by Gary Ballard
“I told you, I’m not a cop,” Brandon replied with a hint of irritation creeping into his voice. “CLED could bust me just as easily as him, after all. Technically, this is industrial espionage. It would make Chronosoft Entertainment look incredibly bad to the mouth-breathers out there.”
Palms down on the table, Bridge calmed the angered executive. “Hey, I know you. We’ve sat here, we’ve shared some polite conversation and felt each other up. I know you’re not a cop. HE won’t know you’re not a cop. I don’t know what kind of yahoos you’re used to dealing with, but real leakers are paranoid bastards. Good leakers get targeted by one of your little hit squads, so you can understand why he might want to be exceedingly careful.” Bridge noted that Aristotle’s attention had focused more intently on Bridge’s back as the client’s agitation had bubbled to the surface. Bridge gave him a subtle signal that things were fine. “Now, about my fee.”
“Upon completion of the first successful leak, we’ll deposit ten thousand in a non-traceable cash account at the vendor you specify.”
“None of that corporate scrip or new federal bills with the tracking software,” Bridge added. “I only deal in Five-Year.” Bridge always insisted on “Five-Year,” a term given to cash minted before 2023. That was the last year cash was produced without embedded chips that could trace every use of the currency as if it was a debit or credit card. Corporate scrip was issued by the company with the Local Government License or LGL, and was just as traceable. Chronosoft, besides employing Thames in the movie business, controlled the LGL for all of Los Angeles County. Bridge wanted to steer well clear of their accountants, not to mention the IRS. There was no tax form for the self-employed whose only skill was “knowing guys.”
“Once we have a deal, I’ll give you the name of my exchange vendor. How soon will you want the first release?”
Thames practically jumped from his seat, reaching into his pocket. Aristotle leapt into action immediately, angling to support Bridge if need be. The businessman pulled out a flier, oblivious to the threat signals he was. Hgnals h broadcasting. “The name of the movie is…”
Bridge cut him off with a quick wave of his hand. “Whoa, whoa, I don’t want to know. The particulars are between you and your boy. The less I know the better.” With a deflated expression, Thames replaced the flier in his pocket quickly. “All I need to know is how quickly do you need someone?”
“This needs to start going out in three days.”
Bridge grimaced and sighed. “That’s one tight deadline. I may not be able to get my top guy with that kind of turnaround. Have you thought about not waiting until nutcrunching time to try to pull this off?”
“I told you, my guy got whacked. I thought I had it taken care of. Will your guy be able to do it?”
“I said he wouldn’t be the best, not that he’d be a muppet. Leaks are mostly cake and coffee runs, and the guys I know aren’t fuckups. He’ll take care of you.”
Thames appeared pacified, finally attending to the drink he’d been fingering since he sat down. He downed the martini in one go, finishing it off by devouring the olive and depositing the toothpick into the glass with a brittle ting. “If that’s all then, there’s a girl at the end of the bar who’s been dying for me to buy her a drink.” His smile was all frat boy bravado, an unbecoming salaciousness reawakening his natural machismo. Bridge dismissed him with a playful shrug of his shoulders, pointing the man to the dance floor. Thames took off like an unleashed dog in heat.
Bridge sat back and let the music wash over him. It was forgettable for all its pomp, a mediocre example of the prograsmic genre. Made by programmers, prograsmic was a collage-like blend of old techno, rock and bits of random sound bites fashioned into songs not by hand, but by programs. Bits and bytes of code pieced it all together into a structure that sounded musical. But there was always something off about the compositions, at least to Bridge’s untrained ear. One of his acquaintances had tried to explain it to Bridge with little success. The music followed the rules of traditional musical structures handed down through centuries of musical evolution, from the time man had started banging two rocks together and dug the rhythm. But the programs messed with that structure, focusing on agitating unconscious associations the mind made with certain notes and frequencies and beats, producing a feeling in some not unlike light drug use. It just made Bridge antsy.
Bridge’s concentration was broken by Aristotle’s voice cutting through the music. His bodyguard’s voice was soft, yet forceful, the voice of someone assured of their power without a hint of overconfidence. “Your presence is being requested,” Aristotle said matter-of-factly, his finger pointing across the club at the waving figure of Barney. Barney was a pain in the ass, one of the many ignorant gophers used by local mob shitheel Nicky Sharver.
“Fuck, that is just what I need,” Bridge grumbled. One of Nicky’s boys motioning to Bridge was never a good omen. It usually meant Nicky wanted something, and when Nicky wanted something, he didn’t take no for an answer. Bridge gave a sarcastic smile and returned Barne
“He wants you in the alley,” Aristotle said. “You know what that means.”
“Yep. I’m about to get a beatdown. Did I piss him off this month?” Aristotle shrugged.
“We could go out the front, put him off until a more opportune time,” the bodyguard offered.
“He’d just look for me until he found me somewhere else,” Bridge replied, straightening his jacket as he stood. “Fuck it, the sooner I get this over with, the sooner I can get with Angela and get paid.”
“You could always give me a raise and I’ll deal with them,” Aristotle said with a malicious smile.
“I can barely afford you now, mountain man. I’m not paying the ER doc to pull their teeth out of your knuckles. How do I look?” Bridge posed before the bodyguard, his clothes immaculate, his demeanor that of the condemned man. He gingerly fussed with his spiky black hair in the wall-length mirror. No sense looking like a mutt until after the violence.
“Like a man about to get his face smacked in,” Aristotle joked. Bridge returned his smirk.
“Funny. Off to the gallows!” Bridge shouted, striding purposefully across the packed house to his inevitable beating.
*****
Chapter 2
August 29, 2028
12:14 a.m.
Bridge made his way across the dance floor with a false air of confidence. He couldn’t afford to let the plebes who might actually be paying attention think he wasn’t in control. Dodging flailing arms and grinding hips, he was reassured that most were ignoring him completely, engrossed by their drunken mating dance. Halfway across the floor, he was stopped by a high-pitched squeal. “Bridge! Oh my God! Where have you been?” Even over the music, he could hear her voice. It was a keening wail he’d never wanted to hear again.
“Lola!” Bridge only just succeeded in sounding excited to see her. Her body slammed into his, her arms crushing his neck in a forceful hug that drove the air out of his lungs audibly. “What… what are you doing here?”
“Dancing, silly!” she screamed, jiggling her hips provoc">
Not all of Bridge’s transactions involved money, and Bridge had collected his fee from Lola without ever following through on his end of the unspoken bargain. She was the perfect mixture of unfulfilled desire and lackluster intelligence that made taking advantage so simple. Code words like producer, screen tests and lunch dates were all it took to unlock her resistance. Now Bridge had to think fast. “You know, I did, and he’s supposed to get back with me when his schedule clears. He’s knee-deep in a project right now.”
She pointed at him, her eyes squinting as she smiled with a drunken mirth. “You’re not lying to me, are you? You really showed it to him?”
Bridge pointed at his chest. “Would I lie? You can stand on me.”
Leaning over with lustful intent, she breathlessly cooed, “Oooooo, Bridgie! And he liked it?” Bridge lied again with a nod. “You want another audition
, baby?” Her breath was thick with alcohol. Bridge could just imagine Aristotle smirking behind him. He turned her around and extricated himself from her cloying grasp as delicately as he could.
“Another time, baby, I’ve got business to attend to. I’ll call you.” With that lie, he was away, his eye locked on Barney, ignoring the hurt expression darkening her features. ‘The things I do for guilt-free sex,’ he thought.
Barney was mumbling something as he opened the door to the alleyway, but Bridge couldn’t hear it over the awful music that engulfed the club’s interior. A sickly orange light flooded into the club through the open doorway, almost painfully bright in contrast to the flashing darkness of the interior. Bridge rubbed his eyes as he crossed the threshold, a piercing headache beginning behind his eyes as his pulse quickened in dread of the coming violence.
“Nicky said you gotta come quick, Bridge,” Barney muttered. Like most hard cases, he went by a wholly unflattering nickname not of his choosing. Bridge wasn’t sure what his given name was, but everyone called him Barney because his nasally voice bore an unfortunate resemblance to the purple dinosaur from a childhood TV show. Bridge had only seen the show on some backwater GlobalNet site after Nicky told him the origin of the nickname, but the comparison was hilariously apt. His gangly form and mopey eyes didn’t help matters.
“I’m coming, Barney, I’m coming,” Bridge replied irritably. He looked down at his feet to acclimate his eyes to the changing light. It wasn’t that the alley was overly bright, but his eyes always adjusted slowly. The fact that he slept such weird hours never helped. He cursed under his breath at a flier that had gotten stuck to his shoe. The alley was full of them, glossy political fliers with embedded video, namdded vistumping for the upcoming Los Angeles mayoral race. Bridge peeled the flier off with his other foot, spitting on the video of the current asshole in charge, Oliver Sunderland. Bridge didn’t have much respect for any politicians, but that grinning bastard earned Bridge’s special contempt for being a corporate-appointed shill.
Last year had been a nightmare year for America in general, but particularly for Los Angeles. The United States government had gone bankrupt in late 2026. Bridge didn’t understand all the talking head blather about how a government that printed its own money could go bankrupt but the effect was clear. The government had no money, which meant the state of California had no money, and the city in turn had no money. The politicians in Washington had spent 2026 bickering with their thumbs up their asses instead of figuring out how to fix the problem, while the states and cities suffered. Los Angeles was a picture of what Aristotle called class inequity in still life, upper crust assholes with gold-plated swimming pools and gated communities living blocks from drug-infested shitholes where the poor shot each other over neckbones. Bridge lived among the shit-upon, the people who relied on food stamps and free clinics to live something close to a normal life. First the government food dried up and then the free clinics closed. City workers were sent home without pay. Crime skyrocketed as people got desperate, and the cops who hadn’t been laid off to cut costs started walking off the job when their paychecks stopped coming. Riots followed hunger like thunder follows lightning.
Then along come the corporations. Congress signed the Local Governance License Act of 2027, and suddenly megacorporations like Chronosoft were allowed to bid for Local Governance Licenses, or LGL’s. The government handed civil administration of Los Angeles to Chronosoft for a song. They established Chronosoft Law Enforcement Division or CLED, who were much better at policing Bridge’s information trade than LAPD. Their board of directors appointed a city council with Sunderland as mayor. The LGL was allowed to run for one year with appointed officials, and that year was up. Elections were four days away, and based on the number of Sunderland fliers in the alleyway, he was trying damned hard to keep his LGL gravy train rolling.
Bridge held the whole LGL scheme in contempt. It was bad enough when giant corporations paid lobbyists to pillage the country legally, even worse when the government gave them control over virtual city-states. CLED’s efficiency led Bridge to change illicit careers. Information theft was a definite crime, but now Bridge worked in a grey area of legality. That didn’t stop most CLED officers from trying to squeeze him for information but as long as he didn’t touch any of the goods, they had no real legal leverage over him. That left many of them to use extralegal leverage. LAPD had been easy to deal with in comparison. Grease the right palms with a pittance and you were golden. It wasn’t as if the cops had been paid worth shit, so any extra income was welcomed by all but the hardcore crusaders. CLED, on the other hand, paid their officers handsomely and gave them carte blanche to actually enforce whatever laws Sunderland’s government laid down. Bridge couldn’t afford to bribe CLED officers, he had to finesse them.
Bridge started to complain, “Now what is so important…” but he never finished the sentence. Caught in mid-stride by a punch to the gut, he doubled over with a loud exhalation. One of Nicky’s boys had come from behind the dumpster to the left while Bridge was distracted by the flier, s. the fldelivering a blow that left him gasping for air. He managed to stay on his feet, but only by leaning on the dumpster. Three more men surrounded him, their shadows growing long over the slick ground. Last night’s rain had pooled in the alley, and the humidity still hung in the air, causing Bridge’s back to break out in a thin line of sweat. Bridge gasped, “I assume there’s a problem?”
“You goddamn right, dere’s a problem!” Nicky shouted from over Bridge’s right shoulder. Bridge heard Nicky’s pimp cane tapping the pavement, and there he was, dressed in the finest white Egyptian cotton suit, a purple and gold tie setting off the stark whiteness of the suit with almost painful intensity, fat cheeks pouring over the coat’s high collar. Nicky never could let go of his LSU roots, garish “Geaux Tigers” colors queering up what would otherwise be acceptable fashion sense. “We got a big fucking problem dere.”
“I’m sure we can discuss it rationally like two grown men,” Bridge responded, finally able to stand his full six feet again. He spared a glance at Aristotle, who stood with arms folded trying to look mean and succeeding. A few of Nicky’s guys were eyeing his stance nervously. They weren’t used to fighting people with the ability to fight back, but Aristotle’s non-threatening body language confused their limited intelligence.
“No, we done passed the point of rational men, Bridge. You set me up a doser.”
Bridge thought back over his recent dealings with Nicky. He would much rather never know a guy like Nicky, but in his business, pickiness was not an option.
The transplanted Cajun ran a crew of thieves and leg-breakers, passing money up the chain of organized crime to people with much more juice. He was just as likely to steal goods from shipping trucks as he was to steal credit information from GlobalNet accounts, and never without a healthy dose of needless violence. Where other criminals were elegant, Nicky was a rabid dog. He liked hurting people. Bridge had set him up with a hacker, a generally reliable scrub named Z@m@, for some big heist Nicky had planned. “Z@m@’s clean, Nicky. He swore to me he was clean.”
“He coulda swore he was the Queen of Fuckin’ England, and he still woulda been lying. He got nicked selling a month’s worth of Trip to undercover CLED. Now he’s doing a dime upstate and I got no hacker.” Nicky leaned angrily on the cane. “So I’m taking it out of yo’ ass.” He nodded tersely to his crew, but they hesitated, eyes glued to the giant bodyguard. Nicky cocked his head, eyeing Aristotle with a petulant squint. “We gonna have an issue with dat, big man?”
Aristotle shook his head, his hands held out in front of him in a gesture of peace. “I don’t pay him enough to sully his hands on your boys,” Bridge quipped with a resigned sigh.
“Maybe you oughtta t’ink ‘bout dat dere,” Nicky snickered. “Might save you a few teeth.”
“I got expenses. Just don’t bust my face too much. Clients don’t react well to black eyes.” The crew started to close in on Bri
dge. He raised his hands for one final plea. “Look, what can I do to make this up? I did dois up? n’t know he was on Trip. Hell, half of these guys are on it 24/7 and you’d never know it. Most of ‘em claim it makes them better crackers. I can get you another guy!”
“Oh, you gon’ do dat, sucker. But I can’t just let you off with a warning. You got to pay a fee for my time and trouble, or else da’ community gon’ t’ink I’m weak.” The first blow caught Bridge across the back of his legs, bringing him down to his knees in a puddle with a splashy thud. It felt like a bat or a club. A boot landed squarely in his breadbasket, sending the air rushing out of his body again. A fist across his jaw made him angry.
“FUCK, Joey, I told you not the face!” Bridge mumbled over a swelling jaw. He spit a bloody mess on the ground.
“Sorry, Bridge,” Joey offered with a sheepish grin. Bridge had hooked him up with a digital pimp that provided virtual ageplay scenarios. Joey liked the jailbait, but Nicky frowned on his boys cruising the high schools, so cyberbait was the solution. Another shot with the club across Bridge’s back put his face on the ground, a wet, gritty mess sticking to his clean-shaven cheek.
The blows came in slow, measured succession. They weren’t really trying to damage him, just make it hurt while having a bit of fun. Each hardguy took a turn, planting a kick in his ribs or a punch to his gut. The blows started to merge into one series of painful flashes when he heard one of his attackers scream out in pain. The beating ceased, the shuffle of feet replacing the sickening thuds of fists on flesh.
“What the hell’s going on here?” yelled a female voice infused with a steel-edged air of authority. It took Bridge a moment to recover his senses enough to recognize the voice. Silence followed her initial question. “I asked you what’s going on here. Now am I going to get an answer or do I have to haul you all in?”
