I spied an offworlder in the near corner, inside a circle of admirers. His shirt was unbuttoned, hairless pecs and tight abs on display. He had a brandy in one hand, and he held the other out front. Some caterpillar-like creature snaked through his fingers, coiling and uncoiling, slithering and sliding. Always in motion. Some kind of genetically engineered pet.
One of his admirers held up a thumb and the offworlder transferred the creature. Fluffy fur wrapped the thumb, then wound back and forth between outstretched fingers. Delighted shrieks sounded over the bar’s hubbub.
The offworlder finished his brandy, and his gaze turned toward the bar, his eyes snagging on my stare. He stepped out from his group and came my way, his legs scissoring inside nut-hugger pants. Despite the still air, the back of his shirt flapped like he was walking into a breeze. His hair blew too, long raven-colored hair that whipped in fictional wind. Vain bastards with their high-tech bullshit.
“I saw you watching me. Do we know each other?”
“No.”
“In that case, I’m Angel. And you are?”
“Straight.”
He lifted a brow. “Forgive me if I doubt that, the way you came in here acting so butch. It’s quite the look you’ve got going there. Badass shades. A bump on your forehead like you’re a tough boy.” He took hold of my empty sleeve. “Oh, and this is a nice touch. Where’s your hand? Is it detachable?”
I leaned back to pull the sleeve from his hand. “You been coming here awhile?”
“You could say that.”
“Ever know a guy named Franz Samusaka?”
“Maybe. Why do you want to know?”
“I’m looking into his death.”
“You police?”
I lost patience. Not sure I had any in the first place. “Did you know the fucker or not?”
He acted taken aback, his lips forming a playfully exaggerated O. “You’ve really got that rough-boy act down, don’t you?”
“Not an act. Did you know him?”
“No.”
“Then fuck off.”
I watched the chill overcome the charm, twinkly eyes going dark, disarming smile going flat. “As you wish,” he said. “I’ll leave you be after I get my drink.”
I went back to scanning the room. A couple sat scrunched together on an ottoman. One was holding a jar up to the light. I could see something small and black inside. He unscrewed the lid and tapped the glass facedown against his palm in an attempt to dump out the object. Whatever it was, it held tight to the side of the jar. He and his partner giggled like teenagers until it finally popped loose.
The offworlder I’d told off brushed past me, his brandy glass now filled. He stopped to look back at me. “You know what you need? A good fuck.”
I pretended like I didn’t hear until he moved off. Asshole offworlder was used to people bowing at his feet. I studied the couple on the ottoman. One of them was picking at the black object with his fingers, trying to get hold of something. Finally succeeding, he pulled it free and made a show of holding it up high. It dangled from his fingertips-black and oily. And wiggling.
A snail, I realized. He’d pulled it from its shell, and now he closed the snail in his fist and squeezed, black juice oozing out from between his fingers and down his hand. Holding his hand over his open mouth, he let the thick black drops fall to his outstretched tongue.
He popped what was left of the snail into his mouth and chewed, an oily drop running down his chin. His lover swiped away the drop with his index finger, and they smiled at each other, the snail eater grinning inky teeth.
Deluski appeared at my side. “Get anything?”
“Did you see that?”
“Yeah. I watched somebody eat one in the other room. A guy told me it’s an aphrodisiac.”
The couple stood and walked to the back, then through a curtain, briefly exposing a set of stairs that led up to what I figured to be some private rooms.
“You think it works?” I asked.
“Hell no.” He laughed. “You know how people make up stories to sell worthless crap.”
“Learn anything?”
“I got a couple guys to admit they knew Samusaka, but that’s as far as it went. You?”
“Dead fucking end.”
“What’s our next move?” Deluski seemed eager, totally digging his first crack at playing detective. The kid impressed me. Made me think he might be worthy of being my number two. Might be.
I asked, “You ever tell me how you got sucked into this?”
“Sucked into what?”
“Into this gang. What’s left of it anyway.”
He rubbed his chin. “It started with a girl.”
“A girl?”
“Yeah. I wanted to impress her, show her I could take care of her. She had this ex who kept bothering her. You know the type, the clingy kind that can’t let go. I went to see him, wanted to talk some sense into him.”
“You give him a beat-down?”
He nodded, his eyes looking distant. “I didn’t want to. I really tried to talk to him, but all the guy understood was fists.”
“Some people are like that,” I said, thinking I might be one of those people.
“Yeah, well, this guy turned out to be Wu’s cousin, and he went to Wu for help. That’s when Wu came to me and told me that he could get me fired. All he had to do was file a report.”
“Unless?” With Wu there was always an “unless.”
“Unless I did a job for him. He had this whole plan of how he was going to steal a shipment of O. He had a tip that a container had just come in, and it was sitting in one of the abandoned shipyards. What he wanted me to do was knock it into the water. There’d be no guards, he said. That was the way these guys liked to operate.”
Already, his story sounded familiar. “Guards would just attract attention.”
“Right. They thought it was better to just leave their shit out in the open. There were so many shipping containers on that pier nobody would stumble upon the opium unless they knew where to look for it.”
I listened closely even though I already knew how this one was going to end. I’d run the same con.
Deluski carried on, his voice getting deeper and harder to hear, as if he were telling the story of how somebody close had died. “He gave me the container number and told me where to find it. It was right where he said it would be, locked up tight and sitting close to the water. I hooked it to a tugboat I’d rented, and I pulled it off the pier and let it sink just like he said. You see what he was thinking?”
“He wanted to make the drug dealers think somebody hauled their container away.”
“Right. They’d go searching the river, looking for a big boat, and while they were off doing that, he’d go back with a small fishing boat and dive for the O. I thought he was a genius.”
“But?”
Deluski’s voice continued to lose volume. I had to lean in to hear him. “But when he dove down to the container, he found bodies inside. A whole family. He showed me pictures of them. A man and woman. Three kids. All drowned. They were trying to get off-planet. A barge was going to come by and sneak them into the spaceport as cargo. I’d sunk the wrong container.”
Deluski was practically shaking. He had to know the truth. I looked him in the eye, my face as sober as my words. “The whole thing was a con. That container was empty. It’s still down there. Still locked up tight.”
“I know.” His voice was solemn as an undertaker’s. “I eventually figured out it was all bullshit. But at the beginning…” He let out a sigh. “At the beginning, I thought it was real. Wu helped me cover it up. I owed him, and I started doing regular jobs for him. By the time I realized I’d been had, I was in too deep. I still remember those pics. Those kids still feel real to me. Fucked me up good.”
I swallowed what was left of my drink and slapped my glass on the bar. A story like that required a good belt. Hard to believe I used to pull that con myself. Some cruel-ass shit.
Right in front of us, a couple sat pressed together on a sofa, lips mashing, hands exploring. Helluva place for a conversation like this. To the rest of the Maze’s clientele, Deluski and I probably looked like a good match. Like we’d just had a moment.