Satisfied, she turned, seeing his anger-hardened eyes.
"Your first payment?" She filled her lungs and adopted a wide legged posture, her head thrown back, taunting. "Come and get it."
"By the Rotted Gods, I will," he growled, starting for her, peeling off his tunic in the process.
Skyla's first kick caught him under the ribs on the right side. She spun, hammering him hard under the mastoid with an elbow, danced, and dislocated his keecap with another kick.
She dropped on him, knee first, as he hit the floor gasping for breath. She rested a forearm across his neck and stared into his dazed eyes. "You forgot to ask why I called myself, 'C.' Interested?"
She let up a little on his throat while he gasped another breath, eyes fear-glazed and frantic.
"C stands for Companions." She let that sink in. "The man you sold into slavery was Lord Commander Staffa kar Therma."
He trembled and she nodded. "Yes, I see you know what that means. Now, stand up." She released him and backed away, waiting, ready to strike again.
He limped to the sleeping platform, eyes miserable. "I— I didn't know. He . . . looked like a Nab who. ... It was an honest mistake!"
Skyla stood impassively. "The Lord Commander's weapons. Where are they?"
Broddus swallowed, gray shading his features. "Top drawer. My side. . . .
Something's wrong with my side. Feels real funny."
Skyla picked a walking stick from the wall and hooked the drawer, pulling it open from an angle. She approached cautiously, wary of booby traps, before she lifted Staffa's possessions from the cavity.
"You were very presumptuous." Skyla turned, settling Staffa's weapons belt over her own. "I didn't lie to you. Holos of our business dealings would have made you rich. Uy Takka, the Regan Minister of Internal Security knows I'm here, somewhere. She would have paid a fortune for such information." She smiled. "But then you won't be reporting it, will you?"
"N-no. N-never. My word ... I give it... I'll never ..." he stammered, blinking back tears. "It was a mistake! Just a mistake!"
Skyla frowned, studying him. She walked to the drawer and pulled a laser from among his other weapons, fingering it thoughtfully. Broddus began whimpering and shaking his head. Eyes wide he clutched his mottling right side. He'd gone white now, and not just from fear.
Skyla checked the charge and triggered the weapon. Smoke curled from the sleeping platform.
"What are you. . . . Rotted Gods! NO!" He lost control of his body, sinking onto the sleeping platform.
"Where's the rest of Staffa's money?"
"In my belt purse, hanging on the right of the wardrobe! Take it. Don't hurt me!"
She pulled the door open with the cane and found it. Only two thousand credits remained. Turning, she slipped the credits into her pouch and calmly walked up to stare into his frightened eyes.
"You are aware of the Etarian practice of dealing with thieves, I suppose."
She bit back the impulse to spit into his face.
His eyes closed for a second and he swallowed loudly. His nod was a bare quiver.
"If you move, I will kill you. Just that simple. Have you the courage to live?
Death would be much easier."
"Live." His face contorted the track of the tears leaking down his cheeks.
"And you will tell the world what happens to those who dare cross the Companions?"
"I . . . I. . . ." He began sobbing.
She triggered the laser on low power. He screamed when it touched his flesh.
With great art, she carved the Etarian symbol for a thief into his forehead, burning deep to etch it into the frontal bone.
"Death is easier," she reminded, heart tightening.
"I want to live!"
Without a second's hesitation, she burned off his right hand; the coherent light cauterized the stump as he screamed deafeningly.
"Live well, thief. Remember the Companions—and the time you robbed Staffa kar Therma." She hesitated at the door, seeing the pale cast to his features. Her first kick had ruptured his liver. Death lingered but minutes away. "... And gave the Lord Commander over into slavery!"
She bundled Staffa's combat suit into an empty pack she found in the main room and pulled her robes on, readjusting the veil. Grabbing up her weapons, she slipped out the door and descended the stairs to the main room. A few eyes looked her way, seeing the pack. No one said anything.
In the street, she turned her tracks toward the little shop where she had rented a small room in the rear. On the way, she studied her back trail. No one. She had to move fast. Broddus might live long enough to tell.
I should have killed him outright! Getting soft, Skyla. No, not that at all.
Dead, he'd have had no time to suffer. Let him die knowing he's a broken man.
She hurried to her small room, trading a jest with the owner, and locked her door. After reshuffling the packs, she donned her combat armor, satisfied by the reassuring tug of her blaster on her hip. She slipped the coarse robes of an Etarian matron over her shoulders and pinned the veil in place. With Staff a's suit and gear packed on top of her white gossamer gown, she took up the packs and left; her steps turned toward the Warden's central slave quarters.
She shook her head as her heart pounded hollowly. "Oh, Staffa, what have you done?" She bit her lip, wondering how he'd managed to stand slavery and degradation.
She could see him, suffering one indignity after another, his wild rages caused by the Praetor's mind traps bringing him to grief after grief. They'd make him suffer for his pride. Stun rods, floggings, perhaps even mutilation.
"You were never taught about the street, Staffa. For all your power and reputation, you never understood the way humanity works. Pray to the Blessed Gods I am not too late!"
The giant, Brots, had arrived arrogant, dominating, his eyes piggish and deep-set in his flat face. Unlike the others, he wore the collar with a disgraceful pride. The first day, he'd begun to test the system by muscling the weaker slaves out of the way. Anglo had been rotated for Morlai, so, for the moment, Kaylla enjoyed some relief.
That night, Staffa suffered a severe bout of depression. Alone in his misery, he didn't realize how long Kaylla had been gone. Suddenly worried, he began to prowl; within minutes he saw her limping in from the dunes. She stopped short of camp, body bent and tired as she settled on the white sand. The Etarian moon hung low, but enough illumination remained to see defeat as she hung her head. Her shoulders began shaking with sient sobs.
She didn't hear the soft grinding of sand beneath his feet. Staffa settled beside her and placed a hand on her shoulder. Tension and fear possessed her as she recoiled from his touch.
"What is it?"
"Nothing. Just . . . just leave me alone!
Even in the pale light, he could see her swollen lips. She resisted when he placed his fingers under her chin and lifted. The side of her face was puffed out. Dark bruises mottled her neck.
"Who?" Pent rage broke loose.
"Tuff, don't. It's only trouble!" Her hands twisted around the scanty cloth she still had left to cover her body. "Promise me? Leave it be, Tuff." The desperate need in her voice drove him to nod and pat her shoulder tenderly.
And he waited.
Brots took the position opposite Staffa the next day, and between the two of them, they bore the front portion of pipe.
"Later," he heard Brots call to Kaylla in his heavy throaty voice. A shiver rippled down her tanned back.
Eyes slitted, Staffa took Brots' measure. The fellow weighed in about a hundred pounds heavier than he did. Huge arms bulged with muscle thick as a wrestler's thigh. Irritating arrogance reeked from Brots' beastly leer. Staffa found himself locking eyes with the giant all through the hot day. The air crackled with challenge.
That night, Staffa watched. Kaylla got to her feet just after dark and ghosted silently away as she normally did to relieve herself in private. Staffa turned his gae to where huge Brots slept and saw the giant'
s head come up. When Kaylla slipped over the dune, Brots rose to his feet—moving to intercept her.
Staffa pursued like a sand leopard as the huge man plodded over the dune crest, eyes on Kaylla's tracks.
"Hey! Well, see who I find in the dunes again!" Brots' thick voice frayed Staffa's temper.
Kaylla's voice carried her sudden fear and resignation.
"Please, I'm tired tonight. Anglo's back tomorrow. He doesn't like the goods used. It will be worse for you."
"On your back and spread, woman. Now! Do it or you'll hurt the worse for it."
Staffa stepped out from behind the dune. "You ever touch her again, Terguzzi scum sucker, and I'll kill you." He'd settled himself, toes gripping the still hot sand. Every nerve tingled as the gut-twisting anger surged. Come on, Staffa begged silently, let me destroy you, you bastard.
Brots rubbed his hands and grinned as he advanced.
They met, thumping hollowly, grunting as they came together and fought across the sands: Staffa with all the tricks in his long experience, Brots with brute strength and animal zeal.
The desperation and guilt burned free, Staffa kicked, struck, and lashed insanely into that giant body. The beating he took fed every frustration and injustice from Broddus' deceit to the hell that burned from each humiliation and the suffering in the sun. He fought, powered by the guilt that obsessed him. He fought for Chrysla and Kaylla, for Peebal and the rest. Staggering blows landed by Brots goaded him with pain that freed his berserk strength.
Staffa unleashed a brutal blow with his elbow, catching Brots under the chin.
The man's head snapped back with a crack. Staffa pistoned a hardened palm to the man's nose, and shot stiff blinding fingers into an eye. His skill prevailed as he broke the big man down, dislocating a kneecap first, breaking a wrist next. Finally he targeted the weaving mass of flesh and lashed out, catching the big man in the throat with a perfectly timed kick.
Brots wavered on his feet, huge chest heaving as a rasping wheeze gurgled from his throat. Staffa stepped back, took a run, and panted a fist deep in the giant's solar plexus. On agile feet he back-heeled Brots to the sand. Staffa dropped to grab the huge head. Work-toughened muscles rippled and bulged under sun-blackened skin. Staffa heaved against the thick corded muscle of the giant's neck while sausagelike groping fingers found a choke-hold on Staffa's windpipe.
For long moments, they heaved, muscles cracking and pulling, sweat streaming down gleaming skin. Their faces contorted with hate. Brots' neck strained. Staffa's vision "I shimmered as his throat crushed under those thick lingers.
Vertebrae cracked loudly in the night. Brots' big hands spasmed before they loosened and thumped into the sand.
Breath tearing at his throat, Staffa swallowed living pain and staggered away before he fell and rolled on the hot sand. He coughed in agony as he massaged his swollen throat.
"You all right?" Kaylla asked, cradling his head as he blinked dully into her pale face.
"I ... think," Staffa croaked, chest heaving. Something damp—a tear—landed on his face. He lifted a spent arm to | give her a reassuring pat.
"Why?" she asked, voice oddly hoarse. "Why kill for me?"
He swallowed again, the sensation like a splintered stick being pulled down his esophagus. He pulled her close, holding her gently while his thoughts reeled. "You're . . . worth more."
They lay there together, Kaylla curled protectively in his shaking arms.
"We've got to get back," she told him finally.
Staffa glanced at Brots's limp body. "Better get him buried first. They'll see him from the air."
Together they dragged the' big man to a slip face in a crescentic dune and cascaded unstable sand over him.
Walking back, Kaylla asked, "What do we say?"
Staffa smiled, wincing at the beating the big man had given him. "That he told us no collar would hold him. That he could beat any desert anywhere and they could let the Rotted Gods chew his abscessed ass before he'd stay a slave."
Hand on his shoulder, she said, "In the end, he would have killed me, you know. It was in him."
"I think of Skyla ... if she were here. If I never get out of here, and she's ever in this kind of situation, maybe someone will. . . . Rotted Gods, what am I saying?" He ended with a self-reproving growl, irritated and embarrassed by this new softness. "C'mon, it's a long hot one tomorrow. Get some sleep."
She glanced up at him in the moonlight and nodded.
"Your Skylas a lucky woman Tuff." Then she walked off to find her place in the sand.
Morning came too early. Staffa stood, wincing at his bruises. Every joint ached as if it had been pulled from its socket. His throat burned, the trachea fevered under swollen flesh. He took a step, reeling on his feet.
Staffa squinted his eyes in the blinding glare of the sun where it hung over the horizon. His dry mouth gagged him. Aching limbs shrieked pain into the base of his brain. Brots had hurt him. Numbly, he came to the realization that the big man might have killed him after all. The agony in his body, coupled with the night's exertion, might keep him from getting through this day.
Gasping stifling air into his wounded lungs, Staffa glanced down at the bruises on his rib cage. His elbows looked like swollen roots and his fists had scabbed, only to bleed when he flexed his hands. He staggered to his place by the pipe.
"Whoa!" the tail man called and Staffa threw his weight into slowing the heavy pipe. He stumbled and almost fell, catching his balance by grueling effort of will.
In agony, he followed Kaylla's directions to align the long tube.
"Yup!" came the cry, and Staffa collapsed under the weight of the yoke.
He blinked, feeling heat radiating from the hot steel.
"Tuff?" The worry in Kaylla's voice cut through his misery. "Come on, get up.
We've got a whole day."
Staffa ground his teeth and levered himself up.
Koree, another of the crew, suddenly bent down, hand under Staffa's arm. "For today, maybe I'll pair with Tuff."
Staffa's bruised voice rasped. "Yeah, maybe today I need it." Why did this man offer help? What was his purpose?
Koree: another misfit. Skin and bone, the man nevertheless suffered here in the sun with the rest of them. Frail and fragile, Koree—like Peebal—wouldn't last long as a slave on Etaria.
Staffa nodded his thanks to Kaylla. Her tan eyes had grown grim. She slapped him on the back encouragingly as they returned for another length of pipe.
"That true," Koree asked, "what they say about Brots?"
"What's that?" Staffa whispered to save his voice as he concentrated on his wobbling feet.
"That he run off?" Koree gnted under the weight of the pipe, ropy muscles straining. "He took part of my food. He took from all of us."
"So?"
"So we all noticed you're hurt. That's all. Many of us saw Kaylla's bruises.
Yesterday, you and Brots . . . well, you love Kaylla. We all do. Today, Kaylla stands straight again. You're hurt and Brots is gone. We'll have our fa share of food and water again."
Staffa coughed hoarsely. "Bastard hurt her. Now, if I could just get Anglo."
Koree hawked brown phlegm and spit into the sand. "Injustice, friend Tuff, is the reality of existence. God made the universe that way. It's unfair that we can only find a hero once in a while to handle bits and pieces of justice."
"I'm no Rotted hero."
Koree ignored him. "Brots is only a symptom of the sickness infecting mankind.
Anglo is a fragment, but he repesents a larger malignancy, one you and I, friend Tuff, cannot cure."
"Why not? If I could get my hands on his scrawny neck. ..."
"He's only a fragment—and killing him would kill all of us when the collars shorted," Koree panted. "That, friend Tuff, is poor social surgery atbest.
Therefore, here, we, at least, must suffer until we find the strength to die.
Others will have to do the surgery in another time."
&
nbsp; Staffa stumbled along, trying to keep his breath. When they dropped the pipe he looked at Koree. "You think it takes strength to die?"
Koree bent to the task of pulling the yoke strap from the sand. "In our situation, yes. Why do we fight so hard to live? What do we do here but suffer? If you accept that there is purpose in the universe, is it suffering?
Can we expect that tomorrow the Empire will fall and we will be freed? No, my friend. I wake every morning with dread. Every moment I suffer, feeling my health sucked away with the sweat of my body. I will break someday. When?
Tomorrow? No. Next week? No. But the week after? The week after that? And when that happens, Anglo or Morlai will cut off my life and perhaps you will carry me to the side and push hot white sand over my body. That is my future."
"Then why keep going?"
"Life is addictive. God made the universe that way. Like a drug, life fills us and leaves us brimming with an illusion of hope. People experience enough successes to nourish more hope. They forget the disappointments because hope is a more enjoyable opiate than despair. We, however, have no such reinforcement here. Somewhere on this endless pipeline death waits. Perhaps the only true underlying reaon we stagger on is that we're goaded by curiosity. When will it come? How long will I last? I ask you, is life worth living if that is the only entertainment?"
"You can always lie down and let Anglo make an end of it," Staffa reminded.
"The collar doesn't cause pain. The disorientation is only limited to a minute or so. You talk of God and injustice. Why? The universe is neutral."
"Is it?" Koree shot him a sideways glance as they staggered under the immense weight. "Suffering and injustice are built deep into the structure of the universe. Entropy is the fuel of progress. Each of the world ecosystems—there are no exceptions—is based on competition. Some life-form eating another, competing for resources at the expense of its brethren. Why? Any species of plant or animal—if not preyed upon by others—preys upon itself. Is that just?"