agreement was that the Carnies could use the space between the Stones," said Richard. "Townies have not, and will not, enter the space between the markers."
"You stormed into our compound!" Redding said. The soldiers shifted, tension rippling through them like a wave.
"Your compound was outside the markers," Richard said.
Redding's face swelled and reddened until she looked ready to explode. "You moved the stones!"
"The Townies never said they wouldn't," said Richard. "They saved their resources for quite a time to be able to work that change." Richard still didn't move anything beyond his mouth. He could have been cast from bronze.
"You've taken two-thirds of my people," said Redding. "What do they want?"
"Initially, they wanted to learn what you did," said Richard. "They wanted to learn about the Portal. About the machines. The Townies have nothing like Carnie technology. Their civilization uses utterly different sciences."
I breathed deeply and slowly, trying to calm the fire spattering along my nerves, willing my muscles to relax, trying to recover some modicum of self-control. No meds, no food, no sleep, and Richard. This wasn't the Richard I had known. The Richard I had known was damaged, incomplete. This Richard might have moved into his shell, might have taken some of his personality, but he wasn't really Richard. He couldn't be. Richard couldn't talk this well, couldn't think this well, couldn't hold his own in an argument.
"Not going to happen," said Redding.
"They knew that," said Richard. "So they moved the border stones. Everything outside the border stones is their property. Including people"
"What have you done with my people?" Redding said through clenched teeth.
"They've been healed of their mortality."
Every soldier in the line froze.
"Regrettably, mortality is hard-wired into the Carnie mind. By removing mortality, they've become more Townie than Carnie. They can no longer speak Carnie."
"Then how can you?" said one of the soldiers next to Redding.
"My brain was already damaged. I'd lost enough of my sense of mortality that the Townies had a blank slate for filling in the missing parts. I am a bridge."
"I want my people back," Redding said, visibly restraining herself from leaping across the invisible line.
"And we can give them back," said Richard
"As humans, damn it," said Redding
"Townie human, or Carnie human?" Richard smiled. "I understand you. What has been done can be undone. Your people can be returned to you, as the Carnies they were when they were found roaming free outside the border. The stones can be restored. The agreement can be amended so that the stones can never be moved again. I'm still Carnie enough to know how you think. So long as no Carnie crosses the fence into Townie land, they will still be Carnie property. They will even expand the land an extra ten miles in each direction along the shore, and another twenty miles inland."
Redding raised her chin, eyes narrowed.
"What do they want?"
Richard raised a hand and pointed. "Sherry."
I staggered. Peterson caught me.
Redding was staring at me. The soldiers around her were staring at me. The men further along the line shifted, their weapons more closely focused on the Townies and Richard.
"There are other things to negotiate," Richard said. "The poor Red Bands. The Carnie Corporation runs the clinic for public relations. You give prion disease victims a place where they can live, where they cannot get any worse. The Carnie part of me guesses that there's no money put into actually treating the disease, and that it's one hell of a tax write-off."
"What does that have to do with anything?"
Richard shook his head sadly and raised his hands, a very Human Richard gesture amidst his inhuman stillness. "Mortality is human. Your human. You suspend them forever. The Townies would offer them healing. A future. Give them the choice. Or their families. Don't condemn them to live like this."
Did he have tears in his eyes?
Redding was trembling with rage, on the verge of boiling over everything. "Let me see if I understand. You give us our people back? With their minds and bodies intact?"
"Yes."
"You quadruple our territory, and you won't move the border again?"
"Yes."
"And in exchange, you want –" Redding swiveled to point at me " – this one Red Band?"
My shaking wasn't nervous plaque any longer. It was fear. Sweat soaked my armpits and trickled down my back. My bowels felt loose.
"Yes," Richard said.
"Why?" asked Redding.
"My condition for translating. She is a good person locked inside bad flesh. She will be healed."
Redding stared at me.
I couldn't run. I couldn't get five steps before Peterson or one of his friends brought me down, hogtied me, and flung me across the line.
"I'm sorry," Redding said, her eyes still on me. She turned to look at Richard. "Listen carefully. Go to hell."
I blinked in surprise. I felt tension ratcheting through the soldiers around me. A weird combination of relief and excitement rippled through me.
"You took my people by force. You destroyed my facility. By force. I want my people back. But there's something else here," Redding said, stepping forward. "Something evil. You have a secret. I will get that out of you. A real human would never dream of trading one of our own. I don't care if she is a Red Band, a tard, whatever. We will figure out your game." She stepped forward again. "We will figure you out, and we. Will. Break. You."
Maybe Redding wasn't such a jerk after all.
One of the suited men jumped forward and seized Redding's arm. She whirled in fury. He softly said "The line. You're on the line."
Redding's glare could have cut steel. She stormed back. "Montague is coming. Earth is coming. And we will burn your world to ash and stone."
"That's your last word?" Richard said.
"I have a counteroffer. Give my people back. Get out of our territory. Never come again. And maybe we won't genetically engineer something that turns all you Townies into sponges."
Richard shook his head. "The Townies have experience in moving the stones. They can do it before Earth can reestablish the Portal. This time, they will move the stones into the ocean. Force you to march into the sea. Earth will reestablish the Portal on Townie land now. We'll be waiting for them."
"And they'll come in force." Redding's lips twisted. "You have no idea of the weapons we have these days. And the kind of people aching for an excuse to use them."
"And once they fail, the Townies will heal Earth. The Portal will be on Townie land, after all." Richard had reassumed his inhuman stillness, but his eyes still flickered at me every few seconds. I could see something in them. Maybe I was lying to myself.
I didn't know who would win in a battle between humanity and Townies. Humanity had horrific weapons, but Townies could teleport and heal themselves. Whatever happened would appall everyone.
And both Richard and I would lose.
Peterson supported me with one hand on my back. He didn't worry when I put a hand on the table, as if trying to support myself. By the time I grabbed the dinner knife and leaped forward, it was too late for him to react.
If it had been a flat-out foot race, I couldn't have gotten away. But nobody expected me to stagger towards the Townie line. I shook. I quavered. Tremors rippled down my limbs. But I swung my rippling legs forward, demanding just a few seconds of performance from them, knife in my hand.
I'd grabbed the knife by the blade. Grease-encrusted metal sliced my palm. That was okay. If I was right, I needed to bleed. If I was wrong, they'd heal me anyway.
I don't know if Richard or Redding were more shocked as I shambled four steps across the dividing line and plunged at the nearest Townie.
I heard rifles snapping into place. Someone shouted "Hold your fire! Hold your fire, dammit!"
The nearest Townie turned to look at me. Its prehensile nose wiggled
at me. I imagined that it was in confusion. I savored every sense: the chlorine stink, my own fear-sweat, the coppery scent of my own blood slipping down my hand.
"Sherry!" Richard screamed. "No!"
I raised the hand holding the knife, a trickle of blood dripping down my wrist, and clenched the edge of the blade to the Townie's naked chest.
A line of pain ripped across my palm. I cried out, surprised at just how badly the blade hurt. My tremors were a constant ache, but this felt like I'd pressed my hand onto a hot wire. I felt the Townie's skin part, the knife edge digging into his flesh as it sliced mine. Our blood ran down his chest, streaming and separating and coalescing around the black hair on his stomach.
For a long moment, nobody moved.
Then the tremors claimed me. I fell back from the Townie with a shudder. My left hand tried to clasp my bleeding right, but I couldn't move well enough. A spasm rippled down my back, then I toppled to the grass. I choked back a shriek.
The Townie gave his own shriek. He starfished on his feet, limbs spasming, and toppled backwards.
I hardly dared breathe.
The Townie screeched, thrashed, and lay still.
Richard said "Sherry?"
Then the injured Townie sat up, with an overstretched smile on his face, and gave a distorted chuckle.
Shock rippled through the human ranks, then Redding said "Get Sherry!"
Men dashed forward, seized me, and wrenched me backwards. Someone stood on my hand as someone else pulled my body, and I cried out as my shoulder lit with its own agony. Then I was almost thrown back into human territory.
The Townie I'd assaulted didn't react, only holding his smile. The other Townie had stepped back.