Metafire

Wendy's job had some desirable attributes. One was that no one much cared about what Wendy was doing. She reported to her boss irregularly at best. Wendy decided to do some additional investigation. She got on the net and typed "http://www.metafire.com," just to look. Then she saw the message from Metafire, "Due to circumstances beyond our control, all telephone and video conferencing activity has been suspended until further notice. If you have questions or requests, please submit them by email to help@metafire.com or type in the Web submittal pages provided here."

Wendy had never seen anything like this before. If you are on Internet, then you automatically have phone and video teleconferencing capability. Perhaps Metafire was trying to save money. But then, if she initiated a phone call, the cost would be hers. What would Metafire care? This didn't make any sense. Furthermore, when she checked out the financial condition of Metafire Systems, Inc., through one of the services on the net, it turned out to be a very strong company. Although privately held, it was estimated to have hundreds of millions of dollars in available capital.

In the NSP listings on the Internet, she found that four Metafire Systems, Inc., capsules had been launched. Two with people and two supply capsules. The launches were recent. Wendy decided that this could be a kidnapping. The timing would be right.