Chapter 38
There was silence. Behind them, once they had passed the ship, there was no more shimmer to pin point its location and the perimeter defence did not activate.
"They'll send people after us if they don't want this reported." Chronica said, staring grimly at the place where the ship was. "And I've been here long enough to know that the desert will have our bones."
"Hey! Look there!" Meryl called, pointing with her chin, both hands occupied with the wheel.
Ahead of them was another car, still some distance away but now approaching them. It was visible by the pools of light from the headlamps.
"That must be Teres." Chronica said with a malicious glee. "Stupid fool is headed towards us, must have missed his turning."
The car turned off the road.
"Someone mark that spot!" Chronica instructed, "it'll be easy to miss if they who know the area missed it!"
.
The first sun rose as they swung off the main road onto the track the car had taken. The rising sun made it all the easier, the light and shadow throwing the tread tracks into sharp relief. Ahead of them in the distance, the car they were chasing threw up dust.
"They lost a great deal of distance with that detour!" Chronica said fiercely. "C'mon, just get them in range." She hoisted her bazooka onto her shoulder.
"Incoming!" Abe yelled and Vash turned and fired upwards at the missile, only to tumble over the windshield and land sprawled in the car on top of everyone.
"Ow Vash!" Abe yelped and tried to shove the man off him. "I almost shot you. Are you hurt?"
"Get off me, you broomheaded idiot! I'm trying to drive here!" Meryl yelped and hit the brakes as Vash got his foot tangled in the steering and almost sent them into the drift at the side of the road.
"Keep driving!" Abe yelled as Chronica fired her bazooka and shot the second missile out of the sky.
"I'm trying!" Meryl spat back.
"Drive!" Abe yelled, and fired with his left arm, his aim going wide.
Meryl floored the accelerator and tried to shove Vash's buttocks out of her face. She drove one handed as she kept him away from her as he wriggled around to find found solid footing.
"S-sorry!" He yelped on seeing her expression. He tried to disentangle his boot from the steering wheel and she pushed at his knee to prevent him kneeing her in the chest. He turned around and flopped into the front seat between her and Abe.
"Ow." He gingerly touched his bleeding shoulder.
"I asked if you got shot!" Abe scolded, concerned.
"It's my old wound from September." Vash caught his hand before he could touch his shoulder.
Livio stood in the back strafed the sky with bullets, catching the first missile.
"They're launching more, I'm gonna run out of ammo pretty quick!" Livio yelled.
"This was a trap! They wanted us to exhaust or annihilate ourselves on the ships automatic defences!" Calor exclaimed. "Turn back!"
"But Teres is getting away!" Chronica's voice broke in desperation.
"You gonna shoot down all them missiles they've launched?" Calor snapped and fired.
"Turn around Meryl!" Livio called.
"No! Don't!" Chronica exclaimed.
"Do it." Livio barked an order, then very quietly turned to the pale eyes of the woman beside him. "Chronica."
There was a sad pained way he said the word, but she fell silent and sat hunched up beside him, her fists clenched. She raised her hand suddenly and Livio caught her wrist as Meryl brought the car around and drove back the way they had come.
"Don't waste your energy on this." He murmured in the same steady sad voice. "Keep it for when you really need it."
"So, where to from here?" Meryl grouched as she crunched the gears in her haste. Vash was sitting right up against her and his gangly legs were too long for the shallow footwell. She had adjusted the chair so she could reach the pedals, not so he could sit beside her with his knees around his ears. His legs being all over the place did not help with her mangling of the gears.
"Just get out of range!" Calor snapped. "Guys, some help would be appreciated!"
Meryl drove back the way they came. Some of the mortars fell beyond the car and blasted plumes of sand into the air. Some took out sections of the road behind them, and others detonated in a rain of shrapnel above them.
Meryl scowled when Vash pulled her hood up almost over her eyes to protect her.
"I can't see!" She snapped at him and tried to shake it off.
Just as they left the detour, a flurry of mortars rained down on them.
"Get down!" Livio yelled.
The explosion was thunderous. Meryl screamed as the car was lifted into the air and landed further along the road with a bone jarring thud. She jerked the steering wheel around and struggled to regain control on the road, as Abe leaned right over Vash and clamped his hands over the wheel to bring the car out of the crazy weaving she was doing in compensating and counter compensating.
"Just keep it steady." He breathed his knuckles white with tension.
"Let go!" Meryl snapped.
Abe did so and gave her a very annoying pat on the head.
"Yes boss."
"You'll get your pay docked for a week if you ever say that again!"
"Hah! So I'm getting paid! Excellent! Fifth Moon is back!"
"Don't twist my words!" Meryl grouched.
"I'm not!" Abe protested. "Extra money will be good 'cause I'm gonna have to replace my bag and all."
"Abe, what nonsense are you talking?"
There was silence from the back. Meryl risked a glance behind her and found Livio sprawled protectively across Milly and Chronica and Abe still clinging to the back of her chair. All their luggage, was gone, most of it scattered across the desert in shreds, that which wasn't burned with a fierce enthusiasm fed by their spare gas tanks. Almost the entire rear of the jeep was gone.
"That's all our supplies." Calor said bleakly.
Livio gritted his teeth and with a grimace jerked a piece of shrapnel out of his arm. Chronica and Milly seemed relatively unscathed, save for a few scratches. Abe did not seem hurt at all.
"Keep driving." Livio instructed. "Let them think they got us."
Meryl continued along the road they had been following.
"They have deep space scanners." Abe pointed out. "They can see what is happening on the other side of the planet. Not gonna be hard tracking a car just yarz from their ship."
Livio frowned; disliking the fact that he did not know what Abe was talking about.
Meryl ignored the argument that ensued. It had been hard driving with Vash perched on the top of the bonnet, but now his legs were blocking the gear stick. He now sat forward with his arms all over the dash and peered over the windshield, staring at things through his yellow glasses. He had a yellowing bruise along his jaw line. She turned and glared fiercely at the road, furious at his ability to distract her. She sneaked another glance just to make certain of what she had seen. How bad had that injury been that it was still bruised a week later?
He then jerked upright and stood, clinging to the windshield, his brown cape and the tails of his duster whipping up around her face.
"Vash, sit down!" She yelled at him, shoving his clothing out of her vision.
"Oh." The way Livio said the word made her stomach plummet.
She grabbed hold of the annoying pieces of cloth and looked around for what both men had seen. Ahead was what looked like a village abandoned to the sands a over a century ago.
"Meryl, slow down." Vash said, in a strangely strained yet calm voice. First one thing now another - she could smell blood.
.
They drove into the village at walking pace. It was abandoned, but then Meryl noticed the blood splattered on the walls and the rank smell of faeces. This was freshly done. Though she had yet to see any people, or their bodies.
Then they drove into the town square. Perhaps thirty people lay there, none of them moving, most of them bloody, their staring eyes gazing up at the new day's suns.
Meryl sank back into the drivers seat feeling ill.
"It's a massacre." Chronica whispered.
Vash and Livio glanced at each other, sickened.
"Knives." Livio whispered and Vash hunched his shoulders slightly and a fiery look came to his eyes. He leaped out of the car and ran hastily among the people.
"It's that Johnston." Chronica spat. "Though I can see Knives cheering him on."
The others disembarked as Chronica and Abe helped Vash with the gristly inspection.
"W-why?" Vash asked with a harsh breath in his throat. He turned and with Livio ran through the village, inspecting the houses and shops around the plaza.
Meryl stood on the runner board of the car staring at the scene. It looked like a plant had done this or someone with a very sharp blade. Yet the blood was all over the rest of the village, but the bodies were gathered here. Why had they done that? Had it been Teres? The villagers wore very odd clothing which reminded her of someone she had seen, but she could not place it. The victims were young and old, male and female, there seemed to be no pattern. She frowned and looked back the way they had come. Unless the village had been drawing power from the invisible ship, then there would be a plant around here. She shucked her sand coat, and hiked her cape onto her shoulders. She headed for the post office and was rewarded with what she was looking for. Behind the blood splatters on the wall was a hand sketched map of the mail delivery points for the town. But look as hard as she might there was no power plant marked.
She walked out a few minutes later as Vash clattered up the stairs and strode in. He stared at the map for a few seconds and his face changed slightly. He walked over to the door and stared out at the people in the village.
"The water." He murmured to himself and ran off to the north.
Meryl followed him.
"What water?" She demanded. She was impressed that she had recovered enough fitness to keep up with him for a short jog.
"Huh?" Vash glanced back, as if surprised to see her.
"You said 'the water' and ran. What do you mean?"
Vash stopped suddenly as they reached the end of the street then flung out his arm to catch her and hauled them both back against the wall as a shot rang out.
"Hey!" He called. "We're here to help!"
Another shot buried itself in the ground by their feet.
Vash took a deep breath.
"I come here to honour the First Leader's command!" Vash called.
There was silence.
"Vash, what are you talking about?" Meryl asked.
"Can we talk?" Vash called, ignoring her.
"Talk from there!" An accented voice called. "We can hear you."
Meryl could not place the voice, it sounded like it was a very thick dialect of the December accent.
"We can help. We can help with the wounded and the burial of the dead. We will leave before nightfall."
"Drop your weapons."
Vash set his black revolver down in the dust.
"Girl, your weapons."
Meryl drew two derringers and tossed them after the revolver.
There was slightly derisive laughter.
"The whole cloak girl."
Meryl glared and handed her cloak to Vash who tossed it out into the street.
"Come on out. We would see you, Meryl Stryfe and your companion is no doubt Vash the Stampede."
Vash poked his head out and then gave a grin of delight.
"First Leader!"
"You!" Meryl exclaimed and followed him out from behind the wall.
In the middle of the road stood the same man who had shared the cell with them back in that town in the east. Now that she could see him in daylight, he was a well built man with broad shoulders and a keen gaze out of his yellow slit eyes. Vash looked around.
"Where is the worm?"
"None of your business, Vash the Stampede. You offered aid, we will accept it. Leave your weapons here as good faith, we will not touch them. This way."
The man turned and walked over to a house. Atop the house stood two other young men both had their guns trained on them.
.
Meryl was a little disorientated as they went in, as instead of the house having the usual rooms within, there was merely a staircase down a fissure in the rock that lead underground. A heavily armed woman fell into place behind them as the First Leader took them down the twisting flight of stairs. It opened out into a long narrow cavern about ten yarz down and each yarz they descended the colder it got. Meryl was shivering by they time they reached the cavern floor. It seemed the entire village was gathered there among the pools of dark water.
"Here's the worst. Do what you can." The First Leader pointed at a young man perhaps eighteen years old who was shivering on a blanket. The side of his head was bloody and his eyes were unfocussed and staring wildly.
"Have you gathered all the people here?" Meryl asked.
The First Leader did not reply.
"Can you let me go back for the first aid kit?" That at least they kept under the drivers seat. "I think Abe and Calor know more about this than I do, I can bring them to help."
"No. Him, I know. You, I know. No one else."
"But it will help your people!"
"If others heard of us, it would not." The First Leader turned away and Meryl jumped in fright as a worm slithered out from what she had thought was a pool, but was in fact a hole in the ground. The two of them crossed the cavern and vanished through an arch. She inched over to where Vash was doing what first aid he could administer.
"Go and help." He suggested and jerked his head towards the other groups of people. A little bewildered Meryl went from group to group, helping to wash wounds and bandage them. As she did so she began to gather the tale of what had happened.
"It was a Plant, like the Chieftain." A boy of twelve told her when she asked.
"It wasn't the Chieftain, hush." His mother gave her a scolding stare for daring such a question and pulled her child away once she had finished bandaging his hand.
"Dunno what caused it, but it was them damned sky devils." An elderly man chewed at his pipe and scowled at her as she washed out the graze he had on his arm. "The new ones. The ones who nuked the north of the world into oblivion."
Meryl had never heard the Terrans referred to by that name, but to these people it must seem that way.
"Not telling no dependant life leecher." The next young woman she helped snapped at her.
"Aw don't mind them young things." An old toothless grandmother lisped at her a few minutes later as Meryl carefully washed out the blood from her hair to try and see the extent of the injury. "They are frightened and confused. Too much has happened recently. They forget the long struggle. We are from dust and we will return to dust." She went quiet and peered blindly around the room with her cataract milky eyes. "I heard he is here, is that true?"
"He?"
"Vash the Stampede. The man in red."
"Yes."
She smiled.
"Then it is good fate that brought you here."
Meryl applied the salve that the villagers used and set about taping up the long cut. It did not need stitches, but it was not going to leave a pretty scar.
"Is that so?" Meryl asked wondering how this could be good.
"We should all be dead." She murmured. "That is what they did to the other villages. But something caused them to flee. You arrived. Good fate follows him, even in sorrow. I listened to all the satellite broadcasts. They can say what they like, but his fate is good."
It was as she encountered her next patient that she worked out what was bothering her about these people aside from the lack of a plant in the village. This man had golden eyes with slits in it. Most of the villagers did not, but were happy enough with such people in their midst.
"Who do you think did it?" She asked him as she helped him with the foot wound he had.
"Who do you think did it?" He asked in reply.
"Teres." She said without thinking.
There was silence.
"We have not heard that name."
"Perhaps you would recognise the name Johnston?"
The man's eyes widened and he set his mouth grimly. When she had finished he stood and tested his weight on it.
"Help me." He ordered and grabbed her around the shoulders as he staggered.
She tried to push him upright again and gave a furious squawk as he copped a feel. Without thinking she ducked away from him and slapped him through the face in fury. He staggered back and landed awkwardly on the ground. Others hurried forward to help him, glaring at her. Meryl then realised she had committed some faux pas as people refused her aid from then on. She retreated to Vash's side seething.
"You didn't punch him?" He asked as if he had caught the last of the exchange and was trying to work out what had happened.
"No, I slapped him. But he deserved it." She grouched
The First Leader then emerged again, this time with another broad shouldered man with his orange hair sticking up all over the place. He reached the young man whom Meryl had helped and Meryl was shocked to see him spit at him in disgust then walk on. Round eyed people watched them cross the floor to where Vash ignored them and concentrated on his patient.
"Our apologies. You are our guests." The First Leader said with disgust. "The dog will be punished accordingly."
"Let him live." Vash said without looking up.
There was silence.
"You ask much of us."
Vash raised his eyes with a flash of frightening fury mingled with great sorrow.
"You do not kill a man for that."
They glared at each other.
"I never realised this was what he meant by a soft heart." The second man said.
"This is the Third Leader." The First Leader said with a slight emphasis which might have implied a slight towards his colleague. "We wish to know why you bring such warriors into our lands."
"We chase a man who has kidnapped the children of my friends. We seek to rescue them."
"He fled to the east, yet you came north. Why?"
Vash raised his head and gazed at them and for a moment Meryl felt her stomach plummet at the pained agony she saw there.
"The Sandworms are not the only ones who can hear the soundless cries of the world."
Vash and the Leaders stared at each other.
"Your friends are seeking you. Our people have disturbed your companion. It is not good that we mix. Do not return here again. Go."
Vash tied off the bandage he was using and stood up. He fished a bottle out of his pocket and handed them to the First Leader.
"You will not kill those who are suffering. Give them this according to the dosage and let them sleep. They will heal, but give them time to heal."
The First Leader took the bottle between two fingers and gazed at Vash.
"Do not presume your aid allows you to dictate to us." He murmured. "We know the ways of survival on this world long before you plants or humans came. Go."
Vash gazed at them sadly before he gave a nod then turned away.
.
Meryl walked out into the sunlight, surprised that it was only early afternoon. She reclaimed her cloak and derringers. Vash checked his revolver and then holstered it.
"Meryl."
She looked up from shifting the heavy cloak into place. Vash was staring up at the sky in the manner he was accustomed when burdened.
"Some secrets belong to the people who carry them." She murmured before he could say anything.
He closed his eyes and smiled slightly, then put his hands in his pockets.
"I asked." He said quietly. "They did not see anyone of Teres' description. Though the First Leader said he might have been in the car that waited outside the settlement while the Plant who wrecked this place walked in to cause this devastation."
Vash fell silent then walked off. Meryl felt her heart wobble; he had done this to track Teres? He wanted to help Fifth Moon with their investigations. She did not know how to express her gratitude, but she had to say something.
"Ah, I was wondering, how many settlements of people are reliant on the sandworms instead of plants?" She said as she skipped along beside him. "There must be thousands. And why don't we know much about them? I mean the only reason I know anything about worms is because they kidnapped me..." She trailed off realising exactly what awful memory that event coincided with for Vash. Great, she had put her foot in it. "Sorry."
Vash gave a single nod.
"All those people. All secret." She tried to drag the topic away from that. "I thought I knew this world, but then I met you and, and... and, well, wow. The truth is stranger than the stories we invented for ourselves."
She watched as Vash gazed out at the road ahead of them with a slight smile on his face. His eyes were dark with pain. She wished she could somehow ease it. She reached out and grabbed his hand, he twitched away, but she grabbed his sleeve this time.
"Vash you have salve smeared on here and eew, is that blood?"
He looked down at his arm and grimaced.
"Hah, there you are!" Abe called and then raised an eyebrow. "Is this why you never came back?"
Meryl jerked her hand away from Vash and he stepped back sharply.
"Well, enough canoodling for now, we'd appreciate some help with grave digging!"
Meryl felt her whole face flush and she stormed across to Abe and grabbed his arm.
"We were not doing anything!" She growled at him. "Where are you burying people?"
"There is a grave yard to the east." Abe gave her an apologetic grimace. "Sorry, did I interrupt something..."
"You didn't interrupt anything!" Meryl snapped. "East, you say? Then this way." She dragged Abe off before he could notice the state of Vash's duster or worse, feel the aura of pain around him.
By the time Vash joined them at the graveyard, he had a lighter yet still grim expression. He had no trace of blood and salve except for several dust smears on his sleeve. He stripped his duster off and lent his strength to digging graves with gusto. Meryl sidled up to him.
"Don't the people want to bury their own dead?" She asked in a hushed tone as he stopped to take a break and wipe the sweat out of his eyes.
Vash shaded his face to look up at her from where he stood in the hole.
"They are watching us. We agreed to this. Let us keep our part of the bargain."
"Our part? We're doing all the work!" She protested. "What is their part?"
Vash gave her an odd not quite smile.
"We're still alive, aren't we?"
Meryl went back to filling graves alongside Milly. She was no good at digging. It was a better job than Calor and Chronica had, loading bodies and driving them out to the graveyard. They set about unloading the wrapped bodies as Calor climbed out of the car with a slight shudder. She did what she must, but was clearly very uncomfortable.
"Look at him." She murmured with a slight frown.
Meryl followed her gaze to find her watching Vash dig alongside Abe and Livio. Sweat dripped off him in the afternoon sun and he did not break his rhythm once he started on a grave. She admired the way the sun caught on his rippling muscles, this was not something she wanted to share with Calor at all! Livio and Abe at least had the decency to keep their shirts on!
"I'd heard he had it bad." Calor interrupted her thoughts. "But ugh, he's not so pretty as his face would lead you to believe, is he?"
Meryl clenched her fist and growled at her in a furious undertone.
"Every one of those scars he earned protecting other people! Don't you ever say that about him again!"
Calor gazed curiously at her.
"Er, what were you and Vash doing all morning?"
Meryl glared heatedly at her, hating the way her cheeks flamed.
"None of your business!" She hissed and marched off to toss sand into the grave Livio and Abe had just filled. For once, she was glad of the assumption. For all Vash's gentle hints, there was a real threat of danger with the Sandworms. She did not see the speculative smile that followed her.
.
They drove out of the village as the first sun sank towards the horizon. Chronica anxiously staring ahead as they took the east road out of the village and drove in a wide loop that circled back around as if to rejoin the road they had tried to follow. They finally encountered car tracks but these disappointingly then stopped in the middle of nowhere.
Livio clambered out and tested the sand and walked back.
"It's not quicksand." He said and stood looking around. But the trail ended there and there was no sign of the other car.
"We're too near the ship." Abe worried, scowling at the rolling desert which was all they could see. "They'll come after us at night."
"Let's drive to the north east." Calor suggested. "We can head over to those dunes by that mesa. But we just need to avoid the ship."
"How do we do that if we can't see it?" Meryl asked sardonically.
"We guess." Calor smiled.
Driving far enough from the trigger perimeter of the ship took several near misses. They only set off the perimeter alert once, and Livio shot down the missile. Chronica drove with a concentrated frown, as if she were mapping out the ship in her mind. They made it to an outcrop of rock near the mesa, but the ground became too uneven for them to drive closer. Chronica came to a halt and killed the engine. They were still in the plane in front of the ship.
"We can't stay here." Abe pointed out. "They will snipe body heat."
"Mora, you can get out and carry the car over the rocks!" Chronica snapped at him. "We stay here."
"We're exhausted." Abe argued. "We're on water rations of two cups a day. We have no food except for Milly's puddings and if we keep driving this car is going to die on us. How do you propose to get past the shield, Chronica? Even if Calor and I were fully able plants, we'd not be able to break that sort of barrier – it withstood Tall Hammer, remember. We need to go further and think out a strategy."
Chronica's glare frosted over into a cold fury and she turned away.
"We're all worried." Livio murmured, leaning over the chair to look at her. "But we've got to be alive to get the kids out. At least we know where they are."
"Maybe!" Chronica spat. "What if they are not?"
"It's the best lead we've had yet! And we saw Johnston near here."
Chronica sat for a long moment in silence then hunched her shoulders and started the car again. She looped back, and took a wide circle around the Mesa. Her route took the car off the faint road to follow the sand through the dunes. They reached the shallow valley between the edge of the Mesa and the high sand dunes that hid the ship just as the first sun hit the horizon.
"Satisfied, Mora?" She snapped at Abe.
He gave a tired nod.
Chronica parked the car by the cliff wall.
"We'll have to set a watch." He pointed out as they clambered wearily out of the car.
"That'll be Vash and I on first watch!" Livio volunteered.
"Wha?" Vash found himself grabbed by Livio and followed him yelping in pain and trying not to fall on his face.
.
"You have an entire bottle of whiskey?" Vash declared happily as they staked out their position on the tall sand dune they had just climbed.
"Oh yes." Livio grinned as he opened it and handed Vash a glass.
Livio leaned back against the rock and tilted his whiskey glass so it caught the last rays of the sun. He glanced at his drinking partner. From their vantage point in the lee of the rock strewn dune they could see the camp, the position of the invisible ship and the ruined village. It was a good spot. He had called Vash away with him because there was this look in his eyes. Livio could not quite explain it, but he felt he understood it. There was also a general consensus that something momentous had happened that afternoon. However, as disgruntled as they both looked, it was probably not what Calor so delightfully had invented. Perhaps a few drinks and well timed words would coax it out of him. Also, he did not want to be around Chronica as grouchy as she was now.