by Brandt Legg
Hudson looked as if he’d just been knifed. “Damn. We’ll just have to wait until the Wizard can get into it.”
“What if he can’t?”
“He can. He’s the Wizard.” Hudson smiled at Schueller. “I have to keep moving.”
“Okay.”
“Good job, Schueller. How’s Kelly?”
“Do you know her?”
“Not for years.” Hudson thought of the younger version of Kelly, the waitress who had dated Gouge for a while and been friends with Rochelle, and then his brain short-circuited, as it often did whenever he recalled the days that led up to that night. “I’ve got to go. Do I have it?” he asked, referring to Zackers’ drive.
“You do,” Schueller said, feeling like a spy. He’d slipped it into his dad’s coat pocket as they’d hugged.
“Good, I’ll transfer it in a few hours,” he said, looking deeply into Schueller’s eyes.
“How?”
“The Wizard made me a special device, but don’t worry about that. The less you know . . . ”
“Okay, but don’t lose it.”
“Don’t worry, Gouge has already made copies. Lots of them.” He didn’t look away from his son. “How are you?”
Schueller genuinely smiled.
Hudson smiled back. “Okay then.”
A few hours later, from the back of an SUV, while claiming to be reviewing policy papers, Hudson followed the instructions and successfully zipped the contents of Zackers’ drive across cyberspace to the Wizard.
Pound won Florida, Illinois, and his home state of Ohio. Thorne took North Carolina, and Cash won Missouri. Few political analysts gave Cash a chance now, declaring Pound a virtual lock for the Republican nomination. His popularity, like his delegate count, continued to grow.
The big shock was on the Democrats’ side—Morningstar got Florida and Ohio, and Kelleher won Illinois. Newsman Dan pulled out a victory in Missouri and North Carolina, but managed to only finish second in the other contests.
“What do you make of that?” Rex asked his boss as they watched the results come in. “Bastendorff might not be as strong as we thought.”
“Nonsense,” Vonner said. “He just doesn’t want his manipulations to seem too obvious.” Secretly, Vonner hoped his nemesis was furious.
“Mistakes happen,” Rex pushed. “Jimmy Carter, Trump . . . ”
“This isn’t a mistake,” Vonner insisted while briskly walking up his custom treadmill, set on a steep incline.
“Can’t control everything,” Rex said, smiling as he walked out onto the patio overlooking the Pacific and lit a cigarette. He never once glanced at the ocean. Instead, he spread a series of seventeen miniature dice on the glass topped table and rolled them in a strange, systematic sequence that only he could understand. His expression changed from mild concern, to anger, to panic, and finally to amusement as the dice fell and he registered the numbers and combinations into his methodical mind, which had twisted into a painful precision from tens of thousands of hours spent inside the digital prisms of the DarkNet. He could find anything there. Thus far, Gouge had slipped through, by the only way anyone could anymore—he had vanquished his entire digital and cyber existence.
Back inside, Vonner was days past worrying about Gouge. He puzzled over the results of the Democratic primaries. Although Kelleher took his home state of New York, he hadn’t won much else, and rumors abounded that he was about to pull out. Morningstar, however, was coming on strong, and had now won more states than Newsman Dan. The two rivals were nearly even in delegate counts. Both, expecting Kelleher to withdraw, were actively courting the Governor’s endorsement. But with Morningstar favored in many of the remaining contests, including his home state of California, Kelleher’s support was most critical for Newsman Dan.
Vonner studied all the maps and delegate counts, troubled, but not quite sure why. “Something isn’t right,” he said to Rex as the fixer returned from his smoke break. “We’re missing a crucial piece . . . ” Then the billionaire’s face went white. “Wait, where is Hudson right now? Double security!”
Chapter Fifty-Nine
Hudson received regular updates from the Wizard. Gouge was safe, at least for now, but the encryption on Zackers’ drive was proving extremely difficult to crack. The Wizard got in touch with Florence and Schueller, thoroughly questioning them on anything that Zackers might have said or done—ever—which might lead him to the key. Nothing.
However, Schueller did recall Zackers mentioning the word “digiGOLD,” which the Wizard mistakenly thought might have been a clue to the way in, but soon discovered it was its own explosive topic. The Wizard pushed farther into investigating the world of digiGOLD. Soon, he realized that Zackers’ death might have to do with something the hacker had uncovered about the virtual currency.
Maybe Vonner had nothing to do with killing Zackers, he told Hudson during one of their matrix-chats.
Any link between Vonner and digiGold? Hudson asked.
I haven’t been able to find one yet.
Keep looking.
The thing is, Vonner would be one of the last people to want digiGOLD to succeed.
I thought it already was succeeding, Hudson said.
Only across the DarkNet, but if digiGOLD ever goes mainstream, it will bring down the banks and brokerage houses, which means the end of the global economy as we know it.
The Wizard sent Hudson a brief outline on digiGOLD. The report both terrified and fascinated him, and it left him even more uncertain about his course. An entity that created funds in a manner similar to the Federal Reserve and other central banks, but operated through some autonomous form of artificial intelligence, was incredible. Adding to the danger and wonder of it were other features, such as the source and destination of fund transfers being untraceable, accounts structured blind with no risk of being hacked. Governments couldn’t seize digiGOLD assets, criminals could not steal digiGOLD, traders couldn’t manipulate its value.
What would it be like to have a single global currency and no more cash? Hudson wondered.
The Wizard had discovered a reference to digiGOLD in a stray message he’d unlocked on the DarkNet. “DigiGOLD is a chance to level the playing field. We can lock out the elites and leave them holding worthless currency from the old system. Stripped from wealth, they will become powerless.”
It was a stunning idea. Income inequality had reached insane levels, with the richest eight people on earth controlling more wealth than the poorest four billion. But digiGOLD could change that in an instant.
Still, apparently not all NorthBridgers shared that view. In the same intercept, the Wizard found this response: “We just want America back. They can do what they like in the rest of the world. People like Bastendorff who meddle will be targeted by the revolution. People who have legitimate business within the United States will be allowed, even welcome, but we will stop the others.”
The Wizard had shown Hudson that Bastendorff was backing Neuman and Cash. He’d also made clear his belief that elections are won and lost in the great glass towers of the money centers with no input from the voters, but Hudson couldn’t buy that. Someone would know. Someone would talk. Someone would stop them.
“It’s all about money and power, maneuvering and manipulating. Vonner has Hudson, Thorne, and one of the Democrats. He’s making a move on the CapStone. Bastendorff has his candidates, and he wants the CapStone for himself.”
Melissa didn’t think it was that bad either. “Sure, Vonner might blur the line, cut corners, even be a totally corrupt, manipulative tyrant, but he’s our tyrant. Win the election, and then you can make changes. Surely the president has some power?”
“But what if he doesn’t?” Hudson said quietly.
Rex, walking up from the server room located in the lower level of Sun Wave, told Vonner that he’d picked up communications indicating Newsman Dan had already offered the VP slot to Kelleher, and that the New York governor was about to accept.
“T
hat still may not be enough,” the billionaire said, not sure why Bastendorff couldn’t get his candidate across the finish line. “Morningstar has the momentum and the math on his side. Bastendorff might have bet on the wrong horse.”
“Maybe not. Turn the TV on,” Rex said, a trace of urgency in his normally reserved demeanor. The fixer started clicking keys rapidly as windows on several large screens opened and closed in swift succession, with seemingly indecipherable data blurring in and out of view.
“Unbelievable!” Vonner shouted from his exercise bike. “I’ll give Bastendorff credit, he sure has flair.”
“What makes you so sure it was him?” Rex asked in a quiet monotone, as if he were far away. His fingers never stopped pounding the keys.
“Who else benefits so much from Morningstar’s death?” Vonner asked, his eyes riveted to the TV screen’s images of absolute mayhem. He brought up two other screens tuned to other stations with similar footage, but muted the audio. The announcer on the first station was giving a breathless account.
“I repeat, minutes ago, California Governor Morningstar was assassinated. The governor, a presidential candidate, had been speaking in Washington Park, in Portland, Oregon, to a large crowd, when what appeared to be a missile made a direct hit onto the stage. We have no confirmation of anything as yet, but as you can see in our live footage, the scene is one of utter carnage. I must stress again that we have no confirmation, but as you can see by this replay of the actual attack, dozens of others must also have been killed, and perhaps hundreds were wounded. First responders are just arriving, along with law enforcement, to this tragic event.”
“New city, new victims,” Rex muttered, “but same war.”
The announcer continued. “We are waiting for word from the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, but this certainly bears all the hallmarks of a NorthBridge attack.”
“Bastendorff controls this network,” Vonner said, pushing a button on his bike which would alert an assistant to bring him a scotch.
“So?” Rex asked, somehow listening and typing frantically at the same time.
“There you go,” Vonner said, pushing another button that would connect him to Fitz. “Bastendorff’s pinning it on NorthBridge. Convenient.”
“Is he?” Rex asked. “Or is it just supposed to look that way?”
Chapter Sixty
With Morningstar dead, Newsman Dan Neuman locked up the nomination. As expected, New York Governor Kelleher joined the ticket as his running mate. That, combined with a sympathy bounce from the loss of Morningstar, helped the Democrats jump to a double-digit lead in the polls over Pound.
Hudson still hadn’t filled the VP slot, which created plenty of speculation. Vonner and Fitz were pushing for General Hightower. Schueller liked Professor Wiseman. But others inside his campaign, including Melissa, thought the bottom of the ticket needed to be someone with real governmental experience, similar to when the outsider Trump chose Pence. A shortlist of senators, congressmen, and governors quickly developed, but Hudson had long had someone else in mind, a person no one had considered.
Less than ten days before the Republican convention, while his staff was in the process of vetting the two finalists, Hudson shocked everyone, including Fitz and Vonner, by choosing Celia Brown, the African-American Republican senator from Illinois, known for her anti-war views. Fitz was dumbfounded. Brown hadn’t been vetted, they had done no polling, and he didn’t even know Hudson had said more than a few words to her since the early debates.
“I’m sure she’ll work out,” Hudson told his campaign manager and Vonner on a joint communicator call.
“She had better,” Vonner said, so furious he was spitting his words. “You decide to bring on an anti-war fanatic—you do realize you’re running as a Republican, don’t you?”
“I’d hardly call her a fanatic.”
“Really? She once introduced legislation to change the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of Peace. She has opposed every military action of the past two decades, and advocates bringing all of our troops home from around the world. All. Of. Them!”
“I like her,” Hudson said.
“Oh, good,” Vonner said sarcastically. “Let’s just hope the voters share your feelings.”
As it turned out, the polls showed it to be a brilliant move. The Republican base had no choice but to vote for Pound, regardless of who was on the bottom of the ticket, but Brown appealed to many liberal Republicans, independents, and even conservative Democrats who were fed up with the trillions spent on endless wars. Thorne, however, opened his radio show with the news, declaring, “‘Pound-Brown’ sounds like a cheap past-date cut of meat, or something that would wind up in your septic system.”
Regardless of the shock-jock’s constant barbs, between Brown’s addition and a post-convention bounce, within a few weeks, Hudson had pulled back to within a couple of points from Newsman Dan.
Privately, Vonner remained outraged. “There are one hundred senators, ninety-eight of them belong to the REMies, and he chooses one of the two that don’t? He picks an honest senator? What was he thinking!?”
Hudson, in a hotel suite in Colorado, had just hung up from an equally exhausted Melissa, who was in New Mexico. It was as close as they’d come to being together since the convention. With the NorthBridge threat, the National Guard had been called out to protect both parties’ conventions, and security had been extra tight at each subsequent event. The tension made each day more exhausting. He had some papers to review, and then a meeting with senior strategists and Fitz, before a day of stump speeches. Savoring the peace and quiet, he decided to resist the temptation to click on the morning news shows.
About to stretch out on the sofa, he suddenly realized he wasn’t alone. Hudson jumped, then exhaled as if he’d just been punched. “How did you get in here?” His voice cracked in relief at the question, knowing he could have been killed if it had been someone else.
Linh motioned toward the door.
He shook his head. “The Secret Service would never have let you in unannounced.”
She smiled. “Being the head of a large organization has some perks.”
“The Inner Movement is not just some ‘large organization.’ I’ve checked. IM is on the FBI’s watch list, and according to one of my sources, the Department of Homeland Security, the CIA, the NSA, and several other agencies have dedicated significant resources into tracking and infiltration efforts aimed at your movement.”
She nodded, her eyes narrowing. “There are many who do not understand us, who are confused, even threatened, by what the Movement is trying to accomplish.”
“Enlighten me,” Hudson said, unable to break her gaze, and not wanting to.
Linh laughed lightly, amused at his choice of words, knowing it was not an accident. “Perhaps we can help each other.”
“I hope so,” he said in an almost desperate tone.
“You will be the next President.”
Hudson assented with his eyes, tired of being the only one who didn’t believe this was a certainty, knowing that the leader of the Inner Movement was the last person with whom he should argue about the future.
“Humanity is at a very perilous point,” she continued, “a crossroad that we may not survive.”
Hudson almost interrupted to ask if she meant humanity might not make it, or Linh’s Inner Movement, but her next sentence shattered his thoughts.
“If you live through your inauguration, we might have a chance to save the world.”
He stared disbelievingly, not knowing which question to ask first. His throat closed, choking around words crumbling into fear and doubt.
“There are many threats, Hudson.” This young woman with ancient eyes looked back at his troubled face and put him at ease by her mere presence.
Who is she really? he wondered. And how in the world did she get in here?
“My friend, the Wizard, told me I could trust you. Is he right?”
“Do you trust your friend?”
Hudson didn’t know whom he could trust other than Melissa, Schueller, and Florence. Outside of those three people, everyone else seemed a possible enemy, and each day closer to the election it became even more difficult to discern friend from foe. He wanted to trust the Wizard, but there was so much going on that didn’t make sense, and there were also too many unaccounted-for years. He knew he had to be extra careful, even with him. Sure, the Wizard had not revealed the secrets of that night from their past, but he could just be saving it, knowing that information would be far more valuable if Hudson won the presidency. The Wizard and Gouge would possess the power to destroy him, thereby giving them a way to control the leader of the free world.
“I don’t know whom to trust,” he finally whispered, but she had long since seen his answer in his eyes.
“Don’t you?”
Talking to Linh was like climbing a mountain in a trance, and his frustration had reached its limits. “How did you get in here?”
“You have enquired about the Inner Movement?”
“Yes.”
“Then you know we work with the metaphysical?” She looked at him with an expression that seemed to say, Isn’t it obvious? and then, when he didn’t respond, she continued, “You’ve no doubt heard of UQP—Booker Lipton’s Universe Quantum Physics studies?”
“UQP is a rich man’s folly,” Hudson said. “I’ve checked it out, and I don’t believe any of it.”
“I know you don’t.”
“Then why are you here?” he asked, resisting the urge to ask again how she’d gotten in.
“Why did you come to see me in San Francisco?”
Her habit of answering questions with questions made him want to smoke a cigarette, something he hadn’t done since his days in the army. “I don’t know,” he admitted, as much to himself as to her.
Linh nodded knowingly. “Our fates are intertwined, Hudson.” She sounded so much older than him, even though she had to be twenty years younger.