d4

by Sherrie Cronin

  ******

  Wednesday Ariel spent the day trying to explain to her co-workers everything she knew about how the coming Monday was going to go. She’d been Baldur’s telescope into the future twice now, and she knew more about the process, and so did Baldur. Much of the information he would get from Ariel would be useless, which is why the process took so much time. He would look for trades that went against conventional wisdom and yet had a high probability of going his way. Basically, he would look for long shots, for surprises on which he could safely bet a lot of money.

  Although Baldur had spent years honing his own skills to focus on stocks and money, he would be relying on a composite of his single-mindedness and Ariel’s own focus. His strongest information would concern areas of interest to them both, and that common ground centered on technology and business. Unfortunately, Baldur would be receiving all of the useful information, while Ariel would get the sorts of things she normally saw, but in Baldur’s much closer time frame.

  Assuming Baldur would use a similar strategy, the trades themselves would mostly involve complex variations of option trading, and therefore they were not terribly time-sensitive, at least as far as seconds were concerned. There was nothing high-frequency about what they did together—it couldn’t even be considered day trading.

  Baldur was constrained by dividing his purchases into many small lots coming from numerous sources, and he had to space them out in time in order to avoid suspicion. That left plenty of time for the crew back at Ullow to swoop in and get the same good pricing that Baldur was getting.

  Jake suggested that Ariel try a few experiments in order to gain her group an advantage. She could let her mind focus on areas where Baldur had little interest. Maybe women’s fashion. He might catch a hint he liked and place a small trade, not wanting to risk too much money in an area in which he was unfamiliar. Then Ullow could trust the insight from Ariel and bet more.

  Ariel could also try to use her own ability to premember the possibilities of the next few minutes to learn of trades Baldur was considering. If she could remember even a few of the most likely that he decided against, then Ullow could still make those trades once she got home. They were probably still a good bet even though Baldur had passed on them, and it would provide some separation between the groups. It could be important over the weeks and month ahead that neither Mikkel nor Cillian appear to have mirrored d4’s trades exactly.

  “He pretty much told me that he intends to make a fooking fortune off of what you two come up with next week,” Eoin told her. “I do not know how fast this guy can turn cash into influence but if this goes the way that we all expect it will, then he is going to have one hell of a lot of money come January 19 and February 16. I mean one hell of a lot more than he already has.”

  “What do you think he is worth all total? Hidden everywhere?” Fergus asked. “Does he have, like, a billion euros?”

  Eoin laughed. “You don’t follow that kind of news much, do you?”

  Fergus shrugged. “Not really. But a billion seems like a lot to me.”

  “Fergus, there are easily over a hundred people out there worth ten times that much, and each of their wealth fluctuates every day by tens and even hundreds of millions of euros. No biggie when you are worth over ten billion. You’ve never heard of most of them. Unless Baldur is lying to himself, and I don’t think he is, he has got to be in that ten billion plus group already to think that he can become so important so fast. Probably hasn’t been there all that long, though, because no one yet has put two and two together. Except for the astute folks at y1 and a few other small groups that watch individual investors, he remains off everyone’s radar. If he can accomplish what he wants in January, and maybe triple what he’s got, then he gets into the thirty-plus billion category and he’s playing with the big boys, the top eighteen richest or so.”

  “Wow,” Ronan said. “I had no idea people actually had that kind of money. Does anybody clear a hundred billion?”

  “Only if you clump siblings together,” Eoin said. “Otherwise, not yet. Knowing Baldur like I do, I’m willing to bet that is exactly what he is shooting for. He’s a goal-oriented, numbers kind of guy. Maybe by the end of February. Be the first lone human to be worth over a hundred billion euros and then slowly start to flex his muscles and go public with his wealth. He’s got to have the tax thing figured out already—citizenship guaranteed in a nice tax haven somewhere. He works to close all the loopholes he used to get there, so no one from d4 or anywhere else ever uses HFT to follow in his rapidly rising footsteps. I guess he figures that he keeps Ariel around in case his own coffers ever dip too low.”

  As soon as Eoin said those words, he knew. Ariel, who was sitting across the table from him, knew it at the same time. In fact, everyone in the room knew. Baldur was getting far richer far faster than he had ever planned. At one point, back when he thought that the process would be slower and fraught with more mistakes, he probably had intended to keep Ariel around. He surmised that he might always need her. He probably did have some old-fashioned idea of marrying her, in the best of cases, or keeping her loyal through threats and extortion in the worst scenario.

  But that had changed. Baldur’s coffers were never going to dip too low now. And he was a man that absolutely, positively wanted to ensure that he not only became the wealthiest person in the world, but that no short-term psychic like him from d4 or elsewhere could ever follow him. That meant that no imitator could ever be allowed to utilize Ariel the way that he had. Ariel could not live by his side. Ariel could not live anywhere. Ariel could not live at all.

  “What was I thinking?” Ariel acknowledged it first. “Last July he used me to make sure that this thing worked. I exceeded his expectations in September and even more so in October. Our last session resulted in some futures trading and a few last-minute options trades that expired on Saturday, and I’m pretty sure I did so well again that I signed my own execution order. If what you say is true, Baldur needs one more really good trading session with me and then he needs me to cease existing.”

  No one said anything for a minute.

  “You are not going to Iceland,” Jake said firmly.

  “No shit,” Fergus agreed.

  “What about Cillian and Mikkel and all they are trying to do and all the work all of you have done? My efforts next Monday are funding them, too. Even though it’s on a smaller, tens- to hundreds-of-million dollar scale, it’s important,” she pointed out. “With this new data you know that after this session Toby is going change his mind and work fast to shut Baldur down before his options mature and all this new wealth makes him so much harder to touch. Good thing he’s got that study in place and more. But that means that Mikkel and Cillian aren’t going to get another chance to make the kind of money that is going to put them past the tipping point on Mars and we all know it. I have to go to Iceland.”

  No one had an argument to the contrary.

  “What can be done to make sure you get out of there alive?” Ronan asked. “Do you, like, see anything helpful?”

  Ariel sighed. The trip to Iceland was in four days. She tried to look out a week, see possibilities that might include something useful. Yes, she saw a fair bit of nothingness now, far more than she had seen while riding the little plane into a winter storm a few weeks ago. This was real danger. The chance of her not surviving a week was bigger than it had ever been in her life.

  But the chance of other alternatives was still greater. Most likely was that she was Baldur’s prisoner, at least temporarily, while he considered his options. She looked ahead a bit more. In one possible world he was trying to stage a believable accident, something that wouldn’t come back to him. In another he was pressuring her to let loved ones know that she was with him by choice. Over there she was escaping from Baldur, and there she was attempting and failing at that escape. There were scenes that made little sense at all, obviously brought on by some turn of events she could not guess. Then there were some in which sh
e was relieved, safe and happy. No information on how she had gotten that way. Damn. But at least they existed.

  “Nothing useful,” she said, not wanting to elaborate. “But I’ll keep trying.”

  Thursday evening she video-called her family to wish them a happy Thanksgiving across the miles. Turkeys were hard to get in grocery stores in Ireland, but she had put some chicken in a slow cooker before she went to work that morning, and had enjoyed the results with homemade mashed potatoes for dinner. It was better than nothing. When she called, her family was about to sit down for their own mid-afternoon feast. Pumpkin and pecan pies were visible in the background, along with a chocolate cheesecake that was probably her mother’s doing.

  For once, Ariel made no effort to conceal her concerns from her mom, or for that matter from anyone else.

  “Things have gotten a little shaky over here,” she told her family. “I’m trying to do the right thing, to help out some really good people I know who are trying to accomplish something important. But I’m going to be in danger in a few days.”

  “You sure are.” Zane and her mother said it at the same time. Ariel’s eyebrow went up. Was everyone seeing the future now?

  “I’ve been talking to Toby,” Zane explained. “He’s working with your friends and trying to think of better ways to ensure your safety. They are all going to do everything they can, but if he’s worried, he’s got good reasons.”

  “You are an unusually open book today,” her mom added. “I wish I knew someone in Iceland, but I don’t. I’m going find out if any of my friends do. I respect what you’re doing Ariel, I really do, dear. Maybe I can get someone helpful added to your security detail. I’ll get back to you.”

  “Thanks guys. I love you all,” she said. As they waved and laughed and signed off it had a faintly familiar feel to it, as if memories and premories of that particular scene filled both her past and her future.

  She decided to take Friday off work, and Eoin did not object.

  “Any special plans?” he asked.

  “No. Just preparing,” she said. He didn’t ask for more.

  The day turned out to be one of those unusual winter days when the sky is bright blue and the temperature climbs into the sixties. Ariel smiled at her good fortune as she took the little car the company leased for her and headed north out of Dublin, planning to drive for as long as it sounded good, and then to stop and do yoga somewhere along the shore.

  Ireland doesn’t have much in the way of sandy beaches. Much of the coast is ancient granite and volcanic remains, and much of its rocky core is old limestone, formed from the remains of tiny sea creatures that led happy lives nearly half a billion years ago, back when Ireland was located near the equator and no mammal had yet set foot on the Earth. Ariel reached for her music, and spent a minute picking her song. She decided on “Bulletproof” by La Roux; it was the perfect choice.

  She drove far enough to find a rocky bit of shore that was deserted, spread out her mat, and worked on clearing her mind. The poses came to her in a random sequence, without thought. The table. The cat. The bow. The plough.

  Her goal was to calm down, and gather her strength. To make herself as bulletproof as possible.

  Downward dog into a cobra into a sun salute and repeat it again. Warrior poses. Low warrior. Warrior two. Warrior three. She had skills, she had advantages, and she had back-up. She finished her routine concentrating on balance, holding a strong tree pose while she gazed at the far horizon.

  She was ready. Now, she needed to go do what needed to be done.

  ******

  Saturday, Baldur paced around his apartment. He had a very nice apartment, one of the best in the city. He had thought often about buying a house because men with money always owned houses, but he’d never been in any particular hurry. Now he was glad that he had waited. Who would ever have thought that someone like Ariel would come along, and that she could raise the level of what he did so quickly and so effectively.

  He looked around his apartment. There wasn’t much that he would miss, and people could be paid later to send him the few things that he wanted. He would be leaving Iceland now, of course, and establishing residence somewhere with far more friendly tax laws and no real inclination to turn its inhabitants over to the authorities of any other country. These places all seemed to be tropical, and Baldur had never cared that much for hot sunny beaches. For starters he hated having to wear sunglasses and sunscreen all the time. But he would adjust. Pick one and learn to like it. He wished he’d had more time to plan, that’s all. This had all happened so fast.

  Baldur was plenty well aware that once the trades were finished Tuesday night, it was a different world. Baldur would not need Ariel, would not need d4, would not need anyone ever again. Except of course for an army of accountants, lawyers and security specialists, but those were the kinds of people that his money could easily buy.

  On the other hand, no one would need him either. Baldur did not doubt for a minute that Mikkel, Cillian, and the entire doom and gloom chorus over in Ireland would have all the money they needed as well when this was over. They weren’t stupid—they saw this as a one-time opportunity as well. They could more easily stay hidden, operating at a tiny fraction of what he did, and once those investments were made, Ariel would be under no pressure ever again to behave to protect her friends or their causes.

  So the remaining problem became Ariel and what to do with her. He’d struggled to come up with a plan he liked, or at least a plan that he thought that he could actually go through with. His latest idea was to have his private plane leave Wednesday morning to take him on a spontaneous vacation in the Caribbean. Ariel would finally sweep him off his feet during their next few days together, and he would do the same to her. In truth it was a bit of his fantasy, and in fact it would be the story that he told. What would one expect, the staff would mutter, after all that time the man and woman were spending together? His employees would find it charming.

  Once Ariel was fully informed about her alternatives, Baldur was sure that she would cooperate and be happy to assure those close to her that she was headed off on a voluntary vacation to celebrate the joys of financial success. He thought that he could even get her to add with a giggle that it was with a man she was becoming increasingly fond of.

  Mikkel would not be happy, of course, and that was partly Baldur’s doing. He wished he had known earlier that he didn’t need to bother pushing Mikkel and Ariel together, but so it went. It hadn’t cost him that much, and it had been a decent enough plan originally. Besides, Baldur thought that he understood Mikkel pretty well. The man was going to copy all the trades he dared, stashing dollars away for his own silly goal. So while he might be sad when his fling left him for the arms of another, he’d get over it. Mikkel was a man obsessed with a cause, and after his bruised heart and ego healed, he’d settle into being thankful that Baldur had given his project all the funding it would ever need.

  The problem was that once they were on vacation, Ariel would need to die an accidental death. It had caused Baldur some uncharacteristic sadness when he realized the inevitability of that conclusion. It did not matter how much Ariel might come to like him or hate him over time. In the end her feelings for him would matter not at all. She was a liability he could not afford.

  Maybe some sort of boating or diving accident would work, provided it occurred when he had an excellent alibi elsewhere. He didn’t need to start out this venture with part of the world convinced he was a murderer. Then again, perhaps something that mimicked natural causes would be better. An unexpected reaction to some exotic local food? Finding a local doctor to work with him would be a trivial problem.

  No, he still didn’t like it happening when they were supposed to be having fun together. Yet he couldn’t afford to wait. It had to be done quickly, before the ever-resourceful Ariel or her friends found a way to ensure her safety. Maybe he shouldn’t even take her along with him to the Caribbean?

  Baldur toyed with
other options in his mind. What was the cleanest, most efficient way to get someone dead and be nowhere nearby when it happened? He saw Ariel in his mind as she had first walked into his boardroom almost a year ago, her inexpensive blue blouse a perfect match to her eyes. She certainly was a unique, even a beautiful creature. She deserved a painless death, maybe even some kind of glorious one. He needed to come up with something fitting.

  26. First Day of Trading

  After Sunday, Ariel packed a bag, checked in with Eoin one last time, emailed Nell all her travel details, and drove over to Jake’s to drop off the key so he could water her plants in case the trip took longer than she expected. She spent a little time playing with the puppy, who was an almost fully grown chow chow by now but still ridiculously cute.

  She exchanged online chat messages with a few old college friends and with a girl from the London office. She spent some time composing a warm email to Siarnaq, one that she hoped never crossed lines into overtly romantic or into a maudlin goodbye. Then she video-chatted with her parents and Teddie, catching them as they were starting their day.

  “Not a lot of well-developed telepaths in Iceland,” her mother said. “It’s a skill that is pretty well distributed geographically, but Iceland is a small place. I might have found someone, though, and we’re looking into it more. Meanwhile I’m going to keep loose tabs on you myself, okay?”

  “Definitely okay,” Ariel said. “Do anything you can to help me, please, as long as nothing gets in the way until Tuesday after the New York Stock Exchange closes.”

  “I got it,” her mother said. “You need to see this through before we get you out of there. I understand.”