Last time I promised to tell you about some of the
Dark Times world machinery and vehicles. So I'll do so in the form of some
extracts from the novels themselves, and I'm adding some illustrations to each
fragment.
The Punch Truck (extracted from The Wastelands Clans)
The
truck was great. A reinforced armored cabin with the windscreen shuttered from above
and below with steel plates, the distance between their edges about a foot and
a half - just enough so that the driver could see the road. The bodywork was
reinforced with steel vaulting the kind they'd used in bygone days in metro
tunnels. Of course, Turan had never been in the metro, but Nazar had told him all
about it. The mechanic used to buy these vaults from traders whose caravans sometimes
passed through the fiefdom of Boris Jai-Khan. And farmers didn't care about
their provenance anyway. Quite a few hotheads were out scouring the towns'
ruins and ancient catacombs for loot.
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| art by A. Shitikov |
The
round hole in the roof was covered with a gun turret which was capped with
thick sheet steel and equipped with a gun slit. Lower, between the seats, they'd
welded a shelf; if you stepped on it, your head would be just opposite the
slit. Next to it, was yet another shelf equipped with steel braces to which a
double-barreled carbine of heavy caliber was strapped.
Turan
walked alongside the Punch. Great wagon, nothing to say. Gigantic black wheels,
solid footplates. The foglights were covered with steel hoops, and the hefty
exhaust pipe was sticking up behind the gun turret.
The
Sander (extracted from The Barbarians of
the Crimea)
I sat at the wheel and set my hands upon it. Suddenly
I got the sensation of… dare I say satisfaction? For the first time since I'd
woken up in the boat I felt calm and at peace with myself. And for the first
time since my escape from the Inkerman Gorge, all thought of Lada Prior had
left me. I squeezed the wheel tighter and turned it slightly.
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| art by A. Shitikov |
In the depths of the hangar, hung between two poles on
chains, was a vehicle without its hood. The unscrewed wheels lay below. The
sander, I remembered: a vehicle for crossing the silt flats of the Bottomland
Desert and the sands of the central Wastelands. It was squat with an open cab
fashioned out of steel tubing. On the front tubes, almost above the driver's
head, were three round headlights, and behind them, a machine gun was mounted.
The
armored bus (extracted from Password
Eternity)
A vehicle appeared on the street. It really differed
from the sanders which I'd seen at the catchers' and monks' places: if those
reminded me of buggies, this one made me think of a square minibus. It was
completely covered in riveted steel plates, with a flat roof and a protruding rectangular
hood. The windows were armored, and instead of the windscreen was a slit
between two horizontal shutters.
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| art by A. Shitikov |
Chuck lifted himself in his seat, studying it, and
said,
"They are Medvedkovo men, may necrosis eat their
livers.
All along the perimeter of the roof, steel rods had
been welded, to which the main cage was attached. Behind its bars, people were
sheltering. It was bristling with rifles and sawn-off shotguns. In the wheel
arches hung oval steel sheets which half-covered the wheels, small for such a
behemoth. A kind of DIY armored car. It wasn't apparently meant for any serious
off-road experiences, more for conducting assault operations in built-up areas.
Or rather, in taken-down areas. The exhaust pipe spewed smoke, the engine
roared, its noise resounding far in an empty Moscow.
Military
Tricycle (extracted from Password
Eternity)
 |
| art by A. Shitikov |
From the hole in the concrete fence I glanced back. I
rearranged the straps of my backpack and checked if the carbide lamp was held
tight on the belt. Selga Ines, Amasin, Rost and two of the fighters stood at
the foot of the hill watching me. A campfire burned by the HQ tent. Between the
vehicles scampered the boys from the fuel clans. One of the vehicles stood out
because of its unusual appearance: like a motorbike but far bigger and with two
steel barrels welded horizontally onto the sides that looked like jet turbines.
Under these barrels were small wheels, like those of a regular sidecar.
Translated by Neil P. Woodhead
