I watched the scowl on Cyrus’s face deepen as I spun out my line of bull. I was making it up as I went along, but as I spouted this stuff I realized that I might have accidentally fallen over the truth while giving them the Glyph version of how the wells worked. The Bugs would learn tons about people from their asking for things.
Finally, Cyrus shook his head. “Even if what you say is true, we can still knock down those walls and take High Vista back.”
“I say you’re wrong, but for sake of argument let’s say you’re right. That still leaves one big question: Why bother?”
They were all looking at me like I was crazy. And maybe I was. Because I was actually enjoying trying to bernie these boobs. It was like talking my way into protected or restricted places so I could gain intel, or posto right in the guts of the beast, talking my way out of jams with cops and property owners and others who took offense at my work. That was part of the grinwhack of being a posto. It’s a high like no other. I was getting a big gulp of it, sweet and fizzy as Homer’s Dr. Pepper.
“What I’m saying,” I continued, “is why settle for this well when there’s an even bigger one out there for the taking?”
“Bullshit.”
I rolled my eyes, thinking Geek really had to work on improving his vocabulary. “Wrong, chump. I’ve seen it.”
Geek was shaking his head. “I say you’re a liar.”
Cyrus finally spoke up, playing wise leader. One whose greed never slept. “Why should we believe you?”
“Don’t care if you do or not,” I said, letting a touch of annoyance creep into my voice. “This isn’t my fight. All I know is that there’s a well three times the size of that one out in another segment, ripe for the taking. I figured you guys might be interested since you have a thing for big wells.”
Geek was plucking at his boss’ sleeve. “I’m telling you, he’s lying.”
“Bite me, Trek-boy,” I said, reaching into my vest.
A half dozen bows were suddenly drawn and pointed at me by men who wanted to look like heroes in a Robin Hood movie, but more closely resembled over-age dissolute Cupids.
“Ice down, guys,” I said. “I just want to show you what I’m talking about.” I pulled out my Cybernado Rollox, snapped it open and flat. Tapped the corner to bring up the menu I wanted. “Here. Check it out. Seeing is, as they say, believing.”
The Rollox displayed the image I’d taken of the well at the top of the hill. An image I’d shopped to make it look like it was somewhere else, and the size of a backyard swimming pool. It was a hurry-up hack job, but I was pretty sure it would fool rubes like these. My clothes might have come from Sally’s, Goodwill, and the occasional dumpster, but my software always cuts the edge and leaves it bleeding.
Cyrus snatched the device out of my hand and stared at picture of the well. His band of butthead brigands clustered around him like adolescent boys around a pornie. Eyes went wide, and the general comment was some flavor of Holy shit!
Geek wasn’t going to let it go. “It’s a fake,” he bleated pitifully. “Has to be.”
“Fine,” I said, reaching to take my Rollox back.
“Now just hang on,” Cyrus said, rubbing his stubbly chin with one hand and keeping a firm grip on the Rollox with the other.
Things were kind of hanging there in the balance when a new factor entered the situation.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Trub demanded as she stepped out of a door that materialized out of nowhere.
I had only a couple seconds to figure out what to do, and the moves I made were mostly impelled by the accusing tone in Trub’s voice. That, and her appearing right within reach. Okay, and from having seen far too many bad movies.
I used one arm to grab her around the neck and shoulders, reaching into my vest with my free hand. Quickdrew my dummystick and jammed it up under her jaw.
She tensed, and I had the impression of having just taken hold of a human-sized stick of dynamite in the fleeting moment before it detonates. I knew she could easily throw me off, beat what landed into a bloody pulp, and was a heartbeat away from doing just that.
“You tell them,” I growled in my best tough-guy voice. “Don’t make me hurt you the way you hurt Poppa Poppy.”
The amount she relaxed was fractional, but enough to tell me that my message had been received. “Tell them what?” she said sharply.
“There, on my Rollox. I told them about that giant wishing well on the other side of the Hoop.”
“What about it?” she said after a pause long enough to make me afraid she wasn’t going to play along.
“You can’t keep them from taking it over.”
“Maybe not,” she said grudgingly. “One big problem. These dildoes couldn’t find six good brain cells if they put all their heads together. No way they’ll ever find it. Can you take them there?”
“Not directly. I can’t control doors the way you can. So you have to drive.”
She shook her head as much as the dummystick under her jaw would allow. “Not a chance, kid.”
“Why not?” Cyrus demanded.
Trub stared at him like a steaming turd on the hot fudge sundae of her life, saying nothing.
He stepped in closer and put his face right in hers. “You can’t keep us from that well. Nobody else has taken it, have they?”
“Not yet.” She smiled. “But I could fix that real fast.”
“You’d do that?”
“Bet your ass I would.”
“Why? What’s the problem with letting us have it?”
“You’re the problem, you old toad. I don’t like you or your merry band of sore losers.”
Cyrus tried for a steely stare that just came off Nixon-shifty. “You’ll like me even less if you don’t take us to that well. Right now.”
Geek still wasn’t buying it. “I’m telling you,” he wailed. “It’s a trick!”
Trub laughed. “That’s right. It is.”
“See! I told you!”
“The bitch is lying,” Cyrus growled. “Men! Surround her!”
The bandits closest to us lifted their bows and spears and clubs and other primitive implements of mayhem. They growled to show how dangerous they were. If it hadn’t been for the sharpness of the blades and weight of the clubs, I might have laughed. They still looked more like a dinner theater pirate gang than any sort of armed force. But I knew even armed morons could do a lot of damage. In fact, they usually did. We call it history.
“I think you better take us all there,” I said, pushing my dummystick harder into Trub’s jawline, hard enough to bring her up on her toes.
“All right,” she said, sounding angry and resentful. “But I warn you, you’re going to regret this.” She raised her voice. “Transport.”
A door appeared, hanging in the air near the catapult.
I didn’t know what Trub had up her sleeve, whether this was an escape route for us, or a trap for them.
“We’ll go first,” I said, starting to frogmarch her toward the door. My thinking was, if it was a trap I ought to make it look safe for the rats to go on a cheese raid.
“No, we will,” Cyrus said. “I don’t trust that woman one bit. She’s a liar and a trickster.” He raised his voice and started bellowing orders. “Men! Get formed up! Lehman, your squad will take the lead. We put these two in the middle. The rest of us will bring up the rear.”
They got themselves more or less organized, then started trooping through the door. Cyrus directed operations from a safe place in the rear, his pet geek beside him and still whining that this was all a really big mistake.