Big Money

by James Hudson

  “That’s amazing!” George exclaimed.

  “Yeah, you called me again and literally ordered to come immediately! I said that I had a date with Tom. You said that you didn’t give a shit. So, when I came to you, you returned my cell phone and asked to explain… But suddenly, my friend James called me. Actually, I had asked James to call me and ask provocative questions like what lingerie I was wearing at the moment and so on. You and I were sitting in the car – that Mercedes CL – and I could see how you were squeezing the steering wheel. While I was talking with my friend James, I was stroking a joystick in your car or a controller… I don’t remember… Something very nice and soft between the seats… I could see you broke a sweat.” Sarah laughed cheerfully.

  “Jeez… it’s like a fantasy of a teenage girl.”

  “It actually happened, George,” Sarah remarked. “Are you ready for another round?”

  “Round?”

  “Restore our relationship!”

  George sighed. “Sarah, I’ve already told you—”

  Suddenly, someone knocked on the door.

  “Holy shit! It’s them!” George hissed loudly.

  “Maybe it’s a hotel maid…” Sarah assumed.

  “I’m opening the window, Sarah!”

  “No! Please open the door!” she cried out. “What if they don’t shoot you? Just don’t be aggressive. Open the door and smile as nothing happened.”

  George heard a scratch at the door. Woman with long nails!

  “Maybe it’s Katie…” George muttered, approaching the door.

  “Who’s Katie?” Sarah asked curiously.

  “The girl who’d rented the room. But she flew abroad…”

  “Open up, and don’t be afraid!” Sarah whispered.

  George quickly moved the wardrobe aside and flung the door open. Sarah went in, smiling. She was holding her cell phone to her ear.

  “Calm down, sweetie!” Sarah exclaimed cheerfully. George stared at her, amazed.

  “What?” she smiled. “I know it’s your birthday today! That’s why you can play games for the rest of the day.”

  George frowned. “What games? Everything is real! It’s not a fucking game!”

  Her smile became even wider. “You got carried away playing this game, George! Come on… nobody’s watching us now! I like everything you’re doing. It’s just breathtaking! You know, I went out with some guys earlier. And I was bored to death.”

  George grabbed her by the waist. “Look, I liked these adventures too. But now, I can die for real! I can’t believe anyone! Because my life is in their hands. And they planned to kill me till tomorrow and take a picture of my dead body. I don’t believe you because I don’t remember you!”

  The smile died on her lips. “I thought you were smarter!” she exclaimed. “At least you could say that you enjoyed my surprise! But you definitely want to stay alone on your birthday. Alone and drunk as a pig!” She threw the folder on the floor. “And here’s your money!” She did the same with the wallet. “I didn’t touch it! Now, please jump out of the window! I don’t care!” She turned around and headed for the door.

  “I’m sorry!” George exclaimed. “Stop, Sarah! Yeah, you’re right. It’s just a game… No people had died for real. Nobody wanted to kill me. Everyone just amused me.” Maybe it’s better to make her believe that everything was a joke, he thought and sighed with relief when she smiled.

  “Surprise?” Sarah asked.

  “Yes,” George nodded. “Just a moment.” He approached the window and looked out. The police cars were still there. Plus, six ambulances. Did they all come to pick up the wounded guys and a couple of cops? This is weird.

  “Let’s go, George! I can’t wait to show you my gift!” Sarah said.

  George Hartley nodded and followed her.

  33. It all Started Three Years ago…

  “First of all, you must lose your weight. At least 40 pounds. In order to stand this severe test, you must be motivated enough. Whenever you are about to eat an enormous piece of cake, you must imagine a hot, sexy body – your future body. Certainly, you’ll have time limits. Say, 50 pounds in six months. If you fail, for example, you’ll lose 40 pounds, we’ll cut off your ear—”

  Sarah squeaked. Her thick legs shivered.

  “Don’t be afraid. You will thank me later because your life will change completely. You know, it’s an infinite pleasure to feel your own sexuality… By the way, you have no financial limits. You can buy a gym membership. Clothes of different sizes – no limits as well. Healthy food – you’ll get it. Just don’t fail!”

  Sarah shuddered and quickly touched her ears. She’d never let them disappear.

  “Of course, we won’t let you feel like shit. You’re working on us now, Sarah. Believe us or not, but we’ll make you happier than millions of people in the world. You’ll have to collect information, seduce, blackmail, eavesdrop, and so on. When you lose weight, we’ll change your values and principles. Don’t be afraid. I swear you’ll like new freedom. Actually, you’ll lose all your inhibitions, overcome feelings of inferiority, and so on. You’ll be watching movies full of violence and reading blood-chilling thrillers.

  You’re still a little girl. You believe in love, humanity, romantic relations, happy marriage, future kids… All this will be replaced by a simulation of feelings. You’ll have to become a person who will change opinions and beliefs in a second, an extremely flexible person. Unfortunately, if you truly believe in God, sometimes you’ll have to become an atheist, agnostic, or even pagan. We don’t require you to betray your beliefs, but you must realize that words mean nothing. Tell people that you’re a poor orphan, and they will believe you. In five minutes, you’ll tell them that it was a joke.

  As a crude example, if you are given a mission to tease an Islamist, you’ll have to go to his house naked, without hijab, offend Allah, and the person will shoot you up in a minute. If you are given a mission to seduce a Buddhist, you’ll probably practice yoga together, eat vegetarian food, criticize meat-eaters, something like that.

  Also, in a year or later, you’ll have to pass an exam. It’s gonna be tough. But we’re sure you can handle it.”

  Two months ago

  “I can’t! I can’t simulate my feelings!” Sarah cried. “I love George!”

  “Don’t you ever tell us about your feelings! In three days, we’re gonna test you. If we see that your heart starts beating when we mention his name, we’ll cut your breasts off!”

  “You’re monsters!” Sarah started sobbing. “I’ve already done everything I was told!”

  “Yeah, Sarah. You were great, actually. But this is your last exam. As you know, George Hartley belongs to the financial world. We, the representatives of the American Financial Fund, would never interfere in the internal affairs of Britain, hadn’t George Hartley inflicted severe economic damage to our fund. He’s not a global financial player but the most significant British player. And he’s unpredictable. We just can’t forgive him for what he’d done in Saudi Arabia. I mean that provocative attacks on Saudi oil facilities.

  By the way, before that, he’d visited Algeria and tried to negotiate with the authorities. Due to the French President and French influence in that region, Hartley’s plans were derailed. But we must stop him because he’s becoming dangerous.”

  “You wanna kill him?” Sarah asked.

  “No. First, we’ll settle accounts with him. Then, you enter the game. You have the biggest influence on Hartley.”

  “I wanna have kids!”

  Deep sigh. “Sarah, unfortunately, the financial world is heartless. You’ll be able to manipulate Hartley. And that means to control an influential financial player in the world! And you’re talking about love… Bullshit!

  George Hartley is one of the men who actually controls all the information. Because he is the information creator. He can create buzzes, gossips, different opinions, discourses. All the money in the world doesn’t mean cash. If we’re talking about th
e richest people in the world, we have in mind stockholders. If the stock prices plunged to zero, those richest people would become poor beggars. In 2008, many businessmen were flat broke. Plus, some of them had to pay off huge debts.

  Nobody wants another global financial crisis. A lot of politicians and financial officials became more cautious after 2008, conducting economic policies. But in recent years, the world became more invulnerable. I mean, cybersecurity is a top concern nowadays. The world economy is so fragile. That crazy bastard from North Korea… that’s my opinion, Sarah… he would say some insane things, and the world was scared to death for a few days or weeks. Thank God, most African tyrants haven’t been engaged in Internet activity yet. Just imagine that some African leader wakes up every morning and writes on Twitter that he might wage war. After breakfast, he changes his plans. That would be horrible! Thousands of fake-news would flood the world. People would never know whom to believe. Everyone would be afraid of everyone and everything!

  Actually, George Hartley always seeks for weak, unstable minds. He likes emotional politicians because it’s so easy to play with them! He would hardly visit Switzerland – a very steady, prosperous, and boring country with predictable politicians. Hartley needs to create chaos in world politics and the global economy. He needs people, say, new victims, to create new trends. People are tired of North Korea or Russia. You know, if someone threatens you verbally for a week, a month, a year, you stop believing this person: just words, no action. Nowadays, the US-China trade war is on everyone’s lips. Next year, the politicians and financial rulers will launch another information campaign. We don’t know yet what’s that gonna be. But I guess in January, we’ll hear something new. Maybe, Iran.

  Or they will come to the conclusion that people are tired of politics, wars, crises. How about the disease? Horrible disease, huh? The maintenance of fear is what they are doing all the time.

  Let me tell you another interesting story, Sarah. About cryptocurrencies. What actually happened to Bitcoin? Why is the price so unstable?

  There are lots of people who had been buying stocks for years receiving dividends since then. They are investors. Big players can’t make them sell the stocks. Investors are usually conservative. But big financial players always needed fresh blood – new traders who would buy and sell stocks every day. They decided to attract an absolutely new group of people – the young generation who had never invested money in the stock markets. Cryptocurrencies rose by 1000 percent and more. Lots of young men started mining cryptocurrencies buying powerful computers or buying cryptocurrencies on the markets. That was very attractive, mainly because you didn’t have to do anything – just buy and wait.

  People who managed risks made a lot of money. But most of the newcomers failed. Greedy, money-obsessed young people believed that they could become millionaires doing nothing. Actually, reporters, analysts – just everyone was spreading rumors about cryptocurrencies.

  When Bitcoin reached the historical peak price, and every housewife heard of it, the largest American exchanges started trading bitcoin futures. That meant that everyone could buy and sell cryptocurrencies using leverage. For example, you had only one thousand dollars, but you were able to borrow nine thousand dollars more and buy or sell as if you had ten grand.

  Rally went on. Nobody could predict when it stops. Some investors didn’t believe in Bitcoin. Including George Hartley.

  He assumed that some big guys controlled the situation. And he was right. Everything had been planned earlier! Just look at the charts. After the cryptocurrency futures were launched, the big players opened large short positions, and the cryptocurrency markets started smashing down. Greedy investors didn’t sell the cryptocurrency until the margin call. Who won? The big players! The cryptocurrency was squeezed out of the hands of those young people.

  That was grand financial speculation. Big businessmen just fucked over naïve and gullible young people.”

  “Stop it!” Sarah exclaimed suddenly. “I’m tired! Why are you telling me all this? You won’t reassure me. George Hartley is not a monster! Yes, money, fraud, speculations… But he didn’t kill people!”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes! I remember him! He’s a kind and sensitive man!”

  “We don’t order you to stop respecting him. But you must stop loving him. One day you’ll have to stop him. You have no choice.”

  34. Birthday Present

  “Follow me, George!” Sarah exclaimed cheerfully.

  “Are we going downstairs?” George Hartley asked. “There are dozens of police cars out there. I bet surveillance cameras spotted me—”

  “Shut up! We’re going to the roof!”

  George frowned but followed the girl. Fortunately, they met nobody on the stairs. They were ascending higher and higher. Soon, George felt short of breath. He was still a bit drunk.

  “So, you believe it’s a game?” he asked.

  “Yeah!” Sarah turned around and smiled. “I think you didn’t play much as a kid. Probably, your parents made you study all the time. And you didn’t have free time. Now you fully enjoy all these fake assaults, robberies, fake deaths, expensive costumes, decorations, fake guns. Big boys – big toys!

  I read somewhere that one rich guy traveled to Somali. He hired a crew, rented a ship, sailed there. The vessel looked like civilian. But there were private military contractors on board. So, the rich guy desired to meet Somalian pirates and attack them. He was cruising for a bruising. And soon they saw the pirates. When they were close, surrounding the ship, our rich guy with the mercenaries emerged from cover and started shooting. Our guy shot at least fifteen pirates. Nice voyage, huh?”

  “I’m not going to kill anyone unless they threaten my life,” George muttered dryly.

  “I thought so,” Sarah nodded. “I’d be surprised if you wanted to kill someone on your birthday. I bet some maniacs did that thinking they’re Übermenschen. Like Stalin and Hitler. But actually, they were just maniacs. Some African tyrants would eat their political opponents, probably like birthday cakes.”

  “Enough!” George winced. “You’re annoying, Sarah.”

  Meanwhile, they reached the door leading to the roof. Sarah pulled an electronic card out of her pocket and swiped it. The door was unlocked. George grinned. But when he stepped forward, he was shocked. A terrible machine noise deafened him. Sarah and George were standing in front of a helicopter. The blades were rotating.

  “Happy birthday, darling!” Sarah shouted. “It’s my present! You wanted it, and you got it! Let’s escape!”

  “But how is it possible? We were talking all the time!” George cried. “You didn’t even hang up the phone!”

  “I like danger!” she winked at him. “And I love you, George!” she cried out, staring at him.

  George shuddered.

  “Let’s get the hell out of here!” Sarah cried cheerfully.

  “Where’s the pilot?” George asked.

  “Gone! I mean, he jumped! He loves BASE jumping! I’m the pilot now!” she smiled.

  “I don’t believe you,” George frowned.

  “So, you wanna jump too?” she laughed. “Actually, I have another surprise for you! Hop in!”

  George slowly approached Robinson R66. The dark-blue illuminated machine looked awesome. Raindrops covered its huge windshield.

  George got inside the helicopter’s cabin. “My laptop!” he exclaimed, taking the computer from the seat.

  “Yeah, another surprise!” Sarah exclaimed.

  “How did you manage to bring it here? I left it in my room where the armed guys killed several policemen later.”

  She handed him the headphones.

  “Actually, I didn’t leave the hotel at all. I wasn’t riding my motorcycle while talking with you.” She glanced at him cheerfully. “I didn’t act as you told me. I entered the elevator and leaped out of it on the fourth floor. Then I returned to the room and picked up the laptop—”

  “You entered, step
ped over the dead bodies, meet no police, took the laptop, and left the room?” George asked distrustfully.

  “Yeah. And then I went up to the roof.”

  “How did you get access to the roof? How did nobody catch you? And also, I distinctly heard that you were driving through the city!”

  “You were drunk!” she laughed. “Stop interrogating me! It’s just a game, George! Don’t take it seriously! It’s your birthday! Relax!”

  In a minute, they took off the hotel roof. George noticed one of the tallest buildings not far away from them. He flinched. It was his skyscraper.

  “By the way, I hired the helicopter, but I didn’t spend your money, George. It’s my present. I like your hobbies, George. I do realize that modern society is very boring for you. Dancing, chatting, playing computer games – all that is for poor people, right? I see… Messing with life and death is much more exciting. I bet you’ve never gone off to war. People who were engaged in active combat hated war.

  But you know what? I think the main problem is that young people don’t want to die in wars because nobody will ever remember them. It’s a shame that soldiers die unknown. Just imagine if everyone in the world was famous and had their own Wikipedia page – every poor, hungry beggar in Bangladesh, every farmer in Venezuela, every herdsman in South Sudan. Some people would fill in the information about everyone. How cool would it be! People would pursue their goals and wouldn’t waste their time on fruitless shit.”

  George grinned.

  “Stupid idealism! Just imagine the colossal amount of lie. People would praise themselves, even if they were bastards and scums. Or who would fill in the information? Specially hired people? Billionaires would order the best biographies then. Thieves, burglars, murderers, swindlers, and amoral personalities would live in the poorest African and Asian states.”

  “You’re not right, George!” Sarah exclaimed. “People lean toward good!”

  “Naïve girl. But now, I sincerely believe you. Sorry for being suspicious, Sarah.”