Think, damn it! He had tried using his phone, doing his best to guess the password for the wireless internet signal that permeated the entire place, but each entry he made was wrong. The device didn't have much of a charge left in its battery, so he kept it off. It's gotta be something to do with Mordrake, but what? I've tried every word associated with this damned cult, and still it won't take it!

  Making his way slowly down the massive stairs, he could see Walter placing a blanket over the old woman he had been giving water to. Elsner nearly stumbled as his legs began to give out, so he leaned heavily on the railing just to get himself onto ground level.

  Walter's cheekbones were now visible as he looked up at the other man. "She's dead too."

  Elsner moved towards the center of the sunken living room and sat down on the short steps with a tired sigh. "Who's left?"

  Walter leaned on the couch while looking down at the floor. It looked like he wanted to cry. "I dunno, man. I-I just want to get out of here."

  "I can't believe he's kept us prisoner like this. It's murder."

  "Who's gonna accuse Mordrake if we're all dead?"

  Elsner's mind still couldn't accept his fate. "People will find out."

  "How? Our phones don't work."

  "You must have told your family that you got here, right?"

  Walter shook his head slowly. "No. Bo... he told me never to tell anybody, and I didn't. Nobody knows I'm here. What about you?"

  "Same."

  "Then we're all gonna die."

  "No, not all of us," a voice coming from the kitchen said.

  Elsner and Walter turned to look. Damone was standing by the doorway leading back to the kitchen. The tall man had a bloody knife in his hand.

  Walter pointed with a trembling finger. "What... what are you doing, bro?"

  Damone took a few steps forward. "Everybody else is dead. Just the three of us now."

  Despite his body's malnourished state, Elsner quickly stood up. "Hey, you need to drop that knife, okay?"

  Damone shook his head while slowly approaching the two of them. "Don't you see? This is the Third Veil. It's a test."

  "What do you mean it's a test?"

  "I’ve thought about it for several days now," Damone said softly. "If the master is right and there's a traitor, then he'll open up this place again once the enemy is dead."

  "A lot of people have already died," Walter said.

  Damone nodded as he took another step closer. "Damn right. Now there's just three of us, but the doors haven't reopened yet. So it's gotta be one of you."

  Walter held his hands up. "You don't have to do this. It's a crime, man!"

  Damone kept coming closer. "I have to."

  "Even if you get out of this, you'll still be going to jail!"

  "No, I won't. The master will protect me."

  Elsner quickly moved backwards, behind the couch. Walter was slower, and Damone focused on him instead, as he used his longer limbs, chasing after the shorter man and grabbing hold of his shirt collar.

  Walter struggled while being held down as the taller man got on top of him, and his voice turned into a pleading wail. "No! Don't do this!"

  Elsner felt powerless as he desperately looked around for a weapon of some sort. "Hey! L-leave him alone!"

  "Sorry," Damone said as he plunged the knife into Walter's body. His victim screamed while flailing his arms around, in a frenzied but futile attempt to try and block more attacks, but Damone's determination won out as he continued to stab at Walter's chest.

  Elsner finally mustered the courage to do something. A metal figurine that resembled an Academy Awards statuette was displayed on one of the side tables and he quickly grabbed hold of it.

  Damone was kneeling on top of Walter, and the bigger man kept stabbing at his victim's ribcage while blood gurgled from Walter's mouth. Elsner quickly closed the distance and swung the statuette at the back of Damone's head.

  The taller man roared in rage as he got up, the blow against his head seeming to do nothing but catch his attention. Elsner backed away as Damone lunged at him, the bloody knife partly grazing his arm.

  Elsner cried out as his left forearm started to bleed from the cut, just as Damone got closer and kept the chef's knife low, ready to stab again. With no room left to maneuver, Elsner swung the statuette he was holding sideways, in a frenzied attempt to block the blade's thrust.

  The thick metal figurine connected with Damone's wrist and fractured it. Damone roared in pain as he dropped the knife. Elsner swung again, and this time his improvised club slammed against the taller man's chin.

  Damone reeled from the blow and fell to his knees. Elsner smashed the statuette on the top of the other man's head. Damone dropped to the floor as Elsner yelled out and kept on swinging the figurine like a club, until his opponent's head became a bloody pulp.

  For what seemed like a long time, all Elsner did was sit beside the corpse, catching his breath. He had glanced over to where Walter was lying, and it was clear he was the only one left alive.

  He was about to faint when he heard it. A loud clicking noise as the bolts on the doors were opened. The sounds were so distinct that they echoed across the near lifeless interior of the house.

  A strong wintry breeze coming from the outside had opened the front door slightly. Elsner stood up and realized he was the last living person still around. When he staggered towards the door he finally noticed the hidden surveillance camera by the entryway.

  Elsner wanted to say something, but he kept his mouth shut as his bloody hand pulled the door open and he limped out into the sunny driveway.

  42 Virginia

  IT WAS EARLY AFTERNOON when a US Navy Boeing C-40 Clipper landed on the main runway at the Oceania Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach. The transport plane belonged to Fleet Logistics Support Squadron Five Six, and had flown nonstop after picking up a small group of men from Leemore NAS in California in the wee hours of the morning before bringing them back to the East Coast.

  The plane spent another fifteen minutes taxiing over to a secluded hangar. No sooner had the passenger stairs been attached to the open rear door of the aircraft than several well built, bearded men stepped out into the clear blinding light of the midday sun.

  Trent Gossard adjusted his sunglasses as he stepped onto the tarmac, his duffle bag slung over his broad left shoulder. His team had been traveling nonstop for almost an entire day, but his excellent physical conditioning kept him from becoming too fatigued. "Home sweet home."

  David Suhey stood beside him while placing his own bags onto the ground. "I wonder why they brought us back here so quickly. I don't think the rest of the Navy finished the exercises we were doing with the Filipinos yet, right?"

  Gossard shrugged as the rest of his eight-member squad came down the stairs and gathered around him. "Who knows? At least we get some downtime ahead of the others."

  Suhey nodded. "I hear you. I think I'll go take the family and head over to Busch Gardens or Kings Dominion or something."

  "Speak for yourself, dude," one of the other men said. "I know where I'm taking my girlfriend—right into my bed."

  Several of the team broke out in guffaws, joking and teasing each other and sharing high fives. As members of an elite counterterrorism unit, they would always play hard when not training or in operations.

  "Heads up," Gossard said as he spotted the squadron's commanding officer making his way towards them from the inside of the hangar. "CO's coming."

  The entire team quickly stood to attention and saluted as Commander Joshua Otis walked up to them. "How's your team feeling, Goose?"

  "We're good, sir. All present and accounted for."

  Otis returned their salutes. "At ease, gentlemen. I'm glad we all made it back in one piece, and the president would like to personally congratulate you on that hostage job in Cebu, but there's a bunch of urgent matters that requires him to stay in the White House, so sadly he won't be here."

  Gossard nodded silently. Everyone in the team knew there would be no public recognition for the kinds of things they had done, and it didn't bother them one bit.

  "Which brings me to my next point as to why you were transferred back here ahead of schedule," the commander said. "SOCOM in Bragg is reassigning all available spec ops units to different parts of the country."

  No one in the team said anything, yet eyes began darting around beneath sunglasses and their scowls intensified.

  "It's got something to do with what happened in Big Bear Lake. The commander-in-chief has ordered us on immediate standby. This means that all squadrons will stick close to their assigned transports and be ready to go at a moment's notice. Any questions?"

  Suhey raised his hand. "Sir, are we going to be based here?"

  "That hasn't been decided yet," Otis said. "We're still waiting on SOCOM to give out our final assignments. For now you will remain on standby."

  Gossard clenched his jaw but said nothing. There goes our R and R, but at least we're on home ground.

  Another man raised his hand. "Sir, this is more of a question regarding the Cebu operation."

  "Go ahead and ask," Otis said.

  "Did we find out what that light that came over us was?"

  Otis shook his head. "I'm afraid not. We've still got forensic investigators back in that resort looking things over."

  Gossard raised his hand. "Sir, I read a brief news report on what happened in California, and the eyewitnesses said they encountered a light up in the sky too."

  "Yeah I read that too. So?"

  Gossard scratched the back of his neck. "Well sir, their accounts are almost exactly the same as ours when it came to encountering that light up in the sky. We had no comms, and even our night vision gear didn't function properly."

  "I understand," Otis said. "DOD thinks it was some sort of jamming."

  One of the others raised his hand. "What kind of jamming was that, sir? I don't know of any sort of ECM that can take out night vision of any kind."

  "We're still looking into it," the commander said. "That's all I can tell you for now."

  Gossard raised his hand a second time. "If we're going to go up against those... things that attacked the people of California, then we're going to need some sort of countermeasure if they put up those lights in the sky again, sir. I put it in my report."

  Otis bit his lip. Gossard could tell their commander was finding it hard to answer questions that he didn't have any knowledge of either. "Like I said, we're working on it. We ought to have a solution the next time it happens, but no guarantees."

  The team kept silent once more. There was no point in repeating their concerns; now they had to trust that someone high up in the government or in the military would find a way to solve the problem and pass the solution on to them.

  "Look, I know you're all uneasy about all this," Otis said softly. "But we are the vanguard. All the tough jobs that nobody else can do get sent over to us; that's why we train like no one else, and we're second to none. Whatever it is out there that did this, we're going to make them pay. Our orders are to protect the homeland, and that's what we're going to do."

  The entire team replied in strong unison. "Hooyah!"

  43 Los Angeles

  JEFF STOOD OUTSIDE of the Torres residence, watching the forensics teams going in and out through the open front door. Several neighbors peeked out from behind the blinds of their own windows to observe what was happening, but the residential street remained mostly quiet as the sun began to set over the urban horizon.

  A part of him remained concerned over what had happened to Piper, but this worry was tempered somewhat by the excitement of being part of a federal investigation. When Jeff and the FBI agents spoke to his dad over the phone, Jeff couldn't help but be pleased after his old man gave his permission for his son to ride along with them.

  Good ol’ Dad, he thought. Always easygoing and saying yes to whatever I want. Jeff felt somewhat spoiled, but he knew his pop would always listen to reason. When Principal O'Bryan excused him from classes to assist in the investigation as well, Jeff was over the moon.

  He immediately thought of himself as one of those heroes in an action movie, going through the clues in order to save his girl right at the end. I bet I'll be featured in the local newspapers when I get reunited with Piper. I'll be the talk of the school.

  As Jeff continued to daydream about being on the front page of the Daily Breeze, Agents Ripley and Valdez emerged from the front door and beckoned to him. Jeff eagerly jumped over the yellow police tape surrounding the property and strode up to them with a confident smirk.

  Ripley pointed towards the front door. "So you paid Piper a visit after she got back here?"

  Jeff nodded. He had actually told them a lie. The fact was he had left Piper with her parents at the hospital, just before the massacre. He had not been to his girlfriend's house for almost a year, but had decided to embellish his story in order to make himself more important to the case.

  Valdez scowled. "Jeff, the timeline doesn't match. You told us that Piper was attacked the moment she got back here after the massacre in the hospital, so how could you have met her in this house immediately afterwards?"

  Jeff bit his lip. He realized he should have known better than trying to deceive two highly trained FBI agents. "Okay, I made a fib. I-I must have gotten stuff mixed up because so many things happened. I think I remember her telling me this after she came over to my house."

  Ripley let out a deep breath while glancing towards his partner. "I knew this was a bad idea."

  Valdez kept her eyes on Jeff. "Lying to a federal agent is a criminal offence, Jeff. You're technically a minor, but this is still very, very serious."

  Jeff looked down at the grassy front yard. "I'm sorry, I-I guess I just got overexcited."

  A short, balding man with thick glasses poked his head out of the front door, eyeing the three of them. "Hey, I think we've got something."

  The two FBI agents immediately turned around and followed the police forensics specialist back inside the house. Jeff followed discreetly and stopped just outside of the front door, close enough to see and overhear their conversation.

  Moving nearer to the sofa, the forensics investigator got down on his knees and used a pair of tweezers to pull out two pieces of paper from underneath the couch. "I found these. Looks like a bunch of government forms that were part of a longer document. Has the CPS logo on them too."

  Ripley stooped over and stared at the papers as they were placed into clear plastic evidence bags. "They look recent to you?"

  "We could check it for prints," the forensics man said. "But there's like, tens of thousands of fingerprints all over this room."

  Jeff pointed towards the documents. "That's gotta be from them! Piper told me they tried to pin her down on the table there."

  Valdez held up one hand in a calming gesture towards the youth before turning her attention back to the forensics guy. "Check for prints on that document first, make it a priority. Then run tests on the coffee table and the couch."

  The forensics man sighed. "This is going to take weeks. My police caseload is already filled to the brim with having to do background checks on those hospital assailants."

  "We don't have that much time," Ripley said. "We'll coordinate and run it through the FBI database as well."

  "If you need additional manpower then we'll send our own forensics team here," Ripley said.

  "That would help," the man said.

  While Valdez got on her phone, Ripley made his way back towards the front door and stood beside Jeff. "You've given us the names Piper told you, but did she give you any physical details on these imposters?"

  Jeff looked away, trying his best to remember. "All she told me was that they looked totally normal. A well-dressed man and woman, and they were always calm and smiling, and then they just snapped when she started asking them the wrong questions."

  "That's not much to go on," Ripley said.

  "I remember... I think she told me that those people might have had something to do with the ones who attacked the hospital while she was there."

  Ripley raised an eyebrow. "She thinks the attack on the hospital and the attempted abduction against her are related?"

  "Like I told you, she was the target."

  "That doesn't make any sense. Why would they try to kill her at first, and then try to kidnap her later on?"

  Jeff shrugged. "You got me, Agent Ripley."

  Ripley turned towards Valdez as his partner made her way over to them. "Jeff here says that the massacre in the hospital might be related to the attempted abduction here. What did the Torrance PD detectives tell you?"

  "They're at a dead end with the Heaven's Path website," Valdez said.

  "Okay, so let's make that investigation a federal matter too."

  "We can't, not unless the city of Torrance asks for federal assistance, and they haven't done so."

  "So we pass our findings up the chain of command and get DHS to nudge them a little."

  Valdez shook her head slowly. "We're already out on a limb here. I've called in my last favor with regards to running any prints we've found here through the federal database for a match. Unless we find some hard evidence that Piper was kidnapped, then I doubt our supervisor will give us any more time on this."

  Ripley frowned. His partner was right. Their supervisor, Senior Special Agent in Charge Ned Summerville, had been reluctant to give them the go-ahead to investigate Piper's whereabouts, telling them that it would be more productive to keep to the Big Bear Lake investigation, focusing on the forensic evidence there, but had reluctantly agreed to give them some time to follow up their hunches after Valdez's repeated pleadings.

  Jeff could see the conflicted expressions on both agents' faces. "Hey, so what's gonna happen now?"

  Ripley looked at his watch. "Now you can go back to class tomorrow. We'll wait for the results from the fingerprint database and see if there's a match somewhere."

  "You're going to bring me along if you do find something, right?" Jeff asked them."You're going to need me you know, because Piper won't trust anyone—especially not government types."

 

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