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Copyright © 1998 Sarah Ellender.
All rights reserved and reproduction without written permission expressly prohibited.
Killing Time
Hi, remember me? The name's Monday Morning. Yes, it is a strange name for an
Earthan lass. Don't bother, I've heard all the jokes you can make about it;
nobody's as original as they think. I'm sure I've met you before, maybe it
was in a previous life. I have trouble trying to keep them all straight
sometimes. A drink? That's very kind of you, mine's a bourbon. With bourbon.
No ice. What have I been up to? Well, let me tell you.
So, anyway, I'm
sitting in Beantown spaceport, waiting for a connecting shuttle on my latest
courier run. It's pretty much like any other shuttlestation; lots of echoing
fake white marble, glaring lights that make you wish for sunglasses and a
brolly, shops with bright holos that sell very thick books about people having
sex with other people's spouses, the usual thing. It's populated with harassed
parents herding bratty screaming kids with sticky fingers, business people
with the old executive waistline (or whatever, depending on their species) and
people like me just passing through.
Have you ever been to Beantown? It's
the worst type of place; nothing to recommend it and nothing interesting to
condemn it either. It is a perfect example of blandness, like a talk-show
host's smile.
There I am, sitting in one of their uncomfortable Formachairs
(guaranteed to form to any body shape but your own) thinking all the stuff
that people usually think. You know. Not How can I benefit my fellow beings?
but What would happen it I just blew it all out of the airlock and started that
Regada tree farm I'd always wanted? and I'd really like a brie and grape
sandwich and Does that man really think black socks look good with brown
sandals? I'm thinking these things and scanning the area. A few ghosts, but
that's to be expected in a spaceport - the occasional crash happens. They
drift by and through the normals, unnoticed. A male Erria vampire looking
pale and moody and sucking on a carton of synthesised O-type, a whole group of
spotty teenagers wearing black T-shirts with the word BOOM written on them in orange.
Who or what is Boom? Maybe some new designer I haven't heard of. It's hard to
keep up with the trends when you're always on the move. The Boom
teenagers talk together for a bit and then look over at me and snigger; I give them a blank look and try not
to let my paranoia loose.
[End of this extract. The full story was published in Gravity's Angels]
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