Out Through the Attic (9 page)

“Stuff it, 2,” Prime scolded as he made a discrete summons in his HUD. “Keep this up and I’ll force you to go on a
vacation
!” Prime punctuated the jovial threat with a hearty, staccato laugh. “How about one of those Vegas worlds with nothing to do but gamble, drink, steal fire trucks, and fend off hookers? Frankly, you could learn a thing or two from 17. He knows the job and the populace of each of his charges. They love him as a
result
of his behavior and appearance, not in spite of it.”

Prime and 2 turned their collective gaze towards the chamber door that cycled open like a great iris. Having received Prime’s summons through the station-net, three small humanoids wearing green environment suits entered the replication chamber and started working on the second of the three clone-tanks. They started preparing it for the imminent creation of 23’s protogenome, whistling quietly as they worked. One of the three technicians opened the tank and began cleaning the inside with a sterilizer, while another followed with a clear synthetic protein that would serve as the placenta for 23. The other humanoids ran through a complex series of diagnostics on a panel at the side of the room, insuring that once impregnated, the clone-chamber would be a suitable womb for the new addition to the family.

“There’s no need to discipline me, Prime. I’m only trying to express my concerns. He just doesn’t seem to maintain the spirit of the season.”

“And you do?” Prime guffawed. “You sound like a mother hen with all that worrying.”

“He doesn’t even wear the
uniform
when he works! And he’s lost all the weight. The last time I saw him he looked like a
mercenary
.”

2 stepped up to another console and fiddled with the filter levels of their shielding. He dialed it down ten percent to let in more of Polaris’ bright, blue light.

“They don’t want the uniform on his route, and you know it. Those worlds abolished cellulite with the advent of artificial bodies. He gets all the cosmop worlds where the populations are mostly cyborgs, remember? Think about it, those folks have no more use for archaic symbolism than they do a combustion engine … but they still want our product.” There was a clatter from within the second support-chamber that drew everyone’s attention. The technician, blurry behind the chamber’s cylinder, leaned down and picked up the protein-sprayer that had slipped from his hands. “Careful, son,” Prime admonished gently with a cheery smile. “We can’t afford any mistakes if we’re gonna make our deadlines.”

The small technician bowed slightly within the cylinder, “Yes, Prime. I’m sorry, sir.” Both his voice and appearance were distorted by the curved plexi-shield in front of him.

“It’s alright,” Prime said just as a bright flash of light filled the chamber. A klaxon sounded three times throughout the station.

An old woman’s voice, full of a palpable, cheery brightness, broke in over everyone’s implanted comm-links. “Attention all personnel. Prepare for docking with incoming vessel
Baboushka
. Teams seven and eight please stand by in bay twelve for cargo off-load.”

“He’s here,” 2 grumbled, his tone barely on the cheery side of dejected. He stepped up to the window and stared out at the approaching starship. “And look at that rig of his … it looks like a
sports-ca
r,” he added under his breath.

“What was that?” Prime asked. He’d heard 2, but he wanted to see if 2 would own up to the bitching.

“Oh … nothing,” 2 muttered. He hit the shade command on the panel before him and shut out the view of Polaris and the offending ship. The internal lighting of the replication pod compensated, bathing them in the soft, artificial light of the panels in the ceiling.

“Come on 2. Let’s go meet 17 in the bay. I suspect he’s not staying long.”

Prime and 2 left the replication pod and made their way to the central lift complex, cheerfully greeting the small passers-by in their tiny green suits. Everyone smiled, and most were whistling happy tunes full of joy. The entire station was as busy as a kicked anthill, with every soul getting ready for the big night that was only two weeks away. As the lift door closed, a jazzier version of one of Prime’s favorites came in over the speakers. It reminded him of a friend long passed who had helped Prime find his way centuries before during a particularly nasty blizzard in the Arctic back on Earth. He couldn’t help but smile at the memory and took a moment to reminisce.

2 looked at Prime and noticed the distant look on his face. “How long as it been since you lost him?”

“Hmmmm … must be about nine hundred years now. I wish you could have met him. He had the purest heart I’ve ever met. You would have liked him. You two were a lot alike in some ways.”

2’s face filled with pride. “Thank you, sir.”

“No, I mean it. He was all about the mission. Dogged and relentless.”

The lift came to an almost imperceptible stop, and the door cycled open. The two men stepped out into a massive docking bay, the curve of the outer hull of SW3 bending away to the left and right for hundreds of meters. Most of the bays were empty, but some held large, ungainly-looking cargo vessels tethered to the main hull via dozens of umbilicals.

An array of these snaked their way out to latch onto the more streamlined and racier-looking Baboushka that had just nestled into its docking cradle. Off-load crews gathered around the still-closed cargo-hold door waiting for the umbilicals to finish latching on and equalize the pressure. The starboard passenger hatch of
The Baboushka
opened before all of the umbilicals had attached themlselves—
against regulations
2 thought to himself—and both Prime and 2 watched a trim figure in a black environment suit step out onto the still-extending platform that slid slowly out from beneath the hatch. He lifted his visor, placed his finger against the side of his nose and disappeared, quickly reappearing below the hatch on the deck-plates of the main bay. He lowered the visor again as he started walking over towards his brothers.

The off-load teams cheered for 17 as he walked through their numbers, and they raised hands to him that he slapped as he went by. Prime smiled at the sight, but 2 frowned.

17 strode jauntily across the deck heading straight for Prime and 2. As he approached, he lifted his hands and flipped the latches at the back of his neck. With a flourish he lifted off his helmet. 2 gasped in horror at the sight, but Prime only smiled. 17 had shaved the sides of his bushy, long, white hair, leaving a Mohawk that popped straight up like a predator once released from the confines of his helmet. He’d trimmed his beard into a bushy goatee, and he now looked more like a hard-core biker than he did Prime or 2. With his helmet tucked under his left arm, he used his right hand to free his long beard and a long ponytail that he’d tucked under the rim of his neck-ring. Additionally, he’d had his eyes replaced with cybernetic implants: small cylindrical lenses that glowed with an internal light. The left one was blood red and the right one bright emerald.

“Cheeno, Pops! 2!” 17 said cheerfully as he walked up to them. His smile was as bright as Polaris as they moved in unison to the lift. “Scans square?” he asked as they stepped in and the door closed. A harsh, rhythmic version of
Noel Blanc
from the French colony world Versailles filled the chamber.

17 hit the actuator for the top level of the station.

“I’m fine, 17,” Prime replied jovially. “How about you?” He could feel 2 doing his best not to hyperventilate at the sight of 17.

“Seven up … jump drive on the sleigh needs a tweeker or three. It’s been a bit glitch and hay-o the past week. I’m sure the techs’ll get it mashed before I gotta rescind.”

“How’s your run looking?” 2 asked tersely.

“Also seven up. With what I brought in, quota for all four cosmops should be square as long as I don’t run into too much trouble on the way back.”

“Trouble?” Prime and 2 asked simultaneously.

“Yeah. Tech pirates. Standard jackers around Simma Prime and Jericho. It’s nothing me and Rudy can’t blammo. You know Rudy. Dogged and Relentless.”

“No doubt,” Prime said. “I always liked the name you picked for your AI.” There was distant pride in Prime’s voice. “It’s good luck. He’ll never let you down.”

“He never has,” 17 agreed. “2, could you make sure they stack
The Baboushka
with those new seeker missiles.”

“Of course, 17,” 2 replied with a dry, business-like tone.

“Nice work on those, by the way.” 17 slapped 2 on the back heartily. “You’re a
genius
! They really pack smasho!”

2 looked at 17 with a mildly surprised look on his face. He hadn’t expected a compliment from his so-very-untraditional younger brother. “Thank you, 17. That means a lot to me.”

“You make ‘em, I break ‘em, right, 2?” 17 put a hand on 2’s shoulder and squeezed in a brotherly fashion.

2 couldn’t help but smile. “I guess so, 17.”

The lift doors opened and 17 stepped out. “I’m going to go see mother-hen, you guys coming? I bet I can convince her to make some Bûche de Noël for us. I know you want me to put on some weight, 2.” 17 winked with the green eye and smiled at them with rosy cheeks.

“No thanks, 17.” 2 replied a bit more warmly. “We have to get back and make the world ready for 23’s arrival.”

“Marv!” 17 blurted. “I can’t wait to meet him!” The lift doors started to close, but 17 stuck his hand out and it opened back up again.

“Oh, and 2?”

“Yes, 17?”

A great big smile spread across 17’s face and he stared 2 dead in the eyes with those red and green oculars. He took a deep breath, held it and let out a huge belly-laugh, “
HO HO HO ho ho ho!!!
”

It caught Prime and 2 totally by surprise, and they instantly started laughing themselves, adding their own heart-felt “
HO-HO-HOs
” to the mix. The laughter of all three echoed down the space-station hallway. Two of three bellies shook like bowls of jelly, and all three of them winked at each other at the same time, their cheeks practically glowing red. The doors closed and the lift rose up towards the deck with the replication pod.

“You still worried about us making a run with couriers like 17?” Prime asked slyly.

“No, Santa,” 2 said quietly. “Christmas will go off without a hitch once again... all across the galaxy.”

LA
SATER’S LUCKY LE
FT

Originally appeared in Penny Dread Tales v.1 from RuneWright Publishing in April, 2011.

With an annoyed scowl setting the exposed part of his face into deep lines, Jake Lasater slowly returned his hot Colts to the holsters at each hip and waited for the thick white veil of smoke to clear. He let out a long, resigned sigh and winced as he rubbed the shallow gash in his right sleeve and bicep. That’s when he noticed the black shuriken sticking out of his left arm just above the elbow. He pulled the irritating little weapon out with a jerk, dropped it on the ground and realized that the fingers of his right glove were now sticky. Holding his fingers up to his good eye, he saw a yellow residue, like honey or pinesap. It coated the dark leather in a jagged pattern that matched the shuriken points. He gave his fingers a sniff and regretted his curiosity straightaway, turning his head with a jerk. The stuff smelled like a cross between snake oil and horse piss fermented in a cheese cellar too long.

“Tricky Tong bastards,” he muttered with a sour, southern Missouri drawl. He aimed his curse like a pistol at the four, silk-clad bodies lying in the muddy alley between him and the bright daylight of Sacramento Street. He’d seen men in the street go running when the shooting started, but they were already starting to walk by as if nothing happened. Chinatown was a rough place where people minded their own. On top of that, everyone knew that the San Fran Marshals would take their own sweet time to check things out in that part of town—if they came at all.

Lasater kneeled and wiped his fingers on the crimson shirt of the dead gambler who’d started the whole thing, trying to remove the sticky resin. “And here I thought we were friends, Po,” Lasater said to the corpse as he rolled it over and looked down into a still, muddy face. All four bodies were clad in red silk, which meant they were part of the Tong. “And you have your boys try to poison me?” Annoyed disbelief filled Lasater’s voice. “San Francisco is not at all what I expected.”

Lasater reached beyond Po’s body and picked up his short top hat from where it had fallen during the fight. Miraculously, it had landed on the one dry spot for twenty feet in both directions along the alley. With a muted whine of clockwork gears from his legs, Lasater stood, brushed the dust off the brim of his hat and adjusted the silver and turquoise hatband so it was straight once again. “You’re lucky you didn’t muss up my hat, Po, or I’d have to kill you again, damn it.”

Lasater gave an irritated shake of his head and pressed the top hat back into place. As it settled over his wavy dark hair, a relieved smile broke up the irritated scowl. He’d had the hat made special back in Kansas City only eight months ago. The inside of the brim had a small inner notch so that it fit snugly around both his head and the skin-tight leather strap that held his left ocular in place. The intricately hinged, brass-set lens was as dark as pitch and blocked out most of the light. The whole thing was set into a steel plate that covered a quarter of his face from cheek to forehead, and the steel had been riveted to the leather band that wrapped around his head and tied at the back. He’d worn the thing since he was discharged from the Union Army back in ’64.

Amputations were common in the Civil War, and like so many others, Lasater had left a fair amount of flesh, bone and blood in that hot Army tent after a Reb canon did its job on him. When the bandages had finally come off his face, the Army docs discovered that, along with everything else, the canon round had made his left eye permanently dilated. Even low light hurt him, but Tinker Farris, at the expense of Lasater’s inheritance, had fixed him up pretty well in all quarters. Lasater was actually more of a man now than when he started. He took his discharge and what little money he got for the amputations and headed west to find his fortune and forget about other people’s wars.