“And if I say yes?”
Johnson smiled and handed him the glass. “I am authorized to give you a forty thousand credit advance. While it is not a large sum, we feel it is enough to show our sincerity in our offer. The remainder of the credits will be deposited in your account upon delivery of the merchandise.”
Jacob laughed. “That’s not enough to get a job like this done. I don’t even know what it would take. And I can’t do it alone.”
Johnson put his whiskey glass back on the small shelf. “You are resourceful, Mr. Quince. And you have resourceful friends. I am sure you will discover a way to accomplish the task.”
“But forty thousand is...”
“I can assure you the people I represent did not get in their position by investing in any project more than is necessary. Especially in an unproven project. ”
Chapter 8
For the first weeks of his prison sentence, Jacob had trouble sleeping. It wasn’t being in prison that kept him from sleeping, it was withdrawing from code. The prison was a low-security corporate prison that sat somewhere between a cheap country club and low-end rehab where everyone wore the same outfit every day. There were no hardened criminals, just people like himself, coders and hackers who slipped up and got caught.
No, it was not the prison that kept him from sleep. It was the withdraws. His body had grown used to a daily dose of code of some kind. Uppers. Downers. Opiates. Cannabinoids. Amphetamines. Dopamine. And to have his chip disabled and the code taken from him sent his body into a whirlwind of emotions, pain, irritability, aggravation, and restlessness. The pharma-tech corporations sold subdermal chips and pharmaceutical code to the public and the politicians on the promise there would be no physical addiction. They promised the government mandatory subdermal chip implants would offer a new, cheaper, safer way to deliver medications, a way to rid the country of the opioid epidemic once and for all. They lied. It took Jacob two weeks to withdraw. Two weeks of tossing and turning and pacing the floors of his cell. Two weeks of tremors so bad he could barely hold a cup of coffee without some sloshing over the lip of the cup. Two weeks of sleeping only after his body couldn’t take it anymore and shut down for a few hours of sleep filled with the bizarre dreams and night sweats, his sheets drenched when he woke, shivering.
He had forgotten the struggle of not being able to sleep in the three years since, but the conversation with Johnson brought it back in force. His mind flipped from the weight of what he had agreed to do to Johnson’s words, “Desperate men do desperate things.” Was he that desperate? He was desperate enough to take the job and was going to if he could get Gomez and Sandy to help. Maybe the bigger problem was he didn’t know why he was so desperate. Johnson was right, he wasn’t living the life he had imagined for himself when he was seven, spending his time trying to learn to code instead of doing whatever it was other seven-year-olds did. He made a life plan, he worked hard for it, and ridiculous subsections in a corporate contract took it away. And now he had agreed to something he still couldn’t get his head around.
Of course, he still had to convince Gomez and Sandy to help him. There was no way he could pull this off without them. He couldn’t even think of where to begin.
He had already given himself a dose of sedative code, but it was not working. He felt tired, but his mind fought back every time the blanket of sleep started to overtake him. He sent another dose of sedative to his chip and stared at the ceiling, waiting.
The next morning he woke in a fog. Sleep had come, but it came late and in small amounts. He made a cup of instant coffee and started toasting two pieces of bread. Waiting for the toast, he sent Gomez and Sandy a message to meet him at Retro Media before it opened.
In the early morning, The Galleria had not yet come to full life, the only real activity centering around the garden and the food court. A few stragglers from the night before roamed in an aimless stupor and several people slept in the walkways, presumably where they passed out at some point in the night. Jacob weaved around and over them on his way to another cup of coffee.
Entering the food court, he saw Sandy sitting at a table, drinking a cup of coffee.
“This better be good,” she said as he neared her. She rarely got out of bed this early after she spent the night running lights at the club and it showed in her eyes.
“It is,” Jacob said, stopping at her table.
“You look worse than I feel,” Sandy said.
“Thanks. I need another cup of coffee.”
“I think today is going to take more than coffee.”
“Let me have my coffee first,” Jacob said.
Together, he and Sandy made their way to Retro Media, cups in hand.
“So what is this about?” she asked.
“I want to wait until Gomez is with us,” Jacob said.
“I hope I didn’t upset you last night,” Sandy said, stepping over a young Steamer woman with ornate brass cybernetics around her left eye and blonde dreadlocks fanning out across the floor.
“Upset me?” He was at a loss for a moment, then their conversation in the club came back to him. His ride with Johnson had completely pushed it out of his mind. “No, I understand. Besides, what I’ve got to tell you will have that conversation on the back burner for a bit.”
“Now you really have my attention,” Sandy said.
They turned down the hallway leading to Retro Media. Gomez was standing by the gate, waiting
