Aftershock Alarms
The aftershock alarms were ringing furiously! Even as Yoo Jae-won hurried toward ID Technology headquarters, his phone continued to blare with urgent alerts. It was just past 9:30 in the morning. He pulled out his Android Phone and checked the screen. Just as he suspected.
Pentagon! Collapse from passenger plane suicide attack!
It was an emergency alarm from the ID Group information team. Quick reports were helpful, but the information was far too vague. As Yoo Jae-won knew, only a portion of the Pentagon’s western section had collapsed—not the entire building. After all, the Pentagon was a sturdy five-story structure arranged in a five-layered pentagonal formation. The notion of its total collapse was absurd.
Hijacked plane collides with the western face of the Pentagon building!
As expected, waiting a little longer brought more detailed information. A photo had also been transmitted. The speed was agonizingly slow, like regressing to the modem era, but the data had been converted into an image, allowing him to roughly confirm the scene. The Pentagon showed damage to a portion of its western wall, exactly as it had before his regression.
That meant the remaining target was the United States Capitol.
“Hmm.”
In the original 9/11 attacks, the Capitol had remained safe. United Airlines Flight 93 had been hijacked with the intention of striking the Capitol, but the passengers learned of the suicide attacks and mounted a fierce resistance. As a result, the plane never reached its target and crashed en route, killing everyone on board. It was an enormous tragedy in itself, yet it was truly fortunate that the terrorists had failed to achieve their objective. If the passengers of United 93 could somehow reclaim the aircraft from the hijackers and land safely at a nearby airport, that would have been ideal, but realistically it was an extremely slim miracle.
Meanwhile, Yoo Jae-won’s car reached ID Technology headquarters, and he headed straight for the chairman’s office.
“President Vincent, please report the situation.”
The building housing ID Investment stood only about five kilometers from the World Trade Center—close enough to hear the explosion when the plane struck. As a result, Vincent Greenhill’s complexion was extremely rigid.
“Do we need any additional measures?”
The current portfolio of ID Investment had changed dramatically from a year earlier. Where direct stock-market investment had once exceeded sixty percent, it now stood below thirty. Gold, grain, and oil futures now dominated. Put options had also been purchased as hedges. Even if share prices collapsed, the losses would be offset. With global stock prices—including those in the United States—plummeting, the put options themselves were poised to deliver staggering profits.
“Stay indoors as much as possible today. Under no circumstances should you or any staff approach the World Trade Center. There is a chance the buildings may collapse.”
“Yes. Its structure is extremely vulnerable to heat. In any case, maintain full emergency protocols for the time being. Also, check whether any employees’ families have been caught up in the incident.”
In his heart he wanted to send everyone home immediately. Yet even now the stock and futures markets were experiencing violent swings. The plunge in share prices was insane, and the futures-options market was generating record volatility. Put options that should have become worthless paper were exploding in value, while call options whose conditions had been met were in freefall.
“One thousand two hundred forty-four point five percent.”
PUT OPTIONS: +1,244.5%
That was the current yield displayed on ID Investment’s internal network. A simple twelvefold increase. Of course, the most explosive puts were showing hundreds of times that return, so this was not the peak. But when the total holdings were considered, the picture changed. The hedged put-option position exceeded one hundred million dollars.
Some might argue it looked less like hedging and more like an all-in bet on puts, yet it remained a legitimate hedge. Even at thirty percent stock allocation, the principal was substantial, producing noticeable losses on the equity side. Fortunately, gold, oil, and grain futures were soaring, driving the overall portfolio return through the roof.
Moreover, tomorrow would bring the true crash. ID Investment stood an excellent chance of surpassing even the returns from the Japanese market play or the Gulf War oil futures. At the same time, calculating yields while countless people lay dead felt profoundly inhumane. A terrorist atrocity had become someone’s profit. It was the irony of capitalism.
Yet on deeper reflection, the United States had repeatedly manufactured such situations to secure national interest. The rise of anti-American sentiment across South America and the daily terrors in the Middle East would never have occurred without American intervention.
“Vice Chairman Remington! Are you safe?”
Remington’s video feed showed him unharmed, though far more disheveled than Vincent Greenhill. Time Warner Nextcom’s headquarters stood at the southwest corner of Central Park in Manhattan, close to the ID Investment Building and therefore spared direct impact. Yet the media group was in frantic motion producing 9/11 coverage, and field reporters had been dispatched toward the World Trade Center.
“The north tower of the World Trade Center may collapse. Order immediate evacuation and broadcast the warning!”
Yoo Jae-won knew CNN’s reckless reporting style too well to hesitate. In the original attacks, the greatest loss of life had occurred when the towers fell. Beyond those inside the buildings, firefighters, rescue workers, and journalists who had rushed close were caught in the sudden collapse.
Without further explanation, Yoo Jae-won transmitted the prepared simulation data. It was research he had commissioned from firefighting experts on fire hazards in high-rise buildings, using the World Trade Center as the example. The tube-frame structure—steel core supporting the center load connected to dense external columns—allowed wider floors than conventional steel-concrete methods. Yet when the central columns were compromised, the damage proved catastrophic. Jet fuel burned at thousands of degrees, rapidly eroding the core’s integrity until the entire building came down.
World Trade Center structural failure under jet-fuel fire conditions — probability of total collapse: extreme
Remington shot to his feet the instant he saw the footage. Though a decade had passed since he left police work, his detective’s instincts remained razor sharp. He rushed off without even exchanging proper greetings, heading directly to Time Warner Nextcom’s broadcast control center.
After ending the video call, Yoo Jae-won turned to what he could do himself.
“This is the first time I’ve sent a global message.”
If cable channels like CNN represented traditional media, ID Talk and TokTok were the communication tools of the twenty-first century. Both applications were already experiencing peak traffic as people worldwide shared 9/11 developments. Simultaneous users and messages per second had hit record highs. Yet user-to-user sharing had limits. Therefore Yoo Jae-won decided to use the global-notice function to display a summarized news bulletin on the overall situation.
The document had been prepared in advance; he needed only to load it from the secure area and make minor adjustments to reflect slight differences between the 9/11 he remembered and the one unfolding now.
“Done!”
He accessed the servers, opened the global-notice function, and uploaded the file.
9/11 Terror Situation Summary
Multiple hijacked aircraft have struck targets in New York and Washington DC. World Trade Center towers at risk of structural failure. Evacuate the area immediately. Full report and safety instructions attached.
The moment he pressed send, his Android Phone rang. The global notice appeared on every screen—locked or unlocked—for anyone running ID Talk or TokTok.
“Nextcom needs a special page as well.”
A dedicated 9/11 section had already been prepared: a news feed containing only related articles, a board exclusively for missing-person reports and tips, and a free discussion board. An automated crawler posted breaking news without requiring human moderators.
The large LCD television in the chairman’s office grew noisy once more. The simulation data sent to Vice Chairman Remington was now being broadcast worldwide on CNN. Twenty-five minutes remained until the tower collapse. It was tight, but rapid evacuation could still drastically reduce casualties.
“Prepare drones at the high-tech research lab…”
Just as Yoo Jae-won confirmed that ID Group’s follow-up measures were proceeding smoothly and began preparing for the post-9/11 situation, the television anchor’s voice erupted again.
Yoo Jae-won’s head snapped toward the screen. In the original timeline, United 93 should have crashed short of its target due to passenger resistance. Yet now it was entering Washington DC airspace?
Ding! Another alarm sounded from his Android Phone. It was a message from the information team operating in Washington DC. An image file was attached. Even the tiny thumbnail preview was shocking enough to make him hesitate instinctively. The small image clearly showed the Capitol building in flames.