The Lord of Opium

Mbongeni was asleep in his crib, with Listen curled up beside him. She was sucking her thumb and looked at Matt with wide, scared eyes. Matt immediately looked around and saw the line of eejits next to the kitchen. If they had moved in the time he had gone, there was no evidence of it. Mirasol . . .

Mirasol was standing next to a bed, and around her lay a drift of pictures pulled off the walls—dinosaurs, reptiles, and insects. The thumbtacks had been removed, and now Matt saw where they had gone.

El Bicho was standing next to her and very carefully pressing the tacks into her skin. Her whole right arm glittered with metal as though she were in armor. Mirasol herself showed not a trace of emotion. Her eyes stared straight ahead, unseeing.

Matt hurled himself across the room. “You little crot!” he yelled. He struck the Bug, sending the boy flying across the bed. The Bug screamed and scrambled over the other side. Matt flung himself on the bed, but he was stopped by Listen, who had jumped out of the crib.

“Please, Mr. Patrón. Please help Mirasol,” she cried, grabbing Matt’s ankle. “I tried to stop him, really I did. He wanted to hurt me, but she came between us. Every time he tried to get me, she put herself in the way.”

The red mist that had descended on Matt’s brain cleared. He’d been about to kill El Bicho. He knew it. He panted as though he’d been running a race. He sat down on the bed, his heart pumping.

“We’ve got to take Mirasol to the hospital,” said Listen. “She didn’t even move when he put those tacks in. She didn’t cry or anything, but it’s got to hurt.”

Matt blinked at her. The Bug was still under the bed, screaming.

“Mr. Patrón? Are you awake?”

“Yes,” Matt said dully.

“You can order the eejits to carry Mirasol to the hospital. I can’t,” said the little girl. “I tried.”

At last Matt responded. “Did Dr. Rivas come here?” he asked.

“He dropped the Bug off and left.”

The Bug is the wrong one to kill, thought Matt. Dr. Rivas is the one who knew what would happen. But he couldn’t unleash Cienfuegos on the doctor. He needed him to train the new physicians and nurses. It was another compromise in the battle to save the eejits, like shooting down an aircraft to avert a war. As Dr. Rivas said, you could get used to being evil. Matt got up and gave the orders to the eejits.

23

THE RUINS OF TUCSON

The new hovercraft was large enough to carry cages of owls as well as Matt, Mirasol, and Listen. Listen planted herself sulkily next to the owls, who watched her with round yellow eyes. She had thrown an unholy fit when informed she was to go to Ajo, and it had taken two eejits to subdue her. Only Dr. Rivas’s command to obey the patrón had made any impression on her. And Matt’s promise to send her back later.

Matt had said nothing to Dr. Rivas about Mirasol. What was the point? The girl hadn’t minded the tacks, and her injuries had been slight. A disinfectant spray, an injection of vitamins, and a few crème caramel custards had put everything right.

Cienfuegos climbed into the pilot’s seat. “You didn’t see much on your way here, mi patrón. Now you can get a better idea of your country.”

They flew down the valley and over the huge observatory. Sunlight glinted off the two telescopes, and soon they were traveling north to go around the mountains. “I could fly over them, but there are dangerous downdrafts in the canyons,” said the jefe.

Matt looked out the window, entranced. The other times he’d been in hovercrafts, he’d been either sick or scared. Now he watched the landscape unroll beneath him. Here and there were the ruins of abandoned houses or the sketchy marks of agriculture gone back to the wild. After a while he saw a large town that had been deserted. “That’s Willcox,” said Cienfuegos.

“Where did the people go?” Matt wondered.

“When the Dope Confederacy was established, people were moved either to the United States or Aztlán,” the jefe explained. “It wasn’t a peaceful transition. Thousands died in the conflict.”

“¡Por Dios!” exclaimed Matt. “Why did the governments allow that?”

“The governments had no control. Drug lords battled homeowners; homeowners fought back. The armies of Aztlán and the United States moved inhabitants who cooperated, but the system broke down in many places. It was a bloody time.”

“Was it worth it?”