesitating. Hardy and the other townspeople were already fleeing -- some of them running back into the courthouse, some of them running into town. The two children were shouting for their parents.
Running off in the glider would mean leaving these people to their fate, including the children. At best, they would be captured and delivered to the Desert King; at worst, they would be killed. Could he really stand by and allow that to happen? The old Stu would have simply fled with the others, but the ICON system had given him the power to protect these people.
Besides, what was the worst these bandits could do to him? He had fought the Brute, the Living Hell, the Lab Rat, the Cannibal, and all kinds of ragers, speedies, and irregulars, and his Regeneration skill and Bulwark defenses protected him from serious injury, and perhaps even from death itself. He had little to fear from ordinary humans, even if they were armed, and even if he was outnumbered.
Luna was still shouting at him to get into the glider. He turned to her and said, "Get out of town. I'm going to stay and fight."
"Are you out of your mind?"
"There's no time. Take Lucky and Millie and get out of here."
"I'm going to stay and fight, too!" Lucky declared.
Luna clenched her fists, furious, and got into the glider. Instead of getting behind the wheel, however, she pulled her shotgun out of the seat. "I guess we're staying," she said, through gritted teeth.
The vehicles were now headed right for them, down Delta's main street. The men in the back of the truck began whooping and hollering and firing their guns into the air, to intimidate them, but Stu, taking a deep breath, nevertheless stepped forward to face them. He reached down and picked up a large rock, a little smaller than a baseball, which he had spotted on the dusty street, and threw it at the truck's windshield, using his Dead Aim skill. The rock, propelled by his ICON-enhanced strength, shattered the windshield and struck the driver, causing him to veer to his right; the truck slammed into the four-wheeler that was running alongside it, throwing the driver out of it, and the vehicles behind them -- the glider and the other truck -- were caught in the pile-up.
Darkly satisfied with his work, Stu removed Excalibur from the glider's storage compartment and approached the wrecked vehicles. None of the men in the back of the truck appeared to be seriously injured, but they were a little shaken up. Stu heard a lot of cursing.
"You're not wanted here!" Stu shouted at them. "Go back to where you came--"
Before he could finish the sentence, a couple of men appeared from behind the truck -- they may have been in the glider -- and opened fire on Stu, blasting him with 9mm pistols. Some of their shots missed, but he was at hit at least three times, once in the shoulder and twice in the abdomen. He felt the bullets rip through his body -- the impact staggered him, and the sudden pain caused him to gasp. He felt blood beginning to dampen his shirt.
The bullets weren't enough to stop him, however. The Regeneration skill instantly went work, repairing him, closing up the entry wounds and allowing him to shake off the pain. He set upon the men with Excalibur, using his greater speed to rush up to them and knock the guns out of their hands and batter their kneecaps, causing them both to fall.
By now two more men had reached him. One of them was carrying a huge silver revolver; the other had a rifle. Though he could recover pretty quickly from these gun blasts, Stu had no desire to get hit again -- it hurt, getting shot -- nor to take a bullet to the head. The Regeneration skill had healed him after the Cannibal had pulverized his skull, but it had taken a while, and he definitely didn't want to go through that again.
So he took a cover behind the truck, drew his Midnighter, and fired a few shots in the direction of the men, just to keep them honest. Replacing the gun on his belt, he then moved around to the other side of the truck, where he found another man, who must have been trying to sneak up on him. He quickly yanked the rifle out of the man's hands and tossed it aside, before punching him into unconsciousness.
There was shooting going on all over now, some of it coming from the courthouse -- Luna and Lucky were apparently firing at another group of marauders. Eldon was in there too, somewhere; Stu was sort of surprised to see that he had decided to stand with them.
Stu had managed to stymie the first wave of attackers, but there were more raiders coming into town now, from the other side of the courthouse -- another truck full of gunmen, plus a couple of dangerous-looking, pink-haired women riding motorcycles. That made at least two dozen men and women in all, and what's worse, they were converging on the courthouse, surrounding Luna and Lucky and the others. Stu had felt pretty confident a moment ago, but the situation was deteriorating -- he couldn't fight off this many men and women all at once, and if he had to worry about protecting his friends, too...
He wished they would have left town on the glider.
There was little to do but keep fighting, however, so he threw himself into the thick of it, using his strength and speed to cut through the gunmen. He was hit several more times, but remained on his feet, trusting his Regeneration skill to heal him, and ran to where Lucky and Luna were pinned down. They were crouched behind a stout, three-foot-high wall, which bordered the grounds of the courthouse; Eldon was there, too, along with Hardy and some of the other townspeople.
"There's too many!" Eldon was shouting. "We're dead!"
"Shut up!" Lucky barked at him, over the gunfire. "Keep shooting!" He was blasting away with his machine gun, which made a sharp rattling noise as it fired.
Stu jumped over the wall and ducked beneath it with them. Eldon stared at the blood on his shirt. "You've been shot," he stated stupidly.
"I'll be all right." He drew his Midnighter again. "I'll lead them away. Try to find some better cover." He started to rise to his feet, but then he saw that Hardy, the old man, who had been hunkered down behind another section of the wall, had, for some reason, thrown down his gun and put his hands up. Turning, he realized that they had been flanked -- the pink-haired women on the motorcycles had come up behind them, and now had Hardy and a couple of the other townspeople dead to rights. These others threw their guns down as well.
"Shit," Lucky muttered.
The gunfire died down to nothing. Lucky and Luna started to turn their guns on the pink-haired women, but the women stopped them: "Drop your guns," one of them ordered. "Or it's open season."
"Shit," Lucky said again. He dropped his machine gun, and Luna dropped her shotgun. Eldon, his hands shaking, threw down his pistol.
Stu ground his teeth. He was sure he could overpower these women, but he couldn't risk attacking them while they had their guns trained on the townspeople. So he, too, dropped his Midnighter.
"Now what?" he whispered to Luna.
"Now?" she snorted at him. "Now we're fucked."