Chapter 136: PB - #12 Dances with the Past
Dances with the Past
“Straight to the Église,” Miles replied, holding out his half-closed suitcase.
“I meant the keister, customer!” the machine squeaked as she grabbed the luggage as delicately as possible before zipping it up. “But I can also give you a lift. For a small fare. Off the books.”
“A fare? You’re a free robot or a trickster?”
“Both, customer!” the employee replied, tossing the bag into the bottom of her basket. “I have a three-year time-leasing contract.” She presented one of her arms, helping the pilot to mount on her bulky head.
The red menace responded angrily, puffing up his wings.
Miles wagged his finger. “No gals. You know the rules.”
“Quack!”
“No blackjack, either.”
“Quack!”
“I left you enough money for three years worth of pizzas!” Miles replied before patting one of his carrier’s shoulders. “Onward, friend. After Enceladus and Old Dodge, I need to forget my copilot’s a grumpy goose.”
“Aye, Aye, Captain!” the robot squealed.
Her heat engine roaring, she crossed the Alliance facility, skirting the empty cells where once stood the largest fleet of Auxiliaries in the Rings. Alas, the hostilities outbreak on Titan had caused many of the hunters to flee towards Jupiter or risk their scalps near Kuiper. Miles felt sorry for the poor devils who chose the second option.
A long steel aqueduct connected the astroport to the automobile ring road running on top of the high black ramparts. Below, between the meteorological towers with large twisted antennas and rusty satellite dishes, mountains of multicolored plastic waste piled up. The shredded bales and torn sails from the Plantations—those large refineries coupled with oil-to-plastic plants—slowly decomposed in the acid atmosphere. Crumb by crumb, they flake the sewage leaking from the culverts to flow towards the ever still Herschel Sea.
“Isn’t it too windy up there, customer?” asked the robot.
“So far so good,” Miles yelled. “I was afraid there would be more bugs.”
“Not many arthropods on Mimas this year. Heat waves almost wiped them all. GM-bee colonies and bird populations dangerously declined too. Earth cannot be emulated, customer. It’s like life, you only have one,” the robot concluded.
The arteries of Nouvelle Patrie first snaked between the last colonial blocks redeveloped into low-cost housing, where the workers of the oil fields and the few beachfront plantations dwelt. They later joined the concentrical neighborhoods of Belle Abeille and Chantilly with their underground shopping malls. Right after, the business district overlooked the small picturesque city center.
Wedged between the circular grid and the Herschel Sea, the peninsular historical heart of Nouvelle Patrie—once a simple Galactic Trade Company trading post and oil exploration base—resembled any 19th-century European city. Its pedestrian walkways—on which the delivery robot was allowed to drive—were paved with gray stone surrounded by facades of exposed brick and roofs of polished slate.
Miles preferred this neighborhood above all others, especially its main thoroughfare, Bourbon Avenue, with its wrought-iron balconies and colorful neon signs. However, his best memories of Nouvelle Patrie came from the Seawall, the floating district along the coast.
After asking the robot to drop off his belongings at the Hotel Monteleone—with rooms specifically reserved for Alliance officials, Miles ordered her to leave him down the avenue. There, an automated burgundy streetcar took him along the calm canals to the dike, home of Ferris wheels and cabarets.
Artificial twilight fell on Nouvelle Patrie. Unable to enjoy the sun or the warm light of Saturn because of the plastic coffin enveloping the satellite, Mimantean metropolitans followed the precalculated pattern of projectors scattered here and there on the roofs. And contrary to the well-cities around Jupiter—like Thebe—the inhabitants held to this “round-the-clock” routine. For after the hard day’s work, came the pleasures of the night.
“Have you heard the tidings?” a passenger asked Miles, handing him a newspaper. Pamphlets from the Separatist League mandating the recycling of electronic equipment for the Cause slipped through his fingers.
The passenger’s mustache stiffened to accompany his smile. “No,” he replied. “King Xiao’s dead. It happened a few months ago, thanks to you guys.” He pointed to Miles’s badge before heading for the running board as the streetcar slowed. “That’s the end of the Lost Triads throughout the system. Good riddance!”
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“Alright, pal…”
Past Chinatown, Miles got off at the terminus, at the foot of a steel cathedral converted into a cabaret, simply called l’Église—or “Church” in Solarian English. There, next to a Statue of Liberty decorated with colorful bras hanging like a wish tree’s offerings, an eloquent android harangued the new arrivals of the pleasure district.
“Tell me…” Miles asked him, pointing to the Église’s entrance. “Is the arcade still under the archways?”
“Can’t use my quarters?”
“Need to get my cash changed. Don’t pay with my FID either.”
The Alliance man smiled as he collected his tokens in the receptacle at the bottom of the android’s belly, who wished him a good evening as he lifted his bowler hat.
Stuffing the chips in the pockets of his jeans, he walked into the crowd gathering in front of the high doors of the cabaret lost in the artificial vegetation. After a few minutes of waiting in the cigarette smoke and the volutes of perfume, he entered the building.
A huge concert hall with balconies spread over five stories welcomed him. On each of the floors, bars and restaurants were packed with people—their tables and chairs oriented to enjoy the show on the main stage below. That night, a Strip Can Can dance number was especially popular. Four years earlier, Miles had seen Dolly Parton and George Michael on the same stage.
Very few bounty hunters or Alliance officials went to the Église because of the hazardous presence of culprits of all kinds. A few badge holders always wanted to zealously replenish their poker losses, and conversely, a felon often sought revenge for a loved one shot down in orbit. But the Église was a lawless turf run by the Marcello crime family, and no altercation was allowed at the risk of being thrown into the heavily polluted Herschel Sea, tarred and feathered.
Despite the distracting dancing of performers in Can Can dress and the lively pop music, he scored well again tonight, renewing his legendary mastery of video games. Alas, a surprise awaited him on the scoreboard.
“Billy Mitchell, sunshine…” replied a raspy voice behind him.
“Billy who?”
A luscious woman with apple-green irises came to put down near the control joystick her martini in which dried square-shaped olives. “A braggadocio with an unlikely tie and an equally questionable haircut. He stopped on Mimas for a whatever-local-game show and crushed most of the scores of your youth.”
“Jess…” Miles said as he recognized the blue-haired gal. On this night, she wore a plastic dress that was as plain as it was fluorescent.
The woman stroked his cheek before ordering a new drink which was served to her in less than a second by a small flying bot.
“Just dropped the anchor,” Miles retorted, inviting her to sit at a nearby table. “Dancin’ tonight? Didn’t see you on the program.”
Embarrassed, Miles hid his fingers under his sweater and readjusted his collar. “Still drinkin’ to the old times?”
“In town.”
Meanwhile, the drone filled his empty glass with gin.
“Better than upstairs, I guess,” the seductive woman sighed. With a leap, she stood up before grabbing a pack of Marlboro Menthol stuck in her suspender. She shoved a cigarette at the corner of her lips. A soldier in a gray parade uniform came to light it for her before disappearing behind a LaserTour cabinet. “You’ve been away for three years. You owe me a lot.”
“A lot of what?” Miles chuckled as he left the table to seize the menthol from her fingers.
“A lot of sex, sunshine,” she whispered through the mint green smoke. “A lot of long and sad sex.”