Horizon Storms - Kevin J. Anderson [146]
BeBob emerged from his spacecraft and quickly put on a pair of sun-filtering goggles. Rlinda was the first to notice the lone man coming toward them. “One guy? He’s awfully ambitious if he thinks he can unload all the supplies and equipment by himself.”
BeBob waved. The man trudged forward and stopped, cocking his head to look at the two delivery ships. He had shaggy, gray-yellow hair and wore old clothes and padded boots; the heavy pack slung over his shoulders was swollen with gear. His wooden walking stick was freshly whittled from a native tree. He had not shaved for just long enough that the stubble on his cheeks looked like unkempt bristles rather than an intentional beard.
Rlinda was amused. “Are you trying to win a Daniel Boone contest? Is that who you think you are?”
“No. I think I’m…Hud Steinman. Never wanted to be anybody else.”
Rlinda shook the man’s hand and tried not to be too obvious when she wrinkled her nose. The man had an odor about him. Apparently his adherence to the true pioneer spirit extended to infrequent bathing, laundering, and changing of clothes. “Are you the colony rep? We’ve got a full manifest of stuff to unload.”
Steinman glanced back toward the tall canyon, where small figures were finally hurrying toward the landed ships. “Colony rep? Hell, no. They’re too busy dicking around setting up committees, filling out permits, and bickering over who gets to be the first mayor. Me, I came here to get away from all that. I plan to walk out onto the plains and fend for myself for a while.”
BeBob looked forlornly at the Blind Faith. “We’ve brought some pretty useful equipment here. You sure you don’t want any of it?”
“Nah, it’s not on my list of needs. I already did my work for the Hansa and now I’m taking my well-deserved reward.” With a smile, he gestured to encompass the big sky. “I’m the one who tracked this place down, you know. I was a transportal explorer, punching a random destination tile and jumping right through—like closing your eyes and leaping headfirst off a diving board, without even knowing if there’s water in the pool.”
BeBob shook his head. “I can’t imagine what would drive anyone to do a crazy thing like that, Mr. Steinman. Better you than me.”
“Davlin Lotze did it,” Rlinda said. “Plenty of times. He didn’t have much common sense.”
The pioneer shifted his grip on his wooden walking stick. “Maybe you two just aren’t old enough or bored enough to take a random gamble. I wanted to go fight the damned drogues. Pissed me off with all that baloney, wrecking Roamer skymines, attacking scientific research platforms, wiping out decent settlements. I had relatives on Boone’s Crossing, hardworking lumberjacks who didn’t give a stale rat turd about who lives at the bottom of a gas giant.
“But the EDF wouldn’t have me because I’m too old. They didn’t actually laugh at me, but I could see it in their eyes at the recruiting desk. Hell, why didn’t they think I could ride a navigation station or operate a weapons console as good as any kid? I just had the bad luck to be born at the wrong time.”
Rlinda opened the Curiosity ‘s cargo doors and studied the stacked crates, then used her own control codes to split open the Blind Faith’s hatch as well. Huge mining machines waited there like sleeping behemoths ready to be put to work.
BeBob, though, wanted to hear the rest of the man’s story. “Born at the wrong time? You got to live through decades of full Hansa peace. Why complain? You must have had a good and productive life.”
“Yes, but it gets tiresome reading historical accounts of other people’s adventures. The Spiral Arm finally got interesting when I was too darned old to enjoy it. But I didn’t let that stop me. I risked my scrawny ass by jumping through transportals. I documented fourteen viable