Russell Twyce

While I prepare for a possible release of my Philosopher’s Stone technology, I should spend some time getting you ready for the philosophy of the Philosopher’s Stone.  The substance of Philosopher Stone is only part of the equation.  You’ll note that it was named ‘philosopher’s’ stone and not something like ‘eternal youth’ stone because the philosophy is critical to the Philosopher’s Stone functioning correctly.

Face the Philosopher’s Stone Philosophy Facts
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Human 2.0 – Infinite Longevity and Ultimate Freedom

Did Nicholas Flamel really discover the rejuvenation secret of the Philosopher’s Stone in the 1300’s? From what history relates of Flamel’s life and beliefs, I surmise that Nicholas may well have actually achieved ultimate rejuvenation, longevity and eternal youth with the stone.

Is Nicholas Flamel alive today? Well, that is another matter. There were some awfully dangerous eras between then and now. Whether he is alive still  and young or not, the possibility of rejuvenation and infinite longevity from a philosopher’s stone lives on eternal.

Infinite Chance for Relationship Longevity

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Chapter 28 of Loki’s Trojan

Requiem for the Undead

“I won’t deliver a statement—per say.” Wall Soft’s acting CEO was at an outdoor podium, facing a throng of reporters. “I’ll just take questions.”

“What happened today on the Sound?” Though he hadn’t been pointed at, a senior wire representative took the honor.

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“This dramatically unforeseen culmination in Seattle,” the powerful magnate gamely grinned, while Amy hobbled away to tend her wounds, “is a final confirmation that I once again have some worthy enemies.”

…

“He sustained numerous life-threatening wounds and is now in a deep coma.” The doctor’s gaze alternated uncomfortably between his clipboard and the patient. “We’ve done all we can but haven’t any prognosis.” The more truthful statement would’ve been that the medical professional didn’t have a clue what was keeping him alive because he really should be dead. “You should brace for the probability that he may be gone.”

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The End.

Chapter 27 of Loki’s Trojan

Games of Ring Around the Squid

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Captain Dick Wadley slammed the transmission into forward gear and the Squid heaved ahead. In the same instant a blast sent the hull lurching to the side. Given his location on the ship, Tariq’s body was both pushed backwards by the inertia of the acceleration and forward from a concussion wave. The opposed forces balanced and he remained on his feet.

One Russian is critically wounded. Poking his head out the hatch, the Iranian saw a man clutching his midsection: his blood was a circular pool.

[Ring-around-the-rosy.] Loki sang the tune of a child’s game.

“Pocket-full-of-posy.” Tariq took up the chant. War is just immature leaders, handling grownup issues—with a kindergarten mentality. One has something the other wants, but the national identities don’t understand the concept of sharing. “Hush-ah, hush-ah, we all fall down.”

[An army’s casualties are not your soul’s responsibility.]

Commanders-in-chief must excuse themselves with that lie. The Iranian hadn’t considered liabilities to his conscience. The mobster and the sheik acted on their motives, but I steered some too.

…

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Chapter 26 of Loki’s Trojan

The General Quintet and an Absconder

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Bob and Sergey both know what I look like and Ghazi is now aware of his previously presumed dead computer expert’s involvement. Those two snippets of information are like nitro and glycerin—soon to combine.

[You could explode before the other human bomb does.]

Thanks, I needed that. Tariq’s mental tongue was in his mind’s cheek. In the distance, the Seattle cityscape dwindled into the omnipresent haze and looking back towards the bow, he saw Ghazi consulting a map.

The sheik certainly had political wherewithal to get him here so fast. Tariq saw where the explosive politician sat shivering from the chill wind, and his fear of detonation. I’m not an expert on manufacturing bombs but I do know one needs a way of triggering them. He looked closer and saw that the blasting caps were wired into a small black device with an antenna.

[That metal matchstick is an awfully short fuse.]

Since I don’t see any bulky pockets in Ghazi’s robe, I can surmise he has a remote transmitter in his shoulder bag. Although he couldn’t see the back of the dynamite belt now, the programmer recalled it was buckled at the rear. I didn’t see that it was locked in place either.

Several minutes later, the sheik took a two-way radio out of his shoulder bag and carried out a brief but unheard conversation.

I’ll assume he’s talking with my two unaccounted-for squad mates.

[There was another boat slip at the warehouse but it was empty.]

Presumably, the others could be on a vessel that left earlier.

[Forewarned is forearmed.]

Foreknowledge is only my opportunity to panic ahead of time. [Content protected for Chevron members only]

Chapter 25 of Loki’s Trojan

Heiress of the Dog that Bites

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The long black limousine looked as out of place as a white one that had earlier pulled up in front of the decrepit warehouse. This one was more so due to American flags fluttering at the corners of the hood. A pair of dark sedans had accompanied, in front and again at the rear. The doors of those vehicles were the first to open and men in sunglasses exited.

“I’m going in alone,” the lone occupant of the stretched limo emerged and waved his entourage away, “and you’re to leave.”

“This was all very sudden.” The detachment commander didn’t like it.

“Tasks like going to a toilet and this, I prefer doing on my own.” He clapped a hand on his minder’s arm. “I’m as safe here as on my crapper.”

“Call me when you need picked up.”

“This meeting is of higher than top-secret classification,” the man held up a warning finger, “and it’s not to be disturbed for any reason.”

“We’ll be on an adjacent block.” The lead bodyguard circled a hand over his head: the signal originated in the cavalry. Mount up and ride.

Chapter 24 of Loki’s Trojan

Two Companies and Three is Torturous

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“I don’t have the exact figures.” Collin felt like a cancer doctor being asked for a lifespan prediction. “I can only surmise from the buying and selling trends. I really thought we had a big war chest heading into this but the money Ghazi bin Omani has spent in the past days is mindboggling. He still needs to have a massive amount in reserve to pay out what he’ll owe when he converts the options.”

“That didn’t answer my question.”

“It’s ironic.” The proxy general laced his fingers on the desk. “Last week we had him in the same position that we are facing now. If the virus hadn’t struck that night, we would’ve finished him on the very next day.”

“Are you saying that tomorrow is my last?”

“I can’t predict it with that much certainty.” Hersker heaved a sigh. “Ghazi bin Omani is probably the only person in his entire organization or in the world that knows exactly how many shares he now owns. He’s not going to let that information leak out, but we’ll be the first to know when he’s hit the target. That will be when he presents his warrants.”

“I’m to simply bend over towards Mecca and pray the Arab isn’t so big that it hurts too badly when he steps up behind?” Again Bob regretted his analogy as he nearly felt his butt stretch as he spoke it. The parallel was especially unnerving as he was currently with a gay man who might even be turned on by the flippant comment.

“The sheik was doubtlessly in that position and waiting for you until a Trojan spared him.” The asshole fought back a snicker at a line that came out funnier than he intended. Condoms, like the brand names Sheik and Trojan, protect against sexually transmitted diseases during the gay anal sex that this discussion is alluding to. “His prayer to Allah was answered. Maybe you should try one too.”

“I’ll do that at sunset.” Bob’s mind added a safety precaution. But I won’t be bending at the waist with Collin in the same room.[Content protected for Chevron members only]

Chapter 23 of Loki’s Trojan

Low Key Sings the High Notes

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‘Low-Key saves it output to my Seattle server but you’ll need to sort the data.’ Tariq’s instructions were in her mind but the protégé hacker also had jotted notes to jog her memory. Jacqueline used the Internet to reach the Bell Town apartment’s computer and found the file. It’s in order of when installed: I want to sort it into where it is located.

‘We want the Trojan running by time zones,’ the programmer had said, ‘so it will look as if it was preset, instead of triggered.’

Jacqueline had waited until three AM in Toronto.

‘It’s apropos to start in Wall’s time zone,’ she recalled his conversation, ‘but the better reason is it will happen while most of the U.S. is asleep.’

“Have some sweet nightmares Bob.” Jacqueline spoke with venom.

‘Set the infiltration routine for a three-hour delay.’ She carried out the task. Then, her right hand’s ring finger hovered above the enter key. ‘A deactivation code sequence will transmit out to all pirated replications.’

“All Greeks away!” Bob Wall’s former slave giggled at her keyboard, as she pushed the Trojan’s final button. “My ex-owner will awake to find his stock market stakes race has skidded into some wooden horse poop.”

…

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“It was substantial.” Hersker couldn’t bring himself to be an asshole about telling him. The man could be declared a national disaster area! “Bob, why don’t you go and spend some time on your new yacht?”

“It’s not been delivered yet. I asked them to change the name,” Bob wondered why they couldn’t paint it on while cruising: he hoped the broker hadn’t just squeezed extra by leasing it out, “from Squid to the Wall-Dorf.”

“The Wall-Dorf?” Collin almost choked. Didn’t he realize how many folk would be calling it the Wall-Dork? That’s just begging for ridicule.

“Like the fancy hotel.” Bob explained. “Except mine is floating.”

Too bad your solvency isn’t. Collin wasn’t an asshole enough to say it.

Chapter 22 of Loki’s Trojan

A Monk’s Key and Some Prime Mates

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“She’s a whore.” In the corridor of a shopping center, a solitary Arab watched the revolving door where the mismatched couple had entered an expensive hotel. “Why does he choose to be in public with her?”

“My vigil was fruitful but it still hasn’t answered my questions.” It was his growing bemusement that caused Kareem to have his driver trail the Iranian’s car. The jihad commander had inquired on the boat tour’s details, to find that it would terminate back at this spot. He had then selected the mall’s tinted windows to provide a superb concealment.

“An Islamic male,” he turned from the window, “should feel contrite about being seen next to an obviously hired sex partner.”

“I suppose so?” A young tourist answered in an Australian accented voice, flavored with uncertainty. She had been browsing a swimsuits rack of when this Arabic man turned and seemed to ask her a direct question.

“You have a problem mate?” A man wearing shorts and a singlet put a tribal-tattooed arm protectively around the female.

“You’re satisfied with only the one doxie,” the fat lieutenant talked as if to the object man on his mind, though he was vacantly staring straight at the honeymooning couple, “when there’s plenty of others available.”

“He seriously gives me the creeps.” The Australian prom queen tried to step a pace back but her bottom bumped into a display bin.

“Is she long-term slut too?” The captain’s mental imagery conjured a picture of Fatima with the older man, in a non-familial pose.

“Don’t talk to us that way.” The tourist man from down-under brought his arm up over his wife’s head and adopted an aggressive stance.

“Lust clouded my mind.” Kareem’s rectum involuntarily tightened on a memory of the excruciating excrement that resulted from his spicy meal. He breathed in sharply and his nostrils flared wide like an angry gorilla’s

“Hit the freaky sheik.” The bride urged and her trepidation agitated the groom’s testosterone—in a decanter that already held five beers.

From the dim recesses of his present moment’s foreground, a flying fist connected solidly with the point of the Arabic man’s nose. He grabbed at his pummeled face and slumped onto the swimsuit bin.

“Let’s shop somewhere else.” The Australian pair scurried off.

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The lady bear-hugged her rescuer: her dangling bulk threatened to topple him over. The elevator cab dropped a foot. The gap was widener: she was able slide free but in fright, she curled her calves around the wall.

‘Let your legs go!’ The programmer watched her rump undulating like two under-inflated beach balls trapped in a plaid-patterned sarong.

The elevator slid another inch. The emergency braking mechanisms were failing in the fire. The woman flopped out like a beanbag: her body dropped onto her rescuer and collapsed him to the floor.

Felling suddenly trapped, as he had during 9/11, Tariq awoke abruptly. Pun wasn’t as heavy as the elevator woman, but in her sleep the Thai girl had draped herself over his chest. He extricated himself and got up.

“I feel as a Hawaiian sacrificial virgin,” the programmer looked out the window to where Phenom Rung’s volcano pedestal blotted out a soon to be rising sun, “standing on the lip of a volcano’s molten maw.”

Chapter 21 of Loki’s Trojan

Smoking Catfish in Spider Silk Nets

The Programmer bit into an oral-incinerating tidbit: it was tough like gnawing on a smoldering stick of fish-flavored chewing gum.

“My food is fiery so yours must be a five-alarm blaze.” Tariq spit the bite in a napkin and took a gulp of water—but it didn’t quench the burning. He and Kareem had dropped the others at a hotel then went to a floating restaurant on a Bangkok canal. The menu was written in five languages and the color of ink used for each entrée indicated its level of spiciness.

“It’s mild.” The larger Arab answered quickly in strained voice.

[A fish lives in water,] Loki replayed a clip, [how spicy can it be?]

It was a poorly thought out rationalization. Tariq had brazenly ordered a dried catfish starter printed in reddish-brown ink as opposed to the safer looking tan writing. He lolled his tongue out and he fanned it with a hand.

[Duh! A breeze can’t cool a spice burn.]

It did help in this instance: a giggling waitress spotted his distress and rushed to his aid with a sliced loaf of bread, to sponge away the pepper.

“It’s not bad.” The officer’s face was ruddy and his voice, breathless.

“I’m glad I didn’t order from the crimson ink column like you did?” Tariq chuckled as he saw Kareem sweating profusely. He paid in pain for his foolishness with the weights and now his mouth has to foot the bill.

[Jihad Joe’s whole life is an ongoing masculinity challenge.]

“I like my food hot.” The captain pushed the words over scorched lips: he really meant that he liked it to be cooked. But when Tariq selected an item lettered in orange then Kareem had to better the bravery by choosing his from the scarlet letters. He chewed gingerly and swallowed quickly.

“I haven’t developed your constitution’s immunity to chili.” The older man pushed his fish dish away and opted for fruit and sticky rice.

“Taking another bite,” Kareem sped up the tempo of his mouthfuls and almost swallowed the food whole, “slows the afterburning effect.”

“My biggest fear with ultra-spicy food isn’t the heat on my palette.” Tariq waited until the red-faced man was nearly finished his entrée before divulging the worst bit. “The nastier part comes after it passes through the internals and reaches the exit orifice. There, the burn is excruciating.”

“Really?” The beet color of Kareem’s cheeks paled to a pastel.

“I plan on taking a carbon dioxide fire extinguisher to the toilet to cool my ring of fire.” The Iranian plastered on an envious expression. “That’s just me though. You appear orally accustomed to the spices, so your entire digestive tract has doubtlessly built up the same tolerance.”

“Yah.” Allah! Why did I eat this? “I can take it.” Kareem had a bitter recollection of how badly his muscles hurt after lifting weights. Now, he was seemingly due to suffer anal agony for his one-upmanship.

“Well, this has been an interesting meal and the dining establishment is similarly memorable.” Tariq appreciatively cast about at the collection of wooden islands tied together with a series of footbridges. The Thai staff, both male and female, were attired in traditional costumes and stood ready to serve. “Still, the riveting question is why are we here?”

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…

“Make yourself at home.” Bernard waved his guest to a den adjoining his office. Two easy chairs sat semi-facing a blazing fireplace. “I brought you here because Mr. Dumont is an acquaintance of mine.”

“Jonathon has gone back to Seattle.” Lauren Smyth apologized. Even the limo driver sent to pick her up had seemed surprised he wasn’t there.

“While your travel ticket was inexplicably and accidentally cancelled.” Stryker sat then took up a poker to rearrange the burning logs. “That was nightmarish service from my airline. Should I fire someone over it?”

“They were nice enough and gave me some compensation frills.”

“I’m sure we haven’t offered nearly enough.” He put the poker down.

“Ah,” Lauren brightened, “Gerald Dumont is who you referred to.”

“Why should I need the son, when his father is already on my payroll.” Bernard clasped his hands together and made a finger steeple. “You on the other hand,” he pointed his two digits at her,
“have shown some interesting aspects of yourself—and not just your pink on the links either.”

“I suspect the reason I’m here,” the lady lawyer blushed on the topic of her public shame, “involves information on Bob Wall and Ghazi Omani.”

“I could easily get that from Gerald.” Stryker reclined further back into his chair and crossed his knee: as if in preparation for a lengthy discussion. “I much more eager to learn what really happened to Ethan Smyth.”