Ariel interrupted him with a guess. “So you, you four, have been working together to strengthen any other, better vision ever since. Are you going to tell me what actually happens?”
“He doesn’t know what happens,” Nell interjected. “Although, as we hone in on various corrections we are getting more of an idea. The problem is that any solution is complicated. It involves a lot of components. We’re pretty sure that there is no single answer waiting to be revealed.”
Mikkel spoke up. “Obviously Mars is involved, but not as a substitute for life on Earth. We think that even under the best of circumstances the colony won’t make it indefinitely on its own. It’s more like if Earth starts to recover, then Mars becomes instrumental in shepherding that process. It becomes a center of stored knowledge, a better avenue of communication—maybe it even becomes the seat of a temporary government. It gives humanity hope.”
“And the slow recovery on Earth must give the Mars colony hope as well. Two planets working on the buddy system,” Nell added. “What matters is that we have shown that within a mere decade, we can affect the odds. Every once in a while they get worse, but mostly they become very slightly better with everything we do. That was until you showed up.”
“Great. I’m a problem for humanity.”
“No. That would be too easy. We’d just shoot you,” Brendan said. Ariel thought that he was probably kidding.
“Then what am I?” She asked the question but her mind had already gone to the odd experience she’d had back when she’d taken this job last December. This conversation. It was the one she had premembered.
Cillian said. “You are capable of taking a still remote chance for survival and turning it into a far better probability. Single handedly.”
“And exactly how do I do this?” Ariel asked, as a good bit of her brain informed her sternly that such a concept was ridiculous.
“I wish we knew,” Cillian said. “But like the rest of this, it’s complicated. I think that one good place to start would be to ask you what you have been doing over the last twenty-four hours or so?”
“Why?” Mikkel asked the question, and he looked more than a little defensive on Ariel’s behalf.
“Because, my dear friend, whatever the young lady was doing, it seems to have nudged up the human race’s chances of survival.”
Mikkel and Ariel exchanged a glance. Nell giggled. Then everyone started talking at once, and it took few minutes for the group to settle back down. Mikkel finally accomplished it by insisting loudly that it was time to let Ariel ask some questions. Ariel was grateful. She had plenty.
She was able to find out that Mikkel had been persuaded to get involved in this odd quest when a nearly crazy Cillian had approached him in 2009. Mikkel was a young professor at the time, and said that he might not have listened at all except that by then Cillian had managed to narrow down the year of the catastrophe that set extinction in motion, and it was the same year that his cousin and childhood friend Siarnaq had insisted years ago would be the beginning of the end.
From Mikkel’s point of view, he had now heard such a crazy prediction twice in his life, and the odds of both people randomly choosing the year 2352 were ridiculous. So he had agreed to learn more, and a delighted Cillian saw the odds of survival go from almost nothing to a little bit better.
After that, Cillian had managed to clear the cobwebs out of his head as he realized that his ability wasn’t a useless predictor of doom. Rather, it could serve as a compass, to provide a sense of whether he was on the right track or not. His gift reminded him of a children’s game, where one child seeks a hidden object while the others tell him if he is getting warmer or colder.
“It’s a far sight better than the kind of visions the saints used to have,” he told Ariel. “You know how most of those went?”
Ariel shook her head.
“They were usually something along the lines of ‘God is pissed and he is sending a horrible calamity, and it is going to be really bad, unless you his faithful people do exactly what I tell you to do.’”
“That’s not seeing the future,” Mikkel said. “That’s extortion.”
“Well, they called it having the gift of prophecy, but it had the distinct advantage of the faithful generally complying, so that the prediction itself never had to come to pass.” Cillian’s laugh had more than a bit of bitterness to it. “Talk about a racket.”
Cillian paused to have a long swallow of beer. Once he was sure that he had the attention of everyone in the gazebo, he went on.
“After Lara left me, I did a lot of research on everything I could find about successful prophets and the phenomenon of prescience,” Cillian said. “Among other things I realized that even though I’d been scoffing at my parents’ greed all this time, I was going to need a good bit of money if I wanted to do things to make a difference. So I cleaned up my act a little and got my dad to pay me a decent salary for doing a real job at his company. I started taking as much other play money as I could weasel from both parents and just pretended to play while stuffing most of it away.”
“Pretty soon I realized that I had a sizable nest egg to work with, and I did some research on investing. I stumbled on HFT. At first I was insulted by it, because it seemed to be such an unfair way for the wealthy to siphon off even more. Then I remembered that I was wealthy and that such a discrete way to make a lot of money almost pennies at a time was perfect for funding a massive and secret group of projects that would ultimately benefit everyone’s descendants equally.”
Cillian explained how once he decided to use high frequency trading, he’d done more research and discovered the quiet yet uncanny success of a new Icelandic investor and his company d4. He had set himself up as an investor in the same office with the intention of copying d4’s success any way that he could. Cillian was certain that secrecy for the time being improved their odds, so after he found Mikkel, he convinced his new ally not to contact Siarnaq, and to keep his work hidden.
By early agreement, the two men seldom talked in person and they never met like this. Cillian funneled what money he could to Mikkel, and Mikkel opened his own account to accelerate the process. While Mikkel focused almost entirely on Mars, Cillian used the money he made to fund several other side projects that also offered some small promise of increasing the odds of survival.
“So Baldur is the reason you picked Ullow?” Ariel asked.
“That’s right. I figured they could do for me what they had done for him,” Cillian said. “When I started using Ullow, I started making a lot of money, but the odds didn’t improve. It bothered me, until I figured out that I had gotten so used to dealing with one new variable at a time that it never occurred to me that I had encountered two at once. The combined effects were largely cancelling each other out.”
“Like destructive interference?” Ariel asked.
“Exactly. Using Ullow and HFT to grow more capital was absolutely raising humanity’s chances of survival. But I couldn’t see it, and now I am pretty sure that was because at the same time Baldur was a growing threat, and his increasingly likely plan to take over the world economy was cancelling out everything positive that I was doing,” Cillian said.
“The man is not a significant player,” Brendan said with obvious irritation.
“In a way he is,” Cillian corrected him. “He matters because if he succeeds, even for a while, he weakens us as a species. Even if after a few generations of disruption things begin to right themselves again, he still leaves us all more vulnerable. Look at the aftermath in the many nations throughout history in which wealth became concentrated in the hands of a very few at the expense of the health and well being of everyone else.”
“You said that even with his most successful reign he turns out to be just a flash in the pan and that you’ve never seen a survival scenario in which he is remembered at all,” Brendan countered.
“Yes, but that doesn’t mean that he can’t do damage now that will make things difficult f
or people down the road,” Cillian replied. “Personally I think landing at Ullow was the best piece of good luck that we’ve had. It made us cognizant of Baldur more quickly and of the need to stop him. Yet at the same time, you have to appreciate the irony that Baldur’s ability to make money has given us a huge leg up in financing the various projects we have going. Mikkel and I have both done much better thanks to him. Baldur has turned out to be both a threat and a useful tool for us.”
“Except that he now hopes to lock Ariel in a closest and use her like a cash machine,” Nell said. “Please tell us that’s not what needs to be done.’
“It isn’t,” Cillian assured her. “Just the opposite. I’m concerned that Ariel’s capabilities could turn him from someone who does damage over a few decades to someone who does enough irreparable damage fast enough that he manages to shut Mikkel and me down. We can’t let that happen. Our problem is that Ariel has the power to turn Baldur into someone who must be stopped now.”
“Yes, but don’t you need to allow d4 to keep on doing what it is doing so you guys can bring in the money too?” Ariel asked. “I mean isn’t it bad all around if y1 manages to get Baldur shut down?”
“No, I don’t think so,” Cillian assured her. “We won’t need d4 for all that much longer. It’s not a bottomless pit. I’ve calculated how much I think we need to have stashed before our investments are sufficient to finance what we need going forward without any more help from Baldur. We haven’t been at this but for a year or two, and I think we are only a year or two away from this tipping point. After that, we want to see him shut down too.
“But Toby is determined to make this all happen just as fast as he can, because he doesn’t know about you guys. Was turning to him for help the worst mistake ever?” Ariel asked.
Cillian chose his words carefully. “We didn’t bring you here today to blame you, Ariel, or to question you or try to tell you what to do. We brought you here to make you fully aware of the situation and to ask for your help. It’s vital that this Toby does not succeed with his plan until we are ready. You have to find a way to convince him to put on the brakes.”
So the conversation finally came full circle to what Ariel thought that they had met to discuss in the very beginning.
******
She probably shouldn’t have given her mom such a rough time about Santa Claus, but Ariel had never liked the idea that a large group of people knew something that she didn’t. It embarrassed her. It annoyed her. All these people dressing up in costumes and conspiring to make her believe a story—and her own parents complicit in the deception? Who cared if she was only nine years old? She still felt like a fool when she found out.
It was very much the way she now felt about the entire Ullow office in Dublin. What a crock. Brendan pretending to amuse a wayward client, when, in fact, said drunk womanizing gambler was arguably the most serious and responsible man in the whole world, with Brendan and flaky failed actress Nell as his two loyal and capable sidekicks. What were some of those other endeavors that they were funding in hopes of nudging the almost inevitable in the best of directions? She resolved to find out.
Then there was secretive, almost paranoid Mikkel, who was really just a gentle intellectual sucked into a scheme to save the world by acting like a greedy new investor. No wait—Mikkel was more than just a gentle intellectual, at least under the right circumstances. Ariel smiled as she remembered their weekend together. The two of them had made plans to meet in Oslo in a few weeks as soon as both of them could get away. They had parted exchanging a long hug that promised more good times ahead.
The other component of the office wasn’t what they pretended to be either. Baldur, the brilliant young investor, was a man with a secret talent that few people would believe and a level of greed well beyond the norm. Big Jake was no friend of Baldur’s, but someone in the office must be. As Ariel pondered the dynamics, all she could conclude was that her own boss Eoin must have sworn allegiance to Baldur and his cause years ago. Why else would talking to Eoin consistently appear to be a bad idea?
In the bluntest of terms, Ariel realized that she had at least one enemy that she had not counted on, and several friends that she hadn’t counted on either. She had a pending crisis for having involved Toby and y1 in her troubles in the first place, and another pending crisis when the first of Baldur’s stock options expired on Saturday, September 22. Not to mention that she had a role to play in humanity’s future that she understand less well the more she learned about it.
She let herself giggle. Okay, so the fact that there was no Santa Claus was the least of her problems.
******
When Baldur’s people reported back to him about the persistent “Do not disturb” sign on Mikkel’s hotel door in Dublin and the redheaded woman seen with him the few times that he did emerge from the room, Baldur was delighted.
“Thank you Hulda,” he said almost warmly as he walked into the office that Monday. “It is useful to know that women can be bought for the price of flowers.”
Hulda looked up from her desk like she was considering whether she should say something or not. Her better judgment lost the battle.
“Men,” she replied firmly. “Can be had for no price at all.”
Baldur stared at her in disbelief—then burst into a laugh.
“You are right! You may be cheap, but we are free, at least to most women that say yes. It’s true. Which is good or I’d be out the cost of two lavish bouquets instead of one.”
He walked on into his own office in the best of spirits, and Hulda wondered what had gotten into the both of them.
******
Ariel had put off contacting her folks directly for weeks now, and she knew it was too long. Emails and text messages made it easy to avoid topics, but her parents had begun to make it clear that they were rightfully worried and wanted to see her face. So she placed a video call home on Labor Day thinking she would surprise them. Her father and sister were out, but her mom was fooling around on her computer and took the call. After greetings and a little complaining about the lack of contact, Ariel tried to change the subject.
“How are things there?”
“Okay I suppose. I mean work is fine and our health is good and Teddie has settled into her senior year in high school, but—”
Ariel recognized a cue when she heard one.
“But what, Mom?”
“I got my magazine article published finally.”
Oh damn. She’d forgotten all about that.
“That’s great Mom. You should be proud.”
“You’d think. But it turns out that I’m getting a lot of flack for it. Some news outlet that doesn’t exactly share my worldview picked up on it, randomly I guess, and decided it was a great subject for a lampoon. They’ve kind of gotten a lot of mileage out of making fun of it and of me.”
Oh dear. “That’s too bad. What idiots. I’m sure that nonsense will die down, and I bet there are those who really enjoyed it.”
“I suppose.” Her mother looked discouraged. “It gets worse. See, I’ve got this daughter I love a lot and I know she’s in trouble right now, and I can feel her worry but she just won’t talk to me. It’s driving me crazy.”
“That’s cute Mom.”
“I try. Come on, Ariel. Please tell me what is going on.”
So Ariel did. Out came more than she had intended, really. Toby and y1 and Baldur and his creepy experiment, and fear and psychics and extinction events, and Siarnaq and Mikkel. Her mom was quiet through most of it, and at the end she looked at least as relieved as she was worried.
“I’m going to email you contacts right now, sweetie. I understand that you’ve got allies there and that is great, and it’s half of why I’m not as worried as I could be. Still, you can always use more. These people I know, they know even more people. Ariel, they would all help you with no questions asked if you tell them who you are. Don’t hesitate.”
“Thanks Mom. I appreciate that it must be ha
rd to be a spectator when your own child is in danger, and believe me, I don’t want this to end poorly. I promise that I’ll reach out to your friends if it seems a wise thing to do.” Ariel was relieved that her mom was handling this as well as she could have hoped, but her mother wasn’t done.
“Also, I need you to understand something else. I stay out of your head, dear, but sometimes I can’t keep from feeling your anger or fear or sorrow when it is really strong. I ignore it, because, well, every mom has to learn that she can’t make everything right for her children, and I’m no exception. You take care of yourself just fine. But if you are really in trouble, suddenly, unexpectedly, and you can’t call anyone else for help, you need to know that you can call me. Feel the problem, think of and visualize information and concentrate on the fact that it’s okay for me to get involved. I’ll have no way of letting you know that I heard you, but I will try to get you some help. Do you understand me?”
“I do, Mom. Thanks. I hope it never comes to that.”
******
To test the potential usefulness of Ariel’s gift, Baldur had mostly gone with investment strategies involving options. They offered more risk and a much larger reward, and he wanted to verify her usefulness by putting serious money on the line with a clear deadline that matched the timeframe Ariel was best at seeing. Options that expired in September and October fit the specs perfectly.
Baldur had split his money unevenly between the two expiration dates, thinking that if the fewer September expirations turned out to be a disaster, he could exit his much larger October positions and minimize his losses. However, if September went well, then October’s results could confirm for him that Ariel’s success had not been a lucky fluke.
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