Welcome to The Strip, Home of Death Ball
Welcome to The Strip, Home of Death Ball
Revisiting an early draft of my sci-fantasy adventure book 'Once Upon a Time in Hyperspace'.
A few years ago, I published my first novel, a sci-fantasy adventure called Once Upon a Time in Hyperspace. Today, while trying to figure out what to post, I came across some early drafts of the book. Now, I should mention that these drafts are very different from the final product and, in hindsight, may even be better than the final book. Maybe I’ll do a revised edition at some point but for now, on account of the fact that I couldn’t think of anything else to post today, here’s a chapter from the long-forgotten first draft of Once Upon a Time in Hyperspace, at the time titled Genesis Station.
The Strip
Situated in the heart of the asteroid belt between Jupiter and Mars, the Strip is one of the most successful ventures in the gambling industry ever to make their records public. Of course, this has nothing to do with its actual profits and just means that the management was stupid enough to make their records public. The same management also chose to build their casinos, stores, wedding chapels, and other centres of modern capitalism in a location that was singularly inaccessible to approaching ships. In short, nobody could get there because of all the asteroids. Unless, of course, they happened to be the cosmic personification of Death and her two new companions, Charlie McCormick, formerly of the Imperial Guard, and Artie Copernicus, a time traveller from the 35th century.
“Welcome to the Strip, boys,” Death announced with a wave of her arm, as they materialized on the run-down and desolate den of vice.
“Looks a bit squalid,” Art noted.
“Yeah, the place is practically dead,” Death giggled. “That’s what I like about it.”
“Terrific,” Charlie said. “Dragged into the middle of an asteroid field for a pun. So are we gambling then?”
“In a minute,” Death replied. “We have a much bigger problem to deal with first: your clothes.”
Buying new clothes from a department store was a pretty significant experience for Charlie. Like the rest of the Imperial Guard, Charlie was conscripted into the service at the age of twelve. Not having any immediate foreign threats or for that matter, an emperor to guard, the Imperial Guard was maintained primarily out of sheer habit. The other reason why the institution survived is because parents discovered that by sending their children off to the army, they would be able to avoid dealing with puberty and all the unpleasantness it causes.
Getting back to the point, Charlie had only ever worn Imperial Guard uniforms his whole adult life and had expected to do so for at least another year or two. Thrust with the freedom to choose his wardrobe, he found himself overwhelmed by the myriad options available to him in this small, off-brand store.
“Look, just try on these pants,” Art told Charlie impatiently, before turning to Death. “I get why he’s got to change but why do I have to bother?” He asked the cosmic entity.
“Because you’re dressed in a prison jumpsuit,” Death replied.
“It’s a rather fashionable jumpsuit,” Art protested. “And who’s paying for all this anyway?”
“Who said anything about paying?” Death asked in surprise.
Anyone who spends considerable time in department store trial rooms will inevitably discover, beyond the fact that they are probably perverts, that a certain pattern exists in how events play out in these special circumstances. Every new person who comes by hoping to try on a pair of pants will rush to the first empty cubicle before barricading themselves within. They will then proceed to try on their clothes and get out as quickly as possible. During these proceedings, if one were to hear something coming from one of the neighbouring stalls, it is considered polite not to mention it.
Not being personally acquainted with these unwritten rules of conduct, Charlie was rather perplexed when a voice called out from the stall next to him asking, “Are you gonna be gambling then?”
It is generally known that one should not respond to questions shouted out across the flimsy partition of a men’s trial room cubicle. However, as we have already stressed before, Charlie is not one of the people to whom this is known.
“Um yes,” he called back. “Yes, I think so.”
“So have you signed up for death insurance yet?” The stranger asked.
“No,” Charlie replied, becoming more and more flummoxed by the whole situation.
“Oh you’ve got to get death insurance,” the stranger exclaimed. “What if those killer robots go faulty and don’t kill you?”
“But I don’t want it to kill me,” Charlie objected.
“What do you mean you don’t want it to kill you? That’s the whole point of Death Ball,” the stranger yelled, overcome with passion.
“What’s Death Ball?”
“What’s Death Ball?” Art asked as he tried on a fedora, checking his reflection in a full-length mirror.
“It’s the only game they’ve got here,” Death explained, stopping to check the price on a one-handed battle axe. “Ooh I like this,” she said excitedly, swinging it at a rather surprised-looking mannequin.
What Death was trying to say before she got distracted was that because of another brilliantly bungled management decision, the Strip’s robot casinos do not support any of the more traditional gambler’s games like poker or blackjack. As it happens, robots are terrible at gambling and the first robot casino went bankrupt within ten minutes of opening. Since then, the management has taken the staggeringly stupid decision to replace all their standard games with Death Ball, a sport where players bet on their chances of escaping death at the hands of a killer robot who, coincidentally, happens to be holding a ball. This was such a disastrous move that the only people to set foot on the Strip for nearly three decades prior to our heroes’ arrival were insurance salesmen, the chronically suicidal, and rabid sports fans.
“Sounds like a terribly unpopular sport,” Art remarked once Death got around to explaining it all.
“On the contrary,” Death said, testing her new axe on a convenient pillar. “It’s got the highest television viewership numbers of any sport ever invented.”
“That still doesn’t explain why you think we don’t have to pay for all this,” Art said, leaping aside to avoid the crumbling debris of the pillar. “Also, what do you think you’re doing with that axe?”
“I’m accessorizing,” Death replied. “And to answer your other question, we don’t have to pay for anything. We just have to win a game of Death Ball and all our expenses will be paid for.”
“You mean, we just have to disembowel a killer robot with that axe of yours?”
“Not we, Art,” she smirked. “Me.”
By the time Charlie dashed out of the department store and onto the casino floor, Art had already found himself a rather nice cocktail and acquainted himself with it. With his new black leather jacket, tight jeans, and sunglasses (inexplicably worn indoors), Art looked rather like a movie star, or at least, like someone trying to look like one. In short, the time traveller was having quite a good time after what can only be described as a rather shaky start. He was rather surprised to find that having new clothes made him feel infinitely better about the total lack of headway he had made towards fixing his wrist-bound time machine.
This curious phenomenon has been noted in many primate species across the known universe. Among them, only the Carcanasians of Carcan-7 are particularly harmed by this because it is their custom to make new clothes out of the skins of defeated enemies. One should never ask a Carcanasian for a makeover under any circumstances. Trust me.
Charlie is not wearing the skins of his defeated enemies because a) he is not a Carcanasian and b) all the enemies he knew he had were already dead, dropped in the Sun along with the station he once called home. However, judging solely from Art’s reaction to seeing Charlie in his new clothes, one would be led to wonder if he wasn’t wearing something far more horrendous.
“What the absolute frackle are you wearing?” Art demanded, practically spitting out half his cocktail and losing his newfound Zen.
“I liked the colour,” Charlie said in defence of the emerald green trench coat that he had chosen to pair with a black t-shirt and white sweatpants that barely reached the tops of his sports shoes. The fact that he was still wearing his helmet did not help his case.
“You look like you ran into a green screen while out jogging,” Art laughed.
“It was my first time alright,” Charlie grumbled. “And anyway there’s something far more important I’ve got to tell you. I ran into this rather helpful insurance salesman while I was trying on these pants and he told me they make you fight a killer robot here.”
“Oh you’re a bit late for that now,” Art said. “Death went up against the whole bunch and killed them all.”
“You’re serious?” Charlie asked feeling quite surprised and a little left out.
“Like a cold. It was horrible. I didn’t know robots could scream like that,” Art shuddered. “Anyway, that put this place out of business and now we basically own the whole thing so why don’t you get yourself some coffee and go find a less painful choice of clothes?”
Coffee is a drink brewed from roasted seeds obtained from certain species of Coffea plants. When consumed, it works as an excellent stimulant on most carbon-based lifeforms, elevating heart rates, speeding up cognition and, in significantly large doses, causing temporary bouts of homicidal rage. What Charlie chose to order was not coffee, it was vodka, which is nothing like coffee though the risk of homicidal rage is still present.
As he sat sipping away at the glass of clear liquid, it occurred to Charlie that he was being watched. This is, of course, a perfectly natural reaction to seeing two men, one tall and one short, intently staring at you from the next table over while pretending to read a newspaper upside down, which was the case with Charlie in this instance.
The fact that the newspaper was upside down did not alarm Charlie. In fact, it was the fact that they had a newspaper at all that freaked him out. Everyone knows all the newspaper companies, along with their owners, shareholders, employees, and sources, were burnt to the ground in the year 2193 after the populace as a whole realized that the only thing worse than bad news was having it show up on your doorstep every morning.
Two ideas popped into Charlie’s trained military brain then. Either these men were time-travellers from the distant past who were fascinated with Charlie’s futuristic (to them) if somewhat dented helmet, or they were members of the Secret Service. Since the men in question were shifty, nervous, and clearly inept at surveillance, Charlie decided that the second idea was probably the right one.
“Hey Art,” Charlie whispered. “There are two Secret Service agents over there staring at us.”
“Yes, I noticed them earlier,” Art said nonchalantly. “Does that happen to you often?”
“No, not unless I’ve made a particularly ill-thought-out crank call.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, when I was about six years old, I crank-called a number asking for a Mr Hugh Dummy. Unfortunately, the number I called was the minister for agriculture and his name was...”
“Hugh Dummy?” Art asked incredulously.
“No, that would be ridiculous,” Charlie said. “His name was Björn Gunderson. But it seems he got so confused by my call, that he sent the Secret Service to spy on me, just to make sure this Hugh Dummy wasn’t a political rival.”
“Hugh Dummy,” Art laughed.
“What are we laughing about?” Death asked as she plopped herself down onto a free chair. The ballgown she had been wearing was ripped, burnt and in some places completely torn away, which was all fine by her.
“Dummies,” Art chortled.
“Secret Service,” Charlie said gravely, nodding towards where the men were sitting. “They’re over there.”
“Do you want me to kill them?” Death asked.
“No, of course not,” Charlie cried out. “Please don’t kill anybody. Let’s just go have a word with them.”
The Secret Service agents looked quite flustered when Art, Charlie, and Death walked up to their table. This had not been what they had in mind but they would just have to wing it.
“Hello, I’m Charlie,” the former guardsman said with a smile. “Who are you?”
The names of the Secret Service agents are not important. This is because, like all things associated with the Secret Service, the names of their members are a closely guarded secret, even from the members themselves.
“It’s not important,” the tall one said.
“I know it’s not important,” Charlie laughed. “That would be a ridiculous name.”
“Actually,” Art interjected. “At one point in the 31st century, humans did start naming their children after common adjectives. It was just a fad, of course, and the practice was discontinued after Prime Minister Inconvenient Career-Oriented Todd passed a law to that effect.”
“That is also not important,” Death told Art before turning to the agents and asking “Why were you staring at us?”
“We were looking for Imperial Guardsman Charlie McCormick, badge number 16830023, of Legion 90,” the short one replied.
“That’s me,” Charlie said. “Why were you looking for me?”
“Sir, you’ve got to come with us,” the tall one said. “There are some very important people who need to have a word with you.”
“Where?” Charlie asked.
“Is that important?” the short one asked, a little confused.
“Well, you see, I’ve just been told we sort of own this establishment,” Charlie explained. “And considering the sheer amount of alcohol and food they have available here, it seems rather foolish to leave and go somewhere else just for a chat.”
“That’s a very good point,” Art nodded.
“You just need to step outside, sir,” the tall one said. “If you would please just step outside for a moment, this will all be over.”
“I suppose I could use the fresh air,” Charlie shrugged. “Alright, I’ll do it. But only because you’re being so polite.”
And so he walked out of the casino, followed closely by his companions Artie Copernicus and the cosmic personification of Death, with the two Secret Service agents just a few steps behind for reasons that will be clear in just a moment.
We would like to take this moment to inform the reader that politeness has been outlawed in many of the higher dimensions of existence because it is so often used as a cover for unpleasantness. The entities who introduced this law were soon burned at the stake for being far too unpleasant themselves.
It is therefore not surprising that the Secret Service agents had something unpleasant in mind for Charlie and his friends, who upon stepping out onto the casino’s front lawn, found themselves inexplicably whisked away from the Strip and their newfound wealth by a teleport beam.
Look I know it’s not perfect (it’s a very early draft; it’s not supposed to be) but reading this again today made me realize that… I’m actually quite good at this writing thing when I’m just having fun. I needed that. Come back on Saturday for the continuation of Corpse and Robbers, which I am also having a lot of fun with.