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Nancy quietly shook her head no. She knew that if she told them about her plan, they'd never agree to help execute it. They'd want to protect her from getting near danger. Where do they learn these tribal rules, she wondered to herself? Anyway, she'd work with what she had, as Spike put it. All she needed was an opening. Roger correctly observed that she needed to get some rest. Nancy also needed some time to herself to sort out her options and her plans. The meeting broke up around midnight. She was happy that Roger just wanted to make small talk on the way back to the city. Nancy's guess was that he didn't understand the urgency of the situation. Once a problem gets started in a system, pulling it back together was going to be a hundred times the effort of avoiding it in the first place. Then, everybody would start demanding to know what was being done to make sure it could never happen again. The reputation of the Internet as a viable, commercially ready environment would be tarnished for years or ruined all together. It might also mean that Spike would either be dead or would need to go into hiding. Either way, she might never see him again. The attack had to be stopped before it got started.
These displays always made Hank feel uncomfortable. He figured it was part of their intent. Hank preferred a simple layout. But then, Hank actually preferred not having an office. Hank's gray sport jacket said it all for him. John Lexicon founded his company as Department of Defense spending on the "Stars Wars" SDI program started. His consumer products division had always turned a profit, but the real money in Lexicon's bank account came from R&D contracts for SDI. Fascination with cryptography during his college years had led him to becoming a recognized expert in message encryption. Most of his DOD contracts focused on missile defense through broad spectrum interruption of the missile's command and control systems. Confusing the enemy smart bombs may not be as flashy as high energy particle beams blowing them up, but it was much more likely to produce results within ten years. It was also the best direct application in the SDI program of his own communications expertise.
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