Floyd circulated Bonner's idea among his men and found—as he suspected he would—that the Lash of the Little People went for it in a big way. Farkas was an almost mythical figure in the minds of virtually every rider on the continent. Few people had ever seen him—but everyone had heard of him. They said that he had carved himself a rich little principality on the eastern edge of Berger's Hotstates. He paid some kind of rent to Berger and in return Berger let him use as many Devils—skag and silk—as he needed. Farkas was also said to have his own private army and some people said that it was a measure of his won strength that Berger would rather make peace with Farkas than to fight him.

There was no doubt that Farkas was a big source of revenue for Berger. Farkas' was a flourishing industry—Berger always said that no one had a touch with slave rearing like Farkas. His product was much in demand and Farkas tended his human garden like the most conscientious gardener.

But most important of all, to the Lash anyway, was the simple fact that Farkas was rich. They said that he was as rich as Berger and Carey, maybe as rich as Leatherman. That his riches were heavily defended made him that much more interesting.

The Lashmen stood around Floyd listening to his plan and, for the most part agreeing. Only Rufus scowled, but he always looked pissed off. It was no secret that he thought he ought to be in command.

"We hit this slave column Bonner's heard about first," announced Floyd.

"What the fuck for?" demanded Rufus.

" 'Cause that's the deal," said Floyd patiently.

"The deal with who?" Rufus insisted, acting as if he hadn't been listening.

"With Bonner."

"We don't need him."

"Rufus," said Floyd, "you ever seen him fight?"

"Nope."

"Then shut the fuck up. We need him."

"Trouble with you, Floydie," said Rufus, "is that you just can't resist the tall fucks in this world. It's as if you're ashamed of what you is."

Floyd colored red to the tips of his ears and marched over to where Rufus stood. He grabbed him by the shoulders.

"How about I beat your fuckin' face in?"

Rufus stared back. "Like to see you try, you little prick."

"This don't seem to me to be the way to start a big raid," said a wrinkled Lashman known, for no known reason, as Bunny.

"Yeah," put in another gang member, this one called Sammy, "let it ride you guys."

Floyd let go of Rufus and lowered his fist.

"Okay," he said as he ostentatiously turned his back on Rufus, "you guys listen to me. Anytime one of you thinks they can run this outfit better' than me, all you gotta do is let me know ..." He rested his hand on the gun strapped to his thick thigh. ". . . And we'll talk about it." The crowd was silent.

Then Bunny spoke. "I don't think we got any problems with you leadin' the Lash, Floyd." The rest of the gang—except Rufus—murmured their agreement.

Floyd smiled. "Good." Then he whipped around and smacked his fist into Rufus' jaw. Rufus was so surprised all he could do was fall down.

"Don't call me a prick," said Floyd as he stood over him, "again."

Scouts went out ahead of the riders to see what they could find. Bonner and the main force followed. It might be a couple of days before they located them, but Bonner had no doubt that they would find them eventually.

The scouts were back in a day or so and they had located their quarry.

"It's a hell of a thing," said one of them, "we snuck up on them late yesterday afternoon and we figured they had put up for the night. You know, making camp."

"We waited," said his companion, wiping some road grime from his brow, "figurin' we'd follow them the next morning, ya know?"

"But the fuckers didn't move. They sat there all fuckin' day. Weird."

"There's a lot of 'em?" asked Floyd.

"Fifty maybe. And the slaves."

"Devils, right?" asked Bonner.

"Yep."

"Skag or silk?"

"A lotta silk, some skaggies taking care of the slaves."

"Man, are they silk, too. 1 mean, these guys look like they got the best of everything. I mean, these guys are Berger's top silkies. Big Harleys, all of 'em got automatic weapons. Sure are pretty ..."

"And they're just sittin' there?" asked Floyd.

"Jes' sittin."

Floyd turned to Bonner. "What do you think?"

"I think we ought to take a look."

Bonner and the Lash moved out. The gang screamed onto the road, their engine wailing as if they couldn't wait to carry their vicious little riders to battle. The deeper, steadier boom of Bonner's big engine set up a menacing counterpoint to the high-pitched whine of the Lashmen's little bikes. The combined sounds would have made a tough man pale a little if he heard them coming at him.

Bobby and Emily had never ridden in formation before and the swirl of engine noise around them made them a little scared, yet also seemed to exhilarate them. It was as if the sea of sound was proof that they were safe. Looking at Bonner guiding his force and the tiny little killers hunched over the handlebars of their machines it seemed to the kids that no one could prevail against such a powerful force.

Bonner was not so sure. The fact that the slave column had paused on the road meant something. It could be something simple as mechanical trouble— maybe a couple of the big trucks had broken down at the same time and they couldn't transport their cargo of doomed men and women. But the scouts had seen no sign of work being done on the vehicles that slavers called "meat wagons."

Bonner had a feeling that the slavers were waiting for something. He hoped it wasn't reinforcements. The Lash was outnumbered as it was. Not seriously, it was only about two to one. Bonner had no doubt that a determined group of Lashmen could take out a big force of silk Devils. The Devils were good but they weren't Stormers and they certainly weren't Radleps. Bonner had seen the Lash slice up a lot of Stormers in his time. When the little guys started fighting they were something to behold.

They stopped a mile or two short of the Devil camp and the scouts were sent out again to make sure that the prey was still camped where they had left them. They reported back within an hour.

"Still there," announced one.

"They're havin' a party. They got a big fire goin' and they're drinkin. They got a couple of the slave women out an', ya know."

"A party," said Floyd. "And we wasn't invited. Those fucks hurt my feelings."

Bonner nodded. A party was good news. If they were lucky, the Devils would be good and drunk.

"I say take them now," said the Outrider tersely.

"Fuck yeah," said Floyd with a grin.

Skippy, the leader of the Devil battalion had his outfit's motto tattooed on his forehead. ("You're Dead Sucker.") The letters were blue and clumsily etched onto his forehead. Since he had had it done some years before, it had begun to itch. He scratched his forehead and listened to the buzzing in his ears. He had had a lot to drink because he and his men were sick to death of waiting. They were bored so they decided to have a party.

Then it hit Skippy. That wasn't drink thrumming through his head. It was the sound of engines.

"Hey, shithead," he shouted at his much despised lieutenant, a Silk Devil called Johnny. Johnny was sitting on the ground, a bottle of the Devil brew, usually called "Gut" resting on his knee. He was watching two of his fellow Devils tearing the clothes off a screaming slave woman. She was about seventeen.

"Hey shithead," reiterated Skippy.

"What?" said Johnny, refusing to take his eyes off the struggling woman. The two Devils had shredded the upper portion of her dress and her white breasts were exposed to the warm afternoon sunshine. One of her ravishers slapped her hard on the cheek. Tears streamed from her eyes.

"They're here."

"Great."

"Well, you assholes gonna be lying around blind drunk when our fuckin' honored guests show up?"

"Fuck 'em."

A few Devils were looking toward the horizon. Their long wait was over. "Now we can get the fuck out of here," said one.

Bonner was the first over the crest. The Devil camp was spread out on an old piece of asphalt a couple of acres across. Bonner had seen sites like this all over the continent and he had never figured out just what they were for. The tarmac was not laid flat like in a parking lot. It was a vast expanse of cracked black paving with rhythmically placed waves, humps, spaced from one end of the piece to the other. In the center of the dark patch of paving was always a square low building. The whole park was scattered about with poles rising to just below chest height. The whole setup faced a big white board, a huge expanse of plaster that seemed to be eighty or a hundred feet high by about forty feet across. Usually they were blank, but on this one someone had painted, in big red, angry letters, GOD. WHY DID YOU FORSAKE us?

There was a smaller sign on the access road that Bonner led the Lash men down? STAR-LITE DRIVE IN. OSED FO E SEASO. Drive into what, Bonner wondered.

In this case, a firefight.

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