‘I can’t leave him out there.’
Billy pushed Reave hard into his seat.
‘There’s nothing you can do. He’s dead.’
‘But we can’t leave him out there. Those goddamn creatures will eat him.’
‘You can’t go out and get him. You’ll be killed yourself.’
Reave slumped in his seat, and covered his face with his hands.
‘Okay, okay, I know it. I know it. Why did we ever get involved in this? Curse this fucking, absurd war.’
Billy dropped into the driver’s seat, and threw the machine into gear.
‘Get into the turret, Reave. Get yourself together. The Rainman’s dead, and we’ve got to get out of here.’
Reave climbed slowly into the turret, and Billy started the machine rolling. The other two machines were also on the move, cutting into the Harodin lines with their turrets spitting bolts and belching fire. Billy swung away from them, and turned sharp right. He pushed the machine as fast as it would go, running parallel to the trenches, between the attackers and the defenders. Bullets hammered against the armour and the fighting machine bucked and skidded as shells exploded nearby. Reave yelled at Billy in alarm.
‘You gone crazy? You’ll get us killed. Where the fuck do you think you’re going?’
Billy clung grimly to the steering gear as a near miss rocked the machine.
‘I’m getting us out of this. Away from this insanity.’
‘But where are you heading?’
‘I don’t know. I’m just getting away.’
‘If you keep running along in no man’s land we’re just going to get ourselves blown up.’
‘All right, all right.’
Billy swung the machine to the left and plunged across the trenches, crushing Shirik under the spiked wheels. Soon they were running towards the rear. Confused Uruks gesticulated at them as they cut through supply columns and rolled across dugouts. The battle zone seemed to go on and on but after thirty minutes they left the last shell hole and excavation behind. They were in the bare, open desert. Billy brought the machine to a halt.
‘We made it. We got out of their war.’
‘It’s too bad the Rainman didn’t make it.’
‘Yeah. It’s too bad.’
‘Where do we go from here?’
Billy slid down in his seat.
‘Who knows? Just keep on going until we hit something. We’ve never known where we’ve been going before. Something’ll turn up.’
There was a long silence. Each of them was absorbed in his own thoughts. The quiet of the desert was strangely deafening after the roar of battle. The occasional rumble of distant gunfire was the only reminder that it still existed. After a while, Reave took a deep breath.
‘Billy?’
‘Yeah.’
‘You got any idea what you’re looking for?’
‘Not really. No more than I had back in Pleasant Gap. I just know there’s something, and I’m going to keep looking for it. One thing’s for sure, we can’t go back.’
Reave nodded.
‘That’s true enough.’
Billy glanced up at him.
‘You regretting this whole thing? You wishing you were back in Pleasant Gap?’
Reave shook his head.
‘No. I don’t regret nothing. I’ll go along with anything. It’s just …’
‘It’s just what?’
‘It’s just that I don’t have your faith that there’s something out there waiting for us.’
Billy laughed.
‘Shit man, I don’t have no faith. I didn’t leave Pleasant Gap to find no divine destiny. The only thing to look forward to in Pleasant Gap was growing old and ending up like old Eli.’
Reave grinned despite himself.
‘That’s true enough. There doesn’t seem to be anything to do except go on.’
Billy started the engine again and dropped the machine into gear, and they moved forward across the desert. Billy halted the machine again and looked up at Reave.
‘Want to drive for a spell?’
Reave climbed down from the turret.
‘Sure.’
He took Billy’s place behind the controls. Billy slid into the standby seat and the machine moved forward again. They rolled across the desert for another few hours. Billy had dropped into a half sleep when the engine coughed and died. Reave fiddled with the controls. Billy sat up and leaned over his shoulder.
‘What’s the trouble?’
Reave banged the speed control backwards and forwards.
‘It just died on me. One minute it was going, and the next it wasn’t.’
‘Move over. Let’s take a look at it.’
Billy squeezed past Reave and studied the controls. He flicked at a couple of switches and moved some of the levers.
‘Sure looks like it’s dead.’
Reave nodded.
‘Just faded out on me. What do we do now?’
‘Foot it, I guess.’
‘You mean just trek off into the desert?’
‘I don’t like this any more than you do, but we can’t stay here.’
Reave took a last kick at the controls, and then opened the door.
‘I don’t need walking across this fucking desert.’
‘I don’t see any way round it.’
Reave jumped down into the dust, and looked back up at Billy.
‘What are we going to take with us?’
‘I’ll see what we’ve got and pass it down to you.’
Billy stripped everything he could out of the fighting machine and passed it out to Reave. When there was nothing left he joined Reave and looked at the stuff laid out on the ground, Reave squatted down on his heels.
‘We ain’t going to be able to hump this lot on our backs. We’ll have to leave most of it behind.’
Billy looked at the mass of stuff, and scratched his head.
‘We’ll just have to take essentials.’
Reave picked up the steel water container and shook it.
‘Ain’t too much water left.’
‘Pour it out into the small bottles and dump the can.’
Reave transferred the water to two canteens and he and Billy slung one each over their shoulders.
‘We’ll need the porta-pacs.’
They clipped them on their belts.
‘And food.’
‘It’s a pity we left our bags back in the bunker.’
‘We’ll just have to stash as much as we can in our pockets, and eat what’s left.’
They sat in the shade of the machine and chewed their way through the surplus of flat, tasteless ration bars. When they’d finished Billy took a mouthful of water and stood up.
‘Might as well get moving. There’s no use hanging round here.’
He hitched up his gun belt, and started walking slowly away from the machine in the direction it had been going when it stopped. Reave clambered to his feet and reluctantly followed him.
It got hotter and hotter. Billy took off his dark glasses and wiped the sweat out of his eyes. There was nothing in sight but sand and thorn bushes under a steel-coloured sky, no sign of a track or habitation. He waited for Reave to catch up, and then started walking again. The heat got worse and then, at last, the sky began to dim, and it grew dark. Billy and Reave slept huddled together on the hard ground. The nights were as cold as the days were hot. They walked on through the second day. They didn’t speak to each other. They didn’t even think. Life shut down until it consisted of nothing more than putting one foot in front of the other. Billy kept his eyes carefully fixed on the ground. He found if he stared at the horizon he began to hallucinate.
He stopped and wearily pulled the top from his canteen. He put it to his lips, and nothing happened. He tilted it further. Still nothing. The canteen was empty. He turned and waited for Reave.
‘I’m out of water.’
Reave held his canteen to his ear and shook it.