As Cher played both segments, I conducted the music in the air. While not perfect harmony, there certainly were recognizably similar elements, including rests. “Cher, play them together, please.”

As she did, Hugall said with disgust, on tape, “The bastards. Fucking bastards. They were willing to kill all those people…”

“I don’t think so,” I corrected. “I don’t think they intended to kill anyone. My guess is they’d worked out the solution before they got started. They just fed it to the pilots.”

One of the reporters confirmed, “This is all on the record, right?”

I nodded. “Go ahead and sing along.” I looked around the table. “Other questions? Anyone?”

Another reporter raised his pen. “Yeah I got one. Where’d you get that cool wheelchair?”

It took two additional days for the CBC to sufficiently verify the details of the Flight 342 story to go with it. The story became headline news pretty much throughout the world, with the exception of the United States, where it was deemed “fake news” being spread by anti-American interests. In the States, the increasingly popular pop-up pirate sites translated and reprinted stories from the foreign media, many of them referring to me as “journalist in exile Roland Stone.” Several British and Canadian musicians sampled the samples; building songs around them, ranging from the rapper Payday’s “Fuck That Wrongman” to folk-rocker Dondi O.’s “Ballad of 342.”

The world speeded up. So much was happening so quickly it was hard to absorb it all. Other nations had to act on this information to squeeze the most possible benefit from it. Since Trump, the power scales had been disrupted and had not yet settled, and this served to once again put a fat finger on the weight pan. The United Nations Security Council proposed censuring the Wrightman government for “human rights abuses against its own citizens,” but that was vetoed by the American representative. Far more destructive were trade sanctions imposed by the EU and Russia, which threatened to significantly impact the fragile economy. China took a more measured approach, announcing it was monitoring the situation but warning the Wrightman government against any further attacks on the American people. In France, a petit peu taquin, an internet petition asking for the return of the Statue of Liberty, garnered more than a million signatures.

I turned down almost all interview requests. As much as possible I wanted the facts of the story to be the focus, not the personalities. I especially didn’t want to bring undue attention to my friends and family still living in the States. I wanted to reach out to Hack, but it was just too dangerous. So, Hack, if you’re reading this, thank you. I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you what it was all about.

My biggest fear was that government investigators might track down and identify Brain McLane. I didn’t dare reach out to him, knowing full well any attempt to do that might instead lead law enforcement directly to him. He’d understand, I was sure about that. That’s why he was Brain.