I hadn't until that moment, down in the dark underbelly of Itokawa, when I regained enough movement to move my eyes and focus them. I saw only darkness at first.
He appeared as a silhouette manifesting out of the shadows, like I was adjusting the brightness on a display only to reveal that a man had been standing there the whole time unseen, unheard, watching me. He was bigger and stronger than @astrowave and @cyberneticflare.
As he came into focus, I noticed his dark skin had a deep rusty color to it, an orange hue infused within his body. His face was stern like iron, the whites of his eyes a brilliant contrast to his black pupils and obscured face.
I had no problem facing off with the Thrusters. I was even ready to go at the leader of the Gravemind squad. But I wanted nothing to do with this man. He would murder me harshly and violently. I had no doubt about it. Speed had nothing to do with it. I could be the fastest being in the world. I could land a dozen hits without even taking a blow. But eventually he would just grab me and throttle me. I'd be dead in an instant, flung in a corner like a pillow with the stuffing ripped out.
I shivered as he came closer, or at least my brain did. My body just pulsed slowly and automatically, but I was starting to get some feeling back, and that feeling was telling me to run away.
"You know why they call us Kings?" he asked in a deep, resonant voice. "K-I-N-G," he said, spelling it out. "Killing In the Name of God. And you know who god is?"
He sat down in a chair in front of me. His presence in the room masked my own, like a black hole pulling in everything in its orbit. I felt small, weak, unsure of myself.
"Me," he said. "I am god."
"Niesh duw neet tewe, gohd," I mumbled, grunting out nice to meet you, god through my waking lips.
"You can call me James."
And that's how I met the leader of the Hollow Kings.
I kept working my limbs as the feeling started to return. My thoughts went to The Pharaoh. With any luck, my crew had successfully left Itokawa. They would have been grounded, told not to leave by the authorities, so taking off would have resulted in a chase of some kind. @foxcutter was good. He would know how to deal with tractor beams, if they had any, and maybe @zerogstar could help him with her knowledge of the asteroid.
But they didn't have a solid pilot. I was the pilot. I wondered what they would do. The ship's computer would kick in and assist, but it would be too predictable. Someone would have to at least nudge it.
I couldn't worry about that now. I had to start thinking about how to store my memories so that I could retrieve them after the Alliance Starmada reanimated me.
Yeah, I felt bleak. I won't lie. I didn't expect to leave this room alive.
"Meh kidday?" I asked, inquiring about my kitten.
"You are Eshu, misfortune or opportunity," James replied. He was referring to a trickster deity of the crossroads, two-faced to give people blessings or curses, gatekeeper of the spiritual world.
It probably looked ridiculous, but I tried to smile. I liked that description. It seemed to suit my mission on Itokawa.
"Your kitten is chaos, a destructive force of nature, with sharp claws and a vengeful spirit."
I shrugged. "Meh kidday?" I asked again, more insistent.
James snapped his fingers. Another person I hadn't seen came forward from my left side and placed the gray tabby in my lap. The kitten crawled up my chest and began assaulting my nose again with forceful licks. There was nothing I could do about it. My limbs were slowly coming back to life, but I lumbered just to lift my hand to my lap.
"Eye luv ewe doo," I muttered to the kitty. I looked up at James through the joyful face and whiskers of the kitten.
"The kitten is safe. Toxoplasm doesn't work on cats. Just a temporary transportation mechanism," James explained.
He stood up and motioned. Light entered the room, like a slow sunrise, giving off a warm morning hue. The chair he had been sitting in, a dark green fabric, was shredded to pieces, stuffing popping out of the side, threads hanging down below.
"His name is Sango," James said.
"But we call him Sparky," a voice called out from my left. "We were playing fetch when he crawled behind our quantum fabricator. Bit through the cables, short-circuiting the line and frying the fabricator. He's lucky to be alive."
James turned his head slowly toward the thug as he was talking. Toward the end of the thug's speech, his voice had softened and slowed. As he finished, he slunk back to the corner.
Sparky, I thought. Meh. I preferred Sango, but maybe I would rename the little guy. I had to get a sense for the cat's personality first, assuming I could keep him.
"Meh kidday?" I asked again, with emphasis on the my.
James chuckled. "Yes, you can keep the cat. It has bonded with you. I may be a monster, but I'm not a monster."
That made me happy for two reasons. One, kitty. Two, maybe I wasn't going to die after all.
I shrugged at James. "What's next?" I asked, surprised that it came out of my lips coherently.
I was able to raise my hand more now. I cupped it around the kitten, moving my face back to spare my nose from being licked raw. I wiggled my toes. This was going pretty well. I could even make a run for it eventually, if I could figure out where the door was. Must be a panel somewhere that slides open.
"Here is what I know," James rumbled. "You are not worth $7.1M qcoins."
The bounty had climbed pretty high. Sure, I had planted the bounty in the first place, but it was still something to be proud of. The question I had was, if I wasn't worth anything to the Hollow Kings, why was I still alive?
"But you are worth something to me. A Vanquisher. That's impressive."
Oh shit. He knew. I wondered how he knew.
"And you really are the Fracker," he continued. "That's something." James had an odd tick, rubbing his large right hand atop his bald skull, like he was giving himself a head massage. It made it look like he was summoning thoughts into his head. "I'd love to make a profit on that, but proving it would be hard. Too easy to fake these days. Besides, the people of Itokawa prefer their mysteries. They don't want you to be the Fracker."
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Well, fuck me. So, he knew I was the Fracker as well. What didn't the Hollow Kings know about me?
There was no sense in denying any of it, so I just needed to figure out how to get out of this predicament. "Why am I here, god?" I managed to ask, my lips starting to respond more and more.
"James," he corrected me.
My brain was waking up. The way he said James, the one word, the human name, reminded me of Amy from the Cosmic Gutter. I made a note of that, and once again my suspicions about how much I could trust Amy rose to mind. Maybe I'd have to steal something from her after all. That would suck. I really needed to get something crossed off my growing mission log.
I added Get Away from James and the Hollow Kings to the list.
"What's the deal, Jimmy?" I replied, because that's who I am.
Unlike many of the people I'd encountered recently, James didn't assault me, but he didn't laugh either. Maybe worse, he just stood there and looked at me, all serious, with a cool demeanor.
"I deal in information."
He motioned, and I heard someone walk over to me from behind. They bit me in the neck, like a fucking vampire, and goddamnit did that hurt. Don't believe all those movies about vampires where the victims are like, Oh, this is so nice. Please suck my blood and have passionate sex with me while I bleed all over this lovely couch. It's a bunch of bullshit.
I flinched as the teeth sank in and realized for the first time that there was a rubber band around my waist connecting me to the chair, and the chair was bolted to the ground. I could move all my limbs, but I wasn't going anywhere. I also realized that the Hollow Kings had bandaged and wrapped my torso where @horsehead had slashed me with her whip, so they must not want me to die just yet.
"Couldn't you have done that when I was still numb?" I pleaded, lifting my arm to wipe blood and drool from my neck, smearing my hoodie with filth. My hoodie had definitely seen better days.
It didn't take long for the room to go out of focus. Sango stopped licking my nose and finally settled into my lap. I could see my kitty, but I seemed only to be able to focus on one thing at a time, if that.
The vampire probably had an arsenal of toxins they could inject. In this case, I was pretty sure it was some sort of truth serum. I was really tired of being beaten, electrocuted, and drugged, but in this instant, I didn't really care. I just wanted to go to sleep on my nice fluffy butterfly rug. I bet kitty would like that too.
"What are you doing on Itokawa?" James asked.
I lifted my head a little and the huge orange form of James came into focus, but big and distorted, like I was looking at him through the bottom of a glass.
"I'm being abducted," I mumbled, "but hopefully not tortured."
James looked to his left. With limp muscles, I tossed my head in that direction to see a wildly distorted view of the vampire. She was a gorgeous woman with short black hair, but she didn't bother trying to do the sexy vampire thing. I was hoping to see her clothed in something modest but sensual, like a bodysuit with a slit down the center that hinted at what was underneath in that vampire temptation sort of way. And maybe a cape. I felt like I deserved a sexy vampire with a flowing cape after all the running and injuries. That would have been nice.
No. I got the fucking horrifying version. She had blood, my blood, still on her face. She was licking it off, mildly, and dabbing with a handkerchief. She wore a full black tactical suit that made her look like a vampire soldier. In my drugged-up state, her face was too big in the wrong places, emphasizing her bloody fangs.
I screamed again.
She shrugged and looked at me. Then she held up seven fingers, the last three of them blood stained. She slowly lowered one at a time, counting down.
When she reached zero, James asked me again. "What are you doing on Itokawa?"
My mind went to the cat on my lap. "Adopting a kitten," I slurred.
The big orange shape stared at me, and then he tried again. "Why did you come to Itokawa?"
That was a good question. Precise. My dull brain couldn't work around it.
"Looking for information. A contact to sell @bitchfrog," I said.
"Who's @bitchfrog?" James asked.
"Sheee's a froggy lady," I spat, throwing an arm out and pretending my hand could hop around, drooling out the words hop hop hop under my breath. "But if I get a booboo, she can fix me."
"Why do you need to sell @bitchfrog?"
His voice was so clear and commanding. Why did I need to sell @bitchfrog? I asked myself.
"Zombies," I said casually, and then I pretended to be a zombie, opening and closing my mouth. "Arghhh. Eooooww. Blaaaaahhhh. Braiiiinnsss."
This went on for a while, I think, because in my zombie state, being a zombie seemed natural to me, so I just mumbled and muttered to myself.
"Dooonnuuts. Sugary dooonuutts. I am the donut zombieeeee. Sprinkles pleaaaaseee. Arghhhhh. Om nom nom."
I ate a bunch of donuts like any donut zombie would. The world finally made sense to me. My purpose was to find and eat as many donuts as I could. Each donut would leave me satisfied but craving another. I could do this my whole life with a smile on my drooly, frosting-covered face.
James voice cut through, bellowing into my brain. "Tell me about the zombies."
"They're zombies!" I said flippantly. "Duh. Very dangerous."
I stared at the floor, but I didn't see any donuts there. My vision turned back to James, but all I could see was a big orange head with his hand like a squid sitting on top.
"Move," I commanded. "I can't see behind you."
"What's behind me?" James asked, looking behind slowly and then back to me.
"Nothing," I said sadly, pouting and despondent. "I was looking for donuts. Do you have donuts?"
"No," James responded. "I thought you were looking for zombies."
"Oh yeah." I flapped my hands around and let them settle around the enormous monster kitten in my lap. He looked terrifying. "My nose!" I cried.
"The zombies?" James prompted again.
"Yeah, I have to find them."
"Are you selling @bitchfrog to turn her into a zombie?" James asked.
"What?" I shouted. "No! I can't find the zombies if I can't find the bodies. Someone's selling bodies. I mean people. People for sale."
"So you're selling @bitchfrog," he said slowly, dragging it out clearly for my benefit, "to find someone who's selling people. A human trafficker?"
"No! Not humans. An aiways trafficker." I liked this game. I wanted James to guess again.
"So you're selling @bitchfrog," he repeated, rubbing his hand on his head, "to find someone who's selling aiways. Why are they trafficking aiways?"
No! my brain screamed. He was supposed to guess. "You guess! You guess!"
James didn't like this game as much as I did. He looked over at the vampire, probably wondering if she had something a little stronger to give me.
"Sounds like someone's making techo-zombies, boss," she said flatly.
He shrugged, taking his hand off his head and crossing his arms. "That right?" James asked. "Someone out there making zombies?"
"Bingo!" I nodded furiously. "To make zombies!"
Then I broke down into tears, the realization hitting me, or maybe it was the full impact of the drugs running through my system. "I don't want to sell @bitchfrog, James. She's human. She might die. I don't want to sell her, James."
In my stupor, I wept like any donut zombie would weep. Deprived of donuts, miserable about @bitchfrog, and just tired and sore all over my body. James kept asking questions, and I just sobbed and spilled my guts. That truth bite really worked.
I started to collect my wits about me toward the end of my ramble.
"And how do they get people to test the virus on?" I asked rhetorically. "They can't just take over a colony. They can't just ask for volunteers. I didn't volunteer. They were like, Guess what? You're a Vanquisher now. Go find the evil scientists. I haven't found them.
"I found @mirrorbird. I thought she was evil, but she isn't. We went on a date, but I don't think we'll see each other again. She smelled like flowers. Everything else smelled like death, especially the zombies. The zombies are coming! We're all going to die! And if the zombies don't get me, @horsehead is going to kill me when she reanimates.
"@auroraloon might try to kill me too, but I like @auroraloon, even though she beat me up. She won't remember me, though, and she'll shoot me before I can talk to her. She looked like a sexy snake, slither slither, not like a freaking horrifying vampire.
"Why don't you look like a sexy vampire?" I continued, rotating to the vampire again and yapping at her disturbing face. "Aren't you supposed to seduce me instead of scaring me? In the movies, vampires make love to their victims, but they aren't really making love. I mean, maybe that's how vampires make love? I dunno. Now that you've scared me, are you going to make love to me? Not you, James. That would freak me out, and I'm already freaking the fuck out.
"I almost freaked the fuck out at the starlab. Everybody blew themselves up! Everybody! Bang! Bang! They blew up the lab, but we escaped. I'm a pilot. I'm a fantastic pilot. And I die a lot. Soon maanny tiiimees. I think my brain is broken. Potatoes! No more potatoes!!!"
James finally stood up, his enormous form causing me to stop mumbling and scream again. He touched my cheek and lifted my face. I stared at his huge orange head.
"Pumpkin head! The Great Pumpkin! You're the Great Pumpkin!" I yelled, terrified. "Is it Halloween? Are you going to visit the pumpkin patch?"
He squeezed my jaw, but thankfully he didn't break it. I stopped yammering.
"What do you want from us?" James asked, still holding my face tightly. His grip brought the world back into focus, as if his hand could wipe away all distraction. I slowed my breath and centered myself.
What did I want, other than a donut and ten hours of solid rest?
"Help me save the world," I grumbled through his grip.
"And we have a winner!" James boomed, releasing my jaw and clapping his hands. "Let's get this man a doctor."