“I’m not finished,” said Kevin. “I think you intend to go back, but I do not believe that you ultimately will. While I have not known any of you long, it is obvious that the only reason you have survived any of your more recent exploits is because you did so as a group. Together.
“Where would any one of you have been when confronted with Kornack, for example?” Kevin asked. “Would you have been able to return Miss Sooss safely to her parents by yourself? And then deal with the subsequent complications?”
“Well, no, but—”
“By which I mean the giant spider.”
“Yes, I know, but… I’m not doing anything like that. I just want to talk to my brother.”
“The Symmorium made it clear they would not allow it,” Kevin reminded her.
“I have to try,” said Loren. “He’s family.”
“And that, ultimately, is why I don’t believe you will ever make it back to the others, ma’am,” Kevin said. “You have forgotten who your real family are.”
There was a moment of silence while Loren considered this.
“Also, there are eight Xandrie attack ships in pursuit and preparing to fire,” Kevin said.
“What?!” Loren spluttered, eyeing the sensors.
“Sorry, I possibly should have mentioned those earlier.”
Loren gritted her teeth. “Oh, you think?” she snapped, gripping the controls. “Kevin, get ready on weapons. Splurt, hold onto something!” She lowered her voice, addressing the next comment mostly to herself. “This could be about to get messy.”
* * *
Several hundred million miles away, Cal plodded through a narrow, cave-like tunnel, a bundle of thin, grubby towels and face cloths in his arms. Metal doors lined both sides of the rocky passageway, and Cal was reminded of those long walks on his first day in a new prison, passing all the other cells on the way to his own.
Eyes peered out at him through the barred windows in the closed doors. A few others stood partly open, and Cal caught glimpses of metal bunks, or empty slop buckets or, on one occasion that would likely haunt him forever, a particularly full slop bucket. Quite what it was full with, he had no idea, and prayed to any and all available gods that he never had the misfortune of finding out.
A uniformed man strode a few paces ahead of him, a cattle-prod-like shock rod weapon held at the ready. He had introduced himself as a ‘Resettlement Specialist,’ presumably because ‘Concentration Camp Guard’ had already been taken.
The Resettlement Specialist stopped outside a metal door that looked exactly like every other metal door they’d passed – aside from a few that had been smeared with blood and excrement – and performed quite a complicated about-turn that involved lots of high-knee action and swinging of arms.
“Nana Joan’s?” he said, so sharply and suddenly that it took a full three seconds for Cal’s brain to recover from the surprise.
“Huh? What? Yes. I mean… yes. That’s right.” Cal looked the door over. “Is this it?”
“This is your assigned living space,” the official explained. “You will find the rules clearly displayed on the wall within, and at any of the Re-Education Centers through the Stagnates. Follow them to the letter, and your presence here will be permitted.”
“Jesus. Re-Education Centers?” Cal said. He’d clearly meant it as a question, but the Resettlement Specialist was now engaged in another turning procedure, and either didn’t hear him or chose not to bother answering. Perhaps, Cal thought, it was just as well.
“Ha-hip!” the man said, for reasons best known to himself, then off he went, arms and legs swinging as he marched back the way they had come.
“Thanks for all the help,” Cal called after him. “And good luck with everything. Keep reaching for those dreams. I’m sure you’ll make an awesome Nazi someday.”
His voice echoed off along the passageways, and then bounced back at him, as if in reply. Cal looked at the door in front of him. The metal was pock-marked with scratches and dents, but it was mercifully free of body fluids. The little barred window had been covered by something on the other side, making it impossible for him to see through.
“Well, here goes,” he said, tucking his towels under one arm and reaching for the door handle. It was only then that he noticed the door didn’t have one. In fact, it didn’t appear to have any means of opening it at all.
He tried to give it a push, but it didn’t budge. He knocked, but the metal was too dense to do anything but hurt his knuckles.
He leaned forwards so his face was as close to the tightly-spaced window bars as he dared get without risking getting his nose stuck. “Uh, hello? Anyone in there? New recruit out here.” He glanced along the dimly-lit and roughly-hewn corridor. “I’d quite like to get inside now,” he muttered.
“Please state your name.”
The voice emerged from somewhere behind the door. It was female, but completely lacking in anything even remotely resembling warmth.
“Oh, hi there!” said Cal, brightly.
“Name not recognized,” the voice said, and Cal realized he was talking to a computer.
“Cal Carver.”
“Name not recognized.”
“Shizz, no, wait!”
“Name not recognized.”
Cal sighed. “Nob Muntch.”
“Name recognized. Welcome home, Nob Muntch.”
“Jesus,” Cal muttered. “Please tell me you’re not going to say that every time.”
What followed was the sound of a large number of locks disengaging. It went on for a good twenty seconds or more. This was already a solid-looking door, and Cal didn’t want to think too much about why it needed quite so many locks.
With a final buzz, the door clicked off the latch and swung open a few inches. Cal pushed it the rest of the way, and was confronted by three anxious faces, all lined up in a row. Or rather, by two anxious faces lined up in a row, and a third, less-anxious face, three feet lower down.
All three of them were, he guessed, male. He got the impression they were young-ish, but couldn’t quite say why. The condition of their skin, maybe, or that slight awkwardness to them that suggested they hadn’t quite mastered how their faces and limbs all operated yet.
“Uh, hi,” said Cal.
The left-most face trembled violently, like it was about to explode, but was, in fact, just nodding very quickly. “Why, hello dere, Mister!” it said, in a suspiciously booming voice. “How be you be doing dere today?”
The other two turned to look at him. “Why are you talking like that?” asked the little one.
“Yeah, Higgsy, what gives?” asked the other. “You sound like a freaking idiot.”
Higgsy blushed. At least, Cal thought he did. His face was orange, pock-marked with angry red acne, and a full fifty per cent larger than his body size suggested it should be. It gave the impression he was in the midst of a serious allergic reaction to something, and just seconds away from full anaphylactic shock. His eyes – all four of them - were also oversized, although that could have been something to do with the lenses of the goggle-like double-decker glasses he wore.
“I don’t know,” Higgsy admitted in a much higher and more nasal tone. “I just panicked. I’m not good around new people.” He wrung his pudgy hands and shot Cal a look of absolute anguish. “I’m not good around new people.”
“Sorry, he’s a total freaking idiot,” said Higgsy’s slightly taller friend.
This one had one of the most interesting skull-shapes Cal had ever seen. From the front, it looked like a tall rectangle, but when he turned sideways, the top part of his head stretched backward until it formed a point, before curving back down until it met the top of his neck. He looked like a particularly aerodynamic cycling helmet had been implanted beneath his milky-white skin.
There were dark panda-like patches under his eyes, but Cal couldn’t tell if that was normal for his species, or if he’d just had a particularly late night recently. His lips were a matching shade of
black, though, so probably the former.
Most striking of all were his eyes themselves. They were almost a negative image of an eye, with the white bit black and the black bit white. Between the two was a faint iris of silver that brightened and faded as he spoke.
“Jork. Jork Doost,” he said, giving Cal a complicated three-finger wave.
“Uh, OK,” said Cal. “Hi.”
“It’s nothing personal,” Higgsy fretted. “I’m just not good around new people.” He patted his chest a few times and breathed deeply.
Jork rolled his eyes. “Total freaking idiot,” he reiterated.
Cal looked down at the smallest of the room’s occupants. He looked almost ‘normal’ – right number of facial features, head the correct shape and in proportion to the rest of his body, eyes not in the least bit freaky or weird. Even his skin was a hearty olive sort of tone that would have gone completely unremarked upon on Earth, albeit with a slightly glittering green sparkle effect on his temples and below his jawline. The most notable feature about him was his height – or lack of it. The top of his head barely reached the middle of Cal’s thighs
“And what’s your name, little fella?” Cal asked, smiling down.
A hush fell over the room. The temperature seemed to drop a full degree, and Higgsy’s hand-wringing increased in both pace and vigor.
The little guy rubbed his tongue against the inside of his teeth, then clicked it against the roof of his mouth. “OK, here’s the thing,” he said. “You’re new. Going by that accent, you’re from out of town. You don’t know me, I don’t know you. Mistakes were made. These things happen.”
His doll-sized face scrunched up angrily. “But if you ever refer to me as ‘little fella’ or words to that effect again, I’m gonna make you eat yourself, feet first. You got me? You’ll be a circle, feet in your mouth, just gnawing on bone, on your own fonking bone, chewing yourself up, like nananan. Choking on your own fonking feet.”
“Jesus,” said Cal.
“And you know what I’ll be doing? I’ll be dancing. I’ll be watching, and I’ll be dancing.”
He began to jig on the spot and clap his hands to a rhythm only he could hear. “Like so. You like this? Huh, you like this?”
He stopped. “Well, let’s hope, for your sake, you never see it again, because if you do…” He drew a circle in the air with one finger. “Feet to mouth, newbie. Feet to motherfonking mouth.”
“OK, OK. Got it!” said Cal. He thought for a moment. “Is ‘Shorty’ acceptable?”
“Fonk you, newbie! That does it! Hold me back, Jork! Hold me back, I swear!”
“Leave it, Alan, it’s not worth it,” Jork said, putting a hand on the smaller man’s shoulder.
“Alan?” said Cal. “That’s your name? Alan?”
“You gonna start on my name now, is that it?” Alan snapped. He raised his toddler-sized fists. “Oh, you got it coming now, newbie. You have got it coming now.”
“Don’t do it, Alan!” Higgsy yelped.
“Yeah, Alan, don’t. It’s not worth it!” agreed Jork.
Cal looked across the three faces, one furious, two concerned. “Do what? What’s he going to do?”
“He’s a Kholo,” Jork explained. “He’ll get super big and super strong, and he’ll tear this whole place down.”
“I will tear this whole place down!”
Cal looked from Alan to Jork and back again. “What, like a midget Hulk? How big are we talking?” He held his hand around shoulder-height. “Like yay high, or…?”
Alan began to breathe deeply in through his nose and out through his mouth. “Oh, man, it’s starting. I can feel it. Oh, you’re in trouble now, newbie. Shizz just got real. You’re in trouble now!”
“We’re all going to die!” squeaked Higgsy.
“Calm, Alan, calm,” soothed Jork. “Deep breaths. In. Out. In. Out.”
“I know how to breathe!” Alan snapped. He continued inhaling and exhaling, all the while glaring up at Cal.
“OK, look, sorry,” said Cal. “I was out of line. Alan, I apologize. Higgsy, Jork, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Cal.”
Higgsy’s already terror-stricken expression became even more so. “You mean you aren’t Nob Muntch?” he gasped. “Stranger danger, stranger danger!”
Cal produced his ID. “No, I mean, yes, I am. But most people call me Cal.”
Jork looked down at Alan to make sure he wasn’t about to explode, then took the ID and examined it. As well as looking at it, this also involved sniffing it and licking one of the corners. “Seems legit,” he said. “So how come people call you ‘Cal’?”
“No idea,” Cal said. He shrugged. “Never thought to ask.”
He looked around the room. It was exactly as cell-like as he’d expected from the glimpses he’d viewed of the other rooms. Two sets of bunk beds stood against opposite walls, running almost the full length of the cell. Beyond the barred one in the door, there were no windows anywhere, but then the entire complex was a five minute elevator ride underground, so that didn’t exactly come as a surprise.
There was a large cardboard box which seemed to be full of clothes, two buckets in the corner – one large, the other much smaller – and a plastic shower curtain that was presumably designed to offer some modicum of privacy while using said buckets.
The floor was concrete. The walls were brick. The ceiling was rough, exposed rock that had been more or less untouched, beyond the occasional piece of graffiti etched into it above the topmost bunks.
“It’s not much,” said Jork. “But you get used to it.”
“Right,” said Cal. “But I don’t plan staying long. This is just a temporary thing.”
Jork and Alan both grinned. Even Higgsy stopped fretting for a moment and managed something resembling a smirk.
“Yeah. Sure,” said Jork. “Temporary. Got it.”
“It is,” said Cal. “I’ve got a friend, she’s… away right now, but she’ll be back.”
“Oh, the newbie’s got a friend!” said Alan. “Ain’t that nice? He’s got a friend.”
“Listen, Nob,” Jork began.
“Cal.”
“Listen, Cal. We get it. We do. When I first started at Nana Joan’s, I didn’t intend sticking around, either. I had plans, you know? I was going to get off-world, see the stars, have adventures!” Jork’s smile became a shade or two less convincing. “That was four years ago. Haven’t seen a single star, yet.”
“Yeah, well I have,” said Cal. “Lots, actually.”
“Well, I hope you made the most of it,” said Alan. “Because you ain’t going to be seeing any more of them any time soon.”
“Yeah, we’ll see,” said Cal. He took another look around the room, then dumped his towels on the only unmade bed. It was one of the two bottom bunks. He’d have preferred to be up top, but it’d be fine for a night or two. Just until Loren came back, or he found a way to get Up There. “So, you guys all work at Nana Joan’s, right?”
Higgsy shrunk back at the mention of the name, which Cal reckoned probably wasn’t a good sign.
“We do,” said Jork. He glanced at Higgsy. “Some of us longer than others, but… yeah. We do.”
“What is it?” Cal asked.
The others looked confused. “What?” said Alan. “What do you mean? You ain’t never heard of Nana Joan’s?”
“No.”
“You seriously haven’t heard of Nana Joan’s?” Jork asked.
“No.”
“He hasn’t heard of Nana Joan’s?” Higgsy added, his puffy brow creasing in confusion.
“No! Jesus Christ. I haven’t heard of Nana Joan’s! I think we’ve now established that,” said Cal.
Higgsy blinked and backed off in alarm. Cal sighed and raised both hands. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have snapped. It’s been a long day.” He smiled as warmly as he could. “What’s Nana Joan’s?”
Jork chewed his black lips for a moment, as if trying to find the right words. “If you’re a custom
er - I mean, if you’re dining there - it’s whatever you want it to be. You know, within reason.”
“And if you work there?” asked Cal.
It was Alan who answered that one. “Only the worst place in the whole galaxy.”
CHAPTER TEN
Following an uncomfortable and agonizingly short sleep later, that had somehow still seen him get up too late for breakfast, Cal stood on a city street, gazing up at the building before him. It was early – criminally early, Cal would have argued – but already the street was filling up with pedestrians, all rushing to get to wherever it was they were going.
“I don’t get it,” Cal said. The restaurant in front of him didn’t mention Nana Joan. Not unless she was actually a he, and was in business with four other men. “This is a Five Guys. How can it be a Five Guys?”
Jork shrugged. “I don’t know what that is, but like I said, it can be whatever you want it to be.”
“It uses some kind of… mind stuff,” Alan explained, with a level of technical know-how even Cal found a little sketchy on the detail front. “It reaches into your brain and plucks out your favorite food joint, and that’s what you see.”
“It’s a form of psychically-enhanced ultra-targeted personalized advertising,” explained Higgsy, who had calmed down significantly since last night, but still shot Cal the occasional wary glance if he moved too suddenly. “It probes your subconscious and formulates its appearance based on what it finds there.”
“Like I said,” Alan grunted. “Mind stuff.”
“So… what? It’s a mind-reading shop?”
“It’s a mind-reading food joint,” Jork corrected. “It looks the way you want it to look to draw you in, then replicators take your order and serve you up whatever you want to eat.”
“Aha! Right,” said Cal, seizing on a word he understood. “I know about replicators, we’ve got one on my ship.”
“Ha! Yeah. Sure you do, newbie,” said Alan. He began pushing the restaurant’s swing door with both hands. It barely budged. “Someone give me some help here before I freak out and smash this thing to pieces.”
Higgsy reached a puffy-fingered hand over and pushed the door open. “There you go, Alan.”
Space Team: The Guns of Nana Joan Page 11