Hunter's Run Part 20

Chapter 24.

Ramon's twin sank down, his eyes focused on the angels, or on whatever it was dying men saw; something Ramon couldn't see, anyway. His mouth went slack, and blood rushed through his lips and down over his chin.

Was there the faintest of tugs as the other died, as whatever bond was between them broke? Or was it just his imagination? It was impossible to say.

Ramon rolled the body to the edge of the raft and pushed it into the water. His twin's corpse bobbed once, twice, and then slid beneath the water. He wiped the dead man's spit from his face with the back of his palm.

The storm was pus.h.i.+ng the little raft one way and then another, and Ramon couldn't say how much of his nausea was from the unpredictable spinning and shudders of the craft, how much from 243 243 the death of his other self, and how much from the loss of his own blood. The sahael sahael snaked across the raft, its pale flesh reminding Ramon of a worm now more than a snake. Its wires sparked, but did not turn to him. snaked across the raft, its pale flesh reminding Ramon of a worm now more than a snake. Its wires sparked, but did not turn to him.

"We got a problem, you and me?" he asked, but the alien thing didn't respond. He hadn't known that Maneck could send the sahael sahael out to operate on its own; or perhaps Maneck was controlling it from a distance somehow. Either way, it was more versatile than he'd thought. Maneck must have launched it after them as soon as he'd freed the out to operate on its own; or perhaps Maneck was controlling it from a distance somehow. Either way, it was more versatile than he'd thought. Maneck must have launched it after them as soon as he'd freed the chupacabra chupacabra from it. from it.

Ramon let out a long sigh and considered his wounds. The cut across his side was serious, but it hadn't gone so deep that he had to worry about a collapsed lung. That was good. His leg, he discovered, had also been pierced at some point. He remembered something from the beginning of the fight. It was a little hard to recall the details. The wound bled freely, but it was superficial. He'd be fine.

He could feel the adrenaline dissipating. His hands were shaking, the nausea growing worse. He was surprised to find himself weeping, and more surprised than that to find the tears had their source not in exhaustion or fear or even the release that came after a bad fight. The sorrow that possessed him was profound. He mourned his twin; the man he had once been. His brother and more than brother was gone, and gone because he himself had killed him.

Perhaps it had been fated to end this way; the colony had room for only one of them. And so either he or his twin had had to die.

His dreams of slipping away, becoming a new man had been just that. Dreams. And now, like the body of the man he'd killed, they slipped away. He was Ramon Espejo. He had always been Ramon Espejo. He had never had a real hope of being anyone else.

He unwrapped the sodden robe from his arm slowly. His awareness of the pain was growing. His pierced side was the most pressingissue. He could hold the robe against it, maybe stanch the bleeding.

He wondered whether it would help if he wrung the cloth out first.

He tried to guess how far he was from Fiddler's Jump and medi-cal help. And what, he asked himself, would they find when they looked at him? Had Maneck and his people left any surprises for the doctors?

Even awash in his grief and uncertainty and pain, some part of Ramon's mind must have antic.i.p.ated the attack. It was no more than a flicker in the corner of his vision; the sahael sahael lashed out at him, thrusting spearlike. He didn't think. The blade was simply where it needed to be at the instant it needed to be there, the human-made steel impaling the alien flesh just inches below the wires at the thing's head. Ramon's heart didn't race. He didn't even flinch. He was too tired for that. lashed out at him, thrusting spearlike. He didn't think. The blade was simply where it needed to be at the instant it needed to be there, the human-made steel impaling the alien flesh just inches below the wires at the thing's head. Ramon's heart didn't race. He didn't even flinch. He was too tired for that.

The sahael sahael let out a long, high whine. A spark blackened the tip of the knife where it protruded through the thing's thin body. let out a long, high whine. A spark blackened the tip of the knife where it protruded through the thing's thin body.

Snakelike, the sahael sahael thrashed, pulling Ramon one way and then the other with its throes. He drove the blade's tip into a branch, pinning the thrashed, pulling Ramon one way and then the other with its throes. He drove the blade's tip into a branch, pinning the sahael sahael to the wood. The flesh below the blade was pale and thras.h.i.+ng violently. The wires and mucous membrane that had once burrowed into Ramon's neck were lolling like a dead thing. to the wood. The flesh below the blade was pale and thras.h.i.+ng violently. The wires and mucous membrane that had once burrowed into Ramon's neck were lolling like a dead thing.

"If you get back," Ramon said, then forgot what he was doing.

His flesh felt as heavy as waterlogged timber. A few breaths later, he remembered. "I did Maneck's job for him, but I'm Ramon Espejo, not someone's G.o.dd.a.m.n dog. You get back, you tell them that. You and all the rest of them can go f.u.c.k yourselves."

If the sahael sahael understood him, it gave no sign. Ramon nodded and muttered a string of perfunctory obscenities as he jerked the knife free and shoved the snakelike body off the raft. It sank into the water; only the head was visible as it bobbed away through the rain, first dim, then grayed, then gone. Ramon sat for a moment, understood him, it gave no sign. Ramon nodded and muttered a string of perfunctory obscenities as he jerked the knife free and shoved the snakelike body off the raft. It sank into the water; only the head was visible as it bobbed away through the rain, first dim, then grayed, then gone. Ramon sat for a moment, 245 245 the raindrops tapping his back and shoulders. A roll of thunder roused him.

"Sorry, monster," he said to the river. "It's just . . . what it is."

There was too much to do. He had to pull himself together. He was cold. He was seriously injured and losing blood. He'd lost the oar and with it what little steering power he'd had. They'd never gotten any firewood onto the raft and he didn't have anything left to light a fire with anyway, although he'd need to dry off and warm up once the storm pa.s.sed. His mind whirled back to the cataract and the queer peace that had settled over him when he'd been stuck on the rock. The thought related somehow to the dream of being Maneck and his trip from Earth with the Enye. He had a sense of something profound coming clear, like recognizing a face once known and then forgotten. When he realized he'd fallen asleep and forced his eyes to open again, the rain had stopped, and a wide gold-and-green sunset was lighting the clouds from below. He heard the chiming call of a flock of flapjacks somewhere far above him.

He had to get an oar. Something to steer with in case there was another waterfall or rapids. But he'd hear the roar of it if there was one, and his twin owed him a watch anyway. Let the pendejo pendejo stay up and keep them safe. Serve the b.a.s.t.a.r.d right after he'd blown Ramon off back in the forest. He had wrapped himself in the ruins of the iceroot leaves, the wide fronds reflecting his own body's heat back against him, before he noticed the flaw in that plan, and by then he was too comfortable to care whether he died. stay up and keep them safe. Serve the b.a.s.t.a.r.d right after he'd blown Ramon off back in the forest. He had wrapped himself in the ruins of the iceroot leaves, the wide fronds reflecting his own body's heat back against him, before he noticed the flaw in that plan, and by then he was too comfortable to care whether he died.

Days pa.s.sed in fever. Reality and dream, past and future, knotted together. Ramon found himself possessed by the memory of things that could never have happened-flying like a sparrow over the rooftops of Mexico City with a slat of the alien yunea yunea in his teeth, Elena weeping like a baby about his death and then f.u.c.king Martin Casaus on his grave, trekking through the bush with the raft strapped to his forehead, Maneck and the pale alien in the pit ap-G e o r g e R . R . M a r t i n in his teeth, Elena weeping like a baby about his death and then f.u.c.king Martin Casaus on his grave, trekking through the bush with the raft strapped to his forehead, Maneck and the pale alien in the pit ap-plauding and throwing a celebratory party for him-all hail Ramon Espejo, hero of monsters!-both of them wearing silly cone-shaped party hats and blowing noisemakers. His consciousness vibrated, split, and reformed like a bubble rising through turbulent water.

In his rare moments of lucidity, he drank the fresh, clear water of the river and tended as best he could to his wounds. The cut on his ribs was scabbing over, but his leg had the hot, angry look of infection. He would have considered reopening the wound in case there was some foreign body-wood or cloth or Christ alone knew what-that was keeping him from healing, but sometime during his fever dreams, he'd lost the knife-maybe it had washed over the side-and he no longer had anything he could use to operate. One time, when he woke in mid-afternoon, he felt so strong and well, he imagined he might be able to catch a fish to eat. But just going to the raft's edge to drink had exhausted him.

One night Little Girl sailed overhead, but the moon had Elena's face, peering down at him disapprovingly. I told you a I told you a chupacabra chupacabra would get you! would get you! the moon said. the moon said.

On another night-or was it later the same night?-he saw La La Llorona Llorona, the Crying Woman, walking the riverbank, luminescent in the darkness, wringing her hands and wailing over all the children who had been lost, her grief endless and inconsolable.

Another time, he had caught up on a sandbar and spent the better part of a day wondering how he might get the raft loose in his weakened state before realizing that he was wearing clothes- his s.h.i.+rt, his field jacket-and was therefore still asleep and dreaming. He woke to find the raft still well in the middle of the wide, now placid river.

Most unnerving, though, were the voices in the water. Maneck, his twin, the European, Lianna. Even when he was fully awake, he could hear them in the clicking and murmuring of the water, like a conversation in a nearby room, whose words he could almost make 247 247 out. Once he thought his twin was screaming, Madre de Dios, Madre de Dios, help me! Help me! Please Jesus, I don't want to die! help me! Help me! Please Jesus, I don't want to die!

The worst was when he heard Maneck laughing.

The small, still part of his mind that could sometimes watch the rest and evaluate it understood all of this. The hallucinations, the burning thirst strong enough to motivate even a man lost in the ruin of his own mind, the swelling and reddening leg. Ramon was in trouble, and there was nothing he could do to save himself. He was too disorganized in his thoughts to manage even the simplest of prayers.

Twice, he felt himself drifting off into a strange twilight sleep.

Both times he managed to will himself back to awareness, death retreating perhaps halfway to sh.o.r.e. After all, Ramon Espejo was a tough sonofab.i.t.c.h, and he was Ramon Espejo. Still, when the third time came-as it inevitably would-he didn't think he could pull himself back again.

The Enye s.h.i.+ps remained his only companions. No longer hawks. Carrion crows and vultures, they hung in the sky, watching him. Waiting for him to die.

When he heard unfamiliar voices gabbling-high-pitched and excited as monkeys-he thought at first that this was some new phase of his deterioration. It wasn't enough that he imagined voices he knew; now the whole So Paulo colony would escort him down to h.e.l.l, babbling in tongues. The fis.h.i.+ng boat cutting through the water, moving slow to keep its wake from swamping his raft, was a new dream. The rustproof paint, white and gray but decorated with a rough image of the Virgin, was a nice touch. He wouldn't have thought his mind capable of such lovely detail. He was trying to make the Virgin wink at him when the raft tilted beneath him. A man knelt at his side, his skin as black as tar, his eyes wide with concern.

A Yaqui was too much to hope for, Ramon thought, Ramon thought, but I always but I always thought Jesus would at least look like a thought Jesus would at least look like a Mexican. Mexican.

"He's alive!" the man shouted; Spanish had not been his first language, and whoever taught it to him had had a distinct Jamaican accent. "Call Esteban! Hurry! And get me a line!"

Ramon blinked, tried to sit up, and failed. There was a hand on his shoulder, gently pus.h.i.+ng him down.

"It's okay, muchacho, muchacho, " the black man said. "It's okay. We've got you. Esteban's the best doctor on the river. We'll get you taken care of. Just don't try to move." " the black man said. "It's okay. We've got you. Esteban's the best doctor on the river. We'll get you taken care of. Just don't try to move."

The raft thudded again, s.h.i.+fting on the breast of the water.

Something else happened, time skipping like he'd dropped acid, and he was on a stretcher with his robe lying over him like a blanket, rising up the side of the boat. The painted Virgin at his right winked as he went past.

The deck stank of fish guts and hot copper. Ramon craned his head, trying to make out something, anything, that could tell him for certain that this was real and not another artifact of a dying brain. He wet his lips with a sluggish tongue. A woman-fiftyish, gray-haired, with an expression that said nothing could surprise her-sat on the deck beside him. She took him by the wrist and he tried to grasp her. She turned his wooden fingers aside, holding him firmly still as she took his pulse. Overhead, the Enye s.h.i.+ps blinked in and out of existence. The woman made a disapproving sound and leaned forward.

It occurred to him for the first time that he'd reached Fiddler's Jump. His first reaction was relief so profound it approached religious awe. His second was an unfocused, suspicious anger that they might steal his raft.

"Hey!" the woman said again. He didn't know how often she'd said it, only that this wasn't the first. "Do you know where you are?"

He opened his mouth, frowning. He had known. Just a moment ago. But it was gone.

249 "Do you know who who you are?" you are?"

That, at least, was worth a chuckle. She seemed pleased by his reaction.

"I am Ramon Espejo," he said. "And, hand to G.o.d, that's all I can tell you."

Part Four

Chapter 25.

Ramon Espejo awoke floating in a sea of darkness.

The tiny lights-green and orange, red and gold-that blinked or flickered around him illuminated nothing. Ramon tried to sit up, but his body rebelled. Slowly, he became aware of the machines around him, the pain in his flesh. For a muzzy, half-sleeping moment, he was certain that he was back in the strange caverns beneath the mountain, back in the vat where he'd been born, swimming again in that measureless midnight ocean. He must have cried out, because he heard the soft, fast sound of human footsteps, and a cheap white LED light blinked on. He tried to lift his arm against the sudden brightness, but he found himself tangled in the thin tubes that were penetrating his flesh like a half-dozen sahaels sahaels. And then there were hands on his wrists-human hands-guiding him back down to the bed.

"It's okay, Senor Espejo. It's all right."

The man had to be near fifty, short gray hair in tight curls and a smile that looked like the aftermath of sorrow. He wore a nurse's smock. Ramon squinted, trying to see him better. Trying to see the room better.

"You know where you are, sir?"

"Fiddler's Jump," Ramon said, surprised by the gravel in his voice.

"Good guess," the nurse said. "They brought you down from there about a week ago. You want another try? You know what this building is?"

"Hospital," Ramon said.

The nurse turned to look at him more directly. It was as if he'd said something interesting.

"You know why you're here?"

"I got f.u.c.ked up," Ramon said. "I was on a raft. I was prospecting up north. Things went bad on me."

"That's pretty good. Up to now you've been saying that you were swimming under water, hiding from baby killers. You keep this up, I'm telling the doctors that you're oriented."

"Diegotown. I'm in Diegotown?"

"Have been for days," the nurse said. Ramon shook his head, vaguely surprised to find an oxygen tube stuck under his nose and hissing softly. He reached up and started to pull it off.

"Senor Espejo, don't . . . you shouldn't take that off, sir."

"I gotta get out of here," Ramon said. "I can't stay in here."

The man took his wrist, his grip at the friction point between rea.s.suring and painful. His gaze locked with Ramon's. He was beautiful, just for being a real person and not some kind of alien, he was beautiful.

"There's no point, Senor Espejo. The constabulary's already been by here twice. If you try to go, I have to call security. And you can't outrun them."

"You don't know that," Ramon said. "I'm a tough sonofab.i.t.c.h."

255 The man smiled, maybe a little sadly.

"We got a catheter running up your c.o.c.k, Senor Espejo. It's what you've been peeing out of. I've seen men try to pull it out. You'd wind up with a p.i.s.s tube about as wide as your little finger. You know, until it scars over."

Ramon looked down. The nurse nodded.

"You're gonna be here awhile, Ramon. Try to relax and heal up.

I'll bring you some fruit gel. You should try to eat a little. Okay?"

Ramon rubbed a hand over his face. His beard was thick and wiry, the way it had always been.

"Yeah," he said. "Okay."

The nurse patted his leg sympathetically. He'd probably known a lot of men in his care who had been visited by the constabulary. He might know what was coming better than Ramon did.

Ramon lay back against the thin hospital pillow, prepared for a long, anxious night, and fell asleep again before he knew he was fading. He woke to the cool light of morning pressing at the windows. He tried to watch a newsfeed, but the cheerful nattering voice of the anchor annoyed him. He made do with the quiet hum of the machines, the distant chiming alarms. He cataloged the aches in his body and wondered what he was going to do.

At the start, it had been simple-get out of town until the Enye came and went and the whole thing with the European had blown over. And then get free, get back, and raise h.e.l.l over Maneck and its hive in the north. Then get back and remake himself, maybe leave his twin to figure out the whole problem with the police. And now here he was, back in Diegotown, tied down by his p.e.n.i.s, and waiting for the constabulary to arrive. Made the sahael sahael seem dignified. seem dignified.

Outside, the city was alive with morning traffic. Vans and transport flyers filled the air, catching the light of the rising sun and reflecting it back into Ramon's eyes like waves flas.h.i.+ng on water. The low throb of a shuttle's lift drive announced some traffic sliding upthrough the thin air to the s.h.i.+ps hovering above. Ramon couldn't see the s.p.a.ceport from his window, but he knew the sound the way men in ages past had known the wail of trains.

The knock on his doorframe was soft and polite. It said I don't I don't have to intimidate you. I don't give a s.h.i.+t if you're scared of me or not. have to intimidate you. I don't give a s.h.i.+t if you're scared of me or not.

That's how much I own your sad a.s.s. Ramon looked over. The man wore the dark uniform of the governor's constabulary. Ramon lifted a hand in greeting, trailing the IV tube like seaweed. Ramon looked over. The man wore the dark uniform of the governor's constabulary. Ramon lifted a hand in greeting, trailing the IV tube like seaweed.

The man who came in was young and strong. Wide through the shoulders, strong jaw freshly shaved, with still just a shadow of stubble. He was the man Ramon had imagined chasing him up in the north before he'd known about his twin, the man Ramon had pretended to be when he was on the river. He was a convenient fiction made flesh.

"You look a lot better, Senor Espejo," the constable said. "Do you remember speaking with me before?"

Ramon plucked at the plastic weave of his hospital gown. Whatever he'd said before didn't count. He'd been out of his pinche pinche mind. mind.

If his story didn't match, he could say he'd been dreaming or something, so nothing before counted.

"Sorry, ese ese. I've been a little f.u.c.ked up, you know?"

"Yes," the constable said. "That's why I wanted to speak with you.

Do you mind?"

Like the f.u.c.ker would go away if he refused. Ramon shrugged, added another little pain to his list of injuries, and gestured toward the small plastic chair beside the hospital bed. The constable nodded his imitation of thanks and sat on the foot of the bed instead, his weight pulling the mattress toward him.

"I was wondering what exactly happened."

"You mean?" Ramon gestured at his ruin of a body. The constable nodded.

"I got f.u.c.ked up," Ramon said. "I went out surveying up north.

That's what I do."