Joan Vinge - World's End

Harkonni was half frowning, now, like a man waking up in a strange bed.

"So you made a strike?" Ang said. "Lucky man. Whereabouts--up there?" He pointed in the direction we were heading; his hand jerked with tension.

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Harkonni nodded a little uncertainly, as if he couldn't stop himself from answering even if he wanted to. "Yes, yes, all over the ground, up there, all over--"

Ang swore and pushed past him, running toward the

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pack beast. "They're mine, goddamn it! I found them first--"

Harkonni ran after him. "No! Leave them alone! It's my treasure--" He clawed at Ang's shoulder.

Spadrin followed them and struck Harkonni with his rifle butt, knocking him down. Ang went through the bags until he found the one he was looking for. Harkonni sat protesting on the ground, with Spadrin's stun rifle pointing into his face.

Ang jerked the bag open and plunged his hand into it, Generated by ABC Amber LIT

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pulling out a handful of lumps. He looked down at what he held, and the blind greed in his eyes turned to incredulity.

"Shit!" He flung the handful away, and dumped the bag's contents onto the ground. "It's nothing but shit!"

At first I thought he only meant that he hadn't found what he wanted. But then I saw his face. I pushed away from the rover and went to where he stood looking down. Scattered on the ground around his feet were small brownish-gray lumps of dried excrement.

I looked from Ang's face to Harkonni's, and Spadrin's.

"Gods!" Spadrin muttered. His mouth twisted with disgust.

The stun rifle quivered in his hands. For a minute

I thought he was going to fire it into Harkonni's terrified face. At that range the charge would kill him. Harkonni began to cry. Spadrin stepped back and away from him, as if killing him was beneath even Spadrin's dignity.

"Let's get out of here."

Ang nodded and dropped the bag he was still holding onto the pile of dung. He wiped his hands on his shorts. His face was empty of everything but relief.

"It's still up there." He looked away, following the whillp's shining acid-etched trail on up the canyon

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with his eyes. "My treasure." He started back to the rover. Spadrin grabbed up a sack of Harkonni's food supplies and followed him.

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"My treasure, my treasure . . ." Harkonni sobbed. He crawled past me toward the pile of dung.

"Gedda!" Ang called. "Come on!"

I went back to the rover, almost running to get away from the sound of Harkonni's weeping.

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I

Dean feel it, I can almost smell it!" Ang said this morning.

He got us moving when it was barely dawn, he was so sure we'd find his treasure today. The fault broken terrain ahead of us was stained a rust red. He swore it would hold the solii formation.

He set the rover's tracer equipment to close-scan for the proper mineral compounds. He was so sure. . . .

The sky was filled with black and purple clouds, the way it often was in the late afternoons, turning the light washed badlands sullen and dark ahead. Lightning flickered and a few fat drops of rain pockmarked the dust on the windshield, making a promise the clouds never kept.

Thunder rolled over and around us like the laughter of the gods. And we came to the end of Ang's journey.

Ang was piloting, like he usually did--today he was even humming tunelessly. He'd never done that before.

Spadrin stole stale snapper biscuits from my plate while

I tried to eat standing up, pressed into a corner of the cab.

His eyes dared me to stop him. I didn't even care--the heat, the stink, the food poisoning, had killed my appetite days ago. Only Spadrin had any appetite left, like

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the animal he was.

Then suddenly the rover lurched to a stop, so abruptly that I lost my balance and knocked over Spadrin's bottle of ouvung. It spilled on his leg. He swore at me, and grabbed my wrist. "Clean it up, Gedda." He jerked me down; I saw his knife blade glint and then disappear. I 114

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pulled off the rag I was wearing as a sweatband. On my knees, I began to wipe the liquor off of his leg. But he stood up suddenly, pushing me aside. "Ang, are we there?" He was looking past Ang's shoulder.

Ang sat silently behind the controls, staring out at something. Sweat trickled down his neck. His hands lay in his lap, clenched into white-knuckled fists.

"Ang!" Spadrin shook his shoulder.

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Ang reached up and opened the door. He got to his feet. Without a word, he climbed out and down. Spadrin leaped down after him. After a moment I followed them outside.

They stood on the edge of a cliff, with the wind whipping their hair. I made my way between rust-red boulders to the precipice. Below me the wall of rock dropped sheerly into a purple abyss. The far rim of the canyon was hundreds of meters away; the bottom must have been a good half a kilometer below us. Down in its shadowy depths I saw a river winding like a snake.

A

river of light ... of molten lava. The crack in the earth ran as far as I could see, looking to the left.

And looking right, I saw on the horizon an immense surface of blazing light, like a sun fallen to earth . . . Fire Lake. Elation filled me. At last.

"It can't be!" Ang shouted. "This can't be here, it can't!" He looked at the rover, as if it had somehow betrayed him. He looked down into the abyss again. He took a step forward, as if he were going to challenge its reality. I caught hold of his arm. He pulled loose, frowning, but he moved away from the edge.

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Spadrin shouldered me aside. I backed up, away from both of them. "What's this mean, Ang?

Ang?"

Spadrin said. "Where's the treasure? Where are the solus?

Ang--!"

"I don't know. . . ." Ang whispered. "This shouldn't be here. We can't be here--" He gazed toward the shining

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horizon, toward Fire Lake. "You can't do this to me!" he screamed at the sky.

"You mean there's no treasure? You mean we came all this way for nothing--and now we're lost?" Spadrin jerked him around. "You fucking dirtsider, is that what you mean?" He struck Page 92

Ang across the face.

Ang lunged at Spadrin, but Spadrin threw him down

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on his back and sat on his chest, holding his arms flat.

"Is that what you mean--?"

Ang turned his face away, looking out into the canyon.

"Yes," he whispered. "Yes." Tears crept out of his eyes and dripped into the dirt.

Spadrin got up off of him, and let him get to his feet.

Ang stood at the edge of the abyss with his back to us.

His tall, broad-shouldered body seemed to wither.

Spadrin stepped forward again and pushed him over the edge.

"No!" I shouted, but Ang's cry as he went over obliterated the sound. I ran forward--but it was far too late by the time I reached the rim. Ang had already stopped screaming. I saw his body rebounding from the rocks far down the wall. I turned away from the edge, shutting my eyes.

Spadrin still stood at the top of the cliff, watching

Ang's body fall toward the planet's core. I heard his laughter before I let myself look at him again--high, strangled laughter edging toward hysteria. "Gedda," he gasped, "get the rover started."