Sparks in Cosmic Dust (24 page)

Restless, with thorns behind his darting eyes and a hyper-jittery sense of where everyone was at all times, Solomon suffered the most creasing headache he’d experienced this side of low-g mining on Faro Luna. So much for sharing everything. He’d been left to lug the bulk of the food crates inside the mine while everyone else packed supplies for the donkeys. No one spoke to him except to order him about. Varinia didn’t even look at him anymore. And the others—they were conspicuously subdued. They chatted together in low tones and seemed to avoid him at all costs.

What was going on? This close to takeoff, with so much pyro up for grabs, would be an ideal time to…

No, they wouldn’t try anything like
—

He dropped his latest crate on the slick cave floor and bolted back outside. Where was Grace? Not with the animals. He scanned the inlet but she wasn’t there.
Shit.
It would only take her a minute to dig up his pyro stash and replace the pouches with colored sand or some other crafty substitute. He’d suspected one of them—Grace or Clay—might try that trick sooner or later. Wait ’til he was occupied, then
bam,
perform the old switcheroo on him, leave him broke-dick.

No wonder they’d wanted him in the mine!

He leaped the narrow channel and sprinted out of the inlet, ignoring Varinia’s pretend look of alarm. She even called his name? Bitch. A warning signal. So s
he
was in on it, too. Standing watch while the old double-crossing vulture did the deed. This had all been carefully planned while he’d suffered his fever. The fucks had scoured the area to find his stash, and they’d already divvied up his share, hoping like hell he didn’t recover.

No, no. The women had looked after him well enough.

So what? They’d had guilty consciences, nothing more. They weren’t going to kill him, just
cheat him
out of his pyro. The three of them, whispering, plotting—they’d been at it all day. He knew. Oh, he
knew.

The second depression on the left. A narrow gap beneath a jutting ledge in the cliff wall, at ground level. He’d sealed the pouches in a waterproof carrier and pegged the bag to the rock, then stuffed sand over the bundle to hide it. Simple but effective. Every night bar the two fever-stricken ones, he’d sneaked here unseen by the others—he’d made sure of that—and added to his fortune.

“And
here she is.
” He caught the good doctor red-handed, on her hands and knees in the sand. Inches from his depository. “I knew it! Slicker than lube oil. You old bitch. Get up.” He grabbed a handful of her graying auburn hair and dragged her to her feet.

“What the hell’s your problem?” She batted his arm away. “Do you know what you’ve just done?”

“I’ve just stopped a heist. A red-hot fucking heist.” Hate jetting like a geyser into his throat, he slapped her face.

Grace slumped onto the sand, shaking.

“Yeah, and stay there, you old buzzard.” He spat on her, a toxic cocktail of shame and vengeance sloshing inside him. “I hoped it wouldn’t come to this, but you’ve played your hand, doc. Finally played your hand. You all have.” He turned and wished he’d brought a weapon with him instead of having to get by the others. But by God, if they got in his way, he’d snap their necks. Like ring pulls on cans of berighold sauce. Fucking double-crossers. What a stupid goddamn sap he’d been, believing he could trust suck-bait strangers like this. They’d been interested in one thing and one thing only right from the start. Have him do the lion’s share of the digging, like a sap, then leave him twisting on some jerkwater way station with pockets full of sand.

How dumb did they think he was? They’d all better—

A thumping blow to the back of his neck sank his knees from under him. The jolt throbbed with a ringing buzz across his shoulders and down his spine. He flopped on his side onto the sand, wondering what the hell had hit him.

“One more outburst from you and we’ll be inheriting your share. No one will need to steal it.” Grace spat on the back of his neck, the epicenter of her demobilizing strike. “For the record, I didn’t know where you kept your goods, and I don’t care. We made a pact and we’re going to honor it. But you—you’re unraveling like there’s no tomorrow. Get a grip! We’re hours away from becoming millionaires. Stop being paranoid.”

“Oh, yeah? And what were you doing digging in the sand
right
where my stash is? You call that honoring a pact?” He coughed, then nursed his sore spine.

Clay and Varinia appeared together. The latter brandished a pistol. “What happened? Where is it?”

“Where’s what?” Solomon groaned.

“Where’s the son of a bitch lobster who attacked you? Back in the sea? You hurt?”

Grace replied, “He’ll be fine. I had to take him out before he got somebody killed. I don’t know what’s eating him, but he was convinced I’d found his hiding place and was robbing him. We struck each other, that’s all. Quits now.”

“You haven’t answered my question.” Solomon sat up, rubbing his neck.

“The wind caught my microdot, blew it across the beach,” Grace said. “I very nearly lost it forever, you dumb hunker. Lucky for me you hit like a sissy.”

“A microdot! I have to hand it to you, Doc, you can come up with a story when you need one. That’s precious.” He mumbled to himself, “Microdot. Hell do they take me for? They must think I’m smogged. At least I stopped them this time.”
And there won’t be a next time.

“Solomon?” Varinia crouched in front of him, her bright eyes pretending pity. “You’re frightening me. What’s wrong?”

He’d witnessed the full extent of her playacting ever since the Delfin. “We’re good together, aren’t we?” she’d told him in her cube bedroom, all so he’d keep her safe while she skipped out on her boss. Who was she kidding? She didn’t give a shit about him. Hadn’t from the start. “Sell your sob stories someplace else, princess. We’re all stocked up here.”

“Crazy. You’re talking crazy.”

“Am I?” He studied each of them in turn. The similarities were so clear and numerous they bordered on caricatures—overdone frowns, worry lines so deep they could catch squid from the sea bed, bright eyes glistening with pyro lust, guilty mouths hanging slightly agape to keep from quivering and betraying their true intentions, fresh sweat clinging to their temples. If this wasn’t conspiracy, his name wasn’t Solomon Bodine. No, everything his intuition had told him was right. They’d thrown in together at some point, and now that he’d foiled their first attempt, they would have to bide their time before trying another switch.

“You—you’re right. I must be exhausted,” he lied, wiping his brow with a trembling hand—a performance to match even theirs. “Really sorry, Grace. I’ve not been thinking straight ever since…that fever really knocked it out of me.”

Not bad. He should try out for the Io Grand Theatre.

“You’d better get some rest, sunshine,” Grace said. “Stay here, see to your goods. We’ll take care of the camp.”

“’Kay. Sorry again.”

“Don’t sweat it. Just an unfortunate coincidence, that’s all.”

Coincidence my ass, you old quack.

“Do you want a blanket or something?” Varinia asked.

“Um, no. No thanks. I’ll just sit here, watch the waves for a bit. Clear my head, you know?”

“All right. But give us a shout if you need anything,” she said.

“Sure thing.”

They left, gibbering together, exactly as they’d done before Grace’s attempted heist. Another coincidence? Sure, just like the old woman choosing Clay and Varinia to check on the
Taras
the other day. Plenty of opportunity to set a trap for him somewhere along the way. They obviously didn’t have the nerve to kill him face to face. That much was obvious. No, they’d have to lead him down a wrong path…into quicksand maybe.

Or did they plan to give him up to the forest aliens?

Christ,
that must be it. The creatures had found out about his accident, they’d located the grave, and Clay—that sneaky son of a bitch—had made some kind of deal with them. Why else would they have let him and Varinia leave unharmed when one of their own lay in a grave with his skull cleaved open? They wanted the
culprit,
damn it. And he was set to be sacrificed for the price of a few extra million in pyro dust.

It all made perfect sense. Twisted, serious sense.

He clawed at his scalp, then pounded his palms against his temples. They had him right where they wanted him, easy as slo-mo skeet in zero-g. So this was why the women had nursed him back to health. To hand him over, like Indian givers, and ensure their safe exit from Zopyrus.

Solomon Bodine, human sacrifice.

He’d have to think quick. Play along. Keep his pyro close and his enemies closer. Then…he had to figure out some way to separate the conspirators. Yes. Use their weaknesses against them, the way they’d used his mining prowess and his fondness for Varinia all this time.

Wow.

A shy fizz of delight leaked into his blood. He shuddered, wrapped his arms around his knees. If it had come to this, then so be it.
They’d
lived up to Grace’s direst prognostications, not him. And greed really had become their downfall. How about that? He’d arrived here with friends, penniless. He would leave here alone with upward of two hundred million clips…if he was careful.

Hmm, maybe God was watching out for him after all.

What had lately grown as familiar and permanent as any place Varinia had slept in since her Selene days now seemed bitter, bare. The only clue that anyone had ever set foot here would soon be confined to marks in the sand and piles of animal droppings, and those would likely disappear with the next rainfall.

Grace lay under a blanket in the top corner of the inlet, catching up on much-needed sleep before the final departure. She’d confessed to staying awake for over two full days, keeping extra vigil despite Varinia and Clay taking their turns at watch. The roly-poly curled up next to her.

The frequent rumble overhead belonged to the lone Kuiper raider whose altercation with the alien city had shocked the camp that morning. The vessel appeared to be circling, though Clay reckoned its wide search radius meant the pilots could only estimate the location of the camp.

“As long as we stick to the cliff walls and the shadows, we might be able to sneak by,” he said. “If they knew exactly where we were, they’d have sent a drop ship by now, and they’d be making lower passes. My guess is they’ve narrowed their search to the city and the surrounding areas. That’s a pretty big pattern.”

“So when do we move out?” Varinia took a last swig of cold McCormick’s—its strong flavor tasted a little sickly without heat, as no fires or steam were allowed in the inlet. The donkeys stood in an obedient semi-circle between her and the sea, munching on dried syntho-vegetation. At least they seemed to appreciate their improvised refreshments.

“Soon as the light starts to wane.” Clay glanced through the donkeys’ legs to make sure no one was listening, and lowered his voice. “We might have a bigger obstacle, though, and we all know it. I hate to say I told you so—”

“He’s worse than I thought,” Varinia had to admit. Pangs of fear and pity had begun to mingle, and for the first time she considered taking action against poor Solomon, if only to ensure his insane outbursts didn’t sabotage their escape. “I’ve never met anyone that paranoid before. It scares the hell out of me.”

“I hear you. It’s impossible to know where you stand with someone like that, or what’s going through his mind. Paranoiacs summon facts to fuel their delusions. It’s like a squirrel feverishly gathering supplies before the winter gets him. Something we came across a few times on Ladon. It’s an accumulation of a number of factors, not just one. In Solomon’s case, his mind’s been turned by the fever. That was the trigger. Remember how hateful he was last night, how eager he was to kill those men?”

“
Do
I? That wasn’t the same guy we brought with us from Kappa. I’m telling you.”

“Then there’s the isolation, the pressure of being hunted by Kuiper ships, and losing you—that must be a big one.”

She sighed and gripped his hand.

“And last but not least, the pyro,” he went on. “Grace’s husband saw the full effects of what this stuff can do to people, especially those who’re relying on it to lift them out of a life in the gutter. It’s potent. Pyro, gold, psammeticum, or just plain old clips. Greed’s an addiction. It hooks you deep down. Just look what happened to Solomon while we were away—he worked himself nearly to death, without a break, to get richer.”

“I blame myself for that. I should never have broken up with him so cruelly like that. He did it because he was pissed at me.”

Clay opened his mouth to speak but shrugged instead, a reminder of the rawness their relationship still had to overcome. It was all rather tacit at the moment. Fragile. The promise of life together after Zopyrus, inside 100z, wrapped her heart like a layer of negligee—exciting, teasing, yet not for public display.

First, they had to get through today.

As things were, that would be no mean feat.

“As long as he walks ahead of us, we should be okay,” Clay said. “He won’t be armed, but we sure as shit will. And don’t hesitate, Varinia. Anyone who’ll hit an old woman like that—”

“All right, all right, I get the picture. He walks ahead, we watch him close. Now can we change the subject? Jeez.”

“Uh-huh. I was meaning to ask, you remember our tryst? The hidden waterfall?”

“How could I forget?”

He leaned in, close enough for her to taste the brandy on his breath and the salt-tinged balm of his manly scent, and softened his voice to a whisper. “Those things I did…crossing the barrier?”

“Yeah. Magic.”

“Well, I was wondering if you wanted me to teach you ab—”

The lead donkey whinnied and shuffled its hooves in the sand. Varinia whipped her head around, and there was Solomon, rucksack slung over his shoulder, striding by without a care in the world. He mimed a whistle, flicked his eyebrows up to acknowledge her and Clay.

The gesture queered her stomach, and as soon as he’d passed, she scowled at Clay. He glared right back, mouthed the word
shit.
They hadn’t heard him approach. And the questions now blackened both their lips…

How long had Solomon been standing there?
How much had he heard?

The first sprinkle of rain peppered his sore neck and shoulders, so he opened his rucksack and unfurled his waterproof mack. The lilac clouds were a little darker than usual, but they moved fast and were not widespread. Probably light showers, nothing more.

As for Varinia and Clay? What was there to say that they hadn’t already gabbed, what feeble strategy remained that they hadn’t just burbled out for all Zopyrus to hear? It was a deluge in his favor. Everything he’d suspected,
everything,
including their not-so-secret affair…well, they were making it all far too easy. Hell, even the confirmation that she was spreading rug in private for that grubby little prick—Solomon didn’t feel the need to scream his heart out any more. Why not? Overhearing them like that a month ago would have devastated him, no question. How to describe the change? Blank. Clear. Soothing. It simply made sense. It all just…
fit.

They were all against him, and he couldn’t trust anyone anymore.

But where was this waterfall they’d sneaked away to? How often had they—

No, focus.
It had to be either nearby, among the cliffs, or maybe on the other side of the forest. The prick had said a hidden waterfall. The torrents draining from the plateau weren’t hidden. The two of them had had a full day to explore while Solomon had worked in the mine. That was it, then. The far side of the forest. If the waterfall was nearer he’d have heard it, and it couldn’t be
up
the beach. Not even the bitch was dumb enough to venture anywhere near the amphibians. So it had to be on the far side of the forest, among the crags there. They’d been bold.

Sure, bold enough to bury him on the way back.

It gave him an idea.

Hours to go before sunset, precious little to fill the time. The homeward supplies were trussed and stacked against the cliff wall, ready to be loaded onto the mules. Varinia had drifted asleep, too, and Clay had lent her his jacket for a pillow. He got up and stretched. The many deep scars he bore would never fully disappear, Grace had told him, but at least they weren’t crippling injuries. After what he’d survived, a lifetime of minor discomfort was a small price to pay.

Solomon, on the other hand, appeared to be in considerable pain, the way he doubled up in front of the mine entrance, his face contorted, open-mouthed, as though he were giving birth. Maybe his headaches had returned, aftershocks from the neurotoxic fever.

Clay jogged over, ready to shout Grace up. “What’s the matter?” he asked Solomon first. “Do you need the doc?”

“No, no. Just…a stomach cramp. I’ve had them ever since the fever—” The griping pain twisted his face white. “I’ll be okay.” He let loose a stuttering sigh that made Clay truly feel for him. No one, no matter how nuts, deserved to suffer like that. He should know. Crawling back to camp after leaving Lyssa—that night of remorseless daggers—he’d experienced the full wrath of inescapable pain. He cringed.

“Do me a favor.” Solomon clutched his sides. “Fetch me a Bolshoi brandy from…in there.” He nodded inside the mine. “I need my own bottle. I—I’d hate to give you guys what I’ve got. It’s killer.”

“Sure. Do you remember whereabouts the crate is?”

“Nah.” He pointed Clay to a helmet lying on the damp rock floor. “Somewhere near the back, I think. Just…just can’t bend down is all. You don’t mind?”

“It’s nothing.”

“Thanks, brother.”

Clay snatched up the helmet and flicked the lamp light on. The line of stacked crates snaked along the right-hand wall, leaving a narrow walkway on the left. Water droplets echo-popped onto puddles and pitter-pattered on the bare rock and solid crates. He continued to the inner sanctum, which was a mere quarter of the size it had been originally, before the cave-in, now reduced by half again thanks to the camping and mining clutter stored there.

What a shame!—burying all this stuff, never to return, and inside Aladdin’s cave itself. Trillions’ worth of clips sealed up, while they had to be content with mere millions apiece. Not exactly tool-push wages, but
ah, that sensation.
Pyro vapor. Colorless and odorless? Nope. Its sharp, energizing tang and muscular vibe beckoned darkly. Echoes of crimson. A place he’d worked harder than anywhere in his life. A place he’d come close to being addicted to, closer than he’d realized until this moment, amid the lingering fumes of his industry.

But he’d found more than any mine could ever give up, something far more rare and precious on this trip. The love of two women. Lyssa had brought him back from the brink, no question. On his stool in Pure Shores, he’d squandered his last clips on drowning out bitter memories. A phantom grid-licker running dangerously low on juice. But Lyssa—
God bless her
—had relit that spark in him, had shown him it was better to live on a knife edge than expire dully in surrender.

He rummaged through the crates of sauces and beans and other ingredients purchased with Lyssa’s blood money for this strange, haunted expedition that was being sealed shut before its time. A tunnel to madness interrupted. Sarcophagi. And it felt right that they were leaving something behind, something of the hard-won journey. Lyssa’s spirit was in here. All around him, in the vapor itself. He sensed it.

Her spark, forever here in the cosmic dust.

He swallowed the lump in his throat. The brandy crate was under one of the syntho-meat boxes, so he bent to retrieve a bottle. As he rose, a prick in his neck made him drop it. Hot syrup spread to his chin and hardened his chest like wet concrete. He tried to turn, to see what the hell had hit him, but his legs gave way. He fell, cracking his head on the edge of the brandy crate.

Varinia’s sweet face, red with exhaustion in the forest, was the last thing he saw.

The last thing he felt was elation.

Thunder ground low across the lavender sky as Varinia blinked her eyes open. The Kuiper ship sounded right above her, maybe skimming the plateau. She yawned and glanced around the inlet. Grace was still asleep in the top left corner, the roly-poly awake at her side. Solomon lay on the other side of the stream, facing the wall. But where was Clay?

As she sat up, a square of cardboard slid from her mack onto the sand. On one side, the turquoise-and-white label for Rhapsody’s Powdered Milk, the cheapest junk on the market but it had served them well enough. On the flip side, neat upper-case handwriting, penned in some kind of dark juice, read,
Varinia, When you wake, come join me at our waterfall. There’s something I need you to see. It’s urgent. Don’t tell the others. Don’t venture out in the open. I love you. C.

Her heart squirreled and she leaped to her knees, scanning the inlet again. What could he be thinking? The crazy, smogged—why would he possibly risk them being spotted like this? For what? He’d already explained everything about his coining abilities. Or had he? This close to departure, it had to be something absolutely vital.

“Jesus,” she whispered. “Jesus, he’s gotta be insane.”

She chewed her lip and gave her sleeping companions a last look before stealing away toward the beach in the shadow of the towering cliff. All she could think about was the magical green glow inside the waterfall, and the infinite wonders Clay wanted to show her. Wanted it so badly he was willing to risk everything, right before takeoff.

The Kuiper craft had just begun its latest flyover pattern, so she had time. Now or never. As she crept out onto the empty beach front, excitement swooped through her, its cold talons fisting on her entrails. The ranks of swells shorn by the wind stretched haphazardly along the coastline, reaching far beyond the cliffs on the other side of the forest. It was a long way, yes, but if Clay was waiting, she would have to go.

Whatever the consequences.