Warp World (82 page)

A career nomad,
Josh Simpson
has driven trucks through the lower forty-eight states, treated and disposed of hazardous waste, mixed mud as a stonemasonry laborer, failed abysmally in marketing, gotten on people’s nerves as a safety man, and presently gets on their nerves even more using nerve release techniques in pain relief therapy.

He lives amidst the scrub and mesquite of West Texas with his cat.

Kristene Perron
is a former professional stunt performer for film and television (as Kristene Kenward) and self-described
“
fishing goddess”. Pathologically nomadic, she has lived in Japan, Costa Rica, the Cook Islands, and a very tiny key in the Bahamas, just to name a few. Her stories have appeared in
Denizens of Darkness
,
Canadian Storyteller Magazine
,
The Barbaric Yawp
and
Hemispheres Magazine
. In 2010 she won the Surrey International Writers’ Conference Storyteller Award.

Kristene is a member of
SF Canada
. She has published the first two novels in the five-book adventure science fiction series,
Warpworld
, with her Texan co-author Joshua Simpson.

She currently resides in Nelson, BC, Canada but her suitcase is always packed.

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Wasteland Renegades

H
ere is an excerpt from
Ghost World
, the third book in the
Warpworld
series from authors Joshua Simpson and Kristene Perron.

War has come to the World and the wasteland, and no one is safe—not even across the dimensions. Separated in battle and scattered to different worlds, Seg and Ama clash with old and new enemies as they struggle to unlock the secrets of the Storm …before it’s too late.

Available 2014

WARPWORLD:
GHOST WORLD

A
ma let Gelsh lead her away from Majed without a fight. What had she hoped to accomplish? A useless gesture for a hopeless situation. Even so, she couldn’t simply do nothing. She couldn’t stand around and let the world have its way.

With a few more coded taps warning her to behave, Gelsh ushered her into the center of a huddle of Undersiders. As always the conversation turned to stories, some she had already heard dozens of times before while working in the pond. Stories that were as much a part of the Undersiders as their hair or skin or bones. Stories that did not include her. She was among these people, but not part of them.

Her own stories? Lost.

Looking around the wide common area of the Place of Others, at the clusters of people bonded together by their pasts and their struggles, she realized that no matter how many scars she bore on her hand she would always be an outsider. This bleak land was more kin to her than any person here. She settled onto the dirt, drawing her finger in meaningless patterns as the wind began to blow.

Like Majed, she kept her face turned to where Yulin waited for the Storm. She stayed like that until an unfamiliar voice jarred her out of her thoughts.

“Undersiders, I see you all bathed for the occasion. Very civil of you.”

“And you came down from pleasuring yourselves on the hilltops to pretend you do useful things around here,” Gelsh said.

Ama looked up to see one of the Creepers. He was not much taller than Gelsh but his skin was darker than the Deathland sand and clear of the pocks and scars that marked so many of the Undersiders. His body was all cord, muscle, and sinew, as if someone had forgotten to put in the fat when he was born. Strangest of all though, was the shell atop his head. More than helmet, the dome was permanently imbedded in the man’s skull.

“What do you want, Chotke?” Gelsh said.

“We came to welcome your newest addition, we have not had an opportunity to do so,” Chotke said. The three other Creepers behind him smiled pleasantly. He looked down at Ama. “I am Chotke, leader of the Creepers.”

Gelsh shoved her shoulder. “He’s talking to you. Answer him.”

“I’m Ama,” she said, stood and brushed the dirt from her trousers.

“Ama is a lovely name,” Chotke said. “Tell me, Ama, have you had a chance to see beyond the home of the Undersiders?”

Her throat constricted. Did he know about her nighttime hunts with T’Cri?

“No,” she said, firmly.

“That is a shame. Would you like to? Would you like to see the view from—” He raised his hand and pointed to a spot high atop the cliffs surrounding the Place of Others. “—up there?”

“What’s the trick, Chotke?” Gelsh’s eyes narrowed.

“Trick?” Chotke smirked. “Look at her. She’s not one of yours, she belongs topside and you know this. I would merely offer Ama the chance to enjoy the air from on high for one small moment of what must be a deathly dreary existence below ground. Would you deny her that?”

“Please,” Ama whispered to Gelsh, eyes imploring. “Just once?”

Gelsh glared at Chotke. “If you try anything …”

“So untrusting,” Chotke chided. “Come along, Ama. The ceiling of the world beckons.”

Ama followed silently as her new guide and his small band led her across the amphitheater, between the high rock walls that surrounded the Place of Others, and then up a long sloping rock face with crude stairs carved into it.

“If you have difficulty, let me know,” Chotke said without turning around. “I know how unused to heights most are but you can trust that the view will be worth it. Once you are at the summit you may perhaps understand why we so seldom come to ground to mix among the Others.”

According to the Undersiders, the reason the Creepers didn’t mix with the Others is because they thought their shit was made of gold. Whether or not that was true, Ama was pleased to feel accepted.

The climb up was long, but relatively easy. She was in passable physical shape now, thanks to her hard work below and T’Cri’s training above. Her hosts kept a reasonable pace and were quick to point out hazards and dangers. Most of all, she enjoyed the fresh air and the light of day. The wind was building and far in the distance a black smudge against the sky foretold of the coming Storm.

Chotke slowed, then stopped and waited for Ama to catch up. “This part is slightly precarious.” He pointed to a wide chasm that separated the rock they stood on from the rock they were headed toward. A ladder—constructed from scrap parts of metal and wood—had been laid across the crevasse. “I will cross first, to demonstrate the safety of our equipment, then you follow me. Do not fear. One of ours will be directly behind you.”

“I’m not worried,” Ama said. The ladder looked sturdy enough, and if Chotke was willing to cross it, then she would, too.

Nimble as the fan-feathers who lived on rock faces, Chotke scrambled across the divide. Ama followed him, moving quickly on the ladder as it creaked under her weight.

“Well done!” her guide congratulated her, as she hopped back to solid rock. “You are a natural!”

“Thanks,” she said, returning his generous smile.

He walked her a short distance further, to the highest point, and gestured in a slow circle at the landscape around them. “Breathtaking, is it not?”

Ama had to agree, it was stunning up here. Below, the residents of the PO moved around like tiny insects. Most were looking up in her direction, many were pointing. She picked Gelsh out of the crowd and waved.

This was the first time she had seen the common area in its entirety. It was a perfect location, a pocket in the middle of a circle of high cliffs. Well hidden, well protected. As long as the inhabitants stuck together, they could hide in this place forever.

There was another sight that was not as reassuring. Yulin, out of sight from the Others but only a short distance from the gathering, was bound to a large rock jutting up from the ground. His arms and legs were spread wide and tied tightly. When the Storm came, he would have no protection.

Ama bowed her head and turned away to look behind her. In the opposite direction, she could just make out the top of a formation too precise and angular to be natural rock. It looked like a manmade structure.

“What’s that?” she asked Chotke.

He squinted and frowned. “That was the home of the Stone Tribe. That is where the Slavers now live.”

“It’s so close.” Icy fingers played up and down her spine.

“Too close,” Chotke said. He stared for another minute, then turned away sharply. When he looked back at Ama, the gracious smile had returned. “Have you enjoyed the view?”

“It’s amazing. Thank you for this. I don’t deserve it.’

“Oh,” Chotke said, his smile creeping further up his face, “but you
do
deserve it.” He waved over the other Creepers. “Well then, it is time to rejoin the party.”

“Okay, I—” Ama’s mouth fell open as the three men scurried over the edge of the cliff.

Three
men? There had been four.

She turned to walk back to the ladder but it was gone. Not exactly gone, though. The fourth Creeper, on the far side of the crevasse, had it under his arm and was walking back down the slope.

There was no way to cross back over the crevasse. Ama stepped to the edge of the cliff and watched Chotke and the other two expertly scuttling down the steep rock face.

“Hey!” Ama yelled. “What about me?”

Chotke looked up at her with a grin. “Good luck, Undersider’s pet,” he said, laughing as he descended.

Gelsh watched the Creepers scurry down the cliff, abandoning Ama at a height that made him dizzy. “Sump-chugging skyrat! Shouldn’t have let her go up there. I’m gonna gut him, I swear.”

At his elbow, Payt laughed so hard he started to choke. “C’mon. Good trick, gotta admit that, ay. ’Sides, just a tanskin, not any of ours.”

Gelsh looked around for a weapon and scooped up a sharp-edged rock. “Good trick, ’til she gets killed up there.”

“And if she does get killed?” Payt asked. He was no longer smiling. “Means we don’t have to fill her belly anymore, far as I can see. ’Course, you could be feelin’ different from the rest of us, being all sweet on the tanskin as you are. Taken her for your sleep-ease yet?”