Flicking

by Lukas Oberhuber

are we tracking?”

  “About five.”

  “I’m not the NSA you know.”

  “Please.”

  “I don’t think so. Too much risk for too little reward.”

  Oh fuck. That was what she was afraid of.

  “You just can’t do it, can you?” she asked.

  “Oh baby, don’t you doubt me.” The distorted voice crackled. “It’s all about reward.”

  She swallowed hard. I’m committed, aren’t I? “I can give something you want desperately.”

  “Oh yeah? What exactly would that be?”

  “Guess.”

  “A night with you? Ha ha, you sure think you’re great. I get chicks like it’s going out of style.” He laughed, the sound coming out ghastly through the vadering. “You should have seen the one goin’ down on me last night. Ass like a cheese wheel from Fr—“

  “Shut up you perv! Not that, no. ”

  “Ok. Tell me then.”

  “I’ll give you the new Oliver Stone movie—“

  “Oh yeah?”

  “—before it’s released. With perfect pixes.”

  “Oh fuck, oh fuck. I would love to shove that shit down Code’s throat. Can you really do that?”

  “I work for Melbox Movies.”

  “You what? Fuck, you’re nuts; I’m in. Gimme gimme gimme.”

  “But I’m sending you the list of phone numbers, IM accounts and IRC accounts to track, as well as the keywords.”

  “Hell yeah, no probs. See you tomorrow afternoon. Gets released at midnight.”

  “I’ll start uploading at six-thirty so you have it all uploaded by seven. That’s two hours before the east coast midnight release time.”

  “I’m making history. Code and Seventy MM eat my dust.”

  The phone clicked off. Andrea took a huge gulp of air, realizing she had barely been breathing the entire conversation. What was she doing this for? Clearly she was bonkers. This could only end badly. Her mouth curled. Not that she could help herself, she knew. She had never been able to keep her nose out of things.

  She grabbed her hair in a long ponytail, and expertly wrapped a scrunchy around it and installed the vadering software. For next time. She’d use it then. She got ready for bed. Long day tomorrow, and she had to figure out how to get a perfectly pixed movie by six thirty, when the earliest she could get her hands on it was noon.

  Speeches

  Mel Boxton knew that many journalists had mentally noted his height as ‘short’ or even ‘diminutive’ on first meeting him, but he was proud of how few had dared publish the word. Instead, he saw how they positioned their photographers near the ground, and focused their stories on his wealth. As one writer gushed in the New Yorker, “The moment I met him, I knew I was in the presence of a captain of industry. His perfectly tailored suit, and the gleam in his eye belied the sheer fun of his job.” Mel had liked that one. He knew not everyone got to jet between houses in Miami Beach, the Costa Smeralda and Vail, but he was sure few deserved it as much as he did. As Mel would tell anyone that would listen, he lived a charmed life.

  Mel could confidently say things were good, especially his gorgeous piece of ass new wife. And he liked the fact that people scurried to do his bidding wherever he went. In fact, many times, he imagined that this was what it was like to be king of France. Although, he sincerely hoped that Louis XIV had more competent people around him than the idiots Mel had to deal with every day.

  That day, Mel stood in front of an industry crowd that adored his every achievement. This was his business, his crowd, his people, and they would love whatever speech he gave them.

  “…the livelihood of thousands upon thousands of American workers is at risk,” he said, his muscular body and balding head emerging from the top of the podium in the large banquet hall. His diamond pinky ring sent dazzling shafts of redirected theater lighting into the eyes of the fawning audience. “The scourge is not offshoring, or even the rapacious movie studio heads…” He pointed at himself as the room roared with laughter. “…or the so-called senseless drivel that we are producing these days in Hollywood. No, my colleagues--can I call you friends?--no, the danger is far more invisible and insidious. It is a rot at the core of the movie industry.

  “You ask what is it? I tell you. In one word: piracy.” He threw his arms sideways, fingers splayed for extra impact. “You ask: how can that be? How indeed? I answer. Movies are fun. Our audiences love us. Why would they want to rob us? Well, look no further than your living rooms. Look at the internet. Children steal movies, the very very latest straight onto their hard drives before most of you have bought a ticket. Every movie ever made. I don’t care when, I don’t care what. Every single last one can be stolen in less time than it took you to eat your soufflé.” He paused, letting the words sink in.

  “Do you know how they do it?” A few people shook their heads. “Do you know how they do it?” he said, much louder this time.

  “No,” the audience replied in chorus.

  “Do you know how they do it?” he roared.

  “NO!” the audience screamed back.

  “There are people who steal DVD Screeners, sit in movie theaters with a video camera or copy a film print as it is distributed. They can do that at the source, almost the minute the movie comes out. No one stops them. ‘It’s a victimless crime,’ they say. Well, the victims are you. The movie industry. Real people.” He spread his hands to the crowd. “Do you know how quickly the average release is available on the internet?” He breathed deeply. “Fifteen hours,” he shouted into the microphone. “That’s it! Fifteen hours.” Sweat sparkled on his forehead. “We don’t even count the weekend gross for another four days after that.” He sighed, a huge glorious theatrical sigh, feeling the audience sigh with him. “Criminal gangs, the same ones that import drugs, terrorists, scum. They take the rips, as they call them, and press them onto DVDs and sell them world wide. They distribute so fast it hardly pays for us to open a movie in Bangkok anymore. We’re losing over a billion dollars to piracy every year, and the cost is growing.”

  “This scourge.” He shook his fist. “This routing of our copyrights, must be stopped. We must reach out, convince, cajole, enjoin, dissuade, sue—unfortunately—and finally, regretfully, incarcerate. We must put a halt…” Mel could feel the crowd and their love for his words, the way they hung on him. Yes, as a person, they would gladly be rid of him, but they feared the internet more than they hated him. “…this message must be trumpeted from every tower, every hamlet, every media outlet, until the world knows what is right, and what is wrong.

  “Do not let this unique way of life, this wonder that is Hollywood, the movie industry that we so love and adore, go to waste, decline, to destruction. Fight with me my brothers, my sisters, my fellows in the business and let us prevail, as we have in the past when we were at risk.

  “When a Senator in Washington wanted to brand us Communists, we fought back. When television went cable, we prevailed, and now with the internet, let us succeed where others have failed. This is my word, my brothers.” Mel had hit a chord. “We’ve got a lot more up our sleeves than hot air. In fact, we will spend hundreds of millions of dollars on crushing piracy.”

  Ten minutes later, the speech was over. Mel stepped down from the stool that allowed him to be seen over the podium, and walked out of the room at the left, and to the elevators. The room rang with applause even once he had left.

  “Excuse me,” a hand tapped Mel on the shoulder as he pressed the UP button.

  “What are you doing?” Mel said, surprised.

  “Sorry. I wanted to ask you a question. Been following you from back there, you didn’t hear me.” He looked apologetic. “I’m a reporter.”

  “I’m very busy right—“

  “I can’t understand why you want to attack and sue your own customers. Where’s the advantage in that?”

  “I can’t comment.”

  “That’s ridiculous. You pontificate for twenty minutes about
getting money back from the ‘pirates’ and now you won’t comment?”

  “Shut up.” Mel pressed the button again, wishing the elevator would arrive.

  “This is a serious question. I think America is owed an answer.”

  “We will defend our rights vigorously. That’s all I’ll say. Now please leave me in peace.”

  The elevator arrived and Mel stepped in, thankful the reporter chose not to enter as well. He rode up to the tenth floor, to room 1034 and knocked on the door.

  A man in a tuxedo opened. “Good evening,” he said.

  Mel brushed past him and sat down at the table in the middle, across from another tuxedo clad figure, not noticing the rich buffet or the modern paintings or the air of anticipation.

  “Hi Frank,” Mel said, declining to shake the other man’s hand.

  Mel had to admit that Frank Close was distinguished in appearance. His full head of thick black hair framed a face that had aged well, lined and tanned, friendly, movie star looks. In fact, before Frank took over the MAIG, the Movie America Industry Group, he had been a minor leading man who had eventually drifted into directing, then producing movies.

  “Hi Mel,” Frank said.

  “Look, I was enjoying my speech and the dinner. What you calling me here for?”

  “Mel, cool it.” His teeth flashed a tight smile. “I’ll dive right in. You do hate civilized pleasantries too much.”

  Mel nodded. “So?”

  “Tell me how the contract is going. You’ve got a Herculean task before you and I don’t have the patience to find out at the