On Monday mornings, I send out a story via email: ultra-brief tales of 1,000 words or more, usually in genres including horror, science fiction, and the supernatural. Those stories collectively are called Once Upon A Time. I’ve also published several ebooks and compendium volumes of those stories so far.

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Here's story 232, of 240 so far.

TCO

Javen pushed the surprisingly heavy door open, and peered into the chamber beyond.

Once his eyes adjusted, he saw that he’d come to the right place. The walls were lined with racks and other shelving, all of it occupied with merchandise. There were security cameras everywhere, and a large counter at the far end, behind which stood a man with a perfectly neutral expression on his face. His hands were at his sides, obscured by the counter unit.

Probably got one of his own products back there, just in case the next customer isn’t friendly, Javen thought, putting a small smile on his face as he walked in.

“Morning,” he said, and the man behind the counter nodded amicably enough, still not saying anything. Javen thought that the proprietor relaxed a little, though, and that was a good sign. Money always came before morality in places like this, but personal safety was first and foremost. If there was ever a guiding principle for a gun shop, that was surely it.

“I’m looking for something for defensive purposes,” Javen continued, fully aware that the owner would have heard that very phrase dozens of times every week, like a password, and that it quite often wouldn’t be true. It was true for him, though, and suddenly it seemed important that the man should know it.

“Things aren’t the way they used to be,” Javen said. “Lots of dangerous people around.”

“If you say so,” the proprietor said at last, and the man folded his arms across his chest. His hands were empty, and Javen thought that maybe it was one of the purposes of the gesture to show that fact. “Take a look around. I’m here when you need help.”

When, not if, Javen noted, but he didn’t take it personally. The man was right, after all; he would indeed need some help before long.

In the meantime, he wandered around, taking his time. There were so many possibilities to choose from. The old classics, identifiable by their heavy metal bodies and industrial look. Conventional military options, all in tactical black with knurled grips and modular attachment points. True antiques, like something out of a holo, or at least lookalikes manufactured as much for nostalgia as actual use. And then the more modern range, with organic-looking synthetic textile panels, inlaid sensors for user authentication and hair-trigger responsiveness, and onboard learning models.

The sole unifying feature was that they were all designed to kill.

The proprietor watched Javen as he went from rack to rack, mostly looking but sometimes picking up a weapon and feeling its weight and texture in his hand. When almost ten minutes had gone by, Javen was startled when the man suddenly appeared at his side while he was puzzling over the controls on the side of a smart mini-rifle.

“Anything take your fancy?” the man asked, and Javen nodded slowly. They proceeded to gather four candidates from disparate displays across the floor, taking them all to the large counter, where the proprietor once more situated himself behind the rubber-topped wooden expanse. Javen noted the many varieties of ammunition stored in boxes and bins at the rear, seeing that all of the containers were biometrically sealed.

Sensible, he thought.

“An eclectic selection,” the man said, drawing Javen’s attention back to the matter at hand.

Before him lay a silver-blue pistol which offered single-shot and semi-automatic fire; a compact assault rifle which collapsed to less than half its usual size at the press of a button; a replica six-shooter which evoked tumbleweeds and horses and lawmen of a romanticised past; and a wrist-mounted weapon with limited range and magazine size but unparalled concealability.

“I’m still not really sure,” he said, and the proprietor folded his arms again.

“What’s your price range?” he asked, but Javen shook his head. It wasn’t about the money. Now the proprietor understood, and the man fetched a tablet device from nearby, quickly scanning each of the four weapons.

“The paperwork,” he said.

This was the part that Javen had wrestled with, but there was nothing else for it. “Run it by me for each of them.”

“The law says I have to read this part to you first, as I guess you probably already know,” the man behind the counter said, not waiting for Javen’s response before continuing. “Ownership of a firearm entails responsibility for its use, and acceptance of its cost. Each firearm’s cost has two components, combined into the TCO: Total Cost of Ownership. The first component is the up-front financial payment. The second is the consequential cost, for which you are legally and ethically responsible.”

The man read it in a monotone, sounding bored, and Javen certainly understood. He had probably read the same words thousands of times, or even tens of thousands. The proprietor was speaking again, and pointing to the assault rifle.

“You don’t end up using this, but you do brandish it at one point, about a year from now,” the man said, reading from his tablet device. “Some punk kid will try to mug you. He runs, and gets flattened by a self-drive truck. Paralysed.”

Then he pointed at the wrist-mounted weapon. “You wear this for a while, and you do fire it, but it jams because you don’t maintain it properly. Takes your damned arm off below the elbow. Ouch.”

He was grinning, and Javen felt a little nauseous. He wouldn’t be buying that one.

“The fake antique there gets grabbed from you, a little over six months down the line,” the proprietor said. “Drug-addict bitch, pregnant and out of her mind on something. She shoots a policewoman in the stomach, and gets shot back for her trouble. Both of them die, and the unborn baby. Which brings us to lucky number four.”

He tapped a few controls on the screen with one hand, scratching his at least two-day-old stubble with the other, and then sniffed. “This is a pretty good one. You kill a home-invader with it; gangbanger psycho. Puts him down good and clean. Kapow.”

Javen nodded cautiously. That seemed OK so far. But then the proprietor wrinkled his nose.

“Seems you get cold feet after that, though, and sell it on to some paranoid old granny. Her three-year-old granddaughter finds it and accidentally blows her away on semi-auto. So those are your choices.”

Javen thought for a while, looking from one weapon to the next, and the man behind the counter didn’t interrupt him.

“Is she a nice granny?” Javen asked, and the proprietor frowned and tapped away at the machine again. After a few seconds, he spoke.

“Reasonably well-liked by her family, I suppose,” he said. “Racist though. Bit of a drinking problem sometimes. Doesn’t end up leaving much of an inheritance either.”

Javen sighed, weighing it up, and then nodded. He tapped the sleek pistol in front of him.

“Better make it this one, then.”

JINX

KESTREL face a new and terrifying enemy: an all-seeing mastermind who already knows exactly who they are, and many of their deepest secrets. Nothing stays hidden forever, and the line between privacy and liberty is razor-thin…

Book 3 in the KESTREL action-thriller series.

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