Climate Change and cryptography go hand in hand like seashells and fractals, and Dr. Ian Hood, Government Scientist soon finds out.

Simon and Eugene discuss Kryptos.

Episode Synopsis

Richard Adams is a man who likes to walk on the beach, study shells, talk to himself, and run away from would-be assassins.  He also happens to be, formerly, one of Ian Hood’s best friends.  They fell out over Adams stealing Hood’s girlfriend, Gillian.

Adams is a brilliant climate scientist or paranoid crank, depending on to whom you listen.  He believes that he has damning evidence of global warming, he also believes that his former employer, Paul Destrano of the Environment Institute, wants to discredit his work and have him killed, because if published, Americans will have to give up their cars.  Unfortunately, that work is locked up on a computer back at the Environment Institute.

Hood visits Destrano, who explains about Adams breakdown.  He also speaks with his former colleague at the Environment institute, Martin Godley, who dismisses Adams’ work as mostly a rant.  On the down low, he slips Hood a note, asking for a clandestine meeting.  He claims to have only dismissed Adams’ work in the hopes that he’d take some time off, relax and get better.  It is; however, clear that Martin lives in fear.

Adams tries to get his work published at Baxter Scientific, but without the key data, Baxter must refuse.  After a refusal from another journal, Adams kills himself.

He leaves puzzles behind for Hood and when he starts to crack them, he gets a call from Martin, who is willing to give Hood the data.  When he goes to meet him, Destrano is there instead, warning Hood that he’ll prosecute to the fullest extent of the law if Hood comes into possession of Environment Institutes proprietary data.  Also, Martin has been fired.  Later, Martin is murdered in such a way to make it look like an accident.

Rachel breaks into the Environment Institute and steals the data – but it’s encrypted!  Curses, foiled again!

Someone has broken into Hood’s home and left a cryptic clue.  Rachel chases this up while Hood cracks the encryption password.  Rachel finds that Adams staged his own death, and that Hood shouldn’t run the computer program because the environment Institute will immediately be able to track him down and know what he’s doing.  Unfortunately, that warning comes too late, and Destrano’s goons are after him.

When Hood sees the data, it’s devastating.  Global warming is going to cause sea level rise and lots of people are going to get their feet wet.  This is the proof the world needs to get real climate action now!  If only Hood can survive to get the data published.

He sets up some real secret agent stuff by handing off the data to Baxter on a bus and then Destrano confronts Hood.  Things look like there might be another dead scientist, but Rachel shows up and stares them down.

The data is published, Destrano and the Environment Institute are embarrassed, and the world, confronted with the heretofore completely unexpected revelation about global warming immediately leaps into action, saving the planet for generations to come.

Or, you know, they just talk about it on the news.