There were now four people working in the rectangular space. Stoll and Viens now worked back to back in the center of the room. Mae Won sat at the far end, and Jefferson Jefferson sat near the door. When Hood was in Los Angeles, all the eccentrics he knew worked in the film business. Scientists were a serious, conservative bunch. Now it was the movie people who wore short hair and understood complex mathematics and the computer programmers who were the oddballs. Mae, who was born in Taipei, had a ring through her nose and orange hair. J2, as they called Jefferson Jefferson, had no hair and a tattoo of a tree on his scalp. When the mood struck him, J2 added new branches and leaves to the tree.
In the 1990s, these individuals would never have made it past the first interview for a position with the federal government. Now, government agencies could not afford to lose good tech people to private or especially foreign employers. This was particularly true of intelligence and investigative operations. What the people looked like was less important than what they could do or the new technologies they might come up with. In their spare time, Mae and J2 were working on what they called omni ink. Paper saturated in their ink would change its display via pixel- sized microtransistors activated by wireless signals. The electronic charge would cause the ink colors to change in nanoseconds, allowing for immediate news updates, constantly changing want ads, and even on-demand help with crossword puzzles. Hood was not sure their pet name 'oink' would work for the new technology. But the question might be irrelevant. He knew from the duo's employment contracts that while any patents would be issued in their names, the government would have a shot at developing and marketing the product. As Hood walked through the door, he could
MISSION OF HONOR
173
not help but wonder, suddenly, if J2 would try to apply oink technology to tattoos.
Viens glanced over as the trio entered the room.
'Good afternoon, everyone,' Hood said. 'What have you got for us, Mr. Viens?'
'A photo ID from the files of the IODM,' Viens replied. 'That's the International Organization of Diamond Merchants. I figured your guy must have had a job before he became a cult leader.'
'Good job, Stephen,' Hood said.
'Thank you,' Viens replied. 'The IODM had his personnel file on-line, as required by law. The computer says that the guy in the three-year-old ID photograph and the guy in that Vatican photograph you sent over are an eighty-nine percent match.'
'The differences being some apparent weight loss around the cheekbones and neck, different hair length, and a change in the bridge of his nose,' Stoll added. 'Possibly due to a break.'
'I'm very comfortable with that match,' Hood said.
'It's a good one,' Rodgers agreed.
'We hacked the tax records in Gaborone and got lucky right away,' Stoll said. 'Your man is named Thomas Burton. Until four months ago, he was a mine worker in Botswana.'
'Did he mine industrial diamonds or gems?' Liz asked.
At her station, Mae Won wriggled the bare fourth finger of her left hand. Hood smiled at her.
'Yes, diamonds,' Viens replied.
'There's the connection between Dhamballa and Henry Genet,' Rodgers observed.
Hood looked at the ID on Viens's screen. There was a color picture attached to it. Below it was a photo Edgar Kline had sent over. 'Are you sure this is the same guy?'
'We're sure,' the heavyset Stoll said from his keyboard.
'I've got a small on-line newspaper report of the Dhamballa guy's first mention,' J2 said. 'It matches the time Thomas Burton stopped making calls from his home phone.'
'I had a look at those phone records,' Mae added* proudly.
174
OP-CENTER
'Where did Burton live?' Rodgers asked.
'In a town called Machaneng,' Viens told him. 'They've got an industrial mine about five miles out of town.'
'According to the file from Mr. Kline, that was where the rally photo was taken,' Stoll pointed out.
'Anything else?' Hood asked.
'Not yet,' Viens replied.
'We've only had Mr. Kline's file for about thirty-five minutes,' Stoll reminded Hood. 'Like Stephen said, we got lucky.'
'Believe me, Matt, that wasn't a knock,' Hood told him. 'You guys worked a miracle. I appreciate it.'
J2 and Mae each slapped the air, giving one another an across-the-room high five.
'Will you be able to access any of this man's medical records?' Liz Gordon asked.
'Yes, if they're in a computer file and that computer has an Internet link,' Stoll said.
'Looking for anything in particular, Liz?' Hood asked.
'Psychiatric care,' Liz said. 'Nine out of ten known cult leaders were treated, according to the last World Health Organization study.'
'That's compared to what percentage of the non-Wacobound populace that's had their heads shrunk?' Stoll
