That had been one of the conditions to TrashTalk’s investment. While Chad and Sanjay were still in the Valley, Josh had pitched the reverse auction idea – why wait for viral marketing to take the Company to a paltry $20 or $30 million valuation? Why not conquer the world in record time – go for an IPO at a billion dollar market cap in 18 months? After all, the TrashTalk fund had $900 million to put to work, so Josh couldn’t waste his time and his investors’ money with any Company that couldn’t soak up its fair share of cash. TrashTalk money was for big boys, not kids who didn’t have the vision and the cojones to swing for the fences. Who could blame Chad and Sanjay for being blown away? Only a year before they’d been roommates in college, and now a famous venture capitalist was telling them they were geniuses. Soon they were being profiled in Wired Magazine – not long after, Chad appeared on The Daily Show, and how cool was that?
Frank thought he was going to puke. He remembered Josh from his MIT days, although he was sure that Peabody wouldn’t remember him. Back then, and for quite a while thereafter, Josh had been nothing special. But then he’d been lucky enough to be in the right start-up at the right time. It got snapped up by a big company in 1997, and for cash – a whole lot of cash. All of a sudden, Josh was a rock star. A few months after the sale, the old-line VCs who had funded his venture invited him to join them as a partner with hands-on Internet start-up experience. Josh’s company had been the one home run in their current fund, and they wanted to have someone with Internet credibility on the team as they went out to raise a new one.
Josh turned out to have the golden touch. Before the bubble burst, he brought the fund into some of the only late bubble-era companies that managed to sell for a tidy profit after the crash. But by 2003, he was tired of being under someone else’s wing, so he contacted a couple of up-and-coming young Turks at other West Coast VC funds and suggested they go out on their own. The smart money liked what they were pitched, and lo and behold – TrashTalk LP was born.
All of this could be learned from the extremely complimentary Wikipedia profile that Frank was sure Josh had paid someone to write. About the only detail it contained that didn’t scream money and success was the fact that Josh was gonzo over cats.
Venture capital and cats…. Just as the Big Man from Silicon Valley appeared at the cheese and cracker table, Frank remembered a sardonic idea he’d had years before. On impulse, he shot out his hand.
“What a pleasure it is to meet you, Mr. Peabody. I mean, what a privilege it is to meet you in the flesh – I’ve heard so much about you.” Josh gave a half-polite smile, and tried to side step his way past Frank to the food. But Frank matched him side-step for side-step.
“Say, let me get you a drink while you fill your plate,” Frank said. “What will it be?”
“Scotch and soda, thanks,” Josh said with resignation, realizing he’d been snagged for at least a minute or two. Frank gave the order to the bartender, and turned back to Josh. “Say, I’ve got an idea that I’ve always thought could be a real money maker. Let me take just a minute of your time to tell you about it.” Josh hoped the bartender would hurry; he’d been buttonholed this way too often in the past.
“You know, I heard what you said about volume now, revenues later, but I think having a revenue stream can still come in pretty handy – in fact, I believe that in difficult times like these, you really need two – and three revenue streams would be even better.”
Josh’s drink was ready now, but Frank was too quick for him. He grabbed it from the bartender and held on tight while Josh dropped his arm, itching to make his escape.
“So here’s the idea – I don’t need you to sign a non-disclosure agreement, do I? No? Great! It’s all about cats.”
With that, Frank thrust the drink into Josh’s hand. Against his will, the VC found himself wavering between the desire to flee, and curiosity over what kind of cat-centric business plan this oddball might have in mind.
“So here’s the idea – the first revenue stream, that is. Everybody loves kittens, right? I mean, they’re cute, they’re playful – who can help loving a kitten, even if they don’t really like cats? But hey – everybody knows what happens with kittens. Before you know it, they grow up to be fat, snotty blobs of fat, and what do you have then? Just an arrogant, furry doorstop, that’s what!”
Josh was turning desperately away when Frank stopped him in his tracks. “So I asked myself, what if you could invent a perpetual kitten?”
Josh’s love for dollars got the better of him, and he turned around again. “And, uh, did you figure out how to do that?”
“Yes – sort of, anyway. Here’s how: we breed a line of genetically identical cats, just like they do with lab mice. Each one will be black, with cute little white mitten paws – maybe even six toes, for people that go in for that sort of thing – and we call every one of them “Fred” so they’ll always answer to the same name.”
Frank paused for effect, and then hit Josh with the clincher: “And instead of selling them to people, we rent them.”
“Rent them?” Josh asked blankly. “Why rent them?”
“Because that’s how you get a perpetual kitten, of course. Once your energetic, darling little Fred starts showing symptoms of morphing into a door step with a bad attitude, you trade it in for a new Fred, and Presto! You’ve realized the magic of the perpetual kitten! It’s really just like pet cloning, except much easier and cheaper – instead of paying a fortune to clone your kitty at the back end, you breed an endless supply of identical ones at the front end.”
Against his will, Josh found himself listening more closely. “That’s an interesting idea, in a totally weird kind of way. But you said there were three revenue streams?”
“Absolutely!” Frank suddenly looked at him suspiciously. “Say – are you sure I don’t need you to sign an NDA? No? Well, you are a VC after all, so I guess I can trust you. We’ll need the customers to sign NDAs, though, and that brings us to the second revenue stream.”
Frank looked to his right and then to his left to be sure no one could hear him, and then leaned closer to Josh. “Here’s the second revenue opportunity,” he said in a conspiratorial whisper. “So now we’ve got all of these superannuated Freds, right? But what can we do with them? They cost money to feed, and you couldn’t get much from someone who wanted to grind them up for fertilizer.”
Josh stepped back involuntarily, but Frank followed him.
“Luckily, though, there’s always a big demand at medical laboratories for cats for experiments, and it turns out they pay pretty good money if you can provide the pedigree of your pussies.”
A look of vague horror began to spread across Josh’s face. He tried to take another step back, but found that his back was already up against the wall.
“Don’t worry, don’t worry,” Frank laughed, pulling him back with an arm around his shoulders. “We won’t really have to sell the kitties to the nasty doctors – or at least not too many of them, anyway – mostly, that’s just a story we tell people when they come back for a Fred exchange.”
“You see, when the customer asks what’s going to happen to ol’ Fred after they turn him in, that’s when you casually mention the cat lab – and how cool is that? I mean, how often do you get to use a word like ‘vivisection’ as part of a marketing pitch? Anyway, when the customer hears that, they’ll almost never want to give poor Fred up to the guys with the scalpels.”
Josh waited, aghast. What could possibly come next?
“And that’s when you tell the customer about the lease buy-out option. It might have been cheap to rent-a-Fred to begin with, but if you don’t turn him back in, it’ll cost you a bundle!”
Frank stopped abruptly, beaming with triumph. “So what do you think?”
But Josh was already edging sideways in shock, bumping into someone and spilling his still-full drink down his shirt.
“Hey, wait a minute,” Frank called, “I haven’t even had a chance to tell you about my oth
er idea – you see, you pair the parents of thirtysomething couples who won’t give their folks grandkids with single parents that never get a weekend of peace to themselves.” But Josh had finally succeeded in escaping into the crowd.
Frank was still chuckling to himself when Marla, looking pale, found him.
“Sorry to leave you alone so long, Dad, I know how much you hate events like this. Did I see you actually talking to someone?”
“Yes indeed,” Frank said. “And this time around, I think you would have been proud of me.”
* * *
6
The Perils of Profiles
While frank was enjoying himself spear phishing venture capitalists, back at the Library of Congress files were flashing out of view like fireflies on a summer’s eve. One by one, documents important and banal, short and long, wafted silently off into the digital darkness to points unknown, leaving only Alexandria Project contribution screen code in their place.
Thus it was that at 10 on Friday morning, Frank’s office phone buzzed, and he heard the inevitably bored voice of the receptionist. “Your turn. Conference Room Two.”
Frank logged off his computer and stood up with a thoughtful look on his face. Just enough time for a little self-coaching as he walked down the hallway. Stay cool, he thought. Stay calm. You don’t have anything to worry about, so just tell the news.
That sounded good, but then again being interrogated – okay, interviewed – by a CIA agent wasn’t something he recalled reading in his job description. And it didn’t help that the interview sheet at the front desk included the names of only three other IT department staff, or that he was unable to figure out why their names appeared and others’ didn’t. Maybe those that did were just a cover for including him? Or maybe the counterintuitive choices were intended to confuse him and put him off balance? Anything was possible. Hell, this was the CIA, for Pete’s sake.
And while we’re at it, he thought, why were these interviews being conducted by the CIA at all, and not the FBI? Nobody knew at this point whether the attacks were coming from home or abroad, but the LoC was in the U.S., so shouldn’t this be the FBI’s turf?
Then there was the fact that nobody else being interviewed had any reason to be nervous. The little chats in conference room two were being passed off as just another part of the LoC security project. Per George’s latest email memo, the recent file grabs were part of stress testing the system, and the contribution screens were simply intended to dramatize the importance of the task at hand. Likely enough, only Frank suspected that these interviews were deadly serious. So while others might be expecting a half hour break from the tedium of their jobs, he had to worry whether any slip up would put him on a watch list.
The door was ajar when Frank reached the conference room. He paused to collect himself, and then rapped on the door frame before walking in.
Seated at the table inside was a man in his late twenties. Frank took in the expensively styled haircut, silk tie, and gratuitous suspenders. The CIA, it seemed, had sent over someone who had watched too many spy movies for his own good.
Frank had expected either some bored, bureaucrat type, or someone genuinely intimidating. Anyway, someone older and more experienced. Instead, he was going to be quizzed by this fancy-pants kid. As he walked into the room, Frank smiled at the young man’s self-important demeanor. Nothing that a stalled career, a big mortgage, and a weight problem wouldn’t cure in a few years, Frank thought. This would be a cake walk.
“Have a seat,” the young man said without rising. “Mind if I record our conversation?’”
“That’s a rhetorical question, I assume?” Frank responded, realizing he was off-script already.
“Actually, yes. Thanks for your permission.” The agent didn’t bother to look up as he cued up the recorder.
Frank flushed as he settled into his chair. “And you are?” he asked.
“Agent Cummings,” the young man replied in a distracted voice as he typed Frank’s name into the recorder. “Cybersecurity Investigations Unit.”
The agent pointed to the microphone in the middle of the table. “Okay, let’s get started. Please state your name and department.”
“Frank Adversego. Cybersecurity Snafus Unit.” Cummings looked up sharply. Frank smiled.
“Cute,” Cummings replied. “But that’s not your full name, is it? So let’s try that again.”
“Okay, Frank Joseph Adversego. Library of Congress IT Support Staff.”
Cummings paused and leaned back in his chair. “Okay, Mr. Adversego. One last try. Please state your full name, with no omissions this time.”
Frank was caught off balance by that one. As far as he knew, his full name didn’t appear anywhere in his employment file.
“Frank Joseph Adversego, Junior,” Frank stated evenly, but his eyes showed his surprise.
Cummings looked pleased with himself. “Don’t be shocked, Mr.
Adversego. We are the CIA, after all.”
“After all, you are,” Frank smiled back.
Cummings leaned back and looked Frank in the eye. “Doesn’t your dad mind you dropping the ‘Jr.’?”
“If you know I’ve got my father’s name,” Frank shot back, “then you know I haven’t seen the bastard since I was twelve.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out the thumb drive with the Alexandria Project screen shot on it. He began tapping it on his knee so he wouldn’t unconsciously start drumming his fingers on the table.
“That’s right, Mr. Adversego, as a matter of fact I do know that. Skipped out on you and your mother without warning, I believe. You have my most sincere sympathy. So maybe we can pick up some speed now, yes?”
An hour later, Frank was no longer angry. Just bored. Instead of continuing with pointed questions, Cummings had simply plowed through what appeared to be an endless series of questions, probably put together by some poor junior staffer confined to a windowless cell deep in the bowels of CIA Headquarters.
Frank sincerely hoped that staff person was Agent Cummings, who increasingly impressed Frank as a self-important prig without nearly enough mental horsepower to justify his ample self-regard. Frank had never liked company-man types to begin with, and being stuck in a conference room for an hour with a real Company man was testing his patience. Frank was playing with the thumb drive on the table now to amuse himself at the CIA agent’s unknowing expense.
Still, it was a relief to be responding to questions that were such easy lobs. Half were clearly intended to catch Frank giving answers that were inconsistent with facts in his personnel file or with questions asked earlier in the hour, while the rest seemed intended to nail down what his usual work day was like – what kinds of tasks he performed, what types of directories he needed to access, and so on. If this was Cummings’s big chance to play a real, grown-up Secret Agent Man he wasn’t making much of the opportunity.
Finally, Cummings paused and began shuffling through his notes. “So what do you think of the LoC’s security architecture?” he asked in an off-hand way.
Frank was sneaking a look at his cellphone and glanced up. “What do you mean?”
Cummings continued his shuffling. “That’s up to you. It’s an open ended question.”
Frank paused. Was this just another random question, or a trick one? What did Cummings expect him to say?
“Well, I guess it’s okay,” he replied.
“Okay? That’s pretty non-specific.”
“I guess you could say that. Or you could say that it’s an open-ended answer.” Frank smiled sweetly.
Cummings smiled back. “Okay. Let’s try this one then. Does the LoC’s architecture meet the standards of a MacArthur Genius Award winner?”
Frank wasn’t going to let Cummings get him off balance this time. “My, my. Didn’t you ever learn you can catch more flies with sugar than vinegar, Cummings? By the way, do you have a first name? Oh – I got it – it’s ‘Agent.’ Say – do you mind if I call you ‘Agent’? It’s fine wit
h me if you want to call me ‘Frank.’”
Cummings stared at Frank for awhile, weighing his options. “Carl,” he said finally, putting his notes down and folding his arms. “So now – Frank – how about telling me what you really think of the LoC’s security architecture?”
Frank nodded his head up and down happily. “Well, Carl, I’m glad we’re finally getting to know each other better. I’d think it would be tiring calling people “Mr.” and “Ms.” all day, not to mention being “Agented” back in response. It must be bad enough having to ask those same dead-end questions over and over.”
Frank paused. Carl glared.
Frank decided he’d made his point, and figured it would be foolish to overdo it. So he quit smiling before he began talking again. “Seriously, though, it’s not bad, for a big shop like this. Of course, any outfit this large can only do so well. But it’s pretty good.”
“Why do you say, ‘It can only do so well’?”
“Well, like most places, we go by the book, and everybody everywhere uses pretty much the same book, figuratively speaking, so the bad guys always know what they’re up against. That might be more or less okay, but everybody makes mistakes, and we do, too. Because everyone uses the same book, naturally those mistakes are pretty predictable as well. So all the bad guys have to do is wait for us to screw up in one of those predictable places, and they’re in the door.”
Carl starting taking notes again. “Why’s that? How do they know when you’ve made a mistake?”
Frank looked at Carl carefully for a second, and then started to feel more charitable towards him; he decided this kid really didn’t know much about IT, and here they’d gone and stuck him in the Cybersecurity Investigations Unit.
Frank continued in a more conversational tone of voice. “They don’t have to know when, just which mistakes are likely to occur. Here’s an example. You can’t just set up a network, make sure it’s secure, and then forget about it. We’ve got employees coming and going all the time, so that means we’re shutting down old and setting up new computers constantly. Every time, we’ve got to get everything right, or we might leave a hole in our defenses.
The Alexandria Project: A Tale of Treachery and Technology (Frank Adversego Thrillers Book 1) Page 6
