Tricia
slipped her datapad into the bracket in front of her so she could see
its screen while keeping her hands free. "Wasters!" she
said.
That one
word immediately had George concerned. The possibility of bullets
flying had considerably increased.
"Miss
Hiddenhill, I really, really need to go now. It's hard to hold two
conversations when I can't pull the mouthpiece away from me."
Tricia
pulled out a grenade launcher from a hidden compartment beside her
feet. The weapon looked like a large caliber rifle.
"Okay,
bye." Tricia ended the call. "Finally!"
"Mab's
aunt?" George inquired.
"No,
her mum," Tricia said, "Concentrate, we've three waster
vehicles coming in." She turned on the ballistic computer on her
weapon. Then she checked the sights.
"Unfriendly?"
George asked.
"Likely."
"What
would they want with us?"
"Spare
parts, fuel," Tricia answered. She pulled out an assault rifle
and checked its ammunition magazine. "It's necessary to bring
extra fuel out here. Fuel production in the wastes isn't much so it's
valuable."
It was a
race to escape. George was going to give it his best effort,
especially if he could avoid having bullets fly at him. He had an
advantage - their vehicle was made with urbanite technology, which
should be better than what the wasters had access to.
The
pickup's engine abruptly died.
Tricia
stared at the driver. "How did you even manage to stall a moving
vehicle!?"
"Give
me a break! This is my first time driving under stress!" George
pointed out.
"Just
restart the engine and go!"
Guided
by terse instructions from Tricia, George managed to restart the
engine before the pickup slowed to a stop.
Tricia
watched the datapad in front of her, which fed video from the camera
at the back of the pickup. She double-checked with the rearview
mirror at the top of the windscreen.
"Three
sets of wheels," the Vixen summarized, "That armored one is
going to be trouble."
George
glanced at the rearview mirror and saw their three pursuers. Two of
them were fast dune buggies with little armor. The station wagon in
the middle had better protection than the other two, and it had a
mounted machinegun. It also had the large wheels typical of vehicles
out in the wasteland.
"Stop
and surrender!" a man's voice was heard from the back, likely
from a loudspeaker on or in one of the vehicles.
"Does
anyone actually stop?" George asked.
"The
people who do are probably dead," Tricia replied.
George
stepped harder on the accelerator.
Tricia
opened the glove compartment and took out a magazine marked with an
orange tape. She unloaded the grenade launcher and inserted the
orange-taped magazine. "Let's hope this trick works." She
turned in her seat. "Hold the vehicle steady while I fire."
"We've
you outnumbered!" came the voice again, "Surrender!"
George
gripped the steering wheel, determined to keep the pickup going
straight for as long as necessary.
With a
hand on the roll bar above her seat, Tricia pulled herself up and
aimed. She fired five shots in quick succession then dropped back to
her seat. She watched the camera view on the datapad.
"Huh,
it actually worked!"
In the
rearview mirror, George saw that their armored pursuer had turned and
slowed to a stop. He had not heard any explosions. "What'd you
do?"
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