ANOTHER DAY.
This one was the worst yet. We lost most of our food today—thanks to Spadrin and his selfish, craven stupidity.
He got into another argument with Ang a few days ago, about his using the rover’s main power access for his plugheading. Even Ang finally agreed that the rover’s electrical system shouldn’t be used for anything unnecessary. He ordered Spadrin to stop.
So Spadrin found another power supply—the unit that kept the perishable food in stass—and he burned it out. But he didn’t tell anyone. He didn’t even know what he’d done, the cretin.
No one did, until we ate breakfast—and spent the rest of the day doubled up with cramps and nausea. Food poisoning; we were lucky it didn’t kill us. When I could think again about anything besides the pain in my gut, I checked the food locker’s field generator, and found the short. I told the others. Even Ang couldn’t ignore the look on Spadrin’s face as he realized what he’d done—not just to us, this time, but to himself.
“How long?” Ang asked.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Spadrin said. He wiped his mouth, wiped perspiration off of his face.
“You used that damn joybox again! How long ago?” Ang dragged Spadrin up from his bunk with a sudden violence that startled me.
“Th-three days,” Spadrin gasped. “Just three days—”
Ang shoved him down onto the bunk again. “Then it’s all ruined! You ruined our food. Why the hell didn’t you say something three days ago?”
“I didn’t know,” Spadrin said sullenly. “How the fuck would I know?”
“You knew you’d blown something, you stupid bastard. Why didn’t you tell Gedda?”
Spadrin glared at me. “He’s supposed to take care of that shit himself. It’s his fault.”
“I can’t fix something if I don’t know it’s out!” I pressed my hands against my stomach and sat down.
“He’s right,” Ang said, meaning me, for once. “It’s your goddamn fault, Spadrin. If we don’t have enough supplies to get us to my strike—”
I looked up at him, and in that moment I realized that he would kill Spadrin, kill us both, if he thought we stood in the way of his obsession. “Listen, Ang,” I said, trying to sound calm, “we still have plenty of freeze dried left. We have enough water. If we ration it out we shouldn’t have a real problem. You said we were getting close—”
He met my eyes, but he wasn’t seeing me. “You can’t count on it, out here. You can’t count on anything. . . . ” He picked up the plate of food that he’d dropped when the sickness hit him. He balanced it on his palms like an offering.
“Well, that’s life,” I said softly, wondering how I would ever reach Fire Lake now. My hands clenched. “I’ll find a way—” I whispered, not meaning to say it aloud.
Ang stared at me, and sanity crept slowly back into his expression. “You’re right.” He nodded; his mouth twisted into a grimace of irony. “We’ll get there. We’ll do it on half rations, we’ll do it on nothing, on our hands and knees, if we have to.” He looked at me again, and at Spadrin hunched miserably on the bunk. Deliberately he wiped the food off the plate onto the floor in front of Spadrin’s feet, and then he twisted the thin metal plate between his heavy hands, crushing it, still looking at us. He turned and went forward into the cab, as if we were no longer there.
We’re still alive; still searching, still following the dead river upstream. We’ve been in these clown-striped badlands for days.
Today we finally met another pilgrim, here in this twisting maze of canyons. He was leading a huge whillp, one of those rubbery, glistening things from Big Blue that secrete acid to suck nourishment out of the rock, and never eat or drink. It was loaded down with sacks and containers, and it oozed along the canyon at barely walking speed.
I couldn’t imagine how long the man must have been out here, moving at the whillp’s pace. I decided it was too long, because when he saw us he wasn’t afraid. He stood in the middle of the dry wash, waving his arms, shouting and grinning through his pale beard as if we were the best thing he’d ever seen.
Ang stopped the rover and we got out. Even the sight of three sweating, filthy, armed men didn’t wipe the smile off of his face. Spadrin stood on one side of me; his eyes were narrow and cold. Ang stood on the other; his face was grim with a kind of tension that I’d never seen on it before. I felt my hands clutching my gun too hard—more because of their expressions than the stranger’s.
“Halloo, halloo,” the stranger shouted, coming toward us with outstretched, empty hands. He started to speak in a foreign language—after a minute I recognized it as Kesraal. That meant he was from Big Blue, like the beast. He stopped in front of us, just short of trying to embrace somebody. He looked at our guns and his face fell, as if we’d insulted him instead of threatened him. He jabbered earnestly, raising grizzled eyebrows.
“What’s he want?” Ang muttered, rhetorically. He scratched himself.
“He asked if he’s offended us somehow,” I said. “His name is Harkonni, and he’s from Big Blue. He’s very glad to see us—we’re the first people he’s seen in almost a year.”
Ang looked at me, surprised.
I shrugged. “I speak a few languages.” I felt something stir in me that I’d almost forgotten the name of.
Spadrin snorted, and gestured with his rifle. “Then tell him to get out of our track, or we’ll be the last people he ever sees.”
I saw the stranger start and frown at Spadrin. “I don’t think he needs it translated. You understand what we say?” I asked Harkonni in Kesraal.
He nodded, still with the hurt look on his face. “Yes, yes.” He answered in the language we were all using, this time. “I understand you. Forgive me, I forgot. I have not had the tongue of this world in my mouth for a long time.”
Spadrin laughed out loud at the incongruous image, and even Ang’s mouth inched upward.
Harkonni grinned, obviously missing the fact that they were laughing at him. His pale eyes were too bright, the eyes of a man with a fever. They were startlingly blue against his sunburned face. I shifted from foot to foot uneasily.
“Yes, yes,” he went on. “It is wonderful to hold conversation with you today. Wonderful to see you all. Are you prospectors like myself?” There was only one other thing we could be, but that didn’t seem to worry him.
Ang nodded. He lowered his gun. Spadrin didn’t.
“I would like to share some food and talk with you,” Harkonni said, with a kind of pathetic eagerness.
“Food? You have a lot of food?” Spadrin asked.
Ang looked uncertain, but he nodded. “I guess we can spare an hour.”
“This is wonderful!” Harkonni beamed. “I have so much to tell! I haven’t seen anyone in a year! I’ll even tell you my secret. I made a strike—”
“Wait!” I said in Kesraal. “Don’t tell us that. It’s not worth it—save your secrets until you reach civilization.”
Spadrin glared at me. “What did you say to him?”
“He told me not to trust you,” Harkonni said earnestly. “But it’s all right, I trust you—” Spadrin swung his rifle butt at me before I could move, and knocked me down. “Keep your mouth shut!”
“Spadrin!” Ang shouted. “For the love of the Aurant, not here!” He pulled me to my feet. “You self-righteous ass,” he muttered at me. “You beg him for trouble.”
I folded my arms across my aching ribs, and leaned against the rover’s front end until I could breathe again.
Harkonni was half frowning, now, like a man waking up in a strange bed.
“So you made a strike?” Ang said. “Lucky man. Whereabouts—up there?” He pointed in the direction we were heading; his hand jerked with tension.
Harkonni nodded a little uncertainly, as if he couldn’t stop himself from answering even if he wanted to. “Yes, yes, all over the ground, up there, all over—”
Ang swore and pushed past him, running toward the pack be
ast. “They’re mine, goddamn it! I found them first—”
Harkonni ran after him. “No! Leave them alone! It’s my treasure—” He clawed at Ang’s shoulder. Spadrin followed them and struck Harkonni with his rifle butt, knocking him down. Ang went through the bags until he found the one he was looking for. Harkonni sat protesting on the ground, with Spadrin’s stun rifle pointing into his face.
Ang jerked the bag open and plunged his hand into it, pulling out a handful of lumps. He looked down at what he held, and the blind greed in his eyes turned to incredulity. “Shit!” He flung the handful away, and dumped the bag’s contents onto the ground. “It’s nothing but shit!”
At first I thought he only meant that he hadn’t found what he wanted. But then I saw his face. I pushed away from the rover and went to where he stood looking down. Scattered on the ground around his feet were small brownish-gray lumps of dried excrement.
I looked from Ang’s face to Harkonni’s, and Spadrin’s. “Gods!” Spadrin muttered. His mouth twisted with disgust. The stun rifle quivered in his hands. For a minute I thought he was going to fire it into Harkonni’s terrified face. At that range the charge would kill him. Harkonni began to cry. Spadrin stepped back and away from him, as if killing him was beneath even Spadrin’s dignity. “Let’s get out of here.”
Ang nodded and dropped the bag he was still holding onto the pile of dung. He wiped his hands on his shorts. His face was empty of everything but relief. “It’s still up there.” He looked away, following the whillp’s shining acid-etched trail on up the canyon with his eyes. “My treasure.” He started back to the rover. Spadrin grabbed up a sack of Harkonni’s food supplies and followed him.
“My treasure, my treasure . . . ” Harkonni sobbed. He crawled past me toward the pile of dung.
“Gedda!” Ang called. “Come on!”
I went back to the rover, almost running to get away from the sound of Harkonni’s weeping.
I can feel it, I can almost smell it!” Ang said this morning. He got us moving when it was barely dawn, he was so sure we’d find his treasure today. The fault broken terrain ahead of us was stained a rust red. He swore it would hold the solii formation. He set the rover’s tracer equipment to close-scan for the proper mineral compounds. He was so sure. . . .
The sky was filled with black and purple clouds, the way it often was in the late afternoons, turning the light washed badlands sullen and dark ahead. Lightning flickered and a few fat drops of rain pockmarked the dust on the windshield, making a promise the clouds never kept. Thunder rolled over and around us like the laughter of the gods. And we came to the end of Ang’s journey.
Ang was piloting, like he usually did—today he was even humming tunelessly. He’d never done that before. Spadrin stole stale snapper biscuits from my plate while I tried to eat standing up, pressed into a corner of the cab. His eyes dared me to stop him. I didn’t even care—the heat, the stink, the food poisoning, had killed my appetite days ago. Only Spadrin had any appetite left, like the animal he was.
Then suddenly the rover lurched to a stop, so abruptly that I lost my balance and knocked over Spadrin’s bottle of ouvung. It spilled on his leg. He swore at me, and grabbed my wrist. “Clean it up, Gedda.” He jerked me down; I saw his knife blade glint and then disappear. I pulled off the rag I was wearing as a sweatband. On my knees, I began to wipe the liquor off of his leg. But he stood up suddenly, pushing me aside. “Ang, are we there?” He was looking past Ang’s shoulder.
Ang sat silently behind the controls, staring out at something. Sweat trickled down his neck. His hands lay in his lap, clenched into white-knuckled fists.
“Ang!” Spadrin shook his shoulder.
Ang reached up and opened the door. He got to his feet. Without a word, he climbed out and down. Spadrin leaped down after him. After a moment I followed them outside.
They stood on the edge of a cliff, with the wind whipping their hair. I made my way between rust-red boulders to the precipice. Below me the wall of rock dropped sheerly into a purple abyss. The far rim of the canyon was hundreds of meters away; the bottom must have been a good half a kilometer below us. Down in its shadowy depths I saw a river winding like a snake. A river of light . . . of molten lava. The crack in the earth ran as far as I could see, looking to the left. And looking right, I saw on the horizon an immense surface of blazing light, like a sun fallen to earth . . . Fire Lake. Elation filled me. At last.
“It can’t be!” Ang shouted. “This can’t be here, it can’t!” He looked at the rover, as if it had somehow betrayed him. He looked down into the abyss again. He took a step forward, as if he were going to challenge its reality. I caught hold of his arm. He pulled loose, frowning, but he moved away from the edge.
Spadrin shouldered me aside. I backed up, away from both of them. “What’s this mean, Ang? Ang?” Spadrin said. “Where’s the treasure? Where are the solus? Ang—!”
“I don’t know. . . . ” Ang whispered. “This shouldn’t be here. We can’t be here—” He gazed toward the shining horizon, toward Fire Lake. “You can’t do this to me!” he screamed at the sky.
“You mean there’s no treasure? You mean we came all this way for nothing—and now we’re lost?” Spadrin jerked him around. “You fucking dirtsider, is that what you mean?” He struck Ang across the face.
Ang lunged at Spadrin, but Spadrin threw him down on his back and sat on his chest, holding his arms flat. “Is that what you mean—?”
Ang turned his face away, looking out into the canyon. “Yes,” he whispered. “Yes.” Tears crept out of his eyes and dripped into the dirt.
Spadrin got up off of him, and let him get to his feet. Ang stood at the edge of the abyss with his back to us. His tall, broad-shouldered body seemed to wither.
Spadrin stepped forward again and pushed him over the edge.
“No!” I shouted, but Ang’s cry as he went over obliterated the sound. I ran forward—but it was far too late by the time I reached the rim. Ang had already stopped screaming. I saw his body rebounding from the rocks far down the wall. I turned away from the edge, shutting my eyes.
Spadrin still stood at the top of the cliff, watching Ang’s body fall toward the planet’s core. I heard his laughter before I let myself look at him again—high, strangled laughter edging toward hysteria. “Gedda,” he gasped, “get the rover started.”
I didn’t move or answer. I felt as though I had become a part of the stone; as though I had been standing that way for millennia. . . .
He looked over at me, the crazy laughter disappearing from his face. “I told you to move.” His voice was like a knife.
“Why?” I said. “You’ve killed Ang. You’re lost. You’ll never find your way back.”
The hysteria still burned in his eyes. “Don’t say that. Don’t say it.” His hands flexed.
I looked away, toward Fire Lake lying on the horizon. Its brilliance turned my vision molten. I stood waiting, waiting. . . .
Spadrin’s footsteps closed in on me, his hand on my arm wrenched me around. My eyes were fire-blind. He shoved me. He shoved me for the last time.
I don’t remember the blow that tore my knuckles and bloodied his face. I don’t remember the blow that knocked him down. I only remember that I was strangling him, beating his head against the ground, when my rage cleared again . . . that my voice was raw from shouting curses, from shouting, “You killed him! You killed him!” over and over and over. Spadrin lay as limp and senseless as a rag toy when I let go of him at last, and his blood was the color of the stone.
I took the knife sheath from his arm and strapped it to my own. I got the guns from the vehicle’s locker and threw them all over the cliff, except for the one that I slung at my back. Then I dragged Spadrin to the rover and poured half a bottle of ouvung over his head.
He came awake, cursing and dazed; he tried to get to his feet as soon as he recognized me. But he slid down again as his body refused to obey him. The look of disbelief on his face was almost f
unny. “Wha—?”
I took a long drink from the open bottle, holding the gun on him. “All right, murderer,” I said. “I’m taking over this vehicle now.” I kicked him. “Get inside. We’re leaving.”
Hatred and fear warred in his eyes. “You think you can take me back?” He pulled himself slowly up the rover’s side.
I shook my head, and took another drink. “We’re not going back. We’re going to Fire Lake.” The fear stayed on his face, but his disbelief came n back. “Fire Lake? You crazy—” His hand felt surreptitiously for his knife. His bruised mouth worked, but nothing came out of it for a long moment. “Why?”
“I’m looking for something.” I hurled the bottle away, and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. My hand was shaking. I tasted blood.
“Then you’re looking for somebody to cut your throat—and mine,” Spadrin snarled. “I’m not going any deeper into this hell.”
“You haven’t got any choice,” I said. “Unless you want to stay here with Ang.” I bent my head toward the cliff-edge.
Spadrin’s face turned the color of ash. I watched him realize what he’d do in my place.
I nodded. “If you want to survive, you bastard, it’ll be on my terms.”
“Gedda,” he whined, “listen, don’t be a fool. We can work a deal, we can still be rich! We’ll go back, there are other ways to—”
“Shut up,” I said. I nudged him with the gun. “Get inside.”
He obeyed.
I don’t understand it. I don’t understand it. We’ve been traveling toward Fire Lake for days, but it never gets any closer. It’s the terrain; it must be the terrain. We have to detour and backtrack, we tie our trail in knots. I don’t know what I’m doing with this damned thing, or how much longer it can hold together now. Ang’s ghost haunts it. The stale smell of his fesh sticks hangs in the air, like an obsession. . . .
I was a fool not to leave Spadrin behind. He’s like a time bomb, just waiting for the right moment. If I had his guts I’d have killed him. . . . No, no, damn it! I’m an officer of the law, not an animal.
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