WARNING

  The Future That Never Was is a work of fiction.

  Names, characters, business, events and incidents are the products of the authors’ cocaine-coated brains.

  Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is however not entirely coincidental.

  This book series contains:

  Gorish firefights - A shitload of profanities - Sexual stuff - Traumatising content - A pedantic smoking cat

  In 1945, at the start of the Atomic Age, the Allies defeated the Empire of Japan and the other Axis powers. Ten years later, top German scientists abducted by the USSR led the Soviets to the moon, starting an unstoppable race for the stars.

  Devoting all its scientific and industrial resources, a divided world quickly gained access to fusion power, quantum computers, AI, systemwide communication networks and nutrigel.

  But with all eyes focused on a destructive Cold War which spread across a colonized solar system, society’s cultural evolution slowed and humankind opened the gates of a very strange future almost frozen in time…

  A future of a unified Martian technocratic government, shady Lunar megacorporations and outer worlds orbital colonies.

  A future of disco cyborgs, flying Chryslers with chrome plating and David Hasselhoff’s outstanding political career.

  A future that never was.

  1. TALES FROM THE WATER TANK

  Roof of the Palmer House Hotel

  Downtown Callisto City (Callisto/Jupiter IV)

  Present day

  A smell of grease and sweat hung in the air. A regular morning for the Kitty crew. But, lazing around under a feather comforter watching Samurai Pizza Cats with a bowl of cereal would have been way more pleasant.

  “They’re making us twiddle our thumbs in the most awful places,” Ali complained.

  Sitting cross-legged inside the water tower where we were hiding, my bounty hunting partner calmly cleaned the magazine of her iridescent Desert Eagle. Laying the oil-soaked rag on her lap, she blew down the dismantled barrel to remove a dust bunny settling in the muzzle.

  Using my rear legs to stand, I watched the coming and going on the neighboring building’s roof through a rusty crack when the ball of fluff looped over my whiskers. “The feds are civil servants, Ali. Good-for-nothing lazy bums…” I replied, brushing it away with my puffy cat tail.

  “Ain’t you a little harsh, Lee?”

  I chuckled. “Solarian public service is an inefficient totalitarian socialist drift and deserves no mercy. And on top of that, it’s corrupted to the core.”

  Ali huffed as she tucked her dirty rag into the pocket of her pink jacket. “Hunger always transmutes you into Ronald Reagan, old mop.”

  “You know me so well—do you have any biscuits left?” I turned my head as my partner glanced at the shredded cookies box.

  “Nope,” she declared. Both our stomachs gurgled at the same time. She resumed: “Want me to order a morning burrito or something?”

  “What are you going to say to the delivery guy? That we’re secretly hiding in a free-standing water tank on top of the Palmer House hotel?”

  “We’re on Callisto!” she explained, frantically typing on the keyboard of her wrist-computer inlaid in her flesh. “They employ drones for—” The implant beeped. “Fuck me! The wireless network is jumpy. I gotta run for the phone booths inside, or use the—”

  “No! Forget about ordering breakfast. A drone makes a lot of buzzes!” I yelled as she shuffled a pile of garbage at her feet. “It could expose us!”

  “You’re the one making a lot of noises howling, stupid cat… and I’m starving!”

  I groaned loudly, almost covering the squeak of the round hatch opening by itself. My partner gasped, quickly assembling her weapon before brandishing it. As from the gap appeared a bald head.

  “Am I interrupting a meeting of some sort, fellas?” the inconvenient guest asked from the top of the steel ladder. Although he was being held at gunpoint, he didn’t bat an eye.

  “You look vaguely like Bill Murray…” my associate reacted.

  “That’s not very nice for Bill Murray…” the man retorted while crawling inside.

  Sheathing her weapon, Ali contorted herself to make room for him. Our guest tore his velvet bathrobe on a steel rivet but managed to lazily slouch between the two of us. A shy sunray coming through the holed roof lit his face up, and I officially recognized him.

  “You’re definitely Bill Murray,” I said, bringing my snout within inches of his round pockmarked nose.

  “And you’re definitely a talking cat. That’s a bigger deal—even for Callisto City. May I ask why you’re hiding in my hotel’s water tower?”

  “What about you?” Ali interjected. “What are you doing on the roof?”

  “Nothing.” The guest wiped some white powder off his fuzzy collar. “I wanted to hang glide to the waterfront. But John Candy chickened out at the last minute.”

  “Aren’t you done martyring this poor man?” I added.

  “No. Would you like some donuts?” he asked as he pulled a bumpy Krispy Kreme box from under his wet bathrobe. “But you shall tell me what’s going on here.”

  Bribed with her daily dose of diabetes, my partner drooled profusely. With both hands, she stuffed half the box down her throat.

  “Glutton…” I complained, back at my spotter’s post with a non-chocolate glazed cake between my fangs. “Ali, instead of pigging out, explain to Mr. Murray why we’re squatting in this awful place.”

  Ali agreed through the pastries filling her mouth. “Lee came out with this stupid plan because of a dude.”

  “Stupid? There’s an army of mercs in that old disused sweatshop,” I replied. “We can’t just storm it! We have to await the green light first!”

  “Here’s the issue, Bill…” she commented, another donut in mouth.

  Bill Murray looked up while rolling a joint. “How come?”

  “Lee’s plan involves waiting!”

  “I see,” our sugar dealer resumed, picking a Zippo in his panther underwear. “Who’s this ‘dude’ anyway? What’s your story?”

  “Well…” My partner reached for her last brick of lukewarm soda, which she pulled from beneath old magazines. After unscrewing the cap with her teeth, she teased the actor: “Fasten your kimono, Bill! ‘cause we have monsters and stuff! Like Tales From the Crypt!”

  “Party on…” he reacted, puffing on his wide reefer.

  Grant Park StarMart

  South Callisto City (Callisto/Jupiter IV)

  A month ago

  “I ain’t sure between the rosy, the bluish and the first one with the chrome plating—and the purple one too,” I whined, grabbing one by one the price tags jiggling at the end of their red string. “The leather suspenders don’t fit well with my clothes. Nor my new sneakers.”

  Lying on a bench with her hands over her face, Zéphyr the awesome data-thief/girlfriend let out a deep sigh. Thanks to her holosuit, she had taken on the features of Wynona Ryder—with a few modifications, like a luminescent apple green hair color, clashing with her red shirt and shorts. But also, even bigger boobies. “Tell me again why you need my opinion on these things?” she asked, bored to death.

  “Because style matters, duh!” I replied, showing off my pink denim overall. Unlike her, I couldn’t cheat by programming a fancy digital disguise to cover a metal envelope. Bounty on my head or not.

  I heard her straighten as her heavy concealed cybernetic body made the furniture’s legs creak. “Ali-love, you quibble over a flamethrower.”

  Pouting, I rested the large weapon in front of the flickering cathode-ray screen displaying the available options. “Z. If I needed a killjoy, I would have stayed with Lee!”

  Zéphyr leaped to her feet and strolled towards the shopkeeper, a small man with no neck and long yellow teeth. “Why would you need it?” she asked.

  Hands deep in my pockets, I started walking out, shuffling my feet. “It would have been useful on Europa—for instance…”

  The data thief didn’t laugh. “And where would you have hidden it?” I gave her a lecherous look. She continued as she stepped in front of me by the Plexiglas door, opening it with her buttocks: “Unless you’re hunting Cylons in the Plastic Fields, this is overkill…” she sighed.

  “This is my special day!”

  Zéphyr smiled. “True. Want an ice cream instead? I guess there’s a Baskin Robbins nearby…”

  Her brown pupils flashed. Her mind was browsing the intraweb through her wireless connection; a luxury only full-cyborgs from the Data Brokers Guild could afford. Mortals like me needed wire.

  After a few seconds lost inside the invisible sea of information, Zéphyr came back to the fleshy and boring reality: “First floor. Right next to the naff arcade.”

  I poked her nose through her glimmering holographic disguise. “Tag! You pay.”

  “Of course I do. It’s your birthday after all.”

  Passing the various military surplus stores and Guns’R’Us, we walked down the spiral staircase to the ground level and the main lobby of the South Side StarMart. On either side of the welcoming fountain, the food court and the giant arcade-restaurant were crammed on this weekend afternoon following Halloween.

  “Pick your flavor,” Zéphyr proposed as we made our way to the clerk, a decommissioned Technocratic Marine battle android with a stupid calotte.

  I cleared my throat.

>
  Taking her eyes off the screens over the counter, my cyber-girlfriend corrected herself: “Pick your flavors.”

  “Better,” I concluded as the robot beckoned us forward to the automated ice cream makers on the wall.

  Later, I sat down in one of the huge armchairs facing the Chuck-E-Cheese with a dark chocolate-white chocolate-milk chocolate-chocolate fleur de sel-orange chocolate-double chocolate ice cream—extra toppings.

  Roof of the Palmer House Hotel

  Downtown Callisto City (Callisto/Jupiter IV)

  Present day

  “Is your story all about shopping and overpriced ice cream?” Bill Murray cut her off, forsaking his joint for a jam-filled donut. “Where are the monsters you promised?”

  I put in my two cents: “Scrooge’s right. Get to the point!”

  Ali pilfered a cake with a skewer lying among the trash and immediately stored it in her left cheek like a hamster. Another one in her right cheek, she resumed, spraying icing all over our guest.

  Grant Park StarMart

  South Callisto City (Callisto/Jupiter IV)

  A month ago

  “What did you pick?” I asked Zéphyr, who joined me a minute later.

  The heat released by her holographic costume had already melted half of her giant ice cream. Annoyed, she was using a straw to enjoy her room-temperature sugar soup.

  “Something people won’t bother about if you ever tell this story in the future…” the cyborg replied. “But I picked an option featuring a reduced probability of ending up with food smeared all over my face—unlike you.” With a flick of her thumb, she wiped a bead at the corner of my mouth.

  “Oh yeah?” I said before biting my scoop. As I sensed an icy drop on my chin, I raised my eyebrows in defiance.

  Zéphyr stepped forward and kissed me. First where the ice had dripped, then on the lips. And finally, on the neck.

  I didn’t feel like eating sorbet anymore. And neither did she.

  “Could we order a taxicab?” I asked, looking around for a phone booth. There was one at the entrance to the arcade, where kids cutting class were crowding in on this late morning.

  Zéphyr agreed. As I dropped my ice cream into the fountain, she took my hand.

  Alas, no sooner had we reached the kiosks, screams shook the arcade. Customers were streaming back into the lobby, leaving school backpacks and XXXL bags of candies behind.

  Standing on my toes, I tried to see what caused such a wave of panic in the back of the room. “What’s going on?” I asked.

  “Would you want to check?” Zéphyr queried as teenagers and children knocked over an aged carousel before the turnstiles.

  “Yeah! Maybe an animatronic turned mad is on a rampage.”

  “Ali-love… your imagination is only matched by your stomach,” laughed my cyber-partner, grabbing a twelve-year-old by the strap of his bag. “Easy there, boy! Why are you all running around like that?”

  Lifted two feet in the air, the child hiccupped. It took him a few seconds to articulate something sensible; he almost swallowed his orthodontic headgear doing so.

  “What does the nerd say, Z?” I insisted, one hand raised to shield my eyes from the blinding neon sign featuring a giant mouse.

  “An animatronic!” The teenager burst out, glancing behind with terror. “An animatronic attacked people near the virtual reality booths!”

  Releasing him, Zéphyr turned to the darkened arcade, then to me. “For real?”

  My hair stood on end… I was so amped!

  2. LITTLE ARCADE OF HORRORS

  Roof of the Palmer House Hotel

  Downtown Callisto City (Callisto/Jupiter IV)

  Present day

  Bill Murray raised his hand. “Wait a second… Aren’t Chuck-E-Cheese mascots supposed to be minimum wage employees dressed up?”

  My partner rolled her eyes. “Come on, Bill! We got 8-bit handheld gaming systems, singing Hershey chocolates and orbital diners delivering square-shaped pizzas directly to your spaceship. We live in the future. Giant stuffed animals are obviously robots.”

  “Or Freaks,” I added. “That’s the case near Amalthea.”

  “Wow! Spoiler alert, Lee!”

  Our explanations flew over our guest’s head, who was high as a kite. “Want to order a pizza, fellas?” he asked. “I’m still hungry.”

  “Ali and I already had this conversation,” I interjected, straightening my tail from anger. “For technical issues, drones remain a big no. Especially for Callisto’s pizza. It looks like quiche!”

  The actor slowly turned to my associate whose stomach grumbled again. “Your pet seems to be a professional spoilsport.”

  Ali nodded, and steam whistled from my ears, like an old Tom & Jerry cartoon. A second later, all claws out, I taught them what to be in a stake out meant.

  Bloody scratched, Bill Murray committed to a newly established intermittent fasting, and Ali resumed her story while applying half a bottle of Mercurochrome on her chin.

  Grant Park Chuck-E-Cheese

  South Callisto City (Callisto/Jupiter IV)

  A month ago

  Following the kid’s fantabulous revelations, I had already graciously climbed the security turnstiles of the arcade restaurant—and nearly broke my brand-new nose slipping. On the other side, I drew my rad-looking gun, and stared at the deserted rows of Paperboy terminals.

  “Did you hear that?” Zéphyr asked as she joined me. The hero of the story.

  “I heard I was right. And that you were wrong.”

  My cyber-girlfriend sighed. “I’ll try to access the network and disable the murder-bot.”

  But as her eyes sizzled, I slapped her to keep her mind in the real world. “No, you ain’t! I’ve always wanted to zero Mr. Munch.”

  “Are you sure? It could be treacherous.”

  “It’s just an animatronic. A brainless robot probably looking to unionize or some shit. What is it going to do?”

  A burst of lead sprayed the terminals in front of us, forcing us to take cover behind a whack-a-mole featuring carnivorous plants. Mucho detonations soon followed, shattering ceiling lights and raining down foam insulation. Several severed electrical wires slipped out of the conduits and a short circuit set fire to a knocked down fryer dragged from the kitchen.

  “God Darwin! The police are already here blindly shooting warning shots?” I whispered.

  Another burst passed within inches of my scalp, setting on the jumpy edentate plant-moles clapping their jaws, and a fairground music.

  “No,” Zéphyr answered. “The cyberamic probably found a scattergun and is rehearsing an Escondido.”

  Removing the safety of my firearm, I shook off the fine carcinogenic dust on my shoulders, and looked up to watch the distant VR booths. According to the kid, that’s where the shooter had taken refuge. Unfortunately, it was impossible for me to see anything in the darkness that had prevailed since fuses blew up.

  “At least this S.O.B. is cornered.”

  My cyber thief remained cautious: “Steve Irwin would say a cornered beast is all the more dangerous.”

  Another blind shot startled us. We couldn’t go on like this.

  Thankfully, an idea quickly crossed Zéphyr’s bio-electronic mind: “How about the explosive devices you subtly borrowed from the store earlier?”

  I gasped. “Do—do you really think I’m shoplifting? I’m an Auxiliary of Justice.”

  She insisted, staring at me with her digital irises before her eyes turned ivory white. Like Lee, she knew my pyromania was only matched by my mythomania. Or, as she said earlier, my appetite. I’m an extreme person!

  Roof of the Palmer House Hotel

  Downtown Callisto City (Callisto/Jupiter IV)

  Present day

  “An extreme person, indeed,” Bill Murray intervened. “So you stole those grenades earlier while browsing for a flamethrower?”

  Ali confessed between two muttered justifications.