Limbus, Inc.

The Slaughter Man By Benjamin Kane Ethridge

Time stood still, as it always did in this moment, and he felt neither dead, nor alive. As far as his life went, everything important existed only in this sad moment. Nothing before. Nothing after. He couldn’t decide if he hated that truth, loved it, or just needed it that way. Living in this instant was who he was, and yet, he’d never really been acquainted with that person. Not really.

Who am I?

What do I want?

As the Sticker punched through the jugular vein and dark red flooded over his apron, he saw a minor commotion up the chain. The first bolt hadn’t penetrated the cow’s solid cranium. The shackler, Jackson Turner, jogged over and exchanged glances with the stunner, Carl Cabers. The two men spoke something inaudible over the driving noise of the process line. Carl lowered the captive bolt pistol and fired into the cow’s skull again. Jackson gave a little electrified hop and returned to the side, taking up the shackles for the animal.

Blood flowed from the drains up the Sticker’s ankles and he responded by stepping on a pedal for the hidden sump pump. Further consideration told him this was a bad idea. The abandoned thirty thousand gallon underground tank had been filled to its limit just yesterday. He could no longer use it as a shortcut. The tank had plumbing issues when Sunshine State Natural Meat Processors first built the facility, and so it was capped off but never properly backfilled with gravel per city requirements.

The main drain was hidden from view, under the work table where the Sticker’s gory equipment usually sat. He ran the pump only when work got moving fiercely. The grade in the floor sloped toward that particular drain anyway, so using it enabled him to go faster than the other stickers (who weren’t privy to its whereabouts).

Last week the blood flow started rising under the table. Rather than throw the pump in reverse and send the nasty smelling stuff out to the appropriate drains, he got caught in the workday rush and put it off.

Today, the Sticker just let it be. He would have to be a mortal employee now like everybody else and work at a normal pace. No more super killer, processing twice as many animals as his peers.

A month ago, when Annette had still been in his life, he might have plotted how to empty that tank so he could retain his star quality, and possibly get called up for a management position. That might have made Annette proud of his return to the stockyards. Might have made her see his potential still existed.

Might have made her stay with him.

That wasn’t the reality anymore. Annette was gone and he was free to be as mediocre as the rest of the people working in this land of shit and blood.

Jackson brought the shackle up to the cow’s dangling hoof. It happened with such suddenness the Sticker only saw Jackson falling, arms out like a messiah, and then he was prone on the corrugated metal floor. The cow’s free hoof continued to fling wildly.

The Sticker ran to the thrashing beast, its labored calls louder than the process line. Carl arrived with his bolt gun. He’d already been working on another cow and knew this had to be done quickly. The chain will not stop was the company mantra and nobody took it for granted.

Carl aimed at the cow’s head. The animal shifted its weight, fell off the processing bar and struck him bodily against the side wall.

The Sticker dropped his knife and threw all his weight into the cow’s midsection. Carl broke free; he held his head and blinked spastically before rising on one knee. Jackson still rested on the floor, palm pressed to a spot between his eyes. The Sticker took the bolt gun, put the cow in a side headlock and discharged a bolt into its temple. The bolt retracted and the animal’s body jerked. It swung forward and sent the Sticker into the wall, knocking all the air from him. He pushed off the wall and hurried away from any other attack.

As he turned, he caught a glimpse of Jackson staggering over to the cow’s inert body. He’d already taken up the shackles again. Someone touched the Sticker’s shoulder and he jumped. Carl extended his hand for the bolt gun. The Sticker handed it to him, and then took his knife off the ground and returned to the bleeding floor.

By the time he was set back up, the renegade cow, hanging upside-down in the air by both its ankles now, slid toward him. He stuck the knife just under the jaw and swept across. You didn’t quit, he thought as he watched the scarlet cascade over his mesh gloves and arm guards. I used to value the good fight, sir, but now… look at you. Look where the fight ended.

He pressed the button and the process line buzzed on, the next cow immediately upon him. The Sticker slit another throat and then kicked some accumulated blood toward the other drain. He was surprised the USDA rep hadn’t had more to say about his workspace. Oh well, cleanliness wasn’t his business. He was just here to do a job and get paid. To live out his wonderful life.

Divorce papers waited for him at home. He wasn’t going to be dramatic; he’d sign what had to be signed. He never thought he’d deserved Annette, and over time he guessed she’d discovered this truth as well.

From the time he was seventeen until he was twenty-seven, he’d worked as a sticker. Then he got married and knew that had to change. He got a management job at the frozen onion factory, worked there until he was thirty-one. Five years ago he’d had a plan. He would become a treatment plant operator at Fabulous Onion Foods and take management courses, work up that chain, save money, open a blood sausage facility someday, since there was a surprising demand in the industry. After a paperwork mishap though, the CEO of Fabulous Onion, Trevor Milstead, was the asteroid that destroyed that prospective world and others.

The unemployment wasn’t enough to sustain his household. The Sticker refused to let their underwater mortgage go into default for the sake of some out-of-state jobs Annette found online. Leaving his trusted territory in the Inland Empire made him uncomfortable, but he didn't appreciate how much Annette despised that discomfort until it was already too late.

He went back to his old line of work at a new slaughterhouse, which was a pay cut of twenty-five grand — but he knew this kind of work and he trusted this kind of work. Even if he could hardly afford his dumpy apartment.

There was nothing else for Annette to admire in a man so quickly neutered. Her husband was a failure, and an ugly failure at that. The Sticker’s crooked teeth were not only unsightly for their angles, but coffee stained. He had bad skin begging for skin cancer, courtesy of his Irish father. And just last week he noticed a small barren spot forming in his otherwise thick blond hair. He’d always called it a cowlick before, but now, no such delusions could be made in earnest. So this was how the hill looked, just as you went down the other side. So much of his life had already passed and yet he’d never felt like it had begun.

The Sticker’s gaze drifted outside to the long, winding corral where the cows marched. The bends in the line were so they wouldn’t see what they were directly headed for, to keep them tranquil. It was probably the first time the Sticker felt envious of the poor animals.

Lunchtime wasn’t a refreshing occasion. Despite the sterile interior and air conditioning of the admin building, the walls hummed with the odor of cattle and dirt. The Sticker sat at the plastic table in a daze. He tried to will himself to open his brown sack lunch; he knew he’d be hungry later if he skipped, but with Annette lounging over his brain, always in his thoughts, forever and ever there, with him, it was impossible to think about eating. He could only glance around at the various groups of workers: the steamers, the singers, shavers, the splitters, shacklers, stunners… it was like a conspiracy of language used to reinforce the idea that all jobs here were created equal. And that wasn’t the case. Just ask the shavers and splitters about that.

Personally, he had always been happiest as a sticker (the term bleeder was frowned upon by the management), because his job involved no heavy machinery or lifting. His body was torn up by now anyway, but more from shoveling waste chambers at the onion plant. The rest of these guys, these younger men, they were popping Advils and Tylenols (Vicodin secretly) and some had bandages chronically appearing on different parts of their body. No way of denying it; the crew was a gruesome lot by day’s end.

The Sticker noticed an employment agency’s flyer hanging from the cork board. Limbus, Inc. read the top banner, and beneath it, a picture of a globe glowed with needles of light. None of the phone number tags had been ripped from the bottom.

Funny thing to see in this place. Could have used them when I got canned.

Jackson and Carl rambled on about the immortal cow from earlier. Every now and then they would involve the Sticker in the conversation and he would nod with their assessments. Jackson, right as rain now, had a gash in his forehead like a miniature crimson hockey stick. He was lucky he’d backed up when that hoof lashed out, or he’d probably be on permanent break-time right about now.

The room went silent suddenly. Gerald Bailey, facility manager, came through the door. The man never visited unless he wanted to ream someone out. Despite not having a manual job, he was always oily. He lived an air-conditioned existence but kept his blue collared shirt open at the top, where puffs of hoary chest hair sprung free. Seeing as everybody had to wear a hairnet and beard-nets, it was a disconcerting sight to say the least.

“Anybody know why there’s a product with three bolt holes in its brain?” he demanded of the entire room. His eyes roved to Jackson. “How’d you get that forehead smile, Action Jackson?”

Jackson stammered. “Shackles struck me in the face… on accident. Got it documented.”

“Be the hell more careful.” Gerald seemed to grow less agitated and his posture slackened. “So nobody knows about the bolts? Any stunners in here?”

Carl began to stand.

“Sit son, you’re still on break. I’m just getting details here.”

Carl lowered back down but his eyes didn’t move from Bailey. “The first two didn’t do the trick, boss.”

“Didn’t do the trick? Is that your excuse?”

Carl frowned. “You counseling me in front of everyone, boss?”

Bailey turned away, muttering something tired and vicious, and his tremendous gut bumped into the Sticker. “Oh pardon — hey you’re the new hot shot that upped productivity that one week.”

“Two weeks,” the Sticker replied.

Bailey’s mangy brown eyebrows hauled his weasel eyes up with them. “I know you, don’t I? Yeah. You used to work at the Fabulous Onion, on the cutting floor.”

“Small world.”

“It is. You know Trevor Milstead? Hell of a guy.”

“I know him.”

Bailey, noticing the conversation’s one-sided tilt, went to leave. He halted at the sight of the Limbus flyer and promptly ripped it off the board. “I don’t know who keeps putting these up, but they’ll likely need to apply at this Limbus place if they keep at it. Any ideas?”

Nobody said anything. After a moment Bailey marched off like a crestfallen general going to war alone.

Somebody whispered, “Why does it matter, one bolt, two or three?”

“Some of the meat is ruint,” another replied.

“Inhumane,” another guy added.

Leaving his lunch unopened, the Sticker slid out from the table and tapped Carl’s shoulder. “You still smoke?”

“Like a chimney.”

“Good, I want one.”

“Since when?”

The Sticker left the break room and a moment later heard Carl push out his chair.

He admittedly didn’t like the taste, but the lightheaded sensation was welcome right now. In the time it took the Sticker to finish one, Carl had smoked two cigarettes and mistook this as a chance to catch up. The Sticker just wanted to stare off into the trees that lined the parking lot outside the processing plant. Just watch their leaves shake with the occasionally breeze… drift… forget this place… forget her.

Carl ground the butt of his second smoke like he was doing some 50s dance move. “All right then, Mister Talkative, I’ll see you on the floor.”

He didn’t notice as Carl left. These days he didn’t notice anybody around him. People were just like those brain-dead cows that came swinging up to him. Substantial only that they took up space and had to be addressed in the moment.

Why? Why was he alone now?

Well, it was simple to explain but impossible to accept. Annette had wanted a life that began and ended in victory, and he’d always hoped she was patient enough for him to accomplish big things. As good as his intentions were to put away money, she saw the writing on the wall after the onion plant. You couldn’t save what you didn’t have, and when a guy only knew the boundaries of his bubble, finding the wisdom to drop every cent into the right tech stocks was a pretty hard feat to pull off.

Still, his heart wanted him to find a way. That’s why he’d gone on Facebook this morning and sent her a message: Can you just tell me what to do? Come home and I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll be whatever you want. Right away. This minute. This second. Please. I love you so much. I don’t care that you were with Milstead. If you want to come home, none of that matters. I’ll be a different person. I’ll go anywhere. I’ll show you. I’ll show you that I’ll go far away from here. Another state. Another country. Goddamn, another planet! I don’t give a shit anymore. I just need you back.

Looking back, the message was painfully embarrassing, but he couldn’t wait to get home and go online. See if she’d responded.

The warning whistle blew then.

Time to work.

After a restless night stalking Facebook and staring at his bedroom ceiling, the Sticker shambled from his pickup truck. He closed the door and took a long drink from his coffee thermos. Noticing his shadowy face in the reflection of his window, he leaned forward and started scraping at his bent front tooth. Love coffee, but goddamn. Another face floated into the reflection and he turned quickly around.

A black girl, perhaps ten or eleven, stood there. Her hair was straightened and fell down her shoulders like a nighttime rainstorm. She had the peculiar, yet smart, outfit of a business woman. The Sticker had never seen such a small pantsuit in his life. To fit her overall stature, her charcoal coat was also stylish. On the lapel the morning sunlight played off a platinum pin that looked like a miniature globe.

She stuck out her petite dark hand. Her emerald gaze cut into him with intelligence and her smile bent gracefully, powerful with charisma, like a politician’s dream. “Tasha Willing.”

“You lost from private school, kid?”

Her smile faded only a bit. “I thought we might talk about a job offering. I work for an employment agency.”

“That right?” The Sticker took a deeper sip from his thermos. He looked to the processing plant. “Got a job, as you can see.”

“You can do better than this.”

“Where are your parents, kid? Your old man work here?”

“Perhaps we can set up a meeting after work today?” She expertly retrieved a business card from a side pocket in her coat.

He took it, rather unconsciously and quickly glanced at it. The text on back said: Take a shot and you’ll go far. We employ.

“Limbus, eh? Well done, kid. Guess you’re the one who’s pissing off Bailey.”

“Bailey?”

“The guy who’s gonna be upset if I don’t get in there soon.”

“Don’t let me keep you any longer, sir. Just give me a call when you decide you’re ready for something better than this.”

The Sticker chuckled. “You’re a nut, kid. Have a good day.”

He walked past her.

“You too, sir,” she said, watching him go.

He must have completely misread the back of the business card before.

Your new job is written in the stars. We employ.

This wasn’t good.

It was only a half an hour until lunch break, so it was very strange that Bailey would call anybody to his office. He normally waited until break and then pretended he “didn’t want to interrupt.” Reporting to the operational manager’s office wasn’t as bad for the Sticker as it was for other workers though. He didn’t have to walk clear across the plant. Bailey’s office was only twenty feet from the bleed floor, right near the mostly shuttered USDA office. Just a hop over the spill containment berm and he was at the door.

The Sticker stood in the surprisingly clean, cinnamon smelling office, taking in the glossy wood paneling, the glass paper weight with a scorpion trapped in it, the photo of a boating event on the Colorado River, the framed newspaper of some quad-bike racing event, the recessed lit painting of a country cottage. Everything was lovingly in its own place, and the greasy man with his disgusting public display of chest hair did not fit the rest of the room.

“Have a seat, man,” said Bailey. His eyes were fixed on a Yahoo news article that featured an unflattering photo of President Obama yelling. He closed the web browser and swiveled around in his seat. He noticed the Sticker still stood. “I said sit.”

“Hurts my back.”

“Fine, shit, fine.” Bailey offered a weary look of lifelong annoyance. “So do you know why I called you in here?”

“No clue.”

“Really?”

The Sticker shrugged.

Bailey blew out a sigh between his rubbery lips and picked up a stack of papers from his in-basket. He dropped them at the other end of his desk. “What are those?”

“My paycheck stubs, looks like.”

“Looks like because they are, smart-alec.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Come on, man, don’t play dumb. What’s all this overtime here?”

“I logged it,” replied the Sticker. “HR didn’t say anything.”

“You don’t get to make your own hours, buddy. I ask you to work over and you accept or decline.”

“This went on for a month. You saw me here, you never—”

“This is abuse. Other people here are entitled to an eight-hour day.”

“First I’m hearing about it.”

“No, actually it isn’t. Look down at the comment section on the stub.”

The Sticker read the note, which looked to be in a different font. Overtime shall be approved per arrangement by management. See supervisor.

“When did you add that?”

“Excuse me?”

“That wasn’t there before.”

“See, that’s the problem with you direct-deposit folks. Always forgetting your stubs.” Bailey took out what looked to be about a month’s worth of paycheck stubs, sealed in envelopes, a rubber band holding them together. All the envelopes looked crisp and new.

The Sticker felt his blood catch fire, but he refused to show the man anything. “You and Trevor Milstead must be good friends, for you to go to all this trouble.”

Bailey’s face went robotically placid. “Finish your day out there and I’ll give your full two weeks pay. Otherwise, you can leave right the hell now and get nothing. Go and have a ball.”

Regardless of all he wanted to say, and subsequently do, the Sticker walked out of the sanitary confines of the office and back into the plant, to finish his last day in the blood and filth.

The Sticker leaned against the moist railing of the production line and wondered if Bailey was still in his office. At this point he was of two minds: he could threaten with wrongful termination, or he could just beat the ever-loving shit out of the guy. As he pondered these options, he found himself strolling the walkway, heading for the office.

No anger, no fear, he arrived at Bailey’s door and pushed it open. The man sat in his chair, head back, snoring, that pubic mound of chest hair rising and falling. The Sticker watched him for a couple moments and then shut the door quietly.

Security hadn’t come by yet. Those guys were still having their last beers in shipping and receiving probably, but the Sticker didn’t want to chance a diversion from their routine, so he moved fast. It was almost laughingly perfect, as though a plan set weeks ago had now come to fruition.

He stopped up the drains and set the hidden sump pump in reverse. The tank was so overloaded, the pump wouldn’t make any real noise until the level hit bottom. Curdled, septic, black blood wormed through the grates under his work table and fanned out over the floor. He fought a dry-heave and plugged his mouth with his fist. Stepping around the sludge, he took another moment to admire its grotesquery and happily cringed at the rotten reek. The containment around the bleed floor would not suffice for long. With the pump going full bore, this biological gruel would cascade over the berm in about ten minutes.

The Sticker hoped it flooded Bailey’s pristine office before the jackass even woke from his nap. It would be a downright crime not to witness that, but he’d stuck around here long enough and getting going was a better idea.

From the bed of his pickup, the Sticker watched a blood soaked Gerald Bailey trudge out to the parking lot. The Sticker laughed and unfortunately some Scotch went down the wrong pipe. He coughed out through his watering eyes and tried to clear his sinuses. After cursing a bit, he regained himself and scanned the parking lot for another trace of any of the misery he might have caused. Bailey’s headlights went on and he wheeled his truck around in the darkness.

So much for my fun. Wish I could see the full cleanup effort tomorrow.

“Well done,” said a voice.

The Sticker almost dropped his bottle of Black Velvet. “Jesus kid, what in the hell are you doing here? Holy shit!”

Tasha Willing stood at the very threshold of dusk. Her green eyes shone. “I heard about what happened and I just wanted to drop by to express how angry I am, on your behalf.”

“Heard? How?”

Tasha wound her hand in circles. “All sorts of ways out there to reap information. That’s not why I’m here, though. Now that you’re free, I’d like to present an opportunity. May I sit?”

The Sticker pressed his lips together and shook his head. Little kids made him uneasy, but calling this girl different from most kids was a colossal understatement. He sidled over. “Sit, but park it way over there. I’m not gonna be framed as a pervert.”

Tasha hopped up and smoothed her suit pants down. “May I have a tug on that?”

Looking down at his Scotch whiskey, the Sticker simpered. “So you’re determined to get me arrested?”

“That’s pretty cheap stuff and it would be better with a little water, but I’ve had a longer day than you can imagine.”

The Sticker glanced around. “Well I didn’t see you take it…” He handed over the bottle.

Tasha tipped the Scotch back, swallowed and ran her tongue over her teeth. “Rough stuff, but it’s better than the air around here.”

He quickly took the bottle back. “Yes, one big cow pie.”

“Indeed. Now sir, I’d like to talk about that job—”

“Just cut out the game, kid.”

“Tasha.”

“Just cut it out, Tasha. I’m not in the mood for talking or playing pretend.”

“I can find you any job you like, anything you like.”

The Sticker glanced up to the sky, gradually dissolving of all light except for a few stars. “Unbelievable,” he whispered. How had he managed to lose his job and take on a midget-sized stalker all in one day?

“I’m not lying. Dead serious here.”

“Okay,” he said, lifting the bottle, then dropping it back down on his knee. “Doesn’t matter what the job is, but how about something far the hell away from here? How ‘bout that for starters, little girl?”

“You’ve lived in Azusa your whole life.”

“How did you…? Oh forget it. Yeah I have, and I ruined my marriage by staying, so… shit why am I saying this stuff to you?”

“I’m the Master Recruiter. I can find you a job somewhere else. That’s a non-issue. What do you believe you’re good at? I already know your abilities from reading your file, but what you believe is more important.”

He opened his mouth and snapped it shut.

“You aren’t going to scare me if you say killing,” Tasha noted.

The Sticker hopped off the tailgate. “Please get down.”

“We’re just talking here.”

“Get down, now. I need to go home.”

Tasha slid off the truck and folded her arms. “But really. What now, Slaughter Man?”

That was a good question, but not one with a simple answer.

“I’ll be okay. Thanks for caring. Really. It was nice meeting you. Never met a whiz-kid before.”

“Me neither.”

He laughed dryly and shut the tailgate with Scotch still in hand.

“I’ll check in with you tomorrow,” she said.

“No, don’t.”

“Hey, I think you can appreciate keeping a boss happy.”

“Might be able to appreciate it, but I’m not very good at it lately.”

“Yes, well, I still don’t know what you think you’re good at.”

“Well, I wasn’t just going to say killing before,” he told her and rounded his truck. He opened his door and looked back at the indistinct slaughterhouse. “It’s the being numb part that I’m really good at.”

Tasha gave him a tiny smile as she fell away, into the night.

He slowly stirred at her touch. The Sticker had been drunk the past three days. He vaguely remembered a call last night from a representative of Sunshine State Natural Meat Products inquiring about the discharge of hazardous waste in his work area. The call was intense and legally intimidating (to say the least) and it wouldn’t have been a surprise to open his eyes to a fresh-eyed young cop bent over him with a wakey-wakey grin.

But instead, the Sticker saw the one and only person he wished it to be.

Annette fell away from him and sat at the worn swivel chair in front of the computer. Her dark hair was shorter, more styled, and she wore a flowered blouse that revealed enough cleavage to quicken his pulse. He knew though. By her darting eyes and sullen face, it was obvious. She wasn’t here to take him back. So he couldn’t work himself up to any peak, only to plummet off the side when she left.

“You come over for the last of your clothes?”

She nodded.

“Did you get my email?”

“I haven’t been online for a few days,” she said.

“Doesn’t matter,” he replied.

“What did it say?”

He propped up on the couch with one quivering arm. His head felt like a site of constant underwater demolitions. It would have been painless to vomit right now. A morbid part of him fancied puking all over Annette’s beautiful blouse and those tits she flashed so cruelly in his face.

“What’d it say?” she repeated.

“Nothing.”

“Why did I know you’d answer like that?”

“Probably because we were married…”

She kneaded a knot in her neck. She got those when she was tense. Other than her apparent awkwardness in the moment, she looked great. Her skin was a richer, bronzer color. Natural though. She’d been to the beach or somewhere outdoors recently. He wanted to tell her but silenced himself before the words formed.

Like some sort of social martyr, her eyes politely drifted away from the table where all his empty beer cans and obliterated bottles of booze congregated. “I just wanted to say, before I go—”

He sat up straight. It felt like someone shot him through the temple with a poisoned arrow. “Yeah?”

“Anyway, I just wanted to say, and this isn’t to over-salt your wounds—”

“Hey, I’m not wounded,” he snapped.

Her eyes handled him like a mother with a child. “I haven’t stopped caring about you, just so you know. I always care. That hasn’t changed.”

This was an altogether different arrow to the head. “What? What does that even mean? I mean, what the fuck?”

“Just because we can’t work in a marriage doesn’t mean we can’t work as friends.”

The laugh crawling from his throat was nearly sinister. “You walked out because of some bullshit lack-of-ambition reason, when you damn well know I’ve worked my ass off in everything I’ve ever done. Now, after all this, you have the nerve to pretend to care about me? I don’t believe you. How can you care about this loser, this guy who hasn’t amounted to dick? You aren’t going to be my friend. You don’t need my friendship. You’ve got a wealthy guy now.”

“I don’t care about money. I just don’t want a hamster in a wheel anymore.”

“Well, that Trevor fucker’s a rat in a maze.”

Annette shrugged. “I wanted a partner. After five years, I’m tired of all the desperation. I’m tired of spinning these wheels. But just because I am, doesn’t mean I want you thinking I’m some cruel bitch that never had feelings for you.”

The Sticker studied the blue paisley pattern on his boxer shorts. He was silent, unsure of her, unsure of himself. “This is like a bad dream.”

Annette looked far more uncomfortable than before. She picked up her purse from the floor and struggled to put its strap over her arm. “I need to go. You’ll be late for work.”

“I quit.”

Her eyebrows knitted. “Really? What, you got something else?”

“Sure did. Met somebody, too.”

Annette sharply laughed. “Who?”

“Wouldn’t know her. Name’s Tasha.”

“Ah, I see.” She looked up in fake jealousy. “Well, ok, I’ll be in touch.”

He jumped up, ignoring the shifting world around him. “Don’t leave yet. We can have coffee at least, can’t we?”

Annette went through the door before he could get there. Chasing her outside would be too much.

But what if this is my last chance?

The Sticker put his hand on the doorknob but couldn’t beckon the will power to turn it. He dropped his head against the wood frame and closed his eyes.

When he opened them, he noticed the Limbus card had fallen on the carpet.

The back of it read: What are you waiting for?

By the time he found parking in downtown Los Angeles, the Sticker was close to gassing up and heading back home. It’d been a long, traffic-filled afternoon, and once off the freeways, his web directions led him on several inane detours before reaching the office building. Had he more to go home to, he certainly would have, but with another lawyerly voicemail this morning that added animal cruelty on top of illicit hazardous waste dumping, he supposed there were worse things than being in L.A. with a full bladder and nowhere to park.

He grumpily paid the lot fee and after a brief stop in a gas station bathroom, the Sticker headed toward his destination. A number of businesses shared the office building, mostly real estate and insurance entities. The sparsely decorated lobby was unremarkable in its avocado vinyl chairs and teak and aluminum tables. He was happy with the powerful air conditioning though as he searched the wall chart for Limbus’ room number. It was a little nutty, he thought anyway, that he’d come to accept Tasha as a legitimate job contact, but he supposed he was at that point in his life now. Nothing was too crazy. He couldn’t stay in his bubble. That damned thing had lost him a good woman. That damned thing had to be popped.

Office #A10.

It bugged him to see a number sign before a letter. He knew it shouldn’t, but it always did. Hopefully that wasn’t a bad omen from the get-go.

By the door the Sticker noticed an intercom with a silver globe adorned on its side. A helpful bronze plate had PRESS FOR ENTRY engraved in it.

He pushed the plate and an intercom bell trilled.

“Limbus Incorporated, do you have an appointment?” said an androgynous voice through the speaker.

“I’m here to meet with Tasha Willing.”

“Wonderful, and what government do you represent?”

“I… uh… am here for a job.”

“Does the Master Recruiter expect you today?”

“I guess so.”

There was a pause. “And what location are you calling from?”

The Sticker opened his mouth and caught himself. “I’m right outside.”

“Yes sir, but at what office location?”

“Los Angeles.” He laughed nervously, thinking he’d failed to understand the question.

“Thank you, sir. Come in.”

The door knob pulsed and unlocked. He twisted it and walked inside. Something frosty swept through him for a split second and everything behind fell away, pulled back, into nothing.

The Sticker stood in the center of a lobby the size of an airport now. His hand was still poised in the air from opening the door, but there was no door anymore….

He glanced around to make sure. The hallway he’d just come from was nowhere to be found. Twenty yards away, a giant globe spun before him, spears of light extruding and retracting in different locations over its surface, dazzling the floor, its every tile inlaid with what looked like cut diamonds in a flower petal pattern surrounded by a mother of pearl circle.

Tasha walked this luxurious floor with the same confidence she had at the oil-stained stockyard parking lot. A smile glued itself to her face. Today she was in a smart-looking red dress with matching hair clip that posted her straightened black hair to the side.

“You should see your expression,” she said, stopping before him. “Was that fun, or what?”

“I’ll go with or what.” He rubbed his arms to confirm he was still part of reality, that this wasn’t a drunken dream.

“If you think that small vapor convey blew your mind, just wait. I haven’t received the full employment report yet, but you’ll be going through a membrane transport and that’s like several hundred cosmic slaps to the face.” She laughed. It was a strange, ancient sounding laugh, but something about it calmed him. He liked Tasha. Maybe that was essential to her duty in bringing people into this weird place though. Maybe he shouldn’t trust her, but he did. Had he not, the Sticker would have been running to get out of this place right about now.

“I don’t know what to say…”

“That’s because the vapor convey integrates with our visitor’s panic synapses. We’ve altered your reactions to receive these new ideas in a measured fashion, invoking a less hostile animal response.”

“Come again?”

“It’s like valium, only permanent.”

“I still feel like me.”

“It doesn’t change who you are, just how you’ll perceive concepts normally catastrophic to the human psyche. We don’t want to spend months rebuilding your grip on reality. This is quicker. Painless. And especially since you’re going to another star system, it’s imperative. Your body will have to adjust to membrane travel, life in space, and all that comes with it. Despite your ability to be numb, as you said, it’s probably a good idea if you bring every precaution with you.”

“Space?”

“You said far away and I listen to my applicants. Come on, Slaughter Man, follow me to my office.”

He trailed her around the globe over to a hallway that ran with bright white marble rather than the intricate lobby tiles. After passing a few shadowy offices, she stepped into a small room and flipped on the light.

She sat down behind a slate colored desk. “Have a seat.”

“Feels better on my back if I stand.”

“Nessun problema,” she replied. A wide screen monitor rested before her, but it was astonishingly simple looking. In fact, Gerald Bailey actually had a fancier model in his office. Tasha typed a few things on a concealed keyboard and concentrated her dazzling green eyes on the screen. “I’ll just be one moment… the report should be… yeah, there it is.” She clicked her mouse a few times and softly snorted.

“How’d you get this job, Tasha? If you don’t mind me asking.”

She smirked. “My father runs this company.”

“Ah. I never could have worked for my old man. Bet that’s hard.”

Tasha was distracted by something on the screen. “Not really,” she replied, “haven’t seen him in seventy-two years.”

The Sticker laughed at this but Tasha’s look of concern deepened. She picked up a slim red cell phone from under the desk and held it next to her ear. After a moment, a miniature voice answered. “You’ve sent my guy to the Princess’s ship. Just what do you think you’re doing?”

She waited, her green eyes absorbing an answer she didn’t like.

The Sticker glanced up at the wall and his mouth fell open. He hadn’t noticed before, and this was a testament to how truly unobservant he was, but thirty or more framed photos stared back at him: there he was with a bat over his shoulder in little league, another in front of burgundy satin curtains with his prom date Ruth Pietro, another in his blue overalls standing next to a water tank at Fabulous Onion Foods, and another, there with Annette on the strip in Las Vegas, the weekend of their marriage and subsequent honeymoon. There was even a photo of him around twelve or thirteen, not too much older than Tasha, and he was in a canoe with a young woman. He wore a smile. His mom wore one too, though less sincere. The photo had to have been taken only a year or two before she ran off with that other man. Since then, he’d only heard from her on birthdays and once last New Year’s when she was drunk off her ass.

The Sticker’s eyes fluxed from her photo back to Annette’s. No, he thought, they were different people. That was a different situation.

“This is the exact same crap the directors pulled on me last time,” Tasha told the phone angrily. “Yeah, yeah, I’m listening.” She looked at the Sticker and made a gabby hand-puppet.

The Sticker’s eyes came back to rest on Annette, hand on the lacy white hip of her wedding gown, the MGM Grand, an omnipresent green behind her. How could she consume him still? Here, in this strange place he’d happened upon, a whole new world, and all that twisted inside his bitter mind was his wife’s shadow. He’d stepped way outside of his bubble, more than he ever bargained for, but evidently his heart and mind hadn’t come along for the ride.

“You miss her, don’t you?”

He looked at Tasha. Her conversation had ended without him noticing, the cell phone resting quiet on the desk.

“I really don’t want to talk about that.”

“I’m good with that.”

“Why do you have so many pictures of me?”

Tasha batted her eyelashes. “I adore studying you.”

“Funny.”

“So, okay then, I’m going to do everything I can to transfer you from this assignment. You might have to spend a couple months there, but—”

“I don’t care. Is the pay good?”

She tilted her head. “How’s four hundred and fifty thousand a year sound?”

“Much better.”

“Marginally,” she said with a giggle that trailed off. “Really though, ordinarily I wouldn’t assign you to something so dangerous. I’ll check in on you though.”

“Sounds fine, except the part with me doubting whether I’m schizophrenic now. That aside, I’m used to dangerous jobs.”

“Yes, I know. That’s why you’re Super Slaughter Man.”

He blew out and rolled his eyes.

Tasha’s face furrowed with concern. “But you haven’t worked in one of the Princess’s ships before, and few have lived to say so. You’ll be asked to do more than stick a knife in a brain-dead animal’s throat. Depending on the Princess’s appetite, you may have to make hundreds upon hundreds of kills on any given day. It will all be challenging.”

“Could be.”

“It will be,” Tasha reinforced and stood from her chair, only coming to his waist. From a drawer, she took out a single sheet of paper and a pen and put it before him. “You will have three or four other workers helping to spread the work out. So, is this something you think you can do? If it is, go ahead and sign and we’ll get started.”

“I can’t really say if I can do this, not until I know what these animals are.”

“I’d love to tell you, but what the food source is can change on a whim with the Princess’s tastes.”

“The meat is only for her, eh?”

Tasha nodded solemnly.

The Sticker read the contract. It was the simplest, shortest legal document he’d ever seen. He had to read it three times to make sure he wasn’t missing something. Afterward, he signed on for the job.

“Did you need to return home? Or are you ready to start today? You won’t be taking anything with you. All your needs will be met there.”

“Where do my wages go?” the Sticker asked, eyes again on Annette in the honeymoon photo, frozen in laughter, lost in Las Vegas sepia tones.

“Special account,” she replied. “No taxes. The IRS is not an issue for us, if you’re wondering.”

“Sounds stupendous.”

“Great, I’ll show you to the membrane station then. You’ll like it. It’s not completely cutting edge travel — really more of a bastardized human version of Gultranz patch gating. It has improved quite a bit though and is probably more secure than the alien technology.”

“Alien… sounds weird to hear that word used seriously.”

“It won’t be weird for long.” Tasha sauntered around him and made for the hall.

“Wait.”

She turned. “Yes?”

“Will I able to check Facebook over there?”

The membrane station was a rectangular chamber with a smoked glass observation window from beginning to end. Those on the other side of the window looked out to a blue ramp hanging with long glassine flaps, which reminded the Sticker of some kind of science fiction car wash.

Tasha sat him down on a short stool, the only piece of furniture in the room. Just in his boxer shorts, it was weird enough being there with a kid, but he blushed a little when a young Japanese woman in medical scrubs entered to take his vitals.

Tasha stood behind the technician, hawking maternally over the process. “You’ll receive a one-time injection of DNRM-33,” she explained.

“And that does what?”

“It sounds scarier than it is, but it will modify your DNA and RNA to accept instructions from the membranes, so your reassembled structure doesn’t take on abnormalities.”

“That’s a mouthful. Does the drug work for everybody?”

“You have a seventy percent chance of success.”

“What?”

Tasha laughed. “I’m kidding. This is a reliable molecular alteration. I’ve never heard of a problem, ever.”

The technician held up the syringe. The fluid inside was clear, benign. “Ready?” she asked.

The Sticker nodded and received the injection. He wasn’t too fond of needles, but as long as he looked away and focused on his breathing, he could handle it.

“Will I feel anything… from this?”

He noticed her phone was at her ear now. “Yes, this is Willing,” she said. “He’s received DNRM-33 therapy. You can fire them up. What? Oh, are you kidding me? Why the hell is he doing that?”

The door opened and Trevor Milstead walked in.

The Sticker could not accept this. The man, his old boss, in that moment, had become the most unbelievable thing in the room. Trevor looked more tanned, just as Annette had. He wore a silk Hawaiian shirt and khaki pants. Some expensive sunglasses nestled in his thick movie star hair.

“What are you doing here?”

“Me?” asked Trevor. “Shit man, you wouldn’t have this job without me. A good crowbar couldn’t have pried your ass out of that cow factory.”

“Mr. Milstead,” Tasha said. “Now isn’t the time, in my opinion.”

“Nobody’s asking your opinion, Willing.” Trevor hunkered down, coming eye level to the Sticker. “I thought Annette would stop talking about you… but even after visiting every damn island in Hawaii, she’s guilty over your ass drying up in some cut rate slaughter house, no offense to my good ole boy Gerald Bailey.”

The Sticker narrowed his eyes. “You got me fired.”

“You got yourself fired, from what Bailey tells me. And now you’ve got some regulators looking for you — something about toxic waste and torturing a cow with a stun gun. I don’t even care if all that stuff’s real. With that kind of heat, I can’t hire you back at the onion plant, not even to appease Annette. I have to get you out of the picture and hope she forgets your dumb ass.”

“Sir,” said Tasha diplomatically, “but is working the Princess’s ship really the answer to that?”

“It’s a slaughter ship, isn’t it? That’s what he does, isn’t it? You told the committee he wanted to go far away, didn’t you?”

Tasha looked down from his gaze and shook her head unhappily.

“Everybody on the committee signed off on it. Your father even endorsed the idea.”

“Father is only getting his information from you, and he won’t answer my calls.”

“A wise man.” Trevor stood and his knees crackled. The Sticker found comfort in that, made the asshole mortal, if only a little bit. They locked eyes for a moment. “I’d offer my hand,” said Trevor, “as your old boss, or as your new one, but I know that’s a waste.”

“You’re not as dopey as I thought.”

Trevor gave him a crooked smile. “Have a safe trip. Don’t get yourself killed out there too soon. That drug therapy is an expensive investment. Meanwhile, your wife will never go wanting.”

Trevor patted Tasha on the shoulder before leaving. The Sticker slid off the stool and nodded to the blue ramp. “Is that where I go? Can I just move on? Right now? Far away, please?”

Tasha regarded him stoically. “Milstead shouldn’t have come down here. I’m sorry for the harassment. I was hoping you’d never even know he was my supervisor.”

“It’s okay. That’s par for my life, and I have nowhere else to go now, do I?”

Tasha gestured to a pair of feet in a dashed outline on the ramp. “Stand there. That’s all you have to do. I will try to visit tomorrow. You’ll be greeted by some of our other employees once you settle.”

The Sticker pointed at the outline for further confirmation.

Tasha nodded.

He stepped into the dashed feet.

“I’m going to leave the room,” said Tasha. “You can go ahead and take off your underwear then.”

He cleared his throat. “’K.”

The transparent membrane flaps pulsed before him.

A moment later the door shut and she was gone.

The Sticker dropped his boxer shorts and kicked them to the wall. His face heated as he speculated on how many people were on the other side of the observation window. He’d never been a shy person, but the idea that Trevor might be looking on was more than unnerving.

The crystal kelp looking things waved faster before him.

Guess there’s more important things to worry about than nudity…

A cold, plastic kiss touched his neck. He turned.

Layers of those flaps stretched behind him. It went into infinity. But how—?

“Keep forward please,” said a voice piped into the room. Pieces of the command distorted and repeated in his brain and his ears. “Please forward keep.” “Keep keep keep forward forward forward please please please.” “Peep Korward Flease.” “Kuh-kuh-kuh, fuh-fuh-fuh, kee-kee-kee.” “Ease, Orward, Eep.”

He saw people before him, stretching forever. But it was him. Trillions, (zillions?) of the Stickers. He saw the back of his head, the long scar down his right flank, his bare ass, legs. He shifted and all the copies shifted. It wasn’t a reflection. They were there! They were all there, all alive. This wasn’t happening like this, right?

The membrane flaps smacked past his body, jarring him left and right. Just as he began to question whether more were coming, the process quickened tenfold. His body stung as the membranes continued their assault. It’d become so fast, they didn’t seem physical now, like the flaps moved through him, a mist, a poison, an aggressive spirit that possessed him and exorcised itself at the speed of light.

When it all stopped, the Sticker heard himself screaming incoherent things that conflicted with the thousand ill thoughts in his mind.

Three men lingered before him in a freezing cold metal room. They were younger than the Sticker, probably early twenties. Two were African American and the other Caucasian. The lighter skinned African American grinned. He had a stack of clothing under his right arm. “Yup, that’s about how I remember my trip, too.”

The other two men evenly smiled and nodded.

“That’s Harper and Timothy,” he said.

“And who are you?” asked the Sticker.

“Razz,” he replied. “Welcome aboard.”

The Sticker changed into his new clothes, which appeared to be a thin cream colored bodysuit made of long-john material. It did the trick though. This place was freezing and the inner lining of the suit sent comforting, if foreign-feeling, waves of warmth into his skin. He guessed he was onboard a spaceship, but he couldn’t see any windows showing space outside. There was a strange back-and-forth feeling in the core of his stomach, as though an imaginary fish hook tugged at his intestines; he assumed this had to do with some kind of artificial gravity imposed by the ship. He could only guess. The Sticker was more of a western type of fellow and hadn’t even sat through Star Wars.

His shoes were closer to apparel to which he was accustomed: work boots with hard, difficult to tie shoelaces and reinforced steel in the toes. He got the first on and was busy tugging on the second when the manually operated cabin door slid open.

The man named Timothy entered the room, his skin as pale as a ghost. Sporting a bald head, he indeed could have passed for one of the Casper variety.

“Yeah?” asked the Sticker.

“You have to come right away. She’s hungry again.”

“Who?”

Timothy tossed him what looked like a small firearm. It didn’t resemble a ray gun, more like a starter pistol with a bronze comb on top of it.

The Sticker followed Timothy into the hall. “Is this about the Princess?”

The other man walked so fast, the Sticker had to jog alongside him. “Sorry, you usually get a few days to acclimatize to the environment, but we are shorthanded, and didn’t expect the Princess to acquire another Fanjlion ship today. She’s already had three hundred processed today. Her appetite is getting worse.”

“What’s this weapon you gave me?”

“It’s called a Fixer Gun. It will fire bursts of fifty staple-darts and that clip holds twenty-five hundred. Target only the head. The Princess will not eat brains.”

“I’m not used to this… kind of work. Guns. I don’t do guns.”

“We were all new to this once. Don’t worry, the Fanjlions are only a passing taste. The Princess will get bored of them eventually.”

Timothy took another corner and the two other men, Razz and Harper, waited in an area where the hall expanded into a docking chamber. “Come on,” they both said, waving frantically.

The Sticker and Timothy sidled up against the wall with the other men.

“Thought you weren’t going to make it,” Razz said critically.

“It’s a long hallway, man,” Timothy snapped.

“Shut up, guys.” Harper’s brown eyes narrowed as he focused. Sweat had formed up on the hotdog shaped rolls of ebony skin on his neck, making them glisten. “The inner chamber is unsealed. Should be coming in here any minute.”

“We’re doing this in the hall?” the Sticker asked.

Razz checked his gun. “What’d you expect?”

A hiss of air released and a single blast of a horn sounded.

“Ready,” breathed Razz.

Everybody put their guns up.

The bodies rushing into the hall could have been a rolling wave of tree branches and knives. The Sticker couldn’t get a bead on what was what at first, not until Harper and Timothy fired their Fixer guns. These alien creatures, the Fanjlion, were humanoid, around five feet tall, rods of muscle over a small bone structure, skin with a mottled tree bark texture, like twig-men from some haunted forest. Each wore a tight white membranous material over their small heads. In the center of the latex-like mask, a square had been cut so a singular eye could stare outward, a radioactive pineapple slice.

“Don’t gawk, shoot!” yelled Razz. He kicked one of the aliens as it leapt for him. Before it hit the ground he fired into its face, the Fixer gun letting out a metallic cough. Golden blood burst like a water balloon from the pineapple eye.

The Sticker raised his weapon as a threesome of the Fanjlions sped toward him. He didn’t want to kill these things. He hated guns. Hated their sole purpose. Hated seeing kids under bloody sheets on the news. Hated… how after his mother left, his father went on a week-long hunger strike that he finally broke by eating a bullet from his Beretta.

The tallest creature of the lot charged out in front. The shiny black webbed hands that extended from the bundle of sticks that was its arm suddenly became blobs that elongated into blades. It flung the lethal points forward — the Sticker jumped back and opened fire on the group. The gun’s coughing sound played hell with his eardrums and the hardware grew colder in his hands with every shot. Taking the lead creature down dead in the chest, the other two aliens ended in a series of misplaced shots in the arms, legs and torso.

But they’re dead, is the point.

“The hell you doing?” shouted Harper, close to his side. “You’re wasting food. The heads, the heads, dummy!”

Or not.

“Well sorry!” he said, just as another group fell upon them.

Harper finished them: one and two and three and four, and number five’s head buckled back and it fell sideways on the pile of his companions.

“Shit,” the Sticker whispered.

“That’s how it’s done, buddy.” Harper flashed a deviant smile. “Come on, let’s back up Tim and Razz.”

The Sticker kept behind the broad shouldered man and rounded the corner where the two other Limbus employees waged a two-man war against a seething mass of Fanjlions. Harper took aim and began squeezing off shots into the crowd. The Sticker lifted his gun, but only for show. Harper must have had hawk eyes to make headshots from this distance.

Unconsciously Harper moved forward and the Sticker followed his lead. Over the sight of the gun, he attempted to track those red glowing pineapples — perfect bulls eyes when you considered them — but the alien gathering coalesced like a confused forest growing into itself and it was a tableau of chaos. The Sticker stuck out his gun, as though getting it marginally closer would help as well.

Then something warm and wet struck his elbow and his gun jumped out of his hand. The Sticker stepped back and realized that the warm and wet was him: he was bleeding from a deep slash down his elbow to the base of his pinkie, the material of his jumpsuit torn clean in half.

Harper took a few more shots and looked satisfied by them. He spared a glance at the Sticker. “What the shit? Did you lose your gun?”

“I—”

The next moment Harper’s head broke apart, first in a clump that took his right eye, then another that destroyed his jaw, the rest of the meat cascading gruesomely to the side and falling off. A single, thin jet of scarlet erupted from the neck just before the man’s body fell to the floor.

“Fuck!” the Sticker shouted.

The alien who had taken the Sticker’s gun took two steps closer, dipping its head as it walked. Its gloved hand around the gun mimicked a human hand, just as surely as it had mimicked a blade earlier. The gun discharged and the Sticker ducked and ran. He had no clue where, but he was running. The creature bounded after him. He could hear Timothy and Razz yelling, but he knew it would be deadly to look back.

The paneling of the ship changed suddenly. It was darker, with glowing red circuitry underneath. The Sticker took a left, charged up into the shadows and wheeled right. He could hear the Fanjlion thankfully fall for the trick and scamper into the opposite side of the room. In the dim light of this new hall, he saw his pursuer gallop up to the threshold. It touched a wall panel, made a circular motion with its hand, and a thick door slid over and locked with a hiss. It turned around and made an aggravated clicking sound, the Fixer gun poised over its head. No wonder it didn’t shoot me. It’s not coordinated enough to hit a moving target. Had Harper only known a few moments earlier…

The faces of Razz and Timothy filled the port hole in the door. They were speaking to each other, hopefully planning how to get him out. The Sticker’s body trembled. He was on the Fanjlion ship.

A bass trilling filled his skull as Fixer darts released right over his head. The Sticker swept down and ran, his every step only inches ahead of ensuing shots. The attack trailed him all the way across the room, where he was able to drop behind a narrow support structure.

Twenty-five hundred darts. Fifty unloading every second, likely. How many were left in the Fixer? At least three hundred outside… but after that last spread?

There was only one way to find out.

The Sticker shook his head once, idiot, and then hauled ass across the hallway. This time he counted, and hoped, god did he hope, that it wouldn’t be the last thing he did. Shots coughed after him, again, again, again. He made it to the other side and shielded himself around another support. Seven seconds. Another couple times and that should do it.

He made another run for it and immediately a dart grazed his hip. The Sticker slammed to the floor on one hand and groaned. Blood poured from his leg and filled up his work boot. Made him woozy. The Fanjlion’s feet scratched against the floor, somewhere in the shadows. The Sticker looked up and saw Timothy and Razz, mouths moving in silent shouts. They pointed to the wall. To the panel.

“Oh,” said the Sticker. He tried to stand. Hobbling left and right, he heard more shots ring out and impact sparks flung off a nearby support. He reached the panel and swiped his hand in a circle as he’d seen the alien do. A droning sound emitted and a light glowed behind it. Then died.

The alien lunged after him, firing what was left in the clip. The Sticker dropped to his knee from the pain in his hip, but it was good that he had — there was a clear path to that pineapple eye. The Sticker grabbed the eye and crushed it between his fingers. Oily blood ruptured over his knuckles and the Fanjlion made several husky burping sounds before collapsing on the floor, a column of gold running from its head down the dark paneled floor.

A minute later, the door opened and Timothy proclaimed, “That’s what I thought, override is always on the seventh panel.”

Razz immediately went down on a knee to help the Sticker. “You okay?”

“Yup.”

“Fucked up your new clothes, man.”

The jumpsuit was shredded, painted in glittering blood, of both red and gold variety. “Guess I did… that guy, Harper…”

“We saw.”

“It was my gun they used.”

“Not your fault. There were more of them than usual,” said Razz solemnly.

“Will Limbus send Harper back to his family somehow?”

Timothy pursed his lips. “No,” he said after a moment.

The Sticker looked at Razz, who looked away. “Work’s done today. The Princess’s clean crew will take care of the rest here.”

The Sticker growled in pain as he stood. “So what happens to Harper? No mysteries, guys. I ain’t in the mood.”

Razz sighed. “He’ll be taken down to be rendered and prepped for consumption with the rest of these bodies.”

“Along with the aliens? You said the Princess had particular tastes though.”

“Yes, but she won’t turn down getting one of us.”

“Not ever,” Timothy added.

Razz and Timothy were in a funk for a couple weeks after losing Harper. Especially Razz, being the youngest of all the men there. The Sticker wagered he’d never seen anyone he cared about die. Both men would often tell the Sticker stories about Harper while preparing for the day’s work. Some of the stories were funny, some serious, but all equally endearing, and to hear them speak about their friend this way proved them decent guys, which made the Sticker feel more at peace with the company he was now in.

As much as they liked to go on about Harper, neither Razz nor Timothy wanted to share too much about how Limbus talked them into this job on the Princess’s slaughter ship. The Sticker knew how they felt and kept that particular course of events from their conversations. He figured they would all end up sharing everything eventually. After a month of killing Fanjlions, Bezdebos, Horta Sa-inj, and Grettish Friars, they were more like comrades in a war, rather than employees working a job.

And just when life on the Princess’s ship got predictable, her tastes would change. They would learn from her robot emissaries that Fixer guns gave the meat a “smell” or that the bludgeons she next instructed them to use had splintered some of the spines and bone shrapnel had spoiled the meat. Now, a full two months later, the Sticker and his two fellow slaughterers were using short-hafted spears, not much different than the long knife the Sticker was accustomed to in the stockyards.

After their kills, a fleet of peculiar robots would sanitize the floors and transport the bodies to the rendering facilities. Their gelatin-red bodies reminded the Sticker of the cinnamon bears he used to eat with abandon, before he developed several root canals. These robots had no visible power supplies or hinged iron limbs like those he’d seen in movies. The eyes were the only mechanical looking component to them, alarming yellow diodes that blinked as they processed information. Efficient at their tasks though, the robots kept things moving in an orderly fashion, especially the emissary models that conveyed messages in unstilted American English.

The Sticker would watch them move around like furious gummy children, pushing mops heaped in gore, moving puddles of thick alien blood with squeegees, picking up corpses and flinging them into the small dump trucks. It was amazing to behold mechanical devices moving around so fluid and unerring.

Which was why the Sticker couldn’t understand the sorry-ass lag-time and glitchiness of the personal computer in his dorm room. Tasha had the computer sent over a couple days after he arrived. The laptop was modern, nothing special, save for the fact that the self-sustaining battery never lost a charge. So again, why all the lagging? Why all the glitches? He was grateful to have some sort of connection to Earth, but this was weak.

The Sticker didn’t post much to any social sites, but he was an avid lurker that read about his friends and sometimes distant family members. One person held his attention the most, however.

He sent Annette another message the day he set up the computer: Did you ever read my email?

The answer came back a few days later. Tell me where you’ve gone. I’ve received phone calls from the Regional Water Quality Control Board, the EPA, and the police department. Your boss, Gerald Bailey, was put in the hospital with a life-threatening infection. They are blaming you.

He typed back: Sorry to hear that. I’m out of state. I don’t think I’ll be back in a long time.

A week passed and another email came through: You need to get back to me soon about this. Are you in town still? I’ve called your uncle Pete, and he hasn’t heard from you.

He replied: Did you get my last email? I said I’m out of state.

Her response: Do you want to go the Freeman’s BBQ this Saturday?

The Sticker sat there, scratching at a burning claw wound from a Grettish Friar on his cheek. Annette had sent this email years ago… why was it coming through again?

Huh? he returned to her.

Then a follow-up email came in: So what state are you in then????? This is serious. You need to contact me.

He didn’t bother to respond.

The next morning the Sticker quickly got dressed. Aside from warmth, the jumpsuits nourished and hydrated them as well. The small amount of body fat he’d had before was nearly gone. He would have felt great had his body not been constantly abused by outside factors. As he suited up, feeling nice and full, satisfied, he heard a knock at his door. He slid it open and found one of the cherry red emissaries standing there.

At first he got a bad feeling that spears were no longer acceptable and the Princess would now like them to strangle her various forms of cattle, but the robot relayed a message from Tasha, in her own voice.

“I’m sorry that I will be unable to visit the ship. The chain of command in our division has insisted I remain on Earth. I’m sorry for this. I hope the lap-top with internet access will bring you some repose. I’m working on getting you transferred, or at least your contract altered so you don’t have to be locked into five years. Take care of yourself and I’ll contact you soon.”

The robot backed away and gracefully strode down the hallway.

The Sticker felt so far away from anything real, but that guidepost for reality wasn’t the Earth, but Annette. Before he slept every night, he wondered if she missed him. With each day that passed, did she realize her mistake? He knew her dreams, saw them grow up from a modest beginning and blossom out. She wanted to become an accountant, but hated school. He coached her through the lectures, tests and all the dreariness that came with it, and then just last year she became a CPA. She thanked him. Profusely. Did she forget the man who did that for her? Would there be a moment when she reflected back to the time she’d felt so small and he made her feel like a giant?

He didn’t want praise. He just wanted some credit.

If she really was going to leave him forever, he at least deserved that.

He attempted to email her several times that night.

Six months passed after those attempts.

No other email came through.

Not even those of the panicked legal sort.

Nothing.

The same day he vowed to stop using the computer was the first time he heard the Princess’s voice. He was loading Fanjlion bodies onto the conveyor and while one of the actuators momentarily powered down, there was a brief course of silence through the rendering facility. The Princess’s scream was pained and infant-like in its misery, and the Sticker thought, without much further reflection, that’s the voice of the thing that will chew me up someday. My body will be mush in her mouth. She’ll swallow me down.

And Annette would never know the difference.

“Hey Slaughter Man, you okay?” asked Razz.

The Sticker opened his eyes. They felt thick and greasy. The sides of his face stung. His nose wasn’t much better. Probably broken in twenty places, or at least it felt that way. He couldn’t breathe through it, so he had to suck in a big breath through his mouth. The slight whistling between his missing front tooth sent a reminder to him of that Joxle beast, how it had picked him up by the neck and slammed him to the floor like some exotic pro-wrestler from beyond the stars. The Sticker had got him good in the end. The creature was smart, but he got it to fall into a hatch for a service tunnel. He bled it out right there. Joxles bled red, just like cows. That was a bit of a nostalgic moment for the Sticker, though it was hard to enjoy after having his ass kicked by something roughly twice the size of a sumo.

“You can just rest there. Timothy and I got this one today.”

“Nah,” said the Sticker. He pushed up on his arm and it felt bruised from shoulder to knuckles. Bruised to the bone.

Razz’s broad African features could hardly be seen in the room. The cabin lights had not powered up yet. “You gotta know something…”

The Sticker lied back down. “Yeah?”

“We were given new orders last night.”

“Don’t tell me it’s the Friars again. If it is… shit, I might have to sit this one out after all. Let you younger guys handle it.”

Razz let go a trembling breath and shook his head. “You got cut up pretty bad yesterday.”

“Thing had sharp claws. Maybe worse than a Friar. Hell, it was just so goddamn strong.”

For a moment Razz didn’t say anything, just sat there, looking numb and featureless.

“What was the order?” the Sticker prompted.

“You bled all over that thing. The Princess got a taste for you…”

The Sticker pushed all the way up in bed now and edged himself painfully against the freezing metal wall. “Grossed her out, eh?”

Razz sadly snorted.

“So, okay, I get it. Now what? You guys gonna fall in line?”

“I don’t know… my contract for this job ends in a year. I hear that some people end up working for Limbus itself. Recruiters, scouts, that stuff. They might even promote me when I get back. I was banking on my luck to bring me there.”

It was a joke they’d both said to each other before. Razz and the Sticker played backgammon every evening and shared the same self-deprecating nature. Neither was that competitive; no shit talking ever came about. They just liked playing games. Timothy wasn’t much for games and chose to read instead, and for that, the Sticker was closer to Razz, which was likely why he was the one to bring this bad news.

They had arrived at a point where neither could take a move.

“You know…” Razz took a while to form the words. “It’s not just the job. You know Tim and I wouldn’t… not for that.”

“Nice to hear.”

“One of the guys before Harper, his crew’s first day of work was getting rid of the last crew. If we refuse her anything, the Princess will demand new people. They’ll take us all out then.”

“Yeah.” The Sticker cleared his throat and swallowed a bad taste in his mouth. “So when does she want you guys to deliver me to her?”

“After you’re completely healed,” Razz replied.

“Makes sense.”

Razz stood and grunted. “No, it fucking doesn’t. But that’s where we are.”

“Why did Limbus send you here anyway?”

“Screwed up my Army job. Too much to go into. Let’s just say Saigon will never be the same.”

“Really? We still have forces over there?”

“Sure do. Don’t believe everything you read. But what about you? Why’d Limbus send you here?”

“Same friggin thing. Screwed up my last job.”

Razz laughed and then trailed off, eyes hazy. “I don’t know what to do, man. I just… don’t.”

The lights in the room came on then, illuminating them both.

“Now do you?” asked the Sticker.

Razz’s mouth peeled back into a grin. “You asshole.”

“Go on now. I need to think about this.”

“We could keep beating the shit out of you, I guess.”

Now the Sticker laughed. “As much as that sounds really fun, I think the Princess will take notice.”

Razz’s face went grim. “She would at that.”

“You’ve seen her then?”

“Just been outside the audience chamber, to deliver a pallet of her digestive enzymes. Heard her eating… smells like a boneyard in there.”

“I know that smell.”

“Not like this, man.” Razz went to the door, all his good humor drained from him. “Take it easy, and Tim and I will come here for our break.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“Oh,” Razz added. “Don’t put on your jumpsuit. It’ll heal you faster.”

“Good to know.”

The robots came by every morning to check the Sticker’s injuries. By the fourth day his cuts had crusted over and his bruises had shrunk from purple clouds to jaundice strata. He was getting better and the robot’s vital scanners were taking note.

Every night the Princess’s hungry screech rattled the walls of the ship. Dying for food. More. It hurt his insides to even listen to the sound. He’d gone back to using his computer and tracked down some classical music by composers he’d never heard of, enjoying both the brooding kind Annette had taught him to like and the more energetic symphonies that lifted his spirits despite everything else.

Razz and Timothy visited him several times a day, but never had much to say. It was becoming obvious that Razz had resigned himself to the worst outcome, while Timothy still held out hope they would think of something.

Around that fourth day, they did think of something, although the plan didn’t summon much excitement from the Sticker.

Robots were in and out of the medical supply cache throughout the day to deliver various digestive supplements to the Princess, including those enzymes she required to process some of the different alien tissues she consumed. But there weren’t only gastrological medications in the cache. In a few instances in the past, the Princess experienced a form of pain that only cybernetic organisms could acquire; steel-shock was the layman’s term, and as the Sticker understood it, this kind of pain involved the inflammation of organic nerves, while the blood took on a high metal content; essentially the whole body experienced something akin to being struck by lightning, continually, for hours. Therefore, in the medical cache, copious drums of a preferred anesthesia called Lethardohl 90/30 could be found. The drug worked successfully on a wide spectrum of life forms, humans included.

Razz’s plan would be to sneak in during the day and hide behind the garbage compactor in the back of the medical cache. The delivery robots had tunnel vision and never did any security sweeps of the room. He would hole up in there for a few hours after they stopped coming for supplies, since they still did a patrol of the halls until all lights went out. It was risky, but worth it for the Sticker. After they had the Lethardohl, he only needed to take a teaspoon orally of the syrup. He would fall into a stupor and he would not feel their knives, nor would he know his final moment.

Brain-dead… and then they’ll cut my throat. How nostalgic.

The Sticker agreed to the plan more for his friends’ sake than his own. If the roles had been reversed, he wouldn’t have wanted to cause them pain either, or see the look in their eyes as he slashed through their jugular.

But you wouldn’t take their way out; you’d fight for them. Right? The Sticker shook his head. Not if Annette was waiting for me. I would do what I had to, to get back to her.

At least, he used to think he would have. Now, he wasn’t so sure. Being far away from her had made him realize that he could breathe fine on his own. He still loved her, but he didn’t think about her every waking moment like he used to.

The night of their medical cache raid, he waited in the hallway, feeling comfortable and less hungry now that he wore his jumpsuit again. This hall was one of the few with a window to space. With the lights out, standing there was standing in nothingness. Only a dim, peach glow came from underneath the door. They could hear Razz slowly breaking the door’s seal from within.

“I don’t want to do this,” said Timothy. “We shouldn’t do this.”

The Sticker said nothing. He was not going to insist on their plans to kill him, not by any stretch.

The padding sound of a robot’s footsteps came from down the hall. The two men froze. With a sucking sound the door to the medical cache opened and Razz poked his head out. The Sticker put his finger to his lips.

The robot’s footsteps faded and they retreated inside the room. Litter and assorted junk spread out over the floor like a small cyclone had gone through the room. Several drums had been knocked over amidst the mess. The Sticker stepped on a pile of thin aluminum and cringed at the crumpling sound he’d made.

“What the hell has gone on in here?”

“Oh, too much to explain, boys, but I’ve been having some fun.” Razz looked excited, out of breath and like he hardly knew where to start. “Tim,” he finally said, “Remember what Harper said about membrane transport?”

“That DNRM-33 stuff?”

“Yeah, the transport stores all biological profiles using that stuff to translate our DNA, blabbety-blab.”

“Ok.”

“He said that in times where astrodynamic computers were down, he knew people who took double doses of the stuff, stepped in and it kicked them back to their original location.”

Timothy nodded, though his face was dubious. “It might be an urban legend, but yeah, Harper thought the membrane’s internal memory cannot possess identical biological data. Another couple doses of DNRM-33 will instruct it to code something previously coded, not once, but twice. This is registered as an anomaly error, a safety measure is supposedly then taken by the system and a forced return occurs.”

“Is there enough of that stuff here for us all to go back?” asked the Sticker.

“There’s a drum of it.” Razz smiled. “We’re good.”

The Sticker ran his hands through his shaggy hair and entwined his fingers at the back of his head. “Holy shit.”

“Hold on though.” Timothy’s face took that ghostly look as he turned from them in the dark. “We can’t fool ourselves. Only one of the robots has a physical key to the membrane station door. If it was a code or a keycard, I could probably work it out, but it’s an old school iron key, as primitive as primitive comes. We don’t know which robot holds it either. They aren’t going to tell us, and if you hadn’t noticed, the robots all look identical. Believe me, I like your idea, but I’m just sayin’…”

Razz glanced at the Sticker. “No worries. I’m not banking on my luck this time.”

“No?”

From his pocket, Razz pulled out what looked like a piece of black trash bag. It curled as he took it out, a living, moving thing.

“You stole one?” Timothy asked.

The Sticker tried to adjust his eyes in the dark. “Stole what?”

The black material bent around Razz’s hand and formed like a glove. His hand grew four more fingers, turned into a ball with spikes, and then into a foot-long machete. After a moment, it dissolved down to a bar shape with a key at the end.

“How did you steal one of the Fanjlion’s gloves?”

“I didn’t,” explained Razz. “These robots aren’t much for discerning treasure from trash. But as you can see from my mess, I am.”

After a moment, Timothy forced a smile. “I really hope this works. I don’t want to be right.”

“Don’t trust your gut. You have that irritable bowel syndrome thing anyway.”

The Sticker laughed.

“Ha-ha-ha. Fuck you.” Timothy scowled. “So what do we do then?”

“Take that bag of syringes there on that drum of DNRM-33 and fill them at the port on the side. We’ll need two each, so fill six. The stuff looks like water but it’s as thick as tar, probably will take some time.”

“Piece of cake.” Timothy picked up the sealed bag of syringes.

Razz looked to the Sticker. “Back me up while I get the Membrane station open. I need eyes in the main hall.”

“Wait!” Timothy went stiff. “What about eyes out in this hall?”

“Hide behind the compactor; believe me, they don’t look there.” Razz flashed a grin.

With the aid of the Fanjlion glove, the membrane station lock turned over so easily that Razz and the Sticker stood, gaping, for a couple minutes. Timothy arrived soon after and they helped each other take their doses of DNRM-33. Razz turned on the membranes and let them warm, then disconnected the terminal, just in case the thing had some strange origin plugged in, which hopefully wouldn’t alter the course of Harper’s theory.

Or myth.

“How much longer do they have to warm up?” asked Timothy.

“Probably fifteen minutes.” The translucent flaps patterned unnatural light over Razz’s face and sloped down his nose.

“I gotta go.”

“You’re kidding me, right? This is no time for your irritable bowels.”

“Membranes aren’t going anywhere. They’re just warming up. The lav is just across the hall.”

“Good God, just go on, hurry up, damn.” Razz waved Timothy away.

Timothy took off into the dark hallway, the sounds of his huffing breaths soon vanishing.

The Sticker leaned against the wall and shut his eyes a moment. It was unreal. The past week he’d thought only about his impending death sentence. Now this. Escape. Even after all he’d been through, he didn’t feel he’d earned this. He was lucky to have been put on board with someone as clever as Razz.

The Sticker picked up the Fanjlion glove and put it on. Razz had let him fool with it a little earlier, changing his hand into different shapes.

“What’s on your mind?” asked his friend, who admired the membranes, head cocked curiously to one side.

“Wondering what you’ll go back to. You were almost through with your contract.”

“Well, there are more important things.”

“Yeah, but… this is one hell of a job. You’ve earned your money. What if they say you’re in breach and don’t pay anything?”

Razz shrugged. “We’re alive. That’s all that matters.”

“I guess.” He stopped playing and let his hand resolve back into four fingers and a thumb.

“So what are you going to do? With all that shit waiting for you back home?”

The Sticker had forgotten he’d told Razz about Annette and Trevor and how he’d left his last job. It was just as well, but still embarrassing to be worrying over those things in the face of all they’d seen. “I haven’t got it sorted out. Maybe Limbus will find me another job. Forgive and forget?”

Razz shook his head. “I don’t know. I cannot predict that company’s motivations. I will say this: I always have a contingency plan, and nobody gets to know about it but me.”

“Pretty slick dude, you.”

“Like buttered Vaseline, baby.”

They laughed and then waited in silence for ten minutes. Razz started pacing over to the door to search outside for Timothy.

After another five minutes, his voice edged with panic. “What the hell is he doing taking so long? This isn’t some casual trip we’re taking. Shit!”

“I’m going to go get him.” The Sticker started off and Razz took his arm. “The membranes are warmed up. We can go. Maybe you shouldn’t risk it.”

“With all you guys did for me, I couldn’t do that.”

“I was afraid you’d say that.” Razz nodded. “I’ll wait until you get here, though I’m not looking forward to seeing any of you guys butt naked.”

“The feeling’s mutual. And don’t worry, Tim’s probably fine. We would have heard something if he wasn’t.”

“Probably fell in, the dummy.”

The Sticker took off into the hall, darkness immediately folding around him. The lavatory was only a dozen yards or so from the Membrane Station, around a corner. It was surprising that Timothy even had problems with his bowels. The food delivery gleaned from their jumpsuits did cause their bodies to produce stool, but it was runny and thin and only a couple ounces every other day. It took less than a minute to be done with your business, so it was concerning that so much time had passed. He got to the lav door and pushed it open.

The door shut behind him and the blackness was absolute.

“Tim, are you okay? We’re waiting.”

The Sticker took a few steps and strained his ears. If only he had a flashlight—

He let out of shout of pain. Something had pierced through his neck and a terrible sensation flooded down his chest and into his heart. The Sticker stumbled back through the door, knocking it open. Timothy came rushing out like a bald wraith.

The Sticker tried to speak but his lips were numb, his throat passage thickened. Every inch of his skin warmed and then froze.

“I’m sorry,” said Timothy into his ear. “That fool thing Harper said won’t work. They’ll come for us anyway. They’ll find us. She’ll eat everybody here. I have to do the right thing.”

The Sticker tried to get the man off his chest, but his muscles had turned to water.

“You won’t feel it. I could have done it in the bathroom. Just cut out your throat. I didn’t. I could have let you suffer. I didn’t. You don’t deserve that. You’re a good man. We’re all good men.” Timothy picked up his knife spear. “We just have a really bad fucking job.”

With the only energy he still possessed, the Sticker brought up his hand, Fanjlion glove turning it to a blade.

The point came out the top of Timothy’s skull. The man’s eyes went hazy. His lips tried a few words, but they came out gummy nonsense. He fell off the Sticker, blood rushing from his mouth like a river at last free from a lifetime obstacle.

The Sticker got up to his knees, looking around dizzily.

The lights in the hall blinked on.

All the commotion had signaled the Princess. Hundreds of padded feet fell in the hall, coming from all directions.

He crawled around the corner. Razz stood in the threshold of the membrane station. Another river of red, this one, an army of like-minded slaves came blasting down the hall from both sides. Razz spotted the Sticker and emerged. The robots were almost upon him.

“Come on!”

The Sticker shook his head. “Go!” he hollered over the noise. “Go!”

Razz fell back inside the room, terror in his face. The door to the membrane station shut.

Good, thought the Sticker. That’s good.

And then he stopped thinking; his presence of mind ripped away and shoved itself into a colorless place.

He didn’t know how long he’d been asleep but the Sticker awoke gagging. The death smell around him was palpable. In his early twenties, working a stockyard in northern California, he’d been assigned the atrocious duty of cleaning out a dumpster that held spoiled beef livers. That was vile.

This was worse.

His eyelids sagged as he fought to open them. The half-moon shaped room took on the ominous look of a mechanical dragon — thin metal plates on floor, ceiling and walls. Several dozen robots scrubbed blood off the eastern wall, and a few scattered throughout the room worked the floors. More huddled behind him, blocking the exit.

The Sticker stood, against all warnings from his body to do otherwise. He faced a large platform that took up most of the room. On it sat, generators, supercomputers, machines tumbling drums of the digestive enzyme, steel cables flexing from dark locations; seeing it all took his eyes for a dizzy ride that landed on the most horrible part of all. Above the mass of unified machinery, an immense head stretched forth, connected to the cables by sinew and taut reams of leathery red muscle. The head had a canine shape, though there was no fur or even skin to speak of, just muscle and bone with two eyes like globes of jet.

The Princess shook from side to side and let forth a spiteful choking sound.

A robot approached the Sticker and said in a bland female voice. “Sit down.”

He looked back at the snarling head, which was large enough to snap him up whole in its jaws. “I’d love to,” he said, and did as asked, his lower back at once exploding with its normal achiness. Exhaustion rolled throughout him and he jerked his head back to keep awake.

The Princess clicked a large bloody tongue against her pink fangs, long as fence posts.

“Your friend escaped through the transport,” the robot translated. “Are you happy?”

“Yes,” the Sticker replied.

The robot clucked and snickered in the Princess’s language.

“That is fine. One friend did not get away.”

A steel caged cart pushed through the gathering of robots at the door, two other robots laboring at its weight. Pieces of Timothy were piled inside. His face looked up at the ceiling, mouth open, chin painted in brown blood.

The Sticker looked on, numbly, thankful for the surrealistic lens imparted on him by the sedative. It took him a moment to remember what had happened. A man who he thought was his friend, so desperate he’d made the wrong choice. The Sticker thought he should be more repulsed by the sight, even under the influence. Maybe it was all the death he’d seen. Maybe because he would never see Annette again. Or maybe he’d always envisioned an awful end to his life and this confirmation held him in morbid awe.

When the robots started tossing Timothy into the Princess’s mouth though, it was gratifying to the Sticker to feel his gorge rise a little. He hadn’t lost his humanity through all this.

As the Princess’s teeth slammed together and ground up Timothy, drums of enzymes twisted and twirled, lights on the computer displays dazzled like a toxic Christmas display, holograms of the food source molecular breakdowns pulsed in the air. Blood sprayed down from the Princess’s jaws and pooled on the floor near the stage. Toward the end of the meal, she made a sickening yummy sound that turned into one of her infant hunger screams.

“More,” said the robot. “Fresh,” it added.

A steel collar clicked around the Sticker’s neck and a force pitched him forward. He twisted his face back and saw several robots handling a large boom connected to his collar. They drove his body across the slippery floor until he slammed into the stage. He thrashed around to break their grip, but his muscles seized at their rock steady resistance. They pulled and he hitched back on his rear.

The Sticker threw an arm behind his neck to see if he could reach the boom. He grasped air, nothing more. As he brought his arm back something tremendous dropped over his bicep. In silent terror he watched as the Princess severed his arm just under the shoulder, ripped it away from his body and greedily chewed it up in the left side of her mouth.

The pain felt like a distant horror waiting to visit upon him. He could smell the meaty odor of the Princess’s breath. Her glassy black eyes rolled back in ecstasy as she ate.

Robots seized him by the legs and lifted the Sticker in the air for presentation.

“Too good,” an unseen robot translated. “More,” another said. “My destiny.”

The Sticker kicked to get free; the Princess caught that leg in her mouth and took it off at the kneecap. Heart racing, blood pumping free of his leg and shoulder, the Sticker closed his eyes and tried to think of Annette, the good times, only the good times. It was difficult to concentrate though, listening to his body parts being sloppily consumed. Another roar of hunger filled the room and shock overtook him.

The Sticker passed out hearing the tremendous, insatiable wailings of the Princess, and this horrific, soul-rattling sound was the same thing that woke him.

But he was in a different place now. He’d been here once before to get bandaged up by robots, after he took that beating on the last job. The medical bay…

Why was he here now?

The Sticker glanced down at the frayed veins and bone protruding down from his shoulder. A thin blue coating of some medicinal chemical sealed everything off, almost like plastic wrap around a chicken drumstick. He couldn’t see his leg stump from this prone position, but it had the same tight feeling down there.

Oddly, but not so oddly, his good leg rested in a rectangular pan of brine, and his good arm soaked in another concoction that smelled of vinegar and spices.

Variety, he thought with a sickening inward twinge.

He tried to move but found his body strapped to the exam table like Frankenstein’s monster. Only they aren’t giving me body parts; they’re taking them.

The Princess’s screams heightened to eardrum piercing levels. He’d never heard her so worked up. The maddening repetition of screeches and tantrum sobs worked at the Sticker’s shredded mind. He wanted to scream with her. He almost began to sympathize with her pain. He almost wanted to end it as much as he figured she did.

But he wanted to live, too.

Live? What life do you have now? You’re going back with less than you came with. Hell… you’ll be like one of those sad, sorry fucks begging near the freeway. LOST JOB, LEG AND ARM. GOT A DOLLAR?

“Shit,” he laughed.

A calm robot voice came over the ship intercom. “Additional hands required to assist with enzyme blending and conveyance. Immediate need. Code 78-9 directive.”

That didn’t sound good. The announcement wasn’t exactly the same as others the Sticker had heard in previous months, but usually more enzymes meant more eating. Just how long had she planned on marinating him here? And why? She’d never done such a thing with her other meals. Certainly not Harper or Timothy.

She likes your taste.

Invisible knives sunk into the core of both his stumps and the Sticker shouted out, blinded by white hot pain. Whatever that blue plastic seal stuff was, it didn’t have anything to take the edge off. The sedative Timothy had pumped into him wore off sometime during his blackout. This next go round with the Princess would be au natural. Would she leave him alive again? Slowly take him apart piece by piece? Or would this next time be the end to all of this?

“Critical need. Code 98-9 directive,” the overhead droned.

Good, maybe I upset her stomach. Maybe she’ll die.

The Princess answered this by suddenly going quiet. The screaming stopped.

The Sticker lay there, staring at the dim canned lights in the ceiling of the med bay. New thoughts raced through his head. If she did die, what would the robots do? Let him rot here, more than likely.

After twenty minutes had passed, those sorted fantasies faded. The Princess began to groan and call again, more fervently than ever.

From down the hall, padded robot feet sounded in parade. The Sticker twisted once in his bindings, just to reassure himself there wasn’t a weakness he hadn’t exploited. The bindings held firmly.

The med bay door opened and the red gelatin bodies of the ship’s robots quickly filled the room, seeming eager to complete their tasks.

Losing no time, they stuck a boom into the side of the collar still snug around his throat. They untied the two straps around his body and pushed him into a sitting position. The Sticker yelped as barbed strings of agony pulled through his chest and groin. The robots disengaged the wheel locks on the exam table, and pushed him out of the med bay. He wanted to grab one of them or grab the boom, but that would mean letting go of the table, and thereby choking himself.

The calls from the Princess intensified as they neared the audience chamber. At the urgency of her tone, the robots pushed the exam table faster.

Here we go.

As they turned the corner and he caught sight of the room, the Sticker straightened and cold resolve shot through his gut out to his extremities, real and ghost alike.

Fuck this.

He swung his leg hard and smashed a robot in the face with his heel. The gummy substance of its face was nothing like the candy, however. Bones bruised and fractured in his foot on impact. He would have yelled out but the air was taken from his lungs as his weight pitched the table sideways.

The robots moved with merciless grace and righted the table.

The Sticker pushed up on his only arm. A robot came around the table, red arms extended to capture him, diode eyes oscillating wildly.

His fingers brushed something. The boom! It’d disconnected from his collar. He wrapped his fingers gladly around it, picked it up and slammed it into the robot’s red skull. Hard vibrations shook his arm but he did it twice more, bending the metal end of the boom’s length. The robot, unhindered, continued toward him.

“All hands report to enzyme catalyst station,” the overhead blurted. “Repeat, all hands.”

The robot stopped, lowered its arms. It turned quickly on one heel and headed off with the others.

The Princess gurgled something in her own language from beyond the door.

The Sticker remembered the translation. More.

He grabbed the edge of the exam table and using the boom like a ski pole, got to a standing position. He headed for the membrane station. Several robots charged past him, no longer concerned with him.

Razz must have fouled the enzymes, he thought. His contingency plan.

The Sticker prayed the membrane station wasn’t locked again. If the Princess wasn’t dead, this happy little escape would be all for nothing.

His pace was dreadfully slow and unbalanced. He fell more times than he wished to count, but thankfully, not only was the door to the membrane station not locked, it wasn’t even attached anymore. The robots must have knocked it off its hinges attempting to stop Razz.

The Sticker activated the membranes like he’d remembered seeing. He painstakingly removed his collar as he waited for them to heat up. Returning to Limbus Los Angeles was still a hope-filled concept. Just because Razz went through this thing, didn’t mean he got sent back to the offices there.

Whatever happened was better than this, the Sticker decided.

When the time came for him to enter the membranes, he had to kneel, making him wonder about unintended consequences.

After enduring the insanity that was membrane transport, the Sticker realized he hadn’t returned exactly to the same place he’d left.

He was back at Limbus, but he wasn’t in the same station. Instead he was in the lobby, near the rotating globe, wailing gibberish at the top of his lungs. He fell sideways, having reformed in a standing position on one leg. As he collapsed on his face, several people in business attire rushed over to help him.

The Sticker glided his tongue over his teeth to re-taste the Frosted Flakes from the Limbus cafeteria earlier that morning. He’d forgotten how wonderful food could taste, having relied on his bio-suit for almost a year now.

Tasha was still depressed. Him showing up missing body parts and smelling of alien meat tenderizer, she took all responsibility for. At breakfast despite all his memories of her intelligent, snarky demeanor, she broke down crying. Though secretly anxious to get back to his third bowl of sugary corn flakes, he put down his spoon and touched her hand.

“At least I made it back. My friend Razz can’t say the same, right? I don’t blame you, so it doesn’t make sense to blame yourself. Got it?”

Tasha shook her head and wiped away jeweled tears from her intense green eyes. “I could have insisted on my visiting. I shouldn’t have bowed so easily. You didn’t deserve a job like that. I should have fought harder for your reassignment.”

Anything else he’d said hadn’t made a dent. She sat next to him in Trevor’s office, her small arms folded tight over her chest, her face pensive.

Trevor strolled in, after keeping them waiting for nearly an hour.

The Sticker’s heart jumped in his chest.

Annette was with him. She gave him a leery, but sympathetic smile, then patted his shoulder, just above his missing arm. Trevor sat and she rounded his desk to stand at his side.

“Annette? You… know about this place?” he stammered.

“As of last week,” Trevor answered, moving a stack of papers off his keyboard. “When you left for your job. Annette was getting an ulcer from all those calls from the water board and the authorities. I had to protect her, and I wanted to be honest with her, since we’re in love.”

The Sticker flinched. “Last week? I’ve been gone almost a year.”

“Actually,” Tasha said, leaning over, “your unorthodox way of returning was the only reason why you didn’t return at exactly the same moment you left.”

“Technically, Trevor tells me that you went back in time,” said Annette, her tone filled with romantic mystery. “Fifty years ago!”

“In respect to the multiverses, things happen simultaneously throughout history,” Tasha said. “Time really doesn’t matter. Every moment is happening all at once… think about it that way.”

“No thanks,” the Sticker commented. He shook away the disturbing idea. “So wait, that’s why I kept getting old Facebook posts and news articles?”

“I tried to send you current database information for those websites, but it took about five Earth years to send it, which complicated the gesture.”

“Are you girls done chatting about space and time?” Trevor asked, blond eyebrows lifted impatiently. “There’s some serious shit that needs attending.”

“Go then already,” said the Sticker. He’d have loved to stand and clock the guy, but with this broken body, from now on, fantasizing would be the only way he could ever seek vengeance.

“We need to negotiate a deal with the Princess of Ganymede. Since she’s refused other slaughterers, we can no longer keep her armada out of striking reach of this circle of clientele. We will sustain a serious loss of partnerships if we allow her to attack this planet. She’s hungry, and she doesn’t bluff. There is one bargaining chip we still have, though.”

“Me.”

“You. Let me read something our people translated. This is from the Princess herself.”

With his good arm, the Sticker propped himself up straighter. It wasn’t every day you got to hear a missive from a thing that would rather see you on a platter than alive.

“I have found the One,” Trevor read. “This man you sent to me, I’ve tasted. I savor his taste like nectar from the Five spirits of Blyne. I know he does not want to cooperate with any terms I shall set, especially after how he was treated last we met, but Mr. Milstead, you must find it in your bland human heart to understand how I can no longer live without his taste. I’ve found perfection in his texture, richness, and I lust after his strong, fragrant blood. If I cannot have him forever, then I see no more sense in rotting away in one of my ships. I will no longer seek employees from your agency and I will encroach upon your territory. You will not stop me. I will eat. I will be full. I will, however, admittedly not be content. You could give contentedness to me and prevent all of this.

You see, I’m in love with this man. If he worries about death, tell him not to fear, because I will accept any food he grows through mechanical synthesis. I will NOT accept cloned tissues or organs. All meat must be grown from his hallowed body. If you give me this… my fleet stays in this system. This is my promise. — PoG”

Trevor folded up the printout. “Fairly steamy stuff there.”

Tasha and Annette both frowned, likely for completely different reasons. After a moment, they all looked at the Sticker, who bent forward as their eyes probed, a little self-conscious of being made to sound important.

“So… I don’t really understand.”

“We have a cellular regeneration corridor at this location,” said Trevor. His handsome face seemed to be the only thing in the room covered in shadow, until he moved his chair forward. “I’ve got to say though, it’s a painful process, especially when you rush it. The Princess will need us sending shipments of your… parts, almost on a daily basis.”

“How bad is it?”

“Worse than giving birth is the most common reaction I get from females. Men are normally at a loss for words to describe it. But come on, you’re being maimed of all your limbs, maybe some of your organs eventually and then you’re forcing your body to regrow itself in a day’s time. It’s hardcore, buddy.”

“Sounds like it,” said the Sticker.

“No!” Trevor smacked his desk and nearly came out of his seat. “This isn’t an occasion to be flip, you bucktoothed fool! This is NOT the occasion. Believe me. Look man, you might not like how things have gone between us, but I respect you enough to at least get the same in return. This is our fucking world we’re talking about here. As I see it, you’re responsible.”

“How?”

“You’re the one she wants so friggin’ bad. Shit. Regenerating your tissues will cost a fortune. Until you went out there, we only needed to send a handful of able bodies willing to bring home a decent paycheck. Now, we’ll probably have to devote one of our molecular chambers just to you.”

“No you won’t,” said the Sticker. “Because I’m not doing it. Jail is better than this deal.” He glanced at Tasha. “Can you get me out of here?”

Tasha looked down and shut her eyes.

“Hey, Tasha…”

“She knows,” said Trevor with a smile.

“Knows what?”

“Knows you’re fucked. If you leave, law enforcement is waiting for your crippled ass outside, waiting for my signal. They’ll have you before you can even hop once to your truck. Not that you could even drive, lefty.”

The Sticker, though unnerved that Trevor knew he drove a truck, just stared blankly at him.

“What’s more, I’m going to take down your entire crew at Sunshine State.”

“What?”

“Pablo, Jackson, Carl and any other folks around you that day. They’ll all be implicated. Because of you.”

The Sticker looked at Annette, who couldn’t meet his eyes. “What happens if I say yes?”

“Superb.” Trevor breathed out a sigh of relief. “I like where you’re going with this… so if you say yes, a few things will happen. For one, you will have total freedom. We will get rid of your outstanding issues with Gerald Bailey and Sunshine State Meat Products and you’ll be free. You’ll be able to leave the offices here, whenever you want, find a place to live, preferably near Los Angeles, so you can come back every day to donate and heal.”

“How much will I get from this?”

“After you help pay for the cost of the cellular synthesis—”

“What?”

“Remember, this is your fault.”

The Sticker wanted to find something heavy and hurl it at the man, but pieces of paper were the only things he saw on the desk.

“What will my pay be then?”

“You’ll make a little more than you did at the stock yards. If there’s any new technology that comes about that makes this more affordable, of course, your salary will be adjusted less that cost.”

“Cocksucker,” Tasha muttered.

“What?” Trevor snapped.

Tasha folded her arms tighter and glared at him.

“I guess you have me where you want me,” said the Sticker.

Trevor eyed him closely, uncertain. “So we have a deal? I’ll get a contract.”

“Can I have the afternoon to think about this?”

“There’s nothing to consider, but sure, you can have a couple hours,” said Trevor. “The Princess hasn’t responded to us in a few days. I think she’s trying to scare us a bit with her silence, but, I’ll send a correspondence you’ve been handed the terms.”

The Sticker looked at Tasha. “Can you help me into the hall?”

“Of course I can.” She put her arm around his mid-section.

As they left, the Sticker glanced back to Annette. He was both startled and overjoyed to see her following them outside. For an instant he thought she may have come to be with him — it’d been so long, but for her, only a few days had passed since they’d last seen each other.

Tasha helped him over to a chair and Annette sat in the other seat next to him. He wanted her to look more worried than she did, but the woman he’d married seemed to have turned a corner and he’d been left on some side street, alone, with no sense of direction to find her again.

Tasha left, probably sensing he wanted to be alone with Annette. Despite what he faced, he was glad to know that somebody here at Limbus was on his side.

“I think you’re being very brave by taking this deal,” said Annette.

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“Not sure I have much of a choice… unless you want to take a chance and get me out of here?”

“What would that help?”

“Come on. Trevor isn’t what you thought.”

“Yeah, he’s more. Supervisor in a company like this! Not to mention his businesses on the outside.”

The Sticker looked down at his hand. It was shaking.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“What’s wrong?” he snapped. “Do you really have to ask that? Are you stupid or something?”

“Don’t call me names.”

“Are you kidding me? You don’t give a shit about me.”

“You know why you’d say that? Because you’re selfish.”

“I’m selfish.”

“Yes. You got yourself in trouble, screwed up in so many different ways imaginable, and now you want sympathy? Shit! You’re going to get your arm and leg back.”

“And then they’ll be taken again and again and again and a-fucking-gain! Did you miss that part, Annette?”

“Stop saying I’m stupid. I said you were brave, remember?”

“Oh lord…”

She narrowed her eyes. “Just stop feeling so damned sorry for yourself. It’s sad.”

“Get out.” He shook his head. “I… don’t have anything else to say.”

Annette left him there without another word. It was surprising she even had decided to talk with him, but then, she wasn’t free of guilt completely.

He watched people walk by and wondered about their various stories, what had brought them to this company. Tasha never came back and he continued to sit there.

Trevor never got an official “yes,” or a signed contract from him, but soon enough he spotted some orderlies pushing a gurney down the hall.

Pushing it, toward him.

The Sticker tested his new limbs, squeezing his fist and his toes together. Though he still had a sore throat from screaming and an intense migraine from the synthesis chamber, he found the simple exercise distracting in the best way possible. He didn’t want to think about losing all four of his limbs tonight, waking up tomorrow to go into that chamber again. It didn’t seem like his heart would be able to take something like that — but then again, perhaps they’d let him grow a new heart.

Absently he rubbed his tongue along his crooked teeth again, hoping for some residual sugar of this morning’s breakfast — something was different though. His front teeth were straighter, in-line. He leaned closer to his hospital bed railing and opened his mouth. The reflection did not lie. His teeth were straight and bright white, completely unstained. It had to have happened while he was under. But why?

“Hi there, Slaughter Man,” said a voice in the doorway.

“Do I know you?”

An older black man with snow white hair walked into the room. The Sticker studied his face for a moment, looked past the age lines and locked eyes. “Razz? Is that you? Holy shit, you’re so old.”

“Ha! Thanks.” Razz pulled out a stool and sat before the bed, a big grin painted on his face.

“But they told me that nobody else came through the transport.”

“Well, can’t blame them for being wrong about that… I returned fifty years before you.” Razz chuckled.

The Sticker opened his mouth but another voice said, “Time doesn’t matter.”

Tasha entered the room. “You could have told me, Dad.”

“It had to happen the same way I knew it would. I’m not playing with what would occur if you’d altered the course of things. You knew that I started working contracts for this company as a young man. I told you that.”

“You never told me it was on the Princess’ slaughter ship. That might have been good information for the Slaughter Man here to take with him.”

“I disagree.”

“You…” said the Sticker. “You’re Razz Willing then? How did I not know that?”

“Actually it’s Arnold Willing. Harper and Timothy made up the name because I always razzed them.”

The Sticker’s gut twisted. “Do you know about what happened to Tim?”

“Yeah,” said Razz sadly. “I’ve known for some time now. I think the tension of that last week really took him to a place he couldn’t return from.”

“I wish I could have…”

“Leave it alone for now. You’ve been through enough. I’m just glad to finally see you again. So yes, nobody except you three ever called me Razz. But what the hell, I never actually asked your real name either, Slaughter Man.”

“So you became some Limbus big shot?”

“ Well, maybe, but I still feel like I’m working on a slaughter ship some days,” Razz explained with a wink.

“Your contingency plan worked, by the way. Whatever you did with the enzymes bought me enough time to get out of there.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” said Razz. “Why don’t you tell him, Milstead?”

The Sticker looked around Razz. In the doorway, Trevor stood with a file folder under his arm. He looked tired and frazzled. The Sticker couldn’t help it but a pre-victory smile crept over his face. He sensed good news — the antithesis of Trevor’s expression.

“Interesting report in about the Princess…” Trevor glanced around, uncomfortable with all the eyes on him. “She suffered massive steel-shock and slipped into a coma, shortly after sending her missive about you.”

Razz turned to the Sticker. “All that scrap metal I found in the compactor — I tossed it in her enzymes. They broke down right away. If she ever recovers, she’ll not be the monstrous eater of the past. Which is well for me. I’m tired of her getting everything she wants while other clients pay the price… not to mention, I haven’t had a good game of backgammon in a long time.”

The Sticker closed his mouth, which had fallen open. “So… I don’t have to go into surgery tonight?”

“I hope not,” said Razz, “you’re being announced tonight at the company’s annual dinner. All division executives have to attend. That’s why we fixed your grill there. Hope you like the new pearly whites, makes you more diplomatic looking.”

He looked at Tasha, who beamed. “I just found out this morning.”

“It’s been tough handling two divisions on my own,” said Razz. “Now I can focus on Ganymede division and you can oversee here.”

“Los Angeles?”

Razz laughed. “No, Earth, of course.”

The Sticker choked on some spit that went down the wrong pipe. He looked at Trevor. “But what’s he do? Besides be rich and an asshole?”

“Those businesses are fronts. I answer to the Earth Director here. My sole position is a supervisor of operations in the Los Angeles office,” Trevor put mildly. “Are you going to fire me now?”

“Are you joking?” The Sticker swung out of bed. Both his feet touched the cold ground. It was a lovely, powerful feeling; he wasn’t dreaming after all. He stood toe to toe with Trevor Milstead now. He’d never been afraid of the man, but he’d never felt like an equal either. “I’m never going to fire you, Milstead,” said the Sticker. “Where the hell is the fun in that?”

Tasha sniffed out a laugh and looked away.

“Thanks, Director,” answered Trevor. When nobody said anything, he hurried from the room.

Razz took the Sticker’s hand. “And thank you, Director, for saving my life.”

“I don’t know how to do this job,” the Sticker admitted.

“Nobody does at first. But with my help,” he said, “you’re going to do great.”

“Phenomenal,” added Tasha.

“But isn’t this strange? Me… working directly for you guys.”

“I told you before. This kind of thing happens all the time. Most of our recruiters were once clients, in fact. It’s because our contracts are so blasted weak. I’ve been meaning to revise them.”

“So you?” the Sticker asked Tasha.

The little girl smirked. “No, I’ve never worked outside the company. I was the first recruiter and I’ll be the last.”

“But how—”

“I’ll send a courier later with your new clothes and invitation,” Razz interrupted. “Sound good, Slaughter Man?” He lifted a hopeful eyebrow.

The Sticker threw up his hands. “Sounds good.”

They left him there in the plush hospital room. He felt like hooting and crying and laughing all at once, but instead sat on the bed and closed his eyes.

When he opened them, Annette stood in the room.

“I don’t expect you to forgive my actions or how brutal I’ve treated you lately. I just wanted to congratulate you. Trevor’s not happy, but I know you’ll be a good boss. I’m really stoked for you. I am.”

The Sticker opened his arms and Annette moved into them. It felt so damningly good to hold her again, savor the moment, before he pushed her back and searched her pleading face. Annette studied his eyes for a moment. “You aren’t still mad at me. Are you?”

He shook his head.

She smiled and went to embrace him again, but he put his hand up. “Of course I haven’t stopped caring about you, Annette, but I do have a business to run now.”

She frowned. “But…”

“So,” said the Sticker, pointing to the hall, “if you please, kindly get the hell out of my building. Now.”

The last course was rainbow sherbet molded into a Limbus globe. The Sticker thought it almost too pretty to eat. Tasha and Razz argued a bit about something work-related into which he hadn’t turned his attention.

“You’re so sensitive,” said Razz. “Must get it from your mother.”

“You haven't even met my mother yet!” Tasha said.

“Uh, how, uh, does that work?" asked the Sticker, jumping into the conversation.

“Time doesn't matter, remember?”

“Yeah…”

“What’s wrong?” asked Razz.

The Sticker sighed. The reality of what happened had finally connected. With everything he’d faced, this new world, a world of boundless responsibility, seemed even more terrifying. “It’s just… I don’t feel I’ve earned this.” His voice betrayed him with a quiver.

Razz shook his head in respectful disbelief. “You have. More than anybody here.”

The Sticker looked down under the table, at his loafers, so strange on his feet.

A representative stopped by the table with individual packets. “Hello, Mr. Willing. Hello Ms. Willing. Here are action items and annual budget breakdowns. Oh and hello, Mr. Fulsome, here is yours.”

The Sticker took his packet and nodded thanks.

Tasha said, “Funny, I remember your name from our files, but it sounds strange to hear spoken. We all just called you the Slaughter Man.”

“Dean Fulsome… not sure I ever knew the man,” said the Sticker.

Razz raised his glass. “Happy Birthday, Dean.”

Tasha lifted hers.

Dean lifted his.

“To time not mattering,” he said.

Their three glasses met.

For Dean Fulsome, that was the moment everything began.