Online Murder Syndicate: The Paranormal Mysteries & Adventures of Special Agent Lou Abrams (The Paranormal Mysteries & Adventure of Special Agent Lou Abrams Book 2)

by Thomas Craig

  http://m.fbi.gov/#http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/training/sat, The FBI Federal Bureau of Investigation, New Agent training. 2013, December 18.

  www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/zuni, Zuni. 2014, February 20.

  http://www.native-languages.org/zuni-legends.htm, Researched Important Zuni Mythological Figures. 2014.

  https://read.amazon.com/?asin=B07C2B1CFN , Outlines of Zuni Creation Myths, Frank Hamilton Cushing. Madison & Adams Press, 2018. ISBN 978-80-268-8868-0

  https://www.history.com/news/a-perfect-solar-superstorm-the-1859-carrington-event , A Perfect Solar Storm, Christopher Klein. Aug 22, 2018.

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  BOOK 3

  TURN THE PAGE FOR AN EXCERPT

  BOOK 3

  Clingmans Dome Murders

  The Paranormal Mysteries & Adventures of Special Agent Lou Abrams

  Book 3 Description

  Copyright © 2020 Thomas Potter Craig III

  All rights reserved.

  Clingmans Dome Murders is the third book in the Lou Abrams novel series. Finding himself without his healing power, Lou rejoins his team members Arya Shah, Lauren O’Quinn, and Tom Holliday to track a deadly stalker with a political agenda moving freely through the Smoky Mountains.

  The pursuit takes the team through Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and most of the southern Appalachian Mountains tracking the one known as “The Wolf of Coopers Creek.” With Fall slipping away and the threat of Winter coming, the team must do all they can to catch the killer before their leads go cold.

  Lou continues to struggle with his disconnection from the Sun and his gift, as his pleas to the Gods continue to go unanswered. The race is on as the team struggles to catch the elusive predator. They face dangerous and deadly encounters along the way while trying to avoid being victims themselves.

  Clingmans Dome Murders

  Prologue

  Growing up in the Appalachian Mountains on the Eastern Cherokee reservation, Waya was always getting into trouble and then running off into the woods until things cooled off at home. At an early age, he developed into an excellent hunter and tracker and felt most comfortable when in the woods. His family named him Waya meaning ‘wolf’ because of his ability to track and hunt, but also for the trouble he always found himself in.

  As he grew older the trouble he found, or rather created, became less forgivable by friends, family, and the tribe. He was incarcerated a couple of times in the EBCI Justice Center mainly for stealing and fighting. It was there, that he met a man who knew every dreadful event the Cherokee endured over the last 300 years. Not knowing if some, or all, of the stories were bullshit, Waya was curious enough to investigate the tall tales about President Andrew Jackson to see if they were true. Jackson seemed to be the anti-hero in most of the man’s stories.

  Waya was no research scholar. However, it was quite easy for him to find an abundance of historical facts on the internet showing how President Andrew Jackson was one of the cruelest people and worst President the United States had ever seen. The status was not solely based on how the ex-President treated Native Americans, but those actions tended to be the bulk of the reasons. Waya already knew some horrifying information from tribal history lessons in school. However, the more he read, the more the anger rooted in him.

  As he researched further, historical documents outlined how President Jackson claimed to have run for President on a campaign to work to advance the rights of men and drive out corrupt rich folk from the government. As history showed Waya, Jackson did neither.

  Instead, it was well documented for Waya to read how Andrew Jackson built up his wealth on the backs of the 160 slaves he owned, who he beat frequently in public and private. Jackson also signed 70 mostly illegitimate Removal Treaties, forcing tens of thousands of Seminole, Creek, Cherokee, Chickasaw, and Choctaw from their rightful land in the east and south. He became the white settler’s champion to unlawful land grabbing to make them all wealthier. Waya thought, how do you remove corrupt aristocrats in the government if you are one of them? He knew the answer, you don’t, and Jackson didn’t.

  Waya read that the Presidents before and few after Andrew Jackson conducted or supported similar atrocities, but none came remotely close to the genocidal massacre conducted by Andrew ‘Old Hickory’ Jackson against the different Native American Tribes.

  Jackson had started his quest of annihilating the Indigenous people of the East and Southeast during the War of 1812 against the British, which quickly turned into a preemptive move to hunt down the Creek Tribes inhabiting land in Georgia, North Carolina, Alabama, Florida, and Louisiana before the Creek tribes could side with the British. After he fought and killed their warriors and innocent farmers, he would order his troops to go kill the Creek women and children. “Leave no one behind,” Jackson was quoted saying on many raids. That’s genocide, Waya thought to himself.

  Waya could not believe what he had read about Jackson supporting settlers wanting the Cherokee land for gold mining and property development. Jackson assigned troops to round up Cherokee and other tribes, placing them in internment camps. From there, if they survived the horrid conditions, troops began relocating them 800 miles West to Oklahoma. The relocation was the infamous journey known as “The Trail of Tears”, and Jackson was responsible for orchestrating it against the innocent during and after his 8 years as President. All of these acts had blatantly ignored past government treaties in place with tribes that should have guaranteed the tribe’s rights to their land FOREVER.

  That day of research was burned into Waya’s memory. As he read the detailed events from 1800 - 1844 he remembered pausing, imagining having to endure those horrific acts and then families being reminded of it through generations for 200 years. It was torture to know the man who murdered his ancestors, forced the remaining ones from their rightful homes in the most beautiful and lush mountain range where they lived for thousands of years, was seen as a hero of sorts through statues and paper currency.

  In the middle of reflecting, Waya took out his wallet and pulled from it a $20 bill with Jackson’s face on the front. Why is he on it? Waya asked himself.

  He researched for hours for reasons why Jackson had been placed on the $20 bill in 1928, which was almost exactly 100 years after Jackson created the Indian Removal Act of 1830 furthering his ethnic cleansing and starting the infamous Trail of Tears. What a horrible centennial gesture, he thought.

  From Jackson’s earlier days of massacring hundreds of Creek families between 1812-1814; he later became directly responsible for close to 16,000 Native American deaths 1830 - 1850 during and after his presidency due to the relocation of close to 60,000 Native Americans to Oklahoma.

  Waya’s research came close to a reasonable act that some could reason as to why Jackson was hailed as a hero. However, the reason seemed to be a forced, unworthy achievement and this added to the boiling rage deep in his gut.

  He found a few historical articles declaring Jackson an American hero based on his January 1815 victory over the British in The Battled of New Orleans. This so-called ‘victory’ was preceded by two years of killing Creek family. However, as Waya read more, history showed the battle was not necessary as the Treaty of Ghent was signed weeks earlier declaring peace between America and Great Britain, ending the war of 1812. News of the treaty, unfortunately, took a few weeks to travel back to America over ocean and land. So, the victory was pointless and just another slaughter on Jackson’s resume.

  Convinced that nothing legitimate existed to salute Jackson as a worthy icon then and now, Waya almost stopped researching. What he found next changed the course of his future.

  At first, the article almost looked hopeful. In 2016 the Treasury Department finely decided to replace the ex-President with someone who actually stood for human rights, Harriet Tubman. Tubman would get center stage on the front of the $20 bill.

  However, in some strange twist to properly add some sort of apologetic gesture, culture, and diversity to the US
currency, the act took a wrong turn in the Legal Tender Oversight Committee comprised of Congressmen from 15 States and two Territories.

  The government decided to postpone the reveal and wait until 2028 to print the new $20 bills as if trying to hit another 100th anniversary. This could be overlooked, Waya thought, if the Treasury Department and Oversight Committee kicked Jackson 100% off the currency, but the Committee introduced a plan to move Jackson’s portrait to the reverse side. A tragic miscalculation considering the timing of the reveal, and the present issues around the country demanding the need to drive more equality, diversity, and inclusion.

  Waya sat in the coffee shop staring at the laptop screen for an hour after reading the disturbing news, stewing in a blind rage of disbelief. He couldn’t help think, No luck for the Cherokee Nation and other Tribes to see one of our ancestor’s most notorious murderers finally abolished.

  He thought what an unfortunate coincidence it would be for the Black and African American cultures regarding a would-be momentous occasion, now destined to have a slave-owning murderer on the reverse side taunting the former slave and American abolitionist on the front side. It all seemed very unnecessary and avoidable.

  Was it a coincidence though? he thought. At that moment in time, Waya couldn’t help to think that the majority of the 30 Congressmen and women on the Oversight Committee had to have thought out this act of reinforcing the oppression of these two already marginalized groups.

  As his mind trailed off again, he thought about how the US Government was supposed to be founded on the principles of representing the people. They could benefit from more diversity and inclusion programs in their ranks to ensure good intentions and ideas didn’t backfire on the very groups they planned to honor and embrace. These were supposed to be the ‘smart and dedicated’ people elected by the people to represent and manage the country to be ambitious, Democratic, and inclusive. More common sense may be needed from some, he thought and let out a slight grunt of a short laugh.

  He wrote the Cherokee word DUYUKDU (JUSTICE) on the napkin and then jammed it into his pocket. Then he wrote down the names of the 18 Congressmen and women that voted for Jackson to be moved to the reverse side and stay on the currency.

  He went home that evening already in a bad mood. After making a TV dinner and sitting in front of his TV, each news channel was as bad as the other. There was no real news. All the channels had polar opposite bias viewpoints as if funded by one political party or the other. He wondered if there were any non-bias media outlets still capable of flexing their journalistic skills anymore. All of them were just fed the party line of their greatest benefactor and wasting everyone’s evening making viewers less intelligent.

  The news anchor on the TV just became white noise after triggering Waya’s thoughts about the government incompetence he learned earlier in the day. The Cherokee had their government, much like each state had a local government. However, the Federal government and Congress oversight had jurisdiction over the Native Americans.

  He could not be persuaded otherwise that it would be anything but wishful thinking that both local and Federal authorities would find ways to stop undermining the intelligence and good nature of the minority groups under their authority.

  Waya imagined that the shame of corruptness, and the lack of dignity and common sense, would continue to cause ripple effects to take place. A film reel played in Waya’s head showing previous decades of events repeating in the present day; more civil rights protests, lack of adequate gun laws leading to preventable tragedies, the exportation of jobs out of the country creating disgruntled communities, riots from injustices and boiling frustrations, unchecked banking policies and bad bond bundling practices crashing the Housing Market and Stock Market. If the government was not working on these issues, what the hell were they doing? Waya asked himself.

  History repeated 200 years after Andrew Jackson ran on a campaign message to get rid of corruption only to see another President who ran on a similar campaign slogan to ‘drain the swamp’ that had formed in the government. Perhaps needed, but not delivered on during the President’s 4-year term, Waya thought.

  The members of the House of Representatives and Congress, along with the President, showed 4 strange years of little sensibility to act with decorum in public or really at all, forgetting quite often to put the people or country’s needs first.

  When Waya tuned back into the non-journalistic grandstanding news anchor spewing about more failed promises and unsubstantiated conspiracy theories, it made him grind his teeth. During a time when people needed real leadership and representatives that could make a difference to the culture and society, none truly stepped up or emerged locally or nationally. It was enough to drive someone mad.

  And it did.

  Waya pulled out the three coffee napkins and place the two off to the side that had the 18 names on them. He picked up the last one and scratched out the word DUYUKDU and replaced it with TSUSASI (REVENGE). Then placed it on top of the napkins with the 18 names.

  The last two weeks went as planned. Days were spent tracking groups of white-tail deer, a few black bears, and elk in the Little River Valley at the base of Clingmans Dome in the Smoky Mountains. Even though this area was not on the Eastern Cherokee Reservation, it neighbored the area, and he knew it well. This area bordered Tennessee and North Carolina and held such fruitful land and scenery. There were many hiking trails for tourists, but he steered clear of those.

  Nights were spent following a few people of interest on his list, learning their patterns at home, to and from their district office, or other functions. He wished one of them, any of them, lived deeper in the Appalachian Mountains to make this more interesting. However, each congressman and woman in the southwest part of North Carolina, eastern South Carolina, and northwest part of Georgia had to be accessible to the people of their voting districts when not on Capitol Hill. Coming to them was a small sacrifice to make for the greater good.

  Waya enjoyed this part of the journey as it made him feel close to nature, to his ancestors, and the history of the area. Expertly blazing his trail, he would purposely stay off the known hiking paths that lead to his destination. He patiently waited days, sometimes weeks for the full moon before making this journey. Waya wanted the light of the moon to allow him to move freely through the forest and creeks.

  The sense of danger in the night hikes made him feel alive. The Black Bears in these parts were known to forage at night. He also knew that widow-maker branches and trees indiscriminately fell day and night. Even though he would smell the bear from a distance or hear the tree cracking from above, both frightening scenarios required you to hold your ground at night. He welcomed either scenario.

  Everywhere he looked in the light of the day he could see a dead Fraser Fir standing or leaning on another tree waiting to fall. The trees had been under attack the last 60 years, decimated from an invasive European wingless insect that enjoyed the Fir’s sap.

  He thought to himself how the Cherokee of the area could not catch a break. European settlers took most of their land and now a European insect was taking their trees.

  He heard a loud snap from above as if a leaning tree were freed from the branch holding it up. He froze, smiling in the light of the moon. Nothing happened. He shrugged it off and kept moving.

  Clingmans Dome is the highest point in the Great Smoky Mountains and only about 25 miles west of the Eastern Cherokee reservation. On a clear day, the views can range from 20 to 100 miles and across many states from the vantage point. This was one of the main reasons Waya chose the tourist observation tower as the location to place his evidence and clues.

  He stood there one year ago on the cement tower platform at the end of the rather long and elevated walkway and could not help imagining a thriving Cherokee Nation in these mountains 300 years ago. The absence of the Cherokee in the valleys below upset him. His people settled this area thousands of years ago. The original area inhabited by the Cherokee hundreds
of years ago crossed eight states and this spot was the center. Now only 8,000 lived on the Eastern Band of Cherokee Reservation 20 miles from this spot in an area only 12 miles by 7 miles.

  In the middle of the forest atop the Great Smokie Mountains, Waya arrived at the base of the cement walking path that wound its way up to Clingmans Dome lookout tower. He took out his knife and drew a symbol on the ground as he did the previous two times and then dropped a crudely made arrow in the center of it pointing up the path. It was an intentional warning sign meant for the Park Rangers to know he had struck again.

  Wearing hiking boots, jeans, hoodie, facemask, backpack, and gloves, he ascended the path knowing cameras were set to catch a glimpse of him. They would, but the images would only reveal his height and build. At the top, where the path joined the opening to the circular lookout, he knelt and took something from his backpack and placed it on the cement. Standing again he carefully looked and listened for signs of the nightlife trying to tell him if he was not alone. All was clear. He descended the path and disappeared into the night.