Author´s Note: Hello loyal readers, I´m back! Wow I cannot believe its been six months already since my last update. Real life got in the way for me and my fabulous Beta PJ Murphy whom I thank for his work btw. Enjoy!
June 7, 2014 - Honolulu
Chuck and Casey spotted the two mobsters whose places they would be taking. One was huge behemoth with red hair; the other was a lanky dark haired, olive skinned man. Apart from Casey's hair, they were almost mirror images of the two quasi-spies.
The two men shared a glance and followed the two mobsters into the elevator at a parking garage. A scuffle broke out in the elevator and a minute later, the two men were out cold. Walking out of the elevator, Casey tucked a special pen into his pocket.
"I gave those two knuckleheads enough of this stuff to make them forget the last two days." Casey grunted.
"According to this, we have to meet Roku at a Japanese bar and grill in twenty minutes. He runs it as a front," Chuck said, looking at the itinerary he picked up from the dark haired man's iPhone.
The drive from the garage did not take very long. Chuck and Casey entered the mostly-empty restaurant. Empty that is, apart from four supersized bodyguards, the weight of which would propel any football team into the playoffs instantly. Behind them, their boss, Roku sat in a booth eating an okonomiyaki, a type of savory Japanese pancake. He looked up as his saw his 'subordinates' enter. He sliced of a piece of his meal and began chewing on it, nonplussed by the people he was looking at.
Chuck noticed Roku looked at Casey and him like they were nobodies; something he scraped from underneath his shoe. He was so notorious in his native Japan, in fact, the local police had created a task force specifically for combating the White Fist.
"You two come highly recommended. I trust you won't fail me for this upcoming task or else we will have…trouble," he said ominously.
"We won't, we will do what you ask of us," Chuck replied. He studied Roku; Chuck knew the man would follow through on his threats.
"Tonight, we will hit the Japanese consulate. There is something of great value to me there," Roku exclaimed.
Chuck and Casey kept the same looks on their faces, but the concern was already creeping in. If they weren't careful, they could set off an international incident. It seemed this Ares Key was in the consulate in a hilly area of the city. Roku made a living breaking the law, but did he really have the balls to violate international law?
It certainly looks that way, Chuck thought.
Night had fallen, it was the best time to strike. Roku had a contact inside the consulate; it was a two floor manor with a few dozen rooms. Getting inside was simple enough. Chuck, Casey and two of Roku's best thugs posed as a repair crew arriving to fix the electrical system that had suddenly 'broken' down. Having the place pitch dark was the perfect cover. According to the White Fist contact, the Ares Key was being kept in a locked room only accessible by an electronic keycard. Fortunately, Chuck's ingenuity would be very helpful. He attached a device to the lock, which searched for the proper code and programmed it on his skeleton keycard. He swiped the skeleton card in the lock and voila. The door automatically opened.
"Good work," commended the former soldier and Chuck's partner.
"I aim to please," Chuck responded with a smirk on his face.
The group of four entered the office, which contained a desk, a very comfortable executive chair, a computer, and several dozen books on a pair of shelves, all of which were written in Japanese.
Their goal was situated opposite of the two bookshelves. A vault stood floor-to-ceiling in the wall next to a painting of Itō Hirobumi, the first Prime Minister of Japan. Chuck went to the keypad next to the vault and dusted a special powder onto the keypad. He then shined a UV light on the keypad, revealing the fingerprints on four of the numbers. He tried a combination of the code but it wouldn't budge. In the hallway Casey heard a shout in Japanese. Clearly the ruse was almost up.
He cursed under his breath. "Hurry up, moron, our time is almost up," Four tries later, Chuck punched in the correct code and the door opened, revealing several items. Among them was a metallic rectangular device, which the nerd presumed to be the Ares Key, and a USB flash drive. He grabbed the key and the drive, the latter of which he shoved into a compartment in his shoe.
Chuck had given the Ares Key to Roku while he kept the USB flash drive, delivering it to Newton. The team gathered around the room, Chuck inserted the flash drive into the tabletop computer, unleashing a multitude of data written in Japanese. Everyone looked in confusion while spoke fluent Japanese and of course understood it.
"I can translate it," Chuck said as he looked over the screen.
"What does it say?" Alex Forrest asked. The former CIA agent was curious
"It seems the technology used to create the Ares Key was developed by a scientist named Hiro Ishimura in 1944 for the Japanese Empire. But before he could develop the device, he died in Nagasaki when the U.S. dropped the atomic bomb on the city. The Japanese government found his notes decades later. He had created the Key…only one Key, though…and he was developing it for defensive measures. It could shut down an enemy's military hardware, but…"
Chuck was frozen in place. "Spit it out, Bartowski," an impatient Casey grunted.
"It has an unintended side effect, like that doomsday device in Escape from L.A. Except this is really a doomsday device. Activating it would affect electrical systems all over the planet. Technologically, it would send us back to the Dark Ages. Billions of people could die in the ensuing chaos. According to these notes, they deleted the blue prints when they discovered what it could do."
Everyone was silent as the prospects of the Ares Key being used sunk in. Their entire civilization depended on electricity for nearly everything from food production to basic services like heating. The starvation, disease and anarchy that would surely follow was chilling.
"This is disconcerting," Newton said quietly.
"The key was going to be sent to Tokyo to be destroyed on Friday," Chuck finished.
"What's the latest development with Kr?"
"He's supposed to meet with Roku on Friday to exchange the Key to the Ring.
Newton shook his head. "we cannot let the Ring get their hands on the Key. Chuck, we're going to surprise Kr at the meeting."
"Are you sure?" Chuck asked.
"There will be a double-cross of some sort at the exchange. These are not honest men, after all," Newton surmised. "We just have to be ready to take advantage of it."
Roku examined the Ares Key carefully. Was this hardware worth all of this trouble? What did this pesky spy, only known as Kr, want with this unassuming looking piece of technology? He sensed that this wouldn't end well for him, but he was far too deep to go back. He understood and accepted long ago the only way to leave this job was in a wooden box.
He glanced at the picture on his desk, a photo of Catherine Brady and him when she was a student in Japan. They were young and in love. He was a low level soldier in a crime family when they met, putting himself through school to get an education. From an early age, he knew that knowledge was power. She saw how he executed a rival gangster from afar and she fled. Years later, he would find out she had given birth to their daughter eight months after she ran away.
He dialed a number and waited for a moment until Kr picked up.
"Yeah," answered a grainy, computer-like voice. The Ring agent only known as Kr was using a scrambler to mask his identity.
"I have your device. Where should we meet?" Roku said impatiently.
"Patience, Roku. I will give you a place of my choosing tomorrow. After all, you cannot be too careful about this."
TO BE CONTINUED...