by Joseph Nagle
Claims?
An inaudible response came in return, Michael couldn’t hear what was said to the soldier, but the man must have received his orders, because he started to move carefully closer to where Michael sat.
Michael could see more clearly now, the man was a Military Policeman (MP) and he had company. Behind him were two other MP’s dressed in full riot gear and holding gas operated, air cooled M4A1 carbine short barreled assault rifles in a firing position; their fingers were on the triggers. Michael was unnerved and getting really tired of having had so many weapons pointed at him in one day.
Sighing and succumbing to the need to be patient, he sat back with his arms outward and awaited further confirmation that he was, indeed, still Michael.
The MP had already passed through the door and was hovering in front of Michael. The MP placed his weapon in its holster on the right side of his body, but only after the other two well armed soldiers joined him inside the plane. They were standing to either side of the first MP, and with their weapons still aimed directly at Michael. Each man had a hardened look in his eyes that clearly stated they would pull the trigger without hesitation. The first MP quickly patted Michael down; satisfied that Michael had told the truth and had no weapon, the MP stood up and removed another weapon from a holster on the opposite side of his body and pointed it directly at and only inches from Michael’s face.
Fear rippled through Michael as he threw his hands higher into the air, “What the hell!”
“Relax, sir, I am just going to scan your eyes for identification confirmation. It won’t hurt a bit.” Green beams of intersecting lasers emanated from the device’s wide barrel, scanning the individual trademarks of Michael’s retina. The small hand held machine quickly returned with what must have been a positive ID, because the MP replaced the device to its holster and said, “Welcome home, sir, I hope you enjoyed the ride.”
“Thanks. I love it when it’s done military style; nothing like having a weapon pointed in your face to say “welcome back.” Reminds me of some family reunions I have attended.”
Smiling, the MP quickly unsnapped Michael’s harness and expertly removed the flight helmet and breathing apparatus. He quickly undid the anti-g suit’s straps taking care when removing the suit from Michael’s right leg. Word of his injuries had obviously made it to Skunk Works. When Michael stood up, he nearly fell; the MP quickly reached out and grabbed Michael helping him to right himself.
The MP laughed a bit and said, “It happens all the time with this plane, sir, a bit of a side effect when flying so fast. Just stand up, your legs will find their ground soon. It has something to do with your internal balance system having been blended up like a smoothie. Doesn’t really matter that much though, there is an F-18 waiting, it will take you to Travis Air Force Base in San Francisco.”
Just great! Another damn flight, thought Michael.
The two other MP’s had retracted their weapons; the barrels now pointed safely toward the ground. They were leaving the plane as Michael found his footing.
The MP at his side nudged Michael toward the door, and Michael said, “Thanks, soldier, I think I got it now.” Michael walked down the ramp; standing at its base were two men wearing customary off-the-rack, style-less dark suits, clearly they were Company men.
So stereotypical, Michael thought, as he rolled his eyes. What the hell was wrong with wearing a good suit?
Michael looked at the two CIA Officers and sarcastically shouted, “What, no streamers and no candy filled piñata? What kind of welcome home – thanks for helping to save the free world and not dying while you were at it - party is this?”
Both agents smiled and stood rigidly like buck privates in front of their drill sergeant. The man closest to Michael militarily barked out, “Good afternoon, sir. Welcome to Palmdale, California, sir. So glad that your big, dumb ass didn’t get shot the hell up, sir. Hope you enjoyed your flight, you big pussy – sir! Tell me, do you still act like a six-year old little girl getting her pigtails pulled when getting on a plane, SIR?”
Responding to the CIA Officer’s insubordinate return sarcasm, Michael had a jab of his own for the six-foot-six inch beast of a man, “Chris, if I didn’t feel so god awful sorry for your mild level of retardation I would jump up there, look you eye to eye, and break that already crooked nose of yours.”
The second officer chimed in as well, “Yeah, him being an idiot might stop you, but knowing that his inordinately large ass would kick your narrow behind from here to Langley probably has something to do with it, too.”
The three MP’s stood off to the side looking at one another in confusion as the three CIA Officers stared at each other. Soon all three men broke out into large smiles.
“Michael, it is really good to see you. How long has it been, since Ahaggar, right? Do you have your new boss by the balls, too?”
The three CIA Officers were exchanging long and firm handshakes now. Trevor, the other CIA Officer interjected, “Michael, we heard about Damascus. What a nightmare, you were ambushed right, the only one to make it out alive?”
And so begins the debriefing, forever friends but always professionals.
Chapter Nineteen
Travis Air Force Base
San Francisco, CA
The F/A 18F Super Hornet landed on the runway that was numbered 3L/21R at Travis Air Force Base in San Francisco. With a maximum speed of near 1200 mph, it was a short hop to Travis from southern California. The fighter jet didn’t need all 11,001 feet of the runway to come to a safe halt, and taxied soon after hitting the tarmac.
From his place, sitting just at the rear of the pilot, Michael could see a line of C-17 Globemasters and KC-10 Stratotankers through the glass canopy of the Super Hornet. Globemasters and Stratotankers were behemoths and needed every inch of Travis’s long runway to takeoff and land. So large, a bus and then some could drive into the belly of the C-17.
He remembered the C-17 well. When Michael was a young paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne Division in North Carolina, his platoon had sat on the asphalt near a landing strip belonging to Pope Air Force Base, and had been waiting for a C-17 to land and pick up his squad of paratroopers. When the massive jet finally landed, an even younger paratrooper had looked at Michael and said, “We gotta jump out that motherfucker? Damn thing is so big it don’t even look like it should be able to fly!”
Pope Air Force base is co-located with and supports the missions of the 82nd Airborne Division, including training jumps for the division’s paratroopers. Michael’s squad was the first to conduct static line test jumps out of the massive guts of the C-17. Sitting in the military cargo plane had offered unusual comfort and space for the paratroopers. Typically, the men were crammed like packed sardines into the much smaller innards of a C-130 or C-141. Jumping from the C-17 had been a wonderfully fantastic experience and required a much longer static line to clear the massive plane, and had given many of the paratroopers a slight taste of their first “free-fall.”
He missed those days: they were days of missions without consequence.
The Hornet came to a halt outside of the Naval Fleet Air Reconnaissance VQ-3 Detachment’s headquarters building. With efficacy, two naval crewmembers placed blocks around the wheels of the aircraft, plugged it up to a generator, and rolled a wheeled ladder next to the cockpit. With the pilot’s command, the enclosure lifted upwards on its hydraulic hinges as the two General Electric F414-Turbofans of the fighter wound down with a high pitched scream. Michael undid his safety harness and climbed down the ladder after the pilot.
“Welcome to Travis, sir,” said one of the young naval crewmen. “Are the other two Hornets right behind you?”
“Come again?”
“The other two, sir, weren’t you with two other fighters? Three left a few hours ago.” The crewmen had a confused look on his face.
Michael just shrugged and pointed toward the Hornet’s pilot, “You’ll have to ask him, I was just along for the ride.” With that
, Michael tossed his flight helmet to the sailor and made his way to the building. Before he was able to open the door, a black Yukon pulled up from around the corner of the building. A fresh faced, young CIA Officer who was pulling driver duty called to Michael from the window, “Dr. Sterling, sir, hop in. I’ll get you to SFO.”
Michael paused for a moment before acknowledging the driver and thought, three aircraft?
Without looking at the driver, he shouted back to him, “Give me a minute, I’ve got to hit the head.” Turning from the government issued, armor plated four-wheel drive SUV, Michael walked into the detachment’s outdated and nondescript headquarters. Quickly he made his way toward the Charge of Quarters (CQ). Michael asked the mannish-looking female marine sitting behind the standard drab-grey metal desk where he could find the bathroom; she responded by pointing a thick knuckled finger down a hallway to his right.
In the spotless and typical military bathroom, Michael had his first moment alone in some time, the Shadow didn’t really count: he had been knocked out nearly the entire duration of the trip. Letting out a long and audible sigh, it was time – time to do something he hasn’t done in quite awhile. He needed to find a phone, one that couldn’t be traced back to him.
Slowly, he opened the bathroom door and looked for signs of life. The hallway was empty. Making his way deeper into the headquarters, he quickly came across an office door. Knocking lightly, he waited for an answer; there wasn’t one. Trying the handle, he found that the door was locked. It was an annoying but easy situation to remedy.
Looking around, Michael quickly found what he would need. An errant paper clip was lying on the floor. He picked it up from the floor and straightened it. Shoving it into the key hole, it took less than five seconds for Michael to manipulate the tumblers so that he could turn the unlocked handle of the door.
Once inside of the office he quickly grabbed the handset of the phone and punched in all but the last digit of a seldom called phone number. Pausing a moment before depressing the final number, he sighed and then pushed the key before he could change his mind. After three-rings a man picked up.
“Hello?” the man answered.
“Hi, Dad, it’s been a while. How have you been?”
“Michael? Is that you? I am good. Good. Fine. Is everything okay? Are you okay, what’s wrong?” His father was stuttering a bit, no doubt surprised at the call.
“Why would you think something’s wrong?” Michael knew the answer, but asked the unnecessary question anyway. It had been nearly a year since he last spoke with his father and only a handful of times over the past five years. He was still stubbornly angry at him from their last encounter.
“Son, you haven’t uttered a single word to me in God knows how long. I call, you don’t answer. I write and you never respond. My emails to you get bounced back to me as undeliverable, like I am some sort of dalit: a filthy untouchable. Now, all of the sudden, out of the blue, you call. The first thing that goes through any father’s mind is the worst. What is it son, what’s going on, are you okay?”
Michael’s father was always intuitive, he would give him that much. It was that precise intuition that led to their falling out in the first place.
“Dad, listen, I know this is a bit sudden, but I need some help and you are the only one that I can think of that has the expertise in this matter.”
“Son, if this has anything to do with what you do for a living, with your choice of profession; you will have to count me out. You run off to the military and then spend all those years finishing your education and getting your doctorate; you would have made a fantastic educator. I love you and I really beg of you to understand my perspective; I want you and me to go back to the way it was. But I cannot in good faith...”
“Cannot what, Dad? Cannot support your son’s decisions without conditions? You’re the teacher, not me, Dad!” Michael could feel his anger rising and knew he had to bring it under control. This wasn’t the time to reopen old wounds.
“Michael it is not about that,” his father missed him, he missed how close they once were and his voice ached with that pain, “I just miss you, son.”
Michael was conceding to his father, he had no choice but to concede. “Dad, we can talk about that another time. Soon, I promise. But, first, I really need your expertise on something. I have come across a symbol that is connected with the name Yeshua. It is a red hand print, do you know of it?”
All that Michael heard was silence.
Michael’s father was never this quiet. This was a man whose mouth never seemed to stop moving, it could be a grating and annoying trait. The occupational hazard of a professor he guessed.
“Dad, are you still there?”
Michael’s father’s mind was nearly a blank; it had been years since he had heard or written anything authoritative related to what Michael was asking him.
He asked Michael, “Where did you come across this symbol? Were you reading about it recently? Did you see a drawing? There aren’t many publications that would even reference this, I should know, I have written most of them. A red hand you say? Was the name Yeshua written underneath the hand? Of course it was. How would you have known of the name Yeshua otherwise? What else can you...”
Michael quickly interrupted the diatribes and digressions his Dad was about to start. It took a number of years, but Michael has learned that in order to get a word in with him one must be forceful; he interrupted him, “Dad! Stop talking!” Michael was shaking his head.
“Oh, sorry, son, a bad habit I guess. Now, where was I? Oh, yes, I was about to ask you what...”
“Dad, you weren’t anywhere! It’s my turn to speak. I can’t talk specifically about it right now; just tell me what the hell it is.”
“Alright already, no need to be so harsh.” Dr. Sterling, Sr. cleared his throat and said, “Son, what you have described is called the Hand of Christ. It is a myth to most people that know about it, and those that do are numbered in the few, mostly scholars, Michael.
Supposedly, when Jesus was to be crucified, he struck a deal with Pontius Pilate and Joseph of Arimathea. They were going to let him live, but He had to agree to leave Judea, to forego his throne.”
“Supposedly, Dad; Jesus left Judea?”
“That’s right, Michael, there is a belief by some – by many really – that the Crucifixion never happened. As you know, Muslims believe that Jesus was a prophet, but deny that he was crucified, and there are over a billion of them. Hell, even the Jews don’t consider Jesus’ life relevant, and that He may have been nothing more than a Rabbi. Anyway, as I was saying, Jesus left Judea. Normally, Rome didn’t care about the minor religions of its citizens, but Jesus was becoming a liability; when He was arrested, Rome feared insurrection. According to my research, Joseph of Arimathea warned Pilate about making a martyr of Jesus, that it could lead to greater problems with the citizens. The simple solution was to banish him from the Empire. Jesus was secretly led out of the Judea with his wife and children; they were taken to Egypt, and Jesus was forced to give up any further attempts at becoming the people’s King.”
“Wait, wait a second, Dad, are you saying that, on top of not being crucified, and leaving the Roman Empire, Jesus was married with kids?”
“Michael, I am not saying that. I am saying that is what some people think, a very small number of people, but the idea of Jesus being married isn’t so far fetched; it is quite plausible. Back then, it would have not only have been customary to marry, it would have been highly frowned upon if a man had not married, in particular, if a Jewish man and Rabbi had not married.”
“Okay, fine. So, where does the Hand of Jesus come in?”
“Hand of Christ, son. There is a difference.” His father corrected him and continued, “I was getting to that. After leaving Judea, Jesus had to split up with his wife and children for their own safety. Jesus knew that there was a good chance that He would never see them again. As the rightful heir to the throne of Israel, He had to ensure
that, even if He was never able to reclaim His kingdom, His children and descendents would be able to.
In a decree of sorts, He set forth an outline of His lineage to include forefathers and children. Along with His family tree, He declared that His descendents shall be named “Holy Roman Emperor” first, and ahead of all others. It was their birthright.
Later, the legend has it that Jesus was smuggled into Rome where he met with Paul – one of his most trusted followers – whose scribe made three copies of Jesus’ decree. Really, it was a last will and testament: one for himself, one for his wife, and the final one for his followers – which is now the church. It is believed that Jesus signed each document with a print of his hand and his name scribed underneath.”
Michael interjected, “the Hand of Christ?”
“Right, son, it was the Hand of Christ.”
Michael didn’t need final confirmation about what his father had just said, but asked his father anyway, “Let me get this straight. According to what you have just said: Jesus was never crucified, He lived, and through a will, His children inherited his right to be King of the Empire.”
“Yes, Michael, that is what I just said. He didn’t die on the cross.”
He didn’t die on the cross. This wasn’t the first time he had heard this phrase uttered today.
“Michael, why are you asking about this? Why is it so important to you, so important to the US government?”
After his father asked the question, Michael put his free hand over the front of his shirt; he could feel the book resting against his skin. As an attempt to ignore the question that his father had asked, Michael asked one of his own, “Dad, what else can you tell me?”
“Nonsense, son, you haven’t answered my question. What are you involved in? What interest does the government have in ancient fairy tales?” It was at this moment, the moment he had finished his question that his father understood. His next question exited his lips in a very slow and precise manner, “You were involved in that attack in Damascus weren’t you; the Ayatollah, too?”
