Coalescence (Camden Investigations Book 1) Page 13

  “No, we don’t, Gavin. I just wish we could find a way to convince Mitchell and Evan of that same notion. Even if there aren’t war vessels in the skies, it doesn’t mean the threat is any less lethal. We will be stepping into an unchartered minefield.”

  Gavin didn’t answer her, but Iris knew she had planted a seed. Gavin behaved impulsively. He might suddenly think scouring canyons for a power source wasn’t such a good or safe idea. If there really were enemy aliens, might they oppose such a course of action? She could only hope they would realize this risk. But it wasn’t enough. She had wanted Ron to come forward and dispel their grandiose ideas about saving the world. A small orb had changed Ron’s world forever. What would even more powerful forces be capable of—like this dial. She reconsidered her last thoughts. It seemed she was buying into an alien presence despite her opposition to its requests. Could that be her subconscious talking? Was it confirmation her mind had indeed been altered? The question now remained: how long would it take for her to slip into the same abyss as Ron? What good would she be to anybody at that point? She bit her thumbnail as the teams discussed strategy.

  Conversation about acquiring camping supplies, meeting with the Hopi Nation and concerns about transporting the dial whizzed over her head. She was lost in desperate thought. What else could she do?

  Mitchell’s phone rang, and he answered. Iris observed Darian and her sister taking the opportunity to snuggle closer together. Kassidy and Rachel began bantering about ancient aliens to Evan’s delight. He countered their disbelief by challenging them to explain how the pyramids could be constructed without alien existence and how obelisks could be carved with symbols so precise that even today’s artisans would be hard pressed to duplicate them. “I can’t be certain,” Kassidy said. “Maybe there was something in the water.”

  To which Evan replied, “Precisely. I think the aliens taught humans how energy and data systems could be transported via water to . . .”

  Their banter subsided as Mitchell closed his call. He appeared as if he had seen a ghost, Iris thought. A flicker of hope emanated. Her psychic sense told her it was the “hold everything” moment she’d dreamt of.

  “It seems the crops were not decimated by the orbs after all.” Mitchell picked up a marker and diagrammed the easel with a seed, a flask of water, and a budding corn stalk. “It would seem our laboratory has discovered a substantial mutation. They believe a new super corn has been born. A seed from the affected stalk was grown in the laboratory, in record time. It’s robust, big, and despite its blue coloring, quite tasty, according to their findings. I can’t believe the record growth myself. I believe our farmer friend will be quite pleased. The scientist even quipped that corn stocks are sure to rise—pardon the pun. He’s at work writing a report for a journal. This is going to be huge. More important, this is going to be documented.”

  “But what does this all mean?” Gavin asked.

  “It means we meet with our alien and reevaluate his arguments,” Mitchell answered.

  “This is good news. It means there won’t be a plague,” Kassidy stated.

  “That’s not for certain,” Evan responded. “Mitchell is correct. We need to speak to the presence again.”

  Iris smiled and fought to restrain herself. She wanted so badly to run over to Mitchell and hug him. But she wouldn’t do it. It would anger him. He had been so excited. In that moment, she realized she loved him. She would be there for him no matter the outcome. But if distrusting the presence meant Mitchell’s feelings would suffer, it was a whole lot better than any of the consequences she had been imagining. She still loved her Dad despite his clandestine work. At that instant she believed love could transcend careers and ideals. She wanted Mitch for Mitch. And in time, if the human species survived, Iris hoped Mitch would love her for her.

  After a few minutes, she sauntered up to Gavin. “It seems the presence has been lying to us. I know you are a man of reason. Will you stand with me and oppose any future plans to assist it?”

  Gavin bit down on his lip. For once, he wasn’t responding impulsively. Instead, he glanced in the direction of Evan and Mitchell his face full of consideration.

  Iris threw back a lock of hair from her face. Despite the news, her psychic sense told her this battle was far from over.

  JACK WATCHED the conversation scroll onto his screen. It converted audio conversation into words thanks to Iris’s iPhone and some reverse-engineered software. The information leak was greater than he imagined.

  Chapter Twelve

  “FOR STARTERS, you can begin by telling us who you are. You must have an identity, and if you claimed to have lived here then you must have had a name, albeit a fake one . . .”

  Mitchell, his body submerged in a bathtub of water, felt Iris’s anger and resolve. She too could sense his feelings because they shared the same telepathic stream of consciousness. Just because her physical body was seated on her bed, about a dozen feet from Mitchell, didn’t mean she couldn’t be connected as closely to him as lovers engaged in a kiss. She may as well have been riding a stallion and charging wildly ahead with a lance. This was the image that flashed between her and Mitchell. The UFO investigator didn’t mediate to temper her rage against the presence. She sensed Mitchell was on her side—and for this moment in time—he supported her line of questioning.

  As if the alien ghost was a suspect caught in the blinding lights of an interrogation room, he behaved a bit more cordially than their prior visitation. Gone was the sadistic grin. He may have been caught in a partial truth, not quite a lie, but an omission nevertheless. The presence maintained enemy aliens would unleash an engineered plague. Yet the revelation that transpired earlier in the evening, namely news of the birth of a super corn, had sprouted seeds of doubt. Everyone had second thoughts about assisting the alien presence, especially since an evolutionary advancement might be impeded. Kassidy went so far as to label it a “plague with benefits.”

  “I will ask you again,” Iris said. Posturing in her subconscious mind, her hand had found her physical body’s hip. But that was just habit. She was detached from her physical being now. Her subconscious was revisiting a land where broken people traversed ruddy soil in desperate attempts to find sustenance. But Iris had to wonder just exactly what point of time was the presence recreating for them? Perhaps it was just his people, decimated from a century long war. If what the botanist concluded was correct, the corn had been affected by light in a way that may have restructured it, via its DNA, to a positive, even desirable outcome. If this plague had been successfully launched before, might the so-called victims now be transformed into higher beings? Iris admitted the idea was radical. She was buying more and more into the belief that alien worlds existed. Yet her father never told her aliens didn’t exist, only that they would never visit her home.

  “Can’t you show us a world where your enemy succeeded?” Iris demanded the answers in rapid succession, giving the ghost little chance to answer via image response.

  “I will start with your first question. My alias as a human was Galloway. I worked at Aero-Sat, a manufacturer of geosynchronous satellites. I, of course, assumed an identity illegally. It was for your race’s benefit.” They watched him shuffle down a corridor of a sterile white building. His ID card pinned to his lapel.

  Iris felt Mitchell’s reaction. It was a grimace. Only it wasn’t visual. It was a tug at her mind. She had already heard Mitchell’s argument as to why he had believed the presence. It was all about revenge. The presence couldn’t bear the thought of the enemy aliens succeeding. It was why Mitchell originally believed. Now, Iris could feel, the more information the presence divulged, the less his story and motivations were made valid. The presence paused and then attempted a rebound.

  “Ah, I see. You don’t believe my people could behave so altruistically. Maybe you’re right. But I felt a need to justify my identity theft. Your society is so offended by this notion. Our people could trade each other’s makeup and consider it
a compliment. But that’s beside the point. What I did was protect your planet from the plague. And what the bugs did on your planet . . . I can’t even begin to recount.”

  Iris grunted. It was another failed attempt to constrain her tone. She didn’t need body language to show the presence how angry she was.

  Mitchell, in an effort to temper her rage, sent a thought to the presence. “My colleague has opened a door you probably wanted to remain closed. I suggest, if you still require our assistance, that you divulge whatever you know about these enemy aliens. We need to understand why they are trying to harm us. So you could begin with detailing what you know about their presence on Earth.”

  Of course, his thought came more in the form of imagery. A human fist rapped on a door. Tap. Tap. Tap.

  The presence, in turn, sent the image of an opening door to the inquisitors. It creaked. Images followed.

  Disgust and disbelief permeated Iris’s subconscious. She witnessed aliens with fake human cloaks, bedding human females, creating babies . . .

  In another scene, a human was being subjugated to some red beam of light reflecting off a hovering ball. She witnessed the victim’s transformation in a wink of an eye. One moment cognitive, the next catatonic, but ultimately programmed against his will. She couldn’t help but think of Ron. Her mind raced. Papers scattered everywhere. Perhaps the papers stood for memory files. A whirring noise activated a scene. It sounded more old school—rather like the ticking emanation from an old projector—than a creation from the late Steve Jobs. In seconds it became clear. It was the Estes Park hotel! A blow by blow replay of her experience of three years ago, only seen from another perspective because others hid themselves in an adjacent room, their minds transfixed. What were they attempting? In a moment it became clearer. The ghosts were neither children nor apparitions but mere holographic images sent to fool the ghost hunters. The projections emanated from the intruders’ minds. They were the projector. It was as if images were being created for Iris and Ron’s benefit. She listened closely to, to read their minds. They said, in effect, if she and Ron expected a haunting, then they would get one. So what really were the red spheres of light the projected children had thrown at Ron? Some form of mind control? She sensed her physical body gasping for air, a noticeable rise and fall of her chest.

  “Come on! You can see what I see! Tell me what’s going on here . . .”

  “I am afraid we are not quite as linked as you think. I cannot experience your memories.” The alien presence’s tone sounded sincere. She willed her physical body to calm; she recalled a relaxation technique where you make an “O” using your index finger and thumb. She then explained what had happened to Ron.

  The ghost responded with deliberate calculation. “As I said, I could only speculate. The best of our spies could not uncover every covert act of deception used. But I would surmise to guess, your friend might now be a sleeper, and in time, his mind will be used for a distinct purpose.” The presence hesitated.

  “Come on. You damn well know what that purpose is. Tell us!” Iris charged again, on her white steed, lance at the ready.

  “We speculated the enemy might want to create what you might call facilitators. When the change is completed, the remaining humans will need guidance. Your friend might head some kind of division where the recently compromised might go for assistance.”

  Mitchell intervened. “But you said it was a plague. How can there be survivors? And to get back to my colleague’s question, are there other worlds where this change took place? Some evidence we might consider.”

  Iris and Mitchell could sense the alien’s head swaying back and forth. “No. No. No. There are no surviving worlds. Don’t you see, even if they intend for this to be evolutionary, it can’t be. Large segments of your population will not survive this change. Others will be doomed to service. Once the enemy manipulates the structure and behavior of the survivor’s DNA, a collective consciousness will harness their minds. They will become subservient, without chance of resistance, against our foe. This is a violation. It is not evolution. And I hoped you would find the examples I had given you to be alarming. What they’ve already done to your people is an outrage. Creating sleeper agents, populating your planet with hybrids . . .”

  Iris drifted in thought. She would give the presence the benefit of the doubt. What if it was true? If there were hybrids, could any person be trusted? She pursued her troubling conclusion.

  “So how do we know who the enemies are? I surmise you cloaked yourself somehow in human form when alive. But what about these offspring you claim exist? With a mix of alien and human DNA, wouldn’t they be obvious? What weird traits might they exhibit?”

  “I wish it were that simple to detect.” The alien answered, and Iris experienced a flash, dour and equivalent to a sigh. “The DNA contribution of the alien progenitors will remain dormant until such time your biology and planet is altered. That’s why this is not a desirable propagation of your species. It will only serve to further their agenda: genocide and servitude.”

  Mitchell felt his thoughts echoing, as if he screamed in a cave. “You claim there is no means to detect the hybrids or those subject to mind alteration. I have to wonder how you can ‘theorize’ their existence. You would have had to experience these acts for yourself. If so, then you allowed these violations to take place.”

  “The few of us remaining were already weakened from their attacks. We could not hope to stop any of their groundwork. We focused our energies on the bigger picture. Namely, I became an employee at a firm so the artifact might do its job: protect Earth against the plague . . . or light weapon . . . if you prefer to categorize it as such. Your object was retrieved from the enemy who unlinked it from a power source in Russia. I managed to repossess it and restore its function—at least for an interim. But we have little time to argue since its function has obviously been interrupted. I do need your assistance to re-link the object again with its power source. And I stress again—it must be you. I trust your governments will only make a bad situation worse. Our surveillance deemed they are too embroiled in their own collusions in an attempt to rule the world globally. They even reworked my obituary. I had died when my ship crashed; they had me dying in a plane wreck. They have probably reverse engineered my craft. And obviously realized I was alien. Yet they failed to pursue the bigger objective. They never concluded my work had to have an objective other than surveillance. But if they had, I am sure they would have secured the artifact and employed it to work in some twisted means . . .”

  “You mean the artifact has multiple uses?” Mitchell asked the presence.

  “You could say that. But most important is aligning the reflectives, what you call balls of light, in a pattern that will negate the enemy’s light discharge. See that it happens or find the remaining portion of your population a slave race.”

  “How could this work?” Iris and Mitchell inquired.

  “You might call it a parabolic method. It will reflect the light away before your DNA can be rewritten, or worse.”

  MITCHELL’S MIND scrambled to make sense. He posited light could be stored. It could also carry instructions. If light could be stored in DNA, what the presence claimed might be true. He would need Evan’s molecular expertise to sort this out.

  But he had to wonder who would survive the attack and become the enemy’s slaves. The alien answered, giving Mitchell even more ammunition to believe his government engaged in numerous conspiracies.

  Mitchell sensed Iris didn’t care for where the discussion was going. She thought the presence was subjugating his thought process with logic. As a scientist, he would be most prone to reason. He could hear her every thought. Maybe she was correct. One moment earlier, she felt as if he had become distrustful of the presence as she was. Now she felt he was starting to come around again, to the presence’s point of view. Am I?

  “THERE ARE those in your government who want to mandate vaccinations. These inoculations are often unnecessary and
can cause more harm than good. Ironically, those in power refuse the very inoculations they endorse. It’s as though they know, maybe from sort of consciousness outside themselves, of the ultimate enemy plan. Every person who regularly receives the injections loses their ability to fight disease on their own. Bottom line: many of these people will not survive the change. Those that do will experience transformations. Paranormal abilities will become normal abilities. But the cost is great; the survivors will serve the enemy, willfully procuring your planets restored resources to their benefit. Their minds will not be their own. And, in a final sadistic irony, those government leaders so desperate to rule will have no choice but to serve.” The presence continued its monologue apparently indifferent to the wall of doubt Iris had tried to construct.

  Iris and Mitchell watched a screen flash. Lines of people being inoculated, stores advertising free flu shots; it actually made sense. Yet Iris still feared the artifact might propagate the very transformation the alien warned of. Everything was so gray. No definition. No way to determine if involvement meant salvation. She would still urge Mitchell and Evan to refuse its wishes. She could still plant seeds of doubt. What if this very act was the first step of servitude?

  Yet what Mitchell revealed in the next moment brought sick revelation, because even if she refused to believe a word of the alien’s rhetoric, her subconscious had no choice but to respond with emotion.

  “I’ve always received inoculations. I’m still here.”

  Iris had refused them in her adult life, believing in holistic prevention. Back on her bed, a tear welled in Iris’s physical eye. It would be unlikely Mitchell would survive long enough to evolve.

  It was another divider. Ironically, the man who believed in aliens might never live to face them. She would lose him if they didn’t act to restore the defense system. Now it had all become personal. She could attach a face with the death list the alien warned of. How could she argue against saving his life? It was so selfish. Yet it still felt the right thing to do, despite the moral implications of giving one person more importance than another. Iris realized her subconscious was making a decision and that it could have fallen prey to the presence upon first contact. Did the presence also intend to link her emotionally with Mitchell to further its cause? Now, who was the conspiracy nut? In any event, one final conclusion triggered innate fear. She had believed her father, wholly. He’d said alien interventions and intrusions would never happen. But now they might. And she was ill prepared to even fathom the thought of serving an agenda of a people who could unleash a power to intentionally kill all she loved.