Georges Russo entered his office out of breath, partly because of the dust and fumes from Vesuvius and partly because he was very late for work this morning by well over an hour. Thankfully his boss Angelo Giordano was not in the office as yet also, time-keeping was not particularly important but he had promised Angelo that he would get a latest report for the European Parliament completed before midday. As second in command he also likes to set an example, but today had been 'one of those mornings'. First there had been an over-night power cut, which had stopped his alarm call from happening, then having rushed out of his eighteenth century house carrying a coffee and his usual breakfast pastry, to find his vintage Ford Taurus would not start. Cleaning the air-filter had taken up another fifteen minutes, plus another five for washing his hands and replacing his now stained shirt.
“Buongiorno,” his PA called as he opened his office door, he took a second to consider whether she was being sarcastic of not, but a quick look at her face told him that she was not.
“Where is Angelo,” he asked.
The PA shrugged and offered to check his diary, which Georges accepted, making him wait in the doorway to his inner office. “Supposed to be in the office, according to this,” she informed him.
With a “Grazie ,” Georges continued into his office, flipped on the coffee machine and then his desk COM. Immediately the priority message alarm sounded and any thoughts of a fresh coffee were lost. There was an 'Alert' message flashing angrily on the screen, and Georges tapped the read tab. The message was from the American CIA with a graded access restricted to either himself or Angelo, Georges began to read:
CIA Satellite Monitoring Centre, Langley, USA
Reference Eastern
Mediterranean Fissure Tracking
Priority Information: Level 2
The fissure that had almost stopped its progress and was assessed to be travelling at approximately 0.7mph (1.12 kph), now seems to have accelerated to between 11 and 14 mph (17-22.5 kph) sporadic. The mean heading is c110 degrees, which if projected will be a direct heading toward Jerusalem.
The reason for the new activity seems to be a reduction in energy signatures for the Crete volcano and geothermal energy seems to be transferred to opening the lead of the fissure. Best estimate 30 to 40 days until the fissure makes landfall on the Israel coast.
Message ends – serial
#17831577-D-249.
Georges hand instinctively reached for his COM-unit and his finger found the button that called Angelo.
“ Angelo Giordano, ah, it's you Georges, I'm at the Vatican waiting to update the Pope, I got a call as I was leaving this morning, how's the report coming,” he asked.
“It's not, I just found a message from the CIA SatMo; that fissure in the Eastern Mediterranean, it's on the move again,” reported Georges.
“Oh great, how fast?”
“Between seventeen and twenty-two kph at times, and heading toward Israel again.”
“OK, get on to the Israeli department of geology, or whatever it's called,” Angelo instructed Georges, “then that's job done, but you'd better include it in your report, this is a priority incident. Is it going to be ready by mid- day.”
“Just about, I'll get on to it, see you later.”