by Mike Brogan
“Using perfect grammar?” the defense attorney asked the jury.
The jury ruled in favor of GV and against Bruner, who claimed GV’s team of high-priced lawyers and engineers confused the jury with engineering and medical double-talk.
Van Horn knew Bruner would find no peace until he found a way to exact revenge.
So a year ago, Van Horn offered him a way. Van Horn would bankroll Bruner if he could find a way to sabotage the launch of Global Vehicles’ new electric XCar.
Bruner smiled and said, “I’ve already found a way.”
The restaurant door opened and Van Horn saw Bruner walk in. Robert K. Bruner was six-two, rail-thin, an anxious man with thick black hair and large round glasses that made his dark-brown eyes look golf ball size. A bushy black mustache hid most of his upper lip scar. He wore a dark gray shirt, dark khakis, black tennis shoes and a gold neck chain with an upside down palm tree. Bruner always wore the gold palm tree. It had belonged to his deceased Iraqi mother.
She told him, “The palm tree wards off the evil eye.”
If so, Van Horn thought, thousands of Americans now need palm tree charms to ward off the evil Bruner was about to unleash on them.
Van Horn waved him over.
Bruner sat down, ordered his Coke, which was served immediately. He looked at Van Horn and said, “Tell me something!”
“What?”
“Why do we two Detroit execs fly over three thousand miles to meet here in LA?”
Van Horn smiled patiently. “You know why. The boss doesn’t want us seen together in Detroit. Too many car business people might recognize us. I’m well known among executives, and you’re very well known in engineering circles. They also know about your very public lawsuit against GV. We shouldn’t be seen together. People might ask questions, assume things, draw conclusions. We should play it safe.”
Robert Bruner shrugged a whatever.
“Are you still prepared to start our program?” Van Horn asked.
Bruner smiled.
“What’s so funny?”
“I already started.”
Van Horn could have predicted it. Bruner always did what he wanted to do, when he wanted.
“Relax. Just small tests.”
“And . . . ?”
“They performed perfectly.”
“Good.” Van Horn felt relieved that things worked. “So why’d you start early?”
“Personal paybacks.”
“For who?”
“A certain Global Vehicles engineer who probably seduced her way to a promotion that I deserved when I worked there.”
“Did your test work?”
“Flawlessly. The XCar obeyed my every command.”
“How’d it happen?”
“She took a sharp left turn off the Mackinac Bridge and fell into Lake Michigan.”
“I read about that. Didn’t realize it was an XCar. She die?”
“No, unfortunately. She was saved by her airbags. Which also helped keep her car afloat until the Coast Guard rescued her. She’s recovering.”
“You said tests. Who else?”
“Two ex-military guys. A US Air Force pilot. A drunk who shot missiles into the home of my grandparents and killed them. I drove him into Lake St. Clair near Harsens Island.”
“Who else?”
“Another US military criminal. I drove him off an I-75-M59 overpass. Justice delivered to both men.”
“We’re they driving XCars?”
“No. One drove a BMW. The other an Excursion. My system lets me take over driving virtually all newer cars equipped with Wi-Fi.”
Van Horn thought of a few enemies he might like Bruner to surge.
They sipped their drinks.
“Since GV moved up the XCar launch date, the boss wants more XCar incidents. One in Michigan as soon as possible?”
“How about today?”
“But you’re here in LA How can you create an XCar incident in Michigan?”
Bruner smiled.
SIXTEEN
Joe and Rosemary Ryan drove home from the Village Social Dinner at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church in the friendly village of Emmett, eighteen miles west of Port Huron in Michigan’s thumb area.
Joe smiled because Rosemary had organized the entire dinner event and it turned out to be a huge success. He also smiled because the Belgian chocolate ice cream was extra rich and creamy and he’d wolfed down a two-scoop cone, then sneaked another while Rosemary chatted with Ma and Fred.
Joe loved driving his new XCar on their long Sunday drive down Keegan Road, letting neighbors take a gander at his shiny new car. He couldn’t believe how smooth and responsive it was. And quiet. Like sitting in Kenockee Cemetery.
The XCar’s fully-charged battery system handled the week’s driving to his farm and back several times. Rosemary calculated he’d driven their XCar about 270 miles this week - for only about six bucks’ worth of electricity. Incredible!
With their gas-powered car, driving that same distance, would cost around forty bucks for gas. Bottom line, the XCar would save them thousands of dollars this year.
Joe laughed.
“What?”
“I knew the local GV dealer would pull your name out of the Win-The-XCar Contest box.”
“How’d you know?” Rosie asked.
“You’ve always been lucky.”
“Me lucky? Where’s the proof?” she said.
“You picked me.”
She laughed and nudged his elbow.
Joe knew Rosie was a winner the first time he saw her shopping in Elmer’s store.
Joe turned onto Brandon Road as a young deer shot out of the woods and ran in front of the car.
Joe started to hit the brakes, but didn’t have to: the automatic braking system sensed the deer and slowed the car.
“That deer didn’t hear us,” Joe said.
“The XCar’s so quiet . . .” Rosemary said.
Joe nodded.
“Maybe,” Rosie said, “the dealer can add engine noise so hearing-impaired geezers can hear the XCar coming.”
“What’d you say . . . ?”
Suddenly Joe felt the car surge ahead.
He checked to see if his foot accidentally hit the accelerator. It didn’t.
Then the car slowed like his foot hit the brake – it didn’t.
Then it raced ahead again like he floored the gas – he didn’t.
“Joe – what are you doing?”
“Nothing! The car’s doing it!”
Again, the car slowed . . . then bolted forward again at fifty, sixty, seventy miles per hour. His foot was not touching the gas.
“Joe – turn the key off!”
“Key’s in my pocket!”
“Hit the brakes!”
“I did! Got nothing!”
“Hit the power On-Off button!
He did. “Nothing.”
Joe saw the busy Main Street crossroad ahead. Cars and trucks sped past with the right-of-way.
He headed toward the Stop Sign.
With no brakes!
Suddenly, the steering wheel steered right . . . and he started to panic until he saw one possible way to stop - and maybe avoid Mercy Hospital!
He strong-armed the wheel hard right onto the road’s shoulder and down into a deep rain-filled ditch. He heard the tires spinning down into the soft watery muck, digging deeper and deeper, sinking the car lower. Soon, the muddy water rose up into the engine and seconds later it hissed, sputtered, and stalled out.
He and Rosemary jumped out of the car into the muck. They stared as their new XCar sank even deeper in the mud and cattails.
“What the hell just happened?” Rosemary asked.
“No damn idea.”
“So now what?”
Joe grabbed his phone. “So now I tell the dealer to come pick up his damn car! I’ll drive our Chevy!”
“Tell him something else!”
“What?”
“He owes me a new pair of Ji
mmy Choos!”
SEVENTEEN
MANHATTAN
In her office, Madison sat with Pete Naismith and GV Chairman Hank Harrison. Hank had just walked over from a meeting at the nearby Midtown Hilton.
They were trying to decide the next steps in their growing XCar surge problem.
She watched Harrison rub his tired eyes and glance at his cell phone every few seconds. He was worried. For good reason. Two minutes ago, they received yet another report of an XCar surge in the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel under the Detroit River.
“How’s the driver?” Harrison asked.
“Just a bruised rib from the XCar slamming into both sides of the narrow tunnel,” Naismith said. “But the surge backed up tunnel traffic to and from Canada.”
Harrison shook his head. “Pete, let’s cover all medical bills and body repairs for her and anyone affected by this tunnel incident.”
“Okay.”
“What about that new XCar surge on I-75?” Harrison said.
“Airbag protected her. She’s fine, thank God,” Pete said.
Pete’s phone rang. He listened, hung up, and shook his head. His face said it all.
“At our Milburn Test Track. A test driver’s XCar surged and slowed, turned left, right, left. Then stopped dead in its tracks. Engineers at the track checked every system, every component. Twice. Found absolutely no problem.”
“What’d our driver say?” Harrison said.
“He said it felt like something grabbed control of the car.”
“Something?”
“Yeah, like something was driving it!”
No one spoke.
“What the hell’s causing the surging?” Pete said.
Harrison shook his head, stood and paced. “Our driveline engineers are working 24/7 on it. Let’s put all our engineers on it 24/7! Computer engineers, Wi-Fi engineers. Get hackers to check out the XCar’s Wi-Fi vulnerabilities. Get everyone. Find the damn cause!”
Pete phoned the directive to an assistant.
“If this problem grows, we have to delay the XCar national launch. If we can’t fix this, the XCar itself might be in jeopardy. And if XCar is in jeopardy, the Global Vehicles future might be threatened . . .”
So will our GV advertising assignment, Madison thought.
“What alarms me,” Harrison continued, “is that these two hundred early-release XCars have the identical electronics, and the identical supercapacitor graphene battery system – as the XCars we’ll soon launch nationally. They rolled off the same assembly line at about the same time.”
Pete said, “Our dealers have already sold or awarded most of the two hundred early-release XCars we shipped them a few weeks ago.”
“Where are those cars now?” Madison asked.
“As of yesterday . . . most are still being driven.”
Madison said, “Even though your certified letter asked them to return their XCars to their dealership for a replacement.”
Harrison nodded. “And even though they get a comparable free replacement car until the XCar problem is resolved.”
Madison sipped her coffee. “More enticement might persuade them.”
“Like what?” Pete said.
“Well, my sense is most people bought the XCar to save gas money driving. So if GV could give them their probable estimated gasoline savings based on their driving mileage they would have gained in their XCar, it might help.”
“That would help them!” Harrison said, “Let’s find a way to do it Pete!”
Christine brought in a tray with fresh coffee and an assortment of fruit and nuts.
“Thanks, Christine,” Harrison said, taking some coffee.
Madison said, “What worries me is the media. Any more incidents and they will jump all over this.”
“I’m surprised they haven’t already,” Harrison said. “We know what happened when VW hid the fact they turned off the cars’ emissions gauges.”
“A crime happened,” Pete said. “And VW paid nearly fifteen billion dollars to compensate owners.”
“But GV hasn’t hidden anything from the owners.”
Harrison drew a long breath. “True, but I’m sending another follow-up letter to those 200 XCar owners who haven’t returned their car yet. I’ll ask them to please return the car to the dealer and pick up a free comparable vehicle, and also a check to cover the weekly estimated XCar gas savings they would have achieved.”
“That should help,” Madison said.
“In the meantime,” Harrison said, “we have to focus on identifying the cause of the surge and fix it!”
Pete Naismith grabbed his phone and briefed his communications and media team on the problem.
Madison was worried. Something told her they hadn’t seen the last of these surges and that maybe the cause might be outside the car. Maybe some kind of bizarre outside electrical interference.
Maybe even outside human interference, although she had no idea how that might be possible.
The advertising wars had taught her one very clear lesson – a healthy dose of paranoia now and then isn’t a bad way to stay in business. Maybe a GV competitor had gone psycho.
She remembered her father telling her a true story about two businessmen: an airline CEO and his advertising agency’s CEO. The two close friends controlled the huge airline advertising account for years. They often went deer hunting together in upstate New York.
Meanwhile, an executive who worked for the same airline and his executive friend at different advertising agency wanted to move the lucrative airline advertising account over to his friend’s ad agency.
So one time, when the two CEOs went deer hunting, they were secretly followed by the two greedy executives. As the two CEOs hunted a large buck, several shots rang out and bullets flew past their heads and ripped into some nearby trees. More shots rang out even closer. Someone was shooting at them. The CEOs hit the ground and called 911. The sheriff and his deputies arrived and eventually traced the shell casings to the greedy executives who were eventually convicted and sentenced to fifteen years.
Her father told her, “Madison, when competitors say they want to ‘bury the competition,’ some mean it literally.”
EIGHTEEN
BIG SUR, CALIFORNIA
Nick Sleete III dined alone at the exclusive Sierra Mar Restaurant overlooking the Pacific. He shoved the last morsel of delicious venison tenderloin into his mouth, washed it down with Glenfiddich 15, then waved his young blonde waitress over.
“You dumped an iceberg in my whiskey.”
“I’m very sorry, sir. I’ll bring you a replacement.”
“A free one!”
“Of course, sir.”
One free Glenfiddich and two lip-smacking caramelia mousses later, Sleete hoisted his two hundred sixty pounds to his feet. He was off to meet young Scarlett, his delicious new arm candy, waiting for him at Carmel Valley Ranch down Highway 1. Sleete needed, and Scarlett provided, a little comfort while his psycho wife was visiting her drooling, brain-dead parents in Little Rock.
Sleete left the waitress a buck tip for his seventy-eight-dollar meal and strolled outside.
“Get my car fast!” he shouted at the skinny valet kid. “It’s the only one like it in the lot!”
The kid ran into the lot and drove his car back in under twenty seconds, jumped out, opened the door, and smiled big for a tip.
Why should I tip the kid? He’s already pocketed fat tips from the restaurant’s high-roller customers.
Nick Sleete stiffed him.
Sleete eased into his new XCar and raced out of the parking lot. People stared wide-eyed at his unique new vehicle. As well they should. No one else had one. It made him feel even more special than usual.
“It’s good to be a GV dealer!” he said aloud.
He burned rubber as he spun onto Highway 1 and headed north toward Carmel-by-the-Sea and Monterey. As he drove, he saw debris left over from the horrific mudslides in recent years. Mudslides that created thirteen n
ew acres of land. Maybe I’ll buy an acre and build a little hideaway for me and Scarlett . . .
To his left he saw the sprawling Pacific Ocean crashing against the rocky shore. Looking at the waves always made him hungry. He’d stop in Carmel and pick up the delicious pulled pork sandwich from Carmel Belle restaurant. Five star food there!
Minutes later, he glimpsed the long Bixby Creek Bridge a few miles ahead. He was stuck behind a big slow-moving furniture van. It pissed him off. He didn’t want to be late. Scarlett might decide to party with another customer.
Sleete pulled out, passed the moving van and jerked back in front of it, causing the van driver to hit the brakes and honk.
Sleete laughed at the guy and sped ahead . . .
* * *
In his Rochester Hills, Michigan home, Robert Bruner sat at his mini command center, studying three large-screen monitors in front of him.
Thanks to his camouflaged access to SkySat-7 satellite system he had a live, birds-eye view of three US highways. One screen showed an XCar in California driving south on Highway 1 toward Carmel. The second, an XCar on I-95 in New York. The third XCar sped down I-80 toward Cleveland.
He chose the California XCar because he liked the ocean view. He watched the XCar speed north toward the long Bixby Creek Bridge that soared three hundred feet above the rocky Pacific shore. The driver had just cut off a moving van and then a car. The guy was drunk or crazy. Or a road-rage bully. All good reasons to target him.
Bruner watched the XCar approaching the long Bixby Creek Bridge.
Perfect location, he thought.
Bruner tapped some commands on his computer, entered the XCar’s OBD II port and soon gained control of the XCar’s driveline systems.
He could now drive the XCar.
* * *
Nick Sleete felt his steering wheel jiggle. A bump in the road obviously.
Another hard jiggle. Not a bump!
Then, incredibly, his XCar steered itself into the passing lane – a No-Passing lane!
“What the fu - ?” Sleete shouted.
He swept past a huge truck - then cut it off - then sped up to eighty!
Sleete hit the brakes. Nothing. He hit them again. Nothing.
His XCar was doing ninety!
He was three-quarters over the bridge. His shirt was drenched with sweat.