Hinn Ch. 28-31

Author's Note -

Welcome to the next installment of Ray's adventure with ancient myth and a new girlfriend. There's a lot that's happened already, you'll probably understand better if you read from the first chapter than start here.

Thanks to a kindly forum-dweller, I've gotten some tips on grammatical errors I've been consistently making. You'll find the older chapters slowly being edited to fix these problems.

All characters portrayed as having sex are over 18.

Chapter 28

It was now nine PM, time for the team to meet with Skepsi. Bidding Emily and Annya a good night, they left the Tongxin reps until the 10 AM meeting back at the campus. Ray temporarily paused the cone's coverage as Pete took the time to pick up Jonathon's dinner from the wait staff, and Ray tipped them lavishly for their professionalism.

Extracting Emily and Annya from the cone's coverage as they left, Ray re-enabled the cone and suddenly realized he was a little overwhelmed. Tauriz's questioning presence led him to say, "Thirty-six hours, Tauriz. Just thirty-six hours, and look at where we are."

"You have done so much, Master. But there is so much more yet to do."

"Yes. No rest for the weary. Let's get this next one done, hopefully as well as the last one went."

"I cannot put the feeling of fatigue from your thoughts, Master, but your body does not tire in the manner of humans. You just will need to learn to understand its new limits and come to accept them. The latter is the harder challenge, I have been told."

Their return to the campus was as easy as leaving it had been earlier in the night. The long-distance escort they'd detected had increased their numbers slightly. They stayed out of sight, but not out of mind.

Arriving at the University, the team climbed out of the war wagon. Pete took the wheel to return to Ray's condo and swap places with Jonathon. The rest of the group walked into the Academic building, returning to the amphitheater classroom about five minutes early. There they found dozens of people thoroughly investigating the space. "Good evening, folks - Skepsi, I take it?" asked Ray in a larger than normal voice.

Two men walked over from the busy crowd to greet them. A younger man with professionally groomed curly blonde hair dressed in a custom-tailored suit was followed by a larger, older, and completely bald man wearing coveralls. "Professor Helms, good evening. Yes, we're Skepsi's team here to talk with you. Specifically, I am Antoine Beauvivre, and this is Holger Ingulfsen, my right-hand man. I have the honor to run the New York office of Skepsi."

"Welcome, gentlemen. I see you folks are well into their inspection - wonderful. How do you wish to handle the mutual searches?"

"We'll have Holger pat your people at the table down if that's acceptable, Professor?"

"Please call me Ray. And as long as it's a professional pat-down, we're fine with whoever you decide is appropriate. Who else were you planning on having at the table?"

"We'd just planned for the two of us, Ray. And you must call me Antoine, then."

"Certainly, Antoine. Is Holger acceptable to you, Mr. Ingulfsen?"

The large man nodded his acceptance, his expressionless, intense eyes locked on Ray's. His expression reminded Ray of the subjects shown during Shark Week.

"Wonderful. I prefer less formal forms of discussion, personally."

"It is certainly your call, Ray. And who will you be having at the table?"

"Myself, my girlfriend Tauriz Aoud, and my lawyer, Jessica Smitts."

"The infamous Ms. Smitts. It is a pleasure to meet you at last."

"And it's a pleasure to meet you as well, Monsieur Beauvivre. Please, following Ray's preferences, call me Jessica."

"Of course, Jessica."

Holger's eyes ran over the three of them, then the rest of Jessica's team. He paused, meeting Hina's eyes and nodded. She nodded back, politely, one professional recognizing another.

"Jessica, would you mind leaving your briefcase with Hina and just bring the two NDAs, the check, and a couple of pens? Let's make Holger's job as easy as possible."

"Of course, Ray," she replied and put action to words.

"Any idea when your folks will be comfortable with the room, Antoine?"

"'Comfortable' may be overselling their position, Ray, but we're as ready as we can be. I take it Ms. Smitt's team will be joining mine on the perimeter?"

"No, I think it's best not to mix teams like this until we're firmly on the same side. If you don't mind, I'd suggest Jessica's team wait over here for us to complete our discussion."

"Acceptable to me, certainly."

"Then that's what we'll do. One second please."

Ray took out his wallet, phone, and keys and handed them to Hina for safekeeping, unlike Tauriz who had nothing in her pockets. Jessica followed Ray's action and handed Hina her phone, earpiece, and a couple small black boxes.

"Ready when you are, Holger," said Ray, stepping up to the man and spreading his arms wide and opening his legs to shoulder-width. Holger just nodded and gave a swift but thorough pat-down. On finding Ray's mechanical watch, he raised an eyebrow. "If that's a problem for you, I can leave that behind," he said before unstrapping it and tossing it underhanded to Hina. As Holger continued the pat-down, Jessica took her watch off and passed it to Hina.

Holger found nothing else worthy of comment, even as his fingers slipped into Ray's comfortable shoes. Tauriz went next, and then Jessica, with no problems.

Holger then stood and assumed the same position Ray had. Using a wish, Ray found that Holger's jumpsuit was a marvelous confection of electronics and armor. He was wearing workout clothes underneath with none of the additional benefits of his jumpsuit. Looking at Antoine the same way, Ray found his suit was similarly much more than it appeared to be.

"So. I won't be asking you two to remove your suits, but I will suggest you disarm any sensor-driven defenses they incorporate. Similarly, any communication links or biometric sensors will fail when we sit down at the table, so please take any preventative measures you need."

"You're not going to pat us down?" Antoine asked.

"No need to. You gents' suits are complex enough to be intriguing, and I can't guess at all their capabilities. So, I'll be blocking them shortly. Is there anything either of you wish to do before I do so?

Ray would have missed it had he not been watching for it. Antoine's right hand fiddled with the hem of his suit coat as he gestured flamboyantly at Holger. "I guess we should turn off the remote links, my friend."

Holger nodded and reached his left-hand pocket. Knowing there was nothing there, Ray couldn't resist smiling.

"This is amusing?"

"Yes, subtly changing your suit's settings with your right hand and the dramatics both of you have shown with your left hands has been amusing to me. OK, last call."

"We are ready, Ray."

Ray changed the cone to include both Antoine and Holger but explicitly disallowing their clothing. This was a minor tweak, almost instantly accomplished. Bringing it up and activating it took only a split second longer.

"OK, gents, please pick your place at the table, we'll settle after you two are ready."

Ray ignored the small packet of electronics taped to the bottom of the table between the two chairs Antoine and Holger chose, as it was outside the cone and thus not a problem. Furthermore, he ignored the cameras and long-distance microphones some of Antoine's staff had left subtly pointed at the table. Being outside the cone, they would record nothing meaningful.

"So, by now you should realize you have no external connectivity. Last call if you need to fix anything."

Antoine waved over to another person in a jumpsuit and made a throat-cutting gesture. His chosen team member nodded and pulled out his phone. Extending jawhar to read what he was typing, Ray realized they encoded everything, including their text messages - it looked like gibberish to him.

"So. NDAs if you please, Jessica."

Jessica passed the two NDAs and the pens to the two Skepsi staffers. Both read them and signed without comment before returning pens and papers. "I would like a copy of the signed forms when you get a chance, please, Jessica," requested Antoine.

Seeing a chance to demonstrate, Ray snapped his fingers loudly. He wished within Hinn to duplicate both signed NDAs and place them on top of each other. Placing a hand on Jessica's near shoulder he said, "One second, Jessica - Antoine, if you pick those back up, you'll find there are now duplicates on top."

He did and found four sheets of paper where there had been only two. Antoine chuckled, "Interesting party trick, Ray. What were you trying to show us, the next mimeograph?"

"Look closer, Antoine. Pick one pair and see who signed each."

Antoine quirked a smile and did so. As he did, his smile fell off his face. "It's a copy of both of ours."

Nodding at Jessica, who retrieved the pair of NDAs that Antoine had not picked up, Ray continued. "What we wish to hire you for is to discourage and/or prevent physical issues. We are not asking for illegal resistance against legal police warrants being served, but if the police come back a third time without a legal warrant, it'd be nice to have more staff on hand to help discourage the SWAT team from deciding that might makes right.

"In addition, we expect knowledge of this new technology's existence to spread beyond just the NSA and others to become interested in it, quite possibly those with far fewer scruples than the NSA. Having an appropriate set of responses ready would seem to be a good thing to do.

"Now, here's what I suspect will be the sticking part. The primary protection focus will be Tauriz and myself, secondary the rest of the team - more on that in a second - and tertiary will be property. If someone targets Tauriz or myself, the rule of engagement is self-defense and disengage after notifying us. If they're coming too hot and too fast to notify us reasonably, we will understand. As you probably have realized, both Tauriz and I are black belts in multiple schools. There's a lot more going on than this, but that's what we'd like to start the conversation with."

"I see," said Antoine. "So self-defense, alert and then disengage if you two are the targets, only, correct?" Ray nodded his agreement. Continuing, Antoine said, "And then appropriate threat response after that if other teammates or property is targeted."

"Correct."

"Who else is on the team?"

"The two of us, Jessica's team of six and a local team of two from Tongxin. I suspect that last number will increase shortly, but that's not a given yet. In addition, we've a meeting scheduled with Boch and Children tomorrow morning to see if they'd be interested in signing on. At that point, we'd discuss how many people they felt would be appropriate to the tasking. I expect those I hire on for this to remain on post for at least a half year with at least a week's transition if someone new has to be brought in. I expect extreme discretion on the technology we're protecting.

"Another potential issue is that I expect one team response. For example, I won't require Jessica to give up her self-defense abilities, nor will I require you to leave your current lawyers, but I will expect and require Jessica to coordinate physical defense ahead of time with you and you to coordinate legal issues with Jessica before they get too far, preferably pre-planned. Similarly, cybersecurity with Tongxin and, if Boch comes on board, I expect they'd be the lead on logistics and their other specialties and following in your specialties.

"That's a lot of words. Questions? Comments?"

Looking at Holger, then back at Ray Antoine smiled, and said, "You've certainly painted a broad-brush picture. I think we can probably work with you, assuming details work out appropriately."

"Excellent. What sticking points do you see?"

"Who's in charge?"

"I am, with Tauriz as my second."

"At what level? Tactical? Strategic?"

"Tactical if Tauriz or I are involved, otherwise strategic. If you're concerned about the chain of command, so am I."

"Indeed, I am. You've not trained with us, nor do you know our capabilities. Yet you wish to lead us in conflict?"

"Let's do this. Tauriz and I will challenge a team of up to eight of your folk to a close quarters scenario. There are several paintball fields around here we can rent, for instance, and if we happen to agree to full contact rules between us we don't have to inform the field owners. Stock tools for us, you can bring whatever you so desire so long as it isn't a striking or shooting weapon other than a legal paintball gun. If you're able to drop either of us, you'll have the unchallenged tactical lead. If we're able to drop your team, or get them to surrender, we'll have the tactical lead. Either way, we'll have the strategic lead."

"I take it your technology gives you significant advantage in such a skirmish?"

"Yes, or any skirmish you care to imagine up to and exceeding a limited ballistic strike."

"Given you've already displayed your close-quarters capabilities to our surprise, I wondered why you wished to hire us."

"Ah, the lady in the suit was one of yours, I take it?"

"Indeed."

"Do the secondary and tertiary tasking help explain it?"

"Yes, to a degree. Plus, NSA. They don't play nice, in our experience."

"They're a concern, but other nation-states are also a concern."

"Fair point. We've had some work against several of them and some of their favored cats' paws, but each time and each player is different depending on many factors. Any other provisions or constraints?"

"Personally, I would prefer you to try less-lethal approaches before going to firearms, but I won't require that - there are plenty of scenarios where less-lethal means ineffective. Consider it a request, not a requirement."

"Given the moral issues and frankly the cost of accidental fatalities, we train that way, to include rapid scenario transitions from less-lethal to lethal and vice versa. We are in agreement as to that being the preferred approach."

"Excellent. Currently, the property in question is wherever we are, plus my condo. We intend a meeting after the Boch meeting tomorrow. So, at 10 AM we'll have a sit down discussion of the technologies' implications, looking at moving to a larger property with room for the whole team, and beginning coordination between the groups that buy in.

"If you sign, you are invited. If not, not. Do you have any other questions I can answer?"

"We have a contract prepared. We will need a few minutes to adjust it to cover the terms we discussed, if that's acceptable?"

"It is, just please realize as soon as you speak with anyone not at this table you'll be audible to a much wider audience, to include NSA and other US federal agencies."

"Ah, I see. Very well, we shall add excess terms and then annotate in ink and cross-sign to remove them. A little obfuscation can be of assistance."

"Works for us. We'll wait here."

"I shall wait with you, Holger will prepare the contract."

"Very good."

Holger rose to his towering height and stalked off. The man moved like a giant cat, and Ray mentioned that to Antoine.

"He is formidable."

"I see. So he is your firm's site lead then."

Antoine chuckled. "I cannot comment, only that I am the lead negotiator at the table."

"While he's off. Clever. I appreciate clever folks on my side, helps to deal with the unexpected."

Antoine smiled and nodded. "Clever is generally a greater force multiplier than physical capability, we have found."

Ray snuggled Tauriz close in Hinn as they settled into a companionable silence. Their bodies were separate but their souls remained in constant, intimate contact. After a few more minutes, Holger returned with a small sheaf of papers he handed to Antoine, who quickly started to review and alter the terms in ink.

Ray mentioned, "At some point, Holger, if things settle down enough, I'd like to spar with you, if you desire. Not a requirement, but a request."

The big man smiled and nodded. "I'll look forward to it, Ray," he said in a surprisingly high and melodic tenor. "If the facilities will support it, we can try it at multiple speeds and suchlike."

"We'll be looking at the options for facilities tomorrow and seeing what we can do going forward. If you have suggestions for training facilities, we'd be glad for the input."

"Be glad to."

Antoine flipped the last page, then flipped to the front page and wrote something across the top before passing it to Ray.

Ray ingested the document into the Hinn sharing the meaning with Tauriz and passed the document to Jessica who immediately began reading it.

"A team of a hundred? I see. I think we might lower that slightly if Boch signs on, correct? Use their procurement, maintenance and support services?"

Eyes raised at Ray's instant command of the contract, Antoine responded, "It is possible, but until we can make such arrangements we'd like to keep the capability in-house."

"Understandable. Three planes, appropriate staff and a closed hangar for long-distance transport - again, subject to Boch or equivalent, but acceptable in the interim. A constant team of four for tactical situational awareness, a response team of twenty, and a team of six for three ground vehicles, all on overlapping shifts. Acceptable. Maintenance, medical, logistics, and others on twenty four by seven. Acceptable. Munitions expenditure costs are fine barring Boch, again, assuming we can make an agreement between the three of us."

Antoine interrupted, "As far as we know, you're not trained with firearms, is that correct Ray, Tauriz?"

"That's correct."

"We've found that manufacturers and suppliers really do matter with firearms reliability and ammo capabilities. We can work with replacement rather than purchasing ourselves, but we'd request significant control on the specifics of the ordered replacements. Not all ammo is the same, even within the same caliber and categories."

"Understandable, and acceptable assuming we can come to a deal with Boch or a similar firm."

"Very good. You'll note there are terms in there to that effect."

"Noted, and glad to see them."

Ray sat back and waited patiently for Jessica to finish skimming. "I'll need to talk to your legal department about the indemnities, Antoine. I don't expect it to be a deal breaker, but there are additional elements we need to address."

"Very well, Jessica, please add that to the contract as a deliverable within a week, and that it may affect the contract price."

"That's one thing I didn't see in the paper was the price, Antoine. How much are you asking?"

"Thirty three point five million US dollars per month."

"Seems reasonable to me - Jessica?"

"Yes, very reasonable."

"All right, let's up that by ten percent, to thirty six point eighty-five million a month. This is operational slop, intended to cover short term and unexpected contingencies as quickly as possible. This does not mean that additional tasking would not increase price, but instead is a premium to cover changes as quickly as possible before renegotiating any contract requirements.

"Please double check Jessica's addition. If it's acceptable to you, initial your acceptance then I'll add my initials through it and we can then sign the document. Jessica, can you have Monica bring her Public Notary seal - assuming that's OK with you two gents?"

"Very much so, and an interesting idea on the ten percent. We should annotate that as an additional contracted item. Would you please do so, Jessica?"

Nodding, Jessica added another brief phrase on the back of the second sheet before passing the form to Antoine who checked and signed Jessica's two modifications. Ray signed the half-million check and initialed each mod to the contract before passing both documents across the table. Antoine signed the contract for Skepsi, Ray signed for himself, Monica attested to both signatures, and they had a deal. Ray wished the proper assets for two months to be available and linked to Skepsi's Grand Caymans bank account, Antoine confirmed their receipt, and they shook hands.