by Ted Dekker
19
THOMAS STARED at the man he now knew had masterminded the virus. A thick Frenchman with fat fingers and greasy black hair who looked like he could stand in the face of a hurricane without batting an eye.
This was Armand Fortier.
They had been sedated, Monique told him. Within an hour of him passing out, they’d both been given shots. Men were dismantling the laboratory. They were going to be moved; she got that much from one of them. But to where she didn’t know.
Then she’d passed out. Neither of them knew how much time had passed since then.
They’d awakened here, in this windowless stone room with a pool table and a fireplace. They were both handcuffed with impossibly tight cuffs, seated in wooden chairs, facing the Frenchman and, behind him, Carlos. Monique was still dressed in her pale blue slacks and blouse, and Thomas still wore the camouflaged jumpsuit.
Thomas had tried to deduce their possible location, but he had no memory of being moved, and there was nothing in this room that couldn’t be found anywhere in the world. For all he knew they’d been out for two days. If he was right, the reason he’d dreamed at all was because he hadn’t been drugged for that first hour after Carlos had tortured him.
That first hour, he’d dreamed of the inquiry where he’d fought Justin and discovered that Martyn was Johan . . .
“Just so you know, the Americans did try to rescue you,” Fortier said. He seemed to find the fact interesting. “And I know from a very reliable source that they were after more than the antivirus. They want you. Everybody seems to want Thomas Hunter and Monique de Raison.”
His eyes moved to Monique. “You have this solution in your head. You’d think I would just kill you and eliminate the risk of them finding you. Fortunately for you, I have reasons to keep you alive.”
His eyes shifted back to Thomas. “You, on the other hand, are an enigma. You know things you should not. You gave us the Raison Strain, and then you inadvertently gave us the antivirus, both sides of this most useful weapon. But it doesn’t stop there. You continue to know things. Where we are. What we will do next, perhaps. What should I do with you?”
Thomas’s mind returned to the dream of Justin’s challenge.
Johan. The man who’d led the Horde against them so effectively had been Johan. And Johan had a scar on his cheek. Thomas had watched the duo walk into the woods to broker peace with Qurong, a peace that was somehow entwined with betrayal.
The crowd had erupted in fierce debate. Thomas had returned to his Guard, and the Council had joined them to berate his decision to give Johan safe passage from the forest. But how could he kill Johan? And hadn’t Justin won the inquiry? They had no right to undermine him now.
The festivities that night had been more dissension than celebration— a strange mix of exuberance by those who believed that Justin was indeed destined to deliver them from the Horde with this peace of his, and animosity by those who argued vehemently against any such treasonous betrayal of Elyon.
Thomas had finally collapsed into a fitful sleep.
“What are you thinking?” Fortier asked.
Thomas focused on the thick Frenchman. He had no doubt that this man would succeed with his virus. The Books of Histories said he would. And, as it was turning out, changing history wasn’t as easy as he’d once hoped. Impossible, maybe. All of this—his discovery of the virus in the first place, his attempts to derail Svensson, and now this encounter with Fortier—might very well be written in the Books of Histories. Imagine that: Thomas Hunter’s attempt to rescue Monique de Raison at Cyclops failed when the transport he was flying in was shot down . . . If he’d been successful in retrieving the Books from Qurong’s tent, he could have read the details of his own life! But it seemed that the path of history was continuing exactly as it had been recorded, and he knew its final destination if not the precise course it would take.
The question now was when. When would they finally kill him? When would Monique die? When would the antivirus actually be released to the chosen few? When would the rest die their hideous diseased death?
“They searched for you with nearly a hundred aircraft loaded with enough electronic equipment to power Paris for a week,” Fortier was saying. “It was quite a spectacle, not all at once or to one region, of course. In circles and to airports throughout the South Pacific. They blocked the air-traffic routes between Indonesia and France. To be quite honest, we barely made it out.”
His lips twisted in a small grin. “We wouldn’t have if I hadn’t foreseen exactly this possibility. You see, you’re not the only one who can see the future. Oh, your sight might be different from mine based on this . . . this gift rather than solid deductive reasoning, but I can promise you that I have seen the future, and I like what I see. Do you?”
“No,” Thomas said. “I don’t.”
“Very good. You still have your voice. And you’re honest, which is more than I can say for myself.”
He turned away.
“I need to know something, Thomas. I know that you know the answer, because I have ears inside your government. I know the president has no intention of actually delivering the weapons that are just now entering the Atlantic. What I don’t know is how far the president will carry his bluff. I need to know when to take the appropriate action. We are now fully prepared for a nuclear exchange, you must know. Knowing if and when they might attack would be helpful.”
“He won’t fire nuclear weapons,” Thomas said.
“No? Maybe you don’t know your president as well as I do. We anticipate it. Any knowledge you give me won’t change the outcome of this chess match; it will only determine how many people must die to facilitate that outcome.”
Fortier glanced at his watch. “We are going public in France in three days. Over a hundred less-progressive members of the government will meet untimely ends between now and then. A Chinese delegation is waiting for a meeting with President Gaetan in his office, and I’ve been asked to join them. Evidently news of the altercations with you in Indonesia have leaked and are causing a stir. The Australians are threatening to go public and must be calmed. One of our own commanders is asking the wrong questions. I am a busy man, Thomas. I have to leave. We’ll talk again tomorrow. I hope your memory serves you better then.”
He regarded Monique, dipped his head barely, and left the room.
Thomas’s mind spun with the details that the Frenchman had just given him. The world was indeed rushing to its well-known end. While he was off dreaming about the Gathering and how it could possibly be that the great general Martyn was really Johan, complete with scarred—
Thomas stopped. He stared at Carlos, who had crossed the room and opened a door that led into darkness.
He turned in profile to Thomas. The scar. Right cheek. Curved like a half moon, exactly as he remembered Johan’s.
“Let’s go,” the man said. “Don’t make me drag you.”
No, Carlos wouldn’t want to drag them. It would mean getting too close—an opportunity for Thomas to do something. The man knew to play things safe.
But none of this interested Thomas at the moment.
The scar.
What if Rachelle was right about how the realities worked? Thomas might be the only true gateway between the realities, but if someone was aware of both realities, then both realities had potential to affect that person. For instance, now that Rachelle believed in both realities, if Monique was cut, Rachelle would also wake up with a cut. And if Monique was killed, Rachelle would also die. Would Monique die if Rachelle did? Thomas hadn’t convinced Monique to believe yet. Nor had Monique ever come into contact with Thomas’s blood.
The link between the realities was belief? Or Thomas’s blood?
Perhaps both. It did make a strange kind of sense. Life and blood and skills and knowledge were all transferable between realities—he’d already experienced that much. Proven it. But why?
Belief.
If someone with even the slightest belief
came into contact with Thomas’s blood, then their belief would be enough to connect them to his reality with him. It would explain everything! And it wouldn’t require that Rachelle and Monique be one and the same.
It was as good a working theory as he’d come up with yet.
“Now. Please,” Carlos said, indicating the room.
There was still a hole in his theory. Primarily, why he was Thomas in both realities, why he didn’t share this experience with someone else.
Thomas stood. “I have something to say,” he said. “Can you get the Frenchman?”
Carlos studied him. “You’ll have to wait.”
“What I have to say he will want to hear before he meets with the Chinese.”
“Then tell me.”
“It has to do with how I knew where you were keeping Monique. You knew I’d come, didn’t you?” Thomas walked forward a few paces and stopped ten feet from the man. Behind him, Monique kept her seat.
“You could have tracked me down in Washington, but you chose to go to Indonesia and wait for me there, because you knew that I would know,” Thomas continued. “Am I right?”
“What does this have to do with the Chinese?”
“Actually, it’s not tied directly to the Chinese per se. I just said he should know this before he meets with them.”
“And this is?”
“That I am going to escape before he meets with them.”
Thomas didn’t have any such knowledge, but he needed the man’s full attention, and this was the first step.
“Then it would have been a wasted call,” Carlos said. “I have no intention of letting you escape. This isn’t a useful discussion.”
“I didn’t say you were going to let us escape. But our escape will involve you. I know this because you’re not like them. You’re a deeply religious man who follows the will of Allah, and I know you well. Much better than you think I might. We’ve met before.”
Carlos shifted. “If you know me so well, then you know that I’m not easily swayed by a fool who speaks in riddles.”
“No, you aren’t. But you have been swayed. Deceived. I know that without a doubt. Do you think that Svensson and Fortier have any intention of allowing Islam to thrive after they gain power? Religion is their enemy. They may set up their own, they may even call it Islam, but it won’t be the Islam you know. One of the first to die will be you. You know too much. You’re much too powerful. You are the worst kind of enemy—they know that. You must as well.”
He didn’t respond.
“You’re not curious as to how we met before?” Thomas asked.
“We haven’t.”
“You don’t have the memory of it yet. We’ve met in the other reality. The one with the Books of Histories. There your name is Johan, and you are the brother of my wife. You’re also a great general who has caused me and my Forest Guard more than our share of grief.”
Carlos apparently found neither humor nor persuasion in the claim. “The only reason you’re alive is because of your witchcraft,” he said. “If you cross me again, I will kill you. I see that you’re not healing so well these days.” He glanced at the bruises and cuts the handcuffs had worn into Thomas’s wrists. “I think you will die easily enough. Give me a reason and I will test the theory now.”
“My gift is from witchcraft? Or because I’m a servant of El—of God? I’ll admit, I haven’t followed him in this reality, but I really haven’t had a chance, and that’s changing. Listen to yourself. You’re marked for death because of your belief in the one you call God! You serve two demons who kill for their own gain. You think they will let you live?”
He blinked.
“What if I could prove it to you? Brother.”
“Don’t be absurd.”
“But you do believe that I know things I shouldn’t,” Thomas said. “That’s why you waited for me in Indonesia. You knew I would show up. I say that you too believe in a reality where there’s more than meets the eye.”
Thomas could see the light in his eyes. As a Muslim, such a belief would be natural to him.
Carlos was tempted to shoot the man then. If Svensson and Fortier weren’t so taken by Hunter’s strange gift, he would defy them and kill the man here.
“Your name is Johan and we are destined to be brothers,” Thomas said.
His mind ached with this nonsensical revelation. Who’d ever heard of such nonsense?
His mother had. She was a practicing Sufi mystic.
The Prophet, Mohammed, had.
Hunter might be misinterpreting his visions, but he might very well have seen others in his dreams. Maybe even him. Carlos. The man’s claims enraged him.
On the other hand, Thomas was smart enough to try something exactly like this to distract him. Handcuffed, the man hardly had a prayer of reaching him, much less escaping from him. But Carlos wouldn’t underestimate him.
“I’ll consider what you’ve said. Now if you will please—”
“Then I’ll prove it,” Thomas said. “I’ll cut Johan on the neck without touching you.”
The words triggered an alarm in Carlos. Heat spread down his neck.
“Do you believe I can do that? Do you believe that if I’m healed in the other reality, I will be healed in this one? Or that if I die there, I will die here? Do you remember shooting me, Carlos? Still, I’m alive. You live in the other reality with me too, and I’ve just had a confrontation with you at the Gathering. I cut your neck with my sword.”
“Don’t be ridiculous! Stop this at once!” But Carlos’s mind reared with fear. He had heard the mystics speak like this. The Christians. He’d heard some claim belief that if a man would only open his eyes he could see another world. And a small part of him did believe. Always had.
“Do you believe, Carlos? Of course you do. You always have.”
At first, Carlos mistook the sensation in his neck for the rage that filled his veins. But his neck was burning. His flesh was stinging as if it had been cut. It couldn’t possibly be true, yet he knew that it was.
He lifted his left hand to his neck.
Thomas watched with surprise as the skin on Carlos’s neck suddenly began to bleed, precisely as it would if he’d just taken a blade to it.
He hadn’t just cut Carlos. But enough of Carlos believed his story about Johan to cause the rift in the realities. One of these two worlds might be a dream, but at the moment it didn’t matter. At the moment Carlos was bleeding because Johan was still bleeding!
The man lifted his hand to his neck, felt the small wound, pulled his fingers away bloody. His eyes stared in confounded fascination.
Thomas moved then. Two steps and he left the ground. His foot struck Carlos before the man could tear his eyes free from his hand.
The man hadn’t even braced for the impact. He crumbled like a chain that had been cut from the ceiling.
Thomas landed on both feet and spun around. Monique was staring, stunned by the developments. Then she was running for him.
“Quick! He has the keys in his right pocket!” Her words piled on top of each other. “I saw them; he has them in his pocket!”
Thomas squatted by the man and felt behind him for the pocket, dug the keys out, and stood. “Back up to me. Hurry!”
They freed themselves in a matter of seconds. Monique’s wrists were bleeding because of the cuffs as well. She ignored the cuts. “Now what?”
“You’re okay?”
“I’m free; that’s better than I’ve been for two weeks.”
“Okay, stay close,” Thomas said.
She was staring at Carlos, who lay unconscious, bleeding from a slight wound on his neck. “What just happened?”
“Later. Hurry.”
The hallway was empty. They ran to the staircase at the end and were about to climb when Thomas changed his mind. Sunlight poured through a three-foot window directly ahead and above. The latch was unlocked.
He redirected her toward it, pulled himself up, opened the window, and swung in
to the window well outside. He glanced over the top, saw no guard, and turned back for Monique.
“Jump. I’ll pull you up,” he whispered.
She caught his hand and he plucked her easily from the floor, wincing with the thought of the pain she must feel in her torn wrists. She struggled a bit to get her knees up on the ledge, but soon they crouched in the window well, window firmly closed behind them. Less than three minutes had passed since Carlos hit the floor.
Monique poked her head up for a look. “We’re in the country,” she whispered. “A farm.”
Thomas saw several large barns and a driveway that disappeared into the forest. This building was covered by old stonework. The sun was already dipping toward the western horizon.
Carlos would wake up soon. They had to put some distance between them and this farm.
“Okay. We go straight for the forest.” Thomas studied the closest trees. “Once we run, we don’t stop. Can you do that?”
“I can run.”
He glanced around one last time. Clear.
Thomas leaped from the window well, pulled Monique up, and ran for the forest, making sure she stayed close. The crunch of twigs and dried leaves welcomed them into the protective trees.
Thomas glanced back. No alarm. Not yet.
Mike Orear guided Theresa Sumner by the arm toward the CDC parking lot. She’d ignored his phone calls for the last twenty-four hours, presumably because she was out of town. But by the looks of the bags under her eyes, he wouldn’t be surprised to learn that she’d been holed up here, working on the virus.
He’d driven out to her house last night. No luck. It was eight the next morning before he’d finally driven here.
“Mike, you’ve made your point. And the answer is no. You can’t go public. Not yet.” She pulled her arm away.
“Twenty-four hours, Theresa. This isn’t about you and me anymore. I made a promise, but I wasn’t thinking clearly. You tell whoever needs to know that they have twenty-four hours to come clean, or I’m putting the story on the air.”
She reached her white SUV and pulled up, face brave but dog tired. “Then you might as well join the terrorists, because you’ll hurt as many people as they will.”
