by Phil Rossi
“With all due respect, Ms. Michaels. Ma’am. In light of the recent riots and the general sense of unrest that has plagued this station for weeks, I’m not sure that’s in the best interest of the colonists,” Captain Benedict objected.
“Captain Swaren?” She looked to Nigel for his opinion.
“I have to side with Captain Benedict. At least until we get things stabilized, I don’t think it would be wise to introduce tourists into the population. Most of Crescent’s residents are pleased with Kendall’s arrest. However, there are always a few bad eggs in the bunch. Tourists are a favorite target of dissidents. At least in my experience.”
“And this vatter concert—are you still planning on letting that occur?” Ms. Michaels asked. She glanced down at her personal terminal before looking from Swaren to Benedict.
“I am,” Captain Benedict said. “Again, the decision is ultimately yours, Ms. Michaels, but I think the event will aid in expediting the… healing process. Renew the sense of community. A positive event after a streak of tragedies.”
Belinda Michaels dipped her sharp chin in a nod.
“Very good then, Captain Benedict. You know your people better than I.” She stood and straightened the small, dark suit jacket that hung from her thin shoulders, then bowed to Nigel and then to Captain Benedict. “I thank you both for your time. I have other responsibilities to attend to.”
Belinda Michaels left with an armed security officer at her side. Benedict folded his personal terminal, placed it under his arm, and departed. Nigel was left in the silence of the large conference room. He suppressed a grin, but was having a harder time keeping his giddiness at bay. Kendall and his loyalists were locked up in a secret location and they’d be off the station in less than a week. A fleet of Core Sec boats was nearing Tireca and would be permanently shutting down the jump gate into Habeos. Darros Stronghold would be cut off, and the raider clans did not posses the resources to create another way around.
Vacation was blissfully close.
(•••)
Ina Cortez murmured and pulled a blanket over her naked body. She shoved a large arm away from where it was pressing uncomfortably on her breasts. The limb belonged to the stranger that lay beside her. She rolled onto her back and the man on her other side came into view; he lay with his back to her, the flesh there a canvas of so many tattoos it was hard to discern any one shape. She sat up and pulled the sheets close around her. A woman lay curled feline-like at the foot of the bed, naked save for a single black stocking. Her buttocks were pink with handprints. Ina closed her eyes and inhaled through her mouth. She exhaled through her nose and then climbed over the human mural, careful not to wake him. Black leaflets were scattered everywhere, along with sheets, pillows, and clothing. Ina tiptoed into the bathroom. The tile floor was cold beneath her feet. She closed the door, sat on the toilet, and thought one very clear and very unsettling thought.
Where am I?
Ina refused to ask what she as doing there. She knew. Ina felt it in the aches and pains that came each time she moved. She looked at the floor and closed her eyes. The Red had gone for now, but it had consumed her completely the night before. Without the Red, she felt empty and ashamed of the depraved things it had allowed her to do in the other room. Ina called to it. She wanted it to come back because she couldn’t face reality without it.
Ina stayed locked in the bathroom for the better part of an hour and waited, but the Red didn’t come. Gathering the will to stand, she climbed into shower. She set the water temperature high enough that she nearly scalded herself, but she didn’t care—it was making her feel clean, and the memories of what had happened in the room outside were falling deeper into her subconscious.
Good, she thought, The Red couldn’t hold onto me for long enough. It tried, but it couldn’t. I know what I have to do. The small victory made her feel a rush of motivation.
There was still hope, but that meant she had to find Marisa before it was too late. Ina got out of the shower. After she dried off, she wrapped the thick, cotton towel around herself and unlocked the bathroom door. She would look for her clothes, but only for a minute. If she couldn’t find them, she would leave in the towel. The desire for flight far exceeded any sense of modesty. She wanted to get out of there. That was all that was important. Let the people in the corridors of the station call her crazy. It was not far from the truth, after all. Ina stepped back out into the bedroom.
The human mural stood a meter or so from the bathroom door. His wiry arms were crossed over his chest. The woman who had been slumbering at the foot of the bed was not far behind him. The lone, black stocking still clung to her calf; her dark hair was a rat’s nest atop her head. The man with the big arms stood next to the dark haired girl. His arms hung at his side, fists clenching and unclenching. The owner of Heathen’s—Maerl—she recognized him clearly now, stood at the rear of the pack.
There was something behind their eyes; something that glowed a low but wild red.
They were not going to let her leave.
“What do you want from me?” Ina asked.
“You’re very special, Ina,” the human mural told her. “You have a job to finish.”
“I just want to go home,” Ina said. “Please.”
“You must anoint the vatter—open his eyes to the Red. His will shall become,” the human mural gestured to the others, “our will. The will of the Three. He will play the music that will open the gateway.”
“I don’t want anything more to do with this,” Ina said and looked toward the door. She didn’t think there was any way she could make it there.
“We have your father, Ina,” the human mural said, and that changed everything.
“What do I have to do?” Ina asked.
“We will show you,” he replied.
The human mural walked up to her, so close she could feel the heat of his body; his scent was powerful. She felt a flutter between her legs. She had no doubt that the same red that glowed behind her their eyes glowed behind hers now. Had she infected them? Or was it the other way around? She leaned into the mural’s lithe frame and his arms slid around her. She began to cry. Ina closed her eyes and felt lips on her neck. The mural’s cheeks were rough and unshaven. It hurt just a little bit, and the hurt began to fuel the Red. She felt more lips on her shoulders. They were soft and feminine. The towel was undone and it fell to her feet. Delicate fingers slipped up along the inside her of her thigh and touched her where she tingled.
There was no way out now. There was only Red.
(•••)
Gerald sat in the control couch with a bottle of 100% real, no-derivative Kentucky Bourbon resting on his knee. He uncorked the bottle and inhaled deeply. The potent aroma made his eyes water. Gerald had saved the liquor for a special occasion. What sort of occasion, he had never really been sure. Up to that point, Gerald’s life had been a string of random and sometimes unsatisfying events that he followed from one star system to another. He had kept the bottle onboard Bean for almost seven years, convinced that one day, there would be a special occasion.
A thick layer of dust had accumulated on the bottle. He drew a smiley face on its side with his index finger. That made him laugh. He poured three fingers of the liquid into a highball glass and set the bottle down on the control console. Gerald put his nose of the rim of the glass and inhaled again, with a little bravado, even. Good shit, yes-goddamn-sir.
“Bean. It’s a damn shame that you have no mouth, let alone a tongue or taste buds.”
“A minor shortcoming, Captain,” Bean said. “If I had a mouth and a tongue with taste buds, I hazard I’d not be dulling said taste buds with alcohol.”
“You say that now, but you have no idea.” Gerald hoisted the glass in the direction of one of the bug-eye cameras set across the fore of the bridge. “To you and I, buddy.”
“Thank you, Captain.”
“No. You’re supposed to say cheers. How many times do we have to go through this?”
“Because we’re leaving this hunk of metal in two days. No more bad mojo. No more seeing ghosts. No more salvage. No more Kendall. Swaren deposited a hunk of change in the account for assisting Core Sec… ”
“By assisting, do you mean how you got taken into custody—with your pants down, no less?”
“Forget it, Bean. We’re done. Retired.”
“That’s good news, Captain. But I’m much too young retire,” Bean responded in a tone of amusement.
“Bean, you were an old man when I bought you.”
“Touché, Captain. Where will we go?”
“We’ve got free escort to New Juno with the Odessa once the Core Sec fleet arrives. I’m inclined to see what New Juno has to offer.”
“I see. Very upper-crust, Captain. Will we need to begin elocution lessons en route?”
“Nope. I’m going to find a nice spot of land, away from everyone else and set up a little house there… ” Gerald thought of poor Maerl—Maerl, who had lost everything in the wake of the riots. He felt a pang of guilt. Compared to Maerl, Gerald had not earned the retirement. He reached out and removed the photo of his brother from the control console. Liam’s smile was still bright, Liam’s wife was still beautiful, and Gerald’s haircut still remained as tragic as when the photo had been taken. I’m gonna make it count, Gerald thought, and then I’ll have earned it. I won’t take a second of it for granted, that’s for damn sure.
“Cheers, Bean.”
“Cheers, Captain.”
Through Bean’s front viewport, Gerald saw a ship permeate the hangar’s ion membrane. The long, polished Mira class cruiser was hard to mistake for any other ship. The discriminating rock star always traveled the stars in a Mira. So, Erick Haddyrein had come to Crescent Station after all. Gerald didn’t think it would really happen. Erick Haddyrein was big shit—one of the music industry’s biggest product pushers. Gerald couldn’t quite figure out why he would choose Crescent for the last stop on his tour. But, famous people were eccentric and he was sure that Haddyrein was no exception to that rule. Gerald laughed and polished off the bourbon. He set the glass aside in favor of going straight for the teat. Maybe he’d check out the concert, for one reason and one reason alone: with Heathen’s shut down for good, he had nothing better to do.
(•••)
The Mira came to a halt in a roped-off landing area. Two rows of security officers flanked the vessel. Some of the officers had just come back to duty from sick leave; Marisa couldn’t help but notice that most of them still looked ill. The nose cone of the Mira lifted open and a docking ramp extended like a silver tongue. A plastic surgery job wearing a shiny chrome suit and matching tie walked down the ramp with an obvious swagger. Unnaturally blue eyes swept back and forth over the deck from beneath a shock of bleached blond hair. Marisa had almost forgotten just how fake civilized folk could look. The man smirked and halted when he reached Marisa and her security team.
“I’m Peter Trappe. Mr. Haddyrein’s manager.”
“I’m Lieutenant Marisa Griffin. I’m in charge of Mr. Haddyrein’s security detail. As you know, we’ve had some recent activity on Crescent and request that Mr. Haddyrein be under guard at all times. He is to stay on his tour ship until the concert. For his safety, of course.”
“That is understood very clearly.” Trappe looked around the deck. “And if your main hangar is any indication, I can’t see why he’d want to go anywhere else on this… station.”
Marisa smiled.
“We call it Crescent, Mr. Trappe. Home,” Marisa said. A figure standing just inside the nose cone of the Mira caught her attention. She wouldn’t have even registered the presence had she not seen the red tip of a cigarette flaring in the shadows. She could make out the bald head of Erick Haddyrein. Trode points on the back of his hand caught stray light off the deck floodlamps and glittered diamond-like for an instant. Marisa had to work to pull her eyes away. Trappe had his hands on his hips and he eyed her with growing impatience.
“Anything else we should be aware of? Perhaps there were details omitted from your initial and wordy email communiqué?” he said.
“No,” she replied and handed Trappe a small data flimsy. “My contact information. You need anything, please don’t hesitate to call. Everything else should be handled by Crescent’s concert promoter.”
After the meeting with Peter Trappe, Marisa returned home. She locked the door to her apartment and turned the lights down low. She slipped out of her uniform and sat cross-legged on the floor. The short, bristled carpet pinched the bare flesh of her thighs and ankles. The air that hissed from the overhead vent was cool and brought goose bumps to her bare skin. The ratty armchair sat across from her—it was mostly a skeleton now, with just a few tattered shreds of fabric hanging from its black plastic frame.
Marisa stared at the towel-wrapped package beneath the piece of furniture. Light the chair on fire. Burn this whole apartment. Get rid of that… that thing, her mind commanded her. It wasn’t too late. If only she could find a way to destroy the optical disc.
Despite her desire to end things with fire and obscenities, she crawled across the floor on her hands and knees toward the chair, her dark hair spilling over her face. She lay on her stomach and reached underneath the chair, almost expecting something to grab her and pull her under. Her fingertips brushed the towel and even through the thick cotton she could feel the concealed object’s power. If someone else touched it, would they feel it, too? If Gerald were to handle it, would every hair on his body stand on end as mine are now? She tugged the bundle free from where it was nestled. It felt good to hold it again.
When she had sent the strange, singing hammer down garbage shaft, she had sent with it any chance of destroying the object.
Marisa sat with her back against the wall and the package resting in her lap. She unwrapped the towel slowly—not because she was afraid, but because she wanted to make each moment last. Soon, the towel was spread open on her thighs. Her face was reflected in the dark, polished surface of the optical disc. The towel was stained with a rust colored ring, as if the disc had bled while it hid under the chair. She ran her fingertip around the edge of the disc. It was cold.
The vatter would ask for it soon, Marisa knew, and when he did she would give it to him. But only when he asked. He would know what to do with it. She would wait. The Black would wait—a handful of hours was nothing.
(•••)
The hush of evening shrouded Crescent Station’s main hangar. A slender woman with cornsilk hair that fell past her shoulders led a handful of black-clad men and women across the flight deck, toward the sleek Mira class starship. The four officers stationed at the foot of the vessel’s docking ramp did not move to intercept the posse—they joined the Aphotic as the group passed by. The motley bunch led by the pretty girl entered the Mira with no resistance.
Even in the dark, the vatter’s quarters were not difficult to locate. The blonde woman left her friends outside the narrow door behind which lay the final key to unity.
She found the vatter asleep. The bedsheets were half cast off his body. He had an erection. She slipped the paper-thin dress from her shoulders and it fell toward the ground. Time seemed to slow with the garment’s descent. The blonde woman mounted the vatter. He didn’t wake, but a quiet moan slipped past his lips as he entered her. She rocked atop him until he released. Even then, he did not wake, but dreamed only of red.
The air shimmered.
The dress hit the floor.
(•••)
The door buzzer rang with a sound distant and murky, as if Marisa had heard it from under water. Slowly, she clawed her way back to the shore of consciousness. She flipped on the bed side lamp. The clock told her it was 3:45 a.m. She rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands and swung her feet out over the floor. The door chimed again.
“Jesus. I’m coming,” she said.
She slipped into her
pants and padded across the carpet. Movement ceased when she saw the towel open on the floor. The optical disc sat there, gleaming up at her. It grinned in a way that only a razor can smile. Marisa opened the apartment door without bothering to see who was on the other side. A man stood in the corridor. He wore a thick, hooded sweatshirt, and the hood was drawn up over his head. She didn’t need to see his face to know his identity.
“Come in,” Marisa said.
He entered stiffly and the door slid shut behind him.
“I’ve come here for something… ” His voice trailed off. She put a hand on his shoulder, a gesture of reassurance. He cringed away from her. “I’ve come here for something… .” he repeated in the same unsure voice. Marisa knelt before the optical disc and wrapped it back up in the towel. She held it out to him and he looked at it stupidly.
“This is what you’ve come for. Take it.”
He stood there gaping at her like an idiot. He probably wouldn’t remember any of this come morning. He wouldn’t remember until it counted.
Marisa grabbed his hand and thrust the bundle to it. She grabbed his other hand and clasped it around the thing. He drew it to his chest and took a step back.
“There is music on this disc?” he asked her.
“… The fuck should I know? Take it. I don’t want to see it ever again.” She opened the door and pushed him back out into the hallway. The door slid closed with him still looking in at her.
A pressure eased from her chest. Her head cleared and she became suddenly weak. She knew the musician had departed, and he had taken with him something far heavier than the optical disc: he had relieved her of her phantasmal chains. For the first time in as long as she could remember, she felt alone. Completely and utterly alone. Marisa began to weep. She wondered why she cried. Was it relief? She felt like she had been let go. I can leave now. She could leave that very instant. Her will was her own again. She was sure of it. The Black had left her. She could no longer sense it. It had slipped away to wherever it slept. The Black was resting for the final thrust.