Smoke on Ice

By Robert Willis

A long time ago — when I first started working at Drifters and still cared about that sort of thing — I invented a drink called Smoke on Ice. Nothing fancy, just a low-temperature diffusion: a bit of carbon dioxide for some fake smoke and Arjjenian brandy cold enough to bite. You inhaled it as much as drank it for a quick drunk while looking sophisticated.

It bought me and the bar a few days of modest fame. Business ticked up a few credits, and I got interviewed for a minute and a half on the internal news loop no one actually watched. The guy from the feed office was so pleased to have a real story that he bought me a drink at Starways — the place regulators make label everything coffee-flavoured beverages. I had tea.

The drink lost popularity pretty quickly, and rightly so. It was a gimmicky thing in the first place. But every now and then somebody would order one without remembering who had created it. The very last time I poured one... well, that’s a story.

It was a slow night, which meant I was doing my favourite thing — standing behind the bar, looking calmly detached while polishing glasses that didn’t need it and listening to conversations I wasn’t supposed to hear. If I hadn’t watched her walk in, carefully threading her way through the tables, it would’ve felt like she’d just appeared at the counter.

She was completely unremarkable. Average height, average build, dressed in the dull beige of ship’s crew. Just another drone on shore leave, right? A few early starters gave her the once-over and then went back to their long-haul survival drinking.

She asked if she could sing for a drink — a Smoke on Ice. I was a little surprised — she didn't look the type. But I said yes — why not? — and I poured the drink for her. In fairness, she sang first.

Oh yeah... she sang.

I put the drink down in front of her. She looked down at it and wrapped her hand around the glass. After a few seconds, she looked up again, her eyes focused on some faraway time and she just… sang. No accompaniment. No movement. Just her voice. Just her voice.

Jajjarrans can sing two tones at once sometimes — harmonies that slide into themselves and melt into tonals that can make the gods weep. It silenced the house. No drinks were lifted, no one spoke, no one even shifted in their chair.

And everyone heard a different song.

I don’t know what language it was — if it even had words. The table of Cargelluan roughnecks sat with their mouths open. A Grjnthian — a hundred and twenty-five kilos of muscle and attitude — had tears running down its face. The dockheads sat like bags of sand, transfixed.

And me?

I heard glories and heartbreaks. And things buried deep in my soul.

Two minutes. Maybe less. The longest two minutes of our lives.

When she stopped, the silence was... loud. You could almost hear hearts tearing.

She picked up the drink, tossed it back in one smooth motion and set the glass down. Gently, as if it were delicate crystal.

And walked out. I never found out who she was, or where she came from, or what ship she left on.

It was the only time anything like that ever happened in this bar.

And the only other time I ever lost my soul to love.

About the Author

Robert Willis is an emerging author who lives with his family and cats in British Columbia, Canada, where he writes science fiction and fantasy.

His work includes short stories and poems with several longer projects underway including fantasy and urban fantasy novels and a pair of science fiction collections.

Robert’s work has been published in Grand Little Things, dadakuku, several FARK Fiction Anthologies, and Polar Borealis.

Visit Robert's website here: https://rawillis.byethost18.com