Pagan Island, Pacific Ocean

Michael was lying on the beach with his eyes closed, soaking up the sun. It was the most relaxed he felt in a long while and he couldn’t believe that almost six months had passed since they arrived on Pagan Island. The place that will be their new home for the foreseeable future.

It was beautiful, with the blue water of the Pacific Ocean and the green carpet over the land, as if it was a Photoshopped postcard. Six months without something bad happening, just working towards their goals. The only thing troubling him in this idyllic environment was… it was too peaceful; like the calm before the storm, it could not last.

Behind him, a massive structure reflected the light of the morning sun. The holographic illusion made the entire thing look more like an enormous self-sufficient ecology greenhouse or a biodome, as everybody was calling it. The dome was more than seven hundred fifty feet high at the center and the entire structure looked somewhat translucent. He had his doubts at first that the whole sleight-of-hand would actually work, but it did. There was even a website explaining their experiments with growing GM-free plants in the controlled environment. Several papers on their preliminary discoveries were published; fake of course, but Max made sure they would stand up even under the most skeptical scrutiny.

The original inflatable shell was long gone, replaced with the outer hull of the ship Max was building, not that the holographic projection showed any change beneath it.

People were already living inside it; there were spacious apartments built all around the residential level. That was the first thing Max constructed on the ship, places for people to live in. At three miles in circumference, there was much more space than they needed at the moment. The residents had formed a small thriving community and were enjoying their life on the island. That’s why he was now lying on a secluded little beach that was quite difficult to reach. The prime beaches were so crowded, he felt he couldn’t relax for a minute without someone coming to him and asking about his opinion about this thing or that. Not that he didn't want to be helpful, but sometimes he just needed some time for himself, a time to relax and to spend it with people closest to him.

With the perfect climate, clean sand, and the bluest water he ever saw, it was a paradise island… if one disregarded the volcano rising in the middle of it.

He remembered the conversation he had with Max about it, it still sounded too crazy to believe.

“So Max, what if that dormant volcano decides not to be so dormant anymore?” He asked a few days after they moved in.

“Oh, that old thing, don’t worry about it… I fixed it.”

Michael looked at the AI with confusion. “You fixed it? What on earth are you talking about?”

“Well, it wasn’t scheduled for eruption anytime soon, but to be on the safe side… I put a cork in it.”

“Max… that is a volcano, not a wine bottle, how the hell did you cork a volcano?”

The AI mischievously smirked. “It wasn’t easy, not by a long shot. First, I built a few large mining drones and they had to bore tunnels to bring the seawater close to the hotter regions within it. As the magma cooled, it started creating a hardened layer, or a ‘cork’ if you will. I continued doing it for quite some time; the tunnels are circular so the hot water is constantly replenished with cold water. You did not notice, but the water around the island is a few degrees warmer than it should be, that is just an additional benefit. The old tunnels are packed solid and sealed as the new ones are made, making the cork thicker.”

That conversation was almost half a year ago and Michael still couldn’t believe that Max had managed to subdue a volcano. On the other hand, he shouldn’t be so surprised. After all, they were building a real, honest-to-god spaceship, and he had to pinch himself every once in a while, to make sure he wasn’t dreaming. Still, volcanoes were something so primal and potentially devastating, the caveman within him was still a little bit wary of it.

The ship itself was enormous. Looking at the diagrams was easy, but to see, and be in it, was a completely different experience. Even walking around it took some time; quite understandably, since it was a three-mile walk. The amount of material needed for its construction was staggering, and Dave was the one making most of it happen. For the past six months, he was the busiest of them all; flying from one location to the other, buying the needed materials, and then organizing them to be picked up. For that reason, Max made special cargo transporters that could transfer tons of supplies in one trip; and the entire operation was a logistical nightmare only an AI could solve. And all that was just a piece of the puzzle.

Since their needs were so immense, a substantial percentage of metals they were… stealing. Okay, not stealing per se, but acquiring it in a long-honored finder’s keeper’s tradition. The ocean’s bottoms were layered with old shipwrecks, which were there for the taking. Max built fully automated drone harvester cargo submarines, which dismantled the wrecks and transferred all that scrap to the island. Using underwater tunnels, with entrances a few miles from the island, they couldn’t even be seen by the island’s occupants, let alone other curious eyes. Some of the famous wrecks were left alone, but Michael was getting annoyed listening to Max complaining about all that metal left on the Titanic.

As a bonus, there was sunken treasure… impressive amounts of it. On a bet with Al, Max found all of the sunken ships that were transferring gold and jewels and collected it. From Spanish galleons to sunken Nazi submarines from World War II, everything was up for grabs. Michael saw the compartment on the spaceship where everything was kept, and it was like entering Aladdin’s cave. There were vast amounts of precious metals, jewelry, lost works of art; all carefully preserved and cataloged. There were tons of miscellaneous stuff there, worth billions of dollars.

Michael and the team even managed to go on one of the treasure hunts. They used scuba suits and followed Max’s drone submarines to an old Spanish galley. Under the sand, mixed with pieces of rotting wood, was enough treasure to make them all insanely rich, not that they cared about wealth anymore. For an entire afternoon, they salvaged old gold coins, heavy crosses encrusted with jewels, and even an old cannon Tyron decided to take as a keepsake. After they had their fun, Max’s minions got to work on it, and with the use of several additional drones, cleaned the site of anything valuable.

It was decided that gold bars and jewels would be used as needed, but anything with historical value would be put aside, to be returned to their rightful owners when it was the right time or to keep it for posterity if it was unclaimed. To whom would one return priceless pieces of Phoenician art, when they were not around anymore? In any case, Max said he had a plan for opening a museum in space, one day.

A subsidiary of Genesis Corporation that dealt with recycling was becoming one of the world’s biggest buyers of e-scrap, or for that matter, any scrap at all. Dave was in charge of the entire operation, which has grown to an impressive size. There were now dozens of recycling plants on every populated continent in the world, mostly specializing in electronic scrap but also buying all kinds of metals by the megatons. Certain raw materials that Dave got for a bargain far surpassed Max’s needs, so he was making tons of money selling refined materials.

Anna was essentially leading the Genesis Corporation, as far as the world was concerned. Hers was the only face associated with it. All visible activities fell under the corporation’s umbrella and it was all legit. The taxes were paid, and there were offices with workers that did some busy work. Just the same, she answered to the board of directors. Of course, it was all smoke and mirrors a.k.a. Max, making it all look as if it were one more Corporation in the proverbial ocean of them. That Board of Directors was not even real, just some fictional identities Max was maintaining.

Genesis Corporation was making money, serious money. The number of scholarships it was sponsoring all over the world was substantial, but that was all investing in the future. Those kids didn’t know it yet, but Max was grooming the next generation who dreamed of reaching space.

The island even had a school, movie theaters, community centers, all built inside the ship. With so many people living on the island, it was a necessity. It was incredible how many kids were here, and they were all having the time of their lives. Mary, Ben’s daughter, was running the whole thing, from online lectures to teachers recruited from the scientific contingent.

One of the first things Max did, even before starting on the ship, was to send a probe to the Main Asteroid Belt. All right, calling it a probe may be an understatement since it was as big as a house. He said that he wanted a head start on asteroid mining, but he was keeping things to himself as far as the progress of that little project of his.

The search of Marianna’s Trench continued, but the preliminary scans didn’t find anything. As it was the only lead they had, Max decided to scan the entire thing, foot by foot, until he could find the place that could give them some answers. That project would take some time since the trench was some 1580 miles long and 43 miles wide on average. Right now, there was an army of scanning bots traveling above the trench floor, and scaring the hell out of creatures’ that lived in those depths.

Overall, Michael thought that things were shaping up really great; but he still waited for the other shoe to drop.

***

A sudden feeling of cold water droplets on his chest made Michael open his eyes, only to see Elizabeth standing above him and squeezing her wet hair on him.

“You know you could have just told me to wake up,” he said.

“You weren’t sleeping, that crease on your forehead appears only when you’re thinking about something serious. This is our day on the beach, so I want you to focus on now, not on some plans for the future,” Elizabeth said while squinting her eyes.

“I’m sorry, milady, I stand guilty before you,” Michael replied, with a mischievous smile.

“First of all, you’re not standing but lying on the beach, and second, you haven’t even come close to the water since we got here. As I remember, you promised me we would go swimming today. So, are you going back on your word?”

Michael's smile turned evil. “Well… if I promised—I promised. Don’t tell me later you didn’t ask for it.”

“Asked for—" her question was interrupted when Michael jumped, and in one smooth move picked her up in his arms and then started running towards the water.

“This is not what I meant!” Elizabeth shrieked indignantly.

Whatever she wanted to say next was cut off by the warm waters of the Pacific Ocean. For the next hour, they played in the water, not having a care in the world… that is until Max interrupted them.

“Michael, Elizabeth, Dr. Ross a.k.a. ‘call me Ben’ needs to talk to you.”

Since Max used both of their implants to speak to them simultaneously, Elizabeth was the one to answer. “Is it urgent? We were taking a day off.” The look in her eyes did not bode well for the AI.

“I wouldn’t interrupt your ‘The Blue Lagoon’ moment if it wasn’t. Hurry up, he is already waiting.”

It didn’t take them long to collect their stuff and to start walking in the direction of the biodome. The giant structure was a sight to behold, particularly if one was aware that the incredibly realistic transparent dome was not real and that underneath the holographic mirage was a metal hull of the ship. They went through the double airlock entrance and used the elevator to reach their apartment on the upper level; if they were not in such a hurry, Michael would have made some stops on the way, simply to observe the never-ending progress in building the humongous spaceship.

After a quick shower to wash away the salt residue, they entered one of the conference rooms Ben’s group used for their meetings.

Dr. Ross, whose physical appearance had gone through a transformation and made him look twenty years younger, was sitting at the table with a noticeably distressed look on his face.

“Ben, Max told us you need to talk to us, what happened?”

“Michael, I need your help, Dr. Emma Williams is missing, Max, show them the images…” The doctor sounded rushed and quite nervous.

“Slow down Ben, who is Dr. Emma Williams?”

Max’s hologram appeared beside the table. “Ben, maybe I should continue?”

“Yes, yes… please do.”

Max pointed at the newly formed image on a holo-screen. “Dr. Williams is a prominent scientist in the field of social psychology; she’s only twenty-eight years old but has already managed to make a name for herself in that field. She finished her doctorate at the age of nineteen and has several published books. Ben managed to recruit her to join us and she is scheduled to arrive here by the end of the month. The reason she needed more time was that for the past year, she has been living in Nigeria, organizing the construction of several schools for young children.”

The image showed a beautiful young woman standing with a group of kids, in a poor village made of mud huts. What caught Michael’s eyes was a fierce look of determination in her eyes.

“She kept in constant contact with her sister, the only family she has left, through a sat phone… that is, until yesterday. Her sister could not reach her and naturally started to panic, knowing how dangerous that part of the world is. So, she contacted everyone she could think of; Ben is one of those contacts and he received her call this morning; I have redirected one of the satellites above the location of the village she was in.”

The image on the holo-screen changed to the one taken by a satellite; a remote village in the middle of a great plain. When that image, which started from a great height, zoomed in, they could all see a gruesome scene. The remains of the burned houses, a few bodies on the ground, and the building that was still under construction, most likely the school—laying in ruins.

“That’s all we know,” Max continued. “There is no other information, her sat phone is not giving any signal, and the village is so remote that I don’t think anybody else even knows that something happened. Michael, there were a lot more people in that village than can be accounted by the bodies on the ground; And of Dr. Williams and her assistant… there is no trace.”

Michael looked at the scene of the massacre, his face hardening into an expressionless mask.

“Our vacation is officially over. Max, summon the team, we are going to Nigeria.”