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“Razon is a smart man,” I said. “He would have wanted allies. It could be another company, perhaps an Israeli one. Do any of your rivals know about this technology?”
“Not that we know of. ”
“Steve,” Ivy said, sitting between us. She put her lipstick away, her hair fixed. She was obviously trying to ignore what I’d seen between her and J. C.
Damn, I thought. I’d assumed the two hated each other. Think about that later. “Yes?” I asked.
“Ask Monica something for me. Did Razon ever approach her company about a project like this? Taking photos to prove Christianity?”
I relayed the question.
“No,” Monica said. “If he had, I’d have told you. It would have led us here faster. He never came to us. ”
“That’s an oddity,” Ivy said. “The more we work on this case, the more we find that Razon went to incredible lengths in order to come here, to Jerusalem. Why not use the resource he already had? Azari Laboratories. ”
“Maybe he wanted freedom,” I said. “To use his invention as he wished. ”
“If that’s the case,” Ivy said, “he wouldn’t have approached a rival company, as you proposed. Doing so would have put him back in the same situation. Prod Monica. She looks like she’s thinking about something. ”
“What?” I asked Monica. “You have something to add?”
“Well,” Monica said, “once we knew the camera was working, Razon did ask us about some projects he wanted to attempt. Revealing the truth of the Kennedy assassination, debunking or verifying the Patterson-Gimlin bigfoot video, things like that. ”
“And you shot him down,” I guessed.
“I don’t know if you’ve spent much time considering the ramifications of this device, Mister Leeds,” Monica said. “Your questions to me on the plane indicate you’ve at least started to. Well, we have. And we’re terrified.
“This thing will change the world. It’s about more than proving mysteries. It means an end to privacy as we know it. If someone can gain access to any place where you have ever been naked, they can take photos of you in the nude. Imagine the ramifications for the paparazzi.
“Our entire justice system will be upended. No more juries, no more judges, lawyers, or courts. Law enforcement will simply need to go to the scene of the crime and take photos. If you’re suspected, you provide an alibi—and they can prove whether or not you were where you claim. ”
She shook her head, looking haunted. “And what of history? National security? Secrets become much harder to keep. States will have to lock down sites where important information was once presented. You won’t be able to write things down. A courier carrying sensitive documents has passed down the street? The next day, you can get into just the right position and take a picture inside the envelope. We tested that. Imagine having such power. Now imagine every person on the planet having it. ”
“Dang,” Ivy whispered.
“So no,” Monica said. “No, we wouldn’t have let Mister Razon go and take photos to prove or disprove Christianity. Not yet. Not until we’d done a lot of discussion about the matter. He knew this, I think. It explains why he ran. ”
“That didn’t stop you from preparing ways to bait me into entering into a business arrangement with you,” I said. “I suspect if you did it for me, you did it for other important people as well. You’ve been gathering resources to get yourself some strategic allies, haven’t you? Maybe some of the world’s rich and elite? To help you ride this wave, once the technology goes out?”
She drew her lips into a line, eyes straight forward.
“That probably looked self-serving to Razon,” I said. “You won’t help him with bringing the truth to mankind, but you’ll gather bribery material? Even blackmail material. ”
“I’m not at liberty to continue this conversation,” Monica said.
Ivy sniffed. “Well, we know why he left. I still don’t think he’d have gone to a rival company, but he would have gone to someone. The Israeli government, maybe? Or—”
Everything went black.
I awoke, dazed. My vision was blurry.
“Explosion,” J. C. said. He crouched beside me. I was . . . I was tied up somewhere. In a chair. Hands bound behind me.
“Stay calm, skinny,” J. C. said. “Calm. They blew the car in front of us. We swerved. Hit a building at the side of the road. Do you remember?”
I barely did. It was vague.
“Monica?” I croaked, looking about.
She was tied to a chair beside me. Kalyani, Ivy, and Tobias were there as well, tied and gagged. Monica’s security men weren’t there.
“I managed to crawl free of the wreckage,” J. C. said. “But I can’t get you out. ”
“I know,” I said. It was best not to push J. C. on the fact that he was a hallucination. I’m pretty sure he knew, deep down, exactly what he was. He just didn’t like admitting it.
“Listen,” J. C. said. “This is a bad situation, but you will keep your head, and you will escape alive. Understand, soldier?”
“Yeah. ”
“Say it again. ”
“Yes,” I said, quiet but intense.
“Good man,” J. C. said. “I’m going to go untie the others. ” He moved over, letting my other aspects free.
Monica groaned, shaking her head. “What . . . ”
“I think we’ve made a gross miscalculation,” I said. “I’m sorry. ”
I was surprised at how evenly that came out, considering how terrified I was. I’m an academic at heart—at least, most of my aspects are. I’m not good with violence.
