“You’re welcome,” Naomi said, suddenly.
We were walking now - we were far from where we had run into Nolan and Leah, and there was a sense of relative safety.
“Huh?” I asked, both because I was thinking about something else, and because I didn’t know what she meant.
“I saved you, you idiot,” she said. “You’re welcome.”
“I saved you first,” I retorted. “If anything, we’re even.”
She snorted. “As if your life is worth the same as mine.”
“If your life is worth more, doesn’t that mean you should be thanking me? Since you got the better end of the deal, apparently?”
She thought about this for awhile. “Thanks,” she said, finally.
-
One worm-drake skull sold for between five hundred and one thousand dollars, after accounting for transportation costs. We had to scoop the brains out through the eye socket, and clean the skull as best we could. Which was a messy job, but there weren’t any buyers interested in the brains or viscera. Go figure.
The price fluctuated somewhat simply because of the nature of the sale - these were independent buyers that Dimen-X was contacting. They were bidding and negotiating, and so some buyers got a much better deal than others on the giant skulls from another dimension. I wondered if they even knew that’s what they were - if they even knew they were real skulls, or if they thought they were simply expensive fakes made in some factory somewhere. You’d think that the real deal would fetch a higher price - but it seemed Dimen-X was extremely choosy about who got to know about the existence of that world.
On the way back from our run-in with Nolan and Leah, I couldn’t think about much else besides making money, fast. Was it a mistake to come down here? I thought to myself. We haven’t found anything of real value yet. Not unless we can sell Kalamuzi parts.
We couldn’t. That was what finally convinced me that Dimen-X must not be telling the buyers what, exactly, they were buying - because I was sure they would buy Kalamuzi skulls, too, if they knew they weren’t just the remains of an overgrown sewer rat.
You would think that I would be despairing at the idea of my mom becoming homeless within a month’s time, but really, I had become numb to it all by then. Sure, I was anxious, and more than a little angry - my mom would have kicked my ass if she heard the things I said under my breath about her - but in another way, what could I do? I just had to make some money, and make it fast.
What do people value? I thought to myself. Precious metals, jewels, land - can’t do that one - cars - nope, uh…
It was embarrassing to have such a hard time figuring out what people would be willing to pay for. I mean, I’m sure I could make a fortune off of magic items and potions and such, but first of all, I wanted to keep them so that I didn’t die, and second of all, I was very uncertain about what Dimen-X would do with such things. I decided to ask.
“You are correct in your thinking, Miles,” RENA answered. “It would be a difficult decision on the part of Dimen-X, and it is one that has been the topic of many meetings recently. At this moment, the executives of the company have divided themselves into two camps, with some exceptions.
“One group argues that we should contact select buyers - multi-billionaires, carefully-vetted corporations, and perhaps even certain nation-states - and sell these items without revealing their source. This does not improve our income potential for the category of items you have sent thus far - that being context-specific items such as animal parts or that sword you sent. That is to say, a sword such as that one is only of particular value because it is from another dimension. The animal skulls are the same. Without the knowledge of this fact, they are selling for only a tenth, perhaps a one-hundredth of the price they could secure otherwise.”
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
I got a couple grand for the sword, all said and done. Which meant she was saying that it could have brought in 20,000, maybe even $200,000. It made sense with what I’d been thinking before. Anyone can buy a weird sword, but a sword from another dimension? One of a kind.
“It would, however,” RENA continued. “Allow us to sell practical goods - such as the potions you mentioned, or even that ring you acquired.”
I fingered the ring in my pocket. It was useful, but how useful? I felt like I hadn’t fully explored its possible applications. Would I give it up for the right price?
“How much for the ring?” I asked.
“This is not an offer, Miles, because the decision has not been made, but I estimate that the profit on a ring that allows the wearers to levitate would easily sell for millions of dollars.”
“Millions?!” I exclaimed. “Take it, RENA! That would pay off all my debts, easy.”
“As I said, Miles, that was not an offer. That is just the estimate for the situation in which the company goes down that route. And you didn’t let me finish. It would sell for at least millions to private individuals - if a nation-state thought that it could use it in war, and perhaps even reverse engineer it, the figure could potentially be much higher.”
“Higher?” I asked. My mind raced at the thought. I could be a multi-millionaire, or a billionaire. “Why the hell would Dimen-X ever say no to that?”
“Would you like to hear the recording? I have received permission to share select portions of the most recent meeting.”
I frowned. Dimen-X didn’t like sharing information with me, not normally. Something smelled fishy. “Why?”
“I can only say that someone at the executive level wished for you to be more informed, Miles.”
“Someone? Not Rhett?”
“I can neither confirm nor deny.”
I sighed. Someone is trying to mess with me, somehow. Confuse me, brainwash me, get me on their side. “Fine. Play it.”
A new voice sounded in my head. It was a gruff voice - certainly not Rhett Nash’s nasally affect. The voice spoke with a hard, no-nonsense tone.
“Gentlemen,” the voice said, the voice audibly deadened by sound-proofed walls. There was zero echo, but I could hear murmuring from somewhere, which died down as he began to speak. “Ladies,” he continued.
“We have here an opportunity of unprecedented proportions. We are sitting on a gold mine, if you will - better than gold. We could sell only a small fraction of the wealth of that mine, and skyrocket to be the most successful business venture in the history of mankind.
“And yet,” he said, voice lowering. “Tending to this mine, this source of untold riches, we have one, singular miner. I wish to revisit this issue of staffing in the future, but I understand it is not the topic of today’s meeting. Luckily, somehow even this miner, this deranged imbecile, has managed to strike gold. And yet we collect from him only the stone! We turn our noses up at the thought of money - we rattle on about ideals, about patience - but what is this we are running? Are we not a business? Are we not here to make money?
“What happened to boldly breaking new ground? Why are we so scared? I agree with Ms. Holbrook on the need for secrecy - of course I do. We all see the value of keeping this in-house, keeping this information proprietary. But to bury it? To not even sell our gold because we’re afraid of someone finding out that we have gold in the first place? - that is madness.
“I propose the following: we continue our investigation into potential buyers, but we do so with the following criteria in mind - leverage. I do not believe I need to explain further, only I point out the following: based on the capabilities we have seen thus far - what we are allowed to see, I should say - is it not possible that we could acquire means of securing more leverage. I believe our miner should be informed of this intention, and offered a complete payment of his debts in exchange for such a capability. Until then, let us work with the contacts we have, who can be trusted. Are there not men and women in this very room who would purchase this gold? Can we not even trust ourselves?”
“What does he mean, leverage?” I asked RENA, when the recording finished.
“I cannot say, Miles.”
“Because you don’t know?”
“I cannot say, Miles.”
I scratched my chin. It sounds like he wants buyers he can blackmail, I thought. Does he expect me to bring him back an item that could help him blackmail people, and keep them quiet? Is he the one who told RENA to play me this recording? If he’s trying to make friends, he could lay off on the “deranged imbecile” stuff.
But completely paying off my debt - that I could get behind.
“So what’s the other group?”
“The other group, Miles, argues that selling the items for profit is short-sighted. If you prefer, I have another part of the recording that I can play.”
“Sure, RENA, go ahead.”
I heard as the ambient sound of muttering voices returned. I heard the dull clatter of heels - at least, I assumed they were heels - as someone walked closer to the microphone. Then, another voice. A woman’s.
“Thank you, Mr. Keener,” the voice said. “We all appreciate your enthusiasm for the well-being of the company, and our pocket-books. I would like to respond.”
The murmuring stopped again, as the audience listened with rapt attention.
“I am not suggesting that we, as you put it, bury this. We all know we have struck gold - it does not warrant repeating. But let me use this analogy another way, if you’ll allow me.
“Let us say we sell our gold. You speak of leverage, but leverage is imperfect. Have we not had our own run-ins with this fact?”
A voice cried out from the crowd. I couldn’t tell what it said.
“Please, Mr. Keener, allow me to finish. I understand what you are saying. Yes, if we had a capability such as you theorize, then we would be in a different position. There is no guarantee that such a thing exists - and as for selling internally, that is a severely limited market, wouldn’t you say? But let us say that you find such a capability, and that is it perfect, and does not lead to the information leaking out. Let us assume that not a single person here, not a single buyer, not even our little miner, when he returns, that none of them speak a word of this to anyone. What then? Can we ensure that they never slip up? That they never make a mistake? That no one ever sees them, stalks them, spies on them, and sees what we are trying so hard to keep secret?
“We are only in the position to make this money because of our secrecy. If we were to lose that, we would not only lose that money, but - well, it goes without saying.
“And another point. The more we sell, the worse things get, in terms of security. But if we, as I suggest, keep it all - well, then. In that case, we get more information, we get more capabilities of our own. If we dedicate teams of researchers to study what our miner sends us, could we not accomplish magnitudes greater returns?
“Why sell at all?” the woman asked. “Why not use it all ourselves? Think of what we could accomplish. You wish to be richer, Mr. Keener, and I can sympathize. But what if, instead, we became more powerful?”