Chapter Twenty-One
Moonbeam had always been a rebel without any cause other than destruction, it had made him the cancer of Utopia, it had gotten him resurrected from the grave by a demon who saw potential and it had allowed him to blaze his way across the galaxy to Concord Dawn, home to millions of alien species passing by, the greasy truck stop of the Universe, a planet-wide Las Vegas.
So what is there to do for a rebellious teen away from home? Get a tattoo.
It was the idea half-formed in his mind when he'd shoved the posse inside the taxi-craft this morning, they had stolen credits to blow, why not do something to bring the happy family closer?
The closest was a little place between replicant brothel and a greasy fast food restaurant for plant life forms, it looked liked any other human tattoo parlour in the system to him, extravagant designs filled the dirty windows.
Inside was the same story, tattoo designs covered every wall, grungy in a colourful kind of way, just clean enough to pass government regulations, the tattoo artist was the big difference compared to any in the human system, a bright red octopus-like creature easily the size of a human; it had dozens of tentacles, some thick as human thighs, others longer and whip-like.
Near the top of the bulbous body area was a huge mouth filled with clean straight teeth that looked like a horse's only larger, three light orange eyes with a slit of sky-blue in each read the newspaper he was holding, two very small horns jutted from his forehead.
He bore one distinctive mark of a tattoo artist no matter the species, he was highly decorated himself, strange designs ran down his bulk, bleeding skulls and burning dice, alien women in suggestive poses, the word MOM inside a heart decorated the top of his left dominant tentacle.
He spotted them after a moment and swallowed what looked like a mouthful of seaweed-jerky, "What can do you for?" It rumbled, the creature's voice was bowel-tremblingly deep.
"Name's David Moonbeam, want some tattoos for me and for my posse."
"Ratnim-Sculuck-Broadback, you've come to the right place, got something in mind?"
When Moonbeam had left he had, the symbol he'd used briefly for the Moon Beam Posse during his first shot at life, a human skull inset by a crescent moon symbol, but like many things it had now seemingly slipped his sieve-like memory by.
"We'll just look a..." He started to say when he saw the barcode symbol; it was nothing special certainly, just a black and white barcode being licked by cartoon flames, "That one." He pointed to it without thought.
Ratnim's eyes followed the finger to the barcode, "Heh heh." He growled a laugh, "That's usually a droid tattoo, reads 666 under their scanners." This didn't seem to make an impression of any sort on Moonbeam; his posse backed him, impassive looks on each face. "Alright what difference it make? Dats the one you want sure thing."
A minute later Dave was sitting on a large white table with his shirt off, Ratmin was holding a small electric device that looked like a cross between a fountain pen and a very tiny harpoon, "Where you want it?"
"Here." Moonbeam clapped the side of his right bicep, "Same for them." There were no objections, Ratmin thought the whole set up was a little weird himself but kept quiet and went to work.
The alien tattooing process didn't hurt, it itched like steel wool being brushed lightly against the skin but didn't feel anything like the human method, confirmed by Taz, Roach and Siggs who all had tattoos already.
"I didn't know you had one." Roach rasped to Siggs, "Where is it?"
"Bet you'd love to know." Siggs teased.
"You show me yours I'll show you mine."
Siggs was the last and Ratmin finished up when the towering Fornsmith lumbered through the door and bellowed for Broadback.
He was a conehead was what Moonbeam noticed with quite some amusement, like in that comedy with Dan Ackroyd, Only this one was the Hulk Hogan of all Coneheads, about 8-foot tall and so broad he had to go through the door sideways.
A grey beard went with a human mouth and nose but the eyes, he had six, where a human's would be bulged red globes the size of tennis balls, a little further up the cone of his head glittered blue eyes that looked like rare gems and near the top were two small green ones, the size of marbles.
"I just wanna get just one skull in before I have to leave on business again." The posse assumed he was talking about on his right arm, it was coated with skull tattoos joined by swirling black patterns, there were at least forty skulls up and down that huge, beefy, arm, varying sizes and species were evident.
"Another job well done Jupiter?" Ratmin bellowed back.
"Well enough to be added to the arm of fame." Jupiter replied, it dawned on the posse, this Fornsmith was a bounty hunter, and this could be a bit of a problem for them as the flavour of the mouth bounty.
Jupiter had a sidearm the size of a sawn-off shotgun and a collection of blades on his belt, when he went to sit he shifted uncomfortably, a huge laser-blaster was strapped to his back.
His arm wasn't his only trophy, several dry flaps that looked suspiciously like the ears of several different species hung off his hunting vest, around his neck was an enormous tooth, to the posse it looked like something tore out of a T-rex's mouth from Earth's ancient past.
Rachel paid Ratmin, Moonbeam considered what to do, they might be able to sneak away, not draw the bounty hunters attention, but...It had been a slow couple of days.
He strode up to the giant conehead, "Morning" He said pleasantly.
"Mornin'." Grunted the bounty hunter offhandedly, he looked away for a moment but drew back to the cheerful human, all three pairs of eyes squinted at Moonbeam thoughtfully, he shook a huge finger at him.
"I know you from somewhere, don't I?" He asked, Moonbeam remained silent.
Jupiter's finger shook more violently as he spoke "Yeah, Moonbeam, David Moonbeam." Red eyes glanced to the posse, blue scanned the room but the small green ones stayed locked on Dave.
Surprisingly fast for a big guy he grabbed at his sidearm, Moonbeam reached under his jacket for his MiniUzi, the posse went for their own weapons.
A shot rang out, as shots are wont to do.
Chapter Twenty-Two
"Freeze! Or the next one goes into one of youse!" Yelled Ratnim, the Fornsmith and the posse froze and turned slowly to the octopus creature clutching the Dracon scattergun. "Alright, it's cool, it's cool, just, just take it outside." Ratnim's rumbling deep voice was tripping over itself repeating.
Jupiter and Moonbeam sized up Ratnim and then each other, "Sure thing Ratnim old buddy." Jupiter muttered.
The Fornsmith was just that extra bit faster than Moonbeam to his trigger, Moonbeam rolled while red light blasted into the wall behind him, Roach pulled a sawn-off and shot Jupiter, a ragged hole appeared in the hunting vest and skin below, he grimaced as the buckshot ripped into his skin but didn't even falter.
Ratnim aimed his gun for Rachel as she pulled her Uzi, she saw him and dived just in time to avoid a shot that would've have wiped her out at point-blank range, she lost the Uzi however and it skittered out of her reach, she went crawling when a whip-thin cord of muscle coiled around her leg and pulled her backwards under the watchful eye of Ratnim's scattergun.
The small tattoo parlour meanwhile had been turned into an impossibly concentrated battle ground, unable to get more accurate shots off in such a confined space bullets and laser whizzed by everywhere like an angry swarm of attacking bees.
A laser bolt lifted Moonbeam off his feet and sent him crashing into a wall, pain arched through his body, there was a hole in him somewhere but this wasn't the time to worry about it.
Siggs' Star Z-84 let off short bursts of bullets, Jupiter swung a fist and broke her nose, she flipped through the air like a gymnast's move and crashed to the floor, Roach went to reload his gun and was grabbed and shoved through the parlour's front window, the glass shattered and twinkled all around him as he landed bone-jarringly on the pavement at the feet of a very confused Na.
"Misspelled a bikie's tattoo." Roach told the confused alien and went about reloading.
A bullet from Moonbeam's gun turned Jupiter's side arm into a twisted hunk of metal, Jupiter jumped from the window, barrelling past Roach and grabbed at the laser-blaster on his back.
Rachel pounded fist after fist into Ratnim who didn't seem sure wether to keep her hostage or kill her outright, Taz reloaded the clips of his 45's and started shooting again, the bullets not having the desired effect on the big fleshy creature, he was knocked away by a swinging tentacle.
Moonbeam gave chase out the window, Roach tripped him up just before lasers turned the air to flame where Moonbeam had just been, they rolled along the ground with blasts tearing up the ground behind them.
Siggs appeared in the window and stopped Jupiter with a couple of short blasts across his chest, the giant roared in frustration. The lower half of Siggs' face was a mask of blood from her broken nose.
Jupiter ran back and kept them guessing with laser fire.
Inside the parlour tentacles whipped and bullets flew, Rach was wrapped in Ratmin's grasp and didn't like the way he was leering at her, a lucky shot from Taz caught Ratnim in the eye and he roared in pain.
In his moment of distraction Rachel wrapped her hands around the barrel of his scatter gun and pulled it away from him, eye bleeding profusely he gave it up unknowingly, she grabbed the handle and jammed the barrel right between Ratnim's giant horse teeth till the poor bastard had the barrel half-way down his throat.
She pulled the trigger and the back of his head exploded in shower of blue goo that painted the wall behind him, Ratnim moaned softly, swayed drunkenly and collapsed over on his counter, dead with a hole in the back of him big enough to put a foot in.
Rachel untangled herself and grabbed the credits she'd paid for the tattoos with, "Sorry, we weren't entirely satisfied."
Moonbeam's shoulders cracked on the subway station floor, Jupiter rolled over him, crushing him for a second, both had lost their guns some where on the long roll down the stairs, Jupiter stumbled to his feet, Moonbeam lashed out with a kick just below the knee, a normal human wouldn't have made a mark, Moonbeam buckled the knee and it nearly dislocated, Jupiter fell once again.
In sync with one another Roach and Siggs were rushing down the stairs shooting, buckshot and bullets pounded the Fornsmith and the concrete ground around him.
Jupiter managed to pull himself up, thick green blood dripped from him, he was amazingly resilient, by human standards impossibly so, he had more holes in him than a whiffle ball and still he lived and fought.
A blade whistled past Moonbeam's head, Jupiter was taking cover beneath the stairs, "Man oh man!" He yelled, "I got a special spot on my arm for all of youse."
He reached up the stair with a powerful arm and grabbed Roach's leg, a sick crack cut through the air and Roach roared, Jupiter let him go and he fell down off the stairs at Jupiter's feet with only one leg to support him, the other, while still attached was clearly broken.
"You son of a whore!" Screamed Siggs, she tried to fire only to be swatted off the stairs and onto the concrete ground, blearily and unarmed Jupiter grabbed her for a human shield, he looked like King Kong with a cursing, redheaded Fay Wray in his grasp.
The towering conehead laughed, all eyes glittering with malice, down the tunnel a subway train rumbled and Jupiter edged over to the track, keeping all eyes on Moonbeam, "Subway's right on time, very fortunate." Grasping Siggs by the neck he held her over the track as easily as if she were made of matches, "Just another job for Ratnim." He said.
"Ratnim's dead, bitch." Said a voice behind him, "and so are you." Rachel pumped the dracon scattergun and blew a hole in Jupiter's back.
The surprised Fornsmith dropped Siggs onto the track and dropped to one knee, he turned to this new threat, Rachel was standing their with the gun she'd stolen from the late Ratnim-Schluck-Broadback, she was flanked by Taz who stared with dead eyes at the cowering Bounty Hunter.
She shot again and green blood blossomed from his chest, she pumped and shot, pumped and shot and Jupiter crumbled onto the subway tracks, next to the panting Siggs, the rumbling down the tunnel getting louder all the time.
Siggs leapt to her feet, "Asshole, we really could've had something, something beautiful." Using him like a step she jumped from the Fornsmith's bulk onto the platform.
Jupiter, hurt but far from dead pulled himself up just in time to see the train bearing down, "Ooh shii...!"
Green, syrupy blood slapped Moonbeam's grinning face, without even noticing he burst into wild peals of laughter, "Never, ever fuck with Moonbeam's girl." He managed to mutter before he started roaring again.
Siggs looked up from where she'd tripped into Roach's hard face, grimacing with the pain from his broken leg, blood coated the back of her shirt and stuck in her hair, a drop of goo slowly slide down her cheek, "Fuck! Look at this shit in my hair!"
Roach forgot his pain for a moment, actually he thought, the slime seemed to go rather well with her red hair and matched her emerald eyes nicely, that or his brain was a little rattled from the fall, either way he started laughing to match Moonbeam, Siggs put her forehead to his and laughed along with him.
By the track the train slowed and stopped, a bulging Fornsmith arm, ripped from its socket, slapped onto the platform, covered in tattoos and clenched in a fist.
Chapter Twenty-Three
That night the posse celebrated in their latest find, a club named 'The Screeching Yotsaw' popular with the local mafia big shots, of course when given the opportunity the posse would gladly party wether they had something to celebrate or not.
Roach and Siggs played a drinking game with a Roppiss named, strangely, Rover and a short Nephran Moonbeam didn't know, despite spending the better part of the day in a healing tank and having his leg as good as new Dave saw Roach still subconsciously favoured the right one when it was his turn to get the next round.
Taz talked to a Caprician mafia-groupie in one corner, the Caprician's were a refreshingly human-looking species with blue dreadlock hair, pale skin and eyes that were a fierce yellow, Taz seemed not to notice the way she rubbed his arm and smiled flirtatiously.
Moonbeam sat in the corner, a pint of Hawjabran ale in one hand and a joint in the other, Rach pressed herself at his side, she plucked the Silmarillion joint from his fingers nimbly and perched it between her own ruby-red lips.
"How about you and me go back to the ship and have a little celebration of our own?" She suggested.
Moonbeam grinned, "Babe, raging Fornsmith's couldn't fuckin stop me."
Meanwhile at 'Our Mother of Glanggloxxanill Hospital' The aging Na hospital director Fnar Kinscher lead the jittery group of interns away from the hit-and-run victim Nephran.
The interns talked softly but excited between themselves, fresh meat the lot of them and this was their first night in intensive care, Fnar had seen a lot of interns go by in his time and from this group of eight he saw potential in maybe two of them, bah! Were interns this incompetent when he'd started out? He didn't think so but maybe he himself had been to naive to notice, he doubted that personally but anything was possible.
"Next we have with us quite a celebrity." He told the excitable idiots that were this hospital's hope for the future, "Jupiter Dranz, maybe some of you have heard of him?"
A thrill went through the interns and they stood in shocked silence as they looked down on the expansive and unconscious figure of the Fornsmith Bounty Hunter.
"Wow, is that really him?" A Roppiss named Rrrahan asked slack-jawed, stupid question thought Fnar, even covered with healing patches and missing his best-known feature, his heavily tattooed arm, and three eyes it was clearly the infamous Bounty Hunter.
"Of course it's bloody him," snapped Fnar, "This patient is an another hit-and-run case I'm afraid."
"A hover car did that?" One of the Na interns whose name Fnar could not remember for the life of him.
"No, this particular case was hit by a train."
The interns stood in a shocked silence, "How did he survive?" Rrrahan asked, more to himself than to Fnar.
"Exactly what are those med school teachers filling your heads with in those fancy schools?" Growled Fnar, actually he'd been uncharacteristically surprised himself by the Fornsmith's survival but kept that to himself, "His species are uncannily resilient, as you may have guessed. And despite massive loss of blood and very serious injuries he was saved by the skill of our surgeons just in time."
"Why is he not in a healing tank for the arm?" A Na intern named Daf asked.
Fnar smiled bitterly, a trick he'd developed years ago especially for interns who asked stupid questions, "Can anyone answer Mr Daf's question?" He asked.
A few beats of silence before young female Na, Ques, one of the two he saw a sliver of hope for, spoke up "The trauma from the detached arm is to great for a refix right now."
Fnar's smile broadened to something closer to authentic, "Correct Ms Ques." She beamed, a teachers pet if ever he saw one but an admirable one, in the top five of her year.
"This patient is in a very deep coma, one that is to dangerous to draw him out of, it is best at this point to let the body heal itself." He paused, "With the occasional assistance of modern medicine of course."
"He is touch and go at this point, but given time and his legendary Fornsmith endurance he may just make it."
***To Be Continued***
Britz-Hoo-hoo! What will become of the Bounty Hunter Jupiter Dranz? Will his path and the Posse's ever cross? Review and keep tuning in to find out! Emphasise on review, now.
Moonbeam had always been a rebel without any cause other than destruction, it had made him the cancer of Utopia, it had gotten him resurrected from the grave by a demon who saw potential and it had allowed him to blaze his way across the galaxy to Concord Dawn, home to millions of alien species passing by, the greasy truck stop of the Universe, a planet-wide Las Vegas.
So what is there to do for a rebellious teen away from home? Get a tattoo.
It was the idea half-formed in his mind when he'd shoved the posse inside the taxi-craft this morning, they had stolen credits to blow, why not do something to bring the happy family closer?
The closest was a little place between replicant brothel and a greasy fast food restaurant for plant life forms, it looked liked any other human tattoo parlour in the system to him, extravagant designs filled the dirty windows.
Inside was the same story, tattoo designs covered every wall, grungy in a colourful kind of way, just clean enough to pass government regulations, the tattoo artist was the big difference compared to any in the human system, a bright red octopus-like creature easily the size of a human; it had dozens of tentacles, some thick as human thighs, others longer and whip-like.
Near the top of the bulbous body area was a huge mouth filled with clean straight teeth that looked like a horse's only larger, three light orange eyes with a slit of sky-blue in each read the newspaper he was holding, two very small horns jutted from his forehead.
He bore one distinctive mark of a tattoo artist no matter the species, he was highly decorated himself, strange designs ran down his bulk, bleeding skulls and burning dice, alien women in suggestive poses, the word MOM inside a heart decorated the top of his left dominant tentacle.
He spotted them after a moment and swallowed what looked like a mouthful of seaweed-jerky, "What can do you for?" It rumbled, the creature's voice was bowel-tremblingly deep.
"Name's David Moonbeam, want some tattoos for me and for my posse."
"Ratnim-Sculuck-Broadback, you've come to the right place, got something in mind?"
When Moonbeam had left he had, the symbol he'd used briefly for the Moon Beam Posse during his first shot at life, a human skull inset by a crescent moon symbol, but like many things it had now seemingly slipped his sieve-like memory by.
"We'll just look a..." He started to say when he saw the barcode symbol; it was nothing special certainly, just a black and white barcode being licked by cartoon flames, "That one." He pointed to it without thought.
Ratnim's eyes followed the finger to the barcode, "Heh heh." He growled a laugh, "That's usually a droid tattoo, reads 666 under their scanners." This didn't seem to make an impression of any sort on Moonbeam; his posse backed him, impassive looks on each face. "Alright what difference it make? Dats the one you want sure thing."
A minute later Dave was sitting on a large white table with his shirt off, Ratmin was holding a small electric device that looked like a cross between a fountain pen and a very tiny harpoon, "Where you want it?"
"Here." Moonbeam clapped the side of his right bicep, "Same for them." There were no objections, Ratmin thought the whole set up was a little weird himself but kept quiet and went to work.
The alien tattooing process didn't hurt, it itched like steel wool being brushed lightly against the skin but didn't feel anything like the human method, confirmed by Taz, Roach and Siggs who all had tattoos already.
"I didn't know you had one." Roach rasped to Siggs, "Where is it?"
"Bet you'd love to know." Siggs teased.
"You show me yours I'll show you mine."
Siggs was the last and Ratmin finished up when the towering Fornsmith lumbered through the door and bellowed for Broadback.
He was a conehead was what Moonbeam noticed with quite some amusement, like in that comedy with Dan Ackroyd, Only this one was the Hulk Hogan of all Coneheads, about 8-foot tall and so broad he had to go through the door sideways.
A grey beard went with a human mouth and nose but the eyes, he had six, where a human's would be bulged red globes the size of tennis balls, a little further up the cone of his head glittered blue eyes that looked like rare gems and near the top were two small green ones, the size of marbles.
"I just wanna get just one skull in before I have to leave on business again." The posse assumed he was talking about on his right arm, it was coated with skull tattoos joined by swirling black patterns, there were at least forty skulls up and down that huge, beefy, arm, varying sizes and species were evident.
"Another job well done Jupiter?" Ratmin bellowed back.
"Well enough to be added to the arm of fame." Jupiter replied, it dawned on the posse, this Fornsmith was a bounty hunter, and this could be a bit of a problem for them as the flavour of the mouth bounty.
Jupiter had a sidearm the size of a sawn-off shotgun and a collection of blades on his belt, when he went to sit he shifted uncomfortably, a huge laser-blaster was strapped to his back.
His arm wasn't his only trophy, several dry flaps that looked suspiciously like the ears of several different species hung off his hunting vest, around his neck was an enormous tooth, to the posse it looked like something tore out of a T-rex's mouth from Earth's ancient past.
Rachel paid Ratmin, Moonbeam considered what to do, they might be able to sneak away, not draw the bounty hunters attention, but...It had been a slow couple of days.
He strode up to the giant conehead, "Morning" He said pleasantly.
"Mornin'." Grunted the bounty hunter offhandedly, he looked away for a moment but drew back to the cheerful human, all three pairs of eyes squinted at Moonbeam thoughtfully, he shook a huge finger at him.
"I know you from somewhere, don't I?" He asked, Moonbeam remained silent.
Jupiter's finger shook more violently as he spoke "Yeah, Moonbeam, David Moonbeam." Red eyes glanced to the posse, blue scanned the room but the small green ones stayed locked on Dave.
Surprisingly fast for a big guy he grabbed at his sidearm, Moonbeam reached under his jacket for his MiniUzi, the posse went for their own weapons.
A shot rang out, as shots are wont to do.
Chapter Twenty-Two
"Freeze! Or the next one goes into one of youse!" Yelled Ratnim, the Fornsmith and the posse froze and turned slowly to the octopus creature clutching the Dracon scattergun. "Alright, it's cool, it's cool, just, just take it outside." Ratnim's rumbling deep voice was tripping over itself repeating.
Jupiter and Moonbeam sized up Ratnim and then each other, "Sure thing Ratnim old buddy." Jupiter muttered.
The Fornsmith was just that extra bit faster than Moonbeam to his trigger, Moonbeam rolled while red light blasted into the wall behind him, Roach pulled a sawn-off and shot Jupiter, a ragged hole appeared in the hunting vest and skin below, he grimaced as the buckshot ripped into his skin but didn't even falter.
Ratnim aimed his gun for Rachel as she pulled her Uzi, she saw him and dived just in time to avoid a shot that would've have wiped her out at point-blank range, she lost the Uzi however and it skittered out of her reach, she went crawling when a whip-thin cord of muscle coiled around her leg and pulled her backwards under the watchful eye of Ratnim's scattergun.
The small tattoo parlour meanwhile had been turned into an impossibly concentrated battle ground, unable to get more accurate shots off in such a confined space bullets and laser whizzed by everywhere like an angry swarm of attacking bees.
A laser bolt lifted Moonbeam off his feet and sent him crashing into a wall, pain arched through his body, there was a hole in him somewhere but this wasn't the time to worry about it.
Siggs' Star Z-84 let off short bursts of bullets, Jupiter swung a fist and broke her nose, she flipped through the air like a gymnast's move and crashed to the floor, Roach went to reload his gun and was grabbed and shoved through the parlour's front window, the glass shattered and twinkled all around him as he landed bone-jarringly on the pavement at the feet of a very confused Na.
"Misspelled a bikie's tattoo." Roach told the confused alien and went about reloading.
A bullet from Moonbeam's gun turned Jupiter's side arm into a twisted hunk of metal, Jupiter jumped from the window, barrelling past Roach and grabbed at the laser-blaster on his back.
Rachel pounded fist after fist into Ratnim who didn't seem sure wether to keep her hostage or kill her outright, Taz reloaded the clips of his 45's and started shooting again, the bullets not having the desired effect on the big fleshy creature, he was knocked away by a swinging tentacle.
Moonbeam gave chase out the window, Roach tripped him up just before lasers turned the air to flame where Moonbeam had just been, they rolled along the ground with blasts tearing up the ground behind them.
Siggs appeared in the window and stopped Jupiter with a couple of short blasts across his chest, the giant roared in frustration. The lower half of Siggs' face was a mask of blood from her broken nose.
Jupiter ran back and kept them guessing with laser fire.
Inside the parlour tentacles whipped and bullets flew, Rach was wrapped in Ratmin's grasp and didn't like the way he was leering at her, a lucky shot from Taz caught Ratnim in the eye and he roared in pain.
In his moment of distraction Rachel wrapped her hands around the barrel of his scatter gun and pulled it away from him, eye bleeding profusely he gave it up unknowingly, she grabbed the handle and jammed the barrel right between Ratnim's giant horse teeth till the poor bastard had the barrel half-way down his throat.
She pulled the trigger and the back of his head exploded in shower of blue goo that painted the wall behind him, Ratnim moaned softly, swayed drunkenly and collapsed over on his counter, dead with a hole in the back of him big enough to put a foot in.
Rachel untangled herself and grabbed the credits she'd paid for the tattoos with, "Sorry, we weren't entirely satisfied."
Moonbeam's shoulders cracked on the subway station floor, Jupiter rolled over him, crushing him for a second, both had lost their guns some where on the long roll down the stairs, Jupiter stumbled to his feet, Moonbeam lashed out with a kick just below the knee, a normal human wouldn't have made a mark, Moonbeam buckled the knee and it nearly dislocated, Jupiter fell once again.
In sync with one another Roach and Siggs were rushing down the stairs shooting, buckshot and bullets pounded the Fornsmith and the concrete ground around him.
Jupiter managed to pull himself up, thick green blood dripped from him, he was amazingly resilient, by human standards impossibly so, he had more holes in him than a whiffle ball and still he lived and fought.
A blade whistled past Moonbeam's head, Jupiter was taking cover beneath the stairs, "Man oh man!" He yelled, "I got a special spot on my arm for all of youse."
He reached up the stair with a powerful arm and grabbed Roach's leg, a sick crack cut through the air and Roach roared, Jupiter let him go and he fell down off the stairs at Jupiter's feet with only one leg to support him, the other, while still attached was clearly broken.
"You son of a whore!" Screamed Siggs, she tried to fire only to be swatted off the stairs and onto the concrete ground, blearily and unarmed Jupiter grabbed her for a human shield, he looked like King Kong with a cursing, redheaded Fay Wray in his grasp.
The towering conehead laughed, all eyes glittering with malice, down the tunnel a subway train rumbled and Jupiter edged over to the track, keeping all eyes on Moonbeam, "Subway's right on time, very fortunate." Grasping Siggs by the neck he held her over the track as easily as if she were made of matches, "Just another job for Ratnim." He said.
"Ratnim's dead, bitch." Said a voice behind him, "and so are you." Rachel pumped the dracon scattergun and blew a hole in Jupiter's back.
The surprised Fornsmith dropped Siggs onto the track and dropped to one knee, he turned to this new threat, Rachel was standing their with the gun she'd stolen from the late Ratnim-Schluck-Broadback, she was flanked by Taz who stared with dead eyes at the cowering Bounty Hunter.
She shot again and green blood blossomed from his chest, she pumped and shot, pumped and shot and Jupiter crumbled onto the subway tracks, next to the panting Siggs, the rumbling down the tunnel getting louder all the time.
Siggs leapt to her feet, "Asshole, we really could've had something, something beautiful." Using him like a step she jumped from the Fornsmith's bulk onto the platform.
Jupiter, hurt but far from dead pulled himself up just in time to see the train bearing down, "Ooh shii...!"
Green, syrupy blood slapped Moonbeam's grinning face, without even noticing he burst into wild peals of laughter, "Never, ever fuck with Moonbeam's girl." He managed to mutter before he started roaring again.
Siggs looked up from where she'd tripped into Roach's hard face, grimacing with the pain from his broken leg, blood coated the back of her shirt and stuck in her hair, a drop of goo slowly slide down her cheek, "Fuck! Look at this shit in my hair!"
Roach forgot his pain for a moment, actually he thought, the slime seemed to go rather well with her red hair and matched her emerald eyes nicely, that or his brain was a little rattled from the fall, either way he started laughing to match Moonbeam, Siggs put her forehead to his and laughed along with him.
By the track the train slowed and stopped, a bulging Fornsmith arm, ripped from its socket, slapped onto the platform, covered in tattoos and clenched in a fist.
Chapter Twenty-Three
That night the posse celebrated in their latest find, a club named 'The Screeching Yotsaw' popular with the local mafia big shots, of course when given the opportunity the posse would gladly party wether they had something to celebrate or not.
Roach and Siggs played a drinking game with a Roppiss named, strangely, Rover and a short Nephran Moonbeam didn't know, despite spending the better part of the day in a healing tank and having his leg as good as new Dave saw Roach still subconsciously favoured the right one when it was his turn to get the next round.
Taz talked to a Caprician mafia-groupie in one corner, the Caprician's were a refreshingly human-looking species with blue dreadlock hair, pale skin and eyes that were a fierce yellow, Taz seemed not to notice the way she rubbed his arm and smiled flirtatiously.
Moonbeam sat in the corner, a pint of Hawjabran ale in one hand and a joint in the other, Rach pressed herself at his side, she plucked the Silmarillion joint from his fingers nimbly and perched it between her own ruby-red lips.
"How about you and me go back to the ship and have a little celebration of our own?" She suggested.
Moonbeam grinned, "Babe, raging Fornsmith's couldn't fuckin stop me."
Meanwhile at 'Our Mother of Glanggloxxanill Hospital' The aging Na hospital director Fnar Kinscher lead the jittery group of interns away from the hit-and-run victim Nephran.
The interns talked softly but excited between themselves, fresh meat the lot of them and this was their first night in intensive care, Fnar had seen a lot of interns go by in his time and from this group of eight he saw potential in maybe two of them, bah! Were interns this incompetent when he'd started out? He didn't think so but maybe he himself had been to naive to notice, he doubted that personally but anything was possible.
"Next we have with us quite a celebrity." He told the excitable idiots that were this hospital's hope for the future, "Jupiter Dranz, maybe some of you have heard of him?"
A thrill went through the interns and they stood in shocked silence as they looked down on the expansive and unconscious figure of the Fornsmith Bounty Hunter.
"Wow, is that really him?" A Roppiss named Rrrahan asked slack-jawed, stupid question thought Fnar, even covered with healing patches and missing his best-known feature, his heavily tattooed arm, and three eyes it was clearly the infamous Bounty Hunter.
"Of course it's bloody him," snapped Fnar, "This patient is an another hit-and-run case I'm afraid."
"A hover car did that?" One of the Na interns whose name Fnar could not remember for the life of him.
"No, this particular case was hit by a train."
The interns stood in a shocked silence, "How did he survive?" Rrrahan asked, more to himself than to Fnar.
"Exactly what are those med school teachers filling your heads with in those fancy schools?" Growled Fnar, actually he'd been uncharacteristically surprised himself by the Fornsmith's survival but kept that to himself, "His species are uncannily resilient, as you may have guessed. And despite massive loss of blood and very serious injuries he was saved by the skill of our surgeons just in time."
"Why is he not in a healing tank for the arm?" A Na intern named Daf asked.
Fnar smiled bitterly, a trick he'd developed years ago especially for interns who asked stupid questions, "Can anyone answer Mr Daf's question?" He asked.
A few beats of silence before young female Na, Ques, one of the two he saw a sliver of hope for, spoke up "The trauma from the detached arm is to great for a refix right now."
Fnar's smile broadened to something closer to authentic, "Correct Ms Ques." She beamed, a teachers pet if ever he saw one but an admirable one, in the top five of her year.
"This patient is in a very deep coma, one that is to dangerous to draw him out of, it is best at this point to let the body heal itself." He paused, "With the occasional assistance of modern medicine of course."
"He is touch and go at this point, but given time and his legendary Fornsmith endurance he may just make it."
***To Be Continued***
Britz-Hoo-hoo! What will become of the Bounty Hunter Jupiter Dranz? Will his path and the Posse's ever cross? Review and keep tuning in to find out! Emphasise on review, now.