“I wanted you for so long,” she breathed in his ear.
Keenan kissed her throat, her breasts.
“I wanted you so bad.”
Her tempo increased, and Keenan realised he was perspiring, sweat stinging his eyes, his breath coming in ragged gasps as this beautiful rampant wild psychotic woman thrashed above him, worked him fucked him used him abused him. He did not care and he took what she had to offer and rode with her fell with her and they spiralled at breakneck speed into an oblivion where nothing mattered, not life nor death, just the intimacy and the violence of the moment.
Pippa screamed as she came, rigid above him, body arched back and locked to him; her whole frame was a clamp holding him tight and only a bullet through the head would have stopped her. Keenan came a second later, rushing into her, emptying himself into a bottomless vessel and the world and Pippa’s smell was around and everywhere. He may have screamed. They fell to the bed, joined, exhausted, slippery in one another’s sweat.
As they cooled, Pippa chewed his ear.
“I missed that.”
“You should have come back sooner.”
“Absence makes the heart grow fonder.”
“You were wild.”
“Yeah.” She smiled in the darkness. “A regular wild child.”
Keenan ran his hands through her hair, and together they pulled silk covers over their languorously chilling bodies; she snuggled against his chest, one leg over his thigh, her hand idly rubbing his taut muscled abdomen.
“Do you love me, Kee?”
“Until I die,” he said.
“That may be tomorrow,” she pointed out.
“Maybe,” agreed Keenan.
The Ion Gunship
Reason in Madness
cruised the darker edges of the Sinax Cluster. Teller’s World was a world apart, lit only distantly by four suns which, between them, managed to heat the ball of rock to a temperature just about habitable by the human species. Except, the planet was forbidden, and—reportedly—uninhabited: a forced emptiness, enforced by unseen execution.
The Gunship cruised, engines howling, and gradually began deceleration, as the grand barren vista of Teller’s World spread out in all its wonderful desolation. The ship gained the upper edges of the atmosphere. As requested, Pippa slowed the
Reason in Madness
to a crawl, and Combat K and Emerald stared out over a distant arena of barren black. Far away, jagged rock rose in a violent staccato range of volcanoes. Fire glowed briefly. A storm raged, and molten rock seared the land.
“Looks like there’s no life down there to me,” snorted Franco.
“It’s a Forbidden World,” said Keenan. “What did you expect, a carnival?”
“I just thought, you know, a few trees or plants or something, maybe a beautiful mountain or two, a few lakes, a town, a brothel: Not...
that.”
He glanced at the terrain scanners. “I am right, aren’t I? It’s just a black flat desert and some volcanoes. No seas, no forests, no mountains, just no goddamn nothing for a man to get his teeth properly into.”
Keenan stared at him. “Are we ready for the descent?”
Emerald approached, and looked out into the drifting desolation. She smiled, and Combat K sensed her mood lift.
“I am home,” she said.
“And what a god-awful shit-hole it is,” snapped Franco.
Pippa kicked him.
“Ow! What you do that for? It’s true, isn’t it? Just take a look! It’s a wilderness of desert and rock that sucks the bloody life out of people, bejesus! It’s a shit-hole, guaranteed. I wish I was back in The City.”
“Shall we tell him about the mines?” said Pippa.
“Mines?” twitched Franco, as Pippa strapped herself into the pilot’s seat.
“Yeah, mines,” said Keenan. “The place is riddled with them. First we have to navigate what Emerald calls the Starfield; the whole atmosphere is alive with billions of tiny Pin Mines.”
“I’ve heard of them,” said Franco, eyes wide. “They’re bad.”
Keenan strapped himself into his seat. “They’re so small, a ship can’t detect them, yet they cause just enough damage to stop you going home. If you’re really unlucky they start detonating one another: you get a domino effect, a chain reaction that takes in a square kilometre of Pin Mines, and of course, you’re stuck in the middle of a molten soup, and dead as dog meat.”
“How do we get through?” breathed Franco.
“Emerald will guide us.” Keenan pulled the locking straps tight.
Franco turned to Emerald, who had also strapped herself in. She smiled brightly at Franco. “Don’t worry, I travelled this path many times, in the Old Days.”
“I thought you’d been imprisoned for thousands and thousands of years?”
“Yes.”
“So... you haven’t travelled it recently then?”
“Not for centuries,” agreed Emerald.
“So... things might have changed?”
“Possibly.”
“What happens if they have?”
“We are dead,” said Emerald without any hint of a smile.
“Why did nobody tell me?” wailed Franco.
Pippa placed a hand on his arm. “We didn’t want to worry you. I suggest you strap yourself in. We might be in for a bumpy ride. Try not to think about the mines covering the planet at ground level, as well.”
“On the surface?”
“Yeah.”
“Is this why nobody ever returned from Teller’s World?”
“One of about a hundred reasons,” nodded Pippa.
“Why wasn’t I in on this very important discussion?” Franco sounded prim and wounded.
“Because,” said Pippa through gritted teeth, “you were otherwise engaged with plastic friends in your little console game. Now, this is going to take a lot of concentration on my part; I suggest you shut up before I ask Keenan to kill you.”
Franco closed his mouth, and his eyes, and started to pray.
Engines screamed.
The Ion Gunship smashed from the heavens, jets fighting the massive gravitational pull, and Pippa focused totally on the emergence before her.
Emerald had told her of a pathway, an invisible road weaving through the Pin Mines. And, while Emerald watched the altitude meters, she guided Pippa with a precision that could afford no error.
The
Reason in Madness
flowed through the atmosphere, veering left then right in a gentle sine wave, towards a flat and barren black desert below. The ship’s occupants held collected breaths for long minutes, waiting for the initial explosion that would tear their craft from the sky, and send them reeling like a smoking corpse carcass to the wasteland far below. It never came.
The Ion Gunship shuddered and screeched, wailed in torture, and fought Pippa’s commands, but within twenty minutes of entering the upper atmosphere, landing struts ejected from flaps, and the Gunship touched down on an endless black plain in the middle of a roaring, raging sand storm.
Engines died, crackling.
Franco looked up through sweating fingers. “Are we alive?”
“For now,” said Emerald.
“Can I unstrap?”
“Be my guest. Just don’t go outside.”
“Why not?”
“The sandstorm would rip the skin from your face. You’d survive for about three minutes.”
“Charming. Nice homeworld you have here,” said Franco.
“It’s like this for a reason,” said Emerald.
“We’ve got company,” said Pippa.
Keenan’s head slammed left. “On the planet?”
“No. Some crazy bastard has just tracked us. I was so busy controlling this heap of junk, I never thought to look for a tail; he must have been cloaked near our entry zone.”
“Who’d want to follow us down here?” said Franco.
“None of the possible answers fill me with hope,” said Keenan.
“He’s just touched down.”
“What kind of ship is it?”
“Scanning now; we have no visual ’cos of the storm... Wait... got it. It’s an Interceptor.”
“Like the one we thought we saw back on Ket?” Franco was frowning.
“Yeah, that’s it,” said Pippa.
“Just before we got blown out of the sky?” said Keenan. “I wouldn’t mind a chat with that bastard. I think we might have a score to settle. Pippa, lock out the shields, and let’s tool up. I think there’s a guy who would like a chat.”
“You’ll get your chance in about ten minutes,” said Pippa. “The Geo Relays say the storm is about to subside.”
Keenan hoisted his MPK. He smiled a lop-sided smile and lit a home-rolled Widow Makercigarette. “Let’s go say hello, then,” he growled.
The ramp lowered into the tail-end of the storm. Black sand whipped into the loading bay, and the wind howled, wailed, cried, and ululated with a saddening forlornness. Keenan crouched, staring out into the bleak wilderness. The ramp thumped the sand, and Keenan strode down, MPK hoisted, cigarette dangling between his lips.
“Fuck it. I’ve had enough of being somebody else’s pawn.”
He turned, staring at the sleek, illegal Interceptor; there was no activity inside, and as sand curled around Keenan’s boots and knees, a swirling dervish of activity accompanied by a song of the land, Keenan pointed his weapon at the ship and unleashed a violent volley of bullets. Sparks chased one another up the cockpit, and Keenan jumped, boots sinking as he waved his MPK at the occupants.
“Come on out. I’d like a word.”
Smoke plumed again, and warily Pippa and Franco followed Keenan down the ramp, both heavily armed: Pippa with a battered MPK sub-machine gun nestled against her breast, Franco with his favourite Kekra quad-barrel machine pistols, stocky in outspread fists.
“Take it easy, boss.”
“Just want a chat, that’s all,” said Keenan. He moved forward, challenging, glaring up through the drifting dancing sand. There was a
clunk
, and slowly the Interceptor’s ramp descended to reveal two figures, blurred by the storm.
Keenan heard Franco gasp; he half-turned.
“It’s you, you maggot!” Franco stalked forward. “I thought we left you for dead on Ket!”
Betezh held out his arms, his expression curious. “What can I say, Franco? You know how I feel about my patients. I’d follow you ten times across the galaxy just to get you under my loving care once again. That’s just the sort of guy I am.”
Franco hoisted his weapons. “Well, it’s time I ripped off your stupid fat face and pissed down your neck!” he snarled.
“Whoa.” Keenan held up a hand. His eyes were fixed on the second figure, and he half recognised the small, unimposing man, wiry, taut, with rough features under heavy black eyebrows. Keenan took in the short beard, the black emotionless eyes. He shivered. He knew the man, but for the life of him, could not place him in his catalogue of memories. Keenan held a deep suspicion that it was to do with something very, very nasty.
“Mr. Keenan,” said the small man, pushing past Betezh on the ramp and jumping lightly to the sand. As he approached, Keenan took in the multitude of scars criss-crossing his torso, arms, shoulders, and even his throat. Something rang a distant alarm bell.
“I know you?”
“Yes. Although the drugs we administered to make you forget may have left trace residues in the brain. You may suffer an after-image—as if you remember me from somewhere—yes? In the same way you get an uneasy itch whenever the name Kotinevitch is mentioned.”
“What game is being played here?”
“No game, Keenan.” Mr. Max smiled. “Forgive me. Let me introduce myself. I am Mr. Max, paid by General Kotinevitch to, shall we say, make sure certain events never occur. Your job is done, Mr. Keenan. You have brought Emerald home. You gained her trust with your pitiful sob stories, and now you have discovered her, removed her, and delivered her like a lamb to slaughter.”
Keenan turned. Emerald was standing at the top of the ramp, her body limp, her stance defeated. Keenan frowned, understanding of the situation slipping away like some complex technical problem in seven dimensions twisting in on itself.
“What is happening here?”
Mr. Max replied for her. “The Fractured Emerald is to come with me. The execution will be swift. There will be no pain.”
“No! I will not go with you!” Her voice was startling in its hatred.
“I think you will,” said Mr. Max. “We know your plan.”
Keenan took a step forward, threatening. “She came here with me, not you. I don’t know you, fucker. All I do know is that you’d better get back on your fancy little fighter and get the hell out of my way, before I give you something you won’t forget.”
“Careful, Keenan,” said Franco. His voice was low; Keenan logged the tone. Franco knew something, something bad about Mr. Max, and his voice held an embedded warning.
Where do I know him from? came Keenan’s unbidden internal voice.
Where?
Where?
“He’s a Seed Hunter,” said Emerald, her voice a lullaby of fear.
Keenan glanced at her, at her defeat. He felt suddenly sick
.