Vice Signaling

I stole a car today. Just clean took it. It’s crazy how many features you can get by if you have the right equipment. I had with me a computer that overrode the system. It wasn’t much. $70K. It was a good hustle.”

“You’re proud of that?”

“You’re goddamn right. I’m good at what I do.”

“I robbed a grocery store blind. I know a guy who works there. He knows all the cameras and the checkout and how to print false receipts. I just took that knowledge and went with it. It took about two weeks to get everything coordinated. But I did it,” Tyrik Wellbotham confirmed.

The men laughed and blew cigar smoke in the air. There was a meeting of the muscles. Their brains had oozed out of them eons ago. They all sat with satin shirts and chunky, gaudy jewelry on their neck and wrists. Bottles of champagne poured like stardust from topless, gorgeous women.

“I scammed at least seventeen banks in the past eight months. It was candy. The whole thing was my sweet spot. All I had to do was tap into their wire service and pretend like I was a supervisor of a bank when the calls were elevated. Everything was in my hand. I just had to ask for the account and routing numbers. I’m telling you, it was candy. The whole setup allowed me to consider the way to get American business,” Abeo Igwe mentioned. He took another puff of his cigar on Fenwick Island in Delaware.

There were two women in the group. They weren’t butch either. They resembled the ones with the champagne. One was Nanina Gole. She smoked on a cigarette that was fifteen dollars a stick. She laughed.

“What’s so funny, Nanina?” Pat Stacks asked.

“You boys have nothing on us,” she said, referring to the other woman in the room, Dovey Farrelly.

“Oh yeah? What makes you two talk of the town? What did you do to take away from the unproductive and give to the productive?”

“We shut down whole data centers that were robbing people of their funds. It was going on for eleven years and we had infiltrated the entire network about five years ago. I have to say, their methods were robust. But we were able to bypass them over the years. The way we just were patient about it,” she slapped Dovey’s hand and laughed. They both sipped their champagne.

“That is impressive, ladies. What we do is important, vital. We’re restoring to the makers by being takers. We’re giving to the people who run and own things their tax money back. We’re not asking we’re demanding that the winners of the world be given what they put into it…and then some,” Oscar Rae explained.

Then, the sound of glass breaking penetrated their ears. Men and women in blue windbreakers all infiltrated the space. They had their hands out with cuffs to fetter the unfettered.

“Hold on, hold on,” Rae announced. “You have falsely come into these premises. You have nothing on us.”

Lead government detective Issac Gonfalon turned Rae around.

“I have a warrant for all of your arrests.”

“That warrant is as permissible in court as a Chinese restaurant menu,” Rae pointed out.

“What?”

Gonfalon backed up with some trepidation. Look into that cupboard shelf. It will list everything that you are looking for but we have no control over at all. Every act was done in accordance with principle and ethics.”

The list of their exploits was itemized with special care. In fact, it was encased in glass. Rae threw the keys to Gonfalon.

He read over the documents. His upper lip quivered. “I’ll be goddamned.” He held on to the papers. He pulled a radio from his belt loop.

“Base Nine, we’re clear here.”

“What? I thought—-”

“We’re clear.”

Gonfalon turned to Rae. “I’m sorry about this intrusion. We’re going to be able to clean up and restore everything as soon as possible. Again, we apologize for our gross negligence concerning this matter.”

Rae smiled broadly. “I just thought you’d be able to understand.”

“Now, I do.”