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  “Who’s shooting my place to hell?” Fat Nat was red with anger and stood to his feet.

  “Nat, get your ass to the ground before you get yourself shot in the head!” one of his card buddies hollered as he was crawling into the bar area on all fours.

  Fat Nat yelled at the top of his lungs, “Nuke attack!”

  “Emergency Nuclear Blast Doors activated,” answered the overhead computer voice.

  The sound of several-feet thick alloy walls rose from the ground in a slow rumble as they sealed Joe Blows up like a tomb. The barrage of pulse-fire continued, but was just a melody of taps from outside, rather than projectiles of death and destruction.

  Fat Nat stood to his feet with a deep frown on his face to survey the damage. He walked to the bar and peeked over the counter. There was the kid, Hyper, lying on the floor, missing an arm, in a puddle of blood, but smiling.

  “I’m good, boss.” He gave a casual salute with his good arm. “The blast cauterized the wound, so there’s almost no blood.”

  “Tab?” Fat Nat yelled.

  “Yes, boss.”

  “What’s your disposition?”

  “I’m shot and lying on the ground.”

  “Any major damage?”

  “How would I know? You were the one who shot me!”

  “Would you have preferred to be shot by me and alive or shot and dead by unknown bastard gunmen because you were too dumb to put face to floor?”

  “Is that supposed to be a trick question, boss?”

  Fat Nat continued his inspection of his place. His card-mates appeared and joined him.

  “What’s Big G’s disposition?” Fat Nat asked.

  “Big G will be needing a new hand.”

  “Fat Nat, what are you going to do?”

  The other men looked at him, and they could see Fat Nat seething as he walked through the establishment—damage, debris, and bodies everywhere.

  “Make sure no one’s dead,” Fat Nat said to his friends.

  “What will you be doing, Nat?”

  “Nobody shoots up Joe Blows, my place of business, and gets away duty-free. I’ll be back.”

  “No, Fat Nat. Not the Terminator stash. You can’t be shooting up the streets with machine guns.”

  “Nobody shoots up Joe Blows!”

  “Nat,” said another man. “You can’t be running around Old Harlem shooting up bad guys. This is our neighborhood. If it were somebody else’s, I’d say give me a piece too, and let’s go. But you don’t be shooting up your own neighborhood. What’s wrong with you?”

  There was one loud, muffled metallic knock, then several more pounds from outside. Someone was knocking.

  The men looked at each other.

  “This is the Police!”

  Sweet Street was totally shut down. Thick, neon yellow police tape—POLICE LINE. DO NOT CROSS—cordoned off the entire area and it was a light show of red and blue flashing sirens. People crowded the slick sidewalks and streets outside the tape, while media arrived in force. One hoverambulance after another landed on the scene.

  Fat Nat argued with the policeman, but was gently restrained by his smoking buddies.

  “I demand to see the body,” he yelled again at the policeman.

  “Sir, this is now an official crime scene—”

  “Yeah, I should know,” Fat Nat interrupted. “I was one of the ones inside getting shot at, watching my employees and customers get shot up and my place of business get blasted to hell.”

  “Sir, I understand you’re upset, but we have to maintain the integrity of the crime scene.”

  “Showing me the body of the supposed one-man, crazy gunman is not going to mess up any crime scene. Let me make it simple. Do you want to show me the body, so I can see who this mook was, or should I shuffle my fat self on over to the media cameras and talk about the deep psychological trauma I’m experiencing—yeah, I can feel it coming on. I might need to call my lawyer or a doctor, or my lawyer and doctor at the same time. Lawsuit settlements come right out of the police budget nowadays, never city hall—”

  “Wait here, sir.”

  The policeman walked over to a superior talking with three other policemen. After a few moments of speaking, one of the policemen gestured to Fat Nat with his index finger: Come here.

  The white blanket was lifted from the lone gunman, lying dead on the sidewalk.

  “Do you know this man?” the policeman asked.

  Fat Nat stared at the body for a while. He looked up and said, “Never saw him before.”

  Fat Nat’s smoking buddies also stared at the body.

  “What about any of you gentlemen?” the policeman asked.

  They all shook their heads.

  “We’re sorry we were so jerky about this. Sorry we can’t identify him for you, either,” Fat Nat continued. “So this mook shot up the place with pulse machine guns?”

  “High-powered,” the policeman added. “He gave us quite the gun battle.”

  Fat Nat shook his head. “And this is supposed to be a safe neighborhood. Well, I have lots of calls to make—hospital, insurance, and so on. I got to get my place of business made whole. Joe Blows has never been closed in sixty years, and we’re not about to start now. I should have the ambulance guys check me out, too.”

  “Sir, we’ll have the shift detectives contact you tomorrow for a full statement,” the officer said.

  “Thanks, officer. Tell us when you need us at the station.” Fat Nat gathered his buddies and led them away towards the crowd.

  The policemen watched them.

  “Looks like they know more than they’re sayin’,” said one officer.

  “People always know more than they’re saying, especially when they’re the victims.”

  Fat Nat and the boys stopped in front of the police-tape line.

  “Nat, that was Easy Chair Charlie,” one of the men whispered. “Easy Chair Charlie never touched a gun in his life! Those—”

  “Shhh!” Fat Nat turned his head briefly.

  The policemen were still watching them. Fat Nat smiled at them. They ducked under the neon yellow police tape and disappeared into the crowds as a light rain began again.

  PART TWO

  Where’s Cruz?

  Chapter 2

  Run-Time

  RUN-TIME.

  Middle-school drop-out at eleven years old. Body shop go-fer at twelve. Hovercar mechanic at thirteen. Valet attendant at fourteen. Hovertaxi driver at seventeen. Hovertaxicab owner at nineteen; bought three more at twenty-one. Millionaire at twenty-two. Started Let It Ride Enterprises at twenty-five. Mega-multi-millionaire by thirty.

  Run-Time was a big deal in Metropolis, a “Who’s Who” among the wealthy elite, and he wasn’t even forty, yet. But, there was nothing “elite” about him. He was from the streets and kept that sensibility, despite his wealth. He owned all the top car washes, hovercar body shops, hovercar rental shops, hovercycle rental shops, hovertaxicab, and hoverlimousine services in the city. Anything that had to do with private transportation, Run-Time had his hands in it.

  But, the operation that surpassed every other line of his businesses was his mobile hovercar security services. The hovercar remained the top luxury item in the city, despite ubiquitous public transportation and commercial hovertaxicab services. With virtually every city resident in some type of legacy housing, it was hovercars that people spent virtually all their discretionary income on. Such an investment demanded some kind of protection, and Run-Time was there to fill the need. Call Let It Ride, and a rep would descend from the sky via jetpack to guard your precious investment hourly, nightly, or daily. No one messed with your car when Let It Ride was protecting it.

  Cruz had been a client of Run-Time’s for years, one of his premium customers and, long before that, a best friend. Run-Time realized the hard way, the higher up the wealth ladder one went, the smaller the number of people one could genuinely call “friend.” In all the years Run-Time
had known Cruz, Cruz never once asked for a favor or money.

  Run-Time strolled into his headquarters building early. He never wore sweats or hoodies. Monday to Thursday, he wore his slim fit business suits and slim ties, and on casual Fridays and the weekends, if he came in, he left the tie at home. The only casual thing he wore was his trademark flat cap. You’d never see his head without it, and you’d never see him wearing it backwards. He didn’t have to work as hard as he did now that he’d “made it”—he could hire people to run his business for him, while he lived the pampered, human vegetable, booshy life, but that wasn’t in Run-Time’s DNA. He was the hardest worker around, among his fifty-five-thousand plus employee corporation. His people worked hard, and he paid them well for it.

  Peacock Hills was one of the premiere business districts in the city. From a distance—a long, long distance—the monolith buildings looked like gargantuan fingers extending into space through the city’s rain cloud cover. Each was illuminated in the conservative colors of white, light yellow, and blue. As with most of the city’s buildings, the roof lighting of each structure reflected off the sky giving them the appearance of having angelic halos.

  Run-Time exited the elevator on the penthouse level, two hundred and fifty floors up, and did as he always did. “Good morning, good ladies,” he greeted.

  He was not a boss who demanded that staff snap to attention at his arrival. His philosophy was, “if you can’t give me a high-five, fist bump, or shake my hand like a normal person, then you’re working at the wrong place. I’m just a guy, not a dictator or the Second Coming.”

  Three women sat at the reception desk, evenly spaced apart from each other. “Good morning, Mr. Run-Time,” the receptionists responded in unison.

  To look at them, you’d think they coordinated their outfits the day before. The Caucasian woman with the British accent was dressed in yellow, the Asian woman with the Southern accent was dressed in blue, and the Black woman with the West Indian accent was in red.

  “Boss, your nine a.m. is here early,” one of them added.

  “Give me five minutes and bring him up to the office.”

  “He’s almost forty-five minutes early, boss.”

  He stopped and gave her a look. “What am I thinking right now?”

  “We’ll send him up in five minutes, boss,” she answered.

  He took the steps two-by-two to his private second floor of the penthouse level, and to his office at the very end of a long hallway.

  Two Japanese men sat facing his spacious, custom-made ivory desk. The older man wore a glowing suit as white as the man’s full head of hair and eyebrows. The younger man wore a black suit. Run-Time could tell that the older man was not only in charge, but at the highest level in his mega-company—he wore mere sandals. Oh, his feet were covered in the most expensive silk socks, but wearing sandals meant his feet never touched the public street like the commoners of the world or even his subordinates. Most in the world had to wear at least calf-high boots, but the older man moved from office to hoverlimo to jet plane only. The younger man watched Run-Time with a slight smile, but the older man was stone-faced.

  “The Orochi Corporation would humbly request a contract for exclusive services with your company,” the younger man continued.

  “I’m very flattered, Mr. Ping,” Run-Time said. “However, there is the matter of the platinum services that I provide to my clients, who, incidentally, are very dependent on my services. I’ve spent nearly twenty years building that dependence. Also, if I’m exclusive with you, then who would take my dear, good mother to the library? I have a few relatives that depend on me. I can’t withhold my limo services from them—family and friends.”

  A slight smile flashed on the older Japanese man’s face.

  “Mr. Run-Time,” Mr. Ping said, “we are not talking about immediate family, relatives, or other acquaintances—a simple exemption clause in our exclusivity contract would be acceptable, and expected. Do not allow your desire to retain contracts with the city sabotage a more superior business arrangement. I am sure we could come up with a figure that would…alleviate any discomfort that exclusivity with our corporation might cause you. Your mother would appreciate more the fact that you could buy her her own hovercar with full-time drivers. Maybe, her own private jet with dedicated pilots. Maybe even, a luxury peri-terrestrial space flight from time to time.”

  Run-Time smiled. “There is a transformational point that any truly successful businessman reaches in his life.”

  “What would that be, Mr. Run-Time?”

  “Money becomes meaningless. I made more in one year than my father, mother, both sets of grandparents, and every one of my known ancestors made in their entire lives, going back as far as the genealogical records can go. Ironically, I became as wealthy as I am, because I don’t care about money. Purpose for me is being the best at whatever I set my mind to and having the freedom to pursue that quest, to always be reaching and fighting for excellence.”

  “Money is never meaningless, Mr. Run-Time.” Mr. Yo finally spoke. “Soon, after you realize that money is meaningless, you realize something else.”

  “What is that, sir?”

  “That the money you acquire is no longer for you. It is to amass power. For that, there is never enough money.”

  “I appreciate that advice, Mr. Yo, but for me, it’s a principle. I am a man of principle.”

  “We, as well, Mr. Run-Time. Principle is the bedrock upon which every other part of what truly makes a man a man is built. With the house of his life, one can build upon a foundation of sand or stone. It is an important decision.”

  “We agree completely. I must say, Mr. Yo, that others have done what you’re asking, favoring one side or the other. But I will never become exclusive with the government, nor will I go exclusive with any multinational or megacorp. I cater to all. That’s what my business is known for—from Main Street to Money Street to City One. I’m sure you can understand that principle.”

  “No,” the older Japanese man quickly replied. “It means you are not mature enough to enter the halls of real power. You still think small thoughts, have small ambitions. Those are of a child and not an adult.”

  Run-Time contained his laugh. “I’m close, but I haven’t turned forty, yet. I think I have more than enough time to be an adult with big-boy pants, big-boy thoughts, and ambitions.”

  “That’s the other thing you will learn, Mr. Run-Time. Mortal men never have enough time. You think one hundred billion dollars is big because you associate with street people who have no money. Yes, to them that is big money. But, Mr. Run-Time, when your life serves a multi-trillion-dollar company, you see things in their true light. One hundred million dollars is what we spend in one weekend on a party for our executives.”

  Run-Time was not a man easily offended, but he was annoyed now.

  “Sir, I prefer to be proud of my accomplishments in life, thus far. Not bad for a junior high school drop-out without a high school diploma.”

  The younger Japanese man laughed. “Still peddling that story, Mr. Run-Time? You secretly got yourself a MBA from the same university my nephew attends. Very pricey. Very prestigious. Very elite.”

  The older man interrupted him. “I am so sorry we can’t do business together, Mr. Run-Time. Our CEO demands exclusivity in his business, so we will continue our search.”

  “I apologize for not being able to serve your needs, Mr. Yo.”

  “We, as well,” the older man responded as he rose from his chair and immediately walked out of the office.

  The younger man rose, smiled as he bowed, and followed his boss out of the office.

  Run-Time watched the men move down the hall from his chair behind the desk. The two men disappeared around the corner.

  His three vice presidents entered the office from an adjoining room—all finely dressed in dark suits. Two female—a tall Lebanese woman and a West Indian woman, and one stout blue-ey
ed Irishman. Right behind them, a man wearing overalls over his purple suit, holding the handle of a contraption with one hand and a long telescoping wand with the other, entered the office.

  They watched as the sweeper did his work, quickly scanning the entire office. In the cut-throat, war-like corporate world, it was common for a visitor to “forget” a listening device or two in someone’s office during a meeting.

  “It’s clean, boss,” Bugs said.

  Run-Time nodded as the sweeper left the office.

  “They can hurt us, boss,” one vice president said.

  “Badly,” said another.

  “If you can’t handle the capitalist jungle, then you should never have left the baby crib,” Run-Time said confidently. “You’re good to your customers and they won’t abandon you.”

  “What about politically?” a third VP asked.

  Run-Time tapped his fingers on his desk. “However…”

  His executives could almost see their boss’s mind race.

  “I want to know every one of our competitors they approach, and get our research boiler-room ready—hire what we need. If we’re going to be in a market-share war, then let’s make sure we can launch our strike before they do.”

  The phone from his desk beeped and he hit the answer button.

  “Call on one for you, boss. A China Doll.” He pushed the button and could see a face on the phone’s small TV screen. “China Doll.”

  He looked at his VPs as his finger tapped the mute. “And have marketing and communications put together a strategy by lunch time.” He picked up the phone receiver. “Full conference meeting at noon.” He put the receiver to his ear.

  The executives wrote their notes to themselves on electric steno-pads and briskly walked out. One of them stopped and pointed to the door. Run-Time made the gesture to leave it open.

  He touched the button labeled VID-PHONE. “Doll. What’s shakin’?”

  “Where’s Cruz?” the female voice asked.

  “Haven’t seen him.”

  “He’s not picking up his mobile. He’s supposed to be having dinner with me at my parents’ today. The first time.”