Richard Read online

  "Do I look like I sell that kind of thing? I don't sell plans. I sell bandages." He looked over his shoulder again, then back at Richard. "I can sell you a bandage."

  "I don't have any money." Not from this planet anyway. He grit his teeth and silently cursed himself yet again for being so unprepared.

  "Then you don't get anything. You want something, you buy it," said the pharmacists again. "You want me to go out of business?" He squinted up at Richard and pushed the glasses up again. He tilted his head to the side and crossed his arms.

  They glared at each other in silence.

  Finally, Richard took a step back and looked away from the pharmacist. He sighed and shook his head.

  "Look, I really need help. My friend got cut up in a crash. I just need some bandages to wrap it up properly, and some antiseptic to make sure it doesn't get infected. I can make the supplies myself, I just need the plans for them."

  "Then you get some money, say..." the pharmacist stooped and picked up the package from the floor and squinted at it for a minute. "say, five hundred dollars for this one, maybe. Maybe more. You get some money and you get yourself a license."

  Richard blinked. "Five hundred dollars? It's a bandage."

  "Well you don't want the bandage. You want the plans to make your own. You need a license that lets you do that. The bandage is five dollars. The license is five hundred. Or more. I don't know – you have to go to the company that made it."

  "What?"

  "You want the plans and that's more," the pharmacist said like that explained it. "You don't want a bandage, see? You want to make bandages. See?"

  "No."

  "You could make five hundred bandages with those." He jabbed a finger at the scanner in Richard's hand. "Or five thousand. That's why it's more. Make sense?"

  "No."

  The pharmacist looked over his shoulder again. He shook his head. Then one hand jammed the bandage's package back on the rack so fiercely that three other packages clattered to the floor. The pharmacist bent and picked them up, muttering.

  "Kids. You want things for free. Like you've got some sort of righ–"

  The bells over the door tinkled and clanged again.

  The pharmacist stopped muttering, straightened up and turned to face the newcomers. Richard looked over the older man's shoulder. He tried to smile at the two dark-blue-suited men coming down the aisle, but the badges on their dark blue shirts were familiar. He had come to Earth unprepared, but not ignorant. His stomach clenched and his hands shook as his eyes moved over the shields pinned on the men's chests.

  The pharmacist smiled. "Hello officers."

  The officers smiled back. One stuck out his hand and the pharmacist shook it. The other eyed Richard, his gaze glancing off the bloody knee of his jeans then resting on the tiny scanner in his hand. Richard's hand moved instinctively towards his pocket.

  The officer grabbed the scanner.

  "Hey!" Richard reached for it.

  The officer's arm butted against his chest and for the second time that night he almost fell to the floor. The officer caught him, closing his arm in a vice-like grip.

  "Thank you," said the first officer to the pharmacist.

  "Thank you for coming."

  "Yep, this is the one" said the second officer still looking at Richard, one hand still clasped firmly on his arm. "This is the one's been causing a bit of trouble around town tonight."

  "Arrgg!" Richard let out a frustrated growl. "I just need a fucking banda–"

  "You may want to keep quiet," the officer cut him off. "Until we get down to the station."

  **********

  Maybe they have bandages in jail.

  Richard's jaw clenched so hard it was getting sore, but the bite of the handcuffs reminded him to shut up. He tried to relax his wrists, but they still pulled reflexively against the biting metal.

  He was sweating. The cool night was slowly lightening into dawn, but it wasn't warming the chill inside the police car and Richard shivered under a drip of sweat sliding down his temple.

  The car stopped. The door opened.

  "Thank you," said Richard as he fumbled from the car.

  They had pulled up to a little box of an office set in a wide parking lot flooded with white light that made a little bubble in the night. Matching cars sat in a row beside the front door.

  A hand clamped down on his upper arm and then he was walking – or being walked – through the front door into the office.

  More blue uniforms walked around inside. A few others lounged in hard chairs. One dozed, snoring lightly, head lolling back. One or two looked up from papers or coffee or phones when Richard and the two officers entered, gave them passing glances then looked back to their papers or coffees or phones.

  The hand holding Richard's arm herded him past the desks and into a smaller room at the back of the station.

  "Sit."

  The hand on his arm pushed him sideways. His legs hit a metal chair beside a wide and dingy desk. He fell into the chair, the hand on his arm jerking him into a sitting position before he could fall to the ground.

  The hand unclamped from his arm, and the officer who'd been herding him sat down across from Richard.

  "We've been having complaints all night about you," he started, his voice slow, measured, his eyes squinting at Richard. "Couple calls from the hospital, then the pharmacy."

  "I was just trying to get some supplies for my friend," Richard explained without hope. "And I don't have any money and–"

  "So you decided to steal them?"

  "What? No! Steal..." He shook his head, utterly, utterly confused. "No. Steal?"

  "That's what Medz is saying."

  "Who?"

  "Medz." The officer raised a eyebrow. "The makers of the supplies you were stealing."

  "I wasn't–"

  "We've been on the lookout for you folks. Medz wants to press charges. You'll be lucky if they only push for a fine." He shook his head. "Worse than theft if you ask me."

  "I didn't–"

  "But some good people are finally reporting you folks. We got a report at the hospital. And the pharmacy. They're sick of you all freeloading."

  "'You all'?"

  "You never turn on the fucking news do you?" The officer snorted. He shook his head. "Fucking kids" he muttered under his breath. "Think you can get away with it. Not anymore."

  "I just needed a bandage! And some medicine."

  The officer leaned back in his chair and smiled. "Uh huh." He pulled a notepad out of his pocket and started to scribble on it. "And what were you going to do with it once you stole it?"

  "I didn't–you're not listening to me!" Richard dropped his head into his hands and spoke through a clenched jaw. "I was going to make some supplies for my friend."

  The officer's smile widened as he scribbled some more on the notepad. "So you were going to distribute?"

  "To my friend." Richard looked up. "Wait–what do you mean distribute? I just need some stuff for my friend, I wasn't–"

  "You were planning on–"

  The door opened.

  It was the other officer who'd come to the pharmacy. He gestured to his partner who got up and flipped the notepad shut. A moment later the door slammed behind both of them.

  Richard rested his head in his still-cuffed-together hands.

  He waited.

  The door opened again.

  The officer who'd interrogated him was back. "Up," he said.

  Richard stood.

  The officer grabbed his arm again and herded him back to the bigger room with all the desks. He shoved Richard into a hard plastic seat.

  "Wait here."

  Then he moved behind a nearby desk, sat down, yawned, and began to shuffle through a layer of papers.

  And Richard waited.

  And waited.

  A hand on the clock over his head desk ticked loudly every minute. Pens skidded over papers and papers shuffled over dingy desks. A few times the door squeaked open an
d slammed shut. Richard just kept his eyes on the clock.

  And he waited.

  And waited.

  The door slammed.

  Richard looked over. A guy with faded pink hair and ripped jeans standing by the door looked back. He looked vaguely familiar. He casually reached into his pockets and pulled out what looked like one of Earth's phone, but there was something more familiar about it...

  The guide!

  Richard stared at the pink-haired guy with the alien technology. The pink-haired guy looked back and smiled faintly. Then he walked over to the nearest desk and talked softly to the officer who had arrested Richard.

  "...settlement... no... they should have called... okay... yeah, yeah..."

  The officer got up, grabbed Richard's arm once more, pulled him to his feet and unlocked the cuffs.

  "Go." He shoved Richard towards the door.

  "What?"

  "Supplier's not pressing charges. Get outta here."

  "Um..."

  "Out!" The officer glared.

  "C'mon," the pink haired guy said. "It's okay." He held the door open.

  Richard walked through it, away from the officer now shaking his head and muttering under his breath.

  "Thief."

  Then the door slammed, and they were out of the police station. The quiet light of dawn was spread over the parking lot, but it didn't do anything to cheer Richard, who shivered in the cool morning air.

  **********

  On the edge of the parking lot, the pink-haired guy stopped. He sat down on the curb. One hand absently played with the tatters at the bottom of one jean leg.

  "You okay?" he asked.

  "Yes." Richard plopped down next to him on the cold curb. "How'd you do that?"

  "I paid the... fine."

  "What?"

  "Paid the fine. I called the suppliers. Medz – they're the ones who've got the cops chasing everyone down. They won't press charges if you pay up for the damages plus fines."

  "What damages?"

  The pink haired guy shrugged. "I..." He snorted and flicked his hands up for a minute in a helpless gesture then went back to playing with the frayed edges of the jeans. He shook his head. "I don't know."

  Richard nodded. "How much?"

  "Five thousand."

  He gaped. "Five thousand? I don't have–"

  "It's ok. I traded for credit before I got here." He looked up at Richard with a sympathetic half-smile. "Why? Didn't you?"

  "Um... no," Idiot. He cursed himself again, thinking of his ill-thought out joy ride. "We didn't um, plan too well."

  The pink haired guy smiled. "It's okay. No one ever does."

  "But..." Richard shook his head. "Five thousand? Why?" The incomprehensible number circled around in his head, and fatigue made it even harder to even begin to understand. "Five thousand?"

  Again, the guy shrugged. "It's how it is."

  "But they told me the license or whatever was five hundred. The-the guy at the pharmacy..." he trailed off, rubbing his head – it was starting to ache.

  "Yeah, but if you try to take it, if you try to take it and share it – they want more."

  Richard shook his head. It didn't make any sense and he was too tired and worried to try to make sense out of it. "How did you know?" he asked.

  "Word travels." He didn't elaborate.

  Richard didn't know what to say so he stared at the pavement. Eventually, he would have to go back to the ship empty handed and hope Grimm was still holding on.

  "So what happened?" the pink-haired guy asked.

  "We had a little... uh, accident - it's not important - I don't know... My friend got a bit cut up in the landing. We need supplies. More bandages mostly. Some other stuff..." he shook his head hopelessly.

  "And you don't have the plans for them?"

  "Yeah... we didn't really come prepared," Richard admitted.

  The pink haired guy smiled. Richard could see the understanding in his face. Travelers this far out rarely came prepared.

  "Can't you just download them?"

  "There's nothing on Earth's networks. And I can't get a signal from anywhere else. Not in this part of the galaxy. Can you?"

  "Huh. No. I mean, I'm not connected anymore. Not to anything off-Earth."

  Damn you back-to-nature types. Richard tried to relax the grimace off his face. He just managed a polite, "Uh huh."

  "Here, I can get you something."

  "I thought you said–"

  "I'm not connected back home. I can still get on the Earth's net."

  Richard shook his head. "But it's been scrubbed - there's nothing useful."

  "Only on the public sites.... we might still find..." the guy scrolled through his alien device "...something useful... there."

  "What?"

  "Got it." He stuck a familiar looking piece of plastic into the guide.

  "Got wha–"

  "Medical kit." A second later he was handing Richard the little piece of plastic. "Wait, you have power to print this?"

  "Yeah, why?"

  "Power's hard to get on this planet."

  Richard barely heard him. He clutched the storage device in one fist. In his other hand the guide already shone with a map, a friendly "You Are Here", and a path back to the ship. He looked up at the pink haired guy.

  "Thank–"

  "Go on." The guy smiled.

  "Thank you!"

  **********

  Richard ran.

  He ran back through the city streets, back past the H signs, back through the outskirts of civilization, back through the dark fields past the road and power line strung above it and the lamps, now dark in the morning light. A stalk stabbed his foot and his ankle twisted over, but he kept running.

  Finally, finally he was back at the ship.

  He ripped the door open and nearly fell over Grimm in the hallway.

  "Where the hell have you been?"

  "Hey." Richard righted himself and fumbled over to the ship's computer, slowly charging in the corner.

  "Hey yourself," Grimm answered. "Where'd you go?"

  "Um, out to get stuff." He jammed the memory stick into the computer and poked frantically at the screen.

  Finally, Richard stepped back from the computer, sank into a chair, took a breath and took a look at his friend. The now-crusty blood drips on his leg hair were mixed with drips of pus.

  Infected.

  Grimm laughed. "Looks good, huh?"

  Richard tried to make his face look less shocked. "It looks... fine." He grit his teeth and turned back to the ship's computer.

  The printer next to the computer was starting to make soft whirring sounds. Something clunked. The thing vibrated ever so slightly. A moment later, a thick, white strip of gauze started to wend its way out of the printer onto the waiting tray, neatly coiling on itself. It was followed by a tiny plastic bottle, then drops of antiseptic.

  "The pain killers'll be out soon. And..." he looked back at the screen and over the list of things in the med kit. "And then something to help you sleep." And then I can finally make some new fucking pants!

  Author

  Blythe, Aelius: (1987–)

  North American scribe, timid, nomadic. Female of the species H. sapiens. Also wrote:

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