This is the concluding chapter of “Root Two,” a novella about numbers, love, and sweet retribution.
If you need to catch up first, you can find:
[Est. reading time: 7 minutes]
My plan was conceptually simple, but would tax the very limits of our collective talent.
The goal was to somehow make it so that the version of the contract that got deployed into CrossWorlds would basically run the intended scam in reverse. Instead of siphoning assets out of users' encrypted wallets and into the wallets preFORMA had designated, it would drain those designated wallets and distribute their contents across every wallet that approved the contract. This would be very hard to do.
But I wanted to make it even harder.
I was determined to not only target the designated wallets (which would likely just be empty proxies anyway), but also any and all wallets associated with preFORMA.
What we were doing was not legal. But if we could pull it off, preFORMA would be obliterated, and, even better, incapable of prosecuting without calling attention to their own evil designs. We were aiming for a complete and unmitigated victory.
Anything short of it, and we would be ruined.
Over the next 24 hours, we plunged the needle into the red zone of insanity. We worked harder than we had ever worked in our lives. Me, with the hot fury of righteous indignation. Hemmy, with the fear of me filling his sails. And Bert, well, I halfway suspected that "insane" was his default setting.
None of us ate or slept. We barely blinked. At one point, my body demanded that I get up to use the bathroom, but only once. It knew better than to ask again.
I’d be lying if I said KrisLove’s face didn’t interrupt my laser focus a couple of times. Would I have worked so hard if not for that sting? Each time, I dismissed the question. It didn’t matter.
Since PokkoDev had a reputation for fast work, it was no surprise when preFORMA pinged Hemmy (our de facto account manager) in the morning, with some concern. Bert and I backseat drove while Hemmy drafted a response, explaining that I'd been ill, but not to worry -- we'd have our review done by the deadline. Then, without a word, we went right back to work.
At 5pm, the end of the business day, we crowded around Hemmy's computer again to watch him send the message that we had completed the validation review.
We suspected preFORMA would want to deploy the contract as fast as possible, before anyone might realize something was wrong. Unless they got suspicious, or somehow noticed what we'd done. If that happened, our best guess (hope?) was that they'd simply vanish. Then again, they might be able to find a way to frame us as the villains, and drag us into a gruesome court battle.
Either way, all we could do was wait. Bert ordered dinner.
We ate in silence as evening darkened the two windows on the other side of the room.
On one level, I was anxious. We had taken an enormous risk. But deep down, I enjoyed the peace of knowing I had spent myself the best way I knew how. I had, as they say, fought the good fight. I was ready to face whatever came next.
And then they deployed the contract. Even Hemmy breathed a sigh of relief. Then he shot me a look like a man pleading for his life.
"I'm going home," I said, then grabbed Bert's shoulder and gave it a squeeze. "Thank you."
He nodded, then headed for the door.
"Cyn," Hemmy said as I followed Bert. I stopped and turned. "I--"
"No," I said. "You don't get to say sorry. You would have let me burn. For some money. We can't come back from this."
And then I left, the hole in my heart sucking the wind out of me as I went.
Even after the most harrowing two days of my life, I slept better that night than I had in a long time.
Sure, cutting Hemmy out of PokkoDev was gonna be a mess. Even if we replaced him immediately, we'd still have to back out of some of the work we'd taken on while we got the new person up to speed. There was also the troubling possibility that preFORMA was not Hemmy's first transgression. He claimed it was a one-time thing, but to take his word on that would have been tantamount to corporate malfeasance.
But all that could wait a day or two.
And in the meantime, I got to watch preFORMA publicly implode as our trojan horse did its retributive work.
The narrative that gained traction most quickly was that they had tried to run a scam on the CrossWorlds ecosystem, but then accidentally encoded the transactions in the wrong direction.
Rather than contradicting this theory, I, along with all the other validators, prepared a short statement expressing a carefully calibrated mix of dismay that we had been exploited, and relief that disaster had been averted thanks to preFORMA's spectacular incompetence. Also, a promise to tighten security to make sure nothing like this could ever happen again.
The whole thing was frankly pretty healing.
The next day, I decided it was time to reach out to Bert and start tackling the colossal mess Hemmy had left behind.
But just as I was about to make the call, there was a knock on my door.
Even though I couldn't remember ordering anything recently, I made my way over expecting some kind of delivery, because there was literally no other reason anyone had ever knocked on my apartment door.
But it wasn't a delivery. It was KrisLove.
The sight of her was such a shock that I saw some of those you're-about-to-pass-out stars.
"I'm sorry," she blurted.
I blinked. It was the only response I was capable of.
"I would have called you, but-- I couldn't-- I mean, I'm hoping by coming here in person, it might-- shit."
She looked at the floor. I opened my mouth, but then closed it again when I realized I didn't have any words for it to say.
Thankfully, she continued.
"I'm here because it was the hardest thing I could think of to do. On the way over, I planned out this whole thing, this whole speech. But it's all bullshit.
"That morning, that note... I didn't have a deadline. I ran away. And then it was really easy to just not respond. To tell myself that it wasn't a big deal. That I was busy. That you were probably busy. Anyway."
She shook her head.
"The thing is you're not supposed to like someone so much so fast. I don't even--" she broke off with a laugh. "I don't even know if you feel the same way! But I refuse to be the kind of person who does what I've been doing. Who avoids doing the hard things. Like apologizing. In person. To you."
Her face twisted itself into a deep wince of embarrassment, and then she looked at the floor again.
"Okay. Thank you. I mean I'm sorry. I mean-- Okay."
She turned to go.
"Hey," I said. She stopped. "You wanna get drunk with me?"
"Oh dear god yes," she said.
So that's what we did.
It’s incredibly satisfying to have this story both finished and out in the world. It wasn’t until I was getting this last chapter ready to publish that I realized how much of my heart actually went into it. I went through that phase of hating it for a while, which is inevitable for a thing you work on for long enough.
But now it’s all grown up and I’ve sent it on its way, and I feel safe to love it again.
I hope you’ll share your experience with it with me. Good and bad. All comments, insights, and follow-up questions welcome. I’ll be thrilled with anything you have to say.
Oh, and if for some bizarre reason you haven’t already…
I suppose this is also the right moment to suggest that if you liked this, you could share it with someone else. Here’s a link for that:
Finally, if this was the first story you read on the Dispatches, and you’re desperate for more fantastic fiction, try this out:
OK, I think we can agree that’s enough big orange buttons for now.
Marvelous. It reads as a sinuous, but self aware, noir.
Wow, what an awesome ending. I didn't know exactly what to expect, especially with the twists and turns of the last two installments, but honestly I basically got everything I want! I would LOVE to see what your original ending looked like, and some thoughts on why you thought it was good at the time, and why you decided against it and made things this way - I am always fascinated with a behind the scenes look if it is appropriate or possible.
Thanks for another great story! I can't wait for the next big thing here on the Dispatches!