Krystal Scent (Krystal Vibration Series Book 2) Page 21

  Pledge, O Sister

  Covenant, O Sister, live and fight to make their women widows and their children orphans.

  Covenant, O Sister, live and fight to make them desire death and hate appointments and prestige.

  Covenant, O Sister, live and fight to slaughter them like lambs and let the Nile, al-Asi, and Euphrates rivers flow with their blood.

  In the name of Allah, the merciful and compassionate PRESENTATION

  To those champions who avowed the truth day and night throughout their Islamic lives. And wrote with their blood and sufferings these phrases of condemnation.

  The confrontation that we are calling for with the apostate regimes does not know Socratic debates of antiquity,

  Platonic ideals of the ancients, nor Aristotelian diplomacy. But it knows the dialogue of bullets, the ideals of assassination, bombing, and destruction, and the diplomacy of the cannon and machine-gun.

  Permanent Islamic governments have never and will never be established through peaceful solutions and cooperative councils. They are established as they have been

  by pen and gun

  by word and bullet

  by tongue and teeth

  Holding the document in her hand and raising it, Karen asked, “Where was this found?”

  Lamboise walked over, looked at it and said, “On the dead guard at the Sehali plant in Pakistan.”

  “How did it get here?”

  “After the president received a call from one of the terrorists, he insisted that we have all the Forensic photography and crime-scene physical evidence to study to maybe help prevent an attack.”

  “Is there anything else?”

  Lamboise picked up a small box, began lifting up each object and said, “These items: a watch, a wallet, a pen, some blank paper, a photo. That’s basically it,” setting the container back in its place.

  “What’s the photo?”

  “It’s a picture police took of the victim.”

  Karen walked over and picked it up. She studied the image and then asked, “Do we have a magnifying glass?”

  “No, why?”

  “I think I see something, but I need to enlarge the photo to see what it is for sure.”

  “I have the photo on a flash drive. We can go back to my office.”

  Karen was a little reluctant to follow Lamboise back to his desk, but she needed to confirm what she was seeing.

  Lamboise found the portable drive.

  Karen said, “May I?”

  Lamboise got up from his chair and Karen sat down. She loaded the photo and then magnified it. She studied each quadrant of the picture until she stopped at one section and further clarified the image. “Look at this,” she said.

  Lamboise, busy organizing some of his papers, looked over her shoulder and asked, “What am I supposed to be seeing?”

  “Letters in the sand next to the hand of the guard.”

  Lamboise strained his eyes but finally shook his head. “Don’t see anything.”

  Karen changed the contrast and the color of the photo.

  “Wait,” Lamboise said. “I think I see something in the dirt. The letters MLISA. What could that mean?”

  “I’m not sure. But it’s too coincidental that next to the fingers of the dead guard lie letters that appear to have been scratched into the sand.”

  ***

  When Karen and Lamboise finished studying the terrorist information and they had shown Durran the photo, Karen was taken back to Hotel d’Angleterre.

  She asked the concierge for her key and went right to room thirty-eight. She stayed a few minutes and then quietly opened the door and stepped into the hallway alongside the courtyard. No one was there. She gently pulled the door closed and locked it.

  She swiftly walked down the hall to the elevator and rose to the second floor. She then tiptoed up the stairs to the Saint-Germain des Pres Suite and unlocked her door.

  She was exhausted. Not because of the day, but her mind was working overtime trying to unravel the mystery of the terrorist plot. Her subconscious mind was working overtime to piece together the strips of paper from the mechanic’s room.

  She put the “Do not disturb” sign on the handle, locked the door, stripped off her clothes, and stepped into the shower. She dried, slipped on her sister’s nightgown, and slid beneath the sheets of her hotel bed.

  She kept twisting and turning. She couldn’t get comfortable. Finally, she drifted off to sleep but the slips of shredded paper continually twisted in her mind along with the letters in the sand, MLISA.

  ***

  Night passed quickly. Throughout Karen’s sleep, her subconscious mind unraveled the mechanic’s shredded paper, and upon waking, she knew what it meant.

  She rose and immediately went downstairs to use the computer. It only took her minutes to uncover what she wanted. She went back upstairs, unhooked her cellphone from the charger and dialed National Intelligence in the United States. After being cleared by giving the appropriate answers to predesigned questions that ensured a caller should be granted access to personnel, she was connected to Carl Etheridge.

  “What do you have?” Etheridge asked as soon as Karen was connected.

  “I’ve discovered what the terrorists plan to do.”

  “What have you found?”

  “The terrorists plan to build an undetermined number of dirty bombs and place them throughout the Louvre.”

  “The Louvre? Why would they want to contaminate the artwork?”

  “I’ve done some research on this. The Louvre provides tremendous revenue to the French government. The last figures I could find are from two years ago and listed income exceeding close to $2.1 billion. Entrance fees, donations and movie and TV benefits all contribute. For the Da Vinci Code, they received $2.5 million.

  “If the Louvre were contaminated by dirty bombs, no one could visit it or use it for at least a year, probably two, because the radioactive particles would find their way into every crack, crevice, opening, and between the paintings and the frames. All those works of art would have to be taken down, moved to a safe room, and meticulously cleaned—decontaminated. And while that’s going on, the Louvre would be closed. It would financially cripple France.”

  “So, that’s the plan, to force France into bankruptcy. Do the French know this?”

  “Not yet.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I gave my French counterpart some information. A sort of a puzzle. It will take them time to figure it out.”

  “You’re playing games with them?”

  “No, there were shreds of paper I found when I was held captive. I gave them to French Intelligence yesterday. But before I did, I studied the pieces. This morning I realized what they meant.”

  “You figured it out from shredded documents? No computer assistance?”

  “My subconscious mind did it while I slept and tied in the letters in the sand next to the dead guard at the Sehali plant,” Karen said, clearing her throat.

  “What letters?”

  “All caps, MLISA. Mona Lisa. But…”

  Etheridge was silent for a few seconds. He then asked, “But what?”

  “I’m not sure how to prevent them from entering the museum and carrying out their plan. I don’t know how they could possibly get in without being seen and then stopped.”

  “Get back with Lamboise and stay close to him. I’ll let French Intelligence know that they had better beef up their security around the Louvre. By the way, your Hip Chip is inoperative.”

  “It was removed when I was kidnapped.”

  “How did they know you had one?”

  “I don’t know, but they did.”

  “Be aware, we can’t track you.”

  Karen hung up and although she had only been up for a couple of hours, she felt exhausted. She decided to order a snack and try to figure out how the terrorists could infiltrate the Louvre.

  ***

  Étienne Mourey exited the men’s room at French Inte
lligence headquarters and walked back to the forensic, computer lab. Alaina Depas was standing in the middle of the room with her hands on her hips looking down at something on the table.

  “Quel est le problème?” Étienne asked.

  “Nous avons un puzzle,” Alaina said. She then explained that upstairs dropped off a twisted mass of shredded paper and said they wanted it put back together.

  “What’s so important about it?”

  “They didn’t say. Just that we had to put it back together.”

  Étienne picked up one of the slivers of paper, examined it, and said, “It’s double-sided.”

  “I know.”

  “Did they say how soon they needed this?”

  “ASAP.”

  “Everything’s always ASAP. How are we supposed to do this?”

  “We have a new program installed in that stand-alone computer at the end of the bench,” Alaina said, pointing.

  “What can it do?”

  “Put the scraps back together.”

  “How?”

  “The first thing we have to do is separate each strip and straighten them out as much as possible.”

  It took well over an hour for Étienne and Alaina to separate and straighten each fragment. The next step was to smooth out each shred so that there were no creases. They had to use an iron just hot enough to flatten the material, yet not burn it. Attention had to be paid so that the remnants weren’t torn. This took almost the rest of the day.

  The twelve-foot-long table was eventually covered with the strips of paper.

  “What now?” Étienne asked.

  Alaina said, “Both sides have to be scanned into the computer. We have to separate each strip so that there is at least a half inch between them. We have to capture one strip at a time. We’ll do one side and then flip it over and do the other before we move to the next.

  “Once the fragments are photoed and entered into the computer as scrambled files, each image is processed through the Document Assembly Program. The program looks at each picture and analyzes all facets of the fragments. It catalogs the shape, the texture of the paper, the color, the rough edges of each tear, and the clean edges of the border, along with the size and style of print or writing.”

  “That’ll take forever.”

  “Not as long if we didn’t have this new program.”

  ***

  Étienne and Alaina were into the morning of the second day in their attempt to unravel the shreds of paper Karen Krystal confiscated from the mechanic’s room in the building where she had been held during her kidnapping.

  They were sitting in front of the computer screen waiting for the Pattern Recognition Program to respond to their latest input. The screen flashed and an image appeared.

  With her fingers touching her lips, Alaina said, “It’s a colored map of the inside of one of the wings of the Louvre. The Denon Wing. The Mona Lisa’s circled. There’s a red X in front of it and the words ‘bargaining chip.’ There are Xs all over the map.”

  Étienne flipped to the next document and said, “Here’s the Sully wing with more red Xs.” He flipped to the next. “Also, the Richelieu.”

  “What about the Pyramid entrance?”

  Étienne clicked on the last image and said, “The area’s filled with Xs. There’s a handwritten legend. X = DB.”

  “What does it mean?”

  “Upstairs is going to have to figure that out. Let’s print this and send it up there.”

  ***

  Paul Durran had just ended his call from Carl Etheridge when Jacques Lamboise entered his office with the prints from Étienne and Elaina.

  “Downstairs has figured out the terrorist plan. They—”

  “Etheridge told me Krystal says it’s the Louvre. Dirty bombs planted throughout including in front of the Mona Lisa.”

  Lamboise dropped his arms down.

  Durran said, “She studied the strips and figured it out.”

  “Son-of-a-bitch, without a computer?”

  “She’s smart. Very.”

  CHAPTER 30

  President François Charpentiér was sitting at his desk when an aid with a plain white envelope in his hand knocked on the door and entered the plush, royal office of France’s Commander-in-chief. He walked over to the ornate desk and handed the sachet to President Charpentiér.

  It had already been opened and inspected for poisonous, anthrax powder. All mail to officials was severely scrutinized.

  Charpentiér unfolded the white paper and gasped. He immediately called for his chief of staff.

  Within seconds, Lucas Michaud, President Charpentiér’s Chief of Staff entered the room.

  “Yes, sir,” Michaud said.

  “Have a look at this, Lucas,” Charpentiér said and handed the letter to Michaud. Michaud read it.

  “We of the World Massacre Movement (WM2) demand € 8,000,000 in return for the safety of the Mona Lisa and other rare works of art in the Louvre.

  “The funds are to be delivered to a specified location to be disclosed later. If the ransom is not delivered or attempts are made to stop this plan, all works of art in the Louvre will be destroyed.”

  “Do you think this is real?” Charpentiér asked.

  “There’s no way to tell. But we’d better heighten security around and in the Louvre.”

  “How many guards do we normally employ?”

  “Around eighty.”

  “We’d better double it.”

  “That’s going to double the expense. The budget is already pretty thin.”

  “We’ll have to pull the funds from somewhere else. We can’t let the Louvre be compromised. It’s too great a treasure and an income source for the country.”

  Michaud left the president and called the Louvre’s captain of the guards and ordered the increase in security.

  The captain immediately set about making phone calls to bring in more men. The process would take hours and not everyone would be waiting by their phone to receive the call. The Louvre was in jeopardy of losing its valuables.

  Charpentiér called Paul Durran.

  Durran said, “Yes, we just unraveled a message and have come to the same conclusion. We also received a call from U.S. National Intelligence. We’re making plans to mobilize.”

  ***

  James Marcil of the Pangaea News Network (PNN) Paris office was in the newsroom typing out a story on the computer when his phone rang.

  “Newsroom.”

  “This is a message from Ansar al-Dine and the World Massacre Movement. Before tomorrow evening, all the artwork in the Louvre will be destroyed unless France makes a payment of eight million Euros to al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb, Algeria for the resistance in Mali. A demonstration showing our serious intent and demands will occur in fifteen minutes.”

  The phone went dead.

  Marcil immediately tried to return the call, but it would not ring through. He tried again. He connected with the office switch center to see if the call had been recorded. After waiting on hold for five minutes, he verified it had.

  Within moments Marcil knocked on his editor’s door and opened it before being acknowledged. “You need to listen to something,” he said.

  Bernard Saunier swiveled his chair.

  “Type this into your computer,” Marcil said, handing his editor the Pangaea Network Intranet address to access the terrorist communication.

  Saunier reached for his computer and typed in the information. He turned up the volume. He listened. “Do we know the source?” Saunier asked.

  “It says Ansar al-Dine and the World Massacre Movement. That’s all we have. They go by WM2.”

  “Where did it come from, geographically?”

  “Here, somewhere in Paris,” Marcil said.

  “It’s probably not real. How long ago did you receive this?”

  “At 8:45 this evening.”

  Saunier looked at his watch and said, “It’s now 8:59. Where’s this demo to take place?”

  T
he vibration and sound of an explosion could be felt and heard throughout the building. The fire alarms blared. The sprinkler system sprayed the room.

  “What the hell was that?” Saunier said and quickly covered his computer and his printer.

  An employee burst through the door, “A car bomb just exploded in front of the building. The front windows are shattered. The glass has fallen into the offices on all three floors.”

  Marcil looked at his editor and said, “I guess it’s real.”

  “Check to see if everyone’s okay,” Saunier said, picked up his phone, and called the broadcast center office. “We have breaking news,” he said. “You’d better alert New York, Tokyo, London, everybody.”

  ***

  The Pangaea News Network in New York had just begun its 3:00 pm report when Corinne Slatterly, the attractive, blonde broadcaster heard her director in her earphone say, “Breaking news.”

  All leads were scratched to report on the news from the Paris office.

  Slatterly looked straight at the camera and said, “We have breaking news. We have a report from our Paris Bureau that a car bomb has exploded in front of our PNN building in downtown Paris. We are switching to Serge Gion in our Paris office.

  “Good evening Serge. Can you tell us what happened?”

  After the customary transmission delay, Gion answered, “At 9:00 this evening, a car bomb was detonated in front of our news offices. Fifteen minutes prior, we received a phone call from a group calling themselves Ansar al-Dine, a member of a group called the World Massacre Movement. I’ll read the message:

  ‘This is a message from Ansar al-Dine and the World Massacre Movement. Before tomorrow evening, all the artwork in the Louvre will be destroyed unless France makes a payment of eight million Euros to al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb, Algeria for the resistance in Mali. A demonstration showing our serious intent and demands will occur in fifteen minutes.

  Slatterly asked, “Were you made aware that the PNN offices were a target?”

  “All we received was the general threat with no specifics except that the demonstration, as they referred to it, would happen in fifteen minutes. There was no time to prepare.”