Dan Simmons - Hardcase

"Of course, of course," said Malcolm Kibunte, bowing the huge rednecks into the rear room of the cinder-block warehouse. "Full auto with laser shit it will be, then."

The Boys had been carefully and repeatedly frisked before being driven, blindfolded, to the warehouse site, where Doo-Rag and a dozen of his men watched carefully and a bit reproachfully. The Alabama Beagle Boys ignored the gangbangers.

"Holy shit," breathed Douglas, who, after Oliver, had always been the least brilliant of the five, "lookit here. Woowhee! Everythang we wanted, rat heah."

"Shut up, Douglas," Andrew said automatically.

Douglas was right, however. The long warehouse room was stacked with boxes of weapons and ammo. Laid out for inspection were AR-15s, M590A1 Pistol Grip mil-spec combat shotguns, Colt M4 full-auto carbines, combat-ready M-16s, compact machine guns such as HK UMP 45s and Israeli Bullpups, and sniper rifles such as Remington's model 700 Police DM Light Tactical.

All four of the Boys wanted to drool. Three of them resisted the impulse, but their small eyes were all alight. If the Boys saw any irony in buying weapons for the coming Race War Heralding Armageddon from black gang members, they did not show it. Of course, the Boys were not deeply into irony.

Darren was ogling a table filled with detachable sights: Aimpoint Red Dots, Bausch & Lomb 10 X 42 Police Tactical Scopes, U.S. Optics SN4 Specops Battle Sights, Comp ML red dots, and others.

"Careful, Darren, my man," said Malcolm. "Your hard-on showing. Weaken your bargaining position, you cum on the hardware." Malcolm grinned broadly to show that it was all good humor between guys.

Darren blushed and turned his back.

Warren was mixing and matching elements into a perfect weapon: the Colt M4 carbine with a compact laser sight, topped off with a Suppressed Tactical Weapons suppressor made out of gold-colored titanium.

"Good choice," said Malcolm. "A handsome combination to take to Armageddon, that be God's truth."

Warren glared but said only, "How much?"

"For how many of which?" said Malcolm.

The Boys licked their lips, looking around in a palpable heat wave of greed, while Warren took a wrinkled sheet of yellow legal-pad paper from his hip pocket—the Boys were all wearing old army fatigue jackets, jump boots, and jeans now rather than their trademark stripes—and consulted his shopping list. He read from the list slowly, obviously adding a few things from the displays.

Malcolm raised his eyebrows and named a price.

The Boys looked at each other in near despair. With the money the White Aryan Army of the Lord had raised so far, they could not quite afford Warren's single carbine-scope-suppressor combination.

"Let us go outsad an' fahr a few of these-here guns," Andrew said craftily.

Malcolm just grinned while Doo-Rag clicked his Tek-9 to full-auto. "Not quite time for test fahring yet, my man," said Malcolm.

"Maybe it'd be time for the police to hear that some Buffalo niggers were the ones who knocked over the Dunkirk army arsenal this past August," said Warren.

"Maybe," Malcolm agreed with a grin. "But if there come even a rumor like that—and we'd hear it because the police wouldn't know where to find these niggers or their guns—then the poor old Chapel of the Good Ol' Boy Aryan Nation Crackers for Jesus gets itself visited by fifty-sixty of Doo-Rag's friends, and the Aryan Nation faithful get themselves shot into little greasy mini-Aryan chickenbits."

"White Aryan Army of the Lord," corrected Douglas.

"Shut up, Douglas," said Andrew.

There were a few moments of silence.

"There is a way that you can get a thirty percent discount on some of the things you want here," Malcolm said at last.

"How?" said Warren.

Malcolm wandered over, picked up a Carbon AR-15.223, sighted through the Colt C-More red-dot sight, dry-fired the black weapon, and set it back. "There a dude that's going to die," he said. "He hiding out in a warehouse in the city. Not armed with nothing more than a pistol. Maybe not that. You take care of it for us, thirty percent off on whatever you carry in to do the job."

Warren squinted at Malcolm. "That don't make no sense." He looked around at the boxes upon boxes of weapons and then at Doo-Rag and his heavily armed friends.

Malcolm shrugged. "This dude a white boy. You know how sensitive we are these days about offing white boys."

" Bullshit ," said Andrew.

"Shut up, Andrew," said Warren. To Malcolm, he said, "You want this guy wasted, why don't you just take him out on the street with one of those?" He nodded toward one of the scoped sniper rifles on display.

Malcolm made a gesture with his hands. "Agreed, be easy to do," he said. "But sometimes the Buffalo police take notice when you gun down citizens on their streets—you understand what I'm saying? Better let this white boy die and rot away in this old abandoned warehouse."

"Then why don't you go in after him yourselves?" said Warren.

Malcolm shrugged. "Doo-Rag and the others want to, but there always a chance that something might go wrong—we drop a weapon or something—and then the federal 'thorities got an idea who borrowed their army toys."

Warren grinned, showing southern Alabama's Department of Corrections' lack of investment in dental care. "But if we leave prints behind… or one of us left behind… it don't bother you-all."

"Not so much," Malcolm agreed.

"When do you want this done?" Darren asked.

"Real soon would be fine," said Malcolm. "You choose the pieces you want with the toys to go with them, we take you to where this dude is sleeping. Thirty percent off, you each get a piece for the price of that one you wanted. Plus all the laser shit you want. Plus some other good stuff…" Malcolm held up a heavy double-optic apparatus with nylon straps.

"What the shit is that?" said Darren.

"Shut up, Darren," said Warren. "What the shit is it?" he asked Malcolm.

Malcolm raised an eyebrow. "Ain't you never seen one of those movies where the terrorists or Navy SEALS or such wear this night-vision shit?"

"Oh, yeah," said Darren. "They just look different when they're not on someone's head is all."

"Shut up, Darren," said Warren. "Night-vision goggles?" he said to Malcolm.

"Correct, my man," said Malcolm. "These take the tiniest little bit of light—not even to notice, dark as a cave to the naked eyeball—and let you see like it was high noon. These goggles here probably led to a shitload of Iraqis going to Allah early."

Douglas whistled.

"Shut up, Douglas," Andrew said automatically.

"You said do this real soon," said Warren. "How soon is real soon?"

Malcolm checked his watch. It was almost 1:00 a.m. "Now be good," he said.

"And we just get to walk away from this place with the guns?" Warren asked.

Malcolm nodded.

"And you gonna give us bullets?" Darren asked.

Warren glared at his brother, but said nothing.

"Yes, Darren, my man, bullets thrown in for free before you go into the warehouse. We got clips of.223s, 45s, subsonic 5.56 millimeters for the Bullpup, 22s, 9 millimeters for some of the carbines, banana clips, 12-gauge shells for the shotguns, even some.308 Match for the sniper shit."

Malcolm lifted some brightly colored hand radios, gesturing like a salesman ready to close a deal. "And we even throw in these personal, multi-frequency portable radios with a two-mile range for free."

"Shit," said Darren. "Those are just kiddie toys."

Malcolm smiled and shrugged. "True, my man. But you understand why once we drop you off—with ammo clips and Kevlar vests as well as the guns—we don't want to wait around."

Warren screwed up his face, thinking about this. His silence suggested that he could find no fault in the logic.