I had an idea of how far we were striking out, but to see it on a simple paper map—on my old state, no less- gave me a pang of regret for the past.
“I know,” Andi said. “I feel it too. So much senseless fucking loss, and here we are on the other end of time with nothing to do except mourn the dead. Or become the dead, I guess, but that’s not in my plans.
“Not for me, either, but, yeah.” I sighed under the weight of memory. “Lotta things that tweak my mind, and at weird times. Like—well, like this map,” I said, waving at it.
“This might help. You have all the weapons you need, and we have satellite data, drones—shit, we’ve even got dragons, as far as I’m concerned.”
“They don’t fly,” I pointed out.
“No, but they do everything else,” she said, referring to the Konnodar and their desert abilities. “The Daymares found something you might want, but I think it should stay hidden. It’s this,” she said, reaching into the desk and pulling out a small device that looked like a flattened egg. There were two lights on it—one blue, one red—and they pulsed softly when Andi picked the thing up. She handed it to me. “A tracker.”
“For the Procurators?” I asked, my eyes going wide.
“For ‘bots. I always suspected we could track ‘bots by keying on their frequency, but this confirms it. I tested it myself, and it couldn’t be simpler. When you get close to ‘bots, both lights shine. When you don’t, the blue light goes out,” she said.
“Won’t it pick mine up?” I asked, staring at the lights.
“Yes, but strength of signal means the lights get brighter, at least until the battery dies, but there’s a workaround in place for that, she said.
“Which is? Solar?”
“No, the Chain. Yulin’s crew have a small power point for you that’s the size of a bean, should give you ten- or twelve-day battery life. You can either take the bus to the Chain when it dies, or plan on sweeping east for a recharge. I suspect you’ll need it after a hard run in the Empty.”
“I can cut east on the Konnodar, as long as the Chain doesn’t mind feeding them. And me,” I said.
“I think they’ll spring for a meal or two. That device is—well, you can use it like a bloodhound—it won’t get you all the way, but once you’re on a trail, it will help chase down anyone with augmented blood tech. This is how you’ll find them, Jack. You just have to crisscross a murderous desert to do so.” She gave me a wintry smile, then reached out and touched my brow. “I don’t know how advanced the Proc technology will be, but my suspicion is that it’s diverged from what I know.”
“I expected as much. This world isn’t ours, so the process will have created something different. Mayme even something more lethal than we can imagine,” I said.
“Then in that case, use those,” she said, pointing to my hands.
“I will.”
Andi cocked her head, listening. “Quiet out there. Time for you to use your hands now, if you want.”
“There’s no one to fight down here,” I said, stepping closer to her.
“That’s not what I meant,” she said, stepping forward to kiss me. Andi’s lips were softer than any breeze, and her body fit me in a way that made every motion charged with eroticism that went beyond her physical beauty. Her cheekbones were high under hazel eyes, and staring at her was a link to my own past—and the woman in front of me right then. I lifted her onto the desk behind us. Her cupid’s bow lips quirked as she lazily began to remove her boots.
“You might do the same,” she said. In a moment, she was pulling at her shirt, freeing a pair of breasts that were soft and inviting. I bent my head to kiss one, then the other, and then she pulled my belt out like it offended her.
I know it offended me, because it kept my pants in place.
When we pressed against each other, she spread her legs to welcome me in, her skin a pale expanse that grew darker where the desert touched her arms, neck, shoulders.
“Come on in,” she murmured in my ear, then nipped at my neck with her even teeth before kissing me hard. I kissed her back as I plunged into her welcoming heat, our hips touching like old friends. Andi was tight, but in seconds, she melded around me like I belonged inside her, which was good, because I do. She fits me, and I fit her, right down to the lazy swirl of her tongue as we played at kissing.
“Turn me around,” she said, and I thought that was affine idea indeed. She rotated and I took her from behind in a slow, easy motion that brought a heated gasp from both of us. Andi was stunning at any angle, but seeing the dimples of her back and the heart shaped hips moving against me was reason enough to thank the skies I was a man. She was flawless in that moment and every other, and our connection got better each time we were together.
“Back around,” she said, switching again to face me. Her hands guided me back in, and then we were face to face, her eyes searching mine with a half-smile on her full lips.
“I should leave on missions more often,” I said, then kissed her again.
“As long as you come back.” She tucked her head close to my neck and pulled me even tighter, moving with urgency as our need began to race side-by-side, small tremors beginning in her legs and my core. If we timed it just right—
“Now,” she breathed, her orgasm unleashing in a torrid wave. I joined her a second later, fighting hard to stay upright while holding her at the edge of the desk, its metal feet squealing across the floor as we climaxed together.
“Right on time,” I said, and she laughed, showing white teeth and twinkling eyes that ignored the danger of our next days.
She pulled me close again, and her eyes grew dark, but only for a fugitive moment. “Come back on time, too. Understand?”
“I will,” I assured her.
She watched me for a moment, then gave a small nod. “Good.”
9
Tegan and I slipped out into the pre-dawn darkness, walking to the harnessed Konnodar. Both beasts snorted amiably as we mounted and waved a silent goodbye to the stablemaster, and in seconds we were coursing across the northern path away from the Oasis. The stars glittered overhead, and a meteor streaked west before vanishing with an incandescent gleam just above Orion’s belt.
“Quiet out here,” Tegan said. She wore riding gear, a pistol, and a knife. All three fit her well.
“I call it the shift change. The night predators are holing up getting ready to give way to the daylight hunters. It’s my favorite time of the day, really,” I said, patting the neck of my Konnodar, who was wide enough that my legs were spread by his enormous shoulders. The saddle rocked easily enough, but I couldn’t help noticing that Tegan was utterly still on her beast. She was born to the saddle, and riding a new species came to her naturally.
“Smoother than a hippo, and a lot less gassy,” Tegan said with a smile.
“I’ll take your word on that, my lady. Were you trained in things other than riding?” I asked with what I hoped was a diplomatic tone.
“You mean am I a delicate princess who worried about boys and dancing, or did I get my hands dirty?”
“Well, now that you put it that way,” I said.
She laughed, and it was a musical noise. “I trained with the rifle, the pistol, and this,” she said, holding up a wicked knife. It had a long blade, curved slightly and serrated on the backside. It was not decorative in any sense.
“Rifle?” I said, inviting her to continue.
“I started as an archer, like most children, but by the time I was seven, had my own long gun. There’s a laziness that comes with being a society that has rifles. We don’t appreciate human loss as much, I think. Killing at a distance is—it’s impersonal and I don’t think that death should easy. My family would rather it was, but not me. That’s one of the reasons they ignored me at council. I preferred to use blood like it cost us everything, and they wanted to treat blood like it was water. It’s a wonder they didn’t ship me off sooner,” she said, shrugging.
“That’s how I
live. How I govern. I treat life like it’s rare, even when it isn’t, and that’s how the Oasis will govern, no matter what,” I said.
“Even if it’s a bad person? There are enough of them out here in this world, Jack.” Her tone said she spoke from experience.
“Even them. Usually, people will make the right decision if you give them a choice. I propose to give them that choice, although there are certain things I won’t negotiate about. Sometimes, I try to wound someone first, but even then—like you said, there are a lot of bad people out here,” I said.
We rode on in silence, alone with our thoughts and the beasts underneath us as the track north dipped under the gravel and sand, then re-emerged as we began the climb toward an escarpment where tow old highways crossed.
The first bullet whined past us as a movement flashed in the corner of my eyes, and my gun was out and firing before the noise had faded. Tegan sent two shots downrange with such speed they sounded almost simultaneous; neither hit the man standing up near a rockpile, but he made a wise decision and took cover as Tegan fired a third round, this one sparking away close enough to his face that he took dust in the eye and howled in pain.
I began to see the other raiders, then, quickly counting an even dozen before I shot one at thirty meters, tearing his chest into ribbons. Tegan’s fourth shot split the skull of a skinny woman with filthy blonde hair, sending her corpse to the sand in a boneless tumble before she could get her crossbow aimed at us.
“Make that ten,” I said, jumping from my Konnodar and cuffing his muzzle. “Stay,” I ordered. He didn’t like it, but he obeyed, his thick tail swishing back and forth in anger.
There were ten armed fighters in rough condition, and I was an augmented warrior at the absolute peak of my career in combat. I was angry, in a hurry, armed with two short swords that shone like razors, and moving toward the raiders at a speed unlike anything they had ever seen before.
It was not going to be a fair fight.
A tall guy rose up, swinging a length of pipe with spikes in even as he fumbled to snap off shots from a small caliber handgun that swung toward me. I didn’t jump—I accelerated through him while plunging my blades forward to cleave his ribcage like a holiday roast. He spun away, shrieking as I moved on, dodging a well-thrown metal spear with a barbed head. The thrower was a powerfully built man with a head like a rock—or it was before I hit it with the pommel of my right-hand sword. One of his eyes popped out as I used my other blade to open him from throat to balls. He bellowed and clutched at his guts, now spilling out into the growing light of a day that already stank like shit and battle.
Two raiders came at me next, then a third, all linked by a wicked razor chain. The one in the middle shot at me with a small crossbow, but the bolt went wide as he was tugged off balance by the fighter on his left, who flinched as I made straight for him. I clashed with the fighter who shied away, sinking my blades into his kidneys and scissoring out in a smooth motion. He didn’t make a sound, but the blood that erupted from his wounds was a hot scarlet curtain. I stepped on his back, felt the spine snap, and jumped to meet the fighter on the right, who wrapped the savage chain around my arm, tearing into me in three places.
I jerked my arm free and looped his chain around him, working it up to his neck by a series of brutal yanks. His fingertips went flying, severed by the chain, just as the raider behind me grabbed my shoulder and lifted a knife to bury it in my skull. His throat blossomed in an explosion of blood and white cartilage, courtesy of Tegan’s rifle. Without thanking her, I whirled to face another pair of attackers, these being much larger, well-fed men with good armor and short spears. One had a pistol, and he shot me despite my evasive tactics. The bullet felt like fire as it passed cleanly through my ear, giving me my first piercing.
“You stinking fuck!” I heard myself roar, jumping to attack with a fury that was beyond nuclear. I broke the first fighter’s neck with a looping punch to his throat, feeling every bit of his body shudder under the rage of my blow. The second—who still had his pistol—brought the weapon around to finish me off, but my right hand was already streaking into motion, severing his arm cleanly at the elbow. He yowled and went down, then he stopped screaming because I crushed his face with my boot, using it as yet another steppingstone to the remaining trio of fighters, who looked like they wanted to be anywhere but in front of me.
Tegan’s rifle boomed again, and one of the men collapsed, his knee a pulpy mass. A short, wiry little prick charged me, and I ran him through with my sword, then twisted the blade free. He died instantly when my steel severed—well, it cut everything important in his chest.
“Time to decide,” I growled.
The last raider let his eyes flick back and forth between me and Tegan, and I could tell he hated the odds. I heard her rifle click, and the man opened his hands and dropped a pair of knives made from some kind of reclaimed metal. They were bright with use and wrapped in worn leather at the handle.
“I applaud your decision,” Tegan said, but I couldn’t speak. I was still volcanic with anger over the fight, and I drew great drafts of air into my nose to calm myself. After a moment, I took a step forward and backhanded the fighter so hard he collapsed, unconscious and twitching.
“Was that necessary if we’re going to talk?” Tegan asked but there was a hint of a smile at her lips.
I rolled my shoulders to lose some tension, then felt my ear. The bleeding had stopped, but the hole remained. It would be a while before I had a whole ear again.
“I needed a moment.”
Tegan smiled, took out her water, and swigged, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand, just like a seasoned desert dweller. “I guessed as much.”
The raider came to a few minutes later to find me going through all of the contents of his pockets, as well as anything of interest his friends had been carrying. It wasn’t much, but there were two decent knives and an array of ammunition, fish hooks, and coiled wire line.
“Fishing gear,” I said, looking at the small pile. “Not exactly desert survival kits, unless there are creeks I don’t know about.”
“My lands are too far away to go for a day on the water,” Tegan said. Her Konnodar burped, sending a wave of hot breath toward the raider, whose eyes twitched in alarm. He was of middle height, but muscular, with brown eyes and deeply tanned skin. His armor was good. His mental state was nothing short of alarm, which made sense given the fact he was staring at my knives, Tegan’s rifle, and the muzzles of two Konnodar who regarded him without blinking.
“Name,” I said.
The man blinked in surprise. “You’re not going to just kill me?”
“Not yet, anyway,” I said.
He shrugged. It was obvious I was dealing with a realist, which might make the next few moments a bit easier.
“What do you want, then?” he asked.
“What’s your name?” I said. It seemed reasonable to start there.
“Lyman,” he answered.
“Let’s speed this up a bit, okay? Where are you from, what did you do before you went raiding in the Empty—things like that, okay? We’ll get to the point of this conversation a lot faster.” I handed him my water, and he drank, then inclined his head in thanks.
“Lyman, from north of here, but got burned out in a raid three years ago. Lost my family, lost—well, everything. I only went with these idiots because I had nowhere else to go, and they were too stupid to be successful. I’m amazed we lasted this long,” he said. “Now if you don’t mind, I’ve never seen anyone move like you before, and that woman looks too fancy to be a girl from the desert. What are you looking for out here?”
“You’re right. She’s a princess, I’m a governor, of sorts, and we’re looking for any path the Procurators use because I intend to hunt them, kill them, and eventually take Kassos. They’re using Hightec that I have some knowledge of, but my instincts tell me they’re not the most well-liked people out here. What do you think, Lyman?”
“I th
ink you’re out of your fucking mind, that’s what. Do you know what the Procs do to people?” he asked me.
“No, but I’m very interested,” I said.
“Mind if I stand? I want to show you something,” Lyman said. I waved him up, and he clambered to his feet, dusting himself off before looking around, then settling on something to the northeast. “See that smoke?”
In the distance, a wisp of black smoke was being carried away, just visible over the horizon. “Sure do. What is it?”
“I don’t know, exactly, other than a small settlement, but if you want to know where the Procs have been, follow the fire,” he said.
“Let’s go look together,” I said. “Drop any weapons. You won’t need them again.”
He palmed a small knife and tossed it to the sand with regret, then held his hands out, palms up. “What now?”
Tegan asked, “Have you ever ridden before?”
“One of those monsters? Hell no. I mean, ah—hell no, your majesty,” Lyman said.
“Tegan will do. Jack, if he tries to touch my breasts, shoot him. Come on up, Lyman, and mind your hands.
“Yes ma’am.” Lyman mounted her Konnodar with a wariness that made him seem a lot less dangerous, but then a giant lizard has a way of doing that to people. He settled in to the back of the saddle and we spurred our Konnodar with heel taps, their muzzles pointed toward the distant fire. The lizards ate up ground, tracking past scrub, rock, and everything in between. We passed a small oasis and I pinged the location with my communicator, sending the data back to Aristine for future use. Every spring was a potential town, and every town would push the borders of civilization a little farther out into the Empty.
In thirty minutes, the smoke was fading but getting close enough that we could smell it. “Here,” I said. The lizards halted, and I jumped down, motioning that Lyman should follow. Tegan slid to the ground like she was born in the lizard’s saddle, and flecks of ash began to dot the air around us. Whatever was happening, it was on the other side of a ravine, covered with twisted scrub and a pair of massive cedar trees leaning toward each other like old friends.
Future Unleashed Page 5
