Project Phoenix

by D. C. Fergerson

  Richard never lied to her before. He promised by the end of today, she would see twenty-two million credits in her account. She would retire her position as an International Law Consultant with full pension from the NSA and be free to do anything she could dream of. It wouldn’t be long now.

  Dare to Dream

  2058 marked several auspicious occasions - it was both the year that magic returned to the world and the year Cora Blake was born. Hers was the first generation of children born in a world of magic since the Second Awakening ended back in 1325. At least, that was how the dragons had explained it. Cora grew up on long car trips with her father across the Demilitarized Zone that separated the United Northern States and the Native Free Lands. She witnessed her father’s magic several times in those formative years.

  She grew to be more like him every day back then. Her skin was sandy tan kissed with red, and her hair black as night. She was only ten when he died, and far too young to understand why no one would talk about it, or why her mother and her uncle fought with each other so loud. Pulled from the Sioux tribal lands in the Wyoming mountains, her mother insisted on taking her back to Chicago to live a normal life. Many children looked different there, but not like her. For all the dwarven children, the trolls, and even a few elves, not a single Native American child attended the private school besides her. When her magical abilities took hold after puberty, the rift between her classmates only increased.

  On the thirty-second floor of her hotel overlooking Bebelplatz in the Mitte district of Berlin, far from the United Northern States, she was no longer an outsider. Quite the opposite, every organization involved in covert operations across the globe coveted magical adepts like Cora. Richard plucked her from her sophomore year at Harvard Law School, with promises to hone her natural abilities in exchange for a year of service to her country. The unimaginable wealth was an added bonus.

  The whole floor had been theirs for over a month, the final leg of a long journey. She sat in the white-walled conference room, at a long wooden table meant for many more than the five members of her team. She tapped her foot, awaiting Richard’s arrival. Drake sat across from her, his scruffy face hidden behind numerous holographic screens. He typed away, the sound of his fingers tapping on the wooden table as he typed away on his holographic keyboard. He stopped only to swipe at the images projected in the air.

  The door clicked open. Cora started to stand up for Richard, but Doctor Nielsen and Giovanna came in together instead. In the time it took Cora to strip down that sweaty, skin-tight Apex Camouflage and slide into a pair of black jeans and a t-shirt, Giovanna had managed to change into a black evening dress, do her makeup, and see the doctor about her ribs. She made beauty a mundane routine, like fixing her morning coffee.

  “I need to raid your closet sometime,” Cora said.

  Giovanna sat down in the leather chair beside her and nodded. “You’re right. You really need to, patatina.”

  Cora scoffed. Giovanna cocked an eyebrow.

  “What? I could dress up if I wanted to. This is just my style,” Cora said.

  “That style was retro in the 2040’s,” Giovanna replied. “Now you just look homeless.”

  “We can’t all be perfect-tens, Gia,” Drake said. His eyes remained buried in his screens.

  Doctor Nielsen sat down beside Drake and shook his head. The white-haired man was much too old and cantankerous to engage in the playful ribbing the rest of the team used to blow off steam.

  “All I said was I like your clothes,” Cora said, incredulous. “Now I’ve got you telling me I have terrible fashion sense and this heap telling me I’m less than a ten!”

  Giovanna raised a hand in defense. “I didn’t insult your fashion sense. I said you had none. That, I can fix.”

  Cora opened her mouth to jab back, but the door opened. The room went silent, even from the tapping of Drake’s fingers against the table. When Richard entered a room, he demanded notice. Although in his fifties, he grew more attractive by the year. Streaks of silver peeked along the sides of his dark, close-cut hair. His crisp suits and rigid military posture paired well with his commanding presence and confidence. He said nothing as he took his place at the head of the table. He stood over his chair, taking his time to look each member of his team in the eye.

  “Damn fine job,” he said. “No camera records, pursuits, no comm traffic. You all made this look like a milk run.”

  Cora smiled. Through two years of rigorous training, for every instructor the NSA made her study with, there was always Richard. The second her training was complete, he added her to his team for their current project. While she was relieved to know this chapter of her life was coming to end, his praise never failed to make her happy.

  “This is it,” Richard continued. “Today, we part ways. It’s been a long time in the coming for myself and Giovanna, but the rest of you have put a year into this project. Now, I get to tell you what it was all for. Every one of you carries a piece of the puzzle, and I’m going to put it all together.”

  “No more gag orders on talking to each other about our missions?” Drake asked, sarcasm in his voice.

  Richard lifted his arm and pulled back his sleeve from his wrist. With the swipe of a finger across his silver bracelet, a holographic screen hovered above the back his hand. He pushed at it with his fingertips, projecting an image across the large wall behind Drake and Doctor Nielsen. They spun their chairs around to observe.

  Cora checked out the photograph on the wall. She had seen the dragon Lucius many times before, on GNN and other media outlets. Like most of the dragons, he shape-shifted to approximate a human form for his dealings on television, and Lucius was the most striking of his brothers and sisters. Long, flowing silver hair draped over his shoulders and down his back, framing his square jaw. His business suits screamed British opulence, but his eyes grabbed her more than anything. Irises glowed orange like the setting sun and held the intelligence of three thousand years.

  “As I’m sure you all know, this is Lucius,” Richard said, approaching the wall. “CEO of Tetriarch Industries, head of the Dragon Conclave, and the unofficial leader of Germany.”

  “Voted ‘Sexiest Man Alive’ on NeuralNet six times in the past decade,” Drake snickered.

  Richard glared at Drake until he conveyed the message to shut up. He continued, “Four years ago, he began using his accumulated wealth to advance the preservation of history. His massive donations to museums around the world seemed like altruism at first. Three years ago, he made large endowments to the Smithsonian and the American Museum of Natural History.”

  Richard pressed a button on his screen and the image on the wall shifted to NeuralNet articles on the dragon’s charitable donations to art and history museums worldwide. Laid out in a grid, fifty different stories moved and shifted with the video content playing on each of them. Another swipe of Richard’s hand and the grid was replaced by a droll, bearded man in a suit. The rotund man looked to be of German descent, and the photo looked like a headshot for a boring nonfiction book.

  “This is Doctor Rory Toller, a professor of antiquity and one of the research and development heads for the Tetriarch branch in Munich. Three years ago, he approached the NSA, tipping us off that Tetriarch had undisclosed archeological digs going on around the world. He also told us to look into the access his donations were buying him at these museums.”

  Cora nodded. “He’s looking for something.”

  “Exactly our conclusion,” Richard pointed to Cora. “We needed to gather proof. The dragons pride themselves on being above reproach. Around the same time this unit formed, the Italian government became suspicious. Lucius’ repeated attempts to buy his way into the Vatican led them to send Giovanna to our merry squad.”

  “No offense,” Doctor Nielsen said, clearing his throat. “But why send her at all? Couldn’t they investigate the situation themselves?”

  Giovanna leaned into the table. “Italy cannot afford to change their position a
s an ally and supporter of Lucius. Turn your back to Tetriarch, you lose Germany. Without the most powerful seat in the EU, we would have no allies at all. At least, not until a pro-Lucius regime replaces the current administration.”

  Cora let the information sink in, adding to what she already knew. The National Museum in Prague was her first mission after leaving training. She recalled it as a field test, and assumed Richard was assessing her skills in the real world. She couldn’t imagine what the NSA needed with shipping and inventory manifests from a museum in Europe. By the third infiltration, she started wondering if the NSA hired her as a prospective jewel thief.

  Richard put a picture of the museum in Prague on the wall. “Since our first mission, we have selectively targeted museums with particularly large donations and seized their shipping and inventory records. From Prague to Paris, there were no signs of anything out of the ordinary. Lucius visited, of course, but the shipping records didn’t show him making any demands. He wasn’t removing anything from them.”

  “Then I came in,” Drake interjected. “This is the part where you all bow down and thank me for your upcoming paychecks.”

  Richard lips curled down at the corners, staring at Drake. He shifted uneasy in his seat.

  “Sorry, boss,” he said, dropping his head. “I get a little full of myself sometimes. Go on.”

  Richard took a step closer and leaned his shoulder into the wall beside the changing image on the screen. Upon a hilltop of lush green sat a building that looked like the product of a castle and a crazy hermit’s mansion. The roof appeared scaled like a fish, colored from bottom to top in a slate gray.

  “Oslo,” Richard sighed. “I hate to admit it in front of him, but Drake’s right. Our own guys back home were poring over the data, and they missed what Drake found.”

  Cora arched her eyebrow and turned her gaze to the team’s hacker. Chubby and covered in disheveled hair, Drake looked like the textbook definition of the word clammy. Other than security cameras and guard gates, she knew a paltry amount of the skill he brought to the team.

  “Don’t act so surprised,” he said. He lifted his head over the holographic screens surrounding him. “I told you I was a genius.”

  Cora smirked back. “You also referred to yourself as the most important member of the team. The ‘heart and brains’ of this project, if I recall correctly.”

  “Drake wrote an artificial intelligence algorithm that found the common thread between these museum visits,” Richard said.

  Drake scratched at the scruffy, oily hair on his cheek. With a raised finger, he said, “That’s an oversimplification. What I created was a fractal algorithm for Stella to use to sift data. She calculated over a hundred variables to find any pattern in the shipping records at the three locations - from buyers and sellers to inventory, patrons, and former owners.”

  “What you found is what brought us to Berlin,” Giovanna replied. “Except this was an office building, not a museum. So, why were we here?”

  “The pattern they shared was in an initiative set up by Lucius,” Richard said.

  With a push of a button on Richard’s wrist computer, the screen changed to three objects. The first was an ancient axe, worn and beaten, sitting in a glass case in Oslo. The second featured a gold ring that coiled around the finger, with snake heads at both ends. The last was a trio of simple stone-cutting tools in a worn leather satchel. Beneath the images, red lines were drawn to two words at the bottom - Project Ashes.

  “Only these three items were flagged by the three museums, at Lucius’ request, using the keyword ‘Project Ashes’,” Richard said. “It took some digging to determine what that even was. We had to leak the name of the project to GNN reporters and have them do the digging for us. The official word from Tetriarch is that the project is for a planned speaking tour in September 2084 where Lucius will talk about his experiences during these periods of history.”

  “That story didn’t add up,” Drake said, facing the team. “The stonecutter’s tools are dated 15th century. Lucius and the rest of his brood were already in hibernation. So, we switched gears and looked at what these museums were doing once they flagged the items. What I found is that he is having the museum track and report the whereabouts of these objects in real time, like if they should go on display elsewhere. That information is being sent to a data hub here in Berlin, and that’s why we hit it today.”

  Giovanna arched her back. She winced and jerked forward, clutching her side. “Ouch. So, do we know what Project Ashes really is, now?”

  “Yes,” Richard nodded. “It’s a list that’s being carefully curated. Today’s location is responsible for it. It’s a data collection facility, where over two hundred museum’s collections are being sorted.”

  “What criteria they’re being sorted against is anyone’s guess,” Drake added, saying, “But we now know that once they hit the Project Ashes list, the data is sent to one of two satellite locations outside of Berlin. The rest of data is biometrically encrypted. That means only the top men in Tetriarch can open it, and only if they’re physically present.”

  Cora raised her hand. Richard lifted his chin to her.

  “I think it’s safe to assume our informant is the key, or we wouldn’t be so happy right now,” she said. “The part I don’t understand is why this would be the end for us. Won’t our next target be the satellite locations?”

  Richard stared at her in silence, letting her question hang in the air. His mouth turned to one side of his face, his tell when he was biting his tongue. He glanced over to Drake and motioned him to answer the question.

  “It’s above our pay grade,” Drake said.

  “What?” Cora and Giovanna said in unison.

  Drake shook his head. “Yeah, about that. NSA has other teams stateside mirroring our work. They acquired the shipping records for New York and Washington. We ran it through Stella, and she flagged twenty-two objects for Project Ashes. So, suits in Washington have decided they’re going in guns blazing. They want to send a message to Lucius to stay off UNS soil.”

  “A raid?” Cora said with a gasp.

  “I’ll be ‘consulting’ for the strike team when they go in,” Richard replied, his voice grim.

  Giovanna sat back in her chair, shaking her head in disgust.

  Richard bowed his head to the Italian beauty. “You will be first in line on the information stream, Gia. I’ve had assurances made that UNS understands the value of having Italy beside us in this. If it’s big enough, this might go to the UN. The Dragon Council might even need to be involved. If Lucius is up to something big, the other dragons are going to want to save face by distancing themselves from him.”

  “This is what happens when you work with Americans,” Giovanna huffed, disgusted. Her face turned red, shouting, “Two years, Richard! We’ve been a surgeon’s scalpel! Now they’re going to go in with hammers!”

  “This is bullshit,” Cora said. “I was fine with an early retirement, but they’re sidelining us so they go bang down doors in a foreign country? Are they insane? Did these guys learn nothing from the Second Civil War?”

  Richard scoffed. He spoke little of his past, but Cora knew he was active during the war. “Learn anything? Hell, Cora, half the guys in Washington were there when the smoke cleared. There’s no learning going on. These were old, rich men before the country split in four, and they’re still old and rich.”

  “Richard tried, I tried,” Drake said. He shrugged and let out a huff. “No one was listening.”

  Cora squirmed around in her seat, trying to make sense of the situation. “I don’t even get this. I’m an adept. You’re a hacker. How are we even going home with this going on? Aren’t we assets too valuable to lose?”

  “Retirement, ha,” Drake mock-laughed. “You and the Doc are the only ones getting that, sister. I’ve been offered a new gig. Hawaii. A desk job in paradise. Another way of saying I’m on standby. You’ll probably be back in the states, right? So you’re on standb
y, too. You just don’t know it until they’re knocking on your door.”

  Cora spun her head to Richard, her Irish temper flaming from her Native sienna eyes. His mouth pulled to the side again.

  “We’ll discuss things once the debrief is over,” Richard said.

  “That’s for damn sure,” Cora replied, crossing her arms.

  Richard’s eyes stayed on Cora. Whether it was concern or sorrow, Cora couldn’t tell. She was too mad at the possibility he lied to her. With all the wealth and freedom he promised, the only thing the NSA could offer to keep her playing for their side was at the end of a gun.

  “What comes next?” Doctor Nielsen said. “My whole lab is packed. I had to dig through a suitcase just to find a stitch-patch for Giovanna’s ribs.”

  Richard shook his head. “No, I meant what I said. You’re going home. All of you. Money is being wired as we speak, and your release paperwork is soon to follow.”

  Richard huffed as he surveyed the room. He picked himself off the wall and held his arms out. “Why do all of you look like we just came back from a funeral? Our mission is complete. We’re going to dinner at a small place in Marzahn. Doctor Toller will join us there, provide the encryption key and leave. After dinner, everyone gets in a taxi for the airport. That’s it. Really, we’re done.”

  Silence and tension clung to the room like a stench. The sterile white walls didn’t even want to be there. Cora didn’t want to be there, either, but not as much as she wanted everyone else to leave.

  Richard shook his head and sighed. “Dismissed. The car is waiting for us downstairs. We have bellhops by the elevator door to help everyone move the last of your stuff out.”

  “Time for a steak dinner and a night of holo-porn on the plane ride,” Drake said, swiping and shifting his screens until he folded them into his keyboard.

  Giovanna was the first to leave, rattling off curses in Italian under her breath as she left. Doctor Nielsen followed. With a grunt, Drake rose from his seat and picked up his computer rig from beside the table. The thin, rectangular black box came up to his hip, covered in stickers of the shitty Electronica bands he listened to. He set it on the conference table and placed his keyboard into a slot on its side. With the push of a button, the lights, screens, and medical monitoring panels shut down. He released a hidden leather strap from a compartment on the rig and slung it over his shoulder. A quick nod to Richard and Drake hurried out of the room.