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He learned that and a great deal more at the dinner break. This time Zak fed the legworm on bags of peanut shells and ground-up acorn. Price's mule liked the smell of the nuts and joined in, chomping contentedly but rather messily compared to the legworm, who took earth, sod, and shell together in a single gulp.
"If we have to move fast, most of what we carry is food for the mount," Zak said. His face and forearms had dozens of tiny scars.
"How do you make it turn?"
Zak pointed to the rein. A metal loop projected from the beast.
"Yes, but what does that do?"
"Oh, you want the science teacher version? Well, a worm's such a big bastard, there's not much we can do that'll influence it. So we make it think that all its motions are its idea. All those whiskers are wired, so to speak, to an organ under the skin on either side that looks a little like an accordion. When it turns, to keep from rubbing against a tree or whatever, the accordion contracts and it turns. That rein is attached to the accordion, and when we pull it closed the beast turns."
"And keeping the nose up?"
"It's got a balancing organ kind of like your ear in the top of its front end. A little jerk makes it feel like it's out of balance, so it'll stick its head straight forward until the organ feels back in equilibrium. But if they're fed regularly they don't graze all the time. They don't need all that much if it's fair-quality feed. All the dirt they pull up in the wild is a lot of wasted effort."
"How does it breathe?"
"That's something. Here." Zak's leathers creaked as he squatted next to it. "Look underneath. That lighter flesh? We call that the 'membrane' but it's actually a good two feet thick. That thing gets oxygen into its bloodstream. Water don't make much of a difference, but they get sluggish as hell and try to find high ground- though sometimes swamp water will kill them."
"I've never seen one this close."
"Where you from?"
"Iowa. Got out young. My dad worked for, you know-"
Zak nodded. "Me too. Indiana. Practically grew up under a tower. The P worked electricity. Cool stuff, but not if you're reporting to one of those pale-assed jumpers twice a day."
"I left home at eleven," Valentine said. "Ugly scene."
"So what does the flea-ranch over there want with the Bulletproof?"
"I'm just trying to get from point A to point B."
"We'll be at camp a little after sundown. Don't fall off."
Gib drove the legworm a little faster through open country. After a few unheeded yawlps, the mule trotted behind to avoid being dragged. The rolling blue hills left off and they climbed onto the beginning of a plateau, where they gave man, grog, and mule a breather. Valentine saw wooded mountaintops in the distance.
"Keep your guns handy," Zak warned as night fell, looking over the landscape with a monocular. "There are guerillas in those mountains."
They struck a road and followed it to a waypoint town of a dozen empty homes, unless you counted barn owls and mice, a couple of hollow corner bars, and an overgrown gas station and market once dependent on the farm clientele.
Valentine marked fresh legworm furrows everywhere. Some ran right up to the road surface before bouncing off like a ricocheting bullet.
They passed up a rise, and a boy standing guard over the road and his bicycle waved them toward a commanding-looking barn. A pile of weedy rubble that might once have been a house stood close to the road, and a crisscross of torn earth emanated from it. Valentine guessed that from a low-flying plane the landscape would look like an irregular spiderweb. Legworms stood everywhere, pale blue billboards in the moonshine.
"Who's that with you, Zak?" a man afoot called.
"Visitors looking for the Dispatcher. I'm vouching, and I'll bring 'em in. Where is he?"
"Up in the barn."
Zak turned around, an easy operation on the wide back of the legworm. "We're here, folks. You'll have to leave your guns, of course."
"Urn, how do we ... ?" Duvalier asked.
"Get a newbie pole, Royd," Cookie called down.
