Tikker's Arc

Chapter 5 of 6

Tikker reached the stone building at last. Its shell held both spices close, but the frost-pepper was warming fast. Tikker pressed against the heavy wooden door and shoved. It did not move. Tikker rammed it with a corner of its shell. The door stayed sealed, locked from somewhere Tikker could not reach. The frost-pepper softened inside its cramped shell. The cold spice would be ruined soon, and no gap in the stone gave a way in. Then Tikker heard music. Low horns drifted from a second building nearby, its walls crusted with cactus and bright flowers. A pink sign glowed above a wide arch. A jazz club, open and warm, with doors that stood wide. Tikker crawled toward the sound, desperate for any shelter with a lock that worked. A man burst out before Tikker reached the step. He wore a dented hat and clutched a soda can, and his boots skidded in the sand. "A CLAM! A desert clam, out here, you know how rare that — no, wait, focus, Dallyho, focus." He crouched low and stared. "You're carrying something cold. I can smell it. Frost spice? FROST SPICE? I wrote a paper on that, nobody believed me, three sleepless nights and they LAUGHED —" He stopped, deflating. "Sorry. Sorry. You need help. Right?" Tikker nudged open its shell. The frost-pepper glistened, already going slack. The archaeologist gasped and grabbed his own hat with both hands. "Oh no, oh no, that's melting, that's — okay, I HAVE something, come, come!" He waved Tikker through the club's open doors, past the horns, to a side room cluttered with notes and dust. There sat a cooler, metal and sleek, half-open. Inside, glass vials rested among frost. Dallyho threw the lid up. "Field samples, keeps everything cold for days, runs on nothing I can explain, which is either genius or I stole it, don't ask." He laughed, nervous, then softened. "Put it in. Quick. Before it's gone." Tikker tipped the frost-pepper from its shell into the cooler. The cold closed over the spice. The slack grains stiffened again, saved. Tikker sealed the ghost pepper ash back alone inside its shell and rested on the floor, shaking. Dallyho knelt, eyes wet and wide. "You found a real one. A real frost-pepper. Do you know what this MEANS? No, you don't, how could — but stay. Please. I can keep it cold." He hugged the cooler. "Nobody stays. But you could." Tikker had the frost-pepper safe at last, resting in cold that would not fail by noon. Two spices held, one preserved, one sealed. But the cooler could not move, and Tikker still needed five more spices scattered far across the desert. The frost-pepper was anchored here now, in a stranger's hands, and Tikker would have to leave it behind to keep hunting.