Arcadian's Asylum. James Axler
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looked at one another, as though they found the one-eyed man beyond their comprehension. The man who had spoken first said, “Others take stuff, want to hurt us. I think they like that bit. It’s not nice.”
Ryan was taken aback. “You don’t try to defend yourselves?”
The man shrugged. “They go soon enough. Then other others come and help, but sometimes they don’t. Mebbe you know them? Mebbe you got more stuff for us?”
A satisfied murmur rippled through the crowd, and they moved forward. Ryan took a step back, not because he thought they would attack, but because for one moment it seemed that they might overwhelm him.
His people took that as their cue to step out into the open. Their presence caused the approaching mob to stop momentarily, before gasping in amazement and moving forward. Before any of Ryan’s people had a chance to draw breath, the ville dwellers were milling around them, touching them and asking questions.
“You know others?”
“You have stuff?”
“Why you so white?”
“Why you so brown?”
Yet none of them waited for answers to the questions they posed before babbling on about something completely different.
Ryan looked, bewildered, over the heads of the milling throng to where he could see Krysty. She shrugged. She was as confused as he was by their behavior.
“They appear to be like sheep,” Doc yelled above the babble. “Passive, and completely without any kind of—”
“What’s sheep?” one of them said, tugging him on the arm.
“I—” Doc began, but was cut short by Jak’s terse comment.
“They’re here. Ones who follow.”
Melting out of the shadows and forming into black-clad pairs holding blasters—was this where his earlier opponent had got his blaster? Ryan wondered—came six teams. Their blasters were raised in the air, but there was little doubting their intent.
“Drop your weapons and come with us,” one of the black-clad men called. “You people,” he added in a harsher tone, “move away from the outlanders.”
The mob did as it had been told. Soon, they were standing apart, watching the proceedings. Ryan and his people were now surrounded on all sides, outnumbered two to one.
“You took out those rebels okay,” the black-clad leader said, as if sensing their mood, “but we’re ready for you, and better trained than that scum.”
“So what do you want? You want a firefight?” Ryan asked in a hard voice, his muscles tensed as he took in the manner in which they had been surrounded. These people were good. But his, he knew, could be better.
“Don’t want that any more than you do,” the men said tightly. “What we want is for you to come with us. Arcadian wants to meet you.”
“He’s got a real strange way of going about that,” Ryan replied.
“Mebbe. But he has his reasons. You might like ’em.”
Ryan took another look around at the black-clad sec, then at his companions. He could see from their expressions that they were with him.
“Okay,” he said slowly, “we’ll come with you. Might be interesting. But we don’t surrender blasters. You got nothing to hide? It won’t matter.”
The sec boss grinned. “Like your style, One-eye. Wouldn’t have it any other way.” He lowered his blaster so that it pointed at the dirt. “Let’s do it.”
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