The Fellowship bc-2

by William Tyree

  Mayflower Hotel

  Washington D.C.

  Ellis had often fantasized about staying in the historic Mayflower Hotel, but her fantasies had not been anything like this. Blackout shades had been applied to all the windows, and a security detail outside the 9th-floor room kept them confined. Overnight, Speers had grown increasingly concerned about the possibility that it had been Ellis, not Drucker, who had been the target of the attacks at the hotel bar and the condo. Ellis thought that theory was nonsense. Trouble just had a way of finding her.

  At least the four-star accommodations were spacious, and the room came at no extra cost. The vacant suite was booked year-round for visiting dignitaries, and it was equipped with an exceptional workspace. Speers had felt it was best to keep Ellis’ work away from the prying eyes at McLean.

  Ellis’ sister, Jenna, was curled up in an armchair, wearing a hotel robe and audio headphones that were as large as tennis balls. For Jenna, Speers’ decision to move the Ellis sisters to a secured location was a bona fide staycation. If she had been spooked by the security in the hallway, or by the fact that her sister wasn’t allowed to disclose the security threat that had forced them to come to the hotel, she wasn’t letting on. After a grueling shift taking complex coffee orders at Starbucks, Jenna had already ordered room service twice and used the suite’s Jacuzzi tub. This was as good as it got.

  Ellis was significantly less content. Although she had hours of work ahead of her thanks to their raid on Drucker’s apartment, and her body was sore from their near-death escape, she was no less antsy for freedom. Understanding that Speers had placed her here for her own protection didn’t help. Every part of her body was screaming to get back on the trail.

  Unable to relax long enough to concentrate, she surrendered to the hotel mini-bar. She found tiny containers of Jack Daniels and two brands of rum that she had never heard of.

  “Whoa,” Jenna said as she watched her sister doing shots with the tiny bottles. She popped the enormous headphones away from her skull just enough to hear the sound of her own voice. “Can we order some room service?”

  “Sure, Sis.”

  Jenna wasted no time in popping open the menu. “Can we order prime rib?”

  The government per diem for employee meals while traveling was $71 per day in D.C. The prime rib was going to take half their food budget in one fell swoop.

  “Please?” Jenna pressed.

  She was too tired to negotiate. And besides, it wasn’t every day she escaped death twice. “What the hell.”

  As Jenna dialed room service, Haley sat cross-legged on one of the beds. She emptied the contents of the backpack they had removed from Drucker’s apartment and spread the manuscript, photographs and handwritten notes out before her.

  Now she saw something that she hadn’t seen in Drucker’s condo: the infamous issue of Inside Washington magazine. The page was turned down to the article. A bold headline, ‘The Country Club Cult That Runs Washington,’ appeared across the top. Someone had drawn a red circle around the title and written SENSATIONALIST CRAP!!! The handwriting matched Drucker’s scarcely legible scrawl.

  She really hadn’t bought Drucker’s claim that it had been published without his consent, but now she saw he was probably telling the truth. Why else would he have been so critical of his own writing?

  She flipped through the handwritten legal pads. Some were filled with quotes supposedly attributed to Sebastian Wolf. She was surprised to see pages and pages of scripture. What was it Drucker had said? Wolf believes that religion gets in the way of following Jesus. For a guy who disapproved of religion, Wolf sure liked to quote the Bible.

  Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit — Matthew 28:19

  But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” — Acts 1:8 ESV

  And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. — Ezekiel 36:26, LS XXIV

  And in turn, you will return my heart from stone to flesh, so that all men may share in the wisdom of the LORD. And the whole world shall rejoice. — LS XXXI

  Ellis recognized some of the scriptures from her studies at Our Lady of Lourdes, the Catholic school she had attended during junior high and high school, as well as her adult Bible study classes. Others weren’t familiar. The capitalized abbreviations at the ends of each passage typically referred to Bible versions. KJV stood for King James Version, ESV was English Standard Version, and so forth. She had never heard of LS. She could only guess that it referred to the Living Scriptures that Drucker had spoken of.

  There were pages and pages of such odd scripture, many of which appeared to have been altered significantly from the versions she was familiar with. There was a strong emphasis on resurrection throughout all the passages, as well as many that seemed to validate the pursuit of science as a God-given directive.

  Soon she came upon what looked like a series of hand-drawn org charts. Most were half-completed, a mixture of names and question marks. There were dozens of names, representing every ethnicity imaginable.

  Written at the top of the chart on the first page was, S WOLF (SHEPHERD). Sebastian Wolf, she assumed, although the term “Shepherd” meant nothing to her. The level immediately below it had two spaces, both filled with question marks. The third and fourth tiers contained some names she recognized, among them N. GISH, and on the same level, R. PRESTON, among others.

  She felt a rush of excitement. This was what she was looking for. A membership list. The fact that there were so many question marks, and no full names or titles, was unfortunate. But she had a written document that appeared to validate the victims’ induction into a secret society. Now maybe she could connect the dots.

  A knock at the door broke Ellis’ focus. She paused a moment, orienting herself. There were supposed to be two guards outside. The knock came again, more insistent this time.

  “Ms. Ellis?”

  She got up from the bed and tightened the white robe around her waist.

  “What is it?” Jenna said, pulling her headphones off. Her eyes got big as she watched her sister retrieve the handgun from the nightstand next to the bed.

  Ellis shushed her sibling, then went to the door and looked through the peephole. It was Jack McClellan, a longtime secret service agent who had been assigned to lead the security team guarding the suite. Ellis figured Speers had put McClellan on the job because he was a familiar face, having worked with her to defend the capitol during the Ulysses Coup.

  The rumor was that he had taken a bullet meant for George W. Bush that he would never get public credit for. Why didn’t he just retire? He had served five administrations. Surely he’d maxed out his pension by now.

  She opened the door and found herself staring at the horrendousness of Jack’s homemade dye job. He was obviously gray by now, and the jet black smear of thinning hair wasn’t doing anything to conceal it.

  “Major fail,” he scolded. “As we discussed, you need to ask one of our qualifying questions before opening the door. What if someone was behind me, holding me at gunpoint? That might be my only way of signaling to you that there was danger.”

  Ellis sighed irritably. “Okay, Jack. You got me. Are we done?”

  He turned to the side and waved his hand. A hotel staffer approached with a room service cart. “I think maybe I should have a bite of that prime rib,” McClellan said as Ellis pulled the cart into the room. “Might be poisoned.”

  “Nice try.”

  As Jenna dug into her dinner, Ellis’ focus returned to Drucker’s list. She was sure now that Gish and Preston had known each other through the Fellowship World Initiative. Now she had to try to identify some other names on the list.

  Throughout the chart, a Y-axis indicated numbers by each level
on the org chart. The Fellowship is a hierarchical society. You have to level up over time. Near the top, you’ve got world leaders, notable scientists. Wolf’s name had no numerical attribution, which appeared to place him as the big kahuna. The second level — where there were only question marks — was the number 21. The number 20 was written beside Gish, Preston and a few other names she didn’t recognize. On the subsequent pages were a list of 19s and a few 18s and 17s.

  The amount of diversity among the listed surnames was worrisome. While Ellis guessed that there were plenty of ethnic minorities in the House and Senate these days, as well as in British Parliament, there couldn’t be this much diversity. That meant this list contained people from all over the world. The Fellowship World Initiative appeared to be truly global. Could all these people be world leaders? And if so, did that mean they were all in danger?

  The thought of the crisis spreading to additional nations was frightening. She had to talk to Carver.

  She went to her bag, looking for her satphone, and remembered she no longer had one. Speers had confiscated it, fearing that it had been compromised. Carver’s satphone number, as well as Arunus Roth’s, had been programmed into it. She went to the desk, powered up her computer, and logged into the secure mission cloud. She posted a private message: call me.

  She got up and paced, then flattened herself into the carpet and bent her legs into a pigeon pose, pondering next steps. Without first names, titles and associated nationalities, identifying these people would be hard. Ellis kicked herself for not keeping up more with international political and scientific news. Maybe then she would recognize some of these people.

  She flipped to a back page and found a whole new slew of Level 20 names. One stood out among them: V. BORST.

  Something shifted within Ellis. Vera Borst? Mother of Mary?

  She did a web search for the name. It was evidently quite rare — there were virtually no other exact matches. United Nations Under-Secretary-General Borst. Like Carver said, a big shot.

  Ellis quickly navigated to the woman’s Wikipedia page, where Borst’s headshot was pictured above an image of the United Nations flag. She realized she had never really considered the flag’s design before. It had a blue background, with white laurel wreaths framing what could only be described as a bleached map of all the world’s continents as seen through a rifle scope.

  Borst’s face was soft and round under a Peter Pan haircut that made her head appear to be remarkably orb-like. The 49-year-old UN leader hadn’t worn any makeup, even in what was obviously a posed photograph. One of those ultra-organic types, Ellis thought.

  According to her Wiki page, Borst had been born in Amsterdam and earned a Ph.D. in biomedical engineering before abruptly leaving science for politics. She had been elected to the Netherlands’ lower house during her first try, and had served in the country’s diplomatic corps for a decade before being appointed UNICEF director. She had subsequently been appointed an under-secretary-general of the United Nations.

  If Drucker’s claims were any measure, Borst’s background in both science and politics made her a lock for Wolf’s inner circle.

  Ellis scrolled lower on the page, reading the text under “Personal Life”:

  Borst is a frequent lecturer worldwide, discussing the need for enhanced global cooperation on the use of embryo stem-cell research to detect and prevent disease. She lives near Seattle, Washington with her life partner, Dr. Dane Mitchell, a professor of biology at the University of Washington.

  “Feeling better, Sis?” Jenna said, spotting the triumphant look on Ellis’ face.

  “Thank you Jack Daniels, thank you Coke.”

  And thank you Drucker, she thought. May you rest in peace.

  Dane Mitchell’s number wasn’t publicly listed. But she knew that the State Department kept contact information for UN leaders.

  She used the hotel phone to dial a friend at State, allowing her typically suppressed southern accent to surface just long enough to charm the desperately single guy into looking up Borst’s personal phone number. In exchange, she promised to go out on a date with him. It wouldn’t be all that bad, she thought. He was kind of cute.

  She hung up and dialed Borst’s number. After four rings, a woman answered the phone. “This is Vera.”

  Via della Conciliazione

  Rome

  Rome’s cobblestones felt good under Carver’s feet. He had discovered years ago that this street, which stretched between the Tiber River and St. Peter’s Square, was the only vantage point where it was possible to properly appreciate the Vatican’s grandeur. High walls surrounded the majority of the tiny Vatican nation, making only the upper heights of its massive basilica and palaces visible. But from here, just blocks from the boundary between the Vatican and Rome, it was possible to see St. Peter’s Square, St. Peter’s Basilica, the Apostolic Palace and the many buildings occupied by various orders all at once.

  “First time here?” he asked Nico, although he already knew the answer by the awestruck look on his face.

  Nico pointed to the towering, four-sided monument with a pyramid-shaped cap. “Why is there an Egyptian obelisk in the center of St. Peter’s Square?”

  Carver smiled. Every time he saw the obelisk in St. Peter’s Square, it was clear where L’Enfant, the architect that created the plans for the National Mall, had gotten his inspiration for the Washington Monument and the surrounding federal buildings. From a distance, it was uncanny how much the massive columns and basilica of St. Peter’s resembled Capitol Hill. Washington D.C. was America’s Rome.

  “Rome has seven obelisks taken from Egypt,” Carver said. “That one was originally installed in the Roman Forum. It’s the only one without the original Egyptian hieroglyphics.”

  It seemed to Carver that the clergy were just as thick on the ground on Via della Conciliazione as they must have been when the four-story building had been erected in 1480. The street was the Vatican’s equivalent of Pennsylvania Avenue, and the Palazzo Della Rovere before them had been the home of countless cardinals, bishops, noblemen and nuns over the centuries until finally coming under the ownership of the ancient Order of the Holy Sepulchre, which answered to the Vatican, and still occupied the west side of the building.

  “Our hotel,” Carver said, pointing to the structure. The east side was a modern hotel called the Hotel Columbus, which was frequented by Vatican visitors and dignitaries.

  “Dude!” Nico said. “Now this is the kind of place where I can get some serious work done.”

  As they entered the crowded lobby, Father Callahan was impossible to miss. In a city full of priests wearing black frocks, the Irish-born CIA operative’s shock of short red hair separated him from the rest. At six foot two, Callahan should have appeared slightly taller than Carver, but his stooping posture put the two men at eye level.

  Carver submitted to Callahan’s crippling handshake. Then he introduced Nico.

  “Your reputation precedes you,” Callahan said in his typically charming Irish lilt. “Welcome to my second home, as it were. You are in luck. My favorite suite on the second floor is available. Two bedrooms. Space to work, a view of the courtyard, and best of all, the ceiling frescoes are all originals, painted by a Renaissance master.”

  As the priest-cum-intelligence operative turned, Carver noted the folds of soft fat at the base of his neck. Callahan had always been a big boy, but it was clear that he’d put on 20 or 30 more pounds since they had last seen each other.

  Carver could hardly believe his eyes when they exited the elevator onto the second floor. A section of wall had been intentionally exposed. He touched the 1500-year-old brickwork with his fingers as he passed, admiring the finishing on the corners and artwork on the ceiling and the stucco finishing work on the walls. The entrance to their room was encased in a beautiful marble frame. Callahan beamed as he unlocked the door and let his guests into the spacious suite.

  “A Salviati?” Nico exclaimed as he saw the artwork. “Seriously?�
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  Callahan looked at Carver. “You didn’t tell me Nico was also an expert on Renaissance art.”

  Carver wasn’t paying much attention. He was too busy admiring an elaborate iron candelabra that hung over the dining table in their suite. It was a magnificent work of art, with the sign of the Vatican — the crossed keys of St. Peter beneath the triple crown — masterfully replicated at its center. “I hope you didn’t lay down your personal credit card for this room,” Carver said, “Because this candelabra is going to look great in my condo in D.C.”

  He led Callahan to the master bedroom and shut the door, leaving Nico to salivate over the furnishings. Then the American began scanning the room for bugs.

  The priest looked nervous. “You think your friend will be, uh, okay out there on his own?”

  Carver nodded. “That chip in his arm is a strong deterrent against flight. Plus, I think he likes this place.”

  The priest smiled, taking in Carver’s ripped form. “Still running several miles a day, obviously.”

  “I try.”

  The priest paused for a moment. “And now, a person with normal social skills would return the compliment by telling me how great I look.”

  “To be honest, you look like you’ve seen some hard miles, Father. I thought Rome was supposed to be a cushy post.”

  “To whom much is given, much will be expected,” Callahan said, quoting Luke. A brilliant student in his youth, Callahan had been recruited by the CIA almost as soon as he had entered the priesthood in Dublin, Ireland. Under the agreement, he was encouraged to fully pursue his ambitions in the Catholic Church in order to rise in the church hierarchy and broaden his intelligence-gathering capabilities. Over the years he had become a highly paid messenger, delivering information, technology and occasional surveillance services while still managing to keep his day job.

  Four years ago he had been offered a role in Vatican Intelligence. With the organization having maintained close ties with the CIA, Callahan had become the primary linchpin in joint operations between the Vatican and American intelligence, as well as other organizations such as MI6 and the Mossad. He was officially a double agent. But the CIA hoped they would remain his true master.