‘15th Marines,’ he replied, hoping that shared military service might break the ice a little.
The officer raised an eyebrow. ‘What were you doing with that cult?’
‘I wasn’t with them,’ Ethan replied. ‘They grabbed me when I got to the towbar. I was investigating a murder by their leader up in Kankakee.’
Now the officer was interested. He grabbed a clipboard and a pen, a piece of paper attached to the clipboard filled with names, most of which had been ticked off. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Warner, Ethan Warner.’
The officer stared at him, then put the clipboard down.
‘Ethan Warner,’ he repeated. ‘I know you’re not on this list. You’re the one on the hook for the murder, the one up in Kankakee.’
‘That’s the one,’ Ethan nodded. ‘Didn’t do it, traced the killer back here to this cult.’
‘Shilo Devilgne.’
‘The same. I tried to grab him and the murder weapon, the things that would prove my innocence, but you guys showed up and it all went to hell.’
The officer nodded, clearly annoyed at the operation’s descent into confusion and chaos.
‘Not something we expected. We hit the island at the same time as the sheriffs showed up here looking for you. So, it looks as though we tripped each other over.’
Ethan grinned around the mug. ‘Cost to me is much higher than to you. I get myself slung back in jail.’
The officer shook his head. ‘Charges were dropped an hour ago. Your partner’s work took you out of the frame for homicide.’
Ethan closed his eyes and his shoulders sagged with relief. Now, more than ever, his exhaustion began to overwhelm him and he blinked to keep himself awake.
‘I’m beat,’ he said as he saw the officer watching him.
‘You’re gonna be more than that,’ the soldier replied. ‘You were a witness to some, events.’
Ethan watched the officer carefully. ‘And?’
‘We’re gonna need a debrief, in detail.’
Ethan shrugged. ‘Let me get my head down and sort myself out and I’ll tell all. I’m in no rush to go anywhere.’
‘You won’t be going anywhere,’ the officer assured him. ‘You’ve been exposed to a classified site, so you’ll be signing NDA’s until your wrist seizes before you’ll be let back onto the streets. You’ll probably be shipped to DC.’
‘Federal prison?’ Ethan asked.
‘No,’ the officer replied. ‘You’re not under arrest but you will be detained. And you’ll have plenty of time to recover. I’ll call for your transport, you can sleep on the flight.’
‘What about Nicola?’
‘Your partner? She’ll be fine, she was also on the island but we know that she wasn’t exposed to anything classified. She’s back in Cairo but we can’t let you contact her. Simple issue here, you’re gonna be off the radar until we sort this whole thing out.’
Ethan leaned back in the seat, the coffee warming him and the blanket comforting. Right now, he couldn’t care less where he was sent as long as it involved a bed and sleep.
‘Done,’ he agreed. ‘Tell me something, what the hell is the military doing with a cult of hippy sky worshippers down here in Cairo?’
The officer said nothing, examining his paperwork.
‘Come on,’ Ethan said, ‘cold shoulder’s only going to increase my curiosity.’
The officer offered Ethan a tight grin.
‘This is how it’s going to work,’ he said. ‘We figure it makes more sense to get you off the hook than add to the mess you’ve created down here.’
‘Very noble of you.’
‘Right now, this area is a military–controlled zone and as you’ve already probably guessed, by the time we’re done there won’t be evidence of anything on that towbar. Literally, anything. Every piece of material recovered from that island has been recorded and is in our possession. Documents, materials, digital files, cell phones…., weapons.’
Ethan got it right away. ‘You got Dwayne Austin’s murder weapon right here.’
The officer nodded.
‘Now, I have the option here of handing over to the Kankakee Sheriff’s Department the two pieces of rock–solid evidence that you need to clear your name, or instead accidentally losing them on the way back to DC. One is the murder weapon, the other is the cell phone Devilgne used while on the Greyhound bus you’d traced him to, thinking he was Dwayne Austin. Case you didn’t know, Austin was never there, it was Devilgne you were chasing. That’s how he pulled off the set–up.’
Ethan’s relief at being both warm and in shelter evaporated quickly.
‘I know about the deception. What do you want?’
The officer leaned back in his seat and folded his arms, watching Ethan appraisingly.
‘It’s nothing personal,’ he offered. ‘This is the way it has to be. Everything you’ve seen here gets forgotten. You sign NDAs as requested, you play the good little boy, and we hand over the weapon that killed Dwayne Austin to Kankakee PD. We also tie that weapon to Shilo Devilgne with DNA evidence. Ballistics on the firing pin will prove that the pistol killed Dwayne Austin, if it is the same weapon, and the cell phone puts Devilgne at the scene.’
Ethan knew that it was the same weapon, because he could tell by the gleam in the officer’s eyes that he had already planned out this whole conversation.
‘What’s the connection with the cult?’ he asked. ‘What were they doing out here?’
‘Need to know,’ the officer explained. ‘You and your partner just got in the way.’
Ethan frowned. ‘All the way up in Chicago?’
‘Dwayne Austin had a big mouth,’ the officer replied. ‘Couldn’t keep things to himself and was in danger of exposing the whole operation, which is what’s happened. Shilo was warned to keep a tight leash on his people and he failed. Add to that his weird experiments with UFOs and a call came from the top to shut the operation down.’
Ethan recalled his strange experience the previous night. ‘I saw it,’ he said.
‘Saw what?’
‘What was behind the lights.’
‘Then keep it to yourself,’ the officer said. ‘We don’t want anything to do with any of that.’
Ethan was again momentarily perplexed. ‘But that was why you set up the cult, wasn’t it?’
The officer shook his head slowly as he checked some more paperwork.
‘The military has absolutely nothing to do with the cult. They acted merely as surrogates for technology that we could not test on an open market or even within the military. Instead, the technology and others like it are released to private companies for testing.’
Ethan understood immediately.
‘Private companies are not bound by the Freedom of Information Act.’
‘Correct,’ came the reply. ‘Suitable volunteers are found within cults like that of Devilgne. A former NASA employee who went off the rails, he was the perfect test bed for advanced technology in return for funding for his little band of crazies. A little more goes into the Cairo Mayor’s Office and Police Department to maintain the veil. It was all working well enough until you and your partner started tracking Austin.’
Ethan leaned back in his seat and drained the last of his coffee.
‘So, you’ve got me over a barrel: comply or face thirty to life.’
‘It’s a no–brainer, but there’s more,’ the officer said. ‘That little light show last night attracted a lot of attention and folks are gonna be looking for you. They’ll want you to talk to them and it’s our experience that most folks can’t keep their mouths shut.’
‘I’m not much one for idle chatter.’
‘Don’t care,’ the officer replied. ‘My job is to seal the operation closed and that means silencing you.’ He leaned closer. ‘One way or the other.’
‘I’ll take the easy route.’
‘Good,’ the officer grinned without warmth. ‘You won’t be coming back to Illinoi
s for a time. I’m thinking at least a year. I’d recommend getting out of the country and not coming back until things have well and truly gone quiet around here.’
Ethan sighed. His first thought was for Lopez. She would not know what had happened to him.
‘If you’re thinking of your partner,’ the officer said, as though reading Ethan’s mind, ‘it’s better if she thinks you’re dead. That way she won’t go around lookin’ for you.’
Ethan shook his head.
‘You saw what she did down here, how far she’ll go. She won’t stop until she’s seen my dead body with her own eyes.’
The officer seemed to consider this. ‘Fine, we’ll make arrangements, but you won’t be able to tell her anything about what’s happened here. Tell her you need some time out to go find yourself, then you get out of America and you don’t come back for at least a year, agreed?’
Ethan nodded.
‘I got one request. Ben Trent, one of the occultists. He’s new to the cult, not initiated yet so he didn’t know much. His mother Lindsay bailed me to help her look for him. See he gets back home safe to her.’
The officer watched him for a moment, and then nodded.
‘Fine. Just in case at any point I the future you’re tempted to break the rules, remember that we can change the evidence at any time we want. You’re gonna be on the hook for a while Ethan, so get used to it.’
‘Shilo,’ Ethan said, ‘he got away. He could blow the whistle on this at any time.’
The officer folded up the paperwork before him and took a deep breath.
‘Shilo Devilgne’s name will be so utterly despised by the time we’re done here that he won’t be able to crawl out from under whichever rock he’s hiding for the next forty million years. He’s the last of your problems right now. Sign the NDAs and start thinking about your vacation, otherwise I’ll have you back in the detention center by noon. I understand there’s a gangster there who’d really like to talk some more with you…’
Ethan knew when the game was up. Though he had a thousand questions, he knew that he didn’t have any choice.
He picked up the pen and began signing the NDAs that the officer placed before him on the table.
***
XXIX
Washington DC
Aaron Mitchell stood in silence as he rode an elevator up through the countless floors of a private high–rise near the Capitol. He stood with his hands clasped calmly before him, his dark longcoat contrasting sharply with the white of his shirt collar, which itself contrasted sharply with the bituminous color of his skin.
Aaron Mitchell was a former United States Marine who had served with distinction in Vietnam before joining the somewhat darker and more mysterious intelligence community of the CIA. At six four and two hundred fifty pounds, Mitchell towered over his contemporaries and would not normally have been selected for field operations were it not for his intelligence and formidable propensity for violence. Surgically inserted into some of the most dangerous places on earth on behalf of the United States, he had served his country with honor as part of the CIA’s paramilitary wing, Special Operations. That, in turn, had led to his current posting when his advancing years had removed him from field operations a couple years previously.
The elevator door opened and Mitchell stalked down a silent corridor. Plush carpet felt soft beneath his polished shoes, and he moved with panther–like silence to a door at the end of the corridor. Here, there were no other people because nobody else was within the building. The people he worked for now could afford an entire high–rise for the purpose of absolute security, although no ordinary person would ever have heard their names.
There was a little–known group of men who controlled the vast majority of the world’s wealth. They were not the well–recognized names of technology or politics, of media or the financial institutions. These were men who operated behind the scenes, who controlled fortunes beyond the imagination not just of individuals but entire countries. They invested as silent partners in profitable ventures, or bank–rolled military operations in third–world countries in return for access to rare–earth minerals and other exotic materials that rarely made the news. They operated a clandestine organisation designed to make money from the ordinary day–to–day workings of society, and could trace their organisation back to post–war America in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
People spoke in hushed whispers of cabals and of secret societies but in reality they knew little of the truth. Such commissions were often anything but secret: the Bilderberg Group annual meetings were kept secret from the media, and yet activists and other trouble–makers often brought these secretive gatherings to the attention of the public. Held every year at a different, suitably exclusive location, the Bilderberg meetings allowed men of power to discuss world matters in an environment safe from political wrangling and media misinterpretation. They were now dominated by powerful men from military and fossil fuel organisations, and as such Aaron’s employers no longer attended the meetings.
They had grown too powerful to bother with ordinary politicians.
Aaron stood before the doorway and looked at what seemed to be a regular spy–hole set into the door. A tiny black lens stared back at him, and he saw a red light flash within. The camera within was capable of analysing the layout of Aaron’s retina, unique to all human beings, as well as scanning his face for its proportions and minor scars and defects.
Moments later, the door unlocked automatically and Aaron walked in.
The room was sparse, containing only a single armchair. There were no windows and only a single lit panel in the ceiling, which gave the occupant the impression of being surrounded by an endless void disparate from time and space. Around the walls were positioned speakers, and as the door closed automatically behind Aaron so he felt the air pressure change around him. The room itself was separated entirely from the main building via coiled springs and pressure pads, creating what was known as an anechoic chamber, a parcel of absolute silence from which no sound or electromagnetic emissions could escape. Essentially bug–proof in the extreme, the security measure had the effect of partially muting all sound within while also enhancing its quality, making Aaron’s voice sound as though he were both underwater and speaking into his own ear.
‘I am here.’
At the sound of his voice a series of numbers lit up around the room, each located beneath a speaker. There were twelve in all. The meeting was prearranged, but Aaron had never met his employers and it was likely that he never would. Their voices were suitably distorted to prevent audio–identification, and there were no screens to display their faces.
‘What news?’
The voice coming from the speaker identified as “1” was brisk.
‘The operation in Cairo, Illinois has been disrupted,’ Aaron reported. ‘The commune we were funding has been dispersed.’
‘Were the project’s goals achieved?’ asked Number “4”.
‘Trans–human modifications were being tested and the results are promising,’ Aaron replied, ‘however the cult was conducting further experiments loosely based around the MK–ULTRA program.’
‘What kind of experiments?’
Number “7”‘s tone was curious, interested.
‘They appear to have re–learned some of humanity’s lost skills,’ Aaron replied. ‘The CIA’s Project Stargate operation again seems to have been the basis for their attempts to transcend their location.’
‘To what level were they successful?’ asked Number “11”.
‘Fundamental,’ Aaron replied. ‘Had they continued I have no doubt they would have eventually achieved First Contact.’
Aaron’s statement provoked a long silence.
The men to whom he reported were known simply as Majestic Twelve, their origin part of the wave of scientific breakthroughs that had occurred in post–war America and which had changed the world ever since. Their leader, “1”, automatically would take over the decision–
making process at a juncture such as this, where potentially the future of humanity was at stake.
‘This cannot be allowed to stand,’ “1” said finally. ‘We all know and understand the consequences of mankind achieving a second Enlightenment.’
Aaron Mitchell knew well to what MJ–12’s leader was referring to. After thousands of years of suffering under the literally murderous oppression of religious churches, mankind’s natural curiosity about the universe won through and shattered the convictions of the pious. Science and education pushed aside the veils of dogma, the scientific method proved beyond doubt the folly of blind faith, and the greed and power of the church collapsed. Centuries of ignorance fell away in what later became known as the “Enlightenment”, the point where human beings finally broke free of declaring the origin of their universe as human–centric, and understood that people were simply one species among many, the planet Earth one among billions, the Milky Way galaxy one among trillions more.
Yet, in all of that and for millennia before, some suspected that beneath the brilliant glare of scientific endeavour the faint but persistent glow of the soul had been lost. No matter how far humanity’s satellites travelled, no matter how broad its knowledge grew, there seemed still to be something just beyond the grasp of all but the most determined.
Majestic Twelve existed to contain the second Enlightenment, a much–feared moment when humanity might realize that it was a victim of its own success. Power, money, greed, capitalism all thrived on the human thirst for safety and security, natural human desires that society had perverted into the need for possessions, for money, for materalistic devices. Security was no longer found among friends but in alarms and police. Money bought the best houses in the best neighborhoods. Influence greased–palms at the highest levels, the rich and the powerful those who could break any law, while those below them could break none without severe consequences.
Majestic Twelve operated at the highest levels of that modern society, and it was a status quo that they sought to preserve.
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