Doubt - Among Us Trilogy Book 1 - a Truth Seekers end of the world religious thriller series

by Anne-Rae Vasquez

  The larger man looked over his shoulder at Rinaldo before saying something to Kerim.

  From the driver side of the van, the door opened and Raffe came out. The look of annoyance on his face was intimidating; revealing a fury she sensed was larger than the situation at hand.

  He advanced towards them in confident strides causing the young men to step back.

  Raffe spoke to them, and his Arabic sounded rougher than Kerim’s and the young men, probably due to his Hebrew accent. They spoke back and forth for a few minutes.

  Cristal held her breath, wondering what the conversation was about. Kerim came up alongside Raffe, and they both continued speaking to the four of them.

  The large man suddenly cracked a smile. He turned to the others whose grave expressions thawed into playful grins.

  Kerim looked over his shoulder at her and signaled with his eyes for her to come to him. He gave her the thumbs up, letting her know that everything was fine.

  She walked over and stood beside him.

  “Hello, nice lady,” the larger one said with a grin.

  “Hello,” she said.

  Kerim reached over and squeezed her hand reassuringly.

  “I study Engleesh in Canada. My name is Walid,” he said, his smile growing wider. “You like Akko? It is very, very, old city.”

  “I’m Cristal. Yes, it is very beautiful.”

  From the corner of her eye, she noticed that Rinaldo and Gabriel were having a side conversation of their own, whispering to each other.

  What was going on?

  She shifted her focus back.

  Walid announced, “I see you before.”

  Cristal’s eyes widened.

  “Me? No, I don’t think so.”

  Walid took a step closer, unable to hide his excitement.

  “Yes, yes…it is you. The day the big earthquake, it happen in Megiddo. My town. I see you in my dream.”

  Kerim’s hand tightened over hers.

  “It’s okay, Cristal. Remember. Nothing is far-fetched.”

  She gulped. Walid was waving his arm like an excited fan asking a famous celebrity for an autograph.

  “I do not forget you. You very pretty. I not forget.”

  He turned around and translated what he said to his friends.

  Kerim said, “It’s time to go.”

  He turned to Walid and said something in Arabic.

  Walid said, “Tammam. Y’alla!”

  She knew this meant, Okay, let’s go.

  He waved to the others to follow him as he walked towards the red VW Golf hatchback that was parked in the space in front of Kerim’s motorcycle.

  Kerim glanced over, and said, “We’re going to the wall.”

  “We?” she asked.

  He grabbed her hand and led her to the motorcycle. “Yeah, Walid and his friends are coming with us.”

  Chapter 25

  Mind Games

  HARRY WAS DRIVING FAST. Way too fast.

  “Slow down,” said the voice that could pass as Dr. Saeed’s.

  Harry glanced at the rearview mirror. Dr. Saeed lounged in the back seat, on the passenger side. No crazy eyes, no spinning head. He was just normal.

  Considering the circumstances, Harry should have been somewhat relieved. Earlier, he had imagined vampire teeth sinking into the back of his neck. Thank God, that didn’t happen.

  He heard his mother’s voice say, “Barukh atah Adonai Eloheinu melekh ha’olam, ha’motzi lehem min ha‑aretz.” Blessed are You, Lord, our God, King of the Universe, Who brings forth bread from the earth.

  It was the only prayer his mother taught him in Hebrew. She made him say it before every meal, despite Aaron’s forbidding any forms of religious expression in their home.

  Saying the prayer was meaningless to Harry. Just some words he would mumble before taking a mouthful of his dinner. If it made his mother happy, he wasn’t going to argue with her. Why he could hear his mother saying the prayer now was just another mystery to him.

  Focus on finding out more about the monster in the back of my car.

  “Dr. Saeed, or is that your real name? Are you going to tell me what you are?” he asked, trying to keep his voice steady.

  “You’re talking very strangely, Harry,” Dr. Saeed replied. “Are you okay?” he said, again in that soothing voice of his.

  His hands gripped the wheel. Okay, play the game. Buy some time.

  “I don’t know, Dr. Saeed. I guess I’m not quite myself,” he said.

  “Ah, yes. You must have fallen asleep when you were waiting for me in the car.”

  Fallen asleep?

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said. “As far as I recall, I was in my car by myself, ready to drive away from GN. And then you showed up from nowhere in the back seat.”

  “Harry, now it’s my turn to say, ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ Don’t you remember calling me? You said to meet you at your car and that it was urgent. That we had to go find Cristal before she ended up at one of the black hole locations.”

  Flashes of memory exploded into Harry’s head.

  He could see himself leaning his head back on the headrest, the seat slightly reclined. There was a knock on the glass. He opened his eyes and saw Dr. Saeed. He unlocked the door to let Dr. Saeed in.

  Harry swerved the car, almost clipping a truck beside him.

  The driver waved his hand out the window and yelled, “Mh ath hvshb shath ‘evshh?” What do you think you’re doing?

  “Get a hold of yourself,” Dr. Saeed said. “Do you want me to drive?”

  Harry felt disoriented, unsure of himself. Did he, in fact, dream up the whole thing? The secret lab? Seeing his dad? Dr. Saeed’s yellow eyes? He did recall having trouble sleeping the last few nights. Was he suffering from sleep deprivation?

  “I said, do you want me to drive?”

  Harry glanced over his shoulder. Dr. Saeed was looking at him with concern. He had to admit that he did not look like a crazy monster. If it was all a dream, then he didn’t have to be afraid of him.

  “Why?” Harry asked, hoping to sound lighthearted. “You don’t like my Israeli style of driving?”

  Dr. Saeed chuckled softly.

  “Glad to see you are feeling better. Your choice of words always amuses me.”

  Wait a minute, Harry thought. Why was Dr. Saeed in the back seat? He never rides in the back seat.

  Harry took a deep breath. “You comfortable back there, Dr. Saeed?” He looked up in the mirror to see a smile curl up on the Doc’s face.

  “Yes, Harry. Thanks for forcing me to sit back here. You know I prefer to ride shot gun.”

  Okay, good answer. Maybe I am losing my mind. Play it cool.

  “You know I had a vision today,” Harry said quietly.

  “Oh? We have some time before we get there. Care to tell me what it was?”

  Harry saw the exit sign to Akko coming up on the right. They were about twenty minutes away from the black hole.

  “I saw Aaron. He time travelled here to GN,” Harry said quietly.

  He looked over his right shoulder to check the blind spot before changing lanes. He caught Dr. Saeed’s eye in the mirror.

  It twitched, I’m sure of it.

  Harry’s mind was reeling as he tried to contemplate why Dr. Saeed, or more like Mr. Hyde, was playing ignorant. A thought crossed his mind.

  Maybe he didn’t know that his cover was blown.

  “And what if that were true?” Dr. Saeed asked, as if luring him in, in his usual reserved way. “How would you feel about that?”

  “Ah, come on. Don’t talk to me like you’re my shrink.”

  “You do realize we both don’t know what will happen when we arrive at the black hole. It could be the end of us all.” Dr. Saeed paused. “So, humor an old friend, Harry.”

  As Harry drove into the city of Akko, he had to slow down as he approached a roundabout. The Israeli Transportation Department installed the roundabou
ts to control the speed of drivers. However, it only encouraged the locals to speed around them like Indy race car drivers on crack cocaine. His mother always told him to “do as the locals do,” so he slammed his foot on the gas and whipped around the roundabout, hurtling Dr. Saeed against the side door, and then toppling him over to the opposite door as Harry gunned the car into a sharp right.

  Dr. Saeed never wore a seatbelt stating that, “If it is my time to leave this timeline, then so be it. I want to enjoy the ride; not feel strapped in like a prisoner.”

  “Dr. Saeed, you okay back there?” Harry asked, chuckling to himself.

  Dr. Saeed grabbed the back of his chair in an attempt to balance himself.

  “Harry, that isn’t funny,” he snapped.

  In the rearview mirror, Harry saw that he had pulled himself up. He began fixing his shirt and patting the sides of his hair flat.

  What a self-centered prick.

  They sat in an uncomfortable silence while he drove them through the old city. Harry noticed that there were a lot of cars on the road with mostly guys not much younger than him, out for a joy ride, heading towards the beach—to hang out or kill time.

  Speaking of time, Harry realized that he should use this opportunity to squeeze more intel out of Dr. Saeed.

  He cleared his throat before saying, “Aaron is here. I can feel it. Call me crazy, but in my vision, Aaron told me that he travelled through time to get here.”

  “He told you this?” Dr. Saeed leaned his head forward between the front seats, causing Harry to almost jump out of his skin.

  “Freak! Do you want to get us killed?” he cried out, as he swerved inches away from sideswiping a parked car.

  “Oh, sorry,” Dr. Saeed said as he leaned back. “It’s just that your vision was not a dream, Harry.”

  Harry could hear the excitement in his voice. Is he for real? So Dr. Saeed really didn’t have a clue that Harry knew his secrets. If the good doctor was attempting to make him doubt himself, it wasn’t working. Deep down in his gut, Harry knew he saw something not from this world.

  He realized that he must be developing a sixth sense, like Cristal. And why would he be surprised? Aaron and Dr. Saeed admitted they had been experimenting on him, too. Deception had a bitter taste. Aaron admitted having tested on himself, too. And who was to say that Dr. Saeed wasn’t one of Aaron’s volunteer test subjects?

  “Harry, are you listening? Your father is alive.”

  “Yes, I know,” Harry replied calmly. “You and I both know that he time travelled here.”

  He looked up at the mirror to see his reaction.

  Dr. Saeed’s eyes met his gaze. “No, he didn’t. Although he would want everyone to believe that.”

  Harry swerved the car over to the side of the road, putting the stick shift into park. He spun around.

  Screw logic. He wanted answers.

  “What the hell are you talking about? Stop talking in circles!”

  Dr. Saeed stared at him, looking almost contrite. He said, “He didn’t die five years ago.”

  Harry was completely baffled at what he was hearing. He had expected Dr. Saeed to explain how his father went FTL, or faster than light speed, on warp drive while time travelling here from the past to the present.“Sorry, I don’t get it. What are you trying to say?”

  Dr. Saeed took a deep breath, getting ready to tell him in his “once upon a time” way.

  Harry groaned.

  “Skip the long explanations and just tell me the Cliff notes’ version.”

  Dr. Saeed replied, “Yes, of course. The data that the Truth Seekers’ team has been decoding uncovered something that GN has been hiding.”

  Harry sighed. “Cut to the chase, Dr. Saeed. You’re killing me over here.”

  Dr. Saeed cleared his throat and wiped the sweat from his brow.

  Man, he’s either a great actor or he’s got something really good to tell me.

  “Okay, in short, GN faked your father’s death. That was the big secret that GN had encrypted on their secure servers.”

  WTF?

  “Are you talking about the data Cristal and Joanna were decoding? We knew that it was a huge secret they were hiding. But you’re telling me the secret was that they had faked Aaron’s death?”

  Dr. Saeed said, “No, no. It’s more than that. But I’m still trying to figure it out. And could you please refer to him as your father? He is your father, after all.”

  “Okay, so you’re saying Aaron was in on it?” Harry said, putting emphasis on the name Aaron as he spat out the words.

  “No, definitely not. They kept your father in a drug-induced coma. For what reason, I’m not sure.”

  He took a deep breath. “The decrypted data Joanna provided had been running through your software program before you left to see Cristal. The data revealed that there was a secret room at GN. I went in search for this room and found that it was guarded. Fortunately, I was able to convince the guards that I had clearance. I found your father in the secret lab.”

  Harry pounced on this bit of information. “Secret lab?”

  “Yes, yes! GN has a secret lab.”

  “Where was it?” he asked with a sneer in his voice.

  Dr. Saeed wasn’t admitting he had a secret lab behind the hidden door in the closet of his lab.

  “In the South wing basement,” Dr. Saeed continued. “When I found him in a comatose state, I administered Zolpidem into his IV drip. He woke up an hour later, although he was quite incoherent at first. I managed to get him dressed and walk him out of the secret lab back to my lab.”

  What a backstabbing, lying sack of sh*t! He played me all along for an idiot, a dumb kid moron. And to think I believed him and put Cristal and all the Truth Seekers in freaking danger.

  Son of a b*tch. He’d be damned if Dr. Saeed used him and Cristal as pawns ever again. Harry was about to say something when the car started to shake slightly. His head felt woozy as he turned to face forward—trying to steady himself. Seconds later, a thunderous sound roared in the sky above them.

  “Dear God,” Harry muttered.

  Dr. Saeed grabbed his shoulder. “Drive, Harry. We must get to the black hole before anything happens!”

  The earth shook subtly beneath the car in waves. Harry shifted gears and pressed his foot down on the gas.

  Chapter 26

  The Wall

  WHEN THE FIRST tremors on the ground started, Kerim and Cristal were standing in front of the walls of the old fortress of Akko, which loomed sixty feet high above them. Seconds later, Raffe appeared out of nowhere. Something about this guy unhinged her nerves. However, now was not the time to pinpoint exactly what it was.

  Cristal clung to Kerim as the ground gently swayed back and forth—the swaying reminded her of when she was standing in her stepfather’s boat while it was docked in the marina. Not that he knew how to drive the thing. He only used it to throw cocktail parties for his wealthy dental clients and show off his perfect family.

  As suddenly as the shaking began, it stopped. Kerim looked down at her, almost the way he looked at Gabriel, right after the earthquake in New York with his “Are you serious?” face.

  She released her arms around him and mumbled, “Sorry, not sure what got into me.”

  Walid and two of his friends were standing off to the side, a few feet from her. Where were the rest of the Truth Seekers?

  “Mizz Cristal,” Walid called out as he ran up to her. “Did you feel the shake of the ground?”

  Cristal glanced over at Kerim who had moved over to the van. He was quietly talking with Raffe, a grim expression on his face. She noticed that he was shaking his head, several times in fact. Cristal didn’t want to even surmise what they were saying to each other.

  She turned back to Walid who was wide-eyed and nervous, obviously aware of the imminent danger, despite appearing to be calm. He smiled at her in a reassuring way.

  “Do not be scared,” he said. “Allah is here and if it is His will, then
we must trust Him.”

  She knew “Allah” meant “God,” and she didn’t think this was the time or place to suddenly become religious.

  “You believe in God, yes?” he asked.

  “Of course, I do,” she said. “I’m just not religious. What I mean is, I don’t go to church or anything like that.”

  He said, “You need not go to a place to talk to God. He is here. Everywhere.”

  He raised his hands up to the sky to emphasize his point.

  “Yes, you’re right,” she said, happy to hear he wasn’t going to try to preach to her.

  That was one of her biggest pet peeves. Born in a Roman Catholic family, her mother always tried to shove her beliefs down her throat. The more she did this, the more she wanted to run away from her.

  Her senses picked up something in the air. The ground under her right foot shifted ever so slightly while her ears were picking up a high-pitched sound, similar to what she had heard before the earthquake in New York.

  Oh, no, not again.

  Her heart began beating faster, her lungs starting to burn.

  “Calm down. You can control this,” her father’s voice whispered in her ear.

  She frantically looked over at Kerim, but he was still in a deep discussion with Raffe.

  “Mizz Cristal?”

  She turned back to Walid whose eyes were deep with concern.

  “I’m sorry, Walid,” she finally managed to say. “I’m not feeling very well.”

  He turned and said something to his friend who dashed over to the car. Shortly after, he ran back with a bottle of water in his hand, stopping, and holding it out to her.

  “For me?” she asked.

  He smiled shyly, his eyes looking down at his feet.

  Cristal was overwhelmed with Walid and the boy’s sweet kindness. Her heart filled with warmth and gratitude. She took the water bottle gratefully, and smiled back.

  “Thank you very much. It is very kind of you,” she said.

  The young man looked up at her briefly, his face turning red. Walid patted him on the back, signaling for him to step back.

  “Drink. It is good to drink,” Walid said to her, motioning with his hands.

  She smiled, removed the cap from the bottle, and tilted it to her lips. The cold water spilled into her mouth, quenching her thirst, relaxing her breathing, and decreasing her pulse rate.

  When she looked up, she gave Walid a warm smile.

  “You were right. The water has made me feel ten times better already.”