That done, I pulled on a robe, gloves, and sandals and wiped down my lounge, my office floor, and my desk. I wasn’t kidding about not wanting to rub up on Hrotata spit. That stuff is technically neurotoxic and sticks around in your system. It was inevitable that I had breathed in a little, but that was impossible to avoid. I had gotten a bigger dose around the Hrotata in the courthouse, even with its industrial air filters. That was nothing compared to direct contact. I still didn’t like Shllokwa very much, which was proof that I hadn’t absorbed much of her drool. If I had let her give me a tongue bath, we’d be best pals for a few hours.
Fortunately, it’s not very specific
stuff. I would have been friendly and
receptive to a Mauraug slave-master if one showed up right then. Maybe.
Definitely would have been slower on the draw. Anything that gets between me and my heater
is a bad thing.
Speaking of Rtrtr, it got a good
wipe-down, too, inside and out. As I got
dressed again, I secured it into its custom holster. Hopefully, I wouldn’t need the weapon
tonight, but you never wanted to be without one. I could inflict bloody harm with tooth and
claw, but a focusing lens pointed in their direction tends to be more
intimidating to most sapients.
Also for practical purposes, I
bolted down a few chunks of synthetic protein.
It was close enough in taste and texture to raw meat to satisfy my
gullet and it would keep me sated for the rest of the evening. Technically, it was nutritious
food. It still tasted artificial, like
chemistry trying to pretend to be cuisine, and the composition was too regular
to fool anyone’s palate. Better
synthetics existed but of course, they were more expensive. I had to settle for the bargain version.
If I was going to a bar, I needed to
drink to maintain my cover. If I was
going to drink, I needed to eat first. I
also didn’t need to be starving if sudden activity became necessary. For one thing, a hungry Vislin is less
rational, more instinctual.
It was bad enough that I was going
to a Thunder Bar. They’re a Taratumm
cultural institution and not the preferred watering holes for Vislin. Not that Vislin were discouraged; plenty of
my kind made the occasional visit and some stopped in regularly. It just wasn’t our kind of scene. Loud music, louder singing, stomping around,
and mock challenges: in the bad old days, a Vislin hearing that racket would
probably be dead soon afterward.
Worst
of all, I personally had never been seen at this particular bar, Trrptet. It wasn’t as if it was too far away, either;
it was only eight blocks away from my apartment. Anyone from my neighborhood would know
something was suspicious if I showed up there randomly.
I
needed a cover story, in case anyone asked.
Even if they didn’t ask, I needed an angle so that secondary inquiries
would get the wrong idea about my presence.
I gave the problem some thought as I dressed. I could just play dumb and pretend I was
checking out the damage in the area… but that wouldn’t open many mouths. I could say I was investigating on behalf of
the victim, Tharrliki. That might get me
some information from those interested in seeing Grust convicted, but it would
still bias what I heard.
I
was still thinking it over as I stepped outside onto the street. I had some time to consider my strategy. Walking from my place to Trrptet Thunder Bar would take a few minutes. The route was actually pretty familiar. The Thunder Bar might not be my usual
destination, but a few of my favorite shops were along the way. Hopefully, I’d get to stop in at the butcher
soon and spend some of my upcoming paycheck.
I might even think about new armor; this suit was comfortable but even I
had to admit that the straps were corroding.
The block where Trrptet itself was situated had a few nice features. There were a couple of pleasant ornamental
parks nearby and the resident fried sausage vendor was a seasoned pro.
Well,
the block had nice features, past
tense. As I got closer, I could see the
path of Grust’s rampage. The storefront
across the intersection from Trrptet was sealed up with plastic sheeting. Chips of glass glittered here and there in
the streetlights, where cleaners had not yet swept them away. Further in that direction, a large disposal
bin was stacked high with debris from the adjacent buildings: chunks of
masonry, smashed electronics, and an entire steel awning.
I
could envision the sequence of destruction, with Grust and possibly one or two other
Taratumm crashing headlong into structures and ripping up
architecture for makeshift weapons.
Stompers on a rampage were scary,
not only to Vislin but pretty much any other sapients, including
themselves. Especially when
anaesthetized by drink (and possibly other drugs), Grust would have been tough
to take down without using deadly force.
The
crowds were correspondingly smaller tonight.
It was a work night, so it wasn’t going to be too busy anyway, but with
fewer intact attractions, the neighborhood was suffering a further reduced draw. Most of the folk I spotted out and about were
an even mix of Taratumm and Vislin, working stiffs walking to or from
work or relaxing afterward with a trip to their nearby social spot. The occasional Hrotata passed by, as well:
always males and often a bit scruffy, likely less favored offspring forced to
struggle to prove their worthiness. They
ended up getting assignments in ‘rough’ neighborhoods like this one, working a
branch of a family business, establishing themselves in a trade, or even venturing
out on their own with new ideas.
Anyone
with enough money or status was somewhere else tonight. If they passed through these streets, it
would be in an aircar. Shllokwa had
definitely been slumming at my apartment. A high-class
Hrotata female stood out around here. It
made me wonder: what had a mated Hrotata couple been doing in the area? The victim of Grust’s attack, Tharrliki, and
his mate, Yavirrt, were officially noted as innocent bystanders targeted by a
rampaging drunk. Why were they
bystanding at all? Shopping for cheap
souvenirs? Visiting a Thunder Bar for
thrills? Or did they have some
connection to their attacker, some reason they would be outside his usual
haunt, maybe some reason they were the focus of his rage?
I
had to stop chewing that bit of gristle when I realized I was only a block
away from my destination. I was
personally dismayed to see the park with my fried sausage vendor torn up and
fenced off. The landscaped turf was
scarred with deep ruts and the flower beds were trampled. I just hoped my greasy friend – and his cart
- hadn’t been hurt. Hopefully, he was
set up in a new park somewhere less dangerous. The official list of casualties had mentioned only the destruction of a roast tuber cart, so the odds were good.
I
was definitely getting closer to the origin of the storm. I could already feel the bass vibrations from
the Thunder Bar around the corner.
Somewhere in front of that building, Grust had stumbled out and picked a
fight with a guy one-eighth his mass.
So,
what was my line? I had been too busy
observing the landscape to think about my social approach. That observation was a waste of time; the
cause of this destruction wasn’t in question.
Even the defense agreed about what had happened after Grust attacked Tharrliki.
It was whatever led up to that attack that needed to be investigated. What approach would get me a lead on the ‘real
culprit’, the supposed saboteur who had slipped Grust a squirt of crazy juice?
Friend
of the accused? Hardly believable. Clueless sightseer? No, already considered and discarded that
idea. Speciesist agitator? That might work.
Hardcore
species purists are a shrinking minority among the Great Family, but there are still
plenty out there. The majority of them
are Vislin; no big surprise to you, I’m sure.
Look, I may make species jokes, but I understand the necessity, even the
advantages, of cooperation between sapients.
Nobody sane wants to go back to the days of predation and genocide. Still, there are those who straddle the edge of
reason, making it sound plausible that Vislin would be better off on their
own. Some even claim that all three
species are being held back by trying to find mutual solutions to every
problem. It’s nonsense if you actually
pay attention to the facts, but separatism is about emotions, not reality…
about what ‘feels true’. Sometimes, I get the feeling that there will be
hate and zealotry until the last star burns out. You know what I mean; the Collective has
problems enough keeping popular support.
The various members have millennia of mutual grudges on top of basic isolationism and
other-hate. For the Vislin, who like to
think of ourselves as superior, apex predators, clearly smarter and
better-looking than any other life-form… yeah.
There’s no shortage of morons. I share an egg line with some of them.
Pretending
to be one such moron would piss off Taratumm, giving them a reason to loudly
protest Grust’s innocence. It would also
gratify any speciesist listening in, maybe ingratiating me enough to hear any
rumors about ‘how the dumb grazer got doped’.
Right there was my first reasonable theory about a possible
culprit. Disrupting a Thunder Bar and
disgracing a member of a prominent Taratumm Herd would certainly be a coup for
a Vislin separatist. Something that
specifically triggered the Taratumm frenzy reaction would be seen as poetically
appropriate.
Of
course, dropping slurs in a Thunder Bar was also a good way to get my own skull
fractured. If I took that course, I’d
need to be ready for a quick escape… and maybe a few apologies later, once the
case was done. It was a bit sad that I felt
more believable as a hatemonger than as a peacemaker. I'd manage. Doing Herd Torbur a favor would be more
evidence of my goodwill than any public protestations of tolerance.
So,
I got ready to act like a real tail-biter.
By the time I’d worked out my script, I was solidly in front of Trrptet
Thunder Bar. In fact, I’d already been
standing on the sidewalk for a couple of minutes, probably looking like a
sapient planning trouble. I scanned the
crowd to see if anyone was watching me.
As if that didn’t make me look even more
suspicious, or anything.
I
didn’t catch anyone staring, at least.
There were definitely a few individuals that looked out of place. A trio of Vislin males were seated outside
the park on the far side of the same intersection. I couldn’t hear their conversation, but their
body language suggested that they were hoping to be provoked. Maybe they were looking for a chance for a
legal ‘hunt’ on another rampaging Taratumm.
I tried to remember their appearances for later consideration. An elderly Taratumm female was dragging along
back the way I had just come. She kept
stopping to stare at the damage, shaking her faded, armored head and grumbling. Probably remembering the days when this was a
prosperous new expansion, before the jobs moved away and the low-lifes (like
me) moved in.
Nobody
looked as if they had recognized me.
No one looked like they were returning to the scene of a crime,
either. If I wanted any answers, I’d
have to ask inside the bar. I straightened
my helmet, prepped my schemes, and checked the catch on my heater for good
measure. Only then did I walk up to the
swinging door of Trrptet Thunder Bar and shoulder my way inside. Seriously, I mean I had to ram it with my
shoulder to get it open. It was heavy.
Opening
the door doubled the volume from the music rumbling inside. As I stepped in, I recognized a popular song
from a Taratumm artist. At least, I
recognized the bass line. The vocals
were being provided by a decidedly amateur singer groaning into a hand
microphone. It takes talent for a Taratumm to sing that badly. A herd of other Taratumm
were seated in the pit around him, half-listening and chatting among
themselves. A mixed group by age and
gender, all dressed in work uniforms, they probably were all employees of the
same plant, maybe even the Tsrrk-Tor facility.
On
the upper level, where I had entered, a handful of patrons sat either alone or
in pairs, all drinking. Most of them
were also Taratumm: a pair of greenish-grey males in engineers' jumpsuits, a lone steely female in private security armor,
plus another two lone males: one grey-green, the other, older, tending toward chartreuse. The latter two wore simple strapped leather kilts, showing off their bulk for the appreciation of... somebody not yet here? All of them seemed dedicated to silence and
intoxication. Maybe they would join in
if the entertainment picked up intensity.
I did my best to file away their features, as well, but there is only so
much you can notice in poor lighting while trying not to make eye
contact.
A sole Hrotata male also sat
alone. I got an equally poor look at
him: a sad sack who looked almost asleep already. He wore a businessman’s shift, badly. A pair of Vislin, both female (remember, I can tell), one white with definite emerald patterning even
in the low lighting, the other with dyed amethyst scales, were sharing some
sort of fried snack and tall, strong-looking drinks. Their armor was minimal, just some lacquered
wood and silk for propriety’s sake. They
seemed far more interested in one another than anything else in the room… including
me. That was fine; I wasn’t there to
make friends.
If
anything, I was there to make enemies. I
strutted over to the remaining occupant of the bar, the bartender herself, a
Taratumm of interesting proportions. For
one thing, she was short and slight for a stomper, maybe only a half-meter
taller than me and twice my mass. Not
young, though, as a few missing scales attested. Her scales were also faded with age, but
still held a pattern of steel grey and sky blue that suggested an interesting
mutation in her egg line. She wore a heavy, dark indigo robe that complimented her natural coloring, cinched by a thick leather belt. Clever gaps and folds allowed her shoulder and elbow spines to poke through. I looked into
her deep-set black eyes and thought, what
a fascinating sapient. Shame I have to
poke at her nest.
“Hey,
hard-head, you got anything worth eating in here? A steak?
Or just leaves and bark?” I gave
her my best naughty youngling stare.
To
her credit, she looked confused rather than upset. She rumbled, “Friend, in case you missed the
enormous glowing sign... and you’re deaf… this is a Thunder Bar. No meat.
Taratumm culture. Maybe you want
to be somewhere else?”
“Maybe
you should check the menu. Some dumb
beast trampled my favorite sausage cart, and I’m missing my evening snack. I’m pretty sure I smelled meat in here.” I looked over the room with an exaggerated
toss of my head, letting my jaws drop open, tongue tasting the air.
“Well,
we don’t serve your kind here.” She made
the cliché sound like righteous defiance.
Yeah, I definitely needed to come back here and beg her forgiveness
later. Right then, though, I had to push
the act.
“You
don’t serve us anymore, you mean?”
“What’s your problem,
dung-beak? Either settle down or walk
out, or else I’ll have the custodians escort you out.”
She was still trying to keep things
quiet. I was aiming for the
opposite. I feigned disgusted rage and
shouted over the soundtrack, “My problem
is this place. A whole block is smashed
up because you stompers come in, get drunk, get worked up, and then roll outside. Usually you just wake up sleepers and
terrorize pedestrians, but once in a while somebody, like that nut-brain Grust,
goes off. Then somebody gets hurt, maybe
killed. Some shop owners lose windows;
everyone loses customers. I don’t expect
you to be sorry. This is your business. But maybe some of your smarter customers will realize they’re in the wrong place, too.”
It wasn’t bad for a speech prepped
just minutes before. While I ranted, I
tried to draw in the crowd. The Hrotata
gave me a bleary-eyed glance but little further reaction. The two Vislin stopped their conversation and
turned to watch, but were clearly annoyed by my antics. One might say they were even offended. The Taratumm in the pit looked up briefly
but either couldn’t hear my insults or didn’t care; they went back to their
business as before. The ones that really
took notice were the Taratumm couple and the loners. They were pissed off. I saw nostrils flare and heard toe-claws
grind into the floor mats.
Still, no one got up. The bartender herself looked aggravated, but
hardly enraged. Frost, she’d probably
already heard worse, maybe even said better.
I was just one more angry Vislin to endure, that night’s indigestion in
this part of the city’s gut. As I had
hoped, though, my tirade prompted her to a rebuttal.
“You’re stupid. I think you know you’re stupid. Grust of Herd Torbur is probably brighter
than you, tail biter. He’s definitely
less obnoxious, even when roaring drunk.
He’s never even come close to attacking anyone here, inside or out,
before now. This so-called pit of
trouble sees one, maybe two fights a moon, and nearly all of those end with the
first kick. In fact, if I do have to boot you out the door, you’d
be more provocation to violence than I usually see in a year. Go home, watch the trial on your screen, and
cry when Grust is proven innocent.”
Cry?
I’d drool for joy if he were set free.
That wasn’t likely without some kind of proof. This female would be a great character
witness for the defense (probably already was, I should check the witness list
again), but she wasn’t giving me anything useful.
I pushed again: “What, you buy that ‘I
was drugged’ defense? I don’t. And even if that story makes him sound blameless, how does it look
for you, for this bar? Drugs just dropping into drinks? Maybe the food? Maybe I don’t want your cooking; I might go
rip up an elderly pedestrian! I
suppose somebody not from around here
doped up your pal Grust? Is that your
next excuse? Or did you see the
so-called ‘real criminal’? No?”
Her eyes narrowed and her nostrils
finally did flare. “You know, it occurs
to me that someone like you might
create trouble at my bar, exactly for the reasons you bring up. Seems like too much coincidence, now that I
think about it. No, I didn’t see who messed
with Grust. For all I know, it could
have been you. You do look
familiar. Maybe I saw you in here a
couple nights ago…?”
A
very good theory, madam, if I do think so myself. As gratifying as it was to be reinforced by
an independent thinker, being fingered as a potential suspect was not the outcome
I had in mind. If brought to the
custodians’ attention, I could explain myself out of trouble, but that alibi would
blow the secrecy of my employment by Herd Torbur. Confession would be bad for many reasons.
I was pretty sure that the bartender
had nothing more to contribute. Even
if she remembered a stray detail, she wasn’t likely to share it with me now. Nobody else was shouting out anything in
defense of Grust. There likely weren’t
any separatists in the bar at the moment, either. At best, I could hope that they would hear
about my outburst second-hand and possibly be receptive to my approach. I should start with that gang in the park
outside…
I was backing off from the bar as
the bartender shouted her accusations, making it look like I was backing down
from the argument. At first, I kept her
in sight, maintaining an expression of disgust and fear. I heard a noise from across the room: tables
and chairs shifting. When I looked over
in that direction, I discovered that the three lone Taratumm had risen from
their seats and were looking at me with unconcealed loathing. One of the males already had his shoulders
hunched, leaning forward with head down, a definite threat display.
“Not a violent place, huh?” I said,
the sentiment fitting both in and out of character. I had expected to be shouted down and
threatened. I had not expected to
actually be in danger of attack, at least not so soon.
The bartender looked at the standing
Taratumm, herself, and I caught an expression of surprise. She evidently thought this behavior odd, as
well.
“Hey, sit down,” she bellowed,
visibly more upset at her patrons’ behavior than at my harassment.
They ignored her, pushing aside
obstacles to come closer, picking up speed.
The pair of male Taratumm that had been seated were also starting to
rise. Even the Hrotata who had been so
dopey before was perking up. He stared
at me with clear interest and a sneer of disgust. I couldn’t see the pair of Vislin, not
wanting to turn my head in their direction and lose sight of the oncoming
Taratumm. Fortunately, the group of Taratumm in the
pit was remaining oblivious and therefore uninvolved.
I gauged my distance to the exit
door. It looked like I had plenty of
time. I tried to feign feigning bravery,
letting my real concern show through as seemingly ill-concealed fear. I backed away slowly, casually, giving the
bartender a sneer.
“Yeah, I thought so. Peaceful Taratumm, so superior. Maybe that’s true…” I didn’t get to finish my improvised parting
shot. With no further warning, the
foremost of the Taratumm, one of the lone males, charged forward at full speed.
He wasn’t just angry… he was already
at full frenzy. How was that even
possible? They should have been
bellowing and stomping, giving me at least nonverbal threats if not verbal
warnings before any of them hit that extreme. Taratumm have an instinctual battle dance that telegraphs their eruptions.
This guy had gone from grumpy to murderous in just a few seconds.
You can’t blame me, then, for being
surprised. Normally, I swear, I’m quick
on my feet, quick with a claw, quick on the draw. If I had known an attack was coming, he
wouldn’t have touched me.
As
it was, I tried to leap backwards and got smashed to the side, clobbered
mid-air by the attacker’s forearm and shoulder.
If I had stayed low, he might have trampled me into the floor mats. I was fortunate not to be impaled on his shoulder spine. Some days, my armor isn't just a social formality.
I
went sprawling into the nearest table, cracking my spine against the edge of
its wooden surface. My tail whacked the
adjacent chair. Both impacts stung
fiercely, and the air was already knocked out of my lungs from the original
slam. I staggered and struggled to get
upright.
There
wasn’t much time for thought. My
assailant was turning and getting ready for another charge. Worse, there were three more angry Taratumm
behind him. They looked close to frenzy,
themselves. How was that possible? How had I gotten myself in this much trouble,
this fast? More to the point, how could
I get out of it alive?
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