Pregled posta

“Well” commented Hutch “Mr. Zoloto keeps in good company.” There were eight girls, all with blond to strawberry blond hair (though none with the deep red of Burgundy's hair.) They all wore their own clothes of varying styles but each had a yellow pin in their hair.
“They're not Mr. Zoloto's company,” corrected Burgundy “they're my own. These are the Nymph Tears.” The girl who had opened the door addressed Burgundy. “No problems Aegle, smooth journey.”
“Doesn't a group like this.” Hutch indicated to the women around him “draw attention?”
“We used to dress up like priestess, but we found that attracted more attention.”
“That wouldn't surprise me...” Hutch replied, his voice trailing off. Another person had caught his eye. Hutch was surrounded by nine fetching ladies, so not just anyone could catch his attention. This man was towering, much taller than Hutch. Much of his height seemed to be in his torso, leaving him with relatively short limbs. His hair was trimmed short but his beard was a long unkempt mass of gray and black hairs. He wore a dark yellow suit. The man could only be an Trellick alchemist, the likes of which were never seen in Findland.
The alchemist went into a stately yellow brick manor, in his place walked out Mr. Zoloto, accompanied by the man built like a wardrobe. “Mr. Hutch,” greeted Zoloto “Welcome to my summer home.” Hutch had always thought of summer homes as small cottages off in the woods. This was nothing of the sort. This was a three story building in a spacious neighborhood with woods behind the homes.
“Gold smuggling has been good to you, perhaps I'm in the wrong line of work.”
Zoloto moved his gums around before speaking. “Take Mr. Hutch to his quarters.” The wardrobe sized man indicated a direction he wanted Hutch to walk, he was flanked by two other men. They walked down an outdoor staircase to a stony basement. Once there the wardrobe sized man indicated for Hutch to enter a room with a door made of iron bars.
“He has a dungeon in his summer home? What's his winter home like?” Instead of answering Hutch's question, the wardrobe size man pushed him into the cell and locked it.
Hutch looked over his room, there wasn't much to see. A small grate let in a bit of light from above. “How do you report in?” he heard one of the other men say. Hutch examined his sleeping arrangements, it was a pile of straw. “Hey!” The man called out “I'm talking to you!”
Hutch turned to face the man on the other side of the bars. “Forgive me, I just assumed you were part of the wallpaper.”
“What?” The man stared at Hutch for a moment before shaking off his confusion “Look, if you want to stay alive then you'll tell me how to report in that your mission is going well.”
“Hmmmm? Ah yes of course.” What kind of odd things do lay people think spies do? “Well first I'll need a key.”
The man looked exasperated already. “Right, I'm just supposed to give you the key to the cell.”
“The cell? Oh no, not that.” Hutch didn't think it would be that easy, but it was worth a try. “No, it should be a key you don't need. One you can afford to lose.”
“I don't have any keys I don't need.”
“So go get one.”
The man squinted at Hutch “Why?”
Hutch tried to look like this was an absurd question. “We need it to signal that the mission is going well.” The man begrudgingly acquiesced and went off to find an unneeded key. The wardrobe sized man had already gone off somewhere. The third man sat down in a chair across from the cell and watched Hutch.
About twenty minutes later the man who was not wallpaper returned with an old key. “Alright, so I've got a key. Now what.”
“Now go to a post box, one next to a post office but not inside, and drop the key in the box.”
“That's it? That's what you use as a signal?”
“Well the signal changes quite frequently, any time we think it maybe compromised. But yes, right now that is the signal.”
The man looked at the key, (There was no reason for him to introduce himself to Hutch, but his name was Linder) then Linder looked at Hutch skeptically. Linder walked out the door and accented the stairs, but then quickly returned. “Pretty clever, have me drop the key at a post office here and let the TSC know our whole operation has moved to Vernon.”
Vernon, so that's where they were. Still in Findland, not far from the sea, sort of a secondary city to the floating federal city of Eneti. “Well, yes I suppose so. You're the ones who moved me.”
Linder looked at Hutch and gave a dry silent laugh. “And how do I know that this isn't a signal that the mission has gone horribly wrong and that you want the whole damn army to swoop down here?”
This guy was putting a lot of thought into the wild goose chase Hutch was sending him on. “Well I can't prove that one way or the other. Though a signal like that would be quite useful. When I get out of here I'll have to recommend something like that.”
“Don't worry about that.” Reassured Linder “Because you're n

Yes, I carry all these keys with me every time I go out, except that one time I got locked out. The Keys I carry can change depending on the jobs we're doing and who's house we'll be at for the next week or so, but generally its this. Along with my wallet, cell phone, loose change and leatherman skeletool, the weight can add up. But once I throw a hammer in the hammerloop, all that other stuff feels like its not even there.

The keys, from left to right, in counter-clockwise order, are as follows:

-My house
-My garage
-My company work van, White 2000 Dodge Ram 1500 (my main vehicle, filled with tools and junk)
-My dad's 2001 Dodge Ram 1500 Pickup with ladder racks he built out of wood. (Mainly used for transporting materials, and firewood and furniture.)
-My dad's green Chevy pickup from maybe '95 or so, that he bought recently from my uncle. This little key is for the hatch on the back of the cap.
-The next key is for the door and ignition on the green truck.
-My mom's Red 2003 Dodge Minivan. They love there Dodge dealer because they helped them out back when my mom was pregnant with me and their car died. They fixed it for free on the spot and gain a customer for life apparently. I'm not a big fan.
-On to the next ring, starting with the gold key. That's for the Haverford Township Parks Maintenance building. We've been doing a lot of work there recently. Still need to go back and do some little things.
-Next is the key to my parents house in the mountains.
-After that is Koolice's apartment building key.
-Then his apartment room key.
-Then my grandfather's garage where we store lawnmowers and digging tools.
-And lastly is the master lock key for every pad lock owned by Haverford Township.

The brass ring is actually a piece of 5/8 inch solid brass pipe from an old bathroom we remodeled. It was probably from the 1800's. I cut off that little piece as a souvenir.

The blue lanyard is is from an American Cancer Society bike ride I used to do every year back in the early 2000's. We would ride a metric century (100 km / 63 miles) Its held up very well over the years. Makes getting keys out very easy if my hands are full or if I'm wearing gloves at work.

This used to all be on one ring, but with the township keys and Koolice's 2 keys and my parent's mountain house, it just became too much. I could take some off, but I'd hate to get somewhere that I needed these, and not have them that day, s I just take them everywhere...every day.