“Confessions” Serial, Tech Wars 21
Johannsen was beside himself with fury. Not only had he lost more good men but they were no nearer to eliminating Brett and Sandy or whatever they were called now. He was also confused. Where had the other armed men come from? What little data he had gleaned was supplied by the wheelman waiting in a van outside the grounds. All the man knew was that there had been a sudden outburst of automatic gunfire from inside the grounds of the house. There had been no sounds of windows breaking and it seemed to him that all the fighting had been outside the house. When no one ran back to the vehicle, he had fled for his life. Johannsen wondered whether that meant that Brett’s friends had been waiting for them?
His thoughts turned to other aspects of the disaster. He reckoned that Brett and his colleagues would most likely move out of the house right away. The trouble was that his Cape Town contact had called him and said that he wanted no further part in the operation. He had just lost four good men with another two in hospital. Short of flying some of his own men from the US, he would have no way of tracking Brett and Sandy’s movements. He doubted if he could get them into position in time. It was time try another approach. So far, the couple had not made any overt moves on his organization and had remained on the defensive. He suspected that, as soon as they felt safe, they would start to attack the elaborate and multi-faceted group that Johannsen was part of. He was only at best middle management – and he had failed. He wondered if he should also disappear. His bosses were very unforgiving but the rewards for success were huge. He decided to hang in for the moment and present a new approach to his immediate boss for whom he had produced excellent results in the past. His new approach was simply to create a false scam and wait until the couple made their first moves. He was hopeful that they would become more visible in the process, allowing him to finally nail them.
• • •
Zoltan was more of a pragmatist. He had lost his entire overseas team. It wasn’t worth taking it any further. There were other fish in the sea. He wrote off Arthur Erskine’s invention as a very bad debt and turned his attention to other projects.
• • •
After the police, ambulances and mortuary vans had all left, Jauncey called Peter, Arthur, Amanda, Andy and Sally into his study. He looked at them with a serious expression.
“We got lucky tonight. Very lucky. I must first of all apologize for thinking that we had shaken them off but clearly we left a trail.”
Peter spoke up. “What on earth happened? As far as I can gather, there were two separate groups who turned on each other without us having to do a thing!”
Jauncey chuckled. “You’re right. Unbelievably, as you know, we did have two groups trying to trace Andy and Sally here. The bigger group is after them because of Sally’s diligent and very successful search for the major villains that use the Internet as their stomping ground, with all kinds of fraud and criminal activities. The smaller bunch, run by a Hungarian, is trying to take the Professor’s latest program, which will save the Supply Chain millions of dollars….”
“With Peter’s help and the use of ExoBrain, I think it will save billions,” Arthur interjected.
“OK, billions. Anyway, by some incredible coincidence, they both decided to attack on the same night. When I switched on the outside lights, both groups saw each other as hostiles, both thinking that we had led them into a trap.”
“So, they opened fire on each other, effectively wiping each other out,” Andy added.
Arthur shook his head in amazement. “D’you think they’ll leave us alone now?”
Jauncey shook his head. “I doubt it. The group after Sally seems to be a huge organization with some very serious people behind it. They’re not going to give up. The other group after Arthur’s program, I suspect, is much smaller. I’m not sure what they’ll do but one group’s enough for us to worry about.”
“What do you propose?” Andy asked as he took Sally’s hand and gave her what he hoped was a reassuring squeeze.
Jauncey sighed. “Sadly, we all have to leave tonight before they can regroup and put eyes on us again.”
“Where will we go?” Sally wanted to know.
“Fortunately, I have a safe place for you, Andy and myself. My suggestion for Peter, Arthur and Amanda is that we fly them to Peter’s headquarters. I’ll have the plane ready for you in the next hour or so.”
Arthur frowned. “Won’t that compromise Peter and the entire ExoTech operation?”
Jauncey shook his head. “First of all, there’s no way the baddies will know anything about Peter or ExoTech. Furthermore, even I have no idea where Peter is based. If Peter’s prepared to take Arthur along so that they can adapt Arthur’s program to ExoBrain – and jointly benefit from it – that’s a win-win in my book.”
Peter and Arthur looked at each other. They both nodded.
“Excellent. I’ve told our pilot to take you anywhere in the world you want to go. I don’t want any of us to know where that is, for safety reasons. The main thing is that the baddies have no idea that Peter and Arthur have gotten together. Even if they found out where ExoBrain is based, they have no idea that Arthur has allied himself with them. How do you feel about that, Peter?”
“Sounds good to me. Does it work for you, Arthur?”“Of course. It makes sense.” Arthur then turned to Amanda who had been sitting quietly throughout the meeting. “My dear, what would you like to do? You’ve been a wonderful PA for me, but I won’t hold you back if you feel that it’s time to move on.”
Amanda smiled, “If it’s OK with you and Peter, I’d like to remain with you, Professor. As I told you before, I have no attachments right now and this is turning into the adventure of my life. I just hope that Peter is willing to have me accompany the Professor.”
“From what I’ve seen of you already, you’ll be a valuable member of the ExoBrain group.”
Jauncey stood up. “Right. We all have to move quickly now. Peter, Arthur and Amanda, can you be ready to leave in twenty minutes? I’ve got a driver and a car that’ll take you to the airport. Andy and Sally, you’ll leave with me in half an hour. I’ve got someone making sure that none of the baddies are still watching. I heard a vehicle drive off shortly after the shooting stopped and the cops made a thorough search of the area before they left. All OK?”
There was a chorus of acknowledgements as the group dispersed to pack their belongings.
• • •
Jauncey piled everyone into an elderly Range Rover, a vehicle he kept for long multi-passenger trips. It was about twelve years old but in immaculate condition. He had a driver take his other valuable cars to a safe storage in case the villains wanted to destroy any of his property while he was away. The contents of the house itself would have to take their chances.
Jauncey drove up the pass to Kloof Nek at the top of the mountains and headed North. Andy finally asked, “Where’re we heading?”
Jauncey smiled. “Thought I’d introduce you to a slice of South African history in very comfortable surroundings.”
“Sounds good. Care to elaborate?”
“OK. Have you heard of the Great Karroo?”
“Nope.”
“In the middle of this country is a huge semi-desert area called the Great Karroo. The Little Karroo is more fertile and runs along the eastern coast. The Great Karroo is dry, little rainfall but mostly clear skies. It has been home to one of the world’s biggest telescopes because of its pollution-free, clear skies. It has also appealed to owners of health spas. One of the earliest of whom set up a luxurious Victorian Hotel in 1899. Celebrities such as Lord Randolph Churchill, father of Winston, Cecil John Rhodes, Rudyard Kipling and the then-famous nurse, novelist and women’s activist Olive Schreiner all stayed here for a while,
“What’s the place called?” Sally wanted to know.
The hotel is in a tiny hamlet called Matjiesfontein, miles from anywhere. They have some bungalows called Matjies Mews which are somewhat isolated from the Lord Milner Hotel itself. I’ve booked three of them. One for you and Andy, one for me and one for our workspace.”
Andy thought about this. “How safe will it be for us?”
“Pretty good. My dad knew David Rawdon who renovated the hotel in 1968. His family still runs the place. They’ve agreed that I can put some surveillance equipment around the perimeters of the Mews but the beauty of it is that we will hear and see any vehicles arriving anywhere near the place from miles away. Hopefully though, we really will have disappeared without trace this time.”
“Hmmm, I’ll miss the sea,” Sally replied.
“Don’t worry. The food’s superb and the place has a distinctive character all of its own!”
An ExoTech Ltd shareholder, Chris is currently authoring two of the four books to be published the day ExoBrain launches and has helped to create ExoBrain’s introductory video to the Confidential Technical Briefing. Chris has spent his working life in the film and television industry, starting with BBC Television in London, then ATV in Birmingham becoming, at the time, the youngest Studio Manager in Britain.
Later, in South Africa, he wrote and directed film and TV commercials, having four South African entries at the Cannes Advertising Festival. After a number of years of writing and directing or producing documentaries (eight international awards) and corporate videos, he concentrated on writing feature film screenplays (five screened) and television series (seven screened). He has a novel, ”Pursuit of Treachery,” with a literary agent and is currently obtaining finance for an action adventure feature film he has written and is co-producing. He is a published poet and has given many readings.