“Yes, yes—go on, Jim.”
“Well, it turns out they aren’t as inert as they seemed,” Nicklin said. “Apparently they weaken the molecular lattice in any piece of material they pass through. It happens very gradually, but some buildings in… in Lomza, P83, I think it is… are starting to split in half. The buildings straddle one of the lines, and it’s gradually chopping them in half—roof beams, walls, floors, foundations, everything. It’s acting as if it was a very weak valency cutter.”
“My enemy never rests.” Montane went on chewing a piece of banapple, but he was doing it mechanically now, no longer tasting the fruit. Completing the purchase of the ship had relieved him of a burden of anxiety, and he had since been enjoying a relaxed but active life in the open air. He had actually grown younger in appearance during the unplanned break, but within the last few seconds the weight of the years had come down on him again, hard.
Good job I didn’t remember the news about the lines earlier, Nicklin congratulated himself. This way the old boy’s digestive juices have been stopped in their tracks. Or should I say tracts?
“Aw, come on, Corey,” he said, “you can’t put everything down to Old Nick. Wouldn’t it be more like his style to chop buildings up suddenly and let them crash down on people?”
Montane gave him a sombre stare. “I don’t know what’s in the Devil’s mind—he’s playing a very subtle game—but I do know that when it’s over none of us will be laughing. And that goes for you, too.”
“I wouldn’t dream of laughing,” Nicklin said, belying his words with a faint smile.
“You’d better not,” Kingsley warned, jabbing in Nicklin’s direction with a forefinger which resembled a gnarled billet of wood. “You start laughing at Corey—I’ll break bits off your skeleton.”
“Go on with your lunch, Gerl.” Montane soothed the giant by patting him on the knee, and a certain dryness in his voice showed that he was recovering his equilibrium. “I’ll give you the nod when I want bits broken off Jim’s skeleton.”
End of conversation, Nicklin thought, again obliged to acknowledge the older man’s mental wiriness. To show that he regarded Montane’s tactic as unsporting, he shifted position until he was sitting with his back to the others, facing down the western slope of the hill. There was no wall or fence to mark the limit of the Fugaccia estate—the foot of the hill shelved into scrub which was punctuated with anvil trees, and beyond that Orbitsville went on for ever.
Allowing his thoughts to return to Danea Farthing and his plans for her, Nicklin wondered how long it would be before the rest of the mission arrived. He and Montane had flown out from Beachhead to New Taranto, whose airport was the nearest to Altamura, and the whole journey had taken only a day. Gerl Kingsley had set off at the same time in Montane’s camper and had completed the trip in five days, but to do so he must have driven like a maniac and almost without sleep. Nicklin had derived quite a bit of amusement from trying to decide whether the big man’s haste had been inspired by loyalty to his boss, or by a disinclination to spend many nights alone with Milly Montane and her metal coffin. (Your wife’s a nice woman, boss—but she’s permanently canned.)
All the other vehicles had remained at the base camp in Beachhead until four days ago, when Montane had wired the news that all was well. They would be proceeding at the speed of the slowest member, with proper rest halts, and it was hard to predict their time of arrival.
Deciding not to squander his mental energy on the matter, Nicklin was gazing around him in boredom when he saw something faintly peculiar happen.
A few paces down the slope from him was a group of yellow flowers, much resembling tulips, and while he was looking directly at them the head of one of the flowers detached itself from its stalk and dropped to the ground.
With little else to occupy his mind, he wondered idly if such events were commonplace in the botanical world. Orbitsville had many varieties of insects, some with bizarre feeding habits, but surely any bug intent on devouring a plant would tackle it from the bottom. Could there be a type which had a taste for petals only, and which first dragged them back to the nest?
As he was tiring of the speculation there occurred a second strange event—a humming, rushing sound close to his left ear, a brief and fluttery agitation of the air. He told himself that it must have been a hornet, but there had been a disturbing hint of power to the sound, and in that instant a preposterous idea was born in his mind.
“Corey,” he said quietly, “this may sound like one of my jokes—but I think we’re being shot at.”
“Shot at!” Kingsley tilted his head back and roared with laughter. The fact that his mouth was wide open possibly saved his life, for the bullet which might have shattered his skull passed cleanly through both his cheeks. He clapped a hand to the bloody, star-shaped exit wound and pitched sideways to the ground.
Nicklin gaped at him, thunderstruck, then realised he was still sitting upright. He hastily bellied down behind the heaps of rubble, losing his sun-hat in the process, fear masked by self-loathing—he had been imbecilic enough to risk death rather than make a chump of himself by needlessly diving for cover. He looked towards Montane, who had also dropped to the ground, and found the preacher staring at him in wide-eyed accusation. Nicklin understood the terror-logic perfectly—he was the one who had talked of shooting, therefore he had caused it to happen.
What next? What the holy fuck do we do next? The questions were a flurry of drum-beats in his mind. I know! Kingsley will take command of the situation and save us all! Good old Gerl is big and tough and he has farmed wild country all his life and he’s probably been shot at hundreds of times and he probably thinks no more of a little bullet wound than he does of a mosquito…
The thought foundered as Nicklin belatedly became aware of Kingsley’s condition. The big man was lying on his side and blood was literally pumping out of his mouth. His tongue was protruding and, although it was swathed in gouting crimson, Nicklin could see enough to tell him that it had been ploughed almost in half. He could also see that good old Gerl was not going to take command of any situation, and his feeling of helplessness increased.
“The rifle,” Montane whispered. “Where’s the rifle?”
“It’s back in the house.”
“You should have brought it.” Montane’s face was stern. “You were told to carry it everywhere.”
Absurdly, Nicklin’s fear was displaced by indignation. “You came out first! You and your pal should have—”
His words were lost in the sound of a new bullet strike. This time the slug, having glanced off a nearby rock, howled like a demented being as it flailed the warm air. Nicklin, who had never been close to a ricochet before, was appalled by its sheer ferocity.
“Go and get the rifle,” Montane commanded, breaking the ensuing silence.
“But you can’t stay up here,” Nicklin said preparing to crawl away.
“I’ll bring Gerl as fast as I—” Montane made an angrily impatient gesture. “For God’s sake, man, get the rifle!”
Nicklin nodded and slithered down on to the bared expanse of fused earth. At the far side of it he rose to his feet and ran down the only clear path, bounding recklessly where there were flights of steps. In seconds he had reached level ground and was sprinting towards the colonnaded facade of the house.
Can this really be happening to me? he wondered, his mind distancing itself from bodily turmoil. Who’s out there doing the shooting? Does somebody really want to kill us, or is it just a hunting trip gone wrong, a few drunks taking potshots at anything that moves for the pure bloody hell of it?