Linfell sets the notebook down and pinches her nose. Then she gets up and starts stretching.
“How far’d you get?” Roger asks, setting his phone down.
“About halfway through. Just to the end of the fourth week.”
“What do you think so far?”
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were wasting my time. She’s just whining about her boyfriend. This isn’t how I pictured the life of some terrorists. There’s nothing about their organization or their plans, aside from that cheap disguise, which we already know about.”
“Keep reading. It gets better. And we have time.”
“I clock out in three hours. And I still have to brief Silus.”
“Trust me.”
Linfell rolls her eyes and keeps reading.
---
“I don’t get it. If things are so bad here, why don’t people demand better conditions like what we learned about in school?” I asked one of the few times Touch and I could talk. It was a little dishonest. I didn’t really care about the answer. My policy is simple: live and let live, and do your best to be a good influence. I don’t like talking about what other people should do. I’d rather stay out of other people’s business and they stay out of mine. But this was the only way I could think of getting him to open up. He loves these kinds of questions, and he never has anyone to talk about them with.
“Before,” he said, “the people had a government to protect them. Now that the role of writing and enforcing laws has been privatized, there’s no one to stop private businesses from cutting corners to get ahead of the competition. Or use violence to quell unruly crowds.”
“What about the people?”
“What about them? The only people corporations have to worry about are the middle-class consumers and the high-class stock holders. So long as they keep them satisfied, then those people won’t care to organize against the ruling party. Us here in the ever expanding lower class are kept in constant fear of losing what little we have. No one can afford to even think about change. We’re all exhausted from work and stressed about money. Even if we all start to organize, we can’t pool enough resources to make a difference. Even if we could, they control the media. They can afford deadlier weapons for their soldiers. It’s possible, but largely impractical.
This is precisely why places like the towns abolished money. It’s simply a means of control and a tool to dominate. It is also the most limiting factor to an economy. No one had to wait on money to come in to start contributing to the community.”
“And there were no classes or ruling party.”
“Technically there are, you have the workers who own and operate everything collectively. Then you have the unregistered contributors like you and me, who technically have no rights or authority.”
“But practically we did.”
“As opposed to here, where we technically have rights and freedoms protected…”
“But practically we don’t…”
I think it worked. Touch seemed to cheer up throughout the week. He came home later a few nights. So it seems he also found a new hobby or a friend to elevate his spirits. Maybe he was seeing Fay.
I continued putting almost all of my free time in searching for a better job. I even found a few safe networks to connect to while at work, close to a few shops in midtown with safe enough wifi.
My mind keeps coming back to finding illegal jobs to do for money. It’s the only thing I can find that stands a chance of making real money and getting us out of here. There were plenty of things I could do where no one would get hurt; I could smuggle harmless goods that rich people just didn’t want to pay taxes on. There were plenty of cries for help, begging for someone to steal food, water, and medicine for families all across the city.
But it’s too dangerous. I don’t know the people I would be getting involved with, or where such a path would lead. As much as I hate to admit it, I can’t afford to take time off work to do some good samaritan work for free, not when I have my own people to worry about. I gave my word to the couple running the Little Village. I can’t just betray their trust, especially when my actions can blow back on them.
Toward the end of our sixth week, I read an article about a string of break-ins and robberies across the upper and middle parts of town. Someone had been breaking into unoccupied homes and businesses, stealing valuables and luxury items over the past two weeks. The article said it was the work of a local gang, with the only eye witness claiming they saw a lone man covered head to toe in black leaving the scene.
Something about this felt off, so I started scouring the nets.
After sorting out the blatant speculations and rumors, I found several stories about someone leaving food, medicine, and other necessities throughout the poor ends of the city. Which didn’t match what was stolen, but the two events were happening at the same time.
On the same nights Touch was coming home late…
I took a deep breath and tried to calm down. I couldn’t even kid myself into thinking he wouldn’t do this. It fit his MO perfectly. Steal from the rich and give to the poor, while also making enough on the side to leave this city for good. He wasn’t above working with local gangs to make something like this happen, so long as he was still the one calling the shots. It was non-violent, done where there was no chance of someone getting hurt, and there was no one working with him to mess up his plans.
If this was him, he was letting a local gang tip him off. He’d go in and steal valuables that no one was going to miss in the grand scheme of things. Then use most of his cut to have this gang deliver to those in need throughout the city.
It was perfect. This was his way of striking back against the system he hated so much. But it’s still too dangerous. And it had to stop...
I stayed up late and waited for him to come home from his shift, hoping this wasn’t going to be a late night. I kept my stylus sword in my pocket. We’ve been traveling together for nearly two months out of necessity. He’s showed me so much, taught me how to survive out here. But whether I liked it or not, we weren’t friends. There is still so much I don’t know about him. I let myself forget that, feeling sorry for him. I didn’t know how he was going to react to being cornered and confronted like this. I’ve seen how scary he can get to those who cross him.
My gut still said he was alright. My gut said he was smart enough to do the right thing, and he had the heart to do them for the right reasons. He’s been nothing but straight with me this whole time. But I couldn’t take the chance that I was wrong about him, not when I was out here all alone, not when I still had my family to get back to.
I put Arch in my room and left Dill out here with me. I felt bad, but if things went side ways, Arch favored Touch, and he could take me down in a single zap.
Dill hasn’t shown any combat capability yet, but holding his soft, warm body brought me comfort. He was smart enough to hide if things got too exciting.
He came home at his usual time, around four, pausing at the entrance to the living room.
“Is everything ok?” He looked worried about me. My heart skipped a beat and my palms were sweaty. There was no turning back. I stood up, one hand in my pocket, gripping the stylus.
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“The break-ins, that you?” My mouth was dry.
He released a deep breath; the tension draining out of him.
“Yes. But everyone’s ok? Where’s Arch?” he asked.
“Everyone’s fine. Arch is in my room. This has to stop right now.”
“This is the only way to get what we need.” he says as if we’ve already been through this before, like he’s tired of having this conversation over and over again. “This place is a trap, and I need to get out of here. I’m making sure no one is getting hurt, and I’m not helping anyone do anything dangerous. They give me locations, I scout them myself, then I hit them when and if I chose. Then sell what I get, back to the people tipping me off.”
“I know. I also know most of your cut goes straight to providing people with food, water, medicine.” His eyes widened for a beat. One of the few times I was able to get one up on him. He never thought I’d dig that deep.
He recovered quickly, I continued. “What you’re doing isn’t wrong. I’ve been wanting to do the same thing. But it’s too dangerous, one wrong move and it all traces back to this place. You can’t keep putting these people in danger.”
“I know that. I’m being careful and taking only what I know I can handle. And I know I can only do this for a short time before people start coming up with countermeasures to get me; more secure buildings, storing valuables elsewhere, increased patrols, trap houses, guards. Even if I’m spotted, nothing will trace back to here. I’m making sure of it.”
“No matter how good you are, you can still get caught! You can do everything perfectly, but still just get unlucky. You know that! It’s fine if you want to take that risk yourself, but you can’t thrust that burden on everyone else, especially if they don’t know the danger you’re putting them in!”
His eyes fall down to the floor.
“I know, I just… don’t know what else to do… This is the only way to fight back. This is the only way to get out of here, to redistribute things a little more fairly, to leave things a little better than how I found them.”
Then he looks me in the eye again.
“There’s no getting around it.” He continues as he digs something out of his pack. “You’re right, there’s always the chance things can go wrong and blow back on these people.” He looks up at me again, holding up a thick bronze and silver cylinder with a thumb switch on it, “But I’m right, we need the money. What if you're attacked by mechs again? We could never afford this EMP, or even know where to find it, if we all kept our heads down and do as we're told. Playing by the rules will get us nowhere. I only need to do it a little longer, then we can go. But I’ll leave it up to you; if you ask me to stop, I’ll stop.”
I didn’t hesitate. I already thought this through, and it seems Touch did as well. We just reached different conclusions with the same information. Nothing new was said.
“Put a stop to it. But tell me, why did you keep this from me?”
“I already thought through how you would react. And I knew putting everyone in danger was wrong. But I’m just so angry I let myself forget, and I knew you would remind me and talk me out of it. I figured you would find out, eventually.”
“Then what was the point? Why spill the beans as soon as I ask? You didn’t even try to hide it.”
“I may have my secrets, or I’ll let people make assumptions, but I won’t lie. Not to you... If you ever want to know something, just ask.”
“Ok, how did you get involved with these guys? And are they going to come looking for you?”
Touch explained how he and his coworkers were approached by an importer from the docks. He offered to pay them to allow his men to smuggle goods through the empty drainage system, to avoid taxes. Touch convinced his coworkers to only accept if they could inspect whatever the smugglers brought through, and they would only allow certain items. The importer agreed to this, which is when Touch got his “raise”. I realized before, when he said he was getting more money, I just assumed he meant a raise.
But after AriCorp started moving against the shelters, Touch decided to reach out for higher paying jobs. A few days later, the importer put him in contact with a group of delivery drivers, separate from Jonah’s crew, that would chat up the locals to find out when houses and certain businesses would be empty, and what kind of security they had. So the drivers would tip him off, he’d move in, and the importer would buy the stolen goods.
As a bonus, he paid the drivers to drop off supplies throughout the city. The supplies were bought under the name of one of the importer’s associates, and officially brought to their building, but in reality, delivered off the record to the needy.
As I thought, Touch was calling all the shots. He let these people know he would have to disappear one day, so they made sure every interaction left no unsettled debt. And they knew not to look for him.
The next night, Touch let his people know that the break-ins were done for. Any more would start bringing too much heat. And that was the end of it.
Over the weeks since I got Touch his bandages for his disguise, he’s been using them to walk around town and sell our cover. Everyone in the Little Village knew how to keep their neighbors’ business a secret. Their lives depended on it; both to keep enforcers out of their neighborhood and to keep gangs from coming after them.
Same with the people on watch with Touchstone. No one outside them and the Village knew about Touch’s true identity, and rumor of the loving Asian-American daughter working to keep her crippled and dying dad alive spread throughout the lower ends of the city. They eventually got used to seeing Touch, going by Henderson, limping around the streets, occasionally going on walks to keep his frail body from wasting away completely.
After a few attempted muggings, people learned that ‘Henderson’s’ cane was used for more than just walking. He never carried anything worth the risk, so they left him alone. Besides his apparent limp, his illnesses were kept vague enough that people filled in the blanks with wild rumor, which my coworkers and friends from the Village happily shared with me.
Some said he was in constant pain, so it never bothered him. Some said he only suffered from occasional bouts of pain and sickness, only coming out when he was well enough to fight. Some guessed that he was faking it, but their opinions got drowned out in the sea of speculations.
Touch used his outings to scout out the city, gather information, and track the activity of enforcers and gangs. Corporate enforcers stayed out of the lower ends of the city unless they were looking for someone who was causing too much trouble for the middle and upper parts. The lower ends were rife with gangs, snitches, and scam markets.
Gangs mostly stole or extorted money from people, stored valuables imported from the docks in safe-houses, to be sold here in the city or exported elsewhere. If you were employed, you were prayed upon by gangs. If you weren’t, joining a gang was the only way to survive. The Little Village managed to stay out of it because they have a high div population, and they have many people coming and going, so you never knew who were you were dealing with. One wrong move and you could be facing down someone with powers like Arch or Jonah’s coyote with super strength. And the place was close enough to enforcer territory that people could go to work in the inner city unmolested.
Enforcer vans would occasionally roll through, sometimes for simple intimidation, or to storm a building and take people away, where they would sometimes get a trial, or just get thrown into a prison on the outskirts of town and forgotten about; from there, they’re sold into servitude, slavery, or to the labs to contribute to the Aether arms race.
---
“That’s it?” Linfell says.
“Yeah…” Roger says slowly, setting his phone down again.
“There’s nothing in here about a terrorist group, a gang. No future plans, no indication of their next move, no accomplices, nothing.”
“Exactly.”
Linfell smiles. “You’re a genius.”
Linfell actively encouraged people and policy to give leeway to the unregistered lower class so they could pick up all the strays and use them for cheap labor. She had a heavy hand in preventing Aliston from turning into a police state, obstructing policies to install cameras, facial recognition, and other kinds of surveillance everywhere. She had a not-so-subtle hand in shaping the corporate enforcers and many other departments she had no business being involved in.
The stunt these two pulled represents a colossal failure in her strategy and methods. She’s made many enemies, and this incident is just the leverage they need to tear her apart.
So she asked herself the age old question that made her career:
How do I spin this to come out in my favor?
As far as she’s concerned, the Little Village is what kept a hardened fugitive from a different city from turning to a life of crime here. It’s only because of this one disturbed individual ‘Touch’ that the biggest slap in the face of authority this city has seen in a long time happened on Linfell’s watch. He manipulated this girl into helping him, fooling everyone in the Village, leveraging the cities underworld elements to his own gain.
Yes. Linfell needed a boogey man. This journal would need to be rewritten, and the original destroyed.
Just the opposite of what Linfell’s enemies would say, this city needed to double down on their efforts to legitimize and integrate the lower class ‘unregistered’ into their economy. If they did, then they could have been tracking this dangerous man instead of allowing him to prey upon the people of the city. If they go hard on crime, it would only force criminals to get better at hiding and make them even more violent.
Linfell continues rehearsing speeches and proposals in her head until it was time to meet with her boss.