The Conduit: Chapter 7

Research becomes exciting when you’re close to a discovery. The words sounded good in the head of Jonas Quinn, an archaeologist working on his doctorate. As he filled in for the professor, he struggled to figure out how to turn from student to lecturer. It wasn’t part of his plan to teach, not at this point in his life. Jonas wanted to be in the field, finding artifacts and researching their history. The world of an archaeologist sounded fun, even exciting, but he’d only been on two digs during his years at the university and had yet to find anything important.

He was in charge of a class because of his skill at uncovering mysteries, but most of those were things he’d researched from history, local lore, and stories of boogeymen around the world. Every culture throughout history was filled with stories. Jonas learned many of them as a child, being dragged around the world by his parents. That was what he longed for: the dirty encampments, the different climates, and the traveling around on someone else’s dime.

Feeling awkward in front of a large crowd, especially one filled with hormone-filled college girls lusting after his attention, he didn’t enjoy public speaking. He went off script from the lecture and asked if the students had anything they wanted to discuss. Most of them knew he’d been in the field a few times and had grown up as a legacy.

As he started to talk about a dig in Egypt, the most important dig site he ever visited, two men walked into the room. Jonas continued talking about what it was like to be there when they discovered Pacal’s Sarcophagus. As he described how they found the mysteriously carved piece of history, the two men walked down the steps of the lecture hall to the front of the room.

The first man, an older, balding gentleman with short-cropped red hair, stopped at the professor’s desk. He unfolded his identification and asked if he was Jonas Quinn.

“Maybe,” Jonas answered nervously.

“Sir, I’m afraid I’m going to need a straight answer,” the man told him.

A hush came over the lecture hall, as several of them whispered to each other. The students were all abuzz over the man with a badge wanting to talk to their guest lecturer for the day. As the kids chattered amongst themselves, Jonas stammered, caught off guard by the intrusion.

“So, what’s this about?” he asked the two men.

“You are Jonas Quinn?”

“Yeah, that’s me,” answered Jonas.

“Sir, I’m afraid I’m going to need you to come with us,” announced the man with the badge.

Jonas read the identification, but what the Federal Bureau of Investigation wanted with him escaped Jonas. He nervously stood with his hand on the podium. Jonas asked why he was there.

“Somebody important needs to see you,” answered the agent.

“Who would that be?”

“Unfortunately, we can’t tell you that until we can speak in private. Um…it’s classified, sir,” explained the lead agent.

Jonas chuckled at the idea that he was needed for anything classified. While he sarcastically told the students his past filled with digging in the dirt and sand caught up with him, Jonas had a history. He’d been in search of things that were of high value to collectors, and not all of them were the type to worry about the laws in different countries. Those encounters led him to more than one bar fight in different countries, as well as a couple of gun fights in South America.

He gathered his things and offered to come with them. When the two men didn’t attempt to put him in restraints, he relaxed about going on this trip with them. Jonas excused the class as he followed the men out of the lecture hall and through the halls to a car waiting for them. When they opened the door for him, Jonas began to take the matter more seriously.

“So, boys, tell me why I’m being escorted out of a university lecture by two FBI agents.”

“We don’t know much, sir. Only that Senator Jameson has subpoenaed you,” explained the agent. “Now, we have a drive in front of us. If you don’t mind.”

It took an hour for the limousine carrying Jonas and the two agents to get to the Pierre Marquette Hotel. Agent Standard, the older of the two, exited and opened the door for Jonas to get out. He instructed the second agent to stay with the car. As they entered, Agent Standard guided Jonas to the hotel lobby, past the front desk, and to the elevators. He pressed the button and stood waiting, his hands clasped in front of him.

“So, you really don’t know what this is about?” asked Jonas, getting nervous over the extraordinary way he was taken from the university and brought to a meeting with a United States Senator.

“No sir, I’m not cleared to know anything more than I needed to bring you to meet the Senator.”

The doors opened, and Agent Standard motioned Jonas to enter. When he followed Jonas into the elevator, Agent Standard had a key that granted them access to the penthouse floor. The doors closed, and Jonas let out a sigh as he disappeared behind them.

Ocean breezes washed over the men working the decks of the Oceanic. The warm South Pacific Sun was a welcome sight to behold after a few sleepless hours in his office. Max pressed pause on the screen in front of him. His eyes were tired and droopy. He hadn’t slept since yesterday, which was unusual for the station commander.

The houseguest surprised Max when she called him by his last name. Commander Shepherd, she’d called him. Neither he nor the men stationed on the detention level wore tags with their names. None of the escort team had identifying markers or name tags. They surrendered those before they made an illegal crossing into Afghanistan, before they found the girl in the rubble and carnage that was once a village full of people.

He'd spent the last couple of hours going over surveillance tapes of her time on the Oceanic, from the moment she was brought off the sub until he spoke with her. The way they brought her in was under a new definition of sensory deprivation. With the black cloak over her head, noise cancelling headphones secured to her ears, her hands and feet shackled tightly, there was no way she heard anyone call him by name. On the detention level, it was always the title of officer, doctor, soldier, or commander. Those were the names everybody used; he was certain of it.

Max began to wonder if there was more to Jane Doe than he’d been told. He sent a message to the group’s secure chat, requesting additional background information. They hadn’t responded yet. As he sat there, rubbing his eyes, a seemingly familiar scent overtook his senses. He was still awake but heard the voice of his mystery woman.

‘You don’t have to worry. I’m not going to hurt you,’ she promised as he looked frantically around his office.

Max wanted to believe his brain was playing tricks on him. He was exhausted, kept up by this mysterious woman visiting him in his bed, invading his space, and disappearing. The thoughts of Jane knowing who he was had plagued him. Max was caught up in it, trapped by the peculiar circumstances of all. Ever since learning of the girl's existence, even before he knew she was just a girl, the strange appearance of his mystery lover had robbed him of sleep. Now, with the stress of finding out where Jane came from hanging over his head, the lingering concern about the military coming to retrieve the ghost ship docked at the first markers, and the nightly experiences he was going through, had he hit a point he needed to rest?

“What the hell is going on?”

In his head, her voice echoed. She was lonely and had found a way to reach out to him. She didn’t understand how she could do what she did, only that she needed someone to talk to, to know that she wasn’t alone.

“Where are you?” he asked.

‘It’s dark here. I can’t see anything,’ she answered him. Max heard the words; still looking for where they were coming from, he got up and walked around the office. He felt crazy talking to a voice in his head. If it wasn’t real, then he was suffering from some kind of psychotic breakdown. If it were, he feared it was something worse.

Max sat in his chair, staring at his desk. Why me, he wondered. When the voice answered, he was convinced he was losing it.

You’re not crazy, he heard the voice say. It promised that it was real and reached out to him because there was something special about him. Max couldn’t imagine what made him any different than anyone else. Then, he hears the voice tell him, because of the darkness he feels inside him.

“So, if I’m not crazy, who are you? Do you have a name?”

She laughed, a sound he swore he could hear bellowing through his head like echoing laughter in a great but empty hall. Max looked annoyed at the chuckling he was forced to listen to, wondering why she found it so amusing. If she was real, it would feel like she was playing with him. Max didn’t find it funny, and didn’t consider violating his mind a game. He slammed his fist on the desk, thinking loudly, almost overpowering the sounds of her voice.

She told him that she was known by many names, then called him by his full name, Maxwell Shepherd. And I know you better than anyone around you, including those things that haunt you in your sleep.

“Prove it,” he challenged her and the circumstances.

After a moment of silence, he was reminded of his first tour in Afghanistan with the special forces’ detachment. You don’t like to remember the faces of those you killed, do you Max? Particularly those faces from the Pashwari Province. Of course, why would you want to remember the worst thing you have ever been forced to do? You still see her face when you close your eyes, even after all these years. She looked so scared, so frightened as you and your men closed in on the man holding her hostage. That little girl was far too young to understand he was a very bad man, and he held her as a human shield.

“I did what I had to do,” he said aloud.

Did you? The voice in his head laughed at the notion after asking. It made him remember the mission, as he and four others approached the village on a kill-or-capture mission to apprehend a known terrorist. One of the villagers took off running, and his team pursued the man into the woods. As they were closing in on their target, a little girl ran in front of the man, allowing him to grab her by the arm and use her as a bargaining chip. When the man turned to face them, threatening to kill the girl, the intelligence officer with the team confirmed it was their target, Abdu Fayed.

“What else could I have done?”

The words were simple as they echoed through him, giving him a chilling reality he fought to live with. You could have spared the girl. But what did you do? You dammed that little child to hell, didn’t you?

“What’s this got to do with anything?”

The darkness within the station commander was what called to her. His soul screamed for help, and she was there to ease his pain. They were both children of darkness, explained the voice in his head.

“I should have pulled the trigger,” he sighed.

You would have killed them both. But instead, he got away with the girl, condemning her to hell. That’s why you see her face when you close your eyes. That’s why you have nightmares, even all these years later. You failed to protect her from what that man would do to her.

Max’s heart started racing. His breathing was heavy, and a tear streaked down his cheek. The memories of that mission had haunted him for so long. He’d never spoken to anyone about what happened outside of his team. He never really had the chance.

Maxwell, what happened to your team? You remember them, right? Eagle, Falcon, Hawk, and Sparrow. They felt it, too. But they never got to deal with their confusion over that call. You all kept it secret from your commanders. Then, they were sent out on a mission while you were recovering from the bullet that caused your shoulder to ache.

Max remembered his team. He felt guilty for them being out there on their own. He’d carried that with him as long as the memory of that girl in Afghanistan. Max began to sob as he heard his mystery woman’s voice echoing in his head.

You wanted to die with your men! The voice bellowed, echoing through his office.

“Yes!” dammit. “I wanted to be with them, to be free of all this.”

That was why she reached out to him. She could feel his pain halfway around the world. She promised she understood because she, too, was in great pain. With her soft and sultry words, she somehow made Max feel comforted. As he listened, he felt her warmth surrounding him, enveloping him from within. As strange as the sensation was, as much as hearing her voice in his head freaked him out, he was suddenly feeling comforted by her presence in his life.

The penthouse of the Pierre Marquette was used by presidents, dignitaries, celebrities, and chief executives. Today it was being used by Senator Jameson for an off-the-books meeting with Jonas Quinn. Jonas sat across from David Jameson, sipping from a glass and reading through a file. The admissions made by the presidential hopeful were unheard of. But the file in front of him showed Jonas everything he needed to believe what the second-term politician was saying.

Senator Jameson told Jonas about the group and their activities. They held power, more power than Jonas fully understood. Not one of them could act alone. Their missions were so complex that politicians, financiers, and industry leaders were needed to facilitate their forward-thinking goals. And in this case, they were thinking about the most powerful person on the planet.

The group referred to the person of power as a conduit, but a conduit to what? Even Senator Jameson didn’t understand what was on the other side of such awesome power. After years of searching, of researching and interpreting ancient texts, they believed the clues to the conduit’s identity were to be found in a mysterious cavern. David promised that if Jonas signed on with them, he would get Jonas exclusive access to a site believed to be the cavern of the conduit.

“There’s a witness,” David announced. “She’s being detained at a black site.”

“The girl found in Afghanistan,” suggested Jonas. “What did she see?”

David admitted he didn’t know how much the girl could tell them, but when the team was sent to retrieve her, she was found in the middle of a wrecked village, a place of death. Everyone in the village was slaughtered. Their bodies were unrecognizable. There were no signs of a troop engagement, and no tracks going in or out of the area.

“That doesn’t tell me much. They could have landed a bird there, then left the same way,” Jonas explained.

“Sure,” admitted David. “That’s possible, but here’s the satellite coverage. You’ll notice the heat signature coming out of the side of the mountain.”

Jonas looked at the images. A single thermal signature was in the center, coming out of the highest point in the range. The area was known for rough terrain, and the mountain peak was more than ten thousand feet. As he studied the imagery, he saw what David saw. Someone was climbing down the side of the mountain.

“Where’d she come from?”

David pointed to a final set of images. One was taken days before the thermal imagery showed someone coming down the mountain, and one was taken after the retrieval team found the girl. The terrain had changed.

“Was this after the earthquake?”

“It was twenty-four hours later.”

David asked Jonas if he would take the job. They offered to fund excavating the cavern that opened during the quake, the same cavern that appeared hours before the thermal signature appeared on the satellite images. The group would buy any findings from the excavation.

“I’m in,” Jonas said, deciding the opportunity was intriguing enough he couldn’t pass it up.

“Great,” David said, letting out a sigh of relief. “But here’s the thing. You’ll report back to me. I’ve got plans, and I need to know that my connection to the group isn’t endangering them. Do you understand?”

Jonas understood him fully. David was worried about what the group’s intentions truly were. He’d tied his horse to a shadowy group, thinking he was doing the right thing for his future. And now, the presidential hopeful wasn’t sure.

“There’s a plane waiting to take you to the coast. From there you’ll meet up with the rest of the team,” announced David.

“Rest of the team?”

David explained how he’d already arranged for guides, experienced climbers, and all the equipment. They’d be able to get underway as soon as they were in the area. All the permits had been arranged, and the resources needed were already being transported to the base of the mountain.

“Alright then,” Jonas said, shaking hands with the senator. “I’ll let you know what we find.”