Chapter 1 Part Six- The Low Meeting
Dallas Morgan looked at the door to the hab as he approached. It was a normal little living place for the area; maybe half-a-thousand square feet and a second floor. Dingy and grungy, this was the kind of neighborhood where few strangers walked and near none visited.
Dallas was one of those people. And he liked that fine and wanted to keep it that way.
The graffiti on the walls and door, the shadows covering the hab in the darkness, the way the hab was detached from its neighbors on the left and right when so many other habs were joined along the street in long, snaky lines of little hab-houses, and the iron fences around the hab’s door made it obvious as an ancient neon sign: this place is mal. It was mal in ways less than easily defined, but mal nonetheless.
Dallas looked back at his guide. After a few minutes of walking through the slummy area, he’d realized what looked like a hardened street-level criminal was actually just a boy, no more than fifteen or sixteen EY’s old.
“What?” he said as Dallas had looked at him. The kid’s scraggly black hair, thick dark eyebrows and skinny frame held up a raggedy coat that had once been nice-looking and perhaps expensive, but now was as patched and cobbled together as the area itself.
Pater never mentioned this part of the city, Dallas thought to himself. Something should be done about this. Buildings should be fixed up, maybe some taxes lowered so people could start businesses if they can’t get jobs…
Now the kid was looking at Dallas, waiting for an answer. “You like living here?” Dallas asked him as they approached the door to the hab.
“It’s here,” the kid mumbled. “I been here my whole life. I heard about other places in school, but this is where I’ll be.”
“Whatddya think about the Earl, Texas Morgan?”
“Who?”
“Who?” Dallas asked, “Who? The man who runs- owns everything here!”
“I don’t think about him at all. I’m too busy getting stuff to eat, paying bills, and not getting caught. We’re here.”
“Who’s Pipe, anyway?” Dallas asked.
The boy looked at Dallas with an expression reserved for people devoid of social skills asking a popular girl to a social function. Or maybe reminding a superior that an inspection was supposed to happen. “Pipe? You don’t know Pipe?”
It was Dallas’ turn to give a blank stare.
“Pipe’s the guy everything in this part of town flows through,” the kid said. “Don’t you guys know anything in the upper levels?”
“Seems we don’t.”
“Listen, you’re here, and that means I did my job. Go up to the door and go in when it opens. I’m leaving soon as you get in”
“Don’t I have to knock first?”
“He already knows you’re here.”
“Really? How do I know he’ll see me?”
“If he wouldn’t, he’d have sent his goons out and we’d both be dead and soaking up the rainwater in the gutter.”
****
“Again, Cutter.”
The words came out through gritted teeth, which were visible under the rim of a lowered black riot visor and only six inches from the terrified face of the young tough that had been threatening Dallas only a quarter hour before.
“He- he’s going to Pipe. You know where that is!”
“Say it again,” said the gendarme, his leather-gloved hand curling the ragged shirt under Cutter’s coat. “This time, speak loud enough that the recorder will pick it up.”
“Buddha, gen! He’s - his is the hab that’s separated from the others, maybe a ten minute walk that way.”
“And why’d he know to go that way, Cutter?”
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“I sent him. With one’a my boys.”
“You sent the heir of the Earl of Morgan with only one punk kid as an escort through the worst part of town?”
“For the fourth frazzin’ time! I didn’t know he was the heir! I thought he was just some rich kid slumming with a tooled-up laser sword in his pocket! I sent Bogs with him so he could scoop up the sword if someone else dusted the guy.”
The gendarme let go, looked slightly away from his prey and touched the side of his visor. ‘Ja get that?” he mumbled. Hearing a single syllable of assent, he looked back at Cutter. “Aright, get lost for now, Cutter. Go back to your little crew, but don’t go far.”
Cutter didn’t need to be told twice. In one second he was a dozen feet away from his interrogation. In three seconds he’d disappeared down an alley, already concocting a false narrative for his ‘boys’ about how he’d eluded capture after intimidating the officer who’d cornered him.
The gendarme looked over at his vehicle, already humming as its engines began powering up. As he got in he barely looked up as another car flew silently overhead, its anti-grav engines glowing as four glowing circles underneath, angled slightly away from its direction of travel as it hummed towards its destination.
****
Dallas walked towards the door of the hab, wondering why it was separated from its neighbors. The city of New Avalon was under a quasi-dome field, and in the unlikely event the dome-field flickered out, poor habs were connected to one another to share heat at night and be close to neighbors. The ultimate sign of wealth and independence was to have a hab that was separate from the other habs around you, showing you had no need for help, and could afford the space around you.
Dallas hadn’t ever seen a completely detached hab outside of his family’s upper class district on any trip he’d taken with his friends to the lower levels of the city. And he’d never seen this particular place at all. He approached cautiously, trying to be alert to his surroundings with his hand holding the currently doused swordhilt of his grandfather. When the hab door silently slid open at his approach, he almost jumped out of his skin.
“Come in, Dallas,” said a voice from inside. “I think I can help you.”
Dallas kept walking. Stepping across the threshold, he was suddenly out of the quiet, mild night and inside a hab where the walls were lined with glowing screens. Some showed graphs of lines or bar charts that were constantly adjusting in response to a stream of information below. Other screens showed street corners that were either silent and dead or vibrant with ongoing activities ranging from singing drunks to attempts to break into buildings. Other monitors showed old vid-runs of films that Dallas remembered his parents watching when he was a little boy, and some showed the talking heads of officials and others chatting on what they thought were private lines, while their thought-to-be-private words streamed in typewritten text below their speaking heads.
“I’m glad you made it here, Dallas,” said a voice from down the hall. “Even gladder you made it without killing anyone on the way. Kept attention from me, which is what I want the most in my line of work.”
“Where are you?” Dallas said.
“You won’t see me. I’m elsewhere. What can I do for the heir of the House of Morgan?”
“You know who I am?”
“I knew who you were as soon as you took your family’s sword and left your Pater’s office building.”
Dallas paused, then spoke freely. “You’re good.”
“I’m the best. On this world, anyway. Too bad it’s only a mid-size one, but that also means the tech’s a little easier to figure out.”
“Aren’t you worried about getting caught?”
“Nope. Most of the time your Pater’s friend Chief Inspector Kai and his gendarmes don’t even know something’s been done. Lately I’ve been having fun trying to commit crimes they don’t have laws against yet.”
“Clever. I bet you could help me today.”
“I believe I could. But belief is a cloud. Facts are cold hard earth. What is it you want from me? I assume your brother sent you?”
“Don’t you know that already?”
“He’s the only person smart enough to hide from me when he wants to. What is it you seek?”
“I need help stealing money so I can get off this rock.”
“Your Pater’s?”
No. My own.”
****
“Chief inspector?”
“Report, Gendarme.”
“A local’s just given us a lead on D-er, on the quarry, sir. He’s headed for the address I’m sending…now.
Chief Inspector Kai looked carefully at the address that popped up on his wrist scanner. He closed his eyes briefly, sighed, and straightened his back. “Send a code T to Lieutenant Lancer. He’s to assemble…no, scramble a tac squad. Get them out there, now. Yesterday. I’ll meet them at the site.”
“Yes, sir,” said the gendarme, the fear evident in his voice. He was new, but he knew that tone from his superior meant that Kai was going to analyze every action, thought, jot and tittle of every officer within a mile of the target. No promotions were going to be offered, but demotions and consequences were going to flow to each and every officer on this assignment for each and every error that they committed.
Kai tapped his wrist. The glowing green screen and its flowing lines of text went blank. “Theotokos, preserve us,” he mumbled to himself as he walked back to his transport. “Don’t you dare do what I think you’re going to do, young Dallas. Or you shall quite likely be dead, and I shall be underemployed.”