Tinker

by Wen Spencer

  Oilcan clunked into the room, rain darkening his shirt. "Hey."

  Burning with embarrassment, Tinker yanked her hand out of her pants and tried to sound nonchalant. "Hey."

  Oilcan shoved his damp hair back out of his eyes. "I went out to the trailer. The level indicators on the power sink are showing that we've only got a few more hours and then it's gone."

  Tinker looked at the darkening sky, seeing that dusk was coming on. "What time is it?"

  "Almost seven."

  "Five more hours until Startup."

  Oilcan shook his head. "The sink only has about two hours of power left."

  "How's Windwolf?"

  "At the moment, holding steady. Lain says that he's likely to worsen, though, once the power gives out."

  Then they couldn't stay at Lain's. Magic wasn't like electricity; you didn't flip a switch and get current flooding the power lines. Instead, like a gentle rain after a drought, magic would need to saturate the area and soak in deep until the depleted earth couldn't hold any more and then form useable runoff. Even after Startup, it would take hours before the ambient level of magic in Pittsburgh would be where anyone could do a healing spell and expect it to work.

  Tinker checked to see if she still had the cancel spell printout and then levered herself out of the chair. "We should be sitting at the Rim nearest to the hospice at Startup."

  * * *

  Windwolf woke as they prepared to move him back to the truck, blinking in confusion.

  "Lie still." Tinker said to him, and repeated it in Low Elvish.

  "Ah, my little savage," Windwolf murmured, lifting his good hand to her. "What now?"

  "We're running out of time, which is unfortunately common for us humans." Tinker squeezed his hand in what she hoped was a reassuring manner.

  "Does life go by so quickly, then?"

  "Yes," Tinker said, thinking of leaving Pittsburgh in a few months and already regretting her promise to Lain. "It must be nice, having all the time to do all the things you want to do."

  He turned his head and looked out the window. "There is a graveyard on that hill. I see them all the time here in your city. We do not have them. We do not die in such numbers. But it never truly struck me as to what these graveyards meant until now; all around you, the churches and the graveyards—death constantly stands beside you. I don't know how you tolerate the horror."

  It scared her to hear him talking about death. "I'll get you to a hospice at Startup," she promised. "But you'll have to hang in there until then."

  "Hang in?" He looked mystified by the English slang.

  "Keep fighting."

  "Life is a marvelous adventure," he whispered. "And I wish not to end it now. Especially now that things have gotten even more interesting."

  * * *

  They eased back down Riverview Road and through the maze of side streets to Ohio River Boulevard. There, the traffic snarled into knots as people fleeing the city collided with those trying to get back in. It took them an hour to travel the two or three miles to the first major split in the road. The night was sweltering, as only July in Pittsburgh could be. They rode with the windows down, and in the mostly stopped traffic, those without air-conditioning got out and stood waiting outside their cars for the chance to crawl ahead.

  "There's Nathan's twenty-car accident." Oilcan indicated a score of wrecked cars and trucks sitting under the floodlights of the stadium parking lot. It wasn't difficult to guess which vehicle had been involved in the fatality. A red vehicle, make unrecognizable, sat to one side, smashed into an accordion two feet tall. "How do you suppose they managed that in this type of traffic?"

  "One of the semis lost its load." Tinker pointed out the haphazardly loaded trailer. "It must have landed on the—minivan?—beside it." The parking lot's entrances, she noticed, had Earth Interdimensional Agency barricades up, and police tape strung at chest height about the cars created an imaginary fence. "Looks like someone got caught smuggling in the deal."

  Judging by the amount of police tape and number of armed men, the EIA, the international agency in charge of almost everything in Pittsburgh even vaguely related to the elves, had stumbled onto a large illegal shipment. There were three tractor-trailer trucks, a dozen large Ryder and U-Haul box trucks, four pickup trucks, and the squashed car—any of which could have been the smuggler's vehicle. Unless they had been part of a convoy, it seemed strange that the EIA had impounded the whole lot.

  "That Peterbilt is nearly new." The traffic opened up for a few hundred feet. Oilcan grunted slightly as he put in the clutch in order to shift out of first gear into second gear. The clutch in the flatbed, an ancient 2010 Ford F750, was stiff; Tinker nearly had to stand on it to shift when she drove. "It wouldn't take much to get it back to running."

  Tinker drooled at it for a minute. "Yeah, but unless it's the smuggling vehicle and thus no one is willing to claim it, someone will have already made arrangements to get their truck back next Shutdown."

  "One can dream." Oilcan grunted through another shift back down to first as they dropped to a crawl.

  Speaking of next Shutdown . . . "I told Lain that I'd go to CMU for a term."

  "You're kidding." He looked at her as if she had suddenly transformed into something slightly repulsive and totally unexpected, like one of those ugly pug dogs.

  "It'll only be ninety days, and I'd get a chance to see what Earth is like."

  "I've lived there," Oilcan pointed out. "Everything is too big. You can spend all day looking at thousands of people and not see a single person that you know."

  They eased up onto the Fort Duquesne Bridge. Below them, barges choked the Ohio, the Allegheny, and the Monongahela rivers. It seemed possible to walk from one shore to the other without touching water. It happened every time Pittsburgh returned to Earth; trade goods coming and going by land, water, and air. She didn't want to think about living someplace this crowded all the time.

  "You're not helping," she said.

  "It's another world, Tinker. If you don't like it, you'll be stuck and miserable."

  "Maybe I'll like it."

  He shrugged. "Maybe. I don't think so. You hate having someone telling you what to do. Think about it. You're going for classes. You've never been to a regular school. Classes start exactly at eight a.m. Bang. A bell rings and you have to be sitting in your seat, quiet, facing forward. And you sit there, without talking, for hours, while you study what the teacher wants you to learn."

  "Maybe college is different. Lain seems to think it's a good idea."

  "And Lain likes to putter around in the garden, planting flowers. You tried that once. Remember how crazy it drove you."

  "I already told Lain yes."

  He scowled at her, and then focused on getting through the city.

  Downtown, despite it being almost ten o'clock, was filled with activity. Stores were sorting hastily delivered goods, preparing for the Startup rush. Once the stores sold out, there would be no more until next Shutdown. Fall fashions were appearing in the windows; anyone who didn't buy early might be facing the Pittsburgh winter without gloves and sweaters.

  The delivery drivers who were still trying to get home to Earth were few, and easily identified. They leaned on their horns, they cursed out their windows, and they disobeyed all laws of man, elf, and common sense in their rush.

  "Watch, watch, watch!" Tinker shouted, bracing herself as one such idiot cut them off. It was a small rabid pickup truck, streaking through a recently changed red light with horn blasting. At the last moment, it recognized that the flatbed outweighed it by three times, and veered sharply to avoid them.

  Only a motorcyclist was in the way.

  A normal man would have died. The motorcyclist responded with inhuman speed and strength, wrenching his bike out of the pickup's way.

  "Is he an elf?" Oilcan asked as he responded to the blare of horns behind him and drove on through the intersection.

  Tinker leaned out to look back. Strangely, instead o
f focusing on the pickup truck that nearly hit him, the motorcyclist was watching the flatbed drive away. He was far too homely to be one of the fey; under a wild thatch of black hair, he was long-nosed and sharp-featured.

  "Nah. Just lucky," Tinker said, and scrambled through the back window to check on Windwolf.

  The power sink read empty, and the spell had collapsed. Windwolf was cool to the touch, and for a moment she was afraid he had died. She stared at him for what seemed to be eternity before he took a long deep breath.

  During the day, Lain had kept dryer-warm blankets on Windwolf. The current blanket was cool to the touch. Tinker called Lain. "The magic's out. Windwolf's cold. Is there anything I can do?"

  "Lie down beside him, under the blankets with him."

  "What?"

  "Is he even conscious, Tinker?"

  "I don't know." Lain was right, though. Tinker was letting the memory of her dream make her self-conscious. A moment ago she'd been afraid the elf was dead; how aware was he going to be of her? "Okay. I'll call you later, let you know how we're doing."

  Tinker turned off the lights, took off her boots, and crawled onto the worktable with Windwolf. Sometime during the day, his hair had come unbound; it spread into a pool of blackness on the table. To keep from pinning his hair under her, she gathered it into her good hand and carefully moved it all to his right side. It felt as silky as in her dream. She stroked the long soft strands into order and then carefully cuddled up to Windwolf, trying not to press against any of his wounds. Lying in enforced idleness beside him, however, made her mind churn through possibilities at a feverish speed. Maybe, her brain suggested, she had dreamed so vividly of Windwolf because of the life debt, coupled with his proximity. Possibly he had shared the memory. Perhaps he had actually instigated the sex, since it was beyond her normal ken of experience.

  She peered at his still face in the shifting beams of the passing headlights. Come on, Tinker, a male this beautiful—and in this much pain—doesn't dream about getting it on with scruffy little things like you.

  Which left her solely responsible. Wow.

  * * *

  "Tinker. Tinker!"

  "What is it?" She blinked awake and realized she was in Windwolf's arms, his head on her shoulder and his scent on her lips.

  "It's the EIA," Oilcan whispered through the window. "They're checking citizen papers. Do you have yours?"

  "Yeah. Hold on." She slid out of Windwolf's loose hold to the floor. Someone banged on the trailer door, hard, making the whole back wall rattle. "Who the hell is out there? The Jolly Green Giant?"

  "All three are big guys." Oilcan's face was visible only from his eyes up, but it was a portrait of fear. Border guards spooking Oilcan?

  "What time is it? Where are we?"

  "Six blocks from the Rim. It's five minutes to Startup."

  "And they're EIA border guards?" Something didn't ring true, and she glanced about for a weapon. "Give me a minute!" she shouted. "I'm—I'm getting dressed!"

  Windwolf's shoulder holster and pistol sat by the worktable. She reloaded the pistol quickly, looped the holster into place, and pulled on a jacket over it.

  She unbolted the door and swung it open. "Here." She held out her citizen papers.

  Some estimated the elfin population to be a billion for the entire planet. Others thought there might be as few as a few hundred million. No human knew and the elves guarded the information closely. Regardless, the elves had allowed displaced humans to remain only on certain conditions specified in the peace treaty. All humans judged criminal or insane in nature were banished, and immigration was to be by elf approval only. While many people fled living on an alien planet under control of an alien race, the benefits outweighed the negatives for many people. Nonexistent unemployment, cheap housing, and a blissfully unspoiled planet proved too much of a lure for many. A brisk trade of smuggling immigrants existed. The responsibility of controlling it fell to the Earth Interdimensional Agency, EIA.

  The border guards usually hugged the border, since anyone a foot within the Rim made the trip to Elfhome. This close to midnight, they should be at the fence, catching the last desperate few and then calling it a night as Startup made all things moot. Six blocks away from the Rim, with only five minutes left, was setting off alarms. They were big men, all three Nathan Czernowski's size, which was odd in humans.

  The largest one seemed to be the leader. He took her ID but dismissed it and her in a glance. Nor did he hand it back. She noticed that he also had Oilcan's papers.

  "Check the trailer," the leader told the smallest guard, although that was a relative "small." "See if the little bird was right. Get the car," he ordered the remaining guard, who moved off into the night. "I want to be gone when this is done."

  The smallest guard grabbed the door frame and levered himself up into the trailer, barely squeezing through the door. His nose worked like a dog's. "It smells like a slaughterhouse in here."

  "We're transporting a wounded elf." Tinker backed away from him, keeping out of range of an easy grab. "We're taking him to the hospice as soon as Startup happens. Wargs chewed him up. He got blood everywhere. That's what you smell." She sniffed to see if it was really that noticeable, and caught his scent.

  Smoke and sandalwood.

  The guard saw Windwolf. His eyes narrowed, and he grinned savagely. "He is here," he rumbled to the leader. "Laid out like the dead. Easy prey."

  "Do them all," the leader ordered. "Quietly."

  Tinker yanked out the pistol, sliding between the guard and Windwolf. "Don't touch him! Touch him and I'll shoot you! Get back! Get out!"

  "Tinnnker?" Oilcan asked quietly in the startled silence that followed, and then started the flatbed's engine. "I don't know what you're doing, but you'd better do it quick! The one outside just waved down some kind of backup in an unmarked car."

  The smallest guard started to move toward her and she fired a warning shot over his shoulder. He jerked backward like it had hit him.

  "Get out!" She fought to keep her voice firm. "This is your last chance! Go!" Amazingly, the small guard tumbled out of the trailer, almost onto the leader, and they both scrambled away. She'd never felt so huge before. She slammed the door, bolted it, and raced back across the trailer, yelling, "Drive! Drive! Drive!"

  The flatbed lurched forward, roaring up through first. "Tinker, I don't think I'm going to be able to make it! The car is cutting me off! Oh shit!"

  A black sedan had raced past them on the left and was swinging right to cut them off. Oilcan was already slowing down when Tinker hit the window. She slid through the window, down into his lap, and jammed her foot down on top of his.

  "Just go!" she shouted. "Shift!"

  Swearing, Oilcan stomped down on the clutch, threw the truck into second, and let up on the clutch. "Watch the car!"

  "I am watching it!" she shouted, nailing the gas pedal to the floor. The big truck leapt forward, caught the sedan at the front bumper, and smashed it aside. The flatbed shuddered at the impact and then shrugged it off, roaring forward.

  They had been down a side street, and needed to turn onto Centre Avenue to reach the border. They were going too fast, hough, for her to turn the truck alone. "Help me turn!"

  Together they cranked the steering wheel through the sharp right turn onto Centre Avenue. There was a stop sign on the other side of the intersection. They mounted the curb, flattened the sign, and swung through the rest of the turn.

  "That was a stop sign, Tink!" Oilcan complained.

  "Yes! It was!" she growled. "Will you shut up? I'm thoroughly pissed off, and I don't need you complaining to me!"

  They hadn't hit the sedan hard enough. It came sweeping up behind them, front panel gone and showing undercarriage.

  The flatbed topped second gear.

  "Shift!" Tink called, easing minutely up on the gas. Oilcan clutched and shifted up to third.

  The sedan took the moment to leap ahead, veering into their path again.

 
"Fuck them!" Tink growled and elbowed Oilcan in the stomach as he started to turn the wheel. She stomped on the gas, and the flatbed roared straight at the sedan. "Eat this!"

  She hadn't grown up in the scrap yard without knowing the strength of the vehicle under her. Built heavy enough to carry over ten tons, backed with a 250-horsepower engine, it was a close cousin to a bulldozer. She aimed at the sedan's back panel, knowing that the car would pivot on its engine block. The sedan spun like a child's toy as they hit.

  The narrow strip of no-man's-land of the Rim was now only a block before them. Beyond it was a tall chain-link fence and the Oakland of Earth rising up in full glory.

  "Oh shit, it's not Startup yet!" Tinker cried.

  "Two more minutes," Oilcan said.

  "Damn!" Tinker slammed the brakes. The big truck fought her more than when she'd hit the car, the wheels locking up, slewing them sideways. She sent up a quick prayer that the bolts on the trailer held.

  Oilcan yelped and caught the clutch before the engine stalled out. "What are we going to do?"

  The guards were swarming forward to intercept her the moment they stopped. Behind them, the sedan was gamely straightening out.

  "Shift!" Tinker said.

  "Shift to what?"

  "Reverse." She shoved his hand aside and worked the gear shift into reverse. "Hold on."

  They started backward, gathering speed. She watched her side mirrors as the sedan this time scrambled out of the way. The flatbed shot past its bumper by inches. Would they chase? No, they seemed confused.

  "A minute," Oilcan intoned.

  A block. Two. Four blocks, and she said, "Okay, let's stop."

  They shifted back to first and sat, their feet arrayed across all the pedals. Far off, so faint Tinker barely heard it over the rumble of the flatbed engine, came the ringing of St. Paul's bells.

  "This is it," Oilcan breathed.

  "One hopes," Tinker said.