his fourth. Maybe his fifth. Mikel had his credit information. If he'd been out of money, Mikel would have kicked him out. Ramon placed the empty glass on the bar and deliberately put both hands palmdown and stared at them. If he was too drunk, they wouldn't seem like his own. They seemed like his own. Mostly. He was sober enough. He looked forward and saw himself in the haze of the mirror; he watched himself smile a little. The woman laughed. There was no mirth in the sound. There was fear.
"I want you to say that you understand," the European said, his voice low. "And then I want you to come with me, and show me how much you agree with me."
"Hey, pendejo," Ramon said. "You want power? How about you come outside, and I'll kick your pinche ass."
The European looked over, surprised. There was a moment of utter silence, and then the bar was shouting, on its feet, cheering. Ramon saw the moment of fear in the European's eyes, the rage that followed. Ramon adjusted the knife in his sleeve and grinned.
"What have you got to smile about, hijo?" the supervisor said.
"I was just thinking about something," Ramon said.
There was a long pause. The supervisor hunched over like they were both prisoners in the same cell.
"You gonna change your story?" he asked.
Ramon took a long draw on his cigarette and sighed slowly, releasing a long, gray plume of smoke. A half-dozen smart-ass comments came to mind. Things he could say to show them he wasn't scared of them or of the aliens for whom they'd made themselves into hunting dogs. In the end, he said simply, "No."
"Your call," the supervisor said.
"I still get the food?"
"Sure. And do yourself a favor. Reconsider. And do it fast. Paul's got an idea how he's going to show the Enye you're full of shit. And if they ask to take you back to their ship, you're gone. And then you're doomed."
"Thanks for the warning," Ramon said.
"De nada," the supervisor said, making it clear by his tone that it really was nothing to him. One way or the other.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Time was a strange thing in the cell. The darkness had left him feeling discarded and forgotten. Now that the LED was on, Ramon had the sense of being scrutinized. The light was unforgiving; it made every squalid stain and scratch and chip in the cell perfectly clear. Ramon considered his wounds and came to the conclusion that while he would ache and piss blood for days, he wouldn't be the last man Johnny Joe Cardenas had killed. He would recover - if the Enye let him.
There were stories, all officially denied, about what happened to men who transgressed against the crews of the transport ships. Ramon had heard his share and believed them - or not, depending on who told them and when and where. Once he'd reached the colony, they had the same status as ghost stories. They were pleasantly frightening and grotesque, but nothing to spend time thinking about. Now, though, he wondered. If they took him, would he hold out?
There wasn't any advantage to him in keeping Maneck's secret if the Enye would wrench it out of him anyway. The slaughter that followed would be the same whether Ramon offered up the information or had it taken from him. Except, of course, to Ramon.
On the other hand, he was a tough sonofabitch. So maybe he could stand it, even if they tried to break him. No way to know without trying.
Instead of obsessing about it, Ramon attempted to pinpoint the moment when he'd stopped thinking of Maneck and the aliens beneath the mountain as his enemies. It had to have happened. He had dedicated himself to killing them for the indignities they'd heaped upon him, and now here he was, wondering if he would be strong enough to die to protect them if the need arose. It wasn't a small change of heart, and yet he couldn't say when it had happened. Or why it felt so much like the moment he'd spoken up for the woman in the bar. Or why the prospect of his own torture and death didn't fill him with some greater dread.
But there had been no promise of survival with the European either. He could have died in that alley as easily as he had killed. The result wasn't the point. It was all about being the kind of man who would do the