Geek Mafia

by Rick Dakan

  Paul counted fourteen drummers in the circle, along with three others who clapped their hands or drummed their knees as they swayed with the music. Most had African-style drums that looked hand made, each around two to three feet tall and played with bare hands. Others had larger, bass drums that they played with soft tipped sticks. A few had conga drums and other store bought pieces. Most kept a steady, simple but fast rhythm, which the more skilled players then embellished upon with even faster and more intricate beats. No music expert, Paul couldn't fathom the complexity of the group's sound, but he knew it sounded good.

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  Chloe took him by the hand and led him to the circle. They dropped their camping gear in the sand and squeezed into the group, a drummer and a hand clapper each grinning and welcoming them to the party. Chloe pulled a thin blanket from her bag and laid it down in the sand amongst the various rugs, towels, and other blankets that the circle had already put in place. Paul sat down slightly behind Chloe, and she leaned back against him as they relaxed and beheld the spectacle.

  The older man soon emerged as the leader in the circle. The other dancers played off his movements as he leaped and cavorted around the circle. Occasionally he would stop in front of a drummer and squat down to bang away on their instrument in a frenzied rhythm. He'd been so lost in this wild, freeform celebration that he hadn't noticed Chloe and Paul's arrival. It was only after twenty minutes or so that he recognized her, and his face lit up with delight.

  "Ha HAAAAA! Chloe!" He shouted, grabbing her by the hands and pulling her to her feet. She squealed as he drew her inside the circle (although when Paul later implied that she'd squealed, she denied it). Immediately they were dancing hand in hand and the circle picked up its beat. Then they spun apart as the older man's own movements caught him up in a twisting movement that no partner could follow. Chloe, fully in concert with the drummers now, danced off in her own direction, gracefully moving near and through and back near the other four dancers, all of whom momentarily matched their movements to hers by way of welcome.

  Paul would never have imagined that the normally self-controlled Chloe would dance with such abandon, and the sight entranced him. She moved with a certain grace to be sure, but it was her vivaciousness and energy that he found most attractive. Her legs pumped up and down, her arms pressing in and out in time with two of the women dancers. Rising and crouching, the older man circled around them like a pot-bellied scarecrow, not in a lascivious way, but as if he was somehow honoring their contribution to the dance.

  The man next to Paul - the clapper, not the drummer - offered him a hit off of his pipe. Paul thanked him, drawing a deep lung full of pot smoke and holding his breath as long as he could before passing the pipe back.

  He watched Chloe dance for many more minutes as the euphoria of the hit (and the three he took after that) washed over him. Two other members had joined the dance now, and once they'd finished the bowl, the clapper suggested they both join in as well. Paul used to love to go out to clubs when he was in college, but he'd scarcely done any dancing since and none at all after he'd moved to California. Why not? He thought, if I can't drum, I might as well dance!

  Paul stood up and swayed in place to the music for a moment, trying to get a handle on the beat. Then Chloe spotted him and swished over, grabbing him around the waist, pulling him close. He moved his body with and against hers, learning the rhythm from her hips, an altogether enjoyable process. Once he was going Chloe, stepped back for a moment and shouted, "Isn't this great!"

  "Yeah!"

  "It's so hot by the fire!"

  "Sure!" he said, as he watched her pull her long-sleeved shirt up and over her head, tossing it onto her blanket.

  Now wearing just jeans and a bra, she pulled him back close to her again. "Come on! Let's dance!"

  And they did. For hours they circled the bonfire, moving to the beat. The circle shifted and morphed along with the changing beats as individual drummers dropped out and come back in when they got tired or decided to join the dancers for a while or just needed a quick smoke. By the time the circle began to wind down, Paul had taken off his own shirt. Some of the time he and Chloe danced close, their bare skin touching. Other times they cavorted separately around the circle, briefly intertwining with the other dancers. And always there was the old man, seemingly everywhere at once, leading the bacchanalian assembly though pure enthusiasm for the dance.

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  When the dancers and drummers finally collapsed from exhaustion, Paul and Chloe fell back into their blankets, covered in sweat and panting for air. The others produced bottles of water and wine, which they passed around the circle. Paul leaned close to Chloe, whispering in her ear.

  "Who are these people?"

  She took hold of his head and guided his ear to her mouth, whispering into it, "This is a real crew. They're the real deal."

  Before Paul could ask what the hell that meant, the potbellied scarecrow man started addressing the whole circle.

  "That was wonderful - just wonderful. I thank you all, from the bottom of my heart, for once again sharing your bodies and souls with me in the dance. This special communion never fails to move me. On a night like this, I realize that we really do have all we ever need as long as we have our freedom and each other." He smiled broadly and then shouted, "Freedom and company!"

  "Freedom and Company!" the group yelled in response. Paul thought back to the call and response session Chloe had led her Crew in after they'd helped him. Were these people high tech criminals as well? They didn't look the part.

  The man continued. "Tomorrow, once again we begin again. We'll rise up from the underground like the first blossoms of spring and bring a little bit of our own version of life into the cold hard world around us. And in return we'll take what we need to keep going, to keep teaching the world that there's another path, a way to live in true freedom. Our actions will resonate through the universe, like ripples in a pond. What we start, others will someday finish. The Revolution will come."

  "The Revolution Will Come," intoned the circle, like a congregation at prayer.

  "Let it be so." The man looked around the group in silence for over a minute, waiting to see if anyone wanted to add anything, but the only sounds were the crackle of the fire and the susurrations of the surf. Then he grinned an infectious, toothy smile.

  "Ok, we'll deal with the details tomorrow brothers and sisters. Tonight we have guests and there's still fun to be had. Drink, toke, and be merry! For tomorrow you might fly!" The group laughed and then broke down into a dozen different small conversations. Two of the drummers stood up to confer with the old man, passing him a joint as they did so.

  Paul had to know what was going on. "So they're a crew like you and your friends?" he asked Chloe.

  "Yes and no. They're much more old school than we are. And they're much more of a community. Really more like a commune."

  "So they're communists?" Paul joked.

  "Some of them probably are. Communists and Anarchists and whatever else lies between those two."

  Paul vaguely knew that such people were out there, but he'd never really considered that anyone could seriously still be a Communist. In his mind that whole thing was a distant memory from the eighties, like Ronald Reagan and New Kids on the Block - nothing he'd ever want to go back to.

  "Huh," was all he could think of to say.

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  "These guys really have it figured out," continued Chloe. "They're a tight knit crew - much tighter than me and mine. They love and support one another. For them, the next score's never what it's about, it's just a way to get from here to there in peace and prosperity."

  "If that's the case, couldn't they just, you know, get jobs? Start an organic farm or something?"

  "They could. Sometimes they do, at least for a while." Chloe was becoming more animated now. She plainly admired this group a great deal. "But they live totall
y off the grid. They leave no footprint in the industrial/information complex. No social security numbers. No taxes. No driver's licenses. They're a real deal Crew, like the classic pirate crews of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries."

  "I prefer to think of us as hunter-gatherers myself," said a soft, deep voice. It was the old man, towering over where they were seated. Chloe and Paul both started to stand up, but he motioned them to stay as he sat down in the sand next to them, his back to the fire. "I've never been fond of the pirate metaphor, but I know some of us truly groove on that idea. As I see it, we're just a tribe of hunter gatherers."

  "That's because you're an old damn hippie," joked Chloe.

  "True, true." He held out his hand to Paul. "My name's Winston. Welcome to our circle."

  "Thanks," said Paul as he shook the rough, strong hand. "It's great. I'm having an awesome time. My name's Paul."

  "I'm happy to have you both here. I enjoyed your dancing a great deal. Chloe's never introduced me to a member of her Crew before. You must be very special."

  This surprised Paul and his face must've shown it. "I...uh..."

  "Paul's not really part of my Crew," said Chloe. "He's more of a former client turned friend. I brought him along because I thought he might enjoy the circle and we were...in the neighborhood together."

  "Ahhh, I see," he said. "Well, it's wonderful to meet you in any event, and you're welcome to stay with us here as long as you like. Of course, we won't be here come tomorrow morning, but that doesn't mean you have to leave. It's a pretty little stretch of beach. I suggest you really take it easy and make the most of your time. It's a rare gift you've been given, this life of yours."

  "Thanks," said Paul. What an odd thing to say, he thought. The whole situation was odd of course, but there was something in particular about Winston that he couldn't quite put his finger on. The way he talked, it was like he was always saying two things at once, maybe more, and Paul wasn't quite getting the full meaning of any of them.

  "Winston, will you take a walk with me?" asked Chloe as she stood up.

  "Of course, sweetie. It would be a pleasure." He nodded to Paul. "It was nice meeting you, Paul. Enjoy the circle. Make it your home for the night."

  "We'll be back in a bit," Chloe said to him. "Will you be ok here?"

  "Sure," said Paul, "I'll be fine."

  Winston put his arm around Chloe's bare shoulder and they walked off into the fog. As they did, the older man leaned over and whispered something in her ear and then kissed her on the cheek, eliciting what Paul jealously Chapter 15

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  thought of as a girlish giggle from her. But, odds were that they were discussing some sort of crew-related business. Maybe she was pitching him an idea for a score or something like that. Still, he couldn't help but feel a twinge of envy, both for the secrets they were sharing and their obvious closeness.

  As he watched the two of them disappear into the fog, several of the drummers came over and sat beside him, complimenting him on his dancing. They passed joints and bottles of homemade beer and unlabeled wine around the fire and talked about different kinds of drums, different styles of dance, music, movies, and even comic books for a while. None of them ever asked him his name or anything about his background. Even when he brought up topics relating to his past, they politely but pointedly shied away from them. They didn't want to know anything substantive about his real identity and they certainly weren't sharing any intimate details with him. If, as Chloe said, they all lived "off the grid," then they would naturally be very protective of any details that might pin them down. He could certainly accept that. Actually, he kind of envied it, this idea of dropping out entirely and never looking back, never having to deal with all the bullshit of the modern world.

  Without a watch, Paul wasn't sure how long Chloe and Winston had been gone. One of the drummers was teaching him the basics of keeping a beat when suddenly he noticed her across the circle, taking a hit off someone's pipe. She caught him looking at her and winked before turning back too her conversation. Paul concentrated on his drumming; trying to master the basic strokes and keep in rhythm with the woman teaching him. After about ten more minutes he thanked her for the lesson and then returned to his blanket. He'd long ago put his shirt back on, and someone had loaned him a ragged but clean sweater to further protect him from the cold night air. The fire was starting to die down now, and although they kept it going with fresh logs from time to time, it wasn't the roaring blaze it had been when Paul first arrived.

  Paul felt good, really good. In a way he even felt powerful. Thinking back on how well the comic con had gone he recalled a very different, much more controlled fire that he'd sat beside three years earlier. It was in McGarry's, a bar in downtown San Jose. Next to the bar sat a gas fireplace that more than compensated for the mild chill in the air outside. He'd been in California for a month, working with Greg to get Fear and Loading off the ground. They had the money and the idea, but they lacked a technical staff to make it reality. They needed a smart, talented lead programmer, but were having trouble finding viable candidates. Frank was their final lead, and Paul knew that if he couldn't convince him to join their fledgling company, the project might never get off the ground. A skilled, experienced computer game programmer, Frank had a cushy coding job at Electronic Arts. He was at the top of his game and bored out of his mind. He wanted to strike out on his own, but had his doubts about Paul and Greg's plan.

  "No offense," Frank had said, "But neither of you has ever made a computer game before. And, Paul, you've never even worked in a technology job. I think you're both underestimating how hard this is going to be."

  "Well," Paul had replied, "That's why we're talking to you. You've got the experience and the technical expertise. We've got the money and the concept."

  "I know Greg's got the money, and that's really the only reason I'm meeting with you. As for the idea, I have to say I'm just not sold. I don't see what makes it better than a dozen other games that are in the works right now."

  At that moment Paul had thought to himself that Frank was kind of a dick. But he had kept his cool and risen to the occasion. "I think the thing you have to remember, Frank, is that Metropolis 2.0 is a proven idea. It's one of the best selling indie comics of recent years. I've received two Eisner nominations for it. Unlike a lot of the derivative tripe that other companies are working on, this will be a game with a built in audience, based on stories and art that have already proven themselves in the marketplace."

  "But that's just comic books. That's a tiny industry..."

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  "Yes," agreed Paul, cutting Frank off, "But comics are where many of the best-selling ideas come from. It's the ultimate test lab for the imagination, because there are no limits on the form. You can tell any kind of story with comics. Anything you can dream up. And all that determines your success is how good a storyteller you are and how original your ideas are." Paul was simplifying things greatly here - in reality big names like X-Men or Superman mattered a lot more than original stories when it came to producing actual sales, but Frank didn't know that and Paul wasn't going to tell him. "The fact is, my ideas have proved themselves time and again. They were a hit there and they'll be a hit as a computer game too. Why? Because nothing succeeds like success."

  Paul had kept on in this vein for an hour, touting his own achievements and appealing to Frank's own sense of superiority as a software engineer. Paul had sensed that the programmer wanted to help found their new company more than he was letting on, but that Frank was a cautious, conservative man and he needed all his fears allayed before making such a drastic, life-changing decision. He put up a skeptical front and made it clear he needed convincing. Over the course of the evening Paul did just that. He showed the veteran programmer a cockiness and self-assurance that were compelling and even contagious - qualities that he saw reflected in Frank's own demeanor. Scribbling sketches on bar napkins and speaking with true passion, he ha
d described in detail the world he'd created in his comics and how it would perfectly evolve into an online gaming experience. Finally he broke Frank's defenses down, and when the programmer started making his own simple suggestions about storylines or how to best implement the comic world in digital form, Paul knew that he'd won him over.

  Coming away from the first fireside chat, Paul had felt a kind of high, like he could convince anyone of anything if he put his mind to it. The same feeling he'd had as he left the CRG offices a few days earlier. Greg had congratulated and complimented him and the two had laughed like children with happiness for their success. Looking back now, Paul wondered if he'd ever actually convinced Frank that he was truly capable of the great things he'd said they would accomplish. In retrospect, maybe not. But after what he and the Crew had done to Frank and Greg and the others, Paul was sure he'd finally gotten the prickly programmer's attention and respect. He'd shown him just how capable and convincing he could really be. Now, the memory of the look on Frank's face in the boardroom when he and Chloe had sprung their trap warmed Paul more than the dying fire.

  Eventually Chloe found her way back to him from the other side of the circle. She was still wearing just a bra and jeans and was now shivering. "Fuck it's cold," she said.

  "You'll catch your death young lady, running around with your breasts hanging out like that," said Paul, in his best faux concerned grandmother voice. He handed her sweatshirt over to her and she quickly pulled it on.