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Ethan was still riding the satisfaction of his rapidly expanding reach when an unfamiliar call came through.
"Sir, the caller's location is encrypted. I am unable to trace it."
Hearing J.A.R.V.I.S.'s warning, Ethan frowned.
J.A.R.V.I.S. might be rated only a primary-tier artificial intelligence by the System, but on Earth he was, for all practical purposes, an apex predator in his domain. The demonstration of that had been the night he walked through the entire secure-network infrastructure of the Aurelian Republic. Doing it without leaving a single trace might have been a stretch, but this was the first time Ethan had ever heard the words cannot do it come out of him.
After a moment's hesitation, Ethan answered.
"Hello. Who is this?"
A measured, authoritative voice came back.
"Mr. Mercer, I take it. Good evening. This is Aldous Renner."
Ethan was, for a beat, blank. Aldous Renner. Why did the name ring a bell?
J.A.R.V.I.S. ran a search the instant the words registered, and a profile projected across Ethan's watch a moment later. Ethan placed it immediately. No wonder it had felt familiar. Renner was the Minister of Public Security, a figure who appeared on national broadcasts with some regularity. It also explained why J.A.R.V.I.S. couldn't trace the line. The Ministry was one of the few genuinely powerful organs of the state. If its communications were easy to track, its technical staff would have been dismissed long ago.
"Mr. Mercer, the investigation into the circuit breaker at the conversion hub has produced results. I've sent the full accident report to your email."
At Renner's words, J.A.R.V.I.S. obligingly surfaced the file, and Ethan began to read.
A long moment later, his expression went dark.
Sterling Energy. Liam Rouse.
He had guessed as much already. But a guess was only a guess, and acting on a guess was how a person got turned into someone else's weapon. Beyond that, the laboratory had kept him fully occupied, and he hadn't had the bandwidth to pursue it. Now, with the national investigation's findings in front of him, the perpetrator of the sabotage was confirmed.
"Minister Renner. I'm curious what the leadership intends to do."
Hearing the probing edge in Ethan's question, Renner answered without hesitation.
"Mr. Mercer, you needn't concern yourself about the fallout. No one in the Republic holds a license to break the law. Rouse chose to do this. He can answer for it."
Ethan relaxed considerably. If the leadership had no need to play a balancing act, then he was free to do what needed doing.
He hung up, and the furious young man wasted no time. He climbed into Bumblebee and pointed it straight at the New Future headquarters.
The laboratory wasn't far from the tower, and the development zone was light on traffic. In ten minutes, Ethan was through the front doors.
Every staff member in the lobby took one look at the Chairman's stormy face and swallowed their greetings.
"What's gotten into the Chairman?"
"No idea. But for his face to drop like that, it's not some small thing."
"Mind your own work. However big it is, New Future isn't going to fall, not with the state behind us."
Ethan rode the elevator to the thirtieth floor and went straight for the CEO's office. Seeing his expression, the secretary outside didn't dare stop him.
"Senior Sister. Have you seen the accident report the government released?"
He pushed the door open as he spoke.
Yvette's expression was not much better than his own. She had genuinely never imagined Rouse would stoop this low, that he would resort to sabotage of this kind to protect Sterling Energy's standing.
To be fair, the Hidden Dragon program's impact on the energy industry was enormous. If a single firm absorbed the entire energy supply, what was left for everyone else to earn? It was precisely why the name Ethan Mercer was loathed across the industry, why every executive's teeth itched at the mention of him.
And yet, as much as they hated him, they also deeply admired the man. The Hidden Dragon program was a project that served the country and its people. Once it ran at full scale, the annual cost of national energy, including every miscellaneous expense, would top out at a few hundred million marks, a more than hundredfold reduction from what came before. What a family had once paid for two or three days of electricity would now cover an entire year. The strain on the national treasury would ease dramatically, freeing tax revenue for other public works. Industrial projects shelved for being too energy-hungry could be revived. It was no exaggeration to say the whole face of the country would be remade by the Hidden Dragon program.
It was because they understood all of this that the executives of the energy industry had, by and large, chosen to look the other way as New Future rose, and would even lend a hand when it mattered. Beneath their identities as businessmen, they were, first, citizens of the Republic.
Which was exactly why Rouse's conduct, from a prominent figure in their own industry, left Yvette genuinely disgusted.
"What's your plan?" Ethan asked.
Yvette wrinkled her nose, her face troubled.
"The real problem right now is that Rouse has pushed a Sterling executive forward as a scapegoat. Whatever arrangement the man struck with Rouse, he insists he did everything himself and that no one else was involved. So on paper, Rouse is still clean. Still innocent."
Ethan raised an eyebrow. He understood at once where the lever was.
"Leave that man to me. I'll get him talking."
Then he changed tack.
"By the way, Senior Sister. It's been less than half a month, hasn't it, until the second-phase rollout?"
Yvette nodded.
"Then let me choose the fourteen cities."
Watching her hands-off Chairman take a sudden personal interest in company operations, Yvette nearly wept.
Seeing no refusal from her, Ethan went to the wall map and circled fourteen cities, one after another.
Looking at the cities he'd marked, even the sharp-minded Yvette didn't catch it at first. Their locations weren't especially advantageous. Their energy consumption was unremarkable. She genuinely couldn't see the logic behind his selections.
And then, looking at the indignation still burning in Ethan's eyes, and thinking of his temperament, the man who would not swallow a single loss, a flash of understanding crossed her mind.