by Homer Hickam
After the set was finished and the applause died away, Riley sat down beside Crater. Their eyes met and Crater could feel the unasked questions. He looked away, then down at the table. “Riley, there’s somebody . . . I can’t . . . not until I figure it out.”
Her hand touched his. He looked back into soft eyes now damp. “Aye, lad,” she whispered. “But can’t an Irishwoman dream?”
::: SIXTEEN
Crater, wake up!”
It was Q-Bess. “Crater, the sheriff has arrested Crescent! He’s in the cafeteria with her now!”
Crater sat up in bed and waited until his mind caught up with Q-Bess’s words. “Why has she been arrested?”
“The sheriff said she murdered Deputy Jones. They found him in one of the biovats.”
“What’s Crescent saying?”
“She’s saying he deserved it.”
Crater’s mind raced. “Don’t leave the sheriff alone with her. I’ll be there as soon as I get dressed.”
Q-Bess rushed off and Crater bound out of bed, got dressed, then made his way to the cafeteria where he saw Crescent, barefoot and in a plain white bed smock, sitting in a chair, her head bowed. The sheriff sat on a bench in front of her, holding a rope attached to a collar around her neck. A greenie was taking blood from her arm. When she pulled her arm away, the sheriff gave the rope a hard yank and Crescent squeezed her eyes shut. Q-Bess was being held back by a deputy.
“Sheriff,” Crater said, “what’s all this?”
The sheriff squinted at Crater. “It’s pretty simple. Your creature here lured Deputy Jones down into the biovat tubes and there she drowned him in the chicken vat. My loyal deputy, done in by a monster.”
The greenie pulled the needle out and bagged it. A trickle of dark blood flowed from the hole in her arm. The greenie placed a patch on it and left. Crescent’s eyes were riveted on Crater. “Did you kill the deputy, Crescent?” Crater asked.
“He deserved to die,” she answered.
The sheriff smiled. “You see? She’s confessed.”
“That was not a confession. She just said he got what he deserved.”
“Lawyer talk,” the sheriff dismissively replied. “Against the Colonel’s rules, as you well know.”
Crater tried again. “Crescent, did you kill the deputy? Tell me yes or no.”
Crescent looked at him, then turned her face away.
“There,” the sheriff said, “that’s what a guilty man—or in this case, creature—does. It can’t look you in the eye.”
“Where’s Deputy Jones?” Crater asked.
“Still in the chicken vat.”
“Do you mind if I have a look?”
The sheriff shrugged. “Why not? Deputy Zageev, keep an eye on this thing. It isn’t to move, do you understand?”
Q-Bess dragged a chair over and sat down beside Crescent and put her arm around her shoulders. Crescent leaned into her. “Go ahead, Crater, honey,” Q-Bess said. “I’ve got her.”
Crater followed the sheriff through the biovat hatch and down the winding stairs to the lower levels. There was a heavy mix of vegetation, meat, and dairy odors permeating the tubes that was almost enough to make Crater sick. At the tube marked BIOVAT #12, CHICKEN PROTEIN, the sheriff swung open the hatch. Inside was a cylindrical vat six feet high, twelve feet in diameter, with a platform above it to support the paddles that kept the pot stirred. Facedown in the bubbling stew bobbed Deputy Jones. The sheriff got a rake, ordinarily used to skim off grease, and hooked it over the back of the deputy and dragged him in, then flipped the body over. Chicken protein goop poured from the deputy’s open mouth. “You see? Deader’n a hammer and drowned in this scrag stuff.”
“Can we get him out of the vat?”
“I figured to do that later,” the sheriff said.
“Can we do it now? There might be evidence.”
“We don’t need evidence. Your crowhopper murdered my deputy and you know it as well as I. Come on, Crater, don’t look at me like that. She had plenty of motive—we all know Deputy Jones had a peculiar thing for her—and she works down in these biovats all the time. Who else would have done it?”
Crater ignored the sheriff and grasped the deputy by his collar. With a mighty heave, he dragged him out of the vat, a wave of chicken goop splashing out on the floor and running down the side. The man was heavy, and it took all of Crater’s strength to lower him to the deck.
“Don’t tamper with the evidence,” the sheriff tut-tutted.
Crater knelt beside the deputy. The first thing he noticed was he wasn’t wearing any leggings. “Did you find his leggings?” Crater asked.
“Tossed in a corner with his boots,” the sheriff replied. “She enticed him down here to have her way with him, then pushed him into the vat.”
“Since the vat is six feet above the deck, she couldn’t have pushed him in unless he climbed up there.” Crater pointed to the paddle platform.
“Then I guess she enticed him up there,” the sheriff answered with a shrug.
Crater looked dubious, then went to a supply locker and got a towel. He wiped off the deputy’s face with it, then his hands. “His nose is freshly broken.”
“I’ll add assault to the charge.”
“His knuckles are skinned.” Crater ran his hand over the deputy’s head. “There are knots on his head. And a scab.”
“Brave lad, fighting back like that. I hear your creature is monstrously strong.”
“The scab would indicate after he was hit in the head, it had time to heal.”
The sheriff shrugged.
“He’s also covered with goop,” Crater pointed out. “I’m covered with goop. I see some has splashed on you too.”
“You’ll be paying my laundry bill.”
“But there’s not a drop of goop on Crescent.”
The sheriff’s eyes narrowed. “She took a shower. She changed her smock. So what?”
“I didn’t see any goop on the way down here. Wouldn’t she have dripped going back up the steps?”
“The person committing the perfect crime is going to be one who knows how to clean up after themselves. Isn’t your monster employed as a maid?”
“Kitchen staff.”
“Same thing, maybe better. She knows how clean up goop.”
“Then where’s the goop-covered smock?” Crater asked. “And if she cleaned this room and the steps, where’s the gooped-up mop? For all we know, this might have been a suicide.”
“That’s enough, Crater,” the sheriff growled. “It was murder and that foul thing did it. If necessary, I’ll find a goopy smock and a goopy mop.”
“You’ll manufacture evidence?”
“You said that, I didn’t.”
“Isn’t it far more likely that it was the deputy who brought Crescent down here to have his way with her?”
The sheriff held up his hand for Crater to be silent, pressed his other hand into his do4u earpiece, then smiled. “Crater, you’re talking more sense than you know. In fact, I believe that’s exactly what happened. I just got back the report of the creature’s blood. It’s loaded with Phenolune. You know what that stuff does. You can walk, you can talk, but you don’t have a clue what you’re doing. Even though it’s outlawed on the moon, it’s available in Armstrong City if one knows where to ask. The greenie says the amount your creature has in it was enough to confuse an army. Deputy Jones probably sprayed the stuff in its face after sneaking into its room.”
“Then she’s innocent! Jones gave her a drug, then walked her down here. Whatever she did, if anything, was in self-defense.”
The sheriff shrugged. “I’m sure an Earthside lawyer would argue it that way. Too bad for your monster the Colonel outlawed that profession in Moontown. One’s motivation for doing evil is never weighed here, self-defense or not. It is always the evil itself that is judged.”
Crater opened his mouth to debate, then closed it, recognizing the futility of arguing with a mind forever closed to anything other t
han the Colonel’s rules and directives. “You still don’t have any hard evidence Crescent did this.”
The sheriff reached into his shirt pocket and drew out a pendant and a broken silver chain. “Got any idea who this belongs to?” He nodded toward the vat. “Found it right over there.”
When the sheriff offered it to him, Crater took the pendant and the chain. Without question, the fiery eagle symbol—presumably a phoenix rising from the ashes—belonged to Crescent. “All right, she was here,” he relented. “It still doesn’t mean she killed him. What happens now?”
The sheriff put out his hand and Crater dropped the pendant and the chain into it. He put them back into his tunic pocket. “I will try your creature before the Colonel, he will find her guilty, then sentence her.”
“Sentence her to what?”
“There’s no death penalty in Moontown and we don’t have a jail. What do you think?”
Crater didn’t have to think. He knew. “Dust walk,” he said.
“The very same,” the sheriff agreed, then stepped out of the way as a squad of greenies arrived to pick up his dead deputy.
::: SEVENTEEN
Three Legionnaire contubernium—the term borrowed from the ancient Roman equivalent of a platoon—waited patiently and with no hope in the giant hangar. Their decans—a borrowed Roman term for noncommissioned officers—walked down the ranks, stopping only to tighten a strap or rearrange a piece of gear. The Trainers were there, strutting along the edges, watching over everything. The transports had landed and were already dropping their ramps, the dark caverns within beckoning. Spiderwalkers crabbed toward the transports, ridden by technicians.
The decans barked an order and forty-eight boot heels slammed together as the contubernium, called contus for short and each consisting of eight men, came to attention. The centurion, who would not be going on this mission, wheeled about and saluted. After a moment, as if considering whether the centurion was worthy, the Major Trainer returned the salute.
“Hear me, Legionnaires!” he said, his voice amplified by speakers throughout the hangar. “You have already been told your mission. Proceed now with all your skill and breeding. Kill anyone who dares stand in your way. Accomplish the bidding of those who rent you, according to the letter of our contract! This is my charge to you! Where does our spirit go after we die?”
Twenty-four Legionnaires and three decans responded in full throat:
It goes to glory.
“Where does the spirit of our enemy go after we kill them?”
To a place of darkness.
“When will we die?”
When we so choose.
“When will our enemy die?”
When we kill them.
“What is our secret?”
Life is death! Death is life!
The Major Trainer strutted away and the contus peeled off, jogging to the transport designated for infantry. Bucket seats lined each side. The Legionnaires sat and strapped in. A trio of Legionnaires—Absalom, Dion, and Lucien—sat together. They had been born together, grown through childhood together, trained together as spiderwalker troops, and were now sent forth on their first mission together. It was a desperate mission but they all were, one way or the other. Desperation made for motivation, according to the Trainers and their creed.
Absalom leaned forward and turned his face toward his two friends. “Are you frightened?” he whispered.
“Terrified,” Dion said.
“Completely,” Lucien said.
“Life is death,” Absalom said.
“I hope not,” Dion and Lucien replied in unison.
The three young Legionnaires smiled at the joke. They were well trained and prepared to die. To laugh in spite of doom, that was their strength.
“Silence in the ranks!” their decan roared. His name was Flaubert. Decan Flaubert stomped back to the three youths, who looked up at him with respectful, wide eyes. “Hear me, you three. You are the major foul-ups of my contu. If you fail me in any way, I will kill you with my bare hands. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Decan!” they shouted.
He slapped them on their helmets so hard their ears rang. “What is your one purpose in life?” he demanded.
“To kill for those who rent us, Decan!”
Decan Flaubert screwed his lips into the grimace that passed for a smile on his scarred mug. “Fine. Don’t forget that and you will do well.”
The ranking decan—a man named Mollet—opened a cylindrical container strapped to his waist and withdrew a photograph. He held it so every man could see it as he walked up and down the ranks. “You have seen the vids and pix of this woman many times. You should have her image embedded in your brain. She is our goal. She is the purpose of our contract. She is the reason you will kill. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Decan!” twenty-four men screamed.
“Her name is Maria Medaris. She is the spawn of the devil, the vilest of the vile. You will capture her if you can. If you can’t, you will kill her upon my command or that of the other decans. Understood?”
“Yes, Decan!”
“Prepared and ready?”
“Yes, Decan!”
Decan Mollet nodded to Decan Flaubert of the spiderwalkers and Decan Nicolas of the light infantry. They nodded back and then all three sat down and strapped in. Absalom, Lucien, and Dion surreptitiously touched gloves.
The transports, their engines hot, lifted off, bound for space.
::: EIGHTEEN
The Moontown Scrapes told the news. The murdering crowhopper, tried and convicted, was sentenced to a dust walk. For the edification of newbies in town, the paper described what a dust walk for the crowhopper would be like. After a reading of the charges and the sentence, the felon would be shoved outside a dustlock wearing an old pressure suit and an hour’s worth of air in its pack. All hatches would be locked for the next hour. The creature’s choices would be few. It could strike out across the dust in an attempt to find shelter before its air ran out, or it could sit quietly until it died of asphyxiation. Of the two Moontown men and one woman, all three convicted murderers, who’d been sent on a dust walk, one of the men had gone wandering, his body later found in the dust less than a mile away. The other man, within minutes of being put outside, had pulled the latch loose on his helmet. The woman chose to sit outside the dustlock and keep breathing until she ran out of air. No one, in all the history of the moon, had ever survived a dust walk.
Crater read the article in the jumpcar hangar office. He tossed his reader down and went out on the mooncrete floor where the jumpcar sat, held in a vertical hardstand. The jumpcar had been hauled into the pressurized hangar for a series of required tests. Riley had the engine hatch open and was monitoring the spark in the igniters. For a long second, he admired the jumpcar that he had come to love. Then he shook his head and allowed a sigh. “If anybody needs me,” he said, “I’ll be at the Colonel’s office.”
“Yes, sir,” Riley said. “And when will ye be back now?”
“As soon as I can.”
“Is it your creature, sir?”
“Her name is Crescent.”
“Sorry, sir. Is it Crescent, then?”
“Yes.”
“’Tis a terrible unfair thing. Just me opinion, of course.”
“Well, you’re right, Riley, but thank you.”
“If I can do something to help, just tell me.”
“I will, thank you,” Crater said, then pushed through the hatch into the main tube and headed for the Colonel’s suite of offices. He had no choice but to confront the Colonel. If anybody could relax his own rules, it was the dictator of Moontown.
The Colonel had a new receptionist, a doe-eyed brunette from Hong Kong. “Do you have an appointment, sir?” she asked, her voice sweet as biovat honey. Crater ignored her and threw open the Colonel’s massive door. The Colonel looked up as Crater walked in. After a moment of confusion, he said, “I don’t recall asking my pilot to appear in front of me. W
hat do you want?”
“Mercy for Crescent.”
“Your murdering creature?”
“She’s a young woman, Colonel, and she’s innocent.”
“A crowhopper is not human,” the Colonel said. “As for her innocence, she murdered one of my deputies.”
“If she killed him, she had just cause.”
“If she killed him, she must be punished no matter why she did it. That is my rule.”
Crater glanced at the placard on the Colonel’s desk that read “De inimico non loquaris sed cogites,” which meant “Do not wish ill for your enemy. Plan it.” “There are extenuating circumstances in this case, Colonel. For one, there was Phenolune in Crescent’s system. For another—”
The Colonel cut him off. “I stopped listening at ‘extenuating circumstances.’ Lawyerly talk is forbidden in Moontown, as you well know. Say what you mean, mean what you say. But let me say it for you. Deputy Jones was a vicious knave, worse than even you know, who deserved killing. Your creature accomplished a good thing in ridding Moontown of him. However, I can’t let it wander my tubeways after it has killed. Think how frightened our tubewives and tubehusbands would be for their children.”
“Sir, if you will spare her,” Crater said, “I will go to every manjack and womanjill in Moontown and promise them Crescent will be under my personal control at all times.”
The Colonel was unmoved. “I’m sure you’re sincere, Crater, but no. It was tried, convicted, and sentenced, all properly done.”
“I would be willing to make a trade for her life, sir.”
The Colonel raised his eyebrows. “And what could you possibly have that would be worthy of such a trade?”
“My invention for gathering water from moon dust.”
“Interesting. I thought it wasn’t ready.”
“It’s not. But it’s all I have.”
The Colonel shook his head. “You don’t have it. I do. Anything built in one of my labs belongs to me. Everyone who works in Moontown signs a contract. You did too, when you started working on the scrapes. What were you? Twelve? No matter. There’s nothing you’ve done in that lab I don’t know about. As for your safe, the sheriff picked its lock within a week of you building it. It pleases me to let you work on your invention, but if you stopped, I’d put my best engineers on it.”