Marty heaved a sigh. “I don’t know, you’re the brain came up with the scheme.”
“Deidra?”
She winced, catching sight of what must be my swollen face and black eyes. “You look bad, Rusco.”
“Yeah, well, not all of us have good days.” I pointed to the holo index. “Time’s wasting.”
She consulted the grid, a 3D enclosed sphere of color and sound, showing a rotating image of a map and gridded layout with various installations. She pressed tabs on the color-coded menu. A computer voice narrated on. She gave a cluck of irritation and turned it off.
A list of registers came up, layover places, merchant retreats, repair shops, seedy guest houses, smoke shops and other dives.
“A couple of these look promising.” Her voice lacked enthusiasm. “The Midges’ Retreat, or wait, here’s a good one, The Traveler’s Depot—meals to go, underground hanger, extra charge. Every miner’s dream.”
I scowled. “Nah, don’t like any of them. Too conspicuous. Sharki’s scouts’ll make us in a second and report us.”
She sucked on her lower lip in glum reverie. “I wish that bastard had died down there. I’d feel a lot better.” Marty sat, nursing his wounds. I winced at the bruises and bloody scrapes all along his forearm.
Deidra brightened. “Wait, I know a place—outside town. It might work—an old quarry, adjoining Abashal’s mine. We can park this ship in the gully and leave for town on foot.”
I rubbed my chin. “Maybe, Deidra. Better…I like it more than the ‘Midges’ Retreat.”
She gave a sigh of defeat. “One of us has to stay back to guard the ship. Guess that’ll have to be me.”
I snorted. “No doubt you’d volunteer. The answer is no. I still don’t trust you. You’re coming with us. We all go in as a group.”
“What the hell? You’re a real hardass.” She threw up her hands. “I have a bad feeling about Tyrone. Already told you about Sharki’s plans for me.”
“Yeah, well me I have a bad feeling too,” said Marty. “Boo hoo. Suck it up.”
“We need flesh regen. Marty’s hurting. Also need to find a mechanic who can repair the warp. If Kragen had come through and fixed that too we wouldn’t be in this mess. I don’t trust just winging in with this giant. Guess we’ll be hitting Tyrone City after all.”
Marty set the coordinates for the quarry and Deidra flew us in. The quarry loomed up on our sights, a big open sore amongst the wide stretches of bogtree and endless pools of brackish water. We dipped down into the mammoth pit and found a spot along the bottom amongst the crags and pegmatite rock formations deep in the ravine, long quarried to death. We set Goliath back under a natural overhang that hid her from sight from the air. It was damp and humid, populated by creepy crawly things no doubt deeper within but we didn’t investigate. This place’d do for now.
Deidra wrinkled her nose in the muggy air. “Happy now? What’s next?”
I motioned her up the carved-out pit along an animal path. Climbing up out of the quarry was an onerous hike. Topside, we took the long slog through lowlands and bogs. We humped it up to Tyrone along the backroads, twelve miles or so into town.
We were running low on food...I had grabbed the last vacuum sealed packs from the ship and we gobbled them down as we walked. Unpalatable fare—freeze-dried mutton with synthetic potato. Food was food and beggars couldn’t be choosers. Better than going hungry, I thought. Only some wild firrits, roaming out of the mangroves in packs in curiosity, crossed our path. But their half-lizard hisses and dog-like barks drew out low-lying gators that came snapping at our heels. We did a frantic U-turn in a hell of hurry to outrun them. Some air cars and supply trucks passed, ignoring us. Ships raced across the lavender-green sky but these were too high to spot us as anything suspicious. Sharki’d be looking for a big ship which he wouldn’t find, if all went to plan, not some hitchhikers and straggler hobos humping it up the backroads out in the boondocks on their way to Tyrone.
Everything on this planet was weird. The spooky light, the queer animals, the creepy, stunted trees, the uncanny windless silence. The odd combo offered an enchanted beauty, one which I could not appreciate at the moment.
We made it to center town at dusk, a weary, disheveled bunch of misfits by the time we caught the last air tram. Narrow streets, puddles of rainwater, hustle and bustle, staring eyes, grifters, hustlers looking for marks. Glitter and chrome, wall to wall billboards and towers, although more rusted and less high than those seen on Gainor and Alphanor.
Night was upon us. Tyrone City lay like a reaper’s cloak, the big bad ugly side of temptation and sin exposed in all its malevolent glory. Neon signs glared sickly across the skyline. Echoes of discordant, computerized music, thump-thumped amid the rankness of the city air.
I’d seen worlds like this before. Destitute, reeking of vice. Arenas of debauchery. Violent, lawless towns. A product of the boom of raw beryl like any gold rush town throughout history. Didn’t like being forced to dip my nose into the reeking stench but here we were.
Air cars whizzed by. Rowdy youths too, weaving through the crowds on helium-powered scooters.
The city had an alter ego of its own on the other side of the lake, a place called Lagoon City. An underwater network linked up to destinations on the far shore, offering mining incentives as beryl-rich as Tyrone to newcomers. Deidra pulled up data on her pocket coder.
The automated voice droned on:
Tyrone-Lagoon city: Transpo service, manufacturing hub for lucrative beryl industry. Thriving tourist trade. Visitors can witness the rare fish lurking in the lagoons and the canals, from shark hybrids
