Max was up early the next morning and without restraints, was able to head outside for a run before setting in to chop wood. Feeling the burn in his shoulders, he was glad for the chance to strengthen his body. For so long, he had been cooped up inside and involved in meetings in the FBI that he had not had much opportunity to strengthen his body. After chopping wood for an hour, Karen appeared with his morning coffee. Max grabbed his and her coffees, set them down on the stump he used for chopping wood and gave her a long, mushy kiss!

Karen said, “Why dahling, I don’t think I need any coffee now! You made me wide awake!”

Max laughed and handed her her coffee, saying, “Karen, I missed you! I am so happy to be here! I don’t know what the future holds, but if we all face it together, I believe we can figure it out!”

Johnny Cooper had gotten specialized equipment for recording that would not be seen, in preparation for the TV show that would be seen during the demonstration. He had gotten hired by the resort. He was just the man they had needed for all of the lifting and moving of the addicts.

Johnny met with Miranda after his first day on the job. She asked him how he was doing and if he had gotten any footage. Johnny said, “This has to be the worst job I have ever had, Miranda. I have gotten some excellent footage, but I have to appear like none of this affects me. My boss thinks I have a stomach problem because I keep having to go to the bathroom to throw up! I don’t know how long I can manage to do this job because it goes against everything I believe in. If it wasn’t for the fact that gathering this information will most likely stop other unnecessary deaths, I wouldn’t go back!”

Miranda said, “Let’s see the film and that will tell us what other pictures you need to capture. Maybe you won’t need to be there much longer, Johnny. Thank you so much for going through that hell of a job.”

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After viewing the film, Miranda said, “The first few minutes are excellent! You sure know what you are doing. The pictures of the nurse giving the shots and the patients completely relaxing, get the point across of what is happening. We need more clear shots of the doctor dumping them into the mine shaft. We don’t want there to be any question of how serious things are up at the resort. Do you think you can manage several shots of that?”

“Yes, I do, Miranda,” Johnny replied. “How are things going organizing the demonstration? Are you going to have more than one demonstration?”

“At this point, we have enough personnel to handle three locations and we were thinking of having the first one at the capitol building in Washington DC and the next one ten minutes later in LA and then the last one beginning in Portland ten minutes after that. Hopefully, staggering the meetings will allow us the element of surprise and the whole video clip will be seen by most of the United States!” Miranda explained.

Johnny was tasked with not only working at the resort, but getting the film ready so that all three places would show the film independently of each other. That way, as soon as one location went off air, it would not affect the other locations. It took Johnny a couple of more days to figure out how to get the shots he wanted and actually get them. The demonstrations were scheduled for January 17, three days before the new President of the US would address the nation.

Meanwhile, on January 15th, Lenny Parson addressed the city council of Portland with his plans for the new apartment buildings for the ex-homeless people aboard Paradise Found. Lenny showed them his plans, explaining in great detail how it would work, how long it would take to put up the buildings and how the finances would work. He also explained about the house mother in each building and how they would keep their finger on the pulse of the people, preventing them from quitting their new job or moving out of the apartment and back to the streets.

Lenny’s proposal was met with smiles and he thought it was in the bag, until one of the councilmen said they would let him know after they listened to a few other builder’s proposals. Lenny’s face fell, although he tried not to show it. He had put so much effort into his plans, he couldn’t afford to not get this job. He excused himself to go to the men’s room and splashed lots of water in his face to calm down.