“You did a good job.”
“You think so?”
“I do,” Shaw told him.
Eli’s face radiated self-satisfaction.
“Apprentice Victoria, you’ve come a long way. The reports are glowing. I knew you were going to be a good one from the start. I can spot them. I always can.”
“Thank you, sir.” She grimaced. “I’m sorry. Master Eli.”
Shaw remembered that she’d gotten into trouble with sir and ma’am in the past.
“Oh, no harm done, dear.” He smiled. “I’m having a meditation session in the Study Room tonight. Would you attend?”
“Me? Oh, of course, Master Eli.” Her eyes widened.
“Good. After dinner.” The man turned his attention toward Shaw. “And, Novice Carter, since you’re expedited, we’ll get you to the Study Room too. Soon. Maybe tomorrow or the day after. They’re immersive study sessions in the residence. My own brand of transcendental meditation. Came up with it myself. It’s patented.”
Victoria said to Shaw, “It’s an honor to be asked.”
“Yeah, well, sure. Sounds like fun.”
Eli chuckled and looked at Steve, who smiled in response. He said to his aide, “We’ll see how fun he feels it is after all the hard work. It can be . . . There’s a word.”
Steve supplied one. “Strenuous.”
“Yes. Strenuous.”
“But,” Steve added quickly, “fulfilling.”
“Cool,” Shaw said, after running the word past Skye.
He noticed that Anja was looking his way. The expression on her face was neutral. Did it mask suspicion, or something else?
“A word with you, Novice Carter.” Master Eli said this in a conspiratorial tone and walked away, without saying anything to the others. Shaw followed. When they were out of earshot, he looked Shaw up and down with his silken eyes. “I have a proposition for you. Just something to keep in mind.”
“Yes, Master Eli?”
“There’s a special group of Companions. The most elite.”
“Inner Circle?”
“No, beyond them. They’re called Selects. Only one percent of Companions are picked. I do that myself, and train them personally. It can take a year or more. But they earn a salary while they undergo the training and afterward. They’re like monks, you could say. You’ve probably seen some around the camp. They have our uniforms but don’t wear amulets.”
“I wondered about them.”
The sullen workers he’d seen in Building 14. Maybe that was the Select training facility.
“They have our symbol, of course. Their heads’re shaved and tattooed with the infinity sign on their scalps. Then the hair grows back.” Eli gave a soft smile. “I know this is only your first day but you fit the profile. You’re single, no children, you like to travel. Journeyman Samuel says you don’t mind working hard.”
So they’d already communicated about him.
“You know what it’s like to have a hard life. That’s an important factor for Selects. And they need to be fit, not the sort who’re easily intimidated. Sometimes people don’t quite appreciate our worldview. There’ve been protests. Even some altercations occasionally.”
“I’ve found, you know, if you speak the truth, that pisses people off.”
“You and Novice Todd are this group’s best choices for Select.”
Shaw recalled Todd from the dinner table. The former military man.
“What exactly would I do?”
“Call it customer relations.”
Recruiting, probably. Going to bereavement centers and funerals. Convincing people to sign up.
“Yeah, I’m kind of up for it. Let me think.”
“Of course. We’ll talk more. Oh, and we’ll keep this between ourselves. Only I and a few others are involved in the Select program.”
“Sure, Master Eli.”
They exchanged the salute and Eli joined the others and walked on.
Shaw and Victoria continued their stroll along the path. She looked at him curiously. “Guess my training’s going okay,” he said.
She seemed to want to ask more but chose not to.
Shaw asked, “Want to get some lunch?”
Victoria hesitated a moment but said, “I should finish journaling.” She held up her notebook, as if she were batting away his invitation.
Shaw studied the appealing, thoughtful face.
Art-house actress . . .
“So the Process’s working for you?” he asked.
“Every day here there are fewer and fewer bad moments. When I advance in a few weeks,” she said, her face bright, “I know everything’ll be fine.”
The cult-speak amused Shaw; Companions couldn’t say they “graduate” from the training. They had to say “advance.”
He said, “I’ll see you at the Second Discourse.”
“I’ll be there.”
Which wasn’t an acknowledgment that they would in fact meet in the Square.
Without giving the salute they went separate ways, Shaw heading down toward the dining hall for a sandwich and coffee. As he walked he was thinking: The Foundation was odd and unsettling, no question about that, the regimentation, the frenzied political rally tone in the dining hall last night and in the Square this morning, Eli’s ego and need for control. Shaw decided it was safe in labelling the Osiris Foundation a cult.
A dangerous one, though? It was hard to dismiss the murder of the journalist in San Francisco and the beating of the reporter Shaw had witnessed. Those incidents, however, now seemed like outliers, committed by isolated negatives: Harvey Edwards, in San Francisco, and Hugh, the dangerous, renegade head of the Assistance Unit. Edwards’s background suggested he was unhinged. And Hugh? Like rent-a-cops everywhere, he would enjoy flexing his authority—and his muscles, putting his little-used karate moves into practice and bullying and coming on to women.
Eli himself was clearly narcissistic but in an almost comical way. Shaw hadn’t seen a truly dark side. He clearly was devoted to his altruistic mission to help people in pain.
As the deprogrammer had said, Eli might not even know about Hugh’s attack or Edwards’s murdering the journalist.
And the Process itself?
A benign bowl of self-help homilies and off-the-shelf therapy. Shaw had no evidence to blame the Foundation for Adam’s death—the reason he was here. The young man was just plagued with an emotional grid gone astray.
Nor was there any particular risk to Victoria or anyone else that he could see. She seemed buoyed by the Process, coming out of what had to be unfathomable depression at her loss.
Beethoven’s notes hummed through the camp. The woman’s voice then announced, “Master Eli’s Second Discourse is about to begin.” She reiterated that the lecture was mandatory for the Novices and voluntary for the other Companions.
Shaw cleaned away his lunch dishes and soon he was walking along the path to the Square, a dozen others nearby, heading in the same direction.
Shaw was tempted to privately criticize them all as lemmings. But that was unfair; these Companions were like everyone else—just trying to make their way through an often unnavigable world in the truest way they could. Colter Shaw found that route in an itinerant lifestyle, tracking down felons and missing persons, climbing sheer cliffs, catching air on his motorbike—testing limits.
Who had a lock on the right answers?
And who couldn’t use a bit of truing up?
The crowd assembled—trainees in the middle, ringed by ICs, like the morning’s session. Across the Square he saw Walter and Sally. He joined them. Her eyes focused on him and she smiled but cautiously. The men did the shoulder salute. Sally watched, mystified. “Oh, you boys . . .”
Shaw said to Walter, “What’s this Second Act?” Nodded at the stage.
&nb
sp; The man chuckled and said, “All I’ll tell you is, it’s a doozy.”
35.
The ICs began clapping and the longer version of the “Ode to Joy” reverberated throughout the valley, just as it had that morning before the First Discourse.
Beyond the stage and Eli’s residence, the mountains and trees stood in sharp contrast, black and brown and green, to an afternoon sky of stunning clarity. The rich scent of loam and pine, tinged with eucalyptus, wafted on a lazy breeze.
The regular clapping broke into frenzied applause as Eli walked onto the stage. His white tunic glowed once again.
He held his hands up and quiet descended.
It was brief, as someone soon cried, “We love you, Master Eli!”
Sparking more applause.
Finally, he silenced the crowd.
“Did you Novices have good sessions today?” He scanned those wearing the blue amulets. He looked directly at Shaw.
Shouts of “Yes!”
One male voice, “You betcha!”
Eli pointed. “I like him!”
The man beamed.
“You’re working on discovering your . . . what?”
“Minuses!” “Pluses!” The shouted words collided.
He turned to no one in particular, like a late-night talk show host remarking to his sidekick. “I knew this group was good. They’re stars! They’re gorgeous!”
Eli’s reward was yet more frenzied applause.
“You’ll tear down that bad construction in no time and start planting the Pluses in the garden of your True Core. I know you will. I know exactly how you’re doing. And you’ll do fine. I’m never wrong.”
He fell silent.
The crowd too.
“This morning I told you about Osiris. What a man he was! A god. God of the underworld. God of fertility.”
Three or four ICs held up tablets, filming.
“Osiris. What a great guy he was. Great! Gorgeous. You know what I like about him? He came back from the dead, remember? He’s immortal.” Eli walked closer to the edge of the stage. Was it Shaw’s imagination or was the spotlight a little brighter?
The master pointed a finger over the sea of upturned faces.
“Just like all of us. Just . . . like . . . you.” He pointed. “Immortal.”
Many of the long-timers were smiling. The Novices, for the most part, looked toward Eli with rapt attention but varying shades of confusion on their faces.
“Now I’m going to reveal the secret of the Process. This is what it’s all about. Immortality. Our slogan: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow. Yesterday, as in your past lives. Today, as in”—he raised his hands, palms up—“today. And tomorrow, as in your future lives.” He let this settle. “The Process will teach you how to live”—he pointed to the gold infinity symbol on the backdrop—“forever.”
36.
A woman beside Shaw—an Apprentice—whispered, “Death is a fallacy.”
Eli called out: “Death is a fallacy! Death is a fiction perpetuated by those in power, by politicians, by religions, by the medical community, by corporations, by the media. Death is a lie!
“They convince you that today is your only shot at existence. They do it to control you. To sell you their bill of goods. Buy this insurance policy, take this medicine, elect that politician, buy this house. Pay a hundred thousand dollars on medical treatment. Live now, you only have one chance. Don’t waste it. Give us your money and we’ll make sure there’ll be some left for your children. After, of course, we take a little bit for ourselves.”
On the word little he held his hands out wide, as if exaggerating the size of a fish he’d caught.
Which brought laughter and applause.
“They’re the ones selling you the ugly, rotten concrete and clapboard houses with rusting roofs to bury your True Core.”
Nods and a few affirmative murmurs.
“Immortality . . .” Eli spoke in a soft voice, which had the effect of drawing the attention of the Companions even more. “Remember I told you this morning that today is brief, it’s fleeting; it’s a blink. And that’s true. But today is only a small portion of the entire life your True Core lives, which extends from the beginning of time to the end.
“Oh, I know, I know . . . This is a lot for some of you to take in. How well do I know that? I’ve been there. I’ve been where you are. I’ve been uncertain, I’ve been cynical. So, just listen to me. Hear me out. That’s all I’m asking. Will you listen?”
“We’ll listen!”
“We love you!”
He said, “Immortality. Every society, every civilization, every religion, primitive or advanced, has their own version of it. You remember my old friend Osiris, right? We love him, don’t we? Isn’t he great? Isn’t he gorgeous?”
Applause.
Shaw wondered where on earth this was going. He glanced toward Walter, who looked back and nodded.
A doozy . . .
“The Egyptians knew that the soul was immortal. Just ask Osiris and his wife. The Greeks? There were thousands of accounts about resurrection from the dead. Souls and bodies reunited and living in Elysium. Read your Plato, one of my favorites. Have you read him? You’ve got to read him. He’s a genius, he’s a gorgeous writer. He writes about the immortal soul all the time. He’s the greatest philosopher the world has ever seen. I read him every night.
“The Buddhists. Don’t you love Buddhism? I do. They say that when people die they transform from a physical body into an immortal body of light—the Rainbow body, it’s called—and they live forever. I love that! Don’t you?
“Christians? Believers will go to heaven for eternity. Sinners to hell. Jesus himself, well, look at him. Died, resurrected, then went up to heaven to live with his dad forever. You read the Nicene Creed? You have to read it. It says that every dead person will be resurrected during the Second Coming.
“Hinduism? They’ve got reincarnation. You live a good life, karma will make sure you come back in a higher place. A bad life, uh-oh. How about the Jewish people? I love people of the Jewish faith. The Pharisees believed the soul was immortal, and people would be reincarnated and, I’m quoting, ‘pass into bodies’ in future lives.
“Islam? The Qur’an says death is the same as sleep. You awake from sleeping. You will awake from death. I could go on and on. Billions and billions of people have been convinced from the beginning of civilization that we’ve lived before this life and we’ll live again, after it. So how can it not be true?
“But with all respect to the religions I just mentioned. They believe in immortality, granted. But there’s a problem.”
Whispers from the ground: “If you’re Christian . . .”
After a dramatic pause, Eli said, “If you’re Christian, what awaits you is a Christian heaven. If you’re Jewish, a Jewish one. If you’re Hindu, you will be reincarnated. If you watch TV, you’ll come back as the Walking Dead.”
Laughs and applause.
Someone shouted, “Zombies!”
Eli chuckled then grew serious. “The rules for immortality have to be the same for everyone, of whatever religion or no religion. True for atheists, as well as the Pope. But each one of those religions I mentioned excludes the others. That means they all have to be wrong. I’m sorry to be blunt but that’s the way I am. I’m a blunt talker. You know that by now, right? I tell it like it is.”
Nods.
“Now, I have nothing against religion. Not at all. I hope you all find comfort in whatever church, synagogue, mosque or house of worship you prefer. But when it comes to immortality, all the priests and holy men and rabbis and gurus . . . they should leave the subject to somebody who knows the truth.
“They should leave it to me.”
37.
Eli looked over the crowd, most of them mesmerized.
After a long moment: “
What do I—humble me—know about the subject? Oh, quite a bit. I told you about my death experience—not near death but actual death.”
“We remember!”
“We love you!”
“When I was dead, I saw things. Images. When the doctors brought me back I couldn’t stop thinking about what I’d seen. They were images of people, places that were familiar but that I’d never seen in my present life or in a movie or read about in a book. Where had those images come from? I had no idea. All I knew was that they moved me deeply. Some made me deliriously happy, some made me afraid, some made me angry. But what I felt when I thought about them, I felt intensely.
“So I began to focus on people and places in the present—people and places that gave me the same kind of intensity. I began to meditate on them. When I did that, the images from the time I was dead came back. They were from a hundred years ago, two hundred, a thousand . . .” His voice dropped. “Imagine that! I was witnessing my past lives!”
Gasps of astonishment, joyful murmurs.
So this was what the Process was supposed to do. Samuel had told him to meditate on intense feelings he had in his life. Doing that, according to Eli’s mythology, would open the door to his past lives.
Eli continued, “I told you I was orphaned when I was young. It was terrible. Devastating. I missed my parents so much. My father, Tobias. My mother, Rachel. How I missed them. When I was meditating, trying to bring those intense feelings back, suddenly I saw them again. We were together in the 1800s. And I knew then that I’d see them once more—in the future.”
Whispers from the Companions as they turned to one another. Most, Shaw could see, were buying what he was saying.
Eli walked to the edge of the stage and looked down at Henry, the balding man who’d been inducted at the same time as Shaw. He was the medical researcher so devastated by losing his wife to cancer eight months earlier. Eli spoke directly to him. “You can never lose anybody. Not permanently. You’ll be together again. You’ll be with them in the Tomorrow.”
The Goodbye Man Page 17
