An Eighty Percent Solution (CorpGov) (31 page)

“It didn’t take long to find the perpetrator
—
the
long
-
forgotten
leader of my think-tank
.
In an effort to advance himself, in the face of my extremely loose reins, he chose to take unilateral action without reporting to me.

“Before I could do anything to stop the activity, a net hack blew down the wall and scooped up the Trojan Horse
.”

Nanogate
couldn’t read her body language well enough to know if she lied or not
.
Before or after
Nanogate
’s initiative
?
Before or after she discovered it
?
Key questions to
how it specifically impacted him
. But how to inquire without sounding aggressive or threatening?

“And this action can jeopardize our current solution?”
Nanogate
asked tentatively.

“Very doubtful
.
This gambit strikes at the most vulnerable aspect of a terrorist organization, not its manpower
.
In fact
,
it could heterodyne with our current efforts or,” she said looking directly at
Nanogate
, “in the face of the very small possibility of failure of our current efforts, this alone might end the GAM
.”

He felt a cold chill run down his spine
.
He needed to find out what plan was in the wind and, if necessary, sabotage it
.

“Very well then,” the moderator concluded
.
“I don’t think this calls for any action on our part.

“Next order of business?”

* * *
 

Tony opened the door to 30117 wearing
thick
latex gloves and smelling of chlorine
.
Ignoring both,
Sonya
grabbed onto one of
his
arms and
dragg
ed
him bodily through the barely opened door of his
still
-
unfinished apartment.

“Hey
!
I was cleaning
.”

“Time for fun instead,”
she
said as she waved to the rest of the GAM action committee
that stood in the hall
.
Even the colorblind would
’
ve objected at the badly mismatched pattern
ed
shirts they each wore
.

“Huh?” Tony asked with startling brilliance
.
She
motioned for Beth
to take
up the attack
.

“
We’re
in a very stressful line of work
.
We have to blow off steam
when we can,
or we go, in technical terms, crackers
.”

“Give me a second
.”
He stripped off his gloves and tossed them inside the apartment, locking the door behind him
.
“
OK
.
So now where are we going
?
I hope my old sweats aren’t going to be out of place
.”

Christine pulled out a Hawaiian shirt that just didn’t quite match everyone else and handed it to Tony
.
He shrugged and swapped his chemical smelling top for one that assaulted the eyes instead
.

“Just wait and watch
.
Learn to trust,” Sonya said, stroking his other arm
.
Together with some bulky parcels,
the group
occupied an entire lift car
.
She felt rather than sensed Tony’s nervousness
.
“Trust,” she said again
.

“I can’t imagine what kind of fun
you’d
all enjoy
.
Couple that with those heavy bags and we have
…what?
Blowing up sushi bars
?
Feeding corpies to the lions
?”

S
he
laughed
.
Christine came over and sat on Tony’s other side
.
Sonya
managed to not
quite frown.

“No, nothing so
’
ame,” Suet said f
rom the other side of the car.
“Use these bags
’
o carry the hea’s of our
assassina’ions
.”
Sonya smiled to herself
.

“Yeah, we put them on pikes around the bush telly and dance around them,” Tolly embellished.

“Ha
h
a
.
Very funny
.”
Christine tugged his shirt
.
When she had his attention she swung her arm like a pendulum at the side of her body
.

“
We’re
all going to turn into clocks
?”

“No, but
we’re
almost there, so curb your curiosity just a little longer,”
Colin
said, kneading his thigh where one of
Sonya’s
poultices caused his jeans to bulge
—
the
unfortunate
results of
Tony’s poor aim
.

The bus dropped the group on the fiftieth floor landing of a nondescript building in the
Rose
District
.
Suet moved
to
the side of Tony
opposite
Christine
.
Tony’s confusion showed on his face
.

Sonya
heard the crash of pins before they could see the door
.
She mentally cringed when she heard country
&
western music twanging over the top of it all
.
Not her favorite music to bowl to
.

“Bowling
!
” Tony exclaimed as the sign
proclaiming “Dance and Bowl”
jumped around the corner
.
“
We’re going bowling?
I don’t have any idea how to bowl.”

“We’ll teach you,”
Sonya
insisted,
pushing him in the small of the back as he began to balk.

“I’ll look like an idiot
.
I don’t even know how to throw the ball.”

“Relax
.
None of us knew how
when we started,
except the Metro trio up there.”

“Smile when you say that,” Colin said, opening the door and holding it for the rest
.
“Really, we will teach you and you’ll be bowling like a pro in no time.”

“I don’t know…”

“Besi’es
.
Everyone
’
ooks
juveni’e
the firs’
’
ime.”

“
Well,
I’ll be stuffed
.
I never figure
d
you for being shy.”

“I’m not, I just don’t like doing things until I figure them out.”

“Don’t worry
.
This is just an excuse to have a coldie or two.”

“Don’t listen to the aborigine,” Colin said
.
“This is a game of skill and finesse.”

“Well…”

“Skill and finesse
?
Lob a rock down at some sticks standing up
?
Lotta skill and finesse there, donger.”

“Don’t listen to those two,” Sonya said over his shoulder
.
“
They’ll go at each other for hours
.
Now come with me and
we’ll
get you initiated
.
I’m assuming since you know very little
,
we’ll
start you with a standard ball
.”
The rest of their crowd broke to various tasks of their own.

“As opposed to an advanced ball?”

“No
.
As opposed to a fingertip ball
.
You’re a big guy with thick muscular fingers
.
Let’s try you out on a sixteen pounder
.
You know, I d
on’t see how you
could’ve ever
been a dentist
.
You couldn’t hope to get your fingers in a patient’s mouth.”

“I was never a dentist
.
I was just in the dental design department
.
I actually was very talented in ergonomics of dentistry
.
I designed a new dental dam and increased the efficiency of ablative picks by seventeen percent.”

“I’m sure
.
How about this one
.
Slip your ring and bird finger in
.
Nope
,
too big
.
This one
?
That should do it for your first day,” she
proclaimed
, giving him back his hand
.

He looked at the bowling ball like she’d just gifted him with nothing more than a big black stone
.
“By the way,
what’s
a ‘pounder?
’
”

“Hah
.
Old terminology
.
Bowling ball weights were determined by how heavy or how many pounds they were
.
And before you ask me, a pound is around
two
kilos…or was it the other way around?”

Sonya led Tony to the four lanes they rented
.
Frances
and Jonah immediately hooked Tony in and started discussing five
-
v
ersus
three
-
step approaches
,
with Beth chiding them about running before Tony even crawled
.
Sonya left him in the capable hands of the other more proficient bowlers
.
While others may have time for fun, this offered another way to observe her charges interactin
g
.
She felt a deep obligation to each and every one of them to make certain the team flowed smoothly.

She admired Tony’s offhanded way of deflecting Christine’s silent advances without being cruel
.
He sat close but not touching
.
He paid her no more attention than anyone else
.
Sonya couldn’t tell if he was oblivious or he took an easy care for her feelings
.
In either case
,
Christine’s smile said more than anything else
.
Tony’s life expectancy went up considerably
,
knowing
what Christine did to
her
lovers
.

Tony brought down four pitchers of beer,
two each of
light
and
dark,
plus
one pitcher of soda
.
No one says
“no”
to beer
.
It provided an excellent lubricant for the team to help shuck off the worlds’ woes for the night
.

“My turn to get the pizza,” Andrew offered.

“You haven’t bought pizza in three years, you cheap bastard.”

“Fair dinkum, Andrew
.
Get on the bounce.”

The more
Sonya
watched
,
the more
she
decided that Tony wore about him a subtle charm
.
She couldn’t immediately decide if it came sincerely or whether he projected it with forethought
.
She didn’t like witching her way into her comrades’ motivations unless necessary
.
Instead
,
she used her own instincts as she followed him even more
closely
.

He deferred naturally to
Frances
on bowling and learned enough to at least keep the ball on the lane
.
He exchanged sarcastic comments with Linc
.
Sonya watched as he calmed down the irascible Suet after her ball, with
far too
much spin, leapt into the adjacent lane
.
He even spent some time
honestly
listening to Beth’s tedious
and redundant
ramblings about her modeling days
.