Page 53 of False Flag

She checked her email on her phone first. The same message that had plagued her for a week was at the bottom of the mail app:

Network Error Cannot Connect to Server

She sighed and hit the Get Mail button on her desktop.

It came as no surprise that the messages with and without attachments had arrived in the inbox of the email address Lost Civilizations had provided for her. Of course, Gerard, and probably Osborne, had full access to every message sent and received on that account.

Firewalls regularly prevented her from conducting internet searches to fact-check the Letora Island archaeological inventory report, which did nothing to dispel her suspicion that the report was written with AI, complete with fake citations and invented researchers.

But when her searches did make it past the firewalls installed on her Lost Civilizations computer, she was left with the creepy feeling she was searching a fake internet. A product of Osborne’s web services empire. His vision of what the information superhighway should contain.

Whatever it was, it was not Al Gore’s internet.

“Did you get it?” Lloyd asked.

“Only at the Lost Civ address. My phone’s internet access is being strangled, and the desktop computer won’t connect to the server. What’s the point of hiring me if I’m blocked from doing my job?”

“You sound paranoid.”

“Do you have another explanation?”

“You’ve got privacy settings on your phone and email that are tripping Osborne’s security.”

“Well, obviously. I’m also allowed to have privacy on my personal email and phone.”

“But you shouldn’t do work on them. Use the email address and phone Gerard provided.”

“Do you seriously think a reputable archaeologist will reply to me at a Lost Civ email address or registered phone number? Block and delete. Same way you treat an internet troll.”

“So we’re trolls here? Pretty fucking rude thing to say when you’re collecting a hefty paycheck from the guy.”

“I said it’s the same way trolls are dealt with. Not that Gerard or you or I are trolls. But you must know many of Gerard’s followers are, in fact, trolls. And not just online. I have an ugly scar on my side to prove it.”

“Gerard doesn’t have anything to do with Archaeological Truthers. AT was made up by archaeologists so they could claim Gerard is the boogieman.”

“I spent a week in the hospital. I almost died. And you think it was a fucking false flag?”

“How do you know it wasn’t?”

“Because there is no such thing as Big Archaeology.”

“Maybe they just haven’t let you into the club.”

She rolled her eyes. A few days ago, she’d described the attack and shown him the scar. It had been a futile effort to gain an ally in the house. There’d been moments when he seemed to open his mind, but he’d invested too much of his identity in following his prophet, Gerard.

She had no way of knowing if Lloyd Burns was a Truther, but she was damn certain Beau Sommerville was.

She pulled a USB drive from her backpack. “I need your annotated maps with the satellite layers and site information for my work. Most of those files are too big to email anyway. Load them on this.”

“They aren’t finished yet.”

“Maps are never finished. They’re always a work in progress, and as I find more site data, my information will be added to yours. It’ll be easier if I have a working file. You can date and lock your layers so I won’t change them. I’ll add my own on top.”

He huffed out a sigh. “Fine.”

He took the drive and plugged it into his computer.

She returned to her work, trying not to think about what Vicki could find on Lloyd’s computer if the thumb drive spyware was able to download his recent activity.