The Money Star

by Jon Lymon

  “Do you think that’s a good idea?”

  Remnant glared at Gordon for a few seconds, his eyes not quite aligning but both betraying inner turmoil.

  “You know what I think is a good idea? Posing as a road sweeper to get bits of crashed ship for our ship. That was my idea. And I’ve been out every morning this week, gathering bits for Edgar. Another good idea of mine was to nick a Bentley and use the parts for our ship. Stealing a watch from a dead pilot and selling it on to raise money for our ship? My idea too. So given all these good ideas I’ve been having recently, yes, I think another Gates is a good idea.”

  Gordon reluctantly poured and Remnant took and paid for the pint and went to sit dangerously close to another female lawyer who had witnessed Remnant’s earlier antics and had remarkably decided to stay. “If you fucking touch or try to talk to me, I’ll rip your fucking eyes out,” she quietly told him as he leaned towards her.

  He paused, mid-lean. “I was going to inquire whether you wouldn’t mind passing me that beer mat, so I can rest my drink on it and not stain Gordon’s clean table,” he said in his best whispered Queen’s English.

  She passed him the coaster without looking at him.

  “Thank you very much. Sorry to have disturbed you.”

  He took deep gulps of Gates and watched Gordon on the phone behind the bar.

  A group of three tourists walked in, hoping to sample the delights of a traditional, Sixteenth Century English public house. Instead, they were greeted by a snarl and a glare from an angry, drunken Englishman. All immediately decided that perhaps the coffee shop would be a better choice after all. As they walked out, they passed an angry, middle-aged woman striding in.

  Elena knew he’d be here, knew he’d have a pint of Gates to hand, but she didn’t expect him to be sitting quite so close to a suited and knee-booted lawyer.

  “Aww no, look what the cat dragged in.” Remnant giggled at his own reaction to Elena’s arrival.

  Her stride didn’t falter. She marched up to him and delivered a penetrating blow to his gut that sent Gates spilling all over her, the lawyer and Remnant himself, who dropped his glass and doubled-up.

  “That’s from your daughter, who wanted me to say thanks for letting her down once again by not being there for her.”

  “Not being where?” Remnant managed to groan.

  “It’s the 18th. Wedding rehearsal day. Didn’t you get my messages?”

  “My phone’s been cut off,” he spluttered, still doubled-up and trying to curl into a ball. Elena handed the lawyer the napkins that Gordon had passed from behind the bar.

  “Sorry for my ex-husband’s inability to handle his drink,” she told her.

  “I forgot about it,” he said. “I’ve been rushed off my feet.”

  “What, more gambling and drinking and annoying women half your age?”

  “She’s not half my age.”

  “You cheeky bastard,” the lawyer exclaimed, but both Remnant and Elena ignored her.

  “I’m trying to get a team together,” he said. Remnant had managed to regain his seat but the expression on his face reflected the internal pain he was still experiencing.

  “And that’s more important than your daughter?”

  “I told you, I forgot.”

  “Well, you can forget coming to the wedding. Chris will be giving Chloe away. At least she can rely on him.”

  “I’m her Dad, not him. It’s my job.”

  “When have you ever done your job, any job? And when have you ever been a Dad, or a husband? Chloe and I have always finished runners-up to the drink the horses the strippers the football the mates the need for sleep. Now we’re being trumped by a fucking lump of rock millions of miles away. Forget it.”

  “Please don’t do this, El. I’ve been looking forward to it for ages.” Remnant fought back the tears, another bitter blow on a day, week, month, life full of them.

  “I said forget it. She doesn’t want to know you. None of us do.”

  Gordon had seen enough and calmly walked from behind the bar and gently placed a hand on one of Elena’s shoulders. “I think you should go, madam. You are, after all, banned from drinking in here for the rest of your natural life.”

  “Get your hands off me. I’m going.”

  She shook herself free of Gordon, and after she had looked down on her ex-husband for a few seconds, she was true to her word.

  Remnant sat, head bowed as the lawyer followed Elena out of the pub, her stained suit earning a sympathetic look from Gordon.

  Left alone together, there wasn’t much each man wanted or had to say to the other.

  “I think the threat of a spaceship crashing through my roof is enough to drive my customers away,” said Gordon softly. “I don’t need you as well.”

  Remnant slowly nodded to himself. “Lifetime ban?”

  “I’ve given you plenty of chances. I really thought you’d turned the corner this time. But today? You’re back to square one.”

  “Help me, Gordon. I don’t know what to do.”

  It’s was a line Gordon felt particularly unsuited to dealing with. “Banning you from here is my way of helping you,” he said, slowly ushering Remnant out. Remnant turned to him and smiled, but Gordon could not look him in the eye.

  Remnant spent an hour wandering around Holborn trying but not necessarily wanting to sober up. He snarled at the office boys who criticised his unshaven face, grey streaked hair, and odorous overcoat. He sat and watched the designer dogs let loose in Lincoln’s Inn Fields until dusk when the park attendant ushered him out with rattling keys and a threatening walking stick. He thought about walking west to Bayswater to see if he could sort things out with Chloe, but he couldn’t go up there looking like this. Not today, the day of the rehearsal. He’d phone her when he got in, apologise for forgetting. Promise to make it up to her.

  But these were lines he’d said before, she’d heard before, and he’d failed to deliver on before. He’d failed to take one too many last chances. He was a failure as a husband, a father, a taxpayer. A failure as a man.

  He slowly made his way back to his flat, pausing only to stare up at a light in the office above DT’s jewellers.

  “Damilou? Oi, Damilou. I know you’re in there. I just wanted to say thanks. Thanks for not giving me a chance. Thanks for not believing in me. Thanks for showing me up in front of everyone. Thanks for calling me a criminal. And thanks for getting the fucking police on my back.”

  Remnant found a scrunched-up can of Gates in the gutter and, after checking it was empty, launched it at the window. It missed, but clattered against the darkened window next to it.

  “Thanks for fucking nothing,” he concluded.

  The door to the jewellers was thrown open and DT strode out. He crossed Greville Street and stood nose-to-nose with Remnant.

  “There you go again, blaming everyone else,’ he said. “It is time you took responsibility for your own actions.” Remnant took a step back, repelled as much by DT’s aggression as his cheese-tainted breath. “It is time you faced up to your responsibilities, my friend,” DT continued, “instead of drowning them in drink.”

  A whistling from above momentarily distracted them.

  “Time you looked closer to home for the reasons for your problems,” DT said, pointing at Remnant between the eyes.

  The whistle above quickly escalated to a roar.

  “Time you…”

  A flash of red. Then yellow. Followed by the stench of fuel. Then ‘boom’. A fireball engulfed the street.

  The force of the blast slammed both men against the wall of the block of flats they were standing outside. Momentary shocked silence was followed by screams and car alarms and showers of brickdust and thuds of falling masonry.

  The muffled sound of a distant siren grew louder. Both men slumped on the pavement as a hail of concrete rained down and smoke swirled. Remnant blinked fine particles of grey dust from his eyes and spat them from his mouth. He sat up and looked around,
trying to get his bearings. His eyebrows, hair, skin, shoulders were temporarily grey, covered in a layer of dust. Ears ringing, he reached down and grabbed what he assumed was DT by the collar and dragged him to his feet. DT’s first thoughts were for his glasses which, remarkably, were unscathed and by his feet. Remnant bent down and handed them to DT who stared at Remnant, unable to comprehend what had happened. DT glanced across the road of debris to what was once the jewellery store that bore his name and housed the fruits and passion of his working life. The first floor office where moments ago he was sitting ensconced in some creative accounting was now on fire, the burning tail fin of a homemade ship sticking out of it.

  As Remnant led DT away, the street filled with people from Remnant’s block and nearby pubs and offices, as eager to help the injured as they were to check out the crash site. Some offered the two men help which Remnant refused. Many were running, hoping to pick up something valuable from the ruined jewellers or the wrecked ship.

  “Don’t look back, don’t look back,” Remnant kept telling DT, who was shaking now, gripping onto Remnant, desperately wanting to look back.

  They made it to Edgar’s lock-up where a strip of golden light under the door and the loud sear of metal being sheared betrayed Edgar’s presence inside.

  Remnant banged on the door loudly during a break in the shearing and then tapped the coded rhythm. Slowly Edgar opened up and looked shocked to see the dust covered pair standing in the half-light.

  “What the hell happened to you two?”

  “Another one down. Direct hit on DT’s.”

  “Are you hurt?”

  Both shook their heads.

  DT forgot his pain, his loss and his near-death experience when he saw the huge tarpaulin Edgar had recently spread across the object in the centre of the floor.

  DT circled it as Edgar lowered the doors. “Can I see it?” he asked.

  “It’s not finished yet,” said Edgar.

  “Doesn’t matter. I’d like to see it.”

  Edgar looked at Remnant who shot him ‘a what harm can it do?’ look.

  With no ceremony, Edgar whipped off the tarpaulin. And there it was. Three quarters of a ship that would be given the challenge of getting them to the asteroid belt and back. The vessel resembled a cigar case to DT, and a dildo to Remnant, though both men wisely decided against expressing their opinion. The ship was long, slender with smaller wings than both men expected. It stood about ten feet high and twenty-five long. DT ran his hand over the smooth metallic exterior as he walked to the front, scaled a small stepladder and peered up into the cockpit through the toughened glass window that had masking tape forming an X on each panel. He saw two beige leather seats, ripped straight out of the Bentley, which was now a shadow of its former self in lock-up, stripped down to its skeletal frame.

  Remnant nodded, impressed by the progress Edgar had made.

  “The basic frame’s in place,” the engineer said. “It’s all about the technical things now.”

  “So those bits we got this morning on our rounds were all good?” Remnant asked. Edgar nodded.

  DT peered in through the pilot’s side window. “Can I go onboard?” he asked.

  Edgar shook his head. “There’s no floor yet.”

  Remnant could see DT was as impressed as he with the ship.

  “Are you pleased with it?” DT asked.

  Edgar nodded. “Sye has done a great job gathering all the parts. The only stumbling blocks…”

  “Oh, I know the stumbling blocks, my friend.” DT interrupted. “I must say I am impressed.”

  “It has nuclear engines too,” Edgar added.

  DT had forgotten about that and looked alarmed.

  “Nothing to worry about now,” Edgar added. “They’re dormant without hydrogen.”

  “And that’s what’s expensive, yes?”

  “That’s why I wanted the hundred grand,” said Remnant.

  DT nodded then rubbed his head as if the nodding had stirred a pain from the explosion.

  “What will you do about your business?” Edgar asked.

  “I will have to wait for the insurers to pay out. Have you seen the cards in Sanj’s window, the ones for pilots?”

  Remnant and Edgar nodded.

  “Well, one of them was recently recommended to me by a wealthy customer.”

  Remnant looked at Edgar who stayed focused on DT

  “So you’re interested in our mission then?” Remnant asked. “You’ll fund it?”

  “Easy. Easy. You are jumping the gun there a bit, my friend.”

  “Sorry, he’s easily excited,” explained Edgar.

  “If you get a good pilot, I could well be persuaded. In the meantime, I could do with somewhere to stay for the night.”

  “I’m going to be working in here ‘til dawn,” Edgar said nodding in the direction of the ship.

  DT turned to Remnant.

  “Are you sure you wouldn’t prefer a hotel room?” Remnant asked. “My place isn’t…”

  “All I need is somewhere to rest, my friend.”

  15

  Stock arrived early at the small basement office Haygue had borrowed from the SEC janitor. Earliness annoyed Haygue as it clearly demonstrated keenness and reminded him of himself when he was younger. The energy. The hunger to know. The urge to discover. The years had taken them all from him. He knew all that his brain could know, his mind now saturated with astral knowledge. The last thing he wanted to do was impart any of it to an annoying writer of an internet blog where spelling and accuracy took second place to sensationalism and conjecture.

  Stock strode in looking months younger than he had the last time Haygue saw him. The SEC chief couldn’t stop himself from shaking the proffered hand, but made sure his grip was weak and short-lived. He directed Stock to sit down in the most uncomfortable chair he’d been able to find in the building. Haygue watched and took delight in Stock’s little grimace as he lowered himself into a seat that had been christened ‘The Back Breaker’, then saw him draw strange shapes with his fingers on the screen of his iPad, and was annoyed by it all. Eventually Stock looked up.

  “Right, I’m ready Haygue. Fire away.”

  “There is no asteroid made of diamond.”

  Stock laughed. “Oh, it’s too late to stop this one now. This one’s big. The Facebook group I set up has close on two hundred thousand likes. There’s a MySpace presence too, for what it’s worth, and I’ve a guy working on a website. I’ll be getting a cut of the t-shirt, mugs and pens income, of course.”

  “Pens? It’s just a picture of a white light. One of our cameras on the way to Jupiter malfunctioned. Is all.”

  “I’ve got the specifications of those cameras somewhere here.” Stock drew a few more shapes on his iPad and swivelled it to show Haygue who outwardly just shrugged his shoulders, but inwardly fumed. Here was where the world was going wrong, he thought. Information was everywhere and accessible to everyone. Everything was recorded. From pictures of drunken nights out with friends, to specifications of SEC cameras, everything could and was being shared. It was the antithesis of everything Haygue believed in. People were better off not knowing some things. Most things. Hell, everything. Stick to your own little world and stop sticking your mouse or fingers in where they’re not welcome.

  “That’s too good a camera to malfunction,” Stock concluded.

  “It was in the belt. It got hit. The lens defence systems were breached. It developed a fault. Story over.”

  “It got hit, it developed a fault, which one was it, Haygue?”

  “That’s classified information. All you need to know is the Prospector project was cut.”

  “Then how come Onamoto talks about a Prospector II?”

  Stock swung his iPad around to show Haygue Onamoto’s homepage. Haygue grabbed the iPad and read a few paragraphs from the site.

  “Do you know this Onamoto guy?” Haygue demanded.

  “We’re just Facebook friends.”

 
“Have you met him, seen him?”

  “I’ve messaged him. I’ve poked him. Emailed him. Just to glean a little extra detail.”

  “Right, and what did he say?”

  “That he used to work here.”

  “So why is there no trace of him working here?”

  Stock shrugged. “I’m no expert on SEC’s personnel policies.”

  “Neither is SEC’s personnel policy department, let me tell you,” said Haygue. “Where does he live?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Haygue clicked shut the locks on the door to the office. Stock looked at him, alarmed. “Have you just locked the doors?”

  “You’re damn right I have. No one leaves this room until we find out where this Onamoto guy is.”

  Stock’s fingers quickly went to work on his iPad.

  “What are you doing there?” Haygue lunged for the tablet but Stock pulled it away.

  “I’m messaging a key Facebook friend, telling him I’m being held hostage in a cesspit of a janitor’s office at SEC. Should get a call any minute n…”

  Stock’s mobile rang. He let it ring and motioned to Haygue to unlock the doors, which he did. Stock then answered his phone. “It’s OK, just a misunderstanding, we’re fine now. Speak soon.” He pocketed his phone and stood up. “You’ve clearly brought me here under false pretences. I think we’re done.”

  “No, no, sit down. Look, I’ve got a proposition for you. A scoop. A real fucking scoop that will make your name.”

  “You don’t do scoops, Haygue. The only thing I ever scoop from your briefings are piles of useless shit.”

  “Why the hell do you keep turning up and asking questions then?”

  “It’s my job. And you’re a rich source of material for my blog.”

  “What’s the name of your blog?”

  “Maybe I’ll tell you for the hundredth time one day soon. Talk to me about the scoop.”

  “OK. Look. There is a new mission. Prospector III.”

  Stock gasped. “So there’s a Prospector II as well.”

  “Was.”

  “Tell me more, tell me more.”

  “I’ll tell you plenty more if you accept a seat aboard Prospector III.”