Alibi High

“He said he'd find us when we got here,” Johnny said, scanning the crowds. “So I guess we just wait here.”

“Alright,” I said, already feeling claustrophobic and germ y aphobic from the crowds.

“How do you wanna play it?”

“I'm genuinely not sure,” I admitted. “I'm hoping it will come to me as it...evolves.”

“I got your back,” he said, nodding. “We'll be alright.”

I was grateful that Johnny was with me. I didn't want to do this alone and I was pretty sure that if Jake had had his way, he would've turned the minivan right back around and headed for home. I wasn't quite sure might not have known how we were going to figure this everything out, but I 'm was glad I wasn't doing it alone by myself .

Johnny nudged me with his elbow and nodded toward the rows of slots. “There's Nate.”

I followed his gaze and sure enough, Nate was strolling over to his us , still in the clad in his Vikings sweatshirt , and looking calm and collected. . He wasn't looking around , or checking over his shoulder or up at the cameras that seemed to be mounted everywhere. He seemed looked more relaxed than when we'd met him in the Data Dork parking lot.

He lifted his chin as he got closer to us, then pointed for us to keep walking past All Kinds Wall of Walleye. We started walking and he fell in step next to us.

“Busy Friday night, yeah?” he asked with a grin.

“Mad house,” Johnny said.

“Pretty much like this every weekend.”

“You come here a lot?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Sometimes.”

Which wasn't an answer at all.

We followed him past the restaurants, past another row of poker tables and toward the far end of the casino floor. The crowd finally thinned, people apparently not wanting to make the walk all the way down that far to the end of the building , especially when everything they needed greeted them as soon as they entered the front doors. We reached the end of the floor a dead-end and turned left, down a narrow corridor, doors on one side, windows on the other. Johnny glanced at me and shrugged.

Nate stopped at a door marked “Floor Security” and knocked.

For a moment, my heart stopped. I thought maybe he was taking us to casino authorities or some other law enforcement officer that who was going to would scold us – or arrest us – for trying to buy stolen computers. As irrational as that sounded, I was fairly certain that's what was about to happen.

Johnny apparently though the same thing. “Wait?” Johnny he said. “Security?”

“Relax,” Nate said. “It's my brother. He works here.”

The door opened and a taller, skinnier version of Nate eyed us. He wore a River Star uniform – red shirt, black pants – with a name tag on the left side of his chest that identified him as Al Swearingchief, Assistant Director of Floor Security. His long black hair was woven into a tight braid and he waved us into his office, a small square room with a desk, a couple of chairs and a laptop on the desk.

“This is my brother Al,” Nate said, gesturing at his brother.

Al held up a hand but didn't say anything as he . He sat down in the chair on the other side of the desk.

“These are the peeps I was telling you about,” Nate said to Al.

Al nodded, didn't say anything, just stared at us.

“They aren't cops,” Nate added. “I asked them.”

Al nodded again.

We all stood there in silence for a few moments. Awkward silence.

“So,” Al finally said, leaning back in his chair. “You're interested in the computers.”

“Yeah,” Johnny said. “That's why we're here.”

Al looked at me. “And why are you here?”

“Because I'm actually the one that's interested in buying them,” I said.

He looked back to Johnny. “So then why are you here?”

“I'm the one that made contact with your brother,” Johnny explained. “We hang out in some of the same places.”

He glanced at his brother. “That right?”

Nate nodded. “Yup.”

Then Al stared at us some more.

“And you're not cops?” he said finally.

We both shook our heads.

And then he burst into a laughing fit so loud that I started and bumped into Johnny.

“I'm just messing with you guys,” Al said, a big grin on his face. “I like to play tough guy once in awhile, you know what I mean?”

“Um, sure,” Johnny said.

“I don't get to mess with too many people here, you know?” he said, still grinning , then . He offered his hand. “I'm Al.”

We all shook hands after that unbelievably awkward greeting.

“So,” he said, making a fist and rapping it against the desk. “You're interested in a few computers.”

Both Johnny and I nodded.

“And you wanna see 'em, I'm guessing?”

We nodded again.

He slapped the desktop. “Alrighty then. Let's go have a look-see.”

He stood from the desk and led us out of the office, Nate trailing behind us. He led us further down the corridor his office was in until we reached an exterior door. He punched a couple of numbers on the keypad next to the door, the pad beeped and he pushed o pen the door, n the handle. We which put us outside again, slipped outside, at the back end of the sprawling complex. We followed Al to a line of about twenty storage trailers, large structures all with keylocked entries on them. He led us to one in the middle, punched a couple of numbers on the pad entered a code and pulled the sliding door to the side. He grabbed a flashlight from his hip and flicked it on, the beam white and bright and filling illuminating the interior of the trailer.

“I know this is all kind of cloak and daggerish,” he said. “Hope it doesn't scare y'all. Just trying to be careful.”

“This is your trailer?” Johnny asked.

Al shook his head. “No, no. Belongs to the casino. But I'm the guy in charge of them. I oversee the inventory and placement in each one. Mostly, we put outdated machines and furniture in them until we sell them off or the vendors come to reclaim them.” He smiled again. “But sometimes I put a few extra things in them. A little safer than keeping them at home, if you know what I mean ? . ”

“Sure,” Johnny said.

Al held the light high and shined it into the trailer. “On the left.”

Johnny and I both peered into the trailer. On the left wall, neatly stacked , were computer monitors and hard drives and keyboards. There were a couple of printers, too. They looked like they were in good shape. Nothing broken. And they absolutely looked like computers you'd see in a computer lab.

“Can I ask where you got these?” I said.

Al's smile dimmed. “You can ask, sure.”

Then he didn't say anything.

“But you won't tell me?” I said. “Right?”

“I'm not sure why it really matters,” Al said. “If you wanna buy computers, I've got some. If you aren't interested, we part friends.” He paused. “Hopefully.”

I didn't say anything hesitated . Because I wasn't sure what to say do . I felt like we were at a critical juncture and I really didn't know what to do. I wanted him to confirm that those computers were from Prism, but he didn't want to. And I wasn't going to actually buy the computers. Which I thought he was starting to figure out.