Melinda and Angela were in a shaded cabana by the pool, where they could be found most afternoons. As usual, Melinda was on her phone having several conversations and Angela would alternate between her laptop and a trashy paperback book.
An overheated man with a red face scowled as he approached them. He was American, and foolishly wearing an expensive dark suit and bright red tie, which matched the color of his sweat drenched face. To complete the look, he carried a briefcase and had a large Rolex watch.
Angela noticed his approach and kept her head down in her book but couldn’t help smirking while she watched the man approach through her oversized sunglasses.
“Excuse me,“ the man started, “I was told the CEO of Genysis energy, Melinda White, was here. Since today is not a holiday, I expect this is some kind of attempt to make me look like a fool.”
“Don’t worry hon, you’ve got that covered,“ Angela responded with a snort. “Yeah, Melinda is here.”
The man glared at her for a second. “I am Reginald Hawkins.” He paused, as if expecting some kind of reaction. “Undersecretary of the Commerce Department.”
Melinda glanced up then continued babbling on her phone.
“It’s disrespectful to be on your phone when someone is talking to you, young lady!” Hawkins scolded, his bushy eyebrows scrunching together like two caterpillars trying to steal a kiss.
“Settle down guy!” Angela replied, her own voice getting a little louder. “She has a mental condition and can’t talk directly to people.”
“That doesn’t even make sense!” Hawkins squeaked. “Do you even know who I work for?!”
Angela could hear Barry laughing from two cabanas over. Barry’s friends had gotten bored with being lazy after delegating all their work, but Barry had yet to start any new projects.
“Umm, I’m guessing the Secretary of the Commerce Department. Oh wait, are we supposed to call them Office Managers now?“ Angela replied, not quite keeping a straight face.
“I will not be mocked! My boss is a member of the president’s cabinet. My father is a Senator!” Hawkins was fuming.
Angela heard Barry loudly making some comment about ‘This Young Master’, but she didn’t get the joke. Barry was a strange dude. Angela received a text from Melinda on her phone.
“As entertaining as this conversation has been, could you please tell us your business. Melinda says you get points for calling her a young lady, but apparently you are blocking the view of her favorite cabana boy.” Angela almost didn’t make it through reading the text, snorting a laugh.
“Very well!” Hawkins said, his eyes were wide, and nostrils flared. He opened his briefcase and pulled out a bound stack of documents. “I am giving you an official request, signed by the Secretary, that your company will hand over the following documents related to your patent application filed March 3rd this year.”
Melinda knew this was the patent she had filed with a general description of their fusion technology after the Russian attack. They had filed this to protect them in case someone else filed a similar patent after stealing their technology. She accepted the stack of documents and flipped through a few pages. She then typed for a while on her phone.
Angela read the message Melinda sent her. She also was cc'd another message to security that future visitors wearing a tie were required to wait outside in the sun for at least one hour before they were allowed inside. Angela relayed the first message, “Melinda says she’s not giving you our technology. If you want to negotiate a licensing deal, she is willing to set up a video conference, so she can talk directly to someone who has more authority.”
Hawkins took a few short breaths and replied, “You will hear from our lawyers soon. I will not forget your disrespectful and seditious attitude. Without the support of the Commerce department, your company will be ruined before the end of the year!”
By this time Barry had walked over, “Dude that was awesome! You are like a tiny gnat threatening a dragon!”
Terrance from Security had also arrived at this point. He grabbed Hawkins by the arm and firmly led him towards the door. Hawkins fussed and tried to break out of Terrance’s grip, only to be casually tossed over the big man’s shoulder like a small child.
“Well, I guess that means your patent application will be rejected,“ Angela laughed.
“I doubt that brat has any real power. He’ll whine to his dad and his boss. They will probably be annoyed at us for upsetting him but won’t bother doing anything.” Melinda said in a text, “They’ll probably send some lawyers at us trying to steal our tech. They might even demand I show up in some Washington court. Maybe his dad will even call me to testify in the Senate.”
“That might be amusing. They wouldn’t be able to understand you!” Angela said, picturing Melinda babbling to a group of angry congressmen.
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“I’ll hire a lawyer and file a motion that I have a mental disability and cannot testify in person. That should allow me to do it over video, if it even goes that far,“ Melinda sent.
“Who was that guy?” Barry asked, wondering what the excitement was about.
“Oh, we just pissed off some government nitwit,” Angela replied. “Someone in the U.S. wants to get their hands on your fusion tech. It’s not exactly a secret anymore.”
“Adriana said someone stole one of the construction robots. The power cell melted down when they tried to tamper with it. Police report said that it was found in an alley. We sent them the GPS logs that the device went to some government lab and then was returned to an alley. They haven’t responded yet, but we asked the police to press charges.” Barry reported gleefully.
“That’s going to really hurt their legal case.” Melinda sent.
“Probably not much. They’ll file their request in a Washington court. You won’t get a fair hearing until at least the second appeal,” Angela said.
“Is it really that bad?” Barry asked.
“No, I’m exaggerating,” Angela admitted. “They’ll probably drop it to avoid embarrassment. There are still some news sites that would report on the government trying to steal technology from a private company.”
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Scott was busy working on AI coding for their new game company. Their company had recruited 23 employees so far. The new HR recruiting specialist, Jessica, handled most of it. Scott, Matt or Alvaro still had to be involved in the initial interviews until they could assign department leads.
Scott had to put aside his efforts implementing Carl’s incredibly difficult and complex cybernetics requests. The new team he put together had worked well together and had come up with the best result. His lone wolf programmers had been paid, but they were a bit disgruntled to have their ‘genius’ work discarded. A couple flat out refused to work for him again. One was more polite, but mentioned he was taking a long-term job in New Mexico and wouldn’t be accepting work for a few months.
Scott was pretty sure Theofanis Zervou had also mentioned taking a job in New Mexico. He pulled up his most recent message. Scott had a rivalry going with the brilliant programmer, at least in his own mind. Theo always scored at the top of the list of programming talent, and Scott had learned a lot from him. Scott was frustrated that even with the Glitch_HR training, he could never get close to the productivity or elegance of Theofanis’ code. Scott suspected if Theo was on the Carl projects, he would have made it work.
The last message he had received was kind of weird. It indicated that Theo was in New Mexico and was asking Scott for help on a difficult project. Scott had replied, asking for more information, but never got a response. Scott decided to look Theofanis up on Glitch_HR. The screen showed he was now working for a government agency called DARPA. There was no contact information. Scott had not seen that before in his system.
Now that he was living in an undersea base, Scott was brave enough to browse the org chart of government agencies. He found Theo and a couple other programmers he recognized. They reported to a man named Boris Fowler and were assigned to a group called ‘Strategic Planning Artificial Intelligence’. Mr. Fowler did not sound like a nice boss. His skills in interrogation, espionage, marksmanship, mixed martial arts and political strategy sounded like trouble. Scott browsed the organization a bit more, growing concerned. The government had put together an impressive team. Scott would be hard-pressed to find employees of similar quality. He had to worry about things like cost and availability; this organization seemed to just grab whoever they wanted. Scott was about to forward the information to Melinda, but instead he paused and called Solomon Rhodes.
“Hey Scott, I’m enjoying the new location!” Solomon said. He seemed to be walking around on the second floor of Proteus.
“Great! I think it’s going to look fantastic in a year or two.” Scott smiled. “Anyway, I had a quick security question.”
“OK,” Solomon prompted. “If this is about that game you are building, I told you I’d look over the plan, but I am not doing grunt work.”
“No, it’s something else. If I email Melinda, is there any way someone else could see it? Like someone who had a system similar to the Russians?” Scott asked.
“Oh yeah, that probably got their attention!” Solomon laughed. “Anyway, it’s good you called. Let’s meet up with company management, and I’ll get you an encrypted email package. I know of a few that are pretty good. Not cheap, but I’d recommend you buy one.”
“Second question. Can anyone see what I’m looking at in Glitch_HR?” Scott asked.
“The security on that application is excellent. It seems to adapt quickly to attacks, and I’ve even seen it build traps that reverse hack people who think they cracked part of it. Whoever programmed that was a maniac! As far as I can tell, the system has expanded past what the Russians originally had because these traps keep getting access to additional hacker networks. The Russians couldn’t break it when it was sitting on their servers, so I think you are OK.” Solomon shrugged, “Someone with high level Security access in your company could see what you were looking at because you granted them permission. The weakest point is if someone has physical access to your computer. I sweep for spyware regularly, and Segio’s guys sweep for physical bugs every week. Nothing is perfect, but you would need a compromised person with high permissions to see anything useful.”
Later they met with the other owners and Melinda. The ‘not cheap’ software turned out to be about $10k per person. Melinda agreed to the upgrade immediately, but asked Scott to stick around and tell her what prompted this.
He pulled up Glitch_HR and showed her the SPAI org chart. He pointed out what he found. Melinda started talking rapidly on her phone. Scott’s phone was one of her target calls.
“I don’t know what they are planning, but we should assume with that team they can build something as powerful as your software. I’m sure their goals will be different from ours, probably some kind of power grab,” Melinda explained.
“Do you think they are going to cause us problems?” Scott asked.
“I think they are going to cause everyone problems.” Melinda replied. “We are long overdue that strategic planner I’ve been wanting to hire. I feel like everyone expects me to anticipate all future problems and conflicts, but I don’t even know where to start with something like that.”
“Jessica can help you recruit them. She’s amazing at that.” Scott offered.
“No, this time I’m pulling out the big guns! Scott, you are getting on a plane to Poland ASAP to recruit our new General.”