“The next time you hear the word drop come out of my mouth, I expect you to hit the floor and give me fifty pushups. Full pushups. And count them out loud so we can both keep track. Drop.” Olive ordered as she waved the pistol haphazardly in Zeke’s direction.
“Yeah right. You’re not going to shoot me.”
Olive cocked back the hammer, venom filling her eyes. Zeke dropped into pushup position and began calling them out.
Outside, Nathan finally got the occasion to cross the street for the laundromat. Unfortunately for him, Alphonse and Kent turned a corner and were approaching in their SUV at that exact moment.
“Look at this. I told you it would pay off to periodically return.” Kent said, pointing Nathan out.
They pulled over, watching as Nathan entered the laundromat.
In the laundromat, Nathan plugged the slug into a bathroom stall’s locking mechanism and twisted the door handle. As advertised, it worked.
He unzipped, sat down and was about to get comfortable when all of a sudden, the bathroom stall door burst open. Alphonse had kicked it in a moment before he kicked Nathan in the face. Hard. Nathan faded to black.
It was only moments later that Olive watched in horror, wondering what to do, as Nathan, his pants still at his ankles, was quickly carried out of the laundromat, thrown into an SUV and driven off. She bolted out, leaving Zeke collapsed from exhaustion.
To her credit, she scurried for her car and attempted to follow the SUV, but was momentarily blocked by a delivery truck, and by the time the delivery truck moved out of the way, the SUV had vanished.
The second crop duster sat idly in Waltona’s field. Olive was rummaging through her barn, stuffing assorted items into a duffel bag of her own. Whatever she was planning, she never looked so determined.
She exited the barn, only to be ambushed by Brady, as he grabbed her from behind, slapping a hand over her mouth.
“Easy, baby. Just here to collect what’s mine.” Brady breathed into her ear, pawing at the buttons on her shirt.
Olive struggled, eventually remembering the pieces of fighting advice Nathan offered. She stomped on Brady’s foot with all the weight she could muster. He didn’t collapse, but he let go of her.
She spun, thrusting an open palm upward into his throat. Brady crumbled to the ground in a heap, gasping for air, struggling not to black out.
Olive stood over him, amazed for a moment about what she had managed to do, but her amazement quickly turned to ire.
“I am seriously going to mess you up. Consider yourself lucky at this particular moment because I’m busy right now but I’ll be coming to look for you very soon.”
Olive just left him there, continuing to fidget in agony, fighting desperately for breath, as she made her way across a field toward the second crop duster.
Somewhere inside Corporate Area 51, Nathan, his face bruised and swollen, sat unconscious, strapped to a chair. Arms, legs, chest. Strapped. It was a large room, but almost as barren as a prison cell. One rectangular table and four chairs. And curiously, one potted corn plant.
Munda and Clarke stood by the door. Jenkins sat nearby. Kent, in his normal half-drunk haze, entered the room, sipping from a bottle of whiskey.
“He still out?” Kent asked the others.
“Alphonse clubbed him pretty hard.” Jenkins replied.
“You mean like this?”
Kent backhanded Nathan across the face, which had the effect of waking him. And as Nathan continued to come to, Kent lodged fist after fist into his body. Only Colin’s sudden presence managed to stop the onslaught as he materialized at the door with Roger.
“Kent!”
Kent backed off, surreptitiously camouflaging the whiskey bottle under his jacket. Colin wasn’t fooled.
“Please accept my apologies. Sadly, my son inherited few of my traits.” Colin told Nathan while maintaining his gaze on Kent.
Nathan nodded, no sweat, as he spit blood. Roger pulled a chair out for Colin to sit.
“You know, I hope you’ll believe me when I say that I hold a great deal of admiration for you, Nathan. Can I call you Nathan?” Colin asked.
“Can’t see why not if you buy me a margarita.”
“Fix Nathan a margarita.” Colin ordered Kent. Kent chuckled but abruptly stopped when he realized that Colin was dead serious. He reluctantly left the room.
“I think my admiration for you stems, at least in part, from your rather resilient nature. I mean, I send my men out to do a few simple tasks and here you are. Still quite healthy.”
“Reasonably. Quite is a bit of a stretch.”
“Well, reasonably then. But look, I’m glad you’re here, Nathan, because we have a few things to discuss.”
Colin regarded Roger, who, on cue, reached into his jacket and produced the folder Nathan gave Lidia, thumping it down onto the table. Nathan recognized it right away, of course, but he held Colin’s eyes instead, watching for the game, betraying very little.
“I believe you offered that to a mutual friend while she was dining at one of our area’s finer outdoor establishments… I couldn’t help but notice you looked a little surprised. That I referred to her as a friend.”
“If she’s your friend, I guess I’m just a poor judge of character.”
“Perhaps. But she’s a fine woman. And she’ll make an excellent senator. I’m hosting a fundraiser for her tomorrow night, as a matter of fact. Clandestinely, of course, we’re sworn enemies…”
“How much did you pay her? What did it take?”
“Don’t look so disappointed, Nathan. But you’re right, an emolument was involved. As you know, running for political office requires substantial capital. Sometimes our friends feel the necessity to pay off campaign debts in a timely and orderly fashion. Some even go on to find that a few of our publicly traded shares pay handsome dividend checks. In the end, all we’re looking for is a sympathetic administration. We believe governments should concern themselves with substantive matters instead of proselytizing against the dangers of genetically modified foods.”
“Call me old fashioned, but I think they should concern themselves with the health and welfare of their constituents.”
“Oh, but they do. Our industry provides governments with one of their largest and most reliable sources of revenue. We create millions of jobs.”
“That doesn’t outweigh the social costs.”
“Of course it does. Governments know that finding alternative sources of revenue would be neither easy nor popular, that adding workers and farmers to the lengthening lines of the unemployed would be politically unacceptable, and that destroying one of the world’s most successful industries would be seen as a supreme act of folly. Sonanfield Reed is as American as apple pie.”
“That’s a great story if you don’t think too hard about the misery that’s sure to be your legacy. You’re adding insulin to corn that ends up in baby formula.”
“Those kids are diabetic, Nathan. We’re helping them manage their disease.”
Nathan just simply shook his head.
“You’re still upset about your sister, I recognize that.” Colin continued. “Unfortunate, I admit, and I was the first to criticize, believe me, but the fact that she had dangerous enemies lent tenability to my son’s proposal. If you were both felled in a hail of bullets, the investigating authorities might justifiably evaluate that it was you who experienced the collateral harm, not her. Our justice system proved as much, there are two people serving life sentences for her premeditated murder. Of course, the real culpability lies squarely with you as far as I’m concerned. You killed your sister when you decided to start meddling in issues that were none of your concern. Conclusive evidence linking our products to dying bees or early onset diabetes in children would’ve placed us in a very ugly predicament, Nathan.”
“You bought yourselves some time. Nothing more. Someone else like me will come along.”
“I wouldn’t put too much faith in that because there
will be no reason for someone else like you to come along. The corn plant that’s sitting there by your feet will help ensure that. It’s a third generation hybrid. Genetically dominant over its predecessors. The new super corn. We’re very proud of it.”
“Is it free of insulin and statins?”
“Don’t be silly. How else would we manage the health concerns of some of our youngest citizens? Our products are substantially equivalent, as you know, so nobody will ever bother to investigate, nor will they have reason to. But if they ever do, our people have engineered our new super corn to disguise our additives and ensure they never manifest on any standardized test. Devilishly stealthy, and quite frankly, intensely exciting. Moreover, we’re now forecasting diabetes rates among some of our most impoverished citizens to fall dramatically over the next decade. And soon, I’m confident we’ll have masked the bee issue as well. In fact we’re almost there, I’m told.”
Kent reentered the room with a margarita and placed it on the table in front of Nathan. Nathan extended fake gratitude before bending to sip it, but his restraints prevented him.
“Can I get a straw?” Nathan asked.
“Untie one of his arms.” Colin ordered.
Kent untied one. Nathan took a sip.
“How is it?” Colin asked.
“Mom made much better.”
“Would you like to swap it out for something else?”
“Yeah, that’s a good idea, this isn’t going to work. How about something simple that your son won’t be able to screw up. Like a beer maybe. Lager if you have it.”
“Fetch Nathan a lager.”
Kent exited, seething.
“My son really is a good kid. Has an issue with drugs and fine spirits but he almost certainly inherited that from his mother’s side of the family. Many of them, including her, have since grown out of it, thankfully, so I’m hopeful he will too.” Colin explained.
“I could use a trip to the bathroom.” Nathan replied, in interrupted transition.
“I’ll keep the rest of this brief then. The contents of this folder are copies produced from original material you downloaded onto a thumb drive. It’s occurred to me that you may still have that thumb drive in your possession and I’d be willing to pay you handsomely to get it back. Then there’s the issue of your ransomware. It’s proven to be more annoying than expected.”
“Picked it up on the dark web. Three bitcoins. Not cheap.”
“You know, I thought about investing in those a long while ago but I couldn’t bring myself to trade actual hard currency for mined computer code, it just didn’t make any sense. Course, had I invested, I would’ve made a fortune, I believe I could’ve purchased at 600 dollars per and sold at over 16,000 only a handful of years later. How much did yours set you back?”
“A little over eighteen grand. Total.”
“You got a good deal.”
“Not bad.”
“Well, about your dark web purchase. We need your assistance in ensuring your ransomware goes away. Now, one million dollars is still a significant amount of money, but it isn’t what it used to be. Which is why I’m offering you two. Completely tax-free, by the way. One million for the thumb drive and another million for the ransomware to disappear.”
“Tax-free certainly helps incentivize, but I prefer odd numbers.”
“Name your price then, Nathan.”
“Five.”
“Five million it is.” Colin blurted out one millisecond afterwards.
“I wasn’t finished.”
“Oh. Please… continue…”
“Five in cash. Another five in Bitcoin.”
“So ten total.”
“Correct.”
“Ten is an even number, Nathan.”
“I appreciate you calling me out on that. Make it five and a half in cash and five and a half in Bitcoin. Odd numbers all the way.”
“Deal.” Colin said after considering Nathan’s new demand for another millisecond.
“Great. I’ll get back to you after you gather the assets.”
“I’m afraid that won’t do, Nathan. You tell me where to find the thumb drive and how best to neutralize your ransomware, and after my people confirm those things, I pay you and you get to walk out of here. What could be simpler?”
“You could let the woman go. I could walk out of here. In a couple of days, we could meet at one of the area’s finer outdoor dining establishments and cement the deal.”
“We’re both too stubborn, aren’t we?” Colin asked rhetorically. He produced a single-use burner phone and placed it on the table, heaving a lungful of air as he did so. Fake exasperation.
“Okay then. I was hoping we could somehow avoid this part, but here we are… The gentleman standing behind me is a rather pious fellow with deeply held religious convictions. He’s convinced the Grand Canyon was carved out over a matter of only a few days during Noah’s flood some twenty-three to thirty-three hundred years ago, for example, but that’s neither here nor there. What’s important from your perspective is that he categorically abhors violence. I promised he wouldn’t witness any if he joined me on this trip, so your safety is absolutely assured while you’re in his presence. The woman, however, is at an undisclosed location, safe and comfortable for the time being but her circumstances could quickly deteriorate. One of my men is with her, a humorless, mean-spirited fellow, nothing like you and I. I think I can still see part of his shoe imprint on your forehead. That’s a burner phone, they call those types. It’s meant to be used only once and it’ll ring another burner phone on the other end. If my man receives a call from this phone, I’m afraid that’ll be his cue to do some rather unsavory things to an aging woman. Slowly too, I’m sure.”
Colin started stabbing numbers.
“How do I know you won’t just kill her anyway? Right after you kill me?”
“You’re in a tough spot, Nathan. I can appreciate that.”
Colin continued poking at his cell phone – about to hit send. Nathan blurted out.
“The thumb drive is in my motel room.”
“My men have been through your motel room.”
“Did they bother checking to see whether the remote worked before demolishing the TV? The thumb drive is in the battery compartment.”
Colin found Munda and Clarke who were busy exchanging glances. Oops.
“You wouldn’t be lying to me, now would you, Nathan?” Colin asked.
“Just let the woman go.”
“The ransomware. How do we defeat it?”
“You’ll find clear instructions on a tiny folded piece of paper, also located in the remote’s battery compartment. Taped there. Be careful not to tear it, it’s my only copy.”
Colin silently instructed Munda and Clarke to check it out. They left.
“If you’re telling me the truth, you’ll be well on your way to becoming a reasonably wealthy man soon, and there will be no reason why anyone should be harmed.” Colin announced as he found his feet, sucking in his gut, adjusting his posture. Here was the general who enjoyed the war. No idea how the real soldiers felt because it was never his head. He exited, finding Kent just outside, returning with a lager.
“He claims the thumb drive and instructions to defeat the ransomware are located in a very specific area in his motel. I’ve sent Munda and Clarke. Don’t kill Nathan until we find out for sure.” Colin instructed, before disappearing with Roger.
Kent entered the room, tossing the lager into a wastebasket.
“Happy hour is over. Tie the son of a bitch back up.”
“Can I go to the bathroom, please?” Nathan asked.
“Shut up.”
Jenkins strapped Nathan’s arm to the armrest, recoiling all of a sudden to an objectionable odor.
“Jesus!”
“Sorry.” Nathan apologized.
“I think he really needs to go, Kent.”
“Let him go in his pants.”
Olive peered down at Corporate Area 51 from a familia
r overhanging ridge. Nathan had divulged its location and explained its purpose when he came clean about who he was, what he was doing etc., but this vista still proved to be a what-the-hell-was-she-looking-at moment. It appeared that freakish to her.
The compound, however, was no longer anywhere as congested as when Nathan visited because it was currently being run with a skeleton staff. The ransomware had crippled operations that much. Olive drew a deep breath and began her descent.
She slipped into the compound about thirty minutes later, avoiding a security camera in a similar fashion as Nathan had, but once inside, she looked frazzled and out of place as she walked about, not fitting in at all. It didn’t help that she was wearing a poncho. A man in a lab coat noticed her and approached, suspicious.
“Can I help you?”
“Oh, yeah, thanks, it’s my first day, I’m lost.”
“Who’re you looking for?”
“I’m not really sure, ah, the guy, you know, the boss.”
“Where’s your badge?” the man in the lab coat asked, completely wary now.
“Is this someone’s idea of a joke?” Olive responded, trying desperately to think quickly on her feet. She pointed into an empty room, vanishing inside as she did. When the man in the lab coat followed her in, he was greeted by an upward thrust to the throat with an open palm.
The man collapsed, gasping for air. Olive dragged him further into the room, apologizing all the way, explaining her situation, as if that would serve as incentive for him to forgive her. She tied his feet and hands with his own shoelaces, finding an electrical chord afterward and tethering him to a radiator. He eventually began crying out for help through a raspy voice box, which disappointed her because she had just poured her heart and soul out to him. So much for being honest and truthful. She ultimately gagged him, no longer apologizing as she removed his lab coat and threw it on, discarding her poncho.
Kent fought off an alcohol-induced hiccup as he swigged from a bottle of whiskey, glancing menacingly at a stoic Nathan. A couple of hours had elapsed since Munda and Clarke departed and Kent expected to hear back from them soon. He loaded a fresh clip into his gun in anticipation before holstering it back under his jacket, having already fantasized at length about the various techniques he’d employ as torture before dispatching Nathan.
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