Department of Student Loans, Kidnap & Ransom

Chapter 17

Walking down the street to no place in particular, Mick felt his phone buzz in his pocket.

Only two people had his number.

He looked down at the message from the unknown number on the screen: 'He's dead. His partners and his boss are dead. Nobody else is coming for you. It's over. You won't hear from me again. Goodbye, and good luck.'

Ally's message felt more than slightly impersonal. But Mick pushed that thought aside as he ran through the steps required to wipe his phone clean. After clearing the data, he decided he should destroy his phone. He then felt the strange but familiar sense of paranoia arriving, from an unclear direction. As if on cue, the solution presented itself: a nice restaurant with a zapping booth at the entrance. The sign promised that their state-of-the-art equipment offered a shock far more tolerable than that found in the older booths. Mick was sold.

Sitting at a table in the back of the restaurant, with his back to the wall, Mick looked at his completely dead phone. He didn't know what he was expecting. The phone was now a useless piece of plastic and metal with the internal electronics now destroyed. But he felt reassured that if someone had stuck a tracking device in his clothes or his flip-flops, it too was dead. And he had no intention to return to his hostel dormitory. His spare clothing, shoes and small collection of toiletries – all of them possible locations for trackers – could be easily replaced.

Mick had cash in a money belt strapped to his thigh, a clean passport with a new name, the clothes on his back, and a head full of account numbers and passwords. He had everything that he needed. And he was free.

But as he waited for his dinner, he felt far less cheerful than usual. Why, he asked himself, did Ally just disappear on him? Why did she not at least pretend that they would meet up sometime, and hang out for a few days? Why did she not set up any system whereby they could get in touch with each other in the future? It's not as if Mick never had any friends that he had eventually lost contact with before, but Ally was far more fun and engaging than any he could remember.

Now Mick didn't feel particularly good about anything. He was thinking too much again.

But then, as the waiter placed the seafood platter on the table, he remembered: that stupid appetite suppressor was also destroyed in the zapping booth. He was now quite hungry.

As the food settled in his stomach, Mick began a quick mood shift. Now it seemed that today was going to be a good day. It was to be one of many good days ahead of him.

Mick tried to trace the reason for his sudden mood shift. Then, suddenly, Mick realized that he had not eaten the night before, and that he had also neglected to eat breakfast.

'Silly me. All I need was some food,' thought Mick to himself.

Mickwas now positive. He felt it strongly and he knew it: everything was going tobe alright.