The Ride. Tom Ph.D. Anderson
in a position to find out if you could do it again?” asked Mildred.
“Not in waking life,” I told them.
All three of us touched glasses, said “AMEN,” and drained them.
<><>
After the new owner said his goodbyes and closed the door behind him, Michael and Mildred just sat and looked at each other.
Michael broke the silence first. “What do you think about him?”
“You realize Bob’s just a little boy in an adult’s body. He’s just a sweet, little boy,” said Mildred.
“You did watch those recordings? You saw the way Bob killed those gloride monsters?” said Michael.
“And we both saw how close those Crocs came to cutting him in half. When I think about what that tic would have done to him it makes the back of my thighs start to ache. What kind of an owner do you think he’ll be?” Mildred asked.
“Bob said he wanted me to run the place as if I owned it. He trusts me to keep the books. Money is not going to be a problem. It’s going to be nice not to have to squeeze each penny three ways before I spend it. Bob came because he loved the wine. Now I think Bob loves Cocuru more than he loves the wine. I think Bob loves Cocuru as much as you do Mildred.”
“And you don’t love Cocuru Michael?”
“I love you. You are Cocuru to me Millie.” Michael turned on the music and pulled his wife from her chair. Michael held her tight. As they moved to the music Mildred let herself melt into him. Mildred felt the bulge in Michael’s pants rub against her leg and wasn’t surprised when his hand slipped under her clothes and caressed her bottom, Michael's flesh touching hers. Mildred knew her husband. Michael always made love to her before he threw himself into a big project and Mildred would hardly see him for days at a time.
Mildred had loved this man from the planet Thracsis since the first time she met Michael. She had put Michael first in her heart from the first time he looked in her eyes as they danced. Mildred would love Michael the rest of her life, Mildred’s last breath a whisper of her love for him. Michael wasn’t lying or twisting his words. Mildred was the planet Cocuru to him, all softness and gentleness and beauty beyond compare. Mildred had been first in Michael’s heart since the first time he held her. Mildred would still be first in Michael’s heart on the last day of his life. The days in between a walking dream.
◊ I gave Michael a year’s salary as a bonus and agreed to give him half of any profits the winery made. This seemed fair, as I knew almost nothing about wine accept how to drink large quantities of it. The winery had been allowed to run down. After paying for the winery, including a fat commission for the Barrillean merchant, which I did not begrudge him, paying for new equipment and the repair of old equipment; I still had enough money to run the winery for a year without any money coming in. I was now officially a gentleman wine producer and I would never need to deal with a gloride monster again.
My master gardener Michael had always wanted to develop wines by mixing grapes from other planets with the house grapes. I approved of this. The winery only used one variety of house grapes to make the house wine I loved, the idea of a new house wine, as I was a new owner and represented a new house, appealed to me. There will always be the old house grapes and the old house wine will always be produced.
I just met Michael and Mildred and I felt like I had known them forever. They introduced me to a man a bit older than Michael named Cedric. I hired Cedric to run my household the way he thinks is best, just as I had hired Michael to run the winery the way he thinks is best. Cedric reminds me of the nicest of the men who raised me at my Uncle’s estate on Udell. I think I am going to love it here.
I still had every intention of traveling to other planets, but that would have to wait. My gloride monster killing days were over. The possibility that the next time a gloride monster attacked me my ability might not take over and save me was a chance I never wanted to take again.
<><>
Michael should have been exhausted, but he had never felt so full of life. Buying new equipment, supervising the repair of old equipment, it was amazing how much you can get done when money isn’t a problem. The fun of taking bids on the repair of the irrigation system and repairing buildings when you know you can afford the best. Michael had the fun of telling the men working on the estate that the winery wasn’t shutting down so they could stop scrambling to find other work.
Even Barnabus was happy. “Michael, I’d hate to see you and Mildred leave. Who else can my wife Sarah and I have over to play cards who won’t mind losing?”
Silus was the one sour note, but he took his defeat with humor. “If I’d known there was another buyer I’d have paid half again as much and still thought I was making a good deal. It was just so much fun having old Sam between a rock and a hard place. The man you’re working for is swimming in a lake of luck. If I were you I would jump in there with Bob the first chance I got.”
Michael didn’t tell anyone about the ghoul hunter part. Cocuru doesn’t have any gloride deposits and is real short on gloride monsters. If Bob stayed on Cocuru the man’s ghoul hunter days are over.
The man’s, all of Michael’s children were far older than Bob and his grandchildren almost as old. The boy from Udell did seem to have a knack for being in the right place at the right time. Swimming in a lake of luck, it sounds nice, but you can drown in any kind of lake.
With his ship finally out of Cocuru’s gravitational grip, Merritt sat and watched Cocuru shrink in the rear monitor. That such a skill as Bob’s would not be used seemed a terrible waste. The boy just needed the proper incentive to go back to ghoul hunting. Merritt had heard the Kinzu were having a problem with a pod of setti in a gloride mine on the planet Kinzu Prime. Merritt would check into the matter.
CHAPTER 3
THE KINZU HOOK
◊I had not finished repairing the big house, the large wood and brick building the previous owner had lived in, when Merritt called from Cocuran Space Control asking for permission to land on my property.
Merritt had agreed to buy my entire first year’s production of wine. The Falcus Federation was interested in buying wine from the man who helped them from once again becoming subject worlds of the Sindar Empire, but the wine was still being aged and wasn’t ready yet.
I could not believe Merritt had made a mistake in the timing of his return, as everything Merritt did would involve a profit or a potential profit. I could only believe he had come to sell me something. Merritt had to know my funds were diminished. I didn’t have the money to buy anything that would make a trip to Cocuru profitable.
When the Kinzu warrior stepped out of the ship after Merritt, I could not believe my eyes. As a child I had lived for tales of Kinzu adventures. The Kinzu were the white knights of the galaxy. Taller than a man with shoulders twice as broad and five times as strong, with a narrow waist and folds of black skin on their heads, which from a distance resembles thick black hair. The gloride planet they had developed on had resulted in their hides being thick and tough, but they were more than just physical power and speed. To a Kinzu honor and justice were everything.
A Kinzu warrior will keep his word or die trying. A Kinzu warrior will not twist his words to say one thing while meaning another. Have the Kinzu on your side and you will prevail, incur their wrath and you will fail. Beware lying to a Kinzu. They can look into your soul and uncover any falsehoods.
Since the first meeting between humans and Kinzu, the words hero and Kinzu have been interchangeable. They were the stuff of adventure tales to tell small children to get them to finish their chores and eat their vegetables.
The Kinzu were the ones who would come to the rescue in the nick of time or find a way out when things seemed hopeless. Believing the Empire of the Lan-Thu was a source of justice for all thinking beings, they became the Emperor’s bodyguard. Their betrayal by the evil Emperor Thu-Lan-Thu was said