Ode To Defiance Chapter 8

3

Big Deals

It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog.

—Mark Twain

At the clack of high heels on the marble floor, Gina Toscano put down her jasmine tea and rose from the booth she had commandeered in the

Haven

's "business" cafeteria. Most of the cafeterias on the

Haven

had plush surroundings that absorbed sound and allowed quiet conversation, but the business cafeteria had gone the extra mile: noise canceling speakers rose inconspicuously between all the booths and tables, turning them into islands of privacy where guests could discuss the most sensitive of topics, from product release dates to quarterly revenue shortfalls. And of course, to get into the place, you had to either be a resident or be accompanied by a resident. While every ship in the archipelago was required to have a main public promenade connected by gangway to the main promenades of the adjacent ships, the business cafeteria was ever so private.

A tall blonde woman in her late thirties, wearing a severe white sheath with pearls swaying from her neck entered the room and narrowed her eyes as she searched for someone. Gina waved warmly to her, and she smiled, more or less, and came over. "Gina," the woman said graciously.

"Dawn." They pecked each other on the cheek. "Thank you for seeing me." As they sat down, Gina continued, "You're looking well." Gina only barely knew Dawn, having initially met her at the First Launch party thrown by Ben Wilson. Now they both lived on the

Haven

. Gina had moved there with Matt after the California government had assaulted SpaceR, and Dawn had come a few months later after Cogent News broke the story of the list of billionaires targeted for civil forfeiture.

Dawn's media empire, which she'd taken over running when her grandmother Anne Rainer was stricken with dementia, was in the middle of the list of forfeiture targets. Gina had been surprised at first that Dawn wasn't at the top of the list—she had one of the largest fortunes in the world, enough to keep California afloat for months if not years—but the editor of Cogent had explained it. While Dawn had plenty of money, she also had plenty of political pull, since her media empire could make or break the typical ambitious politician.

So the California government had chosen caution in the beginning, but now that Dawn was on the BrainTrust, they were too late to do anything except mourn the lost opportunity.

Dawn responded to Gina's ever-so-correct compliment on her looks with surprising vehemence. "Oh, please, Gina. You're a Vogue model. You know better. I look worn and drawn. The family business is killing me." She took a moment to order espresso from the server bot, then continued, "If we were sitting down with a gaggle of vicious social climbers ready to spill half-true gossip about everyone missing from the table, you'd be saying the right thing." She shook her head. "But you said you wanted to talk business. I require more truthfulness than that from my business partners."

Gina felt the tension fall from her shoulders. "Oh, thank God, Dawn. And yes, you do look a little the worse for wear." She took a sip of tea. "When Matt looks like you do and I tell him, he always thanks me and says he needs to do a better job of delegating."

Dawn gave her another smile, sincere this time. "And does he follow his own advice?"

Gina shrugged. "Sometimes. Usually. Eventually."

"Well, I shall try to do as well as your husband." Her espresso arrived, and she took a sip. "What did you want to see me about?"

Gina lifted her tablet onto the table and turned it so they could both see the screen. "Ships."

Dawn raised an eyebrow. "Ships? Isn't that a bit outside your area of expertise? Mine too, for that matter."

"Yes, but when Matt muttered about having a little spare capacity on the

Helios

, and I mentioned it where Colin could overhear, he hooked me up with Alex Turner on the

Argus

." The

Argus

was the ship-manufacturing vessel of the BrainTrust archipelago, and the

Helios

was the rocket-manufacturing ship for SpaceR.

"According to Alex, the

Argus

is also coming to the end of its current run, with the deployment of the last of the five spaceport ships for Matt's Global Express." Gina's eyes gleamed with excitement. "It's time to build a new kind of isle ship—a mostly-residential ship like the

Haven

, where people can buy cabins larger than the standard BrainTrust issue, but more affordable than the

Haven

. Not so ridiculously..." She searched for the word.

Dawn supplied it. "Ostentatious?"

Gina shrugged. "Close enough."

Dawn shook her head. "These isle ships are incredibly expensive. It needs to be as upscale as the

Haven

to pay for itself."

Gina smiled in triumph. "Not anymore. Alex has been teaching me about the newest features." She flipped pages on the tablet to display her numbers. "The

Haven

was built in San Diego using the same methods and materials used in the original isle ships. Even without the gold-plated bathroom fixtures, it was wicked expensive. But here on the BrainTrust, they've been driving the costs down kind of frenetically. The hull is made from calcium carbonate with magnesium rebar, all locally produced from the sea. The superstructure is again mostly salt-water-extracted magnesium, and the labor costs have fallen by a factor of ten as they've standardized the ship-building process and programmed the bots more effectively. For general-purpose manufacture, a bot wrangler typically manages a swarm of ten bots, but with the standardized programming, a single wrangler can handle a swarm of forty."

Dawn studied the numbers. "OK, I see how the costs have fallen since the first ships were built—by well over half. But they're still expensive." She rolled the screen some more, looking deeper into the numbers. "The reactors are still a big factor even though their costs have fallen too, I guess because of the mass-production assembly line they created after they started selling the reactors commercially."

Gina looked at Dawn with mild astonishment and considerable approval. Anne Rainer had had three children and a host of grandchildren, so Gina realized it shouldn't be a surprise that the one placed in charge of the family empire should be frighteningly smart. "That's what Alex says, but it's better than that. The reactors turn a profit."

Dawn raised a skeptical eyebrow.

Gina continued, undeterred. "The new line of beta batteries Dash and Rhett developed are so popular, there's a waiting list two years out to get them." The beta batteries, using Sr-90 as the energy source, had been invented just over a year ago. Even Dmitri Mikhailov—the Russian oligarch who was, if not the BrainTrust’s most important resident, certainly its most grandiose—was getting his yacht retrofitted, replacing the

Buccaneer

's diesels. “The critical ingredient is the strontium, which has to be bred in a nuclear reactor. So we breed and sell the strontium to pay for the nukes.”

Dawn pursed her lips as if irritated at the smooth flow of answers, but the corners of her mouth curled in a smile, and a twinkle lit her eyes. "The titanium for plating all the exposed magnesium is also quite dear."

Gina laughed. "Manganese phosphate is a well-known anti-corrosion coating. The Fuxing archipelago is mining manganese from the ocean floor so successfully that the manganese market is at risk of crashing. We use almost no titanium in the new design."

Dawn scanned the numbers. "You think you can cut the cost in half again?"

"At least," Gina agreed.

Dawn shook her head in amazement. "So, how would this work? I put up the money, you oversee the operation?"

Gina huffed. "I'm putting up some money too." She pointed at the existing list of investments, including her own. She watched Dawn's eyes light when she spotted small amounts from both Ben and Dmitri.

Dawn stayed focused on Gina's investment, however. "I'm astonished that you have this much capital." She continued reluctantly, "Honestly, I've been surprised you could afford your mortgage on the

Haven

." The mansion-cabins on the

Haven

, designed for billionaires, were breathtakingly expensive—the most expensive real estate on the planet.

Gina sighed. "It was a struggle when we first arrived. Matt had just become CEO, and I'd semi-retired. But there wasn't anyplace else to stay, and Ben gave us a good deal on his." Which was to say, Ben had barely doubled his money. "But that was then, this is now. With the Starry Night satellites operational and the Global Express running to five spaceports, our stock is way up, and Matt's awash in bonus money."

After a pause, Gina added, trying not to sound too proud, "Most of this investment is mine, though. I've done pretty well myself, with my own SpaceR stock and a couple other little undertakings." Matt had just about gone through the roof when he’d learned that Gina had invested half of her own money in SpaceR when the stock had crashed during the battle with the California governor. As Matt had explained in a voice that did not quite scream, they needed diversification, not even more dependence on a single financial bet! She'd done well and gotten out, but he still grumbled about it.

Dawn laughed, and her whole visage seemed to relax. "Speaking of investments, you do realize this will hurt the value of our homes? Even if it's not quite as aristocratic as the

Haven

, it'll soften demand."

Gina had been afraid of this, so there was no point trying to lie about it to Dawn. "Yes, of course. I'm OK with it if you are."

Dawn nodded. "As Andy Grove, the CEO of Intel, used to say, 'Eat your own children before someone else eats them.'"

Both of them sipped their drinks. Dawn finished first. "Next question."

Gina laughed in response, guessing what was coming. "Customers. Demand."

Dawn laughed once more. "Exactly."

Gina flipped the tablet to another page. "As it happens, a lot of SpaceR people are looking to get out of the cramped quarters they're in. The archipelago never fully absorbed the influx of people when SpaceR moved out here, so I've got about half the ship's cabins reserved already." She pointed at the list.

Dawn just shook her head. "I give up. But there's still a problem." She started modifying the numbers on the sheets. Gina's eyes widened.

Dawn explained, "Please understand that my investment requirements are a little different from most people’s. The ships are now cheap enough, but I would have trouble justifying an investment in just one ship. It’s too small an amount to allow reasonable tracking. We will need to build at least two." She stuck out her hand for a handshake and Gina took it.

After Dawn left, Gina whipped out her phone. "Roberta! Hey, you surviving the real estate crash in California? Pretty awful? Yeah, I thought it might be like that. Pack your bags, girl. Have I got a deal for you! Real estate...yeah, real estate on the BrainTrust. I need a pro realtor out here ASAP."

The girl with no hands lay on a hospital bed in the med bay of the

Mount Parnassus

. She still looked a little blue, but at least her teeth had stopped chattering. “My name is Shura,” she declared in her little girl’s voice. “I would like to apply for residency on the Prometheus archipelago.”

Ciara looked upon her with eyes that glistened with unshed tears. “Application accepted. Request granted. I’ll be giving you some tests to explore your strengths and weaknesses so you can get a fast start, but you’re in. As soon as you’re discharged, one of your new roommates will show you to your room.”

Shura’s eyes closed and her whole body relaxed in relief. “Thank you.”

Ping chimed in, “You were kind of out of it when we rescued you, so I thought I’d mention that the thugs who assaulted you have been taken care of. They won’t hurt anyone ever again.”

Ciara looked at Ping appreciatively, as if surprised by such a tactful explanation that a bunch of people had been killed.

Shura held up her arms. “They were hardly the most terrible people I’ve met.” She pursed her lips. “The Benin Beloved Chief Advisor for Life’s army did this to me before he became the Beloved Advisor. When he came through my home town in the Dahomey region.” She shuddered. “When I was a little girl. ”

By most standards, she was still a little girl, but no one commented.

Shura continued, “My mom refused to marry any of the soldiers, so they did this to me, then killed her.”

Ciara looked at Dr. Donald Giesen. “This brings us round to the next and bigger question. What can you do for her, Doctor?”

Dr. Giesen was Canadian by birth. The Canadian medical system, run top to bottom as a government fiefdom, had developed an unorthodox solution to the problem of doctors who threatened to make enough money to make it look inadequately socialistic: they had set an upper limit to the amount of money a doctor could make.

So Dr. Giesen and his wife had embraced the system the way a number of other doctors had: they worked hard for about eight months of the year, then slipped off to the Bahamas to sip margaritas for the other four.

When the BrainTrust first started seeking medical professionals willing to telecommute, it had been a natural segue for them to sip fewer margaritas while continuing to give medical care over the web. And when Canada changed its policies to allow full-time doctoring, they decided to forgo the opportunity to labor continuously in wintry Canada and turned to BrainTrust telecommuting from the beach full-time.

But even life in paradise grows old for some people. Donald and his wife (who was also a doctor) had thought in their youth about doing a stint with Doctors without Borders but had never taken the plunge. It had grown into a regret, so when the Prometheus fleet set sail for Africa, the advertisement for a medical team to join the fleet caught their attention. They could get paid, live in a safe place, and still do some good for people for whom top-of-the-line treatment for a gunshot wound was a clean rag.

The Giesens’ first satisfying success had been Abshir, who should have died on his trip to the Prometheus archipelago while crossing the heart of Africa from Somalia. His had been an exciting case.

Shura, however, presented an even more extreme problem. Donald shook his head at Ciara. “The BrainTrust does of course have a couple of bionic hands in advanced prototyping, but they’re shockingly expensive. And honestly, Sara and I are not qualified to attach them.”

Shura piped up, “I don’t really need hands. I can run Accel on a tablet with a stylus and a mechanical gripper I’ve designed.” She spoke more softly, uncertain but hopeful. “I will need someone to help attach the stylus to my arm, and I’m hoping I can use the 3D printers to make the gripper.” Her voice fell to a whisper. “I don’t have a tablet, either.”

Ciara patted her shoulder. “All problems easily taken care of. At least that can get you started.” She pursed her lips. “We’ll have to think about what to do about the bionic hands.”

Ping, of course, knew exactly what to do about the bionic hands. Moments after departing Shura’s hospital room, she called Dash.

Once upon a time, Khalid remembered, he had had dreams. Many different kinds of dreams: some flying, some laughing, some…happy.

For some time now, he had primarily had nightmares. Four nightmares in particular. He’d stopped trying to escape them. Tonight was his mother’s night.

At the tender age of nine, Khalid had become a bookkeeper in nearby Rawah. His customer base had grown at an astonishing rate as word spread throughout the merchant community that there was a child who could do your books not only more quickly and more cheaply, but at least as reliably as anyone else. His name was frequently mentioned at gatherings as an example of the speaker’s generosity in helping the poor.

The fact that no one could imagine a nine-year-old engaging in embezzlement didn’t hurt the growth of his customer list either.

His mother insisted on spending a ridiculous amount of the money on books—textbooks on math and science. He enjoyed the books, which he considered light reading, but wished his mother would let him buy her new clothes more often. And maybe an occasional ice cream cone.

Then one day a dozen pickups had roared into Rawah from the west, with men shooting their rifles in the air. “You are liberated,” they exclaimed joyfully. “You are now a part of the Daesh Caliphate.”

Khalid had heard of the Daesh, of course. They’d been roaming and conquering in northern Syria for a while now and were called ISIS by Westerners.

While the Daesh were not murderous heretics like the Shiites, they still had a bad habit of killing anyone who objected to their rule. Khalid half-walked, half-ran, home, pounding the dusty road with sandals ill-suited to the pace.

Upon arrival, he breathlessly commanded his mother, “We have to leave now. Daesh has come.”

His mother knew the stories as well as he did, and her eyes grew wide. But she clutched her hijab and said, in a strangled mixture of fear and hope, “I’m sure they’ll leave us in peace. They aren’t Shiites, after all.” She shuddered, clearly remembering the death of her husband.

Khalid shook his head. “Mom, listen to yourself. You know better. They burn even Sunnis alive for no identifiable reason.”

A pair of pickups roared through the village and stopped in front of Khalid’s house. Khalid couldn’t stop shaking with his memory of the last time this had happened, but he was the man of the house now. He took a deep breath and went out to meet them.

One of his customers, surrounded by Daesh thugs, pointed at him. “That’s Khalid. He’s the one who’s great with numbers.”

The apparent leader nodded brusquely. “Get in the truck. We’ve been capturing oil wells as often as we can, millions and millions of dollars’ worth, and we need an accountant we can trust.” He opened the door to the lead pickup for Khalid.

His mother came running out, wailing. “You can’t take him like this. He’s just a boy.”

Two of the men leveled their weapons and opened up on her, leaving her more bullet-ridden than Khalid’s father had been. Khalid stared at them, stupefied, and again the shapes of the weapons stuck in his mind. More American M16s, undoubtedly captured from the Iraqi Army when Daesh had slaughtered all the soldiers at a depot.

Khalid launched himself at one of the men, too blinded by rage to think at all. The leader grabbed him by his collar, however, and hoisted him into the truck. “It’s OK,” the man said soothingly. “You’re with us now. It’s probably better this way.”

Khalid sat in the truck, staring with glazed eyes into the distance and breathing raggedly as the miles slipped by.

Long before dawn, in the inky blackness before anyone with a cell phone cam could see, a helicopter emblazoned with the crest of the Great Blue State of California slunk up to land on the helipad of the GS

Prime

. As the copter blades spun down, Keenan Stull stepped forward to personally greet the VIPs. Hunched over in their dark gray suits, holding their hands up as if to mask their faces from an importuning camera, they hustled after him as he led them off the open roof and down the ramps to the Cherry Blossom deck.

Normally Keenan enjoyed bringing his customers to the Babylon deck, where his own office resided. But the scene of the Tower of Babel was, honestly, a bit proud, or even arrogant. He was pretty sure these guests would not appreciate the display of the Triumph of Man. His guests themselves were as arrogant as any he had received, but they didn’t like anyone else feeling equally proud. Hence the cherry blossoms.

The cherry tree renditions on the passage walls, depicting paths through Washington DC, were unrealistic. In the GS

Prime

representation, both the Yoshino cherry trees with their single white blossoms and the Kwanzan trees with clusters of double pink blossoms were in full bloom at the same time. Nature didn’t work like that; in the real world, one set of blossoms died before the other came to life. Goldman Sachs, of course, tried to achieve these kinds of results with all the blossoms open all the time. Once in a while, they even succeeded.

Keenan turned left before reaching the Lincoln Memorial and entered the Jokichi Conference room. The fragrance from the National Cherry Blossom Festival permeated the air.

They seated themselves around the conference table, and Keenan offered to get the coffee for them himself since they had explicitly requested no witnesses, not even an administrative staffer. These particular guests would surely take offense if he used a general purpose butler bot.

As Keenan brought them the cups, he finally turned to business. “First of all, thank you for coming to us for your financial needs. We are, as you know, a full-service provider. Governor, Attorney General, how can we here on the GS

Prime

assist you?”

The AG leapt directly into the explanation. “No one will give us a decent deal on a bond issue. Here we are, sitting on the richest state in the richest country in the world, and no one will give us a loan without trying to rip us off.” The AG’s words came out in vicious bursts. “It’s not like we’re fiscally irresponsible. We ran a surplus last year, for heaven’s sake. How many states can claim that?” He half-rose from the table as if preparing to attack the man offering to be their savior.

Keenan had seen it before. The more desperate and afraid the customer, the more viciously he assaulted the only people who could save him. Keenan was confident he knew the general outline of the request. The public records told the story of California’s financial predicament, and the recent government-backed referendum to overturn California’s balanced budget law told its own story.

Keenan was frankly surprised they’d bothered with the referendum. The paths to circumvent the legal constraints were numerous, and California had used almost all of them on its journey to its current situation. One of the lunchtime games played on the GS

Prime

was, “What’s the cleverest way to raise lots of cash on behalf of governments hamstrung by balanced budget laws?” The best ideas were cataloged for later use; California was not the first government entity to come to GS for assistance, after all. Immense fortunes had been made, and would continue to be made, facilitating society’s guardians in their desperate efforts to bypass their own regulations.

Keenan spoke soothingly. “Don’t let them worry you. The people you’ve spoken to up to this point have a rather simplistic understanding of finance.” Of course, Keenan, with a Harvard degree and a background in the rough-and-tumble world of commodities futures, thought almost everybody in the financial world had a simplistic understanding of finance. “We just need to get you into more sophisticated instruments than the kinds of issues offered by a small-town PTA to fund its cheerleader squad.”

The AG seemed mollified. Too mollified, Keenan realized. If the AG were too complacent, he might quibble about the cut GS would take. “But let’s be clear. We have some work to do to make your paper attractive.” He gestured for the wallscreen to come alive. “Let’s take a look at the problems you have so we can come to a shared understanding of the project.”

Both guests squirmed in their chairs at this but nodded acquiescence.

Keenan began, “Of course, the proximate reason you’re here is the rather dramatic loss of revenues that has occurred since your remarkable surplus of last year. But that’s not all. You had immense long-term obligations before this recent hiccup.”

This time the governor objected. “But we’ve run balanced budgets for generations. We have no debt. Until recently, it was illegal!”

Keenan chuckled. “I didn’t say you had debt, I said you had

obligations

. Take the state employees’ pension fund, for example. You’re looking at several hundred billion in obligations, against which your annual budget currently applies less than two billion. For an investor looking for a reliable income stream, these obligations represent extreme risk. What are the chances that the courts will find the guarantees made to the lenders higher priority than the demands of the retired union employees?”

Keenan popped numbers and figures on the screen until his guests’ eyes glazed, as he had intended. The goal in this part of the discussion was to make the client acutely aware of just how desperately he needed GS’s unique expertise, and how reasonable the profits GS would accrue seemed in the face of such a daunting undertaking.

He switched tracks. “So that’s what we’re up against. Fortunately, we here at GS have had decades of experience with these dilemmas, and we can design a suite of instruments just for you.” He flipped to a new page on the wallscreen. “First, we’ll reduce your visible obligations to make it clear that, despite the revenue shortfalls, you’re actually pulling out of the hole. This will make your eventual offering much more attractive.”

The AG shook his head in disbelief. “You can reduce our debt?”

Keenan did not answer directly since he did not want to have to distinguish between

obligations

and

visible obligations

. Instead, he told another truth. “We’ll undertake what’s known as a cross-currency swap using off-market rates. You’ll put the money we lend you for the swap into the pension fund, demonstrating your management excellence.” He took a breath. “This is where another of your assets comes into play.”

The governor looked at him in astonishment. “We have assets?”

Keenan nodded. “Of course. Specifically, CalPERS, the pension fund itself. If you make CalPERS into the lead buyer of your bonds, others will follow. Despite being dramatically underfunded, the California Public Employees' Retirement System has an enormous pool of funds with which to buy California state bonds. And once they buy in, proving it’s a good deal, you can play the same game with CalSTRS, the teachers’ retirement fund.”

The AG laughed with glee, and the Governor stuttered, “But wouldn’t that be illegal?”

Keenan chuckled. “Oh, if you were a private company, they’d throw you in jail for a century for investing the pension fund in your own stock. But you’re not a company; you’re a government. What we’re discussing here is pretty much the same deal as what the Feds do when they force the Social Security Administration to buy Treasury bonds. It’s all perfectly legal.”

The AG smacked his hands together. “Sounds completely reasonable.”

Keenan continued, “Then, as the final enticement to buyers, we’ll issue the bonds with a sliding interest scale ending in a modest balloon payment some years from now.”

The governor frowned. “Balloon payment?”

Keenan continued smoothly, “And of course we’ll give you our Best Customers deal: no interest for the first three years.” Known historically as the ‘teaser rate,’ the Best Customers deal had come to be known among Keenan’s friends who regularly did these types of government deals as the “sucker punch.”

The AG’s ears perked up. “No interest?”

They had lunch, dining on filet mignon and Cajun blackened salmon while the computers dotted the i’s and crossed the t’s on the detailed workup. The Governor and the AG had relaxed to the point where they even allowed Keenan’s assistant to bring in the food.

As his admin cleared away the dessert tray, now empty of all chocolate mousse, old-fashioned paper spat from a slit in the tabletop. Keenan drew a line on the paper to mark the beginning of a pair of columns of numbers. On the left, in a large, elegant font, was the sequence of repayments if the swaps worked well. On the right, in a smaller font, was the sequence if the vicissitudes of fortune proved unfavorable. “This will be your schedule of payments,” he explained.

The first numbers were quite low in both columns, and, being monthly, stayed low for the entire first page. Given the short duration of the politicians’ attention span, they lost interest before they came to the place where payments started growing at an exponential rate. Keenan finished by pulling out the last, blank sheet of paper and writing in large, bold script the amount of money they’d get immediately to start spending. The paper he wrote upon was a soft, luxurious vellum, proven via scientific testing to hold the recipient’s attention in a soothing way.

The Governor sat up straighter as he looked at the rather magnificent amount of money California would get from GS upon signing the deal. “Impressive. I had no idea we could work it out this well.”

Keenan smiled. “We are here to serve.” The smiled turned sober. He moved to their side of the table and pointed at a dark circle by the wallscreen opposite them. “Now, please look up at the certifying vidcam while we run through a couple of perfunctory corporate policy requirements.” These requirements had been imposed by the executives years earlier to mitigate the legal issues from certain kinds of scandals resulting from misunderstandings. “First of all, you do understand that, in order to pay off the later parts of the loan, you will have to ensure that the State of California recovers, to create surpluses capable of covering these debts?”

The AG waved his hand dismissively. “Of course. Our newest program, the Affordable Child, Worker, and Consumer Protection Act, is going great. The rate at which it’s spending money—”

The Governor interrupted. “Investing. It’s investing—”

“—the rate at which it’s investing money is just fabulous. It’ll surely pay off long before these loans come due.”

Keenan nodded with the same sober sincerity he would have displayed had he actually taken this explanation seriously. “Excellent. Finally, I need you to acknowledge that you are sophisticated financial investors, fully capable of understanding the intricacies of complex contractual relationships, and that you thus understand the agreement we have here?”

The AG snorted. “Of course. Everybody in the State of California knows we’re smart about financing. They wouldn’t have authorized us to do this otherwise.”

The enormity of this assertion held Keenan transfixed for a moment, but no hint of his reaction clouded his features. The vidcam was capturing his expression, after all, on an unalterable legal recording now embedded in the SmartCoin blockchain. He nodded gravely once more. “Of course. As I said, this is just a formality.”

As they climbed onto their helicopter, the AG clutched the paper Keenan had given him and chortled. “What a bunch of suckers, giving us that much easy money with so little hassle.”

The Governor was not quite as comfortable with the deal as the AG. “He’s right, you know. We have to make sure the economy recovers so we can repay this loan. We could really use some new corporate giants paying taxes and buying real estate.” He waxed philosophical for a moment. “Wouldn’t it be interesting to know exactly what the characteristics of a state are that stimulate great innovation? The birth of new businesses? The creation of whole new multi-billion-dollar industries?”

The Attorney General snorted. “Who cares? All I know is, whatever makes a state great, we’ve got plenty of it—more than anybody else.”

The Governor’s failure to acknowledge the certainty of this claim hung in the air.

The AG waved his hand dismissively once more. “Besides, what’s the worst case? Even if the economy recovers more slowly than expected, that balloon payment won’t come due until your last term is over. It’ll be the next guy’s problem.”

The Governor cheered up. “Good point.”

Keenan called the GS CEO, Larry Winters, after washing his hands in a futile attempt to remove the stain from them. Keenan enjoyed working on the BrainTrust tremendously. Not only did he make a lot of money, but he knew he’d done well by doing good. He felt enormous pride in the work he’d done to help SpaceR get new projects off the ground, and some of the projects on the Fuxing archipelago promised to be just as rewarding. He loved working with people who knew what they were doing.

But helping governments spend money their taxpayers didn’t have always left him feeling tainted.

Larry apparently didn’t notice. “I see you were quite generous with the upfront disbursement.”

Keenan grimaced. “The AG was hooked minutes after they walked in, but the Governor was suspicious. I figured some shock and awe would help. The last thing we needed was for them to go traipsing over to the

Wells Morgan

and asking some random passerby over there for other offers. No one ever wins in those kinds of bidding wars.” This reminded Keenan of why it made no sense to feel guilty about working with politicians: when a fool has money, you have to hurry to be the one who parts them.

Larry grunted. “So you sweetened the pot rather than risk competition. Good call.”

Keenan voiced his concern. “We want to get flat on this offering as soon as possible, of course.” In financial parlance, “flat” was the state in which GS, as the market-maker, had long positions and short positions that balanced out. It was the moral equivalent of a gambling house with respect to a game of poker; the house didn’t care who won and who lost since they took their cut in the entrance fee or a percentage of the pot. At the moment, GS owned a lot of paper betting California would make its payment schedule and was committed to selling more. “Selling the against positions should be easy, but…”

Larry offered comforting words. “We have lots of customers interested in non-correlating hedge opportunities, even if the risk is pretty wild. Shouldn’t be a problem.” Larry asked the question Keenan had been dreading. “I don’t suppose you can entice any of your BrainTrust customers into getting in on this action?”

Keenan tried to visualize himself explaining these bonds to Ben. Or Matt. Or Amanda or Colin or Qi Ru. “Not a chance. They’re not morons.”

Ping was sparring with Marcos, one of the other three peacekeepers with the Prometheus fleet, when her phone rang with a blast of music from the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. “Gleb! How’s the new town coming?”

The sound of gunfire—probably AK-47s—came over the line. “Somebody just showed up claiming he owns this place. They sort of have uniforms, so they might be Army. It’s kind of hard to tell around here. Anyway, my guys all ran for cover. We hadn’t yet let any of them have guns, for good reason, and this new guy has a team fully loaded.”

More shots were fired. “I might be able to take them myself, but they’ve also got a technical.” A

technical

, in this part of Africa, was typically a pickup truck with a .30 caliber machine gun anchored in the back. “I figured I’d call before I went after them in case you wanted to send backup.” He paused. “Or in case you wanted to come for the fun of it.”

Ping contained her desire to jump up and down and yip with glee. “Good thinking. With a bunch of machine guns blasting the countryside, no telling if someone might get hurt accidentally. We’re on it.”

She turned to Marcos. “Get Putu and Soup. We punch out for Djeregbe in ten minutes.” She hit speed dial on her phone. “Abshir, time for us to explore the utility of Naval power in a coastal engagement. Head for town, full speed. Yeah, kick in the supercapacitors—but calmly, Abshir. Keep a little power in reserve.” She laughed. “Who knows, the guy who thinks he owns our town may have a navy too.”

Thirty minutes later, the full military power of the Prometheus archipelago assaulted Djeregbe. Ping watched from her copter as Abshir turned the

Storm King

to starboard and slowed to a minimal cruising speed, gracefully slewing the 50mm gun to keep pointing in the town’s direction.

She spotted a series of flashes from a point a little northeast of the town; the technical was firing at her. “How charming,” she said to Putu as he wheeled the copter a little higher and westward while continuing into town. “They have no idea what their effective range is.”

She peered at the vehicle a bit longer. “And they have no idea how to drive, either, apparently. Looks like it’s stuck in the mud.” A handful of men were trying to hoist the truck out of a bog while the machine gunner fired, resulting in a spray of gunfire that seemed more likely to hit one of the men in the bog than one of the copters overhead.

As Ping and Putu zoomed over the town, a cluster of men with machine guns waved them in the air, firing almost as wildly as the technical in the bog. Putu glanced down. “Oh, no, they’re pulling down your pretty sign.”

Ping growled. Oziegbe’s first project upon setting forth to reconstruct the city had been to replace Uteteh’s Surefire BrainTrust Admission Training with a crisp white three-story concrete building named Ping’s Surefire BrainTrust Admission Testing—Free!

Ping had complained that the name was ridiculous, even though it was truthful marketing. They

had

installed a complete facility for doing BrainTrust admittance testing. People who passed the free test got free ferry rides out to their new homes on the archipelago.

Ping had thought the building was a great idea, but demanded they change the name. Oziegbe had been adamant. “We did a lot of A/B market testing, and this name is a winner. In the local community, ‘surefire’ is a very positive adjective, not a scam word. And Ping, well, the word ‘Ping,’ is now a hot brand. It stands for honor, justice, and the crushing of sleazeballs.”

She’d insisted they change the name anyway, but Ciara had insisted they keep it. “Use what works,” Ciara had said, “And consider it penance for dragging us into this undertaking.”

Given that history, Ping now considered letting the new arrivals tear the sign down unmolested. She sighed. Oziegbe would just make another one, no doubt with the word Ping in even bigger, bolder letters.

And speaking of Oziegbe, she saw him several dirt mounds away from the Surefire mound. Gleb accompanied him.

Ping considered leaning out of the copter with her sniper rifle and plinking a few rounds at the shooters below, but the copter was not stable enough for real sniper work, and if she hit the Surefire building, Oziegbe would undoubtedly complain. Instead, she pointed at Oziegbe and Gleb on the ground. “Let’s get the team together.”

Soon both copters had landed in the swampy water near Gleb and Oziegbe. Ping, Putu, Marcos, and Soup hopped onto the muddy land.

Gleb stared at Ping in puzzlement. “I thought you’d bring your Big Gun.”

Ping rolled her eyes. “For what, six guys and a pickup? Please, a little finesse.” She hoisted her McMillan TAC-50 sniper rifle, known as a Big Mac, and tapped it. “See? Finesse.” She put it down. “Besides, I brought the

Storm King

in case we need a little more oomph.”

After a brief discussion, they left Oziegbe behind and abused their copters by using them as boats, floating through the channels with their canopies down and guns up to the far side of a mound adjacent to the one holding the Surefire building.

Reaching dry land, they circled around a crude grocery market on the top of the dirt heap, telling the man and woman therein to stay down. Over by the SureFire, the enemy soldiers spotted them and fired a few rounds. Ping’s men retreated across the peak of their mound, dropped to the ground so just their heads and rifles appeared over the crest, and shot a few rounds over the heads of the enemy. The enemy took positions on the far side of the crest of

their

mound that mirrored Ping’s deployment.

The leader yelled, “Are you Ping? You trying to take my town? This is

my

town. This is

my

building.” He spat on the ground. He waved at the technical in the distance. “Come on, show them!”

The men on the technical surely could not hear but got the message nonetheless. They started firing.

Ping yelled at the leader, “Tell them to stop! Someone could get hurt!”

The leader gave her a wide grin missing only three teeth.

Ping pursed her lips in exasperation. She set the Big Mac at a new angle and snapped off a shot.

The man in the back of the technical firing the machine gun fell backward off the truck.

The leader stared at the tactical, then pointed at Ping. “You killed my man! You can’t kill my men!” He leapt to his feet. “You can’t kill me! If you kill me, my brother will cut off your hands! And cut off your head! Then feed you to the sharks! Ha!” Apparently an ever-so-slight speck of doubt about the quality of his brother’s revenge caused him to hunker back down after waving to the technical.

Putu observed philosophically, “I’ve always been puzzled by threats like that. I mean, if he cuts off your head, why would you care if he feeds you to the sharks?”

On the technical, another man rose to take the place of the dead gunner. The goons’ boss shouted again, this time from a prone position over the crest, “Shoot another of my men, and we’ll open fire for real!”

Ping rubbed her temples. Should she just shoot the goons’ boss? It would surely end this confrontation. She muttered to her team, “Anybody have any clue who his brother is?”

Gleb snorted. “When that idiot first showed up, Uteteh ran off shouting, ‘Now we’re done for! Now we’re done for!’ His brother’s probably some dipshit gangster in Porto Novo.” He pointed to the technical still stuck in the bog, unable to reach the town. “Honestly, who cares? Our village here has many disadvantages, but it’s certainly defensible.”

The technical still barked occasional bursts that threatened to hurt innocent bystanders, if not any of the hunkered-down members of the team. Ping spoke to Abshir, who was dialed in through her earbud. “Abshir, you see the technical off in the distance? Would you please ensure that they cease and desist?”

Moments later, the dim boom of a small cannon firing far across the ocean preceded a large splash behind the truck. A second boom sounded. The third boom came, not from the ocean, but from the location of the truck, after which there was no more truck.

Ping muttered to herself, “OK, so

that’s

what I’m going to do with a Navy.” She yelled at the goon boss, who was still gaping at the place where his truck had been, “Go home and don’t come back.” She curled her lip, thinking about what Ciara would say, and added, “Please.”

Her opponent, rather than responding politely to her polite request, leapt up and gesticulated wildly. “You can’t do that! You can’t do that!” He stomped across the mound toward them.

Ping sighed. “I give up. Gleb, Marcos, which one of you did best in your last sniper practice?”

Marcos frowned. Gleb thrust a finger into his own chest. “I did.”

Ping slid the Big Mac over to him. “Finish this.”

The Brother To Someone Important was still yelling at them when Gleb finished it.

The five surviving soldiers lay over the crest, unable to decide what to do.

Ping shouted, “Throw your guns down. Hands in the air. Stand up and walk this way.” As they hesitated, she continued, “Or I’ll have my ship blast you the same way it blasted the technical.”

Putu whispered, “Uh, Boss, you can’t really do that. You’d damage the SureFire.”

Ping shrugged. “How could they possibly know that?”

Abshir suddenly broke in on her earbud with an edge of panic in his voice. “I’m under attack! Both of the other two Benin patrol boats are bearing down on us.”

Ping’s heart leapt in her throat. Apparently the boss she’d just shot did indeed have a Navy, one twice as large as her own.

Repeated sounds of artillery fire came through from Abshir’s end. After a long pause, Abshir spoke more calmly. “You know, it really makes a big difference to have your gun slaved to a radar-guided rangefinder. Looks like they’re surrendering. I think we have two more ships.” He paused. “Make that one more ship. The other one’s pretty much gone already.”

While this was going on, the men who had worked for the goon with the navy came out with their hands up.

Another short trip through the channels, still ignominiously using the copters as boats, brought Ping’s team to the prisoners. Ping spent the time stewing and wondering who the idiot she’d just had Gleb shoot was.

At this point, Uteteh ran out of the building. He looked down in horror at the dead leader. “Oh, no,” he wailed. “We’re dead for sure now. No, no, no!”

Ping stared at him. “Why? Because of his brother? Who the heck

is

his brother, anyway?”

When Uteteh told her, she slumped.

Gleb offered philosophically, “Well, I was right. His brother

is

a dipshit gangster from Porto Novo. More or less.”

Ping groaned. “Ciara’s just going to love this,” she observed mournfully.