Balance of Power Shifted

by Karl, Victor

  “This shit is getting out of control Carl. I have Joe Public and the press knocking down my Director’s door wanting to know if we have terrorists operating on US soil. That explosion in New Jersey, seen by thousands of people in Atlantic City, caused a near riot, and now we have two more dead US citizens. Have you had any luck running those faces we sent you from the Efficio’s security cameras,” Agent Morgan asked?” Put your skirt down Betsy,” Carl cracked to Matt. “It sure appears that our actors are coming out of the Middle East. The two dead idiots out at the San Diego site are Yemeni operatives based on their identification. It appears they came through Canada about three weeks ago, but we do not know how they got into the US yet.

  The two assholes from the New Jersey site did a nice job of hiding their features and we are not hopeful for identification. We have feet on the ground all over Europe and the Middle East trying to figure out where this activity is coming from. There are no Jihadist fractions chattering about this and none taking credit for it. It’s almost as if they are unaware of what’s been going on over hear in the States.” “What information do you have about the Mississippi hit?” Carl asked. “We recovered the getaway vehicle about five miles away at a Wal-Mart. Stolen the day before in Biloxi and the vehicle appears to have been wiped clean of prints. We are still viewing surveillance cameras in and around the Wal-Mart location to see if we can discern what happened to our perpetrators. The good news is that we think we have a lead on our copter pilot from Fish Island. Using the human resource records we confiscated from Pinnacle as well as some accounts payable records we were able to trace funds to a dummy aviation company and a helicopter pilot that we cannot locate named Bernie Masker. We were able to track a shipment of two helicopters that meet the description of the one used in the attack to the dummy company. Pinnacle has two other certified helicopter pilots, but they have rock solid alibis and I personally don’t believe they were involved in any way. I have a theory that Pinnacle is operating on behalf of some US based interests and using our Arabs pals as pawns in this whole deal. We need to get leverage on Pinnacle’s CEO fast or all his well-paid connections will obfuscate their involvement.” Matt hesitated before saying more, but then took a deep breath and said “Carl, we need to let Efficio know about what we found out about the Chinese and what they are up to with their deep sea excursion.” “Keep that information to yourself Agent Morgan, besides I don’t see what difference it would make to Efficio one way or another.”

  Deep in central Israel, Sal was a 15-year veteran of the Israeli Mossad and had risen up the ranks based on his keen analysis of finance trends. His boss, to track the projected impact of Electricus on the economies of their enemies, had chartered him. His report had blown his boss away as well as everyone up the ladder. His specialty was tracking finances specifically used by terrorists and terrorist governments against Israel. Twenty-four hours before his report was finished and distributed, Israel was putting final touches on a surgical strike into Iran to take out key political and scientific figures as well numerous sabotage teams to impede or stop parts of their uranium enrichment program, but now that was on hold as his report was discussed. He had just come from an emergency meeting with senior political and military leaders. Essentially his report determined that any country that depended on pumping oil from the ground to support their economy, military build out and support of terrorist groups will be fighting internal strife in just five years’ time as oil revenues evaporate as Electricus begins to become the dominate global power source. Simply put, without oil revenue, these countries would slip back to the way they were 50 years ago and most Western countries would have no need to intercede in the region anymore.

  The head of Mossad waited until Sal had finished and left the room before moving the discussion to a related but different topic. Using a slide show, he walked through the structure of Efficio for the other people sitting in the room and explained how the secret of Electricus was tied up in one man. With that, Michael Carter’s face appeared on the screen and he used that to say, “He and his partner discovered the Electricus organism and figured out how to reproduce it and apparently no one, including our own scientists have been able to unlock the knowledge. Electricus is the key to our national security and as Electricus goes so does Israel. We need to either discover the secret of Electricus or protect Michael Carter, which is becoming more paramount as attacks continue to rise against him and his company. We have also discovered a hot bed of activity coming out of the Vatican regarding the push of Electricus to third world countries through their government and various religious organizations. This appears aligned with Efficio’s founders and statements made that they want everyone to benefit from Electricus not just the well off. The interesting thing is that we have not been able to figure out how this has all been happening. We will continue to monitor and investigate. Gentlemen, I would like you to ratify our plan to protect Efficio called Guardian Angel.” The serious group unanimously affirmed the plan activated immediately.

  Ty and I met Fiona at the airport that night which brought a relived smile to her face. On the way, back she talked about the events in Mississippi and had nothing but praise for the workers at the site and Bao as they organized and made sure no one else was injured. She patted Ty on his back, and congratulated him for the two guards whose observation skills may have averted injuries or death. Lastly she talked about how the Mayor and town council had come out to the site immediately afterwards and told her they supported Efficio and that their local police department was already working with the FBI to figure out who was involved. “Mike” she said, “I was really worried that they would not allow us to rebuild since we are a target and it may put people in danger. They wanted it known that the people of Gulfport and Mississippi were not going to roll over in fear.”

  Halfway back to Picatinny, Mike’s phone rang and he saw that it was Agent Morgan. When Mike answered, Agent Morgan said, “Mr. Carter you and your company have the distinct trait of attracting danger wherever you go.” “Don’t we know it,” Mike replied. Agent Morgan, I’m in the car with Ty and Fiona, do you mind if I put you on speaker so all can hear?” “That’s your prerogative Mike since I want to talk about the investigation.” “Agreed,” Mike responded and put the phone on speaker. For five minutes, Matt regurgitated everything that he and Carl discussed including the fact that the CIA was also involved.

  From Mike’s perspective, there was not much, but there were some possibilities. Fiona and Ty had a couple of questions about the sites but not many. Agent Morgan seemed to be hesitating on something, so Fiona in here normal straightforward manner said, “Agent Morgan go ahead and spit it out already, we know you have something else you want to say.” “Your right” he responded, “and for the record you did not hear this from me.” A few minutes later the passengers in the car were stunned quiet. Mike of course knew what Agent Morgan had said to be true but had figured that there was not enough information for the professor to have been able to put 2 and 2 together. Fiona on the other hand had an ‘ah ha’ moment as all the pieces of the puzzle fell together for her and knew how important this information was. “The important thing to take away from this, in my opinion, is that China doesn’t want to stop you and is not involved in the attacks however they want to control Electricus and based on the death of the Professor are willing to take it as far as they need to.” “Agent Morgan,” Fiona said, “Where did this information come from?” “I think you already know the answer to that Ms. Paschel and by the way the information just keeps coming and coming.”

  When Fiona was alone with Mike, she asked, “So what does it all mean if the Chinese launch an expedition to locate Electricus?” Mike, more thinking out loud instead of answering her question directly began saying “well, they need to put an expedition together that has deep sea exploration capability to at least 1500 feet, which could take weeks to organize. If they were lucky enough to find the same plant that Bill discovered, they would have to make a direct
correlation between that plant and the Electricus organism and if they can isolate Electricus, they will have to figure out that the Arsenic element inherent to the plant is the key catalyst for reproduction. So there are a number of tough hurdles that they have to overcome to be successful however if you asked me if it is possible I would have to say yes. Will they be successful? I do not know if they will or not, but I would give them a 50-50 chance of succeeding. By that time, we should be so entrenched in having Electricus available worldwide and would have the funding and infrastructure in place that our goal of distribution to the very needy countries and people will be a given. At the end of the day and China does not know this, the billions they would have to fork over for licensing would be a pittance to what they would gain in doing away with most of their energy costs. It is not as if they would make a fortune with Electricus on the open market since we are setting the bar low.

  The next morning Fiona sat in the kitchen of our base house in what we wore to bed. I had a pair of gym shorts and a t-shirt on, while Fiona on her favorite Victoria Secret’s pajama set. Since Bill was ahead of us by 6 hours, we decided to do a video chat with him before we headed out to Fiona’s parents for an extended family get together. Even though we were there over Thanksgiving, they insisted on getting us there only a couple of weeks later since some relatives were in town. I was looking forward to it since we had actually been working and travelling on weekends and this would be a good day of rest. Good thing there was no mention of Fiona’s name regarding the attacks or her mother would be on the phone fussing about her for hours. The video stream with Bill was established and it took another 10 seconds for the audio stream to sink up and in that time I can almost hear what Bill and Charlene were saying as they pointed at the screen and laughed at us in our pajamas. “Dressed for success,” Bill led off, while Charlene said to Fiona, “I have the same pair of those and they are my absolute favorite.” “Mine too” Fiona gushed as only can happen with two women talking about clothes.

  After filling in Bill on the attacks, he appeared to get dejected when he realized the dangers we had been dealing with in the US and I could guess he thought he was not carrying his own weight. I was sad to see Bill’s heart wrenching reaction to the additional news that the Professor died because of knowledge we had provided. He was concerned that our secret may not be secret in the future. “Man” Bill said, “Professor Greyson was one of the good guys and dedicated to students. I cannot believe he or they figured out the relationship between Electricus and the school’s published find. Unfortunately, I did provide him with the coordinates on the find before we figured out Electricus.”

  I rehashed with him my conversation I had last night with Fiona on what the Chinese might gain from this and he was in alignment with my thoughts. He knew a lot more about what it takes to put together a deep-sea exploration and to find essentially a needle in a haystack at 1500 feet below the surface of the ocean. His assessment was contrary to mine only on the Chinese chances of success being lower at 30-40 percent. “Mike, I need you to come over here as soon as you can. I have been working on a solution to eliminate the need for you or me to spend all of our time at the production plants modifying the seawater chemistry. At the rate we need to produce product it is physically impossible to be able to add the catalyst to all the tanks at all the production sites. What I have done is create a closed system that accepts the seawater into a 5000-gallon tank, the automatic addition of Arsenic happens, and the tank is agitated to ensure the mix is complete. The entire process takes little over 10-minutes, which includes the use of high-speed pumps to bring in the fresh seawater and to pump out to a new holding tank for the reproduction process to complete.

  As Bill was describing the issue and the solution, I was visualizing what he was saying and once again, I was amazed at how easy it was for him to identify and then work though issues like this. “Bill that idea sounds like a great solution but how often do we need to restock the catalyst?” “My estimate is between 4-5 months,” Bill said. Even though I have worked out some security around locking down the distribution system, I do not want to tell anyone what it actually does. We can say we are testing water quality and install some water quality testing tools and meters as part of it. For the rest of the meeting they set up an itinerary for Mike to come over to Italy to see the work Bill and Charlene had accomplished and also the location for 2 or 3 more regional corporate locations which were finalized to Sao Paulo, Brazil, Accra Ghana, Mombasa, Kenya, Butterworth and Sydney Australia. “Let’s set it up Bill,” Mike agreed.

  We rolled up to the Paschel home around 1:10 and only 10 minutes late. There were a few cars in the area, but it seemed peaceful, well that all ended when we walked in the front door. Walking in and putting down some wine and pastries we had brought, Mrs. P met us in the foyer to greet us. “Come” she said, as she started to walk to the back of the house where the kitchen and family room was. As soon as we rounded the corner, we were knocked back with shock as the 50 people crammed into that space yelled congratulations! Mrs. P was beaming as she saw absolute surprise on our faces. There were relatives that had not been around for a while as well as neighbors who knew Fiona and of course our Efficio brethren. Kristen was looking quite pregnant and Taylor and she were eating up the attention they were getting. Sean and Steve were there and were already badgering Fiona on why she was going to marry me. The Filamore’s were in deep conversation with Fiona’s dad and it sounded like they were talking sports. It seemed that every time I tried to put food in my mouth one of Fiona’s relatives started talking to me, so I think it was about two hours later that I was able to taste some of the delicious food that Mrs. P had prepared.

  We had brought our overnight bag so at the end of the party we just crashed there with Fiona in her room and me on the basement family room couch since a number of out of town guests were staying there. As I laid down, Fred who was now about 85 pounds decided he wanted to sleep on the couch with me, but after a brief discussion, he settled for the floor. It went through my mind that we would not be able to wrest him away from Mrs. P in the future. As I drifted off to sleep, I thought it was nice that Fiona had so many caring relatives and was happy that I would be soon part of it.

  A few days later, after landing at the International Airport Leonardo da Vinci di Fiumicino near Rome, I met Miguel and another Clavis security agent who had flown in the day before. Using their rental vehicle, which was a large Mercedes sedan, we drove north along the coast for a couple of hours to the marina area of Montalto. If how beautiful a location is contributed to the success of the venture this one was a guaranteed success. Not only was I staring out the window for the entire ride at the gorgeous scenery and glimpses of the emerald Mediterranean, but also I was enthralled with the building and vantage point on the water. The building did not come cheap, but was at a perfect location on the water, easy access to transportation and enough square footage under roof to meet our needs.

  Since the facility housed yachts and powerboats of the well to do, there was already decent security in place with the stonewall topped with broken glass and barbed wire, but all done in a manner that it blended in with the other buildings and not look like a minimum security prison. We were able to drive through the front gate after it opened automatically for us by someone inside. Then we drove right into the building through the large loading dock door as it opened as if by magic as soon as we approached. As soon as we drove inside, the loading dock door came clanking down.

  As I got out of the car, a man with long blond hair, full beard and thick framed glasses approached. Senor Hart at your service he said as he shook my hand. I was somewhat distracted while looking around the facility because at the same time I was looking to see if Bill was here, and I was not paying much attention to the person in front of me. After a second or two, I focused in on Senior Hart in front of me and it was not until I discerned the telltale wiseass grin that I realized it was Bill in disguise. We both gave each other a strong man
hug and then I added, “That disguise is an improvement, you should adopt it permanently.” “Yeah it’s good to see you also dude” Bill joked. “Come on out everyone and meet my good friend Mike Carter.” As soon as he said that about 9-10 people came out of what looked like an office area and marina supply store. As the others were coming over, he said to Miguel and me “remember I am William Hart to these people and in public.”

  The first person Bill introduced me to was Father Jovinni and based on the way he was introduced my guess was that these two had some kind of bond together. I already knew who Father was and that he was privy to a lot of information so I said “thanks Father for all your help” and conspiratorially said “and it looks like our friend William here is healthy as can be.” “No doubt,” Father said in very good English, but with Italian accent that would do well on the big screen. The other people were his plant manager, who appeared to be a solid conscientious type and a group of workers as well as the two day shift Clavis security guards. I introduced the manager and the security team to Miguel so that they could compare notes and prepare for the modifications to meet Clavis requirements.