Mutant City (5 page)

‘How?’

‘There was an accident – a problem with the cold fusion reactor. When I got to the site there was nothing left but a huge hole in the ground that went down as far as the eye could see. The devastation extended five or six miles in every direction. The entire forest around the facility was laid low by the force of the explosion. All my research notes, the files, the computers, the equipment – gone. The children had gone too.’ He shook his head and sighed. ‘I told myself it was for the best, that the project was doomed. And at least all the evidence had gone with them.’

Zander narrowed his eyes at his father. ‘Why do I know nothing about this? Why have you chosen to tell me this now, when I’m standing for election? You said there would be no hindrance to my becoming president. What would happen if anyone found out what you’d done?’

‘That’s
why
I’m telling you. Like I said, I assumed they were all dead: destroyed along with the Farm. Then I received this.’ He nudged an omnipad that was on the bed at his side and the screen came instantly to life.

Zander picked it up and looked at the image. It was a picture of an illegal gathering of Mutes somewhere in one of the slums. A small section of the image had been highlighted and this magnified as soon as he tapped it, the new image focused on three individuals in the crowd. ‘Who are they?’

‘The tall, pale one calls himself Jax now. That’s my albino mutant. Isn’t he a handsome young fellow?’ He lifted the oxygen mask to his face and greedily gulped at the air. ‘The older man is called Silas. Brilliant mind. He convinced me to give him a job at the Farm.’

‘How can you be sure it’s him?’

‘I’d bet my life on it.’ He smiled weakly at the joke. ‘Besides, how could I forget what my own brother looked like.’

The son stared at his father, lost for words. ‘Did you say
brother
? You have a . . . I have an uncle?’

‘No. You and I have a treacherous snake for a relation. A snake I should have stepped on and killed when we were growing up.’

‘And you didn’t think I should know about this . . . uncle?’

The old man gave him another of those infuriating shrugs. ‘What was there to know? I thought he was dead.’

Once again, Zander struggled to suppress his ire. ‘Who’s the third man?’

‘He’s the engineer who installed the cold fusion reactor. His name is Thorn. The picture you’re looking at is a little over six months old, but a short while ago our men managed to relocate him and bring him in. They used a number of methods, each more persuasive than the last, until he eventually started talking. He told them that my “extraordinary” children had survived. The albino apparently wiped their memories and suppressed their powers so they wouldn’t be conspicuous. Then they were sent out to the furthest corners of Scorched Earth to start new lives. They’re out there, son, and you have to find them.’

‘Why? Why would we rake something like this up? They haven’t been a problem till now – maybe they’re better simply left alone.’

His father sighed. ‘That picture – it’s from a Mute protest march. I don’t need to tell you how these mutant “rallies” are gathering momentum. The freaks are demanding rights – rights they’ve been denied for a long time now. There’s trouble coming.’

‘And what does that have to do with these kids you created?’

‘The mutants outnumber us by about twenty to one. We can’t simply wipe them out – that kind of thing just isn’t allowed these days. The Last War put paid to that. But there might be another way.’

The man in the bed was hardly the same one Zander had seen when he’d first entered; his father seemed re­energised somehow.

‘Imagine if we were able to use these mutant uprisings to repeal the anti-cloning laws. We’d argue that it’s the only way to raise an army in time. Now, try to imagine a clone army of my beautiful freak kids. We wouldn’t need a nuke; we’d have walking, breathing death machines!’

‘They were
that
powerful?’

‘They could have been, if I’d been allowed to carry on with my work.’

‘And that’s the only reason you want them found, is it? As a deterrent against any mutant uprising?’

His father narrowed his eyes at him. ‘I can’t pull the wool over your eyes, can I, son?’

‘Somebody once told me there was more to be learned from what somebody doesn’t say than from the words they want you to hear.’

Melk Senior nodded, smiling ruefully back. ‘The healer Mute – the one who called himself Brick. I need him. He’s my only chance of survival. I’ve already sent a large number of ARM units out to try and find any of these kids based on the information we extracted from our engineer friend. One of those units had an “unfortunate accident” involving an explosive device. The whole thing is getting . . . messy. I want you to oversee the operation from now on and find them.’

Zander stood up, the anger and frustration clear to see on his face. ‘You just can’t stop, can you? Even here, like this, you can’t stop interfering.’ He headed for the door.

Melk watched him leave. He knew full well his son would carry out his instructions; he always did. The boy was weak, a disappointment in every way. President? Ha! No, he was a pawn, a means to an end. Because there was only going to be one president of the Principia while Melk was still breathing, and if the mutant hybrids had survived, he might be able to keep doing exactly that.

Rush

At dusk the day after they’d met, Tink’s wagon slipped down into a deep rut and broke two spokes. Swearing as he reined the harg to a halt, Tink jumped down to inspect the damage, swearing even more when he saw what had happened and cursing himself for not having had the wheel replaced when he’d last had the opportunity. ‘I knew the thing was on its way out,’ he admitted to Rush. Luckily there was a spare tied up beneath the wagon bed, so they pulled off to one side, unhitching the harg so it could graze while they set about replacing the wheel. It was hard work – the heat of the day had not yet dwindled – but Rush was glad of something practical to do. Sitting atop the wagon next to Tink, he’d had too much time to think. And every time he did so, the terrible scene of his guardian’s death played out over and over in his head. When the work was finished, the two of them agreed they would stay put and make camp. Rush cleared the ground so they could make a fire, while Tink began putting up an old, battered tent that was little more than a thick tarpaulin stretched over two poles.

It was as the old man was finishing this that Rush looked up to see a large lop-eared creature emerge from its burrow and sneak out into the murky half-light. Inching closer, Rush straightened up, carefully putting his hand into his trouser pocket and feeling for the stone he always kept there. He curled his fingers around the object. Without taking his eye off the creature, he slowly pulled his arm back and whipped it forward again, releasing the stone.

There was a dull
thunk!
as the stone connected with the creature’s skull. The animal twitched once and then lay perfectly still.

‘Nice shot,’ Tink said.

Rush turned round to see the old man appraising him. He shrugged and gestured towards the hare. ‘Lucky, I guess.’

‘Luck, you say?’ There was a moment when Tink looked as if he was about to say something else, but it passed and he went back to pushing the last of the tent pegs into the ground.

They ate the roasted game for dinner.

To describe the roaring, rasping sound that came out of Tink’s mouth when he was asleep as merely ‘snoring’ was derisory. The noise had started almost as soon as the man’s head had touched the ground, making it impossible for Rush to doze off. Sleep clearly came easily to Tink. Rush nudged him to see if he might stop, and he did, for all of three seconds, after which the angry bear noises began again in earnest. Realising there would be no sleep for him inside the tent, Rush gathered up his blanket and crawled out through the opening.

The moon, framed by countless stars, hung in the sky. He stood, staring up at the nightscape, in awe at the size and beauty of it all. It was said that after the Last War the skies were filled with black clouds that blocked the sun out for weeks on end, killing most of the vegetation and almost all the animals that fed on it. Thankfully the clouds had cleared a long time ago and Scorched Earth could see, and be seen by, the distant galaxies once more.

It wasn’t especially cold, so Rush wandered over to the wagon, reasoning with himself that if he could make himself comfortable beneath the vehicle it would provide him with some shelter if it should rain. As he approached the wooden truck he heard the
hurghing
sound of the rogwan, followed by the noise of its feet padding back and forth. Clearly the creature was finding it as difficult to sleep as he was. Coming closer, Rush saw the animal walking round and round in tight little circles, eyeing the bushes beside it.

‘You need to go, don’t you?’ he said. He hadn’t asked Tink how he usually arranged for this to happen, but clearly the animal had no wish to foul the area where it would have to sleep. He glanced at the tent and wondered if he should wake its occupant.

The rogwan made another plaintive noise, this one almost like a sigh.

‘Oh, what the hell.’ Rush reached forward and undid the karabiner that attached the chain to a metal ring on the back of the flatbed. The rogwan watched him. When he led the animal over to the bushes so it could do its business, he half expected it to make a dash for freedom; it was easily powerful enough to break free of the grip he had on the leash, but it surprised him by allowing itself to be led there and back again without a fuss.

Dog-tired, Rush crawled beneath the wagon. Pulling the blanket around himself, he looked up to see those bulging lizard eyes staring at him. He’d forgotten to secure the chain back on to the ring. The rogwan
hurghed
. Despite everything Tink had told him about the animal, Rush did not seem to feel in any danger. Quite the oppos­ite, in fact.

‘You want to join me?’ Rush asked, moving aside and lifting up his blanket. He smiled to himself as the rogwan curled up next to him.

Rush woke up early the next morning, chained up the rogwan again, started a fire and had the coffee brewing by the time Tink put his head outside the tent flap. The old man crawled out, screwing his eyes up against the early morning light until he could finally stand and stretch. ‘Sleep well?’ he asked, nodding in the boy’s direction.

‘Not too bad once I got away from you and your snoring.’

‘I don’t snore.’

‘Loud enough to wake the dead.’ Rush held out a cup of coffee which Tink gratefully accepted.

They breakfasted on eggs and hard black bread that Tink fried in the same pan. Afterwards, Tink called Rush over, having taken something from the back of the wagon. He held it out for the boy to see. It was as long as the man was tall, and appeared to be little more than two lengths of leather cord, one with a loop at the end. Between these, in the centre and joining the two lengths together, was a small diamond-shaped patch of soft leather.

‘What is it?’ Rush asked.

‘You never seen a sling?’ Tink blew out his cheeks and shook his head. ‘I’d have bet a tooth you’d have had one of these down on that ranch of yours.’ He grinned at the youngster. ‘When I saw you throw that stone at the hare last night, I remembered I had me one of these in the back somewhere. This’ll let you throw a stone as far as a bow can shoot an arrow. It’s like an extension to your arm. I seen people take birds out of the sky with one of these things!’

Rush looked dubiously at the device.

‘Don’t take my word for it – give it a go!’

For the next hour or so Rush practised with the weapon until he’d perfected the technique of swinging it up and round his head and letting go of the non-looped end at just the right moment so the stone flew out at incredible speed. While he did this, Tink broke camp, and it wasn’t long before the two were back on the road again, Tink telling the boy everything he knew about the Wastes and how to stay alive there.

There were no further incidents on the road, and as night fell they pulled in on the edge of the Wastes, somewhere due south of City Four. This time there was no fire. Tink wouldn’t risk anything that might bring them to the attention of one of the marauding mutant gangs that roamed there. ‘This is a bad place,’ he explained to Rush for the umpteenth time. ‘Sure you won’t come with me? You’re good company, and you seem to have a way with that creature.’

The boy considered this for a moment, then shook his head. ‘No. I think we both know that my route lies that way.’ He hoped he sounded braver than he actually felt.

Tink accepted this, getting to his feet and moving in the direction of his wagon. ‘You have the tent tonight,’ he said. ‘Apparently I snore, and I want you to have a good night’s sleep before you set off on your own.’

Rush tried to argue, but the old man insisted, telling him it would not be the first time he’d slept up on his truck.

When Rush woke the next day, Tink and the wagon were gone. He wasn’t entirely surprised.

Just inside the opening of the tent was a canvas rucksack. On top was a handwritten note.

Rush,