Moon City

by Benjamin Kane Ethridge

  I got to the last drawer and sighed. “And fuck it all.”

  With a gasp of annoyance, I made for the bedroom. A whiny siren went off in the distance and I rushed back out to the living room and then into the kitchen. From the inner pocket of my coat, what I called my alchemy collection, I withdrew a couple overlarge pills. Quickly, I found the one I needed. It was lime green with a biohazard logo on the gelatin near the black lettering HCN 100%.

  Now, where to put it?

  I searched around for something that would smash, crush, or melt this capsule and let out the love inside.

  The siren grew louder. Closer.

  “Shit...” I said, out of sorts. “If I was hydrogen cyanide gas, where would I want to be born?”

  I noticed a small tear in the carpet near the front door. Fast, I grabbed the capsule and got down on both knees near the hole the carpet. I tried to fit the capsule inside the hole, but my eyes caught something else at this level, something far more interesting. Across the adjoined kitchen-living room area, near the small bathroom, was a trash incinerator. A messy stack of documents had been piled nearby.

  I took the capsule and walked on my knees to the incinerator. I opened its door and saw the burnt shreds of documents inside. With a glance back to the stack of unburnt documents, I pulled open the incinerator door all the way.

  I smiled. “Lots of docs to burn. Lots of opening and closing this door. My gift to you. Of course this is just for what-ifs, my friend. I'd rather send you to hell and witness it.”

  I placed the capsule inside the incinerator and tucked it into a corner. Then I rested a half-burnt piece of paper over the top. Closing the incinerator, before I could stand, I noticed a name on the document on the top of the stack.

  RICK AGATE.

  A photo of the Limbus mercenary was right next to it. This explained his smell to me, that undeniable scent of greatness that was an ambience in his blood; the greatness wasn’t his, but he bore a resemblance to it.

  “Agate,” the name formed in my mouth. I had been correct. That was who he’d been on the phone with. His brother was no doubt Christopher Agate. Splendid family line, Rick... You are his sibling. Brother of the Gem Stone Warrior. Impressive.

  “Shit, I hope that son of a bitch comes to avenge your death,” I said to myself, excited. “That will be some real good times.”

  The siren blared its loudest yet and the sound of heavy vehicle doors slamming outside got me to my feet. I went to the window in the living room and looked out. Three squad cars parked below and regional police stormed out with their robotic-looking body armor that had unsettled me since childhood. I hated those fuckers.

  “Okay,” I said simply, “I’ve had too much fun here. Time to go.”

  I went to the front door and opened it a crack to look outside. At the same time, I slid out my knife, hoping to use it as much as possible in silence. The next moment, I ducked into the hall, closed the door, and it locked again behind me. I put the knife against my pant leg and made swiftly for the elevator. My vision opened up and I could see down through the floors of the apartment complex. Clusters of regional police stood in the lobby, some piling into the elevator and some flooding into the stairwell.

  “Marvelous,” I whispered.

  The elevator opened on the second floor and the police covered the corners of the hallway, rifles shouldered. The others on the stairs came up to join them and posted at the exit. The stairs were probably the easier play, and I moved for the exit. I went halfway down the hall when an apartment door flung open. A half-dressed woman with drugged-out eyes crashed out into the hall with a hockey stick in her hand. The door slammed shut behind her and she leered at it in absolute rage.

  “Bastard! Lying, cheating filth! I hate you!” she screeched and slammed the hockey stick into the door.

  I halted before trying to go around her. I didn’t have time for this. Without grace, I avoided the stick being winged into my face. The strung-out woman attacked the door again and the end of the stick shattered into splinters, leaving the end sharp like a spear.

  A voice came from inside the apartment. “Police are downstairs, you dumb ass!”

  The woman pounded her frail white fist into the door. “You think I give a good goddamn shit? They’re probably here for you!”

  If only.

  I glanced through the floor as the police progressed through the second-floor hallway. I lifted the knife, ready to carve a path through this idiot. The druggie had no idea how close to death she was and continued another barrage of attacks against the door. I reached out quickly and snatched the broken stick.

  “—the hell?”

  I pulled her with the stick and sent her stumbling down the hallway.

  “Prick!” she yelled.

  As I approached the stairwell, I looked over my shoulder to see if she would follow. She had turned toward the wall and pressed her forehead against it, possibly crying.

  I opened my vision once more and saw two regional police on the floor directly below, posted not far from the stairs. Carefully, I peered over the railing to the bottom floor. I considered the fall and whether my feet and ankles could take such an impact after all these events today. I edged out and slowly sheathed my knife inside my coat. I took time breathing, concentrating, looking at that distant stone floor below me. My heels lifted off the ground, my calf muscles tightening. I rolled my neck and breathed through my nose. There was no turning back.

  I put one leg over the railing. The stairwell door crashed open behind me with an accompanied banshee-like scream. The druggie woman charged at me. “You don’t lay a hand on me mother—”

  She reached out to strike me, and on impulse, the next was a series of fluid movements— I grabbed her wrist; I took her by her small, wasted frame; and I threw her over the railing. A long scream echoed in the stairwell and then stopped as her head struck one of the railings on the way down. Her head struck another, most likely killing her before her body made a tremendous thud on the ground floor. Normally, I wouldn’t flinch at something like that, but my eyes caught a glimpse of her spine snapping and her skull shattering, sending fragments into her brain that burst in fountains of blood. I winced a little. My shoulder ached from tossing her over the side too.

  The regional police abandoned all efforts on the second floor and raced to the stairwell in response to the scream they’d heard. I watched them gather below to investigate the broken body. I returned to the elevator and took it down to the lobby. Once the doors opened, I didn’t get far before several regional police accosted me.

  “What is your name?” asked one who stood before me, dark face shield an inch from my nose.

  I took a moment and then said, “Rick Agate.”

  The officer to my immediate right glanced at a data pad strapped to his wrist. “He’s on here as temporary resident. Came down from the second floor though and the squad cleared every room. There is no photo file on this though. It was declined by LIMBUS, INC.”

  I heard a snort through the first officer’s face mask. “Typical. Well, I don't care what Limbus feels is best or what our squad feels is a ‘thorough search’ of the second floor. We need to detain you until we find our person. Your height and build are too inconvenient I'm afraid. Please take a seat over there. Hang tight.” He pointed to a silver, fabric divan in the corner of the lobby. I nodded and placed my hand over my coat, securing my knife underneath. Let them do their police things. I needed to think anyway and really didn’t want to use any more energy than was required.

  The police would glance at me from time to time and check their data pads, but I chose to stare down at my hands and keep them from shaking. When the elevator door opened and the kid, Carl, walked out, all my attempts to calm down failed. He spotted me right away and went to the police. I shifted in the uncomfortable divan. Carl pointed my way and one of the officers nodded. A moment later, he was walking over.

  Shit.

  I slid my fingers around the handle of my hi
dden knife, getting ready to punch a nice hole in this cop’s exposed throat. The elevator door opened again. Two police walked out with a man in custody. He was a younger man with his hair painted silver and in devil horns. A long, red goatee stretched down his bare chest.

  “Ain't nobody selling brain diamonds anymore!” he blared. “Are you people jacked in the head? I wouldn't stoop to that, you bastard shit-lings!”

  The officer coming my way had stopped and looked over his shoulder at the commotion. I tensed with my knife. Waiting.

  “What's the problem over there, officer?” I asked.

  He didn’t look at me, but said, “Been after that one for a bit. Works for the Firecracker Lady. Heard of her?”

  “No,” I lied. Everybody had heard of her. She owned nearly everything on this moon for the past ten years.

  “Good thing for you,” he replied and turned around to face me. “And your little friend over there vouched for you.”

  “Friend?” I looked at the kid suspiciously.

  “Yessir, the rug rat over there.”

  “Oh, Carl,” I said. “Yeah. We're... buddies.”

  “And his father works for the good ole Commerce Polity, so he's gold with me and my family.”

  I tried not to let my dark emotions surface over this. “Of course he is,” I replied and locked eyes with the kid across the lobby. The boy smiled amidst the screaming drug dealer being hauled outside.

  “You are free to leave on your business. Have yourself a good Beyondnoon,” said the officer.

  “And you, officer.”

  I stood there for a second, a bit stunned by the outcome. The kid approached me slowly and folded his arms, a glint of determination in his eyes.

  “You must think I owe you one,” I said.

  “Nope.”

  “Good—”

  “You actually owe me two.” Carl grinned.

  “Is that right?”

  “I overheard those regs talking about the girl who fell down the stairs. That was Barbara Stannish. She was a tweaker, but she climbed up and down those stairs high as a kite ever since I can remember. No way did she fall down. Seems like maybe someone created a diversion and gave her a little push. The regs aren’t that dumb. They’re thinking it was Devil Horns, but that's just because he's the bad guy they came for and it makes it so much cleaner to think he's the cause of all evil.”

  “So you weren’t the one who called them here?”

  “The regs show up five times a day to this place. I didn’t have to bother and besides… you aren’t the first grown-up who has tried to kill me. I work with murderers every day.”

  “You’re a weird one.”

  “No,” he said, leaning forward and whispering. “I’m smart. You see, it’s me who’s selling brain diamonds. Devil Horns over there actually buys more drugs than he's ever sold. I've made a bit of money off him myself.”

  “Thank you for the slice of your life,” I told him. “Now, I'll be going now. I guess we both share dirt now, even if I don't care what you tell the regs. I could kill everyone here.”

  “I don’t doubt it. You're the Moon City Killer, after all. I knew that by how you moved—like a God. You're him.”

  “You don't want to live very much, do you, kid?”

  “You're wrong about that,” he said. “I want to live by the Midnight Sea, forever. I just need the money.”

  I turned to leave. “It's nice to have dreams.”

  “Just one more thing that might strike your interest, or maybe it won't. I've got about forty-three regular customers so far. My dad lets me play in the warehouses near the CP's main factories. Lots of raw materials there to refine into my product.”

  “Good on you.”

  “Over ninety-eight percent of my customers are Deitii,” he said loudly. “And I know where a bunch of them are living right now.”

  I stopped cold just short of the door and glanced back at Carl. “Is that so?”

  Chapter 7

  Dean certainly hoped these accommodations were temporary like Ricky said. He’d roomed in his share of seedy, rundown joints during his short tenure at Limbus, Inc., but the hall of rooms over the tavern looked like a shanty town where mildew, moss, and rust went to die. Like many places in Moon City, the floors and ceiling were cavern-stone, but rather than vestibules cut from the rock itself, the “hotel” was a series of plank board shacks all connected by a stringy black moss that bore clumpy, vomit-green flowers. Several gas lanterns hung from iron rings in the walls, a few propped up on the floor after their rings corroded to dust. Dean glanced at his room card—not even a key—just a card with the number 38 printed in faded, orange ink.

  As he lifted his gaze, he hopped up as he nearly tripped over a man sitting outside room 36. The man’s head was shaved and badly scarred from cranial surgeries. Dean had seen it before. Brain diamond addicts, or Noggins as they were most often called, had little choices of recovering, but those with money could triple their neural pathways and stay addicted and alive longer. Whatever money the man had was clearly gone. He sniffed dryly and licked his parched lips before loading his tongue with silver and purple crystals.

  “Gonna blast off right here, eh?” Dean asked. “Ain’t got your own room?”

  “Smells like shit in there,” the man said and swallowed the drug with a drowsy smile.

  “No housekeeping, I guess.” Dean chuckled and made his way past.

  “Careful of my cat,” the man instructed sternly. “Watch out for Butterball!”

  Dean could hardly make out the lump of fur circled up near the man. “Sure thing.” He took another look at the man and was reminded so intensely of his cousin Weston, also an addict, but no longer in this world to get high.

  With a heavier heart, Dean walked over to room 38 and opened the thin plank door. There was a latch on the inside, thankfully, which Dean utilized right away. On the floor was a mattress, a wicker basket for clothes, a small chest with a padlock and key for belongings, and, oh, there was definitely a shit smell in his shack as well. Dean got the feeling the odor originated from the ugly moss hanging through the cracks in the planks above, rather than actual shit, but six of one, half a dozen of the other. It was revolting and would take a while to fall asleep.

  He opened the chest and noticed several changes of clothes, shoes, the usual package of Limbus binder full of business cards, and a stack of touch-docs. There was also the weapon box that Dean and only Dean could open with eye and thumbprint. Rick or someone else employed for the company had probably staged everything for him. Dean let the lid to the chest fall and he sighed.

  Night had just begun and it would be some time before he could sleep, thanks to the Constalife, but Dean still felt this awake-time as unnatural, like being underwater with scuba gear for years.

  He sat on the mattress. His knees hurt and he wanted to strip out of the starchy, green garment thing they provided him at City Hall, the snazzy get-up that all prisoners get to wear—but once again, the day was far from over and he had a long, overdue call to place.

  “Hi, sweetheart,” he said to Sandra when she answered.

  “Dean, it’s late. I waited up.”

  “I’m terribly sorry, hon. I didn’t have a watch yet. Just got my equipment now. Every day here is three and a half Earth days. I gotta figure what times of the day I can call you.”

  “You sound weird.”

  “It might be this longevity drug I’m on.”

  “No,” she said. “I’ve heard you this way before. Someone died, didn’t they?”

  “You want to hear about it?”

  “I’ve waited a month back here, at least give me a story.”

  “Fair enough,” he said, “but then… phone sex?”

  “Dean.”

  “Okay, yeah,” he laughed. “I’ll lay it all on you.”

  And he did. He told her everything—even how terrified he was as his body almost failed him against the Quantum Flu. With Sandra, he never had to hold back. That
was one of the reasons he loved her so dearly. He could be vulnerable and she would let him. She wouldn’t tear him down and call him less of a man. That was the sort of thing, he imagined, that had made him clam up so much over the years: his ex-wife wouldn’t abide him being emotional, not in the least—such displays were solely her right, not his; men had to be stone. They couldn’t let anything touch them. Dean wasn’t big on putting his feelings on display though, but he felt safe with Sandra. He knew he could break down and she’d be there to pick him up and put him back together. That’s why he couldn’t lose her.

  “I’m so glad you’re okay,” she told him when he was through. “Even if you’re in that stinky shack.”

  He laughed. “Yeah, I’ll get over it—well, probably not.”

  She laughed this time. “I know you’re probably wondering what my decision is about hibernation.”

  “No, no,” he replied quickly.

  “Well let’s talk about it when your assignment is complete. Okay?”

  “Sure.”

  “There’s really no reason to jump off that bridge yet.”

  “Of course not,” he added.

  “A month is definitely not enough time to make such a big decision. You’re the love of my life, Dean, and if—”

  A scream penetrated the silence outside in the cavern hall.

  “What was that?” Sandra asked. “Was that… a scream?”

  “I don’t know. I’m going to see.”

  “Careful! Call me back!”

  He hung up and leaned forward, opening the chest. He took out the weapon box. Looked at the eye scanner. Put his thumb over the imprint band on top. The lock clicked over. They’d given him a Splitter pistol. He took it and sidled up to the door, peering through the slats in the planks. Another scream rang out. It was the brain diamond addict.

  Dean inspected his weapon. The splitter had only half a charge—not like he’d need much more to take down a tripping Noggin.

  The screaming didn’t sound like drug rage though. This man was in trouble. Dean unlatched the door and stepped out. The Noggin grabbed his skull—blood poured from his nostrils. Dean had seen this progress to a massive stroke. He tucked his gun in his jumpsuit pocket and knelt near the man. His orange cat, while trembling on its old legs, was alert and meowing at its companion.