Perdition by Aguirre Ann

Author:Aguirre, Ann [Aguirre, Ann]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2013-08-27T04:00:00+00:00

23

Feverish Preparations

“Hold the base still,” Wills ordered.

Since it was just the two of them, Dred obeyed. She much preferred the bone-reader when he wasn’t pretending to be crazy. Though sometimes episodes did genuinely overtake him, they weren’t as frequent as he let on. She didn’t begrudge him the fiction, though, as it kept other inmates from bothering him. Even in Perdition, there was a superstitious dread of harming a madman.

A day after their return, he was installing a turret at the east checkpoint. There was no ammo chamber built into the floor, so it had to be reloaded manually. All the men would need to be trained in that, but before it was necessary, they had to get the thing working. Wills had been trying for an hour before she came along, and he was in quite a testy mood, as it was rare for him to require this much effort to get something affixed to his liking.

“I need something to solder this in place,” he muttered.

“Could your bot help?” She recalled the thin maintenance laser.

“Genius. Hold this, I’ll be right back.”

Dred nearly toppled backward as he released the full weight of the gun into her hands. Somehow she steadied it and kept it from toppling. That could’ve been disastrous. Especially if it hit the firing mechanism on the way down. Biting back a curse, she glanced over her shoulder to see one of the guards moving to help her. Idiots.

He didn’t ask if she was all right, just took part of the weight for her. “These are motion-activated, right?”

“Yes, you won’t need to fire it.”

The convict grinned, showing rotten teeth. “Pity.”

She donned her iciest look. “I’ve got it. Step back.”

It didn’t do to permit too much familiarity. Sometimes it was lonely, but better this way; she couldn’t have the men remembering she had been Artan’s preferred bedmate before she’d killed him. It might give them ideas about their place in Queensland. Tam had worked too hard to build her legend for her to screw with it now.

Fortunately, he obeyed, as how she would’ve forced the issue with her arms full of turret, she had no idea. Dred laid it down on its side, away from the firing mechanism and turned to look for Wills, who was on his way back with R-17. The work went faster with the bot’s help, and two hours later, the first turret was installed.

“Why didn’t you have 17 with you?” Given that the droid had accompanied Wills everywhere since they found the thing, she was surprised he hadn’t been using it.

“Ike was finishing some upgrades.”

“Like what?” she asked, as they headed back to the hall.

Wills glanced around as if to make sure there were no eavesdroppers, then whispered, “He’s programmed it for self-defense.”

“That’s phenomenal news.” It was a relief to know some drunken idiot wouldn’t break R-17 in a fit of rage without realizing how critical the droid was. But she couldn’t circulate the truth, or somebody would steal it. Even in Queensland—the least hellish of Perdition’s territories—she couldn’t alter the fundamental nature of the citizenry.

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