Page 15 of Time Traveling Space Bastards

T here was always the final stage of Everclear I always managed to conveniently forget when I decided to hit that bottle. It was similar to the last stage of Long Island Iced Tea. It was the time where I woke up feeling like total trash who might have eaten roadkill the night before.

It was one of the main reasons I didn’t get drunk all that often. But I’d say three time traveling space bastards and a stowaway reappearing after this long and telling me I was an alien god needed alcohol. I tried to be strong and independent. Most of the time I was, but literally, no one could deal with that without some kind of coping mechanism.

This probably should have been one of those days where I took a long, luxurious hangover lie in, but I did need to call work and solve my murder. I had enough money to quit my job and just be if I didn’t die in two days, but I’d been poor long enough that I couldn’t fathom quitting my job just yet. I was planning on calling in.

When I rolled over, I looked at my alarm clock. Mother fuck. I should have been at work fifteen minute ago. I wasn’t planning on going and was thinking about quitting, but I didn’t want to get fired, either.

I tried to jump out of bed and get to my phone, but the room started spinning and my stomach dropped all the way to my feet. Yeah, I wasn’t going to be moving very quickly today. I stumbled into my living room. My new friends had food waiting, but there was one magic thing I required. If they didn’t have cacao trees, did they have the absolutely magical thing called coffee?

One of the shitty things about living alone is that you had to make your own coffee. I couldn’t afford the coffee machines you could program so that manna from the gods was waiting when you woke up. Sometimes, you needed coffee to make the coffee. I’d put water in the coffee machine, walked away, and came back to realize I forgot to add the grounds. That was how I knew it was going to be a shit day.

I couldn’t deal with my boss before coffee. I was already late. He could wait a little longer. I stumbled to the coffee machine and made sure I added the grounds this time.

“Hey, do you have coffee on your planet?”

I expected Enix to answer. He could just look up the answer and cross reference. And he did.

“We have something similar, but not exactly the same. We also dry plants and put it in boiling water like your tea.”

“That’s horrible. If I had to go without coffee, I’d be in jail for murder.”

“We will get you coffee before we talk. I think this planet might hail you as a hero if you murdered one of us,” Kuka said with a smile.

“Wise choice. Aren’t you a prince? Your planet might raze mine if I went into a caffeine-deficiency rage and killed you. And I don’t actually want to do that,” I said, pulling the pot away.

I poured five cups of coffee and set out my extensive array of flavored creamers. Sometimes, I was in a hazelnut mood, but some days called for salted caramel.

“Some people like it black or you’re me and you like the added taste of flavored creamer.”

Enix snatched his off of the table. He was a lot more adventurous now that he tried food and didn’t explode.

“I shall try it black and then with creamer to see which I prefer.”

“You might want to let it cool before you?—”

Aaand, Enix was gulping coffee straight from the pot without letting it cool. And he didn’t set it down screaming that it burned all the way down to his stomach.

“Um, anyone else might want to let it cool a little because it’s going to burn the shit out of you.”

“I’m a pleasure cyborg. You can buy us and have us feel pleasure and pain, but those of us who get stuck working in the brothels usually don’t have the pain setting because they don’t want us asking the sadists to stop because it’s too much. So, I can taste the coffee and I can feel that it’s hot, but it doesn’t hurt me.”

That was horrible. I was so glad he was away from that. He tried it with the creamer next and decided it was the superior version of coffee, so I knew we were going to be besties if I didn’t get murdered. They all preferred it with the fancy creamer.

“So, I’m going to need probably two more cups of coffee, but I’ve had enough to talk about my future murder.”

“So, I’ve accessed the case file. You didn’t show up to work for several days and didn’t call. The owner wanted to fire you, but one of your coworkers called for a wellness check. The police found you inside murdered. You had been strangled, but also stabbed forty-seven times.”

“Well, that was uncalled for,” I said.

I mean, I could only crack jokes at this point because I really didn’t want to get murdered, especially not like that.

“It was overkill. Your apartment was ransacked, but they didn’t suspect a robbery. They found five hundred dollars in a shoe that would have been easily found and the murderer left it. The only thing that was taken was your computer and phone. Based on that and the severity of the murder, they didn’t think it was a random robbery and that your murderer was someone you knew. Especially since there were no signs of a break in. They thought you let them in.”

“Weird, because I never tell people where I live and I only answer the door if I’ve ordered delivery.”

“That’s what stumped the police,” Omi said. “Sorry, Enix can transfer the data to us with our chips. Your coworker said they’d never been to your place, and you never really talked about your personal life. They couldn’t connect any friends or boyfriends with you until they got your phone records and even then, they couldn’t find a suspect.”

I shrugged.

“That’s valid. I don’t have a suspect, either. I only dated guys in the next town over, never told them where I lived, and ghosted them after two months. I have no social media because I didn’t want my parents finding me. I have nothing to say to them and they’d just find a way to control me again.”

“That’s part of why the case was unsolved,” Kuka said. “They eventually realized you were living under a fake identity and contacted your parents. Your parents told them that you were severely ill and ran away right after you turned eighteen when they were trying to get you under a conservatorship. The police formed a theory that you got caught up in some bad things that got you killed and shelved it with their cold cases instead of looking harder.”

“I can always count on my parents to ruin my life, even when I’m dead. And that’s fucking stupid. Even if I was really schizophrenic, I still deserved the dignity of having my murder solved. I was inpatient several times with people with all kinds of diagnosis. We’re all people. We aren’t out there causing chaos twenty-four seven.”

“I know,” Torrek said. “They interviewed several contacts they found on your phone. All of them said they really liked you, but you held back. Then, one day, you disappeared, and they never heard from you again. They found themselves blocked with no way to find you.”

“I don’t think it was one of them. I did the bad boy thing ages ago, but now I mostly go for the himbo with ginger cat vibes. None of them threw up red flags or I would have ghosted them sooner. Like I said, I don’t open the door unless I’m expecting someone. It’s usually a delivery driver, but one of my neighbors has mobility issues and can’t get around easily. They’ll come over with a list if they need me to pick something up, but they always text first because they know better.”

“Lillian James? Yes, she fought harder to keep your case open than anyone. She repeatedly told the police you’d never been anything more than a sound mind around her and she’d never known you to take any type of risks like that.”

“Ugh. I love that woman. I’m going to bring her cookies before I get murdered.”

“We’re going to stop that,” Torrek said. “I’ve been Kuka’s bodyguard for a while. I’ll be yours, too.”

Protected by the Big Sexy Alien with Stripes and Claws. If it wasn’t pertinent that I finish one series, I could roll with that on a new one.

Provided no one murdered me.