The Cassiopeia Contract

Fascists and right-wing militia target the United Nations and European Union over what they call an unholy alliance of leftists and Zionist supremacists who are deploying the full might of the European Union and United Nations to impose migration, multi-ethnicity, multiculturalism and miscegenation on nations world-wide. Inspired by tweets of Donald Trump, fascists start to hit back, first at the polls in Europe, now in Brazil, and by letter-bombs in the US.
A US-based investigative news organization, The Centre for Public Integrity reports that South Africa has enough ingots of highly-enriched fission fuel to produce six atom bombs and that experts fear that it may be stolen and used in a terrorist attack.
When a witness in a treason trial in the Supreme Court tells the court that the apartheid regime developed a mini nuke for the howitzer, officials discover one ingot is missing. The outgoing President of the apartheid regime told Parliament in 1989 that his government had dismantled six-and-a-half atom bombs and everything apropos the bombs had been destroyed, but no mention was made of a mini nuke. Since the ANC government fears extreme right-wing White Afrikaners may use the mini nuke against a government who has turned sharply left since Nelson Mandela died, agents round up right-wing Afrikaners, in particular those who were formerly in the military. ‘South Africa is a political volcano about to erupt’ is how the BBC describes the situation.
Rian Schröder head of the SA Police Service National Operational Unit is ordered to investigate the murders of retired apartheid soldiers but meets with physical obstruction from the military, for agents of military intelligence question his integrity since he too is an Afrikaner. Before long agents from every conceivable nation are after the device. As the search intensifies Rian and FBI Special Agent Marlui Vigueras, a profiler sent to help him identify the killer, become targets of agents of military intelligence, of foreign agents, and of right-wing militia.
On a murdered soldier’s computer Rian and Marlui find two vital clues―Cassiopeia and Bommer. Studies reveal Cassiopeia is a supernova in the northern hemisphere, remains of a star explosion, whereas in Greek mythology Cassiopeia boasted that her daughter Andromeda was more beautiful than the sea nymphs. Bommer was the nickname for the hero of one of the major battles in Angola during which the mobile G-6 howitzer played a major role in wiping out a complete brigade of FAPLA, Cuban and Russian soldiers.
However, ‘Bommer’, expert on the howitzer, is nowhere to be found.
Rian deduces that a supernova denotes a nuclear device, and that Andromeda chained to a rock in the ocean means that the nuclear device was sold to an overseas party and that Bommer would deliver it personally (Perseus on his winged horse Pegasus saved Andromeda). When Rian and Marlui head for the United States of America, FBI Director orders Marlui to New York in the belief that the United Nations building is the target.
But Rian follows his instincts and he and Marlui fly to Los Angeles. ‘Where else,’ Rian asks, ‘will you find a star explosion, and women who are even more beautiful than the sea nymphs, than at the film industry’s Annual Academy Awards presentation in the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles?’ In Los Angeles Rian and Marlui come under fire from the fascist militia who acquired the nuke. When Rian is taken captive by Bertrand Tremblay, leader of Order of Bertrand et Raton, a far-right militia group from New Mexico, will the bomb be found, and if so, who can disarm it before it can be detonated in front of a television audience of one billion people?
As a hissing sound suddenly fills the auditorium, the audience look up to watch awestricken as the massive Millennium Falcon slowly swings out over them, totally unaware that they are doomed like Cassiopeia to be banned to the stars forever.