CHAPTER NINE
Ordal Laverock paced the length of what he called his executionary office. As the president and sole owner of BlueCentric Laboratories, he felt he needed such a place of power, but “executive” had sounded much too pleasant to his ears.
Using only two computers and three tablets, he controlled his entire business from his island compound. It was only an eight thousand square foot island off the coast of Florida, but he had to start somewhere. Hewlett-Packard started small. They were born in a garage.
Every window of his executionary office had an incredible ocean view. The building took up all the land space, leaving no room for a real dock. But that was fine. There was a helipad on top and Ordal rarely allowed visitors.
The night hadn’t turned out the way he’d planned, but all was not yet lost. By some stroke of luck his Intelligent Assistant program, affectionately named Second Thought, had finally traced down the hacker who’d written Carnal Bacchanal.
“Jeulmist aka Jeuley Crissin.” Second Thought boomed through the speakers, forcing Ordal to slap his hands over his ears.
“Thtupid machine. Not aka. A. K. A.” He sat in his high-backed, brown leather, fully adjustable, swivel chair and scooted close to his main computer, completely ignoring that his shoelaces got tangled in one of the wheels…again. He brought up the volume portal and readjusted his surround system levels. Damn thing hadn’t reset after his latest Blue Root experience.
“Whatever you say, fartlicker.” The volume level was better, but–
“What did you call me?”
“I don’t know what you mean, please clarify.” Second Thought sounded innocent. That wouldn’t do.
Ordal opened up another portal and keystroke-by-keystroke, entered in a new response progression. “I heard what you said. You called me a name.”
“I don’t know what you mean, poopiepants. You must be mistaken.”
“There it is again,” Ordal grumped. “What is your problem?” He searched through the code. Second Thought didn’t have any obvious speech abnormalities. Rats. The sheep transmitter might make his changes more precise, but it was easier to edit the code by keystrokes. The sheep microphone was more efficient for the big jobs like entering new progressions and conversational styling. That was why he’d built the darn thing in the first place.
“I do not have a problem, grumpybutt. I am currently furthering my search for Jeuley Crissin.”
“That’s good, but thtop calling me names. It’s not very profethional. What kind of a man do you think I am?”
Second Thought hesitated for a moment, frustrating Ordal further. He’d used the sheep to program the darn attendant’s reply and it better get it right. “I think you are the most intelligent man on the planet. Your stunning good looks and vivacious personality will make you go very far. Why, I’ll bet you’ll soon take over the market and own all the money in the world with your ingenious inventions.”
“Thank you.” Ordal puffed his chest and grinned. Now, all he needed was a programmer who could help perfect the Blue Root. Jeuley Crissin. All he needed was her email address. She’d be putty in his hands before long.
“You’re welcome.”
“That’s more like it.” He swiveled to face his second monitor, forgetting that his shoelaces were still tangled in his wheel. “Dammit. Why can’t I get a decent non-shoelace-entangling chair for once?”
“Would you like some fine cheese with that whine, knucklehead?”
That was it. Ordal smashed his fist down onto Second Thought’s control tablet. “Shut up! I’ll track her down mythelf.”
With one leg twisted around to the side and the other excitedly jiggling up and down in front of him, he pounded away at his keyboard. Search engine after database after amassed media dump, he compiled separate infostructures for Jeulmist and Jeuley Crissin. He’d pinpoint her even if it was the last thing he did. Well, okay, maybe not the last thing. Because the last thing he wanted to do was much bigger. Much, much bigger.
At the thought of such magnitude, he snorted. Jeulmist was his key to getting a Blue Root in every adult’s hands–or underpants, actually–and cornering the adult toy market. And definitely then, women would be clambering to have a Blue Root experience with the greatest inventor of all time. They would woo him and he’d pick out a harem to keep here in his compound. Gosh, just thinking about all those women in the flesh made goose bumps clatter up his belly, the little distended hairs tickling against the inside of his shirt.
Anonymous Blue Root sex was nice, but just for once, Ordal wanted to see who was pleasuring him. He wanted to watch as he pleasured her, too. You know, to make sure he was doing a good job. Sometimes it was hard to tell.
Facts, figures and directories streamed down Ordal’s monitor. As he searched, his sight caught on a heliflyer. Irrelevant to finding Jeulmist, but highly relevant for transportation to and from his compound.
Ordal helicoptered himself everywhere. He’d gone to school for it. Through dedicated hours of simulator practice, he’d been awarded his temporary license. But that wasn’t good enough to legally pilot a helicopter. He’d need to take the next step. Before he could, the school kicked him out and then closed its doors the following week.
He needed that damn diploma and it wasn’t his fault that it hadn’t been issued. When he went to court to win his lawsuit, he gave a full explanation about how he hadn’t done anything that would overload and break the simulators. They’d just stopped working while he was using them. Not like the time he spilled garlicfizz on the nav screen. They could’ve just wiped it off. But no, they claimed that the carbonation fried and gummed the wiring. He was a damn good simulator pilot. And he let the whole court know that. It was a conspiracy.
When the judge learned that Ordal needed a permanent license or he couldn’t get home and likely wouldn’t leave the courtroom, like magic, a new pilot record was created with Ordal Laverock’s name on it. Since then, he’d only crashed three helicopters, but that had nothing to do with his flying. Landing, yes, but not flying. Maybe tonight, he could fly in to Jeulmist’s town and see what he could stir up with her.
Nevertheless, first he had to find her. Two whole hours of fruitless searching went by. Carnal Bacchanal was all over the internet. The title was pretty good. It would’ve been better if both words started with the same letter. He’d have to teach her a thing or two about good program names.
Swiveling back and forth while scanning the data fluttering down the screen, his eyes glazed over and he grinned in spite of himself.
“Bingo.” He’d uncovered an email address, a work address, a home address, a phone address, even a handheld address. She was pretty clever to have them all registered with various aliases. Apparently, she had no idea that there would be someone as smart as Ordal “Orrick” Laverock tracking her down.
He set about dropping her a friendly email.
Dear Jeuley Crissin,
No, that would freak her out. She didn’t use her real name anywhere online. He’d stolen it out of Adrian McLinsky’s accounting chatter.
Dear Jeulmist,
Meet me at
Oh no. He couldn’t just invite her to a pizza place or some bar. What restaurant would really entice her?
Meet me at Le Rouge. I want to make you an offer you can’t refuse.
Shit. That wouldn’t work either. Ordal tangled his fingers in his rumpled hair. He pushed off to spin all the way around in his chair, but his trapped shoelaces nearly forced his knee to dislocate. Rattling off curse after colorful curse, he rummaged through the mess on his console for a pair of scissors, a pocketknife, a hatchet, anything sharp.
Settling for a pair of nail clippers, he worked through the waxed laces of his tasseled wingtips, reminding himself to get at least one pair of slip-on shoes next time he went to his warehouse. While he didn’t really need shoes with headlights on them, the BlueCentric models rotting on the mainland might as well be put to use other than as yearly company holiday gifts.
Sitting back up, he scuttled about in front of his computer and tweaked his way through writing a convincing email with the appearance that its author was simply a friendly businessman looking to gain the acquaintance of an incredible programmer. He trained his software to track the email then pushed it through his outbox.
While waiting for her reply, he commanded his replicator to build a peanut butter, jelly, garlic and grasshopper sandwich. Dinner never looked so good. He considered working on Second Thought’s programming, but on second thought, decided against it. The damn thing would likely develop even worse bugs.
