A dimly lit, smoke filled bar. The old-fashioned, generic music intertwined and mixed with the occupants' whispers and the clattering of machinery coming from the thick station walls created a feverish cacophony. Reclined and slouched, Jason rested with his right hand elbow on the table closest to the exit, his left folded over his stomach. His mouth was slightly agape and his eyes were fixated at a malfunctioning neon sign flickering on the wall in front of him, at the opposite side of the station's corridor-promenade. He was alone. His unkempt hair and beard, dark circles under, and a dead look in his eyes suggested he preferred it that way.
On a night like this, and many others, this was his preferred haunt. Here he would pound away at, firstly, beer, then whiskey, then anything else he could think of. What is life, after all, without a little variety - he thought. Almost like that of a stroke victim, his open mouth slowly deformed into a half-smile, his dead eyes blinked, and his weary head turned away from the neon sign. He turned clumsily, with his chair squeaking as he dragged it across the floor. His hands plopped onto the table, and his head swayed for a moment as he tried to observe the other patrons around him, who seemed more like animate shadows than human beings at this juncture. He was past the whiskey stage, and the beer stage he couldn't even recall. He let his head fall onto the table, and onto his arms. He closed his eyes.
The staring contest with the sign left an afterimage, dancing up and down under his closed eyelids, to the tune of his drunk mind. It was burned into his retina, much like the afterimage he tried to avoid through all of this. The one burned to the back of his head, the one coming out in dreams both waking and nightly. He stared at his fair share of light-bulbs, neon signs and flames, but he never dreamed that the flame of a dying world, his dying world would be branded onto his subconscious. That it would follow him, seemingly, for all time. Go to a therapist, his friends and colleagues advised. Go ***** yourselves, he advised back, and kept repeating until they ***** off - for good.
The afterimage faded as he lifted his head, the room dancing up and down in a vertigo. He reached for his glass, but he knocked it over, the liquid spilling onto and off the table.
He got up unsteadily. It was time for bed. There were no phases after this one, this is the one that makes it fade.
A beeping filled his ears. He jerked to consciousness. His head was heavy, his mouth dry and foul tasting. And his eyes, owing to his habit of sleeping with them wide open, were bloodshot and sore. He squinted and groaned as he rotated his head slowly, trying to identify where he was and when he was. Through the haze he made out the slightly unkempt, dark interior, with delicate electronics, discarded items and pulsating lights. He was seated reclined in a leather seat, and gazing upwards, forcing his eyes open through agonizing dryness he made out an engraved brass plaque above the cockpit window - "Agent J. A. Cox, Poltergeist".
The dreadful beeping that woke him intensified, ringing in his ears and picking at his skull like a ravenous vulture. He jumped up, but was pulled right back with an onset of vertigo. He forced himself up, this time slowly, swaying left and right and running his hands over the control panel, trying desperately to shut it off. He managed to turn off the cockpit blinds, start the air conditioning and jettison some rations before he finally landed his finger on the alarm control switch. He slumped back towards his chair, and dropped beside it. He scowled as he rubbed his eyes and ran his hand through his messy hair and beard, retching from the foul alcoholic aftertaste; Courtesy of the night before. His eyes slowly returned to focus, and he set them towards the ship's window.
The removed blinders revealed a swarm of asteroids buzzing by, and the glare of a sun filtering through them. The ship was on autopilot. To where and why, he couldn't recall. He sat on the floor, resting his head on the side of his seat.
"Computer. Current location and destination." He spoke with a coarse voice.
"We are currently travelling the Kiribati Asteroid Field. Plotted course: Omicron Minor, Planet Toledo." Jason winced as the female-voiced computer replied. "Redirect?" The computer added shortly after.
"Yes..." He cleared his throat and propped himself back into the seat. "Set course for Freeport Eleven."
Pulling into the hangar and settling onto the force field as if on a cushion, the Poltergeist creaked. Time had worn down the tried and tested fighter, and Jason contemplated a visit to the mechanic. But other needs brought him to this "Freeport" in the outer Omicrons, irrational desires of the soul, and everything else had to take a backseat. It is only here, under the noses of the increasingly paranoid, yet increasingly corruptible security staff, that what he looked for could be found. He departed his ship, and fixing his worn jacket's hood over his head, he moved into the station's interior.
The corridors and chambers, though not exactly exactly empty, were practically deserted in comparison to what the station was years prior. The paranoia and the oppressive fear of alien attacks hung like a cloud in the air. The faces of the passerby, those who remain in spite of everything, looked hollow and deprived of hope. Few looked his way as he moved into, over, and down into the lower levels where the object of his desire resided.
"ICTU OCULI - PORTABLE XENOBIOTICS DETECTORS - NOW ONLY 355 SC PER UNIT." - An advert sounded as a holographic projection of the supposed infectee detection device appeared on the station promenade walls, the visage of the beautiful woman holding the object shone neon bright over a staircase leading down. He paused for a moment, observing the advert as it played out - the happiness on her face like a cruel parody of consumerism trying to squeeze out the last drops of profit from the constant misery. He let out a sour chuckle, readjusted his clothes and went ahead and down.
Traipsing through the lower levels, the tone shifted. Here, the same misery resided, just without any pretense of false of hope. No fresh coat of paint over the blood. Just the gritty reality of constant threat of death, the accompanying poverty and the occupants' will to survive in spite of it. At any cost. The graffiti filled walls of the poorly illuminated, trash-filled corridors were like a maze filled with street urchins - but all lead to the same place. The back-alleys and dead-end marketplaces where what he wanted could be found.
Arriving at one such spot, Jason scanned his surroundings, looking for any sign of the locals. A certain less-than-reputable 'entrepreneur' was supposed to meet him here, to deliver the thing he traveled all this way for. Half an hour, one, one and a half. Nothing. He tapped his foot idly while scowling, growing more infuriated by the minute as he courted the possibility of having to leave empty-handed. Footsteps, he winced and turned around.
"Got the creds?" - A youthful voice inquired. Turning around to meet it, he was greeted with a silhouette of a thin, tall man, followed by equally thin but comparably shorter shades. Eyes darting from one to other, he struggled to make them out, but to no avail. As they got closer, the entourage stopped behind, the apparent leader walking the final stretch alone.
"Oh man, I thought this was charity tuesday, my bad." - Jason replied sarcastically through his teeth. Tapping his left jacket pocket he nodded his head upwards in a questioning motion. "Took you long enough. You got the stuff?"
"Princess doesn't like to wait, huh?" - The young man snapped. - "This ain't your comfy military base. These are the bowels of the 11. You Order types think everything's gotta bend your way."
"What's that supposed to mean?" - Jason crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes.
Stepping into direct light, the young man revealed his scarred and pale face, his right eye missing. Attached to his belt a bag with nondescript contents. Jason locked his eyes on the bag immediately. - "It means you want everything served to you without lifting a damn finger. You take but you don't give nothing back"
"That's ***** and you know it - Do you know how much we sac-" Lifting his gaze from the bag, Jason tried to finish his sentence but was interrupted.
"You know what though? I think you gotta taste your own medicine." - The dealer continued, taking up what he considered an intimidating stance, his entourage scuffling slowly towards him. "We could just take everything you have. And why shouldn't we."
Jason took a deep breath, his arms untangled and dropped down to his waist. He shook his head in an almost pleading way, glancing to the man in front of him, the approaching figures and the satchel. Aiming to utter a warning, his breath was cut short as he spotted a glitter in the darkness emerging from one of the figures, then another, then another. With automated instinct, he reached for his belt, pulling out the blaster and unloading all in one quick and fluid motion. His hand pointed from one to the other like in a pre programmed motion, the flashes of laser fire illuminating their targets for split seconds after each shot. Faces agonized and bewildered, falling down one by one. His hand was pointing and rhythmically squeezing the trigger long after they all dropped, and long after the powercell was exhausted.
Silence reached his conscious mind at last. The churning of the station's bowels and the electrical sparks from the shot-through circuitry the only sensory input. Stopping and putting the gun down shakily he inhaled a deep breath, and winced in pain shortly after. Lifting up his pockmarked jacket, he saw the offending area - his right abdomen edge, grazed and shot clear through - the wound already partly cauterized. He uttered an expletive through his teeth and moved towards the scene of carnage, holding the area with his free hand.
Inspecting them one by one, their forms and faces illuminated periodically by electrical sparking, he realized most of them weren't even what you could consider men. All street urchins of various teenage ages. All dead, eyes glazed over, riddled with laser fire. His laser fire. He stood among them for a dozen long seconds, eyes blankly shifting from one to the others - not moving an inch, but still clutching the lowered gun. Cold sweat rolled down his forehead. A sound broke through his daze. A wheezing breath, and he turned around on his heels to face it.
One of them, impaled on a broken pipe through his abdomen, next to a bundle of broken wires shooting red sparks. He limped towards him with as much speed as he could muster. He reached towards him, and grabbed the pipe, as if to somehow help him. But too late. He sighed his last breath through his blood filled mouth. He retracted his bloodied hand. He dropped his gun, his knees buckled. A pouch on his belt attracted his attention. He reached inside automatically, removing a few tiny glass vials. Miniature droplets of precious purple fluid - The Nox - the object of his desire, small enough to fit into his palm.
He dropped to his knees in front of his last victim, the vials clutched in his hand. The rhythmic crackling illuminated the wall above him, upon which the graffiti read:
"In the night
In the bowels
Misery sticks like blood."