Dude

Momentarily blinded by the exhaust of yet another Arcturan Porn Freighter, Beefheart instictively threw up his hand to protect his eyes and was so startled to actually see his own hand he flung himself backwards into - to his further shock - a sandbank.

Looking down at his own body which had been so noticeably absent from view for the past three days, Beefheart found it as disconcerting as if he had encountered a corpse in his bed and scuttled backwards across the sand in a futile attempt to escape it, stopping abruptly seconds later as his back hit an immovable obstacle.

Sweating, heart racing, Beefheart closed his eyes for the first time in three days and forced himself to breathe normally, relishing the sensation. Gradually he allowed his awareness to expand beyond his own panic to begin to take in his environment.

Warm sand. Cool breeze. Salty smell.

Good start.

He opened his eyes cautiously and, squinting against the glare, took in the vista before him. From the surf line twenty yards away to the horizon stretched the bluest, cleanest, most inviting stretch of ocean he had ever seen. To either side the longest, purest white beach of his life lay gleaming in the mid morning sun.

"I've gone mad," muttered Beefheart, as he struggled to his feet in the soft sand. "Space fever, utterly fucking bonke-"

With a sickening crack his head struck a wooden beam and Beefheart slumped to his haunches, seeing stars once again. He turned to get the measure of his assailant andsaw that staple of tourist sites everywhere, a wooden sign post, weathered and worn smooth by sun, wind and salt air. Carved in deep letters from top to bottom of the main post was the word "MIDWAY". At random angles around the top jutted wooden arms labelled "Earth", "Port Salut" and "Planet Playtex" amongst others. Beefheart stared at it in a mixture of awe and disbelief.

Midway... It was a legend amongst pirates, drifters and freeloaders everywhere!

Towards the end of the 23rd century, as transdimensional space travel expanded humankind's influence to the farthest reaches of the galaxy, navigation became increasingly complex. To help ease the congestion a vast traffic control centre the size of a small moon was established at the dead centre of the galaxy. Manned in year long shifts by technicians, they constantly searched for new ways to amuse themselves. By selling favourable information to pirates, drug smugglers and gun runners and blasting police patrols with static, they gained favour amongst the galactic underclass. They also, of course, became extremely wealthy, which allowed them to shape their environment to their own ends, importing billions of tons of pure quartz sand and glacial water to construct the perfect beach. Over Beefheart's head burned a controlled fusion reaction in a nuclear stasis field, orbiting the 10 mile long beach in a day of ever varying length and warmth at the whim of its masters.

Although everyone knew of the existence of Midway, police included, the occupants chose to live a rather reclusive life. Being at the centre of thousands of space lanes made the chances of anyone unwelcome actually reaching it unaided about the same as that of a one legged chicken making it safely across a sixteen lane highway, in rush hour, in the fog. For this reason, its existence was flatly denied by every security force in the galaxy, an arrangement which suited both sides' professional pride perfectly.

Staggering to his feet once more and brushing himself off, Beefheart peered along the beach in both directions. To his left, half a mile away, a single walker strolled along the surf toward him. A hundred yards to his right, two shambling figures giggled uncontrollably while splashing around waste deep in the sea. Further up the beach, on the edge of the dunes, stood two ramshackle wooden beach bars declared themselves to be "Chez Jules" and "The Basement". Only Chez Jules appeared to be open so Beefheart trudged up the sand towards the verandah.

He paused at the threshold to take in the interior. It was a perfect replica of a mid twentieth century Carribean beach bar. Bleached wood floor boards and tables, a long semi circular bar with a brass rail around its edge and another eight inches from the floor.

"Morning," grinned the barman as he poured a marguerita into a salted frosted glass and gestured towards a stool. "What you upto, matey?"

"I've gone mad!" offered Beefheart, climbing onto the stool and lifting the cocktail gingerly to his lips.

"Nice day for it," shrugged the barman amiably. A tattered patch on his shirt identified him as Louis.

Beefheart took a long draw on his cocktail then swivelled around on his stool to face the sea. He studied the Hawaiian shirt on the lone walker for a few moments, the man's gait appearing vaguely familar, before his attention was disturbed by two naked men, screaming with laughter running across the wooden storefront of the bar. They somersaulted off the end of the verandah, landed with both feet in the dunes, then tore off whooping towards the surf. Swivelling back to the bar, Beefheart nodded towards the retreating figures.

"Hey Louis, who they?" he asked, between sips.

"Coupla stoners, hitched a ride here to get their rocks off on the centre of the galaxy. Nice guys, but nuts."

"I've gone mad too. Did I tell you?"

"You mentioned it, sure. Another before your friend gets here?" Louis refilled Beefheart's glass. Beefheart's brow furrowed for a moment, then he shrugged it off.

"Got a phone?"

Reaching under the counter Louis brought out an ancient looking, black, bacolite telephone with an alphanumeric keypad crudely soldered to its front in place of a dial. Beefheart bugged his eyes at it, racking his scarred memory for how to use the device. Picking up the receiver and placing it against his head, as he remembered seeing in history books, he tapped in the 17 digit hex code to access nav unit aboard White Boy Bob's ship. Louis looked up from polishing a glass and without a word took the receiver from his hand, inverted it and placed it back against his head.

"You sure the arial doesn't go out the top?" asked Beefheart, blushing. His face leapt as he heard a click on the line. "Hey Bob!" he shouted into the mouthpiece. "Bob! It's me! It's the weirdest fucking thing! Bob? Hey, Bob...?"

He stared glumly at the receiver. "It went dead. I thought I heard him for a second there, then there was this... noise...."

"Never mind," said a voice behind him. "We have a few things we need to talk about."

Turning to greet the stranger, Beefheart squinted at the silouette in the doorway and struggled to identify what was so familiar about him. As he entered the relative gloom of the bar, the stranger took of his battered baseball cap and aviators and took the stool two down from Beefheart. Not wishing to appear rude, Beefheart turned from the glare of the doorway back to his drink and, blinking away the blur of blue green blobs in his vision, slowly let his gaze sidle over the bar top to his new companion. Louis removed another frosted glass from the fridge, placed it in front of the stranger and filled it to the brim. As he reached forward, Beefheart stared at the scar on the back of the strangers hand.

The same scar that Beefheart himself had sustained in a careless trouser ironing accident on his twelfth birthday.

With his scalp desperately trying to force him to look in the other direction, Beefheart slowly turned to the stranger and looked at the same smug, hungover, battered face he had seen every morning in his bathroom mirror.

"Hey there. I expect you have a few questions to ask me," it smirked.

Twist

Inside the nearby Doom Bringer, WhiteBoyBob's chin dropped to his chest as he expelled a deep sigh of beery air, almost as if deflating himself into the bucket seat of the cockpit. Suddenly he thrashed upwards and outwards at every random surface he could find, punching, slapping, mashing and bellowing forth a primal scream as he did so. The various consoles began to error and bleep their warnings at him as lights flashed on and off wildly in his eyes. He slumped back in his seat again, exhausted from the outburst, but not feeling much better for it either.

"I ca'nt believe he's....gone!" He stuttered whilst wafting the smell of electrical burning away from his face. A small navi console to his right sparked randomly, it's screen rolling and parallaxing in hues of grey and green. Another stern whack stopped that though.

It was almost a tear-worthy moment if it had'nt been for the emotio-empathy-inhibitor he had fitted years ago during his time as a mercenary and freelancer. It was back in those blood soaked, whore-a-plenty, cash rich days that he had met Captain Beefheart who was at the time, serving onboard one of the Casino cruisers that orbited the new-build holiday planets, SKGNEZ1 and BLKPOL2.

---~!~---

"Twist!..." barked WBB as his cigar ash fell marking yet another scorch mark in the green felt.

A card fired forward across the green playing field to land face up infront of him.

"Sir draws a Jack.. Hearts.." droned the Tellerdroid in its synthetic-happy politicians voice.

WBB just stared, grinning, back at the silver domed dolt.

"Twist!..." came the order again and another card skiffed out onto the felt.

"Sir draws a Ten.. Spades.." it synthed merrily. Although programmed to show no emotion, the binary bit that knows whether the customer has won or lost the hand flipped over inside its head.

WBB reached and collected his glass and lifted it towards his mouth, never taking his eyes off the droid. He bit on the pink plastic straw and slurped some of the liquid, only pausing to knock the little cocktail umbrella out of the way with his nose. He replaced his drink on the table (not on the coaster provided) and barked his order.

"Twist!"

Immediately, the Tellerdroid sprang to life.

"Sir already has two cards which were dealt at the start of this hand, the values of which, have yet to be checked. In addition to that Sir also has a Jack.. Hearts.. and a Ten.. Spades.."

"Statistically.. Sir cannot have a hand with less than a total face value of twenty two.."
"Sir has lost this hand.. house wins with a total hand value of nineteen."

WBB paused for a second as if to contemplate the situation and then again voiced his request.

"Twist!"

"Sir.. Statistically there are no cards that I can deal that could prevent you from going over the already exceeded game limit of twenty one.."
"I am going to have to ask you to leave this gaming table before I call security.. .. xZZZzz.."

In a blaze of white neon flash fire and effortless motion the Tellerdroid was no longer a complete unit. From one of WBB's rings emerged a pulsing beam of light that had encircled his fist.

"Twist that you fukka!" Pouted WBB as he layed playful sucker punches into the droids head.
"Twist!.. Twist mutha fukka!"

Within seconds an alarm had been raised and a curtly dressed Ensign appeared beside the table escorted by a group of burly security guards.

"SIR! You have three seconds to get off that Tellerdroid before I allow my men to ruff-u-up"

With that instruction, the guards all began to resonate together with the hum of their freshly drawn taser-rods.

WBB stopped his arm in mid punch action, surveyed the smart young Ensign, counted the security staff one by one taking into account their sizes and weapon choice, checked his back pocket for something, scratched his head, tutted and then climbed off the Tellerdroid, gifting it one further parting blow before withdrawing his ring laser back into its housing.

Immediately the security guards were on him in a restraining pattern. Three on each arm and the others at the front and rear, preparing for a counter attack at any second.

"Take this scum to the Security Cells. Follow me!" chanted the Ensign and marched off through the crowds of on-lookers towards a large glass door in the distance. The security guards followed with WBB in tow as he snarled at the other punters, making one old lady drop her winnings and creating a stampede.

The Ensign tapped his security code into the keypad, leaned forward and to the left and placed his eye to the screen for the retina scan. Even he was not aware that in doing this he was also having his testicles scanned which scientists had found was even more acurate than a retina scan! It also gave a nice tingling feeling which all male workers found pleasant. And happy workers are good to have.

A chime issued and the security door slid open to reveal a long grey corridor with doors either side going off into the distance. They walked in and the door slid closed behind them.

The Ensign walked them down past three of four doors before pausing and performing the same retina/testicular scan procedure. The door slid open and he gestured to the guards with one hand and cupped himself gently with the other.

"Stick him in here for now until an Inquisitor Driod gets here to grill him later.. "

The guards bundled WBB towards the doorway. The Ensign caught his eye on the way in, raised one eyebrow and winked. WBB allowed himself to be taken into the room by the guards and escorted over to a rest area with restraining straps.

From outside the room, the Ensign looked up and down the length of the corridor once and then shut the door with the guards still on the inside. There were sounds of muffled shouting, ripping leather and cracking bones from inside and within a minute, WBB appeared at the door, with all but a bead of sweat running down his nose.

"Ello darlin! How much for a kiss on the bottom?" he quizzed, squeezing a spare cheek of the Ensign's arse.

"Yeah! Fuck you too fatboy!" Laughed Ensign Beefhart, sticking out a protruding black sportsbag he was concealing between his legs.

"Stella!" Grinned WBB.. "Right.. I got me shit. I got me new mate Beefy, now where's this vault you was talking about then?".

---~!~---

"That was over ten years ago" thought WBB as he sat back in his bucket seat.
"Ten fucking years... shit! That job still stands as one of the largest hauls ever in that quadrant. And then he blows his share on the SS Beefheart over there and goes all i'm a Mr Serious Captain on me!"
"And even worse than that, the little nonce goes and karks it too! Pah..Tosser!...."

"You ready to make the jump forward to scout the station for me WhiteBoy?" Chirped Ubermilf over the intercom.

"Does Owl shit in the woods?"

"Ummm.. thats open for interpretation I think mate, but i'll take that as a yes... see you in a few days. And be careful - we don't want to loose any more people on this mission..."

"Ok, Luv, keep your incredibly see-through knickers on. I ain't goin no-where quick. Unless I press this butto........."

With that last word WBB made the jump to hyperspace and was gone.

With the momentary transfer sickness passing, he began to check his systems for what he would have to write on the insurance forms as "accidental damage".

"Ten years.... tosser.... Ten years.......... TOSSER!!!" was all he could think to say as he fiddled with wires and bits of broken keyboard floating infront of him.

His eye was drawn to the image on the screen of the small Navi Console.
Normally during a hyperspace transit, these devices would not function... But it was doing something. A grey, green, changing, rolling image of a face could be seen. Like a fading transmission, it appeared it was talking out at someone.

WBB reached over stared closer at the tiny screen.

"Beefy? Is that you?.... What..the....fuck?.....".

A wave of nausea caught him unawares and he uncontrollably vomitted all over his trousers.

In hyperspace, no-one can hear you swear.