The Third Meridian

A bomb is hidden inside the body of a passenger on a Singapore–London flight. As the aircraft prepares to land, the man loses consciousness. A doctor finds a recent surgical incision and feels a hard object beneath it. Briefly regaining consciousness, the passenger grabs her sleeve: he was forced to board this plane. He mentions his daughter and keeps saying he only had to reach London. Meanwhile, two passenger aircraft explode in the United States.

Another explosion tears through a London–Washington flight carrying CIA operative Marcus Kern and his daughter. Only a short time earlier, they were visiting places connected to their family’s past, trying to repair a relationship strained by years of tension. Now Marcus applies pressure to a flight attendant’s wound and searches for Maya. Both survive, but he has no time to stay by her side. Civilian aviation across the United States has been grounded. No one knows how many more people are carrying explosives inside their bodies—or who sent them.

An organization calling itself the Third Meridian claims responsibility. As the nation watches news coverage of the attacks and their victims, the terrorists launch OPEN LINE—a website inviting people to share stories of injustice. They speak about medical bills that wiped out their savings, eviction, fear of deportation, relatives killed in war. A mother holds up a photograph of her dead son and asks someone to say his name. Her grief is real. So are the stories of others, many of whom openly condemn the attackers. That is why even people who despise the terrorists watch and share them.

OPEN LINE’s organizers decide which recordings viewers will see, what commentary surrounds them, and who will be blamed. They help frightened, angry people find one another, gather outside government buildings, and film arrests and confrontations. Every government misstep gives them new footage. Marcus watches the terrorist campaign grow into an operation designed to incite civil unrest: the killers have captured the public’s attention and now claim to speak for the people they are exploiting.

When drones strike Washington, Marcus and Eliza Hart search for those who supplied the explosives, transported the equipment, and provided access to buildings. The trail leads to Singapore and the team that built OPEN LINE. The man behind the attacks is known as the Cartographer. While the country struggled to recover from the explosions, he was building a database of names, faces, documents, personal grievances, and fears. Now he knows which story will make someone share a recording—and which will make them leave home and join a crowd. He demands a direct conversation with the President of the United States, offering to hand over control of the platform and everything it has collected.

The Cartographer divides the keys to OPEN LINE among ten members of his team and sends them along separate routes through several countries. Each digital key requires its holder’s active participation. Seizing the phones will not be enough: these people must be found alive and persuaded to cooperate. For Marcus, that means protecting accomplices in the attacks that nearly killed his daughter. Some never knew the full plan. Others chose not to ask. Now the effort to shut down the platform before the Cartographer’s next release depends on their cooperation.

THE THIRD MERIDIAN is Sam Nyxon’s complete two-book series about a terrorist campaign that begins with bombs aboard passenger aircraft and escalates into an attempt to manipulate millions of people. Marcus Kern must track down the organizers, keep their accomplices alive, and protect the people whose grief has become a weapon in someone else’s hands.