The Portent

by Michael S. Heiser

  “I’d forgotten about that,” Brian remembered. “How did police identify his remains?”

  “Well, this is probably as good a time as any to tell you … they ID’d him by dental remains and fingerprints on his shoes. The body had been exposed in the desert for a long time—at least a month, though based on your story it was probably longer.”

  “Could they tell how he died?”

  “Not specifically, but the report speculated it was very violent. Most of the major bones had fractures—two broken neck vertebrae.… There were far too many fractures to be accounted for by the act of dumping the body, even if it had been from a helicopter. There’s little doubt he’d been severely beaten. God help Aloysius.”

  44

  If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn’t thinking.

  —General George S. Patton, Jr.

  “Here you go,” Clarise said, handing Melissa a folded sheet of paper, visibly tattered and worn at the edges. “I hope you’ve had more success than I have, whatever you’re working on,” she added, glancing curiously at the table.

  “Not really,” Melissa answered.

  “I’ve spent the better part of three days trying to analyze it and can’t get beyond the obvious. I’m ashamed to say I couldn’t even stop thinking about it over Christmas.”

  “To answer your question, mom, we’re getting nowhere,” Madison said abruptly, hunched over the photocopies of the circle fragments from Becky that Brian and Melissa had spread out on the dinner table in the Pit. She blew a strand of hair from where it had fallen on her nose and sat up straight.

  “I know how you feel,” Clarise said, unable to hide her disappointment. “At this point, I can’t tell you any more than you already knew. The letters on the paper are certainly part of a DNA sequence, but I have no idea why parts of it are circled. Are you sure you can’t remember any other details?”

  “There aren’t any to remember,” Melissa said grimly. “Neil was pointing a gun at us when he handed it to Brian back at Area 51. It was bizarre—he was sputtering about how millions of people would die if he didn’t kill me. He didn’t get the chance to say anything else before the Colonel’s men shot him.”

  “He wasn’t interested in elaborating,” Brian said matter-of-factly. “He was ready to kill us both.” He shook his head. “Sorry, Clarise. We haven’t got anything that would help. Are you sure you don’t want to keep the page?”

  “No need. I scanned it and ran it through OCR software to keep a digital copy. Summit’s been checking the OCR results since this morning to make sure we have an exact version. She won’t quit until she’s done, which should be soon. Nili’s keeping her company in the lab.”

  “Pardon me for asking,” said Malcolm, “but is Summit reliable for something like that?”

  “More than anyone else here,” Clarise answered. “I wouldn’t say we could add obsessive compulsive to her profile, but Summit has a fixation with numbers. She won’t let a digit go unchecked.”

  “Interesting.”

  “That’s one way to describe it,” Madison said absently, shuffling the papers on the tabletop again.

  “How’s Deidre?” Clarise asked Malcolm.

  “She decided to lie down. She was wasted—hasn’t been sleeping well. Too much movement.”

  “Good. She needs all the rest she can get.”

  “How’s the puzzle coming?” Fern asked, approaching the table.

  “It isn’t,” Madison blurted out in frustration.

  “What’s this?” Fern asked, holding up a white napkin sitting in front of Malcolm that had a line of hand-written numbers and letters.

  “That’s what Becky chanted before she killed herself,” Malcolm answered. “I wrote everything down. Once she started repeating herself, I assumed it was a message. I figured we should get to work on it, so I brought it out.”

  “Something else to torment us,” Madison groused, looking at the small square.

  “Madison hates it when she can’t find patterns in data,” Clarise whispered through a proud smile.

  “I heard that.”

  “113619, HGWESTON, 80503,” Fern recited. “What does all that mean?”

  “Who knows?” Malcolm shrugged. “I put commas in between to mark where Becky paused. That might indicate starting and stopping points, but we can’t be sure. Basically, Madison’s right. We’ve got nothing.”

  “There’s got to be some way to make sense of this stuff,” Madison moaned again. “There must be some point.”

  “I don’t doubt that,” Brian replied. “She was programmed by the Colonel, and he never does anything without a reason. He wanted to send a message.”

  “Don’t get frustrated, dear,” Fern said, rubbing her hand over Madison’s shoulder.

  “Too late,” Madison said irritably. “Anyone else want a snack? Popcorn always clears my head.”

  “Ward sends his greetings, by the way,” Clarise informed her daughter as she began to rise from the table. “Got an email from him about an hour ago.”

  “Does he have anything to report?” Brian asked. “I know he’s only been there a day.”

  “Well, he’s been to see the police. He said they’re completely stumped.”

  “Did they share any clues?” Madison inquired, lingering.

  “They say there aren’t any—except for the material at the crime scene, and they weren’t sharing photos. They’re more than willing to talk to him, though. Ward says they’re probably hoping that anyone who is too inquisitive will accidentally reveal something only the criminal would know. If that’s the state of the investigation, they’re pretty much at a standstill.”

  “Strike three,” Brian grimaced. “We haven’t learned anything new on the Antarctic base blueprints, the DNA printout, or what happened to Father Fitzgerald.”

  “Maybe we’ll know more by tomorrow,” Fern reassured them. “Hopefully Graham will learn something at the emergency board meeting. And Madison, if you’re going to make something, you should ask Summit if she wants anything.” She motioned with her eyes to one of the entryways off the outer circle of Pit.

  Madison turned and saw Summit and Nili emerging. Summit headed for a refrigerator, while Nili joined them at the table.

  “Summit’s finished checking and correcting the OCR,” she said, taking a seat. “Has anyone seen Kamran this morning?”

  “He told us he’d be in his room working on something for Dr. Scott,” replied Clarise, looking in his direction. Brian shrugged, having no idea of the project. “Plus, he’s on call.”

  “What does that mean?” Melissa asked.

  “It’s Sabi. Whenever he sleeps, he has devices attached to him to monitor his vitals. They send signals wirelessly to a mobile monitoring unit. It’s Kamran’s turn to keep it with him. Sabi had trouble sleeping last night. I was up with him a couple times.”

  “Nili,” Brian turned to her, “I’ve been wanting to ask you about what you meant earlier—about how my work helped your father. Is this a good time?”

  “Of course,” she replied, smiling warmly. “My father was a cantor in our local synagogue. He was very upset when I embraced Yeshua and Christianity. At first we argued a lot, but eventually we agreed this should not drive us apart. That meant a lot. I loved my father.”

  “He passed away?”

  “He had cancer. I tried many times to bring him to faith in Yeshua, but for so long he could not accept the gospel story. He said he felt like believing Jesus was the God of Israel in a body was blasphemy, that it violated the Shema. ‘Ha-Shem our God is one,’ he would say, ‘and so Jesus cannot be God.’ ”

  “That’s a common obstacle for Jews.”

  “Yes. I did not know what to say—until I found your work about the two powers in heaven, and how the Angel of God was a man with ha-Shem within him, right there in the Torah. As soon as I read it, I knew my father would understand.”

  “And he did.”

  “Yes.” She smiled gratefully. “He
believed because he could see the truth in the Torah. He understood how a Jew could worship Yeshua and not be worshiping another god. After that, his heart was open. He died believing. You were God’s instrument.”

  “That’s wonderful,” Brian said softly, unsure of what else to say.

  “What is wrong?” Nili asked.

  “Nothing’s wrong. It’s just … gratifying … to know that all that study amounted to something besides a degree. It’s been easy to think that it didn’t mean anything, especially because of the way things have turned out.”

  “You mean that you have no post at a university?”

  “Yeah. But when I hear it expressed that way, the idea sounds even less important.”

  “You must not be ashamed. Your path has been difficult and unusual—like the rest of ours. But we are here together. If we serve Yeshua as He wishes, we may have to wait for recognition, but it will come.”

  Brian looked at her appreciatively. “Thanks.”

  “Even you can’t argue with that,” Melissa said affectionately, stroking his arm.

  Summit appeared at the table, a soda bottle filled with a yellow liquid in her hand. Squish again seemed to appear from nowhere to trot lightly behind her.

  “Curry Ramune again?” Madison recoiled, turning up her nose. “That must be what bile tastes like. How can you stand that stuff?”

  Summit eyed her dismissively and took a swig. “It’s good,” she said and put the bottle down on the table. “You can’t have any.”

  “Don’t put it there!” Madison scolded. “That napkin has important numbers on it. The sweat from the bottle will wash them out!”

  Her hand still on the bottle, Summit looked down at the small white square. She made no effort to pick it up.

  “Come on, Summit! Don’t be stubborn—”

  “Wait!” said Clarise in an urgent but even voice. “She’s processing.”

  Brian, Melissa, and Malcolm watched in fascination. Summit stood silently, staring at the bottom of her bottle where it rested, occasionally blinking, but otherwise not moving. The pink strands of her hair hung motionlessly around her shoulders as her gaze remained riveted on the napkin. Brian leaned in and looked closely. The position of the bottle had left only the numbers 113619 visible.

  Fear suddenly contorted the young girl’s face. “No—Nazis!” she wailed, backing away from the table.

  Nili rose quickly and put her arm around her. “It’s okay, Summit; you’re safe here.” Nili looked at the others, bewildered.

  “He’s a Nazi,” Summit said, her voice more controlled, but visibly shaken.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I won’t look at it again!”

  “You don’t have to,” Fern said, coming alongside the stricken girl. “Let’s go to the kitchen and get something to eat, sweetheart.”

  No one said a word until Fern had walked Summit out of earshot. “What was that?” Melissa gasped. “Is she okay?”

  “I’m checking on it,” replied Madison, already at work on her laptop.

  “Summit will be fine,” Nili answered. “Growing up in Israel … The Nazis are still part of life, among other enemies.”

  “I need to explain,” Clarise said. “I told you earlier that Summit has a gift. You just saw it.”

  “What exactly did we see?” Brian asked.

  “Summit has a photographic memory, what some call an eidetic memory. Some people with autism have this ability. In her case, she has phenomenal recall, especially of numbers, but it can include visual memories as well. She has the call number and shelf location of every book in our library memorized—all 20,000 of them. You can ask her if we have a book, and if we do, she’ll give you that information.”

  “That’s incredible,” Melissa gasped.

  “It is, but it’s unpredictable. While numbers are nearly instantaneous, other information recall sometimes takes a few minutes—her mind has to be diverted before the information pops into her head. Other times she sees something that just triggers recall on the spot.”

  “Like right now?”

  Clarise nodded.

  “A Nazi number?” Brian asked incredulously. “What does that mean?”

  “Every Nazi Party member had an ID number,” Melissa mused. “SS members also had personnel numbers.”

  “Nice call,” Madison exclaimed, waving her phone. “That’s it—it’s an SS personnel file number. Summit must have read it somewhere. Does the name Hans Kammler mean anything to you?”

  “Hans Kammler?” Melissa repeated incredulously.

  “Yep. You two know anything about him?”

  “Yeah,” Brian replied, “at least what there is to know. Kammler was in charge of advanced weapons projects during World War II and the concentration camps that provided slave labor for them. He’s rumored to have been the last person in charge of Nazi wingless aircraft experiments.”

  “Wingless aircraft?”

  “Saucers—UFOs.”

  Madison’s rosy complexion began to dissipate. Brian saw fear in her eyes. She went back to her phone.

  “Can we really be sure about this?” Malcolm asked Clarise. “Is Summit ever wrong?”

  Clarise shook her head. “I know it sounds crazy, but we’ve all seen her pull incredible things out of thin air before. She’s never been wrong. Part of the sequence implanted in Becky’s mind has to be Kammler’s SS number. It can’t be an accident.”

  Malcolm slid the receipt out from under the bottle, patting it dry. “God only knows what that means—and exactly what other breadcrumbs the Colonel wants us to find.”

  45

  Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny.

  —Robert Heinlein

  “I’m sorry to call you all out here,” the detective began, surveying the faces of the men and women seated around the oblong, cherry table, “but the truth is, we’ve hit a wall in our investigation. We’re no closer to finding Dr. Fitzgerald today than we were a week ago.”

  “You have no leads at all?” a slender, white-haired man asked, stern faced and leaning forward in his chair.

  “We have one piece of evidence to go on, which I’ll be showing you today. We haven’t divulged this to the public—and it’s critical that you keep what you’ve seen and heard here confidential. There were no witnesses to the crime, no fingerprints, and no forensic evidence left behind—at least that didn’t belong to the victim.”

  “Do you know for sure Father Fitzgerald is alive?” a middle-aged woman in a business suit asked, her anxiety evident in her tone and expression.

  “Honestly, ma’am, we don’t have anything tangible in that regard, though we believe that’s the case. The person who did this left a message—a cryptic, violent one—so we believe Father Fitzgerald is being held as leverage for receiving some response to that message. We’ve made no attempt at that since we don’t understand what the message might mean. That’s really the reason why we’ve asked the board to assemble on such short notice. We’re hoping one of you will provide some assistance.”

  “There isn’t a person in this room who wouldn’t do everything possible to help, detective.”

  “Thank you, sir. You’re Graham Neff, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t look surprised. I recognize you from the pictures out in the hallway. Father Fitzgerald’s secretary told us that you’ve spent some time on campus recently and talked quite a bit with the president. I’d like to talk with you about those conversations and whether you saw anyone with the president that you didn’t recognize.”

  “Of course.”

  “Good. Now I’ll show you what little we have. I’m going to project one of the crime-scene photos on the screen,” he explained, grabbing a remote and pointing it at a projector mounted on the ceiling. The projector whirred softly, and a bright white square appeared on the screen. “If any of you are squeamish, I apologize ahead of time. This will be disturbing, but we need to know if any of you can make sense of it.” He pressed the
remote.

  It took a few moments for the onlookers to understand the image. The first to comprehend what they were being shown gasped.

  “Good God!” Neff heard one of his colleagues exclaim. Some turned away, covering their eyes as though the gesture could erase the sight from memory. Neff stared at the picture, trying to control his own rage and revulsion once he understood what he was looking at.

  The picture was a close-up of Father Fitzgerald’s desktop. There were five books stacked atop the desk, neatly aligned so that the titles showed right-side up. The priest’s desk blotter was covered with blood. A blood-stained scissors lay at the periphery. At the bottom of the stack, positioned precisely in relationship to each other, were two severed ears.

  “It’s the books we’re wondering about,” the detective droned on, matter-of-factly, accustomed to such images. “It’s obvious the perpetrator intended them to be read, perhaps in order, but we’re not sure about that last part.”

  “What are they?” a pudgy but dapper bald man seated at the far end of the table asked. “I can’t make all of them out.”

  “Here’s a list.” The detective turned off the projector and began distributing sheets of paper around the room. “You may show these to other people,” he noted, “but please keep the violent circumstances to yourself.”

  Neff took the page from a woman seated next to him whose face had turned pale. He perused the titles from top to bottom, consciously controlling his facial expression and body language. He knew their meaning in an instant:

  Carl Sagan, Contact

  E. Theodore Mullen, The Divine Council in Canaanite and Early Hebrew Literature

  Melissa Kelley, Esoteric Nazism and Apocalyptic Christian Cults

  Deidre Harper, Mass Hysteria: Psychogenic Illness and Social Delusions

  Malcolm Bradley, Environmental Biology and the Christian Humanist

  “It seems obvious that the Sagan title is a request for contact,” the detective said, surveying his audience closely. “But we have no idea as to whom the message is directed or what the other titles mean in that context.”