SCS Fanfiction Contest Winner – Above the Clouds – ByLuke W. Logan

Above the Clouds – By Luke W. Logan

The Empyrean Hotel, Casino & Spa sits in a geostationary orbit 35,787 kilometres above the Earth’s equator. A seamless blend of Vanguard technologies and human ingenuity, the Empyrean’s facilities boast unmatched levels of luxury without ever compromising on security. With literally thousands of kilometres of deadly vacuum between you and any unwanted guests, when you stay at the Empyrean you can truly relax; safe from incursions, ex-(and current)wives, paparazzi, and tax authorities! Single suite rooms start at $5000 per night. — The Empyrean Hotel, Casino & Spa’s promotional pamphlet.

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Gomorrah stalked the streets of River Heights burning mansions and estates with an irreverent glee that could be seen through the reflective faceplate of her armoured helm. The camera angle cut from directly above to offer close-up—and frequently provocative—shots of her lithe form as the Samurai made her way through an upscale neighbourhood that had been considerably less on fire only a few moments before.

The AI rendering the various camera angles tended to get a little carried away, and some perspectives were considerably more gratuitous than others. In many ways, it was like watching an anime with a serious fan-service problem, in others, it was just a total violation of Gomorrah’s personal privacy. Deepfaking a Samurai was an especially dangerous and illicit endeavour. But here on the Empyrean’s casino floor, using spy satellites and AI to spice up real-time arson was amongst the least of Management’s many sins.

A rolling bar of text scrolled along the bottom of the screen calculating the approximate property damage so-far and offering decreasingly favourable odds for those who could correctly guess the final value of Gomorrah’s napalm-spraying spree. A cluster of middle-aged guests watched the footage with rapt attention, collectively wincing when the feed cut away to different—less popular—Samurai engaged in more mundane forms of frantic violence. The camera always switched back after a few minutes of flashy ultra-violence. Newer Samurai were far safer to spy on, and the pyro-nun was insanely hot—pun intended.

I tore my gaze away from the screens showcasing Gomorrah’s beautifully lit arse just in time to avoid braining myself on an open car door. The culprit of my near-miss was the slowly rotating vehicle taking up a considerable amount of space within the casino floor. My free arm windmilled ungraciously while the drinks balanced in my other tilted precariously. The instincts I’d honed through five gruelling years in the service industry saved both them, and a few days’ worth of docked wages, as I righted my tray, and kept the overpriced liquors in their respective glasses. I also avoided falling into the first sports car launched into space, but that would have just been humiliating rather than financially eviscerating.

I glared at the bright red vehicle and promised myself vengeance should I ever discover a time machine. Somewhere in the not-too-distant-past, Space Karen was enjoying themselves having sent the electric vehicle into orbit and I couldn’t let that stand. I understood it was just the refurbished leftovers of a fifty-year-old publicity stunt, but now that it nearly killed me on a daily basis, I thoroughly despised it and its arguably beneficial legacy.

Fucking, Space Karen.

The few tonnes of antique steel and fibreglass that made up the refurbished vehicle—not to mention its constantly rotating podium—had been placed right in the middle of my preferred path from the bar to the screen lounge. Whichever genius from Management had decided to put the ‘Car to be won!’ on the Casino floor, had yet to update the haptics in our trays. So when I daydreamed and let the gentle nudges guide me towards whoever was waiting on their drink, I frequently found myself walking directly into the bright red convertible.

Despite my grumbles, I made it to my section without further incident. I then spent five minutes unloading my tray to a collection of wealthy gamblers with more money than taste. The haptics in my tray told me where to go, and the cameras in the ceiling made sure my pay would be docked for any mistakes I might make. This early in the day it was better to be seen and not heard. The guests primarily ordered through their augs, and then I would appear a few minutes later to hand over their beverages without a word. They very rarely tipped, but considering nobody tried to flirt with me, I didn’t feel like complaining.

When my tray was empty, I took one last look at Gomorrah on the screens above before making my way back towards the bar. This time I pointedly avoided my inanimate nemesis and walked a little closer to the felt-lined tables where more respectable gamblers exchanged large fortunes over the turn of a card. A small part of me was jealous of the guest’s obscene wealth. The average bet made in this casino was more than twice my annual salary, but having worked at the Empyrean for so long, I had largely grown numb to the allure of wealth. Instead, I had become deeply afraid that the attitudes of the idle rich I catered to were representative of the majority, not the minority of those with true money.

I had seen enough decadence and lack of basic human empathy from the politicians and CEOs who ran my world to last a lifetime. Management were bad, but the things I’d seen guests do while working a night shift made those sociopathic monsters seem like saints.

Seriously, if you want to continue sleeping soundly in blissful ignorance, never work nights in a five-star hotel. The tips simply aren’t worth the existential dread.

When I reached the bar, I set my tray down gently and sighed.

“You okay, Gwen?”

I looked up and saw Sybille smiling at me from behind the counter. She was the closest thing I had to a friend in the Empyrean, which was a big deal for me. Shuttles down to Earth were maddeningly expensive, and staff were effectively stuck in the hotel for six-month tours at a time. No matter how spacious the crew facilities were—and ours were not spacious—spending six months in an enclosed space with someone either made you friends for life or the direst of enemies.

Given my… personality, I had cultivated a lot of enemies during my time at the Empyrean.

Sybille was one of the few who’d been working here longer than me, and she was the only person who not only tolerated my quirks but actually seemed to like them. She called me ‘neurospicy’ and while it made me feel more like an overseasoned taco than a person, it made me feel like her overseasoned taco. I could quite happily live with that.

“I’m fine,” I lied, not really meaning it but daring her to question me. “Do you have drinks for me?”

“Yeah, you’ve got some big drinkers today. There’s a lot of old whiskeys to go back to the screens,” Sybille said, placing the first of many tumblers on my no-longer vacant tray. The drinks kept piling up far in excess of what I was used to, and my eyebrows quirked upwards.

“That’s a lot of booze.”

“Ten points to captain obvious.”

I blushed.

“You know what I mean,” I said defensively.

“I do, but you’re fun to tease,” Sybille replied with her usual smile. “Have you been paying attention to what’s actually going on in your section, or have you been sneaking glances at Gomorrah’s ass all morning?”

“I…”

“Yeah… that’s what I thought.” She chuckled, but there was no joy in it, and I couldn’t help but frown. “The world’s burning, Gwen. More so than usual. The high-ranking Samurai are MIA and all over the planet anathema are hunting people for food. These guys—” Sybille gestured towards where the guests I was tasked to serve watched the Samurai fight aliens live on TV “—are all politicians, shareholders, or captains of various industries. They’ll know better than most how bad it really is, and if you look, you’ll see that they’re all drinking. Heavily. Rumour has it there’s been talk amongst Management about dropping the hotel’s no-minors policy and start selling permanent suites to families…”

I scoffed.

“And give up all the money they make from the joygirl floor? Please. It will never happen,” I answered.

“I dunno, Gwen… Rich people generally like their kids being alive more than they enjoy a quick tumble in the sheets with a well-compensated stranger. Besides, they can have families in the suites and keep the joygirl floor. It’s a big hotel,” Sibylle said, and she wasn’t wrong about that last part.

“Still, I can’t imagine this place with little brats running about.”

“Me neither, but times are changing.”

“You make it sound like it’s the end of days,” I said.

Sybille shrugged.

“Maybe it is.” There was a pregnant pause while my friend continued to pour expensive liquor we could never afford into crystal glassware we would never own. I looked back over at my section and tried to imagine the millionaires and billionaires who made up the Empyrean’s clientele indulging in their illicit vices while their families slept only a few hundred metres away, rather than thirty-five thousand kilometres they did now.

I couldn’t see it.

But then again, I couldn’t see a lot of things.

I looked at their faces, searching for some of the fear Sibylle suggested was there. They looked… drunk, but that was about all I could divine. Maybe if I was normal rather than neurospicy I’d be able to understand facial expressions like Sybille could, but I struggled to maintain eye contact at the best of times and I had the social instincts of a turnip. If it wasn’t for my augs, I wouldn’t even be able to function in a place as loud and bright as the casino. But I had them, so it wasn’t a big deal.

People though… they were still hard for me to work with.

“Your drinks are ready,” Sybille said. She was smiling at me again, but I didn’t know why she’d gone from being needlessly dramatic to overly friendly. I smiled back and made sure to look into her eyes for three full seconds, because that was usually the right thing to do.

“Thanks,” I eventually replied.

I picked up my tray, now filled to the brim with heavy glassware and followed the haptics back to my section. Again they nearly guided me into that damned sportscar, and again I avoided an expensive spill by the skin of my teeth. I wove between the crowds while Gomorrah on the screens above wove between a swarm of flaming anathema. They barrelled towards her threatening death, whereas most of my customers only wanted their drinks. The few who wanted more, I evaded, displaying what I like to think of as a similar level of effortless grace to the pyro-nun I was so fond of.

My tray was half-full when it happened. The floor lurched beneath my feet and I both felt and heard the tortured groan of metal shuddering through the Empyrean’s substructure. The lights went out, only to be replaced a heartbeat later by red emergency lighting and a siren blared its loud accompanying wails.

My augs immediately kicked in, muting the worst of the noise and softening the glare while guests around me cried out in a panic. During the hustle of suddenly moving bodies, I very nearly dropped my tray. Then the main lights came back on and the siren abruptly stopped. Normalcy resumed, ushered in by the disconcerted mutterings of the uber-rich and I wondered what the hell was wrong. This was firmly out of the ordinary. I liked the almost rote routine of the usual day-to-day. I thrived on it even if my job was boring as hell. But I did not like this. My augs were doing their best to keep me calm and functional, but they weren’t perfect, and I could feel my own panic rising as the anxious crowd pulled me under.

Then a burst of static emerged from the recessed speakers which had previously been playing ambient mood music, and I like many others, looked up at the ceiling.

“Apologies for the disturbance. Some fast-moving debris came close to the hotel and we had to fire up the manoeuvring thrusters. Someone in engineering didn’t quite get the message and flipped the general alarm as a mistake.

“Everything is fine. There is no emergency.

“With that said, all staff are to remain in place, unless instructed otherwise, while we run some checks. Please consult your PAs or paired augmentations for further instructions. All guests, however, are to meet in the cocktail lounge for complimentary drinks and cakes. Please check your PAs for further details.”

The voice cut out with another burst of static and the mood music I’d grown to loathe resumed. I frowned, but it wasn’t because of the casino’s repetitive and uninspired soundtrack.

I knew what manoeuvring thrusters felt like and what we’d all just experienced decidedly wasn’t that. Around me guests were checking their issued PA’s or staring into space as they consulted their augs.

One and all, their faces paled. Those who ignored Management’s message were quickly nudged to do so by their peers, and then after some more face paling they immediately made their way to the nearest exit. Their pace could accurately be described as ‘not quite a run.’ For the first time in a long while, I was very tempted to disobey Management and join the fleeing guests. Instead, I checked my augs and read the instructions telling me to remain in place. Judging from how all of my co-workers were looking around at the increasingly empty casino, I assumed that message was universal amongst us staff.

I cautiously walked back to the bar while the last of the guests left the room. I wasn’t alone in choosing the bar to congregate at, and by the time I’d arrived half the game dealers had joined the waiting staff in milling around Sibylle’s station. As a rule, we were a gossipy lot. Exchanging rumours was one of the few forms of entertainment we were allowed to have up here—with anything that could broadcast or receive a signal from Earth being firmly banned. Usually, our talks fixated on which guests were sleeping with who, and who in Management were self-medicating and with what, but today our collective powers for rapidly dispersing information were put to good use.

“So we’re all agreed? That announcement was BS and something either hit the hotel or worse, exploded from within it,” Sibylle said, somehow emerging as our de facto spokesperson in a matter of minutes.

“I still think it could be the manoeuvring thrusters. If there was a problem, they wouldn’t just leave us here. We’re highly valued employees!” Margot offered—she was one of the few holdouts who actually believed management cared about us, and rumour had it she was having a fling with the head of accounting. Most of us knew she’d always take Management’s side, but some of us still nodded along to her placating words.

That was potentially a very big problem.

“When the Titanic sank, officers held the people in second class and service staff below decks at gunpoint while the first class passengers were loaded onto the lifeboats,” I said, and everyone looked at me in ways that made me feel uncomfortable. I knew I was supposed to stop talking, but I couldn’t help myself. My opinion was relevant. I was relevant. “Only 1 in 4 passengers from the lower decks survived compared to 6 in 10 from the luxury suites.”

There was a long pause.

“I don’t see how that applies to us, we’re staff,” someone said, and I barely resisted the urge to mention that on Empyrean we were by far the closest thing they had to third-class passengers.

“What’s the Titanic?” someone else asked, and this time I didn’t stop myself from sighing in exasperation when half the servers started talking amongst themselves about old movies and an older actor’s penchant for women under the age of 25.

“You think they’re evacuating the guests and leaving us here so we don’t get in the way?” Phil—another waiter—asked loudly.

“It’s possible,” I said, “I don’t want to leap to conclusions, but if I’m wrong, why hasn’t Management interrupted us by now?”

Everyone either looked up at the ceiling or down at their issued PAs. Management was always listening while we were on duty. It explicitly was in our contracts. AIs not-too-dissimilar from the ones generating suggestive Samurai footage listened to everything we said through our PAs—and in my case, through my augs—and would flag certain keywords, earning us warnings and reprimands depending on the severity of what was said.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Open talk of conspiracies and corporate neglect should have earned us some sort of punishment by now. Instead, nothing had happened and as the seconds ticked by, nothing continued to happen.

“Let’s say, hypothetically, that something’s gone terribly wrong with the Empyrean, and this Titanic analogy isn’t that inaccurate. What’s the worst-case scenario?” Phil asked.

“The Empyrean is about to explode and we’re all going to die,” Sibylle said dryly. Then she sighed with resignation when no one immediately decided to follow that up. “Come on guys, we shouldn’t forget that while we all call it a hotel, the Empyrean is a space station. A very big space station, moving very fast, thanks to a lot of moving parts—some of which no human understands. And it’s all surrounded by a hard vacuum that will kill anyone not wearing a proper suit within thirty seconds of exposure.”

“Well that’s fucking cheery. Does anyone have a less terrible scenario?” someone added, earning a few grunts of agreement.

“Anything capable of surviving re-entry to Earth is going to be very expensive. You all know how much Management charges for an unscheduled shuttle flight…” I said, and this time there was a chorus of nods. “Given how much money they spent on staff quarters, I think we need to acknowledge the possibility there may not be enough escape pods for staff and guests,” I answered, and this time you could have heard a fucking pin drop.

“Okay, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. No one wants to lose their jobs because we worked ourselves up into a blind panic and then did something stupid,” Sibylle said, and several of my colleagues shot unpleasant looks in my direction. “Nor do we want to sit around gossiping about all the things that could go wrong if something is actually in the process of going wrong with the hotel.” She paused and this time there was a lot of solemn nodding. I felt a growing spike of envy at how easily Sibylle could control a room. “Fortunately, there’s an easy way to test the severity of this situation, before we do anything rash.”

Sibylle wheeled her chair to the wall behind the bar, and after a brief pause, a squarish, brown bottle coated in fine layers of synthetic dust was removed from the top shelf by a robotic arm set into the bar. The robot set the bottle down on the counter with a near-silent clunk and everyone held their breath.

I looked at the cameras in the ceiling expecting an infraction warning to come at any second. A chastising voice, and alert in my augs. Anything. But nothing came. Sibylle cleared her throat and stared directly into the nearest camera lens.

“I, Sibylle Eleanor Drum, intend to open this… 2.4 million dollar bottle of whiskey for personal use.”