THE HILDEBRAND RARITY
THE HILDEBRAND RARITY (FILM CONCEPT)
The Hildebrand Rarity is a dark science-fiction James Bond film, that explores the world of directed-energy technology and the threat posed by psychotronic weapons to humanity. The film is based around the original Ian Fleming short story (first published in March 1960 in Playboy Magazine) and weaves into this story, the machinations of a sinister cult that has arisen from silence in the Seychelles. The film also brings to attention, the recent disclosures on the 'Havana Syndrome', a mysterious neurological illness that severely sickened diplomats serving in the US Embassy in Cuba in 2016.
(The following story is a work of fiction. Any and all similarities to characters, groups, or other entities in real life are coincidental.)
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BACKGROUND:
The international criminal organization SPECTRE (Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion) is secretly developing a clandestine directed-energy weapons program for the furtherance of a very sinister aim.
Directed-energy weapons (DEW's) are a class of tactical ranged weapons that can inflict damage to a target by focusing large amounts of energy at a singular point via microwaves, radio waves, lasers and acoustic beams.
Psychotronic weapons or neuro-strike weapons, as the name implies, are directed-energy weapons that are used to specifically injure the nervous system of an individual through extremely high frequency (EHF) microwave beams. These pulsed electromagnetic rays, fired in the form of a high-powered collimated beam, can easily penetrate drywalls, wood panels and glass windows to inflict severe damage to neurons and nerve pathways in the line-of-sight target's brain.
The destructive power of these weapons derives from the amount of inductive heat energy that is transferred to the target's brain over time. Depending upon the particulars of the microwave weapon system used (antenna gain, atmospheric conditions, power scaling etc), effective radiated power density (ERPD) in the range of 100-1000 mW/cm² or higher, can directly be transmitted to the target's brain through microwave pulse beams, causing inflammatory and degenerative changes in the cerebrovascular tissue.
Initial exposure to microwave weapons can induce severe headaches, nausea and convulsions in the targeted individual, whose symptoms could potentially worsen with time to include acute neuro-cognitive deficits (radiation induced necrosis of brain tissue) and stroke (thermal injury to intra-cranial blood vessels), depending upon the intensity and length of exposure to the RF (Radio Frequency) source.
As the weapon remains completely untraceable and symptoms can always be attributed to natural disease processes, psychotronic weapons remain a most elusive and pernicious technology, which in the wrong hands could pose a very dangerous threat to the free world.
SPECTRE, arch nemesis of the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), aims to incite a global war between the major world powers (NATO & BRICS) within the next decade and has integrated various highly specialized criminal entities under its operational umbrella for the accomplishment of this mission.
One of the groups incorporated into SPECTRE in recent years, is a very secretive religious order operating around the Horn of Africa and possessing high expertise in directed-energy technology and microwave weapons.
FRATERNITAS NABATEA - The Nabatean Brotherhood.
A mystico-criminal syndicate having areas of operations in North Africa, the Gulf of Aden and the Arabian Sea, the Nabatean Brotherhood at its core, remains a secret cult that controls its operatives through initiations, punishments and rank systems. Not much is known about this mysterious order, other than their devout astral worship and practice of ritual murder by strangulation.
This criminal cult, under the austere leadership of its Grand Master, Dr. Arthur S. Moros, is secretly carrying out directed-energy weapons research in an isolated island base in the Seychelles and has tested out microwave weapons on pre-selected targets in various embassies and consulates in East Africa and in the island nations of the Indian Ocean.
The ultimate aim of the brotherhood is to escalate hostilities between member countries of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) and BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China & South Africa), by clandestinely targeting NATO embassies with microwave weapons and seeding mutual suspicion between the two groups.
It is expected that a succession of carefully staged embassy attacks, secretly carried out by the brotherhood in neutral territories, just might provoke a military confrontation between NATO and BRICS forces in the Indian Ocean, ultimately leading the world to war.
A nightmarish scenario that SPECTRE and its agents provocateurs are meticulously planning behind the scenes.
ACT I
THE SECRET WEAPON / ELECKTRO-MAGICK:
The island nation of Seychelles located 1600 km east of mainland Africa in the Indian Ocean has been rocked by a series of bizarre events in the past few months. First came a string of uncanny murders of business and government officials that put the entire populace of Seychelles on edge. A perplexing observation seen in all the strangulated victims on postmortem, was the placement of symbolic articles (old coins, iron nails) in their mouths.
People have also observed unexplainable phenomena around Mahe Island, the largest island of Seychelles, which contains the capital city of Victoria.
Grey angry clouds appearing out of nowhere, vicious thunder strikes, dead fish in the ocean and a rise in psychiatric admissions in hospitals, have all been noted in the past few months. Locals believe a curse has descended on this once peaceful island nation.
On the evening of June 15, 2022, a sinister event happens in the British High Commission in Victoria.
Key staff members, residing within the building, abruptly experience incapacitating tinnitus, vertigo and intense headaches. The symptoms are so severe that all three individuals are urgently evacuated back to the UK where their condition rapidly deteriorates. Within days, the staff members develop spontaneous intracranial blood clots and are shifted to an intensive care unit in the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery (NHNN) at Queen Square London.
MI6 has reasons to believe that a non-state actor might have been behind this recent event, as they have confirmed reports that the French ambassador in Seychelles was admitted to an elite neurology clinic in Paris a few weeks back and remains bed bound to this very day. In addition, two US Navy officers stationed at the Naval Support Facility in Diego Garcia (Chagos Archipelago) were airlifted in March after experiencing anomalous health events (AHI's). Forensic experts at MI6 are convinced that a high-powered microwave weapon was used on the British High Commission in Victoria.
But who was behind these attacks?
And what purpose did these attacks serve?
After receiving his briefing from Vice Admiral M, Commander Bond is dispatched to Mahe Island in Seychelles on June 22, 2022 to investigate the case.
On arrival in Mahe Island after a 16 hours connecting flight at 9:30 AM, Commander Bond meets with the British High Commissioner and the head of the Seychelles Police Force (SPF) at the British High Commission in Victoria, who update him on the current investigation's status.
Bond and members of the SPF scout all potential locations around the High Commission building, where a microwave weapon could have been placed to target the staff.
Commander Bond identifies two buildings, that have the right height and ranged distance from the High Commission's main office and advises the Chief Inspector of the Seychelles Police Force to run a detailed check on these sites, including all CCTV camera footage around the area.
After photographing all potential sites, Commander Bond requests the British High Commissioner for a private vehicle and submits his international driver's license. He is provided with the High Commission's spare vehicle, a 2014 Ford Focus ST and drives it to his hotel, the Hilltop Boutique at Serret Road.
That afternoon at 3:00 PM, Bond meets up with retired Petty Officer Fidele Barbey, the local MI6 point of contact (Section-I / Indian Ocean) at the Seychelles Natural History Museum.
After discussing various aspects of the High Commission's case investigation, Commander Bond out of curiosity asks Barbey if he had noticed anything unusual around Mahe Island in the past few weeks prior to the incident.
Barbey pauses for a moment to collect his thoughts.
He tells Bond that even though the Seychellois people are predominantly Catholic, superstitious beliefs deeply permeate the Creole culture of the islands.
Seychelles was populated by French colonizers with African and Malagasy slaves in the 18th century, who brought with them rituals and traditions of Gris-Gris (witchcraft), the black magic of Africa. In 1958, all forms of sorcery were banned by the Government of Seychelles, but belief in the paranormal persists to the present day.
Barbey tells Bond that certain islands in Seychelles are believed to be haunted by phantoms. The ghosts of the Dauban mausoleum in Silhouette Island, the headless spirit of Fregate Island and the apparition of Mary Best of Moyenne Island are all entities known to the islanders.
But something else has been bothering the inhabitants of Mahe Island for the past few months...
Barbey indicates to Commander Bond on a pocket map, the location of an abandoned island called 'Ile du Nord', that lies 33 nautical miles (62 km) northwest of Mahe Island, where local fishermen fear to take their boats. They say that the island is cursed and that an evil presence resides in it. Word on the street is that anyone who approaches the island is immediately beset with terrible headaches and nausea and eventually goes mad. People stay away from this island at all costs.
The words 'nausea' and 'headaches' alert Commander Bond and he advises Barbey to relay this information and the GPS coordinates of Ile du Nord to MI6 Headquarters ASAP and also request a full spectrum satellite reconnaissance of the island.
Before departing, Barbey informs Bond that the Internet Service Provider (ISP) & telecommunication services in his hotel are not secure and that future mission tasking will be communicated to him through radio messaging in the coming days.
Barbey hands over a small, hefty cardboard box of Seychellois cigars to Commander Bond containing a Walther PPK pistol, three ammunition clips and a one-time pad (OTP) taped to the inside of the box.
Courtesy of an old friend...
Back at his hotel, Commander Bond purchases a Swiss Army knife and a pair of pocket binoculars with cash from the hotel lobby's gift shop and heads back to his room.
Once inside, Bond locks the room's door, closes all the curtains and begins to disassemble his carry-on travel bag.
The Q Branch standard issue carry-on travel bag contains a pre-fabricated gun case molded into the plastic frame of the pull-out handle bar assembly. Bond screws out the gun case using the Phillips screw driver attachment of his Swiss Army knife and connects it to the nylon straps of the luggage compartment to create an improvised cross shoulder harness for his Walther PPK pistol.
The inner fabric of the carry-on bag, made of NIJ Level II Kevlar, can be ripped at its seams and connected through Velcro straps to create a lightweight bulletproof vest capable of ballistic protection against common pistol calibers and stabbing instruments. After cutting through the stitching with the knife attachment of the Swiss Army knife, Bond removes the inner fabric from the front and back end of the carry-on bag and cross links the two pieces to create a bulletproof vest.
Commander Bond now removes the black handle of the carry-on bag. The tube-shaped handle, made of a high-strength forged aluminium alloy has a threaded end on one side. Bond disassembles all four wheels of the carry-on bag and removes their rubber casings to reveal four stainless steel sound baffles. Bond screws opens the tube, slides all the four baffles in and then securely tightens it.
The sound suppressor assembly for the Walther PPK pistol is complete.
With the shoulder harness, sound suppressor & bulletproof vest assembled, Commander Bond decrypts the OTP code and retires to bed.
The next morning on June 24, 2022, a reclusive American billionaire Milton Krest arrives in Port Victoria from Mombasa, Kenya in his mega yacht, the 'Wavekrest' along with his British girlfriend Elizabeth and his personal security entourage.
Milton Krest knows something...
His construction firm 'ABRAXAS, Inc.' was heavily involved in infrastructure works for a mysterious religious brotherhood in the Socotra archipelago in Yemen and Ile du Nord Island in the Seychelles and many of his offshore shell companies are in reality, cover fronts for international money laundering operations of this brotherhood.
Krest is currently under investigation by INTERPOL (International Criminal Police Organization) for financial fraud & illicit wire transfers and has been living in his luxury yacht for the past three years to evade authorities.
As Krest and Elizabeth accompanied by his security entourage, de-board the yacht and enter their Mercedes-Maybach sedans, a phone call comes for Krest.
A man by the name of Trajan on the phone, warns Krest not to disclose any financial statements or documents related to the 'Ile du Nord project' to INTERPOL. Trajan orders Krest to destroy all proofs of financial transactions related with the brotherhood immediately.
Krest demands a price for his compliance in eight figures.
The call drops.
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Commander Bond spends his second day in Mahe Island, sifting through CCTV camera footage obtained by the SPF at the Seychelles Police Force Headquarters in Victoria.
CCTV camera footage near the British High Commission reveals the presence of three black minivans, that were positioned in parking lots directly facing the building during the time of the reported attack. No records of the vehicles can be found by the Seychelles Police Force.
Could this be a portable microwave weapon system fired from the vehicles towards the High Commission?
Later that night, Bond assembles a High Frequency (HF) cross loop antenna using the retractable extension tubes of his carry-on bag. Bond removes 16 feet of tightly wound 12 gauge copper wire, encased in rubber piping all across his bag and winds it around the cross mount. Bond then removes the detachable zippers of the carry-on, made of non-inductive brass and clamps them to both ends of the copper wire, completing the HF antenna assembly which once connected to his shortwave radio set, is now capable of receiving radio signals in the 17 meters band range (18.068-18.168 MHz).
At exactly 2100 hrs local time in Seychelles, MI6 Headquarters in London sends a radiogram, relayed from a secret numbers station in Madagascar to Commander Bond, which he quickly notes down.
The secret message once deciphered through the one-time pad (OTP), tasks Commander Bond to keep a watchful eye on Milton Krest as a person of interest (POI) and to investigate his affiliations and deeper motives.
ACT - II
ASSASSINATION BY TRIANGULATION:
After repeated telephonic negotiations between Trajan and Krest, the brotherhood finally agree to wire transfer 80 million Seychellois rupees into Krest's corporate account in the Al-Salam Bank in Victoria on Saturday June 25, 2022.
The wire transfer is scheduled to happen at 8:30 AM on Saturday morning.
Deep down, the brotherhood hold severe bitterness towards Krest for his treachery.
It is not the blackmail money he asks...it is his impudence.
His silence is crucial for the long-term survival of their clandestine project in Ile du Nord Island.
The brotherhood vow to assassinate Milton Krest, so that other contractors employed under the aegis of the brotherhood get the message and keep silent, or else the Order will shut their mouths for them for good and forever.
A death via sniper is quickly planned.
On a cloudy Saturday morning on June 25, three highly trained brotherhood snipers armed with Blaser Tactical 2 sniper rifles, fitted with Zeiss Divari V telescopic sights and 0.338 Lapua Magnum bullets, strategically place themselves 350 yards around the Al-Salam Bank in Victoria.
As Krest's motorcade pulls into the bank at 8 AM in two bullet proof Mercedes-Maybach sedans, a volley of sharp cracking sniper shots erupts. His personal bodyguards armed with Vector 45 and P90 submachine guns, immediately spring into action and use suppressive fire cover to cover as they try to pinpoint the snipers positions. These private contractors are no match for the hawk-eyed snipers, who decimate Krest's security entourage with deadly accuracy.
A heavy downpour of rain now erupts, bringing with it a layer of grey mist which clouds the optics of the snipers.
Commander Bond and Barbey, who had been following the motorcade in the Ford Focus, rush towards Krest's bullet ridden Mercedes-Maybach. Barbey picks up a Vector 45 and pulls a panic ridden, hyperventilating Krest out of the vehicle.
Bond suddenly catches the sharp glint of sniper optics in an old multi-storey apartment building 300 yards to the left of the motorcade and yells at Barbey to keep low.
Bond picks up a P90 submachine gun from a downed security guard, communicates the exact position of the sniper to Barbey and runs towards the building as Barbey cover fires from behind the Mercedes-Maybach sedan towards a window on the 7th floor of the apartment building.
Bond runs up the stairs to the 7th floor of the building and locates Sniper 1.
After a succession of fierce gunfights, Bond closes in on the distance between him and the sniper and then dynamically enters the apartment room to engage in close-quarters combat with the assassin, who is caught off guard while refilling rounds in his AKS-74U submachine gun.
Bond manages to grab the sniper's arm and breaks his right wrist joint with one sharp snap. Bond then arm locks the sniper and forcefully breaks his right elbow using all his strength.
As the sniper screams in pain and reaches for his handgun with his other hand, Bond kicks him to the wall and delivers the coup de grace in the form a quick double tap fired straight into the sniper's head with his Walther PPK pistol.
The sniper drops dead in a pool of his blood.
Commander Bond now picks up the Blaser Tactical 2 sniper rifle and scans the horizon.
He locates Sniper 2 on the rooftop of a building 200 yards to his left who is viciously engaging Barbey with volleys of sniper fire.
Bond fires a sharp 338 bullet into Sniper 2's left hip joint that breaks his femur.
As the sniper falls to the ground and screams in pain, Bond fires another 338 bullet into his neck...silencing him forever.
As radio communication with both snipers goes silent, the last remaining sniper suddenly realizes that the hunters have now become the hunted.
Sniper 3, with blood-shot eyes nervously scans the horizon.
The downpour is heavy and visibility is severely obscured from his position by fog.
Sniper 3 connects an infrared scope to his rifle in order to catch any heat signature in the horizon.
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While ducking for cover in the apartment room, Commander Bond notices a FLIR (Forward Looking Infrared) scope on the floor.
A cautionary thought comes into Bond's head.
As the dead sniper had a thermal imaging scope in his kit; other members of the sniper team might also be carrying the very same attachment and more than likely he is being targeted from an infrared scope at this very moment.
Bond decides to take his hunch seriously and designs a ruse.
He picks up the corpse of Sniper 1, removes the assassin's black robe and puts his blue coat on the dead body. Bond then props him up on an office chair by fastening the sniper's torso to the chair's back rest with his leather belt and wedges the sniper rifle in his arm pit.
Bond now strategically places the dead sniper next to the window's edge of the room, quickly scans the landscape with his pocket binoculars while hiding behind the corpse and then ducks down.
The placement is correct.
A minute green heat signature suddenly appears in Sniper 3's infrared scope.
Sniper 3 zooms in to see an absurd sight.
A hazy, unknown man with a rifle in Sniper 1's position in the apartment building.
The silhouette of the gunman does not match that of his team member in his thermal scope.
Laying on his back, Bond gently twists the office chair clockwise and anti-clockwise with his legs, giving the illusion of movement to the corpse, while secretly observing the landscape using his Swiss Army knife blade as a reflecting mirror.
Sniper 3 buys the deception.
From his point of view, it seems as if the mystery gunman in the apartment building is scanning the landscape for targets.
Sniper 3 adjusts his sniperscope and fires two 338 bullets into the chest of the dead man, who falls back.
Bond notes the position of the optics glint of Sniper 3's sniperscope in the reflection on his Swiss Army knife blade.
The shots appear to have been fired from a distant house perched on top of a hill.
Bond crouching behind the apartment window, cautiously estimates distance to the house at around 440 yards by using the 'rule of the thumb'.
As the target is beyond the zeroed range of the rifle, a new calibration needs to be done for an accurate shot.
Bond takes out his carabiner key chain, which contains a liquid filled compass and uses it to find the general direction of the magnetic north and the approximate bearing of the incident shots fired. By closely observing the movement of tree leaves and the direction of a flag blowing on the rooftop of a government building with his pocket binoculars, Bond estimates the wind speed at around 10 MPH moving towards the east.
Commander Bond takes out a credit card from his leather wallet which contains a hidden scratch-off miniaturized ballistic calculator. Bond removes the scratch lacquer from the card revealing the analog calculator and estimates the precise range and wind correction needed for the new target on a piece of paper.
He accordingly adjusts the milli-radians on the elevation and windage adjustment knobs of the sniperscope, applies 16x zoom & diopter correction to the eyepiece and then patiently waits for the wind to go still.
Commander Bond now fires a single shot towards an estimate point slightly below the window edge of the 'house on the hill' 444 yards away, overlooking the Al-Salam Bank. The bullet traverses the thin wall of the building and sharply enters the left lateral side of Sniper 3's chest, puncturing his left lung.
Immediate hemothorax sets in.
The sniper stumbles and winces with severe pain and coughs up blood.
The bullet has nicked the hilar blood vessels of the left lung.
His years of training kick in and the sniper manages to get up and aim his rifle with his trembling hands.
The sniper sees an optics glint coming from the apartment building.
He can see a man in the crosshairs.
The man in the crosshairs can see him.
Both fire.
Commander Bond's sniper rifle jams in the nick of time.
Sniper 3's bullet misses Bond's forehead by a mere two inches due to an abrupt gust of wind and cuts his scalp.
Bond falls on the floor due to the high-speed impact wave of the bullet and develops intense ringing in his right ear.
Sniper 3, visually satisfied with the hit, now abandons his weapon and huffs and puffs his way down the hill to his exfiltration point where a running AH-6J helicopter awaits him.
Internally bleeding and hyperventilating, the pale sniper barely makes it to the chopper when two brotherhood operatives sitting inside, pull him into the helicopter and make a hasty departure.
As the helicopter climbs to an altitude of 2500 feet above the ocean, one of the brotherhood operatives sitting in the rear seat grabs the dying sniper, fires a bullet in his head and flings his dead body outside into the deep waters of the Indian Ocean.
The Order never tolerates defeat.
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A bloodied and exhausted Bond now finds his way back to the bullet ridden Mercedes Maybach sedans in the pouring rain, where Seychelles Police Force cars and ambulances have converged. Commander Bond and Barbey take a visibly shaken Krest to Victoria Hospital, where he is admitted with severe generalized anxiety and psychogenic aphonia (mutism) due to emotional shock.
Out of his 6-member security entourage, 4 are dead on arrival, one perishes on the operation table under anesthesia and one is left permanently brain dead on ventilatory support.
Barbey is treated for cuts and scrapes and Bond receives stitches for his scalp laceration.
Bond's blue cotton shirt is soaked with blood due to the profuse bleeding from the head wound.
It is in the emergency center's waiting room that Commander Bond and Barbey make the acquaintance of Krest's girlfriend Elizabeth, who discreetly informs them of her real identity.
Bond notices a series of faint scars on the back of her neck and upper back.
Krest has a vicious side to his nature.
After completing medico-legal paperwork, Bond and Barbey visit the Mahe Island morgue that afternoon with members of the Seychelles Police Force and the Chief Coroner to examine the cadavers of the two snipers. By now, both corpses have assumed full rigor mortis.
The unidentified dead bodies show extensive tattooing on the arms and chest area in an undecipherable language and are immaculately groomed with no body hair. In addition, both corpses have bilateral orchiectomy scars in their perineal regions.
Castrati...a cult of eunuchs.
Most curiously, the black robes that the assassins were wearing are found to be made of a carbon fiber composite material, which is very odd.
Before departing for his hotel, Commander Bond advises Barbey to carry a side arm on his person at all times and keep high vigilance, as a vendetta hit is very likely in the coming days.
ACT - III
GARROTE BY FISH:
Commander Bond and Barbey visit Milton Krest in Victoria Hospital the next morning, who by now has partly recovered his voice.
Krest is extremely grateful to Bond and Barbey for saving his life.
Krest in a hoarse voice tells Bond about his love for exotic fish and deep-sea diving, a passion Commander Bond shares with the man. Krest informs Bond that he and Elizabeth were planning an expedition to the Aldbara Atoll Islands, that lie 666 nautical miles southwest of Mahe Island, to search for an extremely rare squirrel fish called the 'Hildebrand Rarity' and that he would be delighted if Bond and Barbey could accompany them for the trip.
After getting discharged from Victoria Hospital that afternoon, Krest invites Bond and Barbey over to his mega yacht and they plan a 7 day return trip to the Aldbara Atoll Islands with the ship's Captain.
The Wavekrest departs from Port Victoria in inclement weather later that evening.
It is only once the journey begins and Commander Bond familiarizes himself with the ship, that he realizes that Krest's love for exotic fish has a deep psychopathy behind it. The man is an expert fish taxidermist, who derives great pleasure from hunting exotic fish and making art works out of their carcasses. The boat contains a large collection of his artwork that adorns the walls of each room. The lower deck of the ship contains a taxidermy lab where rare fish are stored in formalin tanks, in addition to a large refrigeration unit which is used to cryogenically preserve the dead fish.
After a nauseating three days journey in choppy waters, the Wavekrest arrives at the Aldabra Atoll and sets anchor in the lagoon.
Next morning Commander Bond, Barbey and Krest strap on their scuba gear kits and search for the rare fish in the shallow waters of the lagoon, that contains a large number of reef manta rays (Mobula alfredi).
After some struggle, Commander Bond manages to get hold of the very rare squirrel fish and brings it to surface. Krest is overjoyed and places the fish in a formalin jar next to his bed in his personal suite.
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Back on board the Wavekrest that afternoon, Barbey receives secret correspondence from MI6 Headquarters detailing the satellite survey of Ile du Nord Island performed by the military reconnaissance orbiter Sentinel-5 on his secure laptop, which he hands over to Commander Bond.
The report is alarming to say the least.
Satellite polarimetry studies done with synthetic-aperture radar (SAR) scanning reveal Ile du Nord Island as a focal point of continuous bursts of highly charged pulse waves, that coalesce to form a 3 nautical mile diameter dome, that surrounds and protects the island from all kinds of electromagnetic interference. This invisible electrified dome perfectly explains why the local fishermen felt so unwell in proximity to the island.
The dome also seems to possess Wavelength Division Multiplexing (WDM) properties, by virtue of which all wireless communication signals coming in and out of the dome cannot be intercepted.
Satellite photo imagery and topographical time-series studies of the island confirm major infrastructure development during the last three years (ship dock, helipads, residential quarters and a main facility complex). But the most alarming discovery is the presence of a massive electromagnetic coil field located in the center of the island.
In addition, AIS (Automatic Identification System) tracking around Ile du Nord Island reveal multiple return trips of the cargo ship 'THERMIDOR-6' over the past 34 months, originating from Samha Island in the Socotra archipelago (near Yemen) to Ile du Nord Island. The MMSI number (Maritime Mobile Service Identity) of the cargo ship is registered with a Milton Krest owned shipping company.
How could an advanced technological facility like this develop in such an isolated island, without the Seychelles authorities having no knowledge of it?
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That evening after dinner, Commander Bond and Barbey discuss the highly suspicious nature of the recent murders of government and business officials in Mahe Island, a few weeks prior to the British High Commission attack.
The secretary of maritime security, the head of the Seychelles chamber of commerce, a physics professor from the University of Seychelles specializing in maritime radars and two business men related with the shipping industry were all murdered in very similar ritualistic fashions.
Manual strangulation followed by a totem placed in the mouth.
The Seychelles Police Force suspect a serial killer on the loose...but something does not add up.
The deceased were all high-up, well connected people who due to the nature of their work could have had some knowledge about the infrastructure buildup going on in the island and quite possibly were eliminated by whoever was behind this island's development.
Or...more likely...
These individuals were in the know and had been bribed into a convenient reticence, only to be lynched at the appropriate time in order to maintain the secrecy of the project.
A conspiracy of silence.
The sniper team sent to murder Milton Krest were clearly members of some kind of a secret cult.
The robes found on them, made of composite carbon fiber materials, could potentially be dielectric shielding against strong electromagnetic fields, thus situating them on the island.
Were all these events related?
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Later that night, after Commander Bond and Barbey retire to their personal chambers, Elizabeth secretly enters Krest's personal suite located on the upper deck of the ship and hacks into his personal computer workstation.
Elizabeth Palmer, an undercover Royal Signals officer (CSEng - Communication Systems Engineer) working for Defence Intelligence (DI), had been tasked to infiltrate Krest's inner circle and extract any information related to his shadowy web of cover front companies.
Milton Krest and ABRAXAS, Inc. were under observation by UK's Defence Intelligence (DI) for illegal weapon shipments to private military contractors in North Africa and the Middle East.
Elizabeth manages to decrypt and copy all hidden folders from the computer to her USB drive and is about to leave, when an inebriated Milton Krest enters the room.
His personal suite is strictly out of bounds for all members of his staff, except for the room service maid.
Elizabeth loses her composure as the enraged man yells out loud and lunges at her.
Krest, in a fit of madness, throws Elizabeth on his bed and grabs a stingray-tail whip he keeps next to his bedside, which he calls the 'Corrector' and begins to viciously beat Elizabeth with it.
On hearing Elizabeth's screams, Commander Bond immediately rushes into Krest’s suite and pulls the man off the terrified woman. Krest is seriously drunk and not in correct sensorium. Bond warns Krest never to lay hands on Elizabeth ever again or he will break his fingers.
Krest vomits and collapses on the floor.
Commander Bond takes a traumatized Elizabeth to his room, applies antibiotic ointment to her wounds and gives her two tablets of Ibuprofen (400mg) to deal with the pain.
Bond informs Elizabeth that they will be setting course back for Mahe Island first thing in the morning and that she must report all physical abuse she sustained at the hands of Krest to the Seychelles Police Force as soon as they arrive.
Bond picks up a spare towel, a blanket and his gun strap and walks out of the room.
Before closing the door he tells Elizabeth to lock the room from inside.
Bond finds a nearby four-seater sofa, rolls the towel into a pillow and goes to sleep on it.
----------------------------------------------------
Next morning, a high pitched, blood-curdling scream of the room service maid forces Bond into immediate consciousness.
Bond arms his Walther PPK pistol and rushes into Krest’s suite where he finds a grotesque scene.
Milton Krest is dead in his gold plated bathroom.
His body is bound in iron chains with severe bruising across the chest, swelling of the face and a ligature mark running across the neck.
The prized 'Hildebrand Rarity' is found stuffed in his mouth…
Garrote by fish.
His computer workstation along with filing cabinets in the suite have also been ransacked.
After documenting and photographing the crime scene area with Barbey, Commander Bond orders the yacht's crew to put Milton Krest's dead body in the fish refrigeration unit on the lower deck to delay the decomposition of the corpse.
The Wavekrest sets sail back towards Mahe Island later that night.
ACT - IV
THE MOUTH OF KRONOS:
In the ensuing days following Krest's murder, MI6 and DI complete their dossier on the events that transpired in the British High Commission in Victoria. Satellite studies of Ile du Nord Island confirm the presence of an active facility utilizing high-energy electromagnetic coils. MRI brain scans of the targeted staff all reveal focal thermal lesions consistent with exposure to microwave-based dielectric heating.
On deep combing of Krest's computer files as recovered by Captain Elizabeth, extensive evidence is compiled by Defence Intelligence (DI), which includes detailed architectural plans of the facility, financial transactions of the purchasing networks of ABRAXAS, Inc. and shipment details of high-tech electronic equipment (gyrotrons, vircators, linear beam vacuum tubes), which could be utilized in the manufacture of energy weapons.
All accumulated evidence confirms the initial suspicion.
A directed-energy weapons attack...orchestrated by a group using Ile du Nord Island as their base of operations.
The Ministry of Defense (MoD), GCHQ and the Seychelles Intelligence Bureau (SIB) all concur with the results of the joint report.
A facility like this poses a very dangerous strategic threat to the delicate balance of power in the region.
In light of the recent findings, a high-level top secret meeting is carried out at MI6 Headquarters with intelligence officials of the Seychelles People’s Defence Force (SPDF) and the National Security Service (NSS) of Mauritius on July 3, 2022 to deal with the crisis at hand.
The issue of legality is first discussed in detail by the defence delegates.
Which party would be responsible for carrying out the dismantling of the facility?
The SPDF officials state their situation in clear terms to the MI6 officers.
With a fleet of three active duty coast guard gunboats but with no attack helicopters or armed drones, the SPDF currently does not have the military strike capability to destroy the facility on its own. The Seychelles Coast Guard (SCG) was created to monitor international waters for pirates and for performing various multi-mission duties in the nation's 115 islands. The organization was not developed for counter-insurgency operations and will require military assistance from the UK in this undertaking.
A British naval attack on the island is ruled out by MI6 due to the legality of conducting a sea-based military intervention in a fellow Commonwealth country and the international ramifications of such an action.
A covert precision air strike is deemed to be the best possible course of action in the current scenario by both the SPDF and MI6.
This is followed by a detailed briefing by the Directorate of Air Intelligence, which apprises the defence officials on the unique challenges the electromagnetic dome surrounding the island poses for a precision air strike. Due to the continuous magnetic interference wave patterns within the dome, terminal guidance would not work for GPS / INS guided air dropped munitions, leading to an erroneous bomb trajectory.
The only way around the problem is laser targeting of the facility via a ground-based laser designator, which could provide the terminal guidance needed for a precision strike.
Lt.Col William Tanner (Royal Engineers), the Chief of Staff-MI6, next briefs the defence delegates on the assets MI6 currently has at hand in the Seychelles. The credentials of Commander Bond (Royal Naval Reserve), Captain Elizabeth Palmer (Royal Signals) and Petty Officer (Retd) Fidele Barbey (Section-I) are discussed in detail.
The three of them could be utilized as a covert JTAC (Joint Terminal Attack Controller) team and be tasked with infiltrating the island and placing a laser designator near the facility. The RAF would take care of the rest, followed by an encirclement of the island by Seychelles Coast Guard (SCG) gunboats. All countries involved would have to adopt strict rules of secrecy and deny all knowledge of the mission with no press coverage.
A memorandum of agreement (MOA) is signed by the defence delegates at the end of the meeting.
That evening, the MoD approves the immediate dismantling of the facility at Ile du Nord Island and the orders are directly conveyed to Vice Admiral M and the Director of Military Operations RAF.
An air strike operation is swiftly planned to decimate the facility.
A deep strike package, consisting of a RAF Voyager KC3 (air-to-air refueling tanker) with 3 Eurofighter Typhoons, armed with laser guided weapons will take off from the S.S. Ramgoolam International Airport (FIMP) in Port Louis, Mauritius, the nearest available asphalt runway capable of tanker take-off and landing. Once target identification via laser designator has been achieved in Ile du Nord Island, the fighter jets will destroy the ground facility with laser guided Paveway IV bombs.
Additionally a RAF C-17 transport aircraft carrying a WS-61 Sea King helicopter, rescue crew and Q-Section's equipment will be sent to Mahe Island a few days prior to the start of the mission.
The fighter jets and air tanker are covertly dispatched from RAF airbase Akrotiri in Cyprus to the S.S. Ramgoolam International Airport in Mauritius on July 5 under the cover story of participating in an air show in Port Louis.
Bond is discretely conveyed the details of the mission being planned and told to await the arrival of an old friend.
----------------------------------------------------
After attending Milton Krest's funeral in Mont Fleuri cemetery on July 6, Commander Bond drives up to an abandoned warehouse near Port Victoria Harbor.
Major (Retd) Geoffrey Boothroyd, Chief Armaments Officer-MI6, has arrived from London on the C-17 transport aircraft to hand over a few gadgets to Commander Bond from the Quartermaster's Section.
These include an Omega Seamaster diver's watch with inbuilt GPS tracking, a JTAC Type-163 laser target designator and a portable EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) generator.
Commander Bond and Major Boothroyd now walk towards a secure part of the harbor, where the major introduces Bond to Q-Section's latest offering. A very sharp looking, pitch-black speed boat called the Shadow. Commander Bond has never seen anything like it.
Coated with radar absorbent paint with full spectrum EMP protection and B-5 ballistic protection level armor plating, the boat is a convertible submarine with a cruise speed of 25 knots/hr and a maximum dive depth of 70 feet. In addition, Major Boothroyd explains to Bond that the autopilot mode on the boat can be activated via his diver's watch, which will automatically steer the boat to within 16 feet of his location in water.
The boat equipped with L-Band satellite connectivity also comes with a cache full of EMI-shielded tactical wetsuits, CCR's (Closed-Circuit Rebreathers), Night-Vision Devices (Goggles+Binoculars), DPV's (Diver Propulsion Vehicles), bulletproof vests and weapons (MP5K-PDW submachine guns, Glock 19 pistols, stun grenades & Fairbairn-Sykes daggers) along with ancillary items (wire cutters, medical kits & electrical shark repellents).
Commander Bond is impressed.
Over the course of the next 24 hours Bond, Barbey and Elizabeth plan an amphibious sabotage mission, code-named 'Operation NIGHT THUNDER' with the immediate task of destroying the facility complex in Ile du Nord Island and go over the infiltration and exfiltration strategies in detail.
The operational details once finalized by the team, are communicated to the Directorate of Air Intelligence by MI6 Headquarters.
Saturday - July 9, 2022, is agreed by all departments involved (MI6, RAF, SPDF) as Mission Day, based on ideal meteorological forecasts for both sea and air operations.
----------------------------------------------------
On Saturday night, at 10 pm sharp, Bond and the crew assemble at the dockyard to load up their weapons and strap into their tactical wetsuits. They leave Port Victoria in the 'Shadow' at 1045 pm and silently make their way towards Ile du Nord Island.
Just before midnight, the speedboat stealthily arrives at the edge of the electromagnetic dome perimeter and dives to a depth of 7 meters.
About 800 feet away from the shoreline Bond, Elizabeth and Barbey exit the boat and swim underwater towards the island with the aid of their diver propulsion vehicles (DPV's), guided by magnetic compasses strapped to their wrists.
On arrival at land, all three of them switch on their night vision goggles (NVG's) and remove their CCR kits and flippers.
The plan of attack, as already discussed...is that Barbey will search and destroy the security headquarters of the installation, Elizabeth will target the command center and Bond will place the laser target designator near the main research facility. All three of them switch on their tracking devices, arm their primary weapons and head off on their own separate ways.
The island in the moonlit night presents a most frightening and desolate landscape.
On reaching their recon point positions, all three of them switch on their high-powered night vision binoculars and communicate their assessment of their area of operations to each other via UHF radio headsets.
The facility complex is protected by a 25 feet high perimeter fence wall and watched over by four 70 feet high sentinel guard towers containing high-powered search lights, armed snipers and MG-42 machine gun turrets. The main facility itself comprises of five H-shaped residential buildings, which form an arc around a central building, a religious temple of some sorts, into which armed personnel attired in black robes are seen to enter and depart.
After closely surveying and noting all local threats in the vicinity of their respective areas of operations...Bond, Elizabeth and Barbey connect sound suppressors to their primary weapons, activate their aiming lasers and adopt radio silence.
At exactly 0115 military time, the infiltration operation starts and the three of them stealthily sneak towards their designated areas.
Unbeknownst to them all...the perimeter around the fence wall is rigged with trip wires and anti-personnel landmines.
Barbey moving in from the southeast direction, accidentally sets foot on a trip wire which immediately activates a MON-50 fragmentation mine. The mine instantly cuts the man to pieces.
The loud blast alerts the heavily armed security guards and their vicious Doberman guard dogs patrolling this sector, who rush towards the area of impact.
Immediately search lights start scanning the landscape and the security HQ of the facility deactivates the mines and trip wires around the complex for 15 minutes.
Commander Bond and Elizabeth quickly rush towards the perimeter fence and cut their way through the concertina wire with wire cutters, as the security forces coordinate the search and collection of Barbey’s remains.
Bond and Elizabeth now make their way through the residential buildings into the temple complex.
ACT - V
DEATH BY SIX CUTS:
Once inside the sinister temple, Commander Bond and Elizabeth witness the occult ceremonies of the Order, presided over by their high priest, a venomous old man by the name of Pontifex Sabazios. Members dressed in black robes pour libations over a giant statue of a veiled idol and chant hymns in their shrill voices, as the high priest recites prayers in an unknown language.
Underneath this wretched temple, they discover a subterranean facility where the brotherhood is secretly carrying out its research in microwave weapon technology.
Commander Bond and Elizabeth decide to part ways so that Bond can locate the main psychotronics lab and Elizabeth can find the command center.
As he hurriedly traverses many of the secret rooms and corridors of the subterranean complex, Bond accidentally trips a laser security system, alerting the security forces.
Brotherhood soldiers armed with AKS-74U carbines and As-VAL assault rifles immediately start to converge towards Bond's position.
On sight of the first assault party, Bond hurls a stun grenade towards them and side-rolls to the left, placing himself 270 degrees to their line of fire. In the disorientating flash bang of the stun grenade, Bond empties his first ammunition clip at the stunned guards.
Security sirens now erupt from every corner.
Bond switches the selective-fire mode on his MP5 from automatic to three-round burst to conserve ammunition.
He immediately sights another assault team of 5 guards running towards him.
A brotherhood soldier flings a frag grenade towards Bond, who reflexively picks it up and throws it back towards them. As the frightened guards run in panic, Bond fires quick volleys of 3 round bursts at them, taking out another two soldiers in the process.
Bond fires the remaining rounds of his MP5K-PDW submachine gun at the cowering soldiers and runs as fast as he can to get himself out of his current position.
With the MP5 now out of ammo, Bond arms his Glock 19 pistol and runs towards a nearby vaulted passageway.
It is here that Commander Bond makes a fateful mistake.
Thinking that the doorway on the left would lead into an open corridor, Bonds runs into a storage room with all openings externally locked.
Bond can now hear heavily armed brotherhood soldiers amassing around the entrance of the room.
The game is up...
Bond is trapped.
As the security forces ensnare him from all sides, Commander Bond throws away his pistol, kneels down and raises both hands up.
He is immediately captured and savagely beaten by the guards.
Bond is now brought to Pontifex Sabazios...bruised, battered and bleeding.
Bond notices a ring on the high priest's left middle finger, with a visible sign of an octopus.
Sabazios initiates the conversation by giving a brief sermon on the history of the Fraternitas Nabatea to Commander Bond and then extols the manifest destiny of the Order, with a shine in his dark eyes.
The old man explains in gruesome detail the capabilities of his directed-energy weapons arsenal and the criminal intentions of SPECTRE in the Indian Ocean. He then lays out 6 very sharp knives in front of a dazed and bloodied Bond and informs him of his impending sacrifice to KRONOS, the tutelary deity of the Nabatean Brotherhood, in an ornate ritual involving 6 sharp cuts, as the number 6 is of special significance to this death cult.
But before this blessed sacrifice, Commander Bond is to be subjected to the most severe psychotronic torture.
On orders of Sabazios, Bond is taken to the main psychotronic research laboratory under armed guard. There he is tightly bound in iron chains and has his head strapped into an external beam cyclotron machine. Sabazios activates the machine, which needs time for charging. In 3 minutes time, Bond's brain will be fried inside out by the highly charged ionizing radiations.
The high priest and his inner circle depart to the upper level to prepare the temple altar for the upcoming sacrifice.
Elizabeth in the meantime, manages to enter the command headquarters of the temple and knocks out the mainframe electric circuits of the facility with the EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) generator device.
In the ensuing blackout, she locates Bond's position via the tracking device on her wrist.
Bond held down by two heavily armed guards, begins to experience sharp pain in his scalp and face as the cyclotron machine revs up.
Seeing Bond in such a precarious situation, Elizabeth fearlessly rushes into the lab and fires an entire ammunition clip at the armed guards from her suppressed MP5 submachine gun, instantly killing the two men.
Elizabeth manages to stop the cyclotron machine in the nick of time and liberates Commander Bond from the iron chains.
Bond is grievously hurt and has difficulty in walking.
Thankfully the armed guards had brought Bond's gear along with them to the main laboratory, containing the laser target designator. Bond and Elizabeth pick up the weapons and ammunition of the downed guards along with the laser designator and escape the laboratory through an overhead exit hatch, which opens to the ground above.
Once outside, Bond points the laser designator towards the location of the underground research laboratory and activates the device, which transmits the exact coordinates of the lab to a formation of 3 RAF Eurofighter Typhoons of the 809 Expeditionary Air Wing, which have been loitering in group formation, 33 nautical miles northwest of Ile du Nord Island.
With the coordinates received, the pilots aim their LITENING III targeting pods towards the target, arm their laser-guided bombs and get ready for the air-to-ground strike.
Bond and Elizabeth now have exactly 7 minutes to escape from the area of impact.
----------------------------------------------------
With the electromagnetic deflector shield down, blackouts in various sectors and generalized chaos everywhere in his temple, Sabazios in his command headquarters, grimly realizes that his impenetrable fortress is under siege and that the end is approaching fast.
The high priest, in an act of final retribution, activates his top secret directed-energy weapon system...the 'Scalar-Wave Propagator', a most heinous instrument of mass destruction, which the brotherhood have secretly been developing with atomic physicists from SPECTRE.
The weapon system rapidly begins to charge the ionosphere 100 km above Ile du Nord Island through the electromagnetic coil field, by transmitting massive amounts of electrical energy straight into the ionized layer of the atmosphere.
Once the ionosphere above the island is fully charged, the scalar-wave weapon system has the power to condense mega volts of electrostatic potential seeded into the ionosphere into a supercharged electrical arc, which can then be focused from the heavens towards a pin point position on earth, causing extremely high inductive heating to structures in its target zone.
A death ray of immense destructive potential.
Sabazios, burning with raging anger resolves to incinerate Mahe Island to ashes.
As the weapon system charges up to full potential and critical ionization is achieved...a massive vortex of dark cumulonimbus clouds assembles around Ile du Nord Island, with cataclysmic lightning strikes.
Commander Bond and Elizabeth in the mean time manage to gunfight their way out of the facility perimeter wall against heavily armed units of brotherhood soldiers. Once outside, Bond activates the autopilot mode of the speedboat from his diver's watch, as the weather starts to become menacingly bleak.
Commander Bond and Elizabeth move as fast as they can, withstanding gale force winds and evading enemy machine gun and sniper fire from the guard towers, towards their pre-planned rendezvous point, where their speedboat awaits them.
Bond is hit thrice with bullets...one in the left leg, one that enters his chest on the right side and one that cuts his face.
Badly injured and bleeding profusely, Bond collapses on the beach just two meters short of the water.
With the thundering sound of fighter jets approaching, brotherhood soldiers manning the guard towers quickly turn their attention upwards and start firing their MG-42 machine guns at the skies, giving Elizabeth enough time to rescue Bond and rush into the sea.
The tactical wetsuits that Bond and Elizabeth are wearing, contain an inflatable flotation cell integrated into the bulletproof vest harness, which once activated, can provide 37 lbs of buoyancy.
Holding Bond tightly between her legs, Elizabeth inflates the flotation devices on her and Bond's vest and frantically backstrokes her way towards the speedboat, which moves steadily towards them due to its active GPS tracking of Bond's watch.
With MG-42 machine gun bullets whizzing past by, Elizabeth with great struggle finally manages to push Bond's body into the boat, gets herself into the cockpit and activates the submarine mode.
The boat rapidly descends to a depth of 7 meters, as massive surface waves start to develop around the island amidst the tidal storm.
Just as the ionosphere gets supercharged and all hell is about to be unleashed by the scalar-wave weapon system, the Eurofighters miraculously find their way through the extremely dense clouds into Ile du Nord aerospace.
Due to the very thick cloud formation around the island and a critical lack of visual cues, the strike commander leading the 809 Expeditionary Air Wing, decides to initiate a CCIP (Continuously Computed Impact Point) bomb run on the facility.
One by one, the brave RAF pilots nosedive to an altitude of 3000 feet AGL (above ground level) and manually release their munitions straight onto the facility, withstanding heavy anti-aircraft gun fire from brotherhood soldiers.
Six, 500-pound Paveway IV bunker buster bombs swiftly and sharply cut their way into the heart of the facility and blow the subterranean research lab to smithereens.
Due to the sudden voltage drop, the electromagnetic coil field charging the ionosphere suddenly implodes, unleashing a super electromagnetic pulse wave that arches out and incinerates everything within a 5 nautical mile radius.
As the smoke and clouds settle, a soot-ridden and exhausted Elizabeth climbs out of the resurfaced boat to ignite some signal flares. Commander Bond is losing consciousness fast due to internal bleeding. In the distance she can see the silhouette of a RAF Sea King rescue helicopter headed towards her location, as Seychelles Coast Guard gunboats close in on the island.
End Credits.
POSTSCRIPT:
The Hildebrand Rarity is a short and sharp James Bond adventure with a run time of 88 minutes.
It is a tribute to the two greatest James Bond films ever made.
'Dr. No' and 'Live and Let Die', which were Sir Sean Connery's and Sir Roger Moore's first films.
The Hildebrand Rarity shares a very similar theme to Dr. No.
In 'Dr. No', Dr. Julius No, a member of SPECTRE, utilizes radio jamming to disrupt the Mercury Space Program in Cape Canaveral, from a secret base in Crab Key Island in Jamaica. In 'The Hildebrand Rarity', Pontifex Sabazios, another member of SPECTRE, utilizes psychotronic weapons with the aim to incite a global conflict, through his secret research laboratory in Ile du Nord Island in Seychelles.
In the Ian Fleming novel 'Live and Let Die', the villain Mr. Big (Buonaparte Ignace Gallia) has some form of occult power, by which he controls the people around him. In the novel, he uses the myth of Baron Samedi to cement his dominance over his henchmen, as a self-declared reincarnation of this evil spirit. Same can be said about Pontifex Sabazios, who utilizes the myth of KRONOS and presides over as high priest, to a cult of mind-controlled devotees who worship him as a divine incarnate.
In both novels, Bond infiltrates the villain's island either via boat or through scuba diving, manages to destroy their base of operations and barely makes it out alive. You can see the same theme with 'The Hildebrand Rarity'.
Now for some brief biographical sketches on the two main characters of this story...
SPECTRE Number 8 - Pontifex Sabazios:
Pontifex Sabazios or Dr. Arthur S. Moros as he was known in a previous life, was a post-doctorate neuroscientist, working as a senior researcher in neuro-electrophysiology at the Sloane Physics Laboratory at Yale University. Though highly qualified, Dr. Moros was denied a full professorship after 16 years of dedicated service due to political reasons. This event changed him as a person and he became a highly irate and vengeful soul. With the collapse of the Soviet Union and drastic cuts in defense spending in the early 1990's, his research work in psychotronics was brought to a standstill. After a heated argument with the head of his department, he was promptly fired and made a persona non grata in the academic world. Unrecognized for his great talents and stifled by the claustrophobia of close horizons, Dr. Moros decided to return back to his native land of North Africa and find a new reason to live.
For years he wandered in far-off places in the Sahara desert, struggling to find any meaningful work. Reduced to penury, he traveled to Alexandria, Egypt where by a stroke of luck, he found employment in a private shipping company as a bookkeeper, as he was an expert mathematician. Over the years, his travels at sea took him to various ports in the Gulf of Aden, the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean and he learned a great deal about the inner workings of the shipping industry.
During one of his trips to the port of Djibouti, he overheard some laborers talking about a secret society of black magic practitioners called the 'Brethren of Zuhal' in Axum, Ethiopia who could inflict harm on people's minds through ritual incantations. Dr. Moros, well versed with the power of electrical fields and their effects on the human brain, was naturally very intrigued. He decided to try his luck and after an arduous journey through the highlands of Ethiopia, finally made contact with this secret brotherhood.
The brethren could sense in Dr. Moros, stellar qualities and a great fire.
After undergoing a grueling initiation ritual, he was admitted into the secret society and over the next 3 years, learned all their techniques of mind control and black magick. There he made friendship with another social outcast, a brilliant mining engineer by the name of Trajan. Dr. Moros quickly learned how a cabal exerted power over society through secrecy and decided to make a secret organization of his own.
Dr. Moros and Trajan, along with their closest disciples, created a secret society called the 'Fraternitas Nabatea' with the ultimate aim of conniving and looting the major shipping and oil distribution monopolies of the world. Dr. Moros became the Grand Master of this Order and assumed the title name of Pontifex Sabazios.
The brotherhood started with petty crimes and with time, became the most malefic gangsters in the Tigray region of Ethiopia, heavily involved in narcotics smuggling and kidnappings.
In the early 2000's, hounded by the Ethiopian police force, the brotherhood relocated to the remote island of Samha in the Socotra archipelago of Yemen and established their power base in this most desolate part of the world.
The brotherhood now created sea-piracy groups which raided oil tankers and cargo ships in the Gulf of Aden. By jeopardizing sea tanker routes, the brotherhood collected protection money from shipping companies and dockyards, who did not want to pay millions of dollars in annual security costs. This loot money was utilized by Dr. Moros in creating a highly advanced research laboratory in Samha Island and by Trajan who laundered it through purchasing mineral rich lands and mining facilities in East Africa. Within a few years, their lab in Samha Island had perfected portable medium-range psychotronic weapons.
The brotherhood gradually employed this novel technology in their looting operations.
Brotherhood soldiers in high-powered speed boats would silently creep up around oil tankers traveling at night. The raiders would aim their portable microwave weapons towards the tanker's bridge and accommodation quarters, targeting the personnel of the ship and then lay siege to the big boat from various directions. After ransom money was deposited into the brotherhood's secret bank accounts, the saboteurs would swiftly extricate, leaving the massive oil tanker stranded in the Arabian Sea with a nauseous and delirious crew. If ransom money was not paid, the ship would be sunk or destroyed via explosives.
The brotherhood over the years secretly amassed assets worth billions of dollars and became one of the largest criminal syndicates of Africa. SPECTRE, clearly very impressed with the exploits and technological advancements of the Nabatean Brothers, decided to join hands with them and made Dr. Moros a member of their executive team.
Ernst Stavro Blofeld, chairman of SPECTRE, tasked Dr. Moros to create an energy weapons program in the islands of Seychelles in 2018. Blofeld also ordered Milton Krest, a low ranking member of SPECTRE, to aid the brotherhood in logistics and infrastructure development in Samha and Ile du Nord Islands and in the acquisition of high-tech electronic instruments from private military contractors, through his web of shadow companies.
Seychelles was chosen by Blofeld, as an ideal location to test out energy weapons due to the geographical isolation of the islands. But more importantly, it was the strategic and political significance of these islands that interested Blofeld. If SPECTRE could create a conflict between NATO and BRICS forces in these islands, an armed escalation could be ignited in the Indian Ocean, leading to global war.
World Domination.
The same old dream.
SIS Number 007 - Commander Bond, RNR:
Lieutenant Commander Bond, Deputy Squadron Commander - 7 Sabre Squadron / Special Boat Service (SBS), was severely injured in an improvised explosive device (IED) blast near Gereshk in Helmand province, Afghanistan in late 2010 during a counter-insurgency operation. The explosion severely fractured his left foot, cut up his right arm and blasted splinter fragments into his lower back, legs and face along with 60 percent burns to his lower body. Lt.Cdr. Bond was the only member of the 4 man patrol party that survived the impact of the IED. Deeply comatose and internally bleeding, he was airlifted to the Field Hospital in Camp Bastion, Lashkargah where he underwent multiple surgeries to salvage his left foot. Bond had to endure painful physical rehabilitation for nearly a year at the Royal Centre for Defence Medicine at Birmingham in addition to psychotherapy for post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Even though the wounds eventually healed, Bond was left with chronic backache and foot pain.
Medically invalidated out of active naval service in April 2012, Lt.Cdr. Bond was recommissioned into the Royal Naval Reserve (RNR) Intelligence Branch and underwent three years of professional intelligence training at New Scotland Yard. During his deputation, he obtained a BSc (Hons) in Criminology with Forensic Investigation and a MSc in International Policing from the University of West London, graduating summa cum laude.
Lt.Cdr. Bond also received a private pilot license (PPL) through the Royal Naval Reserve Air Branch and flew fixed & rotary wing aircraft at the London Elstree Aerodrome on weekends, as he pursued his degrees.
After completion of his training, he served with New Scotland Yard's Counter Terrorism Command (CTC / SO15) in various investigative and administrative positions.
Lt.Cdr. Bond was seconded back to the armed forces, to the Special Investigative Branch (SIB) of the Royal Navy Police, as a SIO (Special Investigations Officer) in Nov 2017 and worked in Naval counter-intelligence.
In May 2019, Bond was promoted to the rank of Commander (RNR) and sent on a one year furlough leave to Lebanon to study the Arabic language at the American University in Beirut. After completion of his course, Bond was deputed to Military Intelligence - Section 6 (MI6) and worked as a deep-cover intelligence officer in various theaters of conflict in North Africa for the next 16 months, due to his CEFR C2 level proficiency in the Arabic language.
He was considered an ideal candidate for enrollment in the MI6 covert operations unit 'Section-00' based on his qualifications and officer evaluation reports (OER's) and after completion of advanced operational training at the Defence College of Intelligence (DCI-Chicksands), Commander Bond was conferred the double O status by Vice Admiral Sir Miles Messervy aka 'M', Head of the British Secret Service in April 2022.
In his new role as a double O agent, he has assumed the identity and guises of a civilian. He wears weathered dark blue suits, has unkempt hair and works as a regional sales manager for Universal Exports Ltd, as his day job. Bond carries a Walther PPK/S (caliber 0.380 ACP) with an attachable suppressor in a blue chamois leather shoulder holster. He always sleeps with the Walther PPK tucked under his mattress.
Commander Bond wears a custom-made Ankle Foot Orthosis (AFO) shoe on the left foot, made specifically for him by the Department of Orthotics & Prosthetics at the DNRC (Defence & National Rehabilitation Centre). The ankle brace, made from a very strong carbon steel alloy, provides lateral and rotational support to his left ankle joint, which was severely injured in the IED blast. The steel-tipped attachable shoes are custom made John Lobb Oxford's from St James Street, which come with 200 joule toe cap & metatarsal protection along with heat, electrical and skid resistance. Bond has developed a great fondness for this left shoe brace. Anybody kicked with his left iron foot goes down for a long time.
Commander Bond wears a Casio GW-6900-1 digital chronograph watch, which he purchased in 2010 to commemorate his promotion to the rank of Lt.Cdr in the Royal Navy. This watch was the only article of clothing that survived the impact of the IED blast in Afghanistan fully intact. An extremely reliable and tough watch.
Commander Bond also carries a medium nib Parker Duofold Centennial Classic fountain pen in black ink. Many a man's fate has been sealed with a signature from this pen.
The Hildebrand Rarity Music:
VHS Dreams - A Midday Summer's Dream
I thank you for your time.
Sonero
Thanks for posting! That's a lot of work, and I apriciate your commitment to the story. There's a lot I like about this story: the new locations, the villain working under cover of a religious cult, the psycotronic weapons and Bond working with the Royal Navy. These are elements we haven't seen before or rarely seen in Bond movies. This is very much a techno-thriller, serious and down to earth in many ways. This is one direction EON can take in Bond26, but personally I doubt it. I also like how you used Fleming material.
I'm not sure about the RAF bombing an independent nation when the authorities there aren't a threath to the UK. The RAF bombing of an island with Bond still on it may also being on PTSD with Bond fans after NTTD. I'd rather see 007 and his team just placing explosives there, setting timers and blowing the lair.
I really enjoyed your story and I really hope you and other members will write other stories like this in the future. 😃
As Number24 says, you've put a lot of work into that. I particularly enjoyed Bond's backstory. So, Q's first name is "Quintin"? That's a first, I believe.
I believe his name badge in Tomorrow Never Dies said "Quentin Quigley" but that was just his cover identity as an Avis car salesman I suppose as it was confirmed that he was Major Boothroyd in The Spy Who Loved Me.
It's the spelling "Quintin" that I mean, @Silhouette Man. Sounds like he's about to grab his dog Snowy and have an adventure.
(Also Q=Boothroyd was confirmed much earlier than TSWLM.... )
Yes, it was probably mentioned in FRWL come to think of it. My Bond film trivia is probably a bit rusty these days!
Quintin is a more unusual spelling of that name. It reminds me of Quintin Hogg, better known as Lord Hailsham, who was Lord Chancellor in the Heath and Thatcher Conservative Governments. Incidentally, he was a friend and contemporary of Ian Fleming at Eton and was in the running to become prime minister in 1963.
Thank you for the kind appreciation and suggestions. (Number24, Barbel and Silhouette Man)
Regards.
@Sonero Great work ! Seems much better plotwise than everything Purvis & Wade have been writing since 1999...
A few questions:
1) Does Sabazios's death remain uncertain considering we only see the destruction of the island (like Blofeld's submarine in DAF), which opens the door to a return of the character in future movies ?
2) Has Bond ever heard of SPECTRE and Blofeld before (like in FRWL, TB, YOLT, OHMSS...) or are they completely unknown from MI6 like in Dr. No and Spectre ?
3) What happens to Trajan after Act II ?
4) Does Bond have sex with some women in the movie ?
Thank you @SeanIsTheOnlyOne for the kind appreciation.
1) The aim of Operation Night Thunder was not to destroy the island. It was a surgical strike meant to knock out the main command center and research lab of the facility. As it was a subterranean facility, the impact waves from the Paveway IV bunker buster bombs lead to the collapse of the structure and the death of Sabazios and his coven. The pulse wave that emanated after the implosion in the scalar-wave weapon system, lead to the incineration of the entire island, something that was not planned. The cover story in the news next day was a forest fire in the island caused by lightning.
2) SPECTRE and Blofeld are known to MI6, but are new to Commander Bond. This is the first overseas operation of Commander Bond as a double O. He was made a double O agent in April 2022 and this mission happens during June-July 2022.
3) Trajan was never in Seychelles, but in Addis Ababa in Ethiopia. Trajan had invested considerable amounts of brotherhood funds into buying mineral rich lands in Ethiopia and the next story I was thinking about...Ian Fleming's 'The Property of a Lady' had him as the main villain. This story is set three years after the events in Seychelles.
The Property of a Lady story starts with MI6 receiving secret information about Russian FSB spies paying double agents with emeralds.
The emeralds are found to be weakly magnetized, which is very unusual.
Additionally, a lot of low intensity earthquakes start happening across Ethiopia and Sudan, which geologists cannot figure out why.
Trajan had financed the acquisition of a deep emerald mine near Ajibar in the Amhara Region of Ethiopia in 2018, which is located along the main Ethiopian tectonic fault line in the Semien mountain ranges.
This mine was created through a build-operate-transfer (BOT) project with a Russian mining company 'Kamen' and the Ethiopian government, who are paid in emeralds as part of the deal and will acquire full ownership of the mine after 25 years of operation.
Unknown to both the Russians and the Ethiopians, is the very sinister reason behind the creation of this mine, which only the new SPECTRE Number 8 Trajan and Ernest Stavro Blofeld know.
The remaining members of the 'Fraternitas Nabatea' regrouped to create a new sinister organization called the 'Black Hand' under the leadership of Trajan and have developed tectonic weapons with help from geophysicists from SPECTRE.
These tectonic weapons are directed-energy oscillators that can create earthquakes of varying magnitudes.
Under the guise of mining for emeralds, Trajan and his crew have secretly dug a very deep shaft in the mine and are assembling a huge geo-tectonic oscillator in it. Once completed, this mega-oscillator will be utilized to generate a massive 9.5 Richter scale earthquake in the main Ethiopian tectonic rift, with the intention to inflict major structural damage to the Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, the largest hydroelectric dam in the world.
A catastrophic event like this has the potential to create massive floods in the region, ultimately precipitating a war between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia...a scenario SPECTRE is very keen on manifesting.
As the story goes, MI6 find the same magnetized emeralds in a Faberge egg in an auction in Sotheby's, which was intended to be a one time payment to a double agent working in MI6 HQ and trace the origins of these gems to the deep mine in Ethiopia.
Commander Bond is then sent to Ethiopia to investigate this case.
4) No.
I wanted 'The Hildebrand Rarity' to be a dark science-fiction movie where Bond is not in his comfort zone and there is no time for dalliances.
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@SeanIsTheOnlyOne Thank you for reading the story.
I appreciate your kind comments.
Emeralds can't be magnetic in the real world, I guess you know that?
@Number24 The statement is correct.
Emeralds can not be magnetic in the real world.
But they can be induced (hypothetically) into a weak magnetism.
Emeralds contain hexagonal inclusions consisting of gaseous carbon dioxide, nitrogen and magnesite crystals along with mineral inclusions of hematite, magnetite, rutile, graphite, siderite in addition to trace amounts of chromium, magnesium, iron as well as scandium. It is the composition of these trace elements that helps in identifying the origins of these stones. (reference gia.edu)
Now there is a phenomenon called 'Electrically induced ferromagnetism', where objects exposed to powerful electromagnetic fields can be transformed into weak magnets due to induced electron spin (orbital magnetization / atomic magnetism ).
The way I was thinking about this story was...
Trajan is using sophisticated geo-tectonic technology involving high-energy electromagnetic oscillators to attenuate tremors and is testing them out in the deepest tunnel of his emerald mine.
The same technology (electro-gravitic compression) in a scaled down version, is being used to extract emeralds in the upper levels of the mine, by creating micro-fractures in metamorphic rocks that have been coated with highly adsorbable graphene nano-composite polymers. These graphene polymers enmesh themselves into the rock surface, making it very easy to magnetize and break the rocks 'inside-out' by using electromagnetic oscillator probes, thus liberating the emeralds.
Due to exposure to very powerful electromagnetic fields created by the oscillator probes during the extraction phase, the emeralds from Trajan's mines are weakly magnetized, a phenomenon forensic experts at MI6 can not explain why.
At the same time the earthquakes being reported in Sudan and Ethiopia have their epicenter in the same area from where these emeralds have been traced to originate from, hence the MI6 suspicion that these two events might have a common origin.
That is the way I was thinking about developing this James Bond story.
At the end of the day...it's all 'harmless tomfoolery' as Sir Kingsley Amis used to say.
But thank you for the comment @Number24.
Thanks
@Sonero the way you use the Hildebrand short story is very smart and perfectly fits with the rest of the plot, although I must say Bond having no sex at all is quite frustrating. If you don't want to destroy the horror-occult/science-fiction print of the movie, you can show Bond in bed with some random girl before the mission briefing. If it's a reboot we are dealing with, (re)introducing Fleming's heroe without any sexual moment seems a little bit odd. Do you see my point ?
Concerning Property, there's an obvious redundance with Hildebrand. Not to mention that Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson already used the story in Octopussy. And what a job they did ! I believe some continuation novels also deserve to be considered. For example, I found With a mind to kill by Anthony Horowitz literally amazing. If you had to create a modern plot based upon this book, what would you do and how would geopolitics be taken into account considering the current global context ?
@SeanIsTheOnlyOne Thank you for the kind words.
I see your point.
There is another reason why I did not depict Bond as the lothario everyone expects him to be.
The IED explosion he survived in Afghanistan in 2010, changed him as a person.
The year spent in the Royal Centre for Defence Medicine was a very challenging time for him.
Bond had to undergo multiple surgeries, skin grafts and painful post-surgical rehabilitation.
It took him years of balance and gait training just to be able to walk without crutches.
With time Commander Bond has learned to compartmentalize his pain.
This version of Bond is an injured veteran and keeps to himself.
Concerning Mr Horowitz...what an amazing writer.
A true blessing to us James Bond fans.
'With a mind to kill' was an excellent James Bond novel.
Concerning a modern day plot based on this novel...
A triple agent, Manchurian hitman story in today's context could work...maybe something involving Russia and Ukraine.
But one has to look at the higher dimensions of international politics and at the same time you do not want James Bond movies to be too real.
Thank you.
@Sonero I see. But wouldn't it be interesting to see Bond's state of mind evolving ? Elizabeth could be that kind of woman he progressively feels something for. She probably understands the pain he has been enduring and considering what happened with Krest and the fact they finally work together, there could be a turning point in their relationship. That's only a suggestion but perhaps it doesn't make sense in your story.
Concerning a modern version of With a mind to kill, I agree with you. The challenge is to keep a balance between the real world and fantasy. But that's precisely what Horowitz succeded to do because if you think about it, the Konspiratsia to have Bond kill the target is quite far-fetched, so I guess it wouldn't be very difficult to imagine such a plot dealing with current stakes.
Anyway, thank you for this very interesting job that must have been very demanding timewise !
@SeanIsTheOnlyOne
Bond realizes the predicament Elizabeth is trapped in, the moment he sets eyes on her in Victoria Hospital.
He knows she is a deep cover British agent, who is in a terribly abusive relationship with Milton Krest...a psychopath, but cannot get out of it due to certain information that needs to be extracted from Krest.
Bond being a Commander in the Royal Naval Reserve and two ranks senior to Captain Elizabeth (OF4 vs OF2 NATO rank code), makes this relationship more of a 'senior-junior' kind of a thing, rather than an emotional affair.
Bond is an intensely private man. He never reveals anything about himself to anybody.
This version of Bond is cold and objective...only interested in getting the job done.
A professional spy and a military officer.
@SeanIsTheOnlyOne thank you for the kind appreciation.
I developed this story over the past two years in my spare time.
I am grateful to Mr. Barbel and Sir Miles who helped me with typo corrections over the years.