Steven Campbell - Hard Luck Hank - Basketful of Crap

We began walking down the street cautiously.

The street’s patrons pressed themselves against the walls or entered buildings in a panic. They knew what was going to come from this.

The street soon became empty.

Before I could even see him, I felt the sidewalk shake and boom !

There was a forearm impeding our forward progress. A forearm behind. And eight feet above us was Wallow’s brutal face.

“Wallow, I instruct you to wait here. I will return shortly. I won’t be harmed,” Zadeck said.

We walked around his forearm and I kept myself as absolutely close to Zadeck as possible. Wallow was fast on his feet and agile, but his fingers were enormous without any joints. I did not believe he could pluck me up without a serious risk of killing Zadeck.

As we continued down the street, Wallow spider-walked above us, staying as close as possible without actually crushing us. We were literally being shadowed, as he blocked out the light from the latticework.

“Wallow, stay!” Zadeck commanded. As scary as it was for me, this had to be terrifying for Zadeck, who was just a normal fleshy Colmarian.

Wallow continued to hover above us and I could see Zadeck was sweating profusely and appeared quite scared.

“W-Wallow, why are you still following us?” Zadeck asked.

Wallow was quiet but his face was contorted in rage.

I decided to take a chance, as I couldn’t have this monster following me across Belvaille. I would never be able to release Zadeck or he’d kill me the second I did.

“Wallow, if you don’t leave, I will shoot your boss. You cannot help him by staying near,” I called up to him.

Through gritted teeth, Wallow answered.

“You kill! You die!”

“Fair enough. But you need to stop. He’ll be back shortly. I promise.”

Wallow finally stopped pursuing us. After a moment we were out of his shadow and in the clear street. At the end of the block I hazarded a backwards look and saw Wallow had resumed standing, and was watching us go.

We took the train a bit south just to get some distance. I didn’t often sit on trains with a gun to a crime boss’s head. People, oddly, avoided us.

We got off the train and headed along a random block and sat down. I handed Zadeck the last information sheet from the passenger manifest.

“Have you seen this woman?” I asked.

“Yes, she was my courtesan some weeks ago, but no longer.”

“Do you know where she went?”

“I don’t. She left without a word.”

“Can I ask if she was a fairly athletic woman?”

“Oh, yes,” he said, clearly not favoring. “She was a brute. I believe she could kick open doors if she ever got tired of turning the knobs.”

“Was her skin very pale?”

“Not on her face and hands. But I’d catch glimpses on her ankles and lower neck sometimes and it was so white it was almost reflective. I suspect she wore a cream to cover it. I’d say foundation then a skin shade forty-three or forty-four. High quality.”

“What did she do for you?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you don’t have to tell me if you had sex, I mean what did she do at the club?”

“Sex? I don’t think I ever even kissed her. She didn’t do anything except stand around on those thick legs talking to people. Is this a former girlfriend of yours? She made no mention.”

“No, no. This is for work. I don’t actually know her.”

“Don’t you think you could have called me on the tele and asked?”

“Would you have told me? Besides, I thought she might have been still working for you.”

“Her outside life was peculiar. I had her followed frequently,” he said matter-of-factly.

Trust a boss to be insecure.

“She would visit restaurants, sometimes five or more a night.”

“Did she go or leave with anyone?” I asked.

“No, always alone. And she was wearing disguises. Practically a new one each day.”

“Like what?”

“Oh, just different hair and clothes and styles. I call it a disguise because she wasn’t dressing up. She wasn’t even dressing down. She was completely changing her appearance. She even visited your apartment twice.”

“Really?” I searched my memory. “When?”

“She didn’t go in. You weren’t home.”

“And you don’t know where she is now?”

“She vanished.”

“Hmm. Well, Zadeck, I want to thank you for the help.”

“No problem,” he said without a hint of sarcasm. “I hope you find her.”

“This was the only way I could see doing it. I feared you would brush me off on the tele and it might alert her enough to flee.”

Zadeck stood up with a smile, touching my arm gently.

“No worries, old friend, these things happen.”

After he left, I hurried to my apartment. I took out everything of value, personal or monetary, and deposited it in my new apartment, three houses down on the opposite side. It only took me a few hours.

I was sleeping on the floor when I heard the loudest metallic Crang!

I woke up with a start and, with the light still off, peeked out the front window.

Wallow was hammering my old apartment building. Five stories were being slowly beaten into one.

Wallow seemed pleased when he was done and turned to walk away, but then smashed my couch to dust just to be sure.

When he had gone I heard my two neighbors.

“Building flattened!” One Gandrine yelled.

“Yes!” The other replied.

The other pale sister, with disintegrator, had gone to my apartment according to Zadeck; there were two dangerous Gandrine sitting outside; someone was hanging around making corpses of those who visited me; and Wallow may be coming back to try and pound my apartment.

It was time for Hank to leave Hank Block.

I took all my things and moved far out in the northwest, five blocks from the last working train. I squatted in an empty building. It wasn’t as nice as mine, but the front yard was considerably cleaner.

“Hank, how you doing?” Bronze asked enthusiastically on the tele. I could see it wasn’t his from the call name.

“Fine, I guess.”

“I just heard you got in a fight with a Therezian! How did you manage that?”

“We didn’t fight. It’s a long story.”

“Well, come on and join us! We’re having dinner. I haven’t seen you in ages.”

From all my apartment moving, I was starving. My stomach grumbled just hearing about food. I didn’t especially want to have dinner with Garm and Bronze as it made me feel weird, but I should be an adult about this. A hungry adult.

“Sure. I’ll be there in a bit.”

I got my autocannon ready and opened my door. I was immediately greeted by the backs of two Gandrine sitting on my front steps.

I stood there for what must have been minutes. I had come to this apartment early in the morning. After three transfers on three empty trains.

How did they even get out here? They were probably too big to fit on a train. It’s hard to imagine them shambling all the way out to the northwest. And how did they find me to begin with? Did they have some super sense of smell?

I walked around in front of them.

I wasn’t sure what I was hoping to see. They were just big rocks sitting there.

But this really defeated the purpose of me trying to hide. I mean, it’s hard to miss the only two Gandrine within thousands of light years. There wasn’t really anything for me to do, however. I hiked to the train to meet up with Bronze.

I knew the restaurant well. It served a particular ethnic food. There was only one item on their menu I liked, but I liked it a lot.

The bouncer stopped me.

“Hank, I’m sorry but I can’t let you go in carrying an anti-aircraft gun on your back.”