It seemed to Nik that they'd had little enough time to spend together ...
And now only a few precious moments remained ...
"Do you think we're gonna make it this time, Nik?" Del asked of her partner.
"Do you think we were followed? Did we manage to give them the slip?"
From the tone of her voice, Nik realized that her young friend was desperately seeking reassurance.
"To be perfectly honest, Honey - At this point, I'm not at all sure!"
"I feel that we'll make it ...
But only if the Gate appears before those men find us ..."
"The Amazon Gate was right here when we passed through before! Wasn't it, Nik?"
"Del! Hush! Did you hear that?"
As if by instinct, the women simultaneously made motions to arm themselves.
"What was it?"
"A Hunter, I think!"
"He's disappeared!"
"Back to warn his pals!"
"Can you see anything, Nik?" Del's voice quavered slightly.
"No! But whoever it was couldn't have gotten far!"
"He's off somewhere in this direction!"
There came the softly concussive sound of a muffled rifle-shot ...
And Nik took a slug beneath her rib-cage - in the right side of her belly!
Nik lifted a generous breast the better to inspect her wound.
"My God! Nik! You've been hit!" Del exclaimed as though she couldn't quite beleive it.
Nik was still attempting to examine her wounded belly as Del raised her gun - determined to even the score ...
But the score was evened in a way that neither girl had intended ...
For now it was Del's turn to take a slug in the gut!
"They must have rifles!" Nik gritted.
"With telescopic sights!" She added as Del stared at her wound, too shocked as yet to feel the pain.
"My God, Nik! I think I'm dying!"
"That's likely to go for both of us, Little One!
But I'll be damned if I don't take at least one of them with me!"
A third report came from one of the muffled guns ...
Followed quickly by a loud grunt from Nik as she now took a second slug low and deep in the gut ...
The wound gave Nik the appearance of having suddenly developed a second navel - well below the original ...
The impact of the bullet as it struck her had been akin to taking a hard fist in the belly,
and so now the Amazon struggled to regain something of her composure ...
"Did you see anything, Nik?" Del asked of her gasping partner ...
But before Nik could make anything by way of response, Del gasped as a bullet suddenly punched through her navel ...
"That shot was just a matter of luck!" Nik observed in what was now almost a detached manner.
"I'm dying, Nik!"
Nik glared at Del in her discomfiture.
"So'm I, Honey! We both are!"
"That navel-shot was just dumb luck!
C'mon out you bastards!
Show yourselves!"
"I'll give you creeps what for! I'll ... UNGH!"
This last came from Nik as she in turn took a slug through the navel ...
"And you just said that hitting us in the navel was just a matter of luck!?" Del exclaimed in astonishment.
"It is!" Nik insisted, struggling for breath. "Bad Luck! For us!"
"I see something!" Del exclaimed as once again, she tried to draw a bead on a target ... "Someone's out there!
"And whoever it is - is deliberately shooting us to pieces!"
"I certainly don't think that all this has been by accident, Honey!"
"Oh, My God! Del! Honey, I'm so sorry!"
"Here I am making with the cute remarks while my partner takes one in the chest!"
But then it is Nik herself who is hit once again ...
This time a bullet finds her left breast - all but destroying the nipple ...
Nik had just time enough to make a cursory examination of her wounded breast ...
"I'm done for, Del! I've had it!"
"S'funny! But right now - It doesn't hurt as much - I don't feel much of anything ..."
"It's getting so dark ..."
"Nik? Nik!
Don't leave me, Nik!
I can't take much more of this, Nik!"
"Y'know something, Honey?"
"I don't think that either one of is gonna hafta take much more ...
We can't hold out much longer!"
"Oh, Nik! I doan wanna die, Nik!"
"Do you think for a moment that I came out here with that thought in mind, Honey?"
"But I don't think that we were given much choice about it ..."
"Were we ...?"
"Do you think that they'll find us, Nik?"
"You mean - Our Amazons from beyond the Gate?"
"If they do ... It won't be soon enough to do either one of us much good, I'm afraid ..."
"Give me one last kiss, Nik?"
"Before we go ..."
It was difficult to tell which one of the two was the first to die ...
Not that it made such a great deal of difference to them one way or the other ...
Neither one was in any way competing with one the other after all ...
Somewhere off to the left, a brief late afternoon shower sprang up - and then almost as quickly abated ...
The sun appeared from somewhere behind the thinning clouds ...
And a rainbow slowly materialized ...
Could this natural phenomenon be the mysterious "Gate" the Amazons had been seeking so desperately?
If it be so ...
Then who or whatever had control of it may have been asleep at the switch that afternoon ...
Either that - or perhaps it was simply not in the cards that these two Amazon lovers were to make it back through the Gate ...
Or then again, have they?
Perhaps they have come home - at last ...
