Bethany House comes alive with hope and excitement as we wait for Amelia to arrive with the precious dose of vaccine. My cousin Geoff arrives, along with the demolitions expert, Albert. After helping me in Egypt and at the cave outside Jerusalem, they didn’t dare go near any of the Four safe houses controlled by Zip.
Just knowing me was enough to make them homeless.
Martha and Cindi immediately set to work modifying the room everyone calls “The Laboratory.” This is the place where they work on new gadgets to get around government tracking, write new hacking programs, and generally try to create new ways to live off the government grid. The modification consists of a corner that’s set up as a crude chemistry and genetics lab. Once the sample arrives, Cindi, Blake, and Amelia will do their best to figure out how Henry’s toxin works, and how to produce the vaccine ourselves.
Martha finds me reading reports and brooding about what to do next. My head wants to continue to work on the vaccine puzzle until I find a solution; but more and more my heart and thoughts are being drawn to answering the question of what Jesus meant when He said my moment would be when darkness reigns.
What could be darker than the plague?
“You need to clear your head,” Martha says. “Let’s go spar.”
“I’ve already told you: I’m not going to hit my pregnant wife.”
“Being pregnant doesn’t mean I’m made out of glass. Stop acting like I’ll break.”
I look at my beautiful wife. She looks no different, but knowing she’s pregnant makes me want to protect her more than ever.
“Sorry. I can’t do it,” I say.
“Fine. Then I’ll just hit you for a while. Maybe that’ll clear your head.”
I change the subject.
“I have a question. Who’s doing more work for Christ: Me or Michael? He’s baptized hundreds and is inspiring others to baptize thousands. I’ve done nothing except sit and pray in a blackberry patch.”
“Who says sitting in a blackberry patch and praying is the same as doing nothing?” Martha asks. “Be still in the presence of the Lord, and wait patiently for Him to act.”
I smile.
“Psalm 37, Martha? Aren’t you the Four agent who talked to me outside of class when she was ordered to just observe, and then mounted a rescue mission when she was supposed to be on a suicide mission to kill me? I don’t see you biding your time in the blackberry patch.”
She gets so close our noses are almost touching.
“You’re you, and I’m me,” she says; then kisses me. “We’re each called in our own way, Cephas. Your role in God’s plan may be very different from what you think it is. You thought the Travelers Initiative was to prove Christ a fraud. At one point, I thought my role might be to kill you - and look at how that turned out.”
She rubs her still flat stomach and the growing life inside and I smile, because she’s doing it subconsciously.
“Even so, I need to do more than sit here and read reports,” I say. “Gathering information and putting pieces together isn’t going to be enough. I’ve got to convince Aislin, Garai and Austin to act. Maybe my role in all of this is to unite them.”
*****
Austin is once again unavailable; but Aislin and Garai agree to a short conference.
“You’ve seen the reports and studied the data for yourselves,” I say. “It’s pretty clear the plague is the result of a biotoxin rather than an infectious disease.”
“Agreed,” Garai replies. “We should have listened to you.”
“A classified government report estimates about two million will die,” Aislin adds. “However, this is all being done off the books. There’s no proof our government has anything to do with it. If this goes public, it could just as easily be blamed on Christians. Specifically, it’ll be blamed on the most technologically savvy Christians - namely, you and the Fours.”
“We believe the vaccine is being made in a dozen locations worldwide under tight security,” Garai continues. “Short of an armed attack, there’s no way we can get the millions of doses needed to vaccinate everyone who was born off the grid. We haven’t been able to obtain even a single dose. Have you?”
Don’t trust them.
“According to our information, the doses are coded all the way down to the exact person to which they’ll be administered,” I reply. “The only way to get a sample is to find someone willing to sacrifice themselves by not taking their assigned dose.”
“Then I suggest we all begin stockpiling water,” Garai says.
“It won’t matter,” I reply. “Once everyone is vaccinated, Henry can just send it airborne to mop up any survivors.”
“We’re all in this together now,” Aislin says. “I’m sorry it took so long to see the need for cooperation. I’ll send you all the information I have.”
“As will I,” Garai agrees.
They both sign off, but Garai’s image pops back onto the screen a moment later.
“Cephas, there is another matter I need to bring to you. There was no need to bother Aislin with it. Several messages have been passed upwards through my organization and have reached my desk. They came on paper and all say the same thing: ‘Remind Cephas that his father’s belongings are in my attic.’ Each one is signed ‘Aunt Jennifer.’ What do you think this means?” Garai asks.
It means that it’s time for a family reunion.
*****
Ten minutes later, I’ve convened the Bethany House staff.
“It’s a trap,” William says.
My cousins Geoff, James and Cindi agree with nods of their heads. Martha looks distracted, like she isn’t listening.
“Probably - but, what if it isn’t?” I ask everyone around the table. “What if there’s some data about the toxin or the vaccine in my father’s old stuff? Isn’t it worth the risk?”
“It’s not worth risking you,” William says. “We can send a team to search her house.”
“Sorry, William, but you’d never find whatever it is. Whatever is going on, it’s personal. She wants this to be between just the two of us.”
“There’s no way you’re walking into this alone,” Geoff says.
“Then how about if I just give her a call?”
The group starts to look back and forth at each other. Nobody can think of a reason why I shouldn’t speak with her, but William is still nervous.
“If she’s working with the Corps, as soon as a com link comes in from you they’ll start to trace it,” he argues.
“Then the call won’t come from me,” I say. “Do we still have the chip we took out of Henry Portman?”
*****
Rigging a chip together with a com is the sort of technical shenanigans the staff in Bethany House live to do. They argue over how to do it for about thirty minutes and then get to work. The coms this team created for impersonating people like Bill and Wendy were primarily a programming issue, requiring little more than people willing to give us their personal identification codes. They’re good enough to fool simple identity scanners, so we can use the tube and hover systems or other low security public services, but little more.
The team needs an hour to get everything together; so I slip away to find Albert, the demolitions expert. I find him just as he’s returning to the house with a large box, and stop him in front of the old metal door that says: “Danger! Keep out.”
“I’m curious about something, Albert. If we were to find Henry’s toxin production facility, would there be a way to blow it up and keep the toxin contained inside?”
“Maybe, if it’s an underground facility. If it’s aboveground, it would be nearly impossible to guarantee one hundred percent containment. Get me building plans and I’ll give you an opinion.”
“If we can find it, you’ll be my first stop. Do you even have enough explosives for that sort of job?”
“It would depend on the building, but I do have quite a bit.”
“Really? Where do you keep it all?”
“In my room.”
I can’t help but chuckle.
“You sleep with explosives?”
“I don’t have anywhere else to store them. On the bright side, I get a room to myself.”
“Why not in here?”
I point to the ancient metal door that blocks off the abandoned tunnel.
“It’s already marked with a danger sign and everything.”
“I wasn’t raised here, but I’m told that staying out of there is the number one rule kids learn. Besides, there’s no key. I heard Brill or Austin had one once, but lost it years ago.”
Martha yells my name from the entry to the tunnel and I reply; so she joins us.
“What are you two doing down here?”
“Talking about explosives,” I say.
“Why are boys always fascinated with explosions?”
Martha rubs her stomach subconsciously again. I think she’s glad we’re having a girl.
“The com is ready,” she says.
The chip, combined with a hacked com, is a hardware marvel. They’ve integrated the chip we removed from Henry into the com; so it can pass multiple verification checks. I could probably walk straight through security at Corps headquarters itself with this thing.
“Call Jennifer Paulson in Kenilworth, Illinois,” I instruct the com.
“Just a second,” my Aunt Jennifer says over her com, but the screen remains dark. There’s a lot of rustling sounds; then the screen comes on.
“Henry, I was just thinking about you,” she says.
The woman I’ve always known for her hawkish features, with her hair pulled back in a tight bun, is on the screen wearing a revealing negligée, with her long hair hanging loose around her shoulders. It’s hard to say whose eyes bug out the most when we see each other. I guess it must be hers, because she lets out a little gasp.
“Aunt Jennifer, basic training at The Corps includes desensitization exercises. They want Corps members to be numb to even the most disturbing elements of our present culture, but that was too disturbing,” I say, as I regain my composure and she covers herself with a sweater.
Many of the Four staff are watching on a remote screen in the next room, and I can hear them laughing.
She attempts to muster some dignity by throwing her nose into the air and pretending the whole thing never happened.
“I’m so glad you’ve called, Cephas. I do hope this means you’re seeking the help you so desperately need.”
“Don’t waste my time, Jennifer. We both know the only thing I may need therapy for is what I witnessed just now.”
There’s more laughter from the next room.
How is it that this woman always brings out the worst in me?
“Fine. I trained you too well to play these games. Tell me what you know, and I’ll do the same.”
Somehow her return to her true personality is comforting to me.
“Here are the highlights,” I say. “The disease in Asia is a modified genetic toxin. It was created by a Christian group, of which Mom and Dad were members. When he was investigating the tube accident that killed them, Henry got his hands on it and completed its development. Once he’s vaccinated everyone else, the toxin will kill all Christians living off the grid, thus turning their greatest advantage against them. Your turn.”
She’s not in the slightest surprised that I have this information.
“Your father kept a journal, and I have it.”
The notebook that was stuck underneath the incubator.
“Henry even got the idea of putting the toxin into drinking water from your father. James was brilliant, he just had horrible taste in women. Your mother and her fish head friends led him into a conspiracy to commit mass murder, and now their plan is going to be turned against them.”
“Why would you give the journal to me?” I ask.
“Because even though it would serve them right, this all goes too far and I don’t want the deaths of millions of people to be our family legacy. No matter what you think, Cephas, the average atheist isn’t without a conscience. Most of our guiding principles are no different from those of other religions. We choose to do good things because we believe kindness and cooperation are in man’s self-interest - not because some spirit-being will throw us into a fiery pit if we don’t.”
“I’m glad you recognize atheism is a religion. That’s a start.”
“How interesting that you would choose to preach. I thought you hated preachy religions.”
She’s been watching my lectures.
“Send me the notes over this com signal?” I ask.
“Done,” she says, and the files begin to download.
“Anything else?” I ask.
“Believe it or not, I’m still proud of you, Cephas.”
“Believe it or not, I’m grateful to you, Aunt Jennifer. Whether you want to believe it or not, you played the role that God chose for you perfectly.”
She opens her mouth to respond, but thinks better of it.
“Goodbye for now, Cephas, though I’m sure we’ll meet again.”
She gives me the knowing smile I remember from my childhood.
It’s the look she’d give just before someone fell into one of her traps.
*****
Amelia arrives at Bethany House to a hero’s welcome, but gets little rest before she and the other scientists set to work analyzing the precious dose of vaccine and water samples. It seems like everyone takes to their tasks with new energy. The data team is sifting through even the smallest clues that might show the location of a vaccine production facility; Geoff and James work up tactical scenarios on how to raid such a facility, once it’s found; and Martha is watching over everyone - interspersed with naps and throwing up occasionally, which she blames on a stomach bug.
When they’re not working, the talk around Bethany House is focused on Michael’s journey. His path has continued north, with daily appearances in small lakes, streams, and even swimming pools. In yesterday’s newscasts, he was in Iowa, baptizing in small towns that sit along the Raccoon River. There are few explanations of how he’s avoided arrest; so we assume that years of criminal activity have taught him how - and when - to disappear.
Even more of a mystery is why his appearances haven’t been blacked out of the international news. The stories have even reminded viewers of Michael’s promise to baptize people in his hometown in South Dakota, so crowds have already started to gather in McIntosh to await his arrival. I’m certain that a fair number in the crowd work for the Corps, and Michael will have little chance to baptize in McIntosh Lake before he’s either arrested or forced to disappear again.
I’m sitting in the command center, when someone says: “Put it onto the big screen.”
The screen shows a long shot of Michael standing in Lake McIntosh, with a long line of people waiting to be baptized. The voiceover is an interview with a witness who claims that Michael appeared, standing in the lake where nobody had been standing only moments before.
The entire house is captivated by him, and within hours we estimate that he’s baptized one hundred. Hour after hour we watch him, tirelessly baptizing. He hugs each person and wishes them love and peace in Jesus Christ. I once told Jocie I could look inside her and see her soul, but now it seems that Michael’s the one with that gift. We see him look into people’s eyes and cry with them, and for them, as he tells them of Christ’s love for them and encourages them to sin no more.
“How did he do it?” I ask.
“Do what?” Martha replies.
“Yesterday, Michael was over three hundred kilometers from McIntosh. He can’t have walked that far overnight, and he can’t have taken a tube without being detected. So how did he get there?”
“Must everything be a puzzle with you, Cephas?” Martha asks. “He’s there, and he’s openly baptizing people while the world watches. Isn’t this exactly what we’ve always dreamed about? Why question it? It’s making you sound envious.”
Martha’s rebuke hurts, but I press on.
“Why hasn’t he been arrested?” I ask the room, but nobody answers.
“Look at the aerial shots of the town,” I continue. “Before he even arrived, McIntosh was quietly ringed with Federal agents.”
The screen switches to shots of the crowd.
“Computer, freeze the image,” I say; then walk to the screen.
“Cult hunter, cult hunter, cult hunter,” I say, as I point to the members of the Corps who are trying to blend in with everyone else, but sticking out to my eye. “Believe me, they have enough agents inside McIntosh to arrest him anytime they like.”
“There’s a ring of Christians around Michael at all times,” Cindi says. “Maybe the Corps is just waiting for a better opportunity. Maybe they want his arrest to be low profile.”
“The Federal site commander has threatened to arrest everyone inside city limits,” Geoff says. “The people being baptized just laugh. They know he can’t arrest thousands of people at once, and even if he could, they know life in Federal prison isn’t much different from life at home.”
“They’re missing an important fact,” I say. “The Corps is still allowing people to pour into McIntosh - but they’re not allowing anyone to leave.”
“The Corps is trying to get as many Christians as they can into one place,” James concludes. “They’re all stepping into some sort of trap that’s bound to end violently.”
“Get a message to McIntosh,” I say. “Tell them to keep a careful eye on the comings and goings at the municipal water supply.”
*****
If there’s anyone who doesn’t have enough to do, it’s me. I go through every word of my father’s notes, which Aunt Jennifer sent to me, and don’t come up with anything. In fact, there’s nothing in the notes about toxins or vaccines at all. I want badly to find some hidden message that dad left for me, but it just isn’t there. Most Christians begin teaching their children how to hide their religion before they can even speak. I know they couldn’t trust an eight-year-old with their plans, but why didn’t Mom and Dad trust me enough to tell me about their faith? If they had, maybe there would be something helpful I could dredge up from my childhood memories.
I’m reviewing Dad’s notes, when changes on another screen catch my eye. It’s the map of North America showing the general location of other Four houses. Normally, all of the houses are marked in green, with one occasionally switching to red when a house goes offline for maintenance. My attention was drawn first to a light switching to red near Dayton, Ohio, and then to another near Boston.
“James? Can you come here?”
He walks to the screen without a word, which is generally his way.
“Isn’t the house outside of Boston a big one?”
“Yes. It’s called Galilee House. Geoff’s been there, and he said it’s one of the best equipped houses he’s ever seen because half of their gear was thrown out by M.I.T. and Harvard.”
“Have you ever seen it go offline?”
“No. It has enough back-ups that if one computer needs maintenance, another would have automatically come online.”
“It’s offline now, and before that, the house near Dayton went red.”
As we watch, a light near Los Angeles flips from green to red, followed by one in Oregon, and then one in Georgia.
I look at James, hoping for answers.
“Those are all big houses,” he thinks aloud, as two more lights turn red. “They shouldn’t be going down.”
Geoff enters the command center.
“The main upload server just crashed. Five houses hit their panic buttons at the same time. What’s happening?”
“All we know so far is that seven large houses near major cities have gone down,” James says, as he continues to watch the map.
More and more people are coming into the room to discuss what could be causing the problem. Nobody notices, as I separate myself from the group. Their minds start to wrap around possible technical problems and they ignore me, knowing that I’m not on their technical level. As they brainstorm, Martha sees me sitting alone and breaks away from the discussion to see what I’m doing.
“Computer, bring up all files recorded in Shiloh house in the last five minutes before they hit the panic button,” I order through my com.
A file list comes up. It’s full of all the everyday things the people at Shiloh House were doing and saving. There’s nothing remarkable.
“Show me the last image recorded on each surveillance camera.”
Shiloh House has twelve cameras, most of which are around the perimeter, but three of which are inside the house itself. Shiloh must be located in a wooded area and there’s nothing to see on the last image anywhere outside. Inside the house, there are two cameras showing Four members in a control area. One seems to be running. The third inside camera shows a Four member sprawled on the floor - unconscious or dead.
“Run camera number eight backwards.”
The footage shows twenty seconds of the person lying on the floor, at which point we see a member of a cult hunter kill team stepping backwards over the body; followed by the Four member being shot at point blank range with a stunner. Prior to that, he was on his feet, with his hands raised in surrender. He was unarmed.
“Monitor our outside cameras!”
I yell it to no one in particular.
“The Corps is attacking those houses.”
My command to the group ends their technical discussion, but I give them a new task.
“Seven houses near major cities have been found by the Corps. Figure out how,” I say.
As the group returns to technical discussions, I try to think about the various theories that are being thrown around, but I can’t concentrate, with all of the voices speaking at once.
Is this my moment of darkness? Wait! Darkness…