Peter Whelan's Story

"Yes, well, mine and Wilkins relationship is slippery so it would only make sense," Ben muttered as he glanced over the papers. He looked up as she moved behind him, opened the filing cabinet, and handed him a manila envelope filled with information. He stepped back so she could bring up his file on the computer.

"How could I ever have doubted you?" he teased just as there was a knock at the door.

Ben flipped open the file and caught the name of their mark. He frowned slightly, his brows drawing together as he stared at the paperwork. He reached for Rosemary's chair and settled down in it as the new architect entered.

Rosemary had been very thorough in her investigation with Peter Whelan, not that Ben doubted she would be anything less. There were the basics, physical attributes like age and weight, information on his refinery business, everything from recent purchases to his schedule for the next month that gave them opportunities to do the extraction. He would be a tough man to extract information from, not only was he busy running a multibillion dollar company but a man of that stature would have some serious protection both outside of his mind and in it. And sure enough, as Ben flicked to the next page, he saw that Rosemary had typed up everything she could about his security.

But that wasn't what troubled Ben. As he scoured the file on Peter Whelan, Ben realized that he had worked with this mark before, three years ago. He turned to the pages in the back where Rosemary had listed previous extractions. There were a few names from the Agency he recognized but his and Ginny's name had been conveniently left out. Whelan probably paid off the Agency to keep their names off the record. Whelan had contacted Wilkins about hiring a team and Wilkins gave him Ben and Ginny's names. But before Whelan committed to hiring them for a mission, he insisted on going under with Ben and Ginny to see how extraction worked and what his money was going towards. Ben planned for a basic demonstration about dreams and had Dillinger put him, Ginny and Whelan under so the oil tycoon could see just how remarkable dream extraction was. Instead of reassuring their mark like Ben had hoped, the dream collapsed and when they woke Ginny had not been the same and Whelan forwent the extraction. The assignment was dismantled, Ginny checked into a psychiatric hospital, Ben left the country and Whelan called for the failed mission to be redacted from all Agency files. It had all been one gigantic mess covered up by one gigantic check.

Ben couldn't believe what he was reading. No wonder Wilkins had tracked him down for this assignment. He hardly looked up at the newcomer, until a hand appeared in his line of vision. He glanced up at James, who was standing on the other side of the desk. He was young, dark haired, and had a toothy smile split across his face. Ben flipped the file closed and stood up, reaching over to shake James's hand.

"James," he said evenly, finally managing to collect his thoughts enough to form a workable sentence. "Glad to have you aboard. We were just going over our marks file..."

James frowned for half a second, trying to work out if he had interrupted something -- if not between Ben and Rosemary, then Ben and his own thoughts. A glance at Rosemary suggested he may have been right; she had a tiny frown directed towards Ben, but when she saw James looking, it vanished. "Exactly," Rosemary said. "I'll take you through the basics, shall I?"

"Great," James put his bag down beside the desk and leaned forward. He was determined to give this opportunity all his attention. He'd been after this for years and finally he had a chance. Not just any chance either: he was stood in the same room as Benjamin Buchanan -- whose extraction missions were used as case files at the university -- and Rosemary Firth -- who had apprenticed under Dillinger himself. He couldn't explain how he had been the one to get this chance, other than sheer luck. He was a good architect, but he had no idea whether his skills could transfer to dream architecture. "May I?" he asked gesturing to one of the chairs facing the desk where Ben was seated and Rosemary was perched.

"Of course." Rosemary picked up a small remote control and clicked a button. Something lit up behind James and he became aware of a screen on the wall which he hadn't noticed before -- he had probably been too distracted by the tank of what appeared to be bloated white toads beside it. Before he could decide whether he should be disturbed by the toads, Rosemary began to speak, the screen showing a projection of her desktop. "Peter Whelan." She showed them a photo of a middle aged man. "Billionaire. CEO of Expercon Petroleum. Raised two million for Wish Upon a Star last year, but while he may look like a silver fox," Rosemary smiled, "we have suspicions that he was behind the poisoned water supply to a village on the East Coast, a village that lay above an oil well. The people refused to leave their homes for Expercon Petroleum to extract the oil, but the poisoned water forced them to leave and Whelan's company made millions." James leant back as Rosemary flicked the screen to show a photo of the village -- the houses being demolished -- and another of someone in hospital. "That's just the tip of the iceberg."

She briefly went over accounts of bribery and extortion, illegal dream extraction interrogation and suspicious missing person reports. "A wolf in silver fox clothing," James muttered and cast a smile towards Rosemary, but she was looking down at her paperwork.

"But recently..." she squinted at the writing, "Oh, damn it," and pulled out a pair of glasses, putting them on with a sigh. "Right, yes. Recently, this young woman has gone missing." A photo came on the screen of a girl who appeared to be in her mid twenties. "Charlotte Groves. She is a reporter who, based on her phone records, had managed to get into Expercon Petroleum's main headquarters disguised as a cleaner. Her computer has been wiped so we have no idea what she was looking for or what she found. There's no direct evidence to suggest that Whelan was behind her disappearance, but we believe she found something and was either killed or kidnapped to keep it hidden. We need to get inside Whelan's head to found out not only what happened to Charlotte, but evidence to bring him and Expercon Petroleum down once and for all." She looked between James and Ben and James half considered applauding, but thought better of it; he didn't want to make too big an ape of himself on his first day. He glanced at Ben, hoping for some clue as to what he was meant to ask or say now.