The Crew

You are the commander. You start with a name, a passport and four empty places at the table.

People are looking for work, and every one of them has a trade, a history, a country that will or will not have them, and a price. Some are lying about all four. You read the files, you make offers, and you find out which was which later, usually at the worst possible hour.

Jobs come in from clients around the world — a recovery in Piraeus, an escort over a Polish pass, something in Osaka that nobody will put in writing. Each wants particular trades, particular languages and a particular amount of nerve. Each one expires. Spend three weeks thinking about it and a rival crew takes it while you think.

Then you send them, and it runs hour by hour, and something goes wrong. Something always goes wrong. What you do about it is the whole game: six ways out, none of them right, and the crew you spent a year building is the only thing standing between the plan and the police.