Fiction
The Curious Case of Connor Drummond
A story of the unimaginable
After Frank Glen had retrieved Connor Drummond from his apartment in Birmingham Alabama, he took Connor downstairs to his car that was parked at the curb at the bottom of the building.
Like many of the unexpected errands that Frank Glen had performed in the past ten years, he had no idea what to expect.
Frank Glen was still writing for Newsmaker Magazine and Julie Jamison was still his editor. Frank and Paula Hightower had married and had an 8-year-old little boy named George. All of us were still dealing with the post 911 world. I, Jonathan Margolis, then almost 21 years old, was working with my father and Dr Carmichael on special projects of our own. As was so often the case, our work with OMEGA had become more difficult than I could have imagined at eleven years old. I comforted myself with the knowledge that I could finally muster the strength to be able to speak more. But I was still floating in a sea of noise. That I had discovered someone else with similar strengths and deficits both heartened and disturbed me. I didn’t want to burden someone else with what I had to deal with every day. But I could sense among our enemies there was someone else, someone whose presence like a wolf tracking his prey, was always on the fringes, someone who had abilities similar to mine, and I feared that he was more powerful than I. But I knew I needed someone like Connor to protect our movement from its enemies.
“Do you have any idea what this Jonathan wants from me?” Connor asked Frank as they climbed into the car.
“I’m not so sure you want to know,” Frank responded. ‘If I told you what he’s asked of me, you might reconsider.”
“Is it dangerous?”
“Sometimes.” He paused, “Life-changing, always.”
“That sounds exciting!” Connor observed. “I’ve been sitting in my apartment for two years.”
“What happens if you step out the doors?” Frank asked him as he turned on the engine.
“I begin to see a deluge of things. Information coming in from all directions.”
“What can you see about me?”
Frank pulled the car into traffic.
Connor snickered a moment. “What can’t I see?” He hesitated. “Thank you for giving me a reason to leave my apartment.”
Frank turned the radio on and Connor began to hold his hands on his ears and rock back and forth.
“No music,” he struggled to speak. “No music.”
Frank turned off the radio immediately.
“I should have told you. I’m sorry. I cannot handle the music.”
Connor regained himself.
“Maybe you should tell me everything so that we don’t have this problem again.”
“I don’t know if I told you everything that you would believe me.”
“You’d be surprised what I believe, what I have experienced over the past ten years. to paraphrase a movie, Dorothy your not in Kansas anymore.”
“You’re sure you want to know what I’m going through?”
“That’s part of why I am here, to make the transition smooth for both of us.” He paused. “Believe me, with what I’ve been through, nothing at this point would surprise me.”
“So what can you tell me about this Jonathan?” Connor asked him.
“I thought with these abilities of yours, You would know about Jonathan.”
“I said in my apartment that I knew someone like him had to exist. But I know nothing about him personally.”
“He has done that to protect you. We have had members of our group murdered,” Frank explained. “The more you know about him the more dangerous it is for you.”
“I am not afraid of dying,” Connor answered him.
“I sort of knew that already. Jonathan can see into, the very hearts of other people.”
“What did Jonathan tell you about me?”
“Nothing. He told me nothing. I got a postcard and that letter I gave you. So you see as you. I am completely in the dark.”
Frank removed the postcard from his pocket and handed it to Connor. On one side were simple instructions of place and time and on the left bottom of the instruction side has printed the word “Oiktirmia.”
“This is crazy, you drove all the way from New York to Birmingham based on an address on a postcard.” He paused. “What is this word in Greek?”
“Oiktirmia,” Frank pronounced it in Greek. “It means mercy and compassion.”
“This is not some kind of a cult, is it?”
Frank began to chuckle. “No, it is not a cult. It’s just a group of people working to make a better world.” He paused again. “You can keep the postcard. Believe me, it will have meaning for you. I have seen this many times. You can ask me anything you like.” He began to snicker again. “The irony for me is that I remember where I was when it all began for me.”
Connor set the card down on the back seat.
“I figure we could stop in about two hours, maybe get something to eat and drink. We could have a comfortable discussion.” Frank continued.
“I’m not very good at conversation,” Connor responded.
“I figured that. But I’m sure there is a reason he chose me for this task. I’m just trying to figure it out myself.”
They drove for an hour, not saying a word to each other at all. Connor seemed nervous, sometimes interlocking his hands together and moving his fingers randomly. It was a nervous tick he had manifested since childhood. Frank tried to occupy his mind with recollections about his childhood in Texas. In the strange way that the mind’s eye could take him back in time, he remembered his mother in her kitchen making okra for him as a boy. He couldn’t remember the last time he had okra. He thought it odd how his mind was jumping from random memory to memory, across space and time. He imagined what someone like Connor might be thinking about.
Connor locked his hands together again and then lifted them up to his mouth.
“I worked as a remote viewer for an intelligence agency,” he blurted out. “They had me looking for people all over the world.”
“You didn’t have to tell me this,” Frank answered him.
“I wanted to tell someone this. I had these abilities. You know, from childhood and somehow I ended up in this place. It was like a bad dream, and one day I woke up and it was over. I still don’t know if it was just a dream.”
“Where was this place?” Frank asked him.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t have to talk about this. I don’t need to know anything. My job is to get you safely to New York. I AM SURE JONATHAN CAN HELP YOU.”
But the question in Connor’s mind was whether he could help me. What he didn’t know that I knew, was that the experimental neuroenhancer that they had given to him to enhance his abilities, could be ameliorated with another neuroenhancer from the Brain Regeneration Institute. This had been a protocol that Dr. Carmichael helped create. Everything was coming into place, that would benefit our project, and Connor would be an important link in the chain of consequence, and what I wanted Frank to learn from Connor was how to become more open to other people. What a tremendous blessing it can be to finally see people as they really are for both good and bad.
Frank and Connor traveled for another hour and they pulled into the parking lot of a diner filled with cars.
“Are you up to going inside and eating something?” Frank asked Connor. “I don’t want it to be a baptism by fire.”
“It’s been a while,” Connor answered. “But I’m up for the challenge.” He paused. “You know I forgot to ask you how long this journey will take.”
“I thought given your abilities you would know that. What if I told you the rest of your life? Would you be up to that long?”
“The rest of my life?” Connor repeated. “You know I didn’t bring anything with me.”
“If you want to go back, I’ll take you back.”
“I don’t want to go back. This is exciting for me.”
“For me as well. It’s like a journey where you don’t know the destination.” He paused. “So are you ready?”
“Yes.”
They walked into the diner, and a hostess greeted them, “How many in your party?”
“Do you mean in person, with us, or those with us in spirit?” Frank responded.
“In-person,” she responded.
“Just the two of us.”
She led them to a table at the back of the serving room. They both sat down.
“Are you OK, Connor?”
“I’m OK.”
“What can you sense about these people? How much can you see?”
“Almost everything,” he answered.
“Give me an example. Like that hostess who met us.”
“Her name is Allison, Allison Montgomery. She is 28 years old. She is married. She has a little girl named Paula named after her grandmother, six years old. Her husband is a fireman named Edward, but she calls him Eddie. Her father is dead, of lung cancer. Do I have to go on? I can tell you their birthdays, when they got married, who her bridesmaids were. Ask me a question about her, any question. And all this was just in the five minutes we were with her. It’s that way for everyone sitting here, a sea of information, pulsing through my awareness. Just point someone out, I will tell you their life story.”
Frank began to look around the room, scanning all their faces to see who he would choose. His gaze finally focused on a man of about seventy sitting alone at a table. He had his head bowed as though in prayer.
“Him,” Frank pointed. “Tell me about him.”
“That is Douglas Brinkmann, 72 years old and his wife died just a week ago. Her name was Rebecca. Married 42 years. Six children. He worked as a plumber, was stationed at DaNang in the Viet Nam war. He deeply regrets what he did there and has tried to live a good life. His grief is almost more than he can bear. Do I have to go on?”
The young hostess walked beside their table, and Frank caught her attention.
“I see the waitress is busy,” Frank told her.
“Yes,” she responded. “I’ll see that she takes your order.”
“Is your name Allison?” Frank asked her.
“Yes, it is. Allison Mongomery. Do I know you?”
“No, but I think my friend knows your sister. What was her name, Connor?”
Connor was a little annoyed he was being tested.
“Her name is Catherine,” Connor answered.
“Yes, Catherine, my sister. She’s fine. Thanks for asking me.”
“Tell her that I’m certain that Jake will win his track meet.”
Looking a little befuddled, Allison left their table.
“You didn’t have to test me?” Connor lamented. “I know what a cross I bear.”
“You know the stories of everyone in this room?”
“And everyone they are connected to, like a huge family tree going out in all directions.”
“Now I know why Jonathan has asked me to bring you to New York.”
“No it’s much more than that,” Connor responded. “Your friend Jonathan wants me to fight a dragon.”
“Do you mind if I get up a few moments and talk to Mr. Brinkmann?”
“Of course. Not unexpected.”
Frank rose up from his chair and walked slowly towards the table. When he reached the table, Douglas was still bowing his head.
“I am sorry to bother you, Sir. But your demeanor reminds me so much of my father after my mother died. Are you OK?”
“It’s been tough,” he responded.
“How long were you together?”
“42 years.”
“I just wanted to tell you, that if you just need someone to talk to.”
He reached into his pocket and removed a business size card, with a phone number on one side and the word “Oiktirmia” on the other. “Just call the number and we can talk.” He paused. “I don’t want to disturb you any longer. Thank you for your attention.”
“What is your name?” he asked Frank.
“My name is Frank Glen.”
“My name is Douglas Brinkmann,” He spoke. “Thank you.”
Then he walked back to the table with Connor.
“Are you trying to verify all that I told you?”
“Not at all. I am just trying to show you all the good a person could do with an ability like yours. I know you see it as a curse. But it can also be a blessing. That has been what Jonathan has taught me.”
The waitress finally showed up to take their orders.
.
