An image from my recurring nightmares was the logo of the Gatewick Institute.
“Do you recognize that symbol?” Chloe asked.
“I’m not sure,” I lied.
Chloe pulled up some other documents from that darknet site: three scanned pages. The headers on top of all three featured the logo of the circle atop the triangle.
“Look at this shit,” Chloe said, handing me her phone.
I read through the contents of the first page. There were a bunch of questions that appeared to be related to mental and physical fitness, followed by a checklist of activities designed to “counter the negative” and “enhance the positive.” “Looks like part of an outline for a treatment plan, maybe?”
“Do you think your parents really were involved in this stuff?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
Chloe was shaking her head as she read over my shoulder. “What does all this shit mean?”
“Probably nothing,” I said, hoping Chloe would concur.
“Oh, it’s definitely not nothing.” She pointed at the second of the three pages. “Medication and meditation, float tanks, DMT? This is some MKUltra bullshit right here, K.”
“What if it was just some kind of intense self-help retreat thing?”
“Strobe light treatment, hypnosis…Jesus, K, the medication panel includes ayahuasca.” She held up the page.
“Lots of people do ayahuasca these days,” I said. “The nouveau new age set take that shit like it’s vitamin C.”
“Not back then,” she said.
I shrugged.
“And the rest of the ingredients have been redacted.”
“So?”
“So, if ayahuasca is the mildest ingredient in your psychotropic stew, you’re in serious fucking trouble. You had no idea your parents were into this stuff?”
“No way. As far as I knew, they were accountants. I mean, I guess I knew they were involved in some kind of spiritual community with most of their friends, but I was an only child. Whenever our families got together, I was focused on hanging out with the other kids.”
“Are you still in touch with any of those family friends?”
I thought about the Connors sisters, and the accident came flooding back.
The sound of the static on the radio. The smell of the cab of the truck.
“Hey,” Chloe said. “K?”
“What?”
Chloe put her hand over mine. At some point I’d begun tapping on my thigh again. “Are you okay?”
“No,” I said, “I mean, yes, I’m fine. No, I’m not in touch with any of those childhood friends.”
This was true. I’d tried to look a few of them up on social media over the years, but there wasn’t much there. Once again, I left out the fact that I’d recently seen one very close family friend named Emily Connors in Crow’s office.
Chloe’s hand on top of mine was comforting, and I found myself able to relax a little while she did another darknet search on the Gatewick Institute.
There was nothing we hadn’t seen already.
Then Chloe’s phone rang. It was her cousin in England. She answered and put it on speaker.
“Hey, Johnny.”
“Chloe, how are you?”
“I’m good. I’m here with my friend K. You’re on speaker, so don’t say anything fucking weird.”
“So nothing family-related?”
“Definitely not,” she said.
Johnny laughed. “Okay. So, I spoke to a woman I know about your cult thing. She says she’ll be up until midnight your time and you can give her a ring if you like.”
“Was she part of the cult?”
“Not sure, but she seems to know quite a lot about it.”
A bunch of other voices started speaking on the other end of the line.
“Sorry, kid, I’ve gotta run back to set. Good luck.”
“Thanks, Johnny,” Chloe said.
A second after her cousin had hung up, Chloe received a text with a name and phone number. The woman’s name was Carlotta Blake.
“You wanna call or wait until the morning?” I asked.
“What do you think?” Chloe said as she dialed the number.
Carlotta picked up on the first ring.
“Hi, Carlotta, my name is Chloe and I’m here with my friend K.”
“Hi, it’s nice to meet you. Johnny said you’d be calling.”
“Cool,” Chloe said. “He told us you’d be okay with answering a few questions about the Gray God people?”