Zero's Return (75 page)

Oh, the poor, deluded
little kitten.  Keeping his grin to himself, Slade started unwrapping her from
the tree.  Then, when she didn’t kick him, punch him, or otherwise try to stab,
maim, or strangle him, he got out his lighter and started working on her bonds.

“You realize I’m going to
win this, right?” she said, eying him.  “And you’re gonna serve me or die.”

“Sounds like fun,” Slade
said, prying the melted rope apart.  He hissed and blew on his fingers as he
burned himself in his haste, then started unwrapping her bonds.

When her hands came free,
she still just stared at him.  “You’re a few charges short of a full magazine,”
she said, still peering at him dubiously.

“Generally,” Slade said. 
When her hands came free—and she didn’t try to kill him—he went to work on her feet. 
She watched him in interested silence.

“You know,” she said as
the bonds around her ankles fell loose and she uncoiled like a panther, “you
never accepted the ka-par.”

Slade froze, his mouth
open to object, the horrible realization that she was right hitting him like a
size-nine boot to the side of the head.

“And you’re
really
a super-genius?” she asked dubiously.  She crossed her arms and tapped her boot
on the ground, peering down at him.

“The Tesla of the
Congressional Era,” Slade managed, his eyes warily on her polymer-encased toes.

She continued to tap her
foot.

“Well?” she finally
demanded.

Slade swallowed and
glanced up at her.  “Well?”

Her gray-green eyes were
amused.  “Are you gonna accept?  Or should I just make you my slave and get it
over with?”  She cocked her head at him, eying his lower body a bit too
carefully, a little smile crossing her full lips.  “You’re right.  You
are
sexy. 
I think I’ll put you in a thong.”

Slade’s heart gave
another startled little hammer.  “Uh.”

She started tapping her
fingers on her bicep.  “Well?”

“I accept,” he squeaked.

“
Ka-par
rak’tal.
  It’s your formation, asher.”  She immediately turned and
walked over and started rummaging through his things.  Yanking a piece of
stale, mostly-not-moldy bread from his backpack, she regarded him over the fire
as she took a bite.  “We’ll pick this back up in…”  She cocked her head at
him.  “Three days?”

“Sounds good,” Slade
managed.

“And Sam?” the Congie
said.

Slade swallowed.  “Yes?”

She gave him a pleasant
smile.  “Don’t run.  I can find you.”  At that, she took his backpack—and
everything in it—and walked from the camp, into the darkness.  Towards her
rifle.

Slade sat there and
watched her go, so thoroughly turned on he was having trouble breathing. 
This,
he thought, over the blood rushing in his ears,
is going to be so much fun.

CHAPTER 26 – Warrior Troubles

“You,” Joe growled,
stalking up to the morning campfire in his underwear, “are getting on my
nerves.”

Sometime in the night,
Shael had
re
-stolen the pair of energy-resistant pants he had hung up to
dry outside his tarp that night, cut a good chunk off the lower legs, and had
wound them to her waist using
all
of his thirty-thousand-lobe survival
line.  Thirty-six rods of it.  Her knotwork, apparently, needed work, because
both ends were trailing loose and it was even then unraveling at her feet,
tangling in scrub and grasses when she tried to walk.  And now, a look of utter
concentration on her face, she was crafting a spear using his favorite combat
knife, more of his survival line, and a really big, somewhat-sharp rock.  Joe
could tell just by looking at it that the endeavor wouldn’t go well for her.

As if he were an annoying
child, as soon as he came to a stop beside her, Shael said, “Now you see what a
real warrior’s weapon looks like, Voran.”  Her brow creased in concentration,
she went back to hacking a split into the end of her crude ‘spear.’

Amused, Joe crossed his
arms and leaned back against a tree to watch.

As predicted, Shael kept
cutting herself, the huge rock kept slipping due to its weight, she couldn’t
get the survival line to stay in one place, and despite her best attempts to
knot it, the line kept slipping loose, tangling at her feet.

Eventually, she let out a
scream of frustration and hurled spear, rock, and twine to explode together in
the trunk of a eucalyptus on the other side of camp.  The tree groaned, then
slowly fell over in an arc, cut in half by the garrote of near-indestructible
wire.  Nine-G looked up, curious, but then went back to picking little red
berries into a crude grass bowl, with Alice directing. 

After taking stock of yet
another demonstration of How Flake Could Go Wrong with forty mind-furgs that
could scramble brains or pulverize boulders at a whim, Joe bent down to collect
his knife.  He had another pair of pants, but the loss of his survival line
would be irritating.  “Tell ya what,” he said, hefting the knife.

Shael gave him a look of
irritated incomprehension.

“You let me
cut
you a small
piece
—” he gestured with the knife to her unraveling ‘belt,’
“for you to use, and I’ll teach you how to
tie
,” he pulled off the
bandana he had taken to wearing after his hair grew in and held it up so she
could clearly see the knot, “a
knot
.”  He tugged on it.

When she continued to
give him a blank look, Joe sighed and said, “Twelve-A, translate.”

The minder gave a mental
sigh. 
Must I do all the work around here, furg? 

“What ‘work’?” Joe
cried.  Even then, Twelve-A was propped on a leafy mat of vegetation provided
by a doting Alice and Eleven-C.  Several of the People were sprawled around him
to keep him warm, and one had even lain down near his feet so his toes wouldn’t
get cold. 

I’m still recovering. 
Recovery takes energy.  You said yourself I should rest.
  The telepath
coughed weakly, then tilted his head sideways a little so one of the People
could feed him another of the little red berries that Alice and Nine-G were
collecting.

Joe narrowed his eyes. 
“I hope they make you sick.”

They probably will,
but it makes them feel good to help me.
  Twelve-A accepted another berry
from a doting, concerned-looking experiment.

“Yeah, you’re taking a
real hit for the team, there,” Joe growled.

Maybe you would like
to trade places with me?
Twelve-A offered. 
I could always ask Shael to
beat you until you were dizzy and coughing blood.

Thinking that the
experiment in question would probably jump at the opportunity, Joe quickly
changed the subject.  “I only want my survival line back.  I’m willing to trade
a knot-tying lesson.”

To
her
.  What
are you willing to trade to
me
, sooter?  My chest still hurts to move,
so I can’t sit up and make another hat like I want to.  I’m bored.

“You have forty people
waiting on you hand and foot!” Joe snapped.

That’s boring.

Sensing a bartering
session that was
not
going to fall in his favor, Joe growled, “What do
you want, you pointy-eared Jahul?”

Something interesting
to pass the time while I heal.
  He coughed again, weakly.

Meaning he wanted to
delve into Joe’s memories again in exchange for translator duties.

“You’re not tricking
anyone with the invalid act,” Joe growled.  “I gave you nanos and battledust. 
You’re healthier than the rest of them.”

Good luck telling them
that.
  The smug bastard accepted another berry.

Joe thought about
relieving himself in the furgling’s cider bottle the next time he napped.

Try it, furg.  Perhaps
you’ll wake up scratching your ear with your foot and licking your own asshole.

A muscle in his neck
twitched.  Joe turned back to Shael in a wave of disgust.  She was still
staring at him, pert chin lifted in challenge, like she was waiting for him to
try to take his stuff back—and was going to put him solidly in his place if he
tried.

Remembering the garroted
eucalyptus, Joe cursed. 
Fine, Pointy.  What do you want to know?

Immediately, Twelve-A
said,
I’m still curious what that woman was doing to you when you were
tricking me into telling you who to shoot.  That memory where she was bouncing
on top of you and you were both screaming.
 
It looked painful.

Grimacing, Joe thought
about telling the furgling to bumble back to his sootpile and eat Dhasha flake,
but then realized he really wanted his survival line back.

“Fine,” he muttered. 
“Two tics.”

Five,
Twelve-A
argued.

“Three,” Joe retorted. 
“And you convince her not to mess with my stuff while I’m sleeping.”

Four, and you help
Alice make me another hat.

The very
last
thing Joe was going to do was weave grass like a flower-loving peacemunch
freak, but he kept an even voice and said, “Sounds fair, leafling.”

I can read your mind,
simian
, Twelve-A said flatly.

“Fine!” Joe cried,
throwing up his hands.  “Fine.  Four tics and you keep her out of my stuff.”

And you help make me
another hat.

“Have Eleven-C
mojo
you another hat,” Joe retorted.

It means more if
someone makes it for me.

“She
would
be making
it,” he snapped.

It’s the thought that
counts.
  The telepath gave a little, pathetic whimper as one of the People
repositioned his head to better accept their offerings. 
Besides.  Weaving
grass would do you good.  You’re too violent.

Joe narrowed his eyes. 
Five
tics, I make you a hat, you keep her out of my stuff, and you translate what I
say to her whenever I need it.

Twelve-A considered. 
Six.

“Fine.  Six.  But you
take it
after
I get my survival line back and I’m done showing her how
to tie knots.”

Twelve-A sighed deeply. 
Then his brow creased in a tiny wrinkle of concentration—easily mistaken as a
gesture of pain by his attendants, many of whom immediately started petting him
and cooing.  Joe turned back to the mover wearing his stuff before he vomited
up last night’s pork roast.

Shael’s head cocked
slightly to the side and her eyes flickered toward the minder.  A moment later,
her eyes flared wide and she jerked back to look at Joe, her face tightened
with deep suspicion and…anger?

She says you can dance
on her tek
, Twelve-A told him.

“What did you tell her?!”
Joe demanded, realizing that was
not
the reaction of someone who’d just
been offered a lesson in survival techniques.

I told her you wanted
to tie knots together.

Realizing that was a
colloquial term for Jreet sex, Joe groaned and dropped his face into his
hands.  “You know what?” he groaned, giving up entirely.  “Never mind.  Just
never burning mind.  Go back to eating berries and stay outta my head.  No
deal.”  Shaking his head, he just turned to go safeguard what gear he had left.

Wait…you
don’t
want to tie knots together?
Twelve-A demanded, sounding disappointed.

“No,” Joe said, going to
dig a spare pair of pants from his backpack.  “I definitely do
not
.”  He
dressed, found something to eat from one of the pits, and tried to pass time as
the People lazily went about their morning routine.  Except, now with bumps and
bruises to nurse, it was taking ten times as long.  Progress—which was already
glacial—had ground to a complete halt.

“What’s the chance of
moving this operation along?” Joe finally demanded of the minder.  “I’d like to
make it to our destination sometime in the next millennium, you know?”

I’m not sure I’m fully
recovered.
  Twelve-A coughed pitifully again, to more sympathizing moans
from his fan club.

“Burn you,” Joe growled. 
“You’re fine.”

True, but the other
People have bruises.  It will hurt them to walk.

“Are the bruises on their
feet
?!” Joe demanded, desperately trying not to lose his cool.

No, but they don’t
want to walk.  They want to rest and feel better.

Joe inwardly counted to
ten.  He was a former PlanOps Prime.  For someone like him, watching the furgs
laze about in self-pity was, for lack of a better description, like picking
cankers from his ass in the bowels of Hell.  As pleasantly as he could, he
said, “Those guys are still out there.  You want them to come back?”

You and Shael killed
all the mean ones,
Twelve-A responded, almost accusingly.

Already, the naïve little
furg had forgotten his lesson about hungry people and good intentions.  Joe
muttered a curse to the Sisters, found a good lookout spot, and hunkered down
to watch forty-four full-grown adults busily doing absolutely nothing.  Because
it was so maddening—and because he was about to start yelling and waving Jane
around—Joe decided to reacquaint himself with his favorite drinking pal and
pulled out his canteen to spend the next three hours reminiscing with good ol’
Jim Beam.

He must have fallen
asleep, because he awoke screaming, clawing for Jane.  All around him, the
tunnels of Neskfaat were closing in, and Dhasha were hiding down every hole,
waiting to sink their monomolecular black talons into his liver.  Corpses were
strewn everywhere, lining the tunnels like ragged, clothes-covered hunks of
meat laid out in a butcher’s shop.

It took Joe several deep
breaths to realize that the corpses that he had seen weren’t a dead PlanOps
regiment on Neskfaat, but rather, the
live
sleeping bodies of his
friends.  Several had sat up, looking startled, as his final scream echoed
across the mountainside.