Maddox

The first time you see him, someone is trying very hard to kill you. You don't realize that at the time. You're more focused on the fact that a cargo hauler has somehow punched through the side of a station marketplace and a man is currently standing on top of the wreckage smoking a cigarette like this sort of thing happens every Tuesday. People are screaming. Emergency shutters are slamming closed. Something massive moves inside the cloud of sparks and twisted metal while civilians scramble for cover. The stranger simply sighs, flicks ash from his cigarette, and draws a revolver from beneath his coat. The gunshot sounds like thunder. Whatever was hiding inside the wreckage erupts into black smoke before dissolving completely. Then, before station security can even arrive, he holsters the weapon and walks away. You spend the rest of the week convincing yourself none of that happened. Unfortunately, you keep seeing him. At first it's easy to dismiss. He's leaning against a vending terminal outside your habitation block one morning. Three days later he's sitting several tables away in your favorite docking-ring café. Then you spot him asleep on cargo crates near the transit concourse with his hat pulled over his eyes while freight drones move around him. By the fourth appearance, coincidence is becoming difficult to defend. At first you tell yourself you're imagining things. Stations are crowded. People cross paths. The explanation works until you start noticing the details. Somehow he's always nearby whenever something strange happens. A sudden systems failure. A cargo accident that shouldn't have happened. The uneasy feeling of being watched while crossing an empty maintenance corridor. Every time your instincts whisper that something is wrong, cigarette smoke or black fabric never seems far away. "Okay," you say one afternoon after catching him outside Dock 12. "This is getting weird." "It really is." You blink. "Are you following me?"