Masquerade- Chapter 5
Title: Masquerade
Author: rosejailmaiden
Beta-Reader: nandosagi
Verse: anime, with HG/SS gameverse Rocket executives
Characters/Pairings: Giovanni/Ariana, Petrel, Dr. Zager, Professor Sebastian, Persian
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Alcohol use and a scene of prescription drug abuse
Summary: Everyone wears a disguise at some point. Some wear it to control how the world sees them. Some wear it to hide genius. Some wear it to protect themselves. And some wear it for completely selfish reasons. A twisted tale from the past of how a master scam artist named Francis became a Team Rocket member, where everyone has their secrets, and in which Persian is hungry.
Politics, n. Strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. - Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
The evening crowd at the Snorlax was bustling as always, as Rockets and civilians alike flocked there for a drink after a long day of work. It was the perfect chance for Ariana to slip in, dressed in a long, form-fitting trenchcoat and fedora, unnoticed by the bar's patronage. Ariana typically made a point of avoiding the Snorlax due to the unsavory customers the place tended to attract- though she didn't object to the barkeeps there offering her free drinks, she could do without the constant group of drooling men covertly following her, especially on what was more or less official Rocket business like this.
In her hands she carried a small wooden box, and a leather satchel was slung across her body. She pushed through the crowds to behind the bar, where Noah, a short, balding man, waited alongside Zager.
“We're here on business,” Ariana said, pulling a leather lined card case out of her pocket and discreetly opening it to flash her Team Rocket ID card.
“Come right in, then,” the man said. He moved a decanter of bourbon sitting on a shelf behind the bar slightly to the left to reveal a button hidden beneath it, which he then pressed. The click of a latch opening could be heard, and the shelf was cracked open to reveal it was actually a door to the Snorlax's secret back room.
The back room of the Snorlax couldn't be more different than the main part of it. Because it tended to be used for business, it was far cleaner than the rest of the bar, and furnished more tastefully. When Ariana, Zager, and his associate walked in, Giovanni was already there sitting at a couch in front of a mahogany coffee table, drinking a glass of whiskey and looking bored.
“I assume we're all here now,” he said, as Ariana and the others sat down at nearby chairs around the table. “Shall we begin?”
Noah coughed. “Not until I have my payment,” he said.
Payment? Giovanni wondered. He knew only about Noah what Zager and Ariana had told him in the past- that he was a freelance info broker who attended college classes with Zager, and that he knew everything about everyone in Kanto's criminal underground. To the best of anyone's knowledge, he worked exclusively with Team Rocket, slipping information on police raids, useful allies, and potential enemies along to anyone willing to pay the price he set. He was also allegedly a member, though this evening was honestly the first time Giovanni had ever seen him. Given his age, he wouldn't be surprised if he was one his mother recruited.
“It's right here,” Ariana said, sliding the box across the table to him. Noah opened it.
“Green shards!”
“I knew you needed them,”Ariana said.
“That's his payment?” Giovanni said. “Shards?”
“I happen to be a collector,” Noah said. “I collect the shards and then pass them along to other shard collectors for information and it continues all the way down. Shards can be resold to dealers and other collectors for money, but until that point, they're the most secure payment in the information trade. Untraceable and least likely to arouse suspicion from the authorities.”
He was still confused, but in a way, what Noah just explained made perfect sense to Giovanni.
“Fifty of them, all green,” Ariana said.
Noah greedily clutched the box of shards, admiring the glowing glassy bits for a moment, then closed it up, slipped it under his chair, and folded his hands. “Now that I've been compensated for my information, we can begin.”
Ariana reached into her shoulder bag and pulled out a folder. “This is all the evidence I've gathered that we might have the Thousand Faces artist on our tails.” She revealed some clippings, photos, and books on the con artist, as well as a collection of photographs. All were images of suspected Thousand Faces cons.
“Here are some photos of impostors that have been captured via security camera,” Ariana explained. “Now, part of the reason the police have had difficulty pinning a suspect is because he or she is never seen himself. That's the reason so many theories float around about whether he or she is even one lone figure or a group of copycat incidents.”
The four gathered around the table passed the photos around, studying them.
“I noticed a pattern, however. If you look close enough, you can see all the confirmed impostor photos share a facial shape.” She pulled out a second set. “Here they are zoomed in. I traced along the jawline to make it more obvious.”
“Ariana, this is fascinating. You must have been following this case for ages before all this commotion.” While he knew she was clever, Giovanni never expected Ariana to be the detective type.
Ariana blushed. “Actually I've been following all this since it started,” she said. “I'm a bit of a true crime fan.”
“You'll notice Jon Price is one of those photos. That photograph I took off a crime message board. It's a still from the bank security videos when the impostor Price went and made his withdrawal.”
“The Jon we ran into at last night's ball,” Giovanni added.
Ariana nodded. “I have a decent memory for faces I run into and I can tell that is without question the very Price who gave us trouble,” she said. “Now I know why I thought I'd seen him somewhere before. When I said that, I didn't mean Jon Price himself. Of course I know who he is, he's everywhere. I meant the person under the disguise. The possibility never crossed my mind at the time.” She pulled yet another photo from the folder. “Here's a publicity shot I found of the real one, taken about a year ago. You can tell the difference between the fake one on the camera stills and the real deal.”
Zager, Noah, and Giovanni sat in amazement of Ariana's observational skills. In a few hours, she had managed to accomplish, from simply magazine clippings and photographs, what no police force in Kanto had been able to and had a very plausible lead on the mysterious con man's identity.
“Ariana, why aren't you working with us with a brain like that?” Zager asked.
“I failed science in high school,”Ariana deadpanned. “This is all purely chance, anyway. If this man hadn't made the mistake of approaching me twice in one night, I wouldn't have been able to connect the dots this way. Which brings me to my next point.”
Ariana produced some newspaper clippings from her satchel. They were dated several years back and profiled a young actor's quest to start a community theatre in Viridian City.
“Ten years ago, a young theatre major by the name of Frank Petrel set out to open a community theatre in Viridian City,” Ariana said.
“Frank Petrel...” Giovanni said, the name all too familiar to him.
~
In a city hall meeting, a violet haired young man was giving a presentation to the Viridian City Council with his plans for a new theatre.
“And so, ladies and gentlemen, with this new theatre, I hope to provide a place for young and old alike to experience the magic of the stage. All I ask is that you help me share my creative gifts by fulfilling my grant requests.”
One of the city council members, a dark-haired man in his mid-thirties wearing a navy blue pinstripe suit, stood up from his seat. “Mr. Petrel, you haven't yet given us a total on how much you're asking in grants. You've been extolling the virtues of community theatre for the last thirty minutes but not once have you told us how much this will cost the city.”
“All things in due time,” the young man replied. “Now, I ask the good men and women of the city council, who among you has not been touched by a memorable song in a musical? Who among you has not been at the edge of their seat at the climax of a play-”
“I believe I asked you for a dollar figure,” the blue-suited man interrupted, still standing from before. A minor commotion broke out among the other city council members and those gathered to observe the meeting. The council member held up a hand to quiet the crowd and the commotion ceased.
“So you want to cut to the chase. Well then, if you absolutely must know, based on my estimates, the money I request would come out to... four million.”
“Four million dollars? You can't possibly be serious. For a simple community theatre?”
“A modest fee for the state of the art facilities I propose,” the young man replied. “Are you about to refuse a young child the magic of the stage?”
“Maybe, but I would also refuse a child candy if it cost three times what it should,” the man in the suit replied. “Clearly, I hate children.”
Another commotion followed from the crowd. “That is quite enough,” another voice spoke up, this one belonging to the head of the city council. “I want to keep this meeting civil. There will be no more of these outbursts, understood?”
The council member glared at the head and sat down.
“My friends, you can't put a price on the joy of live theatre. I ask only that you all seriously consider what we as a community have to gain from a new venue to honor the many talented artists we have living among us here in lovely Viridian.”
~
“Frank Petrel,” Giovanni said. “I remember him all too well. I was on the city council that voted to approve the grant for his theater. I was against it- vocally, in fact- but despite my protests and my attempts to point out no community theatre project ever needed four million in funds, not for something that by definition is small... they went ahead and voted to approve the grant anyway. Frank was just too charismatic and passionate to say no to.”
“I remember that whole thing,” Zager said. “The editorial staff of the Times had a field day with you, sir.”
“The editorial staff of the Times,” Giovanni continued, his eyes shifting about the room from the memories the discussion about Frank was bringing up, “ended up eating their words. I did some checking of the numbers involved with his proposal, and found that he had exaggerated them... to the tune of about three million dollars.”
~
“Frank Petrel.”
It was the day ground was set to be broken on the new Viridian City Community Theatre and Frank was sitting on a nearby bench, reading the Viridian City Times and waiting patiently for others on the city council to show up to begin. He looked up from his newspaper to see his adversary from the city council meeting glaring down at him.
“Fancy meeting you here, Giovanni,” Frank said, not looking up. “I'm surprised you have the gall to approach me after your antics at that city council meeting. Here to cede your defeat? Both in this matter as well as the next city council election, the way the newspapers are saying it.” As though he had planned it, Frank forced the main section he'd been reading moments before into Giovanni's hands.
Giovanni stared back at the paper, dumbfounded by Frank's gesture until his eye caught the headline of the staff editorial and everything became clear.
OPPOSITION TO THE ARTS A RISKY MOVE FOR FORMER CITY COUNCIL HEAD FAVORITE
“You really think the Times is a bastion of journalistic integrity, Frank? Don't make me laugh,” Giovanni said, crumpling the paper into a ball and dropping it on the ground, then crushing the ball under his foot. “They'll publish anything to sell papers. Anyone who's ever been someone in Viridian City politics knows that.”
“Perhaps you're right, but in the end, the readers eat it up anyway,” Frank said.
“Not after what I'm about to do,” Giovanni replied. He reached into his jacket's inner pocket.
“You can't possibly be serious,” Frank said, backing away slightly. “You know that's a rather disproportionate re-”
Giovanni withdrew his hand from his jacket pocket and revealed a bundle of pages, stapled at the top corner and folded in half to fit inside his jacket.
“Come on, Frank, you couldn't possibly have thought I was going to pull a gun out on you. Not in a public place like this.”
A relieved look found its way to Frank's face.
“It might kill your professional life, though,” Giovanni growled. “Do you have any idea what this is, Frank?”
“A stack of stapled papers?”
Giovanni ignored Frank's smart-ass answer and proceeded to unfold the bundle. “I did some math on the price of this new theatre,” he said. “I always thought four million was an unrealistic number for something you claimed would be a simple community theatre. And my suspicions proved correct.” He threw the packet of figures and notes at Frank. “I hope your opening night performance was going to be The Music Man, Frank. Because you're doing a damn good job of performing it right now.”
Frank picked up the packet at his feet and read through it, horrified. Giovanni had singlehandedly gathered the evidence proving his plan was a scam, and he had a horrible feeling it wasn't going to stay between the two of them.
“It turns out you only needed 950 thousand to get this thing off the ground. Which, after taxes, would leave you with around three million in pocket. Despite what the press is saying, Frank, I'm a huge supporter of artistic endeavors, I was a major backer of the museum of modern art that opened a year or so ago, for God's sake. But this...”
“If you go to the authorities they won't believe you,” Frank said. “Your name's already been smeared.”
“Tell me where any of my calculations are incorrect, then,” Giovanni said. “If I fabricated anything at all on there, let me know. I grew up around Viridian City and I love it and the people living in it. And I will not stand for anyone swindling those people under the pretense of trying to help it. It's over, Frank. I faxed a copy of this to every member of the city council this morning. They'll be here shortly. To revoke your grant and run you out of town, no doubt.” He smirked at Frank, pleased at the horrified expression the fraudster's face had now taken on.
Frank held the document in his shaking hands. Giovanni was right. Nothing about any of the information was incorrect.
“There's one of their cars now,” Giovanni said, pointing to a red convertible pulling up near the site of the proposed theatre. I would love to stick around and network some, but sadly, I have a business meeting in a half hour I need to get ready for. Have fun.
He turned and departed, a dark grin on his face as he left Frank to the incoming city council members to be disgraced.
No one tried to pull one over on him and get away with it. Ever.
~
“Frank Petrel ended up with an initial sentence of ten years in prison for conspiracy to commit fraud, but his lawyers somehow managed to convince the judge that he had made an 'honest miscalculation,'” Giovanni explained to the other three.
“In other words, they paid him off,” Ariana said.
“Most likely,” Giovanni agreed. “Of course, no one around here really believed that was the case, and I even received a printed apology from the Times' editorial board. Nonetheless... I should have just shot him that day.”
The last line darkened the room's mood considerably. Giovanni poured more whiskey into his glass and emptied it in one gulp, then slammed the glass on the table, startling Zager, Noah, and Ariana. “It would have prevented this mess and I'd have been rid of him once and for all. I didn't think he'd come back to try and rip me off again. I have no doubt he's the one doing it now.”
After stunned silence from around the table, Noah finally spoke up. “I have it on good word from various sources the perpetrator is indeed Frank,” he said. “Although law enforcement has yet to figure out the Thousand Faces identity, it's already noted that Frank was an established con man prior to his stunt in Viridian City. Indeed, he'd tried previously- and successfully- in cities in other regions what he'd failed to accomplish in Viridian, using his education as a means of gaining the public's trust. After a few months of operation, he would make up an excuse to abandon the theatre, take the money he'd made, and run. Mind you, these stunts were under separate identities entirely.”
“So it's possible Frank Petrel isn't even his real name?” Ariana asked.
“Most likely Frank is simply the identity he assumed for the Kanto region. Who knows who he really is, it just goes to show how effective a con man he is. All that's known is similar schemes were executed before this one, too close to it to be coincidental.”
“And I made the mistake of crossing him,” Giovanni muttered. “I can't let this go on. He has my identity and he's going to run with it. Even if they catch him in the act, it's still going to cause damage to the reputation I've carefully crafted through years of work. I doubt he has any reservations about ruining the life of someone who ran him out of town and destroyed his reputation entirely.”
“I can put a reward on his head and see to it he's gone by tomorrow. Just give the word, sir,” Ariana said, her eyes narrowed. If anyone could find and take him out, it was Ariana's agents.
“No,” Giovanni said. “As grateful as I am for the offer, Ariana, we're not killing him. He's too visible as it is and for him to suddenly die at the hands of Team Rocket would draw far too much attention from the media as well as arousing suspicions. All it would take would be for him to die while impersonating me and the dots would be instantly connected by anyone observant enough.”
Ariana frowned sadly, a little disappointed, but she had to concur with Giovanni.
“Besides, it wouldn't be in our best interests to eliminate him,” he added. “I'm actually grateful for the media and public's obsession with him. As long as he's out there, he's another distraction, and as long as the media continues to erroneously link those activities to us, the real activities are ignored in favor of whatever's more exciting and glamourous.”
“So we can't take him out at all?” Ariana asked.
“We can't visibly eliminate The Man of a Thousand Faces from the public eye,” Giovanni replied. “What we can do is attempt to rein Frank Petrel in and have direct control over his activities. Namely, those that don't involve sabotaging me.”
This was met with puzzled stares.
“Have direct control?” Ariana finally asked. “As in-?”
“Here's the plan, we catch him in the act and capture him,” Giovanni said. “I give him a choice- work for me, or I turn him in to the police and he gets to see the man who tried to ruin him once ruin him again, this time in a far more serious way. Either way, we win. I wouldn't mind recruiting someone like him to be honest, he has excellent skills and he'd be a great asset. And if he refuses, I get the satisfaction of seeing him put away, probably forever, as well as more positive PR. The whole attempt to potentially ruin me would blow up in his face.”
“Wouldn't he just be able to choose the arrest option and blow the lid wide open on you in court in some kind of plea bargain?” Noah asked. “You'd think supplying info about Team Rocket's leader would very easily get his sentence heavily reduced, if not thrown out altogether. I've seen enough in my job in the information trade to know how much that stuff means to the legal system.”
Ariana and Zager both glared at Noah with the intent of informing him being that blunt with Giovanni was a poor idea- there was a proper way to bring up such concerns with him, but that was not it, but Giovanni himself didn't seem too bothered.
“You make a valid point,” he said, “were it not for the fact that Frank's trust levels in Viridian City aren't too high. He already tried to scam taxpayers there out of millions while dragging me down in the process, and then spent months impersonating others, including myself to scam them. All to apparently take revenge on me for finding him out. By the time he tries to blow things wide open about any links I might have to Team Rocket- to get out of an arrest I helped make, no less- his credibility is going to be pretty scarce. And that's on top of the fact there's no tangible evidence to prove the case anyway.”
“He'd just get laughed out of the courtroom,” Ariana added. “It's brilliant, sir.”
“More like Frank Petrel overplayed his hand already,” Giovanni said. “As it stands, the folder you've put together is evidence enough to get him a conviction and a fairly long laundry list of charges. It's simply a matter of tracking him down and luring him in.”
~
Sebastian was cleaning the massive mess Persian had left the previous night. Zager was at the bar again, but for once it was on legitimate business and not simply to drink himself drunk, so Sebastian couldn't just drag him off like previously.
“How does anyone manage with this-” Sebastian muttered, getting cut off by something warm against his arm.
“No, go away, Persian, I don't need your- PERSIAN?”
A fluffy, whiskered yellow face stared at him. “How did you wind up here? I thought you were back...” He remembered the meeting Zager mentioned needing to go to and realized if Giovanni was actually there, as he'd said... “with your human. Did he send you here?”
Persian shook his head no. He was incredibly, surprisingly smart for a Pokemon, Sebastian realized.
“You found your own way here?”
Persian nodded.
“I can't believe I'm having a more intelligent discussion with a cat than I have on a regular basis with the people who work with me,” Sebastian said. “Unless you're down here to help clean up the mess you made, Persian, shoo. Surely there are better people you could be annoying around here.”
“Nya?”
“As in, not me,” Sebastian remarked.
Persian ignored Sebastian's comments and immediately walked to one of the computers, sniffing it wildly.
“Persian, what- what are you doing?”
“Purnya, nya nya,” Persian meowed, scratching at the computer desk next to the keyboard.
“Something about the computer...” Sebastian said. “Is it bugged?”
Persian shook his head again and flicked his tail, going for the cables along the back.
“No, Persian, don't chew those...” Sebastian remembered the cans of cat food left over from the previous night. Maybe, like Zager suggested the night before, Persian was simply hungry.
“Aren't you ever fed?”
He took a small pocketknife out and worked the can open.
The smell of the cat food's juices instantly drew Persian away from the computer setup and to Sebastian as he dumped the food onto a plate. “Eat up,” he said, watching the cat greedily devour the meal in front of him.
~
“To catch Frank, we have to draw him out,” Noah said. “His typical tactic is to mimic the day to day routines of his victims and try not to stand out, but offered enough money, he might 'break character' just enough to take advantage of anyone else he can all the way. He's a showman first and a conman second, and it's likely he considers both roles one and the same.”
“How do we have any way of knowing how to find him, though?” Ariana asked. “The gala thing was just a totally chance encounter and I doubt he even realized who he was dancing with. He probably thought I was just a one-night stand or something.”
Zager coughed.
“That's where a genius such as myself comes in,” he said.
~
Francis finally hit on it, after hours of paging back through spam emails after spam email- “someone really needs to learn how to use the spam blocker, Koffing.”
The email containing Giovanni's electronic bank statement. With this, he finally had the name and info on the bank and account he'd need to hack to forge any documents necessary to gain access. An instant money transfer was out of the question- those were easiest to stop and the easiest way to get caught. No, if you really wanted to commit identity theft and get away with it, you had to assume that role and play it to its fullest.
Francis chuckled at his recent purchases, scrolling through them. “It must be nice to have this kind of money,” he said. “I guess I'll know for sure when I'm done, won't I, Koffing?”
“Koff, koff.”
~
“Frank's M.O. is to research his victims at length,” Noah said. “It's a good part of his success. With the right resources he can find nearly any slightest detail about anyone and replicate that, including their documents and identification. It seems a few of his crimes wouldn't have gone off without forged ID.”
“Noah, if you know all this, why is it you haven't told the police? You could have it made by now just with the reward money.” Giovanni honestly couldn't believe Noah would turn down such a chance at fortune with the wealth of insider info he possessed.
“They wouldn't pay me in shards,” Noah said. “But really, the unwritten code of honor for those in the information trade is never work with the authorities. It ends up raising all kinds of questions about what other things we'd know. And we never dispense information without proper payment.”
“I coded a program a few years ago to help Noah as well as intercept potential hacks into Team Rocket's servers,” Zager said.
“As well as?” Giovanni muttered.
“It's a free program I posted for download on every major hacker resource site,” Zager continued. “On its surface, it's a simple decrypter program powerful enough to crack any password for any website, service, or server. But it's got a nasty little tracker rootkit embedded in it that installs itself to the user's directory the minute they put it on their machine. From that minute on, every time they run the program, it sends me a detailed report of their actions along with their IP address.”
“That's ingenious,” Giovanni said, remembering the time his computer was hit by a similar bug. Being infected by such things was a fate he'd wish only upon his bitterest enemies, and he supposed that given the program's intended use, anyone victimized by it would fit that qualification. “What's stopping them from finding a way to get rid of it?”
“Maybe if they destroyed their computer,” Zager said darkly.
Giovanni smirked. “Zager, you bastard.”
“I try, sir,” he replied, returning the smirk. “There's a good chance, given Frank's specialty, he's dowloaded this program. I don't see how he could operate without it. My program is the best, even with the nasty side effects.”
~
Sebastian's cell phone went off, prompting him to scramble from the closet he'd been trying to clean for the last hour- how did Persian fit in this thing to do this?- to answer it.
“What do you want, Zager?”
“I need you to check the hacker database,” Zager replied. “I need you to run a lookup on any and every account for anything the boss has.”
“Are those even programmed in?” Sebastian asked.
“They're some of the first things I put in there-” Zager said.
“-how did you get that info?-” Sebastian could hear Giovanni interrupt in the background, a sentiment he had to agree with.
“-check the dropdown menu marked 'presets' and there should be a whole set marked 'Giovanni', everything should be in there-”
“-everything?-”
“-a list should come up of the accounts and IP addresses that accessed them. When you get those tell me the accounts immediately and then run a reverse lookup by clicking on the individual IP-”
“-Zager, consider yourself very fortunate I consider you useful and trustworthy-”
“-do you understand all that?” Zager finished
“Got it,” Sebastian said, snickering at the exchange between Zager and Giovanni on the other end of the phone. “It's processing the results right now.”
~
As Frank continued running down the list of passwords in front of him, he hit upon one of the last ones, labeled by the program as simply “unknown”.
“What's this?” Frank said. It was oddly different from the others too. Where the others were common words one would typically associate with Giovanni, this one was in a different language altogether- carpemagnusterra- and though part of Frank feared he'd regret unlocking whatever secrets he held, another instinct told him he had everything to profit from it.
One by one he began inputting the pass into the blanks of the sites already open, as though it'd magically open a secret portal. Something about this password told him it was special, and he wouldn't rest until he knew everything he needed.
~
Zager, Giovanni, and Ariana listened intently to Sebastian's report of the results through the secret room's speakerphone.
“Personal email... Viridian City Times... Persian Lovers Messageboard... First Bank of Celadon City-”
“-Logical progression,” Giovanni said. “He got the email address first and no doubt trawled through there to get my other account details to break into. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised he was going for the bank account. But why would he hack the other things?”
“To an identity thief, any info is useful info,” Noah said.
“A forum for Persian trainers? What use does he have with my account there?”
Noah shrugged.
“Sebastian,” Zager said, “have you found the IP addresses yet?”
“Just pulled them up,” Sebastian said. “They're all the same.”
“Jackpot,” Zager said. “Excellent. Do a reverse lookup on them so we can find the location of our man. From the sites accessed and the order they've been accessed, I have no doubt it's who we all suspect. Once we find his location we can move quickly to-”
“-Wait,” Sebastian said.
“What, what is it?” Giovanni asked, slightly unnerved by what seemed to be an uneasy tone to Sebastian's voice.
“Another item just popped up on the listing,” Sebastian said.
“Another one?” Giovanni said. “What could it be? What does he have left to- oh, hell no.”
“It's the Team Rocket server. Somehow he figured out the password went in your email's password box... and got in,” Sebastian said.
“But that server is totally unlabeled,” Giovanni said. “How would he know it was of any use to him?”
“If you have a lot of keys,” Ariana said, “you're going to use them on any doors you can find, if you're positive those keys would open a door.”
Ariana's metaphor was a little clunky but it made sense to Giovanni. Frank didn't think like a normal person, he thought like a criminal. From years of experience being one, Giovanni knew that criminals left nothing to chance and fully explored every possibility if they had any interest at all in being successful.
And Ariana, in her own way, was right.
“This changes everything,” he said. “We're going to need to completely rethink our course of action, and quickly. It's not so much him giving this information to the police I'm worried about, because I seriously doubt he'd be that direct with so much more to gain now. It's more the possibility he'll exploit it as far as he can, then turn to the police after he's finished.”
Author: rosejailmaiden
Beta-Reader: nandosagi
Verse: anime, with HG/SS gameverse Rocket executives
Characters/Pairings: Giovanni/Ariana, Petrel, Dr. Zager, Professor Sebastian, Persian
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Alcohol use and a scene of prescription drug abuse
Summary: Everyone wears a disguise at some point. Some wear it to control how the world sees them. Some wear it to hide genius. Some wear it to protect themselves. And some wear it for completely selfish reasons. A twisted tale from the past of how a master scam artist named Francis became a Team Rocket member, where everyone has their secrets, and in which Persian is hungry.
Politics, n. Strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. - Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
The evening crowd at the Snorlax was bustling as always, as Rockets and civilians alike flocked there for a drink after a long day of work. It was the perfect chance for Ariana to slip in, dressed in a long, form-fitting trenchcoat and fedora, unnoticed by the bar's patronage. Ariana typically made a point of avoiding the Snorlax due to the unsavory customers the place tended to attract- though she didn't object to the barkeeps there offering her free drinks, she could do without the constant group of drooling men covertly following her, especially on what was more or less official Rocket business like this.
In her hands she carried a small wooden box, and a leather satchel was slung across her body. She pushed through the crowds to behind the bar, where Noah, a short, balding man, waited alongside Zager.
“We're here on business,” Ariana said, pulling a leather lined card case out of her pocket and discreetly opening it to flash her Team Rocket ID card.
“Come right in, then,” the man said. He moved a decanter of bourbon sitting on a shelf behind the bar slightly to the left to reveal a button hidden beneath it, which he then pressed. The click of a latch opening could be heard, and the shelf was cracked open to reveal it was actually a door to the Snorlax's secret back room.
The back room of the Snorlax couldn't be more different than the main part of it. Because it tended to be used for business, it was far cleaner than the rest of the bar, and furnished more tastefully. When Ariana, Zager, and his associate walked in, Giovanni was already there sitting at a couch in front of a mahogany coffee table, drinking a glass of whiskey and looking bored.
“I assume we're all here now,” he said, as Ariana and the others sat down at nearby chairs around the table. “Shall we begin?”
Noah coughed. “Not until I have my payment,” he said.
Payment? Giovanni wondered. He knew only about Noah what Zager and Ariana had told him in the past- that he was a freelance info broker who attended college classes with Zager, and that he knew everything about everyone in Kanto's criminal underground. To the best of anyone's knowledge, he worked exclusively with Team Rocket, slipping information on police raids, useful allies, and potential enemies along to anyone willing to pay the price he set. He was also allegedly a member, though this evening was honestly the first time Giovanni had ever seen him. Given his age, he wouldn't be surprised if he was one his mother recruited.
“It's right here,” Ariana said, sliding the box across the table to him. Noah opened it.
“Green shards!”
“I knew you needed them,”Ariana said.
“That's his payment?” Giovanni said. “Shards?”
“I happen to be a collector,” Noah said. “I collect the shards and then pass them along to other shard collectors for information and it continues all the way down. Shards can be resold to dealers and other collectors for money, but until that point, they're the most secure payment in the information trade. Untraceable and least likely to arouse suspicion from the authorities.”
He was still confused, but in a way, what Noah just explained made perfect sense to Giovanni.
“Fifty of them, all green,” Ariana said.
Noah greedily clutched the box of shards, admiring the glowing glassy bits for a moment, then closed it up, slipped it under his chair, and folded his hands. “Now that I've been compensated for my information, we can begin.”
Ariana reached into her shoulder bag and pulled out a folder. “This is all the evidence I've gathered that we might have the Thousand Faces artist on our tails.” She revealed some clippings, photos, and books on the con artist, as well as a collection of photographs. All were images of suspected Thousand Faces cons.
“Here are some photos of impostors that have been captured via security camera,” Ariana explained. “Now, part of the reason the police have had difficulty pinning a suspect is because he or she is never seen himself. That's the reason so many theories float around about whether he or she is even one lone figure or a group of copycat incidents.”
The four gathered around the table passed the photos around, studying them.
“I noticed a pattern, however. If you look close enough, you can see all the confirmed impostor photos share a facial shape.” She pulled out a second set. “Here they are zoomed in. I traced along the jawline to make it more obvious.”
“Ariana, this is fascinating. You must have been following this case for ages before all this commotion.” While he knew she was clever, Giovanni never expected Ariana to be the detective type.
Ariana blushed. “Actually I've been following all this since it started,” she said. “I'm a bit of a true crime fan.”
“You'll notice Jon Price is one of those photos. That photograph I took off a crime message board. It's a still from the bank security videos when the impostor Price went and made his withdrawal.”
“The Jon we ran into at last night's ball,” Giovanni added.
Ariana nodded. “I have a decent memory for faces I run into and I can tell that is without question the very Price who gave us trouble,” she said. “Now I know why I thought I'd seen him somewhere before. When I said that, I didn't mean Jon Price himself. Of course I know who he is, he's everywhere. I meant the person under the disguise. The possibility never crossed my mind at the time.” She pulled yet another photo from the folder. “Here's a publicity shot I found of the real one, taken about a year ago. You can tell the difference between the fake one on the camera stills and the real deal.”
Zager, Noah, and Giovanni sat in amazement of Ariana's observational skills. In a few hours, she had managed to accomplish, from simply magazine clippings and photographs, what no police force in Kanto had been able to and had a very plausible lead on the mysterious con man's identity.
“Ariana, why aren't you working with us with a brain like that?” Zager asked.
“I failed science in high school,”Ariana deadpanned. “This is all purely chance, anyway. If this man hadn't made the mistake of approaching me twice in one night, I wouldn't have been able to connect the dots this way. Which brings me to my next point.”
Ariana produced some newspaper clippings from her satchel. They were dated several years back and profiled a young actor's quest to start a community theatre in Viridian City.
“Ten years ago, a young theatre major by the name of Frank Petrel set out to open a community theatre in Viridian City,” Ariana said.
“Frank Petrel...” Giovanni said, the name all too familiar to him.
~
In a city hall meeting, a violet haired young man was giving a presentation to the Viridian City Council with his plans for a new theatre.
“And so, ladies and gentlemen, with this new theatre, I hope to provide a place for young and old alike to experience the magic of the stage. All I ask is that you help me share my creative gifts by fulfilling my grant requests.”
One of the city council members, a dark-haired man in his mid-thirties wearing a navy blue pinstripe suit, stood up from his seat. “Mr. Petrel, you haven't yet given us a total on how much you're asking in grants. You've been extolling the virtues of community theatre for the last thirty minutes but not once have you told us how much this will cost the city.”
“All things in due time,” the young man replied. “Now, I ask the good men and women of the city council, who among you has not been touched by a memorable song in a musical? Who among you has not been at the edge of their seat at the climax of a play-”
“I believe I asked you for a dollar figure,” the blue-suited man interrupted, still standing from before. A minor commotion broke out among the other city council members and those gathered to observe the meeting. The council member held up a hand to quiet the crowd and the commotion ceased.
“So you want to cut to the chase. Well then, if you absolutely must know, based on my estimates, the money I request would come out to... four million.”
“Four million dollars? You can't possibly be serious. For a simple community theatre?”
“A modest fee for the state of the art facilities I propose,” the young man replied. “Are you about to refuse a young child the magic of the stage?”
“Maybe, but I would also refuse a child candy if it cost three times what it should,” the man in the suit replied. “Clearly, I hate children.”
Another commotion followed from the crowd. “That is quite enough,” another voice spoke up, this one belonging to the head of the city council. “I want to keep this meeting civil. There will be no more of these outbursts, understood?”
The council member glared at the head and sat down.
“My friends, you can't put a price on the joy of live theatre. I ask only that you all seriously consider what we as a community have to gain from a new venue to honor the many talented artists we have living among us here in lovely Viridian.”
~
“Frank Petrel,” Giovanni said. “I remember him all too well. I was on the city council that voted to approve the grant for his theater. I was against it- vocally, in fact- but despite my protests and my attempts to point out no community theatre project ever needed four million in funds, not for something that by definition is small... they went ahead and voted to approve the grant anyway. Frank was just too charismatic and passionate to say no to.”
“I remember that whole thing,” Zager said. “The editorial staff of the Times had a field day with you, sir.”
“The editorial staff of the Times,” Giovanni continued, his eyes shifting about the room from the memories the discussion about Frank was bringing up, “ended up eating their words. I did some checking of the numbers involved with his proposal, and found that he had exaggerated them... to the tune of about three million dollars.”
~
“Frank Petrel.”
It was the day ground was set to be broken on the new Viridian City Community Theatre and Frank was sitting on a nearby bench, reading the Viridian City Times and waiting patiently for others on the city council to show up to begin. He looked up from his newspaper to see his adversary from the city council meeting glaring down at him.
“Fancy meeting you here, Giovanni,” Frank said, not looking up. “I'm surprised you have the gall to approach me after your antics at that city council meeting. Here to cede your defeat? Both in this matter as well as the next city council election, the way the newspapers are saying it.” As though he had planned it, Frank forced the main section he'd been reading moments before into Giovanni's hands.
Giovanni stared back at the paper, dumbfounded by Frank's gesture until his eye caught the headline of the staff editorial and everything became clear.
OPPOSITION TO THE ARTS A RISKY MOVE FOR FORMER CITY COUNCIL HEAD FAVORITE
“You really think the Times is a bastion of journalistic integrity, Frank? Don't make me laugh,” Giovanni said, crumpling the paper into a ball and dropping it on the ground, then crushing the ball under his foot. “They'll publish anything to sell papers. Anyone who's ever been someone in Viridian City politics knows that.”
“Perhaps you're right, but in the end, the readers eat it up anyway,” Frank said.
“Not after what I'm about to do,” Giovanni replied. He reached into his jacket's inner pocket.
“You can't possibly be serious,” Frank said, backing away slightly. “You know that's a rather disproportionate re-”
Giovanni withdrew his hand from his jacket pocket and revealed a bundle of pages, stapled at the top corner and folded in half to fit inside his jacket.
“Come on, Frank, you couldn't possibly have thought I was going to pull a gun out on you. Not in a public place like this.”
A relieved look found its way to Frank's face.
“It might kill your professional life, though,” Giovanni growled. “Do you have any idea what this is, Frank?”
“A stack of stapled papers?”
Giovanni ignored Frank's smart-ass answer and proceeded to unfold the bundle. “I did some math on the price of this new theatre,” he said. “I always thought four million was an unrealistic number for something you claimed would be a simple community theatre. And my suspicions proved correct.” He threw the packet of figures and notes at Frank. “I hope your opening night performance was going to be The Music Man, Frank. Because you're doing a damn good job of performing it right now.”
Frank picked up the packet at his feet and read through it, horrified. Giovanni had singlehandedly gathered the evidence proving his plan was a scam, and he had a horrible feeling it wasn't going to stay between the two of them.
“It turns out you only needed 950 thousand to get this thing off the ground. Which, after taxes, would leave you with around three million in pocket. Despite what the press is saying, Frank, I'm a huge supporter of artistic endeavors, I was a major backer of the museum of modern art that opened a year or so ago, for God's sake. But this...”
“If you go to the authorities they won't believe you,” Frank said. “Your name's already been smeared.”
“Tell me where any of my calculations are incorrect, then,” Giovanni said. “If I fabricated anything at all on there, let me know. I grew up around Viridian City and I love it and the people living in it. And I will not stand for anyone swindling those people under the pretense of trying to help it. It's over, Frank. I faxed a copy of this to every member of the city council this morning. They'll be here shortly. To revoke your grant and run you out of town, no doubt.” He smirked at Frank, pleased at the horrified expression the fraudster's face had now taken on.
Frank held the document in his shaking hands. Giovanni was right. Nothing about any of the information was incorrect.
“There's one of their cars now,” Giovanni said, pointing to a red convertible pulling up near the site of the proposed theatre. I would love to stick around and network some, but sadly, I have a business meeting in a half hour I need to get ready for. Have fun.
He turned and departed, a dark grin on his face as he left Frank to the incoming city council members to be disgraced.
No one tried to pull one over on him and get away with it. Ever.
~
“Frank Petrel ended up with an initial sentence of ten years in prison for conspiracy to commit fraud, but his lawyers somehow managed to convince the judge that he had made an 'honest miscalculation,'” Giovanni explained to the other three.
“In other words, they paid him off,” Ariana said.
“Most likely,” Giovanni agreed. “Of course, no one around here really believed that was the case, and I even received a printed apology from the Times' editorial board. Nonetheless... I should have just shot him that day.”
The last line darkened the room's mood considerably. Giovanni poured more whiskey into his glass and emptied it in one gulp, then slammed the glass on the table, startling Zager, Noah, and Ariana. “It would have prevented this mess and I'd have been rid of him once and for all. I didn't think he'd come back to try and rip me off again. I have no doubt he's the one doing it now.”
After stunned silence from around the table, Noah finally spoke up. “I have it on good word from various sources the perpetrator is indeed Frank,” he said. “Although law enforcement has yet to figure out the Thousand Faces identity, it's already noted that Frank was an established con man prior to his stunt in Viridian City. Indeed, he'd tried previously- and successfully- in cities in other regions what he'd failed to accomplish in Viridian, using his education as a means of gaining the public's trust. After a few months of operation, he would make up an excuse to abandon the theatre, take the money he'd made, and run. Mind you, these stunts were under separate identities entirely.”
“So it's possible Frank Petrel isn't even his real name?” Ariana asked.
“Most likely Frank is simply the identity he assumed for the Kanto region. Who knows who he really is, it just goes to show how effective a con man he is. All that's known is similar schemes were executed before this one, too close to it to be coincidental.”
“And I made the mistake of crossing him,” Giovanni muttered. “I can't let this go on. He has my identity and he's going to run with it. Even if they catch him in the act, it's still going to cause damage to the reputation I've carefully crafted through years of work. I doubt he has any reservations about ruining the life of someone who ran him out of town and destroyed his reputation entirely.”
“I can put a reward on his head and see to it he's gone by tomorrow. Just give the word, sir,” Ariana said, her eyes narrowed. If anyone could find and take him out, it was Ariana's agents.
“No,” Giovanni said. “As grateful as I am for the offer, Ariana, we're not killing him. He's too visible as it is and for him to suddenly die at the hands of Team Rocket would draw far too much attention from the media as well as arousing suspicions. All it would take would be for him to die while impersonating me and the dots would be instantly connected by anyone observant enough.”
Ariana frowned sadly, a little disappointed, but she had to concur with Giovanni.
“Besides, it wouldn't be in our best interests to eliminate him,” he added. “I'm actually grateful for the media and public's obsession with him. As long as he's out there, he's another distraction, and as long as the media continues to erroneously link those activities to us, the real activities are ignored in favor of whatever's more exciting and glamourous.”
“So we can't take him out at all?” Ariana asked.
“We can't visibly eliminate The Man of a Thousand Faces from the public eye,” Giovanni replied. “What we can do is attempt to rein Frank Petrel in and have direct control over his activities. Namely, those that don't involve sabotaging me.”
This was met with puzzled stares.
“Have direct control?” Ariana finally asked. “As in-?”
“Here's the plan, we catch him in the act and capture him,” Giovanni said. “I give him a choice- work for me, or I turn him in to the police and he gets to see the man who tried to ruin him once ruin him again, this time in a far more serious way. Either way, we win. I wouldn't mind recruiting someone like him to be honest, he has excellent skills and he'd be a great asset. And if he refuses, I get the satisfaction of seeing him put away, probably forever, as well as more positive PR. The whole attempt to potentially ruin me would blow up in his face.”
“Wouldn't he just be able to choose the arrest option and blow the lid wide open on you in court in some kind of plea bargain?” Noah asked. “You'd think supplying info about Team Rocket's leader would very easily get his sentence heavily reduced, if not thrown out altogether. I've seen enough in my job in the information trade to know how much that stuff means to the legal system.”
Ariana and Zager both glared at Noah with the intent of informing him being that blunt with Giovanni was a poor idea- there was a proper way to bring up such concerns with him, but that was not it, but Giovanni himself didn't seem too bothered.
“You make a valid point,” he said, “were it not for the fact that Frank's trust levels in Viridian City aren't too high. He already tried to scam taxpayers there out of millions while dragging me down in the process, and then spent months impersonating others, including myself to scam them. All to apparently take revenge on me for finding him out. By the time he tries to blow things wide open about any links I might have to Team Rocket- to get out of an arrest I helped make, no less- his credibility is going to be pretty scarce. And that's on top of the fact there's no tangible evidence to prove the case anyway.”
“He'd just get laughed out of the courtroom,” Ariana added. “It's brilliant, sir.”
“More like Frank Petrel overplayed his hand already,” Giovanni said. “As it stands, the folder you've put together is evidence enough to get him a conviction and a fairly long laundry list of charges. It's simply a matter of tracking him down and luring him in.”
~
Sebastian was cleaning the massive mess Persian had left the previous night. Zager was at the bar again, but for once it was on legitimate business and not simply to drink himself drunk, so Sebastian couldn't just drag him off like previously.
“How does anyone manage with this-” Sebastian muttered, getting cut off by something warm against his arm.
“No, go away, Persian, I don't need your- PERSIAN?”
A fluffy, whiskered yellow face stared at him. “How did you wind up here? I thought you were back...” He remembered the meeting Zager mentioned needing to go to and realized if Giovanni was actually there, as he'd said... “with your human. Did he send you here?”
Persian shook his head no. He was incredibly, surprisingly smart for a Pokemon, Sebastian realized.
“You found your own way here?”
Persian nodded.
“I can't believe I'm having a more intelligent discussion with a cat than I have on a regular basis with the people who work with me,” Sebastian said. “Unless you're down here to help clean up the mess you made, Persian, shoo. Surely there are better people you could be annoying around here.”
“Nya?”
“As in, not me,” Sebastian remarked.
Persian ignored Sebastian's comments and immediately walked to one of the computers, sniffing it wildly.
“Persian, what- what are you doing?”
“Purnya, nya nya,” Persian meowed, scratching at the computer desk next to the keyboard.
“Something about the computer...” Sebastian said. “Is it bugged?”
Persian shook his head again and flicked his tail, going for the cables along the back.
“No, Persian, don't chew those...” Sebastian remembered the cans of cat food left over from the previous night. Maybe, like Zager suggested the night before, Persian was simply hungry.
“Aren't you ever fed?”
He took a small pocketknife out and worked the can open.
The smell of the cat food's juices instantly drew Persian away from the computer setup and to Sebastian as he dumped the food onto a plate. “Eat up,” he said, watching the cat greedily devour the meal in front of him.
~
“To catch Frank, we have to draw him out,” Noah said. “His typical tactic is to mimic the day to day routines of his victims and try not to stand out, but offered enough money, he might 'break character' just enough to take advantage of anyone else he can all the way. He's a showman first and a conman second, and it's likely he considers both roles one and the same.”
“How do we have any way of knowing how to find him, though?” Ariana asked. “The gala thing was just a totally chance encounter and I doubt he even realized who he was dancing with. He probably thought I was just a one-night stand or something.”
Zager coughed.
“That's where a genius such as myself comes in,” he said.
~
Francis finally hit on it, after hours of paging back through spam emails after spam email- “someone really needs to learn how to use the spam blocker, Koffing.”
The email containing Giovanni's electronic bank statement. With this, he finally had the name and info on the bank and account he'd need to hack to forge any documents necessary to gain access. An instant money transfer was out of the question- those were easiest to stop and the easiest way to get caught. No, if you really wanted to commit identity theft and get away with it, you had to assume that role and play it to its fullest.
Francis chuckled at his recent purchases, scrolling through them. “It must be nice to have this kind of money,” he said. “I guess I'll know for sure when I'm done, won't I, Koffing?”
“Koff, koff.”
~
“Frank's M.O. is to research his victims at length,” Noah said. “It's a good part of his success. With the right resources he can find nearly any slightest detail about anyone and replicate that, including their documents and identification. It seems a few of his crimes wouldn't have gone off without forged ID.”
“Noah, if you know all this, why is it you haven't told the police? You could have it made by now just with the reward money.” Giovanni honestly couldn't believe Noah would turn down such a chance at fortune with the wealth of insider info he possessed.
“They wouldn't pay me in shards,” Noah said. “But really, the unwritten code of honor for those in the information trade is never work with the authorities. It ends up raising all kinds of questions about what other things we'd know. And we never dispense information without proper payment.”
“I coded a program a few years ago to help Noah as well as intercept potential hacks into Team Rocket's servers,” Zager said.
“As well as?” Giovanni muttered.
“It's a free program I posted for download on every major hacker resource site,” Zager continued. “On its surface, it's a simple decrypter program powerful enough to crack any password for any website, service, or server. But it's got a nasty little tracker rootkit embedded in it that installs itself to the user's directory the minute they put it on their machine. From that minute on, every time they run the program, it sends me a detailed report of their actions along with their IP address.”
“That's ingenious,” Giovanni said, remembering the time his computer was hit by a similar bug. Being infected by such things was a fate he'd wish only upon his bitterest enemies, and he supposed that given the program's intended use, anyone victimized by it would fit that qualification. “What's stopping them from finding a way to get rid of it?”
“Maybe if they destroyed their computer,” Zager said darkly.
Giovanni smirked. “Zager, you bastard.”
“I try, sir,” he replied, returning the smirk. “There's a good chance, given Frank's specialty, he's dowloaded this program. I don't see how he could operate without it. My program is the best, even with the nasty side effects.”
~
Sebastian's cell phone went off, prompting him to scramble from the closet he'd been trying to clean for the last hour- how did Persian fit in this thing to do this?- to answer it.
“What do you want, Zager?”
“I need you to check the hacker database,” Zager replied. “I need you to run a lookup on any and every account for anything the boss has.”
“Are those even programmed in?” Sebastian asked.
“They're some of the first things I put in there-” Zager said.
“-how did you get that info?-” Sebastian could hear Giovanni interrupt in the background, a sentiment he had to agree with.
“-check the dropdown menu marked 'presets' and there should be a whole set marked 'Giovanni', everything should be in there-”
“-everything?-”
“-a list should come up of the accounts and IP addresses that accessed them. When you get those tell me the accounts immediately and then run a reverse lookup by clicking on the individual IP-”
“-Zager, consider yourself very fortunate I consider you useful and trustworthy-”
“-do you understand all that?” Zager finished
“Got it,” Sebastian said, snickering at the exchange between Zager and Giovanni on the other end of the phone. “It's processing the results right now.”
~
As Frank continued running down the list of passwords in front of him, he hit upon one of the last ones, labeled by the program as simply “unknown”.
“What's this?” Frank said. It was oddly different from the others too. Where the others were common words one would typically associate with Giovanni, this one was in a different language altogether- carpemagnusterra- and though part of Frank feared he'd regret unlocking whatever secrets he held, another instinct told him he had everything to profit from it.
One by one he began inputting the pass into the blanks of the sites already open, as though it'd magically open a secret portal. Something about this password told him it was special, and he wouldn't rest until he knew everything he needed.
~
Zager, Giovanni, and Ariana listened intently to Sebastian's report of the results through the secret room's speakerphone.
“Personal email... Viridian City Times... Persian Lovers Messageboard... First Bank of Celadon City-”
“-Logical progression,” Giovanni said. “He got the email address first and no doubt trawled through there to get my other account details to break into. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised he was going for the bank account. But why would he hack the other things?”
“To an identity thief, any info is useful info,” Noah said.
“A forum for Persian trainers? What use does he have with my account there?”
Noah shrugged.
“Sebastian,” Zager said, “have you found the IP addresses yet?”
“Just pulled them up,” Sebastian said. “They're all the same.”
“Jackpot,” Zager said. “Excellent. Do a reverse lookup on them so we can find the location of our man. From the sites accessed and the order they've been accessed, I have no doubt it's who we all suspect. Once we find his location we can move quickly to-”
“-Wait,” Sebastian said.
“What, what is it?” Giovanni asked, slightly unnerved by what seemed to be an uneasy tone to Sebastian's voice.
“Another item just popped up on the listing,” Sebastian said.
“Another one?” Giovanni said. “What could it be? What does he have left to- oh, hell no.”
“It's the Team Rocket server. Somehow he figured out the password went in your email's password box... and got in,” Sebastian said.
“But that server is totally unlabeled,” Giovanni said. “How would he know it was of any use to him?”
“If you have a lot of keys,” Ariana said, “you're going to use them on any doors you can find, if you're positive those keys would open a door.”
Ariana's metaphor was a little clunky but it made sense to Giovanni. Frank didn't think like a normal person, he thought like a criminal. From years of experience being one, Giovanni knew that criminals left nothing to chance and fully explored every possibility if they had any interest at all in being successful.
And Ariana, in her own way, was right.
“This changes everything,” he said. “We're going to need to completely rethink our course of action, and quickly. It's not so much him giving this information to the police I'm worried about, because I seriously doubt he'd be that direct with so much more to gain now. It's more the possibility he'll exploit it as far as he can, then turn to the police after he's finished.”