Cardinal Crimson Read online

  The Sump Hole was the Underhive’s premier bar, which was to say it was a rat-infested refuse dump that served what tasted like watered-down lighter fluid in bottles that were only clean by the virtue of holding something so toxic that nothing could live inside. The barmaids were slightly cleaner than the bottles and slightly better looking than the rats, but made up for any shortcomings with short skirts and shorter blouses.

  Kal’s home away from home was constantly filled past capacity with gangers and bounty hunters, and the next brawl was always just an insult or accidental bump away. There’d been so many knock-down, drag-out fights in the Sump Hole over the years that the tables and chairs were now bolted to the floor, which made it somewhat harder to hit someone over the head with one, but a lot more deadly when you did.

  ‘I love it when a plan comes together,’ he said, stroking the bare shoulders of the redhead on his lap.

  A voice stung him from across the room. ‘A Kal Jerico plan doesn’t so much come together as fall into place – from a great height with a loud splat.’

  Kal smiled. As long as the redhead stayed right where she was nothing could ruin his mood, not even Yolanda’s strained wit. ‘Hello, partner,’ he said. ‘I didn’t see you come in.’ Wotan’s head lifted under the table at Kal’s voice, but then dropped back down with a clank when it became obvious his master was talking to someone else.

  Yolanda pushed her way through the crowd with ease. Even with dreadlocked hair framing a face dominated by an intricate Escher clan tattoo that ran across her forehead, Yolanda was still far more attractive than any of the barmaids, especially with her tight-fitting vest and tantalising leather loincloth. But the combination of her incredible height, well-toned muscles and array of holstered weapons made even the uninitiated patron wary as she crossed the room.

  After staring down one juve who got a little too close or smiled just a little too broadly as she strode across the room, Yolanda kicked one long leg over the back of the empty chair opposite Kal and slid down. This was Kal’s table, and no matter how crowded the Sump Hole got, there were always at least three chairs open. Kal’s was the one with it’s back up against the wall of the bar.

  ‘Where’s my cut, Jerico?’ she asked.

  Kal toyed with the idea of telling her that only those partners who stood by him in his hour of need would get a cut, but the narrowness of her eyes and the creases running through her tattoo told him she wasn’t in a joking mood.

  ‘I’ve got it in my pocket,’ said Kal. ‘Roberta here is guarding it for me, aren’t you darling?’ The redhead purred into Kal’s ear and shifted quite comfortably on his lap. ‘As soon as Scabbs shows up, we’ll get down to business. For now, get a drink and enjoy life a little. It doesn’t always have to be about business.’

  ‘With you, Jerico, it’s never business,’ said Yolanda. ‘Everything is a big game to you.’

  ‘And what’s wrong with that?’ asked Kal, refusing to let her bring him down. ‘Life is a game, and the one who has the most fun wins.’

  ‘And you’re bound and determined to win at any cost, aren’t you?’ she asked, but a slight curling of Yolanda’s lips indicated she was enjoying the banter. It was the closest Kal had seen her come to smiling in a long time.

  But Yolanda’s proto-smile disappeared completely when the juve sat in the last open chair. He didn’t look at Yolanda, though. In fact, it seemed to Kal that the young ganger was deliberately avoiding eye contact with her. The kid’s blue cloak and too-shiny, orange body armour should have rung warning bells in Kal’s head, but he’d been distracted by Roberta’s tongue in his ear. He didn’t realise the danger until the juve started speaking.

  ‘Hi, my name is Georig,’ he said in a rush, continuing without even taking a breath. ‘I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation. Did you ever think that you might be on the wrong path? Have you ever considered basking in the glory of the Undying Emperor instead of living a life of drunken debauchery? As the teachings of our spiritual leader, the holy Cardinal Crimson, state…’

  The room went suddenly quiet as both Kal and Yolanda drew their weapons in a rush at the mention of the Cardinal’s name. Roberta slid to the floor with a thud as Kal stood and glared at the young Cawdor. From beneath the table, Wotan growled between the juve’s legs, which sounded like a chainblade screaming to life.

  ‘Because you’re so young and so obviously stupid,’ started Kal, ‘I’m going to give you to the count of three to get out of this bar before I fire. Of course after one, Wotan will make sure you can never debauch again. Ready?’

  As Kal breathed in to begin the count, Georig fell off his chair and began scrambling across the floor on all fours, proving he wasn’t as dumb as he had first appeared. The crowd kindly stepped aside, probably more to get out of Kal’s line of fire than to help the kid escape. Kal holstered his laspistols and sat down with a resigned thump.

  ‘I hate Cawdor,’ he said, waving off Roberta as she tried to sit back down on his lap. He was no longer in the mood. ‘Useless bunch, the lot of them. Undying Emperor, hah! What a bunch of hokum. And Crimson? Holy? Scabbs is more spiritual than that two-bit hack.’

  An odd odour wafted across the bar, one that Kal instantly recognised. ‘Although his purity is definitely up for debate,’ he added as Scabbs took his seat. ‘Helmawr’s rump, man. Five hours of bathing and you still reek. Did they find another layer of stench under the first ten?’

  Scabbs slid into the chair that Georig has just vacated. Jerico didn’t know how he did it, but even with a bath and clean clothes, Scabbs still looked like he had slept in trash for a week. There were obviously some stains in his dingy, grey shirt and trousers that would just never come out. If Kal cared more, he’d buy the little rodent some new clothes out of his share, but that money was earmarked for drunken debauchery.

  ‘Nice to see you, too, Kal,’ said Scabbs. He pointed behind him. ‘That your handiwork I saw running out the front like a scared scavvy?’

  ‘Damn Cawdor!’ spat Kal again. He was about to go into another tirade about their holier-than-thou attitude, but Scabbs cut him off.

  ‘So, where’s my cut?’ he asked, holding his hand out over the table. A few flakes of skin fell from his arm onto the booze-soaked table and floated there like little boats.

  ‘Right down to business with both of you,’ said Kal, shaking his head. ‘What? Don’t you trust me?’

  Two heads began shaking across from him. ‘You spent our shares of the last big score before we even saw it,’ said Yolanda.

  ‘Those were business expenses,’ protested Kal. ‘I lost my pistols and had to buy new ones.’

  ‘Pearl handled?’ asked Scabbs. His hand was still hovering over the table, releasing more boats into the Wild Snake sea below.

  Kal looked back and forth at his two partners and saw that he was not going to get any compassion from either of them. But, as he dug into his pocket to pull out the bounty money, he thought he heard his name from over by the bar. He looked up and saw another new face.

  This person definitely had no place in an Underhive bar. For starters, his clothes were clean. And not clean like Kal’s scuffed leather coat was clean. Clean, like new. And these clothes were expensive. They looked like cotton or silk instead of denim and leather.

  ‘Oh scav!’ mumbled Kal, and then quietly slipped under the table. The only people who could afford clothes like that lived in the Spire or acted as agents for one of the Hive City Houses. Both spelled trouble.

  ‘What in the unholy Spire are you doing down there, Jerico?’ cried Yolanda.

  ‘Shhhh!’ hissed Kal. ‘That guy at the bar is looking for me.’

  There was a pause before Scabbs answered. ‘So?’ he said. ‘He’s almost as small as me. You can take him.’

  ‘You don’t understand,’ said Kal. ‘I owe money… a lot of money… for my new laspistols. That’s got to be the debt collector from the Re-Engineers, the Van Saar gang that sold them to me.’

  �
�You’re in debt to a Van Saar gang?’ asked Yolanda, her incredulous voice still too loud. ‘Are you insane? You’re lucky to still have all your limbs.’

  But Kal didn’t answer. He was too busy crawling to the next table. As the debt collector came over toward his usual table, Kal skirted around toward the bar. As soon as there were enough people between him and the silk-suited businessman, Kal stood and slipped out of the Sump Hole.

  Scabbs tried to act nonchalant as the silk-suited man arrived, which meant he spent a lot of effort picking at some loose skin on his elbow and then cleaning his fingernails with his teeth. His only mistake was spitting the wad of crust and dead skin he’d mined from under his fingernails onto the striped, grey trousers of the debt collector, who was by now standing right next to him.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said, looking up into the face of the stranger. The man stood probably two heads less than two metres, which put him about a head up on Scabbs. But his features made him look much smaller. Wire-rimmed glasses perched on a narrow slip of a nose, outlining beady eyes that were so small and dark they wouldn’t have looked out of place on the head of a rodent. His thin, dark hair looked like it had been greased to his head and his face showed not even a hint of stubble.

  He held a small, black satchel and, after wiping the spittle from his trousers with a white handkerchief, he laid the satchel on the table, placing both hands on it as if that would be enough to keep it safe, if Scabbs or Yolanda should want to take it.

  ‘I am looking for a Kal Jerico,’ said the stranger. ‘I assume you are not he.’

  Scabbs and Yolanda looked at each other, quizzically. Scabbs decided the man must be talking to him. ‘That’s right, I’m not Kal, and neither is she,’ he added, pointing at Yolanda.

  ‘A ha ha,’ said the stranger, which seemed to shake his entire skinny body. ‘A good joke, Mr Scabbs. Do you know where I can find Mr Jerico?’

  Being called by name flustered Scabbs. Was he getting famous, finally? ‘You just missed him…’ he started before a quick kick to the shin from Yolanda brought him to his senses. ‘I… uh… I think he went to the little bounty hunter’s room,’ he said, pointing at the back of the Sump Hole.

  The stranger looked back where Scabbs pointed, which when Scabbs looked, he realised, was just a blank wall. Did the Sump Hole even have a bathroom? Scabbs had always done his business in the alley outside. The stranger drummed his fingers on the satchel.

  ‘What do you want with Jerico?’ asked Yolanda.

  The stranger’s eyes scanned the lanky bounty hunter from top to bottom, stopping a couple of times for a longer look along the way. ‘We have business that must be attended to in person,’ he finally answered.

  ‘Well when you find that son of a scavvy,’ continued Yolanda, ‘let us know. We’ve been looking for him all day. We have some unfinished business to attend to as well.’

  Scabbs had to admit that Yolanda was a much better liar than he, and the stranger might have just bought it, except at that moment, a whistle echoed through the Sump Hole, and Wotan jumped to his feet beneath the table, nearly knocking the man’s satchel to the floor. As the stranger grabbed for the handle, Wotan bolted for the door, knocking gangers and waitresses to the floor in a loud racket as he left.

  ‘That, I believe was Mr Jerico’s cyber-mastiff, Wotan, if I am not mistaken,’ said the stranger, repositioning his glasses on his sharp nose.

  ‘What’s a cyber-mastiff?’ said Scabbs, which brought another kick to the shin. He should really just let Yolanda do the talking, he thought. But it was too late. The stranger had left the Sump Hole, following Wotan into the Underhive night.

  Jobe Francks felt more human than he had in a long while. Of course, for him, a long while was counted in years instead of months or weeks. The Soul Savers had fed him and clothed him, and even given him new boots to wear. It felt odd walking through the world without feeling every stone and sharp piece of glass underfoot. Francks wasn’t sure he liked it. It felt a little too detached from the wonder of the Undying Emperor’s creation. But he felt like he could get used to it.

  He’d refused the body armour, but enjoyed the feel of the new, blue cloak against his neck, which offered a constant reminder of his years of suffering as it rustled against his blistered skin. After supper, Randal, the leader of the Soul Savers, came up to Francks with a proposition. He was a tall, gangly man with wavy, blond hair that grew down to his shoulders instead of being worn short in the normal bowl cut of his men.

  ‘How would you like to preach the return of the body to a large crowd of unbelievers?’ Randall had asked. There was a smile on his almost boyish face, but Francks had noticed the slight twitch in the curl of his lips that suggested deceit mixed in with the request. ‘The square outside the Fresh Air saloon is the perfect spot to begin spreading the word.’

  Francks had let his eyes cloud over slightly as Randal spoke, and peered into the black centre of Randal’s eyes. Yes, there was deceit hidden beneath his jovial exterior. Deceit mixed with greed, and just a touch of fear. Randal probably didn’t know what to do with him, so was sending him into another gang’s territory. It was a brilliant move. Randal had complete deniability if Francks got into trouble, and had much to gain if ‘the old man’ actually made any inroads into the other gang’s home. It was how the game was played. Francks remembered those days well, even through the fog of time.

  And so Francks had gone to the square and preached, alone of course. Randal couldn’t afford to send any of his men, who would be recognised by members of the rival gang. He’d drawn a small crowd, mostly drunk factory workers who’d stumbled out of the saloon to get a breath of fresh air from the huge fan hanging over the square that pumped recycled air into the area and gave the bar its name.

  Francks told of the grand plan of the Universe to save them all and bring them into the glory of the Undying Emperor. He regaled them with tales of the crusades fought through the centuries in His name. He spoke of the messenger – the Bowdie – who would return to reveal the intricacies of the universal plan and light the way home into the bosom of the Undying Emperor.

  By the end of the evening, Francks’s voice was little more than a whisper and his throat was raw. After two decades of speaking to no one but himself, his vocal cords were too easily strained. He would have to pace himself for a while. Stains dotted his new blue cloak from fruit and vegetables thrown by some of the more passionate members of the crowd. He carried several of the firmer pieces of produce in his cloak to give to the Soul Savers.

  As he walked through the dark streets, Francks picked at a line of caked blood on his cheek, remnant of a piece of cobblestone thrown shortly after the produce failed to end his sermon. He had felt the surge of blood, a relic of his youth, course through his veins as the pain from that rock radiated through his face.

  He had felt the anger of his old life strain against the self-imposed chains that kept him in check. How easy it would have been to jump into the middle of the crowd and snap the neck of the instigator. But he was here to prepare the world for the return of Bowdie, not to begin a holy war. That was his role in the Universal Plan – at least for now.

  Lost in his reverie, Francks didn’t notice the dark form detach itself from a shadowy alley and slip in behind him; at least not consciously. But somewhere near the base of his skull, Jobe Francks felt the man’s black aura. His mind’s eye, which saw more of the world than any sane man should feasibly be able to handle, noticed the intrusion and primed Francks’s muscles for action a moment before the assassin’s arm shot around his neck.

  The stranger in the silk suit, a man by the name of Sorrento, came rushing out of the Sump Hole just in time to see Wotan lope down the street and turn a corner. Unfortunately for Sorrento, in his headlong rush out of the bar, he failed to notice a large bounty hunter heading into the bar.

  ‘Ooomph,’ said Sorrento as his nose and glasses slammed into the bounty hunter’s barrel-sized chest. He stepped back and tried to re-seat his g
lasses around his ears, but the wire frames had twisted in the impact.

  As he worked on the bent frame, two immense hands dropped onto his shoulders like the gods descending.

  ‘You smudged my armour,’ said a booming voice from above.

  Sorrento finally got his glasses back on and looked up at a wide, scraggly-haired face. A scar running from the edge of the man’s lip down to the centre of his chin marred the perfect two-day growth of beard. One long eyebrow slanted across his forehead and the tangle of black hair covering his head looked thick enough to stop bullets.

  ‘Um, sorry?’ asked Sorrento. The grip on his shoulders tightened, making him cry out in pain. It felt like the fingers had penetrated his skin and were now crushing bone. The street began to spin, or was that his head? It was difficult to tell. He needed to appease this hulking brute before he passed out and ended up dead in a gutter. ‘I’m… unngh… terribly sorry, sir,’ he tried again. ‘Let me… um… buy you a drink to make up for it?’

  The pressure eased, but was quickly followed by a new pain as the bounty hunter slapped Sorrento on the back and pulled him into a ‘friendly’ hug that made him gasp as his chest compressed. They walked back into the bar, where Sorrento proceeded to buy his life back with several rounds of Wild Snake.

  Kal’s luck had definitely changed in the last few hours. After giving the debt collector the slip, he’d wandered the darkened streets looking for a dive where he could drink in peace. By chance, he’d stumbled upon the Lucky Strike Hole. From the front, you wouldn’t even know it was there. It was dark, drab and falling apart, making it look like every other semi-inhabited building in the Underhive.

  The windows and obligatory blast holes were covered by burlap and tape, which by itself had drawn Kal’s attention. Why bother if it was just a flop spot? And a gang would have reinforced those potential incursion points with something more durable than cloth. Intrigued, Kal had gone to the door and knocked. He wasn’t too surprised when a small hatch slid open at eye height.