The Dream Factory

Chess

Chess

'Hmmm.' Brooker leaned so close to the chess board his saggy moustache almost obscured his defensive line of pawns. 

'You're real proud of that moustache aren't you?' Grace Holland picked up her wine and gently sipped it. If she had too much she'd lose to Brooker. Again. 

'Actually I was thinking of shaving it off.' Brooker sat up and ran his fingers along its voluminous width. 'It's being getting a bit irritating recently, sort of itchy.'  

'No, you're not!' 

'Are you saying you like it? Does it make me look handsome? Do you think?' Brooker turned his head sideways so Grace could get the full benefit of his bushy behemoth. 

'I think you look like a walrus that's lost his dentures.' Grace replied nonchalantly. 'OK. Maybe it makes you look a bit distinctive, in a Benny Turland sort of way.' 

'Distinctive. Really, you think so?' Brooker's white teeth appeared behind the mass of curly hair. 'Wait a minute, Ben Turland? Wasn't he?' 

'The mass murderer from The Colonies. Benny the Butcher was his moniker. They left him to die on a rock in the Hestia belt with a list of his victims and a single bottle of oxygen.' Grace nodded and smiled sweetly at Brooker.  

'Nice.' Brooker stretched his arms and yawned. 'You know I've always wanted to see the Hestia asteroid belt. It's on my list of fifty things to do before I die.' 

'It was on Benny's too. They put it on there just before they dropped him off. Are you playing or what?' 

'I was until you raised my moustache's hopes.' Brooker cradled his chin in the palms of his hands and studied the pieces. He wondered whether he should have gone for the Smith-Morra Gambit rather than the Alapin Variation against Grace's Sicilian opening.  

They sat facing each other over the board. The wind outside howled, their hab-hub gently swayed in it's cradle. One of Brooker's pieces rocked and toppled over. Brooker impatiently picked it up a slapped it back on the board. 

Grace took another sip of wine. 'You sure you placed that back where it was? You can admit defeat now if you want.' She did like Booker's moustache but certainly wasn't going to let on. He would become unbearable. 

'Ha,' laughed Brooker, 'you've never beaten me yet so don't try those little physiological tricks on me.'  

The transceiver crackled, 'It's Denz. Is anyone there?' 

Brooker poured over the patterned surface. 'No Denz, its eighty below on the planet's surface, the sun hasn't risen for two hundred years, so we're outside playing snowballs in the trees.' 

'Hello?' 

Grace rocked her chair back on its rear legs and lifted the receiver with her outstretched hand, 'Whhhaaatttzzzzup Denz.' 

'You two better get down here. Quick.' 

'No chance Denz. It's not another three hours until our shift. Whatever the problem is you can deal with it.' Brooker called. 

'No. Really. You're going to want to see this. You need to come down now.' 

'If it's like last time when we spent two hours in that knackered old lift freezing our arses off just for Denz to show us an icicle in the shape of that girl he met in that bar in Gaam 5, I'm going to kill him.' Brooker reached for his jacket. 

'I heard that Brooker.' 

    ******* 

When they stepped out of the lift Denz was there waiting for them stamping his feet and flapping his mitten covered hands around his chest. 'You took your time.'