Chapter 21
They walked out of the town.
"Lina was right; you do need a new coat." Livio remarked.
Vash glanced at the scorched black mark that flared down from his shoulders at the back.
"This old coat saved your life!"
"Some stupid plant dragging me too fast across the room did that."
"Sorry!"
Livio could not believe he was apologising for that, did he not know a thank you when he heard it?
Vash gazed out at the row of tanks just beyond the town. There were squads of infantry near them.
"What's the plan?" Livio asked.
Vash did not reply. He put his glasses on and continued walking.
"Why does Johnston want you so badly?" Vash asked. "This is not about the sand steamer."
He turned when he heard Livio stop.
"Bad?"
Livio glowered at him.
"They captured Chronica." He clenched his fist as the ragged pain and horror gripped him in simply recalling that then went on wretchedly. "I remember parts of what happened." There were gaping gaps in his memory all too easily filled by the blood soaked clothes he had found himself in, and the hotel of dead Terrans. Chronica had done something to him that had brought him to his senses. He was not sure what. Hit him? He had had headaches for days afterwards. Only they had left alive. He had had to help her as she could barely walk. His jaw worked but he could not voice the conflict in his mind.
"Razlo?" Vash asked, gazing out at the Terran tanks.
Livio flinched. He'd forgotten Vash knew his secret, the other personality he carried. He put his hand instinctively to the dome where his left ear had been. They had wired up his body something strange. That other personality knew its old uses, though for now it merely served as a cybernetic ear.
Vash had such a sad expression on his face. No, it was not sadness; it was disappointment. Livio felt his temper flare.
"What's with that face?" He snapped. He did not need the pity that would follow.
"You didn't have to kill them."
Livio gaped incredulously at him. Was he trying to reason with Razlo, or him?
"Like hell. They deserved worse, it was a pity I lost it before I went inside, or I'd have maimed each one of them for life so that they would carry the pain and suffering till the end of their days." His throat was raw and his words came out with scratchy anguish.
Vash reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder.
"The twins are your future. Do not lose sight of that."
Livio clawed his hands at the agony that twisted in his gut.
"Do you think I don't know what I am?" He demanded. "What I was?"
Vash released his shoulder and smiled. The damn fool was smiling, at him, as if something pleased him. What could that be? There was nothing to smile at.
"This new day is nearly half done. Why don't we spend the rest of it in pursuit of love and peace?"
How that was going to happen, Livio did not know, but Vash kept walking and he would follow him.
They made it half way across to the Terran's before the towns bounty hunters realized who they were. Trucks and tomas's came racing out the town.
"No!" Vash waved his hands at them in alarm as the Terran's maneuvered their tanks forward and began firing shells. The town's folk responded with bazookas and truck mounted rocket launchers.
"I'm here?" Vash raised a hand as the two ploughed into each other. They screamed insults about the others nationality, their dubious origins, and what their mothers had been doing at the time.
Livio grabbed the man who was gaping incredulously at the impromptu battle.
"Run! They'll notice us soon enough!"
"What?"
"Can you outrun a tank?"
"No!" Vash staggered backwards, still wide eyed with horror at the fight, as Livio pulled him.
"Then let's get a head start."
.
Livio sat with his back against Vash shivering. It was freezing and a wind had picked up, which froze him even further.
"Whose idea was it to run out into the desert?" He groaned.
"Yours." Vash reminded him without heat. Neither of them could maintain enough energy to quarrel.
"Which direction was that town?"
"Follow the foot prints."
"It's night."
"Wait till morning."
"I'll have frozen by then." Livio hated the cold; it made the skin and bone around his mechanical appendages ache.
"Think warm thoughts."
"Ow!"
Livio opened and closed his hand as pins and needles fizzed up it. He had forgotten the man had a prosthetic arm. The elbow jab did not work on him.
There was a whiff of something heavenly and a slight sloshing sound.
"Oh, I found something better than thoughts." Vash handed over the bottle of whiskey.
Now that was more like it.
.
They woke to a circle of gun muzzles. Livio peered up at the towns men who were silhouetted against the sunlight. An incandescent halo surrounded their heads. Ow, his eyes were drilling pure agony through his brain. He heard a sleepy noise of surprise from beside him as Vash half sat up.
"Get up." The leader of the posse ordered. It was Redge, Livio recalled sourly, he had spent the evening in the Saloon complaining to any who would listen about how Lina had cheated her way to victory. He tried to help Vash to his feet, but the other man seemed far steadier and alert than he.
"This is the second time you've bothered me while I have a hangover!" Livio grouched at Redge.
"That would be preferable to the sun blisters you would have if you stay out here." Redge countered. "Bring them."
He considered his options. He could fight what seemed like forty men, and their tomas's and trucks, or he could follow them to wherever they were taking them. The first left more burning and freezing desert as an option, the second the possibility of a cool jail cell. Wonderful. A dark cool cell. He'd bust out when his head wasn't killing him.
"We sent the Terrans packing last night." Redge explained as they passed by the wreckage of three tanks and in the distance four more. The town's folk were already dismantling them for the metal.
"Can't let them have our people."
Livio pricked up his ears.
"You're setting us free?" Vash asked with a smile of relief.
Redge barked a laugh.
"No. But better us from No Man's Land benefit from the bounty than Terrans, bloody parasites."
There was no jail in Warren's City, but a back room in Redge's house had a stout door and bars over the windows, which seemed to serve the same purpose. It was cool, shady and there was even a bench against the wall. Amazing. Livio tipped himself out onto it and gave a sigh of contentment. Vash sat against the wall and hung his head. There were now quite a few people gathered in the next room staring in at them through the still open door.
"Who would have thought 'Near Hit Eriks' was Vash the Stampede."
"Is he really a plant?"
"He looks hung over, not dangerous."
"When will the Feds get here?"
"Next two hours."
"Good that man is too dangerous. Just look what happened to the town."
Livio squinted at Vash, but the man seemed to be contemplating the inside of his eyelids.
"Alright, alright! Enough gawking. Get out of my house!" Redge exclaimed.
Ah, the peace that followed that. Two hours was it, Livio mused. He would sleep for an hour and a half then.
He woke to a thunderous explosion and rolled instinctively under the bench as the rocks and masonry rained down around him. It had only been half an hour, what had happened? He gaped as Jasmine marched through the rubble and fired at Redge. There was a solid thunk and an 'oof!' as the man went down. Livio gaped at the enormous gun she carried. Where had she found a stun gun? She kicked him in the shoulder.
"Move it!"
He realized he was gaping at her and scrambled out. Vash was lying sprawled against the wall, unconscious. He hauled the man up over his shoulder as Jasmine darted through the still shifting rubble to a large Terran Tank just outside. Doug raised the turret door as they leaped up. Livio had to manhandle Vash inside then dropped down himself. Jasmine twisted it closed as Doug turned the tank and drove it full speed down the street without any concern for people in the way. Jasmine loaded a shell as Livio draped Vash into one of the horribly tiny chairs, the man overflowed gangly legs and arms.
"Firing!" Jasmine called.
The shell roared along the street, clearing it of people. It exploded half an ile out in the desert, making the towns folk reclaiming metal flee.
Livio sat back and watched in dazed awe.
"Like it Dad?"
He grinned at Doug, he had no words for how proud and astonished he was. Jasmine continued to watch the town as it faded into the distance.
Vash groaned and awkwardly tried to find a position that did not have his knees around his ears.
"Wha happened?"
"My amazing children stole a tank, rescued us and we're on the run." Livio exclaimed.
Vash blinked at them.
"Where's Lina?"
"I think by now she's chasing the remaining Terrans blockaded in the east of town." Doug informed them.
"She says to go on without her." Jasmine said soberly. "She says Johnston is important and that she can find work in this town. Vash, I saw her put that money in your bag, so I sneaked it out and shoved it in Mick's diaper bag. Was that okay?"
He nodded.
"Marlon said to give this to you." Jasmine left the periscope and from their bags pulled a gun shape wrapped in an oil cloth. "He says it's as good as new, no charge as usual."
Vash smiled and slumped back.
"And dad, Zachary tuned these." She pulled out two bundles and with a grunt lifted a box of ammunition with a cross stamped on the top. Livio felt the hair on the back of his neck lift. He had not been wrong. He hastily cleared his expression when he noticed Jasmine eyeing him curiously.
"Thanks." He grinned. "Drive east, we need to catch a steamer at Inepril City."
"Where are we headed?" Doug asked.
"December." Livio said with a grim smile.
Except for the silence, there had been no warning before they entered the City. Even driving a tank, they had had to stop when they reached the mound of debris in the middle of the road. Vash kicked at the rubble that covered the street. Several buildings were knocked down, but that was common enough in abandoned towns where the local hooligans from surrounding towns experimented with dynamite, but this was Inepril City, it should not be abandoned. He could see the power plant in the distance, he would find out what had happened.
He leaped up onto the pile of rubble to peer further down the road and felt his blood run cold. He clapped his hand over his mouth so as not to cry out. The kids must not see this. The rest of the main street was a scene of carnage. Blood splattered on walls, half the buildings demolished. A few dead bodies, only a day or so gone by the look of them, lay half buried under rocks. He jumped down. Livio was eyeing the rubble as if trying to find the most suitable route for the tank through it. Vash pointed back down the road.
"Take the kids around the outskirts across to the power plant housing. I need to look around."