Saul saved him from his thoughts by clearing his throat and blasting a wad of phlegm at a nearby rock. “All right, enough standin’ around. Let’s get this stuff loaded up in the razorback so we can get the hell out of here.”

Letho did as he was told, and the two of them made quick work of stowing the rifles and ammunition in the back of the razorback.

Before they left, Saul sauntered over to the two drivers and removed the plasticuffs from their wrists. He squatted down to their eye level and took a moment to wipe the dust from his boots. After a moment, he brought his piercing gaze to bear on the two men.

“Listen here, fools. I may not be able to understand the words coming out of your mouths, but I know you can understand mine. I want you to take the truck and get the hell out of here. We’re not going to kill you, because you’ve been real cooperative. Now go, and don’t make me regret sparin’ you.”

The two men nodded, grunted, and hurled a few choice slurs at Saul, but this time with much less gusto. Within moments they were loaded up and speeding away.

****

They made their way back to Haven in silence. But instead of traversing the floor of the canyon as they had on the way here, the return route brought them through the center of a long-abandoned suburban sprawl. Letho looked on in simultaneous awe and deep sadness as the crumbling domiciles raced by. The dryness and lack of vegetation had prolonged their existence; they stood like unblinking sentinels watching the slow erosion of the cracked earth that once teemed with lustrous green grass.

Rusted-out automobiles still sat in shattered driveways, waiting for passengers that weren’t coming back. Ruined suitcases and the remnants of tattered clothing were strewn across some of the lawns.

“Is it all like this?” Letho asked, raising his voice to be heard over the roar of the wind in the open-cabin vehicle.

“From what we’ve seen, yes. The only place that’s half-decent is the core of Hastrom City, and that’s because the hammerheads have been maintaining it the best they could for as long as anyone can remember. But even so it still don’t look much better than this,” Saul replied.

“What’s a hammerhead?” Letho asked.

“Those fellas back there, the ones driving the truck, they were hammerheads. As you can see, they’re short on brains but big on brawn. Zedock seems to think that the folks that came before somehow bred them that way, so that they would work hard and not ask for much in return.”

“Yeah, I don’t think that was something they covered in my formal ed sequence.”

“Well, people don’t talk too much about it. Hell, most people don’t even remember why the hell we got on the Fulcrum stations in the first place. Zedock knows. I don’t know how, but he knows. Tells me that it gets passed down along the Wartimer blood line.” As Saul said these last words, his face grew drawn and he looked at Letho with eyes filled with emotion. Letho was taken aback by it. “Guess that’s you, pardner, since you’re his blood and all.”

“Tell you what, if there’s some sort of knowledge that gets passed down to me, I’ll share it with you,” Letho said.

“Sounds like a plan,” Saul replied, smiling. “Look, that was a tough draw, what happened back there, with your girl.”

She isn’t my girl.

But it seemed that everyone could see through him when it came to his true feelings for Thresha.

Saul extended his hand, and they clasped hands, their biceps bulging, caked in sweat from the exposure to the sun above.

Then the razorback came to an abrupt halt as Saul slammed down the brakes, yanking Letho forward in his harness.

“What is it?” Letho shouted. But he spotted it before he had finished his sentence. One of the strange mutant creatures was sitting in the middle of the road.

“Something’s wrong. They don’t normally come out at this time,” Saul said, placing his hand on the butt of his Black Bear .50.

“He looks a little worse for the wear than the ones I saw earlier,” Letho said.

“He’s an old one, looks like. Wonder what he’s doing out here all alone,” Saul said. Letho was confused by what appeared to be genuine concern for the mutant in Saul’s voice.

Saul spun the wheel to the left, edging the razorback off the highway and onto the shoulder. The mutie made no motion toward them, just followed them with its doll-black eyes, panting under the boiling sun, perhaps waiting for death.

“So what do we do?” Letho asked as they both sat in the razorback, watching the creature.

“Doesn’t seem to be aggressive. Maybe it’s sick?” Saul suggested. “Well, sicker than the rest anyways. Let’s leave him alone.”

Saul revved the engine and the wheels spun for purchase in the dust that coated the blacktop beneath.

****

When they had left the creature far behind them, Letho mustered the courage to speak.

“Saul, we could have blown that thing away. Why didn’t you kill it?”

“As a rule, Letho, we don’t kill muties unless we have to.”

Letho’s eyes widened. “What possible reason could you have to let those things live?” Letho wobbled his ruined arm for emphasis.

Saul took a deep breath and rubbed his brow in irritation. “Letho, it’s hard to say, and I don’t understand it much myself,” he began.

“Well, try. Spit it out already,” Letho said.

Saul took a deep breath. “Sometimes we find them carrying stuff, or wearing articles of clothing. Eursan clothes. They’re connected to us in some way, and like I said, they don’t normally bother us unless something stirs them up.”

The ID bracelet on its wrist. It spoke to you. Before you killed it. Do you remember, Letho?

“Uh… okay.” Letho slumped back in his seat and let this new revelation sink in. Maybe the air you’re breathing right now is turning you into one of those things, eh, Letho? Maybe if one of them bites you, you turn into them. Just like in those old movies you love so much.

Letho jerked on the collar of his coveralls, bringing the fabric closer to his face, and willed the copilot back into the recesses of his troubled mind.

****

After a short ride that was blissfully uneventful, they arrived back at the same hatch through which they had initially exited Haven, and it wasn’t as they had left it.

“Hey, why is the hatch open?” Saul asked no one in particular. The loose dust outside the hatch had been disturbed and redistributed by the passage of many feet.

“Muties!” Letho growled. As if on cue, several of them shuffled out of the hatch opening.

“Is it okay if we kill them now?” Letho asked.

“No choice,” Saul answered.

But Letho was already on his way. He surged forward, unsheathing Saladin as he sped across the dusty ground.

Saladin, he thought, let’s do this quick and clean. If Saul’s right, we should put these poor bastards out of their misery as quickly and painlessly as possible.

 

Initiating user requested protocol………

Targeting major organs………

Error: Target internal structure does not match any known biological scans………

Targeting brain, enhancing actuators for maximum skull penetration………

 

Letho’s targets lit up in orange-yellow outlines. His body moved of its own accord in that way that he had not quite become accustomed to. He felt his mind drifting as Saladin thought for him, moving his limbs, sliding him to the left as a mutant reached out to tear at his chest with wretched claws. With a clean swipe, Letho brought Saladin down on the creature’s skull, spilling stinking blood on the thirsty ground below. Another mutant came forward, and Letho swiped upward, lopping off the top of the creature’s skull. The loosed piece of the creature’s skull spun through the air, ricocheting off his next target’s head.