a dark future blog…

PAYOFF

May 20th, 2033 by d.s.

My Johnson didn’t get right back to me. It was almost a day before we talked, and then he was very secretive. With what I’d found out, I didn’t blame him. Most all the mundane matters in my own life were less important now that I was paranoid about my latest hack. The hardest part for me was keeping up the illusion that nothing had happened. I wanted to get away for a while and let things cool down, but that would draw attention to me and I couldn’t have that.

I met up with him this morning. It was involved and in a way, the backtracking and deception was a real-life replay of my net running a week before. Anyhow, I have some extra zeros in my bank balance… and no minus sign in front of it. Real cash that will appear to have come from a legitimate job, tracking down a cheating husband. I have more work to do, but it’s nice to feel that the heat is dying down and my job is almost over. I just have to figure out the code. There’s no doubt left in me that he met his demise, just like I would if I wasn’t carful. If I don’t take this all seriously. It’s easy to treat it like a game sometimes, but once in a while you have a close call, and you have to slow down, focus and think. Each move now has to be careful and calculated. Precise. Mistakes will get you killed. The graphics are like a good addictive game, but the results are real-time. In the flesh. When the pixels fade, some guy in a suit has a gun to your head. Not the way I want to end up.

So I left our meeting just as carefully as I arrived. Always looking over my shoulder, but not in an obvious way. It’s taken the whole day to go and come back, but I have something to show for it. A payoff for my efforts. I was starting to think the Johnson wouldn’t come through, and then this. I debate if it’s worth it – worth the risk and all, but I think it is.

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About

This is a story of a future in which the population keeps growing, technology keeps advancing, and people are caught in the crossfire between an Orwellian government and corrupt mega-global corporations. The world of the Sprawl is a dark, urban dystopia, full of conflict and passion and a growing divide between the highest and lowest echelons of society.

Follow Johnny Dark, as he dives deep into The Net, to mine data and search for patterns in the data stream. All along, Johnny tries to make ends meet and stay alive as society follows a dark spiral into chaos.

This story presents posts in chronological order, then to now, top to bottom.

To reach the author: 'ds' at 'arcology.com'.

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