Mercury's Orbit

by Lia Black

  He tried to push himself along with his legs, but his heels slipped through the slimy coating of his blood. He was reduced to wriggling like a woodlouse stuck on its back.

  It would be okay.

  Tomorrow he’d wake up and watch the Flutterby Fairies on TV, just as he did every morning. He found their advice invaluable and insight far beyond any so-called religious wisdom. This morning they had demonstrated how to foster friendship. Thinking about it made his throat tighten. Really, if all it took was sharing a flower cupcake to make a true friend then how come it was so difficult for him? He started to giggle, then cry as his mind became further muddled. Where was Princess? “I would have given you a cupcake, Princess...” he murmured. “I would have...but you made me hurt you...why does everyone make me hurt them?”

  More shouts from below, getting farther away now as the vent split in two directions. Progress was slow, but he was still moving…all he had to do was keep moving. He followed a sharp turn to the right. Maybe they’d given up or gone in the wrong direction. The silvery burn of the atmosphere outside made his nose run, and his breath turned to fog in the cooling air, settling as a light, humid mist on his face. A little further and he’d hear the wind, moaning through the grate.

  Almost there. Almost.

  Reaching further down, he touched the ornamentation at his crotch. The codpiece was more than just a lovely bejeweled cup meant to protect his precious assets; there was a little clasp that opened a small compartment, which housed the trigger for his bombs. That had been the plan, to get them all in one place and blow it to oblivion. Let them negotiate with their god for forgiveness, for Mercury had none.

  Maybe if he timed it just right, he could be shot out of the ventilation system when the explosions went off inside the atrium. Maybe he’d burst through the dome and become a comet, burning up in outer space—a fiery phoenix, beautiful, but never again to rise. He flicked at the latch on his codpiece, but it was stuck tight. Such a fragile thing couldn’t handle being crushed or shot at. Just like with his pretty pistol, he’d succumbed to the lure of form over function.

  “Flutterby, flutter by my window...f-flutter by and m-make me...smile...” He began to sing the song looping in his head, the song that always made him feel better. He would forgive them for their mistake about friendship. Even the Flutterby Fairies were allowed to have an off-day, weren’t they?

  Kind of like the day he was having right now.

  “...Fffflutterby, flut-and-butter b-by m-me...” His teeth were chattering now as the cold became more intense, though he was uncertain how much was the air outside and how much was his body protesting his loss of blood.

  “...Stay and p-play j-just a little while...”

  The blood that had seeped through his clothing felt like heavy, icy syrup, while the rest continued to pump hot from the wound. The voices from below were gone; all he heard now was his own heartbeat stuttering and hammering in his ears. He continued fingering the clasp, trying to open that secret compartment so he could go out in a blaze of glory, but the metal was slippery and wet, and his fingertips felt like they were made of sponges.

  Mercury heard a shout from somewhere up ahead. “Fire in the hole!”

  A series of loud thunks accompanied something bouncing into the shaft above his head. There was a flash, blinding him, then the hiss as the chemical bomb filled the ventilation shaft with gas. The world began to get smaller and smaller until it was reduced to a single, twinkling star.

  With his last shred of consciousness, Mercury managed to flip the latch and the little door popped open. His numb finger slipped across the raised ruby button, as the star fizzled out.

  2

  Tonight, the Roho district looked like a madman’s carnival. Streets and buildings shone like giant black mirrors in the rain, reflecting the overabundance of neon signs and colored lights. There was a constant low hum in the atmosphere, aside from the public monorails whining on their raised tracks. Human static. So many people crammed into such a small area, so much energy of every type being expended, that it became a living thing; a thick, invisible, dome of noise.

  Still in his work uniform, Police Sergeant Sean Argeneau hurried from the postal depot with his package, dodging the waterfall of people rushing down from the monorail steps on their way home from work. Most of them gave him a wide berth, a few gave him a thumbs-up, one offered a salute, and another: his middle finger.

  He passed underneath the one thing not emitting light: the police cameras. If he thought it would make a difference, he’d report the outage, but frankly, it was just a waste of time. They were monitored in a CSD satellite office by cops finishing their last few months before retirement, and old-timers who refused to retire. Even if somebody did notice something going down, it would take too long for help to arrive. Besides, he lived right across the street, and his new hobby of staring off his balcony in the wee hours of the morning made it a lot more likely there’d be a response.

  The Harbor Arms Maisonette was pretentious and inaccurately named; there hadn’t been a harbor within two-hundred miles of the place since Port KC went dry in 2102. The building had once been a factory, but had been transformed, as many of them had, into apartments. It was a trend way before Sean’s time and he assumed it must have been out of desperation. Overcrowding in the cities often required re-purposing.

  Sean ran his card through the scanner sleeve that should have unlocked the outer security door, but the green LED flickered red, then fizzled out completely. He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath and counting slowly down from ten instead of doing what he really wanted to do, which was put a bullet through the device, and then the guy who’d made it.

  He grabbed and held the door as his neighbor opened it from the inside, on her way out.

  “Sarge,” Pearl Ebands said, tipping her round head slowly forward on her long, spindly neck. She was a tiny, impossibly old woman who probably survived out of sheer stubbornness. Her hair was a thin white cloud around her dark head, her skin wrinkled up like a brown paper bag. She’d been the only resident who appreciated having a cop living in their midst, and one of the few who’d actually spoken to him since he’d moved in. Sean liked her. She often chided him for sitting out smoking in the middle of the night while standing on her own balcony doing the same thing.

  “Ms. Ebands,” Sean gave her a smile.

  “Heard about that big raid last night. All over the news. You know anything ‘bout that?” She turned her head slightly, peering at him around the pale blue veil of cataracts.

  “I was part of the sweep outside, but yeah. We finally caught Mercury Fie.” Sean couldn’t keep the small note of pride from his tone. They had been hunting Fie for the past five years. He’d come silently out of nowhere and immediately built a criminal empire with his reputation of being as smart as he was crazy. It had been very difficult to get someone inside who could get close enough to Fie to earn his trust, as he had a habit of killing his own men—specifically his lovers. Officer Craig, who’d been the one to infiltrate Mercury’s organization, got a kick to the face that shattered his jaw, and he nearly bled to death after biting off most of his own tongue.

  Pearl clicked her tongue. “Shame. That boy is such a pretty thing.” She echoed the sentiment of most of the general public, thanks to the media treating Fie like a celebrity. Although he’d never modeled for the images, Mercury Fie’s likeness was used to advertise everything from alcohol to public service announcements about “being yourself”. He was an exotic creature whose origins and genetics were a complete mystery. But like many exotic animals, he was a predator, and one who killed indiscriminately.

  “Well, that pretty thing nearly blew up a ballroom full of some of the world’s wealthiest men and women.” It had taken a bomb squad ten hours to disarm every one of the devices rigged to explode. If Mercury had been successful, the crater left behind would have stretched for at least a quarter mile, rivaling some of the war zones Sean had flown over as a military pil
ot.

  “Wouldna’ bothered me none,” Pearl huffed, waving her knobby, brown hand. “Rich folk ain’t never done nothing for me. I tell you, Sarge, there’s more to it than that. Always something, but this is something different.” She tapped at the corner of her eye as though indicating some kind of special sight before turning away. “Well, go on, get yourself outta’ the rain. Can’t be getting your nice uniform all wet.” Popping open her umbrella, she tottered past him, the canopy as wide as she was tall.

  Sean went inside, shaking his head. Pearl meant well, and he had to give her some credit. Normally her judgment of people was almost uncanny, but in this case, she was wrong. Mercury Fie was bad news. There was nothing there to redeem, no shred of soul worth saving, no excuse that could justify his behavior. Although it was true that most of the people he’d killed thus far were criminals, they were criminals who’d worked for him.

  Sean stopped at the super’s office to tell him about the broken scanner. Things tended to get done when he was in uniform; he knew he cut an imposing figure in the black CSD fatigues, and while he wouldn’t abuse his authority, he wouldn’t hesitate to use it if it meant the difference between somebody doing their job or making somebody else suffer because they didn’t.

  Even though the elevator had been repaired recently—again, thanks to his intervention— Sean took the stairs to his apartment. Despite his re-kindled smoking habit, he maintained his endurance, but he needed to quit. He’d successfully quit when he and Evan had started getting serious, going for almost three years without a cigarette, but when things ended, he needed a way to distract himself. It was stupid, really, but he rationalized it by reminding himself he didn’t drink to numb the pain. On his rating scale of vices, alcohol was much worse.

  Sean’s fifth-floor unit was no different from any other apartment in the building: a gray rectangular box with a balcony. It seemed only he and Pearl used their balconies for anything but hanging laundry. Admittedly, the view wasn’t great. The Roho district wasn’t the poorest area of the city, but that tended to make it a little more dangerous at times. It made no sense for the poor to rob the poor because nobody had anything worth taking, but Roho was mostly lower-middle class; they had more than the poor, but less security than the slightly richer. That was part of the reason he’d moved here. He felt a sense of duty to these people who worked hard for their low wages. He wanted to keep his promise to the community to protect and serve. His comrades on the force made fun of his “do-gooder” attitude, but it was important to him. He’d seen how jaded cops could become, coming from a long line of them himself.

  Tossing his keys into the tray he kept on a small table near the door, he shrugged out of his wet coat before taking the plastic-covered package to the counter. His apartment was sparsely furnished because he just hadn’t found the desire or energy to buy new things. Since he never had guests, a sofa and dining set were unnecessary. He had no eye for art, and hanging pictures of his family on the walls would only serve to remind him he was alone.

  He pressed the blinking message button on his vid-com, letting it play while he unwrapped the box he’d been waiting on for so long.

  “Sean? It’s Mom. Did you get the package?” Sean glanced over his shoulder at the flickering yellow-orange specter of his mom’s head and shoulders. Even with the poor resolution he could see the worried lines of her face. “I’m still not sure why you wanted it, but it’s none of my business. James and Julie have some news... James was worried about telling you because of...well… Anyway, they are having a baby. You’re going to be an uncle. I just thought you should know. Please give me a call when you have some time... love you.” Sean blew out the breath he’d been holding as the image flickered out. He loved his mom and appreciated the concern, but why did everybody think he was so fucking fragile? Yes, even after a year the breakup still hurt like a sonofabitch sometimes; but he was thirty-six years old. He’d gotten through a hell of a lot more in his lifetime, and he’d get through this too… probably.

  “Shit,” Sean swore softly and drew back his hand as the razor knife cut his finger. He stuck it into his mouth, sucking on it to slow the bleeding. He thought again about Officer Craig and fought back the nausea brought on by the taste of blood. Even though they had Mercury Fie now, his motive for blowing up the ballroom full of people, or anything he did for that matter, remained a mystery. The raid had actually taken place several days ago, but the information hadn’t been released to the news outlets until last night, after Fie had been released from the hospital and shipped to an off-world prison to await sentencing. A lot of people seemed to think Mercury had a noble mission in mind, though not even his supporters knew what it was. Because he was so inhumanly pretty, he was looked upon favorably rather than as the cold-blooded killer he actually was.

  Abandoning the blade, Sean ripped open the rest of the box with his hands, pausing before he pulled out the carefully cushioned item nestled in the center. It was smaller than he remembered, but just as heavy. He was shaking as he set it back on the counter and poured himself a glass of scotch before finishing the job.

  His father’s gun, passed down through three generations of Argeneau men, all of them cops: a reproduction Remington Rand M1911A1. They didn’t make guns like these anymore; hadn’t in a long time. Even as a reproduction, it was an antique when his great-great grandfather, for whom he’d been named, had gotten his hands on it. The metal barrel was pockmarked, the once black trigger corroded the color of dull steel from so many years of use. It had been cleaned, but he thought there was still a faint odor like sweet ammonia, sulfur, and maple syrup. Sean closed his eyes. It was a smell he’d always associate with the suffocating warmth of the kitchen on that day in June, a few months shy of twenty years ago. Sean reached into the wrapping and found the boxes of cartridges. Only three packages left of the .45-caliber rounds; one of them absent four. They were so old that he could barely make out the logos on the cardboard, but the cartridges inside had been made by his father. He’d never seemed like the nostalgic sort, but his methodical attention to detail in crafting each bullet was evidence enough. Only a few people understood why Sean wanted the gun after what had happened. Most people would have never wanted to see it again. But it was all he had left of his dad.

  Every day, Sean saw himself becoming more and more like his father. While he’d had a desire to care for and protect, his dad wasn’t very good at it beyond the scope of his police work.

  Like father, like son.

  Sean finally picked up the gun. It was cold and heavy in his hand. The grip was rough but had been worn smooth in places by so many generations of owners. It was a bittersweet posthumous passing of the torch from father to son; a tradition that would surely die with him.

  3

  Located a mile underground on the dark side of Earth’s moon, the Luna Maximum Security Penitentiary— or, LunaMax— was a rat-maze of dark hallways and solitary cell blocks. This was a place where society’s irredeemable ended up, and rarely left outside of a body-bag. The prison was a self-contained city, similar to a military base. Corporate-owned, its workers were confined in their own virtual prison: forced to stay within the oxygenated atmosphere that surrounded the facility outside, and getting daylight from an artificial sun. Most of the security and housekeeping tasks were left to AI, as those were often the most dangerous jobs for humans and few people were willing to work at the prison voluntarily. If LunaMax could have been completely automated, it would have been by now, but there were still laws and rules the prison had to observe, one of which was keeping CSD-trained human guards. Being slated for guard duty on Luna meant you were either really good or had severely fucked up, which is why most prison guards on Earth aimed for mediocrity.

  On the lower levels were the cells used to house the biggest nut-bags of the prison population, the criminally insane.

  This was where they were keeping Mercury Fie.

  Along with his inhuman strength and agility, he had some weird abil
ity to mess up machines. Unless the prison wanted their own security turned against them, Fie had to have human guards rotating around the clock, which meant the prison had been forced to call troops up from Earth, and pay them overtime. That was money that came directly out of their corporate profits. Sean was not here as a prison guard, though. He was here on official escort duty. He was the one who would be transporting Fie to the Intergalactic Tribunal, where he’d be formally sentenced. There was no contesting that the sentence would be death.

  At the front desk, a wholesome-looking young woman with red hair and freckles sat snapping her gum like a kid. Sean could see her firearm in plain view, rather than hidden demurely in the folds of her black uniform. She smiled at him, but her eyes were as hard as steel. Sean handed her his badge and she placed a plastic bin on the counter.

  “Weapons, money; anything you’d like to get back,” she said with a cheerfulness that was cultivated and artificial, handing back his badge. “Then you may advance to the first checkpoint.” She indicated a scanner on the wall near a heavy, windowless door. “Warden Lyttel is expecting you, Sgt. Argeneau.”

  “Thanks.” Sean started emptying his pockets, automatically counting the cigarettes in his case before dropping it into the bin with the rest of his items. He’d rationed them, making certain he had enough to get him there and back, counting for a five-hour delay.

  “Nice job there,” the woman said, and he knew she meant the raid.

  “Well, I can’t really take credit. My squad came in to clear the path for the real heroes.”

  “Oh, Sergeant, you’re too modest.” She gave him a wink that was far more unnerving than flirty. He wondered how many men she’d shot while wearing that same expression.

  Absent any other response, Sean shrugged with a smile, then turned and headed to the retinal scanner near the door. No matter what they said about the technology being safe, Sean was sure he could feel those damn lasers burning little holes through his corneas every time he had to do this. He bent down to focus one eye on the crossbeams. This was the first time he’d be going so deep into the facility and he would’ve been lying if he said he wasn’t a little afraid. Sean stepped back, blinking to lubricate his eye and clear the red hatch-marks from his vision.