Jarrod Conrad had hurried from the Quantum Building in the early morning hours following the burglary of his office. He was exhausted but too amped up to sleep, an overdose of adrenaline still coursed through his system. He was stunned by his cousin’s audacity in actually stealing the equations he had spent his career developing. He knew that Ryan was no stranger to vindictiveness, but he never thought in his wildest dreams he had the balls to actually break the law. It was clear he had grossly underestimated his cousin’s resolve-he meant to settle the score for losing his wife, after all. Jarrod thought the divorce from Sarah had finally broken his spirit; there had been no hint of retaliation after the New York City scam. This misjudgment aside, he would now have to deal with the consequences of Ryan’s foolhardy actions. The renewed escalation of their embittered rivalry would not go unchallenged.
Jarrod wasn’t at all worried about losing his research data. He had every theorem, equation, and technical drawing for his gravity research backed up on multiple computers for just such a contingency; he was never comfortable keeping all his data in one basket. What did bother him was that his antigravity equations were in the hands of another engineer prior to the publication of his breakthrough discovery. Anyone involved at this level of corporate espionage was unscrupulous enough to capitalize on the discovery, without hesitation. This, he could not abide.
Jarrod was relieved he had the foresight to imagine this worstcase scenario. He never kept all the information for the machine in one location; the construction design was kept separate from the operational equations. Neither were the schematics kept on the same computer with the equations to produce a flow of gravitrons. And, finally, the system equations triggered a termination sequence for anyone who tried to use them without his personal laptop computer. Niles Penburton was the only other person who knew where everything was stored.
Any proficient researcher could easily build the device from his schematics, right down to the detail of the microwave dish required to focus the gravitron beam. But without the laptop to synchronize the current with the nuclear core, the machine couldn’t levitate a walnut. Not even Niles knew about this little detail. These built-in safeguards should protect his invention until he uncovered what Ryan had planned for the machine.
Jarrod imagined his cousin was feeling pretty smug after pilfering his research, but Ryan had another thing in store if he thought this was the end of anything. The fool just doesn’t get it. He can’t beat me.
Following the questioning from Detective Morris, Jarrod immediately returned to his home at the campus and retrieved the data backup he kept on his personal computer. Even though he was confident the IBM laptop was secure in the hidden wall-safe, he was in no position to take anything for granted. The laptop didn’t have the computing power of the Quantum mainframe, but it did have sufficient memory to store the various complex equations to make the gravity machine functional.
Thankfully, the laptop was secure. No one had been in his house. He would simply upload this data back at the lab and continue to complete his research for publication before Ryan could capitalize on his discovery. There was no possible way anyone could operate the machine without the critical information that he still possessed. Whoever Ryan was working with would be pissed when they discovered that the information they robbed was incomplete. The laptop equations were still the key to operating his antigravity device, and the stolen data didn’t even hint that something else was needed.
Screw Ryan, Jarrod thought. I’d love to see the bastard’s face when he realizes he doesn’t have squat. This isn’t over by a long shot, Cuz.