Degistani Delinquents, Part 1 - Defrocked
18 Jul 2017Monolith Preacher
Deggie was getting restless, and he decided Black Omega's ranking structure needed something of a shuffle recently, and in this light he called everyone in to re-examine their motivations. As I walked off my ship in Tjakiri and sauntered across the dock, I couldn't help but get nostalgic. I'd forgotten the smells of this place, it had been so long since I'd walked through. The first time I came here I was nearly knocked out by the potency of spice in the air as Mara rattled through my orientation. It became something of an in-joke for a while that I could have some Onion but never a Jalfrezi. As usual, i took it to heart a bit more than I should have, but Vic and Pahn gave me a bit of a talking to about thickening my skin up to banter, and it helped me realise the psychological dangers of holding one's self aloof from one's company. Now, as I walked towards Deggie's nightclub, I couldn't help but feel that might've been the reason I was so ostracised back home in Gcirthi before I left. That wound still stung, but I had been too busy to really pay it heed.All thoughts of home were banished as I opened the door, and the abysmal four to the floor music changed within the space of eight bars as an astute DJ noticed I had entered and gracefully mixed it out to something more technical for my tastes. For all the myriad states of intoxication, the crowd didn't miss a beat in their gesticulations. That's something I loved about Deggie's, the uppers made people sharper instead of just more energetic and the downers were only given out in the designated "kampfy" rooms where luscious silk sofas and zero-g bean bags allowed people to sump whilst listening to minimal ambient interspliced with arms fire and crime reports. It gave quite an atmosphere, and had I found more time on my hands I would happily have downed a few Soma and let my mind wander. But there was work to be done, so instead I snaked my way through the ululating crowds littering the dancefloor in frenzied gaggles and throngs towards the bar.
For possibly the first time to my recollection, Deggie was not cleaning glasses. Instead, some flashy young thing was mixing cocktails in the old way, juggling bottles and using a standard decanter. I thought about asking him if he could make a Truck Stopper to test his skills, but thought it best not to see Deggie with my tattoos hanging off the side of my face when I got there. He served a few girls who asked for the usual layered sparkling drinks which often brought socialites from what would be deemed "polite society" to slum it down here for the sake of a few pictures to send back home so they could make up stories about getting into situations they would never in reality have been able to handle, safe that the reputation of the area would impress their vapid friends back home, and then he served a rather blocky fellow a more rational and carefully rationed shot of Indi Bourbon. I waited for him to finish talking to this fellow for a few minutes before losing my nerve. There was admittedly a lull in the usually steady queue of patrons to the bar, but I had been waiting for some time, and I had business to attend to.
I drew one of my knives and rapped the hilt on the table a couple of times. I knew the sound wouldn't carry, but the image was enough to send the barman cautiously scuttling in my direction. To my surprise, instead of leaning in to talk to me, the scamp merely pointed towards a holosign which read "no weapons at the bar". In response, I flung my knife and took off the first joint of his index finger. As the shock subsided after a moment and the pain started to dawn on the bartender, I hopped over and grabbed him by the wrist, turning his arm to make him pliant as I shouted in his ear.
"Don't think security so lax here as to allow unnoticed weapons in, squire. Anyone who comes armed to the bar is either one of us or is working for us!"
I took a quick sip off his finger to measure if there was any actual iron in his blood, then cauterised the wound after a fashion by dipping it into the liquid nitrogen we used to keep some of our more temperature sensitive decoctions cool.
"You might wanna be more conservative with your pours tonight, and leave the tricks to other kids. Now where's the guv'nor?"
I didn't know whether to be impressed or appalled with him when he asked who I was. One the one hand, I thought I was a distinctive enough person to warrant being mentioned to new staff. On the other, he had managed to keep his composure rather well, and certainly showed some sand to be staying on the offensive in this exchange. Maybe he was relying on the bouncers or the sniper who camped in the oversized discoball we ostensibly kept for retro chic, or maybe he actually had more stones than his waifish frame made him seem. Either way, such gall warranted a response without the extra admonishment I'd give a second rejoinder.
"I'm the Preacher, kid. I'm kind of a big deal around here."
He straightened up, but didn't seemed too impressed.
"Oh, that explains it then. The old man's out the back, relaxing his sciatica in the hot tub in all likelyhood. Now if we're done here, I've got to serve the junkie who just turned up at the bar before their withdrawal kicks in and the medics get called to stop them frothing."
I turned around and noticed a girl with jaundiced skin, one wild eye and a mouth too busy chewing the cud in its cheeks to be able to enunciate any particular order and decided it best to allow the kid to do his job. He took a moment to quick-freeze his absent fingertip and stick it in a glass before serving up a shot of 50/50 ethanol to the girl as I made my way to the back.
------------------------------
Deggie was on my case before I even opened the door to the wet room.
"You really need to stop habitually maiming the staff, Preach."
The door slid open as I approached with a trained line of thought for this conversation.
"Yeah, well you need to start training them so they can tell my face from the other tattooed junkies around here in the first place"
My insult fell on deaf ears as Deggie threw me a curve ball right in the stomach.
"You speak big for a man who just maimed a member of my immediate family before storming in here assuming the high ground in this conversation. You're here because you're under review."
I tried my best to appear unfazed, but the implication I was failing in some aspect of my work hit deep, and he knew it would. He sighed, partially from annoyance at my lack of apology and partially from his back in all likelihood.
"I've been getting a bit bored for being at the bar all the time, too much work's been happening beyond our façade for me to put the hours in. Therefore I hired one of my nephews to help out at the bar. He's been here about a week, and I've been testing how well he does by not letting him know what you guys do. Instead I've let him know your temperaments and see if he can figure out what's going on here for himself. From the looks of that exchange, he's been doing quite a good job so far."
In light of this revelation, I could not help but make a backhanded compliment.
"He's got savvy with people, and his sense of duty extends through pain, but he didn't know my knife was weighted, so I'd give him a 6.5 out of 8"
For the first time since I'd met him, Deggie lost his temper.
"Listen you lanky jacked-up demagogue, you might think you can straightface your way out of maiming a twelve year old, but you've been slipping recently and I've been noticing it. Now you're about to say you've been keeping your systems going and you've been helping with the new ranking system we've got going in and expect me to give you a pat on the back, but your arrogance is showing. Remember when Ouberos borrowed your precious Beluga a few months ago? Well for all the high-tech bullshit your friend Sheng did to the doorways, he obviously doesn't know anything about software, 'cause we installed a backdoor in your comms and have been monitoring you for a while now."
Such a lack of trust after everything I'd gone through with the wing made me blanch with anger, and I drew a deep breath to my stomach to bellow my protest, before his next tirade made me swallow the breath quite awkwardly.
"The worst thing about all this isn't that you've been acting like you're hot shit wherever you go because of your nigh-on redundant Kingship which, you'll recall, we helped you hold on to before you let it slip from your own grasp when we had our own business to attend to. Neither is it your insistence that every member of our staff should treat you like some kind of fucking messiah because of your position within your little Chornobyl cult. Heck, I could even take your hypocritical lampooning of drug users considering how you still take things "for the right reasons" on enough occasions that some people still question whether you're addicted to Thargoid slime mixed with Mulachi Giant Fungus if it wasn't for one thing.
I stared at him expectantly and unimpressed during the moment he gave me to ask what it was or start pulling ideas out of my scrotum concerning my plausible failings.
"Your stupid little space cult isn't exactly that important to you anymore, and that is unforgivable."
The last thing I expected when I walked through the door was to have Deggie lecture me on the finer points of religious belief, but his knowledge of my habits certainly meant that he had been earwigging on my comms and noted my lack of fervour towards my flock of late.
"You know why we hired you, Jaquel? It wasn't because we gave a shit about your ragtag group of pirates in some arse-end Archonian system so backwater that they let Grom take it over without a peep. And it wasn't because of your ability as a smuggler, either. Sure, you may be one of the best smugglers out there, but smugglers are a dime a dozen and the security isn't half as tight as it was when our forefathers were threading needles planetside to make deliveries. And don't get me started on your fleet of FdLs you're barely able to kill a Corvette with half the time, we had better combat pilots before you and we've hired better since you joined. No, the reason we let you join is your cult gave us a way to ensure a tighter grip on our systems when we took them. You might've thought you were laying down your rules when you first came into our fold, but we knew you'd want from us what we wanted from you. Marra scouted you out, kid, and she does her research well."
I was mortified by what I was hearing, and for the sake of keeping some measure of footing I felt a need to at least state my case before he threw me out entirely. Taking my opportunity as he stopped momentarily to belabour a twinge in his back, I sped through my reasoning. All pretence of eloquence had gone by this point, so I reverted to plain speech.
"You wanna blame me for system slippage? Maybe you shouldn't have chosen to re-structure our ranks when we had a mass of expansions going though, and maybe you should've looked at how many people we've actually got compared to our systems. Maybe then you'd have seen we might need to do some more recruiting so we can hire more faceless goons for your preteen workers to mistake on the way through the door to see you. If you wanted to know what I was up to in my spare time you could've asked me instead of getting Oub to hack my systems when he stole my craft, another slight I doubt you cared to address. And if you're questioning my faith, maybe I made the wrong decision to attend to my wing instead of my flock for a couple of months. And maybe I really am a Preacher more so than the lapdog you want me to be, but don't deign me with some bullshit about how we're all family here and I'm overreacting as is my wont. You've taken the gloves off here, and we both know you don't have enough Capos to lose me. How about you cut straight to the point? I've got systems to maintain this cycle and an Archon who seems to care more than you about my input right now."
My mention of the Archon made him ponder for a moment, and he opened a pack of stogies. He lit one up and swirled the smoke into circles as he ruminated. I grabbed one to calm my nerves, and whilst he hadn't offered he seemed uncaring that I neglected to care for his leave to do so. For a few minutes, we both sat there smoking cigars in a sauna room, he covered in sweat and myself starting to feel rather uncomfortable as my spacesuit slowly started to resemble a wetsuit. More of his points had hit the mark than I cared to admit, but I had given him some food for thought as well. He dismissed a few calls from suppliers as we both sat there pondering, and for a few minutes I even allowed myself to release some tension in my muscles by letting the nanomachines in the steam do their work. After what seemed like a few moments and a few hours, he took a measured breath and spake with the ease of an old friend despite the fact I'd met him only a handful of times over the past year since i had joined.
"It seems we've both got a lot going on right now. Maybe the pressure of all this is getting to us. I remember when I was that same calm and collected barman who could make any cocktail a trumped up punter could fathom to ask for. Nowadays I'm so enmeshed in spreadsheets and keeping the spice flowing I could barely remember half the drinks on our menu this week. I suppose it can be hard to keep sights on what matters when there's so much happening. Maybe I need to spend more time with my nephew, and maybe you need to spend more time getting back to basics as well."
Another lull followed as we smoked and pondered. He was right, of course. Deggie had this annoying habit of being right. Must've been how he managed to make all this with only himself and three CMDRs before I came along. That being said, I think most of us were realising just how large this beast had gotten, and the strain on him must've been twice as hard in this regard as anything the rest of us were going through. Just as my space suit reached maximum capacity and the sweat started flowing out of my collar onto the floor, he came to a decision.
"I don't usually take an hour off work nowadays, but I had to be sure I was making the right decision here. You know how we recently expanded into Degastani?"
I nodded slowly, my eyes narrowing as I tried to surmise where he was going with this sudden shift in subject.
"Well, it seems that our usual bully boy tactics haven't been working due to some local insurgents. We don't know much about them beyond the fact they are fanatically loyal to their leader, having a weird kind of faith in him to rejuvenate the metallic world The Pilot's Federation is currently terraforming. Why they won't let industry do it and instead are putting their faith into this berk's divine intervention is beyond me, but I suppose that's the nature of belief." He looked at his stogie, realised how damp it was, and decided to stub it out on the marble floor. "So I'm thinking you go down there and supplant their cult with your own to save us a protracted war against these local metalheads. Might give you a reason to get your head back into your own beliefs, and might give me a reason to get rid of that spyware when you're done."
I didn't like ambiguity at the best of times, but I surmised his intention to be honest, at least for the moment.
"I assume I'll still have to keep an eye on my systems whilst all this is going on?" It was a long shot, but a bit of delegation would help ease the pressure.
"Of course, you're still a Capo, and you've gotta lead by example."
No such luck.
"OK, fine, but I expect all this to be kept between the two of us."
Deggie pondered this for a moment, then nodded. Without wasting time on pleasantries, I turned and walked out the door, feeling suddenly cold as the sweat in my suit juddered the sudden change in temperature through my body.
"One more thing, Preach."
I steadied myself to prevent further shivering as I listened.
"They've got an odd saying they use which you might make more sense of than the rest of us, considering your predilections."
I tilted my head to the side to indicate my piqued interest.
"May your knife chip and shatter"
