The Vatican Knights

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

When Kimball received the call from Shari, he could tell she was elated. “You’re not going to believe this. Six bodies were discovered in Mesquite, Nevada, this morning, about four hundred miles south of Ogden, Utah.”

Kimball recognized the name Ogden, the station point for the Soldiers of Islam, nothing more. “Okay.”

“I just received a preliminary report from the Clark County Coroner’s Office identifying the bodies as the six remaining members of the Soldiers of Islam.”

Kimball pressed the phone closer to his ear. “They know this for certain?”

“Over ninety-nine percent certain, which means I’m definitely on the right track. The bodies, according to the findings, have been in the desert for at least three weeks, or for as long as five. This means they were dead before the pope was kidnapped.”

“Execution style?”

“They were able to find two bullets from an MP5, so it looks that way.”

“Military issue,” he said. “Not the kind of weapon you’d see Joe Blow carry around.”

“No, not at all,” she returned.

“So they were executed, dumped, their residences sanitized—”

“—and the Governor’s mansion was seized with the military precision incapable of the Soldiers of Islam,” she interjected. “But better managed by—”

“—the Force Elite.”

“Yes! They still exist.” There was a period of stunning silence before Shari spoke again. And then, “We have him, Kimball… Our own government took the pope.”

“But why?”

“To start a war,” she said. It was all too clear. “Who is the one man on this planet, the one man, who by the power of his presence can incite a world?”

“To start a war though? Again I have to ask, why?”

“For oil,” she said without hesitation. “It’s all about oil.”

After receiving the videotape through his connections, Yahweh viewed it several times in the darkness of his study. The only pool of light in the room came from the TV screen.

Sometimes he played the tape in slow motion and watched the bishop’s skull erupt in a fountain of blood frame-by-frame, trying to understand why the cleric was so terrified of dying, when an Islamic terrorist readily gives up his life as if it was meaningless.

In the first few clips it was obvious that the bishop was alarmed, his sense of self-preservation so animalistic in display by the way he thrashed in the chair or the way his eyes widened with absolute terror. It was as if the man held no faith. But when the pope reached out to him and whispered a few words of contentment, words not heard over the video, the bishop seemed somewhat pacified.

Although he considered it gruesome, he replayed the tape over and over, trying to differentiate why a man of cloth was afraid of making the graduation to a greater level of being, when a man from another culture was not. No matter how many times he played it, the answer or understanding never came.

Finally shutting off the tape, he sat in utter darkness and mused over the brilliance of the video.

Bringing the pope on stage was a brilliant stroke on the part of Team Leader — an obvious ploy to provoke the masses and encourage anger. Watching the pope in his disheveled state would no doubt work wonders on the emotions of Christians worldwide and wreak havoc long before Shari could do anything to quell the matter.

“Brilliant,” he whispered, then once again, but in a softer tone and with far less emotion, uttered, “Brilliant.”

Within four hours the tape was displayed on the Internet by Aljazeera. Within five hours the world community was in an uproar. The international news media played the edited version of the execution over… and over… and over again.

Yahweh was pleased.

“Oil?”

“Think about it,” she said. “Those photos of the Soldiers of Islam weren’t on the dossiers as mere surveillance shots; they were being targeted. And now they’re dead — all of them. So now we know who doesn’t have the pope, but can surmise who does, which leads us to question number two.”

Her voice picked up momentum as she spoke. Kimball was sure he would have to tell her to slow down. “Members from the president’s own assassination squad tried to take me out for having that CD given to me by the attaché of the Israeli government.”

“Which ties them together — we know that.”

“True, but now we know why there were photos of the oil tracts, and business and political principals from the oil producing countries,” she said.

Kimball didn’t see the connection. “I’m not getting you.”

“Not only is that CD a schematic, Kimball, it’s also a political agenda.” Shari pressed the phone closer to her mouth. “Israel, Russia, Venezuela and the United States are countries with implausible political ties with Venezuela harboring anti-American sentiment. But according to the agenda, and from what we have seen, forced changes may be ahead to better serve the economies of the nations bound by foreign accords by changing the geopolitical landscape and to form new alliances with nations who are starting to tap more of their fossil reserve, like Russia, or in the case of Israel, sitting on top of an oil bonanza that happens to be under Palestinian territory.”

Kimball disagreed. “No way. Venezuela’s way too anti-American to consider an accord with the United States.”

“Their president is anti-American, Kimball. Not the people. And by forced changes, I mean a sudden removal of the incumbent who is replaced by someone who is pro-American.”

“You’re thinking assassination?”

“I’m thinking the purpose of the Force Elite — and this is according to you — is to go into foreign nations and manipulate world leaders to be more conducive to American interests? So yes, I‘m thinking assassination is probably somewhere down the road in order to make this work. Geopolitical landscapes are changed by the act of war.”

Kimball knew that she was right. Ever since the Force Elite was reinvented after President Ford disallowed the CIA to commit assassinations abroad, subsequent presidents saw differently. In fact, they saw a crucial need for the Force Elite in order to maintain an edge over leading powers. Assassinating a political hostile was exactly why the Force Elite was reestablished. This was their game.

“Alternative fuels,” she continued, “at best, maybe twenty, thirty years away. But in the meantime, the Middle East maintains an exclusive franchise now that China and India have a need for their resources, as well. Therefore, the principals are growing concerned and believe it’s time for a new order to be created, since co-dependency on Arab nations with ties to the west appears to be growing more tenuous every day, whereas their ties with China and India become stronger. And with demand between those two countries about six times greater than that of the United States, this country may be finding itself going silently to the back of the bus when the need for oil here is still great.

“So the principals decided upon a final agenda,” she added. “The Soldiers of Islam weren’t soldiers at all, but patsies. And our government used them to point the accusing finger at so the world community would clearly make a rush to judgment as to who committed one of the most grievous acts of terrorism without question, which it did. And what better way to do this by attacking the international psyche by using the most recognizable religious figure as a tool of war. Our governments, Kimball, were using the pope to create new boundaries by trying to muster global support through propaganda for something horrible that’s about to happen. And that’s to start an illegal war against Arab nations in retaliation for kidnapping the pope. But then you’d have to ask yourself this: Who would benefit most from such a war?”

Kimball remained silent, letting her roll.

“If Israel takes over the Palestinian territories, they would do so with little condemnation from world leaders, stating it’s their right to secure boundaries and protect themselves from a common enemy, when in fact they’d be tapping into the oil tracts and filling their coffer with unimaginable wealth to rival the Saudi’s. The United States would benefit if the geo-political landscape in Venezuela changes, which would fall into the CIA‘s hands with a pro-American leader sitting at the political forefront who is more trade friendly, and a country that‘s swimming in oil. Everyone benefits because the need for oil is not going away anytime soon. And with a need such as this country has, along with China and India, the theory is that economies that have separated from the co-dependency of Arab nations would grow exponentially if they can secure accords with nations promising competition with OPEC in order to keep prices stable. And who now has the oil to compete? Russia, Venezuela, and now Israel. Everything’s about money, Kimball. Everything. But religion is a potent weapon that can generate hatred so personal and deep that there can be no forgiveness, no matter what.

“Think about it. Israel and the United States would like nothing better than to break ties with nations who are steadily growing hostile against them. And Russia and Venezuela would like nothing more than to corner a market with China and India vying for cheaper costs to offset OPEC’s sliding scale.”

“And if there’s war…” His words trailed.

“Then millions would die, which I assume the principals would look at as collateral damage if the means are achieved. But what’s truly ironic about this whole thing is that we’re the ones who initiated this holy war, not them. We’re the ones using the fear of terrorism as the weapon against our own masses to trick the world in believing that the terrorists initiated this whole thing, because that’s what’s expected. And what’s even scarier is wars like these usually give rise to ethnic cleansing. I just wonder if the leaders involved had the foresight to see that the Final Agenda held some of the same principles as the Final Solution.”

“I would like to think that we’ve gone beyond that.”

“If there’s one thing mankind has yet to learn, Kimball, is that past history bears little lessons if the powers that be are unwilling to learn from them.”

Kimball sighed. “Touché.”