KITTY KITTY

  EXTENDED EDITION

  Quentin Raffoux

  Aliénor Rossi

  Contents

  Title Page

  WARNING

  PART 1: WHISKERS AND GUNPOWDER

  #01 KITTY HUNTER

  #02 CHINOISERIE

  #03 AN INELUCTABLE DUEL

  #04 THE TWISTED HEIST

  #05 THE MELLIFLUOUS CAVERNS

  #06 LORD OF THE TANKS

  #07 HONOR AMONG THIEVES

  #08 FIRST DATE & COUP D’ETAT

  Interlude: THE MAIDEN OF SECRETS

  PART 2: THE CHILDREN OF M

  #09 THE NUN OF BEVERLY HILLS

  #10 A GALILEAN TALE

  #11 DANCE WITH THE ROBOTS

  #12 NOAH’S ARK

  #13 THE SCARLETT CITADEL

  #14 THE LEGEND OF PURPLE HEART

  #15 RADIO FREAK I: Strange Things are Afoot in Windy City

  #16 RADIO FREAK II: A Concrete Conclusion

  Epilogue: ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE RINGS

  WARNING

  警告

  KITTY KITTY is a work of fiction.

  Names, characters, business, events and incidents depicted in this book are sorely the obvious products of sick minds. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, or legitimate events is, however, not entirely fortuitous.

  This book contains : Violent firefights - Fuckloads of profanities - Sexual ribaldry - Unethical jokes - A pedantic smoking cat

  The current book is an extended edition and a complete overhaul of the adventures of Lee and Ali, originally published in an earlier version called THE FUTURE THAT NEVER WAS: KITTY KITTY in 2021.

  This new book also contains two special episodes reworked to fit in with the main story line, and once featured in FUTURE THAT NEVER WAS: RADIO FREAKS originally published after the first issues.

  In August 1945, the Empire of Japan surrendered, marking the end of the Second World War. The United States of America emerged victorious, standing as the undisputed nuclear superpower.

  But while the West celebrated its triumph, a new threat bode its time. After they quietly abducted top scientists from the smoldering ashes of Nazi Germany, the Soviets accomplished the unthinkable. The Red Flag rose on the Moon. In July 1955.

  Thus unfolded the Cold War. Pouring all its resources into battle, Humanity unlocked the secrets of quantum computers, artificial intelligence, systemwide networks, fusion energy, terraforming technologies and nutrigel.

  An unstoppable race for dominance raged for decades—stretching far beyond Earth and the asteroid belt. Distracted and fragmented, society lost its cultural direction. Humankind then stumbled towards a future that seemed frozen in time…

  A future where a unified Techno-government rules Mars, where powerful megacorps enslave Jupiter’s moons, where warring Soviet colonies plot within Kuiper’s cold reaches.

  A future with disco-cyborgs, flying Chryslers, and an unexpectedly stellar political career for David Hasselhoff.

  A Future That Never Was

  PART 1: WHISKERS AND GUNPOWDER

  パート1: 触毛と火薬

  #01 KITTY HUNTER

  第01話 キティハン

  Nutrigel®. An enlightened pursuit to nourish thirty billion human beings and the scientific vision for sustaining life on an unimaginable scale. A solar system-wide scale, praised the info-ads.

  Shaping food from cheap and reliable nutrigel became an art. A craft so difficult to master most stellar canteens offered the radiation-free substance directly in raw form: an emerald-colored gum cobble coming with a nebulous taste and consistency most customers couldn’t place on any chart. On the lost stations dotting the highway stretching from Earth to Saturn, one could find courses worthy of their ancient name. Sushi, burgers or tartiflette—everything could be baked with malleable nutrigel. Thanks to spices grown in zero-g and black-market condiments, some chefs even managed to recover most flavors of yesteryear, when the people cramming into our native world cultivated genuine organic food.

  Nonetheless, do you know what Nutrigel® is made from? I mean, do you really? That’s a million-dollar question, folks!

  The official patent shiftily mentioned a secret mix of tholin harvested in the Outer Worlds and gelled sublimates filtered from protein pools, while fanciful theories suggested the involvement of cockroach juice—or even powdered seniors recycled for the common good. When not rambling about A-bombs, Carl Sagan did address the Techno-Congress on the matter—his long indictment broadcast on live TV across the whole system. Not a single soul genuinely watched it. On another channel, Magnum P.I. stole his spotlight.

  Truth be told, nobody knows what Nutrigel® is really made from. And no one really gives a hoot. For after all, as the old Belter adage wisely observes, when the machine runs, don’t question the gears.

  I reveled in such refined high calorie nutri-meals with deep sadness. Because like on this day, my cat stomach wouldn’t allow me to finish them off. “What torment! What suffering! What hopelessness!” In this outmoded diner, my last slice of multi-cheese pineapple pizza lay before me—immaculate, on the chipped Formica table.

  “Monologuing in your head again, Lee?”

  I had apparently let the conclusion of my lament slip away. But what could my teenage human sister understand about my agony? Slumped on the peeled and cracked mauve wall bench, Ali was ravenously munching enough cheddar-dipped crusts to feed a supercargo crew alongside their respective lot lizards. Golden crumbs covered her black jumpsuit. Tomato sauce daubed the blond locks falling over her narrow shoulders.

  I, meanwhile, appeared to be overcome by a few counterfeit pieces of tropical fruit on a slice of fake bread despite a real appetite. Alongside saturated fat and bio-corn syrup, moroseness filled my heart. My belly’s imperial roundness reflecting through my emptied Coke glass was more to blame than my usual existential depression. I always had the blues when I overindulged in food. “My life’s nothing but pain,” I heaved, rolling over the greasy table. Only to rehash my sad failure.

  Ali finally pitied me. Or was I decidedly too cute to leave her indifferent? She washed her hands with a wipe that smelled like gasoline and stroked my silky gray coat. After scratching my white-haired chin, she enjoined us to withdraw with her usual improper slang. “Let’s bounce,” she said.

  “But we haven’t finished yet!”

  She looked daggers at me with her piercing blue eyes. “Wanna ask for a doggy bag?”

  I huffed.

  “Thought so, hairball…”

  Here we were again. Arguing and wasting food, while only a few days ago we almost starved in Phobos’s orbit.

  For weeks, my partner and I have been browsing the colonized system searching for a former Jovian pirate on the run. According to some information we gleaned from passing through Ceres in the main belt, our infamous target would be wandering near the Red Planet. Alas, it turned out he apparently never set foot in Techno-space.

  Standing, Ali struggled to fasten her Velcro belt previously loosened as a safety precaution before eating like an ogre. Flustered, she ultimately left it open, revealing her white boxer shorts through the gap. After adjusting the sleeves of her pink plastic jacket, she nonchalantly threw a few wrinkled bills onto the table. They landed in a sauce drip. “Ready-go?” she asked.

  “Always.” With my usual elegance, I positioned myself on her right shoulder, constantly covering our back when we left a public place. Our modus operandi since our turbulent youth back on Titan.

  My human took a bubblegum, and we departed the almost emptied restaurant. The flickering VFD clock upon the main condiment bar showed 3:00 a.m. MT, standing for Martian Time. A useful input, because an eternal night prevailed outside, beyond the aligned rectangular windows.

  Nancy Sinatra sang through the radio over the muted info-ads on the blurry color TV set. Bang Bang barely covered the discussion of weary long-haul pilots in a cubicle near the toilets. Further on, behind a curtain of cigarette smoke, a robot salesman in a poor-fitting suit with a piano tie palmed electronic trinkets off on a group of gullible Martian tourists. Of the staff, only one waitress with medium curly hair and orange gloss remained in the room, busy cleaning the brass knobs of the antique Mr. Coffee machine customized to work in reduced gravity. She bid us farewell with a nod, bouncing her wrinkled jowls and dentures that held a rolled cigarette firmly in place. Her skin was so white—almost translucent. Real sunlight has probably never embraced her.

  Out here, on the long road to the asteroid fields, the sun’s warm halo had already faded into the chill of the void—much like us, my companion and I, dissolving quietly into the silence between worlds.

  “Diet Betty White is on a late shift,” Ali snickered.

  “You’re a very mean scandalmonger.”

  “Sh’yeah.” Following the long row of tufted counter stools, we reached the dirty Plexiglas gates. Tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, Ali pushed the right door with the shoulder I wasn’t sitting on. Despite her efforts, it refused to move, and she tried the other panel. In vain. “Bogus! Who fuckin’ bolted the gates?” she asked. Anger put her Cronian soft drawl in gear.

  “How are we expected to leave? All the way back through their shady carpeted motel? Unhygienic!” I complained.

  Through the glass, I glanced at the outside handle. It had recently been tampered with using some acidified resin. A yellow viscous substance blistered around the magnetic lock. Fishy, to say the least.

  Unfortunately
, I couldn’t warn Ali as someone immediately shouted behind us: “Alright, people! Everyone stay at their table and keep it close shut! This is a hold-up! Y’all know the drill.”

  Found the unlettered fish. The criminal stood on the counter, bowing his legs to avoid collecting his share of cobwebs with his greasy brown mane. His faux leather jacket gave off a strong smell of perspiration perceptible across the room. Various unstitched badges from the corpo-campaigns around Soviet-space adorned his sleeves. I suppose this bandit sneaked through the other platform leading to the lodge, netting us all.

  “Sacrebleu!” I uttered. “We’ve fallen for it hook, line, and sinker.”

  Ali yawned. “Whatever…”

  We slowly returned to our cubicle, meandering between the tables. The veteran continued his plea punctuated by violent coughing fits. Clapping his boots, he threatened the waitress with a short blade sticking out of his shaky palm.

  That wasn’t Diet Betty’s first armed robbery. She showed no signs of nervousness under the thick Tinkerbell makeup barely covering her deep wrinkles. By contrast, the customers started wriggling. Giggling tourists began filming with their newly acquired handheld Super 8.

  “Enough! Don’t anyone fuss or I cool it down! Live on CNN or not! No hesitation!” the robber shouted, spitting towards the nearest camcorder. The bar’s red neon over his skull lit up his sweaty face, threatening to ignite his poor-quality hairspray. He looked like a cult-maniac, and nobody moved after his final warning: “I’m a wanted man, people! You heard that?”

  I heard that.

  “You heard that?” I whispered to Ali, as we arrived at our table close to the wall. There, I lay down against an empty napkin dispenser resting on top of the bench covered with dusty forgotten gum wrappers, just behind where my human slowly slumped.

  “Wait a sec, would ya?” she mumbled to me. She stuck one of the last cold slices in her mouth. “Browsing the register.”

  My partner secretly typed on her wrist terminal, a tiny rectangular Amiga unit inlaid in the flesh of her left forearm and connected to the table’s network outlet by a three-millimeter diamond-shaped wire. Lines of squared cyan characters flashed up on the black monochrome monitor among poorly rendered pictures. I could hear the transputers cramming megabytes of data from the intraweb.

  “Found anything?” I inquired quietly.

  The criminal spun his head towards us, raising an eyebrow. “Hey!” he fumed, jumping from the bar. My tiny heart stopped. The man quickly made his way through the room, loudly scraping the chairs against the floor. Luckily, Ali had finished her research before he could reach us. “I note that someone here don’t lose her appetite traveling ’cross the void! How do they call you, blondie?”

  It turned out Mr. Thank-you-for-your-service just wanted to pass time. This airhead’s smug and intrusive tone made his clumsy old-fashioned approach more awry.

  Even more deplorable, he had ignored me! Me, the cutest face in the system! Lying on top of the bench, hadn’t he noticed my presence? Was I too stealthy for the common criminal? Or was it a challenge? Of course it was. I had to clear my name. A matter of ancestral feline honor. I uttered: “Who do you think you’re talking to, tasteless human? Can’t you see you’re bothering my partner?”

  The troublemaker opened his eyes wide. Obviously, he had never heard a cat speak so eloquently. Perhaps he had never heard a cat speak at all. “Co—come again, ’noxious rodent?” he stuttered.

  “Obnoxious? Rodent? What insolence!” I spat, my ears flattened. “I happen to be a Maine Coon, Monsieur. I’m only one negligible gene away from the ruthless rainforest jaguar!”

  The man laughed. “Listen, mutant… I’m chatting with the babe looking like trouble.” His wrist blade shone under the pale ceiling lights, ready to cut our throats—or, even worse, steal our leftovers. “I’m not interested in her flea-covered Teddy Ruxpin and its unbearable French accent, capishe?” he pursued.

  Or rather, concluded. For a crash and the sweet scent of Cronian gunpowder curtailed his lame tough-hearted speech. The synthetic copper bullet had cannoned from Ali’s weapon hidden under the laminated table through her plastic plate so fast the last slice resting on it had barely moved. It pierced Mr. Pain-in-the-bottom’s throat, continued straight to the junction of his spine and caromed into his skull, turning half his mind into strawberry jam.

  Ballistics behind Ali’s shot appeared to be amazing science yet delivered disappointingly. No large sheaf of blood repainted the restaurant’s decrepit walls. No Wilhelm scream. No backward jump as you can see in those bad direct-to-video productions. New-Hollywood amounts to little more than deception. As usual.

  The thief collapsed to the ground, overcome by the gentle law of artificial gravity. A few spasms and a muffled hiccup followed the fall. George Orwell wrote a long time ago, you have nothing, except the few cubic centimeters inside your skull. Literally true. Until that plateaued dipstick emptied his jammy cortex onto the turquoise flooring, before gurgling his final breath.

  “That’s not clever, Ali!” I exclaimed as I jumped to the ground. “Look at the mess you made!”

  I landed a few centimeters away from a chunk of the tongue and a pool of purplish blood with a dead-fish smell of cancer. The gaze—or lenses—of the last customers who hadn’t seized the opportunity to rush through the motel turned towards our table. Once again, my sapiens—as I sometimes liked to call her when she acted like an ignorant ape—offered a pitiful spectacle of our profession.

  “He wanted to pinch my slice, Lee…” she strongly defended herself while picking up the shiny expelled shell from her inappropriately massive iridescent .50 AE Desert Eagle. “That’s like the most heinous crime of all, don’tcha think?”

  “Aren’t you exaggerating a bit?”

  “Nah.”

  “I believe you do.”

  “Gag me! Ain’t sharin’ no pizza with an ex-corpo dog. Those jerks suck big time.”

  The cook interrupted our sixth spat of the day. Judging by the sleep lines on his puffy face, that fat, bull-necked individual must have been slumbering in the scullery before summoning up his meager courage to intervene once the threat had been averted. Cop material, I may say.

  “Excuse me, Ma’am…” he began by replacing the safety catch on his old Remington.

  “Don’t call me Ma’am,” Ali complained. “I’m barely eighteen!” She lifted her jacket to put her gun in the leather holster under her armpit. By doing so, she revealed her badge inside her left lapel: a discreet gold-rimmed palladium plaque the size of a quarter.

  “Ma’am the bounty hunter…”

  “Geez, dude…”

  “Easy there, partner…” I preempted, graciously leaping back to the table with our bills in dried sauce. “Let the adults talk.”

  Ali hushed me with a harmless slap on the head. She was the only person who was empowered to do so. And by that, I mean I usually coped with her rude behavior with only minor diplomatic repercussions.

  “See, mister… we just prefer the term Auxiliary of Justice,” I explained to the pizzaiolo. “Private officers from Saturn.”

  “If you say so, tomcat.” He scratched his dreadfully shaven throat. “I mean—could you pronto-up, and retrieve the borg’s ID? We’d like to dispose of the body. Corpses are bad for biz…”

  “Alright… alright!” Ali replied politely, her ragged once-white sneakers bathing in clotting blood. “Picking up his FID, and we motor.”

  An FID—or Finger IDentification—assumed the form of a small visible ring replacing the right annular’s first phalanx. This implant made of plastic and metal contained one’s administrative, banking, medical and other boring material megacorps cheaply sold to governments—and vice versa. Not fully unfailing, the FID was usually retrieved when a human bit the dust. Like a morally acceptable scalp.

  My partner summarily cut off our target’s finger with her heel, and we got a match. She quickly found the robber’s name on her wrist-terminal. Joey Neill. And Joey should have run today. But who cares? He was a wastoid and murderer wanted for C$10,000 on Phoebe. Ten thousand dollar-credits of Martian expanding debt. That’s all that mattered.