Quaranteam Phils Tale Ch 20

Chapter 20

November 13

th

, 2020

The last thing Phil wanted to do today was to deal with the fucking press, but there was no getting around it. He'd agreed to provide as much information to Katie Couric as he could without exposing any of their current plans. The idea was to give the press answers to a bunch of things they hadn't even begun to know about, and hope that they missed the really important stuff they could've asked about, but Phil wasn't going to underestimate Katie Couric that way - she'd gotten to be one of the best journalists in the world by having men of power underestimate her.

Phil refused to make the same mistake.

They'd given her an escort (Andy's partner Niko) and let her have a tour of the base for the morning, and the afternoon would be spent talking one-on-one with key members of the staff, including Phil himself, against the recommendation of the base commander.

In some ways, both Linda and Phil

agreed

with General Fielder in that they felt like having Phil and the rest of the team being so visible and identifiable would pose a nightmare for security, but Linda had been promised all the additional resources she wanted in order to keep both Phil and the rest of the team at the base secure.

Also, the request had come from the President herself, which meant it wasn't

really

a request.

Ms. Couric's schedule involved talking to a number of people at the base, including Fielder himself, although the journalist had stressed that they were expecting much of the footage shot at the base to pass through military review before it made it to air, and that they would try and use as little footage taken from the base and its staff as possible while still conveying all the information needed for the story. Still, the base was going to provide the backdrop for a detailed explanation of how the serum worked and what it did and didn't do to deal with DuoHalo.

"How do I look?" Bill asked him, adjusting his tie to the partial reflection he could see of himself in the glass of Phil's office window.

"Like you're compensating for something," Linda told him as she strolled across the office and pulled off Bill's tie for him. "Bill, you're always one of the smartest guys in the room. You don't need the tie. It's showing off. And it makes you look stuffy, like a professor at an Ivy League college that doesn't want you to be there. Especially when you're trying to calm people down."

"You don't think it's too casual?"

"Bill, you're still wearing a sportcoat and a white-collar shirt that screams 'I paid someone a lot of money to keep this color looking this good,' so I think anything that makes you

more

casual is a step in the right direction," Linda said with a chuckle, patting his cheek, like she was his grandmother. "The whole world is going to be watching this, not just your wife and her book club."

"I hope you're right, Linda," Bill said with a soft grin. "This goes down in historical records, you know, and it's going to be the footage that is shown off in schools for a couple hundred years, at the very least. So I'm hoping they use at least a little of my footage, and, more importantly, that they make me look good. It's my one big chance at history."

Phil looked up from his desk and cocked his head at Bill quizzically. "We've changed more lives here than they did with the invention of the atom bomb, and they've never stopped making movies about that damn thing. You should be less worried about how you look in one photograph and more worried about who you want to play you in the inevitable movie adaptation."

"Who's going to play you?"

"Knowing Hollywood's sort of racially inaccurate casting, I doubt they'll get a Filipino actor to play me," Phil said, jokingly. "But as long we're going to get close enough, I think Sung Kang would probably do an excellent job of playing me. He was incredible in 'Better Luck Tomorrow.' What about you, Bill? Who would you like to play you?"

"Oh, just get Paul Giamatti or Martin Mull and be done with it, I say," Bill laughed. "And what about superwoman Linda here?"

"They can leave me out of the story," Linda grumbled.

"The hell they will," Phil said. "I want Margot Robbie!"

"If you'd asked months ago, Phil, we probably could've gotten her for you," Linda teased.

"She's happily married, and her husband got the serum early," Phil chuckled. "But believe you me, I thought about it. At least until I learned she was married. I respect that sort of thing, unlike other people in our little ark."

"At some point, we're going to have to do something about Mr. Covington," Linda told him. "You know that, don't you babe?"

"Yeah, I know, I know," Phil sighed. "Andy's given us plenty of ammunition against the guy but nothing any of us can really prove. And that's the sticking point we've got to find a way to get past at some point. We need to have something that'll stick, otherwise we're just kicking a hornet's nest and hoping to figure out a plan while we're running away."

"That doesn't sound much like a plan," Bill said.

"And, anyway, if you're asking me who should play me, I want Sydney Sweeny."

"She's too young to play you, babe," Phil said with a laugh.

"Sure, but at least we can all agree, she's got great tits, something I definitely want on the permanent record associated with me." Linda sighed. "Although I guess I'll also accept Alexandria Daddario, assuming she's not playing Violet."

"Linda, baby, you should probably be more concerned with whoever's playing you's acting ability than you should her cup size," Phil chuckled.

"You keep what's important to you in your head, babe, and I'll keep what's important to me in mine, okay?"

"If you say so," he said with a smirk. "You finally settled on house size, Bill?"

"Much to my contentment, even if Grace keeps suggesting we get one more to knock us up a tier," Bill replied. "But I keep telling her, at my age? She's lucky I can handle the 15 I'm already saddled up with." Bill rubbed at the small of his back. "I know the serum basically has me operating at peak efficiency for my age, but I gotta tell ya... man... I still get tired some days, y'know?"

"Oh no," Linda mocked. "You'll just have to let your Victoria's Secret model crawl all over your lap and have her post on your cock until you've gotten off without having to lift a finger. How's that going, by the way?"

Bill smirked a bit sheepishly. "I feel kind of like an idiot, because I know better, but I eventually realized she was just faking those orgasms before she was imprinted. I mean, I

know

that between injection and imprinting a woman, a woman can only have the priming orgasm, but somehow in my self-delusion, I convinced myself that maybe I was just too much man for that and overcame it. But then I realized how silly I was being, and I asked her about it, and she admitted to faking it, mostly because she wanted to help my confidence." He shook his head slightly. "But now that she knows I'm not mad about that, and that

I

know that she wasn't kidding about only having been with guys who didn't know what they were doing, we've made it work. The fact that I'm the first and only man to ever get her off? That's more than enough for me to take pride in. Besides, that's far from the weirdest thing that's happened in my family life."

"Oh yeah?" Phil asked with a grin. "What aren't you telling me about?"

"Heavens above," Bill said, sitting down in the chair in Phil's office, looking a little embarrassed, something Phil didn't recall often seeing on the older man's face. "You remember me telling you about Jen's friend Kenna? The one that apparently had a crush on me while she was growing up?"

"The one you told your daughter it would be weird to be sleeping with? Sure, I remember that... Wait... Bill..."

"So apparently Kenna got delivered to a failcase." 'Failcase' was the short-hand term that had been developed for when a woman was delivered to a man for imprinted, but it had turned out the man had died before the woman could arrive. Trying to lower failcases was one of the main reasons why women were paired up with men so quickly. The longer they waited, the higher the possibility there was for a man to simply be dead on arrival. "As such, they brought her back to the base and tried to find someone else she could get a high pairing match with, and the only one within the point where it wouldn't be cruel to send her out... was me." He laughed and shook his head. "So much for standing my ground with my daughter."

"Was Jen happy about it?"

"

Jen

was ecstatic," Bill said. "

Grace

, on the other hand, had some pretty stern words for me. But thankfully they were both there when Kenna was delivered, and it was clear the strain of not having been imprinted for too long was starting to get to her, so in the end, Grace relented and made sure I didn't embarrass myself or Jen's friend, although I guess she's as much my partner as she is Jen's friend now. It's just

very

weird having this girl who grew up with my

daughter

in my bed, you know? But Julia and Kenna get along very well together, and they help compensate for the fears one or the other causes in me. Plus, uh... well, as it turns out, Grace

likes

playing the dominant woman when it comes to the other girls, so she's been getting into her role as 'headmistress' a bit more than I'd expected her to. I came home the other day and she had all of them dressed up in school uniforms and had them calling me 'Professor,' which, uh... yeah, maybe

that's

why I'm so tired today..."

"You gonna marry any of your new partners? Or is Grace going to stay the only one?"

"You know how it is, Phil - it's not up to

us

," Bill laughed. "Grace seems to think I should marry

all

my partners, just so everyone's on the same level, even though I keep telling her that no one else is ever going to be on

her

level. But the whole family is tickled pink by the idea of Kenna becoming 'Kenna McKenna,' except me. I think it sounds like a James Bond villain. Not that I'm going to voice that opinion around the house, naturally."

"Smart man," Linda said with a grin.

"I'm probably going to lose the argument about getting a sixteenth as well, since

somebody

had to go blabbing about the team tiers to her own personal defense squad," Bill said, glaring over in Linda's direction. "Thanks for that."

"Look, Jackie's job is to keep you safe," Linda said. "Being part of a Team that's between sixteen and twenty is significantly better for you. C'mon, you

know

that, Bill, better than almost anyone! You need to get up there in the numbers."

"And now Jackie's trying to convince Grace to overrule me and get the entire Team up to 21, which is madness.

You

aren't even up to 21, Phil," Bill grumbled.

"He's going to be, soon enough," Linda said. "He just hasn't gotten there yet. But believe me, it's my top priority right now. At some point, I'm going to stop letting him say no to suggested partners that I keep presenting to him."

"I don't get much of a say in it either, Bill," Phil chuckled. "But the minute we determined there were actually sizable benefits for crossing the 20-person line, Linda told me I'd better start widening my search or lowering my standards because I was going to get to 21, whether I wanted to or not."

"Like you were going to complain about having more desirable pussy around the house," Linda laughed. "I haven't made you take anybody you didn't want to take, now, have I?"

"No, but you've gotten close."

"If by 'gotten close,' you mean presented you with four different women that any man would break their dick to be able to fuck on the reg and told you that you had to pick one of them, then, yes, I've gotten close," Linda giggled. "Stop being so overly sensitive about it, baby."

"One of the most recent ones barely spoke any English!"

"Sure, but she spoke French, and so she and Charlotte could talk, and Charlotte could tell you what she was saying."

"I don't want to fuck anyone I need an interpreter to tell me what I'm doing right and wrong in fucking them, baby," Phil said with a shake of his head. "That just ain't right."

"Anyway, I should go get ready to talk to Katie Couric," Bill said, standing up again. "Hopefully Niko softened her up for me."

"You think Niko's going to have made it any easier to talk to a journalist?" Linda giggled. "She's doing the tour because she's photogenic, she's relatable and her youth makes her come across as more trustworthy. I personally chose her for the PR gig on this one so that she would set the bar high, not for her to lower it to whatever it is you want it at, Bill."

"That's not... I didn't... you

know

what I meant and that wasn't it, Linda," Bill said. He was one of the few people who Linda liked enough to let him talk to her like that. Most people had to endure the teasing without so much as being allowed a single comeback, but Bill, with all his stammering and stuttering, reminded Linda of her father, she'd told Phil on a quiet night, which meant she tried to cut him more slack than she normally would.

"I know, I'm just teasing you, Bill, relax," Linda said. "Niko'll set the stage properly, make sure Ms. Couric isn't asking too bold or brazen of questions, and that the conversation is at least as relaxed as we're expecting it to be. She's one of my girls for a reason, Bill. I hand picked her from the potential recruits and shaped her into something that I thought would be a good fit with the rest of my team. She's smart, she's resourceful and she gets underestimated a lot. She's going to give you a two-minute briefing before you talk to Ms. Couric. Listen to what Niko tells you and heed her advice. She won't lead you astray. Got it?"

"Yes ma'am," Bill said, making his way out the door.

"Are

you

worried about talking to Katie Couric?" Linda asked Phil, now that they were alone, putting her hand on his shoulder.

"Nah, I'm sure I'll be fine," Phil told her, patting the top of her hand with his own. "I'm used to having to stare down people who want to question my science, and usually those looks are from scientists who understand the science. I'm not sure how much she'll want me to dumb it down to play to the poorly educated, but I've been practicing several levels of explanation, so I'll go through it a couple of times for her, and she can pick and choose which one she wants to use."

"Have you decided how you want to handle McCallister?"

He blanched a bit, a scowl crossing his face. "I've been asked not to mention him."

"By whom?"

"Who do you think?" Phil chuckled. "Both the President

and

General Fielder asked me not to mention him. I don't think anyone likes the idea of it getting out that one of the creators of the serum did so with malicious intent, or that he was kidnapped by a foreign country intent on trying to replicate our formula for their own mass production."

"Have we heard anything more about whether or not McCallister's made any progress for them? Anything at all?"

"The Russians have been inscrutable for months now," Phil said. "Not as bad as the Chinese, but still, we don't really know shit about what's going on inside there. For all we know, McCallister gave them a version of the serum without the pairing, or with

further

modifications to it. After what I've learned about Adam over the past few months, I think he's capable of just about anything."

"His notes are that duplicitous?"

"Half the shit he did to the serum? It doesn't even

come

from

his

work. He's basically plagiarizing work from the company his wife used to work at, and since they were close but didn't actually have anything working, Adam apparently felt

no

shame in just piggybacking off their work and incorporating it into his own. Piggybacking is being generous. This is standing on the shoulders of giants shit we're talking here. If I keep grasping at straws for some of this, maybe I'll reach out to the people who used to work in Adam's wife's company, see if they can be of any use in trying to pry this all apart. Sooner or later, you just have to admit to not knowing all the things you don't know."

"Take all the help you can get, babe," Linda said to him. "Ms. Couric's schedule for the day was first half with Niko, then Bill, then Miguel, then Charlotte, then the General, and then rounding out the day with you into the evening."

"Do I get the luxury of a hard cut off point?"

"Do

you

want to tell the President you cut the interview short?"

Phil let out a very deeply frustrated sigh. "No, I don't. Fine, I'll talk until I'm blue in the face or until Katie Couric tells me that she's done with me. Happy?"

"The President will be, and that's all that really matters, isn't it?"

"Yes dear," Phil grumbled, taking a few minutes to straighten up his office.

While Phil awaited his turn, he continued his research, and found a fascinating path of discovery he wasn't sure he wanted to explore further, but knew he needed to make a note about doing further studies into it regardless of how uncomfortable it made him feel. The composition of nanobots in Teams varied wildly depending on how the Team was doing, how constant their exposure was to DuoHalo and what sort of cohesion it was building into its Team. And that was the data that Phil found slightly concerning...

...the nanobots were

influencing

Team building.

That was the part of the data he was trying to make sense of. It had been data that had been more directed toward Miguel, but all the data regarding the serum went across Phil's desk and every so often, someone had to look at the big, big,

BIG

picture.

And there was demonstrably solid data that proved as Teams grew larger, they developed into a layer of self-sufficiency. It wasn't as though there were any reports of people having their decisions altered or influenced; it simply seemed that the larger a Team grew, the more it had a sense to try and fill in holes for skillsets and personality archetypes.

Teams could easily be broken down into Tiers - 1-5 partners was Tier 1, 6-10 partners were Tier 2, 11-15 were Tier 3, 16-20 were Tier 4, 21-25 were Tier 5, and 25+ was Tier 6, although there were almost no Teams at Tier 6. They were a statistical anomaly, but they still needed to be on the record.

There was absolutely no rhyme or reason for it, but as Teams crossed over from the Tier 2 to the Tier 3 threshold, they started actively working to fill in skillsets and training they didn't have already - security, informational technology, operations, food preparation, medical training, land management, farming... it was like the nanobots were helping to guide large Teams into being semi-independent colonies. They could only influence requests, but the number of requested pairings went up sizably after any team crossed into Tier 3.

It was also working to build in a wide selection of personality styles, focusing from everything to conflict resolution to emotional awareness. Much like skillsets, a too-uniform Team would find itself unable to easily handle interactions with other Teams that had a different outlook on life. The solution was to make sure that the Team represented a wide swath of opinions, political, social and personal. It all made sense in a weird sort of adaptive way, except for the one real problem...

Nobody

anywhere

had told the nanobots to

do

that.

The nanobots were developing systems beyond simple one-person preservation - they were showing signs of thinking of a Team as a colony, and working collectively, beyond the needs of any one individual member of the Team, to prepare for any sort of eventuality they might encounter. They were even generally working to push towards genetic and regional diversity, so that they could take the strongest genes from one portion of the globe and crossbreed them with others.