In the night air was a faint reek from the garbage dump behind the motel, but that faded as they crossed the street. From the roofed section of the ville, the lights from the windows were reflected off the rippling cloth, giving the streets a golden hue like something from an old vid. Now there came the aroma of frying peppers mixing with the clean smell of the desert salt. Somewhere a horse whinnied, and there came the crash of pots and pans, followed by raised voices marking a fight. The desert ville was full of life, and the sound of a whip was noticeably absent at the moment.
“It was this way,” Mildred said, checking the map in her notebook.
The companions passed very few people on the streets, a young boy dragging a burlap bag full of sticks, an old woman bundled under a raggedy shawl limping along a side street. Muted voices came from behind the closed shutters, and something flew by overhead, its passage masked by the patched material roofing the ville. Steadily, the temperature dropped as night descended in full, slices of light beaming through the shutters and around closed doors, becoming brighter in the purple dusk. His boots slapping against the cobblestone street, a sec man walked down the center of the street with a longblaster slung over his shoulder, a hand tight on the faded leather strap. He looked hard at the companions, then slowly nodded, granting them passage and kept slowly walking.
Easing his stance, Ryan let go of his grip on the SIG-Sauer and Jak tucked the throwing knife in his hand back up the sleeve of his camou jacket.
“Lot of security here,” J.B. muttered, taking his hand off his slung Uzi. “Everybody seems scared.”
“If the baron is at war with the Trader,” Ryan growled, “they bastard well should be.”
“Roger that.”
Skirting around the temple, the group heard the gaudy house long before they saw the place. Gales of laughter came from the second floor, shadowy figures ran past the louvered shutters, and there was actual glass in the lower windows, showing a roaring fireplace and tables of men eating and drinking. The few women moving through the crowd were scantily dressed.
A group of horses was tied to a stone hitching post, with a lone sec man leaning against it smoking a home rolled cig. He watched the outlanders cross the street, but said nothing as they passed by, heading for the brothel.
“Must be the designated driver.” Mildred laughed, and waited for a response from the others, then realized the joke was a hundred years out of date. Ah, well.
Stepping through the doorway, Ryan pushed aside a blanket hanging across the opening to help keep out the evening chill. Inside the building, the air was warm and heavy with the smells of food and wood smoke. From the bolt holes in the concrete floor marking where heavy machinery had once been anchored, it was obvious that the place had originally been some sort of factory, now gutted into a single huge room with bare steel beams supporting the second story. Clusters of candles hung from chains attached to the metal rafters, clay bowls underneath positioned to catch drippings so as not to lose a drop of wax. A roaring fireplace was near the wooden counter that served as a bar, with a bubbling iron pot sitting directly amid the crackling flames, the roasted carcass of something slowly turning on a spit.
The tables were mostly cut down wooden spools that at one time housed industrial cable, the chairs a mixture of anything that could be sat upon, including a flat rock and some plain wooden boxes.
Incredibly, over in the far corner a stickie was stuffed and mounted on a wooden box, its eyes replaced with shiny glass marbles, its hands raised as if about to attack. The mutie was wearing pants, but its chest was bare, the mottled skin covered with the puckered scars of large bore bullet holes, along with a stitched slash on its neck that almost went completely across.
“Must been some fight,” Jak muttered.
“Ah, that it was young fellow!” a drunk sec man called out, waving a wooden mug. “Buy me a drink and I’ll tell you all the details. Lost ten men chilling the bastards, and nearly got caught by the Core!”