rude awakening…
Rex awoke to a sharp pain in his ribs. Two sharp pains, actually; one following close on the heels of the other. As his hands moved to defend his body from his unseen assailant, he heard the sound of as-yet uncracked voices.
“Told’ja, Billy… ‘e’s still alive.”
“I dunno. ‘Member those critters last summer? Them twitched when we poked at ‘em, an’ they’s dead all right. Just reflexes, y’know?” Billy’s query was punctuated by another sharp jab.
Rex opened his eyes only to be blinded by the glare of twin suns, and he raised one hand to shield his eyes while the other grabbed the object that kept poking him. ‘A stick?’, he thought as he wrenched it from poor Billy’s hands, ‘what kind of backwards fucking planet would still have sticks?’ As his eyes adjusted to the blazing light above him, the two children came into focus. The smaller one was hiding behind the larger, who was in turn hiding under a ratty old outback hat that was clearly too big for him. “Where am I?” he asked the taller of the two.
“Pa’s ditch, mister!” Billy apparently wasn’t the brightest laser in the arsenal.
“I mean, what planet is this?” Looking around, Rex noticed a couple of scraggly trees poking up through the wasteland before realising his hat was missing. He clearly wasn’t anywhere near the Core. Rifling through his pockets turned up very little – a matchbox, a few spesos, and an old-style key.
“New Mexico.”
“Which New Mexico?”
Silence; Billy looked all out of answers at this point. Rex found a crushed pack of cigarettes in his shirt pocket and drew one out, touching the matchbox to its end and breathing deeply. Guess this planet couldn’t be all bad. He glanced at the image emblazoned on the crumpled packaging.
“You kids know where I can find a place called ‘the hole’?”
“Sure mister, ’bout two klicks up the road… You okay?”
“Can’t say I’m entirely sure yet, Billy, but I’m gonna find out.” Rising roughly to his feet, Rex brushed the dust from his clothes and started to put the matchbox away when he noticed the older boy’s eyes following it. “You like this? I’ll trade you for that hat of yours.”
“Sure, mister. ‘S’too big fer me anyway, and there ain’t no point being a cowboy ’round here anyway.” The boy held the hat out, and Rex held out the matchbox in return.
“Well, Billy, this isn’t exactly a cowboy hat.” Rex adjusted the crown before setting it atop his head. “This one’s an aussie hat.”
“Like that guy the Church of Metal always goes on about?”
“No, not Ozzy. Aussie. You pretty much just find these on Old Earth and on the Edge.” He reached up and gave the brim a sharp tug. “This New Mexico near the Edge?”
Billy looked lost again, and Rex took his leave.
After walking for a while, he looked back to see the boys fiddling with the matchbox, touching it to various items they found in the dust. Maybe not the best thing to leave in the hands of children, but Rex Logan wasn’t the kind of man who walked bareheaded through the desert. That was Corps crap. Anyway, the kids would probably be fine. What struck Rex as more disturbing was that he’d once again woken up on a strange planet, which made three interplanetary benders in only a couple months standard time. It was time to find some new drinking buddies. Rex merely muttered to himself, “Damned Canadians.”
