Hard Luck Hank: Delovoa & Early Years

by Steven Campbell

  Immediately the world became black and white!

  The formerly-green walls, green floor, green desk—the Navy liked green—were all some shade of gray. And everything was streaming trailers. Like bright lights shined into your eyes at night and then moved around.

  Except the trailers were real. You could touch them. Feel them.

  The Commandant stopped. His elite military training was not prepared for a nightmare landscape.

  “I suggest we go outside,” Delovoa offered, “buildings are more danger than protection right now.”

  “What did you do, drug me?” the Commandant asked.

  “Specimen JY-O is under our control,” Delovoa lied, holding up the module in his hand.

  The Commandant took a step toward Delovoa, obviously with the intention of taking the machine away from the scientist. But Dr. Ahmendt held up a similar module.

  “Stop!” Dr. Ahmendt said.

  “We’re on setting two out of ten right now. If you want to be difficult, we slide this to ten,” Delovoa explained.

  The Commandant followed the two scientists outside.

  The exterior was the same. The entire base was in black and white and streaming ghostly images.

  “Why would I let you take Specimen JY-O away from here?” the Commandant asked.

  “Why would we want to take him with us? We just want to leave. We know how hazardous he is. This is him still sedated! I don’t want to be around him when he’s conscious.”

  “And you’ll just hop in a shuttle and portal away?” the Commandant asked skeptically.

  Delovoa took a deep breath to deliver his speech.

  “We have three devices hidden across the base. They are triggering the equivalent of nightmares in Specimen JY-O. If our hand modules are destroyed and the signals interrupted, the devices instantly increase to maximum power. He is catatonic. So imagine the most powerful being in the galaxy having the worst nightmares possible and unable to wake up.”

  “And when you go through the Portal the signal will be broken?” the Commandant asked.

  “We will turn off the devices remotely before we portal. So you guys don’t blow us up in space beforehand.”

  “Aren’t you worried we’ll chase you?” the Commandant asked.

  “You can’t send a tele fast enough to reach any areas we will portal to first, and we’ll portal a few more times. The only way is if you had ships follow us from here. And do you really want to send your ships all across the galaxy? Are we worth it?”

  “Besides,” Dr. Ahmendt added, “we have left a report on some of the inner workings of Specimen JY-O. It’s not a lot. But it’s more than you had. And you might be able to use it with your next group of researchers.”

  “Here’s a suggestion: don’t keep them captive,” Delovoa said.

  “My problem is I don’t trust you. I’ve read what both of you have done. Especially you,” the Commandant said, pointing at Delovoa.

  “Right,” Delovoa answered. “So you know I don’t give a crap about you or anyone here. This is three.”

  And Delovoa twisted the dial.

  A million high-speed projectiles flew out in every direction from Specimen JY-O, lacerating buildings, equipment, and people!

  “This is two!” Delovoa declared, ducking and resetting the dial.

  The Commandant looked at the carnage wrought by the volley and not only was he concerned with what the scientists might do, he was suddenly anxious to make use of Jyonal. If that was only a moment of level three, what military uses could Jyonal be pushed toward if given the right incentives? Maybe these criminals had been useful after all.

  “Where do you have this information on Specimen JY-O stored?” the Commandant asked.

  “It’s with one of the devices,” Delovoa said.

  “Just a shuttle?” the Commandment tried to confirm.

  “And a promise not to follow us,” Dr. Ahmendt said.

  “And you need to load my baggage onto the shuttle,” Delovoa added.

  “Really?” Dr. Ahmendt asked.

  “What?” Delovoa replied, “it’s valuable.”

  The Commandant pointed at them.

  “You have a deal. If you guarantee to turn off the devices before you portal. Otherwise, I will instruct my significant number of warships out there to follow you, into deep space if necessary. And you will see what a shuttle does against a cruiser.”

  “I promise,” Delovoa said.

  “I don’t care about your promises. You,” the Commandant asked Dr. Ahmendt.

  “I promise too.”

  “Fine. Turn this off so we can get you lunatics out of here.”

  The two scientists were extremely scared the entire trip to the Portal.

  They didn’t have three devices like they said. Dr. Ahmendt’s module didn’t even work. They simply couldn’t steal enough parts to make duplicates.

  There was no continuous pinging from Delovoa’s module that would trigger maximum power if destroyed. It didn’t remotely have that range.

  And the one device they had was sitting in Delovoa’s quarters aimed at Specimen JY-O through the window—though the curtains were drawn. All they had to do was walk in and kick it over.

  But, as Delovoa hoped, it just wasn’t worth the gamble for the Navy.

  They portaled six times in the next four months and stuffed as much food as they could fit with ZR3 taking up so much room.

  “I think we should hide in some populated city,” Dr. Ahmendt said.

  “I think you don’t have three eyes or three brains. You can hide a lot easier than I can.”

  “Well, I’m going back home. It shouldn’t be much problem getting work, and no one cared much for the Confederation anyway. Where are you going?”

  “Here.”

  It wasn’t on any maps. It was just a blurb in one of the local news sections: a space station at the edge of the Colmarian Confederation.

  “What will you do there?”

  “Not sure. But I have to figure it will take at least a year for me to get out there from here. How long will the Colmarian Navy follow me?”

  “Good luck, Delovoa,” Dr. Ahmendt said, shaking the other scientist’s hand.

  “You too.”

  “Hey. Do you think we should have tried to set Specimen JY-O free?” Dr. Ahmendt asked.

  “I was a captive for a while and it sucked. When you told me you had been there for eleven years, I buried a bomb under my quarters. In about ten years from now, half that base will be blown to dust. It might kill him, it might set him free. Either way, if he’s still there after that long, I figure he’s better off.”

  HOME SWEET HOME

  Delovoa wasn’t sure what he would find on Belvaille.

  He didn’t know if the military there would immediately arrest him once they scanned ZR3. Or once they scanned he was escaped criminal Delovoa.

  But the city was almost empty at that point and the Navy was only a small presence at City Hall and the telescopes. Delovoa only received the most cursory of scanning and decontamination. ZR3 wasn’t reviewed at all.

  Delovoa borrowed a push cart from someone and moved his robot clear across the city with no one noticing. It was probably more valuable than the city it was standing on and illegal just to view it. But no one cared.

  In the west, Delovoa looked at the city’s blueprints and found himself the largest home. It even had a storage basement, which was relatively unique on Belvaille. In the coming years Delovoa would expand by burrowing into connecting utility tunnels and hollowing out a whole block underground.

  Looking around, he saw Belvaille as a dream home.

  It was filled with criminals like him who had also come here to escape prosecution. For once he wasn’t the bad guy in a nice area.

  Delovoa opened his front door one day and saw three Colmarian Intelligence officers standing there.

  “Are you Delovoa?” they asked.

  He sighed.

  “Yes,” he said, holding
out his hands waiting to be arrested.

  “We need you to repair one of our proton collectors. We’ve got a requisition form,” the officer said, handing it over.

  Delovoa gawked at it. Not only did the Navy know Delovoa was on Belvaille, they didn’t care. In fact, they viewed it as a benefit.

  Delovoa was still technically a member of the Department of Plumbing and Lighting. He had top secret clearance. He had never been officially charged, let alone found guilty, of any crimes.

  It was not easy shipping supplies out to Belvaille. It was even harder finding quality people who wanted to stay there. Having a valuable resource like Delovoa present, and isolated, was a win-win for the Navy.

  They could hire him to repair and build whatever they required and he wouldn’t contaminate the rest of the Colmarian Confederation. And compared to making custom supply and maintenance runs across half the galaxy, Delovoa was incredibly cheap.

  “Sure,” Delovoa said.

  Soon Delovoa was a regular fixture at any place with high technology that needed repairs or upgrades and people had the money to pay him.

  Delovoa was repairing the air conditioning unit in one gang’s office, the boss liking it especially cold in the place, when a rival gang burst in.

  “Get down!” One of the thugs shouted to Delovoa.

  Delovoa hit the deck, covering his head and waiting for the inevitable gunfire to break out.

  Clang! Bong! Clack! Crash!

  Delovoa peeked up at the odd sounds and found about a half-dozen men from each side throwing metal parts at one another. Large screws, bolts, wrenches, anything they could find.

  “Ow!” One thug said as he was hit in the shoulder.

  “Hah!” His assailant taunted.

  Delovoa looked around curiously.

  “Excuse me. Excuse me,” Delovoa repeated.

  The gangs reluctantly slowed and stopped.

  “Hey, this is a firefight,” one of the men complained.

  “Do you all not have guns?” Delovoa asked.

  “Guns?” one of the men scoffed. He was holding what looked like a gear. “We’re at the ass-end of Ginland. We’re lucky to get food shipped here.”

  “So you just…throw junk at each other?”

  “Fix the AC, man,” and a metal box clanged off the far wall.

  The debris started flying again but was interrupted by Delovoa:

  “I can manufacture guns.”

  The hurling stopped and the thugs looked at him.

  “I can make grenades. Rockets. Cruise missiles. Chemical weapons. Plasma guns—maybe.”

  The toughs looked at the scrap in their hands and thought about rocket launchers.

  From that point on, it was an arms race.

  Delovoa sold everything to everyone.

  He sold security systems.

  He sold systems to beat security systems.

  He sold guns.

  He sold body armor.

  He sold armor piercing ammunition.

  He manufactured the market and the competition to the market.

  A few times some upstarts would try and set up shop and Delovoa would merely offer a 25% off coupon to whoever took his rival out.

  Delovoa changed the face of Belvaille and of warfare on Belvaille. Gangs couldn’t be the loose clubs they were before. They were regimented, hierarchical. And gang wars were deadly, disruptive events.

  But more and more people were flooding into Belvaille just the same. Delovoa provided some of the technical expertise to get the largest illegal operations started.

  Belvaille became a major exporter and more than just a haven for lowlifes.

  Delovoa even provided some medical services, because the technicians on the city were horrible, and Delovoa liked having the chance to experiment.

  “Hey, that’s an Ontakian plasma pistol,” Delovoa said.

  “Yeah,” Hank answered.

  “I’ll buy it from you.”

  “It’s not for sale. I’m just here about my ear.”

  “I’ll give you a hundred thousand credits.”

  “Guy, just check my ear, please.”

  Delovoa had the large man lie on one of his construction tables as he scanned him.

  “Whoa, you’re a mutant. I can’t scan you.”

  “Yeah. My left ear hurts is all. I don’t know if there’s water in it or something else.”

  “I’ll give you two hundred thousand credits for your pistol.”

  Hank looked back on the table.

  “Seriously. Just check my ear. The gun isn’t for sale at any price. It was my great-great-great-great-great-grandfather’s.”

  “That’s highly unlikely. And it’ll probably explode if you ever tried to shoot it. I’ll give you three hundred thousand for it. Final offer.”

  “No, thanks. Just the ear.”

  As Hank heard drilling and picking and cursing from Delovoa, he made small talk.

  “You also that scientist who makes weapons, right?”

  “Yup.”

  “Could you make a plasma pistol?”

  “Maybe if you sold me that one and let me take it apart. But I think only the Ontakians have the raw parts. I don’t know how to make a plasma cell.”

  “Oh.”

  “What is your mutation? You’re breaking all my tools.”

  “I heal fast. And I’m dense.”

  “Ah, that explains the scanning. Does it have any side-effects?”

  “I guess I’m a bit slower than usual.”

  “Hmm. So are you looking for a weapon?”

  “Yeah. A gun. Something I don’t have to aim well. And has a lot of power. And is small.”

  “Like a plasma pistol?”

  “Yeah, but I don’t want to shoot this.”

  “No, sir, you do not,” Delovoa agreed.

  “Do you have anything in mind?”

  “Sure. Guns are easy. In fact, I’ll cut you a deal. I’ll fix your ear. Build you a gun. For free.”

  “What’s wrong with my ear?”

  “I don’t know. All you have to do is come back a few more times, three times, so I can study your mutation.”

  “You know anything about mutations?”

  “Nah. Just a hobby.”

  “Alright, I guess. What kind of gun will you make?”

  “One like you said.”

  Delovoa was supremely interested in Hank’s mutation.

  If there was one thing Delovoa wished, it was not to be so fragile. He had been at the mercy of bigger, stronger people all his life. If he could be as smart as he was and as strong as Hank, he felt he would be just about completely free. No one could ever threaten him again.

  The ear was easy enough. A bullet had somehow ricocheted deep into his ear canal and that was extracted.

  “What’s this?” Hank asked.

  “A shotgun. Four barrels.”

  “It’s pretty big,” Hank complained.

  “It’s fine. Here,” and Delovoa handed him a bag of shells.

  Scanning Hank was the hard part. Let alone drawing any blood and analyzing it. And of course there was the near-impossibility of actually duplicating Hank’s unique mutation.

  “You are a medical technician, right?” Hank asked as he lay under the largest scanner he ever saw and had tubes fitted into his nose.

  “Of course,” Delovoa lied.

  “Wow,” Delovoa said. He could see Hank’s cells replicating and repairing. The density of his internal structures was phenomenal.

  Hank got to like his new shotgun more, so he put up with Delovoa’s probing and prodding. Besides, the guy seemed to know what he was doing and he was the undisputed intellect of Belvaille.

  Hank, in his new role as gang negotiator and all-around tough guy, also used his proximity to Delovoa to keep abreast of all the latest gadgets—since Delovoa usually invented them.

  “But how is that lock different than your Mark IV?” Hank asked, while lying on the exam table.

  “I told you, it h
as the magnetic seal. You can’t take that door off once the lock is triggered.”

  “So you have to cut through a foot of steel to enter?” Hank asked, thinking his next job was going to be especially difficult.

  “I didn’t say that. It’s magnetic. What does that tell you?”

  “I don’t know. Magnets?”

  “Electromagnets. Cut the power and they can’t work.”

  “Oh. How do you cut the power to one house?”

  “I wouldn’t try. But you could cut the power to the block fairly easily. Hey, have you been sick, recently?”

  “No, I’m almost never sick. Why?”

  Delovoa had been giving Hank some experimental formulas to see how he would react. Delovoa used methods back from his first mutation work on his home world of Shaedsta and information gleaned from Specimen JY-O.

  Delovoa saw Hank’s cells repairing themselves more rapidly than usual and the inner linings of some of his organs were thickening.

  “Woops,” Delovoa said.

  “Woops? Woops, what?” Hank asked, suddenly worried.

  “Nothing. I just…knocked over my thing.” Delovoa answered, quickly knocking over his thing on purpose. “I think we’re done. I’ll show you how to cut the electricity to a block. Come on.”

  Delovoa gave up the medical trade shortly after that—at least on people who could cave in his skull with their fists. Biology, and especially mutations, were just too unpredictable with too few results.

  Ironically, Delovoa had the best long-term relationship with the Navy of anyone on the station, even the officials appointed there, who tended to be corrupt or incompetent exiles that were intermittently purged by the establishment.

  Once a year, Delovoa gave the Navy a classified report on the state of affairs of Belvaille. He extorted tremendous amounts of money from the local bosses and military to stay off that report.

  Over the decades Delovoa mellowed with age and his more radical notions flittered away along with his remembrances of his eccentric experiments. ZR3 collected dust and his many enemies who had been hunting him across the galaxy either died or picked more rewarding pastimes.

  Delovoa became fantastically wealthy with time, holding an unbroken monopoly on above-average intelligence on Belvaille. Most importantly, he enjoyed it. The whole city, the whole state, knew of him and respected his work.