Текст книги "The Doomsday Key"

Автор книги: James Rollins

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 5 (всего у книги 24 страниц)

Gray still failed to understand the relationship between the former seaman and the university professor, but at least she had him showering more frequently. Even the black stubble atop Kowalski's head was trimmed into cleaner lines.

Gray waved an arm to keep them moving. He remained on hold with the office of the Comando Carabinieri Tutela del Patrimonio Culturale, where Rachel worked. Before leaving Washington, the plan had been to rendezvous with her outside the international terminal, but she was not anywhere among the throngs of travelers. He had tried calling her apartment and her cell phone, but there was no answer. Thinking she was stuck in traffic, Gray had waited in the terminal for an extra half hour.

During that delay, he had used the time to check in with Sigma. It was a little past midnight back home. The director had filled him in on the details of the operation that had blown up in New Jersey. Monk had been involved in a firefight. It all involved a possible ecoterrorist group, but details were still sketchy.

Hearing that, Gray had an urge to hop on the plane and head back home, but Painter insisted that they had matters locked down for the moment. A key person-of-interest had been secured and was being questioned. Gray was ordered to maintain his current status.

Finally a woman's stern voice spoke in Gray's ear, speaking rapidly in Italian. After dating Rachel for over a year, Gray had acquired some fluency with the language.

"Lieutenant Verona is not in the TCP today. According to the roster, she's on leave. Perhaps another officer might assist you-"

"No, thank you. Grazie."

Gray hung up and pocketed his phone. He knew Rachel had been planning to take time off, but he'd hoped she was at the station for some reason. He grew worried. Where could she be?

Kowalski hailed a taxi, and they climbed inside.

His partner glanced at him. "How about that hospital?" he said. "The one where her uncle is being treated?"

"Right." Gray nodded. He should've thought of that. Maybe her uncle had taken a turn for the worse. Such an emergency would've pulled Rachel away. Distraught, she could easily have forgotten about the time.

Gray dialed information and got connected to the hospital operator. An attempt to reach Vigor's room failed. He did reach a floor nurse.

"Monsignor Verona remains in intensive care," the woman informed him. "Any further inquiries must be made through his family or through the polizia."

"I just wanted to know if his niece might be there visiting. Lieutenant Rachel Verona."

The woman's voice warmed up. "Ah, his nipote Rachel. Bellissima ragazza. She spent many hours here. But she left last night and has not come in this morning."

"If she does show up, can you let her know I called?" Gray left his number.

Pocketing his cell phone, he sagged in his seat. He stared at the passing scenery as the taxi sped along the interstate toward downtown Rome. Rachel had arranged a room at a small Italian bed-and-breakfast. Gray had stayed there before. Back when they were dating.

He struggled to think of any other reason why Rachel would not have shown up. Where could she be? Worry edged toward panic. He willed the taxi to go faster.

He would check for any messages at the hotel, then head directly over to her apartment. It was only a handful of blocks from the hotel.

Still, it would take time to get there.

Too much time.

With each passing mile, his heart pounded harder, his left hand tightened on his knee. As they finally passed through one of the ancient city gates and headed into central Rome, the taxi's passage became a crawl. The streets grew narrower and narrower. Pedestrians scooted sideways; a bicycle zigzagged between the cars.

At last the taxi pulled into a side street and came to a stop in front of the small hostelry. Gray hopped out, grabbed his bag, and left Kowalski to pay the driver.

The hotel appeared nondescript from the street. A small brass plaque on a wall, no larger than Gray's palm, read Casa di Cartina. The hotel had been converted out of three adjoining buildings, all dating from the eighteenth century. A half flight of stairs led down to a small lobby.

Gray headed below. The reason for the hotel's name became apparent as soon as the brush of the hanging bell announced Gray's entrance. All four walls of the room were covered with ancient maps and bits of cartography. The hostelry's owners came from a long line of world travelers and mariners, stretching back to before Christopher Columbus.

A wizened old man in a buttoned vest met Gray behind a small wooden front desk. His face cracked into a warm smile. "It has been a long time, Signor Pierce," the proprietor said warmly in English, recognizing Gray.

"It has, Franco."

Gray exchanged a few pleasantries, long enough for Kowalski to come striding into the space. The larger man's eyes swept the walls. With a background in the navy, he nodded his approval at the choice of decor.

"Franco, I was wondering if you had heard any word from Rachel." Gray forced his voice not to sound strained. "I was hoping she'd left a message."

The man's face crinkled in confusion. "A message?"

Gray felt a sinking in his chest. Clearly there had been no message. Maybe she was back at her-

"Signor Pierce, why would la signorina Verona leave a message? She is already up in your room, waiting for you."

Gray's relief felt like a rush of cold water. "Upstairs?"

Franco reached into a cubby behind his desk, removed a key, and passed it to Gray. "Fourth floor. I gave you a nice balcony room. The view of the Coliseum is very nice from that room."

Gray nodded and took the key. "Grazie."

"Can I have someone bring up your bags?"

Kowalski scooped Gray's duffel from the floor. "I got it." He bumped Gray in the rear with his bag to get him moving.

Gray thanked Franco again and headed to the stairs. It was a narrow, winding way, more ladder than stairwell. They had to go single file. Kowalski eyed it doubtfully.

"Where's the elevator?"

"No elevator." Gray set off up the stairs.

Kowalski followed. "You've got to be goddamn kidding me." He wrestled to get himself and the bags up. After two flights, his face had turned a deep red and a string of curses flowed in a continual stream.

Reaching the fourth floor, Gray followed the wall signs to find their room. The layout was a convoluted maze of sharp corners and sudden dead ends.

He finally reached the correct door. Though it was his room, he still knocked before using the key. He pushed open the door, anxious to see Rachel, surprised at the depth of his desire. It had been a long time...maybe too long.

"Rachel? It's Gray."

She was seated on the bed, framed against the window, bathed in the morning sunlight. She stood up as he quickly entered the room.

"Why didn't you call?" Gray asked.

Before she could speak, another woman answered, "Because I asked her not to."

Only now did Gray notice the handcuff that bound Rachel's right arm to the headboard. Gray turned.

A slim figure, wrapped in a robe, stepped from the bathroom. Her black hair was wet, freshly combed straight past her shoulders. Almond eyes the color of cold jade stared back at him. Her legs, bare to mid-thigh, crossed casually as she leaned on the bathroom door frame.

In her free hand, she leveled a pistol at him.

"Seichan..."

1:15 A.M.

Washington, D.C.

"We're not going to get anything more out of her," Monk told Painter as he sank into the seat across the desk. "She's exhausted and still in a state of shock."

Painter studied Monk. The man looked just as exhausted. "Did Creed finish his assessment of the genetic data?"

"Hours ago. He still wants to crunch the data past a statistician to be sure, but for the moment, he confirms Andrea Solderitch's story. Or at least as much as we can verify."

Painter had kept current with the status reports. Dr. Malloy's assistant had described a conversation with the professor just an hour before he was murdered. The professor had been compiling the genetic assay that made up the bulk of the file that Jason Gorman had e-mailed his father. It had revealed a genetic map of the corn harvested in Africa. Radioactive markers showed which genes were foreign to the corn.

Two chromosomes.

"And what about that original file?" Painter asked. "The one Jason Gorman sent to the professor two months ago. The one that contained the genetic data from the seeds originally planted in that field?"

Monk ran a hand over his bald scalp. "The techs at Princeton are still trying to recover the data. They've checked all the servers. The professor must have kept the file isolated to his own computer. The one torched by the assassins. All evidence of it is gone."

Painter sighed. They kept hitting dead ends. Even the gunmen had vanished. No bodies had been found. The assassins must have escaped the blast and slipped past the cordon around the laboratory.

"Though we don't have hard proof, I believe Andrea's story," Monk continued. "According to her, the professor found only one chromosome of foreign DNA in the original seed. He believed the two files showed that genetic modification was unstable in the harvest.

"But without that first file," Painter said, "we can't prove it."

"Still, it had to be why the professor was tortured and murdered. The assassins must have had orders to destroy all evidence of that first file...and everyone who knew about it. And they almost succeeded."

Painter frowned. "Still, all we have is Ms. Solderitch's word. And according to her, even the professor wasn't entirely certain about that instability. The samples could have come from two different genetic hybrids. They might be unrelated to one another."

"So what do we do next?"

"I think it's time we go to the source of all this."

Monk stared at the seed-shaped logo printed atop the file on Painter's desk. "Viatus."

"It all seems to come back to that Norwegian corporation. You've read the intelligence report on that symbol burned into the boy and the professor."

Monk's face tightened with distaste. "The quartered circle. Some pagan cross."

"Initial conjecture is that it might represent an ecoterrorist group. And maybe it does. Maybe some lunatics have a personal vendetta against Viatus. And that first file held some clue about it all." Painter sighed and stretched. "Either way, it's high time we had a talk with Ivar Karlsen, CEO of Viatus International."

"What if he won't talk?"

"Two murders on two continents-he'd better talk. Bad press can sink stock values faster than any sour earnings report."

"When do you want to-"

A hurried knock on the door cut Monk off. Both men turned as the door swung open. Kat rushed into the room and crossed to the desk. Monk lifted an arm, offering a hand, but he was ignored.

Painter sat straighter. This can't be good...

Kat's eyes were narrow with concern, her cheeks flushed as if she'd run all the way down here. "We've got trouble."

"What?" Painter asked.

"I should've gotten this sooner." Her voice was brittle with frustration. "Interpol's inquiry and ours must have crossed somewhere over the Atlantic, got mixed up. Neither side realized we were talking about two separate incidents. Stupid. Like dogs chasing their tails."

"What?" Painter asked again.

Monk took his wife's hand. "Slow down, hon. Take a breath."

The suggestion only made her angrier, but she kept her grip on his hand. "Another murder. Another body marked with the cross and circle."

"Where?"

"Rome," Kat said. "The Vatican."

She didn't have to explain more.

7:30 A.M.

Rome, Italy

"Let's all just stay calm," Seichan said, keeping her pistol steady as a rock.

Behind Gray, Kowalski dropped both bags and raised his hands. His voice soured. "I hate traveling with you, Gray. I really do."

Gray ignored him and faced the former Guild assassin...that is, if she was former. "Seichan, what are you doing?"

His words encompassed multiple questions. What was she doing in Rome? Why was she holding Rachel hostage? What was she doing pointing a gun at him? How could she even be here?

The satellite feed from her implant had her placed in Venice. Painter would have called Gray immediately if she had moved from there to here.

She ignored his question and asked one of her own. "Are you armed?" She nodded to encompass Kowalski.

"No."

Seichan eyed Gray, as if weighing the truth of his words. And it was the truth. They had traveled by commercial airline and had no time to acquire weapons.

Seichan finally shrugged, pocketed her pistol, and entered the room. She moved with a leonine grace, all legs and hidden strength. Gray didn't doubt she could have her pistol back out in the blink of an eye.

"Then we can all talk like friends," she said mockingly and tossed Gray a tiny key. It plainly fit Rachel's handcuff.

He caught the key, stepped over to the bed, and leaned down to unlock the cuff.

"Are you okay?" he whispered in Rachel's ear as he worked the key, his cheek near hers. The nape of her neck smelled familiar, stirring old feelings, warming embers that Gray thought had long gone cold. As he straightened, he noted that she'd let her hair grow out longer, past her shoulders. She had also thinned down, making her high cheekbones more prominent, increasing her resemblance to a young Audrey Hepburn.

Freed, she rubbed her wrist. Her voice was hard with fury and brisk with embarrassment. "I'm fine. In fact, you might want to hear what she has to say." Her voice lowered. "But be careful. She's drawn tight as a bowstring."

Gray turned to face Seichan. She strolled to the window, staring out across the rooftops of Rome. The curve of the Coliseum stood against the horizon.

"Where do you want to start, Pierce?" She didn't bother to glance at him. "Not expecting me in Rome?"

She dropped a hand to her lower left side. It wasn't done casually, but accusingly. The tracker had been implanted during abdominal surgery last year. Just in that spot.

She confirmed what Gray feared. "It was suspicious enough that I escaped so easily from Bangkok. But when there was no hard pursuit, I knew something was wrong." She turned and cocked an eyebrow at Gray. "A Guild agent escapes custody, but there is no more than a cursory search?"

"You found the implant."

"I'll give you all credit. It was difficult to find. Even a full-body MRI in Saint Petersburg failed to reveal it. Five months ago, I had a doctor perform exploratory surgery, starting with where you all operated on me."

Here was the flaw in Painter's original plan. They'd underestimated the level of paranoia in their target.

"The surgery took three hours," she continued with a growing edge to her voice. "I watched it all in a mirror. They found the implant buried in my healed wound-a wound I sustained saving your life, Pierce."

Anger hardened her face, but he didn't fail to note a slight wounding in her eyes.

"So you removed our tracker." Gray pictured the crooked path on the surveillance monitor. "But you still kept it with you."

"I found it useful. It allowed me to hide in plain sight. I could park the tracker somewhere for a while, then move off on my own."

"Like you did in Venice."

She shrugged.

"The city where the curator you murdered lived. Where his family still lives."

Gray let the accusation hang. Seichan shook her head very slightly and glanced away. He had a difficult time reading the play of emotions that flickered past.

"The girl had a cat," she said more quietly. "An orange tabby with a studded collar."

Gray knew the girl must be the curator's daughter. So Seichan had indeed gone to check on the family, moved in close enough to observe the simple routine of their lives, a family shattered by the death of a husband and a father. She must have planted her tracker on the cat's collar. It was a smart move. The cat's wandering through the neighborhood streets and rooftops would make the tracker seem active. It was no wonder the agents on the ground could find no trace of her in the Venetian neighborhood. With the hounds following the false trail, the real cat had escaped.

Gray wanted more answers from this woman. One question was foremost in his mind, a conversation they'd never completed. "What about your claim that you're a double-"

Seichan glanced sharply back at him. Her expression didn't change, but her eyes turned rock hard, warning him to back off. He had been about to question her assertion that she was a mole planted in the Guild, a double agent put there by Western forces, but plainly this was a conversation she didn't want in public. Or maybe he misread her expression. Maybe the bitterness in those eyes merely scoffed at his gullibility. He remembered her last words in Bangkok.

Trust me, Gray. If only a little.

Staring at her now, he let the question drop.

For now.

"Then why are you here in Rome? Why meet like this?" Gray gestured toward Rachel.

"Because I need a bargaining chip."

"Something to leverage against me?" Gray glanced at Rachel.

"No. Something to offer the Guild. After events in Cambodia, suspicions have run high concerning my loyalty. As well as I can tell, the Guild has been sniffing around the recent bombing at Saint Peter's. Something has piqued their interest. Then I heard that Monsignor Verona was involved in this incident-"

"Incident?" Rachel burst out. "He's in a coma."

Seichan ignored her. "So I came here. I believed I could benefit from this situation. If I could acquire some key piece of information about this bombing, I could buy my way back into the full trust of the Guild echelon."

Gray studied Seichan. Despite the callous nature of her words, the reasoning matched her claim two years ago. She had supposedly been sent into the Guild to root out its leaders. The only way to keep rising in the shadowy hierarchy-up the bloody food chain-was to produce results.

"I'd hoped to interrogate Rachel," she explained. "But when I got here, I found someone ransacking her apartment."

Gray turned to Rachel, who nodded confirmation, but there remained an angry glint in her eyes.

"The Guild determined that the assassins were after something the murdered priest had in his possession, something they wanted desperately. The assassins probably searched the man's body, but the explosion left them time for little else. Like searching the monsignor."

"So someone assumed Vigor must have had it," Gray realized and turned to Rachel. "And that his niece might have ended up with it after acquiring his possessions from the hospital."

Seichan nodded. "They went to look for it."

A wince of dread tightened in his gut. If they'd found Rachel, they would have carried out a brutal interrogation, then killed her. And after failing to find anything at her apartment, they were probably hunting for her right now, setting up surveillance at likely locations: apartment, place of work, even the hospital.

There was only one way to protect Rachel.

"We have to find out what they're looking for," Gray concluded aloud.

Rachel and Seichan shared a glance.

"I have it," Rachel said.

Gray could not hide his shock.

"But we have no idea of its significance," Seichan said. "Show him."

Rachel reached into a pocket of her jacket and pulled out a tiny leather satchel, no larger than a coin purse. She briefly described her discovery, how she found the object hanging from a bronze skeleton's finger in Saint Peter's Basilica.

"Uncle Vigor led me to it," she finished and handed over the satchel. "But Seichan and I haven't been able to determine anything else. Especially about what's inside."

Seichan and I...?

From the casualness of her statement, it almost sounded like the two were partners, not kidnapper and victim. Gray glanced toward the bathroom. While Rachel had talked, Seichan had stepped out of view, leaving her towel on the floor. He heard her shuffling in there, and he was equally sure she was listening to them. Any attempt to make for the door and she'd be on them.

"Are you truly all right?" Gray whispered to Rachel, catching her eye.

She nodded. "She only handcuffed me when she took a shower. Not exactly the trusting type."

At the moment, Gray appreciated Seichan's caution. Rachel was head-strong like him. Given the chance, she'd have bolted for her freedom. That might have ended badly. If the other hunters had caught her, they would not have been so gentle.

Kowalski stepped closer now that Seichan was out of sight. He pointed at the satchel. "What's in that thing?"

Gray had already teased open the leather strings. Now he emptied the contents into his palm. He sensed the weight of Rachel's gaze on him, waiting for his assessment.

"Is that-?" Kowalski had leaned over Gray's shoulder. He pulled away. "Oh, man, that's sick."

Gray didn't disagree, scowling his distaste. "It's a human finger."

"A mummified finger," Rachel added.

Kowalski's expression soured. "And knowing us, it's probably cursed."

"Where did it come from?" Gray asked.

"I don't know, but Father Giovanni was working in the mountains of northern England. At an excavation there. There were no more details in the police report."

Gray rolled the leathery digit back into the purse. As he did so, he noted the crude spiral burned into the leather. Curious, he turned the satchel over and spotted another mark on the other side. A circle and a cross. He immediately recognized it from Painter's description of events back in D.C. There had been two other murders on two continents, both bodies bearing this same mark.

Gray faced Rachel. "This symbol. You said you knew the satchel had to be connected to the bombing. Why were you so certain?"

He got the answer he was expecting.

"The attackers branded Father Giovanni"-she touched her forehead-"with the same mark. It was a detail left out of the press. Interpol was investigating its significance."

Gray stared down at the pouch in his palm.

Make that three murders on three continents.

But how were all these deaths connected?

Rachel must have read something in his face. "What is it, Gray?"

Before he could answer, the hotel phone on the nightstand rang. Everyone froze for a moment. Seichan stepped back into the room, dressed in black slacks and a burgundy blouse. She pulled on a battered black leather jacket.

"Is anyone going to get that?" Kowalski asked as the phone rang again.

Gray stepped to the table and picked up the receiver. "Hello?"

It was Franco, the hotel owner. "Ah, Signor Pierce, I just wanted to let you know your three visitors are headed up to your room."

Gray struggled for a moment to understand. It was a common custom in Europe to announce visitors, in case their guests might be indisposed. And Franco knew Rachel and Gray were ex-lovers. He wouldn't want them caught with their pants down, so to speak.

But Gray wasn't expecting anyone. He knew what that meant. He mumbled out a hurried "Grazie," then faced the others. "We've got company on the way up."

"Company?" Kowalski asked.

Seichan immediately understood. "Were you followed?"

Gray thought back. He'd been so concerned about Rachel's absence he'd failed to pay strict attention to the surrounding traffic. He also remembered his earlier concern about the hunters, how they might be setting up surveillance on anyone and everyone connected to Rachel. Gray had placed several calls.

His concern must have reached the wrong ears.

Seichan read the growing certainty in his face and swung for the door. She pulled out her pistol from the small of her back.

"Time for an early checkout, boys."

Chapter 7

October 11, 8:04 A.M.

Oslo, Norway

Ivar Karlsen watched the storm building across the fjord. He loved hard weather and welcomed autumn's rough descent into winter. Icy rain and snow flurries were already sweeping the colder nights. Frost greeted most mornings. Even now, he felt the chill on his cheeks as he leaned his knuckles on the ancient stones and stared out the arched window.

He kept guard at the top of Munk Tower. It was the highest point of Akershus Fortress, one of Oslo's most prominent landmarks. The imposing stone structure was first built on the eastern harborside by King Haakon V during the thirteenth century to defend the city. Over time it had been reinforced with additional moats, ramparts, and battlements. Munk Tower, where he stood now, had been constructed in the middle of the sixteenth century, when cannons had been added to the defense of the fortress and castle.

Ivar straightened and rested a hand on one of the ancient cannons. The cold iron reminded him of his duty, of his responsibility to defend not only this country, but the world. It was why he had picked the ancient fortress to host this year's UNESCO World Food Summit. It was a fitting bastion against the troubling times that were upon them all. One billion people were facing food shortages worldwide, and he knew that was only the beginning. The summit was critical for the world and for his company, Viatus International.

He would not let anything thwart his goals-not what had happened in Africa, not even what was going on in Washington, D.C. His objectives were vital to world security, not to mention his own family legacy.

Back in 1802, when Oslo was still called Christiania, the brothers Knut and Artur Karlsen combined a logging company with a gunpowder mill to found an empire. Their wealth became legendary, elevating them to true barons of industry. But even back then, the pair tempered their good fortune with good deeds. They founded schools, built hospitals, improved the national infrastructure, and, most important, sponsored innovation in the rapidly growing country. It was why they had named their company Viatus, from the Latin via, which meant "path," and vita, which meant "life." To the Karlsen brothers, Viatus was the Path of Life. It epitomized their belief that the ultimate goal of industry was to improve the world, that wealth should be tempered by responsibility.

And Ivar intended to carry on that legacy, one that stretched to the founding of Norway itself. Stories circulated that the Karlsen family tree had its beginnings as far back as the first Viking settlers, that its roots were even tangled with those of Yggdrasil, the world tree of Norse mythology. But Ivar knew such claims were just colorful tales told by his old bestefar and bestemor, stories passed from one generation to another.

Either way, Ivar remained proud of his family's history and of Norway's rich Viking lore. He welcomed the comparison. It had been the Vikings who truly forged the northern world, sweeping in their dragon-prowed longships across Europe and Russia, even to America.

So why shouldn't Ivar Karlsen be proud?

From his vantage high atop Munk Tower, he watched the storm clouds stack across the skies. It would be pouring rain by midmorning, freezing sleet by the afternoon, possibly the first true snowfall by evening. Snow had come early this year, another sign of the shifting weather patterns as nature roiled against the damage done by man, lashing back against the choking toxins and rising carbon levels. Let others question mankind's hand in this global meltdown. Ivar lived in a land of glaciers. He knew the truth. Snowpack and permafrost were melting at record paces. In 2006 Norwegian glaciers had retreated faster than ever recorded.

The world was changing, melting before his eyes. Someone had to take a stand to protect mankind.

Even if it had to be a bloody Viking, he thought with a grim smile.

He shook his head at such foolishness. Especially at his age. It was strange how history weighed more heavily upon one's heart as one grew older. Ivar was fast approaching his sixty-fifth birthday. And though his red hair had long since gone snowy, he wore it shaggy to his shoulders. He also kept fit with a vigorous exercise routine, laboring both in steam lodges and out in freezing temperatures, as in his long cold climb this morning to reach this high perch. Over the years, the routine had left his body hard, his face weathered to a ruddy leather.

He checked his watch. Though the UNESCO summit was not due to start until tomorrow officially, he had several organizational meetings still to attend.

As the storm rolled up the fjord, Ivar headed back down the tower. He caught glimpses of the preparations below in the courtyard. Despite the threat of rain, booths and tables were being set up. Luckily, most of the talks and lectures would occur in the grand upper rooms and banquet halls of Akershus Castle. Even the medieval fortress church would host a series of evening concerts, encompassing choral groups from around the world. In addition, the military museums associated with the fortress-the Norwegian Resistance Museum and the Armed Forces Museum-were being readied for the visiting groups, as were the lower sections of the castle itself, where guides would lead tours into the ancient dungeons and dark passages, sharing the stories of ghosts and witches that had always haunted the gloomy fortress.

Of course, the reality of Akershus was just as gruesome. During WWII, the fortress had been occupied by the Germans. Many Norwegian citizens were tortured and murdered within these walls. And afterward, war trials were conducted and executions performed, including those of the famous traitor and Nazi collaborator Vidkun Quisling.

Reaching the bottom of the tower, Ivar passed into the courtyard. With one foot in the present and the other in the past, he failed to note the round-bellied man blocking his way until he was almost atop him. Ivar recognized Antonio Gravel immediately. The current secretary-general for the Club of Rome did not look pleased.

And Ivar knew why. He had hoped to put the man off for another few hours, but clearly it could not wait. The two men had been butting heads ever since Ivar joined the ranks of his organization.

The Club of Rome was an international think tank comprised of industrialists, scientists, world leaders, and even royalty. Since its inception in 1968, it had grown into an organization encompassing thirty countries across five continents. The main goal of the organization was to raise awareness of critical global crises that threatened the future. Ivar's father had been one of the founding members.