I never expected to solve more crime as a reporter than as a
bulletproof icon. Yet Simon Magus is responsible for more crime in this city
and on the planet than any drug runner. He’s a CEO, the kind that builds
skyscrapers named after himself, paid for by what his companies export into war
zones. He hates me – one of me, for what I’ve been doing in those same parts of
the world when I’m not pushing for a Pulitzer.
He invited me to a lunch on the top floor of one of his
skyscrapers, witless that it'd been me who stopped a homicidal robot on its
roof three days prior. Even with all the shattered glass, he had a breakfast
table set up with Kopi Luwak and imported baguettes. Simon honestly wanted to
talk to me about my criticisms of his company, at first to see if he could wow
and bully me into retreating, but later about the veracity of my sources and
how to keep shareholders happy while enacting reform.
All the while he peppered in attacks against my alter ego. He
wanted to convince me what a danger he posed, taking responsibility away from normal
people. As though he sells VX nerve gas to normal people. The surprising thing
was that when I kept disagreeing, Simon grew more eager, like being stolid
earned his respect.
I'll never forget. He said, "Cal, the world doesn't need him. It needs
you."
That haunted me, and not just as I put on the tights and
stopped his robots. Maybe that means he won.
The next day he bought my paper. We’d gone too deep into the
red over the backfiring paywall, and without his money we’d have sunk. He said
he’d bought it with the money he'd typically donate to PBS. He had me on the
dais as he announced the takeover, and asked me to be the new editor in chief.
If this is a scheme, it’s Simon’s best. Not a single crate
of weapons has ‘mysteriously gone missing’ off his cargo liners since our first
breakfast together, which if you do the math, has saved more lives than I can
at the speed of sound. I can’t help doing the math.
