Jon Grimwood - redRobe

The jump-suits might be cheap but both helmet and flaks cost more than most PaxForce conscripts got paid in a year. Which wasn’t hard given the UN sourced its troops through an offshore broker called DecSec, who leased regular conscripts from Mauritania, Kazakhstan or Peru depending on the type of mission.

In theory the lessee countries got paid by the UN but in practice the IMF usually wrote the payment off against outstanding debt.

Conscript loss was acceptable, which wasn’t something you could say for their top-flight military electronics. Even adding in a completion bonus didn’t take the annual cost of a PaxForce trooper to more than half that paid to LockMart for the helmet alone.

All four soldiers had PaxForce IDs welded into their collars. The kind of crypt chip guaranteed to vibrate frantically if caught in the cross-hairs of a PaxForce snubPup, not to mention tell the snubPup where to get off… UN regulations demanded soldiers also wore rank and number identification, but this was missing in every case. Axl wasn’t surprised.

What did surprise him, though, was the fact he could see all this. And what surprised him even more was that he could see it clearly on a darkened night when Cocheforet was closed down, wooden shutters pulled tighter than a sphincter over windows and front doors kept closed.

Maybe this was the trade-off from Rinpoche for that irritating timecode. Because whatever scam the silver monkey had pulled in there among his neurons it was neat.

‘Actually,’ said Axl, ‘for an outdated Colt with an attitude problem it’s fucking impressive.’

Beside him, Tukten jumped. But mostly because he’d finally realised what Axl already knew. They were riding straight towards a group of soldiers, maybe twenty paces ahead. If Axl hadn’t grabbed the boy’s wrist, Tukten would have pulled round and ridden away; which was about as sensible as staple-gunning a luminous target on his back. At least it was when PaxForce were running a little unofficial R&R.

‘Wait,’ Axl snapped and kicked his heels until the mare he was riding stumbled into an unwilling trot. ‘Unless you want to get killed.’

The torch beam hit Axl’s face just ahead of the voice which ordered him to halt. Axl did. But he waited until his horse was almost upon the guard before yanking its bridle.

‘Shithead.’ The guard snapped up the lux level on his laserlight, shining it straight into Axl’s eyes. Without even thinking about it, Axl shut down some of the rod and cone cells, filtering out most of the brightness.

‘Who are you?’ The voice was rough, casually arrogant but not as hard as the man would like it to be. A corporal, nothing more.

‘Blackjack d’Essiarto,’ said Axl politely. ‘And I’d like to stable my mare ... if that’s not a problem?’

Next to the corporal a wiry kid sniggered and lowed his snubPup. Peruvian by the look of it. Which made sense at this altitude.

‘And this?’ The corporal demanded.

‘My servant,’ Axl grinned as Tukten stiffened in the saddle.

‘You live here?’

‘Do I live here… ?’ Sat on his horse, high above the corporal, Axl yawned heavily and stretched his arms out to his side, then yawned again… ‘Do I look like I live in a shit hole?’ Memories of his flat back in Day Effé crashed in on Axl but he shunted them out of his head. ‘Well,’ asked Axl, ‘do I?’

Someone else laughed and as the corporal whipped round, Axl kicked his mare forward and squeezed between the suddenly straight-faced soldiers. ‘I’m dossing at the Inn,’ he told the corporal over his shoulder, ‘if you need me.’

Axl trotted the hundred paces to the stable door and dismounted without once looking back. He had the revolver tucked into the back of his belt, hidden beneath the thick felt of his stinking coat. Using the weapon would be a last resort and Axl didn’t intend for that to happen. Mainly because he’d have to be seriously stupid to use a black-power .45 against flaked-up troops waving PaxForce-issue snubPups. It didn’t matter how many modifications to the gun Rinpoche had made, without kevlar body armour and a helmet Axl didn’t even have tickets to the same fucking ballpark.

Throwing open the stable door, Axl stopped. Instead of the familiar reek of dung and horse piss it stank of hydrocarbons and over-hot metal.

Five Chinese-built Honda X3 dirtbikes were parked up in one corner, the kind with studded tires and built-in gyro. Not fast, but they could hack ice that would tax a sherpa and slick down any slope that was less than vertical. That was exactly what he’d have brought if he’d had to choose. Except normal people on Samsara didn’t get to ride Honda dirts, or Seraphim 4x4s or Mitsubishi half-tracks come to that. Only PaxForce got full use of technology on Samsara, courtesy of some UN mandate. And even then, the Dalai Lama wasn’t too keen, though he was much too pragmatic to say so openly…

That was what Axl had heard anyway.

‘Feed her and rub her down.’ Axl told Tukten, tossing his reins to the boy. ‘Then get home and stay there, okay? If they want your jacket give it to them, the same goes for your sister or your arse. Don’t get into fights, don’t get riled and don’t waste time trying to be a hero. This lot slot kids like you for a hobby. Understand?’

The stable door had swung shut before the shocked boy even had time to answer. The corporal didn’t challenge Axl on his way up the street, in fact the man did his best to pretend he hadn’t seen Axl at all.

DanceSerious WarPosse announced a hand-printed screamer posted to Leon’s door. Suck On This, Samsara tour. Despite himself, Axl smiled. Some things didn’t change.

A wave of sour chang, sensimillia and stale sweat hit Axl as he stepped though the inn’s door into the crowded bar. The place was rammed to the rafters. Over at a table in the far corner, Ketzia was trying to stop a tray crammed to overflowing with bowls of chang from being pulled out of her hands.

Three teenage conscripts sat at the table, DanceSerious patches epoxied to their shirtsleeves. And the only boy not struggling to slide his hands up Ketzia’s skirt was alternating between sucking hits on a jade chillum and fumbling at Ketzia’s blouse. One full breast was almost loose, its dark nipple exposed, but for all the expression on Ketzia’s face the grinning stoner kid might have been transparent.

The woman’s eyes were blank, her wide mouth neither smiling nor frowning. Unlike the other girl serving, Ketzia didn’t even bother to swat away their groping hands. She’d been here before Axl knew, just from the deadness of her expression which reflected the utter powerlessness of an object with no reason to question the emptiness of those who did only what they were told.

If she expected any help from Axl she didn’t let it show, but then with his two new eyes and reworked face she probably didn’t recognise him anyway.

Just inside the door—and right in his way—six or seven spliffed-up Peruvian kids sat in a circle on the dirty floor. Off duty and killing time with bowls of Cocheforet’s thin beer. Spread out in the middle of them were foil packs of Mexican take-out. Someone had gone to the bother of yanking the heating tabs on the sides before ripping off the lids, but most of the packs were still full.

Axl wasn’t surprised. Reconstituted protein was no one’s first choice and the smell of vat-grown chilli still turned his gut.

‘Shite, isn’t it?’ Axl said, stepping carefully over them. One of the mind-blasted teenagers nodded long before she even thought to wonder who the newcomer was. Avoiding her boots, Axl stepped neatly round a boy on his knees trying to puke, dodged two conscripts kissing and finally reached the bar.