“Why hasn’t it been torn down?” I asked Dad.
We were walking around Washington, D.C. like any other family of tourists, when I was fifteen. I never expected Dad to take us to the national atheism monument.
“We fought hard to ensure that everyone is free to believe however they choose to believe,” he replied. “As Christians, tearing down monuments and silencing the voices of those who believe differently is not our way.”
The monument was carved from many tons of granite and was commissioned by Henry Portman’s grandfathers.
“Look at it closely. What do you see?” Dad asked.
The side we were looking at was divided into four sections. One was devoted to the evolution of man; another to the creations of man; the third to the laws of man; and the last to the future of man.
“It’s about mankind taking credit for everything,” I said.
“That’s right,” Dad said. “Now let’s look at it from farther away.”
We walked across the street.
“How does it look now?” he asked.
“Man’s accomplishments are getting smaller,” I replied.
We walked another block away.
“Now that we can’t see man’s accomplishments, what’s left?” Dad asked.
I thought I’d fall to my knees when it struck me. The two top panels of the monument were smaller than the lower panels and the four quadrants were divided from each other by channels carved into the stone.
“It’s a cross,” I said. “The national atheism monument is actually a giant cross. How could that have happened?”
“The Lord is never hard to find,” Dad said, “When your heart is open, you’ll find He’s often hiding in plain sight.”
******
Dad loved to talk about his experience of time travelling with Mom. Seeing her thoughts and experiencing her emotions created a sense of intimacy between them that few couples will ever achieve. All these years later, I sometimes wonder if they can still hear each other’s thoughts.
On the other hand, Dad has little to say about time travelling alone. He called it “the very definition of loneliness,” where you have an entire lifetime to review and reflect upon the choices you’ve made in your life. In his case, it wasn’t a happy review, as he thought about his time as The Cult Hunter.
I spend an eternity reflecting on my own life, and I find that I have very little to be sad about. I was raised by two loving parents, and was surrounded by family and friends who love the Lord. Even when I try to think about sad times, it’s hard to truly feel sad. I decide to focus on the times I felt I was a disappointment to Dad by creating an image in my mind. It’s a picture of me free- climbing a difficult overhang at Red Rocks Open Space for the first time. Dad’s face looks proud for just a moment, then shifts to sadness. It begins to rain, and the drops on his face look like tears.
That’s wrong. It didn’t rain that day - but if this isn’t a memory, then what is it?
I look again, and realize that the raindrops are shaped like puzzle pieces, each with a picture from my life on it. I can’t help but smile with wonder as I look up at the sky and watch the puzzle- rain falling all around me.
Dad says that our lives are wonderfully complex puzzles that only the Lord fully understands.
I watch the rain hit the ground. Some of the pieces run off like rain, but others stick and start to form a larger picture. All of those moments of sadness weren’t my sadness. They were Dad’s. He pieced this puzzle together himself, but all he knew was that I was going to go back in time. Like me, he doesn’t know if I’ll ever make it back and it makes him sad.
Even without knowing the outcome, he’s willing to send me. Why?
The picture on the ground melts away, and I realize that my thoughts are affecting the drops. Maybe the answers I’m looking for are already here and I just haven’t pieced them together. I focus on the question of what I’m supposed to do, or see, in 2039 A.D. To my surprise, the drops form a picture of Amelia Lake, and then the map of all the places where she took ice cores.
A toxin sample! In 2039 it won’t have degraded. The purpose of the mission was hiding in plain sight the entire time.
With an original toxin sample, Amelia can cure everyone from The Mark of the Beast. There would be no more black lines; no more open wounds.
The picture changes to the Chi-One failed satellite launch.
What does that have to do with toxin samples?
My entire memory of the satellite falling back to earth and exploding replays several times.
The payload was heat shielded by Austin’s composite. What was the payload?
I focus so hard on trying to solve the puzzle that all of the pictures blur. Dad once told me that he most often solved puzzles when he wasn’t really trying, so I let my mind wander.
The picture on the ground goes bright. It’s Dad, chained between two posts inside the mountain, with a blazing map of the world behind him. He struggles to his feet, then holds his arms out to his sides so that his silhouette forms a perfect cross over the glowing world. He looks into the camera and says: “Christ came as a light to shine in this dark world, so that all who put their trust in Him will no longer remain in the darkness.”
Henry Portman comes into view and Dad says: “I believe it’s now been about six minutes, Henry, and I feel fine. Are you ready to believe in miracles now?”
“How is it possible?” Henry asks. “You should be dead.”
“My father never conspired to commit mass murder,” Dad replies. “When he wrote ‘distribute it through the water’ in his notebook, he was referring to the vaccine - not the toxin. Four hid the vaccine in spring water, and has had over a decade to take it all over the world, giving it to the faithful.”
“But the toxin dose I gave to you was five times what you could get through the air or water. It was enough to kill even someone who’s vaccinated. We tested it.”
“That’s true for someone who took your ‘Mark of the Beast’ vaccine; but the extra bit of DNA you put in there as a family legacy makes the vaccine less efficient. Go ahead and release your toxin if you like. It’s nothing more than dust.”
No. It can’t be… it was also in plain sight the entire time…
******
I wake up shouting “Five-X.”
I feel slightly dizzy; so I leave my eyes closed.
The little girl said that all of the bad people are going to go away. When Tyrone Bauer hired Amelia, he wasn’t looking for a cure. He was getting access to toxin. “Five-X” stands for the concentration of toxin they need to achieve in the atmosphere in order to kill every marked person on the planet, while leaving all of The Washed alive. The remnants of Four has been at war with them all along: destroying air tankers to prevent a mass toxin release; buying time until I was old enough to go on this mission.
The pieces were in front of my face the entire time.
I open my eyes to find there’s very little light here in the tunnel, with what little there is coming from the main shaft where The Tombstone will one day be poured. I leave the arena and stumble towards the light. The food shelves that have crumbled in my day are still intact and the emergency supplies are all arranged in neat lines. On the lowest shelf, I see something I’m going to need: the metal lockbox.
When I reach the edge of the shaft, I realize that the little bit of light is filtering around the edges of the elevator, which is at the top of the shaft, blocking my escape.
There’s an elevator control panel on the wall. I try it, but the electricity has been shut off.
How do I get out? There’s no other airshaft.
I look at the rock face opposite me. The elevator shaft is larger than I would have guessed, having only seen it after two hundred years and a demolition effort by Albert. There’s a large channel cut into the rock that houses multiple cables.
They used a heavy counterweight to make the elevator more efficient. If I can disconnect the counterweight, the elevator should fall.
I bend a light stick and shake it. The glow is enough to help me search the area, but I can’t find anything that would help me cut the cables - just a small hammer and a couple of wrenches. I put them into my pack, and use the cables to climb to the bottom of the mine. Hammers and wrenches are interesting historical pieces in my time, but now I’m glad Dad made me pay attention when we visited museums. The counterweight is a large concrete block with the cables connected to it using nuts and bolts.
I get to work with the wrenches and the nuts loosen up with remarkable ease, thanks, I think, to a sticky black substance that Dad referred to as ‘grease.’ There’s tension on the cable, so when I remove the last nut, I leap out of the way – expecting the elevator to come crashing down next to me.
Nothing happens.
I climb back up the cable, until I reach the underside of the elevator car. It’s equipped with some kind of friction brake that’s strong enough to hold the car in place, even without the counterweight. It’s stupid, but out of frustration I transfer to the bottom of the car and hang there. With a loud squeak, the car drops by several centimeters. I start bouncing and moving the car from side to side. The car gives up more squeaks and more downward movement.
Luckily, the car wasn’t at the very top of the shaft; so once I’ve pulled it down a half meter, I’m able to climb from the counterweight groove onto the top of the car. There are two light, metal hatches that must have closed automatically to cover the shaft when the car descended. When I push them open, I’m bathed in sunlight - but also cold air.
The area doesn’t look anything like the beautiful forest I know in the area of Bethany House. There are no large trees at all; just shrubs and piles of fractured rocks. The sight is so depressing that I just want to get away; so I start walking. There’s one place I know I’m going to visit, so I might as well start off there.
Within a few kilometers, I find myself in the familiar comfort of trees. After walking for nearly an hour, I find myself where I know Wendy’s little house should be - but isn’t. The remains of an old barn have been piled up in a large heap and the barn that I know is under construction. They laid a new floor over the old one and have raised three of the walls. The roof joists are being constructed by hand, ready to be raised once the walls are finished. I stare at the job, wondering how I’m going to accomplish what needs to be done.
“Where did you come from?” a middle-aged man asks, as he emerges from the barn.
“It’s going to be a pretty barn,” I say. “Do you own it?”
“I just build them …” he says. “…but in a way I feel like it’s mine.”
“I can see that you build things to last,” I say. “I’m sure this barn will still be standing in two hundred years.”
“I don’t know that anything will still be standing in two hundred years, the way this world is going.”
I hear a strange rumbling and crunching sound behind me, and turn to see what it is. It looks like a small version of Brill’s electric bus. The crunching is made by the wheels, as they run over the ground, but it’s the rumble that draws my attention. Whatever it is, it’s not electric. It has a pipe on its back end that’s spewing smoke.
How gross.
“There’s my ride,” he says.
The vehicle stops and a woman gets out.
“Where on earth did you come from?” she asks. “Dave? She’s got to be freezing. Why didn’t you offer her your coat?”
“I’m fine,” I say. “I should go.”
“Go? Where?” the woman asks, as her face softens. “You wandered here out of the city, looking for work and food, didn’t you?”
I say nothing.
“You’re coming home with us,” she says. “We have more than we need.”
“Elizabeth?” Dave says.
“Don’t you argue with me, David!”
He doesn’t, so I open the back door of the vehicle and get in. The woman drives much faster than a hover bus and the whole experience feels unsafe to me. Luckily, it doesn’t take long to reach their house, which is on a high point overlooking ridges and valleys in each direction. When we come to a stop, Elizabeth shuts the vehicle off by removing a small bundle of metal pieces, and then opens the door to the house with a different piece from the same bundle.
The inside of the house is warm and homey. I walk around studying things, while my hosts make dinner, which is flavored rice, homegrown vegetables, and a lean red meat that I know must be wild game of some sort.
When we sit down, I bow my head in thanks, and Dave and Elizabeth awkwardly follow suit.
“Where are your parents, Jocie?” Elizabeth asks.
“I don’t know,” I say. “They disappeared, and I’m looking for them.”
It’s not a lie.
“Where are you going?” Dave asks.
“I have family in Baltimore. I guess that’s my next stop,” I say.
“Baltimore? By yourself?” Elizabeth asks. “It’s too dangerous. Whole sections of the city are under Marshall Law. People will rob you for a nickel, and it’s really no place for a young woman. Girls like you get raped the day they arrive.”
“Is Baltimore worse than other cities?” I ask.
“Of course it is,” Dave says. “How could you not know?”
I give him an expectant look.
“For years, Baltimore has been the U.S. hub of middle eastern immigration; so now it’s got the biggest concentration of the gene. The death toll and suffering from the toxin is immense. All order has been breaking down.”
Then that’s where I’ll start the search for a toxin sample.