The story so far…
Five strangers gather in a secret Geneva bunker as the US–Iran conflict teeters on the brink of catastrophe.
A staged murder uncovers a buried 1999 experiment capable of creating false memories and even manufacturing the illusion of an attack.
The threat is stopped, but a final message – “There are six of us now” – suggests that someone presumed dead may still be alive.
Writer 2:
JULY 1999
1045 HOURS
It was a sunny day, a welcome relief to Geneva after the torrential rain of the previous weekend.
But the weather meant nothing to Dr Arman Farhadi and Dr Miriam Vale. They were inside a specially designed bunker beneath an old Geneva hotel. Once a popular tourist stay, the hotel had long since become an artifact of history. The outside world had forgotten it.
Few knew that beneath it lay a decisive component of Project Lily, a secret NATO operation conceived to prevent future nuclear warfare.
At its heart was DAISY, a state-of-the-art supercomputer capable of detecting nuclear threats from rogue nations through satellites and radar—and neutralizing them before they became powerful enough to threaten the world.
“We’ve done a good job,” said Arman.
“Indeed. It was teamwork,” Miriam replied, her eyes lingering on his face.
An Iranian by birth, Arman was the son of Dr Ali Farhadi, a loyalist to the Shah of Iran. After the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Ali had been banished from Iran on charges of blasphemy and aiding the West. He settled in California, where he continued his scientific work and eventually passed his passion for nuclear physics to his son.
Miriam had once been Arman’s student. Now, she was one of the six scientists who had helped him build DAISY.
The others were Professor Elias Stern, a British cartographer; Dr Sargov Melsevic, a Serbian nuclear scientist; Dr Yitzhak Peres, an Israeli communications expert; and Dr Yokishiro Hasagawa, a senior Japanese computer scientist.
Project Lily had become particularly critical after India and Pakistan tested nuclear weapons in 1998, followed by the 1999 Kargil conflict—a combination that had raised fears of a catastrophic escalation.
Arman glanced at a photograph lying on the table. It showed the six scientists standing beside a nuclear reactor. A little girl stood among them.
Leila Farhadi—his daughter.
“Miriam, there’s a chance DAISY could be compromised someday,” Arman said quietly. “If that happens, the deactivation code is 17-4-39-XX. The XX will be known only to one person. I won’t reveal who.”
“And remember this bunker is our secret. Do not answer the first three knocks. Wait until you hear another three. Only you and the person who knows the XX code will know what that means.”
Miriam nodded.
She knew why Arman had chosen 17-4-39—the date of the opening of the Major League Baseball season, a small tribute to his lifelong love of the game.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “Nothing like that will happen.”
GENEVA
JULY 2006
1245 HOURS
Professor Elias Stern sat distraught inside the bunker.
DAISY had been compromised.
Someone had manipulated the system so thoroughly that a nation could now manufacture an artificial nuclear threat and trigger a nuclear war.
NATO had shut down Project Lily. As collateral damage, Arman had been dismissed from his position, while Miriam had been ordered to disappear and live incognito. Sargov, Yitzhak and Yokishiro had been recalled by their respective governments.
Now Stern stared at Arman’s lifeless body.
Before his death, Arman had written and posted Stern a letter explaining that DAISY had been compromised. He had also revealed the deactivation code—but only Miriam and one other person knew the final two digits, and Arman had never revealed that person’s identity.
When Arman realized that everything was beyond repair, he had put a gun to his head.
He had also recorded detailed instructions on a tape recorder, asking Stern to take control of the system should it ever be activated again.
Stern arranged a quiet burial for his friend.
Then he put a series of damage-control measures in place for any future activation of DAISY.
Leila is under Miriam’s care, he reminded himself.
One day, he would find the intruder.
EPILOGUE
GENEVA
6 SEPTEMBER 2026
1445 HOURS
The assassin stood smiling at the bodies sprawled across the floor.
It had been too easy.
Stern had posed no threat. He had been killed moments earlier.
“Good old Miriam. She shouldn’t have answered those first three knocks.”
His eyes moved across the room.
“And look at the others. So helpless. The British guy, Victor, and that lanky Colonel Reeves never expected a barrage of bullets.”
He smiled.
“Job done. Now for you, Leila.”
Across the room, Leila slowly rose from the floor.
“Alhamdulillah,” she whispered, having just completed her afternoon namaaz.
Then she looked directly at the assassin.
“Let’s do it, buddy.”
The assassin smirked.
“Jiu zheyang ba—so be it,” he muttered in Chinese.
Dr Zho Yengchen.
To the outside world, he was Japanese scientist Dr Yokishiro Hasagawa.
In reality, he was a mole planted inside Project Lily by China’s Ministry of State Security.
The Americans had long stood in the way of China’s strategic ambitions.
Now, it was time to settle the score.
Leila walked towards the console.
“Activation code?” Zho asked.
She smiled.
“17-4-39-24.”
Zho entered the numbers.
He pressed the button.
Deep in orbit, aboard the Chinese International Space Station, DAISY awakened.
The system automatically transmitted a signal to a hacked American satellite. The satellite relayed it to Oghab military base in Iran.
Four thousand kilometres away, Tehran detected what appeared to be an incoming nuclear missile launched from a US submarine in the Persian Gulf.
The warning flashed across the screen.
INCOMING US NUCLEAR MISSILE.
Iran’s defence system locked on.
A nuclear warhead was armed.
Target:
NEW YORK.
