Koko Takes a Holiday
Read Koko Takes a Holiday Online
Authors: Kieran Shea
Contents
Let’s Hear it from the Boywhore…
Fifteen Minutes Later, at SI HQ…
Welcome to the Second Free Zone
Pressure is a Four-Letter Word
Last Night of the Rest of Your Life
Gimme some Sake, Gimme some Snacks
Damnatio Memoriae
(and then Some)
Let’s Hear it from the New Boywhore
Coming soon from Kieran Shea and Titan Books
KOKO THE MIGHTY
(June 2015)
KOKO TAKES A HOLIDAY
Koko Takes a Holiday
Print edition ISBN: 9781781168608
E-book edition ISBN: 9781781168615
Published by Titan Books
A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd 144
Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP
First edition: June 2014
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
Copyright © 2014 by Kieran Shea. All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
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TO ALL THE INSPIRED FLAMETHROWERS
I HAVE KNOWN—BURN, BABY, BURN.
“ICARUS FELL. BUT, OH, WHAT A TAN.”
BATHROOM GRAFFITI
THE SIXTY ISLANDS PROMO—1:00
CLIENT: Custom Pleasure Bureau—The Sixty Islands
PRODUCTION ENGAGEMENT: 2516 All-Seasonal Hemispheric Cycles
VISUAL FEED 1: CAMERA DRAWS IN FROM SATELLITE VIEW, FLIES OVER THE RENOWNED TROPICAL ISLAND RESORT—
THE SIXTY ISLANDS
. SMOOTH PAN CONTINUES UNTIL CAMERA DIVES TOWARD A FLAWLESS BEACH LAGOON WHERE A LOIN-CLOTHED MAN POSES PROVOCATIVELY. EXTREME CLOSE UP. HE PURSES HIS LIPS WHILE LOOKING DEEPLY INTO CAMERA LENS AND THEN SAVAGELY RIPS INTO A HUNK OF BUTCHERED MEAT. CHEWS.
[CUT TO] VISUAL FEED 2: FOOTAGE OF ISLAND EXPLOSIONS. ISLAND ORGY MASSACRES. PULSE-GUN FIRE. CRUMBLING BUILDINGS. GENERAL MAYHEM ON
THE SIXTY ISLANDS
.
[CUT TO] VISUAL FEED 3: KOMODO DRAGON SPRINGS ON A CRYING BABY.
[CUT TO] VISUAL FEED 1 (CONT.): MAN UNFASTENS HIS LOIN CLOTH REVEALING A MASSIVE ERECTION.
AUDIO: UPBEAT MUSIC
[FADE IN] VISUAL FEED 4: VARYING ATTRACTIONS ON
THE SIXTY ISLANDS
.
VOICEOVER: If there is true adventure in what’s left of your soul,
THE SIXTY ISLANDS
is the one place to indulge your holiday junket passions! A manufactured archipelago engineered on reinforced tectonic plates,
THE SIXTY ISLANDS
teems with attractions and luxuries found nowhere else on the planet. Whether you seek romance, prefrontal cortex obliteration, simulated death consumption, or the ultimate eco-destruction escapade for your family, you will find what you are looking for on
THE SIXTY ISLANDS
. Yes-yes, here-here!
[CUT TO] VISUAL FEED 5: AERIAL SHOT ROTATING ABOVE
THE SIXTY ISLANDS
. [NOTE: No maintenance, power-plant turbines, or SI waste scuppers visible.]
VOICEOVER: A nature-lover’s delight,
THE SIXTY ISLANDS
has taken great pains to hyper-grow protected, unspoiled environments of extreme beauty and abject hostility. And you can destroy it all! Experience firsth and the primal delights of corporatism’s progressive power and Earth’s blessed rush to rebirth.
[SIDEBAR, RIGHT] VISUAL FEED 6: RATE FEES SLIDE BY IN MULTIPLE LANGUAGES WITH REGIONAL CREDIT FLUCTUATIONS, PENALTIES, AND RESTRICTIONS. AS RATE FEES REACH CONCLUSION, SIDEBAR WIPES RIGHT.
VOICEOVER (CONT.): Riot with dangerous synthetic beasts, relax with indiscriminate slaughter, indulge in sexual lawlessness and pestilent disease fantasies. Yes-yes, you can have it all! Vigorous regenerating schedules and cyborg augmentations are designed to accommodate your maximum pleasure and release.
[CUT TO] VISUAL FEED 1 (CONT.): HEAVILY ARMED WOMAN LASHES A CHAIN COLLAR AND LEASH ON THE NOW NAKED MAN. THE WOMAN WINKS AT THE CAMERA. COUPLE WALKS OFF DOWN THE BEACH AS THE WOMAN CUPS THE MAN’S BARE BUTTOCKS.
[CUT TO] VISUAL FEED 7: SUNSET. WHOLE JUNGLE FORESTS DETONATE.
VISUAL FEED 8 [LOGO ZOOM]:
THE SIXTY ISLANDS!
KEY OF SMALL, UNREADABLE DISCLAIMER TEXT. [READ AND SCROLLED RAPIDLY]: This message is from the Custom Pleasure Bureau. To travel to The Sixty Islands you must be over sixteen or have signed guardian’s or warden’s consent. Not accessible from de-civ hot zones, the resettled South African Colonies, or quarantined resource regions. All re-access laws apply from the Second Free Zone. Member Earth Syndicate Alliance-TC 34-AOP.
So the dead Kongercat raiders who were in the bar? The ones who called themselves Ying Fong and Chuòhào? You bet them nasty dakini re-civs, but them foolish. Them no expect my Koko-sama. Be on The Sixty for carnival and all wasted on big liquor and high-happy with shift and shake, thinking them be better than her, but those two be dead wrong. Koko-sama upright alphamama. Koko-sama see many-much fighting and swing the big guns long time before her working on The Sixty proper. Koko-sama shoot them dakini re-civs straight up so now there be red scrambled eggs everywhere. Blood all over floor. All over damn bar.
Koko-sama say to me, she say, “See, Archimedes? Stashing that big pulse gun upstairs was a smart move. I mean, phew, did you see how those two Kongercats’ heads burst apart?”
Oh, Archimedes see that plenty all right. Like a couple of wax gourds that. When Koko-sama hear me shout there be big trouble in the bar downstairs, she zip out of her room all angry-like and waste no time, no way. Take that big gun from the trunk on the landing and warn them two troublemakers to behave and be peace-like, but them no listen. Draw nasty on my Koko-sama. Big mistake that, you bet. Koko-sama cut them two baddies down.
Me sop up some squishy red goo with a sponge and carry the bucket outside. Koko-sama say she want me to splash the bloody water in the street ’cause Komodos like the dirty water. Them dragons hiss and crackle and slurp up that water, you bet. Funny buggers. Like all huff and scruff on The Sixty—the bats, the itty-bitty boars, the frogs and birds—them dragons half animal, half machine.
Me go back inside.
“When you’re done cleaning, make sure you scrub out the mop bucket with a squirt of bleach, okay, Arch? Just don’t go overboard like last time. Maybe half a shot glass’s worth. The flies are on that muck already, and we sure as hell don’t need no more mosquitoes laying eggs and spreading disease.”
“Yes, Koko-sama. Bleach in bucket.”
“And cage up the good liquor when you’re through.”
“Got it. Cage up the good liquor, right-right.”
“And take a shower.”
“Yes-yes. All good scrubby.”
“Atta boy…”
Koko-sama blow me a kiss then and throw back her hair. Me like that. How her long hair fall in a beautiful dark wave.
Supersexy, my Koko-sama.
* * *
Koko Martstellar watches Archimedes sleep beside her in bed and blows out a plume of crinkle-flake smoke straight at the room’s ceiling fan.
Yeah, so things got a little out of hand tonight
, she thinks.
Big deal.
Koko knew an incident like this was bound to happen sooner or later. All of The Sixty’s pleasure vendors have been hurting of late, what with the instability in the lower trade markets tamping down discretionary income and all, but honestly, what was the CPB HQ thinking? Opening up The Sixty Islands to the Kongercat re-civ ilk—what, just because they’re flush with credits and can afford it? Not to besmirch the heavily promoted ceasefires and the internationals kowtowing to re-civ play niceties, but those freaks are just plumb crazy.
After crushing out her smoke in a halved husk of a coconut on the nightstand, Koko leaves Archimedes in bed and slips on a pink silk kimono. She leaves her bedroom and tramps downstairs to check the incoming messages on the bar’s central register. The news on the projection prompts is as bad as she expected. The Custom Pleasure Bureau is sending a security detail around in a few hours. The communication indicates it was their intention to be there sooner, but Koko’s brothel operation is built on one of the few SI islands without a connecting bridge system. ETA 9:00 am, sharp. Huh. For a fleeting moment, Koko rues not letting those two re-civ Kongercats just have their way.
Koko had been going over the books in bed upstairs when Archimedes cried out for her that there was a problem in the main bar. Archimedes has always been a bit of a fusspot, so Koko figured the boy was merely out of fresh ice or grenadine or something. Not the case at all. Koko stalked right out of her bedroom and instantly knew the score. As her fellow mercenaries used to say back on deployment, the two Kongercats had jacked up a total BSGD situation.
Bad shit, going down
.
Kongercat re-civs are pretty easy to distinguish from the run-of-the-mill SI patrons, what with their hereditary facial lesions, papery skin, and Chinese heritage. Generations of excessive radiation exposure from smartwars and general malnutrition have a way of muddying up the breeding, and those two were no exception. Loud, too. Eight drinks into a mean-drunk loud. The women held knives to two of Koko’s best boywhores’ throats, and from the look of things, they were raising their elbows and getting ready to saw.
Koko didn’t hesitate. On the landing outside her room, she kicked open the bamboo trunk braced against the railing and snatched up the Belgian sub-cutter. A hell of a weapon—favored for street-sweeping action. Of course, when those two re-civs saw the huge gun in her arms they drew sidearms concealed beneath their vests. Expected, of course, and a quick finger-squeeze and a wipe left to right was all it took.
Oh, well. No matter. Portia Delacompte will have her back on something like this. A self-defense infraction with a couple of former hostiles on The Sixty for carnival? Are you kidding? Portia Delacompte has seen plenty of bad craziness with the likes of such savages herself, and Delacompte knows how these BSGD scenarios go.