"How could you let this happen?"

"It was an unavoidable, given the break in control."

"This is going to make it very difficult to continue, isn't it?"

"Rest assured, things are in hand. We will be able to achieve our long term goals, within the allotted time frame."

"In case you hadn't noticed, we have the wrong President! This is, I guess, not going to be an easy mistake to correct."

"As I said, matters are in hand. Although we have not installed out first choice of candidate, we should be able to use the current encumbant in much the same way."

"I wish I shared your confidence. Uncertainty makes me uneasy."

Faraday hung up abruptly, and slumped back in his chair. Uncertainty was exactly what he was trying to avoid. The really annoying thing was that he'd seen this all coming, but hadn't been able to prevent it. Still, things seemed to be getting back on track. There would be a couple of bumps along the way, but Maxwell seemed to have things pretty much under control. He tended to rant at the old boy, but that was merely because he knew that he had a tendency to get complacent.

He opened up his computer, and started to check the days reports. When he'd finished with that, he'd move on to the more interesting stuff.

"Someone else must have beaten us to it."

"You mean that Crystal isn't the only system that can do this?"

"It's the only explanation!" Sol enthused. "They've got a setup like Crystal, and they're using it to work out how to steer WorldPulse from the back!"

"Hold on a sec. This isn't the only way they could do this, right?" Beth said. All three of them had got to their feet, and they were standing around Sol's small dining table.

"It's the only way I can think of." said Sol.

"But a few minutes ago, you were saying it was impossible."

"And Crystal is the only way I know to do impossible things!"

"Oh, for fuck's sake." said Beth, exasperated "That doesn't follow at all. All we know is that Crystal is one possibility,"

"It makes perfect sense." insisted Sol. "Crystal can be used to analyse complex systems. That's what it does. That was how I was able to find the connections between the sources and the events they were creating. It could also be used to work out what changes to make to the sources in the first place."

Beth stared at him. "How?"

"It's..." Sol started, then lost confidence in the face of Beth's glare. "I'd have to think about it. But I'm convince it could be done."

"Couldn't you use Crystal to find out who was doing this, then?" Isabelle said.

The other two stopped and looked at her, dumbstruck. Eventually, Sol found the words he was looking for.

"Would you stop doing that, please."

"Doing what?"

"Not saying anything for ten minutes, then coming up with a brilliant idea. It really ruins the dynamics of an argument."

Isabelle smiled innocently.

Professor Maxwell had arrived at work that morning with a positive outlook; everything was going as well as could be expected, and he didn't have any outstanding work to do. He greeted the receptionist cheerily as he walked into the office; this confused the hell out of her, as she was usually lucky to receive a grudging grunt. He made himself a coffee, sat down at his desk, and started checking his e-mail.

In a moment of self-examination, he noticed his unusually happy manner, and wondered about it. He initially put it down to a good nights sleep - last night had been the first one in a long while - but realized that that probably wasn't all. He concluded that it must be due to getting everything finished up by the end of the previous day, and being able to relax in the evening with David Starky and a glass of single malt. He resolved to aim to do this every day.

Given this, one might perhaps expect that the next electronic message he opened would contain some revelation or declaration that would sink this plan as it sailed out of dock. As it happens, it did. The message in question happened to be from Calvin, the new recruit who had, eventually, drawn his attention to the potential problem stemming from Solomon Davies' perusal of the logs. Apparently, Solomon's curiosity had not abated. To the contrary, it had intensified. Calvin did not think this was anything to worry about, but thought that he should, as he had been asked, inform Professor Maxwell.

At first, Maxwell was inclined, despite his far greater knowledge of the situation, to agree with Calvin. Solomon would eventually tire of sifting through the logs, looking for a pattern that he could not possibly find, and move on to other things. Maxwell knew him, although they hadn't spoken for a couple of years, and while his considerable talent for the field would occasionally lead him to pursue intellectual titbits for the sheer hell of it, these rambles never lasted for long. Give him a few days, and he'd be bored of it and chasing after something else.

Maybe he'd better check with Calvin, though, and find out exactly what Solomon was doing. He looked up, searching for Calvin' desk. He found it, but the curved mesh swivel chair was empty. He silently cursed the liberally working hours policy that his operations manager had insisted upon. It may well be what the modern knowledge worker expects and demands, he reflected, but it plays havoc when you actually wanted to speak with someone face to face.

He rattled off a curt mail to Calvin, saying that he wanted a word when he arrived in the office, and got on with the rest of his paperwork. His good mood had been shot down in flames, and he now worked uneasily, with the spectre of discovery looming on the horizon. If his suspicions bore out, the client would most definitely not be pleased.

When Calvin rolled in at about ten, Maxwell discreetly watched him amble over to his desk, greeting people as he went. He sat down, logged on to his computer, and read through his mail. Maxwell smiled to himself as Calvin stopped short, and the slightly dazed expression on his face was replaced by a look of concern. He got up and nervously walked over to Maxwell's desk in it's commanding position at the head of the office.

"You, erm, wanted to see me, sir?"

"Yes." Maxwell let the statement hang in the air for a while, enjoying watching the younger man squirm. It serves him right for waltzing in in the middle of the morning. "It's about monitoring of the logs."

"Oh, yes." Calvin answered hastily, perhaps relieved that he wasn't being fired. It's been increasing, sir, or at least it was until last night; I haven't had a chance to check this morning."

"Yes. You said that in the mail you sent me." Maxwell fell silent again.

Calvin shifted uncomfortably. Maybe he was being fired, after all. "Is there a problem?"

"No," said Maxwell, after another sadistic pause, "But I would like to know more about it."

"I could prepare a report..." began Calvin.

"Actually, I'd rather you show me exactly what you've found." said Maxwell, before he could finish. "I'd like to get an understanding of what's been happening first hand."

Calvin looked at him and gulped. He wasn't sure what to make of this. Maxwell had never shown this much interest in the finer details of his work before. He'd always seen him as a fairly hands off type. Still, it looked like his job was safe, at least for the moment.

"Certainly, sir. Um, where should we...?"

"We can use your terminal. That will be all right, won't it?" Maxwell smiled in what one might've taken to be a welcoming grin, but Calvin saw as a threatening mouthful of teeth, and Maxwell knew that he would.

They migrated to Calvin's own desk, amongst the throng of other Minerva staff busily coaxing WorldPulse towards the results that their client demanded, and began the explanation. Calvin went through the logs with Maxwell, pointed out the unusual features in shaky, broken sentences. Maxwell watched over his shoulder, not saying much, but guiltily enjoying the fact that he was unnerving his underling unbearably. Eventually, the tour of the logs was complete, and Calvin turned to Maxwell expectantly.

"Very interesting." said Maxwell after a second, when he realized that it was his turn to speak. "Yes, I appreciate you bringing this to my attention."

Calvin looked pleased, but qualified with uncertainty - he plainly didn't know what to expect next, but suspected that it might be unpleasant. "Do you, erm, have any idea who might be doing this, sir?"

Maxwell reluctantly decided that he'd probably had enough, and let him off the hook. He leaned in, and said in a low, conspiratorial voice, "We have a fair idea. Obviously, I'm not at liberty to tell you who it is, but rest assured that you've been very helpful."

We left Calvin, bolstered and beaming, and returned to his own desk. What he had seen had done little to reassure him; it definitely looked like Solomon thought he was onto something, which he couldn't possibly be. Of course, Solomon could have made a mistake, be going down a blind alley. That wasn't like him, though; he was too smart for that.

Something occurred to Maxwell. Was Solomon smart enough to do what he'd done himself? Maybe. He could, of course, check. With a surreptitious glance around the room, he started up a program that was only on his machine, and started to work.

A few hours latter, when he was sure of the results, he picked up the phone, and called his client.

"Mr. Faraday," he began, "We may have a problem, or at least some competition. A former student of mine seems to have stumbled upon our discovery."

Beth stopped off at Sol's desk with a coffee. This was the routine, but nevertheless she glanced around furtively, and bent low before talking.

"Any luck yet?" she asked.

"Not yet. And don't be so sneaky about it. People will notice." Sol hissed.

Beth stood upright quickly, sloshing coffee over Sol's desk.

"Oh, shit! Sorry, sorry..." she grabbed a tissue and started to mop up the mess.

"The best thing we can do is act normal until we know exactly what's going on. Try and relax." Sol went on in the most reassuring voice he could manage. He was, if anything, even more jittery than Beth, but his natural paranoia lead him to keep it hidden lest anyone notice.

"Easier said than done," said Beth, coming around to Sol's side of the desk and throwing the tissue into the waste paper basket. "It could be someone who works here."

"For all I know it could be you." Sol answered. Beth stared at him, aghast. "Don't worry. I'm joking." He smiled for a second, then caught sight of the look on Beth's face.

"Not funny." she said.

"Sorry. Anyway, I'll have this sorted out in a little while, and we'll know exactly who it is. Then all we need to do is work out what to do about it."

Beth nodded, then, with a quick glance around, made her way back to her side of the office. Sol watched her go, then turned back to what he was working on.

He had spent the morning interleaving WorldPulse reports (if they stopped flowing, people would start to ask questions) with working on a Crystal query to find out who was manipulating the sources. It was another big job, involving a whole new framework distinct from both the prediction one, and the one he had constructed to find the cause of the problems in the first place. His experience with the latter meant that he could go a little quicker, and made fewer mistakes, but it was still an uphill struggle.

Not only did he have to stop periodically to catch up on the work he was being paid to do, but he had to hide the Crystal window whenever anyone else walked past, for fear that they might ask what it was. Of course, most people wouldn't be able to tell it from the regular WorldPulse interface, but a few would, and these were, give or take, the people he was most worried about. It seemed to him that people were being especially talkative and sociable today, popping round for a quick chat or to ask him something far more frequently than they usually did. Because of this, his progress with Crystal was agonisingly slow.

About half way through the morning, a worrying possibility occurred to him. If the enemy - he had started to think of whoever was modifying the inputs as the enemy - also had a Crystal system, then they could also be doing what exactly what he was doing right now. They could be using their system to divine who exactly was trying to track them down. He started in his chair, then, completely irrationally, looked around him. He suddenly had a intense, claustrophobic feeling of being watched. Of course, nobody was watching him, so he turned back to get on with his work. He almost jumped out of his skin; someone was standing in front of his desk, waiting for him. He calmed down a little when he saw it was Isabelle.

"How's it going?" she asked.

"Slowly. People - not you - keep coming up and asking me things, so I have to stop." he sighed. "And Beth's a nervous wreck." He paused. "How about you? How're you holding up?"

"Not too bad." she smiled, "In fact, I've found out something you might be interested in." She came around the desk and crouched down next to Sol.

"It seems that your friend Meera hasn't been at the Bombay site for quite a couple of months now."

"Oh? I'd not noticed."

"No. It wasn't flagged by a management-speak memo, like most transfers are, which is a bit unusual in itself. Anyway, after a little bit of digging, I managed to find out that she was transfered to another part of the company by and order from the CEO himself."

"Which part of the company?" Sol leaned forward, listening with interest.

"That's the strange bit. It isn't really a part of the company at all; it's a wholly owned subsidiary. Minerva Consulting. Heard of it?"

Sol shook his head.

"Not surprising. It's only existed for a little over three months. And it only has one client. Jupiter."

Sol didn't say anything for a while, then "How did you find this out?"

Isabelle grinned. "Old-fashioned detective work. You don't need to everything with the magic box, you know."