Page 12 of Dustwalker

“What truth are you referring to?” Ronin faced hisguest, though Warlord didn’t look away from the stage.

“The truth of my city. Cheyenne is an oasis in a desert, a sanctuary. I know there are other towns out there, but none are like this place. And that’s because I’ve forged order in a chaotic world. That’s why Cheyenne is still standing. That’s why we have prosperity and comfort.”

“Even chaos has an order to it.”

Warlord’s finger stilled, and he frowned. “Chaos birthed the world we’re forced to endure. It’s a world that needs to be tamed. Orderbrings prosperity, which benefits us all. Even the meatbags.”

“What does that have to do with me? Am I an agent of chaos, a thing to be tamed?”

“No. You’re capable. Never had a walker come through who brought in so much scrap so regularly. You come back damaged sometimes, but you always come back.” Warlord turned his gaze to Ronin; his optics were the gray of old steel. “How many have you ended out there? How many have you left behind to be claimed by the Dust?”

Ronin’s hands twitched on his lap. The faces of every human and bot he’d destroyed were preserved in his memory, frozen eternally in the instant of their death or deactivation. He would carry them until his own end, always with perfect clarity. Yet it was the memories he couldn’t place, the faces that drifted up from his damaged core, the ones from before the Blackout, that concerned him most.

There were hundreds more of those.

“You’re a danger, dustwalker. Not because you’ve killed. Most of us have done that.” Warlord’s finger resumed tapping, slowly but forcefully, no longer with any regard to the rhythm. “You’re a danger because you disregard the rules. The rules are what set this place apart, what raised it above the rest. Otherwise, it would be the same as all the other ruins you’ve picked through. Another gravestone in a worldwide cemetery.”

“I should have sheltered in the Dust tonight.”

Warlord slammed his fist on the table. “No.”

Several patrons glanced over and quickly looked away.

He leaned toward Ronin, his scarred face still impassive despite the intensity in his optics. “You should have shown some fucking respect.”

“Your guards haven’t earned my respect.”

“You shelter here in private quarters becauseIallow it. I offer that to all bots, because we’re the ones who are rebuilding this world and making it whole again. All I ask is that my rules are followed. They’re not difficult. Every bot that wears my mark has the authority to enforce those rules. Disrespecting them is disrespecting me.”

Ronin forced his jaw closed and temporarily cut power to his vocal modulator to keep any words from escaping. Dozens of bots wore Warlord’s mark. Ronin would never make it out of the market if Warlord commanded it.

“You took a few hits out there,” Warlord said, easing back into his chair and swinging his optics to the dancers. “Behave yourself, so you don’t take a few more on your way to the clinic.”

Ronin pressed a metal hand to the table and pushed himself up. A strange sensation skittered over his palm, and his processors, unbidden, ran a simulation—if he unslung his rifle, he could empty the magazine into Warlord’s chest. Power cell, memory banks, CPU…at this range, it would all be annihilated. The simulation ended with Ronin torn apart by the behemoth at the front door. There weren’t enough bullets in Cheyenne to stop Comp.

Still, the idea was strangely tempting.

He shoved his hands into his coat pockets. Zeke should’ve nearly been done with his assessment by now. With a last glance at the stage, Ronin left Kitty’s. He couldn’t determine whether the credit he’d spent for admission had been wasted.

CHAPTER FOUR

For a long while, Lara lay awake. The shock and fear of having a bot enter her home lingered for hours after its departure. Every sound—every creaking board, every distant coyote howl, every clang of the chimes—could’ve been a sign of the bot’s return.

Exhaustion eventually claimed her.

She awoke from a fitful sleep, more tired than before, to find the gray light of dawn seeping through the edges of the doorway.

Lara sat up on her pallet, plucked the canteen off the floor, and studied it in the dim light of the coming day. Herpayment. Payment for a bot spying on her, violating her home, and destroying what little safety she’d felt here.

Will it come back?

Her arm tensed, and she struggled with the urge to throw the container against the wall, to batter it into a dented, useless clump of metal.

But the bot was gone, and the canteen was hers. A valuable item, regardless of its source, no different than the pitcher she’d given Gary and Kate. Despite her anger, she couldn’t bring herself to throw away something useful.

Though she wanted nothing more to do with bots, there was no changing last night’s events. What was done was done.

Lowering the canteen to her lap, she brushed her fingers over its worn canvas covering. All the bot had asked of her was a dance. Nothreats, no demands. It hadn’t even reached for its weapon. Not that it would’ve needed one…