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raj agrawal
Author
Not For Sale!
RAJ AGRAWAL, author

Adult; Mystery/Thriller; (Publish)

Not For Sale! is the story of Ravi Kumar and Caitlyn Mariko, both first generation immigrant, both graduate students at Cornell, both avid fans of Carl Sagan and both knew from the moment they saw each other at the Y in Ithaca that they had found their soul mate. It is the thrilling and exciting story of their journey from their homelands in India and Japan, through the beautiful campus of Cornell on the banks of Lake Cayuga in upstate New York to getting married and becoming parents of three daughters, all born within a year, to achieving recognition as world-renowned scientists and inventors of a new aerospace material that would revolutionize the design of airplanes and the engines that power them. Not For Sale! is also the story of Bill MacMillan and Dave Ward, two of the brilliant and ambitious captains of aviation industry, one-time colleagues, but now fierce competitors, who would stop at nothing to annihilate each other. Dave Ward had lost the battle for the top job to Bill MacMillan at United Electric and was now running General Technologies, United’s competitor, and an underdog in the very lucrative and large aero-engine market. They both saw the new material invented by the Kumars as the arrow they needed in their quiver to win the great engine war and they wanted it exclusively and they wanted it at any cost. Caught in between were Dr. Ravi Kumar, the aerospace engineer and Dr. Caitlyn Mariko, his life partner, and an expert in Artificial Intelligence. They found themselves in the middle of this deadly war between not only the two rivals but also the Chinese. The Chinese saw this new material as their ticket to get into the aero-engine market from which they had thus far been shut off and wanted to capture it just as they had done with many of the other American industries. They all wanted to get an exclusive right contract for the Kumars new invention, and they wanted it in time for the new engine scheduled to be launched in three months. The companies must launch their new engine on this schedule and to be competitive must have the new material which would cut down the fuel burn by half and the climate damaging pollutants by three fourth. Not having the new material was not an option, if the companies wanted to remain in the game or get into the game, as the Chinese wanted. The stakes could not be higher. The husband-wife team, worried about the climate change and its long-lasting impact on the quality of life for the generation of their three daughters and the generations that come after them, refused to sign the exclusive right contract. They wanted this new revolutionary material to be as widely available as allowed by the laws of their adopted homeland – the United States. This did not sit well with the two titans and the Chinese. They unleashed a reign of terror on the Kumars and their family forcing them on a hair-raising worldwide flight for their lives that took them from their hometown Ithaca to Marseille, Casablanca, Palermo, Darjeeling and finally Beijing. The critical three-month launch clock was ticking. Their only hope for survival was to run it down before the professional hit teams, let loose by the companies, ferret them out and force them into submission. The Kumars had their suspicions but did not know with certainty who was behind these attacks and who and what to watch out for. It had turned into a true cat and mouse game. The attacks on the Kumars became deadlier as the clock wound down, but they managed to remain standing. With just three days remaining on the launch clock, they got a break in Darjeeling. Helped by Caitlyn’s lightning fast response from her karate black belt training, and the quick response of Captain Thapa, the head of their security team, they finally had a pair of hitmen in their custody. With the help of the truth machine – a groundbreaking invention of Dr. Johari on Captain’s Thapa security team, they were able to humanely interrogate one of the attackers and confirm their suspicion about Dave Ward being behind one of the attack teams. The chairwoman of General Technologies and Dave Ward’s boss wasted no time, firing Dave Ward and accepting the Kumars conditions for the use of their new material, including non-exclusive rights, in their new engine design. But, there was still the unanswered question of who was behind the other hit team. Was it Bill MacMillan or the Chinese or had they in desperation colluded with each other. The Kumars got their answer from their other captive – Michael Zhang, a high-level operative of the Chinese company who it turned out were a joint venture partner of United Electric, Bill MacMillan’s company. Michael Zhang, coaxed by the truth machine, was about to reveal the identity of the person behind the second hit team when Dr. Kumar received a terrifying message from Bill MacMillan to release Michael Zhang and destroy all evidence they had gathered against him if he wanted to see his oldest daughter alive. The Kumars now had their answer – Bill MacMillan and the Chinese had indeed joined forces and had abducted their daughter and were holding her hostage. The Kumars were desperate but fortunately had an unexpected and well-connected ally – the chairman of United Electric and Bill MacMillan’s boss. The chairman called in his chits at the FBI and the US Attorney’s office forming a high-power task force which was able to locate the Kumars daughter in Bill’s vacation cottage in Lake Placid, safe and unharmed. Bill MacMillan, however, gave them a slip and took refuge in Canada where he was eventually apprehended and extradited back to the States for standing trial on abduction and dereliction of his duties as the head of a major conglomerate. United Electric also accepted the terms of the Kumars for the use of the new material in their new engine. Although both engines would have the Kumars revolutionary material they would endeavor to differentiate themselves on other equally important metrics – cost, reliability and customer support ensuring a healthy competition in the aviation industry and the continuous advancement of the state of the arts. It would also ensure the new generation of airplanes would significantly cut down on the fuel they burn and the climate damaging pollution they generate. A small positive step towards slowing down the damage humans have been doing to the planet and a moral victory for the husband-wife team of researchers and the dedicated associates at their non-profit institute. And the Chinese. They bought and blackmailed their way into getting the chemistry of the new material but not the knowhow of the overly complex process for creating it. The US would keep its lead in one of the few remaining industries that the Chinese had still not captured. They would be buying the new generation of airplanes with the new fuel and emission efficient engines along with the rest of the world. With their world-wide harrowing run now behind them and their new material in both new engines, it was time for the Kumars to take a well-deserved R&R in Caitlyn’s native country of Japan and begin thinking about their new project as they completed another of their personal goal – to climb mount Fuji. They had no idea what their new project would be, but they did know whatever it was, it would also be to fight the climate change and would also be Not For Sale!
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