[h1]Dublin, Ireland[/h1]
[h2]Home of Christy of Donegal[/h2]

With the evening falling fast over Dublin so did Christy swiftly return to his flat. Perched on the sixth floor of an old flat, his apartment was a sparse studio of minimalist design. Draping from the brick walls a Irish flag attempted to give the room a warm color. Alongside of it hung a small portrait of St. Patrick, no bigger than a magazine cover but full of the piety of the man and patron saint of the Irish nation. Alongside the painting at a much smaller size was a wallet-photo sized picture of Che Guevara.

Making the sign of the cross as he passed by the drawing of Saint Patrick, Christy made a brief prayer before gently touching his finger's to the saint's image. Christy didn't count himself a holy man in the church-going sense, but was all the same born a God-fearing Irish Catholic, even if his church attendance was sparse and life of pugilism suggested otherwise. Hanging his coat up on a metal hook alongside these effigies he wandered into the center of his open studio apartment.

Through the windows the winter lights of Dublin shone in the drawing darkness. Like fiery diamonds the incandescent and fluorescent bulbs of offices shone from Dublin center. The glow of street lights cast the city below him in a soft amber glow. He stretched out his shoulders as he approached the windows and looked down into the street below. Life in Dublin went on as if nothing were to ever happen. He wondered if it ever would.

A part of Christy's mind insisted that I.I.R.A was a real thing and not a comic joke; though he had long forgotten the punchline. It was now a thing, a little thing that kept he and his companions together since graduation from university. But since they had been with-held in their progression through Irish society and it felt unnerving. It felt unfair that across that Sea of Ireland that London would and should fair so much better. That British Ulster had shopping malls, and Donegal was still dealing with sheep in the road.

Never mind that. He put the thoughts behind him and turned from the windows.

In the corner of the room a futon sat alongside the flat's radiator. The white coils of the clicking and loudly purring machine was capped with a dented water pot for coffee. Occupying the same space too was a battered and weathered punching bag. The heavy grain in the leather was well on the way to being eroded out by Christy's fists and large sections of it were held together by duct tape even. It was something straight from a movie set, like from the gym of Rocky.

On an end table alongside it he kept a roll of boxing tape. Taking slow breaths he wrapped the tape around his knuckles and turned to go at it with the bag. His fists connected with loud smacks and pops. The chain groaned as the sandbag swung on its joint. But it soon melded together into a steady symphony and song. Christy slipped himself into a boxing-fueled meditation.

The contact Seamus had mentioned today was someone he had brought up earlier. Christy didn't fully realize it was the same person until after he left. But a week prior he had approached him saying, “he found a guy”.

Christy had asked him who he was, but Seamus didn't elaborate. He put the thought aside as a simply hoax against Seamus. But Seamus didn't put it out of his either wholly. Though the questioned loomed: what had taken this person so long to respond? What was his game?

He threw a hard right-hook to the side of the bag and the chains holding it up rattled and squealed as the bag swung back to kiss the wall.


[h2]Home of Seamus[/h2]

The air-conditioning and traffic outside his window hummed through the walls. The ambiance was like that of a space-ship at drift in space, with the sounds of the engines and life-support in the wall humming and churning in respect to that. And illuminated by a pair of glowing computer monitors it commanded the visual effect of the darkened corridors of the control room. And in the middle of it Seamus sat in his computer chair, his girth commanding the space with the stubborn presence of an elephant. Leaning over the keyboard he stared into the glow of the computers. The limited glow of Dublin in a third-story window back-lit the monitors.

It had been a long process of tag over texts and instant messaging to get to where he was now. The responses were slowly directed, and perhaps not at all clear. But now with the Tor browser alive on his screen he was where he was confident the games were to end: a simply built anonymous chat-room in some deeply encrypted corner of the internet. There was one other person on, but no activity. Seamus hung back, glossing over to his other monitor to scan his email.

With a beep, a message was deployed.

“Are you still interested?” it read cryptically.

Seamus leaned forward. Placing his meaty fingers on the keyboard he responded: “Yes.”

There was a brief reprieve of silence. Then the other side responded: “What is it your people need?” it asked.

The question froze Seamus. What did they need? Manpower? Weapons? Explosives? He quickly found himself lacking the basic knowledge to run a proper insurgency. In his indecisiveness he answered with the only thing his guy said they needed. “We could use money.” he typed.

Waiting. Again.

“How much?”

How much was the great question. Seamus pulled a number out of his ass.

“One million.”

“One million?” the response came quicker. Seamus could only assume one million in what.

“Euros.” he informed the man on the otherside.

The other man was again slow and hesitant to respond. But he did eventually: “What'll be the future reimbursement on a small loan of one-million euros?”

Again, a question Seamus couldn't rightly answer. He wasn't Christie. But if he were here he could probably answer. He looked down at his phone of the desk and wondered if he should call. Or would that make this man impatient? He needed to play his cards right. He took charge of the situation, although it didn't feel right.

“How does this work?” he typed sheepishly. He felt trying to change the direction of the conversation was the best he could do.

There was a longer silence. So much so he was afraid the man had up and left. But the tally in the corner of the screen denoted still that there was still one person present on this page. Seamus was getting nervous. Butterflies hatched in his stomach as he tapped his fingers on the table, waiting.

“I can see you don't know.” a message finally came, “But I'll cut you the benefit of the doubt. I don't imagine I could loose out with a million euros.

“We'll consider it a test.” a following message said, “One million I can make up on. We'll follow up at a later date. But talk to your boss and get back to me. Then we can settle a meet.”

A meet? Somehow that made Seamus' nauseous anxiety worse. But he complied, “OK.” he wrote back.