Chapter Twenty Eight
Crash Site - part 2
8 AM
In a military hangar further away, and specially prepared for the occasion, Shin and Lizbeth were immersed in their respective investigations.
The hangar was a self-constructing structure, whose size could be modulated according to their needs. It was not permanent and could be easily dismantled. Its compressed size was no more than a cube of about 70 centimeters in diameter. It was not something that could be easily obtained. It was technology that combined SDD technology with folding material, with fractium and origamium alloys to deploy its special space modifying nature of the self-replicating nanomaterial system. This structure hardened and changed textures, almost as if those walls were actually real concrete and cement. Exploiting the capabilities of deploying and self-replicating structures was too convenient for the future.
It amazed Shin, even though for everyone else it was an everyday occurrence. The hangar was a space of about one hectare, ten meters high. It was such a well-designed structure that it even had special walkways for surveillance. Considering the surveillance system that wasn't really necessary, but Shin supposed it must have something to do with the design of the structure itself.
There wasn't too much bustle in the place. The noise that could be heard was the zipping up and down of the body bags from time to time, when they were opened to check the contents. The place was almost entirely occupied by a blue plastic sheet, and on it rested the sixty corpse bags.
Lizbeth, with her hair tied in a ponytail, mask and goggles, was surrounded by forensic experts, all wearing protective PVC suits. Her task was to identify the victims. A puzzle in time. She delicately examined the belongings that had survived the crash, looking for any clues that might lead her to discover who were those travelers thrown up by the fabric of space-time.
Many of those belongings were to varying degrees burned, or completely ruined, but had been part of someone's life. And many had been placed next to the body bags as they had been able to identify them by the labeled bags many of them carried.
Shin glanced at his partner and lover and saw how she was taking notes on a portable tablet, while the surveyor was the one opening the body bag.
Meanwhile, Shin, with a tired look but deft hands, would be in a secluded area of the hangar that had been assigned to him and that was sealed with acrylic and special ventilation, to avoid contamination of the samples. He had to admit that his work had made him forget his fatigue to some extent and he had begun to work in his area without delay.
His task was equally grim: to perform autopsies or just external examinations on the victims to discover the causes of their deaths. He had brought his portable lab from the ship, and had other equipment provided by the army's forensic department. As the cold light from the hangar illuminated the stretchers and surgical tools, Shin was immersed in a world that became stranger and stranger. For as Lefreve had said, there was nothing normal about many of those bodies.
Shin had donned a PVC suit and activated a mask and goggles from his turtle backpack. He didn't mind the smell, he was used to it, but he wasn't going to argue. Oxy had alerted him and everyone else that in the event of a Dark Event accident they had to handle all evidence with care. The bodies had been scanned and no anomalies related to thelesis or MAP particle dissipation had been detected. That didn't mean they had to let their guard down.
A good number of the bodies at the site were indeed charred. The investigation to determine the identities of many had been based on checking DNA, dental records of the time and checking for pre-existing pathologies in the unburned tissue or bones. They had done a good job with the assistance of artificial intelligence to often locate a body reader and the AI would analyze the patterns of the cadaver, such as the size of bones for example to extrapolate the data from the passengers, and thus know the identity.
Shin finally looked away from Lizbeth and looked at what was in front of him. He was standing in front of a forensic examination table. That had nothing to do with his time in the twentieth century of the Ancient Era. That table had its own reading sensors, a filtering system to eliminate the smell of decomposition and even its own lighting. Nothing to do with that of his time that only had a few channels to drain the fluids.
It was somewhat similar to the examination tables that were in the forensic platform of the laboratory of the Teratology section where he worked on the island. Although what Shin knew was that examinations were now almost always carried out by machines. That must be the reason why many looked at him from afar and wondered. The work of physical examination was left to special readers and machines, that too had changed, although Nevermore encouraged its specialists to perform the physical examination and not just the data control.
Finally he put on some new gloves and set out for his second examination. The previous one had been deposited on another gurney nearby, in another room that was sealed. Despite calling it an autopsy, it was more of an examination and had turned out differently due to the condition of the bodies.
Shin unzipped the bag and sighed.
That body had remnants of clothing stuck to the body and the lower limbs were missing, but that was not the strangest thing. The skull and what was left of its bones were somewhat deformed, almost as if the bones had been made of plasticine at some point. But what caught his attention was something else.
It was that he had never seen a body charred in part and that, on the other hand, the nervous system was visible to the naked eye in those parts where the fire had consumed the flesh. Not only visible but hardened, as if it had been sand struck by lightning.
That nervous system, like that of the previous victim he had examined, had the consistency of something metallic. When he subjected parts of the charred tissue samples to analysis, along with bone, and that solidified nervous system, he got the same results as the previous examination. Although studying parts of the tissue that had not been touched by the fire, under the garments, gave him the possibility of knowing the identity.
"Record," Shin said, turning to his book that lay on its side with the pages open, as he looked at the screen of the two terminals that offered him the data he had taken from the samples. "Diagnostic Record #2. March 21, year 125, 8:15 AM. Aircraft accident victim: Levi Fitzgerald. Male. Age 40 years. Victim possesses a highly atypical abnormality of the central nervous system. The consistency and texture of the neurological structures, such as the brain and spinal cord, revealed an unusually hardened and solid state, suggesting a transformation that resembles, in certain respects, a metallic density."
Shin turned to the body and examined it again more closely.
"It exhibits an atypical hardness and rigidity in the structures of the nervous system, I have no precedent for this in my own experience. Nerve tissues, under normal circumstances, are known for their characteristic fragility and delicacy, but in this case, a transformation is present that goes beyond conventional expectations.
"The victim presents a highly compromised state due to the circumstances of the incident. Significant charring has occurred in various parts of the body, causing obvious deformities in the bone tissue.
"The extremities, trunk and skull have been affected by the fire, which has caused a deformation in the bone morphology. It is important to note that, although the fire could have contributed to these deformations, I cannot rule out the possibility that there are other forces involved that acted on the body before or after the fire.
"If an aircraft has undergone depressurization, explosion and combustion that resulted in charring of the bodies on board, it is important to consider that the cells and tissues of the human body would have suffered significant damage... This would subject the cells to extreme conditions that could destroy or severely alter their internal structures and components.
"On the other hand, the tissue of the right forearm is almost intact and allowed me to effectively prove that there was a problem with tissue oxygenation. Depending on whether the depressurization occurred above 30,000 feet then this could have contributed to the formation of nitrogen in the bloodstream. So the victim was indeed alive when the accident occurred. Rut I cannot say that he was conscious, he may have fainted due to the change in pressure.."
Shin stared again at the solidified tissue.
"Regarding the nervous system. The structure is a chimera. It retains some of the molecular structure of human tissue, but the solidification, hardening and thickening, is due to it possessing an alloy of fractium material, along with an anormal concentration or iron. The absence of microfractures in the bone makes me think of other possibilities for the deformation that do not necessarily have to do with the action of fire, in particular the presence of fractium, which is something that had not been discovered in the year the plane disappeared." Then he turned to look at the screens with the analyses. "In the database this type of fractium only corresponds to a class A arachnid type, the most common of the nuclei and which possessed no functionality once its fractus host died."
Shin turned again to the body with a frown. "Note: the post-mortem ATP analysis, along with the oxidative phosphorylation and electron chain is making me wonder if what happened to all the electronic instruments and batteries on board might also have involved the entire passage. Although I'm speculating about the latter... End of recording."
Shin didn't know if that woman from the Council was really paying attention to the work, but just in case he decided to include his final point of view. It was something he had found curious. The technology of the twentieth century of the Ancient Era would not have allowed her to perform an ATP examination of that type, given that the victims had already been dead for so many hours.
At that moment he felt some knocks on the acrylic and looked up. Lizbeth was entering the decontamination room, before entering where he was. He thought it was kind of funny to see her with the equipment and those bags in her shoes so as not to contaminate. Nothing to do with how they did things centuries ago, not to mention that he could never have imagined her doing that kind of work in another time.
"Did you find anything interesting?" Lizbeth asked, her voice laden with uneasiness. "Have you seen anything like this before?"
Shin looked at her, his heterochromic eyes heavy with questioning. "Never. This is completely new to me. The nervous system of these bodies seems to have withstood the blast, as if they were designed to survive in extreme conditions. But the skin, bone and muscle tissue did not. Whatever happened up there changed the composition of these people's nervous systems. Not counting the bones. I found some similar cases from the war, but they're not quite the same."
Lizbeth frowned. "But how is that possible, what kind of technology could do something like that in that time?"
"Who says we're talking about technology, here? I guess you saw the analyses the other forensics guys were doing early. This is fractium. Fractium that has somehow hardened nerve tissue."
"Yeah, I saw them."
She was staring at him.
"What's wrong?" Shin asked.
"You don't think it's possible there's another one of those, do you? Some guardian from the Other Side?"
"No, it has nothing to do with it."
"It's just that we haven't come across a case involving anything in time since your return."
Shin looked at her. Through those glasses he could tell that she had a somewhat worried look on her face.
He stepped closer and simply pressed his forehead against hers. "Don't worry, I'm pretty sure that was the only one that chased us. I don't think there's another one of those."
"I hope not," she sighed.
He moved his forehead away from hers and tried to change the subject. It wasn't good to remember that one. "You know, it's funny that only this hardening is in the nervous system."
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"Why?"
"Because the nervous system has certain similarities in certain parts to a fractal system as well. Fractus have fractal forms. It's curious that this alloy only attached itself to a part that had a fractal system as well."
Lizbeth seemed to remember something. "Did you read the autopsy report on Philip and Zi's case?"
"The one on Sil Moore?"
"No, the one about the terrorist from the other universe who was like a twin of the cop."
"No. Why?"
"The test said he just happened to have body parts that weren't exactly similar to those of an ordinary human being. I think I read that the blood and nervous system had some differences, as well as some organs looked different. But otherwise it was pretty much the same as the cop."
"Well. That wouldn't be unusual. Assuming we're talking about a parallel universe, maybe on a certain scale some things would be the same as here, but others would be completely different. Honestly from what I read about the case and the cop part I think it could just be an oddity. There are people just like us and you can find them around the corner here in this universe."
"I think I saw your face on a slice of pizza once."
Shin tried to laugh at that but only a half-smile broke out on his face. "Anyway. I was thinking about something else. It's not the first time I've seen something similar, but it's not the same."
Lizbeth looked at him quizzically. "If this has anything to do with some kind of fractus, they showed up a long time after the plane."
"I mean something else different," Shin began quietly, "this reminds me of something I saw once in Naples. In a chapel, to be exact. There were anatomical machines."
Lizbeth raised an eyebrow, intrigued by the connection. "What does that have to do with what we're seeing here?"
Shin paused briefly in his work and looked at Lizbeth. "These anatomical machines were masterpieces of engineering. Some said that was used mercury in the creation. They were created to reveal the mechanics of the human body, how the organs work in interaction with each other. Something that at the time was invisible, unless you attended an actual autopsy."
Lizbeth nodded, still not understanding the connection. "And what does that have to do with what we're seeing here?"
Shin continued, "Raimondo di Sangro, the Prince of Sansevero, was the patron behind those machines. He was an inventor, scientist and alchemist obsessed with anatomy. According to legends, he experimented on human bodies to achieve his vision. But what they found in later research is that the machines were a kind of illusion. There was no mercury or real bodies involved, just an incredible knack for copying the complex engineering of nature."
Lizbeth frowned, taking in the information. "So you're saying that what we're seeing here could be something similar, some kind of illusion, a facade?"
"No, it's simply a curiosity. What we're seeing in these bodies is so strange, so out of the ordinary, it makes me wonder if there's something else behind it all. Just like in the history of anatomical machines, it could be a way to hide the true nature of what happened on this plane. On the other hand... Oxy is here."
Lizbeth nodded at that. "Do you think the Council knows something more?"
"I have no idea, but if this really has to do with fractus and time travel I think we should ask Oxy what exactly happened in that Tokyo explosion."
***
10:13 AM
Mai sighed, somewhat annoyed.
She was in the operations tent, sitting in front of a terminal projecting various reports. Inside the tents no one had their masks on and that was a relief. She had put on her special hairstyling device and had curled her long hair into two buns that, from a distance, made her look like a mouse from a popular amusement park of the Ancient Era.
"I think I could do my job more efficiently without someone breathing down my neck."
Jen Anderson had been standing behind her for several minutes and had been paying special attention to the work Mai was doing. Mai was pretty relaxed about the politics of developing tolerance, but that woman had stood too close and she could almost feel her breath on her head.
"I was just interested in what you were doing."
"As you can see I'm checking passenger data," Mai said, trying to put on a condescending smile.
The woman simply moved away a little and pretended to be interested in the projections on the main table, where the different sector cameras were transmiting live feed, and took an interest in the hangar where Lizbeth and Shin were working.
Both had returned to work, and the number of corpses was growing slowly, as were the identities of the new bodies. Shin had already had five checks and Anderson began to read the reports he was transmitting from his interactive device.
"We've had her like this since early morning," Lefreve said quietly to Mai, trying to calm her down as he sipped his coffee. He was close to Mai and was reading the passenger reports on his Neurowire.
All of those seemed normal with the exception of two identities that had jumped out even in the 2012 investigations. "I honestly didn't remember this," Mai said.
"The what?"
"There was an important scientist on board. One of the ones who postulated the idea of the Neurowire almost a century before it was built..." Mai pointed a finger at him. He was an old man with an ugly scar on his cheek.
"Wow, I didn't know that. Was he someone important back then?"
"Not at all. He was a scientist sponsored by the Empire's Department of Defense. Several years later it was remembered that he was one of the first to foresee the idea of implementing a quantum computer assist in the brain."
"Too bad he's dead," Lefreve said, taking another sip of coffee.
"The body is still not on the list, and neither is who was with him."
"Who was with him?"
"Apparently he had come up under a false identity, but he also belonged to the RIA."
Lefreve frowned and paid more attention. "The RIA? What does the royal intelligence service have to do with it?"
"Apparently they both came from Diego Garcia and took the plane in.... Maldives."
Lefreve looked genuinely puzzled. "Diego Garcia went back into native hands after the Great War," he said, and began to wave his hands. The movement indicated to Mai that he was checking something on his Neurowire. After a few seconds he stopped and spent several seconds reading something until with a new movement he sent something to Mai.
"What is this?" Mai asked. What he had sent her was the cargo manifest for the plane. "Bananas?"
There was a cargo weighing almost a ton that had been loaded on the flight. According to the manifest it was a cargo of fresh fruit. In particular bananas.
"Mini bananas from the Maldives," nodded Lefreve.
"What's so strange about that?"
"Well it's old spy stories I read. I think on more than one occasion the intelligence branch at Diego Garcia has been blamed for using the banana excuse to move goods on commercial flights. Doesn't the RIA have strong connections with the Council?"
They both looked at each other and, out of the corner of their eyes, glanced at Anderson who was still watching the camera transmissions. Now focused on watching Ryuuji and Natsuki who were standing on the ground, scanning something on the grass.
"Do you think it's possible that there was something on board and they want it back now?"
"I don't know, maybe," Mai said cocking her head to the side.
She didn't want to give an affirmative answer. She had no reason to distrust Lefreve and he seemed to her to be a man dedicated to his work. But neither was it to be dismissed that the Council was getting its hands on army personnel from other countries. Such was the espionage game, even if the Council was supposed to be moderating Nevermore's activities. There were sectors in the Council itself that hindered each other, and the same was true of internal espionage.
Lefreve drummed his fingers on the table thoughtfully. "During the Great War... the RIA was in joint operations with the Liberation Army."
"Yes I know." Mai nodded, remembering all too well, though she had been in the Russian theater of operations.
Lefreve was thinking about something and had again started to look for something in his Neurowire. It didn't take long. "Miss Izumi, do you know the story that happened here where we are?"
"No. What do you mean?"
"During the Great War there was a cleanup operation right here in this lake that resulted in failure. It was when the first prototype weapons were still being used."
"It happened right here?"
"Yes. Since then rumors began to circulate that the lake was cursed, but it was no more hearsay... until today."
"What does it have to do with the plane?"
"The RIA was very interested in the operation in this part of the lake. I don't know what they were looking for, but whatever they were looking for, they didn't find it."
"What does the story say?"
"That they were looking to seize a type of fractus. The details are not known and in fact in the official records the story never appeared, but it is known to the locals and to those who like history."
"I didn't know that. I mean I heard there were rumors that the place was haunted since the Great War, but the same goes for hundreds of places."
"Exactly." Lefreve nodded.
"Is it known who was involved in the operation?"
"History says they all died with the exception of the second in command." Lefreve flicked his index finger for a few seconds and then sent the file to Mai.
What he had sent was an excerpt from a neuroblog of stories from the Great War. It showed the face of a man who could not be seen very well, but it effectively told the story of a tactical mop-up team and the supposed identities of those who had participated.
Lefreve did not get to see it. Mai's pupils focused for a thousandth of a second, but she relaxed her face instantly thereafter. "Interesting story," she nodded.
"Do you think it could be related?"
The clues were finely spun, and it was a house of cards that could easily be blown up. Was Lefreve's point that the missing plane might have had something to do with what the cleanup team would later look for during the Great War?
On the other hand, that excerpt was hammering her brain. Was this some kind of joke or a big coincidence? Whatever it was, she had to answer.
"There could be some connection, but it is advisable not to speculate at this point until we have more data on the passengers, and in particular to know that they were not carrying anything dangerous."
Lefreve sighed, pushing away the tension. "Yes, I'm sorry, Miss Izumi. It's just that I've never seen an accident that had so many oddities. I guess you're used to it."
"Do not think so. Dark Events can always find a way to surprise us," she said sincerely and went back to concentrating on reviewing the information. She had been poring over the passenger data, the plane's cargo, and the history of the cargo. As she scrutinized the reports, her expression became increasingly serious.
Her pulse quickened and her mind filled with troubling questions. How could this be possible? Without wasting a second she decided to get out of the tent, with the excuse of going to the bathroom and rushed to the hangar, where Shin and Lizbeth were investigating the bodies of the crashed plane.
When she arrived at the hangar, she tried to look as natural as possible even though she broke Shin and Lizbeth's concentration, who turned around in surprise.
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"Guys!" exclaimed Mai trying to catch her breath "did you discover something new?" She scratched her head and her index finger made a slight movement that Shin and Lizbeth understood. Lizbeth disconnected the main channel of the Neurowire and Shin made a quick movement over his interactive book, while with the other hand he pressed one of the buttons on the device in his ear. Mai approached Lizbeth and looked at both of them as she put her hands in her overalls pockets. Shin, on the other side of the acrylic, just looked at the huge buns on her head. It wasn't the time to say it but he liked the style.
In the main tent Anderson saw Mai through the screens, and quickly zoomed the image. For her it must have been just a break that Mai had taken. On the other hand she had no access to audio from the surveillance in that sector unless a user agreed to record the audio, as Shin was doing with his reports. From the body language of the two girls she guessed that they must be talking about something private and that she should not be part of the case. Although she was wrong about the latter, as she read Mai's lips it seemed that she was simply asking about what they were discovering.
While they were talking about how the investigation was going, Mai started to talk through a secure Neurowire channel. Shin would have no way to respond, but at least he would understand since he had been involved. Still it was confusing for him, the important talk was taking place on the Neurowire, while he had to pretend to be interested in what Mai was saying through her lips.
[What's going on?] Lizbeth asked.
[I just discovered something very weird about all this,] Mai said and looked at Shin. [Do you remember that sculptor who designed the figurine for the cult in Kolsay?]
Shin tried to smile and nodded, pretending to respond to the other small talk they were having.
[Guess what? I just found out that his father was during an operation during the Great War right here.]
Shin looked at her for a second not quite knowing what to say.
Lizbeth frowned as she tried to explain the subject of the latest identities discovered. [You mean the operation you guys did a few days ago?]
[Yes, the same one. What could be the possibility that it's a coincidence?]
[Are you sure it's the same guy?]
[Yes, it's the same one. Franco Bicini, Elif Bicini's father.]
That couldn't be a coincidence at all. What could be the possibility that only a few days before they were investigating someone related to him, but with no apparent relation to the case they were on?