by Mike DiCerto
The auctioneer is seldom lost.
Our paths have sometimes crossed.
Strawbs
Middle City, oddly enough, was located between Left City and Right City in what was perhaps the most mundane and sterile cosmopolitan center ever designed. Dead in the heart of the matrix layout was the four-acre Blood Bone Hall, where Quigmo Digmo, the leader of the Meat Collectors Union and one of the syndicate heads of the five galactic sectors, ruled.
Caffrey had last seen Quigmo at the previous year's Middle City Edible Life Form Convention. A Belkibon by birth, Quigmo Digmo was of a species for whom body weight was not something to be ashamed of or controlled, but, rather, expanded upon in a boastful display of corpulent grandeur. “You can never be fat enough” was the proud Belkibon mantra.
Quigmo stepped up to the reinforced podium, dressed in what was for all practical purposes a red-and-black tent masquerading as a suit, his waist-length blue hair falling like a rippling waterfall over his layered torso. Revealing a mouthful of teeth stained with the permanent brown of old blood, he smiled at the gathered crowd and cleared his throat for a full five minutes before finally dislodging an ounce of God-knows-how-old meat, which he casually spat to the stage floor with a solid, moist thud.
"Welcome. Welcome, you old meat jockeys. I hereby officially deem the Middle City Edible Life Form Convention of 3265 open."
Half-hearted cheers filled the hall. Exotic meat collectors, as a rule, tend to make antsy crowds who despise the formality of such gatherings. Caffrey, as was his innate ability, found a seat beside a woman with hair so black it was as if a wormhole had opened and settled atop her head. He studied with great interest the length of thigh revealed beneath her semi-translucent pants and imagined the eternal joys that could be experienced in such a realm. Another round of cheers beckoned for his attention.
"I'm sorry, what did he say?” Caffrey asked.
"He said the first bid will be for a case of one hundred coolrip steaks,” she said, crossing her legs.
"You buying or selling?"
"Recruiting,” she replied tersely without looking his way—professionally ascetic.
"For?” Caffrey hated terse replies.
"You'll find out if I choose to recruit you."
"I see.” He didn't. He did, however, recognize the irregularly shaped, eight-pointed red-and-gold emblem emblazoned on her lapel—the logo of the once immensely popular interstellar musician Spydersloth Blaust. Caffrey couldn't resist one more flirtatious attempt to get her to face him.
"A Spydersloth fan, I see?"
Growing annoyed at his persistence, she turned and aimed her eyes at his. The purple blast caught Caffrey off-guard.
"One is not a fan of Spydersloth Blaust—that would imply I supported his past dabbling in the horrid art of music. One follows him on his new paths of disharmony and non-lyrical thought,” she returned, with a gaze that reeked of obsession.
Fanatic, he thought as he gave her one last faux smile and pondered running for the hills. He turned his attention back to the auction.
The case of Humproarian coolrip steaks went for ten thousand glid, purchased by a pair of co-joined Gavarians who continually, and quite foolishly, raised the stakes by trying to outbid each other. Then, with great musical fanfare, Quigmo waddled over to a large silver capsule lowered hydraulically to the stage. With a push of a button, the solid face became translucent and a gasp filled the room. The canister contained a frozen three-meter-long silver-finned rag-o-wisp. Caffrey pouted with an air of self-righteousness.
"So bloody trendy,” he said, just loud enough for the anxious bidder in front of him to hear.
For the dilettante of the cosmic culinary arts, a rag-o-wisp, with its delicate, flaky flesh, was hip. A silver-finned rag-o-wisp, found only in the mud bogs of Veneveer 5, was a guaranteed mention in the Society of Interstellar Blue Blood's “Posh Patter” column. A three-meter-long silver-finned rag-o-wisp meant guaranteed sex of any nature with any creature with the tendency for physical stimulation.
Caffrey wasn't impressed, and he left his seat and wandered down the aisle. Having been assigned a double digit in the random drawing, he knew from experience it would be at least an hour before his stock went up for grabs. He let his eyes fall upon the rows of anxiously waving arms, sweaty brows, impatient tentacles and bristled fins and smiled to himself, proud of his ability to not get caught up in the fickle trends of cuisine.
A cool breeze tempted him to the partially open rear door. He exited the hall.
A line of exotic spacecraft filled the landing zone, each glistening in the warm light of the sun. The Moby Dick sat at the far end, nestled between a sparkling new Heavenblaster 5 and a small, nubile Jetstar 1000. The Moby Dick looked, Caffrey strongly felt, the sexiest of the three.
A shriveled voice disrupted his gaze.
"She's a beauty."
Caffrey turned to find no one before him.
"Up here,” advised the voice.
Caffrey looked up. Sure enough, hanging in the air like a day-old helium balloon was a ruddy-faced Kelfkin—one of a race of creatures who floated about in hydrogen-rich atmospheres extracting the light gas, which they store in special bladders at each end of their bulbous bodies.
"Have you auctioned your haul?” asked the Kelfkin.
"No. I'm up in about an hour."
"Good. I have been instructed to make you a private offer."
"Tsk-tsk!” Caffrey spat, waving a warning-filled finger at the creature. “No bidding outside the confines of the convention."
"This comes from Quigmo himself. It's his rule to bend as he wishes,” explained the fish-faced balloon with a certain air of smugness that puckered Caffrey's lips like a bite of lemon.
His concern for the rules of the meat auction was, of course, a cautious ruse. It wasn't as if he were a virgin to closing deals covertly. Just three conventions previous he had sold a beautiful side of frigamoose1 for a record five thousand glid in this very same parking area. However, agents from the Meat Enterprise Advisory Team (M.E.A.T.) were notorious for baiting traders into illegal activity, and Caffrey was well aware of the penalties for unlawful actions.
"If Quigmo is interested in my cargo then he should approach me face to face."
"He's not interested in your cargo. He's interested in your ability to gather cargo."
"I'm retiring."
"He is sure you will be unable to resist this prey."
"Prey tell?” Caffrey inquired mockingly.
The Kelfkin pressed his fishy lips to Caffrey's left ear and whispered. If not for the tensile strength of his optic nerves, Caffrey's eyes would have shot clear across the landing zone.
* * * *
Quigmo Digmo's office was furnished with pieces dangerously close to overdosing on florid detail. The walls were gaudily adorned with tapestries illustrating great, obese moments of Belkibon history; and the ceiling was painted as if by some high-carb, high-protein Michelangelo.
Quigmo lounged naked in his Vibrundaspooner 500, exhausted from his seven hours of battling the forces of gravity at the podium. He moaned uncontrollably as the warming, vibrating, massaging mass of protoplasmic goop molded itself around him, sending sensual waves of ecstatic bliss to his every muscle and pore. Caffrey, employing a more conventional sitting apparatus, bit his lip in disgust and tried to ignore the horrid sound of goop kissing fat.
"L'Orange?” he asked in utter disbelief, for possibly the tenth time.
"Yes, Quark, L'Orange,” was Quigmo's tired assurance.
Caffrey shook his head and tossed the Belkibon an amused smirk.
"Quigmo, you know I respect you and your position,” he lied smoothly. “But this is kwinkleshit. L'Orange is a myth. A tale akin to some Ancient Astral Mariner. The delusional fantasy of children or grown men of equivalent intellect."
He could have gone on for hours but decided he'd made his point. Quigmo burst into laughter, great guffaws of roaring, crackling blasts of air that blew back Caffrey's hair a
nd wrinkled his nose with the slight but definite stench of old bacon and tooth gunk. The Belkibon managed to lift his arm from the tub of goop and point to a small wooden box sitting alone on a long, polished-stone table.
Caffrey lazily stretched his arm for it but to his dismay was a foot short of the object. After a few moments of attempting to bring it to him with some deeply repressed telekinetic power, futility won out and forced him up. He took the small, pretty cube in his hands and admired its soft grain. He lifted the hinged cover. Inside was a small, crystalline cylinder. He held it up to the light.
"It's empty."
Quigmo, expecting the response, rolled his eyes and pointed his arm to the table again.
"Use the glass."
Caffrey, who hadn't noticed the gold-rimmed magnifying glass lying a few feet from where the box had been sitting, did as suggested. Peering through the antique instrument, he focused in on the mere dot of orange something-or-other that was made barely visible by the lens.
"What am I barely looking at?” he asked, his face contorted as he eyed the miniscule particle.
"L'Orange,” Quigmo boasted. “The only sample of the mystical substance ever to be obtained by any creature with the ability to obtain."
"And that lucky creature was you, Quigmo."
"Exactly."
"You're a magician, Quigmo."
"You are well aware of my chain of contacts, of which, my old friend, you are one small but trusted link."
Caffrey moved the glass to and fro as he tried to focus on the tiny sample.
"How do you know this isn't a speck of orange snot? Sneezed into this tube by a Truplimouse? They do, as I am sure you're aware, have orange-colored snots.” He loved playing these games.
"I am well aware of the color of Truplimouse mucus. That substance, however, is a true and authentic sample of the L'Orange mentioned in the great Books of the Camgari, lauded in the songs of reverence of the Baggolits and worshiped in the many magnificent cathedrals of Spandibo. It is real, my doubting Tomasso. You are destined to cross paths with the great L'Orange!” Quigmo pontificated with great enthusiasm.
"Why?"
"Why? You are the nephew of Greppledick Quark!"
"Who vanished into the cosmic ocean."
"Exactly. An eternal mystery."
Caffrey rolled his eyes. The Belkibon pursued its line of argument.
"It has been rumored that he constructed the last Portsmith. Your degree of separation from the mystic L'Orange is but a stone's throw!"
"Quigmo, I heard all the stories about the L'Orange from Greppledick when I was five. He was a loon."
"The mighty Frigonese oak is a nut who held its ground,” Quigmo philosophized.
"A lovable loon."
"If anyone can track it down, you can. You know the folds and crevasses of this sector better than I do."
"Are you suggesting I take this magnifying glass and travel every square inch of the cosmos seeking out every floating speck of magic orange snot?"
Quigmo laughed again, and Caffrey casually covered his nose.
"You are droll, my friend. Very droll,” Quigmo mused, his flesh shuddering obscenely with the remains of a chuckle. “That cylinder was found in a slimy hotel room on Yeplu 7. A hotel room which, witnesses claim, had been occupied by an android getting his master cylinder lubricated, if you catch my meaning. The Portsmith. There are rumors spreading that the Great Orange One and his protective escort have been separated. Never before has such a scenario become reality. If it is true, then the L'Orange is vulnerable. And I want it."
"Why?"
"Why? It is the essence of the All! The Liquid Fire of Antrisa! The Tears of Umalaze! The Milk of the Grand Teat! The purest form of the Prime Matter! The—"
"I've heard all the nicknames."
"And there is something else afoot, my narrow-bummed friend—I am losing worlds. Valuable worlds that I have spent a lifetime achieving control of."
Caffrey raised an eyebrow. This was interesting.
"I am not sure who is behind this attempt to control what is mine, but I shall not allow it. I sense the time is at hand. He who controls L'Orange will control the galaxy. I want you to get it for me. Will you attempt the greatest hunt since the Uldafter Fomaster2?"
"That would put me in quite epic company."
"Accept my offer."
"I'm retiring, Quigmo."
"Don't be a fool, Quark."
"That, my portly prince, is exactly what I plan to be,” Caffrey retorted, with a wave. “I'll take cash if you're still interested in my meat.” He got up and exited the room.
CHAPTER THREE
JUKE BOX HERO
He heard one guitar. Just blew him away.
Foreigner
"I am picking up rather sweet osmic frequencies. Symilia flower oil, to be exact,” Angie said with a definite accusatorial tone.
"Angie-girl, your nose is as sharp as a vexenhound's. Quigmo had perfumed the goop of his vibrundaspooner with that very fragrance,” Caffrey fibbed.
"The only essence Quigmo is fond of is that of his own fat lard oils. You visited Typura Moora again, didn't you?"
Caffrey smirked and ignored the question, pretending to be distracted by the colorful Groovy Tunes Jukebox sitting prominently in the center of the cabin.
"Caffrey Trinesmart Quark the Second, how could you!” Angie scolded in her most prickly voice.
"Oh, Angie, relax. Her voice can never compare with yours."
"And her body?"
"What difference does that make? You don't have a—never mind, Angie-girl. How's about a Bezzie, neat?"
"Yeah, sure, my cheating charm-snake. And you had better bite your tongue."
Caffrey smiled to himself as he thought about Typura Moora, the gorgeous high priestess of the Shimmyshake Palace located in the center of Middle City's only stretch of heart—the always-busy Harmony Road. The paragon of interstellar brothels, it could serve bliss-fulfillment to more than sixty-five very diverse species.
Caffrey made it a point to pay her a visit after each year's Meat Convention. He never grew tired of her wonderful fragrance, her soft lavender skin and almost luminescent hair. Being she was a Finishian, Typura's locks were formed of wide bands of silky fibers that fell from her scalp like long strips of gossamer crepe-de-Chine rather than the fine strands characteristic of most humanoids. Its color was ever-changing, like oil in a sunny puddle. It was unforgettable. Then again, her twin tongues, four breasts, triple-jointed legs and thirty-two fingers set her aside from most of the humanoids Caffrey had clashed physiques with.
Finding himself wanting to be back at the Shimmyshake, he decided to distract his raging fantasies by tinkering with the jukebox. It took him a few hours before he began to understand the device's primitive mechanics. It took further experimentation to bypass the coin-operated mechanisms to finally get the inner turntable to spin. After five hours, with Angie manning the helm and guiding The Moby Dick across the ocean of the Byro System, Caffrey was ready to test the machine.
There were ten or so discs in what he considered to be playable condition. As to which one would have the honor of first play—that was simple. Caffrey had to bow to the synchronicity of the Cosmos—it had to be “Stairway to Heaven."
The titles of the songs, while all colorful, were not what piqued his interest. The fact that these were songs written and performed by humans completely intrigued him. A team of people formed under names like “Led Zeppelin.” “The Rolling Stones,” “The Beatles,” etc., for the sole purpose of creating music was unheard-of on Earth V—perhaps even silly. Ludicrous. Caffrey loved the concept!
He gently lifted the disc from the storage drawer and laid it atop the felt-covered platform. He turned on the power, flipped a switch and sat back. The music began as a series of melodic tones that put a soft smile on his face. He sipped the glass of Bezzie and listened.
For the next eight minutes he was transfixed. Silent. It was simply like nothing he had ever
heard. Music in Caffrey's world was categorized as neo-pleasantry and produced by music generators that composed using a combination of pre-tested pleasing chord arrangements snagged from a huge database, along with a dash of originality created by random-tone sequencers.
While some of it was, in its own soulless way, inoffensive to the ears—other than Caffrey's—this was different. Very different. The music was simple. Pure. The voice was perfectly human with a subtle passion infusing each word in ways Caffrey had never experienced. The lyrics were mysterious. Mystical. He wasn't certain he understood what the song was about but felt as though he were witness to the reading of the secret tome of some ancient order.
Then the vocals stopped, and some sort of electrical string instrument began a solo that screamed with a gentle and confident power. The instrument continued the tale, in its own dialect of vibrating strings, of the woman who believed “all that glittered was gold” and “forests that echoed with laughter.” Caffrey was lifted up the enigmatic stairway to heaven by the magical notes.
The singer rejoined the piece but this time with a gut-wrenching power, sending chills up and down Caffrey's spine. No one ever screamed during a song. It was simply never done!
Caffrey found himself wondering Why the hell not?
Deep into the night, as The Moby Dick cruised across the heavens, he listened to the discs. Over and over. He wanted more. He needed more examples of this musical form that was called Rock in days of old. He wanted to live in a world where this music was created. He wanted to meet the people who created it.
Oddly, like a fly trapped in a bottle and buzzing beneath the surface of the loosened cork, there was a memory trying to surface in his mind. The music seemed to be poking at his psyche and soul. It would take a few hours before it popped the cork of his consciousness.
"Uncle Greppledick,” Caffrey whispered to himself.
"He speaks,” Angie commented with a dash of sarcasm.
Caffrey wandered to the bow window and gazed out at the infinity before him.
"Angie-girl, I know where we're going."
"Where?"
"Well, I don't know where exactly. But I know what for. We're going to collect as many samples of this music as are scattered about this galaxy. We'll start with the titles from these broken discs. I need to hear more."
