V. Larson - Mech

Mudface turned away from the man struggling in the mud and beamed his idiot’s grin at her. “Now, you’ve got that right, girl,” he said and sent the bleeding old woman into the stockade to fetch a fresh bottle of chilled reed-whiskey. As soon as his attention had shifted, the other swamp-folk helped the sick man to his feet and finished loading the flitter.

Then Daddy showed up, riding his sagging one-man flyer over the tops of the Red Hork trees and landing in the glade next to the flitter. Daddy was hugely fat, with a belly that protruded over the rim of his stained greasy workpants. His mean eyes protruded from their sockets, matching his belly. He had a trailer behind the flyer with a load of dead waterfowl in the cradle. Feathers, beaks and claws stuck out here and there between the slats.

“Looks like a nice catch,” said Mudface.

“Must be fifty, sixty black-beaks in there, plus a good dozen of those noisy gronk birds,” rumbled Daddy as he climbed off the flyer’s saddle. The flyer buoyed up a few feet in obvious relief, then the roaring engine shut itself off and the vehicle sank to the muddy surface. A group of bearded thugs gathered around the craft, slinging their weapons over their backs and whistling at the catch.

“Gronks are crap to eat.”

“Yeah, but these aren’t making noise anymore,” laughed Daddy, slapping his flabby thigh. He pulled out his hand-cannon, the twin to Mudface’s, and began reloading it with shells. He walked up to Sarah, still loading. A trickle of sweat ran down from his huge hands onto the hot barrel, producing a wisp of steam.

“What’s taking so long with the loading?” demanded Daddy.

“One of the swampers came down sick,” said Mudface.

“Sick? Has the fever, does he?”

Mudface nodded. He swatted a buzzing insect that chewed at the tough skin of his neck.

“Can’t have him giving it to the others,” said Daddy grimly. He headed toward the huts. Two of his thugs sauntered after him with grins splitting their dark beards.

“Can’t you just give them all some antibiotic?” asked Sarah in concern.

“Nope,” said Mudface. “It’s viral. No easy cures. There’s only one sure fix for a bad case of swamper fever.”

From inside the hut a shotgun boomed. Daddy came out again, looking satisfied. His thugs dragged the flopping body out and deposited it in the swamp.

“Now, you have our deal real straight, don’t you girly?” rumbled Daddy. He kept his eyes on his gun, shoving another shell into the magazine with a fat thumb.

“No question about it, I’ll transport this stuff down, hide it in the caves, then you deposit my share of the cash at First Stellar.”

“Nice and simple,” said Daddy. He raised his head and bored into her with hard little eyes like glass chips. “Let’s keep it that way.”

Sarah nodded.

“We’ve got friends with ways of fixin’ people who screw us,” said Mudface, his eyes were big and serious. He nodded to the thugs who wandered around the place. “I like you, Sarah. Wouldn’t want to see you get messed up.”

“That’s right,” added Daddy. He finished loading his hand-cannon and the breech snicked shut automatically. “I don’t like comin’ into town to do business. It’d be a shame to have that kind of business with you.”

“I assure you, gentlemen,” Sarah told them with her hands raised and open. She spoke with deep sincerity. “I have absolutely no intention of screwing up this deal.”

They both nodded, and the tension eased. Later, after they all had a cool glass of reed-whiskey, a surprisingly clean glass, Sarah made ready for lift-off.

“Awe now, look at that. That damned swamper got mud all over your flitter with that last case,” complained Mudface. “I’ll have ‘im beat for you, girly. Beat real good!”

Sarah’s mouth opened and she found herself about to say thanks automatically. Her tongue caught in her teeth and she said nothing.

Mudface just waved at her, grinning his idiot grin. Sarah pressed the automatic return button on the flitter’s control panel and soon his face was lost in the glade around the stockade. Then the glade was lost on the mold-green carpet of Sharkstooth and finally even the triangular island slipped away beneath the fluffy white clouds of Gopus. The flitter slid up into orbit and docked with her ship.

As she made her way through the airlock and climbed into the rotating shower to wash the sweat from her body, she thought about Mudface’s words beat real good, and shuddered in the warm water.

“Hello mom,” Bili Engstrom shouted into intercom. The sound startled her.

“Hello Bili,” she replied, “how’s your arm, any change?”

“Nope, the heal-bag’s still brown and just a little cloudy. How’s old Mudface? Still a pervert?”

“Bili, let’s not talk like that.”

The connection was cutoff for a minute or so while she removed her pressure suit and made her way in Zero-G up to the passenger section of the boat. Bili, who sat in the tiny galley section working on a model of Garm’s star system and getting glue everywhere in the process, took the time to examine his injured arm. He poked and prodded at the limb through the tough clear plastic bag that encased it in liquids until he could feel the pressure with his new, tingling nerves. His right arm had been crushed just above the elbow in the same accident that had killed his father out in the asteroid belt six months ago. His mother had gotten him to a clinic in time and they had amputated the mutilated arm. Without full medical, they couldn’t afford a really professional regrow, just one of those kits you could buy at the survival supplies department, alongside the jungle ape venom kits and the do-it-yourself amputation packages. It just wasn’t coming out right, though. The bag was supposed to remain clear and colorless, but had turned a nasty, hazy brown over the last two weeks. Bili gave it another hard poke and winced.

“Mom, we don’t have to do this job, you know,” Bili said as his mother emerged from an opening in the ceiling and did a summersault to a standing position. She wordlessly examined his arm in the healing bag. “It’s worse,” she announced tonelessly.

“We don’t need this job,” repeated Bili. “This regrow will work okay, and even if it doesn’t, I can get along with one arm. I’m left-handed, anyway.”

“Don’t worry about it, kid, we’re going to get you on full medical,” she said with false bravado. “It’s a done deal.” She ruffled his hair and used the handrails to pull herself forward to check the screens.

“Not much out there,” Bili said. “Not much on the scopes, either.”

Sarah did find one thing on the scopes however, a small ship of unknown configuration. It was coming in fast from the asteroid belts, approaching Garm from behind Gopus. She shrugged mentally; probably just another smuggler like herself, coming in to make a rendezvous with a freighter headed down to Garm. She pressed her fingers against her temples, feeling the sickness of despair gnawing at her guts. Every time she looked at Bili’s arm now, she wanted to retch.

Back in the galley, Bili poked his withered-looking new arm through the tough plastic again. It looked like a bunch of rotting sausages strung along a white plastic pipe, which was about what it was. He looked at the swirling brown liquids, circulating through the tiny pump and filter with a soft gurgling sound. He bet it stank in there. He bet it stank real bad.

Turning back to his project, he found the glue tube and began to glue the dark little pebble-shaped asteroids into place.

Bili was right next to Sarah, strapped into his crash-seat and eating a bluish hork-apple. “We’re going to meet the freighter now, Bili. Time to close your visor and pressurize your suit.”