The Phoenix Agenda: A Thriller (A Rossler Foundation Mystery Book 6)

by JC Ryan

  This story captured the imagination of everyone; it was heralded as the biggest scientific achievement in human history. It remained the most important news story for many months. The media hysteria was driven to even higher levels when the Supreme Council announced that all medical services would become free for everyone volunteering to be implanted with the medical biochip.

  Neither Anastasia nor the Supreme Council was prepared for the chaos that followed these announcements. There were not enough personnel to deal with the demand for the implants. They had to train tens of thousands of people to perform the procedure. The media showed images of people outside clinics all over the world waiting in queues, sometimes a few miles long. Anastasia was back in the good books of the Supreme Council as hundreds of millions of people turned up to be chipped voluntarily.

  Only two types of people in this world

  It was a Wednesday night shortly after nine o’clock. In one of the backstreets of the Bronx, an old crippled Indian man with a walking stick shuffled into a half-lit basement of an abandoned and ruined apartment block and shook hands with two men.

  “Rube, Sombra, it has been a long time. I am glad you guys could make it on such short notice.”

  “Raj, good to see you again, my friend,” Rube replied.

  Sombra patted Raj on the back, “Welcome back to New York, man. Where have you been?”

  Raj didn’t answer the question, “We have a lot to talk about, guys. Is there a safe place where we could sit down and talk? “

  Thanks to the preventative law enforcement measures, the Bronx was as safe as any of the most affluent neighborhoods anywhere in New York.

  “We have a safe place in the building next door. I’ll go first and make sure the tenant gets another place to sleep for the night. Give me five minutes, then go through the opening in that wall at the back. There you’ll find a gap in the fence five yards to the right. Go through that and to the ground floor, second door on the right in the hallway.” Sombra replied.

  When they were seated at the table in the room, Raj took a little electronic device, similar to a small ballpoint pen, from his jacket pocket and placed it on the table. A little blue light was visible. Rube and Sombra were instantly suspicious. “Raj, what the fuck is that? Don’t tell me you are going to record us?” Rube wanted to know.

  Raj just laughed and said, “My friends you know me better than that, and you should know I would never do such a thing. Let me introduce you to the pen of silence.”

  It took him almost a quarter of an hour of explaining to get the two of them calmed down. In the end, they understood that the pen would block out any signal and voice going further than a few yards from them. Rube tested it and was jubilant when he stood four yards away and could not hear a single word Raj and Sombra were saying, even when they screamed. Rube and Sombra were happy they could trust Raj’s pen and forthwith placed an order for a few of the devices. They explained that the place they were in was one of the many safe houses they had established in every state across the country. Rube, who was the leader of the New York cell of Tectus, gave Raj an overview of their activities and plans. Raj, without disclosing any information about the location of the Rabbit Hole, in turn gave them an overview of the Rosslerites’ activities.

  When he told them how they broke Sam Lewis and his family out of house arrest, his two friends were all ears. They were intensely interested in the technology Raj talked about and questioned him for almost an hour about the spyflies, mosquitos, hummers and earphones at the end of which they placed another order. He instantly became their hero when he produced a box containing some of each of the devices, including the pens of silence. He told them this was a gift from the Rosslerites, and he would show them how to use everything a bit later.

  Raj explained the Rosslerites' top priorities. It was critical to get a message through to President Harper. Equally important was to find out the location of the factory or factories where the chips were produced and to get hold of some of those chips.

  Rube told him that from their hacking activities, they already knew there was only one factory, located in China. From the plant the chips were shipped all over the world, escorted by a special guard force to various distribution points. There were exceptionally strict security measures in place around the chips.

  That didn’t mean the system was foolproof, but Tectus, even if they could get hold of those chips, didn’t have the technical expertise to handle or analyze them. Despite all their hacking efforts and wealth of information gathered, they hadn’t found the technical specifications for the chips yet. They were scared shitless by the idea of handling the chips, and consequently it was not part of their strategy to get hold of any.

  Instead, they were thinking of blowing up the warehouses where the chips were stored. Raj told them it would not be a good idea to do that. It would not have any lasting impact, unless the Chinese plant was also destroyed. Even that wouldn't stop them from setting up another one very quickly. It would be better to look at other options. He got them excited when he explained the Rosslerites’ strategy, which was to get hold of some of the chips so that they could analyze and reverse engineer them and find a way to neutralize them. If that could be achieved, it would level the playing field.

  The Rosslerites were bargaining on the ‘buyer’s remorse’ that would unquestionably begin to set in as soon as people found out what it meant to be chipped. They believed, in the not too distant future, there would only be two types of people in this world. Those who managed to avoid chipping and those who would give anything to get one out of their bodies.

  They agreed that Rube and Sombra would gather all the details about the chips they could get out of their files. What the Rosslerites needed especially were the location of the Chinese factory, the shipping processes, warehouses and control measures. Rube and Sombra would hand the information to Raj when they met again.

  Raj was given the names of the cities and towns where Tectus had safe houses, although none of them knew the exact addresses. It was part of their security measures to know things only on a need-to-know basis. Raj kept a poker face when he heard there were safe houses in all of the states around Montana, where the Rabbit Hole was, and almost smiled when he heard about the one in Billings.

  Before they left, it was agreed they'd meet again in two nights at a different safe house.

  The Edwards dynamic

  Kelly Edwards was aware that people would stare at her whenever she appeared in public. Maybe it was because she was the political news anchor for World One News Network (WONN) in New York and the host of one of the most popular talk shows on TV, ‘The Edwards Dynamic’. Maybe it was because she was a striking, six-foot-two blonde and former Miss District of Columbia.

  At thirty-five, she was still single. It was not because of a lack of interest - she could pick and choose if she wanted to. The reason was that she was not ready yet to settle down and make the commitment required for a happy relationship.

  Twice a month, on a Friday, she would escape the irritating public scrutiny to enjoy being one of the crowd. That was when she got an extreme makeover from the studio makeup artists who transformed her into a brunette with big dark sunglasses. She would slip away for the rest of the day into the streets of Manhattan to do the things normal people do. She would visit her favorite coffee shop, browse antique and second-hand bookshops and, before going back to the studio, top the day off with a sinful cheeseburger and vanilla soft-serve at MacDonald’s.

  From her table on the outside of Luigis’ Espresso, she was staring at the people passing by on the street. Luigi’s was her favorite coffee shop. It was never overcrowded, and she thought the coffee was exquisite. The place and the atmosphere sometimes reminded her of one of her favorite little espresso bars in Rome. Kelly had graduated with an MA in political science and international relations from George Washington University, followed by an honors degree in journalism from Yale. She worked for the Washington Post for almost seven yea
rs, for three of which she was posted in Europe.

  While waiting for her coffee, she was thinking about the success of the once a week interviews she’d been conducting on her show with former heads of state from around the world. Three weeks from now, she would have an interview with former President Harper and his wife. She’d already made inquiries and discovered that the presidential pair did not support the new government; something the public didn’t know and was not allowed to know. She saw the photos and video clips of the presidential couple attending past public events, and it did not escape her that they never smiled. It was not going to be easy, she knew.

  She could not ask them what they thought about the new government nor discuss any politics, past or present, with them. Probably it would be best just to get them to talk about their lives and their interests. The fact that the interview was going to be recorded on the Harper’s farm in Tennessee would help to create the right atmosphere for a good conversation. Fortunately, it was not going to be a live show. These days there were not many of those. If the interview were a disaster that could not be ‘fixed’ with editing, she would have the option to replace it with something else. She just had to record a backup show in advance.

  The interview was already big news - their secret social media polls showed that it was going to be watched by many millions of Americans. That wasn’t a surprise. President Harper was one of the most popular presidents ever.

  She was startled out of her thoughts when an old Indian man with a walking stick, who tried to pass behind her, bumped into her handbag hanging over the back of her chair. “Sorry about that ma’am.”

  She smiled. “Don’t worry, my mistake. I should have kept my bag on the table so there would be more space for people to pass through.”

  America, then the rest of the world

  Since Roy had heard Luke and Salome explaining to the Steering Committee the various ways in which communications could be encoded and encrypted, he had been thinking. He felt sure he could develop a secure communications network with the outside world without having to use the Internet, landlines or mobile phones.

  After the completion of his zinger and mosquito projects, he had more time to work on the communications project and already had a few ideas in the back of his head. First, he wanted to find out if he could establish a reliable and secure connection between computers by using laser beams instead of cables and wireless. His idea was to use the same principal as a fiber optic cable but without the cable. It wasn’t new technology - the military, and NASA had been using it for quite a few years. It was just that he never investigated how exactly they did it.

  Roy immersed himself in the material he’d collected about laser communications over the years. He found some research showing that the beam of a small pocket laser pointer could travel more than twelve miles and be seen by the naked eye without any problem. That was exciting news, as that would mean if it could be seen at that distance by the naked eye it could also be picked up by a sensor. In other words, if a signal were to be embedded in the laser beam, it could be used to communicate.

  In theory, a laser beam could travel an infinite distance as long as there was no obstruction in its path. In a vacuum, such as space, it would go much further than in the earth’s atmosphere, where dust and particulate matter would disperse the beam much quicker.

  Thanks to the information left in their library about the advanced nanolaser technology in use during the 10th Cycle, Roy already had a lot of knowledge about the technology. His laser torches, used for cutting the rocks in the caves on a daily basis, were many thousands of times more powerful than those of a pocket laser pointer.

  With Raj away on a mission in New York, he called in the help of Stuart, Max and Mandy. Soon they had two computers in the lab communicating via an invisible laser beam without any problems. The data transfer speed was mindboggling; reaching rates of multiple terabits per second instead of the kilobit, megabit or even gigabit transfer rates achieved with conventional cables or wireless connections.

  Roy and his three teammates took the experiments outside the caves for testing. Their primary objective was to establish a link between the Rabbit Hole and Mount Ararat. They tested the link up to three miles, and it worked correctly as long as they had line of sight. They studied the topographical maps and found that they would require a few relay devices to overcome the obstructions between the Rabbit Hole and Mount Ararat.

  While they were busy discussing the design of the relay devices Roy said, “Wait, I think I might have an idea that could make things a bit easier for us. How about we build the relay into a mini drone that we can send up high enough to have a line of sight directly to Mount Ararat?”

  “Excellent idea!” Mandy blurted. “That could work very well. But how long will the drone be able to stay in the air?”

  Roy explained that with the same battery technology he was using in the zingers and spyflies, the drones would be able to stay up in the air for months. The batteries would be charged by as little as one hour of sunlight a day, which would be enough to keep it flying for more than five days.

  While Roy got busy with building the drone, the rest of them settled down to make the relay device. This method of communication was secure because the signal was sent in a narrow beam and straight line, which could only be intercepted by a receiver that had to be in the path of the beam. In addition, the receiver had to be able to ‘understand’ and interpret the embedded message.

  Five days later they were ready for another test. They had two laptops fitted with laser transceivers, and a drone equipped with a relay device and a three foot wingspan. They checked the communications between the laptops three miles apart with no line of sight between them, using the drone to relay the beams, and it worked out exactly as they had planned. It was time to demonstrate this to the Steering Committee before they would deploy it between Mount Ararat and the Rabbit Hole.

  The next morning, Roy and his team demonstrated their latest invention to the Steering Committee, who were blown away when they saw the messages coming through on the computer screen in front of them. Stuart, who was sending the messages was sitting more than three miles away, behind a hill.

  As they walked back to the caves, Daniel wanted to know what the chances were that this network could be expanded to cover a much wider area.

  “How far and wide do you want to go?” Roy asked.

  Daniel was joking when he said, “I am thinking all of America to start with and then the rest of the world.”

  Roy was in invention mode and took it seriously. “I already thought about that and it is not impossible, I reckon. We only have to get our own satellite up. To build a satellite is straightforward. Amateurs and scientists have done it for many years. I could build one for us in a few days. The problem would be how to get our satellite into space. For that, we would have to hitch a ride with one of those companies that launch rockets for the purpose. But then, for some reason, I suspect John Brideaux won’t approve our application.”

  Salome just smiled at Roy’s wit, something he had been displaying quite often lately. She liked it.

  The demonstration had stimulated everyone’s thinking and there were many questions and ideas. Roy stopped and looked at Daniel for a while and said, "You know, I think there might be a way around that problem."

  Everyone had stopped and was waiting for him to elaborate. He mumbled a few words to himself for a little while and then said, "If we could build a high-altitude balloon, it could be used to transport a drone into near space, about twenty miles up. With a few drones sitting at that height, we could cover all of America without a doubt."

  The group looked at Roy in disbelief for a moment, wondering if he had a bump to the head recently. Then they remembered what he had just demonstrated to them, and most of them had firsthand experience with some of his brilliant inventions. If he told them it was possible, then it was worth listening to him. They knew that when Roy James set his mind on something, he s
eldom failed.

  Daniel spoke for everyone when he said, "Roy, you just tell us what you need, and we will do it, or get it for you. If you could pull that off it would be a giant leap forward in our battle."

  "Thanks, Daniel. I’m on it right away. I'll let you know when I need help," Roy said absent-mindedly as his brain was already in overdrive.

  The rat race is over for me

  Peter Scott, a glass of whiskey and soda in his hand, was looking around the room of nearly fifty ‘friends’, celebrating his thirty-eighth birthday. There was a battle raging in his mind that had been raging for months now. He barely noticed the attractive girl next to him trying to get his attention.

  There were always beautiful young women trying to get his attention. He knew it was not about him; he didn’t have the looks of a hunk with a six-pack on the cover of glossy magazines, and he knew that. It was just that rich, single men, irrespective of their age, looks, or personality, were always the targets of ambitious and opportunistic women –gold-diggers – as he liked to call them.

  He’d made a fortune on Wall Street in the last five years and had been living the Manhattan high-flyer lifestyle. However, in the last eight months he’d often find himself questioning his life and its purpose. The challenges and excitement of making it big on Wall Street were not there anymore. It was as if he had lost the drive and flair for that type of life.

  Tonight those thoughts were stronger and more demanding than ever. Is this what you want to do for the next twenty years of your life? How many of these friends would you still have if you lost everything? What else do you want to prove to yourself and the world? What do you have to show after nearly forty years of life other than your Ferrari and the skyscraper apartment? Yes, millions in cash, property and stocks, but a marriage that didn’t last eighteen months, countless broken relationships, no family, and no real friends? When was the last time you were truly happy, Peter Scott?