Free Great Sky River by Gregory Benford Page A

for the data the Crafter carried. Of
     course, the Crafter might have been confused, or erred—
    “Beggin’ off now, uh?” Killeen muttered irritably.
    I am not. I simply said—
    Ledroff broke in, —You checking the route?—
    Arthur was inaudible to anyone except Killeen, of course. It was uncanny, though, how Ledroff could gather what Killeen’s
     Aspect was saying. Maybe Killeen had been muttering over the comm. “Yeafold. See those green spikes? There were some like
     it in one of the Crafter’s pictures.”
    —Huh.— Ledroff was a distant speck, his voice tinged with skepticism. Killeen could tell it would be a long while before Ledroff
     forgot the alky-drinking. The Cap’n would use it as a handy way to undercut Killeen. Already he was favoring Jocelyn, to keep
     Killeen in his place.
    “Let’s go that way.”
    —Might’s well.—
    Killeen could hear Ledroff click his teeth together, which meant he hadn’t any better idea. Ledroff skip-walked, kicking up
     dust plumes. Beyond him chugged the transporter mech they had commandeered.
    The older Family members rode on the copper-ribbed sides of the big hauler, clinging with slaptabs to the buffed aluminum
     tank walls. They swung like boughs of motley fruit, bobbing as the transporter lumbered with dogged persistence over the bumpy
     terrain. Iron-gray massifs towered on the far horizon like unreachable fortresses.
    Killeen didn’t like jouncing along on the transporter and had given away his rest turns on it. He preferred to be in the open.
     If a Marauder chanced to intersect their path, it would see the outlying men and women first. It seemedto Killeen only right that he should be the most visible, while Toby walked closer to the transporter.
    To a Marauder its barrel-shaped fellow mech would not be a target. Only on close inspection could a Marauder tell that the
     dull-witted transporter had been hijacked, redirected, and no longer dutifully carried cargo from the little factory to a
     regional depot.
    —Heysay, Dad.— Toby waved from far away.
    “Time to eat?”
    Toby laughed. It was an old joke, from the time when the boy had wanted an extra snack every few klicks. That had been during
     the hard times after the Calamity. None of the Family had been truly prepared. None had imagined that their lot would be one
     of endless fleeing.
    —Noway,— Toby said. —I’m no porker.—
    “Whatsay then?”
    —I’m just getting tired of running alongside this fat-pack on the ’porter.—
    Nobody in the Family had a scrap of fat on them any longer, but their talk was full of references to carrying excess mass,
     to indulgence, to unsightly bulging clothes. It was a wan vestige of a time when fat had been possible, and valued as insurance
     against hard times. But now all times were hard, and the Family used the words of opulence with a certain longing, a hollow
     bravado, as if to keep the words alive was to preserve the promise that someday they could again amass an ample centimeter
     or two of girth.
    “You’ll pick up the porkers when they fall off.”
    —They’ll just go
splat
if they do.—
    “Keep your eye peeled all the same.”
    —I want be out with you.—
    “Too dangerous.”
    —Isn’t!—
    “Is.”
    —Isn’t! Nosay noway! Lookit the greenery sproutin'.—
    “A damp patch, is all.”
    —Isn’t! Ever’body knows mechs don’t like green.—
    “Maybe.”
    —They’re
’finid
of it. Can’t see so good in green light.—
    “Where it’s green there’s water. Which helps rust.”
    —What I said, right? So lemme walk with you.—
    The plaintive warbling note in Toby’s voice touched Killeen. As he opened his mouth to tell his son to stay put and safe near
     the transmech, he instead found himself checking the blue-dabbed overlay in his right eye. A good firm forward-pointing triangle
     stood out against the topo map of the rumpled valley.
    “Okay. Cover on my left.”
    —Hey jubil!— Toby leaped twenty meters into the