The Lord of Opium

“We’ve got to go,” Happy Man bleated. “Please, Glass Eye. We can’t survive here. There aren’t enough of us. Make the Baby Patrón open the border.”

“Why am I plagued with such stupidity?” shouted Dabengwa. “Who told you to go joyriding when we’re in the middle of a war? I should have you skinned and nailed up on a wall as a warning to others.”

“I meant no harm,” babbled Happy Man. “I’ve always been your most loyal follower.”

“Drop him,” said Glass Eye. The eejit obediently opened his arms, and Hikwa fell to the floor with a loud shriek.

“Ai! It hurts! I need a doctor!”

“This is the treatment you get,” said Dabengwa, kicking Happy Man’s ankle. “Now you will open the holoport, boy, and end the lockdown.”

Matt gathered up his courage. “I’ll never do that,” he said, and braced himself for a blow. But it didn’t come. Instead, Glass Eye turned to Listen and grabbed her by the throat. She tried to pull away, but he tightened his grip and she struggled for breath.

“You have seen what I can do. Think carefully.” Glass Eye loosened his grip slightly, and Listen gasped.

Matt dropped his hands to show compliance. He knew the man could snap the little girl’s neck. And he knew that nothing he tried would make the slightest difference. If he attacked, the soldiers would be on him. If he agreed to open the border, it would only postpone the inevitable. Ultimately, Glass Eye would not let either of them live.

Death then, he decided. It would trap the invaders, and Daft Donald and Cienfuegos could finish them off. Opium would remain sealed. Once, he had believed that the country would die without supplies, but that was before he had learned about the biosphere. When the rest of them were dead, the Mushroom Master would free his people and Opium would become the new biosphere.

Matt looked at Listen and hesitated. His hand brushed against a lump in his pocket, and suddenly he remembered El Patrón’s advice: Just because they took your weapons doesn’t mean you aren’t armed. He grabbed Tam Lin’s flashlight and turned it to maximum. A beam ten times the brightness of the sun shot out and struck Dabengwa’s eyes. The drug lord screamed and dropped Listen. He clawed at his face, making mindless groans. His whole body seemed to convulse, as though the various parts of it were at war with one another.

Matt turned off the flashlight. Even the reflection of it dazzled him, and he couldn’t see where to go. But a hand reached through the brilliance and dragged him away. “Good thing I had the sense to close my eyes,” a man said.

They ran until they got outside, and Matt’s vision began to recover. He saw the eejit with Listen slung over his shoulder. “Put me down. I can’t breathe,” she cried. She swayed and held on to him. “Crap! What happened back there?”

“Something I’m sure Sor Artemesia would call a miracle,” said the eejit. “It’s a good thing you still had Tam Lin’s flashlight, mi patrón, because I didn’t know how I was going to take on so many.”

Matt’s heart skipped a beat. “Cienfuegos?”

“At your service,” said the jefe, bowing.

“How did you—”

Cienfuegos smiled. “Nobody notices eejits. I had a devil of a time locating you, Don Sombra. Couldn’t you have dropped a few bread crumbs on the trail?”

“I was out of bread crumbs,” said Matt. He felt like collapsing, the relief was so great.

“I tossed tranquilizer beads around as we left, but we’d better make ourselves scarce.” They walked through the gardens at a normal pace so as not to draw attention. Cienfuegos went in front, with the hangdog posture of an eejit.

49

THE ABANDONED OBSERVATORY

They passed the soldiers throwing water on the lab.

“I couldn’t believe how easy that was,” said the jefe. “I simply walked inside with a flamethrower, and no one questioned it. People ignore eejits at their peril.”

“Where are we going?” asked Matt.

“We can’t stay here, and it’s too dangerous to cross the hospital grounds and head for the chapel. Our friends are fine, by the way. Daft Donald has set up a command post nearby. No, I think we’ll head for the observatory.”

Matt fell silent. Sunlight shone through the trees and cast patterns on the ground. Here and there a beam caught the flash of mica on a stone. Birds swooped out of trees and flew close to the ground until they reached the safety of a yucca. Matt felt the wonder of being alive, of staying alive. Listen, too, was uncharacteristically quiet.