Raiders

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Far across the city, Mason watched a large jet plane push up into the sky and disappear in a bank of low, gray clouds. “Gets a lot worse, you say?” he asked.

Ezra gave a resigned nod. “As I have indicated, after the Athanatoi, the Hidden Hand is the highest of all secret societies.”

“The Athanatoi?” Virgil asked. “Now they really are just a myth, right?”

“Wrong,” Ezra said bluntly.

“Who are they?” Ella asked.

“They’re someone else’s problem. Our problem is the Hidden Hand, and they sit at the top of an unimaginably vast network of less powerful societies. These lesser societies operate all over the world, but it’s from the Hidden Hand that these societies get their orders.”

“You mean secret societies we’ve actually heard of?” Zara asked.

Ezra’s tone grew weary. “If you’ve heard of a secret society then they’re not a secret society any more. That’s not the way these guys roll — they demand total secrecy, loyalty and anonymity and traitors are extinguished without mercy. When the world hears about a society that’s because they’re done with it and they’ve moved on. Skull and Bones, Priory of Sion, Carbonari, Bloodline of the Snake — all of them now just mere shells compared with what they once were as the power goes elsewhere.”

“Like the Illuminati?” Ella asked.

Ezra laughed. “The Hidden Hand is the ultimate Mystery Cult. The Illuminati was created by men who were ordered to do so by the Hidden Hand. They come from Masons and Masons come from ancient Mystery Cults. This is very well-documented. Like the Skull and Bones and the Priory of Sion, they’re just another creation of the Hidden Hand; just one of many cogs in Occulta Manu’s vast, hungry machine. It’s there to deflect from the real deal, like a simple façade in front of a house of horrors.”

Milo was frantically scrolling through pages on the internet. “Shit, he’s right — but there are so few references to the Hidden Hand it’s almost impossible to know anything about them.”

“As I said,” Ezra said, “OM are not in Show Business. These are the big boys, pulling the strings of organizations like Skull and Bones, Rosicrucians, Illuminati, Bilderberg, Carbonari…”

Zara leaned forward in her seat. “Wait, that’s the second time you said that, but isn’t that a pasta dish?”

“That’s carbonara,” Ezra said with a weary sigh. “The Carbonari were a group of revolutionaries operating in Italy during the early part of the nineteenth century during Napoleon’s rule.”

“I’m just yankin’ your chain, Ez.”

“Sure you were. And it’s Ezra.”

Before Zara responded, Mason said, “What was that about Napoleon?”

“History records the Carbonari’s original purpose as resisting the French occupation under Napoleon, but the truth is somewhat darker. The truth is that they were ordered by their masters in the Hidden Hand to resist Napoleon as a punishment for his Egyptian expedition.”

Virgil shook his head. “So they really have been controlling history since way back then.”

“To the members of the Hidden Hand, the time of Napoleon was five minutes ago. They go back way further than that. Anyway, all of these organizations that I’ve mentioned were all created by the Hidden Hand at various times in its long history, and each time there was a specific reason for doing so — a specific place or institution that had to be infiltrated or controlled. Occulta Manu is the dark secret that no government wants you to know about — believe me.”

“Sure sounds like it.”

“When an initiate in other lower societies gets an order from OM they will usually have no idea why they have been ordered to do it or even where the order originates from. The only people in the know are those at the heart of the movement — those men and women who have vowed to follow the ancient mystery religions.”

“Which is where all this Raven crap comes from, right?” Zara said.

“Correct. That is why they hold the ancient symbols in such high regard — with reverence, actually. These guys are the real deal. They carry ideas and beliefs older than Egypt itself — maybe even Sumer. Stuff so ancient we couldn’t begin to rationalize it but to them it’s a code to live by. If you screw with these people you will die. The only way to handle them is with the utmost respect.”

“Has anyone ever gotten close to them?” Caleb asked.

Ezra looked doubtful. “Not really, but last year a man named Morton Wade was killed by the ECHO team. We were monitoring Wade for a number of reasons, not least his connections to the Hidden Hand. He had been part of them once. That may or may not have been where he’d gotten his bloodlust for human sacrifice.”

“Human sacrifice?” Ella asked, horrified.

Ezra nodded. “As I’ve already briefed you, Occulta Manu descends from the ancient Mithras Cult and while there’s no modern evidence of blood sacrifices to Mithras, ancient writers like Socrates described how the mystery religions sacrificed people. I warned you that things were going to get a lot worse.”

“Never mind getting off this plane,” Zara said. “Stop the world, I want to get off.”

“I know how you feel,” said Milo. “Anyone else starting to feel a little sick?”

“What did Socrates say?” Mason asked.

“He described how the Greeks killed men during the observance of religious rites. Not only that, but during an excavation in the Saarburg mithraeum in 1895, a skeleton was found with its arms chained behind its back in a face-down position. This is how victims of Mithraic human sacrifice are usually found.”

“Mithraeum?” Zara asked.

“A Mithraic temple,” Virgil said casually.

“Thanks for telling me this, guys,” Zara said. “I feel I can sleep much more peacefully tonight.”

“Sorry, but this is nothing new. It’s well-documented that such things have gone on right back into antiquity. Wade was part of that, but he started to show signs of insanity and egomania and the Hidden Hand rejected him from their fold. That’s when he created his own death cult and started sacrificing humans in Mexico. It’s not evidence that his masters in OM are still practicing sacrifice, but it’s a possibility.”

“And you say some of the most powerful people in our world are in the Hidden Hand?” Milo said.

Ezra nodded. “Sorry, but yes. Some of the most high profile people are inside their ranks.”

“I refuse to believe this,” Ella said.

Ezra gave her a look of understanding. “I’m sorry but it’s true, and there’s more you need to know.”

The silence said everything.

“Go ahead,” Mason said finally.

Ezra sighed. “We think they’re on the cusp of being able to process specific algorithms to form one cybernetic hive mind,” he said grimly. The gravity of what he had just said was lost on no one, and now a grim, heavy silence filled the air.

“You’re joking, right? Mason said.

“No joke.”

“A hive mind?” Caleb said, dumbfounded. “I can’t believe it. I knew DARPA was working on stuff like that but last time I checked in it was pretty basic. You’re trying to tell me that this Hidden Hand society has already perfected the technology?”

“I wouldn’t say perfected it, no,” Ezra said. “But according to the small amount of information we’ve been able to get hold of, it looks like they’re ahead of the US in the field on this one.”

“How can that be?” Ella asked.

“I can put two and two together,” Caleb said. “And ethics is the four, right?”

Ezra nodded. “That’s about the size of it. Any US Government agency like DARPA has to work inside very specific ethical guidelines when it comes to testing technology like this out on people. I’m guessing the sort of people running Occulta Manu have no such problems, as such, they’ve gotten ahead of us.”

“But what does this even mean?” Zara said. “A hive mind?”

“It means anyone inside the hive mind will be able to share thoughts, to a certain degree,” Ezra said. “The science is in its infancy right now, and as I say, we have no idea what level OM has taken it to, but we can surmise that anyone inside the cybernetic hive mind will be able to communicate with anyone else inside that framework to a certain degree. It means they can communicate at the speed of thought. They blend ancient magic cult with high-tech hive mind — the ultimate enemy.”

“Well, shit in a paper bag and set it on fire,” Milo said.

“This is just great,” Caleb drawled. “Ancient human-sacrifice cults, insane billionaires, hive mind Matrix warriors and plots to take over the world; I liked life when it was simple — just the Raiders getting people their loved ones and precious things back.”

“If you’re going to work with me, then get used to it.”

Mason was not satisfied. “If we’re going to work with you, then the first thing I want to know is precisely why Eva Starling was kidnapped.”

Mat Wills poked his head around the door. “She’s fine, but pretty badly shaken up. I can do some more blood tests on her when we’re back on the plane.”

“Plane?” Zara said. “Going somewhere?”

Ezra looked at his watch and frowned. “We leave for London in less than an hour so we have to get to the airport.”

“London?” Ella asked. “Why London?”

“The rest of the reason you were hired,” Ezra said. “And the whole reason they kidnapped Dr Starling. The Hidden Hand wants something that’s in London, and we’re going to get it first — with your help.”