December 17, 2004

Jeremy flicked his pencil into the air again with his left hand and caught it rather precariously with the two middle fingers on his right hand. His documents were strewn across his desk haphazardly, unorganized piles of information. He had been going over the information repeatedly for what seemed like weeks now. Regardless of how much time he looked at the evidence, it never changed. Neil was pushing him to find as many variants of the terrorists plans as he could. To be fair, Neil was slaving mindlessly away over the same task, apparently according to orders sent down from ranks higher than his. But the facts don t change, no matter how long you stare at the words.

I think I ve developed tunnel vision, he said quietly to no one in particular. His voice was barely audible over the heater vents blasting air into the office space. He flicked the pencil into the air again, but missed it as it came back down. The phone on his desk rang loudly and broke his concentration. The pencil would have to wait. He reached across the desk toward the phone and picked up the headset.

This is Jeremy, he said as the receiver reached his ear.

I ve got to tell ya, Jeremy, Tyler began, out of all the lists I got back, your list had the most interesting observations.

Really, Jeremy replied uncertainly. What do you mean?

Well, most of the team went immediately for the pornography-based newsgroups, including...