Minions (2 page)

He strode the final few steps to Glen’s door and knocked a
confident knuckle based rap, ignoring the adjacent buzzer.  Devlin felt his
heart race waiting for Glen to answer.  He tried to calm himself, remembering he
had nothing to lose.

Glen opened the door and immediately started talking. 
“You aren’t late, but we don’t have much time.  Come on in.  Let me sort you
out a job.”  He turned and gestured for Devlin to follow.  “Close the door and
come this way.” 

Devlin almost baulked at the invitation and considered
challenging Glen’s assertion that he would need a job, but what was the point? 
The assumption was right on the money and didn’t warrant any feigned attempt to
convince anyone otherwise.  He allowed himself to be led down a long corridor and
into a sitting room with a semi-circle of large leather high-backed armchairs
facing a wall of televisions.  He sat adjacent to Glen in one of the central
chairs.  He scanned the screens before him, only then noticing that the right
most screens appeared to display closed circuit vision of other rooms,
presumably in the same building, before Glen blanked the screens
en-masse
.

“I know who you are.  I know who your family is, who your
father is and who he could, might have been,” Glen began.  “But that doesn’t
matter.” 

Devlin slid his hands under his thighs.  “Not that it’s a
big deal or anything, but why didn’t you tell me you knew who I was?” he
asked.  It was a big deal.

“You and your family have had more than your share of
media coverage.”

“So how much do you know?”

“What I know about you isn’t really important.  What
is
important, however, is getting you started.

Devlin struggled a gesture between incalculable gratitude
and cautious apprehension.  He made to say something but no words seemed
fitting.

“Welcome to I.M.A.  Independent Media Analysis.”  Glen
smiled briefly.  “We started doing media analysis, but we evolved with
technology until I inherited some money from my uncle.  Actually, he was
particularly wealthy and left me a lot of money.  Everything really.”

“Sorry to hear that.  Were you close?”

“My uncle was a bastard,” Glen said, pausing only to drink
from his bottle of water.  “Let’s just say that he owed me an apology and my
family disowned me for my very accusations.  My hope he would apologise died
with him.”

Glen was quiet, distracted.  Sensing an uncomfortable
pause, Devlin waited for him to continue. 

“Anyway,” Glen re-focussed.  “I was checking my email one
day while watching an old movie with a guy on his death bed when it came to
me.  What if I could extract one last message from my bastard uncle?  It made
me think.  I figured, what if someone could store an email to be sent when they
die?  ‘
LastGaspStore
’ was born.”

Devlin couldn’t help a look of shock.  “YOU started LastGasp’?”

Glen smiled.  “Everyone’s reaction is the same.  Everyone’s
heard
of
LastGaspStore, or
LastGasp’
, but no-one
really
knows
much about it.  That’s what’s so surprising given that about 50% of the
population are active users.”

“Where’s the surprise?  Maybe your numbers are wrong.”

“Until now it’s been a private company, and so I don’t
need
to advertise my numbers to keep the share price inflated.  More important
though is that I need that secrecy, for both the good of my members and to
prevent the competitors and hackers.  There are actually many more users, but
not all of them are active.”

“Why the big deal about wanting to prevent hackers?”

“Perhaps this would be clearer if you understood more.”  Glen
took a breath and started what seemed a well-practised summary.  “A
LastGaspStore user gets to write a message which will be delivered after their
death to a number of people that they identify.  User accounts are free for a
nominal number of addressees.  Additional addressees or additional messages,
each with their own distribution list can be purchased.”  Glen paused, as if no
matter how many times he’d given his summary it never failed to yield the same
questions.  Now he just waited.

“Who would pay for an email after you die?”

“Not everyone is thirty-something and single like you,
Devlin.  Some people like to have their house in order, and as for your
question about paying, most users just use the free account.  It gives them the
means to say things that perhaps they never got to say, or wanted to say, or
maybe they just want to make sure that a secret doesn’t die with them.  The
catch is that they can’t edit their message.  For that, they need to pay.”

“So if most users don’t pay a cent, who makes the money?”

“One of the interesting elements of the system is how
active
users are identified.  Periodically, users are sent confirmatory emails or are
required to touch base to ensure they are kept active.  In much the same way,
all message addressees are emailed.  This provides the means to ensure the addressee
can be contacted in the event of a user’s death.  All of these emails represent
focussed contact with a particular demographic.  Various parties are only too
keen to pay for the opportunity to be mentioned or advertised in our periodic
contact.  Life insurance companies, for example, are always on the lookout for
people doing wills and starting to think about their own mortality.  I might
add that LastGaspStore secrets are not for sale.

“There’s no competition.  Small players periodically come
and go, lured by the niche and advertising revenue.  But this isn’t like your
average
dot-com
.  They always underestimate the many pitfalls in what
they are trying to achieve, and there are more than you’d believe.  I know
mainly because I’ve had to overcome them all, some before and some after
someone found them.  For example …” Glen stopped and checked his watch. 
“Actually, hang on a minute.  We need to watch this,” he announced before
turning his attention to one of the televisions.  He reached for his remote
control and operated it to re-activate the bank of screens, increasing the
volume of one and muting all others.  “Top row, second from the left” he said,
directing Devlin to the correct screen.

Glen’s timing in tuning into the television was not
perfect.  They’d missed the first part of the featured business news report,
but Devlin picked up on the nature of the item immediately.  Glen smiled a
proud, confident smile, while Devlin took a little more time to absorb the
news.  LastGaspStore was to be purchased by the largest internet company of
them all.  The price was not disclosed but rumours abounded.

Glen silenced the television on the completion of the
report.  “I took the liberty to include you in my staff lists prior to the
sale.”

“Thanks,” Devlin said cautiously.

“The big upside is that all of my staff have just obtained
a sizeable chunk of stock.  You included.”

Devlin’s appreciation settled in and overpowered his inherent
scepticism.  “Holy crap!  Thank-you!”

“Anyway,” Glen continued, ignoring Devlin’s fervour.  “It’s
easier to buy than to develop from startup and attract adverse publicity and
associated hits on your share price when you get it wrong.  Thus the sale.”

“But why would they bother to buy into the niche?  Websites
are a dime a dozen.”

“LastGaspStore is not a website,” Glen paused.  “It’s a
service, and frankly it doesn’t worry me if it goes out of vogue.  Perhaps you
might appreciate things more if you understood the nature of our members’
messages.  It’s about time for a staff meeting anyway.”

                                                                                                                                                          
Chapter - 4.
                  
 

The new day hit Malcolm Venn hard.  He woke restrained in
what could only have been a hospital bed.  He hated restraints, and this was
not the first time.

He looked around the room keen for any cue to aid his
orientation, but all he saw was the solitary, empty seat beside his bed.  The
room was small with little space beyond the clinical stainless steel bed with
dropdown rails, and the obligatory locker for whatever personal effects he’d
managed to keep hold of.  At least it was a single room so the sounds and
smells were his own; something which could not be said in a room shared with
others. 

He did his best to recall what he could of the night
before.  He remembered enough to understand what had happened even though he
lacked the details.  More important, however, was his recollection of the
plan.  His plan extended beyond some gaping holes in his short term memory, and
he remembered it with perfect clarity.

With little else to do, he took stock on what he could
gauge of his health.  His forearms and hands were heavily bandaged, but there
was no pain despite the bandaging, until he tried to clench his fists.  He felt
fine.  Better than fine really, but over the years he’d learnt to not offer
superlatives, good or bad.  He resented that others could describe themselves
as feeling ‘great’, or ‘really bad’ and it would be treated as just part of the
ebb and flow of life, but anyone with bipolar disorder knew to keep these
thoughts to themselves.  Experience had taught him that any hint of honesty on his
part would always come back to haunt him, and he’d regret it. 

Wriggling in the bed, he was alerted to the presence of a
catheter.  He closed his eyes to remind himself that being bed-bound for longer
than just overnight was just part of the plan.  He called out to anyone within
earshot, “I’m awake now!”  There was little more to do but manage his concern
and wait.

The door to his room opened before too long and a cute
woman entered sporting a non-committal smile.  “Morning, sweetheart.  I’m Mary
and I’ll be your nurse for a while.”  She sat next to the bed after struggling
to adjust the pillow under Malcolm’s immobile shoulder.

The opaque glass in the solitary window beside his bed
hinted no more than the fact that it was daylight outside.  “I’d say good-morning,
Mary, but sadly I’m not sure if that would be accurate.” 

“Well, it isn’t morning.  I’m on the afternoon shift.” 
Mary was relaxed as she spoke, but seemed more fixated on the door than
Malcolm.  “You’ve got a visitor outside who wants to speak to you.”

“Police?” he asked, though in reality he expected this the
moment that he woke and became aware of his surroundings. 

Mary nodded.  “Are you ready for visitors?”

“You tell me.”

“You have the right to keep them waiting …”

“That’s not what I meant,” said Malcolm.  The nurse had
obviously presumed guilt based on the presence of police at the door.  That he
was in trouble for something wasn’t an extraordinary leap of faith, considering.
 “What am I on?” 

“You’re not on
truth serum
if that’s what you’re
asking!” she said with a laboured laugh.  Malcolm sensed the tone in the
nurse’s voice as she looked to gauge whether he was being unduly and
unreasonably paranoid.  “You’ve been asleep for a few days.  There was too much
of everything else in your bloodstream for us to give you anything!  So no
meds.”

Not perfect, but acceptable
, Malcolm thought.  “So
my thoughts are my own?” 

“I’m not the doctor, but you’ve had nothing since your
admission.”

Malcolm believed the nurse.  No doctor would have prescribed
anything for him once the results of his blood tests were available.  He’d made
sure that as many drugs as possible were represented in his cocktail, though it
did require a little research to concoct something that wasn’t lethal.

“And your visitor?”

“Just tell me what you know about me first.”

“Alright,” she began; a little hesitant.  “You were
admitted after having been singled out for erratic, but not violent behaviour. 
You had no identification on you.”

“So you don’t know who I am?”

“No, which is possibly at least part of the reason why the
police are here.  Then there’s the matter of the blood on you when you were
admitted.  Quite a lot of blood really, and while you had suffered some
injuries,” she said, pointing to his bandages, “not all of it was yours.”

“Anything else?”

“No.  And you haven’t had any medication.”

Perfect
.  Malcolm wriggled in his bed to get
comfortable.  “Of course, now that I’m awake there’s no legal reason why I
should be restrained, right?”

“Unless there’s concern that the patient poses a threat to
themselves, staff or anyone else.”

“Well, I’m not harming you or others, and I want them
off.  And we can lose the tubes too.”

Mary shrugged cautiously and set about removing the Velcro
straps that were securing Malcolm’s chest, shoulders and forearms.  “This isn’t
your first hospital visit, is it?”

“I don’t think that’s significant in my immediate care,”
Malcolm replied arrogantly.  He watched as each of his bindings was loosened
and then removed.  “And I want to see the doctor before I see them,” he said,
pointing toward the door with his newly freed arm. 

The nurse nodded.  “I’ll be back for the catheter.”  She
left the room carrying the restraints.  She locked the door as soon as she was
outside and Malcolm pictured her briefing the police with what she had learnt
since he’d woken. 

So far, so good.

                                                                                                                                                          
Chapter - 5.
                  
 

Glen led Devlin past the kitchen heading for the only door
leading off a short corridor.  “Look up and smile,” Glen said, pointing to the
series of video cameras along the length of the hall.

They stopped at the door and Glen entered a code into a
keypad while he used his body to obscure what he was doing.  Devlin stood,
fixated on the heavily reinforced door frame; the polished steel standing out
clearly adjacent to the painted walls of the corridor.  The door opened and
with it came a wall of loud music.