Skylock (21 page)

Top fired up his truck at dusk. Slipping on a priceless set of visual-display-monitor glasses, the old-timer deftly adjusted their 3D and latent heat imaging sensors. Resetting the truck's compass from solar to celestial, he spoke over a shoulder.

"I know the terrain. I'll handle the drive. We'll still be way inside the safe zone. So you dudes zee-out if you can manage."

From his place in back, Baker leaned forward between Top and Geri, riding shotgun up front.

"Say Sweet Thang," he offered in his best Okie twang, "if y'all get chilly up 'ere jus' 'member you kin share my blanket any ole time."

The woman smiled grimly. "I'll be fine, thanks."

Top intervened, glancing over a shoulder with an exaggerated drawl of his own. "Where'd you-all buy that accent, Tex?"

"I'm not from Texas," Baker declared. "I'm from Oklahoma."

The old-timer winced. "Hmm. Guess we all got our problems in life."

Top and Geri shared a smile as he shifted the truck into gear.

The night's travel passed uneventfully. The truck's confident motion and monotonous engine drone lulled its passengers into a bouncing, fitful doze. At first light, Top hung a broad, sweeping turn. He aimed them toward the approaching dawn.

"Up and at 'em troops! This is the place."

Trennt sleepily searched the sky, rubbing his stiff neck.

"Any idea when?"

"According to Fibs, any time now."

The wait began. A fingernail paring of spent moon and cold dot of the morning star gave the only skyward reference points. The sooty horizon slowly yielded to an indigo bruise. Healing lines of pink and gold invaded and bloomed. Minutes ground on. The first rays of a new sun pried brutally between earth and sky.

Then came a presence—no sight or sound, but an approaching sensation that brought Baker's field glasses up.

"There!" He pointed, coming to his feet. "Just below Venus!"

Heads raised to look at a faint dot in the distant sky. A growing sound confirmed it: the flat, low whistle and steady blowtorch "whoosh" of a jet plane.

The dot lengthened, then sprouted wings and a swept tail. It entered their view battered and streaked with grime. Its once brilliant white airframe had gone to a shocking gray. A moderate list to its damage side was obvious, as was the broad dark square of a jettisoned panel on its hollow belly.

At its nearest point, the craft passed just a thousand feet overhead. Free as a child's lost balloon, it glided high and truant, answering to no one but itself.

Then it slowed and began the odd hovering maneuvers as Fibs had described. Wings went to a raised angle of attack and the craft made a series of difficult one engine lateral moves, as if indeed pondering a place to settle. But something in its guidance system wouldn't allow a landing and it awkwardly returned to normal flight. Shedding its wings, it receded to the same tiny dot.

"Hot damn!" proclaimed Baker, breaking the group trance. "I'd never've believed it! But it's gotta be her, Jimbo! Gotta be! How long yah reckon she's been up there?"

"Three weeks, maybe."

"Shoot, all that time without landin'. You don't think the pilot's still onboard?"

Trennt slowly shook his head, eyes yet chasing after the departed craft.

Behind the steering wheel Top chuckled, orienting a map.

"Freaky as hell," he said in wonder. "But for once old Fibs was telling the full truth."

He turned for Trennt in the back seat.

"You make the call on chasing her, Cap. But if we go and there's anything of value aboard, I say Fibs deserves some cut of the action for even getting us this far."

Trennt nodded. "Agreed."

The old man lingered.

"Something else. The travel alone will be enough of a ball-buster. But know this, they don't call them, the 'Wilds' for nothing. And I'd guess we might be going deep inside before we're done.

"Bunch of strange stuff boiled up that way since the Quake: hot springs, quicksand, and mud flats that're straight poison from all the chemical dumps that got opened up and mixed in. Just the fumes'll blister your skin a mile off.

"Even worse are the tribes—crazies and killers. Hundreds, thousands, were all freed when the jail and asylum walls caved in, and just the worst are left to deal with these days."

His eyes skewed toward Geri. "Only prisoners they take are better off dead."

Baker scoffed, leaning over the front seat. "Don'cha worry none, Sweet Thang, I'll protect yah."

Top answered without looking over.

"I've been out there before, Slick. Going is the easy part. It's getting back that's always hardest. What I need even less is bad karma on my case from somebody a little too anxious."

He looked to Trennt, speaking flatly.

"For anybody else, I wouldn't go. But I think you're a righteous dude, Cap. So for you, yes."

"Is there money enough?" asked Trennt.

"I'd say so. Enough volunteer farm crops grow wild to keep us from starving. Those scrip bucks should cover the hard goods we'll need. We'll divvy up a shopping list, so no one person draws heat from the man. Just hang loose and be cool if someone shows interest in what you're buying."

"Any chance that guy Fibs might shed more light on the matter?"

Top frowned. "With him you never know. I can try."

Reaching for the truck's ignition, the old man offered a last warning.

"Understand, I won't guarantee anything. Not even getting out empty-handed. Everybody be sure this is what you want."

"It is," declared Trennt, speaking for the group.

"Okay, then. Let's rock."

Royce Corealis settled back comfortably in his meager hotel suite, watching his evening caller depart. He now glowed with success on all counts. His hasty goodwill trip west was working out far better than he'd ever hoped. His medicine show approach of simply drumming up folks on street corner stops about Freeville provided him with an audience far from the hostile lot he'd anticipated.

To the contrary, they gathered eagerly to hear his news of the struggles endured back east. They seemed vexed by their former president's untimely passing and sympathetic toward stories of what their less fortunate city-bound cousins contended with. Royce's vague proposal of a future election stirred their craving for a return to normalcy and he enjoyed free movement through the crowds, offering optimism and hope.

He now smiled. Snake oil and democracy, one and the same.

The local Red military contingent was understandably reserved at his presence. But they did not hamper his entourage and stayed as pleasantly tolerant as their stiff-necked military courtesy would allow. Even this, Royce felt, could be put to eventual use.

Corealis' true purpose was also netting results. Agency scout teams had easily infiltrated the Rendezvous crowds and were probing for information on the lost plane. Better yet, he was now armed with confirmation that his previous agents had indeed disregarded his warning and were aggressively pursuing leads of their own. Things couldn't be working out better.

The director watched his aide pouring cups of Russian coffee.

"It's rewarding to know that values such as integrity and propriety are still very much the fabric of dedicated people like our freelancers. I'm certain our task shall be made much easier by their vengeful efforts."

The director's grin tightened as he took a cup.

"We'll continue following the northern coastline on our goodwill junket and let our crusaders proceed. But maybe at an appropriate moment, we should also play the role of good neighbor and leak word of them as possibly dangerous insurrectionists to the local authorities. A little extra driving force, if you understand my meaning."

Aboard the anchored cargo sub, Major Dobruja was listening to a status report of his own.

"Corporal Lansky saw this himself? The very same two men we passed in the street yesterday also spoke to this bunch of visiting dignitaries?"

The sergeant nodded. "Yes, sir."

"He's absolutely certain?"

"He has no doubt. He was on sidewalk duty when the American dignitaries went past on a tour of the town. They were shaking hands with everyone like politicians do. But at the soup kitchen they singled out the pair as though they knew them.

"The corporal couldn't hear what was said. But shortly tempers rose between Corealis and the taller of the pickers. The group went outside to finish. By the time Lansky managed to work his way around, they'd split up.

"There's been no further contact between the two groups, but Lansky made a point of trailing the pickers on his own for a time yesterday, and they have since hooked up with a woman and an old man. They drove off together last night and were seen again today. This time they split up and spent the entire afternoon bartering for travel goods and fuel enough to go a long distance."

The major pondered the matter. It did strike him exceedingly odd that random pickers would be singled out for such contact by the politicians. And the two men in question did raise his own suspicions, just by their presence.

But otherwise, their actions spoke of nothing different than any other pickers would ultimately wind up doing. Even provisioning so early into Rendezvous usually meant something as minor as simply getting a jump on the competition for some newly rumored treasure field.

Still, Dobruja sensed more. And it bothered him.

His sergeant voiced the obvious. "Extremists?"

"Maybe," Josef answered wryly. "We are, after all, not loved by everyone. Might at least make our own lives more interesting, to deal with some actual radicals. Public trial and execution, maybe. But we've been reminded time and again, by superiors back home, to watch our manners."

Dobruja's thoughts returned to the recent arrival of the American diplomats. He regarded them with typical disdain.

"Our new guests appear to be just more stuffed shirts on a phony goodwill tour, gravely surveying damage they can't possibly correct and making promises of public aid not worth the breath to say them. Still, what could be the connection between two such groups?"

"This Corealis does have a way about him," remarked the sergeant. "Seems to be a good talker. People listen."

"Like all good politicians," assured Dobruja. "Hoping only to handpick a replacement favorable to himself for their empty throne back in Washington, or wherever their self-serving capital is these days. I've seen it happen over and again in their hypocritical two-party system."

The major dismissed the dignitaries. "Well, let them pretend and talk; pass out party favors and shake hands. In a few more days their band will move on, and take their empty promises with them. In the meantime, we're reminded by further orders to offer courtesy, hospitality, and not hamper their movement in any way. This is, after all, still their country."

In a few moments the major's eyes narrowed.

"It might be prudent to continue having someone watch our other group, though. They do seem to be quite the industrious bunch."

"Yes, sir."

Dobruja came to one last point.

"The camp fool Lansky reported as seen talking with the old man. Bring him around for questioning."

"Anything else, sir?"

"Have a squad of our infantry on standby. If our guests do leave again, we may trail after for a few days to see exactly what they have in mind."

Dobruja looked to the sergeant, a feisty jut to his square jaw.

"Regardless, any excuse would be another nice break from more of this old occupation drudgery. Stretch our legs out on patrol. And so soon after our latest victory, eh, Sergeant?"

"Yes, sir!"

Travel commenced with first light. It was easy at the outset, northwest through the gentle run of roller coaster hills and saddles bunched up by the gathering surface action of the Great Quake. The following days would be spent crossing hard-packed pumice sandbars and waist deep streams of distant mountain runoff. Further on uneven ground and sheared faultland steps started, then it was pure desert.

Supper that first night was canned rations, which the group ate in near silence. Geri was done before the others and walked off, disappearing for a time behind the truck. Next to the small campfire Top had rolled an after-dinner smoke. He lay back, head in hands, to enjoy it. Baker, meanwhile, began what would become a nightly ritual of weapon cleaning.

His tools were set out in a preordained sequence. Auto-shotgun, pistol, and custom-boxed sniper rifle were gently disassembled, wiped and rejoined. Oddly, something in the gunman's precise actions and doting care generated a certain hypnotic peace for Trennt. Those nimble fingers racing over familiar latches and pins lulled him to a near doze as he sat cross-legged, spooning up the last of his own hash.

Something blurred past Trennt's face and plopped heavily in his lap. His trance shattered, he shot up, straight-backed. But gazing down, he found ample compensation for his lost woolgathering. There, yellow firelight flickering off its battered cover, was the missing satchel of research papers.

Above and behind him stood Geri, eyes brimming with her standard flush of disdain.

"You haven't asked lately," she reminded, "but I won't welsh on my part of the deal."

Picking them up, Trennt eagerly gave the clutch of papers their first in-depth review; though shortly, he knew it was pointless. Only a hodgepodge of random sheets had survived: partial chemical and enzyme reports, temperature and pressure charts, plant growth evaluations. Nothing that made any sense to him. Maybe a botanist could wring something of minor value from them. Yet even that seemed doubtful.

Just that odd pad of cheap yellow paper held any continuity among its faded and smeared pages. Yet it was in a queer foreign language, lacking the clutches of numbers, degrees, and equations truly valuable information was certain to have.

Trennt flipped through the sheets. Spanish? No. Italian, maybe. What did it matter? Not much to show for all the effort and risk invested. Frustrated at the poor lot of salvage, Trennt gazed across at Geri, now quietly feeding sticks to the fire.