Incarnate: Mars Origin I Series Book III

by Abby L. Vandiver

  Jairo had appeared to hesitate before he said it. Like he was searching for words. Now he opened his mouth to speak, but said nothing more.

  “What?” Logan said, almost sorry she’d let him strike up a conversation with her. “I know that book. But . . .” Logan didn’t want to lie and deny it being her mother. He stumbled over what to say. “My mother’s name is Justin Dickerson. Someone else wrote that book.”

  ‘Yes. I know. The copy I saw had the author’s name crossed out and your mother’s name scrawled in. I know it’s her book.”

  “I’m not like my mother,” Logan answered, shaking her head. “I mean. I don’t have the same theories as she does. I believe what I find here.” She kicked her foot into the dirt.

  “Is she a bad person?”

  “No. That’s not what I meant.”

  “I believe it. All of it.”

  Logan raised her eyebrows. “Believe what?” She snapped her head around and looked at him. “My mother? What my mother wrote? You believe it?”

  He grinned. “So it is your mother who wrote the book?” He chuckled. “Yep.” He nodded. “I believe it.”

  “You couldn’t be serious?”

  “I am. I’m very serious.”

  “How did you get a copy of my mother’s book? Wait, how did you know she was my mother?”

  “Your benefactor had a copy of it. I took an ‘unauthorized’ look at it. I Googled the name. And then I just figured with the same last name, same hometown and all.”

  “So, what are you saying?” She laughed. “You believe that super intelligent aliens visited ancient man?” She shook her head. “That isn’t very scientific.”

  “I’m not a scientist. I’m just sort of a liaison.”

  Logan wasn’t sure what he was. He knew the area like the back of his hand, like he had grown up there. But he didn’t have a smidgen of an accent, and used English American colloquialisms better than she did. And he definitely wasn’t an archaeologist.

  “She made some good points in her book,” Jairo continued. “And didn’t she say that they weren’t aliens. That they were us. Our human ancestors, coming from Mars. They gave this planet life. Created it from ‘scratch’ – if I remember correctly how she put it. She said they made animals, atmosphere, and even their own little version of man right here on Earth.”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never read her book.”

  “You never read it?”

  “Uh huh.” She shook her head. “And I don’t plan on it.”

  That was true, but Logan also had speculated that her benefactor somehow knew of her mother’s book. Now she knew for a fact that because of her mother’s theories, she had gotten the job. Logan had leapt at the opportunity to come to South America for a dig that looked for more than Indian culture. The possibility that the “New World” wasn’t really that - that it was the home to Earth’s first man was too much to hope for, but it was what she had dreamed of ever since she decided to become an archaeologist. And to add to the intrigue, Logan’s mother had told her that the Americas was once the continent known as Atlantis.

  That much of what her mother told her, she decided, she did believe.

  Yeah, she couldn’t believe that humans came from Mars, but she definitely believed that there was more to man’s origin story than what was currently known.

  Logan looked up at the darkening sky lost in thought.

  That’s why she was there, in Belize. Why she agreed to be in charge of this dig, even though she didn’t have the experience and didn’t know for whom she was working. And even though it might be based on something her mother had done. Logan figured, if Atlantis was there in the Americas, it was here that she would find the ancient knowledge of the world.

  Landing a job near Guatemala in western Belize had to be the right place to be.

  “Did you forget I was here?”

  “Huh?” Logan glanced at Jairo. “Oh. No.” She chuckled. “I didn’t forget. I was just thinking.”

  “I noticed you were looking up. Thinking about man coming from Mars?”

  “No.” She shook her head vigorously. “Never.” She turned and looked into his brown eyes. “I could never think that.”

  “Why? Is that too crazy to think? That man could have originated somewhere else. Is that why your mother was afraid to tell it? Because people like you wouldn’t believe it?”

  “People like me?” She gave him a slanted look. He stared at her waiting for an answer. “Aren’t you full of questions?” Logan smiled at him. She stood up and wiped the dirt from the back of her pants and sighed. She patted him on his leg. “Me and my mother are nothing alike. If you want to find out about her outrageous theories, you’d have to talk to her. I just want to find out more about ancient American history.” She lifted up an eyebrow. “Earth’s ancient history.”

  Logan walked over and stood in front of the string-boarded grids of the dig.

  “You know, your mother isn’t the only person that ever came up with that idea. A superhuman race that gave us knowledge.” Jairo’s voice followed her.

  Logan turned to face him and dug her hands in her pocket. “Maybe.” She nodded in agreement. “But no one ever claimed they were from Mars.”

  Perhaps she shouldn’t ridicule her mother. Especially to strangers. She pulled her hands out of her pocket and turned her back to Jairo. She liked Jairo, and Jairo so far had been nice to her. Although he wasn’t very forthcoming on all things benefactor-wise. But, she shrugged, that was probably his job as well. Keeping secrets. Just like her mother.

  Boy, her mother had a slew of them. Not just that man was from Mars, but the proof she claimed she had. Irrefutable proof she had said. Like how she decoded a six hundred year old codex that no one else could figure out, and how it contained, among other things, the knowledge to build spaceships and cure cancer.

  Jeesh.

  Logan had been kind of skeptical about the truth of whether her mother decoded the Voynich Manuscript or that any of those things had been in it. But she didn’t argue the point when her mother told her, she had just listened.

  Maybe she shouldn’t have even done that.

  “Hey, Jairo,” Logan turned and looked at him. “I gotta go. See you tomorrow?”

  “Okay. I’ll be around.” Logan started to walk off and Jairo called after her, “You should try and be a little more open-minded in your beliefs,” he said.

  She turned and glanced over her shoulder at him and drew in a deep breath. She climbed into her rented white Ford Focus and buckled her seatbelt.

  Turning the ignition and putting the car in gear she looked over at Jairo still sitting on the pile of dirt. She was going to get the dirt of the dig off of her and put it out of her mind for a couple of days. She was going to Guatemala for the weekend.

  The car rocked over the uneven dirt road but it didn’t break into her thoughts.

  It had been a hard pill to swallow - the story her mother told her. But it explained many things. Like how Indians, and no other race of people were already in supposedly uninhabited land when the first explorers came. It explained why there were pyramids in Egypt and in the Americas that were similar in style and the advanced technology needed to build them. It explained the similarities in languages between people living on opposite sides of the globe. And it explained how heavy stones were precision cut from quarries miles away and used to build the temples and palaces of places like Pumapunku.

  But she wasn’t letting her mother’s theories, whether Jairo or her benefactor bought in to them or not, change her plans of making this dig her own. To bring to life once again the lives of our ancestors. Find the answers and get the truth of our history out so everyone would know.

  But as it stood right now, she didn’t have her own answers to the truth of man’s past. At least not any better than the one her mother offered.

  She sighed. She had resigned herself to the fact that her mother’s premise – there was a connection between the western world’s evide
nce of ancient man and Central America’s - was valid. Not an extraterrestrial connection, but one just the same. Her mother had shown Logan evidence of it.

  Well, she showed you evidence of the extraterrestrial part, too, and you’re not believing that.

  Logan shook her body as if she just had a chill.

  “Okay,” she said out loud. She hadn’t admitted it to Jairo, but she had to admit it to herself, even if it were a damper to the excitement she felt about his dig. Maybe there was something to her mother’s theory. After all, it was her mother’s contention that what she had found was true.

  How can you not believe your mother?

  Chapter Fifteen

  Cleveland Heights, Ohio

  “Mom!”

  I walked in the backdoor and my kitchen was full of people. Micah came over to me and practically picked me up, wrapping his arms around me tight as a vice grip.

  “Mom. How did you get home?” He pulled back, looked at me and then looked across the room. My eyes followed his as he watched his dad come into the kitchen. My husband Mase pushed Micah out of the way, and took me in a huge hug.

  “Oh my goodness, babe, what did they do to you?” he said. “Who was it?” Holding on to my arms, he pushed me forward and looked me up and down and then pulled his face close to mine. “I’m so happy you’re okay.” I saw a tear in his eye.

  Greg came up from behind me and wrapped his arms around the both of us. I tried to push away, but their arms were so strong around me.

  “Guys! I’m fine. I’m okay. Let me go.” I laughed and tried to wiggle loose from their grasp. I looked over and saw Nikhil Chandra standing next to the kitchen table with a wide grin on his face.

  “Really, I’m okay.” I pushed back at Mase and Greg until they pulled away. And then down the hallway from the front of the house came my sisters, Claire and Cassie, and my daughter, Courtney. “Is the whole family here?”

  Micah followed my eyes. “Yeah, I called them,” he said. “I couldn’t reach Logan.”

  “That’s because there’s no phone service in the Belize rainforest,” I said. I looked around thinking my other four brothers would come walking around the corner at any second. “You would’ve thought I died,” I said looking around the room. Courtney and Claire were crying.

  “You were kidnapped,” Greg said. “That’s just as bad, and could have ended up with you being dead.”

  “I wasn’t kidnapped.” I frowned.

  All eyes turned to Micah. He threw up both his hands. “She was forcibly taken. Against her will. According to Ohio law, that’s kidnapping.”

  Now all eyes turned back to look at me.

  “So. Okay.” I held up my hands. “Maybe I was kidnapped. But they didn’t try to hurt me. And they didn’t ask you for money or anything -” I looked from Mase to Greg. “Did they?”

  “Justin, don’t be so naïve,” Greg said. He looked over at Micah. “You’d better go and call the police back. Let them know that she’s home. And that she’s safe.”

  “You called the police?”

  “You were kidnapped,” came a unified response from most of the people in the room.

  The crowd of people, I should say.

  I spread out my arms, symbolically breaking away from everyone and walked over to the kitchen table. “Just let me sit down.” Everyone followed me. I pushed out a long sigh as I sat. I put my hand over my forehead and closed my eyes.

  Mase put his arm around me. “You okay? I was so worried.” He pulled me in close.

  “We were all worried,” Claire said.

  I nodded my head. “I’m fine.” I opened up my eyes, leaned in and kissed Mase, pulling away, I looked around at everyone.

  “And what the heck could anyone want with you?” Greg took a chair across from where I where I was sitting.

  “You wouldn’t believe it if I told you.”

  Callie went to the kitchen window. “How did you get here?”

  Greg hopped up and joined Callie at the window. “Is there someone out there?”

  “Nobody’s out there.” He and Callie were peering out of the window. “They dropped me off.”

  Again all eyes turned and looked at me.

  “Who?” They spoke in unison.

  “Who dropped you off?” Greg said.

  I looked at Nikhil Chandra, who hadn’t said anything since my return, and then back at the large group standing in my kitchen. “It was Bruce Cook.”

  “Bruce Cook?” Nikhil repeated the name and his whole demeanor changed.

  Greg came over and bent down in front of me with a furrowed brow and breathing heavily. “The guy from the Bilderberg Group? Senator Bruce Cook? He’s the one that took you?”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Everyone in the room didn’t know who Bruce Cook was, so before I could relay the story of what he wanted, I had to bring my sister Callie, and my kids Courtney and Micah up to speed.

  While I told them, both Greg and Mase had amused looks on their faces because they remembered our past experiences with him. But the look on Nikhil’s face was something different. A few times I lost my train of thought trying to read it and figure out what he was thinking.

  “So, this Senator from California is also the head of a secret organization?” Micah questioned me like he had me on the witness stand.

  “Yeah. But it’s not so secretive. We found its website and past member names on the Internet,” I said.

  “That’s true, we did find their information in the public domain, but what they do is a secret, Micah,” Greg spoke. “Call it what it is, Justin. And this guy - a Senator - shouldn’t be a part of it. Where’s the transparency in that?”

  Mase laughed. “There isn’t any.” He went over to the fridge and pulled out a pitcher of iced tea.

  “What’s the name of this organization, Ma?” Micah pulled out his cell phone.

  “The Bilderberg Group.”

  “Google. Bilderberg Group,” Micah spoke into his phone.

  “Here, Sweetie.” Mase put a glass of iced tea in front of me. I’ll go out later and get you something stronger. I know you must need some Pepsi right about now.”

  “Pepsi would be nice.” I smiled at Mase.

  “Yeah so, Micah,” Mase said, rubbing my back, “when I took your mother out to San Diego to meet him, she said the meeting was kind of scary.”

  Micah was scrolling down on his phone, apparently reading whatever his Google search had pulled up.

  “Okay,” Micah said looking up to get our attention. “This says that ‘the Bilderberg Group is comprised of approximately 120–150 political leaders and experts from industry, finance, academia and the media.’” He read off of his phone. “They have annual private meetings and quote, ‘provide an opportunity for participants to speak and debate candidly and to find out what major figures really think, without the risk of off-the-cuff comments becoming fodder for controversy in the media.’”

  “We already know that, Micah. We dealt with those folks last year I told you,” Greg said.

  “Well, I didn’t know, Uncle Greg,” Courtney said walking over to her brother. “Let me see that.”

  “What in the world does that have to do with you being kidnapped?” Callie asked.

  “It’s so strange,” I said turning to Callie. “When I spoke to him last year, he seemed to be trying to goad me. He talked about my books, both of them and he even asked me if I thought I could decode the Voynich Manuscript.”

  “How did he know about your books and that you were working on the Voynich?” Callie asked. “I don’t even know much about those things and I’m your sister.”

  “Good question,” I said. “I never found out how he knew.”

  “I remember you told me that you told ole’ Senator Bruce that you didn’t think you’d be able to do translate it,” Mase said.

  I laughed. “I didn’t know what to say to that man. I went there to see if he knew anything and he started questioning me like I had committed a crime.�
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  “Please, girl,” Greg said. “You went there trying to find out if the man was a Martian.” He started laughing and pushed his shoulder into Mase. “You remember that, man. She said that maybe the people from the Bilderberg Group were the direct descendants of the people who came here from Mars.”

  “I didn’t say that.” I sucked my tongue. I should be used to people trying to goad me after living with my big brother, Greg all my life. He was the perpetual thorn in my side. “And we are the people that came here from Mars.”

  “Yes, you did lil’ sis. That’s exactly what you said. Don’t you remember that, Mase? She said she needed to find Martians to help her figure out what that Voynich Manuscript said.”

  “You did translate it though?” Callie said. “So why didn’t you just tell him that?”

  Greg spoke for me. “Who knew what that man was – is capable of. Good thing she didn’t tell them, look what he did to her today.” He looked over at Nikhil Chandra who had been quiet the entire time. “And you know, Nikhil it was you who told Justin about the Voynich Manuscript and about the Bilderberg Group. If I remember correctly, you wrote the name of the group on the back of your business card.”

  Nikhil looked into Greg’s eyes. A surreptitious grin spread across his face. “Guilty as charged.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Cleveland, Ohio

  Bruce Cook made himself comfortable in the rented limousine as he headed to Burke Lakefront Airport. He had a private plane waiting there for him to take him back to Washington, D.C. after his meeting with Justin Dickerson.

  “Did she want to cooperate?” she asked as he entered the plane.

  “Yes. I think so. I think this worked out well.”

  “Everything is falling into place, then?” She helped him put his things in the overhead compartment and get buckled in.

  “Everything went better than I thought,” he said looking up at her. “Looks like we’re all set. I could have maybe just talked to her in the first place, instead of all that other business. Setting up that little trap to lure her in.” He raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t tell her about that, though. We still have to find him. See what he’s up to.”