“Flank them out the wazoo, huh?” I ask as I run my hand along my chin stubble. I can feel Sophia roll her eyes, but as soon as Ray Steampunk gets on board, the passive aggressive Mind Mage is whistling a different choon.
“It’s a grand idea,” says Steam’s Golden Boy. “We will attack the front alongside Thulean forces, and the Empress’ forces will come from behind. It’s a classic strategy, but if we're smart about it and this information does not leave this room, this will not be something that takes an incredible military strategist to pull off. This is a simple flanking maneuver, and it would be hard to screw it up once we get everyone in place.”
~*~
Bada boom, bada bing.
With a plan in place, the Dream Team, a.k.a Us Trulies, decide to log out.
Nothing like a little brunch to get the day going, and sure, I'd love a brewski, and there's the it’s-always-five-o’clock-somewhere joke I could throw out, but I know Frances would be against it and I'm trying to weasel my way back into her good graces.
So I behave myself as the Brian Eno tone fades away, and I'm helped out of the dive vat by Rocket.
“Ready for lunch, Quantum?” he asks, a crooked grin on his face. His hair is greasy, and he looks like he could use a shower, but he doesn’t smell or anything, and that’s good enough for me.
“As long as it involves pancakes.”
“Wrong,” I hear Frances say to my right.
I'm still not quite out of the vat goo yet, so I can't see her. And I'd like to see her, because, well, she's pretty.
“What about biscuits and gravy, then? Don’t know what I like about it, but it always seems to hit the spot.”
My stomach grumbles at the mention and I hear Homer Simpson say ‘mmmmmm’ in my head. Hard to imagine The Simpsons is still on in the 2050s, but beating a dead horse is the name of the game for televised entertainment.
“I ordered vegan halal cinnamon rolls and vegan kosher breakfast tacos,” Frances says as soon as she’s out. “Because someone has been asking someone else to bring illegal contraband into the Dream Team offices. So I figured I’d stop those someones and just order appropriate food.”
Rocket and I exchange glances. I give him the 'I won't say anything, if you don't say anything' look, and he nods.
“I plead the fifth,” I tell Frances. “Besides, I told you I liked the kosher cinnamon rolls and the halal breakfast tacos, not the other way around. The halal cinnamon rolls are too sweet, and the kosher breakfast tacos always give me heartburn. These things matter.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“That’s Mr. Idiot to you,” I say, much to her amusement.
Sure enough, by the time we have showered off, and I'm back to my real-world duds, my gimpy ass supported by my Commando Cane, an EBAYmazon drone has arrived with our food.
The vegan cinnamon rolls have pink, blue and white icing, and the breakfast tacos are better than I thought they’d be. Maybe vegan food was bad when I was a kid, but nowadays it pretty much tastes like the real stuff. I don't go around parading this fact, because I don't want to see the meat industry go anywhere, old bedfellows and whatnot. But the meat industry is on the way out, considering most of the stuff can be lab grown anyway.
So I wolf down three tacos, tear through two cinnamon rolls, and catch the hairy eye from Frances on the third.
“What?” I ask, my mouth full. “We didn't have a very big breakfast.”
“Quantum, you know better.”
“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.”
“The cinnamon rolls are choice!” Rocket declares, his fingers sticky with icing.
“What does that even mean?” I ask.
Frances is actually eating her breakfast taco with a knife and fork, which is an abomination. But I don't comment on that.
Be a good boy, Quantum, I remind myself.
Once she’s done eating like a lady, she brews some coffee, and as she does, Rocket starts going on and on about the fact that he's going to marry his Steam girlfriend. “We've already set the date, and I’ll go over to India to do it. And then I have to file all this paperwork to bring her here. It might take a little time. So there will be some separation, but at least we have the Proxima Galaxy.”
“Crazy to think that people used to deal with this type of separation through video, or hell, even letters before that. Sheesh. I grew up with it like that, with video, but ever since the Proxima Galaxy came about, I’ve never looked back. Two subjective years stuck there too, but I don’t have to tell you about that.”
“Nope,” he says as he opens a Bull Bean energy drink, “I’ve heard that story, gramps.”
“And it ain't a bad story neither. Next time you call me gramps, I’m going to give you the Rollins treatment.” I nod toward my cane. “We clear here?”
“Yes, sir,” Rocket says, avoiding eye contact.
“Play nice,” Frances says, as she brings me a cup of coffee.
“You put sweetener in this?”
“What do you think?”
“Yeah, yeah, take the fun out of life.” One sip from the cup of Joe and I notice a bit of cinnamon flavor. At first, I think it’s flavored, but then I realize that’s just some leftover residue from the rolls I slammed.
The holoscreen flickers on, and we’re greeted by the War Faun in his human avatar form, who is with Sophia in Colorado.
I realize then the reason Evan hasn't contacted me to tell me about my diet: he's lying on a gurney with a bunch of cords hooked up to him.
Good riddance.
“Aiden ain’t there yet?” I ask. “Don’t tell me it’s that bozo Evan.”
“He’s not a bozo,” Sophia hisses.
“Aiden will be here sooner than later,” says Doc, who is still wearing a bib that's covered in barbecue sauce, a context clue for what he had for brunch.
“You missed a spot,” I tell him. Rocket snorts.
“Not the case,” he tells me, a twinkle in his eyes. “Saving that for later.”
Rocket and I laugh, Frances not so much, and Sophia, thankfully, is too busy messing with cables and grumbling under her breath to join in on the laugh track.
I hear Arnie say something off camera, and Doc tells him to go ahead and do it.
After a little bit of Frankenstein twitching, Aiden comes alive in Evan’s humandroid body.
“Is Quantum watching?” he asks Sophia.
Dr. Wang shakes her head at him. “Yes, why?”
“Hey, Quantum. Like that twitching I did?” Aiden asks Doc’s B-drone.
“It was dramatic,” I tell Morning Assassin. “But I want you to try better next time. Your inspiration is a guy having an epileptic seizure while watching the intro to an anime. Say, Doc, we going to get to some action here or what? As much as I’d like to marvel at Sophia’s invention, I’m ready to get this pony show on the road.”
I wink at Rocket, and for the first time, he realizes that I actually do look over the morning briefings. I mean, I don't study them, but if they're in the restroom while I'm going number two, I skim through them.
And for some reason, they keep ending up in the restroom at Frances’.
Just goes to show you, you can teach an old dog new tricks, as long as those aren’t actually new tricks at all, only you’ve made it easier for him to do what you’d like.
“Hold your horses, Quantum.”
“Holding.”
The camera pans out; I see that there are a few targets that Doc has set up, some in the distance, and others up close.
“Sophia, please step over here,” Doc tells her.
Our daughter of the Orient does as instructed, and after Aiden stands, Doc gives him a handgun and a bowie knife.
“You know how to use these things?” Doc asks, the B-drone now hovering over his shoulder and filming from a pretty good angle.
Aiden starts to laugh.
“Is that a yes or no?”
“Sorry, Doc, I thought you were joking.”
“I think I can handle it, Doc.”
Aiden stands, and takes the weapons from the Dream Team's CWO.
Sophia already has headphones on, and before Morning Assassin begins, Doc too places a pair over his noggin.
Once he’s in position, which happens to be directly next to their little medical set-up, Aiden goes to town.
He fires the handgun at the dummies on the other side of the warehouse, all headshots aside from the first, and to make up for the fact he missed the first, he twists and lets loose the bowie knife, which flies through the air and strikes the dummy in the throat.
It's a hell of a performance, one that I’d pay good money to see (if only I was getting a paycheck).
“Good, now, I want you to go up against Arnie, and neither of you are supposed to disable the other one, I just want you to get used to the movement and the feel of this body.”
The camera shifts to show Arnie, who is standing to Doc’s left.
“Rocket, get the popcorn.”
“Sorry Q Butt, we don't have any popcorn.”
“Frances, how long would it take EBAYmazon to deliver some popcorn?”
“Longer than we have.”
“Damn. Well, just damn, this is going to be awesome!”
After sizing each other up for a moment Arnie and Aiden go at it.
Arnie swings his right hand, which Aiden quickly dodges and uses to flip him onto his back. He lets Arnie back up. Arnie tries to kick this time, but Aiden the humandroid blocks and brings Arnie to his knees again by following up with a kick to the side of his knee.
They go at it for a little bit longer, Arnie only able to get Aiden down once, which is good, which is damn good, and I can tell by the look on Doc’s face that he thinks the same thing.
I know that he has had a ton of combat training uploaded into Arnie, and to see Aiden easily handing him his ass...
Hell, I can almost see the gears turning in Doc’s head as he considers how he can import some of Aiden's natural combat ability into his own humandroid companion.
“This is going to be the coolest thing we see all day, isn't it?” I ask Frances and Rocket.
“Hopefully,” she says, and with that single word, I realize that while things are currently going in our direction, they could switch on a dime.
~*~
A breath of fresh air – there's something you can't get in a Proxima world. I step outside, looking up at the trees that surround the Dream Team offices and the chirping little birdies. There are days when I'm ready to hang up the mantle, rid myself of these Proxima worlds, of these fake digital existences.
Just enjoy some fresh air, and the view.
Ha, I wish there was a view, but at least there's a bench that was put here years ago probably for cigarette smokers. So I sit on the bench, kick my legs out, take a load off.
Frances and Rocket are inside still talking to Doc, Sophia, and Aiden. I hate to modify plans, but I’ve got this itching feeling that we need to get to Colorado, and I'm going to bring it up again later.
Got to go with my gut. Besides, I want to be there when they do it, when they bring Strata down.
I close my eyes for a spell, and as she has done countless times, Dolly appears.
It's a rainy day in the Loop; the gutter dwellers out to wash their sins away, lightning crackling in the sky, thunder so loud it makes you believe there really is a God, and he’s pissed.
It's night, actual night, even though it always looks like night in the Loop, and Dolly has just gotten off work. I tell her to take her apron off, change into something comfortable, and she morphs into that Jessica Rabbit red dress.
“You ready to go out, Quantum?”
“You bet your ass.”
She presses her dark locks to the side. “You want me to bet my ass, honey?”
“Not in a million years, doll,” I tell her, as I put my trench coat on.
We're outside the Mondegreen in a matter of moments, an aeros dropping down from the sky. I'm about to say something to the driver about how he should probably get out in the rain and take a bath, but I decide to keep things kosher, for Dolly’s sake.
We don't go on many moonlit walks.
Most of our nights are spent in my shabby little room at the flophouse, where it's safe, where the only thing we have to contend with is an assassin every hour or so.
Dolly and Yours Truly alone? My brain goes to jelly.
The cabbie makes small talk, and I let Dolly entertain him.
I got nothing to say to this cabbie, aside from ‘keep driving, you schmuck,’ and ‘get us there in one piece, or else.’
But eventually, we get to Three Kings Park.
For once, the yeggs out front standing around their trash can fires are gone. The pigeons are gone too, as is all their bird shit, not too shabby if you ask me.
So Dolly and Yours Truly take that moonlight stroll, no stray mutts, no Riotous fiends scratching in the underbrush, no muggings, no trouble, no nothing. We get to the gazebo at the center of the park and Dolly turns to me, practically falls into my arms.
“Oh, Quantum, we should come here more often.”
“Yeah, we really should, Doll.”
'”What would you like to see change about the Loop?” she asks, and I don't know what the broad is hinting at, but just seeing the tops of her breasts has my heart thumping in my chest, which means I’m not really interested in having a conversation about the grimiest locale this side of Basin City. No siree. I got one thing, and one thing only on the mind.
She playfully slaps me on the cheek.
“Hey, what was that for?”
“Are you paying attention to me?” she asks.
“Of course I am, Doll. And about this city, I don't know what to tell you there, toots. It is what it is, and it wouldn't be the Loop if it weren't the Loop. Sorry. I hate those types of answers, but I don't see the denizens of this dirty shithole getting together to participate in some civic engagement.”
“You’re too negative.”
“Negative? Them’s fightin’ words, Doll. Kidding. I’m just a realist. But you know what? If it makes you happy, I’ll do whatever I can to clean this city up. Hell, I’ll put Bruce Wayne to shame, at least the one portrayed by Ben Affleck.”
“We don’t need a vigilante.”
“Says who? Okay, then, if you really want my opinion, here it is: we need more prisons. If we really want to make some coin, we can privatize the prisons so we can stick more riff-raff in there; the more brunos we get, the more cashola we make.”
Dolly moves into my arms.
We smooch for a little while; I'm just about to equip my blanket made of Mongolian cashmere, item 462, and throw it down in the gazebo so we can get to business, when Dolly tells me about a new horse and carriage service that leaves from Three Kings Park in five minutes.
“Five minutes from now? How did you know that?”
“It’ll be romantic.”
Of course, at the time, I still don’t know she’s the NVA Seed, so I just figure she has a good sense of tourist attractions.
And sure enough, we get to the entrance and there’s a Cinderella-esque horse and carriage waiting for us. Two big Clydesdales and a top hatted guy in a tux at the helm, really fancy, like something you would have seen at Central Park in the 40s.
The carriage door opens on its own and we get inside, feeling like a million bucks.
Talk about a view of the city.
Aeros landing all around us; women of the night looking over towards the carriage with jealousy; drug dealers slipping into alleyways just in case something funny is about to go down; a few thugs covering their heads from the light drizzle that just started up – it's the Loop.
And while I'm keeping an eye on all that's happening outside, just in case there’s a button man waiting in the shadows, Dolly takes my full attention as she unzips her dress.<
br />
Never banged in a carriage before, and for some odd reason, the space is larger than it was before, as if it has expanded. No longer are we talking a five-foot space. It’s now ten feet at least, satin blankets everywhere, cushions of all shapes and sizes, a hint of lavender in the air.
Nope, I still don't know that Dolly has the power to do this type of digital voodoo. I just figure I'm so wrapped up in the moment that I'm hallucinating.
So we get our groove on, and damn if it ain't nice.
And just when I can’t take it anymore, when the sight of her flesh, her long dark hair, her curves for days, the perfect shape of her ass, all get to me, we're suddenly back in my room at the Mondegreen, TV crackling in the corner, the painting of the sailboats slapping against the wall.
Back to where it all started.
We go at it again, and it's a glorious thing. I lay awake all night just holding her in my arms, knowing that eight in the morning is coming, which is when the Loop resets.
Talk about Bill Murray in Groundhog Day. I know when the time's going to reset, and I know that I don't have much longer to do what I need to do next.
So I wake up at six thirty, kiss Dolly on the cheek, and head on down to the kitchen area. As soon as I swing the door open, the Chef throws his cleaver at me.
AA bar activated, I sidestep the meat cutting instrument, and equip my own meat cutting instrument, my Bowie knife, item 33. But I don't use this one on the Chef, instead I throw it to the right and pin the Saucier to the wall, who was just stalking me with an iron frying pan.
I figure I'll make this as gory as I can, but then I get to noticing that I have to make breakfast here after, and I don't want a bunch of blood and guts getting into my scrambled eggs, so I equip item 78, and quickly blow a poisonous dart at the Chef.
He cries out as it hits him in his fat neck, and he falls to the ground, his hands around his own throat. The Saucier is like something out of a Warner Brothers flick circa 1930s, still pinned to the wall, kicking his legs, hitting his fist against the surface, cursing in French.
I drag the Chef into the freezer, and toss him in. I turn to the Saucier and give him two options: one, he helps me cook breakfast for Dolly, or two, I stick a grenade in his mouth and pull the pin, doing great damage to my hand, but killing him as well.
Apotheosis Boom (The Feedback Loop Book 8) Page 8