1
In the four weeks following the revelation about Waxman, Caleb and Phoebe had very little time to think about what it all meant. Every minute was spent caring for their mother and arranging plans to get her safely back home. Working out the finances, transferring money, setting up home care.
While still in Alexandria, they slept in shifts in Helen’s room at first, until Caleb finally convinced Phoebe to get a room at a nearby hotel. She was exhausted, weaker than he’d ever seen her. Every day she seemed on the verge of a total collapse.
“I know what you’re feeling,” Caleb told her at last, after he recognized the look in her eyes. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“What do you mean?” They were at their usual table in the hospital café, subsisting on a diet of lamb gyros and falafel. Relatives of patients came in and out, some glassy-eyed after being up all night crying.
“Believe me,” Caleb said. “I felt the same after… after that tomb took your legs.”
“Let’s be clear about something,” Phoebe whispered through her teeth. “That tomb didn’t do anything but serve its function. Waxman was the one who did this to me. And he’s done it again, this time to Mom.”
She was right. It was Waxman.
“I want him to suffer,” she said, and stared down at her plate, her food untouched.
“I think he does suffer,” Caleb said. “But I know what you mean. The question is, what do we do about him?”
“CIA,” Phoebe said, her eyes darting around suspiciously, as if she were suddenly convinced they were being surveilled. For all they knew, they probably were. It was something Waxman would have done. She picked at her cucumber salad. “What did Dad have to do with them?”
“I don’t know that he had anything to do with them.”
“But the symbol — the eagle and the sun — you saw it all the time when you viewed Dad at that Iraqi prison.” She took a breath and continued. “And I saw the same thing, plus that other sign, the star surrounded by a fence.”
Caleb had been thinking the same thoughts, but for days now. “I saw something in that room Waxman went into at CIA headquarters.”
Phoebe stared at him. “What?”
“A name,” he said. “Stargate.”
“Like the movie?”
“No, like the project.” He leaned in close. “After the Freedom of Information Act opened up a lot of government files, some early CIA projects were declassified.”
“And one of them was called Stargate?”
Caleb nodded. “In the early seventies the CIA began experimenting with parapsychology, after the Russians tried something similar. You know the military; they can’t let the other guy get the leg up, especially in the Cold War.” He took a sip of Coke. “I only know about it because of Lydia. She mentioned it once.” Caleb paused. “As if she knew…”
“What?”
He almost choked on the fizzing liquid. “I wonder if she did know.”
“About Waxman?”
“Think about it. Why does he want the treasure so much? Could he be a Keeper? A descendent of the one that split from the others? And was Lydia trying to warn me?”
“Or were they both using you?” Phoebe sighed, and they sat in silence.
“So what about this Stargate thing?” she took up again. “And why was I seeing visions of it? Crude visions, but then again, I was just a kid. Maybe that was all I could understand.”
“Or maybe you were meant to understand it later, when you were older.” And for an instant he had it: someone wanted them both to know. Wanted them to know what the truth was, even though they would be suffering in confusion for years. Caleb was close to figuring it out, but still there were too many jumbled pieces of the puzzle rattling around in his mind.
He thought aloud: “Stargate attempted to use psychics the same way we use satellite imagery now. Remote viewing. The CIA gave the subjects certain targets — a Russian nuclear plant, Castro’s palace, a downed US airplane — and then the psychics drew what they could see. They worked with maps and landmarks, and in some cases, the results seemed accurate.”
“So what happened?”
“Apparently, the hits were not specific or conclusive enough. Or the government just didn’t want to be seen as kooky. In any case, the funding was cut after the Cold War ended, and the program disbanded.”
“Or it was just buried?” Phoebe asked.
“Waxman had something to do with it, and he still does. He took the program offline, continued it secretly.”
“He seems to still have the financial backing and the political connections.”
“But why the Pharos?”
Phoebe shook her head. “Again, it comes back to the Keepers. Could he be the Renegade?”
“I don’t know,” Caleb said. “I can’t believe he’s one of them. It doesn’t feel right. It seems more personal with him.”
Phoebe adjusted the handles of her chair and polished a spot so her reflection squinted back at her. “Let’s be careful. We know what the Pharos does to obsessions, and we know Waxman. He’ll try again.”
Caleb met his sister’s eyes.
“He’ll be back for us.”
That night they moved her. In a special care unit, Helen flew back to New York City, then to Rochester. An ambulance was waiting to take her to Sodus, where a hospital-appointed nurse named Elsa met them at the door. They got Helen situated in her bed, hooked up the fluids and monitoring equipment and set up a refrigerator to stock her IVs. They filled a drawer with sheets, washcloths and linen. Finally, Caleb took Phoebe to her room, where he helped her out of her chair and onto the bed. She collapsed, letting out a huge sigh.
“At least Mom’s home.”
Caleb didn’t want to complete the thought… so she could now die with dignity, surrounded by the familiar elements of her life.
“I don’t want to give up,” Phoebe said, as if reading Caleb’s mind.
“I know.”
“There’s a chance, you know.”
“Of course,” he said. “The doctors even said it happens. These kinds of comas are not the most severe. She can still move, and might talk, even though what she says might not make sense.”
“No, I mean there’s a chance we can cure her.”
Caleb stared at her. He knew what she meant. “The books. The treasure.”
“Didn’t you write about all the medical marvels that were catalogued in those days? The scientific advances that we’re only beginning to rediscover?”
He nodded. “There were rumors of alternative medical practices and healing techniques that united body and mind to facilitate recovery.”
Phoebe rolled to her side, closing her eyes. “Like I said, there’s a chance.” She sighed. “Sorry, big brother. I need to sleep. It’s been a long day.”
“A long month,” he replied, taking a blanket and smoothing it over her body. “Sweet dreams.”
“Be careful,” she whispered.
“What?” Caleb asked, but she was asleep. He backed out of the room, turned off the light, and tiptoed past Helen’s room, where he peeked in on her. Elsa sat in a chair beside the bed, nodding off while holding a copy of Time Magazine.
Back in the kitchen, Caleb sat alone at the empty table. His vision started to blur, and he felt a tingle of energy move up his spine, circling around and around like a snake, rising to the base of his skull.
He gasped and let the feeling run its course, knowing what was coming. The kitchen lost focus. Water took the place of the floor…