CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Arriving at the Federal building ten minutes before seven in the morning, Alex nodded at the agent holding the door open for him. He emptied his pockets into a pink basket, passed through the metal detector with a lump in his throat, nervously inspected the gun at the observing guard’s hip.
Agent Andrews exited a nearby elevator and patiently waited for Alex to repack his keys and phone. He offered no scowl. He simply stared, a disdain emanating from his aura. As with all unpleasant people, two choices existed: argue—which fed the beast—or bide time and vacate the radius as soon as possible. Alex looked forward to the latter.
Andrews passed the underling a stout key, “Remove his monitor.”
Imagining the authority required to have Andrews greet Alex without a snarky comment, with a positive action, spurned more concern. Powerful figures awaited his arrival. Most-likely, they carried ill-tidings.
The tether unclasped with a snap. The sound lightened his entire body, increased his capacity to deal with future blight. Despite his situation, he smiled, extended and retracted the liberated limb several times before making the mistake of meeting Andrews face.
To Alex’s surprise, the troubled man didn’t snarl. He allowed a beat to pass, and then, with only a twitch of the right eye, led them to the fourth floor.
At this early hour, Alex hadn’t expected the office to be alive with agents, but they bustled. Judging by rolled up sleeves and unwinding French braids, these people had been here for hours. Their professionalism astounded Alex. Not one set of eyes stayed on him—a mild celebrity—longer than a flicker.
He trailed Andrews into a board room. Two men and a woman rose in unison. Agent Andrews closed the blinds, shut the solid oak door, and activated the lock.
“Mr. Cutler, my name is John Willis, Deputy Director of the Los Angeles branch of the F.B.I.” He was a dapper African American with salt and pepper hair, the gritty look of a war-vet, glasses too large for his head. “To my left is Agent Martineau from our New York organized crime division.” He wore a shirt and tie. With shoulders a yard across, the tie seemed comically small. He had olive skin, a healthy mustache perfect for 1970s pornography, and curly hair. He reached across the table, swallowed Alex’s hand in a powerful grip.
Alex’s stomach turned as he remembered these people had implemented much of his current suffering. With every recent life-fork leading him down a wrong path, he couldn’t bare to consider the current agenda, or its eventual outcome.
“And, Jodi Reister,” Director Willis said. “Chairperson of the committee on federal spending. Easily the most important person in this room.” Alex put her in her mid-fifties, blond hair, cut short in the staggered fashion of many women in power.
They all sat. Andrews was left the chair at the end of the table, eight feet from the others.
Jodi Reister spoke, “Mr. Cutler, let me first say how sorry I am for your tragedies and losses over the past few weeks. I, like millions of others, enjoy an annual vacation with family inside the Lobby and am crushed by the latest developments.” She interlaced her hands on the table and searched his face. “As I imagine you yourself must be.”
“Well,” Agent Andrews said before Alex could reply, “something was bound to happen.”
Deputy Willis fixed him with a look of annoyance, adjusted his glasses.
The others waited for Alex’s response.
“A machine inside the brain and all,” Andrews added.
“That’ll be enough, Mr. Andrews,” Jodi Reister said.
“Well,” Alex said. “Thank you for your condolences. I’m still processing everything. I’m really not sure what to make of it.”
“None of us are,” Director Willis said.
Alex saw Agent Andrews fidget in his peripheral, no doubt wanting to chime in with his complete comprehension of the universe.
“Mr. Cutler,” Director Willis continued, “we appreciate you coming in today, and allow me to apologize for our part in adding to your discomfort. Hence forth, I fully expect us to avoid opposition.”
By tossing me in prison for life? Alex wondered. He glanced at the locked door. Were guards stationed outside of it?
“Before I turn it over to Agent Martineau, I want you to know it’s not the agency’s intention to eradicate the Lobby. We do not see it, nor you, as our enemy. The goal of this meeting is to make us allies.”
Were they enemies? Alex still couldn’t believe he sat on the opposite side of the law; that strangers held his fate in their hands, yet again.
“You know of the serious domestic and international conflicts brewing,” Director Willis added. “The public is unaware a date will soon be set to bring countries with differing beliefs to one table in hopes of settling those differences. The United States must enter those talks with the ability to control access to the Lobby.”
That made sense to Alex. “Well, you have the manpower to control the Atriums.”
Dour looks spread on the faces across from him, stealing the remainder of his reply, proving more drama existed. Racking his mind produced nothing as outrageous as the current problems, so he waited.
“Do you know who Rebecca Trevino is?” Director Willis pushed his glasses tighter to his face.
Alex leaned back, cocked his head. Was there anyone who didn’t?
“Tonight, her program will ignite controversy. In this great nation, we allow the media free reign, regardless of its ensuing turmoil. We simply prepare to minimize the damage,” Willis said.
Alex bit back a laugh. Every mention of the Lobby ignited controversy. “Will her program impact this upcoming international meeting?”
“Not as much as our current dilemma,” Willis looked beyond the big man beside him. “Mrs. Reister and I have read the rough outline of the United State’s proposal to maintain peace. It’s a plan only possible if we control access to the Lobby.”
To avoid repeating his previous statement, Alex withheld the urge to comment, wiped his clammy hands on his pants.
“The world is worse off than all the horrors you see on the news,” Willis said. “Many countries do not believe in a free press, and during crisis of this magnitude, we appreciate that. A chasm is rippling across the globe. The suppression of facts helps slow the tide of outrage, but it’s coming.”
Jodi Reister cut in. Her short blond hair hardly moved as she leaned closer, “Mr. Cutler, we need your help. President Tanner personally sent me to meet with you. My presence is to inform you any workable scenario will receive funding. Do not allow cost to hinder your creativity.”
Alex fidgeted. As long as his creativity happened outside of a cell, he wanted to help.
Jodi added a seriousness to her tone. “We hope to have your cooperation by this meeting’s end.”
“If, for some reason,” Agent Andrews inserted. “Mr. Cutler is unable to help, I’m sure I’d do an equal, or better job.” After a look from Director Willis, Andrews shrugged, “If it’s a programming issue, is all.”
“Thank you, agent,” Director Willis said.
Andrews swallowed, folded his hands on the table.
A beat and Director Willis continued, “Agent Martineau, will you apprise our friend of the current situation?”
“Certainly.” The big man filled a glass of water, sipped, and rose, blocking some of the room’s lighting from Alex.
“First off, my condolences to the losses a’ your friends.” His voice carried an East Coast accent, with a twinge of Southie, making Alex suspect he’d worked some undercover. “The world’s a kicked beehive, little soldiers is out stingin’ normalcy in a hundred directions.” He frowned, let a beat pass. “Our mission is to get life back to its former self.
“With international conflicts brewing, many prominent military leaders believe the singular threat we are about to discuss holds the key to avoiding war. You’re the man best able to help.”
Alex rolled his chair back a few inches as if to escape the thought. Who could he help? The program he poured his heart and soul into for the past seven years rushed in untold joy. With one alternate amendment, it was now being cited as a catalyst for destruction.
The media hinted at international tension at the opening of every program. He’d considered it ratings fodder. How could there be this much outrage over people killing themselves? The world endured thousands of suicides a day, for decades. It was a personal choice. Their loved ones suffered emotional stains, but the rest of us moved on, no one protested.
Religious implications stoked the tension, Alex understood that much. Give the right person a Bible or a Qu-ran and you supercharged them with power. Nearly every monolithic preacher and doomsday blogger yelled about the current evil. The speeches resurrected attendance. Who could blame anyone for taking advantage of free speech and capitalism? God Bless America, but troubling incidents continued to escalate.
Fights abounded at protests, whether for or against the Lobby. Since Glen’s suicide, five Broumgard employees had been shot and killed, ambush style. With only one shooting officially linked to their employment, the trend avoided media coverage. And now war? Military action? America still worked to extricate itself from the last half-dozen battles.
The dangers surrounding Alex made him feel like he stood in the center of a dry field of waist-high grass, surrounded by lighter-wielding, meth-addicted pyromaniacs. Remembering his location, he focused on the now, to best offer his advice.
Apparently, noticing his return to attentiveness, Martineau continued. “We believe if this summit is handled correctly, everyone, excluding some in the Middle East, comes out happy. Japan and those in the East want to use the machine as a carrot on a stick, telling their citizens if they live honorable, useful lives, they may,” he made quotations, “’retire’ in the Lobby. We, in the West, want to avoid that, but we can compromise. Perhaps beef up our screening, add a heavy tax. They could limit their permanent trips, impose age limits. Who knows?”
Alex considered the implications. How could the U.S. prevent suicides with an operational Lobby? Strip people naked and make them sit in a cell for twenty-four hours? Cavity searches? X-ray scans?
“You ever heard a’ Paul Spagnelli?” Martineau asked.
Alex thought for a second and then shook his head.
“Paul Spagnelli is boss a’ the crime families operating along the East Coast. Their criminality has calmed over the last few decades as they enter more legal ventures, but there’s still drugs, prostitution, gambling, murders.
“Yesterday, we executed a search warrant on the nephew a’ the big man in connection to a double homicide. It was more a cage rattling session, but we found some guns, a stockpile a’ cash, and some very disturbing machinery.”
Martineau paced from behind his chair. Each time he pivoted, his broad shoulders reminded Alex of air brakes lifting on a 747.
“We didn’t know what we had until our techies started digging. We assumed we were looking at some rig for cheatin’ slot machines or skimmin’ gas pumps. Possibly a bomb, which would a’ been a little out a’ character for these guys, but it’s a crazy world.” He shrugged, retrieved a briefcase from under the table, popped the dual locks, then tossed a thick, hard-cased binder on the table before Alex. “As it turns out, it’s much scarier than a bomb, Mr. Cutler. This device could rock the world. That right there could derail the international peace talks by removing our leverage.”
Alex opened the five-inch-thick, three-ring binder. Inside, photographs of electrical equipment, each followed by a section with schematics, another with analysis.
Martineau pointed at the folder and said, “We’re hoping you can verify our thoughts, and more importantly, that you can crush this.”
Alex was a software guy, one of the rare computer geeks who avoided hardware. Back in Chicago, Sean did his change-outs, and since then, there had always been someone skilled and willing. Picturing his old friend, knowing he now lived among the deceased, dried his throat. He leaned forward, poured a glass of water, drank.
Ten minutes passed in silence as he examined the collection of data. He looked at an impossibility. The content in section D represented a type of macroserver, but a model light-years more compact and sophisticated than Broumgard’s next-gen diagrams. The photographs in section L sucked him in. It seemed this odd contraption of loose wires and welded sensors functioned like an access chair, allowing someone to hack into the Lobby. The processing speed had to be abysmally slow, but a macroserver capable of accessing the Lobby, ludicrous.
If he read the schematics correctly, the entirety of the Lobby existed in a case no larger than a shoebox. Built of a titanium alloy, it must have cost a hundred grand to assemble, a pittance of the necessary R&D to reach this model. He hefted the contents of the binder, returned to the front page. Before reviewing it again in more detail, he looked at the three patient faces across from him, and asked, “Is this…a pirated access point?”
Director Willis’ head dropped, his glasses slipped down his dark nose.
Agent Martineau squeezed the back of his chair hard enough to make the plastic groan.
“That’s our fear,” Jodi Reister answered. “The last thing we need is organized crime getting into the business of Death Trips. The only positive here is this group is usually ahead of the curve, but others will follow.”
“When it comes to a planned suicide,” Director Willis added, “people will pay any amount because, to them, money will soon lose its value. If prominent citizens went around maxing out their credit with plans of defaulting: People putting up homes, cars, college funds, all to just vanish, it would destroy the global economy overnight.”
Agent Martineau cut in, “On a criminal front, there’d be a wave a’ insanity; guys willing to do whatever, and instead a’ money, they’d get everlasting life in a dream world.”
Alex picked up on the syntax of it being “a” dream world, not “his” dream world. Realizing he wasn’t a witch to burn eased a degree of worry.
“Judges, politicians, prosecutors, no one would be safe.” Martineau added. “Society will crumble.”
“If we lose the ability to control access to the Lobby,” added Jodi Reister, “this upcoming summit meeting will be a waste of everyone’s time. If random thugs can offer death trips, we can’t ask the East to shelve, or even limit theirs. If they don’t limit them, we have a hard right-wing branch of the military that will commence war over unfettered suicides. Control of access is our only diplomatic leverage.”
“We are trying to avoid anarchy,” Director Willis said. “Do you get that?”
“Americans believe we are the superpower of the world,” Jodi Reister continued. “But we don’t want to quarrel with Japan’s navy and technology or China’s numbers and training. Alex, if we can’t contain this, if these pirated access points proliferate…” Rather than finish her sentence, she shook her head dramatically, swallowed, licked her lips.
Alex examined the first photo: the many components of the pirated access point.
Agent Andrews cleared his throat, waited to be chastised, and when he wasn’t, spoke, “From my initial review, this is a prototype.” He pointed to the binder. “We confiscated the schematics and an engineer at the scene. Evidence suggests he designed that contraption.”
Meaning, Alex thought, this seizure gave them a reprieve, but not a permanent one.
“Can you confirm this devises’ purpose?” Director Willis said. “Can it actually connect people to the Lobby?”
“I’d need more time with the equipment,” Alex said, “But someone sunk a fortune into this.”
“Our more ambitious expectation,” Director Willis said, “can you circumvent its capability? From my understanding, it needs to jack into the system and copy the entire Lobby infrastructure before a person can load in.”
“That is correct,” Andrews said.
Alex looked at the photo and back at them. “When can I put my hands on the actual components?”
“We can get them here within the hour,” Director Willis said.
Alex nodded absently. “I’ll need Ike Wood, my networking guy from the L.A. Atrium.”
“Done.”
Alex glanced back down and then rocked in his seat to test its comfort.
“Privacy, a speakerphone for access to Victor, two packs of Oreos, a two-liter of Root Beer.”
They all nodded with growing enthusiasm.
“I can’t make any promises,” Alex said, “except to give this my full attention.”
Agent Martineau left the room without a word. The others stood.
“That’s all we are asking for, Mr. Cutler,” Director Willis said extending his hand. “If there is anything you need, just poke your head out the door and ask.”
“You have no financial constraints,” Jodi Reister said as she walked around the table, patted his shoulder, and left.
“If you need my expertise,” Andrews said meekly “I’m available.” Director Willis motioned for Andrews to exit. After another glance at Alex, he left as well, granting Alex his privacy. The rest, saving the world from madness, seemed up to him.