during the initial brief I received from the CIA I was told that was not at all correct. Ever heard of “remote viewing” in an intelligence-gathering term?’
‘Wireless video?’
‘Imagine being able to do exactly that, see something miles away but without any technological aids.’
Stratton furrowed his brow again.This was becoming bizarre.
‘What about precognition?’ Sumners asked.
‘Seeing into the future?’
‘Yes.This is where my understanding of it all starts to get a bit foggy. I apologise. I’m not sure if precognition is the same as remote viewing . . . The example they gave me was PanAm flight 103 that crashed into Lockerbie after terrorists blew it up. A few hours after it happened, remote viewers apparently saw the bomb that brought it down inside a music box.They also saw a back-up bomb; an Iranian woman who lost her family when the Americans shot down that Iranian airliner from one of their missile frigates had explosives strapped around her waist. If the music box hadn’t gone off she would’ve detonated hers. For decades the CIA has used psychics as intelligence gatherers. Apparently we’ve been quite heavily into it ourselves.This is the first time I’ve ever had anything to do with it.The difference between clairvoyants and remote viewers is clairvoyants use the supernatural whereas remote viewers use alpha waves. I suppose one is spiritual and the other scientific. Remote viewers are able to focus on things, the other side of the world if need be: people, objects, smells, colours, emotions. The thing is they don’t always understand what they see. The information they gather has to be analysed, or decoded. Apparently, a remote viewer was tasked to access Osama bin Laden’s mind after the Twin Tower attack to learn his mental state - was he worried or feeling good and secure, that sort of thing. The viewer saw him in a cave, but which cave and where in the world was it? That’s the decoding part.’
Stratton stopped walking and looked at Sumners, trying to control a growing suspicion of the man’s motives for calling him in.
‘Is this some kind of a joke?’ Stratton snapped, more irate with Sumners than he had ever been before. ‘Stratton’s all burned out so we’ll give him the crap at the bottom of the barrel. Is that what this job is? Looking after Harry Potter’s dad? Well, thanks very much, Sumners, but no thanks. You can shove this one up your arse.’
Stratton started to walk away.
‘Calm down, Stratton. Listen to me.This is important . . . He saw the tanker assault,’ Sumners called out to him, then checked to make sure the street was empty, which it was. ‘He saw it being captured and the crew butchered.’
Stratton slowed to a stop and looked back at him, his curiosity piqued.
‘My boss hates the Grenadier,’ Sumners continued.
‘I assure you he wouldn’t have come down here to see you or anybody if he thought the job was the bottom of the barrel.’
‘The tanker was hit around midnight,’ Stratton said.
‘If someone knew about it why did we hit it at the last minute half a day later?’
‘That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you about the decoding side of it. There are thousands of tankers sailing the oceans of the world at any one time. The viewer couldn’t see its name or tell where in the world it was.The decoders didn’t have enough knowledge or information to decode what he saw.’
Stratton faced Sumners. The hook was going in.
‘And what am I supposed to do, hang around with him until he has another vision?’
‘They’re not visions. Look upon them as searches. He’s already found something and apparently it scared the hell out of him. I’m afraid we’ve not been able to decode it either.We need someone on the ground with him all the time, asking questions, clarifying the information. Decoding teams will also be on hand as usual. Different viewers are sensitive to different things. This one sees locations but he’s also sensitive to emotions. So far he’s described what he’s seen or felt as an enormous danger but he can’t tell what that is. To use his own words, he’s never felt anything so horrific in his life.’
‘If this is so big, why me? I mean, this isn’t exactly my job description.’
‘Right now our intelligence resources are stretched thinner than they’ve ever been in our history. Wonderful though remote viewers may sound in theory, they are greatly flawed. Much of their information cannot be accurately decoded. It’s often misleading. On average they’re rated at