There was a refreshing moral flexibility to that section of the city. It was an open secret; one that kept the seedier members of the New Boston populace from seeping upward, like gangrene, to the heights of Uptown and the anointed Cambridge royalty. To Roland, it was home.
Roland was wearing his blocky wool overcoat and a flat cap in Donegal wool to mask his bald head and bulk. Both were black, and together they did a decent job of keeping his asinine proportions from being too obvious. His height and size were an oddity, but there were enough mutants, cyborgs, steroid-freaks and other weirdos out there in Dockside that he rarely rated more than a clandestine gawk from the people he passed if he made the effort to cover up. People just assumed he was some sort of ‘mad science gone awry’ and minded their own business. There was plenty of that going around these days.
They weren’t exactly wrong either, and the irony of that was not lost on Roland. But thankfully, the people in Dockside didn’t ask those kinds of questions, and Roland was uninterested in risking the wrath of the planetary government by answering them. The arrangement worked just fine for everyone, so Roland left them to their assumptions.
Roland was a Dockside fixture, having lived there the better part of two decades, now. The players, movers, and shakers of their little community were well aware of him, and while his origins and abilities were still mysterious, his reputation was not. Roland had worked for, with, and against everyone in Dockside at various points in his career, and he was respected as a neutral party and the sort of guy that it was (to put it delicately) best not to fuck with. If you had a problem in Dockside, Roland could fix it. For a price, of course: he wasn’t a savage after all.
Roland stayed out of the drugs and crime for the most part, but he was no do-gooder busybody either. If you wanted to get high on blaze and fry your brains for fun, Roland didn’t care. But if you wanted to sell blaze in front of Roland’s apartment, you would be directed to a new location.
If you decided to get high on blaze and start shooting up the street? Well, if you were lucky, one of the locals would talk you down before Roland made it downstairs to address you personally. If Roland addressed you personally, you were going to the hospital or the morgue. Those were the rules. Everybody knew the rules.
This was the only reason that Lucia was fairly safe for the moment. After the dust-up at the Smoking Wreck, crime lords across Dockside were almost certainly scrambling to figure out who had sent high-dollar goons onto their turf, and pissed off the one guy who they all knew to leave the hell alone. They would be furious at whoever made such a bold move, and they would be falling all over themselves to make sure Roland knew they had nothing to do with it. At first, anyway: For enough money, none of that would matter.
Lucia, not being privy to all of this pertinent information, was apprehensive. “Is it OK for me to be out in the open?” She was moving in that twitchy, hyperactive manner again, just like at the bar. Roland now understood that her nervous system was dilating her sense of time, a sure sign that she was agitated.
“For at least a few more hours, yes. Probably.”
“Probably?” she replied, just a touch shrill.
“Yeah. Probably.” The big man shrugged, “Right now, a bunch of local bosses are probably calling their regional bosses who are going to call the big bosses to see who ran a high-profile job in Dockside without clearing it. Criminals are very territorial. This is a serious breach of protocol.”
“What if they people after me aren’t crime bosses?” she asked, displaying a very astute understanding of bureaucracies.
“They probably aren’t, but even if it is god himself after you, the major crime syndicates will have a lot of influence over whoever did this, and they’ll be pissed. Whoever tried to grab you tonight is going to be having a very difficult meeting about it, with some very scary people.”
“But money will change hands and apologies will get offered,” he continued, “and the next attempt will go through the correct channels, with the correct fees getting paid along the way. People here know to leave me alone, but there will be too much money on the line for that to hold once the word comes down from the big bosses.”
“How do we know it didn’t already go through channels,” She asked.
“I’d have heard about it by now, or someone would have hit my apartment,” he shook his head, “No, people are holding back right now while everyone figures out who broke the rules and why. Once they sort it out, we will have to get gone, and fast.”
“That’s why we are going to see this ‘Dwarf’ guy?” She asked.
“Yup. I need to see him before the word comes down that you are fair game even if I am in the way. Once that happens, he won’t be able to help much.”
She looked confused, “But he’ll help now?”
“Yup.”
“Why?”
“Because if he doesn’t I’ll kill him.”
Lucia’s face went a new shade of pale at that grim proclamation, “You’ll just… kill him?”
Roland nodded, “Yup. He’s a professional criminal and a certified asshole. The world won’t miss him. If he won’t help me, I kill him and go ask the next one. The next one will help because he knows I killed the last one who didn’t. That’s how it works.”
Lucia’s heartbeat quickened, and her breathing went shallow. She looked sick, “I… don’t know if I can do this.” It wasn’t an admission of defeat, just a bare assertion of a fact, “I’m in advertising and marketing, Roland… I’m not the kind of person…who can…” She was hyperventilating now.
Roland stopped walking and put his hands on her shoulders. He looked her in the eyes, saw fear. Not just fear for her father, or fear for herself, but fear of him.
He looked at her again. She was pretty; no, more than pretty. She was beautiful, and while he liked to think that he was past the point where that sort of thing mattered, he knew she was. He had joined the army decades ago so people like her wouldn’t have to see this world, yet here she was. He had failed again. She shouldn’t be here. I don’t know how to do this Beauty and the Beast shit, he thought to himself, this sure as hell is no fairy tale, and I am no kind of prince.
Roland found it easy, living in Dockside, to forget what he was sometimes. Forgetting what he was and what he had done was a critical part of his day-to-day existence. If he thought about it too much, the guilt and despair would become overwhelming. But it was OK for him to be here. In Dockside he was just another bit of refuse from the shining towers of uptown, not even good enough to live in the Sprawl. Here he was just another enigmatic freak; someone to be feared and avoided. Fear and respect were the same thing here, and that made him a big deal in this little slice of hell. No one here knew, and no one here could judge him for the crimes of his past. He could still judge himself, and he often did. But at least here in Dockside he was neither special nor unique for carrying all his sins.
Now a piece of that other world had fallen from the lofty heights and landed in his little puddle; and she was terrified of him. He looked at the woman. Really looked. There was no evil in her. No guile or malice. She was so bright and clean that he feared the grime of his world might stain her forever.
The same hands holding her slim, terrified shoulders had murdered hundreds of unarmed civilians. They had wrought more death and pain than she would ever realize. They would do more before they were done; he knew that with the absolute certainty of a man who made his bed on the battlefield. He knew that. But he didn’t know how to make her understand it. She was too clean, too nice. She didn’t know evil, she didn’t know what it was to be at war, even though a war had been brought to her, anyway.
Roland was war. From the bottom of his armored feet to the top of his reinforced head, he was built for this in the most literal way. He lived for this, and at this moment he hated himself for loving it. It made Roland feel like an ugly twisted thing; a lumbering mechanical monster, little more than a weapon forged to serve his betters.
He broke the spell and simply told her the only truth he could, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry you’re here, and I’m sorry I’m the guy who can help you. Christ, you should be sipping cocktails with the girls from the office or going on a date with some lawyer or doctor or whatever.”
She was crying now, big wet tears sliding down her cheeks to hang from her jaw. Quiet sobs were shaking her shoulders, tiny in the massive paws of the big cyborg.
“I’m sorry for all the stuff you’re gonna see me do. I’m sorry that I’m gonna have to do it, too; if that makes you feel better. Every part of what’s coming is going to be terrible, no way around it. It will be dealing with terrible people, and that means doing terrible things.” He sighed. A big, heavy sigh. The sigh of a man who knows exactly what is coming.
“These are monsters, Lucia, and that’s why your old man sent you to me. I can do this because I am a bigger monster than they are, is all. I’m sorry about that, I really am.“
Her eyes widened as the perceptive woman saw a pain and loathing in his features that went much deeper than the armor, “No! No. It’s not that. It’s not you. You are what you are, and I don’t have anything to say about it.” For a fleeting moment, she saw a small terrified thing at the heart of the towering mechanical killer. It was strange and sad, and she wondered if he even knew it was there. Her father’s stories had always described Roland as a knight in shining armor, a war hero who bravely vanquished the enemies of peace. This didn’t look like the paladin from Dad’s stories to her. For a split second, she could only see a tired old soldier.
She shook her head, “I just wanted to be so strong,” she gasped, “I want to find my father. I want it all to be okay.” She looked back up at him, “Yesterday my life was perfect. Normal! But now I’m… augmented, and you are talking about killing people, and I just can’t…” She threw her hands up in disgust, and let them fall to her sides, defeated, “I don’t know how to do this. I just want my dad back!”
He tried to smile, “Then just let me do it. Close your eyes, hum your favorite song, or just pretend it’s not you. I would do this for your father just for the asking, and I’d leave you out of it if I could.” He shrugged noncommittally, “But I will see you through this and we will figure it all out.” She was getting control of her crying, thankfully. He let go of her shoulders and squared his, “I’ll do the hard parts. You just stay alive. Deal?”
She nodded, “Deal.” She straightened and wiped her eyes, “I kinda feel ridiculous now.”
“Are you laughing?” Roland’s face betrayed abject confusion.
The woman chuckled, “It’s all just so fucked up, y’know?”
“Better than anyone, Lady. Let’s go talk to the Dwarf.”
“Or kill him, right?” She sounded less horrified with the prospect. Apparently she had just needed a moment to come to grips with it.
“The night is still young, kid. We all may see the morning, yet. Even the Dwarf.”
“Meh. Fuck him.”
He laughed, “That’s better.”
“Roland?” She said quietly and hooked her small arm around his. She did not know why she did it, or why she felt like she needed to say anything. But she trusted her gut.
“Yeah?” The big man grumbled.
“I don’t believe in monsters.”
Roland appreciated the sentiment, he really did. But he knew it for what it was.
“You will.”
Chapter Eight
The Dwarf would be at Hideaway this time of night. It was an apt and descriptive name for the bar, as the door was an unadorned piece of brown metal sculpted with panels to give it the appearance of an old-time wooden door. The only indication that there was anything behind this passage was a painted sign directly above the door that said in simple block letters, “Hideaway.” Facing the grey street was a facade of gray windowless expanse, and the pair had to go down three steps below street level to stand at the door. It was without a doubt, the least-interesting-looking night-time destination Lucia could ever remember going to.
The door thrummed with the regular rhythm of music, an indecipherable tuneless thumping, muffled and low. For whatever reason, Lucia imagined it was going to be all kinds of loud in there when that door finally opened. She braced herself. Roland rapped sharply on the door.
A rectangular viewing panel opened and a pair of beady black eyes blinked out at them, “Private party tonight, guys. Go somewhere else.”
The panel started to close but was stopped by two gloved fingers that darted through the opening and latched onto the frame like a vice.
Roland’s voice, at an octave low enough to rattle Lucia’s molars barked, “I am the private party, Barney. Open the door or buy a new one. Your call.”
Beady-eyes grew wide with recognition, “Shit, Tank! I didn’t realize it was you! The Boss said you might show up. Hold on.”
Lucia heard the latches and bolts clang and clunk as ‘Barney’ set about getting the door open. She arched an eyebrow at Roland, “Tank?”
He grinned, “My last name is Tankowicz. Barney struggles with any word that has more than one syllable.”
The door swung open, and it surprised Lucia to find it had hinges, and was not automatic. This must be an old building, she thought.
Music, smoke, and dingy red light spilled out into the street and washed over the pair. Some no-name industrial punk rock band was playing on a low stage at the far end of the large, open room. The atonal thumping of badly tuned guitars and heavy-handed drum riffs was mercifully drowning out the inscrutable shrieking of the band’s “singer.”
Roland stepped through the doorway, ducking slightly and angling his shoulders so as not to scrape through the narrow opening. Lucia followed. Roland could just barely straighten to his full height inside, with barely six inches of clearance between his head and the ceiling. He would need to take great care moving around if he didn’t want to smash any of the long red tube lights running along the ceiling.
The assault upon Lucia’s senses by the sheer volume of stimulus inside the Hideaway made her wince. Her eyes struggled with the garish, crimson lighting that made the room and everyone in it look like clownish caricatures of Faustian demons. Her ears were pummeled by the music’s volume and lack of structure; none of it alleviated by the mediocre-at-best talents of the musicians.
And the smells, dear god, the smells. Smoke from a dozen different pipes, hookahs, vaporizers, and bongs slammed her nostrils in acrid waves of stinging olfactory assaults. The effluvia of several different inhaled intoxicants were recognizable, and Lucia wondered if she was going to end up high as a kite from just this second-hand exposure. The smoke was at least a mask for the sticky sweet stink of human sweat, stale beer, and cheap perfume that wafted from the sea of half-dressed human bodies writhing and bouncing in a glassy-eyed trance with the music from the end of the room.
It was no less than a Roman bacchanal in that bar, and Lucia, who had never been anywhere more exciting than a college house party found herself disgusted and terrified by the shear unrestrained energy of it all.
She looked to Roland, for lack of anywhere else to focus, and saw only grim purpose and irritated boredom on his face. That was sort of his normal look, and she found it reassuring.
Roland for his part, hated Hideaway. He hated the noise. He hated the drugs. He hated the people who went there. He hated that they only served shit beer and most of all, he hated the Dwarf.
The towering man moved through the crowd with practiced purpose. He didn’t have to push, because bumping in to him was like hitting a wall. Drugged up ravers bounced off of him like ping-pong balls as he stepped through the crowd toward the bar. Lucia followed in his wake, enjoying the protection of the large opening he created. It was nice to not have to touch the lurching bodies all around her.
At the bar, Roland placed both hands on the scarred and stained synthetic wood surface and leaned in very close to speak with the bartender. She was a pretty blonde girl, with spiky hai
r dressed in improbably short iridescent pink shorts and a tank top that would have been tight if it was two sizes bigger. As it was, the only thing holding the beleaguered garment together was a dizzying assortment of pins, bangles, chains and ornaments employed to supplement the structural integrity of the too-tiny garment.
The bartender made a cursory attempt to flirt with the big man. Lucia couldn’t tell if it was something she did out of reflex to get better tips or if she had a sincere thing for Roland. Lucia had a hard time imagining Roland frequenting a place like this, but she was forced to concede that she had only known the man for about four and a half hours at this point.
If Roland’s face was any indicator, her instincts were right. With an irritated pout, the pretty bartender turned away and hit a button by the register terminal. A screen flashed, and she waved him over to the end of the bar where another door awaited.
A light blinked green on the panel next to the door, and Roland guided Lucia through the dim passage. It led to a hallway, about ten feet long and to another door. The door behind them closed, and Roland stood in front of the next one and waited. A panel to the right of the door lit up, and a voice crackled through a speaker, “Tank! Roland, ya’ old fooker! How are ya?”
Roland’s head cocked slightly to the side. He looked at the speaker and said in a low, enunciated growl, “Open. The. Door.”
“Roland,” the voice crackled, “Ye need ta know I had nothing to do with tha’ bullshite at the Wreck. I need ta know yer nae gonna get all bent out of shape and make a fuss in here before I let ye through, is all.”
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