The Bitter Lancer

Torlic hated Tavern Du Lune less than every other bar in Salzon Station. He hated the sticky seats that were marginally less sticky than the seats at Pneumatic Phil’s. The service was only slightly quicker than the languid speed of the Ice Box Inn’s bar. And there were only two or three less psychic androids than Madame Guillermo’s dive. Unfortunately, even one psychic android was too many when its sensors are set on you.

“No,” Torlic said for the fourth time since the bot came over. “I do not want to hear about my death.” He didn’t want to hear about it because it would be far in the future and in a comfy apartment paid for by the holo-films of his grand adventures. 

“Then pay the small three hundred credit dismissal fee,” the bot recited in its metallic voice.

“I don’t have three hundred credits to waste! I don’t agree to your terms of service. I unsubscribe from your notifications. I don’t want to hear it.”

“The Miranda has been restocked,” Vilgaf said. “What job should we do next?”

The android cited three local ordinances explaining why Torlic’s comments were not applicable to the situation. 

“Something that pays well and sounds impressive.” Torlic told his copilot. He was sick of being broke and unknown. There were famous lancers, trained fighters willing to take on any monster for a price, across the Central System. He just wasn’t one of them, yet. 

“For three hundred credits I can tell you the highest paying job available,” the bot commented. “Otherwise I’ll have to tell you about how your death goes. And I assure you it is bloody and unsettling.”

“Then experiencing it once will be enough.” Torlic knew the bots said these sorts of things to get attention.  “Sort by price. We can know which job pays well without this metallic menace.”

“10k credits for a vakbax cleanup,” Vilgaf said encouragingly. “We’ve done that a hundred times for less.”

“Valgon cleanup is not the job you’ll take,” the AI said. “You’ll pick something much more gruesome.”

“Unless we’re killing the Valgon itself it’s not interesting.” Despite the lack of renown, the price wasn’t bad. “Where is it?” 

“Balfo–” the young man’s voice deflated before finishing the star system’s name.

“What’s the highest paying job that we have fuel to get to?”

“For 500 credits I can tell you which machine at Gizmo’s Gambling Gazebo will pay out in the next 100 spins. You won’t have to burn a drop of fuel to get down there.”

“I don’t have any credits for you,” Torlic stared into its LED irises. “So tell me my death or get gone!”

“500 credits is a good investment. My temporal sensors indicate the payout will be in the thousands.”

“I will bust this beer bottle over your metallic skull,” Torlic threatened.

“My temporal sensors indicate the cost of damages you would incur is more than you and your young coworker can afford. You would never be able to pay it, making it a very bad decision.”

“The only thing we can get to is a galgon hunt on Ursa Beta,” Vilgaf said. “It pays 600 credits.”

“That pay is spit in the void. Can I bring the galgon back here to go to town on this AI?”

galgon’s were nasty six legged beasts built harder than starships and had a penchant for shiny objects like Ministers had a penchant for white robes. Due to a popular movie a century ago where a mob boss employed a galgon to dispose of his enemies, galgons got shipped across the Central System. However unlike in the movies, galgons were difficult to control and usually escaped taking out their owner in the process. Badges across the Central System saw it as a win and quit detering galgon smuggling. Although by then everyone dumb enough to want the beast had become its lunch. Leaving lancers like Torlic and Vilgaf to clean up the mess.

“The listing says that the galgon carried off nearly three hundred thousand local credits of equipment. The local government will pay 10% to anyone that can return it.”

“For 250 credits I can tell you if the galgon still has that equipment or if it is merely a staged heist for the tax benefit of the local governor.”

“I’ll tell you that your temporal circuits are busted for free. If they worked you wouldn’t be bothering a table without credits to pay for your predictions.” Torlic turned to Vilgaf, “I’ve got a dozen boring holo-films of us fighting galgons. Is there anything that has adequate pay and interesting work?”

“That’s the best we’ve got. Besides galgons are fun as long as our prec-mal is fueled up.”

Torlic checked the inventory of the Miranda. “We still have some leftover fuel from the job on Tyvon.”

“For 5 credits I’ll tell you if you should restock that,” the AI offered.

Torlic finished his beer and looked at the empty bottle. It probably wouldn’t do too much damage to the bot and if he didn’t want to pay the repair fine he’d just avoid Salzon Station for a few cycles. “Let’s go.”

“You really shouldn’t,” the AI added.

“What do you know?”

“I know that the galgon on Ursa Beta will bury it’s right tusk three inches below your right rib and while it won’t kill you on impact it will pierce your stomach causing stomach acid to leech into your other organs killing you before the boy can get you to Ursa Beta’s medical staff.”

Torlic bashed the AI over the head with his empty beer bottle.

It shredded the leathery skin of the android’s forehead exposing the green oily fluid that lubed its insides. While the android was stunned Torlic slipped out of the booth and dashed for the door. Vilgaf finished the last of his drink and followed suit, surfing through the chaos in his boss’s wake.

“Get your temporal circuits checked when repairing that,” Torlic shouted as he ducked under the arms of the bar’s electronic bouncer.

---

Torlic hated caves. He hated their dampness, their darkness, and their dead ends. Torlic was fortunate enough to avoid the dead ends since galgon had a habit of defecating in every corner of their caves except for their nest. Which meant that stepping in their squishy stool kept the lancers from hiking another half kilo-meter to hit the dead end. 

It was little consolation that galgon deification smelled of lavender and cinnamon since lavender was the flavor of soap Torlic’s mother washed his mouth out with as a kid and he was allergic to cinnamon. The darkness made any holo-footage he tried to capture almost useless and the dampness fogged the visor on his helmet. 

Despite Torlic being behind his copilot the younger man avoided the piles leaving Torlic to step onto the feces. 

“I’m just saying I paid a fortune teller bot to predict my date’s drink order on Val’s Station and it was right?” Vilgaf said.

“Are you sure your date didn’t just say it was right so you wouldn’t feel like you wasted money?” Torlic scraped his heel on a nearby rock. “We’ve got to turn around, this is a dead end.”

“No, because that guy was an asshole. We were drinking at his bar.”

“You’re not an asshole for liking familiar places.” Torlic lowered the camera on his armored chest so that the shadows of the cave looked longer and more ominous.

“No. But you are an asshole for making me pay the tab at the end of the night.”

A shadow moved in front of Torlic’s camera. “You see that?”

“Yeah,” Vilgaf said as he passed Torlic in the narrow corridor. Vilgaf put the handle of the prec-mal in his hand. The prec-mal was a modified cutting device originally used to cut metal. It had a backpack of fuel attached to an L shaped handle with a small jet that when lit was a stunning and effective fiery tool to use in battle. It always looked good on holo-film regardless of what you were fighting. 

“Remember to aim low if you come up to it.” Torlic tried to aim the camera past Vilgaf so that the glint of the prec-mal wasn’t reflecting his light back at him.

They ducked through the corridor in the direction the shadow moved. The cave soon opened up into a room big enough to park a land speeder with a crater dug into the left hand wall. The galgon’s had thick paws that couldn’t cut anything but the large tusks on their snouts that had no problem grating down rock walls.

Torlic checked the right hand wall where he expected to see the battered remnants of the local govenor’s “lost” weapon’s reserve. Instead there was a paltry pile of mirrors, silverware and hand terminals. Ten percent of the recovery of that equipment wouldn’t cover the docking cost on Ursa Beta.

“I think I found how it–” Vilgaf started.

The clank of the expensive prec-mal hitting the rocky ground cut him off. Vilgaf’s screams made Torlic bolt into action. He found a small corridor that was barely a crack in the wall next to the prec-mal. One of the shoulder straps had broken and now Vilgaf was being dragged through the cave by the galgon.

Torlic slipped the one good strap over his shoulder and adjusted the prec-mal’s L shaped handle in his hand. He couldn’t fire it wildly into the crevice. In his younger days he would have relished in a scene like that. But now he had to conserve the fuel. Plus scenes like that were common in Lancer films.

It was a real shame he had to go after Vilgaf. Not because he didn’t like the guy. But because if they were together they could turn back. Now that they knew there was no treasure and they could renegotiate a worthwhile price for the job. Maybe he’d be lucky and get the kid out without killing the galgon and be able to renegotiate a contract.

He hunched over following the drag marks of Vilgaf into the tunnel. Flashing lights of Vilgaf’s headlamp showed the way. His screams helped too. Not in giving directions, the echoes of the cave made the sound impossible to follow, but it added a sense of dread to the holo-film. Plus a dead body would be difficult to drag out alone with their equipment.

Turning a corner Torlic saw the light at the end of the tunnel. He shouted for the beast’s attention. But the curses didn’t work on the galgon like it did on drunks in taverns.

Torlic took his head lamp off and shone it on the chrome siding of the prec-mal. Despite the muck in some places it reflected the light far, focusing it into little dazzling rainbows and pure white spots. The brightness got the beast’s attention, it turned leaving Vilgaf in the narrow hall to backlight the beast.

The jet stream of the prec-mal came to life, its fiery cutting jet nearly deafening and bright blue. He lifted the pack onto his back and waited for the beast to arrive.

Torlic loved fighting galgons more than any other creature in the void. He loved the thrill of them charging more than chasing a tabear. He enjoyed cutting into the galgon’s shielded neck more than cutting out of a vakbax’s webbing. And a galgon’s face was twice as ugly as a spider-hog with a few less tusks. Fortunately, tusks were harmless if you knew how to dodge them.

Torlic jumped to his left as the tusked beast was mere meters away. It tossed its head to strike Torlic. Torlic swiped with the cutting jet of the prec-mal. The fire went straight through removing the beast’s snout from its head along with some of its jaw. He struck again, coming in low and cutting through the protective armor near its neck. Nothing evolution could make could stand in the way of a prec-mal.

The beast fell to the ground. By the light of the prec-mal Torlic noticed that the tusks he first cut off weren’t falling to the ground either. They’d embedded themselves into his gut. The the prec-mal turned off, he needed to conserve its fuel. Two headlamps were all that lit the cave.

Soon Vilgaf was by his side. The guy’s armor was scratched and dented. But the galgon’s soft paws hadn’t done much damage. “I don’t think I want to be a lancer anymore,” Vilgaf said. Inspecting his boss’s wound.

“I don’t know if I’ll be much of anything any longer.” Torlic let out a weak cough and hated himself for it. It was cliché and more importantly, it moved his insides in a way that was uncomfortable since the galgon tusk was embedded in them. 

Vilgaf cut the tusk as close to Torlic’s body as he could. Taking it out would lead to blood loss that Torlic couldn’t afford. He hefted Torlic onto his shoulder and the man weakly limped along next to it. The prec-mal was too much to carry.

“Maybe I can be a guard on a shipping vessel. Fight off pirates and such.” Vilgaf proposed as they carefully weaved through the stalagmites of the cave’s floor.

“You don’t want to do that,” Torlic’s voice was raspy. “Pirates will kill you for fun. The galgon was only doing what was natural.”

“I could stay here on Ursa Beta and work a farm.”

“That’s a slow, slow death. With modern medicine you could be a farmer for 80 years.”

“It all ends in death!” Vilgaf sounded panicked. 

Torlic tried to think of something inspiring for the boy and the holo-film. If these were going to be his last words they were his last chance to be renowned. He should have prepared something years ago. A nice quip like Halgaf the Halfman said before his electronic heart was stopped mid-battle by the sting of a dentali queen. 

“I did this for renown.” Torlic wanted to sigh but held his breath steady because of the pain. “I hoped people would remember my name. But even this town is just going to remember me as the lancer that died and didn’t return their equipment.”

“I’ll remember you.”

“For how long? Besides, it was a stupid goal. But I had fun in the process. There’s nothing like cutting through galgon guts, or wrestling tabears or cutting your way out of a vakbax’s web.”

“Sorry I made us take this job.”

“It was fun, you were right. I had a good time. And if they don’t remember me. Well I enjoyed swinging the prec-mal around despite it.”

Torlic was quiet the rest of the way out of the cave and by the time Vilgaf laid him in the back of the land speeder his breaths were shallow. The camera on his armor pointed at the blank ceiling of the vehicle. It was a terrible final shot in Torlic’s opinion, but there was nothing he could do to change it. 

The city’s doctor pronounced him dead. Nothing in his advanced medical arsenal could help. The governor took the embedded tusk and video as proof the galgon was dead. It would have saved Vilgaf a trip back into the cave if he hadn’t left the prec-mal behind.

Vilgaf’s bruised ribs reminded him of the terror and thrill of being dragged through the corridors of the cave. As he recovered the prec-mal he was reminded that no one else would get dragged or gutted by the galgon and that was probably for the best. 

This town wouldn’t remember his name, Torlic’s holo-film would play on maybe a dozen screens. But Vilgaf enjoyed the bitter man’s company for the years he worked with him and learned from him.

In Ursa Beta’s small farmer tavern he looked for the next colony that might have some work for him. And more importantly somewhere that sold fuel for the prec-mal.