by E. E. Knight
Valentine brought it up to about a thousand feet.
Flying in an autogyro is noisy and busy. The lift from the rotors makes it sway and bob like a cork in a choppy water.
"Oh shit. Land again. Land again," Gide gasped.
"Are you—"
A loud retching sound from above and behind answered his question. The smell filled the cabin, half-digested bologna-and-cheese sandwiches giving off a beery odor. Valentine fought his own gorge, rising in sympathy.
Gide cracked a little panel window, letting in even more of the engine's roar. "You can set it down, Max. I think I'd rather walk."
"Give it an hour," Valentine said, watching the falling sun and wondering if he could stand an hour with the vomit smell. "Fix your eyes on the mountains. That's where we're heading."
Twenty minutes of groaning later Valentine spotted a strange bare patch of earth below, a short hike away from a treelined pond. It was too good an opportunity to pass up. He passed low over the cleared oval of ground and sent small, chickenlike birds on short hop-flights.
He landed with a bad bounce.
"Thank Christ," Gide said as they halted.
"Let's clean out the ship," Valentine said. He extracted a collapsed plastic jug and passed it to Gide. "Your spew. You can carry the water."
She looked at the cleared ground, frowning. "What did this? Helicopters?"
"Don't think so. With luck, you'll see tomorrow morning."
* * * *
Woodpeckers, always up and hard at work even before the roosters cry or the larks rise, woke them. As the sun came up Gide got to see a prairie chicken dance.
The birds, mating in the late northern spring, gathered together at the tramped-down earth and began to jump up and down in front of one another, in wild displays of feathery athleticism.
"Looks like the dance floor at the old Mezcal on a Saturday night," Gide said. "Except no music."
"They're resourceful little birds," Valentine said. "When the snow comes they dive right into a drift and wiggle down deep, making a little igloo. Coyotes and foxes can't smell them under the snow."
"What's an igloo?" Gide asked.
Valentine explained the principle.
"I wonder what the winters are like up here," Valentine said.
"We've got some time to get acclimated. But you don't talk like an Aztlan. Or a Texican, or a Cali, or a Yute. You're hard to place."
"I was born in Minnesota. At least I think I was. I spent my childhood there, anyway."
"That's like Canada, right?"
"Next to it."
Valentine carefully took out his surgical-tube sling, fixed it to his wrist, and put a rounded stone in the leather cup. He sighted on a male at the edge of the fracas, making halfhearted little hops.
"Oh, no, don't spoil their fun," Gide said.
"I don't like to dip into my preserved food unless I have to," Valentine said. "Hickory-and-sage-smoked prairie chicken's good eating."
Valentine knocked the oldster off his feet, scattered dancing chickens as he got up and ran to finish the job with a quick twist. He bled the bird into a cup and dressed it quickly.
"There goes your invitation to the next church cotillion," Gide said as Valentine dropped it in hot water to soften the feathers for plucking. He lifted the cup. "You're not really going to drink warm blood, are you?"
"Can't afford to waste anything. It's like a multivitamin," Valentine said.
"Give me a sip. Might as well start the mountain-man stuff now." He passed her the cup and she made a face as she sipped. "Fuck, that's rude! Like having a bloody nose."
"Your dad never had you drink blood?"
"We liked our food cooked. Haven't you ever heard of salmonella, Mr. Igloo?"
"Who did the cooking? Your mom?"
Gide worked her upper lip again, this time tightening it against her teeth. "She died having me. There wasn't a midwife or anything, just my dad."
"I'm sorry," Valentine said.
"Kids always get along better with the opposite-sex parent, ever notice that?" she asked.
Valentine accepted the change of subject. "I guess you're right." He'd not had the time to experience it with Amalee. Circumstances had changed.
"I'd better see about that bird. Thought I smelled some wild onions down by the pond. We can have a nice fry-up, then wash while it digests."
* * * *
Gide kept her food down on the next hop. Valentine argued with himself over what to do with the autogyro. Aircraft of any kind were valuable enough that the guerrillas would probably seize it outright. But on the other hand, it might allow him to make more of an impressive entrance.
He opted for showmanship.
What he guessed to be Mount Rainier loomed in the distance. He passed over valleys under thickening clouds, watching his fuel gauge sink toward e.
Apart from herds of goats, sheep, and cattle, and the attendant fires in the shepherds' bunkhouses, he saw little sign of habitation. But then a good guerrilla army wouldn't advertise its presence.
Then he passed over another town, built around a bridge and its patched-over road in a boomerang-shaped valley, and saw what he suspected was mortar pits in the hill above, looking out over the reduced hills to the east. Camouflage-painted four-wheelers were parked in a line like suckling piglets in front of a redbrick building in town, and there were well-used paddocks behind the line of buildings and what looked like houses converted to stables. He marked freshly sheared sheep.
Best of all, a limp American flag hung from a flagpole in front of what looked like the town post office. No Quisling force Valentine had ever heard of flew the despised Stars and Stripes, a symbol of racism and greed according to the histories of the New Order.
Valentine swooped around again, enjoying the feel of the tight turn. Men in civilian clothes and uniform were coming out onto the street now to watch the acrobatics.
"Gide," Valentine said, almost shouted. "This looks like the guerrillas. One thing you should know."
"Yeah?" she said, eyes closed, sounding like she was fighting with her stomach again.
"My name's not Max Argent. It's Valentine, David Valentine. I travel under a false name."
"Okay," she burped. "Land, all right?"
Valentine set the gyro down on the other side of the bridge from the town, where the road widened outside the bridge. He engaged the wheel drive and motored toward town. The road was badly pocked, and they bounced a good deal.
Some armed men in timberland camouflage were walking up the road.
"Ma—David, whatever. Open up!" Gide said.
Valentine popped the hatch as he applied the brakes. Gide jumped out and fell to her knees, bringing up a mostly liquid mess.
Valentine jumped out to aid her, but his bad left leg betrayed him and he stumbled. As he caught himself, his foot slipped in a pothole and he felt something in his ankle give. He sprawled.
Gide turned her head, wiped saliva from her mouth.
Valentine rolled over and probed his ankle. Great, a sprain. So much for showmanship.
"Here they come," Gide said.
A brown-haired man under a wide-brimmed black hat with yellow cording halted the others about ten yards away. He had a long, thick mustache that covered his upper lip.
"I hope you two have good reason to buzz us like that," he said. "Otherwise, your welcome to Brantley's Bridge will end with you hanging from it."
Valentine sat up. "We're not spies. We're here to join up. Can you put me in touch with a recruiting officer?" He tried to rise, but the ankle hurt too much. He ended up balancing unsteadily on his bad leg.
Gide got to her feet, parked herself under his armpit. "That's right."
"Shit," one of the men behind, a shotgun held professionally but pointed down, commented. "We should just make heroes out of them now. Save a lot of trouble."
"Recruiting officer, huh?" the man with the mustache said. "I don't know that we have any of those. Least not at t
his depot."
"What do you suggest for recruits, then?"
"You want to die under ol' Adler, we can assist." It began to drizzle. The officer lifted his face to the rain, took off his hat, and wiped his forehead before returning his cover to its place. "First we have to detick you. Then you get questioned. You out of Sea-Tac?"
"No. Opposite direction. We came across the Rockies. The last KZ I was in was the Aztlan Confederation."
"Long trip in that little eggbeater."
"You'll hear the whole story, if you want," Valentine said.
"Tell you what, Mister, we support some garrison militia right here in town. I'm going to hold you here for now, warm and cozy, but we have to keep you to visitors' quarters. We'll turn you over to them and they'll feed you until someone from Pacific Command can get down here. Hope that goes well for you—the alternative isn't pleasant."
* * * *
After a warm disinfectant shower and a quick physical, the captain put them in a rather moldy house. They had running water, though it was cold. Tallow dips offered smelly light at night, and there were some old books to read.
The windows and door were barred from the outside. Valentine watched off-duty men inspect the autogyro, everything from the still-smelly cockpit to the tail rotor. Valentine's weapons and gear were all locked up in the "armory," what had formerly been the modest post office in the middle of town.
Gide silently fretted. Being locked up, in her experience in the Kurian Zone, meant doom.
"They're just being careful," Valentine said.
Finally a tired-looking young lieutenant driven by a heavyset sergeant with a maimed right hand pulled up in a two-horse carriage and visited the redbrick headquarters building.
In a few moments they emerged, accompanied by the mustachioed Captain Clarke and the militia staff sergeant, who inspected their lodgings daily for signs of damage or mischief.
Clarke knocked and entered without waiting for a response: "You two got a visitor. He'll figure out what the hell to make outta you."
The captain and the militia sergeant waited outside the locked door while the newly arrived lieutenant sat down and opened a folding notebook. He had ink stains on his fingers thanks to a problematic pen, and the frames of his thick glasses looked like they'd originally been intended for a woman.
"My name is Lieutenant Walker. This is Sergeant Coombs. You are ... ahh, David Valentine, I take it?" he asked, looking through the bottle-bottom lenses.
"Yes," Valentine said.
"So you're Gide. No other name?"
"I've been called lots of names," she said. "But I wouldn't want them written down."
The sergeant assisting licked his lips as he looked at her. She'd found a thick flannel shirt in one of the closets, and pulled her hair back into a tight ponytail, but she still exuded her aggressive sensuality.
"Have you been treated well since you arrived? You can be honest—I report to a whole separate chain of command. Plenty of food? Wash water? Medical care?"
Valentine plucked at the elastic bandage on his ankle. It had healed with its usual alacrity. "They've been generous with everything," Valentine said.
"Good. Place of birth?"
"Boundary Waters, Minnesota," Valentine said.
"Choa Flats, Arizona," Gide supplied.
"Freeborn?"
"Meaning?" Valentine asked.
"Not born into slavery, on an estate or whatever."
"No," Valentine said. " 'Freeborn.' "
"I was born in the Confederation, obviously," Gide said.
"Military experience? Someone must have taught you to fly, David. Should we start with that?"
Valentine put his hands on his knees. "Have to go back a few more years. I first joined Southern Command in May of 2061, when a Wolf patrol came through our area...."
The rest took about twenty minutes. Valentine just skimmed his wanderings after his adoption of Blake.
Lieutenant Walker's pen ran out when Valentine described the bounty he'd claimed. "Damn," he muttered. "Look, ummm, Major Valentine, this is a bit more than I expected. If I can ask you, though, sir, what did you come here to do?"
"I want our side to win," Valentine said. "Your general's fame has crossed the mountains."
"He doesn't claim any rank, actually," Walker said. "Technically, he's still a civilian. But he's kind of like the president to us. Sometimes he's called the Old Man."
"Just say ol' Adler and everyone knows who you're talking about," Sergeant Coombs added.
Walker fiddled with his pen and inkwell. "I'm going to have to refer your case to higher command. Do you want to stay here, or come back with me to my station?"
"If that would save travel time," Valentine said.
"We'll try to accommodate you," Walker said, looking over his shoulder at the sergeant, who straightened up a little in his lean against the wall.
Walker turned up a new page. "Now, Gide, are you going to tell me you sank the Eisenhower Floating Fortress?"
She was looking fixedly at Valentine, as if trying to decide what the symptoms of delusions of grandeur looked like.
"No. I can ride. I can shoot. I'm healthy," she said.
" 'Can shoot' doesn't do it justice," Valentine said.
Walker spent some time questioning Gide, but Valentine could see he was preoccupied. He was a good interrogator, and for all Valentine knew, the thick glasses and cranky pen were props to put people off their guard. He was good at an interrogator's first job, which was just to get people talking by asking questions that were pleasant to answer.
What assistance Sergeant Coombs offered wasn't clear to Valentine. Maybe he just had a good eye for liars.
They broke for lunch, a mutton stew and applesauce. Then the militiamen packed up a box of wax-paper-wrapped sandwiches and thermoses.
"We'll be there by midnight or so if we get moving," Walker said. He wrote out an order sheet for the gyrocopter to be moved, and handed it to the captain.
"You travel at night?" Valentine asked.
"We don't go fast enough so it's dangerous," Walker said.
"I take it the Reapers don't get this far into the mountains, then?"
"No. We give them too much to worry about in the basin. The tower's men are the ones who fear the night. Not us."
Valentine couldn't tell if this was just rear-area bravado, propaganda, or confidence born of experience.
"I don't suppose I can have my carbine back."
"Sergeant Coombs, what do you think?"
"If he's who he says he is, he doesn't need a gun to kill us."
Walker giggled. "The sergeant has a dark streak like the Columbia River. But let me keep the hardware for now. It'll save questions at the stops, as you don't have so much as a militia cap."
Their gear stowed beneath the seats, Valentine helped Gide up into the open carriage, then climbed up himself. It had iron-rimmed wheels and a camouflage-netting top.
"Sorry for the rickety transport," Walker said. "As a lowly lieutenant, I don't rate a gasoline ration for my duties. Our supply line for fossils stretches way up into Canada, and it's not altogether reliable." He took off his glasses and nodded to the sergeant, who set off.
They stopped three times on the journey, twice at checkpoints outside of settlements and once for an exchange of horses. Passwords were swapped and orders and identification examined. The fresh horses made a difference, and they creaked and rattled on the iron rims into an electrically lit military camp a good half hour before the lieutenant's prediction.
Gide sneezed a few times on the ride.
The sign read camp dew, and the town looked to be built around an old high school. There was a hospital just down the highway, and many of the houses had electrical lights.
"Back to civilization," Walker said. "We'll put you in the Lodge-pole Motel for now. I'm afraid you'll have to stay under guard."
"For the gal's cold," Sergeant Coombs said, slipping a flattened bottle into Valentine's p
ocket as he waved over help with the horses and luggage.
Valentine surreptitiously examined the quarter-full bottle. It was hard to tell the color of the liquid in the dark, but Valentine smelled whiskey.
"Nice of you, Sergeant, but I'm trying temperance until I find my feet here."
"I'm not," Gide said, and Coombs passed her the bottle.
As they got settled in, Walker showed up with a camera and took their pictures, both from the front and in profile. Two more days passed while various orders wandered up and down the chains of command. Gide's face turned red from her cold, or maybe the back-mountain whiskey, and they got sick of washing their clothes and darning socks.
The motel had a water heater that they kept fired up from six until nine in the morning, so Valentine enjoyed hot showers every day. They "exercised" for two hours in the afternoon on a chain-link-fenced basketball court that had replaced the motel's pool, bringing back uncomfortable memories of his time in the Nut. The rest of the time they filled in companionable silence. Though Gide relished stories of his travels and descriptions of the effect Quickwood had on Reapers, Valentine had turned moody and taciturn when not even Walker visited on the second day; he wondered if he'd be sentenced in Washington for crimes committed in Arkansas.
"It's not fun, you know," Valentine said when she asked about the Wolves, and how many women made it into the ranks. "You'll be tired and bored most of the time. Then there's a lot of noise, and you'll look around with your ears ringing and realize half the people you know are dead."
"I don't expect this to be fun," she said. "I just want a chance at them. I'm sick of standing around watching it happen. I can hack it."
"A couple of tattoos don't make you hard," Valentine said, and instantly regretted it.
She crossed her arms and turned away, looked out at a patch of blue sky through the barred window from the front chairs.
"I'm sorry, Gide."
She studied the street. "Whatever."
"Being cooped up with nothing to do gets on my nerves."
"I've killed a man, you know. Two men," she said.
"Sorry to hear that," Valentine said.
"My dad was drinking a lot as he got older. He got scared of going into towns to get work. Thought they'd pick him up, you know? Finally ... I'd just turned fifteen. He tried to sell me. For sex, you know, I was a virgin and all. Some rich guy from Tempe and his manservant came for me. The servant washed me up and combed out my hair and told me how I shouldn't be afraid.
