Re: The Show Must Go Off

The Show Must Go Off–part twenty
\FORMATMAINT \MARKBEGIN \LOCPREP
MCL-BeltMiner#C485640624

I was noting with amusement that their response time had improved when they arrived. I recognized KF2 and saw the rookie when they arrived. A team of three more waited a noticeable hundred feet away. KF2 was tense but still professional. “Enforcer 4967KF2 on site partnered and with backup team. Interrogation likely.” He hung back, though, and waved the rookie to go ahead. I personally think of that as a mistake . . .
The rookie landed from less than a twelve-foot jump with a complete lack of poise and tried to make up for it by talking tough with me. “Enforcer 2054LC4. Open your palms and put your hands on your head, I.D. out!”
I blandly hung my satchel on my toolclip and complied. She scanned me and nodded. “O. H. M., aka ‘Q,’ BuMPS number C485640624. Where are you headed, miner?”
“Arena Row. L-C?” I GameFaced restrained amusement.
“LC4 is my common, miner; what of it?”
“It rhymes with Elsie, an archaic woman’s name.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What are you saying?” Oh, good; over wary. I didn’t need GameFace to put on a quizzical look, but I used it anyway to keep any nervousness out.
“It’s a coincidence. Your call signs are chosen randomly, correct?” For her, this was a complete non-sequitur.
“Can the small talk. You have been in contact with a known hacker, missing in action with a large balance to settle.”
“Which hacker do you mean?”
She actually aimed her shoulder cannon at me. I GameFaced mild surprise and for the first time, my ice-cold fearless exterior began to bother her. She hid it well. “Are you denying it?”
I actually managed to pause a moment, drawing out the quizzical psychotic calm. I was good at cons BEFORE my implants. “By WHICH,” I said, as if talking to a slightly deaf moronic child, “I mean which hacker–I know more than one.”
That made a big dent in the chip on her shoulder. She knew she’d sounded stupid but it was in front of a witness to me cooperating. She reddened a bit. It was cute. “Their names?” Not a bad recovery!
I nodded. “I only know screen names, but if I have access to old news ‘zines I could probably find–“
“Screen names will DO, miner!” She was going to be a screamer.
I nodded again, irritatingly slow. “Your Worst Nightmare, The Shade, The Surgeon, Rack, and Epi.” There, I’d said it. A list of Enforcers’ worst fears. That group of mysteriously missing Beltminers that killed nearly five hundred people on Earth, and only slowed down after finding ice, iron, iodine, and religion before they went AWOP. Payments for their utilities, claim rent, etc. Absent without payout was no longer a ‘shoot-on-sight,’ but for these guys they’d make an exception. The other members of their band were off-gridders, non-Luddites, but hated the net and everything it represented. One wonders how they ever did get along.