McCade's Bounty Read Free Page A

lifting over his head, and a distraught bartender. Broken furniture and shattered glass littered the floor.
    Phil stood about seven feet tall, weighed in at more than three hundred pounds, and looked like a bear. He had brown eyes, a short muzzle, and thick brown fur. He wore a kilt of his own design, carried a machine pistol as a side arm, and wore a twelve-inch knife strapped to his right leg.
    Originally human, Phil had been biosculpted for work on ice-worlds and liked Alice for that reason. Phil was not only a qualified biologist, but a one-variant army, with infrared vision, amplified muscle response, and razor-sharp durasteel teeth.
    He could also go into full augmentation for short periods of time, a state that burned tremendous amounts of energy and left him completely exhausted.
    In this case however the variant hadn't even worked up a sweat. This was partly due to the asteroid's light gravity but mostly because of his enormous strength. Phil was holding a man over his head and lecturing him at the same time. The man looked scared and, as McCade knew, had every reason to be.
    Meanwhile the bartender, or perhaps Meck himself, danced around Phil and begged him to stop. It did little good. Phil had something to say and said it.
    " . . . So, you can understand how I felt. No one likes to be singled out, identified as different, and subjected to verbal abuse. Especially by low-life cretins like you. Though generally a proponent of positive reinforcement, I think punishment has its place as well, which explains why I'm going to throw you through that wall."
    Fortunately for the man in question this particular wall was made of lightweight plastic with a fire retardant foam core. He went through it with no problem at all. As luck would have it, however, there was nothing but solid rock on the other side. He hit with an audible thump.
    McCade winced. Some of the crowd had filtered back in and lifted the unconscious man from the debris. He was alive but would spend the next few days in the rock's infirmary.
    Phil ran an experienced eye over the damage, reached into his belt pouch, and produced five gold imperials. "This should cover the damage with something left over. Agreed?"
    The bartender, a middle-aged man with radiation-burned skin and a sizable potbelly, nodded. He had no desire to engage Phil in protracted negotiations. "Agreed."
    Phil smiled and revealed rows of gleaming teeth. "Good. Now, if it's all the same to you, I'll finish my beer."
    So saying Phil hoisted his beer, poured it down in one swallow, and slammed the mug onto the surface of the bar. Tiny bits of foam and droplets of beer flew in every direction.
    Phil belched and wiped his muzzle with the back of a hairy paw. "Ah! That hits the spot. Hello, Sam, Rico. Ready to go?"
    McCade looked around and grinned. "Ready if you are. Sure you want to leave the place standing?"
    Phil waved a dismissive paw. "Just a slight misunderstanding. You have the nutrient solution?"
    Rico chuckled. "We've got it all right. More'n a hundred thousand credits' worth o' poop."
    Phil frowned. "Rico, you're hopeless. It's not 'poop.' It's a specially formulated nutrient solution for use in our hydroponics tanks. Now, if you'd spent as much time looking at the planet's population curve as you do on hunting trips . . ."
    Phil lectured Rico on hydroponics, demographics, and planetary ecology all the way up to the planetoid's surface. Once there they dodged a small army of vendors, paid an exit tax, and retrieved their space armor from rented lockers.
    With space armor on and checked, they stepped into one of four large locks that served Rister's Rock, and waited for it to cycle them through. Five minutes later it did, and they stepped out on the asteroid's rocky surface. A good-sized landing zone was nearly filled with shuttles and smaller ships, while farther out, the sun made a line of jagged light across the top of a low-lying ridge.
    All asteroids looked pretty much the same