Sparks in Cosmic Dust (22 page)

“There’s a lot left to say about Zopyrus, but I’m still shaken right now. Maybe when there’s time to…Dark shapes have now appeared farther up the beach. Coming out of the waves? What the hell? The turn-off to the shuttle is nowhere near that far. What could…”

Grace pondered those words for a moment, then quietly switched the device off and placed it back inside her carrier. As was her wont, she rose and left for her tent without any fanfare. “Don’t stay up too late,” she said. “Two hours’ watch each. Clay first, then Varinia. Wake me in four.”

Varinia looked at Clay, and he gazed right back.

Before
our
fragmentia gets us?
Grace had fragmentia? She was dying?

Varinia swallowed bitter saliva. The sudden urge to get the fuck off Zopyrus crackled palpably between them.

Day 102 C231,000,000

After a long, exhausting day of digging, refining, feeding the animals and tending to Solomon, drifting off to sleep was the only part of Varinia’s routine that didn’t run like clockwork. Too many considerations, not enough time to think them through properly. Would the elusive watchers ever come down from orbit? Or would they wait up there indefinitely, spying, scrutinizing, and hijack the pyro in space when the
Taras
left Zopyrus? Did Grace’s enigmatic reassurances—
Leave it to me, chick, I’ve been through worse situations than this. Those grid-lickers are in for a black Christmas if they try that
—amount to a definite plan or more cocksure posturing for the group’s benefit?

Was Clay getting fed up of living in the shadows? She
tried
to be warm to him, damn it, but he’d spent less and less time around her since they’d returned from the forest. It was all her fault. She’d protested too much on Solomon’s behalf, and now she’d blown it with the only guy she really ought to have worried about offending. Her logic might be democratic, but her heart sure as shit wasn’t. She needed Clay in her sleeping bag right now, his arms wrapped around her, his hot flesh exciting her primitive parts.

Son of a bitch.
She thumped the tent floor on either side with livid fists. Her sleeping bag constricted her attempt to shift position, so she kicked a tantrum until the magno-clasps wrenched open and she tackled the fabric down below her ankles. Fucking thing. What the hell was she waiting for? She should march over to Clay’s tent, rip the door open and screw his brains out until their screaming orgasms woke the Blue Bitch planet into one giant global lightning storm. Yes, that was what she would do…if she were Varinia Wilcox,
uber
-temptress of Kappa lore.

Goddamn it.

Sarah Jayne Ryan wouldn’t die. No matter how far she fled or how often she shed her clothes, that safety catch inside her head refused to let her fully transform.

Solomon’s latest bout of neurotoxic fever—his only mining gear was full-throttle, and he’d collapsed three times so far—had dissipated these last couple of days. He wasn’t on his feet yet but he was fully conscious, able to feed himself. For his sake, maintaining a platonic facade between herself and Clay was vital. Seeing the woman he loved—and Solomon did love her, she knew—cavorting with another man day in and day out would drive anyone to do irrational things. Hell, he’d already poisoned himself on pyro fumes to escape the pain of her leaving him.

The mounting chill goosed her bare skin, so she eased herself back inside the sleeping bag. There, that was better. Soft, warm.
Stop fretting and get some sleep.

What about the pyro? Almost sixty million clips’ worth apiece? A goddamn windfall. Oh, the places she could visit, the things she could buy, the
wedding she could have.
Who gave a shit about sleep while there were important things like that to ponder? Sleep was for suck-baits. Kappa trash. All suck-baits and sleaze-heavers could go screw themselves because she—Varinia Wilcox,
uber
-temptress—now had a life to look forward to. Somewhere.

She snuggled to that thought and let it drift her away on smooth, homeward currents.

“Up. Everybody…get up.”

The words didn’t register until Varinia heard a horse’s high-pitched neigh nearby. Just outside the tent. A whirring undercurrent similar to a grav generator, and a heavy
krrgh, krrgh
suggested a struggling machine farther away.

She shot up and jumped into her slacks and flung her overcoat on. It was still dark outside, but two brilliant green lights blazed through the tent’s fabric. Their source appeared to be the mouth of the inlet, or perhaps the shallows. It had to be some sort of vehicle. Perhaps a terrain tramper.

Clay tore her doorflap open and made sure she was okay.

“I just woke up. You?”

“We have company,” he said.

Ah, hell.
So it had finally happened. Butterflies swarmed in her empty gut, her pulse ratcheted up to a thump in her shoulder. After days of speculating, fretting over the Yuletide pranksters, at last—contact. She sucked in a few quick breaths and snatched her rifle, checked to make sure it was loaded, then fastened the magno buttons of her coat one by one.

“Come on,” he urged. “We’re not going on parade.”

She stumbled out into the cold night and saw immediately that the vehicle was a small short-range supply shuttle. It had landed on the beach. About the size of a twelve-seater sky-cab, it couldn’t have reached so far into deep space on its own. If it had a psammeticum engine at all, it must only be RAM technology, able to accelerate but not warp jump—warp engines were far too big for a craft of that size.

So who had sent it? Where was the larger vessel?

Danai’s magnificent silhouette galloped across the light beams and disappeared back down the beach, where Grace claimed to have spotted her several times in the past few weeks.

“Follow me. Don’t speak.” Grace slung her rifle over her shoulder and marched out undaunted toward the trespassing craft. In her belt she’d packed two Ares pistols and a hunting knife. She’d made no effort to conceal them. On the contrary, the word that sprang to Varinia’s mind while observing the old woman’s appearance was
deterrent.

“Maybe we shouldn’t walk out in the open…until we know who we’re dealing with,” Varinia whispered.

“If they wanted to kill us, they’d have done it already.” Grace cocked her rifle. “And I said don’t speak.” Into the glaring lights she yelled, “Whoever’s there, you’d better show yourselves. Holler first so I know not to shoot.”

The whirring engine sputtered dead and, for several heartbeats, the fizz and rumble of shore surf dominated Zopyrus. Both lights blinked out and were immediately replaced by the bright beams from two helmet lamps lurching over the rocks strewn across the inlet’s mouth.

Alarmed, Varinia darted behind Clay before remembering the word
deterrent.
This was brinkmanship, Cydonia Face for real and in the dark. Appearance was everything. She sidestepped back to her place, then widened her stance. Gulped a forced, juddery breath.

“Don’t shoot, lady. Yiz got no cause to be jumpy,” came a truly bizarre accent through the pitch. “All we want is a friendly word with ya. Can yiz spare somethin’ hot for two fellows far from home? Coffee mayhaps? Allers here reckoned he saw yiz drinkin’ McCormick’s round the fire the other night.”

“Stop where you are.” Grace stole a few steps toward them, making Varinia very nervous. “If you’re carrying any weapons, drop them now or I’ll drop you.”

“Not armed, lady. We have no reason to carry weapons. Not here. We’re starvin’ winner-minners, that’s all. We had no choice but to land here with yiz tonight. We don’t mean nothin’ threatenin’ by it.”

“Take off your helmets and place them on the sand, torches facing the cliff wall to your right.”

They obeyed.

“Good. Now walk over to the cliff wall.”

Varinia saw them for the first time, albeit from the rear—both over six feet tall and thin, with straight gaits. Their black hair, slicked back in ridges, glistened in the torch beams. Figure-hugging gray spacesuits and orange net jackets, encased in transparent breast and back plates, were an odd combination. From each square of netting hung an unusual item Varinia deduced was personal to the wearer, perhaps memorabilia from home. They included braids of hair, photographs, tiny vials of liquid, and small tubes of colored fabric. All were perfectly still, frozen inside the plates.

“Okay, turn and face me.”

They acquiesced without reply. One of them had a long, thin face with ears that stuck out and round eyes extremely close together. He looked intelligent, scrutinizing his hosts one by one while maintaining a poker face. A single gold tattoo covered the right side of his face from temple to chin. Its shape resembled a curved letter
W
on its side, but with a small extra
V
adjoined in the middle. At Grace’s bidding, he introduced himself as Noriad—pronounced “nor-
eye
-ad.”

He pointed a long finger to his colleague. “And he’s called Allers. We’re from a far-off place called Midas-Oh out in—”

“I know it. It’s near Ladon,” Clay said. “Kind of a jerkwater planet. Rich in minerals but extremely dry apart from one big lake. Just three towns on the whole planet, all of them set for mining and refining. I’ve stopped there a few times for fuel. Not too pleasant.”

Noriad glared at him, smirking through the insult, then he turned to Allers and whispered something inaudible. The latter had a peculiar nervous twitch that stuttered his head back every now and then, as if the gears in his neck had malfunctioned and were ratcheting his skull until he faced skyward. During these stutters, his eyes never left Varinia.

Her turn to shudder. While not as thin as Noriad’s, Allers’s face was completely covered in ink. Silver tattooed words appeared to form a string of sentences widthways from ear to ear, hairline to chin.

“That one’s easy to read,” blurted a hoarse voice from behind.

Solomon?

“What’s the deal?” He bunched the ends of his blanket under his chin as he joined them in front of the two uninvited visitors. He stood straight and didn’t appear to shiver. Much improved from the day before.

“We’re about to find that out,” Grace said. “Glad you joined us, sunshine. This should be interesting.”

“How about somethin’ to drink now? Round yiz fire? A friendly word with yiz, nothin’ more. Just like when we sent yiz that Chrizmas box ’n’ all.”

Grace sniffled, then marched across and checked them for concealed weapons. Convinced they were unarmed, she lowered her weapon. “All right, we’ll listen to what you have to say. I’m giving you beans and biscuits, a few bits of fruit. You can even wet your whistles. But I’m warning you, that’s it. We’ll not turn hungry men away, but if you’ve got any other ideas, shake them loose
now.
We’re full up here. No vacancies. Get me? You can have the hospitality of the camp tonight, but if you’re still here come sunup, it’s
look out.
You understand?”

“Crystal.”

“Good. Varinia, Solomon, watch them while Clay and I get a fire going.”

“Ma’am.” Solomon strode forward to inspect them for himself.

Varinia thought immediately of her stash of pyro hidden in the seaside cliff. If these assholes had been scrutinizing the camp for days, how much had they seen at night? They might know where everyone hid their goods, and simply turfing them out, like Grace suggested, might be the worst idea of all. The bastards could sneak in one night and lift their whole supply of pyro.

But if that was the case, why hadn’t they done it already? This had been a peaceful enough introduction. Guarded perhaps, but cordial enough to allay her worst fears. At least they weren’t going to try anything by force.

So what
did
the inkheads want?

“We’ve come with a friendly proposal for yiz.” Noriad took small bites of his Valerian fruit before spooning up his soup—he didn’t care much for beans, he said—with extreme delicacy. Solomon didn’t trust a hungry man who sipped or nibbled at anything, and anyway, he just plain didn’t like these interlopers. They looked wrong, they mangled the English language, and their Christmas hamper had been out-and-out creepy. They were bad news. He knew it in his gut.

“Yiz got more biscuits or somethin’?” Allers—inkface—tossed his soup into the fire.

Noriad scolded him, hissed at his ear. “Gobshite! Yiz just lost eatin’ rights. Yiz forgettin’ what I told yiz about these winner-minners. From now on, shut yiz trap. Right?”

“Right.”

The politer man was clearly the dominant one, and he held his palm up to his hosts in apology. “He’s lost his eatin’ and speakin’ rights. From now on, I’ll do all the speakin’.” He set his soup bowl down and took a swig of his McCormick’s. “
Ahh,
that’s bloody good. Thank yiz for the kind meal.”

Grace clapped her hands once, loudly. “You want to get to the point?”

After picking at his nails, Noriad ran his fingers over his immaculate ridged hair.
The preening prick.
Still tired after his fever, Solomon grew irritable. He could feel his temper shortening with every nauseating whiff of burning soup. Their soup, their supplies, wasted.

What he wouldn’t give to waste these sons of bitches here and now.

“As yiz know from the Chrizmas box ’n’ all, we’ve been watchin’ yiz close from orbit. Nothin’ threatenin’, just to figure out who we’re dealin’ with. Winner-minnin’ is bloody dangerous unless all winner-minners can be trusted. And yiz all seem friendly enough, so we propose to join in with yiz, to be winner-minners here in this pyro mine with yiz. All friends. Yiz see?”

“I think I speak for everyone here when I say
yiz out of yiz fuckin’ minds, fuckwits.
” Solomon returned Allers’s glare with interest. “No one even knows what the hell you’re saying, and we don’t have to. We’re not sharing this dig with anyone. Ka-peesh? Get yiz skinny asses back up there in yiz taxicab before we use yiz for firewood.”

“Solomon.” Grace checked him. “Ease up.”

He rocked back and forth under his blanket, chewing his bottom lip. What was it about these jerks that riled him up like this? He’d never been so aggressively hostile to strangers before, and he’d met some of the worst suck-bait tool-pushers on any planet. But
Christ,
the urge to rip their throats out and hurl them onto the fire chafed at his ailing marrow. He could already hear the click of their bones and sinew in the blue heat, taste the stench of their suck-bait Midas-Oh carcasses cooking.

Hate.

It infused his every cell.

They were here to get a piece of his fortune, and he wanted them dead.

“We’re unarmed, friend Solomon. I don’t know why yiz are actin’ threatened. All we want is a friendly word before we start winner-minnin’ here from now on. There’s plenty of pyro underneath this mountain, but this here is the only openin’. We have no food nor nothin’, so we can’t dig elsewhere. All we want is to share the pyro yiz haven’t dug yet. From now on, that’s all. Four, five, six friendly winner-minners diggin’ pyro together.”