Hard Luck Hank: Basketful of Crap (25 page)

I stood in my apartment with the two
pale sisters and Garm.

“So, um, I found your companion.
She’s dead.”

No one had any reaction. Except me,
as I looked around worriedly checking if anyone was having a reaction…

“How did she die?” one of the
sisters asked.

“I’m not entirely sure.”

“Where was she?” Garm asked.

“Don’t worry about it,” I snapped,
not wanting to say she was in front of my door.

“That isn’t much information,” a
sister said.

“You didn’t buy information. You
bought me locating her. Which I did.”

I felt this was a tense moment. I
didn’t want the Quadrad mad at me so I decided to give them a bit more.

“We don’t know if she was murdered
or the device you all stole from the Navy killed her. If she was murdered, it
wasn’t obvious.”

“Do you have the device?” they
asked, interested.

Whoops.

“Uh. No.”

Garm put her hand to her head.

“Why do you even attempt lying?”
she asked.

“We would like the device
returned,” they said.

“Don’t you want the body of your
sister?”

“It is of no importance.”

I stood there realizing they hadn’t
cared about her. They wanted the disintegrator. They didn’t even ask for proof
their sister was dead. I mean I could have found any old body. I had plenty of
them.

“From what I understand of it, it’s
really dangerous. Just being near it can kill you. And there are other
interested parties. Can I get back to you?”

The Quadrad showed no expressions.
They didn’t kiss me.

“We would like to thank you for
your assistance,” they said.

They beamed me the last installment
of my fee. They had paid me every week on the dot, but there was something very
final and foreboding about this payment.

“Are you Quadrad normally that
disinterested when your sister dies?” I asked Garm.

“I’m not sure how well they knew
one another. We’re just like normal people.”

“Totally,” I said. “Super normal.”

“Your General wants to attack the
corporation to try and apprehend your ‘Naked Guy’ or destroy the Portal.”

“Well, those are both ideas, I’ll
grant him that. I can’t think which one is worse. I mean, he has to know if you
add up all the corporations they have tens of thousands of soldiers here. Not
to mention tanks and APCs and AFVs and A-something-somethings. Yeah, they beat
the guys at the dock, but that was a small number who weren’t prepared. As for
the Portal, I heard they got like thirty Therezians to come visit.”

“Yes. To me, that is far more
dangerous. The Portal has to be shut down.”

“Let’s go get something to eat
while we talk.”

“Why are you always eating? That
can’t be good for you.”

“It’s my body healing.”

“I think once the technician told
you that, you use it as an excuse to overeat. You can’t even stand up anymore.”

“That’s my mutation!”

“Sure.”

“Punch me in the stomach,” I said,
standing straight in front of her.

“You don’t have to be macho and
prove anything. I know you’re…massive. But that isn’t a good mutation.”

“I didn’t get to choose it.”

We hung around my apartment talking
about what to do next until my grumbling stomach made her concerned.

“Fine, I’ll take you to get some
food.”

I was trying not to make a mess,
but Garm still wore a disgusted expression as I heaped food into my jaw.

Suddenly, food hanging from my
face, I grew reflective.

“You know I’ve never had a good
sense of touch, right? Like my hands?”

“Yes, I remember well,” she said,
rolling her eyes.

“I’m kind of scared, though. I
can’t feel
anything
in my hands anymore. And look,” I picked up the
napkin dispenser, closed my eyes and smashed it on my face.

“I can’t even feel this.”

“You probably shouldn’t do that,”
Garm cautioned.

“I don’t know if it’s my mutation
catching up to me, but I’m afraid I’ll freeze solid.”

Garm, ever-comforting:

“Don’t worry about it, Hank. The
way things are going you’ll probably get murdered before you have a chance to
ever become immobile.”

I got a tele from Delovoa.

“Hank, do you know two women with
white skin who dress like whores?”

“Why?”

“They took the you-know-what.”

I almost stopped eating. How did they
know where Delovoa was? Or who he was? They must have been following me this
whole time. I turned to Garm.

“Don’t look at me. I didn’t want to
let them out of their contract for a reason.”

My tele woke me up the next day. A
restaurant I liked to eat at was being ransacked.

Not much I could do about it.

I browsed my messages and saw it
wasn’t an isolated incident. I realized people must have found out about the
Portals being down. They’re rioting and grabbing all the food. My food!

I called up Delovoa.

“Hey, let’s go get some groceries,”
I said.

“Are you crazy? The streets are
full of looters.”

“I don’t mean go out for brunch. I
mean go loot some food. We’re going to starve with no Portals.”

“Oh. Come over then.”

There were no disturbances where I
was because there were no people where I was. The trains were empty. As I
transferred closer to Delovoa’s, I could see fires and the streets packed with rioters.
I couldn’t understand what was burning. It’s a metal city.

The General came on my tele.

“Surrogate!” He barked. I hadn’t
even answered it. He just yelled at me from my own tele. It was like having
your pillow slap you awake.

“What?”

“We’re going to use the
disturbances to move against the principal target.”

I wasn’t sure which one that was but
either way I didn’t care.

“I’m going to get food.”

“Food won’t matter if we don’t
cease their operations.”

“It will matter to me.”

“Rendezvous with us at Alonkin and
12
^th
.”

He just wasn’t getting it so I
decided to change gears.

“I’m in pursuit of the original
thing you hired me to get.”

“How close are you to recovering
it?”

“Close.”

And I was. Sort of. I mean I had it
at one point—I just lost it.

I hung up my tele and hoped he
didn’t access it again and confirm my lie. Fortunately, he didn’t.

Delovoa opened the door and he was
covered head-to-toe in thick padding.

I laughed, as it made him look fat.

“What is that?”

“This is my riot gear.”

“I need a gun.”

“You have an Ontakian pistol,” he
exclaimed.

“I don’t want to fry people.
They’re just stealing food. Like us.”

“Come on,” he said, leading the way
to his basement.

He was almost as wide as me with
his riot gear on and Delovoa was not a large person normally.

As he held the railing walking down
the ramp to his basement, I just couldn’t help myself and pushed him in the
back.

He fell on his chest, bounced a
little, turned sideways, and got his legs stuck in the railing.

My kidneys almost shot out my
nostrils I laughed so hard.

“Haha. Get me up,” he said, squirming.

I actually took a few extra
seconds, not to be cruel, but because I realized that was what I looked like
when I fell down.

“What if I had hurt myself?” he
asked.

“Did you manage to figure out the
a-drive before they took it?” I asked, changing the subject.

“It’s some of the most advanced
technology in the galaxy. They probably had thousands of scientists working on
it. Billions of credits devoted to it. You’re asking me if I discovered all its
mysteries in less than a day?”

I didn’t answer, because I didn’t
want to hear his snarky response.

“No,” he answered anyway, “I did
not ‘figure it out.’”

“So what did the Quadrad do to
you?”

“Nothing. That I know of.”

“How did they steal the device?”

“I don’t know. I came out of the
basement. Saw them there, then woke up in my bed. If they hit me it didn’t leave
a mark or give me a headache. What are you going to do when you find them?”

“Not sure if I
can
find
them. It took me forever to find a dead one right outside my front door. Not
sure why they stole the disintegrator. They have nowhere to go. Is it safe down
here without suits?”

“Yeah, the device is gone.”

“But the corpse. Is it
radioactive?” I said, hoping I was using the right term.

“The corpse is gone too.”

“What? So that’s two corpses you’ve
had taken from your basement?”

“I guess. How about this?”

He handed me a rifle that had what
looked like four barrels and three triggers and even a keypad and screen on it.
It smelled funny.

“I don’t like it,” I said, putting
it back.

“Hank, technology keeps moving
forward. That’s the way the universe works.”

We walked some ways down.

“How about this?” he said,
indicating an enormous pile of metal that I’m pretty sure was a car engine
hooked up to a barrel.

“That looks like another autocannon
fiasco. I just need something to get us through the mob.”

“Walk through. Who’s going to stop
you?”

“Hmm.”

Delovoa fashioned me some quickie
riot gear. Unlike his it wasn’t padded at all. The whole point was to make it
so that if anyone ran into me, they would want to move away. No one was going
to knock me down and I could push through just about any number of people.

He took some thick synth and
studded it with nails and strapped it to my chest, legs, and arms. He gave me a
helmet to cover my eyes. He wrapped my forearms in metal bands. The final touch
was adding a chain from my waist to his waist so I could pull him out if need
be.

I felt like a tank. Even with all
this extra metal, I didn’t move any slower.

We headed to the train, joined at
the hip, dressed like idiots. Delovoa pushed a wheelbarrow which we hoped to
fill with foodstuffs. It was the same one we carried Toby in, but we scrubbed
it out first.

“I shouldn’t be going,” Delovoa
said.

“You need food too.”

“You dated Garm, right?” he asked
conversationally.

“Yeah. That was a while ago.”

“Who broke it off, you or her?”

“I think it was mutual.”

“So her. And she’s Quadrad? Did she
ever wear an outfit like those women did?”

“Not around me. I could have put up
with an awful lot more I think if she did.”

“And no one since then?”

“Not really. There was that other
mutant, Jyen. You met her. But we were never remotely a match. She left like
five years ago—once she fully understood how pathetic Belvaille was. I never
really expected to find the love of my life here. Everyone is damaged goods. It’s
one thing to hang around and work here. But it’s totally different to be
romantically involved.”

We were silent for some time.

“Since you didn’t ask,” he said,
annoyed, “I’ve learned to separate the physical from the emotional. Somewhat
like you. I don’t think I can truly be in love with someone who is not my
intellectual equal—fat chance on Belvaille, right? I use an organ I invented.”

I couldn’t help it.

“Organ?”

“Not biological. Like a musical
organ. It’s a machine. It knows 153 physical pleasures to induce.”

“Like a back rub?”

“No, Hank, not like a back rub.”

“One hundred and fifty-three? I can
think of like…five.”

“No wonder Garm left you.”

Delovoa and I had done our stealing
and carted our ill-gotten goods home.

I felt a little bad about robbing
from the stores I frequent, but not as bad as starving to death.

“Where have you been?” Garm asked.
She was waiting at my front door.

“Looting.”

“What are you wearing?”

“Loot-suit.”

I wrestled my wheelbarrow inside.
Delovoa ate like a mouse so most of the food was mine.

“Have you talked to the Navy?” Garm
asked me.

“Not really.”

“They attacked the corporation.”

“Can’t imagine that went well.”

I unpacked my food, trying to find
room in my kitchen.

“They lost something like fifty
people. Your Naked Guy is bunkered in the southeast. He must have twenty tanks
around him.”

“The General told you this?” It
surprised me that they were talking. Especially if I was a Surrogate-thing.

“No, I followed them.”

“Yeah, he didn’t call me. Probably
because he didn’t want to hear a big ‘I told you so.’”

She slapped a packet of rations out
of my hands.

“Would you stop worrying about your
stupid food! Four more Therezians have come through, we’re running out of Navy,
and you said the corporation was trying to start a galactic war.”

“Yeah, but how?” I asked calmly.
“You said yourself we’re stuck out here at the edge of the galaxy. Even if they
have other Portals in the freighters, they’ll never transfer the Therezians to
them. They won’t fit in shuttles. Hell, I don’t even know if they’ll fit in
freighters.”

“So you’re fine with us being
stepped on?”

“No, but the Portal is guarded by
Therezians and operated by Gandrine. What can I do about it?”

“It’s just math, Hank. Enough big
feet walking around will eventually kill us. Or damage life support. We have to
stop the Portal if nothing else. The Navy will come to repair our space
Portals. They have a-drives. But it could take months or even years. We won’t
live that long if they keep importing giants.”

I sighed.

“See if you can get any leads on
your sisters.”

I gave Delovoa a tele.

“You didn’t eat all your food
already, did you?” he answered.

“Hey Delovoa, have you had a chance
to brush up on your ancient Colmarian dialect?”