by J. D. German
The Hermetrius Conspiracy
A Novel by
J. D. German
Copyright 2016 by J. D. German
The Hermetrius Conspiracy
Jackson Preston just retired from the Federal Remediation Agency, a clandestine arm of the U.S. Government that “fixes” problems, after 30 years as an “Adjuster”. Without his wife, there didn’t seem to be a reason to go to work anymore. So he retired to a lakeside cabin in the mountains of West Virginia to enjoy nature, and heal his emotions. One bright spot was an email from Lynn, a woman he knew in high school, that has turned into an electronic relationship of sorts.
Then he got the letter warning him he was being watched – some unknown entity had him under surveillance. To find out who and why, he went through the records of his old missions and found one file that stood out. What he found in that file led him to a conspiracy to take over the country by controlling the next Presidential election, and turned him into a wanted fugitive.
Lynn and three others joined him as they are chased around the country while working to uncover the details of the conspiracy. Once they realize how deep and sinister the plot is, they create a plan to expose it and send the leaders to jail. But the leaders were ready for that.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 1
Jack opened the screen door and walked out onto the covered wooden porch, a cup of strong coffee in his hand, and eased his 6 foot 3 inch frame into the oversized rocker with a murmured groan. All the old injuries made their presence known on a crisp October morning like this, with a mist rising off the lake in the distance. He rocked and sipped for awhile, then his mind went to the e-mail he had received the previous night. It was from someone named Lynn . . . Lynn what? Miller, Moore, Martin – that was it, Lynn Martin. She claimed to have known him back in Coal Creek High School and remembered a hot dog cooker made out of a pine board, a couple of nails and some lamp cord that he had demonstrated to their science class. She said she wanted to make one for her granddaughter but wasn’t sure how.
He vaguely remembered making something like that, but couldn’t place anyone in the class named Lynn Martin. It was a small community where you got to know everyone in school during the first couple weeks, so he should have remembered her. He wondered if the e-mail was a lie, an attempt to get his credit card number, or even steal his identity. Or maybe it was a disguised come-on from one of those on-line ‘dating’ services, soliciting him to join and spend his money searching for a new life partner.
That brought his mind to Helen again, his wife of 32 years who had died what . . . was it almost a year already? Maybe that was it. Maybe this Lynn had read about Helen’s death and thought he might like some companionship. But how would she know about the hot dog cooker? He needed to decide whether to ignore the e-mail or respond to it. Right now he didn’t want to let anyone into his life, on-line or otherwise.
As he sat there, letting his mind drift, his thoughts came back to the job he had retired from six months ago at the Federal Remediation Agency, the FRA. The FRA, or the Agency as those involved called it, was tasked with making problems go away. Problems that couldn’t be solved thru legal channels. Their charter included using unconventional means to deal with troublemakers, drug lords, illegal corporate activities, extremists, politicians on the take, and terrorists to name a few.
He had always liked his work, and was very good at it. But with Helen gone, there just didn’t seem to be any reason to get up and go to work in the morning. He realized when he retired that he was depressed and not in the right mental state to make such a decision, but he went ahead with it anyway.
After Helen died he sold their house in Falls Church, and bought this cabin in the eastern mountains of West Virginia. It was in good condition, with a large garage and a great view of the lake. No one else lived on the lake so he thought of it as ‘his’ lake. With the leftover cash from the Falls Church house and the money he had been putting aside to retire comfortably with Helen, he had quite a nest egg that, at his present rate of spending, would last him until he was at least 130 years old. He loved the solitude, but it wasn’t good for his mental state. Now, with the help of antidepressants, he was starting to come alive again and missed the excitement of his job. But not enough to give up this peaceful existence, at least not yet. Maybe he should try to get out more, to merge back into a more active life. If he kept this life up, his brain would turn to stone. That brought him back to the e-mail from Lynn Martin. What’s the harm in answering it? He could always cut off communications with her if things got suspicious.
He sat at his desk in front of the large screen laptop computer and logged on to the e-mail service. He only had the one message from her. Other than an occasional message from one of his three sons checking to see how he was doing, he seldom got any e-mails. That’s what made him wonder about this one from Lynn. If she was who she said she was, how did she find out his email address? Very few people knew it, and he avoided using the internet for purchases to keep it that way. He knew there were places on the Internet where you could find out anyone’s email address, but he wondered how accessible these were to the average non-geek. He thought, ‘Well, I’ve got nothing better to do today. Here goes.’
He wrote that he did remember the hot dog cooker demonstration in Mrs. Fisher’s 9th grade science class, but he couldn’t remember her, and asked how she got his on-line address. He clicked SEND and wondered if he would ever hear back from her.
As he was logging off, his job came to mind and the high-level security clearance it required. He remembered the frequent admonishments from his security officer to always be alert for strangers who try to strike up a friendship with you. Any of them could be working for some undefined agency from some unidentified country that would do anything to get access to what he knew. He always suspected that being paranoid was a prerequisite for security officer positions. Jack realized that, even though he was ‘retired’ he was required to report this contact from Lynn if it went much further. You were never really retired when it came to the stuff he knew, the things he had done, and the people who hired him
to do it.
The next few days went by uneventfully, just like every day now. With no one to talk to his habit of carrying on conversations with himself was getting more frequent. But it helped him wrestle with tough problems. He would question himself, then answer with whatever popped into his head. Sometimes the answer was humorous, although few others would understand the humor; sometimes it was irrelevant to what he was working on; but occasionally it provided an insight that led him deeper into the problem and an ultimate solution. That insight was one reason he had been so good at his job – he had a great store of accumulated knowledge that his unconscious mind seemed to access better than his conscious mind could. When he talked to himself at work, he kept the conversation in his head. He didn’t want others to hear him mumbling and think he was loosing it. But now that he was alone, he spoke out loud to himself and enjoyed the added sense of freedom in doing so.
It was starting to rain as he poured his first cup of morning coffee, so instead of going out on the porch, he sat down at his computer to check the news headlines. He scrolled down past the latest political rhetoric, an earthquake in Japan and a blog about how it was caused by global warming, and a 13-year old boy who was a science genius, which made him think of his hot dog cooker, which made him think of Lynn Martin. He had forgotten his answer to her e-mail and hadn’t checked for a response. He opened his mail screen and found her reply, sent the day after he had sent his message. That was four days ago and she hadn’t sent any “Are you there?” follow-up messages yet. Maybe she wasn’t a spy after all.
Her e-mail was brief, but explained that her maiden name was Spence. That rang a bell. Lynn Spence. A snapshot popped into his mind of a green-eyed redhead, standing in front of a classroom window, the sunlight filtering through her shoulder-length wavy red hair. She was smiling at him. That brought back more memories. He remembered being captivated by her back then, but he couldn’t remember how well they knew each other. Most likely he had admired her from a distance, with a 14-year-old’s fear of making a fool of himself keeping him distant from her. She explained that she found his email address by searching whitepages.com where she got a hit on his son, Jack Junior. She called him and got his father’s email address.
Jack would have to talk to his son about that. Well, at least he could place Lynn Spence in his life, so she must be who she said she was.
#
Frank Wright was in the middle of a fantasy daydream when the computer angrily interrupted. As he watched the letters appear on the screen he pulled the headset microphone nearer to his mouth and said “I’ve got something here. You may want to watch this.” Garcia’s voice came through the headset. “I’ve got it. It looks like he’s answering her e-mail. Are you recording this?”
An hour later, Wright and Garcia were joined by the rest of the team to review the new communication. “What do you think?” asked Jim Patterson. “Is she for real? No one could make this stuff up. Hot dog cooker from junior high school?”
“I don’t know” Wright replied. “It could be some kind of code. We’re expecting our unknown subject to try to contact him. Maybe that’s who she is.”
“Have we been able to find out where she lives yet, Garcia?”
“I’ve searched online and identified 342 people named Lynn Martin, but none with the name Spence associated with it. It’s going to take us a few days to check them all out. We probably should get headquarters to dig into the classified data bases.”
Jenkins, the team leader broke in. “Not yet. I don’t want to alert them until we know more. We’ll see what we can find out about the 342 hits and hope she replies to Preston with more information for us to go on. Has anyone checked out Coal Creek yet? How many of those could there be?”
“I’ve found eleven in ten states so far” injected Garcia.
“You mean there’s a state with two Coal Creeks in it?”
“Yeah, Kentucky has two, both in the eastern end of the state. That’s coal mining country. But we’ll need more information to narrow down the search”
Chapter 2
Lynn was sound asleep, deep in a dream about a horse she used to have when she lived in Texas. She loved that horse. After her divorce, she gave all her love to that horse. Not that she had wasted much love on her husband before the divorce. He had become distant very early in the marriage, so she had to look for other outlets for her love. She would have been a lonely woman if it wasn’t for her three children.
But now, in her dream, Wild One nuzzled her neck and snickered. Lynn gave her the rest of the carrot and patted her cheek. The horse nuzzled her neck again. She had never ridden the horse. The old hands around said it couldn’t be ridden because it was “green broke”, whatever that meant. But Lynn wasn’t into horseback riding. That would be degrading to Wild One, to be forced to do the bidding of a rider. Lynn didn’t want to control the horse, she just wanted to be close friends.
As she turned to look the horse in the eye, Wild One said “You’d better wake up or I’m gonna be late for school.” Lynn dragged herself up from her dream to a semi-awake state. Her granddaughter, Selena, was tickling her neck gently. “Finally, you’re back from the dead. Get dressed, I have a test this morning and I can’t be late.”
Selena lived in Telluride, Colorado with her aunt Ellen. Lynn’s daughter, Betsy, died having Selena. Betsy’s husband, Don, had no clue what to do with a baby so Lynn kept her until she was four. By that time Don had married again, to Ellen, and they took her back in. Lynn kept her for a few days a month to let Don and Ellen have some alone time. On mornings like this she wished Selena was back with Don and Ellen already so she could sleep in. ‘Having her around breaks up my morning routine and gives my day a rocky start.’ Lynn thought.
Lynn rolled out of bed and headed for the shower. With only 15 minutes until she and Selena had to leave, it would have to be a short one. Some days her shower was her favorite time of the day; a time when she could enjoy the caress of the warm water for as long as she wanted and let her mind drift to her special place. But not this morning. In and out of the shower, makeup on, into her jeans and old blue shirt, and ready to go out the door right on time.
But of course, Selena wasn’t ready yet, so Lynn stopped by the kitchen to pour a cup of coffee for the road. As she walked past her computer, where she spent an hour or two a day exchanging e-mails, reading her favorite blogs, and shopping for things she couldn’t find in the local stores, she remembered her e-mail to the guy from high school science class. His answer to her first one was short and formal, but he hadn’t responded to her reply yet.
“I guess he doesn’t remember me, even though he was my first date.” They had gone to the local movie theater to see Love is a Many Splendored Thing, but she didn’t remember much about the movie. She was too excited at sitting that close to him, hoping that he would hold her hand. That was O.K. on a first date, wasn’t it? With no older sisters at home to tell her about these things, she didn’t really know what to expect.
Selena came rushing out of her room saying “Grandma, we’re going to be late!” like it was Lynn’s fault they weren’t on the road already. After getting her granddaughter to school with 3 minutes to spare, Lynn headed back home. As she hung her keys on the hook, she saw the computer again and thought, “I’ll check one more time. If he hasn’t answered I’ll quit bugging him. He’s probably a very busy person. I wonder what he does?” She didn’t need to know how to make the hot dog cooker anyway. That wasn’t really why she contacted him.
As her e-mail display opened, she smiled. There was an answer. She moved the mouse arrow over his message and paused “What if he blows me off. Doesn’t remember Lynn Spence at all. Do I want to know that?” With a quick prayer, she clicked the e-mail open. He did remember her! And he was definitely being friendlier than in his first e-mail. She scanned the lines and saw that he had a picture of her in his mind. That was a good sign. He asked about the hot dog cooker and told her no matter what, don’t to
uch the hot dog when it’s plugged in. He closed with a cordial offer to answer any questions she might have. Oh, she had lots of questions, but those would have to wait.
She wrote a carefully thought out, friendly reply, asking if there were any other dangers she should worry about, like the hot dog exploding all over her kitchen. She went on with a little more history, reminding him that she had moved from Coal Creek shortly after they started 10th grade and, by the way, did he remember going to a movie with her.
She told him a little about Selena and her interest in science and how they planned to have several of Selena’s friends over to try out the hot dog cooker for the first time. She thanked him for taking the time to answer her and, if he had time, would he tell her a little about himself. She clicked on SEND and wished she didn’t have to wait for at least a day to hear back from him. The agony of waiting must have been unbearable back in the Pony Express days.
#
After spending the day cutting and splitting wood for the coming winter, Jack couldn’t wait to get into the shower and scrub the saw dust off. Somehow it worked its way into his clothes and lodged in every crevice it could find. After the shower, he put on his comfortable “lounge around the house” clothes, opened a beer, and walked out to the mail box to see what was there.
There was the usual quota of ads from the local grocery and hardware store, 2 for 1 coupons for Uncle Jim’s Country Pizza, and a solicitation from a bank announcing that, because of his excellent credit rating, he was already prequalified for a $5,000 line of credit. He wondered how that could be since he had never taken out a loan or used a credit card – at least not in his own name.
As he paged through the stack of mail, he came across a garden supply catalog addressed to Helen. A sob got past his defenses and caught in his throat. He wondered how long thoughts of her would have this power over him. Did people ever get over the death of a loved one, especially a sudden, unexpected death?
He forced his mind away from Helen, something he had been working on as an antidote to the depression he was struggling with, and looked at the final letter. It was addressed to Dr. Jackson Preston with no return address on the envelope. No one around here knew about him by that title; he had quit using it two months out of post-graduate school, when the Agency hired him. Maybe it was a letter from the alumni association, although he had been careful to disconnect himself for his past life when he moved up here into the mountains. He opened it and found a single sheet with one printed line that sent a chill up his spine: