Cara held her hand up and showed Ben the stone between her fingers.
“Very nice,” he said, “Does it have a purpose?”
“Ask me . . .” She started to feel sick. “Later.”
She grinned at him triumphantly and dropped the stone into her pocket.
• • •
Max Constant shivered and downed the last of his cooling coffee to take away the strong taste of the stew. It would take his system some time to adjust to eating dead animals. He glanced to either side of him. Some of the diners were tucking in as if they hadn’t eaten for nine months—which they hadn’t. Others were pushing lumps of meat around their plates more cautiously.
He’d not seen much of the settlement yet, only as much as was visible on the walk from the resuscitation room to the bunkhouse, yesterday, and this morning, from the bunkhouse to the catering hall that was little better than the gray structures he’d left behind in Europa. The only difference was the smell. They said it was the water and that he’d get so used to it that he’d cease to notice. It wasn’t unpleasant, just different.
A gaggle of small children erupted from the far corner of the hall, dodging between benches and tables in that age-old game of tag. Kids were so resilient. Even after cryo, they could still laugh and shout and run about. Some were almost as tall as an adult and others looked tiny, but they had to be at least six years old because of the six-to-sixty age limit set for this expedition. Max wasn’t very good with children, but they looked very young to him. Young and noisy.
He winced as they knocked over an empty bench, laughed, and ran out into the crisp morning. Another couple of youngsters from a family near the door followed and were absorbed into the pack.
Max’s head felt fragile, a migraine hiding not far behind his eyes. He still had a small pack of painkillers the sweet young doc had given him when she’d checked him over after resuscitation. He fished the pack out of his pocket, burst one of the bubbles, and put the tab under his tongue. It tasted bitter. They could probably have made it taste like anything they wanted to, banana or maybe coffee, but he reckoned they made it bitter deliberately so you knew it was doing you good.
The Ecolibrians all around him were mostly in family groups or pairs, but he was alone. This had been a stupid idea. Remind me not to be so impulsive next time, but there would be no next time. Olyanda was a one-way ticket.
He’d been desperate for a complete break from his former life; well, now he’d got what he wanted—in lumps.
He dumped his dirty food bowl in the cleaner and headed for the door. Across the river, by a series of large sheds, the area bustled with activity. He walked across to the perimeter safety fence.
“Hey, what goes on over there?” he asked a psi-tech who was straightening out the load on an antigrav cart.
“The tank farm? It’s where they revive and rear the frozen embryos. Cattle, sheep, pigs, horses. All the domestic livestock that you guys are going to need. And before you ask, they’re not clones.”
“I wasn’t going to ask.”
The antigrav cart swayed, and the boxes piled on it slipped sideways. Max ducked under the fence and caught one as it slid. The tech hit the control bar, and the cart settled on the ground.
“Thanks. I guess I just overloaded it. There’s still so much stuff to haul and more shuttles arriving all the time.”
Max gave him a hand to stack the cart.
“There’s no need . . . I mean, you’re a settler . . . but thanks.”
“Does being a settler mean I can’t help out?”
“Your kind and our kind don’t mix much.”
“I’m not psi-phobic. My last girlfriend was psi.”
“Really?”
“Is there anything wrong with that?”
“Not from my point of view. I’m just a little surprised, that’s all. Some of the settlers who come and collect the supplies for Broccoliburg can barely bring themselves to talk to me without good cause. I have to go now.” The tech activated the cart and it lifted clear of the ground.
Max ducked under the fence and walked back to the food hall. A big settler with a slight stoop met him at the doorway. Another, shorter than Max, but thickset, slid up to Max’s other side.
“You’re just out of cryo, aren’t you?” the big man asked.
“Yes.”
“We could tell that because you’re still acting stupid.” The smaller man pressed close to Max’s side and put a heavy accent on “stupid.”
“What do you mean?” Max started to move away, but the big man put a warning hand on his arm.
“He means, you don’t talk to the freaks unless you got absolutely no fucking choice.”
“Why?”
“Because you don’t want the features on that nice handsome face of yours rearranging on some dark, moonless night. Understand?”
Max understood. These were the sort of men who didn’t listen to excuses. He shook them off and sat at a table by himself. He could still feel the touch of the big man’s grip on his arm, and their warning stayed with him.
He helped himself to a caff and sat down again.
“Were those guys bothering you?” A sharp-featured man with a long nose and thin, graying hair slid onto the bench opposite. He looked like a professor, but who could tell in the standard-issue coveralls? “They’ve been hanging around here for days, picking on people. Most of us just try to ignore them.”
“They said I shouldn’t talk to psi-techs.”
“They tried that on me and my family, too. I don’t like the idea of someone putting an implant in my brain, but what anyone else wants to do with their brain is their own business. It’s not as if it’s catching. I heard . . .” He leaned in conspiratorially and glanced sideways toward the two heavies. “I heard that part of the deal for us to come here was that we brought some of the folks that the Five Power Alliance wanted rid of. Those folks who caused trouble back on Earth.”
Known Ecolibrian terrorists—Max had heard the rumors, too. “I wonder how many of them there are.”
“See, this is the thing. Those two guys, just the same two guys, have been hanging around doing to others just what they tried to do to you. Just two guys, but I’ve seen them try to intimidate lots of people. Back in school we called it bullying. I didn’t like bullies then, and I don’t like them now. Our new society is no place for people like that.”
Max wasn’t sure he was quite ready for politics yet. Give it a year and it wouldn’t matter; the psi-techs would be gone. He looked sideways at the men who’d now lost interest in him completely. The psi-techs would leave, but the bullies would remain. He knew which he’d rather have.
A cheer spread around the inside of the canteen.
“It’s the director,” the anti-bullying man said.
Victor Lorient, followed by his wife, came into the hall, flanked by a couple of thick-necked men. Surely they didn’t need minders here.
The minders hung back while the Lorients moved around the hall, talking to small groups with encouraging smiles and handshakes. Rena Lorient split up from her husband and engaged a group of women, her face animated as it hadn’t been on the platform when he’d seen her at the last meeting before they’d shipped out of Chenon.
Max noticed that the bullies moved closer to Director Lorient, hanging on his every word.
Victor himself didn’t get as far as Max’s table before he stopped to address the whole room. It was the usual stuff about pulling together and working hard.
Max tried to concentrate on the content of the speech. The director was a good orator, possibly a great one. The two bullies had gravitated to the pair of minders who’d come in with the director. They seemed to know each other. Did Victor Lorient recommend strong-arm tactics to his followers? He’d always professed to have no connections with the fundy terrorists on Earth, but seeing the way the thugs revered Lorient made Max wonder.
He found himself listening to the way Victor said things, rather than what he said. It
was all so sincere. The crowd loved him. Max felt even more isolated. Why couldn’t he be part of that crowd? Why did he have to see beyond the obvious and search for hidden meanings in the subtext? Max admitted to himself that it was probably because something deep inside told him not to trust Victor Lorient. Perhaps it was because he’d come to the Ecolibrian cause late.
He recalled one lot of foster parents, from the Ecolibrian Children’s Society, trying to fill his head with the ideals. It hadn’t seemed so terrible when he was ten; however, the couple who had fostered Max for the last six years of his childhood, the ones who had given him some stability and a sense of self-worth, had been much more lib than Eco. He’d gone to university and taken an admin job with Alphacorp, in accounting.
Since cutting loose on his own, he’d paid lip service to Ecolibrian ideals until his promotion to the accounting office in Special Operations in York had introduced him to Leila. Living with a Telepath, he’d drifted away from Ecolibrianism and had only gone back after the split. They’d welcomed him with open arms, of course. He was their lost sheep returned to the fold.
Stupid, he told himself again. What had he let himself in for? This was crazy. Thirty-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine rabid Ecolibrians and him, all with more optimism than good sense. It was only Leila’s words, “You’ll be back,” that had driven him on. He would not be back, ever. He’d die here; later rather than sooner, he hoped.
Victor finished the pep talk and handed over to his wife, who addressed the families before handing over again.
“Welcome to Olyanda.” Jack Mario, the colony’s chief administrator, and one of the few folks Max reckoned had real common sense, raised his voice so it carried out across the benches and tables. “These early days are going to be both taxing and exciting. The system we devised on Chenon is now operating smoothly. Your family groups are as previously posted. In order, beginning with . . .” He glanced down at his notes. “Group one hundred and sixty three, you can make your way to the barns to pick up your horses, then collect your wagons from the compound, hitch up and drive to Stores, where you’ll be issued with equipment and rations for your journey.”
One six three. Max’s number was one seven eight. He had a little time yet. His family group was earnest, but boring. As a single man he’d been allocated a traveling place with the Einbackers, three brothers and their father. They had done the training course and were now hoping to make a life for themselves as sheep farmers, spinners, and weavers. He wasn’t obliged to stay with them forever, just to travel as far as the settlement in their wagon, but he got the distinct feeling that Gerta Einbacker, their cousin, traveling in another wagon in the same party, was sizing him up as a prospective mate and that was no joke. She was eighteen, ten years younger than him, with a frame like a lumberjack, a broad, plain face and square, capable hands. Not his type, but she had a sweet smile.
The wagons looked just like the pictures of the old Wild West, except they were built out of different materials. They’d all had to practice driving them on Chenon. Each had a lightweight, foam-metal chassis timbered with panels cut from the weirdly-shaped broccoli trees, and the upper covers were ripstop polytarp, brought in at great expense. Everything had come in at great expense. It had cost Max almost all he had saved to buy into the expedition as an independent craftsman.
The Einbackers had expressed a preference for horses to pull their wagon, rather than oxen, and they had vouchers for four sturdy Cleveland Bays as well as for a start-up flock of forty sheep, a milk cow in calf, and two pigs. They’d blown their last credits on a store-bought handloom that they’d have to haul overland to their new home, wherever that might be.
They all depended on the wagon-train captain and a psi-tech communicator for the journey. They didn’t know where they were going, but they trusted that they would end up in a place suitable for raising sheep, crops, and children. Each of the Einbackers, including Mr. Einbacker senior, had a designated spouse, a mail order bride, who would arrive on the second ark. It seemed archaic, but the colony needed children and strong communities to survive. Max had managed to avoid being paired. He still wasn’t sure if he was where he should be, so there was no sense in dragging someone else into his misery.
He’d hoped to worm his way into the admin department, but all the doors he’d tried had been closed to him, so he’d taken the basic carpentry course, fancying the satisfaction of making something honest and solid with his hands, but, now, he stared ahead to the future and admitted, bleakly, that he’d learned to use a saw and chisels, but he wasn’t a craftsman at heart. The set of woodworking tools, waiting in stores for him, had already lost its appeal. He’d better find his niche pretty soon; there was no room in this kind of colony for someone who didn’t pull his weight.
“We should go.” Byram, the youngest Einbacker, had been sent to get him. Max stood up. He wanted to tell Byram and the whole family to go to hell, but he thought they were probably not so far from it already.
He trailed behind Byram down to the horse barns where the rest of the family had gathered in a sandy yard. Inside a barn he could hear voices. Peering round a group of onlookers, he saw a man and woman struggling to hold onto the lead rein of a big brown Shire, as they led it into the light. It was monstrous. It flared its nostrils and rolled its eyes. Its head was way up as it stared around with its ears flicking nervously this way and that.
“Here, like this,” Max heard a woman’s voice, and seconds later the Angel of the Stable appeared. At least that’s what he thought she must be. She was willowy, with a halo of fair hair, a fresh outdoor complexion, and a soft lilting voice. Quietly she went up to the Shire and took the rein. Speaking softly to it she walked forward and it followed her, docile as a lapdog.
“There. She’ll be okay now. Ease up on the rein a little. Keep a light contact. Don’t swing on her mouth. Imagine how you’d like it. Right, who’s next?”
She brought out two Clevelands for a gaunt outdoor type who had a young boy firmly by the hand. He thanked her and swung the boy up on one of them before leading them away. Next she brought out two riding horses, smaller and neater than the Clevelands, for a young couple. She adjusted the stirrup leathers and saw them mount safely.
“Take them to the schooling arena behind the stable until you get used to them. They’re a bit frisky; they’ve been in cryo, too.”
The horses had to use up valuable cryo space; they weren’t ready for work until they were four. You couldn’t tank a horse to maturity in a couple of seasons and train it as well.
A young man brought out two huge Cleveland Bays for Byram’s father, but when Byram handed over the second voucher, he looked at it carefully.
“Are these all for the same family?” Byram’s father nodded.
“Have you got two wagons or one?”
“One.”
“You’ll hardly need four Clevelands. You could manage with two and take a couple of strong ponies, especially if you’re herding sheep. You’ll need a good dog, too. Have you got a requisition for one?”
They hadn’t.
“We used our last credits for the loom,” Byram said. “We figured it was more important. We hoped we could trade for a puppy later.”
“Don’t leave it too late. Your loom won’t do you much good if you can’t get your sheep in from the fields.”
While Byram and his family sorted out the change of requisition, Max found the Angel of the Stable down at the schooling arena, helping the young couple with the riding horses.
“Use your legs a bit more positively,” she called out to the man. “Firm but gentle. Don’t let him think he can get away with anything. Horses aren’t stupid; they’ll take advantage if they can.”
Max leaned on the rail next to her. She turned and looked at him, and her smile was radiant. It touched his soul more than anything else he’d seen since he’d staggered out of the resuscitation room yesterday.
“Marry me,” he said. Then he looked over his shoulder t
o see whether any settlers had heard.
She laughed. “Too late,” she said, “Anyway, it’s illegal. I’m psi-tech. A Dee’ell.”
“So you talk to animals. I’m not prejudiced. Marry me anyway.”
She laughed again. “Find yourself a nice settler girl. I have a partner already.”
“Your horses are prettier than the girls I’ve seen so far. Are you sure you won’t ditch him and marry me?”
“Won’t and can’t. But thanks for the compliment, for my horses, I mean.”
“Are you ready?” Byram shouted.
Max waved to indicate he was coming and turned back to the Angel.
“Max. Max!” Byram’s voice had an edge of panic in it.
Max sighed. “Got to go,” he said. “Maybe I’ll see you again later.”
He went up to the yard where Byram waited, obviously agitated.
“What’s the matter?”
“She is.” Byram nodded toward the Angel. “She’s psi-tech. You shouldn’t be talking to her.”
Max had felt safe with the Einbackers, but suddenly he felt even more like a real outsider. In the Einbackers’ book, psi-techs were deviants and therefore to be avoided. It was a fervor that bordered on religious zeal.
The Einbackers lined up with their horses. They had two Cleveland Bays with hooves as far across as dinner plates and two strong ponies, small in comparison, but still big enough for a man to ride.
“I’ll manage one of these; someone else can tame the monsters,” Max said and took the rein of one of the ponies, which immediately flattened its ears and tried to nip him. He shortened the loose rein, got his hand under the pony’s jaw and held it at arm’s length so it couldn’t bite him on the way to the wagon compound. All the way there the brothers argued over the apparent disastrous lack of a sheep dog.
All the wagons were the same design, open box-shapes, with the hoops in place but not covered. The idea was to harness the horses and then lead them through the long shed and load their allocated stores before driving down to the collecting field and camping for the night. Their bunks in the utilitarian accommodation block were already occupied by a fresh batch of settlers straight from resuscitation.
Empire of Dust Page 23
