Sooner Dead (Gamma World) - Mel Odom [89]
“But we’d risk discovery by whoever uses this trail if they happen along.”
“I know. We’ve got Riley and his hardshells with us. No matter who’s running this trail, they’re not expecting that. Let’s roll with it for right now.”
“Sure.” Hella went back for Daisy, and they kept heading east. Stampede talked Pardot and Riley into bedding the expedition down early for the day so he and Hella could recon the area from higher up on the mountain.
An hour later Hella told Daisy to stay below the ridgeline of the mountain she and Stampede has chosen as their observation point. Working in tandem, they made their way to the top and hunkered down.
The Amichi Mountains had been shorter in the past, before the collider blew up. The resulting tectonic plate shifting out in California had manifested across the West. In the Redblight the mountains had grown taller, the swamplands more vast, and some of the fallout of mutations and strange creatures had taken up more frequent residence there.
The people who lived in the swamplands were hard and cruel. Strangers weren’t tolerated as a general rule, and in many places were considered a delicacy. Legend held that the human stock that had once existed there had interbred till a number of genetic problems manifested. Still other legends held that some of the creatures that crossed over from other worlds had added to the gene pool in strange and deadly ways.
Whatever the truth was, the bottom line was that the Amichi Mountains were a bad place to be.
Hella scanned the surrounding terrain with her binocs, and Stampede did the same with his telescope. For an hour they ate jerked meat in silence and watched the landscape. Just as dark closed in, a silver mist swept in from the west and came to a stop in front of them.
A moment later Scatter formed out of the mist and stood before them. “Hello.”
Stampede’s ears twitched. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to see you.” If Scatter noticed Stampede’s irritable attitude, he gave no indication of it. “I thought it best that we should talk by ourselves. I do not trust Dr. Pardot or Dr. Trammell.” He paused. “Actually I do not trust any of them. I trust you.”
Hella couldn’t help smiling at the bald-faced honesty.
Stampede’s eyes narrowed and he looked grumpier. “Then why are you staying with them?”
“Colleen Trammell will guide us to the next ripple. Once there, I hope to find a way back to my world or to locate the other person from my world.” Scatter looked from Stampede to Hella then back again, as if knowing he would be the one who needed the most convincing.
“You could have mentioned this earlier.”
“When?” Stampede looked patient. “Dr. Pardot has never given me any time by myself.” He smiled. “Plus, I did not know for certain that I could trust you till I discovered they do not trust you.” He paused. “Does that surprise you?”
“That they don’t trust us?”
“Yes.”
Stampede shook his head. “They don’t trust anyone outside of their own skin. That’s the way most people are.”
Frowning, Scatter shook his head. “The ways of your world are very confusing. In my world there are no subterfuges, no secondary agendas. Quite frankly, I do not like your world. I much prefer mine. Everything there is a known quantity.”
“Your world wasn’t always that way. Otherwise you wouldn’t be in that body.”
“True.”
“Dr. Pardot gave you time to see us now?”
“No. Dr. Pardot has, for the moment at least, succumbed to his own excesses. In addition to being very frail, flesh-and-blood bodies exhaust easily. Dr. Pardot’s exhausts more easily than most, it appears. I could not imagine living in such a vessel.”
Hella smiled. “We don’t think of our bodies as vessels.”
“You should. That’s what they are.”
Stampede’s ears twitched. “Pardot is asleep?”
“Or in a fatigue-induced coma, yes. At present he requires no medical attention.”
“Has he told you about the other fractoid they found?” Hella continued scanning the countryside. Even with Scatter’s ability to break into a collection of tiny robots and ride the wind, she didn’t know