John Landow was a British scientist at CERN, a research organisation which was based near the settlement of Meyrin. He specialised in computer sciences, and was one of the head computer scientists there. He was thirty-five this year, and had been born in London. John had graduated from the American Caltech with a PhD in Computer Sciences.
Recently, John and his team of scientists had made history. They had proved that they were not the first to make computers. Apparently, more than two thousand years ago, the Greeks had invented the computer and the internet. The famed Antikythera mechanism found was a portion of the machinery of their computers.
In addition to that, John had discovered the part of the internet which the Greeks had used more than two millennia ago. Most of the language used there was in Ancient Greek and Latin.
Upon discovering that, the Director-General of CERN, Roistahn Johan, told them to keep the news quiet for the time being. If the general public knew of what they had found, they would go crazy.
About two weeks after making that great discovery, one of the members of the team, a Greek male named Elias returned to Athens to take a short holiday. However, Elias was assassinated by an unknown person. He was found dead in his own house, along with his entire family. All of them had a strange symbol branded on their bodies. The symbol had the famous Parthenon in it, which made everyone who knew of the discovery become suspicious.
After Roistahn’s death, all the remaining members of the team were not allowed to leave the country. However, another of the team’s members, a Swiss named Julian, who had gone to the nearby city of Geneva, had been assassinated. The strange thing was that Julian was found with the same Parthenon symbol branded on his body.
Once the Director-General heard of Julian’s death, he ordered the remainder of the entire team to stay in CERN. They were also guarded 24/7 by CERN’s security officers.
It was two days after Julian’s death, and by then everyone in the facility had heard of Julian’s death. Those that knew nothing of the team’s discovery were making many speculations, and all of the speculations had nothing true.
John and the remaining seven members of the team met the Director-General, Omar Xenopolous, a Greek-Israeli who had been a Mossad intelligence officer.
“I’m sure you’ve all heard of the assassination of Julian. And you also know by now that you are not allowed to leave the facility. In addition to that, you all will be guarded at all times by our security officers,” Omar informed.
Julian asked, “But sir, who is killing all the team members? There must be someone who has insider’s information. Two of our team members killed in less than a week with the same mark on their bodies is too much of a coincidence. Do you have any idea?”
Omar shook his head. “We’ve asked a few intelligence agencies for help, but we didn’t tell them much. All I told them was two CERN scientists who knew each other had been murdered in less than a week, and the same symbol had been found branded on their bodies. But most of the agencies are American, because you know, the Americans are nosy parkers. That’s my opinion, okay. I’m saying that it’s my opinion only because I don’t want to be sued by every goddamn lawyer in America.”
“John, if I remember correctly, you used to be a CIA agent, right?” John answered, “Indeed, sir. But I only served for five years there, as a special agent. You make it sound like I was a CIA veteran that served during the Cold War.”
Omar and the rest of the team chuckled. John was pretty well-known for his humour. “Anyway, I was hoping that you could call some of your friends still working there, and get them to hurry the hell up.”
John went to contact one of his good friends, who was a high-ranked CIA officer. He, Harlow Smithson, was a nice guy in his late thirties, just a few years older than John.
“Hey, Smithson, this is Ludlow. John Ludlow,” he said.
“Oh, hi! It’s really been a while. What is it, a few weeks? Anyway, why did you call me for?”
John explained, “I’m sure you’ve heard about the deaths of the two CERN scientists. My superiors are asking me to try to get the CIA guys to hurry the hell up, because I was one of them and all that. They make it sound like I served during the Cold War.”
Harlow laughed, before saying softly and seriously, “I got a tidbit from a friend of a friend, and it is strictly confidential. But I believe you have the right to know. The CIA people investigating on that believe that a group known as The Athenians are behind the attacks. I think it makes sense, because there’s the Parthenon in the symbol. And you know what? The Parthenon is located in Athens, and it is decorated to Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom.”
“Thanks, Harlow. I’ll make up for it with a drink or two. Maybe next time, when I visit America or you come over to Geneva, eh?”
Immediately after hanging up, John reported the news to Omar Xenopolous. Omar’s eyes widened at the mention of ‘The Athenians’. “Are you serious, John? That was what your friend told you?”
John nodded. “Why, sir? What do you know about The Athenians?”
“In the 1960s to the early 1990s, there was a group of men called The Athenians, who claimed to be ‘Protectors of the Ancient Greeks’. They went around, killing people who were supposedly trying to find out more about the Ancient Greeks. Many of the people killed were historians and archaeologists. They were finally destroyed when the Italians made a big fuss when one of their most famed archaeologists was killed by The Athenians. Responding to the Italians, the Hellenic Police went on a manhunt for all known members of The Athenians. But now it seems as if either not all members were killed, or there are people attempting to revive them.”
“But sir, what if they’re really the long-running protectors of Ancient Greece? I mean, it would make some sense, as not really a lot about the Ancient Greeks are known today,” John argued. Omar scoffed at John’s idea. “We’re scientists, for god’s sake, John.”
After leaving Omar’s office, John went to his team’s research lab. He produced a special thumbdrive, which could hold as much information as fifty ordinary thumbdrives combined together, and stuck it into one of the computers. That computer had stored information of all the team’s findings. Even with the highly-advanced computer and special thumbdrive, it took half an hour to transfer information. That showed how much information they had gathered.
John pulled the thumbdrive out of the computer and stuffed it into his pocket. As he walked out of the room, he saw two security officers standing outside. John greeted them before walking off. The security officers were probably part of the large security team that was guarding the entire research team 24/7. They did not care what John had been doing in the room, their priority was to ensure the safety of the entire team.
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