#006 - "Excess"
Chapter 1: Trial by Fire
Anna bends down, screwing the metal plate back into the wall with her nails.
“He manages to get back half of the mercenary's payroll from the Fortune District? How does he manage that?”
“Well not exactly half, but close to it. He does so through gambling and debt. While none of these mercs will ever admit it, and some probably don’t even realize it, but they’re just as much slaves as we are. A space station in the middle of nowhere is a boring, lonely place with not a lot of things to do. By creating the Fortune District, and making therian escorts a tiered monthly subscription, Hellman more or less holds a monopoly on where and what the mercenaries can spend their money on. Certain tiers of therian services will allow you to have the “date package”, where they accompany you along to the Fortune District. They might then ‘encourage’ you to gamble higher and higher amounts, or go shopping at overpriced stores and boutiques owned by Hellman. Forcing you to eventually take out a line of credit to impress your girlfriend for the evening. If you can’t pay it back, it will be deducted from your payroll. They present the amount deducted from your payroll as just a small percentage rate. But nobody takes a look at the compounding APR.”
The house always wins.
This Hellman guy is absolutely ruthless. The Colonel is exploiting human psychology, starting a vicious cycle of forcing isolated people to either accept the loneliness of space, or be pushed into debt. I bet he starts their pay out great, expecting full well that eventually, the vast majority of them will be up to their ass in debt. Which means the overhead of paying their salary is only around half as much. Not to mention once they’re in debt, they’ll keep having to work to pay it off, in a place designed to send them further and further into debt. Especially since I’m guessing the only ships off this rock are HMC owned, which means you can’t exactly quit and leave whenever you want. I bet the scheduled trips home are far, far apart. It’s basically free labor without the title of “slave.”
“By the way, why did those three girls go this way anyway? If they’re just running an errand for Berrick, they shouldn’t have had any need to sneak their way out.”
“Who knows, it could be any number of reasons. This secret passageway, along with several others, are used by at least a few therians basically everyday. Every situation is different.”
“Are all of them built through the asteroid?”
“Yes. A close friend of mine came up with the idea. She found out that our CS doesn’t consider the asteroid itself as Hellman’s property, which allowed us to dig through and modify the structure of the rock. Had they been buildings or structures, we wouldn’t have been able to modify them in any way, as that would have been considered destroying our owner’s property. Removing that metal plate is about as much as we can do. These tunnels took countless therians years to build, sneaking the rock out was a massive combined effort. So as a vulnerable community, we fiercely guard the secret together.”
“Wow, sounds like your friend is a hero! Her idea has probably saved hundreds of therians from untold abuses and traumas.”
Anna looks distantly at the tunnel, now covered by the metal plate. A proud, gentle smile forms across her face.
“Yeah, she’s probably saved hundreds of lives with her tunnel system.”
Saved lives? While I figured they were probably not treated that great, I didn’t realize their regular treatment could be so… Severe.
I considered that “retirement” potentially meant being put down like Old Yeller; in fact that was my initial reaction. But the more I thought about it, the less it made sense from a basic financial perspective. They have an area called the “Export Box” for a reason, and that’s apparently for storing live merchandise before sending them out to be sold. So intentionally euthanizing usuable, pre-trained second-hand slaves they could potentially make money off of makes no sense. Even if the money they'd make were just a small amount, they could still always just keep them in the Export Box until they happen to be heading out to a location where they could dump them off in bulk. So “incidents” where therians end up dead because of a customer’s barbaric treatment might be pretty common. Actually, given that all these men are disgruntled, up to their asses in debt, and have little or nothing left to lose - I’d actually venture to guess that’s probable.
In their eyes, all they’d be doing is adding to their already seemingly bottomless pit of debt. They probably also blame the therians for their debt, not Hellman. While therians take the brunt of their anger, the Colonel gets to line his pockets with gold. It’s like the old adage says: “Shit rolls downhill.”
It's like the child who gets beat up at school. Who then, frustrated by their own helplessness, goes home and kicks the dog.
It’s a childish, destructive mentality that speaks volumes about their own self-awareness. This is why so many people in the service industry suffer so much abuse at the hands of self-entitled customers. It makes me furious.
Anna was truly risking everything when she took me through that tunnel disguised as a mercenary. This tunnel is the therian’s lifeline. Just having one of these tunnels discovered could put the entire therianthrope community in jeopardy. Unless Anna has a deeply trusted, almost saint-like level of respect among the other therians, if they found out she showed this tunnel to a mercenary - Her reputation among them would be completely and utterly destroyed.
“Okay Master, I’m going to go to the end of the alley and check if the coast is clear of any people. If it is, I’ll give you a thumbs up. If it isn’t, I’ll hold out two fingers, and then take a lap around the block. Keep an eye on my right hand.”
“Got it, I’ll watch from the window”
Anna opens the door, and walks to the end of the alley, nonchalantly looking around. She casually sits down on the edge of the brick flower box in the middle of the adjacent alley, her cat ears twitching and changing direction ever so slightly. I see her hand form a thumbs-up, and I exit the house, closing the door behind me.
As soon as I get close, Anna hops up and swoops to my side, snuggly hugging onto my left arm.
“Looks like I’ll be your date tonight Mister Tony! Hee-hee-hee!!”
Anna gives me bright grin, she’s definitely having fun with this.
But she called me Tony, so she’s probably telling me there might be people in possible earshot. So I should play the part.
“Ah, you must be Anna. A buddy said you’re one of the best, so show me a good time – Yeah?”
“Of course! But… P-please be gentle, okay?”
Anna says, her big amber eyes looking up at me, ears curling, while holding her index finger to her pursed lips.
Too cute. This is weaponized cuteness.
Perhaps sensing my feelings, she gives me a warm sunny smile, a small cute laugh, and starts dragging me along on our “date.”
The first thing I notice about this place is how bright it is. Not just this street, which looks like a clean, trendy downtown area which is oddly vacant of people - But the roof.
Like the Therianthrope District, the Fortune District is also surrounded faux cliff walls carved from the asteroid itself, and has a panoramic view of a fake night sky. But unlike the last area which was purely the night sky, this glass dome has what looks like wide rings built into it, separating the image of the sky. Sort of like a ripple pattern if you throw a stone in water. Each of these rings are entirely covered in a digital display exactly like the ones we saw at the entrance tunnel of the Therianthrope District, but on a whole other scale. All of rings are playing synchronized animations of multicolored geometric shapes dancing across the sky. Pink, orange, yellow, white, blue, green, you name it – All form together to perform a non-stop lightshow in the sky above.
This place is the embodiment of Vegas.
Neo-Vegas.
At the center of the roof’s dome, there is an inverted dome display of swirling and glittering lights. Logos of certain brands rotate around it, changing in and out. I have no idea what any of these brands are, but I can tell they’re ads or sponsors of some kind.
At the edge of the sky dome there is the largest ring, which seems to be playing sports and showing scoreboards. I can see a blue and red robot boxing it out, some kind of badlands style death race using jury-rigged rusted out cars covered in spikes, competitive red kangaroo hunting using aircraft and some sort of sci-fi minigun, and golf for some reason.
“I feel so bad for the people of Australis. They keep hunting them, but the Roos still outnumber the colonists 10,000 to 1.” Anna says with a sympathetic note.
Okay – I have SO many questions.
The reverberations from the music gradually get louder and louder until eventually we hit the end of the street, and are now standing in front of a long train platform. There are two parallel tracks running side by side, a stone tunnel at each end carved out of the asteroid, and a bridge made of glass passing overhead. There is currently a black bullet train with glowing purple stipes stationed at adjacent terminal, with a large number of people boarding and departing. Most are therians and mercenaries, but I also see some people in mechanic jumpsuits, and doctor’s uniforms. Makes sense this base would have more than just these mercenary jackasses to make it run.
I finally get a good view of the district – Or small city I should say. Skyscrapers of various exotic designs dot the cityscape skyline. The whole place is lit up with every color of the rainbow in a jubilant phantasmagoria. This place is absolutely designed to drain every cent from you. Or dracan in this case. Do dracan have cents?
“Do you see that tall, light peach colored building right there? That’s the Cerro Gordo. That’s where I live.” Anna says, pointing towards a very distinct building.
Her “house” is the widest building in the entire city, and one of the taller ones. I have to admit, as an admirer of artistic architecture, her home is absolutely gorgeous. As expected of Hans Hellman. But unlike all the other buildings, which are lit up with what feels like 47 different colors at once - Her building has simple spotlights to illuminate it. It doesn’t need flashy lights to assert dominance.
Cerro Gordo’s architectural styling and design vividly reminds me of the Plaza de España in Spain, but much larger. It’s color is a difficult one to describe. It’s an intricately designed building made up primarily of light peach hued bricks with a hint of orange to them, with brown orange trim. It’s built in a crescent moon shape, and is comprised of several ingressing stories of promenades, which are partially enclosed by a repeating series of stone pillars and arches. At the top, are three major spires, along with a multitude of smaller ones. Two of the larger ones lay at either side, and the largest placed in the center. The spires are a brown orange with a series of opaque matching windows, and a tremendous amount of what looks to be gold damascene. I cannot imagine how long it took someone to inlay all that into the building, or how much it must have cost. But the results are simply incredible – Everything works. Nowhere does it feel like it’s too much or gaudy. I hate how much part of me respects Hellman simply for his appreciation of art.
While the other buildings all follow their own cultural theme, in my opinion, Cerro Gordo wins first prize in spades.
“Shall we go?” Asks Anna
“Yeah, let’s.”
I escort Anna up the stairs, across the bridge, and into the Fortune District. The outskirts of the city feels like a tiny desert, with palm trees, small patches of grass, and catci scattered about. It would be a nightmare watering all these, they must have some sort of inground sprinkler system. But how do they get sunlight? Even if they can change the sky to daytime, this sky isn’t real. They must add something to the water. I sniff the sleeve I dipped in the watering can, and used to wipe Anna’s neck off. I do smell a slight ozone smell. It’s not exactly the same as ozone, I’m detecting a hint of what also smells like black licorice. Whatever it is, it must be what they add to make up for the lack of sunlight.
As we enter, I find that the district is packed with people – Way, way more than I expected. The district has no cars, but I do see people getting picked up and dropped off in unmanned flying taxis. Despite the fact there are no ground vehicles that I can see, the district does indeed have roads and sidewalks – Both of which are being used by pedestrians. The sidewalk and road are constructed of those digital displays like on the roof. Color changing lasers on a black space-like background streak down the sidewalk towards the center of the strip, as if leading us there. While the road itself is slowly transitioning through hazy colors, making it look like foggy water. Anytime somebody takes a step, it leaves a wake, as though they’re really walking on water.
The entrance of the city is mostly smaller businesses all run by therians, which are just as colorful as the main strip. Food stalls, restaurants, smoke shops, bars, pretty much everything an entertainment district needs. I guess like a normal city, this city has been designed to transition like a real one: From the country, to the suburbs, to the inner city.
There are tons of therian and mercenary “couples”, some are even traveling with a gaggle of women. There are also groups of just mercenaries, a ton of whom seem completely plastered, and are stumbling back and forth down the street.
Oh that guy just threw up in that fountain.
Immediately after doing that, five blue humanoid robots with sharp, swooping angles to their design, appear seemingly out of nowhere. The robots run up to the man, push a black baton up to his neck, and without a sound, the man goes down like a sack of bricks. A robot catches him mid-fall, throws him over its shoulder, and leaves while some therians begin cleaning out the mess.
“While public intoxication is allowed, public vomiting is not tolerated. He will spend the next week in the drunk tank. Maybe longer if this is not his first time.”
“Understandable on a space station. Especially since there are so many people in such a small area; it’s a biohazard.”
Says the guy who threw up all over the wall and floor of a storage room a few hours ago, and left it there.
“I know you said that everybody got called back to base, but still, this is an insane amount of people.”
“We’re effectively an unofficial branch of the DRAC military. All of these men have been fighting a proxy war for the DRAC government in Libertalia space for months now.”
“What’s Libertalia?” I whisper
She gestures me to lean down closer, and whispers into my ear.
“According to the DRAC government, it’s a small self-proclaimed government founded by pirates, terrorists, and people branded criminals by the DRAC government. Not a lot of information is available on it except state-censored propaganda. But I have overheard some rumors lately from various mercs that a lot of people have been defecting to Libertalia recently. Those are all just second-hand rumors I happened to eavesdrop in on, so take that with a grain of salt. Only a few countries recognize its sovereignty, out of fear of gaining the DRAC Gov’s ire. But it’s just enough recognition that the DRAC can’t directly invade it using official military forces.”
Ahh so it’s one of *those* situations huh? Where a territory wants to be independent, but the bigger nation wants its land and resources, so it demands other nations to not recognize it as a legitimate governmental body with threats of retaliation if they don’t fall in line.
They’re effectively waging a war of harassment. Brandishing them terrorists and bloodthirsty criminals makes it look justified in the eyes of the public. When they finally do invade Libertalia in force, they’ll undoubtedly herald themselves as the purveyors of peace, truth, and justice.
By using the HMC as their proxy soldiers, DRAC Gov can claim their hands are clean in this matter to the international community. They’re trying to provoke a retaliation from the Libertalia leadership, which would give them just cause to send in military forces. If they can’t provoke a response, they may very well stage a terrorist attack on their own people in order to claim just cause. Calling them terrorists is just preparation for that.
Eventually me and Anna make it to the inner strip. The buildings have all changed from small businesses, to fancy high rise buildings, to giant casinos of various cultural designs.
This place truly feels like some kind of futuristic Vegas. The music sounds like some generic pop music anyone could accept as background music, with maybe a bit more of an electronic element to it. But all that’s running through my head are thoughts about spurs that jingle jangle.
“That one over there is the Red Dragon Palace, I love their seafood buffet!”
The Red Dragon Palace strongly resembles the Forbidden City in China. It has a maroon colored traditional Chinese styled wall around a massive compound of ancient Chinese themed buildings, complete with layered tile roofs. These roofs will never see rain or sleet in their lives, but they still tiled them anyway for authenticity’s sake.
That said, they still bastardized it by making the top of the wall constantly be on fire, gave the wall embedded fluorescent Chinese style dragons, and made all the roof tiles light up in waves of red. How do they even keep the wall burning like that? Do they just constantly import new gas? That seems tremendously wasteful. My respect for Hellman’s taste in art has dropped.
I can see through the front gates of the compound they have what looks like a major festival going on. Granted the festival probably never ends. There are food stalls, hanging paper laterns, and other various games and activities. To be honest, if I weren’t fighting for my life right now, taking Anna there looks like it could be a lot of fun.
I look down at Anna, who’s snuggly fixed to my arm, and she looks like she’s in seventh heaven. Her eyes are closed, with a content expression fixed to her face.
She’s so cute.
I don’t want to ruin the moment, but I don’t know where I’m going, and we need to make sure we steer clear of the Auroria.
“Hey which one is the Auroria?”
“Ah!” Anna exclaims, waking from her stupor, “That one right there!” Pointing at the tallest tower in the city, which is fortunately still a ways away from us.
I’m going to be honest, I am not a fan of the Auroria’s design. There’s nothing partularly tacky or offensive about it like the Red Dragon Palace’s flaming wall or light up roof. But its design is boring.
It's a very clean and modern styled building. It’s entirely made up of blue tinted mirror like glass. Its shape resembles a swan’s neck, with no sharp angles to be found. One side goes straight up, while the opposite side curves up from the bottom, narrowing near the top. At the top, is the “swan’s head”, or observation deck. It isn’t centered on the “neck”, but rather juts out in the front just like a swan’s head would be. Apart from the aurora borealis like lights flowing across the smooth, mirrored surface, there’s not a lot that’s interesting about it.
Well actually, one nice thing I can say is this:
From a logistical standpoint, the building is incredibly impressive. Because there is not a single part of the building which is not curved in some way, each of the mirrored panels had to have been custom made. Apart from the straight vertical “spine” area, I bet the vast majority of windows are completely unique, coming only in symmetrical pairs, with no parts being interchangeable. Coordinating the assembly of that building must have been like assembling a puzzle, because each panel could only go to its assigned spot. If any of them broke, you would have to spend months or possibly years waiting on a replacement.
But how can he afford this place? While I’m guessing Hellman is more than a little wealthy, anyway I look at it, this place cost a ludicrous amount of money. The materials used in this place had to be imported en masse, not to mention designers, labor, tools, and machinery. The idea of spending this amount of money just in order to get half your salary expenses back doesn’t make financial sense.
“How did Hellman afford this place? Building a place this grand just to get half your salary expenses back makes no sense to me.”
“It’s an investment. Hellman had to take a lot of loans out to finance this place, but after Libertalia gets annexed, this base will have served its purpose as a military facility. At which point it will be opened to the public as a resort and resupply destination.”
I can’t tell if Hellman is smart, brave, confident, reckless, or stupid. Taking out a loan is one thing, but this place must have cost a *tremendous* fortune. On paper, the idea is fantastic – You get to keep your overhead down while waging war, and once it’s over, rich investors will flock to the new frontier to make a foothold in the newly annexed territory. Meanwhile you’ll already have a foothold, and be the only game in town. But what happens if they lose? He’s truly betting everything on this conflict working out. But Anna said that he’s cautious, so he must be confident in his strategy. That or his intel. But who would be willing to front him this kind of money on something that isn’t certain to pay off?
“How many times has he done this?”
“Never, this is his first hand at a project like this. Up until now, old bases were sold to whoever was the highest bidder, or kept for small regional contracts such as bodyguard duties or pirate subjugation.”
So his name really must carry a ton of weight. No wonder their armor had “HH” on it instead of “HMC”.
“Let’s turn here, I want to avoid getting near the Auroria as much as possible.” Anna whispers.
We turn down a slightly less crowded steet, walking for awhile before turning again. We go around several blocks, avoiding the Auroria entirely, before returning to the main strip and reaching the entrance of the Cerro Gordo.
It is even more awe-inspiring up close.
We are greeted by a massive mosaic plaza, which has been intricately tiled. A beautifully maintained garden, complete with small stone gazebos. A canal filled with decorative golden fish which remind me of koi. Not to be confused with goldfish, but rather these fish are literally a dazzling shade of pure gold – Which matches Cerro Gordo’s damascene spires.
We make our way across the plaza, and ascend Cerro Gordo’s wide luxurious mosaic central staircase, and are greeted by two female therians serving as Cerro Gordo’s door attendants.
Both of them are dressed in maid uniforms like Anna, only more proper and less revealing than Anna’s. As soon as they notice us, they give us a refined bow.
“Greetings Miss Anna and honored guest, welcome to Cerro Gordo – The most luxurious hotel and casino in the entire DRAC territories. We will do our absolute utmost to ensure your stay is a pleasant one. Be at ease, you are in good hands sir.”
They gracefully open the large wooden doors for us, and we are greeted by a spectacular sight.
The front waiting room has a checkered tile floor, sofas which look as though they were tailored for royalty, and a brilliant white ceiling with exquisite crown moulding. Past the crystal like glass doors, we enter the lobby – A truly expansive room with a tremendous vaulted ceiling.
I am met with a palatte of warm yellow, amber, brown, and ivory white. Which all blend together beautifully.
The caramel brown, glossy tiled floor looks clean enough to eat off of. The walls themselves are a warm yellow decorated with ornate woodwork and carved marble, leading to the breathtaking ceiling, which has been painstakingly hand-painted evocative of the Sistine Chapel.
Several floors overlook the lobby from their banisters, and symmetrical staircases fit for a palace curve down from either side. To my right there is a long wall of crystal doors and windows, leading to a large room with billiard green carpet. There’s a recessed section of flooring where countless people are smoking, playing poker, blackjack, roulette, and past that I can see rows of colorful slot machines.
They must keep the smoking in there, because it would undoubtedly destroy the painted ceiling in here.
To my left, past the ornate wooden pillars, is a carpeted reception area. The section has several sitting areas, and a long row of reception counters which are all artistically carved pristine woodwork. One of the therian ladies sees us and waves us over – No, is she waving to Anna?
We make our way over to counter to check in. I have no idea what I’m doing, but Anna seems confident here, so I’m not too terribly worried. I’ll just try and stay quiet as much as possible, and let Anna handle it.
“Greetings Miss Anna, pleasure to see you as always but… Um… I have you scheduled for a VIP party with Master Hellman in the Auroria for the rest of the night…? Did something happen? Who might this be?”
“This is Tony, he had scheduled a diamond-tier appointment with me tonight, and apparently nobody thought it prudent enough to notify me!” Anna says with an irritated tinge to her voice.
“Diamond!?” The woman quickly brings up her wrist, and a red hologram text box appears in the air from what looks like a wristwatch. She begins frantically scrolling through what I can only guess to be the scheduling.
Should I be surprised at this point that hologram touch sensitive technology exists? I both am, and am not surprised by anything anymore. I’m just exhausted at this point, both mentally and physically.
“I-I-I'm not s-seeing anything on here though!” The woman sputters in a panic.
“I can assure you, I personally verified the payment myself. Somebody fucked up – Bad. Ah! Please pardon my language sir.” Anna says turning to me, giving me a small quick bow.
“Just make it right.” I say, in my gruff Tony voice.
“Yes of course. I am also extremely frustrated with the situation. Please do not allow this to paint your first impression of Cerro Gordo. I will go above and beyond to ensure your stay here is the best you’ve ever had.”
“So you say, but that remains to be seen. All I’ve seen thus far from your staff is gross incompetence.”
I hate acting like a self-entitled customer who, just moments ago, I complained about. In fact I loathe it. I feel disgusted with myself. But I need to play the part. I am truly, truly sorry Miss Receptionist.
The woman is visibly panicking, swiping through tabs like her life depends on it. I don’t know what diamond-tier means, but apparently I’ve become a big deal.
“Y-you’re certain??”
“I’m 100% positive.”
Her chesnut bangs are noticeably damp from sweat, her pointy dog ears have stuck themselves firmly to the top of her head, while her furry tail has tucked itself between her legs. At this point I can sense the stress radiating from the other therians at the reception counter.
Finally she breaks, and profusely bows to me.
“WE ARE SO, SO SORRY SIR!!! But… But we are going to have to cancel-“
“No, absolutely not.” Anna says, bluntly cutting her off.
“Huh!? But – Master Hellman!?”
“I have been doing this before we even had a subscription system, or set up appointments – And yet in my 12 years of being here, I have not once failed to fulfill my duties. Nor have I ever cancelled an appointment, let alone a diamond tiered one. Master is a magnanimous man. I’m certain he will understand if I explain the situation to him.”
“If-if it’s you, then maybe… S-should I call his aide, and have her notify him?”
“No. I have an empty timeslot tomorrow, I want you to lock that in. I will use that time to talk with Master, and find the person responsible for this mess. I will personally nail their tail to his office door.”
Anna says with a tone of firm, silent rage. Her eyes ice-cold, and focused like a hawk.
She deserves an Oscar for this performance, even I nearly believe her.
“Y-yes of course! If you need anything, anything at all, please don’t hesitate to ask!”
“All I want you to do right now is lock that timeslot in, and compile me a list of who was working where, and at what times this week. I will handle the rest.”
“U-understood miss! P-please enjoy your stay sir!” The woman says, deeply bowing to me again, with the other therians at the counter following suit.
I give a quick, irritated grunt, and we depart for the back of the lobby. We arrive at several sets of cylindrical doors, made of what looks like a brushed bronze.
Anna pushes a button, and after a few moments, the elevator dings and the door revolves open. We step inside, and Anna holds both the open door and close door button simultaneously, while hitting multiple random floors. Is… Is she entering a passcode?
After she finishes, the doors close and I feel the elevator begin to ascend.
“…And you say my acting was superb?”
Anna gives me a small chuckle.
“All I did was use the advice you gave me Master.”
“Advice? What advice?”
“’You must first believe your own lies to sell them.’ – All I did was try to convince myself that situation was real, and the rest came naturally.”
“Eheh…”
Anna is scary.
I feel like I did something bad teaching her that.
“Will everything be okay?”
“Yes, but I had to use every ounce of my status and reputation to make it work. Had it been anybody else, I doubt it would have gone as smoothly.”
Anna really must be some kind of big shot here.
Eventually the elevator dings, and the door revolves open.
All I can muster is a single word:
“Woah.”
