Pei Xiao turned the key and cut the engine of her rented Prius. She leaned back into the driver’s seat, closing her eyes to focus on the raindrops pinging off the stainless steel roof in an effort to calm herself. Her eyes opened and centered on the dashboard clock. 3:45AM. Mark would be here soon. Her purple duffel bag lay in a slightly misshapen mass on the passenger-side floor. It contained her sleepover sweats, a fresh pair of underwear, toiletries, and a lilac silk blouse. The black jeans she was wearing were good enough to survive an overnight outing. There was no need to bring a second pair of pants. She had driven directly from the airport here without stopping at a hotel for a much-needed shower. Thankfully, LAX isn’t like most international airports, far-removed from the city. It’s located in the dense LA suburb of Inglewood. This location sucks for any local noise-sensitive Angelinos but is perfect if you have to get to an interview at a Denny’s in neighboring Torrance within an hour after your flight from LaGuardia touches down. With the lack of pre-dawn traffic and an almost direct route down Hawthorne Boulevard, she was able to make the drive in less than 15 minutes, allowing for an early arrival. It gave her the time to try and calm her nerves to the white noise of the rain.
This was Pei’s chance to do something significant. This was her chance to justify turning her back on her family’s wishes. Not to just justify Pei’s decision to herself, but also to them and in doing so perhaps get the forgiveness from her parents that she wanted. No matter how correct she thought her decision to remain in the U.S. was, ever since the night of her doctoral graduation and the phone call home filled with yelling, crying, and threatening separated by long, awkward silences she had felt a heavy weight of guilt covering her. It had been months and they had not called her back. Pei had considered making the first step towards repairing their relationship and calling but it had been her father that had hung up on her. It was his responsibility to call. And there was no way that she would ever apologize for taking control of her own life, even if she might have manipulated her parents in order to get to the point from which she could do so. And, she mused, if her story and name were emblazoned on the front cover of a globally sold, well-respected publication such as Wired magazine? They would have no choice but to forgive her and concede that she had made the proper choice.
Pei’s attention was thrust back into the here and now by a sudden, loud banging on the driver’s side window. She leapt away from the sound, the seatbelt restricting her body from landing in the passenger seat. Her hand grabbed and turned the keys in the ignition while she she shifted her right foot to step on the accelerator and escape the stranger. As a single woman alone in an empty Los Angeles diner parking lot, she was certain that whatever it was outside the door was there to assault her.
"Miss Xiao?" shouted a dark, human-like shape outside her car, rendered askew by a window full of raindrops and thick lines of water.
He knows my name?
"Yes?" Pei responded equally as loudly through the glass, instinctively checking the door locks and unwilling to roll down the window for someone she didn’t know, even if somehow he knew her. Or, at least, knew her name.
"Rehan Rayyan sent me! Your editor?! I’m your photographer!" the shape exclaimed as he pushed a generic press ID up to the glass. "It’s just about 4AM now! I’ll meet you inside!"
The man then scurried quickly through the parking lot and to the front door of the diner, his drab olive cargo-style jacket pulled over his head to protect himself from the rain while bending over slightly and holding what was presumably a camera bag close to his chest in an attempt to keep it dry. Pei turned on the windshield wipers and watched him carefully as he took a seat at a window-side booth and chatted up the waitress, who was quickly following behind him with a fresh carafe of hot coffee. He was a dark-skinned, bald man. Probably African-American if she had to guess, although she knew a few Cubanos and Puerto Ricans just as dark back in New York. He was also extremely tall, standing at least a foot taller than she but with a similar thickness, giving him the ungainly body frame of a maladroit scarecrow. The man removed his jacket and placed it next to him revealing a black t-shirt out from which were sticking a pair of gangly arms that matched the rest of his lack of girth. She turned off the wipers and looked at her watch. 3:50. Almost 7 on the east coast. Mr. Reyyan would have woken up by now, assuming that he had even slept at all. Better safe than sorry. She pulled a mobile out of her coat pocket to type out a quick SMS to him and realized that she was in such a rush to get from the airport to this appointment she had neglected to take it off Airplane Mode. A message from him was delivered to her inbox the moment her phone reconnected to the network. She tapped on the notification to view it.
"A photographer will be meeting you there."
Pei frowned.
"Photographer?" She texted back.
A few seconds later her phone beeped, alerting her to a reply.
"Yes. Roy Bryant. Freelance. Old friend. Good guy."
Bryant. Definitely not a Cubano or Puerto Rican. Pei let out a sigh and grabbed the door handle of the car, ready to make her own dash through the downpour to the restaurant. Her phone beeped again and her face winced in annoyance as she reached back into her pocket to retrieve her it.
"Should always have a 3rd party with you. Legal safety. YOUR safety."
"Babysitter." Pei muttered to herself as her mobile beeped one last time.
"Stay sharp. See you soon. Good Luck."
She shoved the phone back into her pocket with a little more aggression this time, grabbed her shoulder bag, and exited the car slamming the door hard behind her. Roy must have told the waitress that she would be following because she was waiting with the front door open as Pei hurried through at full speed.
Roy scooted over and made space for Pei as she collapsed into the booth next to him. The seat across the table needed to be kept open for Mark, who was due to arrive any time now. As expected for such an early hour, the restaurant was empty save for them, the waitress, and a disheveled, unkempt man with weather-worn skin and wearing tattered army fatigues. He was sitting in a booth near the emergency exit, slowly nursing a hot coffee. Pei guessed that he was one of the Southland’s many homeless, spending what little change he had on a refillable coffee as a means to stay inside and escape one of the city’s rare rainy days.
"Weird, huh?" Roy broke the silence.
"Los Angeles? Yeah. I hear you guys put avocado on hot dogs." Pei tried to sound witty, but feared that she came off more like a bitch. Her concern was alleviated when she heard Roy chuckle.
"No, the weather. Your boss called me a couple of hours ago about this gig. Stringers don’t get much work anymore so I was happy to have it and didn’t mind the wake up call. Anyway, in the small talk he mentioned the wonderful weather New York is enjoying at the moment." Roy motioned toward the plate glass window shielding them from the downpour outside. "Welcome to LA. When you go home, please take your weather back with you."
Pei glanced at his t-shirt, which sported the classic 1977 Star Wars poster graphic, and reflexively frowned.
"Star Wars or Star Trek?" Roy challenged her with the traditional Sci-Fi geek greeting.
"Neither." Her reply was quick, sharp, and instinctual.
Roy’s expression soured, pushing Pei to explain her visceral reaction. "It’s just that I’ve studied real science and science takes a back seat to what the writers think are a cool ideas, like lightsabers. Or that quite often a huge chunk of the story revolves around a single scientific plot point that is complete bullshit. Time travel by driving a plutonium-powered DeLorean at 88MPH?"
"It’s not fair to judge an entire genre based on a few selective examples. It’s not all like that, you know." It was obvious to Pei from his tone that his feelings were a little hurt. The science fiction genre must be significant to him in some way.
"There are exceptions, of course.", she conceded, "There are stories in which the science is well presented and mostly correct, at least for the era in which the film was produced or the book written. There are science fiction movies and books in which the plot explores the human condition in some way and is not centered on a single, Sci-Fi McGuffin. Blade Runner is one of these.2001: A Space Odyssey is another."
Event Horizon wasn’t, but it was a guilty pleasure that she enjoyed while no one was looking. What reasonable human being didn’t enjoy an isolated spaceship haunted by extra-dimensional evil?
"Hard SciFi. That makes you Star Trek, then!" Roy announced
"A starship going back in time by flying around the sun is ’hard science fiction’?" Pei shook her head.
"What sorts of entertainment stuff do you like, then?"
"I’m more of a fan of the thriller and suspense genres, books more than movies or television. I especially like books from Lee Child, James Patterson, Thomas Harris, and a few others. For me, it’s about the exploration of the darker personalities embodied in their antagonists and the intellectual objectivism of the protagonists. I even like the emotional manipulation that comes with the inevitable plot twist in the third act."
"I wonder how real police detectives feel about those kind of books?" Roy smiled at her.
"Probably the same way I feel about science fiction" Pei smiled back.
A roar that could only come from an unsubtle American-built engine vibrated the plate glass barrier and both Roy and Pei turned to see a large, black Chevy Suburban with opaque windows enter the parking lot. It cut through the rain at a pace much faster than was safe in a parking lot, much less a wet parking lot, and came to a stop directly in front of the door. Pei heard the hourly double-beep from her Casio. 4AM. This must be Mark. The rear-driver side door opened. A black umbrella stuck out and opened, followed by a man in a dark suit holding it. He was tall, although not as tall as Roy. Pei admitted to herself that most males of teenage years and older were taller than her in America. Put in the context of where she was, his height and build were more average. Much of the way he looked: dark suit, dark hair, slightly-tanned skin...was plainly, patently "average". The man waited for the waitress to walk to the front and open the door for him before walking briskly into the diner.
Mark did not remove or even unbutton his suit jacket before sitting down across from Pei and Roy. He rested his elbows on the table, folding his hands in front of him. The waitress returned to the table.
"Coffee?" she asked, eager to have something to do.
Mark looked up at her with a pleasant smile and replied in a tone that carried a slight patronizing edge "No, thank you. You can go."
A presumptuous and arrogant personality disguised in an average shell. How obnoxiously stereotypical for a governmental employee.
Pei pulled a digital recorder out of her bag and laid it on the table in front of him.
"You’re dressed well. Headed off to something important after you leave us?" she opened half-jokingly and turned the recorder on.
"No." His smile grew a little wider "And you won’t need the recorder. I won’t be here long."
Mark turned the voice recorder off and pushed it back across the table.
Roy spoke up "Aren’t you Mark?"
"Yes." Mark acknowledged "But I’m only here to tell you where you will be going to meet the person whom you will be interviewing."
Roy opened his mouth but it was Pei’s voice that asked the obvious question first "And that would be?"
"Harrison. My boss. Head of the project. Putting the pieces in place for you to go to him are much more convenient than the other way around. Putting him in public... the security arrangements alone made the decision an easy one. We’re not fans of the random variables that exist in public. Controllable environments are much more preferable." He pulled a name card out of his pocket and placed it face up on the table. The upper third was dominated by a centered DARPA logo. Under the logo there were printed only three lines:
Mark
Concierge
Project E.D.S.I.
Before Roy or Pei could speak, Mark continued "We pronounce it et-see, like the handicrafts website."
"What is ’Project E.D.S.I.’?" Pei asked, deciding to stay with a more formal stating of the abbreviation over the suggested casual acronym.
Mark ignored the question and continued "On the back of that name card I’ve written where you need to be by tonight. It’s a motel in Nevada, just off the Las Vegas strip. There is a room there reserved in your name. You’ll find directions to the motel already programmed in to your rental car’s GPS. It’s a 7 hour drive so if you leave now you’ll make it in plenty of time."
Then Mark excused himself, stood up, and started walking back toward the door.
"You could have just told us all of this over the phone!" Pei called out after him, trying to inject as much annoyance into her tone as possible.
Mark stopped and turned his head to look back at her over his shoulder.
"Phone?" Pei swore that she could make out a snicker "No. No, I couldn’t."
Mark waited for the waitress to again open the door for him then he opened his umbrella and stepped outside, walking briskly back toward the waiting SUV. He opened the door then paused and turned around, looking at Roy and Pei through the rain-splattered restaurant window.
"See you in Vegas!" he shouted.
Mark entered the vehicle umbrella-last and closed the door. The black Suburban sped away from the Denny’s as hastily as it had come, exiting the parking lot and disappearing into the urban landscape.
Pei was already on her mobile talking with Mr. Rayyan and giving him an update. Roy turned the name card over and looked at what was printed on the back.
"Beachside Bungalows?" he mused "In Nevada? Sounds ironic, like calling me ’Curly McFatty’."
Pei hung up and returned the phone to her pocket, motioning to the waitress with her free hand to come over.
"I assume that we’re going?" Roy asked
"My editor is hesitant, but since it seems that they are taking care of the overnight arrangements and covering most of the expenses, Mr. Rayyan isn’t saying ’No’."
"Can we stop by my place first so that I can grab some additional gear and a change of clothes?"
"You head off and get ready what you need to and I’ll pick you up in an hour. I got your contact info off our Exchange server." Pei replied wearily. The nerves and excitement-driven adrenaline that had been supplying her energy for the past 24 hours were leaving fast. "I want to order some breakfast. And have myself another coffee. Or two."