SoulStone
# 47: River City
The politicians wouldn’t admit to it but the country was in an economic recession. Some would say that it verged on a depression. Some places were hurting real bad. River City for example had double digit unemployment. It would have been much worse but for the fact that it was loosing population as fast as it lost jobs. When people lost their jobs they just left the area. The unemployment percentage stayed the same.
A mental midget deep in the bowels of the ’beurocrazy’ must have thought that transferring disabled veterans into an economically depressed area would some how, benefit both and infuse money into the economy. As if disabled homeless war vets had any money.
Not that it mattered to Shelby. One place was as good as another to him. Everyone he’d known were long dead. As it happened Shelby was more fortunate than many of the other vets. A criminal organization was active in the area that he was sent to. Much like Al Capone’s soup kitchens the Dragon Tong ran programs that benefited Shelby, and the locals, more than anything the government had devised. The Tong intimidated the local cops too.
No one, but NO ONE wanted to mess with the Tong. Not twice. The cops, the local politicians and the criminal element were well and truly intimidated. Ironically a (very black) market economy existed in the area controlled by the Tong that was more free under the Tong than it would have been under the law. The little businesses weren’t regulated and inspected out of existence.
Shelby settled in fairly easy. He didn’t need much, and he wasn’t too proud to take any kind of work.
The Next Episode will be
#48: Name that Gal
The Previous Episode was
# 46: Lost him…
the First episode was
#1 : Prologue
I'm
@everittdmickey
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I write
SPECULATIVE FICTION
I have books on Amazon too.
Sometimes I also comment on the news
Sometimes it's hard to tell fiction from the news.
Ah, Shelby finally getting settled and a place of his own. Does he meet up with Mike and the Captain?
stay tuned...