Route 666

suit. They were both trying to get knives into his throat. Tyree shot the panzergirl and the Quince took care of blue suit with a shotgun-stock heartpunch. The sergeant shot her a salute and floored another assailant with a slash from the gun.

She didn't return the salute. She was still singing.

Her gun fell from her grasp and she lurched towards the Josephites as if pulled by puppet strings. Her hair was disarrayed by things rushing through the air. She knew she had to go to the Elder, go with the Elder. Her whole life had been designed to bring her to this point, to set her on the Road to Salt Lake City.

If she went with the Elder, the Mark of Death would be wiped from her forehead. She could live …

Chollie Jenevein's gas tanks went up and fire was falling all over Spanish Fork. A nice, quiet, little town.

She saw Burnside slumped against the drug store, dead without a mark on him, side arm still holstered. Yorke was still screaming. The Elder stood over the trooper and retrieved his spectacles, raising them up to his face like a sacrament. Yorke scratched Oedipus-fashion at his eyes, and kicked at the ground. Elder Seth walked away.

Tyree stood over Yorke, fending off the streams of people with the threat of her gun. Quincannon got to the kid and slapped him, but it had no effect. He dug out a squeezer of morph-plus from his belt-slung medikit and put the Trooper to sleep. Yorke shut up but still writhed. Quincannon tried to get a grip on him.

Tyree still fought the impulse to go with the music. A tall Psychopomp, an elegant girl in see-through plastic, shoved past her and fell in step with the Josephites. She marched off like a catwalk creature. Tyree knew she should follow.

Elder Seth walked towards the city limits, ignoring his flock. Everywhere he went, he could guarantee new converts. Whatever his religion really was, she guessed it had nothing to do with Jesus H. Christ.

She was hearing him right now. 'Six six six.'

With a lurch, her legs were moving, and she was among the multitude. A ticking calm settled around her. Quincannon and Yorke would be left behind with the dead. If she went with the Josephites, she would be saved, she would atone for her sins. She followed.

The Quince called for her, but she ignored him,

She knew it was madness but she marched with the crowd. They were united by love. She knew she was like them, another sacrificial lamb, more meat for the juggernaut that rolled down Route 666 to the Apocalypse, but she was happy with her lot. There were arms around her. To her left was an old man, a Josephite, to her right the 'Pomp she had seen join the resettlers. Together, they walked towards the desert. The old man fell, and his Brothers and Sisters walked over him. He was still singing, they were still singing, as their feet broke his ribs.

Tyree and the tall, thin girl embraced. Her name, Tyree gathered from the gush of welcome, was Varoomschka. Love was all around, and old enmities were strewn in the blooded dirt. When she stumbled, she was held up by Varoomschka and Brother Wiggs. Both had burned away their sins and imperfections and become beacons of purity.

The Feelgood blazed away like a Fourth of July bonfire, and the courthouse began to smoulder. There was a five-man gallows that would burn up beautifully. It was a shame nobody was in a mood to appreciate the fireworks and bake potatoes in the ashes later.

She saw Elder Seth leading his Indians and his saints away from the blazes of massacre, his footprints filled with blood, spirits in the air. And she saw him now, exactly the same.

Someone had hold of her, pulling her away from the ranks of the pilgrims. Varoomschka tried to rescue her from the new tugging, arms slipping around her neck in a bear-hug. Tyree struggled, possessed by the need to be with the Elder. and took a slap in the face.

She closed her eyes and concentrated hard. She didn't want to be a sacrifice for anyone's God.

The Quince was with her now, red face pale. He was the only other citizen in sight not dead or crazy. He had hauled her out of the procession, and was holding her back.

Brother Wiggs, smiling, reached out for Tyree. Putting all his meat into it, Quincannon stuck a huge fist into the Josephite's face. Wiggs' smile caved in like an abusable teevee screen and cracks appeared, but no blood burst through. He drew in breath and his face filled out, beatific expression popping forth.

The Quince was ready to fight, but Tyree didn't want to be fought for. She struggled to be with Wiggs and Varoomschka and Ciccone and Elder Seth. Most of all. Elder Seth.

Then, it snapped inside. She realised how insane this all was. It would be better to die than go to Salt Lake like a zombie. She clung to Quincannon and scanned the pilgrims with loathing.

As Wiggs began to march her off, Varoomschka mewled for her lost new friend and cried out 'suestra, suestra', sister, sister…

Tyree took the fillette's hand and pulled her away from Brother Wiggs. Perhaps she could save someone. Varoomschka squirmed and got loose. She stumbled a few steps, then fell in line with the others. She would find more new friends in the throng.

Damn.

'What…?' Tyree began.

'Hell, Leona, don't ask.'

Elder Seth's party were nearly out of sight now, beyond the walls of fire. Shame flooded through her, self- disgust at what she had nearly been. She shuddered and Quincannon embraced her.

The courthouse exploded, and flaming timbers fell out of the sky like pick-up-sticks.

Quincannon hauled her through the fires and into the wake of the pilgrim procession. They found Yorke, still out cold, curled up on the sidewalk. Taking an arm each, they hauled the kid off towards Chollie's Gas and Inferno. The cruiser was parked opposite, unharmed by the explosions, Tyree's motorcyke was melted metal by now, though.

'Burnside?' Quincannon asked.

Tyree shook her head.

Yorke moaned in his troubled sleep. His eyes leaked blood where he had clawed.

Quincannon punched the access code into the doorlock, and the cruiser opened for them. They hauled Yorke into the back and slipped restraints on him for when he woke up.

The Quince sucked in his belly and got behind the wheel. Tyree took the weapons console and fired everything up. Then they drove steadily out of town, careful to avoid the fires in the road. A mass of twisted, smouldering wreckage blocked their way, and Quincannon had Tyree use the directional cannon to blast a clear path through it.

When they were out of range of flying debris, they stopped, and the Quince pressed his head to the wheel. It was cool in the cruiser after the heat of the day and the fires, and the soundproofing cut out most of the noise.

'Jesus, Mary and Joseph,' Quincannon said. Before them, on the road, the crowd walked. They were thousands strong, a column winding away into the distance. Whoever they had been before, they were Josephites now, marching off to whatever Elder Seth had in store at Salt Lake City.

Tyree's fingers flexed on the keyboard. She could unloose the chainguns, the maxiscreamers and launch a couple of missiles. She had the impression she would be doing these people a good turn by killing as many of them as possible now.

But she did nothing. Elder Seth followed the Path of Joseph.

XVI

12 June 1995

Dying is easy, as her old man used to say, it's the coming back that's hard.

Inside her head, there was darkness. A red darkness. She was sinking slowly into it. Her optic implant was dangling useless on her cheek, her durium skull platelocks were bent uncomfortably inside her head. That wasn't