Romeo Delta 2

by Taylor Rikkinen

  “You brought me a chicken Caesar salad?” she asked pathetically.

  “I promised you that we would share a lunch, didn’t I?” Joe asked with a pleased expression on his face.

  Erin took the bowl in her hands and stared cautiously down at the fork stabbed into the bounty of romaine lettuce. “Umm… Am I allowed cutlery or other sharp objects?”

  “No, but I trust you. Besides, Doctor Singh is busy for the afternoon, so she doesn’t have to know right away,” Joe said casually as he dug into his own bowl.

  “I don’t want you to lose your job because of me…” Erin said weakly.

  Joe shrugged. “I’ll get reamed out later, but I won’t lose my job. Don’t worry. You’ve been doing good keeping the enriched porridge down lately, so I figured that you were ready for a new challenge.”

  Erin smiled warmly at him and began to greedily shovel scoops of the chicken Caesar salad into her mouth and it was everything she ever wanted in that moment. It was a small piece of normality that took her away from all of those terrible memories and she wanted to cry tears of joy, but she held it all back for Joe’s sake.

  “Anything interesting in the news?” Joe asked.

  “Same shit, different pile,” Erin said through stuffed cheeks. “Your president is a real piece of work, I’ll tell you that.”

  Joe let out a small chuckle. “You think he’s bad? You should have seen the guy running against him.”

  “Really? That bad?” Erin asked.

  Joe nodded with a smile. “Not only was he a religious crusader, but he was also a Kyva Corp CEO for nearly a decade before he got kicked out for corruption and embezzlement.”

  Erin’s eyes went wide and she looked at Joe in disbelief. “How corrupt do you have to be for a guy like Kyva Falschwesen to give you the axe?”

  “That was exactly what everyone was wondering at the time, mind you, this president is hardly any better,” Joe said conversationally. “He’s obviously bought off by the corporation and is in no way serving the people in any tangible way, but when you’re selecting a leader for a prison colony, you kind of want a hard assed pontificating alpha male type to wave his dick around in a display of dominance, even if that isn’t your style. He’s a terrible human being by every stretch of the imagination and I certainly didn’t vote for him, but even I have to admit that he keeps those crazies behind the dividing wall in check.”

  “Well, I don’t like him because he’s turning my execution into some sort of family festival,” Erin said moodily. “Have you seen this crap? They’ve turned the bidding wars for the advertising during my execution into a reality TV show and the public are voting on it by sending in text messages. This is insane. I mean, it took me a few years to realize that I was living in a liberal dictatorship up on Sky Base 10, and I think that had to do with the fact that I saw the station more like a workplace than a city, but crap like this… I don’t know how you stay sane, Joe.”

  “I grew up with it and I’m too much of a pacifist to really hate anyone,” Joe said thoughtfully. “I’ve never found a good reason to hate anyone. Everyone is simply a victim of their circumstances, even the crazies beyond the wall. They were born messed up, or else they experienced a trauma so great that it ended up dictating their lives for years and years. I try to empathize as much as I can and it works for me for the most part.”

  Erin gave him an odd look as she continued to crunch a crouton between her teeth. “For a guy that tries to empathize, I find it surprising that you keep calling them crazies. I figured that a guy like you would have been a little bit more politically correct.”

  Joe took a mouthful of salad and chewed it thoughtfully as he shook his head. “I call them crazy because they are. Every one of those convicts went through the same extreme vetting process that you went through and they failed. Pretending that they aren’t crazy or calling them something else would be dishonest. It was that politically correct dishonesty that gave the convicts voting rights and got President Hair-do there elected.”

  “Jeez…” Erin said dully. “Who knew that Dusk was so much like Earth?”

  Joe shrugged. “Just because you’re on a different planet doesn’t mean we won’t have the same problems. We can terraform a hundred moons orbiting a hundred gas giants and humanity will always bring its baggage with it.”

  “I never thought of it that way,” Erin admitted.

  She watched the newsfeed for a few seconds as she continued to shovel scoops of juicy diced chicken into her mouth and watched the President make another bumbling speech full of ignorance and want. Joe may have been numb to it, but she certainly wasn’t. Every syllable that the man spoke was another train wreck of logic, another typhoon of lies, and another seismic shift of embarrassingly unaware buffoonery.

  “Aren’t world leaders supposed to be better than us?” Erin asked peevishly.

  “How do you mean?” Joe asked with equally stuffed cheeks.

  “I mean… When I think of a world leader, I think of someone who is wise, patient, collective, and savvy in the ways of different cultures,” Erin said, as she licked some dressing off of her fingers. “I mean, just look at this asshole. He’s got enough hairspray applied to the point where he looks like a boiled ham in a wig and every time I see him talk, his puffy lips look like a chapped asshole. He’s loud, bloviating, doesn’t seem to know more than eight compound words and he acts like a game show host. I’m waiting for this loser to show me a car hiding behind a sparkling curtain that I could possibly win. And you see that death clock in the corner there? That’s my goddamn death clock being sponsored by his goddamn company. How fucking tacky does someone have to be to think that’s a good idea? This world is being run by elderly children and I can’t believe that this ass clown was the better of two choices.”

  “That’s history though, isn’t it?” Joe asked while being completely numb to Erin’s observations. “The system is rigged, but not in the way that they always complain about during elections. It’s rigged against people like you and me from start to finish and by the end of it we’re only given the illusion of choice. For as long as I can remember, every election has always been neck and neck without there ever being a landslide victory. I personally find it hard to believe that we are as divided as they say we are.”

  “You say that, but you guys literally have a dividing wall going through the center of your colony,” Erin pointed out.

  “Yeah, I won’t deny that,” Joe conceded. “But the difference is that citizens are only on one side of it. If the wall ever comes down, you’ll discover the difference almost immediately. As it is, there are more of them than there are of us and that scares me a little. Kyva Corp keeps bringing in more and more every day and awarding them an increasing number of rights. One day, there is going to be a breaking point and by the time that happens I hope I’m retired and off of this rock.”

  “The money men, the money men. It’s always the money men…” Erin sang absently as she chewed on some more salad. “Why do they always have such fucked up goals?”

  “Beats me,” Joe said placidly. “I’m not rich, so I wouldn’t know.”

  The two continued to eat their lunch in silence and watch the television together while making occasional comments about the world at large. It took Erin’s mind off the brooding nature of her situation and she felt stimulated in a positive way with Joe at her side. She was thinking clearly again and something about Joe’s friendship had inspired her. She wanted to tell him that he was like the light shining out of Pandora’s box. A radiating beam of hope shooting bravely through the fearful darkness of horrifying truths. The one thing bringing illumination to Erin’s universe and guiding her towards better days and giving her comfort in the process. Unfortunately, she had no idea how to say it without sounding like an idiot, so she just gave him a nudge and a smile.

  “Hey, thanks for stopping by and bringing me lunch. It means a lot to me.”

  Chapter 27 – Gumshoe Walking

  With
their time in the biodome concluded, Eddie and Romney discreetly snuck out of the Sky Base 10 crash site by slicing a hole in the tight fabric dome and making a mad dash towards the mining truck trails. Eddie walked for a good hour with his sunburned thumb out before a driver was lonely enough to pull over and give him a lift. Eddie had hoped for some conversation with Romney up to that point, but Romney’s eye was fading in and out with a soft blue light, meaning that he was sleeping and didn’t want to be disturbed. He didn’t blame him. They had been going for 31 hours straight and though Romney had his own set of problems, at least he didn’t feel the grime and clamminess that Eddie was feeling in that bumpy truck. He nodded off a few times and was woken up once to be asked if he was a junkie or something, but Eddie set him straight by saying that he had been caught up in working triple overtime. He wasn’t sure if the trucker believed him or not and he didn’t care. He just wanted to be back at his office.

  A couple hours later, Eddie got his wish and sluggishly walked through the door and used his stiff and tired joints to remove his coat and hat. He reattached Romney’s head to his body and was surprised to see that the guy had managed to sleep through everything. He followed suit and slumped down on his ugly sofa and fell asleep almost instantly. For once, the golden twilight did not keep him awake and though he had recently lived through some tense moments, his slumber was dreamless and undisturbed until there was a knocking at the door. He had no idea how much time had passed since he had fallen asleep, but his body was telling him that it clearly wasn’t enough. He was glad to see Romney walk by and answer the door and he hoped that he could pretend to sleep through whoever had come knocking. He closed his eyes briefly, but as soon as he heard a familiar feminine voice, his eyes shot open and he sat up and began straightening himself out.

  Norah Frost walked in and saw Eddie straightening his thin red tie as he always did around her and she gave him a look up and down. “You look like hell, Eddie.”

  “If I had known you were coming, I would have dolled myself up for you,” he said groggily.

  “I take it Romney didn’t tell you then?” she asked.

  “No, I was asleep,” Eddie said moodily. “What’s going on? You never come by here, it’s always the other way around.”

  “Things got heavy, Eddie.” Romney said with mild annoyance in his voice.

  “Heavy in what way?” Eddie asked.

  “In a way that requires me to come here in person so that there is no digital trail of this conversation,” Norah said briskly. “I’ve got a name and a location for your mystery man. He wasn’t exactly hard to track down.”

  Eddie read between the lines and looked at both Norah and Romney. “Alright… What’s the catch?”

  “Lewis Donavan,” Norah said with a tap of her foot. “Ring any bells?”

  “Uhh…” Eddie was at a loss and scratched his head nervously. “Not really, no. Should I know him?”

  “Jesus,” Romney said with impatience. “The guy that assassinated the last president and put the current two-term vice in charge. Come on Eddie, you’re a journalist. You should know that name off by heart. It was huge news back in the day.”

  Eddie shrugged. “I was a lousy solo detective back then and I’m not good with names. Sue me. Soooo… what…? This Lewis Doberman guy was the imposter aboard Sky Base 10?”

  “Donavan,” Norah corrected peevishly. “Yes, he was the imposter, and although the screenshot you guys gave me was blurry as hell, I was able to run several checks to verify that it was him. He was even registered in the citizen list of Sky Base 10 under his real name, which is kind of odd if you ask me. Last I heard, he was gassed years back in a public execution, but there he was in the footage plain as day.”

  “I see…” Eddie said as he went into deep thought. “Hey Romney, can you bring up the rap sheet on this guy?”

  Wordlessly, Romney emitted a holographic display and all three of them began to read. After a minute of skimming for nuggets of key information, Eddie leaned back against the wall and put his tired brain to work.

  “Looks like the guy had emotional issues,” he said dryly. “A front-line vet with a dishonorable discharge for not climbing out of the trenches when his commander told him too. Labeled a coward with PTSD and sent off for a psych evaluation. Became increasingly erratic during his treatment, until he went nuts and killed the president during a PR visit.” Eddie then let out a sigh. “Fuck, this could just be bullshit for all we know. If you ask me, that don’t sound like the guy that the Erin chick was describing in those audio logs.”

  “Rose-tinted glasses perhaps,” Norah offered. “It doesn’t matter because that’s not the issue. The issue is that I made the mistake of reading Romney’s damn report on what you two have been up too and now I have a supposedly executed assassin practically thrown onto my lap with incredibly suspicious circumstances surrounding him.”

  Eddie waved it off casually. “Conspiracies are a dime a dozen. What’s your problem with this one?”

  Romney politely cleared his imaginary throat and nudged his way back into the conversation. “The problem is that we both witnessed him making a call to Riggs Palmer and then watched Erin Wilco disable the network security so that their guys could engage the dismantling process remotely.”

  “Brevity Romney,” Eddie said with a dull expression. “I can almost hear one of your long-winded explanations coming in from across the horizon.”

  If Romney had a mouth, he would have frowned at him, but his single eye was luckily expressive enough to relay his distain. “Let me spell it out for you. Sky Base 10 was owned by Kyva Corp. Lewis Donavan was clearly working with Riggs Palmer to drop the station and kill nearly 60,000 citizens. What sort of act would you call that?”

  “Oh…” Eddie said stupidly. “I believe that would either be called an act of war or terrorism.”

  “Yes, I’m glad you’re finally with us,” Norah said cruelly. “You clowns have kicked over another hornets’ nest and put me in the middle of it. The prison district has been in an uproar ever since Sky Base 10 came down and the last thing we need is an uncovered act of war to draw people’s attention away from keeping that dividing wall up.”

  “What are you saying?” Eddie asked in surprise.

  “I’m saying I want you to bury this story until it’s more convenient,” Norah said harshly.

  “What?” Eddie asked incredulously. “I’m not burying anything. If this doesn’t come out soon, then it’ll just be shrugged off as another crackpot conspiracy and what’s more is that we’ve got the proof that Erin Wilco was misled and manipulated. Hell, given that both Tom and Lewis have some sort of connection with each other, it’s clear that this may all be some sort of scheme by two men to cause a war that no one really wanted. If we drop it now, we could lose everything. Think about it. Erin Wilco could be the first death row convict on Dusk to ever receive an appeal. This is huge and it needs to come out soon because her execution is in two weeks.”

  Although Norah was small and slender, she stepped towards Eddie with an intimidating air and he felt himself involuntarily press harder against the wall. “Don’t give me that shit. This is about you stroking your ego and wanting to stir up some mud. You don’t give a damn about Erin Wilco and you never will, so don’t pretend. You just want your hot scoop and a fat paycheck, end of story.” Eddie tried to glare at her, but her intensity and penetrating insight into his soul made him look away and he felt like a chastised child.

  Norah reached up and turned his head so that he couldn’t look away from her. “You said that you would do me a favor, anything I asked, if I found you your guy. Well, I found him and the favor I need from you is for you to bury this and forget about it. I don’t give a damn about Erin Wilco either and I’m not going to pretend. She is one woman threatening the dawn of war simply by remaining alive. She’s a loose end that needs to be dealt with, no matter how cruel it may seem.”

  “That ain’t how I operate,” Eddie said through gritted teet
h.

  “Oh yeah?” Norah asked mockingly. “Let me ask you this. How many millions of lives are worth hers? How many years of war are worth Erin Wilco’s life? If we enter war with Riggs Palmer, then one of two things are going to happen. Either those convicts behind the wall will escape and tear up this colony until the streets are running with blood, or they will be drafted into the army along with you and maybe you won’t be so lucky to land in the reserves this time. Bury it, Eddie. Right now, Erin Wilco is a madwoman that brought down Sky Base 10 and that’s what she needs to be if you don’t want the top-level executives to decide upon another goddamn war. This is for the greater good, so do not even think about fucking with me on this one.”

  Norah left the threat hanging in the air and refused to break eye contact with Eddie as she stared him down into silent submission. She then collected her things and left the office without another word, leaving behind only a chilled memory of her presence. Eddie and Romney stood there in silence for a while before Romney turned his head to look at his partner.

  “So, what’s the plan?” he asked.

  Eddie’s eyebrows furrowed and he gave Romney an intense look. “Screw her. We’re going forward. No way in hell I’m burying this, not when we’re this close.”

  Romney nodded. “I figured as much. Do you think she’s right about another war?”

  “She’s an army brat,” Eddie said dismissively. “She sees the edgings of war everywhere she goes, she can’t help it. Me on the other hand… My gut is telling me that something here ain’t adding up and I wish I could put my finger on it… Damnit… She found our guy, but didn’t bother to tell us where he is. Not even if he’s alive or not.”

  “That will not be an issue,” Romney said calmly. “Luckily, I pulled the information off of Norah’s terminal with one of my data worms before she purged it from the system, and I think I know where our imposter may be.”