The Bridge Chronicles Trilogy Read Online Free Page A

touch the goods. I do not care what the goods are, whether it’s information or mineral, virtual or physical. What you trade with the people I set you up with is your business so long as my fee is paid.” The well-rehearsed speech flowed from Bridge’s lips like electricity through a wire.
    “And you don’t care what it is?”
    “Not one iota. Couldn’t give a rat’s ass.”
    “Which is why they call you the Amoral Bridge.”
    “I’m surprised ‘they’ even know the meaning of the word amoral,” Bridge quipped with a sarcastic smile. “It’s an amoral shitstorm out there, Mr. Thames, and I’m just trying to keep dry.”
    “Can you guarantee confidentiality?”
    “I’m still alive, aren’t I? My clients are ghosts, Mr. Thames. The only people who will know you’ve done business with me are you and the person I introduce to you.” Bridge lied, of course, neglecting to mention Aristotle, the six-foot-three lie watching from ten feet behind Bridge’s left shoulder.
    Aristotle was Bridge’s bodyguard, a fantastically gigantic black man with biceps as thick as tree limbs and a stare that filled most with the ff ct with ear of a black planet. Bridge had nicknamed him Aristotle during their interview last year, when the bodyguard had explained the philosophy of existentialism and how it related to the twenty-first century life under a corportocracy. Bridge hadn’t understood a goddamn word of it, but it had sounded right. Bridge had decided at that point that Aristotle was a damn sight smarter than Bridge was, hiring him on the spot. Unfortunately, Bridge couldn’t afford to pay him enough to actually engage in dangerous activities like fistfights. Bridge mainly kept him around for show, a bluff for the easily dissuaded, a bluff that succeeded more than it failed. The last ass beating Bridge was forced to take was eight months ago, and even Bridge would admit he had deserved it. Bridge glanced over Brandon’s shoulder at the reflection of Aristotle in the mirrored walls, buttressing his confidence with the bodyguard’s presence.
    “So what is it you need? Women? Guns? Information?”
    Thames voice fell into a hoarse whisper. “I need a leaker.”
    Bridge laughed a little on the inside. Every movie studio in the States had been conducting legal and not-so-legal wars against what they called intellectual piracy for decades. It had started with lawsuits in the late ‘90’s, suing whatever poor soul they could drum up who had downloaded a copy of a movie or a song before its release date. As the corporations had gotten more legal power in the 2k’s, their rhetoric about the effects of piracy on their business had gotten more zealous, and the legal wiggle room to protect their copyrights had expanded with the propaganda. By the early 2020’s, many hackers spoke of hit teams who scoured the GlobalNet in search of anyone leaking books, games, movies, songs, software and TV shows. Net battles were fought, with rumors of the odd fatality here and there. And no matter how harsh the reaction, the hackers just kept leaking pirated goods and thumbing their noses at their corporate opposition.
    But what few of the normal people not associated with either side knew was that the corporations hired people under the table to leak the releases. They had long ago discovered that pre-release buzz from legitimate reviewers and paid shills only generated so much interest in a media-saturated world. Unfiltered positive buzz from the hardcore underground, the pirates and the punks, was worth its weight in gold. As a result, the media corporations did what they did best. They made a deal. The corporate liaisons, like Brandon Thames here, would carelessly let the leaker know where and when to steal a copy of the media from the GlobalNet database, like something ‘falling off the truck’ because the driver left the back door open. The hacker would still have to do the work, of course, breaking through security and reaching