Gainer Betera, a slim 6’4” in his late forties, was about to put another fist in the pudgy man’s face in case he hadn’t gotten the point from the first punch, but the pudgy man helped him by falling forward, unconscious, in his white plastic cafeteria chair.

The tall cabbie roughly lifted the man’s stubbled chin and helped him do the right thing by returning Gainer’s gold-plated “food chain.” The victor quickly looped the glistening, lightweight chain around his neck and hightailed it toward the docking area, before the Space Station Police could respond to one of the astounded bystander’s call for help.

Such thieves were rare on this pumpkin-shaped satellite revolving around the moon, and Gainer’s philosophy was to help them out by not letting them get away with it.

At the cafeteria entrance, Gainer stopped, inserted his retrieved food chain key with a click into a vending machine and helped himself to both a lunch and a dinner SpaceFeast.

Helped by two moving sidewalks and an elevator, Gainer passed the watchful Dockmaster and told him, “I’ve got a fare” as he headed into the open area towards his yellow tile-plated SpaceCab.

“Helping the drunk home?” asked the Dockmaster.

It’s not like Gainer was lying about the fare, he helped himself justify it, it never failed that when he cracked open a SpaceFeast, let the pungent aroma wash over him and raised his fork, the comm squawk would inevitably interrupt.

The middle-aged drunk referred to by the Dockmaster staggered near Gainer’s SpaceCab, arm bleeding on the yellow, foam-glass-tile exterior, not helped by the fact that cables, panels and floor hookups made the hangar into an obstacle course. The cabbie felt that he should want to assist this reeling man, but there was hollowness inside where there should have been a well of helpfulness.

The hungry cabbie could see the drunk needed the help of a doctor, but his comm squawk, as predicted, said he had a paying fare. The quickly reconstituting, creamy stroganoff smothering the beef and egg omelet would have to wait a while before helping his body fill the gap of a lunch missed due to the food chain thief.

The sequence of buttons he pushed helped let the waiting passenger know he was on his way, and he zipped his craft over to VIP Door 3. She was an elderly Ambassador, but brushed him away as he tried to help her into the cab’s roomy passenger area, with its crescent-shaped, mustard-colored back seat.

“Help me get to Moon City, please,” she requested formally, shifting her shopping bags to a secure position for take-off.

The stroganoff aroma filled the cab, distracting Gainer as he began to help her on her journey.

“How long have you been helping passengers get to their destinations?” she asked.

A chatty customer was not what would help the lanky cabbie the most on the 35 minute ride to Moon City’s Beverly Hills district. In his SpaceCab’s rearview monitor, he could see sticking out of a shopping bag a baguette enviro tube, which helped the hard flaky crust and soft white interior of the two foot long French bread stay fresh.

Suddenly, a passenger craft, helped around a tricky curve with an illegal burst of its FastJets, made Gainer swerve his vehicle to avoid collision.

“You’re not helping anyone!” yelled the cabbie at the craft of frolicking teens. The sideways jerk of the SpaceCab didn’t help the confidence of his passenger, nor did the gentle bump of the taxi’s battered nose into an ill-fated pillar at VIP Door 1.

Apparently the Ambassador didn’t feel this wild driving was helping her desire to return home, so she opened the hatch, gathered her wayward bread tube and shopping bags, and walked out without a word.

The driver feared the attentive Dockmaster would help ensure the safety of flights out of his dock by giving Gainer a Breathalyzer test; but, fortunately, he had seen what happened, and let the cabbie wipe the splattered stroganoff and eggs off his co-pilot seat. Gainer used a little vacuum to help suck up the food, which was strewn about in a manner reminiscent of a trip he took when his daughter was a young child exercising her throwing arm.

“Take this fellow to Blue Cheese City and I might help you by looking the other way as far as an accident report,” said the Dockmaster, sloppily bandaging the wounded drunk’s massive arm using scraps from the First Aid kit in his booth.

Gainer didn’t like paperwork, nor did he need another black mark on his record, so he helped the Dockmaster get rid of his problem. The makeshift bandage had helped with the wound, but not the alcohol; in fact, the fellow passed out shortly after takeoff and wouldn’t wake up an hour later when the cabbie announced arrival atop the roof of his high-rise in the heart of the Moon’s Blue Cheese City.

The unconscious, limp-muscled, overweight man was of no help to Gainer in getting him out of the SpaceCab. Since he was too heavy to drag, the cabbie punched the steam-cleaning button, which helped by opening the back seat like a hatch, tilted the nose upward and dumped the passenger’s body unceremoniously down a few feet to the luna-formed lawn.

The cabbie figured the guy should help by paying for the ride home, so Gainer made the appropriate credits transfer from the drunk’s food chain to his own. This would help Gainer take advantage of having noticed the Thai restaurant he had passed two blocks down, or so he thought. The computerized comm squawk that helped him receive notice of fares needing rides had plans other than a tall cup of deeply-brewed, palate-shocking, sweet/spicy orange Thai iced tea.

A fueling station helped him juice up, but while there, a woman with several bruises and a few cuts ran into his SpaceCab. There were mere ribbons of torn clothing on her, and certainly no food chain, so he knew he wouldn’t get a dime out of taking her to Half Moon Hospital. He was afraid of losing his paying fare to another cabbie and of further postponing his next meal, but the painful, distraught eyes in the back of his SpaceCab helped convince him to bring her to the emergency room – that and the fact it was almost on the way.

After violating a few proximity laws to help set down exactly at the emergency room door so he could run in and get a robe and help her inside, Gainer headed for his waiting passenger. The fashion-chasing, smooth-talker wanted help getting from the rundown entertainment district of Blue Cheese City to the remote Miner’s Village. In the battle between hunger and a paying fare, the decision was helped by the higher rate he could charge going between atmospheric domes.

“Thanks for helping me out, man; I had a hell of a time getting a SpaceCab on Second Street,” said the man adjusting his pink ascot between turquoise lapels.

“No problem,” said Gainer, “but I wish they’d help us commute by finishing the Miner’s Tunnel.”

His SpaceCab joined the lineup of crafts waiting to go through the West airlock, helped a little by the fact that taxis were able to enter the lane closer to the exit.

“Believe me, we want to, and could very well help finish the thing – it’s a tunnel only a fraction of the length of the holes we’ve bored in the cheese.”

“If you want to help move things along, what’s the rub?” asked Gainer.

“You make the mistake of thinking the local government exists to help the local people and not the mining conglomerates,” said the dandy, pushing his hat back on his head, “Say, is that clam chowder in that SpaceFeast; I had to wait so long for a cab I missed a meal and hot soup would really help right now.”

Reluctantly, Gainer gave up his remaining meal to help a fellow starving traveler, after agreeing that the cost would be added to the tab.

After the short hop over the desolate Moon’s surface, the wait to get into Miner’s Village wasn’t as long due to two somewhat neglected airlocks to help with the Saturday night influx of reveling miners.

In the back crescent seat, as Flashy slurped up the last of the potato-ridden, thick, meaty chowder, he had to help guide Gainer the last few blocks to an unfamiliar part of town.

The cabbie pushed a console button that opened the hatch and another to drop steps which helped a person make the three foot drop to the ground, but the fancy dresser was out and running before the last step clanged against the moonrock cement.

“NO!” yelled Gainer, slithering over slimy stroganoff sauce on his co-pilot seat to leap out and pursue this guy who had only helped to separate him from a well-deserved hot meal. After one and a half blocks, Gainer became of aware of how many drug-crazed eyes peered glazedly at him from ill-fated shadows of dilapidated mine ruins used for crack houses, or to help impoverished men in need of woman companionship. He decided to help his ship by returning to it and by letting the thief go.

Too hungry for good judgement, he stopped at the Last Chance Restaurant, which helped those going out to the void with their last chance at food. Entering the dive and smelling the mixture of French fry grease, spilled sodas and moon-spiced beef helped revive him a bit as he spotted and sat down in a booth next to a bearded stranger across from, Donny, a Space Rescuer he’d crossed paths with a few times.

“Hey, cabbie,” said the young waitress, recognizing his station by his worn yellow jumpsuit, “How can I help you?”

“You can help me by giving me one of each,” said Gainer, picking up the flimsy paper menu.

Donny helped Gainer’s esteem by laughing easily at his humor, saying, “Cinda here just might do it, she just might.”

“Help me out here; what’s good?” asked Gainer, resisting the urge to sink his teeth through the golden brown exterior into the soft white mush of Donny’s thick cut fries.

Cinda gave him a bored look, as if nothing on the menu helped her get excited. “Help yourself to the moon-grown salad bar,” she said, pointing at a small stainless steel table with a bowl of wilted lettuce, a plate of dried-out tomatoes and a tub of thinly-sliced green bell peppers, “or you might want the Reuben Special.”

“I’ll go with the Special,” said Gainer, “because it might help me get over losing a fare.”

“Does someone need help?” asked the eager young rescuer, grabbing at his well-stocked fanny pack as he started to rise.

“Sit tight, Donny,” said the cabbie, waving his hand back and forth, “He ran from my cab without paying me, leaving me helpless – chase him -- stay with the SpaceCab – pulverize him – lose the cab?”

“Thanks for your order,” said Cinda, “I hear you; these guys who take help without paying for it really ruin my day.”

“There are enough people who really need help,” said Donny, downing a couple of fries out of habit, without really tasting them, as Gainer looked on jealously.

“Hello, I’m Johns,” said the rescuer’s bearded companion, helping himself into the conversation, “I help travelers by providing a hostel bed. I hear you about people needing help – I make a living on people who can’t afford hotels.”

“Yeah, a place to sleep, but how much can one person help another, really?” asked Gainer.

Cinda grabbed a Special out from under the heat lamp and set it down in front of him, and helped him insert his food chain into her portable register, which instantaneously transferred the appropriate amount of allocated credits from his bank to Cinda’s bank, the busboy’s bank, and the banks of the food venders, food and silverware transportation companies and, of course, to the tax stockpiles of both the Moon and Earth’s federal governments.

“If someone offers to help me, I run the other way – you can’t trust ‘em,” said the hostel owner.

“You won’t let anyone help you?” asked the Space Rescuer.

“You can’t help someone if they don’t want help,” said Cinda, “like my brother who won’t come up to work for the mines and would rather stay unemployed.”

“It would help me if either one of you had a daughter my age,” joked Donny, which made Gainer look down sadly.

Gainer was pleasantly surprised by the gourmet quality of such a remote hole-in-the-wall, but somebody had obviously helped the cook with a good apprenticeship. The heaped corned beef sandwich was warm, tender and spiced in nearly sweet contrast to the impudently sour taste of the stringy sauerkraut sharing its bed between Swiss cheese coated blankets of recently baked, rye-dotted bread, helped to be held together by a gigantic toothpick and lubricated by an intriguing homemade dressing.

“You may not have helped your brother,” said Gainer, “but my stomach, tastebuds and every grateful fiber of my body extend a hearty thanks.”

“Speaking of helping,” said Donny, “Gainer, didn’t you work on the lunaforming project?”

“Back in 2015, the Earth politicians were just realizing that trees helped as pumps to raise water levels to hold topsoil, as they tried to protect the last of the topsoil from blowing away,” said the bearded man, coating the meal in his stomach with a cool, sweet chocolate shake.

“That was twenty-five years ago,” said Cinda, “and two years before they realized that nobody’s body is helped by that genetically-engineered garbage or by produce grown in dirt stripped of nutrients by chemical fertilizers.”

“We had to terraform something,” said Johns, inadvertently slurping on his straw, “and the moon was nearby; so you helped on that?”

Buried guilt wasn’t helpful at a time like this, so Gainer simply agreed in a brush-off manner, even though it was far from the truth.

“How did you help?” asked Cinda, as Gainer stuffed the last morsels of his sandwich into his waiting mouth.

Gainer’s remote dispatch squawk melodically helped extricate him from the conversation and displayed a pickup location in Blue Cheese City on its tiny screen.

“It’s always helpful to get a fare on the return trip,” said the cabbie and he was out of there, taking a soup thermos of leftover potato salad with him.

The scruffy but fit passenger with unruly blond hair carried a duffel bag indicating he’d been out at Jumpland, a theme park where entertainment was helped by a low gravity just over half that of Earth.

The jumper requested help in picking up some roses for his girlfriend before the hop to the space station, and Gainer obliged. Gainer’s cab set down at the designated corner, but the lack of a nearby florist didn’t help his fare’s story. The tall driver’s imagination was about ready to help him rationalize that maybe the jumper was picking up the bouquet from home or from a friend, when the scruffy fellow jammed his duffel sack through the portal between the driver and passenger area.

“You can help me by sticking up your hands and leaning forward,” said the wild-eyed jumper.

“Not again,” thought Gainer, as his years of training at the gym helped his reflexes react without him having time to formulate a plan. Gainer reached down and pulled the weapon-heavy bag through the portal with his right hand and shoved his left fist through the portal helping his assailant forcefully exhale. The surprised jumper doubled over which helped give the cabbie time to open the bag. It didn’t help the jumper’s credibility that there was no weapon.

Gainer pushed an SOS button on his console and jumped out of his cab with every intention of helping the idiot to the exit. But, the athletic jumper came out pummeling Gainer, whose body helped his dizzy condition by dropping to all fours. The stronger attacker pinned his prey and tried to grab Gainer’s wrist to help flip him over, but was interrupted by Gainer biting the guy’s arm as hard as he possibly could.

At the bitten man’s yelp, the Space Rescuer, who had set his craft down near the SpaceCab, came running helpfully onto the scene. Donny separated the two, even though at that point Gainer had the advantage, and asked for help in determining what was going on.

“He was trying to rob me,” said the jumper helpfully, “and he even bit me!”

The rescuer rolled his eyes at Gainer, then shoved the jumper into his van and emerged, after a couple of minutes, with payment to help recompense Gainer for the ride plus a good tip.

“I know the waitress said to help yourself to the moon-grown buffet,” said Donny, “but I don’t think she was referring to the inhabitants.”

“Contrary to public opinion,” replied Gainer, “human flesh does nothing to help a person’s appetite.”

“Now that you owe me one,” said the jocular rescuer, “you’ll have to help me and buy a ticket to the Space Rescuer’s Fundraiser.”

“You’re supposed to help people,” said the cabbie.

“What, it’s not help if you have to pay for it?” asked Donny.

“I don’t want to help anyone else today but me,” said Gainer, switching off his squawk.

“Come on, help me out here,” said the rescuer holding the red fundraising tickets which were shaped like a helping hand.

“You don’t need the help of someone on cabbie’s pay,” said Gainer, “go after the Jumpland crowd – they’re loaded.

Donny smiled and nodded agreement and went back to his craft to help make a new donor out of his captive audience.

Gainer hovered his craft at a lolling convenience Moon Balloon store to buy a fizzy, burn-like-fire root beer to help get rid of the salty human flesh aftertaste. Helped by the massage of sweet bubbles on his throat, he punched in space station coordinates and pointed the nose of his craft skyward.

But, he saw something out of the corner of his eye and he wondered if it helped a woman to have her feet kicking and unusually sticking out the open hatch of a SlimCraft as it hovered 150 feet above the ground. He heard a muffled call which may have been a cry for help.

The cabbie instinctively turned his squawk back on and did a lazy circle around the floating Moon Balloon and its 2 customers’ tethered sky crafts. One of the ships dropped tether and headed south, honking at the SpaceCab indicating it wasn’t helping to block the path.

“Gainer, come in, help me by responding, buddy,” came the voice of his rescuer friend over the air.

The SlimCraft rocked a couple of times until its stabilizers helped it regain equilibrium. Gainer saw the sleeve of a green Women Pilots Club uniform in the window for a few seconds, which helped him remember his daughter’s favorite job.

“I told you I can’t help you out; quit bugging me,” said Gainer, nonchalently bringing his craft around to the open hatch.

“Save your credits,” said Donny, “I just needed help clarifying something you said at the restaurant, or, rather, something you didn’t say.”

“You can help me by keeping your nose out of my business,” said Gainer, wondering if perhaps he was coming up on a romantic backseat adventure.

“I suspect you did more than just help the lunaforming effort,” said Donny, “It doesn’t help to keep these things in and it’s time to tell someone.”

Gainer hesitated, wrestling with self preservation, then said, “I made it look like I was helping the lunaforming. All the money I gave was to help with my charitable tax deductions that year.”

The woman’s legs no longer stuck out the closing hatch, and the SlimCraft turned, so he hid his cab behind the bag of the drifting convenience store, watching, curious whether she needed his help.

Gainer continued, “I knew that the paper published in 1855 by German chemist Baron von Liebig, which determined that the only minerals which helped plants were nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium, was proven false since it didn’t take into account trace minerals, fungus and microbial life that plants need. But, I was part owner of a $120 billion chemical company and it didn’t help our profits that crops survived better if spread with a finely crushed, mineral-rich rock dust.”

“You’re the mystery stockholder that’s been on the lam for the past 15 years, leaving prosecutors helpless?” asked Donny.

“I’d rather go down in history as the secret benefactor who helped the lunaforming of the moon,” said Gainer, following the SlimCraft to a forested park on the north side of Blue Cheese City.

“You’re the one who left a 50 foot container of money on the Lunaform Institute’s doorstep to help the cause?” asked the rescuer.

“There may be a kidnapping you could help with,” said Gainer, again seeing pitch and yaw adjustments that could be evidence of a struggle in the sleek silver vessel.

“You kidnapped someone, too?” asked the rescuer, punching a computer which helped him get the exact coordinates of all crafts, in particular, those of Gainer’s cab.

“Not me, idiot!” said the cabbie, “Come in the Crater side of Sherwood Forest and help me sandwich a silver SlimCraft, X Class – there will be nowhere for them to go.”

“I’m on it, but why didn’t you keep the money?” asked Donny, helping Gainer tell all.

A tear helped carry away pent up guilt. “My 26-year-old daughter didn’t die from Moon Virus; she died from bad nutrition complications and the hospital could do nothing to help her with her standard-American-diet damaged organs. By never helping her by teaching her that organic food has 10 to 50 times the nutrients, I killed the only person I really cared about in the solar system,” said Gainer with difficulty, blinking away tears that blurred the speeding silver craft and the dense forest to either side.

Donny said, “You didn’t exactly kill her, though you could have helped her live longer.”

Pushing a Force Field Net button, Donny said, “I’ve got them, and I’m helping them turn themselves in by netting them.”

The sleek silver aircraft pulled up just short of the net and helped its advertiser’s claims by stopping on a dime and vaulting off the surface.

“Help me cut them off before they head to the City of Lights on the dark side,” said Donny.

Gainer hesitated for a second, torn between helping and the prospect of dining on the City of Lights famed “endive au jambon,” saucy Belgian rocket-shaped lettuce with a taste between cabbage and an onion, wrapped in mouth-watering ham and smothered in melted, golden-baked Swiss cheese.

Normally a SpaceCab is no match for a SlimCraft, but Gainer used a trick he’d heard of which threw an electrical charge into space and then used that to help slide him along slicker than a Slip ‘N Slide, rattling his ship almost to the crack-up point. Gainer fought the controls and ended up blocking the bow of the SlimCraft, his residual electrical charge jumping across to the silver electrode, helping to make its controls go haywire, just as Donny nailed its silver aft with a force field net.

Donny and Gainer helped each other force the silver bird to a landing, just this side of the dark side’s shadowy limb. The hatch burst open and a woman’s face came out yelling, “Help,” but she was pulled back in.

Gainer leaped out of his cab, slid over its nose and helped keep the hatch open by shoving his leftovers thermos in the mechanism. A blast of laser fire scorched the handle of the thermos, which helped increase Gainer’s adrenaline level to give him a good rage.

“Nobody messes with my food!” he yelled, opening the hatch with Donny’s help.

The laser weapon was leveled at Gainer’s recently digesting meal, but Donny squeezed off a shot first, helping down the kidnapper.

The woman, a pretty executive with an Italian pasta decorated purse, clambered out of the craft into Gainer’s helping hands.

“Thank you two so much for helping me,” she said, as Donny cuffed the criminal.

“Help people is what I do,” said young Donny, giving his best heroic smile.

Gainer laughed and said, “I guess I help people, too, at least nice people.”

“Your cab could be of immense help,” she said, “but I need to pick up my son before going stationside.”

“Sure, I can help you get there – that’s where I was headed,” said Gainer, as the rescuer checked her for any first aid needed.

“I’ll help you with that business,” said Donny to Gainer, “We’ll straighten it all out. Your help exceeds your harm so it should come out okay, and, at least, it’ll be off your chest.”

“Thanks, just telling you helped somehow,” said the cabbie.

“Carrying around those failures to help will distort your sense of help every time,” said Donny.

The son’s day was helped by being reunited with his inexplicably missing mother, and he gave a toothy seven-year-old smile upon being allowed to sit up in the co-pilot seat.

Gainer’s mood couldn’t help but be improved by answering the never-ending questions of the genuinely interested boy. It also helped that the boy’s mother was part owner of Spaghetto’s, the largest Italian restaurant chain on the Earth, space station and Moon, one that served Gainer’s favorite Alfredo fettuccine dish with mouthwatering soft garlic breadsticks and a spicy Italian sausage soup.

In the docking area, the single mom again thanked the cabbie for his help, saying, “You saved my life – what can I do for you?”

“I’m just glad that I can help again,” he said, “I’ve broken through something that was holding me back.”

“It’s a sane person that can give and receive help,” she noted, gathering up her son’s school backpack and artwork from the crescent seat of the cab.

“I’d like to continue this discussion of how we can help each other – say over dinner at 7:00pm tomorrow at Spaghetto’s Space View Lounge?” suggested Gainer.

She gave him a wink to help him know his affections weren’t unwelcome and said, “Sure.”

At the docking area door, they parted ways, and Gainer went and peered into a vending machine at six tiny sticky-icing, moist chocolate donuts that would help him celebrate a clear conscious and a potential new romance.

“Lord help you with all that food you eat,” said the Dockmaster.

“Go ahead, help yourself,” said Gainer, smiling widely and offering him a bite.

The End

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Rebecca Mate of Glendale, California, was awarded Short Story Laureate by National Authors Registry and was published in Verses Magazine. Several of her other short stories have been published in small literary publications. Her poetry has been published as well. Two of her screenplays were finalists in a family-script competition at a film festival. She is a member of two writing groups which help her with feedback. She’s attended many writing classes and seminars. In 1998 she started the tradition of a day dedicated to the arts and artists of all disciplines, international Art Day, second Friday in August. She is currently writing a book about Art Day, writing a short sci-fi story, writing a time/travel adventure screenplay and finishing a co-written comedy/mystery screenplay. Several of her articles have been published. She can be reached at artday@earthlink.net.