Deadly Cult

by Joel Gomez-Dossi

  In the ambient light, Jamie couldn’t make out the person’s identity, but he guessed. “Eddie?”

  “Yeah. What’s happening?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Shut up and listen.” Saul’s voice shot through the bathroom. Jamie looked up and saw three people. He figured Gideon and Obadiah were at Saul’s side. Other beams of light popped on throughout the bathroom and Jamie realized there were more than just three people. There were at least ten people there. They looked like goons. Saul walked around the room, casting shadows that moved up and down the walls.

  “Esrom and Roboam,” he began. “God was angered by your behavior. So was Mordecai.”

  The desire to answer surged up in Jamie, but he resisted. Saul looked demented. Possessed. He knelt down next to Jamie. “You need to learn proper reverence to God.” When Jamie didn’t react, Saul grabbed his head and shook it up and down violently.

  Pain from the jerks swept through Jamie. He quietly answered, “Yes. I need to learn reverence.”

  “That’s better.” Saul let his head fall onto his chest. “But now I face a dilemma. Which method of convincing will work best on you, physical threats or emotional ones? Or perhaps we should use punishments with Biblical significance. Christians have used many methods to rehabilitate sinners.”

  “How about castration?” Gideon offered.

  “Yeah,” Obadiah said. “Nothing works better on pretty boys than threatening to cut off their balls.”

  Saul moved closer to Jamie. “I like that idea. The Bible is filled with eunuchs.” His spit sprayed Jamie’s face. “But we have to be careful. We wouldn’t want to spread discord among the Faithfuls, would we?” He looked over to his goons.

  “How do we do that?” Obadiah asked.

  “We don’t. We let the Faithfuls do it for us. It’s still cold inside the dormitories, isn’t it, Gideon?”

  “Yeah. We turned off the boilers long ago.”

  “Good.” Saul stood and brushed the dirt off his knees. “Let’s gather the Faithfuls and meet in the square.”

  Gideon and Obadiah left to rouse the Faithfuls from their bunks while Saul and the rest of the goons hauled Jamie and Eddie into the square. It didn’t take long for them to gather.

  Saul took on the posture of a preacher as he addressed the crowd. “Unfortunately, we had a disturbing incident that needs to be rectified,” he said, drawing out his vowels. “Two Faithfuls have engaged in unclean activities. We need to make sure their sinful behavior is stopped.”

  The Faithfuls looked around for the sinners. Someone in back yelled, “Who are they?”

  “I refuse to place blame,” Saul continued, looking directly at Jamie and Eddie. “That would not be Christlike. But it is my duty to rectify their behavior. Starting tonight, all Faithfuls must sleep with their hands outside the blankets.”

  Another person asked, “And everyone gets punished for the sins of just of two Faithfuls?”

  “That’s not fair,” Grandpa Swanson complained. “It gets cold at night. Our fingers will get frostbite.”

  “I’m sorry, but everyone must pay for the sins of the few.” Saul took a flower from his pocket, put it to his nose, took a long whiff, and dropped it on the ground. Jamie understood the significance. Saul was acting under direct orders from Mordecai.

  The Faithfuls spontaneously chanted, “Mordecai is great. Mordecai is good.”

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Holy Wednesday, early morning

  When Saul finished his announcement, everyone returned to the dormitories. Obadiah grabbed Eddie and escorted him back with the rest of the Faithfuls while Gideon took hold of Jamie.

  “I’ll go without a problem,” Jamie said, shaking off Gideon’s grasp. He began walking. When he arrived at his bunk, he crawled in and closed his eyes. He was awake, though, shivering. His hands were frozen and his heart pounding. He couldn’t make sense of Saul’s latest actions. He felt defeated, and the grumbling from the Faithfuls around him didn’t help. They complained about how Saul was punishing the innocent along with the guilty. They even made threats about what they’d do if they ever discovered the identity of the sinners in their midst.

  In the distance, those damn gunshots started in the same location as before, but with much more frequency. Jamie peeked through a hole in the wall and saw nothing but tree branches and black sky.

  Everything’s a mess now. We’re being watched and I still don’t know who sent us the package. Or why. Jamie knew the secret to the package’s message had to be obvious, he just didn’t know where to look. Now that he was number one on Saul’s special attention list, any unusual activity would arouse even more suspicion. But they had to start looking for clues, no matter what. Time was running out and all he could do was stay in his bunk, worrying and waiting.

  About an hour later, the majority of Faithfuls began snoring and Jamie decided time for action had come. He delicately got out of his bunk and snuck through the shadows to Eddie’s dormitory.

  Making it to Eddie was easy compared to waking him. Jamie worried that he’d scream if he was startled. Eddie’s hands were obediently outside his blanket, so Jamie warmed his own hands before lovingly massaging Eddie’s arms. Nothing happened. Jamie stuck his hand under the blanket and gently rubbed Eddie’s legs. He instantly sat up with a look of terror on his face.

  Jamie covered Eddie’s mouth quickly. “Shh. It’s me,” he whispered. “We have to be quiet.”

  “You scared me half to death.”

  Jamie didn’t apologize. “We have to hunt for clues.”

  “Now? Wouldn’t it be less suspicious if we did it in the morning?”

  “Saul hasn’t had time to fortify his sentries. Right now, there are only a couple of guards in the whole compound. In the morning, every Faithful will be awake and watching us. Our chances are better now.”

  Eddie nodded and got out of his bunk. Jamie propped up the blanket to make it look like he was still sleeping.

  “What about the hands?” Eddie asked.

  “They’d realize you weren’t inside the bunk before they noticed your hands. Let’s get going.”

  However, in the open air Jamie realized how little of the Brethren’s compound they’d actually seen. They had to visit each building and determine if anything suspicious was happening there. If a building looked suspect, they’d take a chance and go inside to investigate. Jamie even stole a pencil and a piece of papyrus to make notes.

  “If we keep alert, we’ll find clues,” Jamie told Eddie.

  “But what if we get caught?”

  “We’ll say we were trying to find the stables.”

  “Why would we do that?” Eddie asked.

  “Because we wanted to get an early start mucking.”

  “Great. And they’ll probably say, ‘muck you, too.’”

  Jamie smiled and started surveying the area. For a moment, everything was quiet. Then more gunshots rang out in the distance.

  “What the hell was that?” Eddie asked.

  “Gunshots. That’s another thing we have to find out about.” He gave Eddie a comforting pat and began surveying.

  “And we can’t forget noting all the possible hiding places.” Jamie gave him a questioning look. “Just in case.”

  The compound was laid out in a big circle, with the public square filling the nucleus. On one side were the dormitories, mess hall, and a large, enclosed root cellar. On the other side of the circle were the Disciples’ living quarters, along with an old clapboard church and the stables. Jamie decided to leave that building for last so they could hide their map somewhere inside, buried in the hay.

  But Jamie was still confused. He looked over the compound and asked, “If this is the entire place, aren’t a lot of necessary things missing?”

  “Yeah. Like, where are Mordecai and Saul’s living quarters? And where are the SUVs parked?”

  Jamie took a deep breath. “Those places are probably hidden, which makes them even more important t
o find.” He looked at the dirt below him. Finally, he spotted tire tracks that looked like they came from an SUV. He grabbed Eddie’s arm and followed the tracks, which led them past the chapel, through thickets and various muck until they encountered a row of spruce trees.

  “Too uniform to have grown naturally,” Eddie said. Jamie agreed. The trees had probably been planted to help hide something. He looked at the SUV tracks, which ran parallel with the trees. Instead of taking the long route around the row, he and Eddie climbed through the spruces. On the other side was a huge asphalt parking lot, filled with the monster SUVs. A tall chain-link fence ran around the perimeter, and the gate had a motion detector attached to it. Jamie figured it connected to the halogen lights affixed at the top of the fence.

  He put his hand in front of Eddie, stopping him from going closer. “We couldn’t get inside anyway,” he said, pointing to an electronic lock on the gate. “Our best bet is to look over there.” He pointed to several brick buildings. They were two stories high. Dim lights illuminated the doors and, as with the parking lot, electronic locks prevented unwanted visitors.

  That didn’t surprise Jamie—what shocked him was there weren’t any windows in the buildings, no way to look in or out. He figured it was probably for protection. Light, however, escaped from the thresholds of the entry doors, so he didn’t try going inside. Instead, they circled the building and found an iron fire-escape ladder fastened to a back wall. They climbed to the rooftop and found another surprise: a parabolic antenna—a huge satellite dish colored to blend in with the roof. Jamie doubted it was painted that way for aesthetic reasons. More likely Mordecai wanted to minimize the chances of an airplane pilot spotting it while flying over.

  The sun would rise in a couple of hours, so Jamie put his hand on Eddie’s shoulder. “We’d better get to the stables before we run out of time.”

  They ran to the barn. When Jamie saw its condition, all he could think was holy shit. The place hadn’t been cleaned in months. Animal dung was everywhere, and the smell was even worse than the stench that came from the dormitory bathrooms. Several scabby workhorses inhabited the stalls. They were obviously overworked and abused. They probably hadn’t been groomed in weeks.

  “Poor things,” Jamie said. “Let’s find some equipment and at least brush their manes.”

  “Not yet,” Eddie told him. “There’s something more important for you to look at.”

  Jamie turned around and saw the back end of the stables, where a beautiful, perfectly groomed white horse whinnied. He gravitated to it and stroked its mane. “Isn’t she beautiful? Do you know what kind she is?”

  “He’s a stallion,” Eddie corrected, and started searching the rest of the stables. “And he looks like an Arabian. They’re one of the oldest warhorses and have been around for over forty-five hundred years. But stallions can be pretty aggressive. I wonder why they just didn’t buy a mare instead.”

  “Stop being so sexist.” Jamie examined the stallion, continuing his loving strokes. When he reached the animal’s hindquarters, he found an oddity. Parts of the horse were painted white. Jamie touched the coloring, and it stayed on his hands. The horse had spots of brown in it. Jamie couldn’t figure it out.

  “Jamie, you’ve got to see this,” Eddie interrupted. Jamie looked up and saw Eddie by the side of a veterinary cabinet. Inside appeared to be bottles and boxes of medications and such.

  “Why doesn’t Mordecai heal the animals himself?” Jamie asked.

  “Probably because livestock is too expensive to lose,” Eddie answered. Then he held another box out.

  “What is it?” Jamie asked.

  Eddie read from the bottle. “It’s called Horse-Safe Dye for Manes, Tails, and Body.”

  “What color?” Jamie asked.

  “Pure White.”

  Jamie ran to Eddie and examined the bottle.

  “Why would Mordecai dye the stallion’s hair?” Eddie asked. “It doesn’t make sense.”

  “I know,” Jamie answered. “Nothing makes sense around here.”

  “I’m getting scared, Jamie.”

  Jamie embraced Eddie tightly. Then he looked into his face and kissed him. Jamie was scared, too, and he hoped to alleviate that growing feeling in the pit of his stomach.

  But it didn’t help. A sudden, muffled noise came from the back.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Jamie’s stomach tensed when he heard the noise a few stalls away. In his mind, he ran through a list of the sound’s possible source. It wasn’t mechanical, and he thought it was too human-like to be the white mare or the workhorses, so it had to be human. He wondered how long that human had been following them, and what he’d seen.

  “Don’t say a word,” Jamie whispered. “We’ve got to back away from each other, but we gotta act casual doing it.”

  “Huh?” Eddie looked confused.

  “Somebody’s watching us.”

  “Oh.” Eddie slowly backed up in the most artificial way possible. Each movement looked exaggerated. Fake. Jamie gave a big yawn. He stretched his arms and turned his back away from Eddie. He covertly scanned the stables, searching for the source. He didn’t see anything, so he turned back and mouthed, Stay here.

  In a voice twice as loud as normal, he announced, “Well, time to muck the stalls.” It was the only thing he could think of to say. He grabbed his pitchfork and marched casually to where he thought the noise had come from.

  But when he got there, he saw only hay. In the corner was an even bigger mound of the stuff. Moving up and down, like it was breathing. He crept to the undulating pile and gave it a stab with his fork.

  The pile yelped.

  “All right, slowly walk out of there.”

  The hay mound started moving and Peter crawled out. He looked more frightened than Jamie felt.

  “What the hell were you doing in there?”

  “Nothing.”

  “How long have you been there, doing nothing?”

  “The whole time. I woke up and saw you and Eddie running around the square. I followed you guys.”

  “Did anyone see you?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Then how much of us did you see?”

  Peter hesitated. “I saw you kissing.”

  “Shit.”

  “Are you guys that way?”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Jamie yelled. “Say what you mean.”

  “You know,” Peter stammered. “Are you?”

  “Are you’re asking if Eddie and I are gay? Well, the answer is yes. We’re queer.” Jamie stuck his pitchfork into the ground. He looked at Peter’s face and wondered if his innocence was for real. If Peter were really that naïve, Jamie didn’t know how to handle the situation.

  “I thought so,” Peter said. “But I’m not that way, you know.”

  Jamie realized Peter wasn’t concerned about their sexuality, but his own. “Eddie and I aren’t judging you,” he said. “You’d still be cool whether you liked boys or girls. Or both. It doesn’t matter to us.”

  “I told you I’m not that way. I’m not.”

  Jamie’s instinct was to comfort Peter, but then he thought, What if I’m wrong? It was possible he was putting on an act. But he was obviously distraught and didn’t have anyone to confide in. Jamie told him, “I understand your fears.”

  Peter seemed to let down his guard. “I went to our family priest and asked him to help me.”

  “Did he help?”

  “No. He told me God’s perfect and doesn’t create disease. Only Satan does that. And since being gay was my choice, my sickness, I’d have to fix the problem by myself.”

  Jamie knelt next to him. “So, what did you do?”

  “I prayed at lot.”

  “Did it help?”

  “No, I’m still…” Peter looked up at Jamie. “But I don’t want to be.”

  Jamie didn’t know what to say. He put his arms around Peter.

  “And then the priest told my father a
bout me, and he got angry. He said that I couldn’t be his son.”

  “That must have hurt.”

  “I thought I’d die when I heard him say that. I should have died, you know.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because I tried to kill myself, more than once. Get everything over with. But I wasn’t enough of a man to even do that right. That’s why I came here. Mordecai will cure me.”

  “He can’t cure you, Peter.”

  “Why can’t he?”

  “Because being gay isn’t an illness or even a disorder. It’s an essential part of your being. Your soul. Trying to live without a soul can only hurt you.”

  Eddie knelt next to them. “You know, Peter, we once had a friend who tried to change his sexuality. His parents enrolled him into conversion therapy.”

  “What happened?”

  “We don’t know. He ran away a couple years ago, and we lost contact. But I do know Jamie’s right. An organization that promises to convert gays succeeds at only one thing: They make dysfunctional, closeted human beings. Don’t let anybody do that to you.”

  “But I’ve got to change or I’ll be all alone, and where would I go?”

  “There will always be a place for you in this world,” Jamie said. “There’s a place for all of us. But I hope you know that place isn’t here, at the Brethren.”

  Peter nodded and wiped away the tears. He hugged Jamie and Eddie tightly. Jamie wondered if he’d ever let go. Jamie told Peter to go back to the dormitories and pretend this never happened.

  “Why?” Peter asked.

  “Because around here, if you’re not straight, you’re going to be dead.”

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Mordecai’s eyes darted to the clock on his computer’s desktop. Just after five in the morning. He hadn’t been to sleep yet. It felt like he hadn’t slept for days, yet he was exhilarated. He could see his years of planning and hard work finally paying off.

  The Disciples’ exercises had to be over and Sharar would be coming by to give him his daily briefing. In preparation, he powered off his computer and locked up its hardware. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Sharar, but there were still too many loose ends with the mission. He couldn’t chance anything.