by John Shirley
What he really wanted to say was, I want my mom and dad, I want to be back home. But he couldn’t say that to Roland.
He was still in shock, after what he’d seen. He’d carried out the deception easily enough—he’d always fallen into playacting with ease—but watching Roland execute those three …
Roland looked at him, his expression hardening. “Anyhow, kid—don’t make sense to sugarcoat the truth, not out here. My guess is … you’re gonna have to learn to survive right here on the planet Pandora—maybe for longer than you expect. No settlement’s really safe, they’re always getting raided—you got to be ready to defend yourself anytime.”
“But I’ll be able to go up to the Study Station from Fyrestone—won’t I?”
“Will you? Who knows when the next starship’ll be stopping by—besides, a supply ship wouldn’t take you on. Got to be one that takes passengers. And orbit personnel, kid, never come down here. They only watch from the safety of up there. From what I saw at that lifeboat site of yours, no one’s been there looking for you. And from what you told me—that starship is burned up and gone. So no help there. The corporations only send help if you pay ’em good money in advance. A lotta money neither of us has. Look—I’m gonna tell you straight up: there’s a good chance your folks didn’t make it. Which means you’re gonna have to learn how to make it down here on your own. I can’t be babysitting you all the time. If there’s no one looking for you at Fyrestone, no sign of your folks, why, I’ll get you to New Haven. The boss lady of the town—Helena Pierce is her name—she’s a good sort. Seems to give a damn. I figure she’d take care of you. But even in New Haven—it’s never really safe …”
There’s a good chance your folks didn’t make it.
Those words rang in Cal’s mind, over and over. They burned in his belly. They made him want to crawl under the outrunner and hide, and he felt his eyes stinging with tears. “You … you don’t have a right to say that … what you said about my parents. That they didn’t make it. You don’t know that! They’ll find me! If they’re alive they’ll never give up looking for me.”
Roland sighed. “Yeah, if they’re alive. But chances are … And kid, we don’t have grief counselors around here, okay?”
That’s when they heard engines revving and tires screeching.
They looked up to see two outriders driving out of the passage, right toward them, about thirty-five meters away. The bandit vehicles were similar to the outrunner but sleeker, lower to the ground, a dull dusty blue color. Skag skulls had been attached in place of fenders over the wheels. The driver seemed hidden in a tanklike turret under the machine guns.
“Uh-oh—looks like the buddies of the Bruiser we took down. I thought there was a couple others around here … that’s what we get for gabbing when we should be moving.”
“What’ll we do? They’re coming fast!”
Scrambling up to the outrunner’s turret gun, Roland yelled, “Kid—you really think you could drive this thing? Then you need to do it!”
Impelled by sheer terror—as the outriders bore down on them, strafing bullets already whistling through the air overhead—Cal ran for the driver’s seat, jumped in, and put the vehicle in gear. He slammed his foot on the accelerator—and the outrunner roared into action, wheels squealing, heading randomly out into the desert. He was jerked back by the acceleration, and had trouble holding on to the steering wheel, as if it were trying to spin out of his grip, vibrating with the jolting of the outrunner across the rugged ground.
“Hold on to that wheel, kid!” Roland shouted. “You want to roll this thing over? You’ll kill us both! Keep it steady!”
“I’m trying but—”
He almost jumped out of his seat then, startled by the noise as Roland fired the big machine gun in the turret.
A long burst from the turret, then Roland shouted, “Ha! Nailed him! Uh-oh …”
One outrider had gone down but the other was coming up right beside the outrunner, engine roaring, close on their left. Roland was firing at it but the angle was awkward, the outrider was too close, the turret gun couldn’t slant down that low. The wheels of the outrider were almost touching the outrunner’s and the bandit’s turret gun was swiveling toward Cal, ready to blast him …
Then up ahead, on the right, a sharp projection of blue stone reared from the plain. On a sudden impulse, Cal turned the wheel sharply toward the projection, accelerated as if he were deliberately planning to crash into it, the outrider following closely on his left. A burst from the outrider’s machine gun sent bullets slashing just over Cal’s head.
“What the hell, kid!” Roland yelled. “You’re gonna crash us into that goddamn rock!”
The outcropping loomed up—then Cal cut as sharp a right as he could without overturning the outrunner. He veered past the big spike of rock—and the outrider, as he’d hoped, with the driver focusing on Cal, didn’t see it … and smashed glancingly into it, spinning out of control, flipping, rolling …
Cal hit the brakes, so that the outrunner skidded, and Roland was launched from the turret with the inertia. “Shit!” Roland yelled, as he was flung out of the vehicle. He landed facedown, sliding over the dirt, ending in a cloud of dust.
Oh no, Cal thought. I’ve killed him.
Cal jumped out of the idling outrunner. “Roland!”
But Roland was getting up, coughing, brushing himself off. “I’m all right. Just scraped the skin off my belly.”
He came stalking back to Cal, stood over him, glaring—then let out a short bark of laughter. “Damn, kid, you got good instincts! You lured those bastards right into that rock!” He looked toward the wreck of the outrider. “Except … they don’t go down easy, just like I told you …”
Cal turned and saw a bloody Psycho, left arm hanging broken, right arm holding up a threatening buzz axe as he came pelting toward them. Teeth bared, the maimed Psycho was running full bore from the burning wreck of his outrider. Howling at them as he came: “I’m gonna skin ya, put on your face, and say hi to your momma!”
Roland vaulted into the back of the outrunner, spun the turret around, and fired, blowing the Psycho in half from two paces away.
“Don’t be talking about my mama,” Roland said.
Zac and Berl were on a sunny hilltop, about a quarter klick from Berl’s camp, waiting for Bizzy to come back from hunting. It was late afternoon, and Berl was staring into the distance. Zac thought he was in some kind of crazy fugue state.
“What you got to learn about this here desert,” Berl said, at last, never ceasing to stare into the distance, “is that most of the time it ain’t what you see that’s gonna kill you. It’s what you cain’t see. Lotta times, what’s right under your feet—or right over your head. See there, that’s what I mean—here they come, some of the toughest rakks around here! Whip out your shotgun, Zac!”
“I haven’t got a shotgun!”
But Berl had one, a big rusty red shotgun that didn’t look very reliable. When the dusty blue rakks, looking like decapitated pterodactyls, dived down at them, Berl had the shotgun butt wedged to his shoulder, squinting as he tracked it. The rakks shrieked triumphantly as they dive-bombed.
“Shoot it!” Zac yelled. “Hurry! It’s going to—”
The nearest rakk flattened its trajectory and struck, slashing at them with its barbed forejaws. It didn’t seem to have a full head, or eyes—just a wedge-shaped snout, mostly mouth, jutting out in front. It raked at them with talons as it went—and Zac was knocked off his feet. He fell onto his back, the air knocked out of him when he hit the stony hilltop. He gasped, smelled the sickly reptilian reek of the thing; his ears ached with the shrillness of its scream.
At the same moment there was the boom of the shotgun firing and he saw one of the rakks explode into bloody rags in midair, just three meters up—the one who’d knocked him down, though, was climbing back up into the sky on strong wing-sweeps, preparing to come around for another attack. The rakks squealed and shrieked angrily
, working up to another slashing dive …
Zac sat up, gasping for air, clutching at the wound on his right shoulder. It wasn’t deep, but blood seeped between his fingers.
“Well one of the bastuds got past me but I got the second one, boy!” Berl cackled. “Now if you just had your shotgun ready!”
“I told you I haven’t got a shotgun—”
“Should never have come to this planet without a good shotgun, young fella!” Berl chambered another round.
Three rakks were flying overhead, their blue almost the same as the sky, sweeping tightly back and forth like kites in a crosswind. Then two of them dived directly at them …
The shotgun thundered again and one of the rakks burst apart, raining reeking blood and animal parts on the two men—the other, injured by the pellet spread, flapped away, followed by the other surviving rakk.
“Ha! I discouraged ’em! They’re gone for now!” Berl crowed.
He lowered the shotgun and twitched his shoulders. “Ouch. Arthritis acting up. Harder to shoot upwards nowadays. Slower too. Was a time I’d have gotten all of the bastuds.”
“You got any of that Dr. Zed medicine I heard about?” Zac asked, kicking rakk guts off his foot.
“I might have a shot or two. But you’ll owe me for it. Hard to come by out here! I don’t see that Claptrap very often.”
They returned to the camp—they’d gone to the hilltop to see if bandits were moving in on them and spotted only rakks. To get to the camp, Zac had to follow the old man down a winding path between boulders, then right past Bizzy. Yellow eyes glowing, the creature seemed to watch him suspiciously as he walked by. It was only a meter away, sitting on a fat rock like a daddy longlegs on a toadstool, stiltlike legs half-folded to either side of the boulder, turning its whole body to watch Zac as he passed. Any moment it might decide to spit corrosive venom at him—and his face would burn away, like what happened to that bandit, screaming and dying …
Why the hell had he ever come here?
He had to make a move, soon, at least try to get back to the Study Station, find out what became of his family. But the lure of that crashed alien ship was still strong. Sometimes he thought he could feel that treasure out there, in the wastelands, throbbing; hear it calling to him …
Zac shook his head, and entered the camp, sat on an old crate as Berl administered the med syringe. The infusion began its work immediately—he felt strengthened, restored. His injuries closed up, the bleeding stopped. Wondrous stuff: nano-nodes that rebuilt the cells from within.
“Like I say, you owe me for that, boy.”
“Sure, Berl. How about we go to a settlement, so I can get some money wired down to pay you with?”
“Hm?” Berl’s face creased in a scowl. “Settlement—me? I don’t go there less’n I have to. I meet the Claptrap, I give him the goods, he gives me what I need. It, I should say, speaking of a robot. I guess he ain’t no he.”
“Well, uh—you could direct me there.”
“I could. But you’d never make it. Hell I’d-a been dead a long time ago if not for Bizzy …”
Berl squinted over at the Drifter and unconsciously touched the collar-like necklace. Looking at the necklace up close, Zac realized that the scaly, iridescent segments strung together on the copper had been wired there by Berl. Those pearly scales, each one only half the size of the palm of his hand, were the extraterrestrial artifacts. Berl had put them together for some reason and it seemed to give him a psychic contact with Bizzy.
“What you looking at, young feller?” Berl demanded, glaring.
Zac decided it would just make the old guy more paranoid if he wasn’t straight with him. “Just—that necklace, Berl. Seems like there’s some connection between you and Bizzy through that thing.”
“What about it?”
“Look, I came out here looking for that crashed ship. Seems likely you know where it is, Berl. Now, why can’t we partner up for real? You want to stay out here, hell, then stay here—I can act as your agent for the find. We can split it. I don’t even need a big share. I’ll sign a contract, whatever you want.”
The old man was fairly trembling with suppressed rage.
Zac cleared his throat and went nervously on. “Berl, come on, man, take it easy—I am not trying to take anything that’s yours. I am grateful that you saved my life. Wasn’t for you, why—”
“Wasn’t for me, some cannibal bandit’d be crapping you out in his turds right about now, mister!” Berl snarled.
Zac winced. “Well I wouldn’t’ve put it that way but yeah. I’m grateful. I’m not out to rip you off. But just imagine—if you want to stay out here, why not do it right? If you were rich, you could send for a construction bot, dig a hole in this hill, make yourself a real bunker—a whole fortress out here, if you wanted to! You could set up robot sentries. You could defend yourself from anything—a rich man could … Berl?”
Berl had the shotgun pointed at Zac’s middle.
Zac licked his lips, suddenly very dry. “Berl?”
“Boy,” Berl said, his voice almost inaudibly low, “I’m thinking the best way I can defend myself … is to cut you in half right here and now. ’Cause otherwise you’re gonna bring hellfire down on me from up there …” He glanced at the sky, then looked quickly back at Zac. “Outworlders flat cannot be trusted! And I was a fool to trust you at all.”
“Can I … have a drink of water instead? I’m really parched, Berl.”
Berl glowered at him—then pointed with the shotgun muzzle at a canteen lying on the ground nearby. “Go on and get you a drink. While I think on if I should kill you.”
Heart thudding, Zac got up, picked up the canteen by its strap, desperate to stall, thinking to swing it around, maybe hit the old man in the head with it before he could fire that gun—Berl had said he was slowing down some.
But then a shadow fell over him. He looked up to see two yellow eyes glowing down. Bizzy the Drifter was towering over him, on its pole legs, quivering, opening its maw. Seeming ready to spit burning spume down at him …
Checkmate. Zac had a choice of sizzling to death or being shot. He preferred being shot. He drank deep from the canteen, put it aside, turned to Berl—and was struck hard in the forehead by the butt of Berl’s shotgun.
He fell, spinning into a sucking pit, wondering if he’d ever wake up again. If he’d ever see his wife or son, if he’d ever find his way out of …
Darkness.
Sunset blazed in Marla’s eyes. Her wrists were pinioned behind her back, and they ached as she was marched along the wooden false beach to the group of slavers standing by a battered flat-bottomed motorboat. Slavers—waiting to purchase her.
Dimmle was behind her, Grunj stalked along to her left. Another sea thug she couldn’t see was off on the right, a step or two back. She hadn’t seen Vance today, though he’d seemed ready to help her escape. She’d thought he’d gone for her scheme. But all he’d gone for was her body. Then he’d locked her up, made himself scarce. Now Vance was nowhere to be seen, and Dimmle had shown up, taken him to Grunj—who’d received her while standing over the smashed corpse of a midget, grinning. “Your time has come, missy ho,” he’d said.
And here she was.
So she was to be sold to slavers. What would happen to her then? A series of degradations—living death?
There was nothing reassuring about the slavers. They were hairy, sunburnt men in layered clothing and hip boots, bits and pieces of armor, holsters and scabbards, a rifle in each pair of hands. Their leader, standing with his hands on his hips, was almost a giant, a one-eyed man with a dent in his forehead and patches of hair on his scarred scalp. It appeared he’d been shot in the forehead, and the skin had grown over the hole—and somehow he’d survived. The side of his face missing the eye was half crumpled in. The other side had once been handsome, she supposed. He wore a sleeveless jerkin; his arms were twined with strings of tattooed sayings, something like Dimmle’s. Take em make em have em use em se
ll em take em make em use em sell em kill em …
It seemed Dimmle knew him, hence the tattoo connection. “Mash!” Dimmle called. “Good to see ya!”
Mash’s voice was like a bone slowly breaking. It came grating out the intact side of his mouth. “Good? Not good. You shouldn’a come here to work for this son of a bitch. I don’t like it when my men leave without asking me.”
“I paid you for the privilege, Mash,” Dimmle said.
“Hmph, after the fact!”
“Never mind all that,” Grunj rumbled. “We making a deal for the missy ho or not?”
Mash grunted, looking Marla over. “So this is the woman, yeah? Not bad! Possibilities. Not terribly young but … we can make a profit on her. I got some special customers on the Trash Coast pay good for that.”
She listened in stunned astonishment as they negotiated her price. Apparently Mash was buying her “wholesale.” She looked around, wondering where she could run to. Nowhere—you can’t outrun a bullet. There was the boat—a flat-bottomed electric boat Grunj used to ferry people to his “island.” One of Grunj’s men waited at the tiller of the idling boat, a heavily armored man with a full-face breathing mask. Why did they wear the breathing masks? The air seemed fine. Were they hideous under there?
The negotiation was over after two minutes and a handshake. Mash gave Grunj a bag of money, and after he counted it, he gave Marla a shove toward the boat. “Go on, my man’ll take you and them to the Coast. Do what they tell you or it’ll go hard.”
Dazed, she let herself be herded into the boat. She sat near the big man at the tiller. Mash got in, just in front of her, then his men piled in. The boat was laden to the brim, sat low in the water as the man at the tiller put the engine in reverse and they backed away from the false beach of Grunj’s Island. They left Grunj, Dimmle, and their men behind. Still no sign of Vance …
The feeling of hopelessness that had been creeping up on Marla seemed to lunge for her throat. She felt crushed by the jaws of despair. She’d never see Cal again, never see Zac, she’d die in some bloody bed, probably …