VoyForums
[ Show ]
Support VoyForums
[ Shrink ]
VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 17:31:49 04/22/09 Wed
Author: Randy
Author Host/IP: S010600179a334297.gv.shawcable.net / 24.69.74.23
Subject: Excellent. Now try this character out...
In reply to: Trudy 's message, "Re: Lawdy" on 15:32:47 04/22/09 Wed

Day 03, 1300
Vancouver, British Columbia




A mathematician, I once read, has made a case that the molecules of Julius Caesar’s last breath have distributed themselves to the point that whenever you or I inhale, we partake in that infamous breath ourselves.

Likewise, ideas have consequences. They move through the members of humanity like the molecules that comprised Caesar’s final exhalation, their effects sometimes small and unnoticeable. Other times, they are focused, brought together, and used to forge tools and weapons of the tangible and intangible kind.

Whatever the outcome, the one certainty is that we, inhabiting a system that is only apparently closed, are never alone. We are never without effect on the world, or on each other; and we cannot escape the consequences of our actions, however unforeseeable those may be.

I thumbed through the book that sat on the glass topped table. It was a thick, well-worn paperback about MK-ULTRA, an early mind control program that was carried out, many years ago, by the American CIA and a doctor at the University of Toronto. I wasn’t reading the book; I‘d already read it twice. Rather, I was waiting for the author to arrive. Part of our arrangement was that she would allow me to buy her lunch, and that she would autograph my copy of her book.

Her name was Naomi Hershel, and we had an appointment, there, at the waterside pub. She was doing research for a new book on the topic of remote viewing and assassination programs carried out by the American intelligence and military communities in the last few decades. I felt honoured to be of what help I could, though I had information that I could not, legally, divulge. I’d given interviews before, occasionally for radio. In the past, not many people were interested. Most takers came from the tabloid press, and late-night radio shows that focus on topics like UFO’s, the Loch Ness monster, and Bigfoot.

But, now, a world-respected investigative journalist had an interest in these things. I was looking forward to lunch with her, looking forward to watching her reactions as I answered her questions. People, when confronted with proposed realities that run against their experiences and preconceptions amuse me, really…as much as I must certainly amuse them. Some consider me harmlessly insane. Some consider me Satanic, or some such nonsense. The last reaction is less common in western Canada than when I lived in my native US. But it does appear, from time to time.

When Naomi arrived, I was taken aback. I was expecting a harried, bespectacled woman in jeans or drab business attire. Rather, she was long-legged, statuesque, and graceful. She strode the length of the pier, between the tables, past the grays and faded blues of the other patrons, in a snug, red, knee-length sundress, with shoulder length auburn hair and a swing to her hips that snagged my attention from a hundred feet away.

I waved my copy of her book above my head casually, a signal that she spotted immediately, and she approached, smiling.

I rose, and she offered a handshake. “Hello, Mr. McGillivray. Good choice. I love seafood.”

Lovely. I shook her hand, grinning like an idiot.

“Mr. McGillivray?”

I forced myself to stop looking into her eyes, and motioned for her to sit. “Very pleased to meet you, Ms. Hershel. It is ‘Ms.’, yes?”

She smiled indulgently, and nodded. “Call me Naomi. please. May I call you Randolph?”

“Yes, please do. Business or pleasure first? Lunch, I mean.”

For the tenacity that her work exhibited, she was an affable woman, and she grinned, blushing only slightly. “Lunch would be great, thank you. I came straight here from the airport, and you know how in-flight meals are.”

I agreed with her sentiment, and we settled down to a casual quarter hour of small talk and pleasantries, punctuated with humorous anecdotes and talk of her past work. All very easy going, very relaxed. I found her company quite enjoyable.

When the last of the dishes were cleared, Naomi became suddenly very serious. The anticipated spectacles appeared, she placed a digital tape recorder on the table, and she armed herself with a notepad and pencil.

“Okay, Randolph,” she declared. “Let’s get started then, shall we?”

I leaned back in my chair, and nodded. “Shoot.”

“You were involved in American research into remote viewing from…”

“April of 1993 to February of 1995.”

“When congress cut funding.”

That was an iffy answer. I fidgeted for a second, bit my lip, and shook my head. “Congress cut funding for STAR GATE, based on a report that the intelligence gained was of dubious use in formulating actionable data. Consider that the Soviet Union began this kind of research as early as the 1960’s. The US in the early 70’s with an eye to catch up. The laws of nature and the capabilities of the human mind, of course, did not suddenly change.”

Naomi peered at me through the top of her spectacles. “Actionable data?”

“Yes. You can’t go in and bomb an aspirin factory just because a remote viewer thinks it’s being used to produce nerve gas. Those kinds of fuckups are for the flyboys and HUMINT assets to make.”

“So, what was it good for?”

I shrugged. “Hunches and leads, at first. Vague sketches. Things for other intelligence assets to take a closer look at. Construction in underground places where satellites can’t snoop, weapons that may be planned or under development. Submarines, missiles, those sorts of things.”

Something glimmered in her eye. “You said, ‘at first’. What do you mean by that?”

“For a long time, the main problem with STAR GATE and the previous programs was one of accuracy. Viewers would describe and sketch places and things quite clearly. But then fly-bys were made or direct intelligence was gathered at some considerable risk, and the photos would show that the reality didn’t match what the remote viewers claimed.”

Naomi sat her pad on the table. “That would be a problem, yes.”

“But,” I continued, “that didn’t always remain the case. Even data that was dead wrong in, say, 1979, would be far closer to reality in 1994.”

She raised one eyebrow. “Really? How often.”

“Fairly often. The problem wasn’t that remote viewers were seeing the wrong places, the wrong objects, or just imagining things, although that did happen. In quite a few instances, it was discovered that they were just seeing the wrong time period. There was a problem with the timeliness of data.”

“And so congress cut funding for the program.”

Yes, I suspected that she was waiting to hook me back around to that question. I gave her the only answer that I could.

“They cut funding for STAR GATE,” I said.

“But not the program.”

“They cut funding for STAR GATE.”

“But not for the program.”

I said nothing for several long moments. Neither did Naomi. She looked at me, smiling, obviously enjoying the game. I liked her, and wanted to help her. I really did. The problem, as I saw it, was that anonymity was not a part of the bargain. And even if it were, and I told her what she wanted to know, and it was published, she could be subpoenaed.

“I have an idea,” I said, motioning to a nearby server. “I’d like a beer. You?”

She shook her head. “I’m working, thank you. But by all means…please have one. Or three. Six would be even better.”

We laughed, and while we waited I suggested that we start from the beginning.

“From the beginning, then,” Naomi agreed. “You joined STAR GATE in ‘93, as you said. What was your role?”

“I was a trainer, of sorts. A consultant, basically.”

Naomi blinked. “You weren’t a viewer?”

“Not officially, no. I did some viewings on my own initiative, but mostly I was too busy helping other viewers with their work.”

“How?”

I never did quite get around to that in the emails that we previously exchanged. She apparently had assumed that I was just a remote viewer, and I was happy to let her think that, at the time. It wasn’t entirely untrue, after all. Besides, this sort of information is much more fun if delivered in person.

“I am a magician. I use the Hermetic sciences to manipulate, transverse, and call denizens forth from other planes of existence.”

Her jaw dropped, and her mouth moved. But no words came out. I tried not to break into laughter.

“A magician. A wizard,” she said. It wasn’t a question.

“That’s right,” I nodded.

My beer arrived, and she began to eye it, greedily. But then she regained her composure, shrugged, and picked up the notepad, again.

“A magician, then. And how did the American government employ you in your services as a…“

I smiled, benignly. “They suspected that I might be the solution to their timeliness problem with remote viewing, among other things. In the western occult tradition, we’re sticklers for detail. We have symbolism and correspondances for practically anything and everything. If we don’t, we invent it. And it seems to work. So, we used ritual to focus the scrying…I mean, of course, the remote viewing efforts of the gatherers.”

“And they selected you based on your previous writings?”

“That’s what they told me, yes.”

“And so, did your…uh…magic work?”

“Apparently. Our positive hits increased by a good margin. Tripled, actually. But when you write that in your book, can you spell ‘magic’ with a ‘ck’? If you really want to use the term, that is.”

Naomi smiled sweetly. “I’ll think of some other word, if that’s okay with you.”

“By all means.”

And then she pegged me back to the Styrofoam: “So, why did congress cut funding for STAR GATE if your accuracy rose? Or did they just not really cut funding for the program?”

“They did cut funding for STAR GATE.”

“And what replaced it?”

At this point, I had three choices: I could terminate the interview, which I didn’t want to do. I was having fun, and besides, I liked her company. Or, I could lie. Or, I could tell her the truth in as safe a way as possible.

I opted for the third door. “Let me speak hypothetically,”

Naomi grinned. “Hypothetically, of course.”

“Let’s say that you are a big wheel in the DIA. You have the politicians of an oversight committee to answer to. And let’s say that, just for the sake of argument, you are working to privatise as much as possible, to feed the machine.”

I paused a moment to let her absorb that, then continued.

“Then, congress cuts a program that looks ridiculous, on the surface. There is a recession going on, and the public would want heads to roll if it discovered that millions are being spent on magicians and psychics. But STAR GATE is working. It’s producing results, better than it was before. What do you do?”

Her grin was mischievous. “Well, I suppose that I’d hand the work over to a contractor, suck the money out of some obscure black budget, and call it something else.”

I nodded, and motioned for her to continue.

“And then,” she added, “I’d use the smoke screen to dump the political oversight.”

She was one smart lady. I raised my beer in a salute.

“And you still haven’t told me the best dirt, have you?”

Smart, indeed. “Oh, hell no.”

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

Post a message:
This forum requires an account to post.
[ Create Account ]
[ Login ]
[ Contact Forum Admin ]

Forum timezone: GMT-6
VF Version: 3.00b, ConfDB:
Before posting please read our privacy policy.
VoyForums(tm) is a Free Service from Voyager Info-Systems.
Copyright © 1998-2019 Voyager Info-Systems. All Rights Reserved.