His friend thought about Jesus. While Aaron didn’t have much of an opinion on religion at all, his roommate despised it. More than once, he’d been kept up late listening to the man rant―Darwin considered it a conversation―about how the ‘two percent’ used religion to control people. He had grinned and nodded his way through the diatribe, waiting for the man to run out of steam and wander off scratching his ass. In Darwin’s mind, it was his turn to use God to get something for himself.
If there was some sort of higher power up there, Aaron figured he better not piss it off. He caught sight of a blonde-haired Latina and shied away; she could’ve been Allison’s distant cousin by appearance. If any supreme being did exist, he, she, or it was a fucking bastard for taking her away.
Better not to think about it at all.
They played three rounds, letting fate have their way with them, which wasn’t a kind process. Darwin put four chips on 11-14, and flung his arms in the air over the layout.
“Come on, Jesus! Hear me now,” he bellowed.
Aaron made sure the ball landed on fourteen. Darwin took his sixty-eight chips, putting ten on 31-33, street. He didn’t invoke the Lord, so Aaron let the ball do what it wanted to do. Darwin put on a show of exaggerated disappointment. He threw away another ten chips before dropping ten more on thirty-one black.
“Come on, Jesus. Thirty-one black.” Darwin buckled at the knees.
Aaron guided the ball to thirty-one black.
Darwin hit the ground, wailing like the bastard son of a holo-net minister and a faith healer. Aaron glared at his own twelve-chip loss and cursed. When he recovered from his ‘presence of God’ routine, Darwin put twenty chips on 27-30. Half the table joined him, as did Aaron.
No Jesus, no manipulation. A few other players grumbled and one walked away. A member of the security staff wandered over after the croupier did something at his terminal. A flick of the eyes set the artificial person’s attention on Darwin. Even this close, Aaron still couldn’t tell if the security man was a synth or a doll. Given the money floating around the Infinity, he assumed doll.
More expensive and more dangerous.
They let several more rounds go by with moderate losses before Darwin put his twenty-one remaining chips inside on zero and invoked Jesus. His eyes rolled back into his head as he pantomimed a seizure of divine influence, while Aaron bet on four black. Everyone gasped as the ball landed in the zero pocket and the pile of tokens bloomed up to 756. The doll had been staring back and forth between the wheel and Darwin. Several more players wandered away to other tables. The doll moved to Darwin’s side, whispering.
Seven hundred and fifty-six thousand credits out of thin air. Aaron made an appraising smirk. I can see why people get addicted to this.
“No way, man. It’s God lookin’ out for one of his own.” Darwin pointed up. He wagered 700 chips on two.
“Apologies, sir, I’m afraid that exceeds the house maximum bet,” said the croupier. Darwin’s indignant expression had barely formed before the man reacted to a voice in his ear. “I apologize again, sir. Management has decided to take your bet.”
“Don’t be an idiot,” droned an aristocratic older woman. “They want their money back. Walk away while you can.”
Darwin bet anyway, grinning. “Praise Jesus.”
The croupier spun the wheel. Four of the six remaining players at the table, including Aaron, put chips on two. As much as he cringed at making his own bet win, it would look suspicious to be the only player not following the sheep.
Darwin looked at Aaron; Aaron watched the ball leave the croupier’s hand as he tossed it into the track. Everyone at the table leaned in, afraid to breathe as they stared at the ball racing around the wheel. A tall woman in a painted-on red dress bet on 10-11-12.
“Rien ne va plus,” said the croupier.
“Dammit, just say bets are closed,” roared a fat man in a cloud of genuine cigar smoke. “We ain’t in France.”
Aaron forced himself not to smile as he caused the ball to linger on the partition between twenty-one and two for several agonizing seconds. When it fell into the two bucket, Darwin howled praises to God. He fell to the ground kicking, thrashing, and cheering for several seconds. Seven hundred chips, paid out at thirty-five to one odds, became twenty-five thousand two hundred. At a thousand credits per chip, twenty-five million and change.
“Hey, what the fuck?” shouted Darwin.
The noise dragged Aaron’s attention away from the tiny white ball. A slender Asian man had taken up position flanking his friend; the doll had grabbed Darwin’s arm. After gazing deep into Darwin’s eyes, the new arrival looked right at Aaron. One second later, the diaphanous presence of incoming telepathy caressed Aaron’s mind―a surface read. As Aaron’s chief thought at that moment was eluding detection as a cheat, the man had him dead to rights. The security man dragged Darwin away.
“Come with me,” a light flared in the man’s eyes.
Energy built up in the forefront of Aaron’s mind. A psionic compulsion burrowed deeper into Aaron’s thoughts, searching for how many people were involved in the fraud. Before Aaron could scream in warning, a crack of thunder tore through his brain, mixing with an anguished scream. He clamped his arms around his head and collapsed to his knees. A violent release of power lapped at the periphery of his consciousness, fringed with burning as though molten steel poured over his skull.
Aaron rocked back on his heels, screaming at the ceiling. A rush of air and debris came over him and blasted away. Distant sounds of smashing glass and splintering furniture mixed with howls of pain and the buzz of destroyed electronics. Smoke choked off his breath. Other screams pierced the veil of delirium; hot tears ran from the inner corner of both eyes. He swiped his hands at his face; bright red fingers came away.
Swaying on his knees, Aaron opened his stinging eyes and peered at the room around him. Moaning people and smashed furniture had stuck in the walls, hanging out of cracked holes. A severed leg twitched on the carpet in front of him. The energy pulsing out of his head throbbed in time with his pounding heart, lessening with each beat. Shuddering from the effort, he looked up. Bodies and chairs crashed to the floor, some peeling away from bloody splat patterns on the wall. Sparks spurted from the ceiling, falling like comets amid a thick haze of smoke. Warm liquid covered him; blood had sprayed everywhere, running down his cheeks and dripping off his chin. The pattern in the maroon carpet, tiny black diamonds in a regular grid, mesmerized him. Soon, the rug flew up to greet his face.
“What the shit was that?” asked Darwin in a choking wheeze, minutes or maybe hours later.
Aaron moaned. One hand flapped like a beached tuna trying to flop itself back into the ocean. The pressure of Darwin’s arms circled his chest, lifting him upright. Chaos exploded around him as the fugue of disorientation churned.
Darwin dragged him across the floor, grabbing at his shirt. “We’z outta here, man.”
“Mmmff! Arpfh! Ey!” Aaron raised a pointing finger in a gesture of triumph… and passed out amid the distant wail of sirens.
etheria closed her eyes and tilted her head to expose her neck. Aaron kissed his way over her jawline and down to her collarbone as she reclined. Her fingernails raked at his back, building an uncontained need for her. She rolled, letting him get on top. He shuddered as her legs wrapped around his, and they became a single undulating mass.
She pushed up on his chest, staring into his eyes. “I want this to last forever, Aaron. Tell me you love me.”
He flashed a weary smile and threw up onto her face.
Or, at least, what he dreamt was her face. One eye popped open, focused on bubbles forming and dying in the pinkish-orange mess painting the pillow he had been kissing. It took close to a full minute to process the state of lying in a puddle of puke. His discontent with his current situation manifested as a “harrumph,” which flung some of the vile substance onto the wall.
Aside from being cheek-deep in such a mess, he felt fin
e. That lasted until he attempted to move. No sooner had he rolled over and sat upright than the room whirled about in a frenetic blur, triggering a bout of dry heaving, cold sweats, and convulsions. A dull ache lingered inside him; his skull and spine had gotten into a bad argument, and he couldn’t tell which won.
His eyes focused between the fingers covering his face, recognizing his jacket and pants draped over the back of a chair at a small, bent desk. Between the lack of blood and the layer of thin plastic, it looked like Darwin had sent it off for cleaning. Trust that man to know a laundry that wouldn’t ask questions when receiving a blood-drenched seven-thousand-credit suit.
Pea-green walls streaked brown from old condensation trails. Perhaps mercifully, only the presence of his own spew registered to his nose. Visible bloodstains and missing patches on the threadbare carpet coupled with the ‘artwork installation’ on the ceiling above the bed―about twenty old condoms―made him thankful he couldn’t enjoy the aromatic ambiance of his surroundings.
Somewhere outside, two men carried on a shouting argument drifting back and forth from English to Spanish, with a little Russian added from a female. They sounded some distance away, but the noise still tore at the inside of his eyelids.
At least whoever was responsible for his being in this room had left him his boxers. The rest of his clothes: shirt, socks, shoes, sat in a pile on the seat of the chair, also in plastic. He pinched his nose, trying to clear the lingering nasty. Soft orange light below him melted to red as the Comforgel pad increased its heat. He found the lack of a sheet unusual, but the powered sleeping surface compensated.
“Kinn’ell… I didn’t drink that much.” He pressed on his temples, kneading. When he looked in the direction of the battered nightstand, a small silver bar chirped and displayed holographic numbers. 5:19 a.m. “Shit.”
He slid to the edge of the bed, slinging his legs over the side with a belabored moan. Every muscle in his body hurt, as if he’d attempted to go from couch potato to paramilitary specialist overnight. Memory of the casino peeked out from behind the slats of a fence of denial. He hadn’t imbibed; his brain had turned traitor.
His toes slipped over rough carpet fibers, clenching for a second before he risked putting weight on his legs. They failed. Aaron slithered to the floor with the kind of moves popular among intoxicated youth attempting to dance. His involuntary mosh left him tasting the rug: foot mixed with a hint of something fruity.
At least it was a woman’s foot.
He crawled, gripping fistfuls of hairy carpet, and dragged himself into a tiny bathroom where the floor went from rug to dingy synthetic vinyl, stained and sticky. One hand reached up to the sink, testing its stability. Satisfied, he grabbed it with the other and hauled himself upright, leaning his hips against it for support. Above the sink, a dust-covered mirror muted the wretch staring back at him.
“Well now,” said Aaron to his reflection. “If I was to take a role in a zombie holo, I’d not need much makeup.”
He pulled at his eyelids, admiring the shade of crimson before rubbing a handful of cold water over his face. Four more handfuls brought increasing levels of consciousness, until he leaned both hands on the sink again, watching the water drip from his nose and chin. Mirror Aaron glared back at him with a scolding curl of the lip.
“Ripping off a casino? Really, mate? You’ve done some dodgy shite before, but that’s a right schoolboy howler.”
“What the hell does that mean?” asked a woman’s voice, muffled and with the rasp of a sore throat.
Still holding most of his weight on his arms, Aaron shifted, looking to his right. A girl with frizzy, bright pink hair and protruding ribs slumped in the bottom of an autoshower tube that had seen better days. Glowing azure NanoLED tattoos of stars overlapped each eye, making the rest of her face seem dark. Red furry handcuffs represented the entirety of her clothing. She looked somewhere between sixteen on a small amount of drugs or maybe twenty-five on a shitload.
A sheet covered in frightening stains circled the tube twice, held by a fist-sized knot.
The way his body felt at that moment, he had no reaction to the sight of a naked woman; rather, he found her presence in the shower annoying as she delayed the application of hot water to his hide. Contrary to his libido, the tiny thread of lust rearing up in his mind reminded him of the dream and a vomit-soaked pillow. He gurgled and looked away, managing to get the streamer of bile to land in the sink. Creaky gears struggled to turn in his head; iterating the steps necessary to enter and operate an empty shower tube would’ve been a challenge.
It took him over a minute to understand the meaning of the tied sheet. Someone wanted her trapped in the autoshower.
“It means I did something right fuckin’ spacky.”
She kicked the plastic tube. “What?”
“Stupid.”
“Why didn’t you just say stupid then?”
Aaron looked at himself in the mirror. “I did.”
“No, you didn’t, you said ‘spackle’ or whatever the fuck that was about howling schoolboys.”
He moaned. “So, what’re you then, the shower fairy or the spirit of sarcasm? Did Darwin leave you there as some kind of sex-type hair of the dog arrangement?”
The tube rattled as she struggled to her feet with her arms locked behind her. “Who the hell is Darwin? I’m Strawberry.” She banged her knee on the plastic door. “Fucking bastard…”
“The pleasure’s all mine, lass.” Aaron tested his legs again, deciding to keep trust in his arms for a few minutes more.
“Not you, jackass. The motherfucker from last night.” She growled. “I should’a known better than goin’ with a damn Driftwraith.”
Aaron grimaced. “What the bloody hell is that?”
“Some shithead neotek motherfuckers that operate outta Sector 214. They spend more time in the ‘net than out, an’ usually only come ‘round here for cheap pussy and chems.”
“So, that makes you―”
“Fuck you, too.” She slammed her knee into the autoshower door again. “Fucker stole all my shit. Talked me into some kink and slipped me something. The cocksucker didn’t pay either. Monro’s gonna fuck his shit up.” She threw her weight at the door twice. “Hey, pretty boy, are you gonna leave me in here?”
“No, you’re in my way. I want to shower.”
“Oh, I’m real done with it. All yours.” She kicked the tube again. “What are you waiting for?”
“The ability to stand.” He threw another handful of water over his face.
“Don’t get any creepy ideas either. Monro will kill you too.”
There aren’t enough condoms in the world. “No. I’m barely ambulatory.”
“Come on dude, speak English. I don’t got my ’mini on me to translate.”
Aaron’s gaze begged his reflection for a reprieve from stupidity. “Only reason I’m on my damn feet now is this sink. Did you happen to notice how I got here?”
“Someone carried you in, I think. I heard someone muttering, but it wasn’t you. They were gone before I woke up enough to yell… and you were out. An hour of screaming didn’t wake your drunk ass up.”
Dammit, Darwin. You picked a right five-star hotel, didn’t you? Aaron took a deep breath and let his weight settle into his legs; every muscle from thigh to calf tensed and shuddered. He stared at the two bolts holding the sink to the wall, mentally threatening them with doom if they failed and dropped him. The reek of an unflushed toilet gave him a clue his senses had resumed working. Aaron lost a minute attempting to poke the flush button with his toe.
“Holy shit, you’re ruined. What’d you dose?”
“Took a big hit of telepath.” He massaged the bridge of his nose, flaking away dried blood from the corner of his eyes.
“That some new shit? Ain’t heard of it before.”
“Uhh, yeah.”
He leaned away from the sink, flailing his arms to steady himself. Once confident he wouldn’t fall as soon as he tried t
o move, he staggered to the tube. The blurry woman on the other side of fogged plastic looked thin and bruised. Despite her situation, she tapped her foot and huffed as though he was the one being rude. She was in his room, taking up his autoshower tube that he wanted to use.
If not for her being in his way, he’d not have bothered getting himself involved with a prostitute who didn’t return from a job. Somewhere, a pimp was on the hunt, and he didn’t feel like absorbing assumed blame. Unfortunate happenstance put this woman between him and a shower. That’s all women were anymore, problems in his way or something to use for a night. A derisive frown twisted his lip while he picked at the knot in the sheet. He lacked the patience or coordination to untie it, and her impatient bouncing tits didn’t help him focus. After a minute of picking and pulling at it, he went caveman and tried to tear it off. Strawberry laughed.
“Look, just be quiet for a tick, eh?” He slapped the tube.
Strawberry gave him a raspberry.
Aaron figured attempting to squat would end up with him on the floor, so he took a knee. Precision had always been his forte with telekinesis. He studied the knot, interpreting the folds of cloth each time the image faded to clarity from the perpetual blur coating his world. A few nudges in the right place loosened the fabric enough to get a finger in and pull it open.
Strawberry shoved her way out, knocking him over backward in a wash of humid fruit-scented air. He lay still amid a blinding dance of flashing lights as she stormed across the bedroom to the door. The migraine faeries fizzled out to faint light spots, which lingered for another moment. Handcuffs clicked when she tried to reach for the doorknob. Strawberry looked down at herself, and sighed.
“Shit.” She paced around the bedroom and nudged drawers and cabinets open with her foot. The more she searched, the more she cursed under her breath. “I can’t fuckin’ go outside like this. Dammit, I think the key was in my purse.” A frustrated scream accompanied metallic rattling. “This is the last god damned time I let some asshole talk me into doing kink.”
“Not my job anymore.” Aaron rolled onto all fours and stood up, again using the sink to keep from falling over. “You should file a police report.” He pushed the bathroom door closed.
Zero Rogue Page 4