章節 23: Asking for Help

<18th of February 1974>

Henry was now finally back to the United States after 11 days of his tiring journey in Nepal.

Henry wished that he could simply just relax today as every day in Nepal but fate seemed to have other plans since Henry never had the time to truly relax in the past few months.

Henry could only sigh as he called the driver in his estate to pick him up.

'I miss cuddling around with Susan.' Henry sighed.

Around 20 minutes later, the driver arrives with Henry's car and drove him off to his Estate where he slumped down and took his well deserved rest.

Henry did not know exactly when he fell asleep, but he found himself already yawning to wake up at a new dawn outside his window. He seemed to have passed out instantly on his bed and woke up in the morning without dreaming.

The time now is 19th of February, 1974.

America's involvement in the Vietnam War had just ended last year, so many people still have resentment to President Richard Nixon.

Henry remembers that in just 2 months, the congress would try impeach Richard Nixon out of the presidential seat but before the Congress could do so, Nixon had already resigned.

'Talk about not getting fired by quitting the job…' Henry chuckled to himself as he sipped on his cup of coffee. 'It's like firing yourself so no one else can fire you.'

As Nixon's term in office went on, President Nixon had grown increasingly paranoid and defensive.

Though he won election by a landslide in 1972, he had resented all those who challenged his authority and approved of attempts to discredit those who opposed him, Nixon had created a lot enemies within the period of his presidency.

In June 1972, police found five burglars from Nixon's own Committee to Re-Elect the President in the office of the Democratic National Committee, located in the Watergate office building.

Police had soon found out that that Nixon himself was involved in the crime, to which he responded by demanding the Federal Bureau of Investigation to stop investigating the break-in and telling his cronies to cover up the scandal.

In April 1974, a Congressional committee approved three articles of impeachment: Obstruction of justice, Misuse of federal agencies and Defying the authority of Congress.

Even though the time now is just in early February, the political situation is already up in flames.

Henry believes many figures in the shadows have already acted against Nixon as Congress decision to impeach Nixon was definitely not done overnight.

Under this hodgepodge politic situation now, Henry decided to take this opportunity as many people attention is focused on the Nixon scandal now.

Nobody would (hopefully) care about some 437 immigrants as every year many immigrants flocks to the United States. There should be a lot more things that the people are focused on right now.

To sneak in 437 Gurkha people at once to the United States is not easy too. This makes Henry headache when thinking about the way to sneak them in. Even if Henry successfully sneak the Gurkhas in, but their identity would be that of an illegal immigrant.

Even though there were many illegal immigrants in the United States, Henry did not want to take this risk as he did not want to leave a legal loophole in the future that his future opponents can use this to attack him.

If He wants to bring the Gurkhas in a legal manner, this needed some connection into the world of politics.

Henry already thinks to use his available connections for now even though his connections are not broad and powerful enough, there was someone who did, and so happened to be one of his close contacts.

It was the Gates family. The Gates family is an upper-class family with a great array of connections.

Mary Maxwell Gates is a powerful businesswoman and William Henry Gates II is a lawyer with many connections too. The Gates family must have some connection to political figure and they can help him.

This was the time to convince the Gates family to help him, so Henry must start with Bill Gates.

Of course, Henry was not ashamed to do this as his network of contact was indeed insufficient as of now as he just debuted to the upper echelon a year ago.

Henry believes this is just a temporary inconvenience as in the future, he will do better with his social circles.

Since the decision already made, Henry immediately acted.

Henry then drives off to Microsoft headquarters in Silicon Valley.

Many Microsoft employees are already busy as Microsoft was getting bigger and bigger each day.

At the beginning of Microsoft establishment, there are only 37 employees but now there are already 158 employees.

The 37 original employees already included Henry, Bill Gates, Paul Allen, and Steve Ballmer.

Bill Gates has 10% share, Paul Allen has 4% shares, Steve Ballmer has 4% share. With 10% of reward option, Henry owned 82% of Microsoft. Now Microsoft market value is just over $1 Million as it just started last December, but this is already good enough.

When Henry appeared within the building, many of the employees immediately greet him as they already know that Henry is the Chairman. Henry simply exchanged a few greetings with many of the new employees so they can better recognize him before he goes to CEO office where Bill Gates was currently at.

When Henry opened the door, Henry can see Bill Gates doing something on a computer in his desk.

Bill Gates immediately reacted with irritation when someone opened his door without knocking, but upon seeing it was Henry, he simply snorted.

"Oh, it was just you Henry." Bill rolled his eyes and laughed. "I thought you already forgot about us here on Microsoft. In fact, I thought you forgot you had a company in the first place!"

"Lately I had been busy with something and didn't have the time to take care of Microsoft." Henry laughed. "I need your help as the stuff I need to do this time is somewhat complicated."

Bill Gates then dropped all he was working on and turns towards Henry with serious eyes.

Bill knew Henry would never ask for help if it was not anything important.

Last time Henry needed help, it was for his mother lobbying them to IBM. This time, it must be something of equal importance too.

"What help do you need?" Bill asked with a serious tone. "Just tell me if it something I can help with, I'll be sure to get it done immediately."

"I need your family connections to help me in lobbying some people in government as I intend to bring 437 immigrants to the United States." Henry sighed. "Don't worry, they wouldn't do anything bad as I need them to do something for me."

'Rather than doing something bad, it's more like they might just build a small town somewhere.' Bill closed his eyes in disbelief.

Bill Gates listened attentively and soon fell into a state of deep contemplation.

Not to mention hundreds of immigrants, he could not tell why Henry would want to bring in immigrants on the first place.

Compared to the favor with the IBM, this was something completely illogical to Bill as this had no impact whatsoever to the company.

"Why do you need to bring 437 people to here, do you want to build a village? You know that recently, US politics has been heating up. The political side is currently on the unstable side." Bill asked Henry with and incredulous look. "Not to mention that racism is a very rampant problem, integrating immigrants will be quite the tough work."

"No, I am not going to build a village, I think…" Henry trailed off. "Point is, I just need to get an entire tribe to the US."

Bill's eye obviously twitched at the mention of 'an entire tribe'.

'It's Henry, it has to be something completely beyond me…' Bill closed his eyes and thought to himself. 'This is totally not abduction…'

Seeing as Bill was already in deep thought, Henry continued to explain the situation.

"It has to do with something private and about whether they can integrate into society or not is something that I will take care of in the future. You just need to convince your family to help me, tell them if they help me this time, I, Henry William, will owe them a favor." Henry explained while he makes a bargain. His favor is important after all, as he will not easily give it people.

When Bill Gates heard that, he was surprised as he did not expect Henry to owe anyone a favor.

He knows Henry was destined to be a great man just from his vision to the future and his genius intelligence. With just both of them combined, Henry destined to be more than just successful.

This meant that when Henry ultimately becomes someone great in the future, his favor will be extremely precious.

Many times a favor can save someone's life just like how Gerald Ford owes a favor to Richard Nixon.

With that favor, Nixon manages to gain a pardon from the law because of Gerald Ford. If not for Gerald Ford helping him to gain pardon, he would have long been in jail or executed because of his mistake in his presidential term.

Bill Gates immediately got how much this meant to Henry and his family. He promises Henry he would do his best to talk to his family about Henry's request.

Henry was satisfied with this because the Gurkhas would be important for him. If Henry manages to gain the Gurkhas tribe, he can use them to further lobbying many other tribes in Nepal.

With just that one favor, Henry would manage to gain access to entire Gurkha ethnicities in the future.

For the favor he gives to Gates family, it can be returned in the future when they need him to repay it.

Henry smiled as he thought of all the possible things in the future where the Gurkhas would be extremely helpful in his plight of reshaping the world.