The Meat Market (Jonathan Harkon Adventures Book 1)

by James Chalk

  My ears burned as I brooded over my inadequacy. As we got closer to the end of the ring, the streets became cleaner and fewer vagrants were visible. The warehouses, bars, and tenements were replaced by retail shops and apartment complexes. I had never ventured this far into Sanctity and did not know what to expect. What I did know was that the Bishop could be found that evening at a Cathedral in the sixth ring.

  Sanctity’s worship scheduling service is open to everyone with an access terminal, or in my case, a forbidden neurointerface. The scheduling service provided very helpful information about the Bishop’s itinerary, including locations and topics for his next ten services. The night’s topic was, “God’s special love and the stricture of protection for the young.” I had a reservation to attend.

  The second ring in the spiral was dramatically different than the first. A perfectly manicured suburban sprawl spread out before me. It was sparsely populated, with enormous homes that were surrounded by lightly wooded properties. Their private entrances were guarded by smart-fences and sentry-gates. The gates yielded entry to sleek, personal, vehicles that had more in common with my BMW in its true form than with the clunky truck it currently appeared to be. In fact, mine was the only truck in sight.

  Concerned, I decided to take the next side road. The side road was empty and, as soon as I was out of sight of the main one, I transformed the appearance of my BMW to match the cars I had been seeing. Good timing too, because as I came around the next bend, an inquisitor patrol vehicle slipped in behind me. My BMW reported active scanning and an attempt at interrogating the onboard database. My BMW has some mad-skills. She used a scan-profile and database that she lifted from a car that had passed us a few minutes earlier. She easily spoofed the patrol vehicle’s sensors. Had we still been configured with a truck’s appearance, they would have pulled us over for sure. Once convinced I was another local power player, they left me alone. Inquisitors aren’t fucking stupid. They know who butters their bread!

  I found a route that rejoined the main road and I relaxed into my new anonymity. Baihu seemed to sense my change in mood and dozed off to sleep. Her soft breathing further calmed me as I gazed out the window, watching the curve of the ceiling rush by. Adjusting my vision for the harsh, nuclear glare of the simulated daylight, I couldn’t help but reflect about the striking differences between Sanctity and Harkon.

  I don’t mean the political and philosophical differences, although those are huge. I’m talking about the physical differences between colonies. Sanctity is a spiral torus, barely able to fit its current population. It is claustrophobically cramped when compared to my home colony’s wide, open spaces. Harkon is a bishop ring that could easily accommodate as many as one hundred billion people, but only has a population of about three billion. Its artificial sun gives out a warm, gentle light that illuminates, without harming the skin or eyes. Flora and fauna flourish and abound on Harkon, with no need for the anti-radiation drugs that all life on Sanctity depends upon.

  What stupid fucking prick of an engineer builds a space colony with an artificial light source, generated by nuclear fission? What, is fusion too hard? They couldn’t download the specs? Nope, it’s another religious thing. Something about how the sun gives off radiation, so God must intend for people to be bombarded with radiation! We are “commanded to live under a real sun,” they say. Never mind the fact that the “real sun,” like all stars, is powered by fusion. Fucking dumb religiopricks. Don’t confuse them with the fucking facts! When pressed, they quote, “So that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.”

  Ridiculous, if you ask me. Their stupid, anti-radiation drugs aren’t even close to one hundred percent effective. I wouldn’t even set foot in their colony, if not for my own radiation scrubbers - another forbidden bio-tech on Sanctity. If they have to live under a nuclear furnace, why don’t they just add scrubbers to their baseline genome? Oh yea, their fucking stupid religion doesn’t allow that either. “God didn’t make man with radiation scrubbers.” Idiots.

  Lost in my thoughts, I barely noticed as we entered ring three and the terrain shifted from mansions to farm land. The fields swarmed with workers harvesting food for the colony. I passed through orchards, watching as young boys shimmied up trees. They were like little monkeys, scampering out on skinny branches to reach the fruit. They were tossing it down to men who were filling crates on large carts that they pushed from tree to tree. I wondered at their apparent disregard for the safety of the children.

  Beyond the orchards, I passed livestock milling about in overcrowded pens. Their mewling cries, snorts, and grunts awakened Baihu. She stared out the window, perfectly still, except for the tip of her tail, which was twitching like crazy. Little tufts of fur rose along the nape of her neck. As her excitement built, a soft, rapid fire, huffing noise came from her throat, and the tufts of fur extended the length of her back.

  I breathed a sigh of relief (and made a mental note to feed Baihu an early dinner) as we turned a bend, leaving the livestock behind. The road now paralleled a river that was dark and thick with farm run off. Rapids formed in the swirling waters. As we passed, I caught glimpses of people who appeared to be surfing small boats on the chocolate waves. I marveled at the courage to face all the bacteria and viruses in that water without any biomods or nanotech. Baihu quietly growled under her breath and then we were past and on to the next ring.

  Ring four, like ring three, was all farm and ranch land. We passed through without event and on to the fifth ring - another suburban sprawl filled with franchise mansions. Another inquisitor patrol vehicle trailed me for a while. The same spoofing worked on them and the patrol soon pulled off, waiting for some poor, hapless guy who dared travel outside his ring.

  The closer we got to the end of the fifth ring, the smaller the homes became, and the less property there was between them. I could tell we were approaching another urban center. When we arrived, I saw that the sixth ring was much cleaner with significantly fewer homeless than ring one. The structures were smaller and more sparse, with wide avenues and orderly landscaping. There were a lot of inquisitors walking the streets, standing around on corners, and cruising in patrol vehicles. My BMW was kept busy by the frequent vehicle interrogations they directed at us.

  Baihu shifted around restlessly on the rear couch. She was agitated and kept making little whining sounds to let me know. I’ve learned to trust Baihu’s intuition. I began to scan the streets for some sign of threat, but nothing materialized and none of the inquisitors were paying us undue attention. We continued on like this for a while, me nervously scanning and Baihu becoming more and more insistent with her whining.

  We were passing a park area when it dawned on me. Tension released from my gut as we pulled into the park’s deserted parking lot. I released the hatch for the rear compartment and watched Baihu hop out of the BMW and rush over to the grass to relieve herself. She quickly returned and settled onto the rear couch for a nap. Crisis averted!

  Back on the road, we made quick time to the cathedral where the Bishop was scheduled to speak. The huge parking lot was almost filled when we arrived. A double line of congregants filed in through the enormous synthwood doors. We parked in the back of the lot and, to my surprise, Baihu didn’t give me any trouble about staying in the BMW. I pasted what I hoped was a sufficiently vapid and rapturous look on my face and joined the line of religiopricks.

  As the line inched along toward the doors, I observed the people around me. In front were two men with long beards. They were dressed in black suits with funny blue hats. The outfits looked uncomfortable, but not as hot and awkward as the very popular robe and bead ensemble that I could see up and down the line. I shivered as I flashed back on my time in the VIP Lounge. Then I couldn’t help but chuckle, “Yup, got to love those robes! You can wear them straight from church to your favorite sado-sex dungeon. No need to change attire!”

 
; Behind me was a family. The father looked tired and distracted. He was carrying a little girl in his arms. His wife was very pregnant and very busy herding five young boys. The eldest looked about thirteen. Clearly brothers, they all shared their father’s light blond hair and their mother’s wide cheekbones. Two of the older boys were arguing.

  The eldest said, “God made the Devil and the Devil is bad so God is bad.”

  The younger brother frowned and replied, “God is good. Mom said so. An he made Jesus, an Jesus loves us so much that he died for us!”

  The eldest laughed and said, “God knows everything and controls everything, right?”

  The younger one nodded his head tentatively, as if sensing a trap.

  “Then, God planned for his son to be killed, and since killing is a sin, God is a sinner!” the elder brother triumphantly declared.

  “No!” cried the younger brother. “We are the sinners. Mom told me that, without Jesus, I would spend forever burning. An I wouldn’t be able to breath. An I wouldn’t die, cause I’d already be dead. So I couldn’t die again. An I would just burn an choke forever. But Jesus loves me an Jesus is God. So I don’t have to be worried about burning. Just say my prayers an love Jesus!”

  “So, God made you just to torture you for eternity, unless you worship his son, who he had killed to save you?” the older boy chortled.

  At this point the argument was interrupted by the mother who swatted the eldest in the ear and told him, “shush up and mind your tongue. I don’ wan’ hear none of that devil talk.”

  The boy looked sullen, but kept his mouth shut after that. His younger brother grinned at him with a triumphant expression spread clear across his face. The mother looked around nervously, as if afraid someone had overheard the conversation. The father was pretending not to have noticed, and I went with his plan of looking anywhere but at the agitated mother.

  I was relieved when I finally reached the entrance. Also, I was amused to discover that Sanctity’s phobia about technology was at blame for the long wait; they were checking people off a printed list. I walked up and gave them the name my reservation was under, and they looked me up. No scanner and no database involved. Very slow, but very convenient if you’re wanted by the authorities for kidnapping, or mass murder, or something.

  Inside, the cathedral was packed with people. It was easy to slip away from the seating line and into a stairwell. I went up a flight of stairs and slipped into an empty office just beyond the stairway. There, I found one of the all-purpose robes and put it on. I exited the office and moved down the hall towards a door with a sign that read “No admittance.”

  The door was locked, but easily broken when I applied a little ‘extra’ pressure to the handle. Beyond it, the severe golden elegance of the outer cathedral was replaced by a plush velvet decor that featured sitting rooms and offices filled with overstuffed furniture and thick carpets. The lights were dimmed and no one was around. I assumed they were all downstairs preparing for the upcoming sermon.

  I moved further into the private quarters, searching for where they would most likely host a visiting big-wig like the Bishop. Somewhere grand and ostentatious, most likely. My plan was to find the Bishop’s rooms and steal the dog while the Bishop was giving his sermon. No fuss, no muss, and no temptation to kill the perverted little pig! Then, I would get the dog to Brenda and trust Intercol to do the rest!

  As I passed a door in the hall, I heard the faint sound of a dog yipping. Smiling, because I was sure my plan was coming to fruition, I cautiously opened the door and moved into the room behind it. The room must have been fairly well soundproofed, since the dog’s barking and yipping was much louder with the door open. I scanned the room, searching for my quarry.

  I was in what looked like a living room for a luxury hotel suite. This was clearly a VIP guest apartment for the cathedral. Adjacent to the living room, separated by a counter with stools, was a large kitchen space featuring shiny steel appliances. The barking was coming from down a hall at the back of the empty room.

  I quietly slipped into the hall, worried that I might be too early and run into the Bishop in his bedroom! So I was very relieved when I saw the little pink bow on top of that greasy brown and white head charging down the hall at me. The little dog was snarling and yipping as usual, but I ignored that and scooped her up. Surprisingly, instead of trying to bite me, she quieted down and began to lick my hand.

  Relieved that things were going so smoothly, I turned to head back to the living room. That’s when I heard the boy crying. His quiet sobs must have been drowned out by the dog’s barking. The crying was coming from the doorway that the dog had charged out of. I knew I should just take the dog and go, but the sound was so wretched. I couldn’t harden my heart to it.

  When I entered the room, the dog, still in my arms, started to growl and snarl. It took me a moment to process the scene before me. A boy of about twelve years was huddled in the corner. He had beautiful blond locks of hair, and wild doe-like eyes. His prepubescent features lent an almost feminine delicacy to his face. Terror and despair radiated off him, palpable emotions filling the room, seeming to force the air out. The half-naked remains of the Bishop were spreadeagled on the floor before the boy. The Bishop’s bare, bulging belly poked out from between the folds of his open robe. The white skin of his legs was stark against the black of his robe. A rapidly spreading pool of blood surrounded where his genitals should have been.

  The little gun looked very big in the boy’s hand. I inappropriately wondered about the ammunition it carried. “Such a big hole for such a small gun. Where can I get that?”

  The gun was still pointed between the Bishop’s legs, but at the sound of the dog it swung up to center on me. The dog went crazy, snarling and scratching, trying to get loose, and the boy started to scream, “Get away, get it away!”

  I backed into the hallway and put the damn dog down. Strangely, she immediately quieted and happily scampered off down the hall. Taking a deep breath, I stepped back into the room and the line of fire. Only I wasn’t in the line of fire anymore. The boy was now pointing the gun at his own head.

  The kid’s hand was trembling and the anguish in his expression was painfully raw. I wondered where he got the gun and what the Bishop had been doing to him, although I guess the latter was fairly obvious. I took a step toward him, but he tensed up and pushed the barrel harder against his temple. Backing off, I sat right down next to the dead bishop and tried to look nonthreatening.

  The boy seemed to relax a little, although he kept the gun pointed at his head. Feeling surreal, and without a clue about what to do, I tried on a smile. “Hi,” I said, “my name’s Jon. What’s yours?”

  He just stared at me, so I just stared back. Eventually, he responded, “Tommy.”

  “Nice to meet you, Tommy. Do you want to talk about this?”

  Tommy replied with a flood of words, “I didn’t mean to do it. I didn’t want to… to do that stuff. I told him stop…”

  “It’s okay, Tommy. He can’t hurt you anymore. Everything is going to be okay. That’s a nice gun you’ve got there. Did you take it from him? Can I see it?”

  “It’s mine. Daddy gived it to me for my birthday. ‘Cause I’m gett’n older, an a man’s gots to have a gun! Mommy says I mustn’t take it to church an stuff ‘cause God don’t like that,” He began to sob uncontrollably.

  “It’s okay, Tommy. Everything is going to be okay. Your mom won’t be angry. I’m sure she will be glad you had your gun!”

  He wept harder, but when I tried to move closer to console him, he tensed. Afraid, I halted my motion. “You don’t know!” he screamed. “You don’t know what they told me… What will happen!”

  “Tell me, Tommy. Tell me what you think will happen. Maybe I can help.” I said, as another part of my mind measured distances and concluded that I could not reach him before he could pull the trigger.

  “The inquisitors!” he sobbed. Racked with tears and barely able to speak, he gasp
ed out, “They’re gonna take us away an Test us. I done it. I gots to die so they don’t Test Mommy.”

  Then he pulled the trigger. Pieces of flesh and skull tore into my face as I screamed, “NO!!!”

  I rushed to his side, taking the gun from his still-twitching hand. It was hopeless. Two thirds of his head was gone. No first aid was going to help him.

  I was coming to grips with the reality that there was absolutely nothing I could do for Tommy, when Harvey walked through the door. Standing there in his brown robe, his eyebrows pressed together in consternation, Harvey looked like an enormous ogre from a fairy-tail. The ogre impression doubled when he roared, “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO HITH EMINENTH?” and charged at me.

  I should have just shot him! I guess I was still stunned by my epic failure with Tommy. While I was hesitating, Harvey made it across the room and swatted the gun out of my hand. He lifted me up in a bear hug and started to squeeze. The ogre imitation was complete!

  He was very large and strong, but my torso is reinforced, so it didn’t effect me much. I used to play games with my Aunt Cleo when she was baby-sitting me. We would pretend that she was an assassin come to kill me and I would try to get away. She made it a lot of fun, but also made sure I learned some things. Things like timing. Like when to run, when to hide, and when to play dead.

  I went limp and tried to look like I was turning blue. Harvey kept squeezing and screaming, or it could have been sobbing. Honestly, it was hard to tell. After a short while, he dropped me and rushed over to his boss. I allowed my limp body to collapse to the floor. I thought about running, but I knew I would not have time to reacquire the dog. Accepting the inevitable, I rose to my feet and faced Harvey in a fighting stance.

  Harvey surprised me again. He didn’t react like an ogre or anything else I might have expected. Instead, he straightened up, came to attention, and performed a deep formal bow. Then he dropped into a matching fighting stance. I responded with a salutation of my own. The long sleeves of my borrowed robe fell over my clasped hands as I bowed deeply, honoring Harvey. When I straightened up, I shot him with the stun gun that had been in my forearm sheath. Aunt Cleo’s lessons had also included when to strike!