Fionna and her two boys are waiting for us on the broad steps outside the house. By this time of night her two girls — nine and five — are undoubtedly asleep.
Donnie, who’s thirteen, has a ponytail that’s longer than his sister Maddie’s. His skateboard is leaning against the side of the house, and I presume that his mom told him to leave it outside. I can imagine how much fun it would be to launch off the railing leading down the porch and can guess what he’s been up to while we were gone. He’s actually unplugged his earbuds and stopped texting long enough to smile a greeting to us.
“Your house is epic,” he tells me.
“Thanks.”
Lonnie, the oldest at seventeen, is already well on his way to becoming a man — and on his way to following in his mother’s footsteps. He won a contest last year put on by Google to see who could hack into a root code that they established just for the event. It took him two hours and eighteen minutes — an hour faster than the second place finisher.
The guys welcome us and Donnie asks his mom if he can throw the pizzas in now. She tells him sure, go ahead, and I have to admit that even though I’m in that strange in-between place you get when traveling — exhausted and yet somehow wired, famished and yet somehow full — pizza sounds pretty good.
As the boys go inside, Fionna nods cordially to Xavier. “It’s good to see you, Mr. Wray.”
“And you as well, Ms. McClury. Have the children won any spelling bees while we were gone?” To put it mildly, Xavier is not a fan of homeschooling, and he and Fionna often go back and forth about it. I think it’s friendly banter, but sometimes I’m not so sure.
“We’re still in training, actually; thank you for asking. And do you know what time zone you’re in now?”
“I think it’s tomorrow.”
“It’s yesterday.”
“Now you’re just messing with me.”
“Come on inside and have some pizza.”
I round up some soda for everyone, and while we wait for the three pizzas to bake, Charlene and I catch up with Fionna.
Xavier heads into the other room to show the boys a new flaming bubbles effect he’s been working on for my show.
When they’re gone I ask Fionna, “Did you tell the kids what happened to Emilio?”
She nods. “Yes. We talked about it today. They know.”
Charlene leans forward. “How are they doing with all that?”
“Well, thankfully, they didn’t know him, I mean, apart from seeing him perform with you a few times last month when we were in town. I’m sure it’d be a lot harder on them if they were closer to him. Which reminds me…” She slips off to my library, which she’s apparently been using as an office, and returns with her laptop computer. “Do you have that USB drive?”
“Xavier does,” Charlene answers.
“Okay.” Fionna hesitates, as if trying to figure out if this is the best time to go and ask him for it, then decides to just plop down again. She tries to stifle a yawn. “It’s been a long day.”
Charlene asks her, “You didn’t find out anything else?”
“Not really.” Fionna’s frustration about her lack of progress is clear as she shakes her head. “I got a good look at Emilio’s files. As far as I can tell there’s nothing regarding RixoTray in any of his online backups. He did have a lot of articles he’s downloaded recently, though, on a certain kind of jellyfish, Turritopsis dohrnii, and a disease called progeria.”
I’ve done a number of benefit shows over the years for children’s hospitals, one of them being Fuller Medical Center here in Vegas, where I ended up meeting a seven-year-old boy with progeria. It’s an extremely rare disorder that causes children to age at seven times the normal rate. They usually don’t live past the age of fourteen or fifteen before dying of old-age-related complications. It’s tragic and sad, but the boy I met was more full of life and joy than most people I’ve met of any age.
Charlene stares at Fionna quizzically. “Articles on jellyfish and progeria?”
She nods. “I have Maddie doing an extra credit report on the jellyfish. We can look at the progeria connection tomorrow.”
The timer goes off, I check the pizzas and see that they’re ready, so we call the boys and Xavier back into the room.
Fionna’s sons fill their plates and are returning for seconds before Charlene and I have finished our firsts. Xavier manages to score a few extra pieces before the boys polish off the rest of the pies and head to bed.
When Donnie and Lonnie are gone, Xavier gives Fionna the USB drive, holding it on the edges to avoid leaving any more prints.
After only a few keystrokes she pauses. “Well, okay, right now I can tell you this is going to take awhile.”
“Why is that?” I ask.
“DoD.”
Xavier looks suddenly very interested. “Department of Defense?”
“I did a contract job for them a few months ago, and what you’re looking at here are algorithms I’ve only seen on military servers.”
“That’s crazy,” I say. “What on earth would Emilio have with Defense Department encrypted files? And what’s the connection to RixoTray? None of this makes any sense.”
“It doesn’t make sense that Emilio was killed either,” Charlene points out solemnly. “But somehow all of this fits together. We just can’t see the big picture yet.”
“In any case,” Fionna goes on, “this USB drive didn’t just come from RixoTray.”
“No. Not if it has DoD encryption on it. Somehow it came from the military.” Xavier downs one of the final slices.
“Or it passed through their hands, yes. I could work on it tonight, but…” Another yawn catches her off guard and stops her in midsentence. “This one could be a full day’s work, even with Lonnie’s help.”
“Get some sleep,” I tell her. “If we’re going to do this, let’s do it right. I want you to keep track of all the steps you go through to get in there, just in case we do need to go to the authorities about this later.”
“So.” Charlene is staring reflectively through the doorway at the fireplace. “Not only do we need to find out why Emilio might have this drive from RixoTray, and not only do we need to find out what files it contains, we need to find out who set up the security on it.”
“And of course who killed him,” Xavier mumbles introspectively. “And why…”
I can see his wheels turning. “What is it, Xav? Something else?”
“Just that Emilio went out to the road bordering Dreamland with me a few times. He was really interested in the place. If that’s military-grade security on there, well…” He gestures toward the drive. “You never know.”
Dreamland, otherwise known as Groom Lake, otherwise known as Area 51, is about eighty miles from here. It’s the unofficial Mecca for conspiracy theorists and ufologists — even more so than Roswell, New Mexico.
Officially, Area 51 does not exist. Officially, no one works at the Groom Lake location.
It’s not unusual to find Xavier parked as close as legally possible to the base so he can try to catch a glimpse of any aircraft — identified or unidentified, terrestrial or extraterrestrial — that might be entering or leaving the area.
“Xav, I’m sure this has nothing to do with Area 51,” I tell him.
“Do you think he was killed because someone wanted the information on this drive?” Fionna asks me, and I’m grateful we’re moving away from a UFO rabbit trail.
“Why not just steal it or question him about it? It doesn’t seem like killing him would lead you any closer to these files, whatever they are.”
“Tell you what…” Xavier offers Fionna the last piece of pizza, and when she declines, and then Charlene and I do as well, he goes for it himself. “Let’s all get some sleep and get a fresh start in the morning. I think it’s pretty safe to say we’re all exhausted.”