The Legend of the Red Swan
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Once the shooting settled with autochthonous authorities—thanks to a couple of blue bills, which had recently replaced the green dollar-credits in Separatist territories—Miles invited the Pinkerton officer, Clover Watercress, to his hotel. The detective and security guard agency lately decided to remain neutral in the conflict between the Technocracy and the Rings’ satellites. Alas, the locals’ animosity towards the mutants of Amalthea wasn’t working in the Freak-rabbit’s favor.
“Gin or carrot juice?” Miles asked as he dropped on the hotel’s kitchen table his big brown bag full of yams and Graham crackers. Reflecting on the large inox fridge’s door, Clover’s ears stuck out over the marbled island.
“Ca—carrot juice,” the Freak replied as she hopped with ease onto her stool. Still too low, she tried to crank it up, spinning on the spot without much success.
A jerky stick between the teeth, Miles went back. After uncapping an Odwalla bottle, he grabbed the copper-plated lever between his guest’s short legs. With two or three powerful strokes, he settled the tiny mutant. “What you’re drinkin’ looks awful,” he said before opening a closet to take out a Cuisinart. Peeler at hand, he started removing the sweet potatoes’ thin skin. “There’s probably not a single real vegetable in there.”
“You think you got meat in your industrial jerky, sir?”
“Don’t call me ‘sir’...”
“Alright, Mr. Villanueva.”
“Mr. Villanueva’s my pop. I’m Miles.”
“Sorry.” From the back pocket of her jean shorts, the Freak pulled out a small blue baggie. “Your snack’s all nutrigel with a little sweetener and hella a lot of preservatives.”
With a flick of her tooth, Clover opened the sturdy plastic bag and poured into his glass the content before stirring the thickening purple substance.
“What a Pinkerton Freak’s doing this far from her Jovian moon?” Miles inquired, stuffing the first potato into the masher.
“Not all Freaks hole up on Amalthea.”
“You from Mars?” he asked, still peeling.
“Ceres. I was in the Techno-Police. I joined the Pinkerton a year back.”
“Ceres? The station made the news two years ago. Somethin’ about a mess at an auction. Data-cartels were involved, right?”
“Tell me about it… A bangtail from the Military Police tried to bust a data-thief, and it ended up a total fiasco. Largely because of bounty hunters from the Alliance—those who crawled their hump with King Xiao, and made the news again two weeks ago.”
“Don’t know them famous hunters,” Miles replied. Plugging the masher, he reached for some cinnamon spray above the stove. “Still impressive.”
“Nigel Hemingwest was also involved in this boondoggle on Ceres. He got apparently stapled in the process.”
“That English looney?” he reacted, his head back in the giant fridge. “That’s why his brothers were on their way to the belt. This is going to be very gnarly.”
“Indeed. I feel sorry for the coffee boilers in the Ceres office if the whole family turns up for revenge.”
“Toss me two eggs, please.”
“The Alliance should learn to control their bulldogs…” grumbled Clover as she finished her juice. Using her gun’s grip, she reached for the egg rack and brought it closer. “What’s your deal with a bounty hunting agency, by the way? Last time I checked, Miles Villanueva used to race a crimson-painted marvel called the Red Swan over Canyon Creek.” She paused. “And died in it. On live TV.”
“I look like a ghost to you?”
“No. Absolutely not! Sorry…” she apologized. “It was a good time. Back in those days, my mum didn’t miss a single Jovian Grand Prix.”
Miles had poured a glass of milk and a spoon of cornstarch in the automated smasher. Skillfully jungling with the eggs, his hand froze above the chrome button when Clover mentioned his past. “A good time, indeed.”
The Forlorn pilot turned around, and glued together the crushed Grahams with some butter-in-a-can into a rhodium-circled ceramic plate. Afterwards he spread the cinnamon-smelling mash into the latter, and gently pushed the pie into a Quick-Oven beneath the stove.
As he threw the plastic wrappings and the eggs’ shells into the trash, Miles let his eyes wander to the restaurant room. To the left of the empty tables, a few arcades and a pinball machine occupied the area around the bar. Until that day, he never noticed the recognizable pachinko machine. A cabinet almost identical to the one on Enceladus rested under a dusty case.
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Reaching into the back pocket of his pants, the Alliance man made his way to the Japanese terminal—not without helping himself a gin pint at the closest tap. The steel ball rolled in his free hand. But he wouldn’t need it. As on the frozen moon, a small bucket of its congeners awaited a never-coming player, hanging on the handle.
“Have I offended you?” Clover asked as she dragged a chair over to him. “I apologize then, Mr. Villanueva—I mean, Miles.”
“That’s all right…” the pilot responded as he blew off a first yellow-tinted metal marble.
Clover watched him, and gasped when, once inserted, the ball triggered some old Japanese pop music and a few multicolored LEDs forming the silhouette of a bird on the game board. “Far be it from me to—” She sneezed as dust pulsed from the speakers. “Sorry.”
“Gesundheit.”
“Thanks.” She went on, rubbing her runny nose: “Far be it from me to mess with a local legend…”
The rookie Pachinko player heaved. “That man’s just Miles today. The Swan crashed and burned after a happy little incident,” he replied, patting his artificial organ under his yellow sweater.
Clover’s ears perked up, and she giggled. “Those rednecks weren’t astounded by ‘just Miles’ but Miles ‘Red Swan’ Villanueva. Because you’ve collected just as many SASCAR trophies as I have litter brothers and sisters…”
The Alliance man’s marble ended up in the largest of the holes in the base. The machine chirped Chopin’s Funeral March to mock him. As he introduced a new ball of black and white color which didn’t have more success, he said: “That’s ancient history.”
“Sorry to bother you.” Clover put a hand on his shoulder. “You saved my tail—and I’m—”
“Don’t you worry.”
Gauging the marbles remaining in the bottom of his basket, Miles noticed that it was almost empty. Fortunately, the sweet smell of the potato pie baking reached his nose and cheered him up.
“What brings you so far to Plasticland after Ceres?” Miles asked as he played a white marble. “Is Pinkerton aware a Freak is no better than a runaway robot in the Rings?”
Clover’s nose wiggled. “A personal matter.”
As the white ball plunged to its end, Miles finished his drink. “Is it?”
“You must have access to the registry, no? As an…” she looked at his brass badge where a drop of alcohol landed. “... Administrative Assistant.”
“Yes.”
“Do you know a varmint called Miguel Francisco Moreno?”
Miles shrugged, grabbing another green marble. The last ball in the basket.
“Better known as ‘Poncho’.”
He played his final steel ball and cocked the lever. “Never heard of him.”
“His bounty’s way below King Xiao or the Data-Maiden.” Her nose wiggled again. Clover seemed to have this tic when anger gripped her heart. “C$135,000. C$135,000 for the bastard who killed my sister.”
The spring relaxed, the ball ricocheted off the first few pins.
“Sorry about that.”
“You mean?”
“Your sister—this guy would be here? Around Saturn? How dangerous?”
“He’s a raving lunatic not afraid of joining the Universal Matrix or whatever the tin cans call the afterlife.”
The green ball bounced over the void.
“Android? What would he be doin’ around here with an army on the streets and such a tempting bounty?”
“He’s a hired gun,” Clover uttered.
Miles has become really good at the arcade game. The ball fell into one of the tiny baskets on the side. Yet nothing happened. He had lost all his marbles but the pink one from Enceladus.
“The samurai’s right. These machines are pure evil,” Miles complained. His glass was empty. “Sorry—your boy should join the Cause. He could kill all the Technos he wants without worryin’ about his bounty goin’ up. He’d be protected, and get all the latest Entertech toys on the market.”
“You too have noticed the soldiers are well equipped for an army of hicks. You’d almost think they’d win their rebellion.”
“Poor idiots believe so,” said Miles, standing up. Before he could reach the metal ball in his back pocket, a cough fit bent him in half
“Are you alright?” Clover asked.
“The pie’s ready,” Miles spat. “May Darwin bless the Quick-Ovens and their radioactive heart.”
The Alliance man took out the pink pachinko marble. After drunkenly examining it for a long time, he put it back in his pocket before getting up and leaning on the metallic frame of the arch. Stretching his numb legs, he put away the chair used by the rabbit after she jumped to the ground.
“I’m sorry I can’t stay for the pie,” Clover told him once they reached the kitchen. Sadness and pity made her eyes gleamed.
Unaware, Miles poured himself another drink. “You sure?”
“I need to catch a shuttle for Albiorix. Poncho would be hiding out there.”
“I understand. Well, good luck with your revenge, Clover.”
This one shook his hand, but less firmly than at the time of their meeting one hour earlier. “Aren’t your Administrative Assistant’s spirit interested in a little bounty hunting? Looks like some fresh air could do you some good.”
“There is no fresh air on Mimas nor the rest of the Rings, Clover.” Miles smiled ruefully as he tucked his hands under his yellow sweater.
Clover pouted and the tips of ears fell onwards. She then silently left the room.