The Gunfighter and The Gear-Head Read Online Free PDF Page A

car, one of the
fastest and best balanced, required less than most, but it would
still strangle and seize up without the daily care of the pump
jockeys. She pulled a pack of Mentos from her jacket and tossed it
to one of the greasy, skinny teenagers working the pumps. The mints
were dried to solid little rocks, but she knew the orphaned
scarecrows that worked the fueling depot didn’t have teeth anymore
anyway and preferred candy they could suck on. The other pump
jockeys, greasy and non-descript, gathered around the one who had
accepted the tip to claim their share of the reward.
     
    “I’ve got a proposition for you, Red,” Zeke
said, drawing Fiona’s attention back to him.
     
    Propositions from most in Tombstone meant
sex, but Fiona knew Zeke didn’t have any interest in sex; he wanted
power and the only reason he wanted it was to cause more pain to
the Slark. Since she’d already brought him six heads, she doubted
his proposition would have much to do with the latter.
     
    “I’m listening.” She leaned against her car
with her arms folded over her chest.
     
    “The Hawkins House is getting too large
again,” Zeke said. “After the last culling, they’re also better
armed than before. I need someone with some skills at creeping
about to spike their methanol.”
     
    “Poison doesn’t sound like your style,” Fiona
said.
     
    “It’s not, but I’m not going to risk my men
against a bunch of half-blind crazies if I don’t have to.” Zeke
moseyed over to his El Camino, his Slark-skin overalls hissing with
every step. He reached into the bed and pulled out an old milk jug
with clear, cloudy liquid inside. “They don’t know about your
little pilot friend yet, but you can well imagine what they’ll say
when they find out about her.”
     
    He had a point. The methanol drinking cult
had it in their minds that the devil was a woman. They already had
their wary, barely functioning eyes on Fiona as the one, and she’d
shot half a dozen of them before they stopped coming after her with
truncheons and knives. She didn’t really want to risk their
zealotry against Gieo, but poisoning them felt a touch too cowardly
for her taste.
     
    “What are you offering?” Fiona asked, hoping
it was something easy to reject.
     
    “A month of free fuel and cuts in line until
it needs to be done again.” Zeke held out the jug of poison and
shook it as if that would somehow make it more appealing.
     
    “I’ll think about it.” Fiona pulled herself
from her leaned position against her car and walked back around to
the door.
     
    “Offer’s got an expiration date on it,” Zeke
said.
     
    “Don’t they all?” Fiona slid into her car and
slowly crept away from the fueling depot.
     
    As far as she knew, the Hawkins House
cultists had existed somewhere in Texas before the Slark invasion,
but she figured they started drinking methanol as communion after.
They were a blight on the town, screaming dire prophecies in the
streets, stealing wood to smoke into methanol to drink, and
breeding like insane rabbits on the edge of town. The old church at
the end of Fitch Street, surrounded by trailers and mobile homes,
marked out their district, but they hardly kept to themselves. The
last time their numbers had grown too large, mostly through
conversion, Zeke had firebombed their camp with Molotovs. Fiona
doubted it would be so easy this time; however, she had no interest
in poisoning women and children, which would likely be a requisite
of the job. With a prize as good as the one offered, Zeke would
find someone to do it, and Fiona would be the primary beneficiary
of the act, but she wasn’t interested in Zeke’s dirty work.
     
    Without anymore hunting to do, Fiona decided
it might not be the worst idea to actually take Gieo up on the trip
out into the desert for tech salvage. Judging from the pilot’s
skill with gizmos of all shapes and sizes, it stood to reason there
would be some pretty valuable goods if they got