“Chaos can’t hurt us, Christian. Because we’re dead already.”

“I think you’re exagger—”

“I’m not exaggerating!” Bailer said, daring to raise his voice. “Even our most optimistic projections aren’t enough to save the company, Christian. Our cash reserves are nearly gone and we won’t be able to meet expenses and debt payments next month. When we decided to go all-in on this technology, our survival was based on worldwide military contracts. Then you shut us out of the market.”

“Craig, we—”

But Bailer kept talking. “Wall Street and the banks are getting nervous. We just rolled out the most transformational technology since the personal computer and our stock only went up a few points. And the pathetic truth is they don’t have any idea of the extent of the company’s financial problems. If they did, our stock would be trading under a dollar and there’d be a moving truck out front carting away your furniture.”

“Are you finished?”

Bailer had never seen anger in Dresner before and he felt a strange twinge of fear. But now wasn’t the time to be blinded by the heavenly light so many people saw emanating from The Great Man. “No, I’m not finished, Christian. If we issue stock at the level we would need to in order to save the company, the markets are going to see our weakness and our share prices are going to plummet to the point that a hostile takeover is almost inevitable. If we don’t, we’re going to have to court a takeover to keep from collapsing.”

“It’s only about money to you,” Dresner said, his brief flash of anger turning to disappointment.

“Wake up, Christian! If we’re taken over or have to file bankruptcy, you lose not only all your privacy, but all your secrecy. What happens when the world finds out just what it took for you to develop your amazing new technology? What’s all your altruism worth then? You can’t afford to let that happen. None of us can.”

Dresner didn’t react other than to turn away and look out over the carefully arranged trees and flowers. The gesture was clear. Bailer had been dismissed.

18

Near Frederick, Maryland
USA

JON SMITH PROPPED HIS bare feet on the coffee table and used a beer to wash down a few more Advil. His television was still propped on a box against the wall and he tilted his head slightly to compensate for its lean.

The subject of the newscast was the mounting tensions with Iran and he flipped the channel, unwilling to even contemplate the idea of ever having to go back there. He’d cross that bridge when he got to it. Hopefully, never.

CNN was running a colorful panel discussion about the national debt and he settled back into the sofa, trying unsuccessfully to get comfortable and regretting letting the saleswoman talk him into the modern design.

What drew him into this particular debate wasn’t his passion for government accounting so much as the fact that a tiny icon in his peripheral vision brightened noticeably when he’d surfed to it. The app was called TVMonitor and its function was to vet what was being said on various news programs. Limitations in network speed made it impossible to do real time, but this particular show must have originally aired early enough in the day that LayerCake had a chance to do its magic.