Chapter 01

Beginnings

While they drive I watch my surroundings with great care and I’m thankful they’ve made an error. The mistake was natural enough but a crucial one for them, whomever they are. What was it, you may ask? They kidnapped the wrong man! Maybe I should start a bit earlier, about a life-time earlier, or more.

Traditions and Education

I don’t know the exact reason why or how it came about, but for some hundreds of years it’s been a family tradition to use a particular set of names for most of the children and the first born male in each generation is named Ed. A few hundred years ago a second tradition started where parents tried to name as many males in each generation with names similar to Ed. It’s silly, I know; but don’t yell at me as I had to live with it for the first half of my life. Here’s how it works.

At heart our family is a large clan where each major branch has a clan matriarch who manages the minor things like naming children and disputes within the family. When a child is born the matriarch is told of the birth and a name is agreed on by the matriarch and the parents. You can use non-traditional names, but if she doesn’t approve of the name you can’t use it. There’s a small cash payment from an old family trust for the first born male in each generation and to get the payment they have to be called Ed. We don’t know if the naming or the money came first as the traditions are that old. The naming approval goes on the time when you contact the matriarch because she issues the name then and it’s silly to change a name after it’s issued due to a delay in telling her. So the tradition is the official first born is the first one the matriarch is told about, regardless of what the clocks or calendars say about the time of the child’s birth.

The day I was born two cousins were born as well. As near as we can tell from the hospital records we were all born in the same minute. I was born in Sydney while my cousins were born in Melbourne and Adelaide. At the time the matriarch was in Perth visiting other family members. My Dad was the first to make contact so I got the bonus: a whole twenty-five hundred dollars for my university fund. OK, it wasn’t much, but when you add it to what my parents put aside plus interest over almost twenty years of good investments it was enough to make me a full fee paying student when I went to university so I had no education loan debt called a HECS debt here in Australia. As a full fee paying student I also had more freedom about how I did my studies.

Dad and his two brothers were very much into puns and other word games so I was named Ed Ward Edwards; my cousin in Adelaide was second in and named Edward Edwards; while the one from Melbourne got lucky with Edmund Edwards. Yes, our families called us all Ed as a short name. At major gatherings for Christmas etc. I got called ‘EW’ or ‘Sheep’ while they got ‘Double E’ and ‘Double E Two’ or ‘Two.’ The matriarch wasn’t surprised when Edward and I had some strong words with our fathers when we got old enough to think it safe enough to do so. Just a few bruises worth all round, and they cut back on their puns.

At first the naming wasn’t a problem because we lived so far apart; it’s amazing how a few days travel time separation can make things easier to bear. When I was about nine my uncle in Adelaide got a promotion with a move to Sydney. He found a house in our street but on the other side of the road. Due to some quirk of the educational system the boundary between two schools ran down the middle of our street and we went to different schools; so this made things at school bearable. Without the possibility of school based troubles we got to liking each other and spent a lot of time together after school and on weekends. Although we never ended up at the same high schools or universities we did end up living together in a rented house we shared. That was until he got married and I moved from our shared house to the flat his new wife used to rent.

He studied sociology and politics to end up with three degrees and he became famous for his books on the political and social dynamics of the nineteenth century. He specialised in the mid to late nineteenth century with a focus on the USA. I mostly studied chemistry to become a research chemist with degrees in chemistry, biology, nursing, computer science as well as the training to be a paramedic working as a volunteer paramedic.

Going to America

In early 2005 my divorce is finalised in the Family Court of Australia. It’s a long and heated case because I don’t have as many investments or as much money my ex-wife thinks I do, and she fights hard to get them. She was badly misled by the funds I managed for other family members because I seem to have a knack for picking the good ones to invest in.

The marriage was OK for eight years then she finds the statements for the several hundred thousand dollars of investments and she was upset I’m not spending any of that money on her. Because I control it she can’t accept I can’t spend it. The divorce process takes nearly three years of bitter court battles; thank heavens we have no children. Early in the fight I hand all of the monies back to the owners and I help them to find new investment managers, thus I cease getting the income for that work.

During this I spend a lot of time with Edward, Margaret, and their three kids - the kids are real sanity savers. During the last few weeks of the case it also helps their sanity because I spend a lot of time looking after the kids while they get ready to move to Albuquerque to take up his new job as a professor at the University of New Mexico. They’d been impressed with his latest book on how the mineral finds in New Mexico affected the society and politics of New Mexico and surrounding states, except Texas, while also affecting the national politics and economy. He showed how a better management of the exploitation of the minerals or a difference in timing would’ve had a major impact on the national and local politics as well as their society’s development. It was controversial and it made for a lot of discussions in the relevant journals for a while.

Anyway, I’d given up my job last year due to the total stress of work and the court. However, with the court now finished I’m at a loose end while helping them get ready to move. Most of the cash I did have is spent on the court case so both my ex and I end up with next to nothing.

All of the furniture etc. is sold and they’re about ready to leave when Edward’s current employer’s senior staff gets around to responding to his written request to finish his contract early. He’d gone ahead with getting ready to go over early to do some sightseeing before the start of the new contract because his boss and his boss’ boss had both given him approval. The higher up denied his request for early termination about two weeks before they’re due to fly out. Man, is he angry about it.

After some long talks on how to manage around this I decide it’s time for me to help my cousin by being a stand in for him to help the family in transit and to settle in. I apply for a US visa and I’ll use Edward’s tickets to help Margaret with the kids. When I put in the application I don’t realise they’re the wrong papers when I use the e-forms Edward got for his application. I thought all the information wanted was a bit extensive for a six month holiday, but I fill it all in and send off the copies of papers they want with an apology for late lodgement plus a request for fast processing along with extra fees. Luckily for me an old friend is at the US Embassy so it goes through fast and is approved, thanks to their file on me from some previous work with the Australian and US governments.

With the rest of us going to the USA Edward will stay at my flat and close it up before joining us in nine weeks. I’ve nothing worth keeping left so I tell him to sell it all and hand the keys back because I don’t want to pay rent for four months of non-use. I’ll get something when I return from America, if I do. I’d noticed my visa allows me to work in my field so I’m giving staying there for a while some serious thought.

I arrive in Los Angeles looking like a harassed father when I manage the kids while Margaret manages the paperwork. We make the shift to the hotel in Disneyland in one piece, somehow, and we have a good week there before we move on with the rest of the planned sightseeing. In the suite we have I take over one of the bedrooms for the kids while the girls share the king sized bed with Margaret. We arrive in New Mexico six weeks after leaving Sydney. Once in Albuquerque we’re quick to set up home for the family in the house the university found. I must admit we do look and act a lot like a family group while out and about due to us all being very close as a family and I’m the kids’ favourite ‘uncle.’

Unexpected Trip

Margaret and the kids are off somewhere for the day shopping while I’m in the backyard tidying it up a little before I put up the children’s swings and things. Just after midday I take a break, a shower, and I get dressed to go to get something to eat at a nearby mall. When I exit the house a car pulls up and two men in dark suits get out of it. They look like your typical government bureaucrat types.

One looks down at a photo in his hand while saying, “Edward Edwards?”

I stop and reply, “Yes, I’m Ed Ward Edwards. What’s up?”

He responds, “Immigration, passport please?” Like a good little boy I reach into my pocket where I carry my passport because when we arrived I was told to make sure to keep it on me when out and about, and I hold it out to him. He opens it to examine the visa. He holds it out and I reach for it. When I do take hold of it his friend stabs me in the arm with a needle and he presses the plunger down on the syringe.

I’ve an extreme phobia about needles so the shock of a sudden stab with a needle triggers a mild physical shock. I start to collapse due to the shock. The first one catches me while the other puts his needle away then he tosses an envelope on the porch. They soon have me in the back seat of their car, belted into the seat, and we’re driving away.

While I sit there and start to recover from the shock I decide to play along with them to find out what the score is. I wonder what it is they injected me with because they seem to expect a quick action from it, but it’s doing next to nothing to me. I put that aside for now as I make a note of what they say and where we’re going. Sometime later, while I’m being thankful about their error, we enter a large estate with a name over the gates.

The House

About two that afternoon Margaret comes home to find an envelope on the porch. She picks it up while she shepherds the family into the house. Once inside she opens it and she goes white with shock.

The top sheet reads:

Mrs Edwards, we’ve kidnapped your husband. We wish to use his knowledge for a while. Do nothing and he won’t be harmed. Go to the police and we’ll know about it, then we’ll kill him when we’re finished with him.

She stands there staring at the note for a few minutes.

Gulping, she goes to the phone and rings her husband in Australia. He’s annoyed as he answers, due to having to jump out of the shower to answer the phone. The time difference makes it early morning for him and he’s getting ready to go to work. She says, “Cousin, I need advice. Ed’s been kidnapped, they say they’ve taken him for his knowledge and he’ll be released unharmed when they’re finished with him unless I go to the police. What should I do?”

At first he’s a bit surprised about things, but he’s quick to catch on and says, “For the moment the best thing is to just sit tight and see what happens. I’ll see what I can do about coming over to help out as soon as I can get away from here. In the meantime, don’t talk to the police or they may kill him. Put the note in a plastic bag in case it’s needed as evidence. I should be able to get to you in a week or so. Contact the university and tell them he’s unable to attend for a few weeks due to an accident, and hope they won’t insist on talking to him. That should buy you some time.” She agrees and hangs up now they’re both on the same page of how to play this situation.

Having warned her husband, Edward, Margaret says a silent prayer for her cousin in-law who she’s come to love like a big brother. Next is a call to the university. The fact they don’t ask for any details makes her very suspicious of the university staff she talks to.

Margaret figures these people probably do have a police contact and may even have a tap on her phone. She looks up a phone number and makes a phone call about getting a handgun and a carry license for her own protection.

This is followed by a trip to a gun store to select weapons and fill out forms. She’s surprised she can get one so fast, but the owner points out the checks for her visa would have done all that’s required for the local gun laws. So, if immigration and the police give approval she’ll be armed as soon as the papers come back in a few days and he’s allowed to let her have the gun then.

In the meantime she contacts an old friend of her father’s about hiring security for the children. The contact is a beached Marine who runs a security and bodyguard service. An hour later she has two armed security guards at the house while her father’s friend, Little Joe - all six foot four inches of him, is reading the note after she explains the situation to him.

Now all she can do is worry, and to trust it all works out OK.

The Academy

I look up at the name above the gate - ‘The Cause Academy of Social Research and Advancement.’ I sit there, keeping still, and wondering what this place really is. We pull up near a door at the back of one of the several buildings on the grounds, park, and they carry me inside. A few minutes later they have me in a room and they lay me on a table.

A man in a medical gown walks over while asking, “How long since you administered the barbiturates?” After he’s told the time he adds, “We’ll wait another fifteen minutes before we start the programming.” He proceeds to confirm my age and weight before checking some charts and getting out bottles of drugs to start drawing some into needles ready to use on me. I almost smile when I see the labels on the bottles through my squinted eyes, because it’s now clear they wish to brainwash me.

You may wonder why this makes me happy. I know the drugs well, and I know they’ll make a normal person unable to move or do anything while the recorded message burns into their brain to program them with instructions. But the tape has no effect unless the drugs have their full effect, and those drugs will have very little effect on me beyond making me a touch groggy and a bit slow.

When I was a child I got into my grandmother’s ‘lollies,’ and I finished off her new bottle of them. The doctors had a fun time dealing with a two and a half year-old boy who overdosed on a full bottle of the maximum dose of barbiturates. They pumped my stomach and poured many other drugs into me to counter the effects. Whatever they did worked because I lived, but it changed my biochemistry a bit. Barbiturates have absolutely no effect on me now, and when I had to go through a special course to make me resistant to truth drugs as part of one of the special government contracts I worked on some years back they found I had a much higher than natural resistance due to the earlier incident. The drugs they intend to use on me here won’t have any effect useful to them.

I lie there and ready myself to just accept the needles this bastard is about to stick me with. The time is almost up when another man walks in and says, “Are we sure we have the right person? I was told Edward Edwards and this man’s passport is Ed Ward Edwards.”

The first man from the car says, “He’s got the right date of birth. He matches the airport photo of the man who went through customs on the flight with the family. His passport has the next entry sequence to the wife, and he’s been with the family since they arrived. He looked after the kids while they went through Disneyland. If he isn’t the right one, what the hell is he doing making like he’s their father? We’ve been watching since they arrived, and this is the first time he’s been alone. The passport and photos match, the name matches, I think someone upstairs made a mistake when they said the name and just read it as one instead of two names.” The new man examines everything and nods approval. Seeing this the doctor injects me and places headphones over my ears.