“I just woke up, give me a break. I don’t know who you are.”
“I’m Valia.”
I lay there quietly.
“No, you’re not,” I said.
“I just told you I am.”
“That doesn’t mean anything, I could say I was Valia but that wouldn’t make it true.”
“Why would I lie to you?”
“I don’t know. You’re an assassin. Maybe you want me to kill Valia. Besides, she couldn’t fit in that armor any more than Garm could.”
“I can shapechange. That’s my mutation. Do you want to know about me?”
“Not really.”
19-10 was clearly not expecting that answer and all four of his arms rose in frustration.
“What?”
“I mean, if you’re going to kill me, then kill me. I don’t feel the need to sit through some boring story if I’m just going to die anyway.”
“How the void do you think I could kill you? Am I going to throw you into a star? I’ve been trying to find a way to kill you for a year. All this will make sense if I explain it.”
“Fine,” I said. “But I need to pee.”
I started to get out of bed.
“Now?”
“Yes, I’m not going to be able to pay attention to your story if my bladder bursts.”
It took a while to get off the bed of course. 19-10 cautiously moved away, as if I could sleepily lunge at a teleporting battlesuit.
I was in the bathroom for a while when I heard from outside:
“How long are you going to be?”
“Until I’m done.”
“You haven’t even started.”
“I can’t pee with an assassin waiting outside the door staring at me. You’re apparently new to old men and their bathroom habits.”
“I’m not staring at you.”
“Stop talking.”
I was silent for a while longer when 19-10 added:
“Try running the water.”
“I’ve been peeing my whole life, thank you,” I muttered.
“Not successfully.”
I turned on the water and tried to relax.
When I was finally done, I crossed back into my bedroom and began to climb into bed.
“What are you doing?” 19-10 asked.
“Getting into bed, why?”
“That takes forever. Can’t you just stand and listen?”
“I’m sleepy. You woke me up.”
When I was finally settled, 19-10 began.
“So I am a shafeshifter—”
“How is that different than a shapechanger?” I asked, referencing the word that he first used.
“It’s not, stop interrupting. It’s just a mutation.”
“What level?”
“Five.”
I had originally been categorized as a level four. Though at this point, I wondered if I would be much higher.
“The Messahn battlesuit was simply a collector’s item when I found it. No one could put it on let alone use it. But I could morph my form to fit inside. It took quite a long time to learn, and it’s a confusing shape, but now it’s second nature. Inside here I have eight eyes, no mouth or nose, four arms, obviously, and various other changes.”
“But you’re saying you’re Valia?” I asked, skeptically.
“Valia is just a form. I don’t have a true me. I could change shapes for as long as I can remember. I’m not a man or a woman, tall or short, fat or skinny. I chose Valia’s shape because I thought it would get me a position on the Kommilaire, and it did.”
“Did you think I cared she’s a cute woman? I never touched her,” I said.
“I know quite a bit about you, Hank. It’s my job. I knew you wanted more Kommilaire and figured you wanted more women to round out your male-dominated force. And I knew you had a past relationship with Garm.”
“Maybe,” I said begrudgingly.
“I took the assignment when I was on the other side of the galaxy. I had heard of you even there. Hank of Belvaille.”
“Why would you want to kill me?”
“I’ve killed other ‘great heroes’ in the past. In every case they were just normal people who had good marketing.”
“Who hired you?”
“Garm. Or I thought it was Garm. But it turned out to be the Ank using her clone.”
“Why were you in the Kommilaire?”
“To find your weaknesses. Find out what you did. The longer I stayed, though, the more I saw you really were your legend. You were the same guy. Executing you would have made me the undisputed greatest assassin in the galaxy. But I wasn’t sure I was capable of killing you and I wasn’t sure I wanted to.”
“You saved my life a few times. Or maybe not my life, but my skin.”
“I couldn’t let anyone else kill you. I wouldn’t get credit for it. If some Totki killed you that would have meant this was a waste of time.”
“Nice.”
“In the meanwhile, Garm’s clone hired me to do other jobs. I assassinated more than a dozen people on the station. You only heard of the big ones. I hired feral kids. I worked with gangs. I shot the Ank—likely so they would be clear of any suspicion. I also told Garm’s clone everything you were doing.”
I exhaled.
“You suck.”
“But I started to realize that if I did, through some miracle, manage to kill you, I would be killing everyone on this station. Men, women, children, gas clouds, insects, robots.”
“What do you mean?”
“You keep this city together. I don’t know how you do it. It’s insanity here. This city is like the organic, traumatic center of a star, ready to explode outward at any second.”
“So I’m gravity? Why is everything a fat joke?” I complained.
“It’s not just that you’re big. You almost never beat people up. But I could see you really did love this city and it was fated to fall without you. I don’t just take any contract. Killing you was one thing, and I wasn’t even sure I wanted to do that now that I knew you, but I was certain I didn’t want to slay all of Belvaille. When you started unravelling what the Ank were up to, I wondered if I was also being manipulated.”
“Well, you were.”
“I know that now.”
“So why are you here tonight?” I asked.
“To say goodbye. My employer is gone and I was working under false pretenses. And even if I wanted to, I don’t know how to kill you. And trust me, I know a lot of ways to murder. I fed you like two pounds of poison and you didn’t even notice.”
“Yeah, poison doesn’t really work on me. It’s just food,” I said. “Don’t worry too much. I’m expecting a massive heart attack any day now.”
“I’d also like to say that as Valia, I learned a lot from you.”
“Glad to hear it. I haven’t been a perfect gentleman my whole existence, but I’ll just throw out there that assassin isn’t the best career. There’s not much worse than looking back on your life with regret. I can speak from experience.”
“We each have our own paths, but like I said, I did learn things.”
“So can you take off your helmet?” I asked. I think I was still a bit unsure it was really Valia.
“No. I have to change forms.”
“You done with the Kommilaire, then?”
“I’m done with Belvaille. Time to relocate. I go where the jobs are.”
“How do you know I won’t stop you?”
“I can be any form I want to be. Unless you stop every ship from ever leaving, I’ll get off.”
“Well, that’s got to be handy for an assassin,” I sulked.
“It is. Take care, Hank.”
“What’s your real name?”
“When I’m an assassin, I’m 19-10. But when I’m living my life normally I think of myself as Jia-Kard.”
19-10 vanished, taking his light with him. Or her.
“Show off,” I said.
CHAPTER 71
I woke up t
he next day, started to make the long journey off my bed, and found it was quite easy to navigate.
In fact, I spun and almost threw myself onto the floor. I landed on my feet, however.
My feet! I could see them. I looked at my hands, my nimble fingers, my arms that no longer resembled construction pillars.
A chill went up my spine. A chill I could actually feel.
I ran to the bathroom. Ran!
I turned on the light and looked in the mirror.
It was me. My grayish white hair hadn’t changed a bit. But everything else had.
I was small. Not small, but fit. It was my body from a hundred years ago. I flexed. I turned. I patted my chest. I could feel through my hands, through my skin.
I jumped!
I all but giggled like a demented little girl in a tickle factory.
I stared in my mouth, put my fingers in my ears—my glorious ears!
I danced around, twirling and hopping and laughing. If this was a dream, I didn’t want to wake up.
Then I stopped, struck with the sudden realization.
I had died.
I had died and gone to heaven.
I’d finally done enough good deeds to erase my debts.
Just to be sure, I splashed water on my face. I could feel the cool water in my hands. Dripping from my chin and nose. I breathed the water it into my lungs. Coughed.
Even coughing was great.
Cough.
Cough.
Cough.
Okay, maybe not that great. Maybe I shouldn’t breathe water even in heaven.
My mouth dropped open when I realized the possibilities:
Food!
I could taste water, just imagine what food would be like. Real food. I hadn’t tasted sugar in decades. Savories. Sour. By the Blue Stars, give me something sour!
I was hurrying into my living room to reach the kitchen when I saw him sitting there.
Jorn-dole’s golden hair caught the light and he wore a pleasant smile.
I stopped in my tracks.
“Jyonal,” I said to him.
“How did you know it was me?” he answered.
“I don’t know many people who could do this. You modified your own body in the past and offered to modify mine.”
Jyonal was a level-ten mutant I knew from Old Belvaille. He was, as far as I knew, the most powerful mutant in the galaxy. And a drug addict.
“How have you been, Hank?” he asked, casually. As if he hadn’t just reshaped my entire body.
“Uh, fine. You? How’s your sister?”
“You know Jyen. Got married. Divorced. Married. Kids. Divorced. I can’t keep track. I said I wanted to pay you back, but she was against it.”
“Pay me back for what?”
“For saving us,” he said, shocked. “I don’t know if you’ve forgotten, but when my sister and I first came here, we were in terrible trouble. You took us under your wing and protected us. We would have surely died without you.”
He was painting me to be nobler than I really was. Helping a level-ten mutant was like a Therezian putting his foot on you and “asking” you to be squished—you didn’t have much choice.
“It was my pleasure,” I said.
“Honestly, I wasn’t sure if I was going to help you at first. I heard all this talk of you destroying the Colmarian Confederation and had to see for myself. If anything, I think you changed for the better. Except for being incredibly unhealthy.”
“Yeah. How did you fix my body?” I asked.
“Well, I didn’t exactly ‘fix’ it. That’s a totally new one. Don’t be upset, but I kind of killed your old body after creating that one.”
I smiled and shrugged. Why would I be upset at someone for killing me? These things happen.
“You see,” he continued, “I take imprints of people who are important to me. I’ve been doing it for decades. I stored your entire genetic make-up from the last time we met. I stored it in the very structure of the city. Though no one could ever see it except me. I used it as a blueprint in creating your new body.”
“Ah,” I said, “so my bones are in the walls?”
“No, just a blueprint and just one wall. I’m glad they didn’t tear it down. All your information could fit on a grain of sand.”
“That’s rather humbling,” I said.
“I had to use your existing brain. Though I stripped away all those excess layers your body makes as best I could. If I used your old brain, you would have forgotten the last eighty years.”
“I’m not entirely sure I would have minded that,” I said.
“So, do you like it?”
“Um. Sure. I mean, it’s my body. There’s not another me around here is there? The big version?” I was concerned we might have to fight or something.
“No. I broke it apart at the atomic level. But you probably want to wait for the filtration system to clean your bedroom. It might make you sick if you were exposed for too long.”
“I could see that,” I said, nodding. I remember getting in conversations like this with Jyonal in the past. You just had to recalibrate your concepts of normality. “Planning on hanging around in Belvaille?” I asked, trying not to sound worried.
“No. It’s a bit too chaotic for me here. I’ll go back home. I like working in my garden.”
I clenched my jaw so I wouldn’t inquire further. But he didn’t care.
“Well, I call it a ‘garden.’ I’m trying to create life. Nothing fancy. I’m not a god or anything. Just want to make some cute pets. It’s not as easy as you’d think, starting from scratch,” he said.
“I bet.” I forced a smile. “You want something to eat?” I hoped us shoveling food might quiet our talking. I had already learned quite a bit more than I wanted to learn.
“That’s okay. This body doesn’t consume food. But I’m happy to watch you eat.”
I went into my kitchen and got my least horrible grub, returning to the living room.
“I noticed my hair is still gray,” I said.
“Yeah,” he replied.
“So you couldn’t fix that?”
“Are you kidding me? Depending on how your brain holds up, I gave you at least another fifty years to live. And you’re worried about gray hair? Buy yourself a wig!”
http://www.belvaille.com/hlh3/hankend.gif
AUTHOR’S AFTERWARD
The novel is over. Really. It’s done. If you purchased this, I sincerely thank you. If you read or listened this far, presumably you liked it, or you are struggling to go to sleep, or you’re in a prison somewhere being tortured.
If you enjoyed the book, I respectfully ask that you purchase it if you haven’t already. Then I can produce more work which will provide valuable entertainment and/or sleep.
Hard Luck Hank: Prince of Suck Page 30
