Blackwater Lights (18 page)

The rain slowed but didn’t stop. The spastic shivering had stopped, but the time he needed to rest between each painful move increased. He didn’t dare lie on his back—he was too weak to sit back up. Instead, he leaned against a wide tree, which provided cover from the lingering raindrops.

He could go no further. His arms were numb from his hands to elbows, and his shoulders felt disengaged from his torso, as if they’d been pulled out of their joints in a sadistic game of tug-of-war. His knee looked like a melon, and the gash in his buttock was caked with mud. He tucked his icy hands under his armpits.

Something crawled into his lap. It took him a long time to realize it was the cat—the scraggly orange cat, rat-skinny from the rain. It meowed at him, a sad cry, and settled down beneath the shelter of his heaving chest.

He wept until he no longer felt anything at all.

The pain returned—bone-deep aching. A radiating fire from his knee, which for some reason he couldn’t move. A heaviness of the body.

But where?

In a bed, in a room; a small, dark room. A fire in a woodstove, casting shadows. No
windows. Something crept up from between his feet, and the orange cat’s face appeared. It licked his eye, then the corner of his mouth.

“Off,” Ray whispered, his voice hoarse. The cat tilted its head, staring into his eyes.

“You should be nicer to him. He saved your life.”

Ray turned. The cat jumped off the bed. An IV line ran from a drip into his arm. A man sat in the shadows, leaning forward on a cane.

Micah, the old black preacher, in his absurd white suit. “Now, just relax, friend,” he said. “No one’s going to hurt you. We’re going to take care of you.”

Ray wiped his eyes. “What’s going on?”

Micah smiled broadly. “Soon, Ray. You need to sleep now.” He slid his warm, rough hand over Ray’s eyes. “Sleep. Close your eyes. Sleep now.”

As if unable to resist his command, Ray fell asleep.

When he awoke, he felt much better, and more conscious, but still sore all over. The preacher stood over him with his bodyguard, Mantu.

“You look much better,” the preacher said.

“I feel better,” Ray said.

“Mantu, get him some tea.” The younger man left the room. “You’re a very lucky man. You were dying. If your little friend hadn’t come running up to us, we might not have seen you.”

“I … thank you. But how did you find me?”

Micah sighed. “I’ve been trying to help you. I knew who you were getting involved with. So we have been keeping a very close eye on you.”

Mantu returned with a mug of tea and handed it to Ray. Its heat warmed his arms and spread to his chest.

“Anything else, Chief?” Mantu asked.

“No, but stay close.”

Mantu nodded. He left, closing the door behind them. Ray sipped the tea—it tasted like ginger, but earthier and more astringent. And spicy, like black pepper.

Micah pulled his chair close to the bed and laid his cane across his knees. The cane, black
wood, was capped with a lion’s head carved from white marble. “It would take me years to explain everything to you. And we don’t have much time. So I’ll let you ask questions, and I’ll do my best to answer them.”

Ray shook his head. “I’m not even sure what to ask. So much has happened.”

Micah nodded. “Indeed.”

“They were trying to get me. To take me back with them.”

“Yes. You are extremely valuable.”

“Because of what happened to me. When I was here, as a kid.”

“Yes.”

Ray breathed deeply. The tea was mellowing him. “What did happen, anyway? What makes me so important?”

Micah indicated that he should drink more tea. “That’s a very long story. But, very simply, you were used by some evil men to further their desire for knowledge. And power.”

“Government men?”

“A subset of the government. More like an exclusive club, really. Men interested in things outside the norm.”

Ray shivered in spite of the growing warmth from the tea in his chest. His eyes were feeling heavy. “But what did they do to me?”

Micah’s face tightened. “I’m not sure about the specifics. Most of what they were doing was never committed to paper, or if it was, the documents were destroyed long ago. From what we’ve been able to piece together, their primary goal was using children as conduits. For establishing contact. They used the tools of their time—drugs. Psychotronics. Ritualistic abuse techniques.”

Ray closed his eyes.

“There’s more we can discuss, but you need to rest. The tea will help you sleep.”

“Wait. Who are you? What are you?”

Micah smiled. “I’m looking for the Truth, like yourself.”

Ray’s eyes were closing of their own accord, but he forced them open. “I need to get out of here.” He suddenly wanted to see Ellen more than anything.

Micah looked at the floor.

“I can’t take this anymore. Any of it. I need to get back home. Away from here.”

Micah shook his head. “I’m afraid that’s not possible right now. Unfortunately, you’ve become a player in this game. You’re not safe from him anywhere. His reach is long.”

“You have no right to keep me here.”

Micah stood. “We’re keeping you here for your own safety. Crawford will hunt you down. You have no idea how much danger you’re in, my friend.”

“Oh, I know.” Ray lifted his right leg over the side of the bed, then his left. They had dressed him in baggy white pajamas. He tried to stand, but yelped as a bolt of fire shot up from his knee, and fell back onto the bed.

“Your knee isn’t broken, but you won’t be walking on it much for a few days. At least until the swelling goes down.”

Ray grimaced. “Look, I appreciate the fact that you saved my life. I do. But as soon as I can walk, I am getting out of here, getting in my car, and going back home.” And he’d grab Ellen and William on the way out, whether they liked it or not. His eyelids drooped, then closed. “I’m going
home
.” He was slurring. Damn, the tea was potent.

When he awoke, the fire in the stove was brighter. He felt light and free of pain. How long he’d slept he couldn’t guess. Hours, probably many hours. Someone had removed his IV and taped a square of cotton to his forearm. He hopped on his good leg to the bathroom. His urine was dark, like weak tea. Not good. He opened the medicine cabinet—nothing. Not even an aspirin. He hopped back to the bed.

The door opened and Mantu walked in.

“You feeling better?”

Ray nodded. “Never felt better. But I didn’t get a mint on my pillow.” Mantu sniffed and handed him a bowl of oatmeal. “Eat up. It’s good, man. Lots of nutrients.”

“Thanks.” He spooned a mouthful. Not bad. Cinnamon. “So what’s your deal, Mantu? You’re part of this thing, too?”

Mantu grunted. His arms were thick as bedposts, muscled and veined. “You could say that, sure.” He pointed to the bowl. “Finish your oatmeal.”

Micah entered and stood at the foot of the bed. “Well, you look much, much better, Ray. Alan worked on you while you slept. His qigong and poultices look like they stopped the inflammation.”

Ray rubbed his leg. His knee still hurt, but the pain was a magnitude less. And the swelling had nearly subsided. “Whatever he did, it worked.”

Mantu nodded. “Alan’s good. The best. We call him Dr. Qi.”

Ray ran his fingers along the cut in his buttock. It had already scabbed over. “Okay. You guys are good. I get it. I trust you. But I need to know what’s going on.”

Micah and Mantu exchanged glances. Micah’s eyes narrowed. “Word has come to us that Sheriff Morton is looking for you.”

“Morton? For what?”

Micah’s rheumy eyes reflected the orange glow from the fire. “A young woman has gone missing. Morton has pictures of you with her. Pictures that would put you away for a very long time. Crawford plays for keeps, Ray. That’s why we’re trying to help you.”

Ray’s fists clenched. “But there’s a woman in town … who I got involved with. I have to make sure she’s okay. I need to know she’s okay.” He wasn’t sure it made sense, but he was worried about her. Intensely.

Micah sat on his chair and pulled it closer to the bed. “We have no indication he’s after anyone but you. But just in case, let us know who this woman is and we’ll keep an eye on her.”

“Her name is Ellen Davis. She works at the diner. She has a kid named William. So who’s going to be watching her?”

“Our associates. The same ones who kept an eye on you. The ones who let us know you were probably lost somewhere in the woods, if you hadn’t drowned.”

Ray shook his head. “I hope you’re telling the truth. Because I can’t let anything happen to her—it’s my fault she got mixed up in this. I need to see her. Or talk to her.”

Micah grabbed Ray’s hand. His grip was almost painful. “I’m trying to explain to you how much danger you’re in. He will follow you. If he follows you and you go to her, you will lead him right to her. Is that what you want—to take him directly to her? I can’t even begin to tell you the horrible things he’s done to people who make him angry. If you get up and walk out of here now, the best thing you can hope for is that Morton will find you first and throw you in jail and deliver you to Crawford after he’s done with you. And that’s the
best-case
scenario. Is
that what you want?”

“Then what am I supposed to do? What are my options?”

Micah exhaled loudly. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? You don’t
know
?”

Mantu walked to the foot of the bed. “It’s an honest answer.”

Ray rubbed his eyes with his fists.

Micah nodded. “I won’t lie to you, Ray. You deserve the truth. When I first saw you, I felt something stir. For whatever reason, for whatever purpose, your arrival set in motion a chain of events that is now moving faster than we could have foreseen. Faster than we can predict.”

“You’re saying it’s my fault that all this is happening?” Denny had called him a catalyst, as if his mere presence had started a chemical reaction bubbling. Maybe he was right.

“No, of course not. But you’ve
accelerated
things. The vipers are stirring. You poked their nest with a stick, and they’re agitated and angry because they’ve lost control.”

Ray closed his eyes. His teeth scraped and his head throbbed. “What am I supposed to do? What can I do?”

“You can help us find some answers to our questions. And we can help you find answers to yours.”

“Fine.” He’d go along. He owed them.

Micah stood and faced the stove. “Let’s start with what we know. It was the height of the Cold War, and if you knew the right people you could get funding for almost anything. Uncle Sam was throwing untraceable money at all sorts of projects, and there was a lot of interest in esoteric matters in those days—the supernatural, witchcraft, extrasensory perception, and the like. The military was at the center of that interest.”

Ray nodded. “My uncle—Uncle Bill, the guy who took me to the camp—was into all that. Uri Geller and Kreskin and bending spoons. He tried to get me to bend a spoon with my mind. I couldn’t do it, and my mom thought he was nuts. But he was serious.”

“Many people were serious about those things. Including the governments of the U.S. and the Soviet Union, and both of them thought the other was gaining the advantage. And factions
within
the governments were obsessed with the pursuit of occult knowledge. In particular, the MKULTRA and BLUEBIRD contingents. And the remote viewers at Fort Meade. Project ONE. And MIRROR, of course.”