throws self on ground in agony I'M SO SORRRYYYYY! My computer died and the computer man took it away and HE DIDN'T GIVE IT BACK FOR FOUR MONTHS. I only got it back last week and thank GOD everything was still there. I now have a new computer and I'm going to be updating regularly. PROMISE.
It's late here now, lieblings, so I'll be brief. This is a pathetically bad and rushed chapter, but I had to get the ball rolling again. More to come. Welcome once again to Chapter Seven - Skulldents.
The plain didn't get better. It got worse. The further they went, the more mines they shot, and even though Karma now allowed Throttle to assist her in blowing them out of the ground, it soon became more of a task to push and pull their bikes into and out of the rapidly expanding craters they made. Karma figured out why it was getting harder – the mines they were shooting were now in conjoined triplet and quadruplet sets, and were designed not to incapacitate, but to quite literally obliterate. They were also all crowded, and were pretty sensitive to disturbances. Some of them were so close they went off in succession like a chain of firecrackers. It was stressful when they did that.
"What time is it?"
"I don't wanna know." Karma was leaning on Baby and having a drink. "It's time for a cigarette."
"We're gonna have to set up camp soon."
"Are you for real? We've only covered about five kilometres!"
"We've covered nine, babe."
"Still not good enough. I was hoping to be almost there by now." She tossed her water flask over Baby's handlebars. "Maybe this wasn't a good idea after all."
"We've already got this far."
"Hmm." She got out her cigarettes and lit one, chewing on the end of it. "Sun's getting low."
Throttle glanced up at the sky, and then back down at his feet. "I still don't quite understand what made me do something this dangerous."
"Because I have a nice arse."
"Apart from that."
Karma leaned on Baby and gave him the weirdest look. It was something between amusement and confusion. "You're extremely, confusingly weird."
"And you're extremely bitchy. When you want to be."
"And you're honest."
"And you're hot. And you know it."
Karma giggled loudly, sending out a lungful of smoke prematurely. "Funny." She sighed and put Baby back on his wheels. Throttle suddenly wondered why he thought of Baby as male – but then, AI tech bikes were usually programmed to be the opposite sex of their riders. It was the way they developed. Unless…
Like magic, Karma began to croon to her bike. "Lookit Baby. All messed up and dirty. I don't know why I let my pretty girl get this way. Service for you next stop, OK?"
Baby rumbled in agreement.
Throttle raised an eyebrow over his shades. "Baby's a girl?"
"Yeah. What's your point?"
Throttle raised his other eyebrow. "It never struck me that you were gay."
"What?" Karma swung around in astonishment. "Just coz Baby's as chickie as they be doesn't mean I'm dyke as a ditch."
"You know the theories."
"Yeah. I do." She harrumphed indignantly. "But I liked Baby more than any of the others. I hate men."
Throttle's eyebrows went even higher. "That so?"
"None of your business, Mr. Wordsmith. But I'm not a lesbian."
"I believe you, pretty lady." He remembered something. "Harley's bike was a girl too."
Karma looked up. "That so?" she said in echo. The cigarette burnt out. "Interesting."
"Is it?"
"Not really. Well, trivially. But not important interesting." She ground out her cigarette irritably with her toe. "That could be another lead, though. Where's her bike?"
"On the scrap heap. Got blown up during the war and she never got time to get another one."
"Blown up by what?"
"A mine." Throttle smiled grimly and didn't know why. Karma laughed quietly, like a predator. "That's an omen I really don't want to believe in." She looked up again. "Come on. Let's forget this. Make camp."
"My stories startin' to scare you, Miss Tracker?"
"They got me tremblin', Mister Wordsmith. Tremblin' like a bitty baby." She looked around. "You see anywhere where we might pitch up?"
"Oh, sure. Lots of places. Y'know, coz a minefield is such an awesome place to camp."
"Stop whinging, will you?"
Twenty minutes later, Karma and Throttle were peering nervously over the edge of a crater that may or may not have been caused by a small meteor. "Shit."
"This was your idea."
"And what, you'd rather sleep on a mine? At least all of these ones went off."
"You think."
"I hope."
"This was still your idea."
"If you had any balls, you'd go down there and check if there were no more mines left. But seeing as you don't, it looks like I'm going to have to do it." Karma slid down the shallow crater on her backside without another word.
It was really Throttle's fault. He'd shot a firecracker mine and it had set off a chain reaction that went in a perfect circle. Karma then suggested that it would be perfect for them to sleep in the ensuing crater, brilliant idea Throttle, and had proceeded to merrily shoot what Throttle perceived to be every live mine within a ten metre radius. She was now stomping theatrically on the spongy sand of the crater's floor. "Wow. No mine here. Oh look, I don't see a mine! There are no mines down here." She threw herself on the ground and rolled around in the dirt.
"Are you fucking crazy?"
She laughed and laughed. "Nah. I'm just dirty. Get down here, Baby!" It took him a moment to realise she was talking to her bike and not to him.
They hadn't brought a tent, due to reasons a) Karma: "There'd be no way in Hell that I'd share a confined space with you anyway," and b) Karma: "I'm not carrying it," so they were stuck with sleeping bags. They both knew it would get cold, but that was a catch they were willing to ignore. They'd spend nights in the desert before.
Karma lit a small fire with the oil cooker she'd brought and sank into an introverted bubble. Throttle was hoeing into his purloined packet of iced biscuits. Karma was on her fourth cigarette and was looking slightly forlorn. "Hey."
"Yep."
"…Do you have any iced biscuits left?"
Throttle smiled slowly. "I thought you didn't want them."
"Screw you. Gimme one."
He chuckled and offered her the packet. She perused them carefully and took two, pink and yellow. "I'm glad you brought these with you."
"Taste good with tobacco?"
"Everything tastes good with tobacco." She pushed the two of them together so the icing got squashed up and popped the whole thing in her mouth. He watched her jaw muscles work as she chewed contentedly.
"Riddle me this, Miss Tracker."
"Affer ah 'inish."
He waited until she swallowed her biscuits and then said, "Where do you think Harley will be now?"
Karma shrugged. "Dunno. Probably big country."
"Where's that?"
"Anywhere you fuckin' want." She stopped to lick her fingers. "Somewhere where there aren't many people – or people that only Mace will trust. I don't know. I'm counting on this laptop we're getting."
"All on a laptop."
"Uh-huh."
He bit into another biscuit and thought. "How many cases have you done?"
"Jeez, I dunno. About a hundred."
"Any of them like this?"
"Trudging through a desert, getting my info from singular sources with little to no backup, you mean?"
"…Whatever this is."
She paused for a moment. "No. None quite like this."
He sat up on his elbows. "How good are you at tracking?"
"Considering the fact that this planet is so screwed up… I'm the best you got, baby." She giggled at him.
"What are the chances of finding her?"
"Let's see. I didn't want to do this job in the first place – I'm here under duress – and Mace was given a couple of day's headstart before I was even called. Hmm. Difficult. Would slim to none be good?" She reached for another biscuit but Throttle pulled them out of her way. She frowned like a child. "Hey. I answered your question."
"So Carbine's paying you to run around in circles?"
"Looks like it," she said brightly.
"Why would she do that?"
"You're askin' me, Throttle?" He was thoroughly distracted for a moment when she called him by his name, not his nickname or some other less affectionate soubriquet, and she took the opportunity to dive on the biscuit packet. "Look, I don't know. Guilt? Carbine's got a lot of guilt. She got a lot of people killed in the war. That's why she was such a good general, you know that! She sacrificed a lot of things, including her own corps. Maybe this is her penitence for her many sins." She licked off the icing from a pink biscuit. "Personally? I don't care. I'm getting money. I'm doing my job. I have to now – it's the law."
"You hate that."
"Oh yeah. I don't like being at the beck and call of some high and mighty bitch. I don't like being at the beck and call of anyone. But hey," she sighed, "I'm getting paid. So that eases the pain."
"So tracking's all about money?"
"It's a living." She tilted her head to one side. "But it's not everything."
"What do you mean?"
"Why are you so freakin' interested?" She half-grinned crazily, licking some pink icing from the corner of her mouth. "I like my job. End of subject."
He leaned back again and looked at the stars as they popped into view. He could remember times like this, a very long time ago, when he was learning how to scout. He was still a cadet, a skinny little thing when he thought about it now. He'd had a girlfriend, his bros, a lot of happiness in his heart. He'd still been a kid who looked at the world but couldn't quite believe it. He'd had the most amazing instructors and year group in the world – quite literally, actually. The kids in his cadet year had been the very essence that had turned the war around.
It got him thinking again, about those years and his instructors. And then he thought of something else.
"When Mrs. Madde was talking about her daughter…"
"Don't start." Karma was leaning back on Baby, looking at the stars.
God, was she always like this? He was bashing into wall after wall after wall. "It was only a question, woman."
Karma sighed. "It's none of your business. Fettle has a mental illness and believes that I'm her daughter reincarnated."
"She called her Rush."
"Yes."
"As in Rusher Dispatch?"
Author's Note: In the Mad-Eyed Owl universe, Rusher Dispatch was a highly decorated heroine who was married to Stoker and was the other founding parent of the Freedom Fighter movement. She was phenomenally talented and worked extensively in scout and missionary work to rescue and relocate refugees and dispossessed citizens. Was killed in a Plutarkian ambush while on a mission trying to rescue a large group of asylum seekers. There will be more about her in Mad-Eyed Owl's work "Sortie and the Heartstitch", to be released at a later date.
Karma was silent for a long two seconds. When she spoke again, her voice was softer. "Yes. Did you know her?"
"She was one of my instructors when I was in cadets."
Karma didn't say anything.
"And if it's any help, you're nothing like her."
She laughed at that. "Good to know." A pause. "I heard she was a good woman."
"A fine understatement, Miss Tracker, but yes, I'll accept that."
"She was married to Stoker, wasn't she?"
"You know Stoke too?"
"Know him, but we've never been introduced. Did some jobs for him during the war, but he always sent a scout to fact me up." She chewed on her cigarette, thoughtful. "Funny kinda guy. Sent all of his messages through a voice recorder and he was pretty blasé. Not someone that I'd expect to be in charge of a massive Freedom Fighter movement."
"Did you know that he was with Harley as well for a while?"
"Fuck me dead. Is this girl your groupie or something? No, I did not know that."
"Maybe you could have an interview with him or something. I dunno, do your tracker take-note thing."
"I'll see. God, Carbine has done nothing for me! Subject in intimate relationship with Freedom Fighter leader would have been miiiighty nice to know…" She reached up and pulled out Harley's folder, writing on the back page with a pen she pulled from her breast pocket. "How long were they a couple?"
"A while. It was sort of unofficial for a bit. Say six months?"
"That's long enough. And Mace and Stoker were close, from what I gather. Or at least while Mace was disguised as a Mouse."
"Well… fairly." Throttle kept his eyes on her now. She was tapping her pen on the paper, her cigarette dribbling ash from the corner of her mouth.
"Has Stoker ever been involved with anything that might have been suspect?"
"I don't like where you're heading, Karma," he said quietly.
"Where am I heading, Throttle?"
"If you're thinking along the lines of Stoker and Mace working together for the Plutarkians at some point, then I retract my statement. I meant to say that I really don't like where you're heading, Karma."
Karma looked up at him piercingly. "I'm not. By 'suspect', I meant something that could have damaged his position as leader of the FF organisation. I wasn't referring to corruption."
"Why do you want to know?"
Karma sat back and lit another cigarette. "Here's how the play could pan out. Curtain rises on Act One of the Stoker Saga. Enter Stoker. Fine man, bit of a sleaze but in a good way, leader of the Freedom Fighters and a better-than-average tactician. Enter Mace. Big guy, good-looking, nice head on his shoulders, secretly a Rat from the eastern province who's been hired by the Plutarkians to do a little undercover work. Stoker meets Mace, thinks Mace is good guy, works closely with Mace and they form a little companionship in relation to getting the stinkfish off the planet. Sound good so far?"
"Keep going."
"Say – just say – that Stoker did a little dabbling with the wrong kind of people and made a few mistakes at some point during the war, resulting in some important people getting killed. Hey, this is hypothetical so the plot keeps moving. Say that Mace, while doing his Sir Spyalot stint, stumbles across this information and thinks 'Ah. If I expose this information, the Freedom Fighters will go insane. They're mostly angry kids at war, impulsive, they'll throw him out for sure. And then they'll require a new leader. Someone tough, similar to Stoker in tact, and has something to his name that will definitely make him look like a good guy.' Any candidates? Have a stab, Throttle."
"That would be Mace. Because all of Stoker's other close associates – who would otherwise take his place – would be suspected of having done the same illegal thing. Whatever that might be."
"Nicely done. If Mace becomes the leader of the Freedom Fighters, they're profoundly screwed – which is what he wants. So, Act Two of the Stoker Saga commences. Curtain goes up, and what have we here? Mace is confronting Stoker, saying he's got damning information and he's going to blab all over Mars, nyeah-nyeah. Stoker, however, has a much steadier head than Mace first thought, and isn't swayed by this at all. He knows he's got the loyalty of his soldiers and they won't give him up, coz everyone fucks up occasionally. Mace thinks 'OK, so this won't work. What's another way I can get him out of a job?' Enter Harley, a pretty little blonde thing who is so much younger than Stoker it's almost obscene, but is still in a relationship with him. Mace knows that Stoker absolutely loves Harley, and decides to play on that. He reveals himself, kidnaps her, and then sends Stoker a message saying that if he doesn't step down, he's going to shoot Harley between the eyes. End of Act Two."
Throttle thought about this for a while. "So why isn't she dead yet?"
"Ahh, good point. Instead of blackmailing Stoker, Mace could've kidnapped Harley as a prisoner-swap. Give yourself up to me and make me leader of the FF Army, and I'll release your girl. That kind of thing could still be ongoing in Mace's mind, even though the Plutarkians can't flick a fin anymore without the Tri-Galactic Federal Police running in and screaming 'everybody get down on the floor!'. He might not even be aware that the Plutarkian War is over."
"Couldn't blame him for that."
She did her sex-cherub chuckle. "Me neither." She rubbed her forehead. "Actually, that's the more likely scenario. Sorry."
"For what? Damning my gracious leader?"
"Yep. That." She reached for a third cigarette, and then paused. She counted how many she had left, and her eyes widened. "Ten? Fuckin' ten. Where did you go…?" She stuffed them back into her jacket pocket grumpily. "OK. So let's write down these theories before we forget them." She began to scrawl on the note-taking pages of the file. "Scenario A. One: subject was in close contact with Stoker, the then-leader of the FF movement. Two: subject's abductor was also in close contact with Stoker. Three: possibility stands that the subject was abducted as such to coerce Stoker to resign from his position as leader of the FF, as was the abductor's initial intention."
She drew a line and started again. "Scenario B. See above One and Two. Three: possibility stands that the abductor discovered AYH information about Stoker –"
"What's that?"
"As yet hypothetical. I'm just gripping at straws here."
"Why do you need all this hypothetical stuff anyway? All you need to do is find Harley. You don't need to know why. You're a tracker, not an officer of the court."
She paused. "Technically, yes. Practically, no." She shifted so she was more comfortable. "It helps you understand your abductor more. If they did something that was totally logical and well-planned, you got a problem. That means that they're smart and they're more than likely to do a runner. If they've done something that was just fucking insane, you've got an even bigger problem. Coz that means they aren't scared of you." She thought about it. "And sometimes there isn't really a reason for you to be tracking them at all, because they haven't actually done anything wrong."
"Such as?"
"My last job was about three months ago. Real tiny stint. Little girl went missing and her mother was going insane, saying she'd been abducted. She hired me and I found the kid with her dad. Turns out the parents had gotten divorced and the mother wasn't following the custodial orders of the child. Her father finally got sick of it and picked the child up from school – as was his right under court of law – and took her home to his place. Didn't even flick his tail out of line. The kid was totally happy."
"How does that even apply to this case?" But Throttle already knew.
"Well… anything can happen."
"You've got a sick mind, woman. I mean, really sick."
"It's happened before. Guy pretends to kidnap forbidden girl so it doesn't took too weird when they just disappear together. Young kids tend to overdramatise the whole thing – and Mace and Harley were both pretty young at the time."
"Harley hated Rats from the depths of her heart. She saw her father get shot in the head by one when she was a kid."
"Uh-huh. And Harley is no longer a kid." She finished writing down her points in the file and stuffed it back in her saddlebag. "Give you another reason why I need to know the motives?"
"This is like swapping stories, woman."
"I'll take that as a 'yes'." She lay back on the ground. "If something goes wrong and we end up having a confrontation, I'm going to have to talk Mace down. And it really, really scares people when you tell them exactly what was going on in their head when they kidnapped or murdered someone. They go to pieces and think you can read their mind. With certain exceptions."
"When they're out of their mind, I gather?"
"Well… yeah. Pretty much, yeah. China Blasko, for instance. I tried the whole negotiating down-talk with her. She listened politely, we exchanged pleasantries and then she shot me in the head."
"In your head?"
"Turns out I got a mighty thick head. The bullet only pierced the first lining of my brain. My balance has never been quite the same since, but I'm OK." She giggled then at his thunderstricken face. "Show you the scar." She parted her hair on the right side of her head and sure enough, glistening white, there was a perfect circular scar that was sunk into a dent in her skull. "Just so you know I'm not lying. You can touch it if you want, I don't feel anything."
He could have fitted the end of his index finger inside that dent. It made him want to shudder. "Why did you even come back to work?"
"Hospital and brain-scans made me bored."
"I'm really starting to doubt your state of mind."
"You ain't the only one, sugarboots." She yawned widely and settled back on the ground. "Try and get some sleep. I'll see you in the morning."
All he could dream about was a girl pulling bullets out of her head and sniggering to herself.
After that, there was nothing.
That is all, bubbles. Critique away.
Mad-Eyed Owl
