Robert Charrette: Never trust an elf

His hopes of getting off easy vanished when he finally spotted the missile launcher; it lay almost directly behind Alpha. Alpha's limbs were slowed but his brain wasn't. The hellion saw where Kham was looking, and began to herd him further and further away from it. Kham tried shifting the path of his retreat around, but the hellion shifted too, pressing Kham further away from the launcher.

Taking what he thought was his best chance, Kham tried to dart past the hellion as Alpha negotiated a rocky patch of ground. Unfortunately, the cyberguy still had too much speed. Alpha rocked back on one leg and lashed out with the other. The striking limb was stiff, but it had enough power behind it to slam Kham's leg muscles into numbness. He went down.

The hellion was on him instantly, pummeling him with both arms. Kham got his own cyberarm free and slammed a good shot home against the side of Alpha's head, denting the damaged plate further.

That was his chance. Kham started pounding on the plate. If he could warp it enough, get an edge to grip onto, he might be able to rip it away. Without the armor's protection, the hellion would take Kham's blows with real effect. Kham might be able to knock the hellion senseless or, better still, crush the bastard's addled skull.

Alpha pounded him mercilessly. Blows he could have blocked impacted with terrible power. Kham felt a rib go, but he kept on. A seam on the metal man's head plate ruptured, and Kham's fingers locked onto the edge.

At last, Alpha seemed to realize his danger. The ruined tribarrel snapped across and knocked Kham's arm away. But Kham kept his grip, and the armor plate ripped away bloodily. But it was no good. The hellion got Kham's arm pinned against the ground. With the weight of the hellion on him and his only functioning arm trapped, there was nothing Kham could do to exploit the opening he had made.

Alpha lifted his left arm limb above his head, then stopped, blinking. Kham figured the removal of the cyberguy's armor plate had loosened a few connections and, for a moment, he dared think that the hellion might be stunned. Then the cyberguy tilted his head down and stared into Kham's eyes. There was a terrible lucidity in Alpha's eyes.

"You failed the master, trog. That releases me to do what should've been done before." The hellion smiled viciously. "If it weren't for your meddling, Beta and Gamma would still be alive. They were my chummers, trog."

As Alpha cocked back his raised hand, a wide steel blade slid out from his wrist, gleaming faintly in the pre-dawn light. Alpha angled his arm, pointing the tip of his blade toward Kham's throat. "This is for my chummers, trog." Then Alpha's face exploded. The chatter of a submachine gun filled Kham's ears as bits of bone and brain splattered him. Instead of disgusting him, the gory shower brought relief.

He was alive.

It was not Kham, but the hellion who had died. Alpha's arm remained upraised, frozen in place. The razor-edged steel glinted in the starlight, pointing heavenward. Kham's eyes followed the line of the weapon and ended up staring into the night sky.

Was there somebody up there to thank?

Kham let his gaze drift down again and saw that there was indeed somebody to thank down here. Neko stood just beyond Alpha's immobile shoulder. The cat-boy still held his Colt in firing position, aiming at the back of Alpha's skull, at the opening Kham had ripped in the armor plate.

Time slipped back into motion, and Kham watched Neko lower the muzzle of his weapon and eject the empty clip. The fixed expression on the catboy's face softened, slumping down through relief into exhaustion.

Kham heaved at the dead weight pinioning him to the ground. It took great effort to get that weight off him. When he did, he lay exhausted, his strength finally spent. Kham stared at the holes pocking the hellion's back; they were the marks of small-caliber shells that could not penetrate the armor. If Kham hadn't ripped Alpha's skull plate free, Neko's bullets would have been ineffective. And if the catboy hadn't shot the hellion, Kham would have been meat. It had taken the two of them to beat the metal man.

Neko limped over and looked down at him. There was a half-smile on his face, a questioning look. But the catboy said nothing.

"Guess maybe I did figure ya wrong, catboy." "Guess maybe you did." Neko held out a stout stick. "You'll need this for your arm. I'd help you up, but I don't think I can take the extra weight."

"S'okay." Kham got himself painfully to his feet and took the offered stick.

Neko pulled a strap out of his pocket, checked to see that Kham's arm was straight, and started to wrap the splint in place. A little surprised, but definitely pleased, Kham let the catboy bandage the arm. "Da two of us don't look much like winners." "Three of us. There's still The Weeze and we haven't checked on Rabo yet. But winners? This is one time when what you look like doesn't matter. All that matters is that you're still breathing."

Kham looked at Neko and frowned. "Weren't you da one talking about souls ta Harry?"

"If you are still breathing and do not have your soul, you have got no business breathing."

Shaking his head, Kham said, "Maybe someday, catboy."

"Maybe what?"

"Maybe someday I'll figure ya out." But first he had some figuring out to do about himself.

While they dragged the litter down to The Weeze and got her on board, Kham did some of that thinking. He did more as they dragged her to the shelter of the woods, where they did what they could for her before going to check on where the Airstar had crashed. To Kham's immense surprise and relief, they found Rabo alive but pinned among the wreckage. It took their combined strength to pry him loose, but in the end they managed. They even salvaged some medical supplies from the wreck, enough to dull the pain of the two seriously injured orks so that they could sleep. It took them the better part of an hour, but they got themselves away from the nest.

At one point some kind of aircraft passed overhead, but nobody bothered them. Kham was glad. He was in no shape for another tussle. With luck, Rabo would be mobile in a day or two, and the three of them could pack The Weeze out. Till then, they'd make do in the woods.

Mostly the catboy kept quiet. So did the woods. No searchers came looking, or gunning, for them. Kham wondered about that, but he saw no reason to complain.

It gave him some more time to think.

This had been the toughest run he'd ever been knocked around on. Too many people lying to too many other people, manipulating them to their own ends. And he'd fallen into the middle of it because of needing money. Running only for money had driven him straight into the hands of the manipulators. He vowed inwardly that it wasn't a position he'd ever end up in again.

"Ya know, catboy. I'm linking about getting outta da business."

Neko looked him up and down with an evaluating gaze. "Unlikely. You were born to run biz."

"Life's short, catboy. Too short ta waste running somebody else's errands. Dyin' fer dem."

"But you're not really thinking of giving up the shadows, are you? You need their freedom too much."

No, Kham realized. He wasn't thinking about giving up. In fact, he was thinking thoughts entirely too strange. "I got a family, catboy."

"And?"

And what? This run in pursuit of the dream of living longer had revealed sides of himself he'd not paid attention to before. Some of it he liked. There were a lot of feelings bumping up against habits and stray thoughts in his head. Still, a couple of things seemed clear.

"Da suits, even when dey're dragons, wanta own ya. Ain't right. Da only way ta keep 'em from doing dat is ta work fer yerself. Ya gotta stand against 'em, fight 'em when ya have ta, and turn dere plots against 'em every chance ya get."