Runt Runner
04 Apr 2021JB Threepwood
Down in The Warrens, I leant against the wall outside of Eve's Attic, a pawnbrokers and black market fence.I was about halfway through a cheap bottle of paint-stripper bourbon. I took a couple of slugs from the bottle as I watched the locals as they went around the busy strip of unlicensed shops.
Further down the wide alley, in the grim flickering glow of all the neon signs, I saw a group of young men chatting to some youth. The men weren't wearing any colours but I could tell they were Silver Crew... the local gang.
The young lad they were talking to wasn't one of them. They were dressed in trendy clothes whilst the kid was obviously a local street rat. The Head of the little squad passed the kid a box... I watched him open it and take out a pair of sneakers. Not massively expensive but more than the kid could afford.
I could tell what was going on. We used to do it back in Rapa Bao. It made me feel bad watching it happen to someone else... but I didn't know any better back then. Probably wouldn't have cared anyway.
It was a sort of recruitment. You find poor kids, ones with nothing... kids in care, war orphans, kids of junkies... and you give them a family.
We'd spot these kids and take them under our wing. Buy them food, take them out for a ride, let them hang out with the gang. Buy them clothes, cheap gifts... make these forgotten kids feel like they're no longer alone.
But The Gang has very few uses for kids.
Once they felt like they were one of The Gang we'd lean on them a little. Get them to "earn their way" in The Gang. Send them on little drug runs. Nothing big, just a few local drops till the nerves were gone... comfortable with moving around with gear on them.
Then the drops would get bigger. Moving on from just a bit of Onion Head to stronger stuff. Then, once they were good at it... wallop!... The Stitch-Up.
Masked-up, one of the gang robs them of their parcel. This is where we would switch on them. Tell them they owe us for the missing drugs. All the clothes we've bought them. The food they've eaten. The gadgets we've given them... roll up the costs until they're in the hole for thousands.
They know we're the bad guys, they know we kill people for owing us less... but they also feel like they've let The Gang down, their new family, and want to make it up to us.
This would be where their drug running takes a step up. Now we get them to run drugs between stations.
We smarten them up and make them dress younger as authorities are less likely to check kids, especially as we tell them to walk through ports behind well-off looking couples.
It's hard to sneak drugs when your ships are being watched by RICO officers so these System Lines are a good way to shift gear. It didn't matter if the kids ever got nabbed... you'd lose the shipment but not a real gang member.
I knew that was what these Silver Crew scumbags were doing to this lad in The Warrens... it's what I'd done to others in the past... and, when I was 11, it's how my old gang recruited me.
I could've stopped them. Get involved. Tell the lad to stay away from them... but would he listen? What difference would it make? All the other kids throughout The Bubble getting pulled into this... it's not up to me to stop it all.
Don't get me wrong, I'm glad to be out of piracy now. Glad I've moved on since those days. My new organisation are good people. They may be smugglers but, in the end, our figurehead "Red Rose" has good intentions and makes our citizens' lives better. I try to be a good guy... to be the hero... for people to cheer me on... but it's not in me.
The gang leader put his arm around the kid and they all walked off out of sight.
I took a long swig on the cheap bourbon.
Not my fucking problem.