The Justar Journal: An AOI Thriller

by Brandt Legg

  Chapter 20 - Book 3

  The Chief had about four minutes warning, thanks to her alliance with the Trapciers. The Imps had cracked into the P-Force system and discovered the planned attacks on the AOI.

  “Miner believes you will arrest him and seize his assets,” Sidis had told her. “P-Force is about to launch attacks on as many as sixteen AOI buildings in various cities. We are still trying to find out which ones.”

  “Lance Miner has gone mad,” the Chief had said.

  “His plan is to make the attacks appear to have come from PAWN, thereby starting the war and taking the focus off him. The AOI will obviously suspend all investigations at the outbreak of war.”

  “Of course. But what must he be hiding to take such extreme measures?” She hadn’t waited for an answer. “Keep me updated every ten minutes,” she’d said as she signed off, then immediately contacted the A-Council Chairman. “Sir, we are minutes from coming under attack.”

  “Details,” he’d demanded.

  “Lance Miner is about to bomb our buildings in multiple cities and lay the blame on PAWN.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Evacuations have been ordered. We’ll know in a couple of minutes.”

  And it all happened just as Sidis had said it would. The warning had not been in time to evacuate more than a handful of agents, and the AOI took heavy losses. Missing from the Imps’ warning were the prison riots. Those uprisings seemed to catch everyone by surprise. Between the prisons and the AOI buildings, enough blood was shed and trouble started that the “end” had begun. After more than seven decades, the fragile peace collapsed into a boiling caldron of war.

  The Chief immediately ordered AOI troops to seize PharmaForce properties, including the critical drug manufacturing plants, and in a move which Sidis had secretly predicted, the Chief decided to use the initiation of war as an excuse to purge the enemy. She authorized retaliatory strikes against many cities with areas suspected to be sympathetic to PAWN. Districts known to contain large pockets of Creatives or Rejectionists were hit. Statements were issued that the terrorists group known as PAWN had begun attacking en-masse. The Chief also allowed the media unlimited coverage. When the Chairman questioned that decision, she blasted his naïveté.

  “The population will be begging us to protect them,” she said. “They will be so terrified that they will turn in their own mothers and children in order for us to make the world safe again. Anything for us to restore their beloved entertainment sites.”

  “You turned off the entertainment?”

  “Of course. There is a war on. The people can’t expect sports and celebrities to keep on pretending everything is wonderful.”

  “It appears you were right about Miner all along. I owe you an apology.”

  “Accepted,” she said. “You’ve seen the initial reports. We have positively identified no fewer than eighty P-Force personnel at the sites of some of the attacks against us.”

  “Yes. Any idea where Lance is?”

  “We’re working on it. We’ve got people going to every known address, but that will take a while, and I doubt we’ll find him there.”

  “What about the prisons? Is he involved there too?”

  “Perhaps. As you know, he has long ties with Polis Drast, who is in custody at one of the rioting facilities,” the Chief said. “But it is too soon to confirm that connection. Sir, I must go.”

  “Of course,” he said. “Please keep us posted.”

  The Chief could barely suppress a smile when she thought about how quickly things had turned around. If she could end the war soon enough, they might make her World Premier. All they wanted was peace, and they did everything to avoid it, such as letting people like Lance Miner and Deuce Lipton get away with anything, including building their own private armies. But now that the war had started, they would do anything to stop it, therefore allowing her to strike both Miner and Lipton, which is exactly what she had planned.

  She zoomed Deuce in order to give him one chance to comply. If he were willing to officially join forces with the AOI and go after PAWN and P-Force, she would let him keep his army, his companies, and his fortune. But if not, she would go full force against the trillionaire. She would use his money to pay for everything.

  He has no idea the power we wield, she thought as she waited for the zoom to connect.

  Deuce, in the middle of his makeshift command center, looked at the INU, one of more than two hundred employed in his study, and hesitated.

  He knew who it was, and he knew what she was going to say. He just wasn’t sure exactly how he wanted to handle it. But what he needed more than anything, was time, so that would be his course of action. Do whatever he had to do to get more time for the picture to become clear, and, if possible, convince Munna to open the damned Justar Journal.

  “Chief, I’m glad you zoomed,” he began. “This sure looks like our worst nightmare scenario, doesn’t it?”

  “I can’t imagine things being much uglier right now,” she said. “But I think we will have much of this under control by the end of the day.”

  “I’m glad to hear it,” he said while authorizing troop movements on other VMs.

  “But we could use your help,” she said. “In fact, I must insist upon it.”

  “Of course. I’m happy to do whatever is needed in order to preserve Aylantik,” Deuce replied, continuing to click commands onto VMs as they spoke. One screen confirmed that the books were under water, another displayed more BLAXERs moving toward Ryder Island, and there were many showing AOI movements. He turned to face the Chief and said, “I’m with you. Just tell me what you want.”

  Chapter 21 - Book 3

  Toronto had so far been spared any attacks, but Miner and Sarlo were not celebrating.

  With his PharmaForce INU network offline, including the connection to his P-Force, Miner was unable to figure out exactly what was happening. With the outbreak of war, he abandoned the idea of safeguarding his system and was trying to get it back up, but that would take at least another hour or two because of the increased satellite traffic. He and Sarlo were doing their best with zooms and flashes, but attempting to manage the crisis as it spun out of control, and with such limited tools, made Miner crazy.

  “Hell, I feel like I’m digging my own grave with a torgon plantik spoon!”

  “They set you up,” Sarlo said. “Blaise must have known.”

  “It would appear so,” Miner replied, watching thirty VMs all showing battles or the aftermath of attacks. They were all Aylantik-sanctioned feeds on the Field that anyone in the world could see. Miner couldn’t access the back-door, private, or government networks until he got his own system back online. “The AOI thinks I did this. As if I, who wanted peace more than anyone on the torgon planet, would start a war!”

  “When we took our system down to protect it, they must have gotten it back up. Somehow shifted the protocols,” Sarlo said. “I don’t know, but we’ve got to regain control.”

  “If we can regain control of the system. They may have us locked out, and I don’t know anyone other than Blaise who can help us with that. And since he’s probably the one who sold us out in the first place‒‒”

  “There has to be another way. Who’s using us? PAWN? Trapciers? Maybe even the AOI?”

  “I don’t know, but the Chief has shut me off the Digi-link!” Miner suddenly yelled, trying to open accounts on a VM. The Digi-link acted as a central bank for the entire world. Without access to it, one was essentially without funds. “She can’t stop InvisiLine.” He allowed himself a hopeful laugh.

  InvisiLine, a control currency and secret bank set up by his father years earlier to avoid just such an instance, was encrypted currency that could not be traced or blocked. Although the senior Miner put the InvisiLine in place in case of something more along the lines of a political enemy trying to cut off his funds, in recent years, with the worry that war could disrupt Digi-Link, Lance had stashed billions in InvisiLine.

/>   “I’m going to win this Sarlo. Just watch me.”

  “The AOI has taken over four of our manufacturing facilities,” she reported.

  “I’m not surprised,” he said. “At least she’ll keep them safe from PAWN without our having to use our resources. We’ll get them back when the time is right.”

  “In the meantime we have to regain control of P-Force or we’re nothing but a couple of fugitives in an out-of-the-way, nondescript building.”

  “Don’t worry Sarlo. I may have spent my life trying to avoid war, but that doesn’t mean I’m a pacifist, or a man without a plan!” Miner had found a second wind, and he’d always liked challenges, even if this would be his last.

  “I’m counting on it.”

  “Look at this, would you?” Miner pointed at his private INU. “Blaise Cortez returns to the scene of the crime.” Miner maneuvered his fingers to accept the zoom and project Blaise’s hologram into the room. As soon as it came through, Miner punched “Blaise” in the face. “You damned guttersnipe!”

  “Lance, my, my, such violence from a guy who is afraid of war.”

  “Blaise, I swear I will find you before this is all over and show you what war feels like.”

  “Really?” Blaise flicked his long brown hair out of his face and mimed a kiss to Sarlo. “If you want to fight so badly, I’ll arrange a meeting with you and Deuce because, contrary to your obviously erroneous and premature conclusions, I am not responsible for your problems, nor am I your enemy.”

  “Hell, Blaise. Even if I could believe you, even if I wanted to, I can’t believe a thing you say.”

  “Why is that? Did you flip your pretty silver coin and it told you not to?”

  “No. I can’t believe you because all you do is lie. You’ve been selling secrets for so long that you’ve forgotten how to recognize the truth. Because you don’t care if your information is true or not, so long as it fetches a good price.” Miner glared at Blaise. “How does it feel to have sold your soul for a little gold?”

  “You tell me.”

  “This zoom is finished.”

  “Lance, the only thing that’s finished is you and your empire unless you listen to me.”

  “Ha!” Miner smiled angrily. “You must think‒‒”

  “Sarlo, please,” Blaise began, looking lustfully at Sarlo, “please, save him one last time. Tell him to listen to me before it’s too late.”

  Sarlo closed her eyes, searching for an answer. Normally she knew when Miner was blowing too fast, but she thought Blaise was a snake. “We took our system down as you suggested, and in our absence the world went to war.”

  “Yes, most troubling,” Blaise said.

  “Most troubling, indeed,” Sarlo replied. “We are getting the blame.”

  “Sarlo, we’re wasting time,” Miner said. “I’ll have assassins find this weasel.”

  “Weasel? Is that the best you can do?” Blaise asked, then he winked at Sarlo.

  “We can’t seem to get our system back up,” Sarlo said.

  “Of course not,” Blaise answered. “The Imps have it completely captured.”

  Miner shook his head.

  “Can you get us back?” Sarlo asked.

  “Your question insults me far more than your boss’s schoolyard name-calling does,” Blaise replied, feigning a hurt expression at Sarlo. “Why would you ask such a thing when you know that I can?”

  “Do it then,” she said.

  “After.”

  “After what?”

  “Lance has a conversation with me without his rude slurs.”

  “Forget it,” Miner said. “He’s the devil.”

  “There he goes again.”

  Sarlo looked at the VMs showing the latest news. Four more cities had Sonic-bomb attacks, and an unidentified rebel base had fallen to the AOI. She recognized it not as a rebel base, but actually as a P-Force outpost in Mexico. Time was evaporating, and so were their chances to save Miner’s empire. They had to trust the last person they should trust.

  “Lance, we have nothing more to lose. Blaise is our best chance,” she said.

  Blaise wisely stayed quiet.

  Miner looked at her as if she had just told him to jump from the roof.

  “They are taking your assets and breaking up P-Force. We must get the system back up.”

  Miner shook his head and took a deep breath. “Tell me what you have to say,” he said to Blaise, tightening a fist in his pocket.

  Blaise had to stop himself from saying, “Now there’s a good lad,” and, in the seriousness of the situation, he even suppressed his near constant smile. Then he said the last thing either Sarlo or Miner expected to hear from Blaise Cortez.

  “Lance, I need your help.”

  Chapter 22 - Book 3

  Deuce promised the Chief full cooperation. She didn’t believe him, but without evidence she could not move against him. Although Deuce and Miner were rivals and they each had sizable private corporate armies, their level of power was not even in the same neighborhood.

  Deuce, because of Eysen, Inc., StarFly, and all his other tech companies as well as three generations of infiltrating the Aylantik government, including AOI systems, had no equal. Miner’s power was almost all linked to the Aylantik through the Council, the Health-Circle, and the AOI. The Chief’s main objective was to avoid, or at least delay, the need to take on the BLAXERs.

  Deuce was confident that he had time, but he had seen the prophecies, and knew worse trouble lay ahead. Too close ahead, he thought, as he stared at the VMs in his study, which were now showing the prophecies from the building on Runit Island. They were changing, and getting worse. He expected that his zoom with the Chief would have improved things, but so far it had not.

  Looking at the eight books that made up the Justar Journal, Deuce tried to figure his next move. The eight books were now completely digitized in his system and feeding the interpretations of the prophecies, so the physical copies were no longer needed, but he couldn’t bear to send them into the ocean depths. Just before slipping them into a small pack, he held them, hoping for a magical inspiration, or at least to feel some sense of their power.

  Nothing. The books were just books. It was the order of the letters they contained that gave them power.

  The VMs, with the live screens, showed more attacks on other cities. He turned back to the prophecies. The Justar Journal was rewriting again. He knew they were safe from the AOI, and that PAWN was still in a mostly defensive posture, so he expected improvements. Instead, the situation had deteriorated further. What the hell is happening? he wondered urgently. I’ve got to talk to Munna.

  Then he saw something in the prophecies that made him grab his INUs and the pack with the books, and run from the room.

  Deuce found his wife and daughter and scrambled them onto a boat. He kissed them both and told the captain to head out to sea. His wife pleaded with him to come, but knew he wouldn’t. She’d learned a long time ago that Deuce had been born for greater things. His daughter knew it too, for she shared the same burden.

  With great wealth comes great responsibility. If humanity survived and the Lipton legacy remained intact, she would one day carry on that mantle which, in Deuce’s case, meant to help save the future.

  Deuce watched their boat speeding away, while continually checking the sky for any threats. By the time he got to Runit Island, Twain, Grandyn, and the others were at the docks getting into two boats. They’d all seen the same thing in the prophecies that prompted him to evacuate his family. He’d assured his wife that he’d personally get Twain to safety.

  “How long do we have?” Grandyn asked as soon as he saw Deuce.

  He checked his Eysen INU. “Twelve minutes.”

  “Who is it?” Nelson asked.

  “I don’t know,” Deuce said.

  “Munna blanked the VMs, but what about the INUs?” Fye said. “The BLAXERs took the INUs.” She pointed at the two men who’d loaded the books and were now jogging toward them.<
br />
  Deuce jogged to meet them. They handed him the INUs from the building, which he inserted into a strap that went from his shoulder to his belt, filled with other Eysen INUs. It made him appear as an old-time bandit wearing lines of ammunition. He quickly gave the men orders, and they immediately began talking into their INUs, relaying the commands.

  “We’ve got to go!” Deuce yelled.

  Munna was the last to board the boat. She stood staring out at the spot where the books were sunk.

  “Don’t worry,” Deuce said. “They’ve removed the Nano-camo, and if anyone bothers to check the satellite surveillance, it will show a large shipping container leaving this island the day before you arrived. It was unloaded last night in San Francisco and from there the trail will get lost. If anyone is still concerned with the books after the start of the revolution, they’ll never think to look in the water off this tiny island. The books are gone . . . and they’re safe.”

  “It’s not the books I’m worried about,” Munna said.

  Deuce nodded. “In order to change it . . . we need to live.”

  “I’ve wondered many times over the past few years if you were up to this task, Spencer Lipton,” Munna said. No one had called him by his given name for as long as he could remember. “You and your father were named after an old friend of mine. Of course, he was a friend of Booker’s too. I hope you have more of him in you than just his name.”

  “Me too,” Deuce said. He’d heard stories about his namesake, Spencer Copeland, but was surprised to learn that Munna had known him. Of course he then realized he shouldn’t have been surprised at all.

  She reached up and put her small, soft, pale, wrinkled hands on his brown cheeks and looked into his eyes. “You have no idea how hard this is going to be. You have to make every right decision. You must trust only the worthy, and know just when to let go.”