Economics for the Wicked

To the likes of Willie Watts there was only one question; whether you were somebody who was ‘in’ or ‘out’. By which Willie would mean to say either you were in a gang or you were outside of a gang. To anyone living where Willie was, this difference was crucial.

Willie was a sixteen-year-old who existed in an urban hellhole named, “the Projects.”

For Willie who only ever knew this world, it was clear he had to be in a gang to survive. As he once said to his friend Joe in a conversation about joining a local gang, “it’s not the only way of living I can think of, but it’s the only way of life I’ll ever know in my lifetime.”  

In the world that Willie knew there was a particular social order that existed, with its peculiar social structures and its own aristocracies. Top of the pecking order for as long as Willie had been alive had been the leader of the gang that ran his block in the Projects, a gang who were known as “the Wolves”. The person in charge of the Wolves was a tall mean looking boy in his late twenties known as “Zombie”. Zombie was the man in charge, part organizer, part manager, and part general officer; what he said and wanted was the law in the little piece of the world Willie inhabited. Nobody knew Zombie’s real name, just his nickname, and the mere mention of Zombie’s name was usually enough to get things done in the block.

Zombie and the Wolves were engaged in a constant war with the members of the rival gangs who controlled the development next to the Projects. Zombie and the Wolves were also at war with the police who made occasional forays into the Projects. Although from what Willie could see, the police presented a minor threat to Zombie and his people and were considered more an irritant than a threat.

So, Willie felt a sense of both pride and excitement when one day word got to him that Zombie wanted to see him. “What!? Are you serious?” Willie had said when guys in the gang told Willie that Zombie wanted to see Willie.

Noone could tell Willie what Zombie wanted with him, and frankly Willie didn’t even know Zombie was aware that he existed, much less what the big man wanted to talk to him about.

When he was walking to where his meeting with Zombie was meant to take place; Willie’s friend had asked him if Zombie was mad at him or something, otherwise why would Zombie want to see Willie, who was not even officially in the gang yet. Willie answered he didn’t know but he was not concerned because since Willie hadn’t done anything he figured there was nothing to worry about.

When Willie got to the meeting place, but he had to wait in the corridor for a full hour before he was allowed into the room where Zombie was, but Willie didn’t mind, he was going to see what for him was tantamount to a combination of a ‘movie star’ and ‘royalty’. So, an hour was nothing.

When he was let in at last, Zombie took a minute looking over Willie like a farmer looking over livestock he was thinking of making an offer for. Then after what seemed to Willie like an eternity Zombie said to the teenager, “so you want to join the gang?”

To Willie this was like being asked if he’d like to win the lottery, so he quickly reached such a high pitch of excitement he could only manage a nod in response.

“Okay”, Zombie replied to Willie’s positive response to his question, “if you want to join us you have to prove yourself…you understand that don’t you?”

Again, Willie nods in response.

Zombie then said, “all the guys I run with, they’re soldiers who had proven themselves…can you do what they’ve done?”

Willie didn’t respond out of instinct and caution. Better to wait for what Zombie had to lay down as an admission fee rather than saying “yes” to anything and everything.

“You see the gun over there?” asked Zombie pointing to a firearm on the table close to them, “pick it up.”

Willie reached out and took the weapon in his hand. It was a small snub nose revolver, kind of old and no longer favoured by any of the gang members, but so far as Willie could tell, it still worked and was capable of wounding or killing anyone shot by it.

Zombie watched Willie take the gun and said, “it’s loaded with five rounds of ammo, you won’t need more than that.”

“What do you want me to do with this?” Willie asked trying to sound unexcited.

“You know the bar at Front Street and Fifth avenue?”

Willie nodded cautiously waiting for the operative part of his assignment. 

 “I want you to go into the bar at about 8.55 pm tonight and wait there until the crowd from the Opera House across the street comes into the place at about 9 pm,” Zombie said in an emotionless tone of voice, “then I want you to open fire on two of the best dressed people in the place before you get out as fast as you can to the Projects”.

“What…I don’t understand. You want me to shoot two people? Which two? Any two people? It’s the opera house on opening night…the place could be full of expensively dressed people. How will I know which two people you want me to hit?”

Zombie looked bored as he responded, “don’t matter who you hit…just take out any two people who look rich.”

“I still don’t understand,” Willie responded, “why do you want me to do this? Why do you want two random people hit? It doesn’t make sense. Why am I doing this?”

“Business. This is just business”, Zombie responded simply, “if you want to join the Wolves you have to prove yourself. You’ve got to do something that qualifies you to be a ‘made man’. For you this is what you need to do to join our ranks. This is what you must do to be a ‘made man’ Do you understand?”.

If Willie was less intelligent or more in awe of Zombie, he would have let it rest there, but Willie was still unsatisfied with what he had been told. So, he asked one more time, “I still don’t understand. What if I hit more than two people when I open fire in the bar? What happens if more people get hurt or die?”

“Don’t matter if more people get hit,” Zombie said with his steady gaze on Willie, “just do what I told you to. Are you up for this? Or should I send somebody else?”

“No…no, I can do this…”

“Okay, and one more thing. Make sure you carry out the shooting inside the bar and nowhere else. Do you understand?”

Willie flinched slightly at this, he was going to do the hit outside of the bar because it would have been easier to get away if he took out his victims as they entered or exited the bar.

Zombie noticed Willie’s hesitancy and added, “this is important, when you start shooting, I want you inside the bar. Also, make sure you bring the gun back with you. Do not leave it behind.”

Zombie paused and waited for a response from Willie but when Willie said nothing more, he said, “now go get out of my sight.”

In fact, Willie wanted to ask more questions, but his dismissal was clear and not open for debate, so he left. 

A week later, at midnight in a dark alley downtown, Zombie waited alone in his parked car for Smith to appear. Zombie was getting impatient when he spotted Smith walking toward his car in the darkness of the alley. Even in the dim light, Zombie could see Smith was dressed in his worn and crumpled old suit with his gravy-stained tie pulled right down. 

Presently, Smith got into the car and sat down in the passenger seat next to Zombie.

“About time Smith,” Zombie growled, “you’re late, you were meant to be here ten minutes ago, just because you got your promotion to lieutenant doesn’t mean the rest of us have nothing better to do than to wait around for you all night.”

“Ah keep your shirt on Zombie,” answered Smith in an off handed manner, “the boys wanted to buy another round in honor of my promotion…so I’m a few minutes late so what?”

Smith leaned back in his seat in Zombie’s custom modified car that Smith often referred to as “the pimp mobile”. Smith reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out a flask. The police detective took a drink and asked, “so what did you want to talk about?”

“A business proposition,” was Zombie’s laconic reply.

“So, what do you want to trade?”

“Your squad raided a place three days ago on the east side of the city.”

“So?”

“Newspapers reported the police recovered ten guns and fifty kilos of heroin in the raid.”

“So what?”

“I know the place you raided, and I know what was actually in there, and what you cops took away from there for real.”

“This is getting boring,” complained Smith, “what’s your point?”

“There were over a hundred guns in that place, not ten as reported in the papers,” Zombie answered with emotion, “and also, there were at least double the amount of heroin that your squad said was in the joint after your raid.”

“What if there was?”

“Your people kept a lot of guns and drugs, so I just want a slice of the action that’s all.”

“So, even if what you say is true why would we want to give you a slice of the action as you put it?”

Zombie reached into his own pocket and pulled out a phone. He found the video and showed the policeman. Smith watched a video of Willie pulling out his gun and shooting two well dressed people before turning and running out the door leaving behind chaos behind him.

“How the hell did you get this? The homicide guys went looking for the security cameras the moment they arrived, and they were told the system was down. Where did you get this when the system was not working?” 

“The system was working, my people just got to the recording before anyone else.”

Smith looked up from the screen, visibly more sober than he was a minute ago, he asked, “got anything else apart from this?” 

“I can give you the name of the perpetrator, his location, and the murder weapon with this guy’s prints all over it. Is that enough for a piece of the action?”

Smith looked away but Zombie knew he could not refuse what was on the table.

“I heard the mayor was riding your collective asses to catch the shooter, is that right? Such a scandal to hit the city with high society victims and all.” 

Smith frowned and asked, “you’re fingering one of your own?”

“Nope, he’s not one of us…yet.”

Smith then opened the door and said as he got out, “be here tomorrow night and bring a truck there’s a lot of guns.”

Then in a moment he disappeared into the night.

Zombie smiled in the darkness of the car, and then he drove back to the Projects.

In the Projects there were lots of ways to do business, but sadly for Willie the part he was destined to play was not as a made man but that of a commodity. Like the asset or livestock that he was, Willie did what was necessary to enhance his worth before the abattoir. 

In the valley of death, the commerce of the wicked only profits the very few with capital.