Back | Next
Contents

Chapter 7

Finding the Reverend Pard Jar hadn't been very difficult. Especially since the on-board computer came complete with a schedule of all the Reverend's appointments, and the programmed flight plan would take them right to him.

It was really a no-brainer. Pard Jar held a revival meeting, got a bunch of converts, then shipped them off to the planet before they had a chance to realize how stupid everything he said was and change their minds. Van Gar pretended like he'd known this all along, because he just felt too stupid that it hadn't actually dawned on him until he looked at the travel log.

After they had cleaned up in the flight crew's quarters and fought over who got to wear the crew's clothing, Van Gar and his recruits, for the most part, blended right in with the rest of the Chitzsky mob that had surrounded Pard Jar in the middle of the station.

He listened to Pard Jar spout his drivel and let it feed his already large stock of righteous anger. Shreta nudged him.

"You can stop kicking yourself now. I'm listening to him and wondering how any of us could have bought what sounds now like a three-day dirty Chitzsky smells," Shreta said in a whisper at his shoulder.

Van Gar turned to her, baring his teeth in an evil grin."I wasn't kicking myself. I was thinking of the many and varied ways I am going to kick his ass."

'. . . A man looks at a mountain. It is very tall, but he will climb it one step at a time," Pard Jar said.

"Why?" Van Gar yelled out.

"What, my brother?" Pard Jar asked.

"Why does he want to climb the mountain?" Van Gar screamed back.

"Because it's there, my brother," Pard Jar said with a smile."Every great journey starts with a single step . . ."

"Isn't that sort of stupid? I mean, why climb a mountain if there's nothing at the top? Now if there was a really great bar up there, or a strip club, it might be worth the trip."

Pard Jar painted on a patronizing smile before he went on as if Van Gar hadn't interrupted him."So, we as a people put our first steps upon our new homeland. Through our hard work and our conviction our world shall bloom, one step at a time, one dream at a time. We are all our own power, we feel and are felt, heal and are healed, love and are loved . . ."

"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?" Van Gar asked with a laugh."Let me get this straight. You're like this superior enlightened dude, and you can't say anything more relevant than vague shit like, We are all our own power. We feel and are felt, heal and are healed, love and are loved."

He'd finally managed to rub the Reverend's fur the wrong way."Perhaps, my brother, this is not the path for you."

"Got news for you, Jack, this ain't the path for anyone. See, me and my friends bought your pretty line of bullshit. We've been to your promised land, and we feel like you screwed us out of our shit. Healing . . . that's what you're going to need after we get done beating you to a bloody pulp. And love, well we'd simply love to shove your crappy home planet right up your lying, cheating, thieving ass."

Pard Jar and his two "assistants" tried to make a run for it, and Van Gar's people—who had been positioned strategically close to the "Pride Leader"—grabbed them. No one in the crowd moved to help the good Reverend. In fact, they had started growling and screaming profanities at him.

Whatever spell he'd held them with had been broken, and he had instantly gone from the dimpled savior of their race to the scourge of their universe in a few short seconds.

After a few gratifying moments of them begging, pleading, and denying any knowledge of what evil Pard Jar was involved with, Van Gar decided to release the two assistants, even though he was pretty sure they were full of shit concerning their lack of involvement. He didn't want any distractions. Van Gar wanted to focus all his anger and energy on the self-proclaimed "Pride Leader."

Van Gar grabbed Pard Jar by the short hairs on the back of his neck and started dragging him back towards the ship, stopping every few feet to kick the good Reverend in the ass with his heavily booted foot."You are going to give us all of our shit back, and if you do that, I might just let you live. With a heavy emphasis on might."

"My brother, all of that money has gone back into the colony," Pard Jar cried.

"Hey! Dumb fuck!" Van Gar stopped long enough to haul Pard Jar to his feet. He knocked on Pard Jar's head with his fist."Is anyone home in there? We've all been to the colony, remember? And we've seen the ship's manifests. Not only have you got all the shit you took from us and others like us, but that stupid shitty rock we've all been hauling around is actually worth some fucking money to the Yorgites, who apparently need a mineral in the rocks as a food additive. We want all that money, too. Since we hauled all the rock, it seems only fair."

Security ran in from all directions, saw what was going on, threw up their hands to show they had no intention of interfering, and then quickly ran away again. There was no way they were going to take on an angry mob of Chitzskies, especially when they seemed content to torture one of their own.

 

Drewcila and her entourage walked to the nearest safe haven, a bar. It took the clientele a minute to realize who had walked into their space, but when they did, the bowing and scraping started.

"Get up, guys," Drew said as Arcadia and Facto helped her sit in a chair close to the bar."Listen, dudes, the shit has hit the fan up at the palace, and I need your help."

"Anything, my queen," the bartender said with a bow.

"I need a vehicle large enough to carry me, my two ambassadors, my councilor, and my sister."

"You can use mine," the bartender said, wading forward and putting the keys into Dylan's outstretched hand.

"I need someone to take Margot and Jurak to the nearest TV station. The people must be warned about the coup."

"I'll do it," a client said, stepping forward.

"I need your loyalty now more than ever, and I desperately need a beer," Drew said.

"Our loyalty to the queen forever!" The patrons of the bar said in unison, as the bartender opened a bottle quickly and started to pour it into a glass. Drewcila shook her head, and he handed her the bottle.

"Ah, you guys are the best," Drewcila said with a smile."I knew you'd come through for me."

"My queen, if I may . . . What has happened?"

"The nobility . . . isn't it always those assholes?" Drew took a long swig of the beer. While she was trying to keep her stomach from slinging the offering out at a high rate of speed, the patrons of the bar and the bartender all mumbled their agreement that the nobility were indeed a lot of assholes. As soon as she was sure she wasn't going to hurl, she continued."They tried to kill me with poison. They shot the king. We barely escaped with our lives."

Stasha opened her mouth to knock holes in her sister's story, and Drew shot her a look which was backed up by Dylan's hand on her elbow.

Drew set her beer down without finishing it, and got shakily to her feet. Arcadia moved quickly to steady her, and Drew looked at her with a smile."You just want to touch me, don't you?"

"That was never a question," Arcadia answered.

"I'd love to sit and chat with you, but we're awful busy. You know, saving the country, and little shit like that. Thanks for all your help, you will be adequately repaid for your service to the crown. Drinks are on me, I believe we have a fund for such things."

They started to leave, Margot and Jurak going with their ride and their instructions, as the bartender showed the queen and her entourage to his car. Behind them the bar yelled out choruses of "Long live the queen!"

Drew looked up and saw Jurak and Margot walking the other way. Jurak still had his silly hat—a rainbow colored beret—on his head.

"Wait!" Drew screamed, stopping short."Jurak, come here."

Jurak trotted over happily, thinking that perhaps he was after all important to her mission. He was feeling a little left out, and wasn't enjoying at all being treated as a common errand boy. Surely the woman could do this job without his help. His rightful place was at the queen's side.

"My queen?" he said.

"Give me that hat. I think I need it more than you do," Drew said.

Jurak looked dejected, and reluctantly pulled the hat from his head and handed it to Drew, who put it in her pocket.

"What's with the hat?" Facto asked as he watched the young man walk away with his shoulders slumped.

"I'm afraid it's over your head."

 

They had tied Pard Jar to a chair with self bonding duct tape.

Van Gar had let him stew there and think about what they were going to do to him for several hours. Now he paced back and forth in front of Pard Jar, a look of concentration on his face, the neck of a beer bottle in one hand and a cigar in the other. Except for Shreta, who he still didn't seem to be able to shake, the other Chitzskies were making up for lost time spending the large amount of cash they'd found in the good Reverend's hotel room on the space station to buy food and booze and anything else money could buy.

Pard Jar looked at him, tears running down his face and matting his fur."I swear to you, brother, I did none of this for my own personal gain. There is no other money! All of the money has gone to buy things for the colony and to pay for the use of the ships, for food and . . ."

"Before you go on lying out your ass, I think it's only fair I tell you that I've spent the last few hours thinking of different ways of torturing the information out of you . . ."

"Brother, what was in my room . . . That was all the money that there is, and . . ."

Van Gar stopped in front of him and stuck his cigar to the fur of Pard Jar's face, holding it there in spite of the man's thrashing until it had burned through his fur and into his flesh.

"You crazy son of a bitch!" Pard Jar screamed in pain.

Van Gar removed the cigar and took an experimental puff off it. He smiled appreciatively and took a longer drag before he spoke."Let me explain something to you. I am Van Gar, and before a moment of insanity in which I actually bought the line of crap you were selling, I was a salvager. Not just any salvager, I worked with Drewcila Qwah, I was her right hand man. In fact, I gave you one of the bitch queen's ships, and here's the thing, see? I can't go back to Drew without that ship, and if I don't get to go back to Drew soon, I'm going to get very, very cranky. I have seen the shipping manifests. You've made a small fortune off the damn rock. More than enough to buy a gazillion recycled domes. You haven't used even one ninetieth of what you've taken in on that one project alone. So you can quit wasting my time, and your breath, lying to me. I want all the money—every last cent of it. And I want my ship back, and I want it now."

"I'm telling you . . ."

Van Gar bent over, putting his face right in Pard Jar's and growled, "You better tell me what I want to hear, or I'm going to wrap my rather large fist in barbed wire and shove it up your ass!" he straightened."And that's just for starters."

Pard Jar wet his pants, giving Van Gar a whole new smell to hate."Your ship's at the end of the docks," he sobbed.

"Do I look like an idiot? I know you must have sold the ship by now and pocketed the money."

"No, I swear. It was so much better than my ship. Besides . . . have you ever tried to sell a Qwah ship? Why is everyone so afraid of your boss, anyway?"

"Because she's very rich, very powerful, and completely crazy. And she's not my boss, she's my . . . girlfriend," Van Gar growled angrily.

"Oh."

"And the money?"

"That's another reason I kept the ship." He sobbed louder."It had room for the big safe I wanted."

"You mean . . . the money's on the ship?"

Pard Jar nodded.

"All of it?" Van Gar asked in disbelief.

"Hey!" Pard Jar defended."When you're scamming your own people out of all their money, and sticking them on a stinking hole of a planet, you know there's a good chance someone's going to get pissed off and come after you. And when they do . . . Well, you want the iggys with you, don't you? Besides, if I had put the money in a bank, even several banks, someone would have figured out what I was really doing long before now. Damn! I can't believe this shit. I should have quit long ago, but no! I had to get greedy. I kept thinking, just one more space station, what could it hurt? I mean, I've been doing this shit for two fucking years! I kept deciding it was time to stop, and I'd almost do it, and then I'd remember just how God damn dumb our people are. Then when the bastards just kept mining the rock, trying to actually terraform that piss hole, and I found out that some other idiots would pay a small fortune for worthless rock . . . Well, it was just so damn easy, wasn't it?"

"And being every bit as stupid as the rest of us, you just didn't know how to quit when you were ahead," Van Gar snarled. He would have liked to argue with the bastard on behalf of their race, except that it was something he had just recently learned himself.

"What now?" Shreta asked.

"We take the Pride Leader down the dock and see if he's telling the truth. If he isn't, we buy a roll of barbed wire."

 

As they rattled down the road in the bartender's kindly offered, if slightly dilapidated, vehicle, Drew suddenly lurched over Dylan, slinging the top part of her body out the window. Dylan quickly grabbed onto and held the belt of her pants. Drew heaved violently, threw up the beer, and then threw up things that she was pretty sure she hadn't finished using yet.

She crawled back in the window looking pale, and wiped the puke and spittle from her face on the sleeve of Dylan's shirt.

"God damn it Drew!" Dylan yelled, and Arcadia jetted her head across Drew to bare her teeth at him and hiss, making him jump."I should have sat up front with the really stiff guy and the hot chick," he mumbled.

"She shouldn't still be sick," Arcadia said in a worried voice.

"Maybe it's guilt," Stasha twisted in her seat to give Drewcila a heated look.

"Oh, I doubt that," Arcadia said simply.

"It's that rich fuck doctor," Drew said sickly."He didn't give me the antidote. He probably gave me some damn placebo."

"Or more poison," Dylan said.

Facto suddenly turned the vehicle around.

"What are you doing, Facto?" Drew ordered.

"Taking you to the hospital."

"He wouldn't have poisoned me," Drew said."Go on to Hepron, I can get medical aid there."

"NO!" Facto yelled firmly."As much as it pains me to say this, you are our country's only hope now, and we can't afford to take chances with your health . . ."

"Damn it, Fatroad . . ." she jumped back over Dylan and threw up again.

"Take us to the hospital." Arcadia said.

It was decided that Facto and Drew would enter the hospital alone, hoping to draw as little attention to themselves as possible, while the others waited in the vehicle.

The emergency room crew recognized Drew at once, and when she fed them her bull shit story, they immediately started to treat her. A tox screen determined that there was no way the doctor had given Drew the antidote.

"See, my people, how none of the nobles are to be trusted? How even a doctor trained in the ways of healing will take a hand at killing the queen to stop equality? Why, you're a doctor, can you believe that one of your own profession could do such a thing?"

"No, my queen," he said stiffly.

"Tell you what, doc. You look like a busy guy. Lots of sick people in here and shit. It's a simple shot, one of the nurses can do it . . ."

"My queen, it's not a problem, but an honor . . ."

"To see my butt? You bet it is, but seriously, one of the nurses can do this. I'm sure you have lots more important things to do than to stick me in the ass."

"As you wish, my queen." He bowed and left, obviously in a huff.

The nurse smiled a knowing smile and went off to get the antidote. Nurses had done very well under the laws of the new queen, and their loyalty had therefore been bought and paid for. Drewcila Qwah was no one's fool.

They were almost out of the hospital when the screen in the emergency room waiting area lit up with a news flash. It was that weasel Atario, and he was shedding big crocodile tears.

"The queen has assassinated the king . . ."

Drew didn't wait to hear more."Let's get the hell out of here," she whispered. Facto was more or less carrying her, and he doubled his pace. Outside the hospital he asked in an angry whisper.

"Did you kill Zarco?"

"I most certainly did not," Drew said with righteous indignation."I shot him, but I didn't kill him. No doubt that snake Atario did it. Damn! I should have seen that one coming."

"Drewcila Qwah, I know you, and if I have learned nothing else I have learned that most of the time when your lips are moving you're lying. Now you and your two alien cohorts . . ."

"I have co-whores?" Drew asked with a smile.

"I said cohorts . . ."

"Whatever the hell those are."

"The lizard woman and Jurak . . ."

"He's Barion . . ."

"But he works for you . . . Damn it, Drewcila." He stopped short, grabbed her chin and forced her to look at him."Did you wait till Stasha couldn't see and then kill Zarco . . ."

"Damn! Now why didn't I think of that?"

"Did you, Drew?"

She looked him in his eyes without blinking."No, I did not. Am I sad he's dead? No. Would I have killed him to avenge the death of my friend and make my life easier? You bet your sweet ass. But my sister begged me not to, so I didn't."

Arcadia was suddenly running up the sidewalk towards them, Dylan not far behind her. Their lasers were pulled, and when Drew turned around to see why, she saw two large security guards coming down the sidewalk after them. However they quickly dropped their weapons and threw up their hands when they saw the two armed aliens, proving—at least in Drew's mind—that their hearts weren't really in it. Arcadia took hold of one of Drew's arms, Facto had the other, and Dylan watched their backs as they made a run for the vehicle. Arcadia pulled Drew in the back seat with her. Dylan gently but quickly shoved Facto towards the back seat as he took the driver's seat. He started the beast and took off at a high rate of speed as two police cars came roaring up the driveway towards them. He expertly maneuvered the vehicle around them and through the parking lot filled with miscellaneous vehicles, barely making it out the main entrance before two more police vehicles rolled in. He punched it, and was pleasantly surprised to find that there was so much life left in the old girl. As he drove like a mad man, avoiding the police cars that seemed to materialize from nowhere, he leaned towards Stasha, "So, babe, you have got to be getting tired, because you've been running through my mind all day."

 

Atario looked with total disdain at the report that filled his screen, then back at the doctor.

"She has managed to slip through our hands. It's as if she simply vanished . . . You say you didn't give her the antidote?" Atario asked with a hint of disbelief.

"No, sir," Dr Sortas reported.

"It doesn't appear to have slowed her down any."

"With all due respect, Chancellor, she had thrown virtually all the poison up, so it wouldn't have done any real damage anyway," The doctor smiled a wicked smile then."I didn't want to actually kill the trollop, just teach her a lesson. I am a physician after all . . ."

"If you had a doctor's ethics, you would have treated your patient. As long as you didn't, you should have given her a lethal dose of something and saved us all the headache of having to deal with Drewcila Qwah . . ."

The doctor feigned being shocked."She is our queen!"

"She killed the king!"

The doctor glared at Atario."Now, I doubt that seriously. Remember that I was in the hallway just outside the door waiting to tend any wounds the king might have. I heard the confrontation between the king and the queen just as you did, and I know that she did indeed shoot him, but that the blast was not fatal. I saw the injuries. I did an autopsy on the body. Blasters leave a signature mark, and there are two very different signatures on his wounds. Now the blaster that Drewcila was carrying was rather large. That would match the wound I found on his leg, but not the other one. So as you can see, I have no reason to believe that she shot him in the head." He looked right at Atario then."After all, an execution style killing? Well, that hardly seems our good queen's style, does it?"

"One of her thugs, then . . ."

The doctor smiled and shook his head."No, that doesn't make sense, either. They had apparently been on the castle grounds all this time. If their intention was to kill Zarco, they could have done it at any time . . ."

"Just why did you request this meeting?" Atario asked raising his eyebrows.

"I think we both know. And we also both know that I can easily prove when I have finished the autopsy who actually fired the blast that killed our good king . . ."

Atario smiled widely then."You must have a price, or you would have gone to the press instead of coming to me."

"Before you decide it would be easier to kill me as well, I think it's only fair I tell you that I have sent my findings and conclusions off as a closed attachment to my attorney with the instructions to forward it to the nearest news agency upon my death. Further, you should know that I do not condone what you have done."

The smile faded from Atario's face."Just tell me what it is you want."

"Since there is no bringing Zarco back, what I desire is a piece of the action. With the nobility firmly behind you, and without Drewcila Qwah to stop you, I have no doubt you will be our new king. As such, you will have the power to make me your chancellor. I want power and position. I want to get back everything I had before that dubious whore stole it away from me . . . and then some."

Atario smiled again."Ambitious and ruthless, a man after my own heart. I can use someone like you working for me . . . Chancellor."

 

Even with Dylan's skill as a driver, they had barely made it out of Capital without being captured, and the vehicle had taken considerable damage when one of Dylan's maneuvers forced it into a fight with the side of a building. The vehicle lost rather badly, and it was now losing power and making an unhealthy wheezing noise. Dylan knew pursuit couldn't be far behind them, so he pulled off the road and into some bushes where the car sputtered and died.

"Beautiful, fucking beautiful!" Drewcila groaned, then leaned out the window and threw up again.

"I can't believe that Zarco would call the entire army down upon our heads," Stasha said, and then turned to glare at what to her dismay turned out to be Drew's ass. She continued anyway."But, oh wait . . . YOU TRIED TO KILL HIM!"

Dylan noticed that Facto was very quiet, and catalogued the fact somewhere in the back of his mind. Drew crawled back in the window and glared back at her sister while wiping vomit off her mouth onto her sleeve, which made Dylan have to swallow hard to keep from hurling himself. There was something about seeing a beautiful woman puke that almost, but not quite, had him thinking about something other than his perpetual stiffy. It had been entirely too long since he'd had sex—at least a week!—and he was more than certain that he could bed Drew's sister. Now what was her name again?

"Get off my back, Stasha!" Drew growled.

Oh, yeah, that was her name. Chicks liked it when you remembered their name.

"We're all a little uptight right now, Stasha," Dylan said putting a hand on her shoulder and gently kneading her flesh. She didn't jerk away, so he kept doing it until she finally did move away, turning towards her sister again.

"None of this would have happened if you hadn't come back in the first place," Stasha started to cry then, burying her face in her hands.

"No, the country would have collapsed in economic ruin. There would have been a war between the classes, and if you didn't all get killed in that, you most assuredly would have been killed when the Lockhedes jumped on the dilapidated condition of the kingdom and took over. And now it's going to happen anyway unless we can get to Hepron Station, which isn't going to be very easy with the whole of the Barion army and police force trying to frag our asses, not to mention the broken vehicle. So, if you'll excuse the hell out of me, in between bouts of puking up what's left of my internal organs, I'd like to spend my time trying to formulate a plan out of this mess instead of fighting with you about shooting Zarco. Who, by the way, IS THE REASON WE'RE IN THIS MESS IN THE FIRST PLACE!"

Tired from the exertion of yelling at her sibling, Drew flopped back in the seat. Her color was almost nonexistent, and she was sweating, which considering it was actually a little cold in the car wasn't a good sign.

Dylan smiled broadly at Stasha and opened the vehicle door."I'm going to get out and have a look around, want to go with me?"

"I'd do practically anything to get away from her," Stasha hissed.

"Fine!" Drew retorted.

"Fine!" Stasha hollered back and followed Dylan out of the vehicle. He walked carefully towards the road they had come from, then stood in the shadow of a tree and watched. When he was sure it was clear, he grabbed a tree limb and started towards the road.

"Tell me if you hear or see a vehicle."

Stasha nodded silently. Dylan went down towards the road and tried to wipe out their tracks by rubbing them with the limb. It wasn't working very well because a recent rain had left the ground muddy, and they had left huge ruts which weren't going to be covered by rubbing a weak branch that kept snapping and breaking over the trail.

"I hear something," Stasha warned.

Dylan threw his branch onto the ruts in hopes of obscuring at least part of the trail, and then ran up into hiding, successfully reaching the tree line and Stasha just as first a civilian vehicle and then an armored troop carrier went roaring past. They had brought out the big guns, and no doubt the high tech shit. So even though these stupid bastards rolled right past the obvious damage, it couldn't be long till they found their trail now.

"Come on, we've got to get moving." Dylan grabbed Stasha's arm and started dragging her along back towards the vehicle."God, I hate all this outdoors shit. Look at the glop sticking to my boots, and my hands are covered in shmutz . . ."

"Do you trust her?" Stasha asked in a small voice. Dylan didn't stop.

"Who?" he asked.

"Drewcila Qwah, my sister. Do you trust her?"

"Of course I do. Drew's a good friend, a loyal friend . . . mostly. So she slept with your boyfriend. Big f'in deal. You act like she did it to hurt your feelings, and she didn't. It probably didn't even occur to her that you'd care. She did it to try to get control of Zarco. Salvagers . . . Well, we just don't live by the same stupid rules that the rest of you do. And Drewcila, well she's the Queen of the Salvagers, ain't she?"

They had reached the vehicle. Arcadia got out and walked over to him.

"Well?"

"We've left a trail a blind monkey could follow, and they've sent out armored transports to look for us. We'll have to get moving."

Arcadia nodded, stuck her head into the air and sniffed, turning as she did so."I smell civilization this way." She pointed, then reached in the open vehicle door and dragged Drewcila, who was mumbling incoherently and limp as a rag, out of the car, and promptly dropped her. Drew's head hit the car door.

"Ow!" She rubbed at her head.

"Oh, baby . . . I'm so sorry," Arcadia said as she and Dylan lifted her up off the ground.

"Key-rist! It's like she has no bones in her body," Dylan whispered to Arcadia, who nodded.

Facto got out of the vehicle and started talking."We'll have to make some sort of carrying . . ."

Arcadia easily tossed the limp, mumbling woman over her shoulder and then started all but running in the direction she had pointed earlier.

Dylan motioned with his head that they should follow her, saying with a smile."Valtarian lizard people are very strong . . . and fast. We'll have to run to keep up." He grabbed Stasha's hand."I'll help you."

 

They were only able to catch up with Arcadia because she stopped to sniff the air again.

Dylan was out of breath and had a stitch in his side, so he knew the others had to be near to the dropping point.

"Arcadia . . . do you think you could slow down a little?"

"Drewcila . . . she's running a fever. It's almost dark. The temperature will drop . . ."

"How can you be sure she's running a fever?" Facto asked, not seeing how anything so alien could know anything about a Barion's physical condition.

For answer Arcadia swiveled so that Drew was even with Facto.

"I have a butt, you have a butt, we all have a butt. This is my butt, and I'll do what I like with it," Drewcila said, and then started laughing hysterically.

"Because she's been talking out of her head like that for over twenty minutes," Arcadia answered, turning back around to glare at Facto as if it was somehow his fault.

"Maybe we should stop and try to make a camp for the night. Build a fire," Facto suggested.

"You mean stay out here in . . . all this nature?" Dylan asked, pulling a face.

"Yes, it won't be comfortable, but . . ."

"No! Absolutely not! Are you mad!" Dylan yelled.

"He may be right, Dylan, we are probably still an hour away from the civilization I smelled, and who knows but that it might be hostile territory," Arcadia said thoughtfully."I grow very tired, and I can see that the rest of you aren't doing any better."

"We could make some sort of stretcher to carry Drew and help you," Dylan insisted."If you would just slow down we could make it."

"But even then there is no guarantee of help," Facto said."It would be better to get some rest and tackle it first thing in the morning when there is light, and we are rested."

"Arcadia can see in the dark," Dylan was now in a near panic."How much rest can we possibly get out here in the middle of nowhere with God only knows what sort of murderous animals and . . . and plants."

"We'll be fine Dylan, help me lay Drew down," Arcadia ordered. He did so reluctantly.

"We're laying her on the cold ground. That couldn't be good for her fever," Dylan insisted. Arcadia just smiled at him, knowing exactly why he was protesting. She rose to her feet and patted his shoulder in a comforting way.

"Don't worry. I wouldn't let anything happen to you, little brother."

Dylan nodded his head, resigned to spending yet another night in the great outdoors. The courtyard grounds had been bad enough, but out here there were no walls. Nothing but woods and trees and . . . other stuff, and it was all that other stuff that he wasn't quite sure of.

He was in hell.

Arcadia took off her jacket and lay it over Drew, then grabbed Dylan."Come on. Let's go get some wood."

Dylan nodded, resigned.

When they were out of ear shot of the others he said, "All right, I didn't want to say this in front of the chick, but," he continued in a whine, "I'm cold, I'm hungry, I'm thirsty, and I just want to have a nice hot bath, crawl into a warm bed with her ladyship, get my groove on, and get some real sleep."

"Help me get some wood, and I'll see what I can do about finding some water and getting some food."

Dylan groaned, "Oh, I don't even want to know what that means."

 

The wood was still damp, and even with Arcadia's wonderful camping skills and the help of a laser, it took them a good hour to get a real fire going. During this time Drewcila's fever had broken, and she had started to sweat again, so she pulled Arcadia's jacket around her and moved closer to the fire. Even if she had her senses back, she obviously still didn't feel like talking.

Arcadia knelt beside Drew and whispered something to her. Drew forced a smile and nodded, so she must be feeling better. Arcadia rose and went into the woods—no doubt to hunt. She came back with her blaster holster filled with water and some small fur-bearing creature impaled on one of the spikes of her tail. She handed the water to Drew first. She drank half of it and handed it to Dylan. Dylan looked at the water reluctantly. It was dirty looking, and he imagined Arcadia had gotten it from some mud puddle. Still, he knew all about the effects of dehydration, so he swallowed hard and took a drink. It didn't taste too bad, a little gritty but all and all palatable. Before he realized what he was doing he had greedily drunk the whole thing.

"Oops!" he said, looking with guilt at Stasha and Facto who were glaring at him.

"It's all right, there's more where that came from," Arcadia promised. She was using her knife to skin and gut the animal, something which none of the others seemed to be up to watching, much less doing. When she was done she put the animal on a stick and held it over the fire, telling Dylan "Hold it here, any closer and it will burn on the outside without cooking in the middle. Any further away and it will never get done. Turn it every few minutes."

Dylan nodded, taking the stick as he handed her his holster to fill as well. He sat down next to Drew.

"So, how you feeling?"

"Mostly stupid," Drew answered in a whisper."I had no idea it would make me this sick. And how could I not have known that eating poison was probably going to make me sick? I guess I really do believe that I'm something more than Barion. At least it looks like the water's going to stay down. Maybe if I can eat something and get it to stay down I'll start to feel humanoid again."

Dylan realized something then."Being out here . . . it doesn't bother you at all?"

"Honey, compared to other places I've been, this is a fucking picnic. Hell, Van Gar and I used to do this sort of thing just for fun."

"What happened with Van?" Dylan asked carefully.

"If I told you, you wouldn't believe me. Suffice it to say he thinks a little too much like my rather uptight little sister over there."

 

 

Back | Next
Framed