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Chapter 5: Victorious.

Water dripped from the tip of my nose, ran down the collar of my shirt. It may have started a beautiful day but, in defiance of the weather forecast, it was now raining. 

I hunched my shoulders and tramped through the street as all around me vivid transparent umbrellas of every colour flowed, pouring around the rocks of the market stalls littering the bustling streets. Everyone else had evidently remembered not to trust the Weather. After 4 months on ships all over the sector - I had not.

'Fuckin' computers,' I muttered as I stomped along. How can the Environment Control Computer not know what weather its own systems were about to create? 

A screen flared into life at the end of the street. A jingling sound blared through the speakers, preempting a broadcast from the Stations Controller - the AI: Vale. 

'Attention. The Martian Fleet Ship: Victorious is on final approach. All hands brace for docking manoeuvres. All port crew, report to Section Alpha.' The voice had an air of unmistakable authority and only the slightest hint of electronic buzzing to indicate its speaker wasn't organic. Not bad for a computer the size of a shuttle. 'Have a nice day.' The broadcast finished abruptly. 

By large no-one had paid the computer much attention. A few people, however, were evidently less than pleased about the impending visit from our planetary benefactors. 

A street preacher by the side of the road seized on his opportunity. 'Filth! Aliens! Abominations walk our streets and now, lo! Demons come to seize the last of what is ours! Rise! Rise children of the Cosmic Wind! You tread the path of the blessed, the righteous will...'

I tuned the nut job out and walked by him and his small crowd of passionate, smelly, zealots. Blaming those on the fringes of society for societies woes was an age-old human tradition. On Earth years ago, they had once blamed migrants from other countries - out here, they blamed aliens from different worlds. Same old, same old. 

There was that word, however. 'Demons'. I somehow doubted the Martians would relish the nickname -  even if it did fit them like a glove. 

Mars was War.

I carried on down the street. Until I reach the 82 street on the 4th level - 4th and 82nd.  A functional name for a functional place. A shabby street filled with mainly storage buildings and one greasy looking cafe. Abby was here somewhere.

It didn't take me long to find her. A gaggle of curious onlookers crowded around the entrance to an unused warehouse, held back by a thin blue line of station security. 

I pushed through the gaggle and straight through the police line. 'Hey, stop!' One of the officers yelled as I walked through the warehouse wide open double doors. 

I ignored him and carried on walking, turning left down a side corridor and pushing through the door at the end. 

I paused. One of the room's occupants looked up. 'Brakeman. You're late.' 

'Jen.' I nodded to the detective inspector politely. 'You're looking less wrinkled than usual, how many goats did you have to sacrifice this time to get a facelift that good?' 

The noise of Jen grinding her teeth was almost audible. She narrowed her grey eyes and folded her muscular arms. 'Fuck you.'

I winked. 'Easy Tiger, a lil' lovin' and I'm afraid I'd snap you like a twig.'

The Inspectors profanity-laden response was mercifully cut short as one of her minions came rushing through the door. 'Ma'am there's been a security bree... Hey! You! Hands in the air!' The officer from outside spotted me standing just by the door, pulled his sidearm free and pointed it at my face. 'I said hands in the air!'

'Shut-up Karl.' Jen snapped, taking out her aggression on her subordinate as I meekly raised my hands a half inch or so in the air. 

'Am I in twouble ofwicer?' I lisped sarcastically, raising my eyebrows and fluttering my eyelashes Karl as his eyes flitted uncertainly from me to Jen and back again. 

'And put the gun down you moron.' Jen's angry eyes passed from Karl to me and then back to the table in front of her. 'If anyone ever gets to shoot this asshole it's going to be me.'

'You heard her precious, skip of now,' I put my hands down as Karl, extremely reluctantly, lowered his gun. 'Skip!' I clapped my hands together as I encouraged him. Karl pushed back through the door muttering and glaring bloody murder at me.

 Ah, you have to love the police. 

'So where's Abby?' I asked Jen's turned back.

'The other assholes upstairs - with the body.'