"How are we going to move the bomb?" Hurk asked. He reached out and dusted the window. Through the stained, cracked glass, the tall pencil-shaped bomb sat waiting. He wondered why no one had fired it off. The last time they'd found one of these underground places, it had been empty, except for a mess of rats that paid them no attention and had continued humping even when Dav had fired off a shot right over their heads. The gunshot had echoed so loudly and longly that Hurk hadn't heard anything for a day afterwards.

Before Hurk had time to offer nothing to the conversation, a voice, thick like mud and twice as nasty, gave them an order.

"Hands up you two. Nothing needs killing today, so don't push your luck."

Dav swore under his breath, which sat about halfway up Hurk's leg. He recognised that voice. It was Hyram's son, Clevus, head of 'human resources'. Human was used, in the case of Clevus, in a pretty haphazard way. Dav knew Hurk was out of the ordinary, and he wasn't getting any taller himself, not since he was ten years old, but that's all part of the magic of life. Mothers always told their children that the tentacles they sprouted or the scalps made of stone, these were all part of life and they loved their children. There was no other option. Clevus had never known his mother. His birth had killed her the second she saw what had come about. No nose, a single eye, hands where its elbows should be and legs like a bird. He wasn't as messed up as some raiders Dav had seen in his youth, but he sure wasn't human anymore. A barn yarn went that every full moon, Clevus transformed into a prairie hen and laid eggs in good children's sleeping rolls.

Dav knew better. If Clevus ever were to find a kid in a sleeping roll he'd just as likely kick it. More than likely actually. Clevus was a mean piece of dirt.

"You boys found something worth having, I suppose. May as well shoot ya and take it myself."

"No," said Hurk, his brain swimming around his head like an eel in a barrel.

"Quiet down, Hurk," Dav hissed, but his partner was too far over him to hear the whisper and too determined to live to have paid it any mind, even if he could've heard it.

"What are you saying, stretch? Keep in mind I got this gun and it's pretty good at cutting folks in two, especially folks who tell me no."

Hurk breathed out. His mind calmed down and thoughts began to collect inside his head. If they got shot and killed now, how would they pay off Hyram?

"We owe your dad a whole lot of money. If you shoot us, we can't pay him back."

Clevus, only marginally smarter than Hurk, slowly and reluctantly lowered his shotgun. "Dad wouldn't like that," he said, more to himself than to anyone else in the room.