fury. Hard night tonight. Hard night every night, but this is one for the books.
I went out this afternoon, a little reconnaissance mission into the heart of enemy territory. To be fair, pretty much any place outside of this stinking twenty-by-twenty room is enemy territory, but this time we’re talking the big HQ, the see-and-don’t-be-seen, the pigeon-in-the-hole:
I went to the Mall. Dangerous digs, no doubt, but it’s a necessary evil predicated by my own seclusion. When it comes to staying alive for any length of time, playing badger is no way to survive. In order to run from the Union, a nearly impossible feat to sustain for any length of time, you have to know where they’re looking, how they’re looking, who they’re using to look. Every Bio-Repo man has his own style, his own way of smoking out the bees, and if you know who’s on your tail, there’s that much more of a chance that you can blow the fumes right back in his face.
The “non-collection” rate for the Credit Union runs about .2 percent. That’s one “escape” for every five hundred welshers, and those odds are regularly stated in big, bold ink at the bottom of every page of every artiforg contract. They must be initialed and signed in duplicate after a trained Credit Union reading clerk has dictated them aloud and ascertained that the client has, indeed, understood the nature of his debt to the Union, as well as the odds of his escaping the Union’s clutches should he decide to flee with his as-yet-unpaid-for organ into some far-flung territory.
During my time with the Union, my personal non-collection rate was 0.0. That’s a doughnut followed by a bullet hole, and it’s a number that won me acclaim in the department as well as with the national Union reps. No one got off free and clear, and even those who evaded me for a year, two years, three at most, eventually wound up flopping around on a floor somewhere, wondering with their last thoughts how I’d finally tracked them down.
That’s until the end, of course, but I don’t think that one slipup counted. Then again, I hope it did. I’d hate to have ended my career as a Bio-Repo man without even one blemish on my record. No one should be too good at this job.
Some years ago, the Mall used to be a sprawling pedestrian marketplace in the heart of the city’s west side, a mecca for trinkets and overpriced semi-designer clothes, much like any other consumer factory in any other town. Mothers scooted their children from store to store in bright red strollers provided by the management, girlfriends searched for gifts for their boyfriends, boyfriends searched for edible panties to force on their girlfriends, a lot of cash was transferred from hand to grimy hand, and all was right in suburbia.
The Credit Union was still in its infancy when the Kurtzman supply house bought out a doublewide storefront previously owned by The Gap and, two months later, opened the doors to the first artificial organ walk-in service station. E-Z Credit, open to the public, no qualified customer turned away. Atop the Kurtzman Walk-In sign, a bright neon heart—not the cartoonish Valentine’s symbol, but an accurate representation of the bulbous, vein-ridden organ—pulsed in crimson and pink, the tubing flashing in a steady, even rhythm. And in time, as if to match the cadence, a singsong chant emanated from hidden speakers, the tune wafting its way through the Mall, luring customers like cartoon dogs inexorably drawn to the smell of fresh-baked pies. Let’s all go to Kurztman’s, let’s all go to Kurtzman’s, let’s all go to Kurtzman’s, where a lifetime can be yours…
The lines were out the door within an hour.
Arnold Kurtzman, who made his initial fortune recycling old NBA basketballs into cut-rate inner tubes before shifting his assets to the artiforg business, was a short, plump, balding man who never failed to attract the most dizzying array of young, beautiful women to his side. He
I went out this afternoon, a little reconnaissance mission into the heart of enemy territory. To be fair, pretty much any place outside of this stinking twenty-by-twenty room is enemy territory, but this time we’re talking the big HQ, the see-and-don’t-be-seen, the pigeon-in-the-hole:
I went to the Mall. Dangerous digs, no doubt, but it’s a necessary evil predicated by my own seclusion. When it comes to staying alive for any length of time, playing badger is no way to survive. In order to run from the Union, a nearly impossible feat to sustain for any length of time, you have to know where they’re looking, how they’re looking, who they’re using to look. Every Bio-Repo man has his own style, his own way of smoking out the bees, and if you know who’s on your tail, there’s that much more of a chance that you can blow the fumes right back in his face.
The “non-collection” rate for the Credit Union runs about .2 percent. That’s one “escape” for every five hundred welshers, and those odds are regularly stated in big, bold ink at the bottom of every page of every artiforg contract. They must be initialed and signed in duplicate after a trained Credit Union reading clerk has dictated them aloud and ascertained that the client has, indeed, understood the nature of his debt to the Union, as well as the odds of his escaping the Union’s clutches should he decide to flee with his as-yet-unpaid-for organ into some far-flung territory.
During my time with the Union, my personal non-collection rate was 0.0. That’s a doughnut followed by a bullet hole, and it’s a number that won me acclaim in the department as well as with the national Union reps. No one got off free and clear, and even those who evaded me for a year, two years, three at most, eventually wound up flopping around on a floor somewhere, wondering with their last thoughts how I’d finally tracked them down.
That’s until the end, of course, but I don’t think that one slipup counted. Then again, I hope it did. I’d hate to have ended my career as a Bio-Repo man without even one blemish on my record. No one should be too good at this job.
Some years ago, the Mall used to be a sprawling pedestrian marketplace in the heart of the city’s west side, a mecca for trinkets and overpriced semi-designer clothes, much like any other consumer factory in any other town. Mothers scooted their children from store to store in bright red strollers provided by the management, girlfriends searched for gifts for their boyfriends, boyfriends searched for edible panties to force on their girlfriends, a lot of cash was transferred from hand to grimy hand, and all was right in suburbia.
The Credit Union was still in its infancy when the Kurtzman supply house bought out a doublewide storefront previously owned by The Gap and, two months later, opened the doors to the first artificial organ walk-in service station. E-Z Credit, open to the public, no qualified customer turned away. Atop the Kurtzman Walk-In sign, a bright neon heart—not the cartoonish Valentine’s symbol, but an accurate representation of the bulbous, vein-ridden organ—pulsed in crimson and pink, the tubing flashing in a steady, even rhythm. And in time, as if to match the cadence, a singsong chant emanated from hidden speakers, the tune wafting its way through the Mall, luring customers like cartoon dogs inexorably drawn to the smell of fresh-baked pies. Let’s all go to Kurztman’s, let’s all go to Kurtzman’s, let’s all go to Kurtzman’s, where a lifetime can be yours…
The lines were out the door within an hour.
Arnold Kurtzman, who made his initial fortune recycling old NBA basketballs into cut-rate inner tubes before shifting his assets to the artiforg business, was a short, plump, balding man who never failed to attract the most dizzying array of young, beautiful women to his side. He
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