Scavenger: Evolution
(Sand Divers, Book One)
By Timothy C. Ward
Copyright © 2015 by Timothy C. Ward
Editors:
Red Sands: Robert S. Wilson, http://www.shiningincrimson.com/
Blue Dawn and Twin Suns: Erin Sweet Al-Mehairi and Tim Busbey, Hook of a Book Media http://www.hookofabook.wordpress.com/
Cover design:
Shawn T. King http://www.stkkreations.weebly.com/
For information on Timothy C. Ward, visit his website at http://timothycward.com or sign up for his author newsletter for giveaways and new releases http://eepurl.com/NA__X.
Signed copies available at http://spikepub.com.
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Worldwide Rights
Created in the United States of America
Table of Contents
Scavenger: Part 1
Red Sands
Scavenger: Part 2
Blue Dawn
Scavenger: Part 3
Twin Suns
To my wife and son, may I be a better husband and father than writer.
SCAVENGER: Red Sands
In a world buried to the nose in sand, Rush felt no choice but to let his ears live for him. River's moan slipped through the floorboards above him like a last desperate cry not to give up. There was life left to scavenge.
The soft and gentle releasing of breath drifted and disappeared into the belly of the Honey Hole, a tavern that reeked of stale beer and dried sweat.
Rush brushed his fingernail through sand embedded in the cracks of his table. His dream had once been discovering the buried city, Danvar, where the wood was unmarked and smooth, where he’d bring up enough spoil to make all of Springston live like lords.
That dream died with his son.
River’s elongated cry soured in his heart's infection, where the memory of seeing his son face down in sand had cut open his soul and left him to the death that never ended.
Set near his hand was the mug of ale River’s appointment had left. He had dropped it off with a cocky grin and, "I’ll make her nice and loud for ya."
Now he lay on a naked and sweating River.
Rush took a drink.
A man stood from a table across the tavern, leaving his compatriot head-over-folded-arms drunk. He looked at Rush, glanced down at the drunk, and pushed in his chair. The ker draped around his neck was bright orange with a horse's head emblazoned in white fire. Even the tower dwellers on the East side couldn't afford such vibrant colors. The pale cheeks and pink-red tan line cutting from nose to ear and circling his eyes identified him as someone unaccustomed to the hardness of a sun-burnt lifestyle. His gaze locked on Rush with pride in his distinction.
The man took a chair from a neighboring table and had a seat close enough to be brother or threat. He leaned in and whispered, "I hear you're Rushing, Springston's famous divemaster."
The honor of his past once again refused to leave him. Rush took another drink.
"I also hear you haven't parted the sand in years."
Rush glowered over the rim of his mug.
"I don't mean to cause waves, but I've got a job offer that could use your talents."
He hadn't had a decent job since Fisher died. Still. "I don't dive."
"Right. You shuffle a mop around a filthy whorehouse and drink warm beer while your favorite girl gets rowdy." The man split a grin worth cutting off. "That's a much better alternative."
Rush set his mug down carefully. "Would you like to see what else I can do with a mop?"
"Hey, I like that. And here I was, afraid you'd lost the vigor that made you the best."
River's panting increased in intensity. He nodded up at the balcony. "I hear you've never had the pleasure."
"I think it's time you parted sand, stranger. Whatever you're offering, I'm not interested."
Stranger leaned closer. His artificial scent matched the man's who'd given him his beer. Rush smelled a setup.
"Is money the reason you haven't…?" he double clicked his tongue and mimicked an ornery cat.
Why hadn't Rush met this guy the day he quit the school? He could have opened up a hole thirty feet deep and left diving in fashion.
Stranger went on as if his company was still welcome, "I've seen your tent, Rush. Not exactly the home you used to have, from what I hear. Is it?"
"You sure hear a lot that ain't your business."
"I hear only what is my business."
What does that mean? "Okay…what's your name?"
"Warren."
"Okay, Warren. The reason I haven't is I'm still married."
"You wouldn't be the first married bloke to slip between a whore's legs."
As if on cue, River let out her climaxed cry. Rush thought of the pleasure he had known making Star gasp the same way. It had been years.
"Besides, I hear you two are about as much in love as the sweaty cheeks I'm sitting on."
"You hear…whatever business you have in Springston, I suggest you take it elsewhere."
"I'm afraid that's not possible."
Rush wanted to say, "You better make it possible," but something told him he needed to find out why. "Lay your cards, Warren."
"All right!" Warren slapped imaginary cards on the table, burping a bit of beer from Rush's mug. One of the bar members glanced over his shoulder, but returned to his drink without alarm.
Warren inched close, revealing a gold tooth in his back row. "I have a very important job that could use someone of your skills, but I wasn't about to offer it without a little digging into your present state."
A very important job could be just what he needed. Something to distract him.
Warren seemed to read Rush's thoughts. "I'm ready to pay you enough for one dive—" he lifted a finger toward the balcony "—to do...whatever you want, for as long as you want it."
Whatever job a stranger offered for that kind of price shouldn’t be worth the filth it would leave behind.
Unless you were Rush, and were already buried in it. He didn't have to use that money on River. Maybe just leaving would be enough. He took another swig of the free drink and let the warmth numb his fears. "Working here has diminished the value of talk."
Warren dropped a purple coin purse heavy enough to buy a trip as far away as he needed, even if it only had coppers. If it had gold…
He noticed Rush's interest, his hitched breath, and smiled. "And that's just a down payment."
Just like that, he could be free of this Hell. But his attachment to Star, a marriage as unwanted as the dirt under his nails, tugged at his conscience. River came back to mind, like a knife ready to use. Lying with her could break him free for good. And he'd be alive again, if only for a moment. As estranged as he was from Star, he didn’t know why he felt guilt. They were worse than strangers.
But too weak to say goodbye.
He didn’t care what the job was. I won't let you keep me here anymore. "I’ll do it."
"All right, Rush is back." Warren slapped his arm.
Rush squeezed the coins inside the purse. Metal that couldn't satisfy his true needs, but metal nonetheless. To a poor man, it was something.
"Now, first order of business." Warren helped Rush up by the arm and guided him to the drunk passed out on his table. A hint of copper tainted the air. He forced Rush to stand beside the man while he stood, back to the bar, and looked at the floor.
Rush followed his gaze to a pool of blood seeping
through cracks in the wood. The man was as still as Rush had feared.
Warren whispered, "I can kill you just as easy."
None of the bar patrons gave a lick about his sudden danger. "Why would you kill me?"
"If you don’t follow through with your end."
In spite of the new weight squeezing his ribs, he shouldn't have expected his exit from Springston to be easy. Rush did not back down.
"Good, now follow me." Warren slid a knife back into a sleeve at his belt.
The sleeve was somehow familiar. You didn't even see him reach for it.
Rush wanted one of the three bar patrons to glance over their shoulders as he left, ask him where he was going, who the stranger was and who the corpse was they had left behind, but none noticed. Rush was the guy that cleaned up their semen and vomit. They hadn’t noticed him in years.
Warren took him to a sarfer smaller than the other sand ships lined outside Honey Hole, one designed to outrun any of them in a race for treasure. The sun blinded him to look up. His eye lids itched with the need to sleep. The higher the sun, the more comfortable he felt nodding off, as far as possible from the night and how it could cut him in surprise. How it could change his life forever.
"You still with me? I need you sharp." The horse's head ker was tucked over his nose, covering his face. Dark goggles shielded his eyes.
"Yeah." Rush picked up his pace and followed Warren onto his ship. "Where are we going?" He assumed Warren wanted to take him toward Danvar. Rumor was some were close to discovering the fabled city.
Warren charged up the generator and the ship buoyed on a pocket of sand waves pulsed to life. He cast the tie from the mainsail and the tan fabric snapped in the eastern wind. The ship jolted to a sharp clip. They passed rundown dwellings through a smoky aroma of charred manure coals and exited Shantytown. Theirs was one of a dozen sarfers headed north to the open sand. Opportunity and death waited on the other side of distant dunes.
Warren cut their skiff starboard, on a trek up the dune shielding Springston's northern face.
"Why are we turning around?" Rush shouted into the wind.
Again, Warren didn't answer. He docked and turned her off in the shelter of an eastern lee. Was it too late to jump off the boat and slide back home? Rush didn't own those legs anymore, so he let the ones he did follow Warren to an open compartment in the floor of the sarfer's bow.
Rush struggled to breathe, or move.
Inside were packed white bundles as thick as bread loaves.
Bombs.
No.
Move, legs!
To their left were the towering sandscrapers of Springston’s eastern habitants. Those who could afford the safety of concrete towers to protect them from the constant shift of sand. Once, he’d had enough money to live among them, but had chosen to live with his divers. Had he gone with the towers, Fisher would still be alive.
Decades of eastern drift piled high up on the great wall that protected Springston. But from his view he could see the buckles in the wall where sand had started to break through. Left too long, it would fall on its own. When it did, anyone left on the other side would die. Even his wife didn’t deserve that.
"Don't…" Words failed to form from Rush's parted lips. Warren's smile could have opened the earth and melted the horizon in showering lava.
The man intended to kill them all.
He pulled out a folded dive suit, a shoulder-strap pack with an air tank inside, and a visor and handed them to Rush.
Rush hadn’t touched a suit since the day Fish died. He couldn’t imagine diving under what had drowned his son. He refused to take hold of the equipment.
Warren looked disappointed, then plotting. "You remember the dead man in the bar, don't you?"
"What makes you think I could kill everyone I know?"
Warren laughed. "Everyone you know? Remember I scoped you out before dropping that bag of coin on your table. The only people you know are the whores who screw the guys you clean up after. They told me you haven't said one word to your wife since she killed your son. Who down there do you give a busted watch about saving?"
He set the equipment down and turned Rush north toward open sand and distant dunes. The touch made Rush's shoulders crawl. He wanted nothing to do with this man and his murderous plans.
I'm not like you.
"Our future is that way. Forget about this miserable part of your life and join me in uncovering the riches of Danvar."
"You picked the wrong guy."
Warren chuckled then poked something sharp into his back, in line with his kidney. "Do you have sand in your ears? I will kill you and leave you for the crows."
"Maybe you should."
"Really? You drink too much. Stuff makes a man depressed. You need to get out and live."
"Killing? That doesn't sound like living to me."
"You low-town folk fail to appreciate the peril our world has thrown our way. You work yourselves to the bone, racing to build lives higher than the sand, farther and farther from the water you spend lifetimes retrieving. For what? Community? Don't get me wrong, we need babies to pass our lineage, but the rules of our existence are only twofold: survive or die. Do you call what you're doing here surviving or dying?"
Over Warren's shoulder, Rush could see two more sarfers taking off north from Springston. Another group of families seeking a better life.
What was Rush doing in Springston? Waiting for Star...to do what? Nothing could bring Fish back. Nothing could give life to what had died between them.
A drip of sweat slid off of Rush's brow and his tongue clogged his dry mouth. He wasn't used to being outside this long anymore.
Warren glanced at the sarfers headed north. "There you go. They are choosing to survive. Over time, you'll forget about this place. But the first thing you need to do is leave."
"It sounds like the first thing I need to do is kill people."
Warren kept his knife pressed into Rush's back as he turned him back toward Springston. Where had he seen that knife cover? "Is there a single person down there that would take this blade and spill their blood for you?"
Rush's first thought was of Star. At one time, she would have, as he would have for her. But now...it seemed they'd both moved on.
"Survive or die, Rush. They've all left you to die. Plus, if you don't, I'll just find someone else. Your sacrifice would only prolong their deaths an hour, maybe. Would it be worth it?"
Warren checked his watch's digital display. "How about I take you back down to Honey Hole and give you two silver to take a long shower and hook up with River for an eleven o’clock shag? Remind yourself about what life has to offer."
Rush didn’t know if he could do either, kill a town or sleep with another woman. They both felt about the same. Traitorous. Vile.
Yet, they both offered the lure of hardening him the rest of the way, of silencing the part that made him hurt through every breath. The alternative was taking the blade and admitting defeat. He wasn't strong enough for that.
"Okay."
Warren slapped him on the back and readied the sarfer for their trip back to town. As they sailed northeast down the dune, Rush felt Star, deep in his heart, crying for him not to let her go. Like she’d cried for forgiveness the night she’d killed his son. He should have said something right away, told her it was okay and that they would eventually heal, at least mostly. But he didn’t. He didn’t believe it at the time, and now he had a hard time believing his life would ever get any better.
River could give him a moment of bliss before he turned himself off. Would Star even care? He knew she would, no matter how hard he fought himself to believe she wouldn’t.
But she killed my son!
And he hadn’t paid her back for that yet. He’d contemplated murder, but its pain wouldn’t last as long as his had.
Warren docked his sarfer outside the Honey Hole, ending Rush’s time for debate. He flashed two silver coins in front of Rush.
I ha
ve no other choice. There is no light left for me in this world. To the dark I go.
Heavy legs took him forward. Each landing tore chunks from what heart he had left. Would he have any remaining by the time he reached his last moment of relief? Would it be relief?
He pushed open Rose’s door to a row of eyes that saw him and returned to their drinks. A crow would have received a more welcome response.
Warren was right. I'm dead to them.
Rose was behind the bar, busy dabbing at a mug.
Rush walked around to stand at the sink beside her.
"River’s waiting for you to clean up after her ten o’clock.” Rose didn’t look up from her work.
Rush set the two silver on the counter, ashamed to admit they were his, and what he planned to use them for.
Rose stopped cleaning and eyed the coins. "Where’d you get those?"
"Savings." It angered him to see her doubt that he had that kind of money. "I want a long shower and River’s eleven o’clock slot." He left her and her gaping mouth behind and climbed the stairs, his legs as heavy as the dead man in the corner. "You can clean up after her last."
River worked on an earring as he passed her room. "Hey, Rush, my skins need cleaned."
"Yeah. They do." He kept walking, his steps a little lighter.
The bathroom smelled like River’s perfume. Rush turned on the boiler and undressed, dreadfully afraid that he couldn’t do this. He thought of her moans. The pleasure that she’d offer. His lungs constricted. It was too much. Too far away, and yet too close. He'd worked hard to stop feeling. She would open him up at the core. This was a bad idea.
Shouldn't I be thinking of a way out of here? Who could I tell? Would anyone believe me, anyway? Justice Stone was gone hunting. He was probably the only person he cared about. All of his students were out diving for Danvar.
But the kids. There were still some in town. Different faces than he'd grown to love, but kids nonetheless.
Scavenger: Evolution: (Sand Divers, Book One) Page 1