Max: Brain Dump 10111
Ask not for whom the bell tolls. It's automated and doesn't toll for anybody in particular. But it is pretty effective in counting the hours I spend wide awake, staring at the ceiling.
"How are you feeling?" she asked.
"Like shit," I said. "I never could sleep in low G. I think I'm gonna go for a walk."
"mmmhm." She was already asleep. I swear she could sleep on a pile of broken glass.
I pushed myself upright and put my clothes on. I was already getting dizzy as I headed out of the door. I kept my head down and followed the walkway. The trams and move-ways hummed above me, barely louder the buzzing in my ears. I concentrated on that hum rather than the gurgling in my gut. I could already tell I was lost. At least I was as lost as one could get in Kennedy. There's no place in the city more than a few meters from some form of transit that would whisk you back to wherever home is. It wasn't too long before my stomach got its bearings and I could look up. The entire city seemed to glow with single spectrum luminescence. It was almost like every surface was made out of sickly, yellow light. It was actually very well executed. You were never in the dark, but you could still see the stars.
*****
Cassie and I met on Liebnez. It was my first time in orbit. I liked it even less then than now. But the station systems were being upgraded and there was good money in it for a silicon jockey like me. Andy, me and half the department had just been laid off, with no real promise of being recalled. Andy heard about the gig on Liebniz from his dad. Three months in orbit, 12 hours of work a day, a crappy room, your run of the station and at the end you would have enough creds to live on for the better part of a year.
Like I said, I had never been in orbit before, so I didn't know how much I hated it.
"A lot of people have trouble adjusting. Just stay out of the G chamber until you are adjusted."
The station's med staff didn't much care for Andy's advice. I would have never hit the G chamber that first week if I waited for my stomach to calm down, and the contract required enough time in the G chamber to insure we could readjust to life planetside once the tour was over. Less rick of liability for management that way. Neither Andy nor I spent much time in our quarters. Andy preferred partying to sleep, whereas I couldn't sleep, so I had no reason to hang out in a tiny room with 18 snoring guys strapped to every surface.
At first I avoided intoxicants. I couldn't hold my liquor when my stomach was settled. And for some reason it took me a few days to remember than herb helped with nausea. I was never a fan of herb. I was more of an amp man. I never quite saw the appeal of smoking up my lungs justso I could get tired and dizzy. I had a "Duh" moment when the waitress told me that the special was low G hydroponic. That's when I remembered that herb was the cure for what ailed me.
Since we were in orbit, she brought me a vaporizer rather than a pipe. It was much less harsh and way more potent than any spliff I'd burned back home. It wasn't long before I was floating in more ways than one. The only problem was that to get high enough to not feel sick, I had to get too high to work. That meant taking two amps before my shift started and trying not to vomit.
One night I drifted to the arboreum. I'd heard it had a little more G than the rest of the station, but still less than a full G. That appealed to my herb scrambled mind for no reason that I can recall now. Due to the slightly higher G, this was a popular fuckspot. Since it was a popular fuckspot, it was also a favorite hangout for voyeurs. Since I was not amongst the fuckers, I guess I was a voyeur that night. That was the first time I saw Cassie. She was riding up and down on Andy. She had short, brown hair that gave her a slight halo as it hovered around her head. She had a great ass too. I was too high and a little to far away to notice much more detail than that. Andy spied me and gave me a thumbs up. Cassie followed his eyes to me.
She said something to Andy. Asking about me I guess. She must have liked the answer because she looked back at me, smiled and started pumping twice as hard as before.
"Did you like the show?"
"What?" I managed to squeeze out while keeping breakfast in.
"She's just got her Ph.D. in history," he went on as if I had answered his question, "and is hanging out here on Daddy's cred until she gets a teaching gig somewhere."
"So it's love, is it? BELCH."
"Parts of me are madly in love with parts of her."
That was our line. "Part's of me are in love with parts of her." It meant that we were too manly to fall in love. We'd hang out with women. We'd drink with women. We worked with women. We had friends who were women. And we happily fucked women any chance we could. But love? That was for eunuchs.
*****
To be continued.
"How are you feeling?" she asked.
"Like shit," I said. "I never could sleep in low G. I think I'm gonna go for a walk."
"mmmhm." She was already asleep. I swear she could sleep on a pile of broken glass.
I pushed myself upright and put my clothes on. I was already getting dizzy as I headed out of the door. I kept my head down and followed the walkway. The trams and move-ways hummed above me, barely louder the buzzing in my ears. I concentrated on that hum rather than the gurgling in my gut. I could already tell I was lost. At least I was as lost as one could get in Kennedy. There's no place in the city more than a few meters from some form of transit that would whisk you back to wherever home is. It wasn't too long before my stomach got its bearings and I could look up. The entire city seemed to glow with single spectrum luminescence. It was almost like every surface was made out of sickly, yellow light. It was actually very well executed. You were never in the dark, but you could still see the stars.
*****
Cassie and I met on Liebnez. It was my first time in orbit. I liked it even less then than now. But the station systems were being upgraded and there was good money in it for a silicon jockey like me. Andy, me and half the department had just been laid off, with no real promise of being recalled. Andy heard about the gig on Liebniz from his dad. Three months in orbit, 12 hours of work a day, a crappy room, your run of the station and at the end you would have enough creds to live on for the better part of a year.
Like I said, I had never been in orbit before, so I didn't know how much I hated it.
"A lot of people have trouble adjusting. Just stay out of the G chamber until you are adjusted."
The station's med staff didn't much care for Andy's advice. I would have never hit the G chamber that first week if I waited for my stomach to calm down, and the contract required enough time in the G chamber to insure we could readjust to life planetside once the tour was over. Less rick of liability for management that way. Neither Andy nor I spent much time in our quarters. Andy preferred partying to sleep, whereas I couldn't sleep, so I had no reason to hang out in a tiny room with 18 snoring guys strapped to every surface.
At first I avoided intoxicants. I couldn't hold my liquor when my stomach was settled. And for some reason it took me a few days to remember than herb helped with nausea. I was never a fan of herb. I was more of an amp man. I never quite saw the appeal of smoking up my lungs justso I could get tired and dizzy. I had a "Duh" moment when the waitress told me that the special was low G hydroponic. That's when I remembered that herb was the cure for what ailed me.
Since we were in orbit, she brought me a vaporizer rather than a pipe. It was much less harsh and way more potent than any spliff I'd burned back home. It wasn't long before I was floating in more ways than one. The only problem was that to get high enough to not feel sick, I had to get too high to work. That meant taking two amps before my shift started and trying not to vomit.
One night I drifted to the arboreum. I'd heard it had a little more G than the rest of the station, but still less than a full G. That appealed to my herb scrambled mind for no reason that I can recall now. Due to the slightly higher G, this was a popular fuckspot. Since it was a popular fuckspot, it was also a favorite hangout for voyeurs. Since I was not amongst the fuckers, I guess I was a voyeur that night. That was the first time I saw Cassie. She was riding up and down on Andy. She had short, brown hair that gave her a slight halo as it hovered around her head. She had a great ass too. I was too high and a little to far away to notice much more detail than that. Andy spied me and gave me a thumbs up. Cassie followed his eyes to me.
She said something to Andy. Asking about me I guess. She must have liked the answer because she looked back at me, smiled and started pumping twice as hard as before.
"Did you like the show?"
"What?" I managed to squeeze out while keeping breakfast in.
"She's just got her Ph.D. in history," he went on as if I had answered his question, "and is hanging out here on Daddy's cred until she gets a teaching gig somewhere."
"So it's love, is it? BELCH."
"Parts of me are madly in love with parts of her."
That was our line. "Part's of me are in love with parts of her." It meant that we were too manly to fall in love. We'd hang out with women. We'd drink with women. We worked with women. We had friends who were women. And we happily fucked women any chance we could. But love? That was for eunuchs.
*****
To be continued.
posted by Max Dobberstein at 11/04/2006 01:01:00 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home