INFINITY HOLD3

by Longyear, Barry B.

  "Your numbers pretty small, Shava?" I asked.

  "What makes you say that?"

  I held out my hands. "Man, you're pulling guard duty. That's a squat job."

  "We have enough."

  I rubbed my eyes and thought on it. Shava didn't need to take over the bait column. All he had to do was immobilize it and get the word to Carlo about the big plan. Carlo's valley army would then turn back and attack Nance and Stays. I leaned back against a rock and put in a ment.

  Shortly before daybreak, the sky that beautiful blue I hadn't seen since the desert, there were voices from below. They got angrier and angrier until Shava called down, "What's the racket?"

  "There's a squab RC down here. Says he's got some meds for the Chief."

  I looked over the edge of the column's top. Ratt was down there surrounded by Shava's yard monsters. There weren't any meds I was supposed to take. Why didn't the little hermaphrodite mind his own business and stay safe?

  "Okay," said Shava. "Send up the meds."

  Ratt put on his most sincere you-stupid-dork look and called out, "What I got here is something that has to be rubbed on the Chief's leg from his crotch to his knee. You going to get your hand in there, sweet thing?"

  Shava Ido thought for a moment and said to the yard monster who was guarding Ratt, "Bring up the punk. If he makes a wrong move, cut him in half."

  Even as I spoke, it sounded stupid. "You can't hold prisoners, Shava. It's against the law."

  As Shava and the squats below laughed, Ratt and his nursemaid climbed to the top of the rock column. Ratt didn't have his auto rifle and he was carrying a gray plastic water bottle. "Here," said Shava Ido as he held out his hand toward Ratt. The kid handed the bottle to his guard who in turn handed it to Shava. As the renegade leader opened the bottle, Ratt looked at me.

  "How're you doin', Chief?"

  "About the same. Where's your piece?"

  "When I woke up, it was gone. Somebody took it." He cocked his head back toward Shava and opened his left hand, palm facing me. Between his fingers was his rifle's auto nut. Shava Ido had nothing in his hands but junk.

  "Thanks for bringing the medicine, Ratt."

  "Forget it."

  Shava had the cap off the plastic bottle and he lifted it to his nose for a whiff. He recoiled from the smell like someone stuck a hot poker up his nose. "Jesus! It's gin!"

  "Gin?" Ratt's guard repeated.

  The tip of Shava's tongue ran nervously over his lips. I knew that track. I'd seen it often enough. Shava was an alk. What's worse, he was a dry alk faced with the juice and the big decision: drink now and blow everything, or put it off for a bit.

  Ratt's guard held out his hand. "Give it over." Shava just stood there, almost hypnotized, until the guard shook his rifle in his leader's face. "Hand it over!"

  A little piece of the CSA in me cheered as Shava made his decision and handed the bottle to the guard. That was how to stay straight. One moment at a time. The guard took a quick sniff, then tilted the bottle to his lips and drained at least a third of it.

  He lowered the bottle, his face screwed up into a puzzled scowl. "Tastes sorta like gin. Sure don't feel like gin!"

  The big man wobbled a bit, his eyes began rolling back in his head, and I braced myself against the pain and sprang from where I was sitting and tackled him. His knee struck my left thigh, I thought I'd pass out, but before that happened the guard went to happyland and collapsed into a pile of meat. I reached for his weapon as the burst from an auto ripped over my head.

  I looked in shock at Shava and he and Ratt were struggling for his rifle. His working rifle. I grabbed the guard's rifle, aimed at Shava, and pulled the trigger. Nothing.

  "You stupid greaseball!" screamed Ratt. "That's my rifle! This one works! Help!"

  Shava's weapon swung around again, the slugs spattered the rocks sending ricochets buzzing around like a cloud of angry hornets. I stumbled up, made a dive for Shava's legs, bringing the three of us down in a pile.

  Firing from below chewed the edge of the rock column and Ratt kicked Shava's face and yanked the weapon from his grasp. "Chief!" he screamed as he began returning fire. "Get his ammo belts before you throw him over the edge!"

  I noted the kid's sense of priorities as I tore at Shava's belt's and beat on his face. Shava bellowed, "Don't be a fool, Nicos!"

  "It's way too late for that," I answered as I tried to pick up a large rock. I couldn't budge the damned thing. I wanted to soup Shava's face, but Prophet was down there, looking back at me. I froze as I saw his laughing face splash and pulp down to nothing, the brains, blood, and bits of bone sticking to my arms and chest.

  A roar in my ear slammed me into the present moment. I opened my eyes and stopped trying to lift the rock. Shava was deader than Manson's parole. Ratt had run an auto stitch from Shava's ear across his forehead. Done past.

  I turned on my knees as a swarm of slugs flew overhead. Ratt was on his side, curled into a ball. I took the belts and the lever-action rifle off of Shava, rolled him over the edge and got to the kid. "Where're you hit, Ratt?"

  "I'm okay, I think. Something hit me in the head. It hurts."

  "Good thing you weren't hit someplace important."

  "You talking from experience, Chief?"

  "As a matter of fact, I am."

  I pulled his hands away from his face and looked. In the growing light I could see an ugly bruise oozing blood above his right temple. "Looks like a rock or a slug bounced off your thick skull. You'll live. Think you can handle a piece?"

  "Yeah."

  Firing came from the steps to the top of the column, and I sent half a clip into the flashes as Ratt crawled next to the guard with the gin breath and retrieved his weapon. He put in his auto nut, checked the clip, and began chewing up real estate.

  There were still plenty of dark shadows, but as the sky grew brighter, it became easier to see. Below the island, the valley floor was covered with mist making it look like an ocean of clouds. Below me, where the woman with the Razai banner had stood and smiled at me, there were several bodies, one of them partially in the dying flames of the campfire.

  The brown sugar was sitting with her back against a rock, the banner clutched across her breast. Her eyes were open and unblinking. What in the hell had she been doing there? Why hadn't she thrown down that rag and run like any yard smart shark?

  At that moment the entire ocean of fog seemed to erupt with rifle fire, and Ratt and I rolled until we found a crack in the rocks, the slugs whining overhead. We crouched there together and for a second it seemed as though we occupied the time/space focal point of every war in the history of the universe. Then it was still.

  I opened my eyes and saw that Ratt's eyes were open, too. He sneered and said, "This doesn't mean we're going to have to pick out curtains or anything, does it?"

  I noticed I was holding his hand so tightly it was a shade of blue. "Sorry." I released it. "It sounds like they finally sorted out the winners and losers. I wonder which we are?"

  I stuck my head out of our hiding place. The rocks were freckled with ricochet scars. Ratt stuck his head out next to mine. I looked at his wound and there was a splinter of rock stuck in his head.

  "How's the head feel?"

  "Okay." He reached up a hand to touch it.

  "Don't. You got a rock stuck in your head. If you jar it loose whatever brains you got left might leak out."

  Ratt snorted in disgust as he lowered his hand. "This from the hardwood who went for the wrong rifle."

  "You nodded at Shava when you said someone took your piece."

  "I was nodding at the guard."

  What was the point? I stood up, made my way over to Ratt's whacked out guard, and picked up the plastic bottle. I sniffed it, and it smelled like gin. I nudged the guard with my toe and muttered, "Some people just don't have any tolerance."

  The guard's head rolled until I could see his face. It was blue tinged, the eyes open wide. I knelt beside him and felt his neck
. He was ice cold and deader than Oswald. "That's not exactly gin," said Ratt. "What you smell is stiletto nuts in water. The kick comes from about twenty zebras Mercy Jane slipped me."

  Zebras. Black-and-whites. Suicide/euthanasia capsules. You could take one capsule, dilute it with a couple of buckets of orange juice, and entertain about twenty very large people for about a week. Ratt's guard had taken in maybe a third of the jug. His corpse would be killing the maggots that tried to feed off it for the next ten years.

  "Nicos?" called a voice from below. It was Lewis Grahl.

  "Chief?" called another voice. I allowed my insides to relax a mite. The second voice had been Margo's.

  "Up here." I checked and my leg was bleeding again. I looked over the side and asked, "How's Lauris? Marietta?"

  "They're all right," answered Margo. Her voice was strange, like she was choking on something. "Deadeye and the other RCs are okay, too."

  The two RCs stepped into the clear space at the base of the columns, rifles at the ready. Seeing Margo alive seemed to fill me with life. I waved my arms to draw their attention. "Here. Is it all over?"

  I got to my feet and helped up Ratt. He wasn't too steady so I kept my arm around his waist to prop him up. By the time we'd made it to the steps, Grahl was near the top followed by Margo. They were both picking their way around the bodies. "I'm real happy to see you two."

  Grahl's permanent frown was even deeper than usual. "I certainly didn't expect to find you alive. God, look at all the dead." He spied Ratt's purple-faced guard. "What happened to him?"

  "You know what the alks in CSA tell you," said Ratt. "One's too many and a thousand's never enough."

  Ratt made a funny. I laughed out loud I was so surprised. Ratt began laughing too but was stopped abruptly by his head wound. Margo got to my side. There were tears in her eyes as she took my free hand in both of hers and held it to her face, then kissed it. I froze for an instant from sheer astonishment.

  "Don't." I pulled my hand back, my head in a spin. "Let's get down from here. Where's Comini? I want to rag that bastard's ass about how his squats handle complaints."

  "He's dead," said Margo.

  It felt like the bottom dropped out of my stomach. The man with the wife and kids back there in the mountains. Take a chance on me, Yani Comini, I thought. Trust Bando Nicos, the Razai, and freedom. See where it gets you.

  I reached out a hand and put it on Margo's shoulder. I felt scared. The panic was suffocating. Someone had to run the bait column's defense against Carlo's valley army. There was more. There was this terrifying feeling for Margo that was growing inside me. It was jammed tight between three deal-killers. She was all-dish angel cake, everybody knew she had a thing for Cap Brady, and Prophet's payback made any kind of long range plan for me pointless.

  I'd seen what'd happened to Alna. Loving someone only doubles the number of ways you can die. It doubles the number of ways the Anna Tanes in this universe can kill you.

  I slowly lifted my hand from Margo's shoulder and pointed down toward Shava Ido's corpse at the base of the column. "That's Comini's number two with all the extra holes in his head. Who's number three?"

  Grahl shook his head. "Maggot meat. Whoever cooked up this move had just about all of Comini's officers pegged. The whole chain of command is wiped."

  "Shava Ido," I said. "He was behind it. What do you mean just about all of the officers? Are any left?"

  Margo pulled me to a stop. "There are a few middle-rung brassies. They or their guards were awake enough to stop Shava's hitters."

  "Well? These survivors? Do they know what they're doing? Can they take over?"

  "They can help," she said, "but you have to take over. This column won't fight for a nobody. They don't want to follow someone unless they know where he's going. You they know."

  "I don't even know where I'm going!"

  Lewis Grahl extended his hand and jabbed me with a handful of rolled green papers. "The Law, Bando Nicos. They know the Law. That's how they know you."

  "What do I know about this kind of fighting?"

  "A fight is a fight!" said Grahl. "Look, they need you. If you go hide in a corner and suck your thumb, Comini's jokers won't fight Carlo. They'll either rabbit or try to cut a deal. Then everybody loses."

  "Don't you get it, cockroach? I don't know what to do!"

  Grahl took a step back, his expression hurt. It was that "cockroach" crack. I'd regretted it right away. But there were other things on the griddle besides his poor little feelings. Margo stood close to me, her eyes narrowed. Her voice was low and menacing. "You are in charge, Bando Nicos. The military officers that're left will help you. We'll all help you. But you are in charge."

  I looked from Margo to Grahl. A damned Hand slave bath attendant and a cockroach. What did any of us know about this kind of fighting? I thought for a second, remembering what the general had said. The job wasn't fighting. Not the way Yani Comini explained it to me. The job was to hang on. Maybe that was something I could do. You don't survive all those years on the streets and in the crowbars without knowing how to hang on. We were on top of a rock. Carlo's valley army was coming to knock us off the rock. King of the mountain. Every kid knew how to play that. I looked at Ratt and the little bastard was sneering at me.

  "You got something to add, punk?"

  "Yeah. A fella once said if I did it my way, I'd end up dead. He suggested I turn it over to my Higher Power. He called himself something like Days of Stupidity."

  "Times of Ignorance," Grahl corrected.

  Ratt looked at the ex-cockroach and nodded. "Yeah. Cockroach, I think we ought to get me back now. My picture is going out of tune fast."

  I took a deep breath, and let it leak out as I nodded. "Okay. Grahl, take Ratt to Mercy Jane and get that hole in his head cemented. Then scrape together the RCs and all of Comini's officers you can find who are still conscious and meet me at the RC wagon. I'll be there in a little while."

  "Very well."

  "And, Grahl?"

  "Yes?"

  "Sorry about that cockroach thing. You earned your way out of that."

  Grahl nodded back, grabbed Ratt around the waist, and began helping him down the stair path as I faced Margo. There was something I had to kill before it multiplied. I took Margo's hands and held them as I looked into her eyes. "Angel cake, I am about the thickest slab of hardwood in the universe. I'm no good at reading signs. Hell, I have a tough enough time understanding things that're spelled out for me. Is there something you want me to know?"

  "I'll ask you the same thing, Bando. Is there something you want me to know?"

  I wanted to throw myself on her lips, dive into her eyes, wrap myself in her arms and kisses. "No," I whispered. "Nothing."

  "Liar." She leaned forward to kiss me. I thought about holding her at arm's length, running, but her lips touched mine first. "I love you."

  "No," I said. "You can't."

  "I can. I have ever since I first saw you in Pau Avanti's camp. I have ever since I gave you that bath in the Men's Hall." She smiled wickedly. "You remember that bath?"

  "Oh, ye— What about Cap? I thought—"

  "You thought wrong."

  "Don't love me," I begged. "Please. You don't know the things I got coming up. I'm not exactly buying green bananas, understand?"

  "What are bananas?"

  "Never mind. I just don't have a lot of time left."

  "I know all I need to know," she answered. She kissed my cheek and whispered in my ear, "I'm praying for you, Bando." She turned and followed Ratt and Grahl down the path and beyond the rock wall.

  I stood there stunned for a minute. I mean, what was I supposed to do with that? Her. There were too many bewildering things rushing me all at the same time. I turned until I was facing the woman with the banner. I climbed down and walked over to her.

  She was dead. An auto had stitched her across her belly. It took her awhile to die, then. I didn't remember any screaming or moaning, though. She had gone slow,
painful, quiet, and alone. Instead of clutching her belly, she was hanging onto a stupid flagpole. I squatted next to her, closed her eyes, and placed my hand on her cheek. She was really very pretty. The image before my eyes kept fighting with my memory of her smile the night before. What in the hell had she been smiling at?

  I thought I'd have to fight her for the banner. I'd heard about death grips before, and even ran into them a time or two. I wrapped my fingers around the greenstick pole and her hands fell from it, limp and lifeless. Holding the banner in my left hand I placed her hands in her lap. There was a dull silver chain around her neck. I pulled the chain and medal out of her collar, bent close, and looked at it. The image of a man and a dog looked back. Beneath their feet was the name St. Rock.

  Hell. Look who she picked. St. Rock. The patron saint of bozos.

  Where I'd learned about St. Rock edged into my mind. It was a real slice of ancient history. Back in the Philly murk I remembered me and Billy Ocho in the church vestry paging through the lives of the saints, laughing it up. We couldn't've been more than eight or nine years old. We'd looked up St. Rock special because we thought he had something to do with music. He didn't. Rock was just the guy's name. Back in Europe during a plague, he used to bop around curing the folk, until he got the bug himself. He recovered but when he went home, no one recognized him. He was thrown into prison as an imposter, and he died behind crowbars. Talk about the breaks. St. Rock. The patron of losers and assholes.

  I dropped the medal back behind her collar. For some foggy reason old Rock had been some kind of comfort to the brown sugar back there in Greenville. I couldn't imagine why, except that no one got put on Tartaros for being a winner. I looked up at the flag and shrugged. I guessed St. Rock around your neck wasn't any sillier than praying to a couple of stars.

  I couldn't bear the thought of the sand bats getting to the brown sugar, and I used the flagpole to crutch myself to my feet as I looked for some rocks to cover her. There were a couple of pebbles, but nothing useful that was small enough to move by myself. I had just about given up when a question popped into my head: When Yani Comini and his army had defeated the slave revolt here years ago, what had happened to the dead? There wasn't any place to bury them. Where were the bones?