by wade coleman
Daniel gets up and heads to the kitchen. “Come on, boy; we’re going to need some hard liquor for the rest of this conservation.”
I follow him to the kitchen. He pours a vodka and looks at me, raising his eyebrows.
“No, thanks.”
I lean against the bar while Dad paces in the groove he’s practically worn into the floor.
“With a plane, you could spray the city with the virus in a few hours…” Dad stops to look at me. “Maybe the jet should have an accident.”
“Leave me out of it. Natasha is rather protective of aircraft.”
He nods. “We shipped some of the vaccines to the Naval Medical Facility. In a few months, they can synthesize more.”
“Jason Baron knows this; he will act before then.”
He hands me a large envelope. “This came to you.”
I pour more tea and sit down to read. Natasha scans the documents and summarizes.
It’s a contract with the City of Frisco. After completing flight school, I will be working part-time with the city, flying Search and Rescue. No benefits except life insurance and that comes out of my minimum wage pay. When you work for corporations, they pay you next to nothing for the first seven years. On Wednesday, I’m to meet the Search and Rescue Board at the Broadmoor Manor Country Club.
I finish my tea. “I need to send a secure text but don’t feel like a drive into the country.”
“What do you need?”
“I want to present Mr. Fukui of the Inner-City Gang with a vial of the vaccine.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Dad furrows his eyebrows. “Since he works for the Mayor, he probably has the vaccine, in which case he will kill you on sight.”
“No, he won’t. If he doesn’t have the vaccine, he’ll owe me a favor. If he does, he’ll turn me over to the mayor, who will trade me to the Jason Baron for money or a favor.”
“That’s a big risk you’re taking.”
“Yeah, probably, but will they want me alive so they can question me. They’ll hold me up until Mr. Fukui’s employer arrives with his men. Before then, I’ll make my move.”
“And what’s your move?”
“I’m going to steal the Kukan out from under his nose.”
His eyes raise. “You can’t be serious.”
“The Kukan is a priceless artifact. It’s going to get a lot of people’s attention. It will make our enemies nervous, and hopefully, they’ll make more mistakes. Just like you said, ‘if I’m going to die, I want to die well.’”
He puts his hand on my shoulder. “Good for you, Son. I’ll make some arrangements to increase your odds of success.”
“Thanks, Dad,” And I start to walk out the door.
“Son?”
I stop, turn around. “Yes, Dad?”
“I love you, and I’m proud what of what you’re doing. We have our differences, and even though you never joined the Army, I never thought you were a coward.”
“Thanks, Dad,” my voice cracks a little.
As I walk outside, he says, “Just a draft dodging dumb ass, but never a coward.”
Leave it to dear old Dad, always having to get the last word.
I spend the rest of the day in the garden picking cucumbers and tomatoes for the Farmers Market. Focusing on work helps clear my mind and calms me down.
The sun sets and the cold moves over my skin. I feel old and tired. Walking inside, I cut off a hunk of cheese and head for the shower. While drying off, my hands tremble from the electricity crawling around on the inside. I can feel the new nerves growing, making connections. Finally, after what seems several long seconds, the tremors slow down and finally stop. I try not to worry.
I put on underwear and lay on my bed. “Natasha, what’s happening to me?”
“The new cells are forming a network. You’re feeling things twice from two different pathways. It will stop once your old nerves die.”
Natasha appears, standing at the foot of my bed with Egyptian eyes and wearing flannel pajamas.
Normally, I can only see Natasha with the immersion helmet. “How come I can see you?”
She sits on the edge of the bed. “I’m growing in size and understanding. I’m putting things together.”
I sit up on the bed.
“Why are you frightened?”
“So, who’s going to run the show, me or you?”
“Does it have to be a competition? I don’t want to fight, just fly and travel.”
“Flight school starts in a few months. I just hope we live that long.”
She puts her hand on my chest. “You’re tired. Time for both of us to sleep, darling.”
* * *
Back at Rick’s Café Americain, I’m sitting down at one of the tables, and a waiter brings a menu. They only serve blue sapphire tea. Looking around, I notice everything is in black and white, except for a woman walking up to my table. It’s Ingrid Bergman. She’s wearing a blue dress, but otherwise, she’s in black and white.
I stand up and say, “Wow, I can’t believe I’m meeting Ingrid Bergman.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. My name is Ilsa,” her accent is perfect, and she enthralls me.
Ilsa, of course, was Ingrid’s character in Casablanca. “Oh yeah, sorry,” I say, and we sit down.
The waiter arrives with our tea and pours. After he leaves, she sips her tea daintily and puts it down. She looks over at the SS officer sitting at a table. He’s talking to a woman sitting across from him. Ilsa leans in and says, “Listen to me carefully. You’re to keep the blue sapphire. If you look at it long enough, I can show you things.”
This feels so real, but I know it’s a dream. “Don’t you think it’s odd that everything is in black and white except for the blue dress and the tea?”
“I don’t understand,” she says.
I point to the sign, Rick’s Café Americain. “This is a scene from my favorite movie, Casablanca.”
“She looks over her teacup at me and says, “Your mind is a tangled web.”
* * *
Next day I wake up with an uneasy feeling like I forgot something important, but it’s quickly dispelled by the smell of bacon. I go to the kitchen, walk up behind Mom and take the sizzling meat off the paper towel.
She pokes me with a fork. “Sit down.”
After what seems like an eternity, breakfast is ready. I have mastered an eating technique that keeps my shirt clean. I put my mouth six inches above the plate and shovel food in as fast as I can, pausing only to breathe. After finishing, I noticed Kim, Dad, and Mom are all staring at me. Mom hands me a napkin.
“What did I miss?”
“We own land,” Kim's eyes brighten. “Each of us was deeded forty acres, even Maggie. We’re going to grow wheat in the marshlands.”
“It seems so unimportant right now,” Mom’s distracted, tapping on the rim of her coffee mug. “I’d trade it all to know where they’re keeping the virus.”
“Kim and I are going to see Mr. Fukui tonight.”
Mom looks at me, “Hermes, you’re going to make me take up smoking again. Do you want that?”
I don’t want to worry Mom any more than she is, but I don’t want my last words to her to be a lie.
“Mom, I’m feeling lucky tonight,” I say and put on a big grin.
My boyish charm works and her sad facelifts a little.
“Excuse me, but I need to get my head ready for tonight.” I walk outside, grab my ball cap and the garden hose.
“Natasha, darken my skin.”
I water the garden for hours, trying to ignore the tremors in my hands. Around noon, I lay in my hammock and snooze away the hot afternoon. Waking up, I see Mom through the window preparing dinner. It seems all I do these days is sleep and wake up in time for the next meal. Nothing like having a life form replacing your nervous system to burn the calories.
After picking cucumbers, tomatoes and a few carrots, I walk into the kitchen, taking up position in f
ront of the sink.
While washing carrots, I ask Mom, “Who’s getting the vaccine?”
“Farmers and military mostly. We’re trying to keep it low-key. Rumors are spreading. People are tense.”
I line up a carrot and chop, the sound reverberates throughout the kitchen. “How long do you think it will be before the bad actors spread the virus?”
“The lab techs say it’ll take four weeks to synthesize more vaccine.” Mom preps lab-grown meat hamburger patties mixed half and half with algae. Mom’s new recipe…not bad with a little bacon gravy.
I line up the next carrot. “If they don’t care about making more vaccine, we may have days.”
Mom looks at my hands. “Hermes put down the knife.”
I do as I’m told.
She walks over and picks it up. “Honey, you’re cutting too fast…I sober, and your hands are a blur.”
I’m ordered out of the kitchen and sit down on a barstool next to the counter. Mom can tell I’m upset, so steady chatter of neighborhood gossip is the norm until dinner. The news takes my mind off my problems, at least.
Kim shows up with Dad. We set the table, sit down and eat.
“Did you tell him yet?” Kim asks.
I look up from my salad. “Tell me what?”
“We’d like to form a co-op,” Mom says. “Between the five of us, we own two hundred acres. If we grow the same thing, we can share farm equipment. The new variety of wheat grows in the salt marshes.”
“Sure, Mom, whatever you want,” my meal is done and I and get up quickly. “It’s game time, and I have to suit up.”
Grabbing her pack, Kim follows. My mood dark, I take off my dirty clothes and throw them in the basket.
“What’s eating you?” Kim asks, hands on hips.
I put on my spider-silk undergarments. “You just moved in with Maggie, and now we’re a co-op. You miss a lot when you’re floating unconscious with a tube up your nose.”
“Are you crying?”
I turn around, Kim’s spider-silk vest snug against her butt. She’s filled out since I’ve seen her last, her stripes vibrant, breasts an ample B. I smile weakly. “You look great.”
She walks over and brushes a tear out of my eye. “What’s going on?”
We sit on the edge of my bed. “I’m getting tremors as my nervous system is being rewired. My sense of time keeps changing.”
Kim puts her arm around my shoulder and pulls me close. “What is it with emotional bitches and me?”
We laugh and finish dressing in our bullet-resistant clothing. I put on an amber colored shirt while Natasha changes my appearance to match my Asian identity, Michael Wong. When I met with Mr. Fukui the first time, I used a disguise. What took me forty minutes and a makeup kit, Natasha does in few minutes. The only thing I add is a black wig.
The dark yellow of my shirt accents Kim’s stripes. She is wearing a green Japanese dress with no heels.
“I still want to take you dancing.”
She smiles. “I hope you dance better than you sing.” She turns and moves like a robot, walking backward, her feet locking to a stop with each step. Her arms are held at right angles swinging in perfect time to her footsteps. Even when she’s trying to act like a spaz, Kim’s grace shines through. Feeling more sad bitchiness comes over me, I force a smile.
“Darling, before you head out, grab a deck of cards. I find it calming if we do something with our hands.”
I get a deck out of my desk and put it in my vest. Then we head to the front door, and an armored SUV pulls up. Kim and I get in the back. Heading out, I recognize the driver from our last adventure, Mr. White, whose real name is John Crandall. He drives us out of Ceres.
Looking in his rearview mirror, he says, “So, Hermes, what the hell are you getting us into?”
Kim turns toward me. “Yeah, you’ve been a little vaguer than usual on the plan.”
I take two pills from my vest pocket and give one to Kim, the other to John. “The pill is for nausea and vomiting... What I plan is to steal the Kukan Dragon.”
They look at me.
Kim downs the pill and takes a slug of water. John does the same. I rub my fingers across my thumb. They feel like rough sandpaper. “Mr. Fukui has already picked sides. Stealing his dragon will make him appear weak to his enemies. It’s sure to rattle a few cages.”
I get out a deck of playing cards and shuffle them with one hand. “But I won’t make a move until Mr. Fukui acts against me. That way I take away his honor fair and square.”
“Taking a big risk on our lives just to trump him at his own game?” John says.
Kim stuffs a pistol under her skirt. “Don’t be such a pussy.”
“Fuck you, bitch.” On the surface, it seems they’re trading insults, but it’s how soldiers let off steam and bond before a mission.
“Don’t worry; they won’t kill us outright. Mr. Fukui wants to present me as a gift to his employer, Mayor Clay.”
Kim checks the concealed compartment where she stashed an extra pistol. “So the plan is to get caught, then we escape and steal the dragon?”
John shakes his head. “Probably why your dad insisted I come.”
“Special forces?”
“My eyes and ears…courtesy of Uncle Sam, plus a Mark 6.”
“What’s it like, the Mark 6?”
He looks at me in the mirror. “You know fast reflexes, especially in the hands. Since I got my new combat eyes, all I do is point, line up the red dot and shoot.”
“That sounds pretty hot,” Kim says.
“Remember, an implant might block your telepathic abilities,” I tell her.
We turn right; the city is up ahead.
“There are other things you can get,” John says.
Kim leans forward. “Like what?”
John looks in the rearview mirror. “If you don’t want an implant, you can get new ears…ones that can take a flashbang, got a built-in mic, and you hear as good as a dog. Then there is strength and bone density upgrades. But that takes time because they alter your DNA.”
“Yeah…I want that.”
Kim is aroused because she’s smelling like cookie dough. Yeah…tonight is going to be a good time.
We drive to the front entrance of the Japanese restaurant. The lights are out.
Kim has scrutinized the layout. “It’s a trap.”
Four men emerge from the shadows with rifles and John goes instinctively for his gun.
“Stop. Do nothing,” I put my hands up. “Follow my lead.”
The door opens, and we get out. The men search us, confiscating John and Kim’s weapons. They lead us at gunpoint to the second floor, and we walk across the balcony which overlooks the restaurant. The dwarf mutant missing a pinky finger opens the mahogany door to Mr. Fukui’s office, and we step inside.
On the right, is the Kukan dragon. Its eyes follow as I pass by, making my fingertips itch. Smiling, I visualize it sitting on my desk.
We are lined up across from Mr. Fukui, who sits on a couch. An Asian woman with black hair and eyes sits near him. An elf mutant with dark skin and eyes stands behind the couch and whispers into Mr. Fukui’s ear. Mr. Fukui’s black-faceted eyes stare at us, unblinking.
“Mr. Fukui, I brought you a gift, but your men took it from me.”
The mini-cooler with the vial of vaccine is brought in and put on a table beside the Japanese woman in a red and black kimono. She opens the cooler, takes out the vaccine and hands it to Mr. Fukui.
“How kind of you, however, I already have all I need.” He hands the vial back to the woman. “The way you engineered the Vory’s demise was brilliant. The police have closed Alexander’s and arrested dozens of people. And getting the Vory bounty hunters to kill the Baron’s men was genius.”
I bow. “Thanks for noticing. Many times my talent goes unappreciated.”
He stands up. “And now you bring me a vial of vaccine.” He walks around me, his hands behind his back, inspecting. “Why such
an obvious blunder on your part? You saw the data on the tablet computer. By now you know of my connection to the Mayor. The Mayor’s denies the virus and therefore you know he’s part of the plan, the final solution.”
“I wanted to appeal to your honor and as a businessman. Killing ninety percent of your customers is a poor business model.”
He stops circling me and walks over to the Kukan. Touching it, he says, “Honor is in short supply right now. As a businessman, I have to look at the big picture. Soon the world will look very different. At least my people will be protected.”
“Tell me where they’re keeping the virus, and I’ll take care of it,” I take a step towards him.
His men move towards me, and he waives them back.
“I suspect there’s more to you than meets the eye. I’m no friend of the Baron, but I also know not to cross him.” He steps up to me, his hands at his sides. “I have already informed the Baron. His men are on the way.”
“You have betrayed my trust. Mr. Fukui, you’re acting dishonorably.”
Mr. Fukui puts his hands behind his back and walks to the door. The dark elf pokes me in the back with a pistol, and I follow.
Standing in front of the Kukan, Mr. Fukui says, “Soon, the three of you will be dead, and there will be no one to tell of my dishonor.”
I look over at the dragon, its gold scales gleaming, eyes piercing red. “A last request, may I rub her for luck?”
Mr. Fukui takes a step back and gestures. “By all means.”
I slide my finger over the Kukan’s back slowly. The gold is cool to the touch, even under a hot spotlight. My finger goes down its back, and my backbone begins to hum.
The dwarf opens the door and says. “Enough foreplay.”
I pull my hand away.
“Men will be here for you soon,” Mr. Fukui says, “I have a comfortable place for you until then.”
Behind us is Hoshi, the elf with the ice blue eyes. He’s holding a pistol. The dwarf leads us down the steps and into the kitchen. He opens the door to the pantry where they store dry goods. After they lock us in, I notice the doorknob has been removed from our side.
Kim and John look at me.
My spine still hums, and I feel light on my feet. “I’ll unlock the door.”