“Not serious? You said that I almost died,” Jask reminded him, squirming to take the pressure off his left buttock. He ached from head to foot.
“And that you did. But you're from Pure stock — which means you come from people who are so inbred that they've become weak and susceptible to the slightest infection.”
Jask thought about that for a while, did not like the implications, but restrained himself from making a hasty and belligerent reply. He did, at least, owe Tedesco that much courtesy. He said, '' You used most of the water on me and lost a couple of days' traveling time. Why?”
“You couldn't go on,” the bruin said.
Jask shrugged, found that the simple gesture required more effort than it reasonably should have, and said, “Why not kill me, then? You threatened to kill me before this.”
“Would you rather I had?” Tedesco asked, avoiding the question.
“It might have been for the best,'' Jask said, considering his answer carefully. He thought of how far they were from Lady Nature, the enclave, everything he knew and trusted. “I certainly can't go on for a few days yet; I'm too weak to stand, let alone walk. Unless it rains, we're going to be in dire need of water because my illness required so much… Yes, you should have killed me.”
Tedesco was frozen for a moment, staring hard at the smaller man, then stood so abruptly that he startled his sick companion.
“You ungrateful, cowardly shit! You stupid, sniveling, self-pitying little bastard!'' His voice was quite a bit above a scream and just less than a roar of thunder. “You people in the enclaves look down your noses at the 'tainted' and loudly proclaim your superiority, but you couldn't survive a minute in a fair contest with any mutated man. Every last one of you is a vampire, sucking life from what the prewar men left you, leeches that don't contribute anything!”
“I—” Jask began.
Tedesco shouted him down. “You say that muscles are a sign of the primitive, that a civilized man should be puny while machines do all his work and protect him. That's nothing more than a cheap philosophical excuse for what you people have let yourselves become. What are your people? Slugs, degenerates, maggots, turds, all of you!”
“Really, you can't say that—”
Tedesco whirled, swooping in at him, reached for him with a suddenness that was terrifying, his lips drawn from his teeth, eyes wide. He grasped Jask's shoulders and lifted him half off the ground, held him up so that they were face to face.'' Maybe I should have let you die. And if I had any common sense, maybe I should have put a power bolt through your brain!” As the bruin spoke, he sprayed Jask's face with warm saliva. “But I didn't! And since you pulled through whatever it was you had, you might as well be made useful.”
Jask tried to pull free, couldn't manage it.
“Starting tomorrow,” the mutant said, “we're going to take that scrawny, underfed, undermotivated body of yours, and we're going to turn it and you into a valuable part of this expedition. We're going to get you up and moving. We're going to start you on an exercise program — push-ups, sit-ups, knee-bends, the whole works. We're going to put muscle where there isn't any, whether you think it makes you primitive or not. You're going to start eating well. If you can keep breakfast down, you'll take a full stick of meat, half a loaf of bread and canned fruit for lunch. You'll have two sticks of meat and a quarter pound of cheese for supper. Protein and more protein—”
“I don't like that meat,” Jask said.
“Tough luck,” the bruin said, letting him fall back to the ground. “Starting tomorrow, you're going to do a lot of things you don't like.”
“You're just wasting your time,” Jask said. “You could go on by yourself and cover more ground then—”
“No.”
“I'm only a hindrance.”
“You're coming along.”
Angry, Jask recovered more of his strength than he had possessed ever since he'd come out of his fever dreams. He sat up, swaying, his lips tight and his hands fisted. “There's no good reason for me to go!” he screamed, his voice not unlike that of a petulant child. “I'll be in your way. I don't want to go deeper into the Wildlands, away from Lady Nature. I don't want to go through any rigorous exercise program. You see? There simply isn't any reason for you to make me do all this.”
“There is,” Tedesco said, savagely, furious for being forced to reveal his reasons but left with no other response. “I don't want to have to go all that way alone.” He turned away from Jask and stalked to the other side of the clearing where he stood for a long while, watching the colored lights in the jewels.
15
For the following twenty days they lived by strict routine. They rose early and breakfasted in whatever clearing they had spent the night, then set out on their trek into the jeweled sea. Each day they walked not fewer than ten kilometers and not more than fifteen, choosing another campsite — with larger-than- average trees — by noon or shortly thereafter. They ate lunch. They rested to permit proper digestion. Then, Tedesco became a taskmaster without equal, daily increasing the number of exercises Jask was to do, stretching his pupil's endurance, building his strength. At supper they talked about what they had seen during the day's walk, about what they might expect ahead of them. After an hour's rest the evening was passed in weaponry instruction. In just two weeks Jask had become quick enough and sure enough to rate Tedesco's approval as a knife fighter — and in another week he was fairly accomplished with the throwing knife as well, striking the trunks of the trees eight times out of every ten tosses. They went to bed early and slept soundly and began the routine all over again. And again.
Water was no problem, for rain had fallen seven times in those twenty days; the channels in the jeweled sea acted as drainage spouts for the storm, gushing white water up to their ankles. They found it a simple enough matter to fill their containers whenever this happened.
Food was a knottier problem, for they rapidly depleted what Tedesco had packed and what Jask had crammed into the gray cloth sack in the warehouse. Tedesco used the power rifles to shoot at some of the larger birds that nested in the jewels and that sometimes flew low over the roof of a clearing. Now and then he bagged one of them, though the power bolt often tore them or charred them so badly that they were not fit to eat. The bruin eventually rationed his own food and cut back on his intake, but continued to force Jask to consume his limit and then some.
One night, when he had eaten more than Tedesco and thought he saw a glint of hunger in the mutant's dark eyes, Jask said, “This isn't right. It's plain that you've lost twenty pounds during the last two weeks, while I've been gorging myself.”
“Don't forget,'' Tedesco said, “that you're the one doing all the exercises; you need to eat more than I do.”
“That doesn't alter the fact that you're beginning to look positively emaciated.”
“I can stand the loss,'' Tedesco growled, though his coat of fur was hanging loosely on him, as if he had purchased it two sizes too large in some odd clothing store.
“I could stop exercising for a while and cut back on what I eat.”
“No,” Tedesco said. “We'll be out of these jewel formations soon, and we'll find wildlife and fruit, berries and nuts and vegetables enough for an army.”
“Will we?” Jask asked, clearly disbelieving.
“Yes.”
“In the Wildlands?”
“Why not?”
“How do you know that anything that grows in the Wildlands is safe to eat?” Jask inquired.
Tedesco harumphed and said, “Don't come on with that religious crap again, please. Not everything that grows and walks in the Wildlands is evil or poisonous. The place may be less hospitable than the lands we come from, but it is not the private domain of any supernatural being like the Ruiner.”