He sighed in frustration. He could see a future of science fantasy made fact, but he could not see the way ahead for himself and Kristene, not one in which they both got what they clearly wanted and deserved, and also allowed them to complete the ship with little to no derailing personal drama.
Kris murmured softly in her sleep and rolled over. Nathan turned and let his eyes linger over her, so close, yet firmly isolated by his own mores and idiosyncrasies. They had orbited around each other for four years now, engaging in brief and not-so-brief opposing relationships, relationships that the other always remained discreetly apprised of. And when each of these dalliances with the outside world invariably failed, they always found themselves circling closer and closer about one another, whether the other was completely available or not. And it was always Nathan who kept them frustratingly and unreasonably from coming together.
Nathan found himself wishing she would just take the hint and move along—even as he dreaded her ever giving up on him, not when their future after the ship was finished was so wide open.
He turned back to his view of the construction bay and approached the window, shaking his head at his own screwed-up train of thought. Waking up with her like this had made him excessively maudlin. All-in-all, it would have been easier to keep a firm resolve if she would just stick to taking naps in her own damn office across the way.
He looked into her third floor office as he thought this and noticed that it alone of all the glass-fronted rooms had light spilling from it. Her computer monitor, dormant for hours, inexplicably lit the otherwise darkened level. A mild buzz of alarm crawled across the nape of neck, but the monitor could have been left on for any number of reasons.
Then the light shifted as someone walked in front of her screen.
Nathan jumped back into the uncertain security of deeper shadows. The telltale monitor glow shifted in color and brightness as whatever it displayed changed. No one came to her window, though. Nathan remained undiscovered, apparently.
He turned and picked up his phone. Relief flooded through him as the dial tone called out strong and clear.
Four digits later, the phone in the complex’s security office rang. And rang, and rang, and rang with no answer. Nathan stifled a nervous curse, his mind conjuring all manner of dire images, foremost among them the vision of his night guard’s lifeless body, lying only inches from the incessantly ringing phone.
Nathan hit the hook and dialed again, this time calling the shipyard’s security office. There was no ring though—only the insistent, staccato buzz of a busy signal. But their office was never busy, especially not this late at night. Dismissing further visions of a trashed office filled with bullet-riddled bodies, Nathan dialed the number again. This time, instead of a busy signal, he received three strident, piercing tones. “We’re sorry. Your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please—”
He slammed down the phone, wincing at the sharp crack it made. He looked down at the phone that had somehow become his enemy and shook his head. He was loathe to do what necessarily came next, but he had little choice.
Nathan picked up the phone gingerly and dialed 9-1-1. Whatever technical secrets their potential intruder failed to uncover would undoubtedly be compromised by the police and their eventual investigation. There went all their remaining operational security.
The phone did not ring or answer, though. Instead, he heard, “We’re sorry. You have reached a number that has been disconnected or is no longer in service. Please check—”
Nathan set down the handset in its cradle with a mixture of relief and anxiety. Something had obviously screwed with the landlines, no doubt as a preface to the break-in itself. He briefly considered the cellular suite in his pocket, but knew that was a bust. Security for the project had been as tight as they could make it. They were dealing with world-changing ideas and technologies, and Gordon had been adamant that none of it get out until he was ready to release it. As a result, none of their sensitive computers had a connection to the outside world, and the entire place was wrapped in the electromagnetic cocoon of a Faraday cage. Wireless signals would never make it outside their complex.
There was no help coming.
Crouching down, Nathan shuffled back to the couch and leaned in toward Kris. He shook her lightly, and then harder as she stayed asleep. Eventually, her eyes fluttered open, confusion and annoyance at being woken up drifting smoothly into an expression of coy innocence as she saw how close he was to her.
She smiled at him, the corners of her mouth amused by the potential of their relative positions. “Oh, I’m sorry. Did I fall asleep?”
Nathan placed his hand over her mouth and received a flash of renewed annoyance from her eyes. He whispered, “Kris, there’s someone messing around in your office and the phones have been fucked with. I think someone’s trying to steal the secure files.”
“Who?” she demanded, her loud whisper muffled by his hand.
Nathan pulled his hand away and put a finger to his lips, glaring at her to stay quiet. “I don’t have any idea, but there’s definitely someone down in your office, working in the dark. I tried to call security, but no joy.”
Kris jumped up and approached the office’s glass front, only to be jerked down to her knees by Nathan, still crouching. She pulled her arm free of his grasp, her annoyance now the beginnings of anger, but he only shifted around to grasp both of her shoulders firmly.
“Stop!” he said, firmly but quietly. “Wait a second and listen to me! We don’t know who it is and we don’t know what they’re prepared to do, but they seem to be trying to stay covert. Otherwise, they’d just pull the drives and steal whatever wasn’t nailed down, but that’s going to change if whoever it is realizes someone’s still up here. You go off half-cocked, you’re going to make things worse and you might even get us killed.”
Kris turned toward him, hissing her words in the barest semblance of a whisper. “Nathan, we can’t let them have our designs! Another company would be bad enough, but what if this is some other country? Can you imagine the Chinese mass-producing these systems? The world would change overnight, and not for the better if my opinion is worth anything!”
“Don’t you think I know that!? I’m not proposing we cower up here.”
“Oh. Then what do you propose?” she asked, an edge to her voice.
“We’re going to stop him—or rather I’m going to stop him while you get outside and call for help on your suite.”
She looked at him, saying nothing, and he could read nothing from her expression. Soon, the corner of her mouth turned up slightly. “Really, Rambo? You’re going to stop the professional industrial super-spy all by your lonesome? Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t your military specialty surface warfare rather than special warfare?”
His eyes narrowed in exasperation. “I’m not going to jump him or anything, but I can’t let him just break our encryption and download anything he likes.”
“So what are you going to do, and why couldn’t I do it too? What happened to not dividing your forces before the enemy, oh great tactical wizard?”
Nathan shook his head and held his own suite out to her. “Don’t mangle aphorisms at me. And I don’t know what I’m going to do, yet, but I do know what you’re going to do. You’re going to take our phones and you’re going to get to the open and you’re going to call in the damn cavalry. You’ve got the critical job here. I’m just going to try to keep him on the premises until security shows up. Do you understand or do you just want to keep arguing?”
She responded by snatching the cell suite from his hand and pulling out her own phone. Both phones worked, and both showed zero signal strength. “Reception sucks out here, even beyond the building. It may take a few minutes to get the word out.”