When plummeting 530 stories from the tallest building in Param Eon with the blue giant sun casting a violet sunset between the glass buildings, most people scream and watch all their days unravel in their eyes, before greasing themselves on the streets below. But not Palo Solar. At least not this time. He kicked his legs upward into a free-fall, diving position. Below him, the streaming lines of air traffic rifled to him at an alarming speed – delivery skiffs, wingpods, even some business shuttles. Then out of the corner of his eye, he saw it – his package.
“That was real swift,” Palo said as the traffic and the spiraling package grew closer to his outstretched hand. The city below lurched toward him, the twilight casting long shadows between the buildings. Headlights zipped below, streams of them criss-crossing, merging and weaving into a tapestry of dazzling light ribbons. Exhaust fumes burned his throat and nose as he caught up to the package – a memory kor. It fluttered in the freefall, the lights refracting through the thick laminate that protected the data film inside.
Palo stretched out his arm, closed his fingers around the kor and deftly tucked it into his vest. Then, reaching to his belt, he pressed a wide pale blue button on the buckle. A high-pitched, humming noise erupted from his belt, his boots and gloves. Lifting his hands, he began to slow and bank upwards – the stabilizers in the palms of his gloves glowed whitely, providing Palo the lift to change his course. By the time he kicked his legs downward and banked hard, he barely missed a diverting convoy of skiff traffic.
Then with a sudden burst from the stabilizers, Palo streaked off above the traffic and between the pillars of glass and intergalactic business.
* * *
Hours later, sidled up to a slythium bar in the Korban District, Palo waited for his client. In his right hand he held his drink of choice – a torrpidu – one third proto, one third phalogin, and one third sundra water. But besides the immense buzz it gave him, he really drank it for its color – a bright blue. He lifted the thin glass to his lips and poured the neon liquid into his mouth.
Behind him, all along the wall were slythium booths. Fashioned from chrome and glass, each booth had a unique dome over the head of the seats. Pumped into the glass dome was slythium gas – a paralytic to humans, but a popular narcotic among humanoid alien species.
Palo scanned the crowd. The Korban District had a high population of Densii – a multi-limbed species skilled with their hands – and this being a shipworks district, there were many at the bar relaxing with a bit of slythium after their shifts were done. Palo turned his head the other way. Again, more Densii, but a few more humans. Back deep in the corner were two Flugas, their tendrils strangely entwined in a mating ritual. Palo smirked and let out a huff-like laugh.
The bartender was a thug of a man. He looked out of place – like he should be with the corps on Raval-9 duking it out against the Slavos. Then he shifted his massive body toward Palo revealing what war could really do to a man. The entire left side of his body had been stripped away and replaced with archaic cybernetics – they had corroded over the years, making his metallic, artifical side almost as rusty as his bronze skin. His clothes were simple and hung baggy on his robotic limbs.
He limped over to Palo, the metallic thud of his left foot slowing down his entire gait. As he approached Palo, his left optic squealed as it zoomed in on him.
“Need another, Solar?” he asked.
Palo turned to him and said, “Yeah. This might be a while, Halfsie.” He’d known Halfsie for years, yet he still felt himself staring at him from time to time. And when he caught himself staring – he felt awkward looking away quickly, so he kept staring.
“Another shady contract?”
Palo finished off his torrpido and slid the glass to Halfsie. “You know, you’d think with all the technology and the massiveness of the COM, that people wouldn’t need couriers anymore. But business has been good lately. Big contracts. Big names. Last month, I delivered a package from the Outer Realm Magistrate’s office.”
Halfsie ran a rough metallic hand through his hair and said, “The Outer Realm Magistrate, huh?” He grabbed Palo’s glass and turned to the bundle of glass tubes at the bar. Each tube glowed in different colors. He held the glass under the pale blue tap and poured until the glass was full, then he swung around and slid it over to Palo.
Palo grabbed the drink and said, “You bet.”
Halfsie leaned into the bar and said, “You must be making a pretty penny then.”
“Where do you get these?” asked Palo.
Halfsie’s eyebrow raised as he asked, “Get what?”
Palo drank from his glass and said, “Those phrases. ‘Pretty penny?’ What are you talking about?”
Halfsie shrugged his shoulders and said, “I get a lot drifters in here. Each one of them gots a gem from one world or another.” Halfsie rubbed his thumb and forefinger together. “A ‘pretty penny’ means a ton of creds…money.”
Palo wiped his mouth after another drink and said, “Creds, huh? Yeah, a few more jobs and I’ll have enough credits to get the ship of my dreams.”
“The Phuron Enix?” asked Halfsie.
“Yep,” said Palo.
“I heard old man Olos wasn’t going to sell his baby?”
“I heard different,” said Palo. “He’ll sell. I know a few people.”
Halfsie paused, knowing what he was about to say would sway the tone of the conversation. “Talked to your pop lately?”
Palo stopped and eyed Halfsie with a stare that could breach hulls, then he lifted his drink to his lips, downed his entire drink and slammed the glass down on the bar. “I have nothing to say to him.”
Halfsie grabbed Palo’s glass and turned to fill it again. He knew Palo and his father were estranged, but he persisted. He never liked to see families pulling themselves apart. “At some point you need to forgive him, don’t you think?” Halfsie turned and handed the drink to Palo.
“He left me and my mother to dig around on a dead planet,” Palo said. “Not exactly anyone’s idea of a good father.” Palo kicked back another shot of the drink.
Halfsie slumped at the bar and moved his head closer to Palo. “Did I ever tell you about my family?”
Palo jeered his head to the side to check out the two Flugas again, then said, “No. No you didn’t.”
“Me and my wife. We had a huge fight. I had re-enlisted with the corps without talking to her. I never seen her so mad. I shipped out the next week to fight the Slavos. Spent a year and a half in a death spiral. And while I was gone, the Nerge ravaged my home world. Everyone was killed. The planet was drained dry. And the last feeling my family, my wife had about me, was anger.”
“When I heard word of the devastation, I wasn’t the same. A berzerker awakened in me. I began killing everything in my path – Slavos, animals, even my own men. I decimated my own platoon. Then the Slavo cavalry came – I took a screamer in the side and the rest is history. The best the medunit had was this fine ensemble,” said Halfsie as he displayed his cyborg half. “I never had that chance. I’d hate to see you pass up yours.”
Palo swirled his glass in the condensation pool on the bar, then he paused. “Maybe,” he said.
Palo looked into his glass – the cool blue liquid sparkled and swirled like a galaxy. He hadn’t thought about his father for months and it felt good to him. His father didn’t deserve the thoughts. Forgiveness wasn’t an option. What man chooses excavating ancient alien artifacts over his own son? Not even the Nerge were that heartless. Then out of nowhere a memory entered Palo’s mind – sail-banking in the deserts of Draedaus with his father, their arms pulling the sails tight, the trino boards buffeting off the sands.
“Make it more than a maybe, kid,” said Halfsie.
Palo shook his head and looked at the old barkeep. “When I get that ship, you’re going to be my first mate, right?”
Just then, a robed being entered the bar and proceeded to a dark table in the back. Both Palo and Halfsie watched the stranger as they positioned themselves at a booth. Palo finished his drink and told Halfsie, “That’s my cue.”
Palo walked through the crowd of Densii, past the romantic Flugas, and to the table in the back. The robed being was mysterious, but appeared to be human. As Palo sat down across from the man, he carefully eyed the man’s face. Beneath the shadows of the hood, he could make out the sheen of a mask of some kind. He sat down across from the man and said, “Your friend had a tail.”
The robed man did not move, but a cold metallic voice hissed from beneath the hood – obviously coded. “Did he now?”
“Well in the struggle the package fell off the
“Was it saved?” hissed the robed man.
Palo ran his hand through his hair and said, “Of course. Nothing a little 300 story swan dive can’t fix, right?”
“Excellent,” said the man. “May have it?”
Palo opened his vest and took out the memory kor and held it across the table. The robed man reached for it – exposing his hand from the robe. It was not armored save for a couple of ancient looking rings – one with a finely crafted serpent with red jewel eyes and another ring with a green triangular gem. But Palo pulled the package back.
“Of course, there is the matter of my payment,” said Palo.
The robed man reached into his cloak and removed a credit chip and threw it on the table. “Fifty thousand,” said the stranger. “Now. The package?”
Palo grabbed the credit chip and handed over the package. “The deal was for ten thousand.”
“Perhaps you’d prefer the lesser,” said the stranger.
Palo tucked the credit chip in his vest and quickly said, “No. I’m fine.”
The strange robed man rose from the table and said, “Good. I wouldn’t want to make you feel uncomfortable.”
And like that, the man was gone. Palo sat in the booth and flipped the credit chip between his fingers. He’d delivered dirty packages before, but he had never willingly taken more creds to deliver the package to the wrong guy. As the round chip rippled over his knuckles, he felt a distant pang in the depths of his brain – a small hint that suggested he had made a mistake. Then he flipped the cred chip into the air, and caught it. As he walked through the bar and towards the exit, Halfsie said, “Looked like a tough customer, Palo.”
Palo said, “Just another delivery, Halfsie. Just another delivery.”
* * *
Above the Palladin Complex, an upscale apartment development, cabs and the occasional drunk ion bike rider whistled overhead, the fluttering knocks of their engines fading into the night wind. Arching between the traffic, Palo lurched to a hovering stop above the roof. As the repulsor disks wound down, they lost their glow and Palo’s feet touched the wet tile of the roof. Palo strode towards the building elevator, zipping up his flight vest and shaking off the cold. Inside the elevator, he leaned on the back wall as the doors closed, flipping the cred chip in the air.
On the 224th floor, the elevator opened and Palo stepped out. After passing over a dozen apartments, he finally stopped in front of one door and pressed his thumb to the scanlock by the door. After a brief moment, metallic locks whirred and chunked as the steel door slid open and he walked in.
Sensing his arrival the lights beamed on – only they flickered for a short time before coming on full power. “That’s weird,” Palo said. Since he had the place, the lights had never surged like that. As he scanned the inside to his apartment, he didn’t see anything out of the ordinary, but he couldn’t help shake that feeling he had at the bar. A mistake. He willingly delivered the package to the wrong person. He looked at the cred chip in his sweaty hand. His hand was sweating. He shook his head and ran his sweaty hand through his long hair. “Get a grip,” he told himself.
Walking past his coffee table, he pushed down the top of his COM beacon – a white plastic sphere the size of a bunta melon. Activated, the small lens on the top crackled to life in a mid-broadcast hologram of the day’s events.
“…steady economic decline in the Bethel system is an indication that the minor skirmishes in the Outer Realm may be sign of what’s to come in the future,” said a cool, plastic voice from the COM. “Palo Solar – You have 318 communiques. 289 from your father. Would you like to experience them?” The holographic visage changed to show a file listing – pulsing with unopened mail.
Palo stepped out of the small kitchenette with a ripe yellow derr fruit in his hand, his brow furrowed. “Not now,” said Palo as he disappeared back to the kitchen. Then out of nowhere, he shouts, “Wait! Save them...save them.” The hologram fluttered as it saved the messages, then went back to the broadcast.
Palo slowly walked out of the kitchen and slumped onto a plush chair in the corner. He bit into the fruit and wiped the bittersweet juices from his lips onto his forearm. The COM flashed with news. Asteroid crashes into the Pento moon. Local governments plead for aid. Nebulaic cruise ship docked due to outbreak. New shipworks opens in Notwen Belt – employment rate increases one point. But as he looked out his long patio window, to the city sprawled out in front of him, lights careening before his eyes like firing synapses, he missed his father for the first time in almost twelve years.
Then right before his eyes, his patio window shimmered slightly and began to melt around a figure. Palo dropped his fruit and cocked his head as something walked toward him, his patio window seemingly dripping off their body. And right when he was about to make out any detail, the figure emitted a blinding flash of light so bright, Palo thought he saw the back side of his brain inside his skull – and then blackness.
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