The rain in the night had made the smoky air damp and it seemed to stick to their clothes like mud. Bonner awoke in the ruins of the motel, smelled the dirty air and told himself he would be glad to get out of the borderlands. The farther he advanced into the Slavestates, the more danger he would face, but it would be better than hanging around in the smoky hell of the borderlands.

He eased himself to his feet, feeling the cold of a long, wet night in his bones and in a dozen old wounds. He stood in the gray morning light looking east wondering for a moment if it was worth going on. Ahead of him lay miles of firefights, pain and death. And that was before he made the Cap. Turn back now, he thought, go back to Chi. But a single fact chased his longings from his mind: Dara.

Cooker sidled up to him. "Starling tells me you're going to the Cap."

"That's right."

"Ever been there?"

"Years ago."

"Tell me about the Cap, Bonner."

"Lots of big buildings, ruins. Lots of big ruins. There's a river. A lot of broken roads, broken statues . . . Cooker, the Cap isn't any different from any other bombed-out city, except the ruins are prettier."

"Tell me," said Cooker eagerly, "is there one big mother of a ruin, they say it's fucking huge."

"They're all huge. Cooker."

"Yeah, I know, but this one is huge. I mean really fucking enormous and it's got a big round whatdyacallit on the roof.''

"A dome."

"Yeah, a dome. Is there one like that?"

"Yeah, Cooker, there's one like that."

"Damn," said Cooker as if he couldn't believe it. "Damn."

"Yo, Bonner, Cooker, let's get moving." Starling was swinging up into the seat of his rig.

"Can I ride with you, Bonner?" Cooker asked like a child begging for another bedtime story.

"Yeah, sure."

The going was still pretty tough in the alley. Bonner's car led, bumping along the narrow track while Cooker stood where the passenger's seat would have been, his back braced against the crossbar on which the machinegun was mounted. The roar of the powerful engines bounced off the steel walls making it seem as if the two vehicles were trapped in a sealed box of noise.

"Hey, Bonner," Cooker shouted, "you got any idea how bad the gas situation is inside the Slavestates?"

"Yeah," shouted Bonner, "bad."

"Fucking right it's bad. Leather has every drop. Every lick of gas north and south of the Cap for two-three hundred miles."

Bonner nodded. This wasn't news to him.

"If they need gas in New York or some other garrison, they have to ask him and he sends it. They have tanks too, they travel in convoys."

Bonner nodded again. He had been known to bring down a convoy now and then. Never in the Slavestates though, they were too big. He would hit convoys in the Snows or the Hots. They were smaller and two smugglers could handle them if they planned the right ambush at the right place.

"So how do you plan to get in and out with your machine here? When you're outbound again, heading for Chi you're gonna be having your ass chased by every Stormer and Radlep on the coast. You won't have time to go sniffing around for no oasis. You're gonna have to point your nose west and haul ass. Run out of gas and you're a dead man."

This wasn't new either.

"So . . ." Cooker scratched the stubble on his chin. "So, I been thinking."

Bonner silently wished that Cooker wouldn't think. It wasn't that he wasn't good at it, but somehow his plans always seemed to come out wrong.

"You wanna know what I been thinking, Bonner?"

"Sure."

"I been thinking that you could use a tanker alongside."

"What are you talking about. Cooker."

"I'm talking about going with you to the Cap."

"Cooker, what do you want to go to the Cap for?"

"Got my reasons." Man, he thought, do I have my reasons. He was going to do his own little piece of damage to that shit Leather. It would be quite a sight. And it would make him richer, richer than the great tank field he found would do. Yes, Cooker thought, he had been doing some pretty smart reasoning. Bonner was smart, but Cooker thought he was smarter. Cooker told himself that he could have been an Outrider, if he had wanted.

"What reasons?"

"They're mine, Bonner. All I want you to do is get me into the Cap. You do that and you got me and my tank, no charge—" it was hard for Cooker to say the last two words—"all the way in and all the way out. What do you say?"

Bonner always knew the gas-hounds were crazy. "Cooker," he began.

"Cut the shit, Bonner. Its a fair deal. You're going to need a hundred, maybe hundred-fifty gals. My tank has five hundred, full . . ." Cooker ran an experienced eye over the fuel tank he was standing on. "What you got here, a fifty?"

"Right."

"And you got a thirsty machine. Think, you fuck. No fuel problems all the way into the Cap and all the  way back to sweet Chi-town. And don't forget, I got my thrower. I'll help out in a firelight." He giggled. "I'll make it a real firefight."

Bonner drove in silence for a minute. He didn't need any fuel problems. And he didn't need the crazy little tanker man around either. It was a question of which was the bigger hassle . . . Finally he said:

"Deal, Cooker."

Cooker smiled and laughed his crazy little giggle. "You won't regret it ... We're coming up on my tank. Just up the ways a piece."

Cooker's tanker was pulled up on the side of the road exactly where the little gas-man had left it. When he saw it. Cooker's eyes lit up, like a proud father.

"Ain't she a honey, Bonner?"

He jumped down from Bonner's car and scampered over to his old truck and climbed onto it with the agility of a chimp. Starling pulled up next to Bonner and shut down his engine.

"That damn tank is the ugliest thing I have ever seen on two wheels, three wheels, four wheels or six."

"Who drives six wheels?"

"No one yet, but someone will. And when they do it'll still be prettier than that thing."

The tanker was about as simple as a vehicle could be. A huge drum, a mean-looking welding job of rough iron plates joined together like a patchwork quilt sat squarely on a huge cast iron chassis. At the fore end was a big old engine looted from some long dead semi, completely exposed. Protruding from beneath the engine was a shaft over which a heavy gear chain hooked. This ran from the front of the truck to the sprocketed wheel on the rear axle, giving the behemoth a single gear, chain drive like a bicycle.

The contraption was steered, by brute force, from atop the tank itself. Up there. Cooker had built himself a little perch, like the box on a stagecoach, with the steering wheel flat in front of him attached to the front axle by a long L-shaped steering column. Behind him, incongruously, was a big umbrella, like the one that people used to take to the beach, which he opened when he needed shelter from the rain or shade to fight the hot sun.

Cooker climbed up to his box seat and slipped into the harness that held the weapon that was his trademark. A bright red cannister hung on his back like an old scuba tank and a long rubber hose snaked through the harness, around Cooker's waist into his hands. At the end of the hose was a big brass nozzle.

Cooker reached over his shoulder and grasped a small pump handle that protruded from atop the tank. He worked it in and out once or twice and opened the nozzle on the hose a touch.

Bonner and Starling could see a fine shimmer of gas dancing in the air. Cooker lit the shimmering cloud with an old Zippo lighter then opened the nozzle wide. A roaring jet of flame spewed out of the hose and leapt onto some stunted vegetation. It vanished as if in a firestorm.

Involuntarily, Starling and Bonner winced. They could feel the searing heat of the blast thirty feet away. Cooker giggled and ran across the back of the tank and let another bolt of flame shoot from his thrower. The fireball burnt itself out in the morning air, leaving a heavy orb of black smoke. The air was heavy with the smell of burnt gasoline.

"How many gals do you s'pose he's dancing around on?" asked Starling.

"He told me five hundred."

"For tuck's sake. Cooker," shouted Starling. "Would you stop jumping around on that tank with all that fire. You want to kill us all?"

"What's the matter. Starling? Make you nervous?"

"Damn right it does. It's what I call taking an unnecessay risk."

"Awwww, now don't you go worrying about a thing. This old gasoline ain't going to hurt her daddy."

"I think that fuck's crazy," said Starling.

Cooker let fly with another blast of flame. It consumed the few pieces of upholstery still clinging to the frame of an old convertible that lay rusting next to the tank. The flames danced over the metalwork, blistering the few remaining chips of paint. Cooker watched with feverish eyes, delighted by his own capacity for destruction.

"And that, boys and girls, is why they call me Cooker! Do you know they used these things to put out fires?" He cackled. "Can you beat that? They called 'em fire 'stinguishers. What a fucked up place the old world was."

"I know the fuck's crazy," said Starling.

"Get used to him," said Bonner, "he's riding with us."

"Now I think you're crazy."

"Come on. Cooker. Stop playing. We got to go."

"Yessir, Mr. Bonner. Onwards to the Cap." Cooker slipped into the seat and started up his engine. The noise was deafening. He grabbed the lever that slipped the truck into gear and yanked it and the engine started working hard, driving that big chain. The noise doubled in intensity.

"Only we're not going to the Cap," Bonner shouted, "not yet. We're going to make a stop first."

"We are," bellowed Starling. "Where?"

"New York."

"What for?"

"Seems to me we could use two things before we visit Leather."

"Yeah. Ammo's one, right?"

"Yes. And the other's Harvey."

"Harvey's in New York? What's he doing there?"

"He's in jail."

"Great," said Starling, disgustedly. "And we have to get him out, right."

"Right."

"He's not on the island is he?"

"I can't imagine them putting him anywhere else."

"Going to the Cap isn't enough for you? You want to hit the island too? Why did they have to put him there?"

"Well, at least we know where to find him."

Cooker watched the conversation pass between the two men and smiled. He couldn't hear a thing, but he was happy. He figured he had made a pretty shrewd move. He had hired the two best former Outriders to escort him into the Cap. Well, Starling was one of the best. Leather was better than Starling, but in a fair fight Bonner was better than Leather. But, he wondered, who fought fair anymore?

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