Chapter Three

Good Fathers make Good Sons...


"Two stages," Rusty explained, "First we position a man of our own."

"There's a gaming expo the day of the grand opening, which Bank is committed to attend," Natalie continued, "To show, what a regular guy he is."

"Frank is suiting up as the gamer."

"Second part, we tie Frank to one of theirs," Rusty continued, "A pit boss with sticky fingers."


"The men who make the decisions are very hard to impress," Frank explained to the models that had been hired for the expo, "That's why I'm askin' each and every one of you to help me sell it, by being the most classy, genteel ladies. The image that we're lookin' for is tasteful elegance."

"What exactly do you want us to do," one of the models asked.

"Raise those skirts up about three inches."

The pit boss walked out of the pawn shop after selling a couple of sets of the golden silverware that were supposed to be in the high rollers' villas. Counting his cash with a smile on his face, he was just about to get into his car, when…

"Does Willy Bank know you're stealing his gold flatware, Neil," Danny asked, as he leaned against the wall of the pawn shop.

"How do you know my name?"

"Oh, we know a lot of names," Danny told him, "We know your wife, Mary, your kids, Leanne and Dolly. We know you're the pit boss at the casino."

"You don't want to…I mean..I-I-I," Neil stuttered.

"We don't want to hurt you," Danny assured him, "We want to help you double your salary all in one night."

"What do you need me to do?"

"Right now, nothing," Danny answered, "Go home. Do your job and at the appropriate moment somebody will present themselves to you. Enough said?"

"Enough said."


"Who is the shill at the expo to rope Bank?"

"We're still looking," Rusty answered, sitting down beside Natalie as they all entered the den.

"We'll find someone," Natalie assured him.

"Well, make sure that it's someone he really despises," Roman instructed, "Back to macro, what is your exit strategy? The players won't be in on the scam, so they'll all think it's their lucky night, but you'll never get them out the door with all their winnings, they'll dump it all back. That's Vegas and that's your problem."

"Well, actually the exit strategy is A problem, but it's not THE problem," Danny said, taking a sip of his brandy.

"The problem is security," Rusty explained, "We're drawing a blank, it's a little spooky."


"The specks aren't on the grey market, the black market or any other market," Linus explained, "And all I keep hearing is that there's never been a system like this. Now, I found out where they designed it, but I can't even get in the building. I've blown all my buy money, my bribe money, four of my best IDs and I am nowhere. Well, not only am I nowhere, I'm pretty sure I'm being followed."

"Do you have anything," Natalie asked him in exasperation.

"Yeah, I think I have a name," Linus told her, "But, I don't even know if it's right. They're calling it-"


"The Greko," Roman said, standing up and looking at Natalie in astonishment, "The Greko Playertrack. They're putting it in Vegas. Uh, well, I'll give you back the hundred grand."

"Why," Natalie asked, returning the look of astonishment.

"Nattie, I like you and you, Rusty and Danny," Roman mused, "I mean all three of you have got style, you got brio, you got a loyalty. You three are the celebrity family of the thievery world, but even celebrities go off the boil. You're analog players in the digital world. You're done."

"Roman," Natalie warned.

"Nattie," Roman returned, "Believe me I would love to go up against Greko and crush him, but it can't be beat. It can't be hacked and it can't be beat."

"Not even by you," Danny asked.

"Oh, with eighteen months, nothing else on my plate, no other jobs, no women, no distractions, no wife breathing down my neck to spend time with her," Roman listed, "Maybe."

"You know everything about this thing," Rusty asked.

"Everything," Roman answered, "Except where it was being deployed."

"The inventor is an old school mate of ours, Nattie," Roman said, looking at her like she should have known this, "Greko Montgomery."

"Ugh," Natalie groaned, "Not that pretentious prick. The pompous ass must have named it after himself."

"Greko," Rusty asked, looking at Natalie, "Roman?"

"Obviously you never served time in a British boarding school," Natalie said, before looking at her father, "Thanks Daddy." Danny smiled at her, she had only been there two years, but it was an experience that she would never forget none the less.

"What's so bad about this thing," Danny asked, sipping at his brandy once more.

"It's an artificial intelligence security system," Roman explained, "He must be field testing."

"You mean it has a brain?"

"A hell of a brain," Roman stated, "It doesn't only think, it reasons. It reads every perpetration in every wager and every seat in an entire casino, hand by hand. It's wired into the floor security cameras that measure pupil dilation and determine if a win is legitimate or expected. It gathers bio feedback, player's heart rates and body temperatures. It measures on a second by second basis to make sure that the standard of gaming algorithm are holding or are being manipulated. The data is analyzed in real time in a field of exabytes."

"Exabytes," Danny questioned.

"You know what a terabyte is?"

"Yeah…" Danny trailed off.

"One exabyte is a million terabytes," Natalie explained, leaning in to whisper it into her father's ear.

"The Greko is housed in an impregnable room," Roman continued, "Shock mounted, temperature controlled and it locks down if it even senses it is under attack. If it locks down, they wouldn't even be able to get out of the room."

"Couldn't we just shut it off, you know, cut the wire," Danny asked.

"That could work," Roman answered sarcastically, "But, still even if you kicked the plug out of the socket-"

"Seriously," Rusty said, slightly annoyed with the man.

"No," Roman answered truthfully, "Short of walking into that room with a bloody magnetron around your neck…you know what a magnetron is, don't you?"

"Something that screws up the Greko," Danny guessed.

"Short of that," Roman continued, "Ugh, I'm kind of shocked that is where we are because this is a problem."

"That's what I said," Natalie told him, giving him an annoyed look.

"But, if we could somehow shut it off-"

"No, there's no if," Roman snapped, interrupting Rusty, "It cannot be shut off. I mean you'd need a real nature disaster; an actual act of God."

"But, if we could-"

"You can't."

"But, if we did."

"You can't."

"You could," Natalie argued.

"Don't flatter," he bantered.

"If we could, how long would it take to reboot," Danny asked.

"Because it's so sophisticated," Roman mused, "Three and a half minutes."

"It might be enough," Danny mused.

"Pick your natural disaster," Rusty said, looking at both Natalie and Danny with a smirk. All three of them turned and looked at Roman with smiles on their faces.

"Get me a laptop," he ordered, a smirk now forming on his. Natalie walked towards the large wooden TV stand and pulled open a cupboard; inside was a laptop. Roman tinkered with it for a moment before nodding at Rusty, Danny and Natalie to come see what he had put together.

"Now, the drill access is through a sewer main on Paris Dr," Roman explained, "It grinds along here to the northwest corner of the hotel, here. Probably about 6 RPM, so you won't wake all the neighbours. When it reaches the resident frequency, the building acts like a tuning fork, to the people inside it will feel like an earthquake. That should be enough to knock out the Greko and that's your exit strategy."


"Hey Bash," Linus called, as he walked through the main where the drill was being housed.

"I'm up here," Basher answered. Linus followed his voice to wear Bash was standing controlling the drill. Linus handed him a brown paper bag and made to leave. Bash looked through the bag, noticing that there was something missing.

"Hey, where are the mags," Bash asked, causing Linus to shuffle on his feet slightly, "Ugh, Linus."

"I can't buy those things," Linus complained.

"I need them," Bash explained, "I can't leave. Why are you such-"

"I'm sorry," Linus interrupted, "Ask somebody else, ask Livingston."

"You're such a wowser," Basher said, glaring at Linus slightly as stepped down from his little perch. Walking over to a notebook, he opened it and handed Linus a letter that had been sandwiched in-between the pages.

"Look, read this to Reuben," he explained, "I've done research, positive messages get through. That's probably another reason why Nattie has those silly little home movies of Charlie and Reuben on repeat."

"I can't say this," Linus said, after quickly skimming through the letter that he had been handed.

"No, I'm the one saying it, you're just a vessel," Bash explained before rushing off to take a look at the drill.

"Come on, Basher, look why don't you take a break, I'll watch the equipment and you go read it to him," Linus bargained. Basher quickly did some readjusting to the drill before getting frustrated with Linus.

"You know when they were digging the tunnel, they had teams of guys monitoring this," Basher complained.

"Yeah, how many?"

"Teams."


Walking into Bank's office, Rusty had to stay extremely calm. He hadn't expected the first time that he would actually get to see his son in person that he would be in disguise and it took all of his self control to not launch himself straight over Bank's desk and pummel him until he couldn't even see anymore. It almost killed him to have to do this.

Placing Roman's laptop on Bank's desk, he pulled up the program to explain just what could happen.

"That's a 5.6," Rusty explained, as the computer demonstrated the damage that could be done both to the city and to the hotel, "If you don't think a 5.6 is possible or even likely, then quite frankly you don't know much about what the bullets seem to report, specifically the section of the Mohambi Black." Sponder's eyes widened as she watched the demonstration on the laptop. She looked at her boss and noticed that he really didn't seem to care.

"I know what you're hoping that it'll just be a blind thrust asphalt…"


"That it'll just produce-"

"See that," Natalie asked, a still miserable looking Reuben as they watched Rusty 'warn' Sponder and Bank that they're sitting in a hazardous spot, "That's Rusty – see Rusty."

"He's doing an Irwin Allen," Linus yelled at Reuben, causing Natalie to look at him slightly out of the corner of her eye, "See that?"

"He's not deaf, Linus."


"Okay, what do you want me to do?"

"Close your hotel," Rusty explained, "Permanently."

"What," Bank snapped, "We haven't even opened yet."

"What are all those people downstairs?'

"That's a soft opening-"

"It's like an out of town preview," Sponder explained.

"You think you can just come in here and tell me to close my hotel," Bank snapped, "I'm not going to close my hotel."

"Sir," Rusty cut across, "If you'll just let me come in here with my team and our gear for a few days, I'll prove what I'm saying-"

"There is now way, we're exposing our exclusive cliental to a bunch of-"

"Scientists," Rusty offered, "We wouldn't want that would we? Let's just hope for the best – that should be enough. Well, just take this, it's a standard tension seismograph, if there is a 'fore shock it will register and you just MIGHT have time to evacuate."

"I don't want this thing on my desk."

"Sir, let me tell you what you don't want," Rusty said, looking at Bank frustrated now, "Your hotel on the cover of Time Magazine, in a twisted heap of steel and glass, you and your customers are underneath and the headline reads, 'Who's to Blame?' That's what you don't want."

"Okay, put an evacuation plan on paper," Bank ordered.

"Will do, sir-"

"I wanna go home," Charlie whined, causing all three adults to look at him, "I wanna see my mama and I miss uncle Reuben…I wanna go home." Rusty's hands clenched slightly. He wanted nothing more than to bring Charlie with him, to just run out of the door and return his son safely to Natalie.

"Don't mind my grandson," Bank told Rusty, causing Rusty's hands to flex at his sides once more, "His mother left him with me a couple of months ago saying she couldn't handle being a parent anymore and he just doesn't understand yet."

"Thank you for your time," Rusty said, before walking out even though it was extremely hard to leave Charlie sitting there.

"If you want to put yourself to good use, why don't you hit the tables?"

"Oh, I don't gamble sir, and neither should you, not with people's lives."

"And now, we have a camera in Bank's office."


Reuben continued to look miserable even with all the progress that they had made. Nattie was looking at the screen regretfully. Clear as day, she could see her little boy sitting in Bank's office, wondering why she hadn't come for him yet, wondering why he was only ever allowed to see her for two hours on the weekends at some park and it hurt her to see that miserable look on his face. It hurt her even more for Bank to say that she had abandoned him.

"I'll see you later, Reuben," Natalie said, not taking her eyes off the TV before she finally exited the room, leaving Linus to read another one of Basher's letters. Linus looked around the room before pulling another envelope out of his suit jacket pocket.

"Dear Reuben," Linus started, "As the band said, 'two hearts beat as one.' When men have been in battle together, they're bonded like the flower, the soil and the sun and like the moon catches the light…Reuben, I'm going to go ahead and leave this here. See ya."


Rusty and Danny walked down the hall from the janitor's closet that they were hiding in, towards the bedroom where they were going to house the hotel reviewer, who would be responsible for awarding, well not awarding Bank his precious five diamond award. The janitor's cart was filled with things that were going to help them change the room from as clean as whistle to almost toxic. The two of them replaced everything that could easily be removed and they even added a few surprises for the reviewer.

Downstairs Saul, dressed as their five diamond award reviewer, was standing in line in plain sight of Abigail Sponder, when he 'accidentally' dropped the information packet for her to see.

Outside the hotel, Bank was desperately trying to get Denny Shields to stay for as long as he was booked to.

"Where are you goin'," Bank asked, as he caught up to the man, "We have you booked through the grand opening."

"A friend of mine," Shields started, "A very serious man told me very seriously that it would be a good idea if I left the hotel. I'm taking his suggestion."

"He can't be too serious, if he knew what I have in store for you."

"Willy, I'm out of here. Thank you," Shields finished, paying the valet a quick tip before getting into his car, where his driver was waiting for him. The two exchange insincere goodbyes and as Bank watched Shields car dive off, he got a phone call.

"Bank, here," he answered, "Confirmed?" Bank rushed inside to where Sponder was standing watching all of the guests that were checking in. He couldn't believe it, his honored guest had finally arrived and he was going to blow this guy's 'Doctor Dolittle' hat right off of his head.

"Okay," Bank said, nodding his head, "You know what to do."

Sponder nodded and quickly rushed off towards where Saul was standing. They were going to put their best foot forward when it came to him.


"Excuse me, Mr…"

"Chub," Saul introduced, "Kensington Chub."

"Good afternoon, ," Sponder greeted, "Would you like to follow me? I think I might be able to move things along for you."

"How very nice of you," Saul answered, replacing his hat back on his head. A bell hop that had accompanied Sponder tried to take the carrying case out of Saul's hands, but the little speaker quickly let out a tiny bark and Saul smacked the bell hop's hand away.

"No, no," he explained, "Her highness is a very delicate animal. It upsets her so, if anyone, but Papa carries her around. All's well, dear."

"Why don't you just follow me," Sponder asked, slightly nervous now. She signalled for the hell hop to grab the rest of Saul's gear and follow her almost immediately. The bell hop grabbed the bags and quickly placed them onto a cart nearby, but not before smacking them into the real royal reviewer.

"Hey, how why does he get-"

"He's a VIP," the bell hop explained after apologizing to the man.

"What does that make me a VUP," the man complained, "A very unimportant person." The man shook his head as he got back in line and waited for his turn up at the front desk.


Debbie smirked inwardly as she watched the man from the photo finally approach the front desk. Telling one of her staff members to go on break, she quickly took over handling this man's reservation, sending him straight up to the room that Danny and Rusty had booby-trapped just for him.

Rusty quickly contacted Saul who was already in his hotel room and put the last piece into place. Reaching into the doggy carrying case, Saul pulled out a toxic substance that once submerged in watch released a noxious smell. Handling it extremely carefully, Saul sat it right near a vent in his room that led straight to Room 1706, the room that the reviewer was staying in.

The reviewer was sitting in his room reading a magazine when the noxious smell hit his nostrils. He quickly called the front desk to see if there was another room available, waving a pillow in to get some fresh air.

"Hello, Front Desk," Debbie greeted, knowing exactly why the man was calling.

"Yes, I'm in room 1706," the older gentleman began trying desperately not to breathe through his nose, "And there's some sort of terrible smell in here. It smells like – well, I need, I need to move."

"Certainly, sir, I'll just see if we have anything available ," Debbie responded, trying to sound accommodating even though she was just playing solitaire on her computer, "I'm sorry, sir. We are fully booked through the grand opening gala. But, I'll let you know if anything opens up. Enjoy your stay at The Bank."

"But, I-"

"Goodbye."

Stepping outside to give his nostrils a break from the horrible smell that had been wafting from his room, the unsuspecting man was met with the sight of the elderly man that was supposedly some special VIP being escorted down the hall by two sentries.

"Absolutely," he heard the man say, "And would you let the VIP Concierge know that I'm ready to see all the available rooms."

"Right away, Mr. Chubb," one of the sentries responded.

"Thank you," Saul said, "Her highness is so very sensitive to smells."