by Jason Bourn
Randy went on, “A small group of us found out about this long ago. We had the advantage in that we could see this play out and it kept our group from going into VR in the first place. We have been secretly recruiting from the non-VR ranks to build up our numbers, but there is a limit to how many people – and the types of people – that never went into VR. Our strategy was to get your group to join us. This would represent the largest addition by far to our ranks that we have ever had. That is why we’ve been following you and decided to finally make contact. You would never have believed these claims had we made ourselves known to you a year ago. Our tactic was to let you see for yourselves – unless we waited, you wouldn’t have had the proof that I know you needed. Speaking of strategy and tactics, can you explain to me what these terms are in your own words?”
Calaes thought this was a peculiar request. He recognized that it was some kind of a test – a test he desperately wanted to pass if he wanted to get to the answers that only Randy seemed to have. “Strategy is what you want to accomplish and tactics are how you go about doing it.”
Randy shook his head. “Yes, that is the textbook answer, but that doesn’t show me you really know what these terms mean.” He looked closely at Calaes and said, “Convince me.”
Chagrined, Calaes tried again. “Maybe an example would help. Long ago, the strategy for everyone living was to get married, find a great neighborhood, buy a house, go to work, have some kids, get old and retire and sit on the porch talking about the weather. Tactics would be how you would go about finding the perfect spouse, the perfect neighborhood, the perfect house, and so on. So, the strategy is the big picture and tactics are the details.”
Randy nodded his head. “Much better. Strategy is the big picture of where you are going, whereas tactics are the smaller decisions on how specifically to get there. So how does this apply to,” he raised his hands wide signifying everything, “this.”
Calaes thought briefly. “The strategy has been to get a large enough group of people to Mars so they can establish a society independent and isolated from the powerful draw of Earth-based virtual reality that threatens to eventually doom the human race. The tactics have been the mechanisms to get those embedded in VR to want to leave VR, train them and shuttle them to Mars where a settlement was supposed to be built. As you know, both the strategy and the tactics are messed up due to the disclosures that we have found – with your help.”
“You know,” Randy smiled, “I believe you and I think a lot alike.” He paused for a moment. “So, does the strategy change, the tactics change or both?”
Calaes thought about it for a minute. Obviously, the tactics had to change, no question about that. But was there a fundamental flaw in the strategy? He didn’t think so. “The strategy seems good, but obviously the tactics will have to change.”
Randy nodded encouragingly, “So what tactics do you suggest given this new information?”
Calaes considered this. Thoughts about what to do had been bouncing around in his head ever since these issues had come to light. Randy had just been able to succinctly phrase the question in such a manner that it helped solidify the answers in Calaes’ mind. “We need to fight off the government that is trying to obstruct the building of the settlement, find the missing material and get the installation work started.” Calaes felt as if he had just been tested. He hoped he had passed. It was obvious that they needed Randy and his group to help make this happen. Without him, Calaes and the other candidates would still be blissfully ignorant of any problems. Looking back, Calaes tried to think how he could have, no should have, known about these issues. He couldn’t think of how he would have known – the government had done an extremely good job of covering it up. “I guess,” Calaes thought to himself, “I’ll just have to be a little less trusting and look a little deeper in everything I do.”
Randy chuckled at the wry expression that had come over Calaes’ face. “It is getting late so we should end this discussion. I think we should schedule regular get-togethers so we can get to know each other and figure out how to merge our two groups to make one big, better, stronger group. And this will help determine specifically what to do to move forward.”
Calaes said, “I am in full agreement, but I don’t know how to set up regular meetings without bringing unwanted scrutiny to both of our groups.”
Randy replied, “We foresaw this issue long ago. We modified the AI that provides your training campus’ cyber protection to allow us to communicate with you without the government being able to detect it. The government has hooks everywhere to detect unauthorized communications. In fact, if you hadn’t had this in place when you hacked into the government’s administration system you surely would have been caught. You see, it is in all our best interests that you not be caught. At any rate, with this modified AI in place, we can conduct regular meetings electronically. We should limit face-to-face meetings to not more than once a month, and keep the number of people to a bare minimum. Since you still have a legitimate reason to leave the campus, I suggest you be the main point of contact. We will limit the number of people on our end to a maximum of two or three key personnel. You have to keep knowledge of our group’s existence to a limited number of key people at first. When the shock has worn off, you can gradually increase the number. What do you think?”
Calaes didn’t know what to think. He realized that if he had time to think about it and come up with a plan, the plan would look exactly like what Randy had just said. “Sounds better than I could have hoped.”
Randy provided Calaes with the details on the upcoming electronic meeting, and walked Calaes back to the door. The walk to the elevator all the way until he landed and was safely back in the training campus was a blur for Calaes. His brain had been exploring all the ramifications of the recent conversation. He didn’t know how everything was going to turn out, but he did know that everything was much more complicated than he could ever have anticipated – and that he was exhausted and was going to sleep very well that night.
CHAPTER 20
The first electronic meeting was about to begin and Calaes looked around to see if everyone on his end was ready.
He had broken the news in a meeting the day after he had met with Randy. He had decided that the easiest way was to start with the three team-leads that had been involved with the government’s administration system hacking: Anya, Nancy and Antony. All three had been wondering how he had found out about the issues that he had asked them to look into. So, although it was a shock to them, they were somewhat expecting something along the lines he told them about. Calaes was pleasantly surprised that it had gone so smoothly.
Now would be the chance for Calaes and these three to meet with the small group of leaders from Randy’s group. Calaes wasn’t sure what to call this group – he hadn’t thought to ask before, but he wanted to be sure he remembered to ask during this meeting.
“I still can’t believe that they hacked our AI and I hadn’t noticed it,” Anya said. “They certainly do good work there, really sophisticated – I’m impressed. I’m really looking forward to working with them.”
“If their engineering talent is as good as their coding talent then we should be in pretty good shape,” Antony commented.
Calaes added, “Well, I have to tell you that Randy is very good. He always seems to be way ahead of me. That said, I enjoy working with him – he seems so honest. A funny thing to say since we’re probably breaking hundreds of laws in going against the government.”
Just then the meeting started. Three new people “appeared,” sitting across the table from Calaes and his three candidates. Calaes was always impressed with the technology – the people really looked like they were there. Randy’s image was there, of course, but also “present” were two new people.
One was an older man, perhaps five years younger than Randy – probably in his mid-fifties. His hair was turning gray, which was odd in this day and age. But what was even more strange was that he was
losing his hair. They had figured out how to fix both the graying and hair loss issues years ago. He obviously was not vain – if he cared at all he could easily have those issues fixed.
Randy pointed to the man and said, “Please meet Tomas Guerrero, lead systems engineer. He is a good person and a good friend. He is also the best systems engineer that I have ever met. A systems engineer,” he explained, “is responsible for everything from cradle to grave. From the initial concept development, through requirements generation, working with the designers to ensure they understand the requirements, through integration, verification and product support, all the way through decommission. You see, our organization gets things done. As such, we’re very engineer-heavy. That means most of our people are engineers – they’re really good at getting things done. Engineers are not known for their people skills, but Tomas has the knack for being good with engineers and good with ‘normal’ people as well.”
Tomas nodded and smiled. “Randy is too kind. We all do the best we can here. I’m sure as you get to know us, you’ll find that we are out to follow the plan that Randy has laid out. We’d like to get your groups’ inputs and add it to our plan to make it even better.”
“Thanks Tomas,” Calaes said. “I appreciate your confidence in us.”
Randy went on, “I’d like to also introduce this lovely young lady, Hope Holmes.”
Calaes’ attention shifted for the first time to the young lady. She was young, perhaps eighteen years old. He wondered what she could possibly be here for. She didn’t look old enough to be a lead, but then he thought that he himself was only twenty-three years old – so maybe he was overreacting. She was quite pretty, though, with long shiny straight golden-brown hair, a very nice smile and a cute button nose.
Calaes felt a little irritation wash over him. This was probably the most important meeting he had ever been in and he was noticing her cute nose. He admonished himself – “Stay on track,” he said to himself.
Randy went on, “Hope, you will find, is one of those few among us that is not an engineer. She is kind of my right hand ‘man’, as it were. You will find she has a phenomenal ability to understand and plan the big picture. She understands strategy and tactics as well as or better than anyone. She has been a major contributor to our plan – I cannot tell you how much we rely on her.” He paused and smiled, then went on, “And for full disclosure, I should tell you that she is my daughter.”
She looked briefly at each of Calaes’ teammates. When her eyes met his, she smiled and Calaes sat up a bit straighter and smiled back. Again, irritation washed over him. He was actually trying to impress her. His conscious mind couldn’t understand why he was doing this. He had never done this before and now was not a very good time to start. Frowning, he said “Welcome to our team.”
Seeing his frown, she smiled even brighter. “Is anything wrong?” she asked.
Calaes thought of plenty of responses, though none very good. Grasping at one so as not to be left gaping he said, “You seem awful young to be here.”
She responded quickly, “Yes, you seem to be young as well. Perhaps we should both leave the meeting now?”
Calaes felt stupid. He rarely felt stupid, but he figured he should cut his losses and move on. “I meant that as a complement Ms. Holmes. You have accomplished a lot, independent of years.”
She smiled even more brightly and said, “Thank you. I’m sure we will get along just fine. I hope so since we will probably be working together quite a bit – that is if that’s all right with you.”
Calaes nodded, figuring that he would get in less trouble if he just remained silent.
“And I,” continued Randy, “am Randy Holmes. I have the honor of being the leader of our group of desperados. We all welcome you to our team. We have a common vision and a common enemy – the government. I’m sure that when we join your resources with ours, anything is possible.”
Calaes then introduced everyone on his team. There were “Welcomes” all around.
Randy waited until the pleasantries had completed and everyone looked expectantly at him. “The main purpose of this meeting is to introduce ourselves and to answer any questions you might have. This will enable us to move forward in a common, coordinated fashion.” Randy waited until someone spoke up.
Calaes asked, “How many people do you have in your group?”
Randy responded, “We have roughly the same number as you do, a little over five hundred. Again, we are mainly composed of engineers with the express purpose of getting things done. Our leadership team decides which items are the highest priority and we focus on getting these done first. We have been able to keep ourselves hidden from the government using funding from several generous benefactors and through the use of our engineering talent. We have some of the best engineering minds ever assembled at our disposal.”
Anya asked, “How were you able to modify our AI without us even knowing about it? I am not a bad IT person, but I had no idea of your intrusion until you notified us.”
Tomas responded, “Don’t short yourself. You are one of the best. We just had the advantage of several years of work. While you were in VR for years, we were busy putting these systems in place. Don’t feel bad – we intentionally made it difficult to detect. We couldn’t afford to have the government find out about us. The stakes are way too high. We can go into all the technical details at a later time. I’m sure that everyone here would appreciate that.” Looking around Anya saw agreement and relief in everyone’s faces. She couldn’t help that she was interested in this – even if it didn’t make the top of everyone else’s list.
Everyone was quiet taking the latest information in. This allowed Calaes to remember the question he wanted to ask. “So, what do you call yourselves?”
Randy responded, “We don’t really call ourselves anything. We are just a team working toward a set of goals. What would you like to call us?”
Calaes responded, “We need to be able to call you something. I don’t know, how about ‘renegades.’ That was a term you used. Or maybe ‘rebels’ or ‘liberators’ or even ‘saviors.’ ”
Randy laughed, “Now, don’t get carried away. The term ‘Liberators’ and especially ‘saviors’ sounds a little over the top. I kind of like the term ‘rebels.’ It makes me feel like we’re doing something of value outside the system – which is what we are doing.”
As the time for the meeting to end was fast approaching, Calaes inquired as to the next meeting.
Randy spoke up looking at Calaes, “I would like you and Hope to meet and discuss the strategy and tactics moving forward in more detail. As I said, she understands strategy and tactics better than anyone. Please set up a mutually agreeable time.”
Calaes was a little taken aback. He had not anticipated this request and was a bit flustered. Thinking about it, though, he thought it was a pretty good idea. The most important thing was to start at the top-level ideas and work their way down. It didn’t make sense to start in the minutia and get lost concentrating on the wrong problems. Calaes nodded and said, “How about next week at the same time. It worked this week, so hopefully it can work next week too.”
Hope looked at him and smiled. “Whatever you’d like. I’m available.”
Calaes nodded and was about to turn away when he realized that what she had said could be taken several ways. He frowned.
When she saw his frown, her eyes lit up with amusement. Smiling, she said turning to her father, “I’m sure Calaes and I are going to get along just fine, I can tell already.”
As the three rebel remote team members’ images winked out, Calaes felt a little out of sorts. Like he had just been played with. He didn’t like feeling like a mouse – he much preferred the cat’s role. Well, he’d have to be much firmer when talking with Hope next week. However, he suspected that would not be easy.
These thoughts were quickly swallowed up with the subsequent conversations with Anya, Nancy and Antony. They were all quite impressed with the oth
er group’s capabilities. The “other” group – he was going to have a hard time calling them the rebels. Yet, as he thought about it, it made sense. The thing that struck him most was not that they were rebels, but that now officially Calaes and his group were acting as rebels as well.
CHAPTER 21
Calaes had been waiting impatiently all week for the meeting with Hope. He both looked forward to it and dreaded it. She somehow knew how to get under his skin, and that was not something that anyone else had been able to do. And he had just met her.
But he had to admit that she was intriguing. She was obviously smart, like her father. And he did like her smile. However, he wasn’t sure he liked her sense of humor – he always seemed to be the target of her jokes. And that bothered him more than he cared to admit. He realized that he needed to act more professionally with her if they were going to be able to work together. In fact, maybe it would be wise to be a bit more stern than normal to keep her natural ebullience in check.
He realized that he was fidgeting, waiting for her to show up. He was glad that this was an electronic meeting – he wasn’t sure he could keep his hard veneer that he resolved to show if this were a real face-to-face meeting.
Just then she appeared. She was dressed in a standard stretch-suit, but he couldn’t help but notice that she filled it out very well.
Wow, where had that come from? What was he thinking? Already this meeting was not starting the way he had planned.
Hope started out, “You look quite nice today. Combed your hair and straightened up your suit, you do clean up nice.” She smiled brightly and looked at him expectantly.
Calaes realized that she was baiting him and vouched to maintain his professionalism, as he had told himself countless times in the last week. He also realized that he had subconsciously made himself more presentable, just like she had said, and it irritated him. Great, the meeting was just getting started and he was irritated at both himself and at her. This was not going well.
