On the thirtieth floor, Sector Blue, I knocked on an apartment door. There were some sounds of furniture being shoved about quickly, then a voice from the other side. “Yeah?”
“Sam.”
“Whitesun?”
I tried not to laugh. I hadn’t been given an ID challenge in ages. “Everclear.”
The door unlocked instantly, and I stepped through. Crash was leaning up against the wall, and she hurriedly shut the door again. She had a gun in her hand.
“You in trouble too?” I laughed.
“Some. Lying low. I was gonna bug out to Haiti for a few weeks. Sam, you really have come at a bad time, I’m sorry.”
I nodded. It was nice to hear an Australian accent again, and even better that it was hers. “It’s okay, I understand. So you know, I managed to hook up some accom at short notice, no drama. Thanks, though.”
She looked a little relieved. “Oh, good. I wasn’t sure how we’d cope. Hey, Danny,” she called out.
A voice came from down a corridor, presumably a bedroom. “Yeah?”
“All clear.”
A guy carrying an energy rifle stepped into the room. He eyed me for a moment, then slung it onto the couch. I flinched, expecting it to go off.
“Nah, it ain’t loaded. Didn’t have time to grab the ammo,” he said in a raw and obvious American accent, extending a hand to me. “Danny.”
“Sam. How do you know Crash?”
“Girlfriend.”
I chuckled and glanced at her. “Nice catch.”
“Thanks, man.”
She flipped me the bird. “Sam’s my ex-fiancé,” she said to Danny. “Split five years ago.”
He laughed and stared me, eyebrows shooting up toward his hairline. “You mean you’re the…?”
“Yeah, that ex-fiancé,” I said.
“So you… and the whole Asakura thing?”
Crash looked about as uncomfortable as I felt. I didn’t like talking about that.
“Danny, I told you not to talk about it,” she said tersely.
“Sorry, babe. Well, sure is nice to meet you, Sam.”
“Likewise,” I said. “So, Crash, why are you two on the run?”
It was Danny’s turn to look uncomfortable. “Yeah, that’s my fault. Just a little misunderstanding between me and some old friends.”
“A misunderstanding between you and an old friend’s ship,” muttered Crash.
Danny chuckled. “Yeah, not to mention the two chickens, or the whole thing with the baseball bat and the can of engine grease.”
There was a pause, then both of them burst out laughing. I sat down on the couch next to the energy rifle.
“Sorry,” Crash wheezed between cackles, “sorry, but we’ve been wound pretty tight the last few days, so it’s good to be somewhere a little more secure, where we can let our hair down a little.”
I shrugged. “I was just the same last night. I spent the last eight months in a desert wasteland, hunted by flesh-eating mutants, running out of food. Felt good going down the pub last night and relaxing with a pretty Syrr girl I’d met that arvo. How do you think I managed to line up someplace else to crash so fast?”
They both stopped laughing suddenly. Crash stared at me as though I’d sprouted an extra head. “Eight months being hunted by what?”
“You heard,” I nodded, laughing. “Flesh-eating mutants. I’ve been shipwrecked on Earth II for the last eight months. Managed to get a lift off-planet with a salvage crew. Absolute stroke of luck. Vig was with me when I got stranded, but we split up and I haven’t seen him since. That’s why I’m here. I need help finding him. I need to call up some of the old crowd and put together a crew.”
Life on the Fringes 