There Must Be A Mistake Ch. 19

Laura hit a switch on the entrance wall, and panels on the Eastern wall opened revealing storage space behind it.

"Everything fits in there quite comfortably."

"Do any more of these walls open?"

"Yes, but they're just for toys."

"May we see the toys please?"

"You better step to the center of the room. The kids don't always put them away neatly."

Laura moved a second switch and you could hear the rumbling begin as soon as the doors began to part. The doors gave way and toys poured out onto the floor.

Doctor Aniston said, "I'm sorry about the mess."

"Is there anything else you want to see in this room?"

"Do anymore doors open?"

"No, those are the only walls that open. Do you want to check anything else in this room?"

"No, we can move on to the next room."

******************

Laura escorted them to the classified science room, and here was where they got into their first argument.

Anna was sitting at her computer, and immediately put her screensaver on.

"What are you thinking Laura? They can't see this information. This is all patentable material."

Laura turned to her group and said, "My sister is correct. I cannot let you see anything that's on our computers, even with your court order. This information has the potential of being patented. However, if you will sign a nondisclosure agreement, you can go through it from beginning to end."

"I will have to call Washington to get approval to sign that agreement."

"You can use any of our phones."

It may not have been legal, as a matter of law it was absolutely illegal, but they traced the call using the Cray 4, and taped the conversation.

The call did not go to Washington. It went to a switching system in southern New Jersey, which sent it to Newfoundland, Spain, Germany, South Africa, Australia, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Guam, Mexico City, and finally to San Diego. The system was running a little slow today, and it took 4.6 seconds for the call to be completed.

"This is Doctor Aniston. May I speak to someone in our legal department please?"

"Hello Doctor Aniston, this is Anthony Pete. Are they challenging the court order?"

"Yes they are, sir, on the basis that the material in the computer is patentable. They will give us access to everything if we will sign a nondisclosure agreement."

"Ask them if the NDA restricts the information to just your group or can it stay within our administration?"

Doctor Aniston asked Laura that question.

Laura said there was no way that their entire FDA was going to have access to this information. They would accept 'a need to know clause, restricted to the top one percent of the administration."

"You can tell Ms. Valentino that is acceptable to us Doctor Aniston."

"Thank you Mister Pete, we will continue our investigation."

"Miss Valentino, our legal department has given us permission to sign your NDA, with your additional clause. Do you want us to wait until you have your attorney draw up the agreement, or can we start our investigation, while he does it?"

Laura smiled. "Since you went through all that trouble to get approval to sign the document, I think I can trust you enough to let you begin your research. I do have a favor to ask you. When you get to the area where we are stuck, if you can find us a way around those damn 'Wood Frogs, I would really appreciate your help."

"I'll see what I can do."

"Ladies, and gentlemen, the computer is yours; have fun. Anna, load up the stasis program from day one. When you're finished, you can go upstairs and have lunch with Sam, or go out to the barn and help Callum with the horses."

Anna laughed. "Oh my, what a choice? I can have lunch with a very handsome married man, who has been known to frisk young women until they organism. Or I can go to the barn, and help a young, unmarried man, who looks like Adonis, and brush down horses until I organism spontaneously. What shall I do, what shall I do?"

Laura laughed at her sister. "You can do them both, if you hurry."

Anna was out of her chair and on her way upstairs, when she turned around and ran back.

Laura said, "I thought you'd be in the shower by now."

Anna hugged and kissed her sister. "I forgot to say thank you."

"Get out of here you nut."

***************

Patti called General Morgan.

"Dan, you were right again. They faked calling Washington to get permission to sign the NDA. The call bounced all around the world, trying to avoid detection, but my Cray was all over it. It went to the home of Jim Pierce, the President, and CEO of Advanced Algorithms. I took a voiceprint of the person speaking at the other end of the line, but I didn't have to, because I recognized his voice. It was William Silver; I have no doubt about it. That's where he's hiding."

"Great job Patti, give these people the real information, because they will be able to tell if it's faked. Help them through the process of everything you did to get to the point of those damn frogs, and your frustration afterwards. You did great on this Patti, keep it up."

"It's my father they are after Dan. I would move heaven and earth to protect him and his family."

"Are you willing to get your hands dirty?"

"Didn't I just do that a little while ago?"

"I'm talking about really dirty Patti. If you get caught, it could mean jail time."

"What do you want me to do Dan?"

"Is there any way for you to hook up into their computers and listen into their conversations?"

"Is that all Dan? I was able to do that since I was a teenager. I helped put three of the five heads of the families that ruled New York in jail when I was twenty-two by looking into their computers, and then destroying them."

"That was you! The FBI never let that information out. They knew you would be dead within days if they released your name."

"The only reason I wasn't dead was because the three Don's put the word out that I was not to be touched. I made a deal between them, the FBI, and the Department of Justice that took all the capitol crimes off the table, and kept the maximum jail time to twenty years. The three of them did not make it to their release dates. Two died of natural causes while in jail, and the other died of steel poisoning."

"I've never heard of steel poisoning."

"An unknown prisoner stuck a shiv in his heart."

"That will do it every time."

"Where do you want me to route these conversations to Dan?"

"I'll set up a monitoring station in the ready room. It will be manned twenty-four hours a day."

"I'll have Pierce's house online within two days."

"Make sure it can't be traced to you Patti. You're too short to wear horizontal stripes."

"I'm going to have Margaret pee in your coffee. You're beginning to sound like my husband."

"Margaret pees in my coffee already. I have very little interaction with your husband, because he never leaves his office. I don't know how he is not blind at the end of his day."

"Thank you Dan, at least I know he's being faithful to me."

"If you ever doubted your husband's love for you, you are a bigger horses' ass then 'George W.' was, for going to war against the wrong country after 9/11."

*****************

Cassie woke up at 1 PM, took care of her needs, and was getting ready to throw her robe on when she realized Callum was on duty taking care of Junie. Since there were only females in the house she decided to go into the kitchen and have breakfast in her nightshirt.

As usual for this time of day, the house was very quiet. She turned, walked into the kitchen, and headed directly to the refrigerator.

She took out the orange juice and placed it on the counter. Then she bent to see what else was available for breakfast. As she bent lower and lower, her nightshirt rose higher and higher towards her hips. When she reached into the bins at the bottom of the refrigerator to take out a piece of fruit, she heard a man say, "If you don't stop there, I'll have a heart attack."

Cassie screamed, stood straight up as a soldier at attention, and pulled her nightshirt down as far as it would go. She was the color of a Maine lobster as she turned to see who was behind her.

"We haven't met, but that was an interesting way to do it. My name is Sam Meisner; I'm the captain on the police force, and a friend of the family. You must be Cassie, and what they said about you is true. You are stunning, bent over at the waist, or standing straight as an oak tree."

"Why didn't you tell me you were here when I walked into the room?"

"I didn't want to startle you. You didn't seem to be quite awake, but I did not think I was going to get the show I just viewed. I should not have let it get that far, but I did enjoy it. My wife will beat the shit out of me when I tell her what I did, but that will not be half as bad as what Patti will do to me for upsetting her guest. Have you ever seen Patti when she is angry?"

"Only once, and that was with Robert."

"Robert doesn't count. Everyone has been angry with him since he was five years old, and refused to do anything."

"He has a job in Maryland."

"Robert is going to work for someone?"

"I heard Patti say to Stephano she doesn't care how much it costs, but they must pay whatever it is to keep Robert employed."

"That boy is something else. Would you like to put a robe on?"

"Why would I do that now, you've seen everything there is to see."

"If you're going to wear something that short around the house, you really should wear panties."

"There were not supposed to be any men in the house, and all women are built the same."

"I guess I should say thank you for the wonderful view."

"Please don't, if I blush like that again, I'm going to need a very cold shower."

"How do you think I feel Cassie? A part of my body is so rigid, I doubt I could stand up and walk straight."

"I'm sorry Sam; now I have to go take a shower. I'm dying here, and you are not doing any better. I'll see you in half an hour."

"Before you leave, we have visitors from the FDA downstairs. Anna just ran to her bedroom; talk to her so you know how to play it."

"Thanks Sam, I'll do that."

***********

Cassie knocked on the door, and Anna told her to come in.

Anna took one look at her and asked, "Are you having an allergic reaction to something; you are as red as a beet."

Cassie told her what happened in the kitchen, and Anna collapsed on the floor laughing.

"Cassie, the only thing that would have made that story funnier was if it would have been Callum sitting there. He would have fucked you where you stood, or he would have had a heart attack."

"That's not funny Anna. I wasn't thinking about Callum sitting there. I was wishing it was Christian."

Anna pulled Cassie down to the floor with her. She took her hands in hers, looked into those magnificent eyes, and asked, "Did we have a breakthrough today?"

"I don't even know Sam, and he made me hotter than a candle flame by just talking with me. Chris and I talked all the time, and I loved it. I haven't talked to him in eight months. Mom and dad will not give me his new phone numbers because he told them we had an argument and he did not wish to speak to me anymore. They won't tell me where he's living either.

He did this on purpose. If I want him, if I want him forever, he wants me to fight for him. He wants me to tell our parents I love him, and I want to be with him as his wife. I don't know if I'm strong enough to do it. So here I sit, safe and sound, in Glen Falls New York, happy and miserable at the same time."

"I wish I had your problem. At least I would know I'm desired. Only one man in college and graduate school came after me. The only reason he did was because he found out I was a virgin. He wanted to add my cherry to his list.

I don't think I'm hideous looking. I don't believe I'm standoffish, and I don't believe I have bad breath. All I know is men avoid me like the plague."

"New clothes might help."

"What's the matter with the clothes I wear?"

"What do you wear when you go shopping?"

"I wear one of my sweat outfits, or a long jogging suit."

"What do I wear when we go shopping?"

"You wear shorts and a T-shirt."

"Which one of us do you think the guys look at more?"

"That's a very sexist attitude Cassie."

"What do you think guys are looking for Anna: Bird food, or meat and potatoes? You and your sister have the fashion sense of bag ladies. If you want guys to notice you, you have to dress to be noticed. Let me take both of you shopping. It will change your lives for the better."

****************

91. Money

"Good morning Patricia, how is everything going at your end?"

"Everything is super dad. The people the former vice president sent to check the status of our stasis experiments checked everything from day one to yesterday. They even offered us some of their own thoughts on the process, which were bogus. They checked everywhere, including the attic, and the barn. When they saw Callum, I think the women wet their pants. He wasn't wearing a shirt, and he was sweating. Laura said he looked stunning, and Anna was drooling all over him.

Jemma, Patrick, and their agents were in the tree line, because they checked each of the houses on the property. When they left they were satisfied we were doing nothing in the way of live testing, because we were far from the point of resolving the issue.

Our friend, Sam Meisner, the policeman who is not a policeman all the time, was with them. He kept telling them they were wasting his time, and helped hurry them along.

We watched each of them like hawks. They didn't have a chance to plant anything, but we did a fingernail check of everything they were near, sat on, or touched. It came up clean."

"That's very good news Patti. Now it's time to bankrupt them. Not only do I want you to take every penny they have in their bank accounts, I want you to buy every available stock option they have. I'm going to call Celeste and Harold. I will have them start buying their stock also. I want to get controlling interest in the company, and once we do, we will fire the board of directors, break up the company, and sell it off to the highest bidders. I want those two assholes to suffer as the government puts them in jail, and they can't afford bail."

"Will it stop them from attacking our project in Temple?"

"I can't answer that either way Patti. They may have cash stored away that they can use to pay for an assault on the spacecraft. We will have our eyes and ears open either way."

"Did Dan tell you what he wants me to do?"

"Yes I am fully informed. Please don't get caught."

"I wouldn't want to be a ninety-six-year-old woman, with two bad hips, living in a nursing home in Plantation Florida, dad. She may be getting visitors during the middle of the night."

"Shame on you Patti, taking advantage of the elderly."

"I was going to blame it on the Kim Jong-il of North Korea, but I thought the vice president might recognize his name."

"I think your mother should've spanked you, at least someone would've given you a pain in the ass."

"Dad, remember, I know where your money is; be nice."

"People tried to find me for over twenty years and could not do it. You got onto a computer and found me in thirty minutes. How long do you think it would take you to find my money if I didn't tell you?"

"That's an interesting question dad, I never thought of it that way."

"Okay young woman, it's time for you to get to work bankrupting those two thieves, and buying up stock in Advanced Algorithms. You know how to do it, so get started. I love you Patricia, stay safe."

"I love you too dad. Don't you dare go anywhere without security surrounding you."

"I can't go to the bathroom without one of them coming with me."

"Do they watch?"

"Patricia that is very personal."

"Goodbye dad."

"Goodbye Patricia."

***************

"This is Doctor Bradley from Anderson Hospital can I speak to Doctor luck please."

"This is his wife Jennifer, is anything wrong Doctor?"

"No Mrs. Luck, I just have some information for him. You can listen in if you want to."

Jennifer gave me a handheld phone and told me it was Doctor Bradley.

I held my breath. "Good afternoon Doctor, how are things in Houston?"

"Doctor Luck, why did you ask us to have that young girl's operation moved to Tuesday instead of Thursday?"

"It was a premonition Doctor. I just knew it had to be Tuesday or she wouldn't make it."

"I didn't do the operation, but the neurosurgeon that removed the tumor from her brain said it was not a moment too soon. They placed the tumor into a jar to be brought to the lab to be studied, when it exploded. He said he had never seen anything like it in his thirty years of experience.

If it wasn't for your premonition, that young girl would be dead. As it stands now, she has a sixty percent chance of living. Thank you Doctor Luck from all of us here at the Cancer Center."

"Please don't thank me Doctor, you have saved two lives; hers, and mine. Keep fighting this dread disease, and one day you may find a cure for it."

****************

One hundred twenty agents were on hand at 2 AM, as the three Federal Express tractor-trailers arrived at the hanger. The boxes were numbered but otherwise unmarked. General Morgan signed each bill of lading as the numbers were called out by the agents, who unloaded them. They placed them on handcarts, and pulled them into the recesses of the hanger. 865 boxes were unloaded and placed in a predetermined order.

The preparations for war had begun.

********************

The landscapers came next. Following the design Colonel Canyon laid out for them, they planted lush bushes and plants starting fifty meters in front of, and twenty meters to each side of the hanger. The plants ran parallel to the hanger, 750 meters to where the berms would start.

At night, agents used machines to press the reinforcement bars down into the earth just below the top of each plant. It took them two days to do all of them before sunrise.

Then there was the 'Sprinkler System.' They rented a trench digger, and dug a hole six inches below ground level in front of the plants. Wires were run through the white pipe, into a twelve inch threaded risers spaced twelve feet apart, and into the sprinkler head. The top of the sprinkler head was unscrewed; the spring discarded, and the wires pulled up. A small microphone was attached to the wires, and slid up to the top of the nozzle of the sprinkler assembly. A piece of cotton was pushed up to keep the microphone in place. The dirt was placed back into the hole and returned to ground level. The microphones were standing fourteen inches above the ground, innocently looking like a normal sprinkler head.

At the end of the day, the entire perimeter of the hanger was wired for sound. Anyone trying to sneak up on the hanger and making a sound would be heard by the technician operating the control board in the hanger.

A water truck came by to water the new plants every third night.

*****************

General Morgan called an engineer he knew from his Desert Storm days. Charles Daniels was a colonel who helped design the breaching elements to destroy Saddam Hussein's impenetrable walls of sand. He was now playing with his grandchildren, and couldn't wait to get away from them.

He told his daughter he could be gone for as much as a year, because of this new job with his former general.

She sobbed at the thought of losing her babysitter.

When the three military men got together, it became like old home week. More war stories were being told then work was getting done.

It was Margaret that put an end to this. She brought in a kitchen timer and slammed it down on General Morgan's desk.

"Listen to me you three old warhorses. Your glory days are gone. You have to defend this place, the people in it, and the spacecraft. From today forward you have fifteen minutes each to talk about your past glories. After forty-five minutes I coming into this room, and I'm going to start cracking heads open if you're not working on a plan to keep this place moving forward. If you're not doing something to protect every person here, your ass is mine."