-Marshal Service Annex, City Hall, Friday Morning-
The heavy manila file came down on the hardwood table with a satisfying
thwack! that was just as Chief Deputy, Art Stirling intended as he passed them out around the table starting with Paige and moving on to the other deputies as he spoke. “Small-fry Friday ladies and gents!” He said with sarcastic excitement and rubbed his hands together. He had a few slides ready to go on a PowerPoint at the head of the table that corresponded with the files he passed out.
“Do we have to really call it that?” Paige grumbled. “’Small-fry Friday?’” She stared blankly when the folder hit the table. Her day started with an immense headache and she was scantly over it.
“Yes,” The Chief responded looking down on her like a boarding-school instructor, “Because I’m the boss and boss gets to pick out nicknames.”
“I love small-fry Friday, personally.”
Her regular partner, Xi, said mockingly. He was completely awake and pivoted back and forth impatiently in his seat.
“Kiss-ass.” Paige shot back. The leather swivel chairs of the conference room were handsomely padded and she was enjoying sliding down into hers further and further.
“Kennedy, you look like hell.” The Chief said, “Were you out all night with the uhh, oh… What was it? the
Horse Whisperer, again?”
“Blacksmith” Xi corrected. “You’re thinkin’ about the shoes.”
“Well, shit”
“You know,
horses-
shoes-
blacksmith.” Xi said turning back to Paige. “It’s word association.”
“Have you been drug tested lately?” Paige snapped cutting her tired eyes over towards him. “And no, I was not.” She continued firmly. In truth, she and Sio had partaken in a local event at Corona Park known as “Thirsty Thursdays” and it was a hit. “I’m sorry I said anything. Now can we please get back to small-fry Friday?” She said flipping open the case jacket and starting to look it over.
Small-fry Friday was a roundup of sorts for the non-violent and less threatening criminal rundown of the Sol City district of the Marshal Service. Most were either on the run from courts in other states or had stolen large sums of money through extortion, bribery, con-jobs or some other method of ill-repute. The Chief actually did enjoy, at least for a day, taking his attention off the big files and focusing on getting his office’s numbers up by bringing in relatively easy-to-catch targets. That, and the fact the swooping arm of his deputies tended to catch the wayward fugitives by complete surprise, made for hilarious stories later on.
“First one up is CT Shader.” Art said starting the slide show. A scruffy looking, though smiling mugshot, appeared of a man in his mid-thirties with a bowl haircut, pencil-thin mustache and glasses. Paige rolled her eyes and shook her head. It was her file. “CT goes by the alias Shade, Shadetree, 2Shad or,” He angled the paper slightly away from himself to make sure he was reading correctly and pushed his glasses up, “2-Shad-4-U,” He pronounced slowly. Everyone looked at their files making it immediately evident Paige would be handling the oddly titled computer hacker. Snickers went around the room. “A few days ago CT shut down a poker website and rerouted all the winnings into bitcoin that he then passed all over the planet while skimming it back for himself.” The deputies all looked on quietly. Cyber-crimes were not their forte, but they knew the perp had to be physically nearby for the Chief to have him on his list. “Oh it gets better folks,” He continued. “After he shut down the website he made a creative little modification to the homepage.” He changed the slide and everyone immediately chuckled. The new slide displayed the website address along with an official looking message:
Domain Seized by United States Marshall Service. Everyone knew
Marshal was spelled with only a singular ‘l’ at the end and was a common error. The rest of the page carried the official seal along with a phone number. “As you can imagine, our phone lines got rather lively with asshole gamblers trying to find out why we seized their winnings, but as it turns out, spell-check may have fucked poor CT. One our surveillance aircraft just happened to catch a phone call between CT and someone else on the Western Shore, where we know he’s hanging out now.”
“So let me get this straight,” Paige said. “He can do all this crazy junk with computers, but he can’t spell
Marshal correctly?”
“That’s about the gist of it.” The Chief replied.
“This whole country is circling the drain.” She said
channeling the sentiment of one of her early mentors. “Just gimmie a couple hours, I’ll get him.”
--------------------------------
Western ShoreAbout two hours later Paige was scoping out the Western Shore apartment that the surveillance aircraft targeted as CT’s latest hangout. She’d been sitting in her
little blue BMW for about thirty minutes just watching the fourth floor unit and listening to some conservative talk radio channel, but not seeing any activity, was about to head up and take care of business. Finishing off a coffee and adjusting her holster slightly behind her jacket as she got out, she ran her fingers over the spot on the rear fender where Milo’s temporary squeeze, that paraplegic ghost of woman, had
dug a healthy gash in the paint during a passive-aggressive fit of jealousy. The bill from Sol City BMW was not cheap, but Paige reluctantly dug into her
split with the bounty hunter and paid it off. Though the car was not hers, she swore then she would not let Asset Seizures auction it out from underneath her no matter what.
Western Shore was more to her liking and as she walked along the sidewalk finding the yards nicely kept and streets clean of debris it reminded her a little of the small neighborhood where her parents lived in Florida. People kept up their own lawns, everyday cars were parked in the concrete driveways and children’s toys could be seen in a few backyards.
Real people lived here and it was refreshing. Keeping a steady eye on the fourth floor and watching around her, she could picture her parents’ home for a moment: Her dad mowing the grass, the tired old 4Runner she drove in high school and college sitting in the driveway next to his pickup and her mother outside running the pressure washer. Milo had told her not to dwell on it so much, but some things did genuinely make her feel good and she had a slight smile thinking about them.
With her star and gun mostly concealed behind her jacket, she blended right in and with her hair down, nonchalantly ascended the four flights of stairs passing a couple of younger girls on her way up who paid her no mind at all. She knocked lightly on the door of the apartment and waited.
There was a heavy
click! inside the metal door as the deadbolt was drawn away and the lock on the knob was turned. A fairly hefty young man happily opened the door wide enough for her to get a sweeping view of the inside behind him. CT was seated at a computer desk with his back to her hammering away at a keyboard with one hand and playing a fighting game on the TV with the other. His head only twitched slightly between the two screens. She didn’t know much about video games, but being able to play it one handed seemed mildly impressive. “Hi,” She said to the boy that opened the door with her brightest smile. He was much taller than her and blushed heavily stammering for a response. She could see the trancelike state her green eyes put over him and it was immediately obvious no woman had set foot in the apartment since the lease started. “Is CT in?” She added a touch of southern inflexion to the question and stepped on through the doorway unhindered.
Hearing his name, CT turned back over his shoulder. His look was serious and accusatory towards his larger roommate. “Bobby! What the hell?! We talked about this!” He barked.
“But it’s a girl.” Bobby replied as if the argument were more than enough to calm all other concerns. CT needn’t be so critical of their guest.
Paige calmly strolled on through. It was surprisingly clean for a single man’s hideout and smelled nice to boot.
Props to Bobby for keeping a nice place. She thought. “Time to go, CT.” She drew her jacket back slightly revealing her star and gun.
“She’s a cop you dumbass!” CT snarled.
“Oh… shit, sorry bro.” Bobby looked both defeated and disappointed. He slumped his shoulders.
“You know you can’t just come barging up in here,” CT said turning back to Paige. “We got rights.”
“He let me in.” She said giving Bobby another innocent glance.
As she turned back, CT bolted for a sideroom and slammed the door behind him. Paige sighed and shook her head. Walking over to the door she put one hand on her sidearm and turned the knob.
Locked.
“You’re not gonna shoot him are you?’ Bobby asked worriedly.
“I’ll just knick him in the leg for being mean to you, Bobby.” Paige replied with feigned sympathy. He melted at the sound of her saying his name. She pounded on the door. “CT open up, I don’t have all day for this…” Her words faded away as she could hear a commotion on the other side of the wooden door and then the distinctive sound of blinds being drawn up and a window opening. Taking a quick step back she kicked the door open in time to find her fugitive tossing a bag out the open window then with only enough hesitation to look back at her slightly amazed face from window frame,
jumped out.
Paige dashed up to the window ledge and glanced over finding CT slowly pulling himself out of a dumpster. “You gotta be shittin’ me.” She said watching him hobble over and pick up his bag. There was a moped parked next to his landing pad and after he threw one leg over and started it up he glanced back up over his shoulder and gave her the finger before tottling off up the street.
--------------------------------
City Hall“So tell me again,” Xi grimaced. “He was like some kind of nerd, go-bag Bear Grylls?”
“He was surprisingly spry.” Paige said. They were again in the conference room back at Central Point. Xi listened to Paige tell the story of CT’s escape while she filled out the incident report. Not knowing a lot about computers, she had taken the laptop he left behind and a few other items from the apartment before she returned: All of which were spread over the table. The Chief and a younger man from their Cyber Crimes division were looking through the lot of it.
“Between rolling in here hungover and the drain-circling computer nerd, you are on fire today.” Xi chided. Paige shot him the same glare as she had earlier.
“Well, there is some good news,” The young man said from behind CT’s laptop. His fingers hammered away rapidly. He liked the busy sound of it and the fact that he was the only one in the room that knew what he was doing with the captured items. The Chief leaned in behind him glancing over his glasses to get a better look at the screen. “Shutdown notice isn’t on the site anymore.” He said turning the screen around for Paige and Xi to both get a look. “He’s replaced it with a link to his blog and a big, bold post he made about how he just gave ‘Sheriff Barbie’ the slip.”
Xi cackled.
“I’ll find him.” Paige said flatly.
“Might have to let CC see if they can get another line on him first,” Art said sipping his coffee mug.
“C’mon, guy jumps out a fourth-story window into a dumpster, almost breaks his back then gives me the bird before he gets away on a moped.” Paige replied. “I love this guy, let me catch him.”
“Think you can pull anything off there that will help us today?” Art said turning back to the CC officer.
“He’s definitely a pro, but he’s cocky.” The young man replied. “Gimmie a few hours.”
“Can I reply to that post?” Paige asked studying the screen. The chief shrugged and she immediately leaned over the table and started typing:
Just keep on blogging CT, I’ll get you tonight.-HB“What’s ‘HB’ stand for?” The man asked.
“It’s an inside joke.” Paige smirked and posted the reply.
