Hard Luck Hank: Screw the Galaxy

by Steven Campbell

  No, it had been moved.

  As my hearing returned and I could almost see again, I looked up and saw Wallow. And heard him. He roared as he picked the robot up.

  He cupped it in his hands, but it was obviously incredibly heavy. His knees buckled as he hoisted with his back. Then he pushed it over his head, triumphant.

  There was no corner of the city that did not hear Wallow screaming. His face was the living embodiment of violence. It was so ferocious I nearly forgot the only thing keeping my leg from separating from my body was my mangled armor and skin.

  Wallow stood fully erect, his arms stretched high above. You got the idea he could hold the Dredel Led there forever, like some benevolent god sacrificing his life for all of ours.

  But that was not how Wallow worked.

  He brought his arms down and slammed the Dredel Led into the city floor.

  I flew four feet into the air and felt like I broke another few bones from the shockwave. The Dredel Led was literally wedged into the superstructure of the space station, only half of it visible.

  Nothing. Nothing could survive that.

  Except ZR3.

  I sat there in disbelief, and considerable agony, as I saw it trying to extricate itself. It was beyond comprehension. What use were rockets, or even lightning, against such a construct? It had just been forced four feet into solid metal and was still going.

  It whirled spastically until centrifugal force popped it out.

  I looked over and saw Jyen slumped against the building. I didn’t see any injuries though.

  ZR3 showed the first real signs of intelligence I’d seen when it turned to face Wallow. All the rest of us it could kill at leisure.

  Wallow wasn’t going to go easily. He lifted his massive foot and stepped on the robot, knocking it down. I think.

  It was hard to tell because he kept stomping and stomping and yelling and I was getting bounced around and my leg hurt and I wanted to be in my apartment or even the hospital. Anyplace but here.

  Then Wallow yelped in pain.

  I looked up to see him falling.

  “Come on,” I managed to grunt, right before he fell on top of me.

  I definitely passed out. For how long I didn’t know. When I came to I wondered if we were winning yet.

  With difficulty, I managed to twist myself to a nearly upright position and saw a big pile of Wallow on the ground, no longer on top of me, but oddly splayed across the street. The robot was chasing soldiers.

  The cars were in shreds and burning.

  Jyen was gone.

  But I heard Delovoa still talking his crazy lingo as he darted around the street in a panic.

  I was running out of options.

  I struggled to rise and the searing pain made me think hard about playing dead. I mean, it’s a robot, right? It’s not going to check my pulse. It doesn’t even have hands.

  But I saw ZR3 literally run over a soldier, breaking him to pieces, and I knew I had to do something.

  “Hank, I can’t see it,” came the voice of Jyonal, whose pleasantly high manner was obscenely out of place in this carnage.

  Holding on to the wreckage of the vehicle behind me, I pulled myself up to one leg. My other leg was twisted at a weird angle and it sickened me to look at it.

  Unless I was going to rust it up with my blood, I really only had one outside hope.

  I took my plasma pistol out of my jacket and powered it on, which is more than I thought it would do after having been sat on by a giant.

  ZR3 seemed to sense its new priority, or realized the Oberhoffman wasn’t quite dead yet, and it turned to me.

  To keep my balance on my one good leg, I clung to the car as the robot ran towards me.

  “Eat thuck! Ow!” I grabbed my mouth, realizing my jaw must be broken.

  I could tell right away my Ontakian pistol didn’t fire normally.

  Mostly because it exploded.

  The vehicle kept me upright, but I smelled my burnt flesh. The Dredel Led was a step away. I thrust myself at it with my last bit of energy and grabbed hold with both arms.

  “Gona. I ’ave it! Can you gee me?”

  CHAPTER 42

  I heard some talking, as if from far away. Heard the word “inject” and then I woke up with a start. A group of medical technicians stood by my bed. But instead of fumbling with my intestines, they appeared to have matters under control. It was then I knew I wasn’t on Belvaille.

  “Good evening, sir,” one of them said.

  I looked around at the fantastic array of medical gear that was deployed. They were almost comical in their sophistication. Like a computer systems salesmen had taken out every model he had in hopes that at least one would be of interest. Their bleeping lights and sounds were like a little symphony.

  “What ship am I on?” I asked.

  “Medical Sloop J-B,” another answered.

  I tried to look at my leg, but I couldn’t rise. I felt it there, but I knew that didn’t mean anything.

  “How many pieces am I in?” I asked.

  “You appear to be in perfect health, sir, though your physiology limits our ability to ascertain your precise disposition. However, your leg has reset itself somewhat irregularly at the knee.”

  “What’s that mean?” I asked.

  “You may have some discomfort or off-gait in your left leg.”

  “A limp? How long?”

  “It would be permanent,” the technician said solemnly.

  “So I’m going to be even slower?”

  “There is a possibility that we could re-break your leg and see if it heals properly this time. We would need to construct some machines for the task.”

  What an option.

  “There’s one more thing,” one of the technicians said. “We weren’t able to correct this.”

  And he handed me a mirror.

  “Really?” I asked, not looking at it. “Do you really think you should say that and give a patient a mirror?”

  I took a deep breath and gazed at myself.

  I had three scars on my face. A small horizontal one above my right eyebrow, a longish one that went from the left side of my nose down to the corner of my mouth, and a sort of thick one that cut across my left cheek and joined the one at my nose. All three scars had a very light green tinge to them.

  I’d never had scars before. My body just healed them away on the rare times I was injured. I actually thought I looked pretty cool.

  “We believe there is some contaminant in the skin that is preventing its healing, though we couldn’t detect anything,” a technician stated. “We aren’t sure if they’re dangerous.”

  “The scars?” I asked.

  One of the technicians turned off the lights and in the mirror I could see the faintest emerald glow from the wounds on my face. Whoah. There were also a few nicks on my hand—presumably all this was from when my poor plasma pistol exploded.

  “Do you know if we took out the robot?” I asked.

  “I’m not aware of what is happening on the space station, sir, I’m sorry.”

  “How long have I been out?”

  “Twenty-three days,” he said gravely.

  “That’s it?” I said, impressed yet again at Navy skill.

  I assumed the Boranjame ship hadn’t arrived yet because the technicians had spoken to me instead of running around the room screaming like little girls.

  I had to get back to Belvaille to find out what was going on.

  In the hallway, I noticed my gimpy knee immediately. It didn’t hurt—in fact I didn’t feel it at all—but it had a different swing. I almost walked into the wall after a few dozen steps.

  It would just take some getting used to. Though in the grand scheme, going from sort of very slow to very slow wasn’t much concern to me. Especially if I was dead from the Boranjame.

  I had to get a shuttle to the space station, which was, as I found, exceedingly easy as an Oberhoffman. I even got them to give me a couple extra sets of unifor
ms, because I needed clothes and theirs looked way better than anything I owned.

  I threw up in the shuttle even before we were undocked. There were no soldiers to clean it up so I did my best, but the pilot raised a glass barrier between my compartment and his.

  The medical sloop was even further away than the dreadnought, so it took quite a while to get to Belvaille. I made calls on the way.

  Jyen was fine, which was a relief. She had used her own bioelectricity to fuel her lightning. She’d basically exhausted herself trying to save me from ZR3, which was why I saw her passed out during the fight.

  She was tickled I was alive and well and didn’t seem to notice my greenish scars. Or at least was too polite to mention them. But she also didn’t know squat about what was happening in the city, so I said I’d be in contact later and hung up.

  “Did we kill it?” I asked Delovoa.

  “Didn’t even scratch it,” he said without much alarm.

  “What? I blew up my gun for nothing? Is it still running around?”

  “Your friend…I don’t know how he did it, but he molded the city street and formed a metal bubble around the both of you. We weren’t sure what to do then, but he slowly opened it and we pulled you out. The robot was inactive and we sealed it back up. I have a theory it shuts down in darkness or when covered.”

  “So all we had to do was throw a blanket over it?”

  “Maybe.”

  “If you say a damn word to that thing, I’ll kill you,” I warned.

  “It’s soundproof,” Delovoa said, unconcerned. “Its container is like twenty feet thick.”

  “Did you ever figure out what it was? A Dredel Led or not.”

  “It’s a big roadblock right now on 32nd and F.”

  “So no sign of the Boranjame?”

  “We’re talking to each other, aren’t we?” came his reply. When did he get so snarky?

  “How are the gangs? They all cooperating?”

  “No, they’re fighting again.”

  “What?” I couldn’t believe my ears. How desperate did things have to become for those idiots to drop their petty problems?

  “Did you really think they were going to turn into model citizens just because our entire state is about to be destroyed? With you incapacitated and Garm demoted there was no one to keep them in line.”

  I hung up and started calling bosses, trying to get to the bottom of things.

  Turns out, it wasn’t as bad as Delovoa had hinted. They were all helping the Navy like I’d asked, but since they had been permitted to re-open their businesses and the soldiers were now allowed a little R&R to raise morale, they had gone back to squabbling over turf and prices and supplies and the hundred other things they fight about.

  Two issues I managed to settle right on the tele. First, the price wars of two competing casinos. I just fixed the prices for them and they agreed. Second, some gangs causing damage to each other’s establishments, which is almost always a precursor to a real fight, so I put an end to that immediately.

  When I hung up, I marveled at how easy it was. Then I realized I was an Oberhoffman in my own private Navy shuttle, with a backdrop of hundreds of warships.

  Nice gig if you can get it.

  CHAPTER 43

  There was a huge line of Navy vessels waiting to dock but our little shuttle snuck past the mega-craft and I got back to my beloved Belvaille.

  For a whole thirty minutes, I felt like a real badass. I was literally in command of the entire city. All the true Navy hotshots had returned to space to prepare for the Boranjame. I had tens of thousands of troops at my disposal.

  After my brief flush of excitement being a real boss, it got damn tired. I had Navy guys questioning me about things of which I had no clue and every crime boss or flunky was calling me for favors.

  I ordered that Rendrae be brought to me, and he was, kicking and screaming. I told him to start up The News again as we needed it.

  “You’re not cut out for a revolutionary, Rendrae. You’re a reporter,” I explained.

  “Editor-in-chief and publisher,” he corrected.

  “People need to know what’s going on and I can’t answer every tele from a quarter-million people on the station.”

  “I’ll do it if you designate me the official information source of Belvaille.”

  Considering he never had a competitor in all the years he published:

  “Absolutely, I can’t think of a better authority,” I said.

  Garm tracked me down somehow, as I was constantly moving to try and shake off all the responsibility. The guards around me didn’t like her. She was still “the traitor.”

  She saw my scarred face.

  “And I didn’t think you could get any uglier.”

  “I like them, they add character.”

  “Yeah, character was totally what you were missing before,” she sniffed.

  “What happened to Wallow?” I asked, wondering if I had fared better than he.

  “Few broken bones I think. The medical ships were much too small for him. He’s got his leg propped on a house in the south,” she explained. “Zadeck’s men are mostly looking after him and being reimbursed by the Navy.”

  “Zadeck is still alive?” I’d just assumed he was dead when Wallow got co-opted by the Navy.

  “He’s very much alive. No one knows all the details of how he lost Wallow. But he’s a completely new person. Playing nice with everyone.”

  “I bet. Without his muscle, he’s not much.”

  “He still has the richest block in the city. That’s a lot of influential friends,” she countered.

  “I guess,” I said begrudgingly. “Wouldn’t it be kind of funny if the Boranjame didn’t show up? All this work for nothing. Not that I’d be complaining.”

  “There’s a ton of chatter on the telescopes. More than we’ve ever seen. But enough small talk, you have a lot of decisions to make, Oberhoffman.” She hauled out a folder with what looked like hundreds of forms.

  I gazed at the stack of work and my heart sank.

  “I quit,” I said seriously. I had been thinking of the best way to do that all day. I established a Governing Council. Garm, some of the bosses, some Naval officers, merchants, and a few chief engineers who kept Belvaille afloat.

  I basically gave them all the decision-making power and I went back to being Hank, though with a really cool uniform.

  With my new freedom I stopped by to see Jyen and Jyonal. Jyen was as worried as ever, practically trembling.

  “You need to work on how you handle stress,” I said once I had stepped inside.

  “I was so worried about you. I’m worried about all of us.” Her eyes were lucid. You could be swallowed by them.

  However, before that could happen, Jyonal came in looking like he had just woken up.

  “Hank. Great to see you,” he said, shaking my hand. “Sorry about trapping you with the Dredel Led, it was the only thing I could think of.”

  “No problem, it worked.”

  “He’s been feeling guilty for weeks,” Jyen explained.

  “You guys want to eat?” I said to prove there were no hard feelings. They were good, if very troublesome, kids.

  I awoke in my apartment later that night to sirens and screaming. I staggered outside to see what the commotion was.

  I grabbed a soldier running by.

  “Are the ships ready?” I asked him, assuming the Boranjame had finally made an appearance.

  “We’re evacuating now, sir,” he said quickly and rushed off.

  Huh? I meant were they attacking.

  Back inside as I dressed, I tried contacting anyone I knew on the big ships. The Wardian, General, anyone above me. No one responded.

  I got a tele from Garm.

  “The Boranjame,” I said.

  “I know,” she replied. “It’s a royal world-ship.”

  Garm, Delovoa, and I were in one of the telescope buildings looking at data I didn’t understand. Even the normally
calm operators were tense and sweating.

  “See this,” Delovoa said, pointing at abstract numbers and swirling magnetic patterns. “That’s them.”

  “So what’s that mean?” I asked.

  “It will take them a while to get here depending on how quickly they travel. It can’t be very fast just because of its mass,” he said.

  “Can the Navy destroy it?”

  “Hank, technically we’re in a wide orbit around that ship. If it gets much closer, its gravity alone will tear us apart.”

  “Dreadnoughts are designed to destroy planets, right?” I begged.

  “It’s not a planet, Hank. It’s a spaceship. An armed one. If the Navy is smart, they’ll run,” Garm said.

  “What will that solve?” I fired back.

  “Them being blown up,” she said simply.

  I didn’t have real access to the top-secret Navy intel, but I could tap into some officer tele channels because of my rank. In their haste and panic, they weren’t very cautious with messages.

  The Navy was indeed fleeing. It became pretty obvious as all the remaining soldiers disembarked. They abandoned everything they couldn’t carry in their hands.

  They were all gone in a little over two days.

  Not only were they leaving Belvaille to its destruction, but the entire state of Ginland that housed it. Who knows how many billions of people. Once folks learned we were not being evacuated, there was panic and more than a handful of deaths.

  We didn’t receive official word until the fleet was underway. Basically the gist was they were in combat mode and couldn’t risk the rest of the Colmarian Confederation by taking time to rescue all us civilians. And they expected to be in battle shortly anyway.

  It was as cutthroat a sentiment as I’d ever heard in all my years on Belvaille. And just like that, the Navy was gone. Every ship except maybe a few dozen shuttles and some frigates with mechanical problems they left behind.

  For the Boranjame world-ship to use its a-drive deeper into Colmarian space, it had to reach the unique area around the Portal. Delovoa calculated that when it was finally close enough to be able to activate, Belvaille would actually be within the diameter of the ship. So even if we survived its gravity, which we wouldn’t, it would physically run into us. And that’s assuming it didn’t blast the station out of the way first.