No Rest 4 Wicked Botniks Chapter 16

Isaac Shinseki #7: A Student Meets the Professor

Oct 14, 2023

CHAPTER 16 Isaac Shinseki #7:

A Student Meets the Professor

Harry “Barry” Hoyle was still in his powder blue silk pajamas. The Professor must have been woken up by Lola’s call.

To Isaac’s untrained eye, this geezer did not look like a gangster at all. First of all, he was at least seventy five years old, and he looked more like ninety. He was only a medium height, small build, no muscle or fat to him, all bones and sinew. He had a slightly disheveled head of gray hair, receding but still present, and a trim, mousy little mustache, also gray. There were actual reading glasses on the end of his pointy and arched wizard’s nose. Even his eyes looked old and small and gray.

When the man spoke, it was with a reedy little voice, like a mouse. His drawl put him a bit west of New Dixie, maybe by way of the Lone Star Republic. “Boy,” Harry began, with the face of a stern lecturer, “I cannot begin to describe to you what an unequivocal breach of etiquette this is.”

Isaac had to be careful here. Harry Hoyle might not look and sound like a gangster, but there were just as many legends and horror stories surrounding him as Vitsin or the Goto Twins. He had more stories than all the members of the Vato Guapo Cartel combined. He’d been a boss here longer than the rest of them. He was a head of one of the Big Six, and Isaac was from a different part of town.

Isaac had to be polite above all else.

“I cannot apologize enough, Mr. Hoyle,” said Isaac slowly. “If there were any other way to resolve this matter, please know that I would have already done it.”

Mr. Hoyle produced what looked like a toffee and began chewing upon it. “And what is ‘this matter,’ specifically?” he asked, around a mouthful of candy.

“A man named Bobby Malone. He claims to owe you a large sum of money. Is that the case?”

Mr. Hoyle smiled, suddenly more wolfish than Isaac had seen him. “Does a full bladder ruin a good smoke?” was his reply.

“Uh, yes, I guess? Sir?” Isaac didn’t know what else to say.

Mr. Hoyle spat out the half-chewed toffee into a handkerchief artfully initialed ‘HBH’. “The answer is yes,“ he said. “You have to take a piss before you can enjoy the cigarette. Bobby ‘Bourbon’ Malone owes me an enormous debt, and only half of it is financial.” Hoyle pushed his glasses up to his eyes and leaned in closer to the camera. “Now, Anonymous Japanese Esquire, I don’t suppose you have woken me up past the witching hour to tell me that you are going to make good on what Mr. Malone owes?”

Isaac coughed. “Not at this moment, uhh, no, sir. I am just trying to save Bobby and your stake in him. A dead body earns no money, except in Old Chicago.”

“In Old Chicago, and in the New Vegas too.” Mr. Hoyle looked at his fingernails, as if searching for dirt. “Bobby might be a better earner as a corpse than he ever was among the living. He’s a born lush, a feckless womanizer, a bad poker player, and a deadbeat detective.”

“I can’t speak to that level of knowledge,” Isaac admitted. “What I do know is this: he barked up the Bratva’s tree tonight, and I’m stuck in a sticky sitch because of it. It’s all a misunderstanding, as far as I can tell, but the tale reaches up all the way to Fyodor the Butcher himself.”

Hoyle looked at him with one eye, sideways, profiled like a hawk in shadow. “Tell me more, Esquire,” he said.

Isaac gulped a deep breath. Then exhaled. “Um… okay… I’ll tell you whatever you wanna know, but I don’t even know where to begin.”

Mr. Hoyle cast his hanky aside. “I’ll tell you where we can start. If the tale reached the Butcher…I’ll give you this info for free…” The Professor reached for a ready made mint-julep. A serving shadow disappeared into the background of the Vidmeet window. “Here’s some free info, Mr. Downtown. The Russian situation makes Bobby even more of a liability. Peace with the Russians and all the other factions is worth a hell of a lot more than 45,000 Stars. In fact, you could say it is priceless, because in fact it is. Above all, The Truce must stand.”

Isaac pushed back. “The Sixty-Gang Truce is why I am calling you. The Russians can't kill one of your own, unless they get your express approval. And they haven't gotten your approval yet, right?”

Mr. Hoyle cracked his neck and knuckles and produced a pack of Bigby cigarettes. He took one out, lit it up, and pushed his glasses back to his eyes again, to get a better look at Isaac. “You calling me weak, huh, boy?” Harry huffed in deep and puffed out a mouthful of smoke right into the camera. Then he drank more of the mint-julep.

Isaac literally shook. He had to get this right. He stammered, “No sir, I would never! I… the point is, if the Russians clip him tonight without going through the proper channels, it might… might make you look weak. But, there’s a big difference.”

“Not here in Envy City, there ain’t.” Mr. Hoyle picked up a silver ashtray and examined it like he was seeing it for the first time. His gray eyes shifted back to lock with Isaac’s. “And you’ve got a pair on you, as the punks say, to be talking about ‘Proper Channels’. Fyodor and I both have some myopic codejackers just like you. They could find out who you really are and exactly where you’re holed up. I already know and respect Miss Harper by reputation, and now I know her face. She lives under my protection. You on the other hand merely annoy me right now. I could call up the Goto Twins this second to get the same kind of permission you think the Russians need from me.”

A little bit of piss ran slowly down Isaac’s leg. “Please, please, please don’t, sir! I’m small time! A dumb script kiddy! Not worth the effort! Not worth waking any of them up.”

Cackling like a mad villain with the cigarette still dangling from his lips, Harry Hoyle clapped his hands together. “Relax, boy. You’ve actually done me a service by calling tonight. I wanted to see you squirm a little… and the sight did not disappoint. I’ll get to calming Fyodor down if it will shut you up and allow me to return to bed. Peace is peace.”

And the window winked out.

Isaac watched the security footage. He watched until the Russians in the back went to their respective vehicles and left. He waited until the limousine roared off with the auto-docs and the damaged man in the back seat before he let out a yawn again.

Then he switched off his command engines. Then he slowly extricated himself from all of his entangled equipment. Then he went to the bathroom. Then he showered. A good long shower. Then he put on fresh clothes and opened the holo-capsule bed for as many hours of natural, genuine SLEEP as he could get.

Tuckered. Effin. Out.

END OF CHAPTER 16