Griff picked up the wood and leather saddle, admired once again the handiwork of the unknown craftsman then positioned it on the back of his horse. ‘Steady, friend,’ he muttered. ‘I know you hate this as much as I do but the boss-man wants us both back on the trail …’
He drew the girth tight around the horse’s belly then pulled another notch through the buckle. He’d already done one slow roll off his mount to the raucous cheers of his companions and he didn’t intend to make that particular mistake again.
Malone experienced similar misgivings as he gazed down at Cadillac. The Mute was one problem he could have done without. Although he parlayed with Mutes and observed the ground rules of peaceful co-existence, he did not share Griff’s qualified forbearance. Malone didn’t like Mutes. Period. But then Malone wasn’t a renegade, a breaker on the run from the Federation. Some of the men he led were genuine deserters – brave enough to seek an independent existence on the overground but also a treacherous heap of garbage. Malone didn’t mind. That was what he been sent out to run: a garbage disposal unit. Malone and the core of his renegade band were mexicans, agents of the undercover organization controlled by Commander-General Karlstrom.
Trapped between the worlds of Tracker and Mute, renegades were basically scavengers; wanderers who roamed the overground with no particular destination and no home to return to. Death was the only welcome they could expect from the Federation. Fortunately there were large areas which had not yet attracted the attentions of the Trail-Blazers and where Mutes were thin on the ground. Like the Rocky Mountains for instance. But there was a good reason why the lumpheads gave the Rockies a wide berth. For six months of the year it was so cold, and the snow was so deep, no one could survive there. Unless of course you were well-organized and properly equipped. Karlstrom had made sure his groups had the expertise and equipment they needed but each item was carefully selected and given a worn, weathered look so as not to strike a false note.
Like any species fighting for survival, renegades were subject to the process of natural selection. The strong prospered, the weak perished. A large group offered safety, continuity and companionship. Malone’s organization also provided the other vital element – strong leadership. Within months of its formation, it had become a magnet, attracting smaller groups and individuals who, up to that moment, had opted for a hermit-like existence. And within the Federation, Malone’s name was deftly inserted into the information network run by known subversives.
To many in this twilight world, Malone had already assumed the status of a folk-hero. Someone who had beaten the system. It hadn’t taken long for his name and approximate whereabouts to surface in the way-stations and work-camps. His wasn’t the only name that was passed along in whispered conversations. There were several others obligingly provided by AMEXICO for the benefit of potential defectors – all of them fostering the notion of a growing rebel movement and a relatively safe haven.
Only very few who managed to join Malone realized they had fallen back into the hands of the Federation and they were quickly eliminated. It was a sweet operation – one of several similar overground ‘stings’ which enabled the First Family to keep its finger on the pulse of the protest movement. And it also ensured a steady supply of candidates for the televised show trials. If the wagon-trains failed to flush out a sufficient number of breakers, Malone and his counterparts made up the balance by sending unsuspecting candidates into a carefully-coordinated ambush.
Had the matter been left to him, the Mute at his feet would now be on his way to the Federation. This Cadillac Deville character was on the wanted list. He’d been nailed. He should have been shipped out pronto. End of the story. Neat, clean and simple to arrange. But that wasn’t how HANG-FIRE wanted to play it. HANG-FIRE was the operational code-name for Steve Brickman, a wet-back who had graduated from Rio Lobo the previous year after serving briefly as a wing-man aboard The Lady from Louisiana.
Malone knew these background details because he had been selected to give Brickman his final test. A potentially fatal ordeal designed to measure a candidate’s courage and endurance. Brickman had been ‘posted’ – tied in a kneeling position against a stake, face to face with the corpse of a Tracker he’d killed in the line of duty. He’d come through it, earning himself full marks in the process. There was no doubt about it. Brickman had the makings of a real operator and his latest trick had been to get in and out of Ne-Issan, bringing two important Mute targets with him: Clearwater, a female Mute and Cadillac, the lump now at Malone’s feet who was taking forever to shake off the double dose of Cloud Nines.
Clearwater had been seriously wounded in a surprise air attack by a stray Skyhawk. At Brickman’s request, Malone and his renegades had struck camp and ridden off, leaving them behind. If she hadn’t died in his arms, Clearwater was now on board Red River. Cadillac had been superficially wounded and knocked unconscious by the same hail of fire.
To Malone, it seemed like an ideal opportunity to ship them both out together. Two out of three wasn’t a bad result, but Brickman wanted a full house. By leaving Cadillac free, he hoped to entrap his third target – Mr Snow, the power behind the Clan M’Call. Which was the reason why he, Malone, had been lumbered with the task of escorting this lumphead as far as navref Cheyenne, Wyoming. A journey which placed his band of renegades in considerable danger.
This was the wrong time of year to be moving around. April was the month when the Mutes hunted ‘red-skins’ – breakers; the annual round-up of strays which were handed over to the Iron Masters in exchange for goods and shipped east. Malone hadn’t planned to leave the camp that Brickman and his friends had ridden into until mid-May. The site was in a commanding position, with good cover and running water: ideal for a long stay. It had been chosen because AMEXICO knew which way Brickman was heading and he was expected to pass close by. At which point Malone – quite by chance – was to pop up and renew their acquaintance. Everything had gone according to plan and then – thanks to some asshole in a Skyhawk and two scumbags who hadn’t seen it coming – everything had gone wrong, forcing him to head west when every sensible breaker was lying low.
The only solution was to travel at night. Mutes, for some reason rooted deep in their collective past, were only active between sunrise and sunset. After that, the hunting posses and turf patrols went home or bedded down for the night. It wasn’t the ideal time for travelling cross-country but after umpteen years in the field, Malone had become adept at reading the terrain and moving men across it under the most adverse conditions.
Even so, he was sorely tempted to call up a sky-hook to take Cadillac off his hands. But this was not his operation. The orders from Mother had been clear and unequivocal. He had been detailed to intercept Brickman at a given point during his journey, assess his reliability and – with Mother’s approval – to render assistance if and when required. Brickman had said and done all the right things but he’d set Malone’s internal alarm system ringing. There was something about him. Maybe it was just Malone’s instinctive antipathy towards clean-cut blue-eyed golden boys, but Brickman was too smart for his own good – and just too good to be true.
In the previous year, six of Malone’s people, including a class-mate of Brickman’s, had been sent north to provide him with the back-up he’d requested to help kidnap the same three Mutes. In the last radio contact made by a mex called Donna Lundkwist, she reported the squad had been sighted by a posse of M’Call Mutes – recognizable by the colour of the feathers in their headgear. The Mutes had put up a smoking arrow – a sign they wished to parley. End of message. No one had ever heard from those six mexicans again. Brickman had been running with that clan. Painted up, grassed-out and leathered. His degree of involvement in the back-up squad’s disappearance was a question that had plagued Malone ever since.
He glanced up at the clear moonlit sky and saw a bank of dark cloud building up on the northern horizon. Malone was astute and resourceful but patience was not one of his virtues – especi
ally when it came to unwanted guests, and even more so when that guest was a Mute. Following the shooting of Clearwater, Cadillac had not regained consciousness. To avoid any hassles, he had been kept in a drugged stupor for the past two days. Helped by clear night skies, they had covered some seventy odd miles. One way or another, Clearwater was now beyond reach. It was high time for this lump to stand on his own feet instead of having to be carried around everywhere. When Mother had asked him to help Brickman, he hadn’t figured it would mean having to namby-pamby an uppity Mute. That was the bit that really pissed him off – not the move.
He dug his boot into Cadillac’s side. ‘C’mon! Wake up you sonofabitch! We haven’t got all night!’
Cadillac stirred drowsily. ‘Uh-humm, yeah … sure …’ His eyes fluttered open then closed again as his mouth opened in a huge yawn.
Malone unhitched his water bottle and emptied it over Cadillac’s face. Some of it went down his throat causing him to gag. He rolled about choking and coughing then eventually sat up clutching his head.
‘On your feet! C’mon! We’re moving out!’ Malone slid a hand under his left armpit and hauled him upright.
Cadillac steadied himself and rubbed his face. His body seemed gripped by a strange lethargy. ‘Mo-Town! I feel –’ His eyes widened as he focused on Malone, then he quickly took in his strange surroundings. ‘Where’s Clearwater? And Brickman?’ A jab of pain from his various flesh wounds caused him to frown. He looked down at his left side and saw two bloodstained rips in his walking skins on the outside curve of the thigh. There was also a deep graze in his belly. An expression of alarm crossed his face. ‘Who shot me?!’
‘You don’t remember? Must have been after you hit the ground.’ Malone told him about the Skyhawk that had appeared out of the blue, making a single strafing run across the campsite before turning for home.
Some premonition of what he was going to say next made Cadillac howl with grief. He wrapped his arms around his chest and rocked from side to side. ‘Oh, Sweet Sky-Mother! Clearwater! Is she dead?’
‘Not when we left. But she was hurt pretty bad.’
‘Oyy-yehh! This is all my fault! What about Brickman?’
‘He’s fine. Came out of it without a scratch.’
The news caused Cadillac to grind his teeth. ‘He would! Hah! How typical! So what did you do?’
Malone did his best to conceal his irritation at being questioned in this peremptory manner. Who the fuck did this guy think he was? ‘Do? The best we could. State she was in she couldn’t be moved. So we dressed the wounds with what we had then got the hell out. No point in staying there once the camp had been spotted. We’ve had ’hawks over our heads for the past couple of days.’
Cadillac’s mounting anger boiled over. ‘Are you telling me she was shot two days ago?!’
Malone checked his watch. ‘Exactly fifty-four hours and twelve minutes ago.’
‘Why didn’t someone tell me before now?!’
Malone resisted the impulse to smash Cadillac in the mouth. ‘Because there was nothing you could do, friend.’
‘Hahh!’ Cadillac became aware of the metallic aftertaste on his tongue. ‘Was it Brickman’s idea to pump me full of drugs?!’
‘Yeah. He said you’d be hysterical, and he was right. Pull yourself together for crissakes!’
‘I am together! He had no right to take matters into his own hands like this! We’ve got to go back for her!’
‘Are you crazy? The only thing that could’ve saved her was major surgery. Federation-type medicine – not the mumbo-jumbo you monkeys mess around with. She’ll be dead and buried by now –’
‘No! Don’t say that!’
Malone ignored the interruption. ‘My job is to help you get back to your own people. Isn’t that what Brickman promised to do?’
‘Yes, but –’
‘There are no “buts”. That’s what we’re gonna do, friend. It was two of my guys who let that plane take us by surprise. So quit blaming yourself for what happened. I can understand Brickman bein’ upset at losing a neat piece of ass but what the hell have you got to cry about?’
Cadillac brushed away the tears of rage and grief with shaking hands that longed to fasten themselves around Malone’s throat. ‘She didn’t belong to him!’
‘Could have fooled me. Is that what the fight was about?’
‘No. We were fighting because Brickman is a treacherous, lying toad!’
‘That seems a mite ungrateful. Didn’t he help you and Clearwater get out of Ne-Issan?’
‘He didn’t do that to help us! He got us out in order to hand us over to his masters in the Federation! He’s not a renegade! He’s been working with a network of undercover agents for over a year!’
‘I see …’ Malone ruminated on this for a moment. ‘Did he tell you anything about this network – like it’s name for instance? Or who was running it?’
Cadillac realized he had said too much and was already regretting his temporary loss of control. His antagonism towards Steve had not diminished but Malone was a virtual stranger. A cipher whose mind, for the moment at least, was inaccessible. ‘No. But we couldn’t have escaped without outside help – which he organized. If he turns up again, ask him about it. All I can say is, no one’s safe when he’s around.’
‘I’ll bear that in mind,’ said Malone. ‘Meanwhile forget we’ve had this conversation. If Brickman does rejoin us, I may decide to let things ride for a while. If you’re right, and he is an undercover Fed then it may be to our advantage to let him think we trust him completely. Know what I mean?’
‘I think so …’
‘Good. Let’s hit the trail.’ Malone gave Cadillac a friendly slap on the back then ushered him over to the waiting horses. He would have preferred to have broken the back of this snivelling piece of lumpshit but – like Brickman – he had a job to do and a role to play. That of big-hearted Matt Malone, friend and protector of abandoned Mutes.
Some six hundred miles to the south of Malone’s present position close to the Platte River, Nebraska, The Lady from Louisiana wagon-train had emerged from the repair bays and was back in what was known as ‘the roads’, being readied for action in the vast underground depot at Nixon/Fort Worth.
In June 2989, The Lady had narrowly avoided a major disaster in its first encounter with a Plainfolk clan aided by a summoner. Caught in a flash-flood, The Lady had managed to extricate herself virtually undamaged but in doing so, she had lost nine out of the ten wing-men posted aboard and their aircraft, plus over eighty line-men. Close on double that number had been wounded.
In November 2990, when The Lady had been sent out into the snows on a special mission, it had been even worse. The explosive charges planted by Cadillac and Clearwater had totally destroyed the blood-wagon and flight car, and the tidal wave of fire that erupted from the stock of napalm canisters and liquid methane tanks stored beneath the hanger deck had rolled through three more cars, incinerating the crewmen in its path.
Abandoning the five gutted cars, The Lady reformed and set course, as directed, for Monroe/Wichita, the still-uncompleted divisional base in Kansas. Arriving at the interface, the wounded crewmen had been off-loaded and rushed to hospital. Commander Hartmann and his team of execs, including Trail Boss McDonnell had been placed under close arrest and shuttled to Grand Central to await trial. The surviving members of the crew who had escaped the same ‘dereliction of duty’ charge were placed under the temporary command of an executive team drawn from the training staff at Fort Worth. It was they who had brought The Lady – defeated and disgraced – southwards through Oklahoma into the relative safety of the Home State and back down the long incline into the depot.
The winter months – whose high point was the celebration of the New Year – were, by tradition, spent on ‘rest and refit’ (R & R). A period when Trail-Blazer crews enjoyed a welcome spell of leave after eight to nine months on the overground, and when the depot engineers began their task of overhauling the trains,
readying them for their next assault on the blue-sky world.
The Lady was in need of more than a refit. The missing wagons had to be replaced, fire-damage to several others had to be made good, the crew had to be brought up to strength and their shattered morale restored. Bringing The Lady back to operational status was a major undertaking but it proved easier than raising the crew’s spirits. Despite the damage and the casualties The Lady had sustained, Hartmann and his executive team – with perhaps one exception – were held in high regard by the Trail-Blazers who served under them. The exec who failed to inspire the troops to the same degree was Captain Baxter, the Flight Operations Officer. He had died in the blast that ripped through the packed hangar deck of the flight car, killing Gus White and the other wing-men, the mechanics, deck handlers and a score of Trail-Blazers.
The Lady’s Trail Boss, Buck McDonnell, whose alertness and quick reactions had saved the forward command car and its crew had been released after two months detention. In a brief appearance before a Board of Assessors, he was informed that all charges had been dropped and was ordered to report for active duty at Nixon/Fort Worth. Exiting from the court room, he was met by a Staff-Commander from CINC-TRAIN who welcomed him back into the ranks of the Trail-Blazer Division. His first task would be to knock the new crew of The Lady into shape and he was to begin immediately. Due to operational requirements, there would, explained the Commander, be no chance of the four weeks base leave to which he was entitled.
In his usual blunt but respectful fashion, the big Trail Boss told him it didn’t matter. After eight weeks on the shit and bucket detail he was just happy to be soldiering again.
The decision to release McDonnell had paid off. From Day One there had been a noticeable rise in the spirits of the veteran crewmen and the transferees and wet-feet – the uninitiated replacements – soon discovered that Big D’s reputation as a fire-breathing disciplinarian was, if anything, an understatement. A second stand-in team of execs from the depot’s permanent staff helped the crew go through their on-board drills but as the weeks passed, even McDonnell became concerned about the deafening silence surrounding the appointment of a new wagon-master.
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