A Curious Tale... 16.

I was left alone for the rest of the day, and thought about my situation. I wasn't scared anymore, as it was obvious they weren't out to hurt me. They gave me good food, gourmet to be honest. Three course meals that came in through a hole in the wall I had thought was seamless. When it closed I still couldn't see the lines that had to be there. These beings were weird, to say the least.
The next day the questions began. And there were so many of them. It was as if they were trying to understand humanity itself. I answered as truthfully as I could, still motivated by a forlorn hope that I'd see Alizé again. I didn't believe I would, as she had died in my arms. Or had she? She definitely wasn't breathing when I held her. I stopped thinking about her and concentrated on the questions. After an indeterminate amount of time and what felt like a hundred meal breaks, I was on question 3951 (What part of their anatomy do you think humans are most attached to?), and I was tired. I fell asleep with my head on the desk, my fingers still on the touch screen.
A few hours later (or maybe more - time had warped itself into unimaginable shapes) and I awoke on the bed. I got up and after God knows how long I eventually finished off the questionnaire, but they weren't through yet. I'd answered 5004 questions (the last one being "Which is worse - dying or living in pain?"), and now they wanted to run tests.
That scared me. I've always been terrified of needles, and that was all I could think of as the chair I has been sitting on strapped me tight and straightened out into an operating table. I lifted my head up a bit to see if there was any way of escaping, but I couldn't even see the straps round my limbs. I seemed to be held in place by nothing at all, but try as I might I couldn't get loose.
A white trench coat walked up and assured me I wouldn't be killed, and that the testing procedure would be painless. Then he put a dark gloved finger on my forehead, and when he took it away I realised he was a she. I was staring at Alizé.
If I could've jumped I would have. As it was my heart started to beat very fast. Too fast, I thought.
"Hi," she said.
"You're... You're dead!" I said.
She walked closer and kissed me lightly. I have never had such a sensory overload.
"Does that feel dead to you?" she asked. I lay there silent, unable to take in what was happening. She gave me a moment to think about it, and I calmed down. I mean, I didn't actually know if she had been dead when she'd collapsed in my arms... It had just been so sudden and had felt so final. She finally tore me from my reverie.
"Does everyone that collapses die?" she asked.
"No," I said, beginning to feel tremendously stupid.
"So why should you think me dead? I was just sedated."
Now I felt stupid. Utterly and completely stupid. I'd been had by my own mind, and it didn't seem fair. Worse still I  had practically been told she was still alive but I'd gone on believing she was dead. Dante wouldn't have been conned so easily. Way to go Einstein.
"Look at it this way." Alizé said. "At least now I know for sure you like me."
True that. I only just realized it myself. Before now I kept telling myself I only reacted out of my sense of right and wrong, nothing more. What a delusional loser.
"Now you have to take these last tests for us," Alizé's voice broke through my thoughts.
"I've already answered all the questions you people asked," more irritated at the confession that she was one of them than the thought of the tests themselves.
"These are medical tests, to find out more about your species."
"I'm far from a perfect specimen," I said. It was true. I'm razor blade thin and have a propensity to illnesses that are more annoying than debilitating.
Alright I was stalling. But who the hell were these aliens to demand that I subject myself to God knows what? It just didn't make any sense. Not to me anyway. At the back of my mind I knew I would take the tests anyway. I knew of no way to escape and frankly it hadn't even crossed my mind. I just hadn't thought of myself as a prisoner. I couldn't. That kind of thought pattern is just foreign to me when I'm getting good food and my mind is kept busy. And anyway I'm used to spending long periods indoors, so it didn't really bother me.
Alizé'd been watching me, trying to gauge my thoughts by the expression on my face. Noticing her I kept a worried mask on.
"Will you take the tests?" she asked finally.
"Yes. It's not like I really have a choice. Why did they send you down here? They would've conducted the tests anyway."
Alizé frowned slightly.
"They didn't," she said. "I thought you'd realise that."
That kept me quiet.

A Curious Tale... 11

She was beautiful. She was dark, curved in all the right places, and had a monster of a smile. She just promised a treat. I wondered what the girl would think when she was picked up in it.

Yes, the reason (or at least one of the reasons - he was also paying me a really neat packet) I’d agreed to Martin’s proposal was parked outside his ridiculously small house on Arbuthnot Road. She was a custom MG XPower SV. We’d always called her the MXT. She looked a bit like a Batmobile, especially with the aerodynamic side grills. And she drove even better. She didn't have a choice really, seeing as she'd cost Martin a quarter of a million credits. I got green just thinking about it. Damn he was rich.

I went down into Martin’s den and saw him painting. He was a really talented painter, but even Da Vinci would have thought twice before buying a C250,000 overcraft on a whim. Martin had simply thought he needed something nicer than his Saab and had somehow gotten in touch with MG, drawn a redesigned XPower, and gotten them to make it somehow.

Maybe I should tell you what Martin did for a real living. He painted incredible forgeries and sold them to less scrupulous art collectors, mostly deposed dictators who Interpol had allowed to keep their assets in return for their abdication when the entire world had gone strangely democratic. Those African and Arab bastards kept Martin well paid and in the lap of luxury. My job so far had been to move the paintings to the international carriers, and that's how I'd become reasonably wealthy in my own right. I still wasn't the tiniest scratch on Martin though.

Enough of my envy. It won't tell the story anyway. So in short, I got the keys from Martin, hopped into the MXT and started driving. New Cross to Peckham. The plan was to pick Alizé, the girl, up from Argos in Peckham and take her to Argos in Lewisham. Which to me was just the silliest idea I'd ever heard. Brilliant for a kidnap, because no one would ever think to take a hostage INTO Argos if they hadn't been there before, but silly because there's always a ton of people in Argos, anyone of whom could become a hero. Whatever. That wasn't my concern. I was going to pick her up at Argos and take her to Argos. Simple.

I was thinking all this as I was driving, and by the time I focused on the mission again I was already in Peckham. I stopped and looked for an unobtrusive place to park the eye-popping car. I decided on a side road opposite a shop selling brandless ancient Italian shoes. I walked into Argos and looked around. The normal queues, some people buzzing around catalogues wondering what on earth brought them into the store but determined not to leave until they'd bought something utterly useless.

Then I heard someone call my name and turned around and stared into the very composed stare of a girl in her late teens. She asked me if I was ready to leave because she was tired of waiting in the store. I didn't say a word and I'll tell you why.

She was beautiful. She was dark, curved in all the right places, and had a monster of a smile.

A Curious Tale... 10

It’s weird how criminals can spot one another. We both knew the other had done something crooked in the past, it just kind of showed.   
Anyway as you might have guessed I soon started driving for him. I told him it would only be a short term thing, and I meant it in the beginning, but I'm not that smart. I'm not being self-deprecating or humble or anything silly like that. I just am not as smart as a lot of people think I am. I've always been good at getting people to believe what I tell them. I don't know what it is, they just do. Most of the time anyway. And I had Dante around for far too long. I miss her. Awesome, amazing Dante.
Anyway when Martin told me he had something legal he wanted me to do I took it with several pinches of salt; a whole cruet in fact. I’d been driving for a couple of years and I hadn’t made a single completely honest taxi run yet. There was always something or another that someone or another would pay massively to obtain. He started off by assuring me that it wasn't criminal, just had to be kept intensely secret. That raised an eyebrow. He also said it was vitally important.
He said he needed me to help him pick up a young girl somewhere in Peckham, and get her to Lewisham.
"But that's hardly worth my time!" I said, incredulous. "She could just hop on the bus!"
I didn't work for him any more. I now had my own fleet of taxicraft. I wasn't rich, nowhere near as wealthy as Martin, but I was doing well on my own, and he didn't begrudge me my independence. He was a good friend. The only one I had really, now I didn't have Dante any more.
"I know," he said, his voice smooth. Too smooth if you ask me. But you won't and he didn't, so my opinion counted for nix right then. Unless I said I wasn't gonna do it. But he knew I eventually would.
I did make him sweat for it though.
"I ain't doing it." That's what I said next.
"Why not," he said, pretending to be taken aback even though he knew I wouldn't be fooled, just like he knew I couldn't refuse him.
"Because if it were that simple, you bloody well do it yourself, wouldn't you?"
"Yes I would," he said.
I shut up. I hadn't been expecting that. I thought he would make up all kinds of excuses and give reasons why he 'honest to God' couldn't go. But he'd admitted without much fuss that I was probably getting myself into something more than it seemed or just downright dangerous or worse. I paused, waiting to hear what he'd say next.
"You can take my car."
"The Rolls?"
"No, not the Rolls. The MXT."
"For real!?"
"Yes for real."
So I agreed.

A Curious Tale... 9

I landed at the shuttle port with a gym sack. I’d arranged for a courier to transport the rest of my things. I realised I would never get them because the transaction would never be carried out. I was far too poor to pay the freight costs, and I’d hired the most expensive dudes possible. Daft as a cucumber. Depression started to set in again.
I walked through the arrivals section and frowned as the many cameras, biometric scanners, x-ray machines and good old fashioned customs officers deciphered exactly who I was and what I was carrying. It was boring, but at least it didn’t take up much time.
As I walked into the arrivals lounge I realised I had no idea where to go. I’d hustled my way into school, and crimed my way through it. The friends I’d made in school were quite frankly the only friends I had. I was lost, and the guy that walked up seemed to realise it.
“Hi” he said.
“Hi” I replied.
“You look like you could use some help.”
“No thanks. I’m fine.” Damn your foolish pride Tosoye! You’re not fine.
“I was only gonna ask if you needed a cab lad.” And he started to leave.  I was in England by the way. That’s where I’m from, I think. Anyway the little reason I still had left kicked in.
“Excuse me!” The man turned.
“I don’t have any money…” The man turned to walk away muttering something about him not getting enough to live on anyway without people looking for free rides.
I went to a row of seats and my phone buzzed just before I sat down. It was a message from Silas.
I’ve instructed that 2000 credits be paid into your account. I felt it wouldn’t be fair if you didn’t get a head start. Good luck.
I had to smile at the nerve of the man. Stupid cocky bastard. I went out and hailed a real taxi, not a crummy overcraft, but one of them old fashioned taxis that run on wheels. It was a stupid thing to do as it cost triple what a cab would, but I couldn’t care less. I had a little leeway.
The taxi driver was incredibly loquacious, and had told me about his entire family before asking me where I wanted to go. His name was Martin. He was probably in his late thirties, extremely fit, and if I was a girl or gay I’d be screwing a taxi driver, to state it succinctly. He looked very well to do though, and I had to ask him how come he wore a Hublot chronogram.
“I’m rich,” he said simply. “I only drive a taxi when I feel like.”
He looked in the mirror and saw how deeply I was concentrating.
“You want to know how I got rich enough to make taxi driving a hobby, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Well that’s one thing I can’t tell you. What do you do, by the way.”
“I just graduated,” I said honestly.
“Oh, new to the job market. Have you ever worked… erm… what did you say your name was?”
“Tosoye.”
“Tosoye. Hmmm. African origin I’d say.”
“How would I know?”
“Oh I wouldn’t expect you to. So back to the question. Have you ever worked lad?”
“No.”
“Hmmm...”
I was getting rather peeved, but he was obviously as rich as I was broke so I had to keep listening.
“Could you do deliveries?”
“I don’t see why not.”
“Got a driving licence?”
“Yep.  All craft.”
Good. Come over to see me.

A Curious Tale... 8.

There are some things that you just can’t take in. That was one of them. Drake had snitched, and Jason had played me. And Dante had left me. I was broke, and I was alone. I was about  to call Dante and tell her I wasn’t going anywhere anymore when I noticed a familiar face sitting a little further down from me. He stood up and walked towards me.

“Silas?” I said, a terrible thought springing to mind.

“Hi graduate,” he said. “Travelling home alone?”

“Yeah.”

“Sad. I thought you’d at least have the company of that attractive female I used to see around you.”

I shrugged, so he continued.

“Can I sit down?”

I shrugged again. He sat down.

“Your friend Drake led us right to Jason, who has a cybertrail as long as… what’s that longest river called again?”

I didn’t say anything. I heard the doors close and almost got up to leave, but thought better of it. There was nothing to go back to. I’d lost this battle and I’d probably be better off far away from this place.

“Anyway, I was determined to catch you actually committing a crime, so I made him reverse all his transactions and I know you’re now broke as fuck and confused about what to do next.”

“Yeah, happy now?”

“Actually no. The idea is to get you to commit another crime so I can catch you.”

So the plonker thought I was the brains. Sure I had he occasional bright idea, but it was Dante who always turned my ideas into viable plans. I was lost. I’d have to get a real job. Me! Work!? I wanted to cry, I was so upset. But I couldn’t give anyone the pleasure of seeing me weak and vulnerable.

“I’m going straight.”

He coughed.

“I mean it. I’m not doing all that anymore.”

“You will,” he said. “You’re a criminal, and it takes more than one reversal to stop the operations of a criminal mind.”

I almost laughed outright. Sure I would love to go out and commit more crimes, but now I’d have trust issues and I hate working alone. I was tired of this discussion, it was depressing.

“Do you have anything to read?” I asked him.

“I have a puzzle book, if you do puzzles.

“Yeah, thanks.”

“Just make sure you wipe it clean when you’re done. Don’t want anyone taking the credit for my puzzle solving.”

I smiled.

“Cocky bastard,” I said beneath my breath, though I’m sure he heard it to because he smirked as he went over to sit in his former seat.

I got busy solving Sudoku and Kakuro. I was broke, I was alone, but I was quietly hopeful something would turn up.

A Curious Tale... 7.

I was more relieved than anything else. I wasn't ready to give Blake any pleasure whatsoever. I was supposed to leave London in a week - the week following graduation. Today I'd graduate, tomorrow I'd leave. I'd only told Dante, and I told her because I wanted her to come with me. She'd refused of course. Said she had to 'find her own way.' That upset me a lot, as I had no idea what I'd do without her. She had single-handedly taken me through school, and I was sure I'd be totally and hopelessly lost without her. I told her so. She looked at me, a slight sadness in her face."I know. That's exactly why I have to leave you""What?""If I don't leave you'll never discover yourself. You've grown so reliant on me it scares me."She was right. That didn't make it any easier for me to take. She was always right, that's why I needed her.

I went through graduation in a daze. I told myself it was just the impending change of environment. I hadn't seen my parents in seven years, and I didn't expect to see them again any time soon. Therefore I didn't have anyone to go home to.I was top of the class. I got a mass of job offers and prizes and what not, and I supposed I smiled graciously as I accepted all the plaudits for the work of Dante's amazing mind. I was really going to miss her. I was going to start a new life with the money I'd saved form all the swindles I'd gotten involved in. I'd always believed that new life would include Dante, and now it seemed a bleak prospect. A sedentary life and no one to share it with. Somewhere deep down I knew I was just being silly, and that I'd find someone new, but it still hurt. I didn't want someone new. I wanted Dante.At least we were together throughout the graduation ceremony. She was the only one as Jason was also graduating, and I was no longer sure how much I could trust him. Drake had dealt my confidence a cruel blow. I knew I wasn't the real brains of the group, but I'd always thought I had the measure of my team, and to be proven so horribly wrong was... well, embarrassing to say the least.

___________________________________________________

Getting on the shuttle out of town was probably the hardest thing I'd ever done. Dante hadn't come to say goodbye, she said it would have been too painful for her. At least I was reassured that she did feel something for me. I had begun to feel very insecure. It had never been a problem for me before, even when I'd just been an average student, before I'd met Dante. She had completely changed me, and already I felt slightly adrift without her. 

As we pulled out of the shuttle-port I thought of the direction my new life would take. With the money I now had I would buy out a small legitimate company with a guaranteed profit stream. Then I'd invest more into it and eventually make it a big company. I'd try not to interfere too much, just offer suggestions on how to make things better, more efficient. This train of thought was helpful. Dante was still at the back of my mind but I was able to break through most of the pain when I focussed on the future instead of the past. I went into the cloud to check out the kind of figures I'd be dealing with in the purchase of my prospective company. Then my eyes fell upon a sentence at the bottom of my statement page and my jaw dropped to the floor. 

"Student credits are not valid outside the institution catchment area."

I was sure I had never seen that before, which could only mean one thing.

Jason had played me.

A Curious Tale... 6.

Blake hadn't been lying. There was a squad of officers outside my apartment, and they were all for cuffing me there and then. I told them there was no way I could run so they should just let me drop my stuff. Blake told them to let me. I changed into threads and a comfortable tee and went with them. They pushed me into the back of the craft and I saw my friend the Tackler from the other day. I said hi.
"You're going down criminal" he said, and was about to burst into a brilliant oratory about how crime never goes unpunished when a look from Blake silenced him. The cop craft was pretty classy. Blake had to travel in style I supposed. He told me not to say a word, and I was happy to do so.
The station was again abuzz with activity, but there didn't seem to be any bad guys around. It looked like neighbourhood watch day. So many regular citizens in summer clothes two sizes too small and with little kids trying to pick their noses without their parents noticing. It was all I could do not to burst out laughing. The Tackler took me into a little cubicle with wood walls, a tiled floor and a great big light bulb on swinging from the ceiling. He started his tirade as soon as he got the door closed. He was one of them goody-two-shoes who never made any arrests but loved to come in guns blazing. I bet he hoped to go out in a blaze of glory, taking down a multitude of the hardest criminals ever in the process. I let him talk and didn't answer a single question. It must have driven him crazy. I didn't care.
Blake was as good as his word. Within an hour, and without interrogating me (Tackler obviously didn't count), Drake was led in cuffed and I was set free. I almost felt sorry for the poor bastard, he was sure to get what passed for his brains chopped up for stem cells. Oh what the hell. he was a snitch.
I went back to my apartment. Dante had let herself in and was lying on the bed waiting for me. I poured myself a drink and went over to her. Say what you like, but I've never been a fan of beer. Too bitter, in my opinion. I like my drinks sweet, so now I was downing a large mojito. Dante took it from me and asked how my exam had been. I had to laugh.
"I just got out of police custody and you're asking how my exam went."
"Well..."
"It was brilliant", I conceded.
"Good. Now how did you get out of that?"
I told her everything I could remember of my conversation with Blake, and to my surprise she didn't seem at all surprised at what she was hearing. I mentioned it.
"You don't seem surprised", I said.
"Well it is a bit odd, but it's not surprising really."
My eyebrows threatened to join up with my hairline.
"Well look at it this way", she started, "He's the son of a decorated hero and he has a lot to live up to. He'd much rather make a  huge killing than just catch someone on a case he doesn't even have evidence of yet."
She was right. But that made something spring to my mind.
"How come we weren't caught on camera?"
Now she smiled. No scratch that. She grinned broader than the legendary Cheshire cat.
"We were caught on camera, but I have all the discs."

A Curious Tale... 5.

Exams were fly. I breezed through them like a certain Mr. Bolt used to breeze through world records at some time in a millennium long past. I had Dante, who as I said, was an understated genius. Due to her efforts, I was a genius too.
It was immediately after my final paper that Blake showed up again. With a smirk on his face that could only mean one thing. Trouble. He was waiting outside the hall for me, so I couldn't run away. he stretched out his hand when I came out. I took it. There's no point in antagonising the enemy when he can easily abuse his power over you. I wasn't taking any chances.
"You've consistently had the best results in your class" Blake said. "How do you do it?"
"I study."
"That's what everyone says."
"How many of them are consistent?" I asked.
"Good point," he conceded.
We walked along the school corridor in silence. When we got to the front door I turned in the general direction of my apartment.
"I wouldn't go that way if I were you" he said.
"What!?"
"There are twenty four police officers outside your apartment waiting for you to get there."
This I hadn't expected.
"Why are you telling me this?"
"I know you may have been involved in this crime, but I also know you didn't actually commit it. I would like to catch you committing a crime, it would give me no pleasure to lock you up for a crime you didn't get your hands dirty with."
I stood and looked at the man. He didn't like his job, he relished it. He got the same kinda buzz from it that I got from a successful felony. You had to respect his nerve. If he got caught doing this he would definitely lose his job, if not his entire life. You rarely got a second chance in this overpopulated society, they just shipped you off to a harvesting asylum, where you were dismembered and used as spare parts for some righteous upstanding citizen.
"Go home" Blake said, snapping me out of my thoughts. "One of your friends squealed, that's why we're back. I'll be outside your home to take you into custody, but I'll ensure you're sprung."
I kept quiet and let him talk.
"Please commit another crime," he continued, and I had to smile. "It would be a pleasure to cuff you and end your devious life."
I called Dante, Drake and Jay and asked them to meet me near my place. Dante said she was already there and the place was crawling with cops. I told her to wait for me. Jay said he'd be there. Drake made an excuse. He said he needed to drive a client to a party and he might see me later.  I smiled when I geolocated him with his phone. He was at home and didn't leave throughout my journey home.
I told Dante and Jay that Drake had exposed us and Jay was incredulous. He couldn't believe that silent Drake had snitched. I told him to calm down. Drake hadn't been in on the whole plan, he just knew that he would get his cut after graduation. It had been Dante's plan, from a tiny idea I'd had while ribbing Jay. Drake was brought in for the muscle. Somewhere in his tiny mind he must have cracked, thought the cops would let him go if he told what he knew. He may even have thought he would still get his cash. Stupid oaf.

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A Curious Tale... 4.

My clothes were dropping off me as I entered the apartment. I needed a shower. I'd been terrified. I might have built my meagre resources around a life of petty yet ingenious crime, but I was daily terrified of being caught. And I'd been caught today, only I hadn't been actively involved in the crime. I had a hot shower, then switched to a cold flow half way through. I read about that in some ancient British series of books about some incredibly lame aristocrat who kept on being almost killed but somehow always came back to save the government's sorry behind. I like him. He broke the law constantly, although he was always on the law's side. I would like to be him, but first I need to earn enough money to become an aristocrat, or at least rich, as rich people no longer had the pleasure of bullying poor people.
I walked out of the shower and picked up the various items of clothing I'd strewn all over the place and chucked them all down the laundry chute without checking in the pockets. I didn't want to remember anything about the night. Except the money of course, but that wouldn't come for a while. I dropped my towel and was rummaging through my drawer for a fresh pair of shorts when someone tapped me on the shoulder. A jumped a foot, but I'm sure I had an out of body experience before I turned round and realised it was Dante. Of course it was her. No one else had the codes to my apartment. I pulled on the shorts I had found and sat down on the bed. I was upset, and she knew I was. I got the impression she knew I was going to be upset even before I made up my mind to be upset. It was unnerving sometimes, the way she just knew me.
"We did it", she said.
I smiled.

---

Blake dropped by the apartment several times that week, and I was trying to study for exams, so I told him off. He told me I was the subject of a federal investigation, and I just laughed in his face. He was definitely aware of some of the other heists I'd been involved in, but since those cases had been long closed he didn't bother to go into them, but that didn't stop him from making dark and threatening references to the Oracle debacle, which of course I'd orchestrated.
I'd thought it amazing that Oracle databases were still being used for by so many traditional banking institutions, so I decided to do something about it. I studied Oracle databases to the highest level, with Dante's help of course. She's the most understated genius ever. I found that because Oracle had adopted cloud databases early with little real competition except from open source providers, they'd been a bit lax. It was simplicity itself to present myself at Oracle headquarters as a QSA agent, and with that I was able to obtain access codes for several employees. From there it was a simple matter of trawling through their records for any slip ups, and I found plenty. You know when you spring a leak, it doesn't take long to turn into a torrent. And that's how it was. I was able to get deeper and deeper into their records, and eventually into client databases... Bank accounts were only for the very rich, everyone else being subject to the UDCS. So I transfered several millions in credits to a fresh record, and made several purchases under a false name and had them delivered to a warehouse. Dante helped me transfer my internet protocols to some sorry sod's records and I was in the clear.
The next day I'd heard a knock on my door and Jason had found us. It was his dad we'd sent to jail, and for some reason he wouldn't tell us, he was eternally grateful. So I found someone who could have done in a couple of days what took me a matter of months.

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A Curious Tale... 3.

I had no idea what Jason was doing in there, and quite frankly I didn't care. That was his part of the fiddle. I was concerned about what was happening where I was. I buzzed Drake to find out if he was cool. He said he was, but I was sure something was wrong. I was about to buzz Dante when I caught a glimpse of something very odd. It was as though something had moved the air aside to make space for itself, although I couldn't see what it was.
And then it clicked. Those damn invisimacs! They were really just very high tech camouflage, taking multiple 3D images of the wearers surroundings and projecting them from the surface of the fabric, which was a nanofibre polymer. They were only available to the police, so was sure we were in trouble. I said one word into my com and started walking sedately to where I'd spotted the anomaly and kept walking.
"Gotcha!" The cop yelled, bursting out of his invisible clothing and wrestling me to the ground. I could easily have incapacitated him but chose not to. They had nothing on me. On any of us. I just hoped the others had scarpered and not tried to finish the job, as there were certainly more cops around than this one that had accosted me.
He hauled me to my feet. He really was full of vim and vigour this one, frisking me and confiscating my com like he had any right to. I patiently let him finish.
"Excuse me officer, but why are you doing this?"
"We had a pretty reliable source tell us you were plotting some shenanigans, so we came to catch you at it."
He was more eager than he was smart. He hadn't even thought to call for back up. What would've happened in the event of me beating the crap out of him, I wondered. Thankfully someone higher up was thinking along the same lines and came striding up, pushing me into a police car without a word.
"This isn't right" I said.
"Neither are you" he replied.
Touché, I thought.
*****
The police station was abuzz with activity. Robot secretaries whizzed around taking dictations, displaying images on their screens and printing documents from their stomachs.Policemen and women interviewed criminals, shoved them up against walls, screamed at them, tried anything to intimidate them into spouting all their evil deeds. I wasn't moved. There was no case against me and I knew it. It was just a question of me keeping a cool head and answering the questions as they came. I looked up and saw Mr. Blake. He walked towards me and frisked me.
"Hey I've already been..."
I fell silent as he pulled a button out of my pocket. A cheap satellite transmitter. So that's how they'd found me. They still didn't have anything, I just had to explain why I spent half an hour hanging around the Bureau of Statistics. I kept a straight face while I thought furiously.
Blake pulled out a copy of my National Statistics file from the time he'd come to my apartment, and downloaded the most recent version from the Bureau files. I had to suppress a smile. Did he really think we were that stupid. The changes, if Jason had successfully made them, wouldn't reflect until the day we transferred our Statistics to our homelands. The increment would happen between the deletion of the files here and the creation of new files wherever it was we were going. It would be very hard to spot. I had to hand it to him, Jason was an absolute genius.
I left my thoughts to look up at the frustration on Blake's face. I could see he knew I was guilty of something, but he had nothing to accuse me of, except maybe loitering, and there weren't any signs around the Bureau of Statistics to make that a valid offence. According to the law he could arrest any citizen on a whim, but had to have a valid and reasonable accusation to hold anyone prisoner. He wanted to question me, but he'd been beaten. He was a good sport though, he didn't make a fuss, didn't ask me any futile questions, in fact, he said just what I would have if I were him..
"I'll be watching you Ethelbert" he said, stupidly thinking I'd give him the small pleasure of letting him think he could get to me. I had the upper hand, no matter how guilty I was.

A Curious Tale... 2.

Mr Blake left fifteen minutes later, after reeling out all the property I wasn’t supposed to have under the Unitary Dividend Caste System. He left without any solid evidence against me anyway.
I hopped in the ride and cut a tortuous winding path to my rendezvous with Dante. It was a cute little bistro in the heart of the central business district of Lagos. Dante was waiting for me, her lips pursed and arms akimbo.
“You’re late.” She said. “Again.”
“Yes Dante but it’s not as easy to sweet talk the QSA as it is to get to you.”
“The Queers?! Are you sure you still wanna do tonight?”
“Sure. It was just some sop called Blake.”
“Blake? Not Elijah Blake?”
“No, this one was called Silas.”
“That’s still bad. He’s Elijah’s son. Don’t you remember Elijah Blake, the square that took over from Nuhu Ribadu as head of the International Anti-Corruption Force?”
“Yeah yeah,” I said, trying to be flippant. “Well he didn’t get anything on me. Where are Drake and Jay?”
“Probably on their third bottles by now. Let’s go in.”
Damilola Rafferty Kentebe preferred to be called Drake. He was the strong silent type. Too strong, in my opinion. But silence is good in this game. Jason Johnson Coker had long feminine fingers that could operate a computer in exactly one ninth the time it’d take a regular guy. And Dante knew something about absolutely everything except her real name. She’d shown up amnesiac on my doorstep two years ago and since then had spent all her time learning about anything and everything. She was just Dante though, the only person apart from me I could trust. And she was 5’ 7”, and sexy in that weird way that only girls that aren’t drop dead gorgeous are – not absolutely stunning, but you’d always take a second look.
We headed out for the Bureau of Statistics. There was only ever one guard on duty. Dante got out of the hover car and walked past him. He ogled her and got a sleeping dart in his neck for his trouble. I tend to be surprised at people who use guns. All you get is a murder trial or an attempted murder trial, and since all guns are linked to their owners UDCS accounts, you get caught. You can’t avoid getting caught with a gun, so why use one?
“How long will he be out?” Drake asked.
“Five hours plus a monstrous headache,” I told him.
Drake stripped the guard and donned his uniform. He looked almost respectable. I told him so.
Drake took one end of the building, and I went to the other. That left Dante and Jay free to go into the building. We’d thought out this little fiddle a few weeks ago. Jay said he could crack any code in existence, so we decided to test him. He’d cracked the Unitary Dividend Caste System remotely in an hour and a half, so we thought we’d do a bit of book keeping, or cooking if you’d prefer.
We were all in our final year at Livermore, except Dante, who worked in some kind of lab on the outskirts of town. We’d decided to change the figures in our accounts exactly a week after graduation. We’d be rich, and since we’d all be expected to return to our homelands, our new identities wouldn’t be traced as long as we left this town. Dante would come with me of course.
Jay was in, fiddling with whatever it is them computer people fiddle with, and Dante was making sure he felt secure doing it. She was a great learner; she could take in information faster than it could be dished out. She wasn’t in school, but she was the reason my grades had been holding up so well. So learning martial arts had been no problem at all for her, and she was a champion. So yes, Jay felt secure in the knowledge that Dante could take anything short of a riot squad.

A Curious Tale... 1.

“Hey baby.”

“Oh hi Dante. What’s happening?”

“Nothing much. I’m bored. Are you coming to see me tonight?”

“Sure thing girl. And I’m bringing something special.”

“Oooh. I can hardly wait. See you. Bye.”

“Love you.”

“Love you too.”

“Bye.”

As I put the phone down the doorbell rang. I walked over to the Sector. The life futuristic is a good thing. The sector is one of those things you just can’t do without nowadays, a voice and touch activated remote control to every part of the house. I wasn’t expecting anyone so I was a bit rattled. When I saw the thin smile on the smooth shaven face, the close cropped hair and very smart suit, I just knew it couldn’t be good. I flipped a switch and all my appliances were hidden from sight. My apartment looked like a regular student’s hostel with sparse furnishing and much clutter. Third year was not an easy task. I flipped another switch and the QSA (the government called them Quality and Standards Assessors, we called them Queer Snitching Assholes) could see me.

“Tosoye George?” he asked. I grunted.

“Tosoye Ethelbert George?” I winced at the middle name.

“Yeah, what do you want?”

“Oh just a routine check citizen.” I winced again at the term, but I let him in anyway. He frisked me.

“Hey hey hey,” I yelled “you ain’t harassing me in my own home man!”

“Very nice home if I may say.”

I shrugged.

“Rather too nice, really.”

“Whaddya mean, too nice?” I wanted this guy out of my flat asap.

“Well you’re classified as a DC3 student (DC stands for dividend caste, by the way). You shouldn’t be able to afford a single resident’s flat. You should be in a six man apartment.”

“Is that why you’re checking me up?” I actually laughed while I told him a friend of mine who lived with his parents let me stay in his place. He frowned, so I offered to call my friend up.

“We know all about your friend. We also know you drive an H8M3 Overcraft. You couldn’t in eight years save up that much money. Your basic allowance only covers for public student’s transport.”

“Look,” I said, finally ticking over. “I honestly don’t have time for this. I’m meeting my girlfriend at eight, and I need to get spruced up.” I was really starting to hate this guy.

Silas Blake. That was the name on his lapel pin. I wished he would just leave. He just stood there watching me, the epitome of patience. I sighed and began to answer him.

“Okay see, I got the ride from my friend’s dad. He promised me one if I got direct admission into university. Then he told me to wait a couple years to see if my grades would hold up. They did, so first thing this year he called me and gave me the codes to my spunky new craft. Is that enough for you?”

The Ring

“Sweetheart”
He had a way of saying that that just melted Joan inside. It was like a code.

for (i = Nathan; i <= infinity; i says "Sweetheart")
do MELT.exe

It annoyed her that she loved it so much.
This time it wouldn’t work though. She was determined to find out for herself whether or not he still loved her. She walked down the stairs to confront him, checking the time on his old grandfather clock on the way. 3:48 am.
“You’ll expect me to believe you’ve been in the studio since eight o’clock right?” she said.
“It is what is, love,” he replied.
“It is what what is? You’re lying.”
“And why would I wanna do that?”
“Umm... let’s see,” she said in mock concentration. “Maybe because you were with your guys in the club and didn’t want me holding back your playa, or maybe... maybe because you were with another...” she let the words hang.
He sat down and looked up at the ceiling. What was all this nonsense? He was sure she didn’t believe any of what she was saying, so he wondered why she said it.
He let her vent her fabricated frustrations, offering little by way of reply, gently encouraging her to let it all out in the hope that she’d run out of steam and allow him talk. She surprised him.
“My bags are in the car and I’m leaving”, she said.
“Why?” was all he could manage.
“Why?” she asked, incredulous. “Why? Because you never listen to a word I say that’s why. Because you’re never at home when I need you, that’s why...”
And she was off again, far from him, a voice that he could tune out as easily as a radio. He only snapped back to the present when the $35,000 engagement ring he’d bought her hit him square on the forehead.
“Ouch!” he said.
“You can keep your fairytale wedding, I’m gone” she said, and out the door she went. He followed her outside.
She’d stopped in front of the car he’d bought her, obviously torn between the fact that she shouldn’t really take the car if she was leaving him, and the presently greater fact that she couldn’t get anywhere near her mum’s house alone at three am in the morning if she didn’t drive. He walked out from the shadow of the doorway.
“Take the car,” he said, “it’s yours anyway”
She hesitated.
If you really don’t feel comfortable, I can drive you over. In any case you really shouldn’t be alone at this time in the morning. What do you say, sweetheart?”
She wanted to say no, but he’d called her sweetheart again. And she knew he was absolutely right, because deep inside she knew he cared deeply for her. But how could he be so calm about her leaving him? She accepted his offer with as much bad grace as she could muster, and sat silent in the car while he drove.
He didn’t say anything either, neither to tell her she was being foolish and should stop all that nonsense immediately; nor to plead with her to stay with him. He just did what she wanted. It infuriated her. He was supposed to get angry, sad, frustrated or at least confused. But he just drove in silence, a very wry smile on his face. She determined to see this through. What she didn’t know was that he was just as determined to win this little war.
>>>>>
Two weeks later Joan got a phone call from a friend.
“Hey you! Tune into E! Now!”
“Why?!” she asked.
“Just do it, okay. It’s important”
Joan flipped channels and watched. She wasn’t really ready to pay attention to the idle gossip peddled by E. She was pining, missing Nathan. But that was until she saw the ring. Her engagement ring on the finger of a rich middle aged fan of Nathan’s. The story said he’d sold the ring on eBay at half the price he’d paid for it. She was livid.
She couldn’t believe he could do such a thing. No wonder he’d been so calm about it. She’d been nothing but a fling right? Nothing but a plaything to be enjoyed until he grew tired. Well thank God she’d left him before he’d been able to dump her. Damn! He was IMPOSSIBLE!
She kept her thoughts in this frame of mind for a good amount of time by remembering all the good times they’d had, and forcing herself to believe they were all lies. Lies! All of them. But how could he be so callous? That was just evil, to make a public mockery of their relationship like that. She couldn’t forgive him this time. That was impossible. But she could go over to his house and give him a rather sizable slice of her mind. Yes. That’s what she would do. She got into HER car (he’d left it with her, the more to be able to mock her she now suspected). Well she wasn’t going to have it. She’d leave his hunk of trash parked outside his house after he’d heard her out. And hear her out he would.
She leapt out of her car as she got to his drive. She ran down the rest of it, and knocked angrily on his door. He looked as if he’d been expecting her, she thought. Whatever.
“Sweetheart”, he said, and she fought hard to steel herself against his onslaught. He didn’t know how hard it made things for her. Sweetheart. After selling her ring. She composed herself.
“Hello Nathan, I’m really mad at you.”
“That’s why you left, isn’t it?” Nathan asked, and she boiled over.
“You sold our engagement ring on eBay!” she screamed.
He didn’t say anything.
Then she broke the floodgates. As usual, he let it all wash over him. He realised he’d let himself get too used to her petulance.
“Be quiet,” he said.
She shut up, stunned.
“What did you say?”
“I told you to be quiet,” he said quietly. “You always make a big deal of little things. If this is why you came” he said, producing the ring, “then you’ve seen it, you can leave.”
She sat down quietly, thoughts racing through her head. She was trying to make sense of what she’d just seen. He’d wanted her to notice him, she realised. Their relationship wasn’t the lie, the eBay sale was. And she’d fallen for it. She was sure he’d known all along that she really cared about him, and that anything that connected her to him was precious to her. So he’d laid down the bait and she’d come running. And now he was asking her to leave.
“But Nathan...” she stammered, “I never realised.”
“Goodbye Joan,” he said.
“Goodbye,” she said, the shame too much to bear, the finality crushing, the knowledge that she’d single-handedly destroyed their relationship bringing tears streaming down her face.
“Goodbye, sweetheart,” he said.

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