As I Walk These Broken Roads (18 page)

Raxx piloted his pickup down the empty road. He kept it under firm control, making slight adjustments to the steering column as the potholes sped by. He kept his neck straight, staring intently as his ride ate up the ground, clutching an unlit
c
igarillo
in his left hand. Wind blew in through his open window, whistling in his ears and rattling his piercings, as the truck churned up a cloud of dust behind it. The afternoon sun was behind them, and the grasses and telephone poles cast long shadows, flashing by on either side.

Wentworth sat next to him, leaning back in the passenger seat. His right foot was up on the dashboard, his elbow on the door frame, and his hand tapped out a drumbeat on the vehicle
’
s roof. Looking over at Raxx he saw the reflection racing across his sunglasses. The deep yellow light from the sun accented the reds and browns of the dry land. He turned back to the road, still tapping his fingers to the music in his head, going over the briefing Captain O
’
Neil had given them before they left town.

“
Highwaymen are only to be expected,
”
she
’
d said, sitting in her office and tapping her fingers on the desk,
“
They don
’
t really concern us; we leave them to the caravan guards. It isn
’
t usually a problem. But this…
”
she chewed her lip,
“
This is something different. I
’
ve heard of raiders getting organized before, and becoming a problem for the cities, but that
’
s only happened in
the south, along the Steeltown-N
iagara corridor, or sometimes on the Oil Route – and, of course, the Badlands. But up here we don
’
t have enough trade going through for that - and the Mennites have even less… here, look this;
”

She carefully took a yellowed sheet of paper out of her desk and slid it across to them.
“
We think this is their leader
.
”
I
t was a crude wanted poster; the man it depicted could have been anybody. Nonplussed, Wentworth read through the list of crimes at the bottom, trying to ignore the spelling errors.
“
The picture
’
s useless, I know – what do you expect from Ing
ersoll? A
ll you can really tell is that he
’
s a big guy. But I
’
m not showing you this so that you can recognize him; I
’
m showing it to you so that you can get a sense of what kind of person we
’
re dealing with. Look – you two can read, right? – they call him Slayer. From that list at the bottom there, you can probably guess why. Ingersoll wanted him bad – for them that
’
s a large bounty.
”

She gave them a moment to go over it, leaning back in her chair.
Wanted
, she
’
d said, in the past tense. Wentworth nodded and she went on.
“
Now, this poster
’
s four years old. Our contact in Ingersoll, the town
’
s Miller, hasn
’
t heard anything about him since. As far as we know nobody had until last year, when the raids on the Mennite settlements started. The name Slayer kept popping up and the descriptions said he was a giant, just like the man in the poster there. But how some derelict goes from being a lone psycho to a gang leader, I
’
ve got no idea. If it
’
s the same guy, and it seems to be, then something
’
s going on – and if something
’
s going on, then it
’
s just one more reason I want him dead.
”

She cleared her throat, and threw back her shoulders.
“
Constable Stewart? Have you got that map ready?
”

“
Yes, Captain.
”
Stewart came in. He was the man who
’
d been sitting at a desk outside
her office when they
’
d arrived;
her aide, probably. He wore the same uniform as her, minus the gold braids, and moved with an air of competence. Moving to the left of her desk, he strung the map up on a couple of clips hanging from the wall.

“
Excellent. Why don
’
t you explain to these two what you
’
ve done?
”

“
Captain; alright, this is a map of Hope and the surrounding area. To the southwest here,
”
he made a sweeping gesture,
“
is where the Mennites farmstead. It is also where all the raids have taken place. Um, except for – well, except for the raid on
Sergeant
Dupont
’
s petroleum shipment, which is this dot up here.

“
For each raid I
’
ve got the date, number of raiders, vehicles used, and any other pertinent data listed next to it. Now some of them, you
’
ll see, are blank; that
’
s because we don
’
t have the information. Others I
’
ve put a question mark next to, showing that the information is suspect. But the dates and locations are pretty definite – you can count on those.

“
T
he blue circle, and the blue dots, represent the first six months of raiding. As you can see there were less of them, and they were more concentrated in the southwest. The red circle, and the accompanying red dots, represents the latest six months. The raiding is heavier, coming almost twice a week, and they have moved closer to Hope.
”

“
Wait a minute,
”
said Raxx,
“
something
’
s bugging me – how has this been going on for so long already? Where I come from they would of got a
bunch of guys
together by the end of the first month. Why haven
’
t you done something before now?
”

The Captain and the Constable shared a look.
“
I was going to get to that,
”
said O
’
Neil.
“
As for why the Mennites haven
’
t done anything, I don
’
t know. In fact that
’
s part of the problem; if they were doing something, we wouldn
’
t need you. But as for why we haven
’
t done anything, it
’
s because we didn
’
t know any of this until late last spring.
”

She leaned forward, hands clasped, elbows on her desk. Her professional cool started to give way to the anger she showed whenever she spoke about the Mennites.
“
You see, they never told us about it.
”
She glared at the two of them.
“
The Mennites are insular, with no central authority. The closest they come to having actual towns is the
hamlets
they group in to buy and sell produce, or our manufactured goods. There
’
s no leader, no intercity communication, nothing. The first sign we had that anything was going on was when the spring
’
s first harvest was smaller than usual. I sent people to investigate, but it was worthless.
”

Stewart shook his head and spoke.
“
They wouldn
’
t talk to us. They
’
d admit to the raids once we started asking about them, but they wouldn
’
t volunteer the information. And even then they wouldn
’
t give us any details – the
E
lders just stonewalled us. We had to rely on the Hope merchants who traded with them.
”

“
Yes… merchants,
”
said O
’
Neil.
“
All of that data there is from the merchants we interviewed. They
’
d picked up rumours w
hile they were out there. Even
t
he best of this information is second rate. We did what we could to corroborate the stories, and
this
,
”
she indicated Stewart
’
s map,
“
is all we could come up with. The good Constable here did the best he could, but as they say in Steeltown,
‘
A worker
’
s only as good as his tools.
’
”

She studied them. Wentworth met her gaze, distracted. Ideas were beginning to form in his head.
“
Can we borrow the map?
”

“
It
’
s yours to keep. I managed to convince the Archivist that we needed it, that
you
needed the best tools we had to operate effectively – I don
’
t want there to be any excuses for failure. Be careful with it, though, you
’
re not getting another one. The old survey maps are valuable.
”

She grimaced,
“
I wish we had more to give you, but that
’
s it. Are there any other questions?
”

Raxx and Wentworth looked at each other. After a moment they
looked back
.

“
No,
that
should be good,
”
said
Wentworth
.

“
Glad to hear it. Now make certain that you do not give away the fact that you
’
re working for us – don
’
t even mention Hope, and in fact, you have one of those – a truck, don
’
t you? Well, try not to be too obvious about where you
’
re coming from. Travel out a bit, then move back in.
”

“
All that driving will take some petroleum,
”
commented Raxx.

“
Well, it
’
s a good thing you
’
re getting paid so well, then, isn
’
t it?
”

Wentworth looked at Raxx and shrugged. They got up to go, and Stewart rolled up the map for them.

“
One last thing,
”
said the Captain, halting them at the door,
“
Be careful out there. And don
’
t trust those Mennites. They only look out for their own.
”

Wentworth
tucked
the map under one arm.
“
Just like everybody else?
”
He turned to go, then had second thoughts.
“
Captain,
”
he said, turning,
“
Just for the record – I take things seriously. Whether or not it
’
s my town.
”

It might have been a nod, the way she dipped her chin slightly, but they were already moving out the door.

So t
hey
’
d left
his
motorcycle behind to save on fuel, and allow them to talk on the move.
A
ll the excess supplies, heavy stuff like Raxx
’
s power converter and the extra fuel
jerrie
s
,
had been removed from the truck bed, stored
in the locker they
’
d rented by
Hope
’
s
front gate. Raxx
had gone
through his pre-drive tune up, checking for anything that could have gone wrong after a week of sitting idle, while Wentworth pulled out his Datapad.

He
’
d been
trying to plot the survey map
’
s information onto his electronic satellite picture, but there was a snag; the grid system from the survey was nowhere in his database. Eventually he settled for approximating the locations, a slow and tedious
process
. It would have to do.