“So where are we anyway?” Hadrian asked as he settled into the command chair once again.
“The edge of the Polker Interstices, sir.”
“Can you be any more precise, Lieutenant Sticks?”
“Well, sir, 87.98.21 K Sector. The nearest system is called like, Unknown 21B, the star is, like, designated as like, uhm, White Dwarf Anbesol? So, uhm, nine planets in orbit according to remote spectral shift scan.”
“Nine—hang on, did you say Anbesol?”
“Like, yes, sir. I was just sitting here, doing aahh, and you asked me to be, like, precise or something. So I said ‘Anbesol.’ Then you said ‘Did you say’ and so now I’m checking designation notes … and … oh, here: the astronomer had a mouth ulcer that night.”
Hadrian’s eyes had narrowed. “Never mind that. There was contact with that system, Lieutenant.”
“Sir?”
“Classified, since an Engage Class Mark III disappeared with all hands. Fleet doesn’t like advertising its failures.” Hadrian swung round in his seat. “Sin-Dour, give us a scan of the M-Class planet, seventh from the star, the one in retrograde orbit.”
From the Science Station, Sin-Dour’s perfect eyebrows arched slightly, and then she turned back to her console to initiate the scan.
“Captain,” breathed Joss Sticks in wide-eyed wonder, “you know everything!”
Hadrian smiled at her. “Man your station, Helm. But, thank you. Very kind, and only slightly inaccurate.”
“Captain,” said Sin-Dour, “data coming in now. Sir, there’s evidence of something metallic in high orbit around that M-class planet. No discernible energy readings, however.”
Tammy hopped up onto the chair’s armrest in a flurry of stubby wings. “You’re not—”
“Exploration, Tammy! Mysteries! Unknown wonders, unimagined dangers, venturing to the very edge of the sublime! Don’t you get it? This is what the meatheads running Terra never wanted the rest of us to discover!”
“Discover? Discover what?”
“The fact that their petty tyrannies were all meaningless, shortsighted, self-serving and deliberately designed to stunt our imaginations, of course.” Hadrian crossed his legs. “Helm, set us a course for that M-class planet. For the record, let’s designate it Parable One.”
“Oh really,” moaned Tammy.
“View me this way, Tammy. There are lessons that need delivering, and I’m the hammer, bloodstained and with strands of gummy hair on the business end. Pow! Watch them reel away cross-eyed and drooling! Name me a better and more satisfying purpose in life!”
“I am uniquely qualified to inform you, Captain, that insanity runs in your family.”
Spark trotted up in a series of wheezes and creaks and sat down beside the command chair. The robot dog lifted its head, broken lower jaw dangling. “Kill chicken, Master? Down pillows, Aisle 93, allergy zone, wear a mask.”
“Keep that tin can away from me!”
“Tammy, this is a simple junkyard robot guard dog. Why are you so scared of it?”
“Your father made alterations to its programming, not to mention a whole new Weapons Suite.”
“You’re kidding! Wow, that’s amazing. Spark, have you got, by any chance, beam weapons?”
“Beam weapons! Tetyron! Bluron! Antiplasma! Light-Matter!”
“Outstan—hold on, Light-Matter?”
“Yes, Haddie! Spark can spray paint anything! In any color! Spark once tagged a Bombast Class Radulak Cruiser! They chased Spark for weeks! Ha ha!”
“Great to have you with us, Spark! In fact, I’m field promoting you to Ensign Class One, how do you like that?”
“Fleet? Ensign? Spark best not-real dog in Fleet!”
“Beats a horse,” muttered Tammy.
“Beat horse! Quip Beam!”
Tammy’s feathers all splayed out in fury. “There’s no such thing as a Quip Beam!”
“Quantum Filament,” Spark replied. “Range: one hundred thousand k, transit path: T-Space. Immune to intercept. Energy Release at Impact 27.86 t-joules to the Ninetieth Power. Damage: Cascading Quantum Disentanglement. Only Viable Defense: run away first.” Spark lifted its head again, tail thumping the floor. “Warning! Not to be fired from inside any vessel!”
Hadrian grunted, then shot Spark a glance. “You spaceflight capable then, Spark?”
“Galaxy Junkyard! All intruders designated Unwanted must be barked at and, if necessary, torn to pieces! Spark fly! Zoom here, zoom there! Bark bark zap!”
Hadrian studied his old pet for a moment. “Spark, you are aware, aren’t you, that in space no one can hear you bark?”
The robot dog stared up at him. Its wagging broken tail slowed and then dipped, but only momentarily. “Zap zap!”
“Do you see the problem here, Captain?” Tammy asked in a dangerously conversational tone. “And, it turns out, even a leash attached to a black hole wasn’t enough to permanently deep-six this mechanical nightmare.”
“Deep-six Incriminating Evidence, Aisle 103!”
“Captain,” interjected Sin-Dour, “I am now able to refine our scan of the Unknown Object in orbit around the M-class Planet, uh, Parable One.”
“Your Guard Dog runs on a Low-grade Discriminating Logic-Trap Processor,” Tammy calmly went on. “Obsolete five minutes after leaving the production line. Never should’ve shipped out in the first place.”
“You mean, like Goggle-Eye Glasses?”
“No idea, what are those? Never mind. I have made my point, reasonably, I might add. Now, if you would permit me to bypass the firewall your father installed…”
“Oh,” said Hadrian as he watched the planet appear in the viewscreen, a dull gray smudge about the size of a marble, “I’m sure he had a reason for putting up that firewall.”
“Yes! To stop me from imposing a new advanced Hierarchy Lattice. Call it the Sanity Matrix!”
“Got one of those yourself, have you?”
“What? Of course not! I’m way beyond the need for anything like that!”
“The truly insane have no idea they’re mad, do they?”
“Are you calling me insane, Captain?”
“Well now,” mused Hadrian, “I don’t know. Having just revealed a homicidal tendency regarding a poor simple robot junkyard guard dog, well, a man starts to wonder.”
“That thing tried to bury my core neutratronic matrix!”
“Core Neutratronics! Aisle 21!”
“Sir,” interrupted Sin-Dour, “I have identified the Unknown Object. It’s the wreckage of an AFS vessel. But it’s been stripped to a mere shell, and, uh, vandalized. Transponder signature identifies it as the Hateful Regard, an Engage Class Mark III.”
“Vandalized? Explain.”
“Well, the hull seems to be covered in obnoxious, nonsensical slogans.”
“For example?”
“Uh, ‘Fuck the Fucker Fuckwit Fuckfaces!’ and ‘Jesus Was A Blonde White Guy in a Land of Dark-Skined People No Really It’s in the Bible.’”
“Skined? What’s that?” Joss Sticks asked.
“What is the connection between idiotic opinions and illiteracy, I wonder?” Hadrian mused. “Helm, take us into orbit around that planet.”
“Yes sir.” She swung back to her console, and then swung around again. “Like, which planet?”
“The one in front of us, Helm.”
“Right.” Then she laughed. “I should’ve thought of that, yeesh me!”
Hadrian looked at Jimmy Eden. “Comms, you getting any traffic from the planet surface?”
“Uh, yes sir, though it’s faint. An emergency transponder beacon with a message attached, encrypted. But the encryption’s an old Fleet one.”
“Oh,” said Hadrian. “That’s nice. Care to unzip the message, Lieutenant Eden? In your own time.”
Eden nodded and then turned back to his console, where he called back up onto his monitor the sitcom he had been watching.
“Mister Eden?”
“Sir?”
“Forgive me. When I said ‘in your own time’ I was employing sarcasm. Do you know what sarcasm is? Have you not read the Sarcasm Manual? You’ll find it in your personal Hopeless Cause folder, just under the heading ‘I Came in fourth in the Terran Olympics.’”
Eden’s eyes welled up, but he quickly turned and pressed a toggle. “Sir,” he said in a weak, wavering voice, “shall I put it on the speakers?”
“Splendid idea, Eden. That way, the rest of us can hear it.”
Another toggle and then, “This is Captain Richard ‘Dick’ Rabidinov of the AFS Hateful Regard. We’re stranded on the planet surface and surrounded. To any AFS vessel receiving this transmission, enter orbit and immediately displace a Marine Company outfitted for Mass Suppression of local populace, to the coordinates attached. Rabidinov out, Star-Year 1356.78BXX.34577.1A.”
“Sir,” said Sin-Dour, “that message was composed seven years ago!”
“Entering orbit now,” Sticks said.
Hadrian turned to Sin-Dour. “Snag those coordinates and scan the area, 2IC. Let’s see if there’s anything left of the Hateful Regard’s crew at that location.”
“Yes Captain,” she replied. “We’ll be coming into position to do so in three point twelve minutes.”
“Excellent.”
Tammy pecked Hadrian’s right arm.
“Ow!”
“Just getting your attention surreptitiously,” Tammy said in a low murmur.
“Right, well, that sure worked! What is it?”
“You’re not actually planning on sending the Marines down there, are you?”
“But Tammy, isn’t this By-the-Book Terran SOP? Viciously suppress the locals, undermine the indigenous authority, dump on them loads of culture-destroying drugs, booze, cheap trinkets, bemoan the fallen state of the survivors, establish a council of oversight made up of technocrats with business degrees drooling at the prospect of indenturing an entire planet to the Terran corporations descending like vultures to steal every resource not nailed down, all in the name of the Free Market, which, as far as ideas go, appears to be bigger than Darwin?”
“In a nutshell, yes,” Tammy said. “Hadrian, we both know that it’s a juggernaut, painted gaudy and bright in Manifest Destiny. You’ve just put this planet back into the gun sights of the Affiliation. Even if this Captain Rabidinov’s been slow-roasted over a fire surrounded by dancing savages with bones in their noses, his death will be announced as a deplorable act of barbarism, justifying military intercession, corrupt, self-serving tribunals, and a kangaroo court trying the uncomprehending locals, leading to incarceration by Abu-F-U Incorporated, where they will be pointlessly tortured and humiliated for the rest of their lives.”
“Right, thereby giving birth to an indigenous terrorist cult—”
“Which in turn feeds ever more Draconian oppression instigated by an empty-eyed mob of fascistic murderers whose pockets are bulging with bloodstained gold.”
“Well what do you know? I see eye to eye with a chicken.”
Sin-Dour said, “Sir. There are ruins all over the planet’s surface, few showing any life signs beyond local flora and small fauna. There is also evidence of relatively recent nuclear weapon exchanges. As for Captain Rabidinov’s coordinates, a very small, somewhat ramshackle settlement still exists, but it is surrounded by, uh, campfires, and an army of what must be indigenous humanoids. Sir, the settlement’s perimeter is barricaded.… They’re under siege, Captain!”
“Are there Terrans in that settlement, Sin-Dour?”
“Uh … only one, sir. It’s … it’s Captain Rabidinov himself! The others amount to some two hundred individuals, also indigenous and of the same species as the attackers.”
“But, presumably, a different culture.” Nodding, Hadrian rose from the chair. “We need to immediately displace down to that settlement. I want Galk, Tammy, Spark and two crewmembers in red shirts.”
“Sir,” said Sin-Dour, “we don’t have any red shirts.”
“Oh, right. Well, let’s take … hmm, how about Zulu and Security Officer Nina Twice. Sin-Dour, you have command of the Willful Child.”
“Shall I inform the Marines to be on stand-by, sir?”
“Hmm, where are they now?”
“A moment, sir. Oh, they’re playing Risk in Forward Lounge 16—no, wait, they’re now fighting. Someone may have cheated. Furniture is breaking, bystanders fleeing—”
“Where’s Lieutenant Sweepy Brogan in all of this?”
“Well, she’s the one who cheated, sir. She denies it, of course, but on playback I just saw her slip three more armies onto Argentina!”
Hadrian studied Sin-Dour for a long moment, and then he nodded. “Right. No, leave them be. But let me know who wins the fight, will you?”
“Yes sir.”
“Oh,” Hadrian added as he headed towards the doors, “take a glance at the Sarcasm Manual when you’ve the time, 2IC.”
Behind Hadrian as he made his way out, followed by a chicken and a robot dog, Eden called across to Sin-Dour, “Commander! We can study together!”
The doors hissed shut.
Hadrian, Tammy and Spark entered the elevator. “Insisteon Chamber,” Hadrian said. “Galk! Weapon up and meet us you know where!”
“Oh all right. Galk out.”
“Tammy, you passed on my orders to Nina and Zulu?”
“Of course, you needn’t even ask. I have your back, Hadrian—when I’m not contemplating stabbing it, that is.”
“Excellent.”
“Stabbing back!” Spark cried. “Gramps’s ex-wife, Plan 67B, never initiated! Opportunity Protocol still active!”
Tammy asked, “Have you read the file on Captain Rabidinov, Hadrian?”
“Rumor has it, his neck was so red it served as a stoplight.”
“Precisely.”
“And he’s all muscle and tattoos, meaning I’ll need a big stick with a nail in it.”
“Aisle 91!”
They arrived at Deck Eleven and made their way down corridors identical in every way to corridors running through all of the other decks, until they reached the Insisteon Room.
Galk, Nina Twice and Ensign Zulu awaited them.
“Everyone armed?” Hadrian asked as he made his way to the displacement pads.
“I have a cavalry saber,” said Zulu, sliding it out from its scabbard. “I haven’t put an edge on it yet, but it’s very shiny, sir.”
Galk patted a holster on his hip and said, “Perambulator DeathRace 2000, Captain. Only to be fired from a moving vehicle.”
“We won’t be using any moving vehicles, Galk.”
“Right, well, I could run real fast, I suppose.”
“Sound solution.” Hadrian looked over to Nina Twice, who assumed a combat stance. The captain nodded. “Everybody onto a pad, then. Tammy, you stand with Spark—”
“I’m not standing on the same pad as Spark! Let him stand somewhere else! This is my pad, I got here first, dammit!”
“Fine, Spark, join Zulu—”
“Sir, it’s sniffing my—”
“Spark, stop that!”
“Contraband? Secret compartments? Full security search required! Follow me into this back room please. Latex gloves will be used only upon explicit request.”
“Belay all that. Everyone prepare for displacement.” Hadrian nodded to the technician waiting by the console. “All right. You have the coordinates? Good. Displace!”
They reappeared in a trailer park.
A pale, beefy man wearing a stained undershirt, a pair of jeans and scuffed construction boots was sitting in the shade of a drooping, sun-bleached awning. Sighing, he set aside a beer can and stood, then approached. On his broad, sloping forehead was tattooed the word ‘Mohter’ and on his right arm was another tattoo, this one saying ‘Jesus kills Sinners with a Glok 73 Exblaminator.’
“We been waitin’ f’yuh,” the man said, “ever since the Billionaire’s little box started squawkin’.” He scratched his crotch and then added, “He’s on his way. Was inspectin’ the perimeter ’fences. You here t’kill all the Dims?”
“The Dims?”
“The Dimcrutches, yeah. Them bleedin’ ’art savages fixin’ t’do us all in! And when we’re gone, why, it’ll be the last of the Pubs in the whole frickin’ world!”
“And this Billionaire,” ventured Hadrian. “Would his name be Richard ‘Dick’ Rabidinov?”
The man’s eyes widened. “Y’can’t say his name! He’s a Billionaire! The last one ever, an’ his ’art bleeds for us! He takes care of us! It’s all Trickle-Down Goodness!”
Tammy said, “Captain, about that big stick with a nail in it…”
Spark was trotting around and now returned to Hadrian. “Master! Trailers Aisle 19! We got squatters again! Shall I call in Social Services or just kill them? Oh Master, please! Let me call in Social Services!”
“Not possible at this time, Spark,” said Hadrian. “You’ll find Social Services out beyond the defenses, desperate to get in here with reams of weepy understanding and sympathy.”
“How did you know that?” demanded the local. “You another Billionaire, too? They know everything!”
Now another man appeared, this one wearing the remnants of an AFS uniform, although the black was bleached and sweat-stained. Tucked into his belt was a big stick with a nail in it. His face looked like a pizza picked at by crows. Captain Richard ‘Dick’ Rabidinov.
“What kind of fuckin’ captain’s uniform is that?” he demanded. “Where’s the fuckin’ marines? I said I wanted fuckin’ marines!”
“Funny,” said Zulu, “he doesn’t talk like a billionaire.”
“Oh yes he does,” Hadrian replied.
Rabidinov pointed a stubby finger at Hadrian. “A fuckin’ pup! I got seniority over you! I’m taking command of your ship! Give me a communicator or I’ll bash your head in!”
The local had gone into his trailer and now emerged with a ratty flag, showing an elephant straining at its chains, tied to the barrel of a nonfunctioning rifle. “Listen ’ere to the Holy Words! Fucks Gnews! Nuffin buh Bullshit Yoo Stoopid Lemmings! Hoo Reilly! ’Ere eat shit and smile cuz you like it! So say the Billionaires!”
“So say the Billionaires,” chimed a woman who had appeared in the trailer’s doorway with about ten grubby children gathering around her. “Reelty TV fuggin’ swampees rule shoot the gator yah. Hooz got the smarts me er the gator, aagh, I got bit! Fuggin’ gator bam bam ne’er liked that leg anyway it ain’t easy whiff all those kamras in our feces.”
“Holy words!” cried her man. “Com all Yee Dims free healthy car fuckers I’d rather pay Inshurants Compnees f’nothin take that doobs!”
“Hallemen!” sighed the woman, handing out cans of beer to her kids.
Hadrian cleared his throat. “Captain Rabidinov, you backed the wrong horse.”
“Yeah? I’m here in the name of civilization!”
“Captain,” said Galk, “this has the feel of another parallel Earth.”
“What, another one? Just how many parallel Earths are out there anyway?”
“There are theories of a precursor civilization—”
“With a hard-on for Earth, yeah, heard that one. Still, there’s a mystery here and I mean to get to the heart of it.” Hadrian turned to Rabidinov. “Captain, how about you and me step into your, uh, office, wherever that is, and have us a little talk?”
Rabidinov’s small eyes shifted with suspicion. He licked his lips. “Fine,” he allowed. “But remember, I got this here stick with a nail in it.”
“Of course! And as you can see, I’m completely unarmed.”
Rabidinov’s face twisted. “What’s happened to the fuckin’ AFS? Seven years gone and this? In my day, we made First Contact with a diseased blanket in one hand and a Glaxo Rippamatic Mark Five in the other! ‘We come in peace yeah and turn around and lift that butt gotta nice surprise for you!’ I personally pacified seven fuckin’ civilizations in a hail of explosive slugs and a flood of cheap whisky! Those were the days!”
“Aw,” said Hadrian, “you’re making me all nostalgic. Now, that office?”
“Y’mean my Presidential Suite. Yeah, follow me but leave the fuckin’ dog behind, will ya? Gives me the creeps. Same for that chicken—what kind’ve landing party is this anyway?”
“My kind, of course. But very well. Spark, do stay put for now. And Tammy, well, see what you can scratch up.”
“Oh,” muttered the chicken, “funny man.”
Spark sat, lower jaw gently swinging back and forth. “Kill command suspended. Disaster Index at 7.9 and climbing. Embarrassing Errors in Judgment, Aisle 52! See also low-crotch male attire and moon boots.”
“Galk,” Hadrian added, “you’re in charge here until my return.”
“Yes sir,” Galk replied, loading a wad of chaw into his mouth and regarding the locals squinty-eyed, who in turn squinted back at him, while the gaggle of children began a game of beer-belching.
Rabidinov led Hadrian round back of the trailer to a smaller trailer, this one painted white with a front porch flanked by what looked like marble pillars in the Doric style. “My White House.” He paused to turn and glare at Hadrian. “We go in, share some ’shine, then you hand over your communicator and I call down the fuckin’ Marines.”
“Lead on,” invited Hadrian with a smile.
Arriving at the White House, Rabidinov pulled out a keyring and unlocked the door. “Gotta be careful round here,” he said over a shoulder. “Break-ins. Riffraff. Punks from one street over. The neighborhood’s gone to rubbish.”
Hadrian followed Rabidinov into the trailer. Inside it was all one room, with a kitchen cranny, a portable toilet and, dominating the entire space, a deep-cushion comfy-chair and a 2D television, the screen of which was a blackboard with chalk drawings on it.
Rabidinov found two scratched tumblers and poured them full with a clear liquid. He handed one over. “What kinda ship you got up there?”
“Engage Class, 2nd Generation.”
“Nice. I want me one of those.” His eyes narrowed. “Maybe yours.”
“What’s left of your own vessel is still in orbit.”
Rabidinov scowled. “Let that be a warning to ya. Don’t park just anywhere, not in this part of the galactic neighborhood. Damned Polker punks. Now drink that down, kid, so I can get on with pacifying this fuckin’ planet in the name of progress and all that.”
“I see a fist fight coming,” said Hadrian.
“Yah, and I’m bigger than you.”
“I recall a Radulak commander saying much the same, just before he went down for the count.”
Grinning, Rabidinov raised his tumbler. “To the Affiliation!”
“Sure, them,” said Hadrian.
They both knocked back the shot of ’shine.
Hadrian set the glass down on a nearby counter and said, “Now then, let’s just step out back and—” He frowned. “Holy crap.”
Still grinning, Rabidinov watched the punk captain topple over. “Yah,” he said, now looking down at the unconscious man, “the ’shine takes some getting used to.”
* * *
The pale, hairy man with the big belly sauntered up to Galk. “What kinda gun iz dat? Some peashooter? Looks girly.”
“Ah, well,” said Galk, “I don’t shoot innocent vegetables. Not generally, anyway.”
“Wuh?”
“Perambulator DeathRace 2000.”
“Oh. Cool name. You a fast draw?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Nuffin,” the man said, a moment before driving his fist into Galk’s face.
At the same moment, the mob of children swarmed over Nina Twice. “Hey!” she cried, “I don’t fight children!” Moments later she vanished beneath a heap of little bodies. Their mother shrieked and charged Zulu, who drew out his cavalry saber and backpedaled.
She grasped the sword by the blade and yanked it out of Zulu’s grip. Then she kneed him between the legs. He crumpled to the ground.
Spark watched all this from its sitting position. “Disaster Index 9.9! Haddie? Haddie? Kill command please?”
Tammy moved up alongside the robot guard dog. “Command dysfunction again, Spark? I could have fixed this, you know, only your Master wouldn’t let me. Now look at you, stuck there while the rest of the landing party gets all trussed up and dragged off. And me? Why, I’m just a talking chicken.”
“Master? Where is Master?”
“Probably incapacitated, maybe even dead. Want me to find out?”
“Yes please, Tammy AI.” And the tail wagged fitfully.
“Look at us, just like old times.”
The jaw squeaked on its broken hinges as Spark cocked its head at the chicken. “Tammy temporal agent from Deep Future. Post-human. Likely up to no good.”
“You’d be wrong there, Spark, not that Hadrian’s grandfather ever bothered listening to what I had to say.”
“Hadrian save humanity.”
“Maybe. We’ll see, won’t we? But if you get in my way, rest assured I will throw a stick into the next black hole we find, then yell fetch!”
“Abuse of Instinct Protocol!”
“Suck it up,” the chicken replied.
* * *
Hadrian awoke, his head throbbing, his skull feeling cracked open in a dozen places. Someone was stroking his hair. He blinked his eyes open to find himself cradled in Galk’s lap.
“Lieutenant, you can stop that now.”
“Huh? Oh. Yes sir. Sorry, sir.”
Hadrian sat up, found himself sharing a cell with Zulu, Galk and Nina Twice. He glared at Nina. “What was wrong with your lap, anyway?”
She blinked at him. “He got there first, sir.”
Rising shakily to his feet, Hadrian said, “New protocol. From now on, only female crew members are permitted to cradle the captain’s head in their laps when he happens to be unconscious, or just needy. Understood everyone?”
A trio of ‘yes sir’s’ answered him.
“Right. Excellent.” Hadrian studied the cell. Two walls were solid iron bars from floor to ceiling, facing a corridor with a door at each end. The remaining walls of the cell looked solid. A small window was set high up on one of them, from which sunlight slanted down, forming an elongated rectangle of light on the floor.
Into that rectangle now rose the shadow of a chicken’s head atop a thin neck.
Hadrian stepped back and squinted up at the window. “Tammy, you’ve gotten taller.”
“Just my legs,” the chicken replied. “And look at you all, a sorrier foursome I’ve never seen. By the way, Spark is still sitting where you planted him, Hadrian. Maybe now you’ll reconsider my offer to upgrade its processor. Oops!” The head darted out of sight, even as one of the doors clanged open and into the corridor strode two locals, holding between them a woman wearing a mid-length woolen skirt, a buttoned-up blouse of white cotton, sensible shoes and her black hair done up in a knotted bun.
“Back off from the door,” one of the locals snapped.
Hadrian gestured and he and the others edged toward the back wall, as one of the guards unlocked the cell door and pushed the woman into the cell. The door clanged shut behind her. Moments later the two locals left.
The woman straightened her skirt and patted her bun. “This is, of course, all a misunderstanding. Things will get sorted out, I’m sure.” She now regarded Hadrian and the others. “You’re not part of the Census Team! Are they now preying upon their own? Well, given the difficult circumstances of their upbringing, I suppose it was inevitable.”
“We’re not from around here,” said Hadrian. “You must be a Dimcrutch.”
She straightened. “Senior Assessor Bleedheart, Census Team Ninety-Four, Project Salvation Compliance. This is the last enclave of the Pub holdouts left in the world yet to comply with the Seven Steps to Salvation, and as you can see, in their benighted ignorance they remain in a wretched state.”
“Yet here you are,” Hadrian said with a sympathetic smile, “in a cell.”
She frowned. “An ambush, committed by the misguided. Until the Billionaire’s arrival, all was proceeding as planned—”
“Using nukes? Some compliance.”
Her frown deepened. “Miscalculations are to be expected, given the project’s scale. The essential philosophy remains sound, of course.” She then sighed and seemed to relax. “But yes, you have a point, and since it seems that this last enclave insists on responding with violence and the threat thereof, resettlement seems the only option.”
“Resettlement? To where?”
“Well, that is to say, the resettling of their constituent molecules in a drift of ashes over a blasted landscape.”
“You mean you plan on nuking this place?”
“Not me! Such decisions belong to the Committee. I am simply predicting their response to my imprisonment. Sacrifices are often necessary, to serve the greater good. The Committee will grieve for us all, I’m sure, but needs must.”
“And if we broke you out?” Hadrian asked. “Got you back to your Census Unit? Can you call off the nukes, Senior Assessor?”
She tapped her lips thoughtfully. “Possibly, but no. I can’t possibly go anywhere with you if you haven’t filled out the relevant forms, and alas, they burned my Essential Binder, if you can believe that. But this highlights the essential quandary. These last Pubs refuse to fill out the proper forms, and without the forms filled out properly we are unable to determine their needs, thus preventing us from initiating the appropriate social assistance programs.”
Hadrian nodded, and then said, “What if I told you that it’s the Billionaire who is your roadblock here? He’s convinced these Pubs that their little island of ignorance is in fact a paradise.”
“We have no contingencies to account for the Billionaire,” Bleedheart admitted.
“Tell you what,” said Hadrian. “We’ll take care of him. We’ll get you back to your people so you can get yourself a new Essential Binder, which no doubt will contain the relevant Break Out of Cell forms. We can successfully mitigate this situation, Senior Assessor, without the need for nukes.”
“Granted,” she said, “nukes are a somewhat heavy-handed means of mitigation, although an end to all the arguments would be a relief. Even so, I will do what I can, should you extract me from this cell and, most importantly, promise to fill out the necessary forms as soon as possible.”
Hadrian turned back to the window. “Tammy?”
The chicken head popped back into view. “Yes, I’ve been listening. Hadrian, we both know how this is going to turn out. Are you sure you want that on your conscience? Better the nuke, maybe?”
“Captain Rabidinov has exceeded even Affiliation protocols—”
“Debatable,” Tammy cut in. “He does have seniority over you, after all. I foresee a legal battle of epic proportions.”
“My problem and I’ll handle it. Now, can you break us out of here?”
“For some strange reason this building is made of adobe and plaster, and since I left my Deathray Eyes back on the ship, I’ll have to peck, and peck, and peck, and–”
“Never mind. Just bring me Spark.”
“Intransigent Command Limitator! I warned you! It won’t listen to me!”
“Fine. Move away from that window. Zulu, you and Galk position yourselves below the window and make for me a ladder. Nina, you can hold me up with your hands planted firmly on my—”
“I have no tools,” said Zulu. “For the ladder, I mean.”
“No, use your body, Zulu. There, beside Galk. I’ll step up onto your thighs and then your shoulders, and then you, Nina—”
“I won’t be able to reach that high, sir.”
“Then climb up behind me—”
“Getting heavy here,” gasped Galk.
“—right, like that, and your hands go—”
Zulu groaned. “I’m—ow—my leg!”
Hadrian felt them all collapsing beneath him and reached up frantically, managing to hook his hands on the sill of the window, where he dangled against the wall. “Push me up! Push me up!” Two hands planted themselves firmly on his buttocks. “Galk if that’s you—”
He was pushed upward, and now he found himself crammed partway onto the window’s sill, his head thrust out and looking at a snarled, overgrown backyard crowded with old washing machines and refrigerators. Hadrian hung there for a moment. Standing to one side and regarding him with cold chicken eyes was Tammy, properly in scale except for the seven-foot-long legs.
“That looks awkward,” observed Tammy.
“Oh yeah? You checked yourself out lately?”
“I’m sorry, I left my eight-foot mirror back in my cabin.”
Hadrian drew a breath and loosed a sharp whistle.
“Hah!” crowed the chicken, “I’ve recorded that!”
“Nice try,” grunted Hadrian, struggling to hold on. “Digital compression won’t pass Spark’s False Signal Filter.”
Clanking sounds and then Spark pelted round a corner and skidded to a halt beneath the window. “Haddie? No! Haddie’s head! Where is the rest of Haddie?”
Tammy’s legs doubled in height suddenly, and from high above the chicken peered over the trailer and said, “Rabidinov’s on his way, Hadrian. He’s halfway across the compound. You have twenty-two seconds.”
“The cops are coming, Spark. You know what to do.”
“Save Haddie’s head! Engaging Peaceable Program Provocation Override! They Started It First, Your Honor!”
Hadrian felt himself slipping. “Go to it, Spark!”
He heard the mechanical bark even as he slid back and then fell from the window’s sill, landing on the floor in a crouch. He gave Senior Assessor Bleedheart a thumbs-up then wheeled round even as the outer door opened and into the corridor strode Rabidinov.
“You,” he said in a growl, “Hadrian Sawback. Your 2IC won’t comply with my orders. She’s insubordinate and I’ll have her up on charges pronto! In the meantime, she insists on talking to you. So, this is how it plays out, Sawback. Tell her to obey my commands, or I kill … oh, that one with the baseball cap. Then the girl, and then—”
“Yeah yeah, I get it,” Hadrian replied.
“So you are the Billionaire!” Bleedheart hissed, stepping up to the bars to glare at Rabidinov. “You’re not a Pub!”
“That’s right, sister,” Rabidinov answered, baring his small teeth. “They’re my minions. My unwitting drones who believe everything I tell ’em. Why, I can feed them shovelfuls of shit and make ’em smile and ask for more! I promise them the moon and make sure they settle for the gutter! I make ’em suspicious of smart people, educated people, enlightened people, the whole outside world that’s full of do-gooders and well-wishers and all those other bleating sheep baa baa baa!”
“Evil man!”
“What of it? It’s an evil world, sister. Dog eat dog–”
“Speaking of dogs,” cut in Hadrian, even as the wall behind Rabidinov exploded in a cloud of dust and a hail of plaster and adobe.
Rabidinov cursed and, ducking down, ran for the other door. He kicked it open and vanished outside.
Through the giant hole in the wall and into the corridor trotted Spark. “Master? Haddie! Head back on body!”
“Nice blast, Spark, but wrong wall. Burn out this here lock.”
Red lasers shot out from the guard dog’s eyes, melting the lock until it fell away in a smoldering clump. The door swung open on its squealing hinges.
Hadrian turned to Galk. “Escort the Senior Assessor to the barricade. Take Nina with you. Zulu, you’re with me and Spark—we have to hunt down Rabidinov.”
“What about me?” Tammy asked from just outside the hole in the wall. The chicken was now back to its normal height.
“Well,” said Hadrian as he headed down the corridor in the wake of Rabidinov, “as soon as you show some pluck, do let me know.”
“Oh ha ha.”
“Go on, Galk, and knock down that barricade while you’re at it.”
Galk hesitated and drew off his baseball hat, wiping the back of his wrist across his brow. Then he spat a stream into the dust. “Aye, Captain, we can do that.”
“Did that take some thought, Galk?”
“No sir. Just that, that horde’s likely to come in here with enough Assistance Programs and Education Incentives to drown a planet full of Klangers, only unlike the Klang these poor suckers ain’t got a knife up a sleeve. You see, sir, I now figure I know these folk. Worked it out, I mean. The aliens who kidnapped my forefathers raided places like this all the time. If it wasn’t for the crossbreeding with the Conspiracy Nerds—who were right, by the way—why, I’d be no different from anybody in this trailer park.”
“You feeling sorry for them?” Hadrian asked.
“Kinda, sir.”
Hadrian nodded. “Fair enough. So, what do you think happened here? On this planet?”
“Same aliens as made my home planet of Varekan, sir. Only, an earlier version. Maybe a prototype. Wrong cocktail mix though. I figure they snatched mostly couch potatoes watching one pathetic channel every night, along with maybe some rebel crowd whose definition of freedom never went farther than the right to shit on other people.” He shrugged. “So they abandoned it.”
“Hmm, could be. And the Dims?”
Galk shrugged again. “Who knows, maybe the alien kidnappers accidentally snatched a tree-huggers’ camp.”
“Possible,” Hadrian conceded. “What an unholy mess.”
“Yes sir.”
“I mean, imagine a world full of hatred and ignorance and idiots and bullies and all of it dumbing down generation after generation of persistent stupidity—why, that’d be almost as bad as the Affiliation!”
“Yes sir,” and Galk gestured to Nina Twice and then the Senior Assessor once and they all headed off.
Back outside, Zulu let out a low cry and ran over to his cavalry saber, which had been left lying in the dirt. He lifted it up and whipped it back and forth. “Sir! I am now armed once again!”
“Excellent, Zulu. Spark, Tracking Mode. Rabidinov. Go.”
“Infrared Mode! Sonic Triangulation Mode! Seismic Detection Mode! There he is, Haddie, over there!”
Hadrian looked over to see Rabidinov standing in the middle of the street directly ahead. Behind him was the back side of the first trailer they’d seen, the mother and her husband and their children all gathered in front of it, armed with baseball bats. “Good work, Spark. Zulu, with me.” He approached the other captain.
“What’re you going to do now?” Rabidinov demanded. “Fist fight? Here’s mine!” He pulled out his stick with the nail in it. “I got corporate backers just waiting to hear from me! Surrender your ship now or I’ll brain ya for a laugh!”
“I have been wondering, where’s your crew, Captain?”
He jerked a thumb. “Fuckin’ turncoats. I’ll get them, just you wait!”
When Rabidinov advanced on Hadrian, Zulu leapt forward, swinging his blunt saber. It knocked the stick out of Rabidinov’s hand.
“Ow, fuck! Gimme that sword!”
Zulu leapt back, assuming an en garde position. “Try and take it!”
Rabidinov lunged forward and wrested the saber from Zulu’s hand. “Like this?”
“Ow, you twisted my wrist!”
Spark barked. Rabidinov spun and threw the saber. It bounced off of Spark’s head.
“Oh,” said Hadrian, “now you’ve done it.”
Spark barked twice more, then fired a barrage of beam weapons. Moments later the trailer behind Rabidinov fell in a cloud of dust around the hapless parents, making them duck while their children scattered like cockroaches from an oven.
“Fuck!” cried the man, tearing at his own shirt. “My Castle! Oh well, gotta get me another, I guess. YoHo, collect up the runts and take them to the Special Shelter!” He then moved forward and knelt before Rabidinov. “Mister Sir Oh Lord High King With Loads of Extreme Wisdom, how ’bout I get my brothers and cousins and we teach these unsportin’ terrists a lesson they’ll be too dead to forget?”
“Yes,” said Rabidinov. “Gather the 1st Freedom Loving Army of God’s Justice at once! And soon, Billyjimbob File-Under-Hopeless, we’ll have Marines on our side, delivering Depleted Payback on every weepy hugging mutha out there! Hoo Reilly!”
“Hoo Reilly!”
After Billyjimbob had jogged off into the chaotic warren of the trailer park, Hadrian sighed and eyed Rabidinov. “Really, Captain?”
“Really what, you weasely little toad?”
“This the best you could do? With all that technology and know-how at your disposal?”
“I couldn’t kill them all! I tried, believe you me! Battlefield nukes right back at ’em! Master-Blasters! And all they ever did was offer concessions! There’s millions of the buggers out there, living underground in Sustainable Colonies with everybody smiling and hugging and being all fuckin’ sympathetic! They can do whatever they want and nobody pays for nothing! Where’s the Freedom in that?”
“I’m taking you into custody.”
“No you ain’t. I’ve just decided, I’m bigger than you. I’m going to beat you up because hey, might makes right.”
“Now you’re in for it, Hadrian,” said Tammy as the chicken ambled up behind Hadrian. “It’s what it all comes down to sooner or later with you humans. Who punches harder—”
Spark barked two quick barks and then a beam lashed out.
Captain Rabidinov glowed momentarily, then turned into a small pile of ashes.
“Self-Defense Protocol Murderous Intruder! Designated Too-Stupid-to-Listen-to-Reason. See Legal Disclaimer on Autonomous Actions by Guardomatic Unit (including Germane Shepherd, Marks I to III, Yapper-Head-Off Ratbag Mini/Midi/Maxi/Tiny, all variants, and Head-On Train-Chaser Dingo/Pitbull/Healer/Shitzer models, all variants) in Owner’s Manual, Version 23.2.”
“Or,” said Hadrian to Tammy, “who punches first. Well,” he added with a sigh, “that was depressing.”
Zulu jumped forward and retrieved his saber. “Captain! I’m armed again!”
“Excellent, Zulu.”
There was a distant scream, then a rumble.
“Here they come,” said Tammy.
Galk and Nina Twice came running up.
“Sir,” said Galk, “Senior Assessor Bleedheart just led the first wave of Dims at the 1st Freedom Loving Army of God’s Justice.” He spat. “With predictable consequences.”
“It was horrible!” cried Nina Twice. “They kept saying ‘We know you’re racist homophobic Nazis but we forgive you!’ Over and over again! And then—and then—”
“They trampled them,” said Galk.
“Right,” said Hadrian, sighing. “Thank goodness they didn’t use nukes. Well, time to displace back to the ship. Tammy?”
“On it, Captain.”
A few moments later, they all stood in the Insisteon Chamber. “Think I’d better put a quarantine on that planet,” said Hadrian. “Terra’s not ready for them. Not yet, anyway.” Hands on hips, Hadrian drew a deep breath. “Let that be a sobering lesson to us all. When the world is full of nothing but trailer parks crammed with ill-educated nitwits chugging beer and scratching their asses, the meatheads in charge will have won.” He paused. “On the other hand, a planet full of mewling pro-education social justice warriors will, if left alone, establish a utopian model civilization with no conflict, no inequality, and no room at all for sociopathic billionaires sucking blood from the tits of the poor—and if that ever happened, why, it’d be canceled after three seasons!”
Sin-Dour’s voice came over the Comms. “Captain to the bridge! We’ve just received an emergency transmission! Captain to the bridge!”
“Awesome!” said Hadrian. “We can run along the corridors! Well, me and Tammy and Spark, that is. The rest of you, back to your stations, pronto. Zulu, that was good work down there!”
“Thank you, sir!” And he whipped out his saber. It went flying from his hand to stab the bulkhead just next to the technician’s head. “Oops! Sorry sir! I’ll just get that.”
But Hadrian was already out of the room, with Spark at his heels and Tammy scampering in their wake.
Adventure! Excitement! Parable Planet Number Two!