Do the Trick

179.

It is the high point of our weekly video conferencing update. Following positive updates from Davis and Saunders, who report that Las Vegas billionaire and staunch Republican supporter Sheldon Aldeson and his nefarious gang of white-collar thugs will be making the final go-no-go decision on Wednesday. In DC, Julie, Harlan and TOM update their status with Senator Hartaugh and Warden Daniels, keeping both occupied, and hence distracted, with a constant stream of thinly veiled propaganda. It is after their briefs that I take center stage to inform the group on the results of the Drone test.

“It was even better than I expected, a complete success. In every phase of the test the device performed above expectation, with two specific functions standing out, the Drones ability to carry a payload and its uncanny ability to add a sophisticated degree of artificial intelligence to the mix, one that makes it virtually impossible for human error to be the cause of failure.”

At this implication, there is a pronounced silence from the panel of eight as the ‘head and shoulders’ aspect ratio captures each in a rare state of shock. Everyone but The Queen. She sits with her pink hair seemingly afire blankly starring into the camera showing the facade of a professional card hack. Everything we have accomplished to date has come from the combination of her dedication and talents, traits I overtly recognize in my short summary. Still she sits in stoic silence.

TOM takes his allotted time to reiterate the need for caution and diligence, lifting a line, interestingly, from Robert Hunter, “When life looks like easy street there is danger at your door.” He cautions us to keep our guards up because, and this comes in the dire tone of an experienced captain of intelligence; “These people, although our every action to date has proven to be effective and well-planned, have achieved their current status not so much because they are lucky, but because they are willing to risk immediate failure for the sake of long-term success. They are willing to lose a battle or two to emerge victorious in the war. Do not underestimate them,” he says.

Again, we sit in muted absorption of his sage counsel. Confidence and preparation are one thing, arrogance and false bravado another altogether.

The Queen is last to speak. She reports that she has managed to get a firm commitment from the security guard at SuperMax Florence and that they have been successful in transmitting the message to Mr Big that he needs to lose fifteen pounds asap. She is complimentary in her address to her older and more experienced teammates, to the extent of refusing to bask in the adulation the small audience has presented, and updating us on the roadblock-like challenge she is currently facing with the ‘Big Board’ code writing. It seems that she may have finally met her match with whatever or whomever wrote this particular piece of legal scamming code. It is, she admits, “fucking brilliant.”

For the third time in the conference, the eight members of this elite group of off-board mercenaries, the last line of defense for a country at war with itself, the fires of which are stoked on a daily basis by the sedition of the POTUS and the complicity of the Senate, are silenced.

Without this final piece of the puzzle, the plan, all their united effort and preparation, the entirety of the operation, will fizzle like a waterlogged cherry-bomb.

Finally she breaks the painful silence.

“But I will be testing a new algorithm tonight, one I am hoping will do the trick.”