by Ben Bequer
He smiled, “Remind me.”
I wanted to go down my personal hitlist of bad guys. Hell, just mention the official White Council’s top ten.
“Do like this,” Jimmy said, putting his hands on the arm rests and lifting his body up, extending his arms. Once he had risen, he took his feet off the ground, and held them straight forward, parallel to the floor. It was like a gymnastics pose, designed to test body strength, except he was doing it on a rickety chair.
“Go on,” he prodded, not even out of breath. He was a slim guy, but he had enough strength to control the difficult position and talk normally. “Do it. I want to see you do it.”
“I can’t,” I said finally.
“What?”
“I can’t do that,” I said. “The Brutal incident caused me to start rejecting the new bones and I’m kind of recovering from some heavy medication I was on for awhile. I can barely walk.”
“Come on,” he taunted. “It’s easy. I can stay like this all day. And you, you’re super strong or something, right? Come on, just try it.”
I shook my head in frustration, “I can’t.”
He pursed his lips in disapproval and lowered himself. Then he got up out of the chair and disconnected the Macbook’s power cable from the wall, winding it about the palm of his hand as he said, “You don’t need me.”
“What?”
Once he had finished with the cable, he tossed it into an open pocket of his beat up leather messenger bag, and put the laptop inside before closing the latch and slinging it on his shoulder.
“You don’t need a psychologist. Maybe a nanny or something,” he said as he put away everything, not even bothering to look at me. “I’m wasting my time here.”
“You’re leaving?”
He nodded, adjusting the strap around his chest and making ready to leave. I stood.
“No fucking way,” I said, standing in his way.
“Or what?”
“Or what?” I repeated, but the guy was staring right back into my raging eyes, totally unafraid of me.
“You were paid for an hour of time,” I said, changing tactics suddenly. I didn’t want to throw this guy through a window.
“You didn’t pay me,” he said, worming around me and heading to the door.
“What does that matter?”
He stopped, explaining it to me like if I was a child.
“What I mean is, why do you care if you got your money’s worth or not?”
I couldn’t believe this guy, he really wanted me to throw him through a window.
“It doesn’t matter who paid you,” I roared. “Hell, I’m practically fucking destitute, okay? I have nothing, so yeah, I’m not the one that’s paying you. Is that what you want to hear? A friend is paying for this. The same friend I asked to find someone that I could talk to.”
I leaned back on the back rest of the chair, frustrated and exhausted.
“I’m the client,” I said. “I asked for help. So help me.”
He did the lip thing again, which meant he wasn’t buying it.
“You don't want me. You just want someone to rubber stamp your recovery so you can go back out there and be a hero. I’m not that guy. I’m not going to facilitate you getting killed. It’s not what I do.”
“I’m just asking for-“
He smiled and wormed around me stopping at the door. “I know what you want.
I threw my arms up in frustration, slapping them on the sides of my thighs.
“Fine, then go. You don’t give a shit? The line starts outside,” I motioned out the door. “Join the fucking club, buddy.”
Jimmy started laughing, which at first seemed like he was faking, but then I realized that wheezing near-choking was his actual laughter.
“What’s really sad,” he said, still chuckling. “Is how little self-awareness you have about how far you have to go. It’s bewildering.”
“I’m a work in progress, Doc.”
He shook his head, waving his arms at me, “No, no, no, no, no. Don’t ever call me that. Oh, my God, don’t ever do it.”
“Doc?”
Jimmy physically cringed.
“Yeah, don’t. Please. Ever. I totally hate it."
“Okay, okay.”
He walked over to me and put his hand on my shoulder.
“It’s not that I don’t want to help. My heart bleeds for you, man. On a personal level, of course. I did my research, I know your story. I know what you've been through and I know what you’re going through. To live out your worst mistakes in the public eye, like that…I don’t know. I couldn’t do it. And now with this bunch of militant boneheads that you’ve got frothing at your every move, doing all kinds of crazy stuff in your name…I mean, your own personal cult. It’s crazy. I’m telling you, I’d be on meds. But professionally? I don’t think I can do it. I mean, it’s unheard of that someone like you asks for a therapist. It never happens. Unless they’re trying to game the system, if you know what I mean. And I’m not going do it just to be cool with the villain turned hero. I’m not.”
“I’m not trying to game the system. I really need help.”
The lip thing again – Jimmy didn’t believe me. But he stared at me long and hard, giving the matter serious consideration.
“Okay. I’ll give you one chance,” he said without giving the matter much more thought. “I run marathons. You ever run a marathon?”
I shook my head no, not really knowing where he was going.
“I do the whole iron man thing too, but marathons are what drive me. My times hover just above two hours, too. I’m real competitive.”
“Good,” I said, about to ask, "and what the hell does that have to do with me?"
“I’ll sit with you, but we’re going to have to tie it into some physical benchmarks. You’re worried that you’re recovering too slow? This might get you more motivated. Here, follow me.”
He said leading me towards the door. I had to get my walking stick to help me stay balanced. Jimmy walked down the hall, not bothering to wait for me, and I had to hurry, my motion more of a hip-dance as I shuffled to stay close to him. Every twitch of muscle closely tied to agonizing pain that no medication could remedy. He took us outside to a walking path that wound between the buildings.
“Okay, here’s the deal. We’re going to race. This path goes around that big building. If I win, I’m out of here. If you win, you get my services.”
I laughed, holding up my cane.
“Oh, poor baby can’t even walk,” he mocked. “You're a super for Christssakes! I'm just a regular schlub. Anyway, those are my terms. If you don’t like it, I can walk.”
“Fine,” I said and he took off his satchel laying it on grass beside the walk way.
“I’m even going to give you a head start, so don’t, OUCH!” he yelled as I smacked him in the stomach with the cane. He doubled over and crumpled to the floor.
“On your marks, get set, go!” I said, so fast it was almost one word, and hobbled down the path, headed for the building we had to circumnavigate.
“You cheating...” he managed but still lay on the floor. I had hit him pretty hard. Not so hard to injure him, but he wasn't getting up for a minute or two.
“Never trust a villain,” I said, moving away as quickly as my recovering legs would let me, but not too far away that I couldn’t hear him laughing at being outsmarted.
A not all that brief excerpt from Interstellar Overdrive: Volume One – coming Summer 2016
They walked away from Constable Hesting’s office, adjusting their breathing masks and chuckling in unison. Alec was the first to verbalize what they were both thinking, “She’s in on it.”
“Don’t give me any shit when it comes time to drill her.”
“I’m debating going back in there right now, dropping her boys, strapping her to a chair, and letting you do your thing.”
Everett stopped and turned to face his friend. “Say the word, but that’s something we can’t undo.”<
br />
“I know,” said Alec.
“I say let’s ask around, see who knows what. Torturing the constable with a laser torch and tack hammer is always on the table.”
Alec didn’t mind the image of the fat woman who had something to do with Pete’s murder strapped to a table, screaming for mercy. But like Everett said, that was a one-way trip. He looked across the street and down a few buildings to a sign swaying in the breeze, “Devil’s Heart Saloon – looks like our kind of place.” Alec’s pace quickened. “I could use a drink.”
“I could use a dozen,” Everett quipped, following close in tow.
They both needed to adjust their masks as they walked. AMP or no, the air in the open street was downright awful – almost as bad as the lingering pseudo-atmosphere near their landing spot. But they realized that, like Hesting’s office, most of the inhabited buildings were connected by a web of forty-centimeter flexible tubing that spread across the entire town. The tubing was strung along a roughshod series of jury-rigged poles and stands that kept it above the ground and far from reach, running from a large distribution cap in the middle of the street and into each building through openings probably intended for power cables. The distribution cap, meanwhile, ran straight into the AMP about a hundred meters away.
The streets were shadowy, barely lit and a series of open vents released steam that combined with the native dust and soot, giving the place a blurred feel – like a world fallen into some hazy level of hell.
They were halfway to the saloon when shadowy figures wearing ragged clothes and wielding hand-made rifles materialized from alleys on either side of the street. They ambled closer, six in all, masks covering everything but their hard eyes.
The tallest wore a wide brimmed hat. “You the fellas just flew in?”
“Boy, you just made the worst mistake of your life,” Everett said.
Hat-guy smiled, flashing yellow wasted teeth.
“We got more guns than you,” he said.
“Those aren’t guns,” Alec said, throwing aside his duster to reveal the FX-99 pulse pistols on his double rig.
Hat-guy’s smile wavered for a moment.
“Except for that one,” Alec said, indicating a tall, dark-faced man wearing range goggles over his eyes. Of the six, he seemed the most confident, with his shoulders relaxed and his hands in his pockets. “Ev, check this guy’s rifle.”
“Alec, is that a Steehl T-47?” Everett said.
The guy’s only response was a sly smile.
“Yeah, I think it’s a 47.” Alec said. “How can you afford a monster like that all the way out here?”
“Like it matters,” Everett said.
“Good point,” said Alec, “Thing’s going to be ours in a minute. Which ones are you going to kill?”
Everett licked his teeth.
“You take rifle-guy since he tickled your fancy. Me,” he said, drawing the big Battlemaster in a flash and placing it against hat-guy’s grimy forehead before anyone could react, “I’m plugging this one.”
“H-hey-” hat-guy managed, stunned by the sudden move.
“What about the rest?” Alec interrupted.
“We’ll get around to them,” Everett said, pulling the Battlemaster’s hammer back with a snap. “Time to die, jackass.”
“W-wait!” Hat-guy’s courage was gone. He took a half-step back, hands open and arms out wide, but Everett took a half-step right along with him and kept the gun glued to his head, like they were dancing.
“W-wait for what?” Everett mocked. “You’re the hard cases around here, right, the motherfuckers everyone has to pay homage to? And you aim to take our ship, right? So please enlighten me about what-precisely-the-fuck I should wait for?”
“Easy, mister,” said one of the others.
“Okay,” said Everett without taking his eyes off hat-guy, “I’m killing the ‘easy mister’ guy soon as I redecorate the walls with this one’s brains.”
“We were just going to ask for transport out,” hat-guy said. “For pay, of course.”
“Right, that’s why you surrounded us out here?” Alec’s attention was drawn to the man with the rifle. Despite Everett’s tirade, he had a knowing look on his face. Either he was very good, and very confident, or Alec and Everett were facing more than these six men. Alec risked a glance at the nearby rooftops, but saw no one.
“This town’s about to lose six of its upstanding citizens,” Everett announced.
“Fellas, please, I really think this is just a big misunderstanding,” hat-guy squealed, trying hard to get Alec’s attention.
Alec looked at the man with the T-47 slung over his shoulder, hands still casually resting in his pockets, “You think this is a misunderstanding?”
He studied Alec and Everett for a long, almost painful moment.
“Yeah. It’s a misunderstanding.” His small grin broke into a wide smile, made reptilian by the range goggles, that let Alec know they had unfinished business.
“I can see the wickedness in the back of your eyes, boy,” Everett said to hat-guy. “Don’t think I can’t. I’ve been around long enough to recognize a man I have to kill when I meet him.”
“No, no, no. Not at all. We can let bygones be bygones,” hat-guy said, his eyes flashing nervously between Alec and Everett.
Everett slowly lowered his gun.
The group took that opportunity to back away until they were a few paces down the street, then took off in a run. All except for the man with the T-47, who gave Alec a tiny, almost imperceptible nod as he sauntered off into the darkness. Alec and Everett kept their eyes on him until he vanished from sight.
“Gonna have to kill them later,” Everett said, muffling his frustration.
“Yeah, but we said ask around first, right?” Alec said, holstering his weapons.
“I say no to bygones,” said Everett, raising his voice as if sending the message after the disappeared goons. He turned to his partner and went on, low enough for only Alec to hear. “I say let folk face the consequences of their actions, for good or for ill.”
Alec pulled his duster closed.
Everett looked back in the direction of the constable’s office. “Think she had anything to do with our welcoming committee?”
Alec shrugged, blowing hot air into his cold hands.
Everett slid his heavy pistol back into its worn leather holster. “I’m looking forward to shooting her in the face.”
* * * *
The Devil’s Heart Saloon was as unimpressive as the rest of the town, just a small structure of corrugated metal like a compact warehouse with a smattering of tables and chairs, all dimly illuminated by a pair of light strips hanging from the ceiling and running at less than half power. At the center, sunk in a deep pit, was a large distillery that emitted a rolling wave of smoky gas that kept the incoming air at bay. The noxious gas mixed with the stench of the saloon’s clientele, their racial distribution a microcosm of Sekai space, with only a couple of humans among the huddled figures. Most were drinking a milky white liquid in tin carafes the size of pitchers.
All in all, the air was considerably better than outside, allowing Alec and Everett to drop their masks and headgear, but there was a stark difference between the air in here and the heady crispness of what they experienced in the constable’s office.
“Wonder if they take standard creds,” Everett said.
“I’ve got some chits and bongos.” Alec led the way to the smoking distiller. A small wiry man sat on a wooden bench beside it, staring at them stupidly. His eyes were yellowed and bloodshot, and his skin was stained so dark that it almost matched his thick moustache. As they drew close, Alec noted that the man had the rather dubious distinction of having had his teeth fall out in perfect symmetry so that the remaining few on the top would slot into empty spaces on the bottom and vice versa.
“How much?” he asked, reaching for a few bongos. They were braised steel lined with etchings of worn gold. Easy to manufacture and hard to fake, a
ll one had to do was press his thumbnail into the soft gold to know if it was bona fide.
The man put up two fingers, his expression unchanged. Alec handed him four. Once the currency was verified, the man grabbed a coiled length of copper tubing capped with a spout and filled a pair of pint-sized tin tubs with the viscous white liquid that seemed to be the town’s signature drink.
“Thanks.” Alec said, and moved toward a pair of empty stools near a long plank of unfinished wood that had been bolted to the far wall to serve as a makeshift bar.
“You’re new?” As much a statement as a question, it came from a young man on the other end of the bar who was busy entertaining an equally young woman. He was dressed with more flair than the rest of the saloon put together.
Alec nodded.
“Just a warning,” the young man said with a disarming grin, “That stuff’s hardcore.”
Everett took a seat beside his friend, swirling the liquid in his tin as he tried not to contemplate exactly how far this was from Scotch. “Looks chalky.”
The two men regarded each other, shrugged, toasted in silence, and took a good long swig before setting their tin mugs down on the bar.
“Feel anything?” Alec asked.
“Somewhere back there. It’s like a tickle.”
“Makes them happy,” Alec said, motioning to the rest of the saloon’s patrons. They were a dark and rough bunch, swathed in heavy clothing to combat the cold outside, with soot-smeared faces and yellowed eyes.
“Don’t know if you can call them that,” Everett said, taking another drink of the white stuff. “See the faces of those poor bastards that tried to jump on Drifter? This place is dying. When that AMP goes, and sooner or later it’s going to go, everyone here will have a few hours before they choke to death.”
“Damn,” Alec said solemnly. He drained his drink and stood. “Want another?”
“Might as well.” Everett finished his drink and handed Alec the empty mug.
Alec crossed the room to the distiller and stepped up to the small smiling man with the dark moustache. “That’s good stuff,” he lied. “Have anything stronger?”
