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shaved to a stubble, his bulging, bare biceps encircled with matching tattoos:
twisted bands of thorns dripping drops of bright blood. He called himself
Poet, and it was by that name that Trader had known him for the past five
years. As far as Trader could tell, the man wrote no verse, read no verse and
never had; his name referred to his ability on the battlefield: precise,
ingenious, artfully devastating. Trader had been present when Poet had
received his disfiguring wound.
During a prolonged altercation over the price of a shipment of canned goods, a
heavy-caliber longblaster slug had clipped him
in the left forearm, leaving behind a large, angry lump of scar near the
elbow, and an arm that he couldn't completely straighten.
Poet was Trader's strategic expert, a war captain seasoned in many campaigns
and skirmishes. He had the kind of analytical mind that could see all the
options and present them for Trader to pick from. Ryan had a similar ability,
but was much less conservative in his suggestions and much more impatient with
indirect methods. Poet had learned the hard way, by losing comrades in battle,
that skirting a fight could sometimes be the best option. Ryan never wanted to
back down. Both men were arrogant and competitive. The friction between them
had been ongoing since the day Ryan arrived, and it had gotten much worse as
the one-eyed man had quickly risen to the rank of war lieutenant. Normally
Trader liked to encourage competition between crew members because he figured
he got more out of them that way. In this case, however, he could see that
things were close to getting out of control.
Trader's strict no-fist, no-knife fight policy was all that had kept Ryan and
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Poet from coming to blows. To disobey that order meant you were out on your
butt, no explanations. Trader had laid down the rule because good people were
hard to find and sometimes impossible to replace. He knew a fight between his
top two advisers would probably end with the loss of them both.
Ryan was almost impossible to turn off, once he got his blood up.
Abe, the thin mustached guy standing beside the two much larger men, seemed
uncustomarily frazzled and glum.
"What's going on here?" Trader asked.
"Minor disagreement," Poet said.
"Major disagreement over something minor," Ryan corrected him.
Trader glanced at Abe, who just shook his head. "Well, the disagreement is
over," he told the two men. "Ryan, go check on the loading of the ammo
crates."
"Gladly," he said, turning immediately for the bulkhead door.
"Poet, give J.B. a hand in the starboard turret."
The older man hesitated a second, giving his adversary time to make a clean
exit.
After they had both left the compartment, Trader said, "Abe, what the fuck's
going on?"
"Trouble," the gunner replied. "Some of the crew don't want no part of Virtue
Lake. Want to give the place a wide berth.
Others want to close the deal way outside of town, someplace secure."
"And?"
The man drew himself up to his full height and looked Trader in the eye.
"Since you're asking, nobody's happy about your trading top-quality predark
military blasters and ammo to a stinking pile of nukeshit like Baron Zeal.
Figure someday we'll end up looking down the wrong ends of all them shiny-new
bores."
"What do you figure?"
"It's a possibility."
"You want to stay behind, Abe?"
"Didn't say that," he protested.
Trader didn't ask the gunner for names; he didn't want to know who was doing
the grousing. He could guess that Poet was against driving straight into
Virtue Lake. He could guess Ryan was for it in a big way. Poet wasn't a
coward, by any means. But because he had seen so many comrades take the last
train west, he was cautious. Prudent. He knew that nobody, no matter how
skilled in combat, had a charmed life. Because he had ridden for years with
many current members of the crew, Poet was concerned for their safety.
Ryan, on the other hand, was relatively new, hadn't formed any deep
friendships, and his only responsibility was to himself.
In regard to danger, the younger man went one-eighty to Poet, feeling that
everybody in the crew ought to be willing to take the same all-out, crazy-ass
risk that he was.
"Pass the word," Trader said. "Get everybody together outside. I need to tell
them all something."
Abe nodded. "Give me a couple of minutes," he said, then hurried out the door.
A short time later, Trader climbed up on the roof of the MCP
and looked over the troops assembled in the cavern, all of whom stared up at
him expectantly. Abe, Poet and Ryan were right in front. Of the seventy or so
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