Tread Fearless: Survival & Awakening (The Gatekeeper Book 4) (44 page)

F
alling into a pattern of disciplined movement and communications was now second nature for the company. After having traveled more than five hundred miles, everyone knew the drill. Everything from avoiding contact with large groups, to performing quick, unscheduled potty-breaks, was performed with speed and precision. Communications were always quick, clear, concise and complete. Everyone stayed alert for trouble, but eager to keep moving - to reach their destination before their luck changed.

John could feel the hope and anticipation in the air. How everyone seemed absolutely convinced their journey was blessed, and that they would reach their destination without any serious problems. But problems were always close - just under the surface. For one, they would need to find fuel soon.

Their current three-hundred mile range would take them into New Mexico, but no further, so the question was where to stop and look for fuel? If they waited till the end, they’d be climbing into the Rockies and likely not find any fuel. If they ventured into a town or city, they’d risk being overcome by desperate survivors and could potentially lose everything.

John was serious about not wanting to fight his way out of a predicament, but he was also a realist. The disaster cured him of any remaining idealistic notions, and realism stood out, front and center, in his thoughts and mind. But there was also a new factor, a new sense of rationale growing within him. He never before considered abandoning himself to fate and accepting the idea of pre-determination. And if his direction was pre-determined, then did that mean everyone in the company was also pre-determined with him?

As he drove along at a steady sixty miles-per-hour, John listened to Jenna and Bonnie talk about life, about their past and the future. Every once in a while, they would say something that would catch his attention and he would listen intently, but for the most part John focused on the road and the compass. He stopped thinking about the past long ago. There was nothing about it that mattered to him anymore, not work, not the economy, not the army, and certainly not the government. Everything about his past was gone, mixed up and buried in the ashes that began to fall from the sky only a few days ago.

As for the future? John considered it, but he didn’t build a story of it in his mind. He didn’t create the future because it was always so uncertain, and uncertainty leads to dashed hopes, and dashed hopes to disappointment. He had an idea of what the Colorado ranch might look like. He had seen it once before in a vision, and knew that it was real. At least it felt real. He hadn’t actually been there, but he believed in it, vision or not.

To place such hope on a single vision was, he admitted, foolhardy at best. His hand went absentmindedly to the compass sitting next to him on the center consul. When his hand touched the brass, always cool in his hand, he knew that it represented the single most positive variable of the equation of sanity. It had, and always would be, proof that the ranch was real. How it came into his possession didn’t trouble him half as much as its existence. It worked, albeit only for him, but more importantly it filled a void of uncertainty in his life.

It also gave him direction. Whenever the company came to a questionable intersection, Pete would radio back for instructions. John would look at the compass and radio back the prescribed direction. A few times the compass pointed them in a direction other than their most direct route, but they always followed it obediently, and were never disappointed with the results. With the advent of the compass, everything began to hinge on John’s growing spiritual gifts. It changed everything for them.

And the longer and farther they traveled together, the more apparent and absolute his status as their spiritual leader was becoming. He didn’t
deny the gifts he had; they were superhuman by normal standards. So of course he found them incredibly useful. But he didn’t know what they meant, or where they would take him. As such, he began delegating more and more of the group’s operations to Pete. Pete was becoming the default physical company leader, and John the ever-present spiritual one. He wondered how long that relationship would work.

John believed it would work until he made a mistake and got someone killed through his non-aggression policy. He knew, from experience, that someone could make a thousand mistakes as a normal person, but make one as a special person and all bets were off. It worried him more than it should have.

John gripped the steering wheel tightly as he tried to imagine how everyone would react to his first big spiritual mistake. Would it ruin everything for them? Would the company no longer trust him? It was only a matter of time before he screwed something up.

People who couldn’t see the other side thought everything was all structured and peaceful, orderly and precise, that no mistakes were made. That might be true with God, but there was still choice on the other side, and with choice came consequence. Perfection, John realized, was a rare achievement on earth, and in heaven, or at least the outer reaches of such, away from God’s domain.

If John made a spiritual mistake, all of Pete’s concerns about their survival, about it being more physical than spiritual, would be justified. And he would be cast adrift, helpless to influence their course in any way. He would be like everyone else, believing his choices were the only ones that mattered, that he was responsible for who he was, what he was doing. People wanted to believe they were in control of their lives, that they were steering their life’s course, and John would be one of them.

A part of him didn’t want to be the spiritual leader for the company. As a former army officer, he wanted to be a normal leader, a military-like leader, making smart tactical decisions, not some shaman or holy-man. He wanted to be normal again, and lead with learned and developed
experience. When it came to spiritual stuff, he was winging it all the way. At times, things seemed to be moving beyond his control, and it really bothered him.

“Maybe I could ask Jenna to make me a robe?”
thought John. He snorted so loudly at the thought that Jenna turned her attention to him and asked, “Something funny?”

“Huh? No. Nothing. Just thinking,” said John.

The women returned to their conversation, and John returned to his thoughts. He knew he couldn’t stall the spiritual momentum he was creating, but part of that momentum was self-perpetuating. It was like he was on some kind of physical-spiritual, spiritual-physical rollercoaster, dipping and climbing, twisting and turning, making him scream and sick at the same time. At times, he wanted the ride to stop so he could take some Dramamine, because he knew it wasn’t over. That was the scary part for him, what was coming.

And what was the price of his gifts? Every time he turned around he was learning or experiencing something new. It was like someone was preparing him for something really big, and he wished he knew what it was. The why of it bothered him too. Why him? He thought that being in the light wouldn’t keep him so in the dark, in a matter of speaking. One thing was absolute to him, he wasn’t working for the dark side.

In less than two weeks’ time, John went from living a purely physical centered life, to living a spiritually centered one.
“Actually, more than living,”
he thought,
“leading also.”
And it wasn’t just his life that was changing. Everyone around him was also changing. Pete’s vision was very important and interesting, and it had a powerful effect on John. It confirmed his belief in following a path of non-violence, or at least a path of less violence. Thinking of Pete’s vision reminded John of Jenna taking Bonnie’s hand that morning when they were talking spiritual stuff. “Jenna, my love?” said John. “Can I ask you a question?”

She faced him, while sitting sideways in the front passenger seat, and said, “Sure. What is it, baby?”

“Will you tell me about your dream?”

The surprised moment of silence told John he had been right. And from watching Bonnie’s reaction in the rearview mirror, John knew that whatever it was, they had shared it with each other. Or maybe it was Bonnie’s dream that she shared with Jenna. Jenna swung her legs forward and said, “What makes you think I had a dream?”

“Jenna, you’ve never been a good liar. Besides, I saw you take Bonnie’s hand in the circle before we left. I know you guys shared some important experience. I’m just curious about why you don’t want to talk about it?” said John.

“Because it just happened last night. I didn’t have time . . . we didn’t have time. Bonnie had one too.”

“Jenna?” gasped Bonnie.

“What? It doesn’t need to be a secret. It’s just us here. Pete doesn’t need to know,” responded Jenna, without turning around in the seat.

“About you having a dream, Bon? Why’s that an issue with Pete?” asked John.

Bonnie leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes. John watched her, trying to understand her concern, feeling it from her, but getting nothing. “Was it something that bothered you? Something about Pete?” asked John.

“No. It wasn’t like that,” said Bonnie. Then she leaned forward and poked Jenna on the shoulder and said, “Go ahead and tell him, sis.”

“What? Me? It was your dream too,” she said.

“Say what?” asked John excitedly. “You guys shared a dream?”

“See,” said Jenna. “I told you he’d freak out.”

“I’m not freaking out . . . and thanks for the vote of confidence, Hon. I just don’t understand why that worries you about Pete though, Bonnie.”

“It worries me because he tends to overthink things. This morning, he told me that his fall really freaked him out,” said Bonnie.

“It freaked us all out,” added John.

“Yeah? Well, not the actual fall, but the dream he had when he was out,” replied Bonnie.

“Really? I didn’t know that. We talked about it. I thought he was okay?”

“It had something to do with killing people, but then he’s not supposed to be killing them,” answered Bonnie. When all was quiet, she added, “But I think it has more to do with him shooting that FEMA agent. That really messed with him.”

“I think it’s more than that,” said John. “Pete’s had to take quite a few lives since this whole mess started. More than he did in combat . . . I can tell you that. It’s probably just weighing him down.”

“You think it’s PTSD?” asked Jenna. “You had it when you got out.”

“No I didn’t,” snapped John.

“Well if you didn’t, you could have fooled me,” Jenna retorted, apparently hurt by John’s harsh response to her personal observation. They had traveled that road before. Long before, when John started having vivid dreams about the coming disaster, Jenna attributed it to PTSD. For her, everything wrong with John was due to his PTSD. It was the answer for everything unanswerable.

“You know, Jenna, combat isn’t the only way to get PTSD. I mean, serving in combat isn’t a guarantee to have PTSD. PTSD comes from many different forms of stress, anything from a car accident, to a house fire, sexual assault, or even child abuse can cause it. You can’t just wrap it all up in a combat-veteran’s blanket.”

“I wasn’t just wrapping it up in a combat blanket,” she snapped. “And I thought we were talking about Pete, here?”

“You’re right. I apologize. But I know Pete. He’s a strong man. He’ll make it through.”

“You’re right, John,” said Bonnie. “He’s a strong man, but he’s also sometimes fragile. I think all the spiritual stuff is stressing him out. Pete’s a very practical man. He doesn’t take well to all the . . . you know . . . all the stuff you do.”

“All the stuff I do?”
thought John.
“What the heck does that mean? You think I’m good with all this? Do you honestly think I’m in control here?”

Jenna put a hand on John’s arm and she said, “What Bonnie means is, Pete’s not like you. None of us are. You’re different. You’re doing things we don’t understand, and we’re wondering if it’s rubbing off on us.”

“The dreams and visions you mean?” asked John.

“Yes,” said both women simultaneously.

John chuckled and said, “I don’t know if such a thing can ‘rub-off,’ but I’m sure it has something to do with the bigger change that’s taking place around us. To be honest, I don’t think we’re the only one’s experiencing these things.”

“But you have to admit you’re different,” said Bonnie.

“Sure. I’m different,” said John. “But please don’t ask me why, or even how. I have no idea why I’ve been given my . . . gifts, or whatever it is you want to call them. Besides, I don’t always think about them as gifts. I don’t like it when you guys look at me like I’m some kind of freak of nature.”

“Superman wasn’t so insecure,” said Jenna, as she pulled her hair back into a ponytail and deftly slipped a rubber band around it.

“Not funny, Jenna,” replied John.

“We’re not calling you a freak,” she added, as she fed her ponytail through the opening at the back of the ball cap. Once her hair was positioned, she pulled the cap firmly down onto her head and looked at John. “I think you’re awesome.”

Jenna wasn’t a ball-cap wearer before the disaster, but now that she couldn’t wash her hair as often, caps were in fashion. As for John’s cap, it sat on the front dash, tucked under the sloping front glass of the windshield. He looked at it and said, “I think you’re awesome too. I just don’t know how to take your criticism.”

“It’s just that you see things differently than us,” she said.

“And when has that been different from before?” he asked.

“True,” replied Jenna. “But it’s more now. Do you think it will continue like this?”

“Like what?”

“Like all of us turning into you? Because that’s what scares us the most. I don’t want to leave my body for anything,” said Jenna.

“Me neither,” added Bonnie.

“Well, I’m absolutely convinced you get a vote in how much you choose to let happen spiritually. And I don’t think, even for one moment, other than death that is, that you don’t have the right to stay in your body if you choose,” finished John.

“It doesn’t bother you, then?” asked Bonnie.

John considered Bonnie’s statement and wondered how to answer her. He reflected on his experiences, how he was literally taken to hell, and made to endure some terrible punishment. But he also experienced many great and marvelous things. He saw and did things that defy all explanation. And try as he might, there was no way to share those experiences with anyone, and do it with any degree of accuracy and completeness. It was virtually impossible. To realize the other side, it had to be experienced, first hand.