Steven Campbell - Hard Luck Hank - Screw the Galaxy

I stood back a ways from Garm as she organized this army and issued orders. She really did know how to get stuff done. What they were going to do when they ran into a combat robot was anyone’s guess.

“Garm, you need to contact all the bosses. Tell them what’s up. There’s still a war brewing,” I said to her.

“You do that. They’ll take it a lot better from you. They’ll think I have ulterior motives.”

“I’ll make some calls,” I said, and left.

Garm hadn’t told me how much info I could or couldn’t give, but I figured I was going to have to tell the bosses something.

First, I teled Rendrae. I told him everything. Dredel Led. Twenty dead. He didn’t believe me for quite some time. Enough time that I began yelling at him, because I had a lot more folks to call and I couldn’t spend thirty minutes on each one. I enlisted his help to spread the word. I even told him to go to the check-in and look at the damage. He was an intrepid enough reporter I knew he would.

The bosses differed. You could see each individual’s personality shining through. Some were ready to commit their men to the effort and asked what assistance they could lend. Others were only into protecting their own interests. Still others simply thought I was lying. That I was on the take from someone and this was some convoluted master plan.

I didn’t talk too long to that last bunch. But what I did do was contact some of the guys who worked for them and passed along the word and told them to do the same. I sent out a broadcast tele to everyone I knew, which is quite a few people. I explained it as succinctly as possible and closed with the advice: stay inside, tele if you see anything.

I went back to Garm and saw most of the soldiers had dispersed. I watched her appreciatively. Takes a special kind of woman, or anyone for that matter, to be able to switch gears so quickly between crook and savior.

When she was done, she didn’t even look tired, and I was tired just having seen her.

“Before we go, Hank, I need you to understand what we’re facing.”

“Dredel Led,” I said gravely.

“Right, and you’re bulletproof. But look at this.” She dropped a heavy square of metal at my feet. It was bent and scorched.

“Do you think your skin is that thick?” she asked.

“As thick as that metal? No, of course not.”

“Well, that’s what those robots did to it. We removed that from the side of one of the buildings.”

“What’s your point?” I asked.

“Hank, you need to duck if you see those things.”

“Duck? Like what do you mean?”

Garm heaved a deep sigh. She then reached for the gun on her thigh, pulled it out, and aimed it at my face.

“See?” she said, alarmed.

“What?”

“You didn’t even flinch.”

“I know you’re not going to shoot me.”

She put the gun down.

“That doesn’t matter. If I did that to anyone else, they would at least move out of the way. You’ve spent your whole life not having to look both ways before crossing the street, or worrying about touching a plate that’s too hot. I don’t think you know how to protect yourself.”

I blinked a bit, then slowly squatted down.

“Like this? I mean, I’m not sure what you’re getting at,” I said.

“Hank, if you play this like you’re doing a street fight with some Belvaille thugs, they’ll shoot you with the”—she pointed to the injured metal on the ground—“gun that did that. And you’ll die. Then I’ll have to hire your replacement. And you’re one of the only contractors on Belvaille who even loosely understands the concept of hygiene.”

“Don’t get mushy. So what do you want me to do then? I can’t get lightweight all of a sudden.”

“Just, stand behind cover. Peek around corners.”

“You’re kidding,” I stated.

“They can’t shoot through the walls. We already know that, Hank. Think like someone who isn’t a mutant for once.”

I frankly didn’t know how I was going to do this. Carry corners around with me? I mean I was going to have to be in front of them sometime, right? Or how else would we fight? And couldn’t they just walk around the corner? Or even fly? I was too slow to be sneaky.

I just nodded my head.

“So when are we leaving?” I asked.

“When we find them, I’m setting up patrols.”

“Do I wait here? I have jobs to do. Paying jobs.”

She gave me a mean look but relented.

“No, you can go. But if I call you you’d better get here in five minutes. Not Hank-speed.”

“Fine.”

I took a catnap to clear my head and moseyed back to my trusty drug dealer Grever Treest. Invasion or not, I still had an assignment and I was holding a lot of floppy-ears’ money.

Grever was, if possible, more edgy than he had previously been.

I figured out why soon enough when he let me inside and the first thing he asked me about was the Dredel Led. It seems Rendrae had released an “Extra” of The News and it was entirely about our robot friends. He also pulled out all the stops and somehow had a potpourri of data regarding Colmarians’ previous encounters with the race.

I was surprised to read that the Dredel Led were the catalyst for Colmarian mutation experiments.

It seems every empire at some point or other takes a shot at the Colmarian Confederation. It’s like a right of passage. But when the Dredel Led came knocking we didn’t have super weapons, or vast resources, or exotic alien physiology, or the overwhelming efficiency that comes from being ruled by just a handful of species. What we did have was the largest amount of biodiversity times a zillion.

So we started cobbling all that together in an attempt to create mutations. Now everyone is subjected to it. Mutants are basically organic landmines that make it harder for us to be conquered.

So that was our great strategy: make it simply not cost-effective to try to invade us.

I knew why we did mutations. I just didn’t know it was the Dredel Led that made us start. Rendrae mentioned the fact that we were losing a war against them and that’s what made us take the plunge into tinkering with our own population. I suppose at the time it was a pretty radical idea, but we’ve been doing it for so long now, it’s just the way it is.

Anyway, after reading that, I found the second reason why Grever Treest was so antsy. He took me into his bedroom and his entire bed was covered in drugs. It was the largest flat surface he could find.

He began detailing all the things he had scored.

“This one isn’t Blue Horizon, but it’s got kind of the same effect. I got four samples of your L-joccaine. This one has more of a mild burn. This is strong, but short in duration. The other two are solid, but kind of lighter, more of a haze than a blaze, you know?”

Grever spoke with encyclopedic knowledge about each and every drug, but all I could see was that I had totally screwed up.

I had stupidly assumed that when he said he would get half of the list, he was literally going to go down and get half of each individual drug. So when I went out trying to fill the rest of it, I bought the remaining half, or as close as I could.

So what I was looking at was basically 150% of some drugs and 0% of others. Some were replaced with completely different drugs and some were “almost” the same.

I didn’t know how drug deals worked intimately, but I figured I had accomplished about a third of what I was supposed to using all the money I was given, less about seven grand. If it was any other kind of transaction, it would be a total botch. I was just hoping this was how drug deals always worked.

I could see Jyen being really pissed and not paying me. I mean the only good thing was that I already got the money for it and at least nothing would come out of my pocket. If she was only interested in those exact drugs in those exact quantities…well, I could tell her to file a claim with Garm.