Zach felt conflicted. It was the end of the day and his brain had turned to mush, so it wasn’t a good time to be making critical decisions. The second presentation was completed sans any fistfights, so at least there’s that. But now here he was drained and feeling like he’s missing something that he needed to do before leaving for the day.

  He looked over his email and then his phone.

  …Right. That thing from Maria.

  Now he was faced with a conundrum. Should he handle the Bunker Ditch incident first or the ‘security snafu’ as Maria put it?

  I’ll decide tomorrow.

  He picked up his jacket and headed to the stairs. The door to the stairwell was closed, but not locked, signaling that the office had officially closed for the day.

  He yanked the door open. As he meandered down, a thought came to mind. Maria had only briefly mentioned the issue. How much information had she given him?

  He stopped between floors.

  Not enough to start.

  She had probably not given him much information to keep him from getting distracted from the committee meetings. Another though came to mind.

  Why were there no questions from the committee about the break in yesterday?

  He was going to need to make a list of questions to ask Maria. Pulling out his phone de did just that while walking home.

  One thing was sure. He was going to Bunker Ditch in the morning.

  The next day, Zach pulled into the same parking lot as before. As he got out, he checked his phone. There was a missed call from Maria. Dialing back, Maria picked up before the first ring finished.

  “I read your email,” she said.

  “And?”

  “I do agree. Timing may be critical on your end and it also gives me time to collect some of the information you requested on my end.”

  “Okay. Then –”

  “You alerted several people about your visit, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you set things up so that you are meeting different people?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you have your taser?”

  “Yes, Maria!”

  “Zach, with what you told me about the bunker, this could easily catalyze into something dangerous. You need to have backups.”

  He mouthed, “Okay, Mom!” Speaking, he attempted to reassure her, “This isn’t the first time. I will have additional security personnel with me, okay?”

  Maria grumbled.

  After reassuring her a bit more, he was able to end the call peaceably. Approaching the now familiar door, he spied the same administrative assistant as last week. He knocked on the door and this time, he didn’t have to pull out his badge.

  Once inside, the assistant had some disconcerting news.

  “You requested a security personnel come with you down to the basement, right?”

  “Yes, considering the situation last time, it seemed prudent.”

  “Unfortunately, security didn’t see it that way.”

  “Huh?”

  “There’s no security personnel assigned to accompany you.”

  “But – but,” he struggled to verbalize. After a couple for failed attempts, he finally spat out, “Possums! What about the possums?!”

  The assistant nodded. “I understand. When security told me that they weren’t going down into Bunker – Ah, I mean –”

  “It’s okay. I know it’s called ‘Bunker Ditch’.”

  “Thank you. Anyway, I don’t understand the reasoning behind the denial myself, I’m just repeating the message.”

  Zach looked from side-to-side, thinking. This did not add up. He would need to ask the members below when he got there.

  He turned back to the assistant. “Is Johnny still my host for today?”

  “Yes,” she answered. “If fact, he was just here…” She looked around. “Where did he go?” She moved from one end of the lobby to the other glancing into the various hallways. “I could have sworn –”

  “Ah, you’re here!”

  They both turned around to see Johnny coming up from behind.

  “There you are!” exclaimed the assistant.

  “Johnny swung his arms out like a showman. “Here I am!” He turned to the investigator. “Bob, right?”

  Zach made a face.

  “I’m kidding! I’m kidding!” He stepped to the side. “Right this way, Mr. Smith.”

  Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  Now he was irked. He followed, nonetheless.

  Johnny chatted as they walked along the hallway.

  “Nothing remotely as eventful as your last visit has happened over the past few days. We’re still talking about it. Especially, the possum part.”

  “Yes. I’ve had people ask me about that back at HQ.”

  “I’ll bet!” He waved his badge at the lock leading to the elevator. “Haven’t had much progress on the extra tunnel, unfortunately. Ah! Here we go!” The locked released and Johnny was able to open the door and then the elevator.

  They entered the elevator down to Bunker Ditch.

  While waiting, Zach asked, “Sooo, do you know why my request for security personnel was denied?”

  “Ah, yes that. Turns out, most of the security personnel do not have the authority to enter Bunker Ditch without one of the members accompanying them. If an emergency happens, they’re only a phone call away.”

  Zach bit his lip. That’s not reassuring when you’re going into a bunker.

  The elevator shook into place and the doors opened.

  Johnny stepped out first and then Zach. Looking around, Zach noticed an increase in paraphernalia in the entrance that wasn’t present last time.

  “Moving stuff?” he asked.

  “Hm?”

  “There are more tripping hazards than last time.”

  Johnny looked around. “Wow. You noticed that? But then again, you’re the safety guy, so I suppose noticing stuff like that comes with the job, huh?”

  “Y-yeah.”

  Johnny waved his hand. “It’s just some old junk that was found while searching. With the incident, it was decided that the bunker was well overdue for a spring cleaning.”

  They entered the bunker proper and headed towards the break room. Inside, Josh sat chatting with one of the other employees, sipping coffee. As they approached, Josh and the employee got up.

  Josh greeted the investigator with his hand outstretched, “Zach! Good to see you!”

  “I trust there’s been no more spider incidents,” Zach replied, grasping the proffered hand.

  “Thankfully, no.”

  Zach looked around. “Where’s Sasha?”

  “Dunno. We were just wondering that ourselves.” He indicated the employee standing next to him.

  The investigator tightened his jaw. “Johnny, do you know?”

  Johnny furrowed his brow. “Nope. Nothing on my end. It’s not like her at all, either.”

  Josh clapped his hands together. “Well, everyone else is here, so why don’t we take another look at the tunnel, eh?”

  He stepped out to the hallway and then realized. He turned to Zach, “By the way, this is Mike, he’s also one of your people.”

  They exchanged pleasantries and headed into the hall.

  The growing group meandered back down to the emergency exit. The entrance was now clear with all furniture pulled away. A ladder was added for the descent down. Outside of the bunker wall, light flooded down from various places, exactly as Zach had left the area a few days prior.

  The investigator ambled in a slow lap around the area. “So,” he began, “the last message that I got mentioned that traces of high purity copper were found in the tunnel.”

  Mike nodded, saying, “That’s right. Thing is, no copper is missing from the records. We’re don’t just let that stuff get scattered.”

  “Far too expensive, I take it?”

  Johnny took this one. “Our company uses most of it. The rest is sold for profit.”

  “Who do you usually sell to?”

  “Mostly a couple of electronics companies. There’s not enough left over to sell to a large number of companies.”

  Zach stopped before the tunnel. “Were you able to determine was machinery made this?” He tapped the tunnel entrance.

  Josh stepped towards the tunnel. “The closest option appears to be same small drilling equipment,” he answered, “which we have.”

  “Oh? Where?”

  “They’re all currently off-site…” He folded his arms. “And small enough to fit in a truck bed.

  “Is it possible that someone used your own equipment to make this?”

  “Not likely. The equipment is too heavy for a single person to pick up and move around. Not to mention the permissions to get around and the shape of the emergency exit from the bunker.”

  Zach pointed in the direction of the door to the outside. “What about that way?”

  “You were out there. Do you think that you could get equipment the size of small motorcycle through that?”

  “Nope.” He glanced up to ceiling, thinking. “Where has John been in all this?”

  “Same as before. Home with a bad cold.”

  “Must be really bad.”

  “Yeah, I’ll need to ask Sasha about it the next time I see her.”

  “What about the records?”

  “What about them?”

  “The ones that document the production and sales of copper.”

  Everyone exchanged glances, unsure of what he meant.

  “The records didn’t show any inconsistencies,” Johnny commented. “Wasn’t that said before?”

  “Yes, it was, but how do you know that the records weren’t tampered with?”

  “Tampered? How? These things are cross-checked and signed off! Not to mention the additional records from the companies who purchase it.”

  Zach turned on his heel. “Who does the cross-checking?”

  “Who? Well, I do some of it.”

  “And who else?”

  “Well…”

  Josh shook his head. “I do not touch that stuff,” he stated.

  Mike also shook his head. “I get emails about it, but that’s it.”

  Zach turned to Mike. “What do these emails say?”

  The Solutions employee shrugged. “I guess what you would expect. There’s a table of production and invoicing and things getting signed off and, uh,”

  Zach crossed his arms. “And what?”

  “Well, this is completely irrelevant, but I do remember finding it amusing when I’d see two John signatures at the bottom of the email.”

  “Two?”

  “Yeah, ya know. There are two guys here named John. Except Johnny here goes as, well, Johnny.”

  Johnny interrupted, “That’s not something to be suspicious about.!”

  “Why would it?” Zach shrugged. “Like Mike said, I’m sure it just looks amusing on the email. But you know it would make for a good mystery plot.”

  “How so?!”

  Zach turned to Josh. “Out of curiosity, if you had two people with the same name is it possible for one to fake the identity of the other in various documentation? Or even fake the both of them?”

  Josh tilted his head. “Both. One would be hard enough. But both? All it would take is someone seeing the emails and seeing that something was off number-wise. I mean, there’s always at least two people signing off and numerous other people getting the records.”

  Zach stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets. “Josh, have you ever heard of repetition suppression?”

  “What’s that?”

  “Think of it as the opposite of Pavlovian response. Repetition results in the information getting ignored and forgotten. What exactly can you remember from each individual email?”

  “Individually? Oh … oh, I think I get it.”

  Zach turned to Mike.

  Mike looked up thinking. “Huh. Now that you mention it. There’s no way I would be able to noticed a small change in those messages.”

  “Would anybody?”

  “I would!” Johnny yelled. “Those documents are my responsibility! I would notice if one went through the system, but I didn’t actually sign it!”

  “Exactly!” Zach smiled. “There’s no way someone would be able to forge your signature!”

  Johnny’s face turned exasperated. “T-then why?”

  “Someone could forge John’s signature.”

  Everyone in the cave huffed a “Huh?”

  The investigator pulled out his phone. “John has been missing work a lot, due to various issues, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Or so he’s been saying. How are you sure that he’s been the one signing every one of those documents?”

  “B-but, I still have to review them as well! Even if … What?!””

  “After my last trip here, I contacted our missing John. Turns out he has been having a lot going on. Extended leave and such. So, I had one of our cybersecurity experts look into any copper sales connected to John.”

  Zach looked at his phone feigning surprise.

  “And what do you know? There’s dark net sales of copper connected to him. They go back for months! Except…” The investigator stepped around to the entry into the bunker. “...during several of those sales, John was tending to his father in the hospital.”

  Johnny’s shoulder’s rose.

  “Now either he is good at being a scumbag, or someone stole his identity. I put him in contact with the cybersecurity department. Turns out his identity was stolen. Go figure.”

  The room fell into a tense silence. Members of the group looked to each other not entirely sure of what was meant.

  Finally, Mike piped up, “Who stole John’s identity?”

  Zach looked to each face. “Who indeed? Who is even capable of pretending to be John?”

  His gazed settled on Johnny’s exasperated countenance. “I’d like a copy of all of those documents with both Johns’ signatures, if you will…John.”