The Ninteenth Post

This is getting more difficult. I was looking around for another W-Fi spot yesterday to continue this narrative, and managed to find myself followed all over town. This car stayed on my tail consistently as I drove through Tulsa, and I couldn't shake it for anything. I finally got myself onto the expressway for a bit and lost him in the traffic. But I couldn't let the idea go that they are still watching me, and apparently, outside of Broken Arrow is no safer than in it. The only thing I can do is hope I get lucky and stay somewhere where they have no contact.

I think what I'll do is start typing out the rest of this in a Word doc and then just find places to rapidly post it. I haven't gone wardriving in years, but who knew all that searching for random open wireless networks would pay off? For those of you who aren't familiar with this, wardriving is NOT what I was doing to shake my chaser earlier. Wardriving is where you go hunting for a wireless network and jump onto it with your laptop. Sure, it's a computer geek thing, but I am what I am.

I'm hanging around St. Francis Hospital at the moment using their network to post this. By the time any Mist associates read it, I'll be quite gone, and my hotel is no where near here. Ha!

To return to the narrative, and my ultimate confession of what troubles me, I was sitting on Hickory, waiting for something to happen. What I saw was a small patch of grass open like a door out of the ground. A man climbed out, like he were walking up stairs, and then he closed the door. Can you say, "Weird"?

He got into a car parked by the curb and drove away. Naturally, I followed. He went to a store in downtown Broken Arrow (one of those two story jobs where only the first story actually contains the shop). He got out of his car and went inside. I parked and followed. The store was open, after all, so it wasn't anything suspicious for me to walk in.

He walked through the store, casually looking at items here and there. I was afraid he was only shopping, but he slowly made his way to the back and disappeared through a door. I casually did the same.

Behind the door was a large meeting room with a small foyer. Several people were already there, just milling around and chatting. I tried to sneak in a few steps when I was met by someone.

"Who are you," he asked me.

I blinked. I hadn't anticipated being stopped, which I should have. I just had to wing it. "I'm new," I replied.

"Really," he said. "Show me the sign."

This could be anything, I thought, and we both knew it. I looked at him for a moment. My new excuse would give me additional excuses for blind stupidity, but then again, The Mist being as exclusive as it is, new members would likely be hand-picked by someone. I opted for my one and only idea of what this sign could be.

I took the Rubik's Cube charm out of my pocket. The door guard looked at it. He nodded.

"Very pretty," he said, "I wouldn't have figured a man to have a little thing like that. A lot of newbies just carry the cube itself around. I guess you'll acclimate real well."

So the cube was a sign. A symbol, at least for the moment, of my inclusion into this club. Well, almost.

"So who recruited you," he asked me. Another unanticipated question, as at this point, I only knew the name of three people associated with the Mist. One had killed herself recently, and I was likely known to be a reason for that. But the others...

"Mack Mulligan," I said, and waited. His eyebrows raised in surprise.

"Really," he said. "Mack actually found someone himself?" The guard shook his head. "He's been so out of sorts lately, I'm really surprised."

"Oh, I see," I said.

"So what did he see in you," the guard asked. This was frustrating. I know he was making idle conversation, but I was tired up making up answers, and all I realy wanted to do was hide in the crowd and see what happens. But since we were chatting, I knew I could give him an answer, and then hit him with my own question.

"Oh, I'm a hacker. He thought I could help with computer issues," I told him. Since I had actually helped Tara with one, that wasn't a total lie.

"That's good. We've been low on computer people for awhile," the guard said.

"Hey, is Mack here tonight," I asked, not even knowing what "here" was for. The guard raised his eyebrows, and I prepared to run.

"Oh, I figured since you knew him-"

"I really don't know him that well," I said, actually quite truthfully, "I only saw him a couple times when he got me on, but I still habe trouble recognizing him."

"No problem," the guard said, "he's here, sure enough. Right over there."

I looked over and saw the man I had followed in. He was clearly around sixty, but still very strong and confident-looking. I sat down in the room, as he took the stand. My mind raced with the possibilities of what was at Hickory. Living quarters? Main headquarters? Who else was down there? Was it an actual place or just a passageway to somewhere else?

I didn't know yet, but I was determined to find out, but first, there was this meeting, and guess what the first topic was.

"Ladies and gentlemen," Mack began, "today, we mourn the passing of Miss Tara Faye Johnson..."

And it was all I could do to maintain my composure.