The Phoenix Apostles

by Lynn Sholes

  Al checked his watch, judging how much of the security video he would need to review. "Let me see the last hour from every camera.

  The guard raised his thumb and extended his index finger to mimic a gun and pointed to Al. "You got it."

  Almost instantly, the digital video disks jumped back one hour, confirmed by the burned-in time code. Each camera had a box in a grid on the large flat screens. There were sixteen boxes per screen and several screens that alternated just long enough for an observer to scan each. Al watched intently as the video replayed. His timing had been right, and in a couple of moments he saw the first shot of Seneca in the parking lot getting out of her car. "There. Pause it." He touched the car on the screen. "Get somebody outside and see if it's still there." He looked at his watch again. "That was forty-two minutes ago."

  "Will do. I'll take care of it personally." The chief took over the video controls.

  "All right, let's forward the video, please." A few seconds later, Al saw the image of Seneca in the lobby. "Stop. That's a good shot of her. Print that screen and make copies. Distribute them to every member of your staff who was on duty. I want them to look at her and see if they remember anything, no matter how trivial."

  "I don't know if we can catch everyone. In ten minutes there will be a shift change for the nursing staff."

  "Do whatever it takes."

  The chief instructed one of the other security officers in the room and then returned to operating the surveillance controls.

  The video displayed more images marching forward in time, from camera to camera-Seneca getting off the elevator on the third floor; Seneca coming back down the hall with a woman behind her; Seneca in the lobby; Seneca under the portico-

  "Stop." It looked to Al like the woman trailing Seneca was disposing of something in the trash receptacle, maybe a purse. "Get somebody out there quick."

  The man radioed the command.

  "Pause it." Al looked at the image of a black Rolls Royce limousine stopping under the portico. "Slow mo, please."

  A man stepped out of the car. Al couldn't get a view of Seneca's face, but she seemed to balk at seeing him, like maybe she knew the man. The woman turned, taking a look around and behind them. A good shot of them both. "Hold it. Get some stills of that man and the woman. Show those around as well."

  The guard returned and proudly announced that Seneca's car had been located in the lot.

  "Okay, start the video again, but keep it in slow motion." Leaning closer to the monitor, Al watched the limo pull away. "Yes. Freeze it right there. Perfect." He had a view of the license plate. "Zoom in." The numbers and letters came into focus. He held up his cell. "Do we have service down here?"

  "Sure do," the guard said. "Repeaters get the cell signals into the security center."

  Al placed a call to ILIAD and gave them the car's license plate number.

  Another security guard entered the video surveillance room and plopped a woman's purse on the desk in front of Al. "Here you

  The chief motioned toward the video monitors. "Want to see any more?"

  "No, I think we've seen enough."

  The hospital administrator came through the door. "Have you gotten everything you need?"

  "I believe so." Al's cell rang. He flipped it open. "Palermo." He listened to the call from his contact at ILIAD for a minute or so, then closed the phone. Looking at the curious faces of those in the room, he said, "The tag was a fake. They must have anticipated the camera getting a look at it. But they didn't count on Seneca dropping the receiver and her call going through to my voice mail. That's the only lead we've got."

  "Sorry there's not more to work with, Mr. Palermo." The administrator turned toward the door. "I'm heading back to my office. If we can be of any more help, just say the word."

  "Thanks. I appreciate all your cooperation. Miami-Dade PD will be sending over a detective. He'll probably want to review the videos again."

  "Not a problem."

  Al heaved out a breath of frustration. "Excuse me, gentlemen. Need to make another call." He opened his phone and found the number in his contacts list. When he heard the phone ringing he switched ears.

  "Matt, Al here. Listen, whatever viper's nest you and Seneca have gotten into is maybe even bigger than we thought. They've abducted her. I've asked ILIAD to get involved, and the police. Maybe the FBI will be chiming in, but so far we haven't come up with anything."

  "Shit. Is she okay?"

  "Don't know. We've got them on video taking her from the hospital. We'll run some facial recognition programs, but unless the kidnappers are already in the system, it may be a dry hole. One thing I do know is whoever is running the show is well financed."

  "Al, I was actually getting ready to call you. I've come across something and it looks like this is all tied to William Groves and Groves Consortium. You talk about somebody well-funded." He spent the next several minutes filling Al in on the Cortes tomb robbery, Professor Flores's notes with the reference to William Groves, and the connection to his boat being sunk.

  "We might be getting closer to the who, but we still don't know the why."

  "Any other clues?"

  "Only that we found Seneca's purse. I've got it right here." Al opened the bag and began going through it. "Wallet, keys, brush, credit cards, and the infamous catacombs camera you told me about."

  Al pressed the button to turn the camera on and hit the replay button. "And it still works." The last picture Seneca took filled the screen. He studied it. "Hold on a minute, Matt."

  He remembered Seneca telling him about the graffiti on the island penal colony prison wall and how they couldn't find the same place the next day as they were leaving. She had wanted to take a picture. However, the shot she got was of scribble on the wall in Spanish that said Jesus is our Savior. But that's not what appeared in the digital picture.

  Al looked at the guard's name badge. Felix Moreno. "Excuse me, Felix. Do you speak Spanish?"

  "Yes, sir."

  He held the camera out. "Take a look at this. Can you translate the writing for me?"

  Craning his neck and squinting at the picture, the guard studied it a moment. "It says you must destroy the veil by fire."

  SWEET FLOWER 2012, BAHAMAS

  SENECA OPENED HER EYES and found she was in the rear seat of a small passenger jet in flight. Out the window she saw the deep blue of the ocean meeting the pristine sky with a crisp line of demarcation along the horizon. Far below, a freighter left a foamy scar in its wake. A few smaller crafts dotted the endless expanse of ocean.

  As she tried for a better look, vertigo set in, and a sharp pain made itself known on the back of her head. Reaching, she delicately touched the spot where the woman named Ilse had struck her. It was sore and tender, but no blood. Her hair was still damp from where someone had cleaned the wound; probably so she wouldn't soil the leather of the executive jet's seats.

  Seneca looked at her watch.

  "You've been sleeping for a couple of hours." Carlos looked up from a magazine in his lap; he sat in a backward-facing seat two rows ahead of her. The earbuds of his iPod hung from his neck. "We gave you an injection to keep you out for a while."

  "Where are you taking me?" She tried to not move her head.

  "I already told you." use leaned around the seat opposite Carlos. "You're going on a Caribbean vacation."

  "I've done nothing to either of you. Neither had Daniel. Why would you want us dead? Whatever the reason, it is all a terrible mistake."

  "No mistake, my love." Ilse turned back around and wiggled into a more comfortable position. "You're the one he wants."

  Judging from the Rolls Royce limo at the hospital and now the sleek, custom-appointed jet, she was obviously dealing with an extremely wealthy individual. On the forward bulkhead wall, she recognized the same logo that had been cut into the glass partition between the driver and passenger compartments of the limo, and engraved on the champagne flutes-the phoenix bird rising from flames. In a circ
le around the logo were the words, Phoenix Ministry. She had heard about the outfit on the news. What could a religious organization possibly have to do with this?

  And what had happened to Al? He was supposed to be right behind her getting to Brenda's bedside. Maybe he'd been kidnapped, too, or hurt, or killed. The depth of her concern surprised her. Maybe she couldn't quite wrap her head around Al being her father, but she had gotten past the resentment she believed. Seneca hoped he'd only been delayed by having to get gas or something as equally mundane. Even if that were the case, it still meant he would be hard pressed finding her now. She was in a plane over the ocean with no idea of its destination.

  Seneca studied Carlos, or Coyotl, or whoever he was. He seemed deeply immersed in the magazine article. His head bobbed slightly to whatever was on his iPod. In thinking back to Mexico City, she now realized he had acted squirrely from the moment she met him at the dig site. She assumed it was the pressure of the video shoot, but now she knew better. He planted the bomb that killed Daniel and the others. She was meant to be part of the death toll. And yet, she was spared. Why? Another surge of survivor guilt pained her. She supposed it didn't matter why she had survived; they were going to take care of that now.

  Daniel's killer sat a few feet away, calmly listening to music and casually reading. What kind of person was this? Was there no remorse? She still reeled every time she thought of how she had managed to shoot and kill the man on the island, but she realized she would do it again to avenge Daniel.

  "You can make this easy or hard." Carlos stood beside Seneca at the foot of the steps leading from the Learjet. "Go the easy route and you'll be treated with respect-there'll be no need for restraints. Choose hard and it'll be uncomfortable. Which is it?"

  "Easy," she answered.

  Seneca glanced around. They had landed at a small commercial airport in the Bahamas-a sign on the main building in the distance read, Andros Town. In addition to the modest terminal, there were a few aircraft service hangars with names like Bahamasair and Lynx Air International, and a scattering of prop commuters and private aircraft. She remembered coming here with her mother many years ago. By the looks of things, not much had changed.

  "This way." Ilse walked ahead of Seneca and Carlos as the jet was being towed into an unmarked hangar. As at the hospital, a limousine awaited. This time it was a white Bentley.

  Seneca watched the pine forests and farms pass as they left the airport and headed north along the rural two-lane road. Unlike the other tourist-destination islands in the Bahamas, Andros was the least populated. There were no big hotels and casinos, deepwater ports for cruise ships, or sprawling junk-filled gift bazaars. Instead, the attractions were angling for bonefish, diving the 140-mile-long barrier reef, and enjoying quiet seclusion.

  Ten minutes into the drive, something caught Seneca's eye. The brilliance of the Caribbean sun flashed off an object that seemed to grow out of the forest to her left. It was a giant step pyramid with sides that glistened like highly polished black onyx. Soon, an imposing concrete wall etched with strange glyphs and symbols ran along the road. A few moments later, the Bentley turned off the main road toward an entrance gate and waited for a pair of large iron barriers to open. The now-familiar Phoenix crest adorned the entrance. She saw armed security guards motion the car to proceed. After a winding journey along a palm-bordered entrance road, the car pulled into a circular drive and up to the front of the six-story pyramid structure.

  In the middle of the circle, Seneca saw a fountain; its centerpiece was a bronze-colored medallion whose surface bore a mixture of ancient Mexican Indian carvings surrounding a stylized rendering of the phoenix bird.

  "After you." Carlos motioned to a pair of gilded doors at the base of the pyramid. Two men, dressed in brown jumpsuits similar to the ones worn by the security guards at the front gate, opened the doors as the three approached.

  Inside, Seneca found herself in a grand entrance hall where the walls appeared to depict historic events of an ancient people Aztec, Toltec, or possibly Mayan, she guessed. The floors were of dark, heavily veined marble, and overhead, a lighting system focused on a suspended circular medallion like the one in the fountain outside. She recalled a similar carving shown to her by Daniel during their preparation for the Mexico City video shoot. She was now certain that the pictographs and glyphs, which seemed to be everywhere, were Aztec.

  Standing in front of a floor-to-ceiling window a man appeared. The sun streamed through the glass, reflecting ribbons of colored light like a prism, the glare haloing him, his figure dark in silhouette. Seneca couldn't take her eyes from the man. Did she stand in the presence of a magician, wizard, prophet, messiah? Or madman?

  Carlos was beside her. "May I present Javier Scarrow, the director of the Universal Phoenix Ministry."

  In a low voice that expressed a sense of mystery and awe, he whispered, "Sweet Flower. Sweet xochimiqui."

  DNA 2012, MEXICO CITY

  "THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE." MATT HELD the phone out as if he'd never seen one before. Shaking his head to clear his memory, he brought it back to his ear. "Al, I saw the prison wall that Seneca photographed on our way off the island. The scroll plainly read, Jesus es nuestro Salvador. I can still see it clearly in my mind. It was a bright and sunny day-there was no mistake."

  He sat in his room at the Hotel Torre Lindavista. As he talked to Al, he reached in his shirt pocket and pulled out the copy of Professor Flores's note with the reference to William Groves.

  "But you did say that you had trouble finding the wall that morning?"

  "Al, I realize it sounds crazy, but if I didn't know better, I'd swear the lettering on the scroll somehow changed overnight."

  There was a long pause. "That's crazy. I think you guys just got the wrong wall."

  "No, you don't understand. The place was big, but not that big. We went to the exact spot where we saw the graffiti on the wall the night before. The only difference from the previous night was now it said, Jesus es nuestro Salvador. I suggested the same thing-that we were in the wrong place. Seneca would have nothing to do with that theory. She was certain. Finally, as I walked away, she took the picture."

  "So you didn't actually see her take the picture?"

  "I turned my back, took two steps and heard the click of the camera. Four, maybe five seconds tops. Give me some credit here."

  "Sorry. Just covering all bases. I don't want to miss anything- no matter how minute. I'm upset with myself that I didn't go straight to the hospital. If I had, she'd still be safe. Twenty-twenty hindsight. Now she's gone, and I have no idea where she is or who took her. 1 just got my daughter back and suddenly she's taken

  "Hey, you don't have to explain. I understand. How helpless do you think I feel? I'm thousands of miles away." Matt glanced at the note. "What do we do now? How do we find her? What about this Groves connection?"

  "Is there a date on the note?"

  "1981."

  "So thirty-one years ago, William Groves wanted to know the history of the veil and how it got to Mexico. Where is Groves holed up these days?"

  "No idea."

  "Finding out should be easy enough. I'll call you back."

  Matt showered and ordered room service, but was too troubled to eat. What could anyone possibly want with dead people's bones? Some of the remains were even thousands of years old. He'd heard of cultures and religious sects that put ground-up animal bones in drinks and food believing them to be aphrodisiacs or elixirs that would improve their sexuality or extend their lives. Voodoo and the like used human bones in rituals. Still, why collect bones from all over the world and go to such extremes? Were these remains handpicked?

  Matt picked up his phone and scrolled through the recently received calls. He found the one he wanted and pushed talk.

  When the hospital operator answered, he said, "Dr. Domingo, please."

  A moment later, the chief of administration came on the line. "Dr. Domingo."

  "Hello doctor. This is Matt Everh
art."

  "Ah, Senor Everhart, how can I help you?"

  "Actually, I've got a technical question. I'm researching for my next novel. The theft of the remains of Hernan Cortes got me thinking about an idea. This may be out of your area of expertise, but can you tell me what can be determined from old bones like the ones stolen from the hospital chapel?"

  "There are some basic facts that can be found from human remains. A few things come to mind. Sometimes it's possible to determine COD, sorry, cause of death. Things like trauma and cancers and evidence of certain illnesses can be found in bones. Also the manner of death might be determined. For example, knife cuts to the ribs or a bullet wedged in the spinal column might suggest how someone died. If the bone collection includes the skull or the pelvis, the sex of the individual can often be determined. In some cases, you can confirm that the deceased had certain types of diseases like syphilis or if they suffered from anemia. There may be lesions from tuberculosis or one might find confirmation of birth defects. Age can also be estimated based upon the different stages of afflictions such as arthritis. If the long bones are present, the height of the individual can be estimated. And bone density can even suggest race. Of course, there's the obvious DNA."