The next few months passed quickly as everyone stayed busy on various projects. The University had agreed to let them drop all their classes for the semester after receiving confirmation of their story of a terrorist attack from the US Embassy in Mexico.
Some of the group moved to the new house next door to the original house, but it did not have room for everyone. They ended up renting a couple other houses in the neighborhood longer term to keep everyone close by.
Elsa had rebuilt her lab and there were several brightly colored animals wandering around the property. The girls and Melinda were all growing different colored hair. Adriana had gone with a light green color, while Melinda was replacing her gray hair with a more traditional blonde. Matt’s friend Zaliha had accepted their job offer but was not willing to let the mad scientists alter her DNA. She did seem very happy to be working in the tropical location and getting to design submarines all day. She mentioned that NASA spent a lot of time in meetings and that they had procedures in place that kept the large organization functioning but did not allow much creativity. Here she could just whip out a new design using robot labor and nearly unlimited materials, and no one really complained when it failed.
NASA had been big on planning every single detail upfront because an error would be disastrous. Everything was debated and checked extensively by committees, and you couldn’t build anything unless it passed a gauntlet of approvals. Here she could just create a design, get it built and modify any problems based on feedback. They had iterated through multiple designs before NASA would have even approved funding for further study.
The government had finished their investigation and ruled that recreational drugs were not being produced at the facility, much to the disappointment of the U.S. DEA. The Russians were criticized by Mexico and the U.S., but they denied the attack despite all the evidence. Nothing really came of it publicly since the press had not been encouraged to report on the attack. One local journalist had written a story which showed up on AP, but it wasn’t a talking point on any of the news networks.
They had repaired the Dark Siren's hull and re-floated it. Crews were repairing and replacing the interior systems and it was scheduled to launch again soon.
Scott was a bit overwhelmed with how chaotic their property had become over the past few weeks. Cars and trucks were parked three deep in the yard and lined up on the street. The air was noisy with chatter in Spanish and English as workers hustled around to different locations. They were framing a new house on the original property. It was much larger than the original and they had poured a foundation over where the shed and bunker entrance had been located.
Two large piers were getting assembled going far out into the water with about 150 feet of rocky coastline between them. The piers were solidly built and wide enough for a two-lane road. The original wall had been partially demolished. A crane lifted steel beams for a parking garage between where the houses had been. A couple crews were chopping down or trimming trees. All this was just the activity on the surface. Scott knew there were also crews installing lighting, plumbing and machinery in some of the new underground spaces that had been carved out.
Despite a fair number of robots working, Scott knew they had over 200 people hired short term on various tasks. The money they had made from the first run was quickly running out. They had paid off $12 million in debts, but they had spent the remainder of the money made on the first run and were already taking on some new debts.
Melinda was sitting inside the second house drinking a martini with the wall street lady Angela Stein. Scott decided to go see what they were talking about.
“Hello Scott, we almost have the mats installed in the new gym. I know you were excited to start sparring with some of the security guys.” Melinda’s voice came out of the intercom while she babbled away into her phone.
“Um, hi Melinda. I’m not sure excited is the right word, but I am going to give it my best effort.”
“Is this really Scott?” Angela was amazed. “Last I saw him he was this awkward, skinny guy. He’s looking pretty good!”
Scott wasn’t entirely comfortable with how Angela was looking at him. She was at least ten years older than him and rather attractive. She was letting her eyes wander all over him without any shame. He reminded himself that he finally had a chance with Adriana now and didn’t want to ruin it.
“Don’t be flirting with my boy Scott,” Melinda said with a smirk. “He’s in love with that sweet girl Adriana who doesn’t realize yet what a catch he is. Doesn’t he look nice with the new haircut and clothes I bought him?”
Scott’s face flushed as his embarrassment reached new levels. Melinda had ordered him new clothes after his old wardrobe had been destroyed by the Russian cruise missile. His old clothes wouldn’t really fit anyway now that he had all this muscle. Still, the way she said it made him feel like a little boy who had his mother picking out a cute outfit for picture day. To be fair, the clothes were comfortable and looked better than the stuff he used to wear. Scott remembered how weird and embarrassing it had been having a tailor measure him and making adjustments. Melinda had said it was to help him “show off the goods”. She could be really creepy sometimes!
“Right, so I’m guessing Angela was a bit worried when she heard we got blown up and attacked.” Scott said, trying to change the subject.
“No kidding. Startups often have difficulties, but Russian commandos are not something I would expect you needed in your contingency planning.” Angela said. “Still, I was impressed with how quickly Melinda is getting things back on track. I came here wondering if she would need additional capital, but once again my attempt to buy more equity has failed.”
“Don’t be greedy dear,” Melinda scolded. “I think we’ll have plenty more opportunities soon that you can get a piece of.”
“Oh? I’ve pulled a lot of money out of my other investments because the economy is looking grim. There was a bit of a bounce due to the stimulus packages, but I feel like a lot of what the governments are doing is making no sense. It seems like a group of senators and congressmen are working across party lines to target anything to do with wall street. It’s really going to put a stranglehold on any possible recovery.” Angela said.
“I heard some very interesting gossip on that topic from one of my associates,” Melinda said. “Someone cut into those politicians' insider trading profits, and they panicked, pulling all their money out of the major funds. Someone finally fixes a major corruption problem, but extracting the parasites is taking the whole system down with them.”
“I heard something like that from some of my friends in the industry. I wonder if the person who took them down was doing it for political reasons or if they were just trying to make a quick buck stealing from a bunch of thieves?” Angela speculated.
“Wait, are you saying this whole economic collapse is because politicians weren’t allowed to steal any more money?” Scott said.
“Try to keep up dear,” Melinda said patiently. “Anyway, the important thing for us is that labor, land and other resources are getting much cheaper. The downside is that demand for some of the metals we are mining is greatly reduced. When the governments try to throw money at the problem, there will be lots of opportunities where the prices will no longer match the underlying supply and demand.”
“I think I can understand that.” Scott said.
“So here in Mexico, they are feeling the drop in demand, so we benefit from the easy availability of workers and supplies. This is great for our rebuilding efforts, and we’ll earn some goodwill with the local government keeping their economy up and running. We can use a lot of the steel and lower price materials right now to build up our internal projects instead of trying to sell it all.”
“So how do we make money in this environment?” Scott asked.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“I can answer that one,” Angela said. “You get loans and grants from the government. They are going to print a ton of money to fix the economy, so you bid on some big projects and generally try to soak up as much of the excess cash as possible. If they are pushing green energy, we start a solar panel company. If they are doing infrastructure, we bid on every contract they have. We can undercut most competitors with your robots and cheap resource costs.”
Angela continued, “Normally these projects would only go to their friends and supporters, but when the economy is crashing, they are handing out so much cash that a wider group of people can grab a share.”
“You’re saying if they propose a project to build a bridge with the goal of creating a couple hundred jobs, we take their money and build it with robots for cheaper?” Scott asked.
“Pretty much. Then we take the money we saved and hire people for jobs we actually need. It’s not like we’re the bad guys, we are just fixing the government’s tendency to misallocate resources. The taxpayer wins with a cheaper bridge, people still get jobs that they are actually suited for, and we get more money.” Angela said. Scott felt like the argument was missing something, but he was willing to roll with it.
“I think I get it. Right now, demand is low so we soak up the excess resources for our own projects. When the government is handing out money, we grab it and build stuff cheap. Later, as other people start building the demand will go up and we sell resources to them, so we make money on both ends of the cycle.” Scott said. “The problem is knowing when and where the government is going to hand out money so we can bid on projects. We don’t exactly have many connections. I guess we should start donating to political campaigns or something.”
“No way! That’s a terrible idea. We use that brilliant program of yours and hire lobbyists,” Melinda corrected. “Why go through all the expense and time building up some slimy politician when we can just pay someone who already has the relationship? So much cheaper and faster plus we don’t need to deal with all the junk mail you get once you start donating.”
“Nice. Did I just hear you have a program that helps you find lobbyists?” Angela perked up. “Can you tell me more?”
“No way!” Melinda said. “Trade secrets. Even if you somehow convince Scott to go up to your room, he better not tell you anything.” She glared at Scott. Did she really think that something like this would happen? Scott had never even been on a date with a girl.
“I would never!” Angela protested. “Unless he’s interested… I’m in the 2nd room upstairs on the right.” She chuckled. She was obviously joking. Scott would never just show up at some strange woman’s room.
“Umm, I think I’m going to go… yeah” Scott practically ran out of the room. Melinda and Angela were giggling as he hustled outside.
----------------------------------------
Scott decided to head into the tunnels next. He needed to get away from those women; they had clearly been drinking too much. The first room underground was set up as a kill box with transparent aluminum windows on one wall and a couple holes that guards could shoot out. Two heavily armed guards he recognized waved him through. They didn’t yet have enough employees that people needed an ID badge - at least not for the core employees. Scott was sure there would soon be a time when not everyone recognized him as the employee count continued to rapidly grow. Only a couple dozen people were allowed on in the lower levels which were still mostly unfinished.
The second floor down was all Genysis Biotech. Elsa and Melinda spent a lot of time there along with a couple others Scott didn’t know too well. Dr. Chaikhot had returned to Thailand after the attack.
The third floor down was going to have the gym, firing range, and probably housing for some of the security people. They were planning to have a cafeteria here too and some meeting rooms. At the moment it was mostly rough space carved out of the rock, but there were a few work crews. One crew was wearing welding masks and had some kind of laser cutting out blocks of stone to make conduits for plumbing and electrical work. Scott would have to ask someone about that later. He didn’t think normal crews used energy weapons.
There were a couple security guys in a meeting room watching several video feeds.
“Hey Sergio. What are you guys watching down here?” Scott asked. He was a junior programmer, but technically he was also everyone’s boss. He figured they wouldn’t kick him out.
“Hey boss!” Sergio answered amiably. “I’m surprised Melinda didn’t tell you about this. She’s been pretty stressed lately so maybe it slipped her mind.”
“Stressed?” Scott said. “She’s sipping cocktails upstairs with her friend.”
“Come on man, you know that’s her socialite personality. She has a pretty unique ability to be stressed and relaxed at the same time.”
“I guess I never thought about it. I kind of assumed moods were more of a hormone thing that would be shared across her personalities.”
“It probably bleeds over like that. She’s made some odd comments during this mission which makes me think she’s not entirely focused… or sober. Fortunately, she has a hands-off management style so her erratic behavior shouldn’t cause any real problems.”
“Speaking of that, what exactly is going on here?”
“Right, so see that building there?” Sergio asked.
“Wait, that looks like the hospital my dad is at!” Scott said, alarmed.
“Yeah, we’re kidnapping your dad and Gabriel. Melinda decided their medical care was unacceptable and she thought our chances were better with military options instead of a doomed attempt at fighting with the medical bureaucracy.” Sergio said ruefully.
On screen, Scott watched as someone pushed a security guard who was slumped in his chair away and was doing something with the computer and camera feeds at his desk. Another screen showed someone walking through some hallways.
“It’s not really that hard to steal patients unless they are in a pediatric ward.” Sergio explained. “The complication here is that we have two targets on different floors. Also, Gabriel does not want to go willingly. He’s probably still upset about getting left behind during the attack and nearly dying a few times.”
Scott could sympathize with what the personal trainer had gone through. He had been told to lock himself in an office shortly before the whole floor flooded. While his office slowly filled with water a Russian diver had shot up the door forcing him to leave quickly or drown. He had somehow overpowered the diver - Gabriel was a really fit dude. He received a bad injury that eventually led to the amputation of his left hand. With some help from Terrance, Gabriel had made it out to the surface and was carried away in time, but only barely. He had received some puncture wounds, burns and shattered eardrums from the explosion of the upper level. He had survived thanks to a military medic who was onsite with the Mexican armed forces.
Scott remembered how cheerful and helpful the man had been when they first met. By all accounts he was now paranoid. There had been some incidents where he attacked some of the medical staff, suggesting he was not handling the mental trauma. Currently, he had been sedated and was strapped in a wheelchair with a couple men making their way to the exit.
“We took the security guard out a little early. Need to work on our timing a bit, but a lot of these guys are new to the team.” Sergio said apologetically. “About half our best guys chose not to participate in this operation. I can respect a guy with moral lines they won’t cross.”
“Anyway, we are jamming cell phone service. All the people trying to call for help about the security guard getting knocked out can just pound sand.”
Scott decided it was best to just keep silent and observe. His dad seemed to be happily chatting with his kidnapper. Scott guessed they knew each other. The two patients were wheeled into a standard white abduction van, and then most of the feeds were cut.
“Well, that was a bit sloppy, but no one was hurt so I’m calling it a win. The security guard will wake up a bit groggy but shouldn’t have any pain.” Sergio narrated.
“I guess they are going to take them to Thailand?” Scott asked.
“Yeah, that’s the plan. Private charter with some medical documents. We got the documents to transfer an unconscious patient out of the country before the hospital denied us the same transfer. These bureaucrats don’t really talk to each other. Most of this nonsense is still on paper so it might as well be shoved in a black hole unless lawyers start looking through it years later.”
“Do you think I can talk to my dad?” Scott asked.
“Uh sure. We’re on regular cell phones, so try not to use words like drugs or kidnapping if you can help it. I don’t really know if they monitor cell phones as closely in this country as they do in yours.” Sergio admitted.
“Hey dad, it’s Scott. Just watched you on TV. How are you feeling?” Scott asked. That sounded pretty non-incriminating.
“Hi Scott! It was awesome! They totally kidnapped me and drugged the security guard.” Mr. Henderson gushed. Sergio gently face-palmed.
“Oh hehe. Funny story dad,” Scott lamely replied. “Well, I think I’ll keep it short. I guess you are going to Thailand soon. Hope you have a nice trip and feel better soon.”
“Oh yeah, I tried to talk Melinda into giving me the full Carl treatment, but she said they were just going to fix the burns and grow me a new eye. Can you imagine them growing an eye in a jar or something? She said something about how they couldn’t do the full upgrade without putting a computer in my brain which would wipe out a big chunk of my memory.”
“Yeah, I’m already mad at her for doing medical experiments on people without their consent. What they can do is really amazing, but it’s so risky since they haven’t tested it on real people. Um, not that I know of. I should probably ask if they tested it on real people. OK I’m going to hang up now based on the dirty look Segio is giving me” Scott said.
Great, Scott was sure he would be on all sorts of government watch lists if they wiretapped here like they did in the U.S.