The Crescent Rule: A Tale of Intrigue and Espionage

By Terrill J. Metz

The Crescent Rule is a book about a young man growing up in a small town who becomes intrigued by a secluded religious community and a train whistle that eminates from their compund.
As time progresses, this young man becomes an agent for the government and discovers a hidden society based in Europe that has secretly controled world governments for over 300 years.
Toby stumbles on the fact that the train whistles he heard as a boy were a call to meetings for the Crescent Rule members right there in his small hometown.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Jun 29, 2011
• ISBN: 9781463418557

Terrill J. Metz

Terry Metz was born and raised in Benton Harbor, Michigan and was an adventurous young man and was always on the whether it was on his bicycle at first, or his VW bug later on. Terry grew to have a love for planes and was very familiar with a number of the smaller private jets. Despite being an extremely busy family man, working long hours for his employer and heavily involved in religious studies and his congregation, he found time to write this book. The Crescent Rule was to be the first in a series of books.

Book preview

Contents

Preface

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Preface

Swerving precociously along El Camino Real meandering to the beach house through Santa Barbara proper, deontologist Thomas McAllister is driving his red convertible singing the tunes he downloaded on his iPod from his best of the 80’s collection. His nose painted white for sunburn protection, lathered on due to what he has seen on his friends’ faces from carcinoma scabs. He drives through the curvy, open road letting his hair go messy, which is out of character for him. He always made sure his doo is neat and trim and in place. The vintage Karmann Ghia runs strong since the engine rebuild at the local Southern California engine repair shop. The duffle bag behind the passenger seat is zipped open just enough to expose its contents, cash worth a small fortune. They look at each other and laugh. More of a giggle actually, waving their hands in the air as if going downhill on King’s Island The Beast coaster.

The love of his life is sitting next to him wearing a Yankees hat, the ponytail sticking through the rear strap opening. Though he is recognizable, her identity is obscure; one wonders who she is. Goodness knows he has had his choice of female companions in his life lately, working closely with so many. She could be any one of them. She even could be from his distant past, from his adolescent years at the beach. The newlywed’s stop at an esplanade north of Santa Monica beach, a scene that reminds him of his summer days when he was a young boy. Here in California, the seasons are not as obvious as they are at home. The pair takes off their shoes and run in the sand down to the shore. They stop to look at the waves and wind surfers going airborne, keeping one eye on the car that he locked to keep the stash safe. She is wearing a white cotton top with shorts that shows her hourglass shape. It is obvious she works out. It is likely she is also a runner, but still cannot make out whom she is. He is not as fit, showing his mature frame needing work at the gym.

The pair is here in time and place, against all odds because of Thomas getting the big break on a case that would have catastrophic effects on the world you and I live in, had he and his team not cracked it. Most of this happened oblivious to the boisterous sea of humanity. The big media outlets did not report it, at least not until the obliteration became known and the international alignment of counter measures was activated. Even the great minds could not contemplate the happenings behind the scenes. Initially, only a select few knew of the weight of his worry, and they were froze by the possibilities, even to relate it to close family. The cabal scheme would be uncovered but not before so many suffered and died for the fateful wishes of a few. However, how it happened within the confines of such a place not known before would surprise even the most skeptical of cohorts. How two opposite entities desired much different outcomes enthralls him to this day. Could there be others like this still operating in the world? He is not too sure. The only thing Tom cares about right now is getting to his newly acquired beach house and enjoy a week of complete and utter relaxation with his new companion, or so he thinks.

Tommy’s life is swarming with unexpected experiences that he thinks only happens to him. He thinks there is an unseen force that booby traps his life. He is not clumsy or ignorant; in fact, he is very bright and methodical. Nevertheless, he knows to be careful to think things always go as planned. When he first moved into his college dorm after he moved out of his parents’ house for instance, he rode his bike by a house that was disposing an older chair someone had put it out by the curb. He walked up to the owner’s door and asked them if he could take the chair. The older man said if he needs a chair, he has a real nice recliner that he and his wife had been wanting to get rid of, but didn’t know anyone who was in need. He told Tom he could have this one instead. Tom told the owner of this newer chair that he wanted it, and he would be right back with his car to pick it up.

Within ten minutes, he arrived with his VW Microbus, and the chair was gone. The old man said he put it out by the curb and a man stopped by in an old pick up and said he was there to take it to your house. Tom missed a real nice find due to some old hillbilly lying about his identity. He should have told the couple to leave the chair in the house, and he and his friend would have removed if for them. Tom’s life seemed to be plagued with this the type of thing: always just barely missing a good thing, just at the wrong time. Nevertheless, he was right on with this.

Their time on the coast is well deserved, as you will discover what he accomplished to earn it. Against all public opinion, peer and family pressure to drop the intuition he so believed in. From his adolescent years on, his inner feelings and calculations are the real reason things are the way they are today in all affected countries or by golly the world, if it is allowed to progress.

What he and his team uncovered and eliminated, or at least diverted, was nothing short of a fantastic ‘global effort’ to change our undying craving for normalcy. He finally gained the respect from his team, who at first thought he was quixotically deciphering the facts. Without explaining in short order how he did it, let’s start from Tommy’s early childhood back in a small sleepy midwestern town located on the sandy shores of Lake Michigan, well sleepy to most, but not to Tommy. His early life experiences and acculturation are very similar to what many kids did in the 60’s, at least in small towns. These tales explain his gathering of cognitive reasoning, which adds to his adulthood objective and, teaches us all object lessons.

He was more mature than other kids were; at least more than his family gave him credit for, including his old grumpy grandfather who Tommy adored. His family tired of his constant reference to the anomalies he felt in this ‘sound’ that caused his curiosity to be pricked.

When you remember your youth, do you recall the times you wondered about the world around you, all of the back ended oddities, the unexplained. Yet you went on without understanding the conundrum moving onto what you could figure out. You considered what made sense for someone your age. For most kids their shallow understanding of how government works is limited to history class during fifth hour. Just as there are gifted kids who have extremely high IQ’s and are book smart, Tommy is more along the lines of street smart. To access the information he needed to find out about life, he questioned anyone who would bother returning his quips, even those old geezers in their 40’s.

You may even find yourself having experienced the same things he did, and had similar intuitions on people and situations, or sounds. His curiosity about one amusement park that was located in his small town fueled his imagination. Especially since, it still shrilled that eerie reverberation that fateful morning, even though it had closed years earlier. You may find your inner person comes out reading about Tommy, whichever gender you occupy, whichever lifestyle you follow, rich or poor. He yearned to add to his data mining about the abnormal and make sense out of it. He always wondered if it was just his perception of things. Some well-meaning acquaintances tried to help even out his views, only to be rebuffed and humiliated by his wit and cunning.

Most people never investigate their inclinations of oddities. They never buy out the time to follow their queries. However, do you know what? Some do, and Tom is one who did, and you and I should be happy he did. So, next time you have a gut feeling things in life are not what they appear, go with it. Watch out where your intuition takes you. Watch where it took Thomas Lewis McAllister!

Chapter One

Formative Years-circa 1969

Tommy McAllister falls out of bed drenched with sweat. Awoken at the end of a reoccurring dream where a large refrigerator with arms and a face chased him, hoping to outrun it as he took refuge inside his tree house.

You’ll not catch me, you’re just a side by side is the last thing he remembers.

Just then the song "Mrs. Robinson" mysteriously starts playing on the Zenith clock radio, he hits the snooze button.

Tommy, Tommy are you alright? I heard a loud thump, his concerned mom yells from the bottom of the stairwell.

Just had another bad dream about that fridge, mom. I’ll be down in a few minutes.

This reoccurring dream may coincide with his deep desire to have his family’s home bestowed with the utility so many of his middle class friends have. On those hot humid July nights, the sheets stuck to him like first aid gauze coated with Vaseline. A youngster gets accustomed to this as they age, and often don’t know the difference until they spend the night at a friend’s house that has it. The deep sleep is incomparable to anything he had experienced. But this morning in his bedroom would prove to be one that changed his life for all time. It wouldn’t be just the heat this time.

As he stands up and stretches, he hears the outside sounds of a warm July morning from his the loft, a bedroom built into the attic area of the big two story Frank Lloyd Wright style home. The stale breeze gently drifts in through the screen that has been repaired using black thread to keep out the bugs, pushing the curtains open with each change in wind direction. The same window his father fell from last summer while painting the outside frame. The warped paneling boards on the ceiling crackle as the sun heats up the roof in the morning. They retract in the cool evenings, popping back into place. The popping would at times scare him in the dark; erroneously believing he was in danger. The Gumby and Pokey duo stand guard on the nightstand. He plops down back on top of his sheets, and tries to get just another few minutes shuteye. The radio turns back on.

Blindly reaching over he turns it off, accidentally knocking over the small statue of the Pink Panther off the nightstand and breaking off its little pink arm. Mother is going to kill me, she’ll be upset on spending 20 bucks on that, he whispers to himself. It gets hidden in his bookcase for now.

On sitting up on the side of the hand-me-down twin bed, he rubs his eyes from that sleep goop crusted on the inside of his eye pits. And while he picks out the accumulation of debris caught between his toes, an echo sound raised his curiosity more than usual. Surveying the room to find out if anything within the confines of what he possesses is the source of this ‘whistling echo’, but finds no cause to condemn anything in close proximity. Glancing outside the poorly painted spring-loaded window, he gives a quick inventory of any machine or device locally responsible for the noise, but still nothing apparent is obvious. What was this thing, this noise?

(Talking to himself)

It’s not these big black crows ‘hawking’ while perched on the roof chimney, (happily enjoying the warmth of the fresh new days’ sunshine, and looking for food to feed its hungry young).

It’s not the sound of horns from the cars or delivery vans driving by, or even kids playing in the nearby field. Those sounds are recognizable.

Hmm, normally he hears it late afternoon into early evening, never much past dark. This sound is never this early, my goodness, never before noon. It is the type of sound you hear in the distance, the kind you hear in your neighborhood mixed in with all the towns’ activities, but never really find the source, a mystery of sorts.

Was I just imagining it, maybe a figment of my observational ability, or was it really there? He wondered.

Was the sound something he heard at the end of the refrigerator dream, waking up to the hot sticky air and all sweaty? Tommy shuts off that pesky radio one more time, after it clicked back on just at the wrong time and listened. He would turn his head like a dog to hear the direction of the source. Would it appear again?

Whispering down to his brother Billy who he thought could help in this self-inflicted concern, but no discernable responsive sound waves floated up from his lair. So Tommy gets up and tiptoed down to his room, descending the wooden steps that crackle from his lightly weighted frame. Pushing open the door, it creaks to expose intruders. The hinges lack the needed lube. Tommy enters into his Billy’s chthonic room . . . a mess as usual. Ignoring the "No Trespassing" sign, the one that was stuck on by reused yellow tape-there to keep bothersome ones like him from entering. He had to maneuver past the trombone and the green high top sneakers his brother dons to play varsity high school basketball. Going to the only window in his room, he opens the Pistons curtains; Tommy nudges him on the shoulder and whispers,

Wake up! Billy, wake up.

His brother just groaned and turned his head around just enough to open ever so slightly one eye; Tommy barely made out whether he had a pupil or not. He mustered up the breath to say one word, "gedowtidiot".

Tommy figured it was two words-maybe three. His breath wasn’t pleasant either. It smelled of puppy turds.

Billy, did you hear that sound? It came from far away. Billy, did you hear it?

It was just loud enough to pierce the humid summer air. It was enough to drown out the distant mower hum from Mr. Snyder’s’ old Toro 2-cycle three doors down.

It’s the type of summer air you remember as a kid that made the world seem as if it is in equilibrium, allowing you to play all day without worrying about what you are going to do. It was warm enough to wear cut off jean shorts and a tank top, with Converse tennis shoes and those knee high white socks, but cool enough not to die of heat stroke.

This kind of summer air made Tommy feel safe. It had a certain smell to it, like the summer gods were blessing the air with life crystals, giving it energy. Billy though seemed to just lay there uninterested in his nervous stammering. But as a young boy at eleven, not much can raise his concern as much as this. He hummed something, and covers went back over his head. Not the type of move as one would be when scared by an old Hitchcock movie, more along the lines of covering up from a cold chill.

But cold it wasn’t, the ceiling fan chilling the room down to about 85, the upstairs of the house lacking the convenience of cooled conditioned air. When Tommy realized there wouldn’t be a response from him; he went back to his room, gazed at the clock radio and figured why he was still so tired, it was just past 8:00 am, and Billy’s team won the big game last night. The smell in his room verified he played the whole game, making the last basket at the buzzer. Sure, he’ll get the attention and notoriety in the neighborhood today.

His room had the same stench that is noticed from a middle school’s gym locker room on Friday afternoons. His mom wears a nursing mask she has left over from when she went to nursing school. Sadly, she didn’t finish because of lack of money, and getting married, and having 5 kids. She sacrificed a lot for her children; something mothers just did in this generation. If she ever regretted having children and not pursuing a nursing career it was never said, and the children never felt it. She loved them more than she ever would have had changing bedpans and dealing with cranky old people, unhappy about their infections.

Returning to the scene of the crime, Tommy dresses and heads downstairs to meet with the awakened part of the family. It is a ritual on Saturday morning to consume eggs, bacon and the best O.J. around, fresh squeezed by his mom. His dad always wore baggy shorts and his favorite Chicago Bears jersey on Saturday mornings. Once, when he was younger, his dad got up one Saturday morning and threw on a pair of dress pants. Tommy noticed his fly was all the way down while he was talking on the phone, and his mom had just taught him how a little boy should be dressed. So he conveniently walked up and zipped up his dad’s fly for him, not realized his appendage was caught in the zipper on the way up. His dad let out a shrill that could be heard from down the street. Tommy never thought a 6 year old could be dropkicked that far in their living room, just missing that old corner antique table. Tommy recovered in a few hours, and so did his father.

Sitting on the back porch, getting ready to take off on his bike to meet the ‘guys’, Tommy brushed off the idea of staying home and doing chores. Sitting there, he started to think about what woke him up this morning: that unmistakable whistle sound. He couldn’t be sure, but this sound usually has a frequency to it, like a timed signal given to ships coming into the harbor for the night, or to drop off its load of sand or iron ore. The gang arrives shortly after, and off they go, like molested bees on the search for the culprit who upset the hive. The chopper style bikes swerve back and forth, just barely missing each other’s wheels. Ending up at a park a couple miles away, they all stand there, peering through the fence links. Without speaking, Tommy pedaled to the far south end of the park, still outside the fence with his adjuvant fellows following his lead. Finding an opening, maybe where other gangs like this wanted to inspect the park (or get in free to ride the refurbished train); they enter one by one, never once stopped by those in authority.

Come on guys, no one is noticing us,