Bitcoin Clowns, page 17
part #3 of Master Shanghai Series
The correct amount that would activate the membership was anybody’s guess, but I expected it not to be the actual absolute minimum, or 1/100000000 BTC, but something that would allow for the transaction to be completed within a reasonable amount of time. The thing with these Bitcoin transactions was that if you don’t attach a fee, your order won’t get through, because it won’t get prioritize, so the correct answer was basically the minimum fee. I put in 0.0001 BTC, and it worked.
The text mentioned ‘Judgement Day’, now that sounded bad and worried me, although I was still quite hyper from having solved some kind of cryptocurrency puzzle. I suppose whoever these people were, they always stroked the system at the pre-coordinated time. They mentioned there would be a next one, which meant there already had been a previous one. Obviously, now I realized that Salamander’s fund had been stolen by them. The text mentioned that the next ‘Judgement Day’ was going to be on the 28th of February 5 PM GMT, which was 1 AM in Shanghai in two days.
I had two days’ time to decide what to do.
Do I tell Lt. Wu? Do I let Brother Fei and by association the Interpol knows?
For the rest of the day, I thought about these two questions repeatedly, as Marvey and I packed up and got checked out of the hospital.
Chapter 32: Race
I saw Teddy walking towards us as we were getting into Kelvin’s car. My parents had already left with the metro, insisting to make use of the elderly discount on public transportations in Shanghai.
“Chief! Wait!” he ran towards me and caught me just in time, his voice was shaky and his breathing heavy, “Chief!”
“Teddy, what do you want?”
“I’m here to warn you,” Teddy said, gasping for air in between his words. “Simon’s really pissed about what happened at the lab.”
“He was mining in there,” I said, half-rolling my eyes, “the lab in Bilious was not designed for that, the power system can’t handle such a heavy load, and the ventilation…”
“I know, I know, it’s my bad,” he accepted the blame for the fire so readily it surprised me. “But that’s not what I am talking about. Please give us back the wallet, please, before Simon comes asking for it himself.”
“What wallet?!”
“Our PI2S-Coin wallet. The one in the server room. I can’t find it anywhere!”
“Well, that’s not my problem. I did not see nor touch anything that day. Your rigs overheated.”
“But I watched the footage from the security camera. You and the American intern were the last ones to go into the server room before fires broke out. I don’t care why it happened. That I can just let it go, but you’ve got to give us back the wallet.”
“Do you mean like a stick drive kind of thing?” Marvey poked her head out through the sunroof of Kelvin’s car and asked Teddy. “By the way, I’m Marvey Simon, and I guess I’m the intern you were referring to.”
“Yes, it looks like a stick drive. I plugged it into one of the machines at the back and went out for lunch with the team. I won’t call the police or anything if you guys can just give it back to me now. We’ll pretend nothing happened.”
“Wait, wait, wait, wait,” Kelvin chimed in, walking over to wedge himself between Teddy and I. “Are you saying that they stole your wallet?”
I frowned at Teddy. “Marv would never take anything that doesn’t belong to her, and I hadn’t even seen the thing, so I don’t know what the hell you’re saying or implying.”
“Leave us alone, please!” Kelvin warned Teddy, whose timid nature was starting to show. He put his hands over his face in frustration.
“Shit…shit. Shit. Shit!” He kicked a stone barrier on the side of the curb. “You really don’t have it? Then where is it?! Damn it, I’m gonna be dead if Simon doesn’t get the wallet back.”
“That’s none of our business,” Kelvin waved us all into his car, locked the doors and drove off. From the rear mirror, I could see Teddy still standing on more or less the same spot, his facial expression alternating between anger, from kicking the stone barrier, and self-pity, from the pain in his foot.
“What a load of bull crap!” Marvey said to us when he was out of earshot. “He thought we stole his Piss Coins, or whatever the second generation is called. Madness! We almost got killed because of his mini-mining factory and he didn’t even apologize! That place was a complete nightmare that place with all the loose wire cables and overstuffed racks.”
“But you did see the wallet thingy he was referring to?”
Marvey shrugged, “Yes, or maybe not. I don’t’ know. I did see a stick drive dangling off the USB slot of the last machine. Funny, I didn’t even know that cryptocurrencies could be stored on a stick drive, so there was no motive for me to take it, really — Rebecca asked me to get myself familiar with the lab, so I walked around and took a look inside the server room. I wasn’t even there 5 minutes when you entered!”
“Don’t fret, Marv.” Kelvin smiled at her through the rear view mirror. “Ha, I wonder how many coins are in that thing,” Zigzagging between cars on the highway, Kelvin was enjoying himself as he relished the thought of Simon Li, his arch-rival, losing something of value to him. Suddenly, his iPhone rang, and because it was connected to his Maserati, we all heard it. “It’s LB.” He told us, and swiped the screen of his iPhone to pick up the call. “Hey, what’s up?”
“Is Jong with you?”
That question annoyed Kelvin. “Why do you always call me when you’re looking for him?!”
“Just tell me.”
I lost my own phone the day when I was picked up at the Crypto fund conference by Dumbo and Axe. I surmised that the phone had probably already been wiped clean and sold across the midlands to Guangxi already. “I’m here, what’s up, LB?” I shouted, not very sure where the microphone in the car was.
“PissCoin plunged to hell just now!” LB said, “It’s nearing zeros, peeps. I’m dead…”
“What?!” We felt the car shifted sideways as Kelvin’s concentration shifted from the road to his coins.
“It’s up, it’s down, then it’s up again,” I said. “Just stop looking at it if you aren’t able to profit from it.” I still held the view that if one had faith in the long-term viability of a coin, then they should just keep it. Was PissCoin viable long-term? It depended on how Rebecca and Bilious wanted to grow the eco-system. I was undecided on the matter as it was still too early to tell.
“You're up then you're down, you're wrong when it's right. It's black and it's white, we fight, we break up, we kiss, we make up…” Marvey started to sing in the background as the men fretted over their losing investments. She cracked me up. I love her, forever and always.
“No, Jong,” LB ignored the singing in the background and continued, “somebody sold a mammoth amount of PissCoin like fifteen minutes ago. It triggered a freaking avalanche. And you know what, I think no one else has that much PissCoin and that much influence except Simon Li.”
“Really?!” Now that was concerning, especially after what Teddy told us.
“I don’t get it,” LB complained, “he just became crypto-billionaire from PissCoin yesterday, why doesn’t he hold on to his own company’s coins longer? I mean, what was the point of cashing out now?! It’s gonna make everyone else thinks that cryptos are just for speculations even more!”
That was indeed alarming. Because I had borrowed my dad’s phone, I could now get connected back to civilization once again. A couple of clicks on the web browser revealed what LB told us to be true. For some reasons, I had an eerie feeling that the disappearance of Simon and Teddy’s precious wallet had something to do with the mysterious man who saved us. Quickly I checked the balance of the so-called RX club’s wallet balance online, and found that there was indeed a fresh wave of high value Bitcoins transactions going into that account since fifteen minutes ago.
“You don’t look so well,” Marvey commented.
“I don’t feel so well indeed,” I said honestly. Although I had nothing to do with the missing wallet, it was clear now that the RX hacker group which I was reluctantly a member of since fifteen minutes ago had something to do with it. Both the guy and I were present at the computer lab when the theft was committed, but he had the cover of the fire and smokes to his advantage and likely was not even filmed by the security camera, which meant if anyone should connect all the dots, I would be the scapegoat in this mad heist.
“Let’s go grab a drink. We should go celebrate!” Kelvin suggested animatedly, “for celebrate for Simon Li’s financial ruin!”
ROOOOOM!
Out of the blue, Simon Li’s, in his yellow Lamborghini Huracan appeared next to our vehicle. He stared deliriously at me then back at Kelvin in the driver’s seat, and gestured through the side window with his hand across his neck that seemed to say, “You are DEAD!”
“That freaking wanker!” Kelvin exclaimed, and floored the pedal of his Maserati. Knowing how these street races could go, I reached over to help Marvey put on her seatbelt quickly. Before long, we were speeding down the highway. The sun was going down. It was just before the afternoon rush hour, the magnificent tall buildings in Liujiazui gleaming from the reflection of the last bit of sun on our left. On our right, Simon’s silver Lamborghini came in and out of view.
“Watch out!!!” Marvey cried suddenly. There was a wall of cars standing still in front of us in a traffic jam, visible only when the highway dipped to a landing such that the blinding sun was shielded by the buildings ahead of us. Kelvin switched gears and slowed down just in time. Our car screeched to a halt not five centimeters away from the car in front of us. We were just catching our breaths when Simon Li’s Lamborghini sprinted by, oblivious to what was in front of him. And when he finally noticed the cars it was too late, no amount of honking would clear his way for him. His car skid the last hundred or so meters before it crashed in an angle into the cars in front of him, triggering a domino effect of collisions of the cars in front of him. A cacophony of screams, honks and alarms chimed on the highway to the flashes of broken head and taillights.
“Are you okay?” I immediately checked with Marvey, who nodded with her stiffened neck.
“Geez-weez! There’s smoke coming out of his car,” Kelvin commented, leaning on the driving wheel for support as he regained his composure. I cranked my neck to get a better look. The front of Simon’s car had been smashed into a mechanical pulp. The damages of the cars in front of his were not any less severe. People were stepping out of their cars slowly to check if everyone was okay . Kelvin dialed 110.
“Help…! Help...!” A faint cry could be heard above the noise of the commotion. Simon’s head, bleeding, was rolling on the frame of the completely shattered driver’s side window. “I’m stuck!” As much as I hated him, it was just human nature to want to save a life in danger. I jumped out of Kelvin’s car and ran to his side, but despite several attempts, I could not get the door to yield.
“Here!” Kelvin had come over with a snow shovel. “Lean back!” I yelled at Simon, and I tried to pop the door with the flat part of the shovel from the side.
“Is this thing gonna explode?” Kelvin asked me, as I was wrestling with the door.
“We’re not in a Hollywood movie,” I assured him.
“No, look!” He pointed at the gasoline leaking off the snapped gas tank of Simon’s car.
“Stop stalling and come help me!”
“My legs stuck!” Simon cried weakly from inside the car. His face was completely red, possibly because the arteries in his legs were under high pressure. He himself looked like he was about to explode before the car.
With Kelvin’s help, we finally managed to wedge the door open, but we could hardly yank Simon out due to the tight wriggle room.
“Get me out of here! Get me out of here!” Simon started crying and screaming. “It hurts!!!”
“Just think about something pleasant!” I hissed at him and grabbed him from under his arms as Kelvin hugged me from behind, so we could pull as hard as Simon’s pain tolerance allowed. We might have managed to move him by an inch or something, before actual firemen arrived and took over from us with saws and jackers.
We walked over to the curb where the injured were being treated and found Marvey there comforting a young boy as his mother was being treated by first-aiders.
“Jessie?” I shouted. I couldn’t believe my eyes. The boy Marvey was talking to was my very own Jessie! What an unbelievable turn of events! Bless Marv for her compassion and love for children.
The boy’s ear twitched on the mention of his name and he turned around to look at me.
“Papa!!” Jessie jumped up from excitement as soon as he recognized me.
We ran towards each other in that instant and embraced. Oh boy, how I missed him.
Chapter 33: Jessie Boy
“Where have you been? I have been looking for you and your mom everywhere!” I held Jessie in my arms and asked. He felt heavier than I remembered which was great. It meant that he wasn’t starved in the times he wasn’t with me. Beside us, paramedics were slowing arriving in the ambulances and got to work. The entire highway was blocked off to prevent further entry and sirens broadcasted emergency safety messages above our heads.
“Hmm…I don’t know,” Jessie answered with a shrug. “You have to ask mom!”
“How’s your mom?” I carried him back towards where Marvey and that woman Paula were sitting.
“She bit her lip.”
“Her lip?”
“I think she did it when a car bumped into us from behind…there was blood everywhere!”
“Gross!” I said.
“Exactly!” Jessie replied, giggling madly in my arms. How I missed the sound of his laughter.
I dropped Jessie down once again on the ground when we were next to the lady. Marvey once again took over the task of keeping Jessie entertained, as I figured out what was going on with Paula. The first-aider had wiped off the blood and cleaned the wound on her lip with rubbing alcohol, unleashing a string of insults at the poor fellow, and she only stopped when she spotted me.
“Am I seeing ghost?!” She shrieked. ‘Seeing ghost’ was the Chinese’s way of expressing shock for running into someone you did not want to meet.
“Nope, it’s real. It’s your husband. I should say ex-husband, ex-baby-seater, ex-housekeeper, ex-tenant, scam-victim and what have you…” I opened my arms wide with a wry smile that said ‘finally, I’ve caught you’.
She blinked blankly at me, as if blinking could make me go away. “Oh, right. No wonder this Guai-mei (foreign woman) looked so familiar. It’s your girlfriend, what’s her name?”
“Marvey,” Marv smiled and nodded to Paula. They had met once in the hospital almost two years ago.
“Have you been in Shanghai all this time?”
“No, of course not…ouch!” she hissed, touching her lips in exasperation from the pain whenever she opened her mouth. “I just got back, and looked what happened! Tsk…tsk…tsk.”
The first-aider caught sight of other people who needed his help more urgently than Paula, who really wouldn’t appreciate it even if he had saved her from swimming sharks or flooding volcano, and left us to attend to the others more appreciative. Before he left, he told us, “Don’t go anywhere. The police will need to get a statement from each of you.”
Being left alone, I pulled up my pants’ legs and sat down next to Paula.
“What are you doing back here, Triple X?”
“What’s Triple X?”
“Not ‘what’ but ‘who’, Xu Xie Xian,” I said.
“You know my real name?!” Paula seemed offended at hearing her own name.
“Well, we were husband and wife. I am allowed to know at least that much about you, don’t you think?”
Paula hissed. “I’ve always hated that name…”
“No, honestly, what brings you back here? Axe?”
Paula pursed her lips, causing a wave of pain to run through her annoyed face. She spoke softly this time so as not to irritate her wound further. “He needed a ride back to Lizhou.”
“You guys are not from Lizhou,” I corrected her.
“You know that as well?! What else do you know?”
“I know plenty,” I replied and took a look at Jessie, who was now jumping around and playing with his Uncle Kelvin and Auntie Marvey, completely oblivious to the fact that they were on the scene of a serial car collisions. “I know that, for example, Jessie’s not your own kid.” That made Paula speechless. Perhaps I did know too much for everyone’s good.
Paula only spoke after a while, “We were all on our own when we were found, and we helped each other.” And suddenly she grabbed me by the collar, “Don’t ever mention that Jessie’s not my son again! And don’t you dare telling him that! I will gouge your eyes out if you do!”
While smiles and tears were the secret weapons of many women against men, violence and threats were Paula’s. She had always been something else, and that was what I liked about her back then, and I still liked her, as a friend, which was why I needed to remind her something.
“You guys have to leave,” I said, “You are being wanted by the police.”
“Don’t you think I know this?” She hissed, “But we have new IDs, so don’t you worry.”
“No, you don’t understand. They know you. They know you have been using a bunch of different IDs, and they know your face very well. It’s on the wall of every police station’s ‘Wanted’ section in the country. I made sure of that. I gave them a bunch of your photos.”
