The Sticker closed his mouth, which had fallen open. “So… I don’t have to go into surgery tonight?”
“I hope not,” said Razz, “you’re being announced tonight at the company’s annual dinner. All division executives have to attend. That’s why we fixed your grill there. Hope you like the new pearly whites, makes you more diplomatic looking.”
He looked at Tasha, who beamed. “I just found out this morning.”
“It’s been tough handling two divisions on my own,” said Razz. “Now I can focus on Ganymede division and you can oversee here.”
“Los Angeles?”
Razz laughed. “No, Earth, of course.”
The Sticker choked on some spit that went down the wrong pipe. He looked at Trevor. “But what’s he do? Besides be rich and an asshole?”
“Those businesses are fronts. I answer to the Earth Director here. My sole position is a supervisor of operations in the Los Angeles office,” Trevor put mildly. “Are you going to fire me now?”
“Are you joking?” The Sticker swung out of bed. Both his feet touched the cold ground. It was a lovely, powerful feeling; he wasn’t dreaming after all. He stood toe to toe with Trevor Milstead now. He’d never been afraid of the man, but he’d never felt like an equal either. “I’m never going to fire you, Milstead,” said the Sticker. “Where the hell is the fun in that?”
Tasha sniffed out a laugh and looked away.
“Thanks, Director,” answered Trevor. When nobody said anything, he hurried from the room.
Razz took the Sticker’s hand. “And thank you, Director, for saving my life.”
“I don’t know how to do this job,” the Sticker admitted.
“Nobody does at first. But with my help,” he said, “you’re going to do great.”
“Phenomenal,” added Tasha.
“But isn’t this strange? Me… working directly for you guys.”
“I told you before. This kind of thing happens all the time. Most of our recruiters were once clients, in fact. It’s because our contracts are so blasted weak. I’ve been meaning to revise them.”
“So you?” the Sticker asked Tasha.
The little girl smirked. “No, I’ve never worked outside the company. I was the first recruiter and I’ll be the last.”
“But how—”
“I’ll send a courier later with your new clothes and invitation,” Razz interrupted. “Sound good, Slaughter Man?” He lifted a hopeful eyebrow.
The Sticker threw up his hands. “Sounds good.”
They left him there in the plush hospital room. He felt like hooting and crying and laughing all at once, but instead sat on the bed and closed his eyes.
When he opened them, Annette stood in the room.
“I don’t expect you to forgive my actions or how brutal I’ve treated you lately. I just wanted to congratulate you. Trevor’s not happy, but I know you’ll be a good boss. I’m really stoked for you. I am.”
The Sticker opened his arms and Annette moved into them. It felt so damningly good to hold her again, savor the moment, before he pushed her back and searched her pleading face. Annette studied his eyes for a moment. “You aren’t still mad at me. Are you?”
He shook his head.
She smiled and went to embrace him again, but he put his hand up. “Of course I haven’t stopped caring about you, Annette, but I do have a business to run now.”
She frowned. “But…”
“So,” said the Sticker, pointing to the hall, “if you please, kindly get the hell out of my building. Now.”
The last course was rainbow sherbet molded into a Limbus globe. The Sticker thought it almost too pretty to eat. Tasha and Razz argued a bit about something work-related into which he hadn’t turned his attention.
“You’re so sensitive,” said Razz. “Must get it from your mother.”
“You haven't even met my mother yet!” Tasha said.
“Uh, how, uh, does that work?" asked the Sticker, jumping into the conversation.
“Time doesn't matter, remember?”
“Yeah…”
“What’s wrong?” asked Razz.
The Sticker sighed. The reality of what happened had finally connected. With everything he’d faced, this new world, a world of boundless responsibility, seemed even more terrifying. “It’s just… I don’t feel I’ve earned this.” His voice betrayed him with a quiver.
Razz shook his head in respectful disbelief. “You have. More than anybody here.”
The Sticker looked down under the table, at his loafers, so strange on his feet.
A representative stopped by the table with individual packets. “Hello, Mr. Willing. Hello Ms. Willing. Here are action items and annual budget breakdowns. Oh and hello, Mr. Fulsome, here is yours.”
The Sticker took his packet and nodded thanks.
Tasha said, “Funny, I remember your name from our files, but it sounds strange to hear spoken. We all just called you the Slaughter Man.”
“Dean Fulsome… not sure I ever knew the man,” said the Sticker.
Razz raised his glass. “Happy Birthday, Dean.”
Tasha lifted hers.
Dean lifted his.
“To time not mattering,” he said.
Their three glasses met.
For Dean Fulsome, that was the moment everything began.
The Sacrifice
By Brett J. Talley
He couldn’t see anything, and all he could hear was a steady drip, drip, drip that thundered in his ears. Drip, drip, drip in regular beats, too loud to be real. And then it wasn’t real anymore. It faded out and almost away — but not quite — as his consciousness expanded to encompass something more than just that sound. His eyes fluttered open, but all he saw was red. A pool of crimson that seemed to expand beneath him as he grew colder. The drip of blood from his forehead added to the flow, but it was a larger opening somewhere else on his body that served as the fountainhead.
He started to lose focus, and the black shroud of unconsciousness mixed with the crimson of the blood on the edges of his vision. As darkness took him, his eyes fell on a piece of white cardboard floating in the midst of the red ocean. It hung there like a ship on the verge of floundering, until a rivulet of red water poured over its side. He watched as the blood touched the thick, black letters. And then, in the instant before consciousness left him, he would have sworn those same letters ignited in a flash of red light, the name they formed glowing in the night.
“So what were you doing at Cliff’s Edge last night?”
Katya. It all went back to Katya.
The detective waited, drumming his notebook with his pencil while Ryan thought about her.
“It’s a simple question,” he said finally, leaning forward in his chair and putting the sharpened end of the pencil to paper, ready to write.
Ryan looked at him. “No,” he said, “nothing is ever simple.”
Detective Fox frowned. Ryan wasn’t trying to be mysterious, but he knew that’s how he came off. The detective had been patient, giving Ryan time to recover after he was found that night, lying in a pool of his own blood outside of the Cliff’s Edge nightclub. Ryan had almost gone over that edge. He was as near to death as a man could be and still come back from it.
“There’s nothing much simpler than a bar fight, son. But I’ll never find the guys that did this if you don’t give me something to work with.”
Ryan thought back to Katya. “I was there to meet a woman,” he said.
“Ah,” the detective mumbled in a knowing way that made Ryan cringe. It wasn’t that simple, but he had chosen his words poorly. And now for Fox, it would always go back to the girl. A jilted lover, a guy who tried to flirt at the bar only to be rebuffed. A rival for her affection that saw Ryan as a threat, one that had to be eliminated. Yeah, for the detective, the answer was obvious. But he was right in one thing. The girl was the key.