Present day
Alex closed the door behind her and paused on the pavement outside her apartment. Shutting her eyes for a minute, she breathed in the crisp spring air. She was more than content with life. Having finally moved out of her parents’ home and into her own apartment, Alex felt liberated. And for the first time in her life, she was free to explore the woman of strength she had become. But when Sam declared his love for her, extending their relationship beyond the borders of their friendship, she knew they could no longer work together. Motivated by her strong convictions to keep business separate from their personal lives she left the university’s Archaeology faculty and took on a more senior position with a private antiquities recovery firm in London. It was a bold step outside the safe boundaries the university provided her, but she was ready. Leaving the university sealed her newfound confidence in life and propelled her career into an exhilarating new direction in the private sector. She no longer spent days lecturing or accompanying students on digs unearthing ancient artifacts for European museums. Instead, her days were spent recovering and returning looted or lost artifacts; determining their authenticity and origin. But with it came a new set of perils on her expeditions as she worked closely with local governments and cultural heritage associations across the globe. It was challenging at times but highly rewarding, and she loved it.
Sam had more than proved himself capable and, upon Alex and her father’s personal recommendation, stepped into her Head of Archaeology position at the university. They were happy together, and their relationship reached a depth akin to that of being soul mates.
Alex smiled broadly as she began the short walk to the bus stop.
“Miss Hunt.” A stern male voice spoke behind her. Alex turned to lay eyes on a tall, athletic-built man dressed in a black suit and tie. His eyes were shielded by black sunglasses, and in his left ear, she spotted an earpiece with its cord running down the back of his neck disappearing beneath his collar. He stood beside an open door of a black luxury SUV.
“Miss Hunt, please step inside the vehicle,” the man spoke again, and this time Alex picked up his strong American accent.
“Why? Who are you?” she questioned with trepidation.
“Ma’am, it’s a case of international importance. Please come with me?”
“International importance? What do you mean? Who are you?”
“It will all be explained to you, Miss. Please step inside the vehicle.”
Alex searched the vehicle’s interior, keeping her distance from the open door. Apart from the chauffeur and this man, the car was empty. She discreetly squeezed her elbow against her hip where she carried her firearm. Something Sam insisted she had on her at all times considering the nature of her new job. She wasn’t sure if it was a mere case of curiosity, but when the strange man in black nudged her again to get in, she did.
The red leather seats and a fitted silver tray with a crystal carafe and two whiskey glasses reeked of luxury. The car’s windows were tinted black and remained closed as the suited stranger took his place in the front passenger seat next to the chauffeur. She fiddled with her window’s electronic button to let some air in, but it was locked. This vehicle didn’t belong to her employer. That much she knew. Perhaps it was sent by one of their new clients. She retrieved her mobile phone from her purse with the intention of calling her boss when the man in black suddenly turned to face her.
“Please refrain from using your mobile phone, Miss Hunt. We can’t afford a leak.”
A leak? A leak of what? Who are these people? She thought. Her heart skipped a beat as she put the phone back inside her handbag and peered through the window for the remainder of their ride. When the vehicle pulled up twenty minutes later to a modern gray building in the center of London, Alex was somewhat relieved to see she hadn’t been taken to an obscure warehouse somewhere in the middle of nowhere. Closed circuit cameras surrounded the large black steel gate, and four guards on duty were each armed with semi-automatic rifles. As the car pulled up to the gate, the guards didn’t stop their car or ask for any security clearance. Instead, one of them promptly opened the gate and let them through.
“This way, Miss Hunt,” the man in black ushered Alex through the large glass doors at the front of the building, passing several more armed guards before being stopped at the walk-through metal detector.
“Are you carrying any firearms or weapons?” Another guard asked.
Alex caught her breath as the thought of surrendering her only safety measure sent a shiver down her spine. She considered taking a chance, praying that by some miracle the machine wouldn’t detect her firearm.
“Ma’am, please place your firearm in the basket and proceed through the scanner.”
Her face must have betrayed her intentions to conceal her gun. Irritated, Alex conceded by unclipping her Smith and Wesson 9 mm pistol from her holster. With a now practiced hand, she released the magazine and emptied the chamber into the container on the table. Once through the scanner, a female guard stepped up to her and body-searched her further. With her pistol tagged and locked in a safe behind the table, the man in black beckoned for her to get into a glass elevator. Alex tightened her shaking hands around the handle of her purse in front of her as she watched the digits on the elevator panel climb thirty-five floors. She dared not challenge her fear of heights by looking out the clear window behind her. Her stomach was already in a knot. The secrecy around the motive for her presence gripped her insides. She still had no idea where she was, or what she was doing there. All she knew was that whoever these people were, their security was extensive and they seemed to be American.
When the elevator doors opened, Alex, stepped out into an expansive office surrounded on three sides by clear floor to ceiling glass windows overlooking London. The man in black stayed behind in the elevator, and Alex soon heard the doors close behind her. At the far end, a group of men was seated at a large glass boardroom table. Unsure of the meeting she had been thrust into, she slowly walked to where the small party hung onto every word spoken by a man dressed in an expensive steel-gray three-piece suit; their attention held captive as if under hypnosis. The distinguished man’s ability to command the room was evidence of his authoritative power and influence beyond what she’s ever seen.
“Ah, Miss Hunt, glad you could join us,” the man’s deep voice and heavy American accent cut through her thoughts.
“Allow me to introduce myself. Matthew Fletcher, most people just call me Matt. Please, come in and take a seat.”
Matt pulled out a black leather boardroom chair next to him at the head of the table. As if recited, the remaining men around the table immediately introduced themselves one by one — A scientist, paleoanthropologist, Air Force general, and a Frenchman whose title she couldn’t quite make out.
“Can I offer you something to drink, Miss Hunt?” Matt didn’t wait for her to answer and signaled his assistant to pour her a cup of tea from a fresh pot that stood on a nearby table. Alex didn’t take the seat he pulled out for her. It was evident everyone jumped at his every command, and she needed to make a stand at the onset.
“Mr. Fletcher, I —“
“Matt, please. Everyone just calls me Matt,” he cut her short.
“Ok, Matt, I’m not one to pass my valuable time with insignificant pleasantries, so can you please tell me why I was brought here and who you are exactly?”
Matt’s lips curled into a slight smile over her directness. Then folding his hands on top of the table, he leaned in and adopted a more serious look in his eyes.
“Alex,” he started “May I call you Alex?”
Again he continued without an answer from her.
“We brought you here because we need your help. Now before we continue, I need you to turn off your mobile phone, please?”
At this point, Alex didn’t find anything surrounding the situation strange anymore and, taking her seat, somehow did precisely what he told her to do.
“Welcome to ICCRU, Alex.”
His declaration caught Alex somewhat off guard.
“ICCRU? What business do I have with the International Cultural Crimes Recovery Unit?” she prompted, surprised at how calm her voice was.
“I’m impressed. You’ve heard of us then?”
“I wouldn’t be doing my job properly if I didn’t, Mr. Fletcher.”
“Well, then you would also know that we take our work very seriously and while we are in a similar line of business as you, our powers extend far beyond any private sector recovery firm. We have the authority of the CIA, FBI, MI6, and Interpol behind us, not to mention the UN, Military, Navy, and Air force units of any country we so choose. Let’s just say we’re quite a bit more senior than the small firm you find yourself at”.
The corners of his lips curled up as he paused. Alex didn’t answer. Instead, she took a sip of her tea, praying her internal trembling wouldn’t betray her composed facade.
Matt cleared his throat and continued. “And while our firm has a highly skilled hand-picked and trained task force, and we go to great lengths to avoid involving outside parties in our assignments, we have become aware of your unparalleled reputation. It appears that your unique abilities make you the only candidate equipped and experienced enough to handle this particular crisis we find ourselves in. Now, my team will brief you on your mission, and you will have ICCRU’s full support no matter what, but you should clear your schedule. We deploy in three days.”
Alex placed her empty teacup back on the table and cleared her throat.
“Mr. Fletcher, while I appreciate the weight your establishment carries, and deem myself flattered with your gracious offer, I think you ought to tell me exactly what mission you’re presuming I’d push my paying clients aside for and jump to accept instead. With all due respect, I’m not easily intimidated or impressed by credentials, and frankly, the secrecy under which I was coerced to come here, leaves much to be desired.”
A few of the men around the table fought back the urge to laugh at her audacious statement, fully aware of the fact that no-one ever took the liberty of declining anything Matthew Fletcher set before them.
Equally amused, Matt’s mouth curled into the slightest of smiles as he moved around his chair and positioned himself in front of the large windows to admire the bird’s eye view of the city below. But his amusement soon turned to a stern voice by which he conveyed he wasn’t about to take no for an answer.
“Mark, I think you’d better explain the situation to Miss Hunt before she assumes she has a choice in the matter.”
“Of course, Matt,” the paleoanthropologist immediately responded.
Dr. Mark Davies clicked a small black remote and excitedly took up position next to the projector screen on the wall behind Alex.
“Miss Hunt, meet Homo naledi. The world’s first and only hominin, or in layman’s terms, the closest relation to our current human species.”
Alex watched as the projector flashed an image of an odd looking combination of a modern man merged with a more primitive one across the screen. Though an artist’s rendering, it appeared bizarrely lifelike.
“This remarkable discovery was made in 2013 during a recreational cave exploration just outside Johannesburg, South Africa. It bears a significant historical discovery that completely turns the evolutionary biology on its head. Over 1500 skeletal bones were excavated and now provide conclusive evidence of a unique human species that was, up until now, completely unknown to us. And I’m sure you can see the remarkable resemblance to humans as we are today. In fact, it took two more years to fully excavate, but our tests prove this is by far the closest relation to the human genus found to date. Further analysis shows us that it’s also the youngest species at somewhere between two hundred thousand and three hundred thousand years old. It’s as close to our human ancestral family tree as we can get! And although the thorax is primitive and appears more ape-like than human, its hands, in contrast, are shaped more modern which meant they were well equipped to making basic tools. Now, his feet indicate he walked upright, while his fingers appear to be more curved, a feature only seen in apes that spend most of their time in trees.”
“All right Mark, simmer down.” Matt interrupted before finally taking his seat behind the table and continuing the brief.
“Our doctor here can get a tad carried away with obvious excitement over this, so let me get to the crux of the matter. It’s the most unique human ancestral species found to date. Nothing like it exists anywhere else on the planet and it’s crucial we preserve it at all costs. As Mark alluded to, it pushes the boundaries on evolution as we know it and proves early man to be more similar to what we look and behave like today versus the original hypotheses that we were all ape-man and Neanderthals. And that’s where you come in Alex. You need to find the last piece of the missing link.“