HARD LUCK HANK

STANK DELICIOUS

by

Steven Campbell

web page:  http://www.belvaille.com

facebook:  http://www.facebook.com/hardluckhank

cover art by  Ian Llanas

back cover by  Le Manh Cuong

proofreading by  http://lectorsbooks.com/editing

All images and content Copyright © 2016 Steven Campbell

All rights reserved.

Web links may incur a data
charge, may not be available at future dates, and are subject to change.

Hank Back Cover:

http://belvaille.com/hlh5/Hank.jpg

This is dedicated
to the game designers, game makers, players, and spectators. I’ve got bad
knees, bad feet, and I’ve wasted years of my life chasing balls, cursors, and
game pieces. But I can’t say I regret any of it.

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

Author’s Forward

PRESENT DAY, CHAPTER 1

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 1

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 2

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 3

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 4

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 5

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 6

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 7

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 8

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 9

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 10

PRESENT DAY, CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

CHAPTER 23

CHAPTER 24

CHAPTER 25

CHAPTER 26

CHAPTER 27

CHAPTER 28

CHAPTER 29

CHAPTER 30

CHAPTER 31

CHAPTER 32

CHAPTER 33

CHAPTER 34

CHAPTER 35

CHAPTER 36

CHAPTER 37

CHAPTER 38

CHAPTER 39

CHAPTER 40

CHAPTER 41

CHAPTER 42

CHAPTER 43

CHAPTER 44

CHAPTER 45

CHAPTER 46

CHAPTER 47

CHAPTER 48

CHAPTER 49

CHAPTER 50

CHAPTER 51

CHAPTER 52

CHAPTER 53

CHAPTER 54

CHAPTER 55

CHAPTER 56

CHAPTER 57

CHAPTER 58

CHAPTER 59

CHAPTER 60

CHAPTER 61

CHAPTER 62

CHAPTER 63

CHAPTER 64

CHAPTER 65

CHAPTER 66

CHAPTER 67

CHAPTER 68

CHAPTER 69

CHAPTER 70

The Unnecessarily Detailed Description of Glocken

Belvaille Glocken Team Line-Up

Author’s Forward

There
are two chapters at the end of the book which are optional. They explain the
rules of glocken and display the positions of the team. Starting with those may
provide greater insight into the fictional sport of glocken, but they are not
mandatory.

PRESENT DAY, CHAPTER 1

I
was going to die.

I
mean, yeah, we’re all going to die, that’s nothing special. Any fool can die.
And fools are usually better at it than most. But I knew exactly what was going
to kill me, and I knew when it was going to kill me, and I wasn’t doing
anything to prevent it.

Was
that brave or stupid?

I
was scared. So scared my feet, back, and shoulders were tingling. My nose was
running and my eyes were watering. I was sweating so much I could feel it
pooling in my shorts.

Six
feet in front of me stood my executioner.

It
was a lobster-like creature over fourteen feet tall. Unlike me, it didn’t wear
any body armor because it didn’t need it. It had a hard, ridged carapace over
every segment of its body, eight legs on an abdomen that stretched behind it,
two arms that ended in pincers, and a torso nearly as wide as I was tall. Its
head possessed no eyes, no nose, no ears, just three long, probing antennae,
and a frightening set of serrated mandibles that made a shrill scraping noise
when they flexed. It was a sparkly green color that might be called “pretty” if
it wasn’t painted on such a monstrosity.

The
creature had been selected, after an extensive search of the entire galaxy, as
one of the best physical specimens in existence. It had one goal: to move
forward and crush any opposition in its way.

I had one goal: to stop it.

It
reached down and picked up a weighted, electronic disk which it carried by one of
the two flexible handles. The creature managed the disk casually, its stance
barely shifting, even though I knew the token weighed more than I did.

There
were almost 20,000 people surrounding us, watching. Even if I wanted to leave,
the spectators would have stopped me.

The
lights flashed, the crowd roared, and the creature charged forward.

My
arms were ready and my eyes searched for a weakness. The enemy loomed up and I
tried to grapple its waist, but it simply ran me over. I felt eight legs, and
thousands of pounds, hammer me into the ground as it passed by.

I
had barely slowed it and in exchange I had suffered a minor concussion and
cracked a rib.

I
got to my feet and ran after it the best I could. It was carrying a 4,000-pound
token and still moved almost as fast as me.

As
I was nearing the creature, I looked over in time to see a massive rock beast
swing his fist like a pendulum and hit a furry, bipedal animal. The animal
screamed and I heard bones snap as it flew directly over my head and landed
twenty feet away.

The
rock beast started to say something to me, but I knew he spoke too slowly to be
of any help so I continued my pursuit of the crustacean.

I
caught up to it and grabbed it by its right hind leg. I got pulled off my feet
as it began dragging me along with its seven other legs.

I
made my lower body as limp as possible, trying to create friction with the
ground to slow the monster down.

The
creature took that enormous token and swung it backward, missing my head by two
feet. If it had connected, it could have decapitated me.

It
then kicked me in the face with its right middle leg. It had plenty of legs,
and the kicking continued, coming from all sides. My upper body was taking most
of the blows and my face felt like raw meat—that was well past its expiration
date.

After
a particularly brutal punt to the head, I yelled:

“Unnecessary
Cranial!”

A
man rode next to us on a motorized unicycle. He was fully encased in armor and
had a shielded helmet with cameras that could zoom in, out, replay, and view
from nearly any angle. He didn’t even look in my direction.

“Stuff
it,” he said, speeding up to watch something else.

The
creature reached back with a claw to try and remove me from its leg. I avoided
the pincer and grabbed hold of its forearm. After several strong shakes,
however, I couldn’t maintain my grip on its shell and I slipped off.

The
creature stood on its rear four legs and kicked me with its front two, sending
me rolling.

I
was attempting to stand up when a voice cried out:

“Hank,
get down!”

I
lay flat.

A
muscular, brown-skinned man jumped over me and rammed his massive, bony head
into the crustacean just under its right arm.

There
was a crack so loud it probably could have broken windows with the vibrations.

The
monster reeled from the blow and tilted…tilted…tilted. And it fell across a
one-foot curb that designated the end of the field. But the most important point
was that the token had fallen out of bounds as well.

That
was it. It was all over.

I
dragged myself over to our side of the field. I was bleeding from my eyes, my
ears, my nose, and probably my hair follicles.

My
fingers were jammed from trying to hold onto the creature and I felt like I had
more sprains than I had muscles.

I
was met by an old woman of an unusual species. Her body looked like a large,
flabby teardrop. She had impossibly thin arms with seemingly nothing but skin
over them. Her legs were squat and short and her feet were enormous, which made
her waddle when she walked. She had no discernable shoulders, and no neck, just
a big head with pointy black eyes over which she wore thick glasses. Her skin
was yellowish with white flakes. She was capable of yelling a command across
the entire field, out into the street, down to the port, where it could board a
ship, take a Portal, go to another planet, dock, and scream at people in an
entirely different stadium.

Magda
Strongarm looked at my sad state with disdain.

“In
my 153 years of coaching professional glocken that was the worst playing I have
ever seen. Now get ready for the next play!”

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 1

There
was, for the most part, no weather in space.

No
rain clouds. No summer breezes. No blizzards. No chilly northwest winds that
whipped off the lake and made you despise going to work early.

So
for the many people who lived in space, or travelled between star systems, there
was nothing to make small talk about. If you got stuck in the elevator with
someone, you might share a quick smile, but then you were reduced to clearing
your throat or examining your fingernails.

As
more and more people took up residence in space, this lack of light subject
matter simply wouldn’t do. The galaxy was becoming socially awkward.

It
was then that glocken filled the void.

Glocken
was a sport. It was a professional sport played nearly everywhere and at nearly
every skill level by nearly every species. Its games, from amateur to dozens of
professional levels, were televised across the galaxy. It was the source of
gambling fortunes, aristocratic ventures, and the idolization of youth and
adults alike.

But
more importantly, it gave people something to talk about.

Even
if you hated glocken, or knew nothing about it, you could still talk about the
Reskin Sleepers. The Reskin Sleepers were an ancient team, one of the first
ever created, and they had never won a game. It was the longest losing streak
of not only any professional team, but of anything whatsoever.

Making
fun of the Reskin Sleepers was small talk that was practiced by species that
couldn’t even speak Colmarian and had never seen a glocken game in their lives.

The
civil war had decimated vast areas of the galaxy. Planets and Systems had been
laid to waste. Whole races exterminated. And when its remaining people wanted
to buckle under the burden of rebuilding, to sob at the enormity of their
problems, they only had to remember that the Reskin Sleepers had been failures
for thousands and thousands of years and were still at it.

The
team really put things into perspective.

Once
insanely unpopular, the Reskin Sleepers had become the former Colmarian
Confederation’s home team. They were a testament that losing could almost be
transcendent.

Which
is why I stood speechless in the Arvesh Coliseum on the space station Belvaille.

The
Reskin Sleepers were winning!

It
wasn’t that Lord Burrey’s Roustabouts were losing, the Sleepers were executing
brilliant plays of staggering complexity. The players were battering the
opposition into submission.

I
had been a fan of the Reskin Sleepers almost my whole life, long before it was
trendy. They made me feel competent by comparison. But I had never expected
them to win. Not in my wildest dreams.

The
stadium was dead silent. Twenty thousand people couldn’t be made this quiet
even if they were individually held at gunpoint, but you could hear a sneeze
from across the stadium.

The
game had been going on for nearly four hours and the Reskin 6-lane scored
again. That was 11 points. Each lane carried progressively heavier tokens,
worth progressively more points, and the players were progressively higher
weight classes. The 1-lane being the lightest, worth the fewest points, the
8-lane being the heaviest, worth the most.

The
score was now 256 for the Reskin Sleepers—glocken scores only kept track of the
winning team. It was an impossibly high tally.

The
referees called the game due to lack of competition.

The
Reskin Sleepers had won!

There
was a long moment of silence.

The
referees repeated their conclusion several times, as if they couldn’t believe
it themselves.

And
suddenly, in the stands, a woman two rows down from me began screaming. Just
opened her mouth and screamed. Another person took up the yelling.

Soon
enough there was an explosion of…I wouldn’t call it jubilation. People were
clawing at themselves, flailing at the sky, shrieking to whatever gods or
psychic powers they held dear.

One
of the most certain certainties in the universe had become untrue. If the
Reskin Sleepers could win a game, what was next? Would light travel backwards?
Would the vacuum of space suddenly have a minty scent? It was completely
irrational.

I
looked down at the field, which wasn’t easy with all the commotion. There I saw
the new head coach and general manager of the Reskin Sleepers, a man by the
name of Irune. He had taken this team, thrown out all the old players, the old
plays, and gotten them their first victory in the history of the sport.

Irune
wore a dark suit, a dark pair of sunglasses, a dark hat. From what I could tell,
during the whole game, he never once moved or spoke a word.

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 2

Leaving
the stadium wasn’t easy.

It
was elevated about 200 feet above the street so there could be buildings
underneath, but that limited the number of exits.

The
space station Belvaille itself was an exact square, fifteen miles by fifteen
miles. It had tremendously diverse buildings of nearly every composition and
design. There were spiraling, multi-colored towers; fat, steel monoliths;
concrete domes painted with exquisite murals; and everything in between.

The
tallest building was still City Hall which stood in the center of the space
station. It was about a hundred stories in height. Not far above that was the
latticework which contained the lights and life support for the city. Past that
was the shield which kept our atmosphere in place and protected us from meteors
and radiation and such.

I
pushed my way through the crowd of frenzied glocken patrons. I noticed the
stalls selling memorabilia were being overrun by rioters. A memento from the
day the Reskin Sleepers had won would be a tremendous collector’s item.

I
reached a stairwell and I was approached almost immediately by a wild-eyed man
wielding a cruel blade about ten inches long.

“Give
me your ticket stub or I’ll cut your throat,” he snarled.

Now,
this guy was about half my size. I was a large person in general, taller than
average. But I also weighed thousands of pounds and had a strength nearly equal
to my weight. Admittedly, I was more than a bit sluggish.

But
I was an Ontakian. A species that was impervious to small arms and even some
large arms. In the times I did get injured, I was capable of healing at vastly
accelerated rates.

This
guy did not remotely frighten me.

I
pointed to my heraldry on my left breast. It was a silver circle with a golden fist
in the foreground, the knuckles facing outward. The fist was larger than the
circle.

It
was a badge given to me by the Arch Minister Maris-To himself. I was a Factotum
of Belvaille System. Which meant I was authorized to do all kinds of nefarious
work on behalf of the nobles who lived here.

Of
course, this guy didn’t know that and didn’t care. He lunged and gashed me
right across the gut. He hadn’t been content to stab me, he had to slash, which
tore two of my buttons off my suit vest.

“My
buttons!” I screamed. I had to wear nice clothes as a Factotum. It was
expected. Now my butler was going to yell at me for getting my clothes trashed.

My
unexpected response, of not dropping to the ground and bleeding, made the
wild-eyed man’s eyes go even wilder and he swung again, cutting my jacket
sleeve from my elbow to my wrist.

Of
course, I barely felt it—at least physically. But I could feel the economic
pain up to my ears, because now my suit was definitely ruined. I should have
just given him the damn ticket.

I
raised my fists and began plodding toward the man. He swung at my hands and
connected, but the knife clattered off my dense fingers and fell out of his
grasp. If he had just run down the stairs I wouldn’t have been able to catch
him. But no, everyone wanted to be difficult.

I
grabbed him by the shoulders and…now what?

I
had a policy of punishing people when they shot, or stabbed, or punched me. I
just felt it was good business. Even if they didn’t hurt me, I couldn’t let
people know it was okay to hit me with a shovel and I would just laugh it off
like a sap. That’s not the reputation you want to have in a System like
Belvaille, where people are more than happy to hit you with shovels.

As
I was thinking what bones to break on this guy, the door to the stairwell
opened behind me.

“Hank,”
I heard someone say.

I
looked back, expecting to see someone else with a knife who was keen on shredding
my wardrobe.

But
I knew the guy. He was a runner for the bookie Ulteem. Well, Ulteem wasn’t
really a bookie. He was a gambling Lord. An actual noble who lived on
Belvaille.

Belvaille,
for the most part, only housed nobles and their servants. Some incredibly
wealthy people lived here. I wasn’t incredibly wealthy, but I had been
here for so long, I was grandfathered in.

“Uh,
hi,” I said.

“You
busy?” he asked, indicating the guy I was holding.

“Not
really. What’s up?”

“Ulteem
wants to talk to you. Also, to settle on your winnings.”

“What
winnings?” I asked.

“You
bet on the Sleepers to win.” He said it suspiciously, like I couldn’t possibly
have forgotten.

I
had bet on the Reskin Sleepers for something like 200 years. In a way it was
greasing the palms of bookies, who I often had to work with, but like I said,
they were my favorite team. And I kind of felt it was an exercise in positive
thinking.

“Sure,”
I said. “Is he at home?”

“Yeah.
Come whenever you like.”

“Hey,”
I said, “you mind taking care of this guy? He tried to knife me. Well, did
knife me.”

It
was an odd request to make of someone else’s employee and I’m not sure what I
was expecting.

The
runner shrugged indifferently. He removed a pistol from his jacket, walked
forward, and hit the wild-eyed man across the face with it. He then looked to
me for confirmation.

“Thanks,”
I said.

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 3

I
managed to get to the parking garage and my limo, but there were problems there
as well. My driver couldn’t get us out because of the large number of people jumping
and dancing on cars or otherwise behaving in a traffic-congestingly manner.

Finally,
I had enough, and since my suit was already destroyed, I got out and began
pushing cars out of the way. Just used my weight and either dragged them or tipped
them over. Fans could continue mistreating vehicles, just off to the side so my
limo could exit.

I
was sweating and dirty and exhausted by the time I cleared a path.

Fortunately,
my butler kept the limo stocked with food and booze. Even when not acting like
a junk yard, I ate a lot of food. All the time. It was one side effect of being
an Ontakian.

My
home was located at One, One, Hank Block.

I
owned a five-story building. It was one of the ways I could afford to live on
Belvaille. I rented out the top three floors and the roof for storage. I would
rent out the sidewalk in front if they let me. I used to own another building,
but it was too expensive to keep so I sold it.

I
didn’t actually live on a street called “Hank Block,” only the building
was called that. Streets could have ten different names within the same block
or one name with a ten-block radius if it was owned by a wealthy nobleman.

It
was not easy to give directions in Belvaille.

I
tiptoed up to my door as quietly as a couple-thousand-pound guy could, and the
door immediately opened as I reached it.

Cliston,
my butler, stood as imposing as ever.

Cliston
was a Dredel Led. A robotic species from the other side of the galaxy. Long ago
the Colmarians had been at war with the Dredel Led, but long ago the Colmarians
had been at war with everyone. Since the Colmarian Confederation didn’t exist
anymore, and I wasn’t a Colmarian anyway, I figured it didn’t really matter.

In
appearance, Cliston’s chest formed an upside-down triangle. He was tall and
broad, yet incredibly nimble. His face had two glowing eyes and a speaker grid for
a mouth. He was black metal with horizontal white pinstripes.

As
a butler, Cliston took 15% of all my earnings and had full say over my
wardrobe, expenses, domestic staff, and nearly everything else except when I
went to the bathroom. He handled all my money, which normally would make me
uncomfortable.

But
a good butler wouldn’t rob me. And Cliston wasn’t just a good butler, Cliston
was the best butler in the city. The best butler in the entire Belvaille
System—and there were an awful lot of good butlers around here.

“Sir,”
he said, in his deep robotic baritone.

He
removed my jacket and handed me a drink without asking.

I
was waiting for him to say something about the damage to my clothes, but he
merely stood there. Which made me nervous.

“Um.
Cliston. About my coat. I saved one of the buttons, but I couldn’t find the
other one,” I said, holding up the bejeweled button like it was a very small
shield.

His
dexterous fingers quickly took it from me.

“Very
good, sir. You are smudged and look tired. Shall I draw a bath and prepare a
meal?”

Hmm,
he was taking it well. That also made me nervous. Cliston seemed to relish
scolding me for not acting more like a gentleman, even though he was fully
aware that I was in the ungentlemanly business of being a Factotum.

My
home, although small, was exquisite.

Cliston
would rotate all the furniture and artwork every 2-4 months. Sometimes he would
get modern work from undiscovered artists. Sometimes it was ethnic pieces from
some distant planet.

And
of course there were the tours. The butlers of major homes would regularly
visit my building with the idea of upgrading the living quarters of their own employers.
I found it all highly annoying and was going to tell Cliston to stop, as I felt
like a stranger in my own home.

That
is, until he pointed out that every time he switched styles, he would auction
off my old belongings at a handsome profit.

Cliston
was one of the city’s tastemakers and my house was an art gallery. I suppose I
could put up with a few gilded fountains in my hallway if it helped me earn a
living.

At
least the second floor of my building was relatively tranquil. That’s where my
office was and there wasn’t nearly as much foppish finery.

I
had eaten about ten pounds of Cliston’s delicious food, and a half-gallon of his
homebrewed beer, and was soaking up to my neck in the tub, feeling good.

“Cliston,
make a note that I have to visit Ulteem,” I said.

“Very
good. And when should I schedule this?”

“Whenever.”

“You
have your Factotum conference the day after tomorrow,” he said.

“I
guess I have to go. Make me a bag lunch,” I said.

Not
only was Cliston one of the best cooks around, but I had to eat special food
because of my species. Normal food and water were mild toxins to me and they
caused me to gain more and more weight as time went on. I don’t mean I got fat,
every part of me became denser, from my bones to my skin. There was a point in
my life I had been well over 10,000 pounds and was having monthly heart
attacks, but a mutant of incredible power had sorted me out by rebuilding my
body.

Mutants
were mostly gone from the galaxy now. They had been created as a policy of the
Colmarian Confederation. There were a handful here and there but the majority had
very minor abilities.

“You
also have a meeting with Procon Hobb,” Cliston said.

“Who?”

“Procon
Hobb,” he repeated. As if saying his name twice would make me know him.

“Who’s
that?”

“Just
someone who would like to meet you, sir.”

I
got a bit annoyed. Cliston knew I liked handling my own deals. He had waited
until I was food-buzzed before mentioning this.

“Is
that his name or his title?” I asked.

“Procon
is his title. It’s being phased out, I believe,” he said.

I
snorted. He was probably on his way down along with his title.

“He’s
quite wealthy. He owns several solar systems and large shipping rights as well
as numerous other enterprises,” Cliston added.

“Oh,”
I said, immediately changing my opinion of the man. “Do you know what he
wants?”

“I
suspect you’ll learn when you see him, sir.”

I
looked up at Cliston. I believe he was literally incapable of sarcasm. But
sometimes I wasn’t sure if Cliston saying he couldn’t be sarcastic was the
ultimate way of being sarcastic.

This
Hobb guy probably needed me to work out a contract with a labor union, get a
gang to back off, or work out a deal with a rival. It would be easy money.

“Sure,”
I told Cliston. “I’ll see him. New buttons aren’t free. Did you hear the Reskin
Sleepers won tonight?”

“I
did, sir. I’m going to be making you a whole new wardrobe,” he said.

“A
whole wardrobe? Why? How are those connected?”

“I
know you placed your traditional wager on the Reskin Sleepers to win. The odds
were 100,000 to 1.”

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 4

The
Arch Minister, Maris-To, controlled everything in the System. He even controlled
the Central Authority, our closest thing to a military, and all its warships.

And
he controlled the Portals. The Portals were what made Belvaille System special.
Indeed, Belvaille was arguably the trade hub of the post-civil war,
post-Colmarian Confederation.

The
Portals let ships travel instantaneously anywhere in the galaxy there was a
connecting Portal. And Belvaille System had countless Portals. The most, by
far, of any System.

The
space station Belvaille shared the name of the System it was in, but it was
just one habitation here. The space station, was, however, the “capital” of the
System, and the largest single dwelling. There were maybe a million citizens on
the space station.

There
were, I’d guess, five billion people in the entire System. Maybe more.
Millions of ships of all sizes were floating in Belvaille System, contributing
to, or sponging off, our vast economy.

The
Arch Minister delegated business interests in the city and System to nobles.
Nobles were just wealthy people from across the galaxy who came to Belvaille.

It
didn’t matter if you commanded a planet if your goods and services couldn’t use
the Portals. You’d still have your planet, but the nobles on Belvaille had
access to trade across the entire galaxy. The opportunities in Belvaille were
tremendous. But you really needed to be here in person to get anything done.

The
Arch Minister didn’t allow the nobles much in the way of security forces,
however. He was paranoid about coups, and for good reason, since it was how he
had originally taken power.

So
the nobles, in theory, had control of all the refining ships, and transport
ships, and workers, and markets, and exchanges that existed in Belvaille
System.

But
they had no way of enforcing that control.

That’s
where the gangs and Factotums came in.

The
space station Belvaille was relatively safe, but off-station was another story.
Gangs were constantly fighting proxy wars on behalf of their nobles, trying to
monopolize resources, workers, wages, or whatever.

Sure,
the Central Authority had warships, enough to quell any rebellion ten times
over, but you couldn’t use a warship to make people productive. Or stop
blackmail. Or prevent sabotage. The Central Authority was too blunt an object
to be of much use.

But
a gang could have people on all the ships, busting heads and keeping order—or
disturbing order, if that was needed.

I
don’t mean the gangs were like tattooed, bearded, smelly thugs in ratty
clothes, though some were. They were the organized criminals who got the actual
work done. Somewhere up the chain an order would be given by a noble and it
would be haggled over and fought about and settled by the gangs. The nobles
didn’t particularly care how it got done, they just wanted it done.

Of
course, if any gang got too out of line, the Arch Minister would have
the Central Authority squash them.

However,
nobles weren’t immune to getting bumped off by a particularly annoyed gang. But
that was bad for business considering nobles usually represented, in some form,
very significant resources in another part of the galaxy.

Where
I came in, and the other Factotums, is that we negotiated between the gangs and
the nobles. We were essentially middlemen. The nobles were required to use our
services. It was another way the Arch Minister limited the nobility, preventing
them from having direct access to gangs or other large forces.

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 5

The
next day Cliston dressed me to go see Ulteem.

I
told him I would be going armed, so he chose a suit that matched my gun.

As
a Factotum, I had a License to Hurt. However, it had very practical limitations
on a space station that was crawling with police. If I went around shooting
people without cause, I’d find my license revoked or, quite possibly, my life revoked.

I
was a very poor shot because of my slow reflexes, so one of my favorite guns
was a huge blunderbuss.

The
firearm was inlayed with vivid designs, encrusted with gems, and covered with
precious metals. But underneath all that, it was still a gigantic gun whose
muzzle ballooned out to twelve inches in width. It fired nearly a pound of
steel pellets and had a recoil that could rock me back on my heels. It was only
single shot and I didn’t carry any spare ammunition because it was too bulky, too
dangerous, and took too long to reload to be practical.

The
appearance of the blunderbuss was usually enough to make most people not want
to see it in action.

I
wasn’t sure if Ulteem was going to cause trouble, but if he owed me as much
money as I thought he did, it didn’t hurt to be prepared.

Ulteem
lived in a condominium complex in the south. It was about twenty stories tall.
He had an entire floor of his own, which was pretty nice.

There
was some discussion at the entrance on whether or not I could bring my
blunderbuss inside, but finally the guards relented.

The
whole floor was mostly one giant apartment with a few sunken areas. There were
some private rooms to the side which were presumably sleeping quarters and
bathrooms. Two of Ulteem’s flunkies walked me to their boss, who was sitting in
the middle of the room around a large table talking to some of his lieutenants.

Ulteem
was a relatively normal-looking Colmarian except he didn’t have a head. He had
two arms, two legs, a torso, just no head or neck. There had been around 50,000
species in the old Colmarian Confederation and you quickly learned there was no
such thing as unusual.

“Hank,”
he said when I came closer.

I
always wondered where his mouth was, but figured it would be impolite to ask.

“Ulteem,”
I acknowledged.

“You
plan on bombarding us? What’s with the cannon?” he said.

“This
is just decoration,” I answered, patting my blunderbuss.

“Right.
Oh, excuse me,” he said. He reached beneath his chair and picked up a plastic
head and put it on top of his torso. It attached to his coat. The head had a
pleasant expression and was painted in high detail.

I
wasn’t sure if Ulteem wore his fake head in an attempt to make people feel
comfortable or uncomfortable. It gave you something to focus on, but it was
frozen in mid-smile and was tilted slightly askew.

“Have
a seat,” he said.

The
two lieutenants had been scowling at me this whole time and they weren’t about
to give up their chairs. I sat in the only empty one left and it shattered under
my weight, leaving me sprawled on my back.

Normally
I tested chairs before sitting, but it had looked sturdy enough and I had
presumed, incorrectly, that Ulteem would have offered me a chair that could support
me. He knew I wasn’t a light guy, just like I knew he didn’t have a head.

“Are
you alright?” Ulteem asked innocently.

“Sure,
sure. I’ll just sit on the floor,” I said. Again, I didn’t know if Ulteem had
planned that. Some of these encounters can be so stilted and full of
one-upmanship. But I was used to these games and didn’t embarrass easily.

“So
what can I do for you, Hank?” he asked.

“You
owe me for my Reskin Sleepers bet,” I said.

“Oh,
that’s right. That’s right. Hank,” he began delicately, “how did you know?”

“Know
what?”

“They
would win!” He almost shouted.

“I
didn’t. I like the Reskin Sleepers.”

He
jerked back and his fake head wobbled.

“Come
on. You’re the only person on the station who laid that bet. You must have had
an inside angle.”

“How
do you know no one else bet?”

“Because
no one else was taking any action on it. I was the only one dumb enough to
think it was a legit wager,” he said.

“It
was legit. I was as surprised as anyone. More, probably.”

“That’s
not what I heard. They say you left the Coliseum pretty quick.”

“What,
am I going to hang around and riot and set fires? I’m too old for that
nonsense,” I said.

“Hank,
if you knew something, you should have come to me. As a business partner. I
could have backed you and we could have floated bets in the Sector.”

“I
thought you said no one else was taking action,” I said.

“You’re
the only person that bet, that’s why! So how did you know they would win?”

“I
didn’t, Ulteem. They got a new coach, ask him.”

“Oh,
funny guy,” he said angrily. “You mocking me, now?”

He
reached up to his fake head, put a palm over the mouth, and dragged downward.
The smile that had been on the mannequin face was suddenly replaced with a
frown. The action momentarily threw me.

“Uh.
What are you talking about?”

“Wait!
Do you know Irune? Did you talk to him? Is that how you knew they would win?”

“I
always bet on the Reskin Sleepers. I have for maybe 250 years. I didn’t know
they were going to win. Look, are you trying to get out of paying me or something?”

“I
didn’t say that. I just wanted in on what you knew. And, if you got something
going, I want you to think of me. Sure, you made some money off the bet, but if
I had known there was a fix, we could have owned this city.”

“No
one can own Belvaille except Maris-To,” I replied.

“Don’t
count on it. He’s not as strong as all that. If he disappeared tomorrow, the
gangs would run this station,” he said.

“That’s
dangerous talk. But I didn’t know the Sleepers would win. I swear it,” I said.

“And
why should we believe you?” one of the lieutenants sneered at me.

“Shut
up, flunky, I’m a Factotum. Talk tough to a wrench jockey off-station. I don’t
mind a bit of a runaround, Ulteem, but I’ll be damned if I let some thick-neck
patsy talk down to me. I’ve been breaking heads on this station back when it
was still under Colmarian Confederation rule!”

“Easy,
easy, Hank,” Ulteem said. “I’ve got your winnings.”

Most
big money transactions went through the banks, which were controlled by a
species known as the Ank, the financial wizards of the galaxy. But Ulteem
wasn’t a bank kind of guy. We walked into one of the back rooms and then I
learned what forty million credits looked like in physical form.

A
lot.

It
was a stack of bills about four feet tall, five feet deep, and five feet wide.

“What
the hell am I supposed to do with that?” I asked.

“I
don’t know. Buy a smaller gun?” Ulteem said.

“How
am I going to move it?”

“I
can sell you some bags and offer the assistance of my men for…five million
credits.”

I
looked at Ulteem’s “face” to see if he was smirking. But it was just as frozen
and plastic as ever.

“Forget
it, no. I’ll move it,” I said.

I
called up Cliston on my tele and had him bring over all my servants. The
dishwasher, the floor polisher, the limo driver, the lady who folded my socks,
the lady who made my socks, and the countless people I didn’t even know.

Cliston
trusted them, or he wouldn’t have hired them. And if Cliston trusted them, I
trusted them to haul my money. So they started making trips from the pile to
the limo, carrying armfuls of cash. I stood guard in the apartment itself.

“This
is causing quite a disturbance,” Ulteem said, after about an hour. We hadn’t even
shifted a small amount at this point. “I’m going to have to close up soon, I
can’t just leave my door open to the galaxy. This is my apartment.”

“Anyone
that gets in front of that door or my people is going to get shot,” I said,
brandishing my blunderbuss.

“I
thought you said that was a decoration,” Ulteem replied.

“It
is. You’ll be shot by a very handsome weapon.”

It
took a tremendous amount of time, but we eventually moved it all to the car and
drove home. The suspension on my limo was taking a beating and I heard a
terrible grinding noise if we went over thirty miles an hour.

Cliston
counted all the bills and it was more than a hundred thousand short, but I
wasn’t going to make a stink.

It
would take nearly as long to move it inside my home from the car. Then we’d
have to move it back, and then out a third time to deposit in a bank. Life was
too short for all that. So I had the car parked in the street like usual, and
tipped off the local Central Authority that it needed guarding. I slipped them some
money and hired a few goons of my own to protect it as well.

I
slept in the back seat in a pile of pillows, blankets, and guns.

Cliston
arranged for an auction the next day.

Five
financial-type people came over and got the specifics. They bid on my car and
its contents. The winning bid was 4.03% less than the total value of the cash,
with the car thrown in for free, which wasn’t a bad deal for everyone involved.

I
removed all the food and liquor ahead of time.

“That
was annoying,” I said, when it had finally been concluded.

“It
is still quite a windfall, sir. We’ll need to get your latest measurements for
your clothes and a new car of course,” Cliston said.

Forty
million was a lot of money. I could probably live off that in my exact same
lifestyle for a couple years. Of course, now that Cliston had his oily little
fingers on it, my lifestyle would immediately improve.

Or
at least “improve” by his reckoning. It seemed the more money I got, the less
comfortable my home became.

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 6

It
was the next day and I was in a large conference hall sitting at a table with
four other men and one creature of indeterminate gender.

The
room was filled with several hundred butlers, security chiefs, gang leaders,
and even a few minor nobles.

Public
speaking was a real drag and I wasn’t good at it. Sure, I could talk to a few
dozen angry guys armed with rocket launchers, but formal speaking made my palms
go sweaty. Well, sweatier than usual.

It
was my turn to speak and I went up to the podium.

“Hello.
My name is Hank.”

Silence
from the audience.

“I
am Factotum license number 00003. There is no 1 or 2. They spelled my name
wrong on the first two forms. I was the first Factotum appointed by Arch
Minister Maris-To for helping him become Arch Minister.”

I
shuffled through my cards.

“Um.
I am a good person to hire because I have worked with nearly every industry in
Belvaille System. I am the oldest continuous resident of the space station and retain
quite a few contacts both underworld and with the government. Some of the
groups I have worked with are the Quadrad, the Farmer’s Collective #208, the
Central Authority, Smeltworks, Beggar’s Alliance, Arkold’s Face Wreckers, and Master
Viqer Denn.”

Still
no reactions other than crossed legs and folded arms.

“I
used to be Governor of the city, I used to be the head of law enforcement, I
have gone toe-to-head with the Therezian Wallow on numerous occasions and
survived. I’ve fought tanks, assault-level Dredel Led, and witnessed the start
of the civil war. And I’m still here. If you need Factotum services, call on
me, Hank. I have reasonable prices and offer discounts for repeat business.”

No
one seemed particularly impressed.

“I
would also like to mention that I have my own heraldry,” I said. “As the only
Factotum with a sigil, I have a great understanding of the needs and concerns
that nobles face.”

Some
interested murmurs at that.

“Oh,
and Cliston is my butler,” I added.

Finally, people began whispering about my
significance.

“Thank
you,” I said, figuring it was best to end on a high note rather than go through
the other lists of accomplishments that no one cared about.

There
was a smattering of applause and I saw some people writing.

The
last speaker was my main Factotum competition.

I
suppose that wasn’t accurate. We didn’t compete that much, he just took all the
business.

He
was a lean man, muscular, and wore his fashionable clothes a lot more
effortlessly than I did. He had red, scaly skin of a color so deep it bordered
on black. His eyes were yellow and piercing and he had three slits for a nose.
If it wasn’t for his mouth, he would look like a stereotypical villain. But his
mouth was filled with giant herbivore teeth. Big old chompers. He couldn’t
close his skin over his massive teeth so he always looked like he had this
enormous goofy smile.

“Hello,
ladies and gentlemen and others. My name is Xandale of Univox Factotal. I’d
like to thank you all for coming and listening to us each give the…merits of
our respective businesses.” He looked up the table at me. I couldn’t tell if he
was smiling more, because that was hardly possible, but it seemed like it.

“There
are numerous Factotums you can deal with in this System, but only one Factotum agency:
Univox Factotal. We don’t just have a single Factotum and some hired punks, we
have over seventy-five Factotums on staff and hundreds of other operatives.
It’s simple numbers, is one going to get the job done faster and better
than seventy-five?”

The
whole two front rows applauded vigorously. It was then I noticed that he had
stacked those seats with all his own people. No wonder I got such a chilly
reception.

“I
could talk to you about who we work for, the jobs we’ve done, the contracts
we’ve fixed, but when we take on assignments, those become private. Your
secrets are safe with us. We don’t feel the need to brag about it or air your
issues to an auditorium.”

He
again looked at me and the front rows went crazy with enthusiasm.

“You
pay for quality. I don’t pretend we are the cheapest solution in the System.
But when your deal is hanging on the line, or your reputation, or your very
life, do you really want to go bargain shopping?”

The
front rows stood up cheering as Xandale took his seat. I saw a lot of the
audience taking notes and approving.

I
hurried back up to the podium. I couldn’t let it end like this or I’d be out of
work.

“Hi,
Hank again. I’d like to point out that I’ve fulfilled more contracts in this
industry than all his Factotums put together and probably multiplied by ten.”
That was slightly untrue. But if you counted all the gang negotiations and
other crooked jobs I’d done over the centuries, sure. Most of his staff weren’t
even alive when I started working.

Xandale
returned to the podium and leaned past me into the microphone.

“That’s
correct. Hank has done a tremendous amount of work here. And I would like to
point out he specifically had a hand in ending the Colmarian Confederation. A job
was offered to him that meant the deaths of countless billions of people and he
didn’t even think twice. I ask you, do you want to hire someone without any
decency? Without any honor?”

Damn.
I should have kept my mouth shut. What he said was only kind of true as
well, but I couldn’t just say “nuh, uh.” The main perpetrator of the Colmarian
civil war was an immortal without a name. I just called him “Naked Guy.” When I
learned what he was doing, I did my best to stop him, but it was too late at
that point. I disintegrated him, what else could I do?

“I’m
bulletproof,” I blurted, trying to fill the silence as I thought up something
better to add.

“Yes,”
Xandale began smoothly. “Everyone knows of Hank’s resilience and inclination
toward violence. But I prefer the softer approach. You can’t shoot a thousand
people every time you have a disagreement. You need cooperation and
understanding. When contracts break, call us and we’ll fix them. You can’t fix
what’s broken by breaking something else.”

Wow,
I was so losing this debate.

“The
two times that I went up against Univox Factotal, my clients won. If you want
decency, if you want propriety, if you want little embroidered napkins, then
hire Xandale. Maybe I don’t have manners, but I get results. Thank you,” I
said.

I
left the podium slowly, waiting to see if Xandale was going to respond. I watched
the calculations flicker in his eyes. He probably considered this a good place
to stop since we were both getting bloody.

He
already got most of the jobs, anyway.

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 7

“Hey,
this is too tight,” I said to Cliston, as he dressed me in my new suit. I was
getting ready for the meeting with the noble Procon Hobb, which Cliston had
arranged.

Cliston
did most of my tailoring because he was simply better than anyone else and I
was a very hard fit. He also knew my dislike for outfits that were too stuffy
or constricting. Especially since I tended to end up in fights, and I wouldn’t
do so well if I had my arms pinned to my sides and a perpetual wedgie.

“It
shows off your physique, sir,” Cliston answered.

“Why
do I want to show off my physique? I’m not a model.”

“I
heard about your talk at the Factotum Conference,” he stated.

“Ugh,
don’t remind me.”

“Maybe
it would be good to rebrand yourself a bit. You already are one of the more,
shall we say, ‘unpolished’ of the Factotums that nobles have to choose from.
Perhaps that could be used to your advantage in marketing your services.”

“Great!
Does that mean I can go back to dressing myself and having a junky apartment?”
I hoped.

“Don’t
be silly, sir. The nobles of Belvaille won’t deal with a grimy commoner. You are
the first Factotum, after all. But we can cultivate a dangerous and exotic image.”

“Whatever,
Cliston. Just loosen the chest in my next suit. I can feel my heart beating all
the way down my sleeves.”

Cliston
ended my dressing by draping a two-inch-thick, barbed chain from one shoulder
to the other, where it hung across my sternum. It looked odd to me, but Cliston
knew fashion better than I ever would.

My
new limo was called around and Cliston saw me off.

“Remember,
sir, highlight your past fights. People are impressed with them, especially the
ones with Wallow, seeing as you’re the only person known to have clashed with a
Therezian and survived.”

Wallow
was a giant that still roamed the space station. He was something like sixty
feet tall and incapable of being harmed by anything that wouldn’t also destroy
the space station itself. I had been poked by him, punted, hit with a pole, and
casually punched. The last one broke nearly every bone in my body and put me in
the hospital for months.

But
the fact I lived went a long way towards cementing my reputation as a guy you
didn’t want to fight.

“Cliston,
I’ve talked to nobles before. All the time, actually.”

“I
know, sir. And I’m sure you’ll be splendid.”

I
had researched Procon Hobb a bit before the meeting, but there wasn’t a lot
known about him. He was a minor noble relatively new to the station.

He
had, from what I gathered, been given the title Procon simply because he had
enough money and resources to be called something. But the older nobles
didn’t especially seem to be embracing him.

The
aristocracy was quite cliquish. I guess that was part of the definition of
aristocracy. They were always trying to ingratiate themselves with the Arch
Minister or otherwise stand out from their brethren, as if controlling an
entire planet wasn’t enough. It was like all nobles had Short Man Syndrome; or
Ugly Woman Syndrome; or, I guess, Lumpy Sludgepile Syndrome for those weird
species.

Belvaille
System didn’t have a star. It was just empty space. It was only settled because
of the unique mechanics that allowed so many Portals to exist here. The closest
thing we had to a star was the space station Belvaille and inside it, the Arch
Minister Maris-To. Everything revolved around him.

I
had been minted a Factotum by the Arch Minister himself, but that was the last
I ever saw of him. We had no personal connection at all and I was quite happy
with that. Flying too close to a star was dangerous.

Procon
Hobb lived in the southeast.

It
wasn’t a tremendous building for a noble. It was only ten stories and a rather
bland construction. Still, owning a building on Belvaille was a pretty huge
deal. I had gotten mine a long, long while ago and I paid a reduced tax rate.

I
was led through the building by servants who looked like small, upright
lizards. They stood only about four feet tall.

The
building was incredibly humid, almost damp. There were giant flowers and other
vegetation sprouting all over the place, and in between was naturalistic
artwork that didn’t clash with the setting.

Quite
to my surprise, I didn’t feel hot. It seemed like I should be hot, but
there was a mist and breeze that must have been whisking away any heat from me.
It was almost chilly.

What
an unusual home.

I
was asked to wait outside a large earthen dome. It was a huge pile of soil and
sod and growing plants in the middle of a steel building on a space station.

Flanking
either side of the entrance were what looked like tall statues decked-out in flowers.
The statues had wolf-like heads but reptilian skin and they were bipedal with
two arms. They stood nearly as tall as me. They each carried massive poleaxes
which, although ceremonial, looked deadly.

I
was about to take a closer look at one of the axes, when I saw the statue shift
his gaze to me.

Those
were alive!

They
had a thick layer of dust on them and spotting from the mist. Some of their flowers
were wilted, dead, or somewhere in between. They looked like dirty statues that
had stood there for years.

In
any case, they didn’t appear friendly. And I can’t imagine they would appreciate
me borrowing their poleaxes, so I admired the nearby plants instead.

You
were either a flower person or not. I felt like once you’d seen maybe a dozen
different types of flowers, you’d seen their whole bag of tricks. Sure, one
might be blue instead of red or have wide petals instead of spiky, but they
were still plants. You weren’t going to sit down and have a conversation with
one.

I
never really understood their appeal.

This
whole building was practically making my eyes water. I probably had spores
growing on my brain there was so much pollen in the air.

A
small lizard person exited the earthen hut and told me I could go in.

I
walked inside, watching the guards as I passed, and their eyes followed me.

Inside
it was spacious but gloomy, having only small fires here and there for
illumination.

In
the corner was a pond and a very large creature sat in it up to its waist. I’d
guess it was about ten feet tall if it could stand.

It
looked like a large amphibian with a solid head and wide mouth. Its arms were
thickly scaled and ended in massive claws about a foot in length each. Its
chest was ribbed with hard bands that disappeared into the water. Its neck was
enormous and thick and insanely wrinkled and sinewy. Each of its two black eyes
was about as big as one of my fists.

Cliston
was standing next to it!

“Cliston,
what are you doing here?” I asked, surprised.

“I’ll
let Procon Hobb answer that, sir,” he said.

I
looked at the large thing.

“Greetings,
Hank,” my own voice said in my head, suddenly.

It
was my inner voice. When I’m talking to myself in my head, that’s the voice I heard.
It was speaking without my command.

“What?”
I looked around.

“Do
not be alarmed. My name is Procon Hobb, though my real name is impossible to
convey to your species.”

Procon
Hobb’s eyes were on each side of his head and he slowly turned so that one eye
could face me directly.

“How
are you talking in my head? Is that you? Are you a mutant?” I asked.

“I
assure you it is safe,” my inner voice replied.

“What’s
my butler doing here?” I demanded.

“I
would like to hire him as my general manager,” he thought at me.

“He
already has a job,” I countered.

“He
would like to hire you as well,” Cliston answered.

“Hey,
can you hear him?” I asked Cliston.

“I
am speaking to both of you simultaneously,” Procon Hobb answered, still in my
head.

“Does
Cliston…” and I was going to say, “have a brain,” but that was stupid. Of
course he did. And if a giant frog/turtle/monster could talk to me, why
couldn’t he talk to Cliston?

“Hire
me for what?” I asked, trying to regain my footing.

“It
is a bit premature for that,” Hobb said. “I would mostly like to hire Cliston,
but he stated he could not work without your permission.”

“Yeah!
He works for me. We’re a team.” I was a bit hurt by this. Was Cliston trying to
cut out on me after all this time? I’d lose half my clients. And I’d eat crappy
meals again.

“No,”
Cliston said, “I explained to Procon Hobb that I would not work without
you.”

“So
general manage what?” I asked.

“I
own a professional Super Class glocken team.”

“Really?
Who?”

“The
Belvaille Glocken Team,” he said.

I
stood there a moment.

“That’s
their name? You can’t call them that! There’s maybe forty teams in this System
and you’re saying yours is the only one. It’s a tradition that team names are
meaningless. Like, something you heard in a dream or saw on the bathroom wall,”
I said.

“It’s
too late for that. He has already established them,” Cliston said.

“And
what do you know about glocken? You’re a butler,” I pointed out.

“Actually,
glocken is quite popular among Dredel Led, even though we do not play. I wrote
a handbook, ‘4009 Guidelines to Efficient Glocken.’ Many of the rules were
adopted for the Super Class glocken league.”

I
knew I shouldn’t be annoyed that my butler was perpetually more talented than I
was, but it did get tiresome.

“So
what’s all this have to do with me? It seems like I’ve been dragged down here
so you can steal my domestic servant.”

“My
players keep going missing,” Hobb said.

“Pay
them more,” I shot back. I was being rude, but I was not feeling gracious at
this point, what with my butler being stolen along with my brain.

“I
pay them exceedingly well. But it is not that they are leaving for other teams,
they are vanishing. I’ve lost several of my star players and they haven’t been
heard from anywhere.”

“They’re
not on vacation?”

“They
left their possessions, wealth, and even their families behind,” he said. “It
is clear they are being taken by someone. I believe it is my competitors. Not
just teams, but other nobles, who don’t wish to see me have a successful
glocken project. Very few people would go to such trouble with no obvious gain.”

“What
you’re talking about is a fulltime job and not really my gig. I’m a Factotum. I
do negotiations. Hire more security.”

“I
was instructed by the government that this qualifies as Factotum labor. I am
required to hire an operative. I am losing a vast amount of money on this
team.”

“I
hate to break it to you, but you can’t just buy a winning franchise. There have
been teams that have gone millennia without winning. First you need a coach—” I
started.

“I
have hired the services of Magda Strongarm,” he interrupted.

Whoa.

Magda
Strongarm was the winningest coach in modern glocken history. She had taken
five different Super Class teams to the Championship and won sixteen times
total. She had to be really old at this point, but it was pretty damn
impressive nonetheless.

“And
a general manager. I guess you want Cliston.”

“Only
with your approval, sir,” Cliston said.

“But
what players do you have?” I asked.

“I’ve
seen the current list, sir. I believe the team could be a strong contender,”
Cliston said.

“Strong
contender for what?”

“The
Championship,” Hobb said.

“You’re
crazy. Win the Championship on your first year? Why not set your sights a
little higher and cure hangovers? Besides, what does this have to do with me?
I’m not going to stand around stadiums looking for kidnappers.”

“No,
and I don’t believe that is how it is happening. You would need to be closer to
my employees than that,” Hobb said.

“You
would be a player, sir.”

I
gawked at them both. I hadn’t done glocken since I was a little kid.

“What
makes you think I have any capability of playing glocken at the
professional—the Super Class—level? I’d get murdered in the first five
minutes.”

“Actually,
sir, your physiology, temperament, skillset, and knowledge make you a perfect
defensive Weight. You could shut down nearly any 7- or 8-lane that is currently
in the game.”

“That’s
ridiculous,” I said.

“If
you are accepted, I am proposing a starting salary of thirteen million credits per
week plus bonuses,” Hobb said.

I
started looking around for a contract to sign before whatever hallucinogenic
was in this mist wore off and he realized what a ludicrous deal he was giving
me.

“Okay!”
I bubbled.

“Actually,
sir, I will be negotiating on your behalf if you don’t mind,” Cliston said,
seeing my eagerness.

“I’ve
handled more deals than you can possibly imagine. Besides, you’re the
opposition. You would be the general manager.”

“I
also wrote several manuals on sports agents, specifically geared toward
glocken,” Cliston replied.

“Fine,”
I said, “but I want to review the contract.”

“Actually,
I am primarily interested in Cliston. I haven’t decided if you are worthy of my
team, Hank,” Hobb made my inner voice say.

When
he did that, it felt curiously like I was doubting myself.

Which
I was.

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 8

“Well
this hardly seems sporting,” I said.

We
were all on another floor that wasn’t so filled with vegetation. There was a
large dirt ring, fenced off with chains. Inside stood me, and a thirty-foot-long
lizard.

“Why
don’t you put that thing on the team?” I asked Hobb, who was safely squatting
well to the side. He had attendants spraying him with water and his two guards
stood nearby.

“The
Usk is a dumb beast native to my home world. If you can triumph over it, I will
consider you acceptable as a member of my glocken team,” Hobb thought.

That
lizard was going to eat me. It was huge. How did Hobb even get it onto
Belvaille? Certainly someone noticed a dinosaur coming in at the port.

But
thirteen million a week, I’d wrestle lava for that.

“So
what do I do?” I asked.

Hobb
made some slight motion and the chains were suddenly released from the Usk. It
sprinted forward, turned, whacked me with its tail and sent me flying through
the air.

I
smacked against the wall, far outside of the pit, and realized thirteen million
really wasn’t all that much money when you considered it.

The
lizard lunged at me absurdly fast and ripped through the metal retaining fence.
There had been maybe twelve poles holding that fence to the floor and they all
bent simultaneously, until half wrenched completely out of the ground.

So
how was I supposed to fight this thing? I was a little hazy on the rules.

The
Usk reached me and opened its gigantic mouth. You could fly a spaceship in
there! It had no discernable teeth, but its mouth was edged with bony protrusions.

I
ducked and rolled to the side. I tried to get up and out of the way but, wham!
I got hit with its tail again and went flying across the other side of the
fighting pit—which was poorly named since we weren’t actually fighting in it.

I
staggered to my feet and was feeling rather dizzy. The room was spinning and so
was I.

But
the good news was I saw the Usk limping and twitching its tail. Sure, that
thing was probably a bunch heavier than me, but I was really solid. It would
probably break its tail just about the same time it broke me.

Not
sure if that would qualify as a victory.

The
Usk charged again and I thought back to what Cliston had said. I would make a
good defender in glocken. Specifically, a Weight.

The
Usk opened its tremendous jaws again, and this time I put my hands against the
roof of its mouth, and one foot on the bottom, stepping on its tongue.

It
then tried to close its mouth and crush me like a stubborn morsel.

But
I stepped in with my other foot and tried to position myself as best I could.

“Uh,
sir?” I heard Cliston call.

I
wiggled a bit, a bit more, and when I felt I had it, I crossed my arms and
kicked my legs out.

I
basically lay down inside the mouth of the Usk.

“I
don’t wish to interfere, sir, but do you require assistance?”

Great
time for Cliston to start doubting me.

The
Usk was gulping, trying to swallow this junk food that had literally hopped
into its mouth. I did my best to let myself be swallowed—up to a point. I tried
to keep myself sideways and my chest as broad as possible so I wouldn’t get my
head or neck crushed and I could still get air. But my legs were already down
its throat.

This
was actually my plan.

I
was far too big for it to chew and there’s no way I’d ever fit down its gullet.
So I was just sitting here waiting for it to suffocate as it mashed me over and
over again with its extremely powerful maw.

After
about a minute it realized this wasn’t working so well and it tried to spit me
out, but now I was holding on and widening my legs to keep myself wedged solid.

It
thrashed around as it began choking in earnest and I felt myself getting rammed
against all manner of solid objects.

When
it finally slowed and staggered to a halt, I called out from my damp cave.

“Did
I win?”

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 9

“You
trying to cheat me, Cliston?” I asked.

“No.
Your base salary is twelve million—” he started.

“What
about thirteen?” I interrupted.

“I
negotiated down in exchange for you not having to practice as much. I know you
enjoy your free time and you will also be engaged in finding the missing
players.”

“You
negotiated with yourself?”

“Yes.
But I did it fairly, I can assure you.”

“Where
is the rest of my money?” I asked.

“As
I was saying, twelve million, minus my 15% as your agent, leaves you with just
over ten million and then I get 15% as your butler.”

“You’re
double-dipping!”

“They
are different tasks. Just like you collecting rent on your building and you
working in your building as a Factotum.”

“Those
aren’t anything alike. You’re the general manager, my agent, my butler. How do
you know when you’re which?” I accused, wondering where my millions went.

“As
a Dredel Led it is not difficult for me to compartmentalize my roles. I had
your best interests in mind—except when I was operating as general manager.”

“So
about 8.5 million a week?” I asked suspiciously.

“Of
course, you’ve entered a new tax bracket and now qualify as an entertainer,
which makes you subject to numerous other taxes.”

“I’m
going to lose money on this, right? I’m going to go out there and get my face
pounded and become a beggar. Why did I ever agree?” I asked.

“You
will make substantially more than you do now, sir. If you can survive the whole
season, you will do quite well financially.”

“Survive?
Even you think I’m going to die. And you’re some glocken strategist.”

“I
meant not go on injured reserve. I have every belief you will do extremely well
as a glocken player. Besides, you still have to negotiate your side project
with Procon Hobb.”

“You
mean finding who is stealing his players?” I asked.

“Yes,
sir.”

“Why
weren’t you negotiating that at the same time?” I asked.

“Because
you always say you like handling your own Factotum contracts and I’m not nearly
as skilled in that arena as you are.”

“Hmm,
I wonder if I can get back up to thirteen million,” I said. “I don’t even know
what he wants. Some glocken players disappear and I’m supposed to find out
where? They could be on the other side of the galaxy running a school for underprivileged
snowflakes. Let me see my contract for glocken.”

Cliston
went into the other room and returned with a stack of papers that could choke
an Usk.

“What
the hell, Cliston?”

I
took the stack and began flipping through. It was like fifty accountants and
lawyers had died on these pages in a grueling fight. At random, I saw there was
an entry for parking on holidays.

“Was
this you or him? Why do noble contracts have to be so complicated? It used to
be you could get by with a few paragraphs and a handshake. Now it’s this mess.”

“You
need to be sure all parties are adequately protected,” Cliston replied.

That’s
what happened when a meticulous Dredel Led was handling both sides of a deal.

I
just hoped I was cut out for Super Class glocken, the highest level of play in
the galaxy.

Once
I was officially a player and Cliston was general manager, Hobb was surprisingly
friendly when it came to negotiate my Factotum services.

Being
a player was my prime responsibility. In essence, I was just undercover
security. There wouldn’t be a lot of investigating I could do while maintaining
a somewhat active sports life. Though I hoped I would be a benchwarmer for much
of the time.

I
mean, I had to be. I wasn’t any good.

Hobb
had a training facility not far from his home in Belvaille. It was a straight
shot south of me across town, but traffic had increased a lot recently now that
everyone and their butler had cars.

The
building was twenty stories tall and took up almost a whole block. I learned
that five other glocken teams and one girl’s ballet school used the building
for their training camps.

My
limo had to park in a lot and let me out.

The
facility was security door after security door with me having to present my
credentials every step. In fact, the whole training complex was basically one
big military compound that happened to be filled with sports equipment.

You’d
need an army to abduct anyone from here. Which led me to think the missing
players had left of their own accord.

“I
don’t want you. You’re too old. You’ve got bad knees, bad feet, bad back, scar
tissue so thick they could build a suspension bridge out of it, you’re slow,
you have no stamina, and by your own admission you haven’t played glocken since
before you hit puberty. Which, it seems, was so long ago you were masturbating
to hieroglyphics,” Magda Strongarm bellowed at me.

This
was an inauspicious beginning to my glocken career.

“But,”
she added, “I am required to take you because I don’t have control over my own
players.” She said that as if it was not only insanity, but the gods themselves
should be heaping vengeance upon whatever fool made that policy.

“Yeah,”
I said, feeling browbeaten.

Magda
was old and odd-looking even by Colmarian standards. She had a big head, thick
glasses for her black pointy eyes, no neck, and a lipless, gigantic mouth. She
had a slender upper body and spindly arms, but a massive waistline over stumpy
legs that ended in feet that were three times the size of mine. When she moved,
she shuffled and swayed and looked ready to fall over any minute. It was only
through a vigorous rocking motion that she managed to stay upright.

“How
much do you weigh?” she asked.

“I
think about 1,900 pounds. Maybe 1,974,” I answered meekly. She made everyone
meek. She was a little lardball old lady and these hulking glocken players
whimpered in her presence.

I
stepped on the industrial scale.

They
had been poking and measuring me all day. They couldn’t scan me with medical
devices because my body was too dense, but that didn’t stop them from shoving
things where things shouldn’t be shoved and monitoring the results.

Magda
read the scale.

“3,215
pounds,” Magda accused, as if it was my fault. “Are you as stupid as you are
fat?”

“I’m
bad with numbers,” I mumbled.

“I
can’t fire you, but I can make you quit. I can make you despise it so much that
you’ll change your whole vocabulary just to avoid using the letters that spell
‘glocken.’ Now go check with the doctor,” she said, wobbling off.

With
my head downcast, I walked through the halls of the training facility. Hobb did
have a nice place here. I guess it was nice. I never went to the gym, so those machines
could be torture devices for all I knew.

It
didn’t even smell bad.

There
were illustrations of the team name, “Belvaille Glocken Team” all over the
place. It was a simple red background with black letters. It might have been
drawn by a child except the signs were too big. Hobb spent all this money on a
team and building and coaches and players and couldn’t come up with a decent
name or sign.

I
got pointed down a few different halls and finally came to the doctor’s office.

“Hank,”
Delovoa said casually.

Delovoa
was just about my best friend, which made me sad every time I thought about it.
He was a scientist and mutant and good guy to have on your side because he was
a horrible guy to have even mildly against you.

At
this point we were both the longest-living residents on the space station. I
had survived so long because of my biology, which healed wounds and diseases,
and could apparently slow old age. And because I had my body recreated from
scratch by a mutant.

Delovoa
lived this long because of his own technology.

He
rode in a heavy-duty wheelchair. It tugged along a trailer that held a large
aquarium. Inside the tanks were all his vital organs, including his three
brains, floating in various-colored liquids. The whole setup was attached to
his hollow chest cavity with numerous tubes.

At
least he had covered up the gaping hole in his torso and gotten a metal sleeve for
where all the hoses connected.

His
head looked like a hairless, wrinkled, upside-down pear with three irregularly
spaced eyeballs that could also blink and look independently. He had tubes and
wires sticking out of his face, and the top of his head had been sawed off and
replaced with a glass dome in which blood regularly spurted up and ran down the
sides.

Delovoa
looked quite gross. And he had done all of this to himself without assistance.

“What
are you doing here?” I asked Delovoa, surprised.

“Cliston
hired me as team doctor. He takes 15% of my salary. I got your ‘medication,’”
he whispered.

Presumably
he meant my Ontakian formula. It was Delovoa that perfected it.

It
was a pretty smart move having Delovoa with us. If the team had to travel, I
would either need to stock up on the formula or make it. And it wasn’t easy.
Even Cliston had to get the base components from Delovoa before he cooked it
into his wonderful meals.

Delovoa
was also a good technical resource. About all I knew when it came to technology
was on, off, and smash. Delovoa was still one of the main repair technicians of
the Portals and he had literally centuries of experience making weapons and
other gizmos. Unfortunately, he had a tendency to overlook the safety of anyone
other than himself.

I
could also use Delovoa’s help on my Factotum job of looking for the
glocken-nappers.

“Man,
Cliston must be making a killing as a sports agent,” I complained.

“No
kidding,” Delovoa replied, as he mixed some chemicals together. “Cliston hired
Ziggles and Garm for the team, too.”

“Ziggy?”
Delovoa and I had disagreements about the name of his Po. I guess that was
rude, but Po were a slave species, normally. Ziggy was Delovoa’s butler. It
looked like a giant pile of tentacle arms and hands with no mouth or features
of any kind.

Garm
had a lot of features. She was the attractive former Adjunct Overwatch of
Belvaille, a member of the ruthless Quadrad assassins, and my one-time lover. I
was also her granddaughter’s gigolo for a short while, though I tended not to
bring that up in conversations. Garm was far more crooked than I could ever be
and was quite a dangerous combatant. She was also a mutant and didn’t need to
sleep.

“Is
Garm going to be a cheerleader or something?” I laughed.

“No,
a player,” he said. “Want some?” he held up a cup of something foul to me and
when I crinkled my nose, he shrugged and poured it down a squeaky hatch on his
aquarium. The solution around one of his organs began to bubble.

I
filled in Delovoa on the other job I had and how I might need his assistance. Delovoa
told me that both Ziggy and Garm were players, taking up the 1- and 2-lanes.
Garm would sub out on defense and someone else would take her place.

So
Cliston had pulled my whole network together and helped staff the team at the
same time—probably collecting 15% from everyone at least once. Knowing Cliston,
in a year or two he would write a manual on how to be a Factotum and put me out
of work.

TWO MONTHS AGO, CHAPTER 10

Once
I left “Doctor” Delovoa and got inside the locker room, the first thing to
greet me was some guy’s naked balls.

“Hi.
I’m Candar, team captain. You’re Hank, right?” he asked.

I
tried not to look at him, but he was an absurdly muscular man who stood taller
and wider than me and had long blond hair. There had to be someone around who
was oiling him up and making sure every hair was in place. He had crisp blue
eyes and angular cheekbones and a dimple on his chin. He was practically a
caricature.

“Yeah.
Hank,” I said, looking at the ceiling.

“You’ll
need to take your clothes off,” he said conversationally.

“What?
Why?” I asked, alarmed at his possible motivation.

“Coach’s
orders. She says it keeps us in shape by forcing body awareness.”

“I
can’t even get to my locker first?” I asked.

Candar
pointed at a sign and crossed his arms.

The
sign read, “No clothes beyond this point.”

“This
is your team now,” he said. “You have to bare all to them.” He said it with
such conviction you almost believed him.

Still,
this had to be unsanitary.

I
started stripping down and I felt Candar’s disapproving gaze.

“How
much do you weigh?” he asked.

“Like
1,900 pounds. Or 3,000. Or something,” I said.

“So
you’re going to be an 8-lane defender?” he asked, the skepticism deep in his
voice.

“I
don’t know. They haven’t told me.”

“Well,
Coach told me. We’re going to use you on defense as a Weight. That’s got to be
the hardest position in the game,” he said severely.

“Hmm,”
I replied. My butt was cold.

We
walked through the locker room with me holding my clothes in front of me and
Candar prancing around like he had nothing to be ashamed of.

And
he didn’t.

Candar
told me he was the first-round pick from Honor Class, which was one level lower
than Super Class. He had led the entire league in token-pounds carried, points
scored from running, token-pounds thrown, token-pounds killed, and nearly every
other category.

He
weighed about 500 pounds and carried the 100-pound token in the 5-lane.

From
around a corner stepped a strange creature. He was short, squat, solid muscle,
and also naked. He had only one, absurdly thick arm. He looked me over and
seemed unimpressed.

“This
is the new Weight?” he asked.

“Yes,
this is Hank. Hank, this is Tobo,” Candar said. “Tobo is our main Twist.”

Twists
were throwers.

“I
hope you’re good.” He said it like he doubted it and then walked off.

We
went down a side hall and had to stop because our path was blocked by a
Gandrine. He took up the entire hallway and seemed to be just standing there
looking at the wall.

“Grah!
This is Hank! He’s going to be subbing for you on defense in 8-lane as you
shift to 7,” Candar yelled.

Grah
was about ten feet tall and I’d guess 15,000 pounds. He looked like he was a
kind of glassy obsidian. He had lots of rough patches, but whole sections were
almost polished. Gandrine were—visibly—sexless, slow, unbelievably strong, and…rocks.

We
stood for a while waiting for a response from Grah, but he continued to face
the wall. After a minute or so, Candar motioned for me to turn around and we went
another way.

“I
just noticed that everyone has pretty short names. Will be easy to remember,” I
said. With 50,000 species colliding, people could, and did, often have names
that were simply unpronounceable or even paragraphs long.

“Coach
made us take nicknames. It helps the fans relate and makes them able to fit on
merchandising. Fortunately, your name is already short.”

We
walked a bit longer and Candar motioned.

“This
is our 2-lane Puffer.”

And
there she stood: Garm.

Her
tight, rippled muscles. Her gorgeous face, cocky yet feminine. Her
short-cropped black hair. Her lack of clothes.

She
looked me up and down as we approached.

“Thad
Elon’s Cancerous Mouth,” she exclaimed, “did you get even fatter?”

“It’s
not fat,” I said.

Candar
raised an eyebrow at me.

“Good.
You two know each other. I need to go run some strategy with Coach. Your locker
is three down on the left.”

He
walked off, with his perfect posture and graceful stride.

Garm
watched him go.

“Now he’s
not fat, if you were confused on what I meant,” she said.

“Is Cliston
getting 15% from you as well?” I asked, ignoring her.

“Yeah. And he said
you’re going to need help on a job, though I have to work under the table. I
can’t support you as a Quadrad while you’re wearing your Factotum hat.”

“How much are you
getting paid to play glocken?”

“None of your
business,” she replied.

“I could just make
Cliston tell me. He’s my butler.”

“You don’t
understand Dredel Led very well. Your butler doesn’t know. The general manager
does. And he wouldn’t tell you,” she said.

“You’re getting
paid enough to stop being a Quadrad for a season,” I said. “That has to be a
lot.”

She shrugged and
let her face go blank.

“You know glocken
is a dangerous sport. They won’t let you carry a pistol or knives.”

“I know that I’ll
be wearing body armor and trying to carry five pounds into the end zone. If
anyone or anything gets too close, I can just drop the token. You, on the other
hand, have to stop some of the biggest, strongest, meanest creatures in the
galaxy. I’d say you should worry about yourself,” she replied.

“Is Malla also
playing?” Garm’s granddaughter was also a Quadrad. It might get awkward having
them around. Though I seemed to be the only one who was ever uncomfortable
about the fact I had slept with both of them.

“No, she’s off
fighting with her relatives about her dead husband’s estate. They’re trying to
rob her. I never trusted that family. Bunch of lowlifes,” the professional
assassin said.

I was about to
answer when another woman walked over to us.

“Hello,” she said
in a dusky voice.

She was a head
taller than me and her everything was just…big. Her eyes were giant and a pinkish-red.
They looked like they took up a quarter of her face. Her black hair was slicked
back, which made her look angry. Her shoulders jutted up prominently and her
biceps were like small melons. Her breasts were each about the size of Garm’s
head. Her muscled abdomen contracted to an impossibly small circumference
before ballooning again to her powerfully thick thighs.

It took a long
time to process it all. My inner calculator was having difficulty with her
dimensions. Her legs should snap that waist in half. And she should be hunched
over from the weight of her perfect, yet overlarge, bosom. She must have
tremendous lower back muscles.

“Hank,” I heard
Garm say.

“What?” I asked,
annoyed.

I had finally made
it to the woman’s feet. Even her feet were large.

“Kitt asked you
something,” she said.

“Who?”

“I’m Kitt,” the
woman said, offering her hand.

“Oh,” I said
hastily.

I took her hand
and she shook it like someone who could run down the field carrying a 40-pound
token. Because that’s exactly what she did.

“Going to shower
off. I’ll see you around,” she said.

“What?” I asked as
she walked away. Was that a pick-up? Was she inviting me to shower with her?

I looked to Garm,
who was no help.

“You think she’s
attractive?” Garm asked.

“No, Garm. I’m the
only person in the galaxy who thinks she is terribly unsexy.”

PRESENT DAY, CHAPTER 2

Our first game was
over and we had scraped together a win. No thanks to me.

One thing was
clear. I was the worst player on our team by far.

I had made fun of the
idea of Garm and Ziggy playing, but they were amazing. Ziggy especially. He was
all arms and hands and it seemed he moved only slightly slower than the speed
of light.

Coach had berated
me for about 35 minutes for blocking my own teammates, allowing the opposing
team to score, and for my overall stinkyness in general.

I headed to the
locker room to try and get my broken body repaired.

Procon Hobb had
this place stocked with the best medical, spiritual, and all other kinds of healing
implements. You had high-tech electro-muscle reconstituters right next to so-called
magic totems representing the Patron Spirit of Contact Sports.

My body was in bad
shape. I don’t mean from the game—though it certainly was from the game—but it
was bad overall. Even though my body healed itself, it had taken centuries of
abuse. I also suspected it was as lazy as I was at the cellular level, so if it
could just fuse some bones together or thicken ligaments to get the job done,
that’s what it did.

So I healed, but
not properly.

The team
physicians submerged me in a tank that bombarded me with ultrasonic waves. It
was part massage and part abuse. I was enduring it when a light shone in my face.

“Hank, what do you
attribute today’s victory over the Moxinall Jacks to?” I heard a familiar voice
ask.

I cracked open an
eye and Rendrae was standing next to the tank with a camera pod on his head.

Rendrae was fat
and green and old. Though he didn’t look very old. He was the source for
news in Belvaille, and had been so for nearly as long as I had been around. He
was an extraordinary journalist.

“Wha’?” I asked
him.

“Hank,” Rendrae
said, his voice slumping, “you need to punch it up. This is for the post-game
show. I go on in fifteen minutes.”

“What are you
doing here, Rendrae?”

“I’m the team’s
announcer. I do color commentary and play-by-play. I’m Rendrae, your Force For
Sports,” he said with gusto.

“You gave up The
News?” I asked. That was the name of his extremely long-running tele
program.

“No, don’t be
silly. I’m just adding a sports section. Latest polls show that 538% more
people read and watch sports than regular news. I’ll use this to fund my real
reporting.”

“That’s sad.”

“No sadder than a
Factotum playing glocken,” he fired back. “And from what I saw, not amazingly
well.”

“What do you know
about glocken? How’d you even get this job?”

“Cliston hired
me.”

My butler was
certainly making more money than I was.

“Well, what do you
want?” I sulked.

“The Belvaille
Glocken Team needs some branding help. I’m thinking of calling the bottom two
defenders the ‘Band of Hands’ because you got Ziggles with however many hands
he has, and Meggaar with his four arms subbing in for Garm.”

“Its name is
Ziggy,” I said.

“Team roster says
Ziggles but I’ll follow up on that. I’m also thinking of calling the top three
defenders, including you, Grah, and Bley-ore the ‘Mound of Pounds’ because I
think you’re the heaviest top three in all of Super Class.”

“Don’t say that.
It sounds like we’re all fat,” I complained.

“It’s just a name,
Hank,” he said. “What do you think of the Reskin Sleepers winning last month?
Is it a new era? Now that the stilted controls that existed during the
Colmarian Confederation have been swept away, is there a more no-holds-barred
glocken?”

“I don’t know, but
I made a bunch of money gambling on them,” I said.

“I can’t print
that, Hank,” Rendrae said.

“Why? It’s not
illegal.”

“The sports page
can’t come out and talk explicitly about gambling. You have to hint at it.
We’re not bookies. This has to be family friendly.”

“Oh. Well, then I
don’t know. I think there are so many teams now that anything is possible.”

The light turned
back on from his pod and he spoke in his reporter voice:

“Do you think
being a Factotum and skilled martial combatant with centuries of experience has
raised your level of glocken play, Hank?”

I thought about
it.

“Maybe.”

The light turned
off and Rendrae gave me a withering look.

“I wonder if I can
get an interview with Candar.”

CHAPTER 3

The next day I
decided to do something I was good at and try and investigate the missing
players.

I figured I would
start from the bottom. Ziggy had replaced the 1-lane that had gone missing.
Looking at the man’s stats, Ziggy was a much better player, so if someone had
indeed kidnapped him, they had done the team a favor.

The man’s name was
Porj and he had an apartment in the east not far from the docks. It wasn’t the
best place, but it was still on Belvaille, which made it luxury by default.

The building had three
guards all armed with rifles trying to cordon me off from the elevator.

This struck me as
very odd. Openly carrying weapons could, or at least should, bring down the
wrath of the Central Authority. Anything that smacked of organized firepower
was frowned upon. And the C.A. frowning was as casual as an axe to the
forehead.

“You better put
those toys away. You don’t have Licenses to Hurt. What are you going to do, blow
bubbles out of them?” I said.

“We have
Licenses,” one of the men said.

I rolled my eyes.

“Right. Look. I’m
Hank, Factotum 00003. I do have a License to Hurt and I don’t mind using
it.”

“We’re licensed
under Factotum number 10337.”

“Univox Factotal?”
I asked, surprised.

“That’s right.”

“What are
Xandale’s men doing in the lobby of an apartment building? Are the door-to-door
salesmen around here that bad?” I asked.

They stood
quietly. Xandale had trained them never to talk, which made them extra
annoying. I talked to anyone if it could ease a headache or help me get a job
done. You had to talk in this business. If they told me what they were
looking for, I might know or point them in the right direction. But as it was,
we all just stood around looking stupid.

It was strange
that Xandale’s men were here, but maybe Hobb had hired them too, or they were here
on unrelated business.

“Fine. Whatever.
I’m on an official Factotum assignment and you are blocking me. You either need
to state your reasons or watch me take those guns from you. And trust me, I’m
cranky already, if you make me exert myself I’m going to be rough with you,” I
said.

“You’ll have to
answer to the C.A. for attacking fellow Factotums,” one said, though there was
just a hint of uncertainty in his voice.

“Did I mention I’m
Factotum 00003? I am totally fine with the C.A. I have a lot of friends
in their ranks,” I said, lying.

I stomped forward
and they didn’t lower their guns, but they parted for me.

“What apartment
are you visiting?” one of them called after me.

“Porj’s,” I said.
“See how easy that was? Do you have any information on it?” I asked. Silence.
“Fine.”

I guess
technically this was a condominium, which was what rich people called their
apartments.

Like the building
I lived in was a “charming Colmarian Confederate.” Which is to say it hadn’t
been rebuilt in 400 or so years.

The condo was
spacious, tasteless, and extravagant. Inside were five women and six men
apparently still living here in some form or other even though the owner, Porj,
hadn’t been seen in several months.

“So…who are all of
you?” I asked.

They tried to
explain it a few times and the more they tried the less it made sense.

“There has to be
some booze in a place like this?” I asked.

I was offered all
manner of drugs but settled for an entire bottle of alcohol which they simply
handed to me. I expect they thought I was the authorities come to throw them
out. From the look of things, they had been partying non-stop since Porj went
missing and I was like a blast of hateful sobriety.

The best I could
make of it was some of the women, or all of them, were Porj’s former
girlfriends and the men were his friends and/or sycophants who had now morphed
into the boyfriends of the women.

“You play on the
Belvaille Glocken Team?” one of the men asked.

“Yeah,” I said. I
figured it was better to leave out I was a Factotum.

“Where is Porj? Is
he coming back?” one of the women asked, though she seemed to be only asking
because it was expected of her.

“I was hoping you
guys could clue me in. When was the last time he was here?”

There were many
dull, drugged glances exchanged among the group. I realized Porj could be
standing in the kitchen and they wouldn’t know. They probably had no concept of
time except by measuring the pounds of illicit substances they had gone
through.

“Let me ask this
another way,” I started. “Did he say he was leaving?”

“He went to
practice,” one offered after a moment of contemplation.

“Good. Do you know
when?” I asked.

“Couple weeks ago,”
another said, and the group seemed to slowly agree on that.

Porj had not been
to practice for two months. No one had checked his condo other than calling and
knocking on the door.

This was his
posse. Porj could have told them he was done with glocken and was becoming a
priest and they wouldn’t care as long as he still provided the same lifestyle.
So for them to not know his whereabouts, I felt was important.

“You guys mind if
I look around?” I asked.

“Why?” one guy said,
taking offense, as if he owned the place.

“So, um, Porj was
a good athlete, right?” I asked.

“Yeah,” they all
agreed vehemently.

“Do you think you
could take him in a fight?” I asked the guy who objected.

“No way,” he
laughed.

“Well, Porj is a
1-lane offense. I’m an 8-lane defense. I’m going to look around,” I said.

All their faces
dropped and they got quiet.

“Can someone show
me where his room is?” I asked.

Every single
person jumped up to help. And I realized: these guys were professional
hangers-on and I was a professional glocken player. They were looking for a new
meal ticket now that Porj had taken a powder.

Porj didn’t have
just one bedroom, the whole condo was a bit amorphous about who slept where. He
had trophies everywhere and news articles and there must have been a thousand
pictures of himself. I took some tele copies of them in case I had to show them
to people.

Like any good
1-lane, he was tiny. A wiry little creature about four feet tall with blue
skin.

As I looked around
one of the bedrooms, the whole group was standing behind me in the hall.

I leaned on the
dresser to get a closer look at one of the photos and I tripped and smashed the
furniture to bits.

“I know you! You’re
in the Mound of Pounds,” one of the men exclaimed.

I didn’t want to
agree to that terrible name, but if it helped, sure.

“Yeah, that’s me,”
I said, getting to my feet.

The other people
were growing excited. I was a real professional. They must have had their
doubts. I didn’t exactly look like any glocken player they were used to.

“He plays above
the Gandrine!” The man continued, and it was like the floodgates opened.

“Porj was always
afraid of being kidnapped. He had three bodyguards. Haven’t seen them in a
while,” one said.

“And a driver,”
another added.

“Is his car still
here?” I asked.

“Yeah, and the
driver came by a few times, but no one is paying him so he left.”

“Are any of you people
the bodyguards?” I asked.

“No, they were big
guys. The team provided them. Porj was tough, but he was really small. The
bodyguards kept crowds away.”

I had to check
about that. I wondered why I didn’t have any bodyguards. If Cliston
hired them, maybe he felt I didn’t need them. If Magda Strongarm hired them,
she probably didn’t mind me getting kidnapped.

“Porj has a wall
safe over here. We haven’t been able to get it open,” one woman said.

“I saw the game,
you played great,” a man said, trying to suck up.

“Show me the
safe,” I said.

It was behind a
drape. A drape that didn’t cover a window. Just a drape against the wall, hiding
a safe. Why not nail a towel on top of it with the words, “no safe here,”
stenciled on it?

I wasn’t a safe
expert, but I could tell it was pretty sturdy and I wouldn’t be able to break
into it.

But that didn’t
matter.

I kicked at the
wall around the safe. After about ten minutes, I had mangled the building
enough that I could pull the safe completely out.

“Okay,” I said,
hefting the metal rectangle onto my shoulder.

The entourage was
staring in awe.

“I need to do some
glocken stuff but I might come back. If you remember anything about Porj that
was unusual in the last couple months, give me a call.”

They all practically
broke their wrists getting out their teles so they could take down my number.

CHAPTER 4

I had just walked
into the lobby with the safe on my shoulder when I heard a voice behind me.

“So you’re a
burglar now, too?”

I turned and saw
Xandale. His rent-a-Factotums weren’t with him. They were presumably off
protecting another lobby.

“What are you
doing here?” I said to the red-skinned, big-toothed man.

“I could ask you
the same thing. I could, but I wouldn’t. What another Factotum does is
none of my business. Unless I make it my business,” he replied.

“Ooh, ominous,” I
mocked.

“I heard you’re
playing glocken. That’s…pretty interesting. Hard getting Factotum jobs?”

“Uh, it’s called
advertising, smart guy,” I said.

“In case a noble
wants to hire a second-rate sportsman as well as a second-rate Factotum?” he joked.

“In case they want
to hire an 8-lane pro in Super Class. I don’t know how many billions of people
see me play glocken, but it’s more than you can hand out business cards to,” I
said.

His massive smile
diminished somewhat.

“Maybe. Maybe you
got a good scam going. But glocken is a dangerous sport and, whatever you say,
you’re not a professional. You’re not even a professional Factotum. You’ve been
squeaking by for a while now and don’t pretend you haven’t. Despite our
differences, I want to offer you a job.”

“Me work for you?
You must be kidding. We don’t even like each other. You’re wasting my time.”

I started to walk
out.

“I thought you
said it was always worthwhile to listen to a deal,” he said.

Bastard. He
probably wrote down all the stuff I said when he was learning to be a Factotum.
I didn’t actually remember the garbage I spouted. I just spouted it.

“Fine. Go on,” I
sighed.

“You could take it
easy. Live in your same place. Work from home. Hell, you wouldn’t even have to
work. Call it a paid retirement.”

This set off all
kinds of warnings.

“Doesn’t that
sound great for me? What do you get out of it, though?” I asked.

“Getting rid of
competitors is always valuable. Frankly, I’m tired of seeing you every time a
Factotum assignment comes up. There’s already too many of us and they keep
registering more. Besides, if you worked for me we could reorganize the
business under your number,” he said.

He wanted my
00003. I always used that as a selling point, but it was actually irrelevant.
So what, I was the first Factotum. Didn’t mean I was any good. But nobles loved
that kind of thing. Hiring the very first Factotum sounded more prestigious
than hiring the thirty-first.

I didn’t want to
snub Xandale, mostly because it was fun to get his hopes up. But retirement
just wasn’t for me.

“I’ll think it
over, Xandale,” I said, leaving.

I took the safe
back to my place and was met by my butler who was also somehow my boss’s boss.

“Good evening,
sir. Would you care for something to eat?” Cliston asked.

I was going to put
the safe down on a sturdy table, but the table was gone. I looked around and
everything was gone. The entire room was stripped.

“What happened?” I
asked.

“You are a
professional glocken player now, sir. I feel that requires a slightly different
decoration pattern. And, as a professional glocken player, your old possessions
increased in value, so I sold them.”

“How much did I
make?” I asked.

“I have it under
control, sir.”

“Dammit Cliston,
I’m not a child, I want to know how much money I have,” I said.

“As you recall,
sir, our agreement allows for me to handle home furnishings and sales thereof,”
he replied.

“I know that, but
I still want a figure.”

I was being
stubborn just because I was tired of all the back dealings he was doing—even if
they were in my best interest.

“Minus what we
paid originally for the items, depreciation, taxes, entertainment costs, and auction
fees, it was 7,538,225 credits.”

Wow. I put the
safe down on the bare metal floor.

“Good. Okay. Let’s
get some food in me. And who is in charge of bodyguards?” I asked.

“Bodyguards for
what, sir?”

“For the players.
Do I get a bodyguard?”

“You will need to
ask your coach, I suspect. Or general manager. I am merely your butler, sir.”

This was going to
get annoying.

I walked into my
bedroom to change clothes and stopped short.

“Cliston, where
are all my clothes?” I asked.

“I sold them in
the auction, sir.”

“Who would want my
clothes? They can’t fit normal people.”

“As I said, you
are a professional glocken player now. You need a new wardrobe. And your
celebrity status helped sell your old things. They were quite popular, though I
wonder if I sold them too early. If you do better in the season they will only
appreciate in value.”

It was weird that
some guy out there had my underwear hanging on his wall. I hope Cliston washed them
first.

“So what am I
supposed to wear?” I asked.

“We’ll do a
fitting tomorrow,” Cliston said. “Dinner will be ready in thirty-four minutes.”

In my armory, I
found some tools that let me bust open the safe.

I knew Cliston
would raise a stink, so I put it out on the sidewalk, and shot it with a rocket
launcher—a small one—then hurried back inside.

Inside were a lot
of drugs. I mean a lot.

There were also more
pictures of Porj. In the last three hours I think I had seen more photographs of
Porj than I had of anyone in my entire life. It was now impossible for me to
forget him.

There were also
some contracts.

I took the
contracts into the dining room and read through them as I ate.

“Sir, need I
remind you that a gentleman Factotum does not read at the table? I am happy to
read for you, however.”

“I’m not a
Factotum right now. I’m a glocken player,” I said.

Cliston was silent
for a moment and I thought he was going to smack me.

But he walked away
into the kitchen. Hey, I wonder if these dual roles might buy me a little
freedom from Cliston’s iron grip of civility.

Here were Porj’s
Belvaille Glocken Team contracts. He had two, one was a renewal. He made almost
twenty-three million a week! I wondered if Cliston was cheating me.

But Porj had been
a starting 1-lane Puffer offense, one of the most important positions on the
team. I was just a defensive Weight.

There were some
receipts for this and that, but he also had a few short letters that were
interesting. They weren’t signed and had no letterhead, but the intention was
clear:

Another team had
been interested in signing Porj.

There was the
usual flattery and hints of rewards and an invitation to come visit them.

What struck me was
this was on paper. This could have easily been sent via tele. Not much was done
on paper anymore. It was too expensive. But a lot of contracts still used them.

Also, things you
didn’t want traced.

I had no idea who
wrote this, sent this, or when.

It could have been
sent by the god/myth/demon founder of the Colmarian Confederation, Thad Elon at
the dawn of time for all I knew.

But it also gave
me an idea on at least finding out if Porj was still alive.

CHAPTER 5

“I don’t know what
you’re talking about,” Garm said for the tenth time.

“Stop lying, you
already told me you could,” I said.

“Where are your clothes?”
Garm asked.

I was standing in
my underwear in my empty living room.

“Cliston sold them
and he’s taking his time making me a new wardrobe.”

“I swear, if I
knew you were going to be parading around like that, I wouldn’t have come
over.”

“For the last two
weeks you’ve seen me completely nude at practice,” I said.

“Yeah, but we’re
glocken players there.”

“How is it
everyone can be these multiple personalities? I’m still Hank at the gym or
here.”

“So…flabby and
nude?”

“I’m not flabby.
Or nude. I’d wrap a sheet around myself but I don’t even have sheets. You’re
trying to change the subject. You told me the Quadrad could intercept tele
transmissions. I need to see if the missing player, Porj, has sent anything in
the last few months.”

“I don’t know if I
told you that or not, but I did say that if I help you I’m not working as
Quadrad. The Quadrad have hated you ever since you attacked their
headquarters.”

“Man, you guys
sure hold a grudge,” I said.

“People hire us for
combat operations and assassinations and covert defenses. You walked in, threw
a bunch of grenades around, blasted our members, then walked out! That’s really
bad for our reputation.”

“It’s not like I
told anyone,” I said. Then I thought about that and realized I had told a ton of
people. Pretty much anyone, any chance I got.

“Ask Delovoa. I’m
sure he has some devices that can snoop teles,” she said.

“I did ask him. He
said they upgraded all the satellites for the new teles and he can’t touch them.
Besides, his job isn’t espionage, yours is.”

She sighed.

“The Librarians
have that information.”

“Those hermits at
the edge of the System?” I asked.

“They aren’t
hermits. Not exactly. The civil war destroyed a lot of information. A lot of
history. They are creating a library of all our data in case it happens again.”

“What’s that have
to do with Porj’s tele?” I asked.

“They store all tele
transmissions.”

“No way! Those
guys? I thought they just kept books and stuff.”

“They keep
everything we would need to understand our society if we have another civil
war,” she said.

“They can’t have
access to all that.”

“The Arch Minister
authorized them,” she said.

“How do you know
all this?”

“The Quadrad have
traded information with them in the past. To fill gaps in their archives.”

“Would they give
me the tele records you think?” I asked.

“I’m sure they
would. I can’t imagine the stuff you have rattling around in your ancient
brain. But. You need to be really careful what you tell them,” she said.

“Why, are they
going to arrest me? They’re librarians.”

“No, but they
might trade whatever you tell them to someone else. And, for instance, the
Quadrad already hate you.”

“So, what, you
guys are going to triple-hate me?” I asked.

“You know what they
can do to you, Hank.”

“What is it with all
the subtle threats lately? Okay, I’ll go visit them I guess.”

“That will take
you a whole day to get out there, you’ll miss two practices,” Garm said.

“Tell Coach I have
ass cancer.”

“You’re going to
get fined.”

“Nah. Me and the
G.M. are tight. He cooks my breakfast.”

Cliston had laid
out clothes for me, expecting I was going to be a glocken player en route to
practice. He had already left to go general manage, so he wasn’t dressing me.

There had to be
some mistake with this wardrobe.

There were five
shirts, all of different sizes and collars and metallic sheens; about 100
pounds of gaudy jewelry, including medallions so heavy they could be used as
wrecking balls, a set of rings that completely incapacitated my fingers; an
enormous fur coat that was too long and dragged on the ground like I was a
fairy princess on her way to a wedding; an eyepatch—a no-kidding eyepatch—covered
with jewels; a pimp cane; spiky boots that looked impossible to walk in; a belt
buckle so thick it stretched from my groin to my upper abdomen; and an enormous
hat with towering feather plumes that made me so top heavy on my silly boots I
needed my cane just to stand up straight.

It was the exact
opposite of everything Cliston swore by and encouraged me to wear. Had he
gotten a software virus?

I wasn’t sure I
could walk outside without tripping into the street and getting hit by a car.
They’d have to quarantine the entire block for dangerous levels of tackiness.

I stared at myself
in my multiple wall screens, which could display me from any and all angles. I
had to lift my eyepatch to take it all in.

You know, there
might be something to this. People who could pull off outrageous, flamboyant
styles garnered a kind of respect. Anyone could wear black synth clothes and
chains and pretend they were a street thug. But if someone could walk around
dressed up like a giant, retarded songbird, he was either a fashion designer or
someone you should think twice about messing with, because he clearly didn’t
give a crap.

I drove to
Belvaille’s port and had my usual cabbie pick me up.

I liked Zzzho. We
had been through a few tough scraps together and he could keep his mouth shut.

Well, maybe not
his mouth. He didn’t have a mouth. Zzzho was a Keilvin Kamigan, a sentient, gaseous
lifeform. He looked like red haze punctuated with lots of little lightning
bolts.

It was that
electricity that allowed him to drive a cab, talk, or do anything. He powered
devices using his own physiology.

Zzzho was a great
cabbie. He didn’t eat anything other than ambient radiation, he didn’t sleep,
or take bathroom breaks. He was a gas cloud. You couldn’t ask for a better
pilot for boring deep-space travels.

He spoke through a
set of speakers he also plugged himself into.

I had to take off
my big hat to enter his taxi. In fact, I was having a rather hard time of
getting in at all what with the fur coat and boots and such.

After some minutes
I plopped in the back and strapped myself in.

“Hey, Zzzho. I’m
going to see the Librarians,” I said.

“The Historians?”

“Whatever. Those
hermit guys way out there.”

“That’s a long
trip. Do you have food and water? Once we pass the last ship it’s maybe ten
more hours,” he buzzed. “Though I might be able to speed up once we’re clear of
the Central Authority vessels.”

“Yeah, I got some
snacks,” I said.

“Are they
expecting you? I’ve never driven a fare to them. Would be an awful shame to
turn around.”

“I teled and they
didn’t say no.”

“Okay,” he
answered.

We disembarked and
stayed quiet as the little taxi navigated through the numerous ships constantly
going to and from Belvaille space station. Once the incessant instructions from
the C.A. subsided, Zzzho started his usual small talk.

“You playing
glocken? I heard it, but couldn’t believe it.”

“Yeah. I’m
supposed to be at practice right now,” I said.

“Do you have any
inside leads for your next game? I could even lay a bet on your behalf. Or is
that illegal?”

“Nothing’s
illegal, but they’d kill me all the same. I don’t even know who we’re playing.”

“Reskin Sleepers,”
he said.

“Really? Wow.”

“Their coach, Irune,
is crazy. I heard he makes them practice twenty-four hours a day,” Zzzho said.

“How is that
possible?”

“In their sleep.
They hook up devices and stuff. Did you see their last game? They dominated.
They went from the worst that ever was to top of the pile.”

“Hmm,” I said,
concerned.

“You should really
be at practice if you’re playing them. You seen their 8-lane? The guy you have
to block?”

Of course I knew
of their 8-lane. I had seen him play once. But I purposely put it out of my
head.

“Hey, just drop
it, okay? I need to focus on other things,” I said.

“Sure, but we got
plenty of time.”

“I know, but I
don’t want to fill it with glocken. What do you think of my clothes?” I asked.

“I wasn’t going to
say anything.”

“Why? Do I look
stupid? I think it’s supposed to make me seem dangerous. Or eccentric.”

“You slammed a
dreadnaught into Belvaille, killing tens of thousands of people. And they gave
you a medal for it. I know you’re dangerous.”

“It didn’t exactly
happen like that.”

“‘Exactly.’ Nice.
But what do I know about clothes? You all look like globs of mud to me.”

The Belvaille
System had a lot of ships in it.

Traffic was
coordinated by the Central Authority Navy. The Central Authority ships were the
Colmarian Confederation vessels that had survived the civil war.

It wasn’t a
tremendous Navy, but it was the biggest in the galaxy by far. The warships that
remained, had been coerced into selling to Belvaille. The Central Authority had
zipped over ten cruisers or whatever, and were like, “Hi, we’d like to buy your
ship. Do you want to sell it, or would you prefer we destroy it?”

So the Arch
Minister was in control of the galaxy’s last Navy. There were handfuls of warships
in other areas, but not many. Except the Boranjame, and they didn’t really
count.

Once we got into
deep space, Zzzho could go a lot faster. Our taxi didn’t exactly have priority
routing compared to some mega-freighter hauling a trillion credits worth of
ore.

We talked about
everything except glocken. I learned the Keilvin Kamigans bartered for
technology by selling gas, which they could manipulate, and by trading some of
their own bodies.

They were the most
efficient known fuel cells in the galaxy. What a weird concept though. “I’ll
give you my arm for a computer.”

“It was Thad Elon
who first started trading with us,” Zzzho said.

“No way! You guys know
Thad Elon too? He created the Colmarian Confederation—supposedly.”

“I know. We didn’t
have any technology before he came. That’s what the legends say.”

“So you guys are
indebted to a Colmarian?” I asked.

“Well, he has a
mixed reputation. Some Keilvin Kamigans feel we were a lot better off before.
In like some idyllic paradise. We didn’t even have concepts of greed because
there was nothing to be greedy about.”

“Wow. Thad Elon
has the same bag with us. It depends on whether you think the Colmarian Confederation
was a force for good or the most backwards bureaucracy of biological waste in
history.”

“What do you
think?” he asked.

“I don’t think it
was the most backwards. Though I can’t name any worse.”

Space was not a
place to go if you were antisocial.

You’d think it
would be, but you were constantly surrounded by people. Constantly in breathing
distance and getting jostled around. Some people even go crazy from it.

I heard of ship
captains giving a kind of personality test to passengers and crew to make sure
they could cope with the years of crammed and cramped existence.

However, there
were a few—very few—people who managed to turn space into the ultimate
hermitage. With a lot of work you could make a few-person spaceship that could
survive indefinitely.

It wasn’t easy,
space was harsh and you couldn’t exactly go foraging for nuts and water.

But Belvaille System
had a couple such ships, situated millions of miles away like they were distant
asteroids. There was generally no reason to bother them, if they wanted to be
alone, they probably had a reason and it wasn’t worth your time.

However, I needed
to talk to the Historians. Fortunately, they were willing to listen.

There were ten of
them and they weren’t old or tired or anything like I thought. They said they were
identical brothers; tall, purple, thin. It was hard to tell because they wore
giant metal helmets with concave glass lenses that covered their entire faces.
It made their features all mash together. I can’t imagine what vision problem
it corrected, but they seemed to get around fine. On top of the helmets were
some antennas and small satellite dishes. They were spry and had muffled voices
because of their helmets.

“Hi,” I said.

“Hello,” one
answered, smiling a tiny, concave smile.

“I’m wondering if
I can access the tele records of someone.”

“Of course. Would
you like something to drink first? It must have been a long flight.”

“Sure,” I said,
never refusing food.

One of them
brought out a glass and there must have been an ounce of liquid in it. I stared
at it a moment, wondering what it could be.

“I’m sorry, but we
don’t have many luxuries here. It’s simply water.”

I probably had
sneezed out more water than this on the cab ride over.

“So. The guy I
need tele records from is named Porj. He lives in the east—” I began.

One of the brothers
held up a hand.

“We need some
information from you first.”

“Oh, sure. I know
all kinds of stuff. Like back when Belvaille used to be a criminal haven. More
of a criminal haven,” I said, winding up for a good story.

“We already have
ample records of that. The reporter Rendrae had quite a comprehensive newspaper
and we have every issue of The News.”

Damn him.

“We need to know
how the old Governor, Vorrin-Gortail,
died. And Belvaille went from a democracy to being governed by Arch Minister
Maris-To.” He stated it like it was a minor request.

The brothers all had
the same gentle expressions, distorted by their foolish helmets.

So these Historians,
in some way, worked for the Arch Minister. But the official word on how
Belvaille changed had always been hazy, a “best not to ask” kind of thing.

In actuality, Maris-To
had murdered the previous Governor with my unknowing assistance. But if I told
the truth, I might as well put on my swimming trunks and dive out the airlock,
because my life wouldn’t be worth that little cup of water.

“Is there anything
else you need to know?” I asked.

“This is all we
are interested in for now.”

I paused to think.

“And you can track
who sent and received teles? And I can see records of that?” I tried to
confirm.

“You can listen to
the actual conversations if you like. Fifteen minutes.”

“Thirty minutes,”
a brother amended.

“Thirty. If you
supply us with what we seek,” he confirmed.

I could do a whole
lot with thirty minutes of tele conversations!

“And no one will
know about it?” I asked.

“History is of no
value if it’s secret. But it will be confidential if that’s what you mean.”

Well, crap. If I
tell, it will be obvious I told. There was no one else there except Maris-To,
and he wasn’t talking. Still…

“Okay,” I said.

They jumped up and
got their cameras ready to record me.

“The night that Vorrin-Gortail
died, how did you arrive at his mansion?” one asked.

“By car,” I
shrugged.

“Limousine?”

“Well, sure,” I
said.

“Did you drive?”

“I don’t know how
to drive,” I stated.

“Were you alone in
the car?”

“No, of course
not. The driver.”

“Was Maris-To with
you?” one asked.

“Uh, no.”

“We have records
from the limo driver, from the front security register at the mansion, and from
the cameras inside, that you accompanied Maris-To that night,” one said,
smiling.

This was a setup.

They knew what
happened. They knew everything. The only thing they didn’t know is what transpired
when that door closed on me, the Governor, and Maris-To.

When we stepped inside,
the Governor was powerful and Belvaille a democracy. When I left, the Governor
was dead, I went on a shooting spree to try and escape, and Belvaille became a
monarchy a few days later.

The galaxy changed
during that private dinner and only two people could say what happened.

“If you withhold
information or try and fabricate anything, our deal is cancelled,” one said.

I took a deep
breath.

“I killed the
Governor,” I lied.

There was no way I
was going to finger Maris-To, it would be the death of me. The Historians didn’t
show any change of emotion. Though it was hard to tell through their fishbowls.

“And how did you
do that?”

“With…a spoon. I
stabbed him with a spoon,” I said.

One was about to
talk, but I interrupted.

“I had to poison
him first. On my hands,” I said, twiddling my ring-encrusted fingers. “The
poison didn’t affect me. I’m a mutant. But it immobilized him. I was one of the
only people who could murder him and get away.”

“Why did you do
this?” one asked.

I could say a lot
of things, some of them true. He opposed immigration. He was too powerful. He wasn’t
satisfied with the work I was doing for him. But all those reasons would lead
me down paths that required a lot of explaining and I would have to keep making
up lies and they would eventually catch me. So I decided to make it simple.

“I didn’t like
him,” I said.

“You didn’t like
him?” a brother asked skeptically.

“Nope. I wanted to
be Governor. I was at one point, you know,” I said.

“Yes, we are
aware. But that was some time ago, immediately after the civil war. And you
helped institute the elections that replaced you.”

“Yeah, well, I
thought people would vote for me. And I was always scared with Vorrin-Gortail
around. That was a feeling I wasn’t used to. He was a level-eight mutant. The
second most powerful mutant I’ve ever seen. I’m really difficult to hurt, I
heal rapidly, but Vorrin-Gortail
could stop time. My own mutations were completely powerless against
that,” I said.

“But there was no
reason to fear him.”

“He constantly
killed people who got in his way,” I said.

“How do you know
that?”

“Everyone knew.
That fear was how he maintained control. I wouldn’t be able to be Governor with
him there. He could just stop time and kill me. I would never be truly safe
with someone like him around. He had also threatened me a number of times. I
figured it would eventually come down to him or me,” I explained.

“What proof do you
have?” someone asked. All the brothers were now standing around me.

“Do you think I
kept the spoon or something?” I asked. “What possible proof can I provide? He’s
dead. I’m not. You know I was there and I had to escape his mansion after his
death. I’m a criminal. Yet here I am, a citizen of Belvaille with my own heraldry,
my own block, and my own building,” I said.

“It could be
argued that you were given those things in return for your silence. If someone
else murdered Governor Vorrin-Gortail.”

“You could argue
anything,” I said. “But I was there and I know what I did.”

“But Maris-To is
now Governor, not you. He gained far more than you did.”

“I realized after
he was dead that I didn’t want to be Governor. Because there will always be
someone like me willing to try and step into your shoes. And with
Vorrin-Gortail gone, I felt comfortable again. It was good enough. Let the
politicians worry about being assassinated, they’re welcome to it,” I said.

There was a long
silence, but they reluctantly agreed to my story and allowed me access to the
tele banks.

The terminal was a
little screen among a massive set of computers. I had to hunch down and squint
to make out the tele details as I scrolled through.

Porj had not made
any tele calls in two months. At least not anywhere within Portal range of
these collection satellites. Which was far indeed.

I felt Porj was either
dead or had totally changed identities, ditching his tele. A guy like that
couldn’t go five minutes without talking or using his tele to watch news of
himself.

He had gotten
thousands of incoming calls and messages, but had not responded to any of them.

His last message
was a short text.

Taking the job!
Let me know if you coming. They pay 3 times more. Call me.

The message was
sent to a person named Yorsh. He was a professional glocken player.

Yorsh was a 2-line
offense who had also played for the Belvaille Glocken Team.

And he had also
been missing for two months.

CHAPTER 6

Everyone used
teles. Even people in other parts of the galaxy used Belvaille’s custom teles.

I decided to use
my leftover minutes granted by the Historians to spy on the Reskin Sleepers’
coach, Irune, and see what he had sent. Hopefully it would be plays or
strategies that I could present to Magda Strongarm and she would finally cut me
some slack.

I dialed through
the files and found Irune’s record.

And it was blank.

Day after day
after day of nothing.

I wasn’t sure I
had it right.

How could someone
not use his tele? How did he get around? Or schedule games? Or order food?

I finally found
one call but it was nonsense. I thought it had been garbled or something and I
reloaded it, but it stayed the same. Clearly it was some code.

I tracked the
recipient and it was a person on Floloria,
the Rettosian space station in Belvaille System. I kept looking and finally found
one incoming message. It read:

00003 might
cause trouble. Should I handle it?

Irune replied with a simple: No.

I tried to check
who the message was sent from, but it was labeled “unidentified.”

“Hey, what’s this
mean?” I asked the Historians. “Shouldn’t it have a name and location?”

One of the
brothers looked over my shoulder. They had been standing a discreet distance
away.

“We have seen
anonymous tele transmissions before, though very rarely.”

“So I can’t see
who this is?” I asked.

“No, I’m afraid
not.”

I stared at it.
Those were the only messages within maybe five months. I don’t know if I was
being proud or paranoid, but 00003 could easily be a reference to my Factotum
number.

I looked up Yorsh,
the missing player that Porj had contacted before he vanished. Yorsh had no
outgoing teles for two months as well. He had not even responded to Porj’s last
text.

I then checked
Procon Hobb’s tele records.

That wasn’t
technically proper behavior for a Factotum, but I was also his glocken employee,
so there. Besides, there was something about him I didn’t like—other than him
hijacking my inner voice and using it to communicate with me.

Hobb had almost no
tele messages either. Not what you’d expect for a big shot like him. But I
guess he didn’t need a tele if he could just think at people.

I was mostly
looking for any references to myself, but if there were any, I didn’t see them.
I didn’t even see any references to the Belvaille Glocken Team. It was just one
of his many, many business ventures and probably a minor one at that.

I tapped my
fingers on my chin thinking about whether I should look up Garm.

Her most recent
message said: Get out of my file, Hank!

The message had
been sent today. To me!

I looked at my own
tele to see if I had received it, but I hadn’t. She had somehow edited her logs
knowing I would be poking around. What a crafty minx.

Seizing the
opportunity and realizing I was running low on minutes, I dialed up Xandale’s
file.

He had lots of
curt messages to his Factotums that I couldn’t understand without reading ten
messages of context. I skimmed through and it seemed like every damn job we had
both gone out for, he had secured. And holy hell did he charge a lot! I should
raise my rates.

I also saw he was
pestering some nobles about getting himself heraldry. Figures. He was still
just a commoner. Some doors would always be closed to him. That was probably
another reason he resented me. I had heraldry and he didn’t.

I went back further
in time and saw an incoming message: Hank is at Orange33. He’s not going to
leave.

Xandale replied: Stall,
I need to talk to him.

That was it.
Orange33 must be Porj’s building. That wasn’t particularly interesting and
nothing I didn’t know.

The brothers
informed me my time was up and turned off the terminal. They offered me another
bountiful drink of a few ounces of water before I headed back to my taxi.

The two people who
had gone missing had been in contact with each other and maybe had been about
to jump ship to another team. That put a distinctly different spin on things.

Could Hobb have
killed them to prevent them joining the competition?

I was getting
ready to leave when a Historian approached me. Probably to offer me another
huge helping of water.

“Hank, we know you
didn’t tell us the truth,” the man said.

“Really?” I asked,
unconcerned. I already got what I came for and didn’t see much further reason
to talk.

“We have been
monitoring you for a long time. We even have your biography and whole
personality profile,” he continued.

“Well isn’t that
creepy?” I said. Zzzho was taking his time picking me up. Why hadn’t he stayed
docked? Was he out joyriding?

“It is of
paramount importance we know the truth or it will be lost forever. Ten thousand
years from now don't you want the facts to remain and not some political
fabrication?”

“Not really, I'll be
long dead and beyond caring,” I said.

“Perhaps I can
sweeten the deal,” the brother said, and he reached up and took off his
fishbowl helmet.

The brother was a
sister. Her hair was a bit messy from the helmet, but she was definitely
attractive.

“Uh, no thanks. I
don’t really go for the brainy types. I can’t provide much in the way of
stimulating conversation and I hate feeling dumber than I already am. I’m more
into dangerous women that I regret sleeping with,” I said. I figured, no point
in being coy if they have my whole dossier.

“I wasn’t trying
to seduce you,” the Historian clarified. “You knew where to look in the tele records,
but you didn’t know what to look for.”

“That’s
insightful,” I said.

“We are unbiased
observers, but this is extremely important and we are willing to bend our
rules.”

“If what?” I
asked.

“You tell us the
truth about what happened. We know you didn’t want to be Governor. When you
made yourself Interim Governor you created elections almost immediately. And we
have numerous tele records of you lamenting your title and responsibilities. It
is your complete lack of ambition and the fact that so many pivotal events have
happened around you that makes us follow your movements so closely,” she said rather
insultingly.

I was just tired.
And clearly they knew me and my weaknesses because they sent a little doe-eyed
Historian to try and coerce me.

“And you’ve got
something to offer in return?” I asked.

“We do.”

Zzzho teled that
he was docked and ready to depart. He said he had been dumping some trash that
other passengers had left over the years. He just opened the doors and let it
float away.

“Okay, Maris-To
killed Vorrin-Gortail. I poisoned him. Maris-To spooned him. I took the heat
and escaped. In exchange for my silence, Maris-To gave me heraldry and let me
and my friends go,” I said. I hadn’t uttered those words in a long, long time.
Now that I heard them with my own ears, I suddenly appreciated the gravity of
what I had just stated. “But don’t tell anyone,” I added lamely.

“We will keep it
secret for as long as we can,” she said. “Here.”

She handed me a
piece of paper, which I took with great trepidation. What dread information
could be worth what I just spilled?

It was a totally
confusing string of characters. There were letters, numbers, different colors,
arrows, subscripts, superscripts. It made no sense whatsoever. It wasn’t a map,
it wasn’t instructions, it didn’t spell or write anything that I could
understand.

“What’s this
crap?” I asked. Annoyed I just traded my life for vomit out of a computer.

“It is extremely
valuable to your aims, I can assure you,” she said.

“My ‘aims,’ what
the hell does that mean? What are my aims? To become the deadest dead guy in
the galaxy? What am I supposed to do with this?” I yelled.

“It is very important,”
she said, though she was losing her unbiased Historian calm and backing away at
my very obvious rage.

If they knew so
much about me, they should know I didn’t like being screwed over in deals. I examined
the page again. I held it up to the light, turning it this way and that, but it
still made no sense.

“Thank you for
your visit,” the Historian said, and she quickly left the hall and closed the
door behind her.

Damn.

When I got back to
the cab, Zzzho was in a hurry.

“Hey, we need to
go,” he said.

“What’s the rush?”
I asked.

“I need to get
certified for a new transport, a long-haul shuttle,” he replied.

“You going to
branch out?” I asked, strapping myself in.

“Yeah. Your
general manager just teled me. I’m going to be your team’s bus driver.”

I don’t know why I
was mad at Cliston for hiring basically everyone I knew and taking a percentage
of their pay. I guess I should be happy that he was so enterprising.

It just made me
feel kind of lame that my butler made more money than I did and was only my
butler for maybe a quarter of the day and the rest of the time he was my boss.

On the cab ride
back, I received a tele from Cliston that I had been fined 50,000 credits for
missing practice. Even though he knew I was working on my other job, of which
he also got 15%.

Then he sent me
another tele as my agent saying he had negotiated the fine down to 35,000.

Could Dredel Led
suffer from schizophrenia?

CHAPTER 7

“This is Rendrae,
your Force For Sports, reporting from the first ever match-up between the
Belvaille Glocken Team and the Reskin Sleepers. We’re in Capital 3 System on
planet Capital 3 in the Capital 4 stadium of the city of Capital 2. The
Colmarian Confederation sure had some insightful civic planners. With me is my color
commentator, and Dredel Led compatriot, Oxobox. There is currently a lull in
the action because the Belvaille Glocken Team has used one of their rest
breaks. So, Oxobox, the score is 148 in favor of the Reskin Sleepers. What
would you say is going on here?”

“There is no easy
way to put this, Rendrae: the Belvaille Glocken Team is not the same caliber as
the Reskin Sleepers. The Belvaille Glocken Team can reliably score one or three
points with their 1 and 3-lane, respectively, but the Reskin Sleepers are
converting seven, eleven, and even sixteen using their upper lanes. It’s a
total mismatch that keeps the Sleepers ratcheting up points. I heard the
strategists in Dredel Led territory have given the Reskin Sleepers an 85%
chance of sweeping the entire season,” Oxobox said in his robotic voice.

“Really? We’re
only a handful of games in. Anything can happen.”

“The statistics
speak for themselves.”

“Oxobox, glocken
is very popular among your people, the Dredel Led, am I correct?”

“Oh, yes. It is
followed almost religiously. We view it as a perfect representation of
biological life and their struggles. It’s fascinating. One of the reasons why
hostilities ended between the old Colmarian Confederation and the Dredel Led
was because the Confederation threatened to cut off all glocken transmissions.”

“You all maintain
this interest even though the Dredel Led are prohibited from playing?”

“We understand why
we are excluded. We could maximize every single position and make it clockwork.
Besides, we do not wish to play. Unlike you, we don’t heal after a particularly
brutal tackle. We can’t ice our ankles or take pain killers. But the Belvaille
Glocken Team has a Dredel Led general manager, the first ever. I see that as a
sign of the future.”

“But Cliston
hasn’t been too successful today. Is it coaching or players or what?” Rendrae
asked.

“Irune clearly has
chosen a superior team and has drilled and trained them to near-perfection. We
are witnessing some of the shortcomings of biologicals today. Faster, stronger,
bigger creatures can defeat their smaller, weaker counterparts. I believe the
referees should call this game before anyone gets seriously injured. Though the
fans may call it by losing interest.”

“It’s already
been, let’s see, four hours and twelve minutes. Our latest audience numbers
indicate that between the first and fourth hour, there was only a 2.3% drop in
viewership. Which means this game could go on for days—assuming the Belvaille
Glocken Team can hold out that long,” Rendrae said.

“I do not believe
they can. They have been out-run, out-hurled, out-defended, in every lane
except maybe 1 and 2. The Mound of Pounds, despite their sheer girth, have been
unable to stop the top three Reskin Sleeper lanes,” Oxobox stated.

“Right. And
Belvaille can’t win a game scoring one and two points but giving up sixteen and
twenty-two.”

We listened to the
tele in the locker room while team doctors and armor repairmen worked
feverishly to put us back together.

My knee guards had
been torn off, my chest pads were so butchered they had to be removed with a
crowbar, and I was more exhausted than I had ever been in my life.

I couldn’t feel my
face. I couldn’t even close my mouth as blood and saliva oozed down on the
ground while my head hung limply.

Magda Strongarm
was yelling at us as usual but I was just numb.

The 8-lane offense
for the Reskin Sleepers was someone I had no business playing cards with, let
alone trying to fight.

He looked like
a…festering giant and his name was Shoz-Magnador-Bethal. The Reskin Sleepers apparently
didn’t care that their players had convoluted names.

His skin was all
bubbled and deformed. Like he had some super-cancer plague infesting every inch
of him. He was “only” about nine feet tall and 5,000 pounds—but he could
somehow throw that 4,000-pound token ten feet.

Which is what he
would do.

At the start of
the play he would pick up the token, spin around and throw it. Then he would
run forward, beat me into the turf, pick up the token, and do it again, while I
tried to bite his ankles.

I couldn’t tackle
him while he was spinning with an enormous token. I took a glancing shot from
it once and that was enough to make me never go near it again.

The only reason he
hadn’t scored an infinity of points was because I was getting help. Grah could
smush this guy, just like he could smush any guy, but he was too slow. And he
had to deal with their 7-lane, who was almost as bad as the guy I had.

“You,” Magda said,
pointing at me. “You lousy stink. Don’t you know what a Weight is supposed to
do? This is why you don’t skip practice. Just sit on that token. That’s
it! Don’t try and engage him, you can’t win, obviously. But he can’t pick up
both of you. Do you understand?”

I was too tired to
even nod my head so she took that as a “no.”

“Look. He’s going
to throw the token. Let him! Let the token fly past you, run up to it, link
your arms in the straps, and contest it. Lie down on top of it and make him pry
your fat ass off,” she said. “That’s what a Weight does.”

“Should I start deep
on the line? So he doesn’t hit me?” I slurred.

Magda slapped me.

“Stupid. If you
start far away he doesn’t have to throw it. He’ll just walk up carrying it.
Have you even seen a glocken game before?”

Coach went off to
scream at someone else and I skulked away to be alone with Delovoa.

“Hey, man. Do you
have anything to help me out here?” I whispered.

“Why are you
whispering? I’ve injected so many drugs into this team that I think a cup of
their urine could get the entire city high. I got something for you, but it’s
not much.”

He snapped his
bony fingers and an assistant came by with a big tub of glop. Delovoa shooed
him away and then put on rubber gloves and a mask and started smearing the
substance on my skin.

“Is it like
amphetamines?” I asked.

“Why do you always
guess stuff you know nothing about? No, it’s not amphetamines or hallucinogens
or artificial sweeteners. It’s a paste of your formula. Your Ontakian body is
trying to shut down and heal. It needs food. But you can’t go out on the field
with a feed bag strapped to your face. As you sweat, this will be absorbed by
your body. It’s not a lot, but it will help you keep going and repair
yourself,” he said.

“Delovoa, don’t
tell anyone about this formula. The last thing I need is for someone to find
out I’m an Ontakian.”

“I make all kinds
of drugs and treatments for other players. Blood thinners, muscle builders,
granite lubricant, breast enlargers.”

“Wait, what? Who
gets that?” I asked.

“I can’t say,
professional discretion. The point is, everyone on this team is doping. You
probably least of all.”

“Isn’t that
against the rules?”

“There are rules?”
Delovoa asked.

“Why are you
wearing a mask?” I asked suspiciously.

“Because your
formula is poisonous to anyone else. Not only that, but this is like…eighty
million calories equivalent or something. If I ingested this, I’d almost
certainly have a heart attack before I could even cough it up.”

We were in the
sixth-hour stretch and I was lined up on defense. I had two hands planted on
the ground as I faced Shoz-Magnador-Bethal. It looked like I was ready to
spring forward, but in actuality I was poised like this because it was as close
to lying down as I could get.

The lights flashed
and I got ready for that token to come sailing. I was about seven feet away and
hoped he wouldn’t hit me with it.

But as soon as the
play started, he dropped the token and ran behind the line of scrimmage toward
the lower lanes.

My training taught
me I was supposed to go contest that token. Just hold the handles for five seconds
and it would be dead. But something told me that Irune didn’t instruct their
heaviest player to go running for no reason.

“Hank!” I heard
Candar yell.

Shoz-Magnador-Bethal
had been handed the 5-lane token, which was practically weightless to him.
Candar tried to stop him and got backhanded by that rancid fist.

Out of the fifty
thousand people screaming, I heard Magda Strongarm cussing at me. It was like
her voice travelled on a different frequency.

I ran across the
lanes on a diagonal path. Grah almost stepped on me as he got hit in the chest
by their 7-lane.

I passed Bley-ore,
the horn-headed blocker. He was locked in a struggle on 6-lane. That wasn’t his
strong suit. His specialty was running at high speed and hitting people with
his neckless head. But he was still part of the Mound of Pounds and could hold
his own in any scrum.

Shoz-Magnador-Bethal
was just ahead of me and he saw me coming. He put out his left hand which
prevented me from getting a shot at his torso. I could try and grab his hand,
but if I missed, he’d have a wide open field.

I knew this was
going to be painful, but I ducked under his arm and threw myself in between his
legs like a saboteur.

His rear leg
jammed into me, then jammed into his front leg and for a brief moment we
stopped. Then I was flipped into the air and Shoz-Magnador-Bethal slammed face
first into the ground. The token went rolling away a short distance.

I landed on top of
the Reskin player and spread myself across him. The referees might be able to
call this a penalty, but I could say, quite correctly, that I was tremendously
hurt.

Looking up, I
hoped to see one of my teammates contest and kill the token, but their 6-lane
ran by, having dropped his own token, scooped it up, and ran it into the end
zone.

We threw
everything we had at them and they still scored 10 points total, their 3-lane
having also scored.

When the play was
over, all the Reskin Sleepers were immediately on their feet and ready to
continue. The Belvaille Glocken Team were slow coming around or had to be
hauled away.

The viewership had
increased in the last hour so there was no chance of them calling the
game due to lack of interest. Magda Strongarm wanted to concede, but the Reskin
Sleepers’ coach didn’t respond. The referees finally ended the game due to lack
of competition.

The result was 264
for the Reskin Sleepers.

It was the highest
score ever for Super Class glocken.

CHAPTER 8

We were back on
Belvaille and I was on injured reserve.

I’m not entirely
sure why. I had at least several bones that weren’t broken.

Actually, I was
quite fine for hobbling around and getting stuff done. But that was a far cry
from playing Super Class glocken. Still, my situation meant I was getting only
a quarter of my usual salary.

I asked my sports
agent if he could talk to the general manager and get me a raise, and in the
meantime, cook me some food.

I told the
rehabilitation people that I could heal myself, but they told me that if
I didn’t go to therapy I wouldn’t even get my quarter pay. I’d get nothing.

The first machine
they put me on was supposed to reknit my torn muscles. It was like a giant
rolling pin with millions of little needles going over my weary body.

They strapped me
down so I couldn’t move and all those needles snapped off against my thick
skin.

Then they shipped
me to another area of rehabilitation where for the next four hours they tried to
remove the needles that were lodged in me.

Delovoa came over
as I was laid up in bed.

“Why don’t you
tell them to stop? This isn’t going to help me,” I said.

“I told her. But
Coach wants it done anyway.”

“She really hates
me,” I sulked.

“Yeah. She said
that too,” Delovoa replied.

“What did she say specifically?”
I asked.

“That she hates
you.”

“Those were her
exact words?”

“I don’t know exactly.
Maybe she said she mega hates you or she massively hates you. But ‘hate’ and ‘you’
were definitely in there,” Delovoa said. “You can’t blame her too much. You
kept letting that 8-lane walk over everyone. When he wasn’t scoring, he put
half the people here on injured reserve.”

“I didn’t ‘let’
him do anything! How was I going to stop him?” I asked.

“How should I
know? I’m just a doctor, not a glocken coach.”

“How long am I
going to be here?” I asked.

“Until Magda gets
tired of torturing you, I suspect.”

“She’s trying to
get rid of me,” I said.

“Is that so bad? I
suppose there are worse glocken players. Like cripples and pregnant women, but
they aren’t in Super Class. What are you trying to prove, anyway?”

“If I get fired,
I’ll lose this job and the Factotum job and I’ll go back to being Hank. That
means I’ll want my butler back. That means you’ll lose the general
manager who hired you. Do you think Magda Strongarm will keep you on without
Cliston?”

“Oh,” Delovoa
said, understanding. “I’ll write you a note and say you’re too sick for
rehabilitation.”

I was walking,
naked, through the training facility, because that was required, when I saw
Kitt working out on some exercise machine.

She was also
naked. And one leg was going this way, and one was going that way, and her arms
were stretched and she was grunting.

I stopped and
stared.

“I know, right?”
someone said.

It was Meggaar. He
subbed in for Garm on 2-lane when we were defense.

He was the perfect
2-lane. He had four long arms, two on each side, was short, and strong. He
couldn’t run very fast, but he prevented anyone from even leaving the line of
scrimmage. He and Ziggy were the Band of Hands, as Rendrae called them.

“What?” I asked,
startled.

“It’s okay, we’re
all friends here. Kitt’s almost three feet taller than me or I’d ask her out.
She’s also twice as heavy as I am,” he said.

“She doesn’t look
it.”

“Hey,” she said,
suddenly standing next to us. She smacked me in my bare ass.

“Ow! I just had a
hundred needles taken out of there,” I complained. It was hard to not look at
her chest. Or her muscles. Or her nudity. She was a good-looking woman. A head
taller than me.

I realized I was
not listening to the conversation again.

“If you got faster,
Hank, you could be offense as well as defense. You’d make five times as much as
you do now,” she said.

“Hmm,” I said. She
was wearing a thin gold chain around her waist. Just a gold chain. It slung
over her hips and dipped under her navel and had little…figurines on them.
There were twelve that I could see. One was a star. A circle. An oval. Some
kind of animal. A—

“Well?” she said.

“Huh?”

“Do you want to
have sex?” she repeated. I had not been listening, being distracted by her
body.

Had she just said
that? Did she see me standing here ogling her and was calling me out?

I actually looked
around to see if it was a joke. Like there was a bunch of people standing
behind me, laughing.

But it was just
the two of us. Meggaar had left and I hadn’t noticed.

Kitt was all
glistening with sweat from her workout.

I was all red and
lacerated and bruised from glocken and failed therapy.

This gal was out
of my league. Certainly in glocken, but also in everything else. It was a bad
feeling and one I wasn’t used to. She was a 4-lane Super Class offense and
defense and did it with style.

I couldn’t even
sit on a token.

“I, uh, don’t know
if that would be appropriate. I don’t think we should have relationships with teammates,”
I fumbled.

“I didn’t say
relationship,” she shrugged. “There are benches in the cooldown room. We could
knock one out there.”

“Maybe later,” I
said, thoroughly confused.

I hastened away
like a little girl who saw a rat and it had pulled a knife on her.

I put on my
clothes and was outside of the locker room in maybe five seconds flat.

It hit me a few
minutes later. What an idiot I was. Kitt was the kind of woman you dreamt
about. She was a woman you bragged about at the old folk’s home when you were
senile and wore a diaper.

What was I
thinking?

I grabbed a bottle
of water from one of the many kiosks along the way.

There was a random
guy dressed head-to-foot in thick clothes and wore a breathing mask. Not
uncommon given all the species in the galaxy.

He saw me and said
something.

“You’re going to
kill yourself,” he said.

“Probably,” I
answered, and I thought he was talking about glocken or therapy or whatever.

He said something
else, but I didn’t pay much attention. He was like a janitor or just some guy
walking around. I was still remembering Kitt.

I was in the limo
home when I thought back to what the man had said. What was it? He said I was
going to kill myself. And then he said, “That’s poison to you,” indicating the
bottle.

But it was just a
bottle of water.

However, it was
slightly toxic to me. But only someone who knew I was an Ontakian and not a
mutant would know that.

CHAPTER 9

Had Kitt really
wanted to sex my bod? It’s not like I hadn’t had women flirt before. Or even be
quite aggressive.

I’d been alive for
a long time. But even in my youth I could never be called handsome. Maybe,
“ruggedly not-hideous.” If a woman bought me a drink it was probably because
she was trying to drug me and steal my wallet.

But what was the
big deal? Yeah, Kitt was in better shape than I was. And she had hundreds of
fans waiting outside our training compound to try and catch a glimpse of her.

I read that she
had done a charity auction, donating a pair of unwashed bras and panties and it
had raised something like 4 million credits. Cliston sold my entire
wardrobe but it had only gotten like 100 grand—which was a lot less than it
cost.

She also made a bunch
more money than I did.

Maybe that’s why
she was intimidating. Was she intimidating?

I had dated Garm.
And her granddaughter. And they were Quadrad assassins. I wondered who would
win in a fight, Garm or Kitt?

Why was it I went
for such tough women? Not that I had gone for Kitt. The carpet had burn marks
from me running out of there so fast.

She was big. Long.
It would be hard to keep track of a gal like that. Lying in bed you’d be like,
“what was that?” and it would just be her arm lounging around, bumping
into your foot—or the ceiling. I suppose you could put little flags on
different parts of her anatomy so you could see where everything was.

No, that was
unkind. She was damn sexy and I was trying to explain away why she had turned
me into a teenage coward.

Fine. Next time
she asked me, I’d say yes. But she wouldn’t ask me again. Not after my response.
I’d have to ask her.

Could I do that?
Just go, “Hey. Fornicate?” That wouldn’t work. Women could get away with that.
I couldn’t. She’d reach down and punch me in my unmentionables.

I hoped I hadn’t missed
out on my one shot.

Cliston had
redecorated my house again.

When I came home,
everything, every item, was covered in a dark, swirling metallic sheen. It was
mesmerizing, but also jarring.

Beyond that, it
was fear-inducing, because I knew what it was.

“That’s delfiblinium!”
I exclaimed.

“Yes, sir,”
Cliston answered.

“Are you crazy,
that stuff is explosive! They use it to push planets around. I once threatened
a Boranjame world-ship with it.”

“Sir, it requires
a certain density to reach critical mass and very particular conditions. This
is a brand new technique. It is only a fraction of a micrometer thick. Even if
you scraped it all off somehow, it would be insufficient to cause much damage.”

“‘Much’ damage?
How much is that when it can blow up a whole planet?” I asked.

“I think you may
be exaggerating, sir.”

“Get rid of it. Those
swirling colors are making me seasick.”

“We would take a
substantial loss if we sold it now. You are on injured reserve. If we wait
several months we would collect at least twenty million more when we auction
it.”

“Okay,” I said
quickly. “Though I don’t know who wants to buy a sofa that’s explosive.”

I decided to hit
up the Belvaille Gent Club.

It used to be
called the Belvaille Gentleman’s Club. Then the Belvaille Athletic Gentleman’s
Club. Then the Belvaille Gentleman’s Club again.

Then someone stole
the “man’s” off the sign and it was the Gentle Club. Then either the last two
letters fell off or someone took them. Anyway, it was the Gent Club now.

It was the longest-running
club in the city and catered to the darker sides of Belvaille.

As a Factotum, I
already came perilously close to the Law side of Law and Order and some people
frowned on me being in the club. But I had been coming here since its founding.

“Not allowed,” Gample
said.

Gample was the
doorman at the Gent Club. He was descended from a long line which included
Pample, and Dample, and an ample assortment of other “–amples.”

“What do you mean,
not allowed?” I asked, raising my eye-patch so he could see I was angry and not
just nearsighted when I squinted at him.

“Gent Club has a
policy on members,” he said.

“I got a lifetime
membership!” I replied.

“Krample gave you
that. He’s dead.”

“It’s not his
lifetime, it’s mine,” I said.

“You live too
long,” Gample argued, crossing his arms.

I didn’t feel like
I was being properly intimidating with my two-foot, feathery hat, so I tried to
take it off, but my giant lace cuffs got caught in the jewelry draped across my
chest and I had to slow down and extricate myself.

I had wanted to
throw down my hat in rage. Or slap him with it, which would have probably given
him a concussion, but now I just looked foolish.

“I’ll vouch for
him,” a voice said.

Podiver Vance,
along with a number of other people, had been watching the confrontation.

Vance used to own
one of the best store chains in all of Belvaille, Vintage Vance Vagaries. But
his flagship store had been destroyed—by me. Well, it was by the Central
Authority, but they were shooting at me. He had never recovered from that. Now
he ran his business straight from the Gent Club.

Podiver Vance was
an extremely tall and thin man. He was about nine foot and his arms were so
long he could touch the floor with his hands while standing perfectly straight.
He wore silk clothes that were tailored to fit him, but because of his massive
dimensions, everything still hung loose so he could move around freely. I kind
of thought he looked like a creepy spider. I mean, if you thought spiders were
creepy. If you thought spiders were sexy then I suppose he looked like a sexy
spider.

“Vouch for me?
Since when did I need vouching?” I asked, irritated.

“You’re a professional
glocken player. I’m sure you got some upscale club to go to,” Gample sneered.

“Just be my guest,
Hank. You can get angry later,” Vance said.

I stopped trying
to throw my hat and put my eyepatch back down with as much dignity as possible.

“Visitor’s pass,”
Gample said, as I was about to walk by.

He handed me a big
necklace with a yellow circle on it, letting everyone know I didn’t belong.
Whatever, I wasn’t going to wear it. Let them try and throw me out.

Vance wrapped his
spindly arms around me and I wasn’t sure if he was trying to hug me or
straighten the front of my clothes from behind.

I was used to
mixed reactions in the Gent Club over the years. This time was no different. A
number of people seemed impressed that a pro glocken player was here and I got
some well wishes. Others were impressed that the first Factotum was here. And
all the rest disliked me.

The Gent Club was
ten stories of dirty dealings and back rooms. A lot of the gangs that were
off-station had some presence in the club or met here to conclude contracts.
Factotums came and went. Nobles were strictly prohibited.

Deals got done
here. No violence was allowed.

Vance had a corner
to himself, which showed he had some influence. Still, I felt bad about him
being reduced to a few tables in a smelly building.

We sat down behind
some of his guards and drinks were placed before us.

“Hey, I want to
apologize again for your store getting destroyed,” I said.

“You never
apologized once. What do you mean ‘again’?”

“Oh. Well, sorry.”

“Not your fault.” I
could see him thinking about that because it was my fault. I had stolen
something he wanted to protect and it had escalated. “Anyway, I want to run a
job offer by you,” he said.

“I’m busy,” I answered.

“You’re on injured
reserve. I saw the beating you took. I figure you got a week at least. It
should be easy.”

“What’s the job?”
I asked.

“I have a client
willing to pay big bucks for the…skin of Procon Hobb.”

“What? You know
he’s my boss, right?”

“You don’t have to
kill him. Hobb’s species sloughs off their skin now and then.”

“And I’m supposed
to just ask him for it? That will go over well. Why would anyone want that?” I asked.

“I suppose you
know, but Hobb has a telepathic ability.”

“Yeah, freaky as
hell,” I said.

“Only like one in
a billion of his species can do that. He’s a major religious icon among his
people.”

“Oh, I thought he
was just a noble.”

“Nobles on
Belvaille are usually way more important in their home Systems.”

“So you’re selling
to one of his people?”

“Have to protect
my client’s identity, but they are religious devotees, yes,” Vance answered.

“What are they
going to do, make a stuffed animal out of his skin? That’s kind of gross.”

“How should I
know? And why do you care?”

“I’m a Factotum
and he’s my client. I can’t work against him,” I said.

“Says who? Is that
in some Factotum handbook that doesn’t exist? From what I’ve seen, you guys do
whatever you want. I heard they just throw the skin away. Or burn it. The pay
is forty million.”

Wow. So many big
contracts. He was right, I didn’t have any restrictions, but if I started
working directly against clients who were paying me, I’d quickly run out of
clients.

“I’ll think about
it,” I said.

“That’s all I
ask,” Vance said sweetly. “And if you did want to repay me for
destroying my store, this would make us square.”

Vance was a good
negotiator. I had forgotten that.

“Ugh. I’ll think
about it, I promise.”

We shook hands and
I got up to go get something more to drink.

I had a keg of
beer that I was sipping when some hoodlums in bad suits walked up to me.

One of them
mumbled something so incoherent I don’t think there were any vowels in the
sentence.

“I have no idea
what you just said,” I replied.

“He said our boss
would like a word with you,” the other man stated.

“My ribs hurt, my
knees hurt, my feet are sore, and I just sat down. If you want me to get up, it
will cost…20,000 credits,” I said flippantly.

The mumbler
relayed this on his tele as I took another swig or six of beer. I was
half-curious and eyed them casually.

“Mmrmmhm,” the man
replied. But the cadence of it sounded like, “Okay.”

“You got 20,000
credits on you?” I asked suspiciously.

“We don’t, but our
boss does,” the intelligible one said.

“I want some cash
now. Empty your pockets.” The men exchanged unsure glances. “Your boss will
reimburse you.”

They turned out
their pockets onto the table and I sorted through the money.

“Eight credits?” I
asked, surprised. I picked up a little digital coin. “I didn’t even know they
made these anymore.”

“It’s lucky. I
dropped it a few years ago and it rolled three whole blocks through traffic in
a straight line,” he said.

I chuckled, flipping
the coin in my hand. Criminals could be superstitious.

Of course, glocken
players could be superstitious too. I could so use a lucky charm or
three. I put the coin in my pocket.

“Does your boss
pay you all in beans or something? Now I don’t even believe he has the money.”

“Our boss is
Ulteem.”

“Oh. Well, carry
my keg,” I said.

Ulteem was up
three flights of stairs, which were a pain to climb. The elevators in the
Belvaille Gent Club were dicey at the best of times and I didn’t feel like
crashing down to the basement.

As a Lord, Ulteem
shouldn’t be allowed in the club. But he was a gambling Lord. So it was
questionable.

He was situated in
the middle of the room with some cheap partitions around him. Despite the vast
amount of money that came in and out of the Gent Club, they could never be
bothered to spruce the place up a bit. This floor had two big potted plants
that died years ago.

“Hank,” Ulteem
said.

Ulteem’s fake head
was different than when I had seen him before. It was purple and wore a turban
and had fangs and a malevolent expression.

The thugs put down
my keg and one of them whispered to Ulteem.

“Aww, you took his
lucky coin?” he asked.

“You owe me twenty
grand for this meeting,” I said.

“Sure.” He pressed
a few buttons on his tele and a bookkeeper came out and handed me the cash. It
looked like the right amount but I wasn’t going to count it. I stashed the wad
in my frilly coat.

“So what do you
want?” I asked.

“Leave us,” he
said, and all his people walked away.

That struck me as
odd. It’s not as if I was going to eat Ulteem or anything, but someone like him
had a lot of enemies. I would think he would be cautious, even in the Gent Club.

“You play glocken
now I see,” he started.

“Yeah. But not
very well.”

“I like you guys.
A real home team.”

“Belvaille has
like a hundred teams,” I said.

“But they’re all
lousy and most aren’t Super Class. Just nobles flashing some cash and they lose
interest in a week. You have good odds on you.”

“On me?” I
asked, surprised.

“Not you,
specifically. Your team.”

“That’s nice to
know,” I said, waiting for the pitch.

“Good enough odds that
if you could throw a game, I could make it worth your while,” he said.

Those were
perilous words and his frightening purple head didn’t make them any less so. I
looked around instinctively.

“If anyone even dreamed
I was contemplating throwing a game, they would kill me,” I whispered, leaning
in close.

“There’s no
governing body of glocken,” Ulteem said.

“It doesn’t
matter. There’s fans. They’re worse. A governing body would just fine me. Or
suspend me. How many billion people watch glocken?” I asked.

“There are
spectators across every species of the galaxy. Next door in Capital 3 System
alone there are nearly a trillion people,” Ulteem said.

“I don’t know
about that, but you’re not making it any more attractive.”

“Put it this way,
that’s a lot of people gambling. If you could guarantee a loss, within a ten-point
spread, I could give you 500 million credits.”

I was about to
shout at him to shut up but I just blinked.

“What?”

I think he smiled.
But he had no head. Wherever his mouth was, it smiled.

“That’s right,” he
confirmed.

I couldn’t
comprehend that kind of money. I had been dealing with a lot of cash lately.
Absurd amounts. But actual hundreds of millions? Sure. He could easily afford
that, if it meant a guaranteed game. People gambled away whole planets. Which
was, again, the reason why I would never touch anything this big.

“No. I’d have to
use all that money to hire an army and go hide somewhere. Someone would get me
eventually. Besides, I simply don’t have much say in the score of any
particular game. I’m just a defender and most times my lane isn’t doing much.”

“I suspect you’d
have to get more players involved, but you’d have enough money to do that,” Ulteem
said.

“Thanks for the
offer. But I categorically refuse. It’s not worth it at any cost.”

“Ah, well. You
can’t blame me for trying. Keep the twenty grand,” he said generously, as if he
had been thinking about taking it back.

CHAPTER 10

Magda Strongarm
asked how long I expected to be sick.

Through my sports
agent, I replied as long as I was scheduled to be given painful and useless
rehab exercises.

She agreed to drop
them so I could return to normal practice and slowly get back in shape. Or as
close to shape as I could get.

Dangling around
naked in the locker room, I tried to casually find Kitt and hoped she would
still be receptive to a little one-on-one training. I was thinking I might use
that as a pick-up line.

The first person I
saw was Neddy. Out of all the people here, he looked least like his fake name.

Neddy was a
Qwintine, a thin, insect-like biped that was twitchy and moved in short bursts.
He was a real powerhouse player. He only weighed about 250 pounds, which wasn’t
a whole lot in Super Class, but he had that exoskeleton backed by further
padding—you couldn’t hurt him. And he was an insect: incredibly strong and fast
for his size. Neddy played both offensive and defensive 3-lane. He was probably
the second most frequent scorer next to Ziggy.

And the bastard,
like Grah, didn’t have to exercise at all. Lifting weights or sprinting
wouldn’t make him better or worse or anything. This was his natural state. He
had a few downsides though. He sucked at any plays that were complex, for
instance. He was a runner and he ran. He’d run over, under, around, through,
but ask him to do anything more complicated than that and he’d get confused and
frustrated. So lane three was its own little world.

Also, Qwintine had
very short lifespans compared to most advanced species in the galaxy. He would
likely only be able to play for a few years and then would have to quit. Maybe
a decade after that and he’d die.

Neddy began
screeching. It was really off-putting, while I was naked, to see a 6-foot
insect, complete with pincers, flexing in front of me.

But Neddy was a
good guy. He wanted me to try and help him understand one of the defensive
plays.

“Shouldn’t you
work with the coaches?” I asked.

“You show. You
work with Qwintine great leaders before. We know you,” Neddy said.

I had met
some Qwintine many decades ago. I don’t think there was much in the way of
conversation.

“Sure,” I said,
though I looked around one last time for Kitt.

After a few hours
I think Neddy got it. He kept jumping up and trying to act everything out. It
was tiring just watching him.

I got dressed and
headed out to the fifth floor to practice. It was a half-field and the other
players were there running routines.

Magda yelled at me
for being late, and when I tried to explain why, she yelled at me again that it
wasn’t my job to half-ass train Neddy, who made four times more than I did, and
was ten times more useful.

It did sound silly
when you put it that way.

Because I was
still too hurt to do any heavy contact, they had me practice twisting.
Theoretically, I should be able to throw massive tokens. It was just a matter
of using my weight, momentum, holding on, and letting go. But I wasn’t
technically all that strong.

I was like a
bulldozer. Bulldozers don’t throw stuff. They use their weight and torque to
push. That’s what I could do.

Besides, I was
clumsy and couldn’t rotate my feet fast enough. We finally settled on the
4-lane token, which was 40 pounds.

I could throw it great
distances, once the throwing coach got me to spin without tripping. But it was
completely random where the token landed when I let go.

Other people were
screaming and diving for cover as this token came flying at them.

They finally put
me in a big netted cage so I could practice without killing anyone.

It seemed pretty
clear that I wasn’t going to be a great Twist, or even a mediocre one.

“So why am I doing
it?” I asked.

“Magda told me
to,” the throwing coach shrugged.

After a while of
me not getting any better and actually getting worse, we switched to 100
pounds. This was the 5-lane token, Candar’s spot. It was hard to believe he ran
with this even though he weighed only 500 pounds.

It felt a little
better but not much. It was still going random directions and I would still
fall down about half of my attempts.

After ten or so
throws and me rubbing my sore shoulders, they brought out the 6-lane token.
This was 500 pounds.

“Just try it,” the
throwing coach said, taking shelter outside the cage. “Lean back as you turn
and keep your feet moving, tip, tap, heel, toe,” he called, moving farther
away.

I spun once,
twice, thrice, and let go. And it hit dead center where I aimed!

“Do it again,” he
called.

I did it and
wasn’t quite as accurate, but it wasn’t bad. The weight increase actually helped
a lot because it countered my body weight. I couldn’t throw the lighter tokens
because I simply couldn’t move that fast. But with the heavier token I could
swivel my feet and lean back.

Almost no one
threw 6-lane tokens or higher. That freak in the Reskin Sleepers threw the
8-lane, but he was the only one, and he used it more as a weapon than a scoring
tactic.

But I felt I could
throw this token maybe twenty-five or thirty feet.

Magda came over
and I finally felt I had something to be proud of.

“And who is going
to pick it up?” she sneered. “Grah is too slow to chase it. Tobo is a Twist
himself, and hardly fast. Candar can’t run with 500 pounds. It would take your
slow ass sixty seconds to reach it after you threw it and it would be dead by
the time you got there. You couldn’t have a more worthless skill if you tried,”
she shouted.

“So what do I
practice?” I asked, feeling there was no pleasing her.

“Keep doing that,”
she said, and bobbled off.

In the locker room
I was beat.

All kinds of weird
muscles I never used were strained and hurting.

Naked, glistening
Candar approached.

“Hank,” he said.

“Yeah?”

“Can you speak to
Grah?”

“Why? What did I
do?” I asked, nervously. Not that I disliked Grah, I didn’t know him. But he
was scary.

“He wants to talk
to you. Wouldn’t hurt to get closer to the team. You miss a lot of practice,”
Candar stated.

“It’s in my
contract,” I replied defensively.

“Perhaps you have to
think about what’s good for the team and what’s good for being a Factotum, and which
you prefer being.”

I was going to
tell him I didn’t particularly want to be anything, but a Factotum was higher
on the list than a glocken reject. But, you know, Candar was so sincere I just
couldn’t say it.

“I’ll talk to Grah,”
I said.

“Hank. You are a
great warrior. You have fought in many wars,” Grah said over ten minutes. I’m
not kidding. It took him ten minutes to say that.

“Holy void, Grah,
what do you want?” I asked, exasperated.

“You have k—” he
started.

“Came? Cornered?
Cajoled?” I tried to finish for him.

“Kiiiih—” he kept
on.

“Kidded? Kissed?
Kinned? Kicked?”

“Killed—” he
managed.

“Killed. I killed
someone? Killed something? Killed time? Killed brain cells? Killed kittens in
kind with cadavers? What? What are you saying? Why are you so slow?” I yelled.

“Killed ma—”

“Please, stop.
This is painful. I’ll go out and practice some more. I’ll even run against you
if you’ll just stop talking. Please.”

“Mast—” he droned
on.

“I can’t. I’m
sorry, Grah. I can’t. I need to go,” I said, holding my head.

I could hear him
talking to the empty space where I once stood. Trying desperately to finish a
sentence. I was shaking. Not because I had maybe pissed off a 15,000 pound
Gandrine, but because I had become so agitated listening to him.

It was like being
forced to watch life in slow motion while you were in fast forward.

I was too tired
and too upset to look for Kitt.

CHAPTER 11

Cliston came into
my bedroom while I was sleeping the next day.

It was the weekend
and we both had off. I had already determined I was going to sit out a week of
practice, anyway. I was getting more hurt while I was supposed to be healing.

“Sir, there are
some Po here to see you.”

I jolted awake.

“Some Po? As in
plural?”

“Yes, sir.”

Either it was
Ziggy’s fan club looking for his forwarding address or it was Zeti.

Zeti was a
Boranjame. Po were their slaves—I’m not sure how Delovoa came by Ziggy.

Boranjame were the
most powerful species in the galaxy. They existed, for the most part, on the
outer rim, living on gigantic planet-sized spaceships. They were a crystalline race
that never stopped growing. Last time I checked, Zeti occupied a building that
was fifteen stories tall and he took up most of it.

Boranjame were
cryptic. They hadn’t taken part in the galactic civil war, thankfully, even
though they could have mopped up pretty much everyone.

They would
occasionally putter around in their ships and tell everyone to leave a
particular solar system because they were going to strip mine it. Anyone who
stayed, of course, died, but they gave you the chance to leave.

Zeti usually gave
me bad news. Boranjame had some strange prophetic abilities. One of them had once
told me how I would eventually die, and it wasn’t all that pleasant.

Cliston got me
dressed in my pimp clothes.

“Can I not have
the eye-patch? I keep running into stuff,” I said.

“It is part of the
wardrobe, sir.”

“Yeah, but…if I
get used to no depth perception, it could throw off my glocken abilities once I
go back to having two eyes. What would my general manager think?”

Cliston paused.

“Very well.” He
went to my closet and returned, wrapping a bandana around the lower part of my
face like I was a bank robber.

I sighed.

In my living room
the Po jumped and spun and danced around like Po were wont to do. I couldn’t
even count how many there were. Somewhere between four and six.

“Hi,” I said, my
voice slightly muffled from the scarf.

They twittered
faster.

“Want to take me
to Zeti?” I asked stupidly, since they didn’t have mouths to answer me. “Um,
everyone move over there if you want me to go to Zeti.”

A Po standing
still was against its nature, so they were only more or less “over there.”

“Okay, I think I
can fit you all in my limo.”

“This was a
mistake,” I said, as I got slapped in the face for about the 400th
time.

The Po bounced
around inside my limo like they were particles in a nuclear reaction.

My driver had
tried to close the divider between us, but a Po had managed to get up there
before it shut. Now we were swerving all over the road as my driver got
battered.

“You guys need to
calm down or we’re not going to make it to Zeti in one piece,” I said.

Maybe they were
claustrophobic.

We finally arrived
at Zeti’s building and I threw open the car door.

I didn’t even get
my foot out before all the Po ran over me and out into the street. Some were
even across the street by the time I had righted myself, as if they
wanted to get as far away from the car as possible.

The driver rolled
down the window and the Po up front popped out.

My clothes were a
mess, but you couldn’t really tell because they looked so absurd anyway. It’s
like I was being extra eccentric by being a sloppy pimp.

I walked to the
imposing building and the Po held the door for me as I entered the temple of
Zeti.

There he, or it,
floated: a nearly fifteen-story, complex crystalline creature. Zeti was
beautiful in a way. He was not some big block of crystals like a Gandrine was
stone. Somehow there were floating and rotating and spinning disks and plates
and shapes of all kinds that moved in an orderly, hypnotic fashion. He was colored mostly blue, with the thick
areas being almost black and the thin areas almost clear.

Zeti had no
organic features such as a face or mouth or arms. He had to communicate through
a set of speakers which the Po were setting up now.

Dozens of other Po
were in the building, scurrying around, doing Po-stuff.

I waited as usual.

I was slightly
relieved to see that Zeti hadn’t grown much, if at all, since the last time I
saw him. I was worried what would happen if he became too big for this building
or for Belvaille.

My feet really
hurt from glocken and practice and the Po were taking longer than I expected,
so I sat down on the floor. I don’t know if this was improper, but I also
didn’t know if wearing a bandit mask was improper.

I looked at my
socks while I waited. They were lacy and thin and didn’t absorb sweat very
well. How did Cliston even get them on my feet without tearing them?

I heard the
speakers click and I stood up.

“The First and
Last has returned,” Zeti said.

That was kind of
typical Boranjame talk. They weren’t big conversationalists.

“Cool,” I said,
though I realized I shouldn’t be flippant with a fifteen-story crystal-thing
who had relatives who drove around in spaceships the size of planets.

“It must be
stopped,” Zeti continued.

“Who or what is it?”
I asked politely.

“Among my people it
has a name. It translates into The End.”

“What’s that
mean?”

“It was the First
and shall be the Last,” Zeti said.

I scratched my
head under my bulky hat.

“I’m sorry, I
don’t understand. You want me to find someone? I can maybe do that.”

“We destroyed its
solar system,” Zeti said. “We were mistaken to do that.”

I sniffed.

“Yeah. It happens
I guess. So this is a guy? What did he do?” I asked.

“I cannot say. It
is forbidden.”

I took out my
tele. I needed to write all this down because it was a lot more than Zeti
usually said.

“There’s a lot of
people in the galaxy. Can you give me a hint?”

“The End must be
stopped. We created it. We created all of you.”

The speakers
crackled with static as if Zeti were overcome with emotion, though the
synthetic voice was calm and serene.

“Created us?
Colmarians? That doesn’t make sense.”

“Your path is
entwined with The End. You may have a chance.”

“Of what?” I
asked.

“You may know the
First and Last by a different name: Thad Elon.”

CHAPTER 12

Zeti said he
couldn’t tell me more. Then they dismantled the speakers and the Po hustled me
out of the building.

I was left on the
sidewalk to ponder all that.

I played back my
tele, but I had started it too late and all I recorded was me going, “uhh,” in
confusion.

Thad Elon?

Thad Elon was one
of the Creator Myths of the Colmarian Confederation. I wasn’t much on history,
but even I knew the concept of him was rather far-fetched. The Colmarian
Confederation had been a conglomeration of 50,000 species across the galaxy.
One guy couldn’t possibly merge all those.

Also, although the
Confederation had created Portals, it had done so after its empire had been
established. So before that, distances had to be crossed via normal ship
travel. It would have taken a trillion billion years to visit all those races.

And while we all
spoke Colmarian now, before the Confederation there would have been well
over 50,000 different languages. How did he communicate, using puppets?

There was simply
no way one being, or even a hundred, could have pulled that many solar systems
together in a lifetime. We knew for a fact there were stages in between. Like
the Olmarr Republic. The Confederation took lots of millennia to form.

Zzzho had even
told me the Keilvin Kamigans knew of Thad Elon. Maybe “Thad Elon” translated
into something like, “person who makes tremendous mistakes.”

But Zeti told me
there was a Thad Elon and apparently he was a big deal. Or the Boranjame
thought so. And the Boranjame were the biggest of big deals in the galaxy—that
I knew of.

What was Thad Elon
going to do, make a new Colmarian Confederation? Was that so bad? The
Confederation had been the most stunted and bureaucratic of empires, but
compared to the loose association of a thousand warlords and nobles that we had
now, it was a step up.

But whether there
was a Creator God or not, what was I supposed to do about it? As of thirty
minutes ago my biggest concern was being on injured reserve.

I went back home
and kicked off my shoes and tore both my socks by accident.

Cliston
immediately appeared.

“Sir, those were
quite expensive. It would have taken me no time at all to remove them for you.”

“Cliston, I hate
those silly socks. I feel like I’m sliding around in them.”

“We went over
this, sir. You are sliding around in them. Your weight makes it
difficult to use normal fabrics and designs. Now I have to buy another pair.”

“I look foolish,”
I pouted.

“That’s the
wardrobe a professional glocken player should wear.”

“Hey, Cliston. Do
the Dredel Led know of someone called Thad Elon?” I asked.

He stopped
examining my socks and looked up.

“Not a person, no.
There is a story of a Thad Elon.”

“Really? What is
it?”

“It is a legend,
though its accuracy is much in dispute. The first Dredel Led weren’t robots as
you know us now. They were the size of cities. It took larger and larger
constructs to store their awareness.”

“Like how
Boranjame keep growing?” I asked.

“Not quite. The
Boranjame grow naturally, as I understand. Dredel Led had to keep becoming
larger to continue learning. Thad Elon was a compound which allowed us to take
the next step and create brains that were similar to organic ones. Our minds are
no longer simple binary. They work much like yours and have the advantage of
being vastly smaller than they once were.”

“I don’t know if
your brain works anything like mine. I can’t be a general manager and sports
agent and butler all at the same time.”

“No, but you
organics can lie. And you can deceive yourself. And you can dream. And
hallucinate. And you can walk and sing and clap your hands and imagine a red
flower simultaneously with minimal effort.”

“So you’re saying
you have Thad Elon in your head right now?” I asked.

“We don’t call it
that. It’s just a normal part of our construction. In fact, it would be
impossible for us to exist without it. At this point it’s not even a valuable
substance. But it was a breakthrough at the time.”

“How is it that
all these races have some kind of Thad Elon?” I wondered aloud. “You couldn’t
come up with a different set of species than machine Dredel Led, gaseous
Keilvin Kamigans, crystalline Boranjame, and the vast miscellany that are the
Colmarians. And in each case it was a major person or thing. That can’t be
random.”

“What did the
Boranjame say it meant?” Cliston asked.

“It was really
confusing. He said it was The End. And was the First and Last.” I shrugged.

“The Boranjame are
an unusual species,” Cliston said.

“No kidding.”

“It has been
speculated they all come from one original being that split itself
apart. When the others grow too large, they likewise split into smaller
entities. If that’s true, for Boranjame, there is no ‘end.’ That concept wouldn’t
exist for them. They will all continue growing and splitting forever.”

“So do the
Boranjame all have the same personality? I met a Prince once,” I said.

“I haven’t a clue,
sir. You have probably met and spoken to more Boranjame on more occasions than
any other person in this System. It’s generally not something that is done.”

“He said my path
would cross with Thad Elon’s. You think it could be a glocken player?”

“If there was a
glocken player that the Boranjame had specifically named and were concerned
about, we would all know of him.”

“There’s not a lot
I can do, then. Zeti’s mystical statements usually come around and hit me in
the nose at some point.”

“Then I would like
to take this time to point out our cash flow has dramatically decreased and we
are in the red after buying the new furniture.”

“That’s your fault
for paying me less on injured reserve,” I scolded.

“That was the
general manager,” Cliston said.

I sighed.

“I think I can
cobble together some jobs in the meantime. Is this ‘general manager’ going to
fine me more for missing practice?”

“Yes, I suspect he
will, sir.”

CHAPTER 13

“You didn’t tell
me he had an army,” Delovoa said, as we moved through Procon Hobb’s building.
Me on foot and Delovoa wheelchair-bound, his internal organs pulled along in
the morbid trailer.

Once we had been
allowed inside, we passed numerous sets of lizard guards with their oversized
halberds. Each one made Delovoa more and more nervous.

We had gained
access so easily because I could prove I was part of Hobb’s glocken team and
Delovoa was part of his medical staff.

We were here to complete
the job Podiver Vance mentioned at the Gent Club: try and secure Procon Hobb’s sloughed-off
skin to give to some religious zealots for forty million.

Cliston had made
it clear my decreased salary on injured reserve was not working well with my
increased lifestyle. An extra forty large would go a long way in easing my
household expenses.

“Of course he has
an army, he’s a Procon,” I said.

“What is that,
anyway?”

“I don’t know.
Something they call rich frog-lizard guys that can talk in your head.”

“He owns our team.
Is this going to get me fired?” Delovoa worried aloud for the tenth time.

“How often have
you met Procon Hobb?”

“Not once,” he
said.

“Exactly. He
doesn’t care about the team. Or not much,” I said.

“And he doesn’t
care we’re going to take his skin?”

“He’s not going to
use it. Do you keep your dead skin?”

“Sure,” Delovoa
replied.

“Yeah, but you’re
weird,” I said.

“Then why don’t
you ask him for it if he doesn’t care?”

“You don’t just ask
a frog guy for his skin,” I said, like I did this all the time.

“But you’re a
noble like him.”

“Not really. I’m
just a Factotum with heraldry. No one is bowing to me. So is Ziggy still your
butler?” I asked.

“Ziggles. No, he
wasn’t a very good butler, anyway. He kept knocking everything over and running
into me. But I get 15% of his salary.”

“Is that before or
after Cliston gets his 15%?”

“After,” Delovoa
said. “How much do I get again if I can help you with this?”

“Five million,” I replied.

“And how much do you
get?”

“Doesn’t matter.
I’m giving you five.”

A little bipedal
lizard wearing bright flowers finally met with us and asked us to have a seat.
There were small rocks for chairs around a pool of water. I got the impression the
lizard was a male and some kind of administrator by the placement of his
flowers and the clipboard he carried.

Delovoa obviously
couldn’t sit on the rocks and they looked rather uncomfortable to me so I plopped
myself on the dirt floor.

“What can I help
you with?” the creature lisped.

“We are employees
of Procon Hobb’s. We would like to speak to him,” I said.

“The Procon
handles only the most important issues. I am happy to assist you.”

“I have security
systems that your boss might find of use—” Delovoa began.

“We have ample
security,” the administrator interrupted.

Delovoa and I
exchanged looks, realizing our plan wasn’t that great. We sat there silently
for a moment. Delovoa tapped at the pond with his wrinkly toe.

“Don’t do that,”
the lizard said, annoyed.

“Sorry,” Delovoa
answered.

“Hey, do you know
I wrestled with some giant lizard a while ago?” I asked.

The little
administrator looked at me but didn’t reply.

“Come on,” I
continued. “It was huge. In a big ring. I think it was called an ‘Url’ or ‘Urp’
or something.”

“The Usk?” the administrator
asked.

“Yeah! That’s it.
Is it still alive? I choked it,” I said.

The man turned his
head slightly and it was the closest to an emotional response I could read so far—because
I wasn’t a lizard. He clearly didn’t believe me.

“You fought the
Usk?” he asked.

“Yeah, it was a
requirement to get a position on the glocken team. Did the Usk survive?”

“It’s alive, yes.”

“Oh, good. It was
such a magnificent animal.”

“Perhaps we are
speaking of different things. The Usk is a carnivore. It hunts and eats my
people on our home world,” the man said.

“I didn’t mean
magnificent as in a good thing,” I quickly backpedaled. “I’m obviously
glad I beat it.”

“I don’t think you
fought the Usk,” the administrator said.

“It whipped me
with its tail and stuffed me down its mouth,” I said. “It just couldn’t swallow
me.”

“Perhaps it was,”
the little man said, surprised. “I believe it was ill for a while, but it has
recovered.”

“What do you use
it for? Security?” Delovoa asked.

“Those who
disappoint Procon Hobb are fed to it,” the lizard said flatly.

“Sorry for wasting
your time,” Delovoa said, putting his wheelchair in reverse and causing it to
make an annoying beeping noise.

“We’ll see
ourselves out,” I added.

Delovoa’s
wheelchair must have had a supercharger because he took off at like forty miles
an hour, leaving me far behind.

We were some
blocks away on the sidewalk recounting our recent success.

“Excellent plan,
Hank,” Delovoa taunted. “Walk in, distract them, and steal a Procon’s skin.”

“I never said I
was a good thief.”

“You’re going to
get us fed to an Usk, whatever the hell that is.”

“Meh, it already
tried to eat me once.”

“Fine for you, fat
boy, I don’t have your thunder thighs.”

“I doubt it could
digest all your metal,” I said.

“Not much
consolation knowing I’d give it indigestion.”

“Still, this is a
lot of money,” I said.

“Not even you are
dumb enough to consider going on with this. You saw they had a ton of guards in
there. And it’s not like you can fight your way in and out, we’d both lose our
jobs. Do you plan on dressing up like a giant flower and waiting in his
bathroom for him to molt?”

“I’m thinking
these people that want Hobb’s skin are going to be happy with any amount they
get.”

“So he’s going to
give you a little bit? Like if you kissed his hand and got a mouthful?”

“No. I’m thinking
the people won’t know Hobb’s skin from an Usk’s skin.”

“How are you going
to get either of their skins?”

“The Usk has to eat,
right?”

This was a boring
job.

I was keeping
track of everything that came and went from Hobb’s building.

Supplies. Repairs.
Servants.

I’d track the deliveries.
And if I couldn’t track them, I’d simply stop the courier, flash my Factotum
badge, and ask them. And if that still didn’t persuade them, I’d flash a gun.

Delovoa was off
trying to research Usks and Hobbs. We had to be sure we didn’t poison the wrong
guy. It would just be my luck if we killed Procon Hobb and we not only had to
try and beat a murder rap, but became unemployed.

Fortunately,
Delovoa teled me that Hobb was a vegetarian. The Usk, as we already knew, was a
meat eater.

I figured the Usk
couldn’t be constantly eating servants. Hobb would quickly find himself
polishing his own toilets.

But what would an Usk
eat? And how would I recognize it?

Maybe I should
disguise myself as a big flower and sneak in.

It was the third
day of my stake-out when a truck pulled up in the rear. They used some heavy
lifters to unload big crates with holes punched in them.

The crates were
bouncing around and I saw what looked like long black insect legs poke out now
and then. The boxes were about six feet long and the holes were maybe four
inches. Whatever bugs were in there were the kind you’d think twice about
stepping on, and definitely the kind you would feed to a thirty-foot-long
lizard.

I followed the
truck back to its delivery service.

I greased the palm
of the dispatcher with 1,000 credits to get the lowdown. They picked up the
shipment from the port. All he knew was they were some big bugs.

I went to the
warehouse but it was too busy to try anything. I waited for most of the
employees to leave for the night and spoke to one of the late-shift janitors. I
only had to give him 100 credits and listen to his lame stories for an hour.

He let me track
down the box that had been delivered to Hobb’s and its manifest.

From the manifest,
I could get the quarantine information details.

But the Central
Authority handled quarantine. And dealing with the C.A., when I was planning on
conning a nobleman, was a risky proposition.

CHAPTER 14

I didn’t have
enough credits to bribe the Central Authority, but I did have an in with my old
Deputy Kommilaire. Man by the name of MTB.

He wouldn’t care
about my job, or motives, and would figure—quite rightly—that I was up to no
good. He tried to kill me at least once.

I called the C.A.
and they told me where I could find him. He was in the western part of the
city, sitting in a patrol car.

That was weird for
a number of reasons. That a random person could call up and be told where a
particular Inspector was, and that MTB, after all those years as an Inspector,
was still an Inspector.

I leaned in the
open window of his car and he pulled a gun on me.

“Oh,” he said when
he saw me, but he didn’t put the gun down.

MTB was a big guy
with a square jaw whose uniform was so starched it could probably deflect
neutrinos.

“Hey, MTB, you got
a minute to talk?”

He looked around,
as if he was expecting a riot to break out in stuffy Belvaille any second.

“Yes.” And he
started to get out of his car.

“Can’t we sit
down? I walked two blocks from my limo.”

“Where did you
park?” he asked suspiciously.

“I’m not telling
you. You’ll probably try and give my driver a ticket.”

“You can’t sit in a
patrol car unless I arrest you. Regulations.”

MTB was big on
regulations. He lived for them. So he would never make more than Inspector. His
bosses probably hated him. Our whole economy was based on nobles double-dealing
with gang lords and here you had a cop who was incorruptible.

He took out a
truncheon and twirled it as we walked along the sidewalk.

“You’re playing
glocken now?” he asked.

“Yeah. Cliston is
making me wear these stupid clothes.”

He looked me over,
apparently for the first time.

“You always wore
weird clothes. What do you want?”

“I need to track a
manifest to its origination and see when a similar shipment is coming in next.”

“That’s illegal,”
he stated flatly.

“Really? Illegal?
There’s a law that specific?” I asked doubtfully.

“Immoral,” he
corrected.

“No one is going
to care or notice,” I said.

“Clearly someone
would or you wouldn’t want the information.”

This guy…

“Come on, for old
time’s sake. Saving Belvaille and such.”

He looked around
in the most obvious, exaggerated way possible for a good thirty seconds. It was
so long that I started looking around, too.

“What?” I asked.

“In here,” he
whispered, and he motioned for me to step into the recessed doorway of a
building.

“I might can help
you,” he said.

“Uh, good.”

“If you can help
me.”

“What do you
need?” I asked.

“A Central Officer
was killed. An Inspector. I need to find his killer.”

“That might be
hard. I only got a few days left on injured reserve and we’re off on another
game. But what are the details?”

“He was following
up on an agreement between Yibble-Sone and the Gwarsh Concern,” MTB said.

“Oh, this was
recent. Maybe a few months ago?”

“Three weeks ago.”

“Well, the
agreement was a few months. I know, since I offered to be the Factotum.”

“Do you think you
can find out who killed him?” MTB asked.

“Do you
want to know or do your bosses?” I asked.

He paused to think
about that.

“Both. But my
bosses most. They can’t have Central Authority killed with no payback.”

“Well, I can tell
you right now.”

MTB gave me a hard
look.

“Don’t you want to
know the name of the Inspector first and what he was doing?”

“I don’t need to
know. The agreement was for the Belvaille planetoid way out there. The Gwarsh Concern
runs their food operations and Yibble-Sone is the noble that owns all the
machinery. Who was the Factotum that handled the agreement?”

“Univox Factotal,”
he said, not understanding.

I laughed.

“Perfect!
Xandale’s group. Big buck-toothed goon. It was one of his people that killed
your Inspector.”

MTB sighed.

“No, I’m not doing
some Hank snow job. I need to know who really did it,” MTB said.

“And I’m telling
you. That agreement is one of the most important ones in this whole
System—that’s why I bid on it. The planetoid supplies the only food that is
naturally grown here. Everything else comes from the Portals and other Systems.
It’s not good food, but it’s cheaper by orders of magnitude. If they shut down
that food supply, we’re completely at the mercy of imported food. So you can’t
blame Gwarsh Concern or Yibble-Sone because if they object and shut down our
food, people are going to starve. You have to blame Univox Factotal.
They’re the only ones without leverage in this arrangement.”

“But what if it was
Gwarsh or Yibble-Sone?” he asked.

I shrugged.

“The point is that
someone pays for the murder, right? You’ll never find out for sure unless you
get a confession, which simply won’t happen. The important thing is we keep
getting food. Xandale can even write off the death as part of doing business.
He’s got a ton of Factotums…just pick one.”

MTB’s dark face
got darker as he contemplated this.

“Isn’t there some
honor among Factotums?” he asked.

“Not that I know
of.”

CHAPTER 15

I had been worried
that there would only be one shipment of bugs a year and I’d have a hard time
intercepting it.

But that was dumb.
The Usk was an enormous lizard. There was a shipment every week.

There was a
freighter in Belvaille System whose sole job it was to breed insects for one
lizard. I felt a little bad that I would be putting those people out of
business by killing the Usk. I also felt kind of bad about whoever was going to
get blamed for killing MTB’s Inspector. And I felt bad about our plan to poison
a lizard, take its skin, then give it to religious wackos and pretend it was a
different lizard skin.

But feeling bad
doesn’t pay the rent.

I told MTB he should
talk to Xandale and coordinate who would be their fall guy. That way Xandale
could pick his worst employee; MTB could explain how it was and no hard
feelings; and even the guy who had to take the blame would be able to buy some
life insurance or otherwise look out for his family.

But no, MTB
wouldn’t do that. He was going to tell his bosses it was Univox Factotal and
nothing more. They would drop the hammer and it would take everyone by
surprise, especially since they likely had nothing to do with it. As much as I
disliked Xandale, he wasn’t so stupid as to murder a Central Authority
Inspector.

But MTB didn’t
want to lie further—once was his limit. He was an odd guy. He didn’t understand
that often there was no good option, just a less bad one.

In any case, six
hours later he gave me the details of when the next shipment of bugs was.

Delovoa had been
concocting a poison we could put on the insects that would hopefully kill the
Usk. Of course, it couldn’t be so toxic it would kill anyone handling the bugs
or be detectible by sight or smell. Not an easy task since the Usk wasn’t
exactly a dainty creature.

Delovoa came over
to my place with a bunch of tools, safety equipment, and a box full of lizard poison.

“Sir, should I
wait up for you?” Cliston asked.

“No.”

“You do have a
game the day after tomorrow. And I notice the doctor is with you, so he is not
assisting the injured players,” Cliston said with some gravity.

“Oh, hi, boss,”
Delovoa said meekly, twiddling his fingers in a wave.

“It’s a good thing
my butler saw us going out, and not my general manager,” I said.
“Goodnight, Cliston, my butler.”

“Goodnight, sir.”

We left and
Delovoa turned to me.

“Wait, he didn’t
see us?”

“Don’t ask.”

This time I had to
pay the janitor of the warehouse 500 credits.

I promised we
weren’t going to steal anything.

He promised that
for 500 credits, he didn’t care.

We found the bug boxes
but they were too high up to reach. I had to get the janitor and pay him
another 238 credits—all I had on me—to get the crates down. He wasn’t very
gentle. He was a janitor, not a warehouse loader, and wasn’t an expert with the
machinery.

There were two
large crates of bugs and they were kicking up a storm now that they had been
dropped on the floor.

The janitor took
his money and left in a hurry.

“Do you just put
the poison in there?” I asked.

“No, you have to
attach the packets to them.”

“Well, I guess
open it up.”

“You open
it up,” Delovoa said.

“You have the
tools.”

Delovoa threw the
toolbox at me, where it clanged by my feet.

“I don’t know
where the poison goes,” I said.

“Anywhere you can
put it. It will attach and blend to their coloration.”

I looked at the
box. It was a sturdy plastic construction, secured on the top with six bolts.

I got a ratchet
that would fit and slowly started undoing them.

I was at the last
one and put the bolt on the ground with the others.

“Okay, hand me one
of those poison things,” I said.

“Put on gloves
first.”

I put on gloves,
as did Delovoa. He removed a small square sack with adhesives all around it. It
was maybe an inch thick and three inches square.

I held it
delicately, but then put it on the ground so I could open the top of the crate.

“Wait—” Delovoa
started.

I took off the
cover and three big bugs jumped out! One knocked over Delovoa in his
wheelchair. One landed on my chest. And I didn’t see much of the other because
I had a big black bug in my face.

I tried to punch
it but it took off before I even cocked my arm back.

Delovoa was on the
ground screaming.

I looked around
but the bugs were gone.

“Easy, easy,” I
said. I walked over to Delovoa and righted him in his chair.

He was almost
sobbing.

“Are you okay?” I
asked him.

He started
slapping at me with his bony old fingers.

“You moron! You
incredibly stupid moron! Why would you just open the crate? Did you think they
were wearing seatbelts?” he yelled.

“I don’t know. I
guess…I mean what do they do at Procon Hobb’s?”

“They probably
have handlers. Feeders. Or they just dump them in a room with the Usk and let
it chase them.”

I glanced around
the big dark warehouse.

“Well, those are
gone,” I said.

“You think? You
want to try whistling and see if they respond?”

“We have one more
crate.”

“Don’t open it!”

“I’m not. But I
can’t fit my hand through those holes and I doubt you can either,” I said.

“I’m not reaching
in there!” Delovoa shivered.

“I can’t catch
them, they’re too fast. Maybe if we put the two crates together I could open it
a little,” I said.

“No. Give me a
minute.” Delovoa zipped off in his wheelchair. He was clearly freaked out by
the insects.

He came back maybe
five minutes later with a fire extinguisher.

“This should work.
The cold will slow them down. Maybe even put them into temporary hibernation.”

“Will it kill
them? I don’t know if they’ll feed him dead bugs,” I said.

“I don’t think it
will kill them. But we’ll spray. Knock the box some and see how they react. And
spray more if we have to.”

It was a good plan
and we managed to put three poison pouches on two of the insects, Delovoa
telling me to be very cautious, as he stayed a comfortable twenty feet away.

I put the lid back
on the crate and secured the bolts. We dragged the empty crate to my limo and
dumped it ten blocks away.

Now we just had to
wait for the Usk to die.

CHAPTER 16

Now this
was really boring.

Delovoa and I were
sitting in my limo, staking out the trashcans of Procon Hobb’s building,
waiting for them to dump out the carcass of a giant poisoned lizard so we could
skin it and sell it for forty million.

“Is this worth
it?” Delovoa asked.

“Cliston just
bought me like sixty million of new furniture and artwork and clothes. And a
new car.”

“So you’re getting
sixty for this and you’re only paying me five?

“No, I’m not
getting that much. He bought delfiblinium furniture.”

“Why?” Delovoa
cried.

“I don’t know.
It’s just what he does.”

We saw some
servants take out a bunch of trashcans and empty them into the dumpster.

“That was a lot.
Go check,” Delovoa said.

I sighed and got
out. I crossed the street and made sure the coast was clear. I lifted the lid
on the dumpster but I couldn’t reach the bags. I had to climb in. Cliston was
going to kill me. I was already covered in garbage.

Ripping open the
bags I thought I finally had it. There was blood and guts and scales. But it
was way too small.

“Ick,” I said.

I went back to the
limo.

“I think that was
one of his servants in there. Definitely wasn’t the Usk,” I said.

“I know.”

“How do you know?”
I asked, annoyed.

“Procon Hobb’s
people just called me,” Delovoa said. “They want to hire me to stuff the Usk.”

“Stuff it? What
the hell does that mean?”

“Taxidermy.
They’re going to give me the carcass so I can stuff it. I guess he wants it in
his hallway or something.”

“I’ve been
dumpster diving for five hours and they’re just going to give you the
Usk?” I yelled.

“Why are you
complaining? This is what we wanted, right?”

“Why would he
contact you?” I asked.

“I don’t know.
Because I’m a doctor?”

“You’re not a doctor,”
I said.

“I took out all my
own internal organs and put them in a functional, iatric carriage to extend my
lifespan, and removed the top of my skull to excavate my cranium.”

“I guess you are sort
of a doctor,” I conceded.

CHAPTER 17

“Not so tough now,
are you?” I said, kicking the stiff and extremely smelly lizard corpse inside
of Delovoa’s home.

“I can’t believe
you fought this,” Delovoa said.

“It wasn’t really
a fight. It just ate me,” I replied.

“So how big is
Procon Hobb?” Delovoa asked, cutting open the creature’s stomach with an
electric saw. “I have to leave most of this intact.”

“He’s a big guy.
Like a big frog-lizard.”

“That doesn’t tell
me anything,” Delovoa said, as the creature’s guts sloshed onto the floor.

“Thad Elon’s Two
Buttholes, that stinks!” I said.

“Yeah, it’s totally
weird. Most corpses smell great,” Delovoa taunted. “How big is Hobb? Real
numbers.”

“I don’t know.
Probably eight feet tall or more. But he was wide. I wasn’t paying much
attention to Hobb, I was fighting this Usk,” I said, kicking its tail again.
“And when I was negotiating with him, he was sitting in a pond.”

“As big as this
thing is, we don’t have enough material to stuff it and also give skin to your
buyer.”

“Well, you’re
getting five million for the skin. How much are you getting as a taxidermist?”
I asked.

“Not much. But
Hobb throws his servants in the dumpster or feeds them to this thing. If he
finds out we robbed him, I can’t imagine he’ll be very happy.”

“He only killed
his servants. We’re valuable employees.”

“Am I a valuable
employee? Because you’re not,” Delovoa countered.

“Well, he likes
Cliston. Cliston will stick up for us if it comes down to it.”

Delovoa cut and
cut and I hauled the innards and meat trying to make space. We were in
Delovoa’s basement, which was vast, but he had so much junk down here.

“This isn’t going
to work,” Delovoa said after a few brutal hours. “There’s not enough here. I
say we just stuff it and keep our jobs. We can sell the meat to the butchers.”

“It’s poisoned,
right?”

Delovoa shrugged.

“Come on,” I said,
“get creative. I’m not giving up forty million.”

“You’re getting
forty? I want half!” Delovoa demanded.

“You’ll get five. Be
artistic. Cut off a leg and have it standing in a fake river. And have the tail
emerging from a cave, that way we can cut it off.”

“Does an Usk live
in rivers and caves?” Delovoa asked.

“It looks like it
would live wherever it wanted, so why not?”

We ordered some blue
plastic fake trees and plants and it was starting to come together. I was
hacking apart the tail, which was four inches thick of skin and a good six
inches of hard sinew under that.

“What are you
doing?” Delovoa yelled.

“Hobb doesn’t have
a tail, I have to cut and unroll this.”

“Yeah, but he’s
supposed to have shed the skin, not chopped it off his own body. You’re
putting cut marks all over it. It has to be smooth and rounded.”

I threw down the
saw.

“Well, it’s the
wrong color and way too thick if it’s supposed to be shed. It’s obvious that
this recently died.”

We were both
getting pissy because of the hard work of ripping apart a monster lizard and
standing inside its stinking corpse for hours.

“Don’t worry about
that. I’ll throw it in acid and bleach. I got a huge tub for disposing of
bodies,” Delovoa said creepily. “But use the rounded flensing blade. If it’s
got rectangular gashes all over it, it won’t fool anyone.”

I gazed upon the
wide array of stainless steel implements around us.

“Okay, I get that
you have to work on your own body, but why do you have all this stuff?”

“Alternative
medicine,” Delovoa said.

I held up what
looked like a large metal bottle opener, complete with corkscrew.

“What’s this for?”

“Eyeballs.”

After six more
hours of vomit-inducing and acid-gagging work, I had sheets and sheets of what
genuinely looked like it could be Procon Hobb’s shed skin. It was pale and
curled and had the outline of scales on it. The claw was the best part, though
the actual nails were missing.

All told, the
section of skin was nearly sixty pounds.

I was running
through the last finishing touches, scraping out any residual meat the acid
hadn’t caught.

“I have to say, it
looks pretty good,” I stated.

Delovoa was busy
trying to taxiderm an Usk using a fraction of an Usk.

“Well, you better
pay me soon, because I think I’m going to have to flee the System when Hobb
sees this.”

He was right, it
wasn’t very lifelike.

“Why don’t you
open its mouth and stuff a bunch of its entrails in it? Have them pouring out.
That will distract people from the fact so much of it is missing,” I said.

“Why would it be
eating itself?”

“They’re just
guts. How many people know what an Usk gallbladder looks like? It will be scary.
Just spray some stuff on all these organs so they don’t rot and cover it in
them. I got the sense they thought the Usk was a really ferocious predator.”

“Maybe because
their boss fed them to it,” Delovoa chided.

“So quit trying to
make it look dignified and make it frightening. Then you can use all these
leftover parts.”

Delovoa thought it
over.

“You know, I could
have just the front half of it, soaked in blood, covered in gore, emerging from
the darkness.”

“And they could
hang it on the wall,” I said.

“That sounds
good,” he agreed.

Delovoa, not one
for long discussions, fired up the saw and began slicing the Usk in half.

“I’m going to take
this skin to my buyer,” I yelled over the noise.

Delovoa nodded
without looking up. He seemed disturbingly proficient at the work.

Belvaille didn’t
exactly have a night time since it didn’t orbit a star, but just for
convenience—and sanity—we still recognized a day and night.

They would dim the
latticework lights when it was our approximation of night, though it never got
completely dark.

It was early
morning and I was covered in Usk blood and had the skin in my arms as I stepped
out of Delovoa’s home into Belvaille’s night.

I was immediately
blinded by lights shined in my face.

“Hank, having just
come from Delovoa’s, can we assume you were working on private physical
therapy?” I heard Rendrae ask.

“Will you be
available for tomorrow’s upcoming game?” The second question I recognized as the
robotic voice of Rendrae’s announcer friend, Oxobox.

“Uh,” I said
smoothly.

This was the first
time I had seen Rendrae’s co-announcer. Every Dredel Led looked different. Not
just like people looked different, Dredel Led had wildly different forms. This
one was about four feet tall, and was a perfectly round, silver metal sphere.
It had some lights on it which were maybe eyes or sensors or who knows, a belly
button. It would roll back and forth a bit as it talked, like it was fidgeting.
I found it odd that “box” was part of its name when it was a globe, but who
could figure out Dredel Led?

Rendrae and Oxobox
were almost twins in a way. Rendrae was green and fleshy, but he was enormously
fat. Not blubbery, but just impossibly round. Maybe that’s how they met, at some
spheroid convention.

“You look to have
gone through quite a rigorous program,” Rendrae continued. “Is that blood?”

“Maybe,” I said,
stalling, looking for my limo.

“Were you bleeding
or was it a transfusion?” Oxobox asked.

“Neither. I was
just, we were practicing.”

I saw they were
shining lights from tele cameras in my face. I tried to get past them.

“Hank, can we ask
why you were at Procon Hobb’s earlier? Were you discussing your contract?”
Rendrae asked.

“I wasn’t there,”
I said.

“A fan provided
video,” he said.

“Let me see.”

I walked over and
he called up the video on his tele. It showed someone leaving the dumpster but
was shaky and hard to make out.

“That’s not me,” I
said.

“Let’s zoom in and
clean it up,” Rendrae offered.

He did so and
there was my big dumb face, looking around cautiously, clearly not seeing
whatever person was filming this.

“Oh, yeah,” I
added. “I was just leaving.”

“His dumpster?”
Rendrae pushed.

“I had lunch with
him and dropped some important…glocken plays in the waste basket and I realized
that anyone could find those—”

“And compromise
your game?” Oxobox finished.

“Exactly.”

“Why didn’t you
tell his servants?” Rendrae questioned, knowing me better than Oxobox.

“I’m a doer. Why
leave it to someone else? Besides, how do I know that servant wouldn’t turn
around and sell it?” I asked.

“So it was an important
set of plays?” Oxobox asked.

“You’ll see in the
game,” I said confidently.

“What were they
about?” Rendrae continued, sensing I was full of crap.

“By the way, I
would like to give a shout out to my girl, Kitt,” I said.

“Your girl? Are
you dating the 4-lane on the Belvaille Glocken Team?” Rendrae asked, suddenly
shifting news gears.

“I wouldn’t say
‘dating.’ But you know how it is. Tight quarters. Athletes. Comradery. Nudity.”

“Nudity? I’m
sorry, I don’t understand,” Oxobox beeped.

“Yeah, Magda makes
us all be naked in the training facility. Nude at all times. Kitt in there,
working out. Sweat dripping off her body.” I looked at my bloody fingers
lazily.

Fat, old Rendrae
was blinking.

“So you’re
definitely playing next game?” Oxobox asked, oblivious.

“Wait, wait, wait.
So everyone is naked in your training facility? Is that why no press are
allowed?” Rendrae asked.

“All the players
are naked. Who cares about the coaches?” I said.

“And Garm. Garm’s
naked too?” he asked.

“Sure.”

“Are you still
dating Garm? You had dated Garm, right?” Rendrae stammered.

I felt I had
conveniently changed the subject from why I was covered in blood, raiding
trashcans, and walking around with a giant lizard skin.

“Garm? That was
ancient history. Besides, I take it as it comes, have to keep your options
open, am I right?” I asked.

“Yeah, Hank!
You’re right. Good luck with your game!” Rendrae said.

Oxobox was trying
to ask some more questions, but I walked past.

“Thanks, Rendrae.
I’ll see about getting you some press access to the gym,” I called back.

“Will you? Thanks,
Hank! Good luck, again!”

CHAPTER 18

“Why should I
deliver the skin?” I asked. “You’re supposed to be the middleman.”

“No, I’m the
Finder’s Fee man,” Podiver Vance replied via tele. “Besides, I don’t want to
deal with a bunch of religious nuts.”

“I don’t either.
And I don’t want them to see that Hobb’s employee took his skin,” I said.

“You don’t have to
deliver it in person. Send someone else.”

But I wasn’t going
to do that. This was a forty-million-credit transaction. That’s enough money
that I wanted to be there in person.

I dressed in one
of my least ostentatious suits.

I was at the end
of an alley between two tall buildings waiting for the buyers to appear on the
other side.

My limo was just
around the corner in case I needed to make a getaway. I would have liked it to
be right behind me, but it would have to double-park. Just my luck the parking
police would show up and I’d be standing here with a drapery set of living
tissue—talk about probable cause.

The location was
far in the southwest of Belvaille. Away from City Hall. Away from the port.
Away from the Central Authority.

Two robed figures
appeared at the other end, finally. They were twenty minutes late.

I couldn’t see
much about them other than they were medium height and were pulling a rather
large trunk.

The robes I had
suspected. Seems religions of all sorts loved robes. What is it with pants and
slacks that holy men couldn’t stand? Did you need air circulating to your groin
to let in the holy spirits?

The trunk reassured
me a bit. If they had just been carrying a satchel I knew they wouldn’t have
forty million. Even in large denominations it was going to take up a lot of
room.

They stood there.

I stood here.

I waved.

They slowly
started walking forward.

I didn’t want to
enter the alley. But I also didn’t want to make the transaction out in the
open. The alley was almost completely obscured. It was a narrow strip between a
hotel and a mansion. The gap between the buildings was only about ten feet wide.

There was a fire
escape high up on the hotel beyond reach and numerous large metal trashcans
near my side. I figured I would duck behind them if any shooting started.

“Do you have the
skin?” one of them yelled out. I could tell they were newbies. You don’t yell
illegal business deals. He had a thick accent, but just about everyone in the
former Colmarian Confederation had an accent.

“I do. Do you have
the payment?” I asked.

One of the men
raised his hand toward me and I heard a voice say, “Bang!”

Literally, someone
said the word, “bang!”

And I got shot in
the left eyeball!

I’ve been shot…a
lot. Pretty much all over. Bottoms of the feet. Butt. Toes. Nose. I don’t think
I had actually ever been shot on my eyeball.

It was an
impossible shot. I was walking. My eyes weren’t exactly bulbous. I tended to
blink now and then.

There was a building
straight across the street with no windows. If the sniper had been on top of
the building it would be a thirty-story shot at a ridiculous angle into the
darkness of the alley. Who the hell shot me?

I ducked to the
right side and tried to scramble forward to get near the trashcans.

I felt my face and
there was blood coming down, but I was too jacked on adrenaline to know if I
had suffered a serious wound.

Was it just the
two guys?

I tried to listen
for footsteps or running or talking.

I set aside the
lizard skin and took out my gun. It was a sawed-off shotgun loaded with
buckshot. The shotgun was the perfect weapon for this alley. I didn’t need to
see them, I just needed to get within about forty feet.

But I had no idea
where they were or what they were doing. More importantly, I didn’t know who had
the gun.

I had to take a
look.

I took a deep
breath and quickly thrust my head out.

“Bang! Bang!”
Someone said.

And I got shot in
my left eye again and my right eyeball!

“Gah!” I said,
diving back into cover.

I had my left eye
closed and they hit it perfectly. My right eye had been hit as soon as it
passed the cover of the trash bin. It wasn’t possible anyone could be that
accurate and fast.

I could tell by
the voice of the person who had said “Bang” that the speaker was only about
fifty feet away. I didn’t need to see. I was going to fill this alley with
steel buckshot.

I took my gun in my
hands, closed both eyes, and stood up and faced the alley.

“Bang! Bang!” The
speaker said again.

I felt the impacts
on both of my hands and I dropped my shotgun. I opened my mouth in shock and
pain.

“Bang!”

I got hit in my
bottom two teeth before I fell back into cover.

Now I was pretty
worried. I was blind. My hands hurt. My jaw ached.

But the voice had
sounded like it was only a short distance closer. They were taking their time
getting here.

Somewhere, out of
the back of my head, I heard Magda Strongarm yelling at me that I was
worthless. I sucked as a glocken player and sucked as a rare-skin smuggler.

Then I thought of
glocken. And practice.

You know, I could
probably throw these big trashcans. Twist them like tokens. And they were wide
enough that they would go bouncing and clanging down this narrow alley so I
didn’t even have to be accurate. I just had to get the distance.

I took hold of the
nearest trashcan, feeling around for the best grip. I could tell it was full.
This one was closest to the street and probably got the most use. I felt it was
maybe 600 pounds in weight. Not massive, but it was boxy and not exactly designed
for throwing.

I thought about
how to position myself in the alley so I wouldn’t smack into the far wall as I
twisted.

I snapped it up,
moved to what I thought was the center of the alley, did two spins, and flung
it.

There was what
felt like a five-second delay and then I heard a scream followed by a crash.

No way! I hit one!
I was just hoping to scare them off.

Now I was standing
there in the center of sniper alley waiting to get shot, but nothing came.

I heard rapid
footsteps approaching and I hunkered down for a frontal attack.

Someone brushed
past me, I heard a swoosh, and they were gone.

My eyes were still
bleeding but I was starting to see some hazy images with my right eye. My teeth
were okay from what I could tell. My hands had been through a lot worse than
this.

The lizard skin
was gone. The person must have snatched it and ran.

I should get out
of here, there was no way they had brought forty million if they were just
going to shoot me. But the idiot in me wanted to be sure, and I also wanted to
admire the fact that I had hit someone with a trashcan from almost forty feet
away.

I got over to the
robed figure on the ground. He didn’t look so hot.

But he wouldn’t
look so hot even if he were still alive. He was a Rettosian.

Rettosians were
one of the major empires in the galaxy. They were ancient and, so I’ve heard,
used to be much more important as a species. Now they were relegated to a smallish
territory and of minor significance.

The stereotype of
them was that they were a conceited race. Like they didn’t realize they were no
longer a big player and acted as if people should take them seriously.

From a physical
standpoint they looked like normal bipedal Colmarians. Except their skin
continuously oozed colorful…syrup. It sounded gross but the Rettosian diplomats
I had seen before wore outfits that would capture and propel the substance into
little waterfalls and trumpets and fountains. It was fairly attractive as ooze
went.

Looking down at
this dead Rettosian, I saw his chest had been punctured by the corner of the dumpster.
Under his robes he wore a plastic compression suit. It kept the ooze in place,
but it swirled around.

I wasn’t an eye
doctologist, but my vision was slowly clearing. I think it was more blood than
anything that blurred my eyesight.

I covered my face
with my hand and peeked upward through my fingers. Where could those shots have
come from? Was someone at the end of the alley and I hadn’t seen them?

With my off-hand I
looked through the large trunk that was still on the ground.

Yup. Empty.

I was about to leave
when I saw a pistol about ten feet away from the corpse.

I walked to it,
still covering myself.

Was it possible
this guy shot me? With a pistol?

I picked it up and
it was clearly a prop of some kind. There was no trigger. No slide. No hammer. No
anything. It was like a toy cutout of a pistol. The only thing that made it
stand out was that it was gleaming chrome. It was so shiny that light seemed to
emanate from it. From a distance it looked two-dimensional because there were hardly
any shadows. On further inspection, I noticed it didn’t reflect. It was
polished to a mirror sheen but had no colors other than chrome.

How strange.

I turned it around
trying to figure out what its purpose was. The Rettosian brought it for some
reason. Clearly someone had a gun, my eyeballs could attest to that.

I foolishly
pressed the empty space where the trigger should be, when I heard:

“What are you
trying to do?”

It was the same
voice that had said, “Bang!” right before I was shot. I was sure of it. It was
just a regular male voice. Clear. Sounded like a banker.

“Uh. Who are you?”
I asked. I was pretty sure the voice came from the gun. Was it a radio? Was
that how the Rettosians had contacted their sniper?

“Who are you?”
the voice replied.

“You know who I
am. Where’s my money!” I demanded from the gun.

“I wouldn’t know,”
the voice said.

“Hey, who are
you?” I yelled, getting my face close to the weapon, assuming it was some kind
of tele.

“Who are any of
us, really? I can’t say.”

I felt exposed in
this alley after having my corneas blasted. There was clearly no money to be
had, so I headed back to my limo, zig zagging like a very sluggish glocken
player. It was rather pointless. If I could get repeatedly shot in the eyes, my
assailant would have no problem hitting my much larger backside.

But I made it out
of the alley, still holding the featureless gun.

“What’s your
name?” I asked the voice, once I was safely away from the alley.

“No one has ever
asked me that before. I’m not sure. I hear the word ‘gun’ a lot. Why not just
call me that?” the voice said.

“Where are you?” I
demanded.

“I don’t know.
You’re the one holding me. You probably have a better idea than I do,” the
voice said.

I got the idea the
voice was trying to say it was the gun itself.

“W-wait. Are you a
Dredel Led or something?” I asked, not sure if this was an elaborate trick and
if so, to what purpose. They already had the fake skin.

“What’s a Dredel
Led?” Gun asked.

“A robot.”

“What’s a robot?”

“Who shot me?” I
asked, changing the subject.

“I did,” Gun said.

“You? You’re a
functioning…gun?”

“I believe so.”

“Why would you do
that?”

“Do what? You are
confusing me,” Gun said.

“Prove it.”

“Prove that I’m
confused?”

“That you’re a
real gun,” I demanded.

“What else would I
be?”

“I don’t know.
Prove it! Shoot something,” I said, waving Gun around.

“I don’t see
anything.”

“You’re lying. Is
this just a tele? Where are you at?” I demanded.

“I don’t know.”

“Just shoot that
wall,” I said, aiming.

“I’m tired,” Gun
said.

“How can a gun be
tired? Who were those Rettosians?”

“What’s a
Rettosian?”

“It’s a…what are
you? Seriously,” I said.

“Didn’t we go over
this?”

CHAPTER 19

I was putting my
stuff on the long-haul shuttle the team used for a bus. We would have nearly a month
in space to reach our next game.

I saw Delovoa and pulled
him aside.

“The deal fell
through. I didn’t get the money,” I said.

Delovoa seemed
indifferent.

“Eh. I got to
stuff an Usk. That was fun.”

I had a million
explanations I was going to use on why he wasn’t going to get his five million
cut, but he didn’t seem to care.

“I also got this,”
I said, holding Gun out to him.

“A toy?”

“No, it’s like…a
sentient gun,” I said, looking around.

Delovoa stared at
me.

“I’m sure it is,
buddy. You look like you got shot in the face. Go to your cabin and I’ll give you
something to help you sleep: really dull music.”

“I’m serious,” I
said. “It had this huge conversation with me. I wanted you to take a look at
it.”

I handed it to the
skeptical Delovoa who turned the shiny chrome weapon over in his hands.

“Hello?” he said
to Gun.

It was silent.

“Let me guess, it
only talks when you’re alone. Um, did this voice happen to tell you that you’re
a space god and you should kill us while we sleep?”

“No. It didn’t say
a lot. Not of substance, anyway,” I said.

“Well, sure. The
pistol education system is totally substandard nowadays. It’s no wonder it
entered a life of crime.”

“Shut up and scan
it. Maybe it’s just a radio or tele. But I want to see,” I said.

“I don’t have my
full lab here. I’m a doctor on board this ship, not a toy repairman.”

“Just look, will
you?”

“You’re awful
demanding for someone who owes me five million credits,” Delovoa called after
me as I walked away.

I turned a corner
and was slapped by Magda Strongarm.

“Where were you?”
she demanded.

“When?”

“Don’t answer my
question with a question!” She yelled.

I thought for a
moment.

“I was in the
bathroom,” I said, choosing a random point in time that she could be referring
to.

“Why are your eyes
bloodshot?” she asked.

“I was practicing
glocken,” I said.

“If you said you
were off drug-binging I’d at least respect that as believable. Report to rehabilitation.
I want them to check you out.”

You wouldn’t think
they would have a bunch of training facilities in a shuttle—or at least I
wouldn’t—but here it was.

They had me read
off an examination chart, and even though I did fine, they started jabbing me
in the eyes anyway. When they were done, I was almost as bad as after I had
been shot.

They put in some
drops and it stung like hell and everything was blurry.

While I was so
incapacitated, they worked over my muscles with what felt like a jackhammer.
They tried to tell me the reasons but I couldn’t hear them over the engine.

I was limping back
to my quarters when someone walked up in front of me.

“Who’s old?” I
heard Garm demand.

“Garm, I can’t see
well, my body hurts, and I’m not in the mood for riddles,” I said.

“Why did you tell
Rendrae I was old?” she said, blocking me from moving past.

“What are you
talking about? Rendrae isn’t even here.”

“You gave an
interview where you called me old.”

“No, I didn’t.
You’re being paranoid. Besides, I’m way older than you,” I said.

Garm took out her
tele and showed me the interview. It was when I was outside of Delovoa’s,
trying to fast-talk away from the reporters.

I couldn’t see it
well, but I could hear it:

“Garm is ancient,” the tape said.

“Really? She’s a
great glocken player,” Rendrae replied.

“Garm is ancient,”
the tape version of me repeated.

“I didn’t say
that. They edited my voice. I said us dating was ancient history. I never
called you ancient,” I complained.

Garm continued to
play the interview.

“By the way, I do
my tight girl, Kitt, nude. Oh, yeah!” The tape continued. It sounded perfect.
Not choppy at all.

“I don’t talk like
that,” I said.

“You dress like it.
You’ve changed, Hank. This glocken stuff is going to your head,” Garm said.

“And why shouldn’t
he change?” Kitt asked, walking up to us naked even though this section of the
ship was fully-clothed. “So,” she said, reaching out and grabbing my crotch,
almost dropping me to the floor, “you want to go to my room and grind some
meat?”

Kitt had a way of
putting me off my game.

“Is that what you
have to offer?” Garm demanded of Kitt.

“More than you
got, dear. I think I had your body just after I got out of diapers. Hank, you
coming?” she asked casually.

“I just got
rehabbed. I can barely see either of you and my back is killing me. I want to
lie down,” I said.

“Suit yourself.
Look me up if you get bored. We got a month here.”

She walked away.

“You got injured?”
Garm asked.

“Yeah. Doing a
lousy job that didn’t pay,” I said.

“Where were you
hurt?”

“My eyes mostly.”

Garm did a
roundhouse kick and hit me in my left eye with the heel of her boot.

CHAPTER 20

There weren’t a
lot of places to hide on a shuttle, even one as large as our tour bus.

I had a lot of
reasons for my subterfuge. I was worried about Garm and Kitt. Also, every time
the coaches caught me, I was rehabbed within an inch of my life. If not that, they
forced me to exercise or watch training videos. Or Candar would give me some mopey
and heartfelt speech about teamwork.

I was not an
exercise kind of guy. I disliked it. It disliked me. We had a mutual misunderstanding.
If I was going to push around heavy weights over and over again there better be
some money or food involved.

Cliston was busy
doing general manager stuff and couldn’t cook for me, so I was left with my
formula in paste or powder form, which was absolutely horrid.

Magda also
realized that slapping me didn’t hurt, so she now carried around an iron plank
which used to be straight but was now bent from her smacking me repeatedly. She
did it mostly when I fell asleep during training.

Recently, I had
been stowing away in the cargo hold with some of the crew. They seemed pretty
excited about being with one of the players and that I was just a normal guy.
That is until Cliston found us and he docked them all an entire week’s wages.
They hated my guts after that.

I was like a fat
burglar, sneaking around the ship trying to go undetected.

And to top it all
off, there wasn’t a drop of alcohol on this whole boat.

Delovoa said he
couldn’t scan Gun, but he only had biological scanners which weren’t especially
good on inorganic substances. If it was a toy, it was a unique one; if it was a
gun, it was a gaudy one; and if it was beaming voices into my head, I should
probably get rid of it.

On a lark I went
to the pilot’s compartment and there was Zzzho behind the glass. He filled up
the whole cockpit.

“Hey, Hank. Can’t
sleep?” he buzzed.

“No, I’m just
avoiding everyone.”

“Come up and keep
me company,” he said.

“Are you going to
zap me?” I asked. I had never been inside a Keilvin Kamigan before and it
didn’t seem a great idea considering he looked like a small thunderstorm.

“Nah, I’ll scooch
over,” he said.

Suddenly half the
cabin, by the door, was empty and clear.

I hesitantly
walked in. I didn’t die or feel my skin crackling, so that was a good sign.

“Have a seat,”
Zzzho said.

I sat in the
co-pilot’s seat. Or maybe it was the pilot’s seat. Or maybe it was the
assistant coffee maker’s seat. How should I know? I didn’t fly ships.

“So how is your
training coming?” Zzzho asked.

“Not good. I would
definitely get fired if they could fire me.”

“Don’t get fired!”
Zzzho said, concerned. “I think I only got this gig because of you and Mr.
Cliston.”

“You made a lot of
money as a cabbie, right?” I asked. “You don’t have to eat or sleep or anything.”

“You kidding? I
had space jerks space-puking in my backseat, not tipping, and I spent all my
time waiting around while someone looked for their luggage or kissed their
mistress. Then they’d run off and not pay, knowing I couldn’t exactly chase
them. No, this is the easy life right here. Pays way more.”

“Why don’t you
become a trucker? Run freighters?” I asked.

“Why don’t you
run freighters?” he shot back. “Those trips can take years. People go crazy in
freighters. I like talking. If people weren’t such pricks, I’d love being a
cabbie. So anyway, work harder on your training. I like this job.”

“I keep falling
asleep during the coursework. I haven’t had a sip of alcohol in three weeks. I
don’t think I’m a drunk or anything, but after a long day of boring stuff, a
drink can take the edge off.”

“Hey, you want a
snort?” Zzzho asked.

“Of what? I’m not really
a drug guy,” I said.

“Of me,” he
answered.

“That’s…I
mean…what?” I stammered. I wasn’t sure if Zzzho was coming on to me or if a gas
cloud could even come on to an Ontakian.

“Yeah. Keilvin
Kamigans sell parts of ourselves as fuel cells. You fleshy things are all
electricity.”

“No, we’re not.
We’re blood and bone and muscle,” I said, thinking he might have us confused
with Dredel Led.

“But you have
electrical impulses and stuff. I’ve done this before. It’s just a tiny amount.”

“You did it to a
Colmarian?” I asked, skeptical.

“Yeah. Sometimes
people pay me for a jolt. Sometimes, when people are trying to skip out on a
fare, I really jam it up there.”

“What up where?” I
asked, alarmed.

“Me up their
noses.”

“This doesn’t
sound good.”

“No, I heard it’s
great. In small doses.”

“Is it like
addictive or something? What’s it do?”

“No, it’s just
electrical. Like a jumpstart,” he said.

“I’m not a car.”

“Just try. You
said you want a drink. Think of it like that. I’ll go easy. Just relax.”

“Don’t go poking
around my lungs,” I warned.

“I won’t.”

I felt a tingle in
my nose and my chest, like I had snorted some static electricity. I rubbed my
face immediately and then sneezed several times.

“See? Not so bad,”
Zzzho said.

I was shaking my
head after sneezing when whamo! Jumpstart was right. I wasn’t
high. I didn’t feel euphoric. My body wasn’t light or giddy.

I was smart!

I gazed around at
all the controls and could tell what they did. Just a quick peek out the window
and I knew the constellations and where we were in the galaxy. But how was that
possible? I hadn’t seen any maps of this area in a century or more, and even
then it was only cursory.

Looking at Zzzho,
I could tell by the pattern of his electrical discharges how he operated the
ship and his means of locomotion.

But I also
understood…glocken.

All the plays made sense to me. Everything we
were doing. And I spontaneously invented a play we had never used before.

I had to run off
and tell Magda. Tell someone before I forgot.

“Thanks, Zzzho.
Thanks again!”

I ran out of the
cabin with the play in my mind. I was fine-tuning it when I thought of Gun.
Something about how he must work.

I went to my
cabin, opened my drawer where I kept the pistol, and picked him up.

“In the grand
design, I suspect it doesn’t matter all that much, but you may wish to be more
careful when handling electricity.”

The voice was
Gun’s. I then felt my whole body go limp and I flopped to the metal floor and lapsed
into unconsciousness.

CHAPTER 21

“Get up, you fat
stink!” I heard Magda scream, from somewhere off in dreamland.

“I’m not fat, I’m
an Ontakian,” I mumbled.

“Ontakian? He’s
delusional. Is he going to be fit to play in forty-eight hours?” she asked.

“Sure, I’ve seen
him survive a lot worse. Just try and make sure he doesn’t have a random drug
test. Because, you know, he’ll fail,” Delovoa answered.

“Get him out on
the field,” she barked, and I heard her distinctive lopsided clomping as she thundered
away.

“You probably
shouldn’t tell people you’re an Ontakian,” Delovoa whispered. “They aren’t the
most popular species in the galaxy.”

I looked up and
saw his twisted face hovering over me, plugged with metal and wires, his brain
case spurting blood, his breath smelling of decay—just normal Delovoa.

“Where am I?” I
asked groggily. I appeared to be lying on a table.

“This is heaven
and I’m God,” Delovoa stated serenely.

“Come on, I know
you won’t be in heaven. What happened?”

“Got me. You were
unconscious for a week,” he said.

“What?”

“Yeah. I have a
hypothesis that it was your body’s manifest hatred of physical activity. You
went into a coma instead of being forced to do cardio and weight training. Like
a defense mechanism.”

“I was unconscious
for a week?”

“Yeah, and you
apparently seem to be hard of hearing,” he said, annoyed.

I tried to swing
my legs around and almost threw up.

“Easy, champ,”
Delovoa cautioned. “I pumped you full of Usk adrenaline to try and wake you up,
but you have two whole days to get in shape.”

“I have a play! A
strategy. I remember it from snorting…well, from before the accident.”

“You can tell
Magda. You’re going to be playing 7-lane.”

“Seven? I’m not 8-lane
defense? Is Grah playing?”

“No, you’re still
on 8-lane defense. You’re going to be 7-lane offense, too. Tobo is
missing.”

No!

7-lane was a thousand-pound
token! I only weighed 2,500 pounds…or so, how could I be expected to run with
something that heavy? How could I be expected to play both offense and
defense? I didn’t have the stamina.

I hurried through
the halls, running into the corners because of whatever amphetamine Delovoa had
dripped into my feeding tubes.

I almost tripped
over Candar. Naked, glistening Candar.

“Hank! Good to see
you up. I need to go over some plays with you,” he said.

“Candar,
fantastic! I have a play. But I shouldn’t be offense. Hey, uh, man. You got a
lump of wax or something on your privates,” I said.

It was hard not to
look down. You tried not to, but still.

“Oh,” he said, and
casually reached down and smeared it around his groin and thighs. He actually did
walk around greased up. I had only been joking about it.

“We need you on
7-lane,” he continued, as if he hadn’t just fondled himself in front of me.
“There’s no one else.”

“Where’s Tobo? My
play needs him,” I asked desperately.

“We don’t know. The
ship landed and within a few days he was gone. No teles. Left his things. No
sign of him or his bodyguards.”

“Why does everyone
have bodyguards except me?” I asked, irritated.

“You don’t have
bodyguards?”

“No.”

“Talk to Magda or
the general manager.”

“Magda won’t give
me any and Cliston will probably make me pay for them—and take 15%.”

“We need to study
plays. With all your absences, you missed most of our tactics sessions.”

“I was
unconscious!”

“I don’t mean just
this week. You also slept during most of the strategy meetings on Belvaille.”

“It’s important to
be rested,” I explained.

“By the way, our
sports cards came.”

He handed me a
small deck of cards. They were electronic portraits with a set of stats.

I leafed through
to find mine. It said “Honk ‘Stank Delicious’” and had a photo of me in
mid-yell as I got hit in the stomach by something or other. The rest of the
card was blank.

“Where are my
stats?” I asked.

“Well, you don’t
actually do anything that is tracked.”

“They spelled my
name wrong. And what’s ‘Stank Delicious’ mean?” I asked.

“I think they
hired the cheapest contractor to make the cards. They either didn’t understand
slang or, I don’t know, maybe they understand it more than I do. Almost
everyone has a nickname,” Candar said.

He was right.
Garm’s nickname was “Footy Lovedove,” which was almost as ridiculous as mine.
Candar’s name was misspelled too, it was “Dandor,” and his nickname was “Pinker
Middleface,” which actually seemed to fit him, though I couldn’t say why. Grah
was simply Grah, and they didn’t give him a nickname. Kitt was “Kittle” and her
nickname was “Boomy Boom Boomy.”

“Did children
write these?” I asked.

“I’m not sure,” he
said. “I wish they had gotten my name right. I changed it once already for the
team.”

“What was your
name before you started playing glocken?” I asked, looking at the rest of the
cards.

“Ca-douer
mah-nostoshian,” he said.

“Not Pinker
Middleface?”

CHAPTER 22

I read somewhere
that the average career of a Super Class glocken player lasted ten games.

Games. Not seasons.

So general
managers like Cliston spent inordinate amounts of time looking through submissions
and profiles trying to find our replacements. I knew for a fact that while we
were here on this ass-pit of a planet, Mapposh 48, there were two dozen people
training at our facility back on Belvaille. They were being put to the test and
the results would be evaluated for that inevitable moment when the current
members of the Belvaille Glocken Team broke down or died.

“His left ankle is
sprained, he’s got a tear in his upper right shoulder, his hip is out of
alignment, and he’s probably suffered at least two concussions,” Delovoa said
of me on the sideline.

“He’s fine,” Magda
waved.

The lucky coin I
had swiped from Ulteem’s flunky wasn’t doing me any good. I spit on it and
threw it in the trash just in case it was bad luck. I was willing to try anything
at this point.

It was hour seven
of a marathon game against the Trapezoid Regunditators.

I had not scored a
point on offense. I had not even left the line of scrimmage. My defensive
counterpart was a brawler with a simple strategy. As soon as the lights flared,
he jumped about twenty feet in the air and came down on me with his 1,500
pounds.

There wasn’t much
I could do. I had to be on the line. I had to be holding the token. I simply
turned this way and that way to try and distribute the blows and last as long
as possible.

On defense, I was
doing a little better. I had stopped their 8-lane from moving. They had a
relatively little guy. He was about four feet tall, but 6,000 pounds. I would just
climb on his back and hold on. Even without me on his shoulders, he could
barely move that 8-lane token.

The score was three
points up for the Trapezoids and had fluctuated only slightly the whole game.
One point them, two points us. Back and forth.

The other players on
my team were in bad shape too, but not as bad as me.

Magda approached,
pushed Delovoa out of the way, and whispered what I needed to do. She
demonstrated with her stunty little limbs what she was talking about.

“Is that legal?” I
asked her, whispering back.

“Let the lawyers
worry about the law. And don’t tell Candar about this,” she warned.

I finished getting
treated, a splint on my leg, hot salve on my shoulder, and lots and lots of
drugs.

I limped out onto
the field to take up my token on offense. I hunched down and hefted it,
positioning my legs like Magda said.

The crummy little
7-lane was thirty feet away, preparing for his airborne bombing run.

The lights
blinked, the horns blared, and I dropped the token. I arched my back, looked up,
and waited.

The Trapezoid
7-lane jumped, his massive legs propelling him high into the sky. But once he
was in flight, he was just a projectile. He couldn’t turn or adjust his trajectory
in any way. I bent over and compressed my legs.

As the defender
came down, I lifted my arms, straightened my legs and back.

My forearms connected
with his chin, my upward force added to his downward force, and I practically
took off his head. I heard a crack and wasn’t sure if it was his protective
gear or bones.

His momentum
carried him bodily into me and I grasped his neck like a vise, trying to hold
him upright even though he was attempting to fall to the ground.

Then with my right
leg, I stepped hard into his shin and twisted with my arms. My weight easily
broke his femur. I had directly, and maliciously attacked a defender, causing
serious physical damage, with no attempt at scoring or even touching a token.

The ref nearest me
signaled all kinds of penalties. I was blanketed with multi-colored flags.

I feigned
ignorance and innocence in equal measures.

“Overzealous
objections!” I yelled.

“Shut up,” the ref
replied.

We were assessed a
sixteen-point fine for my illegal play. Pretty huge.

Candar came over
after the offense was done and screamed at me.

“What do you think
you’re doing? That isn’t how we play!” He said. “Referee, I can assure you that
wasn’t the play I called.”

The ref didn’t
care.

Magda had told me
to do all of it. Demanded. I had taken out their 7-lane, bought us another rest
break, and now the Trapezoid Regunditators were in a jam. They didn’t have
another super-heavy substitute and Magda knew it. That’s why she called the
play.

The Regunditators
only had one guy who could stop Grah and that was most important. So they had
two underweight guys in front of me and Bley-ore.

Magda, when we
were on the sidelines again, told Candar that my actions were deplorable and I
would be held accountable. However, she said we were going with my trick play when
we were back on offense.

No one said it
outright, but I could sense the whole team was happy I had pounded that guy.
Everyone except Candar.

We held the
Trapezoids on defense the next play. We had too much weight on them. We
switched positions on defense. Grah was covering 8-lane and I was covering 7.
We now outweighed them so much we could simply walk forward and tackle them
with ease.

That poor four-foot,
6,000-pound 8-lane had to face off against a ten-foot-tall, 15,000-pound slab
of rock.

Their replacement
7-lane was about a third of my weight, being an upgraded 6-lane.

When it was our
turn for offense, Candar reluctantly signaled for the play that I had dreamt up
after sniffing Zzzho.

I immediately
dropped my token and went behind the line of scrimmage. Garm ran over to me as
we went to the 4-lane. Kitt and Candar blocked for us.

“If you screw this
up, I’ll kill you,” Garm said.

“If I screw this
up, you’ll be dead,” I replied.

Garm squatted down
on Kitt’s 40-pound token and held on to the strap as hard as she could. I
picked the token up by the opposite handle. I then tip, tap, toe, spun, and
threw Garm and the token almost forty-five feet, over the extremely surprised
opposing team. I didn’t get it to land where I wanted, but accuracy didn’t
matter, only distance.

Garm cartwheeled
away from the token in the air, landing gracefully like the expert gymnast she
was.

The token was a
bit heavy for her, but she managed to scoop it up and run the short distance to
the end zone and score. She was completely unopposed.

When I concocted
this play, I had expected Tobo to throw the token, since he was the better Twist,
but he was missing. However, it was Garm who really made the play work. No one
else was good enough, and light enough, to actually be hurled and not end up a
bloody mess. She made it look like she was born to do it.

We repeated this
several times until the defense played shallow, backing up far enough that some
of our slower players, such as me, could get enough room that we had a real
chance of scoring and bringing in the huge points from the top four positions.

It completely
shattered their game.

In five possession
changes, we were up by twenty-three with no end in sight.

The opposing coach
signaled he wanted to quit and Magda accepted.

Victory was ours.

“Now let’s get the
hell out of here before a mob of fans comes to kill me for purposely breaking
that guy’s leg,” I said.

CHAPTER 23

The next day we
were still in the hotel on Mapposh 48, waiting to settle up the purse from the
game.

I got a
tongue-lashing from Candar for my illegal move. He said I had disgraced myself,
disgraced the team, disgraced Belvaille, and disgraced the glocken holy
spirits. I was just a big pile of disgrace.

Magda Strongarm
gave me a tongue-lashing but only in front of Candar. I felt I had turned a bit
of a corner with her. She didn’t exactly give me a sloppy wet kiss or anything,
but she didn’t hit me with her iron bar.

“You need to stop
this,” Cliston said.

“Stop what?” I asked,
seated on the floor of his hotel room.

“You were hired to
make sure no players were abducted. The team had a significant investment in Tobo
and I estimated we had eight to twelve more games out of him.”

“What are you
worried about? You get money from my contract—oh, are you talking to me as
general manager or my butler or what?”

“General manager.”

“But I don’t work
for you as a Factotum, I work for Hobb,” I said.

“You have a
contract with Procon Hobb to assist this team in its operations. You let a
player vanish right under your nose.”

“I was
unconscious!” I said.

“He’s still gone
and you have no leads. The amount of money this team loses every time a player
goes missing is astronomical.”

“Yeah, but I
replaced him. Astronomical? Hey! I want a raise.”

Cliston leaned
back a bit as if he was surprised.

“You’ll need to
talk to your agent about that. I can’t negotiate directly with talent.”

“You’re my agent!”
I yelled.

“Do you want a
raise?” he asked.

“I just said I
did.”

“I think it’s a
good time, too. They really have no alternatives. I’ll see what I can do. I got
you a 35% raise, a food cost fund, wardrobe fund, disability insurance,
reassigned Delovoa as your personal physician, and got you a new limo—one of
Procon Hobb’s, it will need some refitting, but it’s quite spacious. On the
downside, you need to go to one more practice per week, attend anger management
courses, put out a public statement saying you regret your actions in last
night’s game, and you have to work ‘harder’ on loss prevention of players.
Though honestly, they can’t enforce that last one except through Procon Hobb.”

“Wait, did you do
all that with yourself just now?” I asked.

“Yes. It’s a good
deal. I recommend you take it,” my sports agent said.

“Okay, I guess.”

“We aren’t leaving
the planet for a week. I have to check on some prospects here and work out the payment
split with the other team. In the meantime, you need to find out what happened
to Tobo so it doesn’t happen again,” Cliston told me.

“You just said only
Hobb could enforce that!”

“I said no such
thing. And the fact we’re looking at prospects is between you and me. Don’t
tell any of the players.”

“I am a
player,” I said, annoyed. “I’m now 7- and 8-lane.”

“I’m speaking to
Factotum Hank,” the general manager said.

“I can’t go nosing
around in the streets. I did a little research on this dirtball of a world and
it only has one Super Class team. We just beat that team because I did an
illegal play that everyone saw. If I step outside, they’ll rip me apart.”

“I can make you a
disguise, sir,” Cliston said.

I squinted.

“That’s my butler
talking, right?”

“Yes, sir. And
congratulations on your raise.”

Cliston’s idea of
a disguise was two eye-patches, a metal skullcap, diaphanous flowing robes, and
a fake, multicolored beard.

I could see out of
the eye-patches, one was prismed glass and the other had tiny holes. At least I
could see enough to know I looked incredibly silly.

I took a shotgun
with me. The maybe-talking Gun was sitting in my bathroom, on the sink, wrapped
in a towel.

I wasn’t sure what
had knocked me out. Was it inhaling Zzzho? Was it Gun? Was it the combination?
I asked Delovoa and he said that was amazing—and immediately left to snort our
bus driver.

This planet
sucked.

It really showed
me how great Belvaille was and how bad the civil war had been to the rest of
the galaxy. When I did some tele research on Mapposh 48 I found its major
export was sand.

They had a huge
variety of sand here and everyone worked in the sand industry. You’d think it
wouldn’t be worthwhile to transport something that heavy, but it was cheaper
than transporting the rocks and smashing them all up to sand. It wasn’t exactly
a precious commodity, however.

The hotel we were
staying at was massively fortified. Glocken was all this stupid city had and if
our team got murdered, no one was ever going to come here again. People
couldn’t even enter the same street as our hotel.

But I walked out the
front door and left all the security behind with the nebulous goal of looking
for a kidnapped Tobo. Was I supposed to go asking around bars? Maybe pawn
shops?

There was trash
everywhere in the city. The buildings were ruined. It just looked like
everything was on a long, slow decline. All they had was a downtown and that
glocken arena.

What if Tobo
simply quit? I got offered hundreds of millions to throw a game. Tobo leaving
could easily have been worth that. I didn’t see anything more nefarious in all
this than some very capable gangs stepping up to make money.

It was bad for
glocken. But there was nothing in the rules against bribery strictly speaking.
Off the field you could do anything you could get away with. Then again,
glocken fans had a long history of killing people who tried to get away with
stuff, which ended up working a whole lot better than rules, anyway.

After walking
around for a while, I realized my original assessment of Mapposh 48 and its
capital city were unkind. I had mostly gone by tele articles I read and peering
out the hotel windows.

Down at street
level things were pretty vibrant. Lots of stores. Lots and lots of people. It
seemed orderly but not restrictive, like the space station Belvaille back when
it was in Ginland. A bit outlaw and backwater but not embarrassed by those
facts.

I reached the
heart of downtown and it was a true metropolis.

Belvaille was now
dominated by massive buildings owned by nobles and other ultra-wealthy. But here
were utilitarian buildings. And they weren’t constrained by the limits of being
on a space station. The streets were wide. The buildings towering. There was
just…stuff everywhere.

You didn’t have
stuff on Belvaille. There was no room to leave stuff sitting around. Every
square inch of space was used. Here they could have vacant lots and
construction cranes just lounging around like there was no hurry.

I couldn’t
understand how so many people were here, though. It seemed like there was a
person every half-step. They couldn’t all be working on sand. They looked like
normal folks.

Then I realized it
was for the game. They had come from elsewhere on the planet, or System, or
adjoining Systems, to watch my stupid glocken game! How much money was pumped
into this economy from our one game?

No wonder gangs
wanted in on it. No wonder Tobo was gone. Someone who wanted to fix a game
could easily pay him off. And it was a big galaxy to hide in.

I must have
entered the exact center of the city when I looked up to see a tele screen a
hundred feet tall. There were a bunch of symbols looping on the bottom and
sides that I didn’t understand, maybe the prices of various sands, but in the
center was the glocken game from last night.

Specifically, my
illegal play. It looped over and over from different angles.

It was weird
seeing me up there that big. I looked like a Therezian. And it was really
obvious I had cheated.

I stood gazing at
it and then my brain kind of flipped. I guess because I was looking at myself.
Not at myself in the game, but standing here right now.

I raised my hand
and the hand on the tele screen raised. I turned my head to the right and the
screen-me turned to the left. I touched my chin, complete with fake beard, and the
screen version of me did as well.

“Hey, it’s Hank
the glocken player,” someone said. The way they said it was completely
artificial, like they weren’t surprised at all.

It was Xandale! He
was standing about twenty feet away smiling at me with his giant teeth. He gave
me a tiny salute.

A guy came up
behind me, looking from the screen to my face and back. Then another person
came up on the other side.

It was dawning on
the tens of thousands of people who happened to be milling around, that the
villain of last night’s game was standing amongst them.

CHAPTER 24

I was neither fast
nor graceful.

Especially when I
was wearing two eyepatches, had my sprained ankle in a cast, my hip in a
horizontal traction brace, and I was wearing about twenty different flowing
robes all layered and twisted about each other.

As I plowed
through the angry mob downtown, trying to escape, no one was saying, “Now there
goes a fast and graceful guy.”

But plow I did.

Crippled or not, I
was still a Super Class glocken player. While these diehard fans expressed
their very deep desires to see me slaughtered, they quickly learned the
difference between being a fan of glocken and an actual player of glocken.

They were little
more than speed bumps as I charged through them.

As I tried to
remember my way back to the hotel, I was dragging at least three people who
were holding on to my clothes, my legs, and one was wrapped around my head
somehow.

To my credit, I
wasn’t trying to hurt anyone, but they were sure as hell trying to hurt me.

Magda was right,
though, I couldn’t run for long. I didn’t have the endurance. Especially since
I was likely running in circles. It’s not like I could stop and ask for
directions.

I needed someplace
where I could put my back against the wall and try and sort this out.

“Heads up!” A gruff,
male voice yelled.

Like an idiot, I
looked up.

Poof!

I was blinded by a
tremendous flash of light. Afterwards, I felt a powerful hand on my arm, not
like the fingers of the disgruntled fans that had been clutching at me, but a hearty
grip that even I could appreciate.

“Follow me,” the
gruff voice said.

It didn’t say it
with malice. It said it with urgency. And urgency was miles better than
anything I’d heard since my image was broadcast on that big tele screen.

Blind, I stumbled
after the pulling voice.

I felt myself
tripping over and through people, but they were limp and powerless. Everyone
was blinded, at least for the moment.

My vision returned
and after a while we were no longer running over pedestrians but were splashing
along an alley.

Splashing.

I think other than
vomit, this was the first time I had ever seen liquid on pavement. I was so
used to life on a space station that I was momentarily struck by this small
detail even as my life was in jeopardy.

My guide was
dressed in a bulky jacket and had a breathing apparatus that covered his entire
face.

“Hey, you’re that
guy,” I said. It was the janitor from the training facility some months ago.

“Let’s try here,”
he said, pulling me to a door at random.

It was a big steel
door with a big steel lock. He put his shoulder into it and the door
surprisingly broke open.

Inside it was dark.
From what I could see it appeared to be a storage room of some sort.

He replaced the
door and turned on his tele to shed some light.

“Quick, how much
cash do you have on you?” he asked.

“I…like a few
thousand credits I think,” I said, rummaging through my clothes.

“That’s it? A big
glocken player like you?”

“I don’t carry a
lot. My butler has the rest,” I said, giving him the stack of plastic bills. I
assumed it was going to help me get out of this jam.

“You have a
butler?” he asked, his voice still urgent as he counted the money.

“So, where are
we?” I asked, killing the silence as he counted.

“Mapposh 48,” he
said, without looking up.

“I know what planet
I’m on,” I said.

“Gyor-bah City,”
he added.

“I know that,”
I added, though I hadn’t actually known the name of the city. “How do we get
out of here? What do you need the money for?”

“I owe some
people,” he said, with the same urgency. “We can’t talk here, but I have a lot
to tell you.”

“Who are you?”

He reached up and
unfastened his mask, which was held tight with several clasps and made a
suction noise. When it was off, he stared at me.

“Who do I look
like?” he asked.

He was pale,
probably from wearing that mask, had strong features, looked middle aged,
needed a shave, and I could tell he was a muscular guy just from his face.

I really had no
idea.

“Tobo?” I asked, though
he looked nothing at all like him.

“What? No. Why
would you say that? Tobo has one arm,” he replied, raising his two arms,
annoyed.

I shrugged.

“Maybe we should
just get back to the hotel and talk there,” I offered.

“I’m your uncle,”
he said.

If I had been
given infinite guesses, I would not have come up with that. I wasn’t so much
surprised as irritated he would think I could possibly guess that. I didn’t really
know my parents, let alone whether or not I had an uncle, and whether or not he
was alive and hanging out on Mapposh 48 wearing a mask.

“Hi,” I said, my
voice tight.

“You don’t
recognize me?” he asked, surprised.

“How would I
recognize you? Have I ever met you?”

“When you were a
baby. But I just meant our faces are similar. Right? My nose has been broken
more I think. But our chins are almost the same.”

“I was supposed to
know you’re my never-before-met uncle because you have an almost similar chin?”
I asked.

Man, this sucked.
Everyone in my family was stupid.

“Yeah, let’s get
back to your hotel,” he said, urgent again. He began refastening his mask. “You
know this air is toxic to you.”

“And I assume you
get imported air from Ontakian?” I asked.

“Ontak. No, our
planet is destroyed. But it’s not a very difficult mixture. The key is a little
fluorine. It would kill a Colmarian in a few huffs, but it keeps us nice and ventilated.
Want to try it?” he asked.

I was still not
completely comfortable with the idea of being an Ontakian. I was even less
comfortable with sucking down the poisonous air of a random stranger who may or
may not be a relative.

“Not now, I’m
good. Hey, not to be rude or anything, but how do I know you’re my uncle?”

“Well, I know your
name isn’t really Hank.”

“What is it then?”
I challenged. He was right, I had changed my name long ago.

“I don’t
remember,” he said.

“How do you not
remember? And how do you know it’s not Hank?”

“I only met you
when you were a baby, it’s not like we hung out. ‘Hank’? That’s some Colmarian
crap. Sounds like a sneeze,” he said.

“What’s your
name?” I asked.

“IG12822,” he
said.

“What was my
father’s name, then?”

“IG12821, we were
brothers.”

“That wasn’t his
name,” I said. “What was my mom’s name, 12820?” I asked skeptically.

“No, her name was
MAC1791. And your father changed his name to hide his identity.”

I slowly took out
my tele and wrote down those numbers. It sounded far-fetched, but I thought I
should remember my parent’s names if he was legit.

“Are my parents
still alive?” I asked.

“Nope. Dead, like
most Ontakians.”

I had a lot of
questions but my uncle sighed and cut me off.

“So most people
wanted to fight the Colmarians when they came ‘asking’ us to join the
Confederation. We didn’t want to be under another empire ever again. I knew it
was a doomed fight. Your father knew. Sooner or later that many Systems were
going to win against our small world, even if the Confederation was
ass-backwards. However, there was a standing agreement that anyone who wanted
to leave Ontak could do so if they joined the Colmarian Navy. Your
father had a new son and I wanted to live. So we headed for the nearest ship
and surrendered.”

“What about my
mother?” I asked.

“She stayed and
fought. Ontakians can be pretty stubborn,” he said.

“I know,” I
answered, thinking back to my few encounters with them.

“Your father told
me he was going to let you grow up as a Colmarian. He even figured that with
enough time, bureaucratic slip-ups, and bribes, they wouldn’t even know you
were an Ontakian and would think you were just a weird mutant,” he said.

“Yeah,” I
answered, shocked. “They did. They ran all kinds of tests on me trying to rate
my mutant level. They never found out I was an Ontakian and not a mutant.”

“Oh, you’re a
mutant,” he said. “Just an Ontakian one.”

CHAPTER 25

I was still
digesting the news I was an Ontakian mutant when my uncle began rearranging my
outfit in an attempt to make me less conspicuous.

“You know, I lost
a lot of money on you,” he said absently.

“When I was a baby?”
I asked, confused.

“No, no. Last
night on the game. Who taught you to throw players?” he asked.

“You bet against
me?”

“Not against you,
specifically. You were down a man and I knew the odds were dropping and I had
to lock in the bet early. Seemed a sure thing.”

He had taken off
most of my robes and was turning them inside-out and wrapping them around me
like a body turban. Cliston—the butler, Cliston—would be horrified. The other
Clistons probably wouldn’t care.

“Is that why you
need money? To cover your gambling loss?”

“I just owe people.
We’ll talk on that later. We need to get you to safety. You ready?” he asked.

He had removed my
eye-patches, skullcap, fake beard, and basically covered me head-to-toe.

“I guess,” I said,
and I took out my shotgun.

“Put that away. If
you shoot someone they’ll investigate and make you stay. You aren’t a Factotum
here, you’re a Super Class cheat.”

“Magda told me
to,” I blurted.

“Well, it worked.
She’s a great coach. I was dumb to bet against her. But the odds were there,”
he lamented. “Let’s go.”

We exited our
hide-out and it was dark. Really dark. It never got this dark on Belvaille. I
kept blinking my eyes and rubbing my face because I assumed something was
blocking my vision. I hadn’t been on a real planet that orbited a star in
hundreds of years, supposedly when my uncle was nearby, forgetting my name.

I lurched around
the street with my arms outstretched.

We finally reached
some roads that had half-decent street lamps, but they were still nothing
compared to Belvaille’s latticework. They were like big flashlights and made
the area seem creepy and dangerous.

Using our teles,
we plotted a few different routes to the hotel, wanting to have multiple
options in case we ran into trouble.

We passed some
pedestrians and a few cars, but for the most part the city had gone quiet. Such
a contrast from just a while ago when the streets were teeming with mobs
thirsting for my blood. No one seemed to recognize me.

In fact, no one
gave two large, swaddled and masked men a second glance. We probably looked
fairly intimidating in these dark streets.

We were only a
block away from the main road to the hotel when we saw them: a group of about
fifty guys, clearly agitated, clearly drunk.

“You got any more
of those flash bombs?” I asked.

“No. Do you think
you can run through?”

“I’m not sure, you
took off my hip brace. If it spasms, I’m going down.”

“It was too bulky
and obvious. I’m trying to make you look like a Galdo Trader, and they don’t
wear hi-tech sports gear,” he said.

The men were
starting to look our way and talk.

“Well, come on,”
he said.

If a fight started,
I didn’t think the military around the hotel would help. They wouldn’t know who
was who. We had to get past this group.

My uncle walked
forward confidently. I limped forward less confidently.

The men were
turning to us as a whole and there was some shouting and questions and
challenges.

“I’m going to eat
you alive and crap out your souls!” My uncle yelled.

That wasn’t a bad
catchphrase. Not as good as my, “Eat suck, suckface,” but it was okay. I would
probably change it to, “I’m going to eat you alive and crap out your souls and
then eat up your souls and crap those out…again.” No, that didn’t work, it was
too long. I was just hungry, so I was thinking about eating stuff.

My uncle lifted
something from inside his coat and held it aloft with his right arm.

Its design
resembled a torch, but metal, and clearly electronic.

It then burst into
a kind of light. Not a red or blue or green, but the opposite. It was bright
but it turned the entire street negative. I could see only blacks and purples
and dim whites! Everything was in high detail and contrast, but devoid of color.

There was also a
sound and pressure. It hit my eyes like I had been dropped at the bottom of an
ocean. It felt like I was completely cloaked in lead.

I lifted my arm
and was almost surprised it came up with no effort. I felt like I should be
weighted down. I looked at my hand and it was purple and black with white
highlights.

After a second or
two, the pressure thumped ominously and its strength increased.

It was all so
disorienting.

My uncle stood
there with his torch aloft and the tip of it was pure white. The whitest thing
I had ever seen. It was like a hole in the universe and you could push your
hand straight through into another reality.

The mob was having
none of this and sobered up rather quickly. They stumbled around
because, as I learned when I took a few steps, you had almost no sensation in
your body because of the pressure. You had to watch where you stepped instead
of feel. And of course our vision was twisted.

People were
falling over themselves and clunk-walking around to try and get away.

The pressure kept
ratcheting up and I tried to put my hand on my uncle’s shoulder. Not only to
remind him I was here, but to steady myself. I missed, because my
depth-perception was off and I couldn’t quite feel my shoulder and arm working
like usual.

When most of the
non-passed-out mob had successfully left the road, my uncle turned off the
device.

Immediately my
vision was restored and the pressure went away.

“Was that…was that
an Ontakian plasma weapon?” I asked.

“Nah. I think it’s
a wrench. For plumbing. Or gardening. Or something for zoos. I don’t know,
really. Let’s go.”

CHAPTER 26

The security guards
and hotel staff were not happy to see me after I had cheated their home team, but
they didn’t stop us.

In my room we
finally relaxed.

My uncle began
helping himself to drinks from the cooler.

“Now that we’re
okay, what other proof do you have you’re actually my uncle? I remember my
father. I remember him working for the Colmarian Navy. Just like all my
relatives going back forever. That’s why I fled to Belvaille in the first
place, so I wouldn’t have to do that,” I said.

This had been
bothering me. Chin or not, Ontakian plasma shovel or not, catchphrase or not,
he could simply be a good liar. It didn’t match any of the information I had.

“I tracked you
down to Ginland and sent you your father’s uniform and a plasma pistol,” he
said casually.

Almost no one knew
about that plasma pistol! No one alive. That alone was a pretty big credential.

“Why didn’t you
tell me I was an Ontakian when you sent them?” I asked.

“What good would
that do you? I was using the Colmarian mail system. I didn’t know if it would
even reach you or if anyone would read it. I don’t go around bragging I’m an
Ontakian and I don’t recommend you do either. Of all the empires the Colmarian
Confederation battled, the Ontakians inflicted some of the most damage and never
surrendered. The Colmarians are no friends of our people. And the feeling is more
than mutual.”

“Yeah, I’ve met
some fairly agitated Ontakians. But you could have told me so much more, so
long ago,” I complained.

“Look, you’re
alive. I’m alive. That’s more than can be said for 99% of the Ontakians,
including your parents. What you should think about is that your father might
have died killing your mother so you could grow up as a Colmarian. Not whether
your uncle did this or didn’t do that.”

Bam! That hit me
hard.

“He was fighting
in the war against the Ontakians?” I asked.

“Did you think the
Navy was going to let Ontakians join up and become dance instructors?”

“Why would my
mother fight? Why didn’t she just leave like my father?” I asked.

“Like I said, most
Ontakians were never going to submit. It’s what broke us free of the
Rettosians.”

“Rettosians? What
do you mean?”

“You kidding?” he
asked.

“No.”

“I guess they
didn’t teach you this in Colmarian school. We Ontakians were created by the
Rettosians. Genetically crafted. We were their slaves. We worked for them,
fought for them, invented for them. They made us too good and when we realized
it, we rebelled.”

“I never liked
Rettosians,” I said. “I just killed one a month or so ago.”

“Good,” he said,
finishing the last of the booze in the entire suite.

“You said I’m a
mutant. What can I do?”

“Don’t you know?”
he asked.

“I mean, maybe. I
don’t get to compare myself to average Ontakians all that much.”

“No one can heal
like you do. That’s not normal. Ontakians are strong. We’re resilient, but we
can’t knit together muscles and organs like you. Also, you’re much, much
heavier than a normal Ontakian.”

“I thought that
was because I wasn’t eating and drinking right?” I said.

“I don’t know
about that, but there’s no other Ontakian who could play 8-lane in Super Class
without getting flattened in the first play. And I read about you fighting a
Therezian!”

“It wasn’t a
fight, he just stepped on me,” I said.

“The fact you’re
still alive proves that’s a mutation.”

“I thought only
Colmarians were mutants,” I said.

“They just figured
out how to do it. Then they forced it on their population because they were crazy.
But any species can mutate. I’ve seen other Ontakian mutants and even Rettosian
mutants. It’s just really rare.”

“Why didn’t you
come to me earlier? I didn’t know any of this,” I grumbled.

“I have my own
life, you know,” he said. “I got to use the head.” He walked off to the
bathroom.

I stood there
scratching my Ontakian-mutant, fake-Colmarian head.

He came out a few
minutes later holding a towel.

“Hey, lift that
bed,” I said.

He put the towel
on the desk. It was wrapped around Gun.

“That’s a
Rettosian pistol,” he said.

“I know. Lift the
bed,” I pointed.

He sighed.

He bent over, put
his arms wide, and took hold of the bed. He lifted with his knees and pulled
together with his arms and the king-sized bed rose and splintered like it was a
toy model.

“Where did you get
that pistol?” he asked.

“That Rettosian I
killed. Why?”

“Those things are
worth a lot. More than a plasma weapon. It’s only a pistol, but they can do a
lot of harm. Does it work?” he asked.

“It shot me in the
eyes. And it talked to me.”

“Shot you in the
eyes and you wonder how you’re a mutant? What did it say?”

“It seemed like it
had a personality. But I don’t know. It didn’t talk much and it might have
knocked me unconscious for a week. I don’t want to mess with it.”

“I can try and
sell it if you want,” he said. “Split it 50/50.”

“I…I think I’m
okay for now. I got a guy who can look at it. How do you know what they can
do?”

“Rettosians used
to have the best technology. Those guns killed a lot of Ontakians during our
rebellion,” he said.

“What happened to
the Rettosians? I heard they used to be really important but I don’t know much
about it.”

“Rettosians were
second only to the Boranjame at one point. Then they hit the Age of Decadence.
It was a philosophical movement which caused them to give up nearly all
pursuits that had a productive outcome. They relied on slaves and servants
until their empire shrank. That was when the Ontakians rebelled. They didn’t
always have that waterfall look either, they mutated themselves. So, hey, can I
borrow some money?” he asked.

“More than what I
just gave you?”

“Well, yeah,” he
answered.

I didn’t like
lending people money. Because I didn’t like trying to collect. Threatening to
break the kneecaps of your friends was never fun. But lending to family was
even weirder—especially since I thought all my family was dead and I still wasn’t
sure if this guy was my uncle.

“Family” was a completely
new concept to me.

I went to Cliston
to see how much money I had in reserves. Cliston wanted to get payment terms
and interest rates from my uncle but I quashed all that.

My uncle asked if
I could swing thirty million! I said I could give him ten.

He begrudgingly
took the vast sum of money, which was transferred to an anonymous bank account.

Back in my room he
scooped up the restocked liquor from my cabinet.

“You sure you
don’t want me to sell the gun?” he asked.

“Yeah. So tell me
what my parents were like?” I asked.

“My brother was a
prick. Your mother I didn’t know well. We weren’t very close. So look, thanks
for the money. I need to be heading out. Got a few people I need to see and
more than a few people I need to avoid,” he said, heading to the door.

“What? You just
got here! I have a ton of questions!”

“I’ll be in touch.
You’re easy to find. Here. Get this analyzed and start breathing that,” he
said, and he handed me a small tank of gas. “I’m guessing your mutation takes
care of most of it, but it still can’t be good to breathe this air.”

“What’s your tele
at least?” I asked.

“This is a
disposable. They can track and monitor those teles, you know,” he said. “Good
luck, ‘Hank.’ You turned out great. My brother would probably be proud.”

My uncle opened
the door and walked out into the hallway.

CHAPTER 27

I stood there
trying to process everything that just happened.

My entire history
had been rewritten in like three hours. Almost seven hundred years of
hard-living had been turned on its head.

Had I been conned?

I looked at my
tele.

IG12821, IG12822,
and MAC1791. It was a cute family tree.

I read over them a
dozen times trying to see if there was some code. Like if I rearranged the
letters it would be a joke thanking me for the money.

He knew about my plasma
gun and my father’s clothes. I don’t know if I told anyone about that. He knew
I was an Ontakian. He was pretty strong. He had an Ontakian device. And his
chin did look a bit like mine.

Mother Madchay’s Molars,
why couldn’t he have told me more?

I went to use the
bathroom and noticed my uncle didn’t flush. His urine was blue.

My pee wasn’t blue.

I suddenly
remembered that Xandale had been here. He had been the one who fingered me in
the city square. There was no reason he should be on this planet, which was far
removed from Belvaille and anything of value that wasn’t sand.

I wondered if my
“uncle” could have been one of Xandale’s rent-a-Factotums. Xandale might have
been able to research enough on me to pull off that trick and get me to pay him
ten million credits. But as much as it was, it probably wasn’t a lot of cash for
Xandale considering all the jobs he got. He had to be on the planet for other
reasons.

You know, Xandale’s
Univox Factotal would be the perfect organization to kidnap glocken players
like Tobo. He had the manpower, the weaponry, and ability to move around in any
circles. But what the hell could Xandale get out of it? I didn’t think of him
as much of an abductor. The risks were awful high for that kind of work, and
Xandale was paranoid about his reputation. The reasons I wouldn’t throw a game
were the same ones I had a tough time seeing Xandale be a kidnapper—if he got
found out, there were a few million sports fans who would be willing to murder
him.

Throwing caution
to the wind, I walked to the desk and picked up Gun, bracing myself for another
trip to Unconscious Land.

Nothing happened.

“So. Are you a
Rettosian gun?” I asked.

“What’s a
Rettosian gun?” Gun answered.

“Who made you?”

“I was not around
to witness my own creation.”

“But you were with
that Rettosian. The one I hit with a trashcan.”

“I don’t
understand any of that.”

“So you’re a
Rettosian gun?” I tried to confirm.

“I have no idea
what that is. I suppose I’m a gun, though it seems a rather limiting
definition.”

“Do you know what
those guys were trying to do with the skin?”

“Almost none of
what you just said makes sense to me,” Gun answered.

“Did they mention
a deal? Or Hank?” I asked.

“I don’t pay much
attention to people talking. All of that is background noise and rather
confusing to me.”

“Did you
electrocute me? Knock me unconscious?” I asked.

“Not that I’m
aware of. But I’m not sure what my awareness really is. I could be dreaming
this. If I can dream. Which I’m not certain about.”

“I was unconscious
for a week,” I grumbled.

“How do you know
you still aren’t?”

“How did you shoot
me in the eyes? Multiple times! Is that Rettosian a good shot?”

“I shot you. As
for how, I can’t say.”

“Could you…could
you shoot me in the eye now?” I asked a little uneasily.

“I suppose if I
could see you. I can’t see you.”

I was holding Gun
in my hand so I guessed he could only see what was down the barrel—if he was
telling the truth.

“Okay. So, how old
are you?” I asked.

“I don’t know. How
old are you?”

“Maybe five
hundred years? Six hundred? Something like that.”

“What’s a year?”

CHAPTER 28

“I’m pretty sure Tobo’s
disappearance was gambling related,” I said to Cliston.

“Why would you
believe that?” he asked.

We were sitting in
my kitchen back on Belvaille. There had been some stink about letting us,
specifically me, leave the planet after the game, but they didn’t have any
legal grounds to detain us.

I was still
nursing my injuries and currently drinking a cup of coffee after my breakfast.
Outer space sucked. I was glad to be home.

“Well, I was
offered a lot of money to throw a game. Hundreds of millions. From Ulteem. I
figured if he offered me, he could have offered Tobo,” I said.

“And Yorsh and
Porj?” Cliston asked.

“Sure. All the
guys who are missing. If I took that money, I would have to vanish quick.
Leaving my dirty underwear behind would be easy. The more things I left, the
more it would look like a kidnapping or murder. That way people wouldn’t try
and find me. Family…well, I guess you could buy a new one with that much money,”
I said.

“Why didn’t you
tell me this? We could have taken that deal,” Cliston said.

“What? I thought I
was supposed to find the missing players.”

“I’m talking as
your sports agent now. How much was it exactly? Do you think you could go
back?”

“No. I don’t think
so. I do want to point out an alternate theory. I saw Xandale on Mapposh 48. If
it was a kidnapping, his army of Factotums could have done it. But I
wouldn’t take that contract and I can’t imagine Xandale taking it either, it’s
too dangerous. Wait. Should I be talking to you about this? I work for Procon
Hobb when it comes to my Factotum duties.”

“He has turned it
over to me. He can’t be supervising one agent directly. He has a vast empire.”

“Who said you
could take another job? You’re already a general manager and butler and sports
agent. I can’t keep you all straight as it is,” I complained.

“Managing your
Factotum duties is under the jurisdiction of general manager. But how do I know
you aren’t just telling me that story because you’re too lazy to look for the
missing players in earnest?” some Cliston asked.

“Hey. You can’t
know I’m lazy. The general manager guy. Maybe the butler. Maybe my sports
agent. But you’re cheating.”

“I’ve been told. I
had to sub-contract your Factotum liaison because this is not my expertise. I’d
like you to meet your new point-of-contact on this assignment,” he said.

Cliston motioned
and I saw Garm leaning against the kitchen doorframe.

“He’s probably
lying. I doubt he looked at all,” Garm said.

“No. She can’t be
my boss. She’s one of the people I would ask for help on the job. And she’s my
co-glocken person. And she shares my sports agent. And she’s mad at me for calling
her ugly or something when I was trying to escape from Rendrae.”

“You still work
for Procon Hobb. Just twice removed,” Garm stated calmly.

“This is stupid.
You all can’t keep these jobs straight. Between the three of us, there’s like
ten people in this room,” I said.

“I can write down
a flow chart if you wish, sir,” Cliston said.

“Butler?” I asked
suspiciously.

“Yes, sir?”
Cliston answered, as if he were confused why I was confused.

I stood up to go.

“You guys do
whatever you want. I’m going to do Factotum stuff.”

“So why didn’t you
take Ulteem’s offer?” Garm said.

“Who’s asking?” I
answered suspiciously.

“Just me.”

“Well, I don’t
know what else I would do with my life. Sit on a beach somewhere and stare at
my toes? And honestly, I don’t think I could guarantee a loss unless I shot
everyone in the locker room. I’m not exactly a star player,” I said.

I quickly pointed
at Cliston.

“And that last
part I said to my sports agent, not the general manager!”

Actually, I wasn’t
going to do Factotum stuff. Not really.

I had to go to the
first of my anger management classes because of what I did to that player in
the last game. It was all over the glocken sports news.

The office was in
the south of the space station. A new building, cheap by Belvaille standards.

There was no
doorman. The carpet was second-rate. The elevator load capacity was low. The
furnishings were dull and uninspired.

Everything about
the building said it was the temporary home of upscale vagabonds trying to get
a foothold on Belvaille.

My “counselor’s”
office door had his name on a thin plastic card. There was no buzzer or knocker
or anything. I walked in.

The first room
was, no kidding, about ten feet wide and five feet long. He better hope he didn’t
counsel any claustrophobes. There was another door ahead of me.

Two fluffy chairs
were in the waiting area but I could tell they would collapse under me. A one-foot
electric fountain gurgled pathetically in the corner, but it sounded like a
deluge. It was playing a recording of some great ocean, as if you might be
fooled into thinking those five cups of water were really a glacial snowmelt.

It was stuffy in
here. I don’t know how. Belvaille was climate controlled. You had to go out of
your way to make it this uncomfortable.

My counselor
opened the door facing me wearing an angelic smile.

“Hank? Come in,
won’t you?” he said.

I walked into the
next room which was about twice the size of the waiting area. There was one
large couch, a desk, some reference books, and a chair for the counselor.

I sized him up
immediately.

He looked past
middle-aged. Had brownish skin and was very thin. He wore a suit that didn’t
fit and had on some jewelry that was out of style and seemed clunky on him. I
could tell he had gone out of his way to put on his best attire. I bet he
looked himself over and under in the mirror trying on this and that. But he
just didn’t get it.

This was
Belvaille. He looked like a hobo who had stumbled on a few pieces of jewelry
some noble threw out of his limo after finding them under the seat cushions.

“Sit down, won’t
you?” he said, resting in his chair.

“I’ll stand, your
couch won’t hold me,” I said.

“Ah, yes. I’m
terribly sorry about that,” he said, crossing his legs.

This guy was
trying to be the big player in this encounter, the doctor, but he was clearly
out of his element. I felt a little bad for him.

“Before we begin,
can I ask a bit about you? I don’t like pouring my soul out to just anyone,” I
said.

“Of course. I
understand. It’s not easy sharing.”

“Yeah. So where
did you go to school?”

“Yornothi Medical.
It’s in Hamelin Cote System. A space station. Not unlike Belvaille,” he said.

He could have
burped and I wouldn’t have known if that was the real name of a medical school—or
any school for that matter. I was just trying to gauge his response. He seemed
proud of his background, but comparing it to Belvaille was far-fetched. I got
the sense he thought that I was so dense I had to be given an example of
what a space station was.

“Do you live here
now?” I asked.

“Only for the time
being,” he said.

I was probably his
only patient.

“Now how about you?
Did you go to school?” he asked pleasantly.

I sighed.

“So look. I get
it. This is a job. You were hired because I got rough with a professional
glocken player. Glocken players are expensive. I should know. The other teams
want assurances that I’m not going to break one of their player’s legs—as if
glocken were some genteel pursuit,” I said.

He was blinking
and I saw he was about to interrupt me.

“One second. Let
me get through with this, please. I’m not sure how much you know about me. I’m
about 800 years old. I helped start the Colmarian civil war. I was a gangster.
I was a cop. I was a governor. I’ve killed lots and lots of people. But I
almost never did it because I was angry. They’re just jobs. Like your job.”

The counselor’s
mouth wasn’t quite open, but he was a lot less comfortable.

“You got better
things to do and I got better things to do. I can pretend to be angry and talk
about my fear of commitment and whether or not I wet the bed, but I’ll give you
100,000 credits to just go away. Tell your bosses I’m progressing nicely and go
spend time with your family or take on real patients who need your help,” I
said.

“Um. Hank, I’m not
sure where this is coming from, but you have to realize that ethically I can’t
possibly do that. Those things you mentioned, I have to imagine cause you
considerable angst. It may even hinder your glocken playing. I think we should
try and work through them,” he said earnestly.

I had gone in too
fast. That was my mistake. This guy was legit and probably had pretty decent
credentials. I should have tiptoed a little longer. But no turning back now.

“I don’t lose any
sleep over what I’ve done. I lose sleep over what I haven’t done and
what’s sitting on my plate. Right now I got a lot of things to do and this
isn’t one of them. Doc, I’m a Factotum. I’m not sure you know what that is, but
I do a lot of…questionable things on behalf of other people. Sometimes very
questionable. But that’s the galaxy we live in. I do a lot of negotiations—like
this one. The first few passes, I try and make things a victory for all sides
involved. But if they won’t take the offer, well, sometimes I got to make it
less of a victory for one side.”

I gave a pause
while he soaked that in.

“What I’m saying,
Doc, is that my anger management sessions are over.”

CHAPTER 29

I was up to my
waist in a thick gelatinous paste.

Supposedly, it
would help me mend my various ailments, but I think it was a lot of nonsense.
It did smell nice and it did give me a tingly buzz, so I wasn’t in a hurry to
get out.

However, it came
with a price.

Sitting next to me
in the goo was Rendrae and Oxobox. They looked like little boulders that had
fallen into mud.

“Hank. I need to
ask you about ‘the play.’ It’s all everyone wants to know about,” Rendrae said
delicately.

I had been coached
a bit on how to deal with the press, but I was already used to double-speak. I
had been doing this stuff for a long, long time with some very dangerous
people.

“Well, Rendrae, as
I stated to the Trapezoid Regunditators, I’m terribly sorry for my actions. I
had gotten caught up in the moment and I was clearly being out-played. My
frustrations got the better of me,” I said.

“Do you think you
should be sanctioned?” Rendrae asked, as if there were a sanctioning body.

“I know going into
every game that my life is on the line. It’s what glocken is about,” I said.

“When you were
down three points, I was surprised that you went with a cross-pattern
flip-reverse split on two possessions. That cost you another five points. Do
you have any insight into why those plays were called?” Oxobox asked. He tried
to roll around in the paste, but was merely spinning slowly, coating himself.

“Sometimes the
right plays are called and sometimes they aren’t. Sometimes they’re the right
play at the wrong time and sometimes the play was wrong but the timing was
right,” I said, and I splatted my hands in the slime as if to drive the point
home.

“Tobo is no longer
a part of your team, is that correct?” Rendrae asked.

“I don’t follow
those things. You’ll have to talk to the front office,” I dodged.

“If Tobo is gone,
do you think you can adequately take his place? Despite your last game, you are
not a Twist of his experience and your running skills are extremely sub-par. Or
are you looking to make the Mound of Pounds both an offensive and defensive
unit?” Oxobox asked, now completely covered.

“My main goal is
to focus on recovery and my handling skills. I’ll do my part when and where I’m
called on to do it,” I said.

“Even if it
requires you to perform illegal plays?” Rendrae asked slyly.

“Can we go
off-record for a second?” I asked.

Rendrae looked at
the ball of mud next to him.

“Sure,” he said,
and he switched off his camera.

“Aren’t you
supposed to be our team announcers? What’s with the hardball questions?” I
asked.

“I also do my own
news program. I just edit out the bad stuff for the team’s tele channel,” he
answered.

I threw my arms
up, splattering goo everywhere.

“What is it with
everyone being ten different things? Why can’t people just stick to a role and
do it? I don’t know what half the people are anymore!”

“You’re a Factotum
and glocken player. How many assignments are you currently working on? You
think I didn’t see that big bloody pile in your arms at Delovoa’s?” Rendrae
challenged, like the die-hard reporter he was.

I sat a moment.

“Fair enough. But
the official word is I didn’t mean to break that guy’s leg. If you want to
speculate otherwise in your other program, that’s fine,” I said.

“Are you concerned
about the short lifespan of glocken players? There seems to be a finite supply
of Super Class-level recruits and you can’t replace them faster than they
disappear,” Oxobox asked.

“Well, when I’m
gone, I won’t especially care how the Belvaille Glocken Team does without me,”
I said. But then I realized that was a stupid thing to admit. “I mean, I’ll
care. I’ll care a lot. Just not the same way. Not…as a player. But as a
spectator and fan.”

“Do you think the
pay is too high for glocken players?” Oxobox asked, as if anyone would ever
admit that. Even Rendrae rolled his eyes.

“Um, I think we’re
given a fair remuneration considering the dangers involved,” I said.

“It just seems
that quite a few players are quitting after a small number of games. I know the
Dredel Led are concerned this may result in games with inferior players. We
highly value glocken and don’t wish to see it slip competitively,” Oxobox said.

“How many players
are quitting Super Class?” I asked.

“Assuming Tobo
quit—which we have on good authority—almost fifty players this season have left
the league,” Rendrae said.

I sat thinking
about that. It didn’t make sense. That was a huge number, even considering all
the injuries.

“And they’re
quitting? You know this?” I asked.

Maybe this whole
sport was riddled with bribery.

“Well, they’re
leaving the game. They usually drop out of sight. It’s understandable to want
to keep a low profile after being under such a bright spotlight,” Rendrae said
foolishly.

It was foolish
because these weren’t the guys, gals, and creatures who tended to shun the
spotlight. You wouldn’t become a professional glocken player if you couldn’t
handle attention.

“Do you have a
list of players who recently retired?” I asked.

CHAPTER 30

I hadn’t seen
Delovoa in a month or so. On the ship ride back, he had been aloof and only
gave me cursory examinations and my formula.

I assumed he was
busy huffing mind-altering Zzzho gas. Or in the case of Delovoa’s three brains,
minds-altering.

I went to his home
with Gun and the list of missing players from Rendrae and Oxobox. Their list
bothered me because it was large compared to how many there were in Super Class.

A cursory
examination of the list on my tele showed that most of them retired without
suffering any cataclysmic injuries. They just quit. Whether they vanished or
not, like Tobo and Porj and Yorsh,
is something I had to find out.

I buzzed Delovoa’s
door. Again. And again.

Finally, he came
and he looked off. Off-er than usual.

“Hank! Hank!
Great! Come in!” He stammered.

His three eyes
were bugged and spinning. He looked haggard. The blood in his glass dome sputtered
erratically.

Inside, his place
was a shambles. I know Ziggy had quit being his butler to become a glocken
player, but I didn’t understand how a frail guy in a wheelchair could make such
a mess.

“So. Delovoa. How
are you?” I asked.

“Fantastic. Hank,
I need you to get these people,” he said, handing me a sheet of electro-fabric paper
smeared with what looked like dried blood.

“Get them? Like bring
them to talk to you?” I asked.

“Talk? Sure,
sure,” he said, which made it clear that wasn’t what he meant.

There were eight
names of which I knew a few.

“I can’t just go
around kidnapping people,” I said.

“You’re a
professional glocken player, dummy. Ask them out for a drink. It’s what you
people do. They’ll come.”

Oh, yeah. I kept
forgetting I wasn’t just a thug with heraldry.

“What are you
going to do to them?” I asked.

“Nothing,” Delovoa
said. “Nothing much,” he amended.

“I need you to
really examine Gun. It talked to me again. When we were on Mapposh 48. I want to know what it is.”

“Twenty million
credits!” Delovoa blurted.

“What? No.”

“Two million. No,
the five million you owe me,” he said.

“That deal didn’t
happen, you know that. And I’m tapped out. I gave a ton of money to my uncle.
I’m living paycheck to paycheck.”

“You have an uncle?”
he asked.

“Maybe.”

“Maybe I’m
your uncle. Give me twenty million!” He said.

“No. Hey, are you
okay? Have you been high on Keilvin Kamigan this whole time?” I asked.

“Don’t be silly,
you can’t get high on it, but using it did give me a lot of ideas.”

“Whatever. Can you
look at Gun?” I asked, and took it out of its case.

“Don’t point it at
me!” Delovoa said.

“Hello,” Gun said,
as I held it.

“So you’re still
talking?” I asked.

“Sometimes. The question
is, is anyone listening?” Gun said.

Delovoa stared at
Gun. Illegal, absurd technology was irresistible to him.

“Sure, I’ll look
at it. Put it”—he looked around his cluttered home—“somewhere I can find it.”

“I’m going to put
it on your kitchen table,” I said. “His name is Gun by the way.”

“Brilliant. I can tell
you right now it’s not Colmarian,” Delovoa stated confidently.

“And how is that?”

“The old Tech
Codes prohibited making artificial intelligence. And there’s no way we could
fit it inside something as small as a gun, even if we did. Besides, what would
be the purpose?”

“Yeah, Cliston
told me the original Dredel Led were the size of cities,” I said.

“Huh. I don’t know
if your ‘Gun’ is real artificial intelligence or just a bunch of stock answers,
but I’ll look.”

“I need to hack
some more teles, so I’ll need the Historian guys. But they’ll want something in
return. Do you have any information I can trade them? Like, secrets?” I asked.

Delovoa tapped his
blood-squirting glass skull.

“Tell them about
the civil war. How it started. Almost no one knows the real truth. I must have
heard a hundred different versions. Tell them about that…Naked Man or whoever,”
he said.

“Naked Guy. That’s
a pretty damn good idea. And it would finally clear my name,” I said. “I told
the Historians the truth about who killed the Governor.”

“Well, that was
stupid. Why would you do that?”

“They had a pretty
girl ask me. And they gave me this weird paper and said it was important to me.”

I showed Delovoa
the sheet with the letters and numbers and symbols and colors. I had been
carrying it around with me since I got it. At first I was protective of it,
thinking it might be…I don’t know, some ultra-secret code. But now I was
showing it to everyone I met, asking bartenders and waitresses if they could
make sense of it.

Delovoa examined it.

“Looks like a
bunch of colors and designs,” he said.

“Wow! You are
a genius! I know that. What does it mean?” I asked.

“What’s it mean? The
best I can tell is you got the Arch Minister mad at you in exchange for gibberish,”
he replied.

CHAPTER 31

We won the next
game handily.

It was a local
team and they were pretty lousy. They tried to load their roster with the
fastest guys they could find. But a lane isn’t all that wide. It’s not as if
you got three car-lengths to hop back and forth.

Even their top
lanes were fast. But they were too small. One guy got hit by Bley-ore so hard
he almost died.

That’s glocken. That’s Super Class glocken.

Still, my job was
to block their 8-lane. Of course he was their one big guy. I don’t know
what he was. Just an enormous Colmarian. He pulled out a tuft of my hair and
separated my right ear practically in half.

But he had knobby
knees so I would hit him there every single play. Broke my left clavicle, but I
also broke his knee and that was that.

I was now in the
Belvaille Gent Club looking to get stinking drunk. This was my post-game ritual
and so far it had been good luck.

Meaning that I
wasn’t dead—yet.

My face was
wrapped up, my ear, my fingers, I had this big puffy thing around my shoulder.
I would not be dancing anytime soon.

I wanted some
sausages and some XX² liquor.
It was about the hardest stuff you could drink that wouldn’t straight-up kill
you.

I had gotten some
bad vibes last time I was in the Club. They didn’t like the fact a professional
glocken player was crashing their joint.

I don’t know if it
was Belvaille pride—our team was named for the city—or the fact I played
dirty, but there were much more friendly faces than last time.

I was into my
third plate of sausages and a half-gallon of XX² when I spied an old friend.

“Hey,
Lagla-nagla!” I said.

Lagla-nagla was
the “lopsided man.” He worked for various nobles.

There was always
something off about the poor guy. His eyes were crooked—his whole face was
crooked—his hair was uneven, his arms and legs were different lengths. He
fidgeted, he sat wrong, he walked wrong, and when he drank, like half of it
spilled down his lopsided mouth.

He was exactly the
kind of guy you didn’t want working in a high-class establishment. But I guess
he had seniority because he’d been doing it forever.

“Hey, Hank,” he
replied. “Okay if I sit down?”

“Sure.”

He fell into the
chair, threw his arms up to balance himself, and planted his legs. If it was
anyone else you would guess they were joking or dead drunk, but that was a
smooth landing for him.

“So tell me some
gossip. Which noble you working for now?” I asked.

Lagla-nagla
routinely got fired. He had this giant list of credentials, but he was so
off-putting that people didn’t want him around. Just looking at him made you
wonder if he was suffering a stroke—or you were.

“I’m not working
for nobles no more,” he said.

“Aww, sorry about
that. You get sacked?” I asked.

“Nah, I quit. I
figure, the nobles is over. Or just about,” he said lazily.

“What? They own
this System. They own whole planets!” I said, amazed.

“Says who? Them?
They got all these nobles here and they don’t got no armies and they don’t do
no work. It’s the gangs who got the power. I work for Fat Morry, collecting
money at the docks.”

This was
surprising enough I almost stopped drinking.

“The nobles built
this System. Built the city. I know the gangs have power, I work with them all
the time, but they all dream of being nobles.”

“I seen enough
nobles, Hank. Nobles is just paper. Heraldry is, excuse me for saying”—he
pointed at my heraldry—“just a metal badge. Someone shoots you, what’s it
gonna’ do? Not you, I mean. I’m talking the big-boy nobles. Their time is
coming to a close.”

The nobles were
kind of name only. Only the Arch Minister had any real power in Belvaille.

I hoped
Lagla-nagla wasn’t right. Nobles were still my biggest customers and I longed
to one day join their ranks and become a member of the idle rich.

CHAPTER 32

I was at the
training facility working out.

Well, not working
out, I was eating. But food helped me heal, so it was kind of working out.

I had a face full
of sugar pastry when Kitt walked up, boobs in my face.

“Hi, Hank,” she
said.

“Kitt. You want to
have sex?” I blurted smoothly.

I had been
thinking about Kitt’s earlier proposals. Thought about it a few hundred times,
I’d guess. I had a whole complicated series of steps and plays and assists I
planned to use to get me back in a position to ask her if she was still
interested.

But when Kitt
walked up I had been so startled and pastry-tongued that I just blurted it out.

It was a curse and
a blessing to be self-aware. I know when I make mistakes. I know how I look to
the world. And right now, I was a used-up street thug, fully naked, with a face
full of frosting, who had just acted like a gawky teenager.

“I was hoping
you’d say that. That’s what I came to ask you, as a matter of fact,” she said.

“Oh.”

I stood up and we
walked past the rows and rows of exercise equipment I had yet to utilize.

She walked ahead
of me, completely oblivious to me scrutinizing her. She was just really muscular.
I sucked in my gut instinctively. It was the first time ever that I hoped we
could turn off the lights.

We went to a side
room where there were a lot of spongy mats on the ground. I don’t know what
for. Some mat exercises I guess.

We went in and she
turned to face me with a devilish smile. I smiled back and looked over and saw
Candar by the other door to the room.

“Hank, you’ve
missed every practice this week,” he chastised.

“I’m here today.”

“But you didn’t
practice.”

“I’m about to,
hopefully.”

“I just think you
need to work on your attitude. It feels like you don’t take the team seriously.
If you’re going to be offense and defense, you need to commit,” he said.

“Can this wait,
Candar? I’m a little busy. You know. Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge.” I grinned.

“I know, I sent
Kitt to bring you. I want to practice some team-building,” he said.

“Now?”

Garm came in the
room, also naked of course, and she smirked at me.

He couldn’t mean.

I stood there
dumbly and Kitt walked forward and put her arms on my shoulders. Reached down
to put her arms on my shoulders seeing as she was taller than me.

Candar and Garm also
embraced each other.

I was shocked.
This was worth a million adolescent fantasies and I had the cold sweats.

“You’ll have to
forgive Hank,” Garm said, “he’s a bit repressed.”

A while later, in
another part of the gym, I said:

“I feel
traumatized. It’s not as if Kitt isn’t sexy. Or Garm isn’t sexy. Or the whole
thing wasn’t sexy. I could do without Candar, that guy has to show off at
everything, but it just wasn’t my style, you know?”

Grah made the
perfect listening buddy. He spoke so slowly that you could completely ignore
him altogether. I was probably whole paragraphs ahead of him.

“Will things get
weird now? Am I weird for thinking it’s weird? I’m like 500 years old, I’m set
in my ways. Not all my ways, you have to adapt. But some ways. I don’t like
walking around naked. I don’t like purposefully running into freight trains
over and over again. I like to have a good meal or five and take a nap. I like
my sexification to be binary. Am I asking a lot?”

Grah, I could
tell, was starting to respond to my initial question on whether or not it was
okay to talk to him. I went on speaking, knowing I would have time.

“We’re not a
religious cult. We’re not a family. We’re a team. Co-workers. I don’t need to
know your intimate details. You don’t need to know mine. Are you going to be
able to block for me better if you know I have a birthmark on my butt? I don’t
see how.”

Grah was still
trying to say something.

I decided I would
let him talk. It was only fair.

After a few more
minutes I decided I would let him ask me one question because he was
still working on it and I didn’t have all night.

It took a while,
but he finally got it out.

“What is sex?” he
asked.

CHAPTER 33

I was skipping
more practices than usual. I just didn’t feel comfortable after having a
sexscapade with half the team and then afterwards explaining it in
excruciatingly slow detail to a rock creature.

Having me describe
sex was like asking Delovoa to explain generosity.

Was Garm right?
Was I repressed? Me worrying about it almost proved it. And me worrying about
worrying about it was insecurity of repression. Or repression of insecurity.

Damn, why did I
fire my psychiatrist?

There were people
who spent their whole waking lives thinking about sex and trying to get it. That
always seemed horribly pathetic to me. If I looked back on my life and there
was nothing but the blurry faces from one-night stands, I will be sorely
depressed.

Not that I was
some archbishop. I had been around the block a few times, up the street, down
the alley, and in some car crashes. It’s just that sex wasn’t a driving force
in my life.

We could hardly
remember the actual deed. If we were able to memorize all the details
perfectly, there would never be a need to try and have sex again. Whole species
would die out as we spent our lives daydreaming of that one great score. Like
drug addicts can’t recreate the high just by thinking about it. They have to do
it over and over again. Best to not get addicted in the first place, I say.

No one’s life was
going to change in a tremendous way from fornicatin’. But as a Factotum, thug,
and even a glocken player, I did stuff every day that affected people for their
entire lives. If you robbed someone at gunpoint, they’d remember that until the
day they died. Their whole personalities might even change. To me, that’s how
you measured what you’ve done: by the breadth, results, and permanence of your
actions.

Anyway, I went
into the Gent Club to do some exploring.

“Not allowed,”
Gample said to me again.

I leaned on the
coat check window, ripped out the plastic panel that separated him from me, and
then grabbed him by his very insignificant neck.

“I didn’t hear
you. Can you repeat that?” I asked.

He said nothing.
Not even a gurgle.

I let him go and
walked inside. I wondered if the two security guards would give me trouble.

“Great game last
month, Hank,” one said.

“Yeah. I put down 300
credits that you’d break a bone,” the other said.

That stopped me.

“Someone was
taking action that I would break a bone?” That seemed really specific.

“Well, either
break someone’s or break your own. It was 5:1 odds. I also placed that you’d
lose a tooth or take a tooth. That was 10:1,” he said.

“I did that one also,”
the first guard added.

These guys were
grinning ear-to-ear despite me just strangling their boss. It felt weird that
people were gambling on me. People I didn’t even know.

“You’re the
hometown hero,” I heard a voice say, in answer to my thoughts.

It was Podiver
Vance. Nine foot, gangly arms and all. He seemed to know when I was around and
needed something. Then again, that was his job.

“Vance, let’s
talk,” I said.

“My booth awaits.”

He reached out to
me and put his hand on my side. It was still startling even though I knew how
tall he was. Here I was, six feet of personal space in all directions, and the
guy could easily wrap his arms around me.

We went to his
booth and I noticed he was taking extra slow strides. This is a guy who could
probably walk across the room in three steps and he was practically crawling.

He was showing me
off to the club.

We finally reached
his booth and took our seats, Vance’s knees resting comfortably under his chin.

“What can I do for
you, Hank?”

“You know those
people double-crossed me on that job you set up? I gave them Procon Hobb’s skin
and they shot me,” I said.

“Yeah, sorry about
that. If I knew more about them, I would tell you,” he said, seeming sincere.

“What do
you know?”

“That they wanted the
skin for religious ceremonies. That’s it. I only met one.”

“What did he look
like? What species was he?” I asked.

“Species? I don’t
know. Just a Colmarian, I guess.”

“Colmarian? That
could be anything. Describe him.”

“I can’t remember.
He wore robes,” he said.

I felt Podiver
owed me after I had chopped up an Usk, gotten shot repeatedly, and had nothing
to show for it.

I took out the
piece of paper the Historian had given me after I incriminated the Arch
Minister. I was running out of people to ask about it, but hoped Podiver might
point me in the right direction. I had basically pissed off one of the most
powerful people in the galaxy to get it. I wasn’t going to let it sit at the
bottom of my underwear drawer.

“Does this mean
anything to you?” I asked.

He looked at it a
long while, putting it almost right up to his nose.

“Yeah, it’s
Rettosian,” he said finally.

“What? Their
language is a big string of colored symbols?” I asked.

“No, their
language is three-dimensional moving type. You can’t display it on paper. So
they have all kinds of superscripts, subscripts, arrows, and colors to indicate
how letters work when they’re in a two-dimensional format,” he said.

“So what does it
mean?” I asked.

“I can’t speak
Rettosian, I just recognize it. I can get it translated, but it will take some
time. The only people who speak Rettosian are Rettosians. A hundred thousand
credits,” he said.

“How about I shoot
you in the eyes like your religious buyers did to me?” I asked.

“You know when you
robbed my store and got it destroyed, I lost over a hundred million in
merchandise and repairs,” he said.

“Didn’t you have
insurance?”

“Sure. But it
didn’t cover having a Central Authority star fighter blast the hell out of my
second floor,” he replied.

“Okay. I’ll give
you two hundred grand, but you can’t ever use the sad tale of Vintage
Vance Vagaries to guilt me into doing something ever again.”

“Deal.”

“How long will it
take?” I asked.

“Probably a couple
months.”

“Why so long? It’s
not like a book that needs translating.”

“It will take me
that long to find a Rettosian willing to even speak to me, let alone
work as a translator,” he said.

CHAPTER 34

I liked to keep
track of the times I was wrong about stuff. Really drive it into my brain.

It reminded me
that even though I’ve been running deals for centuries, I certainly didn’t know
everything.

When they started
building glocken stadiums in Belvaille, I thought it was the biggest waste of
money imaginable. Total vanity projects.

Sure, glocken was
popular, but people could just watch on teles. Why did we need these massive
structures?

Of course I was
totally wrong.

Belvaille was not
only the geographic center of the galaxy, it was connected by exponentially
more Portals than any other System. Everyone came here to watch games.
The stadiums were booked to capacity.

The Belvaille
Glocken Team’s next four games were all at home.

Magda Strongarm
hired me a personal coach by the name of Hojon No-Leg. He was an old-time
glocken player who was supposed to teach me his skills. He didn’t lose his legs
playing glocken per se, he lost his legs because he had run one too many dirty
plays and the fans erupted, ran onto the field, and pulled his legs off with
their bare hands.

My new official
role was to be the team Hack.

I was to learn
every cheap shot, dirty trick, and means of injuring other players that modern
sports science could devise. Delovoa gave me tools like acid sprays and
fast-acting influenza viruses. I learned how to use my weight to pop player’s
joints and tear their ligaments.

I didn’t feel bad
about it, either.

All of us at all
times use whatever means at our disposal to achieve our biological goals. Whether
gathering food, finding a mate, securing shelter, or whatever.

An insect doesn’t
go, “Wow, that was really cheap, imitating the pollen of a flower that makes up
my diet and then luring me inside to my death.” No. It’s dead. It doesn’t say
anything.

I was a
professional glocken player at the moment. I had to use what tools I had. There
was no such thing as unfair or unsporting.

Every once in a
while I would try and run or make a Twist play, but I was competing against
7-lanes and carrying a thousand pounds. It was pretty clear, even to me, that
if I wanted to help the team and not get creamed, I had to play as ruthlessly
as possible.

We won all of our
games due to attrition. Each game I took out a key player, probably ending the
careers of at least four of them, and we were able to win rather easily.

Ziggy and Neddy
were our powerhouse scorers with Candar and Kitt and Garm pulling off the
occasional rally. The Mound of Pounds mostly beat faces and when they were
beaten enough, we’d go Wedge block for our lower lanes.

Our last game we
took out the opposing 6-, 7-, and 8-lanes completely. Then this poor 500-pound
guy had to not only try and stop Candar, but had to look out for a 15,000-pound
Gandrine rushing his flank.

We weren’t as
elegant or overpowering as the Reskin Sleepers, but we were still firmly in
second place.

“This is Rendrae,
your Force For Sports reporting from the Mega-Massive-Dome in Belvaille System
where the Belvaille Glocken Team has triumphed over the Willowy Webstunters by
85 points. With me, as always, is my partner in crime, Oxobox.”

“I haven’t
committed a crime,” Oxobox intoned.

“And we also have
special guest, Hank,” Rendrae continued. “Hank, three opposing starters down,
two substitutes down, what do you attribute that to?”

“Well, we just got
lucky. The Webstunters put up a good fight,” I said.

“Many people call
you the team Hack, what is your response?” Oxobox said.

“Oh, no, I’m a
player in this league and I take the time-honored regulations very seriously.
There are referees monitoring our every action,” I said.

“You were called
for twenty-three penalties over the last three games,” Rendrae interrupted.

“See? They’re on
top of things,” I replied. “Those penalties hurt us quite a bit.”

“But not nearly as
much as losing a player,” Oxobox said.

“It’s a shame when
players are injured. Truly. I just wish everyone a speedy recovery,” I said
sincerely.

“Evus Maurus, who
you got in a scrum with two days ago, is in a coma from his injuries,” Rendrae
said.

“I hadn’t heard. I
hope he gets better,” I said.

“The doctors
reported he had unusually high levels of Keilvin Kamigan gas in his lungs,”
Oxobox added.

“Hmm, I don’t want
to speculate, but some players do dabble in experimental drugs in an effort to
improve their game play. I do not endorse this,” I said.

“So it couldn’t be
possible that you had anything to do with it?” Rendrae probed.

“How could I even
do that? Carry some Keilvin Kamigan gas with me onto the field? I mean, come
on! And even if I did, I certainly wouldn’t have meant to put him in a coma. He
was probably allergic or something. I’ve said this many times now, when we step
out there, those players are trying to destroy me and I’m trying to destroy
them. Glocken is not a gentleman’s sport. It is a ruffian’s sport,” I said.

“Speaking of
which, I noticed you have been bleeding a lot more your last few games. Is this
an attempt to make yourself more difficult to tackle?” Oxobox asked.

“Yes. That is
totally my strategy,” I said blankly.

“It does not
appear to be working as you have been tackled on nearly every carry,” Oxobox
said. “I’m not sure if giving up your blood is worth the small advantage. Your
stats remain zero across the board.”

“I wish they would
broaden what they report in terms of statistics,” I said, annoyed. “Scoring
points isn’t the only thing that goes on in glocken.”

“Your team is now
easily in second place next to the Reskin Sleepers. When do you think the
Championship will be?” Rendrae asked.

“You’ll have to
talk to Cliston. From what I understand, the Championship takes place when all
the teams agree that they’re running out of players and they need to rebuild
for next season. I think we can squeak out a few more games before things reach
the point of no return,” I said.

“It looks like
you’ll be playing the Sleepers. What do you calculate your chances are?” Oxobox
asked.

“I have the utmost
confidence in our coaching and players,” I said, dreading the idea of ever
facing the Reskin Sleepers again.

CHAPTER 35

Podiver Vance finally
got back to me about the Rettosian writing I gave him. I had completely
forgotten about it, since I was so busy cheating at glocken. He said the
translation of my Historian letter was almost as confusing as the original, but
he had it on good authority it was correct.

He also complained
that he lost money on the deal, because he had to bribe three levels of
officials just to get anywhere.

The translation was
a big series of numbers and letters and dashes and dots.

But this time, I
knew what it was: it was a shipping manifest number.

After getting the
bugs for the Usk, I remembered the pattern.

I wasn’t going to
bother MTB with tracing it. I didn’t need to know where it came from or when. I
just wanted to locate it and see what the Historians felt I should know.

I wandered through
one of the many port warehouses. Heavy lifters were constantly loading and
unloading goods that had just come from space.

I bribed one dock
worker who could understand the manifest number. He pointed me to another
warehouse across the docks.

It took me about three
hours, but I found the crate belonging to the manifest. It was a metal
rectangle, about four feet long, three feet wide, and two feet deep.

I looked around to
see if the coast was clear and I cracked all the seals on the shipping
container. There must have been twenty and it took me a while to figure them
all out.

When the top
opened with a hiss, I was stunned.

The little arms,
the little legs, the tiny body. That face was burnt into my memory after seeing
it so many times when I ransacked his apartment.

It was Porj, one
of our team’s glocken players that had gone missing.

He was quite dead,
though not decomposing to a great extent. The casket must have kept him
preserved.

I checked the
label. It indicated that it had been sitting here for months. Its final destination
was a numbered storage center on Floloria,
the Rettosian space station, with a delivery date of five days from now.

I teled Zzzho and
asked if he could make a taxi run for me. Sure, if I could pay.

“Hey, are you
allowed on the Rettosian space station? I know they don’t allow you on
Belvaille,” I said.

My idea was to
have this gas cloud follow around the casket and see where it ended up.

“You kidding, they’re
even snobbier than the nobles of Belvaille. That station is almost completely
Rettosian only.”

“You’re saying
they got Rettosian porters? They’re going to come over and lift cargo?”

That didn’t seem
realistic to me, knowing the Rettosians. They were my role models when it came
to being lazy.

“No, I think they
have a bunch of servants. Or slaves,” Zzzho buzzed on the tele.

Slaves? I wondered
if they still had Ontakians working for them.

“Okay, I’ll need
to go there in five days.” I said.

“Give me some
notice when you want to leave so I don’t have a fare.”

“Okay. See you
then,” I said.

I wanted to get
Gun from Delovoa. I’m not sure if it mattered, but maybe a Rettosian gun would
be handy against Rettosians—if it came to that.

“Do you want to
know about Gun?” Delovoa asked, when I had reached his home.

“Yes.”

Gun was sitting on
a pillow in the center of the junky room. It looked out of place. Like a relic
among garbage. It was bright even in the dark room, its chrome features
sparkling.

“It can’t be
scanned. Nothing I did could scan it, not even with my most powerful
wavelengths. It has no seams, no screws, no bolts, no way of opening it at all.
I tried inserting a probe down the barrel and it stops after one inch. There is
no way it should be able to fire. It doesn’t look like a machine at all. It
looks like a hunk of very shiny metal.”

“It fired. It shot
me. And it talks. You’ve heard it,” I said.

“Let me finish.
I’ve had long conversations with Gun since you dropped it off. If I had to give
it a personality, I would say it was similar to someone who has a minor degree
in philosophy and lives in its parent’s basement and spends its free time
writing bad poetry.”

That was a little
depressing.

“So can I use it?”
I asked.

“I did get it to fire
several times. I think when it was annoyed or bored or trying to make a point.
I analyzed the shots and they do not appear to be solid bullets. That would
have been extremely confusing since it can’t be reloaded in any way that I can
see. I believe it fires a blob of gravitons that warps localized space in such
a way that it appears to take on the characteristics of a projectile.”

“I don’t know what
that means,” I complained.

“I don’t either,”
Delovoa admitted. “I’m not sure how it works. From what you said, it might take
the bioelectricity of whomever is holding it and use that.”

“Kind of like
Keilvin Kamigans powering electronic devices?” I asked.

“Sort of. Gun
itself doesn’t seem to know how it works.”

“So you’ve told me
nothing. Is it dangerous?”

Delovoa shrugged.

“As dense as you
are, you are a huge store for bioelectricity. You said the gun was fired by
Rettosians or created by them. I’ve never worked on a Rettosian, but their
liquid skin must require a good source of energy. It’s fine that Colmarians
have blood and bile flowing inside their bodies, but to flow outside subject
to the environment, is quite another feat. Still, if I had to guess, I’d say
you’re a much larger battery than any Rettosian. When I held it, it didn’t do
much except talk.”

I looked at Gun.

“I’m going to pick
it up. Kick it away if it knocks me unconscious,” I said.

“I’m in a
wheelchair. I’ll poke it away,” Delovoa said.

I took a deep
breath and picked up Gun, holding it loosely.

“Hello,” Gun said.

“Hi. So, is what
he said true? Do you fire like gravitons and use electricity?” I asked.

“Who said that?”
Gun asked.

“He’s a terrible
listener. I usually had to repeat myself three or four times,” Delovoa whined.

“Delovoa is the
person you’re staying with. He ran some tests on you,” I said.

“I didn’t like him
very much,” Gun replied.

“Yeah. But would
you like to work with me?” I asked.

“I’m not sure. I
don’t have a lot of qualifications that I know of.”

“You can shoot
people, right?” I asked.

“I suppose. Seems
pretty dull work,” Gun said.

“He’s also good
decoration,” Delovoa offered.

“Yeah, you are
attractive as jewelry. And excellent company,” I said pleasantly.

“Do you think so?
Sometimes I think no one understands me. I have trouble understanding others,
so it only makes sense,” Gun stated.

“You’re the first
talking gun I’ve ever met. That alone is very interesting,” I said.

“Should I shoot
him?” Gun asked.

“Shoot who?” I answered.

“That Delovoa
guy.”

“No! No! Don’t
shoot anyone yet,” I said, pointing Gun away from the cringing Delovoa.

“Oh. I’m probably
not a good judge, but he seemed like he deserved a good shooting,” Gun said.

CHAPTER 36

The next day I set
up a formal meeting with Cliston and Garm.

It was brief.

I showed them the
tele pictures I took of Porj to prove I was on the case and had leads. Garm was
satisfied I was working and freed my full Factotum salary.

I said I needed
time to go off-station and investigate. General manager Cliston promptly fined
me, but sports agent Cliston talked the fine down because it was related to our
team.

Butler Cliston
served us lunch.

My Factotum salary
put me back on decent financial footing even with the fine. It was crazy that
despite having gross proceeds five times what I was making a year ago, I felt I
was always scraping bottom.

Manager Cliston
then told me that our next game had been cancelled. He said it was due to them
losing four players.

“Losing or
retiring?” I asked.

“I don’t know, but
they don’t have enough to field a competent team,” Cliston answered.

It was
accelerating. This made the gambling angle seem less likely. I couldn’t imagine
that people would place bets on games being cancelled, that was too obscure.

“In any case, you
need to get in shape,” he said. “You’ve been gaining weight.”

“You cook my
food!” I said.

“Would you like me
to cook less, sir?”

“No. I like food,”
I said.

“There is a two
million bonus if you can lose fifty pounds.”

“Talk to my agent
and see if I can get that down to twenty-five pounds,” I said.

“I got you one
million for thirty,” he answered immediately.

I received an
urgent tele from Podiver Vance at the Gent Club. I figured it was about the
Rettosian script, but he said someone was here to meet me and it was important.

I worried it might
be an agent from Maris-To who had learned I spoke to the Historians. I thought
about not going, but he could just have the Central Authority drag me in.
Besides, the Gent Club was as neutral a place as you could find.

When I arrived at
the Club, the building was silent. I never realized how loud the Gent Club was
until it had switched to this eerie tomb.

I walked through
the ground floor and all the cutthroats and gang lords were whispering and
cringing. Not at me, but at something deeper in the Club.

In his corner, I
saw a stunned Podiver Vance sitting across from an Ank.

All Ank looked
alike. Really. Not even their mothers could tell them apart. They had white,
almost translucent skin, with just slits for eyes and a tiny mouth. They were
tall and thin and their arms were so feeble they were useless.

They all wore
floor-length robes that they covered with chains, jewels, writing, lights,
baubles, and anything else that made them distinct—it was how they differentiated
themselves.

Ank were the
bankers of the galaxy. They controlled all money. They had done so since the
concept of money first existed, probably.

Credits were just
plastic sheets with electronics in them. They only had value because the Ank
said so. Nearly every transaction of significance that took place in Belvaille,
or in the entire galaxy, went through Ank financial institutions—including all
my payments as a Factotum or glocken player.

Ank couldn’t sit
in normal chairs, but he, or she, was seated, so a custom chair must have been
brought along.

Podiver Vance took
his leave and I sat down.

“I didn’t think
Ank were allowed on Belvaille,” I said.

All Ank had the
same voice. It was sweet and tinkling and never sounded like bad news even if
they just told you your puppy dog spontaneously combusted. I tended to think of
all Ank as men, because their voice was somewhat more masculine than feminine.

“We choose to stay
on our ship for logistical reasons,” the Ank said.

The Club patrons
were staring at us quite openly. For people who wanted nothing more than lots
of money, an Ank was like a walking fairy tale. There were practically puddles
of drool on the floor.

“So what can I do
for you?” I asked.

“The Reskin
Sleepers,” he said.

I had not expected
those words at all.

“Yeah?”

“They cannot win,”
he continued.

“Well, they’re
sure faking it pretty well. They are undefeated since they did their major overhaul.”

“You do not
understand. The Reskin Sleepers losing is part of our galactic financial Formula.
It is considered a fact of nature. Now that they are winning, it could cause
economic turmoil.”

“I can’t see them
losing any time soon, unless someone steals their players. Just change your
formula,” I said.

Ank didn’t have
facial expressions, but he paused.

“The Formula is
vast. It has been modified by generations of Ank over thousands of years. You
cannot simply change parts of it. It requires significant time.”

“I’ve been betting
on the Reskin Sleepers to win for hundreds of years. You’re saying it’s a fact
of nature for me to lose?”

“Yes. We were
aware of your wagers. You are even a variable in the Formula: hrswnw. You were
the only person who bet consistently for so long.”

“The only person
in the galaxy?” I asked, shocked.

“No, but the
others were small and random enough that they were lumped under hrswnw,” he
said.

That was annoying.
Who knew how much money I had lost over the centuries on a bet that was
essentially impossible to win.

“So how does this
affect me? I don’t know what you’re asking,” I said.

“We need your team
to play and beat the Reskin Sleepers. We believe you have the greatest
opportunity out of the current Super Class roster. We shall arrange for you to
play them.”

“You can’t do
that. The managers decide the schedules,” I said.

“We set the
gambling odds, the payments, the insurance, the advertising, and every other
monetary aspect surrounding glocken. While we do not enjoy taking an active
part, this is simply too significant to leave unattended. It affects everyone.”

“I’m tired of
fighting for ‘everyone.’ What about me? You know, I broke up that Ank
conspiracy to enslave the population and I never even got a thank you or
goodnight kiss.”

“We are aware of
your activities and you have our gratitude for disrupting the machinations of a
handful of rogue Ank. What is it you wish in return for defeating the Reskin
Sleepers?” he asked.

Hmm. I had once
been given an infinite credit token by the Ank. Infinite. Of course it didn’t
do much good because no one could make change for infinity, but it was nice to
have.

“Can you make me
full royalty?” I asked.

“I’m afraid not.
The Arch Minister controls that and he is…suspicious of Ank influence. If it is
any consolation, we believe the system of government in Belvaille is
unsustainable. We estimate it shall experience a forced revolution within approximately
8.44.”

My jaw hit the
table. A revolution? What would take its place? I figured everyone was sick of war.

But another thing
had been bothering me about the Ank scheme I thwarted.

“Those ‘rogue’ Ank
used clones. They had cloned important people and used them as puppets to help
forward their goals. I’ve seen clone technology before, but how did the Ank get
it?”

“We conducted our
own investigation after the Ank on Belvaille were stopped. We found the clones you
mentioned. The ability to craft such beings was never, as far as we know,
available outside of Rettosian territory. It was a closely guarded expertise.”

“Rettosians? Clones
were used to fight in the Colmarian civil war, too. You’re saying they were
Rettosian?” I asked skeptically.

“The clones in the
civil war were of Colmarians, but the means of constructing them was
Rettosian. The same could be said of the clones you encountered on Belvaille
that were used by the rebellious Ank. That is our hypothesis.”

Porj’s corpse was
already headed there. But now I really wanted to visit the Rettosian space
station.

CHAPTER 37

Some days later,
it took Zzzho seven hours to taxi me to Floloria.
It was not exactly in the prime real estate section of Belvaille System.

People could
apparently deliver goods to Floloria with no problem. But for delivering
myself, I had to talk to their Harbormaster, and he only spoke Rettosian.

That was a perfect
example of what Rettosians were like. Everyone in the galaxy spoke
Colmarian. If we had all kept our native tongues we would have countless
languages at this point. Rettosians, however, refused to adapt. They felt their
language was superior and more elegant.

Frankly, it was.
Colmarian was a simplistic, almost brutal language that could be spoken, with
an accent, no matter what kind of mouth you had. Only Rettosians had the vocal
capabilities to speak Rettosian. It was almost a song.

I was standing
just inside the station airlock while the Harbormaster serenaded me. I had no
idea what he was saying—and this was the person they had in charge of welcoming
strangers.

After some time of
me yelling and gesticulating, they finally brought over a junior member who
could speak Colmarian.

They said I wasn’t
allowed into the city.

I disagreed. I
said this was Belvaille System, and per our laws, anyone could go
anywhere—except Belvaille space station itself. Also, I had been in space for
seven hours and needed sustenance. They couldn’t refuse me. That much I knew.

Reluctantly, they
agreed. They sequestered me in a tiny room and gave me some bad food and sour
water as two guards glared at me.

They were normal
Rettosian guards and like all of their species, their skin was liquid and
colorful and looked like liquid neon. It flowed across their bodies and was
constantly reabsorbed and secreted. The upper class Rettosians would have all
kinds of spouts and funnels and waterfalls built into their outfits to
highlight their peculiar biology. These guards needed functional clothes,
however, so they only had some see-through tubes that carried their liquid skin
across their bodies like plumbing.

The clerk who spoke
Colmarian told me I would have to leave soon.

“Get the
Harbormaster in here, I want to talk to him,” I said coolly.

“He doesn’t understand
your language and has made it clear he doesn’t wish to speak with you,” the
clerk said snootily.

“What are you
going to do, kill me? That would look awful bad,” I said.

I flashed my
heraldry.

“Considering I’m a
Factotum on assignment from Maris-To,” I finished, staring death at the clerk.

The clerk frowned
and left the room.

I hoped that the
fear of Maris-To surpassed the Rettosian umbrage. I also hoped that they didn’t
wonder why Maris-To would ever possibly use a Factotum when he had control of
the Central Authority, who could just ram a hole in this stupid space station
and walk in without asking anyone’s by-your-leave.

The Harbormaster
took a good hour coming back to meet with me and he had three people with him.
They weren’t going to suffer being in my little room, so I was moved to a
conference area.

The other Rettosians
were officials whose titles I couldn’t understand because they were in
Rettosian. But their outfits were cool, lots of flowing, bubbling, gurgling
skin.

The clerk
translated for them.

The Rettosians
only looked at me—physically turned their eyes on me—for maybe thirty seconds
total. When I spoke, they made faces of disgust even before the translation. I
was just some hideous screeching thing that was trying to intrude into their
little paradise.

They kept trying
to ask what my business was and where I was going, but I said that was not
their concern. They demanded to have handlers escort me and that I give them a
report of my findings. Finally, I had enough.

“Look, I don’t
know which System you think you’re in, but this isn’t Rettosian territory.
Maris-To is Arch Minister here. He controls the Navy. There’s like fifty
cruisers, three hundred destroyers, and I think even a battleship floating out
there just waiting to turn this crappy city into a lot of dangerous space
debris. You’re going to give me unlimited access and I’m not going to debate
this any further,” I threatened.

The clerk stumbled
over that translation. I probably should have spoken slower but I got caught up
in the moment.

The Rettosians all
finally turned to me, and I scowled my most confident scowl, like I really had
the might of the Central Authority behind me.

“If you’re going
to enter any homes or question any citizens, they want to be present,” the
clerk translated after some time.

I laughed.

“You don’t
understand. You aren’t citizens of this city. This city is just a pimple
on the stinking ass of Belvaille. I will go wherever my duties take me and
perform whatever work I deem necessary,” I said.

The Rettosians all
leaned in to whisper to one another.

“We hereby grant
you entrance to Floloria,”
the clerk said.

Man, they couldn’t
even admit defeat without being cocky.

I turned to go and
one of them said something.

“Where did you get
that pistol?” the clerk asked.

I looked down,
having forgotten it was on my side.

I was still a
little wary of carrying Gun, but one of my biggest troubles as a professional
thug was that I was clumsy and had horrible accuracy with firearms. Most of my firefights
ended with me running out of ammunition and the walls suffering the vast
majority of my abuse.

I knew Gun was
capable of being absurdly accurate—my eyeballs could attest to it. Though I
also brought my fancy blunderbuss, just in case.

“I got the pistol
from a Rettosian I murdered,” I said quite truthfully.

CHAPTER 38

Once the golden
doors were opened and I was allowed into the heaven of Floloria, I was quite disappointed.

It was just like
old Belvaille had been back in its earliest days.

A space station had
fixed dimensions. You’re never going to make it bigger. So the most economical
use of space was a crapload of rectangular buildings crisscrossed by streets.

That’s what
Floloria was. Belvaille, nowadays, was a kaleidoscope of architectural magic.
Only a handful of buildings, like mine, were originals from Belvaille’s past: boring
steel squares.

Floloria’s structures
weren’t even steel. They knew they had protection from external forces because
of the shield covering the city, so the buildings were some thin aluminum
sheeting. There were actual dents in a lot of buildings—probably from people
ramming their heads into the walls screaming, “Why is this city so ugly?”

I felt pretty smug
walking around at first. I mean this was their great Rettosian city?

After a while I
realized I totally stood out here and I should probably keep my smugness to
myself. Every single person was a Rettosian wearing weirdo Rettosian clothes.
To say I felt unwelcome was an understatement.

I walked around
for about an hour, trying to lose any tails which had been following me, and
trying to get acquainted with the street patterns.

Besides all the
mean looks I received, I felt very uncomfortable and I couldn’t put my finger
on why. Finally, it hit me. I had lived probably 99% of my life on Belvaille.
Not even Belvaille System, but the actual city. A lot of my influence,
street credibility, and even power, came from my knowledge of Belvaille’s inner
workings.

I knew who bought
what, who sold what, who was in debt to whom. I knew the nobles, I knew the
gangs, I knew the crooks, the pimps, the cops, and where you could buy a good
cup of spiked coffee. I knew who sold drugs, who bought drugs, who preached,
who prayed, and who was a false prophet. I’d seen something like twenty
generations grow up, grow old, and die on that city.

Here, I was a fat
guy with fake credentials. I was nothing.

I was an alien on
an alien city surrounded by aliens—and I felt it. It was clear this entire
species didn’t want me here. They thought I was a lesser being.

It’s an ugly
feeling. When I was on Mapposh
48 and an angry mob was chasing me through the streets, it was adrenaline and
fear that pushed me. But here it was a lingering unease.

Floloria had a
small dock comprised of a handful of warehouses. I knew the location where
Porj’s casket had been delivered.

I waited around
and tried, unsuccessfully, to make myself inconspicuous. Fortunately, there
weren’t many people here.

After some time, I
saw one of the oddest creatures I’d ever seen, walking out carrying Porj’s
little casket. The creature was two burly legs and a burly arm where it’s chest
should have been. It looked like a triangle of limbs. It didn’t wear clothes
and had no…anything that I could see. No neck, or eyes, or butt, or mouth, just
three giant appendages.

It carried the
trunk resting in its palm quite easily. I would say over its head, but it
didn’t have a head. It had a thick forearm for a torso. It ended in a wrist and
hand. Its knuckles were about as wide as my whole upper body and so were its
feet.

As I watched it
pound along the sidewalk with those powerful legs, I idly thought it would make
a great glocken player. I was across the street from it, but guessed it to be
maybe seven feet tall—taller if it stretched its hand fully upright. It was
solid muscle.

I tried to keep up
with the trippendage but it was very fast. It wasn’t particularly graceful, but
considering it was carrying a casket, it was doing alright.

I worried I was
going to lose it, but once it got into sidewalks with more foot traffic, it
slowed down considerably so as not to run people over.

How did it even
see where it was going?

It wound its way
through the city and I was beginning to get tired chasing it.

Fortunately, Floloria wasn’t all that big of a space
station so it eventually came to a non-descript box of a building and gave the
door a gentle kick.

The door was
opened a moment later, and the trippendage entered the building, the door
closing behind it.

This was actually
further than I thought I would get. I hadn’t really planned on what would
happen after landing here. I had no authority at all. I couldn’t leave without
their say-so. They probably had people watching me. And my presence wasn’t
especially appreciated.

I looked over the
aluminum building, hoping for a sign. Literally some sign like, “Hey, you
should root through the trashcan out back where we dump out all our secret
plans such as why we have corpses of glocken players.”

I was an old man.

I didn’t
especially look it, but I was. But when my body was remade, everything except
my brain—and white hair—had been changed. So I still had the drive and impulses
of a young idiot. For those of you who are young, you have no idea how reckless
you are until you get older. For those of you who are older and get magically
turned young again by a level-ten mutant, all I can say is that you get to
watch yourself occasionally acting like a moron but can’t stop it.

I walked across
the street and knocked on the door. I decided to just wing it like I did at the
port. I was going to trust in my ability to fast talk.

The door was
opened and inside it was almost crypt-like dark. I hurried in before anyone
could ask, or shut the door.

There was a small
person inside. I got the sense it was a Rettosian, but absolutely tiny, even
smaller than Porj had been, about two feet tall. His skin was unlike that of most
Rettosians, which seemed to flow slowly. His was a hasty, multi-colored storm
on his body.

There was a
hallway and a light at the end. I ignored the little person at the door and
walked in like a man with a purpose. I would use the Factotum angle. Demand
they tell me what was going on.

The room was large
and filled with technological equipment. It looked decidedly medical based on
all my experience recovering in hospitals.

I saw the
trippendage. It had placed Porj’s coffin on a table and the lid had been
removed.

There was also a
large, transparent, gelatinous…thing that was filled with what looked like
blood vessels or oversized nerve cells. It was eight feet tall, light orange,
and pulsated dully.

There was also a
truly ancient Rettosian. His skin was no longer liquid, he had dried solid, and
was cracked and gray. His limbs were so thin that they looked like sticks. His
head was tilted to the side and he had to wear a neck brace to keep his skull
from breaking his spine with its weight. He sat in a glowing, beeping, hi-tech
chair and overall he reminded me a bit of Delovoa.

The last person
was a Colmarian man in a dark suit, all-encompassing dark sunglasses, and a
dark hat. It was none other than the Reskin Sleepers’ head coach and general
manager, Irune!

“Hello, Hank,” he
said with a slight smile, as if he weren’t at all surprised to see me and we
were old pals. He had a leaden voice.

“Uh, hi,” I said,
ignoring the corpse and strange creatures in front of me.

Irune turned to
the old man on the chair and said something that was clearly in Rettosian.

The chair-bound Rettosian
then spoke, but it was all wheezy air. The man was so elderly his vocal chords
were shriveled and dead. A careful listener might have made sense of what he
said—if they could speak Rettosian.

He slowly pressed
a button on his chair and then:

Krooosh!

I felt a sucking
in my midsection like I was being folded in half. The whole room’s interior
smeared like it was a wet painting and the artist was dragging a damp cloth
across it.

Next thing I knew
I found myself in a room on a ship. It was clearly a spaceship because there
were a whole set of windows and I could see stars and other ships outside. If
it was a space station, the shield would block such a view.

Everyone was here.
Porj’s coffin, the trippendage, the blob-thing, Irune, and I even saw the
little Rettosian that had answered the door.

The room was clean
and nearly empty. It just had a table for Porj’s coffin.

“Right,” I began.
“I have some questions. Um. Give me a second to collect my thoughts.”

But the old man
didn’t give me a second and pressed another button.

I felt a pain in
my back and the room smeared again.

I was back in the
original, dark room on Floloria. The only difference was that Porj’s casket was
gone, Irune was gone, and the old Rettosian was gone.

Oh, and the
trippendage took that big hand of his and made a fist.

CHAPTER 39

The trippendage
couldn’t punch very well since it had no chest or shoulders. It could only move
its fist forward and backwards.

It smacked me
overhand, and while not especially painful, it had enough force to make me bend
my legs from the shock.

I grabbed my
blunderbuss and fired. I hit its thumb, but didn’t even break the skin. That
was my only shot. I dropped the blunderbuss and pulled out Gun from my hip
holster. I pressed where the trigger should be but nothing happened.

“Shoot!” I yelled.

“Shoot who?” Gun
asked.

“Him! That thing.”

“Why?” Gun said,
clearly not appreciating the gravity of the situation.

While I was
pointing, the little Rettosian jumped up and wrapped his arms and legs around
my forearm.

He buried his head
down and squeezed. I thought it was a very peculiar tactic, since the little
Rettosian was far too small to hurt me. But those swirling liquid patterns I saw
on his body began to swirl faster—and hotter. He started glowing and I could
actually feel the heat.

I normally
considered myself fireproof. Just another perk of my Ontakian heritage. But
this Rettosian must have been creating some kind of chemical burn with his
skin, and I wasn’t resistant.

I began shaking my
arm frantically, but he wasn’t letting go. His whole body was now illuminating
the room and I could not only feel him burning my flesh, I could smell it.

I put my left hand
on his head to try and wrench free, but he had a tremendous grip for such a small
person.

I finally banged
him against the table and he let go and fell to the ground, where he hissed at
me. I saw even his tongue was glowing hot.

My arm was
steaming and the skin was melted and red in some patches.

I didn’t have much
time to contemplate what scars I would have when I suddenly found myself inside
the gelatinous orange creature.

I could see out
and everything. The world looked warped and wobbly.

I tried to move
around and get out, but the blob mimicked my motions. When I raised my left arm
it kept me encased inside. I lifted my knees and it just bulged out around me.

I began flailing
because I knew I was going to run out of air and I was pretty sure breathing this
blob was bad news. I twirled around slowly inside the creature but couldn’t
gain any purchase or enough momentum to free myself.

All around me were
those nerves or blood vessels, but as I tried to snatch at them, they just squirted
out of my grasp—they were too thin and pliable. I was in a liquid world and my
weight and strength were completely negated.

I had maybe a
half-breath in my lungs when I had been engulfed and it was going fast. As I
exhaled now and then I saw the bubbles ripple and pass away to the surface
where they were expelled.

The table was
nearby, but I couldn’t reach it. It was only a few feet away but I had turned
myself upside down. Inspiration struck and I took hold of my jacket and ripped
it off. Holding it between both hands I dragged it up and down like a shovel. I
was trying to get as much surface area as I could to make it difficult for the
creature to mimic me.

When I scooped up
and down, there were quick pockets of air as the creature tried to fill in the
gaps. I managed to get a few gulps of oxygen so at least I wasn’t in
suffocation mode.

It either figured
immobilizing my legs was the most important or it simply couldn’t contain the
scoop-like jacket, but I was finally able to grab hold of the table with one
hand because my arms were now outside the blob.

I looked around
and could see all the medical equipment, the trippendage, and the little
burning Rettosian. Those two seemed to be waiting patiently for their turns to
attack me again.

I don’t know how I
thought of it, but I took hold of the table with both hands, and pulled in my
feet. I was basically squatting on the table—and covered by a goo monster.

But using my legs
I pushed off as hard as I could and reached out with my hands.

The creature had
to rearrange itself quickly to encircle my new shape and we splashed to the
ground. I didn’t touch, because the orange blob essentially cushioned my
landing, but I did manage to propel myself all the way to the little Rettosian,
who I was now holding in my two hands.

His eyes went wide
finding himself inside the creature and in my grasp. He kicked and bucked but he
wasn’t going anywhere.

However, he turned
on the juice and started glowing again. I could feel my hands burning.

As I hoped when I
made this desperate play, I could see my captor bubbling around the Rettosian.
The temperature was too much for its liquid.

The orange blob
reformed itself so my hands and the Rettosian were outside of its body. I was
getting burnt and suffocated. But I pulled the Rettosian back in and
held him to my chest.

The blob would
either have to let us both go or keep boiling.

The heat was
getting extreme and I felt my chest, thighs, hands, and neck being severely
burned.

I cracked open an
eye to see all the nerve cells moving to the extreme outsides of the creature.
The bubbles were becoming violent when I suddenly felt air on my face and then:

Pop!

I landed on the
ground and a shower of orange goo splattered everywhere.

I was panting for
air. Exhausted and almost in shock from the burns.

Fortunately, the
Rettosian pocket oven was also in bad shape and lying next to me too tired to move.

But the
trippendage was another story.

It had learned
that punching me wasn’t all that successful so it smacked me like a big fly
swatter. Slap! Slap! Slap!

I was prone on the
ground, recovering from burns and asphyxiation, while I continued to get
swatted by an oversized hand. I was too tired to care much and it frankly
didn’t hurt nearly as bad as my burns.

The trippendage
seemed to notice that and it took its big hand, held up its index finger, and
poked me hard in the stomach. It then twisted its finger, pinning me to the
floor.

Okay, that
hurt!

I pushed the
finger off my stomach and rolled on my side. The trippendage kept poking at me
as I tried to get to my feet, and it knocked me down twice.

I finally stood
and turned around in time to see three fingers kind of upright over my head and
the middle finger and thumb crossed. It looked familiar.

Wham!

It let go of its
middle finger and flicked my face like I was a booger it was trying to get rid
of. My head whipped back practically off my neck. I think my brain pancaked against
my skull because I was completely stunned.

The trippendage
winded up to flick my head again.

I had barely enough
consciousness to step to the side as the middle finger came whooshing
past.

A four-foot finger
flicking past your ear at high speed sounds a lot like, “Wake up, stupid!”

I recovered Gun from
where I dropped him and pointed it at the trippendage.

“Do you like to
travel?” Gun asked me.

With Gun still in
my hand I rushed the trippendage and grabbed it around the palm.

The fingers
clamped down on me and it had my entire upper body in its hand.

“What are you
doing?” Gun asked pleasantly.

I tried to step on
the trippendage’s feet, but they were huge. It then tried stepping on my
feet. We jockeyed around, kicking at each other. I felt I outweighed it
significantly, but it was hard to get the upper hand against a giant hand.

“Hank?” I heard
Gun ask as my head was being smushed.

“Yeah?”

“What are you
doing?”

“Arm wrestling!”

I pushed and
pulled and tried to lift the trippendage, but I just couldn’t get any leverage.
It had no weak points. I couldn’t jab it in the eyes. I couldn’t punch its
kidneys. Its kneecaps were about the size of car tires.

It couldn’t do
much to me either.

We just careened
around the room, knocking over and demolishing machines.

“Hank, are you
still there?” Gun asked.

I was trying to
put the trippendage’s middle finger in a headlock.

“What?” I yelled.

“Oh. You were
quiet. I wasn’t sure. What color is the sky here?”

I felt Gun might
make a somewhat interesting topic of conversation at the Gent Club or when
trying to impress a lady, but other than that, I think from now on I would
leave him at home.

The trippendage
and I broke apart. We were both getting tired. Maybe I could give it carpal
tunnel if I let it bash me a thousand more times.

I didn’t think I
could outrun the creature and I was worried about fighting it on the street. The
Rettosians would hardly take my side.

I shifted Gun to
my left hand. I should have dropped or holstered him, but I wasn’t thinking at
full capacity after being head-flicked.

I rushed forward
and the trippendage made a claw-like pose in anticipation.

I reached up and
grabbed its ring finger, ignoring the pain of my wrecked skin. This had not
been a very good plan because the creature began crushing me like I was a
stress ball.

“Hank?” Gun asked.

“What? What? I’m
busy!” I yelled.

“Are you still
dealing with that hand?”

“Yes!”

“Where are you
now?” Gun asked.

“Inside a
building. Just leave me alone for a minute.”

“Okay. But if you exit
can it follow you out?” Gun asked. “It seems awful large.”

It was hard to
strategize while I was getting sweaty-palmed to death, but Gun had a point. I
had watched the trippendage knock on the door with its foot to get in. And the
door’s control panel used recessed buttons far too tiny to be pressed by this
thing’s fingers.

I pushed up as
hard as I could to get free and hastily walked backwards, holstering Gun. The
trippendage was tired too, and waited for me to attack again.

Instead, I turned
and ran down the hall, fumbled with the door, and exited.

Once outside, I
looked up.

“The sky looks
like a normal space station shield,” I told Gun. “Huh. Floloria’s is actually kind of yellow. I
didn’t notice that.”

CHAPTER 40

“I don’t
understand why you’re upset with me,” Gun said.

“Because when I
point you at someone—or something—I expect you to shoot,” I said, as I hurried
along the Flolorian streets.

“I’m always
pointed at something. Do you want me to be firing all the time?” Gun asked.

“Did you even know
what was going on there?” I asked him.

“No. I told you I
don’t pay much attention to such things.”

“Every time I get
in a gunfight I can’t stop and explain. I’ll get murdered,” I said.

“You didn’t get
murdered back there. Or did you? Are you alive?” Gun asked.

“Yes. For the
moment. And I probably would have thought of the door eventually. Look, we’ll
go over this some other time,” I said.

I was feeling very
conspicuous being the only non-Rettosian on the street; the only non-Rettosian
who had recently suffered third-degree burns; and the only non-Rettosian
running along arguing with his pistol.

I was a bit
worried that when I had somehow travelled to that other ship, Irune or that crusty
Rettosian were now taking the opportunity to tele back to Floloria to let everyone know I was a big
meanie. It wouldn’t take them long to actually check my non-existent credentials.

Even if that
didn’t happen, the trippendage could mash the buttons enough times that the
door finally opened and it could come after me.

I had to get off
the space station.

I called Zzzho but
he said he was carrying a passenger. He said the Flolorian authorities made him
disembark when he dropped me off so he figured he might as well take on some
fares while he waited. I told him to divert and pick me up. I would pay for the
fee, the difference, and would owe him a favor.

There was a brief
negotiation as the passenger, a minor gang member who provided protection on a
retail barge, chimed in on how much he wanted in exchange for being
inconvenienced.

The talks were
going bad and the gang member at one point tried to say he wasn’t going to fly
anywhere he didn’t want to.

I explained that
Zzzho was a gas cloud and the thug couldn’t exactly commandeer the ship that
was designed for incorporeal entities, and Zzzho could just shove himself up
the thug’s nostrils and electrocute his brain.

We agreed on ten
grand for both parties.

Fortunately, they
weren’t terribly far away, but it was still going to take them over an hour to
get here.

All the signs on
buildings were in Rettosian. It was a flowery, floaty script that matched their
sound and biology and snootiness. It not only had three-dimensional lettering,
but the letters moved, much like the skin of a Rettosian. Even the humblest
signs looked like a mini-hallucination repeating on a loop.

I needed food,
badly.

I burst into the
first building I came to and there were a half-dozen Rettosians reclining in
chairs with strange apparatus all around them and what looked like Colmarian
attendants nearby. I couldn’t even guess what was going on here. Was it a hair
salon? Was it a skin salon? Was it a massage parlor? No clue.

The Rettosians all
seemed to be indignant-bordering-horrified that I was there. I stupidly tried
asking where a restaurant was, but that just made them cringe hearing my vulgar
words.

I then tried
mimicking eating by moving my hand to my mouth, fake chewing, and rubbing my
tummy.

One of the Rettosians
vomited upon seeing that and the nearest Colmarian literally shooed me out the
door. He kept saying something like “gli-glow-gliche,” over and over as he
removed me.

“Do you speak
Rettosian, Gun?” I asked Gun, but he didn’t answer.

I removed him from
my holster.

“Hey, do you speak
Rettosian?” I repeated.

“What’s that?” he
answered.

“Did you hear what
they were saying?”

“Who?”

I sighed and put
Gun away and went to the next building.

I didn’t have any
success in five more attempts and was beginning to wonder if Rettosians actually
ate food.

It was getting
close to time for Zzzho to pick me up and I decided to head to the port. Being
really hungry in space was still better than dying here with a full belly.

I had to go
through one of the administration buildings to reach the port and I tried to
put my head down and move as quickly as possible. Not just to avoid any
interactions, but to hide the fact I was burnt to a crisp.

I rounded a corner
and there was the Harbormaster, two Rettosians wearing incredibly elegant
robes, and three guards with long rifles.

The Rettosians in
robes were wearing what I had seen before on wealthy diplomats. The surfaces of
the robes bubbled and eddied with their liquid skin, and in between were
fantastic jewels and metals.

They took turns
speaking to me in Rettosian and seemed both angry and pompous. The guards had
their guns pointed down but were tense.

They had to know I
couldn’t understand them, but they didn’t seem to care. Maybe it was just
protocol.

I pulled out Gun and
pointed it at one of the robed individuals. My hope was that they valued their
lives far more than mine and I could bluff my way out of here.

“Gli Glow Gliche,”
I said, in my best approximation of what I heard at the skin parlor. I hoped
that meant some version of “get out.” I saw from their puzzled expressions that
my accented version meant nothing whatsoever.

“Bang! Bang! Bang!
Bang! Bang! Bang!” Gun said.

All the Rettosians
dropped!

I instantly fell
to my knees. Not because I had been shot or anything. I just lost power. I
think I fainted. I was down on all fours and shook my head a bit and finally
managed to get myself together.

“What did you do?”
I asked Gun.

“Shot them.”

“Why did you do
that? I just wanted to threaten them!”

“You got mad at me
for not shooting last time,” Gun explained.

I went and turned
over the body of the Harbormaster. He had a tiny hole right between his
eyebrows. I looked on the back of his skull and instead of a huge exit wound,
like you’d normally see with a projectile, it was the same size hole as the
front.

The rest were similarly
shot and very dead.

“Hey, don’t shoot
unless I say ‘shoot,’ okay?”

I began pulling
the bodies out of the hallway into the closest office. It was thankfully empty
because everyone who had formerly been inside now had holes through their heads.

Despite me having
murdered some seemingly important officials, it wasn’t very difficult to leave
the station.

The few Rettosians
I saw treated me like I was a piece of furniture. One captain disembarking from
another ship actually handed me some trash without even acknowledging me.

I boarded my taxi,
thankful I got out before the bodies were discovered.

Zzzho didn’t say
much and the thug who was my co-passenger didn’t say much. If I smelled like
burnt meat and appeared like burnt meat, they kept their observations to
themselves.

We had been in
space for about five minutes when Zzzho finally spoke up.

“Hey, I’m getting
an urgent message from Floloria. They want us to turn around,” he said.

“Eh, ignore it,” I
answered, as if nothing was wrong. “You know how it is, once people hang out
with me, they can’t get enough.”

“They seem pretty
upset,” Zzzho added.

“I don’t want no
trouble,” the crook next to me said, looking through the small windows like he
could see if we were being followed.

“It’s not as if
Floloria has cannons or a fleet,” I said, hoping Floloria didn’t have cannons
or a fleet.

“You paid me to share
a cab, not get in a fight,” the thug replied.

“I owe you ten
grand. It can be for your time or your funeral,” I said, and I pulled out Gun
and rested him on my lap. I made sure not to point him directly at anyone.

“Should I shoot
someone now?” Gun asked.

“No. No,” I said,
losing a bit of my cool when I thought of what a hole in the taxi would do.
“We’re just going to have a nice, quiet ride.”

CHAPTER 41

“Where have you
been?” Candar asked.

“Nowhere. Why?”

“You missed a
bunch of practices.”

“I know,” I said,
moving past him to get to my locker.

“Why is your skin
all twisted? You look like you were in a fire.”

“I do?”

“Get cleaned up
and on the field. We have to go over what plays we can use.”

“I’m going to be
in rehab for a bit. I’m hurt,” I said.

“Talk to Magda,
then. See what she says about getting injured on your own time and rehabilitated
on ours,” Candar threatened.

“What’s it matter?
If I’m hurt, I’m hurt. If I can’t throw a token it doesn’t matter if it happened
in my sleep or on the field,” I said, walking away.

I was wearing a
fat suit.

Not a suit that
made me fat, but a synth body suit insulated with animal lard. They even had my
face wrapped up and wired tight.

The rehabilitation
people had figured it was the best way to get my body to heal my burns. No one
could find Delovoa, but he had passed on some information about me.

I spoke to Garm
and general manager Cliston and told them what I found on Floloria. Previously,
my plan was to ask the Historians to hack the teles of the players who “retired”
from other teams, but I wasn’t sure it was necessary now. I was guessing they
weren’t retired, they were dead.

“So what do you
think it’s all about?” Garm asked.

“I thought it was
gambling related before, but I think it’s Irune. The guy put together the best
team in the galaxy and started killing players from the competition. Maybe it’s
also gambling, but it would be a miracle if the Reskin Sleepers didn’t
win the Championship this year. That’s partially due to a lot of dead opposing
players. He was at the building where Porj’s corpse was delivered, though not
sure what he wanted with it.”

“What should our
team do to prepare?” Cliston asked.

“You should hire
more security and put out word that if players are personally contacted with
outrageous counter-offers from other teams, it might very well be a plot to
kill them,” I said.

“I think it’s a
bad idea to tell the team that players are being murdered,” Garm said. “The
game is stressful enough as it is.”

“What’s the
Rettosian angle?” Cliston asked.

“I think they’re
just the facilitators providing technology to get this done. They teleported a
whole room. I don’t know how, but they did,” I said.

“Teleported?” Garm
asked.

“Yeah, remember
that Messahn battlesuit, 19-10? It was a relic from the
civil war. It could teleport. Kind of like a Portal, but just for one person.
Well, the Rettosians on Floloria moved the entire contents of a room and then
moved some of us back. If they can do that, it’s no wonder they can abduct
players,” I said.

“How are we
supposed to deal with that from a security standpoint?” Garm asked.

“I don’t know if
we have to deal with them. If I can get some real proof, Rendrae can
print it. Can you imagine the blowback if people found out that Irune and the
Rettosians are murdering glocken players? We wouldn’t have to do anything,” I
said.

I also told
Cliston what the Ank had said. We would be playing the Reskin Sleepers again.
Maybe in the Championship. I then asked sports agent Cliston to negotiate a
raise before I had to play the best team in the galaxy. The raise was denied.

I tried to tele
Delovoa to get his opinion on things, but I couldn’t reach him.

Magda came in, saw
me in my fat suit, and demanded I be fined.

General manager Cliston,
for once, stood up for me and said I had given valuable information on our
opponents, which he would be sharing with Magda later.

I went back to my
place to lie around in my fat suit soaking up cholesterol.

I also gathered a
huge pile of food and put it on my stomach as I stared at the ceiling above my
bed.

I heard the
doorbell ring but I ignored it.

A moment later I
heard MTB.

“Factotum 00003,
on your feet,” he said.

There were a bunch
of C.A. in my bedroom looking mean and official. Mostly mean. But MTB wasn’t in
his usual Inspector’s outfit. He was wearing his dress uniform, which was all
kinds of spiffy and menacing.

Uh oh.

I stayed as calm
as possible as I rolled off the bed, my food and containers splashing to the
floor.

“What can I do for
you, Inspector?” I asked.

“Follow me,
please.”

We walked into the
hall and into my living room, with the guards falling in step behind me.

My living room was
absolutely packed with C.A. It was like graduation day at the academy.

However, there was
one person seated who stood out. He was not a military man. He was a noble.

A Central
Authority noble.

I knew they
existed. I knew their names. But I had never actually met one in person before.

He was sitting in
my chair smoking what was clearly a mild narcotic—I was familiar with the odor.
He had a chest full of medals, and a heraldry that was some kind of green bird.
He was fit and young and handsome.

“May I present
Factotum 00003,” MTB said to the man. MTB then turned to me and said, “Overlord
of Defense, Murdaere Omno.”

Well, hot damn.
This was the head of the entire Central Authority! Murdaere was actually part
of his title, as if to dispel any illusions on what he could and would do in
the course of business.

The noble made the
smallest of gestures without looking at me.

“Have a seat,” MTB
said, like it wasn’t my house.

“We’re having an
issue with some Portals,” Omno said.

Of the billion
things I thought might be spoken, that wasn’t one of them. I didn’t even answer
because I figured there must be more.

But he looked at
me, as if he expected a response.

“Portals?” I asked
dimly.

“Yes, three
Portals have ceased to function.”

That was big news.
Belvaille didn’t exist without Portals, and the solar systems those Portals led
to didn’t exist either. Still:

“Three isn’t very
many, is it? We have hundreds. Or thousands,” I said. I wasn’t entirely sure.

The Murdaere gave
me a withering glance.

“The connected Systems
are of strategic importance. And you can understand the nobles who control them
want them restored.”

This was so beyond
my expertise. I really didn’t have a clue why he was talking to me.

“So, uh, have you
tried fixing them?” I asked, trying to be helpful.

“No one can find
Delovoa and he’s got some damn killer robots in the Portals,” MTB said.

Delovoa had
installed murder bots inside some of the Portals. He said it was to keep out
looters but I think it was for job security.

“Huh,” I said,
still not sure where this was going.

“I brought this up
with the Arch Minister and he mentioned you might be of service,” Omno said.

I put my bandaged,
fat-suited hands up.

“I don’t know the
first thing about Portals. What could I possibly do?” I said.

MTB gave me a
shocked expression. The guards in the room gave me shocked expressions. Hell,
even Omno seemed surprised. They all understood something I did not:

The Arch Minister
had basically told me to do something and I was saying no.

It didn’t matter
if I couldn’t do it. He was the monarch of Belvaille. I had better try.

“What I mean
is, I’m not sure how I could help, at this moment. But I will look into
it and give it my 100% undivided attention,” I said, smiling so hard a wire
snapped on my mouth brace.

“See that you do.
We can provide you with the details,” Omno said, as he stood up.

The C.A. marched
out of my house and I exhaled so hard I almost blew down a wall. MTB waited behind
and closed the door after they had left.

“What am I
supposed to do with this, MTB? I’m a glocken player. And not even a good one,”
I said.

“Stank Delicious,
I heard,” he said, scratching his head. “What I want to know is, I got this
complaint on my desk. Seems the Premier, Vice Premier, Harbormaster and some
guards were knocked off on Floloria.”

“Who are they?” I
asked, mildly surprised.

“The people you
met when you went to Floloria. They were killed slightly after you arrived and
slightly before you left.

“Do I look like
some assassin? What am I, an expert marksman to shoot all those people?” I
asked, exasperated.

“I didn’t say they
were shot.”

Hmm. I kept
forgetting MTB knew me pretty well and was a cop to the core.

“Well, I was
assuming they weren’t drowned on a space station. My mistake.”

“Could be a big
mistake. What were you doing there? Why did you want them gone? The Rettosians
aren’t exactly nobles, but they can still kick up quite a lot of dust.
Especially when their Premier is gunned down.”

“I didn’t say I
met anyone or was anywhere. That’s Factotum business,” I said firmly.

“Hank, that
Factotum crap don’t mean nothing to me. I can arrest you for smelling bad and
dressing in a rubber condom,” he said at my outfit.

“MTB, are you really
going to try and put the screws to me when your Murdaere just came in here to
relay a job from the Arch Minister?” I asked.

MTB smiled and
shook his head.

“You’re always
dancing, aren’t you, Hank? One of these days you’re going to trip and fall.”

“I don’t know how
many times I have to explain to you that we’re on the same side, MTB, just
different methods. Besides, I can’t dance.”

CHAPTER 42

There was no way I
was going inside a Portal to fight some combat robots just because Arch
Minister Maris-To mentioned my name in passing.

Delovoa made
lethal products on accident and those bots had kept the Portals
tamper-free for at least a century, so they must be pretty effective. I’d
probably have to push my way past a pile of corpses just to get inside.

Besides, what was
I supposed to do? The Portals were the most advanced technology left in the
entire galaxy—at least that I was aware of. Was I supposed to go in there,
fight some robots, and then pick my nose and hope that fixed the Portals?

There were only a
handful of people who could repair those contraptions and one of them was my
pal and creator of the murder bots. I’d just wait until Delovoa got back. He
was probably off on a bender somewhere or putting chrome rims on his
wheelchair.

I said I would
give 100% to fixing the Portals, but I didn’t say when.

This was it. The
Super Class glocken Championship was scheduled.

The Reskin
Sleepers vs. the Belvaille Glocken Team.

The Reskin
Sleepers were a given. Even if our record hadn’t put us in second place, even
if the Ank hadn’t effectively guaranteed we would play them, no other team wanted
to play them.

Our own schedule
was shortened dramatically because any team that the Reskin Sleepers played
first, usually ended up with half their players retiring, incapacitated, or dead.

At training camp,
we studied the Reskin Sleepers in great detail.

I also set up a
simple trade with Rendrae. He provided secret practice videos of the Sleepers
and I got him exclusive interviews with Kitt, Candar, and Magda Strongarm.

I don’t know how
he got the videos and I didn’t ask.

We watched their
last games back-to-back with their practice videos.

The practices alone
made it clear. They were doing all the same exercises and activities we did,
just a hundred times better.

We sat there
watching the videos and Candar was full of ideas on how we might triumph against
this unstoppable team. I was beginning to think that Candar wasn’t just an
eternal optimist, he was actually hallucinatory.

The Reskin
Sleepers were positively going to slaughter us. Even hinting to the
contrary was absurd.

I was called in to
talk with Cliston after the videos.

In his office with
him were Garm and Magda Strongarm.

“Great, now what
did I do?” I asked.

Magda hit me with
her metal bar and told me to shut up and sit down.

“I’m afraid I
haven’t been entirely honest about your employment here,” Cliston said.

“You mean I wasn’t
hired because of my amazing glocken skills?” I asked, astonished.

“We need you to
take out some of the Reskin players,” Garm said.

“I hope you mean
take them out to dinner,” I said.

“You don’t have to
kill them. But it seems clear that the Reskin Sleepers organization is working
to make it so they win the Championship,” Cliston said.

“They’ve
succeeded. You’d have to eliminate most of their team for us to have a chance,”
I said.

“The only reason I
came on as coach is because he would be general manager and because I
was promised a hit squad that could work behind-the-scenes,” Magda said. “This
stuff goes on all the time and I’ve lost countless games and more than a few Championships
because another team or some gambling hall or investing cooperative outbid us
when it came time to pay for arm-breaking. Coaching is part of the game,
players are part of the game, managing your front office, and managing your
back office. I like to call this the ‘back alley’ part of Super Class.”

“I’d need an army
and I’d need info and I’d need time,” I said.

“I got your
information. I’ve been following our main rivals all season, getting their
locations and weaknesses. Rendrae and Oxobox have also been helping,” Garm
said.

“You have time. The
Reskin Sleepers are in transit,” Magda said.

“Procon Hobb would
have to know. This could reflect on him,” I said, crossing my arms.

“Procon Hobb…does
not wish to be in second place,” Cliston said delicately.

“Whoever you don’t
stop from playing is going to show up on that field and beat us into the
ground. Beat you into the ground. It’s a preemptive strike,” Garm said.

“I have a job from
the Arch Minister himself,” I stated. I said it mostly to brag, but I also
didn’t know how to approach trying to kidnap a Super Class glocken player.

“You can do both,
the Reskin Sleepers won’t be in Belvaille for another month and the
Championship is a month after that,” Magda said.

“Does this job pay
anything? Or are you going to try and lump all this under my existing
contracts?” I asked.

“One hundred
million for each starting player removed from their roster. Fifty million for
each secondary or defender,” Cliston said.

My eyes started
watering.

“You could almost
hire the Quadrad for that much,” I said, to fill the silence.

“He has
hired the Quadrad,” Garm said. “You think Kitt and I are here randomly?”

“So Kitt is a
Quadrad? I guess I’m not surprised. It seems like the only people I have messy,
compromising, complicated sex with are Quadrad. I should start charging your
organization escort fees,” I said.

CHAPTER 43

Some weeks passed,
and I was healing well, going over the Quadrad surveillance information on the
Reskin Sleepers, and pretending to pay attention at practice.

I tried getting in
touch with Delovoa a few more times but there was no sign of him. At first I
was worried that he might also have been kidnapped, what with so many players
gone missing. But no one in their right mind would try and mess with Delovoa.
He still had a reputation as a dangerous lunatic. Probably because he was one.
I guessed he was off doing something unsavory.

For my scheme
against the Sleepers, I needed help so I scheduled a meeting.

It required I use
the services of a rival Factotum. The man’s name was Jipper. He was a decent
guy, old, small, and very shrewd.

Every Factotum had
their areas of expertise. I was known as someone who was close to the nobles
because of my heraldry. I was also known as a person you couldn’t ignore
because of my mutations. Jipper was a numbers and angles man. He might not get
you out of a fight, but he could get you the best rates and returns.

He wasn’t my first
choice, I didn’t like working with people who were that much smarter than me,
but I didn’t choose him.

We chatted before
the other guests arrived and I explained how I was going to present things.

Ulteem, the
gambling Lord, showed up with ten of his security personnel. On top of his
shoulders he wore a golden head with gems for eyes. It had no expression and
was bald. I thought it was an intimidating prosthetic for a negotiation.

Shor-Nuss was the
other gang boss and he came with eleven security personnel—these guys were
always trying to one-up each other.

Shor-Nuss was a
neck-breaker. He was portly, crude, and dangerous. He wore filthy clothes and
carried numerous hand weapons that were rusty and bent and well-worn. His gang
provided the security for the Reskin Sleepers when they were on Belvaille. I
can’t say I knew much about him. From what I heard asking around, he was fairly
intelligent, but far more violent. He had probably been hired by reputation alone
to dissuade anyone from attempting what I was going to attempt.

We all met in a
movie theater after it had closed for the night—you couldn’t get gang people to
wake up before noon. I had the doors sealed and guarded.

“Right. So we all
know each other. Jipper is Factotum for Shor-Nuss. I am Factotum for Ulteem.
Anyone who isn’t one of us needs to leave this room,” I said.

The security
guards all fidgeted, but the bosses agreed. It took them a good ten minutes to
leave for some reason.

“Everyone put your
tele in front of you on the floor and turn it off,” I said.

They did so
reluctantly.

I took out a big
metal box and powered it up. A light came on after a minute.

“Okay, so that
green light means there’s no tele communication in this area and it’s being
blocked—” I started.

“That’s a blue
light,” Shor-Nuss said.

I looked at it.

“Yeah, it’s blue,”
Jipper agreed.

“Blue, green,
whatever. If it blinks off, that means someone has activated a tele and we all
need to shut our traps,” I said.

“It doesn’t turn
red?” Ulteem asked.

“No, it doesn’t
turn red. It doesn’t turn mauve. It doesn’t sing a song. Listen to me. We
aren’t supposed to be meeting like this. This is against royal decree. You two
shouldn’t even see each other,” I said, pointing to Ulteem and
Shor-Nuss. “It’s just supposed to be Factotums going back and forth over and
over with at least one noble skimming off the top. But I don’t have time for
all that.”

“Can you give my
client an overview of what you’re proposing?” Jipper asked.

I took a deep
breath and tried to remain calm. I was really putting my neck out there.

“Belvaille Glocken
Team is going to be playing the Reskin Sleepers. Ulteem says our odds are
hovering around 30:1 against us. But if some of the Reskin Sleepers players
were injured, any bets you placed now could pay huge dividends if my team won,”
I said.

“So why am I here?”
Shor-Nuss asked.

“I know you’re
doing security for the team. I’m saying if you took a powder and let me and
maybe a small group slip by, we could hit the players and put them out for the
Championship,” I replied.

“How much are you
offering? Assuming my client is in fact the security,” Jipper asked.

“I know he is. I
have Quadrad working with me on this,” I said.

That impressed
everyone in the room. It wasn’t completely true, though. Garm said the Quadrad weren’t
going to have any part of an attack on a Super Class glocken team. It had too
many repercussions if it failed.

“But how much?”
Shor-Nuss asked.

“I’m not paying
anything—” I started.

“The hell with
this!” Shor-Nuss said, rising from his chair.

“The pay will come
from our winnings,” Ulteem stated calmly. That golden head really did have some
psychological power.

“You can
understand our concerns. My client is on the line for security and his
reputation will be tarnished if this were to succeed. And there is always the
messy proposition of splitting winnings. It’s clear to me that neither my
client nor Ulteem could place these wagers or they would become suspects,”
Jipper said.

“Ulteem already
has people who have been dying to put money down on a fixed game,” I said.

“A 30:1 return
sprinkled out across the galaxy. You figure an 85% fulfillment, with the rest
going out to collections, and we split it with my investors 50/50 and then
split it between us 50/50,” Ulteem said.

“How much capital
are they willing to put down?” Jipper asked.

“Five billion
easy. Ten at the high end,” Ulteem said.

I tried to remain
stone-faced at those numbers. I wouldn’t see a credit from it, of course, but
it was still amazing. I looked at the tele jammer to make sure the light was
still nice and greenish-blue.

Jipper whispered
something to Shor-Nuss and we sat waiting.

“Who all is going
to be attacking the players?” Jipper asked.

“We need to remain
a bit hushed on that,” I said. “Enough to get the job done.”

Jipper whispered
again with Shor-Nuss and they went back and forth for some time.

“There’s a
problem,” Jipper finally said.

“And what’s that?”
I asked, already annoyed.

“We only do the
outside security,” Shor-Nuss said. “They got a whole other group that handles
inside. Including the player bodyguards.”

“Well, who is this
other group?” I asked.

“Don’t know. I
been doing this a year and I still ain’t sure. They do their own thing. They
hand us the codes and manuals and we follow them. But they make all the rules.
The security inside the training camp is a lot harder than outside. And no
player ever leaves. You won’t get past them even if we walk you up personally
to the front door,” Shor-Nuss stated.

“Do you know if
the guards are Factotum?” I asked.

Jipper looked at
me, surprised.

“Like Xandale’s
Univox Factotal,” I continued. I was still wondering if he had a hand in things
after seeing him on Mapposh 48 and around Porj’s condo.

“No, I don’t think
so. They don’t act like that. More military,” Shor-Nuss said.

“Are they
Rettosians?” I asked.

“Oh, no,”
Shor-Nuss said quickly. “They’re nothing like them.”

I relaxed, but I
wasn’t sure what to do next.

“But you know,”
Shor-Nuss said, thinking, “they might be speaking Rettosian.”

CHAPTER 44

I walked into
Cliston’s office to meet with Garm, Cliston, and someone I didn’t know.

The other guy was
burly, young, and just reeked of stupid. I had been around con men long enough
that I knew an easy mark when I saw one. He was staring at the furniture and
fidgeting and seemed gee-gosh amazed at everything.

When I came in he
took off his soiled hat and stood up to shake my hand.

“Wow, Hank, Stank
Delicious! It’s an honor, sir!” He said.

He had a firm
shake and he looked like he could bench press a small car.

“Who the hell is
this guy?” I asked.

“You need help to
pull off your job,” Garm said.

I was horrified
she was mentioning it. I needed the utmost secrecy to try and infiltrate the
Reskin Sleepers’ training camp. I wasn’t even sure I could trust Shor-Nuss or
Ulteem and here she was blabbing about it to some random bumpkin.

“What’s that have
to do with him?” I asked.

“He’s one of our
third-string prospects,” Cliston said. “He has sufficient skills and more than
sufficient enthusiasm.”

He was a glocken
player!

“Why not Grah? Or
even Garm?” I asked.

“Because no one
else has the training and the Quadrad won’t let us participate,” Garm said.

“How much are they
paying you?” I asked the man.

“I’ll work for
free!” He said with a big stupid smile. He was enthusiastic.

“I can’t go in
there with some glocken player. He’ll be a liability,” I said.

“You’re a
glocken player,” Garm countered.

“I’m a bad glocken
player. I’m great at breaking skulls. I’m not taking him,” I said.

“You’re running
out of time. Besides, he comes from the volcanic planet of Duor,” Garm said, as
if that mattered.

“Congratulations
on having an inhospitable home world,” I snarled.

“Oh, it’s real
hot, sir,” the bumpkin answered seriously.

Who was this guy?

“He’s almost
completely fireproof,” Cliston said. “Just like you.”

I shrugged.

“We going to set
ourselves on fire to distract them?” I asked.

“Pyrodite
grenades. They can fill almost a thousand square feet with flames instantly,”
Garm said, putting four very scary canisters on the table.

“You’re nuts. If I
set the building on fire, the alarms will sound, everyone will pile out, and
the emergency services will come and arrest me. The whole point is to sneak
in, not try and burn the building down,” I said.

“I can show you
how to cut the fire prevention measures and instant alarms,” Garm said.

“People can still
tele for help,” I replied.

“Can you use your
tele blocker that Delovoa built?” Cliston asked.

“That only works
in a small area. Like a room. And it’s not even 100%,” I answered. I looked to
the kid. “Hey, do you know what we’re talking about? Are you okay with trying
to attack some fellow glocken players and put them out of commission?”

“I’d kill to get
on the team, sir. And I mean that,” he answered.

From his
expression, I believed him.

In the days before
the Reskin Sleepers arrived in Belvaille, I had healed almost completely. Maybe
I had a few more scars, but who was counting at this point?

I still couldn’t
get ahold of Delovoa, but I had more to worry about.

I had two or three
or four big concerns. I had to trust that Shor-Nuss would let me in and not
double-cross me. I had to hope the new guy, whose name was Javter, would be
capable of helping. I had to get in, bypass their extra layers of security,
beat up some professional fighters to the point of them not being able to
fight, and get out without anyone recognizing me.

Normally I
wouldn’t get anywhere near such a half-assed mission. But the fact of the
matter was I was going to have to do battle with these players on the field
when they were ready and I was unarmed, or I could lob a bunch of grenades at
them when they weren’t looking.

Given that those
were my only two choices, I was going with the grenades.

Garm had provided
me details on where the Sleepers would be training in preparation for our game.
She also had the schematics on the building and gave me info on how to
deactivate the fire systems.

I compared the
blueprints with the ones I got from Shor-Nuss and they were the same. That
would have been an easy test to see if he was trying to trick me.

The night of the
raid, I checked over my gear with Cliston. I had eight Pyrodite grenades. I had
three concussion grenades. I had one bomb that could take out a reinforced door
or wall. I had two shotguns. Handcuffs. A toolkit. My tele jammer. And Gun.

I had a long talk
with Gun and he was non-committal on this mission. Not because he didn’t
approve. He hadn’t really listened to me or showed much interest. He was very
esoteric.

“But what happens
when someone dies?” Gun asked.

“I don’t know,” I
said, annoyed our two-hour conversation had taken this turn.

“If you don’t
know, how can you want me to shoot anyone? What if something terrible happens?”
he asked.

“You’ve shot a lot
of people, right?”

“Maybe. What if I
only think I did? How do I know this is truly happening?” he asked.

“You know, Gun,
sometimes you just got to say ‘Eat suck, suckface!’ and deal with the
consequences,” I said profoundly.

Gun was quiet for
a while.

“That makes no
sense whatsoever.”

Cliston gave me a
mask to wear.

“What’s this?” I
asked.

“You need to
conceal your identity,” he answered.

“I know, but this
is a cartoon character. I’ve seen ads on my tele.”

“Does it matter
what kind of mask it is?” Cliston asked.

“Well, yeah. I
want it to be something scary, not something silly. I’ll look like a fool. Why
couldn’t you make me one?” I asked.

“Because I need to
be able to deny I provided assistance in the event the authorities question
me,” Cliston said.

“You could lie.”

“Your butler and
sports agent can lie, but not the general manager speaking to the Central
Authority,” he stated firmly.

“Then don’t answer
as the general manager. Only you and I know you’re ten different Clistons, and
even I haven’t got them all figured out. Answer the door as the general manager
and then speak as my butler. You do it all the time with me,” I said.

“That…is actually
an excellent idea, sir.”

“Thanks. I guess
there’s no time to make me a cool mask?” I asked.

“I don’t have the
materials here, no.”

I looked at it.

“Well, maybe I’ll
be too cute for them to shoot me.”

CHAPTER 45

We took my limo to
the Reskin Sleepers’ headquarters.

It was in the far
west of Belvaille and was one of the temporary facilities that away teams used.
There weren’t many here because Belvaille simply didn’t have the space for
empty gymnasiums when real estate was so expensive.

I did what Garm had
indicated and cut the emergency responder signals. Amazingly enough, those
controls were on the outside! That really blew my mind. You could just walk up
to a building, break a cheap lock, and deactivate all their safety precautions.

I made a note to
check on my building when and if I survived this.

Javter was with me
and he was pumped, following me around like a bloodthirsty puppy dog.

When the switches
were off, I told him to put on his disguise while I put on mine.

“Hey, where did
you get that mask?” I asked him.

He had this yellow
flaming monster face. It was very realistic and way better than my clown mask.

“I had it left
over from a Thad Elon’s Day party I went to,” he said.

“What’s it
supposed to be?” I asked.

“Thad Elon,” he
shrugged, as if I should know that Thad Elon was some scary monster on his
planet. But I guess if I grew up on a volcanic cinder, I wouldn’t be too
thankful to the gods that brought me into existence.

“I hope you were
practicing how to use a gun with Garm,” I said.

“No, I was doing
teambuilding exercises with Kitt and Candar.”

Those horny
bastards! So I had an oversexed accomplice trying to help me attack a fortified
base full of Super Class creatures.

“What do you have
for weapons?” I asked. He seemed woefully unprepared.

“These,” he said,
and he took out a bag and opened it for me.

I actually took
off my mask because I wasn’t sure what I was seeing.

“Why do you have a
bunch of rocks?” I asked flatly.

“I can throw
them,” Javter replied.

I looked at him
and he seemed serious. They were rocks. I mean they were fairly big rocks, like
five inches in diameter, but they were still rocks.

I wasn’t sure
where to begin.

“You were
listening to everything we were saying, right? There are people with firearms
inside there,” I said impatiently.

“I don’t know how
to use a gun. We don’t have guns where I come from. We throw rocks. Trust me, Stank—”
he started.

“Don’t call me
that.”

“Sorry. Trust me,
Hank, I can hit stuff good with these.”

It was almost the
setup for a joke.

A cartoon, a
moron, and a bag of rocks walk into a trap…

Of course, I was a
moron too for continuing. I hoped it wasn’t a trap but it certainly could be.

I was depending on
Shor-Nuss to leave the side door unlocked and unguarded. Past that there were
two more doors to get to the basement and then we were beyond his security and
would have to deal with the inside team—whoever they were.

The back door was
indeed open.

I took the
opportunity to give Javter two Pyrodite grenades. He could use them if his
rocks weren’t doing the trick.

“You are
fireproof, right?” I asked.

“Yeah, up to about
900 degrees and I can hold my breath for almost fifteen minutes,” he said.

Huh, I hadn’t
thought about that. We start chucking around fire grenades and I’m going to run
out of air. I wasn’t sure how long I could hold my breath, but it sure as hell
wasn’t fifteen minutes.

Javter’s planet
must really blow if this is how he evolved: diving in lava lakes to harvest
valuable rocks. No wonder he wanted to join the team so much. Getting beat up
by Super Class glocken players was a huge improvement for him.

We tiptoed through
the halls, which was pretty absurd considering we were dressed like perverted
cartoons and the halls were completely lit.

The next door had
a massive lock and if we were going to get double-crossed, this would be the
place. We had a long hallway behind us and this mega door in front of us.

I punched in the
code I was given and it beeped. Denied.

I tried it again.
Nope.

I was pouring
sweat now and I tried one more time. Slowly.

Success!

We hustled through
the door, moved along a short hall, and cut a right down some stairs.

The security door
here only had a simple lock that I ripped off.

Inside was the
heating and electrical and pipe works of the building. It reminded me of when I
worked in the sewers.

It was also where
they did the laundry of professional glocken teams, so it smelled very similar
to the sewers.

Now we had to just
sneak past some guards we didn’t know anything about, find some players who
could be anywhere, and try to beat them up even though we already knew they
were better athletes than we were.

Good thing we had
a bunch of rocks.

CHAPTER 46

The first room we
came to was massive. I don’t know how they built it. It was like four stories
deep. I had lost track of where we were in relation to the surface streets but
I was surprised to see this room. You can’t exactly tunnel very far in a space
station before you run into problems—like finding yourself in space.

I knew we would
have difficulties getting across the room. Or more accurately, I would. It was connected
and bisected with mesh-wire metal stairs. I was pretty sure those stairs
couldn’t handle my weight.

“Where to now,
Hank?” Javter said.

“Don’t use my real
name. We’re supposed to be in disguise,” I answered.

“What should I
call you? Stank?”

I looked at him to
see if he was serious, but he was wearing a mask.

“No. Don’t call me
that either. Just call me One. And you’ll be Two,” I said.

“Like the
numbers?”

“What? Yes, like
the numbers.”

“I see some doors
down there,” Javter said.

“I don’t think
these stairs will hold,” I answered. “How much do you weigh?”

“About 415,” he said.

“You try them
out.”

He walked out onto
the platform in front of us. It was a four-story drop if that flooring gave
out.

Javter turned
around and shrugged.

“Jump up and down
some,” I said.

He did so and
there was some slight banging from his feet but no hints of metal fatigue at
all. It seemed sturdy.

“Okay, come back
here and let me try. If these can’t hold me I don’t know what we’ll do because
this is the only way that’s clear,” I said.

I put out one foot
slowly. Tap. Tap. I put a little weight on it while keeping most of my
body in the doorway.

“It seems fine,
Hank. Er, One. Are you One or me? I can be either,” Javter said.

I ignored him and
inched out some more. It did seem pretty strong. I put half my weight on
the platform and it didn’t make a sound. Dragging my other foot over, I was now
completely on the metal floor.

I took a big sigh
of relief.

Now it was a lot
of stairs down to another platform, then up a different catwalk to some more
stairs. The whole area was crisscrossed with piping and vents and cables.
Basically anything that moved—water, air, electricity, sewage, laundry, trash—came
through here.

The doors were on
the ground level so we would have to go down.

I put a foot on
the first stair and I passed through it like it was paper!

“TwOne!” Javter
yelled, which confused me.

I felt him grab my
shoulder to try and halt my fall, but that was foolish. I was many times his
weight and he just came cartwheeling along with me.

Uncontrolled falls
are about the epitome of panic. Arms and legs go flailing in some idiotic
attempt to swim through the air. Maybe it’s some avian instinct we still
possess, but it’s nevertheless not very helpful.

When we hit the
ground I landed on my side.

But I also landed
on Javter’s legs. I don’t know how he got under me but there he was. And by the
mangled look of his legs, he was not in a good way.

He began yelping
in pain and I put my hand over his mouth to muffle him. We had just ripped out
a huge chunk of metal stairs, I don’t know why I was suddenly trying to be
sneaky.

“Javter, er, Two,
you need to be quiet,” I whispered.

And just like
that, he stopped.

“Are my legs
okay?” he asked. “I don’t want to look.”

I slowly got up.
My ankle and wrist and shoulder hurt, but nothing was broken on me that I could
tell. Javter was a mess.

“Uh. What position
did you play in glocken?” I asked.

“I’m a Twist,” he
said.

“You’re fine,
then. You should still be able to throw tokens. But you won’t be running.”

“Oh, man! Oh,
man!” Javter said. He had just looked at his legs.

“Shh. You got to be
cool.”

What was I going
to do? I just lost half my strike team and demolished our exit. Three sets of
stairs were ruined. Even if we could somehow scamper up one, there’s no way we
could bridge all those gaps.

“I’m thinking this
attack is over, Javter,” I said.

“I thought we
weren’t supposed to use our names,” he answered.

I took off my
mask.

“Our only hope is
we tell them who we are and try and get out of here. We haven’t done anything
except some property damage at this point. We can leave the weapons here. If
they ask…I don’t know, we’ll say we were trying to meet the competition ahead
of the game to…invite them for drinks.”

“What about me?
What about my legs?” Javter asked pitifully.

“You’re a crippled
kid who wanted to get their autographs and I agreed to bring you,” I said.

I stowed all our weapons
and gear in a duct in the far corner of the room. I figured it was a pretty
good hiding spot because it was saturated with rust and dust and filth, so
clearly no one came back here.

I only kept Gun
and I could pass him off as just a normal sidearm—as long as he kept his mouth
shut.

Using the rock bag
and grenade bag, I tore up some strips to bind Javter's legs together. He could
wrap his arms around my neck and hold on. He had good upper-body strength—and pretty
amazing pain tolerance, I had to say.

I hoisted him up
and looked to see which door was the most promising.

As I was standing
there, the door in the middle of the room clicked and swung open.

CHAPTER 47

I waited for
someone to come in but the doorway remained empty.

I thought if I was
going to pretend to be a harmless spectator, I should make myself known.

“Hello?” I called
out. “We seem to be lost.”

No answer.

With Javter still
on my back, I walked to the open door, trying to simultaneously keep a casual
air while preparing for a fight.

I peeked into the
open doorway and beyond it was a lit hall with three passages. It was completely
empty.

Hmm.

They could be
hiding in wait around one of those corners. But if they wanted to attack they could
have done it in that big open room.

I stood there a
moment trying to puzzle this out when I noticed a security camera in the upper
corner.

Stepping back into
the main room I scanned all the corners and, sure enough, there were one, two,
three, at least four cameras, looking all around.

So they had seen
us come in, seen us fall, and maybe seen me plant a bunch of weapons and
grenades. It was going to be difficult to play this off as a casual visit.

So far I was not
impressed with Garm’s details of this building. I wish she would have mentioned
they had cameras in every damn crevice. But maybe the Quadrad hadn’t penetrated
this far.

I decided to hope
that they couldn’t see the duct where I had stashed our gear or at least
couldn’t recognize them at a distance via camera. It was dark over there and I
didn’t exactly hold them up to the light.

I walked down the
hall with a smile and jaunty step, carrying the crippled Javter on my back. I
gave a hearty wave to the camera.

The door to the
left clicked unlocked and swung open.

Standing where I
was, I could immediately see there was no one behind it.

“What’s going on?”
Javter asked.

“Someone is
letting us walk inside,” I said.

“Who?”

“How should I
know?”

We were similarly
ushered through four more doors and up some, thankfully, firm stairs that
didn’t collapse under me.

We only passed a
few open rooms. Mostly maintenance and storage areas.

Finally, a door
opened at the end of a hall and I could hear voices coming from behind it.

“I might have to
drop you if things go bad,” I told Javter.

“I can still fight
if they get close enough,” he said. “You should have let me keep some stones.”

I walked gingerly
toward the room and the voices died down as we approached. This felt so bad.
Every instinct I had was telling me to get out of there. But where would I go?
Hide in the laundry? They had cameras all over this place.

I licked my lips,
flexed my hands, rolled my head on my neck a bit, and tapped Gun at my side.

“You awake?” I
asked.

“I don’t sleep. I
don’t think,” he answered.

“I might need you
to shoot people,” I said.

“Do they have
noses?” he asked.

I was momentarily
startled out of my mental planning by that question.

“Why does that
matter?”

“I don’t know. I
was just thinking about noses. Where did noses come from?” he asked.

I stopped and
thought about it.

“I don’t know.
Just shush, okay?”

I went back to
creeping forward.

As I rounded on
the room, I could see there were all kinds of computers and equipment inside.
But no people were visible yet.

When I reached the
entrance, I saw a large console, a uniformed Colmarian guard staring at me with
obvious malice, and a large man in a pressurized mask.

I waited, unsure
what to do.

“Hi, Hank,” my
uncle said through his breathing mask.

“Uh, hi.”

“What are you
doing here?” he asked, good-naturedly.

“We should call
for backup, Frank,” the Colmarian guard said to my uncle.

“Frank?” I asked.

“Hold on, hold on,
let him explain himself. He’s not going anywhere,” my uncle said.

“I, um, want to
meet the team. You know, because we’re playing them. I wanted to kind of
welcome them and maybe…” As I was speaking, hearing the words brought into
stark relief how stupid they sounded. My mouth suddenly boycotted, refusing to
say anything more.

“And who’s he?” my
uncle asked, pointing to Javter.

“I’m Two,” he
piped on command.

“We need to get
some guns down here,” the smaller guard said.

“One moment, I
know Hank.” My uncle folded his arms and got serious. “Come on now, do you want
to tell us the real reason you’re here?”

This mission had
been bad from the get-go. I was trapped, surrounded by enemies, and the only
guy who might help me was my sleazy maybe-uncle who owed me a bunch of money.

“I’m here to try
and somehow incapacitate one or more of the players,” I said simply.

“And why would you
do that? What makes you think it would even be possible?” my uncle asked,
clearly not impressed.

“I get a hundred
million for each player taken out,” I said. “I’ll split it with you.”

My uncle’s face
was obscured by his breathing apparatus. I had no idea what his expression was.

“Enough of this,”
the Colmarian said. “I’m calling for help!”

My uncle backed
away from the console.

“Yeah, sorry,
Hank, but you clearly don’t know what’s going on here,” my uncle said.

I was about to
take out Gun when my uncle grabbed the other security guard by the back of the
head and smashed him face-first into the console. The computer practically
ripped in half from the blow, and it was a sturdy-looking piece of hardware.

“Wow, a hundred
million? No fooling?” my uncle asked.

“Yeah. For
starting players. Fifty for bench or defenders,” I said.

The Colmarian
security guard had fallen to the floor and I didn’t know if he was unconscious
or dead, but he was not entering any beauty pageants after getting his face
pushed through a dozen circuit boards.

“So what is your
plan on taking them out?” my uncle asked.

“Well,” I started.
“We have some grenades stored back in that room. Hey, how long have you been
watching us?”

“Since you came
in. That was funny what you did on the stairs. What do you have besides
grenades?”

“I have a couple
shotguns. I, uh, have Gun,” I said, and I turned my hip so he could see.

“You brought the
Rettosian pistol? Do you trust it?” my uncle asked.

“Sure. I guess. It
seems like a good guy. For a gun.”

“Okay, but how do
you expect to take out a player?” my uncle asked, confused.

“Surprise? They
wouldn’t expect us, right?”

“You know there’s
like twenty-five other Ontakian guards in here?” he asked.

“Oh. Really? No, I
didn’t know that. Can I talk to them?” I asked.

“Talk to them? You
want to talk to them? Hey, Two, can you wait in the hallway?” my uncle
asked.

“Sure. If you can
put me down there,” Javter said.

I carried him into
the hall and gently laid him down.

“Things are going
pretty good, huh, Hank?” Javter asked happily.

“Yeah,” I said,
blinking at his ignorance.

I rejoined my
uncle and closed the door so we could talk in private.

“Is your real name
Frank?” I asked him.

“No, I told you my
real name. I wanted to use a Colmarian one so people didn’t know I was a former
slave,” he said.

“It sounds like
mine.”

“That’s what I based
it on. What the hell do I know about Colmarian names?”

“So is it cool if
I talk to some of the other Ontakians? I really want to know about my home
world,” I said.

“You’re just going
to walk up to them and say you’re Hank the Colmarian Ontakian mutant from a
rival team infiltrating the place they are protecting and ask them about Ontak?”
Frank asked.

“Well…you’re
working here. Can’t you introduce us?”

“They don’t know
who I am. Or care. I’m just another Ontakian to them,” he answered.

“Where did so many
Ontakians come from?” I asked.

“Floloria.”

“The Rettosians? I
thought you hated them,” I said.

“A fella’s got to
work,” he said simply.

“So can we get
past the guards?”

“Not if you talk
to them. But otherwise, yes. Your friend with the broken legs can’t come,
though.”

“We can’t just leave
him here,” I said.

Frank sighed.

“I guess we can
get a ladder and a pallet with wheels. I can unlock the doors from here to the
exit. If he gets caught they might find out what he knows, though.”

“I honestly don’t
think he knows anything,” I said.

“But the problem
isn’t the Ontakians, it’s the players. Who did you want to go after?” Frank
asked.

“I was hoping to
go for their 8-lane so I wouldn’t have to play against him.”

“You’re crazy!
That guy could rip both of us apart even if you shoved all those grenades up
his urethra. Our best bet is to go for their 2-lane. Guy by the name of
Bildosa. He’s a big scorer but he also sleeps a lot. Like a real lot,” Frank
said.

“I don’t play a
2-lane,” I pouted. “I was hoping to go for some of the higher lanes. I know
they’re good glocken players, but we got two Ontakians with weapons. Don’t you
think we can handle them?”

“They aren’t just
good glocken players. You know everyone on the Reskin Sleepers team is a
mutant, right?” Frank asked.

CHAPTER 48

“How do you know
they’re mutants?” I asked.

“It’s obvious,”
Frank answered.

I waited for him
to continue but he just stood there.

“Okay, how is it obvious?
It wasn’t obvious to me.”

“I’ve been all
over this galaxy and seen a fair number of odd things. But what these guys can
do isn’t just weird, it’s inexplicable. It has to be mutations. They try
and keep it hidden, but I noticed. I’ve been cataloging their abilities so I
can sell it to competitors. How do you think they keep winning all these
games?” Frank asked.

“Because they’re
mutants?” I replied.

“Sure. A whole
team of mutants. And not even lame mutations, but really good ones,” Frank
said.

I thought about
how strong a team of mutants would be. Like one of me on every lane.

“I think Irune has
some tricks he’s pulling. You know anything about that?” I asked.

“Irune doesn’t do
anything. He doesn’t even coach them,” Frank said dismissively.

“What? Then what’s
he doing at every game on the sidelines?” I asked.

“You’ve seen him.
He just sits there. He hasn’t said one word to the team or made them run
through one practice. Other people do that.”

“Irune talked to
me on Floloria. He even called me by name,” I said.

“Really?” Frank
seemed surprised. “What did he say to you?”

“Just that. Called
me by name.”

“I think Irune is
just a gimmick to hide the mutations,” Frank said.

“But why are they
hiding them? I’m a mutant and it’s not a secret,” I said.

“Because they
don’t want people to know the whole team are mutants.”

“Why? I mean, it’s
pretty incredible they have that many mutants together, it must have taken them
a long time to find, but it’s not illegal or against the rules,” I said.

“You think they found
these players? This many mutants who are perfectly suited to glocken? It would
take a thousand talent scouts a thousand years. No, they’re hiding the
mutations because they don’t want anyone to know they’re making them.”

“Making
them? But that technology is lost,” I exclaimed.

“Says who? You?
You an expert on advanced bio-manipulation? The civil war might have wiped out
a lot, but there’s got to be some labs somewhere that weren’t destroyed. Some
scientists must have survived,” Frank said.

I thought about
this. Wow, new mutants. I figured I was a dying breed, but there might be more
of us. Then again, I wasn’t a Colmarian mutant I was an Ontakian mutant.

“Still, it’s not
against the law. Yeah, some people might be freaked out that they’re making
mutants, but so what?” I asked.

“You know how
mutations worked, right? It was all random. What was it, a 1% success rate?
Less? I don’t know. And a bunch of mutations weren’t good, they were bad. Really
bad. So how many people did they have to mutate to get one Super Class glocken
team? That’s what they’re hiding. All the failures. All the people with
horrific mutations.”

“The Colmarian
Confederation mutated its population to protect it from being invaded by other
empires. I can’t imagine anyone would do it just for glocken,” I said.

“Well, they have.
I mean you’ve played them. You’ve seen them,” Frank said.

“We had videos of
their practices. They’re…really good.”

“Exactly. And if
you think people wouldn’t do this just for glocken, you don’t understand how
much money is involved—wait, they’re paying you a hundred million to take out one
player. So let’s get going.”

“We have to help
Javter, the guy in the other room. And what mutation does this Bildosa have?”

“I don’t know,”
Frank said. “I’ll open the doors back to the surface. Go down the hall and grab
a maintenance dolly. Your friend can pull himself along sitting on it. Then get
your weapons. We’ll need them.”

“How will he get
up the broken stairs if he’s on a cart?” I asked.

“There are other
ways out. I assume you worked a deal with the outside security otherwise you
couldn’t get in. Just tell them he’s coming,” Frank said.

Javter wasn’t
happy to be left out of the fight, but I think he understood his ability to
chew on someone’s foot wasn’t that impressive.

I teled Shor-Nuss
and said Javter was coming out and that he hadn’t been seen. He wanted to know
if the plan was still on and I said it was.

Frank was armed
with…I don’t know. He had on two thick metal gauntlets and a big backpack.

“What’s that?” I
asked with professional curiosity.

“Twin flame
throwers. I never really got good with guns—which is a shame because they’re very
inexpensive. This mask also makes it hard to aim well.”

“Yeah, that’s why
I use shotguns. Never thought of flamethrowers. I had your plasma gun you sent
me for a while, but it exploded.”

“You fired it? Did
it work?” Frank asked.

“A few times. It
shot clean through metal buildings,” I said.

“Yeah, those smart
Ontakians were really smart. Our family doesn’t come from that line,” he said.

Every time Frank
talked I had more questions, but this was a bad time to go over our genealogy.

“Why two
flamethrowers instead of one?”

“They’re different
types. The left one is a short-range cone that I can use up close and not kill
myself. The right one is a liquid stream that ignites on contact and can burn
for up to an hour. You get covered by that, it’s messy.”

We walked through
the halls and passed other guards.

Ontakians.

They were big, rugged
guys, and I couldn’t help staring. But we walked past them without stopping.
Frank said they wouldn’t check our credentials because we had security badges
and Frank, at least, was recognized. I probably looked like a new Ontakian
recruit.

After a while of
them ignoring us, I had to comment.

“For fabulous
Ontakian guards, these guys don’t seem that competent,” I said.

“They’re just
punching a timecard. Rettosians hire Ontakians. I think it makes them feel like
the boss again and they didn’t actually lose the war. In return, the Ontakians
don’t work very hard.”

“How did the
rebellion start, anyway?” I asked, as we walked through the halls.

“Supposedly there
was an Ontakian leader who gathered everyone,” Frank said.

“Did he die?” I
asked.

“No one knows.
Probably.”

“What was his
name?” I asked.

“Thad Elon.”

I stopped.

“That’s not
possible,” I said.

“What?” he asked.

“Every damn
species in the galaxy has some Thad Elon myth,” I said.

“I don’t think he exists.
Or if he did, he was a lot of different people and they just gave him one name,”
Frank said.

“But haven’t you
heard of Thad Elon’s Day, the Colmarian holiday?” I asked.

“Who cares about
Colmarians? Their empire doesn’t even exist anymore.”

“A bunch of other
species have that same name though.”

“So? I’m sure
there are Hanks in other languages as well. You get enough races together the
words will overlap.”

“Yeah, but if
there are Hanks they aren’t all Factotum 0003. Every Thad Elon from every race
is similar. Like some big hero.”

“That sure is
interesting,” Frank said, completely uninterested. “But Bildosa is in that room.
He’s a punchy little guy for his size, and he’s fast. So get those grenades and
shotguns ready.”

“I don’t want to
kill him,” I said.

Frank looked at
me.

“Did you think we
were going to tickle him? Ask him politely to sit out the next game?”

“No, but can’t we
just rough him up so he can’t play?”

“We got a hundred
million on the line. Our best bet is to go in there, raise hell, and get out
before anyone can stop us. You can do what you want, but I’m throwing down a
room full of fire.”

He didn’t wait for
me to answer and hurried to the door.

CHAPTER 49

Frank clicked the
panel to unlock Bildosa’s door. As soon as it opened, I saw a four-foot-tall
Colmarian wearing full glocken protective gear waiting for us.

He was thin and
unimposing.

If Frank was surprised
seeing Bildosa ready and waiting, he recovered quickly and threw a one-two
combination with a speed I could only envy.

Frank’s left cross
was ducked easily, and his right uppercut was deflected.

Bildosa did a
cartwheel into the hallway and was now standing in front of me.

I hadn’t been
ready and was honestly having difficulty following things. Both Frank and
Bildosa were a lot faster than me.

I took out a
shotgun, aimed low, knowing he had on body armor, and fired.

Bildosa did the
oddest split I ever saw. Keeping his left foot on the ground, he leaned far to
the left and kicked his right leg straight up. His arms were outstretched and
touched the wall. He immediately recovered into a standing position. How he did
that so fast was beyond me, but I didn’t hit him at all.

Frank whipped out
his left hand and the flamethrower shot out a blast of fire that filled the
whole hallway. I could feel the heat on my face, but he was right, the flames didn’t
go very far. It was more of a brief puff.

When the fire
faded, we saw Bildosa was thirty feet away from us. He had somehow jumped
backwards without a running start and without hitting the low ceiling.

I didn’t know what
mutant level this guy was, but he was up there.

“Get going!” Frank
said.

I fired two more
shots with my shotgun and Bildosa pressed himself against each wall like he was
attached by pneumatic cables. He moved far faster than I could aim.

I took out my
other shotgun and rapid fired, trying to fill the hallway with buckshot,
figuring he couldn’t dodge it all. But he jumped to my left, flipped up the
wall, took two steps on the ceiling, pushed off to the other wall, then landed
gracefully in the center of the corridor.

I had three more
shots in my bag but I would need to reload. I also had grenades and Gun—I
hadn’t bothered bringing the rocks.

I underhand threw
a concussion grenade and, to my amazement, Bildosa jumped forward, hopped on
the grenade in mid-air, and arrived a few feet in front of us before the
grenade exploded harmlessly out of range.

My mouth was still
hanging open when Bildosa suddenly did a handstand, kicked Frank in the face,
knocking him on his back, then spun around like a windmill and tripped me.

This was their
2-lane! And to think I had wanted to go after their 8-lane.

I started to get
up only to see Bildosa straddling Frank and punching him with both fists. Frank’s
head was thrashing around so much I thought it might fly off. How could a tiny
guy be so strong?

I reached out to grab
him and he punched me in the nose. A blinding pain shot through me and I thought
he must have shattered a bone. Both of my hands immediately went to my face to
protect myself.

Bildosa went back
to pummeling Frank, who was trying unsuccessfully to cover up.

“Help!” He muttered.

I took out a
Pyrodite grenade, primed it, and dropped it on the ground. I curled into a ball
but as I was doing so, I got to see Bildosa really move.

He lunged
backwards with arms and legs outstretched and quite literally flew thirty feet
and landed.

The grenade went
off and I was engulfed in flames. Odd as it was, this was a respite from
Bildosa’s little fists of doom.

While I was
ignited, I had a moment to think about what I had just seen. When Bildosa
escaped, he did not travel in an arc. He shot back like a laser beam,
completely parallel with the floor.

The Pyrodite
grenades didn’t create much lasting flame and died down almost as quickly as
they appeared, leaving just a few patches burning by our feet.

“Maybe we should
go,” I said to Frank, as he stood up.

But he held out
his right hand and launched a stream of burning liquid. Bildosa dodged it
easily. Frank fired three more jets and each time they were casually
sidestepped.

The hall was now
burning brightly about fifty feet away and it was getting harder to breathe and
see because of the smoke.

“Throw another
past him to force him closer,” Frank said.

“Do we want him
closer?” I asked.

But I threw
another Pyrodite like he said.

It erupted behind
Bildosa and even surrounded him for a brief moment, but seemed to cause no
irritation at all.

He then leapt
forward as fast as I had seen him retreat, kicked Frank…somewhere, hit me in
the knee, then the back of the neck, then my side. I’m not even sure I got to
blink before all that happened.

I was on the
ground and I didn’t even remember falling. Hell, I didn’t remember how I got in
this building. I’d probably forget my own name in a minute.

Frank roared and
charged forward.

He was a good brawler.
Really good considering each of those punches packed about as much force as a
rocket-assisted sledgehammer.

But Bildosa kept
blocking them. Not directly stopping the blows, but more deflecting and
avoiding. And for every miss, Frank took a murderous counter-shot.

Frank was getting
beaten silly by this diminutive man who was probably the same mass as Frank’s
leg and the same mass as my big toe. It didn’t make any sense.

“Shoot him!” Frank
said.

I was out of
shotgun shells, but I took out Gun and aimed.

“Hey, Gun, can you
shoot that guy?” I yelled.

No response.

“Gun!”

“Don’t use that
thing,” Frank said.

“Where’d he come
from?” Gun asked.

“Shoot,” I yelled
again.

“To kill?” Gun
asked.

I thought a second
and said:

“No.”

“Yes!” Frank
replied.

“No,” I said
clearly.

“Okay,” Gun said.
“Bang!”

Frank grabbed his
right thigh and dropped to the ground, crying in pain. I also fell to my knees.
I felt tired. Like I wasn’t full of adrenaline in a flame-filled hallway but
was in bed two minutes before going to sleep.

I shook my head
trying to get out of it.

“Dammit!” Frank
said. “I told you not to use it. That’s a Rettosian gun.”

“Why did you shoot
him?” I asked Gun.

“You told me to,” Gun
replied calmly.

I holstered the
weapon and went to help Frank.

As I approached,
Bildosa kicked me in my face again and punched me in my gut, doubling me over. He
then kneed me in my head with enough force I landed on my back.

Like he had done
to Frank, Bildosa stood on my chest and began peppering my face with punches. I
defended myself as best I could, but I still felt the blows.

Again, this didn’t
make sense.

I know this guy
was a mutant, but mutations weren’t magic. I was really strong because I was
thousands of pounds. Frank was faster than me because he wasn’t
thousands of pounds. There was no way this guy could be faster and stronger
than both of us. If he was punching me with this much force, he should be
pushing himself up against the ceiling with each blow because he was so light.
That’s just physics.

But I felt it. And
Frank felt it. It certainly wasn’t an illusion.

The pain was incredible
as this weedy little 2-lane beat the snot out of me.

I had been punched
by a Therezian; fought Dredel Led combat robots; fired an autocannon at point-blank
range; been hit with bombs and missiles and countless bullets. But all of them
were less painful than this.

I was almost
paralyzed.

Frank was faring
no better as he groaned and screamed next to me.

In between blows,
I reached down and got hold of Gun.

“How many people
are in this hall?” I yelled.

“Two,” Gun
answered pleasantly.

Damn. There goes
that idea.

“Well then why did
you shoot him and not the other guy?” I asked.

“Did you want me
to shoot you?” Gun asked.

“What? How many
people are here besides me?” I asked.

“One.”

“You don’t see a
little person about four feet tall?”

“No.”

“Frank! He’s in
our heads! It’s not real,” I said.

“The hell you
talking about? You listening to that gun that shot me?” he asked.

I looked at my
uncle. He was crouched against the wall trying to cover himself as Bildosa
kicked him.

“Your mask. It
isn’t broken. You’ve been punched in the face like fifty times. Am I bleeding?”
I yelled.

With great
difficulty he turned to me.

“No,” he said,
astonished.

I still felt the
pain, but it was dimming. Part of my brain knew it was fake but something was
still going on.

Frank reached over
and took one of my Pyrodite grenades from my hip bag.

He dragged himself
up even as Bildosa kept hammering and kicking at him. But I could see it was
affecting him less as well.

He primed the
grenade and hurled it into Bildosa’s room. We had never gone into that room
since Bildosa had come out to meet us.

There was a blast
and a wave of fire shot from the doorway. Bildosa suddenly disappeared.

A few moments afterwards,
another Bildosa ran into the hallway. The big difference between the two
Bildosas was this one was on fire and waving his arms around, shrieking. But he
quickly tripped and rolled along the floor.

I held out Gun.

“Shoot that little
guy,” I said. “To kill.”

I promptly fainted.

CHAPTER 50

I woke up to see
the ceiling moving past me.

Slowly.

I lifted my head
and saw my uncle dragging me by one foot, though he was having a tough time.

“How long was I
out?” I asked.

He threw down my
leg with a groan.

“Good, you’re
awake. About five or ten minutes I’d guess. I almost broke my back. What do you
weigh, like 4,000 pounds?” he asked.

“No,” I said,
irritated, but I didn’t clarify further.

I still had
niggling worries that Frank wasn’t really my uncle. But here he was risking his
life to save me when he could have just taken off.

“I get half of the
money, right?” Frank asked.

Oh, yeah. He
needed me for the contract.

“Yeah. What did
Gun do to Bildosa?” I asked as I stood up.

“The whole hallway
was just…misted with blood. There was hardly anything left. I told you that
thing was dangerous. I don’t know why it knocked you out.”

“Delovoa said it
takes the electricity of the user. Sorry for shooting you. How’s your leg?”

“You didn’t shoot
me, that gun did. I’ll live. Doesn’t seem to be a bolt inside so I guess I got
lucky. Hurts like hell, though.”

“Yeah, it doesn’t
shoot bullets, it shoots like blobs of space that warp gravity,” I said.

“Well, it can turn
a 2-lane glocken player into ten buckets of food coloring and drill holes in
Ontakian legs. We need to get the hell out of here. Are you okay to walk?”

“Yeah, I feel like
I just took a nap,” I said.

“The facility will
be on lockdown so most guards will be covering the players. I think we can go
through the cafeteria and then to the freight loading zone. Those should all be
low priority. But we’re going to run into the outside security. You said you
made a deal with them?”

“Shor-Nuss. He let
us in, but I don’t know if he told all his men,” I said.

“Then we’ll have
to fight our way out. I’m not too worried though, those guys are just Colmarian
losers. You can whip them with one hand,” Frank said.

“What about you?”

“I got shot in the
leg. I’m concentrating on not bleeding to death and getting us out of here. I
figure I’m doing more than my fair share,” he said.

Frank had tried to
make a tourniquet, but we didn’t have any material strong enough to stanch an
Ontakian’s thigh so he was making do by just pressing one of my extra shirts to
his skin.

Seeing him bleed
and limp like that made me really appreciate how much of a mutant I was
compared to him. That same shot wouldn’t have significantly hurt me. I
certainly wouldn’t look like I was trailing a slaughterhouse.

“If anyone comes
into this hall they won’t have trouble tracking us,” I said, admiring the
streaks of blood on the floor.

“The more you keep
talking, the more likely they’ll come,” Frank replied icily.

We went across the
empty cafeteria and Frank grabbed a huge wad of napkins which he shoved inside his
pants over his wound.

After that we went
through a service door that Frank said led to the loading facility for the
cafeteria. He motioned to be alert.

Two figures in
thick steel body armor came into view at the end of the hall. They were clearly
waiting for us. Their armor made them almost look like robots, but you could
see their faces and skin in some places.

“That’s civil war
armor and rocket pods,” Frank said from behind me. Not sure how he got back there
so fast.

“Hi,” I started.
“I have an agreement with your boss, Shor-Nuss. You see it’s kind of—”

The two men raised
their rifles and fired.

They were almost
lazy rockets. I could see them pop out and make little smoke trails as they
streamed at me. One, two, five, twenty rockets each.

Some flew past,
some hit the walls, ceiling, floor, my chest, legs.

They exploded in
little booms that hurt like hell.

“Guys! Seriously,”
I said, covering my face.

“Shoot them,
dumbass. I can’t take a stream of micro missiles exploding all around me,”
Frank yelled.

“What am I going
to do, shotgun them? They’re wearing dump trucks,” I said, annoyed.

“Grenade them,
stupid.”

Oh, yeah.

I took out and
rolled a Pyrodite grenade. They were about fifty feet away and the grenade
exploded in front of them.

When the fire died
down, I saw they were sealing their suits up. Closing what little openings they
had with bulky metal hatches. They only had one camera on top of their helmets.
It was probably hard to see. Not that two guys trapped in a long hallway were
very difficult to shoot when you had missile launchers.

I didn’t think Gun
could hurt them. If he could, he would probably need so much of my electricity,
it would kill me.

I rummaged around
for my door-smasher bomb, found it, and put it to the first setting I could. I
turned around and held it out.

“Here, throw this
at them,” I said to Frank.

“You throw it,” he
said, crouching lower.

“I can’t throw
well. It’s a bomb,” I whispered.

Frank instantly
snatched it and chucked it past me.

I turned around in
time to get hit by several missiles. But I did see the bomb had stuck right on
the front of one of the suits.

“Wow. Good throw,”
I said.

“How long is the
timer?” Frank asked.

“I don’t know.
Either a minute or ten minutes,” I said.

“Ten minutes?
You’re as bad at this as you are at glocken! We need to get out of here,” he
said.

We looked behind
us to escape and at the end of the hall was none other than Irune, the head
coach of the Reskin Sleepers.

He had on his suit
and sunglasses and looked like he was ready to coach a game. Or at least sit on
the sidelines.

“Shoot him,” Frank
said.

“Why?”

“He’s in our way.”

I didn’t care
about shooting him because he was or wasn’t the coach, but I felt certain he
was doing something with the Rettosians. Maybe it was guilt-by-guess, but for
whatever reason I didn’t have much reluctance about shooting a random,
well-dressed civilian.

I had only brought
the two shotguns and ammo to reload one, figuring if I was in a firefight then
I was already screwed. I only had three shots left. I fired once.

I saw his coat get
ruffled but not much else.

I fired two more
shots and Irune was again unhurt. He just stood there, showing as much interest
in our activities as he showed in a typical glocken game.

“Is Bildosa in our
heads again?” I asked.

“Bildosa is a
grease spot,” Frank said.

The missiles had
stopped and I heard the two guards talking. They didn’t want to risk hitting
Irune, which told me he really was there and not a hallucination.

“Use your death
device,” I said ominously.

“My what?”

“The thing you had
on Mapposh 48,” I muttered.

“I sold that. Use
your gun.”

Irune began
walking forward, and for some reason he seemed more threatening than the two
battle bots, armed to the eyeballs, behind us.

I took out Gun and
held it past Frank so we wouldn’t have that mishap again.

“Gun, do you see
that guy wearing sunglasses?” I asked.

“Hello. What are
sunglasses?” he asked.

“That guy
walking,” I amended.

“He’s a
sunglasses?”

“Can you see him?”
I shouted.

“Yes.”

“Shoot him!” I
yelled.

“It won’t injure
him,” Gun stated.

“Just do it!”

“Bang!” Gun said.

Irune jerked far
more than when I had hit him with my shotgun. I felt sleepy as usual after
firing Gun. But Irune kept walking.

“Did you shoot
him?” I asked.

“Yes,” Gun said.

“What happened?”

“I told you it
wouldn’t hurt him,” Gun answered.

“Frank, light him
up.”

Frank held out his
arms and let loose with both flamethrowers. The whole hallway was engulfed in
fire.

The liquid stuck
to the walls and burned furiously. It also stuck to Irune, who was cloaked in
flames. But he seemed completely unconcerned by them as he continued his stroll
toward us.

BOOM!

We turned around
to see the hallway had been blown open, the ceiling blasted clear, and our
armored assaulters were now piles of twisted metal. My bomb had thankfully been
set for one minute instead of ten.

“Let’s go that
way,” Frank said hastily.

Even with a
shot-up leg, he moved a lot quicker than me. I had trouble keeping up as we
hurried away from the ominous glocken coach.

CHAPTER 51

We had to get past
two more guards to get out, but it wasn’t very difficult.

I broke the arm of
one and Frank broke the everything of the other.

I teled for my
limo to meet us a few blocks away.

“Gun, why didn’t
you ask me if I wanted you to shoot to kill?” That had been bothering me. Maybe
he shot Irune with just a dainty shot—though the guy had shrugged off
two flamethrowers.

Gun didn’t answer.

“Don’t waste your
breath. Who knows what its programming is?” Frank said.

Once inside the
limo I took out Gun and asked again while holding him.

“Because I knew it
wouldn’t work,” he answered.

“How did you
know?” I asked.

“Because I saw
it.”

“But you didn’t
see until after you shot. I’m asking how you knew it wouldn’t work before you
shot him.”

“What do you mean ‘before’?”

“Hank, my leg is
throbbing and I don’t want to listen to this nonsense,” Frank said.

“Can you only hear
me when I hold you in my hand?” I asked Gun.

“I don’t know,” he
said.

I holstered Gun.

“Can you hear me?
Gun? Gun?”

He was silent.

“That’s weird,” I said.

“Makes sense. Why
would you design a gun that is listening and arguing with you when you don’t
need it?” Frank stated.

“What do you think
was up with Irune? Is he a mutant, too? We threw a lot at him,” I asked.

“I’m wondering if
he isn’t a Dredel Led. You got a Dredel Led general manager,” Frank said.

“Yeah, but you mentioned
Irune never coaches.”

“Not that I saw,
but I wasn’t with the team every minute. It would explain how he resisted those
attacks though. He could be a mutant, but if he could ignore
flamethrowers, shotguns, and Rettosian pistols, he should be playing glocken
and not coaching.”

I wanted to tell
Ulteem and Shor-Nuss that the hit had been successful, but Frank wanted to get
our money first.

We went back to training
camp and I teled to make sure Cliston would be there. I didn’t give any more
information because I knew from experience teles weren’t secure.

Frank rattled off
a list of drugs for the doctors to retrieve for him so he could begin patching
himself up. Most were pretty obscure and not your typical salves and antibiotics.
And of course, that fluorine gas.

He was currently
drinking more alcohol than anyone I had ever seen.

“Hey, have you
ever heard of a drug that turns Ontakians into like super-athletic crazy
people?” I asked.

“No,” he said.
“You really should wear a mask. One reason you’ve got no stamina is because
you’re not getting the right air.”

“I’m not breathing
fluorine, man. I’m a mutant, what if my lungs are different than yours? You only
get to make that mistake once,” I said.

Cliston, Garm, and
Magda all came in the sick room, making it rather cramped.

“Who’s that?”
Magda pointed, scowling.

“My uncle. He
helped me take out Bildosa,” I said.

“Their 2-lane is
down?” she asked.

“Dead, yeah,” I
answered.

“I get half of the
hundred million,” Frank said, hopping down off the gurney. “Pay up.”

“We got bad news,
Hank,” Garm said.

Frank patted my
chest hard.

“Here it comes,”
he said suspiciously.

“Kitt has been
kidnapped,” Garm finished.

“We still get
paid, right?” Frank asked.

“I have to wire
our benefactor for the funds, but if Bildosa has indeed been removed, then
yes,” Cliston answered.

“Get wiring,
then,” Frank replied, crossing his arms.

“Do you know who
took Kitt? When? How?” I asked.

“No, we don’t know
how she was taken. We don’t have any leads. She just vanished,” Garm said.

“Did you check the
local sex shops?” I asked, but then I felt lousy. Kitt wasn’t a bad person by
any stretch and I hoped she was just off signing autographs instead of
kidnapped by the Rettosians. “I’m going to have to tell Ulteem about this. The
odds will even out if we’re down a key player. This whole thing might be for
nothing.”

“Kitt or no Kitt
we still took out one of their starters,” Frank said defiantly.

“If Ulteem and
Shor-Nuss already started placing bets, billions could be flushed down the
toilet and they might hold us accountable,” I said to Frank.

He shrugged.

“Belvaille is
getting dull anyway. I don’t mind leaving,” he replied.

“Are we going to
forfeit?” I asked Cliston.

“We can’t. Not
with just one player down,” Magda said.

“How about our
reserve players, Cliston?” I asked. “Can we tap one of those?”

“I don’t have any
for the 4-lane. Javter might have worked if you didn’t break both of his legs.
We only have a replacement 2-lane and 7-lane,” Cliston said.

“That’s me and
Garm,” I said after a moment.

“Yes, I considered
you two the weakest links what with your numerous other duties and enemies,”
Cliston stated.

I couldn’t believe
that!

“But if you
replaced me, you wouldn’t get your cut as a sports agent. And you’d have
to go back to being my butler fulltime,” I shouted.

“I’m aware of
that. But it’s my duty as general manager to do what is best for the team, even
if it means leaving the team,” he replied.

“You’re a nut,
Cliston,” I said. “But if we go out there and play the Sleepers with us down a
4-lane and them down a 2-lane, they’re going to beat us even worse than
before.”

“Bildosa was a
better scorer than Kitt was. But Kitt was more versatile,” Magda said. “What’s
wrong with your leg?” Magda asked Frank.

“He shot me,” he
replied, pointing at me.

“Sounds about
right. How much do you weigh?” Magda asked.

“I don’t know.
Maybe 600 or 700.”

“Too big for a
4-lane. But Candar could drop to 4 and you go 5. You ever play glocken?” she
asked.

“Bush leagues.
Outer rim stuff. Max Class. I was an 8-lane. But that was about 200 years ago
and we cheated a lot,” Frank said.

“Will you be
healed up to play in the Championship and able to play without that mask?”
Magda asked.

“I can do whatever
you want if you pay me,” he said.

CHAPTER 52

Ulteem was furious.

He said I was
sloppy and had drawn too much attention with the attack on the Reskin Sleepers,
which made it hard to fix the game because everyone had heard about what
happened. He said the Central Authority was already breathing heavy on him,
suspecting he had a hand in it. And being the Lord that he was, he had been
told that Maris-To was outraged at the brazen strike on a visiting team.

Ulteem didn’t even
seem to appreciate that we had taken out the 2-lane, Bildosa.

He was in such a
foul mood I thought it best not to tell him that Kitt was missing. I had done
what I said I would do and I wasn’t going to apologize for it.

No one said fixing
bets was easy.

I got a tele from
Delovoa, of all people. I had just about written him off for dead.

He said he was
ready to talk about the Portal issue.

The Portals!
Right. I had been so busy doing other things I had forgotten the Murdaere of
the Central Authority had ordered me to somehow fix broken celestial artifacts.

If I could help on
the Portals, that would be a good alibi for the attack on the Reskin Sleepers.

I called up
Inspector MTB and asked him to meet me at Delovoa’s so we could discuss things.

I rang the
doorbell at Delovoa’s and when it was opened, I was more horrified than usual.

It was Delovoa. I
think.

Delovoa was
normally a decrepit mutant who rode around in a wheelchair towing his guts
behind in a wagon.

The creature that
greeted me was a seven-foot-tall patchwork Colmarian with a bulbous skull that
looked like a big bubble with two smaller bubbles off-center. He had three eyes
that went straight across his face, but nonetheless stared and blinked
independently. He had a massive pug nose that was oozing snot. And beneath it
all was a smiling mouth full of metal teeth.

All of this was
stitched together with surgical clamps and bolts and I could see where the skin
types varied in texture and color. It was like a bunch of aliens got put into a
blender and the ugliest pieces were picked out and stitched together.

“That’s
what you were off doing?” I asked, immediately understanding.

“Shh,” Delovoa
hissed. “Come inside if you want to talk,” he said. His voice was deeper, and
he sounded like he had a speech impediment or learning disability. Probably
because he had a brand new skull and tongue and was getting used to them.

I walked past him
and had to comment:

“Man, you stink!”
I said. He smelled like rotting food.

“I’m not sure
which part of me is decaying, but I’ll replace it when I figure it out,” he
said casually. “So what do you think?”

He put his arms
out and twirled around, hitting me in the face.

Delovoa was now a
bulky, masculine man. His organs were not on display, thankfully. He was
wearing a bathrobe that was too small and part of it was crusted to him from
whatever fluids his new body was leaking.

“Why do you keep
doing this to yourself? What is left that’s original?” I asked.

“I do it because,
unlike you, I age at a normal rate. And, unlike you, I didn’t have a level-ten mutant
rebuild my body. I had to do it myself. My brains are all original, that’s
about it. Check this out,” he said.

He gingerly
removed his robe, with it cracking and tearing and slurping at various points.
Underneath, his flesh was patched together even more than his face, with large
metal sections and dozens of different skin types.

Delovoa was indeed
brawny. I’m not sure his skeletal structure, but he had a strange set of
muscles. He didn’t look like anything I had ever seen.

I was about to mention
what looked like his four pectoral muscles when he grinned and pulled down his
underwear.

“Look,” he said
proudly.

“That’s just
stupid,” I said. “What are you even going to use that on? You’ll go into a coma
if you get aroused.”

“Don’t be
jealous,” he said.

“Trust me,
Delovoa. I am not jealous.” I was almost going to ask where he got the parts
for this new body, but I didn’t want to know. I wasn’t above getting nightmares.

“So do you know
anything about these Portals?” I asked.

“They aren’t
working,” he said, putting his clothes back on.

“I know that. Do
you know why?”

“No. None of my
diagnostics are working either. It might have been a total catastrophic
failure.”

“Don’t you have a
bunch of murder bots there? Can’t they report on anything?” I asked.

“No. I only have
robots in a small number of Portals—don’t tell anyone that. It’s impossible to
fill them all, there’s too many Portals and their interiors are quite large.
The ones that aren’t operational didn’t have any robots,” he said.

“Do you think
that’s why people went to those?” I asked.

“I don’t know that
anyone went to them. Like I said, they might have simply stopped working. You
know at least as much as I do,” he said.

“Finally you admit
it. Did you call me here so I could smell you?” I asked.

“Actually, would
you? I’m a bit used to my own odor, but if you could sniff around it would help
me see what’s going bad.”

“No.”

“Come on, Hank.
This could be very serious if my body is actually putrefying,” he said.

“Okay. But…not
until MTB leaves. And you can’t talk about it to anyone,” I said.

“It’s not
something one brings up in proper society. By the way, how is that gun working?”

“It’s weird.
Sometimes it’s great and sometimes it’s not. If I can convince it to do what I
want, it’s amazing. But I can’t always strike up a philosophical debate during
a fight. And you’re right, it does seem to use my own juice. I get sleepy when
I fire it, which is also a bad thing when someone is about to kill me.”

“How have the
doctors at training camp been? I gave them some instructions on how to help you
before I went off to build my new physique.”

“They’re horrible.
I need you back. Your drugs are better and you can give the raw formula to
Cliston so he can make it into fancy meals. I’m tired of eating it out of the
can.”

“It’s good to feel
wanted,” he sighed.

Delovoa challenged
me to arm wrestle but I was afraid I would rip him in half. He looked fragile
despite his size. He was bleeding all over, but he didn’t seem very concerned
about it.

It turns out he
gave himself that big nose and mouth because he had really missed eating and
tasting in his old body. So now he could taste like ten times as well as a
normal Colmarian and if you gave him a dirty pair of underwear, he could track
you across Belvaille.

MTB came by a
little later.

He took one look
at Delovoa and didn’t even raise an eyebrow. MTB had been a policeman for a
long time and was even more jaded than I was.

“I thought this
might help,” he said, slapping a report on a nearby table.

I flipped through
it.

“This is…space
stuff, right?” I asked.

“Not really—” MTB
started.

“He always does
that: pretends he knows what he’s talking about. I told him it’s annoying,”
Delovoa said.

“These are the
flight data logs that our nearby C.A. military ships recorded,” MTB said.

“Hey, that’s space
stuff,” I argued.

“It shows one ship
coming to a stop very close to one of the malfunctioning Portals about a month
ago,” he continued.

“The C.A. tracks
and records all flights?” I asked, concerned.

“No. There’s way
too much traffic for that and we only store it for a short while. It’s only if
one of the tracking ships is in range. Only a small number have this
equipment,” he said.

“How many?” I
asked.

“Don’t worry about
it. The point is, some ship went near the Portal for over five hours,” he said.

“Near enough to
dock?” I asked.

“You can’t dock
with a Portal. You would have to get out of your ship. It’s not especially easy
to get inside. Probably 99% of the population don’t even think of the Portals
as structures,” Delovoa said.

“The ship was very
close. If we had noticed it, we would have told them to move,” MTB said.

“How did you not
notice if you recorded it?” I asked.

“They record
everything in a radius. That’s a lot of ships moving around. They don’t have
enough people to tell everyone exactly where to go and when. I just got lucky I
pulled this tape before it was erased,” MTB said.

“So they could
have also visited the other Portals but you don’t have that data?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“Fine. So whose ship
is it? Go bust their heads until they tell you what they did to the Portals,” I
said.

“It’s not like the
old days. It’s hard to see what ship is registered to who. People fake it all
the time. All I know for sure is that the ship has a home port of Floloria,”
MTB said.

“A Rettosian
ship!” I said.

“I suppose so,” he
replied.

“Those guys are
doing everything. They’re stealing our glocken players, too,” I said.

“Why?” Delovoa
asked.

“So they can make
mutants. I think,” I said.

“Make mutants? Why
would they need to steal your glocken players? To run around their mutation lab
and throw chemicals to each other?” Delovoa asked.

“Do you know how
someone even makes a mutant?” I asked derisively.

“Yes. And you
don’t need glocken players,” Delovoa answered. “But, you know, you do
need a lot of genetic material. How many of your players did they take?”

“Only a few of
ours, but there are probably a hundred missing across all the different
leagues. Why?” I asked.

Delovoa pondered
this, his three eyes squinting in thought, his nose dripping in concentration.

“The Colmarian
Confederation built their mutation schema from 50,000 species, adding anything
and everything. It led to a lot of wild mutations, but many of them were horrible
or even fatal. If I had the option of building a gene pool from scratch,
professional glocken players would be a pretty damn good place to start. You’d have
the best specimens the galaxy had to offer,” he said.

“It was Rettosians
who wanted Procon Hobb’s skin, remember? They weren’t some religious fanatics
like Podiver Vance said. I wonder if they wanted his ultra-rare telepathic genes,”
I said.

“Yeah, it’s a good
idea. I wish I had thought of that when I was making my new body instead of
splicing gang hitmen and porn actors,” Delovoa said, annoyed.

“What?” Inspector MTB
asked, interested.

“Nothing,” Delovoa
replied.

CHAPTER 53

Of all the things
I might do in preparation for the Super Class Championship against the Reskin
Sleepers, going into outer space to try and fix a Portal wasn’t at the top of
my list.

But I couldn’t
refuse. MTB had told the Central Authority Murdaere that I was on my way.

I understood why
they were concerned. While a busted Portal didn’t greatly affect me, it meant
that dozens of Systems behind the Portal were cut off from the rest of the
galaxy. I don’t know how many people that was, but presumably a lot more than
my pay grade allowed me to ignore.

I was also worried
that I might come under suspicion for the attack on the Reskin Sleepers
training camp, so showing I was a delightfully-cooperative guy was a valuable asset.

Delovoa gave me a
remote camera I would tote around so he could see what was going on. I also had
a complicated toolbox that I hoped I wouldn’t have to deal with.

Zzzho was going to
take me to the Portal in his taxi and there would be a point where I had to
exit, and propel myself through space toward the enormous building and grab
hold. Yeah, the gap would only be about five feet, but that was five feet where
there was nothing in between me and nothing.

I was coming
prepared.

I had my space
suit. And a back-up space suit. And a back-up breathing system.

I also had Gun. I
asked him if he could shoot in space and of course he didn’t know what space
was or whether or not he had been in it. But he didn’t see any reason why he
shouldn’t be able to. Then again, he didn’t see any reason why he should.

So I also brought
a fifty-pound practice token. I had gotten fairly good at twisting them and it
was an oversized blackjack if I needed to club someone. I didn’t want to bring
any firearms because projectiles might bounce around and tear up my suit.

I really hoped not
to meet anything out there, but I also hoped I would wake up one day and
discover I could fart out gold bricks.

My hopes rarely
came true.

“Hey, Stank
Delicious. Just like old times. You off on some deadly mission, me charging you
double-fare,” Zzzho said.

“You charged me
double?” I asked, after loading in all my things.

“No, just a cabbie
joke,” he said.

Since his voice
was electronic, I had no idea if he was lying.

“Okay, I’m set,” I
said.

The entire back
seat of the cab was filled.

“You don’t do many
spacewalks, do you?” Zzzho asked.

“No. Why?”

“Because you can’t
have piles of crap back there, it has to be all sorted. Once the gravity is off
and that door is open, everything is going to float around. You need to be able
to move it in an orderly fashion back and forth,” he said.

Man, I hadn’t
thought of that. I had so much stuff I would have to take multiple trips to
unload it all. I was petrified of going out there even once. I didn’t want to
make a dozen hops. What if I missed the taxi?

“What if I miss
the taxi?” I asked.

“I’ll pick you up.
It’s not like you’ll be going fast and no ship gets close to the Portals.
Especially a broken one.”

“How will you know
I missed?”

“I can see,
you know. But you should also strap your tele on your wrist. It won’t do you
any good in your pocket. Can you dial in those gloves?”

I beeped around a
bit and while it was clunky, it seemed to work.

“This is
terrible,” I said.

“Some people have
microphones linked to their helmets.”

“Where can I get
one?” I asked.

“How should I
know? I don’t have a body. Look, we can’t sit at the dock forever. I only got a
one-hour visa. Dump out some of that junk.”

“I need it all,” I
said.

“I see at least
two crates of food back there. You plan on setting up a colony?”

“What if I get
trapped? I eat a lot,” I said.

“You got a tele
and people know you’re there, do you think they’ll forget about you?”

I grumbled and
hauled out some of the less-essential things. I paused over whether I should
keep the escape raft but finally took it out as well.

I was down to a
more manageable set of items that I could secure in two cargo nets. I left the
glocken token behind because it was just too bulky.

“Come on, we got
five minutes before they assess a fine for loitering,” Zzzho said.

“Why did you only
schedule an hour?”

“The Super Class Championship
is coming up. This dock is slammed with transports. If they knew you were
leaving to go work on a Portal, they’d probably run out here and stop us.”

“Yeah, not a bad
idea,” I said. “Okay, I think I’m pretty well done.”

“Bolting down and
powering up,” Zzzho said.

We made our way to
one of the broken Portals. Delovoa had chosen one of the newer ones as he
thought it would be easier to repair or at least see what went wrong.

Even Delovoa
figured this would mostly be an exploratory mission. I’d get over there, there
would be some giant machine-a-majig that was busted, and then he would whip
together a new one and get a team of actual engineers to install it.

We were about
halfway to the Portal when I got a tele from none other than Xandale. I swear,
his gigantic teeth took up half my screen.

“Hank, did I catch
you at a bad time?” he asked sweetly.

He saw I was in a
space suit of course.

“No, no, just
hanging out,” I said. “What can I do for you?” I asked, pretending he hadn’t
tried to get me killed on Mapposh 48 and presumably been behind a bunch of
other things. There was no point in yelling at him, he was calling for
something.

“I just wanted to
see if you were interested in joining Univox Factotal. I spoke to the Board of
Directors and they agreed to a rather tremendous package. I’m quite jealous,”
he said.

“You have a Board
of Directors?” I asked.

How many Factotums
did this guy have?

“Yeah, I run the
business but we’re all accountable at some point, right? What do you say you
come in and we talk about it? Or I can come to you. I promise, with this much
money you’ll be interested.”

“I can’t really do
that at the moment. But like I said, I will definitely take it under
consideration.”

“I’m afraid I need
an answer right now.” He smiled sweetly.

“Hank, there’s a
ship behind us,” Zzzho said.

I tried to turn
around, which was silly because there were no windows back there and I had
about ten seatbelts holding me in place.

“Sure, Xandale.
I’ll get with you tomorrow, okay?” I said.

“It’s now or
never, I’m afraid,” he replied.

“Hank, the ship
behind us is transmitting that they have lost guidance and are out of control,”
Zzzho said.

Oh, man, that was
perfect. They couldn’t just open up and shoot at us, even if the ship was
armed, which was doubtful. If any ship dared fire on another in Belvaille
System, they’d have the Central Authority warships blow the crap out of them.

But they could run
into us.

I muted my tele.

“Can you get away
from them?” I asked Zzzho.

“That’s a sport
shuttle. It’s about ten times faster and more maneuverable than this taxi. It
seems like it’s going ‘out of control’ exactly where I try and dodge,” he
replied.

“What will happen
if it hits us?” I asked.

“I’ll be out a
shuttle and you’ll be dead.”

“What will happen
to you?”

“I’ll compress
myself to a few cubic picometers. I’ll be fine. I’m calling for help now. But
you need to get out or call them off.”

I turned off my
tele. No point in talking to Xandale any longer.

I drew Gun and
pointed it somewhere behind me.

“Gun, can you
shoot them? The people in that spaceship?” I asked.

“What’s a
spaceship?” he replied.

“Behind us! There
are people in a…a…spaceship.” I didn’t know how else to describe it.

“Yes, I can,” Gun
said.

“Then shoot them!”

“I can’t,” he
replied calmly.

Why did I even
ask?

“Okay, I’m going
to push out, Zzzho. They won’t be able to say they accidentally smashed into
you, then turned around and smashed into me. No ship is that perfectly out of
control. Vent the gas and kill the gravity,” I said.

“Good luck, Hank,”
Zzzho said.

I thought of
something right before the air was released.

“Gun, when we’re
outside, shoot anyone I point you at. Or shoot the ship. Shoot something,” I
said.

I don’t know if he
heard me as the air sucked out with a hiss.

I unbuckled
myself, the side door swung open, and there it was: space. Ready to swallow me
like a big black ocean. We were so far away from the usual traffic there was
nothing in my view. Not one light. It was just solid ink other than the glow from
the taxi. There could be a black wall an inch away from the door and I wouldn’t
know.

I gripped both
sides of the doorframe and pulled myself out into the nothingness.

Resisting the
distinct urge to windmill my arms and legs to try and orient myself, I pulled
out Gun. I could see the ship following us. It was back over my right shoulder.

I aimed in its
general direction and said “fire” and pressed the non-existent trigger. Of
course, I was in space so Gun couldn’t hear me.

The ship was
coming so fast. I could see there were windows in the front. It was
exponentially larger than the taxi.

The ship was
getting near when all of a sudden I got really tired.

It was suddenly like
a dream. Every window on that ship ruptured and a dozen bodies came flying out.

I was too sleepy
to even gawk as the enormous vessel flew past me and crashed into Zzzho’s taxi.
I’m always thinking there should be a sound or some fireworks, but it was
nothing. The taxi just crumpled and then shattered like a cheap plastic toy.

The larger ship
continued onward but I couldn’t see it any longer as it was behind me and I was
too drained to give a damn.

I must have dozed
off or passed out or some combination.

I woke up and I
was talking to myself.

Or not exactly.
Was I still asleep?

“You need to
return to Belvaille,” I thought to myself.

“I know,” I said.
I checked my oxygen and I still had hours left. Why was I so loopy?

“You need to
return to Belvaille immediately,” I thought again.

“Do you have any
ideas, smart guy?” I asked.

“This is Procon
Hobb. You need to return to Belvaille,” I said with my mental voice again.

Oh. I tried to
think of a response.

“Um, I’m a little
busy. I’m kind of floating in space,” I thought.

“I’m aware of your
location. You must return,” Procon Hobb said.

“I’d love to. Or
we could talk now,” I thought.

“I do not wish to
see you,” he said.

“You just said you
did. What is it with everyone and their double-speak?” I thought. Then I
realized he could hear my thoughts. “Strike that last part,” I added.

“I am merely
relaying a message for another,” he said.

“You? Who are you
being a messenger for?” I asked, shocked.

“We all bow to the
whims of the Boranjame,” he replied.

CHAPTER 54

It wasn’t as hard
to get out of deep space as I thought.

I had tried to
tell Procon Hobb to get help, but he either hung up my brain or didn’t relay
the message. I attempted a few dozen tele calls but I kept misdialling and then
I couldn’t talk to the people I reached, because my receiver was outside my
helmet.

Thankfully, Zzzho
had radioed for help before we got fender-bended.

MTB and the C.A.
already knew of my plans to visit the Portal since they requested and
authorized it. They dispatched a ship to collect me in less than fifteen
minutes.

The C.A. handled
the pick-up quite well. They have to remove debris and space junk all the time
to keep the lanes clear, so I was just one more piece of waste. When the ship
got near, Zzzho expanded himself to the size of a small nebula and I was able
to point out that my cab driver also needed a lift.

I asked about the
ship that had rammed us and learned that it had been restrained by tug boats.
They didn’t even have to fake that it was out of control because there were
corpses of half the crew and the observation windows were all blown out.

The C.A. was
investigating that last part, but I felt the case would remain unsolved. There
wasn’t much evidence to prove the deaths were caused by a talking Rettosian
philosopher-pistol wielded by a Super Class glocken player drifting in space.

Unfortunately,
Xandale didn’t seem to be on the ship. He must have called me from somewhere safe.
Figures he would send his lackeys to do his dirty work.

Needless to say I
didn’t make it to the Portal.

I returned to
Belvaille and, per Procon Hobb’s instructions, I was now standing in front of
the imposing Boranjame, Zeti.

I hadn’t even
showered from my space journey and I had soiled myself at least twice—space was
scary. But Zeti didn’t have a nose and I didn’t want to keep him waiting any
longer.

When the Po
servants had finished setting up the speakers they all ran away and hid. That
did not bode well.

“Did you find and
stop The End?” Zeti asked.

“You’re still
talking about Thad Elon, right?” I asked.

“That would be a name
you might associate with him,” Zeti replied.

“You see the
problem is I don’t really hang out with people like that. I’m more of a
commoner. I’ve met and even had dinner with the Arch Minister, but I don’t meet
many creators of civilization. I think they live in a different neighborhood.”

“You have already
met it,” Zeti said.

“I have?” I asked,
shocked.

You would think I
would remember someone like that. You don’t tend to bump into demigods and not
notice—I assume.

“I am not
permitted to say more,” Zeti said. “But it is paramount you defeat it.”

I thought about how
I should phrase this next part.

“I’d totally like
to help. But I really have no clue what you’re talking about. Are you
Thad Elon?”

Zeti was about the
closest to a supreme anything I’d ever met. Maybe this was some oddball way of
him asking to commit suicide. His house was getting a little cramped.

“You know him
well. More than most,” Zeti added slowly. As if that blurb was going to shine a
light.

“Is it Cliston?”

It would be just like
Cliston to be the creator of my species and not brag about it. I know if I
created a species, I would be telling everyone.

There was a long
pause and I was waiting for Zeti. I hope I didn’t piss him off by being
flippant, but I wasn’t sure what else to do.

“I knowingly
accept the consequences of my actions,” Zeti said ominously. “The End, the
First and Last, Thad Elon, is also known as Irune.”

CHAPTER 55

I was back at my
house, drinking.

Trying to drink
enough that this all would make sense.

The man-god of the
universe was the coach of the Reskin Sleepers?

In a way it all
fit. Who else could make that team win? Not only win, but dominate? In
violation of millennia of precedent and even Ank laws of probability.

Irune said hi to
me. I felt pretty good about that. The lord of the Colmarian Confederation,
Ontakian revolution, Keilvin Kamigan technology, Dredel Led brains, called me
by name.

But I also tried
to shoot him. Well, Gun did. I could blame Gun. And the fact he was Thad Elon might
explain why Gun, a grenade, and two flamethrowers didn’t even slow him down.

Why would Zeti
care about Irune, though? He even said the Boranjame blew up his solar system.
That had to piss him off. That’s probably why he created the Colmarian Confederation,
as payback, knowing they would screw up the entire galaxy.

Was he behind the
mutations?

I thought it was
Irune building his team, but that couldn’t be it. Zeti wouldn’t care about
glocken, would he? If Zeti did care, I didn’t see much I could do. There
was no way we were going to beat the Reskin Sleepers. It just wasn’t going to
happen.

I needed to talk
to Irune. Thad Elon. Without him killing me or me trying to kill him. Without
his Rettosian guards or mutant pals.

Just sit down and
ask him:

“Hey, what are you
doing that a Boranjame would want you dead?”

Actually, Zeti
didn’t say I had to kill Irune. He just said stop him.

Shouldn’t be that
hard, right?

I talked to
Cliston and told him what Zeti said.

I then asked if he
could set up a meeting with Irune.

“I could, and it
wouldn’t be unusual. We could use the pretense of working out all the details
of the Championship. The problem is, Irune has never met with anyone in the
past, it has always been assistants,” he said.

“Tell him that the
Championship won’t go on unless you can meet with him personally and get
steel-clad assurances on certain issues,” I said.

“Which issues?”

“Certain
ones. I don’t know. He should be scared enough to come if he thinks the Championship
is in jeopardy,” I said.

“If the Championship
fails to go off, millions of people will riot and our lives will not be worth
very much,” Cliston warned.

“I know that. He
doesn’t,” I said.

“If he really is
Thad Elon, he must know that. And you may assume he knows far more than we do.”

“If he’s Thad Elon
and his next miracle is taking the Reskin Sleepers to victory in the Championship,
he won’t have a problem meeting with a Dredel Led for thirty minutes.”

“I’ll see what I
can do,” Cliston said.

CHAPTER 56

“If I didn’t need
you to play I would beat the piss out of you!” Magda screamed at me.

I was sitting in
my office at home in my special massaging chair. It had been given to me by
Maris-To. Half the motors were broken because it couldn’t deal with the stress
of jiggling my large frame, but it worked enough to make my left butt-cheek, my
right shoulder, and my left lower back feel really good.

I was about to
wonder how she got in my door when I saw my uncle Frank come in after her.

“Did you just
break in?” I asked. I was surprised because that was a three-inch-thick metal
door. Frank was strong but he wasn’t that strong. Not even I could bust in my
door.

“Nah, picked the
lock,” he said.

“Why are you
sitting here and not at practice?” she asked.

“I have a meeting
with Irune in a few hours.”

“Why in the eight
hells are you meeting with him? Is he going to tell you his game plan?”

“I hope,” I said.

She shook her head
and pointed to Frank.

“Bring him. I
don’t have time for this.”

Frank started to
walk forward and I reluctantly got up from my chair.

“Uncle, come on. I
need to do this. Besides, what are you going to do to me? I weigh like seven
times as much as you,” I said.

Frank feigned a
right cross, which I didn’t bother blocking, then he ducked in low, I felt a
tug, then he stood upright and was pointing Gun at me.

“Hey,” I said,
looking down at my empty holster.

“Rettosian gun,
can you see who I’m pointing you at?” Frank asked.

“Yes,” Gun
answered.

“If I tell you to
shoot him can you do that?” he asked.

“Yes, but it won’t
cause much damage,” Gun said.

“Doesn’t have to,”
Frank replied.

“Gun. It’s me,
Hank. Don’t shoot,” I said.

But then I
remembered Gun couldn’t hear me unless I was holding him. Wow, what fickle
loyalty.

“Quit being a
baby. All we have to do is some wind sprints and run some plays. It won’t kill
you,” Frank said.

“Is she paying you
for this?” I asked.

“It was in my
contract. So, yeah,” he said.

“What are you
getting paid?” I asked, curious.

“Thirty a week.”

“Thirty million?”
I asked.

“Yup.”

“That’s more than
me!” I turned to Magda. “Why is he making more than me? He’s a way lower lane
and doesn’t have my experience.”

“The general
manager sets pay scales. Talk to him. Now come on,” she said.

“You got that from
Cliston? Is he also your sports agent?” I asked.

“Huh? No.”

“Bastard. Well,
look. I have a meeting and I need to be in the right mindset and you all are
throwing me off. This is a meeting requested by Zeti, the Boranjame,” I said.

Frank’s eyebrows
raised and he looked back at Magda.

Magda’s mouth was
ajar and for once she didn’t have any bluster.

“Hold on, I’m
calling the G.M.,” she said, and she walked into the hallway.

“You don’t have to
call him,” I yelled. “He’s downstairs making me pancakes.”

“Come on, Frank,”
she said, sticking her head back in.

“Just me?” he
confirmed.

“Yeah,” she grumbled.

Frank tossed me
Gun and left without an apology or even a “so long.” He was definitely related
to me.

CHAPTER 57

The meeting with
Irune took place at a neutral building. It was a restaurant in the north that
served only live food.

It had all kinds
of safety railings and cages and employee-only doors. They even had harpoons
and nets here and there on the pillars and I got the sense they weren’t
decorative.

The place reeked.
It smelled bad. There was only so much you could do to kill the odor of animals
native to fifty different worlds dying on dinner plates.

We’d rented out
the whole building for the day, so it was empty.

The Reskin Sleepers’
security arrived about the same time as I did.

“Hi, Hank. Take
any good trips lately?” Xandale asked good-naturedly.

“Haven’t you
learned not to send your rookies after me, Xandale?”

“Not sure what you
mean,” he smiled.

A few of his
Factotums came in with him and I was wondering if I was foolish to come early.
I wanted to make sure the place was safe before Cliston arrived, but now that
Xandale saw me, he might tell Irune not to come.

I really wanted to
know what his connection was with the Reskin Sleepers but I couldn’t get
sidetracked now.

Cliston was on
time, of course, and sat at one of the tables, ignoring everyone else. He began
organizing his papers and tele. He really expected to have a conversation with
Irune about the game.

Then we waited.

I admit I was
nervous. I didn’t often meet legends or myths. If I doubted him, I only had to
look at the Reskin Sleepers and what he had done with them.

I had been slowly
reducing the overall pimpness of my wardrobe for some time. Cliston was so busy
with our games that he didn’t notice or chastise me. Today I was dressed
conservatively in a black suit and white tie. If I was really going to meet
Thad Elon, I didn’t want to look like a caricature from an exploitation video.

We had waited so
long I was just about to ask if Irune would be joining us when Xandale’s
Factotums began talking on their headphones and I knew something was up.

A moment later,
Irune—Thad Elon—walked through the front doors.

He was dressed in
a tan suit and dark glasses and, I must say, did not seem like he could build
civilization across the galaxy. Maybe it was the fact he was wearing brown
loafers.

“Irune,” I began,
wasting no time, “I need to speak to you.”

“Back off, chump.
This is glocken business with your general manager,” Xandale said.

Irune turned to
me.

“Hello again,
Hank. What is it you wish to speak about?” he said. His voice was low and dull
and again made me think there had to be some mistake about his identity.

Maybe he was like,
Thord Elon, Thad’s long-lost, underachieving cousin. It was possible. I
recently found out I had an uncle of ill repute.

“I’d like to talk
alone, if we could,” I said.

“Forget it! Hit
the road,” Xandale said, reaching down for his gun.

“Why would I want
to talk to you?” Irune asked. It wasn’t snide or pompous, it was a legitimate
question.

I wasn’t sure how
to broach this. I was taking a guess that he had tried to maintain secrecy
about pretty much everything, so he wouldn’t want anyone else present when we spoke.

“It’s about Thad
Elon,” I said uneasily.

He betrayed no
emotions. Xandale looked to Irune, waiting for a response. His Factotum were
itching for a fight. If they were going for weapons, presumably they had
something that could hurt me.

“Very well,” Irune
said, after a painfully long time.

Cliston quietly
packed up his things and walked out.

Xandale and his
cronies were unsure, but Irune took a seat at a table. I waved goodbye to
Xandale and joined Irune.

“Let us know if
you need any assistance,” Xandale called.

They filed out and
I was alone with the Grand Creator.

“I know you’re
Thad Elon,” I said.

“And how is it you
know that?” he asked.

“The Boranjame
told me.”

For the first time
ever, he showed some emotion.

“Ugh. The
Boranjame. They are the biggest meddlers in the galaxy.”

“So it’s true?” I
asked, amazed.

“I’m not entirely
sure where that name came from, but if there is a Thad Elon, I would be the
closest representation of him, yes.”

I was floored. I
felt my legs go tingly. But then again, that could be my bad circulation.

“Why…” And I had so
many questions, I wasn’t sure where to start. “Why are you playing glocken?” I
finally asked.

“I don’t see a
reason why I should tell you anything, I’m afraid,” Thad Elon said.

What was I going
to do, threaten him?

“I-I know who
destroyed your solar system,” I said. Hoping this might work. I didn’t have a
lot of bargaining chips to offer a god.

“How could you
possibly know that? It was billions of years before your species even existed,”
he replied.

“The Boranjame
told me,” I repeated.

He sat thinking
about that.

“Tell me, then,”
he replied.

“If I do, you have
to tell me what you’re up to. What you’re doing that might be dangerous. Or the
Boranjame might consider dangerous,” I said.

“You’re proposing
an exchange? I can’t say what the Boranjame consider dangerous. I’m doubtful
they have much care for the lives of anything in this galaxy. But you tell me
what you know. I will answer some questions if I feel they are appropriate,” he
said.

I didn’t see I had
a lot of options.

“The Boranjame,” I
said.

“Yes. The
Boranjame told you,” he replied.

“No, the Boranjame
destroyed your solar system. They said they created you. And it was a mistake—I
mean, it was a mistake to destroy your solar system.”

I sat there with
nothing. That was about everything I knew, and it wasn’t a lot.

Thad Elon pondered
that a while, looking off to the side.

And then, Thad
Elon suddenly looked very pissed off.

“Did Zeti tell you
this?” he asked.

“Yes,” I answered.

“I suppose I
should have known that,” Thad Elon sighed. “You and I have met before.”

“That’s what Zeti told
me. I’m sorry, I don’t remember,” I apologized.

“I looked somewhat
different then,” he said.

Thad Elon then
casually reached up and took off his sunglasses.

I saw myself
reflected in his dark eyes. His eyes were pure black: pupil, iris, sclera.

“Naked Guy!” I
shouted.

That was the name
I had given this man who didn’t require a name. He had single-handedly caused
the civil war that had decimated the galaxy and ended the Colmarian
Confederation. He had done it because he had “never seen a galactic civil war
before.” That’s it. That was his only reason: because he thought it would be
interesting.

He was billions of
years old and apparently got bored easily.

“I disintegrated
you!” I said.

“Yes, you did. I
want to thank you for that. When I was reborn I had forgotten how entertaining
the galaxy could be—with a little help.”

“Glocken?” I
asked, stumped.

“What of it?” he
asked.

“That’s your plan?
To make the Reskin Sleepers win the Championship? Using mutants?”

Sure, it was a
monumental effort, but for someone who had done all the things that he was
supposed to have done, it seemed like he was slacking.

“Do you really
think glocken is of any concern to me?”

I wasn’t sure if
it was a trick question.

“Um. Maybe?”

“When I was
reborn, I did not have the resources I formerly did. I needed a backer to help
me implement my plans. Ulteem was willing to provide me with substantial
resources if I could guarantee him gaming revenue. The Reskin Sleepers winning
provided him with tremendous earnings,” Irune said.

“That doesn’t make
sense, Ulteem wanted us to attack your team. We did.”

“Yes. He did not
inform me of that ahead of time. He can be irksome in that regard. His plan, I
believe, was to notify security and have you and your teammates be eliminated
in the assault, thus ensuring our victory—as if we needed help. But apparently,
you met someone inside you were already acquainted with.”

“Yeah, my uncle.”

“Ah. In any case,
it doesn’t matter. I have replaced the whole team with new players. They are
guaranteed success,” he said.

“But why? I’m a
Reskin Sleepers fan, or I was, but what does it matter? Money?”

“Several reasons.
Do you know of the Ank Formula?”

“A bit. They said
the Reskin Sleepers winning was bad,” I said.

“I doubt even they
understand their own Formula—the Ank love complexity to an absurd degree. If
the Reskin Sleepers win the Championship, their precious Formula will break.
It’s why I chose this team. Credits will become meaningless and banks will be
insolvent. The galaxy will be reduced to barter and trade overnight,” he said.

“What will that
do? Are you trying to turn us back to the stone age?” I asked, frustrated.

“The galaxy was
interesting after the civil war. So much changing so fast. But things have become
monotonous once again. You are not advancing. There is too much power
consolidated in too few hands. I decided that the galaxy needs more variety.
The Colmarian Confederation was always exciting because you could never predict
what its citizens were capable of. Every city on every planet had its own laws
and codes and heroes and villains. It was truly unique,” he said.

“You’re talking
about mutants?” I asked.

“Yes. I believe,
next to the Portals, mutations were the greatest boon to life in the galaxy,”
he said.

“Just because it
made things interesting? I think given the choice, most species would take calm
and boring over a dice roll of being horribly crippled or wonderfully
powerful.”

“Of course they
would. They would choose blissful stagnation. They would even choose regression
if it provided comfort. But those things are the death of a species. Mutants
made you constantly adapt.”

“Well, I guess
that’s one opinion,” I said delicately. “But you still only created a handful
of mutants. That’s not anything in terms of the population of the galaxy.”

“No, it’s not. But
the number of people in this System to watch the Championship is a significant
number,” he said.

And it hit me.

“You’re going to
mutate the whole System?” I asked, shocked.

“Yes.”

“How are you going
to do it? I thought mutations were like biology and stuff. And it had to be at
birth,” I said.

Thad Elon flashed
the smallest of grins and replaced his sunglasses.

“I’ve answered a fair
number of your questions in exchange for what you’ve told me. But now I think
we are, as they say, ‘even.’” he replied.

He stood up from
the table and turned to go.

What could I do? I
knew the guy was effectively immortal. I disintegrated him and he didn’t
look any worse for wear. In fact, he looked a lot better than when I knew him
as Naked Guy. Cut his hair and put on some decent clothes.

“You’re the First
and Last,” I said to his back.

He half-turned
around.

“And what is
that?”

“I don’t know,
it’s what Zeti said. I thought you might have an idea.”

“Let me tell you
one last thing about your Boranjame. When they destroy solar systems or
planets, do you think they choose randomly or do you think they do it with a
purpose?”

I didn’t know what
to say. I couldn’t understand half of what the Boranjame told me let alone
their motivations.

“They eradicated
my entire solar system in an effort to kill me. Do you have any idea how many
innocent lives were lost?” he asked.

“I doubt nearly as
many as died in the civil war you caused,” I said, immediately wondering if I
had gone too far.

He seemed to contemplate
that.

“You are correct.
But hopefully my methods at this stage are somewhat more refined. Good day,
Hank,” he said, as he exited the restaurant.

CHAPTER 58

How many people
were in Belvaille System for the Championship?

Were they all
going to be mutated?

I couldn’t imagine
the havoc that would cause. In the old days, Colmarians grew up with their
mutations and learned how to deal with them. If people could suddenly explode
or punch through walls or shoot lasers out of their ears, it was going to get
messy around here.

There could even
be another civil war.

Though if the
financial system was ruined, I’m not certain what there would be left to fight
over.

After the meeting
with Thad Elon, I went outside the restaurant and found Cliston had taken my limo.
With the Championship in full swing, I couldn’t catch a cab, they were all
hired out.

What I was worried
about—one of many things—was Zeti.

To trade for
information, I had told Thad Elon that the Boranjame had been responsible for his
planet’s destruction. As I recall, after that happened, he floated through
space for eons.

I don’t know if he
was one to hold grudges, but if he was, Zeti would be in for one hell of a
retribution.

I kept trying to
hail a cab as I jogged across town. Zeti didn’t have a tele number that I knew
of. Once you get past ten stories tall, you’re probably unlisted.

As I ran, I left a
message for Cliston.

“Talked to Thad
Elon. Naked Guy. Irune. He says he’s changed his whole team. He’s going to
wreck the Ank financial Formula by wrecking our team in the Championship. Get
with Magda and brainstorm. We have to win,” I said.

I then called up
Delovoa.

“Hey. Shut up.
Listen. Irune is Naked Guy. He said he’s going to mutate the entire System. Do
you know how he could do that?”

“Sounds pretty
far-fetched,” Delovoa said.

I banged my tele
as if I could slap Delovoa.

“This is Naked
Guy, remember? The guy I disintegrated. The guy who started the civil war. The
guy who created a clone army.”

“Oh, yeah,”
Delovoa said, remembering. “Let’s leave the System. I just got a new body and I
don’t want it getting mutated.”

“Just think about
how he could do it,” I said.

“I can only assume
it wouldn’t be like how the Colmarian Confederation did it. That required extensive
treatment on an individual basis,” he answered.

“Okay, well then
not that. I need to go. Think how else he could do it,” I said, hanging up.

I couldn’t catch a
cab no matter what I did. I was about to jump in the street and try and grab a
car, but I didn’t want to get run over for no reason. I still had to play in
the Championship.

Turn after turn,
block after block, I was reminded how bad I was at running.

Or jogging.

Or I guess I was
kind of fast-walking at this point.

I went around another
corner and my brain tried to jump out of my skull because I saw something I
couldn’t comprehend.

Flying through the
air, like an oversized glocken token, was Zeti.

Just flying.

This was a
fifteen-story, crystalline being travelling at what looked like a leisurely pace
through the sky.

I didn’t know
Boranjame could fly.

And then he hit a
skyscraper and shattered!

I never heard such
a noise. It was like the biggest porcelain plate in the galaxy being hit by the
biggest mallet in the galaxy. It was…beautiful.

There were
cascades upon cascades of crystals blossoming and blooming outward.

Out toward me.

I crouched, turned
my back, and covered myself.

There followed
what seemed like minutes of shards breaking. Each one that hit the ground
shattered again and then those pieces would hit something and shatter further.

I was expecting to
get eviscerated by all those jagged spears, but I didn’t feel a thing. It was
like they were bubbles.

When the sound
died down to a low, persistent tinkling, I hazarded a look around.

There was nothing
left.

A few of the
larger shards were still splintering, but I noticed when they got to a certain
size, they simply faded away. Maybe they were still breaking apart at the
microscopic level. There was no damage done to the area that I could tell.

I hurried over to
the building where I had seen Zeti hit. Not even the windows were broken. I
never dreamed Zeti was so fragile.

Was that how a
Boranjame died?

What were the
consequences of killing a member of that species?

I was thinking
this over and trying to catch my breath, when a familiar blur appeared before
me.

I had to blink and
look away, but I knew it was a Po, one of Zeti’s many-armed servants. It was
moving so fast I was getting dizzy.

It grabbed hold of
my pants, my jacket, my tie, my sleeves, my nose, my hair, my ears and began
tugging.

“Okay! Okay! It’s
all connected, let go! I’m coming,” I said, after smacking away a hand from my
mouth.

It was still
pulling on me when I saw more Po join the herd.

They all began
heaving and hauling until I found myself airborne and rolling among the
hundreds of hands that were carrying me.

I was on the verge
of throwing up when I was deposited unceremoniously on the ground.

“Oof!”

In front of me was
a glowing round sphere, maybe two feet in diameter. It was dark blue and was
emanating a dim light.

“Zeti?” I asked.

But he didn’t have
his speakers so he couldn’t talk to me. I didn’t know how to communicate with a
ball of light. The Po grabbed my hands and pulled me, making it clear I was
supposed to hold the sphere.

When I touched
Zeti it was like sticking my hands on a spaceship battery. I felt like I was
being electrocuted to death.

“Hank,” I heard a
voice say. It sounded exactly like Zeti’s voice always had.

“Ow,” I replied.

“You must listen
to me. The First and Last was created by the Boranjame.”

“Got it! Can I let
go?”

“Please listen. We
also have a myth. In the beginning there was no life, for it was impossible.
The galaxy was in perfect symmetry. There was but one Boranjame who had been
created by Order itself. After some time, the first Boranjame grew lonely or tired
of the equilibrium and managed to change itself. It was then capable of growing
and splitting, and the ripples of this disorder spread across the galaxy. Life
began to form.”

I held on and
tried to ignore the fact I was getting fried. I also did my best to commit this
to memory as I didn’t think he would repeat it.

“With new life
there was also the chance of what you call mutations. Not evolutionary in
nature, they are caused by the Boranjame. Our existence makes them
possible. Thad Elon was the first one and…he cannot be destroyed while any
other life endures. We have foreseen that he will one day destroy all living
things in the galaxy so that he can finally end his own existence. Most of my
kind believe this is our punishment for disrupting the original Order of the
galaxy and there is no possibility of its escape. But I don’t believe that is
true. I believe he can be stopped.”

“What can I do?
I’ve tried to kill him before and failed,” I said.

“You cannot kill Thad
Elon, but you can disrupt his plans. The only great power at his disposal is
infinite time. And that is a curse as well as a blessing,” Zeti said.

“How is he going
to mutate people?” I asked.

“I cannot tell
you,” Zeti replied.

“Then why start?
Why do you keep dragging me into things? Why not just give me the answers if you’re
so concerned?” I yelled.

Zeti, for once,
sounded weary.

“We do not possess
the same free wills that you have. That was the great joke played upon us. When
we introduced change, we became slaves to destiny. We Boranjame like to fancy
we are beings of Order, but sometimes I have my doubts.”

“Well, good for
you. How can I stop him from destroying the galaxy? I can’t even beat his
glocken team.”

“Just as the
Boranjame are restricted, so is Thad Elon. As an agent of Chaos, he will always
move to bring about the greatest change and destruction. It is his nature. It
is his purpose.”

“So wait, if he’s
stopped, would that also stop change? Or Chaos? Or Good Times? Or Midnight
Dancing? This is a lot heavier stuff than I’m used to handling. I mean, if he
ran out on a debt, I’d be the perfect guy. I don’t understand why I keep
getting involved,” I complained.

“Because it is your
destiny. I could not have told someone else and they could not have listened,”
Zeti said.

“So if I
try and tell someone else, will I explode or something?”

“You are not bound
as we are. Which gives me hope that you may help us.”

“I’m going
to help you all. The Boranjame?” I asked, thinking what I might ask in
return.

“You would not
benefit greatly from all life being destroyed,” Zeti said, showing why you
don’t negotiate with demigods or super aliens.

“What if I can’t
stop him? He lives forever, right?”

“You cannot stop
him forever,” Zeti said.

“Then what’s the
point?”

“You cannot stop
him forever because you do not live forever. You are destined to be betrayed and murdered by your best friend.
Unloved, your corpse deserted in the coldness of space, where memory of you will
swiftly become less substantial than the faded light of a long-dead star,” he
said.

“Yeah, yeah. I
heard that before. So when I’m all cold and dead, he’s going to destroy the
galaxy?”

“We will attempt
to find someone else to fight him. And we will continue until we finally fail,
or the end of time,” Zeti said.

“That’s job
security, I guess. Alright. Well, you look pretty bad—as far as crystals go.
Are you dying?”

I was being
facetious, but I felt like an awful lot had been laid on my shoulders and I
wasn’t altogether happy about it.

“Yes, I am dying,
Hank. But not all deaths are forever. You should take that to heart,” he said.

His light slowly
faded out and when it did so, Zeti vanished entirely.

I found myself
standing completely alone.

CHAPTER 59

My hands weren’t
burnt despite clinging to a radioactive Zeti husk. Maybe it was the disturbing
news he told me that only made it feel like I was on fire.

But in any case, there
wasn’t much I could do. I headed to the training facility so I could meet with
Cliston. I needed some opinions other than mine. Because my opinion was that I
should get the hell out of here before I was forced to get murderized in the
Championship, and if by some miracle I survived, I would get mutated.

It took me an hour
to reach the training camp, though I stopped for snacks a few times.

Magda, Garm, and Cliston
were all arguing heatedly.

“What’s this
about, Stank?” Magda asked.

“Zeti is dead.
Irune killed him—I think. He’s dead for sure—or pretty sure. Death isn’t always
deadly, you know. Anyway, Irune, Thad Elon, Naked Guy, is trying to win the Championship
so he can make money worthless,” I said.

They all stared at
me like I had suddenly put on a funny hat, slathered myself with raw meat, and
began doing interpretive ballet moves.

“What the hell are
you talking about?” Magda asked after a moment.

“Irune is the
person who caused the Colmarian civil war. The Ank warned me that if the Reskin
Sleepers kept winning, it would damage the galaxy’s financial system. But if
they win the Championship, it will totally ruin it.”

“You said they
acquired new players?” Cliston asked.

“That’s what Thad
Elon said.”

“Who is Thad
Elon?” Garm asked.

“Naked Guy. Irune.
It’s all the same person,” I said.

“Are you high?”
Magda asked. “Is this some way for you to try and get out of practice?”

“There was one
person who brought about the civil war, Magda. Hank, I thought you killed him,”
Garm said.

“So did I.
Apparently he can’t be killed. Kind of sucks,” I said.

“Why would the
financial network collapse?” Cliston asked.

“The Ank based
part of it on the fact the Reskin Sleepers never win. That’s like some
Universal Truth they plugged into their Formula. If they win, the whole banking
system is gone,” I said.

“Do we have
to win?” Garm asked.

“If you don’t want
to be getting paid for your Quadrad services in buttons and beads, yeah,” I
said.

“No, but is it
necessary for us to beat the Reskin Sleepers or is it enough that they don’t
win?” Garm asked.

“Um. I don’t know.
I know it’s bad that they’ve won any games. Since we can’t possibly win,
I say we just don’t play them.”

“If we don’t play,
we forfeit,” Magda replied.

“Are you sure
about this, Hank?” Garm asked.

“The Ank told me
and Thad Elon told me. Those are pretty good sources,” I answered.

“They couldn’t
have acquired and trained top-notch players in this short a time. And I would
know if they had gotten any star players. It would be all over the news. We
should have a better chance of beating them if they changed all their players
like you said,” Magda assured us.

“If they weren’t
all mutants being created from scratch, you might have a point,” I disagreed.

CHAPTER 60

I had one day to
conduct some final business of my own.

I was going to buy
a spaceship.

Yes, I had a lot
of money. Jewels. Fancy clothes. And my prized possession was my home on
Belvaille. But if money really became worthless, none of that stuff would
matter. The way I figured it, I would need something tangible that I could
secure.

A spaceship could
fly away. A house couldn’t.

I tasked Zzzho
with buying me one, since I knew nothing about ships. He almost immediately
replied with a half-dozen ideas. He had been looking for a new ship ever since
his taxi got creamed.

With me as a
buyer, however, he went into a whole other realm.

“I got the perfect
ship for you, Hank. But you need Central Authority permission,” he said on the
tele.

“I don’t have
that. Wait. Of course I do. I’ll just ring up the Murdaere and say I need it to
work on the Portals. What is the ship?” I asked.

“It’s an old
Colmarian Navy corvette. More of a gunboat, really,” he said.

“They aren’t going
to let me have a gunboat! They don’t let any ship have weapons,” I said.

“They took them
off. It’s unarmed. This is a ship that’s been sitting in space unused for like
ten years,” he said.

“Why? What’s wrong
with it?”

“Nothing, it’s
perfect. It just doesn’t fit what the C.A. like. It’s only got two turrets that
can’t hold very big cannons. There’s only space for six others besides the
crew, and not much cargo. It’s slow, old, and complicated. And it’s really
ugly.”

“Why would I want
that?”

“Because it’s a
military ship! It has turrets, even if there are no guns in it now. It still
has the full automated fire control system. Ship combat is really difficult, you
can’t aim and shoot using your eyeballs. Ships are too fast, maneuverable, and
the distances too large. The ship is also incredibly efficient. It has old
Colmarian Navy reactors. If I used my energy cells in it, I could fly it clear
across the galaxy—and that’s not even a joke.”

“I don’t need any
of that stuff,” I said.

“I haven’t told
you the best part.”

“What’s the best
part? It better be that this thing makes me grow younger, because so far I
wouldn’t spend a credit on it.”

“It wasn’t a real
warship. It was a communications and command ship. They’d use it to direct
traffic among bigger ships.”

“Who am I going to
direct?” I asked.

“Nobody. But
because it didn’t have big guns or heavy armor or speed, what it had was
electronic countermeasures. It can fly almost invisible—once it’s fixed up. And
it can jam other ships.”

“Does that stuff
still work?” I asked.

“It should. I
don’t think anyone knows it’s there. But for someone like you, it might come in
handy,” he said.

Zzzho quoted me
the price and it was astronomical. I would actually have to liquidate some of
my hard assets and fast.

I got Delovoa and
Garm on the tele. Delovoa said he could hook it up so Zzzho could operate all
the main systems. It wouldn’t be hard. Apparently, Keilvin Kamigans are used as
ship crews quite frequently because of their abilities. Garm also confirmed the
ship was used for communications relay and that, yes, it could be stealthy.

Garm had once been
an Adjunct Overwatch in the Colmarian Navy. Specifically, she was in the Colmarian Intelligence Services. Belvaille
still had a collection of giant radio telescopes it used to broadcast across
the galaxy.

“Should I buy the
ship?” I asked them.

“If you want a
Navy ship, I guess. It’s really old,” Garm said.

“That actually
works out better,” Delovoa interrupted. “The older ships weren’t such
fuel-guzzlers. Because the Confederation had to scrimp on supplies. I would be
able to fit some pretty nice cannons in that as well—for a price,” Delovoa
said.

“I’m not trying to
take over the galaxy, I just want—.”

“A way to get out
of Belvaille?” Garm interrupted.

I didn’t end up
contacting the Murdaere. I was too scared. I called MTB and he was the
co-signer on the ship with me, even though he didn’t pay anything. Since he was
Central Authority, he could purchase it without any issues.

I also told MTB,
while he was doing me this favor, what was going on with everything else. He
already knew about Naked Guy from stories I told back when we worked together.

“Things are
getting really bad here in the C.A., too. If you looked out in space, you would
see all our military ships sitting in little clusters. They’re dividing
themselves up,” MTB said.

“Are they going to
attack each other? Or Belvaille?” I asked, alarmed.

“I don’t think so.
Those ships are too valuable to risk in a fight. We don’t have the means of
repairing them if they get tore up. But you never know, people can be stupid
and they might try something.”

“Yeah. Hey, can
you get my ship transferred quick? A gas cloud is going to be picking it up and
piloting it for me. He’s going to use it as a taxi until I need to bug out of
here,” I said.

“It’s basically
derelict. You could probably fly it out without anyone even noticing,” MTB
said.

“Well, crap, what
did I pay all my money for?”

“In case some
cruiser saw it and blew you to hell,” he answered.

“Oh.”

“What do you want
the name registered as? I’m filling out the request now.”

“Um, ‘Suckface,’”
I said.

“Most names are
alpha-numeric. Like NJJ3937BD,” he said. “That’s its current name.”

“Is Suckface
taken?”

“No,” MTB sighed.

“Did you check?
You answered pretty fast.”

“I’m sure
Suckface is not taken,” he replied.

“Good. Then call
it that.”

“So you’re really
getting a ship? You always said you hated space.”

“I do. But, you
know, I hate the ground too. And stairs. And high elevations. And the sewers.
Most places are pretty crappy once you get to know them. But if things go bad,
I don’t want to have to stick out my thumb to try and bum a ride to safety.”

CHAPTER 61

For once, I was
pretty optimistic about things.

Yes, I was poor. I
owned a clunky ship I didn’t know how to fly. I had to play a game against a
team of mutants who would certainly beat me like a masochist at a whip and
paddle convention.

But I felt like I
was ahead of the curve.

I knew we
would lose. But it’s not like I’d die. If the game got too dangerous, we would
quit. Or hell, I’d quit. When we lost, something bad would happen with
the economy. But then it wouldn’t matter that I was poor because money wouldn’t
mean much.

I had my wits, my
looks, and my charm—which were all kind of handicaps, but I also had my
connections, my experience, and mutation.

The only thing I
was worried about was Thad Elon’s plans to mutate the System. But Delovoa said
whatever means he was going to use probably wouldn’t affect me. I was already a
mutant, I was invulnerable to scanning and many toxins. If they could mutate
me, they would probably kill everyone else.

And if I did get
mutated, maybe I’d become really skinny and fast and smart.

It was the day of
the Championship and I had been trying to isolate myself from the whirlwind of
anticipation that gripped the Belvaille System.

We were going to
get trashed and everyone knew it. It was only a big deal because it would be
the first time the Reskin Sleepers ever won the Championship.

People were
gambling like there was no tomorrow. Not on the game so much. They were
gambling on crazy stuff. The Reskin Sleepers were proof that the longest of
longshots could actually pay off. So why not put down a credit or two on a
wager that a neutron star spontaneously turned into a giant bottle of beer? Bookies
were making a killing coming up with fantastical wagers, attracting people by
showing what the payout would have been if they had bet on the Reskin Sleepers
all season.

The Belvaille
Glocken Team had to go to the weigh in.

This was the first
look we’d have at the new Sleepers’ team and what positions they would be
playing.

The space station
was on complete lockdown, with security provided by the C.A., the various
leagues, private gangs, and just about anyone registered to carry a gun on
Belvaille—except me.

We arrived at the
stadium in eight separate armored cars. We had something like twenty decoy
vehicles and I don’t know how many misdirections and checkpoints and blackouts.
The only way we wouldn’t have gotten to the stadium is if a neutron star had
turned into a giant bottle of beer, popped its cap, and the cap smashed into
Belvaille.

There was a lot of
high drama surrounding the weigh in. It was carried out beneath the stadium
near the team locker rooms.

Each player was
taken out one at a time. Their name, stats, history, details, and just about
everything except their DNA and stool samples were displayed on the broadcast.

As the second-place
team, we had to go first. The weighing was all televised to the crowd above us.
We couldn’t see the Reskin Sleepers’ team, as they were hidden from view to
increase the suspense.

Even deep within
the stadium underbelly we could hear the roar of the crowd. You could probably
hear it across space—physics be damned. Rendrae and Oxobox said this was the
most-watched Championship in history.

Whatever. I just
wanted this done and over so I could go back to being a Factotum. I decided
that getting shot at now and then was a lot safer than playing glocken.

Ziggy went up and
the crowd went nuts. He was always really popular. He was cute and he scored a
lot and he never said anything to offend anyone because he didn’t have a mouth.
It amazed me that he only weighed 98 pounds. Anything that small playing Super
Class glocken and being our top scorer was a true anomaly.

Garm got a respectable
ovation. Lots of hooting and whistles. She weighed 123.

Neddy didn’t get
much applause. He was a weird alien bug thing. It didn’t matter that he was our
second-best scorer and a monster on defense. He weighed 265.

Candar had been
switched to 4-lane and his reception was thunderous. I literally looked at the
walls to see if we were in danger of being buried. He weighed 500 pounds
exactly. He always weighed 500 pounds. He was the only person who never
fluctuated. He took it very seriously.

Frank didn’t get
any applause because no one knew him. He weighed 633.

Bley-ore got a
good response. He was a fun player to watch. Hard-hitting, tough. He was 989
pounds.

My turn came up
and I didn’t hear much. I actually paused on my way to the scales, craning my
head for the applause. All I heard was booing.

“Don’t worry about
it, Hank,” Candar reassured me, like a prick.

I hopped on the
scales and I was 3,446. I had somehow gained about 200 pounds.

“Damn, Hank, did
you eat your token?” Garm asked, as I stepped off.

“Hey, don’t worry.
We’re a team,” Candar said again.

Grah weighed
15,233 pounds. He had weighed differently on previous games, but I chalked that
up to the scales being calibrated differently. Even if they were only off a quarter
of a percent, that would really register with someone as heavy as Grah.

Maybe that’s why I
was heavier?

Our defensive
substitutes came up but no one really cared about them. Even though Meggaar,
who replaced Garm on defense, was part of the Band of Hands and stopped most
2-lanes cold.

It was time for
the Reskin Sleepers to be weighed. They walked around the corner one at a time
as their lane was called.

The 1-lane came
into view and it was the trippendage
I had fought on Floloria! I
couldn’t believe it was a 1-lane. Usually you wanted your smallest, fastest guy
there since it was only carrying a 1-pound token.

The trippendage
got on the scales and it said 90 pounds!

Impossible.

We all stared at
each other. Unless that thing was filled with helium, there was no way it was
90 pounds. And I had fought it, it was more likely to be filled with iron
than helium.

Their 2-lane came
up and it was some eight-foot-tall monster that was so over-muscled he had to
swivel his whole body to walk. His arms stood straight out like a T because he
had so many muscles. Even his face was bulging.

He weighed 150
pounds!

This was getting
absurd.

Magda was nearby
and we began to complain to her, but she shushed us. She was no dummy though,
her normally mean face was so scrunched up that she looked freeze-dried.

Their 3-lane was a
Qwintine like our 3-lane Neddy, but this one must have been a different subspecies
because it was about three times as wide, twice as tall, and its abdomen had
glowing spots as if it was powered by a furnace.

Their 4-lane, who Candar
would be playing against, was a Colmarian who reminded me of Podiver Vance. He
was outrageously tall and thin and his arms dragged like long noodles behind
him. His legs were also flimsy and he rolled to create locomotion. It didn’t
look like he had any bones in his body.

The next player
would be taking on Frank. At first I thought it was a Keilvin Kamigan coming
around the corner because it was a cloud of light. But in the center, a bipedal
being floated along, surrounded by a gleaming halo. The person itself
was an iridescent gold.

“Hey, no robots,”
I said.

But the judges had
already scanned him and determined he was some kind of biological species or he
wouldn’t have been allowed this far.

The weigh in room
judges weren’t the actual referees. The judges just did things like check
weight and equipment and made sure we weren’t Dredel Led. They also performed a
very forgiving intelligence check to show we were at least sentient and
self-aware.

The head-check was
so we weren’t fighting animals. But Grah could pass it, Ziggy could pass it,
and even I could pass it, so I had no doubt that the Reskin Sleepers would
pass.

The 6-lane, who
would go head-to-head with Bley-ore was maybe the strangest one yet. It looked
like a five-foot-tall statue made of metal. But it was very rough, like silvered
coal, and had lines and cracks and rough edges everywhere. The most bizarre
aspect, however, was how it moved. It never lifted its feet off the ground.
Instead, it would stretch out its arms and completely collapse into a mound of
debris. Then it would rise up, reform itself, stretch out its arms again, and
fall forward. It could do this quite rapidly. I had no idea how Bley-ore would
fare against that.

They all weighed
comfortably under what common sense said they should weigh.

I was waiting for
their 7- and 8-lanes, though. That would be who was blocking me and who I was
blocking, respectively.

We kept standing
around for their 7-lane but no one came. Suddenly the scale jumped up to 2,500
pounds.

“What the hell, is
he invisible?” I asked.

One of the
assistant coaches from the Reskin Sleepers went over to the judges and began talking.
It was not hard to notice that the coach was a Rettosian. After some time, one of
the judges left and returned some ten minutes later.

The scale was
still sitting at 2,500 pounds.

The judge
approached with some device in his hand. He squatted down and put his nose like
a foot above the scale. He waved for one of the cameras to come over. Everyone
on our team went to one of the tele screens to see what the camera was looking
at.

There he was. It
was a tiny little 7-lane. He must have been a millimeter tall. Or across. Or
something. The judge had a magnifying glass, but you still couldn’t see exactly
what the player looked like.

How was that guy
going to block me? Other than the fact he weighed 2,500 pounds, which probably
meant he really weighed about 10,000.

Yeah, mutants
weren’t against the rules, but come on. I was just fat. I wasn’t the
size of a molecule.

I was so worried I
had forgotten there was still an 8-lane.

A giant claw
appeared from the other side of the room. Its nails dug into the
concrete wall. Another clawed hand appeared and wrapped itself around the door
frame. Using these vantage points, the leviathan pulled itself bodily into the
room.

It then “stood”
up.

Grah was ten feet
tall and could easily fit inside. This thing had to crouch down and splay its
arms wide.

Its lower body was
composed of giant tentacles with suction cups. Its upper body was muscular and twin-armed
with a somewhat lizard-like appearance. Its mouth was enormous and filled with
polished white fangs bigger than my damn skull.

It had six black
eyes, a giant red tongue, and looked beyond malevolent.

It then roared, in
case anyone hadn’t quite pissed their pants yet.

It was impossible
to tell how tall it was, because its tentacles were all across the chamber and
stretched back into the room it had come from. Just its upper body must be at
least fifteen feet.

These Super Class
judges, who had seen a galaxy full of oddities and drugged-out monsters,
retreated in fear from this new contender.

My heart skipped
at least five beats, which couldn’t be good for me.

It took over
thirty minutes to weigh the creature and everyone else had to leave the room to
make space. In the end they added its weight across three different scales.

6,100 pounds…

“Now they’re just
being insulting,” I said to Magda. “What is that thing made out of, sunshine
and rainbows? If that’s 6,100 pounds, then I can touch my toes while jump
roping. I’m not going to try and block that!”

“Relax, Magda has
it,” Candar said. Though even he looked nervous.

Magda raised a
formal complaint and demanded we all be reweighed.

There were lots of
boos and anger from the fans, but the judges also had to know something was up.

They had some
back-up scales and we all weighed ourselves again. We came out pretty much the
same.

The Reskin
Sleepers came out pretty much the same as well.

“Can we forfeit
now?” I asked seriously.

CHAPTER 62

We won the coin
toss so we were first offense.

I never heard such
deafening applause before and I was blinded by the amount of lights. It was
pretty amazing, and even Magda seemed, momentarily, impressed.

As we lined up
against our opponents, things appeared dangerously futile.

Every one of us
was much smaller than our counterparts. Except me, because I was playing
against some microscopic defender.

I couldn’t help
but look over at the 8-lane who stood there roaring and gnashing and clawing at
the air. It took up the whole 8-lane, most of the 7-lane, and its tentacles
extended back half the field. I was going to have to try and block that thing
next possession.

Candar was calling
out plays, but I already decided I was going to sit back and go where I could
provide help. I couldn’t run with a 1,000-pound token anyway. Besides, I had
missed so much practice I had no idea what plays he was calling.

The game began and
I dropped my token and moved behind the line.

I saw the
trippendage at 1-lane smash his huge fist down and I worried about poor Ziggy.
Then I noticed Ziggy had scored. He was about that fast.

Garm wasn’t
stupid, she wasn’t going to try and fight her muscled defender. But she didn’t
have to. The guy was hopelessly incapable of catching her, as immobile as he
was.

She added insult
by running straight at him, jumping onto his chest, climbing his muscles like
the rungs on a ladder, hurdling over him, and practically dancing her way into
the end zone.

The crowd laughed
their approval. They loved her.

We were up three
points already!

Neddy ran
thorax-to-thorax against the other insect and I couldn’t tell if they were
mating or scrumming. But Neddy was clearly out-weighed. The only good thing was
their insect had short arms and legs compared to its massive body. If Neddy
would just try and go around, he might make some headway. But Neddy was
not that subtle.

Candar jumped back
and hurled his token down field. He then tried to run past the long-limbed defender
but was stopped. That guy could probably block the adjacent two lanes without
difficulty. He literally wrapped himself around Candar like an overzealous
scarf.

Frank. Well, Frank
was Frank. My uncle saw weigh-in and knew what was up. He also must have been
paid in advance. He dropped his token, rushed forward against his golden,
floating opponent, and took hold of one of the man’s arms. Bracing his feet
against the gleaming foe and pulling him down to the turf, Frank completely
ripped the man’s arm off! He then took the arm and began beating the dying
mutant with it.

Frank was ejected
from the game and we were penalized twenty points.

He didn’t care,
and he had the wisdom to get the hell out of here. He probably fled the entire System.

Bley-ore held his
token firm and rushed against his mineral defender. The creature exploded into
tiny debris. But then as Bley-ore tried to continue running, he found his feet
were being grasped and held firm by the rubble that was once his blocker.

The rubble grew,
reformed, and entwined himself around Bley-ore. Bley-ore chopped and punched
and kicked and he was slowly—very slowly—moving down the field. But the other
defenders were moving over to assist.

I was about to go
help Bley-ore when I saw Grah, 15,000-pound Grah, go running past me with the
8-lane token. That was twenty-two points if he scored!

The behemoth who
was defending 8-lane had gotten distracted—by the crowd. It rushed over to the
stadium and was now climbing the wall that separated the field from the stands.
I watched it grab about a half-dozen people and stuff them into its mouth! It
didn’t even seem tremendously hungry, it just chewed a bit and let the chopped-up
remains drop to the ground.

The 19,994 people
who weren’t being eaten were screaming in terror. I, myself, stood frozen,
realizing that monster would soon be coming for me.

The referees
signaled for security to step in and they were blasting the leviathan with
force cannons and trying to secure it with cables and nets. It was like ants
trying to attack a meteor, armed only with happiness.

Eventually the
assistant coaches of the Sleepers had to run out and try and coerce the thing
back onto the field.

I looked over at
the Reskin Sleepers sideline and there I saw Irune, Thad Elon. He was sitting
as emotionless as ever, watching the game behind his dark sunglasses with his
darker eyeballs.

This finally
spurred me to action and I rushed forward to try and help Bley-ore.

Just then I was hit
in my stomach with what felt like an extremely powerful bullet and knocked onto
my back. I was winded and blinking and trying to figure out what the crap just
happened.

I tried to get up
when I felt a tremendous weight on my chest.

It was that damn
microscopic defender. It had to be.

I tilted my head
up to see if I could spot him, but my eyes were blurry and there were so many
flashing, colored lights I couldn’t even see my feet—not that I could normally
see my feet.

I brushed at my
chest to try and get him off but I still felt the weight there.

Technically,
because I wasn’t holding a token, this flea shouldn’t be standing on me. He
could block but he couldn’t just set up shop on my sternum.

“Unnecessary…torso-sitting,”
I called.

But as the team’s
Hack, I didn’t get a lot of respect from the referees. They figured it was all
fair game since I didn’t play fair.

Besides, I just
looked like a fat guy who fell on his back and couldn’t get up. It’s not like
it was obvious there was a tiny black hole of a man pinning me down.

Bley-ore was
brought down by the trippendage and the lead-coal creature and the
hyper-muscled 2-lane all working together.

Grah scored easily
as no one even attempted to stop him.

Once Candar’s
token had been killed, the long-armed defender reached over and killed my token
from what seemed like thirty feet away. Candar tried to stop him, but he was
still entangled in the man’s legs.

Neddy was declared
down and his token dead when he simply couldn’t make any headway against his
counterpart.

When all the
tokens were similarly dead or scored, my diminutive oppressor finally hopped
off my chest.

When we got to the
sidelines, Magda hit me in the nose with her metal rod and berated me for not
helping.

“What were you
doing, Hank, playing dead?” Candar yelled.

“That little guy
was jumping on me,” I complained. “I think he bit me,” I lied, when no one
seemed to appreciate my predicament.

Even with Frank’s
penalty, we had five points.

But with Frank’s
ejection, we were down a player. However, he had murdered their 5-lane, so they
were also down a player. Amazingly, they didn’t have any substitutes. They
probably figured they didn’t need any.

It seemed we might
actually have a chance yet.

We discussed what
we would do on defense but I didn’t pay much attention. No amount of strategy
was going to prepare me for trying to stop their 8-lane. I could try and get
stuck to its suction cups, but there was no conventional way I could try and
block that thing.

We lined up and it
took a long time to get started because the Reskin Sleepers wouldn’t pick up their
tokens. The 8-lane was busy screaming and thrashing. The miniature 7-lane may
or may not have picked up the token, it was difficult to see if it was raised a
half-millimeter or not.

Finally, the crowd
was getting very unruly and the referees simply started the play.

The leviathan howled
and lurched forward and grabbed hold of me. It picked me up in one of its claws
and I felt sure it was going to eat me.

Instead it threw
me.

I flew up into the
D24 section of the stadium. Not exactly the cheap seats, but I got a lot of
beer and chips spilled on me instead of wine and fish eggs.

People began
cussing, spitting on me, hitting me, and throwing food. As if it were my fault
I had broken the bones of the four people I landed on.

It was a long way
back to the field and I felt the play would likely be over before I got there,
so I picked up the food that was being thrown and started eating. It wasn’t bad
food. The stadium had a pretty good concessions area, and this was the
Championship.

One guy shot me
with a pistol. Not sure how he managed to bring a gun in here. I ignored him.

This made people
even madder and they threw a lot more food, which I ate.

Grah killed the
7-lane token with no problem. The little flea might have been contesting the
token, but there was no way to tell. He even killed the 8-lane token, which the
leviathan hadn’t bothered to pick up.

But then the
creature grabbed Grah with both of its massive claws and hurled him! It was
unbelievable. 15,000 pounds thrown like a ball.

Grah didn’t come close
to reaching the stands, but he did manage to crush one of our towel boys and a
photographer.

From my high
vantage point it was pretty clear these over-mutated beasts had very little
concept or interest in the sport of glocken. They would forget to pick up the
tokens, would drop them, would throw them randomly, would run out of bounds and
try and attack people on the sidelines.

We would actually
be completely dominating them if strategy was the key factor of this game. As
it was, half their team could probably go to sleep or, more likely, go on some
killing spree across Belvaille and they would still beat us easily.

Because if there
was one thing they understood, it was that they could still win by permanently
disabling us.

Ziggy got
flattened trying to block the trippendage.

Bley-ore seemed to
be suffocating because he had his head completely enveloped by the debris
creature.

Candar was being
strangled by the spaghetti-armed man, despite a foul being called.

The rock-solid
Neddy took a beating from his Qwintine adversary. Neddy’s single-mindedness was
going to get him killed.

Meggaar, Garm’s
defensive replacement, was no match for the hyper-muscular mutant. The 2-lane
took a page out of Frank’s book and ripped off one of Meggaar’s four arms. Meggaar
fell to the ground, bleeding copiously.

I thought the play
would be over quickly, but it was clear that the Reskin Sleepers had no
intention of ending their offense. We weren’t able to kill the tokens and they
weren’t interested in scoring. They were trying to annihilate us.

I made my way back
down to the field as quickly as I could, which wasn’t very quickly.

I jumped from the
upper platform and landed on a lot of annoyed spectators who had been cursing
at me below. Serves them right.

From there, I
jumped down to the field and jogged across the sideline.

Thad Elon was
sitting right there and he spared me a small grin and nod of his head.

I wasn’t sure what
to do, but Magda yelled instructions: grab the tokens and throw them all out of
bounds as quick as possible before our team got slaughtered.

I did so with the
small tokens, grabbing three at a time. The 7- and 8-lane tokens were too big
to throw so I had to hold them for five seconds.

When the play was
officially over, half our team was down and in a few cases, down for good.
Meggaar was short an arm, Ziggy was limp, Bley-ore had nearly been suffocated
to death and the team medics were trying to restore him.

Things were
catastrophically bad and we were only two plays into the game.

CHAPTER 63

It was pretty
hopeless.

We were granted an
extended timeout to count our dead and dying. We were in our locker room which
currently resembled a hospital in a war zone.

Ziggy was busted
up pretty bad and it broke my heart to see the spastic guy so lethargic.
Meggaar was in shock from his injuries. Neddy had several cracks in his
exoskeleton. Candar said he was fine but he was wearing a neck brace and had somehow
suffered a concussion. Bley-ore was in a coma. Even Grah, who was a damn rock,
seemed to be moving slower than usual—which was saying something.

Only Garm and I
were unscathed, and in my case it was only because I had the good fortune of
landing on a bunch of people with bad fortune.

“We have to quit,”
I said.

“I thought that
would doom the economy,” Cliston replied.

“Money isn’t
everything,” I said, having successfully transformed most of my money into a
spaceship.

“They’re hardly
calling any penalties,” Candar wheezed.

“This is the most
crooked Championship I’ve ever witnessed. But that doesn’t help us now,” Magda said.

I went to
Delovoa’s office to try and get some more of that formula cream. I’d slather it
all over myself to help me heal. And I’d eat some while I was at it.

“Good work on the
Portals,” Delovoa said.

I couldn’t get
over his new body. He wore tight-fitting clothes to show off his physique, but they
also showed off his stitches and gunk that was seeping out. His tight pants
looked obscene.

“What Portals?” I
asked, wondering if I had a concussion too.

“The three Portals
are back online. I just checked and I have full access. Everything looks in
order. What did you do?”

“I didn’t do
anything. Remember, the ship got smashed? I haven’t been back in space since,”
I said.

“Well, they’re working,”
Delovoa shrugged, and when he did so some kind of boil or cyst ruptured on his
shoulder and saturated his shirt with blood.

“Portals don’t fix
themselves do they?” I asked.

“If they did, I
would be out of a job,” Delovoa replied, as he continued to rub the formula
cream on me.

“That’s how he’s
going to mutate us!”

“Naked Guy?”

“Yes. Thad Elon.
Could he use the Portals as some kind of, I don’t know, mutant-making thing?” I
asked.

“I don’t see how,”
Delovoa said.

I sighed, not sure
what to think.

“Of course, I’m
not billions of years old and a folk legend known across the galaxy by every
species,” Delovoa amended. “I’m not sure what he could do.”

“Did any of your
co-workers fix them?” I asked.

“No. Those Portals
are assigned to you by the Arch Minister. The Central Authority wouldn’t let anyone
go near them,” he said.

“Then that’s got
to be it!” I shouted.

Delovoa looked
around anxiously.

“Look, it’s a
miracle you’re still alive. All those players are clearly mutants and clearly
high-level mutants. The economy is about to go down the toilet and, according
to you, we’re all about to get mutated—again. You said you got a spaceship,
let’s get out of here while we still can. Your uncle ran out of here so fast I
thought it was Ziggles at first,” Delovoa said.

“Ziggy,” I corrected.

It was a good
idea. And if I was being completely honest, I bought my spaceship partially
with this in mind. I didn’t believe Thad Elon was making idle threats and I
knew there was no hope of beating the Reskin Sleepers.

But now I knew
where the mutation was coming from. Or likely to come from.

And when I hadn’t
succeeded in stopping Thad Elon before, the galaxy had been plunged into civil
war. And we still hadn’t recovered from that.

“Are you guys
planning on leaving?” Garm said, entering the room. “Because count me in.”

“Hank thinks Naked
Guy is going to use the Portals to mutate us,” Delovoa said.

“What the hell’s
in your pants?” Garm asked.

Delovoa pulled
down his pants to show her and Garm looked sick.

“It’s got
gangrene!” She yelled.

“It’s not polite
to point. And I’ll have you know it’s healing nicely,” he said.

“So what’s your
plan, Hank? Go out there and run one or two more plays until we’re all dead?”
Garm asked.

“What was it you
said?” I asked her.

“About you being
stupid or fat?” Garm replied.

“No, about winning
the Championship,” I said.

“That we can’t?”

“No, about…I can’t
remember. I have an old brain. Um, you had…” I looked at my two friends for
help. “It was something about the Championship and winning.”

“I asked if it was
okay if we didn’t win. Does the universe end if the Reskin Sleepers win or if
we lose?” she asked.

“Yeah! All we have
to do is stop them from winning,” I said.

“You make it sound
easy,” Garm replied.

“It is. But that’s
not good enough. We’re still going to get mutated. We’re still going to have
Thad Elon hanging around. Even if we fix one of those, we’re screwed somewhere
else.”

“You’re going to
win the game, fix the Portals, and kill the immortal Naked Guy?” Delovoa asked.

“We’re going to
need the whole team,” I said. “What’s left of it.”

CHAPTER 64

“This seems like a
horrible plan,” Candar said.

The remaining team
members were all together in the locker room listening to me explain my
proposed strategy. Grah, Neddy, and Candar all seemed to be very uninterested.
I admit, what I was saying had to sound like lunacy.

“For once, Hank
isn’t exaggerating. Irune is really Thad Elon,” Garm said.

“If that’s the
case, shouldn’t we be running the other direction from him? Or even celebrating
his existence?” Candar asked.

“He’s not a benevolent
deity. I can’t stress that enough. He started the civil war, which killed
countless billions of people, and he means to do a lot worse,” I said.

“If the Reskin
Sleepers aren’t stopped, you will face economic hardships no matter where you
run,” Cliston said.

“That’s right. All
your hard work as glocken players, all that money you made in exchange for
broken bones and brain loss, won’t be worth spit,” I added.

“He’s telling the
truth as far as I understand it,” Magda confirmed uneasily.

Magda’s
endorsement seemed to get their interest a lot more than any of the other stuff
I had said.

“If he’s really
Thad Elon, we won’t have a chance against him,” Candar argued. “I’ve been going
to Thad Elon’s Day celebrations for as long as I can remember and you’re
telling me he’s sitting out there in the flesh.”

“Believe it or
not, he’s the least of our worries. If I know him, and I do somewhat, he won’t
try and stop us. He’ll probably be amused,” I said.

“We’ll be
fugitives,” Candar exclaimed.

I was beginning to
get annoyed at Candar’s intransigence. This must be what he felt like trying to
get me to go to practice all season.

“I’m doing the
dirty work. I’m used to people being mad at me,” I said.

“It’s true, no one
has ever really liked Hank,” Garm said.

I was about to
argue, but then I realized it didn’t matter. I could see everyone was still on
the fence. My plan wasn’t very good but I didn’t have a lot of time to devise
it.

“Look, I’ve done this
a lot. Save the neighborhood. Or city. Or galaxy. I’ve done it like twenty
times and no one ever thanks me or gives me free food or tips their hat. The
only thing you get is the secret knowledge that you helped billions, or
trillions, or even zillions—”

“Quadrillions?”
Candar asked.

“Shut up. Of
people, and the satisfaction of helping your team not lose,” I said.

“By cheating.
Cheating to the greatest degree possible,” Candar said, distraught.

“Don’t tell me you
think those Reskin Players out there aren’t cheating. I’m surprised this
stadium can even support their weight. We’re the second-ranked team in all of
Super Class and in two plays they managed to disable half of us. Do you really
want to try and play them for five more hours? I sure don’t,” I said.

The team still
didn’t look very enthusiastic.

“Look, if we don’t
do this, no one will. There is no third-place team behind us. There are no
substitutes or defenders ready to step in if we bail. We are the only people
who know about this and can do anything. If we don’t even try, you’ll have to
live with that for the rest of your lives. And trust me, the level of regret
for trying your best and failing is way less than for not trying at
all.”

“Let us go!” Grah
yelled, seeming to settle things for everyone.

Magda filed a
formal complaint. The biggest, boldest complaint you could possibly file: she
said the referees were helping the Reskin Sleepers cheat.

It was one thing
to complain about refs behind their backs or in the media or even on the field.
But a formal complaint was a big deal. She had to present her findings, have
all the referees confer, and then they would pass judgment.

In the history of
Super Class, this had only been done a few dozen times and only when it was
overwhelmingly obvious or the game had effectively been lost. If the referees
disagreed with the protest, which happened almost every time, they could
penalize our team in any way they saw fit for the false accusation.

The penalty could
be instant forfeiture, or a hundred points, or suspension of players.

Absolutely
anything.

And when you
accuse referees of being crooks, they aren’t often lenient afterwards.

Magda and Cliston
met in a room with Irune and one of the Rettosian assistant coaches.

Behind a clear
plexi-screen, the referees all assembled. Two Line Referees, two End Referees,
and the Chief Referee who had final say.

It was not
completely unheard of for spectators to throw things, shoot things, and
otherwise try and maim or kill referees, so when they arrived, they were still
wearing their bulky armored gear and looked like they were going to invade a
planet—and force its inhabitants to play glocken.

Several cameramen
were also present, filming for the broadcast. Despite the interruption in play,
this was seen as pretty high entertainment because it was so rare.

Magda was expected
to make her case, the Reskin Sleepers could refute it, if they chose, and the
referees would evaluate.

“This Court of
Grand Inquiry is now in session. You have stated that you have proof of
deceptive practices by the officiating staff,” the Chief Referee stated
solemnly.

“I do,” Magda
replied.

She began to sift
through her tele with Cliston’s help.

Irune sat
motionless, seemingly uninterested. His Rettosian assistant was clearly
annoyed, however.

At this point, I
walked into the room and stepped past everyone.

I didn’t care for
referees in general. It was easy to not like someone when they had the power to
save you from beatings and rarely did. Of course, my dislike for them was
irrelevant. I couldn’t allow the Reskin Sleepers to win.

“I claim sole
responsibility,” I said. “Eat suck, suckface!”

I stood there
holding Gun in my hand and nothing happened.

The referees all
exchanged looks.

I cleared my
throat.

“Gun?” I asked.

“Yes? Hello,” he
replied, oblivious.

“Kill them all,” I
clarified.

I had seen Gun
shoot through the observation screen on the spaceship that had smashed Zzzho’s
taxi. I didn’t think he would have an issue with the plexi-screen.

He didn’t. The
referee armor was a bit trickier, however.

After shattering
the screen, he shot the two Line Refs in their external optical camera lenses.
This was a straight connection to their eyeballs, and both men dropped. The End
Refs had seams in their chest armor where the plates joined together. But the
seams were connected by big bolts, which could be shot, and shattered, leaving the
armor plates to fall to the ground, exposing their bodies.

The two End Refs
dropped to the ground.

“Stop! You’re in
violation—” the Chief began in his booming voice.

His booming voice
was created with an amplifier located over his throat. Unarmored, apparently. Gun
shot him there and the Chief fell to the ground dead.

The two cameramen
were also killed. I hadn’t wanted that, but I hadn’t told Gun not to, so he
took me at my word when I said “Kill them all.”

The Rettosian
assistant coach stood and, to my shock, he didn’t run away. He was incredibly
angry.

“Where did you get
that weapon?” he demanded.

It was the least
likely response I would have thought of.

I walked forward
so I was safely past Cliston and Magda and told Gun to kill the man standing.

Gun did so with a single
shot to the skull.

Despite their
armor, these were all squishy little men. I felt a bit tired, but not that
much. It was hard to distinguish what was Gun siphoning my energy and what had
been caused by being tossed up into the stands. But my adrenaline was
counteracting it nicely.

I’m not sure how
Gun knew exactly where to shoot when he seemed to know so little about
everything else. I would ask him when I had a little more time on my hands and
I wasn’t surrounded by tens of thousands of people who had just started to riot
because the Championship game was now cancelled.

On account that all
the referees had been murdered.

CHAPTER 65

A huge explosion
rocked the entire stadium.

It was then the
reality of what I had done truly hit me. I had just ruined the weekends of the
entire galaxy’s sports fans. Did I really expect to get away with it?

But I had to.

The Championship
was cancelled for today. But the Reskin Sleepers would just play the third-place
team tomorrow. Or next week. Or next month. Eventually they would win and the
Ank’s great Formula would collapse.

I had to get Thad
Elon out of here. I felt with him gone, their team would crumble.

I hoped.

And we just might
get him to tell us how to stop the mutations.

Zzzho was already waiting
in my ship at the port, I just had to go across a rather inhospitable city to
get there.

Garm and Delovoa
had left before I started shooting and I would need them at the Portals.

Cliston was
leaving with Magda, doing their best to disguise themselves.

I had Thad Elon by
the scruff of his neck and was dragging him around the locker room. He seemed
to find this whole escapade somewhat comical.

Bley-ore and
Candar walked in as I was binding him.

“Bley-ore,” I
said, surprised. “You okay?”

“I told him
everything, and he’s ready to help,” Candar replied.

Bley-ore was exactly
what I needed, but…

“Weren’t you just
in a coma?” I asked.

“I’m on so many
drugs I think if they pulled my brain out I would still be ready to play,” he
said.

“Don’t give them
any ideas, it just might come to that,” I replied.

As far as I knew,
the security in the building was supposed to protect the players and staff. I
wasn’t sure how they would react to me killing the refs.

I had squeezed
Thad Elon into a big, sturdy sports bag. It was designed to carry tokens, but
it now contained a tied-up Creator God.

Candar looked at
it uncertainly.

“Is he going to be
alright in there?” he asked.

I took a step back
and kicked the bag as hard as I could. It flew across the room and smashed into
some lockers and bent three of them.

“You okay, Thad
Elon?” I called out.

“I just wish I
could see what you were doing. It seems quite original,” he replied mildly.

If the guys hadn’t
been nervous before, they were now.

Grah was leading
us out. He would be the front Wedge. He was the widest and strongest, though we
would be limited to moving at his speed.

Bley-ore and Neddy
would be roving Hacks, keeping everyone away or making them wish they had
stayed away.

Candar was the
Forward. If I got in trouble, I would twist the bag to him and he’d go running
to my ship, carrying Thad Elon like a token.

I was the Tilt.
The Captain. The chump. Everyone would be gunning for me.

We had to run all
the way across an angry city to the port, carrying a god in a duffle bag.

None of the
players were complaining because I think they realized this was a lot easier
than playing the Reskin Sleepers.

Also, they were in
Game Mode.

It is hard to
describe the level of concentration possessed by professional athletes. It’s
almost a transcendent state. The Play had been called, and now they were
working off instinct and muscle memory. It was almost as if they were no longer
conscious beings.

We were jogging
down the hallways under the stadium at Grah-speed and all the guards pretty
much stayed out of the way. They were not trained on how to respond to this. A
few held their guns, testing if that was the correct reaction, but then
Bley-ore or Neddy would pound them into the ground.

The rest decided that
wasn’t the correct reaction and merely watched us go.

We were about to
reach the exit when Candar yelled from ahead.

“Central
Authority!” He said.

“Keep going,” I
answered.

“Hank, stop!”
MTB’s familiar voice called.

I thought about it
a moment and modified our play.

“Beggar Down!” I said,
happy that I remembered the maneuver.

“Beggar Back, you
mean,” Candar corrected.

That guy…

MTB was with two
C.A. who were armed, but not impressively so. I didn’t think he could stop us.
Besides, he was the co-signer on my new spaceship. He wouldn’t shoot me. Would
he?

“Hank. Where you
going?” MTB asked.

“What’s it to
you?” I said stupidly. It was all kinds of things to him as a C.A. Inspector.

“You got a few
million people on this city ready to tear your face off and make you eat it,”
he replied.

“Does that include
the C.A.?” I asked warily.

“Did you hear that
bomb?” he asked.

“Yeah, how could I
not? What was it?”

“That was the stadium’s
presidential box getting blown to confetti,” he said.

“So a bunch of rich
nobles are dead?” I asked impatiently.

“Yeah. And the
Arch Minister. Maris-To was watching the game,” he said.

“What?” I asked,
shocked.

“The C.A. isn’t
after you because there is no Central Authority as of ten minutes ago. There’s
no government at all,” he said.

“Are you sure he’s
dead?” I asked.

“I was stationed
two sections over. I’m lucky I wasn’t more popular with my superiors or I might
have been killed, too.”

I’d had no contact
with Maris-To in years, so I was surprised how relieved I was to learn that he
was dead. It wasn’t just that I ratted him out to the Historians and I hadn’t
repaired the Portals like he asked. Maris-To had essentially been a king.

You could never be
completely at ease knowing he was around and could order your execution for no
other reason except he felt like it.

“What about space?
Will the warships fire on me?” I asked.

“Can’t see why.
They won’t know it’s you unless you tell them. And they won’t care unless they
had money riding on the game or something,” he said. “So you did all that to
stop Naked Guy?”

“Yeah. Got him in
this bag,” I said, patting it.

MTB blinked.

“And you’re going
to your ship?”

“Trying to.”

“We can help if
you want. But you got to give us a lift out of here if we make it. I don’t know
how well C.A. are going to be treated in the next few days,” he said.

“Can you tell the
other C.A. to back off?” I asked.

“There is
no C.A. These guys are just my pals,” he said.

“Hi,” I said,
waving.

But they didn’t
look like the chatty type. If they were MTB’s friends, they were strictly
business.

“Sure, the more
the merrier. You guys cover the rear and shoot anyone who looks dangerous,” I
said.

“We’re unarmed,”
MTB said.

“What is that
you’re holding?” I asked, annoyed.

“We have no
ammunition. They said it was because they didn’t want any overzealous policing,
but they really wanted us unarmed when they assassinated Maris-To. None of the
C.A. are armed,” MTB said.

“Who killed him?”
I asked.

“Someone with
high-level access to the Central Authority, that’s all I know. His box was
swept clear at least a half-dozen times and every entrance was locked and
guarded. My first hunch is the Quadrad.”

“No, they wouldn’t
kill Maris-To. Like you said, that’s the whole government. They don’t get any
business from anarchy. And Garm would at least give me a warning if something
that big was going down. But no ammo, huh? Well…then just shake your guns
around and threaten anyone who comes close,” I suggested.

“And we’re going
to run across the whole city?” MTB asked.

“Hopefully,” I
said.

“This seems like a
bad plan,” MTB added.

“I told him so,”
Candar agreed.

CHAPTER 66

I had made a real
long-shot request to Garm before she took off. I knew she wouldn’t be much help
when we tried to muscle our way across town—she was a finesse player not a
blocker—but she was still a member of the Quadrad, and they were still an elite
organization of assassins.

When we got out
onto the street using one of the emergency exits, the lights on the whole block
went dark.

That was the
Quadrad.

With just like
fifteen minutes’ notice, they managed to cut the power to a major street.

There were all
kinds of redundancies in the utilities. Especially with the Championship on. I
would have thought it would take multiple nuclear strikes to turn off the
lights, but apparently all you needed was a few feisty women.

Garm always made
it seem like she was some minor cog in the Quadrad organization, but every once
in a while she pulled off something like this. I didn’t even have to pay them.

Belvaille was a
rich city. Beyond rich.

The citizens here
wouldn’t riot just because of a stupid glocken game. Even the Championship.
They were nobles and the servants of nobles. They had too much to lose.

No one knew that
Maris-To was dead, either. We had been hundreds of feet away from it and only
knew because MTB told us. I didn’t fear anything from the vast majority of
Belvaille.

Even the people in
the stands wouldn’t riot. I’m not sure how much a seat in the stadium cost, but
I had to imagine it was hundreds of thousands of credits just to be up so high
your head was touching the latticework. Those people were certainly disappointed,
but if they could afford to be there, they could afford to go back to their
wealthy lives.

But there were lots
of visitors.

There were people
who had burned their entire life savings getting t-shirts made—everything from
extra-extra-extra-extra small to Gandrine-sized. There were people who had to bid
on jobs as garbage handlers or porters or dishwashers. Those people now
wouldn’t be getting paid. Those people had lost their money, their time, and
their dreams of a big payday.

They would riot.

They were out already,
tearing off their waiter’s uniforms, and bus driver’s liveries, throwing their
worthless merchandise into the streets.

We had a few
things going for us as we made our way to the port, however.

The Quadrad were
blacking out each road as soon as we hit it. I didn’t know how and I didn’t
care. None of the angry people rioting likely suspected that the cause of their
frustrations were twenty feet away from them, hustling down the dark boulevard,
carrying a tote bag with Thad Elon inside.

And the people
that did see us were much more likely to throw insults than body blocks.
Because as mad as they were, as destitute as they had become, it was clear that
jumping in front of Grah or Bley-ore or Neddy wasn’t going to solve their
problems and would instead add a whole new element of pain.

I liked to think I
had gotten in shape since I began one of the most strenuous professional sports
in the galaxy.

But I was slower
and had less stamina now than before I started. I’m not sure if it was because of
my compounding injuries, my mysterious weight gain—which I still blamed on the
misaligned scales—or the fact my body just didn’t lend itself to being in
excellent condition.

In any case, I had
to keep asking the guys to slow down and wait. Even Grah, which was
embarrassing considering he was a gigantic slag heap.

I was glad Magda
wasn’t here to yell at me.

My exhaustion
notwithstanding, I was beginning to think this would be an uneventful trip
across town. Like no one would care we had just murdered a half-dozen referees
in the biggest sporting event of the year.

It was then that
the angry shouting really began in earnest and gunfire started to pop up all
around us.

It only took a few
people with better-than-average night vision to get on their teles to spread
the word where we were and what we were doing. There were an awful lot of guns
on Belvaille and there were plenty of people who didn’t care about
consequences. They could stand well away from the mighty arms of Grah and take
potshots at us.

This went on for
about ten blocks while the amount of yelling and shooting grew substantially.

I knew Candar,
Neddy, and Bley-ore weren’t bulletproof. Grah, as I knew from other Gandrine,
could resist anything short of artillery, so he was fine. And of course Thad
Elon would outlive us all.

I was about to
tell MTB and his Central Authority buddies they might want to get lost when I
looked back and saw they had already split.

Bley-ore got shot
and he ran off to the side to go massacre the shooter and anyone who got in his
way.

I was really
puffing hard and not moving fast at all.

Then I heard a
roar and there must have been a mob of hundreds of people who came barreling
out of an adjoining street. They surged around Neddy like he wasn’t there.

“Blue 202!” I
yelled.

I had no idea if
that was the name of a play. It probably was, since we had approximately two
million bajillion plays, of which I knew about five. However, I didn’t think
one of our standard plays encompassed throwing an immortal opposing coach on a
darkened street. But I didn’t want to yell out Candar’s name in case no one had
seen him yet and I certainly didn’t want to explicitly state, “Hey, I’m
throwing you Thad Elon.”

I stopped, planted
my feet, and did the best twist I could.

I got lucky and
the bag flew relatively straight and high over Grah, who I was worried about
hitting.

Turning to the
side, I prepared to face the crowd and I was honestly concerned. I couldn’t
fight that many people. I had Gun, but I was drained as it was and if he sapped
me further, I might pass out in front of a bloodthirsty mob.

But the oddest
thing happened.

When I threw the
bag, everyone stopped rushing at me, and ran after the bag!

It was like we
were playing glocken and I no longer had the token.

As they changed
directions, I wondered if they were somehow working for Irune or knew it was
him, but they looked like your average rioters. Nothing special, just frothing
mad.

Grah turned
around, knelt down, and stretched out his arms. This was enough to obstruct
half the street and make the mob a little less ferocious.

I don’t think it
was because they were scared of Grah. I think they were in awe. Also, scared or
awed or confused, a mob isn’t really good at suddenly backing up and going
around an obstacle. They were fifteen people deep and trying to push through an
impassible roadblock.

I tried to catch
up to Candar by going around the sidewalk. I couldn’t have thrown Thad Elon
very far and Candar couldn’t run with him too quickly. Candar normally handled
a hundred-pound token, but I had to guess Thad Elon was closer to 200 and quite
a bit bulkier.

I probably should
have let Grah carry Irune to begin with. What was anyone going to do to him? I
wasn’t thinking, and let my ego get in the way. I was the worst person to try
and be a Puffer and carry Thad Elon. Every glocken game I ever played was proof
of that.

Fortunately, the
mob was stopped.

Plenty of people
could get past or around Grah, but when they did, they stood looking and
waiting, not sure what to do. A riot doesn’t need a leader, but it does need momentum.

Grah was a big
enough rock in the stream that the water just became a trickle and meandered
off in different directions.

CHAPTER 67

I was beginning to
think that Candar was playing this like a real glocken game and he had taken
Thad Elon all the way back to the stadium so he could score in the end zone.

Where the hell was
he?

I was about to
tele him when I felt a hand on my shoulder from behind.

I tried to
backhand punch whoever it was and found myself on the ground with Candar
leaning over me. He had caught my wrist, overextended me, and then tripped my
legs so that I fell.

“Hi,” he said, as
if he hadn’t just thrown me to the ground.

“Where have you
been?” I said, slowly getting up.

“Waiting for you.
Are your legs hurt or something?” he asked seriously.

“No. I mean,
maybe. I got shot I think. Maybe that’s slowing me down,” I said weakly.

“Where are the
others?” he asked.

“Neddy got swept
away. I don’t think he’s coming. He doesn’t do well without directions. Grah is
holding back the tide. The cops left,” I said.

“Bley-ore teled
me. He said he’s lost and we should go on without him.”

“Alright. It’s not
much further.”

Candar could
probably walk on his hands carrying the bag in his teeth and still be faster
than me. He also didn’t look tired at all.

The lights were on
so I’m not sure what was up with the Quadrad. Maybe they lost track of us or
didn’t have the ability to shut down this area.

In any case, we
had just reached the edge of the docks and there wasn’t much activity here. It
was mostly warehouses and facilities that dealt with spaceships. I assumed any
dockworkers would be busy doing their jobs and not worrying about us.

We had gone
through most of the docks to reach the berth where my ship was when we were
confronted by three men with guns.

They were dressed
well and wore Ulteem’s heraldry.

Great.

“We figured you
was coming here,” one of them said. “The question is—”

Candar spun around
in a circle and I thought he was going to run away. But it was a complicated Twist
move designed to get a low arc.

Thad Elon’s bag
flew out, hit the three men, toppling two of them over. Candar rushed the
third, pushed down the man’s gun with his left hand, then kicked up his right leg
and caught the gangster under the chin. The poor guy’s jaw must have completely
shattered and he was out cold.

I pulled out Gun
by the time Candar had finished beating the second person.

“Freeze!” I said.
And at that point, there was no one left to freeze except Candar, since he had
dispatched the third man with a simple stomp to the throat, which crushed the
man’s windpipe and left him incapacitated.

Candar picked up
the bag.

“Let’s go,” he
said.

“Those were all
illegal moves,” I said, after we had travelled some ways.

“I used to be a
Hack when I first started playing,” Candar replied.

I couldn’t believe
it. Candar, the ultimate sportsman, used to be a dirty player!

“Why did you give
me so much crap then?” I asked.

“Because it was my
job. Just like it was your job to be a Hack.”

I wasn’t sure I
understood that, but it didn’t matter.

“Here it is,” I
said.

I had not seen my
spaceship before. I couldn’t see it all, obviously, because most of it was out
in space. But there were observation screens and terminals that gave you a view
from just about every angle.

It looked
terrible. Honestly. It was boxy and malformed and completely unsymmetrical. I
know it didn’t have to be sleek and aerodynamic because it wasn’t meant to fly
in atmosphere, but it looked like the ass end of a junkyard.

Zzzho let us in
and Garm and Delovoa were already on board. I wish Cliston could have made it,
but there wasn’t enough time.

“So let’s go and
make us invisible,” I said.

“The ship doesn’t
work like that,” Garm answered.

“Why not? That’s
the whole reason I got this heap.”

“It can’t scramble
the signals of tens of thousands of ships in this System and if you tried, it
would just make everyone try and kill us,” she said.

“Then how are we
going to get to the Portals undetected?” I asked, annoyed.

“No one will care.
We just heard Maris-To is dead and the Central Authority ships are scattering,”
Garm said.

“What if someone
shoots at us?”

“We’ll power on
our weapons,” Delovoa said.

“You installed
guns already?” I asked.

“No, but no one
else knows that. They can see it has turrets,” Delovoa answered.

“If one ship
tries to attack us, we can scramble it. Though, we better be ready to run,”
Garm said. “Is that him?” Garm pointed to the bag.

I had somehow
forgotten about Thad Elon.

“Yeah.”

I unzipped the sack
to display the slightly disheveled immortal.

“Hello, sir,”
Delovoa began. And that alone sent a chill up my back. Delovoa being polite was
a testament to the power we had in front of us. “Do you think you could tell us
about your plans to mutate this System? It might be very…exciting if we could
stop it.”

We all looked to
Thad Elon.

“Why do you
believe you have any chance of interrupting my arrangements? I have many
billions of years more experience than you all,” he said. He seemed genuinely
interested in our answer. Like he couldn’t comprehend why we were even trying.

“I’m just
stubborn, I guess,” I said.

I kicked him in
the face because I wanted to. It actually hurt my toes. And although it whipped
back his head, he didn’t show any signs of discomfort.

“We can’t wait for
the others to get here. Delovoa, give Zzzho the directions to one of our
newly-operational Portals,” I said.

CHAPTER 68

Garm and MTB were
right, no one cared about us. We were just one more spaceship in the System.

Zzzho was flying,
Garm was moving in between the various sensor controls, Candar was standing on
top of Thad Elon, Delovoa was giving instructions to our gaseous pilot, and I
was doing nothing—which I liked to consider one of my specialties.

The adrenaline wore
off and I had a moment to get a good look at Delovoa. He had apparently
discovered cosmetics and applied them liberally in an effort to hide the
grotesquery that was his patchwork body.

But make-up was a
skill. It took years to understand the subtlety of highlight or shadow; how
colors blended and muted and complimented each other; the curves and ridges and
depths that made up a face.

Delovoa looked
like a really frightening clown. He used the most garish colors and seemed to
have applied them with a paint roller.

The trip took
several hours and I almost got up the courage to ask Delovoa what look he was
going for, but I kept remembering that I was on my way to try and stop
Belvaille—and maybe myself—from getting mutated. Delovoa’s obscene face was the
absolute least of our concerns.

“What’s wrong with
Delovoa?” Garm whispered to me, as she was walking from a console.

“He’s a genius
sociopath living in the rotting body he created by splicing together porn stars
and gang members,” I replied. That answer seemed to satisfy Garm and she returned
to the controls.

I went over to
Candar to see how he was doing. He didn’t appear to particularly enjoy standing
on the creator, and destroyer, of the Colmarian Confederation, but Thad Elon
didn’t seem to mind.

Irune probably
wasn’t plotting anything at this moment, but it just seemed like a bad idea to
have him walking around unattended.

He might even have
built this spaceship—or built the people who built it.

We reached the
first Portal and decided that Delovoa and I would enter.

Delovoa was needed
to evaluate whatever technology was in the Portal and I was there to protect
him. I would have totally liked to trade jobs with Candar and sit on top of Thad
Elon, but I was far more durable than he was and there were only two spacesuits
on the ship, one of which fit me. It had only been at the last minute that we
decided to bring more people.

Zzzho was a good
pilot and this ship wasn’t a taxi. It was big enough to be subdivided into
sections, each with its own pressure seal. It had three exits, two of which had
ramps that could be lowered. It was a simple matter of crawling across one of
the ramps to the Portal.

The Portal was metal,
and so massive I couldn’t determine its shape or dimensions. I had never seen a
Portal, really, which seemed odd living in the System that was known for
Portals. But they didn’t have any lights, and in general, they were things you
just took for granted as being there.

Frankly, I wasn’t
doing a lot of sightseeing while I grasped the ramp, completely exposed to
outer space.

Delovoa used his
magnetic boots, but I was too massive for those little magnets to hold me in
place so he advised me to use my hands. I one-upped him and was hugging the
ramp with my arms and legs.

It felt like it
took twenty minutes for Delovoa to open the hatch. When we got inside, I was
surprised and annoyed to find there was no artificial gravity or air.

The Portal was not
exactly meant for habitation.

We had used one of
the lowest access points instead of the more centrally-located freight doors. Delovoa
felt that if there was anything bad here, they would be guarding the larger
entrances.

I was concerned
that even if there was a little firecracker of a booby trap, it could rupture
my suit and kill me. What was the point of being bulletproof if a bb gun was
lethal?

I really hated
space.

It was a long,
long slog through the Portal.

Really long. We
had to climb up ladder after ladder and shoot through a dozen different access
shafts. I was still tired from my two triumphant plays in the Championship, but
mostly from running across the city.

You’d think being
weightless would make all this easy, but I still had mass and momentum. I
couldn’t just go propelling myself in tight quarters or I’d smash into
something and break open my helmet. It had to be a controlled movement the
entire time and my arms were getting exhausted.

Delovoa checked on
things here and there which gave me a chance to rest. I had some food with me,
but I couldn’t eat it. Not without dying. I kept taking it out and looking at
it because I was really hungry. I’d eaten some on the ship, but not enough.

“The Portal is
powered on, but it isn’t functioning as a Portal. I see most of the subsystems
are inoperable,” he said.

Our helmets had
cheap radios to each other, but we couldn’t talk to the ship. We’d have to use our
teles for that.

“So it is a
big mutant-machine?” I asked.

“I won’t know
until we search. All I can tell now is that it isn’t working like it should. It
could be a malfunction,” he said.

“Do you think Thad
Elon is lying?” I asked skeptically.

“No, but you’re
still assuming this is where it’s located.”

“It has to be.
They went offline, Xandale’s goons tried to scare us away—and succeeded—and now
they’re back online with no assistance from anyone. You yourself said a Portal
could be used to mutate the System,” I replied.

“I didn’t say
that. I said I don’t know. I don’t even understand how Portals work. I just
know how to fix them.”

“Well, it’s either
this or ask around if anyone has seen any mutating devices,” I said.

“We should leave
the System. You got a ship. We have Thad Elon. Why stay here?” Delovoa asked.

“Because this is
our home. You’ve lived here about as long as me. Don’t you care that millions
of people could be killed?” I asked.

“No,” Delovoa said
without a moment’s hesitation.

“Besides, where
would we go?” I asked.

“I got an idea.
How about a System that isn’t about to be mutated by an immortal?” Delovoa
offered.

“We’ll find it.
You’ll fix it. We’ll be heroes. You’ll seeeeee!” My voice trailed off into a
scream as the railing I was climbing on suddenly twisted away under me and I
went plummeting sideways through pipes and cables and sheets of metal.

I hit a solid
floor and my helmet shattered, maybe along with my skull.

Everything was so
disorienting. I had lost track of up and down in the zero gravity, but
apparently I was now on the floor. And there was gravity. And the fact I could
breathe probably meant there was air.

I got to my feet
and my left shoulder really hurt. I munched on the food rations I brought with
me, not bothering to take off my busted helmet or gloves. I just stuffed the
food through the crack in my faceplate and ate from the inside of my helmet
like it was a bowl.

I wasn’t on the
Portal.

It was obvious.
Looking around at the walls, the floor, the adjoining rooms, I knew where I
was: Floloria, the Rettosian space station. I could tell by the designs. It was
all those boring aluminum walls with swirly three-dimensional lettering on
things. The Rettosian language.

I had fallen
through a hole and ended up tens of thousands of miles away!

The room I was in
was large, open, and three stories tall, with railings and walkways on each
story above me. Looking up, the roof was definitely solid, but it was occupied
by a vast array of complicated electronic gear. Somehow, I had passed through
that. But I noticed something a short distance away that really caught my
attention.

It was row after
row of shiny metal tubes. Each was about three to five feet in diameter and
ranged from three to ten feet in height. I recognized them, but I couldn’t
remember from where. There were similar tubes on each of the two floors above
me.

I moved closer so
I could inspect them.

“Ahh!” Delovoa hit
the floor behind me. I actually witnessed part of his descent. It was like he
suddenly appeared ten feet off the ground.

He was rolling
around in pain and I remembered that a ten-foot drop was still a big deal to
someone with a makeshift body.

“Where are we?” he
screamed.

“Keep your voice
down. We’re on Floloria,” I said.

“I’m not going to
keep my voice down. How did we get here? How do you know where we are?”

Delovoa was
getting hysterical. I grabbed him by the front of his spacesuit and shook him
until he stopped talking. Which actually took longer than I expected.

“You okay now?” I
asked cautiously.

“Let go of me!
Hey, the cloning vats!” Delovoa said, looking at the metal tubes I had seen.

They were. About a
century ago, when I had been running the city of Belvaille, we had been conned
by the Ank. They had used clones of important people to manipulate us. We never
figured out how they did it or who built them. Garm had rested in one of these tubes
for decades as her doppelganger issued orders to keep us deceived.

“When I spoke to
the Ank earlier and he told me of the financial Formula, I asked about the
cloning they used. He said it was Rettosian technology,” I told Delovoa.

“But how did we
get here? I don’t understand.”

“Remember I told
you I got…like…teleported when I was on Floloria?”

Delovoa hadn’t
believed me, chalking it up to fifty different more likely reasons. Such as me
being a liar, or drugged, or not understanding what the word ‘teleportation’
meant.

But now he was
staring around at our surroundings, which clearly did not belong in the Portal.

“Do you remember
how to open them?” I asked.

“Open what?” he
snapped.

“The cloning
tubes,” I said.

“You’re not
opening anything,” a voice declared.

I turned around
and saw Xandale and three of his Factotum buddies walk in from another room. I
couldn’t have been more surprised to see anyone. They were carrying rifles of
designs I wasn’t familiar with, but which had the distinct appearance of
looking very painful.

“What in”—and I
almost made an exclamation about Thad Elon, but caught myself—“the heck are you
doing here?”

“This is my
client,” Xandale stated calmly. “I thought you would know by now.”

“Thad Elon is your
client?”

“What?” he asked,
looking confused.

There was an
electric whirring noise and the ancient Rettosian I had met on Floloria before,
drove his high-tech chair in. His head was still tilted to the side, his body
looked like a set of toothpicks glued together, and unlike the flowing
fountains of his brethren, this man’s skin had dried up and frozen into a gray,
cracked surface. It wasn’t just cracked with wrinkles, it had real cracks, like
a broken mirror—that happened to be reflecting a really old, ugly guy.

He pressed a
button on his chair and a microphone swiveled up in front of his face.

“This is my
client,” Xandale said.

“You will kill
them if you open the bays,” the Rettosian said in a thick accent. He was only
audible because of the microphone.

“Who are you?” I
asked.

“I might inquire
the same of you,” he said.

We stood there a
moment until Delovoa nudged me.

“Tell him your
name,” Delovoa said.

“Oh. I’m Hank. You
might know me as Stank Delicious,” I said, and then immediately felt absurd for
saying that. “Just Hank, really.”

“And what are you
doing here?” the old man asked.

“Wondering how you
managed to make an instantaneous matter transference device from the Portal to
here,” Delovoa demanded.

“It actually goes
from here to the Portals. I am too old for space travel,” he explained.

The conversation
all seemed so polite and ordinary.

“Xandale, do you know
what this guy is doing?” I asked.

I really disliked
Xandale, but I couldn’t believe he was in on this.

“What my clients
do is their business. I respect their privacy,” Xandale intoned, as if he were
recording a commercial for his company.

“You fool. This
guy is going to mutate the entire System! You have any idea how many people
will get hurt—or killed?” I asked.

Xandale suddenly
lost a bit of his cool.

“I think you’re
confused. We’re just changing the odds in glocken, old friend,” Xandale stated.

“All those players
you kidnapped are genetic templates for mutations. Look at this machinery,”
Delovoa said, indicating the room.

“And who are you?”
Xandale asked.

“That’s Delovoa.
You know him. The guy who conducted experiments on Belvaille citizens for
years. Even he thinks this is immoral,” I said.

“Ah, so you’re
the famous Delovoa,” the old man said.

“Well, I’m not
sure about famous,” Delovoa replied, clearly flattered.

“I’ve followed
your work for some time. Very pedestrian. Lacking imagination. You are clearly
a product of the Colmarian Confederation’s pathetic education framework,” the
old man stated.

Delovoa was a
proud…mutant-monster-thing. If there was anything he loved most about himself,
it was his intellect. He stood there fuming and fumbling. He was at a loss for
words!

“See? This is why I
always know what my clients are doing. You’ve been duped, Xandale. This has
nothing to do with glocken. Why didn’t you investigate what they were really
doing?” I asked.

“We were paid 1.2
billion credits up front,” Xandale replied flatly.

“Yeah, but…are you
serious? 1.2 billion?”

“I have an order
for not only my own heraldry, but a Lordship. They’re processing it now,”
Xandale said.

“Hank. The
mutations,” Delovoa reminded me.

“Right. That’s
great and all, but Maris-To is dead, the government is in shambles, nobility
doesn’t mean a whole lot, and the whole System is about to be bio-engineered,”
I said.

Xandale was not
smiling for once and his men looked pretty uncomfortable.

“One moment,” he
said to me, and turned to the ancient Rettosian. “I’m afraid Factotum Doctrine
forces me to ask if there is any truth to what he said.”

“Are you wearing
your security bracelets?” the old man wheezed.

Xandale looked
down at his wrist, confused.

“The services of Univox
Factotal are no longer required,” the Rettosian continued.

He flicked a
switch on his chair.

Krooosh!

Xandale and his
men suddenly vanished.

I stood there
unsure what to do.

“There is a
Factotum Doctrine?” Delovoa asked me.

I shrugged.

“Yeah, so about
the whole mutating Belvaille thing,” I said, trying to regroup. “We’re going to
have to stop that.”

“You may try,” the
ancient Rettosian said calmly.

If it was a bluff,
it was a great one. Because this guy looked like if I spit on him, he would
die. He had to have something up his geriatric sleeve. Hopefully he couldn’t
teleport us without bracelets or he would have already done so. I looked to
Delovoa, who I noticed had taken a few steps away from me.

“So, I don’t want
to hurt you,” I continued.

“Be my guest,” he
said.

I looked back at
Delovoa again, who was now at the opposite end of the room.

This had to be a
bluff, right? Then again, he had just teleported us across the System by
accident and teleported Xandale on purpose. Who knew what else he could do?

I took off my
cracked helmet and gloves. I wanted to have a little more freedom of movement.
I would have taken off the rest of my spacesuit but then I would have to sit
down and it took a while and I had kind of been called out by a thousand-year-old
Rettosian and now it looked like I was stalling.

I pulled out Gun
and pointed it at the old man and took a deep breath.

“Tell us about the
mutations. How do we stop them?” I demanded.

The old man leaned
almost imperceptibly forward.

“You would attempt
to use my own weapon against me?” he asked.

I looked at Gun
and the old man.

“Yeah. So? It’s
mine now,” I said.

“Is it?”

My knees buckled, I
fell forward, and my face smacked into the floor.

“Hank! Hank!” I
heard Delovoa calling from what sounded like a mile away.

I was so
unbelievably tired! If there had been a snooze button on Delovoa’s yammering, I
wouldn’t even have had the strength to hit it.

But the wave
passed and I slowly found myself blinking back to reality.

I rolled on my
side and noticed I had been drooling. That was indicative that I had been lying
in that position for quite some time. Either that or I had learned how to
speed-drool.

My limbs were not
responding very well. It was like I was insanely drunk and had a hangover at
the same time. But I managed to sit up on my knees and face the old man.

“Sowwy,” I said.
“I didn’t know id dure gun.”

I felt an apology
wasn’t out of order.

“I designed it,”
the old Rettosian said.

“Eh. Gud stuss,” I
said, trying to compliment him.

I felt my arm
twist and Gun was now pointing directly at my own head!

“It is an obsolete
manufacture, but reliable,” he said.

“Gun! Don Shoo!” I
pleaded.

But Gun did not
reply, other than to say:

“Bang!”

My head jerked to
the side with the blast and I slumped forward again.

I tried to release
Gun from my grasp but I couldn’t. As I was groaning on the ground and slowly flopping
about, the old Rettosian seemed suddenly intrigued.

“You’re an
Ontakian! I created you as well,” he said.

“Wow. You ged aroung,
dohwn you?” I slurred. “How dyou know Thad Edon?”

“What is that?” he
asked.

“Hank, he probably
used a different name with the Rettosians,” Delovoa said from a safe distance.

“You cannot begin
to comprehend what I have done, amateur,” the old man said of Delovoa.

Delovoa was a
genius beyond a doubt, but he couldn’t hope to build the things that this
Rettosian claimed to have created.

“Well. You’re
old!” Delovoa replied, hoping that was some stinging slander.

“Yes, I am. I have
seen the rise and fall of empires—and have even taken a hand in them. But the
pursuit of knowledge has always been my only concern. While you, on the other
hand, waste your efforts toying with inconsequential tasks,” the old man
continued.

“How long do you
have left to live? Minutes? Seconds? My legacy will outlive yours,” Delovoa
challenged. He now walked closer, emboldened.

I finally managed
to let go of Gun. Maybe because the old man was no longer paying much attention
to me or because he had written me off. My head was ringing and I was still
incredibly weak, but I felt myself recovering. My stomach was grumbling.

“Is that carcass
you reside in your grasp at immortality? This body of mine is merely one of my
clones. One of dozens. I shall outlive not only you, but your entire species,
if history is any indication of your future,” the Rettosian said.

I was getting my
senses back and managed to stand up. I took a closer look at the room while I
had the opportunity. The two floors above all contained tubes and all contained
machinery. All the exact same machinery. Each floor was a duplicate,
other than the tube sizes.

“Delovoa. The
floors go to the Portals. He’s going to teleport the tubes there,” I said.

The old man made
the briefest and crustiest chuckle ever.

“Very good. I
built you well. Even though I see you are merely a combat version. How
embarrassing for you, Delovoa, that it took an Ontakian to explain my
designs. Of course, I have an obligation to continue with my experiment,” he
said.

He pressed a
button on his chair and all of the tubes on the first floor cracked open with a
hiss.

Delovoa was
furious. I had never seen him this mad.

He pulled out
something from his belt pouch and pointed it at the old man.

“Suck suck,
suckface!” He yelled.

He pulled the
trigger and Delovoa’s little gun fired, and missed. He fired again. Missed. He
fired four more times and finally hit the old man once out of that barrage.

It wasn’t a big
gun, but it didn’t need to be. The old Rettosian gasped and fell out of his
chair onto the ground, looking very much dead.

“Why did you shoot
him?” I asked. “He knew everything!”

“He was an
asshole,” Delovoa said, still raging.

I couldn’t believe
Delovoa. Here we were holding on to Thad Elon who wouldn’t tell us a thing and
we couldn’t harm in any way, but we just killed the one guy who could
have explained all this stuff. Including my own background.

The tubes on the
first floor were now being vacated. It didn’t take me long to see that the
occupants were many of the missing glocken players.

They were
everything from tiny 1-lanes to hulking 8-lanes. There were about forty of them
all sleepily emerging from the tubes. They wore sensors on their bodies and
stretchy coveralls.

“Welcome back to
life,” I proclaimed magnanimously.

Off to my left, I
heard a shriek and I suddenly got clipped in my left knee. It didn’t knock me
down, but it still hurt.

I saw a big
rodent-like thing had run into me.

There were similar
roars and grumblings and psyching-ups from everyone else. They did not seem
happy to be free.

“They must be
clones of the original players,” Delovoa said.

“Really? Did the
dead guy tell you that?” I asked bitterly.

“He wasn’t going
to tell us anything. He was a clone, too,” Delovoa replied.

The clone players
were basically warming up. Some were even doing stretches. But they were all
staring at Delovoa and me.

“So what do we do?
I can’t take on forty players. Do you have any super weapons?” I asked.

“No, I have tools.
I was expecting to work on the Portals, not get transported to Floloria and
insulted,” he said. Delovoa had moved directly behind me, seeking cover.

A runner charged
forward, yelling loudly. But he must have been a 2-lane or something and when
he connected, I reached down and pulled his arms back until both shoulders dislocated.

I wasn’t concerned
about those guys, but there were at least a dozen upper lanes with a combined
weight probably bordering 50,000 pounds. I couldn’t stop that much meat. If
they did nothing but jump on top of us, we’d be crushed or suffocated.

But as usual my
most pessimistic fears turned out to be unfounded.

Delovoa seemed to
be correct and that these were clones. We had experienced clones
before—probably originating from the same Rettosian scientist—and in each case,
they were really stupid. For whatever reason, all clones seemed to be missing a
large chunk of their brains. I don’t know why, maybe that was just part of the
clone recipe. The Rettosian could have told us why if Delovoa hadn’t murdered
him.

In any case, they
were mere shadows of their former selves. They lacked strategy and coordination
and subtlety. It was like they were going through only the most basic motions
that had been drilled into their subconscious.

I was playing my
best glocken game ever.

I had even taken
up Gun’s habit of making bombastic sound-effects to my own plays. Kablow!
Blam-o! Shablam!

I sent a giant
eight-armed defender sprawling after it came lumbering at me, totally
unbalanced and not protecting itself.

I was not only
feeling pretty good about our chances; I was feeling pretty good about myself
in general. After a season of degrading berating and otherwise being the
notoriously bad Stank Delicious, I was standing against the combined wrath of numerous
teams and dispatching them with style.

Just then, the
contents of the entire third floor vanished with a blinding light.

Stopping to stare
at it, I took a few punches and kicks and low blows.

“It’s starting,”
Delovoa said.

“We have to shut
the process down.”

“How are we going
to do that?” Delovoa asked.

He was right. It
was one thing to actively fight them off, but we wouldn’t be able to tinker with
machinery while forty professional glocken players beat on our heads. Clones or
not.

It was then I took
a punch to the nose which brought me back to the problem at hand. In front of
me stood none other than Kitt. Boomy Boom Boomy.

She looked
great—for a clone. But she was rabid and berserk, flailing on me with both
fists.

“It’s Kitt,” I
said, covering myself from the blows.

“No, it’s a clone.
Crush her and let’s go,” Delovoa said.

“Go where? We’re
on Floloria. I had a hard enough time leaving here when I wasn’t an enemy of
their species,” I said.

The second floor’s
contents disappeared with a woosh.

“It looks like
it’s on a two-minute cycle,” Delovoa said.

“So what do we do?”
I asked.

“Get in the
tubes!” Delovoa cried.

“What? Why?”

“It will transport
us back to the Portal. Or one of the Portals.”

“What if it
mutates us? Or uses us to mutate others?” I asked.

“Then everyone
will be fat and brilliant, but it’s better than staying here and dying,”
Delovoa said.

“I don’t have my
space suit. I won’t survive on a Portal,” I said, as Kitt boxed my ears.

“The clone tubes
have life support. People lived in them for decades, remember? Find one that
fits you, or we’re going to have to fight our way out of Floloria,” he said.

I picked up Gun
and holstered it and barreled through the clones like a top-class Wedge. I
found one of the wider tubes and started to get in.

It was not an easy
process to climb into a cloning tube while a dozen Super Class clones were
trying to drag me out and beat me senseless.

“Hurry, Hank,” Delovoa
called, and I saw his tube close as several players slapped feebly against the cover.

I kicked out at
the ones near me so that I could finally lie down.

But when I tried
to close the hatch, it kept bumping into my knees or my head or my gut. I was too
big for the tube.

I was pulling the
lid and pushing at the grasping hands and trying to suck in my stomach and
wiggle into the tight confines all at the same time.

I was really
panicking now as I heard my tube warming up.

With a huge gasp,
I slammed the lid. My feet were sideways, my shoulders about touched my chin
and my nose and forehead were flat against the cold screen.

There were punches
and kicks and I think one headbutt against the lid, but a bright flash erased
it all.

CHAPTER 69

We got lucky. If
you could call it that.

We teleported back
to the same Portal we came from.

Delovoa still had
his intact spacesuit so he was able to move about freely. He walked to my
cloning tube, mouthed some stuff to me I couldn’t hear, and then he left.

I heard my tele
going crazy in my pocket, but I couldn’t reach it. I was taking little
half-breaths because I was afraid if I exhaled with relief, I would blow the
lid off this stupid cloning tube and die in the vacuum of space.

Delovoa went back
to our ship. From there they all returned to Belvaille to retrieve more
spacesuits and a heavy lifter capable of dragging me out. It would take them about
ten hours to make the trip, but I didn’t know that.

I was trapped with
my thoughts, alone in a Portal.

I didn’t know if I
was about to be mutated, if I had been mutated, or if Delovoa left me to
die. Also, what was happening in the System now that Maris-To was assassinated,
the Championship had been interrupted, and Thad Elon was missing? I didn’t know
anything.

But I was not a
philosopher king.

There are those
who are destined for Great Thoughts and dwelling on The Meaning of this or
that.

I was not one of
those people.

I got stuff done
and tried to have a good time doing it.

Let the Big
Thinkers think. I mean, someone’s got to do it.

But when they get
muscled out of their universities, or someone kidnaps their disciples, they’re
going to come asking me for help.

So in a way, I was
just as important. No, I didn’t invent cloning, or mutations, or spaceships,
but I beat up the people who did.

That had to count
for something.

When they finally
pulled me out, I was asleep and covered in rations that I had managed to wiggle
up from my pocket to my mouth. I probably burned more calories doing it than I
consumed, but it kept me occupied.

A lot had happened
in ten hours.

Cliston had
reached safety and that was the best news I had all week.

Magda Strongarm
had been captured, but it was by fans of the Belvaille Glocken Team, and they
celebrated her brilliant non-loss enthusiastically.

The Central
Authority was trying to sort itself, and its warships, out. So far there were
no hostilities, but I wasn’t sure if that would last.

The nobles of
Belvaille were instantly demoted into glorified merchants—if they were lucky.
If they were unlucky, they were robbed and demoted into fertilizer.

It was all about
the gangs now. The ones who had been controlling the unions. Controlling the
facilities. Controlling everything. Lagla-Nagla was right. They were the ones
with the real power. Once you popped Maris-To and the Central Authority broke
up, there was nothing holding the gangs in check.

To my great
annoyance, Ulteem was one of the major players. There was a lot of whispering
that he had ordered the hit on Maris-To. But it could have been anyone.
Maris-To had not exactly been well-liked. I still owed Ulteem for setting me
up, but this certainly wasn’t the time to go picking fights.

The Championship
became old news in the face of all the changes. It was still a hot issue in the
far-flung regions of the galaxy, but in Belvaille, we had far more pressing concerns.

I managed to keep
my building. Cliston was the cause of that. When looters were making their
rounds, they came to my place and saw Cliston standing out front with two
grenades primed in each hand. He was a Dredel Led robot and could stand there
all day and night.

Which he did.

Of course, the big
question was what happened in the Portals with the mutation equipment.

Immediately after
we were teleported, the Portals activated. People in the System said it was
like a stinging heat that they couldn’t get away from. It lasted a few minutes
and was gone.

Something had happened.

There were a large
number of casualties. Maybe they were too close to the Portals or their physiologies
weren’t compatible. Who could say?

Delovoa was
anxious to inspect the mutation devices. I think because he wanted to borrow
whatever technology he could find that the Rettosian scientist had built. But all
the clones had been killed and the bulk of the machinery had self-destructed.

We never did find
any of the missing players, including Kitt. We guessed that once they had been
cloned, the originals were disposed of. Why they had needed clones instead of the
original players was anyone’s guess. Maybe they were just easier to deal with,
or maybe their bodies had to be modified for use by the mutation instruments.

I was also on the
lookout for Xandale. Duped or not, he had tried to murder me at least once. But
the old Rettosian could have teleported him anywhere. If he was still alive, he
didn’t make it known and Univox Factotal closed its doors almost immediately.

We didn’t know if
we were mutated or not. It’s not as if an arm was going to spontaneously sprout
from our foreheads. Mutations took time to develop.

The Portal that
Delovoa and I occupied hadn’t activated like the other two did. Probably
because most of the tubes were empty. Delovoa hoped that we would be spared any
mutation.

But for all I
knew, in a year I could be twice as fat, and three times as dumb.

CHAPTER 70

Delovoa was now
living on the third floor of my building and his job was to try and whip up
some security measures for our home while I was away. He would have plenty
of time.

In my ship, the Suckface,
Zzzho was piloting, Garm was operating our sensor-blocking, and I was guarding
the cargo.

Naked Guy, Irune,
Thad Elon seemed pleased with himself, but otherwise, he didn’t speak.

We took twelve
Portal hops out to the middle of nowhere and kept going. It was a four-month
trip. It was grueling and we were paranoid about being followed. We barely
spoke the entire time, and when we did, we whispered.

Finally, when we
were so far away from absolutely anything that you could quite realistically
say we were in the void, we came to a stop.

I put on my
spacesuit and approached the shackled, bound, and tied Thad Elon. He was in a
black suit that partially scattered scanning wavelengths.

“What did the
Boranjame tell you about me?” Thad Elon asked. This was the first he had spoken
in four months.

“Not much,” I
lied.

“You know I can’t
be killed. I will return someday and finish what I started,” he said.

“What’s that?
Mutating everyone?” I asked.

“No. Destroying
all life in the galaxy,” he said, with the briefest of smiles.

He must have seen
me flinch.

“Don’t worry too
much. I won’t do it until all the collective species have festered to the point
that they are incapable of any originality—which I believe is inevitable. You
may be long gone by that point.”

“Let’s hope,” I
said.

Zzzho opened the airlock
and I covered Thad Elon’s face and made sure he was bound tight.

I then aligned
myself with the coordinates on my tele, and gave Thad Elon the smallest of
nudges. Delovoa had calculated that in this direction there was nothing for about
eight light-years.

The bag containing
the immortal floated out. I watched until I could no longer recognize it
against the inky background.

Thad Elon didn’t
kick. He didn’t struggle.

He was perfectly
content to wait.

The Unnecessarily Detailed Description
of Glocken

No
one is quite sure where and how the sport of glocken originated.

There
is one legend that it started as a mating dance involving fermented liquids, which
would subsequently turn violent. Another story guesses that it came about much
later, when space lanes were opened and Colmarian Confederation ships regularly
collided with one another. One theory that has quite a lot of backing is that
the game wasn’t a game at all, but a meditation on the futility of existence and
sports in particular. In any case, historians the galaxy over have mostly
agreed that glocken has had an overall detrimental effect on the advancement of
civilization.

The
only reason glocken became so outrageously popular over the millennia was
because the game is playable by nearly every species. There are lots of sports
that are played in the galaxy. But when you have untold races competing, there
are bound to be ringers who simply make the game boring.

For
instance, if there was a game that required height, the twelve-foot-tall Banur
would likely dominate and it wouldn’t have as many fans. If a game required
speed, the Po or Dallnast would make short work of it.

People
loved playing sports, they loved watching sports, but they also liked to
imagine themselves, however remote the chance, participating. If you had to
have at least twelve kneecaps to be a benchwarmer in a sport, only the hardcore
gamblers were going to follow it.

Glocken
could accommodate all shapes and sizes and abilities.

The
game was organized into lanes, 1 through 8.

The
smaller, quicker players were usually in the low lanes, while the stronger,
heavier players were in the upper lanes.

Each
lane carried a token on offense.

A
token was a disc with a rope-like loop on each side. In junior leagues the
token would be wood or plastic; in the professionals it was a complicated
electronic device weighted and balanced with metal.

You
could throw tokens, hand them off, roll them, do anything at all to get them to
another person or even an area on the field. Offensive players were never
declared down or out, only tokens.

A
token was dead if it was taken completely from an opposing player and held for
five seconds—five seconds being a key duration in glocken. The professional
leagues had sensors in the loops to determine this, otherwise it was up to the
referees. A token was also dead if you knocked a player down while he held a
token, generally defined as not moving for five seconds since “down” could be
relative with some species. If a token went out of bounds it was immediately killed
and out of play.

You
could drop a token at any time. This could be used to distract the other team
because they had to hold it if they wanted to kill that token, otherwise, an
offensive player could always go back and retrieve it.

If
offense and defense both held the same token, it was contested, and wouldn’t be
uncontested unless the offensive player holding it went down for five seconds, went
out of bounds with it, or scored.

Each
lane carried tokens of different weights. At intramural and non-professional
ranks, the weights didn’t vary much because it was usually all the same species
playing and they simply didn’t have much diversity.

At
the Super Class level, which was the most widely-broadcast professional league,
the weights were:

Lane

Weight of Token

Points for Scoring

1

1 pound

1

2

5 pounds

2

3

10 pounds

3

4

40 pounds

4

5

100 pounds

7

6

500 pounds

11

7

1,000 pounds

16

8

4,000 pounds

22

The
vast majority of points were scored in the 1-4 lanes. Usually one and two. The
heavy tokens were hard to move, impossible to throw, and only a few people per
team could carry them. Often the players in those lanes would simply drop their
tokens and help block for their lighter teammates.

There
were also weight limits on the players to prevent gross imbalances. In Super
Class, the first four lanes of players could not weigh more than 2,000 pounds
total. The second four players could not weigh more than 25,000 pounds.

Players
had to be certified to carry the token in their lane, which meant walk with it
across the field. So you couldn’t stick a ninety-pound guy in lane eight and
pretend he was going to carry a 4,000-pound token.

The
objective, of course, was to carry or hold the token uncontested in the end
zone, which would give the offensive team that token’s points. You only had to
hold a token for one second uncontested in the end zone to score.

Once
all the tokens were dead or scored, the offensive team switched to defense.

There
was only one global score. If one team was ahead by five, and the opposing team
scored five, the score was now zero. So one minute it could be Faintly
Flounderers 25 and the next minute Obscene Grandmothers 6.

There
was also no time limit on glocken games but there were numerous conditions
under which a game could be ended.

If
fans stopped watching, the game would be declared over. For televised games,
the referees would tell the coaches that viewership was going down. The team that
was winning would then try and be as dull as possible so the game would be
called in their favor, and the team that was losing would try and execute
exciting plays to bring viewers back. Even pickup games played for fun usually
recruited official “fans” who would sit around and watch as long as they were
entertained.

Player’s
spouses could call off a game. Early games had gone on for so long that relationships
and even marriages would fall apart. So the spouses formed powerful unions and
they made their opinions known. Again, in non-professional games, this happened
all the time, with angry boy/girl/thing-friends coming to the lanes and
demanding the players return home to dinner.

The
referees could call the game. This was usually due to injuries or overmatched
teams. Referees were generally very well-respected. All the bad ones had been
murdered a long time ago, so it wasn’t an occupation to enter lightly. The
standards were quite high.

Both
teams could agree to end a game. This wasn’t as hard as it sounded. If one team
was getting dominated, they simply wouldn’t line up.

The
game could also end if there weren’t enough players. Teams needed a “fiver” to
keep playing. Any combination of players carrying tokens that totaled five
points. Either a four lane and one, or a two and a three, or a five and higher.
You could have a game with just one player versus one other player and
it would still be considered glocken.

Glocken
games often ended abruptly for one or another reason and there was never much
anger at the cause. If you couldn’t keep your fans, or your boyfriend got mad
at you, that was part of the game.

At
the start of each offense, the teams would line up three-quarters of the field
away from the end zone they were trying to reach. There was no continuing
progress, no half-measures. You scored or the token was dead. Then the next
team was on offense at their own quarter line.

Fields
varied in length, but the Super Class was 400 feet with thirty-foot end zones.

The
offense had to start directly on their own line of scrimmage, but the defense
could line up anywhere they wanted, as long as it was in bounds and on their
side of the line.

You
could replace up to four of your players between offense to defense. Often the
low lane offense would be replaced with heavier, more durable defenders.

Players
were allowed protective gear and you could cover 50% of a player’s surface area
with equipment. Since all species were different, and not everyone’s vitals
were in the same location, this was an early compromise.

To
decide who played offense first was a typically complicated process.

One
team would first flip a coin. The winner of that would then flip another coin
and one of the referees would hold his fingers behind his back. If the result
of the fingers and the binary result of the coin toss was odd, then the
flipping team would go on offense first. If the referees didn’t have fingers,
they could use toes, or appendages, or pebbles, or something that could be
hidden from view. The coin toss was a contest in itself.

There
were many specialized positions in glocken.

TILT:
Player who requires numerous defenders to tackle him. Someone who tilted the
field. They were almost always the heaviest and strongest players on the team.
The problem was that each team got them and then they just bumped into each
other and didn’t do anything. The upper lanes almost never scored.

WEIGHT:
Defensive players. Basically, just grabbed hold of the offense and slowed them
up until their team could assist. Since you didn’t get credit for moving down
field, only scoring, you could take your time and kill tokens at the last
minute.

CAPTAIN:
Called plays and action.

KILLER:
These were expert defenders at making tokens dead. Stripping them from
offense or intercepting passes or tackling. Tackling was actually a last resort
and often a poor use of force and time since most lanes were relatively equal
in player weight. But it was a general name for defenders and there were
sub-roles such as Strippers, Chasers, Stoppers.

HACK:
A player whose purpose was to hurt other players. Not an official position, but
everyone knew what they were and who they were and what they were doing. They
had to be careful as a penalty could be called by the referees if it was too
egregious.

PUFFER:
A fast token runner, almost exclusively 1-, 2-, or 3-lane. They scored the
majority of the points in games and many teams were built around star Puffers.

WEDGE:
A blocker who tried to clear paths for runners, often dropping his own token.

TWISTS:
Throwers. Tokens weren’t exactly designed for throwing. The best throwers did a
sort of rotational twist. Some were skilled enough to have a token land on its
edge and roll. Most Twists limited themselves to lower lanes so they could get
some range, and someone can catch the light tokens without dying. To throw a
token, you had to be behind the line of scrimmage, but you could have it drop
anywhere and it didn’t have to be caught. Good Twists were nearly as valuable
as good Puffers on offense.

FORWARDS:
Players who waited for a throw. Depending on their lane, they could also help
with blocking or simply be distractions.

Belvaille Glocken Team
Line-Up

Weight
(lbs)

Name
- Race

Token
Weight (lbs)

Position

15,000

Grah
- Gandrine

4,000

Tilt

1,000

Tobo
- Colmarian

1,000

Twist

3,300

Hank
- Ontakian

1,000

Weight
/ Hack

1,000

Bley-ore
- Colmarian

500

Wedge

500

Candar
- Colmarian

100

Captain
/ Forward / Twist / Killer

550

Kitt
- Colmarian

40

Puffer
/ Forward

250

Neddy
- Qwintine

10

Puffer
/ Killer

120

Garm
- Colmarian

5

Puffer

150

Yorsh
- Colmarian

5

Puffer

270

Meggaar
- Colmarian

5

Killer

100

Ziggy/Ziggles
- Po

1

Puffer
/ Killer

90

Porj
- Colmarian

1

Puffer