Dominant Species Volume Two -- Edge Effects (Dominant Species Series) (5 page)
Read Dominant Species Volume Two -- Edge Effects (Dominant Species Series) Online
Authors: David Coy
Tags: #dystopian, #space, #series, #contagion, #infections, #fiction, #alien, #science fiction, #space opera, #outbreak
“Yeah?”
“We’re going to the store for some stuff.
Wanna go?”
“Sure, but I don’t have much credit in my
account.”
“I can spot you some if you want. Come on.”
Eddie found the store on the map, and they
decided to walk since it wasn’t too far from the shelters. It was far enough.
The thought of another long hike in his tight boots made Mike almost beg off.
He would have except that there was nothing at all to eat in the shelter. There
would be no free meals from here on out, and it wouldn’t be right for Bruce to
buy food for both of them
and
haul it back.
It was nearing dark, and the heavy dusk came
down like a green blanket on the landscape. Their path would take them right
along the jungle. Mike knew Peter was still antsy about it.
“It’s getting dark. Maybe we should wait
until morning,” Peter said. “You know what Joan said about the nighttime.”
“Oh, come on. We can make it,” Eddie said.
On the way over, Peter stumbled once or twice
trying to keep his eye on the green wall of jungle and the ground ahead at the
same time.
The store was well-stocked and laid out well,
everything nice and neat, but it still seemed dirty to Mike. It was a quality
he couldn’t quite pin down. Eddie introduced himself to the clerk who ran the
store. He was a chubby guy named Davis, and Eddie spent some time talking to
him. It was time well-spent; the store would be one of their most frequent
stops. Eddie was smooth at getting to know people and finding out what made
them tick.
Mike ambled around the store, gathering up
the bare essentials in the way of food. He didn’t want to seem like he was taking
advantage of Bruce and his offer to help him out. He stopped at the boot rack
and looked at a couple of pairs.
“Wait ‘til this time next month,” Eddie
whispered over his shoulder. “We’ll get all this stuff for free.”
Mike wasn’t sure he knew what Eddie meant.
Few things in life were free, really. He hoped Eddie didn’t mean what he
thought he meant.
When they left, Davis put a candy bar in each
of their sacks and smiled sideways at Peter Ho. Mike thought that was weird.
“He’s a good guy,” Eddie said when they got
outside. “A real good guy.”
They stepped out of the store into a puddle
of light. The distant lights in the warehouse cast faint shadows at them across
the irregular terrain and did little to thin the murky blackness beyond their
range. Big noisy bugs had been attracted to the lights above the door and
banged against it aggressively, their wings buzzing against the wall.
“Now we have to walk back in the dark,” Peter
said.
“Whoops,” Eddie replied sarcastically.
“Look at the size of those mothers,” Bruce
said, ducking away from imagined flying attackers. “They’re huge.”
They scampered away from the light and its
buzzing, bumping visitors.
Peter felt the darkness around him like an
evil embrace and could almost feel the jungle oozing life. He drifted away from
the group at a tangent, just to put more distance between himself and the
things he knew were squirming in that black foliage. He wasn’t watching the
jungle anymore; he was afraid to match its black gaze with his and kept his
eyes cast down.
Strange buzzing and chirping and hissing
noises came from the foliage, constantly now. They hadn’t seen a living thing
but people since they arrived, but now, the air was filling up with small
flying things that bumped into them in their flight, bouncing and popping off
their chests and legs and making them slap at their faces and necks. Something
stung Mike on the face, and he slapped at it, caught it and squished it in his
fingers with a little cracking sound. He wiped wet off his cheek and hoped it
wasn’t blood. “Dammed bugs,” he muttered.
They started to double-time it. They were
discovering firsthand what the other residents already knew—night was not the
time to be outside on Verde.
Something about the size of a cat raced in
front of them making a quick clicking sound. It stopped and changed direction
once or twice before heading out into the clearing in a fast straight line.
“What the heck was that?” Mike asked.
“I don’t know, but it’s gone now,” Bruce
said. “And that’s all I care about.”
Eddie screamed at the top of his lungs.
Everybody jumped. Peter went stiff as if he’d
been shocked and dropped his groceries on the ground.
Eddie laughed, and Mike and Bruce finally
joined in—but not Peter.
“That’s not funny!” Peter yelled.
“Sure it is!” Eddie laughed. “That’s why I
did it!”
They helped him pick up his groceries, and
Eddie patted Peter on the back.
“Scared ya, huh?”
“Yeah, you scared me.”
When they got home, Mike made sure the doors
were closed tight. He didn’t want to wake up at night with bugs flying around
his room. When he double-latched the door, Bruce nodded at him in agreement.
Mike and Bruce heated some meals in the
cooker and ate them without talking. Mike had half of a package of cookies and
some milk for dessert. After they ate, they put the rest of the groceries and
stuff away and checked out the washer and dryer near the back entryway. The
refrigerator was small but held all it had to for the two of them. Mike put his
personal supplies in the cabinet in the bathroom and thought about cleaning it
up some, but he was too tired. That was a chore he could do at any time.
Mike washed up, brushed his teeth and got
ready for bed. When he turned out the light, it was pitch dark in his room;
almost too dark to sleep. He’d heard there were two moons that made the night
seem almost like day and wondered where they were. He got up and turned on the
light in the bathroom as a night-light. He didn’t like it too dark where he
slept.
The workday was over. When he lay down on the
bed, the sounds coming from the foliage drifted in like odd music. He heard an
occasional bug bump against the screen and was glad it was closed. It had
cooled down quite a bit, and he pulled the blanket up around his shoulders and
settled his head in the pillow.
With his belly full and clean sheets under
him and with some light in his room, he felt secure and at peace even though he
was billions of kilometers from Earth. He liked the shelter and felt right at
home in it. He would do well here. It was good to have friends and people
around who were good to you. If he worked hard, more good would come to him.
His dad had promised it. He would work hard and be thankful and good would come
to him.
Hard work pays off,
he reminded himself.
In all he was doing okay, except for the
boots. He was outgrowing them fast. By the time he reached his thirteenth
birthday later in the year, the boots would really be too small.
He could buy a new pair next month when his
credit came in.
5
Del
Geary watched the stuff being unloaded from the shuttle and wondered if there
was anything in the shipment worth stealing. The problem wasn’t getting the
stuff; that was easy if you had the balls. The problem was getting it sold.
There weren’t that many people on-site yet so there wasn’t much of a market.
Most of the stuff was building materials and supplies anyway; nothing that
snapped anybody’s socks. There was plenty of other stuff like clothes and
kitchen shit coming down, but the things you could buy for practically nothing
didn’t make good contraband, especially in a small market like this one— not
now. Plus, there was always the risk you could wind up selling a box of plastic
plates to the guy who reported it missing after you stole it. The community was
too closed, and there just weren’t enough people yet.
He ambled toward the dock to get a closer look at the new Number
10's.
You never knew.
He didn’t get too close to the containers—that would be too
obvious. He walked over to the dumpsters and checked to see how full they were;
that was his job after all. He picked up some packing material and scraps of
shit from around them and tossed them in, while he sneaked glances at the
containers. He knew the color codes on the sides pretty good.
Same old shit.
He swept the smaller stuff up into a pile, scooped it up with his
hands and put it in the dumpster.
There. Nice and neat.
An Expeditor drove toward him with a lift stacked with containers.
Geary stood back and watched, then started giving useless, joking hand signals
as the driver placed his load.
Down. Down. Up a little. Come on. Come on. Down. Down. That’s it.
He smiled at the kid driver.
“Perfect, man! That’s perfect!” Geary said.
“Couldn’t have done it without you,” Eddie Silk said.
“You guys got a lot of stuff coming down, huh?”
“A
lot
,” Eddie said.
“Anything worth stealin’?” Geary said with a big, crooked grin.
“Nothing I’d steal,” Eddie said smiling back. “Where you from?”
"Fuji."
“Hey, me, too. I don’t think I saw you there, though.”
“Well, I was there—I swear to God, I was, officer.”
“It’s a big place,” Eddie smiled.
“Yep.”
“Do you know Tap Porter?”
Geary cocked his head, just a little, like a dog that’d heard a
call to dinner.
“Do you?” he asked with a smirk.
“Yeah, he’s a good friend of mine,” Eddie said with an even bigger
grin.
“No shit. Ain’t that a coincidence?”
Tap Porter had been the biggest fence for stolen goods on Fuji.
Anybody who was in business on the planet knew him.
“What’s your name?”
“Eddie. Eddie Silk.”
“Hey, I’m Del Geary,” Geary said and stuck out his skinny hand.
When Eddie shook it, the fingers felt like stiff wire.
“Glad to meet you,” Eddie said.
“How long you been here?”
“Couple of months now. You?”
“A week, give or take.”
“Hot sonofabitch, ain’t it?" Geary said.
“Yeah. Damned if it ain’t,” Eddie agreed.
Geary figured this could be a real stroke of luck if the kid was
willing to play ball. He couldn’t do any better than to have a partner who
could give a personal inspection of the manifests of every Number 10 container
that came down. Their business relationship was already taking shape in his
mind. The kid could tell him where the goods were and when the best time to
snatch them would be. He could snatch the stuff and store it, keeping the kid
in the clear. The kid could stay away from the docks and the warehouse and keep
the suspicion off himself.
Perfect.
“You got a crew?” Geary asked.
“What kind do you mean?”
“A crew, you know, more guys like yourself,” Geary said acting
stupid.
“Yeah. I got a lead deal when I signed on.”
Eddie looked over his shoulder and gave a wary look around.
“Hey, that’s great,” Geary said.
“But I don’t like too many partners. Sometimes the fewer friends
you have the better. What about you?” Eddie returned the query.
“One or two partners is all you need,” Geary said. “Too many
goddamned partners’ll fuck you up.”
“You gonna be around later? We could talk.”
“Talk about what?” Geary said all big-eyed and innocent.
Eddie glanced over his shoulder again.
“Business,” he said grinning.
That was it. The kid was a crook. Before the month was out, they’d
be taking a cut of the good stuff and building up a regular store for the
future. By the time the project got really rolling, they’d have some of
everything-worth-selling safely stashed away. Markets were developed around the
supplier with the lowest prices. You couldn’t supply goods any cheaper than by
stealing them.
They agreed to meet out in the open down by the truck pool at nine
o’clock.
After Eddie drove away, Geary slapped his skinny hands together.
“Yeah!” His hands had so little meat on them, they barely made a sound.
The next thing was to find a place to stash the goods. His shelter
was out—not enough space and his roomy was too straight to risk it. He’d have
to find somewhere else. They might not need a big place to start, but it never
hurt to plan big. On Fuji, he and his partners had three whole shelters crammed
with some of virtually everything that had any retail value.
There were at least fifty thousand people working Fuji. It’d be
years before there was anything like that on Verde. Everything was too visible.
He’d have to find another way, another place to stash the goods.
If he had the money, he could bribe the Riggers to put him up a
hidden shelter somewhere, maybe in the jungle, but that could cost a fortune.
It would be a while before he had that kind of cash.
Turning the problem over in his avaricious mind, he nearly walked
past the answer, right there in the dump.
They didn’t use cylindrical drums much to ship anything
anymore—they were considered junk and surplus to be jettisoned into deep space.
About the only thing they used them for was fasteners, cables, pins and crap
that the Riggers used. When they were empty, they were discarded. Sometimes
they were grabbed up as trash barrels, but more often just left abandoned as expendable
material. Never mind that the goddamned things were made of strong, lightweight
composite and would last for decades in any weather.
He was standing in front of a sloppy stack of twenty or more of
them, part of an ever-growing mountain of waste, each of them big enough to
sleep in.
Perfect.
He could move them into a spot in the jungle, line the damned
things up and put
labels
on them. The lids
clamped tight and would keep out the rain and bugs with no problem.
Just perfect.
He picked one up by the ends. It was light as a feather.
* * *
Eddie was right on time. Geary liked that. He didn’t like people
who weren’t good on their word to the letter. He leaned on the truck and
watched him walk up. He had that little cocky swagger that smart-asses had
nowadays. Geary hoped he wasn’t too cocky; there was a fine line between cocky
and stupid.
“Gonna be a nice night,” Geary said.
“You wouldn't think so if you was out in it,” Eddie said, reaching
for a cigarette. “Yeah, the bugs are terrible.”
“Bugs up the ass, boy,” Geary agreed.
“I saw one the size of a goddamned cat yesterday,” Eddie said.
“Bullshit.”
“Swear to God.”
“Some of those cocksuckers bite, too.”
“I bet.”
Eddie lit up and blew smoke. “So this is the deal,” he said. “We
do this fifty-fifty.”
“Seventy-thirty,” Geary said.
Eddie sniffed and spat.
“I’m taking all the risk, see,” Geary added.
“Well, not all of it.”
“You damned well believe I’m takin’ most of it,” Geary said with a
snort.
Eddie took another drag.
“You’re a greedy bastard, ain’t ya?”
Geary let it slide. “Nope.”
“I don’t need you, you need me,” Eddie tried, pointing a finger at
Geary then himself.
“Well, I tell you what,” Geary said. “You can steal the shit. You
can stash it and you can sell it. You can do it all if you want to, just stay
out of my way.”
Eddie figured it had been worth a shot. He took another puff.
“Okay. Sixty-forty,” he said. “But I don’t go near the shit after I tell you
where it is. Period. You’re on your own.”
“Now you see why I get seventy.”
Eddie ignored it and took another puff.
“I gotta work the manifests, too, ya know. I gotta fudge 'em so it
looks like less came in than did. As long as I do that, we could stay in
business forever. But it takes some doing. It ain’t easy.”
“There still ain’t no risk in it—and don’t bullshit me. You can
screw with the manifests in your spare time.”
Eddie snuffed his cigarette in the moist dirt. “I don’t know . .
.”
“I know you don’t know, and that’s why I get seventy,” Geary said.
“You don’t have to get shitty about it,” Eddie blinked.
“No offense, but I been at this a long time. Probably since you
was in diapers. All you gotta do is tell me where the shit is— that’s it. You
give me the goddamned container number and go have a smoke or a circle jerk
with your little pals. When you get up the next morning the shit’ll be safely
stored away. Hell, come to think of it, your part ain’t even worth thirty.”
“Whoa. Whoa . . . thirty’s the lowest I’ll ever go.”
“We got a deal then?”
Eddie thought it over. Geary watched his face scrunch up like it
was in a vise.
“Yeah. We got a deal,” Eddie said.
Perfect,
Geary thought. “What ‘cha got?” he asked. “What’s come in that’s
worth a shit right now?”
“Not much at the moment. There’s some first-aid stuff coming down
tomorrow. There might be some drugs.”
“Good. Drugs are good. Good place to start.”
Geary knew the kid wasn’t happy with the deal, but he’d get used
to it. He watched Eddie kick idly at the dirt. He could almost hear the words
getting
and
screwed
swimming in his head.
“You’re gonna make a lot of money, kid.”
“Not as much as you.”
“That’s right. But when all that money starts coming your way,
you’ll be damned glad I’m your partner.”
Eddie lit another cigarette. “How’s Tap Porter?”
“Oh, he’s dead.”
“No shit.”
“Yep. Dead as a stick.”
“What happened to him?”
“I killed him when he shorted me. I cut him from here,” he
answered, as he touched Eddie’s stomach and traced a line to his chin, “to
here.”
Eddie looked into Geary’s small, black eyes and tried to smile. He
was a tough kid, but the malice in those eyes put his bladder on the very edge
for a second.
“Yeah . . . ?” he asked, trying to pretend he was tougher than he
was.
“Yeah. You stick to the deal. Don’t you ever cheat me. I won’t
tell you again. If you fuck me over there won’t be nothin’ to discuss. I’ll
just kill ya.”
He tapped Eddie’s arm with the back of his hand as if they were
best friends. “We got a deal?” he said.
Eddie swallowed. “Yeah. We got a deal.”
“Let’s meet here tomorrow, same time. You can tell me where the
drugs are then. See you around.”
* * *
Geary left the kid standing there smoking. He’d given him
something to think about, he was sure of that.
Geary had always figured it was best to be upfront in your
business dealings. He couldn’t stand wishy-washy deals or bastards who tried
to screw you. It was best to just get it all out up front. He’d meant what he’d
said. He’d said the same thing to Tap Porter. He hoped the kid had listened.
Tap Porter hadn’t.
When he got back to the dump that night, Geary was relieved when
he saw the drums still there in a jumbled pile; he’d half expected someone to
grab them before he got to them.