Last Stand of the DNA Cowboys

CHAPTER FIVE

Renatta leaned back in her chair and crossed her long booted legs. 'So the DNA Cowboys are back together?'

Reave and Billy watched the movement. The Minstrel Boy shook his head with a wince. He hated the tag that had been stuck on them through a good part of their career as a trio of all-for-one, one-for-all freebooting partners. He hated it even more than the others did because, inadvertently, it had all been his fault.

'We never called ourselves that, even at the height of the craziness,' he said.

Reave dragged his eyes away from Renatta's legs. 'That was all the work of the people who made up the stories. I swear, we couldn't have done half the stuff that we got blamed for. It wouldn't have been humanly possible.'

It had been years earlier, more years than the Minstrel Boy cared to recall. They had been very young and bold and dumb. At the time of the accidental christening they had been robbing the beer hall at M'Urzank. Despite their weapons, a hard-bitten bartender had decided to act recalcitrant. He had glared at the three of them.

'You think you can walk in here and tell everyone what to do?'

The Minstrel Boy, who had been full of piss, vinegar, and a considerable quantity of gin, had snarled right back at him. 'Sure we can tell you what to do. We're the Cowboys of Instruction.'

For the rest of his days the Minstrel Boy had wondered how those words had free-associated into his head. Maybe it had had something to do with the fact that, at the time, he had been fancying himself a poet.

The bartender had stared at him in disbelief. 'The Cowboys of Instruction?'

The Minstrel Boy should have left it there, but he had been young, and he had plowed right ahead with the gag. He waved his gun with a flourish. 'Right, bubba, we're the DNA code in this cell.'

It had been a drunk in the back of the hall who had roared it our first. 'Shee-it! It's the DNA Cowboys.'

Despite their guns and their intentions of robbery, the whole crowd took up the cry, roaring with laughter and bawling it out.

'Shee-it! It's the DNA Cowboys.'

It was clear that there was now no way that they were going to rob the M'Urzank beer hall without shooting holes in a lot of people just to regain their credibility. Their collective nerve failed them, and after putting a few blasts into the ceiling they had fled the place. Unknown to the other two, however, Billy had gone back the same night with a Nulite incendiary and torched the beer hall. Despite their ignominious retreat, the name had stuck and the legend had been born.

Billy's head was drooping toward the table top. He was on his fifth brandy. His eyes were sunken, his cheeks were hollow, his skin was gray, and his previously shaved hair had grown in only to thick dark stubble. They had tried to clean him up, but he: still looked like an escaped convict with the plague.

'I don't feel so good.'

Reave was clean out of sympathy. Billy had done nothing but whine since they had rescued him from the keepers and legitimized his presence at the Voice in the Wilderness by promising to be responsible for his upkeep. Diamenti and his men gave short shrift to beggars.

'Of course you don't feel so good. You've spent God knows; how long living on plankton and water and talking to your duplicate until you got so crazy, you beat him to death. Before: that, you were on the run. In the last few days you've been tossed out of a road runner on your head. You wind up in Graveyard, and you mug a guy. You take a load of rubyjewels and only just get out of town with your life. Give us a break, buddy. You deserve to feel bad. It's a natural healthy reaction.'

Billy's head hit the table. 'Oh, Mother of God.'

The four of them had retired to a small private dining room, and they sat one on each side of a square wooden table. Billy, Reave, and the Minstrel Boy were all drinking cognac; Renatta had a bluefrost coldpitcher filled with martinis. It was a plain stone room. It might have looked like a prison cell if the grim effect of the stone had not been softened by the burgundy velvet curtains that covered the narrow window. There was a cast-iron bellpull with which to summon a steward. The room was a good deal more comfortable than the bar, and they were able to talk without being overheard. After Billy's arrival they had no longer been quite so welcome in the Great Hall. Renatta de Luxe had come with them. Without anything actually being said, she seemed to have been accepted into their company for the duration. The duration of what was the question that did not seem to have any immediate answer. The conversation kept dragging itself back to the reason they had all shown up in the same place at the same time. Of the three men, the Minstrel Boy was by far the most suspicious, but that had always been the way of it.

'Listen, we've all been around the block enough times to at least keep an open mind about the possibility of there being either a prime or secondary manipulation in the affairs of men.'

Reave did not look terribly impressed. "The affairs of men"? You're starting to sound like a metaphysician, Minstrel Boy.'

The Minstrel Boy smiled despite himself. 'You know me better than that.'

Billy levered himself upright. 'So why bother us with all this prime manipulation crap? Shit just happens.'

Reave laughed. 'It certainly seems to happen to you.'

Billy scowled. 'That's kind of rich, Reave. Where do you get off taking the moral high ground? How many raids did you go on with Baptiste before you discovered that riding into town and murdering the population wasn't as much fun as it had seemed at first?'

Reave snarled, and if Renatta had not laughed, he might have made a grab for Billy Oblivion. Instead, he rounded on her. 'What's so goddamn funny, lady?'

Renatta was not in the least intimidated. 'I was just thinking what a kick it is, sitting here with the legendary DNA Cowboys while they bicker like small boys. I mean, there was a time when I used to regard you guys like some sort of big deal, but look at you now. One of you's been locked up in a monastery, the other's been in a sexual trance, and the third's been out committing mass murder. You've been out there on the edge withimmortality, sex, and violence, respectively, and when you finally get back together again, all you can do is sit around and bitch at each other. Isn't that enough of a joke?'

Reave leveled a finger at her. 'You didn't ought to talk that way. At best, you're here in the capacity of a rookie, perhaps just a mere concubine.'

Renatta curled her lip right back at him as she poured herself another martini from the coldpitcher. 'Concubine yourself, Jack. It's pathetic. The great adventurers? You're a triple burnout. About the only adventure you seem capable of is the kind that ends up with you running out of the bank into the guns of the entire Bolivian National Guard.'

'The Bolivian National Guard? What in hell are you talking about?'

The Minstrel Boy sipped his brandy. 'It's an arcane cultural reference. I think she's suggesting that there's nothing left for us to do except go out and die in a blaze of glory.'

Billy stared glumly into his drink. 'She might be right.'

Reave scowled. 'Screw that. I'm not ready for a blaze of glory quite yet.'

The Minstrel Boy sat back in his chair and reflected on the others. Already he, Billy, and Reave were falling back into the old patterns. Billy complained, the Minstrel Boy worried, and Reave was the headlong swashbuckler who pulled the other two along with his last enthusiasms. The Minstrel Boy was not even sure he liked the other two. Individually they struggled and scuffled, but when they operated together there was a special chemistry. As far as he could see, that chemistry was at work again. The Minstrel Boy would not be happy, though, until he knew why it was at work. There was also the matter of Renatta. There had always been women, of course, but very few of them had wanted to be part of the team in the way she appeared to. The drunker she got, the more she goaded them, as though trying to shame them back to some imagined state of past glory.

'So what are we ready for?' the Minstrel Boy asked.

'Still looking for the cosmic motivation?'

The Minstrel Boy was a little tired of taking attitude from Billy. So the guy had had it bad. Well, which of them hadn't had it bad at one time or another?

'All I've been trying to say is that I find it more than a coincidence that the three of us have been reunited right whenthe world looks like it's going into the start of a new, all-over phase of violence.'

Renatta looked up. 'What makes you think the world's going into a new, all-over phase of violence? How would you know? You've been holed up in the Caverns all this time.'

'I'm only guessing, but it sure looks like it. The Hunters are loose in the Caverns, Baptiste and his gang are running amok among the stasis towns, and Billy's seen nothing but violence since he left the Sanctuary. Even that river settlement we stumbled into was being blown apart by air pirates.'

For once, Reave was on his side. 'He's right about that. There's trouble all over. Baptiste's bunch isn't the only one out raiding the settlements. It sure seems like something's on the boil.'

'All I know is that the three of us ran as a bonded triad and — '

Reave switched back. 'A bonded triad? Is that what we were? Hell, I thought we were just three guys who hung out and got into trouble together. Where've you been getting all of these high-priced words?'

The Minstrel Boy flashed with drunken irritation. 'Can I get to finish a thought, goddamn it?'

Billy laughed. 'Be our guest.'

The Minstrel Boy picked up the brandy bottle and found that it was empty. That was the last straw. 'This is pointless. I'm going to get another bottle.'

'Why don't you just ring for the steward?'

'I could use the walk. Think about this, though, while I'm gone. I may be crazy for looking for some external force that's brought us together, but if there is one, we'd be in a lot better position if we could figure out what it was.'

Swaying slightly, the Minstrel Boy left the room. Outside in the corridor, he had to lean against the wall for a moment. He was drunker than he had thought. He took a couple of deep breaths and pushed himself upright again.

'Pull yourself together, boy. You've got to make it to the Great Hall.'

The dim, smoky gaslights that were the only illumination in the corridor refused to keep still as he lurched toward the steps that led down into the hall. His head was swimming, and he started having second thoughts. Maybe he didn't need thewalk, after all. Perhaps he should just go back and call the steward. He stopped, and that moment of hesitation saved his life. Something sharp and metallic struck the stone wall in a flash of sparks, just inches from his head. If he had not halted, the power shirakin that lay humming on the flagstone floor would have been buried deep in his skull.

'What the. .'

There were muffled footfalls behind him. He turned stupidly. His reactions were shot. A shadowy figure came at him. There was a high-voltage crackle, and a foot-long lightslicer glowed into dazzling life. The short ribbon of pure energy was more than capable of carving him into paper-thin strips. The figure launched itself. The Minstrel Boy's body responded more readily than his brain. His legs, with a seeming will of their own, gave way under him and he dropped to his knees. That appeared to be the very last thing his attacker expected. The mystery figure had aimed both its feet in a high flying kick that was supposed to hit either his head or his upper body. As it was, the blow only brushed his shoulder. His assailant overshot and collided with the wall. There was a metallic scream and another shower of sparks, and the lightslicer touched stone.

The Minstrel Boy fell awkwardly. His right arm was twisted behind him, but his fingers were all but touching the Colt auto in the waistband of his pants. His hand closed around it. The attacker had quickly recovered. He swung the lightslicer. The Minstrel Boy rolled. There were more sparks as the bright weapon bit into the flagstones where he had just been lying. His gun was out. He did not bother with the lasersight. He pulled the trigger, firing blindly. The roar was deafening in the narrow corridor. There was a scream, and the lightslicer fell to the floor.

The door to the room he had just left flew open, and light spilled out. Reave was in the corridor with a pistol in each hand. 'What's going on out here?'

The Minstrel Boy lowered the Colt. He was shaking all over from the clash of adrenaline and alcohol. 'Don't shoot! It's me. Someone just tried to kill me.'

'Who?'

The Minstrel Boy got to his feet. He put a hand on the wall to steady himself. 'I don't know. The bastard came right out of the darkness. Like a fucking ninja.'

Reave pushed past him. He seemed more interested in the fallen attacker than in whether the Minstrel Boy was hurt. 'There hasn't been a ninja in two thousand years.'

Reave gingerly picked up the lightslicer and held it out at arm's length, using its crackling radiance to illuminate the body. He let out a low whistle. 'You pretty much got the next best thing.'

The Minstrel Boy straightened up. 'What do you mean?'

'What we've got here looks awfully like an urthugee.'

'You're kidding?'

'If he ain't, he got himself a full darksuit, lightsink panels, and the whole bit. The kali-rouge don't give those away with every major purchase.' He bent down and peeled off the face mask. 'He's got the yellow headband and the facial tattoos. It really looks like he was going to do the full and ancient yuga on your ass.'

The Minstrel Boy shook his head. 'I wasted an urthugee? Me?'

'You're quite the stud, boy.'

'This isn't real.'

Reave laughed. 'We know it was really blind luck, but nobody else needs to.'

The Minstrel Boy was not amused. 'What the hell was an urthugee doing coming after me?'

Reave was kneeling over the body. 'That's something you're going to have to think about.'

'I'm well aware of that.'

'And if there are any more where he came from.'

'I wish you hadn't said that.'

Reave was searching the assassin's clothes. The Minstrel Boy looked a little shocked.

'What are you doing? Robbing the corpse?'

Reave slipped a number of small metal objects into his pocket. 'These boys have all kinds of killer trinkets. Things you've never seen before.'

There was the sound of heavy boots coming quickly up the stairs. Reave glanced quickly at the Minstrel Boy. 'Sounds like the local law. Try and look casual.'

The Minstrel Boy shook his head in despair. 'Sure, casual.'

It turned out to be not only the local law but also Diamenti himself with his two lieutenants, Axel and Heet. Ramilles Diamenti might not have actually been as big as God, but he was majestically huge. He stood more than seven feet tall and must have weighed over three hundred pounds. Despite his size, though, he seemed to be possessed by a burning inner energy and was able to move his bulk with surprising agility. He was a presence. His florid cheeks, framed by graying muttonchop side whiskers, told of profound self-indulgence, but his eyes showed a calculating, dynamic intelligence. Even his clothes were larger than life. His purple robe, trimmed with ermine and wolf pelt, was like a tent built for an emperor. The gold chain with its massive sampling cup was like his badge of office, host general in his own kingdom.

His two lieutenants were equally unmistakable. Somewhere along the line Axel had been extensively rebuilt. Over a third of him was crude prosthetics, with servos and circuitry exposed. Heet scarcely looked human — he was totally hairless, and his skin was a bright daffodil yellow. His bare skull was strangely ridged, and his ears were elongated and pointed at the tips.

As Diamenti and his men marched down the corridor, Reave and the Minstrel Boy all but started like small boys caught red-handed at some guilty endeavour. Diamenti's roar could have chilled blood.

'So what do we have here? Been indulging in a little slaying, have we?'

The Minstrel Boy looked Diamenti in the eye and decided that maybe casual was not such a good idea. Even though he was telling the truth, there was something about Diamenti's gaze that made him feel as if he were lying.

'I know it looks bad, but I was only defending myself. He came out of the dark at me.'

'You know the stiff?'

The Minstrel Boy shook his head. 'No.'

Reave went a little further. 'We know what he is.'

'And what might that be?'

' He was an urthugee

Diamenti's bushy eyebrows shot up. He turned to Heet. 'Is this true?'

Heet quickly examined the body. 'It sure looks like it.'

Diamenti faced his men. 'I don't want word of this running all over the Great Hall, you understand? Keep your mouths shut.'

The keepers nodded. Diamenti quickly ushered Reave and the Minstrel Boy down the corridor. 'Let's go and talk about this in private.'

The Minstrel Boy and Reave returned to the private dining room, followed by Diamenti and Heet. Billy and Renatta looked startled as the big man and his lieutenant came through the door.

'What's going on out there?'

The Minstrel Boy flopped into a chair. 'Someone tried to kill me. I need a drink.' He glanced up at Diamenti. 'Can I ring for a bottle of brandy? I was going for one when that guy jumped me.'

Diamenti gestured to Heet. 'Go get him a bottle. We don't need a steward coming up here right now.'

Renatta actually seemed concerned. 'Who tried to kill you?'

The Minstrel Boy looked at Diamenti again. Their host gave an imperceptible shake of his head. The Minstrel Boy avoided Renatta's eyes. 'It seems like it might have been a hired assassin.'

'What?'

Diamenti ignored Billy and Renatta's questions and addressed himself to the Minstrel Boy. 'So who wants you dead?'

'Nobody. I don't have a beef with anyone anymore. I've been out of circulation since God knows when.'

Renatta stared into her martini. She looked worried. 'I can vouch for that.'

'Where were you?'

'In the Caverns of the Presence.'

Diamenti smiled. 'Living the lotus life?'

'I needed the rest.'

'So why did you leave?'

'I didn't like the way things were going. People were getting jaded and weird, and the Hunters were out. I figured that some kind of cull was about to start.'

Diamenti turned his attention to Billy and Reave. 'Maybe someone wants to stop this little reunion.'

Reave's eyes narrowed. 'What reunion might that be?'

Diamenti grinned. 'Come on. The whole of the Great Hall is talking about it. The DNA Cowboys are back together.'

'We never called ourselves that.'

'We aren't back together.'

'It's pure coincidence.'

'Are you telling me that, right at a point when the wholeDamaged World seems to be on the edge of another round of violence, you three suddenly turn up in the same place at the same time, quite by accident?' It was the Minstrel Boy's argument almost word for word.

'You can believe it or not. It's what happened.'

Diamenti shrugged. 'It doesn't really matter if I believe it or not. Everybody else believes it, and I figure that you're going to have to go along with it.'

He had a point there. General perception was a powerful force. Billy, who had been staring morosely into his drink, suddenly looked up at Diamenti. There was an odd light in his eye. 'Yeah, but do you believe it?'

Diamenti looked at Billy curiously. 'Is it important?'

'You really think that another cycle of violence is coming?'

'Haven't you felt it for yourself?'

Billy's hands made an awkward gesture. 'I've been on a bit of a vacation myself.'

'Then the answer is yes, Billy Oblivion. Yes, there is another round of violence coming. The moods of civilizations change, even in a fragmented civilization like ours. It's the inevitable turnaround, day and night, summer and winter. All we can do is weather it.'

The Minstrel Boy raised a questioning eyebrow. 'Doesn't it seem like this is shaping up to be a particularly hard winter?'

Diamenti nodded. 'It does rather look like that.'

'Maybe we won't weather it.'

Diamenti smiled. 'Maybe we won't. I'm something of a fatalist in these things. After all, there's only one death per customer.'

At that moment Heet returned with a bottle of very good cognac and cut short the philosophy. It must have come from Diamond's private stock. Despite all the trouble they were in, the Minstrel Boy examined it admiringly. 'This is excellent.'

Heet was not alone. Axel was with him. He whispered something to Diamenti and then handed him two small objects. Diamenti placed them on the table where everyone could see them.

'These were on the body. Do they mean anything to you?'

The Minstrel Boy felt his blood chill. One was a small gold insignia — a tiny sword. The other was a wafer of transparent crystal. He glanced quickly at Renatta. She also looked frightened.

'The sword is the insignia of the Hunters in the Caverns,'he replied. 'The crystal is one of the wafers they give to their designated victims.'

'And you were a designated victim?'

'They hit on me just as I was leaving.'

'They seem to have followed you here.'

The Minstrel Boy did not believe what he was seeing. 'This isn't possible. The Hunters are just a bunch of localized sickos. They couldn't track me across the nothings, let alone employ an urthugee.'

Billy Oblivion was stunned. 'An urthugee?'

Diamenti shot him a hard look. 'We're trying to keep that to ourselves.'

Billy nodded. 'I can understand that. What I don't understand is how come an urthugee is working for these Hunters. Like the Minstrel Boy says, they're just localized sickos.'

Diamenti's face was grave. 'Things change. The kali-rouge Yuba is supposed to last 200,000 years before Shiva is finally slain by the goddess and chaos takes over. Perhaps the goddess has done a deal with the Presence. You can pick up a lot of strange allies in 200,000 years.'

Reave was shaking his head. 'That's ridiculous. All this is legend.'

'What isn't these days?'

'Hell, I don't know.'

'The evidence is on the table.'

Billy picked up the tiny gold sword and turned it between his fingers. 'The immediate question is what you're going to do about this. It's your place — you call the shot.'

Diamenti poured a sizable shot of cognac into his sampling cup. He seemed to be thinking. 'You'll all have to leave here. That goes without saying.'

Billy started to protest. 'Why do Reave and I have to leave? It's only the Minstrel Boy that's in trouble.'

'Can you be sure of that? The world sees you as a trio. All for one, one for all, and the rest of the male bonding rituals.'

'It's those words again.'

Diamenti went on. 'I'm not going to argue about it. I want the three of you out of here inside of forty-eight hours. You're trouble, and that's all the cause I need. If you'll take a piece of good advice, though, I'd stick with each other for the moment. Times are getting rough, and you three always do well in roughtimes. You may not like the idea anymore, but you'll find that you're a lot less vulnerable as a triad.'

The DNA Cowboys were silent. The reunion was beginning to look inevitable.

Diamenti finished his brandy. 'Forty-eight hours. It'd be better if you kept away from the public halls during that time. I don't want any young hopeful trying to score a rep by taking a crack at one of you. To make things easier, I'm going to detail Heet to keep an eye on the three of you, just to make sure there's no more trouble.'

Reave looked Heet up and down. 'I'll feel a whole lot safer.'

Heet grinned. He appeared to have stainless-steel teeth. 'I'll take good care of you boys. There is one thing, though.'

'What's that?'

The grin broadened. 'Don't get me excited. I tend to get lycanthropic fits when I get excited.'

With that, Diamenti and his henchmen left them. The three stared at each other in glum silence.

The Minstrel Boy was the first to speak. 'I'm not sure that I can handle this.'

Reave wearily massaged his temples. 'You were the one who kept saying that it was preordained, that dark forces were at work.'

Billy glared at both of them. 'He knew that he was in the shit, and he wanted to enlist our help to save his ass. Trouble was, he couldn't just come out and say it. He came out with all this mystic crap instead.'

The Minstrel Boy came half out of his chair. 'That's a fucking lie and you know it. How in hell could I know that you two would be here?'

Reave interposed. 'Hold it! Hold it!'

Billy, who had been ready to take on the Minstrel Boy, fell back in his chair. 'All I know is that there ain't no urthugees after me.'

'Can you be sure of that?'

Renatta could not hold back her laughter any longer. 'Will you guys look at yourselves? When are you going to accept that, like it or not, you're back in business?'

Reave sighed. 'She's right. There's no fighting it.'

The Minstrel Boy slowly nodded. Billy Oblivion was the last to give in. Finally he sagged in surrender.

'Damn.'