More Trustworthy Than CNN?

[GB82]

Tim arrives back in the office and heads right over to the computers. After isolating one from the office network, okay having someone good with computers do it for him in order to protect against any viruses, he inserts the disk given to him by Sterling. It was time to see if there was anything here that could help them ... him ... finally get closer to the truth on this case.

Armed with a cup of coffee and a determination born of frustration he puts his right hand on the mouse.

Alright then let's see what we shall see.

[Jmiland1]

Click... click... double-click.

The CD has one big file on it, a PDF titled 'SacRiver2010 Incident Report - Full Reference.' The computer chugs for nearly a minute while it processes the ones and zeros, finally pulling up the first few pages of the document. The first few pages... of 972.

A scan of the table of contents shows its about 100 pages of analysis of the "Incident"--not Drowning, not Negligence, just a nice neutral Incident--laying out the known facts. Most of these first hundred, though, are taken up with a breakdown of everything that may be financially or monetarily affected by the drowning of a little boy in the river. The lawsuits, yes; those sure seemed important to Sterling, and they are fully covered here, in every permutation. But it also includes an analysis of other items, some related, and some not: insurance premiums. School construction over the next 3 fiscal years. Small business loans for river-based companies. Docking fees along the river. Projected costs for tennis shoes. Newspaper circulations.

And then there's the rest of the document--over 850 pages worth--which the Table of Contents merely refers to as 'Appendix A.'

[GB82]

You have got to be fucking kidding me ...

Yeah that was Tim's reaction as he saw the size of the file he was going to have to shift through in order to ... scratch that ... to have the chance to find something that might help, even remotely, in this investigation.

Well fuck it he thinks as he picks up his phone and dials an outside line. "Medium double pep and extra cheese. Oh and a six pack of coke."

Alright smart guy, let's get down to business ...

[Jmiland1]

Anyone who does any sort of data mining for a living can tell you--you don't bother reading every single word. It simply takes too long. You skim the lines, looking for key phrases or words tied to what you need, and from there you can find the things you need to study in more depth.

Simmons is no stranger to such work, and he sets to it with practiced ease. It isn't long before he's halfway through both his pizza, and the first portion of the report--those first hundred pages of incident analysis and financial examination. It is dry, dry reading.

So far the only thing of interest that he has found was in the report's description of the physical evidence left behind:

Analysis of the residue found at the edges of the craft's structural liabilities was carried out by members of the DHS-Geological Sciences Division, and was found to exhibit similarities to previous incidences (see Appendix A, I-238, I-498, I-732).

Tim's roll

2011-04-04 00:37:47
Tim Simmons rolls 7 to Int 3 + Invest 4 (10 Again)
3, 4, 10, 6, 3, 6, 10, 8, 10, 2
4 successes

[GB82]

Tim smiles as another greasy slice finds it's way into his mouth, he'd need to hit the gym this weekend, if he had the time, but the pizza and ice cold cokes had made the mundane work a little less insane. Just a small bit, but it was worth it. Munching on a piece of crust he almost chokes when he sees the reference to previous cases, all seemingly investigated by his department.

He quickly moves to pull up the pages and cases referred to in the Appendix. Taking another pull on his third... no fourth ... coke, the Agent wonders if there might be something here after all.

[Jmiland1]

A hundred years ago, someone would have had to navigate this document without the use of a Find selection. How did they ever manage? Using it cuts Tim's search down to about two minutes total and he finds the cases mentioned.

The bad news is, a quick read-through seems to suggest his initial excitement was unfounded. These cases weren't studied by DHS; the unknown compiler merely found them to be somehow similar to the Sacramento River situation.

The good news is...

The good news... holy hell.

I-238

...Butte, Montana... died in automobile accident...investigation revealed extreme corrosion... in brakes and front axle... previous tune-up only five months prior...

I-498

...Fort Walton Beach, Florida... victim fell five stories through outdoor balcony... and all balconies below... analysis showed massive damage in carpentry... equivalent to years-long infestation by ants or termites... no evidence of insects found in condominium building or debris...

I-732

...Yuma, Arizona... break-in at prison museum... several items stolen... safe door forcibly removed... doorknobs destroyed and dismantled... all affected items showed extreme signs of metal decay...inner workings of doorknobs blackened with corrosion...

[GB82]

You've got to be fucking kidding me. The Special Agent searches each of the cases for more information. What agency handled the case, agent's names, what labs handled the evidence ... if any of those cases had been resolved ...

The last two slices of pizza are forgotten as Tim looks for every last scrap of information he can find on these three incidents. Each new fact would be something he could compare to his own case.

[Jmiland1]

Reading and re-reading the casefiles Tim could almost see them play out in his head...

Butte

Coming off the interstate, Bronson Ketch let his horn blare as he sped down the off-ramp, trying to warn people out of his way. Each stomp of his foot left only a sick, slack feeling: the brakes weren't responding. At the end of the ramp he sped through the red light at the intersection of Flatiron and Fourth. His Honda was still doing 65 on roads designated for 40. Ketch just wasn't slowing down enough.

For six blocks he weaved across the lanes of Flatiron Avenue, trying to slow his momentum down while avoiding traffic. By the end of that too-short trip the horn's honk didn't even register in his mind anymore; but when he swerved too slow and caught the back bumper of a Ford F-150 he heard the crunch of metal and the shattering of glass just fine. Bronson fought to regain control of his car, but then his Honda slammed headfirst into the brickwork of Lucy's Lunchateria. His steering column went right through his chest. That was the last Bronson Ketch would hear of anything.

All of the cases were initially investigated by local law enforcement, naturally. Evidence went off for analysis at local crime labs best equipped for the work at hand. Sometimes that was the end of it; Ketch, for example, was determined to have died in an accident--a freak occurrence, certainly, unfortunate, but there it was. No one was found to be at fault, and the prevailing theory--that somewhere on the interstate Ketch had somehow pierced his brake fluid line and lost it speeding down the highway--held.

Fort Walton Beach

May Williams was flying high. She was graduating college in a month and had a wedding planned for September. This last year had been a turbulent time for her, but now she could honestly tell her friends and family that her life was finally changing for the better. And they all knew it was true.

It was a lazy Sunday morning and May greeted the day by drinking a glass of orange juice on the balcony of her fiance's condo, looking out over the sunrise painting the ocean. With so much opening up in her life she couldn't help but be moved by the beauty in front of her. She was glad that she could finally appreciate it.

Then there was a loud crack like the earth itself tearing open, and the balcony shuddered, and May let out a short shriek as she grabbed the railing. A moment passed and she thought, Get a hold of yourself, don't be silly--

Another, louder, crack, and she was falling as the floor gave out beneath her. She landed awkwardly, a bright burst of pain flashing up her leg as debris fell all around her. May leaned forward and grabbed the railing for support, gasping in shock and surprise. A hell of way to start the morning, but at least she'd get a story out of it--

A roar, now, as the floor fell out of this balcony as well; her hands slipped, and she tumbled another nine feet with the stone and wood and rebar. The roar continued, built and grew. After that first fall there was no respite, and four balconies sheared off the side of the building until she was buried beneath the ruins.

She'd have been lucky to survive a five story fall. The constant blunt trauma and lacerations wouldn't have helped her survival. The M.E. liked to think that she had been unconscious before most of the damage was done, but he had his doubts.

Ultimately it was determined that the condo complex Williams had died at had been infested by a hive of carpenter ants that had died off after doing their sustained damage. This, at least, was the conclusion that was reached; despite such a mass die-off being unlikely, and the complex owners not having had any reports of ants consistent with the damage found. But it was a conclusion everyone could live with. The complex reached a settlement with Williams' family and fiance. That was the end of that.

The museum break-in, that was different. The FBI briefly got involved out of the Tucson field office, believing the heist to have been the work of thieves looking to sell their items on the black antiquities market. The heist was eight years ago; the last update was seven. Seems the case went cold, and the Bureau... well, they didn't bother. If Tim had to guess, it was simply too small-fry for them to put much time and effort in.

Yuma

The lab was never able to determine just what it was the thieves sprayed into the lock mechanism--it wasn't consistent with any known acid, or with sudden freezing--but whatever it was did the trick. The locks were made so brittle that applying enough torque to the knob made the mechanisms just.... shatter.

They'd used the same chemical (it must be a chemical, despite no residue being found) on the safe, somehow slipping it inside and breaching the hinges with it. The door had been entirely removed and tossed across the restoration office.

To be honest, there's little info on the heist itself--effort was spent in finding the thieves, rather than figuring out how they got in. The prison museum was the former first, the latter second, and Yuma hadn't even been a proper prison since 1909. Despite its previous history Yuma Prison simply wasn't up to the task of keeping determined thieves out. It's "restoration office" had been a simple maintenance room fifteen years before. State government hadn't spent any money to improve the security; they never felt there was anything worth taking anyway.

The guard uniform was found almost immediately, left behind in the trash bin of a motel an hour north (but the room was paid in cash, and the tenants unremarkable and forgotten). The brass candlesticks that had belonged to the first warden, those were recovered at a swap meet in Omaha. The Colt six-gun used by Lubbock Lewis during a riot in 1885, which the prisoner pulled off of an injured guard and then used to help the screws restore order to the prison? It's still unaccounted for.

The only thing all three situations had in common, really, were the thick flakes of black material found at each one. None of the cases treated them as anything special. The brittle particles were consistent with extreme decay of the present materials.

Just like the flakes in the evidence locker, taken from the bottom of the Sacramento River where the tourist boat had sunk.

[GB82]

Tim blinks. More than once. Maybe it was the lack of sleep, maybe it was simply that his eyes were tired from reading the computer screen. Or maybe it was because, hot damn, they might actually have something. It was probably an answer that would lead to more questions but it was at least a step in the right direction.

The Agent looks around the office, hoping to catch a glimpse of SAC Johnson. He needed to know what kind of resources the office could pull. Tim was a smart guy but he needed someone with a proper engineering background to look at this to see what the hell could cause these kinds of incidents and who would have access to that type of material.

[Jmiland1]

Tim's prairie dog impression doesn't get him much; the lights are off in Johnson's office. Looks like the SAC is out. He can just see Agent Park's black hair over the wall of her cube, however. She might be able to help--what exactly does she do around here, anyway?

There was something else, too; something Tim couldn't quite put his finger on. Something in the office was nagging at the back of his mind but he couldn't quite piece together what it was.