The Littlest Jackal

by Bruce Sterling

  "Have a cigarette," said Raf sympathetically, shaking his pack. "I can see that you need one."

  "Thanks." Starlitz lit a Gauloise. "Video's all over the place nowadays. Banks got videos ... hotels got videos ... groceries ... cash machines ... cop cars ... Man, I hate video. I always hated video. Nowadays, video is really getting on my nerves."

  "It's panoptic surveillance," said Raf. "It's the Spectacle."

  Starlitz blew smoke and grunted.

  "We should discuss this matter further," Raf said intently. "Work in the Struggle requires a solid theoretical 'grounding. Then you can focus this instinctive proletarian resentment into a coherent revolutionary response." He began sawing through a wrapped brick of Semtex with a butterknife from the kitchen drawer.

  Starlitz ripped the plastique to chunks and stuffed them into his baggy pockets.

  The door opened. Aino had returned. She had a companion: a very tall and spectrally pale young Finn with an enormous cotton-candy wad of steely purple hair. He wore a pearl-buttoned cowboy shirt and leather jeans. A large gold ring pierced his nasal septum and hung over his upper lip.

  "Who is this?" smiled Raf, swiftly tucking the Makarov into the back of his belt.

  "This is Eero," said Aino. "He programs. For the movement."

  Eero gazed at the floor with a diffident shrug. "Many people are better hackers than myself." His eyes widened suddenly. "Oh. Nice guns!"

  "This is our safe house," said Raf.

  Eero nodded. The tip of his tongue stole out and played nervously with the dangling gold ring.

  "Eero came quickly so we could get started at once," Aino said. She looked at the greasy arsenal with mild disdain, the way one might look at a large set of unattractive wedding china. "Now where is the money?"

  Starlitz and Raf exchanged glances.

  "I think what Raf is trying to say," said Starlitz gently, "is that traditionally you don't bring a contact to the safehouse. Safehouses are for storing weapons and sleeping. You meet contacts in open-air situations or public locales. It's just a standard way of doing business."

  Aino was wounded. "Eero's okay! We can trust him. Eero's in my sociology class."

  "I'm sure Eero is fine," said Raf serenely.

  "He brought a cell-phone," Starlitz said, glancing at the holster on Eero's chrome-studded leather belt. "Cops and spooks can track people's movements through mobile cellphones."

  "It's all right," Raf said gallantly. "Eero is your friend, my dear, so we trust him. Next time we are a bit more careful with our operational technique. Okay?" Raf spread his hands, judiciously. "Comrade Eero, since you're here, take a little something. Have a grenade."

  "Truly?" said Eero, with a self-effacing smile. "Thank you." He tried stuffing a pineapple, without success, into the tight leather pocket of his jeans.

  "Where is the money?" Arno repeated.

  Raf shook his head gently. "I'm sure Mister Starlet is not so foolish to bring so much cash to our first meeting."

  "The cash is at a dead drop," Starlitz said. "That's a standard method of transferral. That way, if you're surveilled, the oppo can't make out your contacts."

  "The tactical teachings of good old Patrice Lumumba University," said Raf cheerfully. "You were an alumnus, Starlet?"

  "Nope," said Starlitz. "Never was the Joe College type. But the Russian mob's chock-full of Lumumba grads."

  "I understand this money transfer tactic," murmured Eero, swinging the grenade awkwardly at the end of one bony wrist. "It's like an anonymous remailer at an Internet site. Removing accountability."

  "Is the money in US dollars?" said Aino.

  Raf pursed his lips. "We don't accept any so-called dollars that come from Russia, remember? Too much fresh ink."

  "It's in yen," said Starlitz. "Three point two million US."

  Raf brightened. "Point two?"

  "It was three mill when we finalized the deal, but the yen had another uptick. Consider it a little gift from our Tokyo contacts. Don't launder it all in one place."

  "That's good news," said Aino, with a tender smile.

  Starlitz turned to Eero. "Is that enough bread to get you and your friends set up in the Alands with the networked Suns?"

  Eero blinked limpidly. "The workstations have all arrived safely. No more problems in America with computer export restrictions. We could ship American computers straight to Russia if we liked."

  "That's swell. Any problem getting proper crypto?"

  Eero picked at a purple wisp of hair with his free hand. "The Dutch have been most understanding."

  "Any problem leasing the bank building in the Alands, then?"

  "We bought the building. With money to spare. It was a cannery, but the Baltic has been driftnetted, so... . "Eero shrugged his bony shoulders. "It has a little Turkish restaurant next door. So the programmers have plenty of pilaf and shashlik. Finn programmers ... we like our pilaf."

  "Pilaf!" Raf enthused, all jolliness. "I haven't had a decent pilaf since Beirut."

  Starlitz narrowed his eyes. "How about your personnel? Any problems there?"

  Eero nodded. "We wish we had more people on the start-up, of course. Technical start-ups always want more people. Still, we have enough Finnish hackers to boot and run your banking system. We are mostly very young people, but if those Russian maths professors can log in from Leningrad -sorry, Petersburg--then we should have no big problems. The Russian maths people, they were all unemployed unfortunately for them. But they are very good programmers, very solid skills. The only problem with our many young hackers from Finland... . " Eero absently switched the grenade from hand to hand. "Well, we are so very excited about the first true Internet money-laundry. We tried very hard not to talk, not to tell anyone what we are doing, but ... well, we're so proud of the work."

  "Tell your mouse-jockeys to sit on the news a while longer," Starlitz said.

  "Really, it's too late," Eero told him meekly.

  Starlitz frowned. "Well, how many goddamn people have you Finn cowboys let in on this thing, for Christ's sake?"

  "How many people read the alt newsgroups?" Eero said. "I don't have those figures, but there's alt.hack, alt.2600, alr.smash.the.state, alt.fan.blacknet... . Many."

  Starlitz ran his hand over his head. "Right," he said. Like most Internet disasters, the situation was a fait accompli. "Okay, that development has torn it big-time. Aino, you did right to bring this guy here right away. The hell with proper operational protocol. We gotta get that bank up and running as soon as possible."

  "There's nothing wrong with publicity," Raf said. "We need publicity to attract business."

  "There'll be business all right," Starlitz said. "The Russian mob is already running the biggest money-laundry since the Second World War. The arms and narco crowd worldwide are banging down the doors. Black electronic cash is a vital component of the emergent global system. The point is -- we got a very narrow window of opportunity here. If our little crowd is gonna get anything out of this set-up, we have gotta be there with a functional online money-laundry just when the system really needs one. And just before everybody else realizes that."

  "Then publicity is vital," Raf insisted. "Publicity is our oxygen! With a major development like this one, you must seize and create your own headlines. It's like Leila Khaled always says: 'The world has to hear our voice.'"

  Aino blinked. "Is Leila Khaled still alive?"

  "Leila lives!" Raf said. "Wonderful woman, Leila Khaled. She does social work in Damascus with the orphans of the Intifada. Soon she will be in the new Palestinian government."

  "Leila Khaled," said Aino thoughtfully. "I envy her historical experience so much. There's something so direct and healthy and physical about hijacking planes."

  Eero couldn't seem to find a place inside his clothing for the grenade. Finally he placed it daintily on the kitchen counter and regarded it with morose respect.

  "Any other questions?" Raf asked Starlitz.

  "Yeah, plenty," Starlitz said.
"The Organizatsiya's got their pet Russian math professors working the technical problems. I figure the Russians can hack the math -- Russians do great at that. But black-market online money laundering is a commercial customer service operation. Customer service is definitely not a Russian specialty."

  "So?"

  "So we can't hang around waiting for clearance from Moscow Mafia muckety-mucks. If this scheme is gonna work, we gotta slam it together and get it online pronto. We need quick results."

  "Then you have the right man," said Raf briskly. "I always specialize in quick results." He shook Eero's hand. "You've been very helpful, Eero. It was pleasant to meet you. Enjoy your stay in the islands. We look forward to further constructive contacts. Viva la revolucion digitale! Goodbye and good luck."

  "You don't have the big money for us yet?" Eero said.

  "Real soon now," Starlitz said.

  "Could I have some cab fare please?"

  Starlitz gave him a 100-mark Jean Sibelius banknote. "Hei hei," Eero said, with a melancholy smile. He tucked the note into his cowboy shirt pocket and left.

  Starlitz saw the hacker to the door, and checked the street as the cadaverous Finn ambled off. He was unsurprised to see Khoklov's two bodyguards lurking clumsily in a white Hertz rental car, parked up the street. Presumably they were relaying signals from the plethora of covert listening devices that the Russians had installed in Raf's safe-house.

  Eero drifted past the Russian mobsters in a daze of hacker self-absorption. Starlitz found the kid an interesting specimen. In Japan there were plenty of major Goth kids, but the vampire people-in-black contingent had never really crossbred with Japan's hacker population. Here in Finland, though, there were somber and lugubrious hairsprayed Cure fans pretty much across the social spectrum: car repair guys, hotel staff, pizza delivery, government clerks, the works.

  When Starlitz returned, Raf was hunting in the kitchen for coffee. "Aino, let's review the political situation."

  Aino perched obediently on a birchwood kitchen stool. "The Aland Islands are a chain in the Gulf of Bothnia between Finland and Sweden. They include Aland, Foglo, Kokar, Sottunga, Kumlinge, and Brando."

  "Yeah, right, okay," Starlitz grunted.

  "The largest city is Mariehamm with ten thousand inhabitants." She paused. "That's where the autonomous digital bank will be established."

  "We're doing great so far."

  "There are twenty-five thousand Aland citizens, mostly farmers and fishery people, but thirty percent are engaged in the tourist industry. They run small-scale casinos and duty-free shops. The Alands are a popular day-tripping destination from continental Europe."

  Starlitz nodded. He'd seen the shortlist of potential candidates for a Russian offshore banking set-up. The Alands offered the tastiest possibilities.

  Aino sat up straighter. "The inhabitants are Swedish-speaking ethnics. In 1920, against their will and against a popular plebiscite, they were ceded to Finland as part of a negotiated settlement by the now-extinct League of Nations. In truth these oppressed people are neither Swedes nor Finns. They are Alanders."

  "The islands' national liberation will proceed along two fronts," said Raf, deftly setting a coffeepot to boil. "The first is the Aland Island Liberation Front, which is, essentially, my operation. The second front is Aino's people from the university, the Suomi Anti-Imperialist Cells, who make it their cause to end the shameful injustice of Finnish imperialism. The outbreak of armed struggle and a terror campaign will provoke domestic crisis in Finland. The cheapest and easiest apparent solution will be to grant full autonomy to the Alands. Since the islands are an easy day-trip from Petersburg this will leave the Organizatsiya with a free hand for their banking operations."

  "You're a busy guy, Raf."

  "I've been resting on my laurels long enough," said Raf, carefully rinsing three spanking-new coffee mugs. "It's a new Europe now. Many fantastic new opportunities."

  "Level with me. Do any of these Aland Island hicks really want independence? They seem to be doing okay just as they are."

  Raf, surprised at the question, smiled.

  Aino frowned. "Much work remains to be done in the way of raising revolutionary consciousness in the Alands. But we in the Suomi Anti-Imperialist Cells will have the resources to do that political work. Victory will be ours, because the Finnish liberal-fascist state does not have the capacity to restrain a captive nation against its will. Or if they do --" She smiled bitterly. "That will demonstrate the tenuousness of the current Finnish regime and its basic failure as a European state."

  "Who have we got on the ground in the Alands who can speak their local weirdo version of Swedish? Just in case we need to, like, phone in a claim or something."

  "We have three people," Raf said. "The new premier, the new foreign minister, and of course the new economics minister, who will be in charge of easing things for the Russian operations. They are the shadow cabinet of the Alands Republic."

  "Three people?"

  "Three people are plenty! There are only twenty-five thousand of them total. If the projections are right, the offshore bank will be clearing twenty-five million dollars in the first six months! Those islands are little rocks. It's potatoes and fish and casinos for rich Germans. The locals aren't players. The mob and their friends can buy them all."

  "They matter," Aino said. "They matter to the Movement."

  "But of course."

  "The Alands deserve their nation. If they don't deserve their nation, then we Finns don't deserve our nation. There are only five million Finns."

  "We always yield to political principle," said Raf indulgently. He passed her a brimming mug. "Drink your coffee. You need to go to work."

  Aino glanced at her watch, surprised. "Oh. Yes."

  "Shall I cut the hash into gram bags? Or will you take the brick?"

  She blinked. "You don't have to cut it, Raffi. They can cut it at the bar."

  Raf opened one of the sports bags and passed her a fat brick of dope neatly wrapped in a Copenhagen newspaper.

  "You work in a bar? That's a good cover job," Starlitz said. "What kind of hash is that?"

  "Something very new in Europe," Raf said. "It's Azerbaijani hash."

  "Ex-Soviet hash isn't really very good," sniffed Aino. "They don't know how to do it right... . I don't like to sell hash. But if you sell people drugs, then they respect you. They won't talk about you when cops come. I hate cops. Cops are fascist torturers. They should all be shot. Do you need the car, Raf?"

  "Take the car," Raf said.

  Aino fetched her purse and left the safehouse.

  "Interesting girl," commented Starlitz, in the sudden empty silence. "Never heard of any Finn terror groups before. Germans, French, Irish, Basques, Croats, Italians. Never Finns, though."

  "They're a bit behind the times in this corner of Europe. She's one of the new breed. Very brave. Very determined. It's a hard life for terrorist women." Raf carefully sugared his coffee. "Women never get proper credit. Women kidnap ministers, women blow up trains -- women do very well at the work. But no one calls them 'armed revolutionaries.' They're always -- what does the press say? -- 'maladjusted female neurotics.' Or ugly hardened lesbians with a father-figure complex. Or cute little innocents, seduced and brain-washed by the wrong sort of man." He snorted.

  "Why do you say that?" Starlitz said.

  "I'm a man of my generation, you know." Raf sipped his coffee. "Once, I wasn't advanced in my feminist thinking. It was being close to Ulrike that raised my consciousness. Ulrike Meinhoff. A wonderful girl. Gifted journalist. Smart. Eloquent. Very ruthless. Quite good-looking. But Baader and that other one -- what was her name? They treated her so badly. Always yelling at her in the safehouse--calling her a gutless intellectual, spoilt child of the bourgeoisie and so forth. My God, aren't we all spoilt children of the bourgeoisie? If the bourgeoisie hadn't made a botch of us, we wouldn't need to kill them."

  A car pulled up outside. The engine died and doors slammed.

>   Starlitz walked to the front window, peeked through the blind.

  "It's the yuppies from next door," he said. "Looks like they're home early."

  "We should introduce ourselves," Raf said. He began combing his hair.

  "Uh-oh, scratch that," Starlitz said. "That's the guy who lives next door all right, but that's not the woman. He's got a different woman."

  "A girlfriend?" Raf said with interest.

  "Well, it's a much younger woman. In a wig, net hose and red high heels." The door in the next duplex opened and slammed. A stereo came on. It was playing a hot Cuban rhumba.

  "This is a golden opportunity," said Raf, shoving his coffee mug aside. "Let's introduce ourselves now as his new neighbors. He'll be very embarrassed. He'll never look at us again. He'll never question us. Also, he'll keep his wife away from us."

  "That's a good tactic," Starlitz said.

  "All right. Let me do the talking." Raf went to the door.

  "You still got that Makarov in the back of your belt, man."

  "Oh yes. Sorry." Raf tossed the pistol onto the sleek Finnish couch.

  Raf opened the front door. Then he back-stepped deftly back into the apartment and shut the door firmly. "There's a white rental car on the street."

  "Yeah?"

  "Two men inside it."

  "Yeah?"

  "Someone just shot them."

  Starlitz hurried to the window. There were half a dozen people clustered across the street. Two of them had just murdered Khoklov's bodyguards, suddenly emptying silenced pistols through the closed glass of the windows. The street was not entirely deserted, but killing people with silenced pistols was a remarkably unobtrusive affair if done with brio and accuracy.

  Four men began crossing the street. They wore jeans, jogging shoes, and, despite the heat, box-cut Giorgio Armani blazers. Two of them were carrying dainty little videocams. All of them were carrying guns.

  "Zionists," Raf announced. Briskly, but without haste, he retreated to his arsenal on the kitchen floor. He slung an AK over his shoulder, propped a second assault rifle within easy reach, then knelt around the corner of the kitchen wall, giving himself a clear line of fire at the front door.