CHAPTER TWENTY
The Beaches, Toronto
THE BUILDING’S SUPERINTENDENT confirmed the lack of activity over the last several days. A call would have been placed to the residence, but nothing had been registered to that civic address for over two years. “I didn’t make them out to be the dangerous type,” the super attested. “I just thought they were wackos … you know, anarchist freaks.”
A contingent of Toronto’s Emergency Task Force waited outside a rental dwelling on the second floor. Their Tahoe SUV’s remained out of sight, parked two blocks away from the otherwise trendy Beaches address.
When the authority to proceed was given, the door was quietly unlocked with the superintendent’s key. Only a nod preceded the door being kicked open. Simon, Lionel and the Inspector watched as Sophia displayed a real-time video feed from body cams recording the actual raid. “Go, go, go!” were the orders followed by: “Toronto Police! I need everyone within the sound of my voice on the floor, now!”
Simon could see from the video that the apartment was empty. The scene panned to the left and then focused on a laptop in the middle of a coffee table. The camera shuddered with successive steps, indicating an officer was walking around to get a more accurate look. Simon’s heart dropped. It was an image of someone tied to a chair. A burlap bag had been pulled over their head. Simon instantly knew it was Jennifer by her wetsuit. Her head moved, slightly, indicating she was alive, but when the bag was pulled off by someone out of frame, and Jennifer’s tear-stained face was revealed, the video glitched, then repeated itself. It became painfully clear that it had been pre-recorded and couldn’t be used to verify Jennifer’s present condition.
Simon turned away from the television. Anguish made him look inward, to focus on the emotions which would be his undoing. Jennifer was out there somewhere. He empathized with the fear she must be going through; the fear of dying, of never seeing your loved ones again. A parent’s fear of death often tested the depths of a deeper despair, though. The agony, which undoubtedly accompanies outliving a son or daughter, should only be glimpsed, momentarily, if at all, Simon realized. If it were embraced he would surely be of no use to anyone. He struggled to redirect his sense of peril into something more productive, into a resolve to find his daughter alive. The impending midnight deadline focused his determination. “What have you got for us, Sophia? Is there any data coming in yet?”
The holographic display over the pool table came alive. “Hawks one through four are approaching one thousand feet,” Sophia replied. “A strong breeze at that altitude should allow video to stabilize at any moment.” Literally, a bird’s eye view was projected downward from a distance of some two metres above the covered pool table. The Thousand Islands suspension bridge to New York State appeared in the distance.
“Each of the drones will provide us with an overall perspective of the four search areas,” Connor explained. “They’re our AWACS, as it were.”
The U.S. Airforce’s AWACS, or Airborne Warning and Control System, to which Decker was referring, can detect and track hostile targets over both land and sea. Its ‘look down’ radar offers a 360-degree view of the subject area below.
“Our bird drones don’t use radar, though,” Connor continued. “Their visual navigation system allows them to recognize the essential components of their environment. It also provides us with terrain mapping and surveillance capabilities. While the higher altitude hawks present us with a broader perspective, individual starlings, grackles, and blackbirds offer a closer vantage point.”
“No one will even know they’re being surveyed,” Lionel stated.
Decker continued to explain. “That’s right. Sophia will also be able to focus in on any one individual point of view. This would allow for identification of a boat registration number or vehicle license plate, for example. Specialized software will also enable her to amalgamate the birds’ swarming intelligence in order to provide a composite rendition of any given landscape or structure.” Decker turned to Simon to emphasize a further point. “With assets on the inside of a building you’ll have the capacity to see right through it, so to speak, in order to observe what’s going on inside in real time.”
“Unbelievable,” Lionel said.
Inspector Hansen seemed equally impressed. “You wouldn’t happen to have any business cards would you, Mr. Decker?” he asked.
Decker laughed. “I’m not sure this is within your budget, Inspector.”
Sims, the third member of Decker’s team was already out in the St. Lawrence River. The search commenced from where Marcus located the abandoned boat. Drone hawks were now flying in four separate directions. A complement of blackbirds, starlings and grackles had already struck off as well, each with their own pre-programmed mission.
An accurately scaled image of the Thousand Islands appeared above Simon’s covered pool table. Grid-like lines moved forward with the constantly unfolding, uploading video. In addition to the shoreline, perimeter sketches also outlined each island as it came under its drone’s flight path. Sophia cross-referenced this data with every available resource, adding coordinates, addresses, and names of each island.
The smaller birds swooped into every feature, adding municipal numbers, vehicle license plates, as well as moored boat registrations. Sophia worked to confirm the validity of the data, of what should and what should not be present at any given location. Any anomalies were red-flagged, literally, on the holographic image. This enabled Simon or Inspector Hansen to touch on the respective marker to see if further action should be taken.
Sophia zoomed her display into a different, finer perspective. One of the starlings had landed on an outbuilding, which belonged to one of the many riverside residences. Image balancing software worked to stabilize the picture, but the bird was obviously jumping about. It was looking for something, an entry point, perhaps.
“Did that bird just get inside that shack?” Lionel asked.
“Every structure has to be cleared,” Connor answered.
A detailed high-resolution scan provided Sophia an accurate assessment of the building’s interior. A lawn tractor, several kayaks and paddles came into focus, as did a variety of garden tools. Having completed the scan, the starling was given the all clear by Sophia. The bird quickly left the shed and was relayed the coordinates of its next target. Up/down data links to Sophia were channelled through the over flying hawks. Simon noticed the outbuilding, which had just been surveyed, turn green, indicating it had been cleared.
Sophia quickly changed the scene, again, to something of greater interest. “We’ve got a boat matching Marcus’s description,” she said. “It’s inside a boathouse.”
Simon’s attention was peaked.
The bird’s swarming intelligence beckoned several other drones to land in the trees nearest to the island structure. A complete scan of the enclosed building was completed from the outside first. Like an image produced by a mobile laser scanner, a multi-dimensional software rendition offered Simon the perspective of a Point Cloud, an image which can be manipulated, in this case, by hand. Lionel reached over the table and slowly turned the model in a clockwise direction.
Before anyone thought of it, Sophia sent a photo of the boat to Marcus’s phone. He was still in the hospital, now conscious in recovery. ‘It’s a close match for sure,’ he texted back.
No identifiable marking were visible, at first, but when a black bird fluttered down to a better vantage point a faint outline suggested a grouping of numbers had been hastily painted over. Again, the high-res scan did its magic. Numbers and letters, albeit unclear, began to emerge. A depth differential of only microns allowed Sophia to use her pattern recognition capabilities to compare millions of similar characters on the internet. In microseconds, the boat’s identification was clear.
Inspector Hansen thought of the obvious inquiries, but Sophia was already cross-referencing every available database. “It hasn’t been reported stolen,” she stated, “but its owner’s residence is liste
d as being on the Thousand Island Parkway, just a few kilometres up the road. It belongs to a Mr. Nathan Rickard.”
“There’s a Rockport residence,” Sophia added. “Dialing now.”
Simon felt his throat tighten with the thought of their first solid lead. He and the rest of the men listened as the ringtone went unanswered.
“I’m going to …” Connor stated, before pausing.
“Additional assets are already on the way to the boathouse,” Sophia interjected.
“I was just about … to do that,” Connor added. He seemed almost frustrated by the fact that Sophia was several steps ahead of him.
“Cross-referencing motor vehicle registrations,” she stated.
A three-dimensional image of a Honda Hybrid was replaced by an older model Pontiac convertible. It was in turn was displaced by a regular cab pick-up truck.”
“Wait a second. Go back!” Lionel shouted. Sophia went back to the convertible. “That’s just like the one those girls were driving this morning.”
An old showroom photo was quickly compared with every social media page connected to a Nathan Rickard.
“It was red, though,” Simon stated.
“The registration indicates yellow,” Hansen added. He was looking at the flanking data in support of the main holographic image.
Sophia scrolled through thousands of images, before arriving at a Facebook photo of a red convertible. It was parked outside a residence. Its owner was standing, smiling proudly beside it. The faint number on the house agreed with Nathan Rickard’s address.
“It was probably painted by the owner, but the registration wasn’t changed,” Hansen stated.
Facial recognition software was compared to the portraits side by side. In short order, the man in the Facebook photo was overlapped with the vehicle registered to Rickard.
“It’s a match,” Simon stated.
“Inspector,” Sophia announced. “Can we leave the residence to you and your men?”
“Of course,” he agreed. He reached for his two-way radio in order to call the units at the front gate of Simon’s house.
Sophia turned her attention back to the boathouse. “I’m sorry Simon, but an ultraviolet scan has indicated the presence of blood in the forward compartment of the boat.”
“Can we type it?” he asked.
“We can do better than that,” Decker suggested.
Lionel turned to his brother. “It may not be serious. Marcus thought they used a knife to cut her wrist phone off quickly.”
A specially equipped red winged blackbird arrived at the boat’s enclosure. It entered in the same way the others did, through a gap near the water line. The bird located and then pecked at the crusted blood. There were several drops in the same area, some larger than the others. One droplet seemed sufficient for an accurate assessment. A tongue-like test strip emerged from the bird’s beak, allowing a sample to be tested.
“It’s O positive,” Sophia announced.
“That’s Jennifer’s blood type!” Simon stated, swallowing.
Lionel was getting impatient. “That’s all we need, let’s go!”
A replica of Jennifer’s DNA appeared off to one side of the display. A version of the recovered blood rotated beside it. When Sophia joined them together, she stated: “It’s a match, with a 98% certainty.”
Simon ran his hand over the stubble now evident on his face. “Mr. Decker.”
Sophia spoke up first. “Transferring all assets to the island known as Little Shield.”
Decker looked at Simon. “There’s one more thing we need to do, Mr. Taylor.”
“We should go now!” Lionel stated, harshly.
“Gentlemen,” Decker implored. “We need to confirm she’s there first.”
Simon took a step forward, stopping just short of a dreadful precipice. “Then what?”
“I can assure you, Mr. Taylor, if your daughter is on that island, there is no one on this planet better equipped than us to bring her out alive!”