Then they all want to be heroes and every podunk politico shoots off his mouth about the latest threat to humanity. "

"That"s your politics?"

"Sure. If you want to get something fixed, first f.u.c.k it up so bad that everyone notices and then they"ll be crawling up your a.s.s trying to help you fix it."

"Very novel, Mr. Foster. Very novel and very cynical." h.o.m.osoto looked mildly amused.

"Not meant to be. Just true."

"It seems to me that you hold no particular allegiance. Would that be a fair observation?" h.o.m.osoto pressed the same line of questioning.

"To me. That"s my allegiance. And not much of anything else."

Miles sounded defensive.

"Then, Mr. Foster, what does it take to make you a job offer. I am sure money isn"t everything to a man like you." h.o.m.osoto leaned back. All 10 of his fingers met in mirror image fashion and performed push ups on each other.

Foster returned h.o.m.osoto"s dare with a devastating stare-down that looked beyond h.o.m.osoto"s face. It looked right into his mind. Foster used the knuckles from both hands for supports as he leaned on the table between them. He began speaking deliber- ately and coherently.

"My greatest pleasure? A challenge. A great challenge. Yes, the money is nice, don"t get me wrong, but the thrill is the chal- lenge. I spent years with people ignoring my advice, refusing to listen to me. And I was right so many times when they were wrong. Then they would start blaming everyone else and another committee is set up to find out what went wrong. Ecch! I would love to teach them a lesson."

"How unfortunate for them that they failed to recognize your abilities and let your skills serve them. Yes, indeed, how unfortunate." h.o.m.osoto said somberly.

"So," Miles said arrogantly as he retreated back to his seat, "you seem to be asking a lot of questions, and getting a lot of answers. It is your dime, so I owe you something. But, Mr.

h.o.m.osoto, I would like to know what you"re looking for."

h.o.m.osoto stood up erect. "You, Mr. Foster. You. You are what I have been looking for. And, if you do your job right, I am making the a.s.sumption you will accept, you will become wealthier than you ever hoped. Ever dreamed. Mr. Foster, your reputation precedes you." He sincerely extended his hand to Foster. "I do believe we can do business." h.o.m.osoto was beaming at Miles Fos- ter.

"OK, ok, so if I accept, what do I do?" said Miles as he again shook h.o.m.osoto"s weak hand.

"You, Mr. Foster, are going to lead an invasion of the United States of America."

Chapter 6

3 Years Ago Sunnyvale, California.

Pierre Troubleaux was staggered beyond reason. His life was just threatened and he didn"t know what to do about it. What the h.e.l.l was this disk anyway? Military secrets? Industrial espionage?

Then why put it on the dGraph disks and programs? Did I just agree? What did I say? I don"t remember what I said. Maybe I said maybe.

Panic yielded to confusion. What is so wrong? This was just some old j.a.panese guy who was making some veiled Oriental threat.

No, it was another one of those cultural differences. Like calisthenics before work at those j.a.panese companies that satu- rate the West Coast. Sure it sounded like a threat, but this is OSO Industries we are talking about. That would be like the head of Sony using extortion to sell Walkmen. Impossible. All the same, it was scary and he had no idea what was on the disk. He called Max.

"Max! What are you doing?" What he meant, and Max understood, was "I need you. Get your a.s.s up here now."

"On my way Amigo."

The next few minutes waiting for Max proved to be mentally ex- hausting. He thought of hundreds of balancing arguments for both sides of the coin. Be concerned, this guy is nuts and meant it, or I misunderstood something, or it got lost in the translation.

He prayed for the latter.

"Yo, what gives?" Max walked into Pierre"s office without knock- ing.

"Tell me what"s on this!" Pierre thrust the disk up at Max"s large physique.

Max held the disk to his forehead and gazed skyward. "A good start. Yes, a good start." Max grinned.

Pierre groaned, knowing full well that the Kreskin routine had to be completed before anything serious was discussed. Max brought the disk to his mouth and blew on it so the disk holder bulged in the middle. Max pulled out the disk and pretended to read it. "What do you call 1000 lawyers at the bottom of the ocean." Pierre chuckled a half a chuck. He wasn"t in the mood, but then he had no love for lawyers.

"Max! Please."

"Hey, just trying new material...."

" . . .that"s 5 years old." Pierre interrupted.

"All right already. Gimme a break. OK, let"s have a look." They went behind Pierre"s desk and inserted the disk in his IBM AT.

Max asked the computer for a listing of the diskette"s contents.

The screen scrolled and stopped.

C:a: A:dir

FILE84.EXE 01/01/80 704 FILE85.EXE 01/01/80 2013 FILE86.EXE 01/01/80 1900 FILE87.EXE 01/01/80 567 FILE88.EXE 01/01/80 2981 FILE89.EXE 01/01/80 4324 FILE90.EXE 01/01/80 1280 FILE91.EXE 01/01/80 1395 FILE92.EXE 01/01/80 2374 FILE93.EXE 01/01/80 3912

93 Files 1457 Bytes Remaining A:

"Just a bunch of small programs. What are they?" Max"s lack of concern was understandable, but it annoyed Pierre all the same.

"I don"t know, that"s what I"m asking you. What are they? What kind of programs?"

"Jeez, Pierre, I don"t know. Games maybe? Small utilities? Have you used them yet?"

"No, not yet, someone just gave them to me. That"s all." Pier- re"s nervousness betrayed him.

"Well let"s try one, see what it does." Max typed in FILE93.

That would run the program.

A few seconds later the disk stopped and the computer returned to its natural state, that of the C:. "That one didn"t work.

Let"s try 92. H"mmmm. That"s curious, it doesn"t do anything either. Looks like a bunch of c.r.a.p to me. What are they sup- posed to do?" Max shrugged his shoulders.

Max kept trying a few more of the numbered programs. "I don"t know, really. Maybe it"s just a joke."

"Some joke, I don"t get it. Where"s the punch line? d.a.m.n, nothing." Max punched a few more keys. "Let me have this. I wanna take me a look a closer look," Max said as he pulled the diskette from the machine.

"Where are you going with that?"

"To my lab. I"ll disa.s.semble it and see what"s what. Probably some garbage shareware. I"ll call you later."

At 4PM Max came flying through Pierre"s office door again. Pierre was doing his magic . . .talking to the press on the phone.