Her eyes longed for an affirmative answer from Miles. At first he was somewhat baffled. h.o.m.osoto had indeed sent him on this trip, vacation, to work, undisturbed. But Miles thought that he would have to fend for himself for his physical pleasures. He was used to finding ways to satisfy his needs.

"h.o.m.osoto-San says that you must be relaxed to do very serious business. Whenever you need relaxation, I am here."

The food was as exquisite as was Marasee. He luxuriated in the eternally perfect weather, the beach, the waves and he even ventured under water on a novice scuba dive. But, as he knew, he was here to concentrate on his a.s.signed task, so he tried to limit his personal activities to sharing pleasure with Marasee.

In just a few days, a relaxed Miles felt a peace, a solace that he had never known before. He found that his mind was at a creative high. His mind propelled through the problems of the war plans, and the solutions appeared. His brain seemed to function independent of effort. As he established goals, the roads to meet them appeared magically before him, in absolute clarity. He was free to explore each one in its entirety, from beginning to end, undisturbed.

If a problem confounded him, he found that merely forgetting about it during an interlude with Marasee provided him with the answer. The barriers were broken, the so-called "walls of de- fense" crumbled before as he created new methods of penetration no one had ever thought of before.

As his plan coalesced into a singular whole, he began to experi- ence a euphoria, a high that was neither drug nor s.e.xually in- duced. He could envision, all at once, the entire grand strate- gy; how the myriad pieces effortlessly fit together and evolved into a picture perfect puzzle. Miles became able to manipulate the attack scenarios in his mind and make slight changes in one that would have far reaching implications in another portion of the puzzle. He might change only one slight aspect, yet see synergistic ramifications down a side road. This new ability, gained from total freedom to concentrate and his newfound worry free life, gave Miles new sources of pleasure and inspiration.

As his plans came together, Miles yearned for something outside of his idyllic environment. His strategies grew into a concrete reality, one which he knew he could execute, if h.o.m.osoto wasn"t feeding him a line of s.h.i.t. And, for the $100,000 h.o.m.osoto gave him to make plans, he was generally inclined to believe that this super rich, slightly eccentric but obviously dangerous man was deadly serious.

As the days wore on, Miles realized that, more than anything in his life, even more than getting laid, he wanted to put his plan to the test. If he was right, of which he was sure, in a few short years he would be recognized as the most brilliant computer scientist in the world. In the whole d.a.m.n world.

His inner peace, the one which fed his creativity, soon was overtaken by the unbridled ego which was Miles Foster"s inner self. The prospect of success fostered new energies and Miles worked even harder to complete the first phase of his task. To the occasional disappointment of Marasee, Miles would embroil himself in the computer h.o.m.osoto provided for the purpose.

Marasee had been with many men, she was an expert, but Miles gave her as much pleasure as she to him. As his work further absorbed him, she rued the day her a.s.signment would be over.

Miles left Tahiti for Tokyo without even saying goodbye to Mara- see.

The ritualistic scanning and security checks before Miles got onto the living room elevator at the OSO Building in Tokyo evi- denced that h.o.m.osoto had not told anyone else how important Miles was. Even though he recognized the need for secrecy in their endeavors, Miles was irked by the patronizing, almost rude treat- ment he received when he was forced to pa.s.s the Sumo scrutiny.

The elevator again opened into the grand white gallery on the 66th floor.

"Ah . . .so good to see you again Mr. Foster. h.o.m.osoto-San is anxious to see you." A short j.a.panese manservant escorted Miles to the doors of h.o.m.osoto"s office. The briefest of taps invited the bellow of "Hai!" from its inner sanctum.

h.o.m.osoto was quick to rise from his techo-throne and greeted Miles as if they were long lost friends.

"Mr. Foster . . .it is so good to see you. I a.s.sume everything was satisfactory? You found the working conditions to your liking?" h.o.m.osoto awkwardly searched for the vain compliment.

He pointed at the leather seating area in which they had first discussed their plans. They sat in the same chairs they had the last time they met.

Miles was taken aback by the warm reception, but since he was so important to h.o.m.osoto, it was only fitting to be treated with respect.

Miles returned the courtesy with the minimum required bow of the head. It was a profitable game worth playing. "Very much so, Mr.

h.o.m.osoto. It was most relaxing . . .and I think you will be very pleased with the results." Miles smiled warmly, expecting to be heavily complimented on his promise. Instead, h.o.m.osoto ignored the business issue.

"I understand that Miss Marasee was most pleased . . .was she not?" The implication was clear. For the first time, Miles saw a glimmer of a dirty old man looking for the sordid details.

"I guess so. I was too busy working to pay attention." Miles tried to sluff off the comment.

"That is what she says. That you were too busy for her . . .or to say goodbye and thank her for her attentions. Not an auspi- cious beginning Mr. Foster." Miles caught the derision in h.o.m.o- soto"s voice and didn"t appreciate it one little bit.

"Listen. My affairs are my affairs. I am grateful for the services, but I do like to keep my personal life just that. Per- sonal." Miles was polite, but firm. h.o.m.osoto nodded in under- standing.

"Of course, Mr. Foster, I understand completely. It is merely for the sake of the young woman that I mention it. There is no offense intended. It is shall we say . . .a cultural difference?"

Miles didn"t believe in the cultural difference to which he referred, but he didn"t press the point. He merely nodded that the subject was closed. A pregnant pause followed before h.o.m.o- soto interrupted the silence.

"So, Mr. Foster. I really did not expect to see you for another few weeks. I must a.s.sume that you have made some progress in planning our future endeavors." h.o.m.osoto wore a smile that belied little of his true thoughts.

"You bet your a.s.s, I did." h.o.m.osoto winced at the colorful language. It was Miles" way of maintaining some control over the situation. His dimples recessed even further as he enjoyed watching h.o.m.osoto"s reaction. "It turned out to be simpler than even I had thought."

"Would you be so kind as to elaborate?"

"Gotcha." Miles opened his briefcase and brought out a sheath of papers with charts and scribbles all over them. "Basically the technology is pretty simple. Here are the fundamental systems to use in the attack, there are only four of them. After all, there are no defenses, so that"s not a problem."

"Problem?" h.o.m.osoto raised his eyes.

"Ok, not problem. As you can see here, putting the technical pieces together is not the issue. The real issue is creating an effective deployment of the tools we create." Miles was matter of fact and for the first time h.o.m.osoto saw Miles as the itiner- ant professional he was capable of being. The challenge. Just as Miles promised earlier, "give me a challenge, the new, the undone and I will be the best." Miles was shining in his own excel- lence, and his ego was gone, totally gone. His expertise took over.

"I have labeled various groups that we will need to pull this off."

"Pull off? Excuse me . . ."

"Oh, sorry. Make it work? Have it happen?"

"Ah yes, So sorry."

"Not at all." Miles looked at h.o.m.osoto carefully. Was there a mutual respect actually developing?

"As I said, we will have to have several groups who don"t even know about each other"s existence. At NSA we call it contain- ment, or need to know."

h.o.m.osoto cursorily examined the printouts on the table in front of him, but preferred to address Miles" comments. "Could you explain, please? I don"t see how one can build a car if you don"t know what it"s going to look like when you"re done. You suggest that each person or group functions without the knowledge of the others? How can this be efficient?"

Miles smiled. For the first time he felt a bit of compa.s.sion for h.o.m.osoto, as one would feel for the naive child asking why 1 plus 1 equals 2. h.o.m.osoto was used to the j.a.panese work ethic: Here"s a beautiful picture of a car, and all 50,000 of us are going to build it; you 5,000 build the engines, you 5,000 build the body and so on. After a couple of years we"ll have built a fabulous automobile that we have all shared as a common vision.

h.o.m.osoto had no idea of how to wage a war, although he apparently afford it. Miles realized he could be in control after all, if he only sold h.o.m.osoto on his abilities, and he was well on the way.

"You see, Mr. h.o.m.osoto, what we are trying to do requires that no one, except a few key people like you and I, understand what is going on. As we said in World War II, loose lips sink ships."

h.o.m.osoto immediately bristled at the mention of the war. Miles hardly noticed as he continued. "The point is, as I have it laid out here, only a handful of people need to know what we are trying to achieve. All of the rest have clearly defined duties that they are expected to perform as we ask. Each effectively works in a vacuum. Efficient, not exactly. Secure, yes. I imagine you would like to keep this operation as secret as possi- ble."

h.o.m.osoto took immediate notice and bolted his response. "Hai! Of course, secrecy is important, but how can we be sure of compli- ance by our . . .a.s.sociates?"

"Let me continue." Miles referred back to the papers in front of him. "The first group is called the readers, the second will be dedicated to research and development." h.o.m.osoto smiled at the R&D reference. He could understand that. "Then there will be a public relations group, a communications group, a software compa- ny will be needed, another group I call the Mosquitoes and a little manufacturing which I a.s.sume you can handle." Miles looked for h.o.m.osoto"s reaction.

"Manufacturing, very easy. I don"t fully understand the others, but I am most impressed with your outline. You mentioned prob- lem. Can you explain?" h.o.m.osoto had become a different person.

One who showed adolescent enthusiasm. He moved to the edge of his seat.

"As with any well designed plan," Miles boasted, "there are certain situations that need to be addressed. In this case, I see several." Miles was trying to hook h.o.m.osoto onto the prover- bial deck.

"I asked for problem." h.o.m.osoto insisted.

"To properly effect this plan we will need two things that may make it impossible."

h.o.m.osoto met the challenge. "What do you need?"

Miles liked the sound of it. You. What do _you_ need. "This operation could cost as much as $50 million. Is that a problem?"

h.o.m.osoto looked squarely at Miles. "No problem. What is the second thing you need?"