The Dead Slam: A Tale of Benevolent Assasination by R.F. Bright Read Free Book Online Page A

through the motions. Make all the right faces and meaningful gestures for as long as we can. It’s politics. A show. A puppet show. So someone’s got to pull the strings. That’s what makes it a show. And do not ever forget, my friends — it is a goddamned show!”
    Thomka had drifted into a sullen mood, but listened halfheartedly.
    Petey pointed an empty glass at him and moved to the middle of the floor. “Gentlemen, our grip is failing. If we fumble here, we will suffer greatly. We have to grab what we can, or haven’t already put in a safe place, and move to where they appreciate people like us.”
    Thomka wondered — where the hell would that be?

7
    M acIan banked the Peregrine north and raked along the side of the mountain. His companions’ stomachs roiled, but they were having too much fun to puke. As they rose up and over the rocky peaks of their mountain, vertigo set in. Distortions in scale and perspective altered their faculties as the mountain melted into the foreground and the horizon broke in all directions.
    MacIan poked another faded button and the heads-up display projected onto the wind-dome. Max took note of the button’s position. Details of the terrain below were projected onto the screen. MacIan zoomed in on a mile or so of tightly packed pine trees growing out of massive outcroppings and blind valleys. Not an inch of it fit for humans.
    “You’re right,” said MacIan. “There’s no way up to the spires from this side.”
    “This side,” said Pastor Scott, “runs all the way to Canada.”
    MacIan steered in a wide arc so they might see as far as possible, until he spotted what appeared to be a small city with smoke-stack activity. “What’s that?”
    “That’s Portage,” said Max. “One of the biggest rail hubs in the world, long time ago.”
    “And that?” MacIan pointed to a gargantuan, zucchini-shaped object floating in the far distance.
    “Airship-freighter,” Max said, shocked that MacIan didn’t know.
    “Has to be a half mile long.”
    “Three thousand four hundred feet. Belongs to the Chinese Factory,” said Max. “Biggest freight hauler on the planet.”
    MacIan’s voice flattened. “What do they make?”
    Max looked even more surprised. “They don’t make anything. They’re taking railroad tracks back to China.”
    MacIan drew a smoldering breath through clenched teeth.
    Pastor Scott tagged in. “They set up in the old Pennsy roundhouse, years ago. Built special flatbed cars with arms that reach over and pull up the tracks. They started way down the line, somewhere in Nebraska, near the foot of the Rockies. Then they roll back this way, dismantling the tracks behind them as they go. An arm reaches over and pops the spikes off the ties, then lifts the tracks onto flat-bed cars, hundreds of them. Once they’re all full up, they drive back to Portage, unload, go back to where they left off — start in again. I heard they were done all the way up to somewhere in Ohio now.”
    “They take the wooden ties, too,” Fred said. “They’re worth more than steel. Not a lot of wood left in China. This is all part of one of those settlement deals, or whatever you call ’em . . . the trans-something or another trade agreement? I’m not sure which is which. Nobody asked us. Someone made a fortune and stuck us with the bill.”
    Pastor Scott’s rage had long ago boiled down to vapor. “It was all baked-in-the-cake, back when we made all those Trade Agreements. They shot our future in the head, we just weren’t smart enough to lay down and die.”
    “It’s state of the art,” interrupted Max. He’d heard all this political stuff before. “I love those airships. Helium gives them lift and the same hydrogen fuel system as this Peregrine powers their thrusters. It can carry just about anything all the way from here to China in about a month. Makes its own hydrogen from condensation on the way.”
    MacIan was impressed, but not in a good way.
    Max realized he was