Alvin Gallegos, the head of SynTech security, steps into the conference room. His record in my mind’s database flicks across my overlay: former marine veteran turned FBI agent, joined the company four years ago, nothing in his actions or financials that would make me suspect he might be compromised. I wait for him to finish shaking hands with Evan and Louise before taking my turn with his iron grip. I give him a smile, but his thin lips only form a tight line under his thick, graying mustache.
“I don’t like admitting failure, but Mr. Wu does not exist.” His commanding voice leaves no room for discussion. He pulls an unmarked manila folder from his briefcase, flipping it open to the picture I supplied him of the host of our disastrous tech conference in China. “He was never born, never went to school, never married, never had a criminal record, never did business anywhere with cameras, and has never been photographed other than this once. His description matches about a hundred million people.”
He slides the photo over and reveals the one of the cliff-top estate we destroyed. “This building never existed. It was never constructed. No workers were ever paid to build it. No materials were ever delivered to the site where it stood. The land it wasn’t built on is owned by the Chinese government and no permits were ever issued, no record of it ever created, and no one within a hundred miles knew anything about it being there.”
He spreads the pages of thumbnails of the conference attendees across the table. “I’ve got over fifty people that you reported dead, and not a single one of them has any friend, family member, or coworker that will talk to any of my people about it.”
He looks around the table, his piercing eyes trying to cut through me and my siblings.
“Just what in the hell have you gotten the company involved in?”
“We were really hoping you could tell us,” Evan responds after an uncomfortable silence. “Our only connection to any of this was through that Chinese general, Liu. Right, Noah?”
“Yeah. General Liu set the whole thing up. We didn’t know anything about the host other than that he was described as a friend of the general.”
“Whoever these guys are, I’ve never seen anyone cover tracks like this. No letters, no emails, no paper trail from travel arrangements. It’s as if over fifty people from around the world just decided one day to board planes with cash-paid tickets provided by an anonymous donor to go somewhere that never existed to meet someone that they didn’t know.” He shakes his head. “I can keep pouring resources into this, but I tell you, we’re chasing ghosts and my guys need to get back to their day jobs.”
From Evan: Maybe we should get Lin to talk to him.
To Evan: No. I’ve already told him everything Lin knows about it. And this guy reminds me way too much of her father to let him anywhere near her. I’m not going to set her recovery back by letting her get interrogated.
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My mountain of a brother shoots me a glance but finally gives a subtle nod. “Well then, we’ll have to continue to investigate with Institute resources. Thanks for coming out.”
Alvin shakes his head. “I only wish I had better news. Like I said, I don’t like admitting defeat.”
“Me neither,” I tell him. “And we won’t. But you’ve done all you can, and the company needs your attention on all its other security concerns.” At least that’s what the CEO told me when he asked us to set up this meeting. I think he just wanted us to stop spending company money on what he doesn’t consider a company expense, but of course that’s part of his job.
Once Alvin is gone, Louise turns my way. “So, what’s the plan? Just hole up here and hope that they don’t raid us again? Or hope that they do?”
“That would make life simpler if they showed up while we were here to catch them,” I answer. “Of course that assumes that whatever illuminati-style group we ran into in China was also behind Jeff’s raid.”
“You seriously still think it might not be?”
“I’m keeping an open mind. But it would be nice if it was just one organization we needed to worry about. If they came back we could get one of them and make sure they don’t have a working one of those suicide head exploding things like Mr. Wu. I bet we could get them to talk.”
“Not going to happen.” Evan slumps in his chair. “There’s no way they’d be dumb enough to hit us while any of the three of us or Andrea are here. And it’s not like there’s any chance we’d all leave at the same time again.”
He’s right. We’d be crazy to imagine that Jeff wouldn’t have told his benefactors all about the specs of our cloud’s defense systems.
“We can’t stay here forever.” I stand up. “We’ve got a lot of public goodwill behind us right now after all the news outlets turned Chad into the hero of the century. We need to strike while the iron is hot and use that PR to get as many mineral rights as we can right now.”
Louise laughs. “That’s the thing that’s on the top of your mind?”
“It’s kind of the magic bullet right now. Solves the financials, solves environmental disasters in hundreds of places, and if Stan’s estimates are right about what his class’s autominers can do, solves mineral resource scarcity within twenty years.”
“Whatever. You’re the money and priorities guy.” She gets up and starts walking toward the door. “I’ll be in my lab if you need me.”
I wave her off and walk over to sit next to Evan. “So, you and Valerie still want to come with me to Denver? Meet my grandparents? That just leaves Louise and Andrea guarding the homefront.”
“Yeah. They’ll be fine. Especially Andrea. You’ve seen her new stuff she’s been working on, right?”
I nod. “She could stop an army without breaking a sweat.”
“You still think you’ll be able to tear yourself away from your office?”
“Not for at least another month, but yeah. Once I get the tentative deals I’m working on for the mineral rights done, I’ll need to run around to a bunch of places to close and sign stuff. We can make a stop in Denver at the end of that travel. You can come along if you’re up for it. I can probably get even better deals if I offer up both of us making an appearance. You’re still a fan favorite in a lot of places.”
“Works for me. Is Lin coming too?”
“She is. And she’s leaving her chaperone behind.”
“Lucky you.” He gives me a sly grin.
“Well, I’m hoping to finally get back to at least lucky-adjacent again, anyway. Maybe. If she’s feeling up for it. But at least we’ll get more time with each other than the couple of hours in the evenings that we’re getting now.”