by Rick Dearman
***
I sat down to dinner and decided to order the seven course meal. It would tag another five hundred credits to my bill but I deserved it; it would most likely be the last decent meal I had before moving to Alpha Betro II.
I had the money of course to pay the extra but only because I had dislodged the local constabulary on Earth from my bank account. I'd used judicious name dropping and a quiet word with the judge about “détournement des fonds public”,
I'd been allowed seventy-eight hours to leave the solar system. Of which I had over twenty hours remaining and I was determined to make the most of it.
I groaned noting the waiter was the same hulking useless fellow from the morning. Simon stood beside me muttering and making rude remarks under his breath as I ordered my meal.
He brought the first course and I was startled to see the pert frame of the girl walking past the door behind him. I leapt up from my table and rushed out to catch her. My shoulder hit the tray Simon was carrying.
"Excuse me". I said as I tapped her on the shoulder. "I've been trying to find you."
"I don't know you" she said promptly spinning on her heel walking away.
I glanced back at some disturbance in the dinning room and saw three waiters holding Simon who seemed to have gotten himself covered in gravy or something. “Clumsy oaf” I thought and hurried after the girl.
I took a long hard look at the area below her collarbone and I was sure that I couldn’t be mistaken. She was definitely the girl who gave me the bag. She was in more conservative Loonie clothing which covered her more remarkable features, but it was definitely the same girl. I stood in front of her and held up my hand.
"I'm the man you gave the bag to today in the city centre.” I said to her then added. “I think you have mistaken me for someone else."
"No Sir, I think you have mistaken me for someone else. I have never been to the city centre, I've only arrived on a shuttle from the space station today. Good day Sir." she said.
She turned again to walk away but I grabbed her shoulder.
"I'm sorry miss, but it was you. I simply wish to return your antiques. If you wait here I'll just go to my room and retrieve them."
"If you don't take your hands off me I'll call security!" she said loudly. "Now go away and leave me alone!"
People turned to look at the sound of upraised voices and I quickly removed my hand away from her shoulder. She walked away and I stared after her. With a sigh and a shrug of my shoulders I decided to go to my room and order room service.
Her behaviour was very suspect and I began to wonder if the items in the bag were stolen. If she was a thief she'd not be keen to have stolen goods handed to her in the middle of the lobby of the largest most expensive hotel in Luna.
"If they’re stolen I will need to dispose of them." I thought to myself. I emerged from the lift and unlocked the door to my room heading straight for the bed. I lay down with a sigh and closed my eyes.
"It isn't very attractive to lie with your bits hanging out." said a voice.
I leapt up off the bed and looked around to find the girl coming out of my bathroom with a maula piston trained on my head and the bag in her other hand.
"How did you get in here?" I asked. "What did you give me that bag for?"
"I needed someone to carry it away from the church." she said smiling. "You've been most helpful but now I need to go."
“Look I'm going off-world and if you have some spare time maybe we could have some fun?” I winked at her and smiled patting the bed.
“You have a one track mind, I'll give you that. Open the door.” she said and gestured toward the door with the gun.
I stood to open the door for her, if I wasn't going to have sex then at least I could get some sleep. She kept the pistol trained on me as I opened the door.
“Arrrrggghhhh!” came a scream from the opening door. Both the woman and myself suprised as a large bucket of steaming hot gravy was launched into the room. I sidestepped behind the door and the gravy covered the woman.
KAWOOMP, KAWOOMP! The sound of the maula pistol going off was amazingly loud. The yellow snot looking projectiles covered the door and then exploded. I stood in shocked amazement. Both Simon and I staring at where the door had once been.
I leapt for the opening hoping to get away from these mad people but my foot hit a patch of the steaming gravy. My foot flew out from under me and my body slam into the floor.
KAWOOMP, KAWOOMP! The sound of the pistol again as the woman shot randomly around the room. I looked up to see her attempting to wipe gravy from her eyes with her sleeve, but only managing to smear more into her face.
Simon's eyes travelled over the ruins of the door and the woman with the gun, then settled on me. I could see his face turn into a mask of rage as I stood up in the gravy.
“No!” I shouted at him as he charged into the room. His body smashed into me. Both of us flew backward toward the woman in the light lunar gravity.
I grunted as the back of my head crack into something hard. I landed in a heap with Simon on top of me. His crazed face contorted as he strangled me. From the corner of my bulging eye I could see the face of the woman her nose looked broken and she was bleeding.
Thankfully the room filled with people at that moment, security and staff dragging the crazed peasant off me.
***
That night I sat in the hotel jacuzzi sipping quietly on a 2107 Chateau d'Yquem. The Astute reader will have already surmised that the woman was a master thief. She had stolen the last two copies of something called “a bible”. She'd taken both the paper and electronic originals that had been written on some old computer by the first Pope.
The Loonie church had graciously paid for my hotel and the associated destruction of the premises. Pope Ringo-Elvis himself had given me a gift of a hundred thousand credits and the dubious honour of being a Loonie for life.
I yawned in the hot bubbles and placed the glass on the table.
It hadn't all gone swimmingly. I'd offered to give some of the money to Simon to help with his anger management issues, but he attacked me again! Right there at the press conference. Since I wasn't going to press charged on the deranged fellow they had agreed to keep him sedated until I spaced out.
“Time to ship out.” said a rough voice.
“Bloody Hell!” I screamed as the pilot's scaly head emerged from my jacuzzi.
But that is another story.
Coming in 2011. Two new feature length novels, two incredible new fantasy series.
A new series: Frontiersman
The civil war is over and the rebellion lost. Cheveyo the half-breed is travelling to the frontier to make a new life. He has two pure-bred horses and dreams of creating a ranch and a home. But in the borderlands Cheveyo discovers a murdered family and using his skill and training he tracks down the killers to take justice. But these killers are just a few of the gang working for the man they call "Big Red". Cheveyo soon discovers crossing "Big Red" is life threatening, and it will take all of his skills to just remain alive in the hellish frontier.
A new series: The Librarian
Book One: Ignition
The City of Ettengard is under siege. The Library has been given an impossible mission, the Head Librarian and the Chief Mage have been poisoned. Ranperen and Tantia the young students must make their way across a war torn country to find a cure and to save the library from destruction. Inside the city the clashes between the thieves guild and the beggars are becoming bloodier as the war causes unrest and rebellion. And a mysterious group of conspirators are trying to bring back the glory days of the defeated and evil Empire.
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