I walked along the wall until I stood across from the crevice. Kneeling down, I shrugged off my satchel. I placed it behind me and leaned back, using it as a cushion.
My eyelids grew heavy. My muscles sagged.
Stay awake. You’ve got to stay awake.
Although I’d only known them a short time, I trusted Benigno, Akolo, and Carrie. Akolo could’ve abandoned us, left us to the Grueler. But instead, he’d led us to safety. All in all, they seemed like good people, caught up in a horrible situation. But that didn’t make me feel better about sleeping. Not when Simona’s forces, her drones, and the Grueler were all trying to kill us.
Despite my best efforts, energy quickly drained from my body. I found myself sliding downward. Soon, the cushion turned into a pillow.
Tired. So tired.
My body sagged. I waited a few seconds, trying to gather my strength. Sleep was not an option.
Stay awake, Cy. You’ve got to …
Chapter 43
Briggs’ hands trembled as they shot across the keyboard. His fingers struck the wrong keys, sending a line of meaningless commands into the Eco-Trek PKGCM: Version 4.5.
Agitated, he paused to delete the commands. He took some deep breaths, aiming to clear his mind. Then he attempted to type again. But again, all that emerged was gibberish.
He interlaced his fingers. Turning his palms outward, he extended his arms. His fingers cracked loudly. He tried to focus on the monitor, but the digits and letters merged together, forming an unreadable mess.
He rubbed his eyes. Turning in his chair, he studied the newest additions to his workspace. The boxes, fifty-six in total, were stacked neatly in columns. They contained countless reams of paper, outlining the inner mechanisms and structure of Simona’s model.
He’d tried to organize the paperwork into a helpful resource. He’d read jargon, studied diagrams, and sifted through countless pages of abandoned code. But all it did was add to his confusion. In fact, he was close to chalking it up as a massive waste of time.
And that annoyed him to no end. The paperwork, properly sorted and organized, could’ve been immensely helpful.
He stood up and stretched his aching back. His entire body, from his toes to the hairs on his head, tingled in uneasy anticipation.
Briggs tried to shake the nervous feeling without success. While Simona had been perfectly kind to him, she’d also been far from helpful. She’d delayed meetings and drowned him in paperwork.
In short, she’d acted guilty.
He couldn’t put his finger on it. But if he was in her shoes, he knew he’d have done everything possible to put the inspection behind him. The only reason to slow it down was if she had something to hide.
Briggs wiped his eyes and helped himself to another can of Crisp Cola. Then he opened yet another box and spilled the contents on the table. He sorted through them for a few minutes, looking for leads. Then he sat down in his chair.
Again, his fingers trembled as they passed over the keyboard. He forced himself to work a little slower. Gradually, he cleared his mind. His typing normalized and he resumed his usual working speed.
His eyes studied the screen while he typed. Dozens of complex calculations passed before his eyes. Numbers appeared, feeding into still more equations.
He moved on, passing deeper into the calculations. The model was nearly impossible to evaluate. It was always changing, always adjusting itself to fit new data inputs. However, he was beginning to realize the model wasn’t a completely fluid organism. Cause and effect were, when applicable, respected. That gave him a base from which to continue his investigation.
The screen changed constantly as he continued his trek down the rabbit hole. His back grew stiff from non-movement. His fingers began to ache from pressing so many keys.
Deeper he trekked, using the paperwork to guide him to one of the model’s many cores. The screen changed yet again and he saw all new equations, rules, and specifications. His eyes flew over the information as he scrolled downward.
Then he frowned.
Adjusting the mouse, he scrolled up a few lines to a small section of code. For a couple of minutes, he pondered an anomaly.
His frown deepened.
Briggs took a few notes on a pad of paper. Feeling reenergized, he returned to the paperwork, scanning information and searching for clues to the anomaly. Truthfully, he wasn’t sure what it meant.
But he knew it was important.
Chapter 44
President Walters sat in the Oval Office, his head in his hands. Senator Gar had given him a deadline and it was drawing near. If he didn’t have answers soon, he’d be forced to either support the senator’s campaign or allow the truth, warts and all, to go public. The first scenario would compromise his values. The second one would unleash a torrent of public anger. His scandal-plagued administration would never recover. Without a doubt, he’d go down in history as America’s most corrupt president.
The intercom buzzed. The president pressed the speaker button. “Yes, Alison?”
“Ed is here to see you.” Like always, his secretary’s voice was no-nonsense. “He says it’s important.”
The president felt a glimmer of hope. “Send him in.”
The door opened. Special Agent Ed Hooper strode into the Oval Office. “Wow.” He blinked. “Are you okay?”
President Walters frowned. “What?”
“You look like crap.”
The president wiped his forehead. His skin felt cold, clammy. “I’m just tired. Haven’t slept much lately.”
“Neither have I.”
“I believe it. What’ve you got for me?”
Hooper strode across the carpet, tracking soil along the way. Without fanfare, he took a seat opposite the president. “Just about everything.”
For the next five minutes, Hooper described his meeting with Barney Samuels as well as the man’s subsequent phone calls to members of the Separative. President Walters’ eyes gradually widened until they looked like they might burst out of their sockets.
After Hooper had finished, the president leaned back in his chair. “So, they’re all in on it.”
“It certainly appears that way.”
“But why? It’s not like any of them are hurting for money.”
“That’s the big question,” Hooper said. “But I believe I have a partial answer for you. The Separative’s unofficial leader was — is — a geocybernetics expert named Simona Wolcott. She disappeared eighteen months ago.”
The president frowned.
“So, I did a little digging. She didn’t actually vanish. Instead, she quietly formed a weather research outfit named Eco-Trek. It turns out that Secretary Roost granted a federal land lease to Eco-Trek. It involves Pagan, a small island in the Northern Marianas.”
“Land leases aren’t exactly uncommon.”
“This one is. It comes with a no-fly, no-sail zone. And when I tried to dig up satellite images of the area, I was told they’d been classified by Secretary Bert Bane.”
“Kate and Bert … they’re both part of the Separative, right?”
Hooper nodded.
The president exhaled.
“When I met Secretary Samuels, I told him I knew about the theft. It shook him up pretty good. He planned a meeting. I’m going to listen in, see what I can learn.”
“We don’t have time to eavesdrop. We need to take action.”
“That can be arranged.”
“Good.” The president leaned forward. Clasped his fingers together and laid them on his desk. “Anything else?”
Hooper pulled a notepad from his pocket. He flipped a few pages. “Documentation is sparse. But Eco-Trek supposedly planned to build a weather research station on Pagan.”