“Later,” Cassidy said.
Alex sat beside Cassidy on the sofa and looked at James McCollum. “So? Lynx? Sphinx? Whoever you are, tell us…We’re all ears.”
***
“YaYa will be waiting to see you at the bottom,” Rose told Dylan as they neared the lift to go up the mountain.
“Grandma?”
“Yes?”
“How come Mom stopped skiing for so long?” he asked.
“Oh, well, I think that was probably because it reminded her so much of your grandfather,” she answered him. “Your mom never really told me why, and I never pushed her to keep going with it. She would go, but only when I made a point for us to come here.”
Dylan looked at his grandmother, his forehead crinkling as if he were in deep thought. “I wish I knew him.”
Rose smiled. She didn’t often talk about her husband with anyone, save Helen—not even Cassidy. It wasn’t because she didn’t think about him. She still missed him, but the end of their time together had been immensely painful and confusing for Rose. Jim McCollum had grown distant, at times even to Cassidy, although Rose was sure Cassidy did not remember that. He bordered on the line between what she considered to be depression and anger. Rose had struggled to understand what had happened to shift his personality so drastically. He had always been an even-tempered, fun loving man. When he began coming home smelling of alcohol, Rose had deliberately put some distance between them.
He went to the cabin often that last year before his death without his family. Cassidy never mentioned it, but Rose had come to believe that Cassidy did recall that fact. She suspected that was another reason that skiing and trips to Maine had become a point of sadness for her daughter for a long time. When Dylan came along, that slowly started to shift. And, when things in Cassidy’s marriage to Christopher O’Brien began to tumble into disarray, Cassidy began making trips to the cabin with Dylan for long weekends and school vacations. It was a place that held memories, both of solace and of sadness. It provided an escape for Cassidy when she needed it most, just as it had for her father.
Rose smiled at her grandson as they slid onto the seats of the lift. “Your granddad was an interesting guy,” she said.
“Am I like him?” Dylan wondered.
“A bit,” Rose answered.
She could not deny that she saw her husband reflected in both of her grandchildren, although Mackenzie favored him physically more than Dylan did. Cassidy had favored him when she was a baby as well. As Cassidy grew, she seemed to begin to look more and more like Rose. Rose often wondered if Dylan would come to resemble his father even more than he did currently later in life.
“He loved to build things like you do,” Rose said. “Loved puzzles too, and skiing. He would lose himself up on this mountain for hours on end skiing these slopes. To tell you the truth, I think that is the reason your mom loved it so much. She just loved being with him. You, on the other hand, love to ski.”
“I wish Mom was here,” Dylan said honestly.
Rose nodded. Cassidy had called early that morning. Rose knew that Cassidy had it in her head that Dylan was disappointed by Alex’s absence. She was certain that Dylan would have loved to have Alex with them, but on this trip, in this place, it was his mother he truly missed. She knew he was enjoying the weekend with his grandmothers, but it was not the same as it would have been had Cassidy been with them.
“Someday,” Dylan said as he looked out over the mountain, “I am going to ski Bear Claw with her.”
“I have no doubt of that,” Rose said. Dylan was already proficient on skis. It was one reason Rose had hesitated to take him on the more difficult trails. She was still an excellent skier, but she couldn’t deny that Dylan was close to surpassing her already.
“Ready?” she asked him. Dylan nodded excitedly as they approached the top of the mountain. “You know, your grandfather would have been very proud to see you on those skis ready to tackle this mountain.”
Dylan smiled proudly. “I wish he could see me.”
Rose felt her eyes begin to water. She wished he could too. “I’m sure he can, Dylan. Wherever he is, I’m sure he is watching over you.”
***
“What are you thinking?” Fallon asked Steven Brady. “There is something you aren’t telling me,” he surmised pointedly.
Brady looked back at the reports Jane had sent him on Rand Industries. Most of them consisted of lists of questionable meetings. Some contained company documents. A handful were transcripts of conversations that Tate had been able to acquire. It never ceased to amaze Steven Brady who and what the NSA could find a reason to listen in on. Things just were not sitting right with him. He’d learned a great deal in the last year about the program called Lynx—more than he wanted to know. Brady had never been one to need answers. He had chosen his profession to find the “bad guys” and put them away. Some people chased street thugs and drug dealers. Brady wanted to chase the people who fed the drug dealers and employed the street thugs. He wanted to find terrorists and wipe them out. He had always believed that his job was a noble one. In the last two years, he continued to accept orders and directives while he privately began to question the ethics and purpose of the cause he found himself supporting. He wasn’t sure he even knew what that cause was anymore.
“Brady?”
“Sorry,” Brady apologized for slipping away. “I just don’t get this. It doesn’t add up. The thing is, Fallon, one plus one can only ever equal two.”
“Uh-huh.”
“How is it that people always think they can somehow make it equal four?” Brady asked. Fallon shook his head. “Why are we looking at this shit? Who cares who met with Bob Gray? Hell, we met with Bob Gray. Who is he? Who does he answer to?”
“Isn’t that why we are looking at these?” Fallon suggested.
“No, I don’t think so,” Brady said. He noted the smirk on Fallon’s face. “Were you going to say anything?” he asked Fallon.
“Would it have done me any good?” Fallon returned. Brady sighed. “Someone wants to keep us from something,” Fallon said.
“Yeah, but what?” Brady said. “Jane had to know I would put it together eventually. She sent Alex to Gray, which means Gray is in some way taking directives from her.”
“Maybe she just wanted to buy a little time,” Fallon surmised. “I agree with you, but why? What was Cassidy’s father in to?”
“I’m not sure you’d believe me if I told you.”
“Try me.”
“Programming,” Brady said.
“Computers?”
“People,” Brady replied.
Fallon’s mouth open and closed several times. “You’re not joking,” he said. “MyoGen is part of that?” Brady nodded. “Rand?”
“Presumably,” Brady said.
“So? You think this has something to do with what Hawkins left there, don’t you?” Fallon asked. Brady tipped his head in acknowledgment. “What do you think it was?”
“Only one way to find out,” Brady said.
“I hate paperwork,” Fallon told him.
“See? We do have something in common. Feel like a little field investigating?”
“Who’s driving?” Fallon asked.
***
“I still don’t understand the relationship between Lynx and Sphinx,” Eleana said.
Edmond spoke. “You are confusing the men with the programs. Sphinx is both a program and a person. Lynx,” he looked across the room to McCollum. “Lynx is a program named after the man who founded it.”
“You,” Alex said to McCollum.
“Yes,” McCollum replied. He looked at Cassidy briefly and then back to Alex. “But,” he continued, “Lynx was only a continuation of existing programs.”
“You’re referring to MK-Ultra,” Krause surmised. “So, you decided to pick up where it left off?”
“There was no picking up, Jonathan. It never ended, only on paper. You know better than that,” McCollum said.
> “MK-Ultra?” Cassidy asked.
Alex turned to her. “It was a project the CIA began in the fifties.”
“Dare I ask?” Cassidy went on.
“It was the name of a project that served as the umbrella for hundreds of programs,” Alex said.
“What kind of programs?” Cassidy urged.
“The kind that messed with people’s minds,” Alex told her.
“It started as a way to address issues in the field. If an agent was captured or a soldier, how could we protect information? And, if we captured a soldier or an agent how could we extract information?” McCollum explained.
“Started? What did it end up as?” Cassidy asked bluntly. McCollum hesitated. He looked at Alex.
“Go on,” Alex said. “You have a captive audience.”
McCollum took a moment to center his thoughts. “If you can figure out how to get people to tell you anything or to tell you nothing, it stands to reason you could tell them what to do as well.”
“Don’t you already do that? Issue orders and whatnot,” Cassidy asked.
McCollum nodded. “Yes. But, people can say no. People can choose not to comply with orders, Cassie.” He took a deep breath and looked at Alex. “What would make the perfect spy? The perfect asset in the field?” he asked. Silence loomed as everyone waited for him to answer his own question. “The person who doesn’t know he is spying at all. The person who has information and doesn’t know the information she has,” he said. “You can’t divulge what you don’t recall.”
Alex shook her head. “You were trying to program people.”
“We weren’t trying,” he said.
Cassidy put her face in her hands. “This is…How is that even possible?”
“It’s possible,” Krause muttered. Eleana and Cassidy both looked at him. Krause sighed. “I’ve seen it. It’s possible.”
“Hypnosis?” Eleana asked. “What? Drugs?”
“Yes,” McCollum said. “And other things.”
Cassidy looked at her father in disbelief. He looked back at her regretfully. “What other things?” Cassidy asked.
“Cass,” Alex cautioned her wife. “You might not…”
“No, Alex. I want to know—right now.”
McCollum answered stoically. “Sensory deprivation, electric shock therapy, sensory overload, sleep deprivation…Do you want me to go on?” he asked. Cassidy shook her head in disgust.
“Who?” Alex asked.
“I can’t answer that,” McCollum said.
“You mean, you won’t,” Alex accused.
“No, I mean that I don’t know, Alex. At least, not as much as you think.”
“It was your program,” Krause said.
Edmond interceded. “No program belongs to any one person, Jonathan. Jim implemented the program at Major Waters’ request.”
“Jane’s father?” Cassidy asked.
“Yes,” Edmond answered.
McCollum continued. “My work was with agents and soldiers already assigned to duty in the field,” he said. “That is how it started.”
“Well, we all know nothing ends the way it starts, so what happened?” Alex asked.
“It showed promise. Essentially, we were able to program someone for a particular behavior, a specific assignment and embed a keyword to activate it.”
“This is ridiculous,” Cassidy interrupted. “This is why you left? What’s next? You are going to tell me that there is a space ship with aliens hidden in New Mexico?”
“No, there is nothing like that in New Mexico,” he replied evenly. “There are other programs housed there I am certain you would not approve of.”
Alex leaned into Cassidy. “Are you okay?” Cassidy shook her head. She was livid and having a difficult time believing most of what she was hearing. “If you…”
“No, go on,” Cassidy said.
“What happened to the program?” Alex repeated her question.
“The research was not mine, Alex. It belonged to the CIA. They began to expand it. They wanted to see if they could grow a crop. That’s what they called it—growing a crop, also known as SEED.”
“Of what?” Eleana asked.
“Assets,” McCollum replied.
“Agents,” Eleana said.
“No, not necessarily. I mean assets,” McCollum repeated.
“What’s the difference?” Eleana asked.
Krause looked at McCollum closely. “Not all for the field,” Krause guessed.
“No. Not at all. Some would be placed in policy making. Some would be put in business, banking, education, wherever the agency saw a need.”
“Why would you need to program people for education?” Eleana asked.
“Perception, Eleana,” McCollum reminded her. “Perception is everything. People will believe anything if they hear it enough, even a lie. If the person telling it has conviction? If he believes it is the truth? All the more people will believe it.”
“This is their pathway to war,” Eleana said quietly.
“It is the pathway to everything,” Edmond told his daughter. “War is part of it at times. To maintain control of a lie, you need a support network. Media, education, business, banking, and policy all play a role. What is in your textbooks? The truth or a version of that truth that leads you to a certain conclusion?” he asked. “Does the media beg you to ask questions or does it seek to give you the answers to the questions before you can even ask them? Would you invest in a lie if you knew that it was a lie?
“Jesus,” Krause muttered.
“What did you mean growing?” Alex turned the conversation. McCollum sighed.
Cassidy looked directly at her father. “They wanted to start on children,” she guessed. “Am I right? The earlier, the better.”
“Yes.”
Alex looked at Cassidy and then at McCollum. “What happened with The Collaborative?”
“For years, The Collaborative worked outside CIA boundaries. You have to understand that oversight was far stricter for many years. The CIA and the KGB, MI6, French and German Intelligence services all had their hands tied tighter than was required.”
“Required for what exactly?” Alex asked.
Edmond answered. “The biggest lie, Alexis.”
“Which was?”
“The Cold War. Don’t get me wrong, Communism is not something that we or most of our sister nations supported. It did provide what we needed. There has always been tension between Russia and the other nations in The Collaborative, but then, there has been tension amid all parties at different times. People get greedy,” Edmond observed. “They see ways to make a personal profit. That was initially one of The Collaborative’s objectives—keep the assets in line, both the human ones and the financial ones. If you want to sell a war, even a cold one, you have to pay for it. There needed to be a council if you will, that operated outside of oversight. It began small. Like all things, the more it acquired, the larger it grew, the greedier some people became.”
“And? The fracture?” Alex asked.
“Greed does funny things to people, Alexis. Some people in The Collaborative agreed with the CIA’s plans. Some even thought to take them further. We had an agreement, the five of us. Swore and oath, in fact, that we would do whatever was necessary to protect our families.”
“It was us, wasn’t it?” Alex guessed. “The children they wanted to use. It was us.” McCollum’s silence served as his acknowledgment.
“So you left?” Cassidy interjected hotly.
“Not immediately,” he told her. “And, not for the reasons you are thinking.”
“You have no idea what I am thinking,” Cassidy shot.
Alex took Cassidy’s hand and held it firmly to calm her. “Why leave?” Alex asked.
“The program started to spiral. It became so far reaching that Nicolaus could not even trace all of it. Everyone wanted a piece—everyone. Imagine a cadre of unassuming, loyal subjects to do your bidding, no matter what that might be,” McCollum sa
id.
Alex pinched the bridge of her nose forcefully. “So? You ran away.”
“You were right Alex, they wanted you. All of you. And, they were close. They had parts of my research, but I had the core. They had bits. I took the pieces with me when I went. It set them back far enough that Nicolaus was able to keep them at bay.”
“From us?” Alex asked. McCollum nodded. “But, it wasn’t perfect, was it? This SEED….”
“No, it wasn’t.”
“You’re leaving didn’t stop it, did it?” Alex challenged McCollum.
“It slowed it.”
“Who? Me? Cass? Jonathan? Eleana? Who? Claire?” Alex’s voice rose with each name she spoke.
“You and Cassidy were not subjected to anything. My death ensured that for her. Your father assured that for you and your younger brother.”
“Me?” Krause asked. McCollum offered him an apologetic grin.
“Jim?” Edmond called to his friend. “Claire and…”
McCollum looked at his old friend and shook his head. He turned his attention to Eleana. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I suspected about Claire. Until I spoke with her the other day, I never considered that you might have been dramatically affected. There are schools that subtly use program techniques. But, after hearing about Bill’s stories. Well, it seems, perhaps, that it is possible you did not choose this path entirely of your own will,” he told Eleana.
“What?!” Edmond’s voice blared through the room. “What the hell are you talking about? Nicolaus never told me….”
“Nicolaus didn’t know,” McCollum said. “He wasn’t even certain about Claire. By the time he learned about Jonathan it was too late. I can’t say how effective it was.” He turned to Eleana. “You were not with The Admiral constantly, and not under his care, but you were almost certainly exposed,” McCollum said to Eleana.
“Bill?” Edmond asked forcefully. “I’ll kill him!”
“ Il ya eu assez de tueries! (There has been enough killing)!” Eleana yelled at her father.
Edmond sat back, red-faced. Krause and Alex were both sure they had never seen Edmond Callier so furious. Alex took a deep breath. “And, Claire?”
“Most certainly,” McCollum said. “I fear it only got worse after her mother’s death. He sought to wipe that, replace it.”
Conspiracy (Alex and Cassidy Book 4) Page 27
