As always, Wendy seems to know we’re coming before we arrive. As we approach, I can see her behind the house, standing next to a pile of empty water bottles that Brill sent. This time she’s baked a variety of potential wedding treats for us to sample. Martha digs in like I’ve never seen her eat before, but I’m not hungry. Bill helps himself to a plate loaded with sweets, despite Wendy’s disapproving look.
“You’re positively glowing today, dear,” Wendy says to Martha.
Martha pauses for a moment, reflecting on the observation.
“I know why you and Bill want to be married,” Martha says. “Everything’s better when you feel like you’re right with the Lord.”
“Yes, I’m sure that’s what it is,” Wendy replies, then turns to me.
“Marriage doesn’t seem to be making you glow today, Cephas. Is something troubling you?”
“Yes, something is troubling me very much. We came into possession of a classified report about the tube accident that killed my parents.”
Bill stops eating. Wendy gives him a sideways glace.
“Bill, I read the files you gave me on the accident. Your files included a detailed description of every passenger on the car, right down to where it’s thought everyone was sitting before the car imploded and they were all shredded to little bits.”
Bill gets a faraway look in his eyes - but says nothing; so I continue.
“It must have been pretty hard on the forensics team: a little bit of you mixed with a little bit of me - like a human meat grinder. Is that why your files are missing an entire person? Why don’t you tell me about Angela?”
Wendy already knows what I’m talking about, but Martha is puzzled.
“Angie was my sister. She was killed along with your parents; but that’s not who you want to talk about, is it?”
“What’s this all about?” Martha asks.
“This is all about my great-grandfather, the creator of targeted genetic toxins,” Bill replies. “You know him as the man whose work killed over three billion people around the world.”
“Mitchell the Monster?” Martha says. “He was tried and given the death penalty in absentia in eighteen countries.”
“He was no monster. His system was designed to carry gene-targeted medicines, not toxins. He changed his name and spent the rest of his life trying to help the few who survived the toxin. Somewhere in there, he became a Christian and went to his grave expecting to be thrown into hell for eternity. I’d say he even welcomed it - like eternal torture would somehow atone for his creation.”
“Maybe it’s not too late for him to atone,” I say. “Our government is working on a new generation of his work. Did your great-grandfather leave any notes after he left government service? Any secrets that will allow us to counteract this new toxin?”
“You’re the historian, Cephas. You know the world wanted to bury its dead and its past. So that’s what he did. I just wish everyone in my family had felt the same way.”
“I have a feeling I know what’s coming next,” I say.
“Do you? Are you so sure?” Bill asks.
“Your sister, my parents, and a bunch of other Christians were all on the same tube car,” I say. “That wasn’t a simple prayer meeting. It was something big. I think it was Christians who were fed up and wanted to do something. I’m betting they wanted to do something with your great-grandfather’s gene-targeting delivery system.”
“Never,” Martha bursts in. “They were Christians. Christians would never release a weapon designed to kill millions.”
How I wish that were true.
“I believe your sister created the new version, with my mother’s help,” I say to Bill. “She thought her path to redeeming your family was to wipe out the atheists who modified and unleashed your great-grandfather’s invention. An eye for an eye.”
“I’ll admit; Angie had a twisted sense of redemption.”
“My family tree has some rot too, because my parents were mixed up in the plan,” I say. “One of them must have had the data on the car with them and Henry found something in the wreckage that tipped him off. He searched your sister’s house, and found her notes, and recreated the work. I’m sure he loves the irony of it all.”
“Just stop it!” Martha bursts in again, and Wendy places her hand on top of Martha’s to calm her. “There’s just no way a Christian group was planning genocide.”
“How about the cold-blooded killing of one individual? Would it be okay if the reason was righteous enough?” I ask Martha.
“No. Of course not.”
“When you were recruited to move to Colorado Springs and get near to me, you told Brill it might be best to eliminate me for all the things I’d done to hunt Christians. You even offered to do the job. I killed a man in Bethany just for looking at you the wrong way. Am I any different from my parents?”
“It’s not the same. You’re talking about genocide.”
“Some might say it’s easier to kill a million with your eyes closed, than to kill just one, while watching as the lights go out of their eyes forever.”
Everyone sits in silence for a while. No one is hungry for wedding treats anymore.
“Did your sister ever tell you their plan?” I ask Bill.
“They were an apocalypse cult. They planned to vaccinate everyone who believed in Christ and unleash the toxin on everyone else. They were planning a small production facility that would go unnoticed - maybe just a quarter million doses per year. It was going to take them years of secretly vaccinating Christians before they could release the toxin. She had drawn up plans, but was killed before the facility could be built.”
“But not everyone was on board with the plan; so probably either Garai’s uncle or Aislin took them all out and thought the technology died with them,” I say. “But that leaves some unanswered questions: where did they plan to secretly produce the vaccine, and is the site still there?”
*****
The log cabin once again becomes our headquarters, and we spend the next week searching all leads around the world that might tell us where Henry is producing either the vaccine or the toxin. He knows Christians will eventually become desperate enough to steal the vaccine from him; so he’s quickly learned to give us no electronic clues that would reveal his plan.
I spend a portion of my time searching through decades-old documents that might give a clue as to where my parents - or those who died with them in the accident - planned to hide a vaccine production facility. I dig into the life of everyone who died alongside my parents, with no success.
This time, there isn’t going to be a staff with Roman numerals carved into it to point the way.
Zip is also staying busy. After the success of her initial assaults, the Corps withdrew its people to safe houses, and now uniformed cult hunters are only seen in public as fully armed, ten-member kill teams. First, Zip ambushed three of those teams and wiped them out without losing anyone. Then, when public patrols stopped, she bombed a safe house with a kill team inside. Zip’s not interested in taking prisoners.
Each time Zip attacks, the plague responds with another major jump. It spread across the major islands of Indonesia, where it hit all the larger population centers, but spared many of the smaller islands. When Zip massacred three kill teams in two days, the plague appeared first in Malaysia, then in the Philippines. When the safe house was bombed, the plague jumped many kilometers of ocean to hit isolated cities in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand. Henry is also not interested in taking prisoners.
I’m reading a new report from Amelia, while Martha sleeps on a small bed on the far side of the cabin. In the report, Amelia disputes the official projections regarding death toll. She thinks there’ll be one million dead in the city of Makassar alone. With the entire island affected, she’s now able to leave the city; but when she attempts to travel to the smaller towns and villages, she’s turned away at knifepoint. People in the isolated areas are all healthy and fear that outsiders will bring the plague to them.
Why would Amelia, and people in isolated places, be spared?
“The toxin is being distributed through the water supplies,” I say aloud, waking up Martha.
“What?” Martha yawns and rubs the sand from her eyes.
“Henry can’t use airborne distribution because he needs to control the spread to make it look like a disease. The easiest way to do that is to put the toxin into the water. It would explain why villages outside the city water supplies aren’t getting sick. Amelia’s a tourist; so she’s probably drinking bottled water.”
Martha sits up.
“So what do you want to do?” she asks.
The afternoon sun is shining in on her and she looks radiant.
“We need a water sample. We need to stop this, and we need to get proof and show the world who’s behind it.”
It’s not just the sun that’s making Martha look radiant. She seems to be actually glowing.
Martha sighs.
“You’re the only person in history who got to see it twice, and still witnessing the miracle of Christ’s life hasn’t taught you anything. You’re like one of the masses who followed Jesus in order to get a free meal of fish and bread, rather than to hear His words.”
I feel like a child who’s been lectured to, complete with hurt expression.
“Don’t worry about the toxin, Cephas. That’s a puzzle you’ve already solved.”
“Already solved? Martha, what are you talking about?”
“Do you remember what Christ said to you in the garden? He said your moment will be the time when the power of darkness reigns. He needs you to start a fire to pierce the darkness. That’s the true puzzle for you to solve.”
“Martha, I don’t understand.”
“It’s hard to see the puzzle when you’re one of the pieces, Cephas. Have faith that He wouldn’t set a task before you if He hadn’t first given you the strength to complete it. Speaking of which, shouldn’t you be working?”
Martha nods to the cabin’s fireplace, which has been lit and is burning fiercely. On the hearth I see a hammer, tongs and a familiar piece of metal; so I pick them up and start working the metal like a blacksmith. The piece is almost round, and I start hammering the glowing end to form it into a point. I remove it from the fire and dunk it into a bucket of water, resulting in a loud hiss; then remove it to admire my work.
It’s still glowing brightly near the head end where it should be cool, and when I look at it, the spot is glowing in the shape of a large letter “C.”
A “C” for Christ. I’m forming the nails that will hang Him on the cross.
I drop the nail and it hits the hearth with a loud clang.
I wake with a start, my heart pounding fiercely. Martha is still asleep on the bed, with the afternoon sun shining on her. I had fallen asleep at the desk, with my head down on the report Amelia sent from Indonesia. I scan it and realize that the conclusion I reached in the dream is accurate: The toxin is in the water supplies.
Was that a dream, or a vision?
I have little time to think about it, because Martha screams: “Cephas!” in her sleep; then bolts upright in bed, looking like she’s seen a ghost. She realizes that she was dreaming and runs to me, holding onto me with a grip like death.
“Do you remember our wedding vows?” she asks.
I’ve never heard Martha’s voice sound frantic before.
“Of course I do.”
“You vowed we’d always stand side by side, no matter what. Your joy is my joy; your pain is my pain. Remember? Did you mean it?”
“Every word. What did you dream?”
“I was at Bethany House and I couldn’t find you; but I could hear you screaming in pain. I got to the old door where I hung the “Beware of monsters” sign, and I could hear you behind it. I opened the door and inside was a torture chamber. You were being tortured and I wanted to help you, but you wouldn’t let me. You took all the torture, even though I was begging you to share it with me. You broke your vow. Promise me we’ll always stand together, no matter what.”
I hesitate, trying to put our respective dreams together.
What’s behind that door anyway?
She grabs my face to look into my eyes.
“Promise me!” she says.
“We were married in the name of Jesus. He brought us together and we’ll stand together - as long as that’s the Lord’s Will,” I say.
I hope to see the fear drain from Martha’s eyes, but it doesn’t. She puts her head on my chest and holds me limply.
“Cephas?”
“Yes, Martha?”
“You’re not going to keep that vow.”
I start to move back so I can look into her eyes, but she clings tighter. She doesn’t want to look into my eyes right now. I feel a warm, wet tear hit my arm.
“You’re going to leave me,” she says. “The only thing Henry wants more than ending Christianity is to get his hands on you. You’re going to sacrifice yourself.”
“You’ve been inside my mind, Martha. You know I’ll sacrifice myself to protect you and the baby that’s growing inside you.”
Now it’s my tears that are hitting her arm.
“Cephas Paulson, I love you - but are your powers of observation going to ruin every surprise I plan for you for the rest of my life?”
She’s half laughing and half sobbing. Now she backs off and looks me in the face with red and puffy eyes.
“Yes, I think perhaps they are,” I say, “but maybe I’ll be able to surprise you, from time to time, instead. Have you figured out her name yet?”
“It’s too early to start picking out names…”
Martha’s head snaps up to meet my eyes.
“Wait! Why’d you say ‘her’ name?”
“Surprise! Remember the presence you felt during the return time travel that I couldn’t sense? She was only a few days old. No heartbeat, no neurons. Your experience is testimony to the fact that we receive a soul at the very beginning. She was probably only about eight cells, and yet she could feel your memories, and she named herself ‘Jocie’ from them.”
“Jocie.” Martha repeats back to me. “It’s perfect.”
*****
When we return to Bethany House, most of the staff in the command center are watching the latest report on Michael. We have no idea how he managed to escape the Corps in England without help from Four, but we’re glad he’s here - spreading both the good news of Christ - and hope. Since appearing in New Orleans, he’s popped up here and there in small southern towns, baptizing people. Reports of his appearances make the news, but he always seems to disappear before he’s arrested. We’ve started a map of where he’s been reliably sighted. He’s moving in a zigzag pattern through the south, but seems to have an overall northerly track. I have no doubt he intends to fulfill his promise to baptize in McIntosh Lake.
There’s only one screen that has my attention though, the one at Amelia’s station, as I wait for her prearranged call time. It’s been hours since I realized the toxin is distributed through municipal water supplies. What if this call is too late? I imagine Amelia waiting by the computer for the call time to arrive, and looking at the faucet in her room - thinking she’s thirsty.
The icon only blinks once before I select it and Amelia’s face appears on the screen. I scan her features and exhale when I see she’s fine.
“You look stressed, Cephas. Is everything okay?”
“It is now. Just do me a favor and don’t drink the local water. That’s how the Corps is distributing the toxin: through the water. That’s why people living in the villages have been spared.”
“That makes sense for them, but I must have been exposed. The food is prepared in tap water; I brush my teeth with tap water; and I’m sure I’ve used the water fountains here in the hotel. How did I escape?”
“Maybe you got there too late. Maybe the system had flushed itself out, or it’s only effective for a short time after it’s put into the water. I don’t care how you escaped. Don’t drink the water.”
“Soon, we’ll all be able to drink without fear,” she says. “Look at the notice I received.”
She forwards a notice that came in over her com, telling her she’s scheduled to receive her dose of vaccine tomorrow.
“The hacked com I’m using says I’m a registered woman named Clara Clayton. I was caring for Clara when she died last year; so Four buried her and kept her identity alive. The system tracked her as being on vacation here, so her dose was automatically shipped to meet her.”
“Won’t someone watch you take it?” I ask.
“I doubt it. The cult hunters have mostly pulled out to cover other hot spots. Even if they do, watch what I’ve been practicing.”
She shows me a white pill in her right hand, which she raises and lets the pill drop into her mouth. She swallows; then opens her left hand to reveal the pill.
“Are you sure you want to do that?” I ask. “If you take that dose, you’ll be protected. This could be your only chance.”
“My mind is made up, Cephas. Once they record Clara as vaccinated, I’ll be cleared to travel, and I’m bringing it back to Bethany House for analysis. There’s really no choice.”
That’s one heck of a big hit to take.