Prodigal's Return

“Rona!” Dean Cawdor yelled, as the rushing water of the nameless river yanked him off the drowning horse to send him tumbling downstream.

Sharona screamed his name somewhere distant, but the crashing waves of the white-water river overwhelmed the sound until there was only the rumbling thunder of the icy wash.

Dean fought his way back to the surface, pulling in a lungful of air. Through the spray he saw his horse slam into a boulder, blood gushing from its mouth, its eyes going blank before the animal was swept away.

A line of jagged boulders rose out of the spray. In a surge of adrenaline, Dean tried to slip between the deadly outcroppings. He made it past the first two, but the third smacked his arm with stunning force.

Then an undertow grabbed him, dragging him away from air and light.

Six mistakes mankind keeps making century after century:

Believing that personal gain is made by crushing others;

Worrying about things that cannot be changed or corrected;

Insisting that a thing is impossible because we cannot accomplish it;

Refusing to set aside trivial preferences;

Neglecting development and refinement of the mind;

Attempting to compel others to believe and live as we do.

—Marcus Tullius Cicero, 63 B.C.

With a snap as loud as a gunshot, the rope broke.

“Rona!” Dean Cawdor yelled as the rushing water of the nameless river yanked him off the drowning horse, sending him tumbling helplessly downstream.

Sharona screamed his name, but the crashing waves of the white-water river overwhelmed the sound, until there was only the rumbling thunder of the icy wash. Swimming furiously, Dean fought his way back to the surface, pulling in a desperate lungful of air. Through the spray he saw his horse slam into a boulder, blood gushing from its mouth, its eyes going blank before the animal was swept away—the contents of both saddlebags floating after it.

Throwing himself forward, he strove to reach the sinking animal. There was still a longblaster in the gun boot alongside the saddle, and a rope coiled over the pommel. If I can just get hold of that, he wished desperately.

But the cold water was quickly sapping the strength from his arms and legs, and his sodden boots felt as if they were lined with lead plate. Realizing the hopelessness of the task, he abruptly changed direction and started slogging toward the rocky shore. The spray made it hard to see clearly, and the speed of the water was making the shore race by in a blur.

Stay sharp! Dean commanded himself. Lose it now and you’ll be in a bastard world of hurt.

Just then, something brushed against his leg under the water, and Dean felt a visceral rush of raw terror at the possibility of a river mutie. Kicking furiously with both legs, he felt his combat boot slam into something, and a bubbling roar came up from the muddy depths, heading quickly away.

But his relief lasted only a moment as another boulder loomed suddenly from the blinding spray. Snarling a curse, he grabbed hold of a passing tree and rolled himself onto it a split second before it slammed into the boulder. With a crack of thunder the tree shattered, and Dean was sent hurtling forward, still clutching a broken branch amid a maelstrom of dead birds, leaves, wood chips and pinecones.

Going under again, he almost didn’t reach the surface in time, his lungs laboring with the burning need for air. Erupting from the white-water river, he clawed wildly for anything to help him stay afloat. But his clutching fingers encountered only the turgid water and random bits of flotsam. His stomach was starting to hurt now from the cold, a sure sign of reaching the end of his strength. Making a hard decision, Dean started to unbuckle his gun belt, willing to lose the precious blaster to stay alive for a few more seconds, when a line of jagged boulders rose out of the spray.

In a surge of adrenaline, Dean tried to slip between the deadly outcroppings. He made it past the first two, but the third smacked his arm with stunning force, and the entire limb went numb. Spinning about, he lost all track of direction and speed, then cracked his forehead
against an unseen boulder. For a brief moment, warmth flooded his face, and the water turned red. Then an undertow dragged him down, away from the air and light toward certain doom.

Even as darkness filled his world, Dean clawed for the knife on his belt and began slashing wildly at his arms and chest. More blood welled from the shallow cuts, but then his heavy bearskin coat fluttered away in the tumultuous river.

Pounds lighter, he felt strength return to his weary limbs, and more determined than ever, the young Cawdor fought to control his passage down the icy river. His world coalesced to chaotic swimming, dodging boulders and trying to reach the shore. Any shore. It made no difference now. Long minutes passed, maybe hours; he had no way of telling. Swim, fight, breathe, live became his only thoughts for an unknown length of time. Then his boot brushed the bottom, dislodging loose rocks, and he dug and clawed his way through the shallows toward the muddy bank.

Grabbing fistfuls of weeds, Dean hauled himself out of the battering water, every inch of freedom gained fueling his will to live. There were trees and bushes only a few feet away.

Struggling out of the sticky mud, he barely managed to crawl onto dry land before collapsing. Totally exhausted, he sprawled on the blessed riverbank, gulping in air.

He had to have dozed for a while, because the next thing he knew a crimson dawn was starting to lighten the cloudy sky. Instinctively, his hands and feet started
to tread water again before reason returned. Safe. He had made it onto the riverbank.

Even if I do feel like the loser in an ax fight, Dean thought, grunting at every movement. He had a nuke storm of a headache, his throat was parched and every inch of his body felt bruised and sore. But he was most definitely alive.

Levering himself onto his knees, he patted his clothing to make sure his weapons were still present. His folding knife was long gone, but he still had the big bowie knife, and his Browning Hi-Power .38 was tight in its holster—although a quick check showed the pistol was completely choked with mud. Trying to fire it now would only cause a back blast that would remove his hand. His stomach was rumbling with hunger, but cleaning the blaster was the first priority.

Crawling to the edge of the river, he washed the weapon thoroughly, dropping the magazine to make sure the rush of water reached every crevice. Later on, he would disassemble the blaster and give it a through cleaning and oiling. But his father had taught him that a fast wash would do in times of danger.

“Which this is, since I have no bastard idea where I am,” Dean growled, slamming the magazine back into the weapon and working the slide to eject a round. “Much less where Rona is by now.”

The memory of his mother screaming his name from the other shore of the wild river filled the youth with a sharp pang of loss. But he knew she was a fighter, and would survive on her own just fine. She had for many years. Sharona had stolen him away from his father and the others, and Dean had been really pissed about
that. But his mother had convinced him that she needed him, that Ryan would never have allowed Sharona to stay with the companions. So if Dean would stay with her for a little while, she would let him go back to his father sometime soon. She needed him. The confused youth had given in.

Dean hadn’t been alone since he was nine years old. Rona or her old faithful friend, or one of the companions had been around to lend a hand when it was needed.

“But not today,” he muttered, shaking the blaster to try to remove any lingering moisture. Until further notice, he would have to fend for himself. Oddly, the idea didn’t feel him with unease. He had learned a lot traveling with his father and the other companions; and Dean felt sure there were damn few things in the Deathlands that he couldn’t chill, outrun or outthink. Except for a howler, mebbe.

Thoughts of his father, Krysty and the others flooded his mind. He felt bad about what his mother had done. But she needed him, and that was that. He’d had to look after her like he did before. He knew Ryan would never forgive him. Perhaps when he was a little older he’d try to find him—if he lived that long.

Rising to his feet, Dean stomped to help restore circulation while he took stock of the area. The river rumbled steadily along, disappearing out of sight. There were fruit trees and bushes on the other side, but they might as well be on the moon, so he turned his back to the display of inaccessible food. Out of sight, out of mind.

Outcroppings on this side of the river rose to foothills
that were backed by proper mountains. There were a lot of pines and oaks in sight, as well as a wide field of grass. Dean knew a few parts of a pine tree were edible, but reaching them involved a lot of hard work for a small return. Thankfully, he saw a copse of cacti only a few yards away, and lurched in that direction.

Shuffling over to a forked cactus, Dean paused to check for any signs of a feeder hidden under the ground. But there was no indication of the subterranean mutie, and Dean eagerly drew his bowie knife to hack off the crown of the plant. Clear fluids welled up from the juicy pulp within, and he stabbed the chuck of cactus with his knife, carefully removing the needles, before carving out the pulp. It was sticky and sweet, and tasted like life itself. Smelled good, too, like a flower blossoming in the dead of winter.

Most of the cactus was inside his belly before Dean felt some of his strength return. Spearing one last chunk, he walked back to the river to wash the mud off his clothing. Then he knelt on a relatively dry section of ground to carefully disassemble, oil and reassemble the Browning Hi-Power. With internal nylon bushings, the predark blaster supposedly never needed to be oiled, but J.B. had taught him well. It was always better to be safe than buried.

Trying the action on the piece a few times, Dean grunted in satisfaction, then reloaded the blaster and tucked it away. Washed and armed once more, he decided it was time for some real food. Pine trees were a favorite home for a lot of birds, which translated into eggs for breakfast and, with any luck, something roasted for lunch. Falcon was the best, but there was nothing
wrong with owl, or even robins—although it took about a dozen to make a decent meal. Plucking that many tiny feathers was something Dean wouldn’t wish on a fragging coldheart.

“Afterward, I’ll start searching for a ville,” he muttered, brushing back his damp hair. He took some comfort in the sound of a human voice, even though it was just his own.

The riverbank was alive with chirping insects and croaking frogs, a virtual chorus of nature. If the trees proved to be barren, he’d eat the bugs and frogs. Food was food. He would honestly much prefer a nice roasted crow over a baked frog stuffed with cicadas. Still, whatever didn’t chill you made you stronger, as Mildred liked to say.

Crossing an open field, Dean breathed in the morning air, enjoying the warmth of the sun on his face. Scattered beams broke through the dense cloud cover, causing what Doc used to call the cathedral effect. The air smelled faintly of river moss and punk. A small field of cattails waved gently in the morning breeze, pretty, but useless.

Watching the ground for any sign of animal spoor, or worse, the gnawed bones dropped by muties, Dean was about halfway to the trees when he heard the sound of distant thunder. Fearfully, he looked up at the roiling storm clouds overhead. Swirling black, laced with orange and purple and dappled with shafts of golden sunlight, they seemed normal enough. And there wasn’t any sign of precipitation, much less the tangy reek of a dreaded acid rain that could melt the flesh off a person in only a few minutes.

Dean had seen that happen once, and it was something he would never forget. He had made it safe into the wreck of a predark car, the metal roof and old glass windows offering more than enough protection from the deadly rain. But an old man had been caught in the downpour, and had never made it to the wreck alive. In the morning there was only his skeleton lying on the muddy ground, a bony hand outstretched, still trying to reach the door handle.

Shaking off the unpleasant memory, Dean frowned as the thunder sounded once more, much louder this time. Blasting baron, that wasn’t thunder, but horses!

Caught out in the open, he knew he wouldn’t reach the safety of the foothills in time, so he drew his blaster and knife, and stood waiting for the riders to appear. They might be sec men from a ville, out hunting muties, or slavers trying to recapture an escaped prisoner, or worse, cannies looking for fresh meat for the stew pot.

Grimly, Dean mentally prepared himself to take his own life rather than be taken prisoner and ritually stripped of his skin, then consumed alive by the demented throwbacks. Even barbs treated captives better than that, though not by much.

Just then, a large number of horses galloped over the horizon, the riders bent low in the saddles. Instantly, one of them shouted something, and the entire group changed direction, to head straight toward Dean.

Controlling his breathing so as not to appear frightened, he allowed the riders to come to him. He had five, mebbe six seconds to gauge who these folks were before
the confrontation. In life and death, timing was everything.

The riders seemed to be norms, not muties, and there were only men, no women in sight. That wasn’t good or bad. The horses appeared to be in fine shape, not underfed or overly whipped, which meant the riders weren’t fools. However, their clothing was scraggly and heavily patched, with a wild mismatch of predark fabric, fur and what looked like tent canvas, as if the men had been scavenging through the ruins of some predark city, taking whatever they could find. Only a few of them wore boots. Most were wearing wraparounds, thick animal fur held in place with wide leather straps. It was the kind of clothing Dean would have expected to see barbs wearing.

Or clever folks pretending to be barbs, he thought, which might be the case, as every rider had a longblaster in a gun boot alongside his saddle, and was carrying another slung across his back. They were dressed like outcasts, but armed better than most sec men in a ville. The odd mixture made Dean suspicious of the group, and just for a second he wished that he had made a dash back to the river.

As the pack drew near, he raised his blaster and fired a round into the air both to catch their attention and let them know he had live brass. A lot of people carried empty blasters, and tried to avoid fights through sheer intimidation. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it made you a passenger on the last train west.

Reining in his chestnut stallion, a tall man stopped a dozen or so yards away, and the rest of the ragged group
came to a halt close behind. Dean grunted at the display. There was no doubt who was in charge.

The leader was a thin man of mixed Asian descent, his skin faintly golden, but his face heavy with black stubble. He was wearing a black knit cap and buckskin shirt, and had numerous weapons—a Walther PPK .38 in a shoulder holster, an AK-47 slung across his back, and what looked like a Remington shotgun tucked into the boot near his saddle. There were a lot of AK-47 assault rifles in the group, and a few men with 40 mm gren launchers attached. All looked to be in fairly good condition.

“Morning,” the skinny man said, resting an arm on the pommel of his saddle. “What are you doing this far from Donner ville?”