This book was originally published starting in 2018 and continued into 2019. But it began much earlier than that.

Around 2010 my father was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. No real surprise, it runs in the family, and there had been signs the preceding five years or so. That led me on a journey reminiscing with him about my earliest memories and gave me an idea:

What if someone could remember the future?

What if they could remember every possible permutation of the future they could conceivably experience?

That led to extensive research over the next decade as I compiled a timeline and hundreds of browser bookmarks. From technologies to important people and dates. Special thanks to Wikipedia for this.

Writing finally began in 2018 as my Dad continued to decline. The person he was had mostly left us, but there were still glimmers of the old him there.

He passed just as the series was coming to an end, a full eight novellas. The last part was unfortunately shorter than I had intended, as I found it impossible to write for a time after his death.

Beginning in 2025, I dusted off this early work, and revamped it, adding significant amounts of dialog and story. I've also broken it down into chapters, as the original novella was just continuous text.

From an original novella of just over 25,000 words, this segment of the story has been hugely expanded. It is now the fourth of seven novels based specifically on the original Deadlines novella and is just over 87,000 words.

This seventh novel in the new series is entitled, Mad Beast.

While it may be inspired by my own memories, the people mentioned are entirely fictional characters, with no relation to reality. Especially where historical figures are used. Every effort has been made to follow the rules of Alternate History, where real life characters, living and dead, are used for the verisimilitude and world building, not cheap laughs or as critical commentary.

I hope you enjoy this story, it means very much to me.

PT Brainum

pt.brainum@gmail.com​

I was already in my office when Charlie arrived for the day on May 9th, 1991 with a worried look on his face.

"Sit," I told him. "How hard was it to get in the building today?"

"Security called me last night and told me where the underground tunnels were. I had to park three blocks away, but I bypassed the crowds."

I gave him a nod. "I can't stay here. It'll act as a magnet for the crowds. So far the two groups are standing on opposite sides of the streets, but if I stay here?" I shook my head. "They'll start to fight. I won't have that."

He nodded, but still looked worried. "Charlie, we've been through a lot together. You did a great job at the auction. I'm appointing you as Mr Tulsa."

He didn't even crack a smile, he understood and felt the same fear I did. Mobs were emotional things, prone to erratic behavior. "Thank you, Boss. I knew that was the plan, but I didn't expect it to happen so quickly."

"I'm going to disappear, but I'll stay in contact. You and Tim know what to do, and Jennifer is always there for guidance as well. Matt will stay here too. He'll be available but I have him transitioning to manage more of my charity work.

"We've got phone, fax and email. I'll be alternating the monthly briefing between you and Tim since we'll do it over the phone."

"I understand, Boss," he said, a faint smile on his lips. "I wanted to let you know that the employee bonus goes out today."

"Excellent. I reward loyalty and hard work, everyone will be reminded of it today then. That will help."

"It is still less than 25 billion," Charlie said.

"I can't give them too much, they'd all quit when they saw the size of the checks," I said with a smile.

"I'm buying houses," Charlie said.

"Really, how long have you been working? You started with Jennifer some time ago, right?"

"I was one of her first hires," he said.

"I'd stick to just one house," I told him. "At $100,000 for each year you've spent working for me is enough to buy 10 houses, or fifty if you just do a down payment. But managing that is a lot of work. The S&P 500 would get you to about the same amount if you reinvest all the dividends. Alternatively, if you created a property management company with a couple of other guys to maximize your returns and minimize management expenses, reinvesting in more rental property? Looking for the diamond in the rough, you could make more than that, but not by much. The difference is either working a second job or being an investor. Lots more work, but a possible marginally higher return."

"I'll consider that," he said. "I know that the top suggestion my financial adviser said was to max out my 401k or IRA."

"The key to long term investing is to funnel all the dividends back into further growth. Compounding growth in the S&P makes todays 500k become 16 million at retirement. Save your normal annual bonus for vacations and big expenses like cars. I'll be making all my vacation properties available to employees after they've been with me for two years, so you can have some great vacations."

"I've seen Cook Town," he said.

"Oh, no. No, no, no. Who's calling it Cook Town?" I asked.

"Only a few people," he said. "Does that place in France have a name?"

"du Bas village?" I said. "Something like that. Not much there, the locals were not thrilled about being so close to a nuclear plant, and happy to sell."

"It needs something that evokes rainbows and French cafe life," Charlie suggested.

"See," I said. "this is why you are Mr Tulsa. Matt would be calling Mitterrand and suggesting that it needed to be called Cook Town."

"I think he came up with the name, actually," Charlie said with a smile.

"That sounds about right. I need to dig through my old pictures," I told Charlie. "I've got one of him in a mud bath that would make an excellent poster for office morale."

Charlie chuckled, and made a note. "Let me know what you decide it should be called, and I'll make sure the name sticks."

"Here are the top picks," I told him jotting down a list of fifteen names. "Run it by others, and send a note to Mitterrand, he has more poetry in his soul than I do. As long as it doesn't have my name on it, that is what matters."

Charlie looked at the list. "Prisme is nice," he said. "I think Nova Civaux and Vortaux are bit too commercial."

"Everybody's a critic," I sighed with a smile. "I made up a list of 15 names on the spur of the moment, they won't all be great. Anyway, I like Vortaux or perhaps Vortaux-Elysée."

"That last one sounds more French," Charlie said. "Does it mean something?"

"It's a portmanteau of Vortex and Vaux, which means valley. Elysée comes from the Greek Elysian Fields, the resting place of dead heroes. It works because Civaux is equivalent in English to valley of the dead. Vortaux-Elysée is Vortex Valley Paradise."

I stood and walked over to Charlie, he was about an inch taller, so we were nearly at eye level as he stood too. I put out my hand, and he awkwardly shook it.

"No, we can do better than that," I told him, and we had a nice manly handshake on the second try.

"Mr Tulsa, Charles Munroe," I said. "I've got to get back upstairs and get packed, the sooner the crowds below know I'm gone, the safer everyone here will be."

"Understood, Boss," he said. "I'll keep things going and email you any questions I have."

"Excellent," I told him. "I think you're the right man for the job. You've certainly put in the hours this past year."

He watched as I walked out of my office, and headed back up the circular staircase to my penthouse home.

❖

Jack was waiting at the top of the staircase. "Are you ready?" he asked.

I wasn't. "I am," I said.

"Follow me," he said, and turned toward the unassuming wall that opened at his approach.

We went into security's secret room, and directly into the cargo elevator. From the basement it was a hurried walk down old tunnels under the streets of Tulsa. We came out to a white minivan with dark windows.

"No one will guess I'm riding around in the back of a Plymouth Grand Voyager," I said as I slid into the middle seat. A glance behind showed my luggage was already packed and piled up.

Jack slid in next to me and pulled the heavy sliding door closed. The drive wasn't hurried as we moved out of the parking garage and headed for the airport.

I went aboard quickly as the others grabbed the luggage. In my bedroom I pulled out the drawer that held a black fuzzy ring box. I opened it, and slid the gold ring onto my finger. It had only been three months, but I was headed back to Kiev.

❖

The forty security on the plane were met by another twenty on the ground. It had been an odd flight, Chef Peter had been left behind to plan his wedding and we had served ourselves from his kitchen. I had finished dinner just as we started to land. The SynAV in the tanks had gotten us here in only 9 hours, so it was 3am.

The construction project at Stanislav had been operational long enough that security had maximized the number of people there, as well as provided them my black graphene felt covered Humvees. The caravan had met us at a practically vacant Boryspil International Airport. The terminal was a dimly lit structure. The windows black in the night, reflecting the few external lamps around it. The red neon БОРІСПІЛЬ  sign cast a glow across the concrete roof.

"We aren't going to the terminal, you've already been logged in. Head straight for the Humvee," Jack said from the top of the stairs.

A Humvee was parked at the bottom, its back door already held open by someone from security. I headed down carrying Max in his carrier case. I settled in the back as the luggage was moved from the plane to the waiting vehicles. I had brought a lot of equipment for my temporary exile. I'd need it, my life was entering a new stage.

I lowered the rear window, finding it extra thick. The cool 50-degree night air was refreshing, despite the pervasive scent of jet fuel. Jack joined me in the back after about 45 minutes. As the convoy moved off I watched my plane ascend back into the sky.

"Where are you putting it?" I asked Jack, breaking the silence.

He glanced to see where I was looking. "It is headed to Paris. That is close enough that it could be there at about the right time for a direct flight from Tulsa. It will have a parking space where everyone can see where you are."

It was only 30 minutes traversing the desolate six lane highway into Kiev. The glowing blue sign over the door 'УКРАЇНА' at the private courtyard off of Pushkinska Street was a welcome sight. The light-absorbing felt of our caravan made us look like a fleet of shadows as we pulled through the arched gate and onto the cobblestones.

"Welcome back to the Hotel Ukrayina," said the manager with a warm smile.

"It is nice to be back in Ukraine," I told him, and signed the guest registry. I looked up at his smiling face. "I recognize you," I told him.

He nodded, almost shyly. "You told me to ask my girlfriend to marry me on your first trip," he said.

"Did you?" I asked, remembering the diamond I had slipped him.

"I did. Five years in June," he said with a happy smile.

"Congratulations," I told him. "Are you here at the Palast Hôtel permanently now?"

"I am," he said. "I am the assistant manager here. It has not been called the Palast Hôtel for a very long time though, Dr Cook."

"Sorry," I said. "To me it will always be the Palast Hôtel."

"I understand, it is a grand lady, but she took a new name when she was married," he said subtly.

"I'll try to remember that," I said with a wink. "I wouldn't want the grand lady to be upset with me."

❖

I headed to the elevator, Max completely unremarked on in his big carrier.

"You had a chat with the manager?" Jack asked.

"I did," I said as we headed to the top floor. "He's an old friend from way back."

Jack just watched the numbers go up. More security was waiting as the doors opened, and I was escorted to the same room I'd had last time. "My clock is messed up," I told Jack. "I'll be up when I'm up, no need to wake me."

"Understood, John. Sleep well."

I let Max out of his little prison, and he darted across the room to look out the window. I got into bed and was quickly asleep.

❖

Morning was nearly Friday afternoon when I woke. Max was standing next to my head, a paw on my forehead. He wanted breakfast.

I dragged myself out of bed finding my luggage, and Max's set just inside the hotel room door. I had slept through delivery. I found a can of food for him, and opened it, leaving it on the bathroom tiles. Then I found his mess in the white porcelain bathtub, and after using the bathroom myself, dumped it into the toilet and washed my hands.

While I had permanently booked the entire top floor, the Presidential Suite of room 801 was a warm reminder of home. The Art Nouveau corner room was a prewar jewel. From the windows, past the forest green velvet drapes that smelled faintly of Turkish tobacco. I could see the golden domes of St Sophia's Cathedral.

The original hardwood parquet floors creaked under the thick Romanian carpets as I moved to the room's phone. I picked up the phone and dialed Jack's room.

"Good morning," I greeted him when he answered.

"Good afternoon," he said. "Did you sleep well?"

"I did. The thick walls block all the noise. Can I get breakfast and coffee?"

"It'll be right up. When did you want to get the equipment set up?" he asked.

"After I eat. I'm sure nothing too major has happened since I left."

"The crowds at the Mid have mostly gone home when your plane was spotted parked in Paris," he confirmed.

"Good," I said. "We'll talk more after breakfast."

"Five minutes," he said, and hung up.

I pulled out my laptop and set it on the desk next to the marble fireplace. I found the adapter and plugged it in. I would have preferred a desktop to write a book with, but the power here was too unreliable. I needed a laptop with its built-in battery.

There was a knock at the door and Jack entered pushing a cart. I moved to the dining table, where he set out a carafe of coffee, milk and sugar. Breakfast was thick slices of dark rye bread, and heavy cold butter, matched with sausages.

"Thank you, Jack," I said after my first sip of hot wakefulness.

"I'm going to wait on your couch," he said.

"You can sit, if it is important we can talk while I eat," I told him, pointing at a spot at the dining table.

He pulled out a carved wood chair and sat, pouring himself a cup of coffee.

"I've had a look at the broadcast system you have operating up here," he said. "They have no idea what you're doing to the country, do they?"

I gave him a grin as I chewed on the sausage. "It has been going three months now. There are now eight Ukrainian TV stations."

"I saw the BBS you set up. How are they all communicating with each other?" he asked.

"MERCURY is just an improved version of what I first put up in Kiribati," I told him. "That was an improved version of American Wireless. This is an amalgam of all of those."

"So the transmitters they use to send the video stream to the balloon network is two way?" he asked.

"Yup. They plug in their IBM clones to the network, it lets them send updates on what they are playing next so my TV Guide guys can keep it accurate," I said and took another bite of sausage. "It also lets them send messages to each other. You don't have suits run a new TV or radio station. It's all nerds, and it is fantastic."

"I noticed that as soon as I sent up the Predator that it connected to a larger network. Is that the balloons?" he asked.

"It is," I told him sitting back to take a sip. "Local security already has Predators circling the construction site, and if you brought the AMIGA from off the plane you'll be able to access those feeds."

"I saw that," he said, "but I couldn't control the ones down south."

"Of course not, they all have a PIN code for that. You don't want an operator accidentally commanding the wrong Predator."

"I popped a GNAT, was that necessary?" he asked.

"Yes," I said. "The whole country is covered, and a few hundred miles outside the borders too with the balloon network. My laptop can't transmit far enough to reach the nearest balloon. I'm sure that the engineers have one going, but it is on the other side of the building, better to use our own."

He shook his head. "You sure are sneaky," he said.

"Thank you, Jack. That has got to be one of the nicest compliments you've ever given me," I said.

He just responded with a big grin and a nod, and drank a sip of his own coffee.

"I need to check email," I told him as I wiped my face.

"Do I need to bring you any of the equipment you brought?" he asked.

"No," I said shaking my head and standing from the table. "I've got a MERCURY card already installed in my laptop."

I turned the laptop on and it beeped as I watched as it booted to DOS then to Windows 3.0, the familiar splash screen staying up only momentarily with the 10MB of installed ram. The click and hum of the machine and its 60MB hard drive breaking the natural silence of the room. I exited Windows and went back to DOS, and ran GA-Mail. Windows couldn't use the MERCURY card installed discretely behind a panel inside the Compaq laptop.

"Where did you put the GNAT?" I asked Jack as I adjusted the settings.

"I tied it to the balcony railing from my room," he said.

"How high did you put it up?" I asked.

"Just a few feet, it just looks like a black balloon tied to the railing," he said. "I used the adapter to plug it into an outlet. I don't have a long enough cord to go higher."

"Plenty close enough," I said as my inbox suddenly began to populate one slow line at a time. The request had crossed to his GNAT, been retransmitted to the nearest balloon 20 miles up, moved again across to another balloon and finally reached Stanislav where a 2 meter Inmarsat-A dish connected them, and now me, to the nascent internet. I waited as the number of new messages displayed on the right side of the dot matrix grayscale screen stopped counting up.

I scrolled down to the last unread message, and started work. Jack seeing I was busy, and not having any more questions headed for the door.

"Jack?" I asked just as he got to the door.

"Yeah?" he asked.

"I do need one piece of equipment," I said, looking at the cat.

"I'll get it," he said looking where I was, and finding Max was staring at him with golden eyes. Max was probably wondering if he could make it past Jack and out the door.

A few minutes later, Jack returned carrying Max's automatic litter box, and set it in the bathroom next to the toilet. I heard him unrolling the cord and plugging it in. Its little chime on being powered caught Max's attention as well.

Jack left and a few minutes after, I heard it run its cycle as it self scooped after detecting he had left the box. I wasn't unpacked, but I was all moved in.

❖

After lunch and a furious trade of emails with Charlie and Tim at 9600 baud, I walked down the hallway to the other side of the building.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen," I said as I walked into the headquarters of Ukraine's most advanced TV station.

"Hi, Boss!" they greeted loudly, having been thoroughly indoctrinated in the company traditions started by Matt.

There were four computers running, and power cables snaked outside through the balcony doors where a gas generator ran powering them. I walked to the glass doors to see the Honda EX300. My hand brushed against the duct tape that sealed the door shut against the wind and exhaust, but not the sound.

I moved to stand behind one of them as he adjusted the static display on the AMIGA that did the graphics.

"You do all the TV guide stuff here, and the weather and news is all done at the TV and Radio building?" I asked Greg, the guy left in charge from the original ten.

"It is just the Radio building now, Boss," Greg said. "TV got moved to a new fancy building in town, but our news and weather still comes from the Radio building."

"How are you handling the switchover?" I asked.

"It's easy, we just programmed it into the TV network," he said. "For five minutes, every fifteen minutes it switches to the other transmitter. They play their portion of the programing, either a news tape or the weather report and then it switches back to the AMIGA which displays the rolling TV guide and we play the music from the CD player. Both are connected to the transmitter in the window."

"Nice," I complimented. "I helped draw up the specifications but the guys who used to work at American Wireless before it became part of TWP are the ones who designed and built it."

"It works great," he said. "We code the schedule on the 486 over there," he said pointing at a table on the other side of where we were standing. "And do the advertisements on a 486 in the advertising office next door. We just wait for the breaks for news and weather and use the AMIGA to grab them from the network server," he said pointing at the NeXTcube.

"How often do you get people asking to advertise?" I asked.

"Not often," he admitted. "We use ArtStudio to create up to a ten frame animated bitmap for the advertisement. Each frame plays for ten seconds, so that controls the length of the advertisement. It rotates through whatever we have in the advertising directory automatically. There is a graphic artist we hired to do that, she's amazing."

"I bet it helps that she speaks English," I said.

"It does! She's amazing, English, Ukrainian and Russian. She has been a huge help," he confirmed.

"So how often do you have to update the TV guide?" I asked him as I watched the TV in the corner display the same thing I was seeing on the AMIGA screen, just delayed by a few seconds as it passed through the network and came back to the TV as a live broadcast.

"Usually twice a day, occasionally there will be a last minute change, somebody has a tape get damaged, or something. We keep someone like Bob over there on the NeXTcube to monitor for messages, but he mostly just chats on the BBS as they practice their English."

"Looks good," I said. "Come find me if you need help, I'm in 801."

"Got it, Boss," he said happily. "Security already told us not to let anyone know you are here."

"That is important," I said raising my voice so Bob could hear, as he had turned away from the computer to watch. "I can work from here, but only as long as no one knows, especially the reporters."

I stood and walked to the other balcony in this corner room. A yagi antenna was pointed out the window into the distance. It was connected to a big gray box that had wires running from it to the AMIGA and a CD player next to it. Another coaxial cable ran from it to the NeXTcube.

"Any problems with the network transmitters?" I asked?

"None at all. We have to reboot the AMIGA regularly. We do it at midnight every night, but that is about the only issue we have."

"How popular is the channel?" I asked.

"Everybody watches it, Boss," Bob said, joining the conversation. "Everyone wants to know what is on TV, the local newspaper doesn't have information like that."

"The news and weather are even bigger draws," Greg added. "Everybody knows what time it shows. If a TV is in a restaurant or shop it is usually turned to our channel, just for the background music."

❖

Next door I found Kristianna. "Oh! You are Dr Cook. Why are you here? Did I make a mistake?" she asked after opening the door to my knock.

"Hello," I said. "May I come in?"

"Certainly, Comrade," she said pulling the door open wide. The room had the same features as the others, 4 meter ceilings, ornate wood, and balconies. She had her balcony door propped open and an orange extension cord ran to the desk next to the door where a large 486 IBM clone sat.

I took a seat on the couch, and she sat on one of the tall backed chairs across from it. I looked her over, she had typical Ukrainian farm girl looks, but behind her glasses were eyes that seemed to see everything.

"You haven't done anything wrong," I assured her. "I'm just trying to avoid the reporters in the west for a while, and Ukraine is an excellent second home for me."

"I will not tell anyone you are here," she said immediately, glancing at the gold ring on my finger.

"Thank you," I said. "I thought I could see how you work, can you design an advertisement for me?"

"Yes!" she said excitedly and jumped up to grab a sketch pad.

"What kind of advertisement would you like?" she asked.

"I'd like an advertisement for the Palast Hôtel, something for people on a honeymoon."

"I believe you mean honey month," she said.

"Honeymoon," I said in English, then switched to Ukrainian, "Is what medovyi misiats is here. I'm sorry for being confusing."

"It is fine Dr Cook, your Ukrainian is so good, that I'm sure people forget that you didn't grow up here."

I quirked an eyebrow at her, and she smiled. "I'm making up for lost time now," I told her. "Now, for the Palast Hôtel, I'd like a sample advertisement advertising rooms at 75% off for married couples during weekdays within the first year they are married."

"I can do that, do you want it to run the full length, 100 seconds?" she asked.

"I do," I said. "Do you need to make ten different drawings for that?"

"Not at all, that just determines the length of the advertisement. I can copy the same frame 10 times so it looks like a static image. Most people don't want their advertisement to change."

"Understood," I said. "I'd like it to start with a picture of the hotel, then the notice to all newly married couples, and then finally telling them that it only works with a reservation, and they must show documentation."

"Documentation is easy, Dr Cook. Everyone who gets married gets the shtamp in their passport."

"Really?" I asked.

She hopped up and went to a large leather purse where she dug around until she pulled out a small dark red booklet, with a gold hammer and sickle over a globe on the front. She flipped through the worn pages, then held it open for me to see.

There was a page titled Marital Status, and below that was a rectangular purple ink stamp. Inside written in ink was a handwritten mans name, and the wedding date, as well as the location of the registry office.

Seeing my curious look, she handed it to me, and I flipped through it. At the front was a page with two photos, one of her as a teenager, and one a little younger than she was now.

"Thank you," I said handing it back to her. "I've only seen mine, and it is a little different."

"Yes there are differences," she said with a grin. "You have only one picture and you are not married."

"So would you like me to come back to see your designs?" I asked.

"You can stay and watch," she said, picking up the sketch book and drawing a bright modern looking hotel picture on it with a pencil.

"Kristianna?" I asked and she paused to look up. "Do you know what the Palast Hôtel is?"

"It is the new hotel you are going to build in Stanislav, right? So people can come have a honeymoon under the rainbow?"

I smiled. "That is a very good idea," I told her. "But the Palast Hôtel is what this hotel was named when it was built in 1912."

"Hotel Ukrayina?" she asked. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, quite sure," I told her. "I love old buildings like this one. To me it still is a beautiful palace."

"It is a very beautiful hotel," she said, her eyes sweeping the room as if seeing it again for the first time.

"Well, this is just practice," I told her. "I want to see how you work, and perhaps offer suggestions if I see anything that can make your advertisements better. But I must admit, the advertisements I've seen so far, are quite good."

Her cheeks dimpled at the praise and she flipped to a new sheet where she began sketching out the hotel we were in.​

Sunday, I spent the morning sleeping in, getting used to the time zone shift, and trying to sleep off the jet lag. At lunch, Jack and a trio of other guards followed me as I tucked my hands into the pockets of my track jacket and joined the flow of people moving toward Khreshchatyk. The air was a crisp 65-degrees, perfect for walking under the heavy canopy of white chestnut blossoms. I didn't look like an American kid billionaire, I looked like just another Kiev teenager out for a Sunday snack. I waited in line for my Perepichka, feeling the warmth of the grease soak through the paper, and sighed in relief. For the first time in weeks I was free from the media drama that surrounded me.

I walked down the wide boulevard of Khreshchatyk under a canopy of blooming chestnuts. The Sunday sun felt warm on my shoulders so I stopped at a silver refrigerated cart near the Bessarabsky Market. I traded a few crumpled rubles for a Plombir ice cream. It was a simple paper cup filled with a thick heavy cream that tasted more like frozen butter than the creamy stuff we had back in Tulsa. I peeled the paper circle off the top and licked the lid while I wandered toward a cluster of trees where a small crowd had gathered.

The rhythmic clicking of wooden pieces against stone tables drew me in. In a small clearing several old men were hunched over chessboards while onlookers leaned in with their hands behind their backs. I stopped at the most intense game. A man with a thick wool cap despite the heat was struggling with a complex endgame. He had a Rook and three Pawns against his opponent’s Knight and four. It was a classic positional squeeze that required absolute precision. I stood there quietly finishing my ice cream as the man in the cap reached for his King and then hesitated.

"The King move to G2 is a trap," I said softly. Both men looked up at me with surprise. They saw a kid in an acid-washed track jacket who looked like any other local. The opponent narrowed his eyes and gestured to the board.

"And what would you do, boy?" he asked with a gruff chuckle. "This is a Master's problem."

"It is a textbook transition," I replied, pointing to the f-pawn. "If you push the pawn now you force the Knight to commit to the rim. It is the same way Boris Kogan used to dismantle the Sicilian in the seventies. He didn't look for the kill. He just waited for you to run out of squares."

The man in the cap froze and his eyes went wide as he looked back at the board. "Kogan," he whispered. "I haven't heard that name in years. He went to America. I played him in '74 at the Republic Championship. He was a boa constrictor. You have a good eye kid." He moved the pawn exactly where I had suggested and a low murmur went through the crowd as they realized the trap was now reversed.

I watched as it played out and thought back to the day I had played Kogan. I had let him bring me to a draw, with a very similar play, and made him my very first Ukrainian friend. I moved on, like chess, it had been a passing moment. One of the steps that had brought me to this city and away from the public eye.

❖

I sat at the heavy oak desk in the corner of the suite. Through the window the evening light was catching the gold leaf on the domes of St Volodymyr’s Cathedral. I picked up the receiver and listened to the strange hollow hiss of the line. Instead of the standard American dial tone, I heard the rhythmic chirping of the European exchange.

I punched in the sequence for the US country code and then the Tulsa area code. I could hear the faint mechanical clicks of switches turning over in Frankfurt and then New York. There was a second of dead silence where I wondered if the signal had died in the Atlantic, but then a familiar ring began on the other end. It sounded tinny and far away, but it was the most beautiful thing I’d heard all day.

"Hello?" my mother's voice came through. She sounded like she was standing in a wind tunnel, but it was her.

"Happy Mother's Day, Mom," I said. I had to speak louder than usual to make sure my voice carried over the delay. "I’m calling from Kiev. It is nearly five in the evening here, but I wanted to catch you before you went to brunch."

"Kiev? Isn't that where you went when you took off without telling me? You did it again, John. What is it about Kiev that you fly off and not tell me?"

"It is a nice city, and it is far away from protesters and crazies. How is the family holding up?" I asked.

"Everyone is good. Nick is making sure we are all safe. There are a lot of people coming to stay in the hotel. They all seem to be your fans, they have little pins with rainbows on them. I think the gift shop is selling them now. Nick said we could go see your big rainbow in Washington this summer and stay at one of the beach houses."

I laughed, happy to hear everyone was well. "That sounds like a great idea. I won't be back for my birthday party this year, so after Mattie finishes with the World Children's Council you should all go. I'll email Nick about where he should take you. There are a couple amazing places to visit within a days drive of Ocean Shores."

"Just how long will you be gone?" she asked, keying in on the thing that was most important to her.

"It will be a while. If I'm in Tulsa, I'll bring in the religious people who will fight over me. I don't want that. Plus, they really need the help here. Things have changed a lot since 1986, but they haven't always changed for the better. I'm meeting with the Ukrainian President tomorrow," I said, using a term she would understand, even though Leonid Kravchuk wasn't one, yet.

"You and your Presidents," she said in mock anger. "These old men, they demand too much of your time."

I snorted, holding back the laughter. "It is me asking for their time, Mom. Anyway, tell me. What else has been going on? Any new students with promise signed up for the summer music conservatory session? How's the garden?" I asked.

❖

On Monday morning I went to visit Leonid Kravchuk. The neo-classical, Stalinist era monument he worked in was called the Verkhovna Rada. There was a minor commotion when I presented my little red passport to the first security officer and he saw it was stamped in black ink on the front under the hammer and sickle 'UKRAINE.' He snapped to attention, and gave me salute that caught the attention of the other guards.

"Where would you like to go, Gromadyanyn?" he asked.

"I'm here to visit Leonid Makarovych," I said.

"I will escort you, please follow me," he directed.

I traveled down the long high ceilinged hallways, following as he set a brisk pace. Every so often my guard handed me my passport, so I could show it as needed. The other guards were checking papers with grim intensity that only built as I got closer to Kabinet 21, but I was waved through after a cursory check with my escort. The deep party red carpets down the hallways muffled every step as we moved with directed purpose.

When I reached his official office. The secretary at the door saw the passport in my hand and nodded, recognizing me immediately.

"He is waiting for you," she said, her voice dropping the usual bureaucratic edge. I pushed through the heavy double doors into the inner antechamber.

A man leapt up from a smaller side-desk. He was impeccably dressed in a suit that looked far too well-tailored to be Soviet, his eyes sharp and calculating. This was Viktor Medvedchuk, Kravchuk's right hand.

"Dr Cook, welcome. May I take your coat?" he asked, his gaze scanning me from head to foot as if memorizing everything about me, from my clothes to my pulse.

"I'm fine, thank you," I said.

"Then this way, please," he said, leading me past Lyudmila’s desk to the final door to the inner sanctum, stepping aside to let me pass, but he followed me in.

"John! Please, come in," Leonid said, rising from behind his gargantuan T-shaped desk. He looked tired, but his eyes lit up as he gestured to the seat across from him.

"Leonid Makarovych, you look well. Thank you for arranging my visit," I said as I took a seat, and Medvedchuk took one next to me.

"It is good to have you back so soon. How long will you stay?" he asked.

"A few months this time. Hotel Ukrayina feels enough like home," I said. "I've recently heard some news that concerns me."

"Really, John? What have you heard?" he asked.

"I've heard that the fertilizer is piling up. That's a humanitarian crisis of urgent proportion. I'd like to help," I said.

"Cherkasy Azot has 450,000 tons of Urea and Ammonium Nitrate sitting in storage. Rivne Azot has nearly 300,000 tons. But what can you do about it?" he asked.

"I can buy it, and pay for it to be shipped where needs to go," I told him. "How do I go about doing that?"

He gave me a small smile. "First you need export permission, which I can provide. Then you need to arrange transport. Where do you plan to send it?" he asked.

"You have a copy of the 'Cook Protocol for Market Transition'?" I asked.

"I do," he said. "We are already arranging for its implementation, though some points are still a little vague."

"Good, that makes payment easier. I'll pay you $200 million for your fertilizer and transport. $100 million will go into escrow accounts for fuel to keep BLASCO running. Suez, Singapore, Fujairah, Columbo, Rotterdam, Gibraltar, Panama and Las Palmas. That 100 million will be for a convertible note, which buys me $100 million in BLASCO stock when it lists on the market. The other $100 million will be for however much fertilizer that will buy."

His eyebrows went up, and he looked at Medvedchuk, who was doing the mental calculations. "If it is a telex authorization code linked to a hard currency account, that moves the entire fleet until the end of August, without relying on Gosplan to pay the bills and keep the ships from being seized," Medvedchuk said, coming to the end of his rapid calculation.

"That's fine," I said. "We can review what is needed when that time comes. But how much fertilizer will that buy me?"

Leonid gave a wry chuckle. "All of it, John. Every bag, plus some."

"Good. I understand the Ministry of Rail wants hard cash for transport, reserve some of that to pay them to deliver it to the black earth regions of Russia, everything else should go by boat. I want it heading for Vietnam, Mongolia, and the Siberian Oblasts. Top speed all the way."

"To reach Mongolia it will need to pass through China, that may be difficult," he said.

"I'm willing to pay the Chinese in fertilizer for priority movement to Mongolia. 100,000 tons should be enough to be sure that 300,000 tons reaches Mongolia and Western Siberia via rail. Is there a Chinese ambassador available to arrange that?"

"There is a Consul General here in Kiev. Vitya, call him and invite him here immediately. Let's see if we can get this arranged before lunch."

As Viktor Medvedchuk stood, Lyudmila moved into the office with a tray of hot tea, perfectly timed.

❖

The Chinese consul was delighted, but the whole meeting took well past lunch, and into an early working dinner. Finally back at my hotel room I was working on getting better phone service. From my laptop I typed away as I added my MicroTAC to the network. Like the digital signals that GA-Mail used, the Inmarsat-A dish had a dedicated line for phone calls. I watched as the commands propagated across the network, and the signal strength bars on the cellphone jumped from nothing to full, as the balcony GNAT acted as the local tower. MERCURY and the miniature version of it inside the GNAT were a miracle of software defined radio, a technology that others were only just speculating about.

MERCURY and GNAT ran on very expensive chips that would have struggled without my algorithms to reduce the amount of multiplications required. DSP chips from Texas Instruments, Harris DDC, and Micron SRAM were not cheap but they were the best available. But even then, separate receivers and transmitters handled video, voice and data.

MERCURY didn't have the video broadcast hardware that the TV balloons had, which made the dedicated transmitter used by the local TV stations a must. The Predator video was all compressed digital video streams, which used the majority of the data transmission capacity of MERCURY. The relatively smaller audio transmission capability was what I was using now, modified to retransmit just my cellphone signal.

I wondered if Jack realized it was a $100,000 worth of hardware hidden inside that hydrogen filled balloon tied to the balcony. With my phone ready, I called Charlie in Tulsa. A glance at the clock verified it should be about 9am there.

"Hello Mr Tulsa, how are you today?" I asked Charlie.

"Boss, it is good to hear from you," he said, the smile in his voice clear. "The morning news is reporting that you are hiding out in France."

"Good, and things are going well there?" I asked.

"They are, the crowds around the Mid have gone, and I'm not coming through the tunnels anymore."

"Good, good," I said. "I'm calling  about the list of acquisitions I left you."

"I'm surprised you sent that list to me," he said, "Doesn't Jennifer usually handle acquisitions directly?"

"She'll be managing it all, and has her own list. But you got a list, as did Tim in San Diego. She's prepping for an even bigger acquisition as well. I've got $400 billion to spend, and a list of wants. It is not something that even her team could handle all by itself."

"It is a big list, Boss," he said. "It is all electronic and computer companies so far."

"Tim got the defense wish list," I told him. "You got electronics and communications. It is a good match for the media arm already there in Tulsa with Heartland, and it will boost manufacturing jobs in the city."

"But some of this stuff is in other countries?"

"They'll stay there," I assured him. "But I want the conglomerate headquarters in Tulsa at the Mid. I won't move the companies, but if they need new manufacturing that they can't do where they already are, they'll look around Tulsa first. The oil age is over, and Tulsa is an oil city. It needs a new business direction."

"Cree, ASML, ARM, SGI, Lam, KLA, EMC, TE Electronics and Solectron. I'll have to research most of who these companies are," Charlie said. "Why do all these electronics companies think they need to be an acronym like IBM?"

"They are the future, Charlie. I'm glad you recognized Maganvox and Motorola," I teased.

"Well I know that one just announced really big TVs and the other makes the receivers for American Wireless and my cellphone. I recognized Cisco and Texas Instruments too."

"Let me know if there are any issues," I told him. "I've got a relatively secure phone now, plus the encrypted email."

"I will, Boss," he said. "Have fun talking to Tim."

"How did you know I called you first?" I asked.

"Because Tim and I made a wager on it," he admitted. "If you called him first he would already have emailed me demanding payment."

I laughed, and said goodbye, hanging up the phone then calling Tim.

"Boss!" Tim answered, before I even said anything.

"How did you guess?" I asked.

"I just got an email telling me I lost a bet," he said with a laugh.

"I'm calling about your list of companies to buy," I told him.

"Right, Charlie explained that in his email. I've got quite the list of defense companies here," Tim said.

"I want a new headquarters building for everything under GA Defense. It'll need a new name. I want to keep GA focused on power and energy, with the fusion experiment, SynSolar and SynPower, plus I want them ready to act as R&D for new projects, pulling together the tech from all my companies into new products and patents that they can then send out to the various subsidiaries for production. GA is going to become the place engineers want to work to make high tech hardware at the bleeding edge."

"I saw that in your email. Why California, and not Tulsa?" he asked.

"Separation," I told him. "I'll be back in Tulsa eventually. I want the civilian technology and electronic companies associated with my presence here. Changing the name of the defense arm creates even more separation. San Diego unfortunately won't be more than a place to go except when Tulsa is too cold and Ocean Island is too far."

"Understood, Boss. How do you want me to handle the Department of Defense when they get concerned that you're buying up all their suppliers?" Tim asked.

"It's not everybody," I complained. "I'm saving the industry now, before anybody has to make hard choices about what company dies post Cold War in a couple years. If they are worried about my reliability, just ask them how Desert Storm went."

"I don't know if I'll be that blunt," he said, "But I get the idea."

"Good. I especially want to know when you've got UTC," I said. "I've got ideas about integrating smaller versions of CITADEL for the commander on the ground or in the air."

"Is that why Magnavox is on both of our lists?" Tim asked.

"Yup, we'll split Magnavox between consumer and military tech. Charlie will have the IP and patents. They will make the next gen CITADEL and PEEPS even better, they were a big help with the first version optics. Same with Litton, I want to integrate them with GA Defense and the next gen Predators. I also need a shipyard that can build the first real Alchemist class ship, not the frankenship we're putting together in Bremerton," I said.