Infinite Exposure (18 page)

***

It had taken Margret two days to get the information from her people at the remaining data centers. They were a little perplexed
when she asked about their expansion capabilities and per kilowatt cost of electricity.

“I thought we were all being off-shored?” asked one data center manager.

“I don't believe it will ever be all of the data centers, just most of those we inherited which have a really high operational
cost.” responded Margret. “The board is interested in how much we can expand two of our existing on-shore data centers.”

“So the smallest one loses?” asked the same manager.

“More than likely they will move to one of the other two.”

“Oh.”

Margret really wanted to tell them more, but she didn't dare. There was a remote possibility Kent would find out about all
of this or they would ask him a probing question if he should happen to speak to them. She was sure what she had told this
data center manager would spread like wild fire as soon as she hung up the phone.

Getting the clearance information from HR had been another tooth-pulling contest. Finally, she had Carol deal with HR while
she simply asked the data center managers for information yet again. Oddly, this request for information seemed to invigorate
them. Margret could tell they honestly believed there was a regulation somewhere that was going to protect all of their jobs.
Best to let them beli
eve it for now,
she thought.
In a couple of months it could actually be true.

At any rate, she put the report and spreadsheet together, emailed a copy to Carol and to each member of the board of directors
individually. Once that was done she put a copy of the report in the network directory containing all of the report requests.

Just as she finished doing this Kent dropped by with a new copy of the contract and the roll-out schedule. Kent hadn't bothered
to read through anything, he simply looked at the timeline document and was upset that the United States and Canadian locations
hadn't been included. “I can't present this to the board,” Kent said in an exasperated tone. “She'll just have to do this
over.”

Margret took a look at the document and the contract while Kent went rambling on about something. Finally she looked up and
said, “The board only asked for the international locations when they came back with their letter. My honest opinion is that
the board isn't ready to risk the U.S. or Canadian operations on a new system until it has been in the field for over a year.”

Kent stopped his pacing and stared at her.

“Think about it Kent. The U.S. and Canadian operations allowed us to eat nine other banks because it generated enough cash
for us to risk taking over some poorly run corporations. They aren't going to risk the golden goose when all they are really
trying to do right now is save money.”

Kent still had that “I was born stupid and been losing ground ever since” look on his face.

“Take a look at the list of countries they authorized to be converted to this system and look at the order of the conversions.
It is an inverted list of our highest to lowest cost IT operations. Simply gutting those operations makes it worth taking
the risk on this system. Hell, once the French IT workers are all gone, the entire cost of this project will almost be paid
for. When they get the second country on-line we are turning a profit from this move. After all of the other countries have
been converted and are running smooth, they will allow the U.S. and Canadian operations to use the same software, but not
until then. That will be a separate project.”

Margret was very determined to not let it slip about the Canadian and U.S. data centers having to remain on-shore and be staffed
with U.S. citizens to keep FDIC insurance. Carol was no fool. If Carol thought the board was setting Kent up for a fall, Margret
was going to be on her hands and knees behind his legs telling them to push. Briefly, Margret wondered if Kent's job came
with stock options. She tuned back into the room just in time to hear Kent say, “So you think I should present this to the
board as-is?”

“Yes. It is what they asked for. If they come back and say it needs to include the other operations you can show them the
request they sent out and say we complied with their request, but will be happy to work up yet another quote if their wishes
have changed.”

Kent picked up the other folder he had brought in, presumably it contained the copies for the board, and walked out.

Could the little bastard be catching on?
Margret thought to herself. One thing was certain. None of the big boys had taken Kent out to lunch since he got back from
hobnobbing around the globe. Margret had assumed they were simply punishing him for turning in too big an expense report,
but perhaps they had people in the legal department telling them to keep their distance for when this went bad. It certainly
wouldn't be the first time this bank had chosen a sacrificial lamb for a federal investigation.

***

Jeremy had been idly surfing the Web for a few hours at work. The surfing was thinly disguised as doing research. He was bored
and he was tired. Spending the weekend with Stacie had pretty much worn him out. He didn't really feel it until the second
day back when his muscles started to stiffen up.
I really need to start working out,
he thought.

Finally, he decided to check his personal email. Technically they weren't supposed to do that due to the risk of virus. Lenny
had made them all start using Ubuntu on their desktops since there were no known viruses for it and the OS was rock solid.
Indeed, the only time Jeremy ever rebooted the machine was when an update got installed and popped up a message saying he
needed to reboot for it to take effect.

Once he went to the Web page to look at his personal email he saw the message from Stacie.
At least she didn't send me the em
ail at work,
he thought. When he read the email he was damned glad she hadn't sent it to his work email. He quickly printed out the message
and walked into Lenny's office. When Lenny looked up he didn't say a word, Jeremy simply handed him the sheet of paper.

After reading it Lenny said, “Well, you definitely need to go shopping for this girl's jewelry and make yourself available
once she gets back.”

“I take it we will begin a slow accumulation of Pytho Corporation shares now?”

“You are learning boy. You certainly have far more potential than those other two I hired. Yes, we will start, and this evening
I will make a few phone calls from a disposable cell phone to the accounts we advise and tell them to do the same.”

“Let me guess, you will tell them Pytho will be announcing a big new software package and a major client in about a month?”

“I may leave off the client part,” responded Lenny with a smile.

“So, we will wait for First Global Bank shares to drop a little next week and begin accumulating again there as well?”

“You do just about have this figured out don't you?”

“I have a good teacher,” Jeremy smiled back.

Lenny chuckled. “We have about a month before the bounce happens. By that time we could own somewhere between 12% and 20%
of both companies. Slightly heavier on Pytho Corporation of course. Their stock is down now and will get the biggest bounce
from the news.”

“Can we keep 12% hidden that long?”

“Hopefully. If we do it slowly we should be OK.”

“I take it you will start buying them right now, before making the calls?”

“You really can fill in for me when I'm on vacation can't you?”

Both men simply smiled and Jeremy left the room. Once again, he had brought home the bacon. The other two analysts hardly
spoke to him since he had shown them up in front of Lenny. No need to call a meeting for this one. The email could have given
away his contact. Jeremy was pretty certain Lenny would place that sheet of paper in the shredder as soon as he left. In fact,
he could hear the shredder running now.

Jennifer, the receptionist, saw the smirk on Jeremy's face as he was walking by. She caught his eye and mouthed the word “what.”
Jeremy walked over to her and whispered, “When the bonus checks come out this year you are going to want to cook me dinner
and give me a massage.”

Softly Jennifer responded, “It'll take more than a big check for that, you will have to get my husband an all-expense paid
tee time for a foursome at that golf club he wants to try out and settle for it being breakfast while he is golfing.”

“Interesting,” Jeremy said with a smile as he walked away. She was in her late 40s. Kids were teenagers looking at college
a couple years down the road. Honestly, Jeremy thought she was simply the dutiful wife and mother working here because they
hadn't saved enough for college. He had no idea that she would be open to fooling around once in a while.
The things you learn when you tease!
he thought.

***

John was not having a good day. Today was the day most of the workers at his company voted on unionizing. He had fought this
tooth and nail and still it happened. They didn't need to avoid unionizing all together, simply to hold off for another six
months or a year. John needed the data center migrations to all be completed so he could carry out his plan.

His company hadn't hired too many new people lately. In part it was due to fear they would have to pay people more once the
union came in. The other reason was nobody would take the shit wages they were offering, probably because they thought the
union would be taking over and they wanted to start out at better wages.

They had been short handed the last month. John was working 14 hour days himself and forcing his employees to work even longer.
It's not like it was back-breaking work. Mostly just staying awake and monitoring the job schedulers. Sometimes they had to
mount media for backups to run, then remove the media and label it for shipping. Backups could take hours. The systems were
never off-line. There was a disk to disk backup which happened in a matter of minutes. It was the backing up of the backup
to removable media that took forever. Removable media was needed so it could be taken to off-site storage.

His team had only bungled a few of the media cycle rules. It was much easier when they were shipping things to Iron Mountain,
but now that the off-site backup storage was here in India, it was a debacle. The company they were using (and he assumed
they owned part of) had incompetent help. Basically, John believed they were the people he had turned away. To understand
the true level of that insult, you had to know just how low the requirements were to get in here.

If the people working at the remote site managed to get the correct backup media returned to John's people, it often took
forever to get to it or it arrived damaged. The backup site was about a two-hour drive away. Correction, the backup site was
about two hours away if anything like American highways or interstates actually linked the two places. The chuck-hole-lined
mud ruts and the lack of suspension in the transport truck played hell with the backup media. Some of the cases arrived completely
ruined. It looked like they had simply been tied to the back of the truck and dragged all the way.

John had complained to his boss several times about this problem with the backup storage. His boss tried to look into it,
but was always told “they're working on it.”

The problem reared its ugly head publicly when one of the locations needed to restore a document from a backup. Nearly three
hours after the request, the backup media it should have been on arrived and was unusable. They had to go back and get the
prior day's backup. This time John's boss took one of the upper management type's car and brought the media in it. The car
didn't look so good when he got back with it, but the media worked and they were able to satisfy the request before it was
morning in America. The only benefit from the entire ordeal was that someone above John's boss was now looking into getting
better transportation for the off-site storage company. He probably wouldn't have been so interested if his car hadn't developed
a very large oil puddle under it after John's boss got back. John estimated the puddle was about five quarts in size. One
of those chuck holes must have ripped loose the oil pan.

John went to a window and could hear the chanters out in the street through the glass. All chanting for better wages, better
treatment, and a strike.
Just lovely,
he thought.
A strike will have them locking this place down like a fortress.

When his work day finally ended, John went home to see how his new trainee was doing. This trainee hadn't picked it all up
as fast as the first one, but had learned enough to be out on his own soon. Someone had given him some money and he had taken
a job with a different company here in Bangalore. He had enough money that he could rent his own place in this complex and
would be moving out tomorrow.

They chatted awhile. John answered a few questions, then checked his own email. It really was his own email he checked this
time. Over one-third of the cells he normally handled email for were now being handled by his first trainee. This new trainee
had a much more capable machine and had taken over half of John's remaining cells. John asked his current trainee when the
new trainee would arrive. He was stunned to hear that this trainee would be training two others soon. They would be given
the remaining cells John handled and sent to other locations.

So, I'm being phased out,
thought John. Guess it didn't matter. He would be too high-profile now that there were surveillance cameras all over the
data center. He was going to have to hide once his plan went into play.

It was in the middle of this train of thought when John opened up an email from a cell he used to handle. It was actually
for him. Once he deciphered the message he found out they wanted information about the off-site storage company. John didn't
understand why, but made a note to pull down the files from work. The bulk of the information was on the company Intranet.
The place wasn't of much value as a target. It employed at most 30 people and was only of need if someone had to restore a
system or a file.