The Overseer Page 6

  Jerry moved the thick stack of documents on top of another thick stack of documents, evening up the edges as best he could before taking his own seat at his desk. Jerry swiveled his chair toward John and smiled. “Would you like a Diet Coke?”

  John couldn’t help but let his smile show. “Diet Coke?”

  “I love the stuff.” Jerry reached into a drawer and pulled out an empty can, crushing it in his hand before throwing it into a green recycle bin, where the can clanked as it landed among its fallen comrades.

  “No, thanks,” John said.

  “Do you mind terribly if I have one?” Jerry pointed at a mini fridge at the opposite end of his desk.

  “Knock yourself out.”

  “Thank you.” Jerry removed a diet soda. He cracked the seal with a spray of minute vapor and took a swig. “So, how can I help you today, Mr. Temple?”

  “I’m interested in the Thresher,” John said with a bit of a shrug. “What do you have compiled on that?”

  Jerry whistled, pointing to the corner. “See that filing cabinet? That’s all Thresher stuff.”

  “Wow,” John said, slightly stunned. “I didn’t know there was that much stuff. I mean, Vincent Sobel and I used to stay up late in college, and he’d tell me stuff about the Thresher he’d learned from others. But it was mostly just ‘friend of a friend’ kinds of things. More ghost stories than anything.”

  Jerry nodded jovially. “And I’ve got a filing cabinet filled with ghost stories. You know how it all started, right, with Alessandro D’Angelo?”

  “Sure,” John replied. “Italian monk in the Dark Ages. Founded the Firstborn. Right?”

  “Actually,” Jerry corrected hesitantly, “he would be considered late medieval, early Renaissance. Especially since he was Italian, and the Renaissance started in Italy first around 1250 or so, depending on who you—”

  “Jerry,” John said as a friendly nudge to get him back on topic.

  “Right.” Jerry gave another of his noises, a swishing sound this time. “D’Angelo—who had all three gifts—was betrayed and stabbed on Ash Wednesday 1441, but he didn’t die until Easter, six weeks later.”

  John nodded, trying to hurry things along. “And it was during those six weeks that he made his biggest prophecies.”

  “Right,” Jerry agreed. “He died very slowly, so nobody really knows how many prophecies he made in that time.” Jerry pointed to a place on his rotund side. “As far as I can gather, he was stabbed right about here. His friends were able to stop the bleeding, but I’m pretty sure it got infected. Maybe gangrene or something like that got into the wound and caused him to slowly—”

  “Thresher.” John interrupted gently, nudging Jerry back to the topic at hand.

  “Right.” Jerry raised his hands apologetically. “He started making prophecies about Thresher while he was dying—that the Thresher would eventually destroy the Firstborn.”

  “But?” John asked in anticipation.

  “But we don’t have most of those prophecies. The vast majority of them went underground with D’Angelo’s friends when the Inquisition against them heated up.” Jerry morbidly laughed to himself. “No pun intended.”

  John was confused. “What?”

  “They burned them at the stake. Get it? When things ‘heated up’ for them?”

  John didn’t laugh.

  “Anyway”—Jerry waved off his failed joke—“when D’Angelo’s most trusted people decided to go into hiding, they took that stuff with them. Some of it has surfaced. But we still have only maybe an eighth of what they wrote down. So we really probably don’t have a full picture on the whole Thresher thing.” He shook his head as if it were all too bad. “A classic example of history being lost to the sands of time.”

  “So, the only thing you have are the ghost stories,” John offered, trying to bait him back into conversation.

  Jerry shrugged. “Not only, but that’s a lot of it. Oral tradition. Something a friend passed on to a friend of a friend about something that happened to a long-lost uncle.”

  “Do you think the Thresher is real?” John asked candidly.

  Jerry took a long draw of Diet Coke. “Yes,” he said with some hesitation. “But we have to be careful. There have been some major Thresher scares over the last thousand years. There are some examples from the European side that I might buy, simply because the Firstborn are all but extinct over there, but here in the United States it’s open to a bit more interpretation.”

  “Like?” John prodded.

  “Well, in Europe there was a major scare that the Thresher had come to destroy the Firstborn during the Protestant Reformation. Of course, that was less than a century after D’Angelo died, so the Firstborn were still hiding in chapter houses across Europe at that point.”

  “Chapter houses?”

  “Like office branches. Firstborn monasteries in Britain and France and Italy and so on.” Jerry shrugged. “They were pretty much underground at that point. A lot of the new generation had been raised in fear because the previous generation had been hunted the same way the church hunted the Cathars.”

  “Cathars?”

  “A gnostic sect,” Jerry clarified, then continued. “After the English Civil War is when most of the European Firstborn ‘crossed the pond’ and came to the American colonies. That was a Thresher scare—but they survived. There were a few others. The Salem Witch Trials were a biggie; I don’t have any specific accounts of Firstborn dying in that, but they were hunted because of their gifts.” Jerry took another sip of his drink. “And I don’t have to tell you how bad things got during the American Civil War.”

  John frowned. “The Firstborn fought in the Civil War?”

  “Oh, yeah. It was a big deal.”

  “I’ve never heard of that.”

  “Probably not,” Jerry offered. “Because the Ora had all gone to California to make an instant fortune when the gold rush hit in 1848. Of course, on the East Coast the Prima condemned slavery but were in support of states rights—so they joined the Confederacy and stationed their militia out of Atlanta, Georgia.”

  “I don’t understand how that’s possible,” John argued. “If they didn’t support slavery, why did they join the Confederacy?”

  “Many of the Confederacy’s strongest supporters, including General Robert E. Lee, were not slave owners, or were deeply opposed to the idea. Almost none of the foot soldiers owned slaves or could even afford them if they wanted to. For Prima, like much of the Confederate South, it was a war of independence. No different than the American Revolution. They had no interest in invading the North and felt that they were fighting for their personal freedom.”

  “At the cost of someone else’s freedom.” John shook his head. “I guess I just don’t understand their logic.”

  “Neither did the Domani,” Jerry said with a shrug, “who enthusiastically supported and took part in Sherman’s wildly destructive March to the Sea, burning a three-hundred-mile swath toward Atlanta.”

  “Which was burned to the ground,” John said with a nod, remembering his high school history classes.

  “Correct. And a Domani regiment personally saw to the destruction of the Prima headquarters in Atlanta. So, the embittered Prima settled in Colorado, the Ora stayed in California, and the Domani sought out positions of power in New York City. A major geographical division—but that didn’t keep them from bumping into each other. There were serious attempts to recover D’Angelo’s last prophecies in those days, and so the three orders came into a lot more contact with each other than you’d expect. Much of the Prima sought revenge over old Civil War wounds, much of the Domani sought to demilitarize the Prima, and in the middle of it all the Ora played both sides against each other in the hopes of keeping the attention off of themselves—which didn’t work. A lot of Firstborn died.”

  John thought for a moment. “So, was that the Thresher?”

  “Who knows,” Jerry said, taking a noisy slurp of Diet Coke. “A lot of that violence star
ted with the thinking that Domani had become the Thresher.”

  “So…” John frowned, thinking through the fog of facts. “The Thresher is a group?”

  An accepting nod. “That’s one theory. There’s an oral tradition that one of the orders of the Firstborn will be corrupted and become the Thresher. Blake Jackson was a big proponent of that idea.”

  John shook his head. “A real shame about Blake Jackson and the things he did because of that belief.”

  “Others,” Jerry continued, “believe the Thresher is a spirit. Like a spirit of contention. A general propensity toward the sin of division.”

  “Or a demonic spirit,” John offered.

  “That’s also a popular theory. Or the devil himself.” Jerry shrugged, making another noise. “Who knows?”

  John nodded to himself for a few more seconds, digesting it all. “Vincent always talked of the Thresher as some sort of invisible monster that stalked the Firstborn, hunting them into extinction. But that doesn’t sound like it’s the most widely accepted version.”

  “Well…” Jerry finished his Diet Coke, crushing and disposing of it the same way as the last. “It’s not a popular belief among the Prima, so I’m unique in saying this, but when everyone agrees on something, they usually aren’t doing their own thinking. And people who don’t come to their own conclusions don’t do anything of value.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because,” Jerry said, reaching for his mini fridge again. “If a person believes the truth because they were told so, it doesn’t make them wise. It just means they’re a little gullible and a lot lucky. Even if you landed on the truth by accident, it’s only a matter of time until someone tells you something that isn’t the truth. And if you believe that, like everything else you’re told— then you’re stuck like Chuck.”

  John smirked at Jerry’s pithy comments. “And the alternative is?”

  “Do your own thinking as a solitary person.”

  “Isn’t that lonely?” John inquired.

  “Well…” Jerry shrugged. “Real truth isn’t determined by a popularity contest.”

  “But,” John fumbled, “if that’s true, then how does one person make a worthwhile difference?”

  “They don’t very often,” Jerry conceded. “It takes a group committed to the marketplace of ideas, where people, thinking individually, even disagreeing, can work together in the pursuit of a common goal—that’s when powerful stuff happens.”

  They were quiet for a few seconds as John thought about it. “And that’s precisely when the Thresher raises its head.”

  Jerry smiled coyly. “Most of the time people who are free to do as they please simply do as they’re told. Because it’s easier to have one person doing all the thinking and everyone else following that vision—whether it’s right or not. Which is why we now have the position of Overseer.” He raised a set of open palms. “No offense to you, of course.”

  “None taken,” John assured, taking a moment to think. “So, what do you think the Thresher is?” John asked pointedly.

  “Me?” Jerry asked, a set of chubby fingers pointing at his own chest. “Probably something demonic. Maybe it’s a kind of battle plan, or a specific position a demon takes on—like Overseer for us.” Jerry cracked open his new can, taking a swift sip. “But I do believe that the Thresher—whatever it is—is real. And its tools are fear and pride and a love of power.”

  Chapter 6

  HANNAH SAT IN the coffee shop by the window. Manhattan foot traffic passed her by in a silent parade just beyond the glass.

  She took a sip of her coffee. House blend. Nothing too fancy or expensive. She had a budget to keep, after all.

  Her fingers worked with the pencil, making tight strokes across the pad of paper she had pressed to the tabletop. A jawline. Eyes—young but soulful. Hair—curly and brown. They took shape, one by one, constructing the face of a girl. Whichever girl she was. Nikki? Tori? Kimberly? She was out there—

  —somewhere.

  And her time was running out.

  Hannah looked at the other sketches she had made, all on small pages of lined paper. Ragged shreds across the top where they had been torn from the tiny rings that had held them. Each picture another piece of the bigger story:

  The girls. The house. Abstract sketches of pain and suffering. A tattoo—a dragon.

  She took the last sip from her cardboard cup and pushed it aside, eyes dipping. She would be on a plane now. She would be following after them now—but where was the right place to start?

  Her eyes wandered to the window, slipping out of focus, watching the crush of humanity move silently past.

  “Penny for your thoughts,” someone said from across the table.

  She looked up to see a tall coffee cup placed in front of her as the man sat down.

  “Mr. Bathurst,” she said with a polite nod. “What’s this?”

  “Hazelnut latte,” he said, pointing to the fresh cup in front of her. “I come here myself sometimes. The hazelnut latte is a personal favorite of mine.”

  She nodded and took a sip. “Thank you.”

  “How are you feeling?” he asked. “You did just get out of the hospital, after all.”

  A hesitant smile to show she was fine. “Luckily the flames were mostly on the bottom floor. Some smoke inhalation, minor burns.” She shrugged. “I’m OK.”

  Devin sat back—tan suit, strong features—crossed his legs, and took a sip from his own coffee as he lifted one of her sketches. “These are very good. I didn’t know that you were an artist.”

  Hannah shrugged. “I’ve dabbled in it for years. I signed up for an art class a few months ago to help me with stuff like this.”

  Devin picked up another sketch, comparing the two side by side. “You must be getting As.”

  “Actually,” she said with wry irony, taking an embarrassed sip, “I’m failing.”

  Devin frowned. “I don’t understand.”

  “Too many absences.”

  “What happened?”

  “An elderly couple were swindled out of their life savings and put in a home. I spent most of the semester tracking down their money in the hopes of returning it to them.”

  Devin set down the sketches. “And did you?”

  Hannah shook her head. “I found some of it. But they still lost their house and most of their possessions.”

  “But I thought you were studying online?”

  Hannah gave a thumbs-down gesture. “That’s not working out very well either. It’s just hard to get excited about studying when I could be doing something more…useful, more immediate. You know, helping people.”

  Devin shook his head. “Your grandfather was worried that you would neglect your schooling once you discovered your gift. Don’t let that happen. Although it might seem like a waste of time now, education prepares you for the big stuff. You can’t just fly on visions alone. And I’m worried about you operating by yourself. Why didn’t you ask for help?”

  Hannah shrugged. “I didn’t want to pull anyone else off important things, like John has with you.”

  “Hannah, you nearly got yourself killed.”

  “So, what else is new?” she scoffed. “Besides, it’s not like if something happened to me I’d be leaving behind an orphan or something. It’s just me. My life.”

  Devin pinned her with his gaze. “That’s no reason to go on suicide missions. You have to follow your callings, but you also have to prepare for your future. And take care of yourself.”

  “Like you do?” Hannah challenged, gesturing at him with a raised latte.

  Devin shrugged. “I’m a workaholic; I’m probably not the best example to follow. But don’t let your calling isolate you and overwhelm you. It is OK to ask for help and advice.”

  Hannah sniffed disbelievingly.

  Devin pulled his chair closer to the table. “For instance, I’m interested in getting your help with my current calling.”

  Hannah shook her hea
d as she picked up one of her sketches. “I can’t. I’m already working on something.”

  “The girls?” Devin asked.

  She nodded.

  “I think they may be connected.” He handed her a newspaper. “This is Senator Warren Foster.”

  “I heard something about him,” she said, looking at the picture. “Embezzlement accusation from his former business career, right?”

  “Yes,” Devin said, looking around the room to see if anyone was listening, then leaned closer. “And there’s an organized effort to kill him.”

  Her eyes lazed across the story title. “He’s investigating human trafficking on American soil?”

  “Yes.” Devin nodded. “Saving him could help shut down the entire trafficking business here.”

  Hannah looked at the picture in her hand—a teenage girl who was out there somewhere. “I have my calling. I have to find these girls. That’s the most important thing right now.”

  Devin took a final sip of his coffee and stood. “The assassination takes place in Las Vegas. Foster won’t be there for a few days yet. That still gives you time to work on yours. I’d be willing to help you with your calling if you promise to join me in Las Vegas to prevent the assassination.”

  Hannah considered, taking a draw of hazelnut latte.

  “The key to dealing with one of these may well lie in dealing with the other,” he said as he buttoned his sport coat.

  “You’re right,” Hannah said with a nod. “The hazelnut latte is good.”

  Devin straightened his cuffs. “Take some time to think it over. Pray about it. Let me know if I can count on you.”

  Hannah set down the paper. “I’ll think about it.”

  “Good,” Devin replied. He nodded at her as he left the coffee shop.

  Hannah looked at the newspaper again. She already knew she would help.

  John stirred pasta into the bubbling froth, adding a pinch of salt and moving back to the book that gave him the instructions he needed. He wasn’t the world’s greatest cook, he’d decided, but he was capable of more than simply microwaving a can of soup.