Iron Legion Battlebox

by David Ryker

  Her smile twitched, and faded and she cleared her throat. “It’s Everett out here, Red. Keep your head straight, alright?”

  I swallowed. “Sorry.”

  She waved it off. “No sweat. I’ll be back. Try not to sell anything too cheaply, we’ve got all this stuff on loan from the Athena and we need to cover the value at least” she said, laughing and waving over her shoulder. She circled the counter and was swallowed up by the crowd in seconds.

  I heard Alice’s hatch open above me and she swung down over the counter, her boots clumping on the ground as she landed with a grunt. She stood straight next to me and brushed herself off, straightening her jeans. “So, you and Everett, huh?”

  I straightened faster than I meant to. “What? No. No. What makes you— why would you even say that?”

  She chuckled. “Simmer down, Romeo. I won’t say anything.” She held her hands up and half smiled, her lips pulled into a tight line.

  I felt guilty all of a sudden, though I didn’t know why. “It just sort of happened,” I said quietly, fiddling nervously with a bolt on one of the pieces on the counter.

  “I think it’s great, Red. If you’re happy, then I think it’s great.” She really did smile this time. Relief washed over me. “And anyway,” she continued absently, “it’s not like there was anything going on between us.” She laughed.

  I did too — strangely, with someone else's voice, like canned laughter on a TV show. I wondered why she’d even said it.

  “Besides, it’s not like I didn’t meet anyone on the Athena.” She shrugged and went to the bags to grab more stock.

  My fingers started squeezing the bolt. I cleared my throat. “Oh?” I tried to say with as much nonchalance as I could. “Like who?”

  She stopped and stared at me, raising an eyebrow. “Now why would you want to go and ask a question like that, huh?”

  I pulled my shoulders up into a shrug. “Just making conversation.”

  She dumped the piece on the table and it bounced. “Conversation, eh?”

  “Hey, you should be careful with that,” I said, nodding at the part. I was trying to get off that line of questioning. I didn’t know why the hell I’d started it in the first place.

  She slapped it. “You even know what this is?”

  “No, but it looked delicate.”

  “It’s a ball and socket ankle joint off an F-Series.” She picked it up and dropped it again to illustrate. “It’s about as robust as parts come — I wouldn’t worry.”

  “About the part?”

  “About anything. You’re your own worst enemy, Red. Get out of your head some time. It’s nice out here.” She lifted her hands and gestured around.

  I sighed and nodded. “Yeah, I hear that a lot.”

  She clapped me on the shoulder and walked past, squeezing between Greg’s legs and into the crowd.

  “Hey, where are you going?” I called, leaning over the counter.

  “Bathroom,” she shouted back, turning and skipping backward through the sea of people. “Just don’t sell anything too cheaply!”

  I slumped back onto my heels and rubbed my forehead. As if rehearsed, someone paused at the stall and looked over the wares. He was tall with a long beard, glasses, and a square hat. He scuttled his fingers across the parts and then picked up a small casing with wires sticking out of it. “How much for this?” he asked, his bushy eyebrows dancing.

  I stared at it. “Er… A hundred?”

  He looked surprised. “A hundred?”

  “Uh, eighty?”

  He laughed and shoved it into his robe. “Deal!” He leafed the notes out quickly, shoved them into my hand and then walked off, shaking his head and chuckling.

  I felt like I’d lowballed it, and when Alice came back, she confirmed that I had, but agreed to not tell Everett that I’d sold a controller unit for less than ten percent of its actual value, so long as I promised her we were finally even. I thought it was a bit of a hard bargain she was driving — her life for not telling Everett something — but I was glad to get the conversation away from our relationships. The thought of her with anyone else was twisting my throat into knots. I told myself that I didn’t know why that was, but deep down, I did.

  I couldn’t help but glance at her out of the corner of my eye, watching as she inspected the pieces we had on display, her hair pulled back into a loose ponytail, dancing on her shoulders as she moved her head to look into every orifice on the part she was holding up.

  Where the hell was Everett? An unease had settled over me, and I felt like having her back would cure that, dispel whatever tension was lingering between me and Alice. It was nearly palpable, like a magnetism in my head. I wanted to turn and run as far and as fast away from Alice as I could, but at the same time, I had to resist the urge to step closer. It was just easier when she wasn’t there. I sighed and rubbed my eyes. Everett had been gone for more than an hour by that point, and I was starting to get the feeling something was up.

  Another hour went by, and I started to get anxious. Alice was playing her part effortlessly, selling parts to passersby like she was born to. Her easy-going charm, wide, contagious smile, her infectious laugh — they sucked people in, and got them on the hook without her even trying. She had a knack for pricing things right too — she even had the lingo down. The spiels came tumbling out of her mouth with a mixture of facial expressions to match — oh, I dunno, for such a rare part… it’s hard to say. Look, let’s put it this way, I’m happy to hold onto it. I’m not going to let it go for a penny under the right price. What is the right price? Ha, why don’t you throw me a number, and I’ll let you know if you’re close… And they would, and she’d screw her face up like she didn’t want to do it, and then she’d hide her hand next to her ribs and point her finger into the air, moving it slightly to signify that they needed to go higher. And every time, they did, and handed over stacks of credits.

  I had to grin. It was fun to watch, if nothing else, even if I did have a headache setting in. It was like a buzzing in my ears that wouldn’t abate. I told myself it was probably just the pressure in there, the noise… Maybe hyperdrive sickness.

  She handed me a stack of credits and told me to put them in the lockbox that was in one of the bags. I took it over and knelt down, pulling the two halves apart. A jolt of pain lanced through the back of my eyes and into my head and I screwed them up against the ache.

  “Fuck,” I said, growling at the throbbing inside my skull.

  I heard Alice laugh.

  “It’s not funny.” I turned around and scowled at her. My fuse had shortened immensely, the feeling not abating. I could feel my heart squeezing the blood through my brain and every time another buckshot of pain exploded inside it.

  Alice turned and arched an eyebrow at me. “I didn’t say anything.”

  “You laughed,” I said sharply.

  She stuck her bottom lip out. “Uh, no I didn’t.”

  “I heard you. Look, my head is just killing me — but I’d appreciate you not laughing, alright?” More pain.

  She rolled her eyes. “Jesus, Red, talk about being sensitive. You’re imagining things. And anyway, you think you’re the only one with a headache? You don’t see me complaining.” She waved her hand next to her head. “It’s the lights in here or something.” Baby.

  “What’d you call me?”

  “I didn’t call you anything.”

  “You called me a baby.”

  “No, I didn’t.” She folded her arms. “You’re hearing things.” Damn, talk about neurotic. Looks like someone needs a psych eval.

  I stared at her, hearing her voice, but not seeing her lips move. I blinked furiously and rubbed my eyes with my knuckles. “Did you just—” I shook my head, the pain growing. “Did you just say I was neurotic, and that I needed a psych eval?”

  She laughed nervously and looked around. “No.”

  “You did,” I said, standing up. “I heard you.”

  “You didn’t hear anyt
hing, because I didn’t say anything.” She glared at me, hands white around her elbows.

  “But you thought it, right?”

  She set her jaw. “No.”

  “Alice, don’t fuck with me.”

  Her eye twitched. I knew that twitch. She was feeling the pain as well — the headache.

  She’s such an uptight bitch, I thought.

  Her mouth opened a little and she slung a hook into my shoulder.

  “See,” I said, massaging where she’d hit me. It’d hurt. “You can hear me, too.”

  “What? No, I can’t—”

  “Alice, I can hear your fucking thoughts — and you can hear mine. It’s… It’s gotta be—”

  “The chips.” She sighed. “Fucking hell, is that still a thing?” She winced at another jolt of pain behind her eyes.

  I sighed and thought back, racking my brain for the information that Greg had laid on me more than a year ago. “It’s to do with proximity — I remember — I linked them on Telmareen when—”

  “When you tried to kiss me.”

  “I wasn’t trying to… do that.” I scowled. “It was in case we needed to talk without, you know…”

  “Talking?” She looked at me incredulously.

  “Well, it worked, didn’t it? Got the scar on my chest to prove it.”

  She huffed. “I thought the connection would have been broken by now. It’s been thirteen months.”

  “Yeah, me too — but I guess being in such close proximity has caused it to act up again.”

  She swore. “So what, now you’re just in my head again?”

  I grumbled and shut my eyes, the lights hanging above the bazaar hanging on a wire framework stinging them. “I don’t know… Maybe? Until we split up again, or find a way to cut it off.”

  “And how do we do that?”

  I shrugged. “How the hell should I know?”

  “Because you’re the one who linked us up!”

  “I didn’t think that far ahead!”

  “You never do!”

  I opened my mouth to retort but stopped, aware suddenly that someone was standing in front of the booth. I cleared my throat, forced a smile and turned to face the guy standing there. He was big, maybe in his late thirties with an unkempt beard, wearing a long dark coat with a red and black patch on the upper arm — the Trading Collective colors — and a thick shock of black hair greased up and back. He looked from me to Alice and then back, lifting up a piece of paper in front of himself. “Are you… Red?” He twisted his mouth into a weird sort of half-scowl.

  I nodded slowly. “Yeah…”

  “I was told to come and find you. Blai—” he cut himself off, looking at the paper again. “Everett sent me. She needs you.”

  I measured the guy. He was definitely Trading Collective, or at least wearing their colors — maybe a merc, too, in another life. He had that stink. I could see a pistol hanging off his belt, his knuckles uneven from one too many fights around the station. He’d been sent for me, by Everett, but he’d almost used a different name. Almost slipped. Was this someone she knew from growing up here? He looked a little older than her, but maybe a friend? If he wasn’t he wouldn’t have bothered hiding her name. Wouldn’t have bothered asking nicely.

  I nodded. “Okay.” I had to go. Something must have been wrong.

  “I’m coming,” Alice said, reaching for her communicator — no doubt to call Volchec.

  “No.” I grabbed her arm and stopped it from reaching her pocket. If this guy was from her old life, then something was up. She’d asked for me because I knew about it, but no one else did. If she’d have wanted Alice there, she would have asked for her. But she called me, because this was sensitive.

  Alice stared at me, strangely. “I’m not letting you go alone.”

  “I have to. Trust me.”

  “Trust you?” She scoffed. “You want me to just let you go with this guy?” She threw her arms out. “You can’t be serious. And what about Everett? What if she’s in trouble, or—”

  “She’s not,” the guy interjected. “But I was sent to get him, and no one else.”

  Alice scowled and I shook my head, shrugging at her. “Look — you can ask Everett when we get back — it’s not my place to say,” I said, already moving backward. “Just… just trust me, okay?” I lowered my voice. “And don’t call Volchec” I was around the counter now, the guy already beckoning me toward the crowd, his expression urgent.

  “So what am I supposed to do? Just wait here? Keep selling this junk?” she called after us.

  I nodded. “Yeah! And cover for us if Volchec calls.”

  She was about to say something else, but then the teeming mass of people came between us and she was gone. With each passing step, the headache faded and Alice seeped from my mind. The pace that the guy was keeping up, his hurried step, his glances back to make sure I was stilling following him told me that something was definitely wrong.

  “Is Everett in some kind of trouble?” I asked, pushing through the crowd.

  The guy sighed, shoving someone out of the way and heading straight for the edge of the bazaar. “You could say that.”

  “Are you a friend?”

  “You could say that, too.”

  “So what’s wrong? What happened?”

  “It’s Everett.”

  “I know it’s Everett — but what’s wrong with her?”

  He stopped and turned back. “No, not your Everett, the other one.”

  14

  The guy was walking briskly, like time was short. I kept pace, every sense on alert. Adrenaline flooded through my body, but I kept telling myself that I wouldn’t let it cloud my judgment. Not this time. I had to be cool, focused, ready for anything.

  We threaded our way out of the bazaar into quieter shanty streets, and then into backstreets where trash and shit spilled out of bins and receptacles and gathered in puddles and piles.

  I did my best to dance through them, but the stranger just plowed ahead, kicking liquid and everything else out of the way as he passed.

  When we reached the end of a long alleyway, he hung a right and headed up a rickety staircase bolted to the side of a building, and onto a balcony of sorts. The building below was sizeable, a warehouse by the looks of it, but the second floor only covered around half of the space. The only way up was via the stairs, and the balcony was littered with boxes and crates that were filled with goods of all kinds. The ones that were open showed clothing, machine parts, electronic and hydroponic equipment, as well as ornaments and other decorative knick-knacks. I guessed this was Everett’s — the other Everett’s — place. Our Everett, Dem, had said that she’d robbed this Everett guy years back — that he was a merchant. This had to be his storehouse, or home, or something.

  Beyond the boxes, the wall of the building was clad with corrugated metal, the door a cobbled together slab of scrap. The stranger moved between the boxes and headed for the door, his hand already rising. He rapped hard and stood back, turning and beckoning me forward. “Come on,” he said gruffly. “She’s waiting.”

  I moved up and he stepped out of the way so I could go in first. The second the door opened, I knew that I’d fucked up. I felt the cold barrel of a pistol against the nape of my neck and froze.

  The guy standing just inside had a shotgun, and it was pointed right at my chest. The bore looked enough to take me apart. He was stout, with food stains on the front of the gray sweatshirt that was doing little to hide his hairy gut. He was bald on top with bushy hair sticking out around his fat ears.

  I held my hands up instinctively and the guy in the sweatshirt reached into my jacket and pulled out my Arcram. The stranger jabbed me in the back of the head and I moved into the darkened interior.

  I shuffled forward until the stranger circled around me, keeping the pistol trained on my chest. But I wasn’t looking at him, I was looking at Everett. She was standing, barely, in the middle of the room. Her jacket had been stripped away, and her head was hangi
ng limply on her chest, her hands bound above her head and chained to a girder that spanned the space between the walls. She lifted her chin to look at me. She looked a little roughed up — a couple of punches, but otherwise, she seemed okay. Her shirt, on the other hand, was torn, the hem stretched out of shape. It was clinging together with just a few of the half dozen buttons it’d had originally. Someone had worked her midriff over pretty well. She tried to smile, a thin trickle of blood running from the corner of her mouth, but winced at the pain in her gut and then coughed, spitting scarlet onto the wooden floor. “Good job, Roquefort,” she grunted. “The big guy will be pleased.”

  The stranger’s jaw tightened and his fingers flexed around the pistol, but he didn’t move. He had to be this “Roquefort.” He glanced at the guy with the shotgun and dipped his head towards the wall. Food Stains sidled backward and disappeared through a grubby curtain that hung over a space in the partition that separated the front from the back.

  “Are you okay?” I asked Everett. No one had told me to shut it, or not speak, so I risked it. Roquefort didn’t seem like he’d brought me here to kill me — and he didn’t seem like he was looking for violence, so I still hadn’t really figured what was going on.

  She nodded slowly. “Been better, but I’m okay.”

  I swallowed, nodding back, but not really knowing what to say.

  The curtain was pulled aside and Food Stains came back out. Behind him, another figure emerged. This guy was much, much smaller, though. He was probably half of my height, but perfectly proportioned — like a child with the face of an adult. He strode forward, his coat hanging almost to the floor, the sleeves rolled up to accommodate his short arms.

  “This the guy?” he said. His voice was pitched up a little, his smaller voicebox unable to create the lower notes.

  Roquefort nodded. “Yeah, boss.”

  “Boss?” I said aloud, trying to hold back a smile. “This is Everett?”

  Our Everett held back a laugh. “He’s a Lygmy,” she said, “bio-engineered from humans to use less resources. A failed experiment—” She was cut off, spluttering, as the original Everett hit her in the gut with a tiny fist. She coughed a few more times, blood hanging from her lips in long tendrils.