Day 50 (The DMT Series Book 2) (9 page)

Adam swore. Cody had gone completely insane. He was obviously attempting to force the governments of the western world to rethink their stance on psychedelics by instilling fear in the general population. Adam knew it would never work. Cody had probably looked at how nobody dared to offend the Muslim community and their prophet Mohammed. But there were one point two billion Muslims in the world. Codyism was still a footnote in the history of religions, a tiny speck among giant movements. No government would ever let Codyism bully them into relaxing the drug laws. They simply weren’t important enough. They didn’t possess the voting power.

He walked over to Cameron. She looked so peaceful when she was asleep. So peaceful that he already regretted having to wake her up, having to wake her up to continue her life on the run. He knew there was no way around it though. This latest development changed everything. If Cody was bold enough to strike inside the very heart of America, then Adam and Cameron would not be safe anywhere. He knew Cameron opposed the idea of kidnapping the chemist from the Mexico City Hospital, but there was no other way.

If they were to have any chance of survival they had to strike back.

And they had to strike back immediately.

24

Alejandro leant back in the chair. He had just listened to the radio. Although he wasn’t surprised that MKULTRA had been willing to sacrifice American citizens in their hunt for Cody, the boldness of the operation itself had surprised him. Blowing up a hospital in Washington DC. It was an incredibly risky move. Whoever had made the decision was most certainly on a deadline. Perhaps it was the upcoming US election that worried MKULTRA? Perhaps it was true that a new president would relax the laws on psychedelics and look into all the Black Operations of the CIA? The Democratic candidate had promised to do so in his election speeches, and the average American voter’s trust in politicians had never been at a lower level than it was right now. Many voters were fed up with the way the current government had used the bomb in New Mexico, more than three years back, to gradually tighten the reins on its citizens. No one had actually died in the explosion, still the government had claimed it had been a terrorist act on American soil, that no one was safe.

Blowing up an American hospital, an American hospital inside Washington DC. It was a very brave move indeed. And most likely an incredibly stupid move. Alejandro had been wanting to attempt something similar himself. He had wanted to wait until their following had reached critical mass though. It was a fact that hardly anyone dared criticize Islam anymore. If one studied Christianity, it had been criticised to pieces over the last twenty years. It had had to change its stance on everything from homosexuality to women’s rights. Islam, if anything, had moved in the opposite direction - it had become even more conservative. The discussion had totally derailed. Out of pure fear of insulting Islam’s one point two billion followers, the western world had chosen to close their eyes. Alejandro was a well-read man, and he had read the Quran and the Hadith, the sacred texts, several times. There was no doubt the extremists were correct in theory. Everything they claimed was true; the Quran quite explicitly stated that you would become a martyr if you killed infidels. But the Quran had been written by a warlord, a man who used it as a tool to control his following. Of course he had written what he had. It was the same reason Alejandro had written what he had. The Holy Book of Codyism was nothing but a tool to control its members. Cody might believe he was talking to God at night, but that was Alejandro’s work; he had implanted so many suggestive thoughts into poor Cody’s mind that Cody hardly knew what was real or not anymore.

And none of it was real of course. It was all Alejandro’s work. The brilliant Alejandro’s work.

Alejandro let out a laugh. Now the idiots of MKULTRA had set in motion another one of Alejandro’s plans. He looked forward to seeing how the world would react to Codyism becoming violent. It was after all the natural next step for the religion. Codyism was never going to be a soft forgiving religion like Buddhism or Hinduism, it was always going to be a violent one. There were seven billion people on Earth. Alejandro’s target market was the misfits, the frustrated, the angry; it was the ones who would never succeed in an increasingly individualistic world. Codyism gave them shelter; a place where they could hide from the ruthlessly competitive world and become part of something greater than themselves. Alejandro had quickly scrapped the Atheists as a source for members; they were too sceptical to fall for the scriptures in the Holy Book of Codyism. The most devout followers of Jesus and Mohammed were also scrapped. They were either lost causes or fell into the too hard basket. That left Alejandro with pretty big pool of potential converts though. Poor angry men and women who wanted more evidence than pure faith could provide. By using psychedelics, harvested from nature itself, they could connect to the real God and the real universe. All the suffering they experienced here on Earth wasn’t even real, it turned out.

They just had to learn how to let go.

Alejandro rose from his chair as the new leader of the Uruguayan chapter entered the room.

“Welcome, we have lots to do,” he said, and walked straight across the room to greet him.

25

Adam perused the perimeter of the property with his binoculars. Dr Carlos Herrera was living inside a gated community. Two security guards were stationed by the entry of the gate, and a tall yellowish brick wall encircled the entire property. The community consisted of thirty-three homes, its website had read. And as far as Adam could assess; they would all be multimillion-dollar houses if built back in the US. Carlos Herrera was obviously a successful man.

“We won’t be able to get to him inside the complex. We need to come up with another plan,” Adam said to Cameron, who sat next to him on the ridge, staring out at the City below. She had objected wholeheartedly to the idea of kidnapping the doctor in the first place, and now she couldn’t care less what plan her dad came up with.

“Any suggestions?” Adam asked.

Cameron shrugged her shoulders. If he absolutely wanted to kidnap this poor guy, then he would have to come up with the plan himself.

“OK, I get it. You don’t agree with me. But we need to do something.”

“Why don’t we just ask him?” Cameron asked.

“Ask him? Do you think he’s going to agree to risking his career and freedom to help two strangers produce a narcotic substance?”

“Perhaps, if the reasons are good enough.”

“And what would those reasons be?”

“Winning a Nobel Prize,” Cameron said.

“I don’t understand.”

“Think about it. I have special powers, special powers he as a doctor can verify quite quickly.”

“You mean your ability to heal people?”

Cameron nodded. “If I let him in on the secret of DMT, he might be willing to produce it for us.”

“That would be incredibly risky though. Even if he agreed we would never know his true agenda. He could rat us out to the authorities the second we spoke to him.”

“That’s true. But look at his career. You said that Drecker mentioned him because he was a remarkably talented chemist, the best in the industry. Yet his career has mirrored Drecker’s. He hasn’t received any major promotions or made any breakthrough discoveries for at least twenty years. Think about how you view happiness and success. It is not about what you have achieved, it’s all about where you’re going, in which direction you’re moving. Carlos Herrera’s career has been at a standstill for at least ten years, maybe twenty.”

“So you think he would be motivated by a chance to make a breakthrough discovery?” Adam asked. Sometimes he couldn’t really believe his daughter was only nineteen years old, she was so mature for her age.

“I do. I’m almost certain.”

“Cold reading a person from a biography on a website, it’s risky.”

“It’s less risky than attempting to kidnap a person in Mexico. They are used to that sort of threat down here. He will be prepared.”

Adam grabbed his binoculars from the ground, and rose to his feet. “OK, miss. We’ll do it your way.”

Cameron smiled. “Good choice.”

26

One week later,

Mexico City,

June 2015

It had taken Cameron and Adam more than a week to get organised. They couldn’t leave anything to chance. They had been staking out Carlos Herrera round the clock for five days, and they were now pretty sure they had got his routine down to the minute, because Carlos Herrera was very much a creature of habit. There were few surprises in his life. He got up at the same time each morning, ate the same cereal for breakfast every single day. And after a quick swim in the complex pool he was driven to work by a black car service, before he started his work-routine. “He’s like a damn robot,” Adam said.

Cameron nodded. “That’s great for us though; it increases the likelihood of him accepting our offer. If he’s structured his day like a robot, it means he’s not too fond of surprises. A lot of successful people structure their days like that to avoid disappointments in life, to keep their spirits high for the important stuff. If you have the same thing for breakfast every morning, chances are you’re always going to have a good start on the day.”

Adam laughed. “How do you come up with this shit? Sorry Cam, I didn’t mean it in a bad way, but how do you know all these things?”

“Had to do something on our last leg into Belize Harbour. I read a whole bunch of articles on psychology.”

Adam smiled. He knew she didn’t have it from him, he wasn’t her biological father, but he truly loved how smart she was becoming. She was always studying something, head down in a book or an article on the net. He knew she would become something amazing when she grew up.

“So when do you think we should approach him?” Cameron asked.

“I think we should give it a few more days. Make sure that we have covered all bases. If we move ahead slowly there is less risk of mistakes, and quite frankly it has been easier than expected to hide out in the City. I can’t say I love the air quality, but it would be hard for Cody or MKULTRA to find us here. Maybe we should even consider scrapping the whole plan and just lay low for a while?”

Cameron shook her head. “After all this time stalking this guy. Nahh, not gonna happen. You managed to convince me that we had to take action. We can’t abort the plan just because MKULTRA and Cody have eased the pressure a bit. There is probably a reason it’s been quiet. They must be planning something big.”

“Calm before the storm,” Adam said to himself. He didn’t quite consider himself a sailor yet, but he had picked up a few lessons from living on the boat for three years. And one of those was that calm waters never lasted.

“Dad, I know that guy,” Cameron said, pointing at a man outside the window of the café where they were sitting.

“Who? The guy leaning against the traffic light?”

Cameron pushed her dad in the shoulder, so that he moved out of view from the street. Then she pulled up a paper from the table to cover her face.

“Shit….shit, shit, shit!”

“What is it, Cam? Who is it?”

“It’s one of the agents from the plane, the plane that took me to the US.”

“It’s a CIA agent?”

“MKULTRA or CIA, I don’t know. But I know he was on that plane. He gave me an injection in the shoulder before I passed out.”

“How the hell have they been able to track us down?”

“Maybe they monitor the CCTV cameras in the City? Maybe they’ve been able to get a hit on one of our faces?”

“I don’t think so.” Adam shook his head. “We’ve been extremely careful, and there is no way the cameras can identify our facial features the way we have disguised ourselves.”

“Then what? Why are they here?”

“Someone must have tipped them off,” Adam said.

“What do we do now?” Cameron asked.

“We wait and observe,” Adam replied. “He wasn’t entirely sure what it was. But something was very off with the agent Cameron had recognised. He didn’t seem to be on the lookout for someone. He seemed to be doing something entirely different.

Something Adam had lots of experience doing.

27

Cody was lying in bed when Alejandro entered the room. At first Alejandro thought he was sleeping, but then Cody slowly turned his head, pushing his upper body up to an almost seated position. It was the biggest movement he had done in weeks.

“You’re awake, Master Cody.”

“You did this,” Cody answered.

“I don’t understand, Master Cody. Did what?”

“This act of terrorism in Washington. You blew up the hospital.”

Alejandro shook his head as he approached the large bed. “No, Master Cody. It was the Americans. They did it to blame us, to get our followers to turn on us.”

“You go away for a week, and then this happens. I’m not stupid, Alejandro.”

“You must believe me, Master Cody. I had nothing to do with this.”

“God is not happy, Alejandro. He has been talking to me when you were away, and he is not happy.”

Alejandro’s face almost broke out in a smile. He had brainwashed Cody for such an extended time that the sucker truly believed God was talking to him. Alejandro had to be careful though. Even though Cody was blind as a bat he had amazing senses. Sometimes it was as if he could read Alejandro’s mind by just staring at him with those bottomless pits that had once contained his eyes.

“If you have spoken to God then you know I’m telling the truth. I would never even consider ordering an operation like that without consulting you, Master Cody.”

Cody seemed to consider the flattery a moment before responding. “Very well, Alejandro. But I warn you. Do not attempt to cross me or the will of God.”

“The thought has never crossed my mind, and it never will. I am but your humble servant. Now, let me inform you what I have achieved on my travels.”