Point Apocalypse (24 page)

As I fiddled with the tools I noticed two children's faces in the window: a
tiny tot of a boy with blond tousled hair and an older girl, dark curls framing her curious face. Both watched me with great interest.

The boy looked a lot like the landlady a
nd the girl resembled the goat herder. Apparently, Alexie and Ahmad didn't waste their time here.

I gave the kids a wink and started unscrewing the next bolt.
Kathy returned with some rags and a can of diesel and began helping me.

"Wish you
hadn't been so double fucking quick back at the coast," she sighed. "We wouldn't have been here to begin with."

"Correction," I
prized the filter out of the fuel pipe with the screwdriver. "You wouldn't have been here. Neither would we."

She grinned but didn't say anything.

"When did McLean first decide to find out the purpose of carula?" I ripped a rag in two, soaked its end in diesel and started cleaning the inside of the fuel pipe.

Kathy
paused. "Half a year? I honestly can't remember. Do
you
know its purpose?"

"Not really," I gave her a clean cloth and nodded at the
filter wishing I hadn't started.

Kathy
placed a hand on my shoulder. I put down the fuel pipe. "What is it?"

"Carula," she said. "When the scientists first came
to study Pangea, McLean used to see Neumann a lot and also the woman, the biologist. They told him how to grow seaweed. That's when he started his New Pang farms swapping his crops for Earth deliveries.

"
So what?" I shook her hand off. "Earth needs carula to make a food supplement. Too many mouths to feed."

"That's not what I mean," she shook her head. "If you
compare the amounts of carula we ship and the Earth's population, we'd have to turn the entire coast into seaweed farms. Besides, the riggers still have the gold - why didn't Earth demand it back?"

"Are you talking about the
Arctic goldmines transport? The supply vessel that was caught in the jump?"

"
Exactly. It was packed to the upper deck with gold. Now why would they waste energy shipping carula back to earth, and leave gold behind?"

"I think I know what you mean," I frowned racking my brains for an excuse to cut the discussion short before the Information butted in.
In that case, I'd have no other option but to eliminate Kathy. That would really mess up my plans.

She waited.

"Because," I started, "the energy costs much more than the gold itself."

Kathy
chuckled. "Yeah right. You can tell that to the freshly arrived dumbfucks but not to me!"

"So what do you want?" I
demanded.

"Just to see how the
land lies," she crumpled the rag, blew through the filter and started rubbing it clean. "I knew that McLean would try to use you. He wouldn't work with the FSA. Your Feds must be really stupid, telling him about your mission. He thought that the Feds wanted to expatriate the only carula researcher; they would ask McLean to help you and leave him with jack shit. That's what I wanted to warn you about. I had everything ready, guns, money, I had a whole plan how to give it to you in my brother's house. It didn't work, did it?"

We worked in silence for a while. Then
I asked,

"What did
the FSA promise you for doing this?"

"Amnesty. For me and my bro."

"How do you think you were going to leave Pangea?"

"I'd go with you," She looked up at me, surprised. "Didn't they tell you?"

I suppressed a negative answer. I'd received no instructions regarding her and her brother.

"Right," I changed the subject. "How do you
keep contact with the Fort?"

"I've got a radio."

"Oh," I checked the fuel pipe against the light and took a new rag. "Where do you keep it?"

"
None of your business."

So. This
was getting interesting. She was probably waiting for me to answer her carula question. Or she might be wary of me leaving her behind. She seemed to have grasped the whole point.

"
Kathy. I need to know where you keep the radio in case I need to use it. If you get killed, I-"

"
Until I am, I'm still your contact."

I looked into her face. The way Georgie had described her
back at the coast, you'd think she was a fucking Nazi. And that's what she'd been at first, but now... Now she was a human being desperate to get home, by hook or by crook. I didn't think she was putting it on. But why would George still hate her so much?

"Sorry," I tried to sound calm, "it won't work this way."

"How will it, then?"

"
We've already engaged with General Varlamov's men, if you remember. And we were lucky to survive. Once we find the professor and try to smuggle him out, there will be casualties, believe me."

The kids looked
out of the house. The boy walked out into the yard. The girl hid herself behind the wall, sticking her head out.

"I
believe you," Kathy rose and reached into her pocket for a flat round candy box. "Some of us won't come back."

She o
pened the box and stared inside for a while, then handed it to the kids.

She didn't look like a Nazi freak. Even if she
'd zapped three clones. Could a cold-blooded murderess be so nice with kids? She tousled the boy's hair and told him to share the candy with his sister. Then she came back.

"What's your brother's name?"

"Philippe," she picked up the filter and the cloth.

Actually, the existence of a brother (I remembered the dark-haired French guy
at McLean's place) suggested he was the one with the radio. "Does he know your collaborate with the FSA?"

"Who, Philip
pe? Not the slightest idea. He thinks I deal with several groups. Many raiders do so."

"What if
McLean finds out?"

"He trusts me. And he's interested in making new connections. He can't be everywhere at the same time."

"Fine," I put the fuel tube aside and rose to remove and clean the gas tank.

Once I was finished, I said a silent prayer and
tugged on the starter rope. The engine jerked and sprang to life. For a moment, we listened to its powerful sound watching the water trickle down the troughs into the corrals and houses. Kathy gave me a weak smile.

"Kill the
wretched thing before you waste all the gas!" Hands on her hips, Alexie walked out of the house. "When the men come back, they can start it up then."

She turned to go back in, but added, "
Well done, thanks. Now in with the two of you for a wash and a bit of dinner. Go have a look at your friend, too."

"How is he?" I asked meaning G
eorgie.

"Not good,"
Alexie shook her fist at Wong who was climbing over the fence. "Can't you use the gate?" she shouted, then turned back to me. "You go see for yourself. I should really leave him here for a day or two. Ahmad-jan and I will take good care of him. He seems fit and strong so he can pay us back by doing a few things about the house."

She went back in.

"So," Kathy asked picking her nails, "you gonna leave him here or drag him along?"

I
gave it some thought.

"One of your men can't be trusted," she pointed out.

That was true. The cyber troopers by the river had recognized one of them, but which one? Was it Jim or Georgie? Or Kathy? Definitely not Wladas - he'd just arrived at Pangea, although...

The solution came to me naturally. "I know what to do," I said. "
Wong, come along with us."

The house had only two rooms. One contained a clay oven and a table;
in the other, Georgie lay on a bed. We washed ourselves in a narrow corridor that led to a lean-to. Then we walked into Georgie's room.

He looked even worse than before
. Sweat trickled down his ashen face. The eyes glistened with anxiety. Without letting me speak, he hurried, gasping, begging us not to leave him "in this fucking rat hole". I asked Wladas what he thought about the wound. He didn't waste too many words. Blood loss and septicemia.

He
was right there. It's not the bullets that kill in action: it's dirt. Septicemia - blood poisoning - could turn the smallest scratch into a lethal wound. Especially in the Pangean climate, rife with alien bacteria. I hadn't forgotten my carula wound yet.

I reached into my pocket for a few coins and gave them to Jim.
"You stay here with him." I told him to give some money to the landlady. This way she could arrange it with the raiders to take Georgie and Jim back to the loggers.

Georgie tried to object but
I didn't listen. I gave Jim's shotgun to Kathy, waved to the rest and walked outside.

Alexie was scrambling out of the cellar hatch in
the hallway. I hadn't noticed it at first. She held a pitcher of milk and a packet.

"Here," she shoved the food
to me. "Thanks for the generator." She turned to Kathy. "Go and get some water. Take as much as you can carry."

I took the
pitcher and the packet of what turned out to be frozen meat. Apparently, the cellar had an ice room.

"
Thank you," I said. "I'm leaving Jim to look after Georgie. He'll pay you."

The woman nodded and let us out into the yard. Calling for the kids to come
and eat their dinner, she disappeared back into the house.

We filled our flasks and traced the fence heading east. The sun
crept toward the horizon but the air was still too hot for comfort. In the tree shade I hadn't noticed it that much. I looked back. The goats and their herder were returning from the river back to the oasis.

This time the tigers trailed nearby flanking the hairy goats who paid no heed
to them, apparently accustomed to the predators' company. Three of the tigers were rather large - probably, male. Their skin was a stripeless grayish yellow, two saber teeth protruding from their upper jaws. As for the rest, they looked like normal tigers back on Earth with their catlike heads, long tails and feline gait.

Kathy
slowed down too watching them. "Predators prowl at sunset."

Was it a book quote or her own
sentiment? "And then they dine," I said.

The air shuddered.
Our ears popped from an explosion. Another one thundered through the valley throwing us to the ground. We covered our heads as missiles flashed past us.

When the shock wave
s subsided, I rolled onto my back, sat up and raised the gun. The trees in the oasis crackled as fire licked their tops. Smoke billowed over the barn. Two rockets hissed through the smoke: one hit the goats, the other, the settlement.

Another blow sent me onto my back
. I covered my face feeling the ground tremble. Then it rained with stones and chips of wood.

"The
children!" I heard Kathy over the next explosion.

"Down, you idiot!"
I kicked her feet away pushing her to the ground.

The worst thing
for infantry is a rocket launcher. Once the explosions had died away, we heard the approaching roar of sand buggies. Several of them. The clatter of pulse guns was interspersed with the humming of an engine. A behemoth personnel carrier approached the settlement. His roof sported several grenade launchers.

H
ere we go. They'd mop us up in no time.

The
launchers shuddered spitting out a dozen grenades. The heavy vehicle rocked on its suspension and rammed the fence. Two of the sand buggies headed straight for us and yet another one rolled out into the valley chasing the three remaining tigers.

The
fur on the animals' heads was singed by the flames. Their saber teeth glistened in the setting sun. Incredibly fast, the tigers were catching up with the buggy.

The
pulse gun flashed blue scorching the first tiger's head and ripping through his spine. Blood everywhere. The tiger tumbled; the two others sped up and raced off together, leaping at the buggy. One collapsed in mid-air but the other thrust at the moving vehicle knocking down the twin-barreled gun on the roof.

The
buggy's wheels swerved under his half-ton weight. For a moment, the tiger disappeared in a cloud of dust. His teeth and claws clashed on the armored steel. The combat vehicle tilted to one side and nearly flipped over. Its brakes screeching, it slid a few more feet forward and came to a halt.

A
hatch opened. A trooper emerged raising his pulse gun shooting at the attacking tiger. Still roaring, the animal reached out for the soldier. His gun went flying as the man disappeared in the hatchway. The tiger collapsed on the armor and slid off, already dead.