Office of the CEO
1115 Words
6
Office of the CEO
Petrolsoft Headquarters. Office of the CEO.
“Sit down, Jeffrey. We need to talk about the plan. How far along are you?”
“Relax, cousin. Everything is on schedule. We’ve been diversifying our banking and investments over the last six months in order to keep a low profile. Don’t want to attract the attention of the Securities and Exchange Commission, if you know what I mean. But I need help. Transferring this much money between so many banks is getting to be a problem. I don’t have that kind of time.”
“We’ll work on that. But the SEC is the least of our worries. We just need to stay below the radar of the NSA and their damn eavesdropping. Continue.”
“I’ve been very careful. We have relocated the bulk of our liquid assets to banks in Milan, Rome, London, Geneva, and the Cayman Islands.”
“And what did the analysts at Goldman Sachs have to say about that on the last quarterly conference call?”
“Nothing really. He just wanted to know why. I told him we have always had an interest in diversification. You know, spread your assets across the global banking system—a bet that insulates us from a recession in the US.”
Rune smiled. “And they bought that crap?”
“Well, sure. Have I ever let you down?”
“And how about the other half of the plan? Has the virus been embedded into our next software release?”
“Of course. I told you, I’m on top of it. The virus is planted in the next build. Helix version 6.7.8001 just finished quality assurance testing. It goes out to our controlled release customers first. Two weeks later, we deploy it to our software-as-a-service cloud hosting environments, and that’s when it will filter down to the rest of our customers. The virus will infect their systems and we’ll then be ready to execute.”
Rune leaned across his desk toward his cousin, Jeffrey Dima, and said, “And you’re sure the virus code is not going to be detected by our own software development staff?”
“Positive. It’s highly obfuscated. Not even the development engineers have any idea it’s there.”
“I’ll grant you this. You are good, Jeffrey. You are good.”
“I know,” he said through a laugh. “Hey, how’s that intern? You bagged her yet?”
“I told you to leave it alone. We are too far into the plan to get distracted by a pretty face.”
“Oh come on, we’re ahead of schedule. By the time we execute this thing, the international trading markets won’t even know what happened. And you and I will be rich beyond our imaginations.” Jeffrey turned and began to grin, then yelled over his shoulder. “Miss Baker? Can you come in here a minute?”
“Yes, sir,” came Jana’s reply from her desk outside the CEO’s office.
“What the hell are you doing?” Rune said as he scowled at Jeffrey.
“Oh, relax.”
“Yes, sir?” Jana said as she walked through the door and up to Rune’s desk.
Rune looked flustered but was quick to think on his feet. “Have you finished the research on all the hedge funds we discussed?”
“Almost done now, sir. But are you sure the only ones you needed financials on were those with the bulk of their investments in the oil and gas industry? You don’t want to look at others with more diversified portfolios?”
Jeffrey stared at Jana from behind and his eyes traced down the back of her body.
“Yes, Miss Baker,” Rune said. “That will be all. Thank you.”
“And you want me to open accounts at all of the hedge funds, sir? You don’t want to review the list first?”
“No, I don’t need to review it. I’ve seen over the past weeks just how thorough your work is. Just open the accounts and when Jeffrey asks, you can get the information to him.”
“Yes, sir.” Jana was out the door but turned around and leaned back into the office. She couldn’t help but notice Jeffrey’s eyes had followed her and were now locked onto her chest. When he finally made eye contact, he turned his attention to the laptop in his hands, where he slid his right forefinger across a small fingerprint scanner. As his identity was verified, the laptop monitor blinked to life.
What a slimeball, she thought.
“Oh, sir,” Jana said. “I’m about to head down for lunch.”
“That’s fine,” Rune replied. “Just close the door behind you.”
After Jana was gone, Jeffrey smiled. “Hey Rune, what color do you think her panties are?”
This time, Rune stood and his fists formed on the surface of the mahogany desk. “For the last time, drop it. I’m not going to tell you again.”
“You’ve changed, cousin. When we were kids in our homeland, you were nothing like this.”
“Yes, I was like this. You were just too busy trying to separate virgins from the clothing they were wearing to notice. This company is my world now. I have loyalty to our homeland and our cause, certainly, but don’t cross me on this.”
Jeffrey stood to leave. “You have lost touch with the old ways, and it’s made you soft. You may be CEO of this company, but I am the one in contact with our friends in Aleppo.”
Rune launched from his chair as a vein on his temple pulsed. He pushed Jeffrey against the wall. “Soft? Soft you say? What the hell do you think we’re doing here? We’re about to pull off what will be looked at in future years as the start of everything. We’re about to crush the national economy of the United States. Our people, the funding we’re going to have our hands on? We’ll be able to finance any attack we want. This is an attack against the beast, and I intend to inflict as much damage as possible.”
Jeffrey pushed him back. “The damage we’re about to inflict? What a load of crap. This is not the way of the jihadist. This is the way of the coward. The jihadist takes human life, and as much of it as possible.”
“You don’t like our plan? And I suppose you would say that to the face of Abu Adim Al-Jawary? And where did you think we were going to obtain funding to pay for all those bigger, full-scale attacks he and bin Laden have planned? Huh? Where did you think they were going to get the funds to purchase a nuclear weapon in the first place? It takes money, Jeffrey, lots of money.” He turned and walked to his desk. “And I, for one, intend to do what I set out to do. You can either get with the program, or . . .” Rune trailed off.
“Or what? Don’t threaten me, cousin. I’m in this too deeply. And I’m the only one Al-Jawary will communicate with, not you. You need me and you know it.”
- Writer
