Chill Factor: Book Summary
Upon returning to New Mexico, The band discover that Dean was captured by slavers who have been using the redoubt. Christina managed to shoot one of the slavers and tortured him to find out who took Dean. It turns out that an old enemy, Zimyanin, is the leader of the slavers.
Ryan plans to go and rescue Dean on his own, but Jak, feeling responsible for Deans capture, insists on going with him. Ryan sees Christina's reaction, but agrees to allow Jak to go along with him.
The next morning after a large breakfast, Jak and Ryan leave, enter the redoubt, and jump out, using the LD button to return to the redoubt the slaver's used. The redoubt they arrive in is freezing, well below zero. The walls of this particular redoubt are a deep brown, nearly black. The other fact is that the redoubt is open to the elements as there is a breeze and snow and ice are blowing around in the corridor. Jak is quite ill from the jump.
While finding the entrance to the redoubt they encounter a group of cuddlies. Jak is attacked and injured by one of the small viscous creatures, and Ryan is forced to send him back through the gateway home to New Mexico. He is forced to hunt for his missing son on his own. For the first time since they discovered the gateways, Ryan is able to witness the actual jump in process.
This particular redoubt has suffered a lot of damage. When he leaves the facility, he discovers that it is located in a valley, near an industrial area. A huge sulphur mine is located far below, and that is where Dean is located. It being late, he returns to the redoubt to explore. He finds an incredibly long tunnel which leads to a hidden section of the redoubt, deep in the mountain. This tunnel has a single rail, obviously used for a monorail system. He reaches the end of the tunnel to find a huge armoured sec door. He is about to turn around and head back when he leans on it, and discovers that it is open!
Going inside, he finds himself in a weapons research facility. It has several sec doors, and all but one are closed and locked. The one that isn't locked leads to a room which contains five SEC HUNTER robots and a warning not to cross a red line. Ryan does so, and inadvertently activates the robots who are imprinted with his genetic code, and are programmed to hunt him down and kill him. He leaves the room and walks down the corridor. As he walks, he hears sounds following him. As he reaches the end of the main corridor he hides in some rubble and waits, as the sound that has been following him has gotten louder. He looks around and sees the first of the sec hunter robots hot on his trail.
He fires twelve rounds into the droid, causing quite a bit of damage, as well as blinding it. He is able to lead it outside where he gets it on a cliff face, and knocks it over, smashing the robot to pieces on the frozen ground far below. He suffers a bad hit on his elbow for his effort.
Dean meets Zimyanin for the first time. He lies and tells Zimyanin that his name is Will Goode. Zimyanin is sure that he recognises him, but can't recall where. He warns the boy to watch himself as there are a number of men who enjoy young boys among his guards and the other slaves.
He returns to the entrance where he stops to get some sleep.He awakens just in time to see on of the sec hunter robots about to strike. This robot is dragging on of it's legs. Using his Panga, he is able to severely damage the second leg, dropping the robot to the concrete floor. Hoping to lose the creature, he returns to the research room and locks the sec doors. The robot, badly damaged, follows him and begins to pound on the doors. The hammering lasts for well over an hour before it finally drains it's powercells and shuts down. He is finally able to get some badly needed sleep.
During the night two men named John and Owen try to rape dean. He drives his blade deep into the eye of one, and cuts the others dick off, leaving him to bleed to death. He takes a different bed roll far away from the scene.
As Ryan watches, the third of the sec hunter droids malfunctions as it is activated. It self destructs and is unable to head after Ryan. He waits around for about an hour, waiting to see if the others activate. When they don't he leaves to head to the mines. Shortly after that, the fourth activates and pursues him.
As Ryan makes his way to the mine, a blizzard hits and he is forced to take refuge in a small entrance to the mine. When he enters he encounters two people. Cody and Kate Webb. She tries to bluff, pretending that she has a weapon, but Ryan doesn't buy it for a second. He warms himself by their fire.
Zimyanin learns about the deaths of the two men. He is quite impressed with the skill it took to kill them and knows something strange is going on.
After talking to the two people in the cave, Ryan is quite angry at the fact that they have simply given up and are waiting to die. He tells them that they should go out with a bang, not a whimper. The should at least try to take several of the sec men with them into the long sleep. Cody gets up and goes outside to take a piss when he is attacked by the fourth sec hunter droid. It literally tears him apart. Ryan drags Kate with him and they head deep into the mine to try and get away from the metallic killer.
They spend quite some time racing through the black tunnels. Eventually they come to a section of the mine which is dimly lit by glowing mushrooms. They see the droid, hot on their tails. In another corridor they see a eight foot wide pit, running from wall to wall. Ryan clears it easily, but has to talk Kate into jumping. She barely makes it. The sec hunter droid reaches the pit, examines it. It determines that it can't cross it. So it gives Ryan and Kate the finger and turns around in search of another way to continue the hunt.
A short time later Kate and Ryan come to an underground river. The walls, ceiling, and floor are coated in ice from the mist thrown up by the fast flowing river. Both are quickly soaked to the skin. Disaster strikes and they fall into the river. They're carried a huge distance before they are finally caught in a net set up in the river. They are able to untangle themselves and return to the corridor. They move about, trying to keep warm when they encounter Trackies.
Ryan is able to kill three of the muties and the rest stand around, trying to figure out what to do. One breaks off and runs away, obviously to get help. Knowing what is about to happen, Ryan and Kate jump into the river to try and escape.
Dean quickly learns what and what not to do. He runs into Zimyanin once again. Zimyanin is quite sure that Dean has had something to do with the death of the two men that he was shown.
The underground river dumps both Ryan and Kate into a large lake outside the mine. They make it to shore, where Ryan is able to drag himself and Kate into a small cave. The cave is filled with small branches and twigs, as well as drift wood. He is able to get a fire going. Not wasting any time, Ryan goes outside and gathers up drift wood to feed the fire. He returns to the cave and strips Kate naked to help dry out her cloths and massages her flesh, trying to revive her. The small cave warms quickly and she wakes up. She offers herself to Ryan, and he accepts.
The next day they get dressed. Kate wants to go with Ryan to help him rescue his son. He refuses, and she threatens to turn him in to Zimyanin. He is about to execute her when she says she knows the way around the mine and that he needs her. It saves her life and they head outside to try and find a group of miners to link up with.
They are both able to slip into a line of workers heading in to get some food. One man wants to know what they think they are doing and threatens to turn them in when Ryan tells him that they are there on Zimyanin's orders. He accepts it and they go in to eat. After the meal they are taken to a dormitory.
Here they meet Eldar Bluffield. He is a religious leader who was captured twenty two days before with his followers. Ryan simply doesn't like the man and refuses to allow the man to push him around. Later that night when Ryan goes to relieve himself and is locked in the privy. He hears Kate scream. With a savage kick, he knocks the door off its hinges and enters the room to see Eldar Bluffield holding Kate down and is about to cut off three of the fingers from her left hand. Ryan puts his blaster to the man's head and forces his followers to cut off his fingers instead. A few hours later Ryan hangs the eldar to prevent him from causing trouble.
When Blufflields followers discover the corpse next morning Ryan tells them that Bluffield gave him a message. He relays it and they accept his word on it and leave both he and Kate alone.
Zimyanin is so sure that something is about to happen he orders his sec men to hold a general inspection that night, as he wants to examine each and everyone's face. Ryan and Kate continue to plan their escape and the hunt for his son.
Two sec men are ripped apart by the sec hunter droid. When Zimyanin receives word of this, he finds it nearly impossible to believe that some creature did this.
Later on that day Ryan and Kate are able to slip away from the work gang. They come across a pair of people who were chained to the walls and left to die. The woman was raped and is dead, the man chained is patiently waiting for death to claim him. Ryan is truly sorry that he can't help the man and offers to kill him, ending his suffering quickly. For some reason the man refuses, saying he would rather die with dignity. He asks Ryan to make Zimyanin's passing slow and hard.
A short time later they are attacked by thirteen trackies which Ryan uses nearly all his remaining ammunition to kill. Just after he and Kate are discovered by a guard and are forced back to work. They have no chance to escape and are forced to line up with the other slaves for inspection. To prevent from being recognised by Zimyanin, he takes Kates knife and cuts his bad eye, coating his face with blood. They spot Dean and Dean spots them.
To try and avoid drawing attention to his father, Dean makes sure that he doesn't look at Ryan or kate. Zimyanin spots this, but lets it go. He dismisses the slaves, then stops Ryan. The dirt, blood and mud covering Ryan keeps him from being recognised by Zimyanin. He want's to know what happened to the man's eye, and is ready to allow him to go to the doctor, but Ryan refuses, saying he simply wants to get some sleep and food, then go back to work. It works and Zimyanin leaves him be.
That night Ryan slips away and goes right to the armoury. After kicking the guard in the balls, the man dies from shock, as he was quite ill to begin with. He enters the building and steals a .38 hold out pistol for kate, as well as a handful of ammunition. He also reloads his magazines giving him a total of sixty rounds to fight with.
The body is shown to Zimyanin who accepts the fact that he puked and died from his own vomit, though he is quite curious to why the man's balls are swollen.
The day passes slowly and they don't spot Dean at all. Once again they slip away from the other workers and find a location where they can view the workers as they leave the mine, hoping to spot the boy. It works and they spot each other shortly afterwards. Ryan and Kate join up with Dean and his work group and find themselves sent to a deep part of the mine where they are caught in a cave in. Ryan tries to rescue his son but is clubbed unconscious by a guard. Both he and Dean are taken prisoner once again, but Kate is able to slip away.
At the infirmary Dean is cleaned up and a woman makes a patch to cover his left eye, where he received a bad cut. Kate blows the guard on duty so she could see Ryan, but the guard lies to her and refuses to allow her to enter. Tells her to come back later, so he and his friends can do her. She promises that she will indeed come back.
Zimyanin stops in to see Ryan. He had planned to kill him, but because of his bravery in trying to rescue the boy, allows him to live, to go back to work the next day. He leaves Ryan and goes to see Dean.
When Zimyanin sees the patch over Dean's eye, it clicks into place. He knows that Dean is Ryan's son. So angered he leaves the boy alone, knowing that Ryan can't be too far away. He orders to women to be brought to his quarters so he can relieve his stress. While raping one, he realises that the man who tried to rescue Dean is actually Ryan. He snaps her neck in his anger.
Back in New Mexico a large column of dust is spotted by the others. They can see a number of wagons and see that it is coming closer and should be at the homestead either late that night or the next day.
Kate returns to the three sec men, draws her gun and executes them. She slips inside the building and rescues Ryan. They leave just before Zimyanin arrives.
Zimyanin stops in to see Dean once again and is impressed at the boy's bravery. He comments that if he had ever had a son, he would have been proud if the boy had turned out like Dean. He plans to use the boy as bait to catch his father.
As a distraction, Ryan goes to the dormitories and releases the prisoners. He is forced to shoot several to prove that he isn't fooling around, even though he doesn't particularly like doing it.
Zimyanin gets the guards to round up the escaped prisoners. It takes about an hour, but fifty of the prisoners escaped clean. He places two guards inside the room with Dean and four outside. Kate is able to distract the guards, allowing Ryan to attack. He manages to kill one, while dean takes out the other by driving his blade right into the mans happy sack. He takes the man's Browning and they leave, but not before killing the four men posted outside the building.
Zimyanin loses it. He orders all the prisoners to be executed that were captured. The guards reluctantly do as ordered. He takes a squad of sec men with him to hunt down Ryan, Dean and Kate.
Ryan and his two companions head into the ruined industrial section, planning to make their last stand in the rusting ruins. Zimyanin knows that this is where they went and is close on Ryan's heels.
Deep inside the building Ryan leaves Dean and Kate alone to confront Zimyanin. While they are waiting, Kate is attacked and decapitated by the fourth Sec Droid. Dean flees in horror and meets up with his father, as well as Zimyanin. They lure the droid to an overhead rusting walk way. They rock the walkway back and forth to try and topple the robot. It works, but Zimyanin is determined to heave it over the edge. It breaks his ribs, as well as a wrist before he throws it over. He himself falls and is able to catch onto the guard rail. Ryan is willing to help the man up, but Dean brandishing the Browning, promises to kill him. Zimyanin, not wanting the boy to do such a thing, lets go of the railing and falls to his death.
Ryan and Dean are able to escape from the ruins and make their way back to the redoubt. They jump back to New Mexico. However, one of the sec droids uses the gateway to follow them.
End of Chill Factor
A total of five days passed in this novel.