Dreams Unleashed (25 page)

"Be careful," he warned me.

"Of what?"

"Sweet dreams. Remember that. Do you have people you can trust there?" he asked, sounding worried.

"I have one, maybe two here."

"Find out. Confirm it. If not, remember you've got me, but I'm pretty far away."

"Well I hope I won't need anyone's help."

He paused.

"I hope so too, Ann."

After hanging up, I thought about the phone call for a while. I first tried to reason through what I knew so far. The remote viewing project was still live---but at another government agency. If another group had Project Stargate, it meant that it was being used, because we'd already proven that it worked. So they were likely using it on active targets. They were using it knowing that it would kill most of the viewers.

They'd had a viewer active while I was dreaming of being in Shanghai. Of everything, that probably scared me the most. I had just discovered the now non-existent boundary between my conscious and subconscious minds. The new remote viewing group, it seemed, had found the connection much earlier, and I was reaching to understand the implications. The new viewers could see my dreams as if they were with me, as if they were viewing the same location at the same time I was dreaming.

I've lost my anonymity
. I felt sick. I barely made it to the toilet in time, before everything inside my guts turned inside out. Sitting on the bathroom rug, I thought.
I've worked for so long to maintain my privacy.
I deserve it
.
Now, every time I dream, they could be watching me
. I was starting to get angry.

Getting up, I washed my face and brushed my teeth, then went in my bedroom, kicked off my shoes, and crawled into bed. Emotionally exhausted and deeply drained, I fell asleep.

I woke up soon after, fear spearing through me. My face felt sweaty, and I looked around the room for the threat, but then I remembered: the threat was in my mind. Had I dreamed? I looked at the clock and saw that I had only dozed off for a little over a half-hour. I didn't remember dreaming.

It had been twenty years since I'd tried to remote view. I tried to tell myself that it was like getting back on a horse after being bucked off.

But horses don't generally inflict an early death on their riders
.

Clearly I was nervous, but I decided that now was as good a time as any.

Moving to the living room, I sat on the sofa with my clipboard and pencil, preparing myself to start the Transcendental Meditation. Even after I'd left Project Stargate, I practiced TM and had found it to be an extremely effective tool for reducing stress in my life. After Armond's death, I even attended an Ayurvedic healing retreat at the clinic on Salt Spring Island in the San Juans. They taught me that TM could open an infinite reservoir of creativity and intuitive intelligence. I became even more devoted to meditating after that, practicing it daily.

After twenty minutes of meditation, I slowly opened my eyes to the clipboard paper and wrote the time and the word BEGIN. I then imagined that day, twenty-five years ago, when I conducted my first live remote viewing.

On my paper, I drew the large remote viewing room at the CIA, where small groups of people sat quietly, all with clipboards in their laps. I sketched a man sitting, with another man sitting behind him. There was also a woman. The man nearest the woman handed her a piece of paper. On that paper were numbers...coordinates. I wrote them down.

Latitude: N 31° 14' 10.7712

Longitude: E 121° 29' 9.9126

Finished, I wrote END, along with the current time. I had successfully viewed my original target coordinates.

"Sinéad, tell me the latitude and longitude for the epicenter of the Shanghai earthquake."

She began, "Latitude: N 31° 14' 10.7712, Longitude: E 121° 29' 9.9126"

"Stop." The coordinates were the same.
My first live target was the Bund Hotel
.
Did I see the future, or did I create it
? Did the swinging door in my mind carry my subconscious to reality and, through my dream, generate the epicenter of the earthquake at the Bund?

The phone rang, pulling me away from my thoughts.

"Sinéad, take a message," I abruptly instructed her. I wasn't ready to talk to anyone. After a few moments, the phone stopped ringing.

"Message ready, Ann."

"Replay the message."

"Ann...it's Paul...I know you're back from D.C. Now...about that date..."

"Stop."

My brain was tired. I didn't want to deal with this right now. Then I thought of Bob's reminder. I needed to know whom I could trust. It would have been easy to tell myself that didn't apply to Paul...but I wasn't sure anymore.

"Sinéad, dial Paul from the number he called me from. Send the call to my cell phone."

"Okay, Ann."

The phone rang, and I heard Paul pick up. "Hello?"

"Hi, Paul. It's Ann."

"Hey there."

"I was glad you called," I said flatly.

"Are you okay? You sound...different. Did everything go okay at the conference?"

"The conference was fine. Would you like to come over? I could fix us a late dinner."

"Yeah, I can be right over," he responded.

"Okay."

"Ann?"

"Yeah?"

"You might need to tell me where you live, my telepathy isn't quite working tonight," he teased, trying to cheer me up.

He has no idea
.

Chapter 23

BELLINGHAM, WASHINGTON

The Year 2015

I threw together a green salad for us, with broiled organic chicken and roasted walnuts on top with Caesar dressing. Cooking was always good for centering myself.

That'll have to do
.

About twenty minutes later, the doorbell rang.

I went to the door and opened it.

Paul was dressed in a Bellslicker, a white t-shirt, and stone-colored boot-cut Levi's. With his casual look, he wore a big smile and presented a bouquet of wildflowers from his hand.

"Beautiful," I said, impressed by the flowers.

"Me or the flowers?" he asked playfully, returning my smile.

"Both," I said, stepping aside so he could enter. My heart leapt just a bit.

"Thank you, Paul," I said sincerely, holding the flowers in one arm while I hugged him with the other.

He kissed me on the cheek just as we pulled apart.

That was a surprise...but a pleasant one
. I liked his forwardness.

"How about we sit up here and eat?" I suggested, gesturing to the tall chairs at the kitchen island.

Seeing the salad and bread, he replied, "Mmm---looks good."

He sat while I put the wildflowers in a vase, setting it on the counter.

I dished up salad, bread, and pink lemonade for both of us.

"So why don't you tell me what's up? I could hear something in your voice when you called me back."

"You get straight to the point, don't you?" I asked, coming around the counter to sit next to him.

"Ann, I've been working next to you five days a week for three years. That's..." he was clearly calculating in his mind, "...seven hundred and eighty days I've spent with you. We're a little past small talk now, don't you think?"

"Wow, you're really good at math," I said winking, glazing over his question.

"Ha ha."

For a moment I looked directly into my salad as though looking for something. I was gathering my thoughts.

"I sure hope you're ready for this, because it's a doozy," I warned, forking my salad.

"Bring it on."

"I used to work for the CIA. Did you know that?"

"Nope, didn't know that. How long ago?" he asked, looking into his salad.

I recounted the story of how I started working there. He nodded as he ate, indicating that he was still following me.

"So," I said, "I was there a total of six-and-a-half years."

"That's a long time. What'd you do for them---were you a spy---Bond?" he kidded.

"Yes, I was," I replied seriously.

A piece of chicken fell off his fork. "Really?"

"Yeah, but not in the way that you imagine. I never physically went into the field."

"Well, that's good. What
did
you do?"

"I worked from CIA headquarters, in Langley. I was part of the Science and Technology group, in Clandestine Services. Our group developed the methods and technology to improve how we gathered intelligence. It's the same organization that develops all the cool spy gadgets, like what James Bond uses."

"That
is
cool," he said, with eyebrows raised.

"Of course you would think so, you geek," I teased.

He smiled. The way we interacted with one another was easy. I decided to dive into the more complicated stuff.

"Can I ask you something?" I asked quietly.

"Yeah, ask me anything."

"What do you think of our government?"

"The U.S. government?"

"Yeah."

"Well, if we're gonna get into politics, I need to know how old you are."

"What?" I asked, laughing.

"Tell me how old you are."

"Why? How old do you think I am?"

"Did the CIA teach you how to answer a question with another question?" he teased.

I laughed.

"No. As a matter of fact, I developed that myself---over
forty-four years
of lifetime."

"Forty-four? Really? I could have sworn you were under thirty-five."

"Yeah, I get that a lot," I said, showing off.

"Boy, you've got good genes," he said, impressed.

"My mother had good skin."

"I bet. Well now that I know you're forty-four..." he winked. "You and I are the same age."

"Really?"

"Uh-huh. It helps to know your age, because I can see where you're coming from, knowing what period of time you've lived in."

"I can see that; it gives context."

"Yes, it does. Are you
sure
you want to know my opinion of our government? I mean, I've never worked for the government, nor would I ever. My feelings may be very different than yours."

"Yes. I asked because I want to know."

"I'm a patriot, Ann. I believe in this country," he began.

I noticed that his face changed as he started. There was no more bantering. It was all seriousness.

"But I don't believe in the socialization that's been happening since about 2009. I'm against our government using RFID, whether it's tracking animals, our medical records, or us. Local government, at the county and city levels, has become a noose around the neck of its citizens. The astronomical property and other local taxes are just plain wrong. The county foreclosed on my neighbor's house for
two thousand
that he owed in back taxes, and his house is worth at least three hundred thousand dollars. I have another friend whose house is on a big piece of land, and yet he can't keep livestock on his own land. His daughter wants to have chickens so that she can participate in 4H, and they are forbidden by the city to do so. They have sixteen acres, Ann. What happened to 'we the people?'" He was getting fired up.

I nodded. I had never seen this side of him; he seemed so different.

Paul continued, "You know I love technology, but the things that all levels of government are doing with it is just plain wrong. We need change, from the highest levels of government."

He paused, waiting for my reaction to his confession.

"I agree with every single word you just spoke," I said, looking intently into his eyes.

He met my eyes, then reached toward me and kissed me, full on the lips. I kissed him back. He gently stopped, leaning his forehead to mine. I told myself to breathe; the chemistry was palpable.

He backed his head slightly away from mine and, looking into my eyes, said, "I knew you were beautiful, Ann. But I think you just became even more so."

"Mmm hmm," I responded, unable to find any coherent words.

He smiled.

I drank my lemonade.

He drank his, then ate a little salad.

"I have a good friend who lives in a tiny city in Eastern Washington, and she can't have chickens on her farm, and she lives on eleven acres," I offered, trying to break the lively tension between us.