Hobbes hasn't been back on Oublie in almost ten months, but breaking orbit is always hard. Yeah, the dampeners are going on the old Sarajevo, and yeah, by then he's almost always beary eyed from sleep. Auto pilot went the first six months out from HQ and since then, he's had to make the trips between planets without sleeping, more or less at the helm the whole time.
But through all that, the bumping and rocking and itchy eyes, all Tom can think about was that the first time he broke orbit with those glaciers spread out below him was with Sophie in the co-pilot seat, watching her laughing with her head tipped back and her hair down, tipsy on strawberries and champagne.
'Love you, Tommy,'When he lands, his name is Zachary Paulson and he's in town on business and his eyes are only damp from recycled air
( ... )
There's this thing that happens to him sometimes. He doesn't have a name for it. He's heard of people kept in military facilities, stuck in tanks with wires running into their open brains. People who can see a little further than they should be able to. He's not one of those people, he knows that, but still, sometimes someone fires at him and he's not there, because a split second before the shot came he knew to duck. Sometimes he's rounded a corner and the guy waiting for him has ended up down on the ground and bleeding, because he was ready for him, because he already knew he'd be there. It's not a regular thing, and if he thinks about it directly it disappears, but it's part of him.
And he feels it now. Looks up at nothing and feels a tiny vibration in the back of his mind, like someone tapping a guitar string.
Get out.He drains the glass in one gulp, because that looks less suspicious, slaps down ten credits and pushes back from the bar, turns and scans the crowd without looking like that's what he's doing. Switches to
( ... )
There's something he's able to hold on to through the white noise. Part of him his thinking Peace Keepers and justice and a hundred other things from an out dated rule book and a code of morals that had already failed him, once. Once was enough.
So now, he's not really thinking about anything except that if he shoots this man, Mike Pinocchio, badge 4358, location unknown (known now, now, jesus fuck, right now), then he probably won't make it out the door. He buys a pack of cigarettes out of a machine to offer up an excuse for coming in and doesn't take his eyes off him. The fuck was already making for the door.
Fuck, fuck, already, now, finally, too soon, don't, and Sophie.
The clearest thing in his head is the cool hilt of the gun.
He makes it out into the night and once he's there he lets himself take a breath, exhaling in a cloud of steam into the cold air. He pulls his jacket closer around him and starts to walk, not too fast and not too slow, in the direction of the docks.
He sees a shimmer and looks up. It's the Aurora, green curtains across the sky, and for a second his breath is clean gone. He remembers being a kid, standing outside his family's cabin with all the lights on and blazing, looking up and wondering if they were solid, if he could get in a shuttle and fly up and touch them.
It's too long ago. He shivers and starts walking again, passing the occasional person, but it's late and cold and there's not many people around.
The tugging in his head is gone, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything. He can't afford to stop again. He wishes with a little twinge of annoyance that he could just jump offworld, but he's Zuu's ride back and it wouldn't be a great idea to get one of the better contacts he's had annoyed at him.
There's so much of this planet that he can't experience outside the context of first times and Sophie, and the aurora is no different. He looks up and the shifting lights, and the memory of their house in the outpost with those huge fields behind it is only fuel on the fire. More rage. His boots are well worn and the snow here is packed solid - if he's not silent, he's close to it.
But that doesn't matter. He's fast and his draw is faster, but when it comes down to it, none of that matters. Out the club door, after the mark, and every promise he's made himself over the past two years evaporating like a flash in the pan.
He doesn't know, later, how he caught up with him. All he remembers is the feel of Mike Pinocchio's jacket under his hand, the curl of vapor pouring out of his mouth, and then his cheek is under Tom's fist and, holy hell. Not only is this guy real but he's bleeding.
There's a bruise already forming on his knuckles, but he lifts his fist again.
He doesn't hear the approach over the sound of his own boots, and he's already cursing the little sense in his head for abandoning him as he's being grabbed and whirled around. He's expecting a shot, a pain in his chest or his gut, or maybe a flash of light in his head and then darkness. He never thought it would end like this.
It should be said that he never thought it wouldn't, either.
But he gets none of those. What he does get is a blow that rocks his head back and sends stars shooting across his vision, and he swears he feels his eye come a little bit loose.
He curses loudly and richly, shaking it off, and by the time he sees the offending fist pull back again he's got one arm up to block it and the other is going for his gun. And through the pain and the surprise is a face that he swears he doesn't know. And yet somehow, he feels like he does.
Not like he cares. Gonna fucking blow the whole face off if he can.
"Do you know who I am?" he snarls, kicking the hand that's going for the gun hard. Doesn't know if it breaks or if he really even stops him from drawing it, but the next thing he does is let his fist fly, making contact again and hard. His knuckles are aching, which only makes him smile because who knows what the hell this guy's face must feel like.
"Do you know who the fuck I am?" he demands again, pinning the man back against his wall with his chest heaving, meeting his eyes and not afraid. He'd never been afraid, not once. Not now. This guy could have his buddies coming up behind him. He could have a knife up his sleeve. Doesn't matter. He's close. So fucking close that it doesn't matter any more. He's already fallen as far as he can, there's nothing he can do right now in the dark alley that could make this descent worse.
He feels his wrist crack, though whether that's just bones clicking against bones or something more serious he has no idea; all he knows is that it hurts, and then the fist hits his face again and he's spitting blood from cut lips.
He's still got his gun. He's got a knife in his belt. But he's pinned up against the wall, and he'd shove the prick off if he could get his head to stop pounding. It's more than the blows, it's his fucking eye, and all that'd stop it now is taking it out, and he can't do that.
So he squints through the agony at the man, and when he hears the yelled question he shakes his head and grins with red-smeared teeth. And he spits, blood and bile mixed together, and it hits the side of the asshole's face.
For some reason Neil's face flashes into his aching head, and it occurs to him that he's very possibly going to die here. And the thing is, he's not sure if he even cares all that much.
The spittle and blood hits his cheek and that's what sends Hobbes over the edge of anger into pure, crystal white and silent rage. It was like diving under the water when a hurricane was going on up above, suddenly everything is quieter and farther away and when he pulls his gun from his holster and pushed the cold metal against this fuck's temple, the only thing he's thinking is,
I could kill him right now.
It doesn't even horrify him at all.
"It wouldn't even take another pound of pressure on this trigger to fucking end you, you know that?" he demands, forearm across the guy's chest and pinning him to the wall. His voice is almost calm, factual. "One. More. Pound. You fucking shitbag. Fucker. Mike Pinocchio, badge 4358, smuggler, murderer, cold blooded fucking shit. You a rapist, too? That what you are?" He pushed the muzzle of the gun into his temple hard, snarling. "What the hell are you? Who the fuck would give a flying fuck if I made you the fucking garbage disposal's problem?"
It's all a string of shit that he only has the barest interest in processing, until he gets to the badge number. Mike's hand is inching towards his gun again, because the spit has done what he was sort of hoping it would do, made this crazy prick angry enough that he's probably not noticing very much except his own rage. But at the number his hand freezes.
It's been so fucking long since he heard that number. He heard it when they came to tell him that his job was gone. Just like that. No leg, no eye, no job, no way to pay medical bills that were already piled to the fucking sky, nice knowing you and good luck making money as a fucking cripple. Prison would have been almost preferable.
And he knows. Motherfucker knows, and everything in him snaps, and even the pain in his head feels distant and unimportant. He's angry enough to no longer give a shit, and that makes him fast. A snap and his gun is out of his holster and up against the side of the prick's jaw, and he's grinning again
( ... )
Kill me, his entire body dares the guy when he feels the muzzle crash against his jaw. I have nothing left to loose.
He pulls his knee up sharply, going for his groin and actually laughing to himself. Not scared. No fear left. Keep going.
"No one," he said, thinking of Rave and her dark alleys and nothing put a pallet to squat on somewhere. "I don't fucking exist. I'm one of your innocent bystanders, jack ass. I'm a ghost."
He lifted his gun and banged the muzzle across the guys temple hard.
He should pull the trigger when he feels the knee impact clumsily between his legs. It's a glancing blow but it fucking hurts, but he should still pull the trigger. Just fucking end this. Just another body in an alley, and God knows there's enough of those these days. He doesn't have to know why this asshole hates him.
It's not like he even really needs a good reason.
But he doesn't pull the trigger. He hesitates, and that hesitation is what costs him. Pain greater than he's felt yet shatters through his head as it snaps to the side, he feels something in his head actually rattle and then suddenly he's half blind. He doesn't even hear it fall into the snow. It's held in place in his socket, only comes out with a pressure release on his temple, and it's that release that the prick must have hit.
He hadn't known that was even possible. Well, live and learn.
"MotherFUCKER," he snarls, hands flying up to his head and feeling a warm trickle of blood down the side of his face. He's angry, fucking livid, but more than that he's
( ... )
When the fuck's eye pops out, it's almost comical. It tears an unanchored, humorless gasp from him, a thin approximation of a laugh. He watches Mike Pinocchio flounder, not such a mythic figure now, not nearly so un-killable. He looks at him and sees the recruit that may have once been. He sees the traitor and the cripple and the fucking murderer and he judges them as one. He actually laughs. It's almost pathetic. It's almost not worth his time.
"No," he hisses bending down, going for Mike's arms to get them behind his back, "No, I don't waste my time on fucking cripples, you shit. I'm taking you in and you're doing your god damned time, you know that? Sophie would have wanted it that way."
It's been so long since he's said the name aloud outside nightmares that it tastes strangs. Foreign. He almost doesn't realize that he's let it past his lips.
Fuck. PK. Makes sense, if he knows the badge number, and Mike knows that tone of voice anywhere. Fucking self-righteous, high and mighty. Maybe he'd used it himself, once.
He's almost tired enough and almost hurting enough to just let him do it. He's putting up only a token struggle when the man starts forcing his arms behind him. he's spent some time locked up. It's not that bad, if you know how to watch your back. And at least you get fed.
It's not bad if you don't lose your fucking mind.
And then above the fucking noise of the guy's voice he hears one word.
He's been called a lot of things in his time, most of them not particularly flattering. He's used to it. But this...
Fuck, no, he's not going to let a pissant cocksucker like this take him anywhere. He's not going to let him live if he can do anything about it. He's dropped his gun but he's far from unarmed, and as his hand swings past his waist he unsheathes his bowie knife and whips it back and to the side, stabbing blindly. It's in the direction of the prick's gut,
( ... )
At first, he doesn't even feel it. At first, it's just blind lashing by some dick half in handcuffs and the sudden, inexplicable blooming of something sticky and gloriously warm on his side. On Oublie, it's cold. It barely even bothers him, at first.
Then there's the pain. The slice and the fucking twist, and before he knows it he's on his knees, sharp points of light standing on the corners of his sight.
No, says a voice he doesn't hear so much as feel, Not yet.
He looks up at Mike Pinocchio from his knees on the ground, his side pulsing out blood with each heartbeat, and he spits. He doesn't make it far.
"Coward," he breaths, hand holding his side in, "Cripple. I'm fucking watching you."
He's stepping backwards, out of range of retaliation, at least until he knows how much damage he's done, and he almost steps on it. Thankfully the outside is rubbery and gives under his heel, and he lets up immediately, turning and snatching it out of the snow with barely disguised relief.
He pockets it. Needs cleaning. Might be broken. It's something he can deal with later.
Once this is taken care of.
"Watching me, huh." His mouth twists, scornful, and he steps closer with the knife held out and ready. "That's sweet." He reaches out, grips the man's hair and yanks, jerking his head back viciously. "Let's see how well you watch me with your eyeballs on your fucking cheekbones," he snarls, bringing the point of the knife dangerously close. He's so tempted, so tempted to take his time with this. Make it nasty.
"So who the fuck are you? Might as well tell me, dick. You're dead either way."
He doesn't care. But there might be others coming for him. This guy might be only a scout. And that, he does care about.
But through all that, the bumping and rocking and itchy eyes, all Tom can think about was that the first time he broke orbit with those glaciers spread out below him was with Sophie in the co-pilot seat, watching her laughing with her head tipped back and her hair down, tipsy on strawberries and champagne.
'Love you, Tommy,'When he lands, his name is Zachary Paulson and he's in town on business and his eyes are only damp from recycled air ( ... )
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And he feels it now. Looks up at nothing and feels a tiny vibration in the back of his mind, like someone tapping a guitar string.
Get out.He drains the glass in one gulp, because that looks less suspicious, slaps down ten credits and pushes back from the bar, turns and scans the crowd without looking like that's what he's doing. Switches to ( ... )
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So now, he's not really thinking about anything except that if he shoots this man, Mike Pinocchio, badge 4358, location unknown (known now, now, jesus fuck, right now), then he probably won't make it out the door. He buys a pack of cigarettes out of a machine to offer up an excuse for coming in and doesn't take his eyes off him. The fuck was already making for the door.
Fuck, fuck, already, now, finally, too soon, don't, and Sophie.
The clearest thing in his head is the cool hilt of the gun.
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He sees a shimmer and looks up. It's the Aurora, green curtains across the sky, and for a second his breath is clean gone. He remembers being a kid, standing outside his family's cabin with all the lights on and blazing, looking up and wondering if they were solid, if he could get in a shuttle and fly up and touch them.
It's too long ago. He shivers and starts walking again, passing the occasional person, but it's late and cold and there's not many people around.
The tugging in his head is gone, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything. He can't afford to stop again. He wishes with a little twinge of annoyance that he could just jump offworld, but he's Zuu's ride back and it wouldn't be a great idea to get one of the better contacts he's had annoyed at him.
Anyway, it's not far. ( ... )
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But that doesn't matter. He's fast and his draw is faster, but when it comes down to it, none of that matters. Out the club door, after the mark, and every promise he's made himself over the past two years evaporating like a flash in the pan.
He doesn't know, later, how he caught up with him. All he remembers is the feel of Mike Pinocchio's jacket under his hand, the curl of vapor pouring out of his mouth, and then his cheek is under Tom's fist and, holy hell. Not only is this guy real but he's bleeding.
There's a bruise already forming on his knuckles, but he lifts his fist again.
"Bastard."
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It should be said that he never thought it wouldn't, either.
But he gets none of those. What he does get is a blow that rocks his head back and sends stars shooting across his vision, and he swears he feels his eye come a little bit loose.
He curses loudly and richly, shaking it off, and by the time he sees the offending fist pull back again he's got one arm up to block it and the other is going for his gun. And through the pain and the surprise is a face that he swears he doesn't know. And yet somehow, he feels like he does.
Not like he cares. Gonna fucking blow the whole face off if he can.
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"Do you know who the fuck I am?" he demands again, pinning the man back against his wall with his chest heaving, meeting his eyes and not afraid. He'd never been afraid, not once. Not now. This guy could have his buddies coming up behind him. He could have a knife up his sleeve. Doesn't matter. He's close. So fucking close that it doesn't matter any more. He's already fallen as far as he can, there's nothing he can do right now in the dark alley that could make this descent worse.
He's almost, almost certain of that.
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He's still got his gun. He's got a knife in his belt. But he's pinned up against the wall, and he'd shove the prick off if he could get his head to stop pounding. It's more than the blows, it's his fucking eye, and all that'd stop it now is taking it out, and he can't do that.
So he squints through the agony at the man, and when he hears the yelled question he shakes his head and grins with red-smeared teeth. And he spits, blood and bile mixed together, and it hits the side of the asshole's face.
For some reason Neil's face flashes into his aching head, and it occurs to him that he's very possibly going to die here. And the thing is, he's not sure if he even cares all that much.
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I could kill him right now.
It doesn't even horrify him at all.
"It wouldn't even take another pound of pressure on this trigger to fucking end you, you know that?" he demands, forearm across the guy's chest and pinning him to the wall. His voice is almost calm, factual. "One. More. Pound. You fucking shitbag. Fucker. Mike Pinocchio, badge 4358, smuggler, murderer, cold blooded fucking shit. You a rapist, too? That what you are?" He pushed the muzzle of the gun into his temple hard, snarling. "What the hell are you? Who the fuck would give a flying fuck if I made you the fucking garbage disposal's problem?"
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It's been so fucking long since he heard that number. He heard it when they came to tell him that his job was gone. Just like that. No leg, no eye, no job, no way to pay medical bills that were already piled to the fucking sky, nice knowing you and good luck making money as a fucking cripple. Prison would have been almost preferable.
And he knows. Motherfucker knows, and everything in him snaps, and even the pain in his head feels distant and unimportant. He's angry enough to no longer give a shit, and that makes him fast. A snap and his gun is out of his holster and up against the side of the prick's jaw, and he's grinning again ( ... )
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He pulls his knee up sharply, going for his groin and actually laughing to himself. Not scared. No fear left. Keep going.
"No one," he said, thinking of Rave and her dark alleys and nothing put a pallet to squat on somewhere. "I don't fucking exist. I'm one of your innocent bystanders, jack ass. I'm a ghost."
He lifted his gun and banged the muzzle across the guys temple hard.
"Boo."
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It's not like he even really needs a good reason.
But he doesn't pull the trigger. He hesitates, and that hesitation is what costs him. Pain greater than he's felt yet shatters through his head as it snaps to the side, he feels something in his head actually rattle and then suddenly he's half blind. He doesn't even hear it fall into the snow. It's held in place in his socket, only comes out with a pressure release on his temple, and it's that release that the prick must have hit.
He hadn't known that was even possible. Well, live and learn.
"MotherFUCKER," he snarls, hands flying up to his head and feeling a warm trickle of blood down the side of his face. He's angry, fucking livid, but more than that he's ( ... )
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"No," he hisses bending down, going for Mike's arms to get them behind his back, "No, I don't waste my time on fucking cripples, you shit. I'm taking you in and you're doing your god damned time, you know that? Sophie would have wanted it that way."
It's been so long since he's said the name aloud outside nightmares that it tastes strangs. Foreign. He almost doesn't realize that he's let it past his lips.
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He's almost tired enough and almost hurting enough to just let him do it. He's putting up only a token struggle when the man starts forcing his arms behind him. he's spent some time locked up. It's not that bad, if you know how to watch your back. And at least you get fed.
It's not bad if you don't lose your fucking mind.
And then above the fucking noise of the guy's voice he hears one word.
He's been called a lot of things in his time, most of them not particularly flattering. He's used to it. But this...
Fuck, no, he's not going to let a pissant cocksucker like this take him anywhere. He's not going to let him live if he can do anything about it. He's dropped his gun but he's far from unarmed, and as his hand swings past his waist he unsheathes his bowie knife and whips it back and to the side, stabbing blindly. It's in the direction of the prick's gut, ( ... )
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Then there's the pain. The slice and the fucking twist, and before he knows it he's on his knees, sharp points of light standing on the corners of his sight.
No, says a voice he doesn't hear so much as feel, Not yet.
He looks up at Mike Pinocchio from his knees on the ground, his side pulsing out blood with each heartbeat, and he spits. He doesn't make it far.
"Coward," he breaths, hand holding his side in, "Cripple. I'm fucking watching you."
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He pockets it. Needs cleaning. Might be broken. It's something he can deal with later.
Once this is taken care of.
"Watching me, huh." His mouth twists, scornful, and he steps closer with the knife held out and ready. "That's sweet." He reaches out, grips the man's hair and yanks, jerking his head back viciously. "Let's see how well you watch me with your eyeballs on your fucking cheekbones," he snarls, bringing the point of the knife dangerously close. He's so tempted, so tempted to take his time with this. Make it nasty.
"So who the fuck are you? Might as well tell me, dick. You're dead either way."
He doesn't care. But there might be others coming for him. This guy might be only a scout. And that, he does care about.
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