Agent Quinn slammed the worn manila file folder on Director C.W. Thompson’s desk. Quinn was hot, hot because Thompson had been riding his case all week about the Osiris File. The Office of Electronic Warfare and Investigation had too few top agents and Quinn needed help.

“What do you want from me Thompson?” griped Quinn. “I’ve been working like a dog on the Osiris case for three weeks with shit to show for it and you’re riding my ass like a twenty dollar whore!” The corner of Thompson’s eye gave a momentary twitch through a piercing, blue ice stare...

”Agent Quinn you don’t understand the importance of this case to the OEWI...“ Thompson interjected. “I know you don’t have shit to go on. That’s what we pay you for Quinn. I suggest you go over the evidence again with Berkman at Research and Development, maybe you’ve missed something.”

Quinn swept the file from the desk blotter and said “I don’t see how we could have missed anything Chief... me and Berkman have been over the autopsy results a hundred times. We haven’t found a damn thing.” He turned and sauntered out of Director Thompson’s office.

Steven Quinn was spearheading an investigation into a string of international disasters. The OEWI suspected that a new terrorist organization, known as the QED Syndicate was responsible. On March 31st, 2001 a pirate digital broadcast broke into network programming around the world and claimed there was about to be a demonstration of power and control by the QED Syndicate - power of such magnitude it would force governments to relinquish control of their territories and assets to the QED Syndicate. No one took the threat seriously. No one had ever heard of the QED Syndicate, in fact everyone considered them to be a bunch of crackpots. On the morning of April 1st, 2001, the world took notice.

April Fool’s day 2001 was recorded as the worst day in the history of air travel. There were four unprecedented crashes of passenger airline flights over open water. An American Boeing 737 plunged into the Pacific twenty miles from Los Angeles on route to Hawaii. A South American airline lost a DC-9 over the Caribbean near the Dominican Republic on route to Miami. An Airbus 244 belonging to an English airline plummeted into the Channel on route to Paris. Halfway between Sydney and Tokyo an Australian Boeing 777 went down. No survivors and few bodies were recovered from the crashes that day. Wreckage was recovered from only two of the four downed aircraft. The English Channel and California continental shelf shallows allowed recovery operations, but the black depths of the Pacific and Caribbean did not. In all, 5 bodies were recovered from the downed flights. Two mangled children and half of a man were pulled from the English Channel. One headless female and the pilot were recovered from the California site.

Analysis of the wreckage coupled with the information recovered from cockpit voice recorders and flight data recorders from the crash sites left investigators mystified. No mechanical causes for the crashes could be found. Much like the Egypt Air crash of ’99 there was only deliberate human error to blame - an apparent suicide on behalf of the pilots. Still, four flights disappearing from radar and crashing, all on the same day, was no coincidence. The question was, if the QED Syndicate was responsible for these crashes, how did they do it?

The Los Angeles airport was bustling with Sunday afternoon travelers. An ordinary looking businessman was walking through the terminal, unsure of where he had been or why he was here...and for that matter he could not even recall his name. He suddenly came upon a heavy oak door with a polished brass plaque. He noticed fancy script letters engraved on the plaque spelling “President’s Club” and he stared at the brass doorknob. Looking to the right his gaze fell upon the entry keypad for a moment before his fingers automatically punched in a pass number sequence. There was an audible click when the door unlocked as he turned the knob. Stepping through the doorway he found and seated himself at a small table. A group of pilots at a nearby table were talking and having lunch. The conversation was of the long flights they were about to embark on and what they would do after hours. Most wanted to get drunk or chase women, or both. The businessman felt strangely lightheaded and reached into his pocket for what he thought was a motion sickness capsule. He looked at the capsule, small and crystal clear, as he held it between his fingers. Now he knew what he had to do. The businessman rose from his seat and began to move toward the group of pilots. As he approached their table, he bumped into a gray-bearded pilot. The capsule fell into Gray Beard’s glass of water unnoticed and quickly dissolved. The businessman apologized to Gray Beard for being so clumsy and turned to exit the President’s Club. Returning to his lunch, Gray Beard finished his turkey on rye and drained his glass of water.

Move on to read Part 2 of The Osiris Engima.