Borderlands: The Fallen (12 page)

“I’ve been waiting because that goddamn buncha mercenaries been around, we hadda either kill ’em or wait till they moved on. If they spied on us when we opened it, we’d have to fight ’em for it and the shitbuggers outnumber us. Now, I’ll open it myself. Get outta the way before I jump on you and squeeze your guts outta your mouth.”

“Hey!” someone yelled from the entrance to the gulley. “I got somethin’ for ya!”

The Bruiser turned toward the sound and spotted what looked like his perimeter sentry, Mulch, up on the boulder that bulked in front of the passage to the gulley. He was poised up there with a prisoner who was lying on his belly, maybe unconscious, hands tied behind his back. The prisoner lying across the boulder was a big black guy, looked like that ex–Crimson Lance Roland, who’d been hanging out in the area. The guy was twice Mulch’s size and dangerous as a gasoline can on fire—Mulch must’ve gotten lucky to bring him down.

“I got Roland here! He’s all tied up!” His voice seemed
higher than usual. Shrill. Excited maybe. Catching Roland—who wouldn’t be?

“Good catch, Mulch! Tied up like a skag pup waiting for the roaster!” He pointed at Vultch and Gunch. “Why can’t you bums be useful like that! Come on!”

The Bruiser ran toward the boulder, catching up his shotgun as he went, the two Psychos coming along after him, hooting gleefully. “Another prisoner! Let’s slice him up and …”

The sentry yelled, “Come ’n’ get him!” He rolled the big prisoner off the boulder, so he fell on his side on the ground, with a grunt. Groaning, Roland got to his knees, managed to get to his feet, just as the three bandits got to him—then Roland’s arms came from behind him, and the Bruiser saw that they hadn’t been tied at all, the strips of cloth back there just window dressing. And in each of Roland’s hands was a pistol: Vladolf Rage automatic pistols already barking out their five-round bursts.

Another shot came from the top of the boulder—but that’s the last thing the Bruiser knew. Because Roland’s auto pistol sent its burst up under his chin, the bullets passed through his palate, rocketed up through his skull—and darkness closed over him …

Cal fired, aiming downward with the pistol Roland had given him—he was still on the boulder, just a meter above the nearest of the Psycho bandits. The man was swinging his axe at Roland but one of Cal’s bullets cracked into the axe-wielding Psycho’s head so that he staggered back. Cal expected the Psycho to fall but the masked lunatic kept his feet and came stumbling back toward Roland, raising his axe.

Roland was blasting away at the other Psycho, hammering him with the automatic pistols, emptying the clip. As the bandit spun and fell, Roland dropped one of the pistols, turned, and caught the first Psycho’s axe handle in his left fist, lifted the howling bandit off the ground with it, then smashed down—crushing the Psycho’s skull with his own axe.

Cal watched in horror and fascination as the Psycho went limp, falling back across the legs of his fellow—the other Psycho who was somehow still barely alive, lying facedown, clawing off his own mask … and licking the rocks on the ground just once, before dying.

Cal tore his own mask off and threw it down, slid off the boulder after it. He was grateful to get that mask off. The thing stank, and there was something wet and sticky around the bottom of it—blood from the decapitation. He was wearing the bandit’s jerkin, still. It fit him pretty well …

But this planet wasn’t a great fit at all. It was making him sick.

“Kid—you throwing up again?” Roland asked, coming around the boulder to him. “You know, you keep vomiting, it’s a waste of food. Food’s scarce out here. One reason these scum turn to cannibalism. Me, I’d sooner starve than eat human flesh—there you go, barfing again … Never mind, I’m gonna get the Eridian goodies.”

Ten minutes later, outside the passageway through the cliffs, Roland was just loading the metal case into the back of the idling outrunner, strapping the case down. They were in the shade of a conical outcropping, where Roland had parked the outrunner.

“What are you complaining about now, kid?” Roland asked gruffly.

“I mean, jeez, Roland,” Cal was saying, “on a civilized planet, a respectable type guy, he’d, ya know, take a person like me, lost in the wilderness, right back to a town—without making him put on a mask and a costume and pretend to be a bandit and watch as he blows people’s heads off …”

“First off, you already know the answer to that, kid,” Roland said, tightening the straps. “It’s not a civilized planet. Not since Dahl abandoned it. Anyhow, you wanted a gun, talked like a tough guy about how to use it. Acted like you wanted the action.”

“I shot one of those guys. He just didn’t …
stop.
”

“Takes a lot of stopping power to put a Psycho down. That’s why I nailed ’em up close with the auto pistols. Slam five rounds in the head point blank, you’re on your way. Bam-bam-buh-lam-bam, critical hit.”

“I knew it was a tough planet. I guess I just didn’t think it’d be
this
bad. People cooking other people alive—and eating them. You cutting off a guy’s head like you were cutting a … a melon off a vine.”

Roland chuckled, pushing the case back a little more so it snugged against the base of the turret.

“I just think we should’ve avoided those guys, not gone sneaking up to their camp, and … and just …” Cal’s voice trailed off.

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.

Z
ac 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 …