Bulletfoot One

by Marshall Rust

  Tinker would appreciate the part, anyway.

  She drifted through the town as casually as possible and a couple more men and women at their stalls called out to her. The first three didn't know who she was and demanded similar performances on smaller devices that needed attention, for which she demanded equally small payment. After that, her reputation spread and those who needed something repaired began to seek her out with parcels of food or parts they were willing to trade in exchange for her services.

  Jessica13 would have preferred to simply sneak through the town and learn what she could. She’d never really needed to resort to subterfuge—her escape from Sanctuary was really the first time she’d stooped to it—and she constantly felt that unseen eyes watched her or that others would discover her real purpose. Common sense reminded her that being seen as merely another peddler looking to unload her wares and pick up a few more before moving to the next town made her as invisible as she could hope for. She even had to admit that sneaking would probably be more stressful, although it would have the advantage that there’d be no delays.

  Her fears remained but were offset a little by the realization that she was helping these people in the only real way she knew how. It made her feel better, given that her real reason was to gather information, which felt a little dishonest. Besides, as she’d mentioned to her teammates, while she helped to repair their items, they talked to her. She was a little challenged by the fact that folks expected peddlers to peddle not only wares, tools, and services, but also information from the Outside. There weren't too many who wanted to wander, and those who did were usually in possession of a variety of choice news that could be shared with the others.

  Thankfully, she had a good memory and was able to share snippets she’d heard from the other Knights and substitute real news with a story or two. Mostly, she tried to think ahead and ask a question or two that might start them talking rather than looking to her to do so.

  She settled in to help to fix one of the desalination stations that had been set up around the town and one of the young women who did some of the fetch and carry tasks began to talk.

  "It’s been a while since we had rain," she said. "Which is a pity. It makes us more and more reliant on the water coming from the tower."

  Jessica13 glanced instinctively at the trail of smoke that still rose from the burning building at the top of the hill, but the woman gestured quickly at the concrete tower they had noted when they first approached Auburn. She seemed as little inclined to look at the hill as everyone else, and her expression seemed a little tenser than before.

  "What makes you reliant on it?" Jessica13 asked casually and resumed work on the desalinator. Heat was collected to boil the water to separate it from the elements that it might have been mixed with.

  "Well, the admins there make the water run around these parts," the woman said and seemed a little more relaxed. She leaned in to watch as the copper piping was positioned where the slow flames would boil and clean the water they either brought up from the ground or collected from the rain. It was a crude, inefficient system, but it was all they had to work with.

  Jessica13 looked up from her work and narrowed her eyes at the younger woman. "I don't know much about that. How do they make the water run?"

  "Well, they call it the Hoot Bunker," the girl said and frowned slightly. "You know, after Lady Hoot? The lass with the big fuckin' mech and the owl on her helm."

  "Oh, right." She grunted. "Lady Hoot. So she controls how the water comes around here?"

  The girl nodded. "She controls the rain in these parts and says that if we don't give her the best of our crops, she won't send the prayers to the sky with her name and the Prophet won't make it rain for us.” Her tone had a slightly resentful edge that belied the calm expression on her face. “And now, we can't pump water from the ground anymore. Well, we can, but it's mostly sludge we have to boil off in these damn things"—she tapped the desalinator—“and that ruins all the workings of it.” She sighed. “But it’s better than no water, I guess."

  Jessica13 scowled at the tower and more importantly, at the two balloons like the ones around the bunker they had helped fix. These flew a great deal higher, however, all the way up in the clouds.

  She wasn't sure if it was true that Athena—or Lady Hoot, as she was apparently known—could control the rain but seizing the water underground did make sense. She'd read about some of the bunkers being built to sustain and maintain water supplies in the surrounding areas with the purpose to make the Outside fit to live in again. This one likely had a massive underground reservoir, which was how she could manipulate how much water these people could access from underground.

  "How does Lady Hoot collect what she needs from you to keep delivering the water?" Jessica13 asked.

  "Oh, you know…” The woman shrugged. “Sometimes, it's only the admins sent from the bunker who take what they need, plus parts and pieces and sometimes, even folks." The idea of them seizing people was a concern. Had they all ended up like those in the church, or did Athena have a more sinister purpose for them? While she couldn’t imagine what that might mean, she did know she didn’t want to find out first-hand and cast another surreptitious look around her.

  "They say that there are other towns she collects from,” her companion continued, “but since she takes so much from us, I don't understand why she would need theirs as well. Maybe they only need to give up their goods for her to be able to give the water?"

  It seemed like the people in the area had been cowed into submission through control of their water supply. Not everyone, obviously, because the signal for help had been sent. She wondered if there were others who were still alive who didn’t believe that Athena actually provided the water.

  Technically she did give them the water, but she used it to extort what she wanted from the local populace. Not only that, she was only able to give it because she’d stolen it from them in the first place.

  And not only Auburn, if the girl was right and there were more towns she collected from.

  Jessica13's gaze returned to the smoking ruins of the building and reminded herself that someone had, in fact, called them for help and that they were likely inside the smoking remains of that building. Athena’s control, when the threat of no water didn’t work, was obviously enforced a little more compellingly.

  "What happened on that hill there?" she asked and tried to keep her voice as neutral as possible. She’d learned more from this young woman in a few moments than she’d gleaned from the town as a whole thus far.

  "Oh, Papa says I'm not supposed to talk about it," the girl said a little too quickly. Her expression flickered between fear and resentment and a slightly rebellions gleam in her eyes said she wanted to share what she knew with the newcomer.

  "Well, far be it from me to make you break your word to your father," she replied lightly, hoping her apparent lack of interest would encourage her companion to speak.

  "He's not my father. He's my papa," the girl protested and her eyes widened when she realized the statement had been a little forceful.

  "He's not your father?" Jessica13 asked.

  "No, I…” She looked away and swiped at her eyes. “My father died because he disobeyed Lady Hoot," the girl said. "Papa is the man Lady Hoot told my mama to marry after that. He told me not to say anything to anyone because no one is allowed to talk about it."

  "Do you want to say anything?" she asked gently. It was apparent that the young woman didn’t necessarily dislike the man her mother had married, but she was also torn. If they weren’t allowed to discuss people who had been killed by Athena, it meant she wasn’t permitted to speak about her father either. It couldn’t be easy to grieve in those circumstances, and she was probably afraid to say anything even to her mother.

  "I want to but I shouldn't."

  "Well, you must do what you think is right. But I won’t tell anyone if that’s what you’re worried about. I can keep secrets when I need to and besides,
I’ll be gone soon.”

  "Well…you promise not to blab to anyone?" The girl finally sighed when she nodded. "Papa helped Lady Hoot with the collections this month and she needed more than the past couple of months. People complained, and a couple of them were caught sending signals out of town. The priest who made service in the church used the bell tower to try to call someone else who wasn't Lady Hoot. I guess he wasn't good at it and only Lady Hoot heard, so she took the priest and the people who helped him, and…"

  "Burned them inside the building," Jessica13 said and finished the girl's sentence for her.

  She nodded and wiped her eyes again. "I didn't like it. One of them was my friend's father, but Papa said she would get a new papa too, so I guess she’ll be okay. My Papa isn’t cruel, and he takes care of us, so maybe hers will too. But it’s still sad because her father and mine were good too. I miss him, although I can’t say it because Papa says it’s dangerous. It doesn’t seem right that they had to die to make an example, whatever that really means."

  Jessica13 finished her work on the desalinator and looked at the young woman, who now kicked at the rocks on the ground with a kind of dejected acceptance. It was oddly surreal to discuss people being killed like it was something that happened every day. Friends losing parents and having those parents replaced was tragic enough without it being a deliberate act to terrify a community into submission.

  She looked up as a tall, lean man dressed in the same kind of mismatched clothes she had noted on all the other citizens of Auburn. The only unusual feature was a pair of newly shined boots with brightly polished buckles at the top that jangled with every step he took.

  "Clarisse, there you are I've been looking for you all over," the man said and the girl jumped from her seat and moved toward him. "Who is this you're talking to?"

  "This is Jessie, Papa. She's a peddler!" the girl said as the man draped his arm over her shoulder. "She's fixing the water purifiers and she asked about the church burning."

  "Did she now?" He turned to face her.

  Jessica13 could only assume the girl’s conscience had reacted to being virtually caught in the act made her instinctively blab about what she’d insisted had to be kept secret.

  "I saw the burning." She kept her head low and forced herself not to jerk or shake as she collected her tools. "I asked her about it. She said she wasn’t supposed to talk about it and made me promise not to say anything."

  "Well, she knows nothing can be told in Auburn without me knowing about it," the man said with a chuckle. "It’s good that you told me, Clarisse. If you’re always honest, you'll avoid being in the next burning building, you know?"

  The horrifyingly calm way in which he said something so terrible triggered a shiver of fear, but Jessica13 nodded. Instinct told her she needed to distract the man from the current topic of conversation and somehow ease any suspicion he might feel. "I move around and folks want stories when I travel to their locations, so when I have one to share, they like to hear it. I've found they tend to give me food and drink while I give them good stories, so I’ve learned to listen for the good ones. A burning building tends to be a good story to share. Like I heard out west that a couple of bunkers were burned by pirates that were getting their weapons and parts from a scrapyard from a nearby City-That-Was."

  "No shit?"

  She nodded. "They were burned right the hell out. They took all the resources they could from inside, killed the folks they found, and those who weren't killed died in the toxic smoke from what they used to burn it. They did a thorough job too, I heard, and didn’t want anyone to pick up what they left behind."

  The man nodded. "Well, that is why we have Lady Hoot looking over us. Folks around here think the only reason why they give to her is because of the rain and water she gives them. And while that is true, they have forgotten the real reason why they want to make sure she remains with them. Folks outside of Lady Hoot's protection have to face pirates like the ones who burned that bunker out. The people here have lived for so long under the umbrella of our lady's protection that they forget the dangers she protects them from. The church was burned with those who would have invited risk into our lives and brought outsiders to endanger the peace Lady Hoot has bequeathed us. That burning was a lesson, a reminder to the people of Auburn of what they risk when they anger Lady Hoot. She might not come back to help us."

  The man had the same kind of voice and intonation that Jessica13 recalled Hammerhand using, a kind of hypnotic monotone that made her want to believe everything he said. She could almost understand why Clarisse wasn't more upset about people dying in the church on the hill.

  "Well, I'll tell you something, that story will earn me quite a few meals out in the Wild," Jessica13 said with a chuckle.

  "You're a good mechanic, yes?" the man asked.

  "I dabble," she admitted.

  "Jessie, I think the others said your name was," he continued like she hadn't even spoken. "People with skills like yours are often unappreciated, bartered for, and reduced to the point where you have to tell stories to fill your belly. But someone who works as you do…" He paused and moved to where she had worked to clean the purifier and smiled. "Someone with your skills need not beg for work wherever she goes. You could have a home here. Work all day but come home to a warm home, a bed, and as much food and supplies as you need. Have you considered that?"

  She wasn't sure what he was getting at but she wondered if there wasn't trouble involved along the way. "I've thought about it, yes," she replied and tilted her head as if she reconsidered it. "But I do enjoy exploring the Wild. It’s a chance to get to know the world and maybe share the stories of the world with the people in it, which makes me feel connected."

  "Well, if you ever tire of wandering, know that a place like Auburn could be quite welcoming to someone with specialized talents like yours," he said. "We have a couple of locals who collect vids and manus of how to make things run, but you have a skill for it, I can tell. Experience and learning are hard to come by, even if you can read what can be read in those fucking manus. Folks underestimate how good it is to have everything working as it should instead of having to work and replace what breaks with what might not be such a good replacement if you know what I'm saying."

  Jessica13 nodded. "Well, I'll think about it. I've wandered a while and I've let the word spread that I'll be here to fix what's broken for as long as I'm welcome here."

  "As long as you fix what's broken, you'll be welcome," he said with a chuckle and a kiss on Clarisse's cheek. "You have a nice day now, Jessie. If you plan to move out to the fields or maybe closer to the bunker for your work, let the checkpoint guards know that Barrios sent you. They'll let you through."

  She watched the man as he walked away. As soon as he was out of earshot, she let the shiver of disgust she had somehow managed to contain rush down her spine. She still felt like she was being watched, inspected by those who might suspect that she wasn't who she said she was. The man's oily demeanor and the way he spoke almost made her unable to look him in the eye.

  Even now, she felt greasy merely from the conversation.

  "He mentioned checkpoints?" Mini said as she stepped inside the cockpit and cleaned her hands. "Checkpoints with guards who would be able to stop us?"

  "Something like that. But I think I can use his name for a little more exploration for a better assessment of this place before we rejoin to Tinker and Windchime. We need to make sure we know as much as we can for their benefit and Hammerhand's."

  "I've mapped the roads and pathways through Auburn since we arrived, so I think I have a good idea of how we would be able to reach the bunker, even if it did go through one of the checkpoints," Mini told her.

  "Well, in that case, we can simply drop Barrios' name and pass through," she muttered. As if it would be that simple. “But it might be best if we collect the payment old Caysom promised for our work on the purifiers first. We wouldn’t want anyone around here to think we work for free, right?”r />
  “That is a good point,” Mini replied.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  A feeling of being watched followed her around the town of Auburn as she continued her work. It was mostly tinkering with a variety of smaller devices that would need a little effort to repair them. The people could easily have learned to fix the machinery themselves, including the mechs that were used for the fieldwork.

  A couple more of the men with brightly shined boots and buckles appeared here and there and watched her. It seemed her invisibility had faded as her reputation grew and she could only hope their curiosity had more to do with the novelty of a young woman who traveled the Wild alone and less with her possible ulterior motives. It didn’t come as any surprise to see that the same type manned the checkpoint.

  She had the name of the man that would get her through, or so he had claimed, but she didn't want to draw any more attention to herself. Children had begun to follow her around as she worked, and more of the people talked around her to spread the gossip and stories while tried to listen to any of the stories she had to share.

  It was difficult to be a storyteller when she constantly had to think before she spoke. Most of the stories she knew had to do with the Knights Mechanica, and with Athena’s men watching her, the last thing she wanted was to inadvertently let slip that she was a part of them. They worked with or close to Athena, so the chances were the Knights were known. If they discovered she was a member, she was likely to be the next to be sent into a building that was set on fire.

  They didn't approach her, fortunately, although their constant scrutiny fueled her growing tension and the icy fear that coiled in her gut. Aside from Barrios, none of them interacted with her but seemed content to study her every move through the town and even when she worked on the mechs out in the fields. Small bits and pieces were exchanged as she played the part of the peddler as well as the mechanic, and she shared stories she and Mini were able to think of while they wandered.