The Illuminati

by Larry Burkett

  “Nothing, sir,” the president said as she tried to put her fears aside. “It’s just that I’m afraid of what the public might do if they learn of our plans. How will we eliminate so many?”

  “They will not know of it until it is too late!” the dark man snapped as he got up and walked across the room. He stood silently looking out of the window, then turned, walked back, and stood by the president’s chair. With a look of grim determination, he said, “We will not make the same mistakes again. First the Christians—then the Jews.

  “It is time to make the people suffer some,” he said as a cruel smile developed on his face. “These people are not used to suffering. They will do anything to save their way of life.

  “It is time to launch Phase Five.”

  “Phase Five?” the president said with the question written on her face. “I have not heard the details of Phase Five.”

  “You had no need until now,” he replied as he bent over and stroked her hair softly. “Now, my pretty one, you will see the anger of the world against the cursed Jews. The Christians were their only real allies, and the Jews helped us to destroy them.”

  17

  UNCOVERING THE PLOT

  Immediately after the aborted protest-turned-riot, the word had gone out from the CRC for its members to flee. Some did just that, taking up refuge with friends or family in an effort to avoid arrest. But many simply refused to believe that they would be arrested; they knew they were guilty of nothing.

  One such couple, Bob and Ellen Cofer, in Chicago, decided not to run. Bob felt it was all just a big mistake; the government would never arrest private citizens. He and Ellen had decided not to join the march the day of the riots. They supported those who were protesting the arrest of John Elder, but felt that without parade permits they would be breaking the law, which they refused to do.

  The televised scenes of the marchers being shot down along with the police shocked Bob out of his naiveté.He suddenly realized that the leaders of the CRC had been right when they said the plot against Christians went to the highest levels of government. But Ellen had a different reaction. She thought the Christians had actually started the shooting. As she watched the reports flooding in, she said, “I won’t ever be involved with that group again, Bob. I can’t believe they would shoot police officers.”

  Ellen had been active in the Catholic anti-abortion movement. At first she had felt too timid to picket the abortion clinics, and only worked in the local “care center” office twice a month. But once the “Crack Babies Bill” was declared constitutional, she could no longer stand by. She had joined the street pickets and actively wrote every senator and congressman in Washington. While marching in front of the state government’s offices, she had been photographed and marked for detainment when the riots were being planned.

  Before Bob could answer Ellen’s comment about the shooting, the scene on television shifted to Father Vincent’s school, where Ellen worked part-time as a teacher.

  “This is Paul Bannon. I’m here at Father Vincent’s Parochial School, where the police have just apprehended one of the riot leaders, Father Christopher Long.”

  The cameras focused on the police hauling out a priest dressed in traditional black clothing. It was obvious at first glance that the priest had been beaten. One eye was swollen and blood trickled from one corner of his mouth. He was bent over, as if in pain.

  The newsman stopped a police captain and asked, “Captain, what is Father Long charged with?”

  “He’s one of the leaders of the riot that killed our officers,” the angry policeman said. “He put up a fight and we had to subdue him.”

  “Are you saying he resisted, Captain?”

  “Not only that,” the officer responded as he held up a short-barreled weapon. “He had this on him. It’s a good thing he had used up all his ammunition or he might have shot someone else.”

  “It’s a lie,” Ellen shouted at the television. “Father Chris would never hurt anyone, and he certainly wouldn’t carry a gun.”

  “I think we need to get out of here, Ellen,” Bob said as he felt the knot tighten in his stomach.

  “What do you mean? We can’t go anywhere. This is our home, and we need to be at work tomorrow. Besides, it doesn’t affect us,” Ellen said, sensing the alarm in her husband’s voice. Inside the panic started to grow like a cancer, gnawing at her sanity. Suddenly the emotional pressures of the past several weeks overwhelmed her and raw fear took over. She screamed, “Even if Father Chris is a terrorist, we didn’t have anything to do with it!”

  “Ellen, think about what you’re saying!” Bob shouted. “Do you really think Father Chris could shoot anyone? It’s all a setup.”

  “No!” Ellen insisted naively.“If the police say it’s true, then it must be. We need to call them and tell them that we’re not a part of that group. Call them, Bob!”

  Their two children—Marci, age twelve, and Robert, Jr., age ten— heard their parents arguing and came into the room. “What’s the matter, Mom?”Marci asked, her quivering voice reflecting the panic she sensed in her mother.

  Bob answered, “We’re watching the television news, honey. They police have just arrested Father Chris.”

  “Arrested Father Chris? They can’t do that!” both Marci and Robert, Jr. exclaimed together. “Can’t we do something, Dad?”Marci asked as she began to cry.

  Before Bob could answer, Ellen said,“No, children, he must be guilty, or the police wouldn’t have arrested him. We have to tell them we’re not criminals too.”

  “That’s crazy, Mom!” Marci declared. “Father Chris is no criminal, and I don’t care what any police say.”

  Bob could see that Ellen had lost control, so he attempted to calm her, but her fear made her even more irrational. She started to cry. “I don’t want my children hurt. I don’t care what they do to those crack babies. I just want them to let us alone.”

  “Ellen, get a grip on yourself!” Bob said harshly. “This is not time to fall apart. We’re a part of this whether we want to be or not.”

  “No!” Ellen screamed. “I don’t want to be a part of it. It was all a mistake . . .”

  “Let’s get some clothes and food together quickly and load up the car,” Bob told the children.

  “Where are we going, Dad?” Robert, Jr. asked.

  “I don’t know exactly, son. Maybe we’ll go to Tennessee for a visit with Grandma for a while. We just need to get out of the city.”

  “All right!” the boy shouted gleefully as he headed for his room to pack. He loved to go to his grandma’s house. It always smelled like cookies, pies, and fried chicken.

  It took about thirty minutes to get the car loaded with everything Bob thought they would need. Ellen just sat in the living room crying. He knew she was close to the breaking point and wished he knew how to help her, but their safety had to come first. Maybe when we get to Tennessee, Mom will know what to do, he thought.

  “Hurry, kids!” he shouted for the tenth time. “We have to get going.”

  Finally Bob got everyone into the car. The garage door was just swinging open when another car pulled up, blocking the driveway, and two men carrying weapons got out. When Ellen saw the weapons, she became hysterical. Bob tried to quiet her down, but she was beyond his control.

  As the men approached the car, one of them asked, “Are you Robert Cofer?”

  “Yes,” Bob answered. “What’s the problem?”

  “Please step out of the car,” the other man commanded. “And keep your hands in sight.”

  The nine-millimeter machine-pistol he was pointing said it all. He was ready to kill if Bob resisted.

  “What’s this about?” Bob asked again as he held his hands up.

  “Shut up!” Secret Service Agent Carl Tooms demanded, as he pushed Bob against the door roughly. “You’ll be told all you need to know.”

  Ellen was screaming so loud that Marci began to cry too. Robert, Jr. shouted at the men, “You leave my daddy al
one!” He jumped out of the car and swung at Tooms, who was closest to his side of the car. His blow struck the man in the groin and he cuffed Robert on the side of the head, knocking the ten-year-old down in the driveway.

  “That’s not necessary,” the other agent, Donald Shepperd, said gruffly. “The kid is just trying to protect his father.”

  “The little hellion better not hit me again,” Tooms said angrily. “You remember that he’s a small version of his parents. They’re like roaches. It’s better to stamp them out before they grow up,” the man said as he laughed at his own sour joke.

  Bob felt his heart pumping fast as he looked toward his children and wife. “What about my family?” he asked.

  “Shut up!” Tooms said again. “You should have thought about them before you joined a group of terrorists.”

  “I’m not a part of any . . .”

  But he never had the chance to finish his statement. Tooms jammed the butt of his weapon into Bob’s rib cage, knocking the wind out of him. That and the pain of at least two broken ribs made it impossible for him to speak.

  “I told you to let them alone!” Shepperd said sternly.

  “If you don’t like it, take it up with Washington,”Tooms replied.“These types are all the same. They don’t mind killing people, but they don’t want anyone to touch their precious family.” For all his bravado, Tooms was a coward and backed off as soon as Shepperd came around the car. Shepperd helped Bob to his feet and steered him toward the vehicle on the street.

  Bob and Ellen were loaded in the back of what was obviously a government car. Tooms, still angry, kept his weapon pointed at them the whole time. Something in Ellen had snapped. She had stopped screaming and sat, almost comatose, staring out the window.

  The children were loaded into the front seat with Shepperd. “What will happen to us?”Marci whimpered.

  Shepperd replied compassionately, “I don’t really know, honey. I have orders to pick up just your parents, but we can’t leave you here by yourselves, can we? You’ll be all right.” Shepperd had lied to calm the young girl. His orders included the entire family. I don’t like this, he thought to himself. They don’t fit any terrorist pattern I’ve ever studied.

  As they pulled out of the driveway and headed down the street, they met a gang of youths carrying “Gay Power” signs and wielding sticks and bottles. Behind them, three houses were showing obvious signs of being looted, and one was on fire.

  When the group saw the car approaching, several of the youths threw bottles and rocks at it. Tooms, in the back seat with the Cofers, stuck his weapon out the window and fired a short burst into the air. When the staccato of the automatic weapon reached the group, they scattered like ants in every direction, dropping looted electronic equipment and other contraband.

  Tooms laughed, “I guess they’ll think twice before they throw rocks again.” Then he swore as he touched the hot barrel to his hand while drawing the weapon back into the car.

  The pair drove the children to a converted holding area in an elementary school building. Agent Shepperd got out to talk with the woman in charge of the detention center.

  “These are the Cofer children,” he said quietly so the children couldn’t hear him. Then he showed the list to the woman who compared it to hers.

  “Okay, they’re on the list. I’ll handle them from here.”

  “Where will they go?” Shepperd inquired.

  “Who knows? I just process ’em and get ’em ready for travel. I suppose they’ll go to some permanent place, once the parents are processed.”

  Donald Shepperd grew more troubled. He had been with the FBI for more than twenty years, and old habits don’t change easily. He knew that most of the people they had picked up had had their constitutional rights violated. He didn’t have a warrant—just a list of known subversives supplied by the attorney general’s office. He knew that the treatment Tooms had given Cofer would be enough for any first-year law student to get him off.

  They drove on to another building near the perimeter, where the Cofers would be detained. Bob wanted desperately to ask about his children, but Tooms held the gun against his sore ribs, just waiting for him to ask another question so he could jam the weapon into his side again. Bob prayed silently as they rode on, God, please be with our children, and protect them from harm. He also prayed for Ellen, who didn’t even appear to notice that the children were gone. They only sign that she was still alive was the rise and fall of her chest as she breathed and the infrequent blinking of her eyelids. In a way, her dreamlike shock was a blessing.

  Shepperd pulled the car into the driveway of what was obviously a converted office complex. The entire facility was now surrounded by a triple-layered, razor-sharp, wire fence. As they drove up, a guard swung the outer gates open. Once they were inside, he closed them behind the car and opened the inner gates.

  This is no makeshift operation. They didn’t build all this since the riots started, Shepperd thought to himself. Someone put this in motion several months ago.

  When the Cofers were taken from the car, Tooms spoke to the agent in charge—a large, tough-looking woman. “Here’s one for you,” and casting an admiring glance at Ellen, he added jokingly. “Let me know when you get her into the next stage of processing. I might need to oversee that.” The woman laughed, “You’re a nasty ole man, Agent Tooms.”

  He winked and said coarsely, “What do you mean? It’s just part of my job.”

  Once they were in the processing center, Bob was hustled off to one side of the large room where several dozen other people were being processed and stripped, while the processors gawked at them. He panicked as he thought of Ellen experiencing this treatment. He looked around, but he couldn’t spot her among all the others.

  He realized he was next in line when he heard the angry clerk yell, “You! Strip!”

  Bob didn’t move, and the man swore and shouted again.

  “I said take your clothes off. Are you deaf as well as stupid?”

  “You don’t have any right to treat me this way,” Bob said firmly. “And what have you done with my wife?”

  “Oh, we have a lawyer in the group.” The processor was a large man. He moved directly in front of Bob. “Would you like to see how we treat terrorists in here, you creep?”

  Bob remembered the treatment he had received in his own yard and had no doubt that the man was deadly serious. “No, I’ll do as you say,” he said submissively.

  “Now that’s a good boy,” the man said mockingly. “Now get undressed!”

  Across the room the angry woman was shouting at Ellen, “I told you to get undressed!”

  Ellen was now aware of her surroundings and she screamed, “No! I won’t take my clothes off. You can’t make me.”

  Agent Tooms, who had been standing to one side talking to another one of the agents, walked over to Ellen and struck her across the face with the back of his hand. “You’ll do what you’re told here, sweetie,” he said crudely. Then he reached out and grabbed her blouse, ripping it nearly off.

  Suddenly Tooms was swung around, and as he started to protest, he was struck in the stomach. He collapsed in a heap. Donald Shepperd was standing over him, daring him to get up again. Tooms, fat and badly out of shape, was in no condition to do anything but groan.

  Shepperd snapped at the big woman behind the receiving desk, “You get some privacy curtains around these women, and you get the men out of here, now! Is that clear?”

  “Just who do you think you are?” she protested.

  “I’m going to be the agent that slugs you in about thirty seconds,” Shepperd growled as his eyes narrowed. “You may have to strip search these people, but you’re not going to make a public spectacle out of them. Now get going,” he said with finality as he stormed toward her.

  Hearing the shouting, the supervisor came over to where Shepperd was standing and asked, “What’s your problem?”

  “I want some privacy for these women. And keep the men out of
here!” Shepperd ordered. “You do it now, or you’ll answer to me too.”

  “Listen, agent . . .”

  “Shepperd—Donald Shepperd,” he replied angrily. “You report me or do whatever you want, but right now I want these people treated like human beings. As far as I can determine, they haven’t even been formally charged.”

  The supervisor, only a recent recruit for the detention duty, backed down. “Okay, I’ll get some curtains up,” she said. “But you’ll have to answer for this.”

  “Fine,” Shepperd growled as he put his jacket around a young woman standing totally naked in front of him.

  Something is dreadfully wrong here, Shepperd said to himself as he pushed Tooms ahead of him toward the door. I’m not going to be a party to innocent people being treated like animals. My great-grandfather fought in Europe to ensure that the Nazis didn’t get a chance to rule the world. This is no better . . .

  18

  OIL

  When the Middle East War broke out in 2010, nearly two million Moslems were aligned against Israel. The spark that ignited the war was a report by OPEC that Israel had drilled slant wells in Israeli-occupied Iraq.

  Slant wells had been declared illegal by the world conference on oil conservation, which Israel steadfastly refused to acknowledge. Even under pressure by the United States, Israel had refused to abandon its operation.

  An OPEC report verified that as far back as the first years of the new millennium, Israel had been drilling slant wells in an effort to tap into the last major oil pool in the Middle East. Jews around the world had poured hundreds of billions of dollars into the project. One of the major fund-raisers was Jason Franklin. Amir Razzak also contributed heavily to the project. Working through Rabbi Moshi Amitt, Razzak had provided nearly $100 billion in development funds. Control of these funds had thrust Amitt into the leadership of the Knesset, the Israeli ruling Cabinet, and ultimately the religious leadership of Israel.