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Overplaying a really weak hand, Macon thought. He spoke into his radio, ordered the Transporter to pull up and Casp to cover the door.
"Nobody leaves without my say-so," Macon said, when Casp's bulk filled the front door frame.
The Indian looked scared. Macon wondered if he'd do something stupid with the hammer pick, if push came to shove.
Everyone whispered about the Reapers, the suicides, the Resistance, and the rebels, but most of those bound for harvesting temporized and rationalized until the last few seconds, when death stared them in the face and effective resistance was impossible. Nine-tenths of the Georgia Control were inching toward harvesting, they just wouldn't see it.
Better give them a rationalization.
"I'm here to do a labor draft," he said, slowly and clearly. Some of these border types spoke English as though they'd learned it from a Scrabble scoreboard with a few letters missing. "You're all recruited. Easy work for one day, fifty Control dollars plus a week's ration draw."
"Easy how, boss?" the redhead asked. She had an odd twang to her speech, but she knew how to address Control authority.
Macon smiled. "You have to stand holding a sign with an arrow on it and make sure the arrow always points the way I tell you. We have a convoy heading up into Kentucky, our maps are iffy and signage is gone. There will be military police at the major stops and intersections, but there are still a few turns around downed bridges and whatnot that I need managed."
Macon's first job he'd supervised as a Youth Vanguard had been something very similar, near the Florida border. Only there you had to worry about hungry fauna lunging out of the Okefenokee.
"Finish up your food and have a big drink of Royal Pep on the Control, you probably won't get to eat again until midnight tomorrow morning, if our vehicles are delayed. I'm going to make a pit stop. I want you all ready to go and earn up by the time I'm finished."
He walked up to the redhead and took her by the upper arm. She cocked her head.
"You, darlin'-I've been sleeping in a seat for nine hours. How about helping me work the knots out?"
"I'd rather hold something warmer than a sign, boss," she said. "The bathroom okay? It's all I got."
Macon caught the eye of the Encompass distributor.
"Hey, young man. You look ambitious. Why don't you be foreman and organize some sandwiches to go." They were like sheep. Once you got one moving, the rest would follow.
The whore carefully pinched out her cigarette, held up four fingers to the Indian, and sauntered for the john. He gave her an odd salute in return, as though he were animating a shadow animal on the wall.
"What an asshole," she said. She led him into the washroom, which was cleaner than he'd expected. Apart from a few missing tiles and an overfull waste basket, the place was spotless.
She prattled about how she used to "entertain" in one of the best establishments on the Memphis waterfront and that he reminded her of a better class of men who tipped well.
The jukebox in the diner came on, some song about a long drive ahead before being reunited with absent love. Crap, he really was in the weeds. Well, he'd made his choice.
He wouldn't take any chances. He reached for her, eliciting a moan, and then patted her down, eliciting a what gives, looking for weapons. He found a small knife, a short blade with a nice sheep's-foot handle, with a fork and spoon wrapped up in a damp wash-cloth that smelled like bleach. He dumped them in the overflowing wastebasket.
"Hey, I eat with those," she protested.
"Wash 'em," Macon said. "Take off that chain belt, too. Put it in the trash with the rest."
"Who you know ever got killed with a dog chain?" she said.
Macon patted the trigger guard on his gun with his index finger. "I don't take chances in the sticks."
The whore took off her shirt so slowly you might think she was paid by the hour. Then, rubbing her nipples in absentminded eroticism, she began to talk price.
"If you know what's good for you, you'll give me one just to stay in the good graces," Macon said. He should really be enjoying this more, his chances of getting a woman in the near future weren't great.
"C'mon, boss," she said. "Five bucks. For anything and everything. That's what you tip a doorman in Atlanta."
So began a tiresome argument, her arms crossed on her chest, holding up her small, undernourished breasts. Decent muscle on her shoulders but she could use a few weeks on Georgia ham. Amazing how so many of these people who tried to scratch an existence away from the Kurians wound up thin, sick, and haggard, like wild mutts compared to the sleek German Shepherds of the Control.
Whatever she did, even if she blew him like an eight-hundred dollar private dancer at the Velvet Cloud in Limotown, he'd bag and deliver her. Macon rather liked the idea that the very last skeet dispersing in her body would be his.
After what seemed like endless negotiations, he gave her a dollar. The price of a breath mint. Plus his personal guarantee that she wouldn't have to be out all night holding up a sign.
