The 13th Enumeration (3 page)

Chapter 4
 

New York City

Joe Douglas’s eyes blurred in anger as he watched the numbers on the gas pump flash in rapid succession. They had taken everything from him—his wife, his family, his respectability. A convicted felon, he couldn’t even get a decent job. There hadn’t been enough cocaine on him for two people, let alone for “intent to distribute,” as they’d charged him. That hadn’t stopped the prosecutor. Joe was sent to prison for three years and was released a year early for good behavior. When he got out of prison, no one was there to greet him except his anger. His wife had received full custody of the children.

His knuckles turned white as he gripped the gas dispenser. None of his old friends or work associates from the New York City Water Municipality would have anything to do with him now. Well, he was going to teach those godless heathens a lesson—a lesson the whole world would remember.

The pump clicked off at 199.34 gallons. Joe pulled the dispenser a little out of the welded auxiliary fuel tank in the bed of his pickup truck and topped it off until the register read two hundred gallons exactly.

Inside, the man behind the counter looked up with a friendly smile. “Boy, she was thirsty today.”

Joe nodded. As he pulled his wallet out, he replied, “Man, this is killing me. I wish our crooked politicians would do something about the gas prices.”

Four dollars a gallon,
Joe thought. He remembered when gas was a buck-fifty. He counted out the eight hundred dollars in cash for the salesclerk, took his receipt, and turned to leave. “I’ll see you in a week or so.”

Joe climbed up into the cab of his truck, the sole possession he had retained from his pre-prison life. His first few days in the penitentiary had been one continuous nightmare of bullying, pain, and fear. That was until Hassan walked up and stood beside him one day. No one ever bothered him again. Hassan was a lifeline to a terrified and lonely man who had nowhere else to turn. Over the next two years, Hassan taught him about Muhammad and the Koran. At first he paid attention out of necessity, and later out of genuine interest. Joe had never been particularly interested in any religion, but prison changed all that. With Hassan’s friendship and brotherhood, he embraced the Muslim religion. He knew now that all his problems were a direct result of a godless and hedonistic Western lifestyle and belief system.

Allah willing, he was going to help change that. The two hundred gallons of diesel fuel in the back of his truck were a step in that direction.

Chapter 5

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

After a soft knock, the door opened and five familiar faces entered. Darius stood and calmly welcomed the four men and one woman who entered his office. “Good afternoon, lady and gentlemen.” He ushered his team into the conference room.

When everyone was seated, Darius took his chair at the head of the table. He surveyed the faces gathered there. Although they served in several capacities, each had a specialty which made him or her indispensable to the organization and invaluable to his plan.

Today, they would decide whether or not to set the plan in motion. For Darius, it had taken over twenty years to reach this point. Many of the rest had been working tirelessly—and secretly—for five years. They all knew the success of their plan depended on their silence. Their invention would fundamentally alter the current order of the world. Darius thought it ironic that half the faces looking back at him were Americans born between the years 1961–1981. According to William Strauss and Neil Howe in their book
Generations,
these men and a woman were part of the thirteenth American generation.

And none of them had any idea how significant that was.

On his right sat Alexandra Riley, whose primary function was executive assistant and public relations. The first time he had seen Alexandra was in his second year at MIT, where she was leading an environmental protest. She was an activist in every sense of the word, fearless, passionate, and unrelenting, with classical Irish features and a temper to match her fiery red hair. Her passion, intelligence, and commitment raised her as a leader in the environmental movement until she became the international face of the cause.

That is, until Darius asked her to join his organization three years ago. They met over lunch at a vegan deli in New York, and he asked her if she wanted to change the world. She looked up at him with her pale green Irish eyes, a bitter laugh, and a mocking smile.

“Mr. Zarindast,” she said, “everyone dreams of changing the world. Few ever really make a difference. Most people are content to follow others.”

After a few moments, Darius replied, “What would you do if you had practically unlimited money and influence?”

With a sarcastic tone she replied, “Why, Mr. Zarindast, I would change the world.”

Darius
stood up, laid an envelope on the table, and said, “If you want that opportunity someday, I will give it to you.”

One week later she was standing in this very conference room with a look of incredulity on her face as he finished explaining what he had invented and a modified version of his plan to change the order of the world. He said nothing of
the
Order and his plans for revenge—that was not necessary for her to know. After a couple of minutes of searching his face for some trace of obfuscation, she simply said, “Prove it.” He took her to the complex on the outskirts of Dubai and showed her the prototype. One million gallons of pure water an hour from the sea at ninety-five-percent efficiency. A world-changing invention, and Alexandra was intelligent enough to see the implications. She had been the last addition to his little group.

Next to Al
exandra sat Gavin Matthews
.
He was the son of one of Darius’s old classmates at MIT.
Darius had shared a dorm room with Jake Matthews during his first year at MIT and he was one of the few people Darius still talked to from his old college days. In passing, Darius had mentioned to Jake that he was looking for a good software programmer for his company.  Jake told Darius his son worked at Google and suggested he give him a call.  Gavin, like his father
was a computer genius
.
He
had made several innovations in chip architecture
while at MIT
. His software programming and encryption skills were
also
first-rate.
Google paid him well into the six figures to write software code.
Darius called him up and asked if he could have a few minutes of his time. When they met, Darius told him, “
Your father says you are a computer genius.
I would like you to work for me, and I will pay you fifty thousand dollars the first year. After that I believe you will be so convinced of what we are about to do that you will be willing to waive your salary.”

Gavin laughed out loud, but at the same time he searched Darius’s face to see if he was serious. Darius just sat there and stared back. Finally he said, “Gavin, I am completely serious. All I ask is that you come and see how serious I am. Here is a round-trip plane ticket if you care to find out.”

As Darius picked up his briefcase to go, he said, “Gavin, if what I hear is true, you are a maverick. You dance to your own tune and have a problem with authority. What I am offering you is an unlimited budget with very limited oversight. You will be in charge of computer programming and security for our project. What have you got to lose? A long weekend? I know you may find it hard to believe, but I am offering you a once-in-a-generation . . . no,” Darius corrected himself, “a unique opportunity in the history of mankind.”

Two weeks later Gavin Matthews arrived in Dubai, and Darius showed him the technology and gave him an overview of what he needed. That was five years ago, and Gavin Matthews had worked
without compensation
for the last four years.

Ralph
Scholz
had been a facilities design engineer for Intel, instrumental in automating their factories with robotics. He had the prototypical German attention to detail and precision but with an ability to think outside the box to come up with new and innovative solutions. He was in his midforties and loved his work. He had designed and built, at an unheard-of low cost, an almost totally automated production facility for Darius’s invention. He and Gavin had also worked together on the design and construction of the commercial version. Once he had seen and understood the idea, he too had joined the venture with absolute commitment.

Dylan Gallos was the next member of the team. He was at the top of his field in theoretical and analytical mathematics. As with many of the modern-day mathematical geniuses, he was approached by most of the big names in the financial world. In today’s high-tech financial realm, it was mathematicians who ruled the world. They created black-box algorithms that were used in everything from financial modeling to high-frequency trading, the real wild west of the financial world. Fiber-optic data networks were created to accommodate this shift in electronic trading. In 2007, the London Stock Exchange launched TradElect, able to process three thousand orders per second for an average turnaround time of ten milliseconds. Latency had continued to be reduced since then and was now in the low single-digit milliseconds. Each time a company or hedge fund was able to reduce its latency and gain an edge over the competition, it skimmed millions of dollars off the difference in price between the bid and the ask. As of 2009, over seventy-three percent of all US trading volume was a result of HFT.

But Darius’s invention would change everything. Dylan’s expertise was needed to model the effect it would have on the economies of the world and find the best way to take advantage of the results. For the past three years, Dylan had also been “helping” erode the stock price of Aquarius Element Solutions. Darius had set up a clandestine hedge fund from which Dylan used a custom algo to manage the stock price to their desired target price. Six months ago they had reach their price objective and were just waiting for the final pieces of the plan to be completed.

Arash Jafari was the head of security. No one knew much about him except Darius, and Darius had not felt it necessary to provide the rest with any background. When he was present he sat quietly like a specter, cold and without a hint of what was going on behind his ever-vigilant eyes. What Darius knew that no one else did was that Arash was a senior officer in the MISIRI (Vezarat-e Ettela-at Jomhuri-ye Eslami-ye Iran), the Iranian intelligence service. He was one of Iran’s most decorated, and feared, field operation directors, overseeing American, European, and Israeli agents and their respective intelligence-gathering networks.

Before Darius’s mother died, she told him his stepbrother Arash was alive and well in Iran. Arash was ten years older. He had lived with them up until their father’s death, and then his own mother had come for him. Then one day, Arash was sitting in
Darius’s Dubai
office when he a
rrived for work. He looked
like an older version of the boy he remembered. Arash knew more than Darius thought possible about what he and his team were doing in Dubai. He had offered his help in maintaining operational security, and ever since then, he’d been the eyes and ears of their operations. With his position in the Iranian intelligence service, he had latitude to go and come as he needed. His contacts, including several terrorist organizations, gave Darius a wealth of firsthand information from around the world.

             
“Gavin and Ralph,” Darius began, “it was at your request we postponed the introduction of our invention to the world by one more year. As everyone at this table knows, it is imperative for the success of this endeavor that the secrets of our technology be secured against theft by those to whom we sell our devices. Have you satisfied yourselves that our secrets will be safe from discovery?”

Both men looked intently at Darius, and Ralph replied, “We have made every possible attempt to compromise these devices and have been unable to do so. For the past six months each attempt has resulted in a catastrophic destruction of the device. We are as sure as we can be that they will be safe from discovery for at least one year. Eventually someone will figure out a way, but our estimate is conservative—likely it will take at least two years for anyone to figure out a way to steal the technology. That’s more time than we need to reach our goals.”

Darius looked for any hedging in their expressions or words and was satisfied with what he saw. “Are there any other objections or concerns before I give the final go-ahead?” Turning to his right, he said, “Alexandra?”

“I’m ready,” she replied.

Darius worked his way around the table receiving the same response from each. “Then let’s proceed according to plan.”

They all got up from the table and started for the door. Only Arash remained behind. He paused at the door and quietly asked, “Do you wish me to give the go-ahead to our contact in New York?”

“Yes,” Darius replied. “Let’s proceed.”

Arash held eye contact. “And the surprise?”

“Yes, proceed with that as well.”

“Do we tell the others?”

Darius gave no indication of nervousness or second thoughts. “There is no need to tell the others,” he said.

Arash walked silently out the door. He kept his thoughts to himself. If any of the group ever found out that he and Darius were responsible for what was about to happen in New York City, it could develop into a serious security risk. He had carefully studied each of the other four members of the team, and it was likely that two of them would object based solely on the harm their plan would cause the people of New York. They would
all
object at not being included in the decision-making process.

Well, he would just have to be vigilant. There was much more at stake than any of them knew.