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IX. Tessla

You know... as pretty as parts of the Grey City can get, it's still the worst city I know of. They doll it up, parade it around, and call it a marvel. But it's still a hellhole. Most people have never left their sector. Most people die in their own section personal hell, still gasping in their own muck.

Me? Maybe I'm an exception to the rule, maybe I'm not. This city is full of muck and I've never left it. All I know is I turned thirty last December. That's an age to brag about. Its good news and bad news for the same reason. I'm still alive. Then I spend my time and birthday wondering why I am alive. Then I light up and wonder when I'll hack up a lung.

Yep, I'll get up one day and weeze, hack, cough, cough... there would be my lung on the ground. But it wouldn't be pink, it would be all black and gross like that. It would be puss-covered and kinda moldy like a slice of bread I found behind my fridge. I thought it called me Momma, but it turned out to be Vash yanking my chain... that bastard. People would come up to it and poke it and say, "Gee, is that a burnt piece of meat."

And people who know me would shake their head and go, "Nope, that's Nicholas D. Wolfwood's lung. He was rather hard on it."

"Is that so?" the people will say, "What a shame that he was so hard on that lung." Then they would see me gurgling on the ground. "Oh, buck up... you still have a lung left."

ooo

I left the plantlings at the center. Not before they got a promise out of me to take them to the movies. This didn't make sense, since I had dropped them off two hours ago and had gone to a bar with that Venus with a penis, Elendira. "Come on, Mister," they said to me in their childish voices, "We wanna go to the movies."

I untangled two plant girls from my legs. They only looked nine "Don't worry, I said, cheerfully, "I'll come back in no time."

Someone cleared their throat. I looked up and groaned in irritation. Who should be standing there, but that she-male, Elendira, tapping his watch and grinning like a jackass.

"Awwww," one little girl said, pouting slightly, "But I wanna mawwy you."

"But I can't," I protested.

"How about now?" said the Plant Girl, but she was a woman now and naked... her breasts firm and ripe. "Am I right for you?"

I sighed and reached out, but my hands were aged and crippled by crooked bones. I weezed, "But that's impossible."

"You shouldn't have taken the blue stuff," she said, clucking her tongue at me. "It does horrible stuff to your manstuff."

In panic, I used my aged hands to rip open my slacks. There was nothing there but burnt cinders. Everything was gone... everything. I opened my mouth to protest and my teeth dropped out followed by a rush of hot coppery blood. All I could do was gurgle in panic.

"Told ya," she cooed happily.

My fingers dropped off next and wiggled happily in the street before bursting into flames. My stomach bulged and then split open in a gush of red and black. That's not good, I thought to myself. Then my eyes rolled out of my head and my vision with them. I could still see my body as it crumpled into nothing.

ooo

Someone snapped their fingers against my head. Great, just what I needed. Much to my surprised, I found my head in Elendira's lap. "Oh yes, baby," Elendira mock-groaned, giving me the same grin he had when he picked me up and took me to this little bar which Midvalley happened own, "Give my girl parts a good polish."

I shot up in a hurry. The last thing I remember was Midvalley and Elendira going on and on about fancy new shoes and me wishing for the mattress in my apartment. "You're no lady," I shot back.

Damn dream, damn Elendira, damn Midvalley, and damn Vash for good measure. Midvalley was grinning. "So, you started snoring and I figured I would push you against Elendira for good measure." He shrugged.

"You son of b..."

"Tsk... tsk," Elendira said, wagging a finger in front of my face. I snapped at it and only got my lower lip. As I cussed up a small storm, he cheerful continued, "We have places to go and Last Runs to see." He leaned in close and smiled cheerfully. "Have you ever seen a Last Run?"

"I have," Midvalley said, a bit too eager for my tastes, "Her midsection kinda split open and her cooking guts spilled out as her hair blackened."

No and it sounded gross.

"That's sick," I said, feeling disgusted.

"This coming from the man who blew out the brains of his adopted father. I really don't get you," Midvalley shook his head slightly. "Well," he said, studying one of the many rings on his fingers, "Tell me if you puke."

Bastard, I decided, Midvalley was the king of all bastards in the universe. "Don't worry," I said, smiling broadly, "If I do, I'll make sure to save you a bucketful."

The sight of Midvalley turning green at the gills was more than worth it as I walked out into another grey noon. Elendira covered his eyes and looked up at the sky. "Looks like snow," he finally said, turning up the collar of his coat, "Luckily I'll be in my warm rooms when this stuff hits." He looked at me and tried to act coy and shit. "So," he said in this syrupy voice that still managed to say 'If you don't agree with me, I'll rip off your hands and make you eat them, you!', "Where will you be tonight?"

Not in my apartment for sure. Probably bumming the couch in Vash's penthouse, surfing the channels looking for a good porno. Hey, I'm still a man. "Probably at my home or the church... I'm a real homebody." Except it's not my home. "I'll watch TV... stuff like that." Again, it's not my TV set. I put my foot through my TV... it was sparking already. "Maybe microwave up something... I dunno."

"You could stay with me", Elendira said as we crossed the street.

I could see the big park that was right near where Vash lived in his penthouse. "So this is where the Plant that's getting the Last Run is?"

"Right in the center," Elendira said, "They have three Plants running at full speed." He frowned slightly as we walked into the forest. "So much silliness over this Central Park thing."

"It's nice... it's green."

Elendira shook his head. I finally noticed the silly little fur hat thing that he was wearing. It was fluffy and stupid. "Keeping it green kills a Plant in Fifteen Years. And the fools keep on trying to get this big thing to stay alive... they should just let it die or build a bio-dome."

"Jesus," I said to myself, before clearing my throat. "Damn, Elendira, what kinda fool are you? Even I know how important the park is the way Tongari goes on and on about it."

I was feeling confident, maybe even a little overconfident, when Elendira suddenly smacked me hard. His fake nails cut into my face. "Get it through your filthy, uncombed head, Judas Priest," Elendira hissed, his nostrils flaring and his voice dropping until he sounded like that man in drag he was. "It's just a stupid park... there's no reason to preserve it when it kills Master Knives' siblings."

Knives. Siblings. God damn it all, he was talking about Vash's brother. "You mean..."

Elendira rolled his eyes. "Oh puh-leaze," he said before lighting a thin pink cigarette, "You're Eye of Micheal for crying out loud. You should know who you're working for. Livio, Lazlo, or whatever name he's going by these days, knows."

"Well I don't," I said, touching my hand to my stinging cheek. Fake bitch had drawn blood with his fake nails. "Bitch." I paused a second and added, "Bastard."

"Thank you," Elendira said, suddenly cheerful.

We had entered a small clearing. There were holo-ads flashing everything from canned air to Sparkler Day Cigarettes to toilet paper. And in the middle of the clearing was a Plant Bulb filled with cloudy slightly bloody fluid and her.

The Plant Angel was curled up in the center of the bulb, her wings more bones than feather, the cherubs on her back blackened and smoldering, and her guts spilling out of large rips in her. That couldn't be healthy. She weakly hissed and tried to bite the Engineers attaching cables to every part of her body.

I really didn't know what to think. On one hand, she was a helpless female in distress. On the other hand, she was a vicious alien whose people were bred for the only reason of being power plants. Besides, what could I do? She was good as dead anyway.

They even had a new Plant Angel in a coffin ready to transfer. She was still a child in Plant terms with her small breasts and tiny wings budding everywhere on her body. "A bit young to be bringing into another bulb," Elendira said under his breath, "Don't try to stop it, you'll get shot and what good would that do Master Knives?" He pointed to his own face, "Do you want to get those scratches looked at?"

"What scratches?" I said. I could feel them itching slightly as they shrunk. Just another part of my getting modified. "So all we can do is watch?"

They were pulling switches on a panel. The Plant in the bulb turned her head toward the crackling sound and mewed slightly.

"Roll one. And keep that girl steady, we could blackout the whole power grid."

"Gotcha, gotcha... I thought this was supposed to be immortal."

"Only if powered right I think."

"I don't really care... just get this done, move onto the next one."

There was a kid about ten with her mom, cute thing with missing front teeth and a balloon in one hand. "Hey Lady," I shouted over the crackling in the air, "You mind taking your kid away from this?"

"She need to see this," the woman protested. I would probably never see her again and that was a good thing. I probably would have punched her. "I was at a Final Run when I was a child and I was fine."

"Don't blame me when your kid turns out to be an axe murderer."

She rolled her eyes and turned away. The last run was already starting. The Plant screamed and twisted as her hair turned black. I could hear a childish giggle and realized how sick the city was.

It was already over. The Plant Angel was already dead and her charred corpse was floating down to the bottom of the bulb. People walked off because the entertainment was over. "Is that it?" I asked as they installed the new Plant.

"Pretty much," Elendira said, before adjusting his oversized suitcase. "Stay alive, you. We'll be sending your assignment soon."

"Assignment? What assignment?"

Elendira studied me once more. "Nicholas Wolfwood," he said finally, "You really are clueless, aren't you?"

He winked and walked away. In the bulb, the small Plant approached her dead sibling and ran long fingers through the other's black hair. I watched them closely until the Plant opened her mouth wide revealing rows and rows of long jagged teeth. She bent her head and ripped away half of her dead sister's face. I looked away, feeling sick.

That's when I saw her.

She was on a bench, watching everything. She was thin with small breasts and blonde hair with black streaks running through it. She (definitely female) wore white which matched her freaky little dog with its solid yellow eyes and six legs. It even had a tiny pair of useless wings on its back.

"Good," I heard her say, "The bitch finally stopped whining. I would have gone mad."

I looked at her. Her freak dog was now running around her legs yapping something that sounded 'mama' over and over again. "You talking about the Plant Angel?"

"Of course," she said, rolling her eyes, "What other twit could I be talking about?" She looked just like a female version of Vash. Hell, she even had a little beauty mark on her left cheek. "I'm talking about the Plant Angel I had killed."

"You were the one who ordered?"

"Of course," she said, "She would have died anyway. I just sped up her death."

Her little dog sniffed my shoes. It wagged all eleven of its tails and little wings. "Daddy?" it asked, "Daddy?"

"Hey you," she said, tugging the dog back on its leash so hard it bounced on the sidewalk, "I didn't spend five grand on a Plant Angel-Dog hybrid for you to sniff a human."

The dog ran back up and licked my loafer. Its weird eyes locked on to mine. "Daddy?"

"Little traitor," she scowled and limped to over to the dog. I could see that one of her eyelids drooped and the eye was glassy-looking. "I won't have you doing that."

She casually snapped the dog's head off with a twist of her wrist. The thing twitched once and was still. "That was uncalled for."

"It was made of my DNA. The DNA of the first Freeborn," she said, standing up proudly, despite her fake leg and glass eye, "I made it, therefore it goes by my rules."

I finally recognized the sullen face, that pasty skin, that chin-length haircut. "So you're Tessla Saverem."

Tessla looked at the bloody and mangled corpse in her hands before shoving both pieces into the Plant bulb. The Plant Angel squealed and started chewing at her new treat. Tessla stared at her bloody white gloves and clothes for a moment. She cleared her throat. "Tessla Nikola... I'll be damned if I go by that Saverem bitch's name. How did you know who I am?"

"You're famous, you know," I said, lightning up another cigarette and praying for lung cancer. "Besides I'm friends with Vash."

She gawked at me. "Why would anyone want to be friends with him..." She trailed off and smirked, "Besides Knives and I know what his interest in him is."

"Which is?"

She just walked away, through the trees and to her limo. I stood there in one of few green parts of the city and smoked my cigarette as snow began to fell.

God, I hated that girl.

But she probably hated me too, so that made it even.

...to be continued.