Bronze Wallet Indentured Licensing
Prologue · Late 2020s
In the late 2020s, Trump’s third inauguration had come and gone with a laser‑light show projected onto the privatized Verizon–Washington Monument. MAGA flags snapped in the smog like sales banners. Deregulation unshackled every industry, which is how Bronze Wallet Financial Services won the right to collect debt the way Uber collects rides.
Senior Year · Late 2027
Roseland Charter High School in Santa Rosa was a sun‑baked concrete maze whose walls shimmered with sponsored murals for calorie‑free vodka and cryptocurrencies that had already nose‑dived. When John Magee breezed down the main corridor, phones angled toward him the way sunflowers lean into light. At seventeen he was already six‑foot‑two, shoulders fanning outward like the wings of a jet about to lift. When he flexed to shut his locker, his abdomen, ridged like weathered cobblestones, drew as much praise as any of his touchdowns.
His academics? A blur of franchised lesson modules voiced by cheerful avatars. Multiple‑choice answers autofilled themselves if you blinked long enough. Homework was outsourced to whichever ChatGPT clone offered the deepest student discount that week. One afternoon the chemistry teacher, little more than a licensed chaperone, tried to demonstrate a reaction. Half the class tuned out, watching John practice pull‑ups on the doorframe.
The only exams that mattered were follower counts. John earned spending money by livestreaming bench‑press sessions after sixth period, sweat sliding over his chest the way rain polishes new blacktop.
Bachelor Life · Early 2028
Graduation arrived with drone fireworks that spelled corporate slogans across the sky. John, fresh in custom‑cut denim, posed for group shots. Friends slapped his broad shoulders and joked about sponsorship deals after he graduated as a Top‑Three Heart‑Throb of Roseland Charter. He felt thousands of eyes on his tapering waist and narrow hips. Each flare of color overhead reflected in his hair gel and in the future he assumed would unfold like an auto‑playing reel: endless lifting, endless likes, rent paid by brand collabs.
His parents could no longer support him in Trump’s economy, so independence arrived on his eighteenth birthday. He rented a micro‑loft over a vape shop for twice what his parents paid on their thirty‑year mortgage. The couch folded into a bed with a voice command, California sunsets gleamed through the window, and that felt priceless enough. The place smelled of chicken breast, gym chalk, and the citrus detergent that clung to his laundry.
Mornings he suited up for construction, midday for an electrical apprentice program, afternoons for plumbing gigs. Evenings he split screens: one streaming himself meal‑prepping chicken breasts, another doom‑scrolling comments. Protein kept his torso broad, cables on his arms taut. Nights belonged to the ring light, the camera, and a mirror framed by LED. Grinding through bench sets, he watched veins ridge across his forearms like dry riverbeds. Each pop of triceps brought equal parts gratitude, the body drew viewers, and terror: it was all he had.
The Crash · Late 2028
The downturn hit with the subtlety of a wrecking ball dropped from low orbit. Markets toppled in a week of red‑lined headlines. Building projects froze mid‑foundation; skeleton frames rattled in the Pacific wind. Layoffs arrived by push notification at dawn. John stared at the words No assignments available while his pecs still twitched from yesterday’s decline presses, muscle fibers itching for labor that no longer existed.
Job applications joined billions in a digital landfill. With no work, workouts grew longer, meals cheaper, rent never paused, and in fact doubled under “dynamic liberty pricing.” Streaming tips shrank to pocket change once sponsors realized every kid on the block had an eight‑pack filter. Some nights he lay on the couch‑bed, arms folded behind his head, noticing how the walls felt narrower now that future possibilities had shrunk.
Payment reminders chimed like dripping faucets. He muted them and filmed another nutrition video, pretending the blender roar drowned out more than just fruit.
The Contract · Early 2029
6:13 p.m., 14 January 2029. Doorbell: a cheery retro ringtone announcing doom. Cody and Zach, field agents for Bronze Wallet Financial Services, appeared in pastel polos emblazoned with the company’s chrome‑stag logo.
“Who the hell are you?” John asked.
The duo stepped inside, past John’s imposing pecs. Cody balanced a tablet, posture crisp; Zach wandered, noting the pull‑up bar, the stacked dumbbells, the photo lights.
“You’re seventeen‑thousand eight‑hundred and sixty‑two dollars in arrears, interest compounding hourly. Do you have liquid assets?” Cody sang.
John flexed on instinct; his chest rose, each pectoral ridge casting a hard shadow like freshly baked artisan bread. “You see any?”
Zach whistled. “We see plenty, bro. Just not in a bank.” His eyes traveled down and up again, cataloguing muscles with the caution of a livestock appraiser. Quads pressed against frayed denim; calves curved like inverted hearts.
Cody remarked on the earthy smell of protein powder that lingered in the kitchenette. Zach examined the living‑room mirror that doubled as John’s streaming rig. “Bad news but with options,” Cody began, scrolling.
Those options led straight to Debt Camp. Under the Libertarian Recovery Act of 2028, citizens could swap arrears for “voluntary term labor.” Amazon, triumphant after crushing the final union drive in 2027, bought entire camps at auction.
Debt Camp Agreement © 2028 · Bronze Wallet licensed to Amazon
Slide 1: a contract that shimmered with celebratory confetti animations. Headline: EMPLOYEE‑TENANT RECLAMATION PROGRAM. Fine print promised shelter, basic medical, and quarterly social‑media privileges in exchange for five years of bonded service.
“Think of it as a gym membership,” Cody said. “Plenty of equipment, guaranteed meals, steady content. You’ll shred harder than ever.”
John pictured himself pushing pallets in some mega‑warehouse, camera drones buzzing overhead, followers cheering the fall of an idol. He touched his torso subconsciously: hard planes beneath calloused fingers, the last days of autonomy he would own for five years.
Humiliation spread through his veins, hot and muddy. His triceps tightened. Still, he signed; there was nothing else. Joe Rogan, one of John's inspirations, called it a freedom contract.
The Appraisal
John’s studio apartment became a showroom. Zach paced around him and asked for a shirtless view “for completeness.” John obeyed, cheeks hot.
Arms overhead, he felt cold air slide across his obliques. Cody murmured metrics: upper‑body reach ideal for high‑shelf logistics, heart rate steady, posture photogenic. Zach knelt, tapping a calf muscle that rolled like a coiled rope.
Cody projected a hologram of human silhouettes color‑coded for potential yield. The shoulders of one silhouette glowed gold. “Upper‑body branding prospects,” he explained. “Though the market’s saturated. Handsomeness index lands you at the seventy‑first percentile, respectable but shy of premium.”
“I was ranked Top Three Heart‑Throb in my class,” John protested.
“High‑school metrics age in dog years,” Zach replied. “What we need is transferable vigor. Abs? Good storefront. Pecs? Solid signage. Glutes score well with our warehouse‑labor division. Back width translates to lifting efficiency and VR‑fitness demonstration gigs.”
“Your abs will be prime advertising real estate,” Cody added. “We can stencil QR codes on each ridge. Viewers scan while you lift boxes.”
Zach assessed John like a produce inspector. “Arms symmetrical, shoulder spread impressive, but face-handsomeness only rates a six. Market favors cute-ugly over ugly-gritty combos now.”
Each leering comment on his body felt like an auctioneer praising livestock before the gavel. John tried to puff up, chest plates swelling like storm clouds, but the effect only sharpened their yardstick gazes.
A notification pinged on Zach’s tablet. “Value depreciated. Follower count dipped below two mil yesterday. Sad.”
A few nights later, John opened a last livestream, framing himself waist‑up. Ring light flared along the shallow valley between his pectorals, down the ladder of his abdomen, across arms swollen from anxiety push‑ups. He confessed everything: the debt, the offer, the fear. Viewership spiked.
The final image of his self-owned channel for five years burned into three‑hundred‑thousand retinas: John turning, spine tapering into a narrow waist, shoulders still broad as promise, stepping toward a future payable in muscle.
Epilogue · 2030
In the Vacaville Debt Camp warehouse, motivational posters showed John’s face beside slogans about accountability. He lifted, carried, loaded, each rep broadcasting to devices worldwide. Subscribers loved the redemption arc; sponsors adored the sweat. Bronze Wallet trimmed his debt with every view. MAGA streamer Matt Walsh called it proof that the system worked.
