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The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan
 
#57
Fenspace may be dead, but I'll keep something going. Even if it's hard to keep it consistent.

-----
In the battle between the War and the delta-inducer, there could be only one winner. She's awake with a yell and a clatter, equipment snapping from her back as she stumbled forwards. Warnings blare in her mind disorientating as scanners reach out.

She's ready to fight, braced for the attack, blood on fire cresting an adrenaline rush. A moment later it turns hollow, sensors confirming what she already suspected.

Another bloody nightmare.

Her body stood crackling like thundercloud charged up with energy, and no ground to dump it through. Every nerve screamed to fight, begging for action. They don't shut up. Her mind reaches out through the architecture of the house, fingering down through the rock itself, grounding in the familiar signals of home and her native network.

It's been ten years, she tried to tell herself.

The walls crush in, pinning her in place. Tracers flicker at the edge of her awareness, coded message darting through back of her mind, flickering all around, hunting.

A cold shower doesn't cool her mind. It leaves her staring at herself in the mirror, wet hair forming into streaks of dark blood down her face. The smile mutates. Sinister. Violent. Deep in a world of shit but glad to be alive. Shaded with a battlefield’s worth of dirt.

A dash of cold water can’t wash the shadows from the overhead lights away.

She trims her hair back. Toothpaste banishes the bloody taste of metal from her mouth. A vacuum syringe draws a vial of blood from her neck. A crimson galaxy of sparks swirls within. She feeds it to a modified taster.

The machine chirps back an answer, followed by a formula to re-centre her body’s mix.

She draws a small sample from each of a dozen vials of wave in her personal cabinet, letting it mingle with the blood before pressing the syringe to her neck.

It hits like bullet, rushing through her body, the hot lights of the stage on her face and the thrill of the crowd. City neon strobes by with the roar of the wind and the staccato bark of machinegun fire ricocheting in her body that stops her dead, standing in a cold tunnel.

It dies with a cold chill, answered by a stark, slack-jawed, extra-galactic stare back from the mirror.

The muse humms in the back of her mind, interpolating intent and desire into impulse. A thoughtless whim earns an answer. An old pack of broadleaf tea lurking in the back of a kitchen cabinet.

Nobody could ever understand how she liked the taste, but it doesn't matter. Warm ginger uncoils the springs in her mind, clearing her head.

The adrenaline fades. The edge comes off.

Fatigue remains. Reflecting in the kitchen window, the face that had been forever nineteen gained ten years in a blink. A body, hollowed out inside. The bars of the dome reach up, separating her from the black beyond.

She considers trying to get some rest, but her dayplanner resists, coming to life, ready to stuff. Now that you're awake, you might aswell tackle some of these.

There’s so much normal to be done.

A three hour training session awaits, followed by a sponsor call for the racing team, a promised sale's call to try get a Kulbit to a race team, followed by parliamentarian crap – a ministers question, a vote, Stingray paperwork, all that PEPPER bollocks to keep the bureaurats with nothing better to do happy, and two open troubleshooter cases still simmering on the back burner waiting for results.

36 hours of tasks for a 24 hour day.

The price trying to shift up to something bigger. Grinding gears for three years.

A dozen or more well-wishers enquiring about her dead brother clutter her inbox. She can't bring herself to read them. Her muse punishes her with the salient points anyway. Others are rushing to help. Great. Gaige has a chance of becoming a decent person at least, one good thing.

Another comm request breaks her concentration.

“Hey, uh, Jet, we got a few sensors giving a high radiation reading in the power shaft,”

Only an extension number accompanies the man’s voice. No other identification.

“It's a probably bad sensor,” she answers. The artificial voice of her mind comes back sharp.

“Yeah, but that's 3.6 roentgen an hour.”

“3.6 is offscale high for those sensors. What’re the other two beside?”

“Zero.”

“Great. It’s a broken sensor. Schedule it in DCAMS.”

“Fine,”

Only after the line goes dead does she realise she might’ve snapped someone’s head off. So what? Bothering her over a sensor glitch when there’re more important things to worry about?

The first preliminary report from the KCPD filters into her personal inbox, by roundabout of Sylia and the Knight Sabers. Troubleshooter Jet had been cut out, for being too close. Those were the rules.

To hell with them.

The muse skims the details filtering out the salient points.

One launch point. One discarded SAM body.

Footprints. Two sets.

Vehicle tracks. Something tyred. 4-wheeled. Skid-steer – like an Electrocat. It's already comparing prints against records, offering up potential models of each. It searches out into the wider web, pulling the details on it's own.

Definitely an Electrocat. Short wheelbase model. 2 hour range – about 40km at most on the moon, just within range of Kandor. Hankook mesh-tyres. Probably a rental, she suggests to herself. The muse pings a request to some agencies, routing in through GJ channels, giving it the official stamp. It asks for surveillance footage of the Kandor city airlocks.

Responses are slow. She sets it to check registration, then follow back to the company, the date and hopefully to a driver or a photograph. With luck, it’d beat the KCPD who had to give a shit about warrants and due process.

In the meantime, the formality of training calmed. It gave her mind something else to focus on. Her mind vanishes into the forms, the world outside the moment receding away. Just the two of them – master and apprentice. Teacher and student.

“You did well today,”

The wave had already begun to knit the bloody split on her jaw shut, offering proof.

Maki could split an engine block, and still managed to look ashamed. “I think you were distracted.”

“Hmm?”

“Your ausbildung-stil felt different.”

“I got some bad news,” she says.

Like Noah Scott is a little fucking rich.

Maki smiles.

How someone who could split an engine block could look like the personification of Moe, Jet didn’t know. An artificially human face on an armoured body. Cybers did tend to exaggerate their humanistic qualities.

Together they clean up, repacking and re-oiling equipment, Jet waiting afterwards to work on her own.

Her blades live in a steel case, swaddled in oiled blankets, along with a bone-carved statue of Santa Muerte, and a few other Boskone artifacts. An original SS knife. A catgirl collar. A pair of glasses. Jesus Malverde with a bullet. Thionite vials. Rosebottom’s short-slide original-production CZ-75

The butterfly-blade that killed him hangs above the door with a brand new handle set and the original owner’s name on a brass plate.

She remembers, standing vacant. Her body traces the movements, dancing through the moment. Her comm interrupts the final strike. Priority One, from Command. A rescue signal?

“Hey yeah, we’ve a problem with that broken sensor.”
.
Mundane. From a moron.

“What is it?”

“Yeah, DCAMS stuck it at priority 1, but the exocomps won’t go in there."

“Fix it yourself!”

Snap. Channel closed. Her voice echoes back off the timber walls. A broken doorhandle hangs in her hand.

The next item on her dayplanner pinged up, begging for her attention. More shit to do.

Baron fucking Frigga.

4 Votes missed.
A few proposals, requests for support on various initiatives, gargoyle’s demanding comment on the crash. Letters to be written. Proposals. Comments. 4 questions to be asked of 4 ministers about 4 separate inane things.

The alternate means of war had nothing on the excitement of the real thing. A precession of paperwork, smiles, smoke and daggers.

The muse filters and cleans, simmering the order of business down to the salient points, parcelling out the things it thinks she needs to actually care about.

She works as she walks. Negotiating. Keeping her face up. Getting things done.

Just not bothering just wasn’t an option.

Life had to go on. Shit still needed to be done. it fell to her, want it or not. Nobody could see anything else but her getting on with it. Or the whispers would start. Everyone would talk.

Ford called.

Burned out from the investigation back home, half asleep already. Both of them needing support, both of them able to provide it.

Jet ached to be with her. But that had passed. They were still friends.

Ford slept. Jet worked. Now down to the hangar, to meet her new pilot. She steeled herself. Gaige was a new person.

Waiting with Daryl, wearing Jet’s own face on top of her skintight flightsuit. Transparent panels and all. Jet saw the little differences that marked the face as one of AC’s, the sharped eyes and nose, the deeper blue. On the one hand, eyes darted, taking in every single eye glancing at her. A friendly, innocent blue.

Already, Gaige wore her hair differently. Rougher, more natural.

And she stood. Ignoring them all. Her chest swelled as she drew down a deep breath.

“I’m a pilot,” she declared, answering the unasked question.

Weird as it was to see her own face looking back at her, it still comforted. Already, Gaige felt. confident enough in herself to wear that skintight flightsuit in public. Soon she’d grow and become her own person, finding herself somewhere between the remains of Mackie and the person she wanted to be.

Jet slipped into the role, banishing the thoughts of her brother. Let the dead rest.

“That’s why I hired you,” she said.

Jet’s muse cut her off before she could say anymore.

It’d found her a name.

It’d found her a real mission. Her muse offers official papers, an address, an employer, a photograph, even a GJ service record from ten years ago. A man who’d been to Jusenkyou too.

Her mind falls back and she finds herself wearing a savage grin as she briefly considers bringing him back.

Time to go.

--

Marco’s fate isn’t yet sealed when he discards the dead Geiger counter. He places it back in the equipment locker, dead batteries and all, right beside the warning label advising people not to go into rad-hazard areas without one.

It doesn’t matter. Two sensors read zero, so he knows it's safe.

Fucking arrogant Mary-Sues snapping off at him. Of course he could fix it. But he had better things to do.

Two exocomps wait outside the powershaft hatch. DCAMS assigned the little shits to do the repair, but neither of them bothered.

Silly robots. Their tools chatter in response.

He doesnn’t die when he opens the hatch, wearing only a facemask and boiler suit. His lifetime risk of cancer increases by five percent, as he steps across the threshold, carrying a brand new sensor and a toolbag. He doesn’t die when the overhead lights burned out, fuse on the wall popping, With a curse, he switches on his headlamp.

Everything breaks down.

Blue light flashes off steel, concrete and something that might’ve been glass.

The hatch seals him in the darkness, a faint blue glow simmering at the edge of his vision from the lnmp. Each breath feels normal. Damp. Cool. Each step carries him forward, closer to death. Metal dances on his tongue.

Old iron rock and new steel pipework.

He follows the conduits on the ceiling to the broken sensor, hung from a wall. B-24-A, in a steel enclosure.

Around his booted feet, a cool pool of water. Some part of his mind wonders where the water had come from. It couldn’t be reactor water. A leak would’ve been noticed. The other two sensors would’ve gone crazy.

It’d probably come from the fire system. A leaking fitting or an old valve had to have let go when Unit-4 caught fire. A black, coal-like stain traced the leak-path up to the cable tracks and pipework overhead. It disappeared into the tangle. He called it in.

No big deal.

His body tingles. He sets to work. By now, he’ll be sick for a week, with a ten percent chance of cancer.

Control confirms the cable is good. Disconnecting the sensor triggers a broken wire alarm. Jumping the terminals confirms a short. Definitely a dead sensor.

It takes another ten minutes to get the new unit mounted and switched on. He now has a fifty percent chance of surviving the next month.

Control report another offscale high reading. But not a wire-break.

And he thinks, what the hell?

He wonders.

Two bad sensors?
Short circuit in the terminal block.

He tests the sensor by covering the aperture with a steel plate.

No reduction.

He checks the connections. Once. Twice. Three times. His multimeter puts power into the sensor itself. Current flows at the full 24 milliamps. The maximum value it can, but not a short circuit.

By the time he closes the cover on the sensor, he’s already dead. He just doesn’t know it yet.

His feet slosh through water to find the next sensor, tracing conduits above. It takes another few minutes to find it. To find where it had been.

The cover stands, propped open. Inside it, nothing. Only enough of a resistance across to keep the system from tripping on a broken or short circuit warning and enough dust to tell him it'd been done years before.

Dread sinks in.

He pulls the resistor.

Control reports the wire break.

He runs to the hatch, screaming to seal the compartment off, for a medic, for something to save him. Offscale high could mean anything, couldn’t it? It might just be 3.6 roentgen an hour. It could be fucking anything. It might still be low. It’d only been a half hour. He's sweating.

He's drenched in it. Back in the light, the hatch slams shut behind him. Already, he feels sick. From the run or radiation, he doesn’t know. He fumbles in his pocket for the dosimeter, and stares at the dial, hands shaking.

Both Exocomps slide away from him, as if they could sense the contagion on his body.

A single red needle stands hard against the rightmost limit of the dial.

He knows the meter has no need to read any higher. Recording doses above 600 roentgen is good only for bragging rights.

That arrogant cyber bitch killed him. Slowly and horribly.

Already rotting alive.

--

Minor notes:
I need to change a few earlier things. Jet's locked into a certain mindset, and trying to do the best. I'm also trying - and maybe failing to do it right - to show the lingering wounds from the Boskone war.

Radioactive man is, well, it might be foreshadowing, it might be a glimpse into the culture that's developed. It might be a comment on arrogance and self-destruction.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
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Messages In This Thread
The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 09-18-2015, 10:13 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 02-23-2019, 04:26 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 05-07-2019, 06:00 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 07-28-2019, 01:33 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by robkelk - 07-28-2019, 02:38 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 07-29-2019, 01:06 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 08-12-2019, 06:12 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 08-24-2019, 09:13 AM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 10-27-2019, 08:27 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 11-23-2020, 06:16 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by InsaneTD - 02-04-2021, 09:20 AM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 09-20-2023, 06:10 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by robkelk - 09-21-2023, 06:50 AM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 09-21-2023, 01:52 PM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 10-15-2023, 04:23 PM
[No subject] - by Matrix Dragon - 09-19-2015, 03:16 AM
[No subject] - by Matrix Dragon - 09-19-2015, 08:29 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 09-19-2015, 11:51 AM
[No subject] - by robkelk - 09-19-2015, 04:37 PM
[No subject] - by Matrix Dragon - 09-19-2015, 05:34 PM
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[No subject] - by Matrix Dragon - 09-20-2015, 01:44 AM
[No subject] - by LynnInDenver - 09-20-2015, 04:01 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 09-20-2015, 02:33 PM
[No subject] - by Star Ranger4 - 09-21-2015, 12:03 AM
[No subject] - by robkelk - 09-21-2015, 12:38 AM
[No subject] - by JakeGrey - 09-21-2015, 12:56 AM
[No subject] - by Rajvik - 09-21-2015, 02:53 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 10-26-2015, 04:53 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 11-02-2015, 01:31 AM
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[No subject] - by DeputyJones - 11-03-2015, 11:15 PM
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[No subject] - by Dartz - 02-25-2016, 03:28 AM
[No subject] - by Matrix Dragon - 02-25-2016, 04:20 AM
[No subject] - by robkelk - 02-25-2016, 04:27 AM
[No subject] - by Matrix Dragon - 02-25-2016, 04:32 AM
[No subject] - by InsaneTD - 02-25-2016, 09:07 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 02-25-2016, 11:32 PM
[No subject] - by Rajvik - 02-25-2016, 11:45 PM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 02-26-2016, 03:44 AM
[No subject] - by robkelk - 02-26-2016, 04:29 AM
[No subject] - by Cobalt Greywalker - 02-27-2016, 01:38 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 02-28-2016, 01:30 AM
[No subject] - by Cobalt Greywalker - 02-28-2016, 03:55 AM
[No subject] - by Star Ranger4 - 02-28-2016, 07:11 PM
[No subject] - by robkelk - 02-28-2016, 07:31 PM
[No subject] - by DeputyJones - 02-28-2016, 08:48 PM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 02-28-2016, 11:49 PM
[No subject] - by Matrix Dragon - 02-29-2016, 12:45 AM
[No subject] - by robkelk - 02-29-2016, 02:25 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 02-29-2016, 02:57 AM
[No subject] - by Star Ranger4 - 02-29-2016, 04:41 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 03-02-2016, 03:29 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 03-30-2016, 08:30 AM
[No subject] - by Matrix Dragon - 03-30-2016, 09:27 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 03-30-2016, 10:09 PM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 06-19-2016, 02:42 AM
[No subject] - by LynnInDenver - 06-19-2016, 05:39 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 06-24-2016, 12:11 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 08-02-2016, 12:03 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 11-10-2016, 10:57 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 11-20-2016, 04:59 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 11-23-2016, 11:15 PM
[No subject] - by Rajvik - 11-24-2016, 09:20 PM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 11-26-2016, 02:15 AM
[No subject] - by robkelk - 11-26-2016, 02:40 AM
[No subject] - by Rajvik - 11-26-2016, 03:38 AM
[No subject] - by robkelk - 11-26-2016, 06:01 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 11-27-2016, 02:51 AM
[No subject] - by Dartz - 01-22-2017, 05:56 AM
RE: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 04-02-2017, 06:40 PM
Re: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by Dartz - 07-24-2017, 06:27 PM
Re: The Melancholy of Mackie-Chan - by robkelk - 07-25-2017, 06:02 PM

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