I pulled a chair over and sat down. “What about the second one?” Sabin leaned back and folded his arms. “The first one was easy. The second was more involved…”

“I realize that. Could you do it?”

“Of course.”

Another hologram appeared before us. Cleary was sitting at his desk, programming Pape’s personal tap and VR meeting history to be sent to Cleary. Intercepting someone else’s taps was highly illegal; supposedly, the government alone had the capability and could exercise it only for national security purposes. Rumor had it, however, that the technology had leaked onto the black market. “So how does Cleary get the equipment to intercept Pape’s taps?” I asked.

“I programmed that memory for him in another hologram. You want to see it?”

“Later. I want to see the Pape hologram.”

“Right here.”

Cleary was at home sifting through Pape’s taps. He stopped at one. Pape was meeting with a Chinese man, about fifty.

“Hello, Lewis. You said you’d contact me only if something went wrong.”

“Or when I was done. I’m done.”

The man nodded. “Then we’re ready. You don’t think Cleary suspects anything?”

“No, I’m sure he doesn’t.”

“Why so sure?”

“Because he continues to entrust every operational detail to me. He’s assuming we’re on the same page, that I’m doing everything he instructs me to do.” Pape smiled. “Which I have. Except for our last twist.”

The Chinese man rose from his chair. “Lewis, we won’t transfer the funds until the nanites are released and Cleary is taken care of—both his hardware and software.”

“That’s what we agreed to.”

The message ended. Cleary sat at his desk, his eyes unmoving.

Sabin paused the program. “That’s it.” He turned and looked at me. “Creighton, are you sure when you insert these into Cleary’s memory stream that they’ll work? What if Cleary discovers that he doesn’t have access to such equipment in reality? Then what?”

I let out a long breath. “All I can say is, we need to hope he acts on these memories before he discovers that fact. It’s our only shot.”

“And you can definitely insert them in his stream?”

I nodded. “That’s what I am sure about. I can get them in there as memories. What I don’t know is whether they’ll be seamless in the stream and come across as any other memories. If they don’t, Cleary may notice a glitch and suspect something.”

“So there are at least two ways he may not take the bait.”

We looked at each other for a moment.

“Well…” Sabin turned back to his visiscreen. “Here’s the third memory.”

The holographic Cleary was reviewing the commands necessary to upload his brain software into permanent VR—just as Nichols had done.