Days 19-20 (Alignment)

9 Alignment

``You want me to what? You do realize how damn near impossible
that's going to be, right?''

Grant sighed. It seemed like he'd driven all over the city today
since leaving VonCannon, and he was making very little progress.
Aside from a short lunch he hadn't taken a break. It was good, he
reflected, that he was out of the office and therefore free of
Anders' wrath should the editor know he'd disregarded perfectly
good advice.

Not only was he not at home resting, he was in fact still
working. Patrick Brooks was on the other end of the phone,
sounding flustered, and Grant was doing his best to talk him into
helping.

``I do. Believe me, if I didn't think having a copy of that virus
would help, I wouldn't be doing this.'' The reporter's words
weren't entirely a lie, but he himself wasn't sure of how much he
believed in the Doctor's theory. He could see all the points,
he'd thought some of the things going on seemed a bit uncanny
even before he'd gotten the explanation, but every time he found
himself thinking along the lines of ``machine casting its
influence through time, causing disturbances in our present for
its own shadowy ends'' he failed to be able to take it seriously.

``I'll do what I can.'' Patrick sounded strangely relieved to
have committed to this course, as though exposing the virus
itself and not simply its effects was the final line he had to
cross. ``I'll tell you one thing, though - what you did has hit
his place like a shockwave. I got called in yesterday for an
emergency meeting, didn't even know you'd published the story
until I got to work. Official PR is that these were isolated
incidents, there's no hidden virus, etc, but down in the trenches
we've got orders to find it and wipe it out at all costs. I've
talked to some people I trust, some of them people you've met -
Caster's old crew - and they've seen evidence of the virus as
well. Near as they can figure, some competitor installed it a
while back to cause disruptions.''

``That seem likely to you?'' Grant asked, straining to keep his
voice neutral. At this point, any alternate theory that didn't
involve crazy machines from the future sounded like a good one.

``That's the weird thing.'' Pat confessed. ``You'd think,
competitor virus that can't be tracked down, it'd have wreaked a
lot of havoc, right? I did some going through the incident
reports - you know about the high profile accidents, but do you
know what else has gone wrong?''

``Probably worlds of hurt nobody's figured out yet.'' Grant
didn't want to know.

``Nothing.''

``What?''

Patrick paused, and Grant could visualize the programmer shaking
his head. ``I checked and I double checked. Aside from issues
that actually are minor bugs in our systems, there haven't been
any accidents. No major incidents. And there should be. Granted,
my memory's not what it used to be, but I remember writing some
dodgy code when the deadlines were near. I took the opportunity
to look some of it up, and it's been changed - for the better!
Something cleaned up my code!''

``Doesn't sound like the sort of thing a competitor would do.''
Grant closed his eyes. At the moment he was standing next to his
car, parked in the first disused lot he'd found upon deciding
he'd go along with VonCannon's request. He continued to wish he'd
gone back home instead.

``I have my own theory.'' Patrick sounded as though he was both
proud of this theory, and slightly ashamed of it at the same
time. ``Suppose the major incidents were timed just right.''

``Okay.'' Grant was resisting the urge to grind his teeth. If
Patrick started talking about Coincidence Machines, he was going
to scream.

``They're spaced pretty far apart, after all. Just enough time
for Vervicom's stock and public image to recover. Whoever planted
the virus knew exactly when it would strike. They invest heavily
in Vervicom, knowing that the virus will keep the company in
business, until right before it strikes. They sell all their
shares, an incident happens, they buy all of it back at absurdly
low prices. Repeat.''

``So it's a stock scam?'' It was a mark of how crazy Grant's
world had become that a theory involving a decade-long conspiracy
to inflate and deflate a company's stock was still, by leaps and
bounds, more plausible than the alternatives.

``Yeah, I know.'' Patrick sounded disappointed. ``Not too likely,
huh? Still, the timing of the accidents, all of it coming to
light now, it just doesn't seem like coincidence.''

``I'm going to have to let you go now.'' Grant did not want this
line of thinking followed up upon. ``See if it's at all possible
to get me that virus.''

``If I find it, you'll get a copy.'' Pat seemed amused at this
point. ``At least I can look for it without that seeming out of
place. Bosses want it tracked down, after all!''

``Good luck.''

``Hey, you too.'' Patrick hung up.

Grant sighed. Just for amusement, he held the cellphone up and
glanced at the readout. 51 unread messages. He pressed the button
that would allow him to review them.

``Mr Wynn!'' The pointed voice he'd heard earlier that morning
echoed out of the tiny speaker. ``I have read your story and am
quite intrigued. I must do some research, but if I am correct
this will confirm a great many theories that I-''

Grant deleted the message.

``My kid's college fund was in Vervicom, you fu-''

Delete.

The next several were very much in that vein. He found himself
cutting them off faster, and thus almost missed the next message:

``When we were talking last week,'' it sounded just as irate as
all the previous ones, and if the voice hadn't seemed familiar he
would have pressed the delete key and moved on, ``you promised me
that journalism was teacups. Largest collection of teacups in the
city. And yet, when I picked up my paper this morning expecting
to read what sort of tea cozy would be best, imagine my surprise
when I read your story about corporate wrongdoing on a massive
scale!''

Grant found himself grinning. If all the other complaints were as
good as Rose's, he'd still be listening to them at work.

``That's the second time that viruses have come up in our
conversation,'' the message continued, ``and I rather hope it
won't become a habit. Now, the only way I will be consoled is if
you take me to dinner. Call me, and we'll see if this damaged
trust can be repaired, or if like a teacup it has shattered on
the kitchen floor of truth.'' Normally Rose could keep a straight
face while saying anything, but Grant found that he could hear
her trying not to laugh. The message ended.

``Mister Wynn, I insist you pick up your phone!'' VonCannon's
followup message, according to the recording, had been placed a
good five hours after his first. Grant deleted it and pressed the
'end' button before he could hear the next message.

He frowned. Rosetta had called him yesterday, and he hadn't got
the message because he'd turned the phone off after having
answered several irate calls. She'd probably forgive him...
probably.

He dialed her number.

``Sandys Hardware Recycling.'' It was Rosetta's voice, but the
answer didn't make sense given that he'd called her cell.

``Hey, it's Grant.''

``Grant?'' The voice faked incredulousness. ``I do not know any
Grant. I am but the proprietress of a simple recycling plant, and
have certainly not been expecting any calls,'' her practiced
neutrality quickly switched to that tone of annoyance Grant knew
so well. ``for a day now!''

``Would you believe I was somewhat busy?''

``Actually,'' Rosetta dropped all pretense at this point, ``I
would. After I hadn't heard back, I was wondering why and then I
realized, duh!, you've got death threats to deal with and such.
Phone was off for a while, I imagine?''

``Yes.'' he was relieved instantly. Despite the attitude she
liked to project, Rose didn't tend to hold grudges, but this
didn't stop Grant from unreasonably believing that this would
change at a moment's notice.

``I won't hold your late reply against you.'' she began, ``but do
realize that I'm still remembering this whole teacup incident.
Something must be done.''

Grant mentally revised his thoughts on Rose holding grudges. ``I
really was working on that story.''

``You know what must be done!'' Rosetta responded theatrically.

``Rose, would you care to go to dinner with me?''

``Yes. Now get down here, or you'll be late for it.''

Grant took the cellphone away from his ear to check the time.
Somehow it'd become 5:30 already. ``I didn't know we had a time
as well as a date.''

``We do,'' Rosetta replied. ``It's 6:00. Better hurry!''

Wynn smiled as Rose closed the connection. It was rush hour on a
Monday afternoon, and both he and Rose's office were downtown.
They actually weren't that far, if the GPS could be believed.
Whether it could, in fact, be believed was an open question, but
true to Patrick's research it seemed that aside from the one
glitch it operated absolutely perfectly. The distance didn't
matter, really, because traffic was unlikely to move at all for a
while.

``The things I do for love.'' Grant said to himself as he climbed
back into his car and started it. Completely, entirely worth it.

The phone rang a few times during this trip, but the caller ID
revealed it to not be Rosetta or Patrick or anyone Grant
especially wanted to hear from, so he felt reasonably safe in
ignoring it.

Rose was waiting outside the recycling plant, tapping her foot in
an exaggerated fashion. The attempt to appear impatient was
ruined by her smile.

``You put up with a lot, you know that?'' she asked as she
climbed into the passenger seat. ``It's probably not a good
thing, you know. Backbone's important. You should definitely not
take as much crap from me as you do.''

``Yes ma'am.'' he replied. It seemed to be called for.

She laughed, leaned over, and gave him a quick kiss. ``Ha! Come
on, take me to dinner!''

The ride to the restaurant was slow, but thankfully not as
torturous as the drive to the recycling plant had been. Besides,
Rosetta was there. It was as though the factor which made slow
drives last longer had been outweighed by the natural tendency of
time to fly when having fun. He didn't mind.

There was no wait at the diner - Rose had called ahead - and they
were seated immediately.

Rose sat across from him, positively beaming. She closed her eyes
and steadied her expression. ``I need to tell you something.''

``Feel free.'' Grant replied, wondering what was coming next.

``It means a lot to me,'' she said, in that tone of voice she
rarely used, the one which meant she was being sincere, ``what
you wrote in the paper. I mean, I always knew you had that
knight-errant streak in you.'' she snuck a glance at him. ``But
you went and took on the company that ruined my life!'' she
laughed, her eyes opening again.

He hadn't done it for her, he realized. He hadn't even thought
about how she might react to the story, to seeing the accident
that had crippled her father reduced to a side effect of bad
programming - bad programming that went on to hurt other people.
It hit him, then. He could have lost her over this. She could
have just as easily interpreted her confession to him and his
subsequent story as him using her as a source, nothing more.

``I...'' he started. ``You have no idea how relieved I am that
you're not mad.''

She smiled softly. ``I know. I'm not just a source to you.'' It
was as though she'd read his mind.

``You're not. You...'' he couldn't find the words he wanted -
then: ``I love you!'' he blurted before he even realized he was
going to speak.

Her eyes widened, her mouth opened in a barely-concealed gape. ``
You...?''

He hadn't meant to say it, but it was true. He'd been charmed by
her, of course, ever since he'd seen her again, and each time
she'd demanded dinner or insisted his job really should center on
teacups, it had only reinforced his feelings. He'd known since he
heard her message and, instead of getting annoyed, thought to
himself that he couldn't wait to see her again. ``I love you.''
he said, his voice meaningful, his tone serious.

She put a hand lightly over her mouth. They had dated in high
school, all those years ago, and even in their closest
this-will-last-forever moments, they had never spoken those three
words words to each other. Grant himself had been too afraid. One
of the things that had enraptured him with her was her
quirkiness, but he a flippant response to such an intimate
confession was something he wouldn't be able to put behind him.
Now, though....

He smiled at her awkwardly, opening his mouth to voice the
question.

``Of course I love you too!'' Rosetta practically shouted the
answer before he could voice the question. ``Why do you think I
give you such a hard time?'' she was laughing lightly now. ``Same
reason you nicknamed me 'Stone', because we've got this whole
crush thing going on and making fun of each other was the main
way to go about saying so.''

``In retrospect,'' Grant said, ``probably not the most
straightforward way to go about it.''

``Yeah, the love thing is simpler. Though,'' she confessed, ``
you're so cute when you're pretending to be offended by what I've
said.''

``Likewise.''

``I'm cute?'' she blushed. ``Why thank you!''

``You know you're cute.'' he said seriously. ``I don't think you
ever doubted it.''

``True. But it never hurts to have an outside opinion.''

Grant felt the conversation was in danger of turning into a
stereotypical ``You're cuter''/''No, you're cuter'' argument, and
thus he found himself strangely relieved when the waiter
appeared, asking for their order. Conversation was silenced for a
few moments while they ate.

``You went to college here, didn't you?'' Rosetta asked after a
while.

Grant nodded. He would have elaborated had his mouth not been
full of pasta.

``I moved back as soon as I graduated.'' she revealed. ``That was
about four years ago.'' She appeared to be thinking. ``I know
this is a pretty big city, but in all that time I never ran into
you. That store we met in, it's not that far from where you work,
right?''

``Right, I've dropped in there from time to time to pick up stuff
for the office.'' he managed in between bites.

``I haven't had my business downtown for that long, but even
before I worked at the place I stopped at that store quite a bit.
And yet, it took a whole city's power outage to bring us
together.''

Grant nearly choked on his food, but Rose didn't notice.

``Who knows!'' she continued. ``We might never have met if Mason
power hadn't gotten stupid again.'' she frowned. ``I don't know
whether to hate them for what they did to my family or thank them
for bringing you to me.''

``Either way,'' Grant attempted to phrase his reply as
diplomatically as possible, ``it was the result of a screw-up.
I'd have to go with the hate.''

``Give into my hate, that's great advice there.'' she said, half
teasingly.

``Just call me Darth Wynn.''

``Still, my dark Sith master, I don't believe our meeting was
coincidence.''

Grant coughed. ``No?''

``No!'' she replied slyly. ``It was...'' she curled her fist up
before her, raised it, and in her best evil voice continued, ``
destiny!'' This earned her a few puzzled looks from the diners
nearest their booth, but Grant continued not to care.

``You have a point.'' he managed. Half of him wanted to smile at
her, and half was stuck on her mention of coincidence.
Thankfully, he didn't have to continue conversation as Rose
seemed to rediscover her appetite at that point.

She remained comparatively quiet throughout the rest of the night
and seemed introspective even as he was driving her back to the
warehouse.

``So what now?'' She'd spoken up as they were nearing her
workplace.

He considered. ``I don't think anything's changed. I mean, I'm
pretty sure I loved you before. I'm just willing to say it.''

``That's not what I mean.'' she said softly, her tone nearly
unfamiliar. ``I mean, where do we go next. Not figuratively, not
relationship-wise, I mean literally. Where will you drive this
car?''

Grant wasn't sure where she was going with this. ``Well I was
planning to drop you off.''

``That's one option.''

``...but if you wanted, we could go out somewhere else.''

She nodded. ``If you really wanted, we could go out, but I was
thinking more staying in.''

``Oh?'' He didn't dare think what he wanted to think at this
point.

``At your place.'' she said, bluntly.

``Oh!''

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