The Reluctant Adventures of Fletcher Connolly on the Interstellar Railroad Vol. 3: Banjaxed Ceili Page 9

  “So it’s just like, what’s the use? They’re never going to trust me, so why should I even bother playing fair?”

  The droning of the insects thickens into a rumble. I glance up. The stubby rocket shape of a car passes overhead and circles in to land in the Flower Lake parking lot. The sunlight reflects off the paintwork, turning it colorless. What would it say on the side, anyway? THE XS GROUP in big bright lettering?

  “Imogen—”

  On the pier, Sam stands up and strolls away, a bundle of folded cloth over his arm. I immediately forget about the car.

  “SAM’S RUNNING AWAY WITH MY TROUSERS!”

  We swim back to the pier as fast as we can. In between gasping breaths, I tell Imogen that I’ve been watching Sam ever since we left Treetop. I’ve suspected that he would double-cross us if he got a chance, for what does he owe us really? Nothing. We’re the ones who invaded the Omega Centauri spur and indirectly caused his mother to get slung into jail. Why would he share the proceeds of the Gizmo with us if he had a chance to do otherwise? His friendly act is just that, an act. It means no more than his decision to dress up for the party as James Bond.

  “Jesus, the nerve of the man!” I explode, hauling myself up the steps of the pier. My legs are rubbery. “He even sat down and ate lunch before walking off with the loot!”

  As we hurry past the table where Sam was sitting, I see that he’s even left a fecking tip.

  He’s also left my shoes behind. I suppose they were too big for him.

  I go back and put them on, while Imogen dances with impatience. “Where’s he gone?”

  “The Lamborghini, of course.”

  “He hasn’t got the keys!”

  “Those were in my trousers, too.”

  We blow through the foyer. There’s no one there. That strikes me as a bad sign.

  I push open the door to the parking lot.

  Crack!

  A single gunshot echoes across the parking lot, and the glass door bows out and hits me in the face.

  CHAPTER 12

  I sit down hard on the foyer floor. The door bends and flexes as bullets hit the glass and bounce off. It’s not breaking, because it’s not glass, it’s some amazing A-tech stuff that absorbs kinetic energy.

  “Your nose is bleeding!” Imogen says.

  “Thank feck that’s all that’s bleeding.” I glance around the foyer. We’re still alone, and no wonder. Someone’s just opened up on the hotel with a machine-gun.

  I’d be hiding too if the Gizmo weren’t somewhere out there.

  I wipe blood off my upper lip with the back of my hand. Imogen shrugs her shirt on over her swimsuit, jams her feet into her shoes. “Who’s shooting?” she hisses, during a lull.

  “Sam didn’t have a gun, so that leaves Maude. The manager must have rung her to say the Lamborghini turned up in the possession of three fake aristocrats.”

  I crawl up to the door and push it a few inches open, keeping my head down. Warm air washes in. No more bullets come.

  “I’ll distract her. You stay out of sight. See if you can reach Sam. Don’t get hurt.”

  Imogen nods, determination in her eyes.

  Then she stands up. As she steps over me, she reaches down and squeezes my shoulder.

  She walks out of the door.

  “Maude!” Her voice is clear and confident. “Hey girl, it’s me!”

  I lie unmoving for a second, stunned. A demonic thought whispers to me that she’s changed sides. Walking across the parking lot, singing out Maude’s name, she’s hopping from our wrecked gravy train to a better, high-speed, corporate model—just as she did on the Lost Planet.

  But then I remember the way she squeezed my shoulder.

  And I start to crawl.

  There’s a hedge of giant petals along the back of the hotel building. They grow seamlessly out of the cactus, with prickly sepals at their bases. I crawl behind these to the corner of the fence. A row of cars are parked with their noses to the fence. The Lamborghini, I recall, is at the end of this row. The first car’s a Porsche. The clients of this place are really well-heeled. I remember the nice Australian ladies I met swimming—why do they put up with gunfire erupting here, there, and everywhere? The answer comes with the next beat of my racing heart. Because this is Arnold, not Earth. This is how it’s always been on the frontier. Now the rot’s creeping inwards, and everyone’s getting used to it.

  I crawl under the Porsche and peek out between the rear wheels.

  Imogen stands in the middle of the parking lot, looking around.

  In the silence, I hear the droplets of blood from my nose splashing onto the cactus.

  “Wow. Hey there,” says Maude, not her real name.

  Imogen jumps.

  Maude walks out from behind a bus on the other side of the parking lot. She’s dressed in green camouflage, carrying an assault rifle with a fancy scope. “Imogen, wasn’t it? Last seen shooting my partner in the face.”

  “Yeah, so that went really badly,” Imogen says. Her voice shakes. “But I do want to say I’m sorry. That was way out of line.”

  Maude laughs, dryly. “Oh hey, don’t worry about it. He was a loser. It was his fault those retards stole the A-tech thingy; he wasn’t watching them like he should’ve been.”

  “Gotcha,” Imogen says uncertainly. “Do you want it back? The A-tech thingy.” She holds it out.

  Maude laughs. She comes up to Imogen, takes the artefact from her hands, and gently arranges it on top of Imogen’s wet hair like a tiara. “You keep it. It’s falling to pieces, anyway.”

  Imogen touches the wires, looking devastated.

  “I was just looking for those other asshats who were with you.” Maude raises her gun to her shoulder and scans the parking lot through the scope. The way she moves gives me chills—that grace, those reflexes. They say stackers have genetically diverged from humanity. Watching Maude, I believe it. “I got one of them,” she says carelessly. “The other one, I dunno, have you seen him?”

  She’s killed Sam?!?

  I flinch deeper into the Porsche’s shadow. When Maude turns the other way, I crawl across the strip of sunlight between the Porsche and the next car. Crawl, crawl, rest in the shadow of a chemical-smelling undercarriage. Crawl, crawl, rest.

  “I don’t know where they are,” Imogen says, with an edge of panic in her voice.

  “Oh, because you’re just a taxi driver. Riiiight.” Maude pauses, her head cocked on one side. “Didn’t you say you work for the Bratva?”

  “Maybe not anymore,” Imogen mumbles.

  “That’s a shame. If you did work for the Bratva, we’d be on the same side. Kind of.”

  “How come?”

  “They’re subcontractors for Big Tech. I am, too.”

  “I thought the XS Group was hired sales muscle,” Imogen says, resisting the horrible truth that now unfolds itself within my mind.

  “Well, yeah,” Maude says. “And who do you think hire us? Big Tech. There isn’t anyone else to work for in this fucking galaxy.”

  “There’s Wall Street,” Imogen says bleakly.

  “Oh, sure. I did that for about five minutes. Then I went where the real money is.”

  Poor Ruby, and he thought that if he wanted to make real money, he had to join the pirates.

  Maude paces, sweeping each side of the parking lot with her rifle. I can see the tension in her shoulders. Whatever it is in her that makes her snap, it’s building.

  “So the King invites us to his party,” I can hear her gritting her teeth as she talks, “which is like inviting yourself, but never mind. It’s not a party, anyway.”

  “It’s a trade show,” Imogen whispers.

  “Yep. The moveable feast of conspicuous consumption. Same faces, different planet every weekend. Ghost Train, whatever, there’s always some excuse. Don’t pity the one-percenters. They’re there to be sold on the next big thing. Last year it was force fields. This year it’s biomodding. OK, so it was the year of biomodding in 20
61, and every five years before that, but now the market is finally taking off. So this should be Flower Lake’s year, right? Right? And it totally would have been, if that little retard hadn’t smashed a fucking display case. And it’s all my fault, because I vetted them to go to the party. I played it safe, I only took one post-op freak, and he screws me over. Fucking classic.”

  Imogen speaks. Her voice is stronger. The flame of outrage has been lit. “Don’t you think it’s unethical for Big Tech to sanction this shit? I mean, people are playing with their lives here.”

  And Imogen doesn’t know the half of it, I think, lying with my face pressed to the ground. She wasn’t there when I got Ruby to tell me the truth about the surgery’s failure rate.

  I crawl on, flat on my belly. Only two cars to go to the Lamborghini, and I don’t know what I’m going to do when I get there, but it will be violent.

  Behind me, Imogen answers her own question. “It’s extremely unethical, and it’s also stupid. How much does the King make from patient fees? It’s gotta be chump change.”

  “You’re not thinking big enough,” Maude says dryly. “This is a research project that will unlock the mysteries of Krell technology to create a better future for humanity. So, not stupid. Unethical, however? Yep. Absolutely. And that’s why I’m going to kill you.”

  I freeze at these words. I can’t see Imogen, but she must have frozen, too, because the next thing I hear is Maude’s laughter.

  “You think I’m kidding, don’t you?”

  “I think there’s a normal woman hiding behind the gun and the attitude,” Imogen says in a brave, shaky voice. “I’ve met her. She was cool. She likes Broadway musicals and vintage fashion.”

  The Lamborghini’s bumper pokes into the petals, bending them over. I didn’t park it very well. I slide up over the bumper, brace my hands on the bonnet—

  —and stare into a hole where the windscreen used to be.

  All the windows are gone, the seats destroyed, memory-foam oozing out of rips in the leather upholstery. Maude’s shot it to crap.

  My mind races.

  That means the bullets that hit the hotel—

  —were fired by someone else.

  Ah, Fletch, you idjit. Of course they were. That was a machine-gun firing at the hotel. Maude’s rifle couldn’t do that—well, technically it could, but I can’t see her holding down the trigger in automatic mode and wildly spraying the hotel building. She’s more of the one shot, one kill type.

  I half-hear her and Imogen engaging in a brittle repartee. Imogen’s finally succeeded in distracting Maude from her lethal mission, if only for a few moments. Careful to make as little noise as possible, I haul myself over the bonnet and slide through the Lamborghini’s shattered windscreen. I land in a pile of safety glass fragments in the passenger seat. It’s not sharp-edged, it just feels like gravel.

  On the floor in the back, Sam lies in a pool of his own blood. He’s only wearing his borrowed swimsuit, and he looks so defenceless and young that I have to chew my lips to stay in control.

  I reach between the seats and pull my trousers out from under him. They’re soaked with blood. Pieces of safety glass roll off his chest. They land on the floor amid glittering brass …

  … shell casings?

  Fact o’ God, I didn’t even notice until now that there’s a hatch open in the roof of the Lamborghini, and a belt of ammunition hanging down through it, glinting in the sunshine.

  So that’s what that queer box behind the back seats was.

  It’s now a mini Gatling gun sticking up through the roof between two half-moon shield panels.

  The owners of Lamborghinis, after all, can afford to have them customized.

  Right. We’re in business now. Maude, not her real name, is going to regret the day she tangled with Baron Short of Pervée.

  I start to crawl over Sam’s body on my hands and knees. His blood is sticky on my bare legs. She’ll fecking pay for this …

  Sam opens his eyes.

  OH JESUS!

  I swallow a shout of astonishment.

  Sam struggles to sit up, grimacing, clamping one hand to the bullet wound in his neck that killed him, but didn’t kill him, but should have killed him if this is still the same world I woke up in this morning. I hold him down, trying to communicate with my eyes alone that he’s got to be quiet.

  That’s when I notice the Gizmo buried an inch deep in his stomach.

  I pull it out. It’s not acquisitiveness, just instinct. When you see a five-inch nail stuck in somebody, you pull it out.

  It leaves no puncture wound behind.

  The Gizmo works. It fecking works! “Rejuvenation? More like resurrection,” I breathe in disbelief. Although he can’t actually have died, or he wouldn’t have been able to stick it in himself.

  That’s how you’re supposed to use it, according to the rumors. Just like an injection with a very big needle.

  Sam reaches for the Gizmo—proving that his brush with death hasn’t affected his wits or his agenda. I swiftly stick it down my Speedos.

  What? I don’t have anywhere else to put it.

  I wedge it in there with the point facing up, believe me.

  Rolling clear of Sam, I land in the far back. My underpants are lying on the floor. I take the Gizmo out and wrap it up in them, then return the whole bundle to its place—that feels a bit less perilous.

  I’m on a turntable that’ll allow the Gatling gun to rotate 360°. I poke my head up through the hatch in the roof and peek around one of the vertical shield panels

  Imogen and Maude are standing in the middle of the parking lot, giving out to each other. It sounds like the finals of a victimhood tournament, each one loudly trying to make out that she is more to be pitied. I can’t do anything until Imogen gets out of the way. I finger the ammo strip hanging over the side of the feed tray, hoping it’s not jammed.

  “Mom,” Sam says at my feet. His voice is loud and slurred—he’s not fully conscious, after all. “I’m coming. Wait for me. Don’t die, OK, Mom? Hold on until I get there.”

  “Shut the feck up!” I yelp, appalled.

  But it’s too late.

  Maude spins around to face the Lamborghini.

  I fumble in panic with the Gatling gun.

  All in the same motion—those reflexes!—Maude drops her rifle and seizes Imogen in a chokehold. As if by magic her handgun appears. It’s the same one she threatened us with in the taxi. Once again it’s pressed against Imogen’s head, and this time I have no doubt she will shoot.

  CHAPTER 13

  Maude grinds her gun against Imogen’s head. “Get out of the car with your hands up!” she screams. “I’m gonna count to five, asshole! Five … four …”

  If I do as she says she’ll kill Imogen anyway, and me as well. I stand up, aim at the bus on the other side of the parking lot, and squeeze off a burst from the mini Gatling gun.

  Jesus, this thing chews through the ammo! The belt’s half gone by the time my finger comes off the trigger. Hot casings bounce off my bare shins.

  Bullet holes decorate the bus but Maude hasn’t moved an inch. Right. That didn’t work.

  “This swimsuit really isn’t your color,” she says to Imogen. Her voice is a treacly coo. It’s worse than if she were still screaming. “A touch of red might improve it. And gray. I love the combination of red and gray.”

  Imogen starts to cry. How hard she tried to get through to Maude, and how completely useless it was. Welcome to my world, Ms. Kincaid.

  A loud robotic voice says, “Enough of this bullshit,” and I jump out of my skin, because for a minute there it felt like time had stopped and nothing was ever going to happen again, apart from Imogen crying and me feeling helpless.

  “Drop your gun and walk away from her,” the same voice says. “Actually, drop both of your guns. And all the other weapons you’ve probably got hidden in that G.I. Jane outfit.”

  A small black sphere rises over the roof of the hotel. It’s a high-en
d security drone. For a crazy minute I hope it belongs to Finian. Maybe a truck-mounted rocket launcher wasn’t the only technology he brought along to extend his range.

  But, no. On the side of the drone it says FLOWER LAKE HEALTH & BEAUTY RESORT.

  The drone has a bloody great gun sticking out of the side of it.

  It zips out over the parking lot and points its gun at Maude.

  Maude frowns up at the drone. She’s standing in the circular pool of shade it casts. Imogen backs away slowly. “Who’s operating this thing?” Maude says to the drone.

  “The trouble with being a stacker,” says the drone, “is that your automatic assumption of superiority can sometimes lead you astray.”

  It’s Ruby operating the drone! Good old Ruby!

  “Oh, you must be that ex-stacker who just got hired in the custodial division,” Maude says. “Yeah, actually, I did make a note of you. And guess what? You’re fired.”

  She raises her rifle and opens up on the drone.

  “Imogen!” I shout. “Over here!”

  Her head jerks around. She dashes between the parked cars. Maude whirls. I pull the trigger of the Gatling gun again. The noise is frightful, a buzzing bass drone that eats my ears from the inside. I destroy the bodywork of several cars but I don’t hit Maude. She runs across the parking lot, pursued by the drone. Pieces of cactus gout up at her heels. Ruby’s aim is terrible, too. Or more likely, he’s just not used to operating the drone. He must have sneaked into the security office when he realized what was going on. He’s sacrificed his job and quite possibly his freedom to save our lives. I take back every insulting thing I’ve ever thought or said about him.

  Imogen dives through the windcsreen into the driver’s seat of the Lamborghini. She feverishly brushes glass onto the floor and starts the engine. I’m trying to feed another belt of ammo into the mini Gatling. All this technology we’re not used to. It doesn’t even have to be A-tech to have a bloody steep learning curve. When I have my own planet there’ll be no tech on it at all, apart from my spaceship and my television. Imogen’s still got the Krell artefact stuck in her hair.