Steven Campbell - Hard Luck Hank - Basketful of Crap

“Alright. I need another armor piercing shell.”

“Sure,” he said, about to head into his basement.

“And I need fifty guns and fifty sets of adjustable body armor.”

Anything illegal I could possibly want could be found at the Belvaille Gentleman’s Club. I looked around for people on my short list I wanted to recruit.

Wait. Why should I look for them? I had two million credits to my name. I called the shots.

I sat down in the corner of the cafeteria.

“Put some blinds around here,” I said to the cook, indicating my table. “And bring me a party tray and twelve cans of beer—that hasn’t portaled more than twice.” I gave him a token with a hundred credits on it. He looked at it in his greasy hand.

“What’s a party tray?”

“Stuff with dips. And things to dip. That can be shared.”

He looked at me blankly.

“I can make sandwiches,” he said. “And we got three beers. Garbage, junk, and not bad.”

“Twelve cans of not bad and fifty cups. And make me like fifty little sandwiches. Really small—”

“The bread is one size,” he interrupted.

“Take a normal sandwich and cut it in a third. Or a quarter. This isn’t building a Portal. Give me a tray of those. And lots of napkins.”

“Would you like a mirror and some fluffy pillows?”

“Hey smartass, I just gave you a hundred. And it’s not all for me.”

One by one I called the guys over. I made it really clear to them the first order of business was keeping their traps shut. Otherwise, there would be hell to pay.

Hell being my autocannon.

I asked where everyone was working before offering the job to make sure no one was currently employed at the Ulzaker-Ses club.

I did eat most of the sandwiches. But the guys helped themselves to beer.

Not many of the people I was interested in tapping happened to be at the club at the time. People had lives. So I teled them up and told them to come down so I could talk with them.

They thought it was very odd I didn’t want to talk on the tele and I wanted to negotiate at the Gentleman’s Club. It was a bit of a breach of protocol.

Guys were yelling at sports monitors. And playing little table games with each other. There was a sauna and steam room. Small exercise area. And the chairs were uncomfortable with uneven legs.

And of course it smelled.

After about three hours of corralling people and eating sandwiches, I had hired eighteen men.

“How much does this job pay?” one asked.

“It’s anywhere from one day to one week’s work and it pays 20,000.”

This guy wasn’t a good card player because his eyes bugged.

“For what? Attacking the Navy?”

“No. You’ll know when it’s ready. It’s nothing too big.”

“What do I need?”

“You. Clothes. I’m providing weapons and armor. Again, you breathe a word of this…”

He shook my hand and rose from my table, taking a cup of beer. Quite a lot of people were hovering around the edge of my makeshift recruitment center. They saw guys come in and leave with big smiles and beer.

They weren’t stupid. Well. They knew a job was going down. And they wanted in, whatever it was.

“Hank, what you looking for?” someone asked, peeking over my screen.

“If I want you, I’ll send for you.”

I got one of my recent hires to stand guard out of earshot and shoo people away.

I also got two guys to monitor the Ulzaker-Ses club. Balday-yow and Cad, my old doorman accomplices. Find out who was there, when. The security. The traffic. The entrances and exits. Everything. I didn’t tell them about each other, so if they were any good after a week they would also notice someone else casing the place.

I figured it would take a week for Delovoa to get me all the gear. And a week to recruit everyone I wanted. It was easy at the start, but it would get harder to reach fifty as the pickings got slimmer.

And the longer I waited the more likely someone was to spill. Naked Guy said there were thirty guards. I guessed that meant they were prepped and ready this minute. But no business could be profitable with thirty guards forever. Not even a casino.

So I would wait them out until traffic died down and there was less likelihood of hurting innocent bystanders.

And I considered myself an innocent bystander.

I was now looking for 183 people.

They were the combined passenger lists that corresponded to the blank check-in and quarantine records. Good thing I was being paid by the week.

I was pretty sure the pale sister had jammed the scanners using whatever Quadrad skills they’re taught while being potty trained.

“Hi, are you Jeulada Loenor?” I said to the woman at the door, fumbling over her name.

“Yes? What’s this about?” She was an attractive woman, very short, dark hair and eyes. Seemed young and feisty.

“And does, whew, Gwodendion Bwoew Rastonqil—or something like that—live here as well?”

“What’s this about?” she insisted, her arms crossed.

“I’m just doing follow-up from quarantine. Everything is okay, just need to do a count.”

“Yes, he’s my husband,” she said.

“Ah, good. That’s all I need. Have a great day,” I said, turning to go. That’s two down and 181 more to go.

I was a half-block down the street when I heard from behind me:

“Hey!”

A man ran up to me, looking pissed. He was a muscular guy, face full of stubble. He also seemed young.

“Yeah?” I asked.

“You upset my wife back there.”

This was utterly surprising.

“I did? How?”

“I’d like an apology.”

I wasn’t wearing my autocannon for a change so when he ran up I must have just seemed like a big slow guy. I looked to the apartment and saw the woman standing at the front door awaiting my response.

“No, I think it’s best I say sorry to her.”

I walked past the man and he tried to put his hand on my shoulder to stop me and felt how solid I was.

“Look, uh, we just got to the station. We don’t know how the authorities work here,” he said quickly.

“Oh, I’m not the authorities.”

I kept walking to the apartment and saw his wife growing more and more concerned. At the entrance she suddenly got the idea to close the door. I put my foot out and blocked it. She wisely retreated into her apartment.

“Come in,” I said to the husband.

Inside it was furnished, but cheaply. I assumed they were renting with furniture. The husband and wife were standing next to each other and didn’t look upset any longer.

“Hi. Have a seat.” I indicated their couch.

They hesitated.

“I could just rip off your legs and you wouldn’t have a choice,” I said helpfully.

They reluctantly sat.

“Look, I get it,” I said to the man, “you’re macho, you want to show off to your wife, you want to be tough. And you,” I said to the woman, “you want to see that he cares. When you say you’re upset you want to know he’s concerned.”

I took a step closer and leaned down a bit to put my head more at their level.

“But you’re on Belvaille now. And not everyone is as nice as me. This could have gone a very different way if you said it to the wrong person. Do you all understand?” And I really hoped they did.

“Yeah,” they said.

“Sorry about coming off like a—” the husband began, but I cut him off.

“Don’t worry about it.”

I walked out with a smile on my face, feeling I had done my good deed for the day.

At home I got a tele from the General.

“Are you in a secure location to speak of our operations?” he asked.