They Call Me Evil (The Twisted Earth)

The Twisted Earth

Volume Two:

…They Call me Evil...

Timothy Linnomme

…With Benevolence will also come Malevolence….

And Evil will walk among them…

Contents Copyright Timothy Linnomme 2012

Published by Timothy Linnomme at Smashwords

This novel is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to people or places living, existing or deceased is purely coincidental.

Visit http://www.timothylinnomme.net for a full listing of titles and the latest information including up and coming releases!

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty One

Chapter Twenty Two

Chapter Twenty Three

Chapter Twenty Four

Chapter Twenty Five

Chapter Twenty Six

Chapter Twenty Seven

Chapter Twenty Eight

Epilogue

All In a Day’s Work

I

Evil scanned the general area with his binocs but there were no new tales to tell. What had he expected? It had been over two weeks since he had last seen another human and judging by the wasteland he was now traversing, it would be even longer before that once more was the case. How long ago had it been since he departed Nisee and The Carolines? He scratched his head with a somewhat filthy hand but he had no extra water for bathing; what water he had was for drinking. There was no guarantee of finding a safe water source out here so luxuries like cleanliness weren’t part of the picture. He glanced at the burwar that plodded along beside him; it carried his belongings on a crude copy of a saddle wrapped around its middle without complaint though he didn’t have that much to transport. There was his binocs and counter, two medium sized water containers that were mostly full along with a sack of trail food, a bundle of (relatively) clean clothing, another that contained his grooming goods and a third one that consisted of equipment that he used. A small suitcase contained some books and logs but the last remaining item was the most peculiar. It was a metallic head with a basic human design. Evil called it Mr. Head for the lack of any other name; it was a souvenir from times past. It had been the basis for more than one query and not all of them had been polite. Why are you carrying around a severed head?

There were rumors of a place to the south and west of where he last stopped but it was a long journey there. The rumors said there was Oltec to be had in this place, but it could be dangerous to retrieve. Danger came with his profession so he paid the warnings very little mind. There were successful traders and unsuccessful traders. Of course, some of the ones striving to be successful became dead traders, but he was far from dead. He realized some time ago that he enjoyed the solitude his profession offered in abundance. Towns and settlements had their uses, but there was only so much Evil could take of the noise and traffic and the smells associated with any concentration of humanity; once he was away from places like that, the solitude was always there to greet him like a long lost friend. His name was Hiram E. Schwerin, but people no longer called him by his first name. His parents were of good almane stock though and they had named their child accordingly. He was known by his middle name now: Hiram Evil Schwerin. His father pronounced it ‘ay-feel’, but the people here pronounced it like it was spelled. They call me Evil; my name is a profanity before the eyes of God but the concept of God is itself a profanity…

He was a trader, the lifeline of the people surviving in villages and settlements and towns and cities. In hindsight, he was glad he had left Nisee and its environs because the pickings there were getting rather slim. As a result of that, more people were after less and violence became inevitable over the dwindling supply of Oltec amongst other things. The settlements in the Nisee and Carolines areas had morphed into law abiding and civilized emplacements and would no longer tolerate the violence of traders fighting over whose jack was whose, so that left only two options. Since Evil had no intention of slaving away in a settlement for whatever his boss decided was a fair wage, it was time to find a different locale; with a little luck, there might even be some Oltec to scavenge. Evil hadn’t been one of the traders that had left peaceably, but it was implied that he had best be gone…with the solitude and quiet, you could allow your mind to wander over the past as well as the future, but Evil dwelled in the past because he had no idea what the future would bring. There was always the present, but the present was a sere and sun blasted wasteland where very little life was evident. His mental meanderings never materialized in chronological sequence either, but perhaps that had to do with his short but fractionated existence…

*

...it was fortunate that he didn’t dredge up any time when he was a slave; those visions usually came when he slept, but that didn’t mean that things were peaceful and idyllic…

...he had spent more than a year being a knockabout for what wages he received; one thing they never mentioned about freedom was that you had to stuff your own belly and pay for lodging too, but Evil (Hiram at that time) was more than willing to work. He was used to being called ‘snotnose’ and ‘punk kid’, but he did a full day’s work with no complaint. Chattan was a pretty good sized settlement with what (to Hiram) was a large population. It was north of a place called Atlan. Atlan was supposed to be a very large settlement, but no one lived there for some reason. When he asked, he heard words like ‘fallout’ and ‘lingering radiation’; what did those words mean? There were people who said they travelled around Atlan but they were an odd sort as far as Hiram was concerned. They would come into town with horses and pack mules and even wheeled things pulled by horses. They would sell what they had with them and then spend most of the money that they made in the bars and bawdy houses. They would then leave town broke and looking pale at times and then would come back with even more things to sell. Hiram had no idea what these people sold for coin. The people were called ‘traders’ and the stuff they sold was called ‘Oltec’. There had been a war sometime in the past and Atlan had been one of the places destroyed. Apparently there were things in that place that were worth a lot of ‘jack’ which was a word that meant money or some such…Hiram wondered what a life like that would be like at times, especially when he was doing more disagreeable sorts of work….

…he had earned two silver coins for cleaning out the stalls where the horses were kept but was filthy as a result. He had a bar of soap so why pay for a bath when he could get one for free in the river near town. He also used the water to clean what clothing he possessed. Hiram didn’t really have that many possessions; in addition to three sets of clothing and the bar of soap, he had a tooth stick, what money he had earned, a serviceable knife and the means to light a fire if necessary. Once his clothing was dry, he headed back to town to find something to eat…

…the place was a bar, but they also had food to eat. Hiram didn’t care for alcohol that much anyways, so he had a bottle of carbonated grape beverage and a greasy mass of beef and potatoes with cheese and gravy on top of it. Hunger has few enemies so Hiram was wolfing down the greasy sludge as fast as he could eat, but this was a crowded bar where the alcohol flowed freely…perhaps too much so. Hiram thought he had heard something but he disregarded it because he was eating. He actually had heard something before, but he wasn’t sure what had been said. Something hit him in the small of his back. Hiram barely felt the impact due to the scars he carried from the whippings he had received in the past, but he turned on his stool to look around. There were a lot of people in this place, but he found the thrower soon enough.

"You deaf, boy? I was talking to you; what are you going to have for dessert, milk and cookies? You better get home soon or your mommy is going to be mad. This ain’t no place for a snotnose kid anyways." A ripple of laughter floated around the crowd.

Hiram had been raised in the darkrock mines; the truth of matters sometimes got you less whippings and he still was woefully naïve about some aspects of freedom. He saw no reason to lie or put up a brave front.

"Before they tossed my mother in a furnace, they raped her and then slit her throat so I doubt she has much to say. I earn my own way despite my age and my name is Hiram, not boy."

When the noise in the general area suddenly subsided, Hiram turned back to his meal thinking that the matter was done, but things were only beginning. The next thing to hit Hiram was an empty beer bottle thrown with considerable force. All that happened was that the bottle shattered on Hiram’s back without doing any damage. As Hiram turned around on his stool yet again, he was knocked to the floor by a violent shove. Hiram had been caught unprepared by the attack, but he was far from being down for the count. He grabbed the booted foot headed for his ribcage and pulled with all of his strength. His attacker landed on his back and actually slid a short distance before he stopped. The person was quick to scrabble to his feet, but Hiram was faster.

"You don’t turn your back on me boy when I am talking to you! You need to learn some proper manners! As the man’s friends cheered him on, the man pulled out a whip he had in a holder on the left side of his pants. Give him hell, Carl!" As the man unlimbered the whip, he immediately went on the attack without sizing up his target. If he had stopped to do so, he would have seen death in the gaze of his intended target.

Hiram was naïve in some ways but not so in many others. He didn’t react to being knocked down, but he did regarding the foot headed towards him. When he saw the whip, it almost immediately triggered something ugly that was part of his existence for ten long years. The man wasn’t even skilled at using the whip; he would never be a Conductor. It is the reflex of humans to avoid pain but this was under ordinary circumstances and Hiram had never seen such a thing. Hiram tangled the whip around his left arm from the first strike and then yanked its wielder off balance only long enough to wrap several loops of the whip around his assailant’s throat to hold their head in one place. Hiram smashed the nose of the attacker into their brain with his right hand and dropped the corpse to the floor.

"Any that raise a whip against me will die. Leave me the fuck alone."

Hiram continued eating until the constabulary arrived…there was a hearing, but Hiram was absolved of any wrongdoing…it was also the last time anyone ever bothered him there…

*

The land had become even more inhospitable as he traveled in a general southwest direction. Hilly areas with trees and grass and even some safe water gave way to a parched and dusty flat area with some unfamiliar odors. There were some metal things that rose from the ground that looked like large insects but fortunately they weren’t alive. Hiram inspected a few of the devices but he couldn’t figure out what purpose they would serve; if there was one thing he had learned regarding Oltec, everything from that time served a purpose. He even found some places where people used to live but there was nothing left there to scavenge. Way off in the distance he saw some long and shiny insect moving at a fast clip in the general direction he was headed. Something that fast and large had to be dangerous, so Evil made a note of it in an empty part of one of the logbooks he carried. He had plenty of clean water and dried meat for his journey. The chance of hitting a mother lode of Oltec was why he was here in this inhospitable place; that was all that mattered to Evil.

Evil was lean looking in build but heavily muscled from unceasing strenuous labor. He was dressed in black from a battered pair of boots to dungarees and a shirt bleached to a dark shade of grey. A floppy black leather hat helped to shield him from the sun, but his face could be discerned regardless of the hat’s attempt to hide it. Dark hair fell down below the hat. He was only of twenty six seasons, but his face was weathered from the elements. A set of blue eyes cast their gaze across the landscape he traversed, always looking, always vigilant. There was no mirth within those eyes; what might have been a pleasing shade of medium blue was only the surface of twin chips of cold agate that rarely entertained humor but were ready and capable of killing without any remorse. What skin that was visible upon him was a brutal testimony of scars earned over the years. The small scars on his face were offset against a nasty one across his brow and even his hands weren’t blemish free. He carried his supplies on a mutant pack animal called a burwar. As the landscape became even more inhospitable (if that was possible), Evil reached for a digital counter device he had with his supplies. He switched it on as he looked over the essentially nonexistent collection of things he still had left to sell or trade; he was low on Oltec. He would have to score big this time if he wanted to stay solvent.

He patted the side of the burwar. The burwar gave off a sound between a snort and a growl and then went silent. Evil had tried to figure out the origins of his burwar, but so far had no luck. He had learned several things regarding the burwar over the years, though. First off, the burwar was omnivorous; it could eat essentially anything. Secondly, the burwar would not tolerate humans riding it; some drunkard fool had tried once and he was lucky that he had survived. The burwar was massive in size and could carry a heavy load. Evil had seen a picture of what was called a ‘burro’, but this burwar looked nothing like a ‘burro’. The burro looked like it was soft and fuzzy and gentle. A burwar was none of the above. Its four legs were heavily built; its hide was scaly and tough and hairless; at times Evil thought the animal used that aspect to regulate body heat. Evil had watched a spear and a rock just bounce off the burwar leaving no visible damage. It had a ponderous looking head, but its jaws were powerful enough to crack bones. The only real sort of fur it had was on its chin, in the form of a scruffy looking beard. The burwar’s eyes were solid yellow in color. The heavy bony ridges over its eyes were even more protection. A pissed off burwar could be very destructive. A burwar was protected from the environment in many other ways. It ignored the elements and only occasionally needed water. The burwar had a wicked set of teeth; heavy molars and incisors were mixed with sharp canines; the burwar feared nothing that walked the lands. Evil was glad to have it along. Even as he scanned the landscape, he kept an eye and ear on the counter device. At the moment, all it was doing was making a whispery hum.

He traveled on until sunset and then made camp on the dusty ground. He only needed to provide for himself; no one in their right mind would bother a burwar. While he ate a bland repast of trail food and tepid water, he watched the burwar rip apart some strange plant with spikes all over it. The spikes on the plant didn’t bother the burwar; it ate the whole thing. Next, it stomped on something on the ground and ate that too. After Evil had eaten, he got a stick light and stuck it in the ground. As long as the light was in the sun all day, it would glow with light all night. He reached for a battered Oltec book he had found, but realized he had already repeatedly perused it. He decided to tend to other more important things.

In a moment he had a small flat folding table in front of him with some cleaning solvent. He wore a vest over his clothing that was a lighter gray. He doffed the vest and set to work. There were unspoken rules about Traders like himself. Due to the services they provide, a trader is usually left alone. He unholstered a side arm he carried in a tie down holster. It was very worn on the outside; it used to have some shiny kind of plating. That was largely long gone due in part to its heavy use. Someone named ‘Colt’ had made this Oltec item, and it served Evil well. He took it apart and cleaned what dirt he could find from the barrel. It was usually a good idea to leave a trader alone because they retrieved the Oltec for everyone’s use including no shortage of Oltec weaponry. He checked the bullets in the clip for any signs of deterioration but thankfully did not find any. He kept three other full clips for the pistol on his person. You never knew when you would hit a dud round. Such was the plus and minus of Oltec. He had plenty of ammo for the sidearm, but he looked upon it as solely a backup weapon. The same went for the heavy knife he next attended. It was something called a ‘KA-BAR’. He tested the edge and was satisfied. He remembered finding the sidearm. Methuselah was a harsh teacher, but Evil had learned well from him. Okay boy, so you have a penchant for violence. That ain’t gonna get you far. Work with me and I will show you how to earn as much jack you will ever need! Evil smiled at that memory, but his expression as quickly went hard. Hey boy, Methuselah was killed a few days ago. They think it was raiders.

It had been raiders; the emphasis was on the past tense. He had been given what they had not stolen or broken; they had somehow missed the ‘KA-BAR’ and they had no interest in Methuselah’s journals. It wasn’t enough; the security he had felt for the three years he was with Methuselah had been torn away from him. He had tracked down the raiders who had killed his mentor and even ambushed a few of them and killed them. He had been caught and beaten nearly to death. They had sliced him in the forehead; it had left a nasty scar. He continued tracking them after he had recovered to the consternation of the settlement folks who had nursed him back to health. He had found a deadly Oltec stash over in Nisee. It was in something called an ‘armory’. Most of the Oltec inside was ruined beyond repair, but not all of it. He had found a box of round objects with pins on them. When he followed the directions on the box, the explosion made his ears ring. Then he found what looked to be a rifle, but couldn’t figure out how to load it. Perhaps it had been cast aside for that very reason. Evil prided himself on his reading skill; an illiterate trader was a broke trader. He had found several drums that fit the rifle, and then he found a cache of ammo for it. He had loaded the rifle except it was called a shotgun. It was called an AA-12 which meant Atchisson Assault Twelve Gauge. He quickly rifled the ‘armory’ for anything else, but came up empty. This would be enough, he thought. He loaded the round things into a cloth bag he had found…

*

The raiders must have been secure in their camp, because they only posted one guard. Evil killed him with the knife. There was no attempt at stealth on his part; he just slowly walked into the camp and started throwing the round things at any structure he found or any noise he heard. The AA-12 fired little balls from each shell or things that exploded like the round things; it was not good much for far off shooting, but it made a mess of anything within 40 mets or so. He had been called Hiram up until that time. It was only after everyone was dead in the camp that he snapped back to some sort of reality. He was soaked in blood; none of it was his own. He had butchered them all. As he remembered, he didn’t feel….anything after it had happened. It was what the murdering bastards deserved after all. They had spent all of Methuselah’s coin on alcohol and other such drugs; there was nothing left. He went back to a village to clean himself up; that was the last time anyone had called him ‘boy’ or ‘Hiram’.

The AA-12 was strapped across his chest; it was the most prized piece of Oltec he had ever found. He took it apart and checked it though he knew it was clean. The very construction of the weapon made it a low maintenance item. He had the same problem with this item as he did with the sidearm: on occasion, he would hit a dud round. So far he had been lucky; instead of the round capping off inside the drum, there was only a muffled clunk. He had allowed for this; if he heard the clunk, he held down the trigger. The AA-12 could fire rounds one at a time or fire them continuously. That was wasteful of ammunition but it could solve certain sorts of problems in a hurry. A quick check of the drums and bags on the burwar showed that he was running low on ammo for the shotgun; he had only 43 more rounds left for his shotgun, had he expected that to change? After reassembling it, he slung it over his shoulder so it was in the front and pointing down. He had attached some leather to it as sort of a sling; he could get to the weapon fast enough as needed. He put away his counter and the table and pulled out a pillow and a tent that he owned. It didn’t look like it rained here much, but survival overrode everything. Rain might not necessarily be bad, but it also could be the kind that burned flesh from bone. Soon he was fast asleep underneath the tent’s protection. To Evil, sleep was a double edged sword; though he could escape the harsh reality of his existence for a time while in slumber, this was also the time when he could have some of his worst dreams due to having no conscious control over his thoughts…

*

…the bawdy house was in well-kept shape as much as possible for the purposes of attracting the maximum amount of business. Though Hiram knew what went on in such a place, he had no interest in the wares being offered. The position being offered was called a doorman, but the title gave no justice to what the job really entailed…

"So what do I have to do to earn my keep here?"

"The ladies here provide a service, but at times the customers will…attempt to cheat the house in a myriad number of ways. It is your job to keep the customers honest. In addition to your pay, you can gain a steep discount on the services the ladies provide."

Hiram shrugged. That aspect of things doesn’t interest me; do you have food to eat and a warm place to sleep?

…Hiram had lost his fear of many things a long time ago; while injuries would eventually heal, death in the darkrock mines was looked upon as a blessing. The John had brutalized the bawdy girl so badly that she died a few days later from her injuries but there would be no recrimination for his action; she was only a bawdy girl after all. Hiram had a black eye and numerous bruises from the confrontation, but he still had succeeded in ejecting the customer from the premises. The customer had shot him in the back with a small noisemaker, but Hiram was uninjured from the impacts. The House Owner wasn’t concerned about any injury Hiram had suffered but bullets not injuring a target gave rise to an especially ugly attitude. Hiram was made to take off his shirt at gunpoint to prove he wasn’t some sort of mutant filth; there were somethings of less value than a bawdy girl…

…it turned out that Hiram’s job had more facets to it than he would have imagined. In exchange for protection, the House Owner took most of what the girls earned. If the House Owner felt that any of the bawdy girls were holding out for any reason, the girls would suffer even worse than a customer at times. Hiram had a falling out with the House Owner because he refused to forcibly search a bawdy girl; he had enjoyed the feeling of a roof over his head for as long as it lasted, but he was tired of the unrelenting brutality he witnessed every day and of which he was a part…

…he was just north of the place called Atlan, but what was he going to do? He had found some sort of wheeled conveyance to use as a transport, but what was he going to transport? He missed the bawdy house, but only the food and shelter aspects. He had followed the traders out of Chattan largely for the lack of anything else to do. His confusion melted away once he thought about what people wanted…

…he had hauled the piece of furniture back to Chattan but he was filthy from his labors. The furniture piece had been full of dishes and only two of them had broken during the trip. His effort was rewarded by twenty in silver. Unlike the other traders though, Hiram only spent what money he needed for food and clean clothing and shelter. He decided that he liked scavenging; battling the elements and fatigue was better than battling people. It had been that way at first…

…until he had been robbed of what he had scavenged at gunpoint. Everything had been taken from him except his worn out clothing and his food and knife. He was angry at first before he realized that even a situation like this wasn’t set in stone…

…He had stalked and killed the four who had robbed him once he found them; he wept no tears of remorse for the act because tears were for the weak. He had gotten back what had been stolen in coin jack and then some, but killing the thieves still left him with a cold feeling. It was on one of his solo scavenging missions that he first met Methuselah…

*

Evil awoke with the rising sun. His morning routine outside of civilization was rather quick. He shifted his AA-12 around so it was on his back. After drinking some water, he took a good long piss. Once he packed up the tent and pillow and retrieved his counter, he essentially was ready to go. He wouldn't be hungry until some time had passed. It was about an hour into walking that he noticed something odd about the ground. Most of it was varied landscape from hillocks to depressions. He walked over to a part that was relatively flat. He scuffed away some of the dust and dirt on the ground to reveal some sort of smooth black rock. He shrugged at the discovery. This would make for far easier going then the rough ground besides it, he thought. There was no guarantee that other living beings would not be doing the same, but he felt it was worth the risk. He also noticed that the land was rising. That fit in to the rather vague directions he was given. By the end of that day, he was camped up on some mountains. The strange flat surface even cut through them. He was in sore need of a bath and a shave, but he had no intention of wasting his potable water for that purpose. Dinner for him was (once more!) some jerked meat and some water. The burwar made do with the plants in the area and a few slow lizards.

The next morning, he had passed through the mountains he had crossed. Perhaps half a day away, he saw some ruins. They flickered and shimmered in the heat, but they looked promising. The burwar was busy stomping on lizards and snakes and eating them. Evil hoped he would not get to that point. If it ain’t hiding from you, there is a damn good reason to leave it alone. Evil had learned that lesson rather painfully when he was younger. It was a neat looking lizard, its skin all the hues of the rainbow. It didn’t run from him when he approached it. He picked it up and threw it down very quickly. Methuselah had warned him about that sort of lizard. The lizard had hidden quills that it could jam into anyone unlucky enough to grab it. Extracting them was painful beyond compare. The burwar wasn’t affected by whatever it was eating though. Evil saw a fang snake about the same time it saw him and the burwar. He was preparing to blast it as it moved towards them, but it had targeted the burwar. That was its last mistake. It attempted to bite the burwar on its leg, but even its vicious fangs could not penetrate the burwar’s hide. The burwar felt the attack though; in moments, the fang snake was a bloody mess on the ground. The burwar bit off its head and ate the rest. Evil just shook his head. Is there anything you won’t eat?

He had finally snapped out of his murderous trance. He quickly scoured the remains of the raider camp for anything useful. There was nothing to take except for some jerked meat he had found; he smashed what remained of the alcohol the raiders had bought with Methuselah’s jack and what weapons he found were utterly worthless. He suddenly heard one hell of a lot of noise. He saw some sort of covered corral and the noise was coming from the structure. He approached the structure with caution; in his hand he had another round thing ready to throw. Some kid was poking something through the corral to torment whatever was inside. When the kid saw Evil, he didn’t run. The kid scrabbled on the ground for a weapon, their expression one of rage. Evil shot him with his Colt when the kid had found a pistol; the round decapitated the kid. The noise within the structure had ceased. Evil put away the round thing. Instead he held his Colt in his right hand while he pulled at a loose slat on the structure. It came off easy enough, but he couldn’t see inside. After a moment’s hesitation, he holstered his pistol and proceeded to pull off as many slats from the structure as he could. The stench from the enclosure was near overpowering; it brought tears to Evil’s eyes.

It was an actual burwar! He had heard of these beasts, but as far as he knew, they were wild. Why in hell had they penned this one up as they did? That was a stupid question. A burwar would be worth a lot of jack. He saw why it couldn’t get free. The burwar was chained to the ground by shackles around its legs. Another shackle encircled its neck. The chains ran to metal pegs sunk into some sort of stone. Evil knew what chains felt like; he had worn them figuratively for years when he was forced to mine the darkrock. Are you kidding, he thought. This wasn’t a fellow human; this was a beast that was damn near immune to anything! It might up and kill you if you set it free! His mind was made up, though. Regardless of the consequences, he was going to set this beast free. It took a while before he found some tools that would accomplish the task, but he did. He inspected the shackles first. They were functional all right, but very crude. He had found a rusty saw and set to work. The rear shackles came off pretty easily, but the front shackles were more of a problem. Even though the beast had a shackle around its neck, it still had some free play with its head. Evil was working on the right front shackle when he was smacked by the burwar’s head. He flew six feet before he hit the ground. He got up and dusted himself off and continued his labor. He got knocked down two more times by the time he had its feet freed. The burwar cast a yellow eye upon its liberator. It growled and snapped its teeth at him. Evil had no intention of standing near it while he cut the shackle around its neck. He had seen an angry burwar once; it had been assailed by a pack of canines. It trampled the canines, it bit some canines, and it ate some dead canines after the attack had failed. He managed to find a position which would probably not get him knocked down again and began sawing at the neck shackle. It took about an hour before he severed it. He was able to pry it apart somewhat with his hands. When he heard the first boom from the burwar kicking at the structure, he got away from the general area very fast. Once unchained, the burwar demolished the corral in very short order. It had removed the remains of the neck shackle in the process. It gave Evil a rather baleful glance and then shambled off. Evil turned his back on the burwar and left the encampment.

He was headed towards the village where he had recuperated. He was covered in sweat and blood and grime, so at first he did not hear the thumping sounds. When they finally registered on him, he stopped and turned around. The burwar was following him! He was not sure if his Oltec would stop the beast if it charged. He was too tired by then to care. He turned around and trudged on his way, ignoring the thumping sounds. When the thumps increased in speed he stopped once again and turned…and about jumped out of his shoes. The burwar was only one or two mets from him! It wasn’t growling, it was standing there appraising him with no anger apparent in its gaze. This is insane! He thought. Oh well, I picked up a spike lizard, what is the difference. He reached out and patted the burwar on its snout. Its stench had improved markedly since their last encounter. The burwar felt warm to the touch. It snorted a little and then was calm. Evil shrugged and stopped beside the burwar. When he walked along, the burwar kept pace…..

Evil roused himself up earlier than usual today. About two or three kils away were the ruins he had seen earlier. Though there were signs of overgrowth, some of the ruins were high indeed. This already looked promising; places like this often contained the best Oltec. If it had never been searched for Oltec…..Evil imagined how much jack he could make. That almost begged the question: If it had never been searched, then why hadn’t it been searched? He decided to temper his joy with a healthy dose of caution. The rather smooth path he had up until now no longer was so smooth. Parts of the stone beneath the dirt looked like they had been fused! He had his counter out shortly after making that discovery. Its needle wavered only a little; it still was in the green zone.

He had made it back to the village he had left; a lot of people were surprised to see him but even more of them gave him a wide berth. The burwar wasn’t too happy about the increase of people; it snapped at some who got too close. The people were giving him a wide berth anyways; the stench of death was all over him. He found someone who was interested in the round things he had left; it got him plenty enough jack for a bed and a badly needed bath. He had to sign a register; he put down his full name. He left the burwar where it was; it appeared to have attached itself to him, so he wasn’t worried about it wandering. A good meal upon awaking from a deep sleep also improved his mood. It was two days later that the village constable approached him.

"There was a group of raiders that may have killed at least one trader in these parts. It appears that someone killed them all, men women and children. You know anything about that?"

"Yeah, I do. I killed them. They had it coming. They spent our jack on liquor and other such things; it made them easier to kill."

The constable gave him a hard look. You killed them all; I saw one kid missing his head.

"So? He drew a pistol first. The way I see it, I prevented more misery later because that kid won’t breed."

"Where in hell did you find the burwar outside?"

"They had it caged up so I freed it; I call it weredebt to me for their murder of Methuselah. Do you have any other stupid questions?"

The constable had a fearful look on his face as he left. Why weren’t they calling me ‘boy’ anymore? He went to get another meal when he felt hungry. He heard the people whispering behind his back. He went to get some supplies for his next trip out. He was not treated the same as he was before he left.

"Here are your supplies, Mr. Evil."

"Evil? My name is Hiram."

"No sir, what you did to those raiders was unspeakably evil. That’s what they are calling you now, begging your pardon."

"Evil it is then; those bastards had it coming to them."

When he was ready to leave, the constable came to see him with four other armed men. They told him not to come back there again…

There was one more thing to do before he set out on his own. He found out where Methuselah had been killed; Evil buried what remained of him under a tree that overlooked a small brook. He decided that Methuselah would have liked the view and Evil felt that was the least he could do for the man who taught him how to really be a trader and to curb his violence soaked tendencies at least some of the time…

He snapped back to the present day. There was much to be done now. He already was in the area of the ruins. Piles of rusty metal were interspersed with various sorts of flotsam and jetsam that came to be there for a number of reasons. The burwar could take care of itself. It was up to him to do the same for himself. While one ear was listening to the counter, his eyes were scanning the area. Once it came time to seek out Oltec, Evil was all business with little wasted movement. He clipped his counter to his hip. He had found the counter some time ago; it made it easier to watch out for his own safety. If the counter chattered loud enough, it was time to leave the area. All it was doing now was giving off a soft beep. The needle stayed in the green. There were a lot of places like this that the counter didn’t like. One place he had approached at one time caused the counter to snap all the way over to red; there would be no Oltec from there. As he walked in the wreckage, his eyes were scanning everywhere. The first promising target looked to be pretty much undamaged. He entered in through a broken window when he found the door locked.

He did his best to ignore the plethora of odors that assailed his nostrils. He crushed some bones underfoot without the slightest hesitation. Some guys named ‘Hong Kong’ and ‘China’ made a lot of stuff on the shelves here. So did ‘Taiwan ROC’. They must have been important people at one time. His first find was several packages of pink plastic rollers. They were used to curl hair; that’s what the packages said anyways. He could trade these to women. They were also of very little consequence of weight. Ten packages went into his bag. There were a lot of bones on the floor; most of them were human. He turned on a hand light he had so that he could see better in the confines of the building. Sure enough, a lot of things glittered on the floor. The curler rolls were indirect jack, but jewelry and such was much more valuable regarding its weight. He pocketed some rings and one rather heavy necklace. In the back of the building, there had been shelves full of things in containers, but most of it was gone. He was not deterred though; sometimes, good jack or Oltec came to the patient. He was rewarded with a big sealed bottle of ‘Aspirin’. Someone might need that for a fever. He found two other sealed containers that had something called ‘Vitamins’ in them. He had no idea if the three items were still good, but it took up very little space in his sack. After another inspection of the area and a few more pieces of jewelry, he was done in this place. The burwar was waiting when he emerged.

This process went on throughout the day; any promising building was inspected by Evil and anything of use was put in his sack. This area looked pristine as far as being visited by people before him. That was promising. Another place surrendered up a number of packages of disposable razors. There were coins scattered about in these places, but they were worthless. He had a coin book with his supplies; silver and gold were all he sought. He found a serviceable blanket wrapped in plastic in another building. So far, so good. A building with rusty chains across the front of the structure next piqued his interest. He stepped over the chains and kicked out some glass shards from the window frame so he could enter. This was a strange place indeed. He used his foot to tap at some of what looked to be piles of rust on the floor, but underneath the rust were strange looking devices. One said ‘compressor’ on it. Evil tried pulling on the cord but got no response. In the back of the store in one corner there used to be a counter area which was made of glass. Most of the glass remaining was dirty and smudged. A skeleton lay flopped over part of the still standing counter. Evil immediately headed towards the skeleton. As carefully as he could, he extracted the rifle. This was GOOD Oltec! The rifle itself was useless, but if there was one firearm, there might be others. He was right. He found a pistol marked ‘Taurus’ first. It would need some cleaning, but looked to be serviceable. He found three other smaller pistols that could be suitable for trade if needed. In the back of the store was a big locked cabinet. Evil used a rusty crowbar to break into it. There was ammo here! There also was a massive sized revolver in a worn leather holster. He inspected each box of ammo before he took it. Some of the rounds were corroded and therefore useless. He had found 250 more rounds for his colt along with two boxes of shells that might fit his shotgun. There was also ammo for the Taurus and the other pistols he had found.

Lastly, he had found an Oltec tome. This one was called ‘Small Arms of the World.’ It smelled a bit musty, but was perfectly readable and in decent condition all things considered. He had already made a good haul, and he had only barely started checking this location! There was an even bigger sort of cabinet here as well. It had some sort of wheel fastened to it on one side. Evil grabbed the wheel and turned it. The mechanism made a solid clunk somewhere inside its structure; he pulled on the door and it opened. He coughed as the door stirred up some dust in a choking cloud, but that was worth it for what he found inside. Some of the coins were wrapped in cardboard or plastic while others were sitting uncovered. He knew what these coins were! This was essentially the purest form of jack one could find! He quickly began shoveling them into his sack after placing them near his counter. Silver coins, gold coins, two small gold bars, and some silverware went into his sack. He also found a number of heavy bars that were marked silver. He checked every shelf in the cabinet; in the back of the top shelf were four smaller bars. They looked like silver, so Evil shrugged and took them as well. He left the building in good spirits. This was going to be a good day…at least for the moment…

As he moved in towards the center of the ruins, he was pondering why no one had been here before him. He had filled one sack with Oltec and was starting on another. One place he found looked to have sold Oltec manuals, but there was nothing worth salvaging. A closer inspection showed that not to be true. Some of the Oltec books were in boxes and therefore were not too degraded. There was a bible and some children’s books in decent shape. Another place called a ‘hardware store’ yielded several spools of plastic rope still in good shape. A cavernous building had sold a lot of things, but a lot of it was ruined beyond repair. One area held eyeglasses of some sort. They were light in weight, so he could carry a lot of them. It was always a good idea to protect your eyes. He found some shelves of canned goods still sealed but he knew better than to take any of them. Canned goods lasted a long time but Evil wasn’t going to take any chances; if he got sick out here, he might suffer a lonely death. Next came a dozen can openers along with more plastic curlers. Hidden under some dust and dirt was a big book called a ‘Road Atlas’ He stuffed it into his stack; it could make for some interesting reading; he was short on things to read. There was more Oltec lying around then he could hope to carry!

One clothing store was in ruins, but another had been locked and boarded up. He made an entry into the building by forcing open a wooden panel and was rewarded with racks and racks of clothing but there was something else too. The temperature inside this place was cooler than outside; though there wasn’t much of a difference, Evil still noticed it. Stale air was blowing into the structure from several vents, but Evil didn’t see how that could be even remotely possible. How could any sort of power source have survived this long? Evil quickly explored the store looking for an answer and he found one soon enough. The power room of the store had the usual dead equipment but the large metal box on top of the blue plastic cubes hummed with power. A metal plate along with some signs on the device was covered with some dust and dirt but Evil quickly wiped it away.

El Paso Nuclear Cooperative Remote Power Receiver Module

**WARNING** No user serviceable parts within this device!

Qualified Personnel Only!

**CAUTION!** Possible radiation poisoning if this device is breached!

Nuclear power? Evil quickly rifled his mind for any information on such things. Nuclear power was what the sun used to provide light and heat to planets that orbited them, but such a thing couldn’t exist here unless the power was somehow contained. There was something called a ‘pile’ that was up by where the Chusanns once held sway but Evil had only heard of it in passing. How much jack would such a power source be worth? As quickly as that thought crossed Evil’s mind was as quickly as he initiated a cold and hard reality check.

There were many who regarded the creators of the Oltec as being almost gods, but if they were that powerful and wise, why did they destroy themselves leaving only what could be scavenged? To Evil, that was stupid versus wise and this was the end result of their stupidity. Evil kicked a piece of metal on the ground hard enough so that it bounced off of a wall. If this ‘pile’ existed somewhere in the area, it would be both boon and bane depending on who gained control of it. All that it would take would be one greedy idiot to cause even more damage than had already had happened. An educated Trader stood a better chance of staying alive and they also knew when to draw the line at what Oltec would be salvaged versus that which was best left alone. This ‘pile’ fell into the latter category. It would take a person with more education than even he possessed to properly exploit such a source so Evil decided to leave the matter be…but that didn’t mean he couldn’t profit from the byproducts of its existence…

They were called ‘fatigues’. They were in mottled green and brown and dark gray. Some fit him perfectly. They had boots here too. Heavy boots! His had lasted a long time, but he could see the cracks in the leather and feel the holes in the soles. He pulled off his boots and found a pair that fit. He went out to get another sack. Shortly thereafter, he had two sacks jammed full of clothes and boots and socks. The front display case yielded some cheap looking knives, but they still could hold an edge. Some even had compasses in the pommel. Twenty green and gray t-shirts were next to be packed away. He came back in with a fourth sack. If they had the knives here, perhaps they would have some guns too? These fatigues were military clothing so it followed they might have other military equipment here. It was worth checking out. There was a room in the back, but the door was securely locked. He tried using the crowbar that he found to defeat the door. He managed to pry the door open enough so that he could push it open using considerable force. The squeals of protest from the door grated on his ears; he preferred to do things quietly, but in some cases, he couldn’t.

The effort expended was worth it though. There were racks of rifles and pistols and other things. With a gasp of surprise, he found a crate of the round things he had used against the raiders. Some of the round things were different looking though. There were other things here besides even those. There were pieces of short pipe on the ground and other things called ‘Claymore’ or some such. His problem now was not whether he could find enough on this trip to take, but what would he take from here. He had no way of carting all of this off. There was a greed factor involved here, but he was a Trader. This much Oltec would translate to a HUGE pile of jack! First things first, he decided. He found another 500 rounds for his Colt, and none of the ammo was degraded. Even better, he found some shells that were made for his AA-12, a lot of them. Some were marked ‘HE’ and ‘HEAP’; they were explosive rounds. He also found another drum for his shotgun. He then perused the rifles and pistols present in the room. Some were ridiculously small, smaller than his hand. One rifle was very heavy and had what looked like an upside down ‘V’ attached to its muzzle. The ammo for it was in dark green boxes and there were at least 15 of those in the room. Deadly Oltec… That rifle would be worth one hell of a lot of jack, he thought. He first started with the smaller pistols and their corresponding ammo since they were the easiest to carry.

Boink!

It took him some effort to fasten the newest filled sack to his burwar. He could see even now that the burwar had a heavy load on its back even for a beast of its size. He reached for another sack as the burwar stamped its feet and growled. Evil was too busy getting another sack to pay attention. The burwar responded by stepping to the side and bumping Evil with its considerable weight. What the hell? Evil looked at the burwar. Why in hell did you do that? The burwar growled louder this time as its nose flared and contracted repeatedly.

Boink! Boink!

Evil stopped reaching for the sack for a second and scanned the area. He didn’t see anything at all! What was the burwar’s problem? There was nothing--. Once he was fully out of the spell of the Oltec stash, he was noticing something. On the ground were little conical piles of shit. While some were a dried out white color, others were fresher. Evil inhaled a deep breath. He knew that smell; it was a mixture of pine and vinegar. Then he listened.

Boink!

He could hear them now. Once again he scanned the area. Not too far away he saw a human skeleton. It looked rather recent and also looked charred. Up ahead there was a pile of wreckage blocking the road, but not the entire road. He quickly moved towards the building he had just entered. The burwar followed him. Then he saw them trot through the gap on their bony looking hind legs. I wasn’t the first one here, and now I know why they said it could be dangerous. He saw only three of them at the moment, but he knew there could be a lot more. Boinkers! It took more than just mentioning them to get across how dangerous they were. He knew all about boinkers. Any trader that was successful at trading knew about them. He was lucky he had not blundered into them, or he might not be alive right now. It was easy enough to describe a boinker; most people thought that they sounded comical or cute or adorable… at least until they met one…

*

The basic description of a boinker isn’t hard to visualize. First you take a rat and stand it up on its hind legs. You increase its body size to about two thirds of a met. You then elongate its upper arms somewhat and tip them with talons. You then elongate the hind legs until the creature stands over a met in height with a body diameter around thirty cens at its widest. Its rear legs also have talons. Their talons can rend flesh and even scratch glass. You shrink its head and enlarge its lower body so that it looks kind of like a pear or a teardrop that is canted forward. The sound a boinker makes when moving is due to how their hind legs are built. It is the cartilage and musculature of the knee area that makes their trademark sound. A boinker not only can move quickly but they can also jump pretty high. Next you attach two beady ratlike eyes and put some fangs in its maw along with a tail which is hard, bony and a weapon unto itself. Boinkers come in all sorts of pestilential colors; each color of boinker represents a different threat. White boinkers are simply pests. Their meat is watery and stringy, but it can be eaten. The other colors are much more dangerous in addition to their other quirks. Boinkers are attracted to various things, but they are best at detecting the misery of the wounded and dying regardless of who or what was in dire straits. Their capacity to home in on aural input is considered legendary as well as lethal. Boinkers run in herds, so there was never only one. Boinkers inhabit ruins because it is easier to have the food come to them than vice versa. There might have been a chance of getting more food had they been proactive, but visibility meant ultimate extermination; boinkers are universally hated. Once more, the colors of the specific boinkers determine what sort of threat they represent. The green and yellow ones are poisonous; when wounded, they spew ichor like that of an insect and their bite is both poisonous and infectious. Eating one of those would kill you. The blue ones breathe cold, the red ones belch flame and the black ones spray acid, so if you were attacked by a red and a black boinker, you could be dealing with flaming acid. There are other colors of boinker, but they are far less common than the ones named; overall, they are probably the biggest non-human danger a trader can face. A pack of boinkers can kill a human in jig time...

-Methuselah’s Journals-

*

The smart thing to do now would be to flee this place with what Oltec he had, but Evil didn’t back off that easily. First off, he hated boinkers with a vengeance. Not only were they filthy and disgusting, their very presence led to eventual contamination of wherever they were; Evil had seen more than one stash of Oltec ruined by these creatures. Their shit and piss had a pervasive odor even soap sometimes wouldn’t remove and it wasn’t a good idea to eat anything a boinker found first. The other aspect of things was tinged by a good amount of greed; if he could