Indeed, the greasy haired, thin mustached, middle aged man was not too impressive at first glance.
Looks can be deceiving so I resist the urge to turn around and walk out immediately.
Instead I wave ‘hello’ and introduce myself.
“Yes, yes.
You’re the friend Uncle Lin just called about.
Said to take ‘extra care’ of you.
Heh We’ve known each other for over a decade so it’s no problem.” His jovial manner is an improvement on his first impression.
“Im not sure what “extra care” is but I’m grateful for your time.
I’m looking to sell some metals and minerals from time to time, as well as other stuff.
Unfortunately I don’t know much about you or what you do so if you could please tell me about yourself.
He just said you were a friend.
Heh probably the same thing he said to you.” I say, realizing I really don’t know anything about him, as we shake hands and sit.
“Well I guess the short version is that I started as an indie miner but that only worked out for about 5 years.
Then I got into guarding for some smaller miner fleets, usually a few dozen ships and captains cooperating.
Those usually go sideways after a year or two but taught me a lot of the ropes for logistics security and what to avoid.
Then I joined a merc outfit defending small to medium sized outfits of less than 100 ships.
That lasted 10 years and I really enjoyed it until I was injured a year ago and they offered me medical retirement.
Supposedly I’d never be as valuable as I once was so they just cut me off and had the insurance company deal with me.
I’m guessing you know how much a nightmare they can be.
I decided to take the lump sum payout and try to open a resource brokerage: buying and selling anything that makes me credits.
Currently I’ve got about 20 ships I work with.
Not that many but enough to put together shipments to bigger factories, they don’t buy by pounds they buy by the ton, usually dozens of tons.
They want predictability and reliability, so it takes time to get enough resources together to interest these buyers higher up the food chain than us.
Then you have to build relationships with the corporate buyers.
Oh yeah.” he suddenly stops and reaches into a drawer producing a pack of cigarettes, decent brand ones, offering me one.
I wave my hand, as a no, but appreciate the gesture.
“Thanks but I don’t smoke”, currently anyway.
I might have smoked a bit in my previous life, but not in this one.
Then I add “so you are breaking into the business and that takes time and money and resources”, to wrap it all up.
“Exactly.
Currently It takes about a month to put together a package big enough to entice the big buyers.
As I sign up more captains it will speed up the payout and increase the prices.
As I said they love reliability and regular shipments over time.
Predictability, the Corps love it.
Besides sales, I can also offer resource gathering, especially discreet gathering.
Captains are a secretive bunch who don’t want people to know what they’re doing or where, how, when either.” Yes, that’s all true and good.
Discretion is actually just above price for me, personally.
With having a superpower and all, protecting my secrets is a matter of life and death.
Powerful Corps, Guilds, Mercs, Slavers… all of them would work me to death if they have a whiff of my powers.
No freaking way!
“I’ll admit I’m very attracted to your discretion.
It will be paramount in all our future dealings.
If I’m selling something, no one can know it’s from me.
If I’m buying, the same.
But what about the price?” “My rates are transparent and very competitive with market rates, even a bit cheaper, hoping to bring in more business.
I’ll provide a layer of insurance against those unwanted, but find a way to alert you to possible opportunities at the same time.” Reaching into my bag is a signal I’m still interested, and moving on to the next step.
The small ‘golf ball’ of Platinum alloy with high ratio of Osmium is his first test.
“For example, what would you do with this, how could we sell it, how much could I make and how long for the payout?” I pepper him with the important questions upfront, the rest is just details.
Smiling like a Cheshire cat, he takes out a hand scanner, much nicer than my own, and puts it right on the rock.
He pulls the trigger and waits 30 seconds, then as he pulls it back to check the contents, his eyes open wide for a split second, then return to normal.
He glances at me then at the rock, then says “I didn’t realize you represented a good sized organization.
Small Independent miners usually don’t have this.
Ok I’m impressed.
As far as what I can do with it: 100 pound packages usually can be sold for 5-10% over market rate, takes about 4 weeks to put one together, payment next business day to your account the next business day after i receive the pay out from the buyer.
No problem.
What else you got?” I like this down to business side, impression slightly improved again.
“Ok then I wont hold back.” I pull out the Palladium ‘fist’ and Kamcite ‘softball’, placing them on the table.
Challenge accepted.
He clasps his hands together with a “ha Ha” and scans them both.
Then his brow furrows and he pulls out a magnet and starts placing it at various points on the Kamcite, measuring the magnetism.
Then he puts it down with a confused look on his face.
Shrugging he picks up the Palladium saying “this Palladium is the same as the Platinum: 100 pound minimum, 5-10% over market, 4 weeks to gather enough, next day payout.
Easy.
but this is different” he points to the Kamcite with a frown.
“This Kamcite is a nickel/iron mix from the center of cooling planetoids, requiring enough mass and a magneto effect, creating a Magnetosphere around the planetoid.
Basically this requires enough mass to create a sphere shaped asteroid with a core.
The key thing with Kamcite is its irregular magnetic composition.
It’s far from a nice even negative pole and positive pole at opposite ends.
No, Kamcite poles are warped and twisted, very irregular.
If melted, it loses the magnetism completely and becomes your standard nickel/iron alloy.
Basically it’s worthless once melted.
This Kamcite seems melted into this ball shape but it retains a strong UNIFORM magnetism.
I’ve never seen a uniform magnetism variety of Kamcite.
I don’t even know if it’s Kamcite anymore, but I do know that the natural magnetism is very strong.
There may be a way to sell this but I’m unsure.
This will require some investigation, I can’t promise anything with this but will look into it.
If you find Kamcite in the future just store it as is and bring it to me, no need to process it: just separate it and store it raw.” he is somewhat out of breath after all that.
He also seems a bit excited to find something different, a challenge, but also its difficult to tell a client something they thought was valuable, is actually possibly junk.
Holding my disappointment in check, I ask “so besides the Kamcite they’re both over a month to get paid?
I was planning on using these for a downpayment on a ship.
This might leave me a bit short.” “Dont worry about that, once I log it into the system, it becomes a future sales contract, you might have heard of the ‘futures market’.
This is what they are buying and selling.
It’s just another asset, and I can assign the payout to whomever you want.
Most businesses treat it like ‘cash in 30 days’.
No problem.” He says while nodding.
My last card is the Nutripacks.
Since the Kamcite might be worthless I need to come up with another 20k, and I damn sure can’t use my ore money, since it’s needed to provision 2 ships and sets of mining equipment.
From feast to famine so fast… I thought I was so far ahead, but now I’ll be lucky to barely scrape by.
I shake my head slowly and reach into my bag, to pull out my last chance to salvage this.
Three nutripacks appear on the table in between us and he glances at me, before shrugging and picking them up.
Then a small upturn on one side of his mouth indicates interest.
“Originally, I thought these were basic nutripacks and was going to say no thanks, but these are ‘dessert series’ nutripacks.
Hahaha” My hope level rises slightly.
I say nothing, so he continues.
“But these are the most desired series of all.
They usually sell very quickly in the primary market, direct from manufacturer, but also in the secondary market where we would sell these.
The only problem is that these are singles and they usually prefer to buy them by the case of 24.” Boom!
“How fast would a case of each sell?” I can’t help blurt out.
He finally has me fully interested, and has made up for the Kamcite.
Full marks.
“I could probably move these within 48 hours, if you have a case of each.
Payout 24 hours after that.
So within 3 days of you putting 3 cases here, on my desk, I can have the credits in your account.
Also 10 cases could easily be sold within a week.” Proud now, he puts his hands on the desk, then starts pondering which outfits to offer these to first.
10 cases?!?!
That’s 240k credits at 1000 each!!!
Daaaaaammmmmnnnnnn.
Making 60 a day isn’t too much of a problem currently, so in 4 days I can make a quarter millions credits?!?!
My mind is melting.
I’m so relieved.
The stress of buying the Amadeus and getting the money together instantly falls off my shoulders.
Ahh, like water off a duck’s back.
This meeting has been quite the roller coaster emotionally: up, down, up.
“So what if I can get you 2 cases today, then 5 cases in 48 hours and then another 5 cases 2 days after that?” My greed is making me offer things I’ll have to hustle to make happen.
I can do this right?
But where will I find enough carbon rich stuff?
I really don’t want to make it from poop.
Maybe I can get food waste from the recycling plant, or mulch or compost should work, I think.
“Paid in full in 10 days.” he says in his most capable, slightly smug, business face.
Hah you’re a performer.
I like a bit of a show.
Not too much, just a little spice.
“Last question then.” I stare at him for a few seconds to announce the profundity.
He adopts the ‘hit me with it’ stance.
“Can you source me a few tons of food waste or scraps or mulch?
Something like that.
Completely unrelated” lol bullshit, but who cares.
He knows if he can do this, the deal is his.