The next thing they needed to do was sell off the marijuana.
Like most cities, Chicago had established a Board of Drugs to regulate the distribution of formerly illicit substances. There were depots on practically every street, where people could both buy and sell drugs at a price set by the Board.
The Gunrunner did not imbibe drugs. He could not understand why people would voluntarily disable their mental faculties for hours on end, and for him such a distraction could prove deadly. Cigars were his guilty pleasure- he knew it would kill him someday, and yet he allowed himself to smoke one every day.
The depot that the Gunrunner chose was like many other depots- repurposed from a convenience store, the shelves, instead of stocking snacks and groceries, housed plastic containers filled with carefully labelled bags. A clerk behind the counter jumped to his feet as the Gunrunner entered. Contrary to expectations, employees in drug depots were typically not allowed to smoke their wares. Not only was it a loss of profit, stoned employees often smoked themselves unconscious, and thieves took advantage of this to steal entire boxes full of drugs.
"Welcome to the Green Leaf. How may we help you?"
The Gunrunner had scooped the marijuana in the crates into plastic bags bought from an actual convenience store, and wrote "Marijuana" on them with black marker. Afterwards, he had found a suitably sized plastic tub to carry the bags.
He had told the girl to follow him inside. Although he did not want her anywhere near drugs, he also did not want her outside without him.
"I'd like to sell some marijuana."
"Alright, could I see your seller's license, please?"
This was the tricky part. People who grew drugs were issued a seller's license from their local Board of Drugs, which allowed them to sell their drugs to anyone, anywhere. As the Gunrunner had no such license, he fell back on an excuse.
"It's from Marcus Dent over in Cleveland. Check his license."
Marcus Dent was a fairly well-known drug farmer for whom the Gunrunner had run deliveries in the past. Claiming that it was from him would allow the Gunrunner to sell the drugs with only minor repercussions.
The young clerk flipped through a notebook, muttering "Marcus Dent... Marcus Dent..." under his breath, until he stopped flipping the pages halfway through.
"Ah, yes, Mr. Dent. His license is valid, but it expires in 3 months. Could you tell him to get it renewed as soon as he can?"
"I will."
The Gunrunner hefted the tub onto the counter. The clerk's eyes widened slightly, and he opened one of the bags to extract a pinch.
"This will have to be tested before you can sell it. Don't want people selling random leaves mixed with dope. Is that fine with you?"
"Sure. As long as I get to sell it all."
The clerk put the pinch on a specialized machine that looked much like a scale, and pressed the button. Before the Scourge, due to the softening of laws on recreational drug use, companies had started to make testing kits for drugs. This particular machine detected trace molecules of known terpenes (harmful drugs), and also checked what type of drug the supplied material was.
The first light on the side of the machine turned green.
"Alright, no terpenes. That's good. You're not here to poison anyone."
The second light on the side of the machine also turned green.
"Cannabis confirmed. Good! You're selling what you claimed to be selling."
The clerk took out a large metal basin, and paced it on a mechanical scale. He then began emptying the bags into the basin. In the end, the scale showed a weight of around a kilogram and a half.
"That's a whopper. The going rate for a kilo is about 2100 now- I can give you 3150 for this load."
"Sold. Take it all."
As the clerk counted out hundred-dollar bills, the Gunrunner took a look around the depot. There was a certain attractive quality to the neat rows of bags- labeled "marijuana", "cocaine", or "meth" depending on their contents- and the Gunrunner made a lap around the entire depot. He added a line to a mental clipboard: Carry poisoned drugs to distribute to bandit groups?
By the time he returned to the front of the store, the clerk had finished counting out the bills. The Gunrunner took them and put them in one of his front pouches. He didn't use a wallet- he simply used separate pouches for bills and coins. He took the girl's hand, and walked out.
"Why did you sell leaves?"
The Gunrunner let out a mental sigh as he prepared himself to explain to the girl what drugs were.
"Well, those leaves are special. Lighting them on fire and smelling the smoke makes people happy. But it also makes people dumb for a while."
"So it's a bad thing?"
"That depends on who you ask. Some people call it the best thing in the world, and some people call it the worst. I like to think of it as neither. It's only bad for people who use too much of it. But I'd prefer it if you didn't try any."
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
The girl nodded, then turned around.
"What is it?"
"I thought I saw a weird man looking at me, but he's not there."
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The Stalker ducked behind the wall. He had almost been spotted by that damn brat. And he called himself a professional!
The tracker in the Gunrunner's pocket had been doing its job marvelously, broadcasting his location every second. The Stalker was waiting for the Gunrunner to let down his guard. The moment he did, the Stalker would leap out from the darkness, slit the throats of both the Gunrunner and the girl as neatly as slicing bread, and leave before the authorities had time to respond.
The Stalker was a professional assassin. He had made a name for himself after he committed a string of murders in his home city of Detroit almost a decade ago. The victims had nothing in common except for the murder method- all of them had their throats slit. During this period, he earned a nickname- the Detroit Slicer. He liked it, and continued to kill whenever he pleased, until he brushed too close to getting caught to be comfortable. He decided the Detroit Slicer had to disappear.
But how would he sate his appetite for murder? He turned to the criminal underworld for the answer. He showed up at gang meetings, often unannounced. Whenever he was denied entrance, he would cut- not enough to kill, but enough to incapacitate. Soon, the gangs of Detroit took him seriously, and began hiring him for jobs.
His first gang-backed job was the murder of a prominent politician. Even after the Scourge, the wealthy played the game of politics. This particular politician had been advocating a crackdown on gang activity, and thus the gangs had decided he had to go.
The Stalker tailed him carefully for two weeks, recording his behavior and analyzing it for patterns. On the fifteenth day of the job, the politician was found dead in his apartment, a noose around his neck and a pair of scissors in each eye. When the noose was removed, the head fell from its body- the politician's neck had been roughly severed. The killing caused an uproar, but nobody thought to associate this murder with the Detroit Slicer. Impressed with the way he followed the target, the gangs had given him a new nickname- the Stalker.
After that, he had been hired for more lucrative jobs, sometimes even outside the city of Detroit. And then one day, a man paid him to follow a legend- and murder him if he betrayed the client.
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The Gunrunner frowned. Degenerates were always a problem, and he couldn't always be with the girl. He decided to buy her a knife.
Knives were good for self-protection. Although he would prefer a gun, he didn't think her slender wrists could handle the recoil- maybe in a few years. But for now, he would buy her a knife.
Plenty of stores sold knives, from ordinary grocery stores to even gun stores, but to find the best one would need to find a dedicated knife store.
Stores dedicated to selling knives were surprisingly rare, but the Gunrunner knew there was one in Chicago. He had seen it himself, but had passed by as he did not need a knife. To him, his revolver was enough.
"Hey, are you tired yet?"
The girl tilted her head to the side while thinking what to say.
"Um, a little bit."
"Well, we'll make just one more stop and then we'll find a place to stay. Is that fine?"
She nodded. He smiled. He had always thought of children as whiny, annoying creatures, but this girl wasn't like that at all. Perhaps, he thought, it's because of her rather unique background. None of the children I've met so far were born as a slave, and then tortured.
The knife store was in the mercantile district, which was about 10 minutes away on foot. After the rioting died down, the city had been divided into multiple districts. The residential district housed most of the citizens, and the mercantile district was where one would go to buy an object they needed, whether it was a gun, tools, or food. Of course, there were stores located outside the mercantile district- the clothing store they visited and drug depots, to name a couple- but most of them were located inside the district, as potential customers were plentiful. The industrial district took up almost a quarter of the entire city- containing nothing but factories, this was where manufactured goods were made. Almost none of the factories requiring specialist knowledge were active, but the ones that didn't churned out products day and night. Lastly, the business district took up the least amount of space, and was home to the wealthy, who could afford to finance actual companies- although they were nothing like the companies of old. The politicians also frequented the business district, and one level of the underground garages for a building had been repurposed for the mayor's use. Why underground? The incident regarding the John Hancock tower had prompted the move. The mayor didn't want to be caught on the top floor of a skyscraper while someone was knocking it down- and neither did the people working for the mayor. The slums were located between the residential and industrial districts- it contained the houses with worst damage. As the city collected rent from people staying in intact houses, the poor were forced to live in partially demolished houses in the slums. Additionally, the slums also housed the red-light district, which trafficked sex and slaves.
The entrance to the city led out to the residential district, which was why the Gunrunner's route to the knife shop was fairly simple. All he had to do was walk to the mercantile district, and head for its southeastern edge. Unfortunately, fate seemed to have other plans.
The Gunrunner chose to cut through an alley in order to get to the mercantile district. In the alley were three, well-muscled men, covered with tattoos and drinking beer. Keeping a tight grip on the girl's left wrist, the Gunrunner made to walk past them. At that moment, one of the men reached out and grabbed the girl's right arm.
Instantly, the Gunrunner pulled out his gun and put it to the man's head.
"Let go, or you'll find your brains in the wall you're leaning against- except you won't, because your eyes will be turned into a white mush from the bullet."
The man released his grip on the girl's arm, and walked backwards towards his two friends, who cracked their knuckles and sneered menacingly. The Gunrunner ushered the girl behind him, keeping the gun trained at the head of the grabber.
"What are you gonna do about it, old man? You ain't so fool to shoot someone in the middle of a city, right?"
This was from a man with a yellow mohawk. He swaggered forward, keeping his fists at the ready. The Gunrunner transferred his aim to Mohawk's head, and his grin faded. Then, in a movement so fast his hand became a blur, the Gunrunner turned the handgun around and grabbed it by the barrel, then hit the thug on the side of the head with the grip with a loud thwack. As the man crumpled to the ground, his eyes rolled up so far that only his whites showed, the Gunrunner casually replaced the pistol in its holster. The other two stood there, stunned, then charged the Gunrunner, yelling.
The grabber reached him first, fist outstretched. Bad form, he thought detachedly, as he grabbed the fist and the arm connected to it, and used the grabber's own momentum to throw him over his shoulder. Grabber hit the ground on his back, with the wind knocked out of him. The Gunrunner took the time to deliver a solid kick to his head, for the knockout blow. And then the third hoodlum thrust a punch at his gut, which the Gunrunner diverted to his right, although he was unable to stop the punch from connecting with his side. Nasty bruise, he thought. Take a week to heal. He then used the proffered arm to pull himself closer, then kneed the attacker in the groin. As he recoiled, the Gunrunner delivered an uppercut, a jab, and another jab to his face. To finish him off, the Gunrunner spun and delivered a roundhouse kick to his solar plexus.
If a stranger had happened to walk by at that moment, they would have seen an incredible sight. An old man, behind whom was a little girl watching the scene interestedly, and three men splayed out on their backs. One of them was missing multiple teeth, another was foaming at the mouth, and the third was simply unconscious, albeit with a round bruise on the side of his head.