“Well okay that is legit I guess Sharkey but that is my point is that our next job will go off in total silence.” Which I absolutely intend that it will. And Sharkey says:

“Silence?”

“Total silence. No one will ever know we were there.”

“How silent are we talking?”

“Silent silent.”

“Yeah but there is silent like a silencer, which is kind of a whoop whoop noise, and there is silent like silent, like—”

“Silent silent. Like below the thermocline.”

“The—thermo—what—Jack I don’t know what that is.”

“Like a submarine for fuck’s sake Sharkey did you never watch Das Boot?”

“I’m claustrophobic Jack I don’t watch movies except Westerns and not even those if they spend too much time in the saloon. Mostly I watch those nature shows.”

“I did not know that.”

“We all got our crosses man.”

“Yeah I guess. Okay well we’re going to do our next thing in total silence like a gliding majestic whale.”

“Whales make a surprising amount of noise Jack like they go WHOOMMMNAAAARP to one another right and that is—”

“Sharkey would you get on board with this please? We are going to do this like a real quiet whale, maybe shy maybe even mute.”

“That would be a serious fucking evolutionary problem for an animal that navigates by sonar Jack.”

“So this will be a short-lived metaphorical whale, man, but the silence will be forever.”

“I dunno Jack—”

“They are bored Sharkey.”

“…Bored?”

“Yes Sharkey the Demons are bored.”

I let him consider that in its fullness. Corporate boredom is just what happens and that is fine when your coworkers are typists or software engineers or even sheep herders but it is not fine when their skill sets revolve around germ war and artisanal murderings and making things explode. Then it is not a good thing for anyone.

“All right Jack I will look into it.”

“That is fine Sharkey. Do your thing and we will do ours. If we crime it, they will come.”

And I am right.

—

Incoming call, Poltergeist Secure VoIP: accept? y/n

(Poltergeist is this whole electronic thing that happens in Iceland it is like a concierge service for the digitally liberated societal and legal nonconformist, which is to say criminals of all stripes but also revolutionaries and freedom fighters and so. It is like the spy equivalent of the Apple Store or Google if they were based in nuclear-proof cells hollowed out of the Arctic ice and staffed by ice kobolds with computer science magic coming out of their ass. They are obsessed with client privacy and digital hygge and some variation of Scandawooj libertarian communism I do not comprehend because I do not have husky semen in my blood. Helluva nice people do not under any circumstances piss them off.)

Accept y/n?

y

(Ping and the little light goes green.)

“Hi it’s Jack.”

“Jack Price.”

“Yes that is me hello.”