Contagion, Round Two

[Finnean Nilsen]

I've had this thing in my cabinet for a few years, but because of some help from a friend with my query letter I've decided to start querying it again. Since I haven't read it in a while and I thought it was good last time, I assumed it still was. Luckily some people we helpful enough to point out some pretty obvious flaws to me, so I'm going over it again.
If you don't mind, anyone who could check this out and let me know if I'm getting closer, it would be greatly appreciated. (I edited out the profanity, as best I could):


November 7th



“Tax evasion? You’re holding a seventeen year old on tax evasion?” Chad Turner asked his contact, a tall butch man with a crew cut and the demeanor of a man who had just undergone a vasectomy. Chad was long and lean, dark and smooth, and not in any mood to deal with the ****ing NSA. “Is that even legal?”

“Of course it is,” the mannequin with the National Security Administration badge answered. “We found a hundred and fifty thousand dollars… among other things, in a safety deposit box under his name. We can put him away for at least a year for that, plus a few more for possession with intent…it’s all in the folder, and that’s if we can’t put together any other charges.”

“I didn’t realize the NSA was interested in people’s taxes,” Chad said to the folder, “that kind of changes my opinion on the urgency of paying them. How’d you get into the box?”

“Well, we contacted DHS with his name. They checked it out and then kicked it over to the IRS. They checked the family’s financials, which didn’t check out, so they got a warrant to look into the mustang….”

Chad had heard all of this before, but he got a sick sort of satisfaction by making NSA agents explain themselves. No Show ***holes, everyone of them. They’d sit behind their computers, or work out or whatever they did to look like tree trunks, and then swoop in and take the glory after Chad saved the day. He had a worse title for the FBI, though.

“Which was Toby’s,” he cut the agent off.

“Right, but bought for cash and under the name of his dad. But, naturally, when they checked the signature….”

“The dad’s didn’t match?”

“No, so they were able to get a warrant to check Toby’s financials and they found the box. They opened it in accordance with the warrant and they found about twenty thousand worth of Oxycontins, ten thousand worth of cocaine, another twenty in bootlegged games and such, and a hundred-fifty grand in cash.”

“But they didn’t give it to Cyber-crimes?”

“He’s listed as a National Security threat. DHS would have the lead if he wasn’t a hacker. So….”

“So they kicked it back to you on a conspiracy to traffic charge, which won’t work unless you can find two more people.”

“Well,” the GI Joe life sized figurine shrugged, “we can push the tax trial for a year or so, ask for no bail because of the circumstances, keep him out of sunlight until we find what’s on his computer. He’s known as ‘ToBiN’ online. He’s well known for….”

“I know what he does.” Chad cut in again, he knew everything there was to know about Toby Smith, that was his job. If he didn’t know, then there’d be a problem. The fact that NSA was just now finding out, illustrated everything he despised about them.

“Yeah I guess you would, wouldn’t you?” “Roid-head Bob” as Chad was now calling him in his head, looked at him condescendingly, and then continued. “Anyway, the little **** never actually uses any of his viruses, at least not when we’ve been able to track them, so we can’t charge him with any of the anti-hacking legislation. We could give him ten years if we can prove that he’s been stealing and selling copyrighted games, which we believe he has, but we can’t prove it.”

“What about the games in the box?”

“Can’t prove he stole them, and he hasn’t sold them yet. As is, it’s copyright infringement, that’s it. Like you said, if we can get two more names we can hit him with conspiracy and then he’ll serve some time, but just having them isn’t enough.” Again, Roid-head Bob looked Chad over. “I thought you would know that.”

“So you figure you’ll take him off the streets with the tax charge and gather more evidence while he sits in jail,” Chad repeated from memory. One thing government agents are not, is original. “Makes sense. What do you need me for?”

“We found a program on his computer, we can’t figure out what it is. I was hoping you could talk to him and clear it up for us.”
“I thought you needed time to find what was on his computer.”

“This was still open, easy pickings, the computer hadn’t even gone on stand-by yet, so my guys found it right away.”

[Author Pendragin]

@Finn

a tall butch man with a crew cut and the demeanor of a man who had just undergone a vasectomy.

This sentence needs to be worded differently. Currently, it feels redundant. Overall, I think it reads well. It's definitely not all talk this time. I do;however, feel it needs tightening.

Chad had heard all of this before, but he got a sick sort of satisfaction by making NSA agents explain themselves.

You could probably liven up a little bit, like: Chad knew the script, but to him making NSA agents run through it was icing on the cake

“Well,” the GI Joe life sized figurine shrugged,

"Well," the life-sized G.I. Joe figurine shrugged.

[Keith .]

I've never had a vasectomy, but I suspect that a guy who just had one would be of limited mobility and sore as hell. I don't think they're allowed to lift heavy objects or run. Is that what you're aiming for?

[Finnean Nilsen]

Unpleasant was the general feel, yeah, but I can come up with something better. As it's the first line of narration it should probably really pop.

[Stan Miller]

F,
This is waay better. But starting with dialog is tricky because the reader needs to know who the MC is before the conversations starts. In the movie/TV industry they use the establishing shot. For novels, it's just enough exposition in to establish the MC and the location. For example: "Chad Turner went to the window. He looked at the Rockies, out there on the horizon west of Denver. He rubbed an itchy spot on his neck. Maybe I'm allergic to FBI and NSA agents. Those a**hole outfits are enough to give anybody the hives." That's not very good, but illustrates the idea.

Others have commented on some things. I won't reiterate those, but I did see at least one place where you used the possessive form when the plural form was needed. (...dad's where you needed dads.)

Stan

[Finnean Nilsen]

Thanks Stan. Those dog-goned apostrophes are killing me. I think I'm going to have to crash course myself tonight. I write mostly on feel, and generally I can feel if a sentence is wrong just by reading it. I won't know what's wrong, just that it's wrong. But when it comes to little things like that, switched words the spell-check doesn't catch, apostrophes missing or there when they shouldn't be, my brain just floats right over them and I keep moving.
So thanks again, everyone. Hopefully this is the last time I'll need to edit it, until the next time....

[Stan Miller]

I write mostly on feel, and generally I can feel if a sentence is wrong just by reading it. I won't know what's wrong, just that it's wrong. But when it comes to little things like that, switched words the spell-check doesn't catch, apostrophes missing or there when they shouldn't be, my brain just floats right over them and I keep moving

The single best editing trick I know is to bribe someone to read it to you, while you follow along on the screen. That way there's two sets of eyes on the ms at the same time, and will catch a lot of things that you'll miss on a normal editing pass.

Stan