The Peacock Cloak

faults to infectious diseases. Since the complete process normally took about twelve hours, Jacob Stone, the Rio Quinto ’s captain and sole crew member, availed himself of the opportunity of a little shore leave, a chance to stretch his legs and partake of a few diversions that were not on offer in his cramped captain’s quarters on the ship.
    Picture Stone as a podgy pale-skinned man in his middle years with indifferent personal hygiene and poor social skills. There are reasons why people choose a career that means spending most of their life alone in a space the size of a cramped one-bedroom apartment. Day to day, Jacob’s life had no meaning. He slept, he watched movies, he played video games, he slept some more. His dream, his sole dream, was to accumulate so much money that he would one day be the envy of men whose more conventional lives had been encumbered by such inconveniences as wives, children, families, workmates, friends. He often laughed to himself, alone in his quarters, surrounded by vast tracts of nothingness, to think of his generous untaxed salary accumulating, virtually untouched, in his bank account. Boy oh boy, would he show them! He was already well on the way to his second million.
    Now he strolled alone along Main Street, New Vegas, illuminated and animated for his sole benefit, checking out the craic. There was Clancy’s Irish Bar, Yoko’s Geisha Paradise, the Good Ol’ Little Earth Bar, and Mr Wu’s Wonderful World of Food, each one with its name in bright lights, and its own cheery theme tune tinkling out into the street. Then there was the Simply Vegas Casino, Brando’s Old Time Movie Theatre, and the Vegas Forever Grocery and Souvenir Store. After that came the Wild West Saloon, the Gay Paree Revue Bar and Mrs Morgan’s Place, “the Great Little Whorehouse with the Heart of Gold”. Then came Donny’s Downloads, Vera’s Virtual Vehicle Rides, Pistol Pete’s Shootin’ Range, the Pocket Hilton Hotel (with its grand total of four bedrooms) and the Simply Peace chapel/temple/synagogue. (You could choose which religion when you went in). And then… well, then you were back at Clancy’s Irish Bar again because, like I said, New Vegas is a torus station. The street goes round the inside of it.
    Jacob tried out Clancy’s, Mr Wu’s, the casino and Mrs Morgan’s. Inside these establishments, Jacob found various humorous, folksy and eccentric characters of both sexes, along with lots of pretty young girls and a few handsome young dudes. There were more of these folk out on the streets: Officer Murphy, for example, who stood outside Pete’s with his hands on his hips, surveying the scene with his sharp and humorous eyes, or Ol’ Pop Johnson on his rocking chair outside the Saloon, chewing his unlit pipe.
    “Howdy Cap’n Stone. Long time no see, buddy,” Ol’ Pop called out.
    “Howdy,” grunted Jacob, half-pleased and half-irritated.
    All of these Vegas people were rooted to the spot on which they stood or sat or, in the case of some in Mrs Morgan’s, lay. All of them were controlled by the same single computer and all of them had spent the two-and-a-half months since the previous starship left motionless and in pitch darkness. In New Vegas, the music played and the lights twinkled and the faces came alive only when a spaceman docked and crossed over from his ship.
    Jacob was paying a second visit to the restaurant, dining alone on a synthetic pap said to “have all the spice and excitement of Old Bangkok”, when the game show playing on the TV over the bar was interrupted for some news.
    “Hey folks,” said the handsome anchorman, “this is a news flash brought to you by NVBC. We have a new visitor! Following the arrival a few hours ago of respected starways veteran Captain Jacob Stone we are now also hosting the Exocon Enterprise V and her up-and-coming head honcho Captain Doug Hempleman.”
    “Looks like you’ve got company, Mr Stone!” said Mr Wu from behind the bar. Mrs Wu and all three of the pretty animatronic waitresses looked over at Jacob and smiled.
    They were decorative only, of course, those waitresses, since they were unable to walk. One of them also had a missing arm.
    “Yeah I guess,” said Jacob without enthusiasm, wiping his mouth.
    “ Exocon Enterprise V ,” said the newsman on the TV screen, “is one of the new Class-F multi-function ships that we’ve heard so much about lately, currently carrying cerium extraction equipment to Trixie