I read the text displayed on the lock screen.
Sheriff
Marty, answer the goddamn phones. I've got people calling my cell.
"I thought we had more time, but if he notices that you and I are both gone he'll come looking. I don't want him tracking my phone. I think there's a paperclip in the glove."
"Shouldn't we just toss the phone?" I asked, but opened up the glove compartment and started rooting through it anyway.
"Fuck no, man. That's an expensive phone. Turn it off without a sim and we'll be fine. I think."
I found a small enough paperclip in the junk Marty had crammed into the compartment and popped the sim out a moment later. I powered down the phone and tossed it back into his lap.
We had just left the city limits and were headed north on one of the smaller state highways. It looked like it had only recently been cleared by the snowplows.
"Where are we going?" I asked.
"I've got a buddy that owns a salvage yard. We're on a lot of the same message boards. He's solid. He's a prepper and has no love for authority. He'll help us get across the border. Once my uncle knows I'm gone, this car won't be good anymore. Neither would yours. He'll put out a BOLO and they'd stop us at the border or maybe even up in Canada. You've got some cash, I hope?"
The bag full of gold was beside my feet, along with the rest. "Some."
Marty looked at me sideways, but nodded.
"Listen, man, I saw the magic whatever that was you did with the cell lock and I'm totally on board. We've got some time now—it'll be another forty minutes of driving to Theo's yard. Can you tell me the whole story?"
I didn't see any reason not to, so I did. The stumble through the gate, the fight to survive and reclaim the station. The trip through space to intercept Metra's wrecked ship. Crash-landing that ship so that Brick's bots could salvage the raw materials. I showed him the GN-75, although it probably just looked like a toy gun to someone who hadn't seen what it could do and didn't have an Interface.
"And then I left Metra to build a ship and reclaim the satellite stations. I built what I needed for this trip, loaded up, and came home. I was about five minutes from driving off when Farnell spotted me in my driveway."
"Why didn't you just, you know, zap him or something?" Marty asked, slowing down as the car drifted into the exit lane.
"I don't have a phaser with a stun setting. Everything I've got is super lethal. Besides, your uncle's a good guy. I'm not going to start killing people if I can help it."
"Fair enough, I'm glad you didn't. Uncle Farnell can be a hardass but he's still family."
"We're going to need everybody if the Connahr field fails," I said. "Humans are going to have to stop killing each other and work together."
"Speaking of that, I want to help. I want to be Inducted. Honestly, it'd be like a dream come true, man."
"I wish I could, Marty. I know, theoretically, what I'd need to do to get you Inducted, but I can't make what's needed without a Manufactory. I've got some tools with me, but they're not enough. Maybe when we get to my grandpa's outpost there will be a Manufactory or we can open a gate and get Brick to send an Induction kit through."
"An Induction kit?"
"Yeah, it's basically a bundle of materials and Nanite Clusters to do the initial conversion for Humans, along with some software. It's pretty complex actually."
"Shit, that sucks, man. Do you at least have a laser pistol or something I can have?"
I laughed. "Sorry, man, I left my spare on the station."
The Camino exited onto a two-lane road, scrub trees and snow the only things visible.
"How well do you know this guy we're going to see?"
"Oh, really well. We've been posting on the same board for like five years now. A year ago I found out he had this yard up here in the boonies, and he invited me to visit. I've been meaning to go ever since."
"You're telling me you've never actually met him in real life? Great," I said, and sighed.
"It's not like that, man. Theo's a good guy."
I pulled my tools bag onto my lap and zipped it open. The holstered pistol was right where I'd left it. It was a 9mm pistol designed to look—and work—like a Glock, but not set off sniffers or metal detectors. Basically my grandpa had wanted a gun he could get through typical security checkpoints but that wasn't obviously alien technology. I extracted it and sealed the bag again.
"Whoa, what's that?" Marty said. "You won't need that."
"As Clarence Worley said, ‘it's better to have a gun and not need it, than to need a gun and not have it.’"
Marty paused for a moment. "True Romance. Nice, deep cut."
I was beginning to like Marty.
The holster used the same near-magical material as my GN-75 and adhered strongly to my belt on the right side. It felt a little weird to have a gun on my belt, but I couldn't think of anywhere else to put it. When I willed it, the holster would release the grip it had on the pistol and it would slide free effortlessly.
On the left side of the road ahead I could see a junkyard approaching. Tall, barbed-wire topped chainlink fences were on the outside, but behind those was what looked to be a wall constructed of partially flattened cars. That wall didn't have any obvious gaps. Someone had built themselves a fortress out of Detroit steel.
"This is the place," Marty said, pulling off the road to stop in front of a rusting set of solid iron gates. The road we were on was utterly deserted, still, and silent except for the growl of the Camino's V8 and the crunch of snow under
