Skylock (24 page)

Sudden pain snared the man's face. For a time it looked as though his composure might crumble . . . but it held firm. His eyes hardened and his mouth tightened in proclamation.

"Like so many tons of ore needed to refine the purest nugget, we have survived. What remains is the pitiful essence of our genesis, yes. But also our legacy, the start of a new generation. Children raised out here know nothing but total commitment, self-reliance, and pride. And for the first true seed to flourish, I would not even consider my son's death as a waste."

Trennt concurred. "I wish you success."

Whitney didn't reply. He suddenly looked beyond them all, to the unguarded doorway and a tearful little girl standing there.

"Lahkia." He spoke her name with great love.

His tone gave enough encouragement for the girl to run inside and crush herself in his embrace.

"My daddy is no better, Grandfather."

The chief caressed her thin, small back. "I know, my dear light. The pain is great. But we must be strong and know that whatever happens will have its reason."

The little girl nodded tentatively, still sobbing. Their moment became one of a grandfather and granddaughter. No more time was left for talk with outsiders. Guards reappeared to escort the prisoners out.

Headed down the dim stone corridor, Trennt took a better look inside the sick room. There, a pallid young man lay on a stone billet. His smell hit Trennt first: the strongest kind of urine stink, flushing right through his skin. It sent Trennt back to a dying horse in his uncle's barn when he was a boy.

"Whew," Top puffed in a low breath. "The smell coming off that dude is mudflat toxin, no lie. Must've been got caught out in the chemical bogs."

Trennt studied the fearful little girl looking in from outside the room, then to the young man within.

"What's wrong with him?" he dared asked.

"Nothing, dog!" barked Machu, issuing another shove.

"That's our medical case in there," Trennt reminded. "Even if you've stolen it, I still deserve an answer for it having been taken."

"We steal nothing! It is a spoil of war!"

The chief again intervened.

"He was on a lone pilgrimage across the western plain, on the last phase of his Ooh-Tah, his rite of passage. He found himself caught by the fumes in a daylight crossing of the poisoned flats, as the old one said. It is a miracle he had the strength to make it back."

Having listened to Trennt, the little girl walked bravely among the strangers. She paused before him, searching his face with hopeful, trusting eyes.

"Can you help my daddy?" she asked softly.

The chief set a hand to her head.

"My son's wife died when Lahkia was born. They have only each other."

Trennt studied the little girl a moment, then knelt and gently took the precious oval face in his hands, tenderly wiping away her tears with his thumbs.

"Once I had a little girl about your age. I loved her very much and lost her when she got sick like your daddy. I couldn't do anything then. But maybe I can now."

The message was years beyond her. Yet Trennt's tone brought a thin smile of trust. Choking off his breath, he entered the infirmary and set a cautious hand to the unconscious man's cheek.

The head, hot as an iron and greasy with fever, rolled mushily at his touch. Everything about the sick man felt jointless, muscles gone to jelly in a sinewy body where nothing but cabled strength should reside.

The young man pulsed with a dry, sweatless heat. Raised splotches like fifty-cent pieces covered his skin. Fever blisters crowded for space on his lips. And through lids split like half-healed cuts, brown eyes were lifeless and flat as a doll's.

His pulse was far too prominent. Trennt could feel it thumping through every spot of his skin, double-action pumps of a weakened heart working overtime.

"He's got it," asserted Top. "Seen it happen to a couple dudes on one mapping run. Kidneys are filling with poison that they can't flush."

"What'd you do?"

"Gave them the usual citric-zinc detox pills and piled them under blankets to try sweating it out."

"And?"

"Watched them die."

"You can't give pills to an unconscious man." It was Geri, in a bold tone of voice that surprised both the men.

Trennt glanced over. "Any suggestions?"

"Shock immersion. An old Plains Indian way of breaking fevers."

She folded her arms at their amazement, offering curtly, "Once upon a time I was a college junior in American History studies. I learned that tribes would soak the ill person in hot water to raise his temperature even higher. Then they'd dunk him in cold. The snap between could jar his system back in synch."

Trennt stared mutely. Even with his authority eclipsed, he felt a sudden and strange reliance growing for this troublesome woman. But it was the chief who gave voice to the drawbacks.

"This same immersion might not also be fatal?"

Geri nodded honestly. "Yes."

Whitney regarded his unconscious son for a time, then studied Geri and his own people beyond.

"If we learn something, we all gain. Do what she says!"

The tribesmen reluctantly stepped back, ready to follow Geri's orders. Her manner was bold among the warriors, and had a professional confidence they responded to.

"The big thing we need is water. Five, ten gallons—as hot as a person can stand; again as much, ice cold."

"The solar collectors might still catch enough afternoon sun," declared Whitney. "Get them turned! What else?"

"We'll need a tub to soak him in, one that can be quickly drained."

"We have no such thing!" barked Machu, stepping forward. "This is fool's work, Father! Let me remove these dogs!"

Geri faced the repugnant man. "Your brother has quit perspiring. Before long his brain will cook like a hard-boiled egg and you'll lose him for sure. Is that what you want?"

Trennt offered a suggestion. "The canvas top off our truck might work if tied at the corners."

"Get it!" Geri ordered.

The brother stepped forward, blocking Trennt. "You stay here, dog. My men will get what is needed."

The canvas roof was stripped off and lashed by ropes into a tub shape. Gallons of precious water were set to heating aboveground in an assembly of tiny solar collectors. More was sunk to cool in lower crevice depths. A difficult wait began.

Geri marked time acting as an attending physician, daubing the stricken young man with cooling alcohol and rubbing salves from the medkit. The spirits and ointment beat back his rankness with a smell of hope.

Then, a sullen tribesman appeared.

"We've lost the sun, leader, and the water is barely warm."

Machu shot to his feet.

"This white devil foolishness is done, then! Send them out and let our own healers return."

The chief sighed in accord. "If we have no other means of heat . . ."

"Our truck," said Trennt, "also has fuel. Use it."

The chief motioned to his men.

Distant pockets in the stone floor were filled with lit fuel oil and cans of water strung across to finish their heating. Geri readied the soaking tarp and motioned. "Bring him."

Machu set aside his spear and strode forward to raise his brother, but before he could lift, Trennt was on the other side. He locked eyes and wrists with the warrior, not allowing the man to budge unless they did it in unison. Machu's eyes flashed with surprise, then grabbed Trennt back. Together they hoisted the ailing youth toward the makeshift tub.

The patient looked even worse than before, moving through the thin passageway light. His skin was mottled and lumpy, almost seeming to cringe in the flickering torches. Trennt felt his own flesh crawl as they lowered the sick man into place.

Some distance off, Top and another tribesman stood ready as the hot water brigade.

Her patient set, Geri called. "Top!"

"Yo!"

"Water ready?"

"Guns up!"

"Bring it!"

The pair threaded hardwood spears through the sooty, five-gallon cans' carrying lugs and shuffled over. The hot load was heavy: eighty-plus pounds swinging like huge unwieldy anchors.

Trennt and Baker met them with shirts off and bunched into oven mitts. At Geri's nod, the first can was slowly blended into the room-temperature water. The sick man's eyes fluttered with the new heat. His shallow, racing breath hiked up to a higher notch. Tribespeople glanced about uncertainly, but Geri drove them on.

"Keep it going! Don't mind him!"

The man's skin shimmered. Veins in his throat and temples began to bulge and throb. His eyes swelled against their drawn lids.

Geri shouted again. "Cold water!"

Two tribesmen supported the sick man while she yanked a corner knot to dump the first wash. But the weary, sun-bleached fibers snapped as she moved to tie the rope. It was too short to reattach, so Trennt grabbed the sheared end and drew the cord snug by hand. Geri's eyes met his.

"Do it!"

The cold water was administered. At first the patient hung unaffected and still. Then he began to tremble. Slowly gathering power from somewhere far outside himself, the young man started quaking like an addict gone hours beyond his last fix.

The frigid water about him came alive. It bubbled and fizzed to a counterfeit boil. Yet he couldn't seem to shed the sudden bolt of energy fast enough, and drawing back, finally exploded in a ghastly eruption.

Head and shoulders flew out. Arms shot wide. Icy water sprayed far in a great silver blast. From its depths the youth rose as a high-arched piece of newly cast granite.

Machu shouted, barging ahead.

"The devils are killing him!"

"Keep him away!" countered the chief. "And hold this one down!"

Hands of tribesmen and prisoners alike joined to grab and suppress both men. Shocked at the indignity of his arrest, Machu melted in their grasp, but his unconscious brother fought them all. His case-hardened body corded and bunched with runaway power, until ligament and muscle seemed drawn beyond all possible limits.

Just when it appeared he'd tear himself in half, the patient paused; then softened and crumpled—gone full circle, mush to monster and back.

Geri caught him as he settled into the trough. She gently propped his head while the cold water drained.

"That's all we can do," she said, handing over a thick medkit envelope containing a mix of sugar and salt. "Dry and wrap him up. Tomorrow should tell if he'll live. If he can drink, mix this in two gallons of water and give it to him. It'll replace all the body salts he's lost."

The crowd hovered, numb in the aftermath. Though the patient was still unconscious, his breath now settled into a relaxed, easy rhythm.

The chief granted Geri a bitter smile. He then moved aside to speak a time with a pair of warriors. Shortly after, the prisoners were led from the cavern. Behind, only Machu broke the silence, calling out a final warning.

"If he dies, dogs, you will wish you had first!"

This time the captives were directed to a new, ground-level cell. A boulder was rolled over the opening and the four sat again, cast in darkness.

Sometime later, Top got to his feet.

Trennt looked toward Top's rustling.

"What's wrong?"

"Something's weird in here."

"How?"

"Don't know. Too—too . . . cold maybe, for this far inside the rock."

The old-timer shuffled across the cave. Sweeping his hands slowly in the air before him, he stumbled over Baker, stopped, and doubled back.

Baker growled, shoving him away. "The hell you doin'?"

"I felt something, man."

"What, spiders?"

"No." He continued his motions. "More like, yeah! There it is again."

"What, already?"

"A breeze."

Baker climbed to his own feet. "Oh, you're—" The shooter caught his words. "Jimbo, I think the old coot's right! You kin smell bits ah' fresh air, too."

The rest came over.

"Spread your fingers and sweep them slowly," Top directed. "Move too fast and we'll never find it."

Their hands worked the dark ether in the fashion of sluggish mimes. Then, stooped low, Geri called out.

"Here!"

Top got to a knee. "Right on, Sunshine! It's coming up from low in this wall." He reached in and pulled away some corroded sandstone.

"Oh, yeah. There's big time air coming in! And maybe enough room for a dude to squeeze through."

"Then step aside, Granpaw," called Baker. "Don't wancha' gettin' your old hide hung up in there and blockin' my way out. I'll skinny on through."

He was gauging the opening when Geri objected.

"No. I'm smallest. I made a promise to carry my weight. This is a chance to prove it."

The shooter paused. "Jimbo?"

"Let her try," answered Trennt.

Baker moved aside and Geri shinnied bravely into the narrow crevice. Her head and shoulders disappeared. Slowly, chest and waist vanished, thighs and knees; ankles were last and she was gone.

The gritty sounds of her movement dulled and moved steadily away. Finally they stopped.

Top called in a harsh whisper. "Sunshine! You okay?"

Long seconds passed without a reply.

"Sunshine!"

"Yes," finally came her far-off voice. "Come on through. You can make it. And you won't believe what's out here."

Baker went next. Then Top. Steadily upward, thirty feet and more. It was a snug fit, but manageable, like a passage which had been used before. Last in line, Trennt wriggled through the final yards. He exited into a bone-grating chill.

The path had taken them sixty feet through the settlement's rock walls. It was long after dark now and, compared to the relative in-ground warmth, the starry late night air was brutally cold. Chilled flesh joined frayed nerves as the group stood shivering, in the unexpected presence of their truck.

It sat loaded, just as it had been taken; roof tarp back in place, weapons stacked across its hood. Even the medkit was closed and secured. In addition, their water cans were patched and filled. More brimming skins had been lashed aboard, as well. Inside rested a larder of dried gourd hunks and parched strips of lizard meat.