"I didn't know it could do that," said Snake, softly.
"You should have read the manual, boy."
Keenan climbed into the cockpit, and started the engine. Fumes belched, the engine roared, and with an odd whining and rhythmic clicking the Buggy settled into some semblance of its former self. Keenan hit a switch, and armoured segments of roof folded back; the final two, near the rear wheels, stuck and started to grind in imitation pain. Keenan switched it off, pulled free Cam, and set him on the dashboard. He searched the Buggy, pulling free a recharge lead, and after a few moments of fiddling, plugged Cam in. Rainbow lights flickered across Cam's shell.
"Thank you, Keenan."
"Don't mention it. How long to recharge?"
"Not for that. For Ed and Snake's lives."
Keenan waved his hand, and climbed from the vehicle, dragging first Ed to the rear of the Buggy and sitting him down with a slap. He attached the SnapWire to the Buggy's roll-cage, and repeated the process with Snake, who was groggy from his beating. Both men glared sullenly at Keenan, who'd lit a cigarette. He blew smoke at them, and Ed coughed.
"What now?" said Cam.
"The Junkala King told me to seek the Silver River. But I've been studying the PAD maps of the planet, and it doesn't make sense. This is a normal Earth Standard planet, Y7. All the rivers are natural water, that's why it's so inhabitable, why they built the Sick World here."
"So what are you thinking?"
"North, where the desert meets the sea, there is a long arm of weird geological strata; a glacier, still retreating to the poles but able to survive the edges of the desert sun. It's the only anomaly I can find on this whole ball of rock. On the maps it's named Tekarren Ka, but translated, that means
Silglace.
That's my only lead."
"You're wrong with the translation," said Cam. "Silglace is an abbreviation of the literal. It means
Silver Glacier,
or more precisely,
The glacier which has silver at its core.
You've found something there, Keenan."
"Hmm." He rubbed at his stubble, and winced at his battered body's aches and pains. "I feel like I'm clutching at straws."
"Still no comms with Franco or Pippa?"
"No. Nothing. Not even QGM or LongWave."
"You want to explore?"
Keenan shrugged. "It's on a direct bearing towards Pippa's BaseCamp, so we might as well start there. If the Junkala King was indeed who he said he was, if this whole damn situation isn't just a prick tease, then it's the only viable option I can see."
Snake laughed, from the back of the Buggy. "Fucking heroes, out to save the world again." He growled as Keenan lowered the D5 to his face.
"I suggest you shut up."
"Or what? You'll blow my head off?"
"Exactly," said Keenan, cool eyes meeting Snake's. "You're court-martialled, son. Your days in Combat-K are over. You know it, I know it, and Cam here, property of QGM in wartime, fucking knows it. When it's upheld, you'll be Little Man. And Little Man dies as easy as any other Non-Mil."
Snake gritted his teeth, muscles on his jaws standing out, but said no more.
Keenan hit the MonkeyMan SatNav, which blipped into existence. He punched in co-ordinates from the PAD, and the Buggy's console sprang into life.
"Follow the desert north-north-east for two hundred and fifty miles," said the SatNav. "Then take a right. Ooh."
"Great," muttered Keenan, slammed the Buggy in gear, and wheel-spun through the sand.
A rocky mountain range forced them north through the sand and rock fields, evidence of millennia of the terrifying Rockfalls. Keenan drove in silence, face grim, mulling over his encounter not just with Elana, but the Junkala King of a different age. Cam hummed to himself, apparently happy with the recharge juice flowing through batteries and circuits, whilst in the back, wired to the roll-cage, Snake and Ed sat in sullen silence, eyes dark rimmed, faces blank.
They pounded over harsh desert landscape, eventually circumnavigating the mountain range and turning northeasterly to compensate for navigational deviations. The landscape started to change, with more harsh, spiked plants, cacti and the occasional gnarled tree, some towering to several hundred feet in height, solitary sentinels stretching aged limbs for the sun and wearing their bark like a cancer.
No more imminent Rockfalls threatened them under the harsh, beating sun.
"I need a piss," said Snake, eventually.
"Piss in your pants," said Keenan without turning. He had one elbow on the Buggy's door, a breeze whipping his short hair, a smoke dangling between his lips.
"They say smoking kills you," said Ed, after another few miles.
"Not as quickly as a D5 in the mouth. I'll take my chances, thanks very much."
"I'm serious, Keenan, I need a piss."
And I'm serious, Snake, piss in your pants."
"You have no compassion, brother."
"I have plenty of compassion for the people I like. You don't fall into that category. And don't call me your fucking brother; if I was any relation of yours, I would have executed our mother shortly after your birth."
They continued, the Buggy hammering across rocks and through ruts and the occasional wadi. Keenan kept an eye on the console readouts, aware the engine temperature was creeping into the red.
"You're going to have to stop soon," said Cam, voice low.
"I know. I'm pushing too hard."
"And
then
can I have a piss?" said Snake.
Keenan slammed the Buggy to the right, slewing through sand and dust and shale, which spat in a wide arc like scattering rainfall. The Buggy crunched to a stop beside a towering, solitary tree, and Keenan turned in his seat, glaring at Snake.
"Are you going to whine all the way to the Silglace, Snake, or do I use the BoneStapler from the medical box to staple your fucking mouth shut."
"I'm bored."
"Nice to meet you, Bored, that's an unusual name. Some people call me Killer, for obvious reasons. Now. Keep your damn mouth shut and I won't be forced to put a bullet in your spine."
"He's cracking," said Ed.
Snake nodded, smiling. "You're a fool, Keenan."
"You reckon?" Keenan climbed from the Buggy and stretched his back, twisting in both directions to loosen tense muscles. Pain battered him dully, like punches through a pillow, reminding him of recent exploits. He could picture Elana in his mind; one minute alive, the next squashed flat. Instant death. He grimaced. She had been his key to this place... and she'd been taken away in the blink of an eye. Just like we all go, he thought. Shit!
As Keenan stretched his legs, Snake prattled on, hands suspended slightly above his head, his single dark orb following Keenan like a missile tracking a target. "There's so much about this place you do not understand."
"What, and you've got a degree in the place?"
"I've been here before," said Snake, voice quiet.
Keenan turned, stared at the one-eyed mercenary. "Yeah, right. Bull and Shit, mate."
"I swear it, Keenan. It was a long time ago, well, not by the standards of this place. But I have been here; on a mission. Far north, in the ice and snow wastelands."
Keenan moved close, and offered Snake a gun in the face. "And what pearls of wisdom did you learn whilst you were down here?"
"It's busier than you think."
"Meaning?"
"The DropBots got it wrong, Keenan. They scanned the area, but were...
misled.
There's something here of incredible power. Something of which you have no understanding; it could crush you like a leaf in a storm."
"You talk of VOLOS?"
Snake went quiet, his head dropping a little. Then he looked up, and his single eye gleamed. He sniffed, and gazed around at the desert. "He's everywhere. Can see everything. This is his planet. His world. His..." Snake laughed, "his
Sick
World."
"What else do you know?"
"Hey, wouldn't you like me to spill."
Keenan slammed the D5's butt into Snake's head, and the mercenary was punched to one side, hanging, suspended by the SnapWire which drew eager blood from his wrists. Snake coughed, and spat on the Buggy's floor. Then he looked up and grinned. "That's the spirit," he said. "Go on, beat the shit out of me. Then we'll see who QGM court-martial. You getting all this, Cam? You recording it for your
employers?"
Cam said nothing, and Keenan glanced at the little PopBot.
"What's he talking about?"
"I am required by QGM Law to report such things."
"This just gets better and better."
"We're in a State of War," said Snake. "There are rules. I may have broken them. But so have you."
Keenan, eyes narrowed, moved close to Snake. "You listen to me, shithead, between us lovers there are no rules no more. I'll do what I have to do, to get the job done. You tried to kill me, and no doubt would have done the same to the other squads without a second thought; that makes you expendable. Now, I advise you to keep your mouth shut, or I swear by everything I hold holy, not even Cam will drag me off you."
Snake gave a nod, and stayed silent.
Keenan strode off, pissing behind the towering tree, allowing his temper to slowly dissipate. Cam buzzed alongside him. "You want some advice?"
"Fuck off."
"Don't be like that, Keenan."
"Is that true? About having to report to QGM?"
"It's hardwired into all domestic models," said Cam, his voice uneasy. "It's so the military can commandeer every AI in the event of war. We are now in the event of war. I am, technically, no longer your property."
"So you obey QGM?"
"Yes."
"And if they were to order you to kill me?"
"Technically, I'd have to kill you."
"So, you'd betray me, as well?" He looked sideways at Cam.
"Of course not, Keenan! I'm yours, and we've been through a lot of shit together. Anyway, are you forgetting the Spinal Logic Cubes so quickly? QGM don't need me in order to carry out murder; they can spike you from ten billion miles away!"
Keenan leant against the tree and lit another cigarette. He stared off at distant mountains, huge and grey and orange, shaking his head, lost in thought. "This place is so wrong," he muttered. "What's going on here, Cam? Why did the DropBots fail to spot anything?"
"It seems to be linked to this VOLOS character."
"What is he? A robot? Deranged AI? An ancient king? I don't understand. And where is his centre of operations?"
"Something's coming."
Keenan stomped out his cigarette and scanned the desert. "Where? A buggy? A hovership?"
"Something substantially... bigger."
Keenan caught the tone in Cam's voice, and shielded his eyes. Then his teeth clamped tight shut as twenty mammoth SlamShips approached with a fast drone and whizzed overhead, massive, square black undercarriages flickering with green lights against matt black alloy. Keenan watched, as momentarily they blocked out the sun, and then they were gone leaving trails of ozone and exhaust vapour.
"Did they clock us?"
"Highly probable," said Cam. "They're Mk IVs. Old, in fact, obsolete in military terms. If we had a decent Hornet it'd take out all twenty in a blink; but we don't have a Hornet so it's totally academic. Here, in this place, now, they're the most advanced hardware I've witnessed. They saw us. And they pose a significant threat."
"To whom?"
"Our mission," said Cam.
"Yeah, right, our mission is to explore. To collect samples. Our mission is a piss-steam mission. It's a lame gig, buddy."
"Unless we find something, Keenan. And you found something. You found a junk who told you of VOLOS; you found a link to the civilisation we hunt, the civilisation that threatens the very fabric of Quad Gal. Keenan, we need to get this data out to QGM. We need to establish contact."
"All comms are down," said Keenan, quietly.
"I think I can re-establish contact."
"How?"
"Those ships," said Cam. "That
warfleet.
They will have components. I can cobble something together."
"You mean DekHelix Pro-Blag LightYear Projectors?"
"Yes," said Cam. "Something like that."
"You said warfleet. I'd have to agree, it looks like that. What disturbs me, Cam, my little tennis ball buddy, is where are they going? And more importantly, who are they going to fight? Ships like that - they can carry, what? Eight, nine thousand infantry?"
"More like ten."
"This game is fast changing, Cam."
"Are we still heading for the Silglace?"
"For now. I want to track this Silver River. Can you log the trajectory of those ships? We can look them up next, put a few more pieces of the puzzle in place."
"Not only can I plot trajectories, now I've scanned mass and dimension I can track them. Theoretically. Unless VOLOS has something else up his sleeve."