Steven Campbell - Hard Luck Hank: Basketful of Crap

There was a corpse on the stairs outside my apartment. This was disturbing since I didnt put it there.

He was a dumpy little fellow, as corpses go. He had kind of a bulbous nose, a plump face, and a tangled mass of long black hair. His eyes were frozen in a half-closed daze as if death was a particularly boring school lecture. He was short and wore baggy clothes, perhaps to conceal in life what I guessed was a not-too-amazing physique.

I saw no obvious signs of violence. No blood. No puncture wounds. No gross discolorations. Did he have a heart attack? Did he drug himself to death?

I didnt recognize the man, which made this very odd. I was the only person who lived in this building. I was even the only person who lived on this entire block. My street was quite creatively, and officially, labeled Hank Block.

It was weird to think of someone dying outside my front door while I was asleep. Or maybe I had been in the shower. Or eating lunch. He certainly wasnt here when I came home last night.

I looked up and down the road for some reason. As if I expected to see the Corpse Delivery Man making his rounds. But the block was empty as always.

This was the space station Belvaille. And while a dead body at my front door gave me pause, it was not entirely remarkable.

I walked down the street and headed for the train. I wanted to get to my job early as I had been told my boss was coming into work today.

On the way I passed the usual gray-silver metal buildings that were designed in some form of rectangle to maximize real estate. The whole space station was an exact square, fifteen miles by fifteen miles, with trains bisecting it regularly.

Thousands of feet above, there was a latticework of supports that controlled the environment, kept our atmosphere in place, and provided artificial illumination.

I was a doorman at the Yeolenz Flame casino in north Belvaille. Outside, my two co-workers were already waiting.

Balday-yow was a tall blonde man who wore thick prescription goggles because of his terrible eyesight. These made his eyes look large and somewhat crooked. He had been on Belvaille for maybe twenty years working for various gangs, mostly as a courier.

At the casino door, Balday-yow manned a heavy machine gun that was mounted on a stand. This weapon could probably cut down people at 1300 yards, but because of the way it was positioned, it only had a field of view of fifty feet, making it mostly for show.

My other co-worker was Cad. He was very short, coming up to about my waist. He was a mutant like me and his body was so different that he breathed and ate and drank through his skin. His mouth was just for talking and had no teeth; they had fallen out when he was young, presumably from disuse. When he did his equivalent of a sneeze, his flesh rippled and it made the oddest sound.

Cads job at the door was to control his large pet. It was a trained Mallute: three hundred pounds of fur and teeth and muscle on four legs. He named it Sassy, I think to be cute. It was generally a very pleasant, if slobbery, animal. But if Cad commanded it to attack, it could tear someone to pieces.

Then there was me.

I had a four-barreled sawed-off shotgun I holstered under my jacket. I kept it despite my growing sense it was becoming less and less viable as a weapon. Most people on Belvaille, if they were in the security business, wore some kind of body armor. Cad and Balday-yow had armored vests and I doubt my shotgun could penetrate them even at close range.

All this protection for one casino was pretty standard. Folks wouldnt even step foot inside a building unless there was at least this much gear outside. The city was simply too violent nowadays to have anything less.

Hows it going? I asked the guys as I took up my post in front of the door.

Hank, they acknowledged, already sounding tired.

Sassy came over and bit me on the shin like he usually did.

Sassy! No. Cad pulled on the leash but the animal outweighed him maybe threefold so we had to wait for Sassy to give up.

I absently looked down at the creature.

Sorry, Hank, Cad apologized.

It was only a minor annoyance. Sassy couldnt hurt me.

I was a level-four mutant and in consequence my body was incredibly dense and heavy. I could pull out my shotgun and shoot myself in the chest and it wouldnt hurtmuch. And on the rare occasions when I did get hurt, my body healed much more rapidly than a normal Colmarian. I had even regrown my finger once when it had been cut off. My only permanent injuries were a slight limp, and some dully-glowing green scars on my face and hand from when my old plasma pistol had exploded.

Still, we were required to wear a certain set of clothes when we stood at the door and Sassy kept forcing me to buy new pants. I now owned like ten pairs of slacks with one leg shredded to ribbons. Which wouldnt be so bad but the intriguing world of doormen didnt pay that much. I couldnt get too upset at Cad however, he really didnt have much going for him other than Sassy.

Boss, Balday-yow said discreetly.

We all stood up straighter and looked unbelievably focused as a dark car parked in front of the club. Even Sassy stopped chewing my leg and sat upright. The driver hopped out quickly and opened the back door of the car.

Out of the rear stepped the illustrious owner of the club, Xominion. He wore a tailored suit, jewelry, and had his face and hair in the wet look. Water was pumped continuously through tiny hoses secreted around the top of his head. To me it looked like he was really sweaty, but it was fashionable now.

We all dutifully said our welcomes and he dutifully ignored us and entered the casino.

After a brief pause the driver gave us all a nod, which we returned, and he drove off.

Hey, guys, you know how to get rid of a corpse? I asked.

You mean hide it? Cad questioned.

No, just get rid of it. Theres a dead body outside my apartment.

Whod you kill? Balday-yow asked offhandedly.

No one, it was just there when I came out today.

Then what do you care? No one can pin it on you, Balday-yow said.

Im not worried about it, its justI mean, shouldnt I move it? I looked between the two men, but they seemed to have already lost interest.

Oh, great, its the furniture, Cad said, motioning with his head down the street.

I stepped out of the doorway to see better and yup, here they came.

Gandrine.

Gandrine were a completely different empire from Colmarians. The Colmarian Confederation was by far the most populated and largest empire. It housed maybe 90% of the known species in the galaxy. We were also the least intimidating and most poorly managed by a long shot.

Gandrine were basically a mineral race. They looked like enormous piles of multicolored shale rock. They had arms and legs, a torso, and something that was head-like. But other than that they were rocks. They wore no clothes, had no discernable genders. If one leaned against a mountain and didnt move, you would never know not to drill for gold in it.

There were two of them on Belvaille at the moment. They had come maybe a year ago. There had been a lot of chatter about it and speculation. I had been particularly worried. My whole thing was I was big, strong, and hard to hurt. These things were bigger, stronger, and while I didnt know rock, I couldnt imagine stabbing one with a knife was going to do much.