I: The Wrong Man in the Right Place
No matter how much I desire a rest, some random bullshit always interrupts it. Like now. The rickety train jolts me awake; I was always a light sleeper, so a sudden small jump of the seat - or train car, for that matter - always gets me alert. With a frustrated huff, I sit up from the slight backwards slump I was in earlier, stretching my neck to get some ache out of it.
That catches the attention of some agents I'm riding with. Agents of F.I.P.S.A.; the Federal Internal Planetary Security Agency. From what I hear, the apparent 'big dogs' of criminal investigation and law enforcement in regards to internal affairs. For simplicities sake, I just call them feds, at least not to their face.
"Ease up, boy. We'll be at Diamondback Station in a minute." One of the agents tells me. Agent Ambrose Notker, an older man who's been part of the force for as long as I've been alive...or so I've been told. The short, but raggedy greyed hair on that mug of his tells me everything I need to know about him.
I nod in response, sitting up straight and preparing to stand up, as well as stretching my shoulders while I'm at it.
"Boy..." I shake my head with a chuckling scoff. "I have a name." That's both a request and a statement in-one. The request being, well...'call me by my name'.
"Oh, I know. Red, something-or-the-other." He tells me, patting me on my back in a pseudo-mocking way. With that, the train begins to slow down, chugging down to a stop.
I look outside the windows. I see what looks to be a small town; if the only town in this whole area. Then again, this region is a frontier area of an already-known frontier planet. Can't really be surprised.
I stand up. There's not many people on the train; many only three or four I can see with my own eyes, not including the agents. The agents wave me along, and I follow behind them off the train and onto the station platform. We exit out of the lobby and onto some sort of porch, the main street of the town in front of us.
"Diamondback isn't much to look at, boy." Agent Notker remarks with a chuckle, as he then waves his hand at the other agent.
"Hotchkiss?" He then beckons.
Agent Hotchkiss then steps in front of me one step or so, and points down to the street at a pair of double doors at the corner of a large-ish looking building. Above the door is a sign reading 'THE STEAM PUMP'.
"We got a courier aligned in there to take you to Saints Bridge. Oldish-looking guy, probably has a whore on his lap." He informs me, then patting me on the back to usher me along.
With a nod of confirmation, I turn towards the building and start walking. Hydrogen engine motorcycles are lined outside like bottles on a shelf, as various adverts around the doors promise low beer prices, friendly 'ladies of the night' and 'excellent' service. Then again, the bar isn't really that high for what's considered 'excellent' service in a backwater frontier settlement.
As I go up the steps, a man drunkenly stumbles out of the door, falling flat on his face. Absolutely hammered. Can't blame him; I've been in his position before. I mindfully step over his drunken form and walk through the slowly reshutting doors.
The stench of liquor, hidden sex and barely-washed clothes enters my nostrils. I've smelled worse.
My eyes are drawn to the corner of the room. Old-looking man with ranchhand-type clothes is sitting on a couch. A few skimpy-looking women in cheapish lingerie surround him; probably the whores Agent Hotchkiss mentioned.
"Mr. Lothringer!" He calls, continuing to wave me over.
I approach, slipping past some folks.
"Mr...?" I ask, looking him over. He dismisses the ladies of the night, then placing his hands on his knees in preparation to stand up.
"You can call me Oswald, kid." He stands up, stretching his shoulders.
"I won't keep ya' waitin', I already got a message from those agents that you were comin'." He informs.
He walks ahead of me, and I follow him. We walk out of the establishment and onto the street, with him taking a right towards a motorcycle bike.
"I booked us both rides, you're good." He says.
I nod and mount the motorcycle next to that; he tosses me the keys for it and I light it. It buzzes to life; it's a hydrogen engine vehicle, so no loud whirring.
Oswald reverses a bit and then rides on down the street at cruising speed; I hit the gas lightly and match his speed as we then ride along.
"They didn't tell me why you were needed to go to Saints Bridge?" He asks me.
"I don't know if I could tell you why, sir." I then respond, with a more slightly authoritative 'please stop asking questions' tone.
"Feds and their secrecy." He scoffs, although with no fault laid at me.
"You could say that again." I remark in response.
By soon order we're out of the town, taking a left and riding on a dirt rode past the last row of buildings. What presents us now is a landscape of rolling, forested hills, with dead, wintery trees.
I can tell this man is a chatterer, but even he can't find ways to chew the dog. There's just not a lot to talk about, at least to me.
"Saints Bridge is the only road over the Lantsahatchee, I think." He says as we round a hill bend.
"That's why the scumbags fortified themselves on it?" I both answer-and-ask.
"Bingo. Feds don't wanna blow up the only car and rail road going over the largest river this side of the continent!" He declares with a chuckle, as his gaze shifts up to another hill bend.
"Once we get up that hill, we won't be too far from the place." He informs.
I nod in confirmation. We ride up a hill and round over a bend, going over some sort of small plateau. Then, we both see it: the start of the saints bridge. Large brickwork archways are over both entrances; both of them were fortified by the gang I was informed of to prevent would-be hero feds or cops would busting in and wrecking their shit. A few yards out, he hits the brakes, so I do so in turn.
"This is where we part ways, my friend." He says, looking at me.
"See you around, Oswald." I say with a firm nod.
"See ya', Red. Stop by The Steam Pump sometime, maybe I can buy ya' a drink or two." With a chuckle, he turns his ride around and starts driving off. I kick down the stand and get off my bike, looking at the fortified archway.
The feds sent me. Just me. And all because I got a connection to the hood rat that runs the whole group.
I approach the archway, stopping a yard or two in front of it. Looking up to the top of the archway, I yell to get their attention.
"JIMMY!" I yell. "JIMMY LOTHRINGER!" I then yell.
A few moments pass, and a man with greasy brown hair, dark eyes, harsh 5 o'clock shadow and the scowl of a lifetime peeks up over the archway. Yep, that's him. The guy that crashed the Tolpar, and raped my mother. My old man. Probably a platform behind it or something.
"I never thought I'd ever see your bastard face again, Red." He remarks with a disingenuous smile.
"Wasn't it you who always said a boy 'needs' a relationship with his daddy?" I ask back.
That makes him nod his brow a bit.
"You were an accident, kid. I thought I made that crystal-fucking-clear to you when I put you into a group home when you were little." He explains with a bit more tangible anger.
"An accident implies my conceivement was consensual, Jimmy." I remark back.
"19 years old and you already lost all your damn respect. Can't even call me 'dad'." He scoffs, brandishing the rifle I suspect that he's held the whole time.
"Why would I call a murderer and rapist 'dad'? You assume I have no self-respect, old man." I fire back.
And with that, he steps back, looking behind him and nodding. More people brandish themselves from behind the archway, pointing their guns at me.
"I did what I had too to survive, boy." He says with a sickening disdain. "Your mother never understood that. But I did."
I don't even have an opportunity to respond as he keeps speaking.
"And look where that got us both. I'm here with the most feared crew in the country, while your mother is rotting in a psych ward." He smiles as he finishes, believing he's one this little verbal bout. Oh, but he's not done. I just know he likes hearing his own voice.
"Not even that! She's in there 'cause she tried to kill you, boy! In a bout of post-partem depression! And yet you have the gall to disparage me, the only man who actually made the good decisions for you."
With that, I've had it. My hand snaps to the handle of my gun in it's holster. I don't care if I get shot up a bunch. It's not like I got much to live for anyway.
Half-way through pulling my gun out, a thug of his fires his gun at me. A bullet rips through my side and I collapse to the floor, my hand still clutching my gun.
I lay still. More bullets might come, who knows.
Jimmy laughs. Like he always did when he assumes he's won.
"Poor Red." He disparagingly remarks, then slipping behind the archway.
Then, I pass out.