14: The Virtue of Patience

Shinji Ito sat back in his comfortable chair, waiting. He had become exceptionally talented at waiting, and it was a skill that had worked in his favour more times than he could count. If one knew when to wait, and did so extensively and patiently, he would also know when to act, and hopefully how to act as well. Shinji had made an art out of acting at precisely the right time to achieve the result he desired; few were stupid enough to underestimate a man like him. It was this art that had propelled him up the food-chain over and above his many peers, starting as a lowly programming assistant in a backwater satellite colony called Shinzon, to his climb up the executive ladder of Matsushita metro to eventually become its lead programmer. He had waited at the top of Matsushita, quietly organizing several strategic alliances with other high-technology metros, eventually leading to the formation of the Matsu-Sung Technology Union, the most advanced of all the tech-unions.

Shinji's eventual final leap had placed him squarely at the head of the Matsu-Sung, and made him debatably the most powerful man on Earth. If there was one thing he knew, it was that there were a thousand people beneath him, all clamouring to topple, and subsequently become the new, top dog. All it would take was one mistake – one failed maneuver or premature action – to bring him down. Thus he waited, biding his time, until the information came that would secure his position beyond the petty reach of his clawing, striving underlings.

If all went as he had predicted – Shinji's predictions were seldom wrong, and when they were he made sure no one was left to remember them – he would not have to wait long.

A chime sounded on the console in front of him, notifying him of his assistant Hiro's attempt to contact him from the lower offices. He answered the page, “You make speak, Hiro.”

“Someone is here to see you, Prime Analyst, sir. He claims to have an appointment, though I cannot see it in the record.”

“His name, Hiro?”

“He gives his name as 'Hunter', sir,” said a confused Hiro.

“Send him up, immediately.”

“As you wish, Prime Analyst. He is on his way now.”

“Thank you Hiro. You may retire for the rest of the day.”

“Thank you, Prime Analyst.”

“Yes, Hiro. Goodnight.”

A few moments passed before the lift doors opened and the white-outfitted figure stepped out, each step a calculated move into potentially hostile territory. Shinji’s informant was a methodical man, if a man he truly was. Shinji didn’t know. Shinji didn’t want to know.

“You come later than I could have hoped for,” he said, unceremonially.

“Perhaps,” replied Hunter, “But not later than expected. I know you well enough to know you never expect things to happen more quickly than they should.”

“And has my waiting met with favourable results?”

“I am only here to bring you the information you are paying me to bring, Mister Ito,” said the metallic voice behind a white survival mask, “It is your own affair how you interpret it.”

“It is Prime-Analyst Ito,” Shinji corrected the man. He had insisted on the title’s full usage since the day he was installed; instilling the proper respect in one’s subordinates tended to minimize fantasies of conquest, he had found.

“Then I will call you Shinji,” said Hunter, levelly, “And by the time I have told you all there is to tell, you will be happy enough to be called a data entry operator, or my name isn’t… well, I suppose you don’t know my name, do you?”

Shinji grunted his skepticism about just how happy he would be with the title, but thought better of making an issue out of it. This man had a reputation for doing strange and dangerous things. It would not be the first time a tech-union head had met a mysteriously gruesome death shortly after meeting with him. “Data entry operator is it, then, Mister Hunter. By all means, proceed.”

“When you were a young man, struggling to make a living in the slums of Shinzon satellite as a simple labourer, you developed a keen interest in your colony’s reclamation, based on your belief that through the pursuit of technology one might find some way to unlock the secret knowledge of the universe. Knowledge, you believed, that had been given to humanity – left here by some ancient star-faring race of extra-terrestrials, is that not so?”

Shinji bowed affirmatively.

“And with this belief firmly in hand, you set out to acquire a command over the technological currents of the world, as it was, believing that the great shift had provided humanity with a wonderful opportunity; a world in which one man might claim ownership over enough influence that such secrets might be found out, and used to one’s advantage.

“Evidently you have succeeded in securing your vaunted power – almost. You are not without rivals, of course: Amoco, Golan, and the like. And you have invested considerable efforts into finding what was left behind. To date your efforts have yielded little success, almost as if your hypotheses have been all wrong. You begin to doubt yourself, Shinji – to doubt your vision, and your convictions. I can smell the odour of defeat all over you.”

The Prime Analyst leaped to his feet, his face creased with lines of anger, “You will reach your point, Hunter! Or I will show you just how defeated Shinji Ito really is.” He had a dangerous glint in his eye.

Hunter put up his hands in acquiescence. “Imagine, if you will, what value your extra-terrestrial benefactors must have placed on all of their secrets. To simply leave such knowledge where any common savage might find it would be lunacy. Suppose it had been uncovered by Mao Tse Tung, or Adolf Hitler, or George W. Bush – the world is frozen now, but that is better than if it had been burned to ruin, as it very likely would have been by any number of the despotic dictators of the old-world.

“No, Shinji, if indeed such wonderous secrets have been bestowed upon the Earth, they would have been well hidden, only to be discovered and used in their proper time and place.”

Shinji nodded, “I see what you mean. But how would they hide such a thing?”

“A puzzle, Shinji,” Hunter continued, “A great puzzle whose pieces, laced with knowledge and prophecy, are hidden throughout the ages, and whose final pieces end at the great shift. Only then would it have been possible to solve the puzzle and unlock your secrets. But somebody knew about this puzzle, and hid the pieces away in a place they knew nobody would ever think to look.”

“Whether they thought to leave the matter to simple fate, or whether they knew more about our future than we can imagine possible, I do not know. In either case, your long wait is at an end, Shinji.”

“These… pieces, they have been found?”

“In an old vault, deep in the New Babylon nether—“

“I must send an expedition at once!” Shinji exclaimed, moving toward the inter-comm button on his console.

“You will not find it there any longer,” said Hunter. “The artifacts disappeared shortly after they were found, but the man who found them knows more about your secrets than any other person in human history, and incidentally he is also the other person in human history with the capacity to put the puzzle back together.”

“You will give me the identity of this man.”

“Yes, Shinji, but you should know that I have already informed Mordakhi and Armistad of his existence.”

“What?” Shinji cried, “You have betrayed me!”

“Not so, Shinji,” Hunter replied, calmly, “But I thought it wise to divert the focus from being squarely on you, and to incite a certain level of confusion that you might use to your advantage. They do not know what you know, Shinji; both believe they are seeking what they most wished to find. You are the only person to whom I have told the entire truth.”

“And why should I trust that you have chosen me to reveal this information to, out of all my rivals?”

“Because you know what I know: the virtues of patience,” said Hunter.

Shinji thought about this for a moment, then nodded, “Tell me about this man, and where I can find him.”

Hunterwraith smiled beneath his mask. A measure of truth could accomplish things that an out-and-out lie never could.