Torin Prime: Tartarus Sector

New Philadelphia Colony

05/29/2183

Rain rattled off cheap, pre-fab rooftops of New Philadelphia Colony. It was a calm night and a still darkness but things were not always so. Eighty years ago, a dangerous local rebel faction attempted succession from the newly formed United Americas. Their efforts resulted in much bloodshed, concentration camps and a full-fledged war in space. After two long years the United Americas Allied Command defeated the insurgents and restored order. Prosperity however, did not follow with it.

Few alive are old enough to remember the conflict. Recent generations only know Torin Prime as it has been, burdened by heavy sanctions and an even heavier police presence. Along the streets and alleys of the sprawling capitol colony nearly three hundred thousand souls live in dissatisfaction and poverty. Homes and other structures are dilapidated and run down. Everywhere there is trash, graffiti and useless junk.

For all that, there are also many watering holes. Beneath the muddied streets, in a cellar underneath a twenty four hour laundromat, lies the Liberty Bell Cantina. Honest hard-working locals of every sort are hosted here, as well as some less-honest. Ernest Hart wasn’t sure which sort he was, but he was glad he wasn’t a local in any case. Torin Prime wasn’t his idea of a holiday destination by any stretch. He’d be glad to leave tomorrow now that his business here was finished. For now he sat at the bar drinking a cold beer enjoying the ambiance, such as it was.

All told he’d spent the better part of a month here and he was fairly certain there wasn’t much else to see. Torin Prime was a mountainous world, semi-arid with a cool temperate climate. Outside the colonies high peaks and valleys stretched out to the horizons. People said the hiking and mountain-climbing were ‘epic’, but Ernest was long past an age for such things. Beneath an old tweed cap and a well-worn London Fog overcoat he was just an old man in his late sixties, tan in complexion with a week’s worth of stubble on his cheeks.

Behind the bar, an especially dingy dust-smeared screen played network news nobody could hear over the old jukebox. As the camera zoomed in Ernest recognized the face of a tall, well-dressed man preparing to be interviewed. His hair was graying and his easy smile was gone, but there could be no mistake about who it was. A caption superimposed itself in the lower border as another camera feed took over, pulling back as the man and the interviewer sat down together. The caption read: Paul Van Leuwen, Chairman, Interstellar Commerce Commission.

Ernest shook his head, scoffed, and muttered, “Fuckin guy has no idea!”

“Hows that?” a flat voice asked to his left. Ernest turned his head to regard the stranger who slid unto the stool beside him. He was a thin man, plainly dressed in a long-sleeve shirt tucked into crease-less slacks with a black leather belt and steel-toed boots. It was the same attire most of the local ‘blue-collar’ workers wore who labored in the factories, quarries and mines. The fabric was made of a tight-weaved polyester/cotton blend which was hard to tear, difficult to stain, durable and clean-cut.

“I think it’s obvious. Just look at him,” Ernest answered smoothly though inwardly he was anything but calm.

“What’ll you have?” the bartender asked the new arrival with a bored expression.

“Scotch, neat,” the stranger replied crisply.

“That’s fifty dollars a glass?”

The stranger just smiles so the bartender reaches for one of the few bottles of real liquor he had on offer.

Ernest took the chance to look around a bit more, glancing at the tables and booths behind him. It was a packed house, standing room only except for the bar. Nobody else seemed to be paying Ernest any mind. Still his heart wouldn’t stop racing. Any chance for a quick exit seemed unlikely. Ernest couldn’t shoulder his way through that crowd very easily. Perhaps there was a back door? Yet running blindly into the back storage area of a cellar was just as likely to yield a dead end.

“You don’t look like your from around here?” the stranger asked making eye-contact with Ernest. His eyes were a dull brown, as was his hair, short and neatly trimmed; combed over his brow in such a well-manicured arch it might as well have been made of plastic. He looked to be mid-thirties, perfectly clean shaven with a posture as rigid as a mannequin.

“You’d be right about that,” Ernest answered with a false chuckle. “I’m a long, long way from home.”

Meanwhile, on the screen, Paul leaned forward in his chair holding his hands before him in the way you do when you’re either holding a big bowl or asking for patience and understanding. The cameras blinked back to the interviewer, an elegant woman with bright wholesome eyes and understated lipstick. She seemed to be unhappy with the interview and the way the conversation was going.

“What brings you here? Looks like you have a story to tell,” the stranger said feigning interest.

“I’ve got a few no doubt,” Ernest replied earnestly, “but if you don’t mind I’m just trying to watch this.”

As the bartender came over with two fingers of scotch Ernest gestured to the vid screen, “Hey can you turn that up?”

“Won’t do much good,” the bartender grunts raising his voice to make a point.

“Humor me please,” Ernest says straining to the keep the panic out of the word please.

“Ok old-timer,” the bartender says snatching the remote attempting in vain to overcome the din. Meanwhile, the stranger slides a fifty dollar bill unto the bar to pay for his drink. “Huh?” the bartender says reaching for it. “This is Weyland Yutani currency.”

“Is that a problem?” the stranger asks.

“Uh, I suppose not… if that’s all you’ve got?” he asks annoyed.

“It’s what I carry,” the stranger explains. The bartender puts it in his till without a fuss seemingly out of patience to discuss it further. Just then another song starts playing on the juke box.

And I heard, as it were, the noise of thunder. One of the four beasts saying, “Come and see.”

And I saw, and behold a white horse.

“You know you’re already too late,” Ernest says matter-of-factly, sliding his right hand off the bar through the slit in his overcoat at his side.

The stranger cocks his head over in the odd way a child might, “please explain?”

There’s a man going around taking names

“I’ve got nothing left to prove,” Ernest says leaning back from the bar and pulling out his Browning High Power automatic from its holster in one smooth motion firing from the hip at point-blank range.

And he decides who to free and who to blame

As the first bullet hit the stranger in the chest he was already moving, grasping towards Ernest, snatching for his throat quick as a vipers strike. Ernest was falling however, throwing himself backward off his stool. The stranger’s fingertips brushed against his collar, clawing at the fabric of the overcoat as he fell.

Everybody won’t be treated all the same

The CRACK, CRACK, CRACK of pistol shots erupted three times before Ernest hit the floor blowing holes into the strangers shoulder, throat and stomach. Each wound bled white, viscous lubricant.

There’ll be a golden ladder reaching down

The stranger hopped off his stool and reached down for Ernest unperturbed. His inhuman, synthetic innards were seemingly invulnerable to small arms fire.

When the man comes around

Ernest kicked and rolled away still firing as fast as he could pull the trigger. Around him people screamed and fell over themselves trying to flee. Ernest felt someone’s foot kick him in the ribs. Still he scrabbled away on the floor fighting to regain his feet.

The hairs on your arm will stand up

The strangers hand grabbed Ernest’s collar, yanking back with such force he felt a rush of blood pressure up in his skull making the room spin.

At the terror in each sip and in each sup

“FUCK YOU!” Ernest shouted attempting to twist his way out of his own coat.

Will you partake of that last offered cup

The stranger grabs Ernest’s right wrist turning him around and lifting him up like a rag doll.

Or disappear into the potter’s ground

“Tisk-tisk, that’s not a polite way to leave a conversation,” the stranger says placidly with an eerie bubbling sound as white lubricant squirts out of his neck all over Ernest’s chest and overcoat.

When the man comes around

Ernest feel’s the bones in his wrist ready to fracture like matchsticks as the synthetic begins to squeeze. His grip goes limp, the pistol falling to the floor. By reflex earnest grabs at the strangers other hand as it reaches for his throat. He might as well be arm-wrestling a gorilla. As the fingers clamp around his neck Ernest has the presence of mind to hear the music.

Hear the trumpets, hear the pipers

One hundred million angels singing

The synthetics head explodes in a fountain of ichor and plastics an instant after the loud BOOM of a shotguns report. Ernest feels the strangers fingers relax and manages to gasp in a ragged breath, falling to the floor in a heap.

Multitudes are marching to the big kettledrum

Voices calling, voices crying

Some are born and some are dying

“Hey you ok old-timer?” the bartender asked leaning over the bar clutching a smoking pump-action.

“Never better!” Ernest hissed through gritted teeth. Around him, everyone else in the bar hovered and stared in a state of shock.

“Why was a synthetic trying to kill you?” someone shouted.

“It wasn’t,” Ernest said struggling back to his feet, picking up his pistol and holstering it in the process.

“It had its hand around your throat!” the bartender pointed out.

“I am well aware,” Ernest agreed somewhat hoarsely rubbing at his neck, “It wanted to choke me until I passed out so it could carry me out of here and interrogate me elsewhere.”

“Jesus! What are you going to do?” someone else asked as the crowd started to press back in getting a closer look at the headless android. Most of these people had never seen one before.

Ernest stepped forward again to lean against the bar, careful not to slip on all the lubricant. His right hand and his ribs ached something terrible as adrenaline started to wear off. With his left hand he grabbed the glass of scotch and raised it up to the bartender, “To your health!” he said gulping it down before he turned to face the crowd with all seriousness. “I’ll tell you exactly what I’m gonna do. I’m gonna buy drinks for everyone here. I trust there are no objections?”