Michael Bunker - WICK

The guards in front of the old brew house looked them up and down but did not search them or demand that they surrender their weapons or gear. That was a good thing, because the travelers were not going to patronize any business that wanted them to be disarmed in order to trade there. The guards waved them in and went back to looking up and down the street for trouble.

Inside the restaurant, a palpable sense of having passed into a fantastical dreamland state immediately overtook them. Except for the fact that everyone in the restaurant was heavily armed, and looked as if they hadn’t showered in months, the restaurant itself seemed to be completely unfazed by the drama that was going on in the rest of the world. Candles and lanterns lighted the place, and the delectable smells of Italian cuisine wafted outward from the kitchen. Waiters and waitresses, dressed in aprons, swirled in and through the crowds with trays of drinks (with ice!) and plates heaped with delicious dishes. Luscious green salads, lasagna, spaghetti with meatballs, chicken alfredo, and other sumptuous delicacies steamed past Ace, Peter, and Elsie as they stood and watched with their mouths open and watering.

A maître d’ of sorts met them after a moment and showed them to a table covered in a red tablecloth with white cloth napkins. He took their drink orders and smiled when they all ordered Cokes with ice. Before he could walk away, Peter stopped him and asked him what form of money the establishment accepted for the meals.

“Silver coins are preferred, sir,” the man replied. “We also take gold or anything else of value, but if it isn’t gold or silver coin, you’ll need to talk to the owner before you order. I’ll get your Cokes though. Should I send the owner over?”

“Yes, sir. Please do,” Peter said, nodding his head.

When the maître d’ walked away, Ace looked at Peter and smiled again. This was the sniper’s third smile in a single day, a new record. “If I’m dreaming, donot wake me up!” Ace said. He ran his hands through his hair and felt the rough callouses of his palm scratch the leathery shell of his face.

“I get your point, Ace, but you aren’t dreaming.”

Peter looked at Elsie; her eyes were bright as the waitress returned with their cokes and sat the small platter down on the table, methodically moving each coke from the platter to the table. The ice clinked in the glasses as the drinks settled, and the gas bubbles fizzled in response. Peter looked at the coke, and then at Ace, and continued, “… unless, that is, we’re all sharing the same dream.”

“Oh my goodness,” Elsie exclaimed. “Cokes, with ice? Parmesan chicken with wine sauce? Where in the world are we?”

“Apparently, the owner here has worked out some kind of deal with the two opposing armies, and I’ll wager he’s being supplied by the Amish somehow, probably via a whole system of underground traders. Commerce is the only creature that will outlive cockroaches and will still be thriving at the end of the world.”

“Apparently!” Elsie said.

A tall, dark man with slicked-back hair approached the table and nodded to everyone before speaking. “Paul tells me you might need to work out payment?”

“Yes, sir,” Peter replied, looking the man in the eye. “We have gold, and quite a bit of it, but it’s not in coin.”

“Almost never is,” the tall man replied. “What else have you got?”

“That we’re willing to part with? Not much else.”

“What else you gonna need?”

“Alcohol, if you got it. No dangerous, homemade white lightning or watered down swill, but Vodka or Scotch if it’s available. Still in the bottle. Preferably with the original seals intact.”

The man laughed. “You don’t ask for much, do you? You do know that the world ended, and no one is importing Stolichnaya or Glenfiddich anymore?”

“We could also use vitamins if you have any, a sharpening stone, gun oil, and a gun cleaning kit if you think you might give up any of those items.”

“Vitamins? You’re on your own on that one. The rest of that I can do.”

“Okay, so how does this work?” Peter asked.

“Let me see the gold.”

Peter pulled out a small nylon ammo bag and unsnapped the top, opening it so the restaurateur could look inside. Ace made a show of moving his right hand into his lap, showing the business owner that he had a pistol and that he was willing to use it. Ace still had the Glock strapped to his leg, but he’d picked up a .357 revolver that he really liked, and he especially liked the impact it had on anyone who might be considering something evil. The tall man saw the motion and just smiled. He wasn’t worried in the slightest.

“Okay,” the tall man said, after looking through the gold in the bag, “Here is the way this works. No one else is taking gold that isn’t coinage right now. At least no one that actually has anything that you might want to buy. I’ll take this bulk gold off your hands and replace it with gold or silver coin—your choice. I take a ten-percent handling fee off the top, and the exchange rate is posted above the bar. If you know gold and silver, you’ll be able to tell if the stuff I’m giving you is good or mixed with junk metals. I don’t debase the coinage. It’s not good for business. I’ll tell you plainly that I’d be dead and gone if I was scamming people. I surely wouldn’t let strangers,” he pointed at Ace, “like your friend here, hold guns on me while I conned them,if that is what I was doing.”

“So you just take the gold? How does this happen? I mean, logistically how does this happen?” It was Elsie who asked this obvious question. She looked at Peter, “He could just walk away with our gold, right?”

The tall man looked at Peter and then at Elsie as if to reassure her. He then motioned to Peter. “You come with me. Bring the gold. My son Charlie there will come and sit here with your silent, but deadly friend.” He motioned to a boy in the corner.

“How do we know he’s your kid?” This time it was Ace. Again, the question was obvious. The father looked again at Elsie as if the answer was, too.

She looked at the boy, how he sat with his arms crossed and how there was an unspoken argument about this little charade that the father and son had been having. She thought of raising her own son. Then the idea hit her.

“You use your son as collateral?” Elsie asked with shock evident on her face.

“I find it engenders trust. If I try to cheat you or run off with your gold, kill Charlie. He’s my only child, though, so be sure. Don’t make a mistake.” He let that thought settle and then continued. “I’m not trying to cheat anyone here. I’m doing business, and I’m getting rich. I’m getting rich precisely because I don’t cheat people. I provide a valuable service.”

Peter had heard enough. He pushed back his chair and lumbered to his feet. “Okay, let’s do this.”

“Easy there,” the tall man said, putting both hands up in front of him. Peter sat back down. “I’ll send the waiter over with Charlie. Order your food first. Then, after you’ve ordered, come up to the bar with your bag and we’ll finish our transaction. If all goes well, your meal is on me. I’m not getting rich on the food and drinks. They merely add atmosphere to this, shall we say, mutually beneficial transaction.”

Peter nodded his thanks to the tall man. He leaned his back into the backrest and felt the strain of the muscles relax into the luxurious comfort of something as simple as… a chair. A few minutes later, a waiter came over. He was followed by a curly-headed boy who was obviously, by all rules of narrative logic, named Charlie.

Charlie looked to be about ten years old, and now he didn’t seem to be bothered at all that he was being used to expedite a monetary transaction.