Crimson: The Second in the Trinity Series Novels

by Blade, CG

  “Why didn’t they destroy the evidence Ter?”

  “It looks like they would have gotten trapped underground or possibly killed themselves Petra.”

  “Ter access the latest data recorded.”

  “Yes Petra.”

  What followed was a horrific scene of ‘us vs. them’ with ‘them’ having a huge advantage. Wave after wave of piercer bullets and small handheld globe-like chrome drones were used to strike innocent techs and scientists down. The three people disguised in black suits and ties murdered the employees of the facility like sheep chased down by wolves. The red masks they wore concealing their heads looked very familiar to Petra.

  “Ter those are the same masks we saw on the video in Sweden.”

  “Yes Petra they are the exact same masks.”

  The two taller unknown persons were taking orders from a smaller unknown person who was standing still in the hallway of each floor shooting at angry and scared people who were brave enough to fight back. The smaller person remained calm as his partners did his dirty work for him snapping people’s necks, placing drones in rooms around the facility, and closing the doors behind them.

  “How could they have possibly gotten in here Ter? What about the new cameras, they would have certainly stopped them from entering without a retinal scan or the proper ID?”

  “I do not know Petra.”

  The last stop on their ride of terror was at the Preservation room level as the doors to the elevator opened and they stepped out chasing and gunning down every technician, worker, and secretary that moved. They finished the job doing a room-by-room search and throwing a hand size drone into each one closing the door behind them.

  “Those are explosive devices Ter. Do you recognize them?”

  “No Petra, I do not.”

  After they had finished their unimaginable reign of terror, the two taller assailants stood out of breath, covered in the blood of their victims. Just outside of the elevators the smaller person began stomping their feet, waving their arms around. This person seemed to be shouting at the other two taller ones. The two of them cowered as they continued to take the scolding, for something. Holding a Vidset up to the elevator camera, the doors magically opened and they stepped inside. The camera inside of the elevator showed Petra a new world, a world that was about to be redefined with a Peacemaker, a rope, and a brand new attitude. The three murderers riding the elevator up to the top wiped away their sins with handkerchiefs and chatted nonchalantly to each other. The smaller individual began rubbing their left shoulder with their right hand. Rubbing it hard and flexing their arm. Rotating their arm in circles, the person began making a clenching fist as if the shoulder area was painful or sore. Petra froze as Ter spoke in her head.

  “That sonofabitch, what has he done?”

  “He’s made a deal with the devil Ter and he’s going there to meet her real soon.”

  Chapter 16

  INELUCTABLE

  Friday October 19th 3:46 AM

  The trip to Rayson Industries in the F-35B at its top speed of Mach 1.6 or 1,200 mph was about twenty minutes long as Petra and Ter solemnly discussed the events at the lab. Ter plotted the route as Petra called Ray on her cellphone and told him what had transpired at Meredith and what pieces she had put together already. He explained to Petra that Jackie was safe with him in Washington D.C. and was stricken with ‘morning sickness’. After her phone call to Petra she just couldn’t take being away from Ray any longer without him knowing the truth. She took the Magna-Rail to D.C. shortly after her and Petra had hung up. It was probably the best decision she ever made in her life. Petra could hear Jackie begin weeping uncontrollably in the background. She was screaming over the speaker in the cellphone when Petra gave them the disheartening news. Jackie started smashing things in Ray’s house, wild with anger. Fearing the worst for her and the baby Ray called a doctor who was a close friend of his and who lived nearby. The surgeon quickly ran to his house, looked her over, and told Ray she was in good health. Racked with guilty feelings about leaving the lab and the pain of the loss of all of her friends Jackie passed out—again. This would be a hard pill to swallow when she woke up. Petra asked Ray to meet her at his research and development department with any necessary help or equipment they might need.

  “Petra I am very sorry for your loss. I know you don’t feel but as a member of the human race, I just have to say it. I know Jim and Norman meant a lot to you. They meant the world to Jackie. I just became friends with a lot of them lately. I am truly sorry.” Ray was walking in front of Petra climbing the granite steps that led to Rayson Industries’ lobby door. Rayson Industries headquarters was on North Capitol Street just a stone’s throw away from the White House. It was four-thirty in the morning and a passing shower had left everything soaked. It was a particularly cold October morning. A group of Ray’s most trusted bodyguards and scientists, including Jerry, were huddled around her as she held the dirty box in front of her by the steel handles on its sides. Most of them, armed with weapons at their sides, were rubbing their hands together trying to warm them.

  “Thank you Ray, I appreciate your help and concern. We need to retrieve the bodies from what’s left of the Preservation Room before they decay any further.”

  “I will send a squad of men over there in…“ Ray looked down at his cellphone, “in about two hours and ten minutes Petra.”

  “Thank you Ray.”

  “Now let’s see what’s in that box.”

  ***

  Rayson Industries was the most equipped and modern lab of its kind in the world. In many ways, it rivaled the Med Lab’s abilities on a global scale having several satellite companies and subsidiaries on four continents. Ray went through the former owner’s equipment, kept what he thought was useful, and threw the rest out. There was no way a man of Ray Nelson’s stature was going to, as he put it bluntly, “allow a bunch of fucking Pseudosynths to ruin my reputation, and the company I built with my own blood, sweat, and tears”. While he was involved with the Med Lab over the summer, he coordinated the upgrade of the security system and the thermal imaging at Rayson Industries to ensure this would never happen again.

  “Jerry hand me that small pair of tweezers please.” Ray sitting on a stool was leaning over a three-foot high workbench.

  “Yes sir.”

  Petra stared at Ray’s fingers carefully poking, scraping and cleaning the keypad on the box’s top. The three of them stood safely inside a twenty-by-twenty-foot explosion proof chamber in the testing lab on the fourth floor of the building. Ray and Jerry looked like they were made of glass wearing transparent Kevlar webbing around their bodies and heads over their lab coats. Petra’s armor and face shield encompassed her as they continued to clean the box to examine it.

  “I think we’re ready Petra,” Ray told her, “Jerry why don’t you go, you don’t need to be in here you can watch from the Vidscreen outside.” Ray suggested to him concerned for his safety.

  “If it’s all the same to you sir I’d like to go down with the ship, if she does go down that is.” Jerry smiled at the two of them.

  Ray patted Jerry on the shoulder, “okay Jerry no problem. Do you have a will?”

  “What?” Jerry asked shocked and dismayed by Ray’s question.

  “I am just kidding Jerry ease up.”

  “Oh okay sir.” Jerry said with half a grin trying to laugh but taken back by Ray’s sick sense of humor at a time like this.

  “Ray is kinda funny Petra. I think I like him better than the old Ray.”

  “Yes Ter, I do too.”

  “What’s that Petra?” Ray asked her staring at the box with growing anticipation and curiosity.

  “Oh nothing, are we ready guys?”

  “Yep, do you have the list on you Jerry?”

  Jerry swiped his Vidset a couple of times and instructed his holographic companion “Anna” as he called her to feed him the numbers. These were a set of numbers spit out by an algorithm that had calculated the ten d
igits on the keypad and summed up the probability of a successful ‘opening’ of the box using all of the data fed into it involving events in the year 1980. Anna fed Jerry the output numbers as fast as Ray could punch them in. Ray began to get discouraged at the unsuccessful attempts to open the box as the sequences of the top twenty hits were starting to dwindle.

  “Ray, do you mind if I try?” Petra asked him as he sat on the stool thinking hard with his face in his hands.

  “No be my guest Petra.” he told her as he got up from the stool and turned around stretching his body, trying to clear his mind.

  “Click—ZZZZZZZ—click”

  “Are you kidding me?” Ray exclaimed without even turning around to look at her or the box. He looked at Jerry who looked back at him with a blank stare on his face.

  “I kind of had an idea that they would use this combination with all of the events that have happened so far.”

  Ray turned around and smiled at her with a shit-eating grin. “What was it Petra?”

  “It was three and one.”

  “What?” Ray asked her suspiciously.

  “Yes, the Crimson Alliance, the letters ‘C’ and ‘A’ in the alphabet corresponds with…”

  “—the numbers three and one, got it Petra. Oh for God sakes they weren’t very clever back then were they?” Ray said shaking his head finishing her sentence.

  “No Ray. The most popular password was ‘password’ up until biometrics took over in 2020. Humans were such easy prey back then.”

  The lid of the box now slightly cracked open, Petra detected a very faint heat signature coming from inside of it. “Stand back gentleman I am not sure what is going to happen next.” They responded by turning their heads away from the bright light and shielding their faces with their hands as she tilted the box lid on its two hinges. A red glow cast over her armor and face shield as she opened the box fully. “There’s a tube in here gentleman.” she told them as she cupped it and lifted it out of the red crushed velvet lined box. The glowing crimson emission stayed within the box. Closing the lid with one hand Petra cradled the tube with the other. Identical to a pneumatic tube found at a bank teller drive-thru, the tube was transparent and held together with a spring latch. It had one unique feature; there was a small circuit board inside with wiring. She held the cylindrical tube turning it very slowly examining it closely until she spotted a three-inch wide by two-inch high silver patina covered riveted plaque with symbols. It read:

  “Petra according to my language database those first three sets of symbols on top are distinct Asian languages, Chinese, Japanese, and North Korean, in sequential order of course.”

  “Of course Ter, what does it read?”

  “Crimson Alliance”

  “What does the fourth line read?”

  “It is Japanese. It reads “I am become death the destroyer of your world.”

  Petra stood silent for a moment turning the tube very slowly inspecting the circuit board inside. “Ray we need to put this in ‘the safe’ so I can take this circuit board apart”, she nodded her head towards the explosion proof box in the corner of the room holding the tube in both hands. The intrinsically safe box resembled a transparent stand up safe with two armholes cut out of the front of it.

  “Sure no problem Petra, what’s the writing all about etched on that thing?”

  “You’re going to love this one Ray; it reads ‘Crimson Alliance’ in three different Asian languages. It also reads ‘I am become death the destroyer of—your world.’”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me Petra, the J. Robert Oppenheimer quote from 1945?” Ray was stunned at the revelation. He looked like a ghost as the blood left his face quickly.

  “No I am not kidding, and yes, I think someone was planning something big, for years.”

  Jerry had a look of bewilderment on his face as Petra carried the tube over to the testing area and opened the five-foot high box containing one insulated table for detonating ‘small objects’. She placed the tube on the table and it rocked back and forth slightly on the silver surface. Jerry and Ray both had little beads of sweat forming on their foreheads as they watched Petra shove her hands and arms through the holes in the front of the box. She unlatched the hinged spring handle and opened the tube as Ray and Jerry flinched a little. Removing the circuit board and its contents from the tube, she set the tube back on the table. The circuit board was very simplistic and had two sets of wires soldered to it. Glued to the back of the circuit board were two small one-inch long quarter-inch diameter tubes.

  “These tubes read ‘Energizer AAA’, do you know what these are Ray?”

  Ray burst out in laughter at the question with relief knowing that the three of them were not going to be blown to bits. Jerry who followed Ray’s lead laughing aloud finally catching on to the innocuous joke and situation.

  “What? Petra asked him with a serious stare.

  “Petra those are batteries. You know, to power stuff like toys and remote controls back then.”

  “Oh.” Petra replied with half a grin wondering why this was so hilarious.

  “Petra the circuit board has been powered with these two tiny batteries for ninety-six years! That means that the box is probably a charging unit of some kind keeping the batteries alive.” Ray explained further.

  “These batteries really keep going and going.” Petra added.

  She flipped the board over scraping glue off the small green breadboard with her fingers. The top of a small square black integrated circuit chip module with eight prongs, four on each side soldered into the board read:

  “Petra it reads ‘Made in China—GPS’.”

  “Ray this is a GPS chip, a beacon of some sort, made by the Chinese.”

  Ray peeled his Kevlar body suit off. “Well, this is something Rayson Industries never took into account. The power tubes have been checked and verified for slicing but this, I would have never thought of this. How did a ninety-six year old Chinese GPS beacon activate, remotely disable all of the safety protocols of every vehicle in the nation, and send them colliding together in one spot?” Running his hands through his long peppered hair, he looked forlorn, distressed.

  Petra pulled the circuit board out of the box and handed it to Ray. He took it from her staring at it. She morphed into her dress blues, “I know where to start looking for answers, and there’s going to be hell to pay.”

  Chapter 17

  ACCOUNTABLE

  Friday October 19th 7:37 AM

  “Excuse me for being a little skeptical Captain but this whole story sounds so unbelievable and far-fetched. Are you positive you have this right? The Japanese, the Chinese, the North Koreans? Vice President Connley for God sakes, are you serious?” President Harrison asked angrily staring at Petra as if she had a loose chip. Sitting behind the Resolute desk, he looked up at her standing in front of him in her dress blues with a sadness and regret for the nation written all over his face. Blinking rapidly, he looked like a man who was beaten and left for dead. The thoughts of a million or more of the dead and wounded seemed like they may be lying upon his shoulders. Petra noticed the strong hint of a man’s cologne and deodorant; he probably had not showered or changed his clothes for a couple of days.

  “Yes sir let me show you, would you please lower the Vidscreen?”

  Harrison instructed the Vidscreen to lower. It came down behind his desk and Petra inserted a small crystal microchip into the side of it. He turned in his chair and eased backwards so he could see the massive screen in its entirety.

  “Play Blade Drive file October 19th, 12:01 a.m.”

  The file narrator repeated her words back to her in a vocalization and tone remarkably similar to Ter’s voice. “Playing Blade Drive file October 19th, 12:01 a.m. Captain Dace.”

  What unfolded in front of President Roger Harrison’s green eyes was unimaginable to any compassionate human being as he locked his fingers together tight and pressed them to his lips. Petra watched him as his eyes began to well up.
The entire video was twenty-seven and a half minutes long. It went black after the elevator reached the top and the red masked executioners exited through the back of the General Store. Harrison sat in his black leather chair with his hands covering his face, silent.

  “Sir, would you like some time alone?” Petra asked him holding her cap under her arm, cobalt hair swirled up on her head in a loose bun.

  “No,” he said sorrowfully, “how did they get into the lab Captain, I assumed they had security measures in place?” he asked tightly pressing his lips together. There was visible anger on his face.

  “Yes sir, the thermal camera system is only good for detecting a Pseudosynth’s heat signature. This is only conjecture but I believe the smaller man, Vice President Connley, used a retinal slice program to outsmart the core program. He may have even had a snapshot of someone’s eye, perhaps Jackie’s while he was alone with her here the day we viewed the Crimson video.”

  “Why Captain, why? I don’t understand any of it!” He pounded his fist on the desk and rattled the items on top of it. He stared at Petra for a minute with a look on his face. She had seen that look before and its name was vengeance. The door to the oval office opened shortly afterward and President Harrison’s wife quickly entered the room with two secret service agents carrying handguns behind her scanning the room for intruders.