McCade's Bounty Read Online Free PDF

huge cloud of steam billowed up to obscure the view. As the wind blew it away McCade saw a crawler roll out onto the pad, its white and gray camouflage useless against the burnt area behind it, twin rooster tails of snow flying up behind it.
    It took McCade and Rico a good ten minutes to pull on their heat suits and enter the lock. Phil was already there, sans suit, with a big grin on his face. Thanks to his thick layer of fur the variant could stroll through winter snowstorms that would kill Rico or McCade in a few short minutes.
    The lock cycled open and they left the protection of the ship's hull. McCade had opted to leave his hood and goggles hanging down his back. The cold cut into his face like a thousand tiny knives. He removed the unlit cigar from his mouth and threw it away.
    Unlike Sara, Rico, and Phil, McCade hated the cold, and would've preferred a warmer planet. Sara . . . Molly . . . the names were like spears through McCade's heart.
    Their boots made a crunching sound as they approached the crawler. A door hissed open and released a blast of warm air. McCade scrambled inside, closely followed by Phil and Rico.
    Pawley was at the controls. He turned sideways in his seat. Though normally clean-shaven, Pawley wore a two-day growth of beard. He had short hair, a crooked nose, and thick rather sensuous lips. "Welcome aboard, gentlemen."
    Pawley's words were followed by an awkward silence. Rico was the first to break it. "No offense, ol' sport . . . but let's go straight to the bottom line. Who made it and who didn't?"
    A cloud came over Pawley's face. "I'm sorry, Rico . . . Vanessa was killed. She died defending the fusion plant."
    Rico nodded, and looked out through scratched plastic at the bleakness beyond. Tears ran down his cheeks and into his beard.
    Pawley looked at Phil. The variant stared back, trying to read the scientist's eyes, steeling himself against the worst.
    Pawley ran his tongue over dry lips. "We just don't know, Phil . . . Deena's unit went off-air more than a day ago . . . she's missing in action."
    Phil gave a grunt of acknowledgment. Missing rather than dead. There was hope at least.
    Now it was McCade's turn to look Pawley in the eye. "Well?"
    The word sounded harsh, and McCade wished he could pull it back, but there was no need. Pawley understood.
    "Good news and bad news, Sam. The good news first. Sara was wounded but she's alive. Doc Lewis says she'll be fine in a couple of weeks."
    "And Molly?" McCade croaked the words out. If Sara was the good news, then . . .
    Pawley swallowed hard. "They took her, Sam . . . along with sixty or seventy other children."
    McCade let his breath out in a long, slow exhalation. At least she was alive. Frightened, lonely, but alive.
    McCade's fingers curled into hard fists. First Molly, then Mustapha Pong. Not for money, not for empire, but for himself. McCade's Bounty.

Four
    Molly McCade bit her lip and refused to cry. She'd done a lot of crying during the last few days and it didn't do any good. The pirates didn't care, and the other girls were just as scared as she was. She didn't know where the boys were and hadn't seen any since the attack.
    Molly rolled over, careful not to wake anyone who might be asleep. Sleep was a precious commodity for the children. It was a time of much needed rest and escape from the horror of the ship's small hold.
    The girls were packed into four-foot-high sections, with cold metal gratings under their backs, and very little room to move around.
    They were allowed to leave the hold twice a day. First came the scramble up ladders to the pressurized launch bay, then a bowl of tasteless protein mush, followed by fifteen laps around the hangar. Then they were forced through a bank of over-used chemical toilets, an antiseptic spray, and returned to the gratings.
    And since everything was done in alphabetical order, there was no hope of a better position on the gratings.
    Poor Susy Zobrist. She was stuck on