The Clout of Gen Read Free Page A

it.
     
    As soon as he walked inside, he noticed the flashing light on the answering machine. He was sure it had to be Susan, trying to weasel her way back into his good graces after her indiscretion. John didn’t care, though, as there was nothing else on his mind other than the strange box and discovering its contents.
     
    He placed the case on the dining room table. He had no clue what it could mean or what it might contain. Why did I find it now, of all times? It weighed around twenty pounds and was constructed of high-quality leather. The locks seem to be old, as they were rusted, but they still held securely. John knew he’d never be able to safely open them with the tools he had at home, so he decided he’d have to head to Chinatown for the following day, if the curiosity didn’t kill him overnight. There isn’t a thing those guys can’t open.
     
    In spite of his worries and curiosities and woes, the hectic day finally took its toll on John, and within seconds, he was fast asleep on the sofa bed with the green box right next to him on the floor.
     
    It was a good thing that all of that mess happened on a Friday, as John couldn’t have imagined going to work the next day; honestly, he could barely imagine living after all he went through that day. At nine thirty a.m., John woke up with many thoughts swarming around in his head, but his real focus was on finding out what the box contained, if anything, or if it was simply a strange washed-up box of no significance. 
     
    A quick ride, and he was off to Chinatown. He passed several small shops and finally came across a locksmith. After twenty minutes of light banging and hammering with his special tools, it was wide open!
     
    Inside the box was another container, a plastic one, something like a box within a box. John thought it was probably meant to prevent any water leakage, though the leather already did a great job of that. It seemed that whoever had put it all together went to great lengths to protect whatever was inside. The interior of the box was the same color as the outside. It was cushioned to protect it from any hits or bumps, and the smaller plastic container was totally sealed and air- and watertight, except for a small circular window that could be opened from a little slip.
     
    John thanked the locksmith, gave him a twenty-dollar bill, and went back to his car.
     
    The inside contents included a plastic-wrapped cassette of some sort and a business card written in something that looked like Asian; the card didn’t seem to contain a name—only an address. There was also a silver ring with an odd symbol on it, as well as some letters engraved on the inside of the band. The writing on the ring also looked to be in Asian. Interesting, but what does it mean? John wondered.
     
    The tape looked like one of those old small cassettes he hadn’t seen in a long time. He was glad he hadn’t left Chinatown yet and had decided to check it out right there in the parking area, as the cassette would require a visit to a shop that sold secondhand, outdated electronics. He thought he might take the business card along as well, hoping that the salesman might be able to tell him what it said.
     
    As it turned out, the tape was a small videocassette used in the eighties. The first two shops he went to didn’t have any device that could play it, but John didn’t have to worry, because Chinatown was packed with shops that sold used electronics. After a bit of searching, he found what he was searching for, and for a mere forty bucks, John bought a compatible player. He wasn’t as lucky with the business card, as no one in Chinatown seemed to be able to read it; clearly, it wasn’t written in Chinese, but one of them suggested to him that it did look like Japanese.
     
    Eager to see what was on the tape, John hurriedly headed home. He was starving, so he stopped on the way to pick up a pizza.
     
    Once he was home and settled down with his piping-hot dinner in