The Core

by Jack Robuck

  "How far is this damned town of yours, anyhow?" he gasped.

  Jimmy didn't slow his stride. "Nearest friendly locals are another fifty miles ahead."

  "Well, I'll never make it," Glazier said. He stopped in his tracks, staring out across the sands to where the distant sunset toasted the puffy clouds deep red. "I'll try to keep on trudging along so you all have something to eat when you get hungry. But you'll have to carry me after I collapse."

  "Shut up and walk, old man!" Jimmy laughed.

  A copse of cacti drew Matthew's stare.

  "Once I'm dead, eat me right away, or I'll spoil." The doctor started up his short, stumpy pace again.

  Matthew smiled tightly, not sure at all if either of them would make it. Life on a ship, no matter how large, was no preparation for this kind of survival situation. He was beginning to wonder if coming along had been such a good idea after all. Still, there would be no shelter from the sun or sand in that baking capsule they had left behind.

  A loud, guttural chirping cut the thick air around them. Jimmy grinned, and Rachel whispered, "Finally."

  The two colonists shot each other a concerned expression. Two more low, coagulate rumbles, followed by a high chirp-chirp, and a hollow, raspy clacking.

  The medic looked back at Matthew, trailing in his wake. "Birds?"

  As they passed by the low, tumbling butt-end of a rock formation, they saw a strange sight: a long, scaled green tentacle waving like an antenna in the wind. A few more steps, and a brown slouch hat, a whiskered head, and the rest of the body of a grimy planetsider rode, swaying, into view atop the long saddled torso of a fifteen foot giant lizard. Its bubbled eye alone blinked bigger than Matthew's head, and he had the sudden, horrible sensation of what it would be like to be swallowed up in one gulp by the creature. He stared.

  The mounted local spat a long black stream of something at his feet. "S'matter boy, you ain't never seen a Giant Iguana before? Damn, son, you look plumb untucked. This ain't even a big one." The man let out a nauseating chuckle. He turned his attention to Rachel.

  "I'm Gusset! We come out here to get you. You her, ain't you?"

  Three more planetsiders on their mounts rode up to surround them.

  Rachel grinned broadly, shielding her eyes with her hand as she looked up at the wild man. "I'm her."

  *

  As they rode, Matthew turned his attention to anything other than the enormous scaly back undulating beneath him. He sat high in front of one of the locals, and the spiky comb behind the lizard's head kept threatening to impale him through the eye. He leaned warily back, and eyed Rachel on the next mount over. She sat comfortably in front of her partner, working at her revolver with both hands. The man held the reigns far out to one side, one hand on her waist to keep her balanced. Matthew narrowed his eyes at the man. Rachel noticed his fixed expression, and smirked. He looked away.

  "What are you doing over there, anyway?" he called out.

  "Switching out my ceramics." She waved her revolver at him. "They're all well and good in space, so you don't blow a hole in your ship. But it’s no use wishing you had reloaded when you come up against a heavy-armored Fleet Trooper or a pissed-off Iguana."

  Matthew felt like he had almost no idea what she was talking about. He glanced at Glazier. He had known the medic on the ship, oddly enough. They weren't friends, mostly because of their age difference, but, if he remembered correctly, they shared some major genetic overlaps.

  He glanced at his left palm. He tapped it lightly with the forefinger of his right hand, and it lit up, displaying a basic 128x128 LED grid implanted just under his skin.

  "Display GeneTeam Info."

  His palm screen led into the info with a short spiral display, then it read:

  Matthew Allen. Section Iota-Green.

  800 age-appropriate girls on board.

  Of these, 112 genetically acceptable.

  Of these, 37 personalities deemed likely to result in relationship of sufficient duration to produce offspring.

  Of these—

  Matthew closed his palm. It had been telling him for three years that he was going to marry Angela Harper. He wondered if he hoped she was dead. Maybe a hundred earths away was sufficient.

  What is it about predetermination that makes you want to explode? Mom used to laugh when I asked her that. We've been riding for hours.

  He opened his palm again. "Show colonist data: Richard Glazier."

  His palm spiraled away again, before typing out:

  Richard Glazier. Iota-Green Member.

  12% genetic overlap. Sex: Male.

  Age Viability to Matthew Harper: Irrelevant.

  Personality Viability: Irrelevant...

  Matthew ducked his shoulders and closed his palm, hoping the smelly local behind him hadn't read the text.

  Yeah, no shit. Fucking palm only cares about one thing.

  He smirked at the irony of the thought. When he looked back at his palm, it said:

  Connection Lost

  Screams; an explosion. The unsettling rattle of assault rifles firing in the distance drew the party to a halt. The locals looked around. Their leader looked at Rachel. She nodded.

  The pack of Giant Iguanas turned as one, and slithered like lightning over the badlands, each flinging sand a dozen yards behind them. Matthew grabbed on to the spiky striped comb.

  They breached the ridge above a shallow canyon, and the sounds of battle doubled in volume. A large escape capsule the size of two of the iguanas lay lengthwise against a rock outcropping, where it had rolled to a stop, its parachutes and cording wrapped around it.

  A few remaining survivors crouched, trapped amongst scattered bodies behind the giant cylinder. A dozen heavily-armed soldiers in black had taken up strategic positions above them, around the rim of the hollow, and behind rocks on a long slope leading down to the bottom.

  The Troopers were not firing at the survivors, however, at least not anymore. They had been flanked by three enormous black and yellow scorpions that had been drawn to the sounds of battle. They were each the size of The Waverly's bridge, with curved stingers two yards long and pincers like the lift-claws on a hangar mech.

  Rachel held up a hand to stop the rider, who had pulled a rifle from his saddlebag. "Wait it out."

  As one scorpion crouched low and slashed at the cluster of Troopers, another scuttled around and above on the canyon wall, impervious to gravity, and struck hard. A helmeted head schlunked to the ground, and another, body attached, flew through the air. The Trooper's helmet cracked like an egg on a boulder.

  Rachel held her hand up, firm. The scorpions hadn't spotted them yet, and they weren't attacking the colonists. They were nearly finished cleaning up their fight with the Troopers, however. Rachel hitched her thumb to the rear, and the lizards backed away from the ridge, trying to get out of sight.

  She whispered, "I hope the colonists keep their heads down."

  The third scorpion, the big one, who had been exploring the far ridge after running down the last Trooper, spun suddenly around twice, its long segmented tail waving around its head. It sensed something more.

  One of the iguanas chirped out a loud, low groan in warning before its rider could pull up on the reigns. The big scorpion raised its head and snapped its jaws at them in silent voracity. They had no choice.

  Rachel clenched her raised hand into a fist, and shoved it forward. The riders spurred their mounts up over the ridge, one waving its tail and leaping down onto the nearest scorpion, pinning it, and began clawing at its face. Two others landed nearby, encircling the second.

  Rachel's Iguana jumped down near the survivors. She slipped down to the ground, drew her weapon and began firing.

  Matthew and Jimmy's lizards both crouched low, legs splayed, circling the second scorpion, their riders firing as near as possible into its beady black eyes. The bigger scorpion, from high on the ridge, leapt down onto the tail of Jimmy's iguana, grabbing it with both pincers, and slashed it repeatedly,
wrapping its long, razor tipped tail around the torso and finding the softer underbelly below. The Giant Iguana screamed out and reared up, toppling its riders.

  The planetsider went straight over, striking his head on the ground, and didn't get up. Jimmy, however, hit the powdery red dirt rolling, and came up firing. The scorpion screamed, and Jimmy let off two well-timed rounds into its mouth. Matthew's lizard pounced, head-butting the beast against the canyon wall, and biting down hard on its midsection.

  Glazier's Iguana pawed the head of one scorpion into a bloody mess of gore and shell, and the group focus-fired on the remaining monster until it went down with a clickety shriek. Matthew tried to relax his grip and sit up again.

  The Iguana he was on trotted over and poked the hulking carapace of the big scorpion with its nose before biting into it with relish. The planetsider relaxed the leather harness-mask that wrapped around the lizard's face and under its dewlap. Matthew looked away in disgust. Rachel bounced her eyebrows at him, and laughed.

  The rider behind Rachel pulled his mount's reigns hard away from the carcass. “We'd best be...”

  But the low cut rumble of a ship's turbines stopped him mid-sentence. A shiny black attack ship rose over the near ridge, and they could hear the gas exhaust as its primary chain guns spun up. A flat voice came belching from the loudspeakers. “Throw down your weapons, and dismount. Put your hands on your head. Now!”

  Chapter 4

  The troopers slaughtered the Iguanas. Their great round eyes rolled back under their pebbled lids, and shuddered, still wet. Gusset’s friends lay in the gulley, bleeding out next to their mounts. Gusset was bloodied, sweating, pressed against Matthew in the darkness. His eyes couldn’t adjust to the pitch black of the ship's cargo hold, his senses involuntarily focused on the smell of the tired, miserable bodies packed into its small space.

  The shudder and thud of the landing was followed by the searing sand-colored light that appeared in lines around the big door as it lowered down to the ground. Fleet Troopers were there, pointing rifles and shouting at them, and as a mass, they shuffled, blinded, down the corrugated ramp.

  They cowered, ridiculous, standing hunched together for what seemed like too long in the dust, the wind, and Matthew wondered if they were all going to be shot. The ship bay door went up, and the ship flew off through the canyon. Matthew lifted an arm against the dust as its engines churned the air, too close. He stepped forward, pushing his way out of the group as gently as he could, and approached the nearest Trooper.

  “Excuse me.”

  The Trooper's black helmet snapped in his direction.

  “We were on The Waverly, we're with the Fleet, sir...”

  In a single stride, the Trooper brought his rifle butt crashing into Matthew's face. In a second step his knee slammed into Matthew's gut, sending him sprawling. The Trooper walked away.

  Doctor Glazier came over, and crouched by Matthew on the ground. “You alright, son?”

  “Just my pride. And my face. Mostly my face.” He moved to sit up, but Glazier put a hand on his shoulder and leaned in.

  “We need to be careful here, Matthew. I don't think the word 'Fleet' means to these people what it means to us. Keep your head low, you understand?”

  Matthew nodded, and Glazier helped him get up. They walked back over to join the rest of the group. Across the huddle of bodies, he could see Rachel whispering to Jimmy and Gusset while looking straight ahead into the distance. He had already determined that he didn't know any of the six survivors from The Waverly. He turned to check out their surroundings.

  Before them loomed a scrapyard wall, welded out of junk and spare parts. Through a chunk of grating in the giant sliding gate, he could see a street weaving into the distance between a series of make-shift structures.

  The giant wire-rope pulled taut on its pulley, the winch whining for oil, and the gate began to slide open. Several Troopers corralled the group through. As they walked, Matthew began to recognize the shape of the buildings. They were ruined ships, vehicles; in one place, he could see the oblong bow of an interstellar freighter jutting upright from the ground. Through an old hatchway door, he saw a woman scrubbing laundry.

  Everywhere there were people, and everywhere there was grime. Not the dust of the canyon, but blackened, smudged oil, burnt to a crisp, and it filled every crevice in every building and body part within the wall. The people were ashen, their creased skin coal dusted, their gums shriveled.

  They shuffled past a raised guard platform with steel-pipe railings. Matthew was a little closer to Rachel now, and he could feel her tense up when one of the guards pointed her out to his partner.

  He heard Jimmy whisper, “You think they know who you are?”

  She gritted through clenched teeth. “Shut up, shut up.”

  The other guard elbowed his friend in the ribs. “No way, no dibs. We'll share her.” They both laughed. Rachel's shoulders dropped a little.

  The whole group was marched down a hill to a circular muddy field where a crowd had started to gather. The Troopers stopped to look down at them at the top of the hill. One of them pointed toward the crowd, or the filthy structures that surrounded the field, and then they marched away. The skeletal people shuffled toward them in rags, many shoeless.

  One of the survivors, a middle-aged woman, called out to the Troopers. “Wait! Where do we go?” She looked around at her companions. “We haven't been told what to do!” She took a few steps, and sank to the ground in the middle of the field.

  Several other survivors sat down as well, exhausted and numb. Some cried. In the end, Glazier and Matthew walked over to Rachel, Jimmy, and Gusset.

  Glazier spoke first. “What the hell kind of place is this?”

  Jimmy shook his head in disgust.

  Gusset spat. “Some sort of slave camp, that's all.”

  Rachel turned to Jimmy. “Where the hell are we, you know?”

  He shook his head.

  The few rays of light that shot through junk towers washed the pit, the rusty buildings, and the people in a harsh light. Up the far hill, against the scrap wall, leaned a rusty shack. Its door slammed, and their heads swiveled to the wiry man coming toward them. There were three others behind him, all thin and dirty. They marched down the hill with expressions of cold detachment.

  The wiry man raised his hands toward them. His right held a long knife, and he waved his left in some exaggerated expression. “Welcome to the pit,” he scratched out in a gravelly voice. “Give us everything you've got, and we'll only kill the ones too ugly to fuck.”

  The survivors stared at the men, unmoving, until the wiry man screamed, “Drop it!” and they began tossing their few bags and emptying their pockets.

  Without looking at Rachel, Jimmy whispered, “What are we gonna do here? I don't know if we can take them unarmed.”

  She shook her head. “I'm not giving them anything.” She stepped out of the crowd and held up her hands. “Stop. Leave these people alone, or there'll be trouble for you.”

  Jimmy, Gusset, and Glazier stepped through the crowd as well, and Matthew jumped forward to join them, crossing his arms awkwardly.

  The wiry man circled around to face them, knife up. One of his henchmen pulled out a knife of his own. The other two were carrying wooden clubs.

  “Who the fuck are you people, huh?” The wiry man stepped up to Rachel. “You look like a planetsider, if a pretty high-on-the-hog one at that. But these other fuckers, they don't belong to you. If I had to venture a guess, I'd say these soft little sows look like Fleet fuckers to me! Must be traitors. And there ain't nobody I like better to kill than some Fleet fuckers!

  “So you and your gang here just mosey on outta our way, and we don't have to have no altercations ending up with this knife in your pretty little ass, you understand me, honey?”

  Rachel blinked a slow, long set of eyelashes at the man. “Last chance. Walk away.”

  The man raised his lip in a growl, and drew his knife back just a
s a crushing sonic wave washed over the entire crowd. A Fleet Trooper on an iguana came riding up. He carried a short weapon about the size of a shotgun and when he fired it, another debilitating blast of sound ripped through their heads. Six Troopers on foot jogged up from behind the iguana and began beating people with four-foot long plasma shock batons.

  They charged right to the altercation, and in moments Matthew's group and the gang alike were battered to a flash-fried pulp. As Matthew lay convulsing in the mud, he managed to turn his head to see Rachel, on her knees, gripping the black assault pants and thigh holster of one of the Troopers, trying to hold herself up. Matthew reached out, but there was nothing he could do as the booted foot slammed into her chest, and the shock baton crashed down on her head three, four times.

  The Trooper stepped away, and Matthew heard a man's voice interrupt the moans and weeping of the crowd now littered across the field. “Hello! Welcome to Oil Filtration and Dispersal Facility Three-Twelve.”

  From his sideways view on the ground, Matthew saw the man walk into view. A Trooper, but with no helmet, just a black T-shirt over his assault pants. His large black combat boots stomped through the mud.

  The man knelt over Matthew for a moment, and twisted his head to look into Matthew's eyes. Matthew could see all the way around both large blue irises, and this, with the man's glistening bald head, gave him a deep sense of terror.

  The man licked his lips and moved on, stalking over each of them, half bent over like a madman. Matthew noticed a white circle patch on the shoulder of the man's T-shirt, one side thin like an eclipse.

  The man began to speak as he walked over their bodies. “I am Commandant Trague. I am the ranking Fleet Officer of this quadrant, and one of my many duties is to ensure that this facility operates at peak performance.”

  Trague reached Rachel, and he threw one foot over her torso and straddled her, peering down into her face. She rippled with electric seizure, and foam dribbled down her mouth. Trague put a hand to the side of her face, and she began to tremble, but it was clear she had no motor control.