Point of Contact

“Now, if I hit another key, the software will show me Mr. Ho’s five most visited locations as measured by length of stay.” Singh executed the new function, isolating five specific locations, and took away all of the red spiderweb trace lines to clarify the image.

“As you can see, two of those five locations are his home and his place of work. A third looks to be a local bar, and the fourth a horse-racing venue. The fifth…”

Singh tapped more keys. “Is the residence of this woman.” A photo popped up, along with her personal stats. It was a thirty-two-year-old single woman, plain and somewhat heavyset.

“So Mr. Ho spends quite a bit of time with this woman. For the sake of her privacy, I won’t pull up her name. But just for fun—”

“Dr. Singh—” Lian said, but too late.

Dozens of tracer lines, each in a different color, radiated out from the woman’s apartment. The home terminal of each line appeared, along with the images of their occupants — all men, of various ages and races.

“It seems Mr. Ho’s ‘friend’ has a lot of other friends.” Singh raised an eyebrow. “If you catch my meaning.”

“Friends who are friendly by the hour, judging by the time stamps,” Jack added.

“That’s enough, Dr. Singh.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Singh tapped another key and all of the data disappeared, leaving only the live overhead image of Singapore on the screen.

Jack shook his head. “I’m utterly amazed. You’re putting a beat cop in the sky. A beat cop with a perfect set of eyes and a perfect memory.”

Singh nodded thoughtfully. “More or less, yes.”

“This is what military and intelligence agencies have been doing for the last ten years,” Jack said. “I know you’ve written your own AI programs, but what’s your value-added?”

“You know how these government systems run. A Predator operation might have eighty, a hundred, even two hundred people in the loop, everyone from the ground-control station and flight crew all the way back to the Pentagon, with civilian and military analysts added in for good measure.” He held up the tablet again. “Here’s your analysis team. The UAV we’ve developed can be transported in the back of a truck, unloaded, assembled, and made ready to launch in less than thirty minutes by just two people with a wrench and a screwdriver. Compared to the large military systems, Steady Stare is cheap, easy to use, and requires very little manpower.” Singh flashed a smile. “And of course, Dalfan is prepared to provide any or all of those manpower services if the client requires them. If not, Dalfan provides all of the training and technical support they might need.”

Jack glanced around the room. There were four analysts sitting at workstations with headsets on, speaking. “How does a police department actually use a system like this?”

“The SPF is responding to various calls around the city every day. If they conduct their initial investigation and can’t identify the culprits in a crime — for example, a hit-and-run car accident — an assigned detective will call us and give us the street address of the accident, and then we perform a ‘time travel’ search function like the one I just showed you. We would then call in the terminal address of the alleged vehicle to the detective and officers would be dispatched to the location. We’re not replacing police work, we’re just making it far more efficient.”

“Politicians will love it because their police departments will be solving far more crimes for less money,” Lian said. “And when word gets out, it will deter crime. If every speeding vehicle automatically gets ticketed because of Steady Stare, fewer people will speed — that means fewer accidents, lower insurance costs, and fewer injuries and deaths.”

No wonder Marin Aerospace wants a piece of this, Jack thought. He ran his hand through his hair, considering the possibilities — and the profits.

Jack turned to Lian. “Now I’m getting a better idea why Dalfan has such tight security. The Chinese would love to steal this kind of technology.”

“They’ve already tried.” Lian smiled. “And not just the Chinese.”

Jack checked his watch. “This has been fascinating, Dr. Singh. I’d like to see the airport facility.”

“When?”

“Why not now?”

Lian shrugged. “Fine. Let’s go.”

* * *

The Dalfan hangar at the Seletar Airport was unremarkable, a duplicate of several other leased hangars on the property. A single-wide trailer was parked next to it.

Singh, Lian, and Jack parked the company car and headed into the hangar, big enough to accommodate two Cessna 172s or a medium-sized executive jet. Inside was neither.

“That’s the Steady Stare UAV,” Singh said.