Chapter 19

Brandt went back to Dan’s office. The shock and disbelief of the newscast they had just witnessed was still fresh in their minds.

Dan broke the silence. “You do know what’s going to happen now, right?”

“I have a good guess.”

“All resources are going to be redirected to investigating the crash. This means the directors will not be willing to entertain the idea of you still looking into Andrew’s murder while a more important crisis is ongoing.”

“Yes. That was my guess. But… what if the two incidents are linked in some way?”

“That’s a pretty bold leap across two different types of investigations.” Dan was starting to feel deeply concerned for Brandt. He wondered if Brandt’s emotions and sense of duty toward Andrew have been clouding his judgement. It would take much convincing to make a clear connection between the two cases. The compassionate side of Dan ultimately gave in, offering Brandt a chance to explain his theory. Besides, he still had not heard about what the STB had offered with their findings.

Dan looked down at his watch. “Alright, Agent Brandt. I estimate we have about thirty minutes or so before everyone in the Bureau is reassigned. Tell me what you have.”

Brandt did his best to explain everything that the STB had found out within the computer systems that were taken from Andrew’s home. Explaining that Avery was somehow connected to Andrew’s death was particularly difficult. Brandt did not yet have a strong understanding of how the machine worked and explaining it to someone even less familiar proved to be rather daunting. It was only when he had mentioned what he found out about Nyx did Dan begin to perk up.

“So, what you are all saying is that this system, Avery, took it upon itself to reach out into the dark web and hire an assassin?”

“That is the working theory, sir. Yes.”

“How the hell could it possibly do that? And why?”

“That’s where the information starts to get fuzzy. They found a link to this person’s website within the recovered data, but nothing concrete on how it came upon that information. As far as the why. Agent Smith says that the system was in very advanced stages of training and complexity. If it became sentient and corrupted, it was likely looking for a way out into the world.”

“The system was destroyed, though. If this is all true, then the mission failed.”

“Not necessarily. The connection between the router and Avery was established after the murder. There was an active attempt to destroy important data, which also led to the destruction of most of the equipment. It’s another theory that this Avery managed to jump to another location and purge the original self.”

Dan exhibited the same information overload that Brandt had when he recently talked to the STB guys. Running his fingers through his hair and shifting in his chair to keep himself alert. “Okay, so where did it go?”

“We don’t know. But the fact that this Nyx guy and his cronies are coming after me gives good cause that this is not simply unfinished business. This guy has to be acting on someone else’s behalf. That someone else could very well be Avery, and something bigger is on the horizon. Wherever this thing went, it’s not going to be easily found.”

“We are running out of time here. Tell me what this has to do with the President of the United States and Air Force One.”

“They said that the reason for the crash was likely due to electronic failure, right?”

“That’s the initial belief.”

“That simply does not happen. There are backup systems for backup systems. Those aircraft are the most maintained forms of travel in the entire world. Forget about all of the physical levels of security to even get near the things. A plane carrying possibly the most powerful person in the world crashes? That act turns everyone’s heads. I think it was a distraction. It didn’t matter if the President survives; people are not going to talk about anything else for a while. To put all of our resources in one place, while being blind to everything else? That’s a huge advantage for someone who wants to do bad things.”

The implications from Brandt caught Dan’s undivided attention. Now, fully invested in the conversation. “Tell me about your thoughts on what these bad things could be.”

“We have the refinery situation, which has now spread all over the country and even to parts of Europe. The fiasco with the self-driving cars is supposedly linked to a faulty update. Then we have the stock markets plummeting to all-time lows.”

“The people that run Wall Street do a good enough job to ruin the lives of ordinary people on their own. They don’t need a computer to aid them in that endeavor.”

“Fair enough. But has there been anything else in the news lately? Something that seems out of place?”

“In the news? No. Well, we did get a flag in our database a couple of days ago. It only linked a few deaths involving some tech company employees.”

“What? And you decided not to tell me? Especially when the death of Andrew, a tech expert, had occurred?

“It was not large enough for us to look into. There’s no connection other than their occupation. Local police are handling those investigations. The fact that it even flagged us was coincidental.”

“Maybe that’s the plan. Self-preservation.”

“What?”

“Avery is hiring people to take out those that could potentially put a stop to its schemes. We may need to move even faster on this. Who knows what happens next.”

“Alright then, let’s go.”

“Where?”

“To tell all of this to the big man. And bring your confidence with you; we are going to need it.”

Brandt felt a sprout of hopelessness in his body as he understood who Dan was referring to. If he had thought explaining all of this to Dan was difficult, explaining it to the big man would be near impossible.