Heat Stroke

By Stephen Woods

---

While I try to keep these as self-contained as possible, this takes place after the events of A Stroke of Luck, so you might want to check that out first if you haven’t already.

---

William Stroker glanced back over his shoulder as he limped down a heavily reinforced corridor, eyes lazily drifting over a circular window so thick that the glass began to distort the view. Outside, the ridged and crater-pocked grey surface of Ganymede stretched to the horizon. Jupiter sat like a second sun in the sky above them, nowhere near as bright as the actual sun, but twice as breathtaking.

Willy wiped his nose on his sleeve, satisfied that they weren’t being followed, not by anyone that meant them harm anyway. They reached the staircase down, four floors below him the Ottoman city of Hamid stretched out inside of a natural crater. The roof was heavily reinforced in a patchy haphazard fashion, and without any windows, unlike the corridor behind him that connected the city to the spaceport.

The cobbled streets below were laid out in a circular fashion, much like a spider web, all centered on the domed and spired palace in the epicenter of the settlement. Bright red trams ran around the outer ring of the city, throwing up sparks as they grated their way along the tracks. Another line of them circled the palace, the two circular tramlines connected by two straight streets opposite each other, on each side of the city.

“Been a long time since I’ve been here, well before the trams were running,” Willy murmured idly as he looked down on the finished city, taking a quick rest against the railing.

“I’ve never been here before,” Moe commented dryly, the alien ball of light bobbing near Willy’s shoulder like a miniature sun.

“Really? Surprised you two haven’t explored every corner of the solar system by now,” he started down the stairs, his long red scarf trailing on the ground behind him.

Willy still didn’t understand why the twin luminoids had decided to tie themselves to him, and if he were being honest, he didn’t particularly want to know either. Recently though he’d started to take their companionship for granted. One of them was always by his shoulder, ready to listen to whatever he had to say. It was becoming hard to imagine them not always being there.

Of course, that didn’t mean it wasn’t bloody annoying when they actually responded to what he had to say.

 “You know,” Moe continued, “Just because we could visit every one of your planets and moons within the span of a month doesn’t mean that we’d want to.”

Willy rolled his eyes. “You’re just showing off now.”

“Well, you’d know, you’re the expert at that after all,” Moe pulsed satisfactorily.

 “How can you walk so fast with a busted leg, Mr. Willy?” Julius asked breathlessly from the top of the stairs behind them as he struggled to catch up. Willy ignored him. Julius could get just as annoying as Moe and Lester.

 “Where is Lester anyway?” Willy asked gruffly, changing the subject. “He wouldn’t make jokes at my expense you know, he’s the good luminoid. I should promote him to head sidekick.”

“He’s on Europa, and he just mumbled that he’s not a sidekick, and then something about you being a dick,” Moe relayed to Willy. Moe and Lester were entangled, whatever that meant, but whatever it was allowed them to talk and experience what the other was experiencing across any distance, seemingly without regard to time.

“What? Why’s he on Europa?” Willy asked, hesitating at the bottom of the stairs.

“Just checking on something,” Moe said indifferently.

Willy frowned, stepping to the side as an Octo in a hissing and wheezing suit walked past. “Checking on something, or someone?” he asked suspiciously.

“Don’t forget Willy that you’re still wanted by the Chinese, the Russians, the Germans, the French, and several criminal organizations. We’re just making sure you haven’t added any more to that list.”

“Hey,” Willy wagged a finger accusingly at Moe. “The Russians weren’t my fault.”

“I didn’t say they were.”

“And I’ll settle my debt with Charlie as soon as I see him next, so it’s not like any ‘criminal organizations’ are after me,” Willy continued, as if Moe hadn’t spoken.

“What about Captain Cleaver?”

“Well, that’s not really an ‘organization’.”

“What about Chloe’s band of militants? You know she’s in charge of them now? Not to mention—”

“Ok, I get your point, Moe, I’m a popular guy, I get it. You’ve got to stop feeding my ego though, you don’t want me to get anymore narcissistic than I already am, do you?” Willy joked, watching as Julius struggled down the last few steps with Willy’s trunk on his back. The wooden case was almost as tall as Julius was, but the boy was a lot stronger than he looked.

“Thanks for waiting Mr. Willy,” he wheezed as he reached ground level and lowered the trunk to the ground, catching his breath. Julius was a Darwin, a human-ape hybrid named after their creator, with light brown hair and a distinctive chipped front tooth. He was just a boy, around thirteen or fourteen years old.

He’d become Willy’s shadow, after stowing away on a ship that Willy had bartered passage on after winning an extended game of cards. Willy had cheated of course, he was terrible at cards, but with Lester hiding in a lightbulb in the corner of the room, and Moe whispering what cards each of his opponents held into his ear, he had managed to maintain a winning streak.

“Ok, good break, let’s go,” Willy said with a clap of his hands, Julius groaning beside him.

“Can’t I catch my breath first?” he asked, leaning against Willy’s trunk.

“No complaining, Caesar, you knew what you were signing up for.”

“Just didn’t expect it to involve this many stairs,” he muttered, heaving the trunk back up onto his back.

“Well, you could have taken the elevator,” Willy said, pointing it out behind them.

“Wait. What?It was just there the whole time? Why didn’t you say anything?”

Willy shrugged. “May as well get my moneys worth out of you.”

“But you don’t pay me!”

“And don’t you forget it,” Willy said with a grin. Willy had saved Julius from a beating after the captain had found him hiding away in a cupboard in the ship’s kitchen. After that Julius had followed Willy from where they’d landed on Rhea to where they were now, on Ganymede. And now they were stuck, stranded in the Ottoman controlled city, the last of Willy’s money spent on the ride from Saturn to Jupiter.

He needed to find a way to make enough cash for a trip to Mars, preferably with enough leftover to pay Dr. Wang to fix his leg too.

On top of still owing the good doctor a sizable hunk of cash, his left prosthetic hadn’t been working properly for weeks now, which wasn’t surprising considering the bullet holes and the missing gears. The leg had broken during an altercation with an automaton on Ariel. Luckily his right leg still worked fine, although it too could probably use a bit of grease and a tune up.

“Why do they all wear those red hats?” Julius asked him as they walked deeper into the city.

“The fezzes? Not a clue. Maybe they’re all part of the same phallophilia club?” Willy suggested and then chuckled to himself, unjustifiably proud of the joke.

The streets grew more crowded the further inwards they travelled, men, women, Darwins, and Octos, all watching their progress with measuring eyes. There was an underlying tension to the city; Willy could taste it in the air. It was an unease that made some look twice at those they passed in the street, while others stared down at the cobbles and hurried along about their business without ever looking up.

The streets were filthy too, and with more than the usual mixture of vomit and piss. Paper flyers, ticket stubs, and other litter was beginning to build up, collecting in gutters and intersections. Some alleyways were nearly overflowing with garbage.

Willy reached a hand behind him to pat his plasma pistol, which sat awkwardly pressed against the small of his back where he’d shoved it through his belt. He found that it was always a good idea to keep track of where your weapons were when entering a new city.

“Where exactly are you going anyway?” Moe asked as Willy led them down the busy streets.

“Who said I’m going anywhere?”

“Well, you certainly seem to know where you’re going.”

“Maybe I’m just walking.”

“Hmm…” Moe clearly didn’t believe him, and rightly so, since Willy knew exactly where he was headed. But the thought of showing up at Hasan’s door with a luminoid at either shoulder made him grimace.

“You know what, Moe? You’re attracting quite a lot of attention, and as you pointed out, I amwanted by half a dozen countries, so maybe it’d be best if you went and had a look around the port? See which ships are headed for Mars that we’ll be able to buy our way onto,” he suggested, and then said in a mutter, “Assuming we can find any cash.”

“Fine, I’ll have a talk around. Lester should be back soon anyway.”

Moe disappeared in the blink of an eye and Willy continued towards the center of the city, briefly waiting for a tram on the inner tramline to pass, which gave Julius time to catch up again. The tram left a flurry of falling sparks in its wake from the power lines above.

“I think they might’ve been looking at you, Mr. Willy, not Moe,” Julius whispered as they continued to garner side-eyed glances from passerby.

Willy sighed. “I know, Caesar. It’s not easy you know, being this handsome.”

Julius made a noncommittal grunt beside him.

“Come on, this way,” Willy said and turned down one of the looping streets that circumnavigated the city, something inside his left leg tinkingannoyingly with each step.

“Where are we going?” Julius asked a minute later, awkwardly adjusting the trunk on his back.

“Let you know when we get there,” he muttered, looking at the roadside ahead of them. “That’s the embassy up there on the right, so…” he hurried ahead, scanning the line of shops and cramped apartment buildings that lined the left-hand side of the road, a steaming car honking its horn at him as it passed.

“There we go,” Willy said aloud as he found the familiar coffeehouse across the road from the British Embassy. Tables and chairs spilled outside of the narrow shop front, where several men talked and smoked from hookahs on the street-side, although the coffeehouse looked deserted on the inside.

“Thisis what you were looking for?” Julius asked skeptically, grimacing at the rundown shop.

“Looked a bit different back in the day, I must admit,” Willy said with a shrug and then limped confidently inside, coughing as he passed through a cloud of secondhand smoke. Once inside he surveyed his surroundings, quickly evaluating the two Englishmen near the window smoking from old fashioned pipes, before taking in Hasan himself, standing behind the stained bar.

“What the hell have you done with the place, Hasan?” Willy asked, putting on a stern voice as he approached the bar. “I remember when this shop didn’t have enough chairs for all the people that would squeeze inside, and now it looks like you have the opposite problem.”

“…Willy? Is that you? Ha! I haven’t seen you since you were a boy,” Hasan exclaimed in surprise, squeezing around the bar and roughly embracing Willy.

“If you call a sixteen year old ‘a boy’, then I suppose so,” Willy murmured into the fabric of Hasan’s shirt as the man continued his hug for slightly longer than was perhaps appropriate. Hasan laughed and pulled back, a goofy smile plastered on his sweaty mustached face. He was a jolly man, with a thick upper body, wild eyebrows, and kindly eyes.

“William bloody Str—”

Willy quickly held up a hand to cut him off, speaking over him. “I go by Stroker now actually.”

“Oh? Well it’s good to see you again, Willy, been a long time. Too long… But I’m afraid you’re right, business here in Hamid is not what it used to be.”

“Was that a new sign I saw above the doorway as well?” Willy asked.

Julius cleared his throat behind Willy, but they ignored him.

“Good spotting, yes, after my father passed I renamed the store to the Byzantium Coffeehouse,” he said grandly and then beamed.

Julius cleared his throat a second time.

Willy shrugged his shoulders. “That supposed to mean something to me?”

Hasan laughed jovially and led them further inside, talking over his shoulder. “Byzantium, New Rome, Kostantiniyye, Constantinople, and Istanbul, they’re all names for the same thing, the great Ottoman city where the West meets the East. This was the coffeehouse in Hamid where Ottomans and English could meet and trade in comfort and good company, so the name seemed fitting.”

“Good to see your college education paid off,” Willy muttered and Hasan laughed again, although without the same gusto as before, his bright eyes sobering slightly.

“Mr. Willy, where should I put your trunk?” Julius interrupted out of frustration as they continued to ignore him.

“What? Just on the floor somewhere,” Willy answered in annoyance and then groaned as Julius let the trunk fall to the floor with a loud bang.

“So how can I help you, Willy?” Hasan asked, indicating for him to take a seat.

“A drink would be a great start, but otherwise I need a ride to Mars. Unfortunately… I’m also completely skint, so I need a job, one with a sizable pay day.”

“What have you gotten yourself into this time?” Hasan asked suspiciously, smoothing out his moustache out of habit.

“Why do you automatically assume I’m at fault?” Willy asked, feigning indignation.

“Because I know you, William,” Hasan chuckled as he moved around to the opposite side of the bar top.

Willy huffed out a breath. “Fair enough. So, does anything come to mind?”

“Well, I could ask around I suppose, but no, nothing leaps to mind,” he murmured, frowning in thought.

Lester zipped through the doorway into sudden existence by Willy’s shoulder, which made him pause and frown. What made him think it was Lester instead of Moe? Visually, they were identical.

“Welcome back,” Willy acknowledged with a nod to the luminoid. When he turned back to Hasan he found him frozen in place, eyes wide and locked on Lester.

“Oh, don’t worry, they’re mine,” Willy reassured him.

“They?” Hasan asked, eyes wide, just before Moe appeared on Willy’s other shoulder. His mouth twisted into a wry smile. “Oh, I think you have some grand new stories to tell, but first, let me make you that drink,” Willy nodded and then took a seat at one of the many empty tables in the Coffeehouse, Julius sitting down beside him.

“Find out anything of interest on Europa, Lester?” Willy asked conversationally, picking at his dirty fingernails with an indifferent expression.

“I didn’t, but go ahead, and ask Moe instead.”

“Moe?” Willy prompted.

“There’s a Chinese freighter docked in the east port, and they seemed open to the idea of taking a passenger, albeit for a price.”

“Sounds perfect for us.”

“There’s one issue though.”

“What?”

“They’re scheduled to leave for Mars in the morning, which doesn’t give us much in the way of warning,” Lester answered.

Willy frowned, sharing a look with Julius. “Any other ships heading that way soon?”

“Not for a week or more.”

“Well, better visit the bank then.”

“No,” Moe said sharply.

Willy scowled. “Goddammit Moe, what’s the point in having a full bank account if you won’t let me use it?”

Julius perked up in his chair. “Wait, what?”

“That money is to pay off the debts you owe, and not for any other reason. It’ll save your life one day, just you watch,” Moe asserted sternly.

“Should never have trusted you with the money from the Uranus job…” Willy muttered and sat sulking for a moment before he heaved a heavy sigh. “Well, better get to work then, cause I don’t fancy staying here longer than a few days.”

“How the hell are you going to find enough money within a single day?” Julius asked skeptically.

Willy flashed him a grin. “Just you watch, kid, watch and learn. There’s always money to be found, it’s just a matter of how dirty you’re willing to get before you find it.”

“Surely a great show of bravado, but do you have anything of substance to back up your confidence?” Moe asked with a hint of irritation.

“Nope,” Willy answered, putting his feet up on the table and leaning back in his chair until it balanced on only two of its legs.

“How comforting, let’s just hope you can find some funding,” Lester muttered.

“Get your bloody feet off my table!” Hasan admonished as he brought over a tray with two copper cups and a steaming pot of Turkish coffee.

“But I don’t have any feet, see?” Willy yanked up a trouser leg, revealing the shiny mechanical steel and brass prosthetic beneath his leather boots. Hasan just gaped in shock.

“Ah, how rude of me, I haven’t introduced you,” Willy said before Hasan could ask what had happened to his legs. “This is Caesar, my son in law, and then that’s Moe on my right, and Lester on my left.”

“My name’s actually Julius, and we aren’t related in any way,” Julius explained tiredly.

“At least that you know of,” Willy muttered as he poured himself a cup.

“He has us backwards too, I’m Moe, and that’s Lester.”

“Details, details,” Willy muttered in dismissal as he took a sip of his coffee.

“I’m Hasan, and it’s a pleasure to meet you all. I knew Willy when he was just a boy, here with his—”

“Alright, moving along from ancient history,” Willy said hurriedly, interrupting Hasan. “This coffee is terrible,” he muttered and put the cup back down on the tray before reaching into his jacket for a flask. He dumped the contents of the flask into the cup and then grinned as he took another sip. “Much better. So how’s the city going, Hasan? Noticed that you guys have trams now.”

“That’s right,” Hasan acknowledged with a nod. “That was a big improvement at the time… but recently the city hasn’t been doing so well. It’s all a bit of a mess to be honest, just yesterday there was a giant protest in front of the palace.”

“That explains the hint of oppression I smelled in the air.”

Hasan chuckled. “If that’s what you want to call it. The garbage collectors have been on strike for over a week now, and if it feels hotter than usual that’s because they’ve stopped cooling the air as it’s circulated. Those workers can’t go on strike, they’d just end up killing everyone, so they decided to punish us with this heat instead.”

Willy frowned. “It is rather toasty, isn’t it?”

“Yep, they say the temperature could rise by as much as five degrees by the end of the day… I fear that if they don’t crack down on those bloody revolutionaries there’ll soon be outright riots,” Hasan said solemnly, his brow furrowed in worry.

Willy nudged Julius. “And you thought it’d be hard to find a job today.”

Hasan flashed him a twisted smile, the kindness that had been in his eyes replaced with something else. “One man’s misfortune is another man’s gain?”

“You know it, Hasan.”

Hasan stood up straight as a customer walked in. “Well, I’ll serve this person and then make some calls around for you, see what I can find,” he said and gave Willy’s shoulder a pat before hurrying off to the front counter.

“This man is quite unlike the people you usually associate with, Willy, he doesn’t seem at all killy,” Lester said rather cheerfully.

“Hmm? That’s right, Hasan is a man of culture, or at least he went to University, which is the same thing in my book,” Willy put his feet back up on the table and took a swig from his flask before hiding it away in one of the many pockets of his coat.

“Sometimes I wish someone would burn your book,” Moe muttered, Willy smiling mischievously in reply.

Julius yawned in his seat, his fangs glistening in the electric lighting of the coffeehouse. Willy almost fell backwards off his chair as someone pulled up a seat at their table.

“Excuse me, but may I join you?” the woman asked, sitting down before Willy even gave his bemused nod of agreement. She wore a deep blue coat over a crisp white blouse and took off a black bowler hat as she settled into her chair, placing a cup of tea in front of her. Beneath her hat her black hair was tied back in a neat bun at the base of her spine, and her sharp brown eyes darted between Julius, Willy, and the luminoids.

“Sorry, but, uh… who are you?” Willy asked hesitantly.

“Maria Minasyan, nice to meet you. I’m in Hamid for a few weeks while on business,” she said with the calm confidence of someone who talks to a lot of strangers.

“And, uh… what business is that?” Willy wasn’t sure what to make of her, and he was normally an excellent judge of a person. For instance, he’d known that Julius was a Darwin from the second he’d laid eyes on him. Well, within a few seconds anyway. He’d thought he might have just been a hairy dwarf at first.

“I’m a journalist, currently working for the Galilean Times,” she sipped her tea.

“Hmm, don’t think we’ve ever run into a journalist before, have we?” Willy asked the luminoids as he leaned back in his seat. “So how did you get into journalism then?”

“I was a firsthand witness to a massacre of hundreds of people back on Earth, and then I wrote about it,” Maria said matter-of-factly.

Willy choked on his drink, launching into a fit of coughing.

“So, now that you know who I am, who are you? And what brings you to a deserted coffeehouse?” she asked, looking between Willy and Julius. Julius opened his mouth to answer, so Willy quickly spoke over him.

“Deserted? No, this place is hardly deserted, I’ve been deserted at least twice before, and there’s about five too many people here for it to be considered deserted,” Willy said hurriedly before Julius said something he shouldn’t. It was common knowledge that you should always be careful with your tongue when around a reporter. Especially when, as Moe was all too happy to point out, you were someone wanted by half a dozen different countries.

Maria watched him carefully for a moment. “Really? And what was being deserted like?”

“Oh it was great, I love all the desserts you see, from custards to puddings. Oh and cakes, love me a cake,” Willy said as he refilled his cup.

Julius chuckled, but Maria just frowned, her sharp eyes turning cold. “While that was a very valiant effort to avoid introducing yourself, I’m afraid that I was only asking out of politeness. With your two luminoids, military jacket, and that ridiculous scarf there’s no doubt that you’re the infamous William Stroker.”

Willy choked on his coffee a second time and then slammed his cup back down on the table. “Ridiculous? My mother made me this scarf I’ll have you know!” Willy said in fake outrage, in-between his ragged coughs.

“Hang on a second, you didn’t mention me at all,” Julius said with a frown. Willy filled his cup again, seeing as he’d spilled half of it when he’d slammed it back down onto the table.

“And you are?” Maria asked with a raised eyebrow, looking unimpressed.

“I’m Julius, Mr. Willy’s sidekick.”

Willy choked on his third refill and then decided not to bother with a fourth. “That’s a complete fabrication, he’s Caesar, my cheeky son in law.”

“Oh my god, please stop saying that before someone actually believes you,” Julius said and hung his head in his hands. Willy chuckled, watching from the corner of his eye as the only other two patrons of the coffeehouse left the shop.

Maria pulled a small black leather-bound notebook from within her jacket pocket and quickly scribbled something inside with a fountain pen. “I don’t suppose there’s any point in asking who it is, in this imagined reality of yours, that you’re ‘married’ to?”

“Queen Victoria,” Willy answered immediately and Maria sighed.

“To tell the truth, I’m much more interested in your luminoids than your fantasies. Tell me, why would they chose youas their companion?” she asked him, looking up at the two orbs of light hovering over his shoulders.

“Beats me,” Willy shrugged.

“You do realize that we’re right here? And quite capable of speech,” Moe muttered.

“My apologies,” Maria murmured, her eyes wide. “I’ve never seen, let alone interacted with a luminoid before. What are your names?”

Willy sat up straight. “This one’s Joe, and this one’s Jester.”

Julius rolled his eyes. “He’s lying again, the one on the left is Toe, and the one on the right is Chester.”

Willy almost fell off his chair from laughter. “Toe and Chester! I knew there was a reason I kept you around, Caesar!” he managed to say through his laughter. Julius beamed in satisfaction.

Maria frowned, hurriedly writing down within her notebook. She may have been frowning, but her eyes were alight with interest as she scribbled things down.

“Ignoring these two idiots, tell me, do you often whimsically approach wanted criminals, Ms. Minasyan?” Moe asked from beside Willy.

“Only when I want to do a story on them. I can see the article now, ‘Interview with a Psychopath’.”

Willy raised an eyebrow. “And are you ready to pay me for such an interview?” He frowned. “Hang on a second, psychopath? Did she just call me a psychopath?”

“I could have a talk with my boss, I’m sure we could find a tidy sum to pay for an exclusive,” she said with a keen smile.

Willy considered it for a few moments, and then shook his head. “Nah, I’m not really interested in being portrayed as some mentally deranged master criminal… unless you can get us passage to Mars before this time tomorrow that is. If you can manage that, then feel free to write about how my fingers have been replaced with chicken wings, or how my nose is a cheese grater, or whatever else takes your fancy.”

She regarded him with a skeptical look. “That’s really not how interviews work.”

“Uh, Willy?” Moe interrupted from his shoulder. “Willy, I’m secretly a donkey.”

While Julius and Maria turned to stare at Moe with mouths open in stunned confusion, Willy tensed, instantly recognizing it as the code he’d given to the luminoids to alert him when someone was about to try and kill him. Willy shifted in his seat, a hand moving behind his back to rest on the handle of his plasma pistol.

“What the hell Maria? Just when I thought things were going so well between us.”

“What?” She asked, giving him a dumbfounded look.

“Not her you idiot!” Moe hissed beside him, and Willy’s eyes widened. His back was to the door, so he hadn’t even noticed the people who had entered the coffeehouse behind him. He didn’t hesitate, leaping over the table, knocking the pot of coffee onto the floor as he grabbed the corner of the table behind him and pulled it down as makeshift cover. Julius and Maria acted instinctively, leaping backwards, away from the crazy man floundering over a table.

A second later two explosive rounds embedded themselves into the wall behind Willy, popping as they exploded within the wood paneling a second later. Willy hunkered down against the top of the table, a bolt of electricity from an arc gun burning a ragged scar into the wall to his right. He grimaced as the electricity made his hair stand up on end.

Julius had ducked behind his trunk for cover, while Maria had pulled over a second table and was using that, a small garter pistol in her hand, pulled from somewhere on her person.

“Want us to light them up?” Moe asked calmly from beside him as he finally yanked his pistol out from behind his back.

“What? No, this place is too small, and my mask is broken, you’ll just end up blinding us all,” Willy muttered and then flicked a switch on the side of his pistol and felt it start to vibrate softly within his grip. It was an Edison Sextuplex Plasmatic Scattergun, sold commercially under the nickname ‘the Splattergun’, since its ribbons of plasma were messier than they were accurate. Willy had taken to calling it ‘the Sex Pistol’.

He flicked up the safety bolt and the six heads on the end of the barrel popped forward. The whole thing was powered by a clip of gas filled bolts, and a single jar of electricity, which stuck out of where a hammer would be on a combustion pistol. The battery would be good for five or so shots before he’d need to reload.

“Let’s try out gun-sight, this seems like a good chance for a live trial,” Willy suggested to Moe and Lester, resisting the urge to flinch as another explosive round went off, this one in the top edge of his table, dusting him in splinters of wood. Moe moved forward and sat on top of the Sex Pistol, staying in the exact same position on top of the barrel as Willy moved the gun around, as if he were glued. Lester moved in front of Willy and expanded. It was like he was a balloon filling up with air, his round shape thinning out until, like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis, he became the mirror image of what Moe saw, from the end of Willy’s pistol.

“Alright, let’s give this a shot,” Willy murmured and held the pistol up over the top of the table, using Moe’s vision to aim. There were five attackers, none of them wearing uniforms, and each kitted out with high-powered weapons. They looked like mercenaries, or perhaps bounty hunters. They were professionals in any case.

Willy lined up his sights on one of them and pulled the trigger, the gun pulsing in his grip as it shot out a bolt and white-hot plasma arced to it from the six points on the end of the gun, spitting out into the air. Plasma weapons weren’t very accurate, more like shotguns than rifles, and Willy’s was no different, the ribbons of plasma twisting and expanding wildly in midair, before finding their target. The man went down screaming, the plasma changing color from purple to orange as it wrapped itself around him and he fell to the ground writhing.

“Huh, this actually works pretty well,” Willy murmured in surprise, watching through Moe and Lester as the remaining four mercenaries exchanged looks and then turned towards his table and raised their weapons together. “Ah, shit.”

They opened fire and Willy pushed himself flat against the ground, the top half of the table exploding into wooden shrapnel. He cursed, covering his head after a splinter of wood cut his cheek.

“Julius!” he cried out, looking to his side. Julius looked at him and bared his teeth in indecision, before grabbing the pot of coffee from where it lay by his feet and throwing it over the top of the trunk at the mercenaries. The barrage let up for a second as they turned to assess their new target, Willy taking advantage of the moment by rolling out into the open and shooting off a second shot blindly. Luckily the shot caught one of the mercenaries, the room lighting up for a few seconds as the plasma burned through him, bright and hot.

Hot enough to turn skin into cheese, which was a sight Willy knew he’d have trouble getting out of his head as he rolled across the floor again, taking cover alongside Maria.

“Jesus!” she exclaimed as the mercenaries turned their attention to her table, chips of wood exploding like confetti above them.

“No, I’m Willy, I understand how you could make that mistake though.”

“How can you be joking at a time like this?” she shouted, holding her hands over her head as debris rained down on them. Willy ignored her, nudging the barrel of his gun along the floor and around the corner of the table, Lester floating just in front of him, letting him see where the shooters stood.

Two of them had hopped over the bar counter for cover, while one remained out in the open, providing covering fire. Willy shot, the plasma bolt shooting straight across the floor before it expanded and spun wildly, scorching the floorboards before it got tangled up on the shooters waist.

“Alright, there’s only two left, you think you can distract them with your peashooter while I flank round the side?” Willy asked Maria over the screams of the third shooter dying. She just stared at him with wide eyes, which Willy took as agreement.

Using Moe and Lester to aim his shot he fired towards the countertop and then crawled out across the floor towards the front of the coffeehouse, where he’d be able to see around the counter and finish them off. Only one round left, he reminded himself as his previous shot sunk into the wooden paneling of the wall behind the counter. Two shots echoed through the shop as Maria covered him, giving him just enough time to sneak, on all fours, around to the front of the shop before the mercenaries popped up and started returning fire.

Carefully skirting a half-melted corpse, he darted a glance around the corner of the counter. One of the mercenaries was standing up, firing back at Maria’s table, while the other squatted down below the countertop, staring straight back at him with wide eyes. Willy pulled back with a grimace and then shoved his pistol around the corner and fired off his last shot.

He looked back around the corner when the screams started, but there was only one mercenary behind the counter, writhing on the ground.

“Ah, shit,” he muttered just before a barrel pressed against the back of his head. The man who had seen him must have leapt over the counter just in time, and then raced around to get the drop on him.

He swallowed, raising his hands and dropping his pistol to the ground.

“Got you now, you piece of—” the mercenary started, before a shot rang out. Willy flinched and ducked to the ground, only realizing that he was fine when the mercenary thunked to the ground beside him. He turned around and looked from Maria to the body and back again.

“Nice shot,” he acknowledged and pulled himself up.

“Thanks,” she breathed and was unsteady on her feet for a moment as she looked around at the burnt bodies that littered the floor. “You really are as good as they say,” she mumbled.

“I think so, but I’ve been told not to overinflate my ego.”

“Is it over then?” Julius asked, peeking around from behind Willy’s trunk.

“Yep, and just in time too, I was all out of juice,” Willy answered, grabbing his pistol from the floor and giving it a waggle. He ejected the empty battery and then tried and failed to kick it as it fell to the floor. He coughed and turned away, ignoring the battery as it rolled away.

“You know what? That actually went pretty well, things usually go a lot worse once the fighting starts,” Moe said with a thoughtful tone.

“It did, didn’t it?” Willy agreed with a grin. “Makes a nice change really— Oh Hasan, for God’s sake!” he exclaimed as Hasan emerged from the back of the store, holding a pistol leveled at Willy’s head and wearing a hard expression.

“Look at the bloody mess you’ve made. Do you know how much this will cost to fix?” he barked angrily as he surveyed his shop, keeping his gun on Willy the whole time.

“Yeah, well, sorry about that, Hasan. I’ll find a way to pay for the damage, promise,” Willy tried to assure him.

He just chuckled darkly. “Sorry Willy, but I know your history with debts. And speaking of, it just so happens that one of your creditors has put quite the price tag on your head.”

“Only one?” Moe asked skeptically.

“Wait, you mean youcalled these bounty hunters?” Willy gestured to the bodies at his feet.

“Of course, though I don’t know why I bothered. Clearly they were not the experienced fighters that they claimed to be, or you wouldn’t still be standing… Ah well, more reward for me. Now,” Hasan muttered and then fired a warning shot into the ground at Willy’s feet. “Hands where I can see them, and that goes for the woman too.”

Willy scowled but did as ordered, dropping his pistol to the ground and holding his arms up. Maria gave him a questioning look and he gave her a nod. With a sigh she dropped her pistol too, raising her hands into the air.

“Good,” Hasan murmured, his face glistening with sweat. “And what about the Darwin, where’s he?”

“I’m fine back here thanks,” Julius called out from where he was hiding behind Willy’s suitcase.

“Why are you doing this?” Willy asked, and was careful to keep his face impassive as Lester appeared behind Hasan’s head, hovering just above him.

“It’s nothing personal Willy, but you’re not the only one who’s desperate for cash. Things haven’t been easy since my dad died, and I owe a lot of people a lot of money.”

“Those student loans, huh? Told you an education was overrated,” Willy muttered.

“No, the money I owe is from loans I took out to pay off my student loans.”

Willy stared at him in disbelief for a moment, before throwing his head back in laughter. “You put yourself into debt to get outof debt? I mean, I’m not one to talk, but damn Hasan, you’ve really fallen down the rabbit hole.”

“Yeah I know,” Hasan grumbled with a scowl, his teeth grinding against each other. “But life isn’t always as simpl—”

“Fishbowl,” Willy said and then leapt to the side. Lester brightened and then raced around Hasan’s head at such a fast rate that it appeared as if Lester had swallowed his head whole. Hasan cried out, firing off two blind shots as he staggered backwards, clawing uselessly at his face.

“Huh, that works better than I thought it would,” Willy murmured as he stood up, then ducked back down as Hasan fired three more shots in the direction of his voice. The fishbowl was another new technique that he’d been meaning to try out with Moe and Lester, best suited for when he couldn’t have his mask on, since it only blinded the person inside.

Willy reached down and grabbed one of the bounty hunter’s weapons, an arc rifle that he powered up as he walked around the counter to where Hasan was staggering around, hunched down, as if that would help him see through Lester. Willy knocked the pistol out of his hand easily, and then kicked him backwards; almost falling over himself when the broken mechanism in his prosthetic bucked when he put weight back on it.

“Stay back!” Hasan said as he scrabbled back to his feet, hands questing blindly over the countertop before grabbing a knife and brandishing it wildly in Willy’s direction, his face still hidden within Lester’s bright blur.

“Really Hasan? You’re bringing a knife to a gunfight?” Willy primed the arc rifle, the weapon humming and vibrating, and the hair on his arms standing on end.

“Just let me go, Willy, I won’t tell a soul you were ever here, I swear,” Hasan said desperately, which made Willy frown.

“Don’t beg Hasan, it doesn’t suit you,” Willy muttered and held the rifle casually at waist height. He was just opening his mouth to try and reason with him when Hasan’s hand darted forward and threw the knife. Willy’s eyes widened and he dodged to the side, pulling the trigger instinctively. An arc of electricity shot out, briefly catching on the knife in the air before it struck Hasan full in the chest and he toppled backwards.

Lester stopped fishbowling him and floated in the air above him for a moment, before drifting back to Willy.

He scowled down at Hasan’s dead body, before tossing the arc rifle onto the ground beside him with an irritated sigh. “Hate it when I have to kill friends,” he muttered as he walked back around to the front of the shop.

“To be fair, it was self-defense,” Lester said softly beside him. “Though it is a shame that he’ll now be referred to in the past tense.”

“Nice rhyme there,” Willy murmured and stepped over the dead bounty hunter behind the counter. “Caesar, what the hell am I paying you for? Come see what these guys have on them, put it all on this table, and quickly if you don’t mind, the law can’t be far off after all that shooting.”

Julius reluctantly came out from behind Willy’s trunk and set to work with a grim expression.

“Is it always like this? Do his friends normally try and kill him?” Julius asked Lester gruffly as he turned over a body and checked the person’s pockets.

“Sooner or later they all seem to, it’s true. That’s how he lost his feet, from being abandoned by his crew.”

“You guys know there’s a reporter here, right?” Willy muttered and scowled back at them, before glancing at where Maria sat, furiously writing within that notebook of hers. “Moe, be a dear and find out how long we have before the coppers show up, will you?” Moe bobbed up and down and then zipped out of the coffeehouse.

Willy reloaded the Sex Pistol while Julius dumped all the coins, pistols, and rifles he found onto the table beside him.

Julius was looting the guy behind the counter when he whistled appreciatively, reading from a piece of paper that he’d found on the body.

“What is it?” Willy asked as he finished twisting the new battery into place.

“Your bounty, ‘Reward of one hundred pounds to any individual who brings the body, dead or alive, of William ‘Willy’ Stroker to Chloe—‘” Willy snatched the piece of paper out of his hands and read it himself, ignoring Julius as he exclaimed in indignation.

“That’s not a bad pay out,” Moe murmured as he zipped back into the store, reading over Willy’s shoulder.

“Yeah, but, dead or alive? How’s that any way to repay me for saving her life on the Bouchard job?”

“You didn’t save her life, you just didn’t kill her,” Moe pointed out, and Willy swatted at him absentmindedly, reading the visual description the bounty gave. It didn’t have a photo or drawing of his likeness, which at least was something to be thankful for.

“Who was she?” Maria asked, pen hovering in midair, poised over her notebook.

Willy scowled. “Oh no you don’t, I’m not saying another thing,” he said pointedly and folded the bounty up, putting it into his breast pocket.

Maria shrugged, a small and knowing smile on her lips. “Suit yourself, you’ll tell all soon enough anyway,” she said confidently, grabbing her bowler hat from where it had fallen to the floor and dusting it off.

“Oh? And why would I do that?”

“Because I happen to know just the person who can help you get out of here.”

Willy’s eyes narrowed. “I smell a catch, do you smell a catch Caesar? Not the catch of the day, don’t think there’s any fish on Ganymede, but like, the idiom.”

“I don’t know about a catch, but it does smell fishy,” Julius agreed.

“Weren’t you listening? I just said there aren’t any fish on Ganymede.”

“What? No, that’s another idiom.”

“You’re an idiom,” Willy muttered under his breath, and then turned back to Maria with a skeptical look. “So, go on then.”

“You’d need to do a job for this person, but they should be able to get you to Mars, and I doubt the job will prove much of a challenge for someone of your skill, I mean look how you handled these guys,” she said gesturing at the destruction around them.

“Take note of how she strokes my ego Julius, that’s a clear sign that she’s lying and it’s actually a suicide mission.”

“I thought those were your favorite kind?” Moe asked and Willy swatted at him again, before frowning at the luminoid.

“Hang on, you’re supposed to be finding out how far away the police are.”

“Yeah, they’re about a minute away now. Most of them are all busy preparing for something, so they don’t have many free men to send out,” Moe answered nonchalantly.

“Ah shit, alright, Caesar grab my trunk, Maria pick a weapon, we can’t let these go to waste, and Lester, is there a discrete back exit to this place?”

“There is, yes. Good guess.”

“Wasn’t a guess, I know this place, remember? You guys seem a bit slow today,” Willy muttered as he grabbed handfuls of coins and paper notes from the table and shoved them into the pockets of his coat. Beside him Maria selected a slim pistol from the table and tucked it behind her back.

Willy hesitated, hand hovering over the largest weapon, an Edison arc rifle with a custom paint job. He was still upset that he’d lost his last arc rifle on the Bouchard job, but it was a large weapon, bulky and nearly impossible to conceal, so with a sigh he picked out two matching pistols instead. They were the two pistols with the explosive bullets, painted a maroon that was scratched and peeling from use. He held them up to the light to better admire them.

“Twenty seconds,” Moe began to count down.

“Shit,” he hissed and shoved the pistols into his coat, grabbed a small concealable pistol from the table, and dropped it down Caesar’s shirt as he led the way through to the back of the shop. Maria and Caesar followed, hovering just behind him as they heard police whistles and the clopping of shoes on the pavement outside. Willy kicked open the back exit and limped out into the narrow alley that would deposit them a street away from Hasan’s coffee shop.

“Are we home free, Moe?” he asked after they’d fast walked for a block or two.

“Well, they’re not looking for you. They seem pretty inexperienced actually, considering one of them fainted and the other began to vomit as soon as they walked inside and saw the mess you made.”

Willy chuckled and then pulled to a stop, turning to Maria. “Well, lead on then, take us to these mysterious and well connected people who can get us out of here.”

Maria grinned and tipped her bowler hat in acknowledgment before striding forth confidently, leading them towards the outer ring of the city. Willy pulled awkwardly at his scarf, loosening it around his neck.

“How did you find us anyway?” Moe asked after a moment, moving forward to orbit Maria.

“Recognized Willy the second he entered the port, he looks just as described in the articles and arrest warrants, even down to the scarf. And then him having a luminoid with him just proved it beyond a shadow of a doubt.”

“So you followed us?” Julius asked, grunting as he adjusted Willy’s luggage on his back.

“Wasn’t very hard, kept my distance from the port down to the city, but once on the streets it was easy. I don’t think either of you looked over your shoulders once.”

“Well, that’s usually what Moe and Lester are good for,” Willy muttered, turning to frown at Lester, who hovered just beside him. “You guys have seemed pretty distracted since we finished the Bouchard job actually…”

“Don’t be silly, Willy,” Lester said dismissively.

Julius laughed from behind them. “Nice one Lester.”

“Thank you, I’ve been saving it. In fact I think it might be my favorite.”

“Screw you guys. Hey Maria, are you sure these people you’re taking us to will be able to get Caesar and the luminoids out as well? Cause I don’t have any issue with leaving them behind, just putting it out there.”

“Unfortunately for you, I’m sure it won’t be a problem,” she replied with a quick glance over her shoulder, a small smile on her lips.

Willy watched from the corner of his eye as they passed a group of tired looking Darwins, their overalls and green shirts stained black with soot and oil. There was a tension to them, they weren’t cracking jokes or even talking, just looking darkly at the ground in front of their feet.

“So where’s your infamous mask? I thought you would’ve worn it earlier, while we were fighting. Unless of course that’s the one thing the descriptions I’ve read of you got wrong,” Maria asked him as they waited for a tram to pass, screeching as it cluttered by. It was overflowing with people, hanging off of the sides of the tramcar with distant hollow expressions.

“One of the eye lenses is cracked, so I only use it if I have to. I’ll fix it once we get to Mars,” Willy answered with a shrug. “How long till we get to the bossman?”

“Almost there,” she replied and cut across the road. “This way,” she said and started down a set of stairs.

“Uh, isn’t this…?” Julius started before Willy cut him off.

“Where the hell are you leading us?” Willy asked with a disturbed grimace at the two bathroom doors at the bottom of the staircase.

Maria blushed and shifted on her feet, unconsciously adjusting her bowler hat. “Yeah I know, not the most sanitary of entrances, but this is how you get to them. Don’t worry, it’s in the men’s.”

Willy groaned and hesitated outside while the others walked in. He turned to Lester. “Does it check out, Lester? Is it safe?”

“Aside from the clog in the second stall? It’s safe. What did you expect, half a dozen men waiting for a brawl?”

“Stranger things have happened,” Willy muttered with a shrug as he pushed his way into the toilets, making sure to keep his distance from the second stall. Maria waited with Moe at the end of the stalls, a sign on the door of the final stall claiming that it was out of order.

Willy glanced inside cautiously; a square hole had been cut into the wall, about two feet off the ground. Julius awkwardly squeezed inside, knocking Willy’s trunk against the rough ceiling as he did.

“There’s a ladder down,” Julius called out from inside.

“What’s at the bottom?” Willy asked him, before indicating for Moe to go and check.

“Can’t see,” Julius called back out.

“You go first,” Willy said to Maria, who just rolled her eyes.

“If it makes you happy, sure.”

“He’s got a thing about bathrooms,” Moe muttered, reappearing at the top of the ladder.

“No I don’t, shut up. What’s down there?”

Moe made a low sound before answering. “Not much, there are a couple of long dark tunnels that lead into the bowels of the city.”

Willy glanced over his shoulder as someone entered the bathroom behind him. “Of course there are, how else would you get through to the bowels but through a bloody toilet,” Willy muttered. The person behind him stared at him like he was crazy. “What are you looking at?” he asked before pulling the stall door shut.

Julius was waiting for him by the ladder, Maria already having climbed down. He noted grimly that the rungs were moist from the dripping pipes that crisscrossed along the ceiling above them. He chose not to question what sort of pipes they were.

The ladder wasn’t very long, only about two meters high. Once at the bottom Julius pushed his trunk over the edge and Willy lowered it to the ground with a grunt.

“Where to now?” Julius asked Maria as he reached the bottom.

“This way,” Maria said after a moment’s hesitation, looking between two of the dark tunnels. “Good thing we have the luminoids, I didn’t think to bring a lamp.”

“Yeah, they occasionally come in handy. Rest of the time they’re just a pain,” Willy murmured as he glanced down one of the other tunnels. They were brick and mortar, only just tall enough to walk through without having to crouch down, and the walls were covered in thick pipes.

Julius hurried after them, matching pace with Willy while Lester and Maria took the lead. “You sure we can trust her Willy?” he asked in a whisper. “This is all looking pretty sketchy.”

“I know, it’s finally getting good, right?” Willy replied with a grin. Julius rolled his eyes.

They walked for another few minutes, the ground sloping downwards and the air slowly growing warmer with it.

“Stinks down here, doesn’t it?” Willy muttered after a while.

“Oh, I thought that was just you,” Julius said with a mischievous grin.

“I’m just glad I don’t have a nose,” Moe murmured softly as Willy stuck out a foot to trip Julius up, making him stumble.

They turned a corner, and then came to a stop upon noticing the half a dozen different rifle barrels trained on them.

“Uh, thanks for the warning there Moe. What were you and Lester saying about not being distracted?” Willy muttered sarcastically as they raised their hands.

“Shut up,” Moe hissed quietly. The men and women behind the rifles barked something out in Turkish and Willy and Julius just raised their hands higher.

“Did she just lead us into a trap?” Julius asked in disbelief.

Maria scowled back at him. “Calm down, it’s just a checkpoint, I’ll get us through.”

“Maria? Is that you, Minasyan?” One of the guards called out.

“Hey Osman, told you I’d be back,” she said with a large friendly grin as the guards lowered their rifles and a man with a rock hard chin and a dirty fez stepped forward to greet her.

“And I told you not to bother unless you were actually planning on helping us out.”

“Well then it’s a good thing I brought the help with me,” Maria gestured back to Willy and Julius, who put their hands down only after glancing at each other.

“I don’t know if I’d call street scum and luminoids help,” Osman murmured as he looked over them with a critical eye. “Who do they belong to anyway?” he asked Maria, nodding at where Lester hovered beside her.

“You could just ask us directly, you know,” Lester muttered, before going on to answer his question. “William is our companion, I’m Lester, and that’s Moe,”

Osman turned back to Willy and then laughed heartily. “This man? You’re bound to him?” Osman looked him up and down again as he chuckled. “By the look of him I’m surprised he hasn’t tried to sell you off.”

“Oh, I’ve done it dozens of times actually, but then they come back a couple of hours later once they get sick of whoever I sell them to. Great way of making some quick money actually,” Willy explained with a wide grin.

“And why should we trust a self admitted scam artist?” Osman took a step closer to Willy, as if searching for the answer within his face.

Willy shrugged and shoved his hands into the pockets of his coat. “Desperate times call for desperate pleasures, and all that.”

Maria rolled her eyes and stepped in-between them, laying a hand on Osman’s arm. “You asked me to come back with help, and I have.”

“I asked you to come back once you were ready to help, not to bring it. Looks to me like you came back with trouble. You’re not going to be a problem for us are you Maria?” Osman asked, turning to look at her, his tone serious.

“How do you solve a problem like Maria, am I right?” Willy murmured, stepping up beside them and nudging Osman in the side. Osman scowled at him, before Maria pulled him off to the side, shooting a dark look back at Willy. She whispered something into Osman’s ear, and they talked in hushed voices for a moment.

“Hmm… fine then,” Osman murmured and then turned back to the guards who blocked off the corridor, their weapons still cautiously raised. “Maria Minasyan vouches for their passing, log it and let them through,” he called out and then led the way through into the corridor beyond, the floor angling further downwards as they walked.

“What did you say to him?” Willy asked Maria in a quiet voice, matching her pace. She gave him a smug look and kept her mouth shut, speeding up to walk alongside Osman. Willy frowned and turned to Lester. “What did she say to him, Lester?”

“What? I don’t know, she was speaking too low.”

Willy’s frown deepened. “What do you think, Caesar?”

“I think we’re being led towards the heat, not away from it,” he muttered from behind Willy.

“You’re not wrong, Caesar,” Willy murmured, his armpits already tacky with sweat. He pulled off his scarf, folding it up several times before dumping it on top of his trunk, on Julius’s back. A few minutes later he did the same with his coat. The whole place was like a boiling pot, muggy and stifling, the air feeling almost too thick to breath in.

“Where the hell are you taking us?” Willy asked Maria and Osman before pausing. “Or is that where… it’s certainly as hot as hell down here.”

“Nearly there, Willy-man,” Osman called over his shoulder without glancing back.

The ground leveled out as they reached the end of the corridor, entering what Willy guessed was Hamid’s generator room. Thick cables ran from the ground to the ceiling, pumping power to the city above. People bustled and talked in the passages in-between humming generators, massive water pipes turned into makeshift tables, with doors and planks laid out across them and chairs shoved up alongside. Small nooks and alleys had been walled off with curtains and turned into little rooms and apartments, and planks had been laid across the tops of steel machinery, bridging the gaps, adding a whole second layer to the slum-like sprawl of the subterranean city.

Willy whistled as he looked around, the whole complex had to be the size of a small station, maybe as large as one of the districts on Hyperion. It was certainly just as packed full of people. Massive gears clanked and spun, boilers hissed with growing pressure, and steam rose from dozens of different locations, and yet despite the working machinery people bustled shoulder to shoulder through the labyrinthine pathways.

Hammocks had been strung between some of the thick electrical cables that crisscrossed wildly overhead, and as they walked down the stifling passages that passed for streets, Willy spied forges pumping out bullets, stills pumping out alcohol, and even a passageway covered in pink sheets where scantily clad women of dubious morality were pumping out— Willy shook his head to clear it, focusing back on more important issues.

“What is all this?” he asked Maria as he squeezed past a Darwin hauling a crate of booze, his hairy arms slick with sweat.

“This is the hub where all of Hamid’s power, water, cooling, heating, and ventilation systems meet,” she explained. “It was always the site of their black market too, but most recently it’s become the base of operations for the revolutionaries. As the police cracked down above, more and more people sought refuge down here, to the point where, as you can see, it basically became a city in its own right.”

“They’re packed in like sardines,” Julius murmured beside Willy, his eyes wide as he looked down one of the passages that had been converted into two long rows of bunk beds. All of them were occupied.

“Nice try to redeem yourself there, Caesar, but still doesn’t count, there aren’t any fish on Ganymede,” Willy assured him.

“Actually, someone converted one of the water tanks into an aquarium, breeds smuggled in catfish, sells them to expensive restaurants for a disturbing profit,” Osman told them as he led them up a set of stairs, Willy scowling as Julius laughed behind him.

Osman had led them to the center of the city-beneath-the-city, where a central control tower looked over the whole maze like complex. A dozen men guarded the base of the control tower with every kind of weapon you could think of. One of them even had a crossbow, the tips of the bolts fitted with small jars of electricity, more than enough to stop the heart of anyone who was unlucky enough to be on the receiving end.

“You taking us to the big-boss-man?” Willy asked as the guards patted them all down and confiscated their guns. One of them tried to rummage through his trunk, until Willy stomped down on its lid, crushing the man’s fingers.

“Do try and behave, William,” Moe muttered as he hovered beside him.

Osman frowned at him from the stairs. “I’m taking Maria to see her, but you? You’re staying right there until we call for you.”

Julius balked. “What about me? You can’t leave me alone with him, he’s crazy,” Julius said jokingly as Osman and Maria climbed the steps up to the control room. Well, Willy assumed he was joking anyway.

“What are you looking at?” Willy asked one of the guards who was outright scowling at him.

“You crushed my fingers!” he hissed and waved his hand in front of Willy.

“We’re very sorry for that,” Moe said robotically, zipping over to hover in front of the man, causing him to jump and take a step back.

“Don’t apologize for me, I can say it myself,” Willy said stubbornly.

“Well go ahead then.”

“No, he deserved it,” Willy huffed and then turned to Lester, speaking in a soft voice. “Lester can you get us some eyes and ears up in there?”

Moe sighed as he bobbed back over to Willy, Lester zipping up into the control room in the blink of an eye. “How is it that looking after Julius is easier than looking after you, a full grown man?”

“Hey, I’m not some kid, I’m thirteen years old,” Julius exclaimed with indignation.

“Doesn’t that make you like thirty in Darwin years?” Willy baited with a fake frown of confusion.

“I… what? We’re not dogs you idiot.”

“To be fair,” Moe interjected. “Darwins do age at a slightly different rate, reaching both puberty and maturity about two years earlier than humans. Or about fifteen years earlier in Willy’s case.”

“Enough picking on me, let’s hear what they’re saying up there.”

Moe sighed again and then began to speak, his voice changing, becoming Osman’s, using his connection with Lester to repeat what he said word for word.

“I don’t like this, he makes my skin crawl, and the fact that twin luminoids chose himas their companion only makes me distrust him more. You know the sort of person that luminoids usually latch onto, and this guy is the exact opposite.”

“Jesus, I just can’t escape being picked on today, can I?” Willy murmured, quieting as Maria began to speak.

“You don’t have to like him, he just needs to get the job done, and I believe that he can. Just think of him as a contractor.”

A third voice sighed. “Fine, I’ll hear him out at least, but I’m putting my trust in you Maria, and if he breaks it then you’ll face the consequences right along with him.”

“Hey, what the hell are you doing?” the guard whose fingers Willy had crushed asked, recognizing the voice coming out of Moe.

Maria said something that Willy didn’t catch as he mimed for Moe to stop repeating what he heard. “No sir, what are youdoing?” Willy asked accusingly, turning to jab a finger at him.

The door to the control room opened above them and Osman stepped out. “Let them up,” he called down and Willy grinned and walked forward, Julius following him up the stairs.

Willy, forcibly ignoring the sweltering heat, looked around the octagonal control room quickly. Each of the outer walls was outfitted with control boards of switches and dials, with large windows above the boards looking out on the complex below. The middle of the control room was raised above the rest; an open space with two tables in it, both of them covered in blueprints and plans.

Willy walked up to the tables, taking in the woman beside Maria, who stood confidently in front of one of the tables, her eyes cold and calculating. She had a strong jaw line and thick prominent eyebrows, her hair hidden away beneath a black headscarf. She looked him up and down, and he did likewise, which only made her narrow her eyes further.

“So, you’re William Stroker?” her voice was thick and croaky.

“Well, it’s not him, is it?” Willy said with a gesture towards Julius, who just rolled his eyes and sat down in an empty chair at one of the tables.

“Let me be frank with you, Mr. Stroker,” she started.

“Well, I’d rather use your real name, Frank doesn’t suit you.”

She blinked, and then scowled. “You may call me Derya if you have to.”

“Ok, got it Frank,” Willy said and flashed her a thumbs-up as he pulled out a seat beside Julius and sat down.

She sniffed, glancing at Maria and then Osman. “I see that neither of you were exaggerating,” she sighed and then turned back to Willy. “I think you’re scum, Mr. Stroker… but we’re desperate, we need all the help we can get, and we’re willing to pay for it.”

“Sounds good so far, how much money are we talking?” he watched them carefully as he spoke, noting the way Derya glanced at Maria briefly, and how Osman held his palm on the grip of the Silverthorn pistol strapped to his thigh.

Moe moved to hover in front of Derya, pulsing softly as he spoke. “Ignore him, we aren’t interested in your money, what we want is a flight to Mars.”

“Whoa, hang on, we do want to get to Mars, but saying we’re not also interested in cash is going a step too far,” Willy said hurriedly.

“We’re willing to provide both,” Derya assured him.

“Now we’re cookin’. So what’s the job then? What do you want me to do?” he asked and scratched his nose.

“Yesterday we had our largest protest yet, and tomorrow we’re ready to lead a coup that will free Hamid from the rule of the Ottoman Empire… but we have a problem. Aslan— the Sanjak-bey, is the Red Sultan’s puppet, and he’s sealed himself in his rooms within the palace, which our reports claim is very well protected. Taking him would undoubtedly cost us many lives, as we’d have to storm the whole palace, lives I’m not prepared to lose. This is where you’d come in.”

“Got it, consider him as good as dead,” Willy assured her with a confident nod and stood up. Maria had pulled out her notebook and was busy writing in it once again.

“You seem to misunderstand me, Stroker, we want you to kidnap him, not kill him.”

“What? Why?”

“We’re not murderers,” Osman growled from behind him.

“No one has to die today. Or tomorrow for that matter. Having him alive and in our custody will help with a peaceful change of leadership, as well as show the righteousness of our cause.”

Willy scoffed. “You’re just making things harder for yourself.”

Derya straightened, her jaw tight. “We won’t sink to the level of the Red Sultan, if we start killing people who don’t share our views, then we’re no better than they are.”

Willy grimaced. “You know, I’ve been all over this little solar system we call home, and I’ve never met anyone who was any better, or any worse, than anyone else. We’re all just animals living in imaginary cages,” he paused, and then shrugged, giving them a wide grin. “But I can do a kidnapping, though it’ll cost extra of course.”

“Our offer is non-negotiable. One hundred and thirty lira, on top of passage to Mars.”

Willy pretended to consider that for a moment, before turning to Lester. “What’s that in pounds?”

“About one hundred and twenty pounds, maybe a bit less, but that’s still more than Chloe has on your head, so there’s that I guess,” Lester answered as he hovered above the table, drifting from blueprint to blueprint.

“Alright, deal,” Willy decided after a moment, offering Derya his hand, which she sneered down at before reluctantly shaking. “So where did you say he was again?”

“The palace,” Osman answered, picking up a set of plans from the opposite table. “We have this set of architectural plans for the building, but—”

“Great, bring them over,” Willy said before addressing each of the others in turn. “Moe, go scout out the Palace with your own eyes, if you see anything that doesn’t match the plans let us know. Derya, you should get the ship and money prepared because I want to leave as soon as I’m done. Julius, go find me a kebab will you? I’m starving. Maria, you look like someone who’d know where to find some booze. Now,” he said, reaching the last of them. “As for you, Lester, just keep on glowing you gorgeous bastard.”

“Watch yourself, just because we’ve hired you doesn’t mean you can just—” Osman started as he slapped the plans down on the table, Willy leaning over and looking through them with a focused intensity.

“When he gets like this it’s best just to humor him,” Lester murmured with a weary tone. “Unless you want him to start acting on his every other whim.”

Osman looked at Derya, who sighed and then nodded.

Julius looked between them and then coughed awkwardly. “So, uh, where do I get a kebab?”

 

Willy lounged back in his chair, feet up on the table and cup of black market beer in his hand as he devoured the kebab. The others stood around the table and watched with a mixture of boredom, disgust, and disdain.

Derya made an exasperated sound and stood up. “You’re not even planning anything, you’re just slacking off and eating.”

Willy rolled his eyes. “That’s because I’m already done, I know what to do.”

Maria laughed, and Osman scowled, shooting her a look as well.

“If that’s the case then when do you plan on doing it?” Osman asked.

Willy sighed and stood up. “I guess I can get started now… Moe, everything check out? Are the plans as outdated as they look?”

“There have only been minor changes, most of them improvements or modernizations.”

“How about in the kitchens? Any dumb ones?” Willy looked directly at Moe as he asked, his gaze intense.

“What? Oh! Yes, just the one.”

“How is this relevant?” Osman asked impatiently.

Willy stood up and stretched. “Ok here’s the plan, me and Caesar will talk our way through the back kitchens, then stealth our way up to, uh, what was his name?”

“Aslan A—”

“Yeah, that guy, we’ll get up to his quarters, nab him, then hightail it out of there like our asses are on fire. How’s that sound?”

Maria wrote in her notebook, while the others just stared.

“That has got to be the worst plan I’ve ever heard… But, I don’t care about your methods, only your results,” Derya said tiredly. “Do you need anything to prepare, or are you ready to put this plan of yours into action?”

“Nope, ready to go whenever you want,” Willy said and downed the last of the dishwater-like beer from his cup.

“Then go now, let’s get this over with as soon as possible.”

Osman shook his head. “This is insane, he’s only going to get himself killed.”

Derya sat down in one of the chairs. “Then let him, he’s not getting paid until he gets back here successfully, and we’re out of options, Osman. He’s either going to do it, which makes him a genius, or he’s not, in which case he’s a suicidal idiot who’s no longer our problem.”

“I tend to think of him as somewhere in the middle,” Moe mused in the ensuing silence. “A suicidal genius, I suppose.”

“Or just an idiot genius,” Julius muttered under his breath, which made Willy burst into laughter, before coughing and putting on a more serious face.

“Right then,” he coughed once more. “Let’s get going.”

Osman groaned and shook his head. “I’ll show you the way,” he said reluctantly and held the door open for them.

Willy waited at the doorway too, stopping Maria when she moved to follow Julius down the stairs. “Hold up Maria, just so we’re clear, if you’re going to tag along then you’re going to have to follow my orders, I can’t have you two feet behind me writing in your notebook while I’m in the middle of a firefight.”

She frowned. “I’m not an idiot, Willy, and for the record I can look after myself, if that’s what you’re implying.”

“It’s not, but I need your help if this thing’s going to work out. Well, ok, that’s not entirely true, I might be able to do it with just Julius, but it would be tight.”

She rolled her eyes and pushed past him. “I’ll do what you want Stroker, but don’t kid yourself, I never had any intention of following you into the palace, I value my own life well above some story about an idiot genius.”

Osman shook his head in confusion as he followed Willy down the stairs. “So you actually have a plan then? Is all this stupidity just a façade? A pathetic gimmick to help garner infamy?”

“Sure, I’ll take it, sounds better than being an idiot genius at any rate,” Willy muttered wistfully as he took his weapons back from the guards at the base of the tower. “Is it hotter than before or is it just me?” he asked and fanned himself with a book.

“Hey!” Maria cried out, snatching back the notebook that he’d lifted off her while they’d been talking at the top of the stairs. Willy chuckled devilishly as he shoved the last of his guns into his pants.

He wasn’t joking though; it really did feel hotter than it had before. Heat radiated up from the ground, he could almost feel it in the soles of his feet, even through his boots. Well, he thought that he would have, if he had any feet to feel with.

“Hey Osman, help a kid out would you?” Julius called, pretending to drag Willy’s trunk across the ground. Osman sighed and grabbed one end, Julius grinning ear to ear as they split the weight between them.

“So where are we heading?” Willy asked as Osman and Julius took the lead, carving their way through the overcrowded maze in the guts of Hamid.

“Just follow me, I’ll take you there,” Osman answered briskly.

Willy just rolled his eyes. “Well obviously, but that’s not what I meant, I was asking where we’re heading, where we’ll come out, what street?”

Osman frowned and looked over his shoulder as he answered. “Same place you came in from, the third ring road, just down from Galata.”

“Ah, perfect, that’ll work,” Willy said cheerfully and rubbed his hands together.

Moe watched him curiously, pulsing with light as he hovered a couple of feet in front of him.

“Why won’t you talk about your time here on Ganymede? You seem to know the place pretty well, and I’ve never known you to miss an opportunity to tell a story, Willy,” Moe commented as they left the main sprawl of the underground complex behind them, walking up a set of stairs into the tunnel that they’d come in through.

Willy shrugged. “Some stories aren’t worth the breath.”

Moe made a huffing sound, although it ended up sounding more like a buzz, reluctantly leaving the topic alone. Maria wrote something down in her reclaimed notebook, Willy watching her out of the corner of his eye.

It didn’t take long for Osman to lead them to the exit, Willy sending up Moe first and waiting for him to give them the all clear before climbing up himself and helping pull up his trunk. Osman started to give a rather pessimistic goodbye speech that he was only too happy to leave behind.

Willy limped up the stairs and out onto the third ring road, which he began to follow as it cut around the city. He kept his eye on the left-hand side of the road, looking for a shop that he wasn’t entirely sure would still be there.

“You know that the palace is that way, right?” Maria said after a couple of minutes, clearing her throat loudly before speaking and nodding towards the center of the city.

“I do,” he murmured, and then smiled as he spotted the shop he was looking for up ahead of them. “But first we’ve got to buy a couple of things.”

Maria looked at the front windows of the shop skeptically. “This is a junk shop.”

“That’s right, the best kind,” Willy grinned back at them and walked inside, the shop was cramped and overflowing, nearly everything that you could ever want to buy was packed tightly onto floor-to-ceiling shelves.

“This place is one hell of a fire hazard,” Moe murmured as he drifted down one of the aisles of shelves. The wrinkled woman behind the counter glanced up without any hint of interest, before returning to her work on some sort of clockwork mechanism that was sprawled across the counter.

“Alright, time to get to work,” Willy rubbed his hands together. “Moe, Lester, I need you to search through this mess for what we need.”

“Ok, what are we looking for?”

“Well, let’s start with a walking stick…” he muttered as he limped down one of the aisles.

 

Maria and Julius waited next to the door, Julius sitting on top of his trunk looking bored, and Maria writing in her notebook each time he brought something out from within the aisles and placed it on the countertop, a pile quickly forming.

Moe and Lester zipped around the store, finding what he was looking for faster than he ever could have. In the pile he had a walking stick, a length of rope, the largest kerchief he could find, a fez, a set of risqué playing cards that he quickly hid from Caesar’s view under the fez, and a folding hand fan, which he definitely needed after walking up and down the aisles retrieving everything.

The final thing he added to the pile before asking the woman behind the counter to tally it all up was a leather-bound pocket encyclopedia that made Maria give him a skeptically raised eyebrow.

“What?” he asked innocently.

“You don’t seem the encyclopedic type.”

“Well, you never know when you might need to start a fire, or—” she rolled her eyes and turned away, Willy grinning as he checked the thickness of the book a second time, before tossing it onto the pile.

He paid the woman behind the counter, and then began to pack up his things, tying the kerchief around his wrist, the rope onto his belt, and then pocketing the playing cards and encyclopedia. With walking stick and fan in one hand he plopped the fez onto Julius’s head with the other, before opening the door for them both.

It didn’t take them long to walk to the palace, Willy able to speed up thanks to the walking stick. They were all covered in a glistening layer of sweat once they arrived, the air growing almost as hot as it had been in the rebel hideout a few layers of infrastructure beneath them.

“Hmm, bigger than I remember…” Willy murmured as they came to a halt in the middle of the square in front of the palace, a tram noisily scraping past behind them.

“Well that’s reassuring,” Maria muttered under her breath as she used her bowler hat to fan herself.

Willy led them along the elaborate fence line of the palace, looking up at the four-storied building with a frown before pulling to a stop. “Is this about right Moe?”

“Uh, yeah, couple steps to the left,” Moe replied, sounding slightly uncertain about himself. “You sure this is a good idea though? I mean your—”

Willy swatted him away. “Shoo, fly,” he muttered and then waved for Maria to come closer, swapping places with her so that she was standing exactly where he had been. “Ok Maria, this is your spot right here, don’t move from it, ok?”

She scowled at him. “I know how to stand in one place believe it or not.”

“Well I’m glad one of us does, I can’t stand it personally. Get it? Can’t standit,” Willy beamed, then coughed when Maria and Julius just looked unimpressed. “Caesar, drop the trunk just there,” Julius did as asked, and Willy opened it up, pulling out his long red scarf and then propping his new cane next to it. He handed Maria his hand fan, and then snatched her bowler hat off her head while her hands were busy.

“Hey!”

“It’s better this way, you’ll look more like someone who has just stopped to cool down, rather than someone who’s loitering,” he shrugged. “Besides, I need something to help hide my face,” he plopped it on top of his head and then looped his scarf around his waist twice, covering up his guns, before tying it so that the tails hung over the rope hanging from his hip, hiding it from sight.

“Why, it’s almost like you planned this!” Julius exclaimed sarcastically.

“Don’t be absurd, come on,” Willy muttered and started back across the tiled ground to the gate to the palace stables, which should have more steamcars than horses if the Ottomans were keeping up with the rest of the solar system.

“Good luck,” Maria called out from behind them.

“Don’t need it,” Willy shouted back. He swallowed and used Maria’s bowler hat to fan himself. He didn’t need to look to know that there were sweat stains on his off-white shirt.

“So what are we going to do about those two guys on guard at the gate?” Julius asked, nodding ahead of them.

“Lester’s going to show them the light.”

“Won’t they raise the alarm?” Julius asked with a frown.

“Nah, not when it’s this hot, they’ll just dismiss it as heat stroke… or I hope they will anyway,” he finished in a whisper, and then nodded to Lester, who darted forward and flashed twice. Willy holding the bowler hat down in front of his face to stop himself from being blinded. Julius wasn’t so smart, hissing and blinking repeatedly as he stumbled along beside him. Willy had to guide him forward with a hand on his shoulder as they slipped through the gate, the two guards none the wiser as they either groped around blindly in front of them, or tried to rub their eyes clear.

Willy led them confidently across the stables, ignoring the grandly decorated tunnel that led through to the inner courtyard of the palace, instead heading towards the plain wooden doorway that would lead through into the kitchens, storerooms, and the rest of the servant’s quarters.

“I can still barely see,” Julius muttered bitterly, rubbing his deep-set eyes.

“Sorry Julius, I should have given you a warning,” Moe murmured, moving to hover by his shoulder.

“No whining allowed, we’re officially breaking the law now,” Willy hissed.

“Right, because everything we’ve done up until now has been totally legal?” Julius said sarcastically.

Willy grinned. “Well, when you put it that way…” he paused at the wooden door to the palace, glancing at Moe and Lester. “Anything I need to know about in there before we bluster in?”

“The cook seems like a bit of a dictator, might ask you questions if you look like you don’t belong,” Moe answered, pulsing gently.

“In which case Caesar, you and I are in the middle of a conversation, got it?” Willy said as he pushed the door open and walked inside.

“Got what?”

“What we’re doing,”

Moe and Lester disappeared as they entered the stifling heat of the kitchens, the kitchen hands all sweating buckets as they worked at benches and over steaming copper pots.

“What are we doing?”

“We’re talking about a whole manner of things.”

“Like what? How hot it is in here?” Julius swallowed nervously as they passed the cook, who was berating a kitchen hand loudly.

“It is very hot, isn’t it? But no, there are much more important things to discuss, like the—”

“Uh, Willy, the stairs are over this way.”

“Yeah I know, but all this walking has made my feet tired.”

Julius frowned. “You don’t have feet.”

Willy gasped loudly and then knocked the fez from his head. “How dare you!” he hissed, pulling open a roll down door in the wall. He glanced back into the rest of the kitchen, but no one was looking in their direction. “Quick, get in,” he whispered and pulled himself up inside the dumbwaiter, Julius awkwardly squeezed in after him.

“Are you sure this thing can take our weight?” Julius asked, putting his fez back on as Willy punched one of the floor buttons.

“Nope,” he murmured happily, Moe and Lester reappearing in-between them as the dumbwaiter began to move. They sat there awkwardly as they ascended, Willy swatting away Moe when he floated too close. “Move over a little will you, I’ve got no leg room here,” Willy complained to Julius, cramped into the fetal position.

“Not like you need it,” Julius muttered under his breath, the dumbwaiter shuddering as they reached their floor. Willy shoved open the roller door and crawled out into the fresh air, fanning himself with the bowler hat while Caesar climbed out after him.

“Where are we now?” Julius asked, looking around the lavish room with a confused look.

“Some sort of breakfast room? I don’t know, but this is our floor,” Willy replied, striding out of the door and into a grand hallway in the center of palace. He pulled the bowler hat down over his face as a guard walked out of a room ahead of them. “Lester,” he hissed.

“No, wait!” Julius hissed back, covering his eyes with his arms only just in time before Lester flashed the guard. “You said you’d give me some warning next time!”

Moe made a huffing sound. “No I didn’t, I said I should have given you a warning, but I figured you’d have learned from your mistake.”

“Good one, Moe,” Willy chuckled, untying his scarf from around his waist as he walked and draping it over his shoulders.

“You know what?” Julius murmured after fuming for a few moments. “This is a lot easier than I expected.”

“It always is, Jules, it always is. Guards, locks, and walls, its all just a smoke screen, you just need to know where to slither through,” Willy told him as they approached their destination, a short secondary hallway which would lead to the master bedroom of the palace, complete with a stunning view of Hamid from the balcony. Willy turned the corner confidently, and then nearly fell over as he hurriedly backpedaled, clinging to the wall and turning to glare at Moe and Lester.

“What?” Moe asked.

“When were you planning on warning me about them?” he asked angrily, jabbing a finger around the corner, to where six brand new S. P. Silverthorn & Co. automatons stood facing each other down the length of the hallway.

“Maybe they thought you’d learnt from a previous mistake?” Julius suggested with a smug grin. Willy scowled at him, and then snuck a look around the corner. The automatons didn’t seem to have activated, so he mustn’t have gotten within range of their motion sensors.

“Well, this one is definitely nota smoke screen,” Willy murmured and then pulled his head back around, eyes narrowing when he saw the remainder of Caesar’s smug grin. “Ok, here’s the plan, you go bait them, and I’ll wait here.”

Julius gave him an unimpressed look. “Me? Ow!” he asked sarcastically, and then cried out as Willy slapped him in the belly.

“Shush, don’t be a pussy!” Willy admonished under his breath, glancing around the corner to see if any of the automatons had heard the noise. “Now pay attention, just go out there, get their attention, maybe fire off a shot or something, and then run like hell down the hall and ride the dumbwaiter back down. I’ll handle whatever’s left over, and then meet you where we left Maria, ok?”

“Why do I have to be the one to bait them?” he asked as he glanced around the corner, anxious fear creeping into his voice.

“I thought you were a master baiter?” Willy joked with a proud beam.

Julius just stared wide-eyed around the corner for a moment longer.

Willy sighed. “Look, don’t worry, you’ll be fine, they take a few seconds to activate, so you’ll have enough time to turn and run once they start moving.”

Julius looked back down the hall they’d just walked down, and then took a deep breath. He pulled out the little pistol that Willy had given to him at Hasan’s, and met his gaze levelly. “Alright, I’ll do it, but after this, we’re even, ok?”

“Deal,” Willy agreed semi-reluctantly and shook his hairy hand. He tied his scarf over his nose and mouth as a makeshift mask, the tails of the scarf hanging down his back. He pulled out the matching maroon pistols he’d taken off of the bounty hunters and hunkered down against the wall, giving Julius a nod.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Willy said softly. “Just remember, wait until they raise their arms or start to walk toward you, then run for it,”

Julius swallowed and nodded, slowly stepping out into the middle of the intersecting hallways. He waved his arms, but the automatons didn’t move an inch, just stood there like metal statues.

“Hey Lester, go with him alright? Make sure he makes it out,” Willy said softly, turning to look at the luminoid, who bobbed in response and then zipped over to hover at Julius’s shoulder. “What are you waiting for? Shoot one of them!” Willy hissed when Caesar looked to him, the automatons continuing to ignore his waving arms.

With a grimace Julius raised his small pistol and squeezed off a shot, the bullet pinging off of one of the automatons. All at once Willy heard their engines whine as they started, their heavy feet banging on the ground as they moved to face Julius, who squeezed off another shot before racing back down the hall, shouting ‘good luck’ over his shoulder.

Willy held his breath as two of the automatons gave chase, the floor shaking from their footsteps as they loped after Julius.

Automatons were slow and cumbersome, so Julius was already halfway down the hallway by the time they passed Willy and Moe. He waited, motionless, until Julius had darted back into the room with the dumbwaiter, watching in amusement as the automatons opened fire on the blinded guard that Lester had flashed before.

Four automatons remained, one at the opening to the hallway, just a couple of feet away from him, and the other three in a neat line halfway between the fourth automaton and the double doors to the room beyond. Willy hesitated, and then glanced around the corner again, being careful to not catch their attention.

All of the mechanical monstrosities were of a make he’d never seen before, with only a single arm each, counterbalanced by the heavily reinforced battery that bulged out of their opposite side. He’d never heard of an entirely electric automaton, but considering the brand, he didn’t find it that surprising. Silverthorn & Co. had made the original automaton, and every company that had since tried to replicate it had produced something so inferior as to be near useless.

Simeon Silverthorn was a genius only rivaled by the minds of Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla, though he was said to avoid the both of them like the plague. Perhaps that showed that he was actually much smarter than them, since Edison and Tesla had been at each other’s throats for years, and you’d have to be crazy to get swept up in that drama.

The automatons were all outfitted with gatling guns on their arms, all except for one, which had an arc rifle retrofitted in its place, thick wires trailing from the rifle to the battery on its other side. Willy frowned as he wondered how exactly he was going to deal with them.

“Willy, are you sure you can take them all on?” Moe asked him in a concerned whisper.

“Nope,” Willy answered before running out into the open. He leapt in front of the automaton at the mouth of the intersecting hallway, jumping up and onto it, using its knee joints as footholds as he leveled his guns on its shoulders and began to fire down the hallway. The three automatons further down the hall were arrayed in a line, with the one modified with the arc rifle in their center, so Willy opened fire on the two on either side of it.

His hands bucked with each shot, and just as the automatons further down the hall began to raise their gatling-gunned arms, his bullets began to explode. He took his fingers off the triggers, waiting for the smoke to clear to see whether his explosive ammunition was enough to finish them off. The automaton that he was on top of twitched its head back and forth, trying to figure out where he was. It tried to turn its gun on itself, but the barrel was too long to twist that far around.

He cursed and ducked down against the automaton as bullets began to spray out from within the smoke. “Well that didn’t work,” he said bitterly, nearly falling off when the automaton took an uncertain step forward as it was hit with a barrage of fire from behind, crushing Willy’s metal foot in its knee joint in the process.

“The automaton with the arc rifle is charging it up,” Moe warned him, appearing at his side briefly.

“How long till it can fire?” he asked in a shout above the hail of bullets, readying himself to jump.

“Three, two—” Moe started, and Willy hissed in a breath, leaping backwards into the air, the automaton’s gun barrel turning to focus on him as he sailed through the air. The smoke further down the hallway lit up, a blazing arc of electricity leaping through the air and hitting the automaton that Willy had just leapt off of.

It exploded, the battery in the automatons shoulder sparking and bursting its armor open from the inside out, all the bullets in its ammunition belt exploding upwards in a chain reaction that ended with a secondary explosion within the belly of the automaton.

Willy let out a raw shout of pain as a piece of shrapnel clipped his shoulder, crashing into the ground with another grunt as he landed awkwardly on his Sex Pistol. With a groan he turned over onto his stomach, pulling out the Sex Pistol from his pants, swapping it out with one of the maroon guns.

“That could have gone better,” he murmured, and then began opening and closing his mouth, trying to pop his ringing ears. The hail of bullets came to a stop as the automatons waited for the smoke to clear.

“Time to change tactics,” he muttered as he stood up, briefly glancing at the wound to his shoulder before straightening his bowler hat and running forward, using the exploded automatons body as a step to leap into the air. He fired the Sex Pistol first, at the automaton on the left, flaming-hot ribbons of plasma splattering onto the embossed armor plating of its chest. Crossing his arms, he shot his maroon pistol into the burning hot plasma, while with the other hand he shot a load of plasma at the automaton on the right, and then followed that up with explosive bullets as well.

The automaton on his left exploded just as it raised its gatling-gunned arm, quickly followed by the one on the right. With a satisfied grin beneath his makeshift mask he strode forward, holding up both guns into the chest of the fourth and final automaton. He shot the Sex Pistol, the plasma ribbons hissing as they splatted onto the automaton, and then pulled the trigger on his maroon gun.

The gun made a pathetic clink. It was empty.

“Oh come on,” he managed to say before the automaton stepped forward and slapped him with its arc-rifled arm, sending him flying into the wall.

“That was so close to being really impressive,” Moe murmured above him as he shook his head clear, scrabbling backwards across the ground, taking cover behind the still smoking body of the first automaton at the mouth of the hallway.

“Shut up Moe. Knew I should have sent you with Julius instead. You know Lester’s my favorite right?” he muttered without thinking as he grabbed at the second maroon pistol, pulling it out of his pants and checking how many rounds it had. “Ah crap, three shots left.”

“Then don’t miss.”

Willy paused, an idea coming to him. “Sit on my pistol,” he said hurriedly, holding out his gun.

“Hope that’s not a euphemism,” Moe murmured as he moved onto the barrel, like they’d done in Hasan’s coffee shop.

“Alright, now light up green when I’m aiming at the right spot.”

“Ok,” Moe acknowledged uncertainly.

 Willy took a deep breath, and then shot off another burst of plasma blindly, and then held up his other pistol, watching as Moe briefly flickered green. He angled it back a bit, until Moe glowed steadily. He pulled the trigger, his hand bucking awkwardly from the recoil. He waited only until Moe was green again before firing off a second shot.

“Move!” Moe hissed urgently, and Willy rolled away across the ground, an arc of electricity shooting into the lifeless body of the automaton he’d been using for cover a second later. He could feel the electricity in the air, and got the distinct feeling that the second he touched a doorknob he’d get a surprise jolt.

Two explosions sounded from down the hallway, followed a second later by a third, this one much louder, and then a solid thud.

Breathing heavily Willy risked a glance up, and then climbed to his feet with a smug grin, pulling down his makeshift mask. “And with one shot to spare,” he said cheerfully as he skirted the flaming metallic carcass of the automaton. “And you doubted whether I could handle them.”

“Well, you wouldn’t have been able to without me,” Moe muttered softly.

Willy pretended not to have heard him.

Leveling his pistol he shot his last bullet into the lock on the double doors at the end of the hallway, kicking them open as soon as the bullet exploded. He took in the room quickly, opulently outfitted with rich reds, deep blues, and expensive wooden furnishings. The whole domed ceiling was painted with a mural that he almost wished he had the time to admire.

Aslan stared at him with wide, terrified eyes, unsheathing a ceremonial sword decorated with jewels and inlaid with gold. He held it out between them, his arm shaking in fear as he ordered Willy to leave. At least that was what Willy assumed he was saying.

Willy closed the doors behind him, jumping when he got an electric shock from the doorknob. Aslan began to shout, calling for help, so Willy nodded at Moe and then pulled down his bowler hat. The man cried out as Moe flashed, blinding him. He began to swing and slash his sword blindly through the air, but Willy easily sidestepped his wild attacks, and then slapped him in the throat and twisted his hand backwards, forcing him to drop the sword. Willy began to whistle happily as he pulled the length of rope off his hip and tied Aslan’s hands behind his back.

“What do you want?” Aslan tried in English after not getting a response.

“Shush now,” Willy murmured, untying the handkerchief from his wrist and using it to gag him. Willy picked the ceremonial sword up off the floor, looking at it appreciatively. He cast a glance at Moe. “How much do you reckon this would sell for?”

“Do I look like a swordsmith to you?” Moe asked sarcastically, and then disappeared for a brief second. “Hurry, we don’t have long.”

Willy grabbed the sheath from where Aslan had tossed it aside and put away the blade. He cast a look around the room with a grin, and then walked through into the bedroom, grabbing a pillow before returning. He stripped the pillow from the pillowcase then threw it across the room at Aslan, who whimpered as it hit him in the chest.

He shoved the sheathed sword into the pillowcase, and then began to gather other things from around the room. He grabbed the medals that were so proudly displayed on their very own shelf in the bookcase, as well as the silver statue in the middle of the lush wooden desk.

“Is this really necessary?” Moe asked in a hushed whisper as Willy opened Aslan’s wardrobe and tossed his pocket watches into the pillowcase.

“Yes of course—Oh! This guy loves Silverthorn stuff, huh? This is their newest pistol, doesn’t even look used!” Willy said excitedly as he pulled it out, still in its satin padded wooden box. He shoved it into the pillowcase and then after a seconds hesitation grabbed the expensive looking furs that hung from a hook in the door of the wardrobe.

“Well, you’ve got about a minute before the palace guards shove their way inside.”

“Mm, ok,” Willy hurried back into the main room of Aslan’s quarters, passing the desk and throwing open the doors to his balcony. “Hold onto this would you,” he murmured as he shoved the full pillowcase at Aslan, and then scooped him up into his arms like he was a fairytale princess.

“Do I need to point out how bad of an idea this is?” Moe asked tiredly. Willy ignored him, took a deep breath, and then ran forward at top speed, out onto the balcony. His leg only gave way on his first step, slowing him down a fraction as he leapt onto the balcony railing and pushed off with his good prosthetic, launching out into the open air. Judging from how little Aslan squirmed Willy guessed that he still couldn’t see clearly.

He sailed over the perimeter wall of the palace; the cobblestones of the road rushing up to meet him as he plummeted towards the ground. He gritted his teeth and bent his legs in preparation for landing.

He could feel the springs in his legs reverberating right through his bones as he landed, one of the prosthetics snapping loudly from the impact.

He straightened up slowly, ignoring Moe as he asked whether he was ok. Maria and Julius stood just a short distance ahead of him, staring in stunned disbelief, Lester floating in between them.

A grin stretched across his face.

“I hope you two didn’t catch heat stroke standing out here waitin—” he took a step forward and then fell flat on top of Aslan as his left foot refused to support his weight. Aslan let out a muffled cry as Willy squashed him, before Julius and Maria hurried over and helped Willy back to his feet. He took the cane from Maria and cleared his throat as he managed to stay standing.

“How on Earth…” Maria murmured in shock.

Willy grimaced. “How on Ganymede you mean. Sorry, bit of a pet peeve of mine,” Maria laughed, and then reclaimed her bowler hat from his head, brushing it off before putting it back on.

“Grab my trunk Caesar, we’ve got to go deliver this fancy bastard. Maria, you can be in charge of him, just pull him along by his rope,”

“Alright,” she said reluctantly, grabbing the trailing length of rope from his bound hands. “Won’t we look a bit conspicuous on the roads?”

“Nah,” Willy said confidently as he threw the stuffed pillowcase over his shoulder and began to walk back down the road.

“That was so awesome. Totally insane, but so awesome!” Julius said excitedly beside him as they left the square behind.

“Insanely stupid you mean. Willy always knows how to make a scene,” Lester muttered as he floated beside them.

“Hey, what’s in the sack?” Julius asked, eyeing the strange bulges within. Willy just winked in reply.

“So was jumping off of a three story high balcony always your plan, or did you make it up on the spot?” Maria asked as she caught up with them, struggling to keep Aslan apace.

“I never reveal trade secrets,” Willy said with a smug smile.

“Well, whichever it was, I hope it was worth ruining your leg,” she murmured as she looked down at his broken prosthetic, part of the mechanism within it had buckled outside, giving him a strange looking lump in his trouser leg.

“Ah, it’s ok, whole reason we were going to Mars in the first place was to get it fixed,” he replied with a shrug. It didn’t take long to make it back to the public bathrooms where they’d started from, Aslan put up a bit of a fight when they got close, but another blinding flash from Moe put him back in his place.

They stopped in their tracks as they turned the corner to the street where the toilets were.

“Well, crap,” Willy murmured as they stared at the entrance to the toilets, which was overrun with police, all filing down into the bowels of Hamid.

“That’s not good,” Julius agreed.

“I guess now we know why you said the police were so preoccupied, huh Lester?”

“That was me, dumbass,” Moe muttered halfheartedly.

Willy glanced at Maria, who stared in shocked disbelief. “How the hell did they find them?” she whispered.

“Uh, Willy?” Moe asked from beside him. Willy ignored him, laying a reassuring hand on Maria’s shoulder.

“Sorry Maria, but it sure doesn’t look good for their revolt.”

“But they were so careful—” Maria started, before Moe interrupted with a sharp cry.

“Willy!” Moe shouted, just before a tram beeped its horn behind them. Willy spun around, nearly falling over in the process, just in time to see a blind Aslan get ploughed over by the tram as it screeched to a halt.

“Oh, come on!” Willy cried out in frustration. He limped forward on his cane and leaned over to look underneath the tram. “Oh yeah, he’s definitelydead.”

Maria muttered a prayer beneath her breath, still clutching the piece of rope he’d been tied to.

“I did try to warn you…” Moe murmured.

“Yeah, you did, sorry Moe,” Willy gave it a couple seconds, then shrugged and turned away as two policemen came over to see what had happened. “Oh well, time to get out of here, come on Julie.”

“Uh, ok,” Julius murmured uncertainly, following Willy as he led the way towards the port where they’d flown into Hamid just a few hours earlier.

“Wait, what about my interview?” Maria asked, hurrying to catch up to them.

“Well, your interview was dependent upon the rebellion getting me to Mars, which they’re no longer able to do. But hey, you’ve probably got enough about me in that little book of yours to write something half decent, right?”

“No, the agreement was that if I took you to the people who could get you out of here, then you’d sit down for an interview,” she insisted angrily, keeping apace with him easily as he hobbled down the road. Willy was about to reply when the ground shook beneath them, the low roar of a distant explosion sounding in time to the sudden flickering of lights all across the city.

“Yup, definitely time to go,” Willy murmured and then sped up his hobbling walk. “Didn’t think those rebels were crazy enough to blow up the whole station, but better to be safe than sorry.”

“They would never do that, everything they’ve done has been to protect this place. The explosion can’t have been caused by them,” Maria asserted passionately.

They arrived at the staircase to the port, Willy climbing onto the first step before Julius coughed and nodded towards the elevators. With a sheepish grin Willy followed him and they rode up in tense silence, Maria glowering at him the whole ride.

“How do you even expect to get out of here?” She asked.

“Moe, those Chinese traders still around?”

“They’re just readying the ship for takeoff now. I think that explosion spooked them,” Moe answered after a brief moment. Willy nodded in satisfaction, the lights flickering again just as they stepped out of the elevator. Moe led them down a long corridor to where the traders ship was docked.

“That’s the ship you’re taking? What a piece of junk!” Maria scoffed as they hurried down towards it. The brown and red painted ship was admittedly a lot smaller than he’d been expecting.

“Sure it’s a rather small model, but they should have enough room for us,” he murmured and then tilted his head to one side. “It actually looks like it’s modeled after a traditional Chinese junk, doesn’t it? So in a way you actually made quite a good joke there. Maybe I’m starting to rub off on you,” Willy said with a grin, and then flagged down one of the three men loading unmarked crates into the cargo hold, shrugging off the pillowcase with a sigh.

“Hello there, I—” Willy began before the man interrupted him, speaking Mandarin at a frightening speed, addressing Moe over his shoulder. Moe exchanged some words with him before turning to Willy.

“He wants to know what you’re willing to pay him for passage.”

“Ah,” Willy flashed him a grin, before rooting through the pillowcase and pulling out Aslan’s ceremonial sword, which he tossed across to him. The man admired it in the flickering electric light, unsheathing it halfway, and then holding one of the jewels right up to his eye.

He murmured something in Mandarin before focusing back on Willy. “Alright this’ll do, hurry onboard, want to get out of here soon as possible,” he said in near perfect English, Willy thanking him repeatedly before waving for Julius to take their things aboard.

He turned back to Maria with a sly smile, which she returned with an unimpressed frown. “Well, it was nice meeting you, Maria, but now it’s time to part ways,” Willy bent over in an elaborate bow, which ended in him nearly falling over as his leg gave way beneath him.

Maria cursed, only just catching him in time before he fell onto her. “You’re an odd creature William Stroker,” she murmured as she helped him regain his footing.

“Well I’m glad you think so, I’ve got a reputation to uphold you know.”

She rolled her eyes and looked up at Moe and Lester. “How do you two put up with this guy?”

They chuckled before Moe answered for the both of them. “At least with him there’s no such thing as a dull day,”

Willy ignored them, hobbling onboard the ship as Maria said goodbye to Julius, pausing to wave back at her before disappearing into the ship.

“Your room’s down there,” one of the three crewmembers told him as he squeezed past in the grimy narrow corridor down the center of the ship. Willy followed where he pointed, sighing as he opened the door at the end of the corridor, revealing the cargo hold. The crewman cackled with laughter behind him. “Only place with spare room.”

Willy stepped down into the cargo hold as the final crates were shoved aboard and the doors were sealed shut with a clunk and a long hiss. “You never said they didn’t have room,” Willy muttered to Moe as he sat down on a mid-sized crate.

“I never asked, and you never specified.”

Julius dropped down into the hold and sat down opposite him a moment later, straightening his fez absentmindedly. “So what are we supposed to do for the whole trip to Mars?”

“I don’t know,” Willy murmured, leaning back and pulling a book out of his pocket. “Bit of light reading perhaps?”

He fanned the book open to a random page and began to read, the ship shaking slightly as the engines rumbled to life, a siren sounding as the dock outside depressurized.

Julius frowned. “Wait… is that—”

“Yup,” Willy answered with a grin. “Maria’s notebook, lifted it off her just before, swapped it for that encyclopedia I bought earlier.”

“But, doesn’t she need it?”

“For what? Writing a bunch of nonsense about me? She can do that without her notes. Besides, she describes you as a ‘scruffy and diminutive Darwin quite unlike the Roman Emperor he’s named after.’”

“And she describes you, Willy, as a ‘conceited and flamboyant fool who is seemingly only still alive thanks to sheer luck,’” Moe read aloud from over his shoulder.

Willy snapped the book shut and tossed it over his shoulder. “Was a boring read anyway,” he murmured, and then laid down on top of his crate.

“If you say so, you flamboyant fool,” Julius said softly, a laugh sitting on the edge of his breath. “Or do you prefer ‘idiot genius’?” he asked and then let his laugh free. Moe and Lester chuckled along with him.

A groan issued from between Willy’s lips. “This is going to be a long trip…”

---