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‘Good,’ he said softly. ‘I may also have a surprise for you later that evening.’
She raised an eyebrow.
‘Not a date,’ he shot out, lifting his hands in mock surrender. ‘Just an introduction to the other side of Eden II.’
‘The promised underbelly mystery lunar tour?’ she said with a hint of a smile.
‘Perhaps,’ he said.
‘Where to?’
‘You’ll just have to trust me.’
Harlow nodded with a half smile. ‘Maybe I will. All I’ve seen of Eden II is my suite and the Skylab complex. I think I’m due a trip into the great lunar scape of your silver-dusted rock.’
6
Subterranean speakeasies, sunken casinos and tunnel bars
Kage
Cruising down a tunnel highway in his black and chrome flyer, Kage’s meta vision raked the shadows of the underground passageways crisscrossing and ribboning under Eden II.
This was turf he was very familiar with. Twas where the Sable Riders had roamed for years after first landing on Eden II. Scarred from their five year long nightmare imprisonment and feeling their way around their new home, they’d made friends amongst the gangsters, refugees, drug dealers and bar crawlers who frequented the rock’s basement. There was nothing quite like living amongst the most desperately deprived to understand the true nature of a place.
These arterials, wide as five flyers in some places and tight as a duck’s kiss in others, were darkened course ways littered with crumbling rocks, abandoned furniture, boxes, and tents and lined with graffiti.
Being so deep and dark under the surface, one could never tell whether it was day or night in the tunnels. Shadowy figures and skinny silhouettes slinked along the shadowy rock faces, their pale, drawn faces catching the beams of Kage’s headlights here and there.
Dressed in sand-coloured robes stiffened with wiring, their hands gloved and faces obscured by anti-regolith masks, they were the Luna Pikani. Over time they had also earned another moniker - the ‘whistling Pikas’ because of the unique fluted trill language they used to communicate among themselves.
These distinctive calls helped Pikas find each other during harsh storms that tore through the lunar scape. When the silver moon dust would whip through the tunnel shafts at incredible speeds. Powerful enough to shear skin off, a lunar sandstorm could sweep away Pika camps in seconds, taking along all their belongings.
Yet still, the Pikas endured, building rugged shacks and wearing reinforced clothing to battle the worst the rock could throw at them.
Energy shields from the biomes above them stopped the worst of the extreme lunar storms from penetrating entirely into the tunnels. However, most Pika camps had been erected deep enough into the regolith to escape the raging winds. They were also safeguarded by the stratified lunar-scape and dome high above them that helped regulate pressure sufficient to sustain a breathable, stable atmosphere for millennia.
Occasionally the darkened tunnels would open into wide boulevards packed with sweet-n-sour chilli noodle bowl stalls, subterranean speakeasies, sunken casinos and tunnel rat bars where red-eyed, empty soul figures sat listlessly chugging down synth-hol by the bucket load.
It was the eve of Shotgun Friday, and Kage could feel the palpable tension in the stale, musty air of the underground world. Tomorrow, after payday, and per an age-old tradition, random gunfire would sound through the darkness here as public freak-outs ensued and enemies settled scores.
In the early days of Eden II, before a formal government on the surface, the tunnels had been used by space pirates to hide prisoners, bank schills, and even store bodies. Not so different these days, except that instead of space pirates, the offenders were from the rival gangs that ruled various factions of the Pika Nation.
The Pikas had first emerged from the prison population that had escaped from their jails when the moon had been a security outpost accommodating the worst of the System’s crims, outlaws and thugs. After a few scandalous jailbird breakouts, the prison had since moved onto a large ring station that was easier to secure than a moon planet with easily tunnelled escape routes. That had been over a hundred years ago.
A decade later, a group of ex-cons had requested the then Prime of Dunia for an off-planet habitation they could call their own within easy reach to the mineral-laden asteroids that circled the System. Eager to rid Dunia’s surface of bad influence, he’d agreed.
He’d partnered with a meta-human habitat called Eden City that floated above Earth’s atmosphere. Its people, the Kwavi, had become Earth’s guardians since the Great Suffering. They approached Dunians needing a foothold in the Pegasi system to re-home refugees, mainly from Earth.
The Prime offered the rock for free, and the Edenites the funds to build the first bio-dome.
A few years later, when a civil war broke out in Alloria, another close planetary neighbour, Dunia, was faced with thousands of refugees that it could not physically home there. So they struck a second deal with Eden II. They would welcome Allorians refugees, and in turn, Dunia would provide them with xentium to bolster their biomes, build ships and add tech to their security. They’d been taking in refugees for many years, especially from their home, Eden City, so they had the infrastructure to handle the Allorians. The Dunians also agreed to provide them with regular food drops, raw materials and necessary planetary resources.
Since then, the planetoid, which had enough space for a few hundred million, had welcomed the tired, weary, the homeless and the opportunistic into its embrace. It had also drawn the attention of other planets - more so, their various gangs and underworld groups - from drug gangs to mercenaries, ex-cons and ex-soldiers.
It was the latter who now dominated the subterranean world of Eden II. Luna Pika was a volatile place with tribal and gang-affiliated tensions. The informal settlement was divided into twenty densely populated “habitats” including East Pikani, West Village, Pikani South and North Pika. Most were at ‘war’ with each other for the meagre resources underground. This was a harsh world where the law of Pika-eat-Pika took centre stage. Where senseless murder, breathtaking violence and wild lawlessness ruled.
The Pika gangs ran koko rings, gambling dens and speakeasies, where the residents - half of whom had employment on the surface - spent their earnings. They worked amongst Eden II’s flourishing hotels and restaurants at the spaceport as unskilled labour or space porters. The Edenite companies paid them well; however, the vices of the tunnels were irresistible, and many stayed mired in poverty after succumbing to the lure of the hideous koko drug or the alluring yet intensely addictive nebula dust. Others were gamblers. Still, others were traumatised refugees from Alloria and Falasia who’d found it challenging to fit in with the ordered life on the surface. It didn’t help that the drug epidemic had turned many young Pikas into koko heads, who were a menace to the peace on the rock.
