Thirty minutes later, a slightly balding cook cleaned a flat iron grill while a pair of waitresses gossiped by a register. They had the time because the restaurant was dead. Mostly dead anyway. And somewhere between the baked potato and a bit of tough steak, Justine asked the question that had been on her mind ever since Bleaker Street.

  “Where’s your Blackberry?”

  “Ah,” Foster said before putting down his chicken sandwich long enough to wipe his mouth and swallow. “If I told you, you would think I’m weird.”

  Justine had just taken a bite of steak, but that didn’t stop her from giving him a mocking look. “That ship sailed a long time ago.”

  “Ok,” he conceded. “Fine, but your opinion of my sanity will probably sink even lower.”

  She took another bite, chewed quickly then said, “try me.”

  Foster rolled his eyes, then dug deep into his front pocket. He produced the battered cell phone, pressed the power button, and the screen instantly lit up. The words NEVER LEAVE HOME WITHOUT ME were pulsing brightly for all to see. “Some habits are hard to break.”

  “Really,” Justine sliced another small piece off her steak. “You have all this technology. Technology you somehow designed and had built while locked up in a maximum-security nut house. And you’re still holding on to that relic. I would think someone like you would be onto the next new gizmo, not some castoff.”

  He reverently turned the phone over in his hands, studying the features he knew so well.

  “Castoff, huh? You know, before I could repurpose this banged up little phone to save my life, someone else had to throw it away. Someone else needed to think this little broken marvel held no use.” Foster smiled, then handed the worn-out phone over. “Castoffs aren’t useless, Agent Rushing. Not to me.”

  The first thing she did was tap one of the buttons on the device’s small keyboard. And like before, the tiny screen crackled to life. Only this time, instead of the words, the display only had a small set of segmented bars which represented its current charge. Surprisingly, it indicated one hundred percent.

  “That’s weird.” She held the phone out so Foster could see the same readout. “I had one of these things in college, and I could never keep the damn thing charged past eighty percent. Did you just unplug it?”

  “No,” he smiled knowingly then popped a greasy fry into his mouth.

  “Then when’s the last time you charged it?”

  “Let me see...” Foster knew the exact date he activated the Tesla device. He just didn’t know whether she wanted the answer in days, months, or years. “Christmas of 2007 sounds about right.”

  “You’re shitting me.” Justine brought the phone up to her ear and shook it. “Five years ago? Nothing could go that long without being plugged in, especially one of these things.”

  “That’s probably why someone threw it away,” Foster said, with a hint of sadness.

  “Sorry,” Justine wondered if they were still talking about the phone. She offered it back and the disheveled scientist took it happily. “It’s just… I couldn’t handle a day in a place like that, let alone years. I don’t know how you did it.”

  “Do you want to hear something funny?”

  “I’m not sure.” She took a long swig of her diet coke before giving him an apprehensive look. “You can be a little cruel sometimes.”

  “You’re right about that.” Foster continued to play with the phone while his thoughts drifted back to darker times. “But truthfully. For the first year, I did go a little crazy.”

  “That’s not funny, Foster.” Justine swallowed with a very loud gulp and raised her eyebrows in disbelief at his words. She stared, waiting to see that sly grin he liked to flash so much appear. A sign that this was just another joke. But after what seemed like an eternity, the grin never came. “I don’t understand.”

  Wanting to be as deliberate and straightforward as he could, Foster lowered his knife and fork. “This probably won’t mean anything to a ‘normal’ person, but my life is ruled by the problems I choose to solve. Little ones, big ones, it doesn’t matter. Even as a child, there was nothing I liked better than understanding or fixing something that someone else couldn’t.”

  “Like the phone?” Justine took a cautious bite.

  “Exactly. Of course, growing up poor in the backwoods of West Virginia meant fixing things was more of a necessity than a hobby. And my parents weren’t exactly the type to encourage education. My mother’s claim to fame was working as a part-time secretary for a doctor. And my father… well, he mostly worked as a part-time drunk.”

  “Was he abusive?” Justine signaled to one of the gossiping waitresses for a refill on her drink. “I had a drunken grandfather who liked to push my grandmother around when he was drunk off his ass. First person I ever put in jail.”

  “No,” For the first time, Foster began to see where her sense of justice came from. “My father did more harm to himself that he ever did to us. Unless you count the whole poverty thing as doing harm.”

  A waitress quickly appeared, topped off Justine’s diet coke, then just as quickly disappeared. “You obviously got out of there.”

  “Yes, I did.” Foster folded his arms across his chest. “MIT offered me a full scholarship at fifteen. Had my master’s by the time I was nineteen. After graduation, they invited me to stay on and finish my doctorate, even offered me a spot on one of their top research teams.”

  “MIT, huh?” Justine’s stare shifted from disbelief to quiet acknowledgment. “You didn’t take it?”

  “I preferred a more temporary position. Not a big joiner of teams.”

  “More of a solo player?” she asked.

  “Not that. I just like solving problems, Agent Rushing. And teams generally stay past the solving part and remain until the project’s completed.”

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  “And you don’t like that? Staying until the end?”

  “Doesn’t hold much interest to me.” Foster smiled that grin again. “So, for the next three years, that’s what I did. I floated from project to project, working on anything I found interesting. An attitude that eventually led me to the good Director and the NSA’s problems of breaking codes.”

  “Codes,” she asked. “You mean decryption?”

  “That’s… a subject I won’t broach here for obvious reasons. Though, I will say that once I discovered the signal embedded within the original event, it was my research with the NSA that allowed me to crack it.”

  Justine turned sideways on the booth, allowing her legs to dangle over the side. “Is that where Hoover came from… that research?”

  “Partially,” Foster finished off the last of his flat coke. “After my theory about the signal’s origin surfaced, they were labeled controversial. Fitz Hume went nuts. He said I was drawing too much attention to the agency with my crackpot theory. He ordered me, quite forcefully, to shut up and continue my original research. Well, that didn’t sit too well with my drive to solve a problem. So,” Foster made air quotes. “I ‘politely’ told him that I was leaving the NSA.”

  “I take it the Director didn’t like that decision.” Justine could only imagine the director in one of his moods.

  “More like disappointed. You see, my work for the agency was considered by many people within the intelligence community to be groundbreaking. Groundbreaking and very secretive. So secretive, that leaving for the private sector wasn’t really an acceptable option. Especially when you held my views.”

  “About the signal?” Justine hesitated, then asked. “What were your views on the signal?”

  “Well,” he hadn’t planned on telling anyone on the team his suspicions. But something about the way she was smiling at him right now made him want to tell her everything. And like an idiot, he did. “I thought the origin of the original signal was extraterrestrial.”

  “Like… aliens?” Justine stare turned from caution to excitement. “Cool.”

  “Fitz Hume didn’t think it was that cool.” Foster grimaced. “In fact. He used my views to convince everyone in the agency that I was crazy. And as you can imagine, the intelligence community wasn’t going to let a person with my knowledge just leave for the civilian sector. Especially with my ‘views’.”

  “No, it wasn’t the civilian sector they were worried about.” She suddenly got serious again. “They were afraid another government could turn you.”

  “Precisely,” Foster’s brow furrowed as the past came flooding back in small vignettes of pain and betrayal. “So, one day, two federal agents barged into my office and read me my rights. Then, without explanation, they threw me in an unmarked sedan and took me to the wonderful Wilson Mental Institute.” He gently placed the blackberry down on the table.

  “The first two weeks were the worst. Can you imagine trying to convince a bunch of criminal psychiatrists that you were a victim of a government conspiracy?”

  “Not really.” For the first time, she began to fully sympathize with Foster’s situation. It seemed Fitz Hume had seriously fucked this guy over. “I couldn’t begin to imagine it.”

  “Neither could I, and I can imagine a lot of things, Agent Rushing.” Foster looked out the window and into the darkness. Eight years, he thought bitterly. Eight fucking years.

  “Well, most of my first year was spent trying to get anyone to listen to my ramblings. Doctors, orderlies, nurses, janitors, even the guy who handed out tater tots in the cafeteria were all targets for my wrath and hatred. But no one listened. They were all sure I had suffered a mental break with reality.”

  “Had you?”

  “Not at first. But after about a year of pleading, I did.” Foster turned back toward Justine, and it looked like he was on the verge of tears. “So much so, that I actually needed their pills and their therapy.”

  “Really?” She found the idea of someone going crazy in a mental institution very Stephen King. It both piqued her interest and scared the shit out of her. “Like cuckoo for coco puffs?

  “Yeah. I even started to attend meetings with an open mind, trying my best to understand my problems. I researched every disorder that could possibly cause my so called symptoms. But the more I read, the more I was convinced I wasn’t crazy. I had just been screwed over by the usual thing.”

  “What’s that?” She asked, not knowing what to expect.

  “Government bureaucracy,” Foster deadpanned. They both laughed heartily at the truism.

  “I still don’t know how anyone could survive in a place like that.”

  “The same way anyone would survive a traumatic experience.” He solemnly nodded to his earpiece. “You find a friend that only you can hear and pretend like hell he doesn’t exist.”

  “I bet Hoover loves that explanation.” She laughed. “Speaking of your own personal MCP, how did Hoover come to be in your life?”

  “MCP…?” The reference to TRON flew completely past his analytical mind. But, instead of asking for clarification, Foster simply began to answer her question. “I don’t know anything about an MCP, but Hoover first showed up in the form of a Christmas card.”

  “A Christmas card?”

  “Yep.” He began to regale her with the tale of Hoover’s origin when the doors to the restaurant opened. Curious about who else might need a midnight snack, they both looked up to see Malcolm Purvis hopping up onto one of the barstools.

  Ignoring their presence, their chauffeur/hitman waited for a waitress to bring him a cup of coffee. Then, when an attractive one finally did, they made small talk for a few seconds before taking his order.

  “What are you two doing here so late?” He finally said, swiveling the stool around to face them with a hint of a knowing smirk.

  “Food,” Justine replied, slightly taken aback. “It’s been a long day.”

  “That it has, Miss Rushing. And from what I understand, tomorrow will be even longer. Sheriff Meadows checked in with our fearless leader a little bit ago. He says your prisoner should be ready for questioning first thing in the morning.”

  “Morning?” Justine and Foster looked at each other like excited tweens being told they were going to Disney World.

  “Why not tonight?” Foster asked impatiently, shifting his body toward the end of the booth. “We’re on the clock.”

  “Hold you horses, cowboy. From what I’ve heard, the doctors have the scumbag heavily sedated. Apparently, Agent Rushing’s light touch left him near death’s door.” Malcolm nodded and swiveled his chair back to the counter. The young waitress had returned, and he cared more for her company than theirs.

  “He’s lucky I didn’t kill him,” Justine said, sneering.

  “No,” Foster could see that the very thought of that asshole still breathing the same air as ordinary people really bothered her. “I’m lucky.”

  “I just hope he’s as important as you think he is, Foster.” Justine found his compliment both odd and weirdly soothing. “First thing in the morning, huh? What are you going to ask him?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  Justine thought about the daunting task of breaking the signal’s code. She wondered if everything that needed to be done could be accomplished by tomorrow evening. “Do you think Mosley and Barbara will finish decoding the signal before your 48 hours is up?”

  “No,” he said with an air of finality. “They’re both excellent scientists. But I’m afraid it’s a matter of numbers. Even with Hoover’s digital magic, it would still take them another three or four days of intense number crunching to come close. And that doesn’t even factor more supercomputers falling offline.”

  He paused to eat another cold fry. “There’s just too much data this time.”

  Justine pictured the bank, and all those dead bodies piled up in the break room. The only question she needed answered was whether New York still used lethal injection or the chair. The ephemeral inner workings of a mysterious signal from space were the furthest from her mind. At least, not right now anyway.

  “So,” she picked up the check from the table. “You think that monster has the answers you need. What could someone like that possibly know about a signal from outer space?”

  “Maybe that’s the question I should ask him.”

  They both laughed.

  Even though secretly, Foster had every intention of doing exactly that.