Budget Raygun – Be Ready

The miniature contraption was heavier than it looked.  Much heavier.  So much heavier, in fact, that the weight seemed to be a lie.  There had to be something else going on.  It was almost as if the gun were being pulled to the ground… as if it had been cursed with extra gravity.  With more effort than she’d originally planned, she hefted the tiny barrel upward until it was just below her eyeline and parallel to the ground, her arms extended, her elbows locked.

“That’s right,” she said.  She squinted her left eye against the sun, even though there were at least two ceilings and a floor between it and her.

“You’re going to want to drop that left elbow or you won’t be able to absorb the energy.”  She was relatively sure that he hadn’t yet turned from his workbench to see how she’d been holding anything.

“The energy?  You mean like the recoil or like ‘energy‘ energy?”  Her hands otherwise occupied, she made air quotes with her voice.

“First one, then the other.”

The little brass gun suddenly felt less like a ridiculously substantial toy and more like a threat and it felt even heavier.  Her left elbow unlocked, and her right arm dropped down and across her body, pivoting at her shoulder.  She held her hands and their contents away from her body.

“Don’t worry about me,” she said to his back.

“Worry isn’t the word that I’d use.”

“Okay, basement-Yoda, what word would you use?”

“Hope.”

“You ‘hope‘ about me?  That’s pretty flowery language for a guy dealing rayguns out of his secret underground lair.”

“Who ever said I was dealing?”

She went cold.  “Dude.  What the fuck?  I came here for a reason.  If you’re not dealing, why am I here?”

“You’re here because Dave sent you.  I don’t ‘deal’.  Dave knows that.”

“I don’t even know ‘Dave’.  Some guy holed up at the Book Cadillac tells me that you can hook me up and I…”

“That guy is Dave.  He used to be the concierge there.  Now he’s a more of a concierge at large.”

“Well that’d be great if I was looking for a good sushi place or cheap blowjob, but I’m looking for some protection, so if you’re not selling, I’m just gonna fuck off.”  She started to put The Pinkie back in its designated spot in the gun cabinet.

“Please do, but take your gun with you.”

She stopped and the weight of the gun pulled both of her hands to waist level.  She re-steeled herself.

“Dude, if you think that just because the phrase ‘cheap blowjob’ has entered into the conversation…”

“Young lady, would you please…”

“I’m sorry,” she blurted with genuine shame.  It was the “young lady” that got her.  It had been a while.  “I-I just mean,” she stammered, “if you’re not selling, then… what’s the deal?  You’re just going to give me a gun?”

“Not a gun.  That gun.”

She looked down at the unimpressive assembly of brass bits in her hands, then back up at the cabinet.  It was full of choices that seemed more reliable.  More practical.  More badass.

“So you’re going to give me a free gun, but it has to be this one?”

“Yep.”

She looked back down.  “Seriously, dude.  I don’t know.  Look at this thing.  Is that the end off of a hose?”

“Could be.  Ask a gardener.”

She looked back down.  “Come on, man.  I appreciate the whole ‘free gun’ thing, but why’s it gotta be this gun?”

“Because that one’s yours.”

“Take it or leave it, huh?”

“No.  You’re taking it.”

“So now, you’re not only not selling, but you’re going to somehow force me to take a free gun?”  This was all going in a much odder direction than she’d anticipated and to her mind, that was saying something.  “I’ve only known you for about ten minutes, but I’m going to assume that the fumes down here are getting to you.  You may wanna consider a little fresh air.  You know the sun is out right now, right?”

“Yes, I know.  You should take your gun and go before it sets.”

Her gut said that she was being scammed, but she couldn’t see the angle.  That didn’t necessarily mean that she wasn’t being scammed.  She had hardly had time to become streetwise.  She learned all of her tough guy talk from Will Smith movies and it showed.  Essentially, she was as she had always been, but now she had a fragile shell of false bravado that could have passed for streetwise before streetwise became the order of the day.  Still, she came here for a gun and this lunatic was apparently prepared to see to it that she left with one.  It seemed plainly stupid to argue.  She would simply take the gun and go.  Get out of the strange man’s basement and then make a plan.

“Ooooo-kay…” she said.  She put the gun in her bag and when it settled to the bottom, the strain on the strap pulled her shoulder down an inch.  She straightened against the downward force and turned toward the door.  “So, I’m gonna go.  Uhmm, so, thanks…”  She was just stepping across the threshold of the small workshop when he finally turned toward her.

“One thing, young lady…”

She put her hand on the butt of The Pinkie deep in her bag and waited for the other shoe to drop.  She set her jaw.

“What?”

“You said you were looking for a defensive weapon.”

“Yeah.  Why?”

“I just thought you should know.  That there’s an offensive weapon.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means I expect you to use it.”