A Drone over New York

It was not exactly a fast journey from the bar to pick up the pen drive. Max could still barely believe he had agreed to Anton’s request. After their little chat Max couldn’t help shake the feeling that things were going to get far worse before they got better. He already wanted the night to be over. He needed a bed and some sleep. He was not in the best condition to face whatever Anton had planned.

Despite the conspiracy theories, Anton was right about one thing: Max had to be careful about the way he traveled. Subway was best. Johnny-Cabs were out. The summer storm had provided some relief, but Max still had to spend as little time outside as possible—under the open sky in view of the eyes above. Max knew that over ten thousand delivery drones operated over New York City every single day. His professional and personal life enjoyed the fruits of both their intended and unintended use. One of them had even given him the story that would be his ticket out. They had been his blessing until now. Now a handful of those small little machines were looking for him. It could be more, a lot more. If Anton was right, any Enexup drone was now a Big Brother camera. Max hated all the conspiracy theory stuff, but when your own life could be on the line, it was never too late to be more safe than sorry.

The long journey also gave Max the needed time to process everything that had happened. It was true that this could not be fan retaliation. It had to be someone organized. The whole chain of events made more sense if someone had access to the resources and to the right information. It would explain how they got hold of Dale so quickly. Dale was an employee who had access to the systems. They could have checked the download logs and seen that he had grabbed it. Even ignoring the conspiracy theories, it would still mean that they needed to have people inside Enexup. It was a scary thought, but not too hard to believe given the drone outside Max’s hotel room. The only other alternative would be that this was a first-class—world-class—hacker. But this wasn’t a hacker’s style. Hackers rarely got this violent.

Max’s mind kept working through what Anton had said while the subway rattled its way north. It definitely felt like an uncomfortable ride for a nervous person looking over his shoulder. At this time of the night, only a few people rode in the same car as Max, but his nerves wouldn’t settle. Drunk guys started to look like phonies trying to be ignored. The lone partygoer who moved to nonexistent music looked like a pretender who was faking it not to be notice. It was awkward to glance toward the couple making out, but it did give them the perfect opportunity to watch and note what Max was doing.

Max could only take comfort in Anton choosing a place in the upper west side, so it was easy for Max to notice who is on the carriage with him. After this afternoon it felt like a pointless exercise, but he had to try. He looked around the place, noting what everyone was wearing, if they were looking his way, or not. He tried as hard as he could to work out if any of them might be trying to follow him. If he was spotted again, now was the riskiest time. But the plan they’d hashed out in the bar was a good one. Get the test done as quick as possible while it was still nighttime and the storm had not finished. The only risk now was that they were onto Anton, so someone might have followed him to the bar and then noticed that Max was involved. Max could only hope that wasn’t the case.

But Max worked through the logic. If they had spotted him at the bar, they would have tried to grab him by now. Max had met with Anton, who was probably known to those chasing him. It meant that whoever was after Max did not know about the connection, which was good. He needed to keep a distance from Anton after this. He needed to make sure that he did not blow the one safe contact he had. Keep the communication to a minimum, and only through the burn phones.

So whoever it was had no idea about Anton yet. But Max could still not figure out how they knew about Jack. It was still too fast, too soon. Whoever it was had discovered that Jack was connected in some way. Whoever it was, they were tied into the story from the inside.

Max realized he hated calling the people hunting him “whoever it was.” It was frustrating. They were not some secret society. They were the mob, along with a few dirty cops. But with the cops came the eyes in the sky. It wasn’t just Enexup drones, real or fake; it was cop drones too. They were much more dangerous than just eyes in the sky.

He remembered the cop drones taking off from the top of the police car. Those two who had rescued him were probably honest ones. He felt like a criminal running from them. Max wasn’t doing anything illegal. He shouldn’t have ran, but he did. He ran like a criminal. That was all he was now: a criminal on the run. Hiding, keeping in the shadows. Careful of whoever was watching him.

It was a long, slow journey, made worse by the paranoid schizophrenia.

Eventually Max made it to the storage place. Luckily it was open twenty-four hours. He found a different guy behind the counter. He looked like a relation or something, though. He didn’t ask any questions and let Max go about his business. And Max got in and out without issue.

Holding the small drive in his hand, the risk associated with this small piece of electronics sunk in. It was worth millions of dollars, and it was the key piece of evidence in a murder—and potentially something a big corporation did not want to come out. The money options ran though his head. Selling it to Martha, or someone similar, was now not the only option. Someone would come forward with hush money. Hush money was always big. If it didn’t come, he could also instigate it as well. Blackmail the person on the tape. Ask them to pay for his silence. He could hit multiple people at once. Tyell would be one for sure. The payday could be even bigger! It would be a small revenge. But there were issues with it.

Could he take the money knowing the footage might have been the cause of all of this?

There were lots of options now. A lot to think about.

For now, with the drive in hand, his best option was to head to the address Anton had given him. It wasn’t that far. A straight shot on the subway. It meant more of the same kind of people, but none of them the same. It would have been easy to spot anyone from before. Max had to stay on his guard even more now. Millions were in his pocket. A pickpocket could rob him of the money, but not the risk.

He quickly and quietly made his way to the high-rise on 38th Street. The darkness gave him enough cover if he moved quickly, the rain still offering shelter from the eyes above. All it cost him was getting a little wet.

The building didn’t look like much, but Anton was not the kind of person to pull tricks.

The small, unassuming button labeled 37-3 was poorly lit. No name was listed. There was a hesitation. Now that Max was here, was he really comfortable going to a strange place? He should have arranged to meet somewhere he knew. It would have made him feel safer.

But he was here now, so he pressed the button with his right thumb. He stepped back, waiting for the muffled voice intercom to respond. Instead a buzzer sounded and Max found himself instinctively pushing through the doors into the poor excuse for a modern foyer.

The night doorman glanced up from his phone.

“Evening,” Max said as he walked past.

The poor doorman mumbled a response. It was another set of eyes. There were cameras here too. It was almost impossible to escape them.

Inside the elevator Max pressed the button for the thirty-seventh floor. The doors closed, and for the first time in a while, he felt truly alone.

His ears popped slightly as the elevator silently propelled him upward. It was a nervous wait. There was no elevator music to keep him company. Only the nerves and a basic question:

What on earth am I doing?

Max felt himself grow light as the elevator slowed. No stops. No one else to worry about looking on. No other eyes.

He stepped back from the door. He couldn’t help shake the feeling that something didn’t feel right about this place.

The doors opened to reveal a waiting Anton. The carpeted corridor weirdly reminded Max of a horror movie. Not exactly a great start.

“You good?” Anton asked when he saw Max.

“Yeah. Still a little shaky, though.”

The place was doing little to calm Max. But Anton seemed unnerved. He was the rock that Max needed to get through this.

“You’ll be fine,” Anton said in a quiet, calm voice. “I know we’ve talked about this before, but not knowing stuff makes things far worse than they should be. I’m going to try and find you some answers now. But before we go in, I need to let you know I trust this guy. We’ve done a lot of work together. I’ve told him not to ask too many questions. He just has a job to do.”

“Wait, you mean someone else is here?” Max said. Max couldn’t remember if Anton had mentioned anything about another person being there.

“I’m sorry, Max, but I need him. I’m not technical like you. This guy is.”

Max was not impressed.

“Listen,” Anton said, “I know what you’re thinking, but we need this guy. You can always walk away if you want.”

Damn you, was all Max could say in his head.

Anton really knew how to push the right buttons. He had even taught Max this trick. Give the source the option of walking away. Give them a way out, because that’s all they want. They had always come too far to turn back, but it was the option they wanted. It was a false choice.

Finally Max knew how they felt. He let out a sigh and Anton seemed to smile a little.

“I trust this guy, Max. I think you should too.”

Max knew what Anton was trying to say: this guy was not going to try and screw him over. Still, after a lifetime of watching people screw each other over for a living, it was a hard feeling for Max to shake.

“Okay, okay. Let’s do this,” Max said.

Anton led him down the hall to a door that was unlocked. Through it the two stepped into a standard high-rise New York apartment. It was exactly what Max hated. The small, open-plan living room was IKEA filled, complete with a gym-junkie sitting at the kitchen table, finishing off what could only be an egg-white omelet and a protein shake. Max thought he must work weird hours to be eating that at this time of night. He was wearing an overly tight white polo shirt that showed off his muscle definition. When he got up, Max saw the small laptop behind him.

“You must be our mystery man,” the guy said as he stood. “My name is Bill. Mind if I call you John?”

Bill was totally not what Max had expected.

Despite all that he was, or wasn’t, Max nodded all the same. Max knew that Bill offering a name like that was to protect Max. Somehow it made him feel a lot better. It was part of the old games that Anton had taught him when they worked together. It was like Anton had always said: “A prepared mind handles the unexpected better.”

“Laptop is ready to go,” Bill said. “I’ve installed all the software to run the tests that Anton and I want to do. I’ve also removed the wi-fi card, as well as the Ethernet port. I got the thing for $200, so if you’re not happy with the wipe we do afterward, I have an electromagnet with me so we can wipe the drive. If we do that, just be careful of your pen drive. Apart from that, I’m good to go. So … John, do you want to inspect it before we start?”

Max gave Bill a considered look. Trying to inspect the computer was just going to waste time. Time was the value resource that he did not have a lot of. He wanted to be back at Rachael’s before sunrise and before the storm finished. This guy probably knew what he was talking about, and Max started to wonder where Anton had dug him up. The memory of Anton’s job offer to him after the Bubber case flashed before him. How easily their roles could have been reversed now.

But then again Max was sitting on a $4 million payday. He was going to go and sit on a beach in Thailand. Time was a valuable commodity, so he needed to waste none of it here.

Max reached into his pocket and pulled out the small pen drive. It was dirty and a little sticky.

“Careful with this,” he said as he handed it over to Bill. “This little guy has been through a lot.” Truth was, he didn’t really want to let it go. But he had to now. He had to let someone else handle his $4 million.

Bill plucked it from his hand unceremoniously and plugged it in. “I’m going to create a mirror copy of it on my drive, so that if anything happens, the original will be protected.”

The three gathered around the small glowing screen. No one said a word as the files flew across. An awkward silence followed as the men bathed in the light of the screen. They all just waited and watched the little status bar slowly fill.

Max somehow expected alarm bells to start sounding and Bill or Anton to suddenly panic. But nothing happened, and only silence filled the room, eagerly anticipating the 100 percent copied status.

Ping!

“Done. Here’s your drive back.” Bill pulled it out and offered it to Max.

Bill gave Anton a quick glance.

Anton nodded. “Let’s see if our hunch was right.”

Max noted the exchange. These two had obviously been planning this. He also said “our,” making Max realize Bill was probably someone working on this with Anton. Max couldn’t help but wonder where he fit in. Up until then Max had felt he had always been in control, shaping what happened. Now he was letting someone else play with the strings. Someone else was now the puppet master. Max just had to wait and see what they had in store for him.

Bill flicked over to the command line. His fingers flew across the keyboard as he wrote the commands for the script to run. He typed faster than Max could read. He paused when he finished. His right pinky tapped the Enter key.

The single line disappeared as thousands of lines replaced it. Far too fast for the eyes to see. Far too fast for any sort of comprehension unless you knew what to look for. Sadly Max did not.

Bill was the one left to comment on the code: “The program will take a few minutes to run, but we sh—”

Bill’s face lit up like some teen boy seeing porn for the first time. Whatever they were looking for, they must have found it quickly.

“What?” Anton said.

“Fuck me,” was all Bill could get out.