Gardner Dozois - Hunter’s Run

And now the great ships were coming ahead of schedule; each half-living ship heavy, they all assumed, with new equipment and people from other colonies hoping to make a place for themselves here on São Paulo. And also rich with the chance of escape for those to whom the colony had become a prison. More than one person had asked Ramon if he’d thought of going up, out, into the darkness, but they had misunderstood him. He had been in space; he had come here . The only attraction that leaving could hold was the chance to be someplace with even fewer people, which was unlikely. However ill he fit in São Paulo, he could imagine no situation less odious.

He didn’t recall falling asleep, but woke when the late morning sun streaming through Elena’s window shone in his face. He could hear her humming in the next room, going about the business of her morning. Shut up, you evil bitch , he thought, wincing at the flash of a lingering hangover. She had no talent for song – every note she made was flat and grating. Ramon lay silent, willing himself back to sleep, away from this city, this irritating noise, this woman, this moment in time. Then the humming was drowned by an angry sizzling sound, and, a moment later, the scent of garlic and chile sausage and frying onions wafted into the room. Ramon was suddenly aware of the emptiness in his belly. With a sigh, he raised himself to his elbow, swung his sleep-sodden legs around, and, stumbling awkwardly, made his way to the doorway.

‘You look like shit,’ Elena said, ‘I don’t know why I even let you in my house. Don’t touch that! That’s my breakfast. You can go earn your own!’

Ramon tossed the sausage from hand to hand, grinning, until it cooled enough to take a bite.

‘I work fifty hours a week to make the credit. And what do you do?’ Elena demanded. ‘Loaf around in the terreno cimarrón , come into town to drink whatever you earn. You don’t even have a bed of your own!’

‘Is there coffee?’ Ramon asked. Elena gestured with her chin toward the worn plastic-and-chitin thermos on the kitchen counter. Ramon rinsed a tin cup and filled it with yesterday’s coffee. ‘I’ll make my big find,’ he said. ‘Uranium or tantalum. I’ll make enough money that I won’t have to work again for the rest of my life.’

‘And then you’ll throw me out and get some young puta from the docks to follow you around. I know what men are like.’

Ramon filched another sausage from her plate. She slapped the back of his hand hard enough to sting.

‘There’s a parade today,’ Elena said. ‘After the Blessing of the Fleet. The governor’s making a big show to beam out to the Enye. Make them think we’re all so happy that they came early. There’s going to be dancing and free rum.’

‘The Enye think we’re trained dogs,’ Ramon said around a mouthful of sausage.

Hard lines appeared at the corners of Elena’s mouth, her eyes went cold.

‘I think it would be fun,’ she said, thin venom in her tone. Ramon shrugged. It was her bed he was sleeping in. He’d always known there was a price for its use.

‘I’ll get dressed,’ he said and swilled down the last of the coffee. ‘I’ve got a little money. It can be my treat.’

They skipped the Blessing of the Fleet, Ramon having no interest in hearing priests droning mumbo-jumbo bullshit while pouring dippers of holy water on beaten-up fishing boats, but they’d arrived in time for the parade that followed. The main street that ran past the Palace of the governors was wide enough for five hauling trucks to drive abreast, if they stopped traffic coming the other way. Great floats moved slowly, often stopping for minutes at a time, with secular subjects – a ‘Turu spacecraft’ studded with lights, being pulled by a team of horses; a plastic chupacabra with red-glowing eyes and a jaw that opened and closed to show the great teeth made from old pipes – mixing with oversized displays of Jesus, Bob Marley, and the Virgin of Despegando Station. Here came a twice-life-sized satirical (recognizable but very unflattering) caricature of the governor, huge lips pursed as if ready to kiss the Silver Enyes’ asses, and a ripple of laughter went down the street. The first wave of colonists, the ones who had named the planet São Paulo, had been from Brazil, and although few if any of them had ever been to Portugal, they were universally referred to as ‘the Portuguese’ by the Spanish-speaking colonists, mostly Mexicans, who had arrived with the second and third waves. ‘The Portuguese’ still dominated the upper-level positions in local government and administration, and the highest-paying jobs, and were widely resented and disliked by the Spanish-speaking majority, who felt they’d been made into second-class citizens in their own new home. A chorus of boos and jeers followed the huge float of the governor down the street.

Musicians followed the great lumbering floats: steel bands, string bands, mariachi bands, tuk bands, marching units of zouaves , strolling guitarists playing fado music. Stiltwalkers and tumbling acrobats. Young women in half-finished carnival costumes danced along like birds. With Elena at his side, Ramon was careful not to look at their half-exposed breasts (or to get caught doing so).

The maze of side streets was packed full. Coffee stands and rum sellers; bakers offering frosted pastry redjackets and chupacabras ; food carts selling fried fish and tacos, satay and jug-jug; side-show buskers; street artists; fire-eaters; three-card monte dealers – all were making the most of the improvised festival. For the first hour, it was almost enjoyable. After that, the constant noise and press and scent of humanity all around him made Ramon edgy. Elena was her infant-girl self, squealing in delight like a child and dragging him from one place to another, spending his money on candy rope and sugar skulls. He managed to slow her slightly by buying real food – a waxed paper cone of saffron rice, hot peppers, and strips of roasted butterfin flesh, and a tall, thin glass of flavored rum – and by picking a hill in the park nearest the palace where they could sit on the grass and watch the great, slow river of people slide past them.

Elena was sucking the last of the spice from her fingertips and leaning against him, her arm around him like a chain, when Patricio Gallegos caught sight of them and came walking slowly up the rise. His gait had a hitch in it from when he’d broken his hip in a rock-slide; prospecting wasn’t a safe job. Ramon watched him approach.

‘Hey,’ Patricio said. ‘How’s it going, eh?’

Ramon shrugged as best he could with Elena clinging to him like ivy on brick.

‘You?’ Ramon asked.

Patricio wagged a hand – not good, not bad. ‘I’ve been surveying mineral salts on the south coast for one of the corporations. It’s a pain in the ass, but they pay regular. Not like being an independent.’

‘You do what you got to do,’ Ramon said, and Patricio nodded as if he’d said something particularly wise. On the street, the chupacabra float was turning slowly, the great idiot mouth champing at the air. Patricio didn’t leave. Ramon shielded his eyes from the sun and looked up at him.

‘What?’ Ramon said.

‘You hear about the ambassador from Europa?’ Patricio said. ‘He got in a fight last night at the El Rey . Some crazy pendejo stabbed him with a bottle neck or something.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Yeah. He died before they could get him to the hospital. The governor’s real pissed off about it.’

‘So what are you telling me for?’ Ramon asked. ‘I’m not the governor.’

Elena was still as stone beside him, her eyes narrow in an expression of low cunning. Ramon quietly willed Patricio away, or at least to shut up. But the man didn’t pick up on it.