Ryan glared at him.
“What Captain Connors means,” the colonel said, “is that we’re taking you back to Earth.”
“This is Earth, droolie.”
“From your point of view, I suppose it is.”
“What other point of view is there?”
“You’ll find out, in exactly eight minutes. Until then, I suggest you sit quietly on the curb while we finish our preparations.”
The impenetrable black tints returned to their helmets, as if they were fishbowls filling from the bottoms with ink.
As he waited for the time to pass and the mystery to be revealed, Ryan scanned the ridge top. His companions were out there, somewhere. Question was, would they do the dumb thing and try to get him out of this mess? He sure as hell hoped not. Considering how hard his captors were to chill, any rescue attempt was doomed to fail.
He’d noticed that they’d addressed one another using military rank. In Deathlands, such things ordinarily had little meaning. People could and did call themselves anything they wanted. Colonel. Archduke. God. But there was something in their voices, as distorted as they were, and in the way they carried themselves that told Ryan the references to rank were real. Perhaps they belonged to some far-flung baron’s army? If so, there were no badges, bars or stars; their only insignia was the FIVE on their breastplates, and the word meant nothing special to him.
Ryan took a good, long look at their other gear. All of it was strange. Especially the derrick. It was even more massive than it had looked from the ridge top. It was made up of three interlocking sections that, when extended, doubled its overall length. To what purpose he couldn’t guess. J.B. had been right, though. There were no signs of wear on the superstructure or of its having been cobbled together out of recycled materials. No acid rain damage, either. Everything gleamed, as if it had been recently swabbed with oil.
If the others had been captured with him, they might have been able to put their heads together and come up with an explanation for all of it. Of course, an explanation wasn’t worth the price of their lives. It was far better for his friends that they weren’t here, facing an unknown fate. Ryan hoped they were on their way back to Perdition by now. And that once they arrived there, they had plans to put even more miles between themselves and this place.
Up to this point, Ryan could see no opening for himself, no weakness in the enemy that he could exploit to either gain control of the situation or make good his escape. Thus hobbled, it suited his purposes to be placid and obedient. When it came time for him to make his move, at least he would have surprise on his side. One thing was certain, however. Wherever they intended on taking him, he had no intention of going along quietly.
FROM A DISCREET DISTANCE, knowing that he couldn’t see her face through the black tint of her helmet, Captain Nara Jurascik studied their prisoner. Her interest was neither purely scientific nor purely military. The way he looked, the way he moved, fascinated her. It was more than his apparent natural grace and strength. It was his confidence. The confidence born of a lifetime of freedom. Freedom not easily won. Or held.
He had killed other men, of that she was sure. Probably more men than he could remember. And he had taken the lives of women, too. As a combat vet herself, she could see it etched in his blade-scarred face, a familiar road map of violence.
One-eye was a savage, perfectly matched to a savage land.
And perfectly matched to the needs of the mission.
There was so much to learn about this raw and brutal place, its riches and death traps, and such a short time to do it. What better source for this vital information than a true survivor who’d had the singular misfortune of falling into their net?
Nara recalled how sixteenth-century explorers to the New World had returned to the royal courts of Europe with captured native peoples in tow, as living trophies. The financiers of conquest had no interest in the history, culture and social organization of these prisoners. They had only zoo value. The expedition underwriters were obsessed with the acquisition of a single precious metal, easily mined with slave labor, and transportable in wind-powered sailing ships. While their minions grubbed and murdered for gold, the real wealth of the land lay in plain view before them. The wildlife. The trees. The minerals. Pure water and soil. Vast reserves of petroleum. But above all, the space to grow.