Myra slipped on her dark sunglasses and walked straight down the long underground corridor leading to her office. Occasionally frequented by reporters hoping to grasp a single sound bite, this passage was usually off limits during her speeches. This time, because she had needed to depart prematurely from the press conference, the tunnel had not been properly secured from unwanted guests.
Myra detested answering any difficult questions whereby her prepared answers were not completely vetted by her media staff. In addition, she was certainly not ready to answer any questions dealing with Jules Windsor until all the facts regarding his espionage became evident.
With her head down and accompanied by her trusted aid, Kevin, she continued her march down the long, well-lit hallway. Pictures of former New Reality executives adorned the walls and memorabilia from the company’s inception decorated the passageway.
Myra’s heart pounded as she could only imagine the news that awaited her. Once before she had been hastily rushed from a meeting, and the results were catastrophic. Still toiling in the debacle created by her poor decisions during a small rebellion, she could not afford another public relations disaster.
“Sorry that I needed to pull you from the meeting,” Kevin said in a hushed tone, “but the circumstances require immediate attention.”
“This can wait until we get into my office,” she responded without turning or changing any inflection in her voice.
Dressed in a designer black suit and open collared white shirt, her aid walked slightly behind her to the right. He looked back and forth down the hall, ready to divert any media personnel who might accost them. Though much younger than Myra, Kevin adored her and had followed Myra throughout her executive career at The New Reality. Upon her election, she granted him control over the company’s newly formed International Security Agency (ISA).
With frosted black hair combed to the side and a rugged, half shaven complexion, he sometimes attracted just as much attention from the press as she did. Rumors routinely swelled that Myra was having an affair with him. Despite Kevin’s hopes that their affiliation could someday be more than business, Myra considered herself married to her work and sought out little physical companionship from others, and even less from her unfaithful husband.
Kevin stepped ahead of her at the end of the hallway and placed his hand along a barely discernable off-white circle on the wall. Immediately, a door dematerialized. After stepping into an elevator shaft. Myra would not turn until the door once again materialized behind her.
She then took off her sunglasses and looked up at Kevin. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust. After a recent bout with some life-threatening medical issues, she still had trouble focusing. “What the hell has happened now?” Myra asked. “Another one of my former crooked business partners attempting to blackmail me?”
Kevin placed his hands on her shoulders, trying to allay her fears. Although the news would certainly not be positive, he hated to see her upset.
“Tell me,” she insisted. “Am I being indicted again or is there another insurgency against the WOGs somewhere in the world?”
“It’s Jules,” Kevin replied as the door to the elevator dematerialized.
“Jules.” Myra shivered involuntarily. No one else on the planet frightened her more than Jules Windsor. Pleased by the espionage charges levied against him, she knew it would provide an adequate excuse to dispose of the one person who posed a significant risk to her authority over The New Reality. After receiving boxes of incriminatory evidence about him from an anonymous source, she acted immediately.
From the first time they met, she could barely look Jules in the eyes without feeling as if he were sucking her soul from her. His commanding presence, articulate manner, and overall authoritative demeanor made her tense. Plus, his cunning intelligence and manipulative strategies made her feel like a mere novice in comparison.
Myra walked into her office and over to a glass table by the bay window overlooking a vast tree-swept landscape. After grabbing an overturned glass and placing in two ice cubes from a crystal jar next to it, she filled it to the top with one of the many selections of scotch on the table.
Kevin waited patiently until Myra began sipping her drink before providing the bad news. After a few swallows, he led her to the center of the office where a large New Reality insignia laden with gold and diamond lay etched into the marble floor.
“Jules escaped,” he finally said.
Before she had a chance to react, a distorted holographic image of an aero-bike and two people next to it on top of their highly secure Utah NewREMA camp appeared above the insignia.
“We were just able to acquire this visual,” he continued. “The image had been so badly distorted by some sort of cloaking device that this is the best the ISA could produce.”
Myra pointed to the holograph. “Do we know the conspirator?”
“There’s only a small handful of people in the world who could perpetuate such a brazen act,” Kevin answered, “and we have them all closely monitored at all times.”
“But?” Myra interjected.
“But,” Kevin continued, “the ISA was momentarily fooled by the actions of one of them. Let me show you.”
The holograph appeared to quickly reverse in time until just a barely visible lone figure stood next to the aero-bike. The satellite image became even more distorted as it quickly back-tracked to a canyon with a large flowing river running through it.
“Though we could not directly track the aero-bike,” Kevin explained, “the ISA mathematically calculated its flight path through subtle quantum inflections in the space-time continuum. I’m going to take you back now two minutes before we first lost visual contact with the vehicle.”
A holographic image appeared of an aero-bike skidding next to a rocky outcropping and falling encased in a honeycombed cocoon into the river. The image played twice in order to recap the event.
Myra gulped what was left of her scotch. “Alex Pella,” she gasped, remembering all too well his fate during the aero-bike competition earlier in the day. Because Alex had earned celebrity status after helping cure The Disease, the event made immediate international headlines. She turned to Kevin and handed him her glass. Without another word she sat down on one of her lush white leather couches. The news of one of the world’s most formidable minds working in conjunction with Jules Windsor was overwhelming.
Kevin filled the glass once again and refreshed it with another ice cube before handing it to Myra.
“Alex Pella,” she spat. She shook her head and breathed deeply. “So what do we do now?”
“The ISA has been tracking their quantum fluctuations since escaping,” he answered, “and have pinpointed them somewhere in here in the forest of eastern Oregon.”
“Anything more specific?” she asked.
“That’s all we have so far.”
“Where are they going?” Myra asked, slightly relieved that they were not heading eastward towards Georgia.
“We have no clues as to where they are headed nor of their motives. I have all available ISA pulled to deal with this matter.”
Myra sat back on the couch and propped her arm up on one of the pillows. Despite having the entire world’s militarized WOG forces and the ISA working for her, she felt extremely vulnerable. “Were we able to obtain any information from Jules’ interrogation before his escape?”
“Not a thing,” Kevin responded. “The man’s mind is a closed vault. Our pathologist was just about to start a microdissection of his brain when Alex rescued him. However…”
Kevin stood up and walked over to an end table at the other end of the room. Myra did not pay attention as she was momentarily lost in thought, contemplating what Jules and Alex could be plotting.
Returning with the ornately decorated shield Jules received from Albert, Kevin held it up for Myra to view.
She instantly recognized the ancient artifact—she’d seen it once before when Albert Rosenberg introduced her to his massive collection of Greco-Roman antiquity.
“I’m sure you recognize this shield,” Kevin commented. “It was delivered to Jules Winsor just before we captured him. A note was attached, but only microfragments of it could be found.”
“Do you know where it came from?”
“It originated from a delivery service that stored the artifact for three years before delivering it. What’s odd is that two other packages were sent out from that exact spot from the exact same person of interest—one to you and the other to Alex Pella.”
“The espionage documents?”
“You’ve guessed it,” Kevin replied.
“Do you know what the significance of this shield is?” she asked, admiring its magnificent façade.
“No,” Kevin responded. “But what’s even stranger is that when the forensics lab ran a brief analysis on it, the results were more than unexpected.”
“How so?”
“The lab wanted to do further testing on it before making any concrete conclusions,” Kevin went on to say but was interrupted when the holograph in the center of the room instantly transformed into an image of the Arabian Peninsula. The image began to zoom in on a country at the southeastern portion of this landmass.
“Intel has just arrived that our two refugees have landed somewhere in Yemen,” Kevin said, listening to the information stream in from an ISA agent on the auricular microchip implanted in his left ear canal. All further concerns regarding the shield became minor afterthoughts.
She stood up and pointed at the hologram, “They’re going after the Masjid project,” she said alarmed.
“We have confirmed no such thing as of yet,” Kevin responded calmly.
“I don’t care!” she said. “Blow the whole damn site. I want that whole area leveled to the sea floor.”
Myra surmised exactly what they were after and knew immediate, drastic actions needed to be taken.
“But what about the Masjid project?” Kevin questioned, alarmed at her seemingly rash decision.
She glowered at him. “It all means nothing as long as both Alex and Jules are still breathing.”