Down to the Bottom
Nora slings a shotgun on her back and takes point on her gravcycle, leading the way, Taavi driving the flatbed truck behind with Oliver and Balygyr on the back with the rigged-up comm server. Balygyr puts on his high-tech metal headband and three drones launch from the truck bed, hovering above them as they go.
Hansel, Emile, and Shadrach fire up the other bikes. Emile, deep in thought, guards the rear. Hansel and Shadrach try to flank out to ride at the sides, but the narrow badland roads make that difficult with a hoverbike and impossible if they had wheels. Hovering over the rocky ground and cliffs sometimes forces the pair into single file before and behind the truck as they wind their way through the cliffs and bluffs of the landscape.
"Lot of stuff going on, all. Skender and missing children. Petr. Radio tower, our original destination. Marshalls? Scout Nora?" says Taavi over the comms, drawing the others into conversation. The group decides to bypass the pumpjacks and head straight on to the bar.
Heading out of the valley of Whighte Farm, you realize you must be following the trail that Petyr walked. Every 150 meters or so is a dead steer, papery flesh over black, decayed innards and bones... it looks like each has laid here all winter and not just two days. As you reach the edge of the valley, the trail stops.
Hansel recognizes the situation as he observes and puts together the clues - the discarded canvas, tire tracks, the end of the dead cattle.
"Looks like he sucked the life out of 'em... and got here, to where he had his getaway truck." He considers.
"No... it's a car. A damn nice car, for the badlands. And there, that looks like the rags left of his suit, cast on that bush." There is a moment of silence, the grim reminder that Petyr escaped... whatever he is now.
Nora revs her throttle abruptly and peels out, the rest following behind as she heads deeper into the badlands.
"How's the boy doing, Nora?" tries
Shadrach over comms, but there's no answer. Her bike just speeds up a bit more, racing through the desolate landscape.
"How are you doing, Oliver? "Ever been out this way?" asks
Balygyr of the boy as they sit on the truck.
Oliver shrugs focused on tinkering with the hand radio he is holding, despite the shaking of the truck bed beneath them.
"I've never left the valley.
Not ever. Grandpa didn't allow it. Too risky, he said. Don't know that mom ever did either... but she always had a grudge on that bar. She get mad if anyone mentioned it."
Emile keeps to himself at the rear, keeping an eye out. He wonders how the valley-cattle and roaming bison will get on, now that the fences are done. There's goats watching from the cliffs, varmints popping their heads out of ground holes at the noise and then disappearing. Nothing threatens, which he's glad for. Strange, though, as dusk comes on, there's nothing alive around here at all anymore. Just scrag-grass and striped, eroded stone cliffs.
As dusk falls, the bar is apparent. In the absolute dark of the overcast night, the neon, fully-lit road sign on an 80-foot pole is visible from miles away... cracked and broken but otherwise wide, fat highways intersecting near it.
You pull up in a parking lot big enough to house all the cars of Prudence three times over, a desolate concrete sheet cracked and now pocked with young trees that pushed through from beneath. The remains of a fill station, long since stripped of pumps and parts, mark the near corner. The "bar" is brightly lit at the back edge, now having spread out to take over the whole wing of a strip mall. It is lined in glowing lights, illuminating 200 meters of empty concrete in every direction, about a dozen cars parked outside. At the right end are the open bays of a mechanic, also still lit but not as garishly or invitingly.
Balygyr's drones, taking a loop overhead, identify that this parking lot is nestled on the edge of a plateau, a drop making egress out the rear impossible - security provided by the natural features. There is enough room for a rough access road around the building, he notes, and that the road drops to a floor below the building itself, a few closed garage bay doors closed in the darkness there. The valley floor is another 50 meters below that on the other side.
Nora turns off her bike and dismounts.
"Oliver, you stay here," she calls backwards, then starts walking towards the front door.
