Marcellus pulled the ring out of his pocket and held it up for Maya to see. “Do you have one that looks like this?”
A curious expression crossed her face. “Why?”
Marcellus did not answer.
“Yeah, sure,” she said. “I brought some jewelry along with me. Nothing like what Jennifer's got, but I'm sure I could find something.”
“Good,” Marcellus breathed and slipped it back into his pocket.
“It won't look just like it, of course,” Maya continued. “It's pretty plain the one you have.”
Marcellus winked conspiratorially in her direction. “Doesn't matter.” Lightly, he patted his pocket. “People will think any ring they see on my finger is the this one.”
Maya raised her eyebrows. “Are you serious?”
“Yep.”
“Why would you want to do that?”
A serious look came over Marcellus' face. “Because,” he told her, “I'm don't want to be a monster any more.”
Jennifer delighted in the feeling of warm water spraying over her body. Eyes closed, she aimed her head at the spout and let the bright greenish stream of liquid pour over her face. It broke into broad rivulets that cascaded over her shoulders and disappeared between her breasts. A hot steam rose up around her in a thick cloud. Contently, she ran her hands through her hair. This was the real thing, she thought to herself, even if it wasn't. She couldn't tell the difference, anyway. On the moon, they didn't have showers. She would enter a tiny compartment and be doused with a foul-smelling, off-white powder. They called it disinfectant. After a few minutes to let it sink in (she had to keep her eyes shut), the vacuum switched on and sucked it all away. The acrid taste seemed to linger in her mouth till morning.
A sinfully long, hot shower was not a pleasure reserved for those trapped on the moon alone. On the earth of the real world, only the richest and most powerful people could afford to waste such vast quantities of water and the energy required to heat it. Most people had to content themselves with a splash of lukewarm water that cut off abruptly once their quota had been reached. Jennifer wasn't the only one in the sim who spent an hour at a time in the steamy baths, but she was most assuredly one of the ones who enjoyed it most.
It wasn't her zebra-striped body, of course. Now that she had been imprisoned on the moon, Jennifer went surfing far more often than she used to. Her favorite avatar was Candi. She had others, of course, but Candi was particularly suitable. She provided opportunities to make up for all the usual pleasures Jennifer was being deprived of in the real world. She was a tall, ravishing blond with oversized breasts, a narrow waist, and big lips. Her skin was covered in thick stripes, alternating black and peach over her entire body. The eyes were a piercing yellow. Candi was very popular in the sim.
When she got back to her lavish hotel bedroom, she found Bubbles lounging naked in her bed. Bubbles must have heard she was back and let herself in while she was at the baths. Bubbles was a short, slightly chunky red-head. Her most conspicuous feature was a red, forked tail that sprouted from just over the top of the crack in her ass. It swished listlessly next to her feet as she stared back at Candi with hungry eyes. Candi was pleased. She climbed into the bed.
Afterwards, they dressed and went out. Shining and glittering, together they pulled open the wide, glass double doors and stepped out onto the balcony. A cacophony of noise and light splashed around them as they presented themselves to whomever might be watching, and there were many.
The Grand Hotel Redux where Candi had a private suite overlooked a wide bend in the River Styx. The River Styx wound through the Starlight District, one of the most notorious districts in Ambrosia. There were parts of the sim where it was always daylight and parts where it was always twilight and parts that alternated between night and day in the usual way, but Ambrosia was ensconced in a permanent darkness. The River Styx was famous because it was so wide and deep. Although once in the real world rivers just like it had flown through valleys and beds on earth, they had all long since shrivelled and dried up. Even the Nile was a mere trickling stream at the bottom of a gigantic, historical trench. The River Styx was the embodiment of humankind's memory of what once had been. Except, of course, for the color of its waters. The River Styx was a bright green, and the water that flowed through it had psychedelic qualities.
Across the River was Mordred the Mystic's tower. It was a dark, forbidding place. The walls were sheer and sleek and showed eerily. There were no windows. A thick mass of dark, grey clouds obscured the top, spitting out occasional bolts of lightning and deep rumbles of thunder. What exactly went on up there Candi did not know, but she had heard fantastic rumors. Like many others in the Starlight District, she was still coveting an invitation. Surrounding the tower on all sides was a dense mass of jungle. Strange sounds like the hooting and hissing of dangerous animals could be heard, but passers-by never caught even the slightest glimpse of anything amidst the trees. The narrow, closely spaced rails of an iron fence enclosed the entire domain. There was no gate.
Next to the tower on one side was a large, square lot paved flat with concrete. A massive array of floodlights showed on a large, mounted platform set atop a tall, open elevator shaft. It must have climbed a kilometer into the sky and nearly reached the height of the ominous cloud tops next door. At the top, a few souls had gathered. A little plank like a diving board stuck out from the edge of the platform. Once each minute, someone walked out onto the plank and – to a great flourish of drums – leaped off and splattered on the concrete lot below. This was Sam’s Escape. Visits were by invitation only, and there were no repeat customers. A long line formed out the front.
Beyond Sam's Escape was a slew of triangular, open-air tents. Each rose to a point high above the ground from which colorful banners streamed in the wind. To be sure, there was no money in the sim. Everyone fashioned their props from the same stuff as their bodies: imagination. But some people’s imaginations are sharper than others, and the bazaar was where they traded their artefacts to those less fortunate. They traded whatever they might have that the other might want, and it wasn’t always gadgets, either. An offer of sex or servitude was not uncommon if they buyer had nothing else of worth. To be sure, the utilitarian objects were quickly recognized and mass-produced by just about anyone. But the most prized items were made to order, usually works of art purchased to decorate a new castle or sea villa. Some of the world's greatest artists were active in the sim alone, unknown and unrecognized in the real world where they labored anonymously as middle managers and data analysts and cement mixers. There were bazaars all over the sim, but few were as interesting as the ones found in the Starlight District of Ambrosia. Visits were by invitation only, and a long line formed out the front.
On the other side of Mordred's tower, set in the back of a vast, grassy lot, was a tiny, almost inconspicuous building no larger than a shack, although in far better repair. A mass of people was jammed into the lot. A large, neon sign hung over the broad entranceway along the road by the river: “Himona’s Sexporium”, it read. A smaller sign underneath added: “Vanilla Straight Types Piss Off”
In the sim, nobody was who he seemed. The bipeds and quadrupeds that frequented Himona’s Sexporium were, like everybody else who was surfing, acting out fantasies. Iron spikes and feathery wings and webbed feet are a matter of taste to be sure, but almost all the avatars were well proportioned and attractive, save the few who chose not to be. Some of the scantily clad women were actually women in the real world. Often married, many of them got off on being serviced by one man after another until exhaustion set it. Others were men who wanted to know what it was like to have a vagina and use it. Some of the more manly men were also men in the real world. Others were giggling, blushing girls who yearned to be free of their shyness. Still others were frustrated women who thought of their imaginary penises as a means of domination. Some of the boys in the sim were also boys in the real world and wanted to explore other boys’ bodies. Some were older men who wanted to do the same. But whoever they may be and whatever the reasons for choosing their avatars, the rule was the same for all: in the sim no one ever talked himself in the real world.
The bouncers at the gate were large, reptilian bipeds some three meters tall. They were incapable of proper speech, instead clicking their tongues to express anger or pleasure. More roamed the lot in loose bands, brandishing cruel looking clubs. These creatures policed the behaviour of the Sexporium’s guests. It wasn’t their job to prevent violence, but rather to contribute to it. Male or female, anyone present knew they could be beaten to a pulp on a whim and thrown into the river, or grabbed and raped by one or more of the scaly beasts, unless of course they were already similarly occupied. There were no private corners or darkrooms in Himona’s Sexporium: all the activities occurred uncensored and in plain sight for everyone's amusement.
From the outside, the tiny shack looked small, but once within a whole new world of stages, flashing lights and pumping music awaited. The corridors were narrow and crooked and meandered aimlessly. The halls were tall and wide and filled with intoxicating perfumes. The extra-dimensional space was vast and uncharted. Candi had spent a great deal of time in Himona’s Sexporium, but she had yet to experience all its wonders. She was convinced that the layout frequently changed, although the pills and the fumes made it hard to be sure.
Candi had made a name for herself on one of the Sexporium’s many stages. Later on, she starred in a production whose fame she helped spread to many other corners of the sim, some not so racy as Ambrosia. There was singing and dancing and drama and fabulous costumes. Of course, none of that lasted for very long. Not far into the show the costumes were shed and the whole production climaxed in an orgy involving all of the dancers and most of the audience.
Visits to Himona’s Sexporium were by invitation only. A long line formed out the front.
Beyond the Sexporium was Wally's Wonduhdwome, a gaudy building set back from the road crowded with flashing, neon signs and spitting out tinny carnival music outside the array of wide, double doors. Like the Sexporium, the interior was an extra-dimensional space far larger than the size of the building would suggest. This was the fantastic creation of Wally the Wed Whacko, a self-styled name that entirely agreed with his skin color, personality, and speech impediment. Wally was frequently to be seen wandering through the halls of his game-o-drome, dressed only in his underwear, amiably greeting his patrons and laughing boisterously. A large, garish, yellow “W” had been embroidered on his large, red, hairy stomach. A red cape trailed after his feet, which had been slipped into soft, padded, velvet slippers with bells that tinkled as he walked. No one was really sure what he looked like because he wore a black mask over his eyes. Wally carried around with him a wicker basket in which could be found a mixture of candies and pills, each entirely indistinguishable from the others except by color. “Which color would you pwefer?” Wally would mischievously ask his interlocutors.
Wally's was a place where people came from far and wide to play games. In other parts of the sim, the game-o-dromes offered first person versions of old-time, arcade video games, the ones people used to pump coins into. But Wally's didn't carry any of those. Wally specialized in hunter-quarry games, games he designed himself, games which everyone agreed were of the highest quality. These were games in which the players assumed roles and tried to seek out and kill each other in exotic scenarios. Who was the hunter and who was the quarry was never entirely clear, and the roles were likely to switch back and forth among the players several times during the course of play. Some games required two players and others had adaptations for team play, but whatever the game was and the rules it operated by, there was only ever a single winner.
Visits to Wally's were by invitation only, and a long line formed out the front.
Such was the view from the Grand Hotel Redux. Beyond the immediate attractions there rose the high, majestic peaks of the Vampire District, mostly obscured by the darkness of night. The river itself was lined with tall, elegant lightposts from which erupted tall, blue flames. Two wide, paved boulevards ran along the stone banks. Floating in the middle or moored to one side were a number of party platforms. These were barges that moved along the river, picking up and dispensing passengers as they came across whatever delights they were most eager to experience.
But by far the most amazing sight, the one which could still amaze Candi even after all these years, were the swoops and swoons of the wispy, translucent souls descending down to a staging area out of sight next to the Hotel. Every avatar has a home, the place where it manifests when it first arrives in the sim for a visit. Some districts are open, meaning anyone can register there. Others are secured, which means someone with the power has to give their permission. The avatars floating gently through the air like leaves in a stiff breeze were very lucky indeed, for the Starlight District of Ambrosia was not accepting any more applications and hadn't been for a long time. Combined with the comings and goings of the people on the barges, streaming up and down the boulevards, and amassed at the various attractions, it all added up to a great deal of activity.
This was the sim, and there was nothing like it anywhere in the real world.
“Hi, Candi!” called a faint but eager voice from somewhere below on the boulevard. A host of others quickly joined it.
“Wow, it's Candi!”
“Look at me, Candi!”
“Don't you remember me, Candi?”
Candi ignored the voices. She drew out a cigarette and waved a hand over it. A moment later, the end erupted in a burst of flame which quickly settled down into a tiny, glowing coal. She sucked on it greedily. “Oh God,” she murmured to herself without thinking. “We never get these on the moon.”
Bubbles' tail swished mischievously next to her and rapped her on the leg. “Moon?” she repeated. She was eyeing Candi strangely.
Oh my God, Jennifer thought to herself. After all, there was a war on.
Candi threw a quick look in Bubbles' direction and attempted a disarming smile. “You know, that new club in Farawayastan?”
Bubbles continued to regard her suspiciously.
Candi didn't know what else to say. She just looked at her friend earnestly and hoped she would let it pass.
Bubbles let it pass. Slipping her hand into Candi's, she purred, “Let's get to that party, shall we?” Bubbles smiled up at her. Her teeth were long and pointed and sharp as nails. It made sleeping with her a dangerous and exciting proposition.
Together, they lifted off into the air and started drifting high over the Sexporium in the direction of the shrouded mountains beyond. The passed over low valleys and foothills, then stone structures that rose sharply out of the ground, reaching higher and higher as they progressed. The whole region was shrouded in darkness, for there was no moon, only stars, in Ambrosia's sky. Occasionally they passed a villa perched at the top of a high cliff, bathed in lights, or a hidden lake that reflected the starlight back up to them, or a copse in an isolated field where the people carried torches, tiny points of light that burned mysteriously. These they passed over silently, for they had not been invited, and they could not have gone there even if they had desired.
Eventually they arrived at a large colonnade built along the side of one of the highest peaks. They slipped through the protective field, for it had been keyed to them, and stepped down on the orange, marble floor.
The long, rectangular hall ran quite a distance ahead. To their right was the colonnade, looking down over the twinkling lights of the River Styx, a narrow, green ribbon that wound its way through the Starlight District and beyond. To their left was the rough face of the mountain peak. This was the domain of Baron van Hofmann, a gentile, middle aged man with sleek, red hair and a taste for blood.
A host of people had gathered. A few took notice of their arrival.
“Oh, Candi!” one of them called out as he rushed over and grabbed at her shoulder with one of his paws. “I've been just dying to meet you!” The man who stared at her so rudely in the face was part wolf. His tongue hung loosely out of his mouth. He was panting wildly.
“Get away from me, you prick!” Candi sneered and gave him a violent shove which sent him sprawling.
“There's Complicity!” Bubbles whispered, pointing.
Together, they moved off. They passed a long-haired woman chained to the wall, her back exposed and bleeding. A demon was whipping her. Each time the whip cracked and struck her back, she writhed and cried out in pleasure.
Complicity stood with four other women, calmly watching their approach. When they got close enough, she reached out both arms in their direction and stepped forward. “Candi! Bubbles! I'm so glad you could come!”
Smiling grandly, Candi embraced Complicity warmly and buried her head in her chest. Complicity smiled, revealing teeth much the same as Bubbles, leaned down, and bit her soundly in the neck.
For a great many people the sim was the only place anything new ever happened, so they kept coming back. For others, though, such as Jango, it was the only place they could practice their sinister habits without fear of punishment. As long as he was able to play the gangster while Marcellus was Minister of the Environment in Epstein's Cabinet, there was no need to surf. But circumstances had changed. Jango was back, and this time with a vengeance.
Jesus H Bonney, as this particular avatar was known, was holding a flame-thrower a friend of his had modified especially for the occasion. It was aimed at one of the poker tables inside the Casino Royale. The many people crowded around it were on fire, quickly burning to a crisp.
The infamous bandit and outlaw Jesus H Bonney had a young and pretty, well tanned, smooth-shaven face. His body was thin and lithe. He wore brown and green striped leather pants, a bright orange, button-down shirt, alligator skin cowboy boots with spurs, and a black, leather hat with a wide, floppy brim pulled crooked over the top of his head. A full head of wavy, blond hair poured out from underneath. The belt threaded through his pants was adorned with an shiny, silver, embroidered buckle. A six-shooter dangled from one side. His horse was tethered up out front, although he knew he wouldn't be needing it any more. It was only a question of how many he could nail before they nailed him. He knew this, and he liked the odds.
The sim was an amazing place, not only because of what people could do there, the lives they could lead and the fantasies they could act out, but because it was perfectly safe to do so. The sim was not under anyone's control. How exactly the sim came into existence is a matter of some debate and even legend, but most likely it had its beginnings in the world of gaming. Outside the military, humanity's greatest efforts in the realm of computing were spent here. Vast networks of computers were lashed together, the programs they ran expanded and imbued with ever more decision-making power. It was only a matter of time before one of the virtual worlds took on a completeness of its own and some means to ensure its survival. The sim is the greatest distributed system humanity has ever known, its data hosted and replicated to some degree across virtually every computing apparatus in use, from toasters to space ships to nuclear fusion plants. The sim exists as a universe with its own physical laws, many of which match those of the real world, and the means to modify them as its users see fit. It is not capable of any true awareness, which is why those who use it have nothing to fear except whatever intentions they bring in with them. It is, however, impossible to spy on or shut it down, and so it is also impossible for anyone to trace an avatar back to its owner in the real world.
Jesus H Bonney was one of the denizens of the Great Wide South, a dry, dusty region where the people dressed up in the clothes of a forgotten age and engaged in cattle ranching and bootlegging. Most of those who were homed in the region fell into one of either two camps: sheriffs and outlaws. Some of the most notorious were women, including Bella Starr, his longtime companion in crime. She had come to the most untimely of ends only a few hours before, and it was because of her murder that he was here now, in the Casino Royale, taking his revenge.
All things must come to an end, Jesus knew. But did it have to be today? He could have tried to continue on without Bella. The empire of gambling and prostitution they had built up together over the dead bodies of their enemies – many of them sheriffs – could have survived her death. But it wouldn't have been nearly as fun. Jesus H Bonney had been the best avatar he ever had. He was feared as a ruthless gunman and a vicious brawler, but he was also known as a lively drinking companion, a hustler and a jokester. It was better to end it now than linger on past his moment. And if it had to be now, then it would be this way. They'd gossip about it in the Great Wide South and beyond for years to come. If only he had met her in real life, he thought to himself sadly as he watched the bodies in front of him disintegrate into flame. Maybe he'd come back now and again just to hear what they were saying.
The bullet pierced him somewhere in the back. He dropped the flame thrower. As he drained out of the avatar and started lifting up towards heaven, he caught a last glimpse of the charred heap he had left behind.
Yes, they would remember the day Jesus H Bonney and Bella Starr had met their ends. Still, he couldn't help but hope he'd find a Bella Starr of his own somewhere out there in the real world, even though he knew at the same time it would never happen.
“Even if just for a little while – I don't care how long – I want to be happy. You know, before I die.”
Sitting in their little, two-person quibble parked on the dark regolith of the lunar lowlands, both of them gazing skywards in the direction of the sun, Marcellus wasn't really listening. The words Icarus had spoken echoed about in the broad expanse of his mind for a few moments before he finally latched onto them.
Marcellus started. “Why did you say that?”
Icarus' metallic, bubble shaped head turned. Where his face should have been, Marcellus could only see a perfect reflection of his own bubble. “It's just that I've spent my whole life being afraid,” came the reply, transmitted through radio frequency inside Marcellus' spacehelmet. “Afraid of Jango. Afraid of Epstein.”
“Afraid of me?”
“Sometimes.” Icarus turned away.
Even in the daytime, there are stars in the moon's sky. The sun is just the closest and the largest. It burns brightly, framed in the deepest blackness and cloaked in a veil of shimmering light in which the nearest stars are lost.
The rolling lowlands around them were bathed in her beams, and yet the material was so dark there was very little ambient light. Obstructions cast shadows, but they seemed more tricks of the eye than the genuine item. Even the highlands, the mountainous regions that towered behind them, were much darker than Marcellus would ever have imagined when he pictured the brightness of a full moon in the earth's sky.
The sun, which had risen a few days ago, still hung near horizon. It rose there each month, moving upwards through the sky on its slow trek towards zenith. The earth, though, remained relatively fixed in her position, sometimes a bit higher, sometimes lower, sometimes scuttling from side to side, but never out of character. Everyone on the moon knew where to find her. Most months when the sun rose, the earth managed to take a bite out of her. But this day was different. The earth – a black, featureless orb – was engulfing the brilliant disk of the sun before their very eyes. Now only a mere but still brilliant sliver was visible. Soon it would be entirely extinguished. It happened about twice a year, but this would be Marcellus' first time.
It was for this reason that Marcellus and Icarus had decided to come down to the lowlands, leaving Maya in charge of the Observatory. When they had come to her with the suggestion, they imagined she would put up a fuss about wanting to come, too, but solar eclipses didn't interest her in the least. “Why should I waste my time getting a better look at what we can see plainly from up here?” she asked disdainfully, looking up from one of the many instrumentation panels that surrounded her. “Anyway, I'm sure they'll record it and I can watch it on the link if I feel like it, which I doubt.” The truth is she hadn't left the control room in a week and wasn't likely to anytime soon.
“Why do you want to be happy if you don't even know what it's like?” Marcellus asked.
“Oh, I know. I can picture it quite easily.”
“But how? I mean, if you've never experienced it, how could you know?”
“I was in love once.”
“Oh.” Marcellus sounded disappointed.
“Hey look! It's almost time!” Icarus pointed to the horizon.
Indeed, as impossible as it seemed, the sun's brilliance was dimming.
“I've never been in love,” Marcellus admitted quietly.
“Never?”
“Well, I've been in love. But I've never been loved back.”
“That's horrible.” Icarus paused before adding, “There's still plenty of time.”
“I never knew you had a girlfriend.”
“It was before you knew me. Before I started working at The Company.”
“What happened?”
“She left me for somebody else.”
“It hurt, didn't it?”
“Yes.”
“I'll be you wish you never met her.”
“No.”
“You wish none of it ever happened.”
“No, no. Mark, no.”
“What do you mean, no? You liked the pain?”
“Of course not. But – I don't know. It's hard to explain.”
“Try,” Marcellus insisted even as he watched the dark orb of the earth swallow the radiant brilliance of the sun.
At that moment, they were bathed in a ghostly, red-orange light. The sun had become a ring of fire.
In fact, it wasn't the sun at all, but every sunset and sunrise on the earth, an entire circle of them, all of them at once. Behind it streamed ribbons of ethereal light, ejected from the hidden sun, dancing and waving in the solar wind.
The sat staring at it until the red-orange light began to fade. Suddenly a blinding arc of yellow light tore through the ring of fire and banished the solar corona. Normal daylight returned.
Icarus began to speak. “We had a lot of fun together, especially in the beginning. Stuff I wouldn't want to miss. Okay, she left me, yes, and there was a lot of fighting and bickering, too, believe me, but if I gave that up I'd also be giving up the good times, and then where would I be?”
They sat for a while in silence. It would be hours before the sun had fully extricated herself from the earth.
“I'm sorry if I ever scared you.” Marcellus spoke as if to the sky. He was glad Icarus couldn't see his face.
“There's got to be a reason,” Marcellus muttered to himself, peering down at the roll-up. “People don't just disappear. Not up here.”
“Could be an administrative mistake,” Icarus suggested.
Marcellus shook his head and looked up. “Every week we're loosing one or two. There are more empty beds than there should be. Where do they go, Icarus?”
“Is it really important?”
At that moment, the elevator door slid open. “Look who I found,” Maya announced as she stepped into Munib's tower.
Marcellus, seated at the metal desk set on the other side of the room, glanced up from the roll-up he had been examining. Icarus, standing slightly behind him, did the same.
Jango, pale-faced and sweaty, stumbled out of the elevator and nearly fell to the floor. His eyes were bloodshot and sluggish. Jennifer, gaunt and dour, followed slowly, keeping by the elevator shaft as if for safety. She avoided looking directly in anyone's eyes. When the door swooped swiftly down with a swish, she started.
Maya, smiling cynically to herself, cast a curious glance in Marcellus' direction as she crossed the room.
Marcellus stared for a moment before pushing himself back from the edge of the table. “Jesus, you look like shit.”
“Hey,” Jennifer snapped as she stumbled into the room and nearly fell. “Give us a break, will you? I just got back from a concert.”
The shutters were down in Laplace Observatory. Two weeks ago anyone standing in Munib's tower enjoyed a impressive view of the soft, mountainous highlands to one side and the lunar mare laid out far below on the other, sliced and diced neatly in half by a sheer, towering cliff. The lowlands were laced with flimsy strands of luminescence and the occasional clump of brightness where there was a settlement. The earth hung like a picture in one corner amid the mysterious stars. The cauliflower band of the Milky Way reached through it all like an elastic band stretched out and held by joking hands, ready to release it and send our realities flinging across time and space into dreamland and beyond.
No longer. Now the neatly fitting, protective flaps of the awning had been extended and covered the view all around, the neat brim of a hat like the one Jango used to wear. They kept the dangerous rays out, but not the heat. The air was stifling. Marcellus hadn't known it when he first entered, but the floor housed a number of soft but insistent light sources. These now glowed softly, bathing them all in a comfortable and yet painfully artificial luminescence. They made Jango's face look even more sickly than it was.
“Is that you, Mark?” Jango stood, eyes trying to focus but as yet unable. The hands hung limply at his sides. “Do you know what I heard? They found it. I never thought it really existed. It's in New Jersey. Can you believe it? Fucking New Jersey of all places. Motherfuckers.”
Jennifer laughed bitterly. “You fucking oaf. Of course he knows. We all know. Everybody knows.”
“New Jersey,” Jango repeated uselessly.
“Yeah, we heard you the first time.”
“What is it anyway?” Icarus wanted to know. “Everyone's talking about it, but I still have no idea.”
Maya came up next to him, slowed down, and whispered into his ear.
Icarus' eyes widened. “Is that what it is? Hell, I'd love to have one of those.”
“Wouldn't we all,” Marcellus replied darkly, still staring in Jango's direction.
“It came flying down out of the sky? Just like that?” His eyes were wide and white and very alive.
Maya swung over to Marcellus' other side and shrugged. “They say it was a meteor.”
“Yeah, well, however it got there, it's no wonder Epstein and Xiling are at each other's throats. Whoever gets his hands on that...” Icarus completed his thought with a low whistle.
Marcellus shifted uncomfortably. “Speaking of Judas, any sign of Eddie?”
“Yeah, he's around.” Maya ran a hand quickly through her hair and tossed it about with a rough shake of her head. “I saw him in The Commons an hour ago. Playing foozball.”
“Foozball?” Marcellus frowned.
Maya nodded. “You had Epstein's portrait taken down.”
“Yeah, I had someone comb through the Observatory. The colonies, too. Judas ain't top dog around here no more, is he?”
“What are you doing in Munib's chair?” Jango rasped. His eyes seemed to have finally grabbed ahold of something that was actually going on.
“Oh, look, it talks,” Icarus commented dryly.
“That you, Icarus? Come closer so I can deck you.”
Icarus was about to snap a bitter retort, but Marcellus cut him off with a withering look.
“Munib's not in the base,” Marcellus said simply.
“He left you in charge?” Jennifer asked incredulously. Her arms were wrapped around herself as if she were cold.
“Sort of. Anyway, it just seemed natural.”
“What does that mean, natural?” Jennifer sneered.
Marcellus shrugged uncomfortably and glanced up at Maya. “Somebody has to make the day-to-day decisions. People started asking me questions.” He laughed uncomfortably.
“The window-washer's here,” Jango growled and wiped his eyes wearily with the back of his arm. “He's always here.”
Indeed he was. He was standing on the far side of the room, behind Marcellus, slowly and meticulously going over the inside of the transparent dome with a thin cloth. He had been at that same spot for hours.
“Leave him alone,” Marcellus insisted, hardly casting him a glance. “Poor guy. He's a zombie. And you will be, too, if you keep on surfing! You both should go see a doctor.”
Jango blinked a few times wildly. “Why? What's wrong?”
“What's wrong,” Marcellus repeated softly and snorted. “It's not just the sim, is it? You're on pills. You can get pills up here?”
“Sure,” Jennifer breathed, rocking herself slowly back and forth and staring at him boldly.
“Are you giving him pills?”
“Sure,” Jennifer repeated. If they had allowed gum on the moon, she would have listlessly blown a bubble.
“Well don't! I mean, look at him! For Christ's sake, stop! I ought to have your dealer thrown out onto the surface. Who is it?”
“Just like Precious,” Jennifer sneered. “You fucking bastard.”
Marcellus shook his head. “I don't want to know who it is. But lay off the pills! Both of you! And the sim!”
“Why?” Jennifer hissed at him softly. “You going to use your ring on us?”
A wave of anger washed over Marcellus. How many times was she going to bring it up? “I'm not wearing it, Jen.” He held up both his hands.
“Where is it then? In your pocket?”
“Christ, Mark, do we really have time for this right now?” Icarus complained, gesturing obliquely at the roll-up spread out on the table.
“Shut up, Ikkie,” Jennifer snapped.
“No, you shut up,” Icarus replied harshly. “There's a leak somewhere in the dome. If you're too fucked up to help, fine, go overdose in your quarters or whatever it is you like to do. Right now, we're busy.”
Jennifer's mouth dropped open.
Maya giggled quietly. A quick hand flew to her mouth, but the giggling didn't stop.
“What's so funny?” Jango wanted to know.
“So this is how it is,” Jennifer breathed slowly. “You three against us.”
“Don't be ridiculous!” Marcellus snapped hurriedly. “We're all friends here. But Icarus is right. Now's not a good time.” Jennifer opened her mouth to speak, but Marcellus cut her off. “Anyway I've had about enough of you, Jen. It's been two months now since we got here and you're still bringing up old shit. I told you I'm sorry. I've made mistakes. The others can look past them. Why can't you?”
“They chose to come here!” Jennifer screeched, grabbing fistfulls of hair. “You made me come!”
“Yeah, well, this is the last time I'm going to say it: I'm sorry. And that's it. If you bring it up again, I'll have you locked in your quarters.” Marcellus swallowed thickly but held her gaze.
“You wouldn't dare,” she whispered, letting her hands fall.
“Try me.”
Casting vicious glances at Icarus and Maya, she whirled around, almost fell over, and made for the elevator.
Jango remained standing in the middle of the room, staring at one of the table's legs, a slightly confused look on his face.
“Take him with you,” Marcellus added curtly.
When they were gone, Icarus put a hand on Marcellus' shoulder. “Jango won't remember any of it. But Jen...” He clicked his tongue.
“It was the drugs talking,” Marcellus stated flatly. “It'll go away.”
“I wouldn't count on it,” Maya told him.
Marcellus let out a huge sigh. “What am I going to do? We used to be lovers. I'm not going to, you know...” He let the sentence hang.
Maya shrugged. “Okay, then. Where were we?”
At the words, something snapped inside Marcellus. “Jesus Christ, Maya,” he shouted, flinging his arms into the air and glaring up at her, “don't you ever feel anything?”
Maya seemed taken aback. “Excuse me?” she demanded, a hand held loosely at her throat.
Marcellus shook his head and closed his eyes. “Nothing,” he mumbled slowly. “I'm sorry. You're right. Where were we?”
Maya, clad in an unadorned, puffy, white and grey spacesuit, was looking at Marcellus intently, although it was hard to tell through the thin, reflective film that coated the front of her spacehelmet. She stood at the base of the ramp extending from the airlock of their centaur down to the surface, like a rectangular, metallic tongue having a taste of the local geology. A gloved hand tightly gripped one of the descending rods attached to its end on either side. The spaceship blocked the sun's dangerous rays, for it had already begun its descent towards the western horizon. In a week or so, the lunar night would return.
Marcellus stood on the sandy regolith, hand extended, palm open, looking ahead. Towering spires of bedrock jutted out of the regolith all around. Some were broad and steep, others quite narrow, and they were treacherous to navigate, even on foot. They cut up the terrain as far as the eye could see, making it difficult to find a suitable place to park their centaur. Up ahead, though, was the reason Marcellus had selected the site: a deep impact crater, half a kilometer across, which had sliced through rock and spire.
The sun showed down on Marcellus where he stood, out of the protection of the centaur's shadow. Something small and golden glittered in his outstretched hand.
Marcellus stared into the inky depths of the crater for a short time before closing his hand into a ball and heading back.
Maya followed him up the ramp, stood in the airlock with him as the spaceship pulled it back inside and pressurized the airlock. A green light on a panel by the inner door indicated it was now open.
When they were safely inside, they both pulled off their helmets.
“Couldn't do it?” Maya asked him.
Marcellus opened up his gloved hand and looked down at the ring. He shook his head. “I can't throw it in a crater,” he told her. “Someone might find it.”
A slow smile crept across Maya's face. “Who's going to find it in a crater? There are hundreds of craters around here. It will get buried in the regolith.”
“Not for hundreds of years.” Marcellus bit his lip sullenly. “There has to be another way.”
“Sure,” Maya agreed gaily. “Whatever you say.” And with that, she waddled off towards the fore cabin.
This site and all its contents are the result of the tumultuous workings of the mind of one Adam Wasserman.