"Full evacuation by 00.01 on Day Four of Schedule 01/PrOv/Ce/TC. Redoubt to be sealed throughout and only Ltd sec force remaining in approved external watch section."
Jak had found the piece of paper from which he read, crumpled in a corner of one of the corridors, near what they guessed was a triple sec door leading to the open air. It was the only clue to the speed and organization of the evacuation.
"That's why it's all left running and stocked. Like they just sealed it for a couple of days, and figured they'd return when the scare was over." Ryan handed the paper back to the albino boy, who scrunched it between his hands and threw it onto the floor.
"Only the scare was never over." J.B. shook his head.
"Best get back to relieve Krysty," Ryan said. "Least we got enough ammo to last us a while. Except for Doc's cannon."
The redoubt had been kind to them in most ways. Apart from food and drink and the good hot water, it had also allowed them all to top up on self-lights and grens. J.B.'s dark brown leather jacket concealed a whole mix of the tiny, lethal grenades: implodes and frags; burners and shraps; lights and delays. All were color-coded for maximum efficiency. Jak and Ryan had also helped themselves to a variety of the grens, hooking them on their belts.
All carried mags of ammo, some of it loose in pockets.
Ryan had been delighted to come across some of the scarce caseless rounds for his beloved Heckler & Koch G-12 rifle. The blaster held a clip of fifty of the 4.7 mm rounds, and he'd been getting low.
Since that quality of ammunition wasn't manufactured anywhere in the Deathlands, he'd started to resign himself to dumping the gun and picking up something that fired a more convenient 9 mm bullet. They had loads of 9 mm — for his own SIG-Sauer P-226, for Krysty's P7A-13 H&K, for the Armorer's MP-7 SD-8 Heckler & Koch rifle.
J.B. had also topped up his supplies of 5.56 mm ammo for his Steyr AUG pistol, and Jak's pants pocket bulged with extra rounds for his massive .357 Magnum.
The friends were ready again to take on anything that moved — other than swarms of killer bees.
Krysty stood in the passage, waiting for them. "Doc's woken up," she said. But the look on her face made it patently clear that this wasn't necessarily good news.
"But?"
"See for yourself, lover."
The old man lay on his back, boots stacked side by side on the floor, the sheet pulled up under his chin. With his hands folded on his chest, he looked like the carved figure of a crusader in an ancient church memorial.
Ryan perched on the end of the bed, the other three behind him. "Hi," he said.
Pale blue eyes turned slowly toward him. "Good day to you."
"Know who I am?"
"I fear not."
"Know where you are?"
"Some hospital for the poor and needy?"
"Do you know what the year is?" Krysty asked.
"Of course. It's 1896."
Krysty nodded. "Right on."
Doc made an effort to sit up, then relaxed and lay back on the double pillows. "Please, will one of you take a message to my dear wife? She will be so worried at my absence."
"Absence?" Ryan queried.
"I've been away from home for... let me see. It must be very close to two hundred years now, and she will be beginning to become concerned about it. Do you not think?"
Ryan kept his face schooled not to show his deep worry. "We'll do what we can. I didn't catch your name, I'm afraid." He'd fallen into the older man's old-fashioned and stilted way of speech.
"Theophilus Algernon Tanner. Doctor of Science at Harvard. Doctor of Philosophy at the English university of Oxford. A pleasure to meet you. Pray forgive my not rising."
"Course. Can we get you anything to eat, Doc? Drink?"
"Thank you. A glass of water, and perhaps a Bath Oliver, if you have such a thing."
Ryan nodded, hiding his total ignorance of what Doc wanted to eat. "Sure. Listen, me and the others have to talk some. Then we're going out for a kind of... of a walk. The nurses have all gone home so you better come with us."
"Delighted, my dear fellow. And you won't forget to inform my sweet Emily of my temporary indisposition, will you? My card is in my waistcoat."
"Everyone ready now? I'll just trigger the main doors for a few inches. Jak, get down and have a look under it. See anything you don't like... just say 'close,' and we'll shut it again. We don't need any more of those bastard bees. I can still feel the stings in me."
The boy lay down, his newly washed white hair spreading out on the concrete like spilled foam. Ryan punched in the number code and threw the green lever up. Almost immediately he returned it to a central position to stop the sec door about eighteen inches from the floor. Jak took his time, looking all around outside. "Nothing," he said finally.
"Nothing?"
"Fucking big trees. Fucking hot. Nothing."
Cautiously Ryan allowed the arma-door to slide all the way up.
The heat swept into the redoubt like a tumbling wave, carrying with it an overwhelming smell ofgreen.
The entrance was set back into a hillside, behind what had once been a turning area for large military wags. But that was now a plateau of solid, waving grass, speckled with clusters of the most colorful flowers Ryan had ever seen. Crimsons, golds, purples and vivid yellows seemed even brighter against the swaying emerald backdrop.
"Paradise," Krysty murmured, shaking her head in admiration and wonderment.
Beyond the flowery carpet they could see the tops of luxuriant trees, some of them resembling monstrously big palms. The air was heavy with moist scents and languorous perfumes from the flowers, some of them verging on the sickly.
"Got be Hawaii, or someplace in the Pacific," Ryan said. "Seen an old sec vid about Hawaii. Called Fiftyit was. Weird name."
"I think Hawaii had big mountains," Krysty offered doubtfully. "This looks like it's too flat to be Hawaii."
"Africa," J.B. suggested. "Or India. I've seen pics of jungles looking like this."
"Tell you one thing," Ryan said. "This surely isn't any place in Deathlands."
Doc was wandering around in small circles, head up, staring at the vivid pink clouds that scarred the orange sky. "Red sky in the morning, then shepherds take warning," he said, looking around at the florid walls of the tropical jungle. "Here be tygers, I fear. We must exercise care."
J.B. had taken the tiny microsextant from a pocket and was busily shooting the sun, checking his data on a comp-table of locations. He checked again. And again.
"Hawaii?" Ryan asked. The Armorer shook his head.
"Africa? Or India?" Krysty probed.
J.B. shook his head. "No. It's... According to this, we're in the middle of what was Minnesota."
Doc Tanner began to laugh.