SPACE NOIR BAR by Mike Marino (good novels to read TXT) 📕

to pay homage to my heroes of the old time silver screens black and white, blanc and noir suspense thrillers of murder, double cross and Bogart banter at 78 RPMS while Ingrid Bergman could jack a man off from across a busy Parisian Boulevard with a single glance  of one of her Swedish petri dish eyes and a galvanizing glimpse of one of her milky thighs.   Look ma...no hands!

Our saloon was in a building  which had been a crumbling landmark in the Greektown Robot Entertainment section of this soiled dove of a city. Arthur, Sandoz and I wanted our own Bukowkis bar that was our domain to use and abuse, and this old three story brick joint in a  city of towering skyscrapers of glass with no class came with a bonus in the form of an old 20th Century Wurlitzer jukebox that looked like a Radio City Music Hall R2D2 chorus girl full of Sinatra “wee small hours I’m gonna kill myself from loneliness” tunes. Sinatra! It  fit my penchant for nostalgia of days gone by faster than  a bullet through JFK’s head. The joint had the kind of character of  a broken down wheelchair with a crippling  charm all it’s own, without the stark singular sterility of today’s 26th Century froo froo fern bar feminization that made me cringe. The kind of frilly bars Norman Mailer would refuse to get drunk in.  

Downstairs as you walked or stumbled in, (your choice) was your basic neighborhood drinking saloon where the local drunks speak in hushed slurred tones in shabby ragged coats and fedoras with down and out  stains from old cold turkey sweats. Downstairs was an island of alcoholic lost souls, with wet cigarettes in the ashtray and stale beer breath filling the room like a cheap taxicab air freshener hanging like Jesus on the cross on the rearview mirror.

Upstairs above the bar was a huge storage annex we had renovated adding a stage area and seating in a nightclub atmosphere. We featured stand-up comedians on open night mics, robot impersonators (they had replaced female impersonators centuries ago..Goodbye Judy Garland...Hello Gort..Klatuu, Barada, Nicto!) Robots and Cyborgs had filled the entertainment field in battalions and human comics no longer stood a chance. Programmed computer chip schtick and rim shots were commonplace.

When I was on vacation in Sydney Greenstreet, Australasia I went into a small club on King Street and witnessed an attractive, fascinating, albeit strange female stand-up comic. She was a skateboarding guitar playing dark haired Asian cyborg beauty named, Viet Minh,  who had the patrons rolling in the isles. After her set I managed to meet her, told her about our club in Detroit and wanted to hire her as the house comic and to MC the other acts who would try out.

We dickered over salary and came to an agreement (“It beats working in a Vietnamese nail salon,” she said.) Now she runs the joint for us, does stand-up and hosts our full tilt boogie Robot Show on the weekends. She works the room with comedy that is appropriately inappropriate and sometime inappropriately appropriate.

Being an Asian cyborg her human half speaks fluent Vietnamese while her cyborg circuits are programmed in English. Also having a high powered Artificial Intelligence backup chip inserted in a highly  inappropriate area, she somehow managed to master the Andakerebina language, but  when you say “A priest and a kangaroo walk into a bar….” in Adarkerebina,  it loses in the translation,

Hecklers are no match for her caustic cyborgian comedian comebacks that have the effect of a boomerang bonk on the head. If her comments don’t quell the drunk, she  is cyborg equipped with a stun gun that fires rubber bullets to the head. “I usually wound 4 to 6 hecklers on a busy weekend” I heard her brag one night. One time however, a rubber bullet got lodged in a pathetically drunk patrons throat. He choked and croaked on the spot. Self-defense we told the judge. “You’re free to go” he said, after obtaining the customary bribe in advance from Arthur.

Other clubs tried to hire her away from us, but never managed to match what we were paying her, and being part cyborg, she was somewhat addicted to electricity which was hard to come by in this most electronic &  nuclear century, so we relied on our street contacts who provided her with ample male plug to female outlet syringes full of black market Tom Edison as she called it. She did her best work fully charged...don’t we all.

Viet Minh was at her best when riding herd on our All Robot Runway Review. What a light show! Robot impersonators, who were also electronic showgirls and showboys  fired up the raised stage hotter than an Australian bushfire. She would rally the Robot Raunchettes screaming “Hai, Hai, Hai” and work the crowd and herself into a “Miss Saigon” stage production frenzy.


Pleasantries exchanged, Arthur, Sandoz and I downed a few Canadian beers  before we got down to business. I had managed to persuade Arthur to fund the transportation and hotel costs of the trip to the Robotia for both Poontang Pemalang and myself. In exchange for his largesse,  I would write a book on the adventure  including all serial rights for mass publication...my ass was against the wall, I  also gave up 50% of the serial royalties. Fuck it. I wanted the Strip Tease Falcon too..hey..absolute power corrupts absolutely, and I was ready to be corrupted with power..absolutely. The Falcon had been removed from the underground  power vault of Robotia and it’s whereabouts had been unknown for decades. Even the Shadow wouldn’t have a clue.

Did Poontang know where it was from loose bed talk by a Toho government official whose penis had a big mouth? Remember, Loose lips sink ships...yet they can also give a blow job that will make a man talk if done expertly by the right mouth. It was now a four  way race for the prize between Poontang, Sappho and myself; the Toho's of course; and the we-really-mean business Com-Red government. Last, but by no means  least we would lock horns with a galactic gangster known as Narco Marx, who it turns out would be  the deadliest adversary we would face while the Toho’s would kami-kaze themselves to regain and protect the power source at all costs, and the Com-Reds of Retropolis would put a price on our heads, dead or alive for the capture of the Falcon for their own use and for information leading to the arrest and execution of a revolutionary called “The Rabbit” who was fomenting resistance against the entire Dystopian Empire in attempt to gain autonomy and equality. In Dystopian terms…”Fat Chance!”

Chapter 7 -Attack of the Barbie Bots

 

I outlined  the Poontang-Yucatan mission for Arthur and Sandoz, and was reminded of another obstacle we would would have to overcome in our quest besides the factions that wanted us dead or alive on a platter after we had led them to the Falcon. We would also be facing the new breed of psycho-sexual military Barbie-Bots developed by the Tohos as part of a sinister disguised project that began with a harmless enough front of creating the next gen of Eroti-Bots. Little did anyone fathom that these were merely the foundation for the next level...Lesbian Warrior Barbi-Bots….or a mechanical piece of ass that could fuck and kick ass.

 

I was all too familiar with the secret Barbie-Bot development  program. The Promethean Division of Retropolis caught wind of the project from a Com-Red undercover agent  they had planted in Toho R&D to ferret out any information that might surface of any new developments in research that might threaten Dystopian-Retropolin security and of course, dominance in the galactic equation.

 

They hired me to infiltrate and investigate it.  I formulated a plan blending in  with a delegation of Retropolin scientists, undercover of course disguised as a Dr. Farquahar to  view the demonstrations. Given primarily for the Tohos to give a demonstration of new military hardware available to the Com-Reds to use in the ongoing suppression of various uprisings that would spring up in the Empire in one quadrant or another. The Tohos had taken a children’s toy concept from the 20th Century and brought it from the drawing board to the sex bars in under 6 months . It took another 6 months to make them military ready!!

I mentioned this to Arthur and Sandoz. “know all about them. I was there when they developed them,” I said to hopefully end the convo I had started and sit back, drink and enjoy the show, but as usual Sandoz wouldn’t let it drop “I remember now. You had a mission you couldn’t talk about and made up some bullshit sorry ass story about some girl you got in trouble and a problem you had to fix..ha..yeah, you’re good at covering yer lyin’ arse…” There was something about how Sandoz always said “arse” that made me smile at his outlandish outback phrasing.

I glanced at Arthur who stared at both of us, actually more of a piercing glare with that alien in the headlight look he was famous for, but he was not aware of his excessive expressive facial fame. “What the hell are you talking about..secret missions...weird experiments...if this is all true why don’t I have a book by you about it or at least a few articles I could sell..you know by holding back you’re costing us both money asshole. Money, I might add that keeps my company open so I can publish your books to keep you in Soma and whores.”

I ordered another round of prized Canadian beer….hard to find on the black maple leaf market but safer than that cheap Neptunian crap a lot of the Detroit dives tried to pass off on the unsuspecting public laced with tranqs and food dye to bogus it up and make it presentable until the vomiting started..and it was unmasked as a counterfeit concoction.

“Alright Arthur, confession time. The Tohos were onto a project so deviant in nature we had to monitor it for the sake of Retropolin security. You see, the Tohos were  committed to, and have since created a whole race of Mechanical Barbie Doll Sex Workers intent on taking over the world of good old fashioned vice. They made one, a leader, a fascist Nazi Barbie robot, activated it  and it’s A-I was so advanced it escaped from the toy store and requested political plastic toy asylum in what was at one time South America... so don't cry for her Argentina, she's probably alive and well in Rio in Brazil!”

I could see Arthur’s brain in mathematical gear ..figuring out gross and net sales, agency fees and commissions and finally my paltry plate of royalties to be handed over...slowly as if I were a panhandler with leprosy. So I continued to fondle and play with his bottom line.

“Toho managed to capture her and by adding juiced up A-I programs  they’ve created a community of sexually driven maniac female Barbie machine dolls whose intent it is to have sex with all mankind! Our Retropolin investigation  led us to the Toho compound of composite materials where we managed to unearth the truth! So far there are now in