The Book of Paul -- A Paranormal Thriller

by Richard Long

  Sounded a lot like the Becoming to me. And Paul being Paul, I was quite certain that his scientist minions were working around the clock to ensure that when the Singularity occurred, Paul wound up in the driver’s seat. How? The super-intelligence would have to be integrated in some way with the Paulence. That outcome, and that alone, must be the true mission statement of Tetron.

  I couldn’t wait to see Paul and hear it all from the horse’s mouth. But he wasn’t downtown or at The Plaza. I couldn’t see him anywhere. Then suddenly, I realized I didn’t need any hocus-pocus to track him down. Today was St. Patrick’s Day.

  The parade had barely started when I saw him ride by on a float with the police commissioner. He was standing next to him, waving to the crowd, his hair pulled back in a ponytail again, wearing a black-and-red tartan. I watched him wave and smile as I walked along the sidewalk crowded with blind-drunk shamrock wearers, moving at the same pace as the float. It was easy. I just had to avoid stepping in the puke.

  He didn’t seem to see me. But I noticed something curious. Some of the people were waving back at Paul more enthusiastically than the rest. Trying to get his attention. When they got it, they seemed grateful, like they had touched the Pope’s robe. Then I noticed something even stranger. All these sycophants, many of them cops, were wearing a ring. The same ring. A golden serpent band with the wings and head of an angel. As I passed, I asked one of the cops where he got his ring. He looked at me like he was going to slap on the cuffs and haul me away. I shut my mouth and kept on walking alongside the float. But the cop began following me. That’s when Paul saw me. And winked. He caught the cop’s eye and waved him off. The cop nodded, tipped his hat and backed away.

  Paul gave the Commissioner an elbow in the ribs and pointed to me. I could read his lips. “That’s him. That’s my boy!” The commish gave me a big wave and a smile to match. Then he took off his hat. To me. I flushed with embarrassment as Paul waved for me to join them on the float. I felt too shy, so I walked alongside the entire parade route and watched all the other ringed attendants (disciples? soldiers?) waving. There were so many.

  When it was over, Paul took me out for a drink…at a dingy Blarney Stone. He sure likes slumming it. Green beer and Bushmills flowed like twin waterfalls. The place was plastered with shamrocks and crowded with plastered Irish and Irish-American drunks. About two-thirds of them wore spiffy angel rings. When an Irish-wannabe couple wobbled in drunk from the street, they wobbled back out before they had a chance to order a drink. There should have been a sign posted on the door: CLANSMEN ONLY

  Paul and I settled into a booth in the back. He was getting stinky again, so I leaned as far back as I could. The burlier ring-wearers sat at the tables and booths surrounding ours. Paul’s royal retinue? They made a big show of not looking in our direction, not even listening in our direction. Paul didn’t seem to notice them at all. I didn’t care. Instead, I dug right in, asking if my theories about Tetron, the Singularity and the Becoming were true.

  His reply was terse and terrifying: “More or less. But you have the general picture.”

  “When is all this supposed to happen?”

  “According to the prophecy…2031. But at our current rate of development, we’ll shave off a few years. Let’s say 2029.”

  “Then what?”

  “The future is a probability curve that can’t be analyzed with any certainty. Combine that with what you’ve already learned about the unfathomable nature of the post-Singularity Intelligence and your guess is as good—well, not nearly as good as mine. But don’t waste a minute fretting over the infinite destructive possibilities. Think of all the fun we’re going to have along the way! It will all be one glorious adventure, start to finish!”

  As much as I wanted to keep pumping him for more info on the pending Armageddon, Paul unexpectedly steered the conversation in another direction. “What’s the biggest problem with immortality, from the Hindu perspective?”

  I wanted to get cute and say, “The saris,” but I could tell he was about to throw me a big bone, so I answered, “You can’t remember anything when you reincarnate, so it doesn’t make any difference that you live forever. You have to do the same shit over and over, making the same dumb mistakes a few hundred times—or become enlightened and get kicked upstairs to the divine realm.”

  “The dreaded karma. Memory is the key to everything. Not just identity. Everything. It’s all there, in the DNA. The whole story, every word of it. From the first trace of slime to all the slime in this bar, everything came from the same source code. We know proteins talk to each other, but how do they know what to say? Cellular memory. Without words, they know. Soon we’ll have the whole script. Science will lead the way.”

  “The way to what?” I asked, seriously intrigued.

  “To the end.” He paused a moment, then said, “I’m going to tell you a secret more arcane and profound than the legend of Solomon’s ring and his captured genies, a true story by the way, though trashed up in more of that Arabian Nights crap than I care to endure.”

  “Okay,” I said, wanting to hear more about that but asking, “what’s the big secret?”

  He looked around the room theatrically, then cupped his hand to my ear and whispered, “Science is magic.”

  “Science is magic?” I asked, not sure why I was whispering too.

  “No. Science is magic. See the difference? They are one and the same. Ask the best minds in every field—mathematics, chemistry, biology, physics—they’ll all tell you.”

  “Tell you what?”

  “That everything we see and know and believe to be so solid and dependable is at its core more unfathomably complex and ineffably mysterious than all the Gods or daimons that have ever been invoked since the dawn of time. But in the end, we will know…or at least, I will. And between what we’ve already discovered and what will soon be revealed, it won’t be long before we won’t need these time-consuming rituals, or women to make the vessel.”

  “The ‘vessel’? What’s the vessel?”

  “Who, not what. If you want to live forever with your memories and identity intact, you have three options. The first two we’ve discussed and they comprise the Apostolic mode of succession: first, train willing and dedicated disciples and take possession of their physical bodies in much the same way as I have already demonstrated to you; and second, reincarnate and have your loyal followers search for your new body, as they do with the Dalai Lama, then through the use of some very non-Buddhist ritual magic, awaken the memories of your past lifetimes. The third, and by far the most effective and powerful approach, is to train your own biological descendant and awaken the cellular memories already encoded in their DNA during the act of soul transfer—the Dynastic mode of succession.”

  “The Turning,” I said with not a little awe.

  “That colloquialism has been applied to all these approaches. But it became clear to us that biological successors held so many advantages over the other methods that those options were abandoned entirely, except in cases of dire emergency, which occur with much greater frequency than I care to admit, but are not unexpected.”

  “What kind of emergency?”

  “When you’re in a nearly continuous state of war, as is the case with us Kellys, you can’t always be so picky about your host body, especially not with a double-headed ax buried in your ribcage. So you simply hitch a ride in the nearest available open-eyed human, usually not so hard, because hot-blooded murderers always love to gloat. You stick around long enough to torment them to the point of suicide—the reason for most exorcisms, by the way—then perform the ritual properly with the vessel. Of course, from time to time you’ll get a bullet in the head from a high-powered rifle and you’re back in the Maelstrom again, ready to be recycled. Which, I might point out, is the true genius of our clan’s approach to the whole messy business. Not only do we utilize all the advantages of Turning with a vessel that houses the genetic memories passed on to him—we also have an army of l
oyal soldiers and druids who will stop at nothing to discover the Master’s reincarnated body should the Turning fail.”

  “So there’s no way you can really die,” I was so astounded by the implications of his virtually fail-safe method of ensuring everlasting life that I felt giddy. “How old are you?”

  “This being has existed for…” He paused and took a deep breath. “What you don’t realize, what nearly no one realizes, is that we are all eternal. That’s the message Yeshua tried to bring, before Peter and Paul made him the one and only Son O’God. That’s the message of Hermes, Pythagoras, Apollonius, the druids…of all our kind. We are immortal. Physics 101. Energy cannot be destroyed. You could go so far as to say that all of us are billions of years old. But the gift of us luminous beings, the one thing that makes us feel mortal or immortal, is our sense of self, our identity, which immediately ceases to exist without our memories. Memory as I said, is everything.”

  “Is that what the Book is for? Does it restore your memories after you’ve Turned, or reincarnated?”

  He got real pissy. “The Book does far more than that, but you are in no way worthy of that lesson. Today we are speaking of the vessel. Martin is the vessel and the Guardian.”

  “Guardian of what?”

  “Of this vessel,” he said pointing to his chest. “Until the Turning is complete. Then if you do your job, you will assume the role of Guardian until the Becoming. This is the last Turning. The last time we have to ride on this ridiculous merry-go-round.”

  “Isn’t there another way to do this…that’s not so…parasitic?”

  “There is also a fourth option, but it is even more cruel. I would encourage you to avoid it like the plague. It is Loren’s path. He is very old indeed.”

  “What does he do?” I asked, a shiver running down my spine.

  He paused a long time as if debating whether to tell me. When he spoke again I could see why. It was a dire warning. “He feeds on souls…both here and inside the Maelstrom. But again, that is not a topic you should approach with any fascination. It is a curse for both the victim and the feeder. The consciousness of the consumed is never fully assimilated, and you acquire, in a very real sense, eternal roommates.”

  I could easily picture The Striker gleefully devouring the very essence of his victims. Even “living” with them. My mind wandered down that dark corridor, then I suddenly remembered a question I’d been dying to ask. “What happened after Ceallach died? How did the wise, kind Master turn into mean old Paul Kelly?”

  “Hah! I like that, Billy. And since it’s Saint Patty’s Day, I can’t think of a better time to tell you about the birth of our Clan and the story of the empty vessel.”

  “The ‘empty vessel’?” What hellish new wrinkle was unfolding?

  “The term had also been used in the Apostolic succession. The Chosen One would willfully surrender his ego by degrees through mediation and other techniques until his mind was reasonably uncluttered in preparation for the Master’s tenancy. But after Ceallach, it took on a whole new meaning. We drew a line in the sand. Traitorous bitch or not, it was clear Sophia’s clan was right about one thing—a biological heir was the only proper vessel for a completely effective transmigration. Only this time, it wasn’t going to be another handoff. A solid, experienced leader was needed if we were to survive the centuries of hardship sure to follow in the wake of the Holy Empire’s triumph. The Master alone must endure. And the Chosen One must sacrifice himself just as the disciples had done.

  “Utter ruthlessness was required. The natural inclination to love and care for one’s progeny, to have any degree of attachment, was not a viable option. Fortunately, the entity that emerged after Ceallach’s death was up to the task. After Tormac drove in the last nail, he thrust his sweaty face only a nose-length away from The Master to crow his triumph. The Master leapt into Tormac’s body and Tormac’s gloating conquest quickly turned to screaming horror, followed by a two-day coma. The Master’s disciples knew what had occurred and took the Book to his chamber.

  “When he awoke, the Master had changed irreversibly, his essence contaminated by Tormac and his own unquenchable fury at the killers of his martyred son. After reading the Book he was an entirely different breed, a true Warrior Sage—the right man for the job that had to be done. The new, improved Tormac was cruel and wise beyond measure. He married the Black Rose as ordained, and a boy was born nine months later. He was named O’Ceilleigh after his true father Ceallach. But the Master wasn’t about to make the same mistake again and let compassion interfere with the primary mission—the absolute necessity of his continued existence. He stole the baby from Rose while she was bathing, and took him to a horrible crone, who was paid to make him suffer. Then, at the right time, he rescued the lad, the boy so traumatized he was only a shell of a person, not enough there to care for himself or care about. The perfect empty vessel.

  “He knocked up poor Rosie another eleven times, until she died in childbirth with her twelfth son. Morgana was never seen again in her lifetime, though she was certainly present. Tormac murdered Eoghan and Bradan, assuming High Kingship as Master of the unified clans. Soon afterward, O’Ceilleigh had his initiation ceremony and exceeded all expectations in his apprenticeship. The Turning occurred twenty-two years after Ceallach died. That glorious Good Friday when Tormac took O’Ceilleigh and assumed his identity is the day we mark as the birth of our true lineage—the founding of Clan O’Ceallaigh.

  “Since that day we have prospered in every way. We have eschewed the outward trappings of royalty, since our ambition has nothing to do with the respect and admiration of the masses or our peers. When another Ceallach, son of Tuathal, founded his O’Ceallaigh lineage, we were more than happy at the camouflage it afforded our own thriving clan.

  “Our new succession mode was followed in every subsequent generation for fifteen centuries. I did it to Martin as my father did to me as his father to him—taking the child from his true mother at birth, leaving him in the custody of some cruel, heartless bitch we call the surrogate. However, it was important for the vessel to believe she was his real mother, so the trauma would be as effective as possible in accelerating the process. Even the trauma had its own prescriptive guidelines, the preferred method being the death of the surrogate at the hands of the subject.”

  The surrogate. The subject. The trauma. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Paul ignored my horrified expression and plowed ahead.

  “The next task was to train the subject in the art of unthinking. Unthinking has two goals: to free you from the slavery of your thoughts, and to open you to the realm of true knowing, beyond the shackles of limited possibilities we call our mind. Simultaneously, the subject is taught to withstand astounding levels of physical pain, utilizing a combination of unthinking and other biofeedback techniques during daily torture sessions.

  “After a reasonable degree of progress is made in these areas, the vessel is gradually initiated in our mythology, which elicits an aura of mystery along with an overwhelming desire for participation. It is then that he is formally initiated into the clan and continues to hone his skills through a set of increasingly difficult challenges. These challenges are interwoven with the system’s mythology and are highly ritualized, as well as substantially rewarding for the subject, according to a predetermined set of key motivators selected by the Master to induce the highest level of commitment and positive reinforcement. For me, the worm on the hook was knowledge. For Martin, it was treasure.

  “For the remainder of his training, the apprentice learns all the essential tenets of our society, and his ambition is constantly stoked with ever more difficult challenges and fulfilling rewards. The challenges usually take the form of quests for ritual objects or duels…first with the outside clans, then between his own clansmen. The High King—that’s me, of course—rules the reigning clan. Clan Kelly and the other royal clans are divided into twelve houses. The Lords—one of whom you’ve already had the dubious privilege of meeti
ng—preside over the houses.”

  “The Striker…” I interrupted. Paul shot me a dirty look and kept talking.

  “The houses follow bloodlines, though outside talent is permitted after swearing blood oaths. You’ve seen many of these disturbing gentlemen on our website. Each of these initiates and the other clan descendents go though their own training. They’re given a number of tasks, including quests and duels, plus sundry extortions and executions required to maintain our continued privacy. If successful, the apprentice is granted the title of Knight. From time to time, the most daring of these will make his own play for the throne.

  “The vessel, because of his more rigorous training and direct connection to the king’s bloodline, has now attained a level of unshakable confidence, believing there is nothing in the world beyond his ability. And with that assurance comes an equal conviction in his own entitlement. Not only can he do anything, he deserves everything he craves. This is the exact point where ambition, mastery, courage and ruthlessness attain their proper balance. The vessel swears a blood oath to the Master and is anointed the Guardian, for his role is to both house and protect the essence of all his forebears, all their accumulated knowledge and power. He is shown the Book, the map to the Maelstrom. There he is taken to witness the full glory of its majestic power, and upon his return, the Guardian is prepared for the final act, when he will travel again with the Master to the Axis so he may be reborn.

  “We’ve made some mistakes along the way. Yeshua. Ceallach. And now we have the tragedy of Martin. I always considered him to be my most well-wrought creation, the most perfect vessel of all. He was the youngest to achieve full-fledged Knighthood. Yet, he’s lost almost everything I filled him with: his lust, his ambition and worst, his hate. Now we’re both paying the price for my mistake. I should not have been so ruthless with him. Martin was always such a sensitive lad, with the most tender heart you could ever hope to find. So much the better, I thought. An open heart means an open mind, exactly what was needed. And after a trauma that couldn’t have been more thoughtfully orchestrated, Martin’s brain was like a heap of soft pink slush. How perfect, I thought. How empty. And better still, he could unthink before I even taught him how. Well, well, well. I was glowing with pride! The boy was a natural! A prodigy! When I taught him the technique, you should have seen how he excelled. He could hold back his thoughts for minutes. Then hours. Unheard of!”