Gulf Lynx

by Fiona Quinn

  The original members of the Galaxy Project—who were both the scientists and the lab rats—led difficult lives as their work for the military was ended and scoffed at.

  Since then, many of the Galaxy soldiers had died, others lived in self-imposed hermitages to try to find peace.

  And peace was what I was after.

  The interesting thing here was that in the world of remote viewing, there was no time or geographical tether. The Galaxy operatives had trained to go anywhere along a timeline and anyplace in the universe to observe. Maybe they could even go to Hell and find Angel.

  I remembered reading one account of a man who sent himself on a remote viewing task to go back to where a buddy of his had disappeared in a plane crash during a mission. The plane and his body were never found. That pilot had been listed as Missing in Action—presumed dead.

  Having met Melody Foley, I could see why this Galaxy operative would want to bring his buddy’s family the peace of knowing what had happened to their loved one.

  When the Galaxy operative did the remote viewing session, he saw that the plane was under a waterfall, and that’s why they hadn’t been able to find it. He was also able to talk to his dead buddy. The buddy was happy in the afterlife, and all the more so because he knew that his family had been lifted up and carried by his brothers who had made it home. The buddy thanked him and said he was at peace.

  The operative and some friends had spent their R and R down in South America looking for the plane, and had been successful in finding it, and the missing airman’s remains still strapped into the pilot’s seat. From what the searchers found, they could tell the family that the pilot had died on impact and hadn’t suffered.

  Thank you, God, that the pilot hadn’t suffered. Thank you, God, that the family could find relief from knowing this.

  Maybe the same could happen for me.

  Granted, it was a long shot. But perhaps a Galaxy operative would do a task for Angel, answering the question of what Angel’s soul needed to happen to be at rest.

  I decided that I’d go talk to Iniquus founder General Elliot.

  General Elliot had been in charge of the Galaxy Project prior to starting Iniquus. I wouldn’t want to go up and talk to the remote viewers behind the general’s back. I’d go see General Elliot about a trip in the morning. Maybe I could fly straight from my visit with Abuela Rosa in Puerto Rico and head up to Wyoming to see Herman and General Coleridge.

  Then, like a smack on the side of the head, it occurred to me, I might already have access to some pertinent information.

  When Iniquus was under both physical and psychic attack last year, it was by a man who had been an operative with the Galaxy Project, his name was Allan Leverone.

  Leverone called himself Indigo.

  Indigo had been one of the most dexterous operatives who did remote viewing tasks with the Galaxy Mission. An operative’s success rate was based on how often he produced correct and actionable information. Anything over fifty percent was considered good. Indigo generally got a sixty-seven percent chance of bringing back useful information from his task.

  It occurred to me that that was the exact percentage the NSA AI system had offered up for the correctness of matching Kaylie’s name to the woman in Syria.

  Sixty-seven percent chance had saved many lives. But they had also endangered them when missions had been planned and executed or not planned at all based on what a remote viewer saw.

  Indigo was special. Not only was he entrusted with the secrets of remote viewing but was also one of only two people chosen, because of their morality and altruistic outlook, to be trained in remote influencing.

  In remote influencing, seeds of thought could be introduced into someone else’s brain to, well, to influence their thinking.

  During Indigo’s training and experimentation, the media got wind of the project.

  Americans scoffed and ridiculed the Galaxy’s work.

  Jokes about men staring at goats turned from news headlines to a satirical movie.

  The operatives paid a hefty price tag for years of dedicated service to America.

  Because their work was considered top secret, their efforts were redacted, leaving them no proof of their high efficacy working in the ether.

  Money was withheld from funding their work.

  The project shut down.

  The Galaxy operatives humiliated and shunned.

  When Indigo was relieved of his duties with Galaxy, the things that our government did to him and his family next was beyond horrific. They resulted in Indigo’s wife and son dying, his daughter, Tabitha, becoming brain injured by carbon monoxide gas, and Indigo himself spending years of his life being medicinally restrained in a mental hospital.

  His family destroyed, his health deteriorated, his reputation and his chance to work depleted, Indigo struck back at these attacks using the weapons that he had been trained to use by the military—both remote viewing and influencing techniques. His revenge was nearly successful. Not just in taking down Iniquus, but also in taking over the US government.

  Scary stuff.

  Indigo was dead. He was already sick in the hospital when, by order of the President of the United States, steps were taken to make sure he didn’t recover.

  Within the day, his daughter Tabitha, AKA Scarlet Vine, who learned the techniques and vengeful ethic from her dad was killed as well.

  It was my hands that wrapped around Scarlet’s neck to make sure she was no longer a threat to Striker, whom she had sedated and kidnapped, to General Elliot, whom she attacked, or to the United States.

  The thing that thwarted Indigo and Scarlet in their efforts was Indigo’s adherence to the science of his work. He kept copious lab notes on every single task and influencing operation that he undertook.

  When Strike Force got hold of the scientific logs and was unravelling the long game that Indigo had been playing, one of the things that had been revealed was my role in all of it.

  Indigo had wanted to extract revenge on my mentor, Spyder McGraw, as well as Iniquus owner, General Elliot, both of whom had been involved with the Galaxy Project. Indigo felt that these men had failed to protect the Galaxy project and the operatives who did the work.

  About the same time that Indigo was homing in on me being a vehicle for extracting his revenge on Spyder, Striker had caught Scarlet’s eye.

  Striker and Scarlet dated, briefly. The problem was that Scarlet thought she’d found her one and only. Striker seemed to have that effect on women. Scarlet started planning a future for them together, trying out baby names, and looking for houses to start their white picket fence lives together. Using the tools that her dad had taught her in remote viewing to see her future, Scarlet wrote out remote viewing tasks and went into the ether to see her pictures. What she saw was Striker asking her to marry him, the two of them standing at the altar, settling into their life of wedded bliss.

  The reality was that Striker wasn’t there for the long haul. In his mind they were dating.

  Period.

  Striker simply wanted someone to enjoy, go out on the town, have some good conversations, and good sex. He was already married to his job. He’d told Scarlet this. She just had a different agenda and believed he’d come around.

  Especially after she saw their happily ever after playing out in the ether.

  The problem with her data gathering was that Scarlet had written the task herself. She wasn’t using the Stanford scientific design that separated remote viewing from daydreaming/fantasy.

  She saw what she wanted to see.

  The double-blind tasking protocols were in place for a reason.

  Indigo recognized the problem, along with Scarlet’s delusional thinking, which was a biproduct of the time the government poisoned her with carbon monoxide.

  Like any dad, though, Indigo wanted to give his daughter the moon, or in this case, a future with Striker. Besides, Striker was an Iniquus golden boy. He was one of Spyder’s favorite people, why not
mess with Striker for a little additional payback?

  Tasking information about the situation, Indigo discovered me in the ether, and he discovered my connection to Striker and to Spyder.

  It was then that Indigo landed on the idea that Spyder could be punished through me, just like Indigo had been punished through his children. And he set out to do that. For years, he tormented and tortured me, up until his death he had been the puppet master, messing with my reality.

  The reason I was plowing through these thoughts was that when we were unravelling the situation, I remembered coming across one of Indigo’s tasking sheets with my name on it. It read something to the effect: “Lexi was married. But her husband’s vehicle will hit an IED. Shit that would have solved the problem. Lexi and Angel are very well matched and have an intense connection.”

  Indigo had successfully seen through his remote viewing that Angel would die in the IED explosion.

  I wondered what else he saw about Angel and me. I wondered if any of it would be helpful to soothing Angel’s soul.

  General Elliot had the scientific logs in his Fort Knox-like file room inside his office suite.

  Even if Indigo didn’t note anything of significance about Angel, his death, and his afterlife, perhaps I could take what I knew and what I had gathered from the files up to Wyoming and ask General Coleridge or his protégé Herman Trudy to help me help Angel.

  Since I was already tapping into the unconventional to help find Kaylie and her kids, why not try the remote viewing route to seek out a way to rescue them as well?

  Chapter Fourteen

  Having made my decision to approach General Elliot tomorrow morning about going to Wyoming, I reached out to start an Internet search for information that might help me find Kaylie.

  My hand stalled over the keyboard. There it was again, my psychic knowing.

  “As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives.”

  Fine, I’d start there with my searches and try to figure this out.

  I first had the knowing when I was talking to Miriam about going to Puerto Rico. I was thinking about Strike Force going to Poland, and I was getting a text from Zoe about checking the BIOMIST system. Three possible routes to take.

  I started with Africa and Middle East, Seven Wives to see where that would lead me.

  Muslim men in many countries in Africa and the Middle East can marry up to four wives. But then there was something called the “fifth wife.” Fifth wife being a synonym for slave. So if the man had many slaves, he would have many “fifth wives.”

  The more I read in these articles about the plight of the women in these regions, the more horrified I became. Why weren’t we talking about this more in the international news? Why weren’t our political systems doing something to stop the enslavement of women?

  I pulled myself away from that thread.

  It didn’t feel like the answer to my knowing.

  I tried another route. Who was St. Ives? The articles came up about St. Ives, England. That absolutely felt like a dead end.

  I finally found a Catholic Saints site that offered the story. The saint’s name wasn’t actually Ives. St. Ives meant Cove of St. Ia.

  Apparently Ia, a young Irish princess, was in Cornwall, England trying to catch a boat back to Ireland. The band of other saints she was supposed to have traveled with had gone on without her. That didn’t sound very saint-like of them… “Ia was afraid because she was a young woman and the journey was hazardous.”

  Oh, boy. That sentence rang true.

  I read it again. “Ia was afraid because she was a young woman and the journey was hazardous.”

  Yes, I could feel it in my bones. That was part of what I was to know.

  Whose journey?

  Kaylie?

  No.

  Miriam?

  No.

  Mine?

  That was a big walloping affirmation.

  I was the young woman and my journey would be hazardous?

  Yes.

  I closed my eyes. The wind knocked out of me. This last year had been rather calm on the hazard scale. Ever since Indigo and Scarlet died, things had evened out. I would say that things were going pretty well, that I was living my best life, had I not been under the perpetual grief cloud that Angel’s death formed over me.

  Hazard? I cast the word toward the ether.

  Yes.

  I read the screen, Ia was grief-stricken over her fellow saints leaving her.

  It wasn’t lost on me that Ia was grief-stricken over some saints leaving, and I was grief-stricken over an Angel leaving me.

  The article said that as Ia prayed, she noticed that there was a small leaf floating in the water. Ia took her rod and poked it to see if it would sink. Instead, it grew bigger and bigger. Trusting in God, she stepped onto the leaf, and it carried her across the sea.

  I guessed I was going on a trip. And I’d have to trust in the Fates to take me where I needed to go and do what I needed to do.

  If Ia was a saint, it meant she was killed.

  I didn’t know if that was a part of this. If Ia having been killed had anything to do with the rhyme or with this venture.

  We all have to die sometime.

  My mind went to the moment I had died out in the desert, looking around wondering why the afterlife was nothing like I had expected it to be. My team showed up, pulling me back into my body with their defibrillator.

  What if they’d just let me go?

  What if the pain and the struggles had been over?

  I’ve thought many times since my death that there must be a reason why my soul wasn’t ready to leave this body, some task that had gone unfulfilled.

  Maybe this was the reason?

  Maybe the hazardous journey that was waiting for me, once fulfilled, would allow me to find some peace.

  Only one way to find out. I had to walk through the fire.

  I’d go to Puerto Rico first, and then, with or without General Elliot’s approval, I’d go to Wyoming and task my friends with a remote viewing mission.

  I pulled out my phone and texted General Coleridge. Sir, I’m making flight arrangements to come up and see you and Herman Trudy. If it’s convenient, I’d like to come this week.

  I gazed down at my dogs not thinking anything. Just kind of numb, taking in the new information.

  The text startled me when my phone buzzed in my hand: We already have you on the calendar. The Mrs. has your room at the ranch all set up. Trudy plans to pick you up at the airport. Your flight should arrive on time at 3:40 pm, this Thursday.

  They already saw me coming. That was some precise remote viewing if they already had me on the calendar with my flight time and everything.

  They knew before I did that I needed them.

  This kind of etheric woo-woo always threw me off equilibrium.

  Thursday evening, that would only give me a day and a half with Abuela Rosa. But I was eager to get up to Wyoming and get answers. Both for me and for Kaylie.

  The time clock that Prescott had set for Kaylie’s survival was ticking down. I didn’t want to fail her.

  Chapter Fifteen

  With Kaylie back in the forefront of my thoughts, I focused on the case at hand.

  “Let’s start with the basics,” I muttered as I lined up my thoughts.

  “Speculation is not fact,” so says Spyder. “Assumptions can eat your time.”

  Spyder was full of quips that were supposed to be guideposts on my travels down an evidence trail. For example: I knew that there were three children in the Middle East, each with a different last name who had the familial biomarkers that were associated with Kaylie. I leapt to the idea that these kids must be Kaylie’s.

  I typed a text to Prescott: Who are the members of Kaylie’s family with biologic markers close enough to show up in the system? Where have they been for the last four years? I need to know if any of them has left the United States. Thank you. I tapped send.

  If the NSA image was Kay
lie, I didn’t know why she was in Syria. There were three basic choices:

  Kaylie was in the Middle East because she wanted to be there. I shouldn’t let go of the possibility that she disappeared because she wanted to.

  It could also be that she disappeared against her will but had changed her mind and now things were hunky-dory.

  Or it could be that her circumstances were wholly against her volition.

  “ISIS brides from the United States” I typed into the search bar.

  I scanned over a story about a twenty-year-old college student who had been attending university in Alabama. Alabama? Huh. She’d told her parents she was going on a college trip. Instead, she used her tuition money to fly to Turkey. I scrolled up to find out where this interview was done, Al Hawl Camp, Syria. I noted the journalists name. Perhaps he had seen or heard of another American woman in the area who didn’t want to be interviewed. Or maybe he had some resources in the area, people who might have some information. I’d send him an email and feel him out without giving any specific details. I’d need Prescott to sign off on that. Maybe the FBI or CIA already had a backchannel contact with the guy.

  The date on the article was four years ago.

  I moved back down to finish reading. It said that Hilda had in that time frame been married to three Islamic State fighters.

  Three husbands in four years.

  Kaylie had possibly been with three men who fathered her children in seven years. So that number wasn’t dissimilar.

  Hilda wanted to return to the United States, she was sorry she’d cheered on the beheadings in the videos posted to social media. She’d turned herself in to coalition forces who were detaining her in a refugee camp in northeast Syria.

  There was another American with her. This woman was much older, forty-six. She’d been a legal administrator. Hmm, whatever that was... But it seemed both were educated women. Women with career paths and potential. To give that up and go to a war zone? This woman was from the Mennonite community and had three adult children. Okay, neither of these women were what I might have pictured.