Hunters Run Page 0,75

Ramon chuckled. It wasn't as if they could hang him twice for the same crime. He imagined himself setting up in Amadora, maybe a simple beach house on the south coast. Once he had papers, he could rent a new van. At least until he found enough work to buy his own. He imagined waking to the sound of the surf, the cool light of morning. He imagined waking alone, on a cot too small for two bodies to share. Elena, after all, would have the other man. And he would have her. Ramon could start again. Like a snake shedding its skin, he could leave his old, gray life behind. Maybe he'd stop drinking so much. Stop going to bars and picking fights. Killing men or having them try to kill him. He could be someone new. How many men had dreamed of that, and how few had the chance?

It all depended on getting south quickly, before the recapitulation had thickened his scars and coarsened his hair. Before the wrinkles in his face matched the other man's, before the moles they shared became dark enough to be obvious on casual inspection. Ramon didn't know how long that would be, but he couldn't imagine it would take long. Not so many days ago, he'd just been a severed finger, and now he was nearly back to normal.

Far above, one of the Enye ships blinked out of existence and then back as the jump drives cooled. Ramon's gut tightened, remembering how it felt to be aboard those ships when they stuttered like that. The first time had been with old Palenki and his work gang. The ship had launched from its orbit, rising like a transport van and never leveling out. Ramon remembered the press of acceleration when the rockets fired. It had been like letting the water out of the tub after a hot bath, or like the torpor after sex. The muscles themselves had felt heavy on his bones. He'd smiled and looked over at Fat Enrique - he hadn't thought about Fat Enrique for years - and grinned. The boy had grinned back. They were leaving everything behind, and by the time their journey ended, everyone they'd known or spoken to or been bullied by or fucked or fucked over or been fucked over by would have died from old age. There were stories about the conquistadors burning their boats when they'd reached the new world. Ramon and Palenki and Fat Enrique and all the rest were doing the same. Earth was dead for them. Only the future mattered.

Ramon shook his head, but his mind refused to leave its track. This was another memory growing back. This time, though, he could think as well - observe the river, the Enye ships, the stars, the full moon hardly risen in the east. It was less like experiencing the thing again, and more like a powerful and autonomous daydream.

When they'd stepped onto the Enye ship, his first thought had been of how odd the place smelled - acid and salt and something reminiscent of patchouli. Palenki had bitched that it was giving him a headache, though that had probably been the cancer. They'd unloaded and stowed the equipment, found their way to their quarters by following the painted lines on the walls, eaten a small meal in the pleasant weight of the rocket acceleration, and taken to their couches when the klaxon sounded and the jump drives were set to warm up.

It had been the way Ramon had always imagined a stroke would feel. The world narrowed to a point, peripheral vision dimming, sounds growing distant, and then the discontinuity. He'd never been able to say what changed during a jump; everything could be in precisely the same place, a wrench he'd just dropped still partway to the floor, and still he knew - knew - that time had gone by. Quite a lot of time. That something had happened while he was unaware. He'd hated the feeling.

It was a week after that that he saw his first Enye. Ramon remembered Palenki's smile; knowing and smug and pleased with himself, as he'd gathered the work gang and instructed them on the etiquette their hosts expected. And then the thing had lumbered through the hatchway ...

Ramon screamed. Then the memory was gone, nothing there but the river and the forest. His heart was tripping over fast, his grip on the field knife so hard that his knuckles ached. He scanned the