Armchair Safari (A Cybercrime Technothriller)

by Jonathan Paul Isaacs

  Topolev had tucked his burned hand protectively underneath his opposite arm. He was huddled into a semi-fetal position now, his defiance all but gone, staring at his feet and unable to make eye contact. Anton saw him nod sullenly in acknowledgement.

  “Good. Very good. You’re a good man, Mr. Topolev. However... we aren’t. So pay. Two days.”

  Anton grabbed his coat from the prep table, put it on, and strode out of the kitchen with Johan close behind.

  They met Dmitri at the front door. He was pacing back and forth biding his time, his AK-74u under his overcoat at the ready, but with nothing to report. The smell of burned flesh now permeated the entire inside of the restaurant and Dmitri had a distasteful look on his face from the stink. The three men exited the building. Anton’s Mercedes was still parked quietly by itself on the far side of the street.

  Anton flopped into the driver’s seat and immediately noticed that Misha had taken off his coat and shirt, and was holding the latter around his injured foot.

  “Why are you using your shirt? What happened to the rag I gave you?”

  “It was filthy!”

  “So? You’re changing the color of my expensive car interior.”

  “Well, that’s too bad, you asshole,” replied Misha venomously. “I’m not going to let the fact that you keep your auto tools in a grease-soaked armpit of a towel cause me to get a blood infection. You just wait until my uncle hears about this!”

  It was hard to keep the smirk off his face. “I’ve been working for your uncle a lot longer than you’ve had the privilege of being his nephew. Come now, my boy. Bullet holes build character.”

  “Fuck!”

  Bemused, Anton snapped the car into gear and sped past the empty van they had been discussing earlier. They accelerated far beyond any approved safe driving speed until the car cornered onto the main highway of Calea Victoriei, with Anton barely even touching the brakes.

  “So what happened?” grunted Misha, still putting pressure on his foot, but unable to contain his curiosity around the shakedown in which he had missed out.

  “Topolev is going to inventory his assets and figure out how to catch up on his payments. He’ll be good for it.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  Anton accelerated past a lone straggler of a sedan obeying the speed limit on the highway. “We painted a picture for him of how hazardous cooking accidents could endanger his health. Unless he has the right protection, of course.”

  “Protection? What, like oven mitts?”

  Anton considered that. “Da. That might have helped.” He could see Johan suppress a smile in the rearview mirror.

  Uncomprehending, Misha plowed on. “So what do we do now?”

  “Get breakfast?” Anton asked. He looked over his shoulder and winked at Dmitri. “I have to say, all that cooking and I think I’m a little hungry now.”

  9

  Yuri was The Boss, and The Boss set the pace for the walk along the banks of Lake Morii out near the west end of the city. It was where he liked to come on days like this and get his exercise and his fresh air. Anton walked beside him and slightly behind, keeping his stride small so that he didn’t outpace the shorter, older, slower man. The two bodyguards that always accompanied Yuri wherever he went flanked the pair on either side of the paved walkway and projected their unsmiling gaze at everything in sight. It was just after lunchtime now, and the air felt even more frigid than it should have because of the stiff breeze across the water. Anton wished he could soon go get something to eat. Breakfast hadn’t lasted nearly as long as it should have.

  “The problem with the world these days, Anton, is that it’s getting too complicated,” The Boss was saying. “Too many competing pressures. That means it’s easy to get distracted, like our poor friend Topolev. Times are hard, there is less money changing hands, and that causes people to make poor decisions. It’s just... unfortunate.”

  “Yes, Boss.”

  “So it’s more important than ever to keep people properly motivated, don’t you think? Otherwise, no one pays, and things will get ugly.”

  “The other business owners in that neighborhood will stay motivated after hearing about Mr. Topolev,” remarked Anton. “Johan will be able to soak them for a good long while.”

  “Indeed. So... our restaurateur. What did you do?”

  Anton lit a cigarette. “He had a little cooking accident in the kitchen.”

  “I see.” Yuri stopped and stared out toward the river for a moment. “I heard Misha had a little problem, too?”

  “Just that he was born a moron.”

  There was a moment of silence. “That’s my nephew, you know.”

  “True,” Anton conceded, unfazed. “But that’s not your fault.”

  The Boss turned and their eyes met, and Anton saw Yuri suppress a small, knowing smile.

  “You, my friend, are unfailingly steady,” Yuri said, chuckling. “Your motivations are never in question. I know what makes you tick.”

  “Yes. Money.”

  “Ah,” said Yuri, a wider smile now breaking across his face. He shook his head. “That is not what actually motivates you, Anton. Do you care to guess again?”

  Anton struggled for a moment, trying to think of how his answer was wrong. What did motivate him?

  “Things... you can buy with money?” he offered.

  Yuri glanced at one of his nearby bodyguards. He looked back, impassively.

  “Oh, come now, Anton, don’t tell me that I know you better than you know yourself?” Yuri began walking along the water’s edge again. “You enjoy the working of the scam. Of providing just enough of a deft touch to keep operations going and profitable, but finding out how to do it with style. Sure, the money at the end is nice, but we’ve worked together for too long. Anyone can shake someone down for money. Some smashed windows or a bomb in the doorway usually works. There are lots of ways to provide a warning that protection payments must be maintained. But you... no, you have a certain touch that you use. A way of going about the scam in such a way that is more effective than any measure of brute force. The story of Topolev’s accident will make the rounds in the community. It will have a tenfold effect on other business owners making payments. Romanian meatballs, indeed.”

  Anton nodded. So Yuri had heard the details about what had happened in Topolev’s kitchen, even though he had played coy just a moment before. Had Dmitri reported it? Anton smoked his cigarette, appreciating The Boss and his information networks. He was always one step ahead. That’s why he was still The Boss.

  “I just like to get my hands dirty once in a while.”

  “More than once in a while, from the sound of things,” Yuri corrected.

  They stopped again, Anton taking advantage of the pause to finish his cigarette and stomp it out under his foot. He would have offered The Boss one, except that The Boss didn’t smoke. He didn’t drink, either. For a criminal CEO of a wide-ranging and very profitable illegal organization, he hardly indulged in any self-destructive pleasures that polluted the body. Not even vodka. Anton found that part exceptionally hard to believe. The Boss was Russian, after all.

  Instead, The Boss gazed out over the water, the icy breeze wafting through his slicked-back, graying blond hair. He sighed deeply in thought. Finally, after a full minute of silence, he spoke gravely. “Anton, I don’t have the confidence that Topolev—or any of the other marks we have—are going to pay us at the levels we’re accustomed to.”

  Blinking, Anton cocked his head to the left. “I assure you that they will, Yuri. I will help the boys keep them sufficiently motivated, as we’ve discussed.”

  The bodyguards exchanged glances. No one called The Boss by his name to his face; he was just always The Boss. But Yuri betrayed nothing. He and Anton had a history that went back much too far.

  “You misunderstand me, Anton,” Yuri said, holding up a hand. “I don’t see it as a question of will. It is a question of means. I know that you know this rule well. Romania�
��s economy is a failing one. We are not diversified enough to maintain the levels of income or the lifestyles we’ve enjoyed. Topolev is just a symptom of the disease. Oh, he will try, I am sure. You, as always, are very persuasive. But, ultimately, he will fail simply because his business is failing, as is our country failing around us. We must find other means.

  “Therefore, Anton, I have a little project for you.”

  His eyebrow arching suspiciously, Anton ventured a cautious, “Okay.”

  “I want you to talk to someone for me. A certain young man, very sharp when it comes to technology, computers, the Internet. His name is Krystian. He is very bright, very crafty. He has been involved in a few scams—hacking websites, stealing online accounts, things like that. Profitable. But always small time. He claims he has some ideas on how to make big boy money. You are to go see if his ideas hold any merit.”

  Anton didn’t see any problem with that. “Sure. How do you know this boy?”

  “A friend of the family, I suppose you could say. He used to date Petra—my cousin’s daughter.”

  “I remember Petra,” Anton said. Slim girl, dark and quiet, but with a glint of mischief always in her eye. “How old is she now?”

  “Almost twenty-three.”

  “No! Already? That makes me feel old.”

  “Then how do you think I feel?” said Yuri, laughing. “But that’s also why I want you to talk with Krystian. He belongs to the new generation—all these children, with their video games and their mobile phones and their Twitter. They know the intricacies of this land of technology that old men like you and I will never grasp. Money changes hands all day, every day over the Internet. We don’t have anything going in that world. We are stuck in the old ways, the things that worked twenty years ago—extorting payments from locals with nowhere to turn. But as you saw this morning, our old scams are susceptible to a lot of things that diminish their value.”

  “Wouldn’t those same pressures apply to businesses done over the Internet?” asked Anton, lighting another cigarette.

  “Perhaps. But it is a much bigger pool, and not limited to certain neighborhoods where we operate and other gangs don’t.”

  Anton considered this as he took a drag.

  “Okay,” he offered after a few moments. “You know I will do whatever you need. But why me? Is this another special project, like Misha?”

  The Boss sniffed with mild indignation. “Of sorts, I suppose. This boy, he knows the technology. What he is lacking is the experience around how to scam. He needs a guiding hand. That’s where you come in. You know, keep things simple, and make sure that the business arrangements are sound and secure. Assess the risks and help make proper judgments. And, most importantly, keep me informed. I need someone I trust in that role.”

  Anton stood there smoking, thinking.

  Yuri leaned intimately over to Anton to whisper into his ear. “This... this could be important, Anton. The money is not coming in like it once was. It’s not good. We need... more. We need to try some new things.”

  “I understand,” Anton replied. “And you think it can be done all through this kid and his computers?”

  Yuri leaned back. “Perhaps, if the right man is there to help.”

  “Then I will see how it can be made to happen.”

  “Excellent.” The Boss clasped him on the shoulder. “You, Anton, are my most valuable associate.”

  “Thank you, Boss.”

  Yuri wagged a finger at him. “I really wish you would quit chain smoking those awful cigarettes. They will kill you prematurely, you know.”

  With a smile, Anton replied, “Of all the ways that I may possibly exit this world, I don’t see cigarettes as being the reason.”

  Yuri sighed. “So be it. Get going, my old friend. Let me know what you find with Krystian. I have high hopes. This... this is one of the most important things there is for our future.”

  “I’ll take care of it.”

  As he turned, Anton happened to glance over at one of the bodyguards. The impassive slab of a man gave him a small nod of deference. Anton did likewise as he walked past. Yuri was their venerated patriarch, but even the bodyguards knew who ran the show when it came to making the cash flow.

  * * *

  It took exactly two minutes for Anton to decide that he disliked Krystian.

  Half of that time was spent outside the door, waiting for it to be answered.

  When it finally opened, the first thing Anton noticed was the level of filth in the kid’s apartment. It was awful. Blackout curtains hung over the windows and what little light penetrated their cover only served to illuminate clouds of dust that swirled in the air. Dirty clothes made enormous, mountainous obstacles that made walking in a straight line next to impossible. Anton stared in amazement at how anyone could live like this.

  As for the man—boy—himself, Krystian was even less impressive. He was tall and skinny, with a hooked nose and a pale, sickly complexion. A mop of unruly black hair crowned his head over two dark, beady eyes that shone with a certain kind of sly intelligence. He was wearing black jeans and a black t-shirt that only served to show how rail-thin his physique was. Anton looked at the boy’s arms and wondered if he could snap them in half just using his fingers.

  “You must be Anton,” the boy said arrogantly. “I’ve been expecting you. Come on in.”

  Anton stepped in slowly, struggling to keep the scowl off his face. The walls were dingy and dark. How in the hell had Petra dated this freak? She was a decent-looking girl. There had to be some something that led her here. Maybe this guy had a huge dick.

  Then the smell hit Anton, and he was officially not a fan. The reek of old socks. Or maybe cheese?

  “Do you ever do laundry?” Anton asked. He hesitantly walked into the front room. “Or do you just buy new clothes when the old ones get dirty?”

  Krystian ignored him. “Yuri said you’d be coming to help, though I’m not sure why. I have everything I need. Do you know what you’re supposed to do here?”

  Anton was beginning to question that himself.

  “Apparently you think you have a way to make some big money, eh?” Anton said.

  The self-important air that Krystian had went up a notch or two. “Yeah. I was telling Yuri about this great idea and he got really excited about it. He was saying how amazing and clever it was, and how he wanted a piece of the action because of how much money I was going to make. Thought maybe I’d need some staff, I guess. I told him I didn’t need any help, but after some back and forth I relented. He was pleading so hard that I figured I’d do him a favor.”

  “I see. Sounds impressive. You must phone him regularly.”

  “Oh... yeah, all the time. But most of our conversations are pretty brief. He’s a busy guy, you see. A lot to attend to. You know how he is.”

  Yes, thought Anton, I do know how he is. Yuri hadn’t picked up a phone in fifteen years. And he certainly didn’t plead.

  “Well, I’m sure you’re busy too, my young friend,” said Anton, forcing out his charming side over the wall of disgust bubbling inside. “Why don’t you tell me this idea of yours so that I can figure out how I might help?”

  “Come with me,” said Krystian, arrogantly nodding to the back room.

  Anton followed. The apartment’s bedroom was small, with another mound of clothes in the corner piled upon what was presumably a mattress underneath it, and a tiny window on the far wall that let in the weak sunlight. But what really caught Anton’s attention was the corner opposite the bed. There was a desk covered in three flat-screen computer monitors, two keyboards, and piles of scribbled paper notes and DVD disks. On the floor around the desk were several computer minitowers and a writhing mass of wires between them. A box fan was blowing air onto the whole arrangement. Krystian sat down in an old office chair by the desk and started quickly clacking on one of the keyboards. A moment later, a list of text appeared on one of the monitors.

  “Do you know what that is?” asked Kry
stian, looking proud and smug.

  “No.”

  “Those are credit card numbers.”

  Anton squinted at the screen. “How many?”

  “About thirty thousand.”

  “Did you hack those?” asked Anton, mildly impressed.

  “Oh. No. Yuri fronted the money so I could buy them. You know, somebody steals them from an online service and wants to get rid of them, so they put them up for sale on a black market exchange.”

  Anton’s opinion went from slightly positive back to extremely negative. “Your whole scam is that you bought a bunch of credit card numbers? I thought you were some kind of hacker.”

  Krystian released an annoyed sigh. “People that hack into someone else’s system can get busted. Why would I want to do all that dirty work and leave my fingerprints at the crime scene? I just want to be able to use the data.”

  “So what are you going to do? Buy stereos and televisions and sell them on the street?”

  “Oh, please. That’s so old school.” Krystian looked Anton up and down. “You are pretty old, though.”

  The clock is ticking on this kid, Anton thought.

  He pulled out a cigarette and lit up, hoping that a smoke would keep his hands from fidgeting their way over to Krystian’s neck. “So... keep going. You bought the account numbers. This was with Yuri’s money?”

  “Yes. Fifteen thousand euros. Although even for a bulk buy, that’s a crazy-good price. And what I’m going to do with it is brilliant, just brilliant.”

  Anton stared at him, waiting.

  “Okay,” Krystian continued, turning giddy. “Here’s the plan. It’s incredibly smart. Are you ready?”

  More staring.

  “My friends and I have a code phrase for it. It’s... Online Poker.”

  It felt like a ton of bricks had dropped into Anton’s stomach. This was the scam? Gambling? There would be no control, lots of risk, everything left to chance. He bowed his head and rubbed his forehead. Anton thought he had been sent here to help a clever kid. Instead, he had walked into a disaster that was going to end before it even began. He’d never had to shoot a kneecap for non-payment on the very first visit before.