Mermaid Pirate Dispatch

Chip coughed as an old truck roared past spewing a thick black cloud of exhaust from its noisy tailpipe. The subconscious reminder had him looking down at the display at his waist. Just under six hours remaining. He could feel the skin in his fingers shriveling and a shiver ran up his spine. One last item of business, then he could find his final resting place.

He kept walking until he arrived at his aunt’s house. Chip paced outside for a precious ten whole minutes, his stomach churning as he imagined every possible way she might react. It wouldn’t be good, he knew that for sure. She’d probably lose her mind and give him a scolding that would finish him off faster than the extraction process, but someone had to handle his affairs and transfer the money when it was done.

He knocked on her door, his gut full of lead, and waited. When the door opened her eyes lit up. “Chip!” she exclaimed. “You haven’t been by to visit in years! Come on in! Can I get you anything?”

“No, aunt Stacy. I’m just here for a quick visit. I’ve got somewhere else to be pretty soon.” He glanced down at the display again. Just a few hours to go. He’d thought long and hard about where he wanted to be once he was exhausted, and it wasn’t aunt Stacy’s house.

“That’s fine sweetie,” she said. “What did you need?”

Chip pulled a thin plastic card with a unique pattern of copper contacts on it from his pocket and handed it to her.

“A payment card?” she asked, curious. Her eyes darted to the device at his hips and her eyes bulged. “Oh Chip…” she gasped, putting a hand to her mouth. “No…”

“Stacy I had to. It’s the only chance mom has to…”

“Oh but Chip, she never would have wanted this. You must understand that you mean more to her than her own life.”

Chip raised his eyebrows and leveled a glare at her.

“Of course I know she means the world to you too… but you’re her future.” To his surprise, even as she said it her voice trailed off. She knew she was just making his own point for him.

“In a few hours there will be more money on that card than she can spend in a lifetime. It’ll pay for all her surgeries, medications, and anything else she might need. Just get her the card. Everything is already in her name.”

His aunt rolled her eyes and sighed with exasperation. “I just don’t understand how they can afford to pay so much for.. what? A few grams of material?”

“They’re precious metals,” he insisted. “The only way we can get them now is from asteroids or humans. They actually save a bunch of money by collecting from humans.”

His aunt didn’t care about the answer. Her eyes were welling up with tears and her lip was quivering. “Well,” she said, sniffling, “I don’t really know what to say.”

He stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her tightly. “Just tell mom I love her and I’m sorry I couldn’t do more for her.”

She held him a while, then grabbed his shoulders and stared into his eyes for a bit, her own eyes shimmering under the thick coating of tears waiting to spill out. He let out a weak smile, positive that at least a few of his vital organs were growing more and more sluggish. Even his brain activity seemed to be slowing down. “You should have gone to see her,” she said softly. A tear rolled down her cheek leaving a glistening trail behind.

“I couldn’t,” he said, shrugging.

He said goodbye and left, too dizzy to celebrate how well things had gone with his aunt, wandering through the streets as though in a daydream. He’d always wanted his final resting place to be somewhere quiet and peaceful, and he figured he could save someone a trip if he could get himself to the cemetery.

By the time he stumbled through the gates his vision was blurred. The readout on his hip said he had just a few minutes until 100% exhaustion. His heart beat weakly in his chest and he felt short of breath as he leaned against the fence and lowered himself to the grass. The nerve endings in his fingertips lazily brought his brain the news that he was running his hands over the cool green blades of grass just as the alarm went off on his hip. He knew the device was now sending out a GPS tracking signal so the lab engineers could come and retrieve the device, which now held several million dollars’ worth of precious metals. The beeping faded as several major systems simply shut down and Chip stopped breathing.

[Reddit Post]