Near Death (26 page)

“We’ll get you sorted out, don’t worry,” Alex said.

“We’ve got everything!” Erica exclaimed, overhearing him. “The kitchen and pantry are through there. Help yourself.”

Joe winked at Erica and said, “I think I’m going to like it here.”

Erica announced she was going upstairs to rouse
everyone and Alex didn’t stop her. The moment, he felt, was weighty. It should be marked with words. It would be a pity to wait till the morning.

It took ten minutes for everyone to get down to the great room for a sleepy but happy assembly. The core of the Uroboros salon was present: all those whom Alex truly had wanted to join him.

Davis Fox was there, cozy in a terry cloth robe. Sam Rodriguez had been sharing a bed with Erica. He’d pulled on jeans and a sweatshirt and was grinning from ear to ear. Melissa Cornish, a six-footer, had her old basketball sweats on; in her youth she’d been a top player at U Mass. Alex had met her long ago at a jogging track. She taught criminal justice at Northeastern and was one of his original Uroboros members. Vik Pai had managed not only to shave but get dressed in khakis and a white oxford shirt. He was small but sturdy with a dazzling flash of Bollywood looks. Vik was another original, a long-term grad student at Harvard’s Divinity School with an interest in cross- cultural views of death and dying. The last two were Steve Mahady and his girlfriend. Steve was a science teacher from Boston Latin School, a heavily bearded bear of a man who’d been with Uroboros for four years. Since joining he’d never missed a meeting and was probably Alex’s fiercest loyalist.
His girlfriend, Leslie, was a quiet systems analyst who worked for Verizon, a woman absolutely devoted to Steve and rarely more than inches away from him at all times.

Alex proudly introduced Joe to the group and the man endeared himself by placing bottles of beer into willing hands.

“I know it’s late,” Alex began. “But I wanted to say something tonight. I called out to each one of you and you all said
yes
. You were the ones I wanted for this journey. And you gave me your answer. You dropped your everyday lives and came here without even knowing why I wanted you. That devotion means a lot to me. Now I know it’s not devotion to Alex Weller. It’s devotion to our shared experience. Each one of us has taken Bliss—thank you, Erica, for naming it! Each one of us has been touched by it, changed by it. And we understand that our collective experience is meaningful not only to our own lives but to our fellow man. We have a responsibility. You know it, I know it. It’s a responsibility to share our knowledge for the benefit of others. There
is
an afterlife. Millennia of arguments and speculation and blind beliefs are over. We have proof. And that means there
is
a God, a God of some sort. The comfort that brings, the overwhelming joy of not being alone and adrift in the universe, that knowledge is
something we have an obligation—no, a
duty
—to share. So tonight, my friends, I formally declare that this small band of truth-seekers and truth-tellers assembled here in this magnificent house, we will form the nucleus of a new movement: a movement that will rock the world and forever change it. Humanity doesn’t have to be governed by fears, worries, jealousies—small, petty things—any longer. We have the ability to move people onto a new plane where higher issues reign. So tonight, our little Uroboros Society becomes something larger, grander …
global
. Tonight the Inner Peace Crusade is born and you, my friends, are its founding members. So, let’s drink a toast to us, to the Inner Peace Crusade! I hope you like the name. It’s the best I could come up with!”

They drank and chatted excitedly for a few minutes until Sam piped up and asked, “So, Alex. I’ve got one question: You got any Bliss?”

Alex laughed and replied, “Actually, Sam, I’ve got a shitload of it!”

Most of them took Bliss that night and the household didn’t become active until late morning as people began filtering down from the upper floors.

Alex awoke with Jessie in the large corner master
bedroom. There was a sound of seagulls and waves and the room was flooded with light. He got out of bed, careful not to wake her, and went straight for the windows. The scene beneath him was breathtaking, a strip of snow-covered lawn giving way to a sheer cliff face. Large waves pounded and sprayed against smooth dark boulders on a stony beach. The ocean was heaving and swelling all the way to the horizon where it seemed to merge with a hazy sky. Seagulls swooped past the window, fixing him with one-eyed stares.

From another window he tried to get a look up the coastline but found the view obscured by thick pine woods that surrounded the property.

He got dressed and descended the grand stairway, sliding his palm over its smooth walnut banister polished by generations of children’s backsides.

The house was coming alive. In the dining room, Sam and Leslie were on their laptops. In the kitchen, Erica, Davis, and Melissa were cooking eggs. In the great room, Joe was making a fire, regaling Sam and Vik on the fine points of disarming roadside IEDs.

Alex greeted each one, exchanged hugs and cheek kisses, eventually making his way to the coffeepot. He helped himself to a giant mug and pulled Erica aside. “The house is brilliant. Thanks.”

“I’m glad you like it.”

“You’re sure it’s safe? Your parents won’t be showing up unexpectedly?”

“They’re in Spain for the winter. It’s all ours.”

He sought out Sam and Joe, had them get their coats and led them through the French doors of the great room onto the wraparound porch at the rear. The sun was poking through a gap in the clouds and the air felt mild. If the Adirondack chairs and rockers hadn’t been encased in a hard crust of snow, they might have sat to take in the view. Instead they stood at the railing and marveled, raising their voices to hear one another over the waves.

“It’s fabulous, isn’t it?” Alex said.

“Amazing,” Joe replied.

“Look, over there.” Sam pointed to a cluster of islands covered in evergreens out in Frenchman’s Bay. “Erica said those are called the Bald Porcupine Islands. And out that way is Egg Rock. You gotta love these names. Nothing like that in the Bronx.”

“When’d you get here?” Joe asked.

“Just a couple of days ago. We’ve kept to the house. Laying low.” He pointed at Alex’s chest. “Waiting for orders from the big guy.”

Alex chuckled. “I’ve never been called big guy
before.”

“Get used to it, man,” Sam said. “I’ve got a feeling a lot of people are going to know you pretty soon.”

“I think you already see where I’m going with this, Sam. That’s why I wanted to talk to you and Joe alone. I do have big plans. If things play out as I hope they will, this movement’s going to get big, fast. So even though we’re going to try to keep our group small, we’ll need some organization, some hierarchy. That’s where you two come in. I want you to be my go-to blokes: my right arm, my left arm.”

Joe shrugged. “Whatever you want, Alex.”

Sam, though, anxiously asked, “Why me? I’m new. Why trust me?”

“Instinct. I liked you and trusted you from the day we met. You’re smart and you’ve got personality. I want you to help me with information. We need a web presence. We need to communicate. I need you to spearhead that for me.”

“Sure, Alex,” Sam agreed. “I can do that.”

“And you, brother of mine, warrior. I need you to head up security. We’re going to be wanted men soon enough. We’re going to be hunted. You’ve got to see to it we survive long enough to get our job done. Will you take that on?”

“Headbanger in chief? Yeah, no problem. Born to the job.”

Alex relaxed and allowed himself a satisfied smile. “Now we can get serious,” he told them over the crashing surf. “God, I love the ocean.” Then he put his arms around both men. “Let’s go inside and see if anyone wants to take more Bliss.”

Thirty-four

The basement seemed to go on forever, a rabbit warren of finished and unfinished spaces. The house had a stone foundation with an unheated basement so Alex had to work with the fingers cut off a pair of gloves. He set up in a chilly room that once had been a woodworking shop, though all that remained were the wooden workbenches now, which well suited his purposes. After stringing extension cords and power strips, he plugged in one computer and analytical machine after another, waiting for the blown fuse that never came. Satisfied he had the power he needed, he moved on to setting up tubes and racks and beakers in the way he was accustomed.

Sam came down and watched him work. “It’s creepy down here, man,” he said.

“Well, it’s got atmosphere, doesn’t it? It’ll do.”

“Do for what? What’s the plan?”

“Who knows how long we’ll be here? I can’t be idle. There’s still work to be done on figuring out how Bliss works, what it’s doing in the brain. I can’t do all of it with these instruments but I can do some of it.”

“You’re a workaholic,” Sam observed. “For me, I’m happy to ditch school and do something different.”

“You won’t be idle either, Sam. I’ve got a lot planned for you.”

“Yeah, I’ve already been scoping out servers around the world where we can burrow in and hide. When they shut us down in one place, we’ll be up and running in another. We’ll always be a few steps ahead.”

“That’s why I wanted you, mate.”

“When are you going to tell me—
us
—what it is you want to do, Alex?”

Alex sighed. The time had come to let the thoughts crowding his mind spill out. He was a scientist, not an evangelist, and the newness of the role felt like a suit of ill-fitting clothes.

“Do you like the world we live in, Sam? Does it make you proud to see all this cruelty, greed, selfishness, and violence around you? Does it make you feel good that children grow up having their goals defined for them by advertising men? Western society has hollow values. It’s amoral. We’re a rudderless ship. And if someone’s going to tell me that it’s not so bad, that I’m exaggerating, then what about the rest of the world? Without the veneer of decadence, in places where there is real poverty, you can
see even more clearly how base and futile most people’s lives are. Mankind desperately needs spiritual guidance.”

“That’s what religion’s for, no?”

“Well, yes! But religions accomplish almost nothing. It’s like putting a Band-Aid on a deep cut. Religions give rules of conduct, simple, easy-to-understand guidelines.
Thou shalt do this, thou shalt not do that
. And they hold out some abstract concept of God and heaven to induce people to toe the line. It’s not enough! Very few, maybe only handfuls of mystics through the ages could truly comprehend on a visceral and intellectual level the enormity of two absolute truths. Number one: God exists. Number two: there is an afterlife. Bliss is like truth serum. Everyone who takes it experiences the holiest of holies. It cuts through all the crap and delivers the truth, plain and unvarnished.”

“I don’t disagree with what you’re saying but what do you want us to do about it? Do you want the whole world to take Bliss?”

“That would be wonderful, but not very practical! But you’re on the right track.”

“What then?”

“I think we can help mankind achieve spiritual reorientation if just—I don’t know—just a few percent of
adults take Bliss. Maybe that would be sufficient to permanently change the status quo.”

“Where’s all that drug going to come from?” Sam asked incredulously.

“I don’t know for sure. My friend in Mexico is probably cranking away. And others will follow. Profits will speed the way for prophets.”

“Okay, so we sprinkle the drug around and get a good chunk of the population to use it. What do you think happens then?”

“This is theory, of course, hypothetical, but I think we’d achieve a critical mass of spirituality, enough to destroy our degenerative foundations, the worst trappings of civilization. They’d crumble. We’d have a simpler, purer way of living.”

Sam laughed nervously. “What about all the chaos, man? Destruction? Death? A crumbling civilization means farmers not farming, factories not making shit, power stations not making power. We’d have some kind of postindustrial toilet bowl, a twenty-first-century Dark Ages.”

“I agree there’ll be some chaos and death. But you’re making the incorrect assumption that death is a bad thing. You see, that’s wrong. Our life on earth is not permanent. Everyone can agree on that. The act of dying is a
transition state, merely a bridge from the physical world to the spiritual world. There’s nothing bad about death. There’s nothing to be feared. I think Bliss teaches that.”

Sam looked uncomfortable. “I don’t know, man. This seems pretty radical.”

“Before Bliss I would have agreed; but one’s perspective changes fairly dramatically, doesn’t it? It’s hard for me to even remember what the old state of mind feels like. You might hear the word
Death
, I hear
Deliverance
. You might say
Dark Ages
, I hear
Enlightened Ages
. A world saturated with Bliss would certainly be more primitive from the standpoint of technology but it would not be Dark. Perhaps people would choose to live simpler, moral lives, forsaking petty disputes and war, and preparing themselves for the inevitability of an eternal afterlife in God’s grace.”

Alex saw the look of skepticism in Sam’s young face. “Come on, Sam, let’s go outside.”

They got their coats and went out back, crunching through the thin snow to the edge of the cliff. Below them, it was low tide and thirty yards of rocky beach was exposed. Cut into the cliff was a narrow but even stone stairway with rails leading down to the beach. Gingerly, they made their way down the icy stairs to sea level where
they found a flat dry boulder, sat, and watched the rolling breakers. Alex chose this moment to remain silent and let the power of nature speak. The two men stayed there, side by side, watching the tide come in. Then finally, unable to contain himself any longer, Alex announced to Sam, “I’m throwing down the gauntlet. Thirty days. A month is going to be long enough to change the world forever. I want to start a countdown.”

In the evening, after supper, Alex assembled his followers in the great room. With a glass of wine in hand he looked relaxed, confident. Jessie sat nearest to him, lovingly looking up.