The Skywalkers: A Thriller (A Rossler Foundation Mystery Book 5)

by JC Ryan

  Raj was nodding the entire time, already ahead of her it seemed. “So what you have in mind is tracking the movements of the wealthiest men in the world and see if they are together or at least in touch.”

  “And women. Don’t forget the most ruthless member of the Orion Society was a woman.”

  Raj nodded fervently, “I’ll never forget. So you think there could be something like that? A bunch of people who are determined to control all wealth, for their own purposes?”

  “Isn’t it always? Behind every total take-over ideology is either religious extremism or greed. And often both. What do you think? Is there a way to detect this type of behavior?”

  Raj answered confidently. “There’s always a way. It may not be strictly legal.”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  “We need access to their phone records, email, even GPS data from their cell phones. That way, we can see if there’s a link between their movements and changes in companies such a group might be interested in controlling. Say, energy, financial, pharmaceuticals maybe. Definitely communications.”

  “How would you get that?”

  “Better you do not know,” he answered. And then in a comical parody of an SS officer, he leered and said, “Ve haf our vays.” Regaining his serious demeanor, he asked if she had specific individuals in mind, or parameters he could use to build a profile.

  “I have a few names, but let’s go for parameters. That way, no one slips through the cracks. But Raj, we need a proactive system. Once they gain control of a company, we’d be hard-put to rewind. We need early warning if something is afoot behind the scenes.”

  “I know. What I am thinking is something like a virtual spider web. The way they are staying under the radar is by making small, slow, careful moves. I will build a net fine enough that any move at all will tug on the web. You will know something is going on long before it is complete. Even transactions happening in the background and without the notice of the markets will cause a ripple in the web.”

  “That’s what we’ll call it, then. The Spider Web. And Raj?”

  He alerted, tilting his head to indicate he was listening.

  “Don’t get caught.”

  ***

  Far sooner than she expected, Raj was back to show Salome what he’d built. If she hadn’t known better, she’d have suspected he was already working on it before they talked. With a few tweaks it was perfect for her purposes, and she embarrassed Raj with her praise.

  She wasted no time in setting it to collect data on some of the companies she’d long suspected were being controlled by a hidden agenda. It took days for the data to come in, and when it was complete it was massive. But as soon as she started analyzing and looking at the reports, Salome picked up a number of suspicious-looking anomalies. Among the most alarming was her discovery that literally all satellite communications, internet service providers and telephone companies were in the hands of a handful of companies, each owning 15% to 25%.

  As she dug a bit further and looked at the personal data of some of the CEOs of those companies, and then even further into some of the larger shareholders, it became obvious that what she’d suspected was true.

  There were many puppet CEOs, and many wealthy and powerful shareholders hidden behind other companies owned by yet other companies. Prominent among them were the names of some well-known people; industrialists, old money, politicians; even the current president hiding about five levels deep.

  Salome made a mental note to let Daniel know this president was no Nigel Harper. Of course, not many were the man Nigel Harper was. It wasn’t surprising the incumbent might have shady things going on.

  As she kept on digging into the personal and social interaction of some of those who seemed to have their fingers in the most pies, she learned that many of them, the so-called minority shareholders, were old buddies and in each other’s company regularly. A few retrospective queries of the new databases compared to the history of share movement revealed a few strange bedfellows. Nothing that could land any of them in jail, but the big picture was certainly cause for serious concern.

  Over the next few weeks Salome built a terrifying picture. Pharmaceutical and health companies, communications through all media (TV, newspapers, internet, telephones), energy where Tenth Cycle technology hadn’t yet arrived, transport including airlines, shipping, rail and road transport, along with military contractors, big agro and big pharma, and technology companies; all were controlled by a handful of companies whose names showed up over and over. They were always in a minority shareholder position individually, but as a group the controlling interest was overwhelming.

  Before she’d even finished the thought, Salome answered her own question as to the regulatory agencies. The SEC was headed by POTUS’s crony. The UK had shut down their regulatory agency in the wake of the sub-prime mortgage debacle of the first decade of the century and replaced it with the Central Bank. That was a case of the fox guarding the hens if she’d ever seen one. The answer was the regulatory agencies were either blind or complicit.

  The biggest problem was going to be how to identify the real people behind those companies. She had some names already but she suspected those were set up to take the fall if whatever the real powers were up to became known prematurely. It was going to take more time and effort to get to the bottom of it and to put tabs on all of them.

  Her predecessor in the Foundation, Luke Clarke, was supposedly retired. Indeed, his wife, Sally, became irate if he so much as telephoned her. But because of his position in the family and his years of experience in the security game, Salome thought it was worth the risk of alienating Sally to get Luke’s take on what she’d discovered. It was time to take her findings to him, or rather, ask him to come in and take a look.

  Chapter 4 - There is no stopping this

  Daniel Rossler was at his desk as usual, in the physical plane. His mind, however, was far afield. When had the dream discovery of a lifetime become so unsatisfying? Outside his open office door, employees walked back and forth, going about their business. Momentous discoveries had been made in the Tenth Cycle library, and there were plenty more to be made, Raj assured him. The portion of data that had been translated was a tiny fraction of what was there.

  It had even been more or less peaceful since the threat of mass annihilation from a rogue Middle Eastern cabal had been narrowly averted by the brilliant and untiring work of their own Roy James, now on permanent loan to the Rossler Foundation from CalTech. After the first few tumultuous years since breaking the Pyramid code, a couple of years' peace and tranquility was just what they all needed. And yet, Daniel couldn't help feeling that something was amiss.

  Daniel remembered the world before 9/11, even though he’d still been young. It had changed so much since then; now it was a world with so much uncertainty, violence and death, not to mention corruption and unhappiness. He couldn’t help but feel that people were a lot happier before 9/11 than now. Except for the fact that his family, Sarah and little Nick, had come along after 9/11, he certainly had been happier in those simpler times. That attack had shaken his sense of security along with almost everyone else’s.

  It was true that technological advances had shaped the world in the last two decades. Though it was true the average person’s life on that front had become better. But the scary thing was it seemed humanity was not adapting well to these technological advances. Especially in the realm of communication, people had been saying for years that technology was causing so many social issues.

  People could not communicate properly anymore. The art of socialization, good manners and caring about fellow human beings had all but disappeared. Political correctness had become the norm to the point where everybody exercised their ‘rights’ without consideration for anyone else’s. No longer did the masses recognize the concept that one person’s rights ended when they impinged harmfully on someone else’s. One person might exercise his right of free speech despite it being hate-fille
d - and don’t you dare stop them or say anything about it – while another was shouted down for calling that to the attention of the crowd.

  People did not lie anymore they only “misremembered” or “misspoke”. They did not get fired they got “dehired”, or “downsized”. It had reached the point of the sublime ridiculous. Manholes had to be called “maintenance holes” because it would be sexist to call it a manhole. No one knew what the word du jour was for a person of color, because it changed so often, and yet most people never stopped to consider that there was no need to express a difference based on skin color. Why not just say ‘that man’? Why did his color or ethnicity have to be called out?

  Worse yet, people would get depressed and aggressive if they were not connected to the internet and in touch with friends and family 100% of the time. Studies showed that the majority would give up sleep, sex, money and food in exchange for being connected.

  And yet, the internet, the media with the most potential for honest news and understanding of the world, had become one large scam or a place to watch funny videos that showed the same animal behavior for the entertainment of the masses. Historians warned that it was becoming the ‘bread and circuses’ that brought down the Roman Empire. But no one remembered their history, so the warnings fell on deaf ears.

  Daniel’s inner dialog had turned to these thoughts and similar ones more and more often, but he kept them to himself. They were depressing and worrying, but he didn’t want them to infect his loved ones, or for that matter, his Foundation. He didn’t know what the answer was, but he remembered the warning that came with the Tenth Cycle library. Indeed, he could hardly forget, because Sarah wouldn’t allow him to. Maybe the library contained some wisdom that could be useful. He was mulling over hiring more translators to work through the library more quickly. Maybe a dedicated team to look for political and social information from the Tenth Cycle.

  However, a welcome diversion in the person of Sarah's uncle, Luke, interrupted those thoughts.

  "Luke, what a pleasant surprise. To what do we owe the honor?" After the Sword of Cyrus crisis, Luke’s wife Sally had put her foot down and insisted he retire, again, and this time for keeps. It had been a convenient time, since Salome, the FBI profiler, who'd been seconded to the Rossler Foundation during that crisis had fallen in love with Roy James.

  Luke and Daniel together had persuaded her to leave the FBI and take Luke's vacated position. One of the last favors to the Foundation that Nigel Harper effected was to have the FBI permanently loan her to them, continue to pay her salary and afford her all the privileges as well as the duties of a special agent. Her brief was to see to it that the Tenth Cycle library didn’t fall into the wrong hands. Of course, Roy's presence may have had something to do with it.

  "Salome has been asking me to come in and look at some data she's prepared," Luke said. "Thought I'd stop in and say hi, before meeting her in her office."

  "Glad you did. Can you stay for dinner, after?"

  "Not tonight, sorry. Sally's expecting me home. I'd take a rain check."

  "Ok I'll have Sarah get with her to arrange a date that is suitable, and we might as well make it a party, get Ryan and Emma to join us. Sarah loves any occasion to get us all together, you know. And Nick will be in seventh heaven – his grandma and Aunt Sally spoil him rotten."

  "Sounds good. Anything exciting on the horizon?" Luke, retired though he was, still had plenty of interest in anything controversial coming out of the Foundation's research projects.

  "Not really. It's getting to be downright boring around here."

  "Careful what you wish for, Daniel. Careful what you wish for."

  Only an hour later, Daniel took a call from one of the Foundation's most generous supporters and trusted associate, John Brideaux.

  "John, good to hear from you. It's been too long, my friend."

  "Indeed it has, Daniel. And I hate to be calling just to ask a favor, after all this time, but as you know..."

  "You're a busy man, of course. What can we do for you?"

  "I have a friend, a gentleman who is well qualified, I assure you, who'd like to have a look around the data in your marvelous library, if that can be arranged."

  "I'm sure it can. What's he looking for?"

  "Well," said Brideaux, "That's a bit hard to explain. If you don't mind, I'd like him to explain it to your archivist, and if it's something that would interest you, I'm sure your man could explain it better to you."

  "Fair enough. I assume you mean Raj, our data specialist."

  "He'll do nicely," Brideaux answered. He said nothing about Raj's background, or indeed the fact that he knew almost everything there was to know about it. However, a man whose main goal in life was to prove that the US government had been covering up an alien landing on earth would be the perfect person to help locate any references to ancient flying machines, whether they were of earth origin or beyond. Brideaux had reason to believe that Raj would be easily persuaded to keep the project low key, as well. They'd have to trust one other person, a translator, but that would be easy enough with the right leverage.

  "Who's your friend, if I may ask?"

  "Dr. Stephen Matthews. Retired from University of Michigan a few years back. He's..."

  "A bit of a crackpot." Daniel smiled, and the teasing tone carried through the phone.

  "Quite, but he has made some surprising discoveries."

  "Oh, he's welcome to do some searching. I'm not sure what he'll find that's relevant to his field, but Sarah will enjoy talking with him, I'm sure. And Raj is a bit of a crackpot himself, so the two of them ought to get along."

  "Splendid," said Brideaux. "I'll send him over. And Daniel, thank you."

  "John, after what you've done for us, I could hardly deny you such a small favor. We're glad to have him."

  Salome greeted Luke with pleasure in his former office. The two respected each other as colleagues at the top of their respective professions, despite the agency rivalry between their former employers. Her spot-on profile of the man who'd put together the network of spies for the Sword of Cyrus organization had meshed perfectly with his knowledge of international criminals matching it. Together they'd cracked the spy ring in time for Roy's technological breakthroughs to avert the disaster.

  "Luke, thank you for coming here. It would have been extremely delicate to bring all this to you at your home. How are you doing? Did you and Sally enjoy the visit to Ryan and Emma last night?”

  “I guess he told you about it, right?”

  “No, he didn’t tell me. It’s all here in front of me on my computer screen.” Salome watched Luke as she dropped this bombshell.

  Satisfyingly, his jaw dropped, and then he frowned. “Salome, you’d better explain that. Are you keeping tabs on me? That’s not okay.”

  “Oh, Luke, don’t worry. That was just my way of driving a point home. This isn’t about you. Let me explain.”

  “Please do.” Luke’s tone was still cool, but he was listening. Her next words set him straight.

  “Can I assume you know about The Prophet, Luke?”

  “Oh, of course! That was your baby, wasn’t it? Sam Lewis filled me in on it. Said you created quite a stir when you walked into the FBI offices with your theory about 9/11.”

  “It wasn’t a theory, Luke. It was all there to be read, by anyone who was paying attention. Problem was, no one was paying attention. And now the problem is there are gaps, and it’s happening again.”

  Luke sat forward, stunned. “Do you mean to tell me there’s another planned attack on American soil?”

  “No, no. At least, not like that. What I mean is, no one’s paying attention to things that matter, just like back then. I’ve pointed this out to the powers that be in the agency, but budgets are tight and they won’t listen.”

  “What do you mean, things that matter?” Luke queried.

  “I’ve suspected for a long time that if we’d been tracking certain people, for example, the wealthy familie
s that made up the Orion Society, or the Sword of Cyrus, we’d have known about their underground associations long before they became a problem. You know as well as I do that wealthy people hide their wealth by acting through shell corporations; companies that own companies that own other companies, with puppet CEOs to hide behind.”

  “Sure. Anyone who watches movies knows that. What’s your point?”

  “Well, to make a long story short, I gave up on trying to get the FBI to enhance The Prophet, and enlisted Raj.” She continued by explaining the changes they’d made, telling him he didn’t want to know when he questioned how they were getting some of the data.

  “The little parlor trick I pulled by telling you what you were doing last night is nothing. I also know you stopped at the grocery store before coming here, and that you made an ATM withdrawal. I’ll give you a demonstration of just how far-reaching it is in a minute, but first, look at these.”

  Salome had gathered and organized her data carefully. Only she could have read the truth in it until she'd organized it. Now she handed Luke chart after chart showing relationships that should not have existed, corporate takeovers that made no sense and other evidence.

  After looking at the first chart, Luke raised his gaze to Salome, one eyebrow raised. "You haven't copied this straight from a fringe lunatic manifesto?"

  "Nope. Verified and traced all the shell corporations myself. Every major bank in the US is owned by a handful of European aristocrats who are all related to each other by birth."

  "Why haven't the antitrust regulations been triggered?"

  "Come on, Luke, you know the answer to that. It takes special access to some deeply-buried information to put it together. Security agencies have it, but they're all busy monitoring for terrorism these days."