Steven Campbell - Hard Luck Hank - Basketful of Crap

“I’m getting them repaired. You do the trash pick-up, right?”

“Waste Removal. That’s 4 thfloor. Why?”

“I need a corpse taken away.”

“Who’d you kill?” she asked absently.

“No one, the body was just there. I don’t even know him.”

“Then why do you care?”

“Why do people keep asking that? What if there was a corpse here in your office?”

She looked up from her work.

“How would a corpse get in my office? Pick the lock and then die celebrating?”

“I’m going to bring it here and leave it on your chair. Then laugh.”

She went back to her labors.

“Fine.”

“Hey, can I use your bathroom?” I asked, knowing she had a private bathroom and it was really plush and clean.

“No.”

“Why not?” I asked, offended.

“Because you wouldn’t ask if you just had to urinate. That bathroom isn’t well-ventilated and I know how much you eat. I don’t want it stinking for the next three hours.”

“You suck,” I said, as I left her office.

“I got you a job, didn’t I?” she called after me.

On the 4 thfloor I visited the Waste Removal team.

The hallway ended at a protective plastic shield behind which sat a guy looking bored. He had a huge white beard and dull eyes and he was reading The News .

“Hi,” I shouted through the bubble. “I’d like to schedule a trash pick-up.”

The bearded man kept reading. At first I wondered if the bubble was soundproof, which would be very inconvenient as far as customer service went. But he eventually put down his tele and looked at me.

“You want a six month contract or one year?” he asked with a voice as white-bearded as his face.

“No, I just want you to pick up one thing,” I had lowered my voice because his grumbly whisper came through fine so I figured mine did as well.

“We don’t do ‘one things.’”

“I’ll pay you guys,” I said.

“Yes,” he said without enthusiasm. “We are a business.”

“It’s not even large. It won’t take more than five minutes.”

He seemed to briefly struggle between returning to reading or acknowledging me.

“What is it?”

“Well, it’s a body,” I said weakly.

“A body.” He looked back to his tele and I could see I was losing.

“It’s a small body. And it’s not even decomposed.”

“So a dead body?”

“Well, yeah. I’m not going to ask you to take a live body.”

“Of course not,” he said with absolutely no inflection, but which somehow still reeked sarcasm.

“I didn’t kill it,” I offered helpfully.

“Where is this body?”

“It’s right in front of my door.”

“It’s on Hank Block in front of your door, but you didn’t kill it?”

So this guy knew who I was and was still acting like this? I had really lost my touch.

“What’s it matter if I did?”

“Now you’re changing your story?”

“What are you, a crime investigator? I just want one piece of garbage taken away.”

“A cadaver isn’t garbage,” he stated.

Sanctimonious trash man.

“How much does it cost for a six month contract?”

“Depends on volume. But the minimum is 500 a week.”

That’s not going to happen.

“Garm said it was alright for you guys to make this one delivery.”

He stared at me a moment.

“You’re a terrible liar.”

I looked at the supports of the bubble. I bet I could push out the lower part and squeeze through that way.

He saw what I was doing and flipped a switch under the desk. A metal curtain began to lower slowly.

“Hey! What’s your name! Hey!”

He had gone back to reading as the curtain closed and locked.

I gave it a push and it rippled a bit, but didn’t dent. I’d find him later.

I went to the tape archives where they stored the information from quarantine, the docks, and check-in.

Buddl was there so I grabbed him. He used to be one of the security guards who actually checked people at the dock, but he was a manager now.

He was very angular and I remember when he wasn’t overweight he had a lot of women interested in him because he looked cut. Almost like a comic book character with square jaw and cheek bones. Now that he was older and let himself go, instead of big and round like most people, he was big and square. He looked funny. You could practically use his head as a straight rule.

The pale ladies had sent me what info they had on their friend. It wasn’t a lot, but I could cross-reference it with docking logs.

Buddl and I were in a dark office filled with screens, trying to work out which tapes to get. I put my autocannon against the wall.

“Is that a vacuum cleaner?” Buddl asked.

“Does it look like a vacuum cleaner?”

“No, it looks like a really big gun.”

“Then why did you ask if it was a vacuum cleaner?”

“Look at this carpet,” he reasoned.

The carpet was indeed filthy, but I didn’t get how that logic flowed, so I ignored it.

After a bit of calculations, we deduced that there were about forty-five hours’ worth of tapes to review. And that wasn’t even fast-forwarding through. That was a solid forty-five hours with a dozen different cameras, scanners, and biometrics.

It would take weeks to go through all these tapes.

I gave Buddl 100 credits and he set me up and grabbed me some coffee. He said to call him if I had any questions or needed anything. I made a note to praise him to Garm and slander that unhelpful trash guy.

The scan data was really cool. I had never seen actual scans. All these Colmarians coming through were really different in terms of biology. I was immune to scanning. I was too dense. Not even a hospital could get any information when they put sensors inside me.

I watched tapes for about three hours until my neck hurt. I had to keep looking at all the different screens and different angles and my fingers were starting to flub the keys. I figured I should come back tomorrow and continue. I was worried I would get too tired and miss the person.

Now I would try and buy myself a disintegrator.

“Come on, Hexpin, just talk to me,” I pleaded.

I was pursuing the person in question down Dolgente Block.

Hexpin was an old-timer, spry and wrinkled. He had wisps of white hair floating around the top of his head like a smoky halo, though he was certainly no angel. He had been a major black market shipper for decades. He was fast on his feet despite his age. I guess he had to be.

Since the change in Belvaille, there technically was no more black side of the market. But there were still things even too sticky for an Independent Protectorate to openly admit.

He was the third person I visited and he got me interested because he immediately became uncomfortable and shifty when I broached the subject of a stolen Navy device. Now I was running after him down the street.

“What’s the problem, we’re only talking,” I said.

“No.” He suddenly turned to me, pointing. “What you’re talking about is dangerous.”

“What danger?” I asked. “Who’s going to arrest you?”

He looked around again and stepped in close and whispered.

“I’ll do a lot of stuff, but I don’t mess with technology. Navy technology. That’s life in prison. Or death if you’re lucky. Navy guns, passes, security, whatever. Fine. Hell, I’d sell a destroyer if I could get my hands on one. But breaking the Tech Codes,” he shook his head, his eyes wide with fear, as if even completing the sentence was too risky.

“You know me, I’m not going to rat anyone.”

“We’re on a station that has Navy observation telescopes!” He shouted, then remembered himself and hunched back down. “There are spies everywhere.”