He slowed. He braked and stopped. Then he saw them.He sat there and watched them as they passed, about ahalf-mile ahead.

A monstrous herd of bison crossed before him. It tookthe better part of an hour before they had passed. Huge,heavy, dark, heads down, hooves scoring the soil, they ranwithout slowing until the thunder was great and thenrolled off toward the north, diminishing, softening, dying,gone. The screen of their dust still hung before him, andhe plunged into it, turning on his lights.

He considered taking a pill, decided against it. Gregmight be waking soon, he -wanted to be able to get somesleep after they'd switched over.

He came up beside a highway, and its surface lookedpretty good, so he crossed onto it and sped ahead. Aftera time, he passed a faded, sagging sign that said "TOPEKA—110 MILES."

Greg yawned and stretched. He rubbed his eyes withhis knuckles and then rubbed his forehead, the right sideof which was swollen and dark.

"What time is it?" he asked.

Tanner gestured toward the clock in the dashboard.

"Morning or is it afternoon?"

"Afternoon."

"My God! I must have slept around fifteen hours!"

That's about right."

"You been driving all that time?"

"That's right."

"You must be done in. You look like hell. Let me justhit the head. I'll take over in a few minutes."

"Good idea."

Greg crawled toward the rear of the vehicle.

After about five minutes. Tanner came upon the outskirts of a dead town. He drove up the main street, andthere were rusted-out hulks of cars all along it. Most ofthe buildings had fallen in upon themselves, and some ofthe opened cellars that he saw were filled with scummywater. Skeletons lay about the town square. There wereno trees standing above the weeds that grew there. Threetelephone poles still stood, one of them leaning forwardand trailing wires like a handful of black spaghetti. Several benches were visible within the weeds beside thecracked sidewalks, and a skeleton lay stretched out uponthe second one Tanner passed. He found his way barredby a fallen telephone pole, and he detoured around theblock. The next street was somewhat better preserved, butall its store-front windows were broken, and a nude mannikin posed fetchingly with her left arm missing from theelbow down. The traffic light at the corner stared blindlyas Tanner passed through its intersection.

Tanner heard Greg coming forward as he turned at the next comer.

"I'll take over now," he said.

"I want to get out of this place first," and they bothwatched in silence for the next fifteen minutes until thedead town was gone from around them.

Tanner pulled to a halt then and said, "We're a couplehours away from a place that used to be called Topeka.Wake me if you run into anything hairy."

"How did it go while I was alseep? Did you have anytrouble?""No," said Tanner, and he closed his eyes and began tosnore.

Greg drove away from the sunset, and he ate threeham sandwiches and drank a quart of milk before Topeka.

IX

Tanner was awakened by the firing of the rockets. Herubbed the sleep from his eyes and stared dumbly aheadfor almost half a minute.

Like gigantic dried leaves, great clouds fell about them.Bats, bats, bats. The air was filled with bats. Tanner couldhear a cluttering, squeaking, scratching sound, and thecar was buffeted by their dark bodies.

"Where are we?" he asked.

"Kansas City. The place seems full of them," and Gregreleased another rocket, which cut a fiery path throughthe swooping, spinning horde.

"Save the rockets. Use the fire," said Tanner, switchingthe nearest gun to manual and bringing cross-hairs intofocus upon the screen. "Blast 'em in all directions—forfive, six seconds—then I'll come in."

The flame shot forth, orange and cream blossoms ofcombustion. When they folded,. Tanner sighted in thescreen and squeezed the trigger. He swung the gun, andthey fell. Their charred bodies lay all about him, and headded new ones to the smouldering heaps.

"Roll it!" he cried, and the car moved forward, swaying,bat bodies crunching beneath its tiresTanner laced the heavens with gunfire, and when theyswooped again he strafed them and fired a flare.

In the sudden magnesium glow from overhead, itseemed that millions of vampire-faced forms were circling,spiraling down toward them.

He switched from gun to gun, and they fell about himlike fruit. Then he called out, "Brake, and hit the topsideflamel" and Greg did this thing.

"Now the sidesi Front and rear next!"

Bodies were burning all about them, heaped as high asthe hood, and Greg put the car into low gear when Tannercried "Forward!" And they pushed their way through thewall of charred flesh.

Tanner fired another flare.

The bats were still there, but circling higher now. Tan-ner primed the guns and waited, but they did not attackagain in any great number. A few swept about them, andhe took pot-shots at them as they passed.

Ten minutes later he said, "That's the Missouri Riverto our left. If we just follow alongside it now, we'll bit Saint Louis."

"I know. Do you think itil be full of bats, too?"

"Probably. But if we take our time and arrive withdaylight, they shouldn't bother us. Then we can figure away to get across the Missus Hip."

Then their eyes fell upon the rearview screen, wherethe dark skyline of Kansas City with bats was silhouettedby pale stars and touched by the light of the bloody moon.

After a time, Tanner slept once more. He dreamt hewas riding his bike, slowly, down the center of a widestreet, and people lined the sidewalks and began to cheeras he passed. They threw confetti, but by the time itreached him it was garbage, wet and stinking. He steppedon the gas then, but his bike slowed even more and nowthey were screaming at him. They shouted obscenities.They cried out his name, over and over, and again. TheHarley began to wobble, but his feet seemed to be gluedin place. In a moment, he knew, he would fall. The bikecame to a halt then, and he began to topple over towardthe right side. They rushed toward him as he fell, and heknew it was just about all over... .

He awoke with a jolt and saw the morning spread outbefore him: a bright coin in the middle of a dark bluetablecloth and a row of glasses along the edge."That's it," said Greg. "The Missus Hip."Tanner was suddenly very hungry.

After they had refreshed themselves, they sought the bridge.

"I didn't see any of your naked people with spears,"said Greg- "Of course, we might have passed their wayafter dark—if there are any of them still around."

"Good thing, too," said Tanner. "Saved us some ammo."

The bridge came into view, sagging and dark save for the places where the sun gilded its cables, and it stretchedunbroken across the bright expanse of waters. Theymoved slowly toward it, threading their way throughstreets gorged with rubble, detouring when it became com-pletely blocked by the rows of broken machines, fallenwalls, sewer-deep abysses in the burst pavement.

It took them two hours to travel half a mile, and it wasnoon before they reached the foot of the bridge, and, "Itlooks as if Brady might have crossed here,'* said Greg,eyeing what appeared to be a cleared passageway amidstthe wrecks that filled the span. "How do you think he didit?"

"Maybe he had something with him to hoist them andswing them out over the edge. There are some wrecks below, down where the water is shallow."

"Were they there last time you passed by?"

"I don't know. I wasn't right down here by the bridge. Itopped that hill back there," and he gestured at the rearview screen.

"Well, from here it looks like we might be able to makeit. Let's roll."

They moved upward and forward onto the bridge andbegan their slow passage across the mightly Missus Hip.There were times when the bridge creaked beneath them,sighed, groaned, and they felt it move.