Final Shadows: A Bishop Files Novel #3 - Softcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Kay Hooper, who has more than thirteen million copies of her books in print worldwide, has won numerous awards and high praise for her novels. She lives in North Carolina.

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***This excerpt is from an advance uncorrected copy proof***

Copyright © 2018 Kay Hooper

The Bishop Files

Final Report

August 31st

To Whom It May Concern:

I hardly know how to begin this report. There are many reasons, not the least among them being that I myself got much more deeply involved in the situation than I had any idea of becoming when I first became aware of what was happening in the then loosely organized, almost entirely underground psychic “community” I was only peripherally aware of at that time.

I believed that not only could I remain on that periphery, observant and seeking to understand without interfering with what was happening, I believed it would be best for me to do so. Best for their struggle. Best for my own growing teams of psychic agents and investigators, the SCU and Haven. Best for these “civilian” psychics, living their desperate, secret lives alone for so long by necessity even as external events and a growing threat pushed them to reach out, to form connections between themselves and others like them in a response that was, I believe, entirely organic rather than in any way planned.

At least in the beginning.

I have come to understand that in ways I never understood before, I myself am a part of that psychic community, connected to it, linked in a way I had not believed was possible. It is something apart from the connections I feel for my teams within the SCU, a different sort of bond formed for a very, very different reason. But another organic, naturally evolving link that quite literally became necessary for the continued existence of psychics and even, perhaps, of our human species.

And the more specific links, links between myself and Miranda, between John Brodie and Tasha Solomon, between Sarah and Tucker Mackenzie, between a ten-year-old orphan child named Annabel and her unusual constant companion, and last but not by any means least the link all of us have with a remarkable woman named Murphy—those connections and others began to assemble, finally, the puzzle of what was really happening here, and why.

Even the “bad” actors in all this had their parts to play, and often very highly unexpected and even positive ones. Though I have often found a clear line of demarcation between good and evil, black and white, it more often seems there are many shades of gray, many complex combinations of both good and, arguably, evil.

Evil acts do not necessarily mean that all involved are evil. And seemingly benevolent acts are not always what they seem. Lessons hard-learned.

And perhaps it is simply a universal truth that if, between the goal and the reaching of it, too many years pass, too much distance exists, too many events occur, too much “new” history is built and old history lost, then those once obsessive goals begin to be questioned at least by some, previously ruthless methods begin to be questioned, then that, too, is another piece of the puzzle, and a vital one.

Understanding that puzzle and what it meant had finally come, but also understanding the part each of us had to play in order to triumph. And we had to triumph. There was so very much at stake in this battle. This war. Far more than most people will ever be aware.

Few of us are able to go through our lives feeling certain of why we’re here, of what part we’re destined to play in our lives, let alone in our world, our history. Few of us are ever granted the certainty of knowing that our actions have true meaning, not only for ourselves but for others, even for the whole of humankind, and perhaps even its destiny.

But if any mortal can know the truth, or at least part of the truth, an unexpected and wholly remarkable part of our history and our future, a small group of very special humans knows it now. I know it now. If any mortal can look at his or her world and be certain that their own acts matter in the existence of that world, even the continuance of it, that group of people and I know it now. If any mortal can be certain of his or her place, or his or her part, in defending the very existence of our own species . . . it is something of which we are utterly certain now.

The story is incredible. Some would never believe it. If I had not been a part of it, I am not sure that even I—with so much knowledge of the capabilities of the human mind, both “normal” and paranormal—would have, could have, believed it. But I was a part of it, I bore witness to what happened and why, and I am very much a believer.

I will set down as much of this knowledge and understanding as I feel I may as we agreed, here in these private reports, which may or may not be opened and read one day, depending on your decision and those who come after you. After us both.

Perhaps not would be better. But I will leave that call to you or to someone who comes after us to make. There will always, I fear, be the threat of some outside enemy determined to destroy us, and should that happen in the future, then perhaps our world will need to know that we are capable of fighting back. Even quietly, secretly, and without fanfare. Capable of fighting back, and of winning.

Despite even my own doubts as to the wisdom of revealing what lies herein my report, I only hope that one day the truth can be known.

I believe we owe that much to the warriors, to the fallen, to the silent, unnamed, unacknowledged, and largely unknown watchmen on the walls of our civilization who have guarded us, the most vulnerable among us, and even our society, without our awareness. As dangerous as the truth may prove to some, as unbelievable, as frightening, it is a truth all of humanity should know.

Respectfully submitted.

Noah Bishop, Unit Chief

Special Crimes Unit, FBI

The darkness drops again; but now I know

That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

—W. B. Yeats

One

Wake up.

You need to wake up.

Henry, you have to wake up.

They’re going to kill you.

Henry McCord had a lifetime of practice in hiding the fact that he saw dead people. A medium, that’s what it was called. He’d been a medium for thirty-six years, more or less. He could actually remember the first time he had seen the dead and understood just what he was seeing. At his grandfather’s funeral. The old man had stood on the other side of the casket and winked at him.

Henry had been six.

So, thirty years, really, of learning to cope in whatever way he could. Realizing early on that grown-ups didn’t want him to talk about the dead people, that it made them really uncomfortable. Which had puzzled a childish Henry, since it seemed to him they would have liked to know that they didn’t just go into the ground in a box and get covered with dirt, that there was something more than that. It had reassured Henry, at least then.

Now . . . he didn’t even know if he still believed that. And despite his several conversations with Bishop, he was still unconvinced that he could ever learn to control his abilities well enough to make some kind of better use of them.

He still didn’t get how seeing dead people could be put to any real use at all, far less some larger, more important use. Not even in investigating crime, since Bishop had told him somewhat ruefully that the dead, especially the murdered dead, seldom showed up to help in any way at all, far less to tell those investigating the crime who had killed them.

So what was the use in that?

What...