Honestly, I think it would’ve been better if he hadn’t said anything at all, but the other people on the land continued to not disturb us, so eh.

  “Got his eye,” Amy said, clearing her ear out with her pinkie and tossing me the gelatinous orb, “any idea why we need it?”

  “I’m sure Bones has a reason.” I chuckled as I looked over the eye and Eugene messily downed the Rillibut’s.

  Have to say, holding a freshly plucked human eye certainly unnerves a man somewhat, but that discomfort faded pretty quickly as I started to try and think about where I was going to put it.

  It’d probably get squished in my pocket, and it wasn’t exactly like I could get Flint to hold it.

  I was about to give up hope and just accept that I was going to have to hold onto it all the way home, but then I remembered the pouch I’d put my spurs in.

  “How’s Flint?” I asked, pulling my spurs out of the pouch and putting the eyeball in, “He jump at the explosion at all?”

  Amy shook her head, half to get her hearing back and half for the normal reason, “I’m pretty sure spending so much time wrapped in flames makes you immune to a little poof like that.”

  “You call that a ‘little poof’?” I scoffed amusedly, gesturing to the sizeable hole in the wall, “That ‘little poof’ could’ve turned us into a squishy red paste.”

  “Maybe,” Amy replied with a shrug before nodding to Eugene, “he seems okay though.”

  “I’m pretty far from okay,” Eugene groaned, “but by all accounts I’m healthy. What the Hell was that?”

  “That was what I came here for,” I said with a smirk as I finally shook off my armor and pretended the sensation didn’t freak me out, “you remember what we talked about?”

  Eugene’s brow furrowed at that, “Of course I remember, why wouldn’t I remember?”

  “No reason,” I replied before taking a seat on the desk and going to work getting my spurs on, wondering if he knew how damaged his noggin had been, “and you’re sure you’ll be able to do it?”

  “You heard Nate when you came in,” Eugene said, nodding to the de-eyed accountant, “things are gettin’ kind of difficult around here. Boss always promised to legitimize the business, but his greed stopped him.”

  “Y’all want the business to be clean?” I asked.

  “Why wouldn’t they?” Amy scoffed, leaning on the desk next to me, “The second the Nexxies decide that they’re more trouble than they’re worth they’ll nuke ‘em from orbit.”

  “She’s exaggerating, but yeah,” Eugene chuckled, “truth is a lot of these guys have family, people who don’t need to be roped into the trouble we could get in. Don’t get me wrong, there’ll be a few out there who were loyal to the old man, but no more than five or six.”

  “We should off ‘em, make an example.” Amy suggested.

  “Or we could not do that?” I replied with a surprised laugh, “Folk who don’t want to be here don’t have to be, that’s the message I reckon you should send out there.”

  “Me?” Eugene asked, “Why not you? I get wanting to keep the business in the family so to speak, but these guys ain’t stupid, they’ll know it’s coming from you.”

  “I think it’ll sound better coming from you,” I said as I finished getting my spurs on and dropped off the table, “besides, you speak the language?”

  “What language do I speak that you don’t?” Eugene scoffed, “Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you ain’t so different from us.”

  “Then you’re standin’ in the wrong place.” I replied before quickly changing the subject back, “Point is that I don’t want to deal with any sort o’ fighting on my way out of here, which means these folk have to feel like they’re under no obligation to do something stupid.”

  “And going up against you would be something stupid?” Eugene asked cockily.

  “Does no one see the man-sized hole?” I chuckled, “Trust me, just do as I’ve said.”

  Eugene was struggling, no doubt about that, but he appeared willfully powerless to what I guessed was the Charming Rogue upgrade.

  “Alright, fine,” Eugene sighed, “it’ll take me a few days, maybe a week, but I’ll get everything in order.”

  “Great.” I replied, making for the door and stopping just short of opening it, “Just a thought, but maybe you should go first.”

  “Probably, yeah,” Eugene half-laughed as he walked over, “might be an idea to give me my gun back.”

  “Smart.” Amy said, handing him the machine gun as he walked past, “Wouldn’t want them to think you were under duress or anything.”

  “Shut up.” Eugene lightheartedly jabbed before opening, stepping through, and blocking the door, “Just… make sure you’re ready to bug out. As quick as I’m sure your sniper is, I’m not exactly confident that they can take out ten people at once.”

  “I don’t know,” I huffed with a grin, “she’s pretty damn quick.”

  “Still though, better safe than sorry. Oh, and one other thing,” Eugene said as he turned to face me with his hand outstretched, “nice to meet you, boss.”

  “Stargun,” I replied, shaking his hand, “but most folk just call me Chuck.”

  “Well, Chuck,” Eugene said, still shaking my hand and emphasizing my name in an obvious attempt to memorize it, “let’s make you the most powerful man on this rock.”

  18

  For about five seconds I was really excited about the prospect of not only making a new army of allies, but also being able to fill out the map at home as soon as the operation was copacetic.

  Then reality set in.

  It wasn’t the kind of thing that made me stop in my tracks or anything, but it certainly did a good job of kicking every other thought out of my brain like a pissed off landlord.

  I didn’t know if I was ready to take on that much, home had already been attacked by the Protos when I wasn’t there, and it wasn’t like we were undergoing the smoothest takeover in history.

  Hell, up until five minutes before I’d had no idea I’d be taking over anything.

  ‘You’re fine,’ the voice in my head said, clapping me on the shoulder, ‘your best decisions are the ones you make automatically. That’s what kept you alive in the war.’

  Before I had the opportunity to start delving deeper into my memory and the war my sense of self-assurance had mentioned, we reached the front door where two burly men stood with their guns aimed at Amy and I’s chests.

  “Relax, boys,” Eugene said, waving them off, “he’s dead. Definitively.”

  Breathing a sigh of relief, the men lowered their weapons and allowed us to step outside.

  “Don’t worry about them,” Eugene whispered once we were outside, “they were just waitin’ for the ol’ clanker to give the kill order.”

  “That’s comforting.” I chuckled in response, following Eugene around the back of the house and looking at the unsure expressions of the men we were passing, “And these guys?”

  “Mixed bag,” Eugene replied coolly, “my advice to you would be to head on out as quickly as possible, I’ll contact you once everything’s cleared up.”

  “Guess we should just be grateful we’re getting out of here without a fight.” Amy half-joked.

  “Day’s still young.” a voice grumbled from the crowd.

  My first instinct, naturally, was to find the guy and stare him down, but I was quick to remember that they had guns and Amy didn’t have any sort of armor to speak of.

  So, in an act that felt kind of cowardly and twisted my stomach up, I got in the truck, letting Amy take the wheel again as I grabbed up my revolver and got ready to take fire.

  “Just head back up the way you came then hammer ‘round to your sniper,” Eugene suggested through my open window, “don’t want to pull all the attention there if you haven’t already.”

  “Thanks,” I replied with a nod, “look forward to hearin’ from you.”

  “Look forward to workin’ with you.” Eugene chuckled before slapping the side of the truck twice.

  Taking the signal, Amy threw the truck in reverse, whipped us around to face the way we came, and floored it.

  “Bit eager?” I remarked amusedly as my body got used to the speed.

  “Trust me when I say we want to be as far away from that circle jerk as possible,” Amy muttered concernedly, “Eugene was really understating the whole loyalist thing.”

  “Are there more of them?” I asked, lurching forward then back again as we hit the slope and kept on driving.

  “There are probably some camps out here that are slightly obsessed with the old man,” Amy said, “but it isn’t the numbers that’s the problem, it’s the tenacity.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “I mean there’s the Protos, then there’s crazy cyber fetishist mountain men.” Amy replied with a little shudder, “The ones that didn’t see him as a god saw him as a mortal godlike sex idol.”

  “And it’s bad to kill gods, right?” I joked.

  “I’m serious, man,” Amy scoffed amusedly, undercutting her words somewhat, “these people are messed up. Honestly, the only thing that they have over the Protos is that when they nab folk they tend to keep ‘em mostly healthy and not just take your money and mail the pieces back.”

  “Guess that’s kind of indemnifyin’.” I said as we reached the top of the ridge and started driving around the plateau, “So, I’ve been meaning to ask…”

  “How do I know those guys?” Amy chuckled, “I ran with them for a while, long time ago when I was an impressionable kid and wanted to make some easy money.”

  “And why’d you leave?” I asked.

  “Became too much of a boys’ club,” Amy replied with a shrug, “don’t get me wrong, I like hangin’ out with guys plenty, but that line of work didn’t exactly invite the most savory of characters.”

  “You were concerned for your safety?”

  “What? No!” Amy laughed, “They never tried anything that warranted a response, but they knew what would happen if they did.”

  “Drinking through a straw and crappin’ out a tube.” I chuckled after our sniper had come into view, laying on her back next to her rifles.

  “Here I thought you two were going to leave me out here on my lonesome,” Roxy chuckled after popping up and walking over to us as we slowed down, “we get what we came for?”

  “Most of it, yeah,” I replied, only then remembering the eyeball rolling around in my pouch, “hop in back so we can get the Hell out of here.”

  “Trouble?” Roxy asked as she used the back wheel to hoist herself up and into the tray, “I didn’t hear any more shots?”

  “Just trying to put some distance between us and them before we outstay our welcome, I’ll explain on the way home.” I said with a smile in her direction through the cab’s window, “Nice work.”

  “Naw, thanks,” Roxy replied confidently, “but in all fairness, the rifle did most of the work, I just had to hide afterward.”

  “Boomer’s fun, huh?”

  “You can say that again,” Roxy chuckled, “kickback’s a force to be reckoned with though. Nearly thought she was goin’ to dislocate my shoulder.”

  “Heh, guess I should’ve warned you about that,” I replied, feeling slightly guilty that I hadn’t, “anyway, you pulled it off.”

  “As did you two,” Roxy sighed happily as she got into a comfortable position and got ready to doze off, “another win under the Stargun Agency’s belt.”

  Not even going to pretend that that didn’t make me smile enough to make my face hurt, I was proud of our little outfit, we were really starting to secure the foothold I’d been pursuing.

  The Stargun Agency was making a name for itself all across the moon, and I was confident that we were only going to go up.

  19

  Aside from a few level up reminders, a couple of pit stops, and some sightseeing of the various gorges and mountains we’d missed on our way to Bald Rock, there wasn’t a whole lot to do but drive.

  Not that I’m complaining, the faster we could get to Bones the faster we could get home, but as I looked around the daylight-blanketed desert I couldn’t help but wonder what the moon would’ve looked like if the Protos hadn’t screwed up the terraforming.

  Would it be a lush forest world? A water world?

  Endor or Kevin Costner?

  Now, I knew that the moon must’ve been designed with my personal preferences in mind, though that led me to think about to what extent it had actually been designed.

  I’d found myself in a rabbit hole of rabbit holes as I looked over the boundless desert in search of some sign that Earth hadn’t been designed in the same way.

  A bunch of bureaucrats that came to be known as ‘reapers’ toying around with life that led to death that led to more life that...

  Truth was that I’d begun to get some understanding into how it had taken Roger so long to get me into my little slice of not-Heaven.

  “You doin’ alright?” Amy asked from the driver’s seat, having only just recently swapped with me, “I thought you were goin’ to have a nap?”

  “Can’t sleep.” I replied distractedly.

  “Constipated?” Amy queried knowingly, “I know these sorts of journeys block me up worse than a cork.”

  “Nothin’ like that,” I chuckled, shaking my head, “just made the mistake of thinkin’.”

  “Been there.” Amy chuckled, “Nothing worse than lettin’ yourself be alone with your thoughts for a while.”

  “Tell me about it…” I muttered amusedly, “Anyway, how’re you doing?”

  “Constipated.” Amy replied flatly with a nod, “But good otherwise, been too focused on sleep and drivin’ to start delving into the meaning of life and whatever else.”

  “Lucky you,” I remarked amusedly, “you reckon we’re far off?”

  Amy shook her head, “Based on your directions, I’d say we’re about fifteen, twenty minutes out.”

  “Fifteen minutes?” I scoffed, “And you only just took over?”

  “Guess I needed the sleep,” Amy replied after giving me a shrug, “besides, ain’t my fault you didn’t pay attention to the GPS.”

  I didn’t have a response to that, nothing legitimate anyway, and so settled for a sigh and a smile, “S’pose you got a point there.”

  The conversation from there petered off somewhat, mostly because there really wasn’t a whole lot left to say until after we’d finished up with Bones.

  Have to say that always got to me, that inability to hold a conversation when something important was just on the horizon.

  It was a fault of mine, a minor one, but it was there.

  Good news was that even without talking the final few minutes to Bones’ shack basically evaporated, disappearing into the dust cloud we were leaving in our wake.

  “Alright,” I said after Amy had put us in park, “you guys wait here, I’ll give a shout if I need you.”

  “You reckon there’s a chance this’ll go south?” Amy asked as I jumped out of the truck.

  “I don’t think so,” I replied, making sure my revolver and machete were tucked firmly in place, “but if he does feel cheated over the missing eye… I’d just rather we weren’t all within gobbling distance.”

  “Fair enough.” Amy scoffed, barely hiding her concern, “What should I do if you do shout?”

  “It’s a small shack and I have armor,” I said matter-of-factly before shutting the door, “I’m sure you’ll think of something.”

  I was doing my best not to walk in a way that showed the very real sense of fear I was feeling, but without being able to see myself I had no hope of telling if I looked confident or like I was smuggling a bunch of lobsters in my drawers.

  Truth be told, I wasn’t even really sure why I was so damn scared, and there was no denying that shame was resting in my brain just as comfortably as my fear.

  I tried to tell myself that it was because owls had always kind of freaked me out, especially after seeing one do that head spin thing firsthand, but it was more than that.

  Although, I suppose the extra dread might’ve been coming from the fact that there was literally more owl than normal waiting beyond that crappy shack door.

  “Hello, Chuck.” Bones said, making me damn near leap out of my pants as he lumbered around from behind the shack, “I trust the… errand went as planned?”

  “As well as one could hope,” I replied as coolly as possible while trying to keep my lungs down my gullet and get Bones’ items out, “there was an incident with one of the eyes though.”

  Bones let out a long sigh at that and shook his head, “I figured I’d be at least slightly disappointed…” he murmured sullenly as he accepted the PDA and eyeball in his feathery hand then looked up at me with a smile, “Ah well, these things happen.”

  With that, Bones pocketed the PDA and, without looking away or losing his smile, ate the eyeball.

  I’ve seen some dark stuff in my time, real dark stuff that was way worse than what I’d just seen, but something about seeing a giant bird eat a man’s eye like a jelly baby has a unique effect of making your clackers ascend and your eyeball’s retreat into their sockets.

  “So,” Bones said, clapping himself on the stomach, “I take it I’m to go to your compound, arrange employee information and such there before getting to work?”

  “That…” I trailed off, still somewhat thrown by what I’d just witnessed, before clearing my throat and nodding, “That works for me. You need a ride?”

  “No, I’ll be fine.” Bones replied before producing a ComCube from his pocket and placing it on the side of his shack.

  “Are you sure?” I asked, watching as a blue ring emanated from the ComCube around the shack, “We’ve got plenty of room in the back.”

  “I’m quite sure.” Bones reassured me after the shack, in the space of a camera flash, disappeared into the ComCube, “I prefer to stretch my wings every so often.”

  Naturally, I assumed he was speaking metaphorically.

  He wasn’t.

  “Y-you alright?” I asked as I looked over Bones’ almost excessive wingspan which, as he unfurled his arm-wing-things and tore his sleeves, made a series of cracking and popping sounds, “Sounded kind o’ creaky there.”