Yet despite all this, the most striking thing about him was that he carried no blaster. Even the eight-man team swarming over the roof had handblasters holstered and attached to their clothing. But this man, standing as still and silent as a ghost in the burning desert air, carried only a long-bladed knife of his own making, with a finely honed blade and an intricately carved handle that appeared to be of bone.
The sec man covering the area to the east turned and hollered across the space between himself and the silent giant.
“Yo! Crow, y’all ain’t gonna believe this, but there’s a whole bunch of people walkin’ out of the desert.”
The giant said nothing, but the shout led to hilarity from the men working on the roof.
“Shee-it, you been chasing them desert mushrooms again, Petey?” yelled a thickset, heavily scarred man with sandy hair thinning on his scalp, not pausing in his task of rapidly resetting the thick asphalt tiles as he spoke.
“Shut up, Hal,” the sec man countered. “Just take a look-see.”
The sandy-haired man stopped momentarily and looked up. Squinting into the desert haze, he could make out the straggling line of the companions as they approached slowly.
“Well, I take it all back, Petey,” he said. “Where in hell did they all come from?” He looked down to where the impassive giant stood. “Hey, Crow, y’all hear that? And they got blasters out,” he added.
There was a pause—not long enough to denote that the giant was ignoring the exchange, but long enough to impose his sense of authority. Something that was emphasized by the manner of his reply.
“I heard. They’ll all be exhausted. Must’ve walked for days, no matter which way they come. And they don’t know if we’re friendly folk. They’ll be too exhausted to be a threat.”
His voice was quiet and low, almost a rumbling whisper that carried across the hot desert air despite the almost inaudible volume.
It was a voice that commanded respect.
“What you wantin’ me to do about them?” Petey asked.
The giant spoke again without turning. “Let them come. Keep your blaster ready but down, like theirs.”
“How the hell you know that?” Petey asked, looking back at the approaching line to double-check.
There was the ghost of a shrug from the giant, but his voice was still impassive. ‘”Cause we’re as suspicious of them as they are of us. Stands to reason. We don’t spook them, they’ll be fine.”
” ‘Kay, you’re the boss,” Petey said, turning back to them.
“Sure am—and you boys on the roof remember,” the giant continued, indicating by tone alone that he had noted the way in which the work crew had stopped in order to watch the approaching line.
The hardness in his tone made them start work with alacrity.
“THEY GOING TO BE a problem?” J.B. whispered, his voice barely audible.
“Looks like they’re wary rather than hostile,” Ryan called over his shoulder.
“Let’s hope it stays that way,” Krysty added. “I don’t think any of us are up to a firefight right now.”
“I’ll second that,” Mildred commented.
Ryan continued on, his people following, until he was a few hundred yards from the waiting sec man. Noting that the large and muscular sec man had his blaster held across his chest but with the barrel pointing down, Ryan took one hand from his Steyr and waved slowly and carefully. He called out in a hoarse and cracked voice that barely carried across the space between them.
“Hey! We’ve been in the desert for three days. We don’t want a firefight, just a little water and direction to the nearest ville…” His voice petered out into a cough, the sheer number of words too much for his damaged and dry throat.
“Okay,” the sec man replied, his voice strong and clear across the distance. “Y’all just put those blasters down and leave them before you come any farther, and we’ll be just fine.”
Ryan stopped his people and held ground at the distance. Coughing heavily and hawking a dry phlegm ball that made it hard to speak, he croaked, ‘”Fraid we can’t do that, friend. I appreciate you don’t want strangers coming on you with blasters out, but we can’t just leave ourselves defenseless.”